read & write

I haven't been writing up here as often as I used to, but I certainly have been writing a LOT this few weeks back. Besides, I guess this is one of those times for a blogger when production is not as fruitful..^^ Credits to this writing class I'm taking, I feel like my mind has "expanded" from too much cognitive work. As much as I like to write, I actually had a wobbly history with writing classes. I remember dropping a class and withdrawing from another a few quarters back, merely because of this lousy thought that "I am not in the mood" to write. Now when I think back to that, I don't think I'm any more zealous to write right now than I was back then. But don't get the wrong idea. I'm not planning on withdrawing this time (considering the tremendous effort I've put into this course) insyaAllah. My professor is making me read and write a LOT. I've been either staying up late or waking up early (or both) every other day to finish all the homework before class. But I'm glad that she finally came to realize how much she has made us do. One time she said in class; "You know what? When I looked back to the homework that I've given you..I just realize..it's a LOT. You guys are doing really really great with your assignments. You should be proud of yourself. Congratulations! Do you feel good about it?" And the class was like "Um..Uh..Yeah.." Well, at least she does acknowledge our commitment to her class..and I must say I kinda like her style..^^ and I'm glad I have my housemate taking this class with me..otherwise, it would have been even harder on me.

p/s: I called mom the other day. Hearing her voice, it relieved my longing for home a bit..=)

the story untold?

"Growing into Literacy"

Living in a country a thousand miles away from the English-speaking lands, how could a boy ever have anticipated the impact that this foreign language would make in his life. A boy who was still too naïve to project and foresee what he was going to need the most in his blurry academic future. As opposed to his mother-tongue, this was the language whose significance was not apparent to his eyes when he was in primary (elementary) school. The boy, unfortunately, was me. Back then, we were taught the basics of this language, and I would not do anything more than what my teacher told me to. Even if I were to, I could not seem to find a strong reason to do it. Reading and writing English was rare, let alone speaking; I would immediately get stuck on the second sentence as I finished my first. After all, I did not have any English background whatsoever to begin with, unlike those kids whose parents were professionals. My dad was not highly educated, nor was my mom. I'm not saying they were not clever, but opportunities to pursue studies were rare among the villagers. In the old days, most of us could not afford a tertiary education. So in my family, English was beyond our need. These were among the limitations that discouraged me from making any effort to polish my English literacy.

Years later, as I enrolled in the secondary-level education, I began to feel that there was a growing need for me to at least improve my literacy in English. I was admitted to a full boarding school in town, the place where kids from different places are recruited based on their excellent academic achievements in primary school. There, the environment had grown a little more competitive, academically. But still, it was not helpful enough to nurture the interest in me for advancing in English. We did more reading and writing here as compared to before, but to me it was all for the sake of fulfilling my obligation, or getting a grade good enough to get by. Don’t bother asking about spoken English, it was never emphasized. English was only spoken during class sessions, and in a very limited amount. To top that, those who tried to speak English outside class would be labeled a “show-off." In this case, I went along with the majority, refraining from taking any risk of going against the flow. This was the kind of attitude that crippled my progress. Nevertheless, my growing interest in the language forced me to do extra learning for myself, in secret. I started to pay more attention in class, and keep a handbook in my pocket titled “vocabulary." Deep inside, I had a hunch that the day will come when my extra efforts will somewhat pay off.

