"You must have done something right"

I woke up all emotional yesterday, one of my good friend, Kak Husna was about to have her PhD viva that morning and I could not be there with her because I was one of the panels for the internship program's interview held by my parent company.

The turnover of the interview was very poor, 2 out of 9 students came. When asked why, one of the candidates said the email went to her "Junk mail" and defended those who did not come.

"But you are here," one of the panels, Mr. O pointed out.

"I am lucky because I happened to check my junk mail last night," she said innocently.

Then, Mr. O said something that hits me really hard..

"The fact that you are here today must mean you have done something right."

...

At noon, I received a message from my friend saying she passed her viva, and I was super ready to go out and celebrate with the girls.

In the car, on the way to Alamanda, we talked about how it is all rezeki from the Almighty. Once, a researcher received the best FRGS project and so many recognition, but nearly failed for her PhD viva. Us, with funny PhD projects, Alhamdulillah had such easy viva, the irony.

"It is unpredictable, all these," Kak Husna said.

Well Dr. Husna, the fact that you are here today, doing minor correction for your PhD thesis must mean you have done something right.

That simple sentence somehow has a powerful comforting effect towards me.

You must have done something right..

How Allah swt is fair.

Wishlist and nazar

Alhamdulillah.. as of today, I've done all my nazar for PhD.

I nazar for 3 things:
1. To belanja my department
2. To fast for three days; and the hardest was..
3. To qatam Al quran.

I was hoping and praying to get the last one done before I give birth.

With morning sickness and all, I managed to get it done finally.

Happy sangattttt!!

I must say this is one of the super helpful app..

Help me kill my time during traffic and while I was bored.

2 down for the year, 6 more to go.. in shaa Allah, ameen. I have faith :)

Now nazar for the gentle birth I'm about to have..

my phd convo and my interview with rtm

Last Sunday was the day where I became the happiest girl in the world. It was my PhD convo.. the day I've been waiting for, for as long as I could remember.

Alhamdulillah.

I graduated with most of my friends from the department..

It was also a special one as Tun Dr. Mahathir was awarded with honorary doctorate from our uni at that day. What better way to have your convo right.

Being the youngest to get her PhD at the convo, I was also later being interviewed by the RTM.

After having our lunch on that day, we had a family photoshoot done by Elegant Vision. It's a door to door photoshoot.. very convenient for Khaira.

I bought the deal from mydeal for RM100. And paid additional RM350 for the raw and edited pictures both soft copy and printed.

Some raw pictures captured on the day.

Though I was hoping both my grandmoms and uncle were here to celebrate,  I guess I miss my co supervisor the most.

The first journal I made, he gave me about 30 revisions. Now, I published around 30 journals and conferences already.. and a renowned reviewer in my field.

The first exhibition I attended he gave me 17 revisions. Up to date, I participated in 10 exhibitions and won medal each time.

I miss him.. so far away in Oman now.  But my supervisor is still here to mentor me, so much I need to learn still.. so Alhamdulillah for His plan.

To both my supervisors, Prof. Dr. Norashidah and AP Dr. Mansoori.. thank you for making me who I am today. God knows how much I change.. both of you witness the evolution.. I pray every day.. only Allah swt can pay back all the debts I have to you guys.

I love them a lot.

While at it, the university suggested me to write a book and gave a talk on how i finish my phd part time in three years.

In shaa Allah.  Let's pray I'm given the strength to share it with my dearest readers.

Syukran

I'm currently blogging in viva room.

Whatttt?? Another viva?

Yup. But just not mine. I'm attending as observer this time around. So much fun. I shall summarize the questions from the examiners.

Anyhow.. let's talk about my post viva.

I nazar for three things, and Alhamdulillah I managed to cross the first one on 20th Aug which is to belanja my department makan.

