Digitizing My Experiences

Merry Christmas 2008

2008-12-26T02:09:00.006+08:00

Well, 2008 is coming to an end and it seems that I'm still alive! I've been absent for a while in updating this blog so much so that the tag-board is spammed till I have to delete all the posts. Since I've been inactive for quite some time, I will hence put down some of the questions you will probably ask.

What have I been doing?
Well, I've been busy pretty much with work. Been going back around 8+ lately fixing up issues after issues in my workplace. As for entertainment side, I had the priviledge of watching Heroes and Top Gear S12 for the past few weeks but since Heroes is on a break, I guess I finally found some time to update this.

What did I do for Christmas?
I slept past the church morning Christmas celebration as I had a late night playing computer. I only woke up at about 12+ to have my lunch and then went to Sheraton Imperial in KL with my family as they had a free stay there. After watching Vantage Point with my parents, we headed for a buffet dinner at the hotel. I came home after that while my parents continued staying there as I had work tomorrow.

How have I been?
I'm pretty OK. Although work is tiring at times, it is expected and with the current economic situation, it is best to continue to perform my best to avoid being last and getting fired (if it happens). I bought myself a new computer not too long ago which enabled me to play the hottest latest games around without any frills. This also contributed in my lack of posting in this blog.

Any new hobbies / interests?
Other than my growing interests for tech / gadget stuff, the new thing which I might pick up next is cycling. Several colleagues have pursuaded me to pick it back up and although my first attempt did not go too well, it's nevertheless something which I could see myself do in the future. I am now contemplating in acquiring a bike to further the interest/hobby.

First Attempt? Didn't go too well?
Last weekend, I attended the Putrajaya Critical Mass cycling event thingy with 2 of my colleagues. Seeing that I had no bike or helmet, I hastily borrowed them from my friends. As I mentally prepared myself for the event, in my mind I thought it will be easy with little uphill and just go for the 20+KM route. Funny thing is that I forgot to take into account that 20+KM is a very long distance and hence did not fully prepare for it. My water supply was limited and my energy consumption was a little too high at the start. At about 6-8KM in the route, I found myself extremely tired and exhausted. I pushed a little further to continue but eventually my muscles cried out and then refused to move.

I parked the bike at the side and then immediately had a cram on both my calves and was then no longer able to continue. The support cars and everyone else was too far ahead and was not able to return to get me. My colleague continued on to try to get to the car fast and then come and get me. It took about 30 minutes for them to reach their car and another 30 minutes to find me somewhere in the middle of Putrajaya. Being stuck in the middle of the highway with no landmarks, unable to walk and a almost dead phone battery was quite scary. In all I waited for about 1 hour before they found me on the opposite side of the road.

The experience was definitely unpleasant as every slow moving motorbike looks like a snatch theif or something. But for some funny reason, I found myself passing the time somewhat quickly by playing with a ant nest I found nearby. I spent minutes just staring at the ants moving back and forth on the ground and occasionally place obstacles like rocks and sand on their path to see how they recover or unburrow themselves.

Eventually I was rescued and I was unable to walk normally till about 2 days after where the pain finally eases and I was able to walk up and down the stairs easily. Despite the setback, I think I will continue to attend that monthly event and continue to train myself to be able to complete the event and take the wonderful pictures around Putrajaya.

Am I seeing someone?
If you mean by girlfriend, the answer is no. There may be a few interests but we'll see how it goes. Am not actively pursuing but rather taking a normal steady approach and see how it unravels. If it is meant to be, so much the better. If not, at least I'm not head over heels yet. One thing for sure, i'll keep my vulnerability in check constantly taking a 3rd person view of things to make sure that I don't do anything stupid that could potentially ruin anything/everything.

Malaysian International Fireworks Competition 2008

2008-08-30T02:40:00.013+08:00

As the title suggests, I was priviledged to attend the event twice. Once on 24th (Team Spain) and another on the 29th (Team Australia). It was my first attempt at taking fireworks with my compact so I thought maybe I could learn a little before moving on to a D-SLR. I borrowed a tripod and head off to the event. It was quite embarassing when I arrived there because every tripod had a DSLR attached to it and I have a small compact on it. I was actually surprised when I looked at the pictures taken cause the pictures actually turned out pretty well.

Team Spain

Team Australia (Finale)

In conclusion, the sight of countless fireworks going off one bye one is just simply breathtaking. There is no way of saying it except that it's an event one should not miss. I'll surely look forward to next year's event and hopefully it will be better than this year.

No I didn't die in KK

2008-08-12T00:35:00.005+08:00

Haha! It's been so long since I last blogged. You guys might have thought that I have died in KK. Haha! Well I didn't but was kind of close to it when I succumbed to the cold and failed to reach the peak! GAGH!

But nevertheless, I attempted and reached the height of 3668m out of 4095m. It was quite a view even from up there. And when you're back down, you just cannot believe that you were up there less than 24 hours ago. Anyway, below are some of the pictures of the climb.

This is near the beginning where everyone is still OK

The road is long and steep

Top of the world

Actually, I think it is not that hard to reach the summit. The key points are, practice and exercise before the event and equipment. For me, I had neither as my head lamp decided to fail the minute before the climb. Left without a light, I had to follow other people's pace and hence had to use more energy to climb blindly and not knowing which step has the least inclination. I only had 4 practices prior to engaging Mount Kinabalu and that too I think is a contributing factor to my downfall. In addition to that, the coldness actually got a hold of me and broke me. I succumbed to the cold wind of 2-3 degrees celcius and after trying to hold it, my body gave up and at then, the battle is over. All I wanted was to head down and sleep.

But after thinking through it over and over and over again, I think it is possible to reach the summit if I've taken the proper steps and if everything goes to plan. I would like to attempt it again if given the opportunity and would definitely try my best to make it to the top. Do contact me, if you're going in the near future.

A tough challenge ahead

2008-07-05T12:30:00.001+08:00

About a month ago, I made a decision which would very much stretch me to the limit in every way. The following picture will help show you what the challenge is.

That's right guys! I'm going to climb Mount Kinabalu. The problem is that for an unfit guy to climb up, they normally require an intensive training of at least 3 months to be fully trained before going up. I only have 4 weeks and only the weekends to prepare. Is it enough? I sure hope so but initial trainings has proved that I have a problem with dehydration, low stamina and quite heavy to pull my own weight up.

Over the course of 2 weeks, I've been training at Bukit Jalil Park for the staircases, Pak San / Bukit Wangsa / Bukit Puteh for the trail hikes and Bukit Kiara for building up my stamina and cardiovascular systems. I'm supposed to go to Batu Caves today, but due to an unforseen circumstances in work, I have to come to office to work in the morning thus ceasing a chance to train myself.

I hope I'll be able to make it all the way to the top and back in one piece. I'll try to get the pictures up here once I'm back. Till then, keep me in prayer and do join for my trainings if you would like to.

The idea of sharing...

2008-05-31T23:59:00.002+08:00

It's a rather cheesy topic to talk about but a recent event prompted me to pen this down. Many of you all would know that I do not like to share my things. I like to have my own snacks, my own drinks, my own PC, gadgets and all. The only thing I seem to share is my collection of avi's. Anyway, to cut the long sotry short, I'd like to ask your opinion on sharing based on a scenario I've recently observed.

I recently visited a family whose parents had young children. The kid was playing his own toys all to himself. After a few minutes, another family came to visit. A kid of similar age joined in. The father of the first kid asked that he shared his toys with the new comer. He was a little upset as the other kid does not know what or how it's supposed to be played and end up throwing the toys just to hear and see how the toys react when its thrown. After a couple of times the new kid threw the toys, the parents stopped him and later went home after their visit.

The incident got me thinking. Why risk share something you have set up nicely to someone who don't know what you've been doing? Supposed it's a Lego and you've aseembled yourself an impressive object only to be thrown or torn into pieces? This also raises a question, why is it that when someone visits your place, you are asked to share your toys / PC / things with others? And why is it that when you visit someone's place, you are asked to allow the host to let you play? If i've let them play with my things, why can't I have straight access to other people's stuff too?