I graduated from secondary school with flying colors. I passed a scholarship interview and was enrolled in an American Credit Transfer Program (ACTP) at a college far from home. Here, I had a complete turnaround of my environment. I had to face a massive culture shock. The competition was much tougher; the atmosphere was dense with the pressure to get ahead. Here, not only was English highly emphasized, but it was also a "distinction" to those who were proficient in it. It was spoken everywhere in the area. Unlike those upper- and middle-class fellows who benefited from their childhood upbringings, I started out here from zero. As the name of the program implies, all the courses were biased toward English. Out of eight, six were devoted to English alone, be it Public Speaking, Writing, or Critical Reading. Upon admission, there was a placement test carried out to assign classes to students. To my worry, the test was based on English proficiency alone. Students were placed in classes ranked from the most proficient to the least proficient in English. It turned out that I was placed in the second last class. All of a sudden I felt a sense of inferiority surging into my veins, telling me I must regain my pride. I was not sure how my other classmates took the outcome, but to me it was an insult. The reason for the test was so that the teachers could give proportional attention to the different classes. I was so against the policy of discriminating us like that. Personally, I would have preferred the classes had been assigned randomly so we students could learn from each other, something which I thought to be more effective since we were closer to our friends than we were to our teachers. As a protest, I never went to any of the upper classes unless necessary, as I couldn’t get over my inferiority. On the other hand, those from the upper classes seemed to really enjoy visiting lower classes. I bore all these feelings for a semester long before the classes were finally assigned at random. From that point on, I made a vow to myself; I must and will catch up with those in the upper classes. If I were to make it abroad, I will make it prepared.

Prompted by the inferiority I once experienced, the next two years were devoted seriously to my pursuit. I did anything I could to improve my literacy skills, from imitating what the teachers said in class to jotting down new words and phrases into my ever-present handbook. There were times when I even resorted to talking to myself when no one was around. That was how serious I was to learn this language. After two years, the moment I had been waiting for finally appeared. I made it through to a university in this foreign land of America. When I first came, I realized it was the time to put all that I had learned in theory into practice, as I was going to have everything I needed to boost my literacy. Having focused my life on this sort of disappointment-driven pursuit, I had to pay the price for my obsession. I was getting ahead of myself, and was so concerned with reaching perfection that I became paranoid about making mistakes. I was not sure what had caused me to resort to being a perfectionist, but it had been an awful experience. Now I wouldn’t speak or write any English unless I was certain it was hundred percent correct. For this reason, there were times when I ended up being silent due to the fear of looking or sounding "imperfect." Not only was I paranoid about being imperfect, but I was also afraid of seeing someone better than me among my fellow native friends. I used to regard them as potential threats to myself. At this point, my obsession was doing me more harm than good.

I finally came to realize my damaging mistake; I took in too much from the book because I thought I could learn everything from it, believing that everything other than what was written in the books was inaccurate. I did not realize there was more to acquire through hands-on experiences. Now, I have learned much from my history and started to take things easy on myself. Over time I realize that having a goal and passion to make it real is good, but beware that it may turn on us if it happens to grow into an obsession. I have learned that the best way to improving my literacy is to learn as I go. There’s no need to push myself too hard just trying to stay ahead, when it is actually doing me more harm. My revenge-driven pursuit ends here, I now regard growing into literacy as an enjoyment rather than a burden.

A work submitted to Karen van Meenen of Writing Seminar

inikah summer?

"musuh utama"

So the five week long Summer quarter has begun. By the looks of things, these five weeks to come are gonna be hectic and quick (I hope). I've got a LOT to do in a very limited amount of time. At first I really2 doubted if I could get myself in the "mood" to study this Summer..but for the sake of getting everything over with real quick, I went for it anyway. I think one of the things that really helps in keeping me going right now is the thought that I'll be going back to Malaysia in a few weeks..(haiz..) Lets see..two lab reports to be handed in next week..and there is Chem Sep Exam 1 to prepare for as well. Hm..the thing is, I barely understood what Dr. Craig taught in class today. Oh Chemistry! To be honest, I've never looked forward to taking another Chemistry lab since I took Organic Chemistry labs long long time ago. I like Biology labs way way better. Ya Allah, look at this servant of yours who won't quit complaining. Ok, enough of this luahan perasaan..it's time to get to work. Actually it's not that bad at all..it's just me being dramatic here. Ok lah..wishing all those that are stranded here in RIT a great & smooth-flowing Summer quarter..ameen. =)

p/s: Penat main tukar2 bateri iClicker kat belakang kelas tadi..huhu..

di mana aku?

