Category: Personal

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Karoshi #2

Karoshi is becoming common in Japan and more women are suffering. Working at the risk on one’s life is part of Japanese social culture and it is known as selfless devotion. 24 year old Matsahuri Takahashi who was a victim of Karoshi, worked 20 hours a day. Can you imagine how much time she had for sleeping and resting? Miwa Sado who was the journalist of NHK, who did not have enough sleep which was less than 6 hours a day, died of karoshi at the age of 31. Hence, don’t overwork and make sure you have enough sleep and rest. Take a good care of your health, since health is wealth.

Cute Fb Care React Reaction Emoji | Citypng
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Benchmarking CEFR Public University Practices #1

Assalamualaikum, Good Evening and Salam Sejahtera,

Dear team

We are pleased to inform all Deans that the AJK for CEFR at UA under the appointment of Pengerusi Majlis Dekan Bahasa will conduct its 1st webinar on ‘Benchmarking CEFR UA Practices’ tomorrow.

Date : 2 April 2021 (Friday)
Platform : ZOOM
Time : 9am – 12.30pm
Invitations had been sent out to all AJK CEFR representatives. Each university can invite 5 other representatives from their institution.

Many thanks to all participating universities. Especially to those universities who had volunteered to share their CEFR practices.

• IIUM
• UTHM
• UKM

We look forward to this sharing session. And we are grateful to also have YBhg Prof Hazita Azman to share her views as the Pengerusi of Majlis Penarafan Standard dan Kualiti Kualiti Bahasa Inggeris (MPSKBI).

Thank you.

PM DR ZARINA OTHMAN (Pusat Pengajian Citra Universiti UKM)
DR ERDA WATI BAKAR (Universiti Pertahanan Nasional Malaysia)

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Soft power

This morning in the BBC News, it was mentioned that China is practising soft power. That is very intriguing. I googled soft power to learn more about the term and specifically what it means by China’s soft power.

The definition of soft power found on the BBB News website is “soft power is the power to be loved. Hard power is the power to be feared”.

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I would like to end posting on communication but accidentally came across a quote which is worth mentioned.

You can’t compete globally unless you have appropriate communication skills.

-John Wolfensohn-

What do you think? Do you agree with John?

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How to communicate according to Al-Quran

“O you who believe! Guard your duty to Allah, and speak words straight to the point”. (Surah al Ahzaab 33: 70)

While talking with people, don’t act smart or beat around the bush but come to the point and be straightforward in your expression. Use apt words and speak directly. Don’t play with words.

Also one should draw a clear line between being straightforward and being rude.

To read more go to

The Qur’anic Art of Effective Communication
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What is communication?

Before you learn to communicate, you need to know what communication is. What is communication? Communication is the ability to deliver information, news or thoughts to others.

https://www.habitsforwellbeing.com/9-effective-communication-skills/
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How we react depends on our emotions not intelligence.

In a meeting, my colleague was complaining about the amount of work that her department had to deal. Nevertheless, she did not make it crystal clear the source of the over work. Since we are from the same academy, I jumped to conclusions, thinking that she was complaining about my department. Based on the previous experience with her, I was a bit emotional and defended my department. I gave her a call after the meeting with the intention to confront her. And guess what I got. She was not pointing to my department but other department and I spoiled her plan. The past experience and emotions do influence our decisions and reactions. Luckily, there was no hard feeling. This is what I have to practise

Open my mind before I open my mouth

Each emotion offers a distinctive readiness to act; each points us in a direction that has worked well to handle the recurring challenges of human life. as these eternal situations were repeated and repeated over our revolutionary history, the survival value of our emotional repertoire was attested to by its becoming imprinted in our nerves as innate, automatic tendencies of the human heart.

intelligence can come to nothing when the emotions hold sway

(Daniel Goleman, 1995: 4)

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LAK-UTM FSSH LA Linguistics Seminar Series- Part II

Guest Speaker: Assoc. Prof. Dr. Hanita Hassan

Chair of Language Academy,
Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities,
Universiti Teknologi Malaysia
Member of LAK Board of Directors

Topic: Multimodality: Communicating with Eyes, Ears and Heart

Link: Join Zoom Meeting

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86366808916?pwd=cDRkbW54aVJkUkYrVnRHNWlMcFNPUT09
Meeting ID: 863 6680 8916

Passcode: LAK-UTM
Date and time: 18 March, 4:00 p.m. (Malaysian time)

CPD will be recorded

The attendance link to be shared during the session.