Jika kita perhatikan

Saya mempunyai banyak masa sejak pencen dan bermastautin di perkampongan di Amerika Syarikat. Ramai di antara kita menganggap cara hidup di Amerika, adalah seperti yg kita lihat di kaca Televisyen. Dalam pemerhatian saya, lebih ramai rakyat Amerika yang hidup dalam kesempitan. Kita sangka bahawa semua orang yang mempunyai kenderaan di Amerika, adalah orang senang. Kebanyakan mereka hidup dalam hutang. Kenderaan ada lah benda yang wajib. Di bandar-bandar besar sahaja mempunyai pengankutan awam, tetapi bagi bandar yang sederhana, tidak ada, apa tah lagi bandar-bandar yang kecil yang penduduknya kurang daripada 10,000. Untuk hidup kebanyakan mereka bekerja dengan gaji minima, terutamanya mereka yang hanya berpendidikan setakat sekolah menengah saja. Motivasi untuk menyambung pendidikan ke tahap yang lebih tinggi sangatlah berkurangan. Lepasan sekolah menengah (high school), di bandar-bandar kecil kebanyakannya tidak tahu membaca dan menulis dengan baik. mereka hanya tahu menulis nama mereka dan nombor sahaja. Tidak suka membaca, sebab tidak boleh membaca dengan baik. Walau bagaimana pun kebanyakan mereka pandai bercakap, yang tidak tahu ekor pangkal. Kadang-kadang, saya merasa kasihan terhadap mereka ini, cakap sahaja berdegar-degar, tetapi semuanya kosong.
Entahlah...

Toys: of grown men and boys

People say the difference between men' toys and boys' are the price. How true. Boys and men like the same toys. Cars, heavy and mean vehicles, monster trucks etc. Boys got the thrill of having those you bought them from the stores. Driving them over sand pit or on the floor. But 'real Men" like the real things. Guess my husband is one. Look at my yard, there is the mean D7 Bulldozer, a White backhoe, a Pontoon boat, a tractor, and the smallest one is the ATV. Inside the house there are guns of different capacity, from SKS, a few shotguns, a few handguns, meanest of the handguns is the Magnum. (Some of them I enjoy sharing my husband's collection and some are my very own.)
Computers too are toys for grown men. There are 4 computers in the house of two people and 3 dogs. Wish the dogs know how to operate the computer, so that I can move them computers to their houses. Well, the spare bedroom is full of computers and their paraphernalia.
The 2 garages are full of power tools which I can not even think of naming them or what they are for.
Men, men, men, wish they remain as boys when come to toys.

It's gone for good

I had my long awaited surgery last week Wednesday 17th of August. It is gone now, that little biddy thing called gall bladder. It took only a few minutes to get it out, (but of course I was not aware of it). The waiting was the painful one. Tests after tests were done, just to confirm that it is the culprit that was making me sick for a long while. Even after it was first confirmed, and a date was set up for the surgery, the surgeon wanted another nuclear medicine test to be done. After those were taken care of, I had to go and have the lab works done. I have my arms poked everywhere to get blood, x-rays, ekg, etc.
Waiting for the day of the surgery was not that bad because I had company from Nashville and that helped kept my mind off from the surgery. Then the day arrived. Packed my things in a small backpack and off we went to get the surgery done. We had to wait for quite a while, though my time was supposed to go under the knife was at 11:30 am, it was'nt until noon I went to sleep under those big lights.
An hour or so later i was in the recovery room with my husband was no where to be seen. I woke up with a little nausea, other wise i was ok. I had to stay in the day ward for another hour or so, before I was allowed to go home. My husband was there waiting. He was arranging to have drugs ordered and be picked up at the pharmacy on the way home.
I was put on the wheel chair and wheeled out to the car and off we went to pick the prescription and home. At home, I looked down on my tummy, and i saw 4 places covered with bandaid, so I guess those were the places that had been cut up.
I slept and woke up having nausea and threw up. I could not eat or drink anything because my throat was very sore. I went to sleep again.
The next day my friend from Nashville and his friend M came to visit me. M cooked me chicken soup and the aroma kept me awake in bed. However, i could not eat that lovely soup because I still could not swallow. I ony drank some of the soup. Thank you M and Mo for coming to see me and cooked me the lovely soup which I ate yesterday.
They stayed overnight and in the morning my husband made waffles (the easiest thing to make) for breakfast. I sat and joined them for breakfast, but i still could not swallow, I ended up eating most of the cantaloupe instead. I hope they did not serik coming to visit me. I am sorry i could not entertain them properly.
oh I forgot to mention, when i was recovering, my husband went and got me a present, a new toy for me, a SHOTGUN.
Alhamdulillah, I am doing fine now. My staples will out on the 24th August.

