bangkok day 2...

Continued from here.

Woke up pretty early on the second day and headed for breakfast in the guesthouse's lounge. After that we took a short walk to the Sala Daeng BTS Skytrain which is like 5 minutes away from where we stayed.

Patpong during daytime.

Funny to see how many shops with Japanese names along the streets of Patpong, I didn't even notice that when we arrived. It's like a mini Japanese Street here.

BTS Skytrain. Way more efficient than Malaysia's LRT.

We decided to go to Pratunam Market which is, according to the map, located quite near the Phaya Thai Station.

Apparently we got it wrong.

Took us more than half an hour's walk from the station to the market (under the hot sun), we swore that we won't take anything other than taxi to return later.

Streets in Pratunam Market.

Pratunam Market is a place where you'll find plenty of tailors selling custom-made working blouses, pants, or old folks' attires. We initially thought we could get some decent buys here but sadly we got that wrong. The stuff sold here are just not our styles. But that didn't stop me from getting a pair of jeans at 300Baht (RM30) though!

The famous Jay Puy.

After spending the entire morning & noon in Pratunam, we headed back to the guesthouse for a short rest before proceeding to China Town.

We got to China Town close to evening hours, and once we stepped out of the taxi we went straight to the much talked-about Jay Puy, rice served with thick kaeng karii, a chinese-style curry. You can almost certainly miss the stall if you're not paying attention, simply because the curry stall doesn't look like they're doing business.

In fact, you don't even see tables anywhere. Everyone either sit on plastic stools holding up your plate of curry rice or you just tapao and leave. There's a variety of curries available, but we again chose the one most people ordered, the thick pork curry with potato.

Yummy!

Suffice to say, it's by far the best meal we've had in Bangkok throughout our 4-day stay.

Mr Cowboy preparing pork satays.

That, and the pork satays where you can find almost everywhere in Bangkok. They all taste the same, which is simply delicious!!

And they're only at 10Baht (RM1) per stick!

I bought one everytime I passed by a stall selling pork satays. I just can't resist it.;)

I can eat this for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Around 7pm, we went back to get dressed up for the night.

Sirocco & Sky Bar.

You can see pictures of the bar circulating in emails, people speak in awe of this place, which means you can't miss out Sirocco when visiting Bangkok.

Located at the 63rd floor of Lebua Hotel, you get to see the most magnificent view of Chao Phraya River behind you under the romantic moonlight.

Back to reality though, nothing here is cheap.

We spent a close 2,000Baht (RM200) for drinks alone (OMG!).

Lightning strikes.

But really, you cannot not come here. Just sitting up here looking at the majestic view of Bangkok's nightlights is priceless.

Our expensive drinks.

Too bad though, that it rained after a while. We thought we could enjoy the entire night outside admiring the lights of Bangkok city, but fate had it that it rained cats and dogs for the rest of the night.

Bangkok's night lights.

But not before we took enough pictures of the amazing view from the top of the world.

Simply beautiful.

To be continued...

bangkok day 1...

Have I mentioned that I was in Bangkok last month for a holiday?

These photos are a bit late, but didn't really have the time to write a lengthy post until now, so this is the update.

The gueshouse we stayed during the first two days.

Bangkok, the capital of Thailand, is locally known as 'Krung Thep' or 'City of Angels', It's a short form of the Thai name, which I don't think anyone uses at all. The full-length version of its name, when translated, is something like 'Great city of angels, the repository of divine gems, the great land unconquerable, the grand and prominent realm, the royal and delightful capital full of nine noble gems, the highest royal dwelling and grand palace, the divine shelter and living place of reincarnated spirits'.

Now you know why us 'foreigners' simply call this capital 'Bangkok', derived from 'Bang Makok' or Village of Olive Plums.

Cafe Kaldi is a local version of Starbucks. This is one of many you'll find along the streets in Bangkok.

During our four-day trip, we stayed in Silom for the first two nights. We stayed a bit further from the Riverside, closer to the nightlife in the city. While it used to be known for the shipping and ports during the olden days, Silom has transformed into a business area packed with office workers during the day.

At night though, the entire place magically turns into the infamous night bazaar and red light district of Patpong.

One of the stalls in Soi Pradit, Silom.

We stayed in a decent guesthouse called 'Take a Nap Hotel', which really isn't a hotel. It's a budget guesthouse for free-n-easy travelers like us, but with more privacy. Every room has different 'themes', if that's what it's called, and at 1300Baht/night (~RM130) for a double room + breakfast, it's considered relatively cheap in the area.

Our first meal in Bangkok, and it's heavenly. ;)

We arrived at the guesthouse at 11.30am, and the receptionists are more than welcome to allow us early check-in. Once settled down, we proceed to walk over to Soi Pradit Market, about 20-30 minutes walk from our guesthouse. Not known for anything extravaganza, but always packed with office workers during lunch hours. We went for the stall with the most customers and ordered what everyone else were eating, rice with braised (?) pork. Or something like that, I don't know. I just pointed and showed 2 fingers (for two), and there comes the plates with delicious pork rice. It's a pretty common sight to see Thais plucking the chilli and chew them when they're eating any meals, but since spicy's the trend here I'm not surprised.

Neilson Hays Library

On the way back we stopped by Neilson Hays Library. This wasn't our intended stop, but the architecture and designs are so captivating that we went in for a short visit.

Entrance of Neilson Hays Library

It was a pretty well-kept old library with the classic feel. Very brightly-lit, and although a bit small, it's extremely cosy to be sitting in here and reading a book.

Enjoying the air-conditioner in the library after a long walk.

You'll find plenty of foreigners taking some time and hang around in this library and enjoying a book or two.

Jim Thompson Store.

Opposite the road of our guesthouse is the Jim Thompson Store. Jim Thompson is the company that revived the silk industry in Bangkok and you'll find plenty of Jim Thompson outlets in Bangkok. There are plenty of stuff (not just silks) sold here, tableclothes, wallets, handbags, pillowcases, cookies and even Jim Thompson postcards. While I think everything in the store are quite overpriced, the place is worth a visit for any tourists. I don't encourage to buy anything there though...;)

Soi Polo Fried Chicken.

Towards the evening we took a cab to Lumphini and went to try out the much recommended Soi Polo Fried Chicken. Most cabbies have no idea where is the location unless you show the map, and seriously at that time I felt I may have been misled to think the fried chicken is really that good.

Personally, it tasted so-so, pretty much like our local mamak's fried chicken. Perhaps 'farangs' don't really enjoy their KFCs and prefer these, I don't know.

Suan Lum Night Bazaar.

From there we took a short walk to the Suan Lum night bazaar. When we arrived it was still pretty early (6pm), but most stalls were already up and ready to do business.

Illegal vendors in Suan Lum operating as usual despite court battles to close it down.

