MemoiRs of SY

Happy 2012

2012-01-25T22:55:00.003Z

**临出国前，阿麽跟我说：“回来要来找阿麽啊，阿麽煮饭给你吃..” **

**人在国外打电话给阿麽：“阿素怡阿你在那边打回来啊? 贵不贵?” **

看见了这两行字，心里揪了一下。

那是去年写下的。

我两位挚爱的婆婆，一位是外婆，另一位是奶妈。

她们都是我妈妈以外最疼爱我、宠着我的人……

这想家的季节啊，持续在燃烧着……

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

在此献上迟来的祝福，

祝大家龙年安康、如意。

新年快乐！:)

想家的季节

2012-01-18T00:54:00.004Z

昨日是爸的生日。

接着周末是农历新年了。

一年一度想家的季节

又到来了……

“只想让你们知道我真的很好……”

J，期待着窗外的月亮变全 —— 下一次的团圆……

Bratislava, Slovakia

2012-01-05T21:31:00.016Z

It was late June last year when I visited Bratislava, Slovakia. We (Desiree, Aylwin, Kenny and I) took a bus from Vienna to Bratislava after our 5 days stay in Austria. We chose to fly back to London from Bratislava because of its cheaper flight ticket (compared to Vienna - London route). Yet I didn't regret because it gave me a chance to discover this hidden gem in Europe - Bratislava (BTS).

One of the most unforgettable experience in BTS was Slovak food. The lady who led us for city tour recommended a Slovak pub to us so that we can try out some of the traditional Slovak cuisines.

Slovak food mostly involve meat, cheese, potatoes and flour due to limited agriculture. One of the best example of their national dish is Bryndzové halušky, which is made out of potato dumplings and special kind of unpasteurized fermented sheep cheese called 'bryndza'. We were told that one will either hate it or like it because not everyone can take the taste..

We also tried another dish (cant remember the name), which is sort of omelette fried with bacon and mushroom.

I thoroughly enjoyed both dishes very much, as they were something new for me. N.B: the cheesy potatoes will actually fill you up quickly.

- cheers with Desiree @ Slovak pub -

We spent the rest of the day strolling around the old town after the city tour. It was great to know briefly about the history of the country (not that I can remember every single details), because it makes you feel closer to the city when you know about Her story :)

Bratislava has a mixture of old and modern style of buildings, which all impressed me in its own way.

- the UFO-like new bridge -

- rococo style Blue church -

- ancient but unique post box -

Not to forget the friendly community too. Slovakian was one of the friendliest people that I have ever came across with. We were lost in the city during the night when we arrived in BTS, but we were not afraid at all because the locals were just so helpful. They will approach you and help you out as far as they possibly can :)

I truly enjoyed myself in their friendly atmosphere during the day in BTS city center.. the city was filled with natural joys, peacefulness and liveliness...

- a lady in the market selling preserved foods -

- streets performance -

- & lots of loving families in town -

Visiting BTS was an enjoyable experience for me. I am glad that we made a stopover in BTS, simply because Slovakia has the beauty that cant be denied :)

A day in Kinsale

2011-12-28T02:44:00.005Z

Kinsale, a town in County Cork, Ireland, which is located about 25km south of Cork City.

I paid a visit to Kinsale town together with Jolyn and Xinyi when they came to visit me in Cork in mid December. The main thing that brought us there was to try out the well-known seafood restaurant in the town.

- Kinsale, Cork -

The bus journey took about 45 minutes from Cork City to Kinsale. We reached around 10am,and because it was a Sunday, the town was so peaceful that u barely see anyone walking on the streets. The shops were still closed, with a sign "open at 2.oopm" hanging on the door. How relaxing the locals' life are.....

- on the quayside at Kinsale -

We walked down a few streets in town, successfully found some shops which were opened for visitors. I fell in love with a shop in which I found loads of ancient treasures, i.e ancient yo yo, ancient funnel etc etc. I feel like getting everything from the shop but I ended up only buying 2 of treasures for myself.

Seafood in Kinsale is well known among our Malaysian gang in Cork, in particular, this restaurant named Fishy Fishy. It was the reason we went to Kinsale in fact, and thank God it did not let us down.

The starter itself was wonderful. Brown bread and white bread were served with butter and a special cream. We had 2 plates of starter and finished all of them.

Xinyi ordered seafood chowder and oyster. She had both her thumbs up with her food :)

- Seafood chowder -

- Oysters -

Jolyn had fish pie. The pie was baked with salmon and some other fish. She didn't manage to finish her dish because she loved the bread more than her dish. So she ended up eating more bread than fish..

- Fish pie -

I ordered monk fish. Didn't know how monk fish looked like until I googled it just a minute ago. I loved my dish as well. The fish was served with mushroom risotto in cream sauce. Monk fish is definitely one of my favourite fish now :)

We had a great experience with this restaurant in overall, and before we left we each received a seashell as souvenir from the waiter. Probably it was a special treats from the house for being the 1st customers on that day :D

We did took a couple of good photos in Kinsale town too.. Particularly love these 2 photos..

- my 2 buddies in Cork -

- Jo sending her warmest hug from London -

Love to be together with them....I know by heart, that our friendship grows as we grow up, and it is still growing strong... :)

心情

2011-12-28T01:53:00.002Z

New Year is arriving.

Yet I am still not ready for its arrival.

I just feel so unprepared...

向左吗？向右吧？

慌了的阵脚，瘫痪了前进的步伐。

失去了斗志，仿佛世界末日……

此刻复杂的情绪，空白的思绪；

犹如剪不断，理还乱……

J，只想静静地……静静地静一静……

Merry Christmas

2011-12-21T10:37:00.004Z

Christmas is just around the corner. The Christmas cheers was brought up about 2 weeks ago by our lab supervisor. He decorated his lab with lots of christmasty decors, and made us played our own radio while working in the lab :)

- lab door with holy wreath -

the lab full with mini Xmas trees, Reindeers,Santa....

-this is the Snowman Santa!-

and the reindeer who sings with his legs folded like ah beng...

and not to forget about the Christmas Lolli Cake! one of my supervisor baked us the lolli and treated us after our clinic session :) It was yummylicious! It definitely made my day, and my clinic partner's day :)

Yet I am still waiting for the snow to fall, it doesnt really feel like Christmas now..........

Anyway, I would like to wish everyone who came across my blog a Happy Christmas and a very Happy New Year :)

二十二

2011-12-12T02:51:00.013Z

今夜，嘴角一直都在上扬着，无法自拔。

被满满的祝福围绕着，其实也让我有些受宠若惊，不过感觉很温馨。

也是第一次，拆着礼物，拆着拆着，泪水决堤。

很开心，因为今夜夜空格外美丽。

很开心，因为真的幸福就在身边。

很开心，因为今天步入二十二的我

发觉自己……

成长了。

谢谢大家献上的祝福

和一份成长的礼物

“若是不曾走过　怎么懂……”

J心里住着的那个小孩，今夜的笑容特别甜美…… :)

刚刚好

2011-12-05T23:42:00.004Z

日子有欢笑，也有苦涩……

一切综合，就是甜蜜的负荷。

我不敢回想大二那年的迷失及对周遭的失望，或许是不想剥开伤口，但我明白自己已经不奢望“患难交知己”的存在了。真正扶持着我的患难知己，一直都守候着，只是他们呢，不在身边。

但我很庆幸，大学三年级的生活较多的是欢乐的时光。是我自己放开了吧? 也许吧！纵使还会疑惑一个人的真心与否，我还是选择了不面对。糊里糊涂的，反而更好过不是吗?

可喜的是，其实好人一直都在。

可悲的是，我没给他们机会靠近自己，让我浪费了足足两年的时光。

我很开心终于打破心防，重新认识身边的他们。我更开心，原来那份“赤子之心”还有被遗留在世上，而她就在我身边。

渐渐的发现，自己更进一步融入了这里的生活。这所带来的欢乐，从所未有。这种快乐，原来很重要，不管你要不要…… 因为这远方的家，就是一个游子的精神之柱。

那个十月末，我们一起郊游……

一起欢笑……

一起玩乐……

一起在一起……

所有温暖，因为你们给我的幸福……

刚刚好。

J，今年的第一个生日愿望：只想给你们一个大大的拥抱！:)

冬季

2011-11-30T21:33:00.006Z

秋意逐渐逝去，雨量逐步在增加。

早晨的日出，始终不见太阳的踪影。

天空一片灰茫茫，没有一丁点的暖意。

转眼间，天昏地暗。

日短夜长的日子，才正要开始呢！

步行在寒冷的天气中，挣扎在狂风暴雨中，

不自觉的加快了步伐，

势必赶在完全天黑以前抵达家门口。

这就是冬天。

寒冷的冬季，冷得让人抖擞，

但冷却不了女孩对家里的思念。

J，今夜想念远方那温暖的家。

何去·何从

2011-11-17T22:11:00.004Z

有时候我贪心地想，

如果心里是有个方向及定位系统 (GPS)，多好。。。

至少，我可以理性着我的感性。

Of sis love

2011-10-25T22:33:00.010+01:00

My elder sister visited me in Cork last week and stayed here for a week. This is the first time ever having a family member to visit me in Cork, a place where I have been living for past 2.5 years, which is about 11000km away from our Malaysia home. Honestly, it feels so unreal. Yet I enjoyed her companion as I will have my lunch dinner ready whenever I come home from hospital. And I get to go shopping with part of the bills not paid by myself too.

I have so much things on the list to do together with her, and I am glad because we managed to do most of them on the lists! She tried the well-known Irish food - Irish stew, heard about Leprechaun, visited some of the Gaeltacht areas and last but not least celebrated HALLOWEEN!

She was lucky because it was sunny most of the time when she was here. Being able to sight seeing around Ireland during sunny day is the best blessing ever, and luckily she was being blessed throughout the entire week of her stay in Cork!

We visited Cobh, a beautiful small town in south-east of Cork. We took a cruise there and came back to Cork city by train. Captured a photo of Cobh from the cruise when we were near the pier as below. The colourful buildings and gigantic church looked so charming under the blue blue sky...

We walked around Cork city centre too.. snapping photos at O Sullivan's Quay..

Dolls band performing celtic music on the street. NB the harp - a symbol of Ireland.

She managed to see the melancholy view of Autumn as well... falling leaves, greyish sky.....

and UCC campus did impressed her in Her own way........ :)

1 week doesn't seem enough for me to spend my time with her. It will be another N years until we meet again. I wish I can just be nearer to home sometimes..

Jie jie, thank you for making it to Cork and spending wonderful moments with me here! May u be blessed and love you always.... :)

Start of clinical years

2011-09-16T01:26:00.007+01:00

So helllooo 3rd year! Well in case you are wondering what course am I doing now, I am a dental student. 3rd year is so called a "transition year" for us as we are now stepping into clinical years after 2 full years of theory-based teaching. We have started college for 2 weeks so far, but I still find myself struggling to adapt to this new lifestyle. Finishing college at 5pm almost every weekday is tiring. But I will readjust my biological clock soon...

And what makes us feel more like a dentist now is to have our own dental instruments. We all have to get a dental kit (which costs 4000euros), and I have got mine last week! Even more exciting is that we were asked to engrave our initials on the instruments as to avoid mixing up instrument with other students, but this actually makes me feel more like I really own them, my little babies.

Just want to share my excitement here! Here's my tool kit (it does look like a carpenter's tool kit though :P ).

Hopefully things will go well for this year. I promise to work hard and may God bless :)

Of sweeties

2011-09-02T22:05:00.003+01:00

During the summer break, I made a trip to Kuala Lumpur to visit college friends, Shirlene and Lihui, my besties during A-level course. We were room mates & flat mates. We hanged around with each other almost everyday besides school hours. After finishing our A-level course 2 years back, we all went to different university and hence seldom see each other again since after.

Gathered at Mid Valley for dinner and supper. I actually hoped that we could have longer time to be spent together...

Got them a leprechaun each, and hopefully the luck of Irish will be with them always :)

I miss you babes!

书香

2011-09-01T00:04:00.003+01:00

想与各位分享两本好书 -- 《生命没有如果》、《医院，我的乌托邦》，作者李永业医生。

若你是《星洲日报》副刊的读者，对李永业医生一定很熟悉。他的一双手不只善于挥舞手术刀，还可以写出一篇篇的好文章。或许是感受到他文笔之间的细腻吧，让我阅读他的文章时不时“眼湿湿”。

《生命没有如果》这本书去年就出版了。书本收集了他年少时离乡背井到外国生活的点滴，并记载着他对父亲的当初用心良苦所存有的感激，当中流露出对亡父的思念。由于李医生对与自己无法陪伴父亲走完人生的最后一段路无法真正释怀，进而使他产生了寻根的念头，放下在英国伦敦任职了20年的职位，毅然回马重新开始。我认为这份勇气是值得鼓舞的。毕竟能够实行这个决定，绝对不是每一个人都办得到。

而今年第二本书《医院，我的乌托邦》面世后，我侥幸能赶在乘搭飞机回爱尔兰之前把它弄到了手。我很庆幸，因为阅读着它，我的回程路上是那么的充实、有意义。这一回，他把人事间各种人面对生老病死时，尤其面对疾病（癌症），那种恐惧及逃避的心理赤裸裸的摊开在读者眼前。这一本书所记载的，其实对我这位医学生来说，像是上了宝贵的一堂课--从不同角度了解病人的心情、如何面对病人的情绪等等。李医生的认真、耐心及热忱，相信已成为不少医学生学习的对象。

其实对于这两本书来说，对于李医生对华人传统的执著，才是我真正欣赏的部分。有一天若是迷失了，这两本书或许会指引着你，回到那回家的路。那道寻根之路……

*《生命没有如果》、《医院，我的乌托邦》皆在马来西亚大众书局出售。

Update

2011-06-30T20:22:00.003+01:00

I remembered the other night when we separated in the airport, she hugged me so tightly that I can feel how reluctant she was to say good bye. I don't know since when hugging a person when we meet or about to leave become a habit... A welcome hug always warms me up especially when I finally see them after a long long journey. And a good bye hug always gives me the courage to leave, as I know she'll still be there for me whenever I want to come back to her again some other time..

