Bye, IDFR

It's the last day of our third training, Young Diplomats. I never had any feeling to come back home on every last day of training, because I knew that i would miss the memories and also the people I'd been around all those days, my cohort-mates, the officers, and also my beloved alumnis who taught me A LOT of things, taught me to be a better person in conclusion. I felt thankful until I am not glad at all to see the back of theirs. We always say "Now, let's come back to the reality" after finishing our training and right before going back to school, because being in JSLC and being around with these people is like a dream that feels genuinely real that I do not ever want to leave.

*wiping tears* okay, so on the last day, we had a closing ceremony, and our closing ceremony got more exciting because we collaborated with the Saudi diplomats' closing ceremony, and luckily, I had a good skill in Arabic, so I got to interact with some of them HAHA.

The closing ceremony started with the Zapin performance that we performed in front of the Ambassador Norman, Mdm. Hafizah, and the Saudi diplomats. It turned out so good and we enjoyed it! :))) and then it went with the speech by Ambassador Norman, including him complimented us being so energetic during the whole 5 days at IDFR by asking questions and volunteering to answer every question that was asked by the speakers, at a very young age. Then, the ceremony continued by a speech, given out by a representative of the Saudi diplomats. Lastly, the speech by JSLC Cohort * representative, JSL Nazira which was very super excellent! We, then, enjoyed the meal and interacted with each other.

After the ceremony ended, we packed our stuff and got ready to go back to Johor! Gosh, I was telling myself that I would miss these whole activities that we did together one day, and yes, it does happen. Alhamdulillah, we came back home safely and no one was sick after that. May more good memories and knowledge that we would gain on another training :D

4 is Always the Best Number

I woke up and it was the 4th day of our third training! I was so excited for this day because we would be going for a study trip to High Commission of Australia in Kuala Lumpur (beside the KLCC to be specific). but before that, there was a session before we went to the high commission. The session was with Mr. Zikry Kholil and it was pretty mesmerizing.

The most fun part was when he asked us to pick anything in the room and immediately speak about it like we try to promote it so that the other person would be convinced to buy that stuff from us. Each and one of us did it in a creative way. I picked a sweet on my table, and said that the sweet was not an ordinary sweet. it was a magical sweet. once you plant the sweet on the ground just like any seeds, it will grow a "Sweet Tree". there would be a lot of new magical sweets appear on that tree. and there is only one magical sweet that is available in this world now. and that sweet was in my hand, so it costed RM2B.

Then, Mr. Zikry continued his session which is about Leadership Skills. He really gave importance in embracing making mistakes. He also encouraged us to travel as it improves our knowledge about cultures, languages, make international friends, and breaks our comfort zone. 

After that, we went to the High Commission of Australia in KL! We listened to an explanation about the affir between Malaysia and Australia currently have. We also learnt about general knowledge about Australia though. Did you know that emus and kangaroos were chosen to be part of Australia's embelm is because emus and kangaroos cannot walk backward? so it is like a symbol of a sustainable development of Australia. and there are 43% of Australians that were born with one foreign parent. so there are so many multicultural people that were born by interracial marriages in Australia. woah!

The high commissioners were very nice. they gave each of us a book that tells the relations between Australia with South East Asian countries, "Endeavours of Excellence". THANK YOU!

The 4th day was not ended yet! We then went to Hotel Istana, Kuala Lumpur for Protocol, Grooming, and Social Etiquette and Fine Dining and Reception sessions. We formed two lines to welcome the honourable speaker, Mr. Sophian Ab. Rahman. He is the protocol officer for royal ceremonies.

Mr. Sophian then taught us the right way of having dinner/lunch in a grand ceremony. The hotel served us bread and soup, appetizer, main dish, and dessert. and Mr. Sophian taught us the right way to use a napkin, to use the fork and knife, etc. Thanks to him, now wherever we go to hotel, we could eat in a proper way. it means that there would be no more flying knife or fork after this.

FYI, the picture above shows the right way to call upon a waiter.

After this long yet exciting day, we went back to IDFR, and got ready for our final Zapin practice for the real performance on the day after.

