24...eh 23 la...

Another year, and another birthday away from home.

Just before midnight, text came in and wished me a happy 24th birthday. I read it, and then locked the keypad on the phone. Only after 15 minutes, did I unlock the keypad and re read the text, and realised that 24 is wrong. I'm only 23. Haha.

"to the beat of tradition we danced, eyes meeting, arms swaying, cheeks blushing, feet uncoordinated"

It was yet another simple birthday, as always really throughout my life. Have I ever had a real birthday party? surely, but I can't remember my baby years ( I still believe one of them, brother sister or cousins dropped me on the head when I was a baby, but they deny it profusely). Its always dinner with the family, and drinks with the Kakibangkus.

"in the dark, sparks flew, oh how the sparks flew..."

This year, its sad and happy. Sad because no family and kakibangkus, but happy because brothers cooked and baked for me. Appreciate it guys.

"light? say it isn't so, waking up is not an option now"

Remember those videos last year? we're making fresh new ones this year. One is already on my youtube, silly test video, but fun nonetheless. Another 2 definitely coming, because its required for BERSATU, with potentially more video fun after that.

"what good is a name, if it's not for reference"

With exams getting closer, and one more assignment to hand in, its officially nearing the end of semester one. Like my age, time flies.

"teardrops of water triggered by time"

A month disconnected

Looking at the date stamp of my last post, it has been exactly a month since I updated. Why? The answer to that would be my laptop is not functional, and still not functional. I haven't been totally disconnected though, thanks to the Massey computer lab, and the 24 hour access card.

A lot happened in the last month, a bad luck month really for me and my flatmates. The car was acting up again, and took 2 weeks to get well again. Safwan's car blew up...well the engine did, which meant its not functional and meant there is one less car at the house. Iylia can't drive anymore, because he got pulled over by the police, and he's still presenting a Malaysian license, which goes invalid after a year. Well he can drive, but if he gets caught, he'd be imprisoned, and the car he drives would get impounded. Sam's power supply blew up, which was the most minor of all our bad luck. And of course my laptop is unusable, which i'm predicting to be the motherboard, and if it is the problem, I won't bother and continue being a bonafide student in the computer labs.

So enough of the tales of bad luck.

I cut up my first whole chicken this month. It's good cutting steaks into small pieces, but tearing up a whole chicken with a meat cleaver is wayy better. I have pictures of the event, but due to the laptop not functioning, I have limited access to the pictures, which are in Safwan's cam. I promise you the grit and determination of dismantling that piece of poultry was caught on camera.


BERSATU games down the block and around the corner. MUMSA has been appointed co-hosts, with Wellington Students Organisation, with the event being held in Wellington this June. The top committe of MUMSA will be involved with the actual games, so they have appointed a few select people including me, to handle the contingent in their place. The top committee say they're busy with BERSATU, but I think they're just dumping their load on to us "choice" slaves, haha.


There was a leadership meeting/seminar in conjunction with BERSATU games down in Wellington at the Malaysian Students Department. I was not even supposed to go but due to transport and Razif unable to get an extension, I replaced him, and along with Iylia, Sheng and Eugene drove down to Wellington for the ANZAC day weekend. Left Palmy early and reached Welly around 10 ish. It was quite empty, mostly because people were still in Church for ANZAC day appreciation.


We were all seperated accomodation wise, with the reason of mingling with other leaders of other contingents being thrown at us. I didn't mind that, pretty valid reason. I did mind however mind that MY accomodation looked like a whorehouse from the outside, and Iylia's looked like a modern motel, and even had Sky TV . Woo-saaah. I started to dread the trip, After settling in (if that was ever possible in that building), we were told to be at MSD, and so we were. It was my first time being at the MSD, and I was quite impressed. Went up to the dewan for a briefing with Aunty Rose, the student attache here in NZ. Aunty kept repeating "Expect the Unexpected" and after all was done, it was exactly that.


After the briefing, we played frisbee. Fun? not when you play it in the dark. Aunty said all events on the schedule must be performed, and because we were late with the previous item on the schedule, it was already dark by the time we were done. Everyone was still up for it, some groaning of course, but generally looked lively. It all went well and we actually caught the darn thing while in the dark, except for Iylia, who tried to catch a pass, and bumped into a team mate, and fell down spraining his ankle. What most of us were annoyed about at that point, was that aunty refused to call the driver to pick Iylia up and back to MSD. Instead, we as a group, took turns carrying him from the park we played, which was down a hill bout 10 minutes from MSD. It was good that we came together, but in a way dangerous, for Iylia, and for us as well. That invariably left him useless when it came to activities over the weekend as he was on crutches. Alas, all was justified by aunty at the end of the seminar. The night ended late, even more for me as I went for coffee after.


I didn't get much sleep in Wellington, because its damned noisy at night, and it was early starts each day. The second day was mainly for BERSATU, where the committee presented their presentation to the contingents. It got quite heated and it will be a different BERSATU next year if proposed changes are approved.

The third day was the best, and all the stress of no sleep and high levels of annoyance with aunty's mental tests were gone as we participated in an "Amazing Race" kind of activity called senses. Kudos to the organisers of that, coz it was really a great experience. It helped me bond with new comrades as we sang, laughed, guided and made fools of ourselves together as a team. My team would have won too, if I hadn't broken an egg. I would have never seen Wellington if not for that activity, and again that made the whole weekend worth it. That night, tired bodies sat down for a final talk with aunty, where she explained herself to us. She was testing us with , in her own words "putting you out of your comfort zone", which was spot on. She justified her actions, and I personally think its a loss to MSD in NZ if she was not there working with us students. She refused to take credit for the success of the weekend, but she got us there, and that deserves credit.

So that was my month disconnected. Sorry there are no thousand words worth of pictures.