carrying a berry, making merry

thanks, everyone <3

2008-08-26T17:34:00.003+12:00

For those who called/sms/facebook/thought of me on my birthday, much thanks!!! Didn't do anything earth-shattering, went out for some Japanese food, felt like having some sake.

"Can I have this sake please? We'd like it warm, thanks"

"Er... Can I see some ID please?"

WAHAHAHA

I look young enough for her to ask for my ID. Unfortunately, didn't have any ID on me so no sake.

After dinner, decided to go watch "Wanted". At the counter,

"Can I see some ID, please? This movie is M16"

Wah a bit too much right.

for my parents

2008-07-08T20:32:00.001+12:00

Snowboarding pictures

Not much of an update. Pretty busy the moment!

pekak (thanks Lavi)

2008-03-20T14:38:00.003+13:00

aiks i am feeling quite guilty from cabut-ing neurology clinic in the afternoon. the nicer everyone is, the more guilty i feel. oklah, my partner left already so may as well.

it is Easter this weekend! a couple of us are going off for the weekend, the plan is going kayaking (with the dolphins, said the brochure. i would probably accidentally hit them on the head with the paddle), chill on the beach with a few bottles of cold beers and then drive back. the motels/backpackers/etc are mostly fully booked but luckily the 5th one I called had a vacancy left.

"bla bla bla do you have any rooms left?"

"bla bla bla yes we have enough space in the room for you guys"

"ok cool do i give you my credit card to book the room?"

"yeah but are there MALE couples?"

"har? male couples?"

"yeah male couples"

at this time i'm like wtf male couples why the hell do you want to know that anyway. then i said

"er i can't really hear you"

*laughs* "ok, are the MALE couples among you"

then it finally dawned one me. MARRIED COUPLES LAH!!!

"NO NO MARRIED COUPLES"

or male couples either

imma cook!

2008-03-18T11:51:00.007+13:00

Woohoo. Made from scratch! Come come come! I cook for you guys!

Paintball 2007

2007-11-12T12:59:00.000+13:00

More like Painball. Let's do it again!

Paintball pictures here and here.

Miniature golfing pictures here.

Auckland is fun! So come!

Bungee Jumping

2007-11-09T16:18:00.000+13:00

w00t!I did it! Bungee-d off Auckland Harbour Bridge at 40m.

The most difficult bit was standing at the platform thinking "Why the hell did I just pay NZD100 to do this to myself?". After the leap, everything was "sweet". Come to Auckland la, I can teman you guys go jump again.

Oh and the bungee cords were "Made In Malaysia".

Hopefully the next destination will be Queenstown. At 134m. 8.5 seconds free fall. Woohoo!!

COME TO NEW ZEALAND!

exams

2007-10-28T19:55:00.000+13:00

Got this in an email. So cute!

New school semester

First week:

Second week:

Before the mid-term test:

During the mid-term test:

After the mid-term test:

Before the final exam:

After reading the final exam schedule:

7 days before final exam:

6 days before final exam:

5 days before final exam:

4 days before final exam:

3 days before final exam:

2 days before final exam:

1 day before final exam:

The night before final exam:

1 hour before final exam:

On leaving the exam hall:

After the final exam, during the holiday:

lolol

2007-10-16T09:46:00.000+13:00

Girl: Do you love me?
Boy: Yes, dear
Girl: Would you die for me?
Boy: No, mine is undying love

Aboy came home from school with his exam results.
"What did u get?" asked his father.
"My marks are under water," said the boy.
"What do u mean 'under water'?"
"They are all below 'C' level"

hahaha rofl

2007-10-15T17:53:00.000+13:00

Out of a 3 hour clinic:

"I've never heard of this drug (xxx). What is it?"

"Oh, xxx a tablet"

"... ok"

Wah really meh.

damn you, exams

2007-10-14T10:33:00.000+13:00

DAMN YOU!!!!!!!
&!^@!(*&@^!%#!&@^!*&^*(@)!@*^!%@^!!!!!!!

Got this off the Internet sometime ago.

Recipe for revision

Ingredients

Lots of good intentions - because if all goes horribly pear shaped, at least you can say you had them
Plenty of paper and stationery - for doodling when your brain is about to explode
Instant Notes in Biochemistry - you're going to need it, especially if all those 9 am starts were a little too much to ask
One room from which you will not leave - other than to eat, drink, use the toilet, and to hyperventilate down the phone to your friends
One punchbag or similar - a wall would suffice, particularly as the average student has neither the money nor the space in student digs for such stress beating luxuries
Painkillers - paracetamol, aspirin, ibuprofen, codeine, though not all at once - to be used in the event of overuse of the wall
A photographic memory
A miracle - or those who actually believe they happen
Beta blockers (own prescriptions only - please, as black market propranolol is not a good idea before the biggest exams in your life to date)
Teabags, coffee, and lots of sugar
Redbull - "It gives you wings"
Thirty hours in a day
Eight days in a week - that way you have time to eat and sleep, as well as revise
A vast selection of takeaway menus and a telephone to hand - if you cannot afford this, then several loaves of bread and a surplus of baked beans make an ideal substitute
A leaflet on stress management - although you'll be so stressed, you won't have time to read it
Generally stick to using the wall

The week before

Preset room to about 17°C - if there is no working radiator in the room (as in most student accommodation) then improvise with suitable layers of clothing
Put all those good intentions to one side
Bored already? - take a trip downstairs and prepare a hot beverage, chat to your housemates, then reluctantly return to your room
Finally open a book. The first topic seems so unfamiliar that you have to check the subject syllabus to make sure you need to learn it. You do (as is usually the case)
Spend a copious amount of time writing out perfect notes on the particular topic. Six hours have now passed and three pages of perfectly condensed notes have been copied from the textbook. This is now the time to panic as you look back over the list of topics and slowly realise that the topic you have just spent the last six hours toiling over is one of 25 topics, all as gruelling and similar in complexity
Telephone a colleague. He or she is just as stressed as you are and together you decide that perhaps three or four heads are better than one, and a group revision session may be your best sporting chance of cramming two years of information into a few days
Five minutes later your colleagues arrive with books and notes in hand. After spending the first half hour telling each other about how stressed you are and how everyone is going to fail, you start to quiz each other on things you've learnt
Arghh! Everyone else seems to know much more than you do. You decide that this public display of lack of knowledge is not going to help your exam performance, so continue for the rest of the week studying on your own, filling in chunks of missing or lost notes from 9 am lectures.

The night before

By this time there are no nails left on your fingertips. You can't eat for fear of vomiting. Your notes seem alien to you. All you can do is sit and hope. An all night session is on the agenda, but you are so exhausted that you fall asleep at 2 am.

To serve

Serve with a generous helping of blood, sweat, and toil. Garnish with a handful of pencil shavings.

The end result

Who knows, only time will tell. The thing to remember is that thousands of medical students undergo this cruel ritual every year, and most of those do indeed pass. Don't give up hope.

gg no re

2007-10-10T17:40:00.000+13:00

What's the difference between a teabag and the All Blacks?

The teabag stays in the cup longer.

because i got wings!

2007-09-05T22:10:00.000+12:00

I just had a can of Red Bull and now I've got wingsssssss!!! Too hyper to study. So I shall blog!

Kitchen

Wahah our one week old fridge

Yes Mum, I eat fruits.

Hsien Wen "Eh really ah take picture? Don't laaaa"

Hong Chee "Yes I'm awake lah"

Chia Yee

Welcome to my humble abode.

<3 src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v627/ice_sylph/DSC01210.jpg" alt="Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket" border="0">
The place the magic happens. I mean studying.

Listening to:
Earth Wind Fire - September

"Ha Ha Ha Ba de ya - say do you remember
Ba de ya - dancing in September
Ba de ya - never was a cloudy day"

Before Redbull:

After Redbull:

Ok break time's over. Back to studying.

Snowboarding 2007 + Paintball

2007-08-31T21:37:00.000+12:00

OKOK! don't leave this blog! Here are some pictures as promised of my ever-so-wonderful life in Auckland

We left Auckland at 3 am so we will be just in time to snowboard the next morning when the ski field opens.

Introducing our very own (not really, we rented it) environmental friendly vehicle

Day 1: Snowboarding

woohoo!! after all that self-induced torture, we checked in to our humble abode for the night

It was weird to walk outside after breakfast and see a pig snorting by followed by a goat, 2 dogs and a Kit Chung.

Day 2: Paintball

"We Indians" versus "You Chinese". Technically Balwinder isn't an Indian (neither am I) but owell.

Kit Chung made his bandanna from that cloth you clean the kitchen counter with, in case you are wondering why it looks so darn familiar.

Red team lost though.

"Ok Ok. What's the plan la?"
"Dunno! We whack only lah!"
"Er. Ok"

*Me camping behind my favorite tree*

KALAH!

And those were Ray-Bans.

Bruises galore but it was damn fricking fun! Now who wants to sign up to come to Auckland for a holiday?

Currently feeling:

I'm mumbling to myself what I usually mumble at this time of the year: "Why oh why didn't I start studying earlier?!?!?!"

funnies

2007-08-10T20:49:00.001+12:00

snowboarding + paintball = weekend of self-inflicted pain

2007-07-24T13:16:00.000+12:00

more updates and pictures later!

a day in the life of a med student

2007-06-19T23:08:00.000+12:00

hello from hamilton

2007-06-09T11:41:00.000+12:00

hello hello my dear friends! it has been a long time since i updated (erm not that anyone cares) but yeah, i've been sent to Hamilton to do my Obstetrics and Gynaecology block for 6 weeks.

Soon Han said, "Instead of receiving emails, you will be receiving babies!! *evil laugh*"

but but but... i'm leeching off someone's wireless connection. wahahaha so i will be receiving emails AND receiving babies!

i don't really get why people don't secure their wireless connection but oh well, good for me.

Tim says though, "Doesn't mean someone's house door is open you can walk in, have a look around and use their TV!!". erm point taken.

Hamilton isn't as bad as i thought it would be.

woohoo! each unit/student is provided with a TV (mine is bigger than everybody else's ^^), king sized bed, attached bathroom, microwave etc.

surprisingly (!!!), i could not get any work done with the TV staring at me in the face

i love the colour of my pillowcase. i have the matching duvet cover back in Auckland and said a friend "wah! can give people seizure wan. your duvet cover".

i'm so used to sleeping on single beds my whole of my life and this king sized one felt very empty so i taruh all my stuff on one side. hoho. by the way, did i mention i love my heater? well i do. it is the only reason why i'm warm enough to get up to go hospital in the mornings. either that or i have to get a guy to warm my bed for me ^^ the latter is way harder to get so i shall have to stick to the heater for the time-being.

life is good *thumbs up*! looking forward to Obstetrics and Gynaecology, although my timetable is packed to the brim but i reckon its good to be busy.

what i am up to

2007-05-30T22:32:00.000+12:00

i'm sure what i'm doing with my life right now isn't all that interesting but i really have nothing else to talk about in the Land-Situated-Underneath-The-Land-Down-Under.

some people here are just too ignorant! this guy working at the airport conveyor belt asked me

"so you flew in from Singapore, aye? how do you say hi in Singapore?"

... wtf?

"we normally say 'hi' because everyone there speaks English"

damn bodoh right!

i got this so many times when i first arrived to New Zealand last year:

"oh, which part of China/Japan/Indonesia are you from?"

"oh, how long has your family been in Malaysia? are the rest of your family still in China?"

"oh are you a malaysian? but you look so chinese/indian!!!!"
*pengsan*
this will usually then lead to the previous question

this one takes the cake:
"hey hey hey are you from Malaysia?!!! how do you write my name in Malay?"
*get up from previous pengsan and pengsan again*

"Eh let's go to the zoo!" said Carrie. "DOWAN" you said.

2007-05-08T03:13:00.000+12:00

"but but but why"

"becos the zoo very smelly wan"

"er ok"

i already posted my zoo pictures on facebook and i don't see the point of posting them here again.

yes, click me! i can take you to carrie's zoo pictures

hongchee is lame

2007-05-08T00:33:00.000+12:00

hongchee says (8:30 PM):
i know wat the creature is already
the one u saw in science centre...