Purrrfect Pictures

Our Day 1-3 are full of diplomacy classes and Zapin practices. I've learnt a lot of things, about Malaysia's foreign policy, Malaysian missions abroad, United Nations, and the issue-that-most-of-the-speakers-spoke-about, ASEAN. These classes got me interested in being a diplomat one day. It is on my list of ambitions now lol.

We took a tour at IDFR building on the first day. I swear, every room is beyond amazing! This treaty room (the picture) where many treaties and agreements were signed in there, is my favourite one. From the designs to the history of the rooms, super impressive!

We went to Ministry of Foreign Affairs (KLN) in Putrajaya on the second day. THE BUILDING WAS MASSIVE AND .... *speechless. it is very very beautiful. the combining colours of bronze, green and white is a genius one. I started to love this ministry just because of its building lol.

and of course, we took a couple of pictures there. by couple, i meant hundreds. and this is our best Cohort 8 group picture so far. I promise you, every picture that was taken in the building turned out to be perrrrfect.

Could you guess what this picture does mean? TET! can you see the 8 number there, in the picture? we formed the 8 number! and Mr. Syahidan and Mdm. Kara are the cores of our cohort (it's supposed to be like, kind of metaphore, but nah)

And also, my team, consisting JSL Heshvienie, JSL Nasrul, and myself did a very very good job (perhaps we were the best team, they did not tell us tho) on the Group Presentation session on the third day. Also, we were presenting about ASEAN.

Arrived at IDFR

I woke up, and it's the 4th day of our second training. I would be the emcee for that day's first session, so I made a research on the detail of the speaker of the session, which is Ms. Sharyina. She is a secretary for the manager of Pavilion Mall, Kuala Lumpur. She came and taught us about her expertise, which is, Image, Personality, Appearance, and Grooming.

After the session ended, Mdm. Norbiha took the stage and gave us a task regarding world knowledge as we would be going to Institute of Diplomacy and Foreign Relations (IDFR) in Kuala Lumpur on that day. After all the brainstorming, we had our lovely closing ceremony including the JSLC appointment letters presentation. 

The certificate was signed by my idol, yall! After the ceremony ended, the bus that would take us to KL arrived at the hotel. it was hard to leave the hotel lol seriously tho, it's because that i learnt a lot of things there, and i would be missing every moment of us all together there. We began our journey by the doa that was recited by our Imam, JSL Fauzan. The journey was full of writing reports, listening to songs, watching movie, writing diaries, writing reports again. 

We finally arrived at IDFR at 9.00 p.m. We had a short brief by Ms. Farsha, one of the secretariats in IDFR at the dining hall. Everyone seemed so sleepy, even though they already slept along the journey to get there lol. After the briefing, we went to our rooms and went to sleep.

Got Caught by a Security Guard

It's the third day of our second training, the Young Corporate Leaders Program, and guess what, Mr. Johan Ropi, the founder of a very famous teenagers style mall, KILANG BATERI came and gave a talk about Essence of Branding. I really could see his perseverance in business, no wonder he is a successful man now. He was so energetic when it comes to branding and he is also Johorean. I mean, he could be brutal if he heard anyone accusing Johor for bad things.

It was a privilege for us to have the manager of the Grand Paragon Hotel itself, Dato' Season Chan to spend his time with us and talked about Negotiation Skills. I could see that he talked based on his own experiences in business. 

After that, we went to Angsana Mall to experience ourselves on how to negotiate well with people. We were distributed into groups consisting of 2 person, and I was with JSL Nazira. Then, we were given a thermos flask, which was costed RM32, and our task was to exchange the thermos flask into something else that are costed higher than RM32  by negotiating with the shop keepers.

Firstly, we tried to barter with a scarf shopkeeper, but it did not turn out so good. The shopkeeper wanted to offer us a scarf in the first place, but the scarf was actually costed lower than RM32. so we asked for more lol, and she declined. then we searched for others. Our second attempt was with a collagen shopkeeper and it surprisingly worked out HAHA. Our way to achieve this was a bit difficult. It was because the manager of the shop was not there, there was only a shopkeeper. so we asked the phone number of the manager by from the shopkeeper, and called her by ourselves, and of course, the sweet talker, Anis Nazira was the one who did it. Firstly, the manager sauid that she was gonna accept the exchange, and then she refused, and then she re-accept after all those sweet words. and yes, WE MADE IT!!

