I am feeling heartache. Guess something just stays there in heart. Period.

My Milestones for 2009

In a few days more, it will be year 2009. In the meantime, I would like to believe that I am busy at drafting and outlining what I will do for the rest of 2009. Make no mistake that I will be busy doing mistakes and making mistakes, that’s for sure. For what I know, mistakes are good. Mistakes are the indication of my path towards my dreams. If I never commit to any mistake, then probably I am not doing anything at all.

The main problem is, would I commit the mistake twice? Okay, that hit my thick skull with a bang! How can I make sure myself will not do the mistake twice? It’s a question that yet for me to ascertain, indeed.

For whatever it is, year 2009 will mean a lot for me. I grew quite a bit since I got back from the States in the past 3 years. This time, I am sure the future demands me to be more decisive and courageous.

Yes, I put a personal dateline for myself to hit my target – a millionaire by 35. I have also mapped my career and business venture inline to that financial goal. At this moment, I have nothing in my coffer except some ideas of how to reach that goal. Whether it works or not, I don’t know for real until I commit some actions upon that goal.

Linda (my upline) sent me an inspiring sms in 2007 (which I still keep it till this day). It says, “Great ideas, great goals and great intentions are meaningless without great actions. People achieve success in life not just because they take charge of their thinking, but because their thinking propels them into taking action”.

True to its very word – success requires more than just some plan or some ideas. It relies heavily on the action for one to achieve something.

So here I record my goals for year 2009.

1. Keep my financial ledger in order, clear any outstanding debt and increase my annual income by 50%.

2. Applying for pre-seed grant to establish a company which focuses on IT for agriculture. I am partnering with my old school friend for this matter. We are looking to secure RM 150,000 to fund our first prototype. We are in the midst of preparing the application documents and doing some research to complete the business plan. Thus, the plan is to submit the completed documents by March 2009. The company will most probably commence its operation (pending to approval) in September 2009.

3. Establish a company to deal in agriculture – we become entrepreneur in growing domestic vegetables and tropical fruit to cope with local market demand. This I share with six other investors. We aim to accumulate a minimum of RM 100,000 of cash saving by the second year of the establishment. This will be the seed money for next agriculture venture for export to international market. Dateline for establishing this small enterprise will be in May 2009.

4. My promotion to Agency Manager by June 2009. Therefore I need to raise a total group sale of RM 2,000,000 by May next year (I kowtim already for personal total sales, it is in excess of RM 650,000 now). I am also recruiting more talented and independent business associates into my business group. I figure out to have a total of 30 new business associates.

5. I qualify myself for incentive trip to Seoul, South Korea by June 2009. Speaking of the trip, I will be retreating to Bandung/Jakarta for holiday somewhere in June as well, yeayyy (at Public Mutual’s expenses)!!

6. Start getting serious in personal relationship. Oh yeah, I know it’s very touchy issue here. I am planning to get married by 2010. Being married at the age of 30 seems a good year for me. Seriously!

7. Sending my parents to the pilgrimage in Makkah by the end of the year.

8. Locking my time of 4 hours a week to teach free tuition in Modern/Additional Mathematic, Physic and Chemistry for SPM candidates at an orphanage house in Hulu Klang.

9. Bring down my weight to 70 kg. Need to do this for health and fitness reason (padahal nak fit sket main golf 18 hole). Dateline June 2009.

10. Get an iron set of Taylormade Burner xD with Taylormade Burner 3 & 5 fairway woods by March 2009. Wohohohoo!!!!

Oh Lord, please help me to achieve these goals successfully! Good bye 2008. Welcome 2009.

One Last Thing Before I Sleep



You know, Shall We Dance is one of my favourite movies. In fact, one of my junior presented me with the CD of OST Shall We Dance before I left Penn State for good.

This is the most memorable quote I have in mind when we talk about this movie.

Beverly Clark said,

We need a witness to our lives. There's a billion people on the planet... I mean, what does any one life really mean? But in a marriage, you're promising to care about everything. The good things, the bad things, the terrible things, the mundane things... all of it, all of the time, every day. You're saying 'Your life will not go unnoticed because I will notice it. Your life will not go un-witnessed because I will be your witness'.