Suan Lum night bazaar is only a few years old, and is just getting its crowd when it was announced to be closed soon for other developments. But that doesn't stop the vendors from opening the stalls. If you don't read the local papers you won't even realize that these vendors are actually operating illegally!

This night bazaar isn't the cheapest naturally, but bargain hard and you'll be able to get a thing or two for dirt cheap prices. Of course, there are some other bazaars and markets in town where you can get great deals as well, but for the first night we're content to get our hands full shopping for souvenirs here.

Patpong Street at night.

Around 9pm we left the bazaar with both hands busy carrying plastic bags filled with clothes, souvenirs and shoes. Took a taxi back to our guesthouse and had a short rest before we went back down to enjoy the nightlife in Patpong.

Patpong is famous for its gay bars and tiger shows, while the night market is filled with over-inflated items. For a T-shirt you can get in Suan Lum for 150Baht, you're likely to find the same shirt here selling at 300Baht.

The notorious street filled with gaybars in Patpong.

We took a short stroll along the few streets there, but really, if you're smart and have done your research you wouldn't want to buy anything here. Plus, it's not really fun to have 20-30 Thais
asking if you're interested to watch pingpong shows, which I don't really want to explain here.;)

To be continued...

4 years down the road and nothing much has changed...

In a little more than a month, this blog would be celebrating its 4th birthday. I don't think I'll be free on that day to wish my blog a happy birthday (I'm slotted in 'busy' mode that week), so I might as well blog about it since I remember about this now.

My first post was crap. It was written due to pressure from a couple of friends who blog as well. I didn't expect 4 years on, I still have this blog. And actively blogging still.

4 years back, there weren't many blogs in Malaysia. I know I'm not the first who caught the blog flu, but really, even project petaling street has just begun operation for some time. There are plenty of great stuff to read in that blogtal.

I struggled to write in html back then. I still do, but thanks to blogsphere's popularity nowadays the host does everything for you.

I can blog about anyone I want then because nobody knows, since nobody really reads blogs.

I lost my passion in blogging some years back during the time where plenty of useless blogs mushrooming out from nowhere, and everyone tries to make money out of blogging. Reading others' blogs became fun no more because people are copying and pasting news just to get easy money. Quality bloggers shunted the blogsphere, and I lost interest as well.

I don't know what spurred me to continue blogging, but I just thought of something just recently.

Maybe 10 years, 20 years, perhaps even 50 years down the road, I would have compiled a thorough journey of my life, and I can imagine myself laughing my socks off reading the first few posts I made. This will be my diary and will be recording many more important events in my life, my loved ones, my friends, my country, my everything.

50 years later, if I'm blessed with grandchildren, they would be sitting on my lap, reading back the old posts, and ask me why the heck my generation is so out of fashion.

Happy be-'earlied' 4th birthday to my blog.

There will be many more anniversaries to come.

ray of light...

It's been almost a week since I last updated.

And yes, I have got the new hedgehog, yet to name it, don't really know what to call it but I don't think that matters much since she won't know I'm calling her anyway. Haven't had the time to take any photos of this snowflake hedgehog, but you guys can bet I sure will post them up here when I do. Unfortunately the hedgehog is a bit bad-tempered, so far she has not quilled down any time I tried to touch it. The hissing and puffing sound sure makes it like she's a bit grumpy. Too grumpy to my liking. But well, I think I'll have ways to tame her.

On another issue, I'm thinking of something new to start. While it's too early to say anything, but I think I've found something which I think I will have a passion in doing.

No, it's not breeding hedgehogs, although yeah, I'm planning to do that as well, but um... I think I'll make a public announcement when I achieve some success in it.

In any case, I think I'll be pretty busy for the coming months due to this new thing that I wanna do, plus my job and hedgehog breeding, and heck, my brother's getting married end of the year (have I mentioned it?). This will not be good for my health, hahaha...

But like the frequently used proverb, "no pain no gain". This is the time to go through some pain I guess. Wish me luck!

my second hedgehog...

3 months after getting Cactus, I've finally decided to get a female hedgehog, first step towards my plan of becoming a hobbyist breeder.

I have reserved a 4 month-old female hedgehog, a solid snowflake with dominant white quills from another fellow hedgehog enthusiast. Consider my lady luck because I was scouting for a platinum-coloured, but an all white snowflake will be a beauty as well.

Will be getting the hedgehog this Saturday if nothing goes wrong, after some time I'll be posting pictures of the new addition here in my blog...:)

ads back in...

After blogging several years without any ads in my personal blog, I'm beginning to let loose a little and add one into mine. What's better than earning a little cash while spending time on your hobby right?

To be honest, I've been registered with Nuffnang for a couple of years already, I think, but I did not really concentrate in a blog for the purpose of drawing click through ratio from my friends, who are the majority of my blog readers anyway. Therefore I started another blog, which is now defunct (unfortunately). I found that blogging what people loves to read is not what I really want to do.

I blog about what I love to read, and what I would want to read back 10 years down the road. And I think this blog serves my purpose, and reverted back to active posting with this blog for the past year. I mean, I write what I want to write, and to hell who cares what you guys want to read, right?

My blog has been ads-free for as long as it existed, and finally I've decided to include one that does not get into everyone's face, but at the same time is given enough attention while viewers get to read what they wanted to read. I'm not expecting much of a passive income by including Nuffnang's ad, but hey, it's a Malaysian's effort and heck I feel better putting Nuffnang's ad rather than any other advertisements from foreign companies. Support local product they said, no?

78 cents...

Ouch.

that rock that bothers us all...

"I still maintain my stand that we have half the victory, and half the failure. All are rocks anyway, there is no mempelam (mango) there, nothing, not even a blade of grass. But people like to rub it in. But let's face it. Malaysia did not lose all. Whoever says that, either he or she does not understand the international law result, or they are playing belukar politics."

"It is a subjective assessment, of course. The fact that Batu Puteh is not with Malaysia now, I think that is the nagging problem. The fact that we have Middle Rocks, not many people appreciate."

Foreign Minister Datuk Seri Dr Rais Yatim's opinion on ICJ's verdict to rule that Pedra Branca belongs to Singapore, while claiming that it should have been Malaysia's.

While I understand that our current Foreign Minister shouldn't be blamed for the lost of the island to Singapore, I seriously think he's in self-denial to claim that we have half the victory, when the only win situation is to claim back all our islands. Losing any of these rocks are just pure failure. Nothing else.

The maps of Malaysia put forward does not even recognise Batu Puteh as part of Malaysia, and it is purely our fault that the island was eventually awarded the the tiny country south of us. How can the important letters and documents go missing, and why do we let Singapore maintain the island independently in the first place?

Just concentrate to get back Batu Puteh and stop critisizing citizens for feeling disappointed that part of our country is lost.

united malaysia for malaysians...

Got the link through a close friend's blog, and finally got to listen and watch the music video after numerous attempts, don't have a speaker you see, I'm poor...;) Goofy as it seems, the video served it's purpose to call for unity in our home, our country, our beloved Malaysia.

