Book Review : 7) Attachments

Book Review : 7) Title: Attachments

Author :  Rainbow Rowell

Publication : Orion

Page : 355

Lincoln, is a shy IT guy. He was responsible for monitoring emails. Beth and Jennifer’s emails attracted his attention the most and little did he know one of them fell for him!

He too, fell for the girl. But as a man who was already in his 20s and still living with her mom, he didn’t know how to approach a girl and he hadn’t truly moved on from his ex-girlfriend who already married and had kids.

I’ve read Eleanor & Park, I love it so much! I kinda expected more from Powell. Little did I know ‘Attachments’ was Powell’s first ever novel. I understand now.

Lincoln grew up and became more matured as time passed by. 

Not everyone has the guts to be vocal about what s/he feels and thinks about. Some people need more time to confront others and speak up. Some chooses to leave and some chooses to hold on and come back when the right time comes.

Book Review : 8) Finding Audrey

Book Review : 8) Title: Finding Audrey

Author : Sophie Kinsella

Publication : Doubleday Canada

Page : 286

This is a story about a girl who tried to overcome her fear after being bullied at her school. Audrey would wear dark glasses all the time, even in the house, never go out, never talk to new people. If she met a new person, she would freak out and end up crying. Linus helped her to overcome her fears, but everyone should know that change comes from within.

Teenagers do get depressed and bullying happens everywhere. Kinsella is spot-on in her descriptions of anxiety and she provides an honest look at the disorder through Audrey’s therapies and recovery.

Kinsella is such a funny author but I didn’t rank this book as my top 5 favourite books because I needed more explanation on Audrey’s past.

It’s such an eye-opening for me to understand about this kind of issue. I, now, understand that not everyone is not strong enough to face bullies and to face realities in general. Family is the strongest support system everyone needs, and good friends can also be as important!

Book Review : 9) The Rosie Project

Book Review : 9) Title: The Rosie Project

Author : Graeme Simsion

Publication : Penguin

Page : 330

It’s a story about a geneticist, Don Tillman who lived by the rules, scientific theory and the concept of probability.

To be honest, at one point I felt like reading my probability slides (laughing emoji, please imagine this)! 

Don Tillman devised The Wife Project to find his perfect wife, and all the criteria were just too impossible to find. A woman will only be considered as suitable for this project only if she would sleep as scheduled, only talk about theories, exercise regularly and believe that all ice-creams taste the same! Ridiciluous!

However, in the middle of the project, his friend (note that he only had four friends in his entire life), Prof Gene set him up on a date with Rosie and he ended up helping Rosie finding her biological. He fell for her but he didn’t find the exact theory that could explain his feelings, so he preferred dismissing the strange feeling he felt.

I ranked this 9th because at one point I felt like reading a science book, I felt like Don Tillman was more like a robot, not a human because he didn’t have feelings. But when I think about this again, the author has successfully portrayed Tillman’s life very well. Kuddos to Rosie for having the charms to change this heartless man!

Book Review : 10) Who Do You Love

Book Review  : 10) Title: Who Do You Love 

Author             : Jennifer Weiner

Publication      : Simon and Schuster

Page                : 385

A story about a girl named Rachel and a boy named Andy. They met at an ER room, Rachel had a heart disease meanwhile Andy had a broken arm. They met again when they were 15 at a camp. They lived in different states, they came from different family backgrounds. Andy is a poor boy, living in Philedelphia with her mother and he went to a catholic school. Meanwhile, Rachel came from a rich family, she’s a Jewish girl and her family insisted her to marry a jew.

They grew apart because of their social status, different interests but love always brought them back together, even after they’ve reached their forties!

The plot is pretty much unexpected. I like it when the author touched on racism issues, religious, drugs, social problems in her book. All of these issues could break a relationship and torn a family apart. It takes courages and patience for everything to work. Love means nothing without tolerance.

I liked this book the least because I felt like the owner elaborated so much on unnecessary stuff but left important things unsaid. I wanted to know more about Andy’s dad, I wanted to know more about how his mother felt all this while. I wanted to know about what Rachel parents thought about her ex-husband. There’re so many questions in my head, thus I ranked it last.

June Book Review!

Hello everyone! I’ve devoted my past time in the last 3 weeks reading. I’ve skipped watching anime in my summer list, and I read instead.

I miss reading so much. When I read, I felt so absorbed into the character’s life, I felt miserable, heartbroken and sad when the character lost someone who’s so dear to her. I was as delighted as the character when she found the love of her life. I was constantly repeating words written by the authors if the words gave impact to me.

