Wtf?
Am wrecking my brain for hours and hours (haven’t slept since last night!) to summarize a research (in english) for a presentation on bilingualism.
Just to share with you how CHEEM (read: gilerrrr siakkk) Malay is.
And MADDENING.
divergent thinking = pemikiran mencapah
cognitive flexibility = keterlenturan kognitif
subtractive bilingualism = kedwibahasaan kurangan
Apa ni, korang????!!!!! Gila ke?!!!!
What happened to the notion that MALAY IS SIMPLE, IDIOT PROOF, RILEK-ONE-KORNER?
WHO THE HELL THOUGHT UP THESE WORDS ANYWAY???!!!
*bangs head repeatedly with Kamus Dewan*
Invite-invite*
After a spate of blistering hot days, what could be better than a dark, cool, rainy evening?
…A batch of freshly fried jemput-jemput, of course (or banana…whatchamacallit…puffs?)
and a pot of freshly brewed coffee.
Grab a plateful, sit at the balcony and breathe in the scent of the rain. Nice.
Break the puffs delicately, as they are blisteringly hot,
savour the taste of bananas nicely caramellized
and wash it down with a sip of that thick aromatic coffee.
Of course I didn’t do all that. But my MIL did. 
After breaking fast, she pointed to a bunch of bananas that she bought in the morning.
Then she said,
“Dah lama Lin tak buat jemput-jemput. Jemput-jemput Lin sedaaaap.”
(“You haven’t made jemput-jemput in quite a while. Your jemput-jemputs are niiiice.”)
That second line has the potential to be a tad lewd, depending on who says it.
So I take that as a compliment, though some may see it as propaganda to make me do something in the kitchen.
But I take it as a compliment, thank you.
I told her I’ll make her a batch tomorrow, plus the bananas will be riper and nicer for making this jemput-jemput.
But remembering that I may just be out tomorrow for dinner, I decided not to dampen her hopes and just make it tonight. Not that it’s difficult at all to make. Took me about 10 minutes, maybe less, to whip up the batter and 5 minutes later, it’s done.
The Wriggly One @ Ooyah couldn’t wait to get her grubby hands on them either. While trying to cool down a piece to be fed to her, she got impatient and literally took things into her own hands. Of course it was hot, so on reflex, she threw it onto the floor. Ouch.
But did she learn her lesson? Of course not.
Ooyah knows how to enjoy life best. Stuffing herself with jemput-jemput while watching her favourite sinetron Mimpi Manis, shaking her booty whenever the dangdut songs come on.
Intermission.
I cannot believe I haven’t signed into wordpress for over 10 days.
And I haven’t been bloghopping either.
Am I…growing out of it? Losing the knack for it? Getting tired of it?
Or maybe I’ve just been too busy.
Yeah, that’s it. I’ve been too busy.
Today is the start of my 1-week recess, and no, I don’t get to eat the whole time for ONE week continuously. I would have if it wasn’t for Ramadhan. 
I sure hope I get to blog on some days. Just so that I won’t forget how to speak or write in English.
Truth be told, it is not really a break for me as it would be my LAST chance to get my ass started on my assignments which are now stacked up tower-high (you know I’m exaggerating, right?) , soon to topple all over me and crushing me to death (this is FOR REAL, and that’ll be next week). I will have to get out of the house by noon either to school or to the library opposite to get all of them done. The Laptop Monster Ooyah will torment me with her incessant whinings the moment I sit my ass in the study, and it won’t be nice/ fair, would it, if I lock myself up in my bedroom doing my work while my in-laws take care of the jumping jellybean all day?
Oh and if I don’t get my ass out of the house, I’ll just end up lying in bed the whole day with Ooyah jumping on my tummy and biting my thigh (well she tries, not knowing it’s too thick for her guppy-like mouth), watching all the sinetrons playing on Sensasi on loop.
At last count, I have…
-2 presentations next week ON THE SAME DAY, 2nd October (I’m doing Madrasah education for my Islam module and Homosexuality for my Multiculturalism module.) (The latter I’m having lots of fun with.)
-1 presentation the week after, 11th October (Frasa Sendi Nama for my Morphology module) (I’m one-third done)
-1 presentation the week after Raya, 15th October (I MUST finish this by this week or I will never get to enjoy Raya)
-1 wikipedia entry for my Teaching of ML Lit module. (This I will worry about LATER.)
I hate hate HATE presentations.
About Ramadhan so far, I have been very tired lately, knocked out as early as 9pm, waking at 2am, nod off on my readings, only to wake for Sahur, then sleep again. I have a mug of coffee every morning, but the placebo effect has obviously worn out on me. I need a new drug please.