As of now (10.37pm, 28 May 2008), 59,469 individuals have downloaded the song, over 100,000 had listened the song through youtube, and thousands of bloggers are spreading the same message through their blogs: we all hope for a single united nation and we are all proud to be Malaysians. See beyond colours and you will see that we are brothers and sisters, after all.



Spread the love, Malaysians. Spread the love.

Our country needs it.

content...

You know, sometimes you really wonder if you're experiencing difference phases in life after being alive for a quarter of a century. Yeah, yeah, I know I'm not old enough to talk philosophy, but sometimes, at times, I begin to feel more and more content with whatever I have now in my life, or anything that may come in the future.

There has always been times when I felt that I do not make enough money to live a comfortable life. Call me materialistic, or anything you wish, but that's what makes the world spin, no? I want to, I need to, be financially-independent if I'm being serious in buying my own home to stay with my beloved one, and to take care of my family with ease, while at the same time making enough money to travel to places I have never been to, and perhaps going for some occasional fine-dinings if my financial situation permits.

I'd live extremely frugal at times in recent years, to the extent that I thought I can save a couple of bucks if I have bread for lunch instead of a decent chicken rice with iced tea. At times I'm very satisfied, but there will be times where I wonder if I'm doing enough.

But then again, from time to time, I'd have moments where I sit back to think, long and thoroughly that maybe, perhaps maybe, sometimes money isn't everything. I'd count my blessings to have a proper roof over my head now. I'd appreciate myself if I can spend a little more to have some decent dinner outings with my girlfriend. I would spend a little to pamper myself and the people surrounding me, just for the sake of spending. During these moments, I would think that there aren't more important things in life than having a good time, and enjoying life to the fullest in slow-motion.

I know it won't be long before I go full throttle in making money again, but it's always during phases like these I would tend to sit back and relax, and think about what's best in life. And a cup of nice hot coffee on a Sunday afternoon, with nothing else to worry about, it's as though the best thing that can happen to me at the moment.

Sometimes, after taking a couple of steps forward, you need to take one step backward just to have a wider view of the road ahead of you.

Sometimes, it keeps you sane.

Other times, it keeps you happy too. I'm content to be happy, at the moment.

tortoise...

I've uploaded quite some photos of Cactus lately, it'll be biased if I didn't put in any photos of my beloved tortoise as well.

Photo uploading will do for now, lately I'm a bit too busy to think of proper stuff to blog about. Things may change though after the Bangkok trip end of this month.

So for the time being, enjoy some tortoise photos!

crépes cottage...

Went to Butterworth and Penang last weekend (whew, I travel a lot lately...), and finally had the chance to stop by Crépes Cottage for some much recommended pancake desserts my friends have been praising non-stop.

Swoosh!

Crépes Cottage is owned by an old lady by the name Agnes, and is located somewhere along Gurney Drive. It's a very small cottage by the roadside, with ample parking spaces behind the comfy wooden cottage.

Strawberry Roll

Coincidentally, my girlfriend's best buddy worked for quite some time in this cafe, being the nephew of the owner, as a chef. Many of my friends have dined here and left with praises and good reviews, while for me, 3's a charm as I finally get to test the desserts after failing to have any meals the first two times I dropped by.

Traffic Light

Both my girlfriend and I met up with her other friends working in Penang just to have a taste of the much-talked pancake desserts, we ordered 5 different pancakes for our 11pm supper, one being a new dessert yet to be named.

Hot Apple

I personally find the pancakes very unique, you seriously don't find these kind of desserts at a lot of places.

Italian Iced Coffee

My girlfriend paid tremendous compliments to her best bud who has never served her any desserts available in the menu everytime she visits. And this time there's no difference, we have a specially-made chocolate pancake dessert pre-ordered.

Unnamed Dessert specially made for us!

Am pretty satisfied with the environment and food, I've never tried having supper in such cosy cottage with such colourful walls. And the final bill that came that night was pretty astonishing as well, we spent only RM60.00 on 5 pancake desserts and 5 drinks. Quite a bargain compared to any other eateries along Gurney Drive.

Mango Cup

Crépes Cottage is located at 77-A, Gurney Drive, Penang Island. You can contact Agnes at 019-448 1680 for reservations especially on weekends as there are limited tables in the air-conditioned cottage. For a large gathering of sorts you'll need to sit in the lawn outside, but you'll get the enjoy the breezy wind at night.

Great place to hang out during weekends, too bad they closes at midnight. But they don't mind if you sit around chatting the night away as long as you pays the bill!

whisked away...

I took the last Friday off and left for a short relaxing trip to Malacca. Time to take a short break from work before the busy season approaches. And it's 0.5 of another resolution fulfilled for the year 2008.

Took off around late noon and arrived Malacca Town in less than 2 hours, my girlfriend and I went straight to Jonker Walk's dessert house for a nice bowl of durian cendol. Hanged around until 6pm and when our ex-housemates were off work, we met up for a satay celup session, slurp!

After dinner, we headed back to Jonker Walk for a little shopping spree, but I was obviously very exhausted that night, my legs were wobbly and my eyes were watery even though the clock has not hit 11pm yet. Spent the night at my ex-housemates' rented apartment, which was quite comfy (and those buggers are renting it for RM2XX a month, OMG how the prices differ from KL properties!!!).

The following morning we headed back the street again for some chicken rice ball, before going to the infamous A Farmosa and the Santiago Fort. We took a trishaw ride around the Stadhuys just to kill time, before heading down to Muar to look for my ex-housemate (the same one, working in Malacca but went back to hometown in Muar). We again had some food fest, went for some char koay teow, pork and pork intestine satays and the last but not least, Muar's signature food otak-otak! Well, there's nothing much about the trip other than food, but when you travel for food you go for good food, hahahaha...

Meanwhile, I've captured a better picture of Cactus, this time with a decent camera.

Introducing, Cactus!!!

I like to pretend to look like some soft toy...

Uploaded a large image, but I reduced the quality because this blog kept returning errors when I tried uploading a bigger file size.

cactus...

Finally, some photos of my hedgehog...:)

I've decided to name this little bugger 'Cactus', for obvious reasons. He has a bitemark on his right ear, and I don't think it can fully recover and grow back the missing part. But this guy's still as handsome as ever.

Made him a tupperware home for snuggling during the day time.

Busy exploring and sniffing around in my room when I brought him up first time.

More interested in nibbling the tissue. Bad boy!

Trying to run away when I picked him up. This fella can't sit still.



After all the hassle, decided to take a nap and ignore me.

Yummy!!! Dinner time for Cactus. The bowl's always empty by the time I wake up in the morning.

