A 176° view at 158cm high

Goodbye 2010 - Goodbye Understanding Axiao

2010-12-31T23:59:00.000+08:00

As the title say it all, I think I have outgrown the blogging phase of my life. Not really wanted to put so much of my personal life in cyberspace anymore. I think most of the things I did in my 20's were so much of discovering myself, testing where my limits at, discovering new places, new friends, travelling and looking beyond where I stand and getting information from everywhere and trying to absorb as much as possible from this wonderful world. While it doesn't really get me going anywhere from where I am now (actually I'm writing this in the comfort in my home back in my hometown), I am very happy to say that I lived my 20's to the most maximum as I can/afford to made it happened. I will always cherish the posts I made here and those back in Friendster where it all started as it is a part of me growing up/older. From now on, I will share the happenings in my life only to those who are close to me. There will be more yumcha sessions, I hope. Or by email for those faraway.

Coming into 2011, making into my 30's I wish for all to have a healthy, wonderful life. Live with no regrets and enjoy the abundance of what life has to offer, be it good or bad. Learn from past mistakes. Forgive and forget. Be patience, be strong, be honest. Embrace what life has to offer and make it the best for yourself.

Sincerely,
Shiao Chin

Revisiting Australia

2010-12-09T23:20:00.003+08:00

via my blog. Haven't blog about the trip either, yikes! Hope to blog all travelling before the year ends!

Hello Opera House, and ooOh, I remember the Opera Bar, and that day I had the most drink of my life, embrace the culture...*hiccups*

Lesson learnt

2010-11-30T23:14:00.002+08:00

Theory:
Good managers are to be able to recognise their employees emotion and able to manage the emotions as well. And in the same time, keep their own emotions in check.

In actual fact:
Managers practices the extinction theory, whereby choose to ignore the situation, eventually the problem will go away by itself.

Question:
How does the employee need to channel their emotions so that the actual fact managers will be able to react on them?

In the real world:
Managers will be able to recognise their employees emotion, practise the extinction theory, and finally bitch the news around. Muahhaaa....

I tried!!

2010-11-21T21:58:00.002+08:00

I tried to study, for at least a week now. But still fail miserably. Succumbed to Bejeweled Blitz for few days now. Set a Hi-score today! See, I even bought some new colourful new pens and a pencil case to put them in. My book is still brand new!

Had an assignment already for OB (organisation behaviour), but should not be a problem. Due 30 Nov. Had to write who am I, if not mistaken. Having a blog meaning I still can write a proper article (I hope). Ok, really need to study that accounting now!

2010-11-14T08:07:00.000+08:00

Sorry, if overuse, it's just an excuse.

Day 1 at Class

2010-11-09T21:56:00.002+08:00

So today it's the 9th of the month, I'm guessing I need to post something up.

Today is my first class for my MBA course. And I survived it!

Well, yesterday supposed to be the first class, but it was cancelled, and at the same time decided not to take the subject (Managerial Economics) as it was not a prerequisite subject for next trimester, and also afraid if I couldn't cope with the sudden command of workload and study load. So 6 credits for this trimester.

Nothing much is learnt today as it was still in the warming up session. The getting to know you part. There were approximate 40 students in my class. Most of them were fresh graduates, just joined the working taskforce. A few of them from banking line. I was hoping there were some CEOs or students at managerial level that will join my class so that there's a variety when it comes to views as I know there are difference when you are looking top-down and down-up. Unfortunately, there were none. But there were 2 working for themselves, not sure if they are entreprenuer or anything like that, haven't got that close though.

Tomorrow's another class. Accounting for Decision Making. God help me! I'm not sure if I can do any accounts anymore. The last accounting sum I did was probably during secondary school, and I'm not quite sure if I aced it. All I know about accounting now is balance, credit and debit. Hopefully I can survive this subject without any major mishaps!

I like this

2010-10-28T23:43:00.000+08:00

We recognized your contribution.

Made my day.

I am Number Four

2010-10-27T23:08:00.002+08:00

The title caught my eye.
And so I bought it and complete reading it in 3 days.
Which means, I liked the storyline and kept flipping pages until my sore eyes couldn't take it anymore.

So, we got vampires(Twilight) and warlords(Harry Potter) for bestseller for the past few years. And now, guess what?! We got a bestseller coming up which feature ALIENS! Yes, you heard me right. Alien invasion.

There were nine of them. Each were numbered in sequence. They were children when they fled their planet due to invasion. Three of them were killed in sequence, Number Four is on the run. All nine of them never had a real name. Number Four is known as John Smith. And he is a Lorien running away from the Mogadorians in planet Earth.

So as much as any typical story like the vampires and the warlords, John Smith is a loner, well a good looking loner which makes others to be interested in him. And as he turned older, his Legacies kept coming. Legacies are capabilities that a Lorien can use to protect himself against the Mogadorians when they fight in war. Just like a twitch with a wand and some magic spell, but way cooler.

I'm making the story boring by telling all here. Well a movie is coming up in 2011. Watch the trailer here. http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi2731936025/

Top 10 Most Annoying Employees: Don't Become One!

2010-10-09T08:24:00.003+08:00

source

These days we’ve got heavy competition for our products and services and even stiffer competition for our jobs. The one thing none of us needs is to make matters worse by shooting ourselves in the foot.

Over the years, I’ve noticed a number of behavioral attributes that really annoy the heck out of managers, especially senior executives. We’re not talking light-hearted annoyance like constant interruptions or incessant whining. We’re talking career-limiting behavior that’s bad for business, bad for the organization, and far outweighs whatever benefits you might bring to the party.

When he was annoyed with someone in a meeting, one CEO of a large technology company would imagine the person’s compensation — dollar sign and all — emblazoned on their forehead and decide right then and there if he or she was worth it. Cold-blooded, I know, but a true story nevertheless.

Still, I’ve seen otherwise bright, capable people dig deep holes for themselves when they thought they were doing the right thing. They weren’t. And while I’ve typically been on the annoyed side of the equation, I have to admit, I’ve been on the annoying side once or twice myself — and really, really wished I hadn’t. So be forewarned. Here’s are the 10 kinds of employee you don’t want to be:

Top 10 Most Annoying Employees
(OK, let me check if I've been one or I'm surrounding by many...>.<)

1. “Trust me.” If you’re a star performer who has proved your worth time and again, then you’re one of an elite group of trusted individuals. But if you’re not in that category, saying “trust me” or “don’t worry” to a skeptical senior executive sends up a red flag a mile high. Just don’t do it. Hmm, I'm not such person because sometimes I couldn't even trust myself. But I have never seen such person before, maybe it's the Asian culture, that we have less of such people.

2. Fearless risk-taker. People mistakenly think that entrepreneurs, executives, and VCs are huge risk-takers. They’re not. They’re calculated risk-takers. Their job is to minimize risk for their stakeholders in a risky environment. When they see someone dive into the deep end without looking, they don’t just get annoyed, they get rid of him. Yea, there's nothing such as fearless risk takers, only foolish risk takers.

3. Know-it-all. Everyone hates a know-it-all, but it’s particularly annoying to senior executives who didn’t get to where they are by not knowing what they don’t know. And they know you don’t have all the answers, either. Know what I mean? Haha, I'm not there yet. By there meaning the executive position.

4. Teflon guy (or gal). Nothing sticks to the Teflon guy. He won’t engage and he won’t be held accountable. You tell him over and over to take the bull by the horns, and he says okay, but it never happens. When you follow up, all you get are excuses. And the worst thing about it? The crap he won’t deal with ends up on your plate, and that just ain’t right. Holy cow, throw a stone I might just hit 2!!

5. “I can do anything you want.” For some reason, some employees think that, no matter what you want or need, all they have to do is smile and say, “Sure, I can do that” — whether they can or can’t. They mistakenly think that’s a “can-do” attitude. It’s not. It’s promising what you can’t deliver. I call that “can-say, can’t-do.”
Hahaa...seen one before. Frustrates the boss to the max, but still the boss needs to smile and deliver. Akakakaa...

6. Star-struck “yes” person. Say what you will about bosses wanting employees to kiss their butts and kowtow to them. Sure, they exist, but they’re the weak ones. Successful executives want to know the truth, and they want it straight. To them, sugar-coating “yes” people are worthless, period. Give me such boss anytime!!

7. Talk, talk, talk, never shut up. Most executives are pressed for time. They want you to tell them what they need to know, listen to what they have to say, and get the hell out. If they want to chit-chat, you’ll know it. Yawn, sounds so familiar!

8. Drama queen. It’s always something: a personal saga, a coworker’s out to get them, or a litany of excuses. Whatever it is, it’s more important than getting things done. Excuse the gender reference; it’s just an expression. Hmm..there's one drama queen, and LOTS of drama KING!!!

9. Bureaucrat. Responds to every request with a boatload of inane reasons why he or she can’t do it or arcane things that must happen first. The opposite of a flexible, can-do attitude. I can think of 1 or 2..ahahaa..

10. “This is how we did it at XYZ company.” It’s one thing to apply your experience to new situations, but you can’t just blindly assume that because it worked there, it’ll work here. Every situation is different; there are lots of ways to do things, and one size rarely fits all. Besides, it’s really annoying. Never had such opportunity to see such person, because most likely they will quit before they have the opportunity to say anything like that.

Now now , where's the juicy gossip monger?? What?!! It didn't even get in the charts??
It means bosses like gossips too!!

18 vs 30: Got any different?

2010-09-09T18:56:00.006+08:00

I have been carrying a picture of my 18-year-old self. I have been carrying it for like 12 years now. It was a constant reminder of how I was when I was a teenager. Wow, teenage years was like eons ago now that I think of that. Those carefree days, riding a motorcycle around town, with nothing to think about but hockey and SPM.

Looking back at my picture, zit-full face, dark skin and short hair, specky (gold frame, what was I thinking about??!!), and comparing it with pictures I took currently, I thought I looked somewhat different but somewhat still familiar. I'm much fairer now, long hair. Still have the occasional breakout though (%^$%#%#).

So this is the the picture that I have been carrying for 12 years and the most recent one that I took.

I renewed my driving license.
:)

So got any comments?

I thought I smirked in those pictures?

OMG, I think my cheek has sagged a lil, forehead got bigger, eyes got smaller?

Jalan-Jalan in Shanghai

2010-07-09T09:35:00.004+08:00

In my previous post, I mentioned I wanted to go to those places. And I did. Shanghai tourist attraction is really near to each other. That's the Oriental Pearl TV Tower. It could be much nicer to look at if not for the haze surrounding Shanghai.

We had a good laugh when we read this sign. Fortune the Riverside Stop the Garage. Direct translation man. Apart from the language, I think Shanghai is really a great metropolitan city. Well structured and organised. I heard from my Chinese colleague that the location where the factory is now was an agricultural land 25 years ago. And now it is a huge piece of industrial land. And 1m sq of a apartment in Shanghai may cost up to 20000RMB. There's no way a middle income person can afford an apartment in Shanghai! In addition to that, non-Shanghainese do not have the same privilege as a Shanghainese as in schooling etc. To get to stay Shanghai, they have to go through something like a PR application. Such a life in China.

One thing I noticed was that their apartment do not have the ugly grills that Malaysian apartments have. So I think this says Shanghai is safer than Malaysia and I raised my 2 hands to agree to that. Why? See all the nice pictures posted here. If not for the cab driver to return my camera, I most probably wouldn't have this post up. It happened that I dropped my camera in the cab while exiting it. Kancheong-ed for 1 hour. :)

Okay, back to places in Shanghai.

This is Shanghai Bund view from across the river.

My only nice shot of Peace Hotel. It was under renovation while we were there.

Another angle of Shanghai Bund.

This is Yu Yuan (not the garden, just outside)

Yu Yuan Garden, so many lanterns in conjunction with Chap Goh Meh.

The blue lantern thing was the mascot for World Expo happening in Shanghai now. There were so many of them on the streets.

Nanjing Road. Bad haze spoilt my shot.

Yu Yuan Garden. Lazy to read so just took this shot and read it now. Haha.

Cherry blossom. For real!! But there's just one blooming.

Last shot for Shanghai.

Packing and off to Rainforest Music Festival!

Makan-makan in Shanghai

2010-07-03T13:06:00.000+08:00

So this post came up 4 months late. So it was still spring and Chinese New Year atmosphere in the pictures below.

I covered all that I mentioned previously.

Shanghai, to me is more like a business centre rather than a tourist attraction. I went there for like 4 days and managed to go to the places I said I wanted to go despite the lack of time and I was there for business matter.

But in this post, I'll first cover all the delectables! Yummy!

First day landed in Shanghai, we went for Sze Chuan-style dinner. This is at YuXin SiChuan, just a throw away from the hotel we stayed, Supreme Tower. Dinner wasn't as expensive as we thought as the restaurant looked really classy. Just RMB250 for the 3 of us.
This is beef floss, I think. Hot.

A nice tofu-something with crabmeat.

Their chao pai (must eat) dish. Forgot the name already.

This is fish. Forgotten the name of the dish, but all the supposedly soup you are looking, isn't soup. But OIL! There's not a drip of water in this dish. OIL, all of it! And it's as what SiChuan dish is famous for, my tongue got numb after eating the dish.

And this is how big the dish was.

The fish, very fresh. As it was kept in the hot oil throughout the dinner, every piece was hot and nice.

And introducing to you, the culprit that made our tongues went numb. My friend tried to bite it, and lesson learnt!

Some low profile vege.

A change of look. This is lunch in factory. RMB6 for all these.

These are from Yu Yuan Garden.

So so chawanmushi.

A better egg tart can be found.

A very disappointing Shanghai Xiao Long Bao. Din Tai Fung is way better. But the crowd there was really misleading. Cis!

These coming pictures were taken from a restaurant where our counterpart treated us. Forgot the place and name of restaurant. But it was yummylicious to the max!

Starters. Some fish.

Lotus root. Sweet stuff.

Glutinous rice with pork inside. Salivating again!

This is a very nice Xiao Long Bao! Much better than in Yu Yuan Garden!

Very nice dessert. I think it's mango inside with some cream. But it was heaven!

I think my friend told me this is soup in teacup. A direct translation. Very nice. I had 2 eventhough I was full!

Some vege.

Chicky feet. Hot and spicy, Sichuan Style!

Overall, I think food in Shanghai is good! Most probably it was the weather. Cold weather vs hot food. Perfect combo!

Row the Dragon!!

2010-06-15T21:49:00.004+08:00

Cool T Shirt huh?!!
That's the ladies team tshirt that I will be wearing for the 1Malaysia Putrajaya Dragonboat competition this Saturday!

In fact, I will be rowing for both mixed team and female team!

Mixed team will be rowing this Friday morning at 8.15 and afternoon at 3.3o. ZEGIO GREAT OUTDOOR SDN BHD - TEAM A, that's the team name, such a mouthful. Well there's a Team B as well. I will be rowing on the right side, but no tell tale for the position. My captain said team strategy, hehehe.

This is the Mixed Team A.

Such vibrant people. But all are growing wings after 3 hours of paddling every weekend. Inside joke. Haha.

These are the Ladies Team. All strong, confident girls, except one "Puan" Roshidah, our steerman!
Ladies team are rowing this Saturday at 8.15am also, I'll be rowing on the right, 4th rower from behind. Since our lane will be the first lane, nearest to the pavilion, should be easy to spot, especially with the sharp yellow T-shirt!

This is Reha, our team captain. Jalan ada gaya kapten nie!

Yo, Syahrul the steerman with his long stick..aakakakaa

Ooohhh...sexy ladies in Team A!!

Lastly, CC & the coach. Hot huh?!!

Oh, by the way, Happy Dumpling Festival!!

30 started off with a BANG!

2010-06-10T21:54:00.004+08:00

Won myself a luxury hotel stay in Siem Reap from Travel & Leisure. Who says 30's are dreadful? I'm seeing more wonderful, luxurious stay in my travels in the future. Hahaa..if I am able to win any of these stuff in the future.

Now I need to know how to claim this prize!!

Another Decade "Pooooffff"!!

2010-06-10T10:06:00.002+08:00

10-6-10

Big 30 has landed!