2nd year flew by. I wouldn't say it was really quick but I was relieved when everything was over. Result came out and I wasn't too satisfied with my performance. Dad & mom congratulated me so as other friends, but I just couldn't feel the way it was supposed to be. Anyway I have found out my mistakes so I've got over it. Will have 2 months of summer holiday starting from now, I do need a real good rest :)

Am yet to update about my trip to Austria and Slovakia. But am busy cleaning the house at the moment, at the same time busy packing for the next trip to Italy, Switzerland, Paris and then, my lovely home - Alor Setar, Malaysia. So I guess I shall come back again 3 - 4 weeks later. Hope those who are having holidays enjoy your break too.......Till then!

Quick Update

2011-06-10T16:04:00.004+01:00

As expected my life after exam was aimless. I filled my time with dramas, novels and exercising for the past 2 weeks. Can't even remember what day and what date it is today.. that's what happened to me when I have nothing to do - feel lost.

Anyway things got better last Tuesday as we started our clinical attachment lecture and then the orientation on Wednesday. We officially started shadowing 4th year dental students on Wednesday afternoon! My group was assigned to Dental Surgery department that afternoon. The procedure we watched during that session was mostly tooth extraction. But compared to the clinical attachment that I attended 3 years ago, I learned more information this time, i.e more in details about the dental instrument used and the purposes of using a specific ingredient. As surgery is interesting so I somewhat had a good kick start for this one month attachment. Hopefully I'll keep up the heat / spirit until the last day! :)

Oh ya Mr & Mrs Tan were here in Cork 3 weeks ago for a week. And I tried cooking a new dish - Penang Char Hor Fun / Alor Setar Char Ying Yong, but since I don't have Kueh Teow so I substituted it with spaghetti noodle. Turned out quite good :)

目送

2011-05-31T22:57:00.004+01:00

突然想起幼稚园的时候。那时的我应该是六岁吧！

姐姐大我一年，所以无论到哪里我们一直都是一起的 -- 一起坐巴士上学，一起学绘画、钢琴，一起上补习班。有姐姐在，有人陪着，从来都不需要害怕什么的，因为有什么事就由姐姐挡。就在六岁那年，姐姐上小学了，剩下我自己一个人坐巴士上学。其实我很害怕一个人。上学的第一天，我恨不得我和别人一样，有妈妈送到校门口，至少可以有多些勇气面对下车后的一切。若是搭巴士，我的勇气就必须提前拿出来，也就是在踏上巴士后的那一刻，什么都得自己面对了。所以我一直问妈妈有没有空送我上学，虽然知道答案一直还是一样，没空。

那年上课的第一天，我们都不知道自己被分配到什么班，哪一位老师是班主任。所有的小朋友都集合在校园里的空地，由自己或家长陪伴寻找属于自己的队伍，唯一的线索是name tag 上贴着的colour dot。颜色一样的朋友就是你的同学，班主任也会凭颜色来确认你是她/他的学生。熙来攘往的人潮把我淹没了。我不懂自己属于哪一个队伍，在六岁同学集合地的人群中寻觅并希望班主任会快点找到我。一些老师会抓住我的手，然后瞄了一眼左胸口的name tag, 然后说了一句：“哦不是我的班”，然后就放开了我。同样的情景重复了几次，我还是找不到属于自己的队伍。我记得那时的我其实很慌，很想哭，但同时潜意识的我告诉自己不可以被人发现我其实在人海中“迷失”了，所以故作镇定在那里兜兜转转，希望自己尽快被发现。我不懂最后我如何被发现或发现自己的队伍所在。印象中好像是被同班同学发现了然后叫我加入他们。我不记得了…… 但那时必须自己面对的慌乱，却还会隐隐感觉到。

很多时候我还是一样，希望可以依赖人，却鞭策自己要自己面对自己的事情。即使多么的无助，多么的害怕，却总是把它埋在心里绝口不提。到后来不说的原因是不想家人担心吧…… 然后自然而然把自己塑造成无敌铁金刚的形象，殊不知藏在冷酷的背后是一颗害怕受伤、更害怕一个人承受那无助的心。也许这就是潜意识里的一种自我保护吧……

Hmm 其实现在也没在怕什么，只是读着龙应台的《目送》，读着读着就想起了上学第一天那情景。

“慢慢地我了解到，所谓父女母子一场，只不过意味着你和他的缘分就是今生今世不断地在目送他的背影渐行渐远。”

Nighty nighty

2011-05-30T01:41:00.006+01:00

Well kind of having Music Man heat now! I spent the night watching Music Man concert in Taipei in 2008. I attended Music Man concert but was the Malaysia's pit stop in 2009. It has been 2 years but I still can recall that night which was so unreal... :)

So ya some of them must be thinking I am being bias here. Everyone has their own preference and I'm just telling you he's the only one artist that I respect and salute the most, and of course, I can't find any reason to not continuing loving his art works.

If you're interested, you may try the video below. His chinked-out and rock musics are my fave! (i.e the Heroes of Earth & Heart Beat albums)

OH my summer exams are officially over now! weeee............ time to re boost my energy level now...nighty nighty :)

An outing

2011-05-16T00:26:00.007+01:00

Went for an outing to Mahon this afternoon to watch a circus - Fossett's Circus. I can't recalled the last time I watched a circus. I don't even remember that there will be a clown fooling around in a circus. Haha. The difference between this show and those I watched last time when I was young is that they do not use any animal in the show. I don't know if it is because this is a small local circus and so having less budget, or because they do not abuse animal.

As it is Sunday, many parents brought along their kids to the circus..

-the audience-

The clown has big flabby tummy, and his hair is styled into shovel shape, just like Jedward's (Irish pop celebrities) hairstyle. Of course, he is hilarious as well - I have not laughed this way for years. He simply had the power to make me sit back and relax, and laugh like a child. Some lucky audience was chosen to join his silly performance too..

-them saying goodbye-

We then had our dinner at Nando's in Mahon Shopping Centre.

Although it's not something new to me, but I think this is the first time I ever tried their peri peri chili sauce properly. My maximum level is only Medium Hot. But I will say I still prefer ketchup. Haha.

- the sweet couple: Ben & Keezya -

-me & Sue -

and yup, I have got rid of my curls too :)

-

2011-05-15T00:38:00.003+01:00

Took 2.5 half days off after the last exam on Thurs afternoon. Have been hitting the shopping centre continuously for 2.5 days which are the so called "short break". Put it in other words, shopping heals everything.

I went to Pennys after the exam, tried on 5 jeans but ended up buying a cardi. Went to the hair salon later on and ended up doing a skin test there. FYI, skin test is a necessary procedure in the hair/beauty salon here if you're a new customer to the salon, and wish to undergo a treatment which may involve a sensitive skin reaction. Hit Tesco after that and have forgotten what did I buy.The same thing happened yesterday and today. Had lunch there and went Pennys and Tesco for N times. Shopping always heals my sickness - sick of studying notes. Ahhh this sickening life is going end soon!

Btw my lunch today was Malaysian Mee Goreng (mamak)! It didn't really taste exactly like the mamak noodles from mamak stalls, but it did make me feels like home! Like it but not the making me thirsty part :)

Treated myself with popia as well :)

But I still miss these.....

will be so sick of eating out soon anyway.. I just know myself well... :)

下一次

2011-05-10T01:50:00.007+01:00

今夜想起了那一夜，巴黎铁塔下的我。那一股失落感，却也渗杂着些许期待.. 一年过去了，那份失落始终没被填补，或许愈加沉重。枯燥的生活不算什么，跌跌撞撞过了一年，更遗憾的却是找不到一起成长的知己良伴。迷失的羔羊，究竟是谁..

总觉得巴黎和梁静茹是那么的合适。她甜美的歌声总是流露出自然的浪漫，就像走在巴黎的街道上那自然的浪漫，心情自然会爽朗起来。

"也许我会再遇见你像恋人般重逢美丽..."

J，期待着下一次重逢 :)

Kids

2011-04-28T01:02:00.018+01:00

Tell you a secret, I enjoy taking care/ pampering kids. I just have the temper to deal with small kids, even I myself have no idea where the temper came from. Even when they turned out to be clingy after being "friend" with me (some will probably find that annoying), I will still entertain them with patience. Well, I've been dealing with my aunts' children since I was a teen, until these recent years when I have come to study abroad.

In fact, I only see them during Chinese New Year - a time when all the relatives gather together in my grandparents house. But at the same time, it will be a time when the adults (as well as some other elder cousins) got headache. Imagine more than 5 kids gather in a house - their noise can just make the roof collapse! See, I do not exaggerate. The photos below is not of the full number of my cousins yet :P

What I used to do was to take out a packet of sweets from my bag, and bring all the kids who want to eat sweet to follow me to a room. Of course, whoever have eaten the sweet must stay in the room, and they can do whatever they want in the room but not running around in the living hall. And so my 5 other aunties and my mom will be chatting happily in the living room.

To hold the kids in a room for a longer time, one trick ain't enough. So sometimes I came up with tricks like "oh lets take photos together", "tell me stories about your school" etc etc.. A new thing such as a camera will never fail to draw their attention.

5 years back...

And I realised it was indeed a great thing we had done together. At least I feel warm when I look back to the photos we had taken together. Now that everyone has grown up, they might not be as easy to be tackled anymore like last time - the girls will tend to stick together for "girls talk", whereas the boy will choose Play Station over camera nowadays, but still, they will always my dear cousins, a bunch of kids that I sayang the most :)

希望有一天他们长大了，但那份曾经纯真过的童年不会被遗忘。

Well, I came out with all these because it's my little cousin brother's birthday today :)

It was 5 years back after SPM exam, I spent my Christmas in Singapore with him and his family..

He was only 3 that year. Sending him to his day care centre in the morning was a real tough task. I even brought out the cane when he started crying on the bed and refused to go out without daddy or mummy. But soon I realised the cane wasn't an effective weapon, so I talked to him nicely and gave him a hug instead. It did worked! So we went down the apartment happily after that and walked towards the day care centre across the street. It was drizzling that day. My right hand was holding his small sized Pikachu umbrella to protect him from the drizzle, while my left hand was holding his small hand tightly...

Last summer when I was home, I did paid them a visit in Singapore. The overly pampered little boy had turned into a big brother. I am glad that he didn't forget me though! We had a great time, of course, together with her bubbly little sister.

陪伴他们的同时，住在心里的那个小孩，往往也在微笑着 :)

Last but not least,

Happy Birthday Kai Kai!

-

2011-04-18T14:48:00.003+01:00

Bruges

2011-04-10T23:57:00.004+01:00

We took a train out of Brussels to Bruges on the 2nd day in Belgium. It is a small fishing village and is well-known of its scenic view.

We walked without a map at the same time enjoy the good sunshine in Bruges town. The town was actually crowded with tourists, which I didn't really like it...and so this town didn't really impressed me much as it was expected to be...

But one thing that I am sure is that it was a great place to play with your camera :)

The pictures usually explain my feelings.. can you feel me? :)

the sophisticated Brussels

2011-04-09T22:17:00.007+01:00

Brussels, a sophisticated place on Earth. Me as an emotional lady, Brussels definitely has touched my heart in Her way :)

I'm not really a huge fan of chocolate, but still liking them as normal girls. In Brussels, one can try as much chocolate of any Brands as you wish. Among all I found the Cupido as my favourite. The chocolate shop is located just next to the hotel we stayed in, so I basically dropped by to try their chocolate before heading back to hotel :P

Besides chocolate, they serve great waffles as well -I really mean it! If you happened to be in Brussels, get a waffle from the stalls along the street. Those served in restaurant will no satisfy you much.

Whilst for the beer lovers, Belgian beers are easily accessible too! I tried the Hoegaarden, which tasted far better than the Heineken. But Guinness stout still top my list.

And now for the seafood lovers! Mussels and fries is a famous Belgian dish. At the same time, you can enjoy escargots, fresh oysters, lobster, salmon fish as well :)

We visited some famous landmarks of Brussels as well.

-Grand Place -

-St Michel church -

- Atomium -

- Mini Europe -

- Musical Instruments Museum -

Chocolates, waffles, beers, musics, buildings.... Those are the things that I like and maybe that's why I fell in love into Brussels..because this small city has it all :)

transit in Rotterdam

2011-04-08T01:47:00.000+01:00

Our destination after Amsterdam was Brussels. Yet we decided to make a transit in Rotterdam to visit the cubic house. I read about the cubic house from the Internet and was really stunned. I truly love the design of the house, so unique so kawaii.. :)

The cubic houses were designed from the idea of living on "tree houses". Surprisingly city council approved this project and so here goes the cubic houses as a symbol of Rotterdam.

One cube = one apartment. There are 3 levels in the house, you can design them into an apartment with 3 layers. The space will be just nice for a couple to live in, but not a family. The showroom has a small garden at the uppermost level. It was amazing as one can easily sunbathing there, right under the roof.

We planned to visit the port of Rotterdam as well, but the weather was a bit too harsh. Strong wind and drizzles refrained us from going near to the port. So we didn't get the chance to visit the landmark Erasmus Bridge as well as the Walk of fame :(

Anyway, the visit to the cubic house alone was worth the transit.. I realise I'm somehow a fan of unique architectures! :P

a trip to Amsterdam

2011-04-07T23:27:00.007+01:00

After 2 months of whining, I finally got the chance to let out myself........ we made our way to Holland (the Netherlands) on the 1st week of Easter break!