It was fun. One of the best caterer I've used so far, Alya Jaya. I super love the service too. I initially booked for another caterer which suddenly cancelled the 4 days before the event. Tuh pon after I called them multiple times to ask if there's any confirmation fees. So as the last minute replacement,  Alya Jaya did a brilliant job!!

One thing I should have taken note next time, beef!! One of my menu is daging salai masak lemak cili padi and boyy 10% of my colleagues are hindu. Sighh..

Enjoy the pics!!

Menu from Alya Jaya

My backbone

Desserts pot luck home made by my friends

The day I passed my PhD viva gracefully

Alhamdulillah.  I am surely a blessed servant of Allah SWT.

That morning of 8th July, god knows how many butterflies wander around in my stomach, I arrived safely at the viva place an hour before my viva. Greeted by a good friend, Kak Husna who came for the moral support.

One of the external was already there! I was not ready for a small talk with my examiner, but I ended up with one I'll forever treasure.

While setting up the slides, BFF Sumayyah surprised me with her little boys. Came all the way early in the morning for me!! At that point, I told myself.. I must do this. For everyone around me.

With the 2 Ms

15 minutes before viva started,  my friend Sajaa came. At this point, everything I read became just some blurry lines. She told me to recite Al Ala instead. I did and felt good afterwards.

I began my presentation with full confidence. One of my external fell sick on the day, he just sent his report and the chairman decided to proceed. At that point I know that for that external examiner, I already passed with minor correction. Otherwise they won't proceed with the viva.

And when I presented with my full of animations slides inspired by Love, I knew I had the second external examiner. You just knew the look of awe. Later when I was done, she said, "the slides were too beautiful that I immediately forgot what to ask you."

Right after presentation, the chairman opened the floor for general questions. The external gave me only 1 question and 2 from my internal examiner. The questions were very minor. Then, I know I had this.

Taken by my supervisor during viva when they went through the thesis page by page

Specific questions were very minor too. My viva was done in an hour; thats a new record.. the fastest so far. With very minor correction to be done in a week. Normally they gave 60 days. Just to show how minor it was.

5 minutes after viva taken by Kak Husna, was trying to call Love to tell him the good news

 

Right after my viva, a good friend, one of my mentor asked me to come to the pantry where he.. I repeat it's a he.. baked a cake for the first time in his life for my viva. It was perhaps one of the best carrot cake I had in life.

More lovely friends came..

And met some more for our pre celebration at Nando's.

So now I'm struggling with my correctionns. And I guess I'm the happiest person in  planet earth who was about to be awarded as a Dr before I even turned 28. Alhamdulillah.

My gratitude goes to my supervisors, my hubs for the continuous support, my daughter, my parents and family, my lovely friends and to everyone for the doa of which without it I myt not be here today. Alhamdulillah.

ITEX 2013 and Utusan Malaysia

Alhamdulillah, I won silver in ITEX 2013!! :)

 

Funny when we won gold twice previously, it was not in the news.

Was in Goldcoast during ITEX so thank you my Supervisor for presenting on behalf of me :)

Tips for PhD Viva

So, my Viva has been postponed again to 8th July, I hope this time is for real. But yeah, Allah SWT knows best. So, I hope I will make full use of the plenty times given to me.

Anyhow.. I asked the 'Doctorate Support Group' I joined in facebook for the tips in Viva.

So let me just share with you some of the tips that they shared with me:

1) Know your research novelty
2) Bismillahi tawakkal tu a'lAllah wala haula wala quwwata illa billahil a'liyil a'zim
3) Confident and smile consistently
4) Remember all the famous authors with the year
5) Relate your work to prior research work
6) Solat hajat :)
7) Give charity before viva
8) Recite Rabbi yassir wala tuasir throughout
9) Viva day - Read yaasin after solat subuh
10) Think positive!!
11) Recite yassin the night before and pray so that the examiners will listen to our explanations and understand them
12) Zikir/Al fatihah all the way from home to viva place
13) Selawat to Rasulullah before starting the viva
14) Relate the findings and objectives clearly
15) Seek for the supervisor's blessings a day before the viva
16) Run test the slides before you start (meaning come early) and check all the equipments
17) Light meal for breakfast on the viva day
18)  http://www.academicjoy.net/phd-during.html
19) "Examiners role is too assist you" :) 
20) Solat tahajjud, solat hajat n solat dhuha, baca selawat tafrijiyah n zikir rabbi yassir
21) Ask for parents or husband to recite yassin and solat hajat during our viva
22) Virtual viva --> http://viva.3owl.com/

May we benefit from their sharings!! :)

PhD viva?