Life-is-so-unfair part 1

2010-05-04T21:23:00.005+08:00

Tell me about it. roll eyes

My first encounter with life-is-so-unfair probably when I was 5 or 6 years old. Remember in kindergarten, at the end of the semester, there will be graduation ceremony where kids will performed some dance on stage or probably make a fool out of ourselves? That's when I found out life-is-so-unfair. You see, I was small, skinny and dark that time, due to the freedom I had at home, I spent most of my free time outside chasing boys. Yeap, my neighbours, we had lots of running contest, and I beat most of them, cause they were younger and their legs were shorter. Haha..ok, out of context. Anyway, back to the dance thingy. So I was dark and skinny, and girls were supposed to be pretty and fair. So I was placed at somewhere at the back of the line. Yea, life-is-so-unfair, right?

Next, when I was in primary, I played hockey for my school. Before that, there must always be a selection for players. So, I was still small, skinny and dark that time. There were 20 to 30 over girls, but I made it to the final 18 players, most probably due my dad sent me to training during school holidays, when other girls were spending their time at home braiding their hair. But I wasn't the top 11 players just yet. See my position was fullback, a defence, normally, they required a bigger size girls. See life-is-so-unfair again, due to my size.

In secondary school, I remember we had those Skim Pinjaman Buku Sekolah, where textbooks were loan to the students who cannot afford to buy them. So, me and another friend were the last 2 who didn't get the loaned textbook due to the parents' salary were higher than the supposedly income bracket, were called to the teacher's table. There was one slate left for the loan, and the teacher asked, who should get the last slate. I mean come on, my dad's a teacher with 4 kids, all still studying while my friend's dad's an engineer with 2 kids. Close 2 eyes also know which one to give the textbook to, right? Furthermore, most of my friends in my class are children of businessmen, come on, pendapatan gaji baru RM600? See life-is-so-unfair.

Fast forward to working life. Parts and parcel of working life is promotion and bonuses. Sometimes, I worked like a bull, and I get peanuts. Some people while they skimped here and there, they also get the same amount of peanuts that I received. See LIFE-IS-SO-UNFAIR!

Reebonz - Unveil The Surprise

2010-04-30T12:17:00.004+08:00

...and unleash your buying power...

Reebonz brings glamour closer to you.

Buying branded good at discounted price, isn't it fun and exhilarating?

Especially if the pieces are limited and the sale last only for 3 days the most.

Coach is now on sale at 50% the most!

The bag below sold off just 7 minutes after the event launch today. So fast!!

Plus, you get free shipping in Malaysia.

And the below are the upcoming events. Who said sales are for girls only.

They are having Paul Smith & Fred Perry sale coming up.

I'm looking forward to see what Miu Miu and Becksondergaard has to offer.

You may join using this link REEBONZ

Else go here http://www.reebonz.com/

and

key this angshiaochin[@]yahoo[dot]com at the invitation code.

Wait no more.

Unleash your buying power.

no money to buy?

just be like me, make this website your favourite lunchtime buddy.

nice to be enjoy after lunch break yo!!

LeftBlock X Nike

2010-04-24T00:04:00.005+08:00

Went to LeftBlock X Nike event yesterday , which happened in 1Padang, 1Utama. It featured Nike Sportswear pieces, customized with details, that every piece has its individualistic style.

LeftBlock, a brainchild project of 3 fashion blogger, Joyce Wong from KinkyBlueFairy, Jacinta Cheng from Travinia and Michelle Pong from Project Muffstit bring Nike Sportswear to another whole level.

One of the many fashion shown during the event.

And we got to play dress up our own group member!!

...And the result, funky people all around!

Also got he chance to bump into many bloggers that night. The one without name is my friend, by the way. Ahaha...

And who can forget, door gift from Nike.

Now meet my Nokia

2010-04-21T23:32:00.006+08:00

so you met my Nooka..

now

meet my Nokia..it's a E72 babe, bronze and looking so sexy...

that's my old faithful T610 that I've been using for 6 years. 6 years!! it definitely deserve a post for all it's contribution. no, it haven't die on me yet, but it just have some limitation nowadays. i'm so used to it's alarm that now it serves me as an daily alarm, that indian song that i have could just give me a shock everyday at 6.20am.

bought my T610 using my first bonus. cost rm1100 then. i'm that kind of person that pays good money for a technology that can last me for a very, very long time, so this E72 better serves me for more than T610. ok, fine, i'm a scrooge when comes to technology. this E72 cost rm1399, vomit blood. me and my sister get ourselves one each. her's silver.

i haven't explore most of the function yet. tried the GPS, working well. other's not yet. later or maybe not. see mood i guess.

Meet my Nooka

2010-04-18T22:17:00.004+08:00

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Meet my Nooka Zoo^TM.

Which I won from a contest again. The Nooka Nooka Artist Impression. Yea, I know, I'm so lucky. Before you get jealous, please read my tips on winning contest.

Nooka Zoo^TMis so complicated to use that I needed help to wear it. That's Luis or Louis showing me how to strap it on. His Nooka watch was even funkier, rainbow-ed color!! Such happy watch!

Doing the normal picture shot for H5 photo's collection I think. Can't show any close up photo of myself as I just touchdown from Guilin that same day. I looked like crap basically.

There are so much more Nooka watches in the store. I forgot to take pictures of them. Tired to think. I guess you guys have to check them yourselves in their store in Bangsar Village 2 or Midvalley.

Challenging Full Marathon...

2010-04-09T09:20:00.003+08:00

Maybe within next 3 years.

Registered for KL Marathon for 21km again. First time trying a 21km run was last year also in KL Marathon. Not that difficult I would say since I completed the race in 3h 17 mins, just 17 mins shy of the cut off time. So this year's target is to complete the race within cut off time.

Prior to the race I am taking part in the Subang Jaya Run this 25 April. I think this is going to be my third run in Subang Jaya Run. 10km just to warm up to the running feeling and pace. Hopefully to run another race in May before going to be big one.

Friends are asking to join Angkor Wat Marathon on 5 December 2010. I'm so tempted, since after the race can do sightseeing, since I never been to Cambodia before. Maybe will participate in the 10km run only, I need my legs to walk properly to do sightseeing. :)

Another race I'm interested is the Penang Bridge Marathon happening in 21 November 2010. Planned to run a half-marathon for this one, but it's too near to Angkor Wat marathon race date. Oh, so berbelah-bahagi.

Mulu Pinnacles - Checked!!!

2010-04-01T17:00:00.001+08:00

29 March 2010 12.00pm sharp

If by Rudyard Kipling

2010-03-17T21:12:00.002+08:00

For those whose knot still tangled, whose path still a crossroad too many, may it bring a spark in your remaining embers.

If

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!

Summer Shine Shine Special Sauce

2010-03-02T23:43:00.007+08:00

On the 7th day on Chinese New Year, we decided to have steamboat for celebration.

Lots of balls, fishball, vegeball...

Lots of mushroom...

More roomss...

Also fake crab meat

Fu zhuk..

Shrimps, lots of it..

More mushrooms..

Of course, healthy vege..

More greenies..

Also, 年年有鱼(余)..

And the steamboat..yummy, yummy..

So, as the title goes, summer shine shine special sauce, there must be a special sauce to go along with steamboat. Normally, we will use sambal belacan, thai style chilli sauce or Kampong Koh brand chilli sauce. But my sister wanted us to try a special sauce. She learnt it from her days in Macau. So here it goes.

First, we have fried crisp onion.

Sesame seed, also fried.

Peanuts, all mashed up.

Chilli powder, to make it slightly hot.

Garlic, to make it even hotter.

Also, soy sauce & sesame oil and some sugar.

Voila, summer shine shine special sauce!!

Hot, spicy, sweet, crunchy, salty....behold your taste bud, it's all there. Trust me!

Summer shine shine busy at work. Do more next year ye!!

Gong Hei Fat Choy. That's all for CNY posts.

Going to Xiao Long Bao land

2010-02-23T22:36:00.005+08:00

Leaving to Shanghai in approximately 5 hours.

For business.
So not much sight-seeing can be done.

But hopefully I can visit these places.

YuYuan Garden
Nanjing Road
The Bund
Oriental Pearl TV Tower - hopefully can see it form the place I stay. It's 2.5km away.

Hopefully can stuff myself silly with lots of Xiao Long Bao.

Kong Hei Fat Choy.

CNY@Teluk Intan

2010-02-19T09:58:00.000+08:00

Gong Xi Fa Cai!!

Long awaited post and many more to come.
Real bird, seriously.....:P

Everybody....HUAT ARR!!!

My mom's precious flower 富贵花. Anyone knows what it's called in English?

富贵花 in it's glory!!

I also in glory...wahhaaaa....

Hu Hu Hot Hot

2010-02-13T00:31:00.003+08:00

Year of Tiger is coming!

Today is the year of the Rat year. As usual whenever it's around Chinese New Year, the weather will get so hot that everyone is sweaty and sticky.

It's 12.30am now. Usually, night breeze will cool us down, but it still hot and humid. Tomorrow (ooppss, today) later in the morning, flurry of activities will start. All the cookings and maybe bakings will start and then we'll have our reunion lunch (we always do lunch), then me and my sisters also my mom sometimes, will parade in our new clothes, hahha....family tradition.

After that gambling session starts.

To the new year, GONG HEI FAT CHOY!!

I hope it brings lots of good outcome for me in my life in all aspects!!

Amazing Grace by Micheal Telepary

2010-02-04T13:44:00.003+08:00

Last Saturday, I had the privilege to attend a special music session thank to Hoong Ling. This music session featured a flute player, Micheal Telepary from Netherlands. The music he made was so wonderful. The flutes he used were American Indians flute, not the conventional flutes.

Here's a clip of what he performed last week. Amazing Grace by Micheal Telepary. Enjoy.

More pictures of the flutes he used to come.

Umei-ya (sedap-ya)

2010-01-26T22:42:00.007+08:00

Introduced to this Japanese shop in Damansara Utama called Umei-ya by the birthday girl. Umei-ya means good food shop in Japanese, I think. Anyway, waste no more on space words, let's just jump to the pictures of the food.

Shishamo Itaki Kyuli
Maguro, Salmon & Tuna
Butterfish Tuna Dragon Maki Kani Unatama Maki Soft-shell crab Unagi Sushi Sukiyaki Shishamo (looked at those eggs) Wasabi Icecream Salmon, Ika & Tuna Shashimi ChawanmushiGreen tea Ice cream Gold

Our total list. Forgotten to take most of the pictures as we were overwhelm with food. Consumed 5 bowls of edamame.

Looking back at the pictures made me want to eat Umei-ya again.

Umei-ya = Sedap-ya

Weddings, Weddings & Weddings

2010-01-22T00:03:00.001+08:00

10 wedding invitations. And I attended 6 of them. End of 2009 was really a good year to get married I guess. And all of them were ex-colleagues except one existing colleagues. I started to wonder now when will my closest friends will get married? 2010?

28 November 2009
Noel & Linda's wedding dinner at Sheraton KL. Noel was university friend, hometown friend, plus colleague once. Wedding posh and grand.

5 December 2009
Sin Ka Fai's wedding. Ex-colleague too. Merimba hutan together before. Had the dinner in Ipoh. All the dishes were huge in portion. People say he looked like Hacken Lee!

20 December 2009

Tan & Siew Fung's wedding in Hakka Village, KL. My first few colleague's that I chummed with when I first joined this company. Tan shared the same birthday with me. Siew Fung was one of the most chatty person I ever met. Hehe.

25 December 2009

Ming's wedding in Xi Lai Ton Serdang. My group member yo. Don't play play. He looked young but he's only 1 year younger than me. Haha.

3 January 2010.

Hadi's wedding. Ex colleague plus group member too. His wife said my baju coordinated with their wedding theme. Bangga yo.

3 January 2010

Chow's wedding Xi Lai Ton, Shaw Parade. He got married. Congratulations!

6 weddings attended. One thing increase another depleted. Not married friends increase nor single friends decrease.

My weight increased!!
My purse got skinnier!!

Plus I got spare now. Spare tyre that is. Such life that is after wonderful meals.

No Plastic Day

2010-01-10T11:27:00.002+08:00

Selangor government declared all Saturday as "No Plastic Day" and I witnessed that!

Went for grocery shopping yesterday and was amazed that not only big retailers did that, smaller shops also practiced "No Plastic Day". I took my own carrier bag but realised that it was not big enough to put all my intended-to-buy-grocery list so I ended up buying less than what I had listed. Not all were must use items anyway.

So "No Plastic Day", yay for the environment, yay for my pocket!

WHAT!!?? 2009 no more?

2010-01-07T13:53:00.001+08:00

This is what happened when you had a too long break at the end of 2009.

My office had a long break from 25th Dec 2009 until 4th January 2010. And today is the 3rd day working into year 2010.

Wow, it's year 2010. It's just 10 years to realise vision 2020. I remembered when I was doing SPM or is it PMR, the karangan always had this title, "Wawasan 2020: Beri pandangan anda terhadap visi ini." Something along the line. Now, it's only 10 years to come, do you think what I wrote back then will realise in 10 years time?

2010 marks a new beginning for me. It's only another 6 months before I hit the BIG 30. Holy cow shit?!! Where did my 20's go? Let me check.

~ Spent 2 years in uni before graduating.
~ Spent 3 months working for free in Malaysia Airlines for practical training.
~ Joined this current company in 2002 immediately after convocation.
~ Working in this curent company for 7 years already.
~ Tempted to change job in 2005, but eventually change department from QA to design.
~ Spent a year travelling for job requirement, where sent me to Pattaya, Bangkok, Phitsanulok in Thailand; New Delhi, India (visited Taj Mahal, yo!!); Tokyo, Japan (Disneyland yay!).
~ Started travelling with my own pocket money to many, many places in Asia, Bangkok, Macau, Hong Kong, Shen Zhen, Taiwan, Chiang Mai, Bali, Vietnam & Korea.
~ Conquered several mountains/hills in Malaysia, Gunung Tahan, Gunung Kinabalu, Gunung Datuk, Bukit Tabur.
~ Met many fabulous new friends in Raleigh and in working life.
~ Did many adventurous stuff, bungee jumping, diving, white water rafting, bamboo rafting, zorbing.
~ Moved house 8 times in the 7 years relocated to KL. Living out of a suitcase once.
~ Realised true friends in life.
~ Had the once in a lifetime chance to run in the Beijing Olympic Torch Relay in KL.
~ Had a surgery to remove a growth underarm.
~ Permed my hair, cut my hair real short, had it dyed flaming red.
~ Started blogging, first in Friendster, now in Blogspot.

Many more, but cannot recall. That's my life in my 20's. Looking back, I say, it was quite an adventure. Well, they said 20's is the time you discover yourself. Did I? I'm not sure, maybe I did.

Anyway, a new decade has begun. I remembered writing in my diary (that was before blogging started), I put some targets to achieve when I hit 30. Looking back, some realised, some not. Some are in the progress of achieving. 6 more months to come. Hopefully by then it will all be achieved and I might share it here. For now, nope, it's still personal.

So now, back to new year. Resolutions. Let's just make it simple. I mean simple to achieve.

1. Complete my Project 52: That 7 Days of My Life (put on hold since August).
2. Lose some weight gained since 2008 (that's 5kg)
3. Do not buy on impulse (my yearly resolution, normally broken after days into new year)
4. Do not buy anymore books until completed my unread collection (I think there's about 20 books)

So, 4 only. I think number 3 will be broken once I step into a shopping mall.
Tahan, girl, tahan!

So, back to Vision 2020. Did I write anything about it? Nah..I doubt cars will fly in 10 years time.

smashpOp.net Christmas giveaway!!

2009-12-14T16:00:00.004+08:00

Dear Santa,

I know you have been checking the cyberspace and dropping be-earlied Christmas present everywhere. And I FOUND you in smashpOp.net!

So since I already know what you are giving away, be I made my wish very, very clear below. I hope you can read my handwriting!!

"I want the NIKE Hayward from smashpOp.net for Christmas!!"