Took these pictures using my camera phone, hence the bad quality. Wait till I bring home a DSLR, there'll be better shots for uploading...;)

Someone has offered me another female salt & pepper hedgehog, together with the cage, food, and the wheel as well, at quite a bargain price because he is moving and is no longer able to keep it. I'm still wondering if I should get it, will it be too early for me to have 2? I'm still learning new things with Cactus everyday, I doubt if a second one coming now would be a good time. Heck, today I spent half an hour chasing after the little bugger in the house when I took him out to clean his cage.

money come money...

If all goes well tomorrow, I'm officially an online trader, hahaha...

I've been putting up my comic collection up for sale in the internet, just started the web running last month and it got picked up real quick. Of course, being a regular member in a few forums does help my advertising.

Tomorrow I'll be meeting my first buyer who'll be the recipient of my Age of Apocalypse comics, that lucky bugger. AoA is my favourite title in X-Men, the first storyline I collected which started over 10 years ago. I'm selling off my collection of 26 issues, which will be quite some healthy 200% profit roughly.

Hopefully end of the month the second buyer will have time to meet up for another collection of mine. If everything's good I'll be putting in more effort in online trading and put up other second hand stuff for sale in the future.

Wish me luck...:)

broken...

Hopefully I can catch this tonight. If time permits.

hoglet in the family...

It's working hours now but what the heck, now it's officially lunchtime and I'm gonna blog this anyway, hahahaha...

I went to collect my hoglet (baby hedgehog) from my breeder Dickson last night, boy, it was a tiring journey to drive all the way to Batu Caves. But thankfully, it was worth it.

Sat down at the KFC with Dickson and his girlfriend, and chatted on the basic necessities of this hoglet. Apparently the hoglet belongs to his cousin, and fortunately I reserved this young fella earlier because when the hoglet began quilling, this kiddo turned to be a beautiful salt & pepper snowflake, and his cousin must be thumping his chest, Dickson said his cousin claimed that if no one has reserved he wanted to keep it, hahaha... I'm lucky that Dickson kept his promise. It was originally more of a standard salt & pepper. Dickson confessed that this is by far his most beautiful hoglet he and his cousin managed to breed.

It had an injured right ear, part of it bitten off. Got it after a fight with siblings (what a loser). But anyhow, it'll be fine, in fact now I can recognize my hedgehog easily, hehe, still applying some medication though... And for a hoglet, it is unusually tame. When we first met this kiddo let me hold it and it doesn't ball up like other hedgehogs (hedgehogs recognize smells, and usually rolls itself into a ball when they see strangers or smell different stuff). It was already running around actively, and not making any hissing or puffing noises. Hahaha, I think it's my fate that I always end up with pets that are unusually tame. ;)

Reached home very late, and took the hoglet out so it can adapt to a new environment. Dickson said usually his hoglets take about a couple of days before they get used to the new surrounding, food and stuff. This little guy doesn't look like it needs time though, this morning when I woke up it already pooped all over the wheel I left in it's box.

No doubt I'll start posting pictures here when I have the time, but now it's back to work. I'll be attending a play tonight in PJ, entitled 'Broken' if I've not mistaken. Hope it turns out to be good. And tomorrow I'll be back to the alma mater to resolve some issues, you guys know what they are. So after that I'll be back home playing with my hoglet again!

our spm level...

"help me..i m fill the jpa scholarship..closed by this midnight..i want to ask about pharmacy..i got 7A1 and 4a2 in spm..my chem and bio got A2..am i will be shortlisted??or better if i choose the engineering??"

I copied the above from somewhere (not going to mention where) because I find it extremely shocking.

Please look at the sentences and check out the grammar mistakes.

Then proceed to read what kind of SPM results he/she obtained.

Surely it's not possible right?

How can he/she get an A1 or A2 for English? What the heck? Has the SPM standard dropped so low? Dear oh dear, now I know why we get students with crazy loads of As in their certificates.

Shit, and I only got a C3 for my 1119.

I must've been crapshit back in Form 5.

just another manic monday...

Or not.

General Election 2008 is over, and things are back to normal. At least things look to be normal to me. In fact, Sunday was pretty normal too, much to my surprise. But I'm proud that this time around, Malaysians are mature enough and did not cause any troubles anywhere in the country after the elections.

A quick recap on what happened on Saturday, few prominent BN candidates were ousted from the Parliament.

S. Samy Vellu himself, with G. Palanivel, S. Sothinathan, S. Veerasingam and Dr K.S. Nijhar; the top five in MIC, won't be sitting in the Parliament for the next four years, arguably the worst casualty in BN's group of parties.

Gerakan's leader Dr Koh Tsu Koon lost, and lost big, in Penang, with only two of his party members remaining in the Parliament. PPP president M. Kayveas is in the losing end as well.

MCA's leader Ong Ka Ting stays, but many won't be joining him as Tan Chai Ho, Ong Tang Chuan, Wong Nai Chee, Fu Ah Kiow, Donald Lim and Chew Mei Fun among those rejected by the people.

Umno did not fare too well, big names Sharizat Abdul Jalil and Zainuddin Maidin are out.

Of all these names, Sharizat must have been the biggest surprise. Although Nurul Izzah does ooze some confidence and a leader in the making, I did not expect Sharizat to falter after all she has done for the country for the past few years.

Tsu Koon's defeat was down to his Motorola deal, obviously, and Samy Velly didn't make a good impression with his threats. MCA's list of losers are clearly due to their inability to voice out the people's unrest.

I believe the major reason why the Opposition had so much support this year is due to citizen's rejection to the Government. Easy assumption, with all the prices hiking up, poor management of funds ending up with hundreds of millions going to the drain (90 million to send an idiot to space as a participant? what the hell?), corruption, racial polarisation and discrimination among few.

Of the late 2 weeks, they did not do well even though the managed to control the local medias to broadcast and channel their 'successes', while hiding all the flaws from public. What they did not expect is that the internet nowadays provide more than adequate news, unfiltered ones, for the citizens. The Star, NST, TV3, RTM and the others, you guys should be ashamed for letting BN control you guys like muppets.

With BN denied their craved 2/3 majority, what will happen in the Parliament? It'll be some time before we can expect some major changes towards our lives, especially now that the combined PAS, DAP and PKR seek to make some voices heard with the five states won.

But still, expect changes. For better or worst.

and mommy told me tomorrow will be better...

So the Opposition did what they set out to do, deny Barisan Nasional the 2/3 majority.

My plea to the Opposition leaders,

We have made our voices heard now, we have shown that we can make a difference, and we have voted you all to help us achieve a better tomorrow.

Now it's time for you to show us what you can do, and don't let me and my fellow countrymen down.

We have gone lengths to show our support, and while I believe changes may not necessary always be better, at least we have hope. We can hope for a better governance and future for our beloved Malaysia, for the sake of every single Malaysian who stepped forward to be counted.

We voted you in, and we have the power to vote you out.

Goodluck, and God bless Malaysia!!!

tales of inks...

Flipped over the NST this morning and to my disgust the Election Commission has declared that the indelible ink will now not be used during voting procedures, 3 days before the big day.

