Cyza Sector

Last Saturday afternoon, we had the opportunity to visit 5 unfortunate families which are categories as among the poorest in Gelang Patah area, or possibly in Johor Bahru too. They earn less than RM400 per month and they survive with only that amount of money. Thanks to our friend, Maizon who also is our insurance agent, whom invited us to participate in this honorable activity. It was an annual activity organized by her insurance agency.

Following are just some of the selected photos that I have chosen within my limited time while doing my experiments and thinking about my research.

This was taken before we visited the house. There were all together 3 cars and 1 MPV. Off course the MPV is my white Proton Exora. My White Proton Exora was loaded with supplies for 2 families.

Those are the supplies mentioned earlier. Besides food stuffs, there are also clothes which were donated which was put in my MPV after I took this photo.

One of the house that we visited has this. Under the house is actually river of Gelang Patah (not sure what river). Actually all of the houses that we visited are not in good condition.

The 3rd house visited by us. This family has 2 children who are not physically healthy and a wife who is not mentally healthy too.

That’s me in action, off course, carrying 2 packed of 10kg rice.

The roof condition of the 3rd house. Well, that was in short our pictorial experience on our recent Saturday afternoon activity. To be continued soon…

Today, I just want to share some impressive story about my other half. We have been married for slightly more than 9 years and blessed with 3 beautiful kids. She started to work as a tutor in August or September 1999 in a local public university in south of peninsular Malaysia. After completing her masters degree in 2002, she became a lecturer. End of 2005, she pursued her Ph.D studies. Originally she planned to study abroad. We preferred to go to UK. But then we were not allowed because she has performed her first degree in UK. Hence, we selected New Zealand as an alternative. However, while planning all these, she got pregnant of Alya, our third child. Because of that, we collectively decided to just continue her study in Malaysia. At the same time, I can continue to work as a process engineer in  an edible oil company in Pasir Gudang.

Recently, she successfully completed her Ph.D (Chemical Engineering) with minor correction, well actually most of them are just formatting errors. I must say that her thesis and research is very impressive.

While we were undergraduates

Since we’ve known each other more than 12 years ago, I always see her as a genius person. That is one of the most important trait that she has. She study less but she can pick-up very fast without any effort. On the other hand, I studied harder than her because I’m not that clever or brilliant as her or the other students. I need to put more effort to succeed in whatever I do and whatever I learned. That is my key to success >>> Work Hard. I will read wherever I am, even at the bus stop while waiting for my school bus or while stopping at the traffic light in my car. I don’t like to waste the precious time just like that.

Work

Both of us have a good career, I thank God for that. As some of you know, I’m currently doing my Ph.D and I’m in my 3rd semester. In the university, I will at most of the time be in the lab, working on my research. My wife, in the other hand has more jobs to do. She has to teach (lecture), supervise research students under her, write and publish papers, think of her research, coordinate and manage her consultancy Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) work and much more. In addition to that, her English is so good that she also do proof reading and editing services which focuses on chemical engineering thesis and technical papers. You know what… I’m really impressed in how she managed to do all of those work, calmly. It’s really amazing!

Home

At home, it’s a different story. As soon as we reached home, I will normally relax, rest, watch TV, tease my kids or do my online activity. On the other hand my wife will change her attire and go straight to the kitchen to cook for us. During this fasting month, I prefer eating at home rather than buying from bazar Ramadhan or eating out at any Ramadhan Buffet. While I rest, she still work, but now she work in the kitchen, with our maid assisting.

Later at night, she will check our kids homework and revision. My kids prefer to refer to her rather than me. I don’t know why? Am I that fierce?

Superwoman

Do I consider her a superwoman? Yes, definitely. She is more excellent than me at work. Of course, I have a different set of experience because I have been working as an engineer for almost 6 years. That’s a different story. But now, I’m starting my career as an academician and I’m catching up with her. Once she is assigned a task or a project, she will be laser focused to complete it as soon as possible. Yep…she’s very focus. That’s one thing that I need to learn and master from her. I need that to be successful in my career and my online business.

Before I end this entry and break fast in a matter of minutes, I would like to say to my wife that I appreciate her being part of my life. All of us love and embrace you. You are such a great person, wife and mother. Thanks for everything, my dear…

Oh yea… before I forget.. Thanks for cooking chicken rendang for me… hehe

Without doubt blogging has emerged as a very powerful tool for people not only to express themselves but also to make money online. Many of them started blogging without realizing the enormous potential that can be achieved financially. I’ve started blogging since the 3rd quarter of  2006 and honestly I just blog to share and ramble about my chemical engineering knowledge.