There you go, Santa, just in case you can't read my hand written note. :)

Thank you Santa aka smashpOp.net. :)

p.s I need active bloggers to support me for this event to win the backpack. Please put the Chritsmas giveaway banner in your blog, link it to smashpop.net and mentioned in your blog you supported me, and email me me back so that I can let Santa knows. Thanks, peeps!!

p.p.s. supporters galore

mybaby sis : http://shiaoping.blogspot.com/2009/12/my-er-jie-frequent-contest-winner.html

gackyiswacky : http://gackyiswacky.blogspot.com/2009/12/christmas-giveaway.html

Best Travel Buddy

2009-12-12T14:41:00.001+08:00

It's not fun when you travel alone. I mean, unless you are going for a soul searching trip, travelling alone really kind of bored. Don't you think so? Who is there to discuss whether we should turn left or turn right when got lost in massive open night market? Or whether we should go ahead with the purchase when we have second thoughts?

There my friends, we should have a travel buddy. Well, I have been to several trips, be it within Malaysia or outside Malaysia with several people. Colleagues, secondary school mates, uni-mates and my sisters.

I'm sure you guys know that travelling with sisters will always, I mean really always, started with arguments and quarelling in the morning and get back good eventually later in the day. But you don't want to kind of spoil the mood especially if you are in a holiday, do you? But despite all the bickering, I still love all my sisters. And hell yeah, we are going to Langkawi for New Year countdown and expect lots of bickering.

Well, travelling with colleagues is fun too especially when we can all get the same days off. There's no need to compromise of taking extra days off. But travelling with colleagues cut half the fun cause, well, no matter how close you are to them, they are still your colleagues. You can't be as crazy as you want to be or talk as much crap as you want to, cause you don't want your crazy lil stunt during the holidays sneaking up on you on fine day during office meeting.

Going out with uni-mates are fun too. Note going-out, not travelling. After leaving university for so long, no matter how close you were with your uni-mates, things are bound to change. I'm sure all the wavelength that you shared during uni times has already gone way, way out of spectrum. So I prefer a gathering with uni-mates. Maybe a 3day-2night getaway, where, we drink booze and talk about old times sake. And at my age, marriage, buying houses are the main topics. Just wait for another couple of years before the topics change to babies and diapers. Oh..dreadful.

For me personally, I like to travel with my secondary school mates. We known each others for more than 20 years now. Basically we grown up together, not only as high school friends but as adults together. There were past times to crap about in the middle of the night and there are future to ponder with during a long bus ride. And yeah, they get the crappy joke that I often make. So secondary school buddies are still the best to go travel with.

So now I'm going to introduce my best travel buddy!!

Taiwan 2005
Chiang Mai 2006

Redang 2007

Korea 2007

Hong Kong 2008
Tioman 2009

2010, diving trip to Redang or Lang Tengah, Sarawak Rainforest Music Festivals and Australia!!

Best travel buddy said, never been out of Asia, so when hit 30 must go outside Asia, so Gold Coast, here we come!

I Won A HP Laptop from Spritzer

2009-12-01T21:57:00.004+08:00

I won a HP laptop from Spritzer's My No.1 Moment photography contest.

I was the 4th Week Winner. Submitted my Olympic Torchbearer photograph for the contest ~~just for fun~~ for winning and 3 weeks later, today, I got the call from Spritzer personnel telling me I won the contest!!

Will be collecting the laptop soon. Need to provide the correct label for proof of purchase. The empty bottle now is collecting dust at my room corner. Better dust it clean before submitting to them. :)

Everyone ask how come I always win stuff. Well, I'm going to share some tips. These tips are pretty logic and simple to follow. But I do not gurantee if you don't win anything.

Rule Number 1 (Mother of all rules)

If you never participate in any contest, you will NEVER win anything. Never say, "Arrhh, I will not be so lucky." How do you know if there were only 10 person who joined a contest and there were 20 prizes? I did that once and I missed a free Beijing/Shanghai trip for 2 from Snips Salon.

Rule Number 2

Never join a contest half heartedly. Give some heart and you'll be surprise how easy the slogans/the answers/the hidden clue will come to you. Which is why I never excel in sudoku challenges because I never did the challenge wholeheartedly. :)

Rule Number 3

Be creative. Make it personal, but not too personal. Just like reading advertorial blog, you would prefer reading the blogger's experience rather than just how good the product is. This trick is especially good if you are to join some contest where your personality needs to shine. Like reality TV.

3 tips are enough for now. If I write more, it's going to be long and boring. Just like slogans contest, 15 words or less. Someone ask if luck plays a role. Well I think maybe a 5%, 95% is your effort. No effort no winning.

Till the next winning.

Clocking out from South Plant for the last time

2009-11-21T23:31:00.007+08:00

After 7 years 4 months working in the South Plant, last Thursday (19/11/09) marked the last day I'm clocking out from it. Come next Monday, I will be clocking in at the North Plant (which is only 1 kilometer away). Why the drama, one may think, but 7 years walking up and down the familiar path, knowing every corner and every hideaway location, changing to a new location made me miss this cosy spot of mine.

In 2002, I started working as product safety engineer and back then I can proudly say "My Lab". Yes, the lab still existed (well until last Thursday) but the management has gone through several hands after me.

3 years down the road, I decided to change department, now I am design engineer, downgraded from a laboratory (with a door and a 2HP aircond) to this 4mx4m workshop. Yeap, that's my workstation. Messy, I know.

And this is what is on the other side of the trolley table. My small cabinet table.

The software team moved one week earlier and this is what remained of their previous location. The boxes were meant for our department for packing. The height is even higher than me!!

This is Megat, my group member, the 5S representative of the department, a shitty job that no one wants to be appointed to. Kesian him. And he sits right next to me.

And this is my office table. Next to me is the model leader, next to him is the project leader, next to him is the project manager aka head of department. Cool place to sit huh, but my new location is so shitty that I'm backing all the members and facing a wall! I hate facing walls, maybe I will buy some mirrors to view what's going behind me. :)
This 10% of the amount of stuff packed when I took this picture.

On the packing day, I still need to carry out some test. This is the last test I was doing. Random On/Off test.

Not forgetting, the toilet shot. So guys from my office who reads my blog, so now you know how the ladies toilet looked like. Hahah..

This is the amount of boxes that I'm moving to North Plant. All boards and equipments under my care.

This is the looked of my workshop after packing.

My office table after packing.

This is the ladies toilet upstairs. I super like the mirror coz it's until waist level.
Final group shot. Not all department members were inside.
Me getting out from my sector the last time.
Me clocking out for the last time from South Plant. So emo......

Best boss departure

2009-11-06T07:52:00.000+08:00

No, he didn't die or something, but to return to Japan after 7 long years. One of his dream was to actually retire in Malaysia, but it seems that didn't come true to him. Nevertheless, he enjoyed staying in Malaysia for the past 7 years. He especially enjoyed the food as can be seen in his food blog (a rather popular one among the Japanese) and not to forget the ladies too. Well, that's what he told me. I believed it 100%. Hahaa..

We had a farewell for him in Oct 7 (yea, this post is rather late) and it was the best farewell party I have ever been to during my working life here. Thanks to the committee members, the farewell dinner was actually a blast. Speeches as usual but the best part was when the video show where all the Pan Asia managers wishing him luck in his future undertakings shown that he was very well respected in the Pan Asia region. That was just simply awesome.

The man looking back at himself. We had a small welcome gift, a note clipper, where the man's face was put up and some quotes he given out before. And then, they dressed him up in the Malay traditional costume, the Baju Melayu and suddenly, he looked like a grandpa having his birthday party. Hahaa...

I got him a farewell gift. Why did I look happier than the person receiving the present? Maybe it's really true, giving is better than receiving. As I know he loves food so much, I got him a cookbook. A cookbook specializing in Chinese soup, which I think rather fits him as he likes to cook too. And not forgetting.....

BAH KUT TEH (肉骨茶) ingredients....a must love item by all Japanese members in my company. There's just something about Bah Kut Teh and Japanese. They all love it. Too bad that the recipe book did not have a Bah Kut Teh recipe, which was why I got him the ingredients. And plus it came with Japanese recipe on the wrapping which was a plus point. Most of you might say well, it's bound to be wasted because he most probably will chuck it away. But WRONGGgg...he actually cooked it and posted it in his blog. I say he's a darn good cook. The outcome was actually believable. Haha..I hope he tried out all the recipe in the book.

He said he might come back to Malaysia when he retire in 7 years via the Malaysia 2nd Home program. It's cheaper to retire in Malaysia than in Japan. Cheaper food, cheaper golf, nicer weather, what is there not to like about Malaysia. Politics (but he doesn't need to care about it anyway). So, I will see you in 7 years (hopefully).

p.s. Thanks to Wan for the fabulous pictures.

This is imbalance..

2009-10-25T09:31:00.004+08:00

You know you have been working too much when all your call history in your phone were your colleagues' numbers.

An ex-colleague cheekily replied to my FB status to change my number. Very funny hor..:P

This week I had been putting almost 14 hours daily into and that left me only 10 hours to myself. 1 hour to commute to work. Left 9. 6 hours for ZZZzz. Potentially left 3 hours for myself. What can I do in that 3 hours left? Watch 1 movie. :(. And that left me with no social life. And I only get to see my housemates potentially like 30 minutes per day if they haven't gone to bed yet, which is very unlikely.

Work's been challenging but being me (read: competitive by nature) cannot lose out to what others perceive (of time and design wise), so I'm going to make this work. Another 14 hours per day for next week I guess.

**I need a holiday**

Sis(Cyst) Got Cyst(Sis)

2009-10-11T07:33:00.003+08:00

Not sure in what order the title should be.

Sis just underwent ovarian cyst removal operation last Tuesday. A huge cyst measuring about 5-6cm resided for more than 1 year as she had abdominal pain since over a year ago. After constant nagging from mom, sis went for ultrasound last Saturday and found out about the cyst. Now who says mom's nagging is no good??

I now know that caring and worrying for people you love are more taxing that being sick yourself. Ferrying my family around, making calls and receiving calls, relatives visits and all the waiting were really energy sapping moments. Telling sis that it's going be alright was another way of composing our ownself that it's going to be alright.

Sis discharged from hospital on Thursday and now recuperating at hometown.

Ovarian cyst is so common nowadays that when I asked around my friends and colleagues, some of them had it, removed it or somebody close to them had it. Had our lifestyle changed so much compare with our parents generation that having ovarian cyst now is just like having bad acne breakout?

To good health.

Reformatting the Lappie

2009-10-02T22:18:00.004+08:00

Too lazy to install all the software thus the lack of Project 52 post.

No motivation to blog nowadays. But recently I found a great thing to play with.

Here it is:

Arrrhhh...made me feel like having a long nice holiday again.

Movie Screening: Beyond A Reasonable Doubt

2009-09-13T20:27:00.003+08:00

After 2 months long of working late nights, averaging 11.30pm to reach home, getting a free movie screening from NuffNang was a bonus.

Beyond A Reasonable Doubt.

I liked the plot, a twist in a twist. However, I felt that the movie was selling Jesse Metcalfe's hotbod and sweet face more. And it should be darker and slower. The scene where Jesse's characeter's best friend and partner in crime getting the evidence to break Michael Douglas's so-called DNA evidence was extremely, unnecessarily to be of such fast pace action. A high-rank cop chasing a journalist using a police car on the streets full with people. Come on, first, an "investigative" journalist shouldn't be easily scared or clumsy. Secondly, a high rank cop abused his authority so freely? Apart from the unnecesssary drama, I would say this movie was brilliantly plotted. See below for the synopsis.

The center of the film is ambitious, struggling reporter C.J. Nicholas, and his fierce suspicion that the popular and successful lead District Attorney Mark Hunter has won an unprecedented string of 17 high-profile convictions (and built his rising political reputation) by planting DNA evidence at crime scenes. Determined to expose this corruption, C.J. embarks on an audacious plan – to fabricate a collection of circumstantial evidence that seems to point to himself as a murderer, then reveal his ruse when Hunter deploys his “surprise” DNA proof, thereby exposing the corrupt DA. But Hunter proves a cannier and more dangerous adversary than C.J. had anticipated, and the young journalist must rely on the love and trust of Ella Crystal, a rising young attorney in Hunter's office, to save his career and his life. With a final twist that challenges our notions—as all great film noir does—of justice, ambition and trust, BEYOND A REASONABLE DOUBT blends a fierce intelligence and contemporary sensibility with the romance and danger that we associate with the classic Hollywood cinema that serves as its forebear.

T-Music Festival on Fire (Literally)

2009-09-13T02:11:00.004+08:00

We were half way through the show when the power lines short-circuited and caught fire. Chin was just started to perform at that time, and suddenly we heard loud bang sound. Then at first the mic went off, followed by the music and then all the lighting went off. Those who were seat at tier 3 (RM68) can clearly see the fire on the running track.

The fire went off for about a minute when somebody stupid poured some water hoping to put it off. But didn't he (it's a he because he must be a security or Rela) know that electrical items when caught on fire can be only be doused with CO2 or sand but not water? I saw that once he doused it with water, the fire came as big at the picture above!! Only 3 minutes later that somebody took the fire extinguisher to put off the flames. Imagine if this happened at the backstage and it took 3 minutes to get the fire extinguisher, I think all the singers could have died!

The management shut off all electricity and first time ever in concert, the stage was in total silence. Chin was sporting enough to stay on the stage to pose for pictures even though at first he didn't what exactly happened. Even the MC were struggling at first and then they switched to megaphone to address the crowd. The electrician took about more than half an hour to repair the damages. Within this period, Z-Chen, David Tao, Khalil Fong, Kay Tse, Sam Lee & some other singers came out to pace the crowds with megaphone by singing a lil bit of their songs.

The concert continued from there on until I left at 1.30am, Joey Yung was singing that time. Not a big fan of hers so left early. She was the last to perform.

Who were great at the concert? Power Station (damn power voices, sang for whole 30 minutes), Soler(handsome guys with hotbods and guitar, what can you ask for more?), David Tao, Z-Chen (unfortunately Z-Chen's performance were spoilt by some technical glitches, however he was sporting enough to make a joke out of it and sang I Will Always Love You by Whitney Houston acapella style while waiting for the glitches to recover). ManDHanD were good too but their performance were marred by mic problems. Sam Lee I think he was great too but I was really tired at that time. Kay Tse also good.

Galaxy 15th anniversary will be marred by this fire incident. I'm not sure how much they need to pay for the damages done on the track.

0909090909

2009-09-09T09:09:00.004+08:00

9 September 09 9.09am

Cannot miss this date to post something up although I am very tired of working late nights lately. The next date that have so much similarity will be 1010101010 (ten ten ten). Tonight we will be having a farewell dinner for one of our bosses. Looking forward for the dinner as I can go back early after the dinner.

Why this date is so special?
9 represents longevity for the Chinese, so 0909090909 is such a properous date and time that many of the Chinese couples got married although it's still in the Hungry Ghost month. But however, none of my friends are getting married today. Thought can tumpang glamour.

I wish for good health for my family on this properous date.

Happy 0909090909 for all the people in the blogosphere.

p.s. 090909 so coincidently 3 of us wore the same black and white stripes to office...ahahaa

Project 52-10

2009-08-23T10:38:00.001+08:00

Project 52-9

2009-08-23T10:34:00.001+08:00

2009-08-10T20:29:00.005+08:00

J U S T E X P A N D E D T H E R E A D I N G P A N E L

Travelling in 2010

2009-08-10T14:14:00.002+08:00

Just a day after I posted about money and how I'm struggling to control it, AirAsia is having sale to all local destination. My itchy feet longed for a trip or two. I'm sick with sore throat at home and clicked some destination offered by AirAsia and I got such an unbargainable price offered. Travel bug hit me immediately!!

RM58 return to Kuching????

So I checked next year's Rainforest Music Fest and it happens to be in July 9-11. And the price offered applied on those dates!!

Hence, I AM GOING TO SARAWAK next year!! TWICE!!!

The earlier trip will be to Mulu Caves in March. It was booked earlier this year. Got to keep the fitness up cause I heard Mulu Pinnacles is not that easy to conquer.

And so I clicked more destination. All were bargain price. And next year in May, I will go Redang Island for diving again also for the price of RM58 return trip!!!!

What a bargain!!! Okay, my sore throat is back. I will take a rest now.