News splashed across all national newspapers and blogs, internet news all over the world.

47,000 bottles of the indelible ink, costing the government RM2.4 million, was brought in over a week ago, and after 'much discussions' the EC chairperson Abdul Rashid Abdul Rahman has confirmed that it will cause plenty of troubles and misunderstanding at the polling stations and decided against it.

Why, for Pete's sake, does he only manage to figure that out after spending RM2.4 million of us taxpayer's money is beyond my imaginations. I mean, look! I am paying my tax to subsidize the government to buy bottles of inks which are now practically going to be stored in some whoknowswhereisitgonnabe storeroom until they get expired and be disposed off!

This news just pisses me off and flipped my day.

I'm sure we will not be facing petroleum price hikes if these funds are used to subsidize petrol, plus all those cash gone in transactions in government bodies, or in another word, corruption.

Why is Abdul Rashid the EC chairperson? I can pick up a stone and throw it across the street, any man who gets hit can still make a better judgement than this guy. Especially when it involves so much money!

resolution no. 7: check...

Had to separate the posts despite writing at the same time, just for my preference's sake.

Was browsing through my new year resolutions for 2008, and am proud to say that I can cross of my no. 7 from the list.

Bought a couple of Public Mutual funds last month after much consideration, and am pretty happy with the funds I've selected. One of it isn't doing too well right now, but overall I'll be content considering that KLCI isn't performing that good anyway. For a long term prospect, I'll be hoping that this will be the first step in my unit trust investments, and hopefully these will help me cover the inflation rate and rising cost of living in Malaysia. Will be looking forward to get a few more after more research and discussions with some experts.

Some of the resolutions look to be on course as well, of course, the majority of them are year-long targets, I won't know until 2008's over, but at least I'm yet to break any.

Plus, if all is according to plan I will be receiving my hoglet in approximately 10 days from my breeder. He has shown me the pictures, and boy isn't the little guy handsome! A standard salt and pepper hedgehog with unusually huge amount of white quills, making it looking like a snowflake.

I guess you guys won't know what I was talking about there, when I receive the hoglet I'll post some pictures in my blog, so be prepared to be poisoned with hedgehogs!

deaths come too often...

Just received news from relatives that my mother's younger brother had passed away last Saturday due to kidney failure, the same day my sister's having her birthday bash.

Mom took the news quite well, managed to cook up the party without a sweat, and cleaned up the mess too in the aftermath.

Is she feeling tired of facing the same emotional agony once too many times? I won't know for sure, but her eldest brother passed away a few years back, and not forgetting my great-grandma and grandfather had left us for good too last year.

I suppose she's pretty sad, but she's not showing it I'm sure. What could hurt more than deaths of loved ones, though they live so far away? Life's cruel, and definitely testing faith at times.

Sent my parents to the airport yesterday morning so that they can catch my uncle's funeral in time, and they'll only be back tomorrow night.

Counting my uncle, this will be the seventh of the unfortunate many which were happening to people around me. My great-grandma, grandfather, and four of my colleagues have had close relatives passing away in these few recent months. Sure a lot of deaths I'm looking at, too many in fact.

But as our lives goes on, so do the people around us. Time to appreciate loved ones, no?

election...

So here it comes, election day next weekend, are you voting?

I heard on the radio yesterday where some people were discussing whether to vote the person or the party. Interesting debate, and in general the society (or the callers mostly) are bent on voting for the party regardless of who the candidate will be at their respective area. Is this a wise choice? Or will you choose based on a candidate who can help you and your community in general?

As for my personal preference, I'd like to remain on the fence in open blogs like this, so I wouldn't say what's my stand.

But I do remember back then in my university's election, I did encounter some laughable candidates. I remember a guy came into the lecture hall before the class begins, and tried to preach and convince us students to vote for him. On his manifesto, he vowed to discard MUET as a compulsory requirement for graduation.

I found it amusing and absurd, and I thought this guy would never win an election with silly ideas like that. In a world where people constantly try to improve themselves, why do we want to do that? Shouldn't we be looking forward to achieve better results and strive to be wiser?

How wrong was I. The idiot won, and MUET was discarded from the graduation requirement.

Our country is still young and growing. People, please vote wisely so that our country can prosper.

Happy be-earlied Election Day to everyone, may the best candidates win.

torty torty...

Took some pictures with the tortoise last Sunday and edited into one piece. Enjoy the pictures!

the pathetic state of malaysian football...

Did anyone else catch ESPN's Sportscenter last night?

There was this interview with some bigshot in the Football Association of Malaysia by phone, and throughout the conversation the screen showed FAM's emblem with the FA bigshot's name (I didn't notice cuz I was busy laughing at the emblem).

The emblem, instead of the words 'Persatuan Bolasepak Malaysia', has the title 'Persatuan Kenasepak Malaysia'. Boy, I thought it was some prank but obviously it isn't, I guess Sportscenter really did a lousy job in searching for our country's FAM emblem, or perhaps it's because that is our latest emblem design?

Wahahahaha!!!

festive season's back...

Going into holiday mood again, wahahahahahaha...

Been off work since last Saturday, went to Butterworth on Sunday and just got home today by plane. This must be the best travel I've had during festive seasons, why the hell haven't I thought of that all those years?

My father picked me up in his new Mini Cooper S, and let me drove home, hehehe... But anyway, having been stuck with Kelisa for so long, driving a MCS doesn't feel much different, but what the heck, it's not my car and I'm not gonna complain since I get to drive a fancy car.

This CNY looks to be a bit dull, I don't know, maybe it's because my grandfather passed away last year and we won't be visiting others, but I know I'll be breaking the 'pantang-larang' thing this year and visit some friends with my form 6 mates. It's been a long time since I've met them and I'm beginning to feel that they think I'm boycotting them, sigh.

ZH's back in town and from the last chat he sounded like he's going to set up a gathering or sorts the week after new year, how it will turn out to be we'll have to wait and see. But I seriously hope everyone here in KL can meet up for once, at least before Nic leaves to work again after his lengthy rest.

Happy Chinese New Year everyone!

days of past glory...

It's probably the worst possible time to be a Liverpool fan these days. All these results crises, Yankees takeover which left the club in debt, and the owner speaking to a potential replacement behind the current manager's back, humiliated by Luton Town last week, and 12 points off the pace in the League.

How bad can it go?

A year back, when Hicks and Gillette took over from Moores to be the new owner, much promises were made. New stadium, huge transfer kitty, free of debt, and a chance to challenge for the much craved Premiere League trophy.

One year later, the yankee doodles claimed that they don't have enough money to fund the new stadium, and are now in debt. How did these American buggers manage to cheat millions of Liverpool fans and most importantly, the Liverpool Football Club? How can millions of eyes be so blind to not foresee this will happen?

