Cyza Sector

I’m quite busy and at the same time very exhausted. Today, after work, I slept until 11.30 pm and then I found myself browsing through Facebook with my other half.

Why I’m exhausted?

Well, it’s actually a combination between work (plus some stress) + the futsal game yesterday + KRT (Kumpulan Rukun Tetangga) activity. All of that in one day – one night.

Work

At work, besides the daily routine job, we’re preparing for a major plant shutdown this weekend. That means I’m working on Saturday and Sunday. Planning, preparation and all sort or arrangement must be carefully made to ensure jobs will run silky smooth. Earlier today, 2 dozens of “Mat Salehs” (western foreigners) from Europe paid a technical visit to my work place and I found myself entertaining a dozen of them! Pheewww…. Luckily everything when OK.

Futsal Game

It was a gigantic battle between KRT Bandar Pulai Jaya versus some school staff from Pekan Nanas, Johor. Though we played for just a mere 40 minutes, we’re really glad because our physical endurance ran out. Off course”lah”, because all players are categories as fathers!!! Panciiiit bebb!!!

KRT

After the futsal game ended about 10.05 (+ 5 minutes extra time), I returned home to get some rest and sleep because in just a few hours time I need to be awake. It was our turn (shift) to be a “soldier” protecting our territory. I woke up at 1.00 am, grabbed my M16 and a couple of grenades, walked my way to the our commanding area in front of my house. We guarded the area till 5.00 am.

p/s. We did took a break and had roti telur bawang and teh tarik at a nearby Restoran Mamak at 3.30 am.

ETC…

Featured in Skor Career

Mr. Zul from Skor Career made an interesting entry about my chemical engineering career. If you want to know me a little bit better, you can start from what I do. Well, I mean what I do for living. Thanks Zul.

Perfect Lunch Date

Yesterday, my wife traveled all the way from Skudai to Pasir Gudang (roughly 48km) to have a lunch date with me at Kedai Makan Rahmat. She has been begging me to bring her there for a lunch. At 1pm sharp we headed to Kampung Pasir Puteh, parked the car, sat and order our meal (what else – the famous Siakap plus other side dishes) I don’t want to snap anymore photos as I’ve done it before.

To my surprise, I met a group of suppliers who has been dying to treat me all this while. They almost completed their lunch. I’ve been avoiding their invitations by giving all sort of excuses. I whispered silently to myself, this is the perfect moment if they really want to treat me @ sponsor my lunch date! …and yes, while we’re enjoying our meal, one of them stepped to us and informed that they’ve settled our bill. That was really cool. We had a sponsored lunch date at Kedai Makan Rahmat!!! I hope and pray, good coincidence like to repeat.

Timing Belt Overdue

One of my cars, Proton Waja Enhanced Version has passed the 80,000 km marked. It is time to replace the timing belt, alternator belt and aircond belt. However, if I send my car to the normal service station that I used to do all this while, it will cost be nearly MYR1,000 (including major service). I’ve surveyed for cheaper alternatives (around MYR300 to 400 for similar job) and I’m thinking to permanently ignore the Proton service center which are too costly. What do you think? Should I opt for the cheaper one?

Looking at the title you people might think that I am giving a very serious thought on who to vote for the coming election. Should I choose our long ruling Barisan Nasional or opt for something different to see whether they can lead our beloved country well. Ahhh…I don’t really care actually. I am not really interested in our country’s political issue…maybe not yet.

Driving from home to my kids’ kindergarten everyday is actually a very quiet and private time to chat with my first and second born, dedicated for them to fire away any question in their mind, as long as it doesn’t disturb my driving. It is usually either filled with Marsya’s voice singing all the kiddy songs she learnt at school or the Monday till Sunday countdown, screaming her heart out. Ikhwan is more subtle and quiet, maybe because he’s a boy. He doesn’t always enumerate and parade what’s been taught at school, in fact it’s quite hard to even make him tell us what’s been happening at school. Two different little personalities, aren’t they.