Am I to sacrifice the stuff I care to let others play and vandalize it? Am I to let other people take advantage over me? Supposed a really dominating person were to always take advantage of our kind offering to allow them to play something and we wait patiently for our turn but we never get it, what are we to do? Nothing? Are we to do anything to stop them from being like that? Do nice people always finish last by allowing others to domninate and take advantage of us?

Let me know.

2 Days of Freedom!

2008-05-12T23:54:00.005+08:00

Whoa! I just got back from a really really cool weekend. I had the opportunity to go for a festival for 2 days in Port Dickson to witness Tiesto's Elements Of Life Tour in Malaysia! In addition, several other famous DJ's were there such as Ferry Corsten, Cosmic Gate and several other upcoming DJ's. They all played different music and styles with various displays and pyrotechnics which provided a very uplifting and energetic atmosphere.

However, for both nights, Tiesto only came out at about 12AM when we've all already used up most of our energy cheering, shouting and jumping for the earlier DJ's making us less energetic for Tiesto. It is such a shame that Tiesto didn't put up much of a performance on Friday due to some inconsiderate people shining bright lasers into his face and eyes while he's performing. Nevertheless, he still put on quite a show but it wasn't until Saturday night that it was the best! Below are some of the videos taken for the event. I bought a 4GB SDHC Card for my camera to enable me to record 90 minutes of the event. I was able to record about 70minutes before my battery gave way. Enjoy the following:

Cosmic Gate - Nebula + Everything (Freedom 08 EOL Tour)

Tiesto - 10 Seconds to Sunrise (Freedom 08 EOL Tour)

Tiesto - Break My Fall (Freedom 08 EOL Tour)

Tiesto - Elements Of Life (Freedom 08 EOL Tour)

He's a Pirate (Freedom 08 EOL Tour)

Tiesto - Adagio For Strings (Freedom 08 EOL Tour)

You will notice that I did not have any videos taken on the Friday night (9/5) as I thought cameras were not allowed in the concert hall. I only brought it in on Saturday for the recordings. I apologise for the poor video quality especially on the first Tiesto video (10 Seconds to Sunrise). This is due to the fact that i over zoom in and soomehow the camera was not set to focus on Tiesto but rather on the stage. For the other videos it's a little jerky as I was constantly shaken by people walking and pushing about their way to the front as well as me jumping or moving to the beat. Nevertheless, the audio is still pretty awesome!

I look forward to future occurance of such concerts and would gladly welcome other DJ's like Armin Van Buuren or DJ Shah or Aly and Fila to come and show their stuff and play their music. The choice I made to go to the concert is not a mistake and I hope that my videos will encourage and grow the community of trance fans.

ADND + Penang Trip + Stolen Wipers

2008-04-19T23:35:00.014+08:00

Ok, I know I have a lot of catching up to do in updating you all on what have been happening to me. This post will be a photo blog where there will be lots of pictures to describe the events that happened over the past few weeks/months. Suffice to say, I have bought myself a new digital camera and I've been experimenting with various shots/angles to get really good quality images and hopefully if I have the interest, move on and get myself a DSLR. Anyway, without further delay, here are the pictures taken with my new Digital Ixus 80 IS.

Accenture Annual Dinner and Dance
Well, on 4th of April, my company had an annual dinner of which everyone has to dress up to the theme of the evening which was "Magic". Weeks prior to that, all of us had to scratch our heads to think of what kind of costume would we wear? I at first thought of going as a wizard but after hearing that the best dress costume actually wins a Wii, I asked my friend to help me dress up to win that. In the costume renting shop, he suggested a Witch Doctor / Shaman kinda of costume. And here is how it turned out.

Shyan and I

I end up not winning the Wii, but this "cupboard" did. OMG!

Sze Lyn and I

Other Accenturians in their magical costumes

Penang Trip
About a week ago, I went to Penang to celebrate my grandmother's birthday. I took an Air Asia jet there and it seems that Air Crash Investigations really scares the crap out of me when it comes to flying. I think I should stop watching it. Haha! Anyway, here are some captured moments.

Air Asia logo captured on the seat of the aircraft

A view from Equitorial Hotel in Penang

I thought this shadow looked interesting

I really like this shot taken in the hotel

There was a wedding fair in the hotel, and I thought this looked nice

My brother, my grandmother and me

My Wipers Got Stolen!
Yesterday, when I was going out for lunch, I noticed something was wrong with my car. To my horrow, the wipers were stolen! All 3 of them! Grrrr!! Took these shots when I was going back and as you figured, it was raining! Imagine driving under these conditions. Gosh!

I have to remind myself to not on the wipers else my windscreen would ...

Back wiper is missing too!

On a Valentine's Day

2008-02-15T00:38:00.010+08:00

Valentine's Day has now just passed and you may ask "how did it go?" or perhaps "met anyone?". Well the answer is this. No, I did not spend it with anyone nor went out. I worked till 7 and then when I got home, I was so tired and just decided to stay at home. Initially I wanted to format one of my PC's but I end up playing some Tower Defense instead. How did yours went? Feel free to leave a comment below.

I was just looking through some of the pictures taken from my phone last year and here are some selected few which didn't make it in my previous posts.

Perth City taken from King's Park

One of the parks in Perth. Sadly, we don't have such a neat park here in Malaysia

Perth City viewed from the park

Cloudy skies somewhere along NKVE

There is no denying that this building actually looks quite cool

Sun setting behind KLCC

Clouds around TPM

Wisps of clouds

My New Ride!

2008-02-01T01:51:00.000+08:00

Yay!! It's arrived! Just in time before CNY! It arrived yesterday (Jan 30th). Sufficely to say, so far everything is working except that I haven't test out the CD player. Handling is surprisingly good although the car rolls a little too much on cornerings. It's still good and I would say an above average car.

Ever since the blog started till about a couple of months ago, every post has a proper story in it or something really valuable or thought provoking or something of which someone can write a comment on. However, lately I've not been having the many blog inspirations and hence am just unsure of what to write on this space.

I like to write a lot about my past, but I just keeping getting myself smacked in the face to tell me that I should no longer write about the past but instead look towards the future. Well, I can't write much about my future as I'm no Hiro and can't bend space and time :P

I hope that I'll be able to find interesting topics to pen down and attract more visitors soon. That's it for now, have a good day.

PS: Am still having slight coughs.

I'm sick...

2008-01-20T23:15:00.000+08:00

Gosh... I've been sick since wednesday. Normally for any flu sickness I get, it starts from having sore throat on the first day, fever on the second, running nose on the third and cough after the sore throat is over. However this time, on wednesday morning, I woke up with all the symptoms (except the cough).

I felt like calling in sick and not go to work and stay at home to get some rest, but I have some stuff that needs to be done and I really need to get it done on Friday. So I went to work to try to complete as much as I can in my not-so-efficient state. In office, my running nose got worse and then i realised that its starting to come out of my nose. When I brought my finger to my nose to check if it's really coming out, to my horror, my finger is filled with blood!

Immediately I tilted my head and waited for it to stop bleeding. When it stopped, I went to the bathroom to wash my hands and make sure that there aren't any more blood on my nose or dripping out. Looking a little pale, I momentarily shut off in front of my desk dreaming that I was completing my work only to awaken within a minute to notice that I was dreaming. Lol!, But at least I now knew what to do and manage to perform my duties. Isn't it cool to let your dreams show you what you need to do? Haha!

The next day, my voice started to change I begin to develop more phlegm. Having difficulty breathing with my blocked nose, I was almost unable to perform any heavy thinking or coding. Eventually, I did but efficiency was really bad. Most of the time was spent staring at the screen trying to code while at the same time trying to breathe. On that night itself (thursday), my nose was so blocked that I was unable to catch much sleep as I was unable to breathe.

I woke up feeling really crappy and after my wiping myself dry with the towel after my bath, I tasted something salty on my tongue. I realised that something is dripping from my nose to my mouth. I ran to the mirror only to see a long trail of blood from my nose to my mouth and it was really scary. It almost looked like one of the movies where one of the guys get punched in the face and blood oozing out of the nose. I tooked the shower head and hosed it all off only to find that it keeps flowing back out. After about 3-4 times, it finally stopped and I sighed a sigh of relief.

