Random: Family Appreciation Post

Have you ever just looked at your parents and thought,

"Alhamdulillah, I'm born into this family"?

Momentum Ramadhan

Salam.

Apa itu momentum?

Momentum ialah suatu daya yang akan membuatkan sesuatu yang bergerak itu terus bergerak. Kalau ikut apa yang kita pelajari di sekolah dalam subjek Fizik dulu, formula momentum ialah mass (jisim) didarabkan dengan velocity (halaju). Untuk menghasilkan momentum yang kuat, mass dan velocity sesuatu objek itu perlu kuat juga. Dengan itu, objek itu akan terus bergerak tanpa berhenti.


Muslim Juga Ada Momentum

Sebagaimana momentum boleh bergerak secara fizik, momentum juga boleh berlaku dalam perlakuan kita sehari-hari. Sebagai manusia, kita sudah jelas bahawa tugas kita di muka bumi ini ialah sebagai khalifah [2:30] dan hamba Allah [51:56]. Dalam jangka masa hidup kita yang singkat ini juga, iman kita mudah berkurang dan bertambah. Oleh itu, bagi memastikan iman kita sentiasa berada di paras selamat, kita perlu memperbanyakkan amal ibadah kita. Insya-Allah, amal ibadah yang ikhlas akan membentuk taqwa dalam diri kita. Dengan taqwa itulah kita akan dapat menjaga iman kita. Bagaimana? Jawapannya ada di dalam firman Allah s.w.t:

“Wahai orang-orang yang beriman! Jika kamu bertaqwa kepada Allah, nescaya Ia mengadakan bagi kamu (petunjuk) yang membezakan antara yang benar dengan yang salah, dan menghapuskan kesalahan-kesalahan kamu, serta mengampunkan (dosa-dosa) kamu. Dan Allah (sememangnya) mempunyai limpah kurnia yang besar.”

[Al-Anfal, 8: 29]

Taqwa lah yang akan memandu kita untuk melakukan amal yang baik dan mengelakkan maksiat dan perkara-perkara yang lagha. Taqwa jugalah yang akan menggerakkan kita untuk sentiasa bersemangat dalam beribadah dan beramal. Dalam erti kata lain, taqwa ialah momentum kita.


Ramadhan: Bulan Optimum Membina Taqwa

Seperti yang kita tahu, bulan Ramadhan ini suasananya sangat istimewa. Antaranya, dalam bulan inilah diwajibkan ibadah puasa. Cuba ingat balik firman Allah swt. tentang puasa ni:

“Wahai orang-orang yang beriman! Kamu diwajibkan berpuasa sebagaimana diwajibkan atas orang-orang yang dahulu daripada kamu, supaya kamu bertaqwa.”

[Al-Baqarah, 2:183]

Dengan terang lagi bersuluhnya di situ Allah swt. nyatakan bahawa salah satu jalan menuju taqwa ialah dengan berpuasa. Dan dalam bulan Ramadhan inilah, Allah swt. mewajibkan ibadah puasa ini yang akan membawa kita menuju taqwa!

Bukan itu sahaja, dalam bulan Ramadhan ni juga, pintu syurga dibuka seluas-luasnya, pintu neraka ditutup dengan dikurung syaitan di dalamnya, pahala amalan dilipatgandakan, doa orang-orang yang berpuasa antara doa yang mustajab dan terdapat juga lailatul qadr iaitu malam yang lebih baik dari seribu bulan. Mana ada suasana sebegini di bulan-bulan lain. Serius, bulan Ramadhan je yang special begini! Suasana beginilah yang paling optimum untuk kita bina taqwa.

Kerana itulah kita sangat digalakkan untuk memperbanyakkan beribadah di bulan ini dan mengurangkan perkara-perkara lagha. Pada masa ini, kerana syaitan dibelenggu, kita hanya tinggal melawan nafsu sendiri. Pada masa ini, kita boleh mengenal pasti sebanyak mana diri kita yang sebenarnya mampu beribadah.

