Beautifully Imperfect.: domesticated much?

Day 14: Can You Smell Chinese New Year?

domesticated much? Saturday, January 14, 2012

Share |

MIA.

australia Wednesday, August 01, 2007

Ugh. The Internet at home is not working. It hasn't been working for five days now, I think, and it's annoying the crap outta me. I feel so shut off from the rest of the world without Internet, lol. Apparently our landlady has called Telstra, and they claim that there's nothing wrong with the line on their side. Sheesh. Well, we're not getting any Internet on OUR side - isn't the customer always right?

So, as usual, I'm sitting in the library, getting my fix of the World Wide Web.

Got the job, as I said in my previous post. Went for an induction, which was basically just filling out tons of paperwork and Tax File Number stuff and signing contracts and receiving employee handbooks and stuff like that. I really wonder if shop assistants in Malaysia go through all these. Ching was pretty surprised when I told her that I needed to send in a resume for this job. And ironically, right after that, we went grocery shopping in QV, and saw that even the position at the bakery required you to send in a resume.

We surprised Zhen Han on Saturday with a belated birthday dinner. Adam came from Frankston to be our accomplice, and bring Zhen Han out of the house so that the four of us could prepare dinner. Woke up early in the morning, and Yao, Serena and I made our way to Springvale to buy the veggies and meat, while Mel stayed at home because the cleaners came, and also to make sure that the two guys got out of the way so we could have the house to ourselves.

Came back at 1 plus, and surprise surprise, they were still at home, playing some computer game. Well, too bad, we started cooking, and Zhen Han didn't even come out of the room one bit. Hah. Finally, they left to have lunch at about 4 in the evening (Yes, lunch) and then to Princes to play pool, and we all rushed around finishing the dinner.

Yao - whom if you all haven't already gathered - is a fantastic cook, so she was obviously in charge of the main dinner while the rest of us helped out. Let's see what we had - chicken wings in mui choy, wintermelon & lala soup, sliced beef and tomato stir-fry, an assortment of mixed vegetables, and dried tofu strips with chilli and cabbage. Everything sounds weird typed out in English but you only need to know one thing - it was damn good. Lol. I made honeymelon sago again, and Nutella cheesecake (which disappeared in two days, so it feels very satisfying for me). Hee.

We switched off all the lights when Adam msged to say that they were on their way back, which I suppose did seem a little fishy because our house is never ever pitch black. ~~We don't pay the electricity bills so we don't really care about conserving energy~~. So, yeah, that was suspicious, and plus, when they opened the door, the first thing they smelt was food.

Zhen Han: (mumble mumble mumble something about where everyone is) Is this a surprise?
Us: (at the same time, we switch on the lights) SURPRISE!

-_-" Damn cha tou.

But all in all, he looked a litttttlllleeeeeeee bit surprised, so I guess it didn't turn out that bad. And of course, Yao's cooking was fantastic, so we were all very full and satisfied at the end of the night. Finished off dessert with the two bottles of white wine sitting in the fridge and then went out to get more beers and drinks and played poker. Yes, I finally know how to play poker. Hee. I must've been the only eighteen year old person on the planet who doesn't know, but now I do. And I even know a few different kinds of poker now. I feel so enlightened, heh. Although I can deal better than I play, no thanks to the guys because everyone else went to sleep and they needed a dealer. Sheesh.

Ooh, and exciting stuff - will be going off to Mt. Buller this coming Saturday. Which is like in what, two days time? Just knew about it only yesterday, so it feels even more exciting because it's pretty last-minute and all. Timing's pretty good actually, since I actually bought a beanie yesterday on a whim. Hah.

Nothing much else that's going on. Mel and I made a list of things to do before leaving Australia just now during Performance Measurement lecture, so hopefully we get at least 80% of those things done, if not all. I suppose I'll be starting work soon. And yes, as usual, I didn't get the Taxation Law lecture this morning. I'm so screwed.

Hopefully the bloody Internet comes back sooner rather than later. Talk to you guys then!

Share |

Please Don't Take My Sunshine Away.

australia Friday, June 29, 2007

I swear, the Melbourne weather hates me.

I woke up at 8:30 a.m. to an extremely sunny, bright sky. Which is a rare occurrence in Caulfield. So, the housewife in me decides to drag my lazy ass out of bed, wash up hurriedly and do my humongous pile of laundry.

So, fast-forward an hour later, the sky is still pleasantly sunny and my laundry is done. I go out to hang it all up, because Mummy always says that you need to hang your clothes out under the sun to kill germs (See, she taught me well.). I think she's been saying it since I was four years old or something.

