DESTINATION UNKNOWN

Just came back from meeting Kak Majmin (ex TKCian whom I adore for her outlook in life) at KGPA to sort out the flights for tomorrow's golf game.

Since we were short of two people, I invited two of my neighbours to join in.

My exchanges with Arnold (one of the two neighbours):

LK: Our flight is at 7.29 a.m. Fee is RM 82.50. See you tomorrow.

Arnold: Hi Lini, where are we flying to?

LK: It depends on our game. Destination Heaven if we have a good round or Hell, god forbids, if we don't!

Arnold: Couldn't agree more! See you.

FAMILY MEETING ON LEBANON TRIP

In light of the Day of Rage in Lebanon yesterday, I sent the following message to the other two fellow council members of the Rende reign.

"there will be a Rende family meeting tonight at 8 to discuss about our trip to the Middle East. Your attendance is compulsory."

Franco's SMS exchanges:

FR: I'll be there. I have a conference call at 9. An hour should suffice, correct?

LK: better know your geography to expedite the discussion.

FR: we will unroll our big world map.

LK: do we still have it?

FR: I think so. I will check.

Tasha's SMS exchanges on the other hand:

TR: so proper!

TR: I accept the invitation!

LK: so cute and so official at the same time. You are ready to take my job at SKM!

TR: oh no!

LEBANON

The plan was for us to spend the CNY 2011 in Lebanon and Syria. After 4 years of peace, I thought Lebanon would be politically stable now. Well, at least they were until the unexpected happened two weeks ago.

the Lebanese parliament was dissolved, tension is now filling the Lebanese air and talks on civil war outbreak are mounting!

On the other hand, there are also a lot of comforting words from other camps who are confident that Lebanon will not go to war again since they have been doing so well, economically, with a growth of 9% last year and expected GDP of an additional 8% this year.

We are leaving in a week, the question is, do we still go?

FLEXIBLE WORK PRACTICE

After spending half a year writing guidelines for flexible work practice and accumulating tips for the SKM managers and staff to make this practice a success, the proposal was tabled to the Regional Leadership team last Friday, 21st January 2011.

That date will now be a new milestone for SKM. The leaders and managers are now committed to embrace this work practice.

As Kak Lina, an ex-TKCian whom I play golf with quite regularly said on my FB trail "Diversity is no longer a luxury, it is a necessity for forward looking companies....."

I believe her. Time is changing and so are the needs of the employees. I have been waiting for this moment to happen within SKM and now that we have finallly arrived, it is time for me to put in my application to work from home!

I am so looking forward to that.

BYE PAPA

We dropped Franco off at KL Sentral this morning and as usual Tasha was in tears.

Eventually, I managed to gather enough courage to ask her the question, the answer to which might hurt the feeling of a mother.

Me: Girl, why do you always cry when Papa has to go on a business trip and you never cry when I go anywhere? Some times the places I have to go to are more dangerous, like Pakistan, Cambodia?

Tasha: Cause I know you will survive wherever you go, mom!

REFLECTION ON 2010

2010 was a good year for us.

a) Tasha started playing 18 holes of golf with us. This has come top in our list of acheivement as we are now able to spend more time as a family!

b) Franco and I ran the furthest distance ever in our life - 30km and we hope to at least complete one marathon in our lifetime in 2011.

c) Tasha made major improvements in her skiing and skied on slope 6 in Club Med Sahoro! Even Franco and I struggled on this slope which is meant for intermediate to advance level skiers. Kudos to my little wedgy!

d) Despite her lack of practice, Tasha passed her Grade 4 piano exam and now resolved to spend more time on her piano for her Grade 5 exam in 2011.

e) Franco got promoted 2 scales up the ladder! He is the most hard working in this family of 3, so, it is definitely the promotion that is well deserved!

f) I managed to get out of the gruelling Shell program (thanks to the Client) and am currently working for the same Client at advisory level, giving me more time to golf during the weekdays. In 2010, I managed to play 30 rounds of golf on weekdays and expect to top that up this year!

g) After 30 years, I was finally reunited with some of my primary school friends from Zainab 1 over a raya do. It was wonderful to see how well everybody is doing with their lives.

h) On the family front, I managed to help mom with her treatment with Dr. Nick Boden. Despite a lot of hardship in organising the trips to the hospital, we managed to endure it and now she is back to her active self.

i) Found a tennis partner who is as crazy or even crazier than I am. So, we started playing 3 days a week resulting in a major improvement in my tennis game.

j) I was out of Malaysia for 67 days out of 365 (source: SOS International) and did not get fired by my boss for it!

Hopefully 2011 will bring us more happiness, health and wealth....ameen.

PIANO PRACTICE

Tasha on her promise to practise piano:

I promise I will practise piano for one hour and I will force kakak to listen to me for one full hour even if it makes her ears bleed!

sms on 27th December 2010

THE WIN

Tasha: Mom, so sorry I forgot the cooler again! But Miss Lillee said she will keep it for me until January next year.

Mom: It's ok. I forgive you since you won the golf competition.

Tasha: How did you know? It was supposed to be a surprise!

Mom: I have my sources. Well done. How do you feel?

Tasha: Winning is very tiring!

sms conversation with Tasha in November 2010

I PAD

I have been the proud owner of the I Pad for exactly one month today and I only have a few words to say about it....it is totally awesome and it is a life changing machine.

I LOVE MY I PAD.

Sorry, I have to say more than that just to make a point:

You can do pretty much everything on the I pad - read Quran, play games, engage in social network via facebook and e-mail, work (not much of this but that is how it should be anyway), book a vacation, get directions and the list goes on - all done with such simplicity and ease!