Whenever I thought of Holland, the very first thing that came into my mind was always the windmills, then the tulips... other than that, maybe.........the national football team in orange jerseys?? Well, there are actually many more. I''ll list them out later :)

This trip to Holland definitely gave me a better insight of Holland. We joined a half-day tour which was great as I learnt a lot about the reasons of using clogs, why the buildings were built this way, etc.. Personally, I failed to categorise Amsterdam as a small city leading a simple lifestyle or a true modern city leading hectic lifestyle. She appeared to be somewhat intermediate.

Symbols of the Netherlands

1. Windmills

The half-day tour bus brought us up to the countryside Northern to Amsterdam city. We visited Zaanse Schans windmills site. This picturesque windmills site was exactly a picture that came real from my imagination :)

2. Tulips

Another symbol of Holland. Tulip is one of the most significant agricultural exports of the country. No doubt, the beauty of the flowers and bulbs attract a significant amount of tourists to visit the country as well.

After we arrived in Schiphol airport, Amsterdam, we headed to the Keukenhof garden straight away. We weren't that eager, it was just that the garden is a distance away from the city centre, so we decided to visit the garden before head down to the city centre. Moreover, IT WAS A GOOD SUNNY DAY -- perfect for a walk & photo shooting! :)

See, I didn't exaggerate about the weather, did I? :P

3. CLOGS

Clog is the special kind of shoe that the farmers wear on their farm. Because of the loose consistency of the soil and sticky mud, the special clog prevent the farmers to stuck themselves in the mud and also enable them to walk properly on the farm. They are made of light wood and are nicely carved.

This pair is obviously far bigger size for me! I prefer the red colour clogs though! :D

4. Cheese

The variety of cheese they have are amazing! We were brought to a cheese farm as well during the half-day tour. Over there, we were allowed to try all types of cheese. Some were really great but some didn't really suit my taste. The smoked cheese was my personal preference :)

5. Orange Jerseys

Catch a glimpse of the jerseys shop when we were strolling on the street. The striking orange colour was absolutely bright and attractive!

6. Sex & Drug

Behind the charming tulips and lovely windmills, here comes the ugly/special side. This face of Holland might not be widely known. I only got to know about the Red Light District of Amsterdam after LY paid her visit to Amsterdam in spring last year. Things to bear in mind, if you encounter a COFFEE SHOP, that's not a kopitiam where you can drink kopi O. When you order a cake for dessert/high tea, you better watch out the content. HA. They might contain drug that will give you some ecstatic effect. AND GIRLS, watch your boy tight during the trip, as this area can be a very interesting one to them... :D

Amsterdam, a loving yet thrilling place for me. But I'm sure that the lovely side did overtake the ugly one in overall. She is just different in Her own way. I actually had fun learning about Her stories! Oh ya, a museum named Anne Frank Huis has an interesting story as well. It is about the life of a family hiding from the anti-Jews force during World War II. The house was where the family hid from the force. Did not take any photos in the museum, so will not talk about it further :)

Oh well, I bought a pair of cute red clog as souvenir, but I have not found an owner. Put your hands up if you wish to have it, of course, first come first serve basis k! Hope you enjoyed reading the post :)

- THE END -

-

2011-03-24T21:11:00.004Z

This idea slipped into my mind.

I am going to

1. Sleep all day

2. Party all night

tomorrow.

The best damn day ever is arriving soon.

KEEP HOLDING ON.......... for now :)

红蜻蜓

2011-03-23T14:41:00.002Z

最近不时不自觉地哼歌，一直repeat着一首经典老歌 -- 小虎队的《红蜻蜓》。我也不知道为什么会是它 ...

飛呀　飛呀

看那紅色蜻蜓飛在藍色天空

游戲在風中不斷追逐它的夢

天空是永恆的家　大地就是它的王國

飛翔是生活

我們的童年也像追逐成長吹來的風

輕輕地吹著夢想慢慢地昇空

紅色的蜻蜓是我小時候的小小英雄

多希望有一天能和它一起飛

當煩惱愈來愈多玻璃彈珠愈來愈少

我知道我已慢慢地長大了

紅色的蜻蜓曾幾何時

也在我歲月慢慢不見了

我們都已經長大　好多夢正在飛

就像童年看到地紅色的蜻蜓

我們都已經長大　好多夢還要飛

就像現在心目中紅色的蜻蜓

-----

今天好想哭。

星期五考最后一张paper了，我要撑下去....

-

2011-03-19T12:42:00.004Z

I've booked my flight home. I'm flying with Etihad Airways again this time :)

18th July : Paris - Abu Dhabi - Kuala Lumpur.

19th July : Kuala Lumpur - Alor Setar.

26th August : Alor Setar - Kuala Lumpur.

26th August : Kuala Lumpur - Abu Dhabi - Paris.

27th August : Paris - Cork.

My punggung will be senget towards the end of these days..

Apart from that, I'm deadly broke at the moment after paying for all the tickets, means that I'll have to eat grass for the rest of the 1.5 months...ahhhhh :((((

-

2011-03-14T23:04:00.008Z

What keeps me alive nowadays?

Don't know why at the same time I thought of a short video from the 15 malaysia series. I sighed :(

-

2011-03-14T00:04:00.005Z

日本陷入前所未有的大灾难。

追看报道时，一直心有余悸。

还好友人短时间内报了平安，还不至于那么担心。

几天前，一位朋友的弟弟在一起交通意外中不幸身亡。

我们听见了这震撼的消息后，非常难过，可想而知那位友人一定更难过。

四名大好青年就这样，丧命了。实在叫人心疼。

这种毫无预警的分离，最痛。

对于应对灾难，日本让全世界人上了一堂宝贵的课。

那些互相扶持、临危不乱的画面，映入全世界人的眼里，印在全世界人的心坎里。

预习防范措施，巨资投入防范天灾的计划，如今一切值回票价了。

什么时候，我们才能学会珍惜老天给以我们无天灾的优待呢？

其实句子隐藏了本意，我不想说得太白。

人祸本来就可以避免的，条件是各方得做好本分。

保持道路状况良好是应分的工作，也是一种责任以及对驾驶人士的基本保证。

我们到底还需要牺牲多少个宝贵的生命来让各方醒悟呢？

天有不测之风云，人有旦夕之祸福。

我们无法预料明天会发生什么事，

所以只想在此提醒大家，要时时刻刻照顾好自己，好好保重。

愿天佑日本。

也愿死者们九泉之下，安息吧。

2011-03-10T22:12:00.004Z

有时候，他人笔下的一篇文章，往往出其不意地触动了自己的心，又或者反映了自己的心境。用文字表达心思，我往往自叹不如，那就由他人的笔记记录心中的认同吧！

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

人的一生，当如花之盛开，花之凋零，红红火火地燃烧，瀟瀟洒洒地离去。我平生最恨“遗憾”二字，爱一个人，就一定要告诉他我的钦慕；心怀一个梦，就全心全力去追求，如席慕容在诗中表现的义无反顾：

我是飞蛾奔向炙热的火焰

燃烧之后必成灰烬
但是如果不肯燃烧往后
我又能剩下些什么呢除了一颗
逐渐粗糙逐渐碎裂
逐渐在尘埃中失去了光泽的心

取自：星洲日报／副刊‧文：周锦聪‧2011.02.21

Recent life (in point form)

2011-03-09T01:22:00.005Z

1. I spent 2 nights watching PPS since after the final exam yesterday evening.

2. I completed 2 online assignments a few minutes ago.

3. I sewed a total of 6 buttons today, which fell off from my coats and cardi few months ago.

4. I still have a stack of clothes to iron or they are too crumble to be worn.

5. I still have an online assessment pending which is due on Thursday noon.

6. I am never in bed until 2am lately. This is not a good sign. I can hear my liver protesting from inside.

7. I realised that I'm using the laptop at hours more than I imagined. I started and ended my day in front of the laptop screen everyday. YES. EVERY SINGLE DAY. I just can't blame anything else but laptop for the deteriorating eye sight..pffffff :(

NB:

1. 2 out of 9 modules are down. I have passed one and waiting for the result for another one.

2. Another 3 assessments to cover in the next 2 weeks.

--> AND THERE COMES THE ONE MONTH EASTER BREAK :)

-

2011-03-03T21:16:00.004Z

Spring is here. We get lots of sunshine nowadays. I've switched from wearing a thick coat to a thinner jacket. But in this March, days are still not cool. I mean in the way of FUN-cool not the cold-cool. 4 more exams to cover. And I'm still trying hard to juggle every single modules in this limited time. Sigh.

I should have worked harder,only if I can wind the clock back to the past...

Something New

2011-02-21T23:49:00.010Z

We had our 2nd Pharmacology tutorial at noon today. Normally, tutorial is something like the lecturer give questions, then you give an answer and some explanations of the answer. And most of the time not much people wants to participate in the discussion because of several reasons. People might not want to say something wrong, or they just don't know what to say.

BUT the one we had today was worth mentioning here because it was totally something that we never ever expected to have. When the lecturer started the tutorial, he introduced us a "clicker". Well, he is a Dutch and sometimes the way he deliver the information is kinda like "not in order". For example he was telling us how does a clicker look like, its function, u need to press the button bla bla bla, before telling you that we are going to use the clicker for the rest of the 50 minutes of the tutorial. So I was confused at first. And then we he started distributing the clicker to us, I eventually got him -- we are going to use them during the tutorial, not to buy them from somewhere for other use.

So that is the clicker. If you ever watched the game show "Who wants to be a millionaire", when the player wants to ask for the audience opinions, the audience will tell the answer they think which is correct by clicking the button on a clicker. Then the answer will be received by the computer and being analysed. What a cool technology!

So we have to answer the MCQ questions he set and click the answer within 30seconds. And then the analysis will be shown on the screen.

It was really a great fun! I never expect to be exposed to this type of learning method. There are a lot of criteria you can learn from the analysis too. He can comment a lot from this learning method too - "You just press the button, I won't know who give that answer and I don't wanna know", "Oh seems like many of you miss out the time to answer this question", "Well most of the people got the answer wrong" etc etc..

Can you see the point? Based on the analysis outcome, you can actually know if the question is difficult for the students to answer or vice versa, what answer does the students tend to choose: A, B or C, then you can discuss why is that answer such a preference, and so on and so on.. And most importantly, everyone can answer the question comfortably on their seats without having to be fear to answer them wrongly in front of everyone. This will be a good way to let people to do some mistakes but not feeling ashamed in public, as well as to learn why the answers are wrong. Isn't this brilliant? :)

By the way, we all are focusing more on the Tooth Morphology because we have a spot exam coming up, and the final exam for this module. So these two evening I was spending hours to learn how to identify the permanent teeth.

2 nights well spent. But I'll be so sick of the teeth after this week, I guess. Hopefully the shape and features of the teeth will be something that will be locked in my mind forever after this :)

Personality Test

2011-02-17T19:57:00.004Z

I came across this website here when I was reading a friend's blog. It is a personality test. And it is frigging awesome - damn chun! How can the computer know a person so well in less than one minute time but a person who has know you for more than a life time just cant understand you, at all?

These are my results below:

Your view on yourself:

You are down-to-earth and people like you because you are so straightforward. You are an efficient problem solver because you will listen to both sides of an argument before making a decision that usually appeals to both parties.

The type of girlfriend/boyfriend you are looking for:

You like serious, smart and determined people. You don't judge a book by its cover, so good-looking people aren't necessarily your style. This makes you an attractive person in many people's eyes.

Your readiness to commit to a relationship:

You prefer to get to know a person very well before deciding whether you will commit to the relationship.

The seriousness of your love:

Your have very sensible tactics when approaching the opposite sex. In many ways people find your straightforwardness attractive, so you will find yourself with plenty of dates.

Your views on education

Education is very important in life. You want to study hard and learn as much as you can.

The right job for you:

You're a practical person and will choose a secure job with a steady income. Knowing what you like to do is important. Find a regular job doing just that and you'll be set for life.

How do you view success:

You are afraid of failure and scared to have a go at the career you would like to have in case you don't succeed. Don't give up when you haven't yet even started! Be courageous.

What are you most afraid of:

You are afraid of having no one to rely on in times of trouble. You don't ever want to be unable to take care of yourself. Independence is important to you.

Who is your true self:

You are mature, reasonable, honest and give good advice. People ask for your comments on all sorts of different issues. Sometimes you might find yourself in a dilemma when trapped with a problem, which your heart rather than your head needs to solve.

short break

2011-02-14T17:53:00.007Z

The weekend in London was absolutely brilliant! I never feel the happiness/ carefree/ joy for such a long time, and I got them all back over the weekend.

The real good weather was an extra bonus for me!We did photo shooting with the Big Ben, London Eye and Westminister Abbey too! * Didn't bring along my thumb drive so couldn't transfer the photos from LY yet. Will share it next time :)

We also had good food, shopping (unintentionally) as well as spending some quality time with some secondary school and college friends.

It was the wisest choice I ever made in this semester. I feel less suffocated and much fresher now.

I'm all set to start another round of serious study now! Oral Histology & Tooth Morphology (AN 2008) Final: 28th Feb (spot test) and 7th March (written test). Go Go study! xx

Air Crash 2011

2011-02-10T18:58:00.009Z

Photo courtesy of RTE news.

It has been a difficult day for the Corkonians today. And this incident is added to my list of "Top 3 tragedies when I am abroad in Ireland" after the flood and volcano ash disruption. I hope that the list will not go on.

A commuter flight departed from Belfast crashed at Cork Airport this morning. The light turboprop aircraft overturned and caught fire while making a 3rd attempt to land in heavy fog. 6 passengers are confirmed died from the air accident, whilst 6 were rushed to the hospital. They are now in stable condition but have to stay in hospital for overnight. The crash did put many people from all over the country into deep shock.