Anyway, NOT the point. The point was, I happily finished hanging up all my laundry. And almost immediately, like how it only happens on TV, the sky turned grey. The sun went back to sleep. And I was left with a full load of laundry, stupidly hanging in my backyard under a gloomy, sun-less sky.

GRRRRR.

On a lighter note, the zoo was damn fun. We were complete tourists and snapped about a million photos. (Okay, so a million is an exaggeration, but I still think 251 photos is plenty) Saw the cutest little penguins ever, one of which I named Phillip. Because of Phillip Island and its penguins. Shut up, I know you're laughing at me. -_-

It was just really fun, because the zoo was very well-done and well-kept and there was tons of animals. And you could really get up-close to the docile ones. Very cool. I last went to the zoo in Malaysia when I was about five with Ching. Don't know if it has improved much since then, but if it hasn't, then it can't compare to the Melbourne Zoo. A must-go if you like animals.

I also have a new affinity for giraffes. Lol.

The cutest little things EVER. :)

I'll try to put the other pictures up ASAP, so you can see how much fun I had. Hee.

That's about all for today, going to go to the DFO in Cheltenham later. But I'm only going to watch Quinnie and YK shop. Not shopping myself. Well, except maybe a pair of black ballet flats. But that's ALL. I'm broke. (And I'm going to keep repeating that to myself under my breath like a mantra when I see something that tempts me.)

But if it's cheap and good value for it's money... then I'd be stupid and out of my mind to NOT buy it right?

Ugh, the perils of shopping.

Share |

Yes, It's Over.

australia Monday, June 18, 2007

I am done with finals! Okay, so I was actually done on Friday, 12:50 p.m., but yeah, you get the idea. Went to DFO with Serena after that, and shopped till our heart's desire. I bought a $4.95 bag. *is proud*

We cooked nasi lemak, with chicken rendang on Saturday, with honeydew sago for dessert. Yum. Sunday was more shopping, this time at Bridge Road. Pretty disappointing. Nothing much unlike the beginning of the year when we practically raided the shops there. Lol.

Today was a collapse-at-home-day. Mopping floor, cleaning room, stacking up all my over-and-done-with textbooks and notes. Lazing around and eating nasi lemak leftovers.

Oh, apparently there was a shooting this morning at Flinder's in the city. I had no idea till Caryn told me. Scary shit. I've always thought Australia was a safe place, compared to the US where you hear of school shootings once in maybe two years. Case in point, Virginia Tech. You can't walk into say, Target, and purchase a gun like you might be able to in the States. And yet, this morning, there was a gun-wielding guy, letting off 6-7 shots in the CBD. Pretty scary stuff. Any one of us could've easily been there. Friends living in the city could've been easily walking down the street.

Let's hope this is not the first of more to come in Melbourne. May the one victim rest in peace, and the other two heal as quickly as possible.

Okay, this was not meant to be a depressing post. Sorry.

OTH Season 4 finale was possibly the smiley-est, happiest episode EVER. The way it all ended. Damn sweet. Damn nice. Baby James Lucas Scott. Obsessive adorable Nathan & Haley. Brooke and OMG-so-awesome-Chase. The BFF-ness of Lucas and Haley. Brotherhood. The Rivercourt. Dance routine to Spice Girls. I've been watching it a few times over. Lol. Jasmine and I might have spent an hour this afternoon obsessing about OTH and Season 5. Hah! :D

Serena's going home on the 20th and I am going to be so bored. Lucky thing Ching finishes after that, and we are going to go ~~eat~~ ~~shop~~ have fun!

My stupid work permit STILL hasn't arrived. I'm so annoyed. At the rate this stupid thing is going, I'm only going to be able to work for about two weeks, one week of which I want to volunteer at the Monash Abroad orientation for Semester 2. Grrr. Why is the stupid immigration taking so long? I hope they haven't rejected my application. Joachim got his easily, I remember. Please come tomorrow, work permit.

I am going to completely die for Semester 2. I'm taking two third-year units because of the exchange - all the units have been screwed up because not everything is available in Caulfield and yada yada. Don't want to bore you with the inside works of the Monash curricular system. Long story short, I'm doing two third-year units next semester and might possibly die. That is, if I don't already die on the 13th of July, aka results day.

Ehhh. This post is heading back down the depressing lane. Better end it now. Love you all! xoxo.

