It's been so long since I've seen a clear blue sky

2008-12-04T01:11:00.002+10:00

I just came back from a super duper feast with my friends. It's a birthday celebration planned by me at Kuishin-Bo, Suntec City. The last time I went for their dinner buffet, I didn't attack the seafood, mainly because I am lazy to peel the crabs and prawns. But today, there were 4 lovely people who dedicated their time attacking the seafood and also spoiling me with all the peeled prawns and de-shelled crabs (although I only ate one prawn but I do appreciate Dagen's effort!). It was another makan session where we spent the time pigging out and laughing loudly with and at each other. Today however, was a little more special. Besides being the birthday of my good friend and my cousin in KL, my good friend and her boyfriend (who is also a good albeit irritating friend) announced their engagement and showed off the lovely engagement ring which sparkled incessantly under the lighting. So this makes the second engaged-to-be married-soon couple out of the four couples I know. Yay!!! I do feel happy for them and at the same time, I'm happy that I do not feel envious of their status. Strange as it may sound, I don't feel the urge to be in the same boat as them right now...and that relieves me...heh heh...

Congrats to these four wonderful people...!!!
My pockets are going to be "kang kang" soon!!!
Remember what I said about a buffet wedding lunch/dinner....hahahhahahahaha...

2008-10-20T00:49:00.003+10:00

Lately, I've been pondering. Just wondering about my life and whether I should keep living like this. Changes are happening rapidly around me and yet I feel like I'm at a stand-still. My friends seem to have an aim, a direction which they are pursuing. I feel like I'm making no progression. Perhaps there are plenty of things I wish to do, but I give myself excuses and procrastinate. Now I just want to stay away and think. To decide. And yes I am tired of it all. I'm just running round and round in the same spot. Just living a meaningless life. But I do not know how to change this. And this depresses me.

2008-07-06T12:30:00.002+10:00

Yes, my posts have become extremely infrequent but in my defense, I am too tired to write in weekdays and I usually play all my weekends away. Haha...excuses excuses excuses...

I went down to Paradiz Centre for dinner at Hey Hey Hotpot with the gang. There were eight of us so we had two tables joined together and chose two different soup bases. I was thinking to myself that this place had better be good otherwise Dagen was going to get it from me. It was his enthusiastic recommendation of the place that got us down there and it wasn't cheap for a normal steamboat buffet. It's $25++ on weekdays and $27++ on weekends and we paid $32.50 each.

We made a reservation to ensure we could get a table on a Saturday night and I'm glad we did. The place isn't very big and it was practically full that night. Still, a location at Paradiz Centre is pretty weird. I would never think of going there if no one told me about. It's like some ulu pandan place in town where I have never been and I realized that I have never been to this Cathay place as well. We walked from Plaza Singapore and I kind of got disorientated. Fortunately I could just follow blindly, haha. Anyway, back to the food.

My table chose the fish soup with green apple which the other table had herbal chicken soup. I know fish soup sounds weird for steamboat but I do not like herbal soup so I refused to have that at my table. Very seh gor but I don't care...hahhahaha!!!

Their buffet menu had both cooked or uncooked food (for the steamboat) and I love their "satay" chicken. It's chicken pieces marinated and cooked on satay sticks. That was delicious though a little too salty after a while. The variety for the steamboat was pretty good. I had the tofu and it went really well with the soup. They served beef, chicken and pork and their beef and pork were finely sliced in shabu-shabu style. The beef slices even came on a tray of ice! Presentation was good and they also had golden mushroom wrapped with meat slices. That was yummy although we did get overindulged in meat that night. Their meatballs seemed handmade which ought to be good but I hated the smelly vegetables they added in. Their chilli sauce had the same vegetables as well and I couldn't take it. Oh yes, their chilli sauce can be mixed to your preference but it was too sweet for my liking. It tasted similar to satay sauce and I would have preferred sambal chilli. The most fascinating items that they had were these tiny dumplings filled with either custurd, prawns (har gao) or char siu (they call it char siu bao). You had to cook them for at least two minutes and I didn't think dim sum and custurd would go well in soup. However the custurd one tasted alright and I liked the char siu bao. The har gao had cheese in it which made it rather powdery. Still, it was something new that I had not experienced before.

Another highlight that night was seeing Terence Cao or Cao Guo Hui as others might know him as. Dagen was pointing out to us that he was over there but I thought that he was talking about the television (and I was not the only one who thought so) and I didn't really bother about what Dagen was saying. After all, he is an actor and it's not unusual to see him on the tv. After a while I looked up from my bowl of soup and realized that Cao Guo Hui was actually there in person. Apparently he and a partner owned the restaurant and he was there to help out. I must say that he is really good-looking. He does look so much better without the make-up and he looks so charming when he smiles. So us girls spent the night ogling at him, hahahhaha! Eye candy for the night!!! He also came over to our table and recommended their dessert which was either almond jelly or osmanthus jelly. By the way, his English is good. He didn't speak broken English or Singlish. I chose the osmanthus jelly which was not too sweet and tasted interesting. I gave half of it to Ah Hao but only because I was too stuffed to finish it. It won't be something I will order on its own because one small portion costs $4.80.

Some of us went back to my place for mahjong after dinner. Now I make people to weigh themselves when they first arrive and when they are about to depart. Haha...just another service I provide since I have a digital weighing scale. Besides, my friends seem to enjoy the process of seeing their weight go down after mahjong. Then we can tell ourselves that mahjong is good exercise that can help us lose weight. It's a delusion but at least we are happy.

Lovely Saturday night...I do recommend Hey Hey Hotpot. The soup is good and the food quality is great. Pity about the chilli but you can't have it all. The price might also deter some people so I guess I'll go back only when I'm feeling rich. Heh heh...

2008-06-20T22:23:00.002+10:00

Phew these few weeks have been crazy. I'm really tired from work. This month, work involves standing up most of the time and with lots of physical movement. So basically, my legs ache to the point of cramping and my left hand and thumb are hurting. My colleague tells me that this is normal. I figure I just need some time off to rest the affected parts but rest won't come so soon. This month I'm also involved in the accreditation of one of our labs. My boss has kindly asked me to sit in on the process to learn and be a back-up in case the lady in charge happens to be unavailable some day. It's nice to have a new learning experience, anyway I'll be working in that lab soon. However, there's been a huge amount of technicality and sometimes I struggle to catch up. These people are engineers and not scientists and most of the time, they are more interested in equipment issues, not the work that is actually performed in the lab. So in the past two weeks, I've been hearing a lot about exhaust fans, AHUs, back-up generators, motors, pressure maintenance and some programming. I just hope that I can remember enough to be a proper back-up should the need ever arise. Accreditation went very smoothly today. There weren't any major problems and there were just a few suggestions for improvement. I'm glad this is over. The technical engineering talk was starting to wear me down. I don't know how my dad does this.

I celebrated my birthday two weeks ago. No photos to put up this year though. It was a very casual day out with friends except for me getting a nice and expensive present and being the special girl for that day. The plan was to go down to JB for a nice shopping and eating trip. A friend backed out because she had heard about the rioting in KL and Penang and was worried that it might affect JB as well. The rest of us were supposed to go ahead, but it rained so heavily that day and we cancelled that whole trip. Instead we went down to TM to catch Kungfu Panda which is a great animation. I loved every moment of it and was laughing from the start to the end. My favourite parts had to be:

when Master Wu Gui caught Po stuffing his face with the scared peaches
Mantis giving Po accupuncture and Po's face cramped up in front of Tigress
Po's big, fat butt squashing Tai Lang's face as they were falling down the stairs
Po imagining the dragon scroll to be food so that he could jump up and grab it before Tai Lang got it

After the movie, we had a nice and simple dinner at a nearby coffee shop where Chris and the rest surprised me with my present. It's a Philips Audio Video player for me to use as I travel back and forth from work. Yay!!! Now I can watch all my serials if I can't get a seat on the train and I can listen to the Morning Express as I head down to work. It's definitely a useful gadget so I really, really like it!

2008-05-29T23:13:00.003+10:00

I've been so lazy to blog these few months and it feels like I don't really have much to write about. The weeks fly by and I do the same old stuff week after week so there's no need to keep repeating my weekly schedule. Yet there are some new things that have happened but I don't feel like elaborating. Instead, I shall do a quick run-through for the special activities that I have been involved in.

Went to Bangkok for 6 days in March with Chris, Ju, Mr Tan, Hao, Kit and Da. Ate lots of local food, good restaurants, major shopping every single day. Had a really good and cheap Thai massage and spent fantastic quality time with great friends. Will definitely want to have another holiday with them next year.
A colleague chose to transfer out of the lab and I got nominated to take over her current new duties. Now I'm officially the deputy technical manager in the lab. Means more work, same pay but with more chances to learn, learn, learn. Procurement and equipment maintenance is not as easy as it sounds.
Took a 10 days holiday to Turkey with Mum and sister. Surprisingly I enjoyed the trip. Wanted to go to Egypt at first but something screwed up that trip. No regrets going to Turkey and will definitely encourage people to go. Beautiful sights, rich culture and history. Food not so nice unless you like salads, olives, cheese, tomatoes and there's hardly any spicy food. Made some friends on the tour; we were lucky because most of the tour group were in the 20s to 30s age group.
Signed up for the Shape Run with friends. Will be running 5 km in July. Been practising. Am surprised that I can actually run 5 km without stopping and complete in 35 to 40 minutes. Will keep training. Want to complete within 30 minutes if possible.
M's leaving in 3 weeks. Don't think will go to the airport to send him off. Just spend more time with him these remaining weeks. There goes another tennis and makan buddy for 3 years.
Stopped going out with K after some incidents which lead to disappointment and a total "can't be bothered and don't care anymore" attitude. Strangely, this wasn't as hard to do as it sounds. Must have been really tired of the whole episode that I didn't think it was worth any time to worry about. Anyway K has asked (very politely) to meet up this week. Will be meeting him (answered him very politely) and will probably behave very politely.

2008-02-18T02:28:00.002+10:00

Since Chinese New Year is still ongoing and I didn't get to touch any mahjong during my trip back to M'sia, this weekend has been like a mahjong make-up session. I played at Chris's house on Saturday and won $18 then I played at Mike's condo by the sea a few hours ago. Keong kindly sent me home at 11.40 pm and I rushed to get to sleep since I have to be up at 6 am. But I can't get to sleep. I'm very awake with so many thoughts running around in my head so I might as well come online and write them down. Perhaps I will feel more settled once I've done that.

I've been quite touchy recently and I'm not sure why. Maybe it's that time of the month, maybe it is long overdue. Suddenly I feel tired of being the one who is always in charge of organizing and planning events for the groups. Before Chinese New Year, I actually blew up at my friends for cancelling our plans for dinner because they told me extremely last minute. We were supposed to meet for dinner and they only informed me at 6 pm when I got off work. Plus it was everyone cancelling at the same time. I got real pissed because I had cancelled dinner with family because of them and they really should have let me know sooner so that I could at least still go for dinner with my parents. Of course they were all sorry and apologized and I forgave them and we were supposed to put this all behind us. But then today Keong said something that made me think about this all again. He was telling his friend that I was the "mother" of the group and was good at cooking and taking care of people and that everyone called me "mother". This, of course, is not true. Only Mantou calls me Ma and the rest just call me Wei Wei. Still it got me thinking. Do everyone really see me as the mother figure? Do everyone automatically expect me to always do the planning and the cooking and all that? I really hate to admit it but I think so and this does not sit well with me. I guess I'm tired of being the one that everyone relies and depends on. I'm tired of being the problem solver and I'm tired of people only coming to me when they want something from me or want me to do something for them. I want people to step up and stop letting me be the authorative figure. I guess Steph was right.

So I have decided. For the next few months, I'm going to stop organizing gatherings and outings. I'm going to stop planning for people's birthdays and worrying about what to get them. I'm going to take a break and see if anyone actually steps up. Perhaps it was my fault for being so assertive and always being the first to initiate plans. So now I'm going to stop, right after the dinner I have planned for the coming Saturday and maybe a Ubin cycling trip the Saturday after. Hey, old habits die hard and I do really want to go to Ubin. Haha!!!

Jon McLaughlin - So Close

2008-01-01T14:32:00.000+10:00

This is from the Enchanted soundtrack.
What a lovely song...sigh...

You’re in my arms
And all the world is calm
The music playing on for only two
So close together
And when I’m with you
So close to feeling alive

A life goes by
Romantic dreams will stop
So I bid mine goodbye and never knew
So close was waiting, waiting here with you
And now forever I know
All that I wanted to hold you
So close

So close to reaching that famous happy end
Almost believing this was not pretend
And now you’re beside me and look how far we’ve come
So far we are so close
How could I face the faceless days
If I should lose you now?
We’re so close
To reaching that famous happy end
And almost believing this was not pretend
Let’s go on dreaming for we know we are
So close
So close
And still so far

The First Day of Year 2008

2008-01-01T14:02:00.000+10:00

I'm spending this day at home, cleaning and throwing out stuff I don't need and can't use (like coupons and vouchers that expire 31 Dec 2007). At the same time, I'm waiting for Keong to call because he promised to play tennis with me. Actually, last night I dreamt that he would pang seh me today and as time passes, the dream seems more and more likely to come true. I have this feeling that he's sleeping at someone's house at the moment after all that partying and drinking last night.

Still, I'm satisfied with what I've done so far...

do laundry
clean and sweep my room
put new bedsheets for my sister's (she's coming back on Sunday!!!) and my bed
file up all my bills from December
throw away coupons and vouchers
clean up my computer by saving, burning and deleting files
ate some leftovers from last week (I need to clear the fridge too)
put photos into photo album instead of leaving them on the table to collect dust

I am looking forward to this year. I think there's going to be a lot of good things happening. I dreaded the arrival of Year 2007 because it meant that I would have to return to Singapore. But I think Year 2007 went pretty well for me too.

went for the Australian Open 2007
got rid of my mole
got a job I enjoy
had plenty of outings with friends
have an income to support all these outings
tried new food and new eating places
bought lots of new clothes without feeling guilty about spending money
am able to start giving my parents pocket money (AHAHAHAHAHH!!!)
got an MP3 player
had a great birthday and gave some friends good birthdays as well
got a lovely new handphone
converted my driving license
made new friends
started playing badminton again

So, as this new year begins, I have lots more memories to add to my collection. I do wish Milo and Steph could have been in more of them but there's nothing I can do about that. This year, for once, I'll make some resolutions and try my best to keep them.

play more tennis (at least once a week)
play more badminton (at least once a week)
spend more time with family
stay in touch with my old friends
get in touch with long lost friends (this is hard though)
go travelling with Mum and sister
go travelling with friends (preferably Taiwan *hint hint*)
do something different with my hair
eat out less and cook more
go cycling at Pulau Ubin (been saying this for years now)
stop being so hypocritical at work

Ok I shouldn't add too many to this list. Otherwise I'll end up doing none. I would like to visit Steph and Milo but I really don't like going to KL and the air tickets to Brisbane are really expensive at the moment. We'll just have to see what happens. Maybe I'll get a good pay raise this year??? Haha!

2007-12-30T10:57:00.000+10:00

The Prima Deli saga continues as more samples came in late on Friday night. That meant that we all had to stay back to process them. We all look forward to Fridays since it's the start of the weekend and we get to go back at 5.30 pm. But this week (again!), we stayed till 7.30 pm and I had to come back the next day to do the follow-ups. Sigh...

I thought it wouldn't be so bad to go back on Saturday, even though I was exhausted from Friday night. My colleague offered to pick me up from Toa Payoh at 8 am and I had a direct bus from my place down to Toa Poyah. So I woke up at 6.15 am (15 minutes later than normal!) and went down to wait for the bus. I missed the first bus, partly because my eyes were half-open and my brain was not in operation mode just yet. But I thought to myself, I had time to wait for the next one since I was out early and it usually took around 45 minutes to get down to Toa Payoh. I ended up waiting for 20 minutes for the next bus. Then this bus had to break down right at the bus stop of Milo's place and we had to get off and wait for another bus. ARGH!!! By then I knew I wouldn't be able to meet my colleague in time so I sent her a message asking her to go down first and I would make my own way there. I felt bad to ask a 50+ year old lady to wait for me. Once I made it to Toa Payoh, I walked at super fast speed to the MRT station, stopping for 2 minutes to buy breakfast at Mr Bean. I had cravings for soya bean milk and I was hungry. The train was arriving in 1 minute so I ran down to catch it. I didn't know that the ride from Toa Payoh to Choa Chu Kang would take 35-40 minutes and actually, I slept most of the way there. Still, it was such a long ride! I should have taken the East-West line instead. Ok, never mind. From CCK, I had to take another bus to my workplace. When I got to the bus stop, bus 975 came. But I couldn't remember which bus I was supposed to take. I thought it was 925 so I went to the bus directory to check. Turns out I was suppose to take 975 and I had to wait for the next bus again. By the time I reached work, it was 9.45 am and I meant to be there at 8.30 am. Sian!!!!!!!!!

Mantou asked me out for dinner yesterday. It's such a surprise. Usually her schedule is packed on Saturdays so the moment her message came in, I knew that if I didn't go, it might be months before I see her again.

I still wanted to have korean even though I had that on Thursday with my colleagues so I suggested Mario's Kitchen at Bugis. Mag had trouble finding a parking lot and her car was starting to heat up. I went out to meet her and go around with her while she hunted for a slot and brought her good luck. After picking me up and making 1 turn around Liang Seah street, we actually got a slot a few doors away from Mario's Kitchen. Should have picked me up earlier eh? Haha!

At Mario's Kitchen, we shared a kimchi pancake (this is my absolute favourite korean dish), a chicken BBQ and a spicy soup. The chicken BBQ was huge. I think the plate was almost the size of a large pizza. The soup was weird. It had mushrooms, watercress and some preserved veg with beef chunks. It tasted weird too. I had a cup of korean green tea which was something new and I really liked it. It was a little pricey at $2.50 per cup but it was different and nice. The best was still the kimchi pancake. I had expected Mantou to not want this since she hates vegetables but she preferred it to the seafood pancake which came with spring onions. That was good because I wasn't too keen on the spring onions either. The last time we had korean together was in Brisbane, somewhere near Chinatown and we also ordered the seafood pancake. It came with more spring onions than seafood and we spent the dinner picking out every strand and packing them for Milo. We tried to bluff her, telling her that it was a dish on its own. I don't know if she believed us but she did finish it. Hahahhaa...ahhhh those good old days...