Weather conditions was really poor this morning. The low temperature was chilling topped up with the heavy fog. The gas station which is 2 minutes away was not visible from my house gate. Many imaginations came flashing in my mind but not the air crash. It thrilled me when I read the news at noon. And because I'm planning to fly out from Cork to London tomorrow evening, so I did follow up the latest news since after. Hopefully the flight disruptions will be lifted by then.

May I offer my deepest condolences to the 6 victims and keep fingers crossed for the survivors.

Dinner

2011-02-09T22:45:00.002Z

It was Timah's Birthday on the 1st Feb. We had lunch with her at American Captain on the day itself. We then had a candle blowing session on the Friday night, in conjunction with the CNY dinner at Pandamama restaurant.

She was sooooo lucky because the manager gave her a Panda as present, so everyone was saying they wanna go to Pandamama for their birthday celebration next time because they want the Panda doll! How cool is that to have a Panda on your bed! I want one tooooooooo!!

We had a lot of nice food that night! The portion each dishes is a bit small, but all are really delicious. Mabo Tofu, Crispy Fried Chicken topped with Mango sauce and Siew Yok (Honey Roasted Pork) are my favourite. Now I know where to go in Cork if I'm craving for Chinese food :)

Anyway, I'm so exhausted to do anything at the moment. I seriously think that I need some extra energy drink to survive this second semester. BUT the Ayam Brand's Chicken essence from the Chinese shop was ridiculously expensive which makes me reluctant to get one :( I'm gonna take a good rest this week and then start the battle with Tooth Morphology subject starting next week. The final exam for this module is coming up in 2 weeks time! Aza aza fighting................. :)

OSCE 2011

2011-02-07T13:16:00.009Z

OSCE is finally OVER! It was rather fun than frightening throughout the whole examination process. And I think this is the first time I talk about my studies here. I choose not to do so in the past because I do not wish to turn my blog into a serious space. But it is an exception this time because the senior dental students actually jotted down the questions they got from last year in their blogs, and it was very helpful in guiding us in preparation for the exam. So I'm going to do the same thing so that the future batch will benefit from this as well :)

The Materials asked were mostly of basic stuffs including Dental Materials, Dental Hygiene, Ethics & Law, and Dental-related scenarios. Only the Behavioural Science questions were kind of in details, which I actually create my own answers happily from the beginning to the end :(

There are 23 stations all together. 19 real stations & 4 rest stations. My rotation of the stations was pretty good since I only have the role-play station towards the end. Role-play was the most daunting part for me, but it eventually turned out to be alright, which was good :)

Here are the questions:

Behavioural Science

1. Angry Patient scenario. Watch the video, write 5 interventions in dealing with the Angry patient, and 2 criteria which can be improved.

2. Define phobia. State 4 possible factors causing phobia. Fill in the blanks :

i. Belenophobia is the fear of ____.

ii. Aichmophobia is the fear of _____.

iii.Algophobia is the fear of _____.

iv. Trypanophobia is the fear of _____.

3. Define Compliance. What are the treatment factors that will affect the following:

i. Pre-treatment

ii. During treatment

iii. After treatment

4. The stages of change (Precontemplation-Relapse). What are the 3 advantages for having online health promotional over the TV and Printing in the past.

5. Role play: Give Oral hygiene instruction to the patient, indicating the cause of Plaque formation and how to remove Plaque using the dental care product given. (Toothbrush, Floss, TePe, Mouthwash, Tongue scrapper)

Dental Material Science

1. Watch video & find the errors in mixing: Zinc Phosphate Cement

2. Watch video & find the errors in mixing: Alginate Impression

3. Match the bottles labelled A,B,C, D with their characteristics (negative marking) : Zinc Phosphate Cement, Zinc Oxide Eugenol, GIC, RMGIC.

Dental Hygiene

1. Identify the instrument : William's Probe. (Marking scale on the probe, function)

2. Identify an instrument which can be used to scale the interdental area supragingivally. Explain the characteristic of the instrument.

3. Gracey currete 5/6 & 11/12 can be used to scale which part of the teeth? State 4 specialties of the instrument.

4. CPITN sextant box. Explain the outcome of the examination according to the result taken.

Ethics & Law

1. Case scenario : A patient (Irish Rail driver) has a fit when come to your clinic. He recovers in a short time and reschedules the appointment with you. He then go back to work (driving at the rush hour). What issue of Confidentiality arise in this case?

2. Case scenario: A patient has Hepatitis C and is HIV positive - you saw him holding hands with you colleague (which is married albeit separated). What issue of Confidentiality arise in this case?

3. Case Scenario: A 13 years patient came alone to you and request to have bleaching and crown capping to be done on her. You did not explain the the possibility of having side effect (0.0009%) to her thinking it is not a big concern. What issue of Informed Consent arise in this case?

Others

1. State 4 characteristics of Nicotine Dependence. Draw and label the Cycle of Change.

2. Hard tissue charting.

3. Identify the tooth labelled A,B,C. State their features and the time of eruption.

4. Contact angle. State the dental materials which is relevant to this, and why?

The funny part was that: I LEFT MY ERASER BEHIND IN THE VERY 1ST STATION! *shaking my head* Thank God I'm using a mechanical pencils which have a small piece of eraser at the back. So do remember to bring an extra set of stationery because u wont want this to happen!

The role-play was far better than getting a case to deal with difficult patient, so I feel relieved when Timah told me it was about giving oral health instruction. Well, I actually speak/do better when I'm under pressure. Anyway I'll say prepare well and it's gonna be fine :)

OK it's time for bed now! Hope that the 2nd half of the class enjoyed their sessions too!

Ciao! :D

AHH

2011-02-06T22:39:00.002Z

“放弃比坚持还需要更大的勇气。”

我小小的脑袋快爆了...

那个不安的感觉，实在是讨人厌..

但愿明天一切顺利。

Happy CNY

2011-02-02T13:07:00.006Z

This is the time where all the family members as well as the relatives sit together at the table for a steamboat dinner - the so called "reunion dinner". It is happening right now at home in Alor Setar.

I was not alert about this important day last year until my sister texted me telling that they are having the dinner at home. But this year, I skipped the lectures just to wait for them to Skype with me. Well, another reason was the not so good weather, so I decided to stay home. And I discovered that the other friends who are currently away from home, are all online on their Skype too. HA.

Anyway would like to wish the Chinese all around the world a very Happy Chinese New Year.

恭喜发财！

-

2011-01-29T14:26:00.008Z

Well Chinese New Year is near. And this is usually when I get homesick badly - not only because I don't get to celebrate CNY at home BUT also the fact that I have to prepare for the damn exam. So while the others kept on updating their fb status to "balik kampung", I am here reminiscing the photo collections in the Family folder.

And I found these! It was about 1.5 years ago. Me and my younger sister & little brother worked together to make a card for the youngest sister who was going to sit for her very first important examination in life - UPSR. I scribbled some cartoons and wrote notes while both of them coloured the figures.

And so it turned out this way...

She was actually delighted when she received the card. But she was just laughing and trying to suppress her happiness inside. Yes, this is my family's custom. We are not "open" enough to tell out loud the way we feel. I'm still trying hard to make a turnover, especially at this moment when I don't have the chance to participate in their life and to watch them growing up. We are lucky because of the invention of internet and Skype in this era. The huge physical distance actually brings me and the family closer together. This may sound absurd but it is somehow like a popular phrase "失去了才懂得珍惜", which we all know well but can't help behaving that way over and over again.. So for those who are still busy working or still away from hometown at this moment, 回家吧!

It is time to go home :)

-

2011-01-28T19:13:00.005Z

The provisional Summer Exam Timetable is out.

Instead of feeling the big burden/ stress, I was happy because I can now start planning for a short trip after the final, and right before the clinic attachment starts.

18th May onwards, I WILL BE AS FREE AS A BIRDIE! :D

let alone the RD2007's Oral Exam....x

Family

2011-01-18T12:37:00.010Z

There is nothing much but a simple family gathering which would make me happy. Yea they are my "family" in Cork.

Sometimes when people are around you all the time, you tend to take that as granted. You don't appreciate them. You start seeing the negative sides of everything but not the positive one.

Sometimes there will be somebody in the family who behaved in his/her very personal way of attitude , and you tend to be swayed by listening to other peoples' words, making thing worse and so the situation went out of control. The ugly faces revealed, the awkward feelings during the conflicts, the source of problem left unexplained, the one who stayed, the one who walked away, the awful experiences left haunted and so on......

Sometimes you just need to take a pause and look back. Maybe we just accidentally left the faith and communication behind.

We learnt our lessons from the mistakes we did in the past. Those who didn't are fools. And I whispered in my heart, I'll never let the history to happen again.

Because harmony is the source of happiness of the family :)

BLAH

2011-01-09T21:00:00.003Z

I have no idea when was the last time I need to rush for assignments deadlines. This learning log thingy is just as annoying as the debate thingy.

I AM SERIOUSLY NOT LIKING ANY OF EM!

Deadline is so near, and I’m so reluctant to do the work.

SCREWED.

the START

2011-01-04T11:42:00.003Z

Today is the first day of the 2nd term.

I'm lucky enough that I can sleep in because we don't have any lectures until 4pm.

BUT I have slept for more than 12 hours in total since last night.

By the way we still don't have our blackboard updated by the lecturers until now.

NO handouts for printing, no idea what's going to be lectured later.

I think the lecturer is busy sleeping as well.....

What a good start :D

永别曲

2011-01-01T07:18:00.005Z

我还以为我已经做好了心理准备

但最终还是哭红了眼

清晨乍醒的那刹那

抓起手机翻开信息然后急忙回复

等着回应的那十分钟仿佛是十小时

传来的最后消息是

她不等姐姐了走了

那时候我们还小的时候她还单身的时候

我和姐姐都喜欢去隔壁家玩

我总是喜欢到她房了翻阅那本红色的命运书

然后问东问西

她总喜欢说笑说话都很直接

说完后哈哈大笑

还记得她把姐姐的名字Sabrina该改成Nana

然后自个儿笑个不停

之后她嫁人了

我和姐姐还一起见证了她的婚礼呢

之后我们就很少再聚在一起

只有在新年和清明会小聚

农历新年初二

她是唯一一个会回家回得了家的女儿

从不曾缺席

可是今年不会了

当她病了我却因为害怕而缺席了

到了病入膏肓时

才知道再也没机会出席在她清醒时刻

纽约的班机延迟了

她姐姐比原定的时间迟了一天才抵达家乡

这么一天的迟到成了永远的迟到

距离有时候就是那么遥远

即时是短短那几分钟

1月1日

她的生忌也成了死忌

别了，亲爱的二姑

我会为您祈祷的

愿你一路好走

安息吧

新年

2010-12-31T16:13:00.007Z

从台北倒数庆典现场直播转到台中再转到高雄，没瘾... 很侥幸赶在亚洲结束2010年前几分钟转到了东方卫视，和在上海世博广场倒数的人群一起迎接亚洲的2011年。主持人的祝福词让人瞬间感到温馨、深刻...啊，好久都没听见有人说那么美丽的华语了。还有, 力宏也在那儿。

新年了，我还没拟定什么resolutions，应该也不会拟定一个吧，因为我的新年在浅意识里已是八九月。新的学年就是我的新年。但从今天起要在年月日的column把年份换成2011，还是会觉得···怪怪的。一年逝去所带来的震撼往往比一个月的流逝还要大。我只希望接下来的日子大家都会健康、快乐。

在此衷心地祝大家新年快乐。

干杯。

*其实我告诉了我自己，有机会我一定会再回到那美丽的上海去走走看看。:)

White Christmas 2010

2010-12-30T00:54:00.011Z

I took a train up to Dublin for Christmas few days ago. Stayed there for 3 night, having Xinyi as my companion throughout my stay in Dublin. She fed me non-stop, and brought me for shopping. She will never say I'm fat like a pig now because I have never break her ultimate record in gaining weight (YET). This is why I can remain happy all time even I've gained weight.

We had steamboat on Christmas eve. I had a great night stuffing myself with all kinds of meatballs, meat slices and my favorite quill eggs and egg noodle. I met new friends and played UNO with them. I got to play the drum for the 1st time of my life after dreaming for it for such a long time. It was also my first time to blow a candle and make wish for Christmas...

We had another gathering on the night after Christmas. Bak Kut Teh was the main dish. My favorite pork bag wasn't in the soup, but I still enjoyed it.

The snow stopped falling on the day I reached. Yet the snow had not melted due to the subzero temperature. We happily took photos at the roadside, which was covered with white fluffy snow.

I wrote my sister's name on the snow, as required by her, but I didn't really like the outcome. So I decided to make her a snowman, with her name on it.

in the process..

and here you go.....

S for SS not Superman -- I didn't make him a red underwear.

So that was my wonderful white Christmas 2010...

Food in London

2010-12-23T23:46:00.006Z

It was a year ago when I visited London -the capital of England and United Kingdom. London city was my number one choice when I was deciding where to go during Christmas last year. There were so many reasons for me to make my way to London: good friends, good shops, good food... One weird thing was I never think of those places of attractions. As a result I didn't really visit all the tourist attractions in London even though I had spent 10 days of my winter holidays there.

Good food was my top priority. I was dying for oriental food, so the place we went on the first day was Chinatown.

- London's Chinatown -

We tried Shanghai Xiaolongbao, soy milk, Stewed meat rice (LuRou Fan), Fried Oyster, Beef noodle etc etc in Chinatown. The food was precious and delicious, as they were something that I can't always get in Cork. And the best part was the incredible cheap/reasonable price.

- Lu Rou Fan -

- Beef noodle -

We also visited Bayswater and had a short gathering with Jin and XY.