Share |

End of the Week.

australia Thursday, May 24, 2007

Bugger it. I hate being on credit. Tried sending a text out just now for forever. And then finally it fails, and Optus tells me its because I've only got 18 cents left. That's like RM 0.50. Can send 10 smses to Maxis line back home okay. Ish. So annoying. And I've got no class tomorrow and I'm lazy to even leave the house tomorrow to get a top-up. Grr. Plus, I've got to give the house a huge clean because I don't want my brother telling my parents I'm living in a pig-sty or something.

Okay, I know he won't because his house probably looked worse than mine when he was studying here, but still. I want it to look all bright and shiny for my family, okayyy.

Anyway, finished compiling the assignment yesterday night, and handed it in today. Yay. Be gone, assignments, be gone! That's all the assignments we have this semester, and about damn time too. I've never had an assignment due so late in the semester before. Finals are like what, two weeks away? And we have an assignment due. -_- Stupid, stupid people.

I made beef stew for dinner... but it doesn't taste like my mum's one. BOO. I must call her and bug her to idiot-talk me over the steps one by one. I tell you, if I could cook a quarter of the things my mother can, my future husband will be a very happy, satisfied, ~~round~~ man. Lol. Just look at my father. :P

Yeah, nothing much to say today. Internet is super duper fast, and I am basking it all its speedy glory by watching random clips on Youtube again. Addictive. And it's so fast that I just have to click on it, and it immediately buffers while I'm watching. I can watch the whole clip once I click on it without pauses or lags. Amazing. Just when I was losing hope in our Internet.

This time tomorrow night, my brother and his family leave on a jetplane to come HERE. HERE. HERE! *is dancing-on-air happy* I must go and buy them some Krispy Kreme. Hee.

Me: I want to go buy them some Krispy Kreme la...
YK: I also want! Make sure you give me some okay?
Me: Think I'll buy like a dozen or something..
YK: Okay, then you can give me 11.
Me: -_-" Soooo greedy. Then my brother, my sis-in-law and three kids share one miserable pathetic doughnut IS IT?
YK: Sharing is caring maaa...
Me: -_-" x 1000

*

Share |

Distracted Is My Middle Name.

australia Wednesday, May 02, 2007

So, I ~~skipped~~ opted out of the second half of Cost Info lecture on the basis that I would go home and prepare my tutorial work for Financial Management and Cost Info tomorrow.

See, that was the plan. All set out nicely. Just calling out for execution.

Had awesome dinner. Porridge. Now, you all know how I usually feel about porridge, but for some reason today's one was great and reminded me of home. We had plain white porridge, with all the teochew/chinese porridge side dishes - pickled lettuce, preserved beancurd, salted egg, fried dace with black beans and luncheon meat. Yummmmmm.

And then, I told myself, right, it's time for tutorial work.

WRONG.

G-Mun and Quinnie came over. And we ALL left to Princes to play pool. Princes is like the only source of entertainment we have at night around our place. Its open 24 hours, just like an eight to ten minute walk away from our house, and you have pool, table tennis and arcade games at your disposal. Reminds me of Asia Cafe a little. Just a teeny weeny bit.

I think I'm getting better at pool. Either that or I just had a very lucky day. I was playing with Quinnie, and had potted my last ball and was going to pot the black next. Serena thought I had finished and started clearing the balls. -_- LOL. Ish. And we played this super fun three player pool game, where you have to pot your opponent's allocated balls, so we played against G-Mun and killed him off first. Hee. *confetti*

But anyway, not the point. The point is that I didn't do any work at all. Omg. This is horrible. I have a 1500 assignment due on Monday, the first welfare committee meeting on Friday, and tomorrow we're going to the city because apparently our PM will be at Flinders to launch some batik thingy undoubtedly in relation to Visit M'sia 2007.

Isn't it weird how we never go to see our PM in our country, but wait till he comes all the way here to a different continent before going to see him? Hah.

Okay, that's not the main reason we're going to the city; it's actually cause we're going to meet Serena's goddad, but still, yeah. We're still dropping by Flinders. Because we're a bit jakun, like that. Lol.

Oh and according to Serena's goddad, Siti Nurhaliza and Datuk K are here too. God knows what for though.

So yeah, we're all back from Princes, and I'm all bathed and moisturised and probably should be doing my tutorial work now, but I'm blogging. Distracted till the end of time, I tell you.

I'm trying to abstain from shopping for the next 30 days, but I think I'm going to fail since we're going to the city tomorrow. How?