What I got for being a brave girl

For being good and brave to undergo all the lab tests and the nuclear scanning, my husband bought me a 9mm hand gun. Drool Ayu drool..shoots good and just nicely fit in my hands. I have been target shooting these few days and trying to beat Ayu's accuracy. And I am getting better especially with this little cutie.

She came and...

She came and before we knew it we were sending her to airport again. Before she even boarded the plane, we were already missing her. We made sure she got through the screening area before we left incase the gun powder residue might got her into trouble.
We hope she had great fun the weekend she had with us. We sure did enjoy her company. Wished she had more time to ride the four wheelers and had some fun riding on wilder terrain. We could have arranged a trip to the river bank where it would be more challenging rides. Wished she could go horse riding too.
I knew my husband enjoyed some intelligent doscussion with her. They discussed Einstien which was beyond my range and all those things about space travel. i guess my husband got carried awy with his love for sciences and science fiction ;).
We hope she would return.

My Guest is coming

That friday evening, Bill and I left for the airport to pick up my first Malaysian guest. There was some delay, and when the plane landed we scanned our eyes for a familiar face (muka melayu). There were many planes landed at the same time and there were so many passangers pouring out of the gate. Bill, kept on saying, there's a short one and skinny one...then nope looks old...and again there's another...nope someone was hugging her, nope... not our guest.Then there she was smiling towards us. I told our guest during one of our YM messages to look for an old matsalleh and an equally old melayu woman waiting for her, she would not be wrong.
Well, we had our guest tucked in our small speedy car and sped off home to the boonies. Bet she never knew how the boonies look like before. we arrived home late and then after a roti canai do, we all went to sleep. My guest slept on the couch.
The next morning we went to town to get our fishing licences. Then my guest had fun riding all the big machines around the yard.
That's all for my day one hehehe

A Bad Fishing day is better than a good day at work

There is this advertisement on the local radio saying that a good day at work is nothing compared to fishing. Of course, the advertiser was promoting his fishing gear store. However, indeed, fishing is a very good way to relax and catch on your dreams. I used to go fishing with my husband and my dogs during weekend not so long ago, when we still have the old motorhome. We used to load up the motorhome with all our needs for a few days away from home. Of course, when the dogs came along, their food too. The dogs enjoyed the swim in the lake and keep unwanted creatures away from our camp. Bubba used to ride beside the driver and no one could make him move from the spot. Mind you Bubba was not a small dog...a real big mastif Boxer, with an ugly face. He used to get a lot of attention on the road. Those were the days. Later we had 3 big dogs, getting them to agree to get on the motorhome was a chore. Since then the dogs did not go along anymore and we only limit our camping for overnight.
Let's get back to fishing. When my guest came, one of the agenda was to go moonlingt midnight fishing. I usually did not go with the 'crew', but since my guest was going, I too went and got a fishing licence for the weekend.
According to the 'crew' a diehard fishers, the night we went was the worst night they had, since there were so many boats anchored and fishing. Usually They would come home when their 3 or more ice chests (coolers) get full, but that night we had only one ice chest full. Anyways that was more than we can eat.
The ride on the boat was heavenly, the breeze kind of make you want to go to sleep. I was sleepy, since my guest and i did not nap in the afternoon. We spent yakking. We packed some food to take a long in case we get hungry. We also brought along an empty bucket, incase we need to ermmmm like my husband said 'to water the fish' We did not use the bucket though.
When we arrived, our seasoned fishers found that their favourite spot had been taken, but the sonar on the boat showed a lot of fish swimming around under us. We picked a spot and anchored. Then, my husband was fixing our fishing rods with fake worms and each fishing pole has 3 hooks. We began fishing and guess who caught the first fish, my guest!!
Most time according to our seasoned fishers, they caught 3 fish at one time, but that night only one time Lynn's grandson caught 2 at one time.
Well, we went on jigging our fishing lines, with my guest sitting on my left and my husband on my right. They kept bringing in fish after fish and none bit mine! however, when we were getting to leave I caught the last one...a big one too.