- Bayswater town -

We tried a highly recommended dish - Peking duck in a restaurant. We ate the duck in the traditional way, which is to wrap the duck slices, scallions and cucumber in a Mandrin crepe, fold it and eat it. It was super duper delicious, which was above my expectation :)

- Peking Duck -

We also ordered other dished which I was craving for a long time after a few months leaving home. Those familiar sweet and sour taste, minced meat tou fu, kangkung.........arghhhh can I have them now toooooo, LLY??

We spent a night in a Thai restaurant in Grosvenor Place. The restaurant has a nice ambiance, and the food was excellent. I personally like the pineapple rice and the Tomyam soup. As Jo had a deal coupon so we actually ate good food in this fantastic upscale restaurant at a low price :)

Eating & dining in London was obviously a pleasant and enjoyable experience throughout my 10 days stay in London, as it is a place where I can effortlessly find a big varieties of food. And I believe that when people enjoy the food, they will start loving the city....

What about the food?

2010-12-21T18:40:00.009Z

The famous food in Spain is the Paella. I googled to get to know more in details about this dish earlier. It is originated from Valencia which is on the east coast of the Spain. The non-Spaniards view it as Spain's national dish, but the Spaniards consider it as a regional Valencian dish. As I read down further, I got to know that Paella sometimes is cooked with land snails/ rabbits. Geeeeezz.. I hope I didn't accidentally eaten them when I was in Spain :(

-Paella Vallenciana-

The rice they used are bomba rice, which is shorter and rounder than the long grain rice we normally use. They seasoned the rice with curry gravy, and cooked them until they are like the porridge which has dried out. It tasted good when eaten ordinarily, but better when we added the lemon juice.

Dining out in Málaga is really cheap. We spent less than 15euros for a proper meal, which includes appetizer, main course and dessert plus a drink.

-Appetizer : tuna salad-

-Main course: Pizza-

-Dessert: Bluberry cheesecake-

It cost me only 8.50euro for everything above. You hardly can find a single dish (main course) that cost you only 8.50 euro in Ireland, but in Málaga we can get a full meal! This explains the weight gained -- we ate like a pig throughout the 5 days in Spain!

We also tried other snack food like vegetal patatas (potato). The big potato was baked in the oven, then slightly mashed and topped with a few ingredients on top. I love this patatas!

-traditional Spanish omellete-

The restaurant will serve you bread once you are seated, or after you've made your order. Most of the bread I tasted is salty, and I don't really like them. It is usually free of charge, but some restaurant did charge you for the bread.

We realised that the Spaniards' diet is a bit (VERY) oily too. The food served was usually sprinkled with a layer of olive oil on top. You can add more oil on your own if you want to, as they have the 2 small bottles of olive oil on the table for you to top up. We were traumatized with this habits as oil is always not a friend to the girls. So we actually wiped the extra oil using the napkin :(

-the very oily eggs & fries-

-the very oily chicken fillet-

But in overall, the food was good. You can simply search for Chinese food or fast food if you're not used to the oily Western food. There are a number of Chinese restaurant which are easily accessed in town. The best thing is they are cheap and you wont need to hesitate much to walk in to a restaurant and eat all you can! :)

Finally I've covered all I want to write about my Málaga trip. I realised that memories fade day by day, so this is where I can store and protect the memories :)

Benalmádena

2010-12-21T02:17:00.007Z

Benalmádena is a small town in the province of Málaga. It is situated about 20 mins away from Málaga city centre by train. There is a entertainment theme park operating in the town, called the Tivoli World, and us the monkeys decided to spend a day in the theme park.

We didn't do proper research on the theme park before we made our decision. We thought the theme park is open everyday as according to the website, but a local told us the theme park is open in the weekend only during winter time. DANG! Gaya and Vini were so sad as they were dreaming of the theme park the previous night and couldn't wait to play and rock the theme park, and this bad news definitely tore their hearts into pieces!

Instead of heading back to Málaga city, we stayed in the town for a day.

-the deserted theme park-

The friendly local suggested us to visit Benalmádena Pueblo, a small village on the middle of the hill. So we took a bus up to the village for lunch.

The village is small, quiet and peaceful.

One thing I like about the village is the architecture of the houses. In Spain, the buildings usually have a small balcony connecting to the rooms. The size of the balcony is very small, which can only fit 3-4 persons at most. The door to the balcony is usually the tall wooden door, which normally has vintage look.

I have this imaginary scene in my mind: Every morning, after she wakes up and gets up from her bed, she walks towards the wooden door, opens the door and steps out to the balcony, looks at the blue sky and takes a deep breath ~ ahhh.. fresh air, what a good morning! If she happens to see the guy opposite her house, she will say "Buenos dias!" haha..

At some places in Málaga city, there were benches on the pedestrian streets outside the apartments/ houses. The funny thing is that the benches are arranged to face the balconies instead of facing the busy road like what we usually have in other countries.

Another scene slipped in my mind when I saw the benches: a guy sitting on the bench, singing love song to his love one staying in that apartment. The girl can either find this romantic, so she enjoys watching his performance from the balcony, or finds this annoying so she throws a pot of flower down from the balcony. haha.. I thought of a pot of flowers because they usually plant flowers in pots and hang them on the balcony or lattice windows. This is another concept that I find it decorative.

So I camwhored a lot in the village because I really love the architecture of the buildings! We then had our lunch in a small restaurant, where we spent a whole afternoon eating and chatting. As it is a small village, the locals there cant really speak English. So we actually had problems ordering Vegetarian food for 2 of my friends. They told the waitress not to put meat in the food, but they came up with serving seafood in their meal! The 2 of them nearly fainted and all they can eat was potato and eggs.

We came back down to Arroyo de la Miel town in the evening. The town was less hectic in the evening. We strolled around in town and visited Puerto Marina (Marina port).

-Arroyo de la Miel-

- in the candy house-

- waiter serving beers-

We traveled back to Málaga at night. We then spent the rest of the night eating and mingling with other hostelers, until lights off.....

Málaga - sunbathing in winter

2010-12-18T01:17:00.010Z

One will never think of sunbathing during winter time, but the sunshine in Málaga is just too warm and lovely that you will actually get tempted to go to the beach.

We made our way to the la Malagueta beach after a few days in Málaga. The first few days were the time for us to set up ourselves for the outing to the beach - buying slippers, hat, etc. We thought of having a picnic at the very last minute, and so we went for grocery shopping in Super Sol before we strolled to the beach.

The scenery was exactly the same as the one we saw on the postcard.

It is part of the Costa del Sol (Coast of the Sun) of the Mediterranean Sea. The sea water was actually cold but it was rather refreshing. The tender sunshine and refreshing breeze made it a "just nice conditions" for one to enjoy at the seaside. No sweats, no sun burn. Aww I'm truly in love with the winter in Málaga.

-coast line-

- picnic under palm tree -

- dancing in the sea -

- playground -

We spent one whole day at the seaside. We danced in the sea, raced on the beach,took a lot of photos and videos, ate ice-cream and chips etc etc. It was a great time when you can leave everything behind and simply relax yourself..

And you will find yourself smiling like a sunshine too :)

P/S: it is rather cynical as when I'm writing this post at home, it is snowing outside my house.

Málaga - the best destino for winter break

2010-12-17T15:32:00.013Z

Málaga is the second most populous city in Andalucia and the sixth largest in Spain. Lying on the Costa de Sol of the Mediterranean Sea, it enjoys subtropical climate. And this is where you can enjoy the warmest winters in Europe.

The average temperature throughout our 5 days stay in Málaga was 15'c, and it was sunny all the time. We chose to spend our winter trip in Málaga instead of Barcelona because the flight ticket from Ryan Air was ridiculously cheap (55 euros return).

We have heard a lot of the bad experiences from those who had traveled in Spain, especially the skillful pickpockets in Barcelona. This made me a bit over-cautious when we first arrived in Málaga. But as time goes by, I realised the security in Málaga was not that bad as I thought to be. Of course this doesn't mean you can be totally carefree.

We visited a few important sights in Málaga:

1. The Gibralfaro Castle (Castillo de Gibralfaro)

-panoramic view of Málaga port from the castle-

2. Alcazaba

-night view of Málaga city from Alcazaba -

Both Alcazaba and Gibralfaro Castle are the remains from the Islamic time.

Bullfighting is a traditional spectacle of Spain. Málaga has its own bullring, called the La Malagueta Bullring.

3. Bullring (Plaza de Toros de La Malagueta)

4. Roman theatre (Teatro Romano)

The Roman theater was built when Málaga was ruled by Roman Empire before Muslim Arabic took over Spain.

We also visited Picasso's museum which is located in Buenavista Palace. The artist, Pablo Picasso was born in Málaga.

5. Museo Picasso

6.Cathedral of Málaga

We stayed in Babia Hostel which is situated in the city center, and hence we walked passed the main street Calle Larios everyday. The street is like a shorter version of Grafton street in Dublin. The street artists made the street even more happening and lively.

-Calle Larios-

Since Spain is the home of MANGO, ZARA and Pull and Bear, we got good bargain from those shops. I arrived in Spain with only a suitcase, but came back happily to Ireland with 2 luggages. :P

If you like those higher end brands eg: BURBERRY, El Corte Ingeris will be the place for you. But I think Selfridges or Harrods in London will suit you better for those brands.

-varieties of souvenirs-

To sum it up, Málaga is a great place for a short break especially during winter. Together with Her interesting history, welcoming locals and relaxing pace of life, Málaga did impress me in Her own way..

Birthday

2010-12-17T14:33:00.003Z

It was my 21st one week ago. Birthday for this year is rather a simple one -- a dinner with friends in Cork, and not to miss out a birthday cake.

Thanks a million to those who came for the dinner, presented lovely cards and gifts & wished me a Happy Birthday. And thanks papa mama for the love and sacrifices you both have made throughout these 21 years. I am nobody without you all :)

Thank you again to all, and Happy Birthday to me ~

Weather talk

2010-11-30T21:30:00.013Z

In early November, the scene of the falling leaves touched my heart deeply. I enjoyed watching the leaves fall and lie quietly on the ground in fact, as well as feeling the peaceful surrounding atmosphere. The view compliments well with the feelings, giving a sentimental Autumn in overall.

As I always forget to bring along my camera, I was actually begging for the trees to save some leaves until I capture some of their photos to mesmerize the awesome Autumn view. And I managed to take some photos of the "dirt path" that I always use to go to college :)

-Early autumn -

-Mid Autumn -

The weather change tremendously in late November. It was cold even during day time, which was less than 5'c during day and less than 0'c at night. I was shivering under my duvet one night and so I've to turn on my fan heater for the whole night long since after.

And YAY, today the last day of November, snow visited Cork. I was expecting snow as according to weather forecast it will be snowing today. But I didn't really put high hope as Cork doesn't really snow. The snow was only about 3cm thick last year, and it lasted only for one day. BUT it snowed this morning and I was smiling from ear to ear while looking outside the window! The next thing I did was to rush up my room and get my camera for photo shooting. Snows simply made me joyful! :)

- front road -

-I can smell Christmas now!-

-the front yard-

Why is Christmas a jolly season?

I found an answer today :)

Dent Ball

2010-11-21T23:18:00.004Z

And that was another memorable night, the Dentistry Ball 2010. Gaya, Jo and I made it to a full ball this year.

-First arrived at Rochestown Park Hotel ~ champagne reception-

It was a masquerade ball, so each of us got our own mask :)

-Mairead and me -

The dinner was good, at least it was better than my expectation. For the appetizer, we had Creamy Chicken & Mushroom served in a Light Puff Pastry Case.

-Appetizer-

A cream lover like me definitely love it so much! Then we had Roast Stuffed Turkey Crown with Baked Ham and a Rosemary Jus for the main course.

-Main Course-

Then we had Homemade Pavlova with Tropical Fruits for dessert. I forgot to take a photo of the dessert, but it was the worst among 3 I'd say. First of all I don't fancy pavlova, and secondly I was accidentally ate the KIWI which was one of the fruits on top of the pavlova, which gave me an allergic after eating that! Gosh I was lucky as it was only a tiny slice of kiwi or I'll be on the bed at home instead of the ballroom dance floor!The allergic reaction subsided within an hour and so I managed to stay until the ball ends.

Sue,Timah and Keezya joined us for the after party. And yeah~~ PARTY TIME!!

It has been ages since we last went out to a pub/club, in addition almost all the classmates were there in the ball, so we did actually enjoyed it a lot!

-Lisa ~ my best ever Corkonian friend!

-Louise ~ best buddy ever!

And this, the tallest classmate -- Mr Paul H, who grabbed me up in his arms as I was complaining to him that I hate his height!

-classmates-

It was indeed a good good night :)

-THE END-

-

2010-11-16T01:09:00.008Z

Am obsessed with Joe McElderry's new album recently.

Do check out his new songs "Ambitions" & "Superman"!

Simply addicted to them :))

-

2010-11-12T00:06:00.007Z

Has been in a swinging mood lately. Maybe because of the heavy workload or maybe it is me worrying too much. When I was back from the group meeting earlier, I was really glad and relief. I can't describe how good the feeling was to have supportive and helpful friends around me. I must say I am lucky. Thank God for being kind to me. I am really thankful and hopefully I'll get through this term fruitfully and peacefully. Things are gonna be fine soon. Very soon :)

And just a reminder to myself *and everyone else*, I'm turning 21 in a month time, finally! Can't wait for it! Gotta get myself a key soon :D

-

2010-11-08T00:09:00.001Z

Tensed up.

I don't like this November.

母校

2010-10-28T21:08:00.003+01:00

较早前，在星洲日报阅读了一篇文章....