I then quickly move to my computer and googled "nose bleed flu". To my relief, some of the sites said that there will be a higher chance for nose bleed when one is having flu. I then went to work after that feeling slightly more relieved.

Now after almost 5 days of sickness since wednesday, I no longer have the sore throat or the fever but now still have the running nose and blocked nose as well as cough which I foresee will take at least a week or 2 to cure. Thankfully there hasn't been anymore nose bleeds. Hopefully I will be cured completely much sooner and I'll be able to resume normal work duties.

Hello 2008!

2008-01-12T23:46:00.000+08:00

First of all, I really do apologize for the lack of posts lately. Things have been rather busy for me and I've somehow lost the time allocated for blogging. Or it could simply be because my family now reads my blog and I'm just trying to keep things to myself. Hehe.

Anyway, it is a new year and guess what? I planned the eve of 2008 to go to church for the watchnight celebration but due to some persuasion, I changed my mind at the last minute and find myself in a cybercafe playing past 12 and did not even notice anything. It was only at 12.15 did we realize that we missed it. Darn!

Let's do a little recap of the events happened in 2007. I always thought that 2007 is a good year as it has the number 7 in it which is my favourite number and its of course the perfect number. Most of the things happened were good but there were some which was not so good things but then again; it’s a good learning experience. Here is the list of events/things that happened to me in 2007.

1) Started Working at March
2) Met a really good looking girl
3) Found a nice Young Adults CG to go to
4) Had increment on September
5) Heartbroken on November
6) 7 Year commitment ended on December 15th
7) Earned enough points to claim an iPod

Well of course in every new year, there must be new year resolutions. This reminds me of a MSN status of a friend on my MSN which reads "My new years resolution is to procrastinate it till next year". Although hilarious, most of us tend to follow that idea.

Looking ahead for 2008, I would like to see these things come true:
1) Get promoted at March.
2) Nominated for above and beyond
3) Get that 18months working experience and start getting the HotSkill perks as well as completion of ASDA
4) Expand my network
5) Improve my softskills
6) Save & Earn more money
7) Lose some weight
8) Find a girl?

That’s kinda it for now. I do hope that I have more time to write more in the coming days. But then again, if all I say is always "Things are good" or "it's fine", it will be kinda boring for you all as well as for me writing it. But of course I don't want to be in a bad situation or things all going bad for me. Hehe. Anyway, see ya next time :)

Merry Christmas!

2007-12-26T11:58:00.000+08:00

Well it's the last holiday of the year and what have I been doing? Well, my brother was in KL for the weekend till Christmas, so on the early morning of 25th Dec, we went to Midvalley for brunch then to Garden for some shopping before seeing him off there. He went back to SG using the newly started bus company called Airebus.

When I came back, I was tired from all the walking and since I had little sleep, I fell to sleep almost immediately. Woke up when a friend of my parents came and I went upstairs to watch some videos. I managed to watch 2 episodes of Junkyard Wars; a series which I really love but not had the chance to watch it last time. After that, while waiting for dinner, I tried burning my 2 seasons of Heroes. OMG! I've wasted like 5 DVD+R's burning and still I now only have S1 E1-12 on one disc while the rest either burned unsuccessfully or had trouble reading them. I'm already thinking on whether I should return the Burner back to the distributor and get another one.

At night after dinner, I sat at home and watched another episode before I called Vincent asking him if there were any plans at night. He informed me that he will be attending Jason's open house and so I went not long after that. Gosh there was so much food! Most notably the chocolate fondue is amazing! Not to mention the apple crumble, the bread and butter pudding, the spaghetti, the cupcakes and the big turkey they have. Since I had dinner earlier, I was only able to nibble on the small and light food/snacks. After some chit chatting, I went home stuffed with the wonderful food there. Note to everyone: If you're invited to some makan in Jason's house, don't hesistate. You'll definitely find good food there :)

Updates - Destroyed My DVD Burner

2007-12-09T02:45:00.000+08:00

Ok ok, I really apologise for the lack of updates here. There is just so many things to do with higher priorities than bloggine lately. Hehe. Ok it's a bad excuse. Sufficely to say, I've been rather busy. From my previous post, you all know that I've been through some tough times. It just sucked so much out of me. At times I just feel so crappy that the day just goes by without me doing anything. Thankfully, now it's not so tough anymore. I'm slowly regaining momentum and facing life's challenges as I used to be. There is now less days of "no mood larrr" but more of "let's try to finish task a/b/c in a set time". Its gonna take a very very long time to fully get over it I think.

Work has been very demanding lately, but not enough to complain that it sucks. I like the challenge and the strict timeline, but the only problem is that I get too much distractions in the process. As I'm about to start the task, either my MSN will pop up with someone wanting to chat with me or someoen will ask me some questions regarding som problems they encounter with the software/program that they're using/testing.

As a close friend of mine say, "our program is perfect, the problem must be with you". Unfortunately, it's not applicable in this context although there are some times when it does. Haha. Anyway, with the constant help I give to others, I find myself having little time for the task I need to complete. I feel really bad when I have to delay a couple of releases as I really wanted to complete any given task within 80-100% of the allocated time frame.

But all in all, that's not so bad consider that I've received a couple of recognition from my superiors. Over the couple of months, I've collected enough "internal performance points" to redeem myself an 8gb ipod nano (new generation model). It really seems like a nice gift to redeem but is this the lure to the mighty blue Apple? Will I soon be converted to an Apple supporter and end up buying Mac's and laugh at all Microsoft supporters? Hmm... I thought of redeeming it and giving it to someone else but I've not got anyone I'd like to bless cheerfully. Haha. Well maybe I'll save up for the other things. Who knows maybe they'll put up the iPhone for redemption when it hits Malaysia. Ooooo...

Besides work, I've just screwed up my DVD Burner. Thinking that I can utilise my extra DVDRW drive as an external drive. I bought a RM40 external usb-ide cable and connected to my DVDRW. It runs perfectly fine except for the occasional inability to detect the drive when I connect the usb cable. A couple of months back, I decided to keep my laptop on 24/7 and purchased some external fans for cool the laptop down. Using the power adapter, I extended it to connect 2 fans blowing to the laptop.

Unfortunately, the power adapter which came with the RM40 usb-ide cable, only has 3 pins (1,2,x,3) instead of the regular 4 pins (1,2,3,4). The fans uses only 2 pins (1,x,2,x). So I fabricated 3 wires to connect (1,2,x,3) to (1,x,2,3) and voila the fan + DVDRW works. However today, after failing to detect my DVDRW with the USB and after a couple of troubleshooting, I decided to look at my power connectors. When I finished tinkering with it, I switch on the power supply and "boom" the adapter blew up! Apparently, I've inverted it to (3,x,2,1) and boom the adapter fried. I quickly took my DVDRW to my desktop, hooked it up, the drive is detected in BIOS and Windows but I am unable to open/close the drive. Upon using the paperclip to open the tray, slot in a DVD, closed it manually, the drive did not spin up nor blink. Darn it! I just destroyed a perfectly good working DVDRW. Now I think I have to get a new one or just move my operations downstairs. Sigh... Gagh! I need to start burning stuff. I'm running out of hard disk space...

Haha. Sorry for the geek talk. I think I probably lost a couple of my readers here.

As a summary, things a ok-ish but it could have been better. Well, what is not meant to for me will not be mine, while what is meant for me will eventually be mine. Anyway happy birthday to me as today I'm now 22 years old.

On a sleepless Saturday night...

2007-11-19T00:12:00.000+08:00

Here is the conversation I had recently when I couldn't sleep. Just wanted to post it so that I don't lose it.