After dinner we were so full (as usual) so we proceeded to walk slowly and aimlessly around till we felt better. We walked back into Bugis Junction where we saw a roadshow for teeth whitening. There was a guy doing that right there in the middle of Parco and it looked so weird. He had blue gel on his teeth and there was a red mouth-opening thing so basically, that part looked rather like a clown. It was such a coincidence since Mantou had been talking about doing teeth whitening during dinner and this roadshow was offering it at a lower price than her friend's dentist. But she didn't want to do it in the middle of the crowd and frankly, I wouldn't want to either. I offered to bring a towel to do crowd-control for her though, haha!!! We got a pamphlet and continued walking but as we were about to cross over to Bugis Village, we has thi discussion about the teeth whitening. The pamphlet said that you had to do 4 sessions of 10 minutes each which would take around 45 minutes in total. To me, it sounded like you had to go back 4 times for 10 minutes worth of treatment but Mantou argued that the 45 minutes meant that you could do the 4 sessions at the same time. We couldn't agree so we went back and it turns out that Mantou was right. While we were there, Mantou asked more questions and the lady offered to give us the treatment for $400 each which was the same price as what that guy was paying except that we could do it in the clinic instead. By right, doing it at the clinic would cost $99 more than doing it on the spot. Mantou was keen but I wasn't sure. In the end, while Mantou was chatting with the lady, I decided to go for it. A present to myself. We weren't going to do it on the spot though. Instead we put a down-payment and would probably do it sometime in February when Mantou and I are less busy.

Something to look forward to...

December 2007

2007-12-24T20:24:00.000+10:00

The end of another year.

I always assumed that December would be a slacking month. After all, many companies shut down or slow work because a lot of people would be clearing and taking leave to go on holidays. I was so wrong. Work was busier than ever, with many more samples coming in due to the festive season. Then Singapore got hit with a big food poisoning outbreak courtesy of Prima Deli. (These things really don't have any sense of timing.) Since the culprit was Salmonella, my lab became the main testing facility and I must say that we have all been working like crazy because of this. In the midst of this Prima Deli frenzy, oysters starting coming in like mad as well. I don't want to elaborate too much but just know that in this month, all of us felt like overworked crazy people. As my friend so correctly pointed out, we don't even have the time to commit suicide. HAHA!!!

Thank goodness things are winding down a bit. We still have a whole lot of work and I still have a whole lot of oysters to clear but because of Hari Raya Haji, Christmas and New Year, there's only so much we can do.

Then there's Chris's and Ju's birthdays this month. How could I have ever thought this would be a relaxing month??? I was damn stressed in trying to plan for both their birthdays, having missed celebrating them last year.

Chris's Bday Celebration:

I brought her for a pedicure treat before we met up with the rest of the gang for dinner. My first pedicure and Chris's second. We took so long to choose the colours we wanted for our feet. But it was a good experience and we will be going back for more since we both got psycho-ed into taking up a package with that place. Two guillible fools...hahhaha...

We had dinner at Tony Roma's and had to queue for a table for 8. They didn't take reservations, how dumb!!!

After dinner, all of us headed down to Mount Faber in Keong's and Ju's cars. We went to the Jewel Box, recommended by a friend. We had to pay $8 to enter but that included a cable car ride and a $5 drink discount so it was worth it. The cable car ride was great! How often do you get to take the ride late at night, all the way down to Sentosa and back?

My surprise for Chris and Ju was asking Ah Ren out to meet us. This is no easy feat since he is always extremely busy but I managed to persuade him to come; plus he stays right at the foot of Mount Faber.

I got her a heart and flower white gold, rose gold and diamond pendent with a white gold chain. It wasn't cheap but we had a whole lot of people wanting to chip in for her present.

There was a live band and we each ordered a drink. Actually the Jewel Box is a really nice place with great atmosphere. The only problem is that the place is open-air and so you get a lot of second-hand smoke from people sitting around you.

A very nice day and night out. Totally memorable and I hope it's the same for the rest who joined me on this day.

The long long long Deepavali weekend.

2007-11-12T13:15:00.000+10:00

It's been a wonderful break from work. Planning for holidays, even short ones like this, make work and time move so much faster. You can strike off each date from your calender when each day ends and count down to your break. In this case, I took Friday and Monday off and made my first trip back to Melaka since I started working. So my dad picked me up from work on Wednesday and we took a quick dinner before heading "home". The subsequent four days were filled with eating (popiah, char kuay teow, mee goreng, mee rebus, chicken rice balls, organic food), shopping (bought 3 pairs of shoes, 1 skirt from G2000, 1 lipgloss because I lost my only one) and driving.

I really like the Kancil. It's small and parking is easy. It has no power steering so I enjoy using my muscles manuvering the car around. Plus I got lots of drive practice and seriously, M'sian drivers are terrible. I know the KL drivers are supposed to be the worst around but let me tell you, drivers in Melaka are no better. They drive like there are no other cars around, cutting from left to right, they don't signal and they seem to drive without brakes. I think S'poreans come here and get influenced by this bad driving because I have seen some S'pore cars behaving badly as well.

I got a hair wash and trim at my favourite hair salon with a super shiok head, neck, shoulders and back massage for 15 minutes. All for only RM32!!! I actually wanted to get some highlights but the girl quoted RM130 for my hair length whereas if you did a complete dye plus highlights it was RM220. I decided to get the complete job next year instead.

I didn't have a chance to go to any pasar malams this time. I was really looking forward to the food and strolling around the stalls. Next time perhaps.

Life in Melaka is slow and simple. It's similar yet different from life in Brisbane. People here take things easy and eating good food doesn't necessarily mean spending a bomb, sitting in a beautifully decorated room with air-conditioning. The best food I've had here come from tiny, stuffy coffee shops with sticky tables. Sometimes these coffee shops come complete with slippery floors and smelly drains, yet the queues are long and the food is cheap. I think only those who have really lived in M'sia will understand. Perhaps it's all about the simple life. With food as good as theirs, they could possibly expand and earn more money. But they seem satisfied to earn enough to get by. They close their stalls and shops when it's a holiday or a Sunday sometimes. It's totally opposite from what you see in S'pore. Over here, it's earn and earn and earn while you can. Money, money, money.....

2007-11-03T22:33:00.000+10:00

YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!

It didn't rain and I finally got to go down for tennis. The newly refurbished courts are such a disappointment. I miss the old courts with the blue. Now the courts are green and red, like any ordinary court. It's no longer unique. Sigh...

Still, a court is a court and I really, really miss hitting. I missed tennis and I missed the guys. There were 8 of us who came down today. 5 of us were seniors and 2 were these new juniors whom I have never met before. You can tell that they are freshies by the way they hit. The weather was good though I'm quite rusty. Timing and footwork are all off today. I need to play more and I'm hoping that could be arranged with Keong. Apparently he plays from 8-10pm on weeknights sometimes and hopefully I can join in after work. Plus I can bug him to tell me stories and I have a direct bus home from his place. BEST PLANNING!!!

It was nice to see Jarred, Tian and Dave after so long. They are all the same jokers but there was a point when we were all sitting outside the courts resting and they were suddenly discussing Keong and Sjai. Jarred and Dave were on Sjai's side it seems, from what they had heard from Sjai. It's all quite strange because I hear Keong's side and I think it's not right to judge harshly when you have not heard the full story. As a friend, I really, really, really wanted to just speak up for Keong (after all, that's what friends are for....awww....so sweet) and defend him because it might not all be one person's fault. Then I remember that he prefers that I keep my mouth shut even at his expense and he doesn't wanted people to know too much. So I sat there like a dumbass, feeling so conflicted, unable to say anything and I was glad when the topic is over. I realise that as much as I like these guys, sometimes I really don't know them at all. Perhaps it's better that I didn't. Then I can keep seeing the good and nice side of them and not the ugly side. People can be so hard to read and you never know whether they are lying to you or not.Ahhh what the heck! I shall just play my tennis and keep quiet.

2007-11-03T16:42:00.000+10:00

I went out with the student from work last night. We had a "date" as she called it. I wanted to bring her to Miss Clarity for dinner but they didn't take reservations for Friday night and the queue was pretty long when we got there. So we walked back to Bugis Junction and ended up eating at Terra Cafe. They serve mainly pasta courses and prices include a soup and dessert. It's pretty worth it and the food we had was nice. I tried the carbonara for $11.90 while she had the dory fish with linguine for $13.90. Prices are excluding service charge and GST though. After dinner she wanted to bring me to her favourite dessert shop. It turns out I've been there before. Mag brought me for my birthday and I brought Burger when he came down. Even though I had been there twice, I had never tried their signature dishes so last night I finally got a chance. I expect most people may not appreciate them. They are ginger-flavoured but I love the feeling of hot ginger sliding down my throat. The desserts were interesting, although a little sweet and extremely filling. Or perhaps that was because we already had dessert part 1? Ok so after dessert part 2, she was craving for coffee and we wandered around Bugis trying to find a table at any coffee place. Starbucks was full and so was TCC but the waiter was nice and let us sit and wait for people to leave. We sat there with the menu, slowly analyzing the drinks and deciding what to have. Fortunately we didn't have to wait that long and I ordered the Peach Me Up. It's some milk-blended peach drink. I guess it would have been more satisfying if I wasn't already so stuffed with food. Then she wanted to eat cake because the cake display was sooo tempting and the waiter just HAD to put us right behind the display. We ordered the Matcha (green tea) Tiramisu but it was....horrible. Too much cream and the green tea part tasted like red bean??? Plus I really hate red bean. Due to this very unsatisfying cake, she ordered new one, this time she got the American cheese cake which was, naturally, very cheesy. Dessert part 3 was just too much for me and I couldn't even finish my drink. We sat there chatting and laughing until closing. Why is it that we are always the loudest in any place? Still I had tons of fun and it was a new experience to go out with someone who can REALLY eat and still stay nice and slim. Phew...I love food but even that was too much for me. Interesting indeed!

Here are some of the food photos:

Matcha Tiramisu...please don't order it if you do go to TCC. The plate is really nice though. I liked it so much!

Dory fish with pasta.

Carbonara with lots of mushrooms. But it tastes pretty good. Almost like Pastamania's.

Left - Steamed egg white with ginger. Right - Steamed milk with ginger.

The lovely cake display.

Hot cinnamon choco latte and my Peach Me Up.

Overindulgence in just one night...but oh I had such fun doing it...haha...

2007-10-21T02:42:00.000+10:00

It's an early Sunday morning and I just got home half an hour ago. I'm exhausted; I had to change a total of 4 buses to get home...where are the taxis when you want one? My feet are aching so bad; wearing work shoes for more than 10 hours is so not recommended. I should be sleeping because I need to be at the Singapore Turf Club later at 9 am but my bath has refreshed me for now and since I can't play my Warcraft because it keeps lagging (coincidentally, only after Keong and Dagen had their hands on it), I shall blog a little. I was at the Singapore Veterinary Association conference the whole day and even though I really disliked having to go, I did enjoy the presentations today. It is seldom that I actually stay awake and attentive for 80% of the time. I learnt a lot and they kept feeding us every 2 hours or so. I had my fill of smoked salmon sandwiches, yum!!! I also met my ex-lecturer from poly with a group of TP students and we had a very nice chat. She was quite amazed to see me and know that I was working for AVA now. She even mentioned that I'm all grown up now...ahem...those were her exact words. Well, I don't feel all grown up though I'm supposed to be one now that I'm working, earning a salary and all that. Strangely enough, Keong also said that he was the youngest among us when we went out for supper at Chomp Chomp last night. Yet, he was the one who had a car and was driving us around. The rest of us 'grown ups' either had no license or no car. How sad that sounds! Look at us, relying on someone who doesn't have a fixed salary and is younger than us... Ah well, as long as he doesn't start complaining about it. Plus I do try not to take advantage of his car. I don't treat him like a free taxi and call him up whenever I need a ride though I can't say the same for others. We were counting the number of years that we have known each other. FIVE YEARS! Perhaps that doesn't seem like a lot. My friend was just telling me how she's known HER friend for 10 years now. Still, five years and counting, we meet up regularly and chatter never ceases when we are together. This is the gang I feel most at home with and you know what? Under different circumstances, I would never have talked to any of them throughout my three years in poly and we would have never really known each other. Hence I must thank fate (and maybe GOD?) that things in my past have brought me this way. I am very lucky, in more ways than one, I know that. Even my ex-lecturer says so...

2007-10-07T13:01:00.000+10:00

I caught Resident Evil: Extinction yesterday. It was a last minute decision to watch this show and I was surprised to see it being available at the cinemas so early when the actual release date was 11 Oct. The show was short but I liked the action. There was lots of killing, blood everywhere. The plot was not fantastic but then I don't really expect much from shows like these. I watch them mainly for the blood and gore. I think Chris and Kit didn't quite enjoy it because they were a little scared. But I'm glad I caught it anyway. Incidently, Channel 5 was showing Resident Evil: Apocalyse at 10 pm last night and when I reached home, I watched that as well. I do like the Resident Evil series but I don't think that there'll be a fourth one.

I've been in a charitable mood this week. I bought a Noah's Ark calender 2008 from my friend and I went down to Plaza Singapura to take a look a the Acres exhibit there. When I first got there, I couldn't find the exhibit and I thought that I might have got the date or location wrong. Then we saw it right behind the MRT exit. It wasn't obvious unless you walked to that area specifically. So we were entertained for a few minutes by this guy with his magic coin trick and then signed a petition for the "Animals Matter To Me" campaign and donated some money. They were trying to collect 4000 signatures. After that, we walked around the exhibit looking at posters explaining the different kinds of animal cruelty. It really is quite sad to see how horribly animals are exploited and treated by people. I figure that animals need more care and concern and I would rather donate to organizations like Acres than NKF. This whole week reminds me of the dog at my workplace, the chicken industry on which I did a whole lot of research on for my honours and the possum. That saddens me.

For those who are interested, you can take a look at these websites.
www.acres.org.sg
www.noaharkcares.com

2007-09-24T00:14:00.000+10:00

I just dyed my hair. Well actually, Chris dyed it for me.
I chose the L'oreal Feria Pear Blossom and it turned out ok.
At least you can see the difference between my old colour and this new one.
It's still not light enough though.
I liked the ash brown colour I did just before returning back to Brisbane with the blonde highlights.
It was beautiful.
I'll be trying to get that colour back once my hair has had the chance to recover from this dye job.
Plus I want highlights which means I need to get it professionally done.
Home-made highlights aren't nice enough.

2007-09-23T13:34:00.000+10:00

I've come to the end of my training period at work. I've "graduated" from the training and will be assuming real work next week. There's still lots to learn though. I am looking forward to this new period of work. Even till now I feel like a student on attachment who's getting paid to follow and learn from others. Perhaps this feeling will be gone when the real students start coming to our lab. There are already 4 students in other respective labs but none in mine. I think the university students will be posted to my lab at the end of the year. That will be pretty exciting. We need more younger people around. There's too many uncles and aunties around at my workplace. In fact, I'm already quite close to this Ngee Ann Poly student. We take the same shuttle bus and train back and usually chat all the way. As nice as my colleagues are, sometimes you do feel that age/generation/frequency gap. I want a friend who can laugh like a hyena with me, share the same kind of jokes with and is on the same level as me. So far, only the student comes close. The other girls are in different stages of life as I am and have different priorities. Maybe I still have a lot of growing up to do because all I want to do now is have fun and to be happy. The girls, on the other hand, want and need and do much different things from me. Don't get me wrong, they also love food, shopping and going out with friends. But one of them is a wife and mother. Another has a steady boyfriend for seven years now and is hoping to persuade him to settle down with her. The last one, well, she's too nice for her own good and a staunch Christian. She's so demure and gentle. She can't say no to anyone and hence is easily taken advantage of. My friend says that she is a typical Teochew woman. I don't know if that is true. Come to think of it, I've never really analyzed the Teochew women in my family (I'm half Teochew). Then again, Juju is Teochew too and she is a total opposite from my friend.

I'm settling down into this work and play routine. Work hard from Mondays to Fridays and then play like mad on Saturdays and Sundays. I see Chris almost every week and sometimes more than once a week. This week alone, I would have seen her three times already. We went for dinner with Kit, Mr Tan and Keong at Serangoon Gardens. We ate at Aston's and the food was cheap and good. Then we bought tau huay from Chomp Chomp for dessert. Initially all of us were going to tabao the tau huay back because we ate too much already but the tau huay was just too tempting. We ended up opening all of our tau huay and sharing and trying each other's tau huay flavours. I tried chocolate, strawberry, almond, mango and egg that night. I still like the egg best although mango and almond were good too but they tasted more like pudding than tau huay. After overeating (as usual, we never learn), Keong kindly sent all of us home. It's so nice to have a friend with a car and plenty of free time on his hands *wicked laughter*

I accompanied Chris to get her hair cut again, this time at Kimage Funan IT Mall. It's so troublesome to have short hair. You have to keep trimming it to keep it in shape and unless you have a good regular hairdresser to go to, cutting your hair can be a horrible experience. On the bright side, hair will grow eventually so at least you won't be stuck with the bad haircut forever. Fridays are sometimes the worst day to go out. My energy level is usually at its lowest after the work week and it's hard to muster up some sparks of energy to go out. I am stubborn though, and I want to go out no matter what. So I get home all exhausted but I don't sleep till at least 1 am because I don't want to waste my free time. It doesn't really make sense to me after I write this down but what the heck!

Right now, I'm waiting for people to fall in at my house. We are having a potluck party and although it would be nice to have each person cook and bring something down, it's not very realistic. We are not in Brisbane anymore and how I miss those days! I baked a batch of oatmeal raisin cookies and will be providing rice and fruits. Chris is bringing Japanese curry, broccoli and a cheese cake. A mahjong session will automatically follow lunch and Chris and I will be dyeing each other's hair. I'm quite bored of my hair colour. It's not as light as I would like it to be. Hopefully this will lighten my hair considerably.

Things have been pretty strained with me and Em. Perhaps I'm the only one who is feeling this. I know that Em can be very dense and insensitive sometimes. I've reached the point where I just don't care anymore. A brief update from Keong appalled me but only for that few minutes. I think this friendship is over. I've been very cool to Em when Em messages me. Sure I reply the messages, but I say what I need to say and don't bother with asking questions or being too nice. This is for the best...

It's A Happy Wappy Beautiful Day

2007-08-31T22:44:00.000+10:00

I'm in a fantastic mood! Today is like such a wonderfully, lucky, unbelievable day!!!

It's a very simple explanation to this great feeling...
I just got a pay rise!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Wheeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Actually I've known about this for around two weeks' now.
But they've finally confirmed this news and sent me an email notifying me about the exact amount I'll be getting.
PLUS I'll be back paid from June since this pay was supposed to start from June 2007.
Whooooooooooooooopeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Did I mention that I got the highest pay increment among my colleagues?
Not to be boastful or anything, but this makes me feel sooooooooo good....hahahaha....
I'm not sure why this is so, but....if they give it, just take it!!!
Heh heh heh...

