Happy Valentine's Day & Happy Single Awareness Day

Happy Valentine's Day for sweet couples out there!

Happy Single Awareness Day for single persons out there!

It's typically bizarre and amusing that many are so happy to spend so much on a very common day of Feb 14. Same applies to Mother's Day and Father's Day. During these three days, flowers and food in restaurants (classy restaurants in particular) will definitely burn a hole in your pocket if you ever patronize the florist shops and restaurants.

Another thing that is closely related to Valentine's Day is the food of love (chocolate). I just wonder if you love your another half (or halves =.=) so much, why are you so eager to sabotage their health (no offense)? Many studies report that chocolate is good for health in helping to prevent heart disease (Malaysians' first killer) and cancers (every four of Malaysians, one is contracted with cancer). But bear in mind, if you read the articles carefully, cocoa is the one which is good for health, and not chocolate. Many actually mistakenly take chocolate as cocoa. Try to think of it, chocolate is processed snack or drink, correct me if you think there are no preservative or excessive sugar in it. So in the way you adore your lover, you are actually sabotaging them. See Feb 14 brings so many adverse effects to us. :(

Nevertheless if you utilize Feb 14 and spend it fruitfully (no chocolate, no great restaurants with the perfectly pleasant ambience, no flowers) with your another half, it certainly will enhance your relationship. There are still many things to give and do la on this particular day.

Anyway may God bless the sweet couples and not to forget to take care of the single persons too!!!

Chinese New Year Activities

Well, this lunar new year is the lamest I ever have. But there were a few happenings which I'd like to share.

CNY Eve

After reunion dinner of steamboat at our own home, dad gave each of us (four siblings and my mum) an ang pao, more precisely 'ya sui qian' 压岁钱 in Mandarin. The steamboat was still as great as every year, there were clams, abalones, big prawns, big silver pomfrets, sea cucumbers, fishballs, veges, etc. There were few more but I do not know the name in English. No crabs this year though.

Then I went to meet my friends up at the temple near by my house. We later went to another temple as my friends wanted to pray there. It's kind of a norm for Chinese (Tao) to pray at the temples when the clock strikes 12am right at the first moment of the first day of lunar new year. For those superstitious ones, they are even eager to have their joss sticks to be the first placed in the censers in order to have the greatest luck, fortune, etc presented by the Gods (statues in my view) they pray. But being a free thinker who only trusts myself at this point (still couldn't find a religion I could embrace), I just stood there to watch throngs of people to pray.

Between 11.30 to 12 am, fireworks were played
like they was given free.

This temple is kind of famous in my hometown

Unexpectedly I bumped into my former classmates in high school, almost half class of it. We then went to have a chat in a coffee shop nearby until the shop closed. Some of them then headed to Phei Ping's house (my former classmate) to gamble (chor dee). I didn't join them as I would have to go my uncle's house the next morning. I also found out that more and more of my friends have a partner to cling on already. :) May God bless the sweet couples.

First day of CNY

Woke up after being shaken by my sis. Took a bath and got myself into new pants and blouse, new lingerie too. My mum said everything must be new from top to bottom, from in to out =.=

Cramped into my dad's car and made our way to my uncle's house. Ate non-stop like idiot there. My uncle sort like holding an open house every lunar new year. He is a boss of a paddy farm and a seafood supplier too. Many Malays work for him, so he uses this chance to sort of appreciating them and to make the house even merrier though many relatives gather in his house already. Bear in mind, I use the word 'open house', it is because those who do not work for him, but just same kampung to one of my uncle's worker will come to eat, drink and get ang pao too. =.=

One satay hawker was hired to bbq satays for the comers. 2000 sticks of satay were gobbled down by the visitors in just an hour. I tried my best to eat as many as I could too. But was stopped by my mum, she said I couldn't eat too many, must leave for the Malay comers. =.= I just managed to eat around 15 sticks of satay. The satay and the kuah (sauce) was indeed very delicious, way better than KL and PJ ones.

