a year out

With the limited time that we had in our degree and the theoretical strategy that our uni has , Melbourne university architecture students are urged to find practical experience outside.

What I like, I get paid double of my scholarship and taste the real architecture. Contracts, clients, colleague, office, boss and more importantly the real design.

But what I dislike.. despite I owned an excellent portfolio (shameless confession) which could make ladies at the reception desk fall in love with .. (ehem),  there is too many obstacles arise constantly which  causes me in my subconscious mind to crawl with a white flag begging for mercy ..

visa issue, no firm is hiring, university weird rules, rental problem..

I have to admit, I nearly give up after feel a bit tired about all these but alhamdulillah, someone has remind me how I used to be! I owe you..

These day students are abused by the the government boundary rules. The fact that we are poor, innocent and yet grow with a white canvas heart has been wrongly viewed by the authority.

Le Corbusier had once travel thousand miles with feet and wagons German, worked with the legendary Peter Behren and brought back to France a scroll holding a secret of concrete portal frame or known as Dom-ino. I mean look, we can do better these days escpecially in the age of jet plane, but it will not be the same, plus it wont happen without money, visa procedure and nationality issue.. think about it.. impediment created will kill the human true nature of thirsty for knowledge.

Young kids are no longer excited to break the E=mc² or even understand why an apple dropped on Newton’s head. They are abroad for the sake of being abroad, and of course scores in exams and sponsored by some rich affiliations. Being abroad heh?  I can see some of them are gravitated to online games rather than exploring the new world. reason? “I’m here to get good mark, go back home, and work with the affiliation.” I know you are trying to be ‘bersyukur’, but dont you get it? you are the chosen one and with your genius fast absorbing brain, you should capable to make yourself a legend. or at least a respectful person.

I will make sure my year out is worth more that what everyone is expected. But I need to be picky about the firms’ location as well. As Muslims need to pray 5 times a day and attend Jumaah prayer,  I don’t feel good if I skip one of these for the work sake.  (I got one in Brighton Beach, but it is so far away from mosque). And yes, to be picky in choosing jobs’ location means I have a really uncertain route in front of me and what I have to do is dua.

One thing for sure one day I will be a legend, I will be a hero, and I will be an avant garde. Just wait and see as my name will be written in the architecture history books.

ps:// i have battled depression for months and so far I have able to manage it quite well, but sometimes it does come back to bite me in the ass. Lately someone has cheer me up but luckily the injection of philophobia in me is still strong.. or I am lying to myself? I dont know.. I wish I know..

anak seni

Sitting in front of me were 3 guest critiques, my tutor and my fellow studio mates. As usual not afraid but my hands were shaking. Presentation. This is my battlefield and I can’t resist them from showing the excitement that I had. Standing behind me handsomely, were 15 A2 drawings (some of them I couldn’t finish it), 1 1:200 model, and 1:20 sound bath model. Before I had a go for my final presentation, I closed my eyes and had one last breath, suddenly all these images projected in my mind…

I can still remember, how far I used to live 2 years ago. 8 km from university while just relying on tram and most of my classes started at 9 am but I never complain. I killed the traveling time in tram on thinking how I could I amazed people with my idea.

I can still remember, how fools I am before I get into university, when my eyes were blinded with computer games and I start forgetting what does art means to me. Fortunately a guy who worked in Pasar Seni saved me.I owe him a bright future.

I can still remember, the day I went to JPA interview for ‘Seni Bina’ course, I had no idea what does architecture means but I threw my dices because the course contains a word ‘Seni’ in it.

I can still remember, how sad my dad was when I refused to be a doctor and I had picked some weird art course but I’m sure that now he is really proud of me.

I can still remember, the night I was awake until morning to finish up my SPM Seni Reka portfolio. There was nothing that could made my body and mind non stop operating other that having pleasure of working with obsession.

I can still remember, every single trophies that I won for poster competitions back in secondary school and how my mom smiled when she saw one of the trophy had a same height as me.

I can still remember, how mad my primary school maths teacher was, when she realized half of my maths books was filled with comic that I drew. It was detained under her office and disappeared from my sight forever. I wish she had spent two minutes of her ‘female cikgu chatting time’ to read it and realize how great the drawings were.

I can still remember, how me and my brother planned to be cartoonists when we grow up and I’m amazed that he still adhere the dreams. Hold it there brother, I promise that I will establish a studio for us.

I can still remember, the hard life that my family had when we get back in Malaysia. There is no way my parent would buy me toys, but it didn’t make me sad because I could make them out of papers.

I can still remember, how was the second hand lego bucket that my dad bought back in UK had give some space in my brain for creativity. Ayah, I really appreciate it. Thankyou

I can still remember, when I first participated in drawing competition. I was 6 and it was far far away from my win. My mom convinced me, said its ok with smile.. But I was persisted and promised that every single first place trophies will be mine.

I can still remember, how proud I was when my art teacher showed my mom’s drawing to my class as an example for the next week drawing competition. I never knew my mom could draw such a beautiful drawing! It was the moment when my eyes are opened to art and it was when my art chapter begin!

and ayah, mama this one is for you

I rolled my words, made them sway on a dancing floor in a hall of idea, swing along with the songs that came from my drawings and models.
and the final presentation went really well. I can see each of the guest critiques’ faces were filled with satisfaction and I still can’t forget what one of the guest critique said, ‘Its a flawless project, welldone.’

Alhamdulillah, my design subject for architecture studies degree is finally over with satisfactory!

