People do play tricks

After a week-long Gawai break, we were back in the meeting room. The LAF (Lembaga Akademik Fakulti) meeting was held this morning. This is one important meeting not to be missed. I have been planning for months to present our newly-reviewed diploma curriculum—Diploma in Computer Science. It is one of the oldest programs in UiTM. I am honored to be part of the evolution process of DCS.As I studied the curriculum, I saw many flaws and shortcomings. It’s like mending an old house—you renovate the kitchen at one point, and then the living room for the coming Raya, or extending the bedroom for more space etc. The house does not look better but it serves the ever-growing needs of the family. That what happened to our DCS. Over the years we changed this and that to meet certain purposes or solved problems but had never been successfully reviewed the curriculum thoroughly. I am not gonna try to do it either because it is a never-ending task. Anyway, my presentation at the meeting was okay—so I thought. I could have never imagined that today I would learn another lesson in board room meeting—people do play shit. I brought into the meeting a proposal of a new curriculum that we have put a lot of man hours into it. Workshops , meetings, debates and discussions have been initiated to come up with this proposal. I have put a lot of time putting together the bits and pieces to support our arguments. Today I learned that those are shits that people like to play around in a board meeting.  I was speechless to see my words were twisted around, my arguments were not seen and understood and my justifications were irrelevant most of the time. I learnt today that you don’t go into a meeting with a big pile of working papers or properly aligned documents. It’s like a kid going to the football field in the kampung wearing soccer boots, knee pads and guards where as the other kids are playing with kaki ayam—they will create a whole new game to make you look like an ass. The same thing happened in the board meeting today, I was stunned as the others were playing a whole new ball game. I just did not understand at all. I was cornered last time in the same board meeting and now again in this meeting. I feel so stupid as I could never learn my way around this game in a board meeting. How do you feel when your own buddy  had turned  against you…hey wait a minute you said something else last time….nothing can help you now…as if you were alone in a crowded room, gasping for air to nurture your disbelief of the circumstances.

I went on trying to get a new footing in this mad and noisy situation but nothing helped as if I went deeper and deeper into a shit hole. What went wrong? I don’t have the answer but I know I don’t have something that I should have—and I don’t know what that is. I thought democracy plays well in a board meeting—nope, that’s how they will officially kill you or make you suffer by sending you away with a big question mark and ask you to come back and ask the same question again and again. I thought having friends would save my ass, nope people see that as an opportunity to gang up that would include everyone else but you. I thought a good paper work will strengthen your argument ; nope, they will play around with your words and plans until the whole thing collapsed. I am really confused. Now I have to go back and explain the whole thing to my department and get another round of kick-ass thingy.  How positive can I be at this point and time ? am I being punished or something?

So far I am still at it trying to get through. Deep down I know there are answers to all those questions. And I know I will get to them eventually….in my own way. Maybe I need that X-factor the next time I walk into the meeting room.—whatever that is. Or maybe I just keep talking until someone listens ……

By the way, good luck in your next meeting.

Meeting ! meeting !

I guess I just could not get away from this daily ritual. Meeting. There is no fun whatsoever in doing this but we have to do it anyway. I have never come across someone who can make meeting fun and enjoyable because the very nature of it , it is no fun. I just wish to come across such a person; he /she must be really something. Anyway, since my admin appointment and a regular at the faculty’s meeting , I have picked up a few soft skills:

1. Don’t lose your temper over an issue; it’s not worth it. If it is so important to you than stick to it but if the meeting is not going your way, let it be. There are other ways to resolve your issue. For some , meeting seems the only way but believe me there are other ways as well. Find them.

2. Drowning an issue. When the meeting is facing an issue deems sensitive to the upper board; the issue will eventually get dismissed. If you raised an issue that you think important but others don’t, they will start picking up your issue bit by bit until a completely new issue emerges. Your issue has been drowned and if no effort from you to save it then it will be gone.

