What a comeback!

الســـلام عليــــكم و رحمـــــة الله و بركاته

تحية طيبة أما بعد،،

(Arabian Prince)سيداتي آنساتي سادتي، نرحب بكم على متن طيران
و على الطيارة من طراز ايربس 380 وهي آخر اضافة لاسطولنا الجوي

24 days, 6 hours and 17 minutes since my last entry. Ok fine it's just been 11 days, but it sure as hell feels like much longer. Remember that last paragraph or so of the previous entry where I went on about not having plans for the easter break and mountains of work etc.. well let's just say there was a change of plans to all of that. I enjoyed my easter break to the max and didn't get through much work, atleast not during that week long break. However, I did manage to discipline/sit myself down the week after and all I saw for 3-4 days was loads of pages, piles of work and many lecture slides and tutorials and nothing else!

والآن اليكم تفاصيل الموجز

Right before the start of the easter break I was supposed to be expecting a couple of friends over from Birsbane, but nothing was confirmed yet. On the first weekend of the easter break I recieved a call from a friend telling me that they were surely coming and it was just a matter of getting their airtickets. The day after was a public holiday and everything was closed so they were delayed, but they got their tickets the day after and flew over right away. My housemate and I went to pick them up from the airport and that's when the fun began!

Here's a little something about them. Two very dear friends, one I've known for quite a while and the other just recently but proved to be one hell of a friend. My housemate and I went over to Brisbane (& Goldcoast) last Summer (late November) and spent all our time with them. We had a crazy time there. It was literally unforgettable, but there was so much to do and so little time especially towards the end. Nevertheless we really enjoyed ourselves. We made them promise that they would come over the next chance they got. Well... they kept their promise =)

I wouldn't know where to start with all the fun we had, the places we went, the things we did and the things that happened. We had a blast! I am very thankful that they came over, otherwise I'm certain that we would've wasted our easter breaks. I'm quite sure they had a wonderful time. But by the end of their stay I was wondering which of the two trips was 'kra-Z-er' and we safely came to the conclusion that our Goldcoast trip was more of a blast. Well ever since they left, the house feels so empty and it's back to our (my housemate and I) boring routines.

The week after the easter break (which was a day shorter due to a public holiday-Anzac day) was this semesters most hectic week by far. I wasn't prepared at all for an upcoming test, and my last resort was to study for the test the day before. Little did I know that I had not one but TWO tests on that day. I just found out about my second test the day before. I've never been used to being this type of student all my life, I didn't even know what it felt like. So for me to be put in such a situation was a bit interesting because I didn't know how to react. What I decided to do was stay back after my classes, study at the library until they were about to close (I've only done this a couple of times before) and then go back home and study some more. Basically I was determined to study until I dropped, and that's what I did. I also had to study for both tests throughout the next day during my breaks. All in all I managed to do relatively well al-hamdullilah, atleast that's what I think, I'll have to wait and see what the results have to say.

My Warman project! We were informed at the start of the semester that this project will account for 20% of this particular subjects final grade. We were also given an insightful look into the project. It was due 2 months from the start of the semester. I could go on about this project but I'll try to keep it short. The aim or objective of the project is to design and build a device that is capable of travelling along an L-shaped platform/track while seeding allocated field alongside of the track. It's a wooden track/platform and the seeds are pieces of PVC piping. This was percieved by almost everybody as a challenging task, and it didn't fail to prove itself as one! Bear in mind that the unit has very little to no material at all about this project. In other words we (groups of three or four students) were required to come up with this device (be it electrical, mechanical or robotic) from scratch! Analyse the project, solve the problems, design the device and build it all with whatever past knowledge we had. My group of four (my Bahraini friend and two of my Indonesian friends) might've not been the most hard-working of groups, but we certainly put alot into it! We dedicated so much time and put in loads of effort that we were bound to be satisfied with the final outcome.



The project was due the day after my two tests. In order to get our work done, I didn't mind meeting up during the break (despite the fact of having my friends over from Brisbane) but my only concern was to have our meetings early in the day so I could get them out of the way for our outings later on. Since I couldn't attend the last couple of meetings I happily agreed on taking on the task of coming up with our projects final report. The best part was that I only had one day to come up with a whole final report! As soon as I came back from my two tests I got started on the report and it took me the whole night to finish. I just managed to finish it by 1 am. As soon as I was done the guys gave me a call and asked me to come over to the track which had been built in uni to test run our device. For those of you that have read this far and are wondering, it was 2am! At the time I was over at my friends' house helping them out a bit with the final touches on their device. Not too long after that I was in uni. It was my first time (and probably the last) to ever be on campus at 2.30am in the morning. It was bloody cold and I was wearing my comfy home shorts! Had I known that I would stick around uni until 5am in the friggin morning I might've reconsidered. Oh well it was too late by then and I had no choice. Surprisingly there were other groups at that time testing their devices too which sort of felt reassuring to some extent. The actual testing time the morning after (a couple of hours later) was amazing. Getting to see how innovative and creative people have been in building their desgins and how well everyone performed. Our run... let's just say things didn't go as planned unfortunately. But one thing's for sure, we have all learned so much from this project and it has certainly been one of the best hands on experiences in our studies so far. We got the chance to apply all our knowledge, learn new things and gain new perspectives on different things.

I think that's more than one entry can handle. I should've saved some of this for that final report. Enough for now... and hopefully I'll be a bit more active around here.