Sifat, tamak haloba, dengki dan pentingkan diri

Tell me if anyone out there does not have one of the above. I like to read the problems and issues in the Utusan Malaysia column DCCK (Dicelah-celah kehidupan). Most of us have one or the other, but in different degree. I read about single women who are educated and holding good professional carreers yang tak teragak-agak bermadu demi untuk memenuhi permintaan nafsu kehidupan mereka. I sit and think, isn't this one kind of tamak? you want to have it all at the expense of another? Don't they ever think that they are blessed with kesenangan, kemewahan, kebendaan etc. and not thankful to Maha Penyayang? Praise Allah for what they have dan rezeki yang mencurah. Don't they think, that is their rezeki? perhaps itu saja rezeki mereka? Kenapa mesti tamak dan iri hati dengan alasan tidak complete kalau tak bersuami. Enjoy anugerah Allah, dengan apa yang ada and kalau bukan rezeki tu, memang tidak menjadi rezeki.
Just my thought for the day. To get away from the miserable feeling before my surgery :)

To know or not to know

I guess everyone of us are in the same dilema as me when it comes to see a doctor for an illment. The symptoms seem to be not too life threatening yet it worries and bother you. You try every kind of remedies that you think would solve the problems, but still the symptoms remain. Your other half persuaded, pushed and almost drag you to make that important appointment. However, you are still waiting for that home made remedy to work, or the over the counter medicine to hit the spot. For two months those trial by error medication did not work. That is my story. Unable to take the bothering symptoms anymore, I made that Phone call for an appointment.
I went to see the doctor or Primary Care Physician. So, I had to describe all the uncomfortable feelings that is messing inside me. It is easier to describe it in Malay which does not have equivalent in english, like you feel "macam ada seketul angin menumbuk naik" every time after I ate. That ball of air pushes up and it would make it hard for me to breathe. It will also trigger a cough that definitely make me breathless and pain in the chest. In "my medical self diagnosis", I associate it with food, with gastrities, heartburn etc. So all the home remedies, like eliminating greasy food and taking gallons of maalox and zantac were my presciption. Well, they did not work.
My doctor, then thought I might have problem with my useless spare part called the gall bladder. I was scheduled for the ultrasound and indeed it was discovered that, that small thing is acting up. It is collecting sand or batu to make a permata. Then I am scheduled for a surgery to remove it. It will not take place until after Mid July. Until then I still have to put up with the symptoms.
Do you still think ignorant is bliss or it is good to know what is wrong with you.

Critters of my woods

Syyyysh...don't let Roo, Dumdum and Max hear about them. There are possums, raccoons, rabbits, armadillos, squirrels, tortoises, owls etc. that make their homes in my woods. They dug up holes to make nests, they live on the trees and they tunnels underground like those "tubes" in underground Londra. There are ghophers as well as moles. Every time after the yard/lawn is mowed, there would be little mountains came up dotting the yard.
Roo, Dumdum are good hunters, but Max who is supposed to be a sheep guard dog, is learning fast. So far Max has brought home tortoises and baby birds to play with. Once in a while Roo would let him play with the rat that she caught. Max is still fancinated by the growing hill that the gophers are kicking out from the ground. Max would bark, scratch and lastly dig up a big hole in order to get to the gophers. Gophers are smart and they have a network of tunnels underground and Max can dig up to Malaysia and never catch one.
I have never seen these critters before in my life until I moved here. I have seen some pictures of them of course, but have never really seen them "in person" hehehe. The first winter I was here there was alot of snow and one morning when i went out to sweep the snow off the deck, I saw these giant "footprints" along the house. I called out to my husband, and when he saw them, he said "who would be snooping around". I was worried. Actually my husband knew that those were rabbits prints, but just to make me nervous and teased me.
There was this loveable looking creature that look at you so harmlessly at night and it is white and furry and that I learn is a possum. Raccoon wears a mask and very furry too. It looks like a big cat and I was so sorry that one day Bubba (my old departed dog) brought home one.
Dumdum is a bird dog (Labrador retriever) yet I have never seen him caught anything in the air yet except a rabbit or too. Roo is another kind, an Anatolian sheperd, but she is everything. She could hunt and catch quails in the air, squirrels in the air and numerous other critters. She also killed 2 armadillos in one morning. Poor critters they are not very safe in my woods. Do you know that when you shine the flash light into the owl's eyes you can catch them. They would not know what was coming. Owls make eerie love calls at night and some nights they would be calling for hours.
Another kind of critters that come out at night that can scare you is the cayote. they are actullly harmless. they hunt only small animals, but their cry or howling they make, would scare you. Max is supposed to be a cayote killer. Cayote is scared of big white dog at night, but since Max is still a puppy, he is scared of them instead.

