it has been 35 days since i last blogged a proper long post~

“You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look FEAR in the eye. Do the thing you think you cannot do.” – Eleanor Roosevelt

Ola! It’s been a while since I have blog a proper post. For anyone who still bothers reading my blog, I bet you are bored of all my short posts already. Sorry, study life has been really overwhelming lately. What with the ongoing thesis work, now comes the clinical attachments that take so much of my time, energy and sleep. Now that I am having a mid-sem break (a short one at that), I thought I will indulge a little and blog about stuff that has been going on lately. There has been a lot happening. For those who add me on facebook will most probably seen photos but in my blog, you will just get a summary. Haha.

----------------------sang yat fai lok------------------

Last weekend, I went to a BF gathering in celebration of Valerie’s 23rd Birthday. It has not been that long since I last saw the BF gang, considering I went to Benjamin’s birthday just last month. But I was so happy to see Jino, Yin Ching and Si Toh who did not make it to Ben’s 23rd. Yin Ching is still as chatty as ever and I am so proud of her for coming tops as best student in her major in UM. Also, equally happy to see is Jino who never fails to crack me up, even from the moment he stepped into Valerie’s house. Now if only I can meet Wai Yin and Suzanne, both of my close buds who did not attend both birthdays. Where in the world are you guys? LOL~

- All photos courtesy of Valerie, the birthday girl. Too bad the group pic is missing Jino & Ben who came a little late. Miss you guys all a lot -

----------as our lives change, we still remember-------

Just the day before, I went to Leisure Mall to meet up with some old primary schoolmates. Yes, it has been that long. I met Steph and Jag not too long ago, in another reunion so I was especially ecstatic to meet Arnidcha and Raveena. I was especially envious hearing Ravee got to go Oman for her industrial training, all expenses paid for by her uni, USM. Wth? That is so cool okay? Jagdeesh also gave us some Russian pistachios chocolate to try. At first we were doubtful as the only person who could read the label is the person who is giving it to us. Lol. But the verdict? Sweet and yummy~

- All photos courtesy of Stephanie’s camera. There are more but since I look like crap that night, I decided not to post them. Lol. Cannot blame me. The night before I had a late-nighter preparing for my clinical case presentation and then stuck for more than 2 hours on the journey from HUKM to Setapak, stuck for yet another hour from Setapak to Leisure Mall, circled the parking lot for umpteenth of times before finally meeting the girls. So yes, I was kinda late when I arrived but hey, better late than never? -

-----------Oishi-sona ryori--------------

The month of August also marks an important date – My mom’s birthday. This year, my aunt decided to treat my mom Japanese for her birthday. As usual, I tagged along. Nyehehehe. The destination is Ikkyu at Faber Towers, somewhere on the way from Mid Valley to Cheras. The food is plenty and pretty cheap for Japanese but it was okay, not really fantastic. Maybe it’s because I have had better Japanese food before. But overall, it was delicious enough for me to finish my dish.

-----------Vivir Para Comer-----------------

As for me, I treated Mom to La Bodega. This is our 2nd time there. With my mom, she is not really adventurous to try new places unless her friends or colleagues bring her there first. The food is still great, although not as great as the first time. We actually ordered two different tapas and I actually love both of them so much. My mouth is watering now, like literally, looking at these pics. Of course, we had to have the Lamb Chuletas as well. They were delicious:)

- Both the tapas that we ordered. I think the 2nd one is more sinfully delicious. I swear, if I keep eating food like this, my arteries will be clogged in no time. Sigh. There are more pics on my facebook. -

-------------------La Dolce Vita---------

After meeting up with Form 6 friends and primary schoolmates, I also find myself going out often with my uni friends. It doesn’t help that the girl living with me likes going out so much and another friend who is a movie addict. No wonder I am always broke by the end of the week :( Together with either or both of them, I have watched many movies – Love in Disguise, Repo Men and Tekken. And also tried many wonderful food in Pavilion.

- We had lunch at Athena’s , a Greek restaurant. The food is good, love the fish. Lol. And then a friend treated us to heavenly cheese cupcakes at The Loaf, under my recommendation. Nyehehehe. -

- We had dinner at Michelangelo’s, an Italian restaurant (no, not on the same day). My pasta was surprisingly good, albeit a little spicy but I was a little disappointed in the drinks. Wished I wasn’t so broke, would love to have ordered the fish dish, sounds yummy. And of course, who can forget the ultimate indulgence, Shimino’s wraps. I totally love my ice-cream wrap. I can eat it whole day. -

--------------------annyong!!----------------

It is difficult to find time to go out with my roommates lately because of our busy and conflicting schedules but after rescheduling so many times, we finally found the time to visit MOFEW 2010 at Mid Valley. I was especially excited because it was my first time going to an online bazaar after reading it again and again in blogs. Of course, even much happier is I managed to copped some cool items at the bazaar. Really happy I went and I wished I can go again. If only, their venues are not always so far away :(