More good news came my way later in the afternoon.
Even though Em couldn't play tennis with me tomorrow morning, I found out that the school courts would be open and the tennis gang would be playing tomorrow.
Yessssssssssssssssssssssssss!!!!!!!
I MISS TENNIS even though I've only missed last Saturday's session.

Oh yeah, when I got down at Pasir Ris MRT today and walked to the bus stop, the bus came immediately.
Usually I have to wait for 15 to 25 minutes before the stupid bus decides to show up.

Did I already mention that today is a super duper fantastically wonderful gorgeous day????????
*birds are chirping to me outside me window right now, theoretically of course*

HUGE SMILES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A New Handphone Soon???

2007-08-18T17:19:00.000+10:00

Many of you will know that I have been using my current handphone for 4 years. It's still in pretty good condition for a 4 year old piece of technology but I think it's time for a new one. I have been looking around and while I would love to get another Nokia phone, the recent Nokia models look like crap. They are all big and bulky and aren't stylish or sleek at all. Hence I was initially thinking of switching to Sony Ericsson. My dad has this $500 voucher so I want to make full use of it. At first I had already decided to get the Sony Ericsson W880i. It's the new super-slim phone at only 9.4 mm thick, plus the phone looks quite cool. However, it's also a MP3 phone which means it has a 1 gb capacity which you are essentially paying for and it doesn't come with a FM radio. Getting this phone would make my MP3 player quite obsolete. Still, it was the best I could find...until I received the M1 newsletter yesterday. There are TWO new Nokia super-slim phones coming out in September AND they both come with MP3 function and FM radio. Woohoo!!!

Check them out!
Nokia 6500 classic - http://europe.nokia.com/A4425253
Nokia 2630 - http://www.nokia-asia.com/A4448023

I'm eyeing the 6500 but we'll see how much it costs when it does come out in September.
Ooooo...I'm so excited!!!

Saturday BBQ and Farewell for Wen

2007-08-11T22:57:00.000+10:00

My sister, Mum and I have been organizing for this Saturday's BBQ. We have been planning and purchasing food here and there for two weeks or so. I know the food's going to be good. My sister ordered beef rendang from this Malay lady in M'sia who does superb rendang. My aunt orders it for her Chinese New Year party every year and I always look forward to that particular dish. It's not cheap though, and the lady only cooks when you order a minimum of 2 kg of beef or chicken.

Initially, the weather looked bad on Saturday. It was raining heavily around 2 pm but the rain cleared up by the evening. I prepared Milo's seafood pasta and fried tomyam tanghoon on the day of the BBQ. My gang of friends (Chris, Mr Tan, Denyse, Kit, Keong, Mike) were invited as well and some of these "gamblers" came earlier to play mahjong. Heh!

Dagen kindly helped me to start the fire after I pestered him non-stop and as usual, the guests were late. Still, I got to play with the cooking with some of Wen's badminton friends and kept feeding my group of friends. Bascially, they were so lucky that I was doing the cooking for them. Wen was also busy moving around with cheese cake, rendang and other various food. My friends loved the pasta and rendang although some of them couldn't take the spicyness. It was nice to see Denyse enjoying the food because I don't know her that well and it's good that she seemed to have fun.

Strangely enough, my group of friends were making the most noise and were the most rowdy. I guess Wen's friends are more of the gentle or demure type whereas my friends don't care that much. We had tons of fun and laughter. The party ended around 10 plus and after clearing everything up, they went up to my room and played mahjong until 1.30 in the morning.

Saturday was super tiring after tennis, preparing food and entertaining people. But I think I was most tired from laughing so much. I had great fun this Saturday and I'm sure Wen did too. She got lots of great presents including this sheep cushion that vibrates. I like it so much and it's going to be mine while she's away in Netherlands. This adds to my collection of farm animals, heh heh heh...

Nelly Furtado - All Good Things (Come To An End)

2007-08-04T02:20:00.000+10:00

Honestly what will become of me

Don't like reality

It's way too clear to me

But really life is dandy

We are what we don't see

Missed everything daydreaming

Flames to dust

Lovers to friends

Why do all good things come to an end

Flames to dust

Lovers to friends

Why do all good things come to an end

come to an end come to an

Why do all good things come to end?

come to an end come to an

Why do all good things come to an end?

Traveling I only stop at exits

Wondering if I'll stay

Young and restless

Living this way I stress less

I want to pull away when the dream dies

The pain sets it and I don't cry

I only feel gravity and I wonder why

Flames to dust

Lovers to friends

Why do all good things come to an end

Flames to dust

Lovers to friends

Why do all good things come to an end

come to an end come to an

Why do all good things come to end?

come to an end come to an

Why do all good things come to an end?

Well the dogs were whistling a new tune

Barking at the new moon

Hoping it would come soon so that they could

Dogs were whistling a new tune

Barking at the new moon

Hoping it would come soon so that they could

Die die die die die

Flames to dust

Lovers to friends

Why do all good things come to an end

Flames to dust

Lovers to friends

Why do all good things come to an end

come to an end come to an

Why do all good things come to end?

come to an end come to an

Why do all good things come to an end?

Well the dogs were barking at a new moon

Whistling a new tune

Hoping it would come soon

And the sun was wondering if it should stay away for a day 'til the feeling went away

And the sky was falling on the clouds were dropping and

the rain forgot how to bring salvation

the dogs were barking at the new moon

Whistling a new tune

Hoping it would come soon so that they could die.

Fergie - Big Girls Don't Cry

2007-07-29T03:13:00.000+10:00

Somehow, this song applies to what I'm feeling right now...
How depressing...............................

Da Da Da Da

The smell of your skin lingers on me now
Your probably on your flight back to your home town
I need some shelter of my own protection baby
To be with myself and center, clarity
Peace, Serenity

[CHORUS]
I hope you know, I hope you know
That this has nothing to do with you
It's personal, Myself and I
We've got some straightenin' out to do
And I'm gonna miss you like a child misses their blanket
But Ive got to get a move on with my life
Its time to be a big girl now
And big girls don't cry
Don't cry
Don't cry
Don't cry

The path that I'm walking
I must go alone
I must take the baby steps until I'm full grown
Fairytales don't always have a happy ending, do they
And I foresee the dark ahead if I stay

[CHORUS]

I hope you know, I hope you know
That this has nothing to do with you
It's personal, Myself and I
We've got some straightenin' out to do
And I'm gonna miss you like a child misses their blanket
But I've got to get a move on with my life
Its time to be a big girl now
And big girls don't cry

Like the little school mate in the school yard
We'll play jacks and uno cards
Ill be your best friend and you'll be mine
Valentine
Yes you can hold my hand if u want to
Cause I want to hold yours too
Well be playmates and lovers and share our secret worlds
But its time for me to go home
Its getting late, dark outside
I need to be with myself and center, clarity
Peace, Serenity

[CHORUS]

I hope you know, I hope you know
That this has nothing to do with you
It's personal, Myself and I
We've got some straightenin' out to do
And I'm gonna miss you like a child misses their blanket
But I've got to get a move on with my life
Its time to be a big girl now
And big girls don't cry
Don't cry
Don't cry
Don't cry
La Da Da Da Da Da

2007-07-21T23:35:00.000+10:00

People are so complicated but we try out best to understand them. I should think that females are more susceptible to this and want to know more so as to show concern towards their friends. So they are labelled as being "nosey" or "kaypoh" and I think, most girls feel that they can change someone they care about for the better. I don't think that people can change that easily unless they truly want to. It's like quitting smoking; no one can do it for you, you have to want to quit on your own no matter how much your friends and family beg and plead. This is why I don't waste my breath on my smoking friends. If they truly want to quit, I can show them support and assist as much as I possibly can.

I always want to know my friends well. I wish to understand how they think and why they act the way they do. Maybe it's something like psychology and similar to how Keong analyzes the behaviour of others. However, this is not possible if the other party doesn't share his/her thoughts and emotions. Of course, I can't be unreasonable and force them to do so. Plus I realize that the more I dig, the less I get and occasionally, the less I understand. I think it's time to stop asking and stop questioning because the more I hear, the more unhappy I get. I wish I had not been so bloody concerned and judgemental in the first place. Now I think I might have taken the wrong step, said the wrong things, thought the wrong thoughts and trusted the wrong person. I don't want to know, ask or understand anymore and I will keep my distance from that person.

Ban Mian Fantasy

2007-07-15T21:36:00.000+10:00

I love ban mian...the S'pore version of ban mian and ever since I have had to eat "cai fan" at work and for dinner everyday, I appreciate ban mian (and other various types of noodles) so much more.

I don't like drinking soup but ban mian is the dish that can make me slurp up every single drop of soup.

I love eating a whole bowl of ban mian and not feeling guilty because at least I did not indulge in an extremely unhealthy dish.

I love picking out the ikan bilis and eating them while they are crispy.

I love the noodles which are chewy but not soggy (unless you are dumb enough to leave the noodles sitting in the soup for more than 1 hour).

I love scooping out the bottom of the bowl looking for "hidden treasure" such as pieces of egg or minced pork.

I love the chilli which is salty, spicy and slightly sour all at once.

I love keeping the egg yolk till the last before dunking it into the chilli and popping it whole into my mouth (hence I get very annoyed when the uncle/auntie bursts my egg yolk while cooking).

I love keeping the soup for last (and also letting it cool) before slurping it down.

For those who are not so familiar with S'pore's version of ban mian (aka Mushie and Burger), there are some things you should note:

Even though ban mian has become a hugely popular dish in S'pore and there is practically one stall in every hawker centre, kopitiam or food court, not all ban mian stalls are good. I especially detest ban mian from food courts. Personally I like ban mian from the Qiu Lian Ban Mian outlets but not all outlets have good ban mian. You have to do it trial and error and hunt for your personal favourite.
As with the varying standards of ban mian, the chilli also changes from stall to stall. I much prefer the pounded fresh chilli in light soya sauce but most stalls are now serving pounded chilli in vinegar. It's not as nice but it'll do. I hate chilli sauce the most; it's like blended chilli with water and vinegar...so gross...
Ban mian is always freshly cooked, ie. one pot = one serving...hence it comes to you piping hot and one should never be over enthusiastic aka GREEDY and start trying to slurping down the noodles or take huge gulps of the soup. It might just land you in hospital for throat inflammation.
Prepare lots of tissue paper. Eating ban mian is guaranteed to make you sweat from every pore (ok that's quite an exaggeration but I've seen friends dripping with sweat while eating ban mian) and sometimes your nose runs as well.
Get ready to run into an air-conditioned place to cool down if you happen to be eating at a hawker centre or kopitiam. S'pore is much too humid and you are bound to be sweating for a good while if you don't cool down fast.
If your ban mian is mainly clumped together and tastes slightly floury and uncooked, you should complain to the stall because they did not cook it properly for you (unless you enjoy eating under-cooked noodles in which case you could have just told the uncle/auntie to pour soup over the raw noodles for you and help them save electricity, hahaha)

2007-06-30T23:57:00.000+10:00

Saturday...my favourite day of the week, because I get to go down to TP, meet up with the tennis guys and play tennis. Once you start working, the weekends become very precious and you won't want to waste the time. So when my time was wasted unnecessarily this morning, I was really pissed. The team had training so there weren't as many courts or people to play with today. I had to call Coach up to get permission to come down, just in case we were disturbing their training. I only managed to get two seniors, excluding myself, to come down and play today. I asked them to let me know what time they would be down at the courts because there was no point in my going down when there wasn't anyone to play with. So I got down on time, but one of them never turned up while the other was really late. I was standing there waiting for 1 and 1/2 hours in the end. I did get to play for a while in the end and I played a doubles match with the girls. But that was so disappointing; I had problems with my serve and made so many stupid unforced errors. It was a very unsatisfactory tennis day today.

On the bright side, I had a chance to chat with a couple of guys whom I don't usually talk to. It turns out that I might have misjudged one particular person. Sometimes I make my judgements too quickly based on the person's actions and behaviour without getting to know the person better. Still, I'm not going to change my mind so soon regarding this person. It's a pity the tennis guys are so young, as nice as they might be, there are times when I feel old with them.

Although work is enjoyable and I am happy there, it's quite sad that majority of the workforce are female and there are many older people. So far, my colleagues and I have only seen two younger guys who, unfortunately, are not working closely with us at all. We only see them during lunch and perhaps on the shuttle bus. Well, at least I can say that there aren't any distractions and we can concentrate on our work better this way, heh... Hey sometimes you have to look on the brighter side of things.

People say that you can't lose what you never had.
I say, you can't miss what you never had.

Tian Tian's Bday

2007-06-16T23:46:00.000+10:00

My fellow Gemini and tennis kaki whom I have known for at least 5 years now.

Happy 24th birthday!

It was nice to have the old tennis gang meet up for this occasion. Everyone is so busy post-poly with their own lives that we seldom have a nice get-together like this. As usual, we had lots of fun, lots of laughter (Tian Tian is a natural comedian), lots of suan-ing here and there (may I just say that Chris and I make a great suan-ing team??? muahahhahaa!!). The time we had for lunch was just not enough but I have to be thankful that we even managed to grab lunch together. Tian was late for an hour plus even though he took a cab down. I was late by 25 minutes because there was a super long queue at the bank; I hate running errands on weekends. Mike had to rush off for his NDP practice thing (I don't know why they had NDP practice when it was pouring outside), Chris had to rush off for a dinner celebration with her family and Keong had a doubles tournament at Kallang at 5 pm. So there you have it, a bunch of poly grads who are leading busy lives but still find time to run down to Queensway and buy birthday presents for a dear friend (actually only Chris and I went down to do the shopping, haha).

Lunch at Carl's Jr, the Marina Square branch. Keong always has to do weird poses when we take his picture.

I seldom get a nice photo of Mike too. He pretends to be camera-shy.

We tricked Tian by giving him this scarlet blouse and pretending that it was his actual present. Sure he's smiling in this picture, but you don't get the hear his vulgaries or see his expression when he pulled out this blouse hahahhaha! Yes my tennis friends are all very vulgar but I'm used to it.

Now this is his actual birthday present! The company of two beautiful girls is more than enough to keep him happy...hahhahaa....ok now you understand why Tian always has to ask me to shut up and says I have no shame!

Work @ Lim Chu Kang

2007-06-15T12:02:00.000+10:00

I've officially started and gone to work for 1 week. So far, I'm adjusting pretty well to waking up at 6.15 am and leaving to catch the bus at 6.30 am. I take the train from Pasir Ris/Tampines all the way down to Jurong East and then catch the shuttle bus which leaves at 8.05 am. I always get a seat on the train so I try my best to catch some sleep and listen to my music at the same time. I sit with my friend and colleague during the bus ride into Lim Chu Kang but we exchange greetings and then fall silent. We are both NOT morning people.

I had to do an orientation tour around the work complex on Monday and Tuesday so that I could get to know the different labs (there are 8 altogether), find out what the labs do and also meet the people working there. Apparently there isn't much chance for different labs to meet during work because each lab does their own thing and there is no need for interaction between the labs. Mostly we only get to see each other when we take the shuttle bus, have lunch or go to the toilet.

Majority of the people working there are very nice and friendly. They smiled and welcomed me. Although I was supposed to spend a few hours in each lab to watch the people working, I got "chased" out very politely from certain labs because they were shorthanded and had a lot work to do. I was also paiseh to hang around and disturbing their work. So my shortest orientation in a lab lasted 5 minutes while I spent the whole morning in another lab. But it turned out good because I had time to go back to my lab and interact and learn from my colleagues. Plus my orientation was over in 2 days while this other girl who started on the same day as me had to undergo 4 days of orientation. Basically the admin department arranged for her to spend half a day in each lab whereas my boss arranged my tour so he squeezed in 4 labs on Monday and 3 labs on Tuesday. Heh heh heh...lucky me!!!

It was good to start learning about what I was supposed to do. I like doing microbiology work and there's plenty of that at my new job. There are eight different stations where people rotate every month. I started out at the sampling station first. This was where I had to take samples of certain weight so that the other stations could process them. Actually, sampling is where you get to see various types of food being brought in. So far, I think the intestines are the worst. They smell bad and they smell worse during and after processing. I have to hold my breath each time I work with them but the people there are so used to the smell that they don't seem to mind it anymore. I hope that doesn't happen to me... it might mean that my sense of smell has been ruined!

When you get right into it, work is really busy. Most times you don't really get a chance to go back into the office to use the computer and the only break time is at lunch. Wanting to get a drink of water or go to the toilet is also hard when you have so much to do but so little time. Still, it makes the time pass really fast and before I know it, it's time to catch the shuttle bus home. One thing good is that we get to leave work on time and we don't have to do any overtime work. That's great because if I did any OT I would get home so late. Already I reach home around 8 pm everyday which doesn't leave me with much time to do stuff. I am getting used to it though and I'm already sleeping early and waking up early. Even sleeping in during the weekends doesn't happen anymore; I sleep before midnight and am up before 9 am. It's a huge change from my old lifestyle and I kind of miss that. Oh the sacrifices you have to make!!! Hahahahahaha!!!

23rd Birthday!!!

2007-06-07T12:12:00.000+10:00

Ok yes, I realize that my birthday post is soooo long overdue, but I've been a little busy with work and all that. Such a lousy excuse I know...haha...

Anyway I truly enjoyed this year's celebration, even though I was quite distracted. My grandmother came down from Melaka to stay with us for a couple of days and my mom was away touring Europe. I was basically the new "housewife" for the time being; making sure the house was clean and in order, cooking when necessary, purchasing groceries and all that. Actually I quite enjoyed running the household on my own; I had plenty of practice while I was in Australia and I missed being independent and doing things my way.

My grandmother's birthday happens to be a day before mine and she came all the way down to S'pore to celebrate our birthdays together. So we had a simple dinner on the 6th of June, just my family and my auntie's family out at the kopitiam at Changi Village.

Mantou asked me out for lunch on the 7th and we went for claypot chicken rice at some ulu place. I had the chance to ride in her brand new van and she gave me a treat with some ginger chicken dish and of course, a serving of claypot chicken rice. Even though I thought the rice was quite pricey, the food was good and as usual, we ate like gluttons. We were doing stupid stuff in the shop, laughing over the menu's bad English and spelling (Letuce and Fermented Red Residue???) and taking lots of photos with retarded faces.

After lunch, we wanted to catch a movie BUT the school holidays had begun and everywhere was packed with school kids. We couldn't get tickets for the shows and time slots we wanted and we ended up at this dessert place near Bugis where we sat and chatted. I tried their "yuan-yang" dessert which was half almond paste and half sesame paste. Too bad the sesame had a slight burnt taste; perhaps they had cooked it for a little too long.

