December Diary

Hello and Good morning to my dear readers ;) I seriously did not realise I haven't blog in a month plus that I don't know where to start. As soon as my reading week ended (the last post was the last night before I started lectures again) I began to have coursework and more every single week until I handed in the last one last Wednesday yaay me :)

Two Fridays ago, my girlfriends who are staying at the same place as me, Capucine and Natalie had a pizza movie night. We walked over to get Vegetarian pizza along the road then we watched 27 Dresses at the basement movie room. It was so fun and such a nice catchup! :)

 

 

This is my home-made salad on nights that
 I am not so hungry so I just have a light dinner

 

Now I have started my Christmas break and since Wednesday I have been busy skyping with my besties, 4 so far and also my sister and family. 4 more planned skype sessions dued soon. And one time I skyped for 2 hours and 40 minutes *omg jawdrop I barely realised that. Guess I have had so many stories and she has too that we literally talked and definitely not realise its been that long ^^

Yesterday I met my Singaporean friend, WanTing for lunch then at 5, I met my Malaysian friends for ice skating in Westfield, Shepherds Bush! My first time ice skating in the UK, it was so fun but it felt too quick because we paid £9 for an hour (student price) but we entered at 620 after getting our skates and all then we had to go out at 655pm. Hopefully more next time. Then we surveyed restaurants there to see if any were halal. I was fine with vegetarian food but most of my friends weren't so keen on it so in the end we decided to eat at Penang, a Malaysian restaurant there. It was so epic, an outing with my Malaysian friends, eating Malaysian food and the British waiter spoke some Malay- I felt like I was back home for a moment. I had Nasi Goreng belacan then for dessert we had pisang goreng with vanilla ice cream, reminds me of my favourite one in Madam Kwan. Then after dinner, my friends wanted to go to Body Shop but then Aira took me into Lush and the organic beauty of the shop made me stay and browse longer. She began to tell me of all the nice products there. Then suddenly one of the sales-lady approached me and I told her about my hair loss and if there was any suitable product and she introduced me to a bar shampoo.?? It felt so weird at first I thought bar soaps are for body only, I've never tried for shampoo and did not even know it existed. And since the one she showed me was for hair strengthening and I really was keen on natural products, I bought one :)

Lush was the last shop we went to before heading back home. The journey back was only about 30minutes or so and that was the beginning of my Christmas break :)

Feeling particularly relaxed today and had roti canai and sugar for breakfast. I am so glad my course works are done. Some people wonder what we do for coursework and its basically like interpreting a map, drawing what you interpret to be beneath the surface and then draw a 3-D section its very subjective because different people would draw it in different ways but generally the pattern should be the same then we answer a few questions based on the map and write about the geological history of the area. It is pretty cool to me doing these stuff but of course it is definitely not easy. And I like the fact that for all my coursework we use colour pencils and require colouring hehe. Another one required me to look at thin sections of a rock under a petrological microscope and come up with a specific rock name and put all the rocks together on a simplified cartoon map then come up with the history of the place. So yeah, the main purpose is to learn about the history in a particular place. I feel like my course has an element of geophysics (this year one of the best chapters is locating Earthquakes), geochemistry, biology ( fossils, plants, Earth in general), astronomy (supercool), history (tad bit boring), English (write essays and papers- last year I researched into Gemstones), maths, art (because we draw and colour) and it feels great to be doing an element of everything into 1 degree, I really enjoy it. 

Just a computer modelling image of Structural Geology, we haven't
really learned how to make this because mostly it is
 manually done in class but we're heading there

I remember last weekend, I was working on 2 courseworks to hand in last Monday and Wednesday (just a few days ago) then on Monday I also had an Arabic test! So last weekend was one of the most hectic ones. But my favourite part of last weekend was cooking with my <3 & feeding ducks in Hyde Park *sempat oops, still handed in coursework on time :D and also visiting my uncle, aunts and cousins. They came for a holiday and stayed at my aunt's place here. I was so happy to see them and visited them Sunday night, yup night of my Arabic test and submission and at my aunt's house I ate lamb asam pedas with leek soup and for tea, I had potato and shrimp fritters that my aunt made. It was soo yummy. Then my cousins and I played wii and a card game and before I left, we took pictures. Here comes the funny part, you see two of my cousins where headscarves so when we wanted to take a photo, they grabbed theirs. And when my little cousin Sara saw that, she grabbed hers too. And then my other cousin, Adam was wearing my muffler around his neck and then when we started to take photos he wore it like a headscarf and looked very much like a pretty girl! It was super funny and everyone laughed as he was taking different poses then wearing my aunts' sweater. 