“Oh, rupanya aku boleh solat sunat banyak-banyak lepas Isya’,”
“Oh, rupanya aku boleh qiam dengan kerap,”
“Oh, rupanya aku boleh puasa sebulan berturut-turut,”
“Oh, rupanya aku boleh tak catch up dengan gosip artis,”
“Oh, rupanya aku boleh main game kurang sejam,”


Momentum Ramadhan

Kemampuan menambah pahala sebanyak-banyaknya dan mengurangkan perkara-perkara lagha ini baru dikenal pasti dalam bulan Ramadhan. Itulah diri kita yang sebenar. Kita mampu jadi sebaik-baiknya. Hanya perlu bersabar dan kuat menentang nafsu diri. Ikhlaskan niat setiap kali sebelum mula beribadah. Kita mahu keredhaan Allah. Kita mahu menuju taqwa.

Percayalah, apabila kita cuba sehabis mungkin dengan sebaik-baiknya, akan terwujud sebuah momentum yang kuat, yang akan mendorong kita untuk terus beramal ibadah, walaupun Ramadhan telah pergi. Itulah taqwa yang dicapai, yang kita bentuk ketika Ramadhan untuk menjadi bekal dalam menjalani bulan-bulan seterusnya.

“…dan hendaklah kamu membawa bekal dengan cukupnya kerana sesungguhnya sebaik-baik bekal itu ialah taqwa; dan bertaqwalah kepadaKu wahai orang-orang yang berakal (yang dapat memikir dan memahaminya).”

[Al-Baqarah, 2: 197]

Dengan momentum itulah, bukan mudah untuk kita terus berhenti daripada melakukan amal ibadah yang banyak. Kalau amal terhenti pun, momentum itu akan membuatkan hati kita rasa tidak selesa.
Walaubagaimanapun, momentum itu takkan berjalan secara konstan. Lumrah kehidupan, akan ada ujian-ujian yang menjadi resistance yang mengurangkan momentum. Apabila Ramadhan pergi, syaitan akan kembali menganggu. Jarak yang semakin jauh dengan Ramadhan juga boleh membuatkan kita lalai. Allah swt. juga akan terus menguji kita dengan berbagai-bagai ujian bagi membezakan siapa yang betul-betul beriman dan siapa yang tidak.

"Patutkah manusia menyangka bahawa mereka akan dibiarkan dengan hanya berkata: "Kami beriman", sedang mereka tidak diuji (dengan sesuatu cubaan)? Dan demi sesungguhnya! Kami telah menguji orang-orang yang terdahulu daripada mereka, maka (dengan ujian yang demikian), nyata apa yang diketahui Allah tentang orang-orang yang sebenar-benarnya beriman, dan nyata pula apa yang diketahuiNya tentang orang-orang yang berdusta."

[Al-Ankabut, 29: 2-3]

Apabila momentum Ramadhan yang dihasilkan itu kuat, pastilah kita akan dapat melalui ujian-ujian selepas Ramadhan dengan baik, sehingga dipertemukan dengan Ramadhan lagi; itupun kalau Allah izinkan lagi.

Maka, oleh kerana selepas Ramadhan kita akan melalui sebelas bulan yang penuh dengan ujian sebelum Ramadhan seterusnya, wajarlah kita membina momentum yang kuat sementara Ramadhan kali ini masih berbaki.

Jadi, mari tanya diri sendiri: bagaimana momentum yang kita berjaya hasilkan setakat ini? Adakah amalan kita cukup untuk mencapai taqwa sebelum Ramadhan berakhir? Bagaimana keadaan hati dan iman kita sekarang? Bagaimana hubungan kita dengan Allah swt. sekarang?

Akhir kata, sebelum ana mengakhiri penulisan ini, ada doa daripada sebuah hadis yang boleh kita amalkan untuk mencapai taqwa.

Dari Ibnu Mas'ud r.a. bahwasanya Nabi s.a.w. bersabda:
اللّهمّ إنّي أسألك الهدى والتّقى والعفاف والغنى
"Ya Allah, sesungguhnya aku memohonkan padaMu akan petunjuk, ketaqwaan, menahan diri dari apa-apa yang tidak diperkenankan serta kekayaan hati."

(Riwayat Muslim)

Semoga Allah swt. memberikan kekuatan kepada kita dalam usaha-usaha untuk mencapai taqwa. Selamat menjalani hari-hari terakhir Ramadhan. Selamat memburu lailatul qadr.

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This is an article I posted for IKRAM Siswa. The original webpage is here. [click]

Wassalam.

Half-of-2015 Summary

Salam and hi :)

Just to update what's been happening in my life because 2015 is almost half-over.

January 2015

Final exam for my 5th semester. 3rd year.