[carrie`] - singapore number +6590352282 says (8:30 PM):
?
what creature
the one with big boobs?

hongchee says (8:30 PM):
is a combination of elephant ear, kiwi mouth, ostrich body
that alien

[carrie`] - singapore number +6590352282 says (8:31 PM):
yeah
what?

hongchee says (8:31 PM):
got the ear which looks like radar

[carrie`] - singapore number +6590352282 says (8:32 PM):
yeah what creature is it?

hongchee says (8:32 PM):
it is a combination of elephant ear, kiwi mouth, ostrich body
elekitrich

[carrie`] - singapore number +6590352282 says (8:32 PM):
... oh shit damn lame... ok i'm gonna post this on my blog

hongchee says (8:33 PM):
wahahah
oi

"Eh let's go to the bird park!!" said Carrie. "DOWAN" you said.

2007-05-07T03:51:00.000+12:00

"but but but. why?" said Carrie

"because got bird flu lah" you said

"er ok" said Carrie

in the "Talking Bird" section of the park, there were about 10 "talking birds" in cages and each had a plate similiar to the one above. it was more amusing to watch the visitors peer into each cage and trying to coax the birds to say something.

"say hie, minnie, say hie!"
*screech*

"say happy birthday, happy birthday!"
*screeeeech*

"what's your name, what's your name?"
*scrrrreeeecccccccch*

dumb humans.

a vulture who can er climb trees.

penguins!

speaking of penguins, i have a lame penguin joke:

why are penguins black at the back and white in front?
...
.....
.......
.........
BECAUSE RIGHT their flippers are too short, can only clean in front, cannot clean the back that's why the back is black

*silence*

er ok. moving on.

pelicans

a 100 feet man-made indoor waterfall

a double-wattled cassowary

a 9 storey loft where you can purchase some nectar for $2 and the birds will come to you. quite cute

pigeons

Singapore week 4 : Because my friends and cousins ffk-ed me

2007-05-05T22:21:00.000+12:00

because all my dear friends decided to ffk me (ok, my cousin melissa was sick so she doesn't count), i decided, what the heck, i'll go out and play without them. so very spontaneously, i took a bus to the Singapore Science Centre and spent my day being surrounded by kindergarten kids. my dad used to bring my sisters and i to the Science Centre almost once a year when we were kids. oh, and who could forget the bit where my second sister fell in an inflatable rubber wading pool. but that's a story for another time.

i don't really know what this is. i think this is someone's perception of how a Martian would look like. big ears to pick up sound because the air on Mars is very thin. and the furry thingy on the top is for to er chase away mosquitoes and flies? occasionally help shade the sun?

never realize this was a fish until it blinked

a mudskipper (duh)

this is quite a funny one. the hermit crab kinda raised his/her/it's arm/leg/whatever and waved it at me when i snapped the picture

no idea what fish is this. just some random shot.

quite a cool BP taking set. pretty much self explanatory.

a prawn? he kinda flutters around. very amusing to watch

poor Einstein, from E = mc² to climbing up and down ropes in a green jacket & purple pants

woah action figure kononnya. i bet if you press the button, he'll be screaming "E = mc²!!! E = mc²!!! E = mc²!!!"

tomorrow i'm off to Jurong Bird Park and its the Zoo & Night Safari on monday! more pictures then.

like that lah

2007-04-28T17:36:00.000+12:00

before flying to Singapore, the pilot was introducing himself:

"welcome bla bla bla the flight will take bla bla hours etc..."

"we won't be experiencing any major turbulence but please fasten your seatbelt throughout the flight. but then again, who knows, right? *laughs*"

wow very reassuring

"we will be uh turning right to sydney. yeah, in the direction of sydney. *pause* actually in the direction of singapore"

LET ME OFF!

ward round 101

2007-04-26T22:25:00.000+12:00

"madam teoh, can you tell us what is your name?"

patient stirs from her sleep

"madam teoh, what is your name? your name arrr?"

the nurses tried to help, speaking in hokkien:
"madam teoh, madam teoh! sih mih mia???"

"MADAM TEOH, CAN YOU HEAR ME? WHAT IS YOUR NAME, MADAM TEOH?"

"madam teoh loh"

sparkling white teeth

2007-04-17T01:53:00.000+12:00

conversation with a friend's mother:

"wah eh your teeth fake wan izzit?"

*taken aback for like 4 seconds*

"uh no. i had braces done and uh yeah"

"so straight and so white! like fake one liddat"

*thinking of my 21st birthday present which is yes, the picture above*
thanks guys, for my white teeth. you know who you are! malas to type all 10 of you here.

the weird thing is, my grandmother said the exact same thing about my teeth. she said they look fake. got meh?

gah

2007-04-14T03:08:00.000+12:00

it's about 11pm and i just arrived home after waiting for the bus for AN HOUR.

i met an old college friend whom i haven't seen in over a year for dinner at a mall nearby and i took the bus home (save money lah, cab very expensive leh). 2 buses did not bother to stop because they were too full.

third bus finally came (yay!). it was so packed but i managed to squeeze in and all i could think of when i grabbed the handle bar above my head was: thank god i shaved my armpits in the morning.

singapore week 1

2007-04-12T21:50:00.000+12:00

like other hospitals, the house officers here in singapore present cases to their consultants:

"this is a 67 chinese year old gentleman who came in with..."

"and hor, he got allergic to penicillin loh. des why loh."

"he was found to be fallen by his maid in the toilet"

"cannot like that wan. it will catches his leg"

and i thought my english was quite bad.
------------------------------------------------------------------------

decided to change the name of my blog on a whim. now this blog is known as "carrying a berry, making merry". bored of the old name.

What I've Done

2007-04-11T03:24:00.001+12:00

my life as such

2007-03-30T18:55:00.000+12:00

the nurses in the emergency department were preparing for the arrival of a suspected myocardial infarction and the nurses asked my ED registrar

"is the patient a male or female?"

said my registrar "yes."

everyone "O_o"

"yes!! the patient is either a male or female. hope it isn't something in between"

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

currently doing geriatrics, i have this fear of old people. i'm afraid they might fall off the bed and fracture their hip, get a subdural haematoma, starting dancing around (the differential diagnosis for everything is "delirium" or "dementia" in the geriatric ward) or something like that.

but so far most of the patients i've seen are quite friendly (albeit a little deaf) and willing to help us students. one said to me:

"of course i'll fucking help you! you will save lives next time!"

erm. ok. a bit too enthusiastic. or maybe he was delirious.

some elderly patients do not have the best eyesight.

"hello! my name is Carrie and i'm a fifth year student doctor. do you mind spending some time talking to me and maybe let me examine you?"
*repeated at least 3 times with increasing volume*

"sure dear!! did you come by yesterday? i've had a few other students coming to talk to me"

"oh that would be my other teammates, and there are 4 of us in the group"

"oh... you must all look alike then!"

"uh... actually the other 3 are all guys..."

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

on a lighter note, i'm going back to malaysia next wednesday (4th April). going to be in singapore for a month doing neurology as a selective for 4 weeks. quite looking forward to it.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

currently listening to: 30 Seconds to Mars

ENT Surgery

2007-03-26T23:21:00.000+12:00

in theatre with this ENT surgeon and he started drilling me on the anatomy of the nose

"so tell me about the anatomy of the nose"

"uh... top 1/3 is bone, bottom 2/3 is cartilage and there is the upper and the lower lateral cartilage"

"ok so tell me about the lower lateral cartilage"

"uh... it is made from erm cartilage and uh water"

"yes yes so how many parts are there?"

wtf got parts wan meh??!!

"ok, so they don't teach you anatomy in malaysia, they don't teach you physiology, i know they don't teach you pharmacology. so what the hell do you know?"

*tamparan hebat*

the locals studied anatomy for one bloody year and what do we get? 3 hours of anatomy of the respiratory system. on paper.

2 hours into a septorhinoplasty and the scrub nurse dropped 2 instruments accidentally. says the surgeon to the nurse:

"what is wrong with you today? why, you from malaysia too?"

wtf??!!!

another day, another surgeon.

"ok young lady, how many branches of the facial nerve are there?"

wah this one i know lah. damn confident.

"five"

registrar motioning a big NO behind me and he gestures 1 and 5.

"uh i think fifteen, actually"

"good! so what are they?"

"... temporal, zygomatic, buccal, mandibular, cervical"

"yes yes and the other 10?"

where the heck did the extra 10 came from??!!

OMG OMG OMG POTC 3!!

2007-03-21T09:53:00.001+12:00

where is my mcdreamy?!

2007-03-17T21:40:00.000+13:00

am currently doing "Specialty Surgery" which consists of 7 days of opthalmology, 3 days of neurosurgery, 5 days of urology and 5 days of ORL (or ENT).

no, no mcdreamy here. seriously... seriously.

neurosurgery registrar "seriously, we don't care if we don't see you at all for the 3 days. i will still sign your attendance sheet"

chia yee and i walked into the operating theatre where one consultant was operating with 2 registrars assisting.

"hello! we are 5th years doing neurosurgery at the moment"

all the surgeon does is raise his eyebrow(s). ONCE.

chia yee "oh what is going on now?"

registrar "mumble mumble" *points vaguely to the dude on the table with his back split open*

chia yee and i "uh... ok..." and left 5 minutes after that. balik tidur.

chinese new year + coromandel trip

2007-03-17T12:43:00.000+13:00

some familiar faces? we had a malaysian buffet as chinese new year dinner. 30+ of us lau-ing yee sang was uh quite the memorable.

too much yee sang will make you wanna be ultraman

first, we were suppose to make a seal, but someone added a shark's fin and then someone else added a mermaid's tail. so uh we're not sure what it ended up to be. but oh well.

best waves in the whole world

nevertheless to say, we all came back super sunburnt. for the past week, epidermis(es) were flying all over the house.

and i got bilateral ankle oedema for almost a week because of the bloody sunburn.
i'm looking like toast that is burnt. aloud.

2007-03-17T11:53:00.001+13:00

no title lah

2007-03-16T00:36:00.000+13:00

wish us all luck

2006-11-22T11:32:00.000+13:00

this is how i'm feeling right now. and i don't wanna be like tim.

Paper A is tomorrow. wish us all luck! i'm looking at the bright side, i'll be home in less than 2 weeks.

damn cool!

2006-11-16T23:24:00.001+13:00

has it been 13 years already?

2006-11-11T22:05:00.000+13:00

i miss dancing

2006-10-30T21:29:00.000+13:00

damn. i miss the good ol' IMU days of last minute dance practice. those were the days.

more piercings?

2006-10-26T17:29:00.000+13:00

currently am quite addicted to ear piercings. i just had my 11th pierce (7th earring hole). if you know what i mean. i wanna get another one soon and i'm thinking of something along this line.

no, mum, this isn't my ear. i got it from the net, in case you were wondering haha

in terms of ear piercings, this kind of piercing is known as the 'rook'. me thinks it looks quite sexy! what say you?

good luck to all!

2006-10-24T20:42:00.000+13:00

yeah, good luck to those who are having their finals. PWNED THE EXAM TO DEATH! look it in the eye and go "BWAHAHAHA I'M SO GONNA PWN YOUR ASS"

especially to lavinia, tim, dave-o and the 5th years: kit chung, zhi yi and kim zhuan and _________ [whoever i missed, insert your name here]!

good luck.

next time when i tell my kids to study, i'll tell them
"go and study la! don't be like tim!"

some random text

2006-10-23T20:18:00.000+13:00

i received an sms from an unknown number last night and it went something like this:

"love to see you this saturday, 7.30pm at bla bla bla performance"

because a friend of mine mentioned about some kind of performance beforehand, i assumed the text was from her. i texted back:

"yo, thanks for inviting but i'm not sure i'll be able to make it because i might be on-call next saturday. will you be playing, though?"

"maybe" was the reply

"oOOoo cool! what will you be playing?"

"drums. what do you think?" (at the time of typing, i figured it sounded sarcastic but i thought she was asking for my opinion)

"oh i really think you should play. that would be cool"

"are you coming?"