Mundane Self BizTalk

It's 3.43 am in the morning. I am not sleeping just yet. Actually, my mind works best after 12 midnite. Yes, it is such a crazy hour. When I was a student, I used to work at Pollock Library for a graveyard shift; 12 midnite to 7 am. The job gave me good money though albeit the work was a bit boring..ermm to say the least.



Talking about work - it's never ending. Truly, works keep men and women as well from three vices; boredom, evil and ....okay, I couldn't recall from my mind. My mind practically on constant spin when it comes to work. FOr me, anything that generate income is considered as work. So here I am, lepaking at cyber cafe, figuring ways of how to initiate my project. This time I am gonna take a leap of faith. A risk for myself and my partner as well. 2009 will see me going into business full blast.

Having conversation with friends about this business venture reminds me of why I want to do business again. Failure is a must for one to have success. The way I see it, I shall have more risk if I don't start doing it now.

My good friend has agreed to give us a coaching on how to secure grant from government agency. I also have figured out on how to secure further capital injection into the company by a means of grant from another agency. I guess this will spearhead our effort to be majority shareholder in our next business venture when my cili fertigasi project kicks in.



My friend mooted an idea from the Japanese culture, "keretsu", which is to form a coalition in business in ensuring the survival of the business as collective force. I find the idea is a sexy idea. Hehehe, Yeah..sexy in a sense that we cover each other's asses actively by securing an equity in each partner's business entity. I think it's also a way of securing capital from within the group, rather than taking up loans from the financial institutions. It made the whole process simpler.

Anyway, there is endless of list that me and my partner need to do till March 2009. I handle most of the business side and my partner is handling the technical part. Therefore I need to learn business accounting & finance, Company Act and management. Ooh ohhh..before I forget, I also need to study again on marketing and sales as well. Woww, this is like going to school all over again. Sheeesshhh!!!

Character Flaws



Having shared my dreams and ambitions for next year, I believe that it takes a set of characters in order to pursue those dreams. And I just realize that I have plenty, I mean seriously, plenty of character flaws. It has dawned on me that my dark side is so much dirtier than I thought it is. Lucky for me to realize on this after I came through with some exposures on my bad personality.

Well, I won't come up with any excuse to behave badly. There is no excuse to be bad person with anyone else, even to my enemies (if I had one or few). All I can do is just to say sorry and keep myself on toe when I start to act 'asshole'ly. Hahahaha, what a word!

Having said that, there are times for me to close down this online journal of mine because what people may have felt when they read about my thoughts or ramblings. Howewer, I feel it's not just the time yet for this to get its last bow out. Maybe in a few years more la kot.

I wonder, who will come knocking this blog when the writer decides to say Good Bye.

Hmmm.....

I Just Could Not Believe This!!

Golf at Palm Garden Golf Course Today



I had a golf session with my client this morning at Palm Garden Golf Course, Putrajaya. He's a specialist psychologist. SO I guess that must carry some heavy credentials attached to his name. Never mind about that, but what I like to point out here is that we had an interesting conversation while golfing together.

More and more professionals are becoming swinger and this has become a trend in Kuala Lumpur. Yes, a swinger! - yes, ladies and gentlemen.

He said he counseled a few of them, individually or with their partners during his clinic hours. He said that things can get really messy and people are denying the early diagnosis. People like to do things but deny doing it. It's so much easier to fuck then to undo the fucking. Because once the sexual activities take place, it set up a motion in establishing an emotional relationship. Once the emotional relationship starts, everything will start to fall off. Okay, minus subscribing the prostitutes (somehow now I remember the story of my old friend's visit to Lrg Hj Taib and asked for RM70 service for 2 clients, if you know what I mean here).

So yeah, I learn a lot about the social psychological situation in our society during my one-hour drink with him. Many of the issues he raised during the conversation still haunt my mind.

But one thing I feel I need to acknowledge myself - I was verrrrrrrrrrrryyyyyyyyyyyyy good at tee off today!! Yeayyy! Thumbs up for me!!

The person who was standing next to me is the ADUN of Meru, Dr. Abdul Rani. I first met him in winter of 2002 in Glasgow, Scotland for HIZBI's winter gathering program. At that time he was only a doctor who has clinic in Meru and actively involved with PAS organization and I was Secretary of Malaysian Islamic Society of North America (MISN*).
Six years have passed in a blink of eyes! I never thought that I would be meeting him again and seated with him again in a function like the above. But this time, he is the ADUN and I'm the trainer for his constituents for SPIES program. Interesting!