Day after day, my blog gained popularity and enjoyed spicy organic traffic from uncle Google. Soon, I discovered the opportunity of making money via blogging, which at that time was an alien to me. Since that moment, I never turn back. I keep learning and exploring more creative and innovative ways of making money through blogging. Though I don’t make hell a lot of cash via blogging, but hey…I still earn more than double what I’m paying my maid. That’s when I wrote a short Malay report called “Teknik RM1000 sebulan” which was released end 2009.

I then explored and find other ways on how I can increase my blog earning. That’s when I attended Smart Blogging Seminar conducted by problogger Rohaizad. In that seminar, I learned new ways of making money officially and in-officially from niche blogs. Shortly after that seminar, within less than a month, I managed to cover back the fee that
I paid to attend to that seminar which was RM400. I basically applied the technique and knowledge I obtained from the seminar.

8 months after that, to be exact, yesterday, I start thinking… What is my blogging direction?

I have about 3 dozens of blogs but my income is not beyond 3k yet!!! I need to do something. I need to change my blogging approach. I re-visited 2 blogs which once I occasionally visited while I was not tight up with experiments and re-search, Johnchow.com and Hongkiat.com. I carefully analyze their blogs. I checked the advertisement section and
do some fast calculation. Hey…this guy is earning more than $40k per month just from a blog called johnchow.com while the other guy is earning more than $4.5k per month just from his blog Hongkiat.com. If you are like me, dwelling in Malaysia, just do the maths. This Hong Kiat guy is earning more than RM12k per month, almost as equal to a professor’s salary in a public university. Just imagine how much John Chow is earning in Ringgit Malaysia? Multiply $40k with 3.14 = ……….. ?

So, I need to strategize. Should I split and divide my time to entertain 30+ niche blogs that I presently own and earn quite less OR focus on a minimum of 3 blogs ONLY and try to earn >$3k  per month? That’s more than RM10k per month!!!

It’s not really a huge decision, but still I need to make a decision, especially in this moment where I’m tied up with my research study.

So, what about you? If you are an expert, amateur or beginner blogger, you can also look at this angle. If you are problogger (chances are NO problogger will be reading my blog), you have nothing to think from this plain entry of mine because you’ve earn substantially handsome from your blogging or online property.

If you are a beginner and would like to have my opinion, then read the tips below:

1. Build a blog using your own domain and host the blog somewhere reliable.
2. Don’t use the free blogspot.com or wordpress.com.
3. Focus on creating yummy unique useful content everyday. It’s only one blog, so spend at least 30 minutes a day on your baby blog.
4. Build credibility and trust from your readers.
5. Focus on backlink as well, do lots of blog commenting.

What will happen then?

Your blog will grow bigger and more people will be following your blog.

That will be the time where you can start your own advertising space. Hmmm… What do you think of that?

I am not suppose to write a blog post at this moment. I will usually write any post after work, at home. However, today, I need to release some of my stress and tension somewhere. I need to channel them to a safer place which would not harm or jeopardize anybody’s safety.

It’s all about not having enough equipment to run my experiment. I have planned to purchase all this experimental set-up for more then 1 year. One by one, these equipments, parts arrived. However, after certain extend running the experiment, I notice I’m missing something. Then, in order to successfully and smoothly run the experiment, I have to swiftly order the equipment and as a result I have to wait again. I just hope, I will successfully prepare all equipments, tools and bloody thing that is required to run the experiment and get some results.

Well, this is what we call research. We do something, meaning we “search” for something… then we discovered that it’s not working. Then we “search” again why it’s not working. That is call “re-search” = “research”. It’s a process and this process require huge amount of patient.

I’m basically at that stage now. I’m taking my breath and trying to be as patient as possible. Need to think of a new strategy on how to solve my problem. Need to plan my work so it can be completed in the allocated time.

Credit to Tun for taking the nice photos of me with my experimental rig.

It was an exhaustive but rewarding weekend. Last Friday, we break fast (iftar), as usual at home. Normally, my wife will cook something for all of us. If you asked me the menu that evening, I have forgotten…. haha… and I just asked my wife and she also have forgotten about the menu she cooked.

Saturday Story

Then on Saturday morning, we headed to Kuantan, my wife’s hometown to have iftar there for the first time this fasting month. We requested my mother in law to cook laksa and fried mee. Laksa is for us while the fried mee is for the kids. They are not ready to eat laksa yet. We arrived in Kuantan at about 4.30 pm and visited a Ramadhan bazaar at Taman Tas. We bought a handful of colourful and tasty food for the iftar. We arrived at my in laws at 5pm and I rested myself.