"i am still unable to find a maori patient (we need to hand in a case report on a maori) so i might hang around the hospital to see if i'm able to find one or not. gen med sucks"

"where r u"

"uh... auckland"

"ok are you coming to chch (christchurch)?"

at this point, i was like ????

"uh i'm not going to chch anytime soon. wait, is this christine?"

"no, i'm not. sorry, i didn't know who i was talking to"

-_-''

i hate sundays

2006-10-15T19:18:00.000+13:00

feeling quite emo at the moment. i hate sundays because the next day would be a monday. doing General Medicine as my last run. ARGH! so many things to do, so little time. monday means another day of taggling along with the registrar feeling utterly useless because i can't be of any help.

my team does not have a house surgeon (that's a newly graduate) so my registrar is extra busy, and he sucks at multitasking (he told me himself) so most of the time i'm hovering behind him as he writes his notes. i hate mondays.

who will be back home in dec? i'll be flying back on the Dec 4th and most probably will spend about a week in KL so hope to see you guys then, alright!

exams are coming. damn.

i got a new haircut!

2006-10-15T17:13:00.000+13:00

am quite pleased with this new haircut. can save on shampoo money! since i came to new zealand, i've only had ONE haircut. the wind is getting stronger and at the end of day, my hair would be in knots. so i figured oh well may as well go cut it all off.

before...

and after...

it might not look it but the front is actually longer than the back. i like it! this is the shortest cut i've had since erm secondary school which was uhm 5 years ago (shit i'm old). any comments about how puffy my checks are will be ignored. ya lah, ya lah i know i put on weight lah. so tell me what you think! although it is a bit too late to change anything but yeah tell me what do you guys think. i'm goona colour it red when i get back to malaysia. just too expensive here.

Univertisy Ranking 2006

2006-10-08T16:09:00.000+13:00

THES - QS World University Rankings 2006 Top 200

University of Auckland = 46. not bad.

University Kebangsaan Malaysia = 185. University Malaya = 192. oh well. at least they beat University of Aberdeen

sorry weijin, dalhousie isn't listed. ROFLLOL.

he is da man

2006-10-05T23:41:00.000+13:00

Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew is the man.

why he is the man

lmao

2006-09-23T09:19:00.000+12:00

watch this
and compare it with the video below. damn creative.

opotiki GP run

2006-09-19T13:22:00.000+12:00

each one of us got $250 stipend from the university for our GP run which was 2 weeks long. $60 of which we can claim for petrol. my accommodation only cost $100 for 2 weeks. what does that mean? THAT MEANT i had a 2 week holiday which was paid for by the university! haha how cool is that? very cool, you would agree.

--- edit ---

well i just realise we are kinda paying for it since the international student fees are THREE freaking times more than what the locals pay. @*&#^*!&^$*!&@#*@&!

a sure sign that spring is coming

chia yee was our official "person-who-drives" (driver sounds a bit bad)

official 'sleeper'

some random shot of the sky

there's a cafe here called "Two Fish" that serves the best Flat White in Opotiki. a (headless) rubber chicken as a table marker. when the lady went "oh grab a table marker from the basket". i was spoilt for choice! how would i resist a headless rubber chicken among a rubber cockroach, a rubber tarantula, a pony with pink, sparkling flowing hair and a rubber fly?

on the wall of "Two Fish" cafe. beats me why one fish is playing a guitar while the other blowing a trumpet when the mountain behind them is sprouting brown stuff. *shrugs* never mind the fact that they are both standing on their hind fins. they must be gasping for air (sorry, internal IMU-LB joke)

catherine (my GP partner), me and sarah (a locum)

yes, our second snowboarding trip in the span of one month. never mind that Mt Ruapehu is about 4 hours away from Opotiki. started driving at 4 am to reach the mountain before 10 am

i thought this was a pretty cool picture with angry, dark clouds

had to pry the camera from my dead, cold fingers afterwards. freaking cold! our favourite past-time while on the chair-lift: sweeping snow bits off our snowboards to unsuspecting people below. usually we target the ones who can ski/snowboard damn well. kesian those who kept falling so we left them alone

my GP is an outdoor enthusiast who encouraged us to go kayaking. in winter. yes.

the weather was just right for kayaking. in winter.

i was clutching my camera tightly in case it fell into the sea. if it fell, then GG

useless pic. my toes. just checking if i had enough

what a lovely sunset. pinkish-reddish-orangeish skies

that's my GP "please call me Jo"

busy taking more pictures as he was tying up the kayaks

not a very nice shot of the sunset. ggrr clouds

Whale island. there is a story behind the name but erm i forgot liao

on our way back, we saw a FERRARI lawfully following the speed limit of 75kmph. very painful for the car lah.

yeah, i had to gabung two shoots together to make a complete rainbow because the rainbow was erm too wide. according to a friend, it is actually quite uncommon to see a single rainbow in NZ. so far i've seen 7 rainbows and they were all DOUBLE rainbows! had to look quite hard for the second one, though

back by popular demand

2006-09-19T12:25:00.000+12:00

yes yes, i'm back by popular demand! here are more pictures of our snowboarding trip, GP posting and another snowboarding trip!

our 'house'. we paid for 6 people but managed to sneak in another 2. malaysians, tsk tsk tsk

see, damn cun. we even have a fireplace! which did not serve much function. it was still freezing at night

quite a cool living room. it even had a TV, DVD/VCD player and a video player (who uses those anymore?!). AND a SAUNA ROOM! wahahaha

the guys managed to get the fire going. as i mentioned above, the fireplace did not serve any purpose except to boost the egos of the guys "eh got fire! got fire!" erm... alright

wah! DVD/VCD player and sauna not enough! it had to have a pingpong table!

zhi yi trying to imitate a fly. good job, zhi yi!

do you feel the urge to go snowboarding after seeing this picture?

my backside itchy!! i need to go snowboarding!!

chia yee and i with our rented snowboards. so cold we all wore 2 layers underneath our ski jackets. i DID NOT put on weight, ok. the gloves in my right pocket looks like another hand.

ahh.. bliss... looks like we are standing above the clouds

our main mode of transportation. bas mini!

the snowboarders minus kitchung the photographer

anybody up for snowboarding next year? WE CONFIRM GOING AGAIN! but you will end up with really sore ass and knees for at least a week after snowboarding. you wouldn't believe the different 'kinds' of falls we had. flip 360 degrees kind also got. i fell frontwards, on my palms (we rented wrist guards), did a full 360 degrees flip with my legs in the air and ended up with a super sore coccyx. i swear i felt my brain slosh to the front, slosh back and slosh sidewards. right then left then right again.

the slope wasn't very steep but your snowboard really feels like its going very fast if you don't know how to brake -_-||

just a quick update

2006-08-18T13:41:00.000+12:00

yes yes an update finally. have been off the internet for almost a month now! the bloody internet connection box in my room is not working. welcome to life in grafton. and new zealand. where most people work at the speed of a speeding snail.

anyway, i'm blogging from my GP Clinic in opotiki. nice place, opotiki is. been having awesome weather all week long though it was flooded last week. must be our presence that made the sun shine. hoho

other than spending time in the GP, we got to spend a morning at the local vet and saw how a bitch (a female dog, that is) was being spayed. quite a different experience, i must say. other than that, we spent some time at the local farm where we got to milk cows, feed some calf(s?), fire questions at the farmer and got information about cow-farming in case we decide to quit medical school to go down the cow path. Jim, the owner of the farm kindly let us sample raw milk (i.e. have not been homogenised or pasteurized) from the cows and i liked it so much so that he offered to let me finish the whole mug. which i did. then only he told me a human stomach normally would not be able to process raw milk and that i would be having problems (i.e. diarrhoea) the next day. thanks very much, Jim.

oh and kiwi fruits! yes yes those lovely, lovely green fuzzy things. we got to visit a kiwi farm (thanks, Jean!) and got a bag of Golden Kiwis free of charge. i learnt my lesson and found out that 6 kiwis will send you immediately to the toilet.

other than wandering around in farms and generally making life miserable for the people here, we attended a Body Attack session at the local gym. which was basically aerobics with lot of hands and legs (mostly mine) flailing about.

more update as soon as i can!

all photos from chia yee's camera ^^

i miss home...

2006-07-17T18:59:00.000+12:00

arghhhhhhhhhhhhh BANANA LEAF RICE!!!!! PAPADAM!!!!! NASI LEMAK!!!!! *withers and dies* quite a lame 8 minute long video. i'm just watching it for the food. mamak!!

what can i say? only in malaysia -_-'' but the skater is singaporean!!

ownage

2006-07-13T19:18:00.000+12:00

a commercial filmed in malaysia! see if you can recognize the escalator in LOT 10, KLIA express, pudu raya and the dancer guy (hyun joon) wiping malaysian road haha

All Blacks vs Ireland pictures

2006-07-08T17:20:00.000+12:00

true to my word! here are some pictures we took during the All Blacks vs Ireland on the 17th of June.

before the match started

All Blacks performing the haka

damn clear pictures aye! i love my new camera, thanks dad!! we were so close, we could literally smell the sweat! well not that i want to.

alcoholics unite!

2006-07-07T18:26:00.000+12:00

the president of the alcholics is actually chia yee. vice-president is hong chee. i'm just a kalefeh (someone extra). really!

alcoholic no. 1

alcoholic no. 2

alcoholic no. 3

alcoholic no. 4

alcoholic no. 1 again

now you know why she's the president lah

making do with bowls instead of wine glasses. is like that wan!

sidetracking, one good way to confuse the locals is to bring out all the rojak manglish in full force and i can guarantee you they won't even know you are speaking english.

i'm back!

2006-07-07T17:01:00.000+12:00

IMU students are treated quite nicely here! at the beginning of the year, we were assigned a "buddy" each and throughout the year, we have functions with our "buddies". this time it was a bowling session at a really dodgy bowling alley where EVERYONE's (maybe except chia yee's) bowling ball favored the left side. in addition to that, the machine could not read the 'leftest' pin and if you hit the other 9 pins, you would automatically have a 'strike' or 'spare'.

medical school from my room (cell) window

first floor hallway. chia yee in action!

chia yee - balwin - hong chee warming up for bowling

very 'kai' strike. i only hit 9 pins but i got an automatic strike! whoopee!

our buddies. quite a lot came eh! maybe because it was for free

universal dodgy bowling alley sign : a leg popping out to fix the pins

balwin - mark - chia yee - hong chee's head - me - jenny

Semua Hitam!

2006-06-19T01:34:00.000+12:00

All Blacks 27 - Ireland 17

ownage.

pictures will be up the second i get them resized!

for you guys

2006-05-23T18:42:00.000+12:00

tim - happy belated birthday!

wei jin - belated have a safe trip to dalhousie! (aka forsaken-piece-of-land-some-canadians-have-never-heard-of-before)

hannien - get well soon!

rotorua pictures!!

2006-05-21T22:00:00.000+12:00

yes yes yes!! holidays for 2 weeks!! yes yes yes!! edited some of the really nice pictures of trip. the rest of the pictures i did not edit were pictures of us pointing obscurely to something above our heads and doing weird poses. ok damn lazy to type anything so just see the pictures and imagine lah.

view from the cable car

omg we look so good!

this one is some ride where they tied us up in a sphere-like thing...

and dragged us higher...

and higher somemore...

and then released us!!

we survived it!

zorb!! but we decided not to play zorb because it was damn expensive and distance 'zorbing' down is damn short lah

but looks like fun eh!

the estima we rented.. not bad hor!!

the motel WHERE I LOST MY CAMERA

yes new zealand is overflowing with sheep

more white, fluffy things

MORE!!!!

i'll throw in some BLACK COWs since there are so many WHITE SHEEP(S?)

oh this is the mountain where Frodo was suppose to bring the Ring (nah i'm just kidding)

the water was steaming wei!!

more of the steaming here

omg we look so good! how can anyone look so good is beyond me

self explainatory

the boys are too busy playing with the water while ignoring me who is being strangled by chia yee

the most beautifulest thing!!!

have you ever seen such a blue???!!