A: Oi! why wake us up in the middle of the night... zzzz...
B: What's up? Something wrong?
Me: Cannot sleep lor.... sigh
B: What can I do for you?
A: Aiyoh, sure about her again...
Me: Haha. Yes...
B: What's up?
A: Need to guess meh?
Me: Haha.. Yea... just feel like crap
B: I thought you've moved on?
A: Told you already still don't want to follow.
B: Oi, give some help la...
A: Help what? He himself don't want to help
B: When love take controls, sometimes ppl don't think straight
Me: I have to agree with 'B'. I just wish that I can unwind everything. I've done quite a number of mistakes to her.
A: Remind me on who's the one being hurt. You or her?
B: Shut up la... Don't have to put salt on the wounds.
A: Wake UP la! It's not going to happen. Just move on
B: Aren't we supposed to help him achieve that?
Me: That would be greatly appreciated
B: We all make mistakes, if she'd forgiven you and you her, what's there to feel guilty
A: She's a bitch!
Me: SHUT UP! OMG! HOW CAN YOU SAY THAT! She's one of the most perfect girl compare to all that I've met.
A: Just trying to help you move on...
B: I think 'A' should keep quiet for a while. If you look from her point of view, she did nothing wrong. You simply misinterpreted some signals.
Me: Yea guess so. Guess I have to crash and burn this time. I've had enough of living my life in a dream. There is no such thing as happily ever after with some girl. The movies, series and TV all tell lies. There is no fallen star or some one true love waiting.
A: That's why they're called fiction. You really think you can find someone so right/perfect? And you really think that's her? Omg!
Me: Yea.
B: Just let time heal the pain
A: OMG! Time? The last one barely healed. If not, I still think its there. I know three is a good number, but I don't think you can take another man. Bzzzz. You wake me up for this?
B: Aiyah, what to do? You want to condemn him or help him?
A: Tell you what, since you mentioned about the close door policy last time, do just that. Shut the door to everyone. Push people back before they get a chance to hurt you.
B: Hey, how is that going to achieve anything?
A: Well you wouldn't get hurt.
Me: That's kinda true actually. It's not that hard to implement.
B: Don't listen to him. You've been saying that you did not have enough social life. Don't close up just over some small issue.
Me: If everytime I open up, my heart shatters into a billion pieces, no thank you.
A: Tsk tsk tsk. Look at him, collecting all the little pieces together barely able to make it back to one piece.
B: Well that's where we're supposed to help. Unfortunately, I don't have much experience and neither do you, 'A'.
A: I still think they are a waste of time. Focus on your other goals, like you said last time. House, car (s), technology, etc.
B: I used to remember family has a higher precedence than all that.
A: You have to say something to remind him of that right? Now who's helping?
Me: Lol, no need to argue la. I guess 'A' is right. I should pick myself up, do whatever I can and also not forgetting God to help me through this time of trouble.
B: That's the spirit! We'll be helping you too! :) And yea. Sorry to remind you of that, but I really don't think you should not do the close door policy. Alter it a bit so that it's not so closed but rather set guards at your emotions and heart so that its not so open.
Me: Wouldn't that just make me less transparent or less of myself? My idea is that if I don't meet anyone, they won't be hurt but for the people I meet, I open up completely and I expect them to do the same. Just that this time, I think I kinda overstepped my boundaries and expected a bit too much since we kinda barely know each other.
A: All the alarms was blazing. You just shut them off.
B: It won't make you any less transparent. But yea, you did shut the alarms.
Me: Haha yea. Should have paid more attention to that. Really thought it might work. Could have been the pressure from the commitment since it's ending really soon. Everyone has a gf or is getting married.
B: But you know true love waits.
A: Haha.. funny... isn't it time and tide waits for no man.
Me: Hmm.... interesting... but i don't think that works for love. I think that for love to work, it has to be 2 way. If she's never attracted to you, it's going to be difficult, if not impossible as it would seem that you'll be doing all you can to attract her and it will seem that you're trying to buy her love.
B: Ahh, now that you mention it, that's quite true.
Me: So in essence, if you have no looks, money or ambitions to attract someone or turn someone's head, it would probably not work. The only possible way is to have the inner beauty shining out so bright that others will get attracted to it. But it's hard as not many have that and that's why I think it's not going to work out for me.
B: Err... I don't agree the last part. You're way better than that!
A: Just focus on work la.
Me: Guess so... I guess it really ruined my confidence level.
B: All can be build up. Give it some time.
A: Talk about time, I want to sleep already. Omg...
Me: Haha. Me too! I don't want to waste the weekend away man.
B: Just don't think so much. We'll help you.
A: Please don't wake me up this late... zzz
Me: Thanks guys. Pray for me. I'll try not to disturb you. Haha!
B: No probs
Me: I'll post this conversation on the blog ok?
A: Ok.
B: Will it be offensive to some people? 'A' did say something bad about her.
A: I was merely helping him to move on. Ok, I don't mean it anyway.
Me: Well, I think it's ok. I didn't agree on your statement anyway.
B: Well, then I think its ok too. Go ahead.

If you've read the whole conversation, I'll have you know that the whole conversation was created in my head on Saturday night when I couldn't sleep. A and B are just a representation of my conscience.

Oh my, have I gone mad by talking to myself? Will I have a split personality like Gollum/Smeagol? I don't know. God, help me...

Anyway feel free to leave any comments. Just don't leave any destructive comments or say anything bad about her and stuff. Love is always uplifting never destroying.

Updates updates...

2007-11-14T00:19:00.000+08:00

My apologies for the long hiatus. Suffice to say, I had quite a rough time over the couple of weeks since the last blog post and its safe to say that things are now getting slightly better.

If you know me well enough, you'll know what i've gone through over the couple of weeks. I really want to take this time to appreciate all of you with all the advice, guidance and encouragement.

Anyway, let's see how I've been doing lately. Well, work has been the same old same old. I’m doing quite well although I now have quite a challenging task to accomplish. I'll try to finish it either tomorrow or the day after tomorrow. I have to pick up and learn PL/SQL more in depth to complete this task. I hope I'll be able to do it successfully.

Apart from work, I recently watched Stardust and what an amazing movie it is. I usually don't like all the fantasy fantasy show with magic here and magic there but this one is just superb. A balance between fantasy, witty jokes and action and you get a blockbuster. The only problem was that when I was watching it, there weren’t any girl watching with me. It made my friends and I look a little bit 'gay'. But it's alright, the movie is still good! :)

The other interesting thing is that Heroes is now getting more and more interesting. I really recommend everyone to watch it. But if you haven't watch at least season 1, don't start on season 3. I will not put any spoiler here but do watch it. Only problem is that I have to wait weekly to watch it which is kind of annoying. I really hope that they put a proper season break and don't leave us all hanging on a story plot. :)

Anyway that's all I have for now. I hope that I will get better and overcome my problems soon. :) I wish you all the best to all of you in your work, studies, exams and relationships.

A Week to Forget

2007-10-27T23:00:00.000+08:00

This whole week blows. People who know me would know that I'm facing a rather tough and challenging moment right now fighting 2 events of pain and disappointment. For the first event, there was post writen earlier about it but was not published due to the sensitivity of the post. Many of you have read it and yes I've decided not to post it till maybe sometime in the future. Thank you for all your inputs. I really appreciate it. Unfortunately, I don't really like hiding secrets or have stuff too personal/sensitive to post so, I will review all your reviews and post it at a later time. For now, i agree that its not appropriate.

Anyway, the second event happened on wednesday after CG where I discovered that my car got stolen! Over the past few days, I've been asking why did it get stolen. I've summed it up in a few reasons:

1) It looks quite new due to the fact that my mom maintains it well
2) There are many workshops in that area and they could use the car as spare parts
3) I didn't lock the steering with a steering lock

I've also wondered what could have prevented it:

1) If I were to change car with my dad's Wira before going CG
2) If I were to park a little closer to my CG leader's house
3) If I were to put on the steering lock
4) If I were to drive the car to mamak instead of taking my friend's car

If any of the steps were taken, it wouldn't happen and I wouldn't feel so bad and it won't be that inconvenient for my whole family now having to only use one car instead of 2. But what is done is done. All I can do now is let the police do what they do (hopefully) and get the car back intact and in pristine condition.

In summary, it has been a very bad week for me. Facing a major problem that has kept me up night after night and my mom's car getting stolen which also has kept me up at night. I just hope I can forget all these things and move on with life.

I would like to end with a hymm to remind myself of what a friend we have in jesus and also to take everything to the Lord in prayer.