At 4pm, there was a 'lion dance perfomance' held in my uncle's house. The lion actually made the word of "fa" 发 using Mandarin orange slices. And those aunties and cousins thought it was a 4D, one of my cousin even snapped the picture of the orange slices to have a better study of the 4D later on. =.= No pictures taken as I was too shamed to take out my V3xx mobile phone with 1.3 MPs camera attached. My cousins' camera are too sophisticate!!

At 5pm, my dad was tired and bored, and so we went back to our own house without having dinner with my uncle, auntie and cousins.

Another thing which made me happy was I get a RM1000 ang pao from my uncle. Perhaps it's little for most of the people, but for me, it's definitely a lot.

Second day of CNY

Awaken by the blaring of TV, my parents were watching the feng shui guru to elaborate the luck of the 12 Chinese horoscope throughout the year of Rat.

Then right before we were about to go to my maternal grandma's place, my paternal third uncle paid us a visit. He chatted trivial things with my parents and asked about our studies progress and performance. Before he left, he handed on thick ang paos to four of us. Another RM1000 =)

We then went to my grandma's house. Chatted with my cousins and ate laksa. I ate two big bowls of laska. My auntie's laksa is way better than any laksa that we can get outside.

Later we went to pray in a temple in Kuala Gula, a place near my grandma's house. We fitted ourselves in 4 cars! Sort like making a parade to the temple. The temple was founded decades ago and is very famous. It is also well-known for its heaven and hell landmark.

The main entrance of the temple

Climb up the staircase to see the human-made hill of Gods
(Gods stay in that hill)

The huge Kuan Yin statue stands
beside the hill of Gods

Later together with my cousins, we visited the heaven and hell while my mum and aunties were resting at a pavilion. No pictures taken, as I was forbid by my mum to do so. We were even warned not to say something bad, keep our mouth shut for the best. =.= This is normal in Chinese families (Tao) to not irritate those Gods and Ghosts.

Breathtaking scenery taken from the heaven place

After dinner, I went back while my mum stayed overnight at my grandma's place. I left as I wanted to study for test and to do homework. But at the end, I was watching HK series diligently. =.= My dad was speechless of my behavior.

Fourth day of CNY

Made my way back to PJ by train at night (will blog about it in the coming post). My friend, Gin Hwa who is good in bakery gave me some cakes. They were mouth-watering!!!

The cocoa cake (positioned at the middle)
is made without using flour

I never expected I could write this long, at first I was thinking of letting the pictures do the talking but ended up crapping so much. Anyway though I didn't have anything excited during the CNY, I was still happy as I could gather with my family and relatives again to cherish the most important festive season.

Happy Chinese New Year 2008

2008 is a year of rat or mouse (if you like to call it), but definitely not a year of hamster, right? As far as I know, there are twelves Chinese zodiac signs represented by different animals, rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, sheep, monkey, rooster, dog and boar. And until now, I think there is no new animal to take over rat. Correct me if I'm wrong. But this year, as the year of rat, many actually mistakenly take hamster as rat in the decorations.

Tell me if the one being circled
is not a hamster

Besides, something has puzzled me for years. Why most of the CNY decorations in word are upside down? What does that mean in particularly?

Anyway, Happy Chinese New Year 2008!!! Be the new year full of joy, health and wealth!!!

Suffix and Prefix of "LAN"

I was just learned that any word start and end with "LAN" is a vulgarity.

When LAN stands alone, it means "Local Area Network". Same applies to those words with prefix and suffix of "LAN", they are just Local Area Nonsense.

Tulan-Very frustrated
Sample sentence- I was very tulan with his selfish and kiasu attitude.

Lanlit-Arrogant
Sample sentence- He is not welcomed because he is very lanlit.

Lanhiamp-Serious
Sample sentence-
Person A: John banged his head to the glass door and had 30 stitches on his head.
Person B: So lanhiamp ah? Is he okay now?

I was scolded just now for saying lanhiamp.... I was innocent, okay?! I didn't know it's a vulgarity... Kenny also used tulan for 'n' times la....

Cliche 3

"The Earth is round. Now you're on top of the world; 24 hours later, you're upside down"

Perhaps this may explain why we always have ups and downs as we progress throughout our life. I used the word "progress". If we stay stagnant, then I think our life will not be enlightened by the joy of the so called roller-coaster ups and downs....