So, in this post I’m gonna rank my June books!

     1. Perfect by Cecilia Ahern

2. Flawed by Cecilia Ahern

3. The Life List by Lori Nelson Spielman

4. Letters to The Lost by Brigid Kemmerer

5. The Forbidden Game by L.J. Smith

6. The Girl You Left Behind by Jojo Moyes

7. Attachments by Rainbow Rowell

8. Finding Audrey by Sophie Kinsella

9. The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion

10. Who Do You Love by Jennifer Weiner

In my next 10 posts, I will tell you about my honest opinion about the books and maybe on how they affect my feeling and life perspective. I’m not a professional book reviewer but at least my opinion can help you in choosing the right book to read :)

3am conversation is always therapeutic

Yesterday I was at the weakest point of my life and indeed, when we’re at that point of our life, we should pray to God seeking for His guidance. I totally agree with that.

But as a human, I also need someone to talk to. My friends and I, we have grown older and apart. Again, back to my geographical reason lol. But I guess it’s true that we can’t get everything we want in life.

If we lose something, we’re gonna gain something.

I still have my ultimate best friend that is willing to listen to my stories. We’ve been reminiscing about good, old times (we feel old cause it’s been 5 years since we left high school). 

High school memories are always the best, I remember most of them and they’re very close to my heart. Maybe I will miss my university life as much. Even though I won’t be able to meet my high school best friends for every single week these days, I still know that they will be in Malaysia later once we’ve graduated. But university friends? It hurts to even think about the last days of university, I won’t be able to see Aanika, Sara, Nusaiba cause we’re all from different countries!!!!! Countries, OMG!

I’ve been reading a lot of novels these days, since last two weeks, I’ve read 9 novels and I updated my novel reviews on my instastory because I don’t have the strength to really write my reviews on my blog. lol.

Novels gave me so much insights about outer life, I enjoy reading novels more than watching series or dramas because I get to know more about the characters’ feelings when I read. 

After reading some of the books, I’ve noticed that most of the authors were mentioning about the idea of having high school sweetheart.

High school best friends, they grow older with me, even at one point everyone is growing apart, the memories that we’ve shared will always bring us together. I’m glad to have high school best friends. I’m also happy to have someone as my high school scandal, best friend and sweetheart <3

You know who you are.

Thank you for everything!

I lost myself, again.

Have you ever been in a situation where you don’t feel good enough? 

You don’t worth anything. You lost direction in your life and you’re at the weakest point of your life? Have you ever felt that?

I’m feeling it right now. I feel like I don’t know anything about myself. 

I don’t know what am I good at, what are my strengths? 

I’m 22 but I don’t feel like I’ve proven my worth, I haven’t used everything I have to live my life to the fullest. What does it mean by ‘live your life’ tbh? Idk. 

I don’t know what I want to achieve, I feel like I’m never good enough. 

Do I even have any potential? Some people who are younger than me have started their careers, have a solid idea on what they want to be in the next 5-10 years. I don’t. Well, I I used to have them, when I was 17. But 5 years later, today, have I achieved those dreams? If I did, what’s next? If I didn't, what should I do?

I’m going to have my internship in a month but I’m not ready to meet new people. I feel like a wallflower these days, I’ve changed. Can an extrovert turn to be an introvert? Yes she can. I prefer it that way these days. Because I’m done with all the critics. But people are gonna judge me anyway. I’m tired of keep making new friends when my old friends would leave me. Or it’s me who left? But a college mate once told me, as you grow older, you would lose your friends, but never forget to have networkings. Maybe I should stick to that. 

I’ve never been given the freedom that a 22-year-old woman should get, but I shouldn’t let that be something to stop me from doing things I love. What do I love? I don’t know. I like photography but there’s always a negative competition, disgusting vibes that people have against me when I only take pictures because of my love for it, not for praises. 

I like dancing but someone told me it’s so inappropriate for a hijabist to dance. Haha, my life is like the story of the donkey, the father and the son, right? Maybe I should tell everyone to mind their own business and stop telling people what they should do with their lives. 

Pathetic Aliah needs some help and love.

Instagram Feed

I’ve tried my best to keep my feed of certain themes 

but when I said themes, they’re basically pictures of the same shades of shawls. 

Silly, I know. 

But most of the time, I’m out of captions. 

I have a basic idea on what to type etc, 

but every time I feel like typing one, I would think three times. 

Will I ever be judged by what I’m saying? 

This relates to my earlier post. 