HOHO the guide pamplet said more than one hour is needed to climb the bloody steep mountain but we did it in 20 freaking minutes! eat that!!!

narcissistic time

yes with more sheep at the background

chia yee damn stress driving back when everyone in the car is snoring away

WTF?!!

close up, close up.

i hate lamb. with all my heart and soul. the lamb here has this weird erm lamb smell!!! yuck!!

anyway, damn fun right!! come to new zealand!!!

Malaysian English vs The Rest of The World

2006-05-09T10:13:00.000+12:00

When giving a customer bad news:

The Rest of The World : I'm sorry Sir/Madam but we don't seem to have the sweater you want in your size, but if you just give me a moment, I can ring up the other outlets for you and see if they have it there

Malaysians : No Stock

When returning a call:

Hie, this is William Stevens. Did anyone over there page me a few moments ago?

Hello, who page?

Asking someone to make way:

Excuse me, I'd like to get by. Could you please make way?

S-kew me, pris.

When someone offers to pay:

Hey, put your wallet away, this drink is on me.

No-need-wan. I chia you lah.

When asking for permisson:

Excuse me, do you think it is possible for me to enter through that door?

*pointing to the door* Eh, that one can ar?

When entertaining:

Please make yourself right at home.

Eh, don't shy shy lah.

When doubting someone:

Hmm... I don't recall you giving me the money.

Where got!

When declining an offer:

If you don't mind, I would prefer not to do that.

Don't wan lah.

In disagreeing on a topic of discussion:

Tom, I have to stop you there. I understand where you are coming from but I really have to disagree with what you just said about this issue.

You mad ar. Where got liddat wan!

When asking someone to lower their voice:

Excuse me, but could you please lower your voice? I am trying to concentrate here.

Eh shardap lah!

When asking someone if he/she knows you:

Excuse me, but I noticed you staring at me for some time. Do I happen to know you?

Oi! See what! See what! Wan to kena whack izzit!

When assessing a tight situation:

We seem to be in a bit of a predicament at the moment.

Die-lah wei! How??!!

When trying to find out what happened:

Will someone tell me what has just happened?

Eh, what happen? Why liddat wan?

When someone did something wrong:

This isn't the right way to do that. Here, let me show you.

Har!! Like that also you dunno how to do meh! So lousy wan.

When one is angry:

Would you mind not disturbing me?

Celaka you. Go away lar.

rotorua part 1

2006-04-21T21:36:00.000+12:00

don't really have much time to blog now (actually i'm just feeling lazy) so i'm just gonna post some pictures we took when we went to rotorua for easter weekend. more pictures will be up soon!! too many pictures to post so i just made them into .gif format.

the .gifs are so small!!! argh damn frustrating! anyone knows how to make them the normal size? i think photobucket resized them even though they were smaller than 1MB. any ideas? anyone?

my camera was stolen in rotorua. :( well i guess that was my fault because i left the camera in the motel room (i know, it really sounds dodgy, eh?) when we went out for dinner. i didn't realize my camera was gone until the next day. some bastards broke into the room and took off with 2 cameras and 2 watches! ARGH!!!! MY CAMERA!!!! and i took so many nice pictures with it... it went through so much with me! i'm gonna miss you, camera...

anway...

on the second day at rotorua, we went whitewater rafting and sledging!

it was damn bloody awesome!!

one of the many waterfalls we rafted/sledged (is that a word?) on

and this is the freaking 7 foot drop waterfall we rafted on

i know, i know... it doesn't seem that high, right?

awesome!

the happenning ones!~

that's all for now. gonna go edit more pictures!!

and oh, happy anzac day!

kawau island trip

2006-04-04T22:10:00.000+12:00

ok so annually, grafton hall organizes a trip to kawau island for all the residents. damn cool. the ferry trip took slightly more than a hour but we occupied our time by snapping pictures.

this was before the ferry/ship/whatever-you-call-it left the dock/jetty

damn fun hor!

we walked through the woods (unlike the mosquitoe infested jungle of tanah melayu) and we saw the clear blue sea!

the water was freezing cold!

chia yee and i actually wanted to go for a dip/swim but it was just too cold. however we did manage to jump of a wharf about 8 feet tall! the first jump was sooo cold!!! face muscles all cramped liao.

then we did the next sensible thing which was to climb up and jump in again! this time i tried to 'hero, hero' and did a somersault. i ended up with a freaking sore ass for 2 days.

DAMN FUN!!

and oh, it does not get anymore n00bier than
this

late updates!

2006-04-04T21:22:00.000+12:00

yay! more pictures for you guys to see!

ok, about a month ago, there was this party at grafton. (that's where i'm staying) it was a beach theme party and one guy took loads of pictures with my camera! after looking through all the pictures, i came to the conclusion that drunk people cannot take a decent shot. it is as if i'm looking through the eyes of a drunk guy. all the pictures taken were damn blur! and oh, each of us were give 5 coupons for 5 free drinks. hehe vodka, rum, bacardi coke, beer etc.. apparently we get these kinda parties quite often. there was another one just last weekend~ happening leh!

that's simon all dressed up as a pirate! with an erm collared shirt and erm surf shorts?

we tipu-ed the gwai-los that we were from thailand, hence the hand gesture.

another post coming up!

Kingdom Hearts 2

2006-02-25T02:09:00.000+13:00

*jumping up and down*

look what i just found!!! i am so excited!! there is captain jack sparrow from pirates of the caribbean (by the way, pirates of the caribbean 3 is coming out in 2007!), stitch from lilo and stitch, mulan from erm mulan, and if you look closely enough, you can see little yuna from final fantasy x!! and many more!! i am so freaking excited!!

ARGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I WANT TO PLAY KINGDOM HEARTS 2 SO BADLY!!!!! i want my ps2!!!!!

marae visit

2006-02-20T19:25:00.000+13:00

last weekend, we had to attend this compulsary marae stay-over. marae literally means 'meeting place' in maori. the marae was our lecture hall and bedroom for the weekend. imagine 140+ people sleeping under the same roof! cool leh

more pictures!

meet my new friends, resusci anne 1 and resusci anne 2. they don't talk much, though

the view outside the marae

the sun and the sea

behind me is volcano rangitoto which has been predicted to erupt sometime in this century

that's gayatri (she's practically and m1 because she hangs out with us a lot) and the marae

not my camera senget lah. we were standing on a hilly area

that's it folks! won't have time to take much pictures because my surgery run is starting next week. damn it. today's lectures was from 830am to 515pm. can die wei.

ripped off

2006-02-14T17:23:00.000+13:00

i went to get my blood test done today after class. it is a compulsary thingy to check whether we have the required antibodies (bla bla bla) before we are allowed to go on ward rounds. it cost me a freaking NZ$161!! CRAZY OK! i think they are trying to squeeze every single bit of money from us. our international student fees are triple what the locals are paying!

"you scared of needles?"

"erm yeah how did you know?"

"i can see it on your face *laughs* have you ever had a blood test done in new zealand?"

"uh no"

"oh NZ's one is very different. no pain"

me looking very sceptical because the needle looked the same. however i've never seen the container thingy and it looked damn canggih so i kinda believed him for a wee bit until...

*prick*

tipu (bluff) me. still painFUL lah.

sailing trip

2006-02-12T11:20:00.000+13:00

the international office treated us international students really well for the whole of orientation week. they even organized a sailing trip (plus lunch) for us! it isn't entirely free, though. we had to pay NZ$20 (x 2.7 ~ RM54) per person and the university paid NZ$48.

pictures pictures!!

in grafton, before walking to the harbour

our boat, courageous. one of the many ships of 'Pride of Auckland'

looks a tad like a pirate ship, doesn't it?

sky tower from the harbour

our lunch. not very impressive but everything taste wonderful when hungry. the cracker and cheese was very 'masuk angin', though

ooohh we took turns steering the boat. it was quite like driving a car

me - may shan - saleena - hong chee

auckland harbour bridge (the only harbour bridge bungy in new zealand) where you can bungy off the bridge at a height of 40 metres

the finished work of art! (refer to previous post)

you can probably guess what's this for. not gonna try this anytime soon, though!

lectures with the fourth year officially starts tomorrow (last week was a bridging/refresher thingy).

we are going to have 2 weeks of 8.30am to 5pm lectures.

i miss IMU.

more great stuff!

2006-02-06T20:31:00.000+13:00

classes officially start tomorrow. bummer.

first i shall start by putting a picture of me lovely oneself

the university treats us international student really well! we were brought to 3 hospitals we are going to be posted at and every hospital provided us with food! be it morning tea, lunch or afternoon tea. some of them were even kind enough to pack us muffins to eat on the bus! at the end of orientation, they brought us to this chinese restaurant for lunch and then to the museum. cool, huh!

a candid shot i took outside the museum

took some pictures with some of the performers

erm...

act macho lah

quite backdated, right? now everybody plays WOW *roll eyes*

boys and girls, please do not try to climb a volcano, if you ever see one. it is known to be dangerous. speaking of volcanoes, there is a section in the museum where you can experience first hand what would happen if there is an actual a volcano eruption. really cool!

for lizard lovers

wouldn't it be cool to have these as pets??! it might trample you to death, but oh so cool!

these are real, mind you. in a glass case, of course. DAMN GROSS! i hate cockroaches with every single heartbeat and i know you do too, cmingo

these are only maybe 2% of the lovely flowers here

may shan with some geese

cool, right? i wonder how old the tree is

awesome weather! the clouds here are soooo clear and they move really fast too

kia ora from auckland!

2006-02-02T20:13:00.000+13:00

that means 'hello' or 'goodbye' in Maori language, by the way.

auckland ROCKS big time! oh wait, before i forget to mention it, the auckland museum KICK ASS! you guys must come to auckland and go there (and to visit me, of course). at the museum, we got to see the famous maori 'haka' being performed, and i tell you, it made the hair behind my neck stand! it was awesome! words cannot describe it, you guys must come and see it for yourself! you can see haka videos at the All Blacks homepage. wicked stuff.

edit : i googled around a bit and i found the exact same cultural dance i saw in auckland museum! it is about 6 minutes long with the haka dance at the end. *clickie*

anyways here are more pictures of auckland. i took my time editting them, hence the long wait.

my flight to auckland. was pretty excited at that point!

took the bus and then walked to Victoria Street market. may shan, armed with a map, is our official navigator. she did an awesome job, by the way. nobody got lost

there is a revolving restaurant at the top

i would most definately prefer bungee jumping. at least there won't be cars, trucks or concrete greeting me if something went horribly wrong!

the weekend was Auckland Anniversary Day and they had loads of activities down at the harbour

we saw her again today (the picture was taken a week ago), in town, painting the streets downtown!

imagine having to stand absolutely still with minimal movements, in the hot sun wearing thick white makeup and covered from head to toe. respect. this guy is pretty famous too. i saw him in couple of different brochures

just about to go to Auckland Domain (a huge ass-kicking park which is like 5 minutes walk from where i stay) to see the fireworks

a very cool game! its like an ordinary ping-pong game but after you hit the ball, you must put (or rather, throw) the bat down. the next person must immediately pick the bat up and hit the return ball

a patch of trees at Auckland Domain at about 7.45pm. there are so many beatiful trees here that it made me want to be a tree

after admiring the trees, it is time for frisbee! all of us (except Drew) have never played frisbee before and it was amazingly fun!

say FRISBEE!

watched 'memoirs of a geisha'. good movie! it felt a bit weird that when they opened their mouth to speak, they spoke english

an accidental shot of stephanie

my new found friends. they rock. lol

i love my new friends! je t'aime!

all the girls got flowers from Drew. he's a really sweet guy from O.C, California. he's going to Christchurch in a few day's time to study engineering

yup, and that is about it! that was my first week in auckland. i took loads of pictures at the museum today but i haven't editted them yet. more pictures and stories in the next post!

memoirs of a geisha?!

2006-01-24T06:10:00.000+13:00

??!!

2005-12-31T22:02:00.000+13:00

a few of many clubs available at university of auckland

petronas union sounds damn boring, though. 'petronas' is a stupid name for a club.

