The Day : 1M4U Charity Event @ Sekendi Orphanage

The event on 21 September 2013 went well. These are some of the photos captured by my husband, the official photographer for the event.

If you wish to visit Rumah Kebajikan Anak-Anak Yatim Sekendi, these are the coordinates:

This is the entrance.

Opening ceremony. The moment I saw these three key person smile, I knew I mustve done something (or everything) right ;p They are Datin Wan Rahimi Salleh, Tuan Mohd Fasiah Mohd Fakeh (Member of Parliament of Sabak Bernam) and Ustaz Halimi Hayat, the Principal of the Sekendi Orphanage.

We sang four patriotic songs together. (Look for Nabil, Nazreen and Ms Square Face)

 Talk by a nutritionist on healthy food.

 Art and craft session for kids below 9 years old.

 One of the telematch games - drinking straws construction.

 Motivational games. Notice Nabil there?

It was a successful event.

Early preparation : 1M4U Charity Event @ Sekendi Orphanage

More info on this program (here) and (here).

Friday afternoon

My family departed for Sabak Bernam on Friday. I have to be there early since Kuala Lumpur is 2 hours away and the programme will start at 8.30am the next day. There are still a lot preparation to be made in Sabak Bernam. Since none of my committee members can stay for a night in Sabak Bernam (Saturday = Family day) so I went there alone, against all odds. I checked in at a resort, 10 minutes away from the orphanage.

Kids were having their lunch in the car

I have scheduled a coaster to send all the boxes, rice and all donated materials to Sabak Bernam on Friday evening. I got help from my colleagues to load everything into the coaster at the office and I have arranged for the orphans to unload everything into the storage area at the orphanage. Alhamdulillah. 

Nabil's new friend, Iwan

Saturday morning

I went to the orphanage early in the morning. The PA system guys was already there. I showed them the area and they started to do their work. 

Shortly after, the caterer arrived with breakfast. I showed him where he supposed to place the banquet tables and he started to do his thing.

The psychology officer who is in charge for the motivational activities arrived and he helped me with the banner. Someone else supposed to do it but he havent arrived. I cant wait even for one more minute. It has to go up immediately before people start coming!

I started to arrange the chairs for the health talk in the library. I got help from the orphans to wipe the dust off the chairs. They seemed so happy to be involved :)

Once everything is in place, I performed a soundcheck. It went well. 

I went back to the resort to fetch my family.

Recycle

I have this stack of used papers in my room.  

Instead of shoving them into the shredder machine, I choose the one with one-sided printing (most of them are), cut it and bind it. I turned them into a book. It is now my mind mapping note book. It is free.

How I repaired a badly-scribbled school exercise book in 10 minutes

I came back from the office and Nabil told me that Nazreen and his cousin, Sarah scribbled his school exercise book. I thought it was just a tiny scribble that I can tear the page off and no one will notice.

But the problem was more serious than that. We got people with guns and swords, bazookas, a giant snail, racing car and a couple of girls with funky hairdo. All dangerous stuff.

I found these on every single page. In red pen. Except for the one with Agama exercise. I grab a new exercise book and took off the staples for both books.

I took out the scribbled pages and replaced them with the new set of papers. I stapled the existing paper and the new set together. It was completed in less than 10 minutes.

Good as new.

Nabil was so proud that her mom can do wonders. He'll figure it out one day.

The songkok is too big

Nazmi's first Raya.

Countdown : 1M4U Charity Event @ Sekendi Orphanage

1 more day. Minus today.

Word-uttered-most of the day: Alhamdulillah.

The goodie bags for the children, low income families and single mothers are ready! Thanks to Nora and the rest of her team!

I am attending a Mind Mapping Course the whole day today (and yesterday) and I have to run in and out for these....

Updates today:

Health examination programme was cancelled.

I called up the Head Bureau of Health and ask them to get anyone to talk on food / nutrition / etc.

I also arranged with an Ustaz for a talk on Family Development, should we failed to get a speaker on healthy food at the last minute.

And we manage to get a NUTRITIONIST in one hour. Alhamdulillah.

The coaster and van are not enough for the trip to Sabak Bernam.

More than 40 people registered and we only have enough seat for 30 pax.

I went to negotiate with the team of climbers (they booked the bus to Genting Highland on the same day for their climbing activity) and they agreed to use the coaster. We get the bus and a van. And one car. Enough for 50 people. Alhamdulillah.

The wording on the banner is wrong. (Note : It was agreed by everyone before it was printed).

I called up a printing centre and manage to get them to print the new one to be collected tomorrow and it costs me 50% lesser than the first banner.

I manage to talk to the President and she agreed to use the old banner. Alhamdulillah.

I was informed that we have no in-house mobile PA system. We need to rent it somewhere else. I was given a contact number for a company and they charged us quite high. After a few minutes negotiating, I manage to get it at a cheaper price. Within our budget. Alhamdulillah.

The donation (in cash and goods) still flowing in, non-stop. Thank you all. Alhamdulillah.

I truly believe Allah will show us the way if we are doing good deeds.

Promo : 1M4U Charity Event @ Sekendi Orphanage

I am organising a charity event at Sekendi Orphanage, Sabak Bernam, this weekend, under the 1M4U fund. I already have many things on my plate but the team trusted me with this big programme, so why not?

My hardworking colleagues, Ms Nora and Ms Aini spent their morning, till evening, buying goods for the orphans, low income families and single mothers. Thank you so much. We also thankful for non-stop donation of books, coloured pencils and cash for the underprivileged.