While I was driving last Monday, on the way back from school, Ikhwan suddenly popped a question that left me bewildered for quite a moment. Guess what, he questioned me on what is up with all those flags hanging along our roadside at this time of the year. He’s never seen it before in his entire 5++ years of life of course. I found it really hard to explain what an election means to my little five year old. How can I put it in a very easy way to make him understand what those flags are for. My head was spinning for an answer but to no avail.

I was just hoping that he would drop the question and forget about it. This is a absolutely a tough ordeal for a mother, not being able to answer a question from her son. Hmmm…

After deliberating in my head, I was saying to myself that if I don’t know how to put it in other way, just tell him what it is literally. The true meaning of election. Lastly, I just said:

‘Itu bendera Barisan Nasional, Pas dan Keadilan. Sekarang ni nak pilihanraya, kita kena pilih siapa jadi the next Perdana Menteri of Malaysia. Bendera tu suruh kita cross siapa yang kita suka.’ (Translation: Those are flags of Barisan Nasional, Pas and Keadilan. Now is the time of our country’s general election and we have to choose who got to be the next Prime Minister of Malaysia. The flags are telling us on who to vote/cross)

Surprisingly, he took it well, with an ‘oowwwhhh’. Yeaaa…he understand? I wonder. But that was it for Monday and I was relieved. I thought I have satisfied his curiosity, have answered the mind boggling question in his head and settled it once and for all. To my surprise the next day, he repeated the same question….my gosh. Here we go again. And I recite the same asnwer…..

Now he’s asking me: ‘Mommy dengan Daddy kena masuk party tu ye. Kena cross macam flag tu ye…’

What do you do if you were me….hahaha.

I have never tasted diet coke before, up until I started my diet last three days. To substitute for my carbonated drink that I love so much, I thought why don’t I drink diet coke instead. From what I read through the carb counter in the Atkins site, diet coke has 0 carb and no sugar at all. Therefore, as I reached the mall, I went straight to the beverage shelf and pick up a can.

Before I tried it, I read the labels on the can which says that any intake of low energy drink should be supervised by a doctor. That alone already triggered a not so comfortable feeling in me. It also says that the drink is not suitable for phenylketonurics, what the hell is that?

As I got home, I decided to give it a sip and it taste nice I thought. I wonder why does it has to be drank only with doctor’s supervision. Even my husband also tried it and says that it taste nice. To investigate on diet coke, yesterday I googled on ‘Is diet coke bad’ and I got an endless list of it. There are tonnes and tonnes of site explaining on how bad the drink is for a human being.

The culprit in the drink is the aspartame added in substitute of sugar.

Aspartame is poison!

• Aspartame/Nutrasweet is not very sweet in itself, that may be why Equal puts Dextrose (sugar) and maltodextrin as the first ingredients, so that it tastes sweet.
• Aspartame/Nutrasweet is a brain drug that stimulates your brain so you think that the food you’re eating tastes sweet. If you pay attention you’ll notice that when using Aspartame/Nutrasweet, everything you eat at the same time also tastes sweet! This may be why Aspartame/Nutrasweet causes you to crave carbohydrates. Hence, you won’t lose weight using it.
  BTW, cyclamates got pulled off the market in the 70’s in the US (but not Canada or the rest of the world) because the sugar industry saw too much of their market disappear.
• Aspartame/Nutrasweet (aspartylphenylalanine-methyl-ester) breaks down to its poison constituents at 86 degrees (Aspartic Acid 40%, Phenylalanine 50%, and Methanol 10%). Remember your stomach is at 98.6 degrees! Therefore you should never use Aspartame/Nutrasweet in hot beverages or cooked foods such as Jello. How the FDA allows this remains a mystery. There is mounting evidence that the “Burning Mouth Syndrome” experienced by the Desert Storm troops was actually Methanol poisoning from the Diet Coke they drank lots of, after being exposed to desert temperatures.
• Aspartame/Nutrasweet’s 10% Methanol appears in the body quickly and is the  same alcohol (wood alcohol also in lacquer thinner), that your mother correctly warned you could make you blind. Many skid-row alcoholics had major problems with this cheap but deadly form of alcohol.
• Aspartame/Nutrasweet’s 40% Aspartic Acid is an “excitotoxin” in the brain and excites neurons to death, i.e. it kills brain cells and causes other nerve damage.
• Aspartame/Nutrasweet triggers Migraine Headaches This even happened to me!. The Usenet is filled with posts by people who have pinned their migraines down to aspartame/Nutrasweet consumption.
• Aspartame/Nutrasweet’s breakdown products attack the bodies tissues and create Formaldehyde which builds up in the tissues forever. Remember the smelly, eye watering fumes from the frogs you dissected in school? They were preserved with Formaldehyde! Formaldehyde is thought to cause cancer.
  The American Bottlers Association did not want the FDA to approve Aspartame/Nutrasweet because of what the test report showed. But the FDA approved it anyway!
• Airline pilots stay away from Aspartame/Nutrasweet because they are well aware of the documented dangers.
• Aspartame/Nutrasweet also breaks down to diketopiperazine [DKP] which is proven to cause Brain Tumors! Brain Tumors used to be rare. Several of the rats in the original study formed brain tumors during their Aspartame/Nutrasweet exposure. The researchers surgically removed the tumors and returned the rats to the study and discounted the tumors.