The menu that day (Saturday) at Kuantan:

1. Laksa
2. Fried mee
3. Martabak
4. Variety of cakes (kuih-muih)
5. Orange cordial
6. Hot tea
7. Green Bandung drink
8. Kurma

As usual after performing Magrib prayer we went to perform Isya’ and Terawih.

Sunday Story

The following day, we returned back to Johor Bahru and hope to make it to have iftar at my parents place. We managed to reach my folks home in Taman Gembira at 5.30 pm, that is after we did a little bit food shopping in Bazar Ramadhan in Kampung Melayu Majidee.

Honestly, I don’t like the experience buying food there. It was pack, crowded and difficult to walk. Another obvious reason I hated going to this kind of Bazar Ramadhan is because there are a lot of women who could not care less about their own attire. I avoided to look but most of the times, it was accidental view. There are women who wear very tight and fit dress. There are also some who wear see through dress which reveal their body underneath!!! What the hell is this? Are they fasting? Or simply showing off their flesh.

Well, that’s one of the most significant reason I hated to go to most of the Bazar Ramadhan. However, the one in UTM is OK. Maybe because most of them who are there are UTM students and staffs, and all of them are decently dressed. The Bazar Ramadhan in UTM is also not crowded. Ops… enough of that… Need to stop that before I changed subject.

Back to my original story. We have iftar at my folks home on Sunday and the menu were:

1. Martabak
2. Otak-otak
3. Various assorted cakes (Kuih-muih lah)
4. White rice
5. Daging Gulai Kawah
6. Chicken rice (for the kids)
7. Kurma
8. Ayam percik
9. Curry fish
10. Fried chicken
11. Hot tea

Why the hack the menu was more? Easy… My mother informed me that she has nothing to cook at home after my younger brother, Budeen left earlier the same day. So, I told her not to worry. We will buy the food at Bazar Ramadhan. Upon reaching home, I found out that my father also has bought food. It was basically a simple communication break down. That’s fine. The extra food was successfully carried forward for sahur!!! as usual…

Tuah’s new home

My mother happen to accidentally took care of a baby stray cat at her home. The cat, named Tuah, is not physically cute but she is a charming cat. The problem is my mother cannot take care of the cat because she is not very fit to take car of Tuah. Tuah will eat and do her business anywhere (shit)… Hence, my mother asked my favour to relocate Tuah to anywhere far away from her house.

Feeling pity of Tuah’s fate, I offered to place him behind my house. That will be a place, not too spacious but better then no where for an innocent teenage cat who don’t know what’s happening. Will continue about Tuah soon. It’s time to break fast…

This very afternoon, I felt very exhausted. Exhausted for running few experiments and thinking of many things. Breaking fast will be in 1 hour time and you and me, we are looking forward for this.

I  don’t have any specific story to share. I’ll just mixed them all together in 1 nice blog post.

Running experiments

I have been running experiments since last week. Actually I have just started running those experiment to get olefin from glycerol. However, until now, I have not yet obtain any trace of olefin gas. I’m not sure about the liquid olefin because I have not yet analyzed the liquid product. I don’t understand something. Yesterday and last Friday while running the experiment, a very bad odour, believed to be some oxygenate or VOC appeared forcing me to wear a special mask to protect my breathing quality. However, today, no such smell was produced!!! Funny but full of mystery. Well, the exploration will continue tomorrow for my quest to make renewable olefin. If in any extend you don’t understand anything in this paragraph, don’t worry. Just pretend you understand…haha…

Terawih

This year, I see something good. All of us, we went for the Terawikh prayer in the surau in front of our house. My daughters, Marsya and Alya, only had the opportunity to join their mother to perform Sunat Terawih two nights ago and I can see they love it. Ikhwan… hmmmm… he has been joining me since the first Terawih without missing one night. However, I can’t really see him praying because I prayed in front of the saff (line). I just hope he prayed properly on the rear row, or specially known as “kids row”. Before and after prayer, Ikhwan will cycle. We go out together from the house gate, then he disappears. Then after Terawih, as I reached the house gate, he will be there. He has been spying my movement.

Break Fasting

This is the joyous moment of the day, no doubt of it. Fantastically, my wife who is a career woman who just obtained her doctorate degree head straight to the kitchen. She will cook the heavy meal everyday without fail with the assistance of our imported maid. Tonight, we have requested to eat hot delicious chicken porridge, the same as yesterday’s. Despite of the low fire on our cooker, I believe she will manage to prepare the long awaited meal by the family. Once in a while, our nice neighbour will call and give us some of their prepared dish. That’s extremely nice of them and we really appreciate that so much.

