Flashback: My working experience in Hush Puppies Genting

When I was studying in UNITEN, we students used to have a long 3 months holiday if we don’t want to take up special semester. I am not a fan of special semester because it’s was a complete waste of time and money. There were only 8 hours of class time per week during special semester and yet we had to pay the apartment rent and other living expenses.

So instead of wasting money, I decided to make money during one of the 3 month holidays. At first I was thinking of working part time in Kangar as I don’t have to worry about accommodation and transportation problems, but the salaries there weren’t “encouraging” enough.

Just before I decided to stay at home to "shake legs" for 3 months, my friends suggested that I try looking for sales job in Genting Highlands. They said that the pay was good and the employers usually provide accommodation within walking distance to the work place. So I quickly bought a bus ticket to Genting Highlands to try my luck.

The First World Plaza

I decided to look for a job in one of the shop lots inside First World Plaza, a shopping center in Genting Highlands and I was lucky to find a job as a part time sales assistant in Hush Puppies.

Hush Puppies is an international brand of contemporary, casual footwear for men, women and children. The price range for the shoes can easily reach RM300 because of the high quality of the shoes. So not all poor people like me can purchase shoes from Hush Puppies.

Why a sad-looking dog as the logo?

At first I don’t think that my workload will be high because I thought that not many people will buy shoes in Genting Highlands. Although the price of the shoes is the same with other Hush Puppies outlets throughout Peninsula Malaysia, but I thought that people come to Genting Highlands to play roller coasters, or to gamble, not to do some shopping.

The huge amount of stocks in the storeroom

But turned out I was wrong, the shop was full of customers during holidays or weekends. Most of the customers were foreigners as they have greater buying power compared to Malaysians. Usually tourists from the Middle East or China were rich and they won’t be bothered by the price of the shoes.

During my 2 months working life in Hush Puppies, I served many weird customers and I can still remember a few until today.

I once served an auntie from China who had trouble choosing the right size and color of the shoes that she liked. Size 6 was too small for her and size 7 was too big, to add on her misery, she also cannot choose the right color for the shoes. So she ended up very tulan and bought all of the shoes. All size 6 and 7 and all the color of the shoes that she liked. She paid all the shoes with her platinum credit card and walked out happily.

There was also a customer from Middle East who bought 15 pairs of shoes amounted to thousands of ringgit. I don’t know why he bought so many shoes but I know that he’s damn rich. Maybe he got oil wells behind his house.

Hush Puppies did have a small amount of local customers when I worked there, most Malaysian customers bought shoes there because they had to. Some bought shoes because their shoes were spoilt during their holidays in Genting Highlands. And the most frequent local buyers were all the ah pek who wear sandals or slippers to the casino. The casino prohibited sandals and slippers so the ah pek had to buy shoes from Hush Puppies. They usually picked the cheapest shoes in 5 minutes and headed straight to the casino.

Not everyday is peak season for Hush Puppies, during weekdays when only a few customers came in, I usually just sat there with my colleagues chatting or commenting on every passerby. And when we were really bored, we did some stupid things, we played hide and seek in the storeroom, we went to kacau the pretty salesgirls next door, or even went to toilet many times just for the sake of loitering around the plaza.

May Kwan trying to scare everyone in the storeroom

What we did when we were bored

Even though we had to bear with smelly feet and smelly shoes all the time but it was fun working with a bunch of fun colleagues. There was no politics inside the Hush Puppies working environment because our salaries were fixed and not based on commission basis, we don’t have to fight against each other for commission.

By far this was the most fun job I’ve ever had, I don’t have to crack my brain for the job and the working environment was great. But it was just a part time job, I earned some extra pocket money and it’s time to move on.

I hope my job can be as fun as this. ;-)

Lucky Valley

I studied in Muadzam Shah for 5 years but I never heard of this place called Lucky Valley until my final year of study.