"encouraging the spirit of friendship, cooperation and togetherness"?

booooooooooringggggggggggg.

"killing each other" and "inexhaustible supply of meat"

ahhh that is what i'm talking about, man.

on a separate note, this website is a pretty interesting read.

her humps

2005-12-31T21:21:00.000+13:00

the song with the most creative lyrics of year 2005 :

"My humps, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my lovely lady lumps"

is it just me or does fergie has an extra 'hump'? and her skirt looks a few sizes too small for her.

she has humps, alright

merry christmas part 2

2005-12-31T20:58:00.000+13:00

ok, ok i know christmas has come and gone but well no harm putting more christmasy pictures!

i know this has nothing to do with christmas but what the heck is 'ayam penyek'?!

christmas decoration #1

christmas decoration #2

decoration at centre court, megamall. the only thing lacking is snow!

centre court from above

my sister, cherrie

eh she is damn hot stuff lah. so many guys want to add her to their friendster. how come this isn't happenning to me??!! i also want!

merry christmas part 1

2005-12-19T21:46:00.002+13:00

christmas is coming!!

i don't have a christmas tree at home but i shall show you lavinia's tree!

nice, right? it looks way better at night with its lights turned off

if you do not receive any presents this christmas, it is because lavinia chopped off santa's head and displayed it in her house!! tsk tsk tsk lavinia...

since santa does not have his head attached to his shoulder, he is obviously not well enough to deliver pressies

i just got back from melaka where both my parents attended a wedding dinner while my sisters and i sat in the hotel and lepak.

there is a restaurant in/under the ship

the view from my room

the resort is called 'watercity' hence the 'everything is under water' look. quite cool, right??!

took a walk after dinner and spotted the ugliest santa claus i have ever seen in my life.

he looks like he wanna punch somebody

nothing exciting happening to me lately so there isn't much to blog about. more pictures coming!

stupid people shouldn't be allowed to write subtitles

2005-11-05T04:18:00.000+13:00

was watching this japanese basketball anime (dunno if any of you ever heard of this but i love the manga so i bought the DVD) ‘Dear Boys’ and i died.

actual line: (said in english)

nice rebound!

subtitles:

oh how beautiful the backboard is!

my whole body started to twitch convulsively,

i fell out of my chair, onto the floor,

and i began to froth at the mouth. (not a pretty sight, i know)

can die ok!

i'm really bored, you see

2005-10-27T20:29:00.000+13:00

i was clearing my Friendster inbox when i came across some old messages.

hi i dont mean to sound rude but i mean seriously i am not interested in girls. or cross-dressers. or losers like you. can you understand?

hi~~
my name is carrie ..
of course we can make a friend ok!
(",)

i'm rich!

2005-10-27T19:39:00.000+13:00

My blog is worth $8,468.10.
How much is your blog worth?

my blog is worth $8468.10!! not much, but hey, at least my blog is worth something!!

[edit]

uhm... but compared to these people, i realize my blog is not worth that much.

Kenny Sia's

My blog is worth $1,016,736.54.
How much is your blog worth?

or Singapore's blog princess, XiaXue's

My blog is worth $1,918,871.46.
How much is your blog worth?

so malu

2005-10-27T18:22:00.000+13:00

i went for a haircut this morning. the last time i cut my hair was when i was in KL around september. but my fringe was getting longer so i decided to cut my hair again. so, i went in the salon, sat down, and this guy with blue fringe decided to come and blow-dry my already dry (and dried) hair. go figure.

anyway, the lady boss came over and i told her i wanted a trim. she stared at my luscious locks (a bit dry,yeah but still luscious) for a few seconds and told me my hair was too "thin" and if i decide to trim it further, i would not have much hair left. so all she trimmed was my fringe. that took a grand total of 1 minute which is roughly equivalent to 60 seconds. and it costed me rm8. oh well.

now this reminds me of an embarassing conversation/situation i had with this hairstylist in KL. i went to the place i usually cut my hair to find that my regular hairstylist was not there that day. so i had this other lady cut my hair. she was wearing this maternity-like clothing which had gathers around the chest area and falls loosely to the waist. uhm kinda like wearing a loose skirt as a top, geddit?

i've seen this lady many times before and this time, she looked as if she had a bulge at the tummy area.

so i thought she was pregnant lah.

halfway through, i opened my big mouth and said (in chinese):

"ooohh... how many months dy?"

"huh?"

" *gesturing to her stomach* how many months?"

"huh?"

"uh... you pregnant, right?" [at this point, i felt a bit uneasy]

"no, i'm not pregnant. do i look pregnant?"

"uh..."

at this point, i was praying reaaaallly hard that a hole would miraculously appear in the middle of the shop, which is on the second floor in Sungei Wang, for me to jump in.

" *raises her voice a notch* i'm not pregnant lah! this kinda clothing like that wan"

and luckily i didn't say something like "oh... boy or a girl??"

so malu, i tell you!!!!!

Disneyland!

2005-10-11T05:43:00.000+13:00

Disney's newest and smallest (at about 306 acres) addition is of course, Hong Kong Disneyland.

come on, everybody knows who Mickey Mouse is! we've heard the songs, seen the cartoons, seen the toys and let's not forget, the cheap Mainland ripoffs.

Disneyland was filled to the brim with people! the week me and my sister were in Hong Kong coincided with a week-long public holiday in China. and guess where the Mainland people decided to go for their holiday? rrriiiiggghhhttt.... Disneyland. can die ok.

i'm actually very lazy to blog so i'll just post pictures instead.

lots of photos ahead!

security check as we entered Disneyland was super tight. we were each allowed one bottle of 500ml mineral water. no other food or drinks allowed. they want you to spend! spend! spend!

the first critters we saw as we entered were Chip and Dale! so adorable!

after conquering Tarzan's treehouse, we bumped into Tigger and Winnie the Pooh!

finally!! after waiting close to 45 minutes in the hot sun! because no visit to Disneyland is complete without a photo with Mickey! i dunno why but Mickey was looking especially handsome!

Mickey's Philharmagic boasts some awesome 3-D effects! thanks to strategically-released water vapours, scents and winds, you can smell the flying pies, orange cake (according to my sister, because i did not smell anything), feel the breeze as if you are riding on a flying carpet! now how cool is that!

now it is time for the daily Disney parade!

the fireworks at night was totally awesome!

Kingdom Hearts 2

2005-10-10T20:49:00.000+13:00

Kingdom Hearts 2 is coming out! those who played Kingdom Hearts 1 will know why am i so excited! Kingdom Hearts has got to be the best game on PS2 ever! in my opinion, KH is way better than any Final Fantasy games. i’m getting high just by looking at the screen shots!

Sora's new look! Sora was voiced by Haley Joel Osmont in KH 1

Abu, Iago and Donald Duck

Captain Jack Sparrow from 'Pirates of the Caribbean' and Sora

Dale (the one with a red nose) and Chip (he's the one with a black nose)! they are so adorable!!

In a battle with Mulan

gaya or what!! that is Hades with the lemon green and yellow hair. i think the guy in red is that guy from FF. not too sure.

KH2 will be released in Japan on the 22nd of December! can't wait!!

korean dramas

2005-09-12T23:35:00.000+12:00

Complicated Relationships

a love triangle (or rectangular) is a must! however, there are sub-categories under ‘love triangle’

two guys, one girl – in this kind of love triangles, both guys are good-looking, professional and of course, filthy rich. the Girl, on the other hand, is poor but very beautiful. (if not, how could she get 2 guys to fight over her??)

two girls, one guy – again, the Guy MUST (bolded and italicized) be rich. of course, it would be better if he is an heir to a massive fortune and/or company. Guy is usually the vice-president (or any post higher) of his father’s company. he is always seen in business suits and of course, handsome (also bolded and italicized). Girl is poor but very beautiful. Other-Girl is usually as financially stable as Guy but she is evil and/or psychotic/possessive. in this kind of love triangle, Girl is always sacrificing herself for the good of Guy. but rest assure, in the long line of k-dramas history, Other-Girl has never gotten Guy.

recently, the two guys-two girls love rectangular is getting more popular, not to mention complex. i shall try my hardest to explain this ever-so-complex situation. an illustration:

Guy, Other-Guy and Other-Girl grew up together. Guy secretly nurses penchant for Other-Girl. unfortunately for Guy, Other-Girl likes Other-Guy. in the midst of debating where he should tell Other-Girl how he feels, Guy meets Girl. at around the same time, Other-Guy also meets Girl. Other-Guy then falls in love with Girl. Girl, predictably, is in love with Guy but Guy is in love with Other-Girl! at around episode 14 (out of 16 episodes), Guy realizes he, too is in deeply in love with Girl.

Point to note - in the long history of k-dramas, Girl (the sweet, innocent, pretty one) ALWAYS gets Guy, whom she is in love with. this is somewhat equivalent to the Big Bang Theory or Einstein’s Relativity Theory, if you will. however, she always gets screwed by Other-Girl (also pretty but evil) somewhere at the middle. self-sacrificing is a national past time of South Korea – much like how badminton is here.

The Guy’s Profession

let’s take a closer look at Guy’s profession. no salesman, no KFC manager, no pizza delivery guy and definitely no warung guy frying pisang goreng at the roadside. this is because his father is always the CEO of a large corporate/ shipping company.

Guy MUST be rich, good-looking, intelligent, has a prestigious family background and skilled in whatever he is doing. he also will have completed university level education and is a holder of an MBA (or other degrees equivalent to MBA) from overseas (98% of the time from America). he drives a huge, expensive imported car (most of the time, a silver SUV or a BMW convertible). he also must be able to play at least one musical instrument. if (99% of the time he does) Guy has fabulous abs, the camera always takes a step back to capture his glory when he takes a shower. whenever Guy is in despair, he will take a shower with his clothes on, trying to look depressed but cool at the same time. not an easy feat.

The Girl’s Profession

let’s now focus on Girl’s profession. she is likely to be working in Guy’s company. Girl is usually fully capable and does everything there is to do but she rarely gets any form of recognition. more specifically, Girl’s career is not very important in k-dramas, at least not enough to focus on. if Girl does not work at Guy’s company, she is most probably helping her mum in a restaurant. the restaurant either sells fried drumsticks or stewed pig’s legs. even though she claims and/or seems to be poor, she is always equipped with a state-of-the-art Samsung cell phone, the kind with a camera.

Caught in the rain

it is also essential to have a torrential downpour and it involves one of the main characters sitting on a park bench through the night waiting for his/her love. sad to say, the idiot stupid enough to do so is usually Girl. logically, if you are waiting for someone and he/she is late/does not turn up, you would take out your cell phone and give him/her a call, right? nope, no such logic in k-dramas. when sitting in the rain, you will temporary forget that you (and the person you are waiting for) has a cell phone.

Slapping

up till now, i have never been slapped nor have i slapped anyone as how the characters in k-dramas slap each other. in fact, i have never seen other people slap each other in public too.

when Other-Girl is pissed, what does she do? she slaps the nearest moving thing which always happens to be either Girl or Guy.

pissed? slap.

jealous? slap.

in a fight with Girl over Guy? slap.

tangan gatal? slap.

[insert random emotion]? slap.

Cancer and Motor Vehicle Accidents

ah, my favourite topic. the main character ALWAYS (huge fonted, bolded and italicized) dies from cancer and/or other chronic terminal disease. and the worse thing is, they usually do not recover. basically when Girl/Guy gets diagnosed with cancer, he/she goes “ok, my life is over. gl. gg. no rm.”

after much calculation, there is 96% of a chance that Girl is the one with cancer. Guy gets to play guardian angel and takes care of Girl during her last remaining days. it cannot, i repeat, cannot be an accident. no such thing as sticking a finger into the toaster, no bee-sting, no being struck by lightning, no falling off a cliff, no shark attack. it has to be, i repeat, has to be cancer. in the final stages of his/her cancer, he/she always have to go on a journey.

they ignore little, minute, unimportant details such as : chemotherapy, radiotherapy, surgery and modern medical care in general.

so without trying, they usually end up dead.

just after the main character dies, his/her partner will die of a motor vehicle accident. most of the time, Girl/Guy will die just OUTSIDE the hospital. the vehicle most prone to kill the Girl/Guy is a truck/lorry carrying bricks going at a breakneck speed. just outside a hospital. and when the driver of the truck/lorry sees the person crossing the road from afar, he usually does NOT apply breaks. instead, he keeps honking and then rams into Girl/Guy crossing the road.