Oh yes, and I think autumn is so super pretty. The leaves are different shades of pretty yellows and reds and greens and and the pavements are covered with fallen brown leaves. Walking through leaves and hearing the crunching beneath your soles is pretty therapeutic. It makes me feel extremely child-like for some reason (Yes, I realised the sentence before this sounded pretty sadistic, so I quickly added this one =P).

See, I started typing up this post because Jo wasn't replying me on MSN, and he still isn't, btw. Big shout out to Jo because if he hadn't not replied me, you wouldn't have this update. Hah!

P/S- Come on you red Devils! ♥

*

While we were cooking pasta yesterday:

Serena: (holds up two packs of pasta; penne and some spiral-y pasta) Which one you want?
Me: Errr... Eenie meenie miney moe (lands on the penne pasta)
Serena: (jerks the penne away, obviously already wanting the spiral-y one) Oh, so this one OUT!
Me: -_-"

*

Share |

Scorch the Skin.

australia Friday, March 23, 2007

The Internet is co-operating today. It's not up to optimum speed, but it's being slightly better today. So, random thoughts, here we come.

It is damn bloody hot today. Omg. You would think I would be completely used to the heat, being a Malaysian and all, but it is crazily unbearable today.

I think I'm going to melt soon, and that my clothes drying in the backyard will soon start a bonfire. It is THAT hot.

I miss fans and air-cons and my house's marble floor downstairs, where no matter how hot it was outside, it would still be cold. :(

HOT. It was so effing cold on Tuesday and I was in shorts and five minutes into the walk to class, it RAINED. And now, just a few days later, it is hotter than Malaysia.

I swear, the weather here PMS-es very regularly.

*

Eve, a.k.a. the Tai Soh, told me that she sold the Honda Civic. *throws a tantrum*

The super sexy black Honda Civic which all the guys, without fail, drool over everytime they come to my house. Which she said she would keep for me to drive when I came back.

SOLD. SOLD. How cannnnnnnnnn?

Bye bye, Honda Civic. It was fun while it lasted. :'(

*

Looks can be deceiving. Do not judge a book by it's cover. Nothing is ever what it seems.

And... I am a bigger bitch than you think I can be. Do NOT push my buttons. Friends back home can vouch for this.

*

YAY, going to go see Ching tonight! Gone are the days when I could just pop next door. So it's to the Melb Uni night market first, with Serena and the rest, and then over to Ching's place. *is excited*

*

Do you all find Patrick Dempsey-slash-Dr. Derek Shepherd-slash-McDreamy on Grey's Anatomy hot? I... am kinda mehhh about him. I was watching Entertainment Tonight on our crappy, fuzzy tv yesterday and apparently he topped their list of sexiest men on TV.

Dr. McDreamy.

I mean, he's ooooooookay.

But I can probably list you five actors off the top of my head who are sexier than he is.

Justin Chambers who plays Alex Karev, also on Grey's.

Give me Dr. Alex Karev anyday.

*

I cooked spaghetti last night. :D

And the night before, we had lemongrass chicken and stir-fried veggies.

It was too good, that I didn't have any time to take any pictures. :D

*

I have Money and Capital Markets presentation next week. And it's so hot that I can't even bring myself to open the textbook. How is anyone expected to STUDY in this heat?

*

Random new song recommendations:

Landon Pigg - Great Companion
Stefy - Orange County
Youngbloodz - Imma Shine
The Arcade Fire - Rebellion (Lies)
The Spill Canvas - Sunsets and Car Crashes
Secondhand Serenade - Awake
Anything by Chris Daughtry :P

*

Some of you might remember that I used to write for the school mag and the college mag. ~~Some of you~~ Sharm might remember that I used to write fics. Hee. Some of you will also probably remember me wanting to be a journalist before I chose business and commerce.

The point is, I used to love writing. But now, I can just open up a posting window in Blogger and stare at it for ages, the blinking cursor mocking me.

Have I lost what little flair I once possessed for writing? Stringing words into sentences that do not sound like they have been written by a ten-year-old seems like a chore sometimes. I sent in an application for a spot on the student union committee, which I probably won't get anyway, and just answering 'Do you have any previous experience in student representation?' took me a whole twenty minutes.

Inspiration for little stories used to come to me, but it doesn't visit anymore.

Inspiration has forgotten all about me. :(

*

Evermore performed at the Australian GP last weekend. John Mayer is coming in April. Ben Kweller is performing soon, I think. Nikola Sarcevic just played a couple of weeks ago. and according to Cath, Rachael Yamagata will be in Singapore soon. Okay, not that it really affects me in any way since I'm all the way here, but I just wanted to throw in that little fact. Lol.