What A Friend we Have In Jesus

What a Friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear.
What a privilege to carry, everything to God in Prayer.
O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear,
All because we do not carry, everything to God in Prayer.

Have we trials and temptations? Is there trouble anywhere?
We should never be discouraged; take it to the Lord in prayer.
Can we find a friend so faithful, who will all our sorrows share?
Jesus knows our every weakness; take it to the Lord in prayer.

Are we weak and heavy laden, cumbered with a load of care?
Precious Savior, still our refuge, take it to the Lord in prayer.
Do thy friends despise, forsake thee? take it to the Lord in prayer;
in his arms He'll take and shield thee, thou wilt find a solace there.

My Perth Trip

2007-10-20T03:49:00.000+08:00

This post will probably be the longest I've posted ever. Do note that it's quite heavy on the load out as there are quite a number of pictures uploaded. Do take the time to read through the blog and enjoy the pictures as it took much time to sort out the hundreds of pictures taken and upload them here. My apologies if the pictures don't turn out quite well. Most of the pictures are taken from my phone camera and some is from my Nikon Coolpix 5000 digital camera. In addition, this blog have been writen on my phone while I was in my trip so some tense in my sentence may be a little bit confusing.

9 October
I crossed the Singapore border in an Aeroline bus from 1Utama and as it weaves its way around Singapore, I suddenly felt a heavy burden on my heart. I'm not sure what it is as it could be that I'm missing my home, my work, my office mates, my friends or merely not being able to watch 2 episodes of Heroes in my time away.

I've found out that I'll be staying in Singapore for a night before embarking on my journey to Perth at 3.50PM the next day. After watching a couple of episodes of Air Crash Investigations days before the trip, I am very worried that I may not walk out of the trip alive thinking that the plane will crash. I even thought that I will write the final moments of the plane on my phone and seal it in an airtight bag if there were to be any disaster. For dinner, I was wondering if I should have contacted Eileen to meet up or not. In the end, I didn't as I'm with my family and I think I should spend more time with them.

At night, we had dinner in Sushi Tei in Raffle's City Plaza. I strongly recommend the golden roll there. It's really awesome with a layer of mango coating the rice with fried prawns in the middle. We went back to the hotel for a good night rest for the journey tomorrow.

10 October
I had a very restless night. Cramping 3 people on a single queen size bed meant that some of us didn't have much sleep with the constant blanket/comforter moving about on the bed. We again went to Raffle's City Plaza for brunch at Food Junction food court. The fried black carrot cake there is really delicious.

We left for the airport shortly and as I got on the plane I hoped that Perth is good or better than staying at home or else we would be wasting a load of cash and time for something we could see on Google Earth and Wikipedia.

My flight to Perth via Tiger Airways

I arrived at Perth at 9PM and the temperature was very cold. At night while we slept, the temperature dropped to 8 degrees and I couldn't get much sleep. I was saying that this is not what I have in mind for a holiday. 2 nights without much sleep is a bit too much!

11 October
We woke up and had breakfast before taking a walk around the neighbourhood with my uncle's dog. Later we went to King's Park for a little sightseeing. The flowers were amazingly beautiful! How I wish to share that sight with someone I like/care about. The beautiful flowers with the cool wind brushing through the skin and overlooking the city far away.

King's Park Memorial

Some blue wildflowers

Some red wildflowers

Some flowers in the Japanese Garden

More flowers in the Japanese Garden

An odd coloured looking tree

A fountain in the middle of King's Park

We left for AQWA (Aquarium of Western Australia) to see the marine life on display there. It is relatively similar to the one in Langkawi's but I get to see the seals and many other species not seen in Malaysia. I'll let the pictures do the talking.

Rockfish disguising itself

A shark!!! RUN!!!

A Seal

Jellyfishes

12 October
I woke up at about 9 and had breakfast. We left to Perth City after that. My uncle parked at King's Park and walked down the infamous Jacob's ladder to hitch a free bus ride to London Court. I bought a couple of souvenirs there and walked about in that area. We had lunch in a pancake restaurant in Cavillion's Place. After that, we went to a market and bought some nuts and strawberries.

Jacob's Ladder

After watching the sunset, we went to have dinner in Cincerello's which is famous for its Fish and Chips. We ordered a little bit too much as each dish comes with too much fries. In the end, we ate all the fish and seafood but left a load of fries as we're too full to consume it.

Watching the sunset on the beach

13 October
My uncle cooked bacons for breakfast and it was awesome. Had a chance to watch Heroes episode 3 as my cousin got the episode from a friend. YATTA!!! (Note: At this point onwards, I was very happy as I really wanted to watch Heroes)

We later went to Point Walter's for a short picnic there. It’s a place where there is a sort of beach on a river where people can come and have a picnic there. There is a 500 meters sand bank which extends from the land to the river. I walked on it and it took us about 30mins to walk to the end and come back.

The beach on a river

Some seagulls

Black Swans are only found in Perth

14 October
I went to Caversham Wildlife Part to view the Australian wildlife there. In there, we get to feed the kangaroos, touch the wombat as well as the koalas there. I'll let the pictures explain it. It is said that the Caversham Wildlife Park is better than the Perth Zoo itself.

A peacock with its wings extended

Feeding a kangaroo

A sleeping koala waiting to strike!

A Koala on top of a tree

At night we had an amazing dinner in Nicholson's Bar and Grill. They serve really good, cheap and big portion food. It was really delicious.

15 October
Today is quite a boring-ish day as we did mostly shopping for the whole day. We went to Harbourtown for shoppipng. Had lunch in a Japanese restaurant called Shimizu. The Chicken Teriyaki is not bad.

Later, we went to Garden City for more shopping and had tea in Miss Maud's. The pastry there is relatively good but nothing much to boast about. Unfortunately, I didn't get the chance to try out much stuff as they were closing when we're there.

16 October
We went fishing at Point Walter's and I was very excited as it was my first time getting my hands at fishing. We bought the bait, attached it to the rod and as my brother fling the rod; the hook went one side of the water and the bait another side of the water. We were laughing at the sight of that and after several tries, he got it working and later when I got my hands on it, I had many unsuccessful tries but eventually after the whole thing, I caught about 3 fishes. Unfortunately, they were all blowfish and we had to throw them back to the river.

We packed our bags and prepared to leave for Singapore. I learned that the plane will be arriving Singapore at 2.30 AM and that my bus to KL is at 10AM. We spent about 6 hours in the Singapore airport walking about, waiting for Mcdonald's breakfast and tried to sleep inside. We eventually reach KL at 3PM.

Overall, it was a good trip with a couple of small snags at the start, but in the end I said it was worthwhile.

Updates...

2007-10-08T01:41:00.000+08:00

My apologies for the long break from the last post. To be frank, I'ts been a rather strange past few weeks. Again, the strange feelings hit me again. Questions like 'Am I good enough?', 'Did I do something wrong?', 'What could I have done to change it' bombarded me over the past few days. It all ends in one answer. The boundaries cannot be violated, neither can take any more steps forward and I'm asking a little bit too much.

Besides that, work is so far good. I really like it there and I do hope to be able to excel more and be more zealous in climbing up the ladder. My target is still clear. It might only take a little bit more time, but I surely do hope to see it come true.

In other news, I'll be going to Perth, Australia on Tuesday 9 October. I'll be away for approximately 9 days to have a short holiday with my parents there. As much as I like to stay at home, it's been a while since we had a family holiday; the last being in 2002. During the holiday, I'll be missing 2 episodes of Heroes of which will be airing on Tuesdays weekly. In addition, I'll also miss the French WRC event over the weekend. Sigh!

I do hope I'll be able to post some pics when I'm back. Do pray that I will be back safely. I've been watching too much Air Crash Investigations and I'm a little worried on getting onboard a plane. Especially one which airline I've known little about; "Tiger Airways". I don't like the idea of budget airlines nor the fact that I'll be travelling in the wee hours of the night/morning. I do hope they'll have plenty of rest and proper checkings on the planes else this would be the last entry from me. Well, I do hope it won't be the case. See you all in a week ++.

