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Its been a very strange few weeks for me. There is a concept in Islam called Qadr, and its been the thing which attracts me most to Islam - of course also the certainty that this is the truth. Its very strange - this concept of certainty. Its almost boolean - you are either certain of something or you are in doubt. Even if there was 1% doubt its still doubt. For me, time after time I feel like the doubt has been lifted and what lies beneath it is certainty.

Yes, back to this concept of Qadr. One can translate it as pre-destination. I’ve still much to learn about this concept. Its the idea that everything which happened and will happen was of divine decree. However, this must not be confused with the lack of free-will. Its the idea that all our choices in life was already known, that we would’ve made the choices we made irregardless of whether there was a plan or not. In other words, whatever we will choose has been chosen by us and its already written down. So whatever happens will happen and whatever happened could not have happened otherwise. More so I believe that I am walking down the path I know I should have walked down maybe a few years back, but yet I would never have walked down the path unless everything which happened had happen to lead me to where I am at the moment. Perhaps lost, helplessness, darkness was all part of the path I’m supposed to take.

I am definitely a man of faith. If I were to play a character in Lost, I would definitely be Locke. I cannot begin to explain to anyone what I’m going through except for the fact that I believe there must be a reason - perhaps in this life and most likely be for the life after. My friend once told me truth is something I can’t handle. Now that I’ve experienced part of the truth I totally understand why its so mind blowing. When things out of the blue happens and everything comes together so eloquantly you can’t help but allow it to confirm my philosophy of life. Its a feeling of blissfulness, feeling of total trust and a feeling that its going to be ok.

I’m standing here reading Randy’s blog. I admire him for making such a decision, and I believe that he will find what he is looking for as long as he is patient. I believe the path is laid and sometimes the hardest thing is to find the courage to walk the path.

I know I’ve been led spoon-fededly down my path, but the most daunting thing is I just don’t know where the destination is. I guess this is why they call it…Destiny.

Not that there are anything definite which anyone doesn’t know about anymore. But seeing that I don’t update this blog regularly, many people who used to visit this site no longer really visit it anymore.

Well, family is here in the UK until 26th. Well, Rakin and my parents will go to Barcelona for a few days before heading back to Liverpool whilst they continue with Madrid and Dublin. I will stay here with my grand mother.

End of the month, I’m off to South Africa. It should be a lot of fun, get to meet up with a very good friend of mine, Randy. Hopefully doing some cool things over there again after all the different Moron no Tabis.

I just paid off my car, hence the broke-ness. But as YGG did correctly point out since I am going to South Africa and that I should not have any right to complain about my financial situation. But because of this situation, I have decided not to upgrade to D90, and I have many reasons not to buy extra lens for the S.A. Trip.

I am beginning to enjoy work a lot. It gives me a sense of purpose I suppose, and because of the people around me, who are mostly from Asia (and Sri Lanka), I feel more alive at work. I think I suit the Asian working environment a lot more, and this company is absolutely perfect because it feels like Asia but its in Europe. It comes with all the perks of European company such as working environment and time, and also the perks of Asian working attitude. In short, I am glad, in fact, very glad I am working here, and even though I am taking a lot of time off this coming months, I do feel a sense that I miss work -> Which is very rare for me.

In short, I am happy with life. There are some things which can be better, i.e. the social aspect - the fact that I am no longer in London means that I am feeling the chore of going back to London every week to ’socialise’. I miss the good old times. But at the same time, I know this is my destiny, and I shall wait patiently for my destin(y)ation to reveal itself.

Huh!…I never thought the day would come that I actually would wake up, put on a shirt, working pants and a tie to go to work. Still unable to iron my own clothes, I put on what I consider half-iron shirt and headed to work. Same old londoner taking the tube and all. But instead, this time I am travelling out of London into High Wycombe. I must say that its a very nice town from what I have seen yesterday, and I really don’t mind moving out there when I come back to Sri Lanka.

