Berjalan2 di Old Trafford dan London

December langsung tak ada post. Semakin hari semakin malas nak blog.

And harini Deby nak declare Deby sungguh malas nak twit or FB lagi. Banyak sangat bendasing dan makhluk dan serangga yang tak puas hati. Sukati saya la kan nak post apa? But noooo... ada je tak puas hati. nak marah. nak comment. Bosan. Cukup bosan.

Oh. Post ni bukan untuk ranting. nanti ada yang tak puas hati lagi.

Post ni nak cerita Deby pergi Old Trafford. Yup. Pegi stadium Manchester United. Am i a fan? Nope I am not. Pergi pun sebab teman pakcik dan makcik yang datang Berjalan ke London. Kepada yang bising cakap saya asyik berjalan, just so you know, masa ni college saya tutup, okay? Cuti dari 21 dec smpai 1 jan.

Pergi masa hari mendung dan sejuk bangat. Tapi nampak sangat pakcik puas hati. Die hard fan la katakan. GGMU. Ternampak Kagawa. and ramai betul groupie Japan dia. tapi Deby tengok je la. Malas nak kejar. Hensem, in an Asian kinda way. Deby sebok tengah makan nasik goreng time tu. Ye saya bawak bekal.

Iklan: saya suka bangat dengan scarf Michael Kors saya

Ni la sket2 gambar kat Old Trafford. Cantik padang dia. Our tour guide explain how they culture the grass (culture, dalam erti kata mudah menipu rumput tu yang matahari sedang keluar supaya dia boleh tumbuh dengan jayanya), nampak how they take care of the stadium. Pakcik saya mengeluh kalau lah stadium Shah Alam or Bkt Jalil dijaga macam nie (oh pakcik saya die hard fan Selangor and Harimau Malaya, tiap kali game mesti pergi). Nak buat macam mana, dia depends gak dengan jumlah investment atas team tu sendiri.

Siap dapat certificate. 

Tapi personally saya rasa Emirates stadium lagi cantik. Tapi itu pun saya nampak dari jauh. Yelah. Stadium agak baru katakan.

Gunners. Gambar dari luar stadium. 

Sempat singgah gak Etihad stadium. Alang2 dah sampai Manchester.

cantik kan boots saya? kan kan?

Dalam berjalan2 tu ada la pergi the normal tourist attractions, London eye, Madame Tussauds, etc. Gambar ada banyak juga. Semua kat Facebook. Malas nak post kat sini or twitter. and yes, twitter saya dah dimangga. Menyampah bila orang baca twit saya pastu comment tak puas hati la, sebok nak tau apa saya buat lah. TOLONG. bosan gila.

Gambar serba sikit sepanjang saya berjimba dengan pakcik makcik saya.

shopping masa boxing day memang harus. 

Big Ben. 

Kami memang gedik

Dekat London Eye

Post harus dekat tube

Di camden town. memang menarik. 

Gambar2 ni semua diambil menggunakan Samsung Galaxy Note II. My new toy. Oyeh, baby!

Homemade Pesticides

warning: post ni dalam english. ampun ye.

Yesterday night, a friend of mine went on a cockroach (!) tour at the Science Museum. Being superbly sick as I am, I was unable to join him. Teasing him about fnding ridsect andsoforth reminded me of a mini project I made my students do during my year as a lecturer.

The title of the mini project is Homemade Pesticide (oh, fyi, the course was Chemicals in Agriculture). So what they have to do is try to find something (household items, etc) that can be made into pesticides.

Basically my students did a wonderful job. Even my beloved big boss (a.k.a the dean) loved the project so much. And this mini project truly helped them during their final exam, i kid you not. So hereby I assert that rather than emphasizing on theories and lectures, focusing more on hands on and practical works are so much better in guiding students to achieve the course outcome. :D (psst: that class achieve a beautiful bell graph for their marks)

Okay back to the topic. There are numerous items that you can turn into pesticides in your homes. Though we have to purify it at some point (which my students didn't do), and we have to test the potency of each substances (they didn't have time for it), their tests showed that most of them works. Though some smelled really bad, I think the insects will run away based on the smell itself. :p

1) capsaicin (pepper/cili)

This is an excellent source for a pesticide. What they did was they blended these, filter it and use the liquid. I really can't remember the exact aliquot, or water to capsaicin ratio. And i also don't actually remember if they checked the effect on plants, will it burn? i have no idea. but well, basically it works, so maybe needs to purify and adjust the concentration.