Blog Title Changed

2007-09-26T00:18:00.000+08:00

It is time to move on from being known as the 1337 geek to be a normal ordinary person. Let's face it, having leet talk on my blog will not enable me to find girls. "Its too geeky," as some of you may have put it.

Last time, some asked me why did I put "Being Ub3r 1337 H4x0R" as my blog title. My reply was, "that's because I'm being Ub3r 1337 H4x0R". That was almost my answer to all questions addressed to me. I even almost said it in one of my job interviews.

"Tell me about yourself"

- "Sir, I am Ub3r 1337 H4x0r."

Good thing I didn't say it. Although if he's a pro gamer, he would have understood it and laugh at it but I would definitely not get the job.

So now you may ask, why the sudden change of the blog title? Well, to simply answer that, it has come a time where I don't find it as attractive and funny as the time I put it up. I find it childish and seem to have grown out of it. It is also apparent that I'm still learning (Ancora Imparo) to be a better person and it need not be broadcasted to the whole world about it.

Anyway, I would like to apologise for the lack of updates to this blog. I've been rather busy lately where I have plans the moment I come back from work. When I do come back, I'm so tired that I don't feel like looking at the computer screen anymore. Here are some small updates on what I've done:

20th Sept
I attended our project's New Promotes Dinner at Pantai Seafood Restaurant. We booked a total of 3 tables with about the attendance of 28 people celebrating 4 new promotes. We had lala, prawns, fish, chicken and crabs bringing the total to about RM1100 for all 3 tables.

22th Sept
We had a poolside BBQ party for our project at Casa Indah. There was an assorted set of food ranging from fish, pork chop, chicken wings, prawns and sausages. I didn't stay for long as I've got a meeting with my ex classmates from 5 Keruing 2002. I drove to Curve to meet them at Fridays. I arrived too late to order anything and hence headed for Clement's house to chat and reminisce old times. Clement opened up 3 bottles of wine and the 9 of us downed all of it over a period of 2hours. We had a good time remembering the days in school and even remembered where each of us sat in the classroom. Its great to see some are already working and some are still studying and one got married. But all in all, it was a great time seeing all of them again.

24th Sept
I had dessert with Allan Chong, Tzzy Jian and Liwan in secret recipe. Though they mostly talked about their preparation for their studies in UK, it was great to see all of them again. I for one was very pleased to see that Liwan is still pretty much the same as last time. The person who upholds various principles and hold on to it even with the many distractions. Tzzy Jian as usual still say the same old phrase "Focus la bro.." and now it seems I've learned a new phrase "Kiak!". Allan is still rather the same and its great to get to see them before they all fly back to UK.

That's it for now, I'll try to update more frequently from now on though I can give no guarantees. Do let me know what you think of the new blog title though.

My Packed Weekend

2007-09-09T22:28:00.000+08:00

Over the weekend, I managed to experience many new and wonderful things. For starters, on Saturday, it was my convocation for my Bachelor of Computer Science. What a joyful occasion it was.

It started around the morning where I woke up, strangely feeling very well with little to no signs of my sickness. Dressed up, got into the car and head for Sunway Lagoon Resort Hotel at 11. We eventually reached there at 12.15 after getting stuck in the jam for a very long time. Apparently, Jackie Chan was in Sunway Pyramid launching his new gym. In addition to that, New Straits Times was giving away free tickets to Sunway Lagoon.

We went in, and I met up with Marc who was there seeing a friend graduate there. We chatted, took some pictures and said bye. I then met up with Sean, Vincent and their parents. Their session was on 11am so they've ended and were about to have lunch and head to the photo studio for their family portrait. I took my academic dress and started taking a few photographs with my family. We waited till 2.30pm when we're allowed to enter the main hall. There was a quartet orchestra band playing some famous classical pieces which I like.

One of the photographs taken

The Quartet orchestra band.

At 3pm, the procession began. The chancellor, vice chancellor, pro-vice chancellor and all distinguished guess began to enter. There were a few short speeches and then the ceremony began. Row by row, the graduates takes their turn to receive their scroll. My turn was coming up and I was tensed. "This is it! This is what I've worked so hard over the past years. Yatta!" As I stood at the stop of the step facing the chancellor, my name was called (Thankfully he pronounced my name right). I doff my bonnet, waited for him to doff his and started walking towards him. I shook his hand received the certificate. I then shook hands with the dean of the faculty and walked down.

We sat down for a while and waited for the other students to receive their certificates. After that, there were a few more speeches and then it ended. We rushed to the photo studio to have our family pictures taken. We then head back. I quickly changed, took my dad's coat and drove to Sunway Lagoon Resort Hotel again for the Cocktail party at night.

They made us wait for a while before giving a couple of speeches on welcoming us to the alumni and congratulated us. Dinner was served after that. The radishes and the fried rice were surprisingly delicious. Sean commented that he wouldn't mind having the chef to cook for his meals at home. Oh well, it was really good with the free flow of coke, sprite and wines. I couldn't drink as I drove and would be best if I do not get intoxicated. We left shortly after that to MacDonald’s to catch up with some of Vincent's & Sean's course mates and have "supper". After dropping everyone off, I reached home at about 1am. What a tiring day.

On Sunday, I woke up at 7+ and had Dim Sum at Atria with my family and Jason. We left for church at 9.15. Church celebration was great! There were less turnout than last week but nonetheless, the message was awesome. There were many people who responded to the altar call.

After the celebration, I had lunch with Sean and we discussed about a few things regarding change. As we both knew, I am quite fixated on some things and can be called conservative at times. I was discussing with him and getting his opinions on should we accept some of the changes happening to the people we mix with. For example, when looking for a girlfriend, would he accept someone with say dyed hair, tattoo, piercing, lots of makeup, nail varnish and also if he'll accept someone who goes clubbing, pubs or bars regularly.

We then adjourned to Shah Alam to witness an autocross event beside the GoKart circuit in Shah Alam. We get to see Honda CRX, AE86, Toyota MR2 and assorted locally made cars. The idea of the event is to see who can set the fastest time to go through the circuit made out of cones in the car park. Some of the cones indicate that the driver must drive a 360 around it, some just for slaloms.

A MR2 going round the cone

It's interesting to see how some take the neat clean line with no drift while some would drift round it and some just get it all wrong; knocking the cones, going wide and stalling their cars. It was a hot sunny day but its still an interesting event to watch. I've never smelled the smell of burned rubber on the road. Suffice to say, it stinks. All in all, both Sean and I agree that the best vehicles there in taking those 360 turns were the Kelisa's. Their small and light weight allows them to be agile and clean on the turns. A soft touch of their handbrake allows their car to swing around neatly and cleanly. However they may be slow on the straights though. I didn't know who won as we left early.

A Kelisa going round the same cone

I was so tired after that with the previous hectic day and today standing under the hot sun. I was worried that I might get heat stroke or perhaps collapse due to tiredness. But overall, it’s been a great and packed weekend.

My Merdeka Weekend

2007-09-02T22:25:00.000+08:00

Over the Merdeka weekend, it was fun, celebrative and painful.

I suppose the first question that comes to your mind would be why I said it was painful. Well, simply because after our Home-Evangelism in Kay Yeow's house, on the way back to my car, my right ankle was sprained when my foot hit an uneven surface of the road. The immediate sharp pain made me sat on the hot tarmac floor instantly moaning about the pain. I was forced to get up shortly after that because the tarmac was extremely hot. I limped to my car and sat there for a few minutes while I wait for the pain to subside. It didn't and I had to drive home using my left leg to brake as I couldn't move my right leg to the left to step on it. Suffice to say, I had to live with the pain for 3 days before able to walk (rather normally) on the third day. I still feel the extreme pain while walking down the stairs though.

Anyway, on the plus side, Home-E was really great! Ever since the Home-E's I've have with the youths, I always thought that it would be very evangelical or the leader would try really hard to try to sneak in things about Jesus or share John 3:16 with the non believers. This time however was different. We first arrived and had lunch at about 12. Here are the various food we had in our Home-E

Bread & Butter Pudding & Tuna Sandwiches

Nasi Lemak & KFC & Fried Meehoon

Satay

After lunch, we played Taboo where we had lots of laughter and fun. Kay Yeow then had us all sit together and he began to share about how he met his friend Eric and what was his memorable moment. Jin Mei followed suite and Kay Yeow then shared a little about how God has helped him and his family through the years from his forefathers coming to Malaysia and how he ended up with a job, family and daughter. He ended the meeting by asking the non believers to come to his cell on Wednesday if they want to find out about Jesus. We then separated the food to be tapau'ed and left shortly after that.

