One Day by David Nicholls

I'm exactly one year behind in updating the books that I've read.  This book was read during raya holiday last year (12 months ago) and I'm now in the current raya holiday.  Time do flies - with the speed of light ...

Anyways back to the book.  I didn't realize I had the book until I saw the movie's still ad in Goodreads and realize that somehow the title sounds familiar.  A rummage thru my unread list cupboard proved I was right.  Based on previous experience, whereby I watched a movie based on (already owned) book, I tend not to read it.  So to avoid that I quickly read this one.

The storyline of One Day is not new.  A story of 2 people which expands for twenty years.  Mostly its funny but also moving.  Really I can imagine Anne Hathaway playing Emma Morby character.  In fact I'm picturing her all the way as I'm reading the book.  Back then I didn't know who will play Dexter Mayhew which kept me wondering and trying to put a face to the character.  

Emma and Dexter characters remind me of this movie called Before Sunset which was a sequel to Before Sunrise starring Ethan Hawke (I didn't watch Before Sunrise).  Its about two characters whom are in denial of their feelings to each other and choose to suffer through out the years.  "I love you but I just don't like you anymore" kind of stuff.

One Day was a fast read for me but I didn't expect the ending as such.  Since I'm a sucker for romantic comedy movie (but not in books) so I'm looking forward to the movie.

Eid Mubarak 2012

Amir Ishak clan

I think I should rename my blog as do you remember me?  It has been so long since I last post anything at all.

So before I miss Aidil Fitri altogether, here is the photos compilation of the recent celebration at my in-laws place in Ipoh.  After several years of not celebrating our 1st raya there, this year we (my family) did.

I've tried to upload the video into YouTube but after countless attempts which I'm too lazy to elaborate here but let just say it forced me to abandon the task but I found another way of uploading it onto this blog but unfortunately the pics quality are not HD (high definition) enough in the video.  Meaning the more beau tee effect in the photos doesn't work here :p Sorry.

Anyways enjoy the video.

Salam Aidil Fitri & Maaf Zahir Batin.

The Hakawati by Rabih Alameddine

Everything can be told.  It's just a matter of starting, one word follows another - Javier Marias (A Heart So White)

p36 Hakawati - teller of tales, myths & fables (hekayat)

This book is a gem and the author is a genius.  There were many plots and subplots.  Stories within stories. Fables and myths mixed with current tales.  Many, many interesting characters but never once was I lost.  I understood the story perfectly well even after I have to put it away for a while ~ to attend to life's reality.  That's how good the book was.

The story is about a young man Osama al-Kharrat who returned to war torn Beirut to be with his family (near and extended) and his dying father.

p7 I was a tourist in a bizarre land.  I was home.

When Osama was with his family and friends, standing vigil at his father's deathbed, they turned to the things that gave them solace - gossip, laughter and above all, stories.

... stories do not belong only to those who were present or to those who invent them.  Once a story has been told, it's everyone's, it becomes common currency, it gets twisted and distorted; no story is told the same way twice or in quite the same words, not even if the same person tells the story twice, not even if there is only ever one storyteller - Javier Marias

Osama was reminded of why and how his grandfather became al-Kharrat (the fibster) and along the stories that he learned to tell, Osama's own family tales were also a fascinating real time drama.

On p292, one of my favorite character who was Osama's uncle (his father's youngest brother) died.  He was such a colorful and interesting character that I felt disappointed when he died in an uneventful death.  Just like that and he's gone.

Like I've mentioned earlier there were many incorporation of old tales and fables of the Arabian Nights into this book which many I haven't heard before this but characters or rather their names were familiar to me.  Maybe because I knew them from the local version of the 1001 tales of the Arabian Nights, once upon a time ago when I was young

The Hakawati is funny, captivating and enchanting from its very first line, “Listen. Let me take you on a journey beyond imagining. Let me tell you a story."

The Girl on the Landing by Paul Torday

Ever once in a while you stumbled upon a book which isn't recommended by anyone.  You just feel like picking up the book and give it a go.  Well, that's what happened to me for this particular book.  I'm not a fan of 'clever ' book but this one is and I'm so glad I chose it. 

This was read in July, 2011.  Yup, I know I have issues with updating my reads for the blog.

p83 It was like living with a someone for 10 years, you thought worked in a tobacconist's shop and then finding out that he was a nuclear physicist.

The novel begins as Michael, a middle-aged man of means, is dressing for dinner at a friend's country house in Ireland. As he descends the grand staircase, he spots a small painting of a landing with an old linen press and the white marble statue of an angel. In the background is a woman clad in a dark green dress. During dinner, Michael comments on the painting to his hosts but they say there is no woman in the picture. When Michael goes up to bed later, he sees that they are correct. This is only the first in a series of incidents that lead Michael to question his grip on reality. His wife Elizabeth is unsettled by the changes she sees in a man she originally married because he was dependable and steady, not because she loved him. Suddenly she is aware that she has never really known Michael and as he changes, she sees glimpses of someone she could fall in love with. Michael, in the meantime, is disturbed by events up at his family's ancestral home in the wilds of Scotland and by a past that he is threatening to destroy everything, and everyone, he has ever loved.