Lucky Valley's Chinese name - 乐居岭

My friends who have been there told me that Lucky Valley is just a few kilometers away from Muadzam Shah and they said that I should go there and take a look because it is kind of special. They also told me that many city folks like to go there during weekends to meditate. My first reaction was: “Meditate???!!! In the middle of the jungle?!”

So out of curiosity, I decided to go there and check it out.

The bumpy road to Lucky Valley

The entrance to Lucky Valley is not a proper road, it is covered with rocks and mud. What makes the journey even harder is that the road is the combination of many steep uphill and downhill slopes. Obviously the road was made for four wheels drive vehicles like Mitsubishi Pajero, but the curiosity to find out about the place made me continue the journey with my mom’s SLK (Super Little Kancil).

My SLK

4 people in a Kancil, driving on a road like this wasn’t fun. After a long bone-cracking journey we finally arrived at the gate of Lucky Valley. To be honest, the gate looks creepy, it’s like the entrance to an old castle.

As seen in The Lord of the Ring

When we arrived, there was nobody there. So we decided to look around. There were small offices, a canteen, a nice lake and a hostel, which were all empty. Weird thing was that all the doors were not locked. Maybe they think that no thieves will want to steal things in the middle of the jungle.

We walked around the compound and thought that there’s nothing special, just a school-like facilities where people meditate by the lake. So we decided to go somewhere else to discover the place.

We drove deeper into the compound of Lucky Valley and found something amazing.

There’s a pyramid-like building in the middle of the jungle.

The shape of the top of the pyramid is like one of the roundabouts in Kangar

We were excited and quickly went down to take some photos. I got to admit that the place was peaceful and a perfect place for the meditation “kaki”. People can meditate outside to enjoy the fresh air in the jungle and when it’s raining or too hot, they can continue meditating inside the building.

Amy pretending to meditate

We were amazed when we got inside the building. It was like an air-cond room even though no fan was turned on, I couldn’t figure it out why, the heat from the outside never reach into the building.

Too many jargons, if you understand please explain it to me

A quick look around inside the building and we found out that this place got something to do with magnetic field. Meditating inside a good magnetic field for the body can achieve peace of mind blah blah blah… I don’t understand the reason because I studied accounting, but as a conclusion it’s good for u lah.

A few hundreds meters away from the building is a small deer farm. I don’t know whether the deers were meant to be food for people or as pets. But if there were raised for their meat then they were not lucky enough to be in Lucky Valley.

Flashback: My first day in UNITEN

5 years ago, mid of June 2003, I stepped into another stage of my life. I decided to enroll in the accounting degree course offered by UNITEN Muadzam Shah.



My first day was exhausting as I had to go through a lot of intake procedures early in the morning like taking picture and some other paperwork along with hundreds of other new students.

In between the waiting time I was able to know some new friends but in the end I was only able to remember a few names as my tired brain cannot “process” so many names in a short period of time.

After all the troublesome procedures, I finally got my keys for my apartment room. I was so anxious about my new apartment because I’ve been to many other university provided apartments or dorms and they were like crap. It was a 1km journey from the old campus to my apartment so on the way there I was praying hard to every god that I can name in this world that the apartment room is in a good condition.

When I reached there I was glad that my prayers worked.

Not 5 star hotel standard but it's nice and clean

The apartment room is in tip top condition. It was brand new. I can still smell the new paint in the apartment.

Once I am into the apartment I went to the toilet and when I came out to wash my hands, I noticed something not quite right.

My unshaved face and messy hair, don't laugh ok.

I forgot to shave, and my hair was very messy as I slept in the car during the journey from KL to Muadzam Shah.

No wonder some people looked at me weirdly during the intake procedures session. And the most important is that I had that kind of messy face being taken as photo in my student ID card. Certainly not a good first impression.

My dad and my little brother helped me to unpack my things in my room while my mom started her “mom-talk” to me.



“Ah Yang ar… remember to drink more water, eat more fruits, eat more vegetables, do sports, cover your blanket at night, don’t get sick, remember to pang sai…”

My mom still giving "mom-talk" when my dad took her photo

I can tell that she was pretty worried at me being away from home for a long time. Luckily I listened to what she said and I graduated healthily.