Well, after this lunch and dessert with Mantou, I had a dinner with family out at Crystal Jade. This time I bought them dinner and it was damn expensive! Ok the food was not bad, even the quantity was not impressive, but to pay $86 for a dinner for five people is a little extreme. I'm not going back there again.

On Saturday I had my usual tennis session followed by lunch with Jarred. Nice and simple...

My sister and I met Chris, Kit, Keong and the guys at City Hall where we walked to Marina Square for lunch at Waraku Japanese restaurant. We ordered many dishes to share and the food was not too bad. I enjoyed the bibimbap even though it's supposed to be a Korean dish??? Then I received my birthday presents, kindly bought by Chris and Keong and sponsored by the guys, Tian Tian, Julie, Kit, Mantou and of course, Chris and Keong. THANKS GUYS!!! I love my new Wilson tennis bag, Body Index work bag, Starburst gummies, Red Rock Deli sweet chilli and sour cream potato chips and the plastic toy car... Excuse me Chris... I know you all call me Doraemon but it doesn't mean I can transform the toy car into a real one!

All in all, it was a good birthday celebrated with good and close friends.
Thank you to all those who texted to wish me happy birthday.

2007-06-06T23:51:00.000+10:00

Oh the time has finally come! I have found a job which seems promising. I'm still in a shock that I actually got selected when it was my very first interview. I did want this job pretty badly. It's related to what I was doing back in Food Science Australia, dealing with food and microbiology. For me, it's the dream job. I just hope that when I start working, it will meet up to my expectations. The only problem would be the travelling I have to do everyday. It will take me 2 hours to get to that place which means a total of 4 hours of travel daily. That is a lot of time wasted but if things go well, perhaps I might invest in a small, second-hand, cheap car.

MPH Booksale and a new gadget

2007-06-04T00:11:00.000+10:00

My dear cousin informed me of the MPH sale being held at the Expo and asked me to go along with her. Being such a sucker for such sales, I immediately said yes and we arranged to meet on the 1st day of the sale. Unfortunately, my dear cousin had to call off the date the night before. She asked me to go on Saturday but that was my tennis day. Then she asked me to go on Sunday but I wanted to spend that day with my sister. In the end, I went to the sale on my own on Friday morning.

Friday was a working day so I didn't expect to see so many people hanging around Tanah Merah station waiting for the train heading down the the Expo and the airport. There were plenty of uncles and aunties around. When I got to the Expo, I saw the reason for so many older people. There was the food fair held at the same place and they were all buying bak kua because it was really cheap. $20 per kg!! No wonder the train smelt of bak kua on my way back.

Fortunately the MPH sale was not as crowded as the food fare and it kind of shows how much Singaporeans enjoy their food as compared to books, haha. There were so many more books this sale as compared to the last MPH sale I went to about 3-4 years ago. I spent more than an hour slowly walking through all the aisles and picking my books. As usual, I wanted to buy lots of books but had to budget myself. Money was tight when you aren't working. I ended up with 12 books and paid $68 for them. I just love buying books, wrapping them up and reading them over and over again.

After shopping at the MPH sale, I wandered down and thought of checking out the food fare but it was so crowded and my books were too heavy, heh! So I went home and put my books down and had my lunch. I had a quick lunch and then headed out to catch the train down to Jurong East. There was a Creative warehouse sale and I was going to meet my sister there. I planned to get an MP3 player to ease the journey I would have to take when I started work. Almost all research work were in the West and travelling from one end to another was really boring without some music and you couldn't count on the radio because reception ended when the train went into a tunnel or underground.

The warehouse sale closed at 7 pm which I thought was ridiculously early for a Friday night. Shouldn't they have kept the sale open for a little longer so that the working crowd could pop down after their work? I met my sister at the location at 6.30 pm because she was late and I was late and I got lost taking the shuttle bus by myself. Luckily there were still quite a crowd and we did a quick browse around. I decided on the cheapest model and my sister wanted to get it for my birthday. So I got a white MP3 player with 1 gb memory space for $55. YAY!!!

A NICE NEW TOY FOR ME TO PLAY WITH!!!
THANKS WEN!!!!!!

Visit from Steph and Milo

2007-06-02T17:58:00.000+10:00

On Steph's second day in S'pore, we had a nice buffet lunch at Suki Sushi with the guys, Kit, Julie, Chris, my sister and I. I organized this lunch for them to meet up with Steph as I didn't know when they would get another chance to see her again.

Mr Tan's expression is so "nice"...I'm sure Chris loves it...haha.

Lucky Dagen sitting with these 4 lovely ladies...

Sushi outing...a huge success with lots of laughs, some mishaps and plenty of chatting.

This is supposed to be a huge bubble tea pearl and there was a guy inside. It didn't look like a pearl though.

This was an air-blown float, heh, and I thought there was actually someone inside so I was damn shocked when I watched Chris go up and box it.

Mag's birthday present from Steph.

While waiting to reach our destination on the train....

Heh doesn't Milo look a little kukumalu??

Can you believe we had dinner at Marche AFTER our sushi buffet lunch? It was a good dinner though...haha...

Yay Kim Clijsters!!!

Visit from Steph and Milo

2007-06-02T17:51:00.000+10:00

Steph stayed with me for two nights and she decided to make good use of the pool. She's giving a nice cheeky wink!

I brought her down to City Hall for lunch and lots of shopping!

We had lunch at Cafe Cartel with Milo and Diana. Cafe Cartel is such a good place to bring Steph since she loves bread and of course, Cafe Cartel provides a free flow of bread. So Steph had bread for starters and bread for dessert...I'M SERIOUS!!!

As you can see, us four girls were such gluttons and ate sooooo much.

Little soft toy massagers which we bought for each other. I bought the seal for Milo, Milo bought the dolphin for Steph and Steph bought the octopus for meeee....hahaha I know it's quite lame but at least it's memorable.

Visit from Steph and Milo

2007-06-02T17:30:00.000+10:00

Showing the girls around my school.

I love my school!!!

Letting Steph try the Singapore version of ban mian. Don't be fooled by her face; she liked it very much.

Steph and Milo at the MRT station.

Sending Steph off at the bus station...one last laugh for the hyenas...

Bored at Home

2007-04-26T17:19:00.000+10:00

Well, actually I'm not that bored at home. I do enjoy my time in my room, reading, chatting or Mapling. I can see how my friend is able to stay at home all day for almost a year. It becomes a habit. Hopefully it will not get too far for me. I am still looking for a job and am still applying. Waiting and waiting. In the meantime, I do other things. I still have my weekly tennis. I meet up with friends. I play mahjong. I play Maple. I read a lot. I clean the house. Sometimes I cook. I enjoy cooking. A sense of accomplishment. I am trying to change myself as well. Becoming a different and better person perhaps? Ah well, my friends will know when they see me. They might question me. But in the end, it's my choice and I've already gone ahead with it. Meet me, accept me and enjoy me...

Rob Thomas - Little Wonders

2007-04-26T17:01:00.000+10:00

I love this song. I heard it on the radio before I heard it in the movie "Meet the Robinsons". The show was great and this song makes it complete.

Let it go,
Let it roll right off your shoulder
Don't you know
The hardest part is over
Let it in,
Let your clarity define you
In the end
We will only just remember how it feels

Our lives are made
In these small hours
These little wonders,
These twists & turns of fate
Time falls away,
But these small hours,
These small hours still remain

Let it slide,
Let your troubles fall behind you
Let it shine
Until you feel it all around you
And i don't mind
If it's me you need to turn to
We'll get by,
It's the heart that really matters in the end

Our lives are made
In these small hours
These little wonders,
These twists & turns of fate
Time falls away
But these small hours
These small hours still remain

All of my regret
Will wash away some how
But I can not forget
The way I feel right now

In these small hours
These little wonders
These twists & turns of fate
These twists & turns of fate
Time falls away
But these small hours
These small hours, still remain,
Still remain
These little wonders
These twists & turns of fate
Time falls away
But these small hours
These little wonders still remain

Visiting Steph 3

2007-04-10T17:18:00.000+10:00

A final visit to the Batu Caves so that my KL visit would be complete.

There are 271 steps to climb up into the cave and it's not an easy climb when the weather is hot, you are sweating profusely and there are litter, coconut shells and banana skins all over the steps.

Within the main cave.

Some wall paintings which were really pretty with all the colours but the words were all in Tamil so we didn't understand them.

I don't really know what this it but it looks quite freaky. It seems like some kind of mystical animal with a woman's head, goat body and beaver tail???

More wall paintings with strange gods.

The colours were so beautiful.

We went down to Leisuremall where I got a root beer float from A&W which happens to be extinct in S'pore. According to Steph, A&W is already endangered in KL. I'm not surprised. The quality of the food has dropped so much and their floats taste like they were diluted with water.

We had dinner at a vegetarian place because I wanted to try this Hakka dish called "lui cha fan" which is a place of rice and vegetables like kailan, long beans, groundnuts, pickled turnip (cai por) and beancurd.

The dish comes with a bowl of soup which must be eaten together with the rice. It's some herbal concoction of tea leaves, mint leaves and other herbs. I personally thought that it looked like the algal water of neglected fish ponds.

So here you have it!!! Mix everything together and eat up! (Erm...this may be Steph and Wan Shi's favourite dish but it certainly is not mine. I am not a soupy person, not a herbal person and definitely not a veggie person.)

Visiting Steph 2

2007-04-10T13:28:00.000+10:00

Steph's parents brought me to see the Thean Hou Temple which was supposedly quite well known in KL. The place was not as far as I had expected and with no traffic, we got there in about 30 minutes. The weather was so hot though and walking around the temple grounds just made me sweat like mad and feel dehydrated.

Getting some "holy" water from Guan Yin but you have to step on this ledge on the floor for the water to actually come out.

Getting a divination lot from the temple but apparently you were supposed to think hard and pray for what you want to ask. Steph and I were too busy playing to even think of praying. Still, I got a pretty good lot which told me that I was born under a lucky star, blessed with happiness and longevity.

A wall decoration at the temple. It's pretty and colourful.

This is an overview of the main temple hall. There were a lot of tourists around and Steph said that even the locals would come here to take a few photos of their own.

Imitating the pose of the cute cartoon monk behind me.

It's Steph's turn now! People kept looking at us like we were crazy.

This part had statues of the 12 animals but I like the dragon cos it was the most elaborate and beautiful.

Steph and her bull...moooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo....

Heh heh...rat look-alike contest.

Steph is trying to 'jiang dao li' or talk reason and act intellectual...hhohohoho...

Visiting Steph

2007-04-09T22:04:00.000+10:00

I have been saying that I was going to visit Steph in KL and this kept getting postponed for various reasons. Finally we were able to settle on the Easter weekend and I managed to get my bus tickets up to KL. There was no public holiday for Malaysia on Good Friday but she took leave on that day just for ME!!!

I arrived on Thursday evening at Pudu Raya bus station where Steph and her dad picked me up. Fortunately I didn't have to wait too long for their arrival. The Pudu Raya area is very rough with a lot of petty crimes so I didn't feel safe standing around there by myself.

We went back to her place to have a tasty home-cooked meal by her mum and then made a last minute decision to head out to the pasar malam nearby. We ended up buying MORE food and ate so much that night. After dinner and supper, we had a nice long chat whilst lying in bed. It was so good that we could catch up from when we last parted and still talk so easily.

The next day, Steph the tour guide attempted to show me around. We went to the Central Market first and had to get there taking the LRT. It was my first time taking public transport around KL since I usually get chauffered everywhere, hahahah! We had to walk from the train station down to the market which was actually a tourist place where people could purchase souvenirs to show that they had been to Malaysia.

On the way to Central Market.

Reaching Central Market after 10 minutes or so.

Steph has never seen the angkluang before and had no idea what it was. So much for being Malaysian!!! I had to explain what it was and I grew up in Singapore....wahahahha...

We took lunch at the Central Market and I was so fascinated by the sight of BLUE rice! We tried to ask the seller to explain what the blue rice was but his English was really bad.

Nasi Campur is like the Malay Chup Fan (cai fan). You choose and take the food that you want and bring the plate over to the cashier where you pay for it. It's a lot more flexible than chup fan because you can take as much or as little of the dishes as you like but you still pay pretty much the same.

Here's my selection: blue rice (of course I HAD to take the blue rice but it didn't taste that wow), fried kang kong, beef rendang and tempeh (I love love love tempeh!). Total cost: RM 5.

Steph chose the brown santan (coconut) rice which tasted a little like nasi lemak, sambal chicken, achar and keropok. Total cost: RM 4.50.

After lunch we walked down to Chinatown after asking for directions at the tourist information counter. It's nice to know that they have such things in KL. It makes things a lot easier for the tourists especially when so many people in KL still cannot speak English.

Chinatown was a long, straight street with lots of stall selling fruits, drinks, fake bags, clothes, pirated CDs and accessories. We shared a bowl of guilingao first (RM 6) since it was such a hot day and I do like to eat it. This was the very ho liao type where you could taste the herbs but unfortunately was quite bitter and Steph didn't like it. Good things are not always yummy!!! Chinatown was actually quite dodgy. There were lots of guys who would try to get your attention by making perverted sounds and comments. How can they expect to sell anything when all they are accomplishing is just to scare off the female customers? I suppose they think they were being cheeky but at times I just felt like slapping some of them. Ugh!!!

There was still plenty of time after Chinatown so Steph decided to bring me to Sogo at Bandaraya. The shopping mall was have a big sale and she bought a pair of work shoes at RM 134 and a swim suit at RM 76. I managed to find a nice pair of sandals at a bargain price of RM 16. I saw a very pretty pair of heels at RM 30 but they didn't have my size. Total disappointment but at least I did buy something.

We went for more shopping at Midvalley (hey, we are typical girls!) but stopped at a Hong Kong cafe called Kim Gary for some snacks and to rest our tired, tired feet. Steph suggested that we order their famous toast to try.

Thick toast with peanut butter and condensed milk. Absolutely sinful but also very yummy. I was quite amazed that the bread was so thick so the price was actually quite alright at RM 3.50. I have a drink of the iced Hong Kong white tea (Da would like it) and Steph had Yuan Yang which is a mixture of my tea with Hong Kong coffee.

Shopping at Midvalley was disappointing. We couldn't find anything we liked and all the shoes shops did not have anything close to what I wanted. Anyway it was time to go for dinner with Burger. Unfortunately we took the train from the wrong side and got off at this super ulu train station. It kind of reminded me of the ulu train stations you had in Brisbane. The structure was very similar. Steph started panicking and rushed to ask a guy for help. He just told us to take the train from the opposite side of the station which was pretty much common sense. But we were tired and our feet hurt. Luckily that train brought us to the correct stop but when we tried to exit the station, the machines would not accept our tickets. It turned out we had bought the wrong tickets and the people there asked us to pay them an extra RM 2 each. That didn't really make sense but I didn't understand Bahasa so I left it at that. However Steph felt the same indignation as I did so she went back to "confront" those men. They told her that she should have been grateful that we weren't fined RM 10 each as this was the rule set by the station and they even showed her the signboard which mentioned this. I still thought it was unfair because it wasn't as if we were trying to get a free ride on the train. We had made a completely innocent mistake by purchasing the wrong ticket. UGH!!!!!

Burger was waiting for us at the train station and we walked down to the mamak stall for dinner together. We had an interesting dish of roti prata fried with meat, garlic and onions. It was quite nice but very unhealthy. Still it was my first time trying this dish. I wonder if S'pore has this as well.

I forgot the exact name of this dish so I shall wait for Burger to enlighten me.

Enjoying the food and company and trying to do Christine's favourite pose.

Reflections

2007-03-14T01:14:00.001+10:00

So I've been slacking since I got back from Brisbane and I've finally had the chance to take my break. I've managed to catch up with most friends, played lots of tennis and mahjong and eaten most of the food I've missed. I've been mapling a lot as well which is actually such a waste of time.

Many things have been happening around me whilst I live in my little Maple world. A friend got married. Many friends are busy working. Some are busy mugging for exams. I didn't really know why I'm still hanging around and not actively searching for a job. So far most of my attempts have been half-hearted at best.

Then during a mahjong session on Saturday, Kit made me realise what was going on. I wasn't happy with my life at all. I mean, I am happy when I'm with my friends, I'm happy when I'm playing my game, I'm happy when I'm lying in bed reading my books, I'm happy when I'm playing tennis but these make me happy on the outside and I'm not happy inside.

Usually I'm a very happy-go-lucky person. I can live each day as it comes and not worry about the future. But now I understand that I'm still living in my past. I can't push aside the 2 years I spent in Brisbane and now I compare everything to my life in Brisbane. It's dumb but I can't help it.

It's also weird being so free everyday while everyone is working or studying. Mondays to Fridays go by slowly and I feel extremely lonely. I am often tempted to ask some friends out on weekdays because I'm so bored and tired of staying at home. However, it would mean spending more money and I would be making use of them just because I have nothing better to do. Hence, the weekdays are spent at home, on my computer and with my mum.

I really need to snap out of this...I'm not used to feeling so depressed all the time...

Happy Birthday Hyena No. 1

2007-02-25T03:22:00.000+10:00

I knew it was your birthday but somehow I got carried away and forgot to send you an SMS greeting. I'm so sorry my dear! I read your blog and I'm glad that you have the Seows' to celebrate this year with you. Hopefully we will be able to spend next year's birthday with you instead. I know that it can be depressing spending a birthday all by yourself and I think back to the first year I met you when you told Steph that you had baked yourself a birthday cake and wanted to give her some. I understand how it is to feel alone, forgotten and maybe unwanted. But I assure you that you are not alone. I really, really, really, really miss you and Steph so much. I wish we could relive the Sandford days...

P.S. I'm glad your birthday present is working well and that you are making full use of it.

Love you lots.....

Chinese New Year is very different this year

2007-02-18T20:49:00.000+10:00

I'm back in my hometown, Melaka, right now. We come back every year to spend the Chinese New Year with the rest of the family. This time round, there aren't any celebrations for us. No decorations are put up, no firecrackers to be lighted up, no well-wishes and no ang baos to be given or received. Yes, it's a quiet time for the family. Some things are still the same though. We go down to our grandmother's place for the annual reunion dinner. We eat oranges and receive visitors at home. Lots of goodies and drinks go round the table for guests to munch on while they chat away. There are also the usual questions and exclamations from the uncles and aunties. Standard stuff really; sometimes I wonder if they go through a script with all their predictable questions and answers. Oh well, that's what relatives are for and that's what they'll always be like. I might end up the same when I get much older. I do enjoy showing off my lovely Australian Open tan, although not many people appreciate it. Quite a few of the older generation have already commented about my colour with dismay. I wonder what my other grandmother will say about it. Even though this is not the first time coming back to Melaka so dark, I always managed to surprise her with it. Heh heh heh, I can't wait till she sees it. She's quite likely to shake her head and ask, "Why so dark? What have you been doing?" in Teochew.