Alhamdulillah..

Lab report dah hantar dan exam 1 GE pun dah lepas (tak habis2 dgn GE pun). Lega rasanya..sekarang semuanya nampak bergerak dengan lebih perlahan dan munasabah. Tapi ni baru permulaan..lepas ni ada 40-60 mukasurat lab report menanti..huhu. Hari tu dah stay up sampai pukul 3, kalau yang ni tak taulah. Sekarang ni rasa agak gembira sebab eksperimen yang aku buat semalam menjadi..dengan jayanya. Aku dan lab partner aku, Amer, selalu macam agak ketinggalan bila buat eksperimen ni..tapi at the end of the day we always managed to pull through. You know how it feels..lepas dah penat2 kerja, pastu kita dibayar gaji. Tapi sepatutnya sekarang ni kena sedih jugak..sebab dah jarang dapat pegi masjid dan hadir mesyuarat harian. In fact, inilah yang sepatutnya paling disedihkan. Nak difikirkan..kalau ini ujian..sekarang aku memang sangat teruji..fikir risau untuk agama dah semakin pudar nih..haritu time orang lain pergi charge 'bateri' ke Buffalo aku duk habiskan bateri kat rumah..aduih. Bila situasi macam ni berlaku, aku tau aku perlukan kawan-kawan seperjuangan to keep the semangat alive and burning. Subhanallah..It's a great thing to have them around!

Hati ni sangat terkesan dengan suasana..bila dah selalu habiskan masa dalam suasana dan percakapan duniawi, sikit-sikit iman akan haus. Myself in particular is very susceptible to my surrounding atmosphere..and it always gets me worried when I have to be away from the atmosphere I'm supposed to spend much time in. Bila usaha untuk dunia dah take over mmg susah nak nampak indahnya usaha untuk akhirat. Sebab akhirat memang tak boleh dilihat..ianya tersembunyi..dan salah satu cara untuk menjadikannya 'kelihatan' adalah dengan banyakkan bercakap dan mendengar tentang perkara-perkara akhirat..which is something I've been missing lately. At times, I do have to ask myself, "Where am I?" Aku berlari ke arah dunia sedang aku menuju ke akhirat. Sekuat mana pun aku lari ke arah dunia aku tak akan dapat mencapainya..dan sekuat mana pun aku lari daripada akhirat aku tak akan dapat mengelaknya. On the other hand, kat dunia ni apa yang diusahakan boleh nampak terus resultsnya..kat rumah ni ha, gambar results gel electrophoresis belambak-lambak nak kena tampal dalam lab notebook. And just for the record I'd like to show u one of those;

Figure 1. Bands of DNA extracted from poor bacteria.

P/S: Tiba-tiba terfikir pasal Malaysia..sesungguhnya perutku semakin terseksa oleh keterpaksaan untuk makan makanan-makanan di sini..dah tak sabar nak balik rumah ni. Rindu nak makan to my stomach's preference. Rindu nak pergi markaz Sri Petaling. Rindu nak ke masjid nek motor dengan ayah with nothing getting in the way..the best thing a father & a son could ever do together! =)

missing out

Assalamu'alaikum...

O yeah..GE is showing it's true colors now. Sekarang tengah sibuk buat lab report GE. Hari Jumaat minggu lepas duduk dalam lab dari pagi sampai ke petang sibuk mempurifikasi DNA kali ke-2, sebab lab hari Khamis tu gagal. Lepas dah bertungkus lumus kerja berjam-jam, bila tiba masa melihat results..tahniah, lab perlu dibuat untuk kali ke-3 kerana results turned out not as expected. Yea..2nd trial failed as well. Ada budak-budak ni yang dah buat sampai 3-4 kali pun tak jadi-jadi lagi..kesian. Lagi tensen..tak dapat keluar minggu ni bersama kawan-kawan yang lain untuk beri laluan kepada GE. Sedang diorang sibuk khuruj fi sabilillah aku sibuk dengan kertas-kertas graph. I'm really missing out on what they are gaining..ruginya. Salah sendiri jugak sebab planning tak betul. Hm..harap ada hikmah disebalik kejadian ini. So..harap juga dapat siapkan lab report secepat mungkin, lepas tu siapkan lab notebook, dan lepas tu get ready untuk exam 1 GE minggu depan. =)

GE

Assalamu'alaikum!

