PhD... does it sound fantasy?

With Farrah's consent, I wrote this post to wake myself up, this is for real! Apa keje la Kak Fidah ni pegi publish email Farrah kat sini ek. Ala Farrah, bukan ada orang baca pun blog akak ;)
Akak sangat2 excited dengan Farrahnyer progress. Bestnya! Akak tak tau mana pergi my determination. Tak taulah apa yang hinder me from making it happen. Keje ke? Nak kata ambitious-tak pun, main2 je keje. Responsibility? Hmm, saperlah yang depending no kat aku ni kan, ada tak ada pun seruper je. Don't know what, yang aku tau there is something... takpe, forget it.

Farrah ni expert dalam Remote Sensing (akak silap, ingatkan Geoinformatics, kekeke, lain eh). Dia ni graduate first class masa kat UTM dulu, mana ada orang senang senang leh grad first class kat sana. Memang genius. Seronok akak tau bila awak share share ngan akak. Dulu kata nak apply Minnesota, tapi macam nak ke Texas lak ni eh? Colorado tu sounds good jugak. Nevermind, comes what may, you've got a husband as your best companion. (Takleh la aku nyibuk, hehehe)

Diana, aku tak rasa aku lama kat Toyota, tu pasal la aku tak berani nak commit to any long-term loans ngn company ni. Tu pasal la jugak aku 'password-protect'kan blog ni. Kang boss aku baca, uhuhuhu....

There were times I thought this would not be just a dream... hmm do you sense an Antarctic-sized "but" coming along.

PhD... why does it sound fantasy, 'cause it ain't no easy!

_________________________________________________________________________

From: Farrah Melissa Muharam [mailto:farrahmelissa@gmail.com]
Sent: Mon 1/7/2008 6:43 PM
To: smaas@lbk.usda.ars.gov; Maas, Stephen
Subject: PhD Opportunity - Initial Discussion

Dear Prof. Stephan J. Maas,
First and foremost, I would like to thank you for allocating a few minutes of your time to entertain this email.
Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Farrah Melissa and I am a Malaysian citizen. Currently, I am a tutor at the University Putra Malaysia, one of the public universities in my country. I am attached to the Department of Agricultural Technology and a member of the Precision Agriculture research interest group. The reason I write you is to discuss any possibility for me to be attached as a PhD candidate at your institution and to have you as my supervisor for my PhD study. I came to know about you through your extensive publications on Remote Sensing related studies during my research background study.

As for my academic background, I was awarded a BSc. (Remote Sensing) from a local university and an M.Sc. (Remote Sensing) from the University College of London (UCL), United Kingdom in 2005. After graduating from UCL, I exposed myself to the palm oil plantation industry for 2 years, researching on yield monitoring and nutrient assessment using Remote Sensing and GIS technologies before I made the decision to contribute and to expand my skill sets by joining the academic world.

My area of interest is to apply Remote Sensing and GIS for crop monitoring/crop yield mapping/crop yield estimation and crop nutrient assessment/management. I am also interested in implementing Remote Sensing Image Processing for vegetation information extraction. Attached is my resume for your further reference.

It will be my great pleasure if you can consider my application to pursue my PhD project under your reputable supervision and thus allowing me to gain precious experiences while working together with your research team. I hope that we can further discuss this matter.

Your kind attention is highly appreciated. I am looking forward for your respond.

Thank you.
Best Regards,
Farrah Melissa

From: Maas, Stephen
Date: 9 Jan 2008 03:12
Subject: RE: PhD Opportunity - Initial Discussion
To: Farrah Melissa Muharam

Ms. Muharam-
Thank you for inquiring about a PhD program at Texas Tech University. I am very impressed with the information you provided in your resume. Please allow me to review your material over the next few days to assess how well you might fit into the program here, and to determine if funds would be available for an assistantship to support you. When were you thinking about starting a PhD program--in the summer or fall of this year, or the spring of next year?

-Steve Maas
_________________________________________________________________________

From: Farrah Melissa Muharam
Date: 9 Jan 2008 08:42
Subject: Re: PhD Opportunity - Initial Discussion
To: "Maas, Stephen"
Dear Prof. Maas,
Firstly, I would like to thank you for your reply and concern. It is my pleasure to inform you that I will be awarded a funding assistantship from Malaysian Education Ministry if my application is successful. The assistantship will include tuition fees, personal allowances, equipment allowance and health insurance. Yet, this excludes research activities expenses such as traveling and data collection. I have in mind to start the PhD program within this year, if possible. Again, many thanks for your kind response and I hope to further discuss on this opportunity.