The Melaka house has come a long way since I last saw it almost 2 years ago. The garden is much more extensive thanks to my mum. It has a whole variety of plants, lovingly taken care of by her. There is a new fish tank connected to the side of the house with a glass wall so you can view the fishes swimming while in the living room. There are two freshwater lobsters in that tank and I like watching them prowling around the bottom, unaware that I am staring at them. Mosquitoes are here to stay though and I hate getting bites which itch for days. This place feels more like a holiday getaway and feels like I'm staying out on the countryside. Of course there are endless chores to carry out because this house requires more maintenance than the one in Singapore. The floor gets dusty faster, there are plenty of lizard dropping and dead insects every morning and the garden needs weeding, pruning and watering all the time.

I'm getting lots of practice with driving. I get to drive the automatic Kancil without power steering but at least I'm working my muscles. Driving can really make you a slob. You get lazy and sit in an aircon environment so all the food you eat turns into fat instead of being burned by walking and taking the bus. Bad, bad, bad, bad, bad.

Although most shops and stalls aren't open during the first two days of Chinese New Year, I've still been doing a lot of eating. We go to our grandmother's place for dinner almost every night and she always cooks too much. My dad organized a small buffet party at our place for some relatives. An aunt held another buffet lunch at her place and I totally loved the rendang beef she served....yummy!!!

I've been doing too much eating and slacking. My hands are itching for tennis and I want to swim....

Australian Open 2007

2007-02-07T12:20:00.000+10:00

Two red, sunburnt girls with one extremely brown girl at dinner.

The daily schedule board, it's our favourite because we can't be bothered to take down the schedules for each day and we won't spend money to buy the programs either.

Queuing up to enter the Australian Open grounds, I look really lost but I'm just bored of waiting for the gates to open.

Standing beside a signboard, waiting for a match to start.

Mag's not so favourite player.

The update centre where we go all the time to check for matches and plan our next move.

This is the Garnier World where you get to go in for free facials, massages or hairstyling and get a free goodie bag at the end. The bag was really good; it had items that were quite expensive but as you can see, even the Aussies know how to be kiasu. The queues everyday were so long that you had to wait for 2 hours before your turn came.

I'm sunburnt, sweaty and sticky from the sunscreen but dinner is more important.

I know you can't really see much but this is the match between some guy and another guy....hahahha....actually it was James Blake and Fernando Gonzalez.

Fabrice Santoro is an amazing doubles player...too bad all his partners played badly and brought him down with them...ugh...still he is so cute...

The beautiful blue sky of Melbourne, after the rain and early in the morning. The clouds tend to disappear towards the afternoon and the sun is relentless.

The Bryan brothers, after winning their match. These two are super cute as well.

Maggie Bum Bum with the same signboard.

Australian Open 2007

2007-02-07T01:39:00.000+10:00

Look at the crowd in the Rod Laver Arena.

Rod Laver Arena right behind me.

Beside one of the outdoor courts. No one was playing because it was raining.

After a match, the crowd clears quite quickly. We managed to get this shot before the ushers chased us out.

Dinner was super spicy, super oily, super yummy Shanghainese fish.

This is how much oil was in that pot!

The dish looks much better once all the oil was removed.

A huge result board outside Rod Laver with the winner and runner-up from 2006.

Maggie Bum Bum's turn with the board.

Mag's all time favourite player!!

2007-02-07T00:45:00.000+10:00

I've been in Singapore for about a week and a half now and it's been going good so far. I've settled into my room and put up lots of photos on the cupboards. I have met up with a few friends although I'm taking my time to meet up with everyone. I played tennis 5 times last week and went swimming once. It was so good to finally get to go down to school and play with all my friends. I don't look forward to meeting people on the street, especially the ones whom I was not so close to. I'm just tired of answering all the same questions over and over again. People always ask the same stuff like "Oh are you back for good?" or "So have you found a job yet?" and "What are your plans for the future?"...blah blah blah... I need a tape recorder so I can just record my model answers and play them to whoever wants to know. Ugh!!

Chris organized a dinner for Friday night and the guys (nan ren) were all supposed to come to see ME! In the end, only 2 of them turned up but still this was good because we had a nice number for mahjong where I won the most. Whoopee!!! Did I mention that I now have a mahjong table and mahjong set in my house????

Saturday was tennis with the TP team and we played for almost 3 hours before going for lunch. I love spending time with the gang. Everything is so relaxed and natural. Everyone has the same passion about tennis. Although the gang has become a lot smaller than the past, we have remained close and it's wonderful to know that these are people you can meet up even when you've been out-of-touch for a while and still feel close to them. There's been talk about setting up a TP Alumni tennis team and if all goes it, this will be starting soon. That's something to look forward to. After tennis, I went for dinner with my oldest friend (no, he's the same age as I am but I've known him for so long) and we played a little mahjong with my sister. A total disaster occured after that when I was trying to close up the table with my right leg but it was too heavy. Instead, it fell flat on the floor, with my foot stuck between the metal rods. Damn that hurt like hell and I had a huge bruise popping right out! Luckily Wen got some ice and that brought the swelling down. I am still limping right now and I can't play tennis...darn it...

On the bright side, I managed to go for a late supper with my lecturer, Ju and Chris. It was so last minute because Ju and Chris couldn't or didn't want to go at first but around 10 pm, they all called and said that they wanted to meet after all. So we went down to Geylang because it was one of the places where people normally go for supper but then, we switched to East Coast since everyone was too full to eat anyway. Hence, we headed to the Mac's at East Coast and bought some drinks, walked along the beach and found a bench to sit on. Boy, it was so crowded that night, probably because it was a Saturday. We had a great and meaningful talk for a couple of hours when we decided to go down to my lecturer's place. Chris had not seen his place and I had only seen it before he moved it. We got there around 2 plus in the morning and continued the talk till almost 5 am. It's a good thing my mum and dad aren't so uptight about my going out since I went to Brisbane.

I got home and slept for 4 hours before waking up. There was going to be a meet up between us Maplers that day. First there was a mahjong session and then we went down to City Link Mall for dinner. I had tons of fun and laughed a lot. It was good considering I had not met some of these people face-to-face before. Everything went smoothly although the topics tended to veer towards the game. Still, it was a good night to remember.

Dinner at New York New York with Kit, me, Da, Cloudy and Ken Ken.

Dessert afterwards with my sister in the photo as well.

For now, I'm taking things easy and slow. I want to go out to meet friends but at the same time, I just feel like resting at home. I feel like I need some time for myself, especially after starting work immediately after finishing up my honours. Even though I love my job, even though I took 2 weeks off from work when my family came over, even though I had 1 week off for Christmas and New Year, and even though I got to go to Melbourne for 1 week to watch the Australian Open 2007, I feel like I haven't had enough time to breathe and have a proper holiday.

Let's just wait and see...

Back In Singapore

2007-01-26T11:55:00.000+10:00

The last day in Brisbane went quite well, despite my luggage being overweight and having to remove a few of my items. I threw all my shoes, some toiletries, the blue lamp and my blue Reebok bag to Shio and Tomo. Thank goodness they were there with me! It would have been such a waste to dump the stuff into the rubbish bin. Stupid SIA is so strict these days and I had to be served by two grumpy, unfriendly Asian staff at the check-in counter. How annoying!!! After I had settled the check-in luggage, I had to worry about my hand-carry ones. SIA apparently only allows each passenger to bring in 1 hand-carry luggage with maximum weight at 7 kg. I had 2 bags and one already weighed 6 kg. Hence I was stressing about how I was going to enter the gate without being forced to remove one bag. Fortunately, the guy at the start of the immigration counter did not check my bags or question me about them. However, the two Asian girls came down to the boarding gate to help out and again I had to worry about whether they would recognise me as the girl who was trying to bring too many things onboard their precious airlines. When I finally got to my seat without any further incident, I realised that my flight was pretty empy. There were only about half the seats full and quite a few rows were totally empty. This pissed me off because obviously the plane would have been able to take much more luggage but no, they had to make me remove 8 kg worth of stuff. Idiots!!

The flight was good and I watched so many movies. I was glued to the screen for 7 hours and managed to catch these shows:

The Guardian
The Departed
Open Season
Accepted
Some HK comedy
Some Korean horror movie

My mum and dad picked me up at the airport with the new car (well it's about a year old but I've never seen it before) and I was asking why my sister wasn't there with them. She did promise to come along and pick me but at least without her, there was more space for my suitcases. When I got home, I was quite tired. I wanted to take my time to unpack and wash up but my dad kept nagging me to put my luggage in my new room. So I did as I was told and when I opened the door and turned on the light, I saw a huge group of people inside waiting to surprise me. This was so unexpected and I was really grateful that they took the time to come down to see me. No wonder there was so much food on the table and I assumed that my mum wanted to fatten me up. Seeing these people was bittersweet. I loved that they made an effort to come down and it meant so much to me. At the same time, they reminded me that I was going to be stuck here, in Singapore, for at least 3 years. I was still sad about leaving home and it was hard putting on a brave face and entertain them. It was worse when someone I didn't want to see turned up. No one could be blamed for this except me. So we sat, they ate, we chatted and then they went home. Now it was time for me to get a closer look at my new room and settle in.

I love the new room. My mum and dad painted it a light apple green when it was pink before (one reason why I didn't want to move into this room long long ago). I have a new (well actually it's old because my dad handed it down to me) desk and my bed was already in there. I just needed to move my stuff in and start making the room my own.

Farewell Brisbane

2007-01-25T22:16:00.000+10:00

Oh yes, it's time to leave and I can't bear it. I've made my home in Brisbane for the past two years. I've found dear friends, family and myself. I've changed and grown so much. I love my life here but now I have to start over and make a whole new home. It will take much getting used to. I think, no, I will fall into depression when I get back. For now, the feeling has yet to hit me but it will slap me in the face once I land in Changi Airport. I think it's been hard on my family, hearing me tell them that I don't want to return. I never thought I would become like so many of my generation who experience Australia and want to stay there for good. I must admit, I have fallen in love with Brisbane. Then again, it could also be because I found my real self down here. I grew up and matured down here. Of course, I'll bring all the memories back, though I am afraid that once I leave, I will go back to being the old me, adapting to the Singapore lifestyle. I don't want to change and yet, I change so easily. How scary this is! Lets' all wait and see. But for now, leave me alone...

I'll feel better on my own.

The Start of 2007

2007-01-01T23:02:00.000+10:00

I can't say that the first day of 2007 was an eventful or memorable day. It is just a regular day like any other, with chores to carry out and meals to cook. The only difference is that all the shops are closed. No shopping can be done. Hence I spent most of the time at home sleeping, cleaning and slacking.

The last day of 2006 is a whole different story. I stayed over at Milo's place on Saturday night and prepared banana chocolate bread only because I managed to find cheap bananas at $3.99 per kilo (usually bananas go for $10-12 per kilo). We were supposed to stay over and watch this Hong Kong comedy but the DVD player wasn't working. So Mag, Steph and I ended up watching a French comedy on tv which was damn old ( you could tell from their clothes and hairstyles) but was so damn funny. It was basically about a son who comes from a strange family with 2 guys as his parents but one of them was a sissy or a fag as mentioned in the film. The son wanted to get married and the girl was the daughter of a conservative family with the father involved in politics. Hence the family goes crazy trying to pretend to be a normal family with a normal butler (who happens to be a transvestite and usually goes around the house wearing pink mini-shorts and no shoes). The sissy ends up dressing up as a female on the day the two families meet but all hell breaks loose when the paparazzi turns up and the real mother of the boy comes to the dinner. Heh...hilarious!!! Did I mention that this weird family owns a nightclub for transvestites and they stay just above it? In case you're interested, the title of this film is "La Cage Aux Folles".

The next day all of us woke up late, had lunch at home before heading out to Gold Coast at 2 pm. We took a while to find a nice beach with minimum people. The beaches were quite full considering it was a Sunday and also New Year's Eve. Then we proceeded to have lots of fun playing in the sand, enjoying the waves and clear salty water and of course eating snacks. We managed to squeeze in another video emulating the reality program Survivor but I won't be showing it to any old person. Mag is going to edit it first and I'll see how it turns out first.

The beach was great although I would have liked a little more sun because I'm trying to get a tan. I guess there'll be plenty of time to tan while I'm at the Australian Open for five days in a row anyway. We showered and took some time taking photos at the beach before driving back up to Surfer's Paradise to try to get some dinner. Parking was such a nightmare. We drove round and round and took about 1 hour to get a decent free lot but still had to walk about 15 minutes to get to the centre of Surfer's. Still the weather was so good, windy and cooling. It almost felt like winter. What a wonderful way to end 2006 and start 2007!!!

We walked around, hungry as hell and planning to eat dinner, have coffee and finish off with ice cream for dessert. We decided to have dinner at Billy Baxter's and it was a good thing the food came fast. The food was pretty good or maybe we were just too hungry. Anyway we were really full after that but we each still ordered a cup of coffee from Starbucks and Coffee Club. Those who know me will know that I don't usually go for coffee because I react to strong coffee. But I was tired and sleepy after swimming at the beach and eating the heavy meal. Without the coffee I would not have been able to stay awake for the countdown. In the end, getting a caffe mocha made me really high. We had to wait for about 50 minutes for the countdown and for the fireworks to start so while waiting, the deejay was playing super retro MTVs but the crowd seemed to enjoy it. We just went along and sang if we knew the words while Steph and Mag entertained themselves by shouting stupid things such as, "You never wear underwear!" or "Stop going around naked!". It was quite interesting to watch the crowd do stupid things as well. We were standing just before the first aid tent so we saw a few girls who were too drunk to stand on their own get sent to the tent. I must say, the first aiders were doing good business that night. I believe the police would also be making tons of money from all the fines they could issue to people who were either drinking or drunk in public.

The countdown was pretty spectacular. I think the fireworks went on for about 15 minutes and they were just gorgeous. There was lots of smoke and pieces of burnt paper flying around but it was all part of the atmosphere. Mag said that the fireworks we saw were much better than the ones they did in S'pore and I'm sure they were. I just had to remember to keep my mouth closed or I would be eating ashes. After the fireworks the crowd slowly dissipated but I think many were probably heading to pubs and bars to continue partying. As we walked around, lots of strangers (mainly guys) were wishing us 'Happy New Year' and there was even this guy who asked to take a photo with us. I guess we were just too charming as a group, heh heh heh!!! Finding a toilet was a problem and the one we went to was quite disgusting. I think one of the toilet bowls was spewing water and the floor was flooded. Still, it wasn't as bad as some of the toilets I've seen in Malaysia and the S'pore hawker centres. The Aussie girls were complaining about this toilet but they haven't seen the worst yet.

We were all pretty tired after the whole day and I was feeling nauseous from the coffee. So we walked back to the car and proceeded to drive home. I got home around 2.30 am and promptly fell asleep after washing up. I have to say, the start of 2007 was super!!! I just hope the rest of it goes well too.

2006-12-27T11:55:00.000+10:00

Trying to climb up the tree..

Made it!!!

My signature pose!!!

Dinner at Cam Rahn Restaurant after my graduation.

2006-12-26T22:50:00.000+10:00

Graduation presents from Kit & Darren, Wan Shi & Tommy, Steph and Milo!

Me!

Hyenas rule!!!

ME AGAIN!!!

2006-12-25T23:39:00.000+10:00

I was lazy to do both the hat-throwing and the jumping photos so I decided to do them at the same time. Hey, jumping was quite tiring ok!!

Hot, hot, steaming hot in the heat and wearing a heavy, thick graduation gown.

I like seeing the rays of light coming through this Flame of the Forest tree. Thanks to Steph for getting this photo.

We got quite a few family photos which was great since most times, one of us will be left out in the picture. So don't yawn and complain if there are too many in the blog.

One more jump for my graduation and official end to studying in UQ. Sob sob sob...

2006-12-25T21:38:00.000+10:00

Just before the commencement of the ceremony, we tried to squeeze in as much photo-taking as possible.

I ran out of the ceremony right after I went on stage and received my fake certificate from the chancellor. It was such a good idea; I really pat myself on the back for doing it. We were able to take lots of photos, get the professional photos taken first and be the first to eat at the reception. Yay!!!

Playing around with my housemates...love you guys so much!!!

More housemates and a present from Wan Shi and Tommy.

An Interesting Article

2006-11-07T13:48:00.000+10:00

Why we fancy people
Sarah Fielding
Numbers have the answer ...

Sometimes it's hard to put your finger on the exact thing that makes you crazy about someone. It's something about the way they look, but it's not as obvious as beauty. It's something about the way they make you feel, but it's more subtle than charm or personality. So what is it? We've all heard of pheromones, those rampant, uncontrollable chemical signals that govern everything from our food habits to our memories. For homo sapiens, these organic messages are all part of the fascinating yet unpredictable science of romantic chemistry — but more on that in our article, 'Chemical attraction', coming soon. So why do we fancy people? Relationship researchers have uncovered new evidence that shows who we fall for isn't all about feelings and fate, but rather our subconscious mind choosing someone who's our perfect match in ways we couldn't even begin to imagine.

Here's a look at some of the ways our minds rule our hearts.

The waist-to-hip ratio
Pin-up girls like Marilyn Monroe have long taken men's breath away with their beauty and sex appeal. Unbeknownst to most, what men are really ogling when feasting their eyes on these sexy sirens is their perfect waist-to-hip ratio. These mythic proportions occur when a woman's waist measurement is 70 percent that of her hip measurement giving a waist-to-hip ratio of 0.7. But it's not just curvy women who sport these vital statistics — models Twiggy and Kate Moss also have a 0.7 waist-to-hip ratio. These measurements announce to prospective mates a woman's fertility and health.

Research has also revealed that women prefer a man with a waist-to-hip Ratio of 0.9, the very same measurement of men who are, statistically, healthier, more fertile and are less prone to prostate and testicular diseases. Top tip: You can work out your waist-to-hip ratio by taking a tape measure and measuring around your hips (the widest part of the hip bone) and the waist (the top of the hip bone). Then divide your waist measurement by your hip measurement, and voila, waist-to-hip ratio.

Mirror, mirror
No one would confess to consciously seeking out a partner that looks like themselves, but in many cases, that's precisely what ends up happening. And there seems to be nothing we can do about it. Some relationship studies reveal that people are subconsciously attracted to their mirror image, with researchers noting some spooky similarities in couples' appearances from the size of their ears lobes, to the length of their middle fingers, and even the capacity of their lungs. It's not that we go out there looking for someone with the same length fingers are ourselves (well, not usually), but somewhere deep inside, the need for compatibility and a perfect match on all levels is making the decisions for us.