So, all critters that make your home in my woods, please hide when you hear three dog stomping into the woods in the morning and in the evening. You will be safe if you stay real quiet.

Love of my life

It was worth the long wait for the love of my life. One morning while driving to work, I heard Radio 4 DJ said that there was a long distance request for a song by Jim Birkman (sic) entitled "Love of My Life" It was from Bill in Oklahoma to "Mutiara" in Penang. Then the news broke that I had an American boyfriend. Then I had many phone calls from friends who tuned to the radio while driving to work that morning. Tiada rahsia lagi. Then people pieced things together and they deduced that my several trips to the US was to meet up with my boyfriend. Which was not true at all. Bill was an old friend, and on one of my trips to the US, I called his old phone number. Surprise, surprise, he still kept the number and we are still using the same number now.
After that phone call, we kept in touch online, emailing and talking on icq. We did not meet until a year later. Then we met and end of the story.

Anniversary Gift

Although my anniversary is not until this weekend, the present has arrived. It was delivered by DHL. I was not particularly paying much attention when the DHL van drove up the hill and into my driveway. I was busy mowing my yard. The yard needed to be mowed badly since the rain has turned it into a hayfield. The driver came out and I asked him to put the package on the deck.
After i was done mowing, I picked up the package to brought it inside. It could be the tractor parts, the computer stuff, the ATV parts or whatever my husbands finds interesting online. I told my husband about the package that arrived when he came home. He said it was for me, it was my anniversary present and I can open it eventhough it is still a few days away. It is a present and it is meant to be opened. So, I did. It was what I really wanted and was plannnig to get it for my birthday, but my husband beat me to it.
I spent the whole evening trying to read the manual for this too technical toy. I am unashamedly technologically challenged. I read and I read and finally could get the basic operational system. I am just satisfied that this toy works and I will try other functions when the need arises.

Alone during bad weather

This is my first experience being alone for a couple of days. My father in law is in critical condition in a nursing home about 2 hours away from where i live. My husband has gone there to be with the family and make necessary arrangements. I had to stay home to take care of the animals. I would join him if things turn for the worse. However, those 2 days were, the weather decided to turn bad. There were bad stormy days and nights, with tornadoes and thunderstorms and hailstorm. We had had bad and severe weather before, but my husband was around to take care of everything.

Before he left he had made sure that the underground cellar was prepared. He made sure the batteries for the TV and weather radio are working. He also made sure all the important documents and stuff were moved into the cellar. The only thing we did not do was to run the drill for the dogs again. Well, the weather turned bad the first evening he was away. I put the chicken in their pen and fed them real early. There are a few hundreds of them. I put the pick up truck in the barn because if not the tornado, the hails would break the windshields. I could not put it in the garage because, the 2 garages have 2 ATVs and my car. I could not squeeze the pick up into it without knocking something.