Money & Me & the "thing" called credit card

2009-08-09T23:32:00.005+08:00

Last week I had a conversation with my sister regarding using the cheque for credit card payment. I am using cheque for credit card payment while she uses the online banking for payment. Each transaction costed RM2 if the credit card is from another bank and you can't pay 2 cards from the same bank in a single transaction. So my sister has 2 credit cards from 2 different banks so that will cost her RM2x12x2=RM48 per year just for her credit card payment. Where as I'm using cheque for payment which cost me (RM0.15+RM0.30)x12 = RM5.40 per year. RM0.15 is the price for a single cheque while RM0.30 is how much the stamp cost. Okay, calculate the yearly fee for current account RM20. So that's RM25.40 in total. The total I fork out for these credit card payment fees is half of what my sister is paying hers.

I am not a stingy person. I just don't like to spend on things that will not belong to me eventually. Just like the online transaction fees. I have another way make the payment without extra charges I will definitely do it.

Talking about money, here's my two sen thoughts. Money is the root of evil, so they say. But human cannot live without money, can't they? So we are the slave to money. No one complains about having lots of it, but everyone grunts when they can't afford the basic necessity. Those with lots of it will find way to earn even more. Those living without it learn how to cope with the basic. Where am I going from here? Okay, I am a slave to money, who isn't please let me know.

Money is the root of evil. I said that earlier on. But you know what is worse that that? CREDIT CARD!! Yes, that plastic card that already cause many young bankrupts. Imagine having non-existence cash that one can use without care in the world...well...until the card being rejected because of over the limit. But wait, some of us do think twice when getting an expensive purchase. But now, here comes the GRANDMOTHER of the ROOT OF THE EVIL.

THE INSTALLMENT PLANS.

Almost everywhere I can see there's 0% installment fees. For 6 months, 12 months, 24 months!! All these are making the false impresssion that one is just paying peanuts when making these purchase, hence one will make more of such purchases. And one is included yours truly here. My laptop was on installment plan, my camera was on installment plan, my facial was and still is on installment plan (just purchase a new plan 2 months ago). MUST KICK THIS HABIT!!

Just had dinner with some of my secondary school friends. 2 of them already purchase their 2nd and 3rd property and going to an auction this coming Tuesday for her 4th property while I still stared at my sad bank balance. FML. >.<

Project 52-8

2009-08-06T07:31:00.004+08:00

Project 52-7

2009-08-06T07:28:00.003+08:00

Adidas King of The Road 2009

2009-08-04T23:26:00.004+08:00

I ran the crappiest run I ever had participated in.

11km in 1h 45 min. That's like walking. I was really walking. In fact, I was really having a hard time finishing the race. Shah Alam wasn't a hard place to run. There's no slope and the weather was quite good. My left knee started to act up a quarter into the race. So I started walking fast. 3 quarter into the race, the pain reached the unbearable level that I almost wanted to give up the race. But it's all in the mind. Yea, because my sister was waiting for me at the finishing line to take picture of me, so I bear the pain and finished the damn race.

Bumped into some of the girls I met during the KL Towerthon, Mariana and Hanis. Both of them also said the run was hard as there were no markers. Lawrence and William also said the same thing.

But one thing I like about the race was the running vest was nice!

I admit I am...

2009-07-26T19:05:00.001+08:00

...but I am creative...hehehe...

Project 52-6

2009-07-22T23:35:00.001+08:00

Project 52-2-5

2009-07-22T23:31:00.002+08:00

Train tracks & Needless to Shave (anymore)

2009-07-19T17:34:00.004+08:00

I was hospitalised, ermm no, I was scheduled for surgery last Monday, thus the lack of update on this blog.

It's not a major surgery, although I was zonked out for like 50 minutes before the anasthetic effect wore off. Well, it's true they when say, the moment the patients are awake, they'll try to remove the oxygen tube from their mouth. That's what I tried to do when I was awake. They really shove that tube deep in the throat. However, my right hand was still weak, thus I didn't quite manage to take that tube out. :). My left hand was totally immobile as there was this huge bandage underarm.

I had a surgery to remove a cyst underarm. In medical term, it's called left axillary swelling. Arrghh, medical jargons. Totally cannot understand them. Got the lab report on Friday on the findings of cysts (there was 2 cyst) and all the medical terms totally cannot process into a normal human being mind.

Read this:
Foci of haemorrhage and suppuration are noted along the cyst wall fragments lined by keratinized squamos epithelium. Even with my 9 years of watching CSI, lost counts of ER episodes, I cannot fully understand the whole sentence. I know haemorrhage (bleeding) and epithelium (skin tissue). But the next sentence I could understand it well and it was a relief. No granulomas or evidence to suggest malignancy is seen. Meaning no cancer!! (Of course my surgeon explained it all to me during my visit.)

So now I had this ugly train tracks under my left arm. The sutures can only be removed next Wednesday and so I had to change the dressing daily myself. Imagine taking out the surgical tape from the underarm side (ahem, armpit la), you know being tape, it's so sticky and every time I change the dressing, it's like having a wax stripping session!! But unfortunately this stripping session does not removed the underarm hairs at all. Yikes!! So, I'm going to show my hairy underarm to my surgeon next week when he removes the sutures. Haahhaa..

On the other hand, my sister said I don't need to shave of the scar anymore as scars will not have hair follicle. True? That will save lots of hassle.

Till next Wednesday, me and my train-tracked, hairy armpit bid you adieu.

Project 52-4

2009-07-08T23:57:00.000+08:00

I was top ten in KL Half Marathon..

2009-07-04T18:44:00.005+08:00

from behind..WTF!! Shy man!! Malu-nyer malu..but nonetheless, I was brimming with happiness that I actually could finish the race. There you have it, my official results. But I want to complain. I started later than gun time. But my delay start wasn't recorded! I didn't run in 3h31min. I completed the race in 3h17min. I timed my race!!

21km-ers: Lee, me & Addy waiting miserably for the bus to come.

Started my day waking up at 4.15am to ride the shuttle bus to Padang Merbuk from Leisure Mall at 5am. But the bus took 45 mins to arrive (the brochure said every 20 mins, ngo pei!). Left Cheras at 5.45am, which means 30mins before the half marathon runners being flagged off. A 20mins ride to city centre, left us 10 mins to keep our belongings, clear our bladder and I really, really need to go for a toilet break at that point. Cleared my bowels at a nearby police station (ya, police station), I was practically running about 800m before the starting point. Warming up session, so they said.

By then, the half marathon runners were way ahead of me already. I was running on my own well, except for a few late arrivals like me. I ran a lonely race all along Jalan Loke Yew. I didn't see any runners all the way until the 5km mark. Up until the 10km mark, then only I saw the backmarkers of the half marathoners. My pace were steady and I was able to overtake most of the backmarkers.

My pace were alright all the way until I reached the National Museum. At this point I felt a little hungry and the sun started to shine. I was disappointed that I couldn't find the banana station. My first target was to reach the banana station. But there were none. Not even a sight of banana skin! And another thing that was driving me to complete the race was the sprayed-on markers on the road marking how many km-s passed the starting point. Like 7/21 meaning 7km since starting point for 21km. But the marker was missing from 11km onwards. So I was kind of lost after that.

When I reached the intersection of Jalan Sultan Sallehunddin and Jalan Raja Laut, I thought I completed the race. But I had another 2km to go. I was hungry, dizzy and thirsty and all I had in mind was, just another 2km to go, you got to do this! It was mind over matters now. One step at a time. And there you have it....

...me..on my way to the finishing line!! Look at the determination plastered all over my face! Hoong Ling was there cheering for me. It took me awhile to hear her shouting out for me. And I waved like a cray fellow. It's good to know someone was waiting at the finishing line cheering for you.

Me at the finishing line. How come I don't looked very tired?

Me and my half marathon finisher's medal.

Somehow, I found 21km (half marathon) was easier to run compared to 10km. Maybe it was more on the endurance rather than the pace. Looking forward to another 21km. But for the next one, a 10km race will be. Adidas King of the Road, 2 August 2009, Shah Alam!

Project 52-3

2009-07-01T22:18:00.001+08:00

Mana Mengo?

2009-06-29T22:53:00.007+08:00

Mango Mengo Tango Xango...
Mengo Mengo Mengo Mengo

I must be freaking nuts, you think. Well I'm not. Well maybe a lil bit, coz who will wake up at 4.30am on a SATURDAY MORNING just to join a treasure hunt that started at 7.45am? And nope, I wasn't hunting for mango

What's MENGO?

MENGO stands for Malaysian Environmental NGOs. You can check out their profile from the link. Truth to be told, I was only interested in the treasure hunt more than what they are doing (gasp!)

So back to the treasure hunt. There were approximately 130 teams, each team comprised of 4 people. The Quickie crew were there too with Belinda and Zher Peen and they were filming their hunt. Maybe our team was filmed too..hehe..

My thinking hat (hehe, not mine la)

Ok, back to my team. The name "ACT NOW" courtesy of team leader Mr. Adrian Yeo. Yea, my team mate from AXN BIG Challenge. Next up, Ms. Li Ann, my ex-colleague, also my previous winning team from the AXN Beach Challenge together with Adrian, and lastly was Lawrence, my ex-colleague, first time teaming with him.

Team ACT NOW: Lawrence, me, Li Ann, Adrian (pic courtesy of mytomyam.blogspot.com)

Our hunt started in Padang Timur, PJ. We had to take the LRT from Taman Jaya to KL Sentral and there were 5 questions along the route. The very first answer was just right in front of the station. I noticed some of the newbies ran off straight to the LRT which caused them to travel back sometime later. From KL Sentral, we had to take LRT again to Dang Wangi and then walked a distance to Bukit Nanas to take the Monorail to Hang Tuah station. The questions at this route were tougher for my standard. Some serious concentration was needed. Some example was "Sounds like a mouse hiding under a Hilton". And the answer was Paris Miki signboard right in from of Times Square. I should have gotten it right but the answer only realised to me after the event. Sigh.

Queing in KL Sentral

Then from Hang Tuah, we travelled back to KL Sentral and from there we walked towards the ending point at MGS Brickfields. The questions got so tough that we decided to take a break and had some cendol before proceeding. Like that also can?? Anyhow, we managed to submit our answer without any time penalty. :)

Cendol break.

Team ACT NOW got 12th placing, with 80 out of 110 marks. Not bad considering we were competing against some professional hunters. Yea, they do exist!! Check out their score.

Our loot of the day.

3 Pin Folding Plug

2009-06-24T23:41:00.001+08:00

I hope it really works!!

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/06/23/uk-folding-plug-concept-could-flatten-that-bulky-british-adapter/

Project 52-2

2009-06-23T23:59:00.001+08:00

Female Tennis Player Grunting..

2009-06-21T10:04:00.002+08:00

Lately in the news, there were some complains about how loud the female player's grunt. At first I thought what nonsense was that about because I know sometimes, just like in karate or judo, you just shout out loud just to get the nerves out. But after watching the video below, I now know why.

Just like the commmentator said, "If you close your eyes, you thought it was a torture chamber".

Project 52-1

2009-06-17T23:57:00.001+08:00

Z-Chen Mini Concert at the Gardens

2009-06-13T00:36:00.005+08:00

I was expecting a showcase and album signing, but to my surprise it was a full-flegded mini concert. And when I say mini, it was only the venue that was mini, Z-Chen performed like a superstar on fire for 2 and half hours!! Many of his inner circle friends came to support. I saw Yang Wei Han, lead from the Siddartha: Musical. Vivian Tok from MYfm was there too. Plus many artist that I could recognise the face but cannot remember the name.

The show started about 8.30pm at the Gardens Ballroom (first time ever a concert ever held there) with Z-Chen opening with a new song from his latest album 暗戀: 張智成. Then followed by a series of his older songs by Malaysian songwriters. Then it came down to a part where Z-Chen played tribute to his best friend A-Sang who passed away in April by singing her song LEAVES and when he sang 保佑我, I almost wanted to cry <shy>. A-Sang's sister who came down to Malaysia was called on stage and was given a big hug from Z-Chen. The mood quickly change after the beat become uptempo a bit. When he came back to encore, the whole ballroom stood up and danced with him when he sang 迷魂陣. After that it was 暗戀, the whole ballroom sang along with him. And that's the cue to finish....NOT...

Z-Chen came back for a second encore!! This time he sang Monica by Leslie Cheung, and English songs, One Sweet Day by Mariah Carey and Believe by Cher. It was like a party inside the ballroom.. Everyone was so hype up and danced along. It was 11pm when the concert ended.

Z-Chen, you are truly a superstar!!

Opening with some dancers
Even Micheal Guang Liang also came to support!!

Singing comfortably on a chair.

Tribute to A-Sang who passed away in April.

A-Sang sister who was overwhelmed by emotion.

p.s. Will try to get some video uploaded!!

Project 52: That 7 Days of My Life

2009-06-09T21:48:00.003+08:00

Prologue

In less than 2 hours (one and a half hours to be exact) I will turn 29.
Which means it will be the final year I will be spending my twenty's..(hu hu..). So before I go complaining, "Damn it, I'm 30 already", I'm making a blog tribute (not sure if it's the correct words) to what I'll be doing in those 365 days starting tomorrow until June 9 2010.

And the title for the project will be...

Project 52: That 7 Days of My Life

Once a week, starting next Wednesday, I'll put a collage of 7 pictures taken daily for the previous week and highlighting the event(s) that got me really excited or looked forward to. There might be some blank picture for some days (I hope not) if there's nothing special going on, but maybe I could just take a picture of my dinner, or lunch or maybe the shoe I'd be wearing that day. Anyway, I hope I will get this blog project running until I got a full 52 weeks, my full 29th year living in this planet.

Happy birthday to me..:)

Now, for my birthday wish...

First week after American Idol ended...

2009-05-29T14:08:00.008+08:00

For the past 3 months, I looked forward to Thursday & Friday nights to watch American Idol. Now that it ended last week, suddenly those two nights just seem so blank to me. And wtf that Kris Allen won that show when Adam Lambert was so good. Man, those Americans were so damn kolot.

Today, I suddenly looked up in the sky and saw...

Is that an eclipse or what? Why did the moon looked so red to me?

Anyway, it's end of May already. Normally, this is the time where people goes, oh man, look how the time flies, it's middle of the year already...Yeap, that's true. It's mid of the year and I'm so looking forward to it..because...it's my birthday next month.

Not just any ordinary birthday but it's the one that will be last one in the 20's...Gosh, I suddenly felt that I have to be very responsible for what I'll be doing next. Maybe I should..:)

Anyway, I'll start a new project in my blog for celebrating my last year of my twenties. It'll be called Project 52: That 7 Days of My Life. Maybe some of you might have heard about Project 365, where one took daily pictures of their life and post it in the blog. I found that it's too heavy for me to post daily pictures in the blog, so I thought why not collect all the pictures taken daily, crop it into a big picture and post it. It'll be more fun as I can choose to highlight that one or two or three most exciting day of my life in a particular week. I'm so looking forward to it now. Can't wait to get older...hahahaa

2009-05-21T07:42:00.000+08:00

In a month's time, I will be doing this...

Not all of it, just half of it.

It's the Standard Chartered Kuala Lumpur Marathon happening on the 28th June 2009. I registered for half marathon like 2 months ago and started to train for it. But unfortunately, training took some time off due (see my side bar - training log) to work and my plain laziness. So now I hope I can get pass the banana station which is at 15km.

Got to work the training!!

To give or not to give

2009-05-06T23:05:00.005+08:00

Remember her?

She gave, whole-heartedly, no regrets or whatsoever, and came back with a souvenir as big as the Mercedes Benz logo seven times over.

And now she has returned with a story to tell, and a mission to accomplish, and a dream to inspire others to do the same.

Be an organ donor today.

I already am since I was 18, what stops you to do so?

Hoong Ling successfully donated 60% of her liver to save An Qi, a 13 year old girl suffering from liver cancer. Both donor and recipient are growing healthily now as I type this. It has been 4 months since she donated her liver and now that her story has reached the masses, and riding on the wave of the popularity of the story, she now is preparing the second wave of her mission which is to inspire other people to pledge to become an organ donor.

How?

First, Hoong Ling is now writing a book based on her experience throughout the journey. Of what inspired her to become first become a organ donor and then becoming a living organ donor. From then on, she will published her book and promote it out to the public, not to promote herself but to inspire others to pledge to become an organ donor.