But one thing I’m quite glad about, I haven’t been eating much, really. I have a small serving of rice, and whatever simple dish that my MIL has prepared for break fast, and that’s it. I don’t go on kuih-shopping sprees, dessert-demolitions or what have-yous. I haven’t been to buffet-rampages, fast-food frenzies, and all that. Not one bit.
Ah but what good does that do? I don’t see myself shedding anything other than hair, pretty much cos of the metabolic-rate thingy, you know, the one that slows down when you go on diet (in the stupid attempt to conserve energy and burn as little as possible?) It doesn’t help at all that my metabolic rate, as it is, is -6 million.
Raya is 2 weekends away and nothing has been done. (Gulp.)I have already VOWED that I WON’T be making cookies and kuih this time round (did I ever tell you I made about TEN kinds of cookies and kuih 2 years ago??? Not including the cakes that I baked!) I simply do not have the time do it, considering the fact that I have deadlines before and after raya.
I’ll just leave it to the in-laws this time round to do the putting-up-curtains shite and all. Husband said he will be painting some walls, and cleaning the nooks and crannies of the house a week before raya. Actually I don’t really care because I don’t think I have the time to have many guests over anyway. Damn assignments. Really hate them for cramping my style. I’m really into this celebrating raya tradition, and I go way over the top, but this year, I JUST CAN’T.
But what I WILL do, in the spirit of Hari Raya, is to make my favourite bakes. hehehe. Just THREE things, promise:
1) kek kukus (4 batches of it- whoa nelly!)
2) kek lapis madu tiga
3) my FAVOURITE FAVOURITE BROWNIES. (Angelina, will save you the crumbs.)
Oh and I’m going handbag shopping this weekend.
French or Italian?
Tan Hong Ming and Umi Qazrina.
This has got to be one of the most adorable and heartwarming things I have ever seen.
It brought a tear to my eyes.
http://62.128.138.159/petronasmerdeka50/vnew_4.html
MUST WATCH.
It’s official….
….I’ve gone mad typing 6 million reader responses….
The madness of reading articles in ENGLISH,
and then arranging my thoughts about it in MALAY…I mean, what do you do with the phrase ‘overt collusion’? Only to find a possibly loose translation which is kesepakatan ternyata. What the ….
It’s getting to me. Indeedy.
Which can be translated literally as:
Ia semakin menghampiri saya. Indidi.
I have written so much in Malay this whole freaking week that I refuse to speak it anymore to anyone. Give my Malay brain a break please.
Malay trivia…
Did you know?
turnover rate = kadar ganti pusing
magnitude = magnitud
liability= liabiliti
AND….I bet you didn’t know this…
mosaic = ?????
Come on, you can do it, genius! Yeah, even you non-malays can do this one!
its…..
MOZEK.
Told you; Malay is such a beautiful language. And very inventive too.
Kepala hotak bedengung betolll.
Which can be loosely translated as
Head-brain buzzing really!
No Response
I thought I could be taking a breather during this e-learning week. At least take some time to read through my notes, start drafting up assignments, take a short trip (hehe okay this is a bit too much).
But all I have done so far, every freaking night since last Friday is to write one reader-response after another. Every lecturer has decided to take up every waking hour that we have this week, to do THEIR reader response.
There’s even one whose reader response assignment requires us to log on every freaking day to check for updates, give 1st draft submission, read 3 other students’ responses, comment on them, then I have to check the comments given to me, AND do some editing, AND FINALLY submit the final product. That takes ONE #$%@# WEEK.
Multiply that by 4 modules.
I’ve been staying up all night every night. Can’t get much work done in the day, with Baby around. I sleep at 6am and wake up at 12pm. That’s how it’s been for 4-5 days. I’ve become angry and irritable because of this, to the point that I feel like giving them a piece of my worn out mind as a response. 600-1000 word response, you think easy, is it?
I can’t even get to test out my spanking new tablet pc and play my Sims on it. Tsk. I’ve been wearing the buttons out with my rigourous typing, that’s all.
I’d much rather GO TO SCHOOL as usual. Really. I can’t believe we’re given MORE assignments on top of the ones that we have. e-learning week my ass. The ‘e’ stands for extra lor.
Gone are the hopes of being able to go for one high tea buffet each day, just before Ramadhan starts. Sigh. Gone are the fantasies of going on a pre-puasa shopping spree. Gone.
Tonight after my LAST session of ah-lien make-up class, we will be sleeping over at my mom’s place at Teban. We’re hoping to leave early tomorrow for far-out MANDAI. Yeah, we’re headed for the ZOO!
It’s baby’s birthday in exactly a week’s time, so we’re thinking of doing this one-week celebration thingy for her. If not for the fact that Ramadhan starts the day after her birthday, we’d have had a bash. Well looks like we’re just gonna have a small celebration at home in the form of a kenduri kesyukuran, and also to welcome blessed Ramadhan.
Now back to my freaking readings and responses.
