I Am Asif

My then room-mate Murad had just come back from a short trip, and he was pretty damn excited. He knew I was a travel and photography buff, so he couldn't wait to show me the shots. He was going through his camera roll on his laptop, and I could see why. Their trip to Gunung Ledang (Mount Ophir) was truly scenic from the moment they hit the roads outside the city. But when finally he showed my the shot of the waterfall, I was stunned. He tried to move the slideshow along but I wouldn't let him. For the next few minutes, I just kept watching the shot, and my mind already knew that I have to be there. Soon. My thirst for traveling and love for photography both had to be drenched in those waters. So a few weeks a later when me and some pals set out for our unforgettable road trip across Malaysia , I had to put Gunung Ledang as our first stop. As we entered the park area, I was a bit concerned to be fair. My buddies also started looking at me questioningly, 'where the he...

It was a long drive to Pahang, around 8 hours I guess. With my friend Titash driving all night and me riding shotgun keeping tabs with the GPS, the drive was enjoyable for the major part. From brightly lit highways to dark swerving roads, it gave me a pretty good experience of night-time drives. Towards dawn I was seriously nodding off, going back and forth between dream and reality. After praying Fajr at a mosque in Jerantut, about an hour away from the National Park in Pahang, we had no choice but to take a nap right there. Then after a quick breakfast, we started again. And it began to get a bit tight. We were running out of gas, we didn't know if we'd find a gas station. We were running out of cash, not knowing if we'd find an ATM any time soon. But nonetheless we kept going, hoping the fuel and cash both will last this turn. And all of this trouble was to visit the National Park in Pahang. More specifically, to experience the canopy walkway. High near the treetops o...

I've always had a thing for personal websites/landing pages. It's been a really long time since I started my first one, which was made using Google Pages. I dug up my old emails to figure out that it's been almost nine years since I launched that! I remember I was the first one among my friends or family to have such a site online, and it made quite a stir. Soon quite a few of them started to make their own. After the folks at mountain view discontinued Pages (like many other services they used to offer), I switched to Weebly. But by then, social media sites had already become quite popular, and your Myspace, Hi5 or (a bit later but more importantly) Facebook profile became the most common address to hand out to others. I was into these platforms from the early stages, being quite active and growing my friends list in Hi5, Orkut and Facebook. Quite a while later I was introduced to LinkedIn and fell in love! Also, I was part of the beta group for trying ou...

As the train that takes us to the top of Penang Hill started to climb up, the trees and rock faces on both sides started to move away. And all of a sudden I'm high above the tree tops, and the sparkling city of Penang Island and the distant mountains are spread open before me, while the train track cracks a line between the green. Breathless, taking in the scenery while being unable to say anything but SubhanAllah , I remembered I need to start taking shots again! Penang Hill, Penang, Malaysia. Didn't expect the photos to turn out so nice to be honest. The train was moving at a considerable speed and was jam packed with tourists. Alhamdulillah, the time spent there was absolutely amazing and I enjoyed the splendid look and feel of the environment while trying to photograph them to the best of my ability. I highly recommend this spot to anyone travelling to Malaysia. Enjoy and Share.

When I asked 4 year old Abdullah what he's gonna become when he grows up, I got an answer that made me laugh, and think.

It's really given me big jolt. One of my dear friends back in UTM, Malaysia, and Deeni bro, Abdur Rahman from Gaza passed away last night. He was one of the most selfless characters I've seen among my friends. He's the kind of a guy you would call in any need, any time of the day, any day of the year. He'd be there for you. The kind of a person with a perpetual smile on his face; a companion in all the jokes and jibes friends throw at each other. It's really hard to find such an active, selfless and joyful bro like him. He was about 30 I guess. I think I know what you're thinking. 'How did he die?' . Yeah, that's what everyone thinks of when he hears of someone else's death. So if I answer that he died in the sea, pulled away from the strong arms of his dearest friends completely out of sight for hours, only to be found floating on the surface the next morning, we feel like 'oh yeah that's why he died' . As if he wouldn't die if h...

Up there in the cloudy tip of Penang Hill, which you can reach after a visually stunning inclined train ride, you get to a point where you find hundreds of 'Love Locks' on an iron grill. Inspired by many different locations around the world, I guess they started this in Penang Hill not too long ago, judging by the number of locks. Lovers write their initials on padlocks, and lock it in the grill and throw away the key, hoping their love would be locked forever. Although the concept seems nothing more than a sham to me, I was still having fun looking through all those different initials and names painted on the locks with bright colors. But I wasn't looking just randomly, rather I was searching for a very specific message, and I was hopeful I would find it, at least one. And I did find just one, but it was enough for me. Because it spoke my words. Penang Hill, Penang, Malaysia. It has happened to me so many times, that I'm travelling in the most spectacular of t...