Hey..it's been a while since I last racked my brain trying to find things to write. Judging by the rate I was going at, a one-week hiatus is pretty long I guess. Well, I've been racking my brain all right..but through a different channel? I'm taking this one lab people always think twice to take: Genetic Engineering (GE). No idea? Well..I'm not sure about it myself but..from a very2 simplified point of view, I can say that GE centers on the recombinant DNA technology, in which you manipulate physical features of DNA to...do things. Lets see..so far..it's not bad at all. In fact, I'm kinda enjoying it. Unless I'm getting the wrong first impressions, I think I'll pull through and stay breathing by the end of the quarter. Well of course this GE thing is keeping my hands and brain busy, so much so that there's only a tiny little room left in the academic portion of my brain for other subjects. It's always GE all week long. I feel like I've done the workload for one quarter in just one week of school..huhu. Great. I can hardly find the time to write a post nowadays. Last Thursday I had to camp out in the lab for almost 7 hours (with the other poor Malaysian peeps), from 2 pm all the way to 9 pm. Unlike with some other typical biology labs where messing up is not a the-end-of-the-world issue..almost all the experiments in GE are tagged with irremovable "do it until you get it right" labels. So if you mess up you'll have to do it over and over. Once during a lab session I talked to Dr. Rothman;

Me: "...to me taking this lab is like taking 3 labs at once."

Dr. Rothman: "Well, to me teaching this lab is like teaching 3 labs at once."
Me: "Haha..yeah."
Dr. Rothman: "But..what you learn in this lab is equivalent to what you learn in 3 labs."
Me: "...Exactly!"

I warn you..Dr. Rothman can be hilarious at times..that's what I like about him, he makes being in the lab more comfortable and casual on us.

Dr. Rothman was right. Lots of things from different labs I took that never made sense before are starting to fall into place now. The things I learned from GE have shed light on the mind-bugling puzzles I bumped into in the past. The skills I felt kinda tricky to master before are becoming all in a day's work now. Well..I know this course has a lot more to offer..and I hope I can get the most out of it, insyaallah.

P/S: GE rocks..mari ambik GE..=)

winter quarter closes down

Alhamdulillah..Finals are over (yeay!), though they didn't really go as I'd anticipated..(-_-") Hm..the snow is not showing any signs of clearing up or even receding. One of my professors assured us that the snow would go away in a week or two, and this was two weeks ago. Guess what..the snow is still there, even more than ever. Well, we don't really 'know' things. We may be able to predict and plan but we don't decide what will happen. Anyway..as decided in mesyuwarah a few weeks ago, this weekend we three Malaysians are supposed to be going to Syracuse for our three-day khuruj. But the thing is we haven't got any updates on this, since we haven't been to the masjid for quite some time now. I guess this exams thing has got us pretty much caught up in worldliness. There might be no elder brothers left to go with us this time since most of them have spent time in masthurat jama'ah last week. Although we ourselves have been in contact with this effort for quite a while, and are 'experienced' enough to handle things on our own, we still need an elder brother to kind of supervise us over there. There might not be problems with doing the 'amal and everything, the issue here is how to deal with the management and to get around when we are there. After all, we're still youngsters who are hasty and lack wisdom..hehe. We'll see how it goes later today.

P/S: One-week break ahead, what to do? I don't want to end up wasting my holidays as I always did.

"weather-sick"?