I was prepared. I brought pillows, food and drink into the cellar and waiting for the time to go in. When the time came I let the dogs off their chains and whistled for them. I fixed the ramp for them to go in. I did a trial run, 2 dogs did just as instructed, but my puppy max refused to go in and had to be pulled in with the leash. Great, it took about 3 minutes to get them in.
The weather was not tornadic the first evening, but with wind and hails, I decided to wear the weather inside the cellar with the dogs. So when it started to have lightning, I got the dogs into the cellar, without much problems, because this time I had food to persuade the puppy to get in without a fuss.
We stayed there until the storm blown over, about 0ne hour or so. All went well until last night. Storm at night was quite difficult to organize, but the chickens were already inside their pens. One chore eliminated. Only the dogs. This time I brought the dog one at a time, so that they did not wander away, while waiting to get in. That was easier than the first time. Stayed in the cellar longer this time because there were so much lightning and rain.
We got out almost at 11 pm and we survived the storms without my husband.

Hopefully we will not have real bad weather before summer comes. If there are, we are prepared.

First balckberry pie of the season

Yesterday afternoon Roo and I went to pick blacberries in the woods. Roo was just to keep me company and of course when we were in the woods she went to do her things. I don't know what things dogs do, but she surely went away for a while. Then she came back and lay down by the tree. I picked about a basketful of them juicy berries and came home thinking what was I going to do with the berries. I can't eat all of them. I can make them into juice and freeze it or i can make myself a pie. At this moment I am still contemplating the pie. Will tell if it does materialize.

Here is the blackberry pie recipe

FYI I cheat, I bought ready made pie shell from the store and ready made pastry as well.
However I get this recipe for standard pastry.

Flour 2 cups
Salt 1 teaspoon
shortening, chilled 2/3 cup
cold water about 6 tablespoons.

Sift flour and measure
Add salt and sift again
Using a pastry blender or 2 knives, cut in half shortening thouraghly until mixture resembles coarse corn meal. Cut in remaining shortening coarsely or until particles are the size of peas.

**** Can use food porcessor

Sprinkle water, one tablespoon ata time and mix dough with fork. Do not stir. Use enough water to hold the pastry together. use plastic or wax paper to press together gently into a ball. Chill dough.

Blackberry filling
Sugar 3/4 to 1 cup
Flour, 3 to 4 Tablespoon
Salt, 1/8 teaspoon
4 cups of well washed and drained berries
Use more or less sugar if needed
Butter 2 Table spoons
Lemon juice 2 tablespoon

Pre heat oven 425F

Roll pastry as underscrust to fit 9" pie pan
Combine sugar flour and salt.
Spread this mixture over pastry lined pan
Add the blackberries and sprinkle the left over mixture over the berries.
Sprinkle lemon juice and dot with butter.

Roll, fit and seal the upper crust...or make into strips and lay pastry strips in a lattice pattern over the pie.

Try lah.

