from gold coast to sunshine coast : the coast line

I was in standby mode last weekend. Macam-macam hal... Was in no mood to write anymore, terribly exhausted, excruciating headache, which is gone on Monday, alhamdullillah. Hmmm... maybe one of the reason of my not being me last weekend because I was anxiously waiting for my sifoo greenlight for conference submittion. My co-author was hoping there will be no changes, for she didn't want to spend the weekend working. She celebrated her birthday yesterday. I understand how she felt. I was too, hoping there will be no changes to the paper. Was totally out of this editing work. I need a BREAK.... (owhh but have another submittion in mid April)..... sangap betul

Anyway, I finally have the spirit to update the blog. Luckily I have some pictures that do not require a lot of words to describe... ahahhahah.... otak ku refuse to work again. These pictures were taken onboard AirAsia went we left Coolangatta Airport for Malaysia.



A view taken just after we left the airport. Nie dah masuk New South Wales, another state in Australia.








We are now in Brisbane, nearing Brisbane Airport. That is the Gateway Bridge, the only motorway with a toll.




I think that is Redcliff, one of the popular tourist attraction in Queensland. Further up is another popular tourist attraction, the Sunshine Coast.

More picture in our fotopages.

Bon Voyage to Feeza and family

Another family went home for good. Time passing without notice. Almost everybody I know, when I first came here to Brisbane is going back. And I realised that soon my time will come, but feeling anxious on what will happened then.

We sent feeza at the airport on the 5th February. Feeza came here to do her masters degree. She and her family came a few months after we came here, and we were appointed by the committee to help her settle down in Brisbane. We have a Malaysian Student society, almost all Malaysian student (Malays) is a member of the society. This society will organise social gathering, and also help new comers to settle down for the first week. What we usually do, for example, find temporary accommodation, prepare meals (depending on the situation), show newcomer around the city, get important things done, like opening up bank account, mobile phone registration and buying groceries and stuff. And also showing the new students around the campus.

All member will take turn in doing this, more like, hmm how to put this in words, Ok... hmmm... like this. Say when we first arrived, the committee has selected several families to help us settling down. Later, after we have settled down, we were then assigned to help newcomer with the same thing. And when feeza arrived in 2007, we were one of the families who look after them for the first few days, until they found a permanent resident. When they first came to Brisbane, feeza has just finished her confinement (berpantang) and adam, her son, was just over 2 months.





And adam was almost 2 years when they left Brisbane for good.







Bon Voyage, nice knowing you guys. I know feeza reads my blog occasionally, so, all the best feeza. Hope to see feeza and family in Malaysia in the near future.

Finally.... see you again Malaysia

Alhamdullillah....finally we are leaving Malaysia soon. Aiyah, I am out of words laaa.... how fortunate I have some pictures to describe the day.





Tu semua mereka-mereka yang stranded bersama kami..... Tak sabar untuk masuk waiting room.

Ada hikmah di sebalik kejadian ini.

We left Malaysia at half past 7 pm, Tuesday, 28th October.

Still no news

The next day, at 9am, we went down for breakfast. Mat Salih were everywhere, at the lounge, outside the hotel, at the dining area. There were some having sun bathing outside the hotel. The hotel was actually a shop lots converted to hotel.


We met a Malay couple there. They were going to Sydney for a holiday. And we also met a Chinese family. Both of them were worried about their connecting flight. Aiyah... sure burn la...they just hope AirAsia would arrange something.

I was also worried. I was schedule to present about my research on Friday, 31st of October. I haven't done the slides yet. I was planning to do the slides when arrived in Brisbane.

Luckily the Nasi Lemak was yummy. Asking around, nobody knows what is the situation.

We were told later, at around noon, buses will pick us up at 2pm. The AirAsia has charted MAS airplane that scheduled to leave at 4pm that afternoon. Apparently they could not fixed the problem with the AirAsia plane. This is one good news to me and atang, because that means we will arrived at Brisbane airport, instead of Cooloongatta.

TBC again laaa...

Nobody tells us what is really going on

After we finished the ikan bakar at Nyonya's place, my bro sent us back to the airport (dlm ati rasa nak patah balik Seremban je). We were supposed to board the plane at 11.15pm. However, looking around, it was unlikely the plane would leave at 11.45pm. Everybody was so anxious, nobody was around telling us what is going on. The AirAsia hostesses were giving out free burger for everyone. But since we just had a heavy dinner, we didn't take it.