So after this, every time you go to Angsana Mall, make sure to purchase any collagen or perfume at D BAYDURA HEALTH & BEAUTY shop! We exchanged the thermos flask with a collagen that was costed RM38 and a couple of perfumes, costed RM18. We made RM24 profits! After that, a terrible problem appeared. After exchanging to the collagen and perfumes, we wanted something more. so we tried to exchange these stuff into something else that costed higher, but unfortunately, we were almost busted by a security there, in Angsana Mall. Right after we negotiate with another shopkeeper, the security guard approached us and asked us if we were sellers. He then told us that unregistered sellers are prohibited and so on. GOSH! IT SCARED ME, and also Anis, I could see it in her eyes. so i I decided to take action by explaining the real reason why we were there and negotiate with every shopkeeper there. Luckily, the security guard understood and we quickly walked away. HE ALREADY TOOK OUR COLLAGEN! but of course, he handed it back to us. pheww

At that night, we presented all the items that we had exchanged at Angsana Mall, and our team started as the first one to present. It felt so good to share the experience that we had been through to the people that always will to listen.We then gave the collagen to Mr. Syahidan, our program coordinator for JSLC as a gift from us. 

I am a Commander !

WELCOME TO GRAND PARAGON HOTEL!!!!!
*greeting myself when there were actually no one welcomed me there right after entering the door*

The morning i woke up, i felt like it is still early. until i remembered that i still got a lot of stuff to buy, black belt, febreze, shoes kiwi, and toiletries. so i rushed and got ready faster than lightning after that. we stopped at the Mydin Store and also entered the store and grabbed then paid for the stuff faster than anyone could imagine, like having an Amazing Race. but this time they dont offer money.

okay, so, back to where we were, Grand Paragon Hotel. gosh this hotel is amazing (the dining hall for more specific, since that is the first thing that i'd look for everytime going to...exactly, anywhere... because food is life. okay, and of course i did not take a long time staring at the dinind hall. i went straight to our conference room since i am running late (actually it wasnt really late, but since i am in JSLC, everything seems so late even we still got time).

Jumping to the our first session! the first slot was started by Mdm. Kara Syafinaz binti Basirrudin, this independent, super strong, super inspiring woman. I AM A BIG FAN OF HER!! She started the slot by explaining on how to be a proper emcee. She told us that whenever we become emcees, we need to be the personal assistant of the speaker. 

Mdm. Kara's session which is CODE Analysis allowed me to know myself better. I got to realise that I am actually a person with a commander style, which is I totally agree and im proud of it lol. but the cons are, I am kind of a person that has a big ego and sometimes does not want to listen to anybody else.

After having lunch there (i swear, it was very delicious. i dont want to talk about it, or u would find my blog is not a diary, but a history text book instead, bcs there are a lot of things i would talk about if it comes to food), we listened to a talk given by a representative from SWM Environment. i have just realised how important it is to separate solid waste at home. most of the solid waste at home actuallt take a freaking long time to dispose by themselves. I've also known that food waste could be "recycled" to make new furtulizer (which is new to me. gosh, id been living under a rock).

ME

Does it ever seem like you have more adversity in your life than other people do?

As if everyone around you is having an easier time of things than you are?

You begin to feel sorry for yourself and think, “Why does this stuff always happen to ME?”

Well, everyone asks themselves that everyday because at that very moment, they forget about all those kind and good things that they ever did. At that very moment, they feel like it is going to be the end of the world and feel not determined and start blaming themselves endlessly.

For me, the secret of my success, yes, I do always blame myself for the mistakes that I did, I mean it is the right thing to do. but instead of just sitting there and crying over split milk, I'd try to think of a solution and not to make those mistakes again.

then, the most important thing is BE PROUD OF YOURSELF

BIO-DATA

Name : Mohamad Hazim bin Mohammad Zamri (Hazim Zamri)
D.O.B : 31 May 2001
Height/Weight : 170cm / 56kg
Residence : Pasir Gudang, Johor
Email : jslhazim@gmail.com
Education : SMK Pasir Gudang
Educational Achievements : UPSR  4A1B
                                                PT3     11A
Language Known : English, Malay
Hobbies : Movies, Music, Books, COFFEE
Siblings : 1 big brother, 2 little brothers, and a little sister