Below are the best 6 boards that I bet in for the exhibition. Because we were only allowed to present 6 A2 boards (3 front and 3 at the back), so I put the first 3 with my digital renderings and 3 at the back with my hand drawings.

3 digital renderings

3 hand drawings

ps: I had my job interview last Friday and I’m not sure myself whether I had nailed it or not.. maybe because I’m immuned with interviews so I don’t feel what I supposed to feel in the real one. sigh..

my own quotation

yes, i create my own and please give me credit if you use it .

“if two days ago i was an idiot, yesterday i was a moron, but today i’m stupid” – firadauskhazis

“I believe that clouds are walkable, physicist have proved me wrong, but one day architects will make it real!” – firadauskhazis

hunting for job

I’m supposedly will be graduating this December, but I’m deferring it to March next year so that it would buy me some time to get enough money for my family flight tickets. I really want them to be here and see me in my graduation attire.

Job.. I have sent my resume to a few firms but I haven’t got any calls from them..

Artwork.. the good thing is I’m finally convinced with my own art signature (before this I hardly decide what it should look like). oh yeah~!

bekerja keras

Two and a half week + 1 exam paper left before I completed my degree. Got hell of works to do and I want this semester to have a happy ending. Got structure reports due tomorrow, evening got meeting with my Mentor and on Friday (9am to be specific), a guest critique is coming for the detail drawing review which I haven’t start any. ~yeah~

architecture-city-islam

“Architecture … is one of Islam’s most vital manifestations as well as practical servants. Islam was essentially a city religion, and as a result it found in the city its basic elements. .. The most tangible embodiment of all Islam’s realities and ideals remains its architecture.” – Umberto Scerrato

more penguins

Iteration ? Is this call iteration? shiteration? maybe..

its spring! yea!

I’m more productive when its not cold.

credit to kamil for d80+tokina 11-16. really need to get one of these wide lense.

Mid Semester Work

I think I have found the reason why I don’t find myself suit with the iteration process in designing..

It is because I have tons of idea.. My brain keeps visualize things and I just realize that I can’t stop it. There so much thing I want to do in my design and iteration will just make it worse as a new idea will appear every single time I do iteration.

Thus the process has no longer become a process of refining but it will just give me difficulties to decide which one I should choose.

Alhamdulillah, the mid crit was good and after all the comments from the guest critiques and as well as some advice from Derham last semester, I think I have start to understand myself. I should restraint myself from shooting all the idea in one spot because I would need some for my future project as well as during my career and I have to start use the time that I got on the presentation board.

So basically what I’m designing this semester is a Public Bath House. Its much more like the 2009 Pritzker Award winner’s building, The Therme Vals by Peter Zumthor.
We are assigned to design the individual space of different bath (which has different temperature, smell and etc). Its much about how people perceive the atmosphere in the individual bath rather than a big concept wrapping up the building.
Below are videos about the Therme Vals.

Finally my order has arrived..

Peter Zumthor, Thinking Architecture

A book that has already sold out in the Australia market and a special order is required if you want to get one which will take 4 months or weeks (can’t remember which one the shop boy told me). But I bought it from UK through ebay and its only take about 3 weeks.

Malaysia and Architecture chapter 1

One thing about Malaysia’s architecture is the works are not laid on a blue canvas. I have done several observations on Kuala Lumpur and Pulau Pinang each time I went back there and it will be rude if I say that the architecture of these two cities are not great. I have seen thousands of fabulous buildings regardless their age in these two cities but why a pair of ears of Malaysian architecture student who has been talking about architecture for almost three years with other architecture students from overseas have never ever heard any good praise about our architecture except for the Petronas Twin Tower and Putrajaya?

One thing for sure, architecture does not means buildings.

Architecture is much more like an art implemented into society as a social generator. It works as a pleasure for eyes to see and also functional for everything it meant to be. So now developers, lets question yourself, are you trying to tick these two fundamental tick boxes? or you just want to boost up your company with a big gigantic building crowned with the company logo??

If you do aim for the second option, well, congratulations you have just waste billion of ringgit. I’m saying this as I believe your vision will never ever reached the people.

Malaysia landscapes are polluted.

The sky is filled with haze and the buildings are no longer freely standing. They are suffering.

I guarantee you, this scenario only happens in Kuala Lumpur and sometimes in Pulau Pinang. Has anyone up there thought about how to solve this problem or at least realize that this is a big issue? It is not an unfortunate for Malaysia to have a cloudy sky, besides we should be more grateful about it, but haze is totally a different story. Why does within the same country, Taiping has a nice clear blue sky with a fluffy clouds floating in it but not in Kuala Lumpur?

The answer is Malaysians are too obsessed with these words, ‘duit’, ‘besar’ and ‘kaya’. Development goes nonstop but unfortunately it goes on a wrong track. Why does the investment on monorail and LRT are stopped while the development are still going on? The community keeps growing and nobody can stop it but it is pathetic when the facilities that being invested are not for a long term run. Between 3 fly overs stacked on each other which required the community to own their own car (Persiaran Kewajipan as an example) compare to a ‘tram system’, which one is much more expensive? If the government would spent enormous amount of money on the tram system, wouldn’t that means the same when government spend money on the stacked fly overs while people have to spend on cars and fuels? To think again, government’s money is the people’s money in anyway.

If its an equal, can’t we choose the one with ecological features? Because we do need to save our environment. We do need to save our architecture. We do need to save our social generator. We do need to save our country landmark and identity. Lets give the blue sky a chance to shine.

ps: kalau seharian berjalan-jalan di Kuala-Lumpur, memang akan dapat hasil tahi hidung yang banyak. tak percaya sila cuba