Pencen

There are many people who are already retired, about to retire and thinking about opting to retire early. I belong to the first category. I opted to retire early for a few reasons only I knew. I was toying with the idea for quite sometimes after i turned 40. I have this big rough plan of how to run my life. At that point I have had what I really wanted. I had some education, enough to see me through, if i ever need to supplement my income. I have stashed away some saving to see me through the next 15 years or so. I have all the material needs i would want ( to my standard lah). A house, a car, some stocks, some saving etc.
I was looking to quit my job at the right time and persue my desire to go and do dakwah. Not the dakwah the way people stereotyed. I wanted to dakwah about getting educated. To me an educated pious person is much better than a non educated one. This big dream of mine would take a very serious planning. How would I go about it? Like many American missionaries do, they offer 'sincere help" with string attached or like the typical "melayu dakwah' that tak berapa menjadi due to sebab-sebab tertentu ( I do not want discuss it here)
The opportunity came when I took up this assignment to work in Uzbekistan. I went to a place so foreign, to me although I can boast that i am quite an extensive traveller.
Communication with my host was a problem. I do not speak uzbeko or Russian neither do they speak English or Malay. So for the first few days it was like ayam talking to itek and with lots of signing.
Then I decided to teach my host and son, an english word a day and a sentence to go with it.
A week or so, we could at least communicate in english and signs. Then one day my host came to me with an Al-Quran. She handed me the Quran and said "You read I no read". Then I knew that she wanted me to teach her to read the Quran. So, I began teaching her the alphabets and soon we were laughing together.
She learnt to read the Quran, she learnt to pray and I only learnt a few words of Russian. That is my kind of dakwah...Do it subtly. I do not need to go and tell people that this is haram, that is haram etc. These people who are "educated" are eager to know about the religion that they would take pain to learn and read about the religion. They will learn and appreciate the religion better.
Well, i digressed, sorry about it. back to opting to retire or pencen. There should be a good planning before one retires. To me, once I retire, i should have no debts to haunt me and the little money I have after the retirement should be able to see me through. I did not plan to live in luxury, but just secukupnya.
Although with good planning, I found out it was not that easy to slide from one chair to the other. There was no smooth tranfer from having 'lots' of money to spend than having to jimat the money you have since I did not get my pencen and gratuity until six months later. Immediately after I retired, I followed my husband back to the US, thinking that all my papers were in proper order, but of course they were not. Some papers were misfiled and the amount I had to settle with the Income tax was wrongly typed etc. I had to take the 40 odd hours journey to settle it once and for all. Then the waiting game. I had to go back again, now to Jabatan Pencen to check why my pencen was not coming. I sat there in front of the officer in my well worn clothes and a tired face with a jetlag until I saw the money has been transfered into my bank account. Somebody was sitting on my file.
Susah nu nak dapat pencen...Then came the adjusting period, I was not used to spending someone else's money ( my husband's) I became very frugal. I am still adjusting after all these years. I am getting better after my husband told me not to take my Malaysian money out, unless we need it badly. But he said if i still feel like shopping for shoes and handbags in London like I used to, then I might need to take my ringgit out.
Well, in my elder sister's case, it was different. She saved and saved and when she opted to retire early, she thought she had enough for 'her'. The moment she got her graruity, her husband persuaded her to buy a Honda Accord. After much persuasion she agreed. Lo and behold, the car is in her husband's name. Soon after, with a sparkling car, he found another wife. And what happen to the car? My sister has no chance of sitting in it. Hangus.
So for all the women out there. Beware ! jaga wang pencen anda!

Max wants a friend to play

Max is 7 months old, but his size says something else. He is 3 ft tall and weighs about 70 lbs. My little great Pyreenes puppy has grown in size but still a baby. Max is in dire need of a friend to play with. Although there are Roo and Dumdum, Max can't entice them to play with him. They do entertain Max from time to time, but Max's size and roudiness as well playfulness put them off. From time to time Dumdum lets Max ride on his back, but not for long as Max is much bigger and heavier than Dumdum. Roo lets Max pull her tail and her ears, but Max sometimes gets carried away. So, most time they tried to keep away from Max. Max rolls over, crawls on his belly just to invite them to play with him, but they ignore him. Poor Max. Max tried to find other friends to play with him. He goes into the woods and brings home a tortoise. Plays with the tortoise but it was no fun since the tortoise does not respond. He tosses up the tortoise, catches it up in the air, kicks it, but there isn't any response.
Yesterday Max found another friend to play with. It was a baby bird learning to fly with mother bird flying around to encourge its baby. Max was excited, he went to pick up the baby bird in his big jaw and tossed it to fly. He chased it around the yard and catched it again and toss it up. Mama bird was worried and made a lot of noise, but Max was enjoying himself and perhaps the baby bird was enjoying it too. After a while when Max tossed the baby bird a little too high, the baby bird landed on the branch and stayed there. Max was heartbroken and tried to jump to get to his new friend, but the mama bird was encouraging the baby bird to get back into the nest. Aall afternoon, Max sat under the tree waiting for his new friend to come out to play.
Poor Max needs a friend to play.