Secondly, now that her writing is already a work in progress, Hoong Ling started a new wave of promotional idea by giving a mascot to the campaign. The mascot is already out and currently she is running a "Name the mascot" campaign at her website. Spread the news! I am proposing "DOTIE" as abbreviation for Donate Organ Today, Inspire Everyone.

Thirdly, one's man burden will be as light as a feather if shared. Hoong Ling now is looking for some help in order to get the book out in the market. It's in the midst of editing and soon will be published. Support her in terms of RM (money) or whatsoever you think may help. I am no help in terms of publishing a book. Best if you can purchase the book from her. Contact her at hoongling@hoongling.com for offering her help.

Thanks a bunch!

Beautiful

2009-04-30T21:29:00.003+08:00

If I didn't answer your call by the 7th time you ring me..

2009-04-28T23:12:00.005+08:00

a) I might hate you...seriously..:P

b) I might drop my phone into the toilet bowl..seriously it happened to my friend before

c) I might lost my phone to a snatch thief

of all the probabilities above, I think the c) would be the highest in Malaysia because it happened to my sister's friend last Sunday.

We were supposed to go for buffet at Jogoya at 5pm. My sister sms-ed her at 4pm to park at Starhill and she still replied ok. After that all calls went to voice mail at first ring. Somehow it just seemed so wrong. If she were to ffk at last minute at least a sms or a phone call to inform. That was like no response or anything at all. Like suddenly disappear into thin air. So my sister thought that she might lost her phone to snatch thief (whoa!!)

So we went ahead for buffet without waiting anymore. We waited like an hour before proceeding. The next day, my sister told me that her friend really got snatched by robbers when she was crossing the road. So suey. I mean how high is the coincidence that she really got snatched?

Like seriously...

3am

2009-04-25T10:16:00.002+08:00

3am.

It was the record for me to work that long in office in my 7 years working life. The latest I remember going back late was like 7 years ago when I was just a greenie and needed to help my senior to finish up some task and that was up until 12am.

Yesterday, it was a different role for me. I am a subleader now. I have to make sure my portion works so that other members who are going to carry out testing at supplier site will not have problem once they are there. We wrapped up at 3am once we concluded the risks and the ways to counter them. And part of the team will continue to troubleshoot on Monday.

It's amazing that my brain can still process information at such late hour. There were people who will grew impatient and grouchy once it gets late in the night. Some were unresponsive or slow to response. I am still calm but gets hungry very quickly. This is just the beginning of a new project. Foreseeing many many more late nights.

On the other hand, on Thursday, my group, there are 4 of us, received a very, very good news. Although it has not been formally inform yet, but it seems to be 99% surety. The news have boost up our confidence and commitment to perform even better.

What I did today exactly 1 year ago

2009-04-21T15:31:00.000+08:00

at 4pm in front of Times Square, KL.

A year had passed so quickly that I don't even realise it.

A year, 12 months, 52 weeks, 365 days.

I held my head real high and proud to carry that torch. I'm pretty sure my family members who were there to support were too. But it's time to look for new adventures and continue this journey called, LIFE!

My Hair Story

2009-04-11T10:11:00.009+08:00

~~Girls~~ Women and their hair story.

Aplenty.

Curls, coloured, side parting, no parting, bob-style, crop-short, pixie cut.

You name it.

Personally I cannot comprehend a person that can stand the same hairstyle 3 years, never change even once. Believe it, I do know such a person. And the hairstyle isn't really nice looking (you know ala 90's Chinese school girl where the hair is mandatory to keep above shoulder length, yeah, that type.)

So here I would like to share my hair experience. Friends who know me better know that I change my hairstyle as often as the inspiration comes to me. If not, I would just stay at that one look, which you will notice in the pics below. I would call that my transition period hairstyle.

I tried to find more pictures pre 2006, but they were all stored away in some disc and was too lazy to dig them up so my hair story will start from 2006. Pre 2006, it was more on colours and short fringe type. So here we go.

2006 March.

One of my transition period hairstyle.

2006 September. Trying get my hair as long as possible.

2007 February. During Chinese New Year.

2007. 4th day into Chinese New Year. Bob-style was instyle then.

2007 April. My bob at it's best look.

2007 August. My bob got coloured.

2007 early December. Hair got longer.

2007 late December. My favourite hairstyle. Red and stylish.

2008 February. Still red and hot. Very high maintenance hairstyle.

2008 September. It got to the bob again. :( Boring

2008 October. Short fringe bob.

2008 December. Short fringe bob. Now I looked like a teacher. Sien.

2009 January. Here comes the transition period hairstyle again.

Then I got inspired! Here's Samantha Who lead actress hairstyle. I got a similar hairstyle. Believe it! (Just that my fringe is short because it wasn't long enough to carry her style, yet)

So, here I was in SNIPS saloon in Leisure Mall with hairstylist, Cammy.

Cut, cut snip, snip. She said my hair was too healthy and jetblack.

So, colour it will be more refreshing.

Voila, after the dyeing session.

Now, it's the perm time. This thing was called Magic Perm. Uses electricity and it was damn hot!! One of the assistant needed to keep blowing cool air into my hair to keep it cool. And I was like "here, hot, left, up, lower, hot", giving her directions where the hot location was.

All the cotton thingy was to prevent the heat going to my head. But still very very hot!! (I know I looked funny)

After the curler was taken down. I cannot help laughing at myself.

Now it was time for treatment. I got smoke in my head!

Didn't look any difference yet.

Cammy helped to style my hair. And it looked really nice.

Here's a look a few days after having my hairstyle change.

Haha..I wonder how long will it be until the next change. Hair length and time that is.

AXN BIG Challenge - The Experience

2009-04-05T21:58:00.002+08:00

Here's my recollection of what happened yesterday during the AXN BIG Challenge sponsored by Malta and LG.

Reaching the mall around 11.30am and went straight to the registration booth to realise registration starts at 12pm but my partner still running some errands in KL city centre!! Gasp!! Luckily registration was quite slow moving as the participants need to write down their name & ICs and sign some indemnity forms. So I queued along CK and Karlye while waiting for Adrian to reach 1Utama. It was sort like a mini Tahan expedition reunion as me, Adrian, CK, Karlye & Lydia got chosen to participate in this AXN challenge. Got a quick lunch at 12.30pm before proceeding to Highstreet where briefing starts at 1pm. Chelsey from SpannerWorks gave us a quick briefing about the race before passing the mic to DeeLu from CoreZone to give us the safety instructions. After that it was race time!!

There were total of 15 checkpoints (CP). CP1 to CP8 can be carried out in random order whereas CP9 to CP15 must be carried out in sequence. We were given an envelope where all the clue cards for CP1 to CP8 and the passport to get all our stamps once we cleared the CP's task.

As the horn went off, Adrian & I and CK & Karlye dashed towards CP2, the diagonal abseil which we thought was the CP1. However as we realised many others were aiming to the same spot we changed our strategy and checked on of the other clue cards given, CP4 which contained a key. Of those places that contained a locker could be the bowling alley or the fitness center. As we mad dashed around the corner towards the staircase, Adrian caught some locker along the way and tried our key, number 28. And surprisingly the locker opened and there was a crosswords puzzle, a fastforward to CP2, where we had to find out 5 AXN shows before proceeding to the task itself. There's no way to do this on the run, so we chucked it aside and ran all the way up to Camp5.

We were 2nd group at Camp5. Lydia's team reached before us. Here we got to climb over a boulder, jumped down approximately from 2m high, do a traverse rope challenge and then climb another 5m high wall climbing! And voila, we got our first stamp! Next up CP2. Along the way I tried to fill up the crosswords puzzle. Couldn't get much as I don't have Astro in my house, so when we reached there and submitted out "fastforward pass" to the marshall, imagine our horror as we just got 3 correct answers. Now we needed to get another 2 correct, but can't think of any other shows so we just hantam all those that sounded like a tv show and hoped that we somehow got them correct. Wasted almost 10 minutes doing so before finally got it correct. CP2 was the diagonal abseil while doing the maths (addition & subtraction only), which is considered quite an easy task for me (I'm an engineer, if simple maths cannot do, die la!). Both of us need to carry out the task in a separate abseil, my line's answer was 11, I totally forgotten about Adrian's answer (I think it was about 60+). One funny thing here was that I came down before Adrian and I went to his line and poked the fellow who I thought was Adrian. It was the marshall instead. Haha. There was a team that got penalty for getting the answer wrong. 10 minutes penalty, but I considered that we already got ours when trying to solve the puzzle up there.

Next clue was "There's a field here" which pointed towards the futsal field. Aplenty thanks to Karlye to mention about it earlier on. This CP7 was quite easy. All we had to do was to dribble the ball in zig-zag manner and shoot to the goal. With one eye covered with eyepatch. We completed the task in zippy manners and rushed to the next CP, the Teh Tarik Task, CP3. In Teh Tarik task, one member had to pull the tea, from above the head level to the waist level while doing a 360degree turn and the other member had to finish teh drink. While Adrian was doing the task, I took the opportunity to drink water as much as I could (there's no water station up until here.) But then eye-hand coordination tak betul we swapped task and I pulled the tea and Adrian drank it. Then off to CP5, the capsule challenge. Capsule challenge was easy but intense. We had to find 5 AXN challenge flag rolled into many many small capsule (like those pills). This task reminded me of the Amazing Race 3 where the participants need to crack open the fortune cookies to retrieve their clue. We beat an all girls team while doing this because we didn't pull out all the paper as they did. We just peeped inside and if it's blank then it's not the correct ones. The correct ones had red colour tones to it.

One of the clues, CP8 showed a carpark sign, Level 3 8M. We got there and saw the clue showing the Batting cage! We should knew it that this place should be one the task and could have check it out when doing the futsal thingy thus could have save a lot of time. Anyway, the task here was to pitch the ball through a number which chosen earlier. Each member had to complete the task and was given 15 balls and had to pitch through 4 times. And this was the must do task, no penalty given, which means if we didn't get it through the first time, we got to queue all over again to do it. Adrian got through the second time, I only got through after the third try. It was at this CP where we realised that at CP4, the locker key, we need to get a stamp from the producers themselves. And the producers were mobile. Meaning they walked everywhere along the CPs. As I had to queue again for the pitching, Adrian ran down to CP2 for the stamp. It took him almost 20 minutes before reappearing at CP8 as the producers were walking about. I even saw one of them up in CP8.

Now we had our final CP to go which is CP6 evacuation point, outside of 1 Utama building. It was supposed to be a crime scene investigation game here but unfortunately the rain has ruined all the evidence. Wow, sounded like a TV show here. So we just got our stamp on our passport and off to the sequenced checkpoint.

From CP1 to CP8, for every completed task we were given a small piece of puzzle. The puzzle will show the location of CP9. We already guessed the location of CP9 when we saw the AXN fellow standing in the lift. The task was to count the number of AXN logo at the banner in the time duration of the lift going from level G to level 5. One lesson learnt here was to read the task card carefully. We were counting all the logo when Adrian realised there's something wrong with the banner and the way we were calculating them. The answer was 28 anyway.

At CP10, the codebreaker. This task was mind grueling as well. The code was pasted on a glass panel facing the sun. Imagine the glare!! The broken code sounded like this. "This is Agent 701 from checkpoint...(sorry already forgotten the whole message)". After breaking the code, we need to sms the message out using the LG phone to a number decoded in the message and wait for the "Go" in the return sms. We waited and got our first response back asking us to "try again". Die la, what went wrong. It couldn't be we decoded message wrongly. Adrian rechecked the message and realised instead of typing "CHECKPOINT", he typed "CHECLPOINT". We resend again the correct message and this time we got it correct. Yahoo!!

CP11 was kind of tricky. We were given a clue card, just a picture from a view looking down at the one side of 1Utama. We found the view where the pciture was taken but at a higher level and we went from level 5 to level 4 to level 3 before getting it correct. This was the Malta Challenge. Adrian was blindfolded while I had to give him instructions on putting puzzle pieces together. At first it was quite ok as my instructions were quite clear. Then when the first team completed theirs and other teams started to arrive, all my instructions went haywire. All I remembered shouting out was just "Turn, Turn, Turn, Turn, Turn".........I am pretty sure Adrian's expression was like this "_" at that point. Upon finishing the puzzle, we must drink up a Malta Quench drink each. Refreshing. Again no water station.

"Merdeka, Merdeka, Where to park" was the clue given for CP12. We were stumped at this clue. Merdeka, where could it be? What came into mind was Dataran Merdeka. Where to park? It's the parking lot. So we rushed to the parking lot and the leading team, Team 14 was already on their way to the next CP. Here we got to soak our feet into ICE COLD WATER for 2 mins 24 sec. This was challenging both mentally and physically!! My feet almost cramped and my mind kept on wanted to give up but thanks to Adrian's consistant persuasion that I held that long. (All my Malta I give to u).

CP13: An exercise a man can practise. Yoga? Celebrity fitness it is! Again mad dash to Celebrity Fitness as we know the leading team were not that far. Adrian did a serial of exercises while I did the pole dancing. It was a quick CP stop for us. Next clue "Read more for less". As a frequent book reader, I was sure this was Payless Bookstore. We reached here before the leading team. But they reached just mere seconds after us. So now we were neck to neck! We were required to find a book based on the clue given and collect the bookmark inside and pass to the marshall and get our final clue card. Completed in no time and we were leading now!! Yay!!

We knew where the last checkpoint was because we stumbled on it while looking for CP6. CP15! Here we come!! In CP15, we need to paddle across the lake in a tyre tube, come back with a pingpong ball holding up in a spoon in our mouth. We got to play it dirty and wet here. Aahhh...who cares now!! Plasma TV is in our hands now because even if the other team arrives, this game was a queue system, unless either one of us dropped the pingpong ball, then we will get a 10 minute penalty. But then again, the other team didn't show up even after 10 minutes, so we were 100% sure we were winning this challenge. We even had the time to discuss whether to put on our shoes and how our entrance to the finishing line should be. WTF? Haha..

Ok, we decently make our entrance to the finishing line (so unlike us) at 5.15pm. 45 minutes ahead the expected time to finish by the organisers. And waited for another 30 minutes before the second team arrived. The third team arrived 15 minutes after that. Had our 10 seconds of fame being interviewed by the MixFM Djs and then proceeded to the prize giving ceremony.

Third place RM300 from AXN, RM1000 from Malta and one LG DVD player each!
Second place RM500 from AXN, RM2000 from Malta and one LG handphone worth RM1000 each!!
First prize, RM1000 from AXN, RM3000 from Malta and ONE 42" LG PLASMA TV EACH!! EACH!! EACH!! (And we were discussing earlier what to do with the plasma TV if there's only one given.)

I'm all sore now but still very, very, very happy with the results.
No cameras were allowed during the race, but there were pre-event and prize giving ceremony pictures here. Unfortunately all our passport and clue card were taken away by marshall after the race. So no pictures of that either. :(

p.s. Karlye asked me to do this. Their team was leading all the way until they had to find the producers to stamp their passport for CP4!

AXN Big Challenge Winner!!

2009-04-05T08:37:00.002+08:00

And we are so slutting it!!

Thank you AXN!

Thank you LG!

Thank you Malta!

p.s. Have to do a memory recollection before posting the whole mad dash in 1U!

AXN BIG CHALLENGE

2009-04-03T00:09:00.003+08:00

I'm gonna win it,

I'm gonna win it!!

Wait, the event will only takes place this Saturday?

(In 1 Utama New Wing at 2pm-7pm)

But I couldn't care any less.

I'm just going to win it, with my partner in crime of course.

So damn confident,

But then, why participate if not for winning it.

Completing the race ain't just going to do it.

Being the champion it is!

We are talking about AXN Penang Beach Challenge 2006 Champion here.

