Opening a restaurant

I have really been busy doing stuff trying to get this restaurant ready. You wouldn't believe what kind of things I have had to go through, but I'm glad for it in a way because I am learning a lot about how to set up a food business. I was entrusted to create a look and help with the design of the place but I seem to have taken on a lot more! It's been worth it as the restaurant is operational now and EVERYBODY is welcomed to dine! We serve Moroccan, Western and even some local dishes. The name is The Olive Branch Cafe and it is located in Dataran Ara Damansara ( near Subang Airport) .Please do come and try it!!

the season for Holidays!!

It is coming on to the end of the year and plenty of holidays are on the horizon. For parents this can be a bit of a headache as the children are at home all day without the stimulation and company they would normally get from school. Hence comes the tricky job of keeping them entertained and keeping ones sanity intact. It has not been easy, I have to say! Parents, especially yours truly will be sighing a great sigh of relief once school comes around in January. My eldest daughter will be in Preschool or National Kindergarten for this coming year, and I am considering putting my youngest daughter in as well. She has been voicing out that she wants to go to school like her "kakak' and get to have her own schoolbag, bottle, etc! She is not quite 3 yet so, maybe another semester before I send her to join her sibling. Then their Mommy can have a couple of hours of peace for her to pursue some much needed activities!

life skills : carpentry...

I was trying my hand at some woodwork yesterday to fix up the staircase which was damaged by termites. After buying some wood at the hardware shop ( they always smile at me when I buy stuff there...must be unusual seeing a lady buying hardware) I proceeded to saw it to the proper length and then found out that I had to make a groove in the wood to fit it properly to the step. Thinking about how the heck I was going to do this, and also lacking the proper tools., I rummaged around the steel cabinet outside where we keep a multitude of stuff and found what appeared to be a chisel ( i don't really know what one actually looks like- last time I did any woodwork was about 20 years ago- how time flies!) Then I started hammering the wood. After some time, I actually managed to get system going and produced a decent looking groove ! Today, hopefully, I'll be able to finish it. Next step- polishing the finished job with some floor treatment!

beating bullies

I don't know what possessed me the other day when I was trying to find a parking spot at the local Giant. As usual, I prefer to wait by the side of the road hoping that somebody in my lane is going to pull up, putting on my signal lights to let people know I'm waiting there. Somehow, I have this uncanny (God-given ) ability to kind of sense when a parking spot is going to be available, and sure enough, a few metres away I could spot someone about to pull out. I waited patiently for the driver to start moving, not bothering to inch too much closer, so as to give them plenty of space to come out.I was pretty confident that the other drivers could see me waiting there as my signal light was on , and sure enough, they drove past me to look for other spaces. Lo and behold, a car suddenly pulled up right in front of me, seemingly to take the parking space I had so patiently waited for. I honked at the guy ( I could see two of them in the car), in case they had not seen me there waiting, but he didn't budge. I honked again, just to make sure and at the this point, I was getting pretty cheesed off. I knew this guy was trying to be funny and thought he could bully me seeing that I was all alone. I waited for it, and as the guy moved his car forward to reverse park, I inched my car forward so he couldn't get into the space. As expected, he wound down his window to yell at me. I yelled right back, knowing he probably couldn't hear me, since I didn't lower down my own window. ( I know, some of you would be thinking-what the heck are you doing, just give in and go find another space- there were two of them and I was by myself) but somehow I just didn't feel like giving into this bully and besides, there were plenty of cars behind me ( ergo, witnesses) to back me up in case something nasty should happen. He made as if to open his door, once again gesturing threateningly at me, and so I just kept yelling at him. Seeing he had no choice ( I couldn't and wouldn't move anyway, and the cars were piling up behind me) he slammed back into his car and drove off. Hurray!!!! I quickly reversed park into the slot and then went off into Giant, hoping he wouldn't be crazy enough to seek revenge by slashing my tyres or scratching the car, and thank God, when I came back out, everything was safe and sound.So much for men being the protectors for women- nowadays we have to look out for ourselves!

time to look good..( or try to, at least)

I have decided that it is time to take my beauty regime seriously, since I'm already in my early 30's (shock!horror!). Actually I think that I've passed the recommended age at which we must begin to take such things seriously, but what the heck, better late than never, I guess. I have tried to be religious about it, but inevitably I would falter when other things start taking up my time!! But after having a look in the mirror lately, and noticing some things which I have not noticed before (gulp!!) I resolve to do a better job. Thank God I have been good about going to monthly facials, that's something, at least. I have learnt that if we don't take care of ourselves, no one else will, and that by taking care of myself and thus making me feel better, it will only help in making this life less stressful and thus more pleasant for me and the other people in my life:)

a day at the movies with the kids..

I have just gotten back from the movies with my husband and two kids. The movie of the day was Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs...quite a mouthful, so I will just call it "Cloudy". As with the previous movie, both our two little girls were with us- my eldest Ikhlas,4 and my youngest, Ihsan, 2 and a half years old. I thought I had learnt my lesson with the previous movie ( which by the way was the very cute G-Force) in which Ihsan spent most of the movie running around the aisles with me frantically whispering at her to si down. her elder sister ,Ikhlas was unusually well behaved, which I attribute to the fact that she was sitting on her Auntie Nafis' lap. Otherwise, she would usually be questioning everything that she saw in the movie until at one movie some of the audience members actually shushed her! ( she DOES have a rather clear high-pitched voice!) And so, today, at the Cloudy movie, I was naively wishing that the two sisters would behave better as it was a fully animated movie ( as opposed to partially animated in G-Force). But of course-NOT! Little Ihsan started chucking of her shoes and found the crawling space under our feet and in the gap of the rows of seats in front of us more exciting then the movie.I lived in peril of losing sight of her in the darkened theatre. Thank God she only started acting up about three quarters way through the movie. So, in between catching whatever scenes I could, I was also frantically looking out for her as well as...you guessed it- shushing my other daughter! Sigh....movies with kids are ANYTHING but the relaxing enjoyable thing it ought to be (in my dreams....maybe in another couple of years,huh?) but at least we all made it back home safe and sound and most importantly, with all shoes accounted for!