Oh and did I mention that apart from being clever this book is also creepy ... ? (Twilight zone theme, is most appropriate now)

p293 Elizabeth ran back to the house, slammed and locked the door.  Her  3 bars mobile signals suddenly disappeared 

I had to stop reading to catch my breath.  Too terrified to read.  Fearing for Elizabeth.  That's how good or scary the writing is.

p304 Lamia is a Greek word means greedy, female demon.  part woman part serpent and drank the blood of men.  

So now you know.

This was a fast read for me.  It's a psychological thriller which if I knew from the start I would not have chosen it but choose it I did and it didn't disappoint at all. In fact, I enjoyed it very much.  Like the cover said, its clever (think Sixth Sense movie) and gripping.

ps/Sharin if you are reading this, this book is not for you

Having a Coke with You by Frank O'Hara

I never knew this poem before nor do I know who the author is. It was mentioned in the movie Beastly which I just recently watched and I looked it up. And when I saw the the author read it, I immediately fell in like with it.  Like at first sight.  If you may call it as such  ^_^

So enjoy.



HAVING A COKE WITH YOU
is even more fun than going to San Sebastian, Irún, Hendaye, Biarritz, Bayonne
or being sick to my stomach on the Travesera de Gracia in Barcelona
partly because in your orange shirt you look like a better happier St. Sebastian
partly because of my love for you, partly because of your love for yoghurt
partly because of the fluorescent orange tulips around the birches
partly because of the secrecy our smiles take on before people and statuary
it is hard to believe when I'm with you that there can be anything as still
as solemn as unpleasantly definitive as statuary when right in front of it
in the warm New York 4 o'clock light we are drifting back and forth
between each other like a tree breathing through its spectacles

and the portrait show seems to have no faces in it at all, just paint
you suddenly wonder why in the world anyone ever did them

I look
at you and I would rather look at you than all the portraits in the world
except possibly for the Polish Rider occasionally and anyway it's in the Frick
which thank heavens you haven't gone to yet so we can go together the first time
and the fact that you move so beautifully more or less takes care of Futurism
just as at home I never think of the Nude Descending a Staircase or
at a rehearsal a single drawing of Leonardo or Michelangelo that used to wow me
and what good does all the research of the Impressionists do them
when they never got the right person to stand near the tree when the sun sank
or for that matter Marino Marini when he didn't pick the rider as carefully
as the horse

it seems they were all cheated of some marvelous experience
which is not going to go wasted on me which is why I am telling you about it

—Frank O'Hara

The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown

To live in the world without becoming aware of the meaning of the world is like wandering about in a great library without touching the books.

This book was my read in June last year.  I love Dan Brown books.  Maybe because I'm always fascinated with fictions that interlace with facts, history and religion.  I know there are plenty of books out there with the same genre but let just say I'm sort of loyal.

I was planning to visit a girlfriend in Washington last year so reading this book was aptly and I also plan to take the book tour.  So there I was busy jotting down all the must-not-miss places to see from the book.  Alas the visit didn't materialized due to my work commitment but finished the book I did.  Perhaps, one day.

Back to the book.  Although it was fast paced for me but it didn't capture my interest as much as I thought it would be.  I have high hopes for this book, perhaps that was the reason.  Nevertheless, I like all the quotes and captions I found thru out the book - as usual.

p58 We all fear what we do not understand
me: like other religion and culture

p112 Knowledge is a tool.  And like all tools, its impact is in the hands of the user

p143 Alcohol came from an Arabic word al-kuhl

p537 Avrah Ka Dabra = abacadabra = I create as I speak
me: magic ^_^

p596 Albert Pike - what we have done for ourselves alone, dies with us.  What we have done for others and the world, remains and is immortal.

At one point, the book sort of lost me and I couldn't care much about how the story ends but I did enjoy all the many infos especially the history behind the words and monuments in DC.  All are saved for my 'perhaps one day' visit to Washington.

Without wax
me

The Ten Year Nap by Meg Wolitzer

I really want to like this book even before I read it.  I can anticipate myself making a connection to at least one out of the four female protagonists or even to all four.  After all, I am inspire to be a housewife one fine day.  Yup, you read me right.

The book is about 4 women who leave their careers to embrace motherhood and before you knew it 10 years had lapsed. What was meant to be temporary dragged to a decade ...

It's like the snooze in an alarm clock.  No matter how many times, the alarm screams at us, we can always find time for 5 min more (or in my case 9 min more) of sleep.  I'm not surprise that motherhood and marriage can make a decade of time flew off just like that.  

Alas, it didn't happened.  I mean the connection, that I hoped for between the characters and me.  

I like the idea of the story but it didn't engage me.  I found the story to be too narrative and sometimes too real for me to enjoy.  And at the end I struggled to finish the book.  But thanks to a short holiday to the island of Tioman where I purposely took only this book with me so I can finish it.  Limited access to internet on the island helps too.

ps/finished reading the book on June 9, 2011