After an hour, my family decided it was time to leave. Since that moment, I am on my own and started my studying life for 5 years in UNITEN.

My nightmare

No more nicely prepared hot Milo on the dining table every morning in Muadzam Shah.

Flashback: SMK Derma (Part 2)

As a leading school in Perlis, SMK Derma has the best infrastructures and manpower among the schools in Perlis, it even got an ISO certificate many years ago. As a result of its fame gained from the ISO certificate, many other schools management teams visited Derma in order to learn how to manage an international certified school. Schools that visited Derma were mainly from Malaysia, at one time, Derma even got visitors from a Thailand school.

Whenever there were visitors, the whole Derma will be in a so call “emergency state” where everyone in the school including the gardeners dressed up nicely to welcome the visitors. Before the visitors arrive, the school will be cleaned and kept in a tip top condition so that the visitors can nod their heads throughout the whole visiting period. Students will act like very hardworking in class, some even raised their hands to ask questions whenever the visitors go pass the classroom. That’s the Derma spirit.
The other Derma spirit is that the students managed to fully utilize the infrastructure in Derma. Like go on a date with lover at the pondok where it is meant to be a studying place. Or even play football in the assembly hall.

Behold, the Old Trafford of Derma

Yes, this is what I did when I was in Derma. Our definition of football in hall is played using other smaller ball-like items, such as water bottle, small coconuts, bottle cap… you name it. And when we can’t find these things, we ended up stealing a proper football from the storeroom. Then the goals will be set up by putting chairs on each corner of our “football field”. The size of the “football field” was decided based on the number of players. Once we started the game, we can do it whole day, even after class and ended up go home late. Sometimes even got girls joining the game, no kidding.

Derma's motto: Berusaha Tetap Berjaya

Football aside, the assembly hall is actually meant to be the place where assemblies were held. The assembly was held every Monday morning and I bet that most of the students hate to go to assembly. For teachers and headmaster, assembly is the time when they got to instill some studying spirit and love towards the school to the students. On the other hand, for students, assembly is the time when they have to stand closely to each other for 2 hours in a hot hall without functioning fan and listening to crap like: “Kamu semua orang mestilah belajar bersungguh-sungguh supaya mendapat keputusan yang cermerlang dalam peperiksaan yang akan datang…”

But for me, I like assembly, because this is the time that I can unleash my evil prefect power and drag out students who were talking during the assembly. Students who were being dragged out will have to stand outside and cannot go back to their classes after the assembly until they were being questioned by the discipline teachers. However, I admit that I didn’t carry out my responsibility properly, I used to drag out more students when I am not in the mood, talked to my friends inside the hall when I am in the mood, and when I am sleepy, I just go outside, grab a chair and sleep. That’s why I didn’t got promoted as the head prefect after four years of service and the head prefect position went to a new guy with 3 months of experience.

And the above picture is the field of Derma, it is the size of 2 real football fields (not the assembly hall football field size). This is the place where 22 students fight for 1 football, and the place where students compare who runs faster. It’s a stupid place but I like it compared to a classroom with lots of matematik tambahan equations on the blackboard.

Among all these places in Derma, my favorite place is definitely the Kedai Kooperasi, in short we called it Koop. I like Koop so much because this is the only place that I can hang out with my kaki ponteng friends with AIR COND. Koop is like the mini Tesco in Derma, the Koop is only the size of a small living room but it sells anything that a typical student needs. The Koop sells exercise books, stationeries, junk foods, ice creams, and even toiletries for the hostel students (SMK Derma is a semi-hostel school). However, with so many cases of female students got pregnant, I think the Koop should start selling some condoms.