2) lemongrass (serai wangi)

Lemongrass or Cymbopogon is a natural insect repellent.  If i remember correctly there's already a commercialized product made from lemongrass in the market. I kinda don't like the smell though, I think there's added ingredient into it. But we can do it ourselves at home. As usual, just grind/blend chopped lemongrass, filter them and wallah, we can directly use it! It seems that lemongrass is good to repel flies and maybe cockroaches (you hear that, mr cockroach?). Again, the concentration plays a vital role, do be wary of too much or too little. play around with it.

3) Garlic (bawang putih)

I think this one has the worst smell among all. Garlic, or the scientifically known as Allium Sativum, is also a natural insect repellent. Well, if you ask me, its a natural human repellent as well. I think the smell alone is good enough to tell those insects (and humans!) not to come near. For this one I suggest you to try with a lower dosage, as the smell is really overpowering.

There are a few more (ginger, dioscorine, salt), but I'm running short of time. So in conclusion, there are many simple solutions for insect repellent, some of it are easily obtained. Do try them out, and let me know if it works. And to Mr Cockroach, beware!!!

Love from London,

Selamat Hari Raya Aidil Adha

Tahun ni sambut  raya haji dalam keadaan demam batuk n selsema. Sedih tol. Pagi2 lagi dah pergi Malaysia High Commision dekat Belgrave Sq untuk solat raya, dengar khutbah. Lepas tu pergi open house (aunts of Kak Zaila) dekat South Kensington. Let me tell you, rendang ayam kat situ memang superb! teringat2 rendang nenek. Sebijik pedas dia. Dapat lontong, laksa lagi. Happy sangat. At least takde la rindu sangat food raya kt Malaysia.

gambar gediks!

Qish, Kak Zaila, Baby Inex and me

among the ladies, beraya at Kak Zaila's aunties' house

lepas beraya, terpaksa masuk office jap. Did i mention i had to become a lab manager? serious taknak, tapi entah kenapa kena paksa. So kena masuk office jap, siapkan permit sebab hari Khamis deby demam panas so tak pergi office, orang2 office dah start sibuk2 call and email. Sedih je bila sakit pn orang tak kasik rehat. :(

Lepas touch and go kat office, Qish ajak pergi shopping kat Oxford street. dan saya bagaikan orang gila shopping mopping. Hahaha. Akhirnya dapat boots idaman hati! yay! Let me tell you, forever21 memang murah bangat kat sini. And i have to mention gak, deby dah lost weight byk gila sejak balik sini balik, now i can wear size 25 jeans! pencapaian nih!!! Sorry, excited lebih. sila abaikan. along the way, suara deby makin hilang. awal pagi suara rock + sexy serak, sampai petang suara memang dah takde. 

Our haul

so in love with this!

Today nak pergi MSD ada open house, tomorrow dekat Mara Hostel gak. Walaupun suara deby dah hilang, raya is still raya kan? makan is still makan gak. hehehe

P/S: next week nak pergi Birmingham (lawat Opie) dan Coventry (lawat Faiz and Ary)

P/P/S: next next week nak tgk Evanescence and the Used in concert! wuhooo!

P/P/P/S: sangat stressed out pasal kerja, most days rasa nak nangis je. T.T sbb tu asyik berpoya2 je skrg

Love from London,

Playlist saya

Aduiii... tak boleh tidoooo... lately ni mesti deby tak boleh tido malam. nape entah. insomnia? banyak fikir? Grr...

So bila tak boleh tido, deby dengar lagu. Macam2 genre, ikut mood.

Kalau tengah mood jiwang, sweet etc, ni playlist Deby:

Kalo tetiba nak dengar lagu2 English, ni playlist dia:

Perasan tak ada satu lagu tu termasuk dalam kedua2 playlist? Hehehe.

P/S: next entry nanti, deby nak citer hobi baru deby k

A story of mr freddy n ms sophie

Hello, my name is Sophie. This is my favourite cat tree. One day, I was lounging in my penthouse happily. (the penthouse is exclusively mine because i am the only one that can fit into this.)

I decided to take a nap because i was so tired after jumping and running all around the house. But then i realized that Mr Freddy is sleeping at the second floor apartment. 

"Please Mr Freddy, do not disturb me. I want to sleep."

Mr Freddy: "Hey, this is my cat tree! You cannot be here!"
Sophie: " This is my penthouse! You cannot fit!"

Mr Freddy: "We'll see about that~ now shoohhhh... go away!"

Mr Freddy: "Now see. I can fit in too!"