- After spending hours shopping, we had lunch at a Korean restaurant, Kyung Joo. It has been so long since I last had Korean and I love it~! The meat were so tender and juicy, the ddokbugi was orgasmic, and you can see from the pic above, my mouth was full almost the whole time. Yeah, I have a thing for Korean food. Why was I not born there? Lol. -

--------------bon appetit!!--------------

Yesterday, I went to this quaint pattiserie in Imbi after reading it from Kim In Pink’s blog. No, I dunno her but I sometimes follow her blog because her photos are nice and her fashion style is cool :) I have been mesmerised ever since I saw the photos in her blog and I have been pestering my friends ever since, telling them about this place. Finally, my Mom agreed to bring me there. Anyway, the place is too awesome to be blogged about here. I will save it for my next post since I took so many photos of the place. Here is a little preview, in case my next post is another decade away.

-----------------my two cents---------------

Right, so after blogging about my updates, here is me blogging about my thoughts. After staying at home for 3 days lazying around and being up to no good, it is paramount I start doing serious work but not before I blog about this. I got inspired after reading someone else’s post but here it is, my secret thoughts when it comes to love and relationships:

1. I secretly believe that love never lasts.
2. For a relationship to lasts, I secretly think you need be with someone you truly like, no matter how long it takes for him to appear.
3. I secretly fancy guys who have pierced ears. Not too many until he looks freakish. But when I see a guy who is not that good-looking but has pierced ears, I stop to give him another glance.
4. I secretly loathes guys who dressed like small kids.
5. I secretly thinks guys look their best when dressed in formal wear. Not drabby formal, but nice ones. I think it makes them look more handsome than before :)
6. No matter if the guy is not good-looking or has a poor attitude, if he is a gentleman, he totally have my votes. I mean, really, we all sometimes wish chivalry is not dead right?
7. I secretly think being a spinster is alright, as long as society can just freaking leave you alone.
8. I think if a guy makes me laugh, it can help lose the any awkwardness between us.

There. Here is my list of thoughts. Just wanna share it :) Toodles…good night world…

so many birthdays

First up, big congrats to all my friends who are graduating this year. I am sorry I cannot make it to your convocations due to my packed schedule of classes. Finally, the day you all have been waiting for. All the best in your next embark;)

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Seriously, these two weeks have been a whirlwind for me. Almost every day I find myself going out until my impending notes are accumulating like mad. Since it is the new semester, there has been lots of orientation activities with the juniors. It is the last time we, as seniors, will get a chance to know our juniors. This year is definitely a great improvement compared to last year’s orientation. At least this year juniors can remember our names and vice versa.

There have been a lot of going out as well. Already I went out to watch four movies since coming back to UKM. Three of those, I went with coursemates. There have been a great deal of birthdays as well. So many that I am sorry if I forgot to wish anyone. Here are some photos I took of 2 birthdays I had a chance to be part of the celebration – Benjamin’s and Tze Im’s.

30.07.10

More photos *HERE* from Ben's camera!

On a Friday, I went to a former VI classmate’s new house for his birthday. I think this is the first time I get invited for Ben’s birthday. It is also the year he graduated. For some who may have read “The Sun” newspaper might have spotted Ben on the front page. He has gotten the very prestigious Royal Degree Award from UM. Congrats Ben!!!

Anyway, I apologized for the lack of photos, including the group photo. Every time I am with the BF gang, I just end up talking more than taking photos. I hope someone will post the rest of the photos up soon. So here are some of the best ones I took:

Ben’s lovely birthday cupcakes. The pro thing about this is its uniqueness and the fact you don’t have to cut it as you can just pass the cupcakes around to each person. The con? The fact that you have to blow all around the cupcakes. Kekekeke. Ben was funny when his head went around blowing the candles. The cupcake was super yummy. Love love the icing;)

of birthdays and post-exam outings

Macau was not bad, HK was a blast, and Shenzhen is disappointing

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Yes I am back from my holiday trip. Before I start blogging about my trip, however, there are still a bunch of photos that I want to post first.

Most importantly, are bday photos of my Pharmacy friends dating all the way from September. Coincidentally, they are all BLOGGERS too. LOL.

~Clara's 21st birthday

~Jia Xiang, Plaza Prima

~6th October 2009

For Babi Sia's birthday, we decided to celebrate one day later than her actual bday (which is on the 5th) because she kept expecting us to celebrate her bday, so we decided to give her a surprise. It was a joint bday between us Pharmacy gang + my housemates. Her present? It was a SS501 cd since we knew she is a huge fan of Kim Hyun-Joong. It was difficult to choose a present for her. I hope she likes it =)

Read more about it *here*

~Jane's 22nd birthday

~Pizza Hut Setapak

~30th Sept 2009

A much much belated bday post is Mei Chieng's bday. Us Pharmacy gang celebrated her bday with pizza + cake. Hehe. I hope she likes her present we got her. It was a humongous heart pillow. LOL.