Good balance
Symmetry of facial features in a partner is another factor that's high on most people's subliminal wish list. This requirement is thought to be a primal instinct; asymmetrical facial attributes are sometimes linked to genetic abnormalities. It is thought that suitors favour a partner with a more balanced face in order to ensure any future offspring will be healthy and free from genetic irregularities. This desire for facial perfection can even be accounted for by the world of mathematics. Objects proportioned with a ratio of 1:1.618 (a measurement known as The Golden Ratio, or The Divine Proportion) are amongst the world's most aesthetically pleasing objects. These include the Pyramid of Giza, the Parthenon, and sometimes, the human face. These proportions have been used by everyone from artists to plastic surgeons in the quest for flawless beauty.

Birth order
Researchers are now convinced that your birth order plays a part in how attractive a prospective mate will find you. And while your position in the family is hard to ascertain at first sight, subtle characteristics you may display to your date send secrets messages to them informing them of your birth order.

Eldest or only children tend to take responsibility and are confident, but on the downside, often feel pressured or stressed.

Middle children have great social skills, are diplomatic and entrepreneurial, but sometimes feel insecure or undervalued.

Youngest children tend to be carefree, experimental and friendly, which, when taken to the extreme, can manifest as self-centredness and irresponsibility.Studies have revealed that eldest and only children are often attracted to one another because of their drive for success and desire to take care of others. Youngest children, with their easy-going natures are often attracted to the adventurous spirit of middle children. Sometimes our appeal to members of the opposite sex is nothing more than a numbers game. But with any luck, we will find our opposite number, and complete our own magic formula.

Taken from http://lifestyle.ninemsn.com.au/flirt/article.aspx?id=157539

2006-11-03T11:45:00.000+10:00

It’s been almost a month since I’ve written anything and posting photos don’t count. A lot has been going on in this month. Looking back really makes me wonder how I got through it all but I managed it somehow.

My final report was due on the 18 of October, the same day as my mum’s birthday. Two weeks before the deadline, I was working at home, frantically trying to compile and complete all the bits and pieces. There was so much trouble with the internet and the modem. In the end, the modem broke down and Milo had to purchase a new one. Steph and I both had reports to rush so we packed our stuff and moved to Mag’s place for a night like refugees. Fortunately I was able to get my work done on time even with all the distractions. I sent the complete report to my supervisors for editing on Monday, two days before it was due. It was good that I finished it beforehand; all I had to do on Wednesday was to go to the lab to print and bind three copies and then going down to school to hand it up. On the same day, I had arranged to meet Milo and Steph in the city. We headed to Chinatown after waiting for ages for the bus to come. Apparently some of the roads in the city had been closed off because cracks were found and they had to fix them up. The traffic jams for the next few days were pretty bad. We made it to Chinatown after 40 minutes of waiting for the bus and we went straight to the noodle shop just beside Yuen’s supermarket. The lunch that followed was so amazing. The texture of the noodles was just right, the chilli was awesome and the company was great. After doing some shopping at Yuen’s, we went back to the city and headed to Harvey Norman. They were having a promotion for photos at 15 cents for each 4R print developed, so the three of us took advantage of this promotion to develop tons of photos. Milo must have printed over 400 pieces, Steph had around 300 pieces while I had about 200. The prints came out nice and clear but they are still sitting in the covers they came in. I’ll wait till I get home to sort them and put them into my photo albums.

After the report was submitting, I took a break and starting watching shows and playing games. It felt good to be able to do these without feeling guilty. I must say that I did go a little crazy with the games. There were days when I actually stayed up till the sun rose. Before I knew it, it was time to prepare for my final presentation. I admit that I procrastinated a lot before sitting myself down and putting the slides together. During this time, I starting my driving lessons, did up my resume and sent it to Subway. Then I did a practise presentation in my lab with a few of my colleagues. It went well and I took the comments and criticisms and edited my slides and speech. Gary approached me after this and offered me some work on his project. He would pay me to help him out with his work if I was interested. This was unexpected was such a great experience for me. I just need to wait and see if he can confirm everything with his boss. Hopefully, this will work out well. Another two days of relaxing before the actual presentation day came.

Yesterday, I was nervous but excited at the same time. At the back of my mind, I was truly free once the presentation was over but at the same time, I had to get through the presentation first. I was in the lecture room early so I tried to distract myself by looking through a Tasmania brochure. A few minutes before the session started, I saw a familiar face. One of my colleagues had come to watch me. I was happy to see her and chatting with her helped me calm down a little. At 2 pm, the session began. I tried to listen to the girl but I got lost. Her project was not interesting for me and I had problems understanding her accent. I don’t mean to sound condescending but her English was not the best. Still, I hope the examiners understood her and that she would do well. Gary and Milo came in just before I started my presentation. I was happy that Milo was there even though I got a little apprehensive when she took out her camera. Once I got up there, I forgot about everything else and tried to focus on what I was supposed to say. The presentation went quite smoothly except for certain times when I stumbled and tried to slow down my speech. Then we got to the Q&A part. This was what I was worried about. The questions came and I tried to answer as best I could. I can’t really remember what the questions were and what my reply was to them. It all just happened really quickly and before I knew it, I was done with my honours!!! Another colleague came through the door and congratulated me. He had been standing outside the whole time and didn’t want to come in as it might have disturbed me. I was really touched that my colleagues and Gary took the time to come, whether or not they were obliged to be there.

Although my honours is completed, I still have a lot to do before I return to S’pore. I need to finish my driving and pass the test as soon as possible. I have to plan a trip to Tasmania for my mum, my sister and I. I want to start brisk walking and swimming again. All these will go into my schedule from now till January. For now, I will take each day as it comes. I will wait for Gary to confirm my employment. I will enjoy myself as much as possible. I will appreciate my time left in Brisbane, in my home and with my dear friends.

2006-10-14T21:32:00.000+10:00

2006-10-14T21:23:00.000+10:00

2006-10-14T18:11:00.000+10:00

Steamboat pictures

2006-10-14T14:23:00.000+10:00

Lots of cups to put our sauces...

Balls, balls and more balls...yum yum yummy!!!

Dinosaur mouth...this always cracks me up

R-rated fish balls.

The whole steamboat gang

2006-10-05T01:15:00.000+10:00

You Are 45% Left Brained, 55% Right Brained

The left side of your brain controls verbal ability, attention to detail, and reasoning.
Left brained people are good at communication and persuading others.
If you're left brained, you are likely good at math and logic.
Your left brain prefers dogs, reading, and quiet.

The right side of your brain is all about creativity and flexibility.
Daring and intuitive, right brained people see the world in their unique way.
If you're right brained, you likely have a talent for creative writing and art.
Your right brain prefers day dreaming, philosophy, and sports.

Are You Right or Left Brained?

The Road Ahead is Troubled

2006-10-02T17:52:00.000+10:00

I can see so many obstacles up ahead. It seems like I can't even complete my honours in peace.

The internet has been giving us so much problems. Calling the help desk is no help at all. I've been getting assistance from so many people and yet it can't be solved. The worst is when the internet appears to be fine, giving me a ray of hope, and then it comes crashing down. Wireless internet is extremely unstable. It comes and goes when it pleases and using the ethernet cable is no better. We can't be restarting the modem all the time. I'm at my wits' end. I've already tried every trick (that I know) in the book and if Mag can't fix it, I'm so dead. I have my final report due in 2 weeks' time.

Even though we had a nice steamboat party last night, I'm still troubled and worried. I want to do well for my honours and everyone can be nice and reassuring but it's not up to them to decide. I know for a fact that I already screwed up my last report which was worth 25%. There goes my first class honours. All I can hope for is a second upper class. Still, my report is going very slowly and I'm actually a little lost. Not too sure how to write the best report and present my results in the best way. It's all up to me now.

Dreams that are so vivid...I can still remember them weeks after I had them. I had another last night. This time I was actually crying in the dream. That has never happened so far and it's freaking me out. I don't believe that dreams are a depiction of something that has yet to come. But I do believe that some parts may be linked to your subconsciousness. Although I have not thought about EM in the last few weeks, maybe my subconscious self has not forgotten EM. I hate it when my dreams remind me about EM. All I want to do is to put EM out of my mind and get on with my life. How can I do this when I keep dreaming about EM?

I have a headache now. Too much troubleshooting with the internet and repeating the same steps over and over again just to reap the same result.

I have a headache now. Stay out of my head because I need some peace and quiet.

2006-09-28T08:37:00.000+10:00

It's the term break and we had a nice, simple dinner at Kit and Darren's new place. I like their apartment. It's quite spacious and cosy although it could do with some more furniture since the hall was quite big. The floors were all tiled so it would be easier to clean. It was a perfect day for fried beehoon with chicken curry when the day was stormy and windy. Mag bought tau huay from the one and only (apparently) tau huay stall in Brisbane. Yay it was so yummy! I'm glad that it was smooth and tasted just like the tau huay from my favourite stall in S'pore. It'd better be good with it costing $3.50 per serving. Such a pity that the stall is so far away!

Maple is getting too addictive these days especially since there are so many new friends who play. I must admit that I play for the company and not solely for the game. It's fun to be able to talk to the people back home and get updates on S'pore. But now I have to concentrate on my work. I've thought of uninstalling the game from my computer but I won't do it unless my self-restraint fails me. I want to test myself and see if I have enough self-control. Of course it's sad that I can't play and work at the same time. Anyway, I guess I'll have plenty of time to play my heart out when I finish my honours. Sometimes I really admire my sister. She is driven and focused. She knows her priorities so much better than me and her self-control and self-discipline are fantastic. I can't ever be as good as her but I've been trying. So far, I can confidently say that I've worked my hardest these past two years. Now I just have to make sure that I do it with no regrets.

There's a new game that was just released in September and I so want to get it. Neverwinter Nights 2 sounds awesome and it's the latest release of my favourite series of games. Neverwinter Nights 1 sucked because you couldn't control your party but the new game allows that. With all the new monsters and quests available, I'm definitely drooling over it right now. I can't wait, I can't wait, I can't wait...

http://www.atari.com/nwn2/features_about.php

As promised...

2006-09-18T00:00:00.000+10:00

Straight hair...I don't think I'll go for permanent straightening after all.

Bubble-blowing so fun

Steph's turn to blow

Some fireworks from RiverFest, all taken right at our balcony.

2006-09-16T07:26:00.000+10:00

I'm up at the crack of dawn (literally) and it's such a lovely day. The skies are cloudy and grey and there so much fog that I can't see further than the river. This is the kind of weather I like! No bright, hot sun for me! I do hope that it rains later on. It doesn't matter anymore since Mag and I have decided to cancel our exercise plans to be hardworking.

Although this is one week late, I would like to extend my heartfelt congratulations to Mushroom. Something wonderful happened to her last week, highlighted by her chirpy "Good morning!" when she normally just grunts, looks blur and heads off to wash her face after waking up. There was also a lot of singing, happy thoughts, secret smiles and who can forget her staying up until 7 in the morning to chat to someone. I only know this because I was awake too, watching the US Tennis Open finals that day. Her head was so definitely in the clouds and we could all see the difference in her behaviour. Even her hitting us in our butts seemed like a happy issue for her. She would smack us and start laughing merrily. Of course, the most important clue (noticed by Milo) was that a certain photo which was once hidden away in the cupboard has now reappeared on her desk. Woohoo!!!

P.S. I like to eat Ramli burger...drool...

Looking forward to this evening. We're going out together for the Pizza Hut buffet. Normally I wouldn't go for a pizza buffet but due to circumstances which I am too lazy to explain... It will be nice to visit a new suburb for a change. I hope it's a nice place and we're going early so that we can go shopping!! Yay!!! After missing out on the Garden City trip, I really feel like going shopping with the girls. Not that I have anything to buy but girls will be girls.

P.S Sorry there aren't any photos yet. I haven't got them from Milo.

What do you think?

2006-09-05T21:30:00.000+10:00

I took this test and got some results.
I agree with some and disagee with others.
But then again, isn't this always the case for all the quizzes you take online?
What do you think?

You Are 5: The Investigator

You're independent - and a logical analytical thinker.
You love learning and ideas... and know things no one else does.
Bored by small talk, you refuse to participate in boring conversations.
You are open minded. A visionary. You understand the world and may change it.

2006-09-02T23:37:00.000+10:00

Thinking about what dear Mushroom said to me just two nights ago...

Saying that Milo and I have very different ways of "mothering" people, Magnag in particular.

Quite surprised by this statement because I've never really thought that I actually "mother" anyone.

Assumed that it's just plain old me being thoughtful and kind to my dear friends.

Maybe it's interpreted as being motherly.

Anyway, it's my way of showing that I care.

Small gestures are sometimes nicer than one great big one.

Changes

2006-09-02T12:55:00.000+10:00

The girls went down to Shyen salon for haircuts on Wednesday. This Shyen place is like our new favourite. The stylist, Mel, is Malaysian and she cuts very well. The prices are similar to normal salons but we like it since she knows how to cut Asian hair unlike some Aussie salons which totally ruin our hair. Anyway the three of them made an appointment and came back with unexpected results. Magnag's hair is pretty much the same, only shorter and neater. Steph cut her hair short, so now it's above her shoulders. She dyed and added 10 foils to it as well so she came back looking very different. I like it though. It's not as messy and she looks very fresh with this hairstyle. I hope she keeps it this way. Short hair looks great on her. Now with this style, she looks a little like a mushroom and so I've started calling her mushroom. Heh heh, I told her that currently she looks like a straw mushroom but if her hair starts getting thicker then she may look more like a button mushroom. Anyway she looks so cute now and I love irritating her with all the mushroom calling. Milo dyed her hair brown as well so now she's not so blonde. With the hair cut, she looks neater and her hair is also not so poofy. Nice, nice, nice!

After the hair cuts, Milo highlighted Magnag's hair for her with the red dye she had bought ages ago. Unfortunately they had lots of leftover since Maggie's hair is so short and she only did highlights. Hence, they used the leftover dye on my hair, last resort because everyone else had their hair dyed already. Now my hair is strawberry-red because it absorbed the dye much better than normal black hair. I really got a shock when I woke up the next day and saw it like that. I'm still not used to seeing my hair so red. Plus, it's got some kind of shading where my top is red but the bottom is my original colour. They seem to like it and my friends at work say it's nice. So maybe I just need to take some time to like it. No matter what, it's only hair and I can dye or cut it away if I really hate it.

Tonic - If You Could Only See

2006-08-27T23:17:00.000+10:00

(Chorus)If you could only see the way she loves me
Then maybe you would understand
Why I feel this way about our love
And what I must do
If you could only see how blue her eyes can be when she says
When she says she loves me

Well you got your reasons
And you got your lies
And you got your manipulations
They cut me down to size
Sayin' you love but you don't
You give your love but you won't

(chorus)

Seems the road less traveled
Show's happiness unraveled
And you got to take a little dirt
To keep what you love
That's what you gotta do
Sayin' you love but you don't
You give your love but you won't
You're stretching out your arms to something that's just not there
Sayin' you love where you stand
Give your heart when you can

(Chorus)

Sayin' you love but you don't
You give your love but you won't
Sayin' you love where you stand
Give your heart when you can

(Chorus)

The Bubbles

2006-08-26T21:16:00.000+10:00

As I was doing my mindless experiment today, a million thoughts went through my mind and I had so many things I wanted to record down into my blog. But when I left my workplace, all these thoughts flew out of my head. Now the only think I can remember from the day is how much I miss the days when I would play with my sister. I loved to blow bubbles. I would blow them in the bathroom while taking my bath, using my own body shop. Trying to blow the biggest bubble I could and catch it in my hands before it burst. Going into Toys'R Us would mean begging my mom for a bottle of their bubble solution. Then I would blow the bubbles from the window of my room and try to blow as many as I could with one breath. I remember when my window and room were filled with these bubbles. It was so beautiful and I loved it. But then my mom would always scold me for blowing them in the room because it made the room soapy and slippery. Still I would blow and blow until my mom threw my bottle of bubbles away. As I grew older, other things filled my mind and I forgot about the bubbles. I was too busy with the internet, MTV and computer games. I don't know why I suddenly remember the bubbles and now I miss them. I want to fill the sky with bubbles once more.

I'm going to buy myself a bottle of bubbles as soon as possible. Then I can blow to my heart's content and there will be no one to scold me (so long as the neighbours don't complain).

2006-08-26T19:21:00.000+10:00

It's been a difficult few weeks. I'm mentally tired all the time. I want to run away from all my problems and stay home all day. My home, my room is my hideaway but I'm only able to use it at night, when I'm so tired I don't even read to sleep anymore. So many problems keep cropping up at work. Work's been hard. I'm so busy all day I don't get to touch my computer except to turn it on. I don't get to eat lunch with the rest. Instead I sneak off whenever I can for a quick meal and gossip magazines are my only companion. Then my supervisor sees me reading those magazines and starts telling that I should be reading journal articles. Easy for him to say. I think if he keeps it up, I'm going to explode one day. I think I'm just unlucky.

Thank goodness I have the girls to come home to. At least I don't have to worry about work when I'm with them. Yesterday's movie session was great. The show was so good. Even though I don't think it's Jet Li's best movie, I still like it for the fact that it had a good meaning and excellent fighting scenes. I don't think the Aussies enjoyed it though. People kept walking in and out of the cinema during the show. Also some left before the show ended. Oh well, it's their loss. GO AND WATCH FEARLESS if you haven't caught it yet.

Toe Part 2

2006-08-21T23:34:00.000+10:00

I got a shock today when I removed the plaster after my bath. This looks much worse up close. I don't what to do with it now. Should I put another plaster or leave it open to air and dry? I'll put the plaster nontheless. I can't stand the sight of it and it will hurt if I touch the bare toe onto something such as my bedsheets.

Clumsy

2006-08-19T21:41:00.000+10:00

Yes it's happened again. I tripped in my toilet and cut my toe badly. Blame it on my oversized slippers, blame it on the toilet kerb, blame it on my own clumsiness. Mantou sent me to the doctor and luckily I didn't need stitches. The nurse was so nice and helped me clean up and bandage the cut. Then she gave me a tetanus jab just in case which was good since the jab could be considered free once I claim it from the insurance. By the way, the doctors here are so expensive. A short visit today cost me $70 for consultation, $10.40 for the wound cleaning and another $10.40 for the jab. I can't believe the consultation was more expensive than everything else and I only talked to the doctor for less than 5 minutes.

Ekka 2006

2006-08-14T10:41:00.000+10:00

This year's Ekka was so much fun. My only regret is that we should have gone earlier so that we could spend more time there and the showbag that I wanted would not be sold out. No matter, Milo's working there anyway so I might get her to buy that showbag for me. Otherwise it was a whole day of taking photos, watching the animals and spending money. I bought 3 bottles of honey and 3 bottles of Chai tea. There goes $20! We went for dinner at CyberCity afterwards, meeting up with Wan Shi, Tommy and Danielle. Although we were tired from all that walking, we had lots of fun and laughter and we ate 2 plates of sweet and sour pork. Yum yum yum!!! My craving for sweet and sour pork is officially satisfied. What an awesome day with awesome friends!