大树爷爷搬来K校

一个上课日的早晨，看到草场边来了一辆吊车，从篱笆外吊著几棵光禿禿的树身到清馨小径旁，正纳闷著，就听家教主席说是他们漏夜从直落湾也路旁救回来的大树。

学校一直在推动环保，却没想到家教协会成员这会儿给学生上演了一出最实际的“救地球行动”。政府在市中心砍了许多大树，我们伸出环保之手救了16 棵，並移植在校园內，让大树的生命在吉华K校延续，让绿意在草场边延伸……家教成员为落实环保而移植大树的行动令我深深感动。忽然想起多年前曾读过一篇移植大树的故事给孩子听。於是回家翻找书橱，果然找到那本《桐树爷爷搬新家》，就向王副校长请缨在环保周的讲座上给学生安插一个讲故事时段，因为我深信，通过有深度的故事，可提昇孩子的人文素养。

那一天，在礼堂，我告诉同学们200年树龄的桐树爷爷怎样陪著三代人度过快乐的童年。后来，因为地方上的发展而被迫砍掉，幸好来了一批官员，决定把桐树爷爷移植到公园去，让它继续给人们纳凉，与孩童做伴。

通过power point，我让同学们看到故事中可爱的画面，也让同学们知道桐树爷爷的真实故事是发生在台湾。而在K校，也上演了同样的剧情，並通过照片让同学们看到大树爷爷如何从市区搬到学校来。

我想，我们的学生看到了师长的用心，也看到了大人对响应环保、疼惜地球的诚意。

静思语说：“心不难，事就不难。”只要有心，环保，並不难。

星洲日报／副刊‧文：黄丽根‧2010.10.11

开心的是，至少我知道我母校依然是着重着人文教育，而不是一味灌输学生们要“样样第一名” 。
吉华K 校，我引以为傲的母校。=)

Dingle & RIng of Kerry

2010-10-27T22:41:00.005+01:00

It was Cork Jazz Festival weekend but we made our way to Killarney instead of staying in Cork for the festival. We joined the Dero's Tours to visit the Ring of Kerry and Dingle in Killarney.

Some may have seen the photos in my facebook. So yeah, those peaceful environment, scenic view, beautiful mountains etc etc, you can find it in Ireland. Somehow it's just like the heaven on Earth.

Dingle is an Irish speaking region. Irish is one of the Gaelic language, and the interesting part of Irish language is that it only has 18 alphabets -- I never know about this before the trip! And I'm glad to tell that so far I only know how to say "My name is Janelle" and "I'm from Malaysia" in Irish :D

It was a rainy day when we visited Dingle. But we were lucky enough because the sun did a great job by showing up Herself when we wanted to get down the coach for photo shooting. So those photos in Dingle ended up with "mixed coloured" sky, a bit of blue and a bit of grey, sometimes with sunshine, sometimes without. Well I think we wont be this lucky anymore if it's a winter time :P

Inch Beach @ Dingle

Slea Head Drive (the most Westerly point in Europe)

The second day was a sunny day! We visited Ring of Kerry. The tours circled the magnificent MacGillycuddy Reeks mountain and stopped by at some villages such as Glenbeigh, Waterville and Sneem. It was more about sight-seeing and we did camwhored A.L.O.T. :P

Lunch @ Waterville

Joining a sight-seeing tour without an DSLR is not good. Only one out of a hundred photos turn out to be the most satisfying artwork. Sigh.

Personally love this picture the most :)

Perio Lab

2010-10-19T15:25:00.005+01:00

So we finally did something more related to dentistry. It was the second session of the perio lab and I managed to grab a few seconds to snap photos.

We started on manual scaling, well what we did was actually removing the nail varnish (the plaque) from the teeth models in the manikin's mouth.

Despite the muscles ache on the palms, I did have fun! :)

今晚上,想写一首歌

2010-10-15T21:13:00.004+01:00

礼拜五晚上

久搁在心里角落

不去触碰的思绪

一个不小心

放任了它

只想说

多的是我不想知道的事

多的是你不会知道的事

谢谢你

让我依然有能力感受

那被冷落的希望

Aloha!

2010-10-01T21:36:00.002+01:00

Heyyyyy buddies, I wonder if u guys still follow my blog? :P

Time flies, and I've come back in Cork and have had 2 weeks of lectures. Everything is on track except the revision part. It is a bit hard to get back to the books after 3 months of summer holidays :(

The last weekend we had a small gathering in conjunction with the Mid-Autumn Festival. Some of them imported Tang Lung from Malaysia!! This is so cool.. that was the first time I play with the lantern after N years, under the moonlight in this Western country. We sit together at the front yard, holding the lantern in the dark. It was the Saturday night, the breeze was cold, whereas the moon had lost it's full-moon shape. The best thing is to have Xinyi celebrating this special day together! :)

Second year is not that easy, as I have a lot of modules to cover, as well as practicals and exams. It is quite surprising that I came back without any plans what places I should travel for current academic year.. Sigh..

Miss these moments........

.......terribly.........

台北 · 野柳

2010-08-23T04:33:00.007+01:00

野柳，位于万里乡，为突出于北海岸的狭长海岬。

那天，我们选择乘搭直通客运到野柳。我们先搭捷运到捷运忠孝敦化站（或是忠孝復兴/台北车站），再转搭国光客运1815号，直达野柳站下车。

若想尝试乘坐火车，可从台北火车站坐到基隆火车站，再转搭基隆客运至野柳站下车。

下车后步行约十分钟，途经一个渔港，便抵达目的地 -- 野柳地质公园。

野柳地质公园为台湾北海岸明珠，其岩石经千百万年的侵蚀、风化，并在交互作用下逐渐形成各式各样形状的岩石。再加上蓝天、碧海、黄岩、白浪、小桥、沙滩的衬托，这地质公园啊真是让人叹为观止!

当我走近海岸时，美丽奇观让我眼前一亮，那一张嘴也始终合不起来呢! 我们跑到岩石区，在那儿蹦蹦跳跳，照相照个不停，兴奋不已。唯独天不作美，下着纷纷细雨。

那海岸线其实更像是传说中的月球表面，满处是窟窿，凹凸不平。

其中那个像蜂窝头的岩石最特别。岩石上布满大大小小的洞穴，犹如蜜蜂窝一样，远看很可爱，近看却很恶心。因为其实海岸边有"小强"，也就是海蟑螂的出没。小强会在那蜂窝的洞穴进进出出，看多了就会毛骨悚然... 然而小强却不足以影响我对地质公园的美好印象，我们还是很享受在岩石上行走、拍照的时刻 :)

这就是海蟑螂啦!

而野柳地质公园的象征，就是这个拥有雍容尊贵的形态的女王头了。

一颗蘑菇状的岩石变成一个女王头，确实是让它从麻雀变凤凰了 :D

台北 · 乌来

2010-07-27T04:40:00.009+01:00

距离台北之旅也有好一些日子了。一直拿不定主意该以英语或华语来写台北，再加上懒虫作怪，结果这文章就一拖再拖。

那个八天八夜，先说说天气吧。六月杪的台北，正处于春夏交替的时候。早晨五时半天已亮，中午头顶上的太阳无比地猛烈，下午接近黄昏时分却会下起倾盆大雨来。在台北这八天里，几乎没有一天是不下雨的。还好晚上雨停了特别凉快，正是逛夜市的好时光。

由于是自由行/背包旅行，我们的行程都是自己安排，随时可以依据天气更动。除了台北市，我们也游走了野柳、九分和金瓜石一趟。暂且把这些先搁后再说。

至于我印象最深刻的则是乌来乡。

若从台北车站出发，可以选搭新店客运直接上山，或搭捷运到新店站，再转搭新店客运上山。当然，后者较省时间。然而我们四人到了捷运新店站后，直接乘的士（Taxi）上山，以便午后下起雨时就可以下山回家。

车子沿着山路往上开，一路可看见绿葱葱的树林，真让人忍不住想摇下车窗呼吸窗外的新鲜空气。绕过了樱花园后，不远处便传来了瀑布那飞流直下的流水声。那是乌来乡气势磅礴的乌来瀑布。

抵达缆车入口处，付钱买票后，我们便乘着缆车往云仙乐园奔去，准备进入仙境畅游。那里环境清幽，耳际尽是虫鸣鸟叫声与潺潺流水声，心情自然也愉悦起来。美丽的大自然啊，有谁能拒绝它的魅力呢...

游完云仙乐园后，我们又乘着缆车下山，再步行到乌来村。

翻阅乌来乡手册，乌来村原来住着泰雅族原住民。听见是泰雅族，JJane 的反应则是：“哇，盛产美女的民族!” 果然，途中经过原住民商店，在店里头看店的女子身穿着传统服饰，大多样貌清秀，皮肤较黝黑，而且口操不太精准的华语，正迎上前来待客。

我们还乘坐了超酷台车呢! 一路上台车“喀拉喀拉喀拉”沿着轨道行走，像是出发打仗的气势，其实却是把我们载下乌来老街，好过瘾!

逛老街前，我们决定要泡温泉。乌来乡“Ulai” 其实是泰雅族语 [沸水] 之意，是台北盆地南缘主要的温泉发源地，即是泡汤的好去处。

尽管是夏天，泡温泉对我们来说毕竟是新鲜事儿，所以我们就浩浩荡荡泡汤去! 不过并不是我们幻想中那面向樱花背对山的露天泡汤场地，所以有些小小的失望。

午后下起了雨来。我们泡了汤后还是顶着雨去了乌来老街。雨势可不小呢。然而泡了温泉精神爽，我们还是愉快的东吃吃西喝喝。这条老街正是我感受到原住民热情的一面。由于下起雨来了，老街几乎没什么游客，就剩下我们几人在走走。原住民们都会请我们到店里坐坐，让我们试喝米酒，试吃海燕窝顺便等雨势转小。不管你是否会买他们的小吃，他们不会赶你走，只怕你淋湿啦。唉! 这就是城市人与朴素的原住民不同的地方....

乌来的美食包括麻糬、冰温泉蛋、绍兴蛋、米酒、竹筒饭等。

我手上那特大号的香肠是山猪肉香肠，超韧超好吃! 婷手上握着绍兴蛋，冰冰冷冷的，应该还不错吧? 还品尝了竹筒饭和麻糬 :)

乌来风景特定区，在位于台北南部的乌来乡，也是台北之旅我的favourite景点之一。若你也热爱大自然，大可抽些时间亲近大自然，感受泰雅族的热情招待吧! :)

Darulaman Lake Park

2010-07-19T01:28:00.004+01:00

11th June

It was quite a moment ago when we went to this place in this not-so-exotic county.

It is the Darulaman Lake Park located about 20mins away from Alor Setar, a still-new getaway for us the Alor Setarian. One can enjoy the greenery over here, or if you are into water sports, you can go for canoeing.
You also can jog on the jogging track or stroll by the lakeside using a tut tut car.

We girls of course will prefer.... driving the tut tut car :P

It was kinda hard for us to get together after our (endless) farewell. Yet one thing that never change is their warm and charming smiles :)

Music

2010-07-08T16:04:00.003+01:00

情难牵梦难圆
谁陪我话当年
我的泪就像
失控的狂雨纷飞

情难牵人已远
失去你心已缺
满怀的憾恨
为何当时我不在你身边

xxxxxxxxx

*静下来，细心听听，有时后，一首老歌也会牵动人心...

KL & Malacca food hunt

2010-07-08T03:19:00.012+01:00

13th June - 19th June

Went down to Kuala Lumpur to meet Shirlene after spending 2 weeks at home.

I'm lucky enough as Kang Ying Ying went to KL as well right after Shirlene went back to her hometown. Eventually we went for food hunting around KL and Malacca with her and her brothers. I just cant shut my mouth during our outings. FYI, they all are food monsters XD.

It was her younger brother's birthday that day so they decided to eat something grand. So we went to Puchong for Shabu-Shabu buffet. Price : RM 27.85 per person (Adult). Each person will have his own hotpot, all you need to do is to grab the ingredients from the rotating belt in front of you, throw them into your own hotpot and eat when they're cooked. No sharing of hotpot means more hygienic. Thumb up for this criteria.

Ini lah tiga food monster.

The next day we went further down to Malacca. Other than eating, the only thing I can remember is the torching sunlight. Only God knows why is Malacca so-damn-HOT..

Our first stop was Donald & Lily's Nyonya food.

Nyonya Bihun.

Nyonya chicken bla bla (Can't rmb the name of this dish)

Nyonya Laksa.

And I discovered that Nyonya's dishes have sweet taste, not spicy.

We then visited Jonker street, again, craving for food. One of the famous food in Malacca is the chicken rice ball.

The unique thing is that rice is rolled into spherical shape, that's it. The chicken still tasted like chicken, so nothing much to expect :P

We visited the St.George church before we came back to Jonker street for cendol. Me personally don't like it so I'm not introducing it here.

We then drove around the town, visited some places such as Portuguese settlement and St.John hill. Later then, we bought popiah at a roadside stall. This popiah is really special, because it contains 猪油渣。When you eat it, wah... really pok pok chui one. KangYingYing mia favourite lah ni.. XD

After finish eating popiah, we straight away went to another shop for another Malacca's well-known food, so called satay celup.

It's something like loklok, just that the kuah you dip in is not boiling water but satay kuah. It's not buffet this time so we didn't eat like the previous night. If you eat more, the boss will treat you with special offer, means you'll get big prawns, scallops, sotong etc at low price.. And no doubt, we were qualified to get the big prawns so I got the chance to know about this special deal.

celup-celup.

fighting for big prawns

The food hunting session in Malacca officially ended in the evening when we departed back to KL.

The day after Malacca, we went to Midvalley. Met up with some friends and this lady (Hoi Ting) 不甘寂寞 ran here to meet us up as well :) Too bad she missed the chance to watch Sex and the City 2 with us, but we did had a great time together as well.

We had nothing to do there so we went to the Gelato ice-cream stall to try the ice-cream. After that each of us got ourselves an ice-cream and ate like a little girl..