Read more about it *here*

~Carolyn Teo's 21st bday

~Cannes Cafe Setapak

~13th October 2009

The "maknae" of our gang has finally become "2NE1" (according to her). We had a small celebration for her between us 6 girls + her "bro" Terev.

Sorry I do not have any photos. I thought I did take photos of that night but turns out that I did not. But, you can read more *here*.

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Another interesting event is of course, the post-exam outings. Facebook of UKM students are now flooded with photos of what they all did right after exams.

My finals ended on a Thursday. After that, myself and Sia went to Prima to help with Course Nite souvenirs.

Only on Friday did Sia and I get to go shopping. We went not only to Times Square and Sg Wang but also to Pavilion. Lol.

Outside Pavilion were lots of outrageously early Christmas decorations. Sia wanted to bring one of the reindeer back to A-5-5.

Inside the shopping complex were also no exception when it comes to spreading the Xmas cheer.

I think Pavilion always outdo themselves when it comes to decor. Since we were never going to be able to afford to shop here, we might as well take photos.

Are these photos creative? Hehe. I got the idea because when passing by the Christmas trees, I saw my own reflection in these ginormous tree ball decors.

For lunch, we had the tea time buffet @ Sakae Sushi. Only with Sia, can I sit in a sushi restaurant for 2 hours eating twenty plates of sushi.

For dinner, my roommate BB and I went to Red Potato, this really nice restaurant that had just opened in Setapak.

This is our 2nd time and who knew, I bumped into my coursemate here. Haih...you know who you are...*lost appetite*

While waiting for our food, we played around with the curtains. Looks like wedding veils? LOL.

Yay, finally our food arrived!! I forgot what we ordered but this place is really "dae bak!" Must come and try the food. The lady is also funny. BB accidentally left our apartment keys and the lady scared us by telling us she did not see our keys anywhere. Turns out she was tricking us, because she later returned the keys to us ;)

pre-exams: did you miss me?

On 18th August, this young man would have turned 22 years old and one year shy of graduating as an engineer. Please show your support in memory of my good friend by signing up as members here: http://justiceforgaryrobert.webs.com/

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Finally I am back blogging after my hectic mid-semester exams are finally over. I have so much stuff to update and I had originally intended to blog all day for this three days but since I have a report due Monday and lots of LI-related stuff (that I had procrastinated before this) to do, I decided to keep this post short and simple (hopefully).

#1: Tze Im’s bday on 1st August 2009.

I know this happened ages ago and I had intended to blog about this earlier, but with the sudden passing of Gary, I thought it might be a little inappropriate…

Anyway, this was a birthday surprise gone wrong. We wanted to surprise Tze Im with a bday cake as she come back to Setapak from Penang but tak jadi lor. When Wei Wei and I went to their Prima house, we found out that Janice and MC went down to eat dinner. Wei2 and me were in charge of buying the cake and then we passed it to Ai Li to put into the fridge. Few minutes later, Ai Li came out, looking worried. We wondered what was wrong.

“I cannot fit the cake into the fridge.”

HAHAHAHA. Ai Li is so so cute ;)

So, the 3 of us tried to fit the bday cake into their small fridge by removing some of their groceries. Suddenly, Tze Im came back with Jia Ying. Panicked, I went and greeted her with the bday candles in my hand. But she already suspected something wrong when she saw Wei2 and me in her house.

Worse thing is, while waiting for Janice and MC to returned from dinner, Tze Im had opened the fridge and we didn’t know how to stop her. Haih…

Ya lor, so no surprise but still got bday cake. Hehe…so,

Happy 22nd Birthday “Lao Im!”

-the cake, the birthday girl and the present-

#2: Mice lab (again!) on 10th August 2009.

The last time was back in 2nd year. Needless to say I was not thrilled when I heard that our CNS lab is about doing experiments on mice again.

The objective of this time’s lab? To test the sensory nerves of the mice. Sounds kesian right?

My group had to forced the mouse into a restrainer and place its tail into warm water. When the tail flicks, then we recorded the time. Second time, we injected morphine (as an analgesic) and repeat the whole thing again.

The mice this time around are super ganas lor. Will not stop struggling, unlike the last time. Will not stay still at all, made me so freaked out just trying to put its tail into the water. And, really, touching the tail was so so disgusting. And freakin’ scary!