 

So its kindda strange that my 3 months break where I have seen a significant increase in carbon footprint has finally come to an end. And yes, strangely enough I am quite glad that I will be entering a more routine life. I am glad that I took 3 months off. I don’t think I would ever be satisfied to go straight from finish studying to entering work. Whats more? I don’t actually think that my holiday is over…3 weeks from now I will be on the plane to Colombo. Never been there, don’t know what to expect. But I think I will like it.

 

*** 1 week later…. ***

 

Can you believe this? 1 week of working life just gone…like that. Its been a crazy week in terms of commuting. You see, my office is in High Wycombe, and I live in central London. So it takes me around 2 hours to get to work. Sometimes its faster with a bit of running. But you know what? The fact that I can still wake up every morning at 6:30am with a big smile on my face, looking forward to the 2 hour commute is remarkable. The office is very spacious with large desks for about 100+ of us in the office. Of course big bosses get their rooms with glass doors whilst we hardly get a desk for ourselves. Its very different from what I am used to. Surely, there are supervisors who share the same floor space as us, but there is an atmosphere of freedom in a motivating way, which no other jobs had given me. Perhaps is the fact that there are 6 of us starting and its quite a good group culture here.

 

I can’t wait until I get a car and be able to drive to work. In a way, I could see myself starting a life here in this little town called High Wycombe. I have experienced the big cities like London, lived in satellite cities like Atsugi and now is a nice change to a small English town on the suburbs. Perhaps its the initial excitement. Nevertheless, I am excited about learning new things, but moreover, it is the structured training which I like. Its unlike AK when I was free to do anything, and that nobody cared if I was not working or that I had too much free time. Over here, I get the right amount to keep me going. Going to talks and presentations on different departments, learning about warehouses and finance. Its the flexibility and the technical knowledge I am acquiring everyday. Now I’m learning Oracle, PL/SQL, I will be learing C# later, and before you know it, I will be an Engineer who programs.

 

I am grateful for everything that happened in Japan. I am grateful to my housemates who helped me grow as a person. I am grateful that I could take 3 months out to do what I had always wanted to do, and do it for myself. It will inevitably make me a better person and a more sucessful person in the future. I am excited and optimistic.

Noooo! All the American series I like are coming to an end. I have just watched the last episode of LOST in season 4. Its messing with my head too much I’m telling ya!!! Ahhh, I must take my hat off for the writers of this show. It has just put a whole new twist to the story. There is no way of guessing what will come next in this show. I can’t wait until the next season.

I have climbed Fuji, I have climbed the tallest mountain in South East Asia - Mount KK, cycled the whole of Route 70 in Okinawa and I have swum faster than I could swim. It was all 1 thing which got me through it all: Determination. Sometimes I wonder where my determination comes from you know? Just like tonight, after a long long day, I’m still sitting here revising. My head is hurting and I know for sure that tomorrow’s exam would probably be the toughest of my exams. I really hope that I could do it. I can’t say I did spectacular in my previous exams, but it was all I could have done. After tomorrow 4 down, 3 to go. I just need to concentrate, concentrate and concentrate, which seems to be the hardest thing for me to do right now.

Also, I am trying to find my heart - my real heart. How come I don’t feel anything for all those people who died in Myanmar this weekend?

So, here is the deal…I am having exams. Woohoo…But I am feeling waaaaayyyy too relax for someone having exams. For one, I believe that the exams are not an end in itself nor is it that big a means to something. I am just in this transition state of nothing-ness as one would say.

I am putting more eggs in the speech recogniser I am making for my final year project than I am in my exams. Yes, I am revising hard. Yes, I don’t know that Hyde Park still opens after 7pm. I am seriously stuck in this room which is around 1/2 or 2/3 the size of my roon in Japan from 10 to 10 and then from 10 to 10 when I am sleeping. This is perhaps not so healthy as one might suggest - especially given the fact that there is no natural lighting in the room - which means that I am lacking vitamin D big time. Which is good in some ways I suppose - so I won’t take too much calcium from the hard water in the London Water. However, it might stay in my kidneys :S which is a scary thought.