At dinner time, we went to the food junction downstairs. They recommended 老友鬼鬼 stall, so I tried the yau char guai with the porridge. While KYY tried the 豆浆油条. Bought Sister Crispy Popiah and Shilin 鸡排 as well..

We had our girls talk that night at Bukit Jalil before KYY departed back home to Alor Setar......

橘子 · 红了

2010-06-29T06:38:00.003+01:00

在台北
发现了橘子

原来她在不久前
红了

回程途中
是橘子陪伴着我

飞机准备着降落的时刻
乍见一颗星

闪啊闪
在那辽阔的天空中

闪阿闪
就只有一个它

那颗闪亮的星

是寂寞吧?
还是默默的守候?

看着逐渐退色的晚霞
感觉也累了

想静静的放空一下
哪怕
就只有那么一下下

a sweet escape to Dublin and Galway

2010-05-23T20:03:00.008+01:00

20.05.10 - 22.05.10

Pit Jo (Jo Lyn) made her way to Ireland for the very first time. And as the hosts, me and Xinyi welcomed her with open arms. After picking her up in Dublin Airport, we had our breakfast in Kylemore restaurant, a place where Jo fell in love with Irish sausage! haha..

breakfast time

The weather that day wasn't that bad. So we decided to go out of the city instead of doing some shopping in Dublin city centre.

So we took a bus to Bray, which is located about 45 mins away from University College Dublin.

Bray, Dublin

Our main purpose to visit Bray was not to play with the sea water but to climb the hill.

Before we started our cliff walk session, each of us got ourselves an ice-cream - a MUST in summer!

la la la...

The weather was just nice - no torching sunshine, no rain water. We made our way up the hill using the small path, and in between we didn't even want to look back how steep is the slope.

When we almost reached the hilltop, we heard some weird sound. And when we proceed further, we saw this amazing scenery. Wild horses grazing at the hilltop! How cool is that!

We spent an afternoon in Bray. Headed back to city centre to have our dinner at O'Neills bar and restaurant. It was a traditional Irish bar and it is now serving as a bar & restaurant. Love it much! Jo tried the Irish stew while me and Xinyi get ourselves Lasagna and Fish & chips. We got the chance to watch the traditional Irish songs live performance.

We then went to the Temple Bar to grab some photos. The street was quite merry at night.

We did have a look at the Hard Rock cafe in Dublin. As we were too full to try the dessert, so we decided to head back home.
It was the day that changed my feeling towards Dublin. It wasn't as bad as I thought/feel during my first visit. Dublin is as well a nice place, yet, Cork is still my preference :)

The second day, we made our way to Galway as we planned to visit the Connemara and Cliffs of Moher. In this trip, we have Nabila and Valerie with us =)

We joined a tour to Connemara. We visited the Cong Village, and the famous Kylemore Abbey. Along the way, I saw the another side of Ireland - the Ireland that people always thought to be.
Sheep grazing on the grassland, as well as cows, horses and donkeys.

It was a relaxing tour and I like the peaceful scenery so much. No internet, no phone calls, no electronic devices around.

When the bus suddenly stopped by a lake, me and Jo's mouth were both wide opened. WAH. It was when we saw the Kylemore Abbey in the bus. The view was really awesome. No words can describe its beauty.

This is a place which will make you believe those "live happily forever" fairy tales. The pictures in the storybooks does exist! Haha. I am really amazed with its stunning 3D view.

We strolled in the compound around the abbey. Spent some time to have our tea-break as well.

Neo-Gothic Church

That night, we spent our time in Galway city centre. We visited St.Nicholas Church and had our dinner in a lovely cafe.

The next day, we visited the Cliffs of Moher. It was a sunny day and this put everyone in an extra-ordinary good mood.

first arrive at the cliffs

Another amazing view of the trip. Cliffs of Moher is Ireland's most spectacular coastline. We enjoyed leisurely walks along the coastal pathway, at the same time trying hard to protect ourselves from sunburn! haha..

Cliffs of Moher

Xinyi's decent look :P

5 of us

It was a pleasant trip which allows me to discover the another side of Ireland. It was tiring as when old friends meet we always tend to talk non stop and as a result we all experienced sleep deprivation. Nevertheless we had loadss of silly acts, yet lotss of laughter.

I took my bus back to Cork that afternoon, while Jo departed at Shannon Airport to head back to London. Meanwhile Xinyi took another route back to Dublin with Nabila and Valerie.

Shall see you guys in Malaysia!

- THE END -

Update

2010-05-17T22:28:00.004+01:00

I'm on SUMMER HOLIDAY!

weeeee.......

先苦后甜, tasting it now.

I finally get to walk on the streets in the city centre after a month!

Did some retail therapy this afternoon but I kept on yawning during the whole process.

It doesn't work on me now, I'm just too tired to have any feelings right now.

Need to take some rest mentally and physically. haha..

I wish I'm energetic enough like my Irish classmates do!

Huge drinking session going on few miles away from my home!

Anyway before I end this I'd like to ask for a small favor from you guys... please pray for me so that 13 days later the super damn emo Volcanic ash wont hit the Atlantic Sea so that I can fly home safely without any disruption!

Up to Dublin on Wednesday. yeaaaaahhh xxx

...

2010-04-30T13:01:00.003+01:00

Last day of April.

Am anticipating for the arrival of May :)

4th May : Fundamental of Dental Practice

6th May : Physiology

10th May : Topographical Anatomy

14th May : Introduction of Biomolecules & Metabolism

17th May : Principles of Human Structure for Dentistry

27th May : DS Oral exam

The April study month was fine in overall, although there were days with struggling, unpredicted external influences etc.

Self-medication is always the prescription that works the best.

So I want MAY to arrive, and I will get through it.

Let alone the unfinished notes.

*Big smile*

misses

2010-04-22T10:42:00.004+01:00

I'm awake at 6.30am every morning.
Because the sky turns bright at that time.

My night time only starts at 9.00pm.
Because the sky turns dark at that time.

I miss everything back home.
So I dream of everyone I missed in my sleep.
I even miss my study table at home.
People always say 夜长梦多
but I'm totally opposite.

Spring is adorable with its sunshine.
But Summer will be wonderful with its warmth.

So what I can do now is to hold on and wait.
For the arrival of the wonderful Summer :)

...

2010-04-15T14:24:00.005+01:00

While the East side of the Earth was still traumatized by the severe earthquake in Qinghai..

The West side of the Earth was stroked with another disaster. A volcano in Southern Iceland erupted.

"Lava melted the glacier, causing major flooding which forced the evacuation of between 700 and 800 people from their homes in the remote, lightly populated area 125km east of Reykjavík." RTE news

Irish & UK airspace are forced to close today due to the plume of volcanic ash which is moving across Europe.

Keezya & Li-Ann are now stranded in the airport as their flights is cancelled. How random things can happen.

...

For now, lets pray for the victims who lose their homes, their families, their love ones.

May God bless.

笔

2010-04-11T13:55:00.003+01:00

一出又一出的大龙凤
接二连三的上映
剧情越演越精彩

台上的人不亦乐乎
台下的人拍案叫绝

有谁又真正了解
那场戏背后的一场戏

如果说聪明人的把戏
相等于佛口蛇心
我宁愿是个傻瓜

如果说成人的世界
相等于复杂浑浊
我宁愿是个小孩

而住在心中的那个小孩
也许会一天一点
慢慢地被吓跑

Paris · Day 3

2010-04-06T09:00:00.011+01:00

3rd April 2010.

The last day of our trip. It was drizzling in the morning. Yet it didn't stop us from exploring Paris. After checked out from the hotel, we took the RER to Versailles( a suburb of Paris ) to visit Palace of Versailles, a royal château in Versailles.

The palace was the official residence of the Kings of France from 1682 until 1790. There's an extensive fairy tale park around it, but we only saw a tiny bit of it from the outside. We couldn't make it to go inside the palace as the queue at the ticket counter was super duper looooong.

Golden gate, golden window frame... Everything was so luxurious..

part of the fairy tale garden

Since we can't get in the palace, we decided to leave to the Paris flea market - the "Le marche aux puces de Saint-Ouen".

We did some shopping, and ate the Crêpes again. This time we chose the Crêpes with savory fillings and it did taste differently from the sweet Crêpes we tasted earlier.

Jin needed a proper lunch so he decided to try out a kebab shop nearby. We ladies were all stuffed, so Jin was the only one busy choosing the meal from the menu on the wall. As he doesn't eat beef, he asked the workers in the shop to confirm that his meal is "beef free".

But the problem was, the shop workers don't really speak English. So they brought Jin in front of the stall to show the type of meat they were about to use for his meal. Yet, no clue. All the meats look alike for Jin. And so Lay Yin went to have a look, and the following conversation took place...

LY : "Chicken?"

Worker : "No no, big (hands flapping)"

LY : "Big?? OH OH Turkey? "

Worker : " Yes yes! "

Everyone : " HAHAHAHAHAHA...."

Ya so this is one of the problem you will face in France. 9 out of 10 people don't speak English. So it will be easier to have the destination name written on the paper if you need to ask for direction. But still I will say Paris is easy to access with a map in your hand in addition to the Metro which will bring you directly to most of the tourist attractions.

And here's some souvenirs we got...

We left Paris by Eurostar train at 9.25pm that night.. 3 days isn't enough to explore the Paris city. Maybe this is the way Paris city makes you to miss her...

也许我会再遇见你

像恋人般重逢美丽

Ces't la Vie

Till our next date, Au Revoir, Paris...

xxx

-THE END-

Paris · Day 2

2010-04-05T21:20:00.009+01:00

2nd April 2010.

Our journey began after the breakfast. The first destination was the Centre Pompidou, which was designed in the style of high-tech architecture. As I googled back, I found out that this building was constructed from 1971-1977. This is amazing as its classy and modern appearance doesn't really suit the time frame it was being built.

It houses the largest museum of modern art in Europe ( Musée National d'Art Moderne ) etc.. We ladies did cam-whored outside the Centre Pompidou for a moment. We were wearing our uniform of the day - J'Adore Paris , meaning I LOVE PARIS! Cool huh ;P

After that we headed to another museum, the well-known Musée du Louvre. Another silly thing happened. We were outside this big building which we have no clue what is it, and we were seeking high and low for the triangle thingy.

One thing we realized was, for every tourist attraction, the building is really a massive one. Just like the picture below, I felt like I was walking on a cold desert, without knowing where to go.

And after half an hour looking for the triangle from the map/ roadsigns , we saw most of the people went in this building. And Jin finally spoke out something sensible "OH maybe the triangle is inside this building?!" And so we all were laughing and agreed to give it a try by going inside the building.

By the time we went inside, something in front caught our eyes... and we started to laugh at each other for our silliness..

Look carefully and you can actually see the triangle in the middle there..

This palace-liked building is actually the Louvre Palace, which houses the Louvre Museum.

Four silly creatures sitting by the fountain side xx

In case you didn't see the triangle, lets have a closer look.. ;)

Cam-whored again outside the museum for almost an hour before we entered the museum. The weather wasn't really nice. It was cloudy and windy. Yet, we were still able to stand the coldness and take lots of photoss.... =)

One of the "must-sees" in the museum is Mona Lisa. In fact the main purpose we paid 9.50euro was to see her smile.

Anything special? Hmm....

We then proceeded to Moulin Rouge, the Red Mill. If you want to see the "CanCan" in Paris, this is the place. It is in fact a popular attraction especially with the men in the audience, while around this area there are strip clubs and peep shows...

Of course, we didn't watch the show since it's way too pricey.. too bad Jin! (Whoops)..

And so we moved on to the see another most memorable sight in Paris - Arc de Triomphe (凯旋门) . The Arc de Triomphe was commissioned by Napoleon in 1806 to honor of the victories of his Grand Armée.

Again, its size was impressive. "BIG" is not enough to describe it, so use the word "ultra-GIANT". We climbed 284 steps up to the viewing platform of this gigantic arc, and from the top, you can view the city of Paris. It was really awesome. A-W-E-S-O-M-E. The ARC is situated in the centre of the star-shaped Place Charles de Gaulle, with 12 streets radiating from the centre.

The street down there - Champs Elysées, is a 2km long shopping street, and also a place where you can experience the City of Light at night. One of the most significant symbol of this street would be this..

After dinner, we headed back to the Eiffel Tower to see it's night view. The tower will only switch on it's light for the first 10 minutes of every hour. We got to see the lights on at 11pm. It was indeed the shortest 10 minutes we had ever experienced in our life time. HaHA.

Eiffel tower radiates different ambiance at different time. It is strong and powerful during the day time, but when comes to the night time, it turns to be tender and romantic. There's no reason that you can't fall in Love with Paris. As the scent of romance is all around in the air...

End of the 2nd day....

Paris · Day 1

2010-04-05T17:23:00.011+01:00

1st April 2010.

Early in the morning, Aik Jin (Jin), Xin Yuan (Desiree), Lay Yin and I gathered at the St. Pancreas railway station in London. We were all ready to take the Eurostar train to Paris. Yes, PARIS - my dream city since young! Paris is always an elegant city in my opinion, as well as an exotic one. We all were really excited that morning as we were about to experience Paris on our own for 3 days.

We arrived at Gare du Nord rail station at about 9.30am local time (GMT +1). The train journey took us less than 3 hours time. We went straight to our apartment-hotel (Citadines) in Boulevard Beaumarchais to settle down our luggage. After that we started the journey of the day.

Coincidently there's a morning market nearby the hotel, so we went to hop around in the market to look for our breakfast.

However, we barely can find cooked food in the market.. This made Jin thought about Char Koay Teow back home. He was desperately craving for it since the morning market back home has all sorts of noodles and nasi lemak but here, only cheese and raw turkey etc etc.. LOL..

Not far away from the market, we saw July Column (Colonne de Juillet).

So we were actually at Place de la Bastille, a square in Paris which is often used for political demonstrations nowadays.