So there it goes. I was crushed. I decided not to continue drinking it anymore. Eventhough there are many more websites saying that it’s not that harmful because the aspartame content is low, I still think that I don’t want to harm myself. I would just have to bear my craving for carbonated drink these few days.

My husband very rarely drink them. He prefers good fresh filtered plain water, and he drinks a lot of it. What about you? Do you drink carbonated drinks?

Check out this game. It’s really cool Just press number 5 (the red button circle) and the disc will drop. All together, you’ll have 5 chances to accumulate your point. Play the game and tell me how much point can you get? It will be fun!!!

On a bright sun warm sun shiny day, we went to Bukit Layang-layang, Pasir Gudang, Johor Bahru, Malaysia to witness the International Kite Festival 2008 which is held from 19-24 February 2008. It is the last day and the park was still flooded with people and vehicles parking alongside it. Various activities were organized to attract local and international visitors. This is the second time I brought my family to the kite festival.

A giant Egypt pharaoh kite flew in the air. The contestant is from USA.

That’s the contestant pulling his pharaoh on the dry yellowish grass. The rain has not hit Pasir Gudang for about 1 month.

Some of the kites flying in the light beautiful blue sky

Spiderman kite. My son could not resist to have this one. So, we bought it for him for MYR5/piece (string included).

Some of the goods sold at the festival. Among them are hats and kid’s stuff.

Paint ball field is also available. However, when we came, the battle have not yet begin.

Some small toy cars are up for sale as well. They cost MYR4 each. But you can get 3 for MYR10. I’m not sure about the quality…

Cheap jeweleries are also sold here. Most of them comes from China.

Some other kite design up for grab.

A bunch of fast food restaurant also participated in the kite festival. Among them are Kentucky Friend Chicken, Pizza Hut and Ayamas. Well, they all come from the same mother company!

The shade prepared for visitors to enjoy the international kite show.

What is this? I’m not sure. Maybe it’s a type of kite as well…

Me with that mini umbrella hat. That cost us only MYR 5. It’s cool under that “umbre-hat” .

Me playing with my kids. There are hundreds of other kite enthusiast playing around huge park.

I told you there are a lot of kites there…

I don’t know whether a similar international kite festival is held in other places or not? But, it is definitely an annual event in Johor Bahru. If you miss this, you can come here again next year. It’s really fantastic but it’s hot (warm).

Few days ago I stumbled with a new exciting photography website which conduct trading and biding of digital photos called Prospek.net. I’m not sure about you guys, but this is my first time learning about the concept. We are used to ebay.com (everybody knows about this) and Lelong.com.my (Malaysia) where people can sell and bid for various new or old stuffs. Well, Prospek.net is just the same except it sells and bids digital photos. Buyers can decide bid and buy the photos they desire at a reasonable price.

Prospek.net has set a wonderful platform where photos can be sold by individual as well as a corporate company (business). This is a superb opportunity for camera maniac and enthusias, professional photographers, ammateur photographers and people who love to take photos to set up their own digital photo store. This can be done on a part time basis and as a profitable hobby.