Rafa Benitez has had a run of poor results, and we all are pretty annoyed to be honest, but speaking with a clear conscience it's totally unethical to speak to Klinsmann in what was meant to be 'an insurance policy' when the club was still fighting in all four competitions back in November (although Liverpool got knocked out from the League Cup after that).

It's exactly like what happened to Tottenham earlier in the season, and we all see how low can Martin Jol bring the club down with all these turmoils inside a club. I don't have to elaborate much further on what outcome for both Jol and Tottenham...sigh...

Come on Liverpool, let's get things back on track and show what you can do. I sure can enjoy a good winning run in the league, and have another crack at the Champions' League trophy.

And while I'm still on this topic, I wish some club would just offer some big stash of cash to take away Riise, Voronin and Sissoko, watching them play is such a pain in the ass.

new year resolutions...

I'm not one who set myself some targets to achieve every year, but somehow I have a feeling that I should be making a list to keep myself from going off track from my ambitions this year.

Here goes my new year resolutions for 2008...

1. Lose some weight. Yes, you hear me, stop laughing. A healthy 2-3 kgs will do fine. I'm not very greedy.

2. Hit at least one big target in my job, which will be hopefully a healthy performance for the company.

3. Travel overseas at least twice. Booked tickets to Bangkok already, which will be in May. Target second outing at the end of the year.

4. Make at least one investment in properties. Big or small, whatever.

5. Keep my pet star tortoise alive and well.

6. Treat my parents to big meals on their birthdays.

7. Buy unit trusts.

8. Don't overspend a month's salary in any months.

9. Bring my girlfriend outstation to Malacca or PD or Ipoh or wherever nearby for a weekend outing. Twice.

10. Try my hands in hedgehog breeding, and become a hobbyist breeder, getting side income from this.

Let's see if I can stick to my resolutions come end of the year.;)

short news...

Back from Singapore for several days already, and back to work as usual. You guys should stop bugging me to keep updating my blog because I don't have internet connection all the time!

Anyway, it's 1am right now, brains' not functioning well, especially since I've just returned from futsal half an hour ago, it's damn tiring. Was out for a month already, after taking a couple of weeks off to let my ankles heal, and then after that off to Butterworth and Singapore. Thank god I came home without a scratch, I'll be gutted to have injure myself again after resting for so long.

Anyway, how's the new year so far? Nothing much on my side, except that one of my tortoises died. We brought them back to Butterworth and the younger one apparently got motion sickness, didn't eat well after that and refused to take antibiotics. The vet said it suffered from stress from the long journey, pretty damn sad about that. The other one is doing fine though, was damn excited throughout the journey and kept climbing around in the tank. Wonder why these 2 can have so different adaptabilities...sigh...

Anyway, it's January, everything's back to square one. New targets for the new year, going to go all out again after a comfortable 2 weeks break, I'm all geared up for work now!

Happy New Year everyone!

darn weekend...

Supposingly the Super Grand Slam Sunday is going to be hell of a great entertainment for me with Liverpool vs Man Utd and Arsenal vs Chelsea being showed live on the telly. I could just sit on the couch and watch football with junk food all over the place.

Instead I've been working all night and missed both matches, and I had to endure keeping track of the games using Soccernet's Gamecast. Bloody hell, already missed the match live, and Liverpool lost despite having over 60% possesion and 20 attempts? This has to be kidding, it's like last season's fixture and dejavu.

Gonna give football a break this week, too tired to get my brains all worked out on something beyond my control. So I'm here happily blogging on a Monday evening, how is that possible?

Hahahaha, I didn't go to work today...;) Wait, actually I did. It's just that I worked for over 24 hours continuously I only came home at 8am this morning. Gonna tell ya, working from 6am to 8am the next day without a break is pretty hell draining, by the time I took my shower this morning my eyelids kept shutting themselves and I felt all lightweight and drifting around.

Crashed into the bed and didn't wake up until 3pm when a client called (damn, I forgot to turn off the mobile).

An easy Monday today, another couple of days at work, and I'll be off for a longer break. You can be pretty darn sure I'm gonna turn off my phone during this coming break, any calls work-related will pretty much bring stress even when you're on holiday.

So people, expect me to be M-I-A for a week...:)

i'm dreaming of the white christmas...

Ho ho ho, it's the year end holidays and Christmas is approaching in 10 days, it's going to be a cool and long break for me after so long.

I don't know why, but Christmas seems to be the holiday I look forward to most. Probably caused by all those Christmas movies back then which gave me a warm and serene feeling during this festive season, I seem to enjoy this most.

I'll be on a long break from work next week onwards, a deserving one I would say, after going for a stretch of 3 weeks without any days off. And I still have to apply using my annual leaves instead of replacement leaves, sigh... Can't complain much, there are days where I'm idle, and there'll be days when I have to work my socks off.

Anyway, I'll be celebrating Hari Raya Haji and Christmas in Butterworth this year, much to my delight to be able to be at a place so far from work they'll have no chance to drag me back...;) After that, I should be on a short trip to Singapore for an appointment, all the way until the end of the year and back in time for New Year.

Things didn't change much, except that I lost my passion in blogging, gained 2 new pet tortoise, bought a new handphone, and with fingers crossed, owned my first ever property (provided that nothing goes wrong during the transaction in half the year that follows).

My pet tortoises (Indian Stars) came about 3 months back when we're having an awful lot of time and decided that these cuties can bring much joy to our lives. True enough, the two hatchlings have been keeping us occupied with their daily diets and sunbaths, cleaning their poops and aquarium, my girlfriend now shudders when I told her I wanted to get another pet: a hedgehog. Hahahaha, anyway, I still hope that will happen, I'm so desperate to have a hoglet, and am now studying so hard to be a breeder. Hopefully I'll be able to turn it into a hobby, a hobbyist breeder. How nice does it sound?

Forgive me for not posting any photos of my pets here, I've been away from blogging for a gazzilion years (in blogging world, at least), I've forgotten how to post a picture here.

For this Christmas I've got myself a new handphone (yes, I've finally BOUGHT a handphone) instead of inheriting old mobiles from my brother for the past 7 years. Nokia 5310 XpressMusic. Google it up if you have no idea what phone is this. Got it during SS14's Digital Mall Price Crash early this month, although I suspect that the price didn't really vary that much. Anyway, splashed RM1,000 on this slim buddy, at least I have the comfort to know that now I don't have to bring out an old phone when I'm out meeting clients, hehehe... Downloaded some interesting songs into it and boy, does it play like a real radio. I'm impressed with the sound quality when it's on MusicPlayer mode, but the ringtones and alert tones are a bit too quiet. Wonder why is that... Anyway, I'm still pretty much satisfied (you have to when you've spent 4 digits on a phone!).

And the property. Ha, what's to say, let's just say this is my first step into investment world. A cheap, and I would say bargain, property which came along several months back when I was still learning my trades in property investment. I've come to realize that this interest requires a lot of research and endless reading and scouting. Hopefully this will be a success, and the first of many.

