Travel Series : Easter Holiday 2011 - London Day 2

Day 2 - 23rd April 2011

Day 2 was more relaxed and nature-like, I would say. We started quite late sbb semua orang bangun lambat akibat kepenatan hari pertama. As usual, breakfast was in bed. Luckily masih ada roti and cereal to isi perut. Plus I brought some 30 energy bars so that we would be energetic like the energizer bunny (how coincidental is that, energizer bunny, easter bunny.. heh). We went to Houses of Parliament and took the guided tour. It costed 15 pounds. Best. The only thing is that, during the tour we weren't allowed to sit down as our arses are not worthy enough hehehe.. but truly, memang kena berdiri and dengar the tour (60 mins). Kaki I dah terketar² and dah sakit belikat cause I sangkut my SLR tapi takleh amek gmbar. Damn. We can only sit at the Commoner's room (cause we have no Royal blood. Except for Putri, tapi mungkin Royal yang dimaksudkan mereka adalah macam set-set Prince William). But the cool part is that we got to learn about the Parliaments, get to see the rooms where the action takes place. Masuk bilik yang the Queen tukar baju and pakai her crown (and its a damn big room to tukar baju and pakai crown). Cuma, tak boleh ambil gambar :( But the tour guide, Joana was really funny. sempat dia masukkan unsur² lawak masa tengah semua orang muka serious dengar citer.

We headed for lunch dekat Nero Cafe opposite Big Ben. (semua ni dekat² je, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, Houses of Parliaments and Eye of London.. (eh lupa nak add! on the first day pun we all naik Eye of London.. ok will edit the previous post) ). After that, Putri pergi lepak dengan kawan dia. So it was just me, Adina and Ana. We headed to Hard Rock Cafe! Memang itu must-go for me. Funny thing is, we got lost agak jauh jugak la nak ke destinasi. Turns out, it was only a few steps away from the Tube station. Mental note : When uncertain, ask for directions. (Gambar sesat and tensyen) As we reached HRC, ada dua tempat rupanya. Satu the cafe itself (for makan) and the other one is the souvenir shop. And get this, we had to QUE to get in to buy souvenirs. Rasa macam nak beratur masuk club je (not that I have ever done that. But it just felt like it). I thought macam nak beli benda² kecik je, but since kena beratur lama, campur the sesatness, my friend said, 'ko baik beli something dalam HRC nih..' . True enough. I bought a SpiceGirls HRC Tshirt, a rantai, a drumstick (for husband) and a shotglas. Tip : if you guys plan to claim VAT, ambil borang kat counter and suruh orang tu isikan as you pay. Ana only told us later (setelah dah sampai Hyde Park and macam malas nak jalan balik ke HRC) that we had to get the forms kat HRC itself, maka burnlah VAT claim saya. *FRUST!* Although it was like ala takat 8 pound je (as she said), it's still money (ye la, bagi orang yang tak bekerja macam saya, 1 pound pun saya kutip). With that money, I could buy another Victoria Secret EDT kat airport. Damn! (yup, memang murah kat airport. Will blog about this later). Oh well, takde rezeki namanya :(

 

                         Ketika sesat, terambil gambar nih                            Sebelum sesat

                          Richie Sambora babeh                                              Sampai juga

After berbeg - beg shopping di HRC (me only satu beg, kawan² lain berbeg - beg). We headed to Hyde Park. Cantik la. Kat sini, objective saya adalah nak tengok Princess Diana's Memorial Fountain. Memandangkan we all bawak banyak beg (they) and to the fountain is about 10 mins away from the entrance (katanya), we rented 3 bicycles and cycled through Hyde Park. Waaa bestnya! rasa macam citer The Sound of Music, with the wind blowing through my face, and I slowly sang, 'The hills are alive... with the sound of music.. aaaaAAaaaa' , didn't feel like I was 29 at all! After about 15 mins cycling, we finally reached the Memorial Fountain (tipu! katanya 10 mins je jalan). Best la tengok fountain dia. very unique. snapped some pics and menikmati keindahan kejap, then suddenly, dah start mendung and hujan. We headed back to the Tube station. Mula² undecided. But later we decided to balik hotel, sbb hujan. sayangnya. Sedih gak. Tp in a way, bagus gak, boleh letak barang² and lepak² jap. Malam sambung lagi. This time, it was already 530pm.

