Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri

Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri to all of my family and friends! This is the second year we celebrated Eid away from home and it's not the same as when we're in Malaysia. In fact it's pretty really low key  for us since the boys went to school and Daniel went to work as usual. I spent most of the day cooking dinner. My parents, my brother Najib and my sister Nabila are in Mecca celebrating their Eid ul-fitr there and my brother, Nasfi and my sis-in  law, Shahnaz went back to Shahnaz's hometown in Johor and my brother, Najmi is somewhere in KL. So we're pretty scattered all over. Being a close-knit family, this is not normal for us. It's kind of sad in a way to have Eid differently from what we used to have. But changes are sometimes inevitable. My wish is to have our families, from both sides nearby. That would be great  because we love to have all of you here or we could visit you guys :-)

Mushroom and onion quiche for breakfast, back to normal breakfast time. During Ramadhan, we have to get up super early in the morning to have our Sahur before fasting time starts at dawn. In summer, it could be as early as 3.30am. But towards the end of the fasting month, it is more forgiving, the last morning of Ramadhan we got up at 4.30am.

Dinner was the highlight of the day. We decided to wear our traditional outfit to put us in a more festive mood. Ezzat lost his front tooth later that night. Poor boy already had a hard time eating during dinner.

Our dinner - beriyani rice, tandoori chicken, cucumber raita, cucumber and onion chutney, dhal curry and fruit salad.

Cheesecake as dessert. I accidentally baked this 30 minutes longer than I should. But it turned pretty good fortunately.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Eid-ul Fitr 2008

This post is long overdue. The next Eid which is Eid-ul Adha is coming up on Dec 8th, and only now I am putting up pics of Eid-ul Fitr. The pic above was taken the day before Eid, last day of fasting month. It was raining in the morning and I love rain especially when I drive pass by the padi field on the way to office. The padi has been harvested in September so all one can see at this time around is just water. But it's a good time to catch fresh water fish inside these plots!

People busy buying fresh meat and chickens at last minute. One can find many makeshifts stalls like this one here around the villages and town. They're mushrooming especially towards the end of the fasting season.

I love this candid shot. It's a test shot prior to the real one taken by Najib and plus we're so late for prayer at the mosque.

And hence, this is the only proper Eid family picture for this year. Not so great, plus Nabila is still in New Zealand.

Here's Farhan all smiling.

And Ezzat is happily showing his wallet full of money!

Another test shot. And this is taken at the boys' great grandparents's house at the village. They've passed away so many years ago but dad's sister and brother and his family live here. And one family is missing, another uncle who lives in Kuala Lumpur. Eid is not that fun when the Mukthi's fam are not all together. Otherwise we would have another 10 additional people in the pic!

2008 family picture.

The boys are pretty restless actually. It's probably around 3.30pm and is way past their nap time.

Next stop - Uncle Sharuddin's house. And met my cousin, Nizam with his wife and kids. Actually we visited another uncle, mom's oldest brother - Nizam's father. But I didnt get to take nice pics there. Anyway, Nizam is the one sitting next to Ezzat, and his wife is on the very left. We're all tired by this time, coz it's already late afternoon but it's still fun and plenty of yummy food!

Just hanging out, watching cartoons.

Oh dad, so busy replying text messages wishing Happy Eid.

Here's Uncle Sharuddin, on the left, with his parents - my Tok Ciks, and his wife. Tok Cik - the one in blue is mom's uncle. That makes him hmmm..my 2nd grandfather? I also call his wife Tok Cik. Heh..so it can get pretty confusing sometimes. So there's a male Tok Cik and the female Tok Cik. Get it?

Aahh the lovely ladies. The 3 younger ones are Auntie Jah's daughters and that makes them my 2nd cousins. The one at the very right in light purple got married 2 days ago. Pictures to come later. Mom, u're closing your eyes!

And here are the gentlemen. From left, my 3rd brother Najmi, 1st cousin Nizam, my 2nd bro - Nasfi and Najib, the eldest son in the fam.

Hmm I think this is taken on 3rd day of Eid. This is my friend Laila and her daughter, Aleesha. And they came all the way from Kuala Lumpur coz Laila's hubby's hometown is in Alor Star.

One happy family.

Eid in 2 days!

I'm at the office, still. When everyone else..(almost) seems to already be in Eid mood. Luckily my assistant Ina still turns up to work, happily singing along to Eid songs on the radio since early morning. Emir has started his school holidays yesterday for a week while Ezzat and Farhan still go to their kindergarten which is already 90% empty by the way. AndI rather them spend some time learning something over there rather than at the laundry shop watching Ultraman the whole day. Luckily they don't protest!

One good thing this year, I don't have to join the frenzied traffic on the highway unlike the past 13 years coz I am already in Alor Star! Though I kinda miss all the excitement of going back to my 'kampung' (Kampung = village). It's always been very bad this time of the year, when people rush to go back to their hometown and traffic jam will always be massive, and cars will stuck for hours on highway. Along the way to office these few days, I saw many cars parked along the road side, the drivers stopped to buy fresh meat from instant mushrooming small stalls. And then there are lemang sellers everywhere. Lemang is a delicacy and one will usually find it only during Eid. It's made from glutinous rice, and instead of water, it's cooked with coconut milk, barbecued in hollowed bamboo stick. Yummy to be eaten with rendang which is another delicacies. Rendang is a dish, we either use white or red meat or vegetables even, cooked with some herbs and spices, chilies and coconut milk, slowly simmered so that the meat becomes tender and the liquid is almost gone, and the flavor of all the ingredients are nicely infused together. It takes hours, but the result is worth all the waiting. I'll take some pictures if I come across any of these later.

By the way, I still have many pictures need to be uploaded. Do you guys still want to see them? It's been quite a long time and they may not be that fun anymore to see...heh..I'm such a lazy bum when it comes to uploading coz it takes such a long time sometimes.

Anyway, here are some family pictures taken on morning of Eid last year. Mom always want the color to be coordinated so you'll see some sort of uniforms in here hehe. Nabila (my little sister) is missing though since she's in Auckland and will still be there until end of this year. I went to the tailor yesterday and my Eid dress is not ready yet coz the tailor's mom-in-law just passed away last week. But she said she'll try her best to make it ready by the 30th. So let's hope it will be ready by then. It's a tradition to wear new traditional clothes on morning of Eid. The boys already have theirs since mom bought for them. And Uncle Daniel has one too actually. Not sure if it fits him though. Too bad he's can't join us this year. Next year perhaps? :=)

Ezzat 's playing 'bunga api' on eve of 2007 Eid.

A picture of Mukthi's Fam plus Yati on morning of 2007 Eid. Notice the colorful envelopes that Farhan's holding? Kids get money in packets like that instead of presents - we call it 'duit raya'. I miss those days when I was still entitled to that huhu. Really fun days with all the $$$$! Nab's missing. Adik!.....Next year boleh join balik naaaaaaa.

Just us.

Hanging out before going back to Dad's village in Jitra.

Cheeky boys, happy to get duit raya!

Aaahhhh..this is the larger version of the Mukthi's clan at my Wan's house at our village. Almost all of my uncles and aunties are here, except for one with his wife. Wan (grand dad) and Tok (grandma) already passed away so many years ago. Dad's the eldest in the family, with 3 other brothers and 2 sisters. See how the boys outnumbered the girls? I think that's explain my 3 boys? Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of mom's side of the family. Hope to get some this year.

The heroes.