So there I was, 24 hours before my Viva. My every inch of body feels tense and excited at the same time.

During Zuhur, my friends told me, tomorrow at this hour, we're gonna celebrate your doctorate. Ameen, ya rabbal alamin.

At about 3pm, supervisor called,

"I am very sorry to tell you, it seems like the email sent by COGS to one of the examiner bounced back and he didnt even know your viva is tomorrow. It's very unfortunate, I am sorry."

Numb.

All the weeks that I went home late for my baby, the weekends I sacrificed, the admin works I put on hold, and whaaattttttt???

Then, it all makes sense to me. Allah must asked me to prepare better, Alhamdulillah.

So my Viva has been postponed to 25th June, please extend your du'a for me friends. May I come back on the 25th with the best news of the century, Ameen.

Pardon me for the lack of updates!!

Di hamparan Shamrock - A review

The first religious book I read was "Aku terima nikahnya" by Ustaz Hasrizal and I was immediately hooked.

The way he wrote, is very near to people like me.

Take La Tahzan for example. I can't really relate to that. It makes my self esteem as a Muslim goes down the drain, hehe..

Anyhow,  I just finished reading "Di hamparan Shamrock" by the same author. It was like walking down a memory lane of 11 years of his life in other countries; to name a few.. Ireland and Jordan.

I read it at the very right time.

Doing a PhD is not an easy thing; not physically, not mentally, not financially.

Since I am not willing to wait for a scholarship from the university, I decided to do it part time. Mann.. Imagine, teaching, supervising, administration work, and research at the same time; not forgetting.. Daughter, sister, mother, wife all at one go.

Part time = pay it myself. On top of that, PTPTN+housing loan+car loan+ASB loan. :)

And mentally simply because time is against you. Perhaps someday, when the time is right I shall share how challenging PhD is for me mentally. Even at the thought of typing this down, I had to hold back my tears.

And "Di hamparan Shamrock" is something I really can relate to. I hardly cried when reading a book, this is one of those which I just refused to read in public.

To a friend of mine, the ones I wish to keep for life, the ones who gave me this book as it was her love at first sight.. This book will go from one hand to the other in this lab, as a motivation for us here to wrap up our 3 years work.

Doakan..

Shortcuts

Shortcuts, don't we all love them?

What is not to like?

It saves time, it's efficient, much shorter way to get to the destination.

But, life is not a shortcut.. Like it or not.

You need to wander around, make mistakes, get lost once in a while, in order for you to be sure and to remember the correct path to the destination.

The same applies to research life.

If you think you can do a research via shortcut, don't bother calling yourself a researcher, seriously.

Just to cheer up the day

Desperately need something to boost up my mood..

Hahahaha!!

Ok, now.  Happy mood on, thinking cap is on. To thesis, bismillah.

Voucher and books :)

Sometimes, we complain for not getting anything.

And when we do get that something, we feel fishy about it.

Even worse, when we get something, we misuse that something.

So today.. I would just like to thank the governement for giving me this..


Ahamdulillah :)

Which an hour later turned into this..



Waaawawawa!!! Rambang mata di kedai buku.

And since sharing is caring, I bought something to everyone back at home too!!! I so love kedai buku, even though it's just KOOP Uniten. Haha!