Was asked by Adrian aka my partner in crime (for things like this) via email a month back whether to enter this AXN Big Challenge which is happening in 1 Utama this year. I said what the hell not because back in 2006, we drove all the way from KL to Penang just for the AXN Beach Challenge. Nevertheless, we got first place. :)

So this time, we needed to submit a team particulars, a team photo (we didn't meet each other since Gunung Tahan expedition, so I'm guessing he sent the Gunung Tahan pictures..err wait, I think met him in Youth 09 event...arrhh...nevermind) and a slogan on why we wanted to join AXN Big Challenge. Adrian did a hell of a job writing up the slogan and kudos to him (I salute kau kau for his creativity as I won't be able to write such thing in such a short notice). So this is what he wrote:

Both are adrenalin junkies, she bungee-d and I’ve trekked the lost world of Maliau. Poking our nose at every opportunity to join the TARA every single year, but to no avail, yet are loyal supporter of AXN’s events. From Penang’s Beach, to KL streets and now the BIG one. She’s high in life, enjoying her travels in search for new adventures, ate bugs in streets of Khaosan, and soaked the sun in the Irrawady delta. I am a green freak who flies the eco flag, promoting tree planting to reducing carbon footprint and recently hunting waterfalls seems to be catchy. We just can’t seem to get ourselves being idle. Last March we conquered Mt Tahan, enjoyed a night of icy rain and had the pleasure of toilet with a mountain view. Coloured & Bliss.... life. What’s next, THE B!G ADVENTURE, they say it’ll bring on Malta spice and MIX of adventure in 1 big UTAMA mall. It shall be HOT and true to AXN’s spirit, expect the unexpected. “I don’t believe!” We say game on. Else, we’ll be both stuck at out office desk bound job on a lousy weekend. Cheers.

And what's great is that he don't even need to ask me what have I been doing to come up with such a slogan. Nope I don't call it a slogan, I'm callling it a heck of a pimping our adventure to the AXN people. AXN is full of adventurous, if they don't choose us for this, I can go bang my head to the wall (with my pillow as a barrier, eheh).

Okay, so we waited for the closing date. And waited for another week to pass, by now, my spirit has gone lower than 50% for the chances of getting selected for the event. But, hello AXN, this Monday, I received a call from Adrian, and I don't even need to wait for him to say hello, I took it as a sign that we have been shortlisted for the race. Yee-ha..

Sports shoes...checked!
Long pants...checked! (no long pants, only at knee length, boleh la AXN boss)
What else?
Must reach there by 12pm, okay. (making a mental note here)
Race will be at New Wing to (oh shit I forgot where)

I have no expectation of what the race will be like. I mean the format. Could it be like a treasure hunt? Cracking some weird coding? Doing some weird stunts? Running from checkpoint to checkpoint confirm to be the format as it has always been the practice of AXN challenges. But the cut off time is at 7pm. It's a whole 5 hours there. Oh my, what is going to happen this Saturday!!

Another note of excitement was that another pair of my friends, CK and Karlye also got in!! So now we can combine our strength and win the AXN Big Challenge. Sorry ar CK, Karlye, we are taking the first place, second place you guys take la..hehee...

So if you guys are reading this and plan to go to 1 Utama this Saturday in the afternoon, come and say hi to me! I'll most probably be like a madwoman running around the mall. Wait, I think no running is allowed. Power walking be it!

Putrajaya 1st Hot Air Balloon Fiesta

2009-03-24T06:41:00.005+08:00

Writer's block lately, thus pictures make amend. :)

Happy balloons in the air!

Pink elephant saying hi!

Fire in the hole!!

Peacock's backside and smiling clown!

Me and my Nescafe!

Zorbing! Great fun! Can't talk inside coz all we did was "Ahahaa!!!" & "Ahhahhahaaa!!" Run hamster run!

My sister's funnier inside the ball...akakaaa..See a video of hers.

World Forestry Day: Tree Planting 3 By Eco Warrior

2009-03-22T20:20:00.011+08:00

brown water. muddy trek. long way. hot sun. kids. adults.
10000 trees. 700 plus volunteers. one aim.
raja musa peat swamp reserve forest.
world forestry day. 21 march 2009.

Happy tree planters

;)

KL Marathon 2009

2009-03-20T14:09:00.003+08:00

I must be nuts to sign up for half marathon for the Standard Chartered KL Marathon this year. The run will take off at Dataran Merdeka on June 28, which left me around 3 months to train up my stamina. And training starts tonight!

Full marathon is 42.195km. (I shall conquer you one fine day)

Half marathon, divide the amount by half and you'll get 21.097km. How far is that exactly? It's as far as driving from my office to my place in Mahkota Cheras. Again, I must be crazy to do this. But then again, I participated in countless times in 10km run. So my target is to see how much further I can run past 10km mark. Brilliant target!

This map shows the route for the half marathon event. Seems achievable target. Just wondering if could complete within the cut-off time, 3 hours. :)

Half marathon, here I come.

Other nutties joining FULL MARATHON includes Leelee. Best wishes dear!

World Forestry Day 21 March 2009

2009-03-17T22:28:00.009+08:00

While the rest of the world is talking about Earth Hour which will takes place only next week, I am promoting World Forestry Day happening this Saturday 21 March 2009. Like many other "World Day" which coincidentally ALL occurs in March ..

21 March World Forestry Day - I'm planting trees
22 March World Water Day - I'm saving waterfall
23 March World Meterological Day - I'm seeing stars (just joking)
28 March Earth Hour - I'm turning off the lights

So what's happening this Saturday here in Malaysia, very near to you, just 45 minutes northbound from Kuala Lumpur in a peat forest called Hutan Simpan Raja Musa in Batang Berjuntai, Eco Warriors will plant 10000 (target) in conjunction with the World Forestry Day.

So, I'll be there planting many trees and hope to see more people joining this activity. Drop me a comment if any additional information is needed.

Meanwhile, while waiting for the day to come, first take a look at the previous tree planting hosted by Eco Warriors. It's rewarding to see all the hardwork (sweat and ~~blood~~) in some certain way will benefit the future.

Diving in Tioman

2009-03-13T23:12:00.010+08:00

What a tiring weekend last week. Got a long weekend break as Monday was a public holiday. So instead of going back to hometown, I went for a diving trip to Tioman with my best travelling buddy, AC.

I got my diving license 4 years back and since then I didn't do any dive at all. So I was all nerves as I had to relearn all the skills before going into the water to say hello to the underwater creatures.

We departed on a Saturday night bus at around 11.30pm and arrived in Mersing around 5.30am. There's only one word to describe the bus journey. COLD! Too cold until it was impossible to sleep at all. Once arrived in Mersing we headed to the jetty. The last time I was here, the bus station and the jetty was just like 5 minutes away. But it seems that either one of them has relocated, thus both of us walked like 20 minutes to reach the jetty.

Once reached there, we got our ferry tickets booked earlier on. But for those who travel to Tioman without prior bookings, do not worry because they sell tickets on the spot too. We were stumped to know about this as we delayed our trip 1 day later because the ferry was apparently full when we initially called to ask. Damn it. Anyway, we waited for our ferry to arrive at 6.30am and talked crap to each other.
Believe it when I say we had a boarding pass for the ferry ride. Haha. Brilliant idea even though we just got to hold the boarding pass like for 10 meters only before giving the pass to the ferry operator. Tioman was 3 hours away from Mersing. So what else to do than to sleep.

Once reached Salang jetty, we were greeted by AC ex-colleagues, Michelle and Sam. Almost most of them are divers. So it was like a company trip to them. So nice. Luckily for us to meet them at the jetty because Maxis has no coverage in Salang beach. Lousy. Cannot call home to tell mom I safely arrived. Blek to Maxis. Dropped our bags in Pondok Seri Salang, nice hut just 3 mins away from the dive centre and headed to breakfast. After breakfast we prepared for the first dive.

A refresher course for both me and AC. A refresher course means a course to refresh your underwater skills. We did a BCD setup check, buddy check, regulator-snorkel exchange, swim around abit, mask removal and fin pivot. It's amazing that I still can remember how to do the skills mentioned. I think it's kind of like riding a bicycle. Once learnt will never forget. A bit clumsy, yes, but cannot forget.

Then we went around the jetty for a while before emerging from the water. Lots of Nemo and Dory there. Haha. Easiest to identify these 2 fishes as they were very colorful. Rested a bit, had lunch and then proceeded with the second dive of the day. Yea, diving trips are like this. You eat, you dive, you eat again and you dive again and then you sleep for the rest of the day. I slept like a pig from 9.30pm till 8.30am.

Second dive was a boat dive at Batu Malang dive site. I like and dislike boat dive. Like it because I can do the backroll entry, dislike it because I will have a bad, bad case of seasickness everytime the engine's not running. So most of the time, I will be the second to jump into the water after the divemaster. Highlight in the second dive was a huge cuttlefish aka sotong about 1m length. Unlike the normal small once available in the market, this one was really huge. Others were clownfish aka Nemo, barracudas and pufferfish. Many others I can't identify (yet). As our tank (air tank that is) still left about half, we proceeded with the third dive in Pulau Soyak. More of Nemo and Dory here. We ended our dive around 5pm.

Next day, we were up and about around 8.30am in the morning thinking that we were going for a morning dive. Unfortunately, things turned around and we only departed for our first dive at 12pm. This time was Fan Canyon. The name of the site itself already disclosed what we will be seeing underwater. There were this huge fan looking sea fan all around the dive site. Highlights of this dive we saw a turtle! Pipe Fish! Stingray! Spanish Dancer! Whitetip Reef Shark!! Pictures courtesy of Alex. Thanks man.

The turtle. (What's up dude?)

The stingray. (Who's Jimmy Ray?)

The white tip shark. (Now I can say I swam with a shark. But this shark was sleeping apparently. :P)

Water temperature was just 28 degrees Celcius and it was quite cold for me. We didn't get to the shore after the first dive. We rested on the boat for our compulsary rest period between dive which was more like a fighting-with-seasickness period than resting period for me. Upon exiting the water, the effect of immediate. I can't even looked up as what a normal cure for seasick is to look at a faraway land. Can't do that. So I just closed my eyes and basked in the afternoon sun while waiting miserably for the 50 minutes to gone by while the rest of the divers eating their tapau-ed lunch. :(. All hell broke loose (in my stomach) when 50 minutes gone by. Once I stood up to prepared for the next dive, whatever was left in my stomach came out, to feed the fishes. Hahaa. Once my fully digested nasi lemak was out, I was as healthy as a tiger. And I backrolled in the water almost immediately.

Second dive of the day was in Batu Malang again. There was a slight current this time. So we went against the current first and then drifted back to the boat. Highlights of this dive was the cave exploration or more like a swim-through some holes. Struggled a bit to control the buoyancy at the first one but managed to get through the second one quite well. We also saw a jellyfish bobbing around.

That's our divemaster, Ezad with the jellyfish.

We ended our dive for the day and back to shore. There was an incident which caused death the a diver that happened on this day in Batu Malang. A Japanese female diver who came from Singapore was hit by the propeller of the boat. What an unfortunate outing for her. May she rest in peace.

Okay back to Tioman Island. Tioman island, an idyllic place to take a break from the hustle and bustle of city life and how true it was. Imagine this, food was served in such a slow manner that I almost wanted to die out of hunger. On the last day, I ordered cheeseburger for lunch/tea and 20 minutes later only to be told that there's no cheeseburgers available, how about grilled burger. Fine. So I changed to fries as we were catching to ferry soon, but to get the fries on my table, it took almost 40 minutes from the time I changed my order. Sigh. So travellers beware, please go and order your food at least one hour earlier before the hunger pang comes.

There are a lot of things to explore in Salang beach. Here's some pictures.

Here you have the famous Jambatan Konkrit. Yeap, the one on the right side. :P

Then you have lots of iguanas. Big iguanas. If you zoom the picture, you can almost see the crabs on the right side. The crabs have only one side of the clamps sufficiently sized-up. I can't see the other clamp.

Big iguanas, really! See the size ratio between foot and the iguana which was further away. I say they were almost 6-7 feet long.

The dive centre. Azmi dive centre. This picture taken on the last day.

Back to diving. The last day of diving we did 2 deep dives. 25m and 28m deep. The first was in Terdau (not sure about the spelling). I saw lionfish!! Bonus: I saw 2 lionfish next to each other. Nice. And also boxfish. Cute lil yellow box fish.

Yellow Box fish. (pic taken on Alex's earlier dive)

Second dive was a wreck dive. Here we spotted stonefish, an eel (a white small one, don't know how to identify as I only know moray eel), triggerfish and razorfish. Bonus: I saw 7 razorfish!! Razorfish was a funny looking fish that swims vertically. Really. Unfortunately photographer already went back to KL, so no pictures of razorfish. However, I googled them up. Scroll down for razorfish pictures.

Stone fish (pic taken on Alex's earlier dive. The one I saw was much bigger)

Razorfish (pic source. Told you they swam vertically)

End of the wreck dive when I was down at 70psi (that's how much air left in my tank), as we were at shallow water about 6-7 meters, I can't go deeper anymore as my total body weight including the tank has reduced as the air in the tank has reduced. So I went up. It was not good as we were supposed to do a safety stop at 5 meters for 3 minutes to release the nitrogen inside our body. And another thing was a safety measure as there might be a boat coming through as diver resurfacing without control. So the divemaster immediately pulled me down and I grabbed hold of other divers while doing the safety stop with them. Note to myself: Add more weight the next time.

Nemo aka clownfish
Some nudibranch.

Some underwater creature I cannot identify.

Honeycomb grouper.

I must learn to identify these.

Some fish. :)

A lot of fishes. I think these are ikan kembung.

Mermaids! :)

On the way back, me and AC purposely chosen seats right in front of the TV in the ferry as we wanted to watch the movie shown. But unfortunately we were "entertained" with some crappy karaoke MTV. Crappiest!! I cannot tahan that I needed to take photo as a proof to show how crappy it was.

Crap or not? 3 hours of these!

I won something from KYspeaks.com

2009-03-07T09:40:00.004+08:00

I am a contest addict.
Joined a lot of them with little thoughts of winning. Who knows, I might a get shot of winning just by participating.

A lot of people ask, "Eh, how come you always win stuff/contest?"

I replied, "If you don't join, then you never gets the chance to win!"

So..(back to story)

Got an email from OMD saying that I won the U-Mobile contest running in KYspeaks.com back in January. I thought I didn't win anything as nearly 2 months has passed. Nevertheless it was nice to win something.

So this is what I won.

Surprise awaiting.

A big bag of U-Mobile merchandise.

Okay, they only have the prepaid number and RM50 reload card which catches my eyes. Others were the big metal water bottle which I have like 4 of them from various activities that I joined. A table calendar, which I don't use. A nice pen. A handphone tag cum screen cleaner. And many many U-Mobile brochure.

I will not use this number as I have my own number. Who wants a brand new U-Mobile prepaid plus RM50 reload card for RM30 please drop me a message.

Cepat-cepat, siapa cepat, dia dapat!

KL Towerthon Challenge 2009

2009-03-01T20:22:00.015+08:00

Visited KL Tower today, not by the usual way, the lift, but using my own 2 feet climbing those 2058 steps up. Yeap, I'm nuts enough to participate in the KL Tower International Forest Towerthon Challenge 2009. What's nuttier than this was the fact that I managed to get to form 2 teams from my company to join this crazy event! (Well, engineers are not all geeks okay?)

Nuts people testing their muscles power.

I participated in the Women's Open category as well as the Corporate team event. Men's Open and Women's Open were flagged off separately. Men's Open participants were flagged off in 3 separate groups about 300 runners/climbers each in 15 minutes apart. Women's Open were flagged off after the Men's Open which left me a lot time to camwhore!

These 2 are my friends, Shi Wei and Su Lan from Raleigh KL. They were fundraising for their Summer 09 expedition this year to Sabah. Anyone who wants to sponsor them money or in terms of flight tickets are welcome to do so. As you can see in the picture, both their legs were tied together (I mean 1 each) and they actually completed their race I think within 1 hour. Kudos to them!

The black thing tied to my shoelace was the timing chip. It went beep beep after crossing the starting line and finishing line. That's why we cannot play cheat by joining the race half way because the time will not be taken.

Women's Open category starting line. Why am I still taking pictures? Haha..Because I know I wouldn't win the race, so by as well take some pictures for remembrance. And see who I found. B886. Yuan Yu Fang. Winner for last year's Towerthon in women's category and yea, you guessed it correctly, this year she also won it again. Her time 17 mins plus. I think I took that long to reach the second water station.

The tower half way from the starting point. Massive building. But I'm going to conquer it!