I, too, am being controlled by society. The pressure is always on me. Social pressure. 

Broken english is better than unintentional grammar mistakes. It’s funny how people are being too concern about one’s grammar, but hardly use proper Malay grammar to begin with. 

There’s a fine line between correcting people for them to improve and correcting them to show you’re better. Living in Montreal has widened my perspective on language. The first language spoken here is French and yes French people always prefer their language over English. But my friends who speak English since the day they’re born have never judged non-native English speakers, but non-native English speakers have always been so judg-y towards each other lol. 

And whenever someone is trying to improve her English, they insult her by saying how arrogant she’s to forget her mother tongue language. I mean, as long as the message is well-received, the purpose of having language as a tool of communication is pretty well achieved, right? Grammar is indeed very important, but maybe it is more important when it comes to a formal thing. Oh well, then again this is just my honest opinion on language. 

My whole point is stop labelling people. Just because her photo caption is in English, it doesn’t make her any better than someone whose caption is in Malay. After all, never judge someone from her picture (or caption). You don't know everything about someone just because you follow him/her on instagram :)

The Born of Keyboard Warriors

As social medias become the new norm of today’s society, there born a group of people called the keyboard warriors. Some of them are very positive and polite. Some are just too honest and rather be categorized as rude.

These people have the courage to criticize and throw every possible bad words to someone they don’t know in person simply because they’re behind those screens.

Cyber bullying is real. You might think those who have depression due to cyber bully seem to be weak and fragile, but you have to rethink your opinion. 

Imagine having more than 100 comments written on your twitter/instagram posts criticizing your very existence, especially towards your physical appearance, your family and your life, for every single day. 

“You’re stupid. You’re ugly. You’re a b****. You’re a wh***.”

Having to read those statements every single day.

If you receive them once or twice, you might be able to ignore them. But for everyday? For more than 100 times per day?

You’ll end up questioning your existence. And that’s bad.

On the other hand, people are telling you what’s right and wrong in your life. They’re not advising you, but rather forcing you to do something they want you to do. You become their slaves, mentally tortured and your soul feels the need to follow what they want because you’re afraid of being criticized more. You’re scared of those hatred speeches. You’re living in their bubbles. Your life is being controlled by their opinions. So you change accordingly.

But as you change, another group of people will criticize your change. Now, you’re stuck in between. You are criticized either way and you can’t make both sides happy but you’re afraid of being labelled as bias. 

Your life is no longer lived as you please. You’re not becoming yourself.

This is reality. It happens.

If all of these ever happened to you, you have to be strong. You have to hold on to your life principle and you have to consider what’s wrong and what’s right based on your moral, religion and principles that have been nurtured by your family or maybe by someone you inspire most.

Life is short so do things that won’t make you regret during your later days.

But I have something to say for the keyboard warriors who are selfish enough to brutally say what they wanna say without even thinking about others’ feelings. To those who think they have the power over someone’s life. To those who are very rude to others and have no idea what they said are hurting many people. To those who’re shallow minded and jugdemental. Tho those who play God and are arrogant enough to categorize who’s a sinner and who’s saint.

You are the ones who have to rethink your very existence. Put yourself in others’ shoes before saying things that will hurt you if those words are written to you. You should know that you don’t have even the slightest right to say wether one deserves to be in the heaven or hell. Say good things and good things will happen to you. You may have repented to God but remember that if you hurt one’s feeling, you should apologize to that person too. If you don’t like something, you can advise but you should know how to say it properly. Most importantly, all of us can improve ourselves while we have the time to do so. So, it’s never too late for you to repent too :)

Friendship Posts

Friendship posts on instagram always trigger me.

I’m not sure in a good way or a bad way haha!

I kinda miss the idea of having best friends 

and receiving cute appreciation notes from my best friends.

I miss those moments. 

Now, my high school friends are all grown-ups. 

Everyone is busy and I am already lost track of everyone’s life.

Instagram posts and instastories are the only ways I have to keep me updated with everyone’s life.

But I’m not always on my instagram now because I don’t have wifi at home, I only got to be on instragram when I wanted to post picture.

So, I’m not very connected to the outside world, I must say. 

Everyone is studying in different places.

I am lucky/unlucky. I am unlucky to not study in the same place as my friends. But I’m lucky to get to know new friends.

I’m unlucky to not have best friends like how I used to have before. 

But I’m lucky that I still have friends that care about me.

After all, I need to move on from that phase, right? 

Now, I shall cherish my moments at home and not to grieve about my loss hahaha