So many musical acts, so little money.

I am broke. POKAI. Empty-walleted.

Why oh why, did I go buy those two dresses?

My little voice in my head says: Because they are really pretty and you will be kicking yourself if you don't buy them.

I hate you, little voice in my head who justifies shopping.

*

That's enough random-ness for the time-being, no? :) Send my love to everyone, guys.

Edit: Spoke too soon; the Internet is now misbehaving again. Bluek.

Share |

More Like Home.

australia Sunday, March 18, 2007

...but still not quite.

You know what I mean. This room, this house, will never be home. But right now, after I have Wendy-nised my room, it is feeling more like home. Just that it will never be home.

I went to buy my linens yesterday, finally. Hee. Spent a whole shitload of money, but yeah, it was a necessity, and Papa did tell me to spend on necessities, and well, Monash did bank in my AUD2000 travel grant already. :P

We went clubbing on Friday night, which was the night before, and G-Mun and Quinnie stayed over at our place after that, so G-Mun drove Quinnie, Serena and I there the next morn because we all needed to get things.

Clubbing was boring. We went to this club called Amber, on... Lonsdale Street, I think? Yeah, anyway, it wasn't intentional. Quinnie, Serena and I were shopping in the city (I bought two gorgeous dresses, shh!) on Friday afternoon, and so it happened, Maria, this girl whom I met from the house party, texted me to tell me that there was gonna be a Monash Exchange pub crawl that night.

A pub crawl, seems to be very much part of their culture here. Pub crawl, or sometimes also known as booze cruise. You meet up in one pub, and then just basically make your way from pub to pub. Monash Exchange Club, or Monex, planned this bar crawl on Friday night, which was what Maria told me about.

I wanted to go, and hee, the rest wanted to go with me too, so we left for dinner in the city first. YK, Aaron, and a bunch of others met us after dinner, and we were already late for the pub crawl. We made our way to the second pub on their itinery, but by that time, it was so difficult to find the other exchange students, the bar was crowded, and besides, most of them who came with us weren't exchange students, so the rest of us decided to split and to find our own bar.

Jasmine, Kai Han's friend, led the way around the streets, and we ended up at Amber. Caryn came too. Finally, first club in Australia. It was interesting, though, because we had clubbing virgins with us, hee. It's always interesting to see people's first experience of a club.

The inside was okay, they had pretty lights that reminded me of Maison's. But we were early, and the crowd wasn't there, and the music SUCKED bad. Ick. I can't believe I'm actually missing DJ Goldfish and t-Bone. That's how bad it was. Just as the music started picking up a little, we had to leave because the last train leaves at 1.04 a.m. WTF. I have never left a club so early in my life before.

We ran like MAD to catch the train from Flinders, which was like what, maybe two streets away? Omg. The ten of us were literally running across the streets and to the platform, and just as the last person stepped into the train, the doors closed and the train started moving. Talk about timing!

So yeah, both of them stayed over and the four of us went to Ikea, which is in Victoria Gardens Shopping Centre in Richmond, after everyone woke up. Which wasn't thaaaaat early, lol.

Got all my necessities - laundry bag, mouse pad, rug. But what I really needed was my sheets and quilt and quilt cover. I've been sleeping on a bedsheet-less bed for over a week before yesterday night. It's because it's a double bed, so none of the sheets the landlady left fit, and I didn't want to just buy any lousy bedsheet from Coles (which is equivalent to Malaysia's Tesco), so I wanted to wait till we went to Ikea. But so disppointing, I tell you. Their quilt covers were all seriously ugh-ly.

Went over to K-mart (which is a departmental store, way better than Jusco, though) to look for quilt covers in a rush because it was already 5:40 and they closed at 6. Yes, shops here close crazy early. No such thing as malls opening till 10 pm. Shops close at 5 normally, and 9 only on Fridays. Imagine that.

But yay, I finally have my sheets and warm wool quilt and pretty Hawaiian looking quilt cover. Heh, Adam will have nothing to complain about the next time he comes to visit from Frankston. So many complaints and he wasn't even sleeping in my bed, just sitting. -_-"

Aaaah, had such a good night's sleep last night in the newness of it all.

Preeeeeeeeeeeetty.

I have ceiling to floor mirrors. =P

So yeah, it's beginning to feel more like home because I have all this stuff which I personally chose and bought in my room. I have linens, my icky uni books, collage of photos of family and friends (Siokkwan, I chose the pretty pictures of you like you requested in case any new friends come into my room :P), so it's comfy and home-like.