I seriously hope I don’t get the mice clinical test for my thesis next year…:(

-my group did the Tail-Flick test-

-this is the group that sat next to my group, which we had nicknamed “The Group with the Olympic Mouse”. Why? because their mouse jumped out of the container. Super jumper lor. That is why they had to put the metal grill on the top to prevent it from jumping for its freedom. This group did the Hot-Plate test-

#3: Visit to Nuclear Agency Malaysia on 13th August 2009.

I think the place is kind of interesting but don’t know whether is it because we don’t know much about nuclear energy, we all got kind of confused listening to the explanations, up to a point when we got kind of bored already.

The worst part of the day is not the trip but the logistics is so crap and a waste of time. Imagine waiting for the bus for 2 whole hours just to bring us back to Setapak. Why everyone was so stressful? The next day we had a Biopharmquiz with Dr Haliza.

We got on the bus at around 1pm. But reached back home at 9pm even though the visit ended at office hours at 5pm. Why? Thanks to logistics lor.

One thing I cannot stand my coursemates doing is to stick together like glue. The X of them are always together, whenever we are divided into non-formal sub-groups like this. What is this? Kindergarten? How old are you until you are so socially inept to mingle with your own coursemates? Haih…

Conclusion: The place is very interesting to learn about nuclear energy but maybe next time I should come prepared so I would not feel blur most of the time. Logistics is crap.

For more, click about Wei2’s experience and all the pics are on her facebook.

-On the way there, sat with Sia. Hehe. I am never going to sit near JC (the one in the background) and Gan Boon Yan anymore. Boys that cannot stay still-

-the nuclear reactor is seriously, the highlight of the trip. Super cool weii. But no pics allowed so this is the miniature version of the actual reactor that is 1000X bigger lar of course. Funny part is how they actually use a custom-made fishing rod to fished out the radioactive material-

-the seven of us good friends. Tze Im wore black, she absorbed the most radiation.

Hahaha. No lar, that is not true-

-The two Carolyns and Wei Ping aka Terev Dickxon were in the same sub-group as me. It was fun hanging out with them-

-Mr. Emo-

-Finally he is back in the blogging scene after a super long hiatus-

-Bloggers Rock!!! Ai Li baybeh, Babi Sia, me and Ah Jane-

-the younger and cuter bunch out of the 7 of us. Hahaha-

-(L-R): YongXin, TzeIm, MeiChieng, Janice, JiaYing, AiLi, me, YuSiang and SzeWei-

-Everyone is not wasting time studying for the quiz the next day and also the upcoming mid-sem exams-

#4: My mom’s birthday lunch @ Mid Valley on 15th August 2009

My Mom turns XX years old on 13th August but because I was not around then, I treated her to a birthday lunch at Manhattan Fish Market @ Mid Valley on a Saturday.

Mom’s grilled seafood platter was heaven and my fish fillet was fails miserably. Not tasty at all lor.

Also tried this Korean sushi / sandwich that tasted good but very filling with all the rice.

Did some shopping but nothing interesting to look at. Bought something though. Will post it up in my shopping blog soon (hopefully!)

#5: ALICE’S GRADUATION PARTY on 15th August 2009

After lunch in the afternoon with Mom. at night I had dinner at an old friend’s house, Alice Pushpanathan. She graduated from UM recently. I know, so fast right? Sob Sob…I still got one and a half more years to go. Alice went to matriculation so that is why she is graduating a lot sooner than me.

Thanks to Stephanie who became our driver that day to Alice’s house, which is quite far. All the way at Seri Kembangan. We even got lost TWICE. First time around Stephanie misunderstood the directions. Second time, Jagdeesh who was guiding Stephanie through directions given by Alice via SMS told Steph to turn left. Only after she turned left, Jag said, “But the directions ask to turn right.” Hahahaha. That was a riot.

Ok-lar cannot blame the girl. She rarely comes back to Malaysia since she is busy becoming a future doctor, studying Medicine at Kursk, Russia. Cool right? She is really awesome for being able to survive so long in a tough course so far away. Currently, in her 4th year of studies.

Stephanie, on the other hand, is in her final year studying Biology at UKM. Her thesis is more on zoology, studying about some rare crocodile species. Ya, I didn’t really get it. Hahaha. I am sorry, I am not so in touch with the animal kingdom.

Malvina, she is working with her Dad right now. And honestly, Malvina is such a great motivational speaker that she has insipired me very much to put all my effort in my studies right now. She is right, we need to think positive in order to attract positive energy and giving yourself a time limit to make mistakes in order to grow from it. Jagdeesh emphasized to me about getting my basics strong and although I cannot finish reading a certain subject, make sure what I know, I know it damn well.

Thanks friends for everything!

-Malvina, Jagdeesh, Alice, me and Stephanie-

Post-exams post is after this…