Proposal defense

Alhamdulillah :)

I went to my viva presentation, eh silap.. proposal defense today with two main objectives:

1) To impress the examiners.
2) To be impressed by the examiners.


Bring it on! I'm half way there!

And i have achieved both :)

I am at the best of my mood today!! And even more excited to do my PhD, I have faith in my project, I'm just plain happy!!!!~

Happy to receive such brilliant suggestions from my examiners.

Happy to have two official supervisors that push me to the edge and pull me back the time I needed that.

And happy to have one unofficial supervisor who spent the night to go through my slides and my way of presentation in ways a teacher could have never done so.

I looked up to these 3 people equivalently much, though the unofficial ones has not yet hold a PhD or a Master degree, but the skills he taught me is beyond repayment.

Thank YOU..

simply for telling me that I have flaws. :)

Karma

Last week, i was not in a good mood.

Testbed for my PhD had not yet working.

Those who were supposed to give technical supports had not yet answered my questions.

To top it all, supervisor had not yet reply my emails. Email kawan2 lain reply pula, sedikit sensitif, maklumlah hormon ibu mengandung..

So, when my project students came and met me without any appointments (or any progress); I got slightly annoyed. I could not remember what exactly i said to them, but their face filled with disappointment as they left. Chomanneyoooo..

I felt guilty the whole week. So, yesterday when another project student came, I treated him nicely.

Right after he went back, my supervisor called me, asking about the progress of my PhD while replying all my questions that had been pending since last week.

That was when it hit me..

Karma.

When I treated my student nicely, my supervisor will treat me even nicely in return. As much as I am a lecturer, i am still a student after all.

Subhanallah..

-Maafkan saya student2, saya masih belajar-

The last final

Had my last final paper on Tuesday. Hopefully this is really the last because during undergrad, I thought I had my last paper already, but then after about 3 years without any major examination, I had another one for PhD.


My last exam ticket

Anyway, the question for my exam last Tuesday was nothing technical. More of like asking your opinion on Ethics, on leadership in doing research, etc. Then write an essay about it.

One question caught my interest though. About whether you consider an academic achievement as the main requirement to undertake a research project.

Hmmmpphh... Tough question.

I answered yes but not the only requirement.

I personally think you must also have really strong determination, equally much (or maybe more) than your academic achievement.

I don't consider myself as a brilliant student during undergrad. I skipped classes whenever the lecturer bore me, I even skip classes now that I'm doing my PhD and a lecturer myself (not proud of it). I sat at the very end row, I hated exams and I only received my Dean's list once during my final semester which I believed my FYP project contributed much for that.

Truth is, you can't judge a student by his or her examination marks. I mean, our exam questions are too memorization-based. Which engineer in the world would still memorize that long equations once they are working, we still refer to Dr. Google anyway. Understanding the concept in a whole is more important, and hence you can't hundred percent judge a student by their marks.

And the ability to understand and analyze are so important in research; you have to consistently ask yourselves why this and why that. Many of my students seem to understand a concept just the way it is. Like the fact that wireless network is more fragile than wired network. But they never asked why. Hence, they just memorize the fact that way.

How are you going to do a research if like that? In research, curiosity helps.

Passion helps. The first time I started to do research, I was given two options; on RF and on Optical, I fell in love with the one in optical although my basic background is more to RF. Eventually, when you love something, you'll be curious about something and you always want to learn more.

Determination helps. You must want something that badly to have it. Because even if you're clueless about something, with determination, you can have the spirit to go on.

To end this, for me, academic achievement is not everything. What matters is your effort in everything pun. And doa pun termasuklah dalam part of the effort. :) Just my two cents.

My current obsession

My current obsession has got to be..

My new lab!!!!!!! :)

Pfftt.. Geek!

Don't get me started on the first thing i think about when I wake up and the last when I'm about to fall asleep. My supervisor said, "If you want to be successful, you have to sleep with your (research) problem." And our iron lady a.k.a mak Shameem said, "In order to be successful, you must want that something so badly".