Again, it will never quite be home. Because there are no gregarious toddlers coming in and out of my room jumping on my bed, no mum and dad rapping on my door, complaining about my constant need to lock the door, no chi muis lazing around on my bed gossiping, no rumbly air-con noises. Little things like that.

I am odd, am I not?

*

It was the Australian GP today! Gahhhh. F1 is back! And I can have my sports dosage back. I am so behind in EPL news that it's pathetic. I miss Man Utd. I miss Gary running down the right flank. All they care about here is their Australian football, which is like a weird cross between soccer and rugby. I tried watching it once and I don't understand it, eesh. So anyway, because Mark Webber's Australian, they will definitely broadcast the races here, so thank god for that.

Although, the teevee is seriously crappy and fuzzy and lousy. Sigh. But well, Kimi was on pole, how could I not watch? Perfect race, dude. Gah. He WON. Take that, Fernando Alonso. *sticks tongue out*

It's weird to be supporting someone who drives for Ferrari though. I've always been a McLaren fan since the days of Mika Hakkinen and then it worked out perfectly when Kimi went over to McLaren after Hakkinen left. But now... you have Alonso polluting the shiny-ness of the McLaren team. Even worse, his face has been plastered all over billboards in Australia because Vodafone sponsors McLaren this year. He just doesn't fit the McLaren team. Ick. :( Which is such a shame, because the other McL driver, Lewis Hamilton is one superb rookie. Third place on his freaking F1 debut. WHOA.

That's how fuzzy the tv is. But s'okay, Kimi makes fuzzy look good.

The Flying Finn is back and I am seriously one happy girl.

Just ask Serena, I was happily mopping the floor after Kimi won. Lol.

*

Yao, who's our other housemate from China (who btw, is doing her Masters in Commercial Law. Respect.) cooked Serena and I dinner tonight. She's super sweet. And a good cook. Yum.

Good food.

I know I have a lot of updates to catch up on and I'm working on it. I shall resolve not to be a lazy blogger while I'm here.

Ta, people! Leave me a msg on the chatterbox, kay?

Oh yeah, and it's getting colder. Brrr. You people probably think I'm crazy, but I actually like standing in the sun now somedays because it's warm.

Share |

Tireddddd.

australia Wednesday, March 14, 2007

I've gotten into a bad habit of putting more alphabets into a word than actually is necessary, just to stress it.

Example? I missssssss you alllllllll. I wish you all were hereeeeeeeee. I jusssssssssst had dinner.

It's a horrible habit. It's so awfully whiny looking but yet I cannot stop doing it. Sheesh. It's as bad as Jo's kekekekekeke hehehehehehe lolz habit. Nooooooooooo.

Oops, there I go again.

Anyways. I'm tired. Like the title says. I overslept this morning and missed one tutorial, but that's not the point, hee. I had four hours straight of classes today. Two lectures back to back, and both lecturers not being the most interesting lecturers in the world. I used to be able to do four-hour-straight classes back in MUFY, but that's probably cause each class was only an hour long and we would move from class to class and ~~make noise~~ socialise in the corridor in between classes.

Wednesdays are hell. That's what I get for cramping all my classes together just so I can have a long weekend. I have Mondays and Fridays off, whee. No pain, no gain. But that doesn't stop me from bitching about it.

You know, back home if you had asked me what my favourite chore was, I probably would have said doing the dishes. I've always liked that, soaping dishes, and feeling the texture of a clean plate and singing off-key to whatever song was stuck in my head. Despite that stupid old Malay proverb that says you marry an old man if you sing in the kitchen. WHATEVER.

Anyway, the point is, in the strangest way possible, doing the dishes is calming, in a way. No concentration is needed. It's hard to describe, but it's just relaxing. Weird, I know. You can add that to the endless list of Wendy's weird quirks.

So, today, while doing the dishes, I realised something. Maybe I only liked doing the dishes back home because I don't do it everyday. Yes, I admit, I am lazy and am lucky to have someone who does it for me. But, I still do it occasionally, especially when I bake or cook myself. So maybe, after a year here, I won't enjoy it anymore, because I have to do it every freaking day, or starve to death because I don't want to dirty any dishes, or leave them in the sink and let my housemates dunk my head into the toilet bowl 49 times. You choose.

I also might possibly be the only person in the world who enjoys doing the dishes and who thinks about not enjoying cleaning the dishes anymore after a year in Australia...while doing the dishes.
-_-"

Sorry. I know there was no bloody point to this post, and I will send you a virtual hug if you have actually read this far.

*HUGSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS*

Crap. There I go again with the unnecessary letters.

P/S: I have two clocks on my blog now! One on Malaysian time and one on Melbourne time. Hee, I was blog-surfing, and saw the clocks on Aaron's blog and I gatal, so I put them up too. Thank you, Aaron. For that you shall receive a free advertisement in this post...

...Aaron takes pictures superbly-duperbly well with his super-duper canggih camera. Click here

Tata, m'loves. Need to go wrap my books now and get started on homework. HEH. Missing you all! to ooh and aah over his work. =)

Share |

Baby, One More Time.

domesticated much? Wednesday, May 24, 2006

Okay, so with the absence of internet and sickly assignments, I hadn't had much time to update.

But my bad, how could I keep away from posting pics of my lovely new niece for so long?

New rugrat in da house, y'all!

World, I introduce to you, my darlin' angelic niece, lil Miss Amelia Tan Yuet Ling.

The night she was born. Look at how tiny she is. Well, tiny in the sense that she's small compared to everyone else. If you look at it in the sense of her being in Su's stomach, then she looks pretty big, lol. If that makes sense. Sorry, I'll stop my rambling now.

Aww, look at her.

Joshua, who is now a kor kor, was so excited throughout the night and kept on tugging at my skirt to 'see his baby Amelia'. His words, not mine. :)

My brother, the proud papa.

Two weeks later, during Mother's Day. Look at how scared she looks. Psst; Evelyn's actually squealing at her, that's why.

Yawn. Guess we tired her out.

Ain't she lovely?

So, for those of you who still can't keep my giga-family straight, that was Amelia;

These are her two speedo-donning older brothers, Joshua and Joel, who have a bright future as kid swimming trunk models ahead of them.

Her cousin, Aaron, who recently got number 8 in class, yay! [There, Zhen Han, this is the one that whacked you. Hee.]

And his sister, dear Vanessa, who now insists we call her cheh cheh instead of baby.

There you have it, my convoy of kids who drive me crazy on a daily basis.

*

It's a do-it-yourself meal.

The gang came over for dinner one of the days because my mum was making her special pan mee. She makes the dough, and the soup, and all the stuff you put into the pan mee eg. mushroom, meat, ikan bilis, fried onions. And the rest of it, is DIY.

Whenever DIY is involved, you can bet on it getting messy, and funny.

A very dark-looking Jo, and a not-any-fairer Ching at my kitchen table with the dough.

Suki beginning to cut up her pan mee pieces..

...And somehow they turned out like this. So, she dumped them into Jo's pot while it was boiling, and he had to eat it. :D

Enjoying the meal. Burp.

We ate till we were so full that I swear I could practically hear all that soup sloshing around in everyone's stomachs after that.

*

The day for mommas.

I made a carrot cake with cheese toppings and raisins for mum.

Joseph a.k.a. Ah Dong decided that he wanted to make chopchip cookies for his mother. Guess who's help he enlisted and who's kitchen he put into danger?

Giving me high blood pressure and all.

So, first he came late. Second, he didn't buy me any lunch. Third, he's just Joseph lah.

Teaching him how to bake is not easy, trust me. I braved the task, and barely emerged alive. Just ask Mary or Jo, who came along just for kicks.

My newest student. Oh joy. Psst; Ming was a better one, I'll have to say. Just ignore that sentence, Dong. Oh look, there's Mary too. And the electric mixer, which is older than me, by the way.

So, finally, the batter is done, and Dong starts scooping it out onto the trays.

But the process is too slow, and in the end, we all had to chip [pun totally unintended] in with help. After that, our brilliant friend decided he wanted a mega-cookie, and went on making a big round one about the size of a CD.

But, being the lovely, kind friends that we always are, we decided that a mega-cookie would be too boring and therefore, morphed the CD into Winnie the Pooh, amidst great protest from Dong. Ta-daa!

After staring our work of art also known as the Winnie the Pooh cookie, Dong decided that he too should get creative, and went to work. The end result? This piece of, erm, something. :D

The end result: Loads of chocchip cookies, and one very tired me.

Hey, at least his mom was happy. And now Dong owes me a plate of the best nasi lemak in the world. Maybank mamak nasi lemak, yumm.

*

Oh well, guess I better head in to bed soon then. Class was tiring today, but not like I attended them all. *sheepishsmile*

I let myself be persuaded easily by Mel, Zhen Han and Darren [those culprits!] to skip a lecture and to go to Pyramid for lunch. Shame on me.