Now I'm in the 6th semester, or 2nd semester of my 3rd year. so, it's the time for my practicum.
So,

February-March 2015
Teaching practical in Makassar, South Sulawesi, Indonesia. A total of 30 Faculty of Education students were sent to Indonesia: 9 to Jogjakarta, 9 to Semarang and 12 to Makassar. In Makassar, 6 students sent to UNISMUH (including me) and another 6 sent to UNM.

The students were very warm towards us, the Malaysian practical teachers. Alhamdulillah :)
They like listening to our BM too.

Teaching preparation at night, in the International Office. The wifi there is great.

Got to meet my relatives in South Sulawesi. This is the time where I got to know my relatives closer. Baru nak hafal nama satu-satu. Alhamdulillah all of them are very warm, kind and friendly.

Alhamdulillah got to go to many places in Makassar and even got to visit my late grandfather's hometown in Belawa, Wajo'. I sure had an amazing experience there.

Other than learning and getting many things there, I also got to know my FP-mates closer, especially those who were placed in UNISMUH like Dolly (my classmate), Santy and Saiful (both from Sports Science and they were my classmates for several classes), Kak Fiza (Kemahiran Hidup) and Kay (Electrics and Electronics). I guess if we didn't join this program, we won't know each other much. I also got to be closer to several lecturers like Cikgu Ali as the coordinator for this International Practical Programme, Dr Zainuddin Hassan as UTM's representative in UNISMUH and Dr Safarin as UTM's representative in UNM. They are all very friendly and helpful.

May Allah bless all of them.

Got a new niece. So, now, I have *counting*
Khayrat, Sayyid, Ubaydah, Adeena, Iman, Anis, Ikram, Kauthar, Yusra
4 nephews and 5 nieces!
Anis is the newborn niece, Suhaib's daughter.

Hi Anis!

March-May 2015
HARMONI. It is a convention held by IKRAM Siswa. This is the first programme I joined after almost a month without liqa' usrah because of being outside Malaysia. It's a great a booster to motivate myself to get to the mode of a students' activist again. cewah. Alhamdulillah got to meet many friends and gained new inputs from this convention.

The akhawat from UTM Skudai, Johor.

Teaching practical in SMK Tunku Abdul Rahman Putra (STARP), Kulaijaya.

2KA1

2B

The English Teachers.
Missing kak Shikin and Mr. Chong.

I seriously had so much fun during the 2 months and 2 weeks of practical in here. Despite doing daily lesson plans and having difficulty in classroom management and delivering the teaching, the teachers and students in there had given me a lot of strengths with their support and friendliness. My teaching supervisor (lecturer and guru pembimbing) gave me a lot of advices for improvement.

I think the best part in teaching is when I could remember all my students names, so I got to manage the class easier. How do I memorize their names? Everytime before I start the class, I'd point to each students while saying their names. Macam zikir. Lol. This is actually a technique introduced by my lecturer, Dr. Abdullah. Alhamdulillah the students listened to me well. They are also very friendly towards me. Best melayan karenah mereka. Oh, and one of my students is actually my classmate from SMIH's sister.

now I'm done with the teaching practical. and my 3 months of holiday has just started.

June 2015
One of my closest cousins got married. Nabilah is officially a puan now. Congratulations!

The bride and groom with the single cousins and sisters.

Alhamdulillah the ceremony went well and the weather was great. For Nabilah and her husband, Malik, Barakallahu lakuma wa baraka 'alaikuma, wa jama'a bainakuma fi khair :)

Ramadhan is coming. Yup, in just a few days! Let's make the best out of this ramadhan! May Allah accept and bless all our deeds.


What's next?
I have lots of plans coming. Some of them includes working, organisation meetings, gathering, reunions, etc. May Allah gives strengths to accomplish all those smoothly.

and, I'll be a final year student in September! Time flies so fast.


ok. That's all. Have a great and blessed day, everyone! :D

Wassalam.

MEDSI Interview in UTM

Salam and hi.

After a long time of not updating this blog, someone dropped a comment asking about the interview in UTM. Then I realised I've not been updating things about my study in UTM for a very, very long time. Wonder where has the enthusiasm gone now.

Alright, so, the comment is as follows:

salam kak, i was quite curious about the utm interview because there werent quite much blog posts from the seniors about utm.. could you share with us, the juniors some of your experience interviewing? is it the same like the foundation interview?