Maka pulanglah kami ke hotel and lepak. Me and Adina sembang sambil makan Maggi kari in a cup (just like the good ol days in Taiping) dengan rambut bergulung dgn tuala sbb baru lepas mandi, duduk bersila atas kerusi. Rasa macam kat Maktab cuma kalini perbualan bukan pasal Prep, Fizik, Addmaths atau Reymee from Innuendo. But about LIFE. Wow have we grown :) Rasa best la cause it's been a loong time that I didnt have those kinda talks. Slalu sembang dengan suami.. and dengan classmates kat sini. Bila borak dgn classmates sini, rase penat aa nak kena cakap German. It's not berborak. It's hard work! nak kena pikir grammar, translate bagai.. This was really relaxing to me.. Walaupun beribu² batu dari tanahair, felt just like in Mesia :)

After solat jama', we headed out nak makan dinner. Plannya, nak pekena Sup Tomato from Nero Caffee kat bawah hotel, which is SO SEDAP and murah. Tapi tengok² dah tutup (baru kol 8pm). Time² ni la rindu kat kedai mamak. So takpela, we ronda² kat hotel area and took pictures. Best la amek gmbar at night. Sbb jambatan² sume berlampu and it looks gorgeous. AFter that, singgah Marks and Spencer lagi skali, beli susu and Cheese for breakfast keesokan harinya. And then balik hotel.. That was it for day two.. Very relaxed. :)

Her story : Life so far

Decided to compile some of the selected pictures and turn it into a video clip.. Enjoy :D

So that you wont be bored waching all 100+ pictures.. sbb diiringi dengan lagu hehehe

mek meli

The montelest German- Malaysian-Kelantanese 3 Year old.. Melina.. panggil dia Mek Meli

Pandainya dia siap²kan Shisha

Layan...

my first 2011 post

Hello! I hope its not too late to wish you all happy new year 2011! How was your new year's celebration? We had a great time. Since me and my husband will be turning 30 this year, we decided to have some makan² and hanging out at our house. Our New Year's eve was celebrated with a theme. I came up with the idea, A Black and White Affair. Everyone wore something either black or white or both. Which looked fabulous and turned out great in pictures.We had finger food. I prepared tuna sandwiches and hotdogs and everyone brought something. In the end, we had too much food and had to tapaukan for everyone. The party was supposed to commence at 2000. Tapi dunno they all ni dah germanise kot.. 1830 dah sampai dah.. But it's okay for me :) Activies were rock banding in the livingroom, karaoke-ing in our room, poker in the kitchen and borak² di satu sudut di hujung living room. Memang agak happening jugak la I might say. The topics that we talked about covered almost everything. We talked about games played masa kecik². Main getah, main tiang, main rubber, main pen, ting ting, main bola pakai kertas, macam² lah lagi.. Borak citer hantu la, politics, economy, social.. Movies, theorems, weather, life, life in the past, life in the future. It was just chilling and hanging out. A laid back party. Towards midnight, we headed downstairs to play with fireworks. In Deutschland, fireworks diharamkan, kecuali on New Year's eve. They call it the Sylvesterfeirn. New Year's eve depa memang kaw kaw jual. What's cool in Mannheim is that banyak lelaki so diorang ni rajin main mercun. I think we had almost more than 100euros worth of fireworks bila dah dicombine kan. So main la mercun sampai almost 1am. Bila mercun dah habis, we played snowfight pulak. Someone threw a big snowball at me sampai tertelan sedikit snow. So apa lagi, kejar la siapa yang baling tu.. Hahaha.. I forgot for a moment that I am turning 30 this year. But we had fun being kids and letting go of everything and just being happy. I knew that that moment would probably not come again or if it did, it wouldn't be as much fun. We felt somewhat close to each other. Walaupun some I just came to know their names that night. Bila tangan dah sejuk and semua mengigil, we headed upstairs and continued with the Rockbanding, Pokering and Karaoke-ing. The guests stayed till almost 0300am. We finally slept at 430am.. and had to wake up again at 0530 to catch our morning flight to Ireland. Gila. I had fun. :)
 Here are some pictures... Enjoy :) 

Rocking it

 New Year!