A Sense of Devaju

I have plenty of friends; some I met over the net and some I met at some functions or perhaps we went to the same college or high school. But one thing that makes me feel great about this experience is when i finally take the plunge to meet up with an online friend.



Yeah, i actually experienced that for so many times. But this one was different. I met her in a social web portal after I page hopping from one profile to another. I saw a photo of her and she looks cute. So we exchanged messages a couple of times and the topics were getting better and better. Later it became a habit to write to her almost on daily basis and sometimes I got reply from her on the same day itself. That’s how I learned to know about Australia. It happened in just one or two months. I think it was in October 2006. Then I thought, since she was coming home for holiday, maybe we should exchange our telephone numbers. That thought stayed idle for a couple of days till I decided to make up my mind about it.

And so we talked over the phone. First time I heard her voice, I was a bit disappointed because her voice sounds like Lisa Surihani’s voice - if you know what I mean. So that isn’t a selling point. Hahahaha....but anyway I managed to handle my disappointment well because it wasn’t a major one anyway!

I’m not quite sure how long it took for us to finally meet but all I remember was that she sent me an sms telling me that she was planning to come down to Kuala Lumpur for a shopping trip. I was thrilled.

So we finally met at Midvalley Mall. I can swear over my mother’s name that the moment I saw her, I felt the time was stopped. My eyes were fixed on her. Everything around her was just negligible. She was in black jeans and black three quarter long sleeves t-shirt with cyan color of cardigan covering the t-shirt. She put black and white veil to cover her hair. I can also swear on my mother’s name that I remember till today where exactly she was standing when we first exchanged the glance and where she brought me to after that. I guess that kind of moment won’t come easily to our lives, would it?

Hahahaha...amazingly how the waiting for such moment was finally coming to my life. Unfortunately we didn’t have a great ending except for suffering emotionally, especially for me. Anyway, the whole experience made me of who I am today. A bit evasive when it comes to relationship and women.

The whole reason why I wrote this entry is because I’m watching this soapy movie called “You’ve Got Mail”. Hahahaha, yeah, I am sucker for romantic comedy and easily indulged myself in the moment. Like this one!

Bisnes ooo Bisnes...



Aku berhajat nak mulakan perniagaan dalam pertanian. Aku dah jumpa dengan beberapa kawan yang mungkin berminat untuk berkongsi modal untuk tujuan ini. Ada juga kawan aku bertanya, kenapa aku pilih budak-budak Alam Shah saja. Jawapannya senang saja. Aku percaya pada kawan-kawan Alam Shah aku. Ada yang nerd, ada yang cam setan, ada yang biasa-biasa. Aku kenal diorang dah berbelas tahun. Aku dulu kena ragging sama-sama dengan diorang masa di sekolah dulu. Kalau bergaduh bergasak sekali pun, kita buat sama-sama saja. Kalau tak puas hati pun, kita settle behind the closed door. Pusing-pusing pun memang jumpa sama-sama diorang juga. Senang cerita.

Kursus cili fertigasi tu akan dibuat pada hari Ahad minggu depan. Aku sendiri dah jumpa dengan consultant yang bakal ajar kitorang. Fee kursus tu hanya RM 100/pax je, tu yang aku pikir, bila lagi kan? Kurang-kurang aku dapat ilmu.

Business model is very simple. Lima orang investors akan jadi shareholder and directors. Tapi kena lantik sorang Managing Director untuk kawalselia operasi. Cara compensation akan difikirkan kemudian. We aim for 5 years plan. 2 tahun pertama kita akan fokus hanya pada cili fertigasi. 3 tahun kemudian kita akan venture into different sector in agriculture. Kita akan monitor economy of this business. Modal yang dikumpul bersama mungkin dijadikan hanya sebagai cash reserve tapi capital expenses akan dibiayai oleh loan bank. Maka sales pun kena tally untuk bayar loan. Jadi aku kena calculate balik berapa capital expenses yang diperlukan setiap tahun.