Spring is here

Yes, spring is here. For most people who live in the temperate countries, this is the time of joy. Gone are the cold winter days. The days get longer and the warmth is here. This is the time to get busy too. In my neck of the woods, the birds are busy mating, so are the rabbits, and all the critters that live in them. My husband and i are busy as well, but not busy doing what the critters do. We get busy gardening. We get busy raising baby chicks. My husband gets busy with his passion of going fishing. Fishing is not only for sport, but for food too. He is busy fixing the pontoon boat (belongs to his fishing buddy) and getting all the fishing gears and paraphernalia that goes with fishing. Last weekend, they went out fishing and brought home two ice (igloo) chests full of them fish about 200 ekor. Know what, that is not the end of the fishing trip. Then we have to clean them. He fillet most of them and i keep some whole fish for curry and some for the grill. I learnt to clean the fish and i still don't know how to keep the fish heads intact. So I kind of chopped them off.
That is the fishing chapter that will go on until the Fall or until my husband gets tired of his favourite sport. I still have half of my deep freezer full of last year's fish.
About gardening...late winter my husband put organic fertilizer in the garden, cowdung and chicken stuff. Cowdung was free from the neighbour's ranch and of course the chicken stuff was from our own chicken coop.
Now the garden is ready. We do not plant until the last deep freeze i.e until April, but we still get late freeze as late as May. In my garden, i have asparagus, tomatoes, cucumbers, beet, spinach, squash, beans, bell peppers and other plants.Of course not forgetting my cili api and serai.
Spring too is the time for all weeds and plants starting to bloom in order to propagate. My neck of the woods is full of blooms now and when i take a walk everyday in the morning, there are new flowers blooming.
Early blooms are those of peaches, cherries, blackberries, cottonwood etc. To my observation the pinky flowers are the first to appear, then the white ones, then the others. Now there are myriads of colors, if you love natural wild flowers. There are of course them flowers that you cultivate. I have some daffodils, tulips, gladioli which are gone by now. Right now only petunias and 'rose jepun' are blooming. Creek mertle have not even budding yet, as it is more of a summer flower.
Summertime is another story...I shall be busy canning fruits and vegetables. Sometimes i don't know why I canned them as they are cheap in the market. To my husband, personally canned tomatoes tastes 100 times better than the one you bought from the store. Fresh tomatoes from your own garden are juicier and tastier. Well, for me the technique used to preserve food is more intriguing than the finished products itself. However I agree with my husband that my preserved peaches and pears taste better than the one in the can from the store. My pear tree has not made any fruits yet, it bloomed but not making any fruits. My husband thinks it is a male tree, perhaps we need to find a partner for it. Well, even without a tree I got more than I can canned from a neighbour down the road. She would have loaded up a pickup truck full of them if I did not stop her last summer. And as a gesture I gave her a bushel of garlic from my garden ( a big bucket).
Busy huh...well, i can choose to stay at home not doing anything, just watch TV or I can keep my time occupied with chores and enjoying my time at my own pace. I could keep my yard small and hire people to mow my yard, but i do enjoy mowing the yard all 6 acres of it and another 2 acres for my husband to brushhog.
I enjoy walking in the woods and spy on the wild grapes and wild plums and balckberries etc. I spy this morning that the balckberries are almost ready and soon i will be busy picking them and making them into juice and jem/jellies.
Well, that is spring for me. Just want to share my spring time.

Tradedio

When you live in the countryside, your local radio can be very useful. In my little township, we have a programme called Tradedio on the local radio station. You can trade anything on the radio. You can call in to say that you have something to sell or something you want to trade or something you want to buy. It is very interesting. You can find all kinds of things people want to sell or trade. You can sell your farm produce, your used tractor, lawnmower, bed, couch, kitchen utensils, stove, washer dryer, just anything. You leave your phone number at the radio station and people can call in for more information. We bought a used cement mixer for $50 which normally costs $399. I put my puppies for adoption to good home and people called in to adopt my puppies.
I think it is a very good service for the local people. Not everyone can afford new tools just to use once or twice. We bought the electric cement mixer because we wanted to make a walkway from the house to the garage. Without it, it would be back breaking mixing cement for a 5 yards walkway. People sell cars, ATVs, houses and properties (land) there too. You can call and go to look at them if you are interested. We went to look at an 80 acres ranch with grazing field and 3 fish ponds ( ponds to water the cattle). The price was about $42,000. We did not bring our check book, but someone else did and paid a downpayment for the property. So, we know the next time we are interested, we should bring the check book along.
The programme runs for an hour from 8:30 - 9:30 am every morning. A person can only sell 3 products at a time.
I think it is a very good community service.