After strolling around the area, we decided to go to view the most prominent symbol of Paris - Eiffel Tower since the weather was really good. It was a bright sunny day yet the mild-to-strong wind was chilling. It was in fact a perfect day for photo shooting =)

The first glance at the Eiffel Tower was really unreal. U-N-R-E-A-L. The feeling at that moment was really indescribable - I have never see a huge massive posh iron building like this before..

Obviously, the next thing we did was photo shooting...

We strolled around in the Champs de Mars park as well, and I can't stop myself from turning my head to look at the Eiffel Tower behind us all the time.

While the couple were dating sweetly in the park...

I had Eiffel tower as my date on that day.. not bad also lah.. ;P

Then we reached the École Militaire (Military school) which houses various military training facilities.

After lunch, our next destination was planned to be Norte Dame. BUT. yeah there's a lot of BUT in this trip. We made a lot of silly acts which were foolish but funny.

We supposed to walk to the North but instead we went to the South. So we walked and walked and walked, passing the University of France, and all of a sudden we saw this building..

Looking hard on the map to find out what the hell is this and then only we realized it's the Panthéon , which contains the remains of distinguished French citizens.

After this we headed back to North to look for Norte-Dame de Paris (Our Lady of Paris) situated at Île de la Cité, an island situated in the middle of the Seine.

The Seine （塞纳河） flowing slowly underneath..

We then strolled around the area and tasted the crêpe, a small dessert, as well as looking for Tabacs (cigarette) shop to buy stamp for our postcards.

Dessert in France is superb! The girls were eating dessert happily everyday while Jin was commenting that the desserts are actually sinful. What a comment from a guy. LOL.

We headed back to our hotel to check in in the evening, and guess what, all of us couldn't get up from the bed after taking a "short nap", which lasted for 3 hours. Hahaha...

End of the first day....

Alice in the Wonderland

2010-03-29T23:02:00.006+01:00

5 girls rushed to the cinema to catch this movie this morning ...

Alice in The Wonderland!

Do you believe that I actually never know what's Alice doing in her wonderland until today? Haha.. My childhood is not about fairy tales I guess.. I've no idea too.. xx

Anyway most of the characters/cartoons in the movie are cute in overall, and the character that I found the most attractive one was this..

Tweedledee and Tweedledum!

The way this twins walk or talk or bully each other are simply funny! Maybe the bald head and the round belly suit them a lot! Toink Toink! xD

Thursday Night

2010-03-25T23:03:00.011Z

Today is the last day for the teaching term. We finally finished our last lecture for the 1st year Dentistry course this afternoon! Mixed feeling.. My first year's university life ends in a blink of eyes! I already start missing my classmates... :(

I'll be having Easter break starting now for a month, follow by the Summer Exam in May and then I'll be on the flight back to Malaysia =D

After the lecture this afternoon I allowed myself to browse the net instead of forcing myself back into the Biochemistry notes to prepare for the upcoming assessment. Was trying to get some ideas to plan for the Taiwan trip in June (people, your recommendations are most welcome!), so I watched 食尚玩家 in youtube. Really miss the show a lot! I especially like the hosts 浩角翔起, the 2 guys who are really funny and crazy. I'm really anticipating for this backpack trip =D

Since the holidays have officially started now, loads and loads of plannings are playing in my mind........ I even scribbled plans for the next year summer and next next year summer. HAHA..

One of my passions is this..

Yeah! NYC -- New York City!

"Concrete jungle where dreams are made of There's nothing you cant do The streets will make you feel brand new The lights will inspire you..............."

But now I'm gotta experience the city of Fashion -- Paris! before the NYC!

Bonjour Paris!
I'm coming sooooooonnn....xxx

Friends from Home

2010-03-24T17:34:00.003Z

They were here in Cork yesterday and they simply brighten up my day! I love you guys.... =)

Thoughts

2010-03-21T17:20:00.006Z

Lets be a bit random today. It has been a long time since I last wrote about what I think, or what's bothering me or lets just name it the so called "from the bottom of the heart post". Most of the time I'm only blogging about the events or some happenings here, I have no idea why, but blogging is no more a priority for me nowadays.

Life can be simple. As simple as like, you keep it as a routine - attend lectures,tutorials, practicals, study for the assessments,browse facebook whenever there's some spare time or whenever you're bored etc etc. Sometimes you might need some entertainment, or social life, so you attend others' birthday party, or go to the pub just to relax or for tension-releasing. and then you break the rules, you'll come back home after wee hours. While adventurous people like me might want more things other than all these, and so traveling comes into part of my life. Anticipate for my departure date, start packing my luggage one week earlier, and then excitedly pin on the map the place I just explored when I arrive home -- all these are simply grand and satisfying :)

Talking of my life over here, ya it's great, whenever you ask me, I'll say I'm doing great, because I don't waste my time doing things I don't like or can say, wasting time to make my life miserable. Staying far away from family always means we've to take care of most of the things all by ourselves most of the time. And so you can say I'm independent enough to survive outside there because I manage to manage my life well. But I'll say there's still time you will feel like something is missing. It always happened to be when I need advices or solve some thoughts, and so I pick up the phone and then only I realized, it's already midnight time over there, means papa mama should already in their dreams at this time. Sigh, so in the end I'll just let go whatever it was bothering me earlier.

I actually very appreciate that I have my girlfriends with me here who I can count on, and I can talk truthfully what I'm thinking or speak out my opinion honestly. Able to be remain as a person who you really are, is actually the most comfortable / best way to maintain a friendship. And perhaps, this is a quality that makes a friendship worthwhile as well as long lasting. And that's why, I can either be a very close to you friend, or only a Hi-Bye friend, simply because I don't know the technique to manage an intermediate stage of friendship.

I was talking about this friend last night to Gaya. It was actually hard to recall how bad a person treated me previously, and those remain in my memories are all good one in fact. I'm happy that we all moved on and lead a different yet interesting life in our own ways. And then I realized, I actually do miss friends back home. :)

Oh hey people, if you notice the updates in the itinerary column, yeah, I'll be in London again next week, and also the most anticipating one - Paris! And ya, I'm finally making my way to Taipei in June, so if anyone wanna special order any beauty products from Taiwan do jot down a list and pass it to me. Anyway, no guarantee I can get what you want but I can try to hunt for you girls! Anyway, what I'm most looking forward is to go back to my home sweet home, and to meet you guys back home :)

Well, I don't wish to come out with a lengthy post which might probably bore you out.. So I guess I shall stop here.

See you guys soon! Cheers :)

Paddy's Day

2010-03-19T23:54:00.007Z

17th March , St. Patrick's Day, a celebration of Ireland's culture.

Since this is the first time to experience this brand new celebration, Keezya, Timah and I decided to watch the parade in town instead of studying for the next day's anatomy assessment.

So here we were, joining the crowd in town..

St Patrick's Day also known as Paddy's Day, and one of the significance is wearing green on the day. But too bad, we couldn't manage to wear green shirt, because we don't have any green shirt!
So as for fun, me and Keezya painted our faces with shamrocks and Irish flag stickers.

The "leprechaun" lady who helped us to paint our faces :) Hmm, so what's leprechaun? It's a type of fairy in Irish folklore which looks like....

this - green hat, green coat, which orange-brown beard. Oops, this lady don't have beard. Haha.

I personally like this fella's attire - the "Pog Mo Thon" trousers, meaning Kiss My Arse =P

The theme of the parade for this year is "Ships to shore" which is to celebrate Cork's maritime culture.

And actually I don't have much idea what's going on with the parade. There's lotsss of cartoon characters/ superheros and basically, I'm suck in all these. Haha.. Well here's some of the photos of the parade..

- pirates boat -

- naval ship -

- green giraffe -

and lastly,

can anyone tell me, is she a Peter Pan or a Robin Hood?

xx

Lunch

2010-03-09T16:29:00.004Z

I'm happy today.

Because I had 花生莲藕汤 for my lunch.

Everyone was asking me "what's that long long thing in the fridge" when I got the lotus root from the oriental emporium the other day.

It's my beloved LOTUS ROOT!
A precious one!

xxx LOL xxx

100marks

2010-03-07T20:35:00.004Z

Read this article in Sin Chew Jit Poh. Would like to share it with you guys..

100 分同学

朋友的儿子小鼎，在高中以“生物”为傲，因他从小喜欢生物，考试时，生物成绩总是全校最高分，所以同学都笑称他“生物怪咖”。在大学甄试中，小鼎高分被录取，开心地进入了台湾南部的一所国立大学的“生命科学系”。他，终於可以好好发挥他最喜爱的生物专长了。

生物第一次考零分

可是，开学后一个多月，朋友南下去探望儿子，儿子却愁眉苦脸，闷闷不乐；一问之下，儿子才难过、低声地说：“妈，上週生物第一次考试，我考……零分！”

“啊？生物不是你最强、最棒的一科吗？怎么会考零分？”朋友一脸不可置信地问道。

“我们老师上课，都用英语讲，我根本就听不懂！考试也用英语出题，我根本不知道怎么回答……”小鼎低头，吞吞吐吐地说。

在台湾，不管是日常生活，或是学生上课，都是使用华语，几乎没有说英语的环境，可是，为了让大学生更具国际竞爭力，有些大学要求教授，上课逐渐改用英语授课，学生也要看英文书。

“妈，你知道吗，我们班上有个马来西亚来的侨生，他的国语（华语）腔讲得怪怪的，我都听不太懂，他竟然生物考了100分！”小鼎愤愤不平地说道。

当然，马来西亚是多元种族的国家，英语是必懂的语言。不过，小鼎又说：“妈，我们班那个马来西亚侨生好厉害，很多成绩都好棒！当我们的报告被教授打不及格、被退回来时，教授却把那侨生的报告拿得高高，对大家说：‘这，就是我所要的报告！’”

听起来，小鼎的自尊心真的大受打击，万万没有想到，一个从马来西亚来台湾的男侨生，生物成绩竟然考100分；而他，零分。

用辛苦获取幸福

不过，小鼎又跟他妈说：“这学期，我参加了魔术社、街舞社，你知道那个侨生参加甚么社吗？他竟然参加‘领袖社’……天哪，甚么是‘领袖社’，我听都没听过，他说，他回马来西亚要当领袖……”

小鼎原本心中不平，但说说，却转而用敬佩的口吻说：“妈，那个侨生好节省哦，他都很晚才到餐厅吃饭。”“为甚么？”“因为自助餐厅七点半去，大家都快吃完了，那时候去，点的菜，阿姨都会算特別便宜。我们一餐吃四、五十元，他都只有吃十多元……他都吃白饭，点最便宜的剩菜，再加很多不用钱的肉汤汁……”

小鼎又说：“而且，那侨生都参加校內外很多演讲比赛，他说他没甚么钱，他必须靠演讲比赛得名次、拿奖金，才有钱在台湾唸书……”

听了这真实故事，我很感动。人，就是要“不要怕穷，要穷中立志；不要怕苦，要苦中进取。”在通往成功的过程中，有时是孤单，是穷苦，是寂凉；但也是充满希望、毫不抱怨，只有坚定信念、努力实践。

“辛”与“幸”，就只有差一横而已。而且，“辛苦过后，必有幸福来临啊！”

星洲日报／副刊 ‧作者：戴晨志‧2010.01.30

...

Last Thursday me and Gaya were chatting with our Irish housemates, a.k.a "girls talk". One of them saw the good luck card I pinned on my notice board which was from my mom's colleagues gave me (written in Chinese words), and she asked:

"What's that?! The letters are so cool.."
"Yeah it's Chinese words..I speak Mandrin at home.."
"You speak Mandrin? It's the 2nd spoken language in the world..so you can speak both top 2 languages in the world! You should be proud of it!"

....

So, friends, do you just found a reason to be proud of being a Malaysian? =)

Sunday

2010-03-07T17:25:00.006Z

It has been a long time I never cook properly. This morning I decided to spent some time in the kitchen. So I came up with my menu - Bak Kut Teh and stir fry Ladies Fingers.

I actually love to slack in the kitchen whenever I feel like ''buang masa''. Moreover this weekend was quite an emotional one, so busying in the kitchen can somehow give me some sort of distraction.

Gaya cooked kurma curry today. So I've learned how to cook the 3rd type of curry! Yay =)

my Bak Kut Teh

too bad I don't have 油炸鬼.. or it would be perfect..

And I saw a photo of my beautiful forever young aunties from my uncles photo album in facebook. I like it!

International Cultural Week

2010-03-04T23:27:00.007Z

It was the International Cultural Week on the 22nd & 23rd Feb. International students from different country have the opportunity to set up exhibition booth and introduce your country to the other people. So we, the 1st year Malaysian in UCC did set up our own booth. And this was the time we played the role as "duta kecil" Malaysia.

We decorated the booth with Malaysia flag, posters, traditional costumes, traditional music instruments etc etc, and nevertheless, we promoted our well known Malaysian FOOD!

As for me, I (surprisingly) managed to get the Rojak sauce from one of the oriental emporium, so I prepared Rojak as one of the side dishes. While the others prepared cucur, Pohpia,....

my rojak!

Gaya, Timah, and Keezya introducing Malaysia

While me... busy taking photos? Haha!
Have a guess what age is he at ;)

The school kids visited us and they were so active around. They actually finished up our food and kept on asking us for more Chili Sauce when they were eating the cucur! Timah was really having a good day as she claimed that those kids brighten up her day! =P

Apart of introducing our own country, we did visit other country's booth as well. The Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, Bostwana, Equador, India had there booth set up too.

at the Saudi Arabia booth

Some of our classmates came and support us as well!

Gaya,Clodagh and me.

Sorcha,me, and Maria.

Aaron and Louise.

And the guys performed silat during the lunch break.

Lastly, a group photo of us, the 1st year Dental students.

Wee ^^