I am not too hyped up about exams and that was probably why I found myself unable to answer at least 30 marks of the paper. WHY IS THAT PAPER SO BLOODY HARD?? I wish they do scale it and not take the marks as it is, because I am sure I won’t score more than 60% AT MOST. Blah…then again, exams are exams and they will happen again and again in life, and perhaps its easier to brush it off and say…Whatever!

I’m trying my best…but reality seems to surreal. I am studying Japanese for tomorrow’s Japanese Orals - and I don’t even think I can answer the questions they would ask me about my speech on influence of religion if they were asked in English, let alone in Japanese. Well, a good thing is I know God is kamisama. That is one vocabulary ticked off my list :S AHHHHHH

Ok…1 down…6 to go…

Just watching the 1st episode of season 4 of UK Apprentice. It had left me in utter shock and reaffirmed my opinion that I probably would not like it in the commercial world. Of course, it is an extreme version of what a commerce world would be, but basically, I don’t like to work with people who cares only about winning and less so the people around them.

Tomorrow I will be doing a presentation to one of Walmart’s CEO (not Scott Lee) on sustainability business proposal. I don’t think that our idea is very strong, but whatever there is, it will be workable and as long as its presented well, we will have a chance of moving on to the States next month to present it to more board of directors.

Then on Saturday I am driving a van 1/2 way across the country to help Terry move from Poole to Oxford and catching a plane at night back to Hong Kong. I really hope I can survive until then.

Its been a long time since I have to have a sleepless night to finish off my work. I have not stopped for the past 2 days, and my mind seems to be on this wheel which is rolling from 10am to 11pm everyday. Sometimes I take a break, walk in the park, grab a bite. Its good in a way, because I feel that I am living a constructive life and that I have actually learnt something this year.

Makes me more certain of doing a PhD, but at the same time, I am having concerns over my lifestyle outside work. I am thinking that perhaps it would be best that I live on my own or in halls next year if I do fail to get a PhD placement in Cambridge or Reading.

But for now, I have my cup of tea, a calculator and a pen. I will begin my sleepless night of shadowing effect on mobile radio communication networks…This is student life!

As part of my resolution to go swimming everyday, I realised that nowadays I could swim with a lot more ease. I think I know the reason - and it is because I am eating beef again. I know everyone is scared about mad cow disease or killing many cows, but we are buying from the Halal butcher from Nottinghill Gate, and the beef seems to be quite good quality.

You see, I think the beef is giving me the iron to build more haemoglobin so that I could last longer swimming.

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Apart from that, I try to have dinner with Andy (my cousin) twice a week now. He seems to be enjoying London and his work, which is good. However, as much as I admire his ability to work in the commerce world, I don’t think that it is very possible for me to survive there. Today after a chat with Mu Li, I gathered that its best to stay as an engineer. I told him what Vincent is doing since he’s choosing about the same subjects as him. But the question is why is it so hard for Chinese people to do engineering in this country, and why are they so attracted to £££???
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Heard from my brother that one of my swimming coaches passed away from a heart attack at the age of 38. Its quite a shocking news. It makes me wonder why we bother troubling ourselves in many unnecessary affairs when God can take away our lives at anytime He wants - and yet, it seems so difficult to concentrate on things which matters.

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Chinese New Year coming up. Going to have hot pot next Wednesday, asked over Andy and mentioned it to a friend from lifesaving (who joined very recently) who might be coming. I heard that Hong Kong is colder than London today. But why was it so hot last year when I went back?! I had to wear short sleeves last year. What is happening to the world? I heard Jerusalem saw its first snow in a long time, and many Middle Eastern cities also suffer from cold temperatures. I wonder why!

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I have to stop procrastinating! I should just submit my PhD application soon. It does seem odd that I will be Dr K Shah in a few years (if I suceed). I wonder if it is just an excuse to keep me in an environment where time is not a real factor and that I could have a more flexible lifestyle. I heard from Jon today that Spinvox seems quite interested with the idea of PhD…but I don’t know, they still haven’t really gotten to me about anything yet. I also saw something called EngD which seems very interesting, perhaps if Spinvox were to sponser me, I could do a EngD instead of a PhD, but it will take 1 more year to complete.

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Japanese test tomorrow…Why do I suck so much??

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