The pokerdealer

 Our fireworks

 Semua yang hadir

Depan rumah

Before 2010 ends

I have almost 2 weeks of holidays and my husband has 3 weeks. It's nice to have him around the house sepanjang masa. He will do his stuff and I will do mine and sometimes we will do stuff together. Right now he is busy finishing his PS3 game, Fallout Vegas. And I am in between watching movies and learning Deutsch. Yesterday I wrote my resolution and my target for the first quarter of 2011. I taped it next to the mirror with the hope that I will not ignore it :p
(Click to view larger). Yeah, looks pretty sensible. and No, i decided not to gain weight since I have recently purchased a pair of jeggings and loving it! Jegging like leggings only made of jeans. How cool is that! It fits nicely and looks great when your wearing boots because the jeggings will go straight inside your boots.

Why did I finally decide take multivitamins ? Why only start now?

• I realized that I am gonna be 30 by next year 
• Since my husband is on a healthy diet regime, he unintentionally made me wanna have a healthy diet as well.
• My hair is changing color 
• I have Vitamin B12 deficiency
• The multivitamins in Germany are sold in solluble tablettes. Instead of swallowing pills, I can drink them, in Orange flavour some more! (in case you didn't know, I have problem swallowing pills)

I can sum up my targets and resolutions into three main areas; Deutsch learning (OMG- this is typical German grammar.. Deutsch lernen) correction, learning Deutsch, consuming healthy food and reading.

Why my target is for the first quarter? Well, I don't wanna wait until the end of the year to see where I am at. 3 months is just nice to review my progress and still have time to improvise till the first half of the year. By March, I will complete my Deutsch Course and hopefully, inshaAllah dah lulus for my visa.. Please pray hard for me.. My visa has to be renewed by then and kalau semua okay maka it smoothens the process of my Permanent Residency and it makes it easier to find a job or further my studies :) That's why I am really struggling with my Deutsch.

For all you readers who have been good to me, here is a picture of myself. I have mentioned this before and will mention this again, this is an unprivatised private blog. I feel very happy blogging here knowing that the people I share it with have good hearts and are not judgmental. 2010 has been a challenging year for me (If I have the time, I will blog about the highlights of the year). It's a year with full of significant changes. Honestly, I can't wait for 2011 cause it's gonna be a great year inshaAllah :)

This pic was taken by my husband. We were on our way back from grocery shopping. We got used to carrying heavy things on our bagpacks and walking back home with it since we don't have a car to carry our groceries. This was after a 2 days of heavy snow. Snow was up to my boots! White Christmas indeed.

This is me at Mannheim's Weihnachtsmarkt (Christmas Market). On the left, I was eating Crepe with Nutella. Sedap! And on the right, I was having Alcoholfrei Glühwein. It's a traditional German drink. But they drink it with alcohol of course. The content that I had was Zitrone.Normally they will drink it during the cold winter. I brought bag the mug which costed 2€ as a souvenir.You can see very clearly that I am very lefthanded. Haha..

One question, what is the last thing you wanna do before 2010 ends?

Round Round

Halo, its been awhile since I last blogged. First things first. I am fine alhamdulillah. The chicken pox is almost gone :) Weather here has been great. Frühling ist hier (Spring is here)! So I can see flowers slowly growing by the roadside and in the city.

So what's my update ? Lemme see, Mr. Lucky brought me to town on Tuesday. We went to Engelhorn. It's like a huge store that sells alot of sports attires and equipments. And apparently, I just found out today, they sell designer handbags too! wah wah wah! I bought a whole set of sports attire (See picture) which consist of snowcap, sweater, another sweater by adidas (climacool in pink yo!), tracksuit, and adidas sports shoes, also some socks. Mr. Lucky bought a ganas badminton racquet and a fußball shorts (apparently this is how they spell football). After that, we had KFC for dinner and head back home :) Happy camper I am. Alhamdulillah.