What a relief! As soon as I got my presentation done, it was as if a 1.5-ton rock has been drawn off my head. I felt so light. The presentation went well I guess (Judging by the number of people who were still awake upon wrapping up the slides). Last week was super hectic. I spent the first three quarters of the week getting ready for exams and the last quarter of it working on my presentation and review paper. It's been a while since the last time I got pushed this far. At this very moment, if I flapped my hands up and down in a rapid motion, I would go floating in the air (exaggerating). So this week, it's lab notebook time! Lucky that I'm taking just one lab, so the labor is not as burdensome as taking 3 labs at once (past experience). Worldly things always bring butterflies in your stomach. The only thing that can bring peace to the heart is religion. Only by remembering Allah will the heart find true peace.

"...Verily in the remembrance of Allah do hearts find rest!" (Surat Ar-Ra'd: 28)

I've got a problem waiting to be dealt with: the delay on the purchase of my flight ticket. All thanks to HSBC for denying me my ticket home. The secure code thing is making me sick to my pancreas. I don't recall having such an issue the last time I bought my ticket online. The worse part is I don't feel motivated at all to try to resolve this problem. I'm going back to Malaysia a little late this time to make way for the Summer classes I'm planning on taking. I learned my lesson from my last homecoming. Last time I went back for the entire break but ended up not knowing what to do at home. There was still much time left over even after I did my 40-day khuruj. I could've gone for 40 days twice and still had enough time to get bored. Hm..I've been going back every year now. I'm not homesick. Each time the freezing winds outside pierce through my body, the first thing that pops into my mind is "Malaysia!" That makes me "weather-sick," huh?

p/s: May Allah swt make our dealings easy. Ameen.

a drop of reminder, a pool of apology

MySA's general meeting last night was quite interesting, especially the last portion of it when our president was directly addressing us about our putting Malaysia's pride on the line. Well, not all of us of course, but this Malay saying would well describe the situation, "Kerana nila setitik rosak susu sebelanga." What a moving speech. I expected no less from a president of his caliber. The things he said about us bearing the rights of others really made me rethink the purpose of my being here. Just how much sin I have committed by just slacking off in my studies. Sometimes you just need someone to strike at you head-on like that for you to get it. A real friend is someone who can give you a sincere advice when you really need one, even if it costs you your tears. How you would take it, that's for you to decide. After all, reminders are beneficial for Muslims. Back to the issue, so now MySA is not giving out any "aids" to anyone any more. I wish they could have done that way sooner, so I could have spent more time sharpening my reasoning skills.

Speaking of reminder, someone just gave me a warm reminder to come to the dodgeball tournament tonight. Well that's not strange at all since I skipped the last treasure hunt contest and put my team at the risk of losing their winning points. (And my team did win.) MySA have come up with this new rule where points will be deducted for every absence; a particularly effective strategy against those who hardly show up in the meetings. So it seems like I'll have to at least make sure my attendance is checked somehow. "What a drag...", the line my favorite Naruto character would say if he gets caught up in a tricky situation. It's a good thing though that this time around the matches between girls and boys will be done separately; otherwise, some people might not even consider coming at all. I'd love to be actively involved in these get-together activities as much as others do, but for some reasons I can't. By saying that, I'm not trying to offend anyone here, just delivering my sincere thoughts. My apology if it does sound that way. =)

p/s: MySA = Malaysian Students Association

Wassalam

so much for kicking back

Well here I am on the very last weekend of my holidays. Hm..this one-week break has been nothing but a disappointment. Hours and hours spent on PS3, watching anime, and other unproductive activities that at the end of the day I'd regret doing. I could not get a single thing done from my work list. Wait, I don't even have a work list to begin with. Great. That's it then. So much for a wonderful break I guess. And yet here I think I can make these last days count. How? Lets see. Oh, I can at least get my brain ready for the kick-off, or clean up my room, or get my laundry beautifully done. Of course I need to also reset my biological clock to default since my circadian rhythm has gone haywire now. My system can no longer tell if it is daytime or nighttime. Well what else would you expect from a prolonged period of sleep deprivation? As a result, I ended up being nocturnal.