Me and my friends hang out too much in the Koop and enjoy too much free air-cond so we decided to contribute towards the Koop by helping Mr. Chew, the Koop teacher-in-charge to run the business. We became cashiers, cleaners and storekeepers in the Koop whenever we got the free time. In fact, some of us enjoy being in the Koop so much that we decided to come back and help even after we graduated from Derma. At one point that the Koop became the gathering place for us…

I am the nerdy guy in the middle with red t-shirt

Flashback: SMK Derma (Part 1)

Whenever you mention SMK Derma in front of Perlis people, especially aunties, their reaction will be: “Wah… Derma ar… good school wor...”

Don’t be surprise by this kind of reaction because SMK Derma is one of the selected schools in Perlis. Selected school means that the school selects the students base on their UPSR results, one can only enter Derma if his or her UPSR result got more A than anyone else in the whole world. With rotans in their hand, I am forced by my parents to study hard during my primary school days, so I am fortunate enough to get into Derma.

So you might wonder how come a selected school got this kind of lousy name: Derma. Like the school not enough money only. Actually based on what I heard many many years ago from a Derma teacher, the founder of the school name it Derma because the school is set up from the donations and funding of the society, plus the founder is lazy to think of a name for the school, so he just name it Derma, and the name is used until today.

Undoubtedly, the time is Derma is one of the most memorable moments in my life, I spent 5 years in Derma, from 1998 till 2002, here I met lots of gila friends and some good teachers who threatened me to call my father if I still fail their subject papers.

Derma is the place where I had my first fight, my first experience of being a prefect, my first experience of bullying juniors with the help of my prefect status, first time to fail an exam (damn matematik tambahan), first time to be in the school basketball team (although I am selected as the last backup choice if the whole team is injured). So many first time in my life and made me the person I am right now.

I managed to go back to Derma a few months ago and glad to say that there are not much of changes going on after 5 years, Derma is still Derma.

Here, my fellow budak Derma, I present you the recent pictures of Derma.

The pondok is the prefect place to kacau cha bos

This pondok is the place where I and my friends gathered during recess period and ponteng kelas. We used to sit there hanging around until we really have to go to class or go home. We even created a record of sitting there for the whole school time, from morning till afternoon, that means us skipped ALL the classes, sorry cikgu. This place is also the place where love blossomed, many of my friends hang out there too long and ended up became couples, maybe they studied Kimia there for too long and there were chemical reactions between them.

The picture above is the canteen of Derma, this is the place where I can buy a plate of delicious nasi lemak with a piece of chicken, an egg and ikan bilis for RM1.50. I can say that it’s the cheapest in town, probably the whole world. So when the recess bell rings, everyone will run like hell to the canteen to buy one, because the nasi lemak is limited.

Beratur? apa tu? I tak faham lah prefect...

There is a tradition where students don’t queue up in the canteen and I am proud to say that this tradition is still practiced until now. As a former lousy prefect, I am quite proud to say that no one will listen to the prefect when asked to queue up to buy food, everyone is concentrating on how to squeeze into every inch of space available to get nearer to the counter to grab the nasi lemak. So usually fed up prefect like me will join the crowd to grab the nasi lemak and when the discipline teachers came, we prefect will act like very hardworking trying to control the crowd, then when the teachers is gone, its business as usual.

Chinese class is conducted here at Big Pondok as most class were occupied

During my days in Derma, there was no teacher who teaches Chinese, so all Chinese students who wanted to take Chinese paper in PMR or SPM pleaded the school for a Chinese teacher. At first we got Mr. Ooi Luen Thien who drove 30km all the way to Derma as a Chinese tuition teacher after school hour on every Friday, but some playful students including me tend to skip classes and play paper airplane in class, we all thought that he’s just a tuition teacher and couldn't care more (To Mr. Ooi, if you are reading this, I am sorry, I am just a kid at that time u know).

After some time, the school found out about our non-taking-it-seriously behavior and decided to conduct Chinese class on school hours and employed a permanent Chinese teacher. And so we got Miss Chow, she somehow managed to control us a bit but some still managed to skip class, including me. However, when SPM is just around the corner, we all got panicked as we still don’t know the format of examination after 2 years and decided to stay in class to study Chinese.