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My Aidil Fitri this year
(2008) |
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This year (2008) I celebrated the first day of Aidil Fitri
in Dungun, Trengganu and the third day in Tronoh, Perak .
If you are wondering where I spent the second day, well..we
spent it in Naza Ria, traveling from Dungun to Tronoh. We
left Dungun, which is Salmiah's hometown, at 10.30am and
reached Tronoh, which is my hometown, at 9.30 pm. If you are
wondering why it took us 11 hours to reach Tronoh, read on.
It will probably also assist you if you intend to travel to
Trengganu from Perak or vice versa by taking the road to
Cameron Highlands.
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We began our first day of Aidil Fitri by performing the
Solat
Suboh. After that we went to where Salmiah's
parents were buried in peace, to recite verses from Surah Yassin for them
and prey that may
Allah SWT bless their souls. We returned to the house to
take our shower and by that time , nasi dagang was ready to be
served for breakfast. After breakfast, we went to the mosque
to perform the Solat Sunat Aidil Fitri. |
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After performing the morning prayer at a local
mosque, the children queued up in the house at Jalan
Nibong Stesyen to ask for forgiveness from their parents
and aunts and uncles.
At the same time they also received "angpows". from
each of them.
In the photo on the left, Salmiah is seen giving his youngest
brother, Zul Azrian an advice on a subject best known to
them both.
Nasimah, who's Salmiah's younger sister and sitting
next to her, was waiting earnestly for her turn to
contribute her "angpow" to him. |
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Hoesni & wife, Rosmani giving out
angpow packets |
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Newly-married couple, Nor Syahirah and
hubby, Zahir also giving out angpow packets. They married in August 08. |
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After the asking-for-forgiveness and angpow
ceremony was over, it was time to take group family photographs.
Here are some of the family group photos:- |
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Front Row L-R: Johan, Syarah (Adek), Syufiana
(Meena) & Syahil |
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Second Row L-R: Syuhada, Salmiah, Roslan &
Jowin |
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Kak Nor with her 4 children. L-R:
Nadira, Kak Nor, Ayub, Hafriz & Nadia. Kak Nor's
hubby was away working in Mauritania and couldn't join them for Aidil Fitri this year |
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Sharil and Norzehan with their eldest
son,Haziq. Their baby son was fast asleep |
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After the group family photo sessions were over,
we visited Salmiah's stepmother, who lived just next door and
then we went to her auntie's, Makcik Yam, followed by her uncle, Ayah Long. Finally,
we went to Kak Nor's house for lunch. Even though our stomachs
were already full by then, we still managed to finish at least a bowl of
the delicious soto prepared by Kak Nor. When we got back
to the house, we started to prepare for the long trip to Tronoh,
which we were going to go on the following day. |
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2nd Day of Aidil Fitri |
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We left Dungun at about 10.30 am on the second day of Aidil
Fitri. We took the road to Kuala Berang, where we were delayed
for about 1 hour due to a traffic jam. We discovered later that
the jam was caused by a traffic accident on the Kuala Berang
bridge, which we had to cross along the way. |
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The photo on the left was taken when we were at Kuala Berang,
where we were caught in a traffic
jam. It was quite difficult to accept the fact that a
traffic jam could happen in a small town like Kuala
Berang. So you see I was wondering profusely what it was that was
causing the traffic jam. In fact Johan, who was
sitting directly behind me, was also doing the same
wondering (see photo on the left :-) This was the
first "wondering" that we had to do. Since this was the
first time that we were traveling to Tronoh using the
Cameron Highlands route, we had a lot of
"wonderings" to do along the way to decide which was
the correct route to take to reach Tronoh or whether we
were going in the right directions. The
fact that it took us about 11 hours to finally reach our
destination, proved that we were therefore not that
successful in making the correct decisions along the
way.
After we finally crossed the bridge at Kuala Berang,
we decided to drop by the Kenyir Lake for the benfit of
Johan and Jowin, who had not been there before. After
appreciating the beautiful scenery and also taking a few
photos, we went to the nearby surau to perform the
solat. Unfortunately, it was quite dirty inside there and we
decided to continue with our journey, intending to stop only
at the next mosque along the way to perform our solat.
Whichever body was managing the surau had probably
overlooked the fact that their cleaning staffs should
also be available during the holidays to maintain and
clean the surau regularly. |
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Taking photo with L-R: Meena,
Norsyuhada, Syahil, Syarah, Johan & Jowin by the Kenyir
Lake |
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Taking photo with Jowin & Johan by the
Kenyir Lake |
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The surau at Kenyir Lake |
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Interior of the surau. Notice the dirt
underneath the door |
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The second "wondering" that we had to do was when we
reached a T-Junction. We took the left turning as
indicated by a man-made sign board. Suddenly the road conditions
changed from a nice wide highway to a narrow Felda road with
tight turnings, potholes and rough patches. . We had to turn
back to read the sign-board again to be sure that we took the
right turning. We indeed took the correct running.
We had to travel for about another hour on the Felda
Aring
road until we reached another T-junction. The road
conditions changed back for the better. We took the left
turning, which would lead us to Gua Musang. Motorists
to Kota Bahru took the right turning. Soon after, we reached the Gua Musang Rest & Recreation Area,
where there was a surau. We stopped here to perform our solat (jama' takdim) before proceeding
again to Gua Musang. |
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Gua Musang Rest & Recreation Area. No
eating stalls were opened on that day, except for 2
stalls selling drinks. |
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The male surau at the R & R, where we
performed our solat takdim. |
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When we reached Gua Musang, we took the road
to the left as indicated by the signboard showing
clearly the route to Cameron Highlands. After a few
kilometers, we reached a roundabout, but there was no
signboard to say which road would lead to Cameron
Highlands. We decided to take the road where the sign board
pointed out to Kuala Lumpur because
we thought Kuala Lumpur could also be reached by
going through Cameron Highlands. But we were wrong.