Aku dah bincang juga dengan consultant tu pasal macam mana nak buat marketing and sales untuk cili ni pasal barangan pertanian is perishable. Tak boleh simpan stok lama pasal kualiti akan turun. Jadi harga akan turun juga. So ni akan affect kitorang financially. Dia kata demand dalam KL dan Selangor untuk cili sebenarnya tak mampu nak dipenuhi pasal banyak sangat. Dia sendiri akan bantu kami dalam hal marketing ni. Bagus juga. Itu sebenarnya yang kitorang nak.

Aku fikir kalau projek cili fertigasi ni berjaya dan dalam tempoh dua tahun kami mampu untuk mengukuhkan kewangan syarikat, kami akan laburkan pada projek pertanian lain pulak. Aku aim dalam tempoh 2 tahun, syarikat akan kumpulkan duit sebanyak RM 100,000. And kalau nak dapat banyak tu, makna kata kami kena tingkatkan bilangan anak-anak pokok. Kalau seribu batang pokok boleh hasilkan secara idealnya sebanyak RM 10,000, then kitorang mungkin kena tambah lagi sepuluh kali ganda. Tengoklah macam mana. Aku tak boleh decide sorang-sorang. Menda ni kami buat secara kolektif. Jadi kena ikut vote la jugak.

Acap ada kate pasal economy of scale. Walau pun aku tak berapa paham sebenar-benanrya tapi aku rasa aku boleh paham apa maksudnya dengan phrase tu. Kalau ada sapa-sapa kat sini yang boleh explain apa menda economy of scale secara teori dan praktikalnya, bagitau ajer la. Aku memang minat sangat nak tahu menda alah tu. Aku terfikir untuk kembangkan kepada pertanian pisang untuk export. Client aku sorang ada buat kebun pisang kecil-kecilan yang memang menjadi. Mungkin dia boleh guide kami pasal macam mana nak buat bisnes pisang pulak.

Tapi terang-terang sebenarnya aku dah bagitau kat kawan-kawan aku, menda ni anggap ajer la percubaan pertama kita sama-sama dalam bisnes. Modal yang dikeluarkan kira anggap hangus. Ini long term project. Kalau menjadi sungguh, semua orang akan dapat hasilnya. Kalau tak menjadi, kita belajar dari kesilapan.



Banyak sebenarnya boleh dibuat dalam bidang pertanian komersil. Aku lebih suka aim pada direct to customer punya sales, tapi kalau dapat tangkap account dengan Giant ke, TESCO ke, lagi bagus kan? Ada steady income walau pun mungkin tak tinggi mana harga yang diorang nak bayar pada kitorang.

Mana tahu kalau diusahakan betul-betul, mungkin cita-cita aku nak jadi millionaire pada umur 35 tahun tu on track? Kalau kita tak cuba, kita tak tahu. Kata James Sun, the finalist for the Apprentice season 6, we live only once, take the risk and live the life. Yup, aku hidup sekali. Kalau boleh, before aku mati, biarlah aku jadi somebody. Kalau tak untuk komuniti di sekeliling aku, kurang-kurang untuk diri sendiri and family.

Dah lama agaknya aku tak menulis terus dari hati. Aku rasa mungkin aku sekarang ni lebih suka menyembunyikan perasaan aku daripada berlaku jujur dengannya. Berbanding dengan entry-entry aku yang lepas, memang nyata sangat aku dah jadi hati kering. Betul ke hati kering? Ke simpan kemas-kemas apa yang hati rasa?

Wallahu’alam.

Soalan yang sama lagi aku dapat daripada client aku semalam.

“You tak ada girlfriend lagi? Umur you dah berapa ya?”.

Kalau client lelaki tanya, aku boleh jawab dengan nada bergurau sebab memang aku kena kutuk kaw-kaw punya dengan married client ni. Kalau client perempuan tanya, aku buat muka straight face ajer. “Memang takde, nak wat camner. Saya busy sangat kerja kot”. Pastu aku wat senyum kambing. Selalunya soalan tu mati kat situ saja.

Tapi semalam client aku sambung lagi bercerita pasal chemistry antara lelaki dan perempuan. Mungkin dia lebih berpengalaman sebab dia dah kahwin, lepas tu cerai. Besarkan anak tiga orang by herself. Dia lebih kurang baya mak aku. Mungkin sebab tu aku hormat pada dia and just layan ajer perbualan tu.