We waited, feeling haggard. Luckily me and atang were sitting in front of a TV. There was a Tamil film showing at that time, I don't know the title of the film, but it was a wicked funny film. At least something to divert our attention from worrying about the flight.

Almost quarter after 12 am (Tuesday, 28th October), there was an annoucement telling that the flight is cancelled due to major mechanical problem to the airplane. Sudden uproar took place. People was frustrated OK. We have been waiting of 4 hours, wondering what is going on. Until they decided to cancelled the flight. More than half of the passengers are Caucasian. A handful of passengers have small kids with them. There are also a number of old citizen. Aiyah.... kesian betul....



The AirAsia management has arranged a hotel for us. But before we could leave the airport, there was some misunderstanding incident happened between AA staff and the immigration. We were told later that, according to the immigration department, our status in Malaysia is not valid anymore, because in the record we have left Malaysia. Somebody told me, if we committed a crime, we have an alibi to defense (I don't know about this la... need to ask my sistah for confirmation...). We saw airport staff, going up and down, to settle this matter. At that time, some passengers had even sleeping on the chair. I myself felt like laying flat on the chair. So tired and sleepy.

Nearly 3am, we were able to leave the airport, and walked to the awaiting buses outside the airport.





We reached the Nilai Hotel at around 3.30am. I really felt like zombie, couldn't think straight. But I still can hear clearly from Atang, how he wished we could go back to Seremban instead.

TBC...again

The flight was delayed 1 day

Last week I have mentioned that our flight was delayed for 1 day. Now I will tell you a story about our ordeal at LCC terminal on the 27th October, the day that we were supposed to depart for Brisbane.

On that unfortunate day (but fortunate in other circumstances), we left Seremban at close to 6pm. We were schedule to leave Malaysia at 9.40pm. We left early because we didn't want to be caught in the traffic jam, due to Deepavali holiday. We took the Sepang trunk road (alahai lupe la jalan tu...tapi jalan dalam, lalu Salak Lama, Nilai, Sepang). Arrived at LCCT around 6.40pm. Oh yes, we were sent by my-in-laws to the airport. Upon arrival before check-in, I look at that big black box that displayed the flight itinery searching for our flight information. I was suprised when I saw on the board, next to our flight #, it said "cancelled". Eh betul ke nie? I did double, triple checked with the travel itinery, all particular is the same, except the departure time. I assumed it was a mistake. So we went up to the counter, and check-in.

Later we joined Along, and in-laws (all atang's siblings were there, except one of his brother) for a dinner. Along said, lets have some last McD dinner. After the last meal, we waited for my bro to arrive, and soon my sistah, my BIL and newphew, haziq have to leave because they had an open house invitation to attend. So when my bro arrived, we went to Dome for a cuppa.

At 9pm, we said goodbye to my bro, and went to the waiting room. Normally we will board a plane, at least half an hour before the flight leave right. But went we arrived at the waiting area, people were still sitting down, and it was already quarter after 9. So I tought we have missed the calling, so we went up to the I counter for query. So happened at that time, the AirAsia people were about to annouce about the delay. It was expected the new time schedule at 11.45pm. Immediately atang called my bro, wondering whether he was still nearby. Lucky for us, he was still within the airport area. So we asked for the transit pass, and went out to meet my bro. My bro took us to a restaurant for a second dinner, this time at Nyonya Ikan Bakar (sedap nie... nak rekomen tapi lupe kat mano).

TBC....

Time to pack up

The thing that I want to avoid finally arrive. Have to do it.... have no choice....



Seperti biasa, athirah akan mula sibuk nak masuk luggage.



This time I bought Nan Yang White Coffee O besides Aik Cheong Coffee.



Full of instant mee. This luggage was 70% packed.



Some books and fav CDs.

As a result, we have exceeded our luggage allowance by 10kg. Have to pay RM150.00 for that. No need to comment laa.... I have expected this to happen. However, I have to leave Tun Mahathir autobiography (that big grey book, underneath "CEO Malaysia" book) because it is way to heavy. Just imagine I have that book in the luggage, must have cost me more. Am reading "Honk!! If you're a Malaysia".

Bon Voyage Ainul and family

Ainul and family went home for good. We sent them off at Brisbane airport. All the best Ainul, mana-mana pun sama aje..janji hati tenang... Dont forget us yaa... ada rezeki kite jumpe kat kampung.

apa la keje si yaya tu