June has got to be the summer Love

Summer term has begun. Yesterday was a bank holiday so today school starts their holidays and undergraduates students some of them have already finished their exam. Oh how wonderful. But me? I still have to go for work.

Usually when summer starts, this will be the busiest time around. London will have endless flow of tourists from all around the world. You just cannot go on the tube and through oxford st without bumping into them ruining their picture taking. You might be generous enough to take one for them.

Its a wonderful feeling. Everything is colorful,people smiling and walking their faces all up unlike in the winter where people wore black, walks so fast while facing downward trying not to be friendly.

I think this time around Malaysia has also starts their school/term holiday. School children especially will be flooding the shopping malls, playgrounds and cinemas. You'll be annoyed when everything is fully booked on star trek movie.

Owh! and weddings. There'll be dozens and dozens of wedding invitation. This year its my friend's. Everybody is turning 25 and my my how time flies. I'll be back in Malaysia not until september. Sadly I would not be able to attend any of them. But thanks and much appreciated to some of them who still sends invitation all the way from Malaysia to England. 

This is for the love birds in June. To Ein and Joe 060609. To Nasri and Azura 060609. And especially to Ria and Shimi 210609. I hope you'll be the happiest bride that day (for the girls). And the groom will take care of you dearestly. The older generations said that patient is the key to a long life marriage. 

Did I miss any other of my friends who's getting married?  Oh well, To all the brides and grooms-to-be in the month of June. I wish you all the best wishes in life and may it be filled with more and more love and happiness ever. Amin....

GLORY GLORY Man United

As was flipping through my previous blog entries page by page as I realized that I used to wrote entries like school girl did. My font were sometimes inconsistent, a certain letter were capitalized in the middle of some words and sometimes when I'm extra gay or just like to extra waste my time, I'll bold up the words and decorated it with not just 1 color but almost the entire color templates. oh how immature.

I was this close to delete my previous entries but being a sentimental fool I am I decided that I'll keep them and maybe someday I'll print them as my hardcopy journal. Oh how I miss wrote in bahasa but sadly my own bahasa malaysia has rotten since it has seems century since I wrote "karangan bahasa Malaysia". Plus my international friends won't be able to understand my mother tongue. I think next time I'll varies my entry between bahasa and english and maybe if I'm a bit extra generous I'll put a little footnote/small dictionary to make my entry understandable to all my friends and families.

Apparently I haven't come to my point of this entry. The point is I was so busy traveling and entertaining guests come and go at my home so I'm a bit late in updating this blog. Last weekend was the premier league finals. So we went to Old Trafford to watch the game between Man Utd and Arsenal. We didn't went into the stadium to watch the football live as me and Fairuz had to save some amount of budget for us to travel to Milan and Swiss next month. 

So my brother adam and Fairuz's  friend who apparently an MAS pilot, Azmir had the chance to celebrated the glorious victory of Man Utd in the Old Trafford stadium after watching the game. Whilst me and Fairuz just enjoy the scenery of Manchester and enjoying the heat of the premier league environment before Manchester went to Rome tomorrow. 

It was a crazy day, it rains the seconds it shines. So here's the pictures

Old Trafford here we come.

Here come the glory man supporters. So energetic.

This old man was so eager to be in my pictures.So I gave him a chance. So generous I know!

Fans and supporters come and gather at the stadium

At last they can celebrate the victory at home.

Everybody was in red devils. This man had a worried look before the game started.

They even wear red jumpers.

I already knew that they will be number 1 again this year.

Honey wait! the wind doesn't help here.

Ahhh....much better.

Aihh...what the...??? Why is he in the picture?

The star wars character also wants to be part of Man Utd team. Or maybe they just wants to promote their shop in the Mall.

He who is a hardcore fan.

Me who was drag to this game.

Alright honey. now now don't get too excited. people are watching.

Ahhh...much proper. See there's about 70 thousand people around us.

Now make sure I don't look fat.

I still think I look fat.

Enough now..

You guys won't believe this crazy fans.

They actually climbed on the United Trinity, Best Law Charlton statue. And guess what, drunk!

This is Us at the end of the game. Everybody almost gone home now.

Now this is priceless. We stumble upon the famous singh families who sat next to Alex Ferguson in every each of Man Utd games.(except that second man from right, he is Azmir although I have to say he does look like a part of the family). They even have a facebook fan page.

Endless effort and Never give up = Dreams come true.

Alright.

Here the thing about funding. You have to have an endless efforts. Sometimes its either you're lucky or unlucky. Sometimes you think that some people doesn't even deserve the scholarship as much as you do but frankly, as cliche as it is "god knows better". Everything that happens there's a reason behind it. There are a few government bodies that offers scholarships/loan to study abroad. Have the effort to survey, researching and always read the newspapers or education magazines. These are the best place to find a scholarships. You have all the time in the world to blog hop why not google for scholarships? Newspaper is where I've got mine. I applied for it, got an interview and got the offer. Here's are some ideas of scholarships that I can think of at 2231 hours.

Malaysia-Scholarship.com

1. JPA - Only for Master, Check JPA website.

2. Mara - There's always no hurt to google so check the website.

-scholarships - for Master and PhD, I don't know the exact numbers but their offers are not as many as JPA.

- They also have loans which you can apply but I'm not sure for which degree. check with mara.