Aku bagitau kat dia yang aku buat masa ni dikejutkan dengan banyak berita perceraian. Then aku bertanya, apakah orang kahwin hanya untuk bercerai? Dia kata banyak benda boleh jadi sekarang ni. Antara faktor utama ialah sebab ekonomi keluarga. Suami dan isteri bekerja kuat untuk tingkatkan pendapatan keluarga. Dalam keadaan tu, mereka terdedah kepada bermacam-macam dugaan baik dari segi pergaulan sosial atau pun pekerjaan. Masing-masing stress. Tambah lagi bila kurangnya pegangan atau pun amalan agama, jadilah benda-benda yang tak elok. Asalnya benda simple tapi bila dah terlajak, tak boleh nak gostan semula. Tu yang jadi kes cerai sana sini. Tak kiralah untuk lelaki dan pompuan.

Apakah aku sebenarnya takut untuk hal ni? Yelah, aku bukannya baru lagi dalam hal bercinta. Cinta, putus cinta. Cinta, putus cinta. Suka, tapi kena reject. Sakitnya sedikit sebanyak terkesan kat hati. Dulu papa ada pesan pada aku, kalau boleh kita berkahwin ni biarlah kekal sampai ke akhir hayat. Itu ajer la pesan ayah aku dalam soal perhubungan ni. Memang tak pernah lah dia cakap-cakap macam tu dengan aku sepanjang 28 tahun aku jadi anak dia ni. Memang tak pernah sekali habuk aku cakap kat dia pasal sape yang aku suka, sape yang aku minat kecuali sekali saja dulu. Itu pun memang sampai berpintal-pintal tali perut aku nak bagitau kat dia. Tapi hubungan tu tak jadi, so sampai sekarang aku jadi segan sendiri nak cakap kat dia. Samalah dengan mak aku. Tak pernah ajar aku cakap bab-bab gini.

Aku percaya dalam kegagalan dalam perhubungan bukanlah jatuhnya pada satu pihak. Kedua-dua pihak bertanggungjawab sebab it takes two to tango. Baik lelaki mahu pun perempuan kena cermind diri sendiri. Dalam hal aku sendiri pun, aku lebih banyak salahkan diri sendiri. Mungkin cara aku approach tak kena, mungkin mindset aku tak betul, mungkin apa yang aku sebutkan depan dia tak berapa nak kena. Bila kenang-kenang semula perhubungan yang lepas, aku Cuma suka ingat yang manis-manis saja. Yang boleh buat aku tersenyum dan ketawa. Taknak la aku ingat bab-bab yang buat mood aku down. Yang penting, aku doakan orang-orang yang pernah aku sentuh hatinya atau yang hati aku disentuh olehnya bahagia dalam hidup masing-masing.

Fokus aku sekarang ialah pada bina kareer dan relationship aku. Aku still ingatkan diri sendiri pasal target aku untuk jadi jutawan by umur 35. and aku jugak still ingatkan diri sendiri pasal bila aku nak settle down. Ya, memang aku nak settle down. I put the date in year 2010. Yep, masa tu aku dah umur 30. mungkin masa tu aku dah jadi lelaki yang cukup matang untuk jaga hati perempuan, belajar untuk handle diri perempuan and jugak share sama-sama dengan dia pasal adventure hidup berumahtangga.

Kiranya aku ada tempoh dalam setahun lebih dari sekarang. Mana mungkin nak kahwin dalam masa setahun tapi tak ada calon? Takpe, I believe in law of attraction. If the mind keep focused on task in hand, the things will come easily and effortlessly. Sama macam berdoa, kalau doa hari-hari dan usaha hari-hari, hasil doa tu akan datang tanpa kita sedari.

Doa tu penting sebab ia jadi dorongan dalam subconcious. Doa untuk jadi orang yang kaya tapi bertanggungjawab, doa untuk jadi suami yang bertanggungjawab pada isteri dan anak-anak, doa untuk jadi anak yang menyenangkan ibu ayah. Mudah-mudahan doa-doa aku termakbul. Mudah-mudahan kerja amal kebajikan yang aku buat jadi wasilah untuk aku capai hasrat di hati. Ameen.