After about half an hour's drive from the roundabout, we decided
to stop to ask the occupants of
a house by the road side whether we were going in the right direction to Cameron
Highlands. We were told that we had taken the wrong road and
advised
to turn back to Gua Musang for the right road. When we
reached Gua Musang we had to stop twice again to ask for directions
before we finally found the right route. |
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The Government Authorities in Gua Musang should do
something about improving the sign signs in Gua Musang
because I'm sure we were not the only ones who "got
lost" trying to find our way to Cameron Highlands
from there. So, if you intend to travel to Cameron
Highlands from Gua Musang, the correct direction to take
would be the road leading to Pulai. We won't have wasted more than one hour's
traveling time had we known that we should take the
road to "Pulai" to go to Cameron Highlands. |
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The trip from Pulai, Gua Musang to Cameron Highlands took us about
an hour and another hour to reach Simpang Pulai. It was already
dark by the time we reached Simpang Pulai. We stopped at a
Petronas station to refill our Naza Ria before we proceeded to
Batu Gajah. After Batu Gajah, we took the wrong turning again. I
did not realize that a new road had just been opened to the
public and I mistook
this new road to be another road, which I took in the previous
year to go to Tronoh. We lost another hour or so before we finally reached our destination
at 9.30 pm. |
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That night and the following night we stayed at a
rented house ("Home Stay") in Bandar Sri Iskandar not
far from Tronoh. The house was fully furnished with two
(2) air-conditioned rooms. The rent was only RM100.00
per night. If you are interested to stay at this home
stay, you can call En.Azman or Pn Nani at 019-5790779,
019-5780779 or 05-3713360. They operated 4 home stays
under "Bestari Homestay". The Home Stay is comfortable
for 5 adults. If your group consists of more than 5
people, make sure you bring along extra "toto" and
pillows with you. After checking into the home stay, we went to
the house of my sister, Rosnah who has prepared a
delicious dinner
for us. She, together with her hubby, Isa and daughter,
Aween were very happy to see us and we chat for quite
sometime before we went back to our home stay.
My other sister, Mastura was also there together with
her hubby, Aziz to greet us. We didn't have lunch
that day and were therefore very hungry. So we had a
good dinner before we retired for the night. |
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Internal view of the Home Stay, where
we stayed. |
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3rd Day of Aidil Fitri |
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That's how we spent the second day of our Aidil Fitri. While
others spent their time visiting their friends and
relatives, we spent time in the Naza Ria car. Looks like I
have to reviseour plans for next year's Aidil Fitri, to make
sure that we utilise our first few days of the Aidil Fitri
more constructively. |
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The next morning we visited Mastura's house at Bandar Seri
Iskandar, but not before we lost our way again and Aziz (Mastura's
hubby) had to come to "rescue" us where we followed his car
from behind. After a brief chat, we went to Rosnah's house
for breakfast and after that we proceeded to Kampung Kurnia
to visit my relatives there. MakCik Kiah, my younger sister
Jun, sister-in-law Liz and their children were there. We
also visited the place where my late father was buried in
peace and recited a few verses of the Al-Quran for him and
prey that Allah SWT bless his soul. |
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The Tronoh family members with
Liz and MakCik Kiah at the back row |
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L-R : Aween (Rosnah's only
daughter), Isa (Rosnah's hubby) & Jowin |
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L-R: Rosnah, Johan, Salmiah & Syahil |
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Me & Rosnah as among them |
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4th Day of Aidil Fitri |
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The fourth morning of Aidil Fitri found us having roti canai
as breakfast with Isa and Rosnah. After breakfast, both of them were kind
enough to lead the way to Simpang Pulai through the
complicated network of roads there. I guess I have to visit
them more often to get familiar with the road.
We left Tronoh at 8.30 am and reached Kuala Trengganu at
2.30 pm, stopping only at Green View Garden at Cameron Highlands
for half an hour to refresh ourselves. We also stopped at a
surau near a kampung after the Kenyir Lake to perform our
solat jamaq takdim. Kuala Trengganu was
in a bit of a traffic jam when we reached there. This time
the journey back took bout 6 hours instead of 11hours.
It just shows that if we know the right way, we can reach
our destination without delay. |
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L-R: Johan, Syahil, Meena, Salmiah &
Syara |
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Meena & Syara at the turtles' pen |
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Johan, Nursyahada, Syahil & Jowin |
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Roslan & Salmiah |
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After we reached Kuala Trengganu, we went straightaway to
Jamaluly 's house. Jamaluly is Salmiah's younger brother and
so happened that day he had an open house. We helped
ourselves to the nasi minyak, satay and ketupat pulut served
by him. After lunch, we sent NurSudaha to her college at
Besut. |
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L-R: Salmiah with Luly and his wife |
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Syara and Salmiah with Luly's baby son |
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On the way back from Besut, we stopped
at the "Floating Mosque" at Kuala Trengganu to perform
Solat Jamaq Takdim for Maghrib & Ishaq |
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On the way to Dungun, we stopped for
dinner |
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