I'm not sure if this cliche contradicts with the book (The World is Flat) I'm reading now. Hopefully I can do a comparison after I finish reading the book. It may take me quite a time because I want to have a serious reading of it.

Fragile Love

If a live is fragile, then I would say love is not much less fragile than a live.

Having a friend confide in me just now. Both he and his girl were together for almost two years and enrolled in the same University hoping to go down the love path longer and forever. Who knows just a couple of weeks studying in the university, the girl got to know a new guy who was happened to be in the same class as with my friend and his girl friend. The "know" I meant has a further and deeper meaning, it means both of them (the girl and the new guy) started to go along without my friend anymore.

Tell me if a strong relationship (at least it's how my friend perceived) could be easily torn apart by a mere new excitement? I've seen my such cases before, and the only conclusion I made is love is too susceptible to new temptation.

Sometimes I would really say in order of not getting hurt, it's better for me to protect myself first, and this also leads to the point that I never have the chance of savoring the temptation. =.=

Handle love with much care please

Life is such a dramtic irony.

My First 2008 CNY Card

Short Talk:
I just realized I'd not been talking using my mouth for the passed few weekends. Still, I did not sense loneliness, thanks to the advent of IM. @@

Gong Xu Fa Cai

Thanks to my ex-housemates, they actually read my blog and posted me this creative CNY card... Again Gong Xu Fa Cai, everyone!!!

Life is All About Engineering

Those who are close to me definitely know I was about to choose Genetic Engineering as my Bachelor's Degree after my Fifth Form studies.

...

Somehow at the end I chose Actuarial Science; both AS and GE are such a Antarctic-Arctic difference. Most people agree that one's interests will not go far from each other but intertwine instead. But look at mine, AS and GE are totally unrelated yet I'm stupefyingly interested in both of them.

Slowly as I am getting busier with AS knowledge, I started to read less about GE...

...

Somehow today when I was reading about derivatives, I found out that AS is actually stunningly close to Financial Engineering...

...

Somehow, I was suddenly impressed by FE, it sounded cool to me!!!

...

Somehow I find that a Financial Engineer is definitely not mediocre compared to an Actuary. *smile*

...

Somehow I can't find a single thing in our life which is not related to engineering. =.=

....

...

....

*speechless*

A Series of "Sui" Happenings

Short Talk:
Being asked by my friend to write out my Chinese name, under such an unprepared condition, I wrote one of the words wrongly. But it was the older name I used before, I wrote the current one correctly. I still feel shameful and embarrassed!

Jan 21, 2008 4.00pm

The sky was clouded. I asked my friend, Chun Yong should we wait for the bus to go home. He said it was unlikely to rain in a short jiffy, and so I urged him to head home in a quicker pace. While we were about to reach Section 17 (the housing estate that both Chun Yong and I are currently staying), huge drops of rain beat my face, and followed by a merciless downpour with many thunders and lightnings. We just couldn't stop, as there was no place for us to shelter. Having no choice but to continue walking against the cold and strong wind with rain drops beating us ceaselessly though I did carry umbrella. The whole sight in front of me was a totally white curtain, I could hardly see a thing. The lightnings were incredible, all seemed to strike just in front of me (am I too sinful)? I was so scared being struck. Lastly we reached, as I couldn't continue anymore, I asked Chun Yong to let me shelter for a while in his house. After half an hour of thundering and raining, they were ebbing away, and so I made my way home.

As I thought this was the end, I realized it was just the start.

I took a nap after bathing and eating. Then I checked online for my Exam P/1 detailed results though I knew I failed it. Just wanna know the details actually. To my horror, to my frustration, I found out that I just needed another f*ck*ng one or two questions to pass the exam!!! I was so sim tia (heartbroken) that I needed a one whole night to cool myself down.

How I wish to get a '6',
I just want a '6'!!

