ASMA HAMID

Last week flew by so quickly, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I hope every week leading up to my flight back to Malaysia goes by just as swiftly. It was also incredibly productive! At work, I discovered an issue with my project. Instead of getting overwhelmed and overthinking it, I approached it like an experienced engineer and tackled it head-on. It's amazing how much stress overthinking can cause. Here's to more days like that!  On Monday, Don and I went cycling. Initially, we didn't expect to cover much distance, but this time we went the farthest compared to all our previous rides. My favorite part was cycling on an actual road for half the route; it boosted my confidence riding on the road. Wednesday was tennis day, and I'm starting to really enjoy it because we had our own dedicated coach. We focused on drills to improve our ball-handling skills because I still can't keep a rally going. Friday brought us badminton and a game of "7Wonders" at Meriam'

Two weeks back, I mentioned how autumn had finally arrived. Well, I take that back now. Once again, I jumped the gun on the weather. It's been boiling this week, and I've had a tough time sleeping, tossing and turning due to the heat. The temperature feels like we're in Malaysia, except we don't have any air conditioning here. Luckily, I found some Thai green tea tucked away in my kitchen cabinet and decided to pamper myself with a generous cup. Setting the weather aside, this week has been quite productive, despite the emotional rollercoaster I've been on. My mum was in the hospital on Monday (she's out now, thank God), and it was really tough knowing that there was nothing I could do about it. I did call her as soon as I found out, but it didn't provide much solace because I knew that if things took a turn for the worse, I couldn't be with her right away. I also caught up with a former colleague, and it dawned on me how much I missed working with him.

I knew I couldn't bear being home all weekend and to be honest, I didn't want to be alone either. Sometime midweek, at the same moment I had organised a game of badminton and invited myself over to M&D's flat, I also texted Faten to see if she had any plans. We decided to go to Epping Forest. I had prepared baked sushi and Malaysian-style sardine sandwiches for the walk which I was quite pleased about. As I rode the tube on my way to meet up with Faten, I had a chance to reflect on my week and my own feelings. I'm about to be quite vulnerable here. I generally struggle with liking myself, but on days like yesterday, I managed to appreciate myself for the effort that I had put into making myself like myself a bit more. I know they say you should love yourself, but I think that's a bit too far-fetched for me right now. We took the central line all the way to Epping, the final station, and started the walk through the forest. Sometimes, we followed paths that were

The season is changing, it feels like autumn is finally here. I used to get excited over autumn, but over the years, I've grown to appreciate the summer. It feels a bit sad that I can now hear the leaves rustling, I can feel the temperature dropping and I can see the days getting shorter. I sometimes wish that I could share this feeling with you so that you can experience what I'm experiencing. But you don't like the cold and we don't talk anymore. - - -  I just got off a one-hour call with someone who seems to understand me better than I understand myself because we're so much alike. We're both in this phase of life where our comfort feels unsettling. We’re at a crossroad - we're caught between the comfort zone and a restless yearning for more. In a way, we're living our dream lives but we still feel incomplete. We feel like there’s much more potential within us but the idea of committing to something bigger feels daunting.  Carrying on with our present

I've had a lot of difficult weeks lately, with a few days in between where I'd feel a bit relieved because I've managed to distract myself. I'm going through some sort of dilemma where I'm growing older but I don't feel like I've achieved anything or that I'm heading towards the right direction. I have been telling myself that it's ok to just live but I can't 'just live' for the rest of my life. In addition to that, some of my friends are leaving and it takes me back to the time when THG disbanded. A massive part of me being here is because I have my friends here but when they leave, I don't just lose friends but I'd also lose my reasons... And finding new people that you like being with and can really depend on and trust (as an adult) is so difficult because you don't give people that many chances anymore... That's a bit of my life rant!  Now, those distractions were actually very enjoyable distractions. There's quite

in case anyone (inc. myself) is wondering - i've been trying to finish off my portugal blogpost and because of that, i haven't been doing my weekly ones. sadge.

It was a long weekend because of the bank holiday. Munirah and I had earlier planned to crash Nina's Paris trip. This was something I told Nina that I wanted to join as a passing comment at the end of last year, and it actually happened. I think it's a bit crazy just to think about how about 15 years ago, we were up north in this country growing up together. We had then gone to Malaysia and lived our lives separately, only meeting up once a year. And then here we are, abroad, experiencing Disney again but when we're a lot older. If you had told me that when I was 12, I would have laughed and ran off to play, but now, I think life's pretty incredible. On Monday, my uni friends who stayed over left in the morning. They kept on inviting me to go to Sheffield with them, but they only did because they knew I had other plans. I went into town to get myself some snacks for the trip and then headed into London that evening. I ran for my train, but I got to Victoria pretty early

Finally - a weekend to myself which usually means that most of it was spent catching up with people in Malaysia. I wouldn't have minded going out to be fair. It was good to just catch up with my family and friends online. I stayed in Maidenhead, and because the weather was nice, I had obviously felt guilty being inside the house so I brought my book to the river and instead of reading it, I had a nap. But it was a very good nap.  Obviously, I'm only picking this back up after 2 weeks of laziness. Last week, I was in London for a potluck picnic. I made chicken pie for it which took forever to thicken because I had too much in the pot - it turned out ok in the end... I think. I hadn't tasted it so I hope it was alright. It was nice just hanging out with friends, but it made me realise that I'm no longer who I used to be. I used to take those opportunities to really get to know people but I'm no longer that anymore - making new friends is a lot of effort!  So that brin

It was another busy weekend - I didn't have time/energy to write a post last week! I had half expected it to be a recovery weekend because I felt like I haven't been able to have a breather since Eid but it didn't go that way. On Friday, Auntie A came back from Switzerland and had dropped by my place to get her luggage. An Auntie who lives in Maidenhead picked her up and they dropped by mine for a bit. They invited me to a potluck picnic on Sunday that another Malaysian was organising. I wasn't feeling well on Saturday but pushed through anyway. I went out to the shops to get ingredients and spent the rest of the day preparing for Sunday. It was good that I was able to get myself busy! Sunday was the best. I initially intended to help Auntie M out with preparing but I got ready too late. Uncle picked me up from my flat, we went to their house and bungkus some nasi lemak. There was a lot of food and I'd like to believe that I tasted every single one of them because I