When I'm so immersed in reality I always forget I haven't blogged for a long time but that doesn't mean I don't enjoy blogging anymore , I really do and especially when people say I've helped them or leave nice remarks on my blog, I truly appreciate it and feel happy to have a positive impact on another being..

Speaking of which I'm such a sensitive person, sometimes I easily feel offended when people act foolishly to me or criticising directly without any rationale. I always try my best not to offend others and some people simply don't care, which is simply rude. This statement is made because you know when you're in a committee and there's that one person who you really can't get along with but you act politely and professional. They are much older yet act childishly rude and harsh. Urgh if you know I'm in which committee then you know what I'm talking about. So this incident happened 1 week plus ago but I've settled it in a diplomatic manner.

Advice for people out there who are kind and polite to others yet feel hurt at times yet don't want to defend or say anything because they don't want to offend anybody:

Stand up for yourself because if you don't nobody will. And be as kind and polite to people but when people do wrong to you, make sure they get the message that you are the wrong person to mess with. There is no need to be all b**ch-y to convey the message because that just makes you look weak. A simple word of wisdom and the truth about the way the person is acting is good enough to guard your dignity and self-worth.

 

This message is mostly applied for people who are just acquaintances, not really family or close friends, I guess in those cases you would need a better personalised approach.

Back to more happy stories :)

 

Last Monday night we had a Yoga Christmas dinner and I ate veggie pizza, celery sticks and carrot sticks while chatting with our Pilates instructor, Francine who is from London. When some of us mentioned we were staying in London over Christmas, she recommended a few nice places to go! And the next day we had Vinyasa Yoga with music flow and our instructor, Sarah recommended me to a few places to, they are so sweet another reason why I enjoy going for yoga/pilates.

One crazy thing that happened while at the Christmas dinner is that I did not know minced pies had Brandy and after eating 1/3 of it, only did I realise when they passed me the box. At first I thought it was alright because it had a green V- okay for vegetarians and so yeah urgh- good lesson for me.. Its unavoidable sometimes when you are overseas. For example last year, I freaked out when I got to know the sausages that I saved from falling out of the fridge was actually pork... I wore a mitten to class that day and eventually threw it away and had to clean my hands with pure soil. Some memories I will always remember  >.< The worse of it all is to know that black pudding is actually pig's blood and people actually eat it yucky. And no no I did not eat this, its just that I was at a buffet at Dorset and I wanted to try the black pudding because I just thought it was literally black pudding, but no it was actually something else luckily my friend told me.

 

Oh before I forget, there was this sweet Christmas dinner in the Queen's Tower Room! You see, Thursdays after Global Geophysics lecture , my course mates and I always have lunch in QTR. I remembered that QTR was going to organise a Christmas Dinner but I was not sure when and just figured that they might have special dishes, that's all. Little did we know that that fine Thursday was THE DAY. You see we finished lectures early that day so we headed down together and SURPRISE!! Christmas songs, Christmas trees, candles, table cloth, waiters wearing red and santa deco outfits, wow!... It was amazing... one because I was with all of my friends at that time, two because I was not expecting that, three because it was genuinely so beautiful and magical....four because we were one of the first ones who reached.. five because they had a veggie option for the meal that day... I was so so happy and there was even Santa Claus going around giving chocolates to students. And on the table it was beautiful with glitter, candles, shiny things that said Merry Christmas ohh they were so creative and sweet to have this for us :') on top of all that amazingness, there was small gifts for us in packages on the table!! And also games like Charade and riddles that we can play after eating and even paper hats. The gifts in the boxes were like a comb, large bookmark, keychains, card games and things like that. It really made my day in the midst of coursework busyness. Thank you to all the staff and cooks in QTR :D

 

 

 

This is entirely vegetarian food, I'm actually getting used to veggie food.

 

 

I think I have covered all the highlights from since I last blogged and to many more memories to come :) I'm really looking forward for a visit from my high school friend, a daytrip with my <3, more Skype sessions, more outings in London and of course studying :) Alhamdulillah I learned that when you are patient, perseverant and positive as well as faithful, Allah will help you out. Always bersangka baik with Him and do the best you can to make yourself, people you love and God happy. Take care everyone and till I blog again :)

 

 



My cute little baby was a little ill so happy he is much better
and just like to have his pictures all over my room,
laptop and this time even at the end of my blogpost :)