But, still, I gotta turn in early, because I'm waking up early tomorrow. Not for class, because I have Thursdays off, but to catch the live telecast of the Idol finale results. It's not like I like either Taylor or Katharine [sorry, John!] but I want to catch it for the sole purpose of watching all the top 12 come back to perform, especially Chris and Elliott, and all the extra bits and pieces that they usually show.

I do however think Taylor will win, but Kat will be way more successful. But that aside, I really don't care who wins. Because this would have been my ideal final two, so this part of my blog is going to be like a little shrine to them, lol:

Smouldering Chris, and charming Elliott.

Because like us, they like wacky photos too.

And they both look good with instruments. Lmao!

*

The song of the mo- Ricky Martin's [yes, surprise, I still listen to him!] It's Alright.

Thought of the minute- Zzzz.

Wish(es) of the day- For Ryan to glare at Taylor and Kat tomorrow and say "And the winner is...Chris Daughtry!" Hee, a girl can dream, can't she?

Thing(s) I should do- Pack my table so that I can have a nice, clean slate to study on.

Thing(s) you should do- It's Jia Min's bday, so drop her a line.

Favourite quotes since the last I blogged:

*Mel pores over Darren's Java coding for his assignment*

Mel: His writing is so terrible man. He use his left hand, is it?

Me: Yah. *pause* He's left-handed, what.

*laughlaughlaughlaughlaugh like two insane girls while the guys stare and wonder what happened*

*more laughing ensues as we tell the guys what happened*

:D!

Ahh, I love funny days like these. Hee hee.

Share |

Summing Up.

cny Monday, January 23, 2006

I'm sitting here at work at 9:14 a.m. listening to bloody Chinese New Year music. I'm waiting for 10 a.m., when they change the music to Mix FM. It feels like I haven't updated in ages, but it hasn't been that long, has it?

At least I'm finally done with the cards. All those damned pink envelopes went to the post office on Friday and are hopefully travelling to the thousand different destinations whose addresses have been SO painstakingly written by the other three temps and I.

Baked a ton of CNY cookies on Saturday - choc chip, pineapple tarts, peanut cookies, kuih bangkit, butter cookies.

You would think that with all the music and CNY cards and cookies, that I would be raring up and all geared for CNY, but really, I'm not. Lol.

I used to count the days till the first day of CNY when I was a small kid with two pigtails. Somehow, this many years later, it's starting to lose it's novelty. Sure, I love the red packets filling up my empty wallet. Who doesn't, seriously? But well, it's supposed to be more than that, but really, that's just all it's become to a lot of us, hasn't it?

Well, break out the mandarin oranges, I say. I suppose I'll get into the mood after we have the first yee sang. We have this 'lil unofficial competition every year with the yee sang. My siblings and their other halves and me; we see who can carry the yee sang highest with our chopsticks. And usually my second brother wins because he has the longest limbs. Lol. While my parents and my grandparents are left shaking their heads at all the yee sang that miraculously flies across the table in our quest, and at our childishness.

Tuesday to Friday was just work and work and work. Chinese New Year cards and database cleaning. Went to pasar malam with the usual gang on Thursday.

Friday night. What a way to let loose after work. Went out with Michelle again, and this time with the rest of our old 6 Yakin gang. [minus Sharm, and plus Sioki, of course] We seriously had not had something like this for, well basically, six years. Since Standard 6. It was great fun, just like old times, only now we have a lot more booze.

Was at P1 for awhile, playing tai ti. Then, left to Nook's and stayed till bout 3.30, which is this place in Menara Choy Fook Onn in State PJ. The boss there is SO cool. It was Huay Lian's birthday a few days ago, so we told them, and they brought her a free Flaming, and a 'Happy Birthday' ballooon and all. Gave us a good deal on a bottle of JD, plus a free jug of beer. And we got them to change the music so we could dance and all [pssst, there is NO dance floor, btw] and they were so cool with everything. Seriously, people, it's a great place to chill, so you should totally go there. Played a few drinking games - that stupid confusing big small fish game. Ish.

Oh, and Mun Fong gets an accent when she's pissed drunk, lol! That was funny. I shall spare you all the OTHER details that happened that night.

Went to Bryan's house after that, while the rest of them drank somemore, and I took a nap. Sleepy, larh. Bryan's chair was too comfortable. Got home at about 4.30 and knocked out after that.

Great fun. And I'm already missing Michelle. Sigh. She hasn't even left yet.