A good example is the Spiderman series where Peter Parker was broke and needed some cash. He sells photos of spiderman to a newspaper company at a relatively very low price (under priced). If at that time, Prospek.net exist, I think Peter Parker can sell Spiderman photos online and enjoy lucrative income from those “Spiderman in action photos”. Why? Simply because the media was so desparate to have spiderman at their magazine and newspaper front page.

Example of the Spiderman digital photo you snapped being on the front page of Maxim magazine

For Digital SLR users, this can be your platform to create your own gallery and at the same time digital photo studio store. Hence, there’ll be more and more Paparazzi all over the world. If you snapped a really cool photo, you can straight away upload it at prospek.net and let the net do its work 24/7.

Your digital photos will get massive exposure and it will be easy for media (magazines and newspaper, advertising company) to notice and buy your photos. However, bare in mind that phornography is prohibited here.

Currently, Prospek.net just launched a fantastic contest in conjunction with the Malaysia’s General Election 2008. So, let’s kick off. Grab your digital camera, DSLR, camera handphone and snap those political campaign, war posters, general election etc. Eye catching photos will be rewarded with RM200.oo. Check out the details here.

I just registered with Prospek.net and I’m now rushing to upload some of my best photos. Unfortunately, the internet connection at my parents house is poor (I’m at my folks place while posting this entry), so, I still could not upload those gorgeous digital photos. I’ll do it as soon as I’m back home powered with my super broadband .

Kelmarin, sebelum lunch break, member sekerja aku telefon dan ajak makan tengahari. Aku tanya, “Apesal tiba-tiba takde puting beliung, takde taufan, tetibe je ajak makan?”. Dia kata, “Alah….ikut je lah…. Ada orang belanja makan, makan aje la…”. Aku yang memang tengah diet time tu, terpaksalah follow he member aku tu.

Tepat jam 1300 Hrs, aku pun jumpa member aku kat tempat scan card dan clock out. Rupanya dia kata ada supplier nak belanja makan. Aku bukannya kenal pun siapa supplier ni? Tapi tak kisahlah, dah ada orang nak belanja makan, belasah je lah . So, aku pun follow member aku ni dan rupa-rupanya kita dibawa makan ke Kedai Makan Rahmat.

Sign board restoran ni pakai tayar lori yang di ‘recycle’ semula. Tayar lori tu belum botak lagi! Tapi mungkin dah bocor kut… Nak kata sign board ni “unik” atau “budget?” itu pilihan anda. Tapi hakikatnya, taukeh kedai makan Rahmat ni memang loaded. Berkat kemajuan dan kemakmuran kedai makannya, dia ada 3 buah kereta mewah parking dekat rumah sebelah restoran tu. Sign board dia tu memang perlu ditukar atau diperbaiki, sebab ada huruf-huruf yang dah ‘vaporized’ atau lesap. Well, takpe lah, kita makan sajalah.

Ini bukan kali pertama aku mengunjung kedai makan ni. Kalau tak silap percaturan aku, ini mungkin kali ke-3 aku singgah bersantap kat sini dalam tempoh hampir 3 tahun aku mencari sekeping pizza sesuap nasi di Pasir Gudang. Masuk dalam kedai makan je, Fuhhh!!! Ramainya manusia. Supplier dan member aku yang sudah acapkali makan kat situ cakap, Kedai Makan Rahmat ni buka tengahari dan peak “hour”nya adalah dari pukul 1300 sampai 1400 Hrs. Malam taukeh dia tak berniaga. Cukuplah dengan buka bisnes tengahari je, dah masyuk banyak giller.

Aku pun kekadang terfikir, kenapalah ramai sangat pengunjung kedai makan ini. Adakah sebab makanannya? Atau sebab suasana indah nyaman angin sepoi-sepoi bahasa di tepi laut? Let’s check it out?

Semua meja memang penuh. Siap ada orang kena berdiri tunggu nak makan. Tapi aku ter”miss” ambil gambar orang berdiri.

Kedai Makan Rahmat ini sebenarnya menjadi tumpuan pekerja industri, pekerja kontrak dan projek, mereka-mereka yang hendak entertain client, mereka-mereka yang nak sekali-sekala makan special.