This was floor number like I'm going to count! Endless stairs to go. Can't even see the top.

Looking down. Which was a bad move because I got dizzy immediately after taking this shot.

Some of you might think wtf am I doing running with a camera? If not how can I get picture like this. 6 floors to finish. Yea, totally. I was all hyped up when I saw this sign but, calculation was that for every floor in this KL tower is equivalent to 4 flights of staircase, which easily was about 48 steps (if every flight of staircase is about 12 steps la), I want to faint already.

This is me at the end of the race.

My nutty colleagues. Yea we all completed the race. Not bad considering we were all deskbound in office.

B994 and the famous 2058 steps KL Tower.

Su Lan and Shi Wei also completed their race! See those sweaty T-shirt. All hardwork paid off.

After resting we continued our journey down. This is the queue going to the lift going down. No way I'm going to go down by the staircase anymore. I have no idea why we all were so happy. Must be the lack of oxygen up there or too much adrenaline rush to the body system.

Upon exiting the KL tower, all finisher were given a finisher medal. Wow, I haven't got a medal for a long long time already.

Results! Results! Check it out man. My team got 8th place. The other team got 10th place. But there's only 10 corporate teams participating....ahahahhaaaaa!!!

The thing is, you see, my group, 8 people, 2 girls, the rest of them guys. Only top 5 finisher's time will be calculated. Well, my name was inside at 4th position. I completed my race in 43m 33s. Which means I beat the other 3 guys. Fuuhhyoo!!!
Lastly, me and KL Tower. Yea, I conquered you. And I'm towerthon-ed, tower-ed torn!

My finisher medal. I'm going to hang it somewhere.

Craps you get everyday

2009-02-27T21:11:00.004+08:00

I was walking with my sisters in Pavilion last Sun day when we were approach by some promoter promoting the Pavilion free stuff with RM100 purchase in any stores in Pavilion. Normally, if I am interested I would have stop and take the brochure and listen to whatever stuff that is being promoted. But since we were already on our way to the parking lot, I just waved my hand and said no. I think my sisters did the same. But the stupid promoter kept on pushing the damn brochure into our hands and said,
"Why so fidgety, it’s just a brochure."
" Can’t you just listen to me for a while?"
" If like this you are not respecting me."
(Exact words in Cantonese, Tim kai kam kham cheng. Lei kam yeong chau mm chun zhong ngo.)

“YOU ARE NOT RESPECTING ME”????!!!!!

Can you imagine these words coming out from a promoter who is supposed to be promoting something to you? Shouldn’t the promoter be very the exceptionally courteous, down to earth, most probably had taken NO for an answer for XX millionth time?

Once I heard that, my blood already boiled up to the maximum. If my blood were visible, I am sure they will look like those boiling hot hot spring water, hot enough to cook eggs in it. Fuhh..!! *Steam coming out from ears*

So, I stood there listening whatever crap that fellow had to say. I even took that damn brochure and pretended to respect that damn fellow by listening attentively. After he finished his crap, he started to ask what kind of cards we were using and those kinds of stuff, what bank will have how much discounts etc. Yadda, yadda, yadda...

Once he completed asking his questions. I immediately shoved that damn brochure right in front of his face and said a firm
NO, I AM NOT INTERESTED AND THANK YOU FOR EXPLANING.
And immediately walked off with my sisters from there without even looking back.

Nah..take it back, I am respecting you by standing there like a log pretending to listen to you promoting the discount that I in the first place already not interested in and even said a thank you for wasting my time. My sister said that the promoter's face immediately turned color after I shove that brochure, but don't care. He asked for it for insulting us in the first place.

I am not being disrespectful to those promoters out there. If you are selling something that I am genuinely interested in, I will approach you. You don't even have to hardsell to me. For those who treat all their potential customers like the above, I recommend you to quit your job. Find something that doesn't require you to talk!

Dementor Nemesis Champs With A Perfect Score

2009-02-21T21:48:00.013+08:00

I had a treasure hunt event again today. This time, it involved the whole company. The last time was just my sector family day event. So competition was a lot harder as there were some past years participants.

My group comprises of the previous hunt participants. As we participated as a group before, chances of winning is considerably high. Out hunt started from Bangi to Kajang to Bandar Tasik Selatan to Sri Petaling to Puchong and back to Bangi.

There were 35 questions and 5 treasure items. This time we targetting 100% correct questions and 100% correct treasure items. Last time we couldn't get 100% because there's missing 1 treasure item.

And so we hunted. Surprisingly, when we went to purchase our treasure items, we didn't bump into any of the other teams at all. None eventhough we went as many as 10 or 11 petrol stations to buy our treasure items. I'm not sure whether it's a good sign or a bad sign.

As we continued our hunt towards Puchong we got a taste of urgency as there was a bad jam caused by road repairing. Damn, really tension at that time. However, we managed to get through the jam in 30 minutes.

At last we completed our hunt and I was 100% sure that we got all correct including the treasure items. So champion is in our hands already. So we took our own sweet time walking from the carpark to the check in place in the canteen. Never suspecting there was some other teams that might get 100% correct.

After out lunch, we gathered for the answers announcement. As we already know that we have all the answers correct, we just waited for the winners announcements. So third place goes to a team with 92 points. Pretty impressive. All treasure items correct means they only have 4 questions wrong. Then the marshal announced all the teams position from number 20 to number 4. Obviously there was no Dementor Nemesis name being called out because of the perfect score. Then the marshal invited both teams out to the front. This is no good sign, normally they would just announced the winners.

Apparently, both teams had perfect score. Now rules say if there's a tally in score, the fastest time to complete the hunt will be the winner. Now, we regretted taking our own sweet time walking from the carpark to the check in point.

2 minutes separating the winner and the runner-up.

Jeng-jeng-jeng...

And the winner is ...

DEMENTOR NEMESIS 3!!

We couldn't hide our excitement anymore. Our smiles stretch from our left ear to our right ear. So we went home RM800 richer.

My groggy teammates early in the morning in our "powerful" yellow t-shirts.

Group photo.

Flagging off by Wani, our HR representative.

The treasure items.

Prizes for the winners and lucky draws.

While waiting for the lunch and answers announcements.

A nice reflection of the mirrors in canteen while staring at the food.

Winners for the most creative team. They took the box of one of the treasure items and wrote "No Stock" and submitted to the marshals. Cheeky! :)

The top 2 teams. Team red and team yellow.

Perfect score was announced and we congratulated each other.

And team yellow beat team red by 2 MINUTES! So happy!

Winners of Treasure Hunt 2009 with our mock payout card.

2 minutes!

I made a vow not to walk leisurely again next time in any treasure hunt!

Luckily we didn't stop for ice-cream at the last petrol station. If not, we could have less RM200 for ice-creams. Hahaaa.....

Leap of faith...nah...I'll pass

2009-02-17T22:19:00.005+08:00

Dear Gemini,

Here is your horoscope for Tuesday, February 17:

Even if you don't feel that you're quite ready for it, today is still perfect for taking action. You should know what to do, but you may have to take a leap of faith (or two) before you see success.

So this is what my horoscope tells me today when I seek the truth from the stars.

Today I was presented with opportunity. An opportunity that was related to I-cannot-tell-you-what-it-is-about. I was given a day to make up my mind, to weigh the pros and cons, to come to a decision that will make put me back into what I-cannot-tell-you-what-it-is-about previously but only at a higher difficulty.

So I weigh my marbles, to check whether I have the enough before I could loose my marbles just like that fellow in the PeterPan story if I took the opportunity. Did some soul searching. Did some "Dear Thelma" with others. Although I am so tempted to take the opportunity, but history showed that I-cannot-tell-you-what-it-is-about was kind of infamous among all, thus I trust my own instinct and said a FIRM NO!

I hope I made the correct choice.

p.s.
For those parents who firmly made their children's to study law, accountancy and medicine 10 years ago can laugh now. Those are the recession proof jobs I know.

Next time, if I ever raise any kids of my own, I'll make sure they study one of the three above.

"Now, don't say ma never tell you ha...."

Found! (End of rainbow)

2009-02-12T22:39:00.003+08:00

No pots of gold but a 4WD?

Source (some ~~technical~~ scientific explanation can be found here)

North Selangor Swamp Peat Tree Planting 2

2009-02-09T21:37:00.004+08:00

I planted some trees last Saturday.

Woke up at 6am(I don't even wake up so early to go to work) on a Saturday morning to get ready for the tree planting event in Batang Berjuntai by the Eco Warriors. This is the second time they are having this tree planting event. Got to know the founder of this group, Matthias from Canon Goes Green event last year. Apparently, I already know him as Mr. TreeHugger from another event in Genting Highland in 2007. What a small world.

Ok, back to the tree planting.

The event supposed to start at 8.30am. But commonly known as typical Malaysian timing, most of the participants reached after 8.30am and we proceeded with breakfast first and then only followed by briefing by the Forestry Dept personnel. There were 24 plots to be planted with the seedlings. Each plot has about 10 rows times 16 slots. All the participants were divided into 10 groups with a group leader who has participated in the previous tree planting event. I was in Group 9 with Connie, Cylien and YY. We worked in 2 to make things faster. One person dig, the other person removed the plastic bag and plant the seedling. Our group completed plot 9 in less than 1 hour and then we proceeded to plot 13 and 14. After one and a half hour of planting, it's time to wrap it up. We planted about 4000 Mahangs seedlings. Good job I would say considering there were only 100 odds of us planting.

The purpose of the reforestation in the swamp forest it to let the rainfall finds its natural path to the ground and reduces floods possibility whenever there's heavy rainfall and also provides water to the nearby paddy fields when there's a dry season. SWAMP PEATS ARE IMPORTANT! Mahangs seedlings were chosen as they were the pioneer of swamp peats and they take about 5 to 10 years to mature and provide natural shade to the swamp peat before the next stage of reforestation could be carried out.

YY, Cylien, Connie, Matthias, Me

This is NOT the way you dig a hole. Took too much energy!

Swamp peat at Batang Berjuntai

The next event will be on 21 March 2009, which falls on the World Forestry Day. Target is to have 500 people planting seedlings in Batang Berjuntai Swamp Peat Forest (yes, it's the same place). Come out and help the nature. It's a good workout anyway as YY says it.

立春 The start of spring, the new era has begun

2009-02-04T20:34:00.005+08:00

Today is Li Chun 立春, officially the start of spring according to the Gregorian calendar, which means, today would be the supposedly Chinese New Year as most of the saying goes 迎新春, which means welcoming the new spring.

But unfortunately in Malaysia, Chinese New Year holidays are only on the first and second day according to the lunar calender, which fell on the 26 and 27 January this year, so I went to work today. Nevertheless, since today is the start of new spring, I also purposely wore a red shirt to work today and my nice 宝葫芦 pendant (gourd-shaped) for good luck.

As the Chinese ushering the new spring, a new era is unfolding in my homestate, Perak. Today, the state opposition coliation party (BeEnd), which happened to be federal government ruling party, gained the EQUAL seats in state assembly, with the 3 of state ruling coaliation party's assemblyman/woman quit their respective party and declared themselves independent state assemblyman/woman. But they now stand together with the opposition party, BeEnd, saying they are giving their support to them. I mean, come on, if you are an independent, why are you siding them? Aren't you supposed to be stand by the people's side? Another state assemblyman jumped from from the state ruling party to the opposition party (which he just jumped from like few weeks ago), see isn't it confusing? He jumped from UmmmNo to the state ruling party then jumped back, and then jumped back again until the media refer him as the Frog King.

The seats now stands at 28 vs 28 with 3 (fake) independents. Where is the majority may I ask? What happened to democracy? What happened to people's voice? It no longer is needed as far as I'm seeing at how things are going. People in Perak are cheated I say.

If this is how the new BeEnd, new UmmmNo is going to be, aren't we all be very afraid.
Be afraid, be very afraid humming behind my ears as I type this.

So today as we usher the new spring,

迎新春, 迎新風,

we also usher a new era.

The era where DEMOCRACY ENDS!

Happy Birthday Everyone....

2009-02-01T23:31:00.003+08:00

It's officially everyone's birthday today according to the Chinese Lunar calendar. It's the seventh day into the Chinese New Year, 人日 , which by the saying of some Chinese legends, man were made/born on this day. So again, Happy Birthday everyone.

May this 牛 Year will bring alot of 'Moo'lah to you.

Hehe...

So as the tradition goes, today everyone will toss some yee sang high until the sky while wishing for more luck in whatever they are wishing upon.

I had two yee sang feast today. One with my family before I drove back in the afternoon and another during dinner with colleagues. The picture above was taken before the tossing starts because after all the tossing and wishing are done, only half of the ingredients are left in the plate, most of them were strewn all over the table, what a waste. But nevertheless, that's how it was meant to be.

"Bonus this year..."

"Stay healthy..."

"No pay cut this year..."

"Get a boyfriend this year..."

"Get married this year..."

"Get higher pay but workload still the same..." (wah, this one I like)

GONG XI FA CAI

Cindy & Sam

2009-01-20T21:59:00.002+08:00

Best things about being a girl is when one of the girlfriends is getting married, we can always use that excuse to go shopping for jewellery whole day. Imagine going from shops to shops, asking the sales person to show and let us play around with golds, platinums, silvers and diamonds (some of those that we definitely can't afford now).

That's a butterfly design pendant, one half is gold and the other is silver, the the bling-bling in the middle is the smallest diamonds available. :) And that's our gift to our friend who got married last Friday. (Ermm, technically 4 years ago, but traditionally was last Friday). Chinese tradition, as long as the bride's family didn't give the bride away, no tea ceremony, both of them are not considered married. '_'

To the newlyweds, Cindy and Sam, congratulations on your marriage. May both of you have a wonderful and love-filled wedded life.

p.s I'm coming for my angpow this Chinese New Year..hehehe...

什麼原因會讓你想哭?