Ekka 2006

2006-08-14T10:06:00.000+10:00

The time spent with Ju and my sister

2006-08-10T18:45:00.000+10:00

2006-08-10T18:27:00.000+10:00

2006-08-01T21:29:00.000+10:00

My gums hurt. Sore and painful. Chewing is such a chore. Soon I'll be reduced to eating porridge and milk. Having 3 wisdom teeth come out at the same time is terrible. I don't understand why they have to come out together. Is this some kind of sadistic competition they are having? Even touching them gingerly with my tongue hurts. Brushing is something I don't look forward to. Now what? I am reluctant to see the dentist because they charge such crazy rates. Just hope I can tahan until next year when I go back home. =(

All gone...all gone...

2006-07-29T21:01:00.000+10:00

Yes today Milo's parents went back. I'll miss them. Milo's probably thinking about them right now. I can totally feel her sadness and longing. I understand that she wants them to stay. Unfortunately we can't always have our way.
How nice it was to have a real family to come home to.
How nice to have parents to fuss over you.
How nice to have a mom to cook, clean and look after you.
How nice to have a dad fix and handle things around the house.
How nice to sit down at the dinner table every night and have a simple home-cooked meal together.

And yet, I would look forward to having the house to myself once more. I would enjoy not having someone to nag at me. I would love being able to do my things without having to worry if my parents were bored or not. I think I'm addicted to my independence. I would want things this way even when I go back. I would want my parents to knock on my door before entering. I want to wake up whenever I want and eat whenever I feel like it. I want to go out without reporting and asking for permission beforehand. I don't know if things will work out this way but I can say that I have thought of moving out when I go back to S'pore. I have thought of renting a room for myself just so I can have my freedom. I will not do it though. As much as parents can be annoying, I don't want to break their hearts by telling them I don't wish to stay with them; that I would rather stay with a bunch of strangers. No, as much as I would relish my independence, I treasure their feelings more.

2006-07-24T00:06:00.000+10:00

I cannot believe I'm helping HER. I cannot believe I'm being nice and civil to HER. This is so ridiculous. I shouldn't even be talking to HER. I should be ignoring HER and pretending that I never received any of HER messages. Why am I so stupid? SHE uses all these terms of endearment with me and all I want to do when I hear them is slap HER hard in the face and then punch HER until SHE passes out. Violent I know. Yet I have no excuse, no reason to be nothing but nice to HER. After all SHE hasn't offended me directly. We haven't even have much contact with each other. But SHE pisses me off. I detest HER so much. Why am I such a sucker for being kind and helpful?

Do quitters really deserve our respect?

2006-07-21T23:58:00.000+10:00

I remember long long ago, when I was still very young and innocent (I'm still young now ok), there a program on Channel 8. It was featuring this singer called Eric Moo and they were celebrating the fact that he managed to quit smoking after much hard work. So this entire program was about his experience and how proud he was to be able to quit blah, blah, blah... My dad was watching the show with me and he went, "Big deal! So what? I've never started!". At that time I was thinking that my dad was being such a spoiler and not being very supportive of this guy's success.

Now I realise that I actually agree with him. Why should we give praise and credit to people who smoked, drank, gambled, took drugs and finally managed to quit? It's not that I'm saying they went through a tough ordeal to quit. It's not that I'm saying the process was easy and they are making a mountain out of a molehill. I know that giving up cigarettes and drugs for someone who is hooked isn't easy. It might be the toughest thing that they have ever done in their lives. But for them to succumb to temptation in the first place, be it because of bad influence, peer pressure, desperation, stress or any other reason, doesn't it show that they chose the easy way out?

There are so many books and stories on TV shows like Oprah that feature people who went into rehab and come out clean. A Million Little Pieces is one good example which was given heaps of publicity but turned out to be more fiction than fact. I don't understand why the public would buy such a book and actually feel emotion for the author, especially if they are not drug users themselves. Shouldn't they be thinking to themselves that they can celebrate the fact that they have been clean all their lives? That they were mentally and morally strong enough to resist?

We all go through rough patches at some point of our lives. We all would have been given the opportunity and the temptation to try these things. But shouldn't the attention be given to those who have never given in and stayed true to themselves? Picking up a cigarette or popping a pill should not be condoned even in our darkest hour. Many films always feature the characters heading to a bar or lighting a cigarette whenever they are troubled. That is so wrong. It encourages the public to follow in their stead.

Social smokers are just as bad or even worse. I cannot comprehend why they would smoke just because they happen to be partying or in the company of fellow smokers. This hints to me that they want to fit in with the group and they have no self-esteem or respect for their own bodies. It's bad enough that people get hooked on to smoking so easily. The fact that these social smokers are saying that they are not like normal smokers because they can control themselves and not get addicted is such a hypocrisy. The fact that they can choose whether or not to smoke and they choose the former shows that they are complete idiots.

I salute everyone who have never gone down these paths. They are the ones who should be given our attention and respect, not those who have walked the path and turned back.

Kasey Chambers - Like a River

2006-07-20T21:47:00.000+10:00

I heard this on the radio. The singer's an Aussie so they promote her songs big time. It's a nice song though, very country and good for chilling out to. Definitely worth the time downloading to add to my collection.

Sometimes you walk like an angel
Sometimes you walk like a man
Sometimes you crawl like a baby
Makes me forget who I am
Have you ever been held before
Like honey to the bee
I've never been held before
Like you hold me

Chorus:You make me feel like a river
Like a water overflow
Wanna shout it out from the Mountain
Wanna sing it on the radio
I'll sell my soul like a sinner
If it means you'll never go

I think the sun is finally rising
Its burning down because I miss you
I'm gonna walk right through the fires
Cos all I wanna do is kiss you
Rain falls, won't wash this away
I'll build a stonewall to make you stay

[Chorus:]You make me feel like a river
Like a water overflow
Wanna shout it out from the Mountain
Wanna sing it on the radio
I'll sell my soul like a sinner
If it means you'll never go

[Chorus:]You make me feel like a river
Like a water overflow
Wanna shout it out from the Mountain
Wanna sing it on the radio
I'll sell my soul like a sinner
If it means you'll never go

Never go
Never go

2006-07-20T20:23:00.000+10:00

The house is silent and peaceful. Only Danielle and I are around. Steph has gone out for dinner and a movie with friends. Mil's away up Sunshine Coast with her parents, uncle and auntie. How fortunate to have family around! Even though the sheer number of people squeezing in the house (8 including the original housemates) makes using the amenities a little troublesome, I love the idea of coming home to a house full of people. It just seems so much more cosy and you have something to look forward to at the end of a busy day. Work has been so hectic and my PMS colleague isn't making things easy for me. At least I could come home and forget about all those problems by chatting around. I don't know if I would like having my parents here though. Somehow I feel that they might feel awkward. I cannot imagine my parents sleeping on the couch because they have never done such a thing before. My dad doesn't cook so he can't shower his love by cooking up a feast for me. My mum cooks but she wouldn't want to cook while on her holiday and sad to say, I think I prefer my cooking to hers. My dad isn't the kind who could stay home all day waiting for me to come home from work to entertain him. He would probably rent a car and be out golfing all day, leaving my mum at home by herself. Such is the case even back home in S'pore and he hates to go touring around. He would rather play golf. So if I had a choice, I would rather have just my sister to come, even though I know it would be quite impossible for her to come again at the end of the year. Chris was right. The graduation ceremony is nothing but a show for parents and relatives to bask in the glory of their beloved child being able to get a piece of paper and prove that all that money was well-spent. Given a choice, I would skip the ceremony altogether and go shopping with my friends or sister. In fact, I think, during my ceremony, I shall go up and take my piece of paper and then walk out of the hall instead of going back to my seat and listening to a couple of boring speeches and a school song which isn't even in English. I shall go out and wait for the ceremony to finish, meanwhile taking pictures and playing "Turtle Jump". Anyone wants to join me?????

P.S. Now even Danielle has gone out to get groceries. I want to go out too. But I need to save the money and also work on my report which I have been neglecting for so long. Why oh why oh why......

2006-07-04T22:59:00.000+10:00

Short Notes

2006-07-04T00:49:00.000+10:00

10 degrees now and everyone is freezing. I wonder why I don't feel cold and am going around without shorts? Maybe I am crazy.
Sick yet I don't feel sick. I have a blocked nose and a phlegmy cough which is irritating and the phlegm is giving me a very sexy voice right now.
Cough mixture is disgusting and since I have to suffer with it, I'm making everyone else take it as well. Juju is coughing so she has to take it anyway. My next target will be Chris, muahahahhaha!
The house is slowly clearing but I have to emphasize on the "SLOWLY"!!! We have too much stuff around.
I just bought a study table for $15 and a box fan for $8. What a bargain!!! The table isn't in the best condition but it'll do for 6 months and it's big and spacious. Plus the seller gave me a small coffee table, some plastic storage racks and boxes AND a radio for FREE. Some people are just so nice and generous. Also thanks to the gals for helping me transport my table. We had some trouble because it was so big and couldn't fit properly in the car.
Thought my sister was arriving this morning so Mantou and I drove down to the airport to pick her up. I called her on her handphone to ask her to come out and she was still in S'pore!!! Shit, miscommunications and she is only arriving tomorrow morning. Apologies to Mantou from my sister and I for making her go all the way so early for nothing.
I'm tired but I wanna watch tennis. Now I feel so lazy to go down to work because I have nothing to do anyway. But I really should go down and just show my face. I'll be on leave soon to spend time with my sister and go down to Sydney.
Booking accomodation, tickets and the car are getting so troublesome. The internet is supposed to allow us more flexibility but it's not as simple as it seems. Plus booking online requires a credit card most of the time. I hate having to use my dad's credit card all the time. It makes me feel guilty.

2006-06-29T00:05:00.000+10:00

This is soooooo not true!!! Then again, I guess I'm considered to be a teen anymore, sob sob sob sob...( http://www.mrtraffic.com/sleep.htm)

I knew moving house would be troublesome but I got more than I bargained for. I had to call for electricity, gas, phone and internet connections and all were under different companies. I hate it when I call and the company uses the voice recognition message system. I feel like such an idiot talking to the damn machine and sometimes it doesn't recognise what I'm saying. Must be because I don't have the Aussie slang. Installation and set-up fees are so expensive. We must be paying almost $300 worth of those and that's not including the subscription fees. So now, everything has been connection, even the internet, but no one is staying at the house. Such a waste of money but it can't be helped. The cleaning and packing seems neverending and now I really want to stay in my comfortable room and just forget about everything else. My work in the lab is going fine but I have too much to do and so little time. I can go in on the weekends but it will take me 2 hours to travel each way. That's way too long and I am reluctant to waste my weekend on the bus. How how how??? Someone please give me a solution!!! Plus Julie and my sister are coming to stay. Chris will be in the house too. It's going to be so messy and all I want to do is lock myself in my room and stay there with my computer game. Then I can escape and forget about the real world and all the problems that come along with it. Too bad, I don't even have time to play my game now...getting sufficient sleep is my only luxury...

2006-06-28T23:57:00.000+10:00

Aiyah I know I was supposed to complete my previous post but I'm so tired. Having to clean the house after work is exhausting and it's taking its toll on me right now. I couldn't move after I took my first bath in the new place. I just sat down on the sofa and stoned away. People were asking me questions and I could hardly hear them. I was about to close my eyes and fall asleep but was rudely disturbed because we had to rush off to catch the bus. I was sorely tempted to sleep there tonight. Instead I'm home and typing away even though I really should sleep. I think I need the rest. I feel extremely short-tempered today and little things annoyed the hell out of me. Like when I got to the new place from work and buzzed for ages at the door but no one picked up. And then I called Steph and Mil but no one picked up. I buzzed some more and finally called the house phone before I was left in. Really annoyed but the usual me would think nothing of it. Missing the bus by a few seconds meant waiting another hour for the next one. Damn pissed! Irritated that dinner came late because the chef overslept and I did give her a wake-up call but she turned off the phone on me. Little things but they were getting on my nerves....I need my rest....

Moving House Part 1

2006-06-20T00:37:00.000+10:00

It feels so weird to be packing up my stuff when I'm not going home. I'm packing and cleaning my room to get ready to move them over to the new house. A mixture of sadness, excitement and anticipation. I'm confused. It's so hard to think of leaving a place I've called my home for 1 and 1/2 years. Still, looking forward to the joy of having a new home and a beautiful home of our own. Things will work out well...

Thanks so much to Christo, Mantou and Wilson for bringing their cars to help us transport the stuff over. They also helped with me moving my bed and cupboard but I think I will need help moving the bed again. Sorry guys but I get tired of the same arrangement after a while and I like variety. It's too bad my bed is so heavy and has a stiff bedframe. If only it has rollers like my current bed...sigh...

I know Christo likes the new place. It does feel like a hotel room especially with the winter temperature which makes the whole place feel like it's been air-conditioned. I know you're envious but don't worry! You get to share this lovely place with us for a few weeks before you leave. To think you wanted to stay at your cousin's place at UniLodge. Then you would have missed out on so much fun.

We played a little game of hide-and-seek down at the garage before leaving. Stepho, Milo and I took the stairs down and even though Christo and Mantou left first in the lift, we arrived first and I thought they were hiding from us so I locked the gate leading from the lift to the garage. Wilson was already in the car and he said that he didn't know where we had gone. But I assumed that he was lying and just trying to trick us. So there we were, in the garage and looking into every space trying to find those two when Stepho suddenly motioned for me to hide. Haha, Christo and Mantou had just come out from the lift and they found themselves locked in. Wilson was great. He played along, saying that he hadn't seen us and that the door had closed and locked on its own. This was so fun; the two girls were asking all sorts of questions and trying to figure out how to get out to the garage. They also tried calling us but thankfully the handphone was on silent mode so it didn't give away our hiding places. We let them go back to the lift and out-of-sight before I went to unlock the door and Wilson called them to come back. Strangely enough, they appeared from the other side of the garage. Apparently they had gone out the main gate and come in from the side gate of the garage which was supposed to be locked in the first place. Oh well!! It was fun while it lasted. Needless to say, they were a little pissed at us and wouldn't let us get onto the car. Heh..never mind never mind...we still had Wilson's car...

After all the excitement, these two asked if we wanted to go out for supper. Milo and Stepho declined since they wanted to study for their exams but I went along even though I was still super full from dinner. I was carrying some stuff for Mantou and Christo and Mantou, with good intentions, opened the passenger door for me. Unfortunately, the door slammed right into my knuckles and I couldn't move for a few seconds. Damn that really hurt!!! It's a little sore now but don't worry, I'll be fine, I'm brave!!! Hehe...

We decided to go to Cybercity instead on 3 Monkeys.
(will continue story soon, time to sleep otherwise I'll be a zombie tomorrow)

Jewel - Again and Again

2006-06-20T00:29:00.000+10:00

I've always loved Jewel and she writes her own songs which I can really relate to. This is her latest single which is so great because I haven't anything from her for so long and I thought she had stopped singing. You HAVE to listen to this song...I'll send it to you if you can't find it. Apparently it's not even available on DC++. I had to get my sister to download it for me and even though we have different tastes in music, she likes this song too.

Listen dear
I need you to hear.
I cannot disappear
I've tried again and again and again and again.

I know we said
That we'd give up
You said we'd had enough
Again and again and again and again.

But you, you're always on my mind.
It's like this all the time.
Say it's cause you're mine
All mine...

And if you will, I will
Try to let it go.
And if you try, I'll try
Try to let it show us the way
Cause love is here to stay
Just look me in the eye
This is do or die
And I will stay in love
Till you say enough
There is no giving in
There is no giving up in love.

Walk down the street
Stare at lots of things
The fast and steady streams
Again and again and again and again.

Do what I should
Try to stay busy
Your face is all I see
Again and again and again and again.

But you, you're always on my mind.
It's like this all the time.
Say it's cause you're mine
All mine...

And if you will, I will
Try to let it go.
And if you try, I'll try
Try to let it show us the way
Cause love is here to stay
Just look me in the eye
This is do or die
And I will stay in love
Till you say enough
There is no giving in
There is no giving up in love.
Like a movie I once saw
In the darkness I recall
Feeling the beauty and the pain
And when you call my name
Say you feel the same.

Cause' if you will, I will
Try to let it go
And if you try, I'll try
Try to let it show.
And if you will, I will
Try to let it go
And if you try, I'll try
Try to let it show us the way
Cause love is here to stay
Just look me in the eye
This is do or die
And I will stay in love
Till you say enough
There is no giving in
There is no giving up in love
In love, in love
We're in love

I cannot disappear...

Hairy Stuff

2006-06-11T13:17:00.000+10:00

Steph, if you're reading this, don't worry. I'm not going to tell you how many hairs there are in your bathroom or how many different types of hairs there are. But I do want to tell you and Milo that my hair is now like Hermione's from Harry Potter. Thanks a lot ah...hahahaha...

These two girls braided my hair last night and I had to sleep with the braids because Milo thought that I would look good with wavy hair and she was trying to convince me to perm it. To me, permed hair is like the kind my mom used to have. The poofy, huge hair look that was probably really popular in the 70's. Therefore, no perms for me thank you. However, I let them braid my hair to get the temporary perm look because I was curious about how it would turn out.

No good, no good, no good...I don't look very nice. My hair is now really big AND poofy. How ironic! At least I know now that perms are definitely not for me and this will probably wash out by tomorrow and I'll have my normal, messy but not so messy hair.

Should I do what Steph recommends and get my hair straightened? I've gone over this question numerous times and my answer was always, "Nah!". Firstly, it's real expensive and I don't exactly revel in the thought of having to sit in the hairdresser's for 5-6 hours straight. Secondly, I worry that the treatment will damage my poor hair further. Thirdly, this is just a "want" and not a "need". It's not like I would die if my hair wasn't straight and I don't want to end up like the kind of girls with super straight and flat hair.

Good news

2006-06-10T17:05:00.000+10:00

WE GOT THE APARTMENT!!! Woohoo!!! I'm really excited. I can't wait to move into this place. We've already paid the deposit and will be signing the lease next week. Then the place is officially ours. A place of our own. Lovely! Wonderful! A new beginning! Hee hee hee!!!

The beautiful and spacious kitchen. I can't wait to move in and use it.

The master bed room aka Milo's room. Nice decor isn't it? It's blue!!!

Balcony area with chairs and a BBQ set at the end.

Living area and dining table. The kitchen is on the left while the tv and sofas are on the right.