On Wednesday, I cooked ikan talapia 3 rasa which finally tasted like ikan talapia 1 rasa. But in the end, the pinggan became licin. It's either it was really good or we were really hungry. I think it was the latter :p The next day, we had an appointment at the immigration office at 330pm. It's called, Ausländerbehörde Mannheim (yes, I too, have a problem pronunciating this). So I had to go to the city and meet Mr.Lucky at Mannheim Hauptbanhof (Mannheim Main Train Station). Since I was going there by myself, the big challenge was to buy the bus ticket. See, usually Mr. Lucky would buy it for me the day before since its valid for 24 hours. This time, I had to do it by myself. I was abit scared since I was kaloting to go to the bus stop (reason will be explained below). I knew I had to tekan 24 hours, and somehow the price would be 5.20€. And finally, I did it! I got the ticket yay!

I reached Hauptbanhof a few minutes earlier that Mr. Lucky so I had the chance to snap some pictures using my nokia (Mr. Lucky would pretend he doesn't know me if I put on the tourist-y hat :p hehehe). Then, we went to the immigration office and reached there on time. The funny part was, the guy was explaining and explaining and looking at me and Mr. Lucky and then suddenly I think he said, 'she doesn't understand a word I'm saying rite?'. It was kinda funny though then he made that nak marah look and a lady came over and said something like 'how come the German embassy in KL gave a visum if she didn't take any German classes?' Well, apparently it's compulsary to at least attend Level 1 German class. But it's not my fault. They said it's ok since I have a degree. They looked over at my documents and asked us to sign a declaration form and waited to 10 minutes or so. After that, they called my name, FRAU YAMALLUDDIN. That's how my name is being called. hehe. We went in the room and the looked at Mr. Lucky in the eye and said, 'I cannot give you the visa'. Mr. Lucky sighed and said something in Deutsch. I was panicked and almost wanted to cry. And the guy continued, 'I cannot give you the visa because u didn't give me her passport'. and he laughed. We were like Fuh!!!! Serius serius pun pandai gak dia bergurau. Haha! So we gave him our passport and made our payments and now, finally I have a permanent visum in DE. Alhamdulillah. All thanks to Mr. Lucky :) (I have to attend a 600 hour integration class consisting of language and how to survive here in DE. Can't wait! ) After that, we went to Istanbul (a Turkish shop) to buy halal meat and chicken. For dinner, we celebrated the day with some sushi with our dear friend, YY. We went back home with a full belly and a new bedroom (that's why I was kalot because I finally finished kemasing the other bedroom. Now we have the floor all to ourselves, a bedroom and an entertainment room yay! except for the houseowner's daughter but she rarely comes to the 2nd floor)

On Friday, we went grocery shopping at Rewe and bought a whole lot of stuff since we haven't been doing grocery for awhile. This morning, I went to Wasserturm with YY. The weather was a perfect 16°C. She showed me around the bandar. We went Saturn to get a water filter. (The water here has sedikit CaCo3), stopped by at H&M and NewYorker and also Engelhorn. That's when I found out they sell designer handbags that costs superexpensive that I don't think I can afford right now hehe. We walked to the supermarket and I bought some Tulips there and a cute vase I bought in Nano Nana (something like Hinode shop) to brighten our kitchen. Now the floor has abit of the feminin touch. hehehe.. check out some pictures that I managed to snap today :) 

Those are my tulips and my new water filter. I reached home almost 2pm and Mr. Lucky was arranging the shoes by the door. Awww... I cooked speghetti for the first time! That was our lunch and dinner. Hehe..

Well, that's my update for now... I'll see you guys around k.. Tschuss!

Lately

Yes. No. I mean, lately I have been staying at home. Mr.Lucky suspects that I have low blood pressure. Since I have not been feeling well. Perhaps yes. I am sooooooooooo dying to go out. Like literally. I need sunshine and fresh air and abit of sweat wouldn't hurt. This chicken pox is almost diminishing so its good news. Alhamdulillah. The weather here is still cold though. It's about 7° / 9° during Mittags (afternoon). And we have very little sunshine compared to KL. Some parts of DE is still snowing like Berlin, Dresden, Hamburg, Stuttgart and München. Mannheim is comparatively warm (I suppose ?)  compared to other cities.

 Most of the time, I hang out in front of the heater, and also Choco-loco-bear (CLB) [i know he is not a bear but just be it like that ok] keeps me warm whenever its cold, read my Time Traveler's Wife and learn abit of Deutsch to get a head start on my classes that will be commencing in April. Here are some pictures of life at home so far. hehe..