3. JPA/KPT(SLAB/SLAI) - For universities staffs and fellowships(soon to be staffs). Send out CVs to the university to become their staff/fellowship. Again, Just email the Univ for enquiries.

4. Non gov/gov organizations - Usually they advertise in the newspapers/magazines.

5. Self sponsor - obviously you have to kiss and hug daddy :)

6. Potential companies (i.e Petronas, Mimos etc) - Of course you have to be their staff first and the offers circulate within their company usually for RnD. Check with your company if they offer any. And go to careers fair and check out which companies offers scholarships.

7. Yayasan (Pahang/Bukhari) - I'm not sure if they offer postgraduate study. But they do offer to undergraduate now and then. Check with them.

8. Biasiswa Yang Di Pertuan Agong - Every year our great Agong will give out scholarships to those who really wants to pursue postgraduate studies in economics, science or law. Shortlisted will be interviewed. Check JPA website.

9. Khazanah Nasional Berhad - Check website for requirements and types of scholarships.

10. Commonwealth scholarship - google is a great tools.

11. Any scholarships in the whole wide world - Just google!

12. Bank loans but please never the loan shark!

This is important! I have to tell you this. If you want to pursue PhD you have to really want to do PhD, not because you want to be abroad. And you have to know what field and major you want indulge in your PhD. That is why PhD scholarship in Malaysia usually are offered to those who's already a staff in a company or government sector. Or those who wants to work in research and development areas. Maybe if you are in other developed countries with a PhD you have so many prospects you have so many options. But in Malaysia? They are short of researchers for now. So if you really want this you really have to love research. It is not easy being a PhD student!. So think about it first before you do this. What do you want to do when you have your doctorate? Researcher or an HR manager? Why do you want to pursue PhD in the first place or do you just want to be glamorous because you're overseas?

If you just like traveling, why not keeps some money and book an air asia ticket in advance :)

The effort is not as easy as it may seems. If your lucky you'll have the process smoothly. I had my tough time applying and the process was oh so painful but in the end it surely pays off.

Best of luck!

Dreams are not Impossible If you want to further you studies, Why not!

I've been receiving a lot of emails from all over malaysia asking me questions on how to further their studies overseas either for Master or PhD. Questions like how do I choose which Universities are the best? How do I apply? Do I have to take IELTS or not? What are the requirements?

It has been flattering and delighted to received emails and I'll be happy to help all of you out there and guide you through the process of applying based on my experience.

Before you go further ask yourself what type of environment do you want? Some people says "nevermind Oxford or Cambridge, I want to go to Imperial because they offer best engineering courses and I will be living in London". Or maybe some people says "nevermind Imperial, I want to go to Southampton University because they offers best in Electrical Engineering and I'm doing Electrical not Civil and I hate living expenses in London".

Some people care particularly on the courses that certain Universities offers but not the ranking of the universities or vice versa. For example Edinburgh university have good Actuaries course, king's college offers best in Medical and Law courses, Oxford Brookes are best for Architecture etc.

This was 2007 Universities ranking. The time when I was applying for my PhD. Click for larger image. Courtesy of Times Higher Education 2007.

The first column is for 2007 ranking and the second column is for 2006.

For me I would rather be in Oxford/Cambridge University eventhough they don't offer the best in Electrical Engineering like Southampton University because part of it I love being around nerds from other courses and be friend with them. But mostly because I love it that people all around the world (professionals and industrialist) recognized my degree are from. And I also enjoy the facilities they offers.I was this close to apply to Cambridge but the thought of leaving London? I would rather pass. But really it does depends on you. There is no right nor wrong. There are more other Universities out there which are also great.

So here is roughly the guide;

1. And after you have decided which Univ you want to go, you can visit their websites by just google, check all the requirements and application process. Some Univ prefers online applications and some still prefers on paper. Requirements (such as degree results, IELTS grades, interviews, project results, work experiences etc) varies depend on different departments/schools in different universities. It will be easy for you to apply online. Its just a process of clicks. And wait for the offer.

2. After you have the conditional/unconditional offers from the University of your dream you can apply for any scholarships from any potential company, government etc. Or even better you can sponsor yourself! show them that you have the offer already but most sponsorships prefers the unconditional offer (conditions usually involve the acquire of transcripts and IELTS results).

3. Then you have everything complete you can now apply the Visa. For information visit VFS Global.

The process sounds easy ain't it? But through the process you will have all the ups and downs which you have to endure (like visa applications, fulfilling certain conditions, financials etc).

So I wish to any of you who are furthering their studies best wishes. Do email me if you have any more questions.

This was last year 2008 ranking. the rest of the list you can check out in the website.

for Universities ranking you can check out the Times Higher Education website.

Best of Luck,

Hana' Fedora

Just got back from Scotland

Sorry for not updating for a while there. While my friends back in Malaysia just got back from Kem S.A.T.U in Sungkai, I've just got back from Hull to see my cousin's newborn and Scotland visiting families. Fairuz drove the MPV the whole journey. Enough to say that it was really tiring so I've decided to just post pictures for now. For more pictures do visit my flickr.

The weather was friendly to us so it was a delight to snap good pictures.

In one of those castle in Scotland

The weather are cold although it looks hot

Siblings

The hubby

Me

The family

I'm the big sister

We're waiting for the boat to fetch us to the castle

Mom and dad