And in my defense, you always get so psyched about new things, ryte?

New environment, new work to do, new hardware, new fancy software.








Things have been so crazy lately; running nose when teaching sucks a lot, sore throat does not at all helping, been thinking about grandmum 24/7, with phone constantly in my pocket, so this helps me calm down..

I remember the first time i played around with the hardware, spent about 1 hour thinking why it wouldn't communicate with each other. Jawapannya --> Lupe nak switch on power supply.

See, in real life, the stage where I am currently, you could not afford to do mistake. But with research, mistake is just a tiny step towards success :)

Imagine, a year and a half spent for my Master to come out with this hardware, an hour towards success won't hurt at all.

It's not just the Doctorate that I'm busy chasing, but it's the short time I have to contribute to the man kind.

Panic attack :(

FAITH..

..is such a strong word.

You can do something and still be successful at it even when you have no faith in whatever you're doing.

But, the satisfaction? The joy? The confidence?

Those are the things that you don't receive in return. And if you don't receive that, whatever you're doing is simply called 'work'.

Quoting from David Shakarian (GNC), "I never worked a day in my life. It's not work when you love what you're doing."

I remember some mornings I woke up when I was doing my Master research, where I just sat in front of my make up table, numb, shutting the whole world away and just cry. You just woke up, feeling so numb, so static and all you need to do is move forward, even just one step.

Such panic attack..

..that I'm having one now. The first for my PhD.

"When Allah guides me to it, He'll guide me through it".

Insya Allah.

Please grant me the strength, to move even a tiny bit. Cuz that tiny steps will lead to something so much larger.

Minggu terasa pandai

Had my geeky moment last week.

Won the best paper award for 2010 IEEE International student conference, IEEE SCOReD. Alhamdulillah. Thanks to all my supervisors, and to the one in Oman, I hope I make you proud. :)



Love was there during my presentation and when I received the cert! Whee!! Terasa extra pandai!

Andddd.. terasa even more pandai when I was invited as the session chair for the conference. All the other chairs were Drs. and Assoc. Profs., only two people who are yet to recive their doctorate were given the honour to be the chair.. Me and my undergrad's lecturer, who is now still my mentor.

Read the email they sent me...



"You may be advised that this position has been nominated among the experts of each related field." --> Terasa pandai. :)



Alhamdulillah. May this encourage me to work even harder.

Hold my hand, so we don't get separated :)

In life you’ll meet four types of people:

1. Ones that run
2. Ones that walk
3. Ones that sit
4. And ones that just walk backwards

Me? I used to run a lot. And grabbing those I love to run with me. If I fall, I wake up and run again. I wait for no one, so you have to chase me, the way Love chases me.

But lately I feel a little exhausted and decided to walk down the road while holding the hand of my better half and just enjoying the beauty of everything. I figured if I keep on running, I’ll never have time to truly enjoy myself.

Then, today, I met someone. Who used to push me to run faster. God, I missed him. And it’s clear to me now, that he is part of the reason why I run. And today, he makes me want to run again.

I don’t want to sit still, because I’m still young. Full with energy and enthusiasm. Once I get to my finishing line, I will sit down and relax.

I don’t want to walk backwards because I’m so keen to know what’s in front of me. Whether it’s pretty or ugly, you’re the one who interpret it. Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder after all.

I don’t want to walk because I found joy upon reaching the checkpoint.

And I don’t want to wait along the way because I know we’ll meet at the finishing line. Don’t ask me to wait, run with me. Don’t ask me to slow down, because that’s what everyone has been telling me, RUN with me. Don’t scared that I’ll fall because what doesn’t kill me just makes me stronger.

And if you’re scared to run with me because you’re scared I’ll leave you alone, behind, wake up. A friend after all is not someone who waits with you through thick and thin, but pushes you to be better, through thick and thin.

Cheers to the last checkpoint of my education life, PhD. Halfway through, Bismillah..