That's Choco-Loco-Bear (a gift from YY) with my hp (a gift from Mr. Lucky) hehehe 

 Living with a heater

Tomorrow I am FINALLY going out, yay! I haven't gone out since I got lost in the forest.. oooh.. then I went to the hospital during snow.. and I went to the clinic to do a follow up check up with the doctor (which was soo cool. He speaks English, yay!). So, yeah, tomorrow Mr. Lucky is gonna buy me a pair of running shoes, and I will be going jogging when the weather is not so cold anymore and I am back on my feet again. woo hoo!! And then on Thursday, we are going to the Immigration office to settle my visa (hopefully alles ist gute). So, yay! again! I need this. I need to go out.. Watch out world! I'm coming... with no chicken pox virus (inshallah).

I found a radio station, BIG FM that plays 80% of English music. Out of 10, 2 of them are German songs. So it's not so bad. And they plan Lady Gaga's Bad Romance too! Btw, Lady Gaga will be coming to DE in May to do a concert! I am hoping that I can find someone who can accompany me but the tickets are expensive.. We'll see if I decide to go or not cause the place is quite far from Mannheim, (2 hours via train ) König Pilsener Arena, Oberhausen. Since the lost in the forest incident, I'm scared that I will get lost again.. in the city pulak! Minta dijauhkan.. huhuhu

Well, I guess that's all for now. I wanted to post a video of me singing Lately by Jodeci. But it's just to embarrasing when I view it again. Haha! If I am in a tourist-y (I learned this word from Nadia hehe) mood tomorrow, I will quietly record a video of the city using my Nokia and post it here hehe..

This blog is not so glamour (check out the number of clicks below) cause I only share this link with the ones who are close to me. Although they can always ask other people to read but its okay. The thing is, I dont want to really advertise it as much cause I you never know who might read your blog. I was just from my old blog and it's really disturbing to know that people landed on my blog after googling my name or some other people's name.. So, I wanna lay low this time :)

Ok. readers. Pray I won't get lost tomorrow! Bis später! Tschuss!

Pokerface

Thats a very small picture of me from the back (ignore the guy). This picture was taken on the day I left KL and this was in KLIA about 1040pm on 25th February 2010. I looked kinda lost and eager at the same time. But certain. I was on my way to start my new life in DE. Land of the Deutsch. Deutschland. I didn't know at that time I was carrying a chicken pox virus. Now I have a pokerface and listening to Lady Gaga's Pokerface while blogging. Well, who said it's gonna be easy.. but then again who said it's gonna be hard. Just go through it one day at a time :)

It snowed. I experienced my first snow experience! and to top it off i got my chicken pox too! Isn't it ironic? Dont u think? Funny2.. I have been resting a lot that's why there weren't any web activities as much. But today, I feel abit better alhamdulillah so I am gonna upload the pics of snow.. Check it out..

Morning of 6th March 2010

 Morning of 7th March 2010

 Ok.. I will blog more when I am feeling better and have more activities to share ok. :) Danke! 

Like Some Twilight Movie

Salam. Hello. Guten Tag!

Its day 6 here in DE and the weather is as u can see at the printscreen photo I inserted. Yes2. Its in german. Almost everything here is german.. wait.. not almost.. EVERYTHING here is in German (Deutsch). so i need to master the language real quick to get by. sometimes just listening (not watching ye), listening to the TV, can pick up a few words.. they will be talking real fast.. and I'll be picking up words like this: 'good (guht).... right (richtig)... exactly (genau)... later (später).. bye (tschuss)..

Yesterday, the weather was really nice in the afternoon. It was sunny and temp was like 10 degrees. So I decided to go out to take some fresh air and snap some pictures. I asked the houseowner's daughter, Carie to accompany me to go to the river, Rhein which is just nearby the house about 10 mins walk.

People were jogging and walking and you can see old people just sitting there enjoying the fresh air. Young couples jogging with their MP3s, track suits and jogging attires. Carie wanted to show me a nice place where there were Swans and Ducks swimming near the river. I got some really nice shots of them. Check it out.

 This is the view of the Rhein River from Lindenhof.                          This is a shot from below the stairs.

This is the view of the place that looks like the beach.. nice rite..   This is the walk way to the forest.

                           Carie.. the houseowner's daughter              Really nice view here.. almost sun set

 

 These are the ducks and the Swans swimming                           Say hello swan!