3. If you have something to say then say it at the beginning of the meeting. Mr Chairman, Sir, before we start let me say……if Mr Chairman is a happy chap that day you will be lucky but otherwise you might get a smackdown. But always try your luck because if you say it at the eleventh hour of the meeting nothing will get through; we would either be too hungry to stay on or too tired to contemplate your statements.

4. Get an early start. Sometime you can try putting your issue ahead through an email. This can also be a good tool to lobby a decision.

5. Better late than never. Being late to a meeting is more acceptable than being absent altogether. Cook up a good excuse and you are as good as the others. You can catch up with the agenda later on with the secretary that you must always be nice to.

6. Keep your honorable manner with the chairperson and respect your colleagues. Address people properly.Always begin with “ Tuan Pengerusi, izinkan saya …..”. Talking big as if you are the most intelligent person there is a strategy from yesterday; no one will respect you for that.

7. If there is one meeting that you can avoid then skip this one …..meeting with bendahari (bursar). It will drag on and on .

8. Never keep your wife or kids waiting until you finish the meeting. It will never finish. Make arrangements way beforehand.

9. Always take notes. Sometime minutes of the meeting are not exactly the same as what has been agreed upon. You will find your scribbles more important than ever.

10. Don’t serve double standards with your staff; inside or outside the meeting. Be truthful. If you promise to support your staff then by all means support him/her; even if that means sticking your neck out. Some people promise something outside the meeting but once inside he’s a sucker only good to save own ass. Be honest to yourself and your people.

OK that’s it. Good luck in your next meeting.

What has 'Haj' done to you?

after spending so much time ,money and effort what really the whole thing has done to you ? beside completing the Islamic pillars, does  it change anything ? it should be and supposed to change us in a lot of ways. I guess mostly it depends on how it started ; the first tick that started the whole journey.

after the Haj : at Madinah airport

Making little steps with the little ones

Today I have never been so proud of my students and colleague as they've taken some time off from their busy class schedules and spent with these under privileged kids. We invited about 20 kids in and around Shah Alam for a one-day problem solving workshop. there are maybe hundreds if not thousands of such kids around us that need a little coaching in their study but we never have the time to entertain. today albeit all the shortcomings we called up these kids and shared the little knowledge that we have so they might see their UPSR challenge a bit brighter. I asked them about UPSR earlier in the morning and they just did not  know what that really means to them. So that was the group we are dealing with today----not to say slow but under privileged as some are bright and happening but not into studying  that much. Most of the parents cannot afford the many tuitions held every where during this school break---not even at their own school. the urban poor as you might put it.  Alhamdulaillah everything went very smoothly; thanks to everyone involved.

the kids were excited as well

it's one-to-one coaching

blurr aje adik Aiman ni

some need extra help

Rahman trying to put some senses into it

okay let's do it again

relax atmosphere as we want it to be

but very attentive

let's do it together

I really don't have the idea....so kakak la buat

When things move.....

The rain drizzled as the call for fajr  filled  the misty clouds. This is Shah Alam among a few places in this modern part of the world where “ noises from the surau” is acceptable. This is our life and we will make sure out great great grandchildren would never ever forget this thing that we value most  for our spritual well being. But most importantly Shah Alam is our home  now; the place to go to end the day. My place is simple with  old and used furnitures we brought home from  England more than ten years ago but always refreshing and rejuvenating nevertheless. No one complains and I don’t see any need to replace any of them in the near future. So they will be there for many more sittings and chattings from us. Anyway, Shah Alam is busy again with students coming back for the new semester.  Had my first class yesterday and it was very good, I think. A small group of post graduate students doing  master’s in computer science. In the near future we will host only pg students here in Shah Alam when the other undergraduate programs move elsewhere. The issue of moving out is haunting me the first time it was mentioned in a meeting. The hassle for moving will be phenomenal; not that I against the idea altogether, but the challenge will be so huge I just don’t want to ponder upon it. Our CS programs will move to Jasin; locks,stocks and barrels. The Math programs will go to Seremban 3. The move is inevitable come 2014 when the place is ready. The news broke out into the faculty’s email  today and expected to be turned and twisted into something. May Allah have mercy on us. As the issue of amanah tugas pensyarah still hot and burning with SPBA hanging below the nose , this moving issue will haunt us even deeper into unbelievable mess. Personally, I think moving is good for this faculty just like our prophet moved from Mecca to Madinah for better Islam. It shows the dynamic nature of the things around us moving, changing and evolving. We can’t go against nature, it will happen with or without us. The same goes for our context as well. UiTM has to move and change for its survival to say the least. So let it be, maybe something good will come at the end of it we really don’t know. The main thing is where WE put ourselves in this fast moving lane. World will not stop moving  because we don’t move; but we have to start moving and put ourselves  in a  proper place.I am still thinking of what to say in the next departmental meeting. People will act and react. I strongly believe many will go against the idea, so maybe I just keep quiet.