For those who do not know about the exam unique grading system, this is the explanation from SOA (Society of Actuaries):

"Grades are reported on a 0 to 10 scale. Passing grades range from 6 to 10; failing grades range from 0 to 5. On this scale, the interval is 10 percent of the score required to pass; for example, a grade of 5 means failing with a score of at least 90 percent but less than 100 percent of the score required to pass. A grade of 0 does not mean that the candidate received no points, but that the candidate's score was less than 50 percent of the score required to pass."

Jan 22, 2008

If the day before was still not sui enough, look at what happened to me today.

As the day before of raining cats and dogs, me myself and my sports shoes were drenched in wet. So I have no sport shoes for today, then I simply grabbed a pair of shoes in the shoes closet without checking the condition of the shoes (who will?). Almost at the end of my last lecture session, I found that my shoes were damaged terribly, it was nearly torn apart into two parts (I wondered if it was made of paper or leather). While on my way back home, it was getting worse and last it was torn completely. Can you imagine?! Luckily I wore socks. I then walked on socks on the tarred road!!! Can you imagine?! Again luckily, there was a pasar malam right in front of me, so after staggering for twenty steps, finally I saw a shoes stall. This saved my life!!! And so I was no more distracted and continued strolling down the pasar malam happily while savoring many Malay snacks...

I'm still surviving right now, it seems that my EQ is not that bad, at least I didn't cry to my mum, lamenting this and that... *contented smile*

A Fruitful Day

Jan 21, 2008

Saw a booth selling some well-known international magazines at a much lower price today at my campus' lobby. To top it, the agent gave away many free gifts once we subscribe it. I subscribed Time (54 issues annually) and Fortune (26 issues annually) on the spot and paid them cash. I'm broke now. The normal cover price is RM967.00 but I subscribed them at the price of RM362.20. How many percent of discount, you count it, I'm not good in Maths.

These are the two free gifts I chose:

This book costs around RM80 in the market according
to the agent. But I checked Amazon.com just now, the price
is only US$18.21 which is around RM63.

A laptop backpack

Though my own laptop backpack is way better than this one,
I chose it just because of the word "TIME"
Lame?

The free gifts in one shot,
ignore the unrelated background

Someone said I was too irrational to buy it without much pondering. But the prey was right in front of me, tell me if a humongous knowledge hunter like me, could resist drooling and let the quarry slip away from my palm? @.@

@#$ D0Nt PUnCh M3 Wh3N Y0U R3@D TH!$ &*!

I get easily exhausted recently. But I get more exhausted when I have to read @#$%^ type of wording when the caption, phrase, sentence is not short!!

It's fine if you put ~Ҝ£¢Ҝ~ in your banner and as your tagline. Afterall it just took less than 2 seconds to realize what are the four alphabets. It's kind of artistic decoration, so it's still okay.

But when you read this "sAnTa ClAUs Is COmInG tO ToWn", it surely takes another jiffies for a worn-out person to get the message. It's still fine and bearable. Afterall it doesn't have those special symbol like @, £, etc

But when you see this
"~H~E~L~L~O~I~ A~M J~E~S~S~"
Tell me how many seconds you take to digest it?

If the above one is bad, how is the following one?
"{A}(D){D} (M)[E] {I} [A]*m* {J}[E](S){S}"
Tell me how many seconds you take for this one?

If the above is worse, how is the following one?
"{@}(D){D} (M)[3] {I} [@] {Ҝ}[£](¢)<Ҝ>"
Tell me how many centuries you take for this one?

I'm totally worn out after typing this out... Perhaps I should appreciate those artistic people who actually take the 'effort' to decorate their writing. *Drum rolls* Cheers for them @.@

Stay Away from The White Coffins (for your own good)

Technology can be merciless at times

Well, I'm sure many of us have half tumbled down the grave no matter how young we are. Don't get a shock, your eyes have no problems, I'm no kidding as well....

The polystyrene food containers that we(students and workers) use almost everyday do not only cause an irreversible consequence to our Mother Earth but at the same time put our lives in jeopardy too.

It's not lame at all to bring our own fork, spoon, and container to school or workplace. We, Malaysian should learn from Japanese and Taiwanese; they never bring the white coffin to school or workplace (this is clearly reflected in their dramas). Japan is way advance than us, but they don't let the technology to take their precious lives at granted.

Bring this instead