This question reminded me of the times when I googled for interview tips for both foundation and degree interview. hihi. I hope my answer in this post will help.

Answer:

I hope she's asking about the MEdSI interview. MEdSI is a test for students who are applying for any education courses in Malaysian universities. It consists of two phases: (1) Written test and (2) Interview.

I got the MEdSI interview in UTM Skudai because I live in Johor. All interviewees from Johor will have the interview in UTM Skudai regardless of the public universities they applied for in UPU. The interview is held at the Faculty of Education.

Here's an extract of my experience. When I got there, there's a simple registration and then I was seated outside a room to wait for my turn for the interview. There were several interviewees too and none of them applied for TESL like me. Sobs. There were Sejarah, Sains and KH applicants.

Because our courses were different, our interviews were a little different too although the beginning is pretty much the same. If you've experienced the interview for foundation, that's a bonus because the interview is pretty much the same too.

Here are some questions I remember:

1. Tell us about yourselves
(When they asked me, they asked in Malay. And then they noticed that I applied for TESL, so from the 2nd question onwards, the interview is held in English.)

2. Why do you want to become a teacher?

3. Why do you choose the subject?

4. Why do you choose this/these universities?

and some more questions which I don't remember much.
There were other interviewees who had to show how they will teach (so they have to 'teach' the interviewers the subject), and had to sing too! I guess I'm lucky enough because I don't have to do any of them. Alhamdulillah. but it's good to get yourself prepared for both.

Some tips:

1. Wear clothes with bright colours. Avoid dark, dull and gloomy colours.
2. Wear formal attire and shoes (of course).
3. While speaking, make sure your pronunciation is clear. Don't speak too fast.
4. Make sure your voice is loud enough to be heard. (because the chair for the interviewee is put very very far from the interviewers.)
5. Do ask questions when they ask "Do you have any questions to ask us?" so that you'd look like you have interest in the field/university.

Well I guess that's all. Hope this helps.

Thanks.

Wassalam.

The Making of Scones

This post is entirely copied from my batch's blog. It was the post I wrote pun.

__________________________________

Salam.

Alhamdulillah, hujung minggu lepas dapat join program ke-3 dalam siri 'The Open Circle'. Buat yang belum tahu, The Open Circle ni program bulanan khusus untuk wanita/gadis yang merupakan alumni Sekolah Islam Hidayah (PaLS). Masa program pertama dan kedua, diadakan sembang santai dengan Makcik Sumilah dan Ustazah Jamilah (respectively). Untuk event yang ke-3 ni, nak buat kelainan sikit, maka wujudlah idea untuk buat kelas baking. Hidangan yang dipilih ialah Scones sebab tak ramai tau buat, tapi sebenarnya mudah je nak buat, insya-Allah.

Scones ni merupakan hidangan British. Dia macam donut, tapi takda lubang, luar dia keras tapi rapuh (crumbly) dan dalam dia lembut. Rasa dia manis. Biasanya dimakan dengan jem dan krim. Oh, sedapnya.

Ini plain scones yang dah diletakkan jem dan krim. strawberi dan kismis tu hiasan je.

Kami belajar buat 3 jenis Scones: 1) Cheese Scones, 2) Raisin Scones dan 3) Plain Scones
Tak banyak beza pun dalam resepi ketiga-tiga scones ni.

Memandangkan kat FB dah di-share resepi yang English version, maka di sini ana share resepi versi Bahasa Melayu. lagi senang nak express. ceh.

Plain Scones

Bahan-bahan:

• 225g tepung naik sendiri (boleh campur tepung biasa), sudah diayak/sieved
• 25g gula kasta
• 50-100g butter sejuk
• 1 cubit garam
• 1 sudu teh baking powder
• 150ml susu
• 1 biji telur campur susu
• Aluminium foil (buat alas baking tray. Senang, tak perlu basuh tray)

Cara-cara:

1. Campurkan tepung, garam, gula dan baking powder. Gaul rata. Guna tangan je.
2. Masukkan butter dan gaul rata lagi. Pastikan gaul guna hujung jari je, dan gaul sampai dia jadi crumbs. Pastikan juga takda gumpalan-gumpalan kecil. Biar nampak smooth macam pepasir.
3. Buat lubang kat tengah-tengah, masukkan susu. Gaul rata guna sudu kayu.
4. Taburkan tepung (dusting) atas gumpalan mixture tadi.
5. Masukkan dalam fridge selama 10 minit. (Tapi kalau nak cepat, boleh skip this step)
6. Uli sampai dia jadi setebal 1-2cm.
7. Tekap guna cawan atau gelas. Elakkan memutar ketika menekap bagi memastikan scones dapat menaik dengan baik semasa dibakar.
8. Letak scones yang dah ditekap atas aluminium foil (yang kat baking tray, of course)
9. Sapu campuran telur + susu atas scones yang dah ditekap supaya atas dia jadi berkilat lepas dibakar.
10. Bakar selama 12-15 minit dengan suhu 220°c
11. Lepas siap, belah dua scones secara melintang, sapu butter, jem dan/atau krim. tutup balik scones, dan makan.

Senang kan?

Cheese Scones

 Untuk Cheese Scones:
- Tambah secubit serbuk lada hitam lepas no. 1
- Tambah cheese yang dah dicincang lepas no. 2. Guna goat cheese sedap, sebab rasa dia pekat lagi.
- Tak perlu makan dengan krim atau jem. Boleh makan terus gitu.

Untuk Raisin Scones:
- Tambah kismis lepas no. 2. 

Pre-baked raisin scones.
Macam chocolate chips pun ada kan?
Oh, raisins ni boleh ganti dengan chocolate chips pun, kalau nak.

Jadi, itulah dia resepinya. Mehla cuba buat.
Kalau batch ada buat gathering yang ada potluck, boleh la ramai-ramai bawa scones buatan sendiri. ohoho.

InsyaAllah program The Open Circle akan diteruskan setiap bulan. Ana akan terus update bila ada nanti.

Oh, dan tahun ni merupakan tahun ke-5 sejak kita habis sekolah. Jom buat gathering batch ~

Sekian, wassalam :)

How I Learn to Read Arabic and Al-Qur'an

Salam.

Here's another sharing of how I learn to read.

My experience of learning to read jawi/arabic letters and the Qur'an is rather different than learning to read Malay and English.

In Malaysia. kids normally started reading Al-Qur'an by reading Iqra' (book 1 to 6) followed by Muqaddam (consist of surahs from juz 30 of the Qur'an) and then Al-Qur'an.

Because jawi is a traditional writing of Malay, we also learn jawi during childhood. I don't remember I started reading jawi since kindergarten or primary school, but yeah, it was around that age. In primary school, the deeniyah (religious) subjects are taught in jawi, so I indirectly learn to improve jawi reading from there. I also learned the Arabic language there, so my Arabic reading also improved. but yeah, my Arabic proficiency was bad because I didn't like memorizing vocabularies..

Now I could only remember some of the Arabic words and simple sentences. uhuhuhu. My Arabic language proficiency has declined since I finished school. I only practice Arabic in my prayers and in Qur'an reading. hm hm.

I think this is how my Iqra' looked like

Moving on to reading Al-Qur'an;
As a first step towards learning to read Al-Qur'an, like other kids, I started by reading Iqra'. I learned Iqra' since kindergarten, in Tadika Cahaya Iman. However, I never finished the whole Iqra'. I guess I wasn't as passionate as when I read Malay. From reading Iqra', I also learned to read jawi a bit. Hence, I could read jawi and some arabic words (duh, they're the same letters).

I don't remember why I didn't finish the whole Iqra', maybe because I was too slow or because I always skipped going to kindergarten. Although my ability to read jawi and Arabic is limited, I could still memorize some duas, recitations in prayer and short surahs in the muqaddam because we recite it every day in kindergarten and it continued when I enrolled to the primary school, SRIH.

At SRIH, I straight away read muqaddam because we had to memorize surahs from the muqaddam. Fortunately, I could already read the short surahs at the back because I had been reading them during kindergarten.

During Ramadhan, there was always tadarus for kids and teenagers at our neighbourhood's mosque, Masjid Jamek BBU. Mama was one of the mosque's committee (still is), so she brought all my siblings to the tadarus session. I can't remember very well, but I think I got grouped with those who read muqaddam. But one day, I wanted to be in the same group with my older sisters who could already read the Al-Qur'an. That was my first time reading surahs other than in juz 30. I was around 7 or 8.