Amnesia

other than cancer and car accidents, another form of illness is amnesia or more commonly, memory loss. amnesia and car accidents are closely related because people in k-dramas ALWAYS suffer from amnesia after a motor vehicle (other than truck/lorry) accident (if he/she does not die). however, no worries because the Girl/Guy always recover at around episode 29 and a half (out of episode 30).

Going Blind

going blind is also a popular form of illness. blindness and cancer are closely related because cancerous tumour always grows and compresses the optic tract thus leading to blindness. allow me to illustrate.

Girl and Guy are childhood sweethearts (again). Guy gets into a car accident and goes to America for surgery. Guy loses his memory and does not return. Girl is devastated. Guy (with his memory still lost) returns and bumps into Girl.

before i continue, i could like to stress that Seoul (where most k-dramas takes place at) is the fourth largest metropolitan are of the world by population. what are the odds of two people with day jobs bumping into each other? however, if you throw logic and common sense out of the window, then yes, they will definitely spot each other.

Guy does not remember Girl but Girl does.

*after, say, maybe 14 or more episodes of tears and anguish*

finally, Guy remembers Girl but he goes blind because of the aforementioned car accident. Girl is devastated.

*more tears*

Guy regained his eyesight after a miracle surgery!! how sad for him to regain his eyesight to find out that Girl is blind because she has the aforementioned tumour that compresses the optic tract. feeling sad, Girl goes on the also aforementioned journey without telling Guy.

without these 8 things, a k-drama will not be a k-drama. enough said.

people who travel are called travellers!

2005-09-08T02:22:00.000+12:00

the three travellers:

lavinia, who cannot speak a single word of mandarin or cantonese

tim, who is sufficiently fluent in mandarin and a maybe little cantonese

me, who is 'half-past six' in both mandarin and cantonese

loads of pictures and wild (and some not-so-wild) travelling adventures in Hong the Kong! read on!

Day 1

is the day three travellers flew to Hong Kong. the flight was not very eventful except for a rude chinese lady sitting beside me who almost spilled her red wine on me. you know lah, how narrow the airplane seats are. and she almost gouged my right eye out by incessant waving of her left arm.

after numerous failed attempts to gouge my eye out, we reached Hong the Kong. omg we were breathing Hong Kong air! the travel agency guy 'collected' us and gave us our airport transfer tickets for the bus. after waiting for a while, this chinese guy peered at my bag (which had the hotel sticker stuck on it) and went:

"how come i called for so long but you did not reply? your bus is waiting for you"

and i weakly mumbled something that sounded like mandarin accented cantonese

"uh... i cannot really speak cantonese"

our hotel was in Wan Chai, on Hong Kong island itself. it was a 3-star hotel but eh the room not bad! very spacious and the toilet is quite equipped. got air-dryer somemore!! wait, the hair dryer was outside the toilet, i think. oh well.

after dumping our bags, we explored the area! because exploring is what travellers do, right? lo and behold, the hotel was smack in the middle of a freaking RED LIGHT DISTRICT!!!! when i said 'red light district', what i really meant was a whole ROW of nightclubs and more on the opposite side of the road! lots of ang-mohs looking for one night stands (i presume) and lots of girls dressed skimpily sitting outside of their respective clubs, trying to drag (yeah, literally drag) any ang-moh who happened to pass by.

Day 2

had breakfast at this chinese restaurant near the hotel. i think only really old people in Hong Kong actually get up in the morning to have breakfast. like lavinia said, the inside looked like an old folks home.

Golden Bauhinia Square

after breakfast we went to Golden Bauhinia Square to see this huge, gaudy, gold bauhinia (that's a kind of flower) to commemorate the handing over of Hong Kong to China. typical tourist routine : walk around looking blur, snap pictures, dilly dally a bit, and back to the bus.

Hong Kong has loads of high rise buildings

Aberdeen Fishing Village

apparently the government of Hong Kong has decided to recollect the land (or sea?) on which the village was on at the end of the year so we were just in time to see this 'village' before it hilang. Jumbo, the floating restaurant Hong Kong is so famous for, is right in front of the fishing village.

Jumbo, the floating restaurant actually floats!

the three travellers pose for a dodgy picture for the travelling photoalbum

minus the dodgy fishing hat

there are actually more boats at this village

Repulse Bay

after this, we went to Repulse Bay to rub a statue of the 'God of Wealth'. there is actually a method to rub the statue (sounds a bit wrong here) but i forgot lah. you know the stomach is the favourite anatomical area when you notice the paint at the stomach area of the statue has already faded.

notice the huge black/gray mark at the stomach of the statue

Jewellery Factory

a tour will not be complete without useless trips to a jewellery factory and a herbal shop. at the jewellery factory, i was ambush by an overly eager saleslady. can't blame her, though. she was just doing her job. i was innocently looking at the display of jewellery in the glass casing when she pounced on me. following conversation a mix of mandarin + cantonese + bahasa indonesia.

"miss, are you looking for a piece of jewellery?"

"uh... no, i'm just looking"

she took a pendant out from the glass display

"this one! this one nice! you see, there are 5 pieces of diamonds in this! and the surface, feel this! feel this! this is the kind on rolex watches! it will never scratch!"

"uh... i don’t think so…"

"come, you can try it on!"

she proceeded to grab my neck and hook the pendant on my existing necklace. i felt it was rude and not too wise to pull away because she had my neck and so…

"see! so nice! so nice and sparkly! young people should wear bright bright!"

"uh... yeah..."

she then whipped out her calculator and punched some numbers frantically

"now got offer! the offers ends tomorrow! you know lah, in september when Disneyland opens, the prices will go up very high!"

"uh... ok..."

"see the normal price is HKD8000 (which is about rm4000) but now only HKD5500 (about rm2750). so cheap! cannot get anywhere else"

at this point, i was sweating at the thought of a rm2750 (rm4000 before discount) pendant hanging from my neck. do i look like i can pay a freaking rm2750??!!??!!!

i declined her as politely as i could and walked off. i wandered off to look at other stuff and guess what? she was stalking me!!! it got so intense that i dare not even look at any jewellery because she might just pounce on me, force my throat open then force a piece of jewelley down my throat and then make me pay for it.

Ocean Park

we had only about two and a half hours in Ocean Park but it was enough. it was at Ocean Park that i decided i hate people. tim always blogs about hating people and i thought oh well, maybe he was just being bitter. now i honestly understand how he feels. there was this bloody china woman who was gesturing with her fat and pigmented arm, speaking at the top of her lungs in some loud china mountain language/slag.

hello auntie who is wearing a gaudy pink blouse that says ‘DIOR BABY’ with a even more gaudy pink three-quarter tights with blue and orange flowers on it??!!! even my semi-deaf great grand-uncle all the way in australia can hear you, ok??!! bloody hell.

as she waved her arm, she whacked me really hard at the side of my head.

*takes a deep breath*

i’m actually fine with people accidentally hitting me because well, it was a crowded place but at least have the courtesy to apologize lah, auntie!!! after hitting me, she turned back to her friends as if nothing happened. and i thought Malaysians were rude.

anyway back to Ocean Park. as the name implies, Ocean Park is a park in the ocean, right? and an ocean has loads of marine life, right? right! the Shark Aquarium totally rocked. well, minus the sweaty and smelly people. other fishes were housed in Atoll Reef, also another beautiful aquarium. fishes there were as fat as buses. and ugly. and pigmented. nevertheless, quite cun to see colourful fishes swim by.

the highlight at Ocean Park was the dolphin and sea lion show! and i decided that i want to be a dolphin in my next life.

took a cable car down

Hong Kong from the sky

then the three travellers paused to do what they do best, which is posing!

3 travellers + 3 tiki dolls

me in an ocean park cap which made me look oh-so-tourist with lavinia

at the exit, i saw this damn hip aunty. she looks old enough to be my mum but still so hip with rambut yang merah macam api yang membara

Shenzhen

the package included a two nights stay in Shenzhen which is damn near so we took the train. the train is pretty similar to our LRT in Malaysia but not so packed.

people crossing the Hong Kong border into China. we were not allowed to take any photos but i snapped when the officers were not looking

Day 3

the breakfast was scary. the stuff in China does not taste the same like back in Malaysia. everything there is so bland and tasteless. after breakfast its another visit to a mineral factory/jewellery shop.

NOOO!!! not people again!!! NO! no! NO! no! NO!!

a pair of Pixu guarding a ball. the lady at the mineral shop was telling us that Pixu guards the treasure in heaven (something like that) and it eats wealth. basically it does not (or cannot) shit. since it cannot (or does not) shit, the wealth he/she/it/whatever ate will accumulate in its stomach for its master. some people like shit, you see. the world has a diversity of people. and the ball in the middle actually glows an eerie green in the dark. quite cool.

after the mineral shop, we went walking around a shopping complex. and guess what??!! we met Colonel Sanders’s (from KFC) long lost chinese twin brother!!!!

Kapitan Tan Sandal

it was also in Shenzhen i saw ugliest thing i had ever seen. this hideous pink fluff the china people call ‘dress’. notice the huge oil palm seeds disguised as a necklace.

have you seen anything so ugly before in your life? the dress, ok. not me. not me!

Day 4

took the train back to Hong Kong. it’s a free day for us! tim called his friend, Dominic who kindly brought us around. after lunch, we took the LRT to Mongkok. omg one look at the rows and rows of clothes shops and both me and lavinia suddenly grew wings on our feet. needless to say, we shopped like mad people.

street market in Mongkok. loads of stuff to see! and the weather was pretty cooling and windy although it was noon

somehow i don’t think my stomach can take pineapple paratha. pineapple i can take. roti canai i can take. but pineapple and paratha?? i’ll pass. and potaTOE paratha? i think i’ll pass also. after eat halfway got someone’s TOE inside. how gross

after Mongkok, we took the LRT to Tsim Tsai Tsui to walk somemore and had dinner with tim’s bunch of Hong Kong friends. very friendly people! but they spoke to fast for me to understand. nice people! bought us korean bbq dinner and drinks afterwards! i like them!! i had never walk so much in a single day before. when i sat down for dinner, my right leg was twitching involuntary. after that, i could not feel my legs, seriously.

Day 5

also another free day! which meant more shopping!!! from our hotel we walked to another big shopping complex in Causeway Bay.

sat down on the floor in the middle of the shopping complex, managed to snap a picture before the security guard shooed us away

we left the guys to do macho things such as thumping their chest at regular periods while yelling battle cries while lavinia and i did our shopping. we took the LRT and went to Tsim Tsa Tsui again. shall not bore you with our shopping details so yeah, we shopped. and shopped. and walked. and walked.

Day 6

good bye hong the kong!

last view of hongkong from the hotel window

there! at the corner!! can you see a skimpily dress lady!!!

bluff you wan lah haha

too bad Disneyland was not open when we were there. actually good thing also. at the airport, tim and lavinia did their last minute Disneyland merchandise shopping while i sat and watch. because why? because i was broke.

landed in Singapore and stayed there for a night. after Hong Kong, Singapore was quite boring.

posing while waiting for the green light

after Hong Kong, i swear, shopping will never be the same anymore.