Ikan siakap goreng inilah yang membuatkan warga industri kawasan Pasir Gudang kemaruk santau. Bagi aku, ikan siakap besar ini cara masaknya simple: goreng je. Foto ikan siakap di atas – sudut selatan.

Foto ikan siakap – sudut utara.

Sambal kicap untuk dicicah semasa melahap si siakap tu.

Aneka masakan melayu nusantara menjadi sajian. Lauk-lauk lain pun sederhana macam biasa. Ada ayam masak merah, udang goreng (yang di pasar jual RM18/kg tu), tempeh masak cili, sambal belacan dan beberapa masakan melayu yang aku kurang familiar. Lauk lain add lagi, tapi tak order.

 Sambal belacan, bukan aku yang nak, tapi member Tionghua aku yang menggemarinya.

Kalau nak minta fresh orange, minta maaflah… Takde. Tapi Kedai Makan Rahmat menawarkan air limau special. Hidangan asas air lain seperti teh, sirap dan sebagainya tu memang adalah.

Tatkala bersantap, kekadang nampak bot dan feri yang ulang alik dari Stulang Laut ke Batam. Nun jauh di sana, kelihatan Singapura, belah paya bakau.

Tengahari masa matahari mengembang terik, ada juga anak muda yang menyejukkan badan dan merapatkan ukhuwah sesama member dalam air laut. Ini pemandangan dari Kedai Makan Rahmat belah tepi, dekat tempat cuci tangan.

Bukan setakat rumah dan pondok kecil atas laut, tapi tampak di situ kren berkuasa besar berdekatan dermaga pelabuhan Pasir Gudang.

So, kalau korang berminat nak merasakan suasana desiran bayu sambil melahap menu utama ikan siakap size besar, menghalalah ke Johor Bahru > Pasir Gudang > Kampung Pasir Puteh > melalui beberapa rumah kedai dan jalan kampung. Kalau tersesat, tanyalah orang tepi jalan, tapi orang tepi jalan tu mestilah orang di kawasan Kampung Pasir Puteh. Tapi jangan datang malam sebab tak buka.

Harga, kira ok lah. Kalau atas meja ada ikan siakap goreng trade mark Kedai Makan Rahmat tu, standby RM40. Itu kira sekali dengan beberapa side dishes asas dan air limau satu jug (kalau datang 4-5 orang). Selamat mencuba dan menjamu selera.

Check this out. How cool is that?

That’s me, zakiyamani.com when a sexy female American Fortune reporter interviewed me at my oil production plant, mmm my empire. Thanks to my comrade, from Sports Illustrated for showing them the way to my 6 acres plant asset (including storage tanks). If you want to interview me, please liaise with my p.a. I won’t disappoint you

p/s: If you want to be interviewed by them, you must be a successful person. To be a successful person, you must click here.

I didn’t plan to make an entry today, but I just could not help myself to blog about the three new buttons on the top right hand corner of zakiyamani.com. Are those button for sale? Hmmm….well, not for the moment. They are meant for you! Yes, you can earn those buttons and get free publicity, free marketing, free ads, free traffic to your website.

Button # 1
This button is very special. It will be dedicated to zakiyamani.com subscribers by email. At the end of the month, I will make a draw. There’ll be 4 weeks in a month. That means, 4 lucky person will take turn to fill the 125 x 125 spot. So, what are you waiting for? Enter your email address at the subscribe by email form next to this post and you’re on your way to get your button.

Button # 2

This is my “love button”. From time to time, I will exchange button with my associates. Do you want to be my associate?

Button # 3

This final button will be dedicated to the top commentator of the month. He or she will proudly dwell there for 10 days. Hmm….I haven’t thought what to do with the balance 20 days of the month yet. Perhaps, if you have brilliant super ideas, please feel free to shout it to me…

Oh yes…I almost forgot. What if you fall in those category who do not have a website or blog? For this case, I’m sorry. I don’t have anything to offer so far. Maybe you can donate the spot you earn to other bloggers . By the way, so fa, majority of the visitors are a webmaster themself.