Mak aku...My mother

AN's blog's on her Mak touches my heart. Until now I still could not make me write about my mother. I love my mother very much. Too much to bare what is in my heart. I wish I told her millions time how much I love her. Now that she is no longer with us. I sometime wonder, if my mother is still around, would I married a foreigner?, leave the country or get married at all. All I wanted to do was to take care of my mother. I knew she had had a very hard life when she was young and growing. Although her father was a rich man, she never get to taste that kind of life. Being the youngest sibling she was being pushed from one household to another after her mother died and her father remarried to a (Tengku). She was left with her grandmother, then her big sister and she never went to school although her father (my grand father) was educated. (My grand father went to the same school as Tunku Abdul Rahman Putra and classmates). My mother learnt to read and write Jawi through learning The Koran and learnt the Rumi by reading her brother's books and learnt english much later when my sister went to 'english school'..very basic english, so that she knew what my sister was studying. I lived mostly with my grandparents.
What saddened me most was when i saw my mother cried one day. My late grand father's second wife relative came to find my mother to ask for money to pay for the cukai tanah, if not paid would be lelong/auctioned off. My mother cried because all these years nobody told her that her father left a lot of harta and her step mother and her relatives have been 'makan harta anak yatim'. I guess when men got a new wife, they automatically forget that they still have children.
My mother asked me what should she do...the amount of the cukai takberbayar was almost RM30,000.00. I told her, forget about it. let it be auctioned off. Those who have benefitted from the ladang getah and dusun tu, should pay because they were the one who got all the hasil all these years..berpuluh tahun makan harta nak yatim.
So, since then i promise myself that i would never hurt my mother and would take care of her. She would come first in my life. Alhamdulillah, i think i did that. I took care of her all the 6 months she was ill with cancer. made her happy and i think I managed to make her know that i really love her eventhough not in so many words.
There are a lot of things i sanjung about my mother, but i just can't put them in words. I keep it deep in my heart.

A simple life

I have taken a 180 degree turn or is it a 360 degree turn in my life. I am back to the simple way of life. I enjoy the nature and appreciate the beautiful God given paradise. The first part of my life was to get away from the rural life that was considered to belenggu our lives then. With education, we broke the belenggu, got to live in the cities and join the the rate race. Got to live in a lifestyle which is considered to be modern and classy. Dine at fine restaurants, vacation in faraway lands that many still can only dream and move with the crowds that 'have made it'.
Now I am back living in the rural area living simply and close to nature. I can say i have had what I worked for and done whatever I wanted to do and now sit reminisce on that part of life. I made a choice when I decided to move over to rural USA. I did not figure out that rural here really means rural, like Pekan Sik in the 70's. However I have come to love this place that my husband and I worked hard to make it as beautiful as it is today (my opinion).
I have gone gaga when i discovered that perssimon (pisang kaki) grow wild, pecan just thrive everywhere, walnuts can just be picked up when it dropped on the ground, wild grape vines just climb whatever they can hang on to...but now i take advantage of all these nature abundance.
I learn to make jellie out of wild grape juice, wild plums, berries etc. I can assure you, one can never be hungry, if one is creative and innovative. I learn to pickle my summer vegetables and preserves the fruits. My pantry is now full of foodstuff that most time i give them away. I raise free range chicken for eggs and meat, my husband goes fishing when it is fishing time ( he loves fishing). My 3 deep freezers are full of chicken meat, fish and some frozen vegetables. Life is simple when we make it simple.
We cleared about 6 to 8 acres for yard and garden and left the rest grown with trees and wild flowers. I enjoy walking in my woods which changes with the season, different flowers, different bushes and different critters. We keep more than 30 big trees in our yard and grow fruit trees. 6 years I have been here and we have made improvements on our property and it looks now like a mini park. There are tracks and walking path in the property and big rocks to sit on in the woods, it has become like a recreation place for me and my dogs.
I thouht i could never get used to living in this kind of environment, but now I am finding it hard if and when I have to leave. The difference between my childhood rural experience, is that living in rural USA, we can still get all the modern facilities as compared to my chilhood. perhaps even now in my old kampong or very rural malaysia, we can get all these facilities too. We use well water from the bore hole with an electric pump that supplies our needs. We buy propane (gas) for our heating and cooking stored in 2 big 500 gallons tank, and we get our electricity from the rural coop. We are thinking of using solar panels when we can afford initial capital investment.
We want to live as close to nature as we could, but we still need to use the cities.