Too long and winding for reading, I know, I'll end this post here now. Kam, so now that you're back in NZ, I guess you can expect to get my updates from this half-dead blog. ;)

Adios amigos...

short update...

Let's start with a joke:

A pair of husband and wife are filing for a divorce. Both wanted the custody of their 6 year old son. The judge couldn't decide who should the boy follow, and therefore asked the child, "Who would you prefer to stay with?"

"Neither. Both of them always beat me. I don't want to stay with them," replied the boy.

"Then who do you want to stay with?" asked the judge again.

"I want to stay with the Malaysian Football Association."

"Why?"

"Because they never beat anybody."



Haha. Okay, lame.

So here's the update. I was MIA for such long time due to a single reason: my girlfriend was staying with me for the past couple of months, and since she said she would not want to read my blog, I have no choice but not to blog at home.

Of course, now she's back in Penang she encouraged me to update my blog since she knew it's one of the things I usually do before we started dating a year back. ;) Very thoughtful girlfriend I have here, doesn't it make you jealous? Hahahahaha...

She finally got her posting and she'll be based in PJ, woohoo! So now she is no longer worried about being thrown to whatever town she had never heard of, I can also take a breather. And since she's starting work next month, I'm thinking of getting a part time job at night. Any recommendations?

I'm seriously thinking of Starbucks, but apparently the pay's real bad. I mean, I really wanna learn a trick or two in this business, but if it really takes up so much time and gains so little in return, maybe this is not really a good idea. But I guess I can look for others. Well, let's just wait till the girlfriend's steady with her job first, then I can put some serious thoughts into this.

I'm damn sleepy right now I don't remember what I wrote above. Next few days will be hectic, I'll need to get all the sleep I can get now. Tata...

a little bit of this and that in 2007...

I'll start the same way I've always done - 'It's been some time since I last posted...'

Hahahahaha, damn, I just can't find the passion to blog the way I used to like a few years back.

2007 certainly isn't going the way I expected. Particularly since so much misfortunes that have happened, and it's still only May. My greatgrandmother passed away 10 days before Chinese New Year, and the entire family spent the festive season in a solemn mode. With her passing, the family got into some minor rifts with the relatives, although I'm not really that into it I still managed to catch some gossips here and there, and to put it in a simple word I couldn't be bothered about what's what with my distant relatives.

Early April my colleague's sister and family were involved in a bad highway accident, which ended in death to the entire family except the daughter, who is now staying with her aunt back in Johor. Such a young age with so much in life ahead of her, and here is she now, an orphan. Makes you think why God let these things happen don't you?

Later that week my grandfather decided that he has had enough and passed away peacefully in his sleep. As much as I hated him for all that he did in the past, I still have his blood running in my body, and obviously I'm gutted to see him gone. In fact, I feel a little odd now that I don't have to push him around in his wheelchair, no more talking to somebody who'll just stare blankly at you, and seeing his room unoccupied with just a bed and empty wardrobe in it.

His funeral is not the best of experience you can get, where my step-uncle decided to come back with his family to pay his respect. No complains on that, only that he quickly left before our family started discussing the shares everyone need to chuck in for the funeral. Funny, since we're the ones who helped him out of his stupid debts when he came searching for us looking to split my grandfather's wealth (which didn't really work, he had some heavy debts as well) a few years back when my grandfather suffered from stroke. Mind you, he's not dead yet that time, of course I'm offended that he wanted to talk about the will.

My aunt then went through operation to remove her fibroid and uterus for fear of a cancerous growth in her body, and thankfully it was successful and safe. She's all well now, only that she has some difficulty moving around for the time being.

And later in the month the father of a close friend got involved in an accident which until now, no one knows how did he end up in the hospital. My friend came all the way back from NZ, and I'm glad now his father is recuperating well.

Later in August my grandmother's going to have an operation on her knee, which have been bothering her for quite some time.

Well, not all are bad news really. At least Liverpool now is in the Champions' League final, and have a decent chance to lift a trophy in what was a disappointing season, for me. Milan will be tough, especially seeing the way they ripped Man Utd apart at San Siro, but Liverpool have every chance to battle it out to lift the trophy for the 6th time, and they're again wearing all red against Milan's all white. Hahaha, sometimes the English papers write so many superstitious stuff you can't really ignore. Liverpool have not lost in a European cup final wearing red against opponents in white, how's that? Not that I'm going to think the final's tilting this way because of that, but a 50-50 match will be interesting to watch.

And I can also look forward to the Phuket trip with my girlfriend end of this month. The first time I actually get to travel overseas by plane. Not bad eh? It may sound embarassing that I've never been to anywhere outside M'sia except S'pore (to visit my uncle) while my family members have been all over the world; across Europe, HK, Taiwan, NZ, Turkey, Korea, China, whatever place and no one asked me along to any of the trips. Nevermind, at least now I'm earning my own money I can spend some to go places I wanna go. I'll be leaving a day after the Champions' League final, so won't be missing anything there, hahaha...

I hope this post is long enough to compensate the 2-month missing entries. Expect more or less the same in the future, I really don't find it fun anymore especially that the blogsphere is full of 'copy-and-paste' copyright criminal bloggers. I'm giving up on the blogging world and going back to normal human life. ; ) So see ya people, keep in touch the old way, phone or meet-up, whichever more convenient.

photo day...

Had some great time doing a photoshoot two weeks ago. Here are some of the photos for you guys to enjoy, hehehe...

Too lazy to upload the rest already. Maybe next time. Ditto for now...

wanna know how i celebrated chap goh meh?

Sometimes I don't get why people enjoy going to concerts.

You take out a big chunk of your bank savings so that you can go wrestle your way to some dirty seats in a bloody hot and smelly stadium, get bitten by mosquitoes for 3 hours, have some crazy drama queen fans screaming their lungs out right behind you, and that annoying girl beside you kept kicking you as she sings horribly out of tune the entire night. The worst thing I can imagine - thank goodness it didn't happen to me - is to have a 60 year-old woman beside you, dressed like some la-la mui and shouting so hard you'd be worried whether her lungs will fly out right at your face.

Welcome, people, to Wang Lee Hom's KL Heroes on Earth Concert. I rest my case.

Surprisingly though, I actually thought the concert was worth the money. I mean, where else can you find an artist; who also writes and produces, who plays the guitar, drums, piano, keyboard, violin and er hu, all in the same concert?

That's a great concert, to be honest. Even for people like me who loathe these teenage fangirls' activities. Lee Hom definitely has the looks and body, dances well (modern, hip-hop and breakdance in the concert, as well!) fantastic showmanship, and has a good voice. Together with the talent to fuse classical Chinese music into western styles, I'm running my brains overtime to figure who else can do such thing.

Now don't worry, I won't go screaming my lungs out for this Lee Hom guy here. Not a fan, never will.

Too bad the girlfriend is one. That explains my appearance at Bukit Jalil Stadium last night.