"convocated"

2005-09-01T21:50:00.000+12:00

ok, ok this post is seriously overdued. i just got back from singapore where we stayed one night after landing from hongkong. going to blog about hongkong in my next post. some photos taken the day before convocation at Hilton, KL Sentral and also during convocation.

bloody hell the hotel room was soooo nice!! there was a plasma tv in the bedroom and also another small tv screen in the toilet!!! so that you can watch tv while brushing your teeth or while doing whatever that you do in front of the mirror. damn cun. the toilet was almost half the size of the bedroom itself.

skinny timmy does not come together with the bathtub. thank god

the shower comes from the roof! water from heaven! yes, i do realize that i sounded a bit jakun. but i memang never see before what

to make your stay in Hilton more memorable, skinny timmy is always ready to iron your clothes while wearing a very ah-mah bathrobe

yvinne - chingling - me - lavinia - chiayee - kathleen - leesha - suchen - charlene
we look like quidditch players getting ready for a game. the robes were huge!

the people who 'convocated' us

me - dr francis archike - lavinia - tim
one of my favourite lecturers. one of the smartest lecturers in IMU as well. and very fierce!

i love the five of you very much! gonna miss you guys when you leave..

dexter the sweet one- me - william the chou ah beng one - bobby the tall one

hong chee the cute one - me - soon han the curi glamour one - jack the super nice one!!

me and nam fei - the super act cute ones

subtitles screw-up

2005-07-24T17:31:00.000+12:00

you guys have to read this. it is HILARIOUS! goes to show there are people with worst english than me! haha *rolling around with glee*

kuching trip!

2005-07-24T05:55:00.000+12:00

ok i know this post is waaaaaaay over due but well here are more pictures of kuching for your viewing pleasure!

we visited a crocodile farm that belongs to this fella named Jong. therefore his farm is called 'Jong's Crocodile Farm'. clever eh? now this mr jong has acquired for himself a vast collection of different animals. some examples are as such : an ORANGE iguana, a phyton, some piranhas, some peacocks, a bear, a pair of attention-seeking otters, an eagle and you guessed it! CROCODILES! let me tell you, the amount of crocodiles he has... is CRAZY! loads and loads and loads! and loads and loads and loads! now i shall think twice (and maybe thrice) before i go swimming in murky lake or something.

have you seen an orange iggy before? nah here in kuching you can find one!

soooo cuuuteee.... but they were smelly and noisy!

all throughout the trip, we were teasing wei jin non-stop about bailing. we were flipping through the FHM issue of "100 sexiest women in malaysia" and we saw bailing ranked dunno number what lah. he was the only one who thought of bailing as 'pretty' and 'exotic' and 'ok what' (something to that extend lah) while the rest of us thought that she was just plain ugly. and weird looking. and has a perfectly round head. ok, the last comment came from me.

kuching is also famous for this fast food franchise called 'sugar-bun'.

wei jin is not upset because of the 2 miserably looking chicken but because we kept kacau-ing him and bailing

walau wei jin you blind kah!! maybe you kena hypnotize by the black and white strips on her baju

ok let's sidetrack and ask our fashion guru, miss lavinia (who happens to be the poll winner of m103's 'most fashionable' category. means she is the most fashionable one in our batch la, stupid) what she thinks of bailing? she says..

....
....
....
....
....
....

lavinia is so disgusted and wrinkled her nose at the mere mention of the name

ooohhh looks like she got wei jin trapped in her 'web'

my lunch from sugarbun. bun-3 pieces of cucumber and tomato sauce-the meat-bun. looks kinda sad.

but sarawak has loads of other yummy food!! this certainly deserve a mention: sarawak laksa! one of best i've ever tasted, really. we had to get up earlier than usual (read: around 10am) to catch the laksa guy before he closes for the day.

yum yum! sarawak laksa washed down with honey teh kekwa

the main highlight of the kuching trip, besides the food and the company, has to be the Rainforest World Music Festival (RWMF) 2005. it was soooo good! ok, minus the drunk people dancing like their pants were on fire. stupid people. we went for 2 out of 3 days because we were pretty broke. rm60 per night. kinda mahal right? but it was all worth it. my favourite band was this band called Shannon from poland who played celtic music. omg they were da BOMB! i bought their cd and was promptly rm75 poorer.

the guys from Shannon in kilts! ooOOooo

we had seafood at buntal 3 days later and guessed who sat at the table next to us? YES!! SHANNON!!! but me and lavinia too malu to go up to them to take a picture. oh well.

kuching has also a variety of interesting shop names.

imagine this:

me : mum i'm going to the eye shop ah to get some contact lenses
mum : ok which shop you going?
me : the eye shop
mum : yalah i know lah! which shop lah?
me : the eye shop la
mum : i said i know you going to the eye shop but which shop la??!!!

ok, you get the picture. next time when i open my clinic, i will not call it 'the clinic' to avoid mass confusion.

kuching is also the first (and last) place in the world where you can see yoda (yes the one from star wars) singing karaoke! don't believe ah? see this!

sing, i shall. with me, strong force it. but not sure about my vocal abilities, i am

and the grim look on his face just shows how serious he is about his singing! don't laugh at him lah you! after he chop off your hand (or other body parts) with his light saber then you know.

....
....
....
....
....

EXCLUSIVE IN KUCHING!!!!! SEE THIS!!!

....
....
....
....
....

bloody hell this perdana parked in TWO parking spaces!!! people in kuching all park like this wan ah? quite shiok lah. i wonder how did tim pass his driving test? once tim was driving, leading the way for wei jin (who drove another car).

tim : ok, throw him off track (begin to switch from right lane to left to right to left)

tim : ok, confuse wei jin (signals right but turns left)

tim : ok confuse him (turns into some lane which unfortunately turned out to be a dead end with wei jin who didn't turn, smirking in his car)

ok here are some sunset pictures to wrap this post up. taken at damai resort. beautiful place with crystal clear sea. can even see the fishes!

the unpacking nightmare

2005-06-27T02:28:00.000+12:00

i hate packing. but i hate unpacking more.

'packing' consisted of randomly throwing knick-knacks and books into boxes or any available plastic bag. i have loads of rubbish. i honestly do not know how did i manage to accumulate so much rubbish in just 2 and a half years in bukit jalil. in addition to that, i had more than 20 pairs of shoes to bring home. my dad, when he saw the shoe boxes, rolled his eyes and muttered 'just like your mother'. 3 pairs of which i did not remember buying.

unpack! unpack! see the amount of stuff also mau mati

4 hours later. not much progress, i know. i was side-tracked by my playstation 2.

slid my closet door open and 2 letters were staring up at me. NZ. THIS IS A SIGN!!

banting rocks

2005-06-27T01:37:00.000+12:00

they say a picture says a thousand words.

banting here we come!

it was low tide and we practically were in the middle of the sea! super cool

tim managed to coax a hermit crab to come out of its shell

a tiny, helpless crab caught by tim-the-ruthless. looks damn geli up close.

zhao kang-genesis-kathleen-lavinia

putrajaya mosque by night

good job. in total, you have just read 6000 words. not bad.

i did it

2005-06-25T12:38:00.000+12:00

i did it. i really did it.

i passed the end of semester 5 examination. i broke down in tears when i saw the word 'congratulations'. that word has never held any significance for me till yesterday.

life in IMU has finally come to an end. i certainly have mixed feelings about this. i'm really going to miss everything in IMU. even the leaking toilets and air-conditioners that do not work half of the time.

this is going to be the last message posted from Vista Komanwel as i'm moving out today. i'm happy i get to spend the the rest of the year growing fat, not having to pick up a single book and spending precious time with my PS2. i'm sad to see the apartment i call home for the past 2 and a half years, looking so empty. sheng yeeng has already moved out. kathleen will be leaving either today or tomorrow. life goes on.

half of my stuff are already in boxes waiting to be brought home. i'm waiting for my dad to come and after that, i'm going home. home.

me back

2005-06-18T05:23:00.000+12:00

i'm finally back after a 3 week hiatus. what have i been up to, you ask? exams la, stupid. you want me fail meh??!!

the results for my PMS matching is out. i'm due for the land where all the sheep added together, outnumber the people. if all goes well, i'm will continue my medical struggle in Univeristy of Auckland, New Zealand. set lah, i shall shear sheep and knit sweaters as my kerja sambilan. please place your sweater orders now, first come first served. that 'baa baa black sheep' song shall be my theme song from now onwards.

but i'm not leaving so soon, though. my semester starts in february 2006 so i shall have the rest of the year to rot. and rot i shall! with glee, no less. anyone kind enough to let me rot at their homes, do let me know. much thanks. i'll go crazy if i rot alone at home for 6 whole months.

the last week before the exams were filled with random panic attacks. but hey, you too would have panic attacks if your roommate was the top-scorer of the batch! she knew practically knew everything that needed knowing. nevertheless, she helped me cramped in as much stuff as i could at the eleventh hour. here's a huge thanks to you, sheng yeeng.

a slip!

2005-05-28T02:23:00.000+12:00

suddenly i remembered a conversation between a friend and i.

me : eh you know, i think somehow, guys are just better in games like dota and warcraft lah. girls panic easily.

friend : yalah, because guys have better hand and eye co-ordination mah

me : oh yah lah. i've read about it somewhere. eye (points of hand) and hand (points to eye) co-ordination

*a moment of silence*

friend : ... well i think i've just proven my point

yoda needs to make a phone call!

2005-05-28T02:10:00.000+12:00

remember in one of my previous post i said that yoda was advertising on radio? it goes something like this.

yoda *picks up phone* : hello?
darth vader : *nasal breathing tone*
yoda : an evil presence i sense [well, duh]
darth vader : *breathes in that sexy way again*
yoda : call for help i shall with star wars celcom recharge pack with rm10 rebate and get a free hologram notebook bla bla bla. *giggles* i enjoy. *giggles again* one with the force i am.

OH MY GOSH.

I WANT TO DIE.

or strangle the person who made this advert.

what kind of advertisement is this??!

since when yoda [who happens to be a jedi master] uses a telephone? and when he is in danger, he calls for help?! on the phone??! whatever happened to the force? his lightsaber? no more batteries meh? no more that hologram thingy? and giggling? when he is in danger, he giggles?

urgh the person who came up with this advertisement should grow more creative cells. please. for the sake of mankind.

perang bintang rawks!

2005-05-21T21:43:00.000+12:00

eh there are some spoilers below. so if you have yet to catch Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith and you want to be surprised out of your pants, then do not continue reading.

similiarities i've noticed in most Star Wars movies

1. chopping of distal body parts

first hor count dooku damn beh shiok anakin skywalker because hor, anakin more leng chai than him mah. so hor count dooku chopped off anakin's right forearm lor. then hor when anakin met count dooku again in Episode III, he want to take revenge lor so he chopped of both count dooku's arm lor. aiya chop also never mind la. since count cooku not leng chai (and damn old), right?

at the end of Episode III, obi-wan kenobi damn beh shiok anakin lor. why leh? because hor anakin become naughty boy oredi la. because hor anakin simply go chop chop other jedi knights lor. so hor obi-wan chopped off anakin's both legs and left arm lor. haihyo. what a waste la. since anakin damn leng chai. never mind la. now he can wear the black suit and now he talk damn sexy lor. got the deep breathing nasal sound. wah so sexy la!

anyway, after this anakin become 'dark weather' right? *refer to previous post* that's why hor every time he appears, the weather become dark lor. always rain wan. want to hang clothes also cannot dry properly. haih. now he not sexy dy.

then hor when luke skywalker fight 'dark weather', 'dark weather' chopped off luke's right forearm lor. wah! this 'dark weather' damn bitter hor! people chopped him last time now he also wanna chopped other people's arm. then when they fight the second time, now hor it's luke's turn to chop his father's arm lor. wah i can see the love between father and son. you chop me, i chop you. wah damn nice hor.

2. closing door/windows with a flick of the hand

ok now back to proper english. in the movie, a simple flick/wave of hand can close/open doors/windows. obi-wan used it, anakin used it, heck, i'm sure all jedis used it! shit damn useful. imagine this. *wave* microwave door opens. *wave* plate flies in. *wave* microwave door opens. *wave* plate flies out. super useful for lazy people like me. if you wave hard enough, you can even propel a person right across the room. let's say you don't like this person for some reasons (maybe he/she very yong shui or he/she simply has a face problem), you can wave your hand and the person will fly across the room. and i used to think a simple 'fuck off' would suffice.

3. hanging off legdes

does hanging off a ledge make a jedi more 'jedi-ish'? almost every prominent jedi in the movie hung off a ledge at one point or another. does it make the jedi more gaya after he manage to clamber from the egde of death? beats me. maybe its the 'i'm-hanging-at-egde-of death-but-can-still-climb-up-and-own-the noob' kind of gaya.