Less or no time for my online adventure

This month, or possibly the coming month too, I may see my time allocated for my blogging and IM minimized. This is as a result of my load as a Ph.D student. I’m now in my 3rd semester and I have completed setting up my experimental rig. It’s time for producing results. During and after getting the results, I’ll write and publish some technical papers. After that, I will be developing the reaction kinetics, mechanism and create a process simulation of my work. Hmm… I believe that will definitely consume most of my time. I’ll try my best to manage my time and at least spare some time for my online business.

OK…enough of that… There are 30 more minutes before we can break fast. My kids are at the playground and my wife is now preparing some tasty sandwiches….yummy… OK, I want to take a break and watch our 29 inch bulb tube (not LCD or flat screen TV). Wanna watch this Indonesian sinetron…

It is important to have something that we like to do in our lives. That something must be special and when you do it, you will be very happy. No matter whether you are sleepy or exhausted, you are still excited and fired up to do it.

I would like to share my interests. I will always try to spare or adjust my time to do those things. Oh yea..I will also share my family members interest too… Check it out:

Me (My interest and favourite):

1. Blogging- managing my blogs.
2. Learning and enhancing my affiliate marketing skills.
3. Watching movie (at movie or at home) especially Indonesian movies…
4. Playing football or futsal. Or simply do any sport activities to sweat myself.
5. Playing with my kids. Sometimes teasing them till they cry…haha…
6. Watch Desperate Housewife.
7. Watch EPL especially Manchester United live game.
8. Play Football Fantasy.
9. Travel / outing.

My wife’s interest:

1. Reading English novels. Her favourite is Sidney Sheldon.
2. Home decor.
3. Watching movie (same like my point #3).
4. Watch American Idol, American Next Top Model and Jangan Lupa Lirik, Desperate Housewife.
5. Travel / outing.
6. Read Beautifulnara and Facebook.

Ikhwan’s interest:

1. Drawing.
2. Cycling his bike in high velocity (high MPH).
3. Watch cartoon channel: 611, 612, 613.
4. Play at the play ground.
5. Play games, internet games, any games…as long as it is games. He can be a game expert.

Marsya’s interest:

1. Complete her homework as fast as possible.
2. Reading.
3. Play at the play ground.
4. Hug and cuddle with mummy and daddy.
5. Nenen.
6. Cry (merengek) + sulking.

Alya’s interest:

1. Watch cartoon channel: 611, 612, 613.
2. Play at the play ground.
3. Play baby doll.
4. Nenen.

Are they interesting? hehe…How about you. I hope you can share some of your interest…

p/s: The photo shows my wife releasing her tension and stress after completing her Ph.D.

One week after entering the operation theater in Johor Specialist Hospital, Ikhwan encountered another interesting tragic moment. Guess what…

After school, he squeezed his time to cycle his bike. As usual, he “Rempit” his bike and collided with his sparring partner, Azam, a standard 1 boy neighbour, from the same school. He fell and slides on the tar road with his left cheek, left elbow and left hip affected.

He was supposed to attend the Jawi class at 7.30pm. However, due to the injury, misery and pain, we let him skip the Jawi class.

Today is Sunday and yet his skin injury is not totally dried yet. When it is fully dried, I will be the one who will “kopek” his dried wound. hehe…

The photo up there was just taken when I write this entry. It was originally worse than that with Ikhwan continuously crying. Deserve him right and let he learn the lesson. He have not yet felt from a bike that bad.

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Can you imagine this… Do you know what is that?

That is actually cat shit @ cat poop… This bastard climbed up to my White Proton Exora and do his business there like a gangster!!!

I brought my Proton Exora outside and asked my maid to wash away those shit!!!

The flies are really enjoying those organic smelly shit.

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This is the follow up post (yeah…I know it’s one week already) about Ikhwan’s experience in the hospital. Sorry, I just posted photos and brief description. Very the busy!!! hehe

Ikhwan waiting agonizingly before entering the operation theater

Ikhwan with his new dress

Ikhwan after the operation…His playing game!!! In my laptop.

That’s the tiny piece of paper. Very small… The overall cost of the one-day treatment is RM1,700. 90% of the cost is covered by the insurance and 10% of it was covered by us (RM170). This was just a simple treatment/procedure. Just imagine what will be the cost for a massive or chronic illness?!!!

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