Come to think of it, it seems that my whole life has been reduced to an awful period of laxity. Days and nights passed by in waste. This is certainly not the state one would want to die in. Rasulullah saw once said in a hadith, more or less the meaning;

"The dwellers of Jannah will not regret anything except the time they spent in this world without the dzikir (remembrance) of Allah swt."

Looking at this, I can't help wondering how much the dwellers of Hellfire will regret on this Day. And thinking how much time I've wasted so far simply increases the intensity. Only on that day will we realize how precious a single second in this world is. Believe it, on the hereafter scale even half a second of this world counts a lot. Well, of course we all want to improve for the better. I always wanted to occupy my time to the maximum. But to do this we need strength, and this strength comes from iman. And definitely my iman still hasn't reached the level at which I can significantly avoid the irrelevant. So until then I need to work on my iman even more, and you guys too insyaallah. =)

Wallahua'lam

Cell Phys to Rustic via Walmart

Over with Cell Physiology lab. To Rustic Village, four of us in the car. We offered Br. Talhah a ride but he refused, saying that he wanted to take the bus with his other friend. Never mind. We stopped by Wallmart on our way home for a quick shopping. Since I didn't have anything to do here, I just wandered around until my housemates got everything they needed. They got in the line for self-checkout. I knew it would take them a while, so I decided to wait at a bench near the checkout counter. This was when I saw Br. Irfan dashing in. I was about to greet him but then stopped when I noticed he was in a hurry. I got back to the bench, sat, and began daydreaming.

I was halfway to the moon when someone suddenly caught me in a hug. It was Br. Gungor. (I wish it had been a girl instead~) He was with his two sons, Omar and Ismail, who seemed to me more like his bodyguards (both of them have a tall and sturdy build.) Br. Gungor is a Turkish American who works as a General Manager (GM) at an HSBC branch here in Rochester. Pretty cool profession I must say. His other son, Adam, is at UB (University at Buffalo, NY) now doing his Bachelor's degree in Medicine. I never asked how long he has been here, but I can tell from his flawless American he has lived here for ages. He's been spending time with us in jama'ah pretty regularly and in fact he is our 'amir for this month. It feels kinda weird that I know very little about them despite having been with them for over one and a half years now. I should open my mouth and ask more.

Home! (unproductive portion of the night you don't want to know about)

being left out is no good

Hm..This might help alleviate my worry. I have 3 exams coming in a row next week. But of these, the one that's giving me the 'chill' now is Genomics. The other two are manageable I guess. By virtue of intensity, Genomics is even tougher than the other two put together. I've been spending the entire weekend now reading pages which are not really making sense to my brilliant mind. Hope things will start snapping into place soon as I hate having to read everything several times. Anyway, I don't wish for this feeling to get the better of me. I'm well in control! I remember Maulana Abdul Muqeet was saying, more or less;

"A Muslim does not run into trouble except that Allah swt will reward him for his worry or restlessness, even to the most trivial extent."

For example, you put your key in your right pocket and later look for it in your left. Here, in the transition from your right to left pocket, there's a little worry in your heart that you might have lost your key. Allah will reward you for this! See, even this simple thing has a value in the side of Allah, let alone greater trouble and sufferings; It goes without saying that the rewards would be even more tremendous. Besides, these are an expiation for our past sins. So, no matter how difficult a situation may seem, never give up hope. Have trust in Allah and rest assured knowing that He is rewarding us accordingly.

There is one thing that bothers me more though..I decided to skip my khuruj this month to make way for the exams, and I truly feel bad about it. It was a super tough decision to make really. So Br. Kamran, Karkun 1 and Karkun 2 had to go without me this time. This fragile iman needs to be polished. I wish to make up for it next week insyaallah. The exam results better be worth it or else I would regret not going even more. Like this Malay saying goes; "Yang dikejar tak dapat yang dikendong keciciran."