I was very excited that I got to read new surah from Al-Qur'an, not from Muqaddam. Because I was in the Al-Qur'an group, they started tadarus from the beginning of the Qur'an, which is Surah Al-Fatihah, followed by Surah Al-Baqarah. I was excited looking at the long verses. I heard to people reading the verses and check the verses in the Qur'an I held. Then, it was my turn to read the Qur'an.

Since it was the first time I read new surah, I read veeeeery slowly, recognizing each letters in the words. My groupmates had to patiently wait for me to finish reading the verses. My big sister who sat beside me (I think it was Uswah) corrected my reading a lot of time, patiently. I think I sweated because I wanted to finish reciting the verses quickly but it was hard. Because I read too slowly, Mama asked me to read only two verses when it was my turn. Huahua.

I think it was because of the tadarus that I grew interest to improve my reading of the Qur'an. I envied people who could read the Qur'an smoothly and quickly. I wanted to be as good as them.

During the end of Ramadhan, there was a 'Majlis Khatam Al-Qur'an', like a closing ceremony for the tadarus programme. The participants of the tadarus got duit raya and a new Al-Qur'an.
I really liked my new Al-Qur'an, so I immediately wrote my name on the first page when I got home.
Since then, I began to read Al-Qur'an as a daily routine after performing maghrib prayer (but I do skip sometimes, hehe). Mama is my teacher and Abah also sometimes corrected me when he's near.
I started reading by myself when....I can't remember when.. but maybe when I was in standard 4 or 5? at around 10 to 11 years old.

The tadarus programme was an annual thing (because Ramadhan used to be during our school breaks), so every year, I would join the tadarus. After form one, Ramadhan started to be during our school days, so we stopped joining the tadarus at masjid. During my last year of joining tadarus, I got a new Al-Qur'an with translations. Just as what I need to enroll secondary school.

Alhamdulillah from the tadarus programme and making reading Qur'an a daily routine, my Qur'an reading got better. I also improved in tajwid as we learned tajwid in school and there were ustaz and ustazah to check and correct our reading. But it was only in secondary school that I really became cautious on tajwid in reading the Qur'an. Hence, it was in secondary school that my Qur'an reading got more proper.

Alhamdulillah now I could read the Qur'an well. yeayy. but of course, there are still a lot of things to be learned. There are still tajwid rules to master and surahs to memorize. gulp.

 May Allah implant love towards Al-Qur'an in our hearts,
and may we got to be in the Quranic generation. Yoshh!

*sambil berdebar di dalam hati, layakkah aku? oohhh.. takpe kita berusaha je.

This is how I learn to read Arabic and Al-Qur'an.
to summarize,
Age 6: Read Iqra' (not finished)
Age 7: Read Muqaddam (not finished)
Age 7-8: Read Al-Qur'an
Age 10-11: Learn tajwid
Age 13-14: Become conscious of reading with tajwid

Yeahh, it's  a looong journey of learning to read Qur'an properly. May Allah count and bless the effort. wuwu.
It's hard to be istiqamah in learning to read Al-Qur'an. During the early times, I was quite ambivalent towards reading it. Ye lah, iman goes up and down.
but,,, may this heart always be close to Al-Qur'an.

That's all.

Salam :)

P/S: All pictures in this post aren't mine. Those are results from Google Image search.

How I Learn to Read; Tadika Memory

Salam.

Just a random sharing on my early memory in Reading.

(padahal esok ada paper lagi. huehue. oh yea, it's the final exam season now. but I really feel like writing now. It's a way of relieving stress. aiceh)

Some kids start reading at the age of 5, some at 4, some at 6. It depends on the age they started going to school or kindergarten.

When I was 5, I got into Tadika Cahaya Iman (one of the many kindergartens under Iman ELC), now known as Tadika Iman BBU. When I entered level 1, my sister Safiah was in level 2. Because I'm very close to Safiah, I wanted to be attached to her all the time. I cried a lot when my teachers told me to enter my own classroom because I wanted to be in the same classroom as my sister's. I remember when my teacher had to hold me to get me in my classroom while I cried loudly. And there were also times when my teacher just let me sit with my sister in her class. Yeay.