The river view from the balcony.

22nd Birthday

2006-06-07T23:30:00.000+10:00

This year's birthday was good. I can't compare it to last year because the situation is totally different. Last year was good because it was funny to make Chris and the rest panic about me disappearing. This year, I had a surprise BBQ below my place. I didn't expect such a large scale party and I was rudely awakened by Mantou and Kit while I was sleeping. I was sick this entire week, having the same problem as last year. Basically, eating will result in puking and nausea was present almost all the time. I actually didn't go to work on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. I went in on my birthday since there was an important meeting in the morning but the journey to work made me feel really bad and I think my supervisor could tell and she told me to go home. So I did and slept till 6 pm when Kit and Mantou disturbed me. Hence, I was dressed in my sleeping clothes and look so messy. My hair is like some mad woman's...didn't expect my birthday photos to look so unglamarous, heh. Anyway it was so fun to hang out and chat with these friends. I ate lots too, but I ended up puking out most of it later on at night. Thank you, thank you, thank you all for organising this wonderful day for me especially since it's the exam period and you all should be using the time to study.

Also, thanks to those who remembered my birthday and sent me birthday wishes.
The list is as follows and is random.
I just write down whoever comes to mind.

Mom, Dad and Sister (Mom called when I really felt like puking, haha)
Ah Hao (wished me 1 week in advance because he was going for reservist later)
Mark (sent me an sms, heh heh)
Mr Tan (who was also in on the plans for the BBQ, don't worry I have many birthdays to come)
Dagen (you owe me a birthday treat and I don't want kopitiam ah)
Keong (sent me an sms, not bad, was surprised that he remembered, or maybe it's Friendster)
Ah Thai ( also surprised that he remembered, die lah so many people remembered mine but I forgot theirs, so guilty)
Christine (must be Friendster again)
Ah Mah (thanks for calling me, I really appreciate it, I thought you forgot)
Weiming (you owe me lots of treats)
Peiyi (belated bday also good)

Yup, I'm really really happy that this year was so fun. Falling sick obviously was not part of the plan but at least I could stay home from work. Muahahahaahah!!!

Party preparations?

Beautiful flowers from my dear hyenas...

2006-06-07T23:13:00.000+10:00

Goody food that I'm not supposed to be eating but heck, it's my birthday. I'll puke if I want to...heh heh heh...

Look at the pretty decorations put up by these wonderful people.

Friends from Warren Street. Alvin is missing, too busy studying...

Playing as usual. Photo-taking is so fun...

Unwrapping my present!

2006-06-07T22:22:00.000+10:00

Ok I know I said I had cravings for almond jelly a while back but giving me a packet of almond jelly pre-mix on my birthday....???!!! You should have made the jelly instead...

Yum yum Boost is damn addictive!! Why you give me chocs when I'm sick??

Yay!!! Earrings are my upmost favourite!!!

Thank you. I'd like to thank my mother, my father, my sister, my goldfish, my carpet, my moo-moo, my pillow, my instant noodles....

Unit 7 is the best...best at complaining to management!!! Wahahaha!!!

Yeah!!! The organisers of the BBQ... much thanks to them!!!

Ooo some unexpected guests...

Hips Don't Lie - Shakira Feat. Wyclef

2006-06-04T13:37:00.000+10:00

Wow such a nice a catchy song from Shakira!
Makes you wanna get up and dance!!!

Ladies up in here tonight
No fighting, no fighting
We got the refugees up in here
No fighting, no fighting
Shakira, Shakira

I never really knew that she could dance like this
She makes a man wants to speak Spanish
Como se llama (si), bonita (si), mi casa (si, Shakira Shakira), su casa
Shakira, Shakira

Oh baby when you talk like that
You make a woman go mad
So be wise and keep on
Reading the signs of my body

And I'm on tonight
You know my hips don't lie
And I'm starting to feel it's right
All the attraction, the tension
Don't you see baby, this is perfection

Hey Girl, I can see your body moving
And it's driving me crazy
And I didn't have the slightest idea
Until I saw you dancing
And when you walk up on the dance floor
Nobody cannot ignore the way you move your body, girl
And everything so unexpected - the way you right and left it
So you can keep on shaking it

I never really knew that she could dance like this
She makes a man want to speak SpanishComo se llama (si), bonita (si), mi casa (si, Shakira Shakira), su casa
Shakira, Shakira

Oh baby when you talk like that
You make a woman go mad
So be wise and keep on
Reading the signs of my body

And I'm on tonight
You know my hips don't lie
And I am starting to feel you boy
Come on lets go, real slow
Don't you see baby asi es perfecto

Oh I know I am on tonight my hips don't lie
And I am starting to feel it's right
All the attraction, the tension
Don't you see baby, this is perfection
Shakira, Shakira

Oh boy, I can see your body moving
Half animal, half man
I don't, don't really know what I'm doing
But you seem to have a plan
My will and self restraint
Have come to fail now, fail now
See, I am doing what I can, but I can't so you know
That's a bit too hard to explain

Baila en la calle de nocheBaila en la calle de día
Baila en la calle de nocheBaila en la calle de día

I never really knew that she could dance like this
She makes a man want to speak Spanish
Como se llama (si), bonita (si), mi casa (si, Shakira Shakira), su casa
Shakira, Shakira

Oh baby when you talk like that
You know you got me hypnotized
So be wise and keep on
Reading the signs of my body

Senorita, feel the conga, let me see you move like you come from Colombia
Mira en Barranquilla se baila así, say it!
Mira en Barranquilla se baila así
Yeah
She's so sexy every man's fantasy a refugee like me
back with the Fugees from a 3rd world country
I go back like when 'pac carried crates for Humpty Humpty
I need a whole club dizzy
Why the CIA wanna watch us?
Colombians and Haitians
I ain't guilty, it's a musical transaction
No more do we snatch ropes
Refugees run the seas 'cause we own our own boats

I'm on tonight, my hips don't lie
And I'm starting to feel you boy
Come on let's go, real slow
Baby, like this is perfecto

Oh, you know I am on tonight and my hips don't lie
And I am starting to feel it's right
The attraction, the tension
Baby, like this is perfection

No fighting
No fighting

Cool Site!!!

2006-06-04T13:28:00.000+10:00

Hey people, please go to this site if you have the time. It's done by a friend of mine and you can request songs, English or Chinese. It's a very new site so please be patient with it. It's usually turned on at night so you could listen while doing your work at the same time.

http://powerdjs.blogspot.com/

2006-06-04T13:05:00.000+10:00

It's been some time since I've really sat down and seriously read my friends' and family's blogs. I've been too distracted I guess. Anyway I was reading a cousin's blog and started thinking. This cousin is a lot younger than me so we've never really been close. Age gap, generation gap, call it whatever you want. She is also a S'pore PR like me so she has a choice to stay either in M'sia or S'pore. Right now she's studying in M'sia although her mum has plans to send her over to S'pore to study. It's not that surprising; so many people want to come over to study because S'pore's degrees and universities are much more recognised than M'sia's. She is reluctant though. I know it's the comfort zone thing. I had to go through that barrier as well. I guess you could also be worried about the different standards and competition you might face in S'pore. Thinking about this, I'm really glad my family came over to S'pore when I was young so that I could grow up here. I was used to the fast-paced, competitive nature of the schools here and I didn't know anything else. Then I came to Australia and I saw another side of the world. Obviously life here is much more relaxed. The Aussies are so cool and laid back, not just in their studies but also their working life. Sometimes I wonder how they are able to keep up with the rest of the world with their current lifestyle. Then again, I know that this is not the case in Sydney or Melbourne. Bigger cities mean more stress, more pressure and the lack of time. They are quite similar to S'pore. I found the people on the streets impatient and everyone was rushing here and there, just like Orchard Road in S'pore. In a way, I'm thankful that I got to make the change from a fast-paced life to a slow one. It would be much harder to go the other way and I suppose this might be what my cousin would have to contend with. I don't know and I can't say if things will go well for her. This would depend on her and how she takes what life throws in her face. It's also about the person's character and personality. Would you choose to stand up strong, thicken your skin and move forward with the new life in a new country? Or would you step back, turn around and run away home? I've heard of stories of friends' friends' friends' friends' who cannot handle the new life and culture and end up back home after wasting the huge sums of money used to send them over. They just give up and run back to mummy and daddy. Of course I think these people are dumb and weak. But who am I to judge? I cannot scorn them because they made a choice, albeit a choice I feel is wrong. It's their life, their time and their money. I just hope that given the chance, they will grab it and make the most out of it. I already know about 2 cousins who are planning to come to S'pore. I have a few who have left their hometown to go to KL to study. There is one who will be going to the UK to continue her course. I have my doubts about some of them but they might prove me wrong. Nevertheless I wish them all the best and hope they will cherish their oppotunity and not waste it.

2006-06-04T12:53:00.000+10:00

Sigh...something's wrong with my blog. I can't put any pictures up at all. Anyone else having this problem?
I wanna put up some pictures of the houses we visited...
Help me somebody!!!

Winter 2006

2006-06-03T08:26:00.000+10:00

Winter this year arrived early. According to Millie, the actual start of Winter should be on the 1st of June; yet into the 3rd week of May, temperatures were already dropping to the lowest of 8 degrees at night. Damn shiok!!! I love it!!! I'm so glad that we're having a normal (normal so far) winter this year since it's my last year here. My quilt is all ready and I have resolved not to use the heater at all. My hands are already so dry that they have cracked in different places. Using lotion everyday doesn't seem to help. Maybe I should spread some butter on them since my body butter is not helping. It's also due to the ethanol we use constantly at the lab. That thing is super drying since it evaporates and takes the moisture away. It doesn't help that we have to wash our hands every time we want to leave the lab. So that results in about 5-10 hand-washings in the lab alone.

We just went to see 2 houses today. One is a townhouse on the way to Toowong, near the BP petrol station. This one was pretty nice. The previous tenants had converted the garage into a game room with a table-tennis table inside so there was like a lot of extra space. But the design of the place was weird. The first two rooms were downstairs with the garage while the kitchen, living room and master room were upstairs. I was worried about the safety of the rooms since anyone could climb over the fence and come into the rooms easily. Noise was another issue as the place was right beside the main road heading towards Toowong. The kitchen was rather small as well but I kind of liked the concept of having the living room upstairs. It was interesting. We told the agent that we would discuss and get back to him next week.

It was still early for the next house viewing so we walked to Toowong to buy some groceries. Mantou met us there and then we headed to Hawken Drive for lunch. Unfortunately, the Viet-Chinese place didn't open till 12.30 pm and we were there at 11.30 am. At first we thought it would open at 12 pm so we hung around and waited and waited and waited. Finally I was sick of waiting so I called the shop's number and we could literally hear the phone ringing from outside. It was obvious that no one was going to pick it up so we went home to keep the groceries. We also watched the videos from Wednesday night. OMG it was damn hilarious!!! We laughed and laughed and laughed till we cried and my stomach hurt. This is something I will remember for life...especially the part about Millie Tan...

We went down to view the second place since the appointment was due and Steph did say that she didn't have a very good feeling about it. I must admit that when we got there, it wasn't too impressive. After all it was this tall building which looked rather run-down from the outside. The intercom and buzzer were also out-of-order. We met the agent and she brought us to the lift to go up to the 6th floor, Unit 11. Ugh the lift was so small and cramped. I think I would rather climb the stairs. So we entered the unit and my first thought was, "Wow, this place looks quite posh". The furniture was not what you would expect for students to have. They had a nice glass dining table and black sofas with a tv and stereo. I was looking at the wine glass and china collection and thinking that they seemed so out-of-place for students like us. Then I looked into the kitchen and it was beautiful! So spacious that 4 people could cook in there at the same time. There were quite a few cupboards and even one that looked like a larder complete with lots of containers and trays to put stuff. The fridge was the kind with the freezer and chiller side by side and was definitely larger than the previous house's. It was even bigger than my current fridge. There was a great view of the river from the balcony. The rooms were nice. I really liked the blue room with a single bed and an L-shaped office desk in the corner. Then again, I probably was attracted to it because of the colour, heh heh. The other 2 rooms had double beds but no study tables. Other than that, everything was almost perfect. We stood out on the balcony and talked for a while. The girls were already in love with the place and I liked it too. So we told the agent on the spot that we wanted it. She said no problem and since we had already passed her our application forms, she told us that she would go in on Monday and process them. We would get confirmation by Tuesday. Now we were all happy like monkeys and chatting merrily as we walked down the stairs. Then Mantou mentioned that she hoped the agent wouldn't give the place to other people who might be willing to pay more than $450 per week. Alamak....we didn't think of that. This had happened to Mantou last year and now all we had was a verbal agreement. Damn!!! Now want to be happy also cannot. Now I can't have a peaceful weekend because I will be worrying about the place....zzzzzzzzzzz.......

A Sight for Sore Eyes

2006-06-01T00:37:00.000+10:00

I woke up late that morning and hence, missed my bus. I was sitting at the bus stop waiting for the next bus when this guy came and sat opposite me. He was wearing a pair of black running shorts; the kind that are really short and reveal a lot of leg. So he sat down facing me with his legs open wide. I didn't notice at first but when I did, I couldn't believe my eyes. This guy obviously wasn't wearing any undies since I could see his penis hanging out from the shorts. OMG!! He was a pretty old guy too; around his late thirties or early fourties. Either he was oblivious to his penis sticking out or he was doing it on purpose. Anyway, I didn't know whether to feel offended or to find the situation funny. I chose the latter and so I was glancing in his direction every now and then and laughing quietly. There was this Muslim girl sitting beside me. I wonder if she knew and how she reacted to it. The truth is, it wasn't a very nice view and I was glad that the bus came soon after and that the guy didn't get on the bus. That would have been the ultimate case; him flashing to a busful of people!!!

On Another Note...

2006-06-01T00:10:00.000+10:00

I asked my supervisor if I could take some time off from work in July when my sister and Julie are here. She did say yes but also with the comment that honours students during her time never took time off although it was getting more common these days. Yes I know that this was a jibe at me but I refuse to react to it. I act blur and smile. What can I say? I'm selfish and I desperately want the time off. Who cares what she thinks of me? I guess, as long as I know I'm doing my work well and working hard, I have a clear conscience and I can sleep at night. Then again, I seldom have problems sleeping. Wahahahahaha!!! Yay I'm so looking forward to July.

Tonight we had fun. But there was a slight upsetting moment when Chris came up to me to tell me that N was angry that we didn't ask her along for dinner. Ok, maybe Chris would feel guilty about it but I didn't. I was angry myself that N would even think to blame this on us. After all, this dinner thing wasn't even my idea. It was almost an impromptu event which occurred after the rest finished their respective movies. Since they ended around 5 pm, they decided that we should meet after my work and go out for dinner. There were already 5 of us in the car so how was it possible that we invite another one? What's more, N would be a one-plus-one situation. It's impossible to squeeze 7 people in the car, not to mention that fact that it's illegal. Or were some of us expected to take a bus or train home from Fruit Grove just so that we could have dinner together? That was just illogical. For me, I would understand if someone didn't invite me for an outing with plausible reasons. It has happened to me before and I didn't make a scene out of it or make the party feel guilty about it. I refuse to feel sorry or guilty for my actions when I did nothing wrong.

Movie in the Making

2006-05-31T23:57:00.000+10:00

I had a very fun dinner at the Green Tea House in Fruit Grove. It took a bit of time and navigation to get there but as usual, our bunch were the noisiest in the whole place. We can't help it; it's just in our nature to be rowdy and laugh like mad women when we're together. We made crappy jokes, came up with new ideas for our video-making and of course, teased each other endlessly. Speaking about the video-making, it's like our new game; our new passion. It started off with a documentary about dimples and how we were debating the cause of dimples. Mantou decided to film it down and tadah!!! Our first video!!!!! With a few odds and ends tossed into the clip; it was damn hilarious. It will be something I will watch every now and then and laugh to myself. This isn't my first experience with video-making. Somehow, I've always been at the end of the camera when Chris is holding it. She's made a few lame videos of me and she just loves showing them off to our friends. Not that I really mind; I think my self-conciousness had decreased drastically since I came to Australia and I am more daring these days. Skin is definitely getting thicker and thicker. Anyway, we made yet another video regarding exercise. Watching it, I can't believe it's really us on the screen. I'm glad that this group goes all out and is not shy when it comes to doing stupid stuff. Tonight, it was MTV night. Yes, the 5 of us actually sang and danced to two songs and I can tell you, I laughed so much that I think I've burned all the calories from my dinner. I can't wait till Mantou edits them and we get to see the final results. I won't upload these videos for all to see. They are not meant for a stranger's eyes. Ask me if you want to see them and I'll decide if I can send them to you or not.

Waiting for food...hungry, hungry, hungry, cold, cold, cold...

Playing with the spring roll because it's so smelly. I took one bite and didn't want to eat anymore.

A Battery Story

2006-05-14T23:20:00.000+10:00

My calculator battery died on me about a month ago. I didn't think much of it since I only used it to count how much Chris owed me for groceries and vice versa. This week however, I needed a scientific calculator to do some analysis for my experiments. I required the log and 10^ functions. I could have done this in the lab but I was quite tired that day and wanted to get home as soon as possible. So I brought "homework" home that night. When I got home, I was lazy and only got to starting my work at 11 pm. I went to borrow a calculator from Steph and she said that hers was quite old and had some problems with the screen but I just wanted to use it quick and go to sleep. So I took it into my room and started keying in my figures when I realised that her calculator didn't have the bracket function which I needed or the equation would be wrong. I went back to her room and returned it to her. Next I decided to try Tommy's. I knocked on his door and asked if I could borrow his but also checking first whether his calculator had all the functions I wanted. When he said yes, I took it from him and it was not a scientific calculator. This was a more pro one with much more buttons and it was heavy. I couldn't find the "ON" button so I asked him how to turn it on. He gave me a "like that also dunno" look and pressed "ON" for me. Then I looked up at the screen and it had some previously stored memory there so I asked him how to remove that from the screen. This time he gave me the same look together with a roll of his eyes. Coming from Tommy, this is really unusual!!! He normally is quite patient. I guess he thought I was really dumb, hahhaaha... Happy with the calculator, I brought it into the room and tried working with it. But I still had problems. I didn't know how to key in 10^ and it wouldn't let me delete some stuff. I was quite annoyed by all these problems so I decided to return the calculator and bring the work into the lab the next day and use a NORMAL calculator. As I was returning Tommy his calculator, Wan Shi must have heard and taken pity on me. She passed me her NORMAL scientific calculator and I was left shaking my head. I went around borrowing calculators from each of my housemates only to have to return them one by one just because I couldn't or didn't know how to use them and because my own calculator's batteries were gone. What a night!!!