Thank you
Best regards
Farrah Melissa

From: Maas, Stephen
Date: 10 Jan 2008 02:47
Subject: RE: PhD Opportunity - Initial Discussion
To: Farrah Melissa Muharam

Ms. Muharam-
Thanks for your reply. If you have funding through your own assistantship, that would make it easier for you to join my program here at Texas Tech and study whatever topic you were interested in. I am checking with the University administrators regarding how we could handle your situation, particularly with regard to whether you would qualify for "in-state" tuition (which is much less than the tuition normally paid by foreign students). I hope to have this information tomorrow.

If you were to start in the fall of this year, there are also some university fellowships that you can apply for here at Texas Tech that could help pay your costs here.

Can you email to me a copy of your college transcripts showing what courses you took in your undergraduate and Master's programs? This would not have to be an "official" copy from the universities (a scanned photocopy will do). This will help me decide if you might be a good candidate for my program here.

I will contact you again when I've heard from my university administrators.
-S. Maas
_________________________________________________________________________
From: Maas, Stephen
Date: 12 Jan 2008 06:13
Subject: RE: PhD Opportunity - Initial Discussion
To: Farrah Melissa Muharam

Ms. Muharam-

I have found out that, since you would have an assistantship from your Education Ministry, you would qualify for in-state tuition at Texas Tech. In-state tuition is significantly less than out-of-state tuition.

I am curious about how the assistantship from your Education Ministry would be handled. Will they pay you a fixed amount (like a monthly salary), or will they pay you back for expenses (like tuition and insurance) that you incur? As you probably would guess, the cost of living in the United States is rather high. Typically, my Ph.D. students receive around 1500 to 1800 $US per month from the research assistantships that they have from me. This should give you an idea of what it costs to live and go to school here. Here at Texas Tech, we are very concerned that foreign students have sufficient funds to be able to live a reasonable life while they are here in the U.S.

Please remember to get me those copies of your transcripts.

Have a good day!
-S. Maas
_________________________________________________________________________

From: R. Khosla
Date: 20 Jan 2008 11:00
Subject: Re: Malaysian PhD student
To: Farrah Melissa Muharam
Cc: "Nelson,Carissa"
Dear Farrah Melissa:
Greetings! My apologies for not responding to you sooner. You may have seen my auto-generated email that I am traveling overseas for my sabbatical. I have intermittent and limited email access during my travels.

Thank you for your email and interest in graduate program in Precision Agriculture at Colorado State University (CSU). Congratulations on earning a scholarship from your government for Ph.D. degree program. Indeed, your academic background, preparation and credentials are quite impressive.

CSU has a strong graduate program in the area of your interests, spanning from site-specific nutrient management using a suite of active remote-sensors (hand-held, air-borne, and satellite based) to site-specific precision manure management, weed management, integrated pest and disease management, etc, using a suite of precision technologies. I have several graduate students and one of my recent Ph.D. graduate students did extensive crop monitoring using hand-held active remote sensors and satellite imagery for yield estimation, he recently finished his graduate degree and is now working for Natural Renewable Energy Lab. You may choose to continue his work further if you would like. Alternatively, we tailor make the graduate degree program for each and every graduate student to best meet their need and area of research interest.

I realize you have a scholarship from your government, however, in addition, we may be able to offer you a "recruitment scholarship" based on your credentials. You would be a very competitive for that scholarship as well. When do you plan to start on your Ph.D. graduate program? Have you had a chance to write your TOEFL and GRE exams? Please let me know and we can send you the application material or you can apply online as well.

Thanking you for your interest and looking forward to hearing from you.
SIncerely,
Raj Khosla
--------------
Dr. R. Khosla
Associate Professor, Precision Agriculture
Associate Editor, Soil Science Society of America Journal
Chair, International Precision Agriculture Conference 2008-2010

Department of Soil and Crop Sciences
C13 Plant Sciences Building
Colorado State University
Ft. Collins, CO 80523
Voice: (970) 491-1920
Fax: (970) 491-2758
www.precisionag.colostate.edu

The Cracked Pot

From a cousin of mine, who knew what I've been through
When I slipped down a steep incline, nearly lost hold of grounding truth
There he rose steadily out from the murky haze
Pulled me solemnly then told straight to my face
Though not in our favour the circumstances behave
Devotedly in humility must we seek His Grace

Here how the story goes...

An elderly chinese woman had two large pots
each hung on the ends of pole
which she carried across her neck


One of the pots had a crack in it
while the other pot was perfect and always
delivered a full portion of water


At the end of the long walk
from the stream to the house
the cracked pot arrived with only half full


For full two years this went on daily
with the woman bringing home
only one and a half pots of water


Of course the perfect pot was proud of its accomplishments
but the poor cracked pot was ashamed
of its own imperfection and miserable
that it could only do half of what it had been made to do


After two years of it perceived to be bitter failure
it spoke to the woman one day by the stream
"I am ashamed of myself, because this crack in
my side causes water to leak out
all the way back to your house"


The old woman smiled
"Did you notice that there are flowers
on your side of the path
but not on the other pot's side?"