Because I was too attached to my sister and protested to not enter my own class, I then stopped going to the kindergarten. Huehuehue. I don't exactly remember for how long I went to kindergarten during level 1. But I do remember my class' name. It's either 1 Cerdik or Cerdas. (haha takla ingat sangat)

Us in our kindergarten uniform.
I'm on the left, Solehah in the middle, Safiah on the right, holding Hayat.
neomu kyeopta.. huahua

The year I was turning 6, I enrolled in the same kindergarten again and started a new life. Because Safiah had enrolled in primary school, I went to the kindergarten alone. I still remember the first day I entered my class in level 2. I was in 2 Pintar. I could still remember some faces I had met during level 1.

Anyway, it was when I was in level 2 that I started learning reading. Cikgu Ros was my homeroom teacher at that time, and she's the one who taught me reading using the 'Bacalah Anakku' book. I remember that it has its, um, volume, I guess. Bacalah Anakku 1, Bacalah Anakku 2 and so on.

When I started learning, my pace of reading was rather slow. I slowly got to new Bacalah Anakku book. Finishing a few pages of Bacalah Anakku took quite some time. But that didn't demotivate me. Cewah. I had liked books even before I learn to read. So I guess I just went with the flow.

Because I was still learning to read, I also wrote slowly. There was this one time when my teacher (can't remember her name, but she was quite fierce, I was super scared of her) asked us to copy what she had written on whiteboard. She wanted us to copy that before we went home. Then, she said the scariest words kids ever heard "siapa tak siap, tak boleh balik." (those who don't finish, can't go home). Once I heard that, I really tried to write quickly, but it was too hard. When my friend had finished, she told me to hurry because our van might arrive soon. I was too scared to the thought of not going back home that I cried while writing. I don't remember what happened next, either I finished writing or the teacher let me go, but afterwards, I went out of the class still crying. Yeah, I was very kememeh.

yeah, get them today! These books helped me to read.
The Bacalah Anakku series

Back to books and reading. I like books because Abah always bought books with beautiful pictures. Our siblings' favourite was the Martini series. The Martini book has beautiful illustrations. (not the Martini cocktail tau. I tried googling for the images of this martini book, but only the pictures of the cocktail showed up -__-"). Well, I guess my family did play a crucial role in getting myself to be interested to read. I always saw Abah, Mama and my sisters reading. I also saw my sisters read the Martini series, so I sometimes joined them. But of course, they read the words while I just looked at the pictures, and tried to connect the pictures with the words my sisters read.

One day, I picked up one of the Martini series book and 'read' it to myself. I 'read' it out loud. Actually, I didn't read the words. I just made up the story based on the pictures in the book. I remember Abah and my sisters giggled watching me 'reading' that.

I didn't exactly remember when, but that was one of the moments during the times I started reading at home too. Because I also read at home (I think it's with the help of Mama or my sisters, can't remember), my reading improved.

At the kindergarten, I quickly finished one after another Bacalah Anakku book. Aicewah. Bangga plak. and finally, I finished the whole Bacalah Anakku series. yeayyy, alhamdulillah.

There was one day when Cikgu Ros told everyone to sit according to their book number. Bacalah Anakku 1, here, Bacalah Anakku 2, there, Bacalah Anakku 3, there and so on and so forth. Finally, she said that those who have finished all the books to sit at the centre of the class with her. So I went there with others who have finished. She said something like complement and that she loved us because we have finished the books. That moment, I was very happy. teehee.

I could officially read normal books (not books with suku kata) from that moment on, at the age of 6.

This is not me.

Oh, I also learned to read English around that time. That time, we read the Peter and Jane series. But I never finished the whole series. Huehue. Well, at least I could read Malay.

But yeah, my English was bad when I was a kid. During the entrance exam for primary school, I was confused of the names of blue and green colours. I even read mother as 'moder', not 'mader'. Alhamdulillah my English now is OK. Yeayy.

Ehm. Back to reading.

Alhamdulillah my family members like to read, hence I felt interested to read too. When I look at them looking at books, I thought that it must be interesting. That motivation boost my enthusiasm to read Bacalah Anakku at the kindergarten. I remember when I finally could grasp the readings of suku kata, I read each suku kata in the book boringly and quickly (bajet tere sangat), so I could finish the book quickly.

That was my experience of learning to read.

Alhamdulillah for this nikmat and ability.

Ah, reading Malay and English is one experience.

Reading jawi and the arabic letters is another experience. I shall share it later.

Thank you :)

P/S: All pictures in this post aren't mine. Those are results from Google Image search.. except the first one.