Ok, that's it. No more free advertisement for this American-Chinese guy anymore in this blog. One concert is enough. Let's hope Michael Jackson doesn't stage a comeback concert in Malaysia or I'll spell bankrupt.

it's just one of those days you can't reach work on time...

I feel so damn annoyed and irritated.

Sometimes I wonder what the government's thinking when they built those digital signboards along Loke Yew road.

Yeah, yeah, of course they tell you informations regarding the traffic. And also about flashfloods. And accidents. Important stuffs.

The only thing is that the bloody digital signboard is erected right in the middle of Loke Yew road, and you need to be caught in the stupid jam for a veeeeerrrrrryyyyyy long time before you can read what's written on it.

Today I was caught in the traffic on my way to work. I was wondering why the queue was so damn long, cars weren't able to move as far as from Leisure Mall. Must be some accident in front I thought. So I crawled for a further half an hour before I can finally see that signboard which read:

"Raptai untuk sambutan Hari Wilayah. Laluan di Dataran Merdeka ditutup"

And I get to choose whether to spend 15 minutes to crawl my way to the alternative route, which will take another 30 minutes to reach my working place, or continue to crawl in the jam for another 30 minutes before I reach the same destination.

That's pathetic isn't it?

If I was warned before Leisure Mall, I would've turned right away and head towards PJ, pay the toll, drive all the way to Midvalley before making a U-turn heading back to KL to my workplace. And I can still arrive faster, for bloody's sake!

So what's the point having that stupid digital signboard again?

gathering soon?

Not meant to be for you guys who're probably reading this, cuz I'm talking about a possible gathering with my ex-coursemates soon. ;p

Received a call from Yean in the evening today, she just switched jobs and gave me a call (more like a scolding). Stuff like why so long didn't contact, why no news, things like that.

So in the end I agreed to hold a reunion in the coming months. When exactly, I have no idea yet, ahahahaha... But I think there are quite a few of them who remained in KL after graduation, so there'll be some help in organizing a 3-day get-together.

Hmmm, I'm thinking of allocating one day for an outing to Sunway Lagoon. Since I've never been there before. And it fills up an entire day's agenda, hahahaha...

Ok, need to start sending out mails to people, need to show some progress before Yean gives another scolding!

one hand in my pocket, the other holding an empty wallet...

I should probably blog more often, it's already 2007 and I didn't post much for the past few months, hehe...

I should set "blog more often" as my new year resolution, but I know I'm gonna break my resolutions anyway, so I didn't bother.

I went to the Pharmacy Nite last Friday, quite reluctantly to be honest. (Well, already low in $$$ this month, and dinner like that chopped off a big slice of my remaining allowance for the rest of January). I thought of skipping it, but I guess the softer side of me knows that attending it would make my girlfriend's day.

It's her final dinner anyway, I'm sure she wants me to be there with her.

Well, for this round, girlfriend 1, $$$ 0. Let's hope it stays one round.

The dinner was good though, but I didn't eat a lot (I had my dinner a couple of hours before that because I wasn't expecting to go until the last minute). Plus, the performances and video presentations were totally awesome. Spent most of my time helping them to take photos, and taking care of the purses when they all went all over the place taking photographs.

But in the end, seeing the looks on my girlfriend's face, I guess it's worth it.

Or, to put it on a simpler term, worth 2 months of lunch.

Yes, looks like this time I WILL really get back in shape. Wish me luck, fellas!

money money money...

Pretty long since the last update (again), but since Nic is actively blogging again, I thought I should pretend to be putting in some effort too, hehehe...

Between now and the last post, I've been to Butterworth three times, and celebrated New Year with my girlfriend's coursemates in Port Dickson; filming their music video for the Pharm Nite dinner which will be held this Friday.

Thought of going to the dinner, but with the way I'm spending recently, I'm better off saving a few more pennies in case of emergency.

Last month was a disaster, financial-wise. I don't know how I did it, but I managed to overspend my salary. The trips obviously took up a big chunk of it. Also, some unavoidable expenditure for Christmas gifts and house-warming gifts. But still, I never thought I would outspend my income. I guess it's time for me to do some financial planning.

No more lunch. No more suppers. No more new clothes. No more driving around aimlessly. No more coffee breaks. No more unnecessary breakfasts outside.

Hmmm... sounds like a good way to diet too. ;)

Okay, will be meeting up with Cheng one of these days to talk about some insurance policies and stuff like that. Pretty sure that'll take up a big slice of my salary too from next month onwards. Sigh...

how the world has changed...

Sorry for the ranting coming ahead, but I just need to let some of my anger off my chest, because I'm all riled up right now...

You see, my aunt asked to take her 2 teenage sons in at work here during their holidays so that they won't turn bad mixing with their friends, as they're already pretty notorious for skipping classes in school. I was reluctant, but since my 'other' aunt agreed, we took them in for a couple of weeks to see if they can do a proper job.

Today is only the third day and I'm already feeling like pulling my hair off my head.

First day at work, they were... wait, they didn't turn up. DID NOT TURN UP. And they didn't even bother to call. Instead, WE called them and guess what was their excuse?

They're LAZY to come.

Second day, only one turned up. Naturally, we asked where's the other one. This other cousin of mine said his brother went to play football and won't be reporting for work, and that he'll come the next day. Fine. So I gave this cousin of mine some general work. He said he wanted to do some computer work and I was surprised to see him volunteer, so I agreed. Gave him some photos to key in names and stuff, thought it'll be better to start with some easy job.

Bad call.

He ended up chatting on messenger and checking out his friendster profiles the entire day. And like that's not bad enough, I went through his work this morning and found that half of the workload I gave him ended up with silly mistakes such as keying in wrong names and double spacing. Damn...

So this morning I made him correct all the mistakes and then banished him to other general work, AWAY from the computer. Didn't work too well it seems, as everything I leave my desk he'll end up in front of one of the computers when I return. And all my colleagues didn't dare to say a word because he's MY cousin. Exactly what I was afraid of from the start.

Not only that, he kept playing sms with his friends the entire day at work, sometimes taking up to 15 minutes meddling with his phone. And complaining of tiredness when all he did was packing up photos into plastic bags.

And while at lunch he boasted about having 4 handphones. FOUR handphones. At the age of 14. Where'd you get the money my dear?

Oh, and his father fetches him to work every morning, and his mother picks him up after work.

Is it just me, or do everyone else think that kids nowadays are born with silver spoons in their mouths?

My dear oh dear, why do you even need to get a part time job? So that you can boast in front of your female classmates in msn messenger, during work?

And did I mention his brother did not turn up today, too?

I am so fed up right now, I called my aunt and told her I won't keep him in this department from tomorrow onwards. She can throw him to somewhere else and get a taste of 'normal working experience' and I don't care a squat. It's the best to make him learn the hard way instead.

My aunt should pay me for babysitting his son instead of the other way round.