"That's because I've always known about your flaw.
So I planted flower seeds on your side of the path,
and every day while we walk back, you water them."


"For two years I have been able to pick these
beautiful flowers to decorate the table.
Without you being just the way you are
there would not be this beauty to grace the house."


Each of us have own unique flaw.
But it's the cracks and flaws we each have that make
our lives together so very interesting and rewarding.
You've just got to take each person for what they are
and look the good in them.

* * *

AL-MUDHHEEK / AL-MUBKI
He Who Brings about both Laughter and Tears

"And that it is He Who makes (whom He wills) laugh, and makes (whom He wills) weep. "( An-Najm, 53:43)

Believers know that Allah creates whatever they experience and thus are pleased with Him in all circumstances, no matter how difficult. Knowing that mundane things are transitory, they do not grieve over any loss, for they know that their moral excellence will be fully rewarded in the Hereafter. Moreover, Allah promises believers the best life in this world.

~ HarunYahya.com

Inartistic touch from the hand of...

My passion for art never fades away though I'm lack of proper lesson. These are some digital reproduction of the illustrations I made a while ago. Two of my most precious drawings had been submitted to Faculty of Built Environment UTM in preparation for admission to the Department of Architecture. Back then, I wasn't given freedom to choose my own path. But I have faith that every creature on earth has provision guaranteed by God.
I ended up being an architect after all—a computer system architect.

The Heart is a Lonely Hunter

Lepaskan Kembali Aku Ke Laut

"... Tidak jauh rupanya semua tempat dariku. Segala-gala di bawah langit ini ada kaitan sesama sendiri dan semua manusia seperti saudara dan jiran tetangga sahaja. Hairan, kenapa tidak aku sedari tentang dekatnya dunia ini dengan diriku?"

Dari mimpi Leftenan Muda Usmal

... Tidak lama kemudian, Puan MacGillivray, setelah cukup lama bermesra dengan tetamu-tetamu di kumpulannya, meminta diri, dan bergerak pula ke kumpulan suaminya yang ketika itu sedang berbincang darihal bendera baru Persekutuan Tanah Melayu.

"Kenapa diikutinya rupa bendera Amerika Syarikat?" tanya Puan Bourne, "kenapa tidak diikutnya rupa Union Jack?" Tanya balik Jeneral Bourne kepada isterinya "jika diikuti Union Jack, soal pula orang, kenapa diikutinya Union Jack?"

"Negara ini ada kaitannya dengan Britain, tetapi tidak ada sedemikian kaitannya dengan Amerika Syarikat, bukankah bendera Australia dan bendera New Zealand berasaskan Union Jack?"

"Bendera hanya lambang. Mungkin kepada orang-orang di sini rupa bendera baru itu membawa pengertian yang penting kepada mereka. Mungkin semangat kemerdekaan yang ada pada orang-orang Amerika dahulu terdapat pada bendera itu. Lagipun apa sebab nak diikutinya Union Jack, orang-orang Tanah Melayu pada ketika ini sudah hilang cintanya terhadap Britain."

Dari perbualan Pegawai-pegawai British di King's House, 11 Julai 1954

Novel oleh Shaari Isa ini menggambarkan masyarakat Tanah Melayu di sekitar tahun 1954 hingga 1957 iaitu suasana ketika negara hampir mencapai kemerdekaan. Corak kehidupan lima golongan anggota masyarakat waktu itu diceritakan dengan amat teliti. Golongan tersebut adalah pentadbiran British, pejuang kemerdekaan, anggota tentera, rakyat jelata dan pengganas komunis.

Gambaran kehidupan rakyat ketika itu dengan jelas dapat saya rasai apatah lagi latarbelakang cerita adalah sekitar Kampung Bharu, tempat saya membesar dan bersekolah. Padang Kelab Sultan Sulaiman adalah betul betul di hadapan sekolah saya, Sekolah Menengah Puteri Wilayah. Saya mula mengenali novel ini lama dulu, sebaik habis persekolahan, kalaulah saya baca dari awal, tentu saya cemerlang dalam matapelajaran sejarah. Menduduki SPM di KISAS, saya cuma lulus sejarah dengan P7. Sekarang baru ada rasa patriotik.

Sangat digalakkan sebagai bahan bacaan untuk remaja di alam persekolahan.

Kenapa tiba tiba nak tulis pasal novel ni? Sebab masa tengah tengok berita kat RTM1 tadi, ada sedutan drama adaptasi novel ni. Jadi, terus tulis....