 

                 Oh yeah, that's me... with my new jacket :)                   History of the river

So there we were happily taking pictures and Carrie showing me around the river. We were talking and chit chatting until i got a call from Mr.Lucky saying that he is about 10 minutes from reaching home. See, that's gonna be abit of a problem since the house keys are with me.. and we kinda got lost... in the forest!

At first, it was not so scary.. people were still walking, and taking dogs for walks.. and somehow, we took a wrong turn and reached somewhere quite far from where we started. Nerds! (ok, too much 30rock :p ). And the time that we got lost was the other place that we got to which was beautiful (the picture of almost sun set above). yeah.. it was like a beach kinda.. and we saw two boys playing with their dogs.. even though it was almost sunset, we were still very far from home.. I was abit worried but I knew we will reach home somehow..

The drama started when we reached Camp Strandbad and it was already dark. Carrie called Joe a few times asking for directions. We needed to keep the Rhein on our left so that we can find the way home. And true enough. But as we walked further, and it became darker.. things started to get creepier.. and there were no lights at all. We started to panic and I was quite hesitant on walking forward since I don't see any signs of civilisation at all.. and no lights.. and we decided to turn back after we Carrie said 'oh my god, this is where we were just now.. we were in circles' .. Deeply, I wanted to cry, so badly. I imagined a lot of bad things, I thought I would never see daylight again.. I recited some versus to calm myself down. I even quietly sang, 'My Favourite Things' from The Sound of Music so that I won't feel so bad. But I was the adult between the two. I had to play the cool, calm and collected card. Carrie was cool too, she said 'we're gonna die.. we're gonna die.. i dont wanna die in the woods'.. but I know she was joking... (right?)

So we walked back to Camp Strandbad where there were lights but no one around. Then, there was a lorry that entered the Camp.. so we headed there straight away. Oh yes, in every drama, there is always a climax scene.. the climax scene for this drama would be when Joe called Carrie's handphone, it went dead. Bummer! see, this is just like some Twilight movie with the forest and all.. (sigh).. so we ran and ran in the dark before it gets darker and colder (I think the weather was between 2°C to -2°C im not sure. but what I know is I was shivering). So we reached the camp but the ultimate challenge is that we needed to climb through the gates, like a pelarian. And I went first and the climb and the jump made me realize that my body isn't getting any younger (Jogging will commence real soon!). Carrie was real smart when she gave me the bag first and then climbed the gate (and why didn't I think of that?). She had to take off her shoes to climb the gate which made it look easier for her. Yeay Carrie!

Finally, civilisation. No more lost in the forest.. No more lost in translation.. Just.. still.. lost.. She put her simcard in my very old Nokia phone and immediately Joe called her.. Lucky! because Joe's hp's batteries were also almost dead :p Suddenly we saw a light. and someone calling Carrie! It was Joe on a bicycle.. That's when I spoke to Mr.Lucky saying that we will be home soon. Joe brought us to a cab place. Me and Carried went home by cab and Joe cycled back home. In the cab, I realized that we walked realllllly superfar. The cab fair was 10.50€. yeah. Imagine that.

Alhamdulillah, we reached home at 7.40pm.

What an adventurous day 5 in DE :)

New Kid on The Block

Guten Tag!

Welcome to my new blog. This is actually the spinoff from my previous blog. This blog will tell you mostly about my life here. My new life in a different country.

I landed safely in Frankfurt on Friday morning and was greeted warmly by my husband who is residing in Mannheim (30 mins by ICE from Frankfurt). Its now day 5 in Deutschland. It's a beautiful Tuesday morning and the weather is about 0 degrees. I am still getting used to the weather. Coming from a very hot country (currently KL is about 35), my body got a shock but the usual me, taking it positive :)

I love the cool breeze and the wind blowing through my face. Sometimes I wear gloves even though there is no one else wearing it, but I don't really care cause I feel cold :p well, nothing much for now.. just an introduction to my new blog.. :)

yeah, I am the new kid on the block.. check out some of the pics I took on the way back from groceries.. Enjoy! Perhaps if the weather is not so cold, I might go out for some snaps of the neighbourhood and post it here :)

 

                      Finally.. I get my müller joghurt!                    On the way back from Rewe (grocery shop)

bis bald!