The event will be held on 21 Sept 2013. Anyone who wish to contribute cash for them (you can choose to donate to the orphanage - but not all kids are orphan - or you could choose to donate to low income families/single mother), you can transfer it to my account and I will make sure it will reach them. InsyaAllah.

What you give, you will get back.

Multitasking is OK

Extracted from (here), multitasking is can mean performing two or more tasks simultaneously, or it can also involve switching back and forth from one thing to another. Multitasking can also involve performing a number of tasks in rapid succession.

Some researches shows that multitasking is wasting a lot time and reduce productivity. You dont have to agree with that.

I am blessed with the ability of multitasking and I know it is necessary most of time if you are a wife, a mother with 4 kids, no maid and you are working, involved in international negotiation, organising a charity event, running your own businesses and prepare entries for numbers of competitions, all at the same time. But you dont have to do it all the times. For me, multitasking is fine.

Long lost friend from Guinea

I had a best friend from Guinea when I studied architecture at IIUM. I had mentioned something about him in my previous post (here). We lost contact for a few years and I accidentally got his number from a Guinea student while me and my kids were having a coffee at IIUM's cafe.

OMG, it is such an interesting story..

I went to my friend's open house with my kids (all four of them). My husband was away for two days for a photoshoot. After we had our lunch there, we head back home. It was raining heavily and I decided to make a few detours and let the kids enjoy the fun and laugh longer, in the car. I dont want to get wet while opening the gate, so I plan to drive anywhere until the rain stopped.

Since I miss IIUM so much, I drove the kids there. We made a few stops and took some photos. And lastly, after the rain stopped, we stopped by at one of the cafe and I bought a few hot chocolates and coffees. The kids chose to sit at one of the clean tables in front of the counter, beside an international student. I believe he is an African.

Being an IIUM student, he politely greet me and said something nice about my kids. Then I started to talk about my old days in IIUM. When he said he is from Guinea, without wasting any time, "DO YOU KNOW BARRY MOUCTAR? HE WAS MY BEST BUDDY AND HE IS FROM GUINEA" (it was actually a crazy thing to ask because Guinea is not that small and not everyone would know each other in Guinea. It is like when you met a Swedish engineer in a conference and he knew you are from Malaysia and asked "Do you know Abdul Malik? He is from Malaysia!" - get the point?)

And he said YES. 

One of his friends who came in afterwards, have Barry's number. He actually remember it by heart - it shows that he contacted Barry A LOT. He told me that Barry was in Malaysia a couple of months back. I text-ed Barry on the spot and he replied back!!!!!! I have been trying to get his number for yearss!

We exchange stories about our family and I am so glad to know that he is a successful architect in Guinea. This is his website - www.moucbeearchitecte.com. I asked him to visit my blog whenever he is free. And recently,  I got this from him >>

I just posted another entry on food just now :) LOL.

Lunch

Our lunch on Saturday.

Grilled chicken with rosemary eaten with grilled potato wedges, onion and cherry tomatoes coated with olive oil. With a little bit of salt and black pepper. Eaten together with a bun, chilli sauce and mustard. Nyam nyam.

Test drive

We brought baby Nazmi for a test drive.

In between, they had a serious meeting together.

We were contemplating for a few weeks on which is the best among the ten shortlisted. But, Atuk bought it first yesterday.

Makan-Makan Raya 2013

This is our first experience with Raya Open House which involved families, neighbours and friends on the same day, since we moved in. Last year, we organised separate session for each category.

We cook everything with love :)

(The photos are not in a particular order. I captured them in between entertaining our guests and topping up the food)

For main dishes, I made spaghetti bolognese and rice porridge (considering some of our friends have toddlers - and I love rice porridge). My husband made chicken soup to be eaten with rice noodles, kuey teow and of course, rice porridge.

For the porridge, I have prepared some garnishes - roasted peanut, fried anchovies, salted fish, salted egg, soysauce, fried sambal, pickled carrot, fried shallot and freshly chopped cilantro and scallion.

For side dishes, I prepared mini beef samosa, grilled chicken salad, corn and green apple salad.

For dessert, I made fruit cocktail custard with mango pudding, chocolate cake, lychee jelly, apple crumble and Malaysian ice-cream (chocolate and sirap bandung).

I also prepared ingredients for Mexican quesadilla should we ran out of food. Fortunately, the food is enough for everybody. 

After Maghrib, we ordered a few hundreds of satay for our guests. Alhamdulillah, quite a number of people arrived after Maghrib, including my uncle, aunts and my in-laws.

At first, it was manageable. Around 4.00pm, a lot of people started to arrive and I never seen my house THAT FULL. Every inch of the porch, living room and reading area were full with friends. My kids' room was full with kids. Hobby area filled with kids playing games. Dining area was full with cousins (and my brother) who lend their hand doing dishes, slicing the grilled chicken, peel some apples... THANK YOU guys.

It was a day full with blessings. Nearly 200 people came. A few of my KAED classmates which I rarely seen since we were graduated, came with their families. My ex collegues from MHLG came all the way from Putrajaya / Kajang. I manage to prepare all the food. And everyone likes it very much... Alhamdulillah.

I also grateful to receive these gifts from my friends. Thank you Zatul Himmah & family for the hamper, Nurhasnadira & family for the bananas and Saifulizam from Cake Bros for those lovely red velvet cupcakes!!!

....and thank you Dr. Shahrul Yani & her family for this baby pillow! 

E P I C.

Someone asked me why bother going through all troubles cooking for 200 people whereby I could just order the food and spend time chatting with the guests. Well, I love to cook. No trouble at all. I just need to improve on chatting with the guests part :)

I really have to say this now.

I LOVE MY JOB.