On Sunday, all of us went to our new church, Dream Centre. Since it was my first time there, my first impression was that it is really really huge! I was so lost there that I couldn't find people that I know. Eventually I managed to contact Lemuel and we both sat upstairs. The sound is great, the projector is awesome, I love the moving lights and the seat with the foldable writing pad is brilliant! It is indeed a dream church.

The size of the main auditorium is huge

The balcony

For once after so many years, we manage to have a service lasting more than 2 hours although my leg was screaming in pain as I had to lean my weight to the left leg. But all in all, it’s really a wonderful place. I can't help but wonder what phase 2 will be like...

Ps: I apologise for the poor quality of the images

Patience is a virtue

2007-08-25T03:45:00.000+08:00

Today was actually the only day of which I actually got stuck in jam for 2 hours with me on the wheel. It really sucks. Today is my colleague's last day of work and we decided to have a farewell dinner for her in KLCC. As a result of that, I have to drive down to KLCC from TPM (Technology ark Malaysia) @ Bukit Jalil to KL. Though the route is simple, one straight road to KL via the KL-Seremban highway, it's normally very jam during the peak hours.

I was about to leave at 6 to try to beat the jam and attempt to reach KLCC at 7pm or later but was delayed till 6.30. Upon leaving the gate at TPM, I was welcomed with a staggering jam. I later found out that SMART Tunnel was closed due to flood water testing. In total It took me 2 hours to get to KLCC rather than the 20-30mins on the SMART Tunnel route. SMART Tunnel really works!

Anyway, the topic today is patience. The 2 jam was actually a test of patience. It is annoying to drive through the jam and try to be there early. But, more often than not, we actually need to have patience to go through the things in everyday live. We wait for the web pages to load, we wait for the transport to arrive, we wait for programs to run, we wait our food to arrive, we wait for Heroes to be released and also we wait for the right one to come along.

As most of you know, I have a 7 year commitment to fulfill. I'm holding on to that commitment and hope to see it pass so that I may get into a relationship. This post is a reminder for me that I need to have this patience for 4 more months. I just have to rely on His timing.

Why Do I Worry So Much?

2007-08-13T23:58:00.000+08:00

It has come to my attention recently that I worry a lot about things and people around me. I worry that I will not wake up one day, I worry that I might get rejected one day, I worry for the people I like/love, I worry that something bad will happen to them, I worry that I may get fired and etc etc.

People who know me will know that I always tell people not to worry about tomorrow for tomorrow will worry about itself which is found from the bible in Matthew 6:34. Well it seems that I do not really practice what I preach. I know that God's hands are into all the things I care about and frankly speaking, His care definitely make mine look small. So why can't I have enough faith to believe that things will be fine?

Its actually kinda like Anakin Skywalker from Star Wars. You have to let go the things you care most about. The fear of losing it will lead to anger and to hate and ultimately to suffering. That is a path I definitely do not seek. I have to let go all these worries and let Him deal with it. I have to trust Him that He will make all things beautiful.

However, I suppose one could put the blame on humans saying that we always fall. We'll always want things for ourselves for our pleasures. The selfish nature of humans will always rely on ourselves rather than God. However I have came to realise that God gave us the keyboard and the mouse to lead ourselves through life and hardships. But, all he asks is that you let go of the keyboard and mouse and let Him control them to guide you to the end. It is a tough thing to do and it always requires constant reminders that He's the boss and that we need to believe that he will eventually give us a better life far more than we could hope for.

This post is a reminder for me to keep on believing in Him and let Him control the things I cannot control.

Accenture WAN Games 2007

2007-08-06T00:29:00.000+08:00

On Saturday, we had a tournament with the battle of the wits, skills and reaction. We had our DoTA and TFT Tournament in Accenture. You may ask why WAN? Well that’s because its the Solutions Workforce in Malaysia vs the Solutions Workforce in Singapore. Since I don't really play TFT, we formed a team of 5 and entered ourselves for the DoTA tournament.

Since some of the team members don't really know each other, less know what their skills are, we tried to practice in the weeks before it. However with time constraints and location (i.e. 1 stays in Sg Long, 2 stays in PJ etc) we could not really meet up after work to practice. We therefore tried to play over TCP/IP using tools like Hamachi and Lancraft.

Since the rules were set that we're going to play -apem, our group leader has asked all of us to play a different strategy. The strategy involves all of us to be in the middle lane and push all the way for the win. Our hero lineup was set to be Keeper of the Light, Tiny, Leshrac, Pugna and Zeus. Our leader told each of us to practice against AI when we're not playing together. I was selected to use KoTL which is not really my favourite hero, but playable. As the days got closer and closer, each of us had our doubts on winning, except our leader. He was very confident on our strategy as long as we get to pick the heroes we want.

So the day came and we woke up at 9 to try to be there at 10am for a few practices together before the real event at 12pm. Shortly after that, it’s the real thing, the real event. Since we're team 1, we have to play first. I was really tensed up as this is my first ever tournament. Normally I only play for fun as I never find it fun when it becomes a game of math where each action is calculated precisely to get the kill.

We took our places and the first round starts. We got our heroes except Zeus. He picked Crystal Maiden instead and at that point, I thought "Oh no! Taufu Hero!". Anyway, we just went for the strategy and boy oh boy, what a surprise. The enemy picked some really weird heroes; Meepo! Our strategy worked against theirs and within the 35 minute window, we took out all their Towers, barracks as well as the throne. Our morale was high and was pumped for the second game. It was a good feeling to win using a strategy of which none of us have tried before except our group leader.

The second game followed suit and we emerged victorious again with us destroying everything within 22 minutes and having 44 kills with 5 deaths. That means that every 30 seconds, we killed a hero. We couldn't even believe that we achieved that standing. With this win, we are now finalist in the final round. That got us a little worried as they now know our strategy. Will they be able to counter it? I crossed my fingers as we went to lunch to further discuss on it.

Our leader said that as long as we manage to pick our key heroes, we should continue using the same strategy. And so we did for our third game. This is the game where we fight against Singapore’s best team. Indeed they know our strategy and tried to counter our strategy. Good thing that they didn't pick the heroes that we need. It was indeed difficult. We couldn't take down the towers as fast the first 2 games, but once the killing starts, we just kept killing and pushing and eventually, we took their towers one by one and as we near their throne, the timer hit 30 minutes limit and hence we have to stop to take down the score. Each hero kill is 1 point, each tower and barracks is 10 points and the throne is 100 points. We destroyed more towers and barracks and hence we won.

Shortly after that, we have to play against the other Malaysian Team as they too won against their Singaporean rivals. They definitely knew our strategy but we still managed to pick our heroes and thus did the same strategy of all of us going down the middle to take out as many towers and barracks as we can. We were halted by 3 enemy heroes in the middle while they send 1 hero each to the side lanes which we totally ignore. We had a little struggle and we panicked when we took out one middle tower while we lost a tower each on our side lanes. That’s 1-2 score with us losing. And to add to the difficulty, they sent Zeus to the side lanes and leveled up to about level 11 before coming to the middle to fight against us. His ultimate alone made all of us half life instantly and forced us to fall back.

We bought our support items (Arcane Rings and Mekanasm) and headed out again. This time, we managed to get the timing right and slowly we pushed in to their base and took out their barracks. At 30 minutes, upon tallying up the score, we won by a slight margin. We emerged victorious for the whole tournament.

As for prizes, it has yet to be announced. After the TFT game, it is said that we'll each get a RM100 claim on F&B. The previous tournament, on top of the claim, our Solutions Workforce boss topped up a Razer mouse for each member in the team. I hope that it too will be the same case this time. Haha!