The school holiday is coming up next week so that means my daughters are coming home. Hoooray! The house has been quiet for quite a while now. So it’s time to roast a chicken for kabsah rice. It’s not really a kabsah rice but my version that uses some of the kabsah spices. But it’s the best in the world, really.

Be good people....OK, so where is Jasin?

..and it's March already.......

As the new year celebrations are still hot in the air,the first day of the third month is already here. Even my new year’s resolutions are still in the making and two months have already gone. How the time fly so fast bypassing  your thoughts and actions. A lot of things have happened since my last entry so much so that I give up altogether putting them here. Let they remain in the memory for as long as the memory can serve me. Sometime we want some of the things to be forgotten after a while. Let bygone be a bygone. Computer memory on the othe hand is permanent in the sense that they will be there for as long as  facebook is there or google remains relevant; theoretically computer memory can last forever. So you see forgetfulness is sometime good for us as not everything we want  to last forever.

OK, life has been treating me fairly if not ideally. I feel good about myself and  my family. A lot of good things have been happening to us not to exclude the unfortunate circumstances. They are inevitable most of the time. I feel strong inside with my relation to Allah, Alhamdulillah, nothing else matters anymore because when things  get out of hands I would drop everything and go into my prayers to regain my inner peace and tranquility. They are not merely words to fill up my  thoughts anymore but my trusted life line to keep me going from a second to another second. I feel so great as if I just found Allah after so many years asking where is my God ? He is indeed very close to me all this while. The problem was I did not look properly, honestly and sincerely. I just followed whatever people say and do; without meaning and the true purpose of the actions. It is hard to formulate the path to Allah because everything  about it comes from within your inner most heart and soul. Although the Quran and Ahadeeth are there to guide, we sometimes lost in the middle of the journey due to out of focus and lack of purpose. We are confused most of the time and abandon the journey half way. My advice is to keep looking and  insyaAllah He will show the way. I have been trying  to change my working life ( the eight hours per day  at the office) to be within my spiritual perspectives but it is a constant challenge. The meetings are always dragged beyond the sound of azan, inter activities with people in the department are not always ‘clean and clear from bad intentions’, decisions sometime questionable, etc. Sometime I wish to stop all these and retreat to  a place where nature and divinity are part of the ecosystem. I guess early retirement is the right word. But that would be an eternity in my calendar.

Work is hectic, endless and just a massive load of craps. Not that I hate my job, to be fair to myself and everyone around me, but why should I have to put up a constant struggle to protect my feeling of liking this job? My job is to run a small department  within a faculty; a simple one ,you might say. And it should be simple and enjoyable stuff, but in reality it’s far beyond that.  I am on leave for the past few days to catch up a brief break before the start of new semester next week; but the work keeps coming through the phone, the internet and today I ended  up in a meeting room talking about work some more. I don’t mind to come over because I love my work but then that will breach my pledge to give myself a break. That kind of conflicting actions that challenge my true purpose of working.

Boring, isn’t it? Well that’s my life, hope yours is a lot better than mine. But whatever it is, find your way to Allah because everything else won’t matter. Good luck.