I knew about blogging somewhere around August 2006 (that was after I installed a broadband in my house) and I immediately signed up with blogger which provided a free blogging tool. Since I love to write and share stuffs/information with people, I began blogging about my work which focuses to chemical engineering. After a week or two, I learned that people are making money from blogging. So I made a short research and found out that most people are making money from Google Adsense via blogging. Now, I think a lot of people knows and have a Google Adsense account.

Back then, I have zero basic knowledge on html. I have no eBook to refer to play around and adjust the look of my blog. After my Google adsense account successfully created, I was so excited. I know I can begin making money but the problem was, how I install those script codes. Well, I learned by trial and error; until I managed to get the format I desired. I diligently posted in my blog until I earned my first Adsense cheque in January 2007. I was really happy and excited on the fact that I’m earning in US dollar.

I never expected my blog (which is rather technical) to received overwhelming respond from the market. Organic traffic poured in and my subscribers increased gradually. Hence, I thought, it would be better to have my own domain and hosting. That was after I read John chows advice in his free ebook.

I bought my first hosting with what I thought an ample research. The space and bandwidth was extremely big (for a newbie like me), 10 GB and 110 GB respectively which I bought for RM198 per year. Now, I realized I should have bought cheaper and smaller space simply because the demand is not met yet.

That’s fine. I got few details and information from the hosting company and began my adventure in cpanel. My God, what is this…? Slowly I learned and explored. Luckily there is a tool called Fantastico. So, I installed my first wordpress blog using Fantastico and it was easy. This is the easiest way to install a wordpress blog. We can also manually install the blog but it certainly take more effort compared to Fantastico. The instruction in Fantastico is simple and easy to understand. If you’re lost, you can always refer to other blogger friends.

But then, I knew that there was other tool to upload and download the theme and plugins. Being so green in the webmaster’s world, I really don’t know anything abut FTP and so forth. That time, Mael, who was doing practical training at my work place thought me about FTPzilla. We went to a cyber café and he gave me some wordpress and FTP tution. Thanks mael.

I played around and explored wordpress. Being so used to blogger.com, I found it so hard to comprehend wordpress. To me, Blogger.com was simpler and straight forward. I wonder, people have been saying that wordpress is the best and easiest blogging platform, but I just could not understand why they say so. Nevertheless, I continuously learn and began enjoy using wordpress.

Soon, I experienced a problem with my wordpress blog. Internal server error 500 appeared. I consulted with few people but still I could not solve the problem. Perhaps that time I gave up to early. I became fed up and just left the blog as it is. (If you face Internal Server Error 500 problem, you can refer to blogjer.com for some ideas to solve them).

After about 5 months leaving my wordpress blog, I have a second thought of getting it back in action. I deleted the blog. This was done from the cpanel via Fantastico. Then I set a new blog again with the same domain name. Though I have a number of posts in my previous blog, I don’t really mind losing them. I just wanted to start fresh. But….why did not I thought of deleting my blog before? Well, that is not the actual solution. It was rather an act to remove some bad experience from my memory and starting a new dynasty. That blog is the one you’re reading now.

If you are one of them who are currently using blogger.com platform, perhaps it’s time for you to move on to a new wordpress.org platform. It is far more superior than the other blogging platform. Thousands of theme and plugins dedicated to wordpress are available for us to us. If you’re scared, confuse, don’t know how to use wordpress, don’t worry… There’ll be a helping hand. I’ve been there and sometimes I faced problem with my blog and I’ll asked few other bloggers for help and ideas to solve the problems. All of them are helpful and I really appreciate it. Some blog discusses about setting your own domain and preparation required to set up a wordpress blog. You can also visit a wordpress forum like forum.easywordpress.com to discuss your problem.

If you’re looking for some sort of e-book, check out “How to develop money making niche-site with Wordpress“. The e-book is basically meant to create a static website using Wordpress platform but it does contain valuable basic informations about Wordpress which will be useful for newbies.

I’m not a wordpress expert or guru, but if you have a problem, feel free to drop any questions in the comment area. I’ll try my best to assist. If I can’t, I believe there’re others who will offer a helping hand .