4. shedding of clothes

ohh my favouite one. before any important jedi fight, it is always a habit to shed their outer robe. damn. too bad its only the outer one. i wanna see anakin shed more!! damn sexy to see the robe slid to the floor. hoho. by the way, this only appilies to anakin ok.

speaking of jedi robes, i want a jedi robe with the 'jedi hood' for my birthday!! shit its damn gaya to walk around with the brown robe that swishes behind you. say, when you turn right, the robe would fly like 90 degress behind you. just oozes with gaya. can i have a light saber while i'm at it?

say it like this

2005-05-19T18:20:00.000+12:00

i was watching some chinese entertainment news the other day on tv and the presenter came on dressed as Darth Vader. nothing wrong dressing as your favourite villian once in a while but why is everybody riding on the Star Wars fame?

yoda, for one, is on some english radio telling everyone how good this particular recharge card is. i rolled my eyes and turned to some chinese station instead. and guess what? yoda again, get this, speaking in chinese telling his chinese speaking fans to get the same recharge card. *cringe* so please go and buy this recharge card and the FARCE will be with you!!

and this particular presenter cannot pronounce 'Darth Vader', try as he might. he kept saying 'I'm Dark Weather, I'm Dark Weather'. he would be better off saying 'tee ohh ohh' (sky dark dark), no? still mean the same thing.

'Revenge of The Sith' became 'Revenge of the Six', 'Revenge of the Sick' and 'Revenge of the Cyst'. '

jibe aside, i am damn excited to watch the movie tomorrow! no matter how disgusting the cyst might be.

Little Red Riding Hood

2005-04-26T17:49:00.000+12:00

funniest thing i've read so far! so i'll share it with you guys!

From "Politically Correct Bedtime Stories" by James Finn Garner

There was once a young person named Red Riding Hood who lived with her mother on the edge of a large wood. One day her mother asked her to take a basket of fresh fruit and mineral water to her grandmother's house-not because this was womyn's work, mind you, but because the deed was generous and helped engender a feeling of community. Furthermore, her grandmother was not sick, but rather in full physical and mental health and was fully capable of taking care of herself as a mature adult.

So Red Riding Hood set off with her basket through the woods. Many people believed that the forest was a foreboding and dangerous place and never set foot in it. Red Riding Hood, however, was confident enough in her own budding sexuality that such obvious Freudian imagery did not intimidate her.

On the way to Grandma's house, Red Riding Hood was accosted by a wolf, who asked her what was in her basket. She replied, "Some healthful snacks for my grandmother, who is certainly capable of taking care of herself as a mature adult."

The wolf said, "You know, my dear, it isn't safe for a little girl to walk through this woods alone."

Red Riding Hood said, "I find your sexist remark offensive in the extreme, but I will ignore it because of your traditional status as an outcast from society, the stress of which has caused you to develop your own, entirely valid, worldview. Now, if you'll excuse me, I must be on my way."

Red Riding Hood walked on along the main path. But, because of his status outside society had freed him from slavish adherence to linear, Western-style thought, the wolf knew a quicker route to Grandma's house. He burst into the house and ate Grandma, an entirely valid course of action for a carnivore such as himself. Then, unhampered by rigid, traditionalist notions of what was masculine or feminine, he put on Grandma's nightclothes and crawled into bed.

Red Riding Hood entered the cottage and said, "Grandma, I have brought you some fat-free, sodium-free snacks to salute you in your role of a wise and nurturing matriarch."

From the bed, the wolf said softly, "Come closer, child, so that I might see you."

Red Riding Hood said, "Oh I forgot you are as optically challenged as a bat. Grandma, what big eyes you have!"

"They have seen much, and forgiven much, my dear."

"Grandma, what a big nose you have - only relatively, of course, and certainly attractive in its own way."

"It has smelled much, and forgiven much, my dear."

"Grandma, what big teeth you have!"

The wolf said, "I am happy with who I am and what I am," and leaped out of bed. He grabbed Red Riding Hood in his claws, intent on devouring her. Red Riding Hood screamed, not out of alarm at the wolf's apparent tendency toward cross-dressing, but because of his willful invasion of her personal space.

Her screams were heard by a passing woodchopper-person (or log-fuel technician, as he preferred to be called). When he burst into the cottage, he saw the melee and tried to intervene. But as he raised his axe, Red Riding Hood and the wolf both stopped.

"And just what you think you're doing?" asked Red Riding Hood.

The woodchopper-person blinked and tried to answer, but no words came to him.

"Bursting here like a Neanderthal, trusting your weapon to do your thinking for you!" she exclaimed. "Sexist! Speciesist! How dare you assume that womyn and wolves can't solve their own problems without a man's help!"

When she heard Red Riding Hood's impassioned speech, Grandma jumped out of the wolf's mouth, seized the woodchopper-person's ax, cut his head off. After this ordeal, Red Riding Hood, Grandma and the wolf felt a certain commonality purpose. They decided to set up an alternative household based on mutual respect and coorperation, and they lived together in the woods happily ever after.

IMU Ball 2005

2005-04-16T19:05:00.000+12:00

IMU Ball 2005.
9th April.
Whispering Flames, Unforgettable Sentiments.
Marriot, Putrajaya.

the gang

alex and i

me, hsu pheen and lavinia

juz chillin`

wei jin and i, both trying hard to be gaya.

rain rain go away

2005-04-16T07:51:00.000+12:00

ok, i must blog about this.

today, as kathleen and i were just about to leave food avenue after dinner, it poured like crazy. being the two nutcases that we were, we decided to brave the rain and walk (kathleen can't run in her heels, hence 'walk') across the street back to vista. bad idea. very bad indeed.

we had no umbrellas and we did the next sensible thing which is to improvise and used our files to cover our heads. another bad move. the wind was so strong that we felt like walking under water. it was THAT strong. anyway, we passed the guard house outside vista B and the next thing i heard was a yelp from kathleen and when i turned to look, i saw her 5 weeks worth of Nervous System notes flying in the air. her notes were either still flying, lying in the middle of the road or stuck at some car's windscreen. and the exam is next week. what a disaster!!

kathleen, in a short skirt and heels and me, still in my white labcoat ran across the street to collect her already doomed notes, all the while pelted mercilessly by the rain. we manage to get all except for some that made their way onto the main road outside IMU.

we wade our way through puddles of water and reached home in one (freezing cold) piece. i ironed dry whatever notes we saved and i think now kathleen is in a mild state of depression.

imagine your notes of 5 weeks gone like that. you fiercely tried to stay awake even in the most boring of lectures. you painstalkingly wrote down notes while the lecturer droned on and on and on in a monotone voice. and now, no notes. zilch, zero, nada, nil.

and the exam is on friday.

really to DIE for

2005-04-05T04:49:00.000+12:00

kathleen, who absolutely loathe 'rotiboy' said,

"yala! smell a bit also feel like dying! eat dy after that sure die wan! yuck!"

and she walked away holding both arms at a 90 degrees angle holding the two bags of rotiboy.

just look at the amount of oil on the bag. if you do not die from the smell (like kathleen almost did), you will probably die from many blocked coronary vessels.

orientation

2005-03-07T05:43:00.000+13:00

ok, as you probably can see, i just changed back to the old template. been having loads of problems with the new one. for one thing, the scroll button cannot accommodate the pictures and took the fun out of viewing the complete picture. and the fonts were damn tiny in the archives. haih.. wasted all my effort editing that template. anyhow i prefer this good-old-template.

orientation was fun!! for me, at least. never seen so many seniors in one station before. we sure did scare the juniors! haha.

THE recipe for ragging the juniors:

ingredients :

(the amount is up to you, if you are feeling particularly cruel, feel free to increase any of the following)

· 2 buckets large enough to hold gooey, disgusting stuff

· cooking oil

· a lot of flour

· bottles of smelly fish sauce

· bottles of smelly cencaluk

· bottles of smelly rojak sauce

· chicken eggs, preferably rotten (however we, being nice and lovely seniors, used high grade chicken eggs, fresh from the hen)

· leftover food (such as alex's leftover kfc chicken from his birthday celebration, or wei jin's 3-month-old pizza, or a huge bag of leftover noodles)

· some ikan kembung, preferably dead and with their intestines slipping out

· a large fish head, also preferably dead

· writing ink, or water-based paint

· some paint brushes

· water, to mix

· salt and sugar, to taste

· other smelly and disgusting things you can think of

THE crucial steps:

1. first of all, pour the cooking oil into one bucket. with a considerably amount of care, slowly mix in packets of flour. stir slowly (please, with a stick, not your hand) to avoid spillage of the precious ingredients.

2. then, pour in the bag of leftover noodles, taking care not to spill anything. do not worry that the noodles are cold, colourless, and lumpy. just ask a junior to 'volunteer' to put their hands inside the bucket and break them into small, satisfactory sizes.

3. next, carefully open the bottles of smelly fish sauce and cencaluk. pour them into the second bucket. add water and voila! instant recipe for pleasant smelling t-shirts and shoes.

THE ragging :

(need not be in the sequence stated)

1. make the juniors do their cheer multiple times in the hot, scorching sun. wait, where will the seniors be? why, we will be in the comfortable shade of a tree, of course! where else can we super seniors be?

2. after exchanging pleasantries with them, make them stand in line and pass the raw, dead ikan kembung with their mouth from one end to the other.

3. then, make them have a PDA (Public Display of Affection) with the fish head. that is, make them lick the fish head like they mean it.

4. make the guys lie down on the ground and have the girls each roll a raw chicken egg up one pants leg and smash it (hard) at the crotch area.

5. make the guys soak their shirt and make the girls soak their shoes in the the second bucket (the one filled with fish sauce and cencaluk)

6. seniors can also go around using ink and poster paint to write anything they want on the juniors. the back, neck, forehead or anywhere that has skin is allowed.

7. statements below and others that are similiar are highly recommendable :

- come to IMU Ball 2005!!!!!

- orientation is fun!

- m1/03 rocks!

- seniors rulez!! and i suck!!

- alex *ahem* ching ling

- carrie is damn cun

- lavinia is sexeh (lavinia made me write this)

- chia yee is medusa

8. repeat any steps from no 1-6 as many times as you like

ooh nice

2005-02-28T20:20:00.000+13:00

for some weird reason, i really like the wallpaper of the callab computer, you know, the one saying.. wait, lemme check.. ah! saying 'chill out, IMU Ball 2005'. wah damn gaya. good job to the wallpaper creater! looking forward to the ball! that will be another post for another time, k?

anyway, i'm sitting pathetically in callab, waiting for the imu-it-department-man to finish tinkering with the equally pathetic printer. the guy is standing and staring at the printer. for 10 whole bloody minutes! does he think staring at the printer will make the paper spit out? huh. maybe i should try that sometimes.

outside, i could hear noises that could only be heard twice-in-a-year. the delightful sounds of juniors being ragged senseless. aahh... bliss..

oh and guess what? i saw an over-protective mother walking around the atrium, anxiously observing the seemly innocent ragging. huh talk about pampered.

hey!

2005-02-27T20:19:00.000+13:00

hey i'm looking nice and new! haha.. for those of you who are partially blind, i've just changed my template! however, this is a temporary template until i've done some polishing to my photoshop skills. then i'll come up with the ultimate template. muahahaha.

i know the pictures look awful with the scroll button there but well there is nothing i can do. eh actually there is. malas.

*running frantically with hands in the air*

spent too much time editing this template! argh!! i need to study!!

seriously.

why are you laughing?

you don't believe i'm going to study?

ok, you're right..

more pictures

2005-02-03T23:33:00.000+13:00

nothing much happening lately so nothing to blog about. here are more pictures instead! sorry to those with dial-up!

lavinia, kathleen and me

fei : hey man, can i have a peek at the fungus you cultured?
prakash : huh! no way! the fungus is all mine! i cultured it! i said its all mine! hands off!!! MY FUNGUS!!

m1/03 guys oozing with gaya

m1/03 are the champions!

lavinia and jeng

tsk tsk tsk, wait for food also wanna pose