2009-01-20T18:31:00.002+08:00

心理測驗題目：什麼原因會讓你想哭?
排一下自己最易哭的原因! (1是最容易 , 5是最不容易)
五個選項分別是：
a. 感動
b.傷心
c.痛 ( 是肉體, 不是心靈)
d.生氣
e.擔心/緊張

排好了嗎？準備看答案囉！
請看自己把該選項排在第幾個順位來找解答喔∼
----------------------------------------------------------------

感動：不是跟你很熟的人覺得你是 ......
排在第 1 - 一個常常把自己藏起來的人。很有神秘感。不容易接近。
排在第2 - 一個很會關心別人的人。很容易發現身邊有人不開心。不會很容易講錯東西或話題。
排在第 3 - 一個傻傻的人。怪怪的。想做什麼就做什麼。不過很可愛。
排在第4 - 一個不會想﹐老是要人擔心的人。 (特別是長輩)
排在第5 - 一個很聰明﹐很負責任的領導人。對你很尊敬。

傷心：跟你很熟的人覺得你是 ......
排在第 1 - 對很多事都要求很高的人。不過有很多時候都太固執。
排在第2 - 可以跟你講道理。黑白之間分辨得很清楚。
排在第3 - 心思很細膩的人。很多時候傷心不會表現出來，不過其實大家都看得出來。
排在第4 - 會先想很多才會做選擇。不想自己給人看扁,自尊可以算是很強的人。
排在第5 - 外剛內柔的人。但其實知道你的內心不是那麼堅強。

痛：你想要別人覺得你是 ......
排在第1 - 很需要別人保護的人。
排在第 2 - 不是那麼容易接近的人。
排在第3 - 好人一個。很關心身邊的人。不怕做犧牲的人。
排在第4 - 很聰明 , 不過又不會驕傲的人。
排在第 5 - 很清楚自己想什麼要什麼的人。

生氣：你最希望你的情人是......
排在第1 - 跟你很合拍。你跟他想的東西是一樣 , 不用問便知道對方要什麼。
排在第2 -不會很客易發脾氣。要懂得容忍你。外剛內柔。有自己的性格。
排在第 3 - 內心是很可愛的一個人。你猜不到下一步他會做什麼。
排在第4 -很細心。你需要什麼他都有準備。不會因為很少的東西便找你。
排在第 5 - 智慧很重要。可以管得到你的人。而且要講道理。

擔心 / 緊張：其實真實的你是 ......
排在第 1 - 一個很怕給別人看到自己是什麼樣的人。不喜歡自己性格的人。
排在第 2 -孤獨的人。很希望可以跟一大堆人在一起。不過很多時候都不知道怎樣跟別人溝通。
排在第 3 -覺得朋友比天還重要的人。很珍惜身邊很多朋友。敢愛敢恨。不過不喜歡的人你就不會去管..
排在第4 -直接的人。很多時候因為這樣的性格跟別人不合。希望有多一點人可以了解你, 特別是你喜歡的人。
排在第5 -不是很清楚自己將來要什麼。不過就很幸運的走過半生。不會對很多東西有要求。最重要是可以開心過每一天 !

~~~

I chose

傷心：跟你很熟的人覺得你是 ......
排在第 1 - 對很多事都要求很高的人。不過有很多時候都太固執。

(cannot decide which order)
擔心 / 緊張：其實真實的你是 ......
排在第 2 -孤獨的人。很希望可以跟一大堆人在一起。不過很多時候都不知道怎樣跟別人溝通。
排在第 3 -覺得朋友比天還重要的人。很珍惜身邊很多朋友。敢愛敢恨。不過不喜歡的人你就不會去管..
感動：不是跟你很熟的人覺得你是 ......
排在第2 - 一個很會關心別人的人。很容易發現身邊有人不開心。不會很容易講錯東西或話題。
排在第 3 - 一個傻傻的人。怪怪的。想做什麼就做什麼。不過很可愛。

生氣：你最希望你的情人是......
排在第4 -很細心。你需要什麼他都有準備。不會因為很少的東西便找你。

痛：你想要別人覺得你是 ......
排在第 5 - 很清楚自己想什麼要什麼的人。

Youth09 & Russell Lee

2009-01-11T21:20:00.006+08:00

Has no connection or whatsoever except that it happened yesterday. :)

Went to Youth09 with much anticipation with all the hype going around in cyberspace.
So I went.

And I saw...
Belinda from 8tv Quickie...

This thing tickled my funny bone. Mini UFO catcher. Thought of taking this away with me. Haha..

Hot & Fly Crew. Doing nothing but yapping away. Err..like what they do normally lo.

I went to support Raleigh KL. But caught one of them looking at..

Celebrities talking craps about each other. I have no idea why were they trashing each other at that point I was there.

And so disappointingly, Raleigh was given a "space" for displaying their stuff for FREE. But it was freaking faraway from the crowds. It was next to the stalls selling clothes, but the crowds were so tiny, all the stalls selling clothes moved downstairs themselves. So the Raleigh kaki, "pak wu ying" killing the flies (direct translation). So sad. Even the crowds were not their target crowds, see those people in the picture below, how can they go into the jungle to volunteer?

Cosplay. "_". Seen better.

Youth09 for me was like a big bazaar or worse like pasar malam that gathered all the young people to showcase their talents (those good ones) or show off their dressing sense (those lepak kakis). Youth lifestyle? Do all of us really live like that? Seriously? Maybe they do, but I don't. And I could seriously see how different the crowds were (race I meant) on those going to Main Stage and Stage B where all the ~~craps~~ above took place and those in Tun Dr. Ismail Hall where the National Youth Entreprenuer Convention were held (I just walked in, nobody stopped me). And for the Community Hall, things were just pathetic. How can they give talks when the Battle of the Bands were going on just below the hall.
~~~

On the other hand, after the Youth09, I went to Cheras Leisure Mall to watch a movie with my friends. While waiting, I lingered around Popular Bookstore and the there's this small booth selling Russell Lee books, you know the guy with the famous "True Singapore Ghost Stories", and he'll be there for autograph session. At first I hesitated because I never read the book. It was Book number 18 now. But when I saw him coming, be tahan liao, I quickly buy the book and I was the third one to get his autograph. Check out the pictures on why I bought the book. Hahaha....

Seriously, I don't even know it's the real Russell Lee or not with him dressing like that.

That's a Russell Lee handshake. And the book was signed with "Specially for Shiao Chin, So nice to meet you. Welcome to TSGS series!!"

And for those who wanted to know, he sounded like a British.

Bangles & Belts

2009-01-05T16:00:00.004+08:00

If I were to put that as my new year resolution, I would have broken my resolution 3 days into new year.

And that is

"I CANNOT BUY ON IMPULSE ANYMORE"

That had been my previous years (notice the s behind year) resolution since I don't even remember when. So I know I would have break this stupid resolution of mine as quickly as I step into any malls, thus that was not included in my new year resolution. In fact, I have none this year. :D

Bought something last weekend on impulse obviously during an outing with my mom and sisters. Almost bought a pair of shoes along but held back myself. Brilliant.

As usual Chinese New Year is lurking near, we always will buy new clothes to usher the new year, as for good luck or something, or maybe just to show off to relatives that whose new clothes were better. But nowadays it has just become an excuse for me to buy more clothes. Haha..

Every year, I tried to find a theme for my outfits for Chinese New Year, so it made it more interesting. Last year, I had my shocking ala Rihanna red haircut, so any outfits didn't matter as the main theme was my red hair.

So this year, the theme would be...

Bangles & Belts
Don't they just made an outfit perfect?

Bought these bangles on separate occasion, but on impulse mode. Each less than RM10.

Bought this belt in Hong Kong. About RM30 only. Nice!!

Bought this belt in Bangsar August 8. Cheap. Less than RM20.

Same as the above but black in color.

My model of the day. Too lazy to parade myself. :D

Happy 2009

2009-01-01T19:23:00.003+08:00

This is the year I'm celebrating new year of my final year in the 20's age bracket. ~~Damn.~~ Ooopss, can't usher the new year with swearing in my blog. Age does not matter to me as long as I have lived and never regret the things I have done in the past. So, I am grateful that I've gone through 2008 with so many nice and wonderful experiences, and yadda yadda yadda..

Well, what's for new year?

I thought of some targets to achieve. Yea, I meant target, not resolution as resolution might gone obselete in my case for I don't really see myself in doing a long term target. My targets are more of like in 3 months term. Sometimes shorter. Is that good or bad? I'm not sure. Some people might say I'm living by the day basis in that case. But it's my life. So I'm living my life. You go manage your own, ok?

So one full year break into 3 months term, so I have a 4 period of 3 months to achieve my targets (if I already have any by now). The long holidays are killing me and my brain, can't think of any target achiveable now. Maybe after work starts next week, my cranky brain will come up with something.

Happy New Year.

Macau Never Change

2008-12-31T08:09:00.012+08:00

Apart from Cotai Strip

Proof?
Picture one was taken 4 years back when I first visited Macau. There was this stamp vending machine that caught my attention and I took a picture of it. Boy, I looked so dark and skinny then.
Picture 2 taken earlier this month when I visited my sister. The vending machine was still located at the same place. Some changes were made to the surface of the machine but it's still the same. SAME! I was wearing 3 layers of clothing, it was less than 10degC and the wind was blowing. I wasn't this FAT!It was near the Lord Stow's bakery where it was famous for it's Portuguese egg tart.

When in Macau must try their Portuguese cuisine. My sister introduced these food to us.

First it is BBQ Suckling Pig Portuguese style. The skin was crisply and nice. Not too much of fats.

Then it was Baked Clams with Portuguese sauce. Nothing special about it. Looked and taste like normal lala in Malaysia.

Then it was this Sauna Shrimp.

The prawns were live and kicking when first presented to us. They were marinated right on the spot with some wine and chillies and something else. And then after the prawns already got dizzy and nicely marinated, they were thrown into a hotpot with coals inside to cook them. My youngest sister was so disturbed by the dancing prawns' scene and she sweared she'll no longer eat anymore prawns that were cooked alive! And she didn't even touch this dish. See it for yourself.

The final product of Sauna Shrimp. I am carnivore, I don't really care how about the prawns being cooked alive. Boy, they tasted just fine.

Coming to Macau one couldn't miss the mother of all casino, the Venetian. So here I present to you the Venetian.

The Venetian punya jamban.

And the famous "street artist". This fellow really don't move, don't flinch a lil bit. DON'T EVEN CLOSE HIS EYELIDS. That's why if you see carefully, the eyes were really really red.

While we were in Venetian, there was this Expo going around. Adult Asia Expo to be exact. Things like this will never be shown in Malaysia, so we bought our tickets for HKD100 and planned to feast our eyes inside.

Yea right...There was nothing much to be seen except for some women in sailormoon suit

Maid costume...

Cat costume...

Some dude in weird costume..this is getting like a cosplay or Halloween costume party...

Some babe in lingerie..wait...this isn't a babe, this is a dummy...looked so real huh..

Some China lady in body paint.

And all the hamsap onlookers taking pictures.

Dicks on display. Crystal dick, marble dick, plastic dick, all sizes all colours all shapes.

Damn geli punya blow up doll. This doll can vibrate you know.

And finally there's something to show. There's this naked dude, called Pricasso (do note the name), painting, using his equipment, the dick. And his ass too, somehow to smudge on the drawing. I am wondering whether his dick can be functional or not after all the drawings. The below picture is the only decent one that I can put it up here. Otherwise, he's either showing his dick or his balls. Haha..Btw, only his body looked nice. His face looked kind of old. Old man painting with his dick, Pricasso. Euugghh...

There was some other event on the stage too. But I was too far from it to get a nice picture. There were male strippers dancing and stripping off, of course. And there was one Japanese AV actor, apparently very famous, teaching the guys how to use the fingers to satisfy the ladies. So much for HKD100.

The Ruins of St. Paul. Just a wall. Nothing much about it. Instead it was here I ate my PorkChop burger which I missed out the last time I came to Macau. Nice burger.

And I won while playing e-roulette and e-baccarat in Wynn. HK935. It's almost RM450. See I was so happy.

Another new thing I discovered while in Macau was the ferry direct to Hong Kong Airport returned you HKD120 in tax refund if you use the SkyPier service. But you must buy the ticket one day before departure date and you must show passport and ticket to the ticketing booth. The ferry ticket cost HKD235, tax refund HKD120, so in total it's just HKD115. Cheaper than if you buy a ferry ticket to Hong Kong pier and take a MTR to HKIA.Plus you can directly check-in your luggages from Macau. No need to lug those big bags around. Picture is showing the list of airlines that are using the SkyPier.

Adios from Macau trip.

Youth'09

2008-12-24T22:34:00.003+08:00

I'm going.

Are you?

It's time to hear what the youths have to say

about

Entreprenuership...Technoprenuership..

..aRts...

..JobSeeking opportunity..

~~~

It's time to see how youths participate in

..Community Services...

..Healthy competition..

I got my free pass, what are you waiting for?

Youth'09 is organised by Youthsays.com

Halong Bay and Hanoi

2008-12-21T20:55:00.006+08:00

This is my 98th post for this year and I will conclude my Vietnam travel story here.
Phew, finally...

Where was I?

Okay, the train ride from Hue to Hanoi took 12 hours. We couldn't get the soft bed ticket, the so called first class ticket, so we got the 6-berth, hard bed. Really hard-bedded. There was no mattress this time, just a small carpet like those Muslims used during their prayers. But being me, I can just fall asleep almost everywhere. I was eating a Vietnam specialty in the picture for my dinner that night. It wasn't a normal baguette with ham and cheese. It was filled with noodles, pork, chicken slices. eggs and vegetable. Only available in Hue station.

After a 12-hour journey, again we had to hunt for accomocation again. I tell you hunting for hotels in Vietnam is really a good place to train your muscles. Of all the hotels we surveyed, on average we had to climb 3 to 4 storeys high. The hoteliers won't let you know the price first, they'll say come I show you the room, and we had to climb again and again just to see the rooms. So we got lazy and just followed a random Vietnamese guy that say he'll pay for the taxi if we agreed to stay in his hotel. And we got a crappy room with a view of a bamboo shop also for USD10 per night. I swear I saw a cockroach running by in the room. But all 3 of us were just too lazy and tired to care.

So what to do in Hanoi?

Since we were staying in the Old Quarter's we walked to the Hoan Kiem Lake which was like 20 mins away. Legend says that there was a giant turtle that rises from the water once a upon a time with a magic sword that help an emperor named Le Loi to win his war. It was played in the water puppet show that we watched later on that day.

One thing that really impressed me was the strength of the person who was controlling the puppet under water. You know how hard it is to move things underwater. And they managed to make those puppets so much agility as if they were pulled by string instead of controlled by bamboo sticks under water. Check out the video.

Watching the water puppet show just took like 1 hour plus. Since we had so much time to spare we walked around Hanoi discovering places and we had Com Pho as our lunch. Com Pho is something like mixed rice in Malaysia. Seeing us as foreigner I'm definitely sure that the owner made us pay more because I paid like RM7 for my lunch (daylight robbery). But it was the 2nd last day in Hanoi and we just couldn't care as we wanted to spend all our Dong. And to further deplete our wallet, we went to this Dong Xuan market, to purchase some souveniers back home. I got some keychain with a Vietnamese lady for colleagues but apparently they preferred cutesy stuff than those traditional-looking ones. I still have 3 to spare.

Then we retired for the day.

Now get ready for Halong Bay!

I was so hyped up about this Halong Bay trip because the karst mountains/islands just fascinates me. How can something like that could appear in our world? There were supposedly almost 3000 of such karst mountains/islands around this area. People were saying it was similar to GuiLin in China (I'm not sure about that, let me travel to GuiLin to confirm this. Anyone to sponsor me? Hehe)

We travelled about 3 and half hours from Hanoi to reach Halong Bay. We purchased an overnight in the junk trip for USD165 in Hanoi earlier on. The travel agent said nice room wor. Okay, anyway we already expected such price so we agreed on it. We had seafood for almost all our lunch and dinner there (except for breakfast).

We were greeted with a lot of junks. When I say alot, really A LOT. Check out the pictures!! From the tour guide's info, there were about 300000 of these kinds of junks in Halong Bay. (I could have mistaken i, it could have been 3 million of them). This is tourism at it's best that I have ever seen. My country could never done anything at this scale.

It was very windy that day. And just like half an hour after the junk departed from the port, the karst mountains were seen. Check the videos for the karst mountains. There were like really a lot of them.

More here.

Haha, got you isn't it. This is what I want to say. After a while all of them looked the same to me. And I got bored. When one gets bored, stupid ideas started to flow to the brain. And the result is:

And it got worse :)

Well, the trip alone wasn't just seated in the junk doing nothing, but we went to Thein Kung cave. Inside the cave we could see many different staglatite and staglamite, some looking like a tortoise and one ahem, looked like this,

For those who are afraid of seasickness, no worries. The sea was so calm until I can do this pose. Wah sai, I looked like part of some Chinese Kung Fu movie apart from the clothes I'm wearing.

One of the night scene I managed to capture nicely. Right after I took the picture it started to rain (slightly) again.

For those who plan to go Halong Bay, I would recommend a day tour will do. It just cost about USD17 for a day trip compared to ours USD65 for overnight trip. You can opt to go to Tam Coc instead. Nice scenery according to my friend who went there a month earlier. One thing that made me pissed off about the Halong Bay trip was the fact that we had to purchase our drink in the boat and it cost USD1 for a can soft drink and USD2 for beer. Have to buy lo, if not how, drink seawater or drink toilet water? Damn the capitalist.

Anyway, after the trip we went back to Hanoi. Here we went to the night market in Hang Ngang street. Nothing much to compared to those night markets in Suan Lum, Bangkok but it was a place to pass time by.

Nice 3D cards selling in the night market.

Plain porcelin statues for painting 10000VND each.

Fancy helmets USD10 each. So nice.

Cutesy Vietnamese dolls.

On the final day, finally, we went all out with our remaining money to eat well. First we went to this Ice Cream shop called Fanny's Ice Cream. It's easy to locate as it was just located right next to Hoan Kiem Lake on Hang Trong Street and it was printed in most of the travel brochure anyways. The ice-cream was thick and nice. So yummy.

Next we went to this chocolate buffet in Sofitel Hotel in Plaza Metropole. Cost us USD15 for the buffet but it's like heaven to chocolate lovers. I'm letting the picture to speak for itself.

And this concludes my travel story to Vietnam. So long Vietnam.

Previous: Hue Ancient City, Central Vietnam