Oppss.. Oh oh... How to get out?? 

Okay never mind i'll just sit at this side. 

Wait a minute, where is Sophie??

There you are! This penthouse is mine, do you hear me? Mine!!!

~~The End~~~

Thames Festival: Night Carnival

Hidup kat London nie, memang agak menarik. Terlalu banyak festival, games, concerts disini. Yelah, antara major cities in the world. Last weekend kawan2 ajak pergi Thames Festival, a yearly event to celebrate London and River Thames. Actually The Mayor's Thames Festival ni kira a big event sebagai penutup summer setiap tahun. In fact, lusa ada lagi events untuk festival nie, contohnya River Race.

So yang Deby pergi ni dekat Blackfriars, iaitu Night Carnival. Dalam erti kata lain, a parade. Kat sini boleh lihat pelbagai costumes menarik (ada yang menakutkan, ada yang sexy mexy), numerous cultures (ala2 cult pun ada gak), music dan sebagainya.

Masa kat sini la Deby teringin sangat ada camera yang best2 untuk ambil gambar. Sebab bila ambil dengan blackberry Deby, memang serious tak cantik. Bateri cepat habis lak tu.Tapi untuk invest dslr, tak mampu la saya lagi. Ingatkan nak beli digital camera biasa je, coz yang lama (but not so old) camera dah hilang. entah mana deby campak. Ternampak a few bridge camera aka superzoom yang agak murah. compact system camera memang sangat la tidak ada dalam budget saya. decisions, decisions.

Anyway, enjoy the pictures yang tak bape nak lawa nie. Abaikan kepala2, rambut2, tangan2, sweater2 manusia yang termasuk dalam gambar ni. Unfortunately sy ni pendek orangnya, duduk kt depan pun still ada orang2 blocking sy.

InsyaAllah kalau Deby rajin masa River Race tu Deby try ambil gambar elok sikit. *wink*

rimau? dragon?

sexy lady

rupa macam wicked queen dalam carton snow white.

macam hantu je rupa dia

i have a suspicion patung ini menggambarkan mother earth? sebab dancer2 die kaler oren kuning, melambangkan summer. tp entah la. x berani nak ckp lebih.

another dragon? burung? entah

colours ni utk autumn kot?

ini saya serious tak tau ape maksud dia

scary ok

Seriously, ada customs/patung yang scary gila. so half way through deby terus balik. *ye saya penakut, especially time gelap*
Malam tu Deby notice, di awal parade semua costume ceria, warna2 summer, comel2 cantik2. tapi makin lama makin dark theme dia. ada symbolic? i have no idea.

adakah deby akan pergi lagi next year? mungkin tidak, kalo theme dia masih lagi menakutkan macam tahun nie.

P/S: belakang rumah deby nie thames river. :D

P/P/S: kat belakang2 ni juga Craven Cottage.

Borough market, London

Hari Sabtu lepas Deby dan kawan2 berkunjung ke Borough Market, tempat yang sangat famous di London kalau nak makan cheese.

Image taken from google

Borough Market ni terletak di Southwark, London. Cara paling senang nak ke sini ialah dengan melalui Tube (Underground) ke London Bridge (yes, London Bridge is falling down, falling down, falling down... as if!)

Dia open from Monday to Saturday, tapi Monday to Wednesday dia cuma open for lunch (10am-3pm), Thursday dia open 11am-5pm, Friday from 12pm to 6pm, and Saturday 8am to 5pm.

Seriously, this market is a haven for food! Dia ada macam2 jenis food, from cheese to fresh oysters, to fresh vegetables and fruits, even ostrich meat!

Untuk Muslim macam kita nie, pepandai la nak pilih, ye tak.

Salah satu favourite Deby is raclette, a Swiss dish. Basically dia cuma potatoes and cheese, tapi cara dia buat tu special.

Cheese dicairkan (melted) ada bara api kat atas cheese tu tapi sorry camera hp je so tak nampak

Lepas tu cheese tu akan dipotong (scraped off atau nama dia racler) dan diletak atas potatoes

Ni la end product dia. cheese + potatoes + pickles. sedap gila

Selain tu, member Deby serang kiosk oysters dia. Fresh, katanya.

Fresh oysters! besar gila, ada native ada rock oyster

sorry gambar tak cantik

Banyak lagi food kat situ. For desert Deby makan german cheese with fruits (cheesecake lah!), sedap cheese dia, and vegetarian friendly ye semua nie.

Nanti ada peluang saya mau pergi lagi. Banyak lagi tak dapat makan. <3