All in all, it was tiring but it was great fun to play with my fellow Accenturians. I sure hope to see more of this event being organized in the future. Anyway, that's it for now. GG :)

My Past Logs

2007-07-23T01:56:00.000+08:00

In a recent cleanup of my room, I found my log book (aka my diary) after 5 years I started it. I thought I lost it when I tried to hide it. Found it in one of the Fizik SPM books. When I was young, I never really believed in the phrase "One day, you will look back this day and laugh". But it really happened when I read the logs on the book. I henceforth decided to blog it down. It's going to be long so do read them when you're free. Anyway, here it is :)

22 Jan 2002
This is the first log ever recorded. The day went on smoothly as it always has. I came back from school and had Char Siew Rice for lunch. I had a dream of my dream girl getting married to a close friend. The flashes from the dream have continued. I wonder when it will end. Went tuition from 4 - 6. Since my mom came early, I couldn't get the chance to communicate with others.

23 Jan 2002
Today school was boring but we managed to use the IT Lab. The computer which I am using is giving me a lot of problems which disappoints me. The dream is still having effects on me. Went tuition from 4 - 5.30. Came back and watched TV. After that, I did 3 Add Maths questions. School - Tuition - Homework. Is that all in life?

24 Jan 2002
Today, school seemed longer than it used to be. The homework given is almost impossible to complete. I now have 2 hours to complete it after penning this down. It seems that Lemuel has asked me to pass a message to Liz saying that he liked her. Tuition today was a little boring as I have already learned what he was teaching. Gosh, he's so slow. But its good as it reinforces what I've already learnt.

26 Jan 2002
Yesterday, school was quite good. During a Kimia Test, I scored 9/10. It felt good. However I Was disappointed when there is no IT. It was replaced with Kimia. Bleh! CF was quite tiring. Carrying all those speakers up and then down. After that, I went to Jason's house and played Liero. We also had a little talk about our own philosophy. Oh by the way, I managed to pass the message to Liz and chatted with her online.

Today however was good till evening. I Went wih Lem to the doctor for him to get a jab. After his jab, we ate lunch together. I went to his house later to do my homework. After that we played Liero. We reached church at 4.45. Lem went off early as he had to have dinner with his uncle who came from overseas. After CG, I asked Ming Ern to fetch me home after the church service. It was a surprise to see Liz in the same car being fetched back as well.

27 Jan 2002
Today seems to go normal. I watched a couple of movies on Astro. At 6.30 we went to Sam's place for house blessing. Many people from my dad's Zone turned up. Liz, Lem, Jeremy, Lydia and Lyvia were all there. I Managed to tell Lem that I still like her. He was kinda jealous when I sat with her on the same table. He later said he will back off. I Played Monopoly for a while till there were only 2 players left. I went down and left shortly after that. Saw Liz online and I chatted with her till 12.30 about life.

28 Jan 2002
Woke up and finished the Star Trek Armada 2 game. The ending was crappy. Had lunch with Lem in Taman Megah. While his mom went and bought bakery stuff, I managed to talk to him about Liz. He passed me another paper which says he wants to start a relationship with her. I went home and started to download a MTV of which Tim wanted. Liz came online and I told/pass her the message from Lem. Later I got a call about Christine Ong's birthday party at her house. It was in that place where I first played this game called Mafia...

29 Jan 2002
Today was ok and made better when our Kimia teacher did not enter class. We did a summary for BM and passed it up on the spot. Nothing really happened today :)

30 Jan 2002
Today was ok but when it was recess time, I suddenly felt extremely sleepy. During IT today, I finally managed to finish my Library program. However there is still the bug of borrowing the same book unlimitted times. I must be having stress as I went Mr Goey's tuition only to find out its wednesday. It is English tuition and not Add Math tuition.

3 Feb 2002
After 3 days away from home, I am finally able to write this log. I was in Penang for my grandfather's funeral. I missed my add math tuition, school and CF on Friday. I just came back from dinner with Lem. It seems that he is advancing further into trying to get Liz. I on the other side is trying to stop him from advancing any further. I think he is really into it...

4 Feb 2002
Today, school was tiring. This is because during PJK, we had to run 8 laps consecutively. That's about 800m. Later when I got home, I told Lem over the phone that Liz received 6 flowers from various different guys. I told Lem that the competition is going to be tough. However he said next year when he transfers to my school, he'll advance into full gear in an attempt to chase her. I wrote an email to Liz warning her of the incoming advances. As long as I'm still her friend, I'll try to guide her as much as possible so that she'll not be influenced to the dark side.

5 Feb 2002
We had 2 free periods today but Kimia is a little fast paced today. It seems that I have adapted to Form 5 life although it’s a little tough at times. I called Lem to as a few things about Liz. He said something about not starting a relationship with her. Did I get the wrong message? Or is he too busy playing some computer game?

I was given a set of songs to play for CF by Sue Min. I have practiced a few songs and I hope I'll do well in CF.

6 Feb 2002
School was boring with all the Sastera stuff. In IT, we were supposed to do some Excel exercise but I was busy rushing to finish my VB Library program. I hope I'll finish on time to pass up on Friday

7 Feb 2002
Today during lunchtime; I managed to ask Lem to clarify some stuff. It seems that what he told me or passed to me was a joke. He was totally joking about him starting a relationship with Liz. He said he was doing some survey. The strange thing is that he said he really likes Liz but also added that now is not the right time.

18 Feb 2002
Spent a week in Penang and since my brother is back, I didn’t write any logs. The Lemuel case has been solved. One problem came out from all that though. It stirred up my feelings for her which I tried so much to suppress. I thought I've got over her already. It seems that I like her more now. But the commitment and studies is the only thing stopping me from taking another step. However on the 16th, I saw Liz dancing up on stage for the first time. Gosh, she looked really beautiful up there.

20 Feb 2002
I finally managed to pass up my IT project after the project dateline got extended. It seems there were some other people whose project is better than mine.

24 Feb 2002
I was lazy to report the logs for the past few days. Today, Lem sent me a file which is a list of girls he likes. After looking at it, I suddenly felt lonely. Who are my friends? I feel that I'm losing Lem as a friend. My parents think that I have no friends because I'm selfish. I think differently though.

3 Mar 2002
Well its been a few days since the last log as I was busy with work. Nothing much to log down. All I know is that my relationship with Lem is breaking up. He seems to be with Sam all the time. Plus they keep talking about Rockman, Marvel Vs Capcom and some other PlayStation games.

23 Mar 2002
Its been almost a month since the last log as I was busy preparing for exams. Now its over and so far, no failures. Here is what I got

BM: 63
BI: 64
Mat: 60/90
Sej: 42
Moral: 87
Ki: 49
Fiz: 39/90
AddMat: 76
IT: 74

24 Mar 2002
Today, we swapped class with 5 Batai as one of the students in their class broke her leg. So now we have to climb 3 flights of steps to go to my class. Anyway, my feeling for Liz is getting stronger. Lem thinks that by knowing her favourite song (O Town - All or Nothing), he knows more than me.

29 Mar 2002
CF was held in the hall today. Paul brought some boxes of new wires which was good as its long enough for the stage. We had a play in CF and she was acting in it. Gosh she looked really beautiful in that white blouse and black skirt. I feel that Lem is not really backing off. I'll henceforth be on yellow alert to keep an eye out on him

8 Apr 2002
School was good. We got our class back. Finally back on ground floor. I've just got my approval to go for the CF camp. I started to write a story but it got stalled as there were some plot complications.

"If you change yourself to suite others, you stop being yourself"

13 Apr 2002
Sports day. Right after perbarisan, an Unggul cheerleader fainted. She regained consciousness and did quite a good job. No mistakes. Well at least this year there wasn't any crazy stuff like last year. I will never forget what was done to her last year. Anyway, Unggul won this year with 24 golds.

"One problem could destroy a strong friendship which was built long ago"

27 Apr 2002
Today time went by pretty quick. Vincent and Yi Khai came over and instead of studying; we played PC Games and watched Joe Satriani video clips. In church, she was dancing. I just have this strange feeling for her when I see here up on stage. Why is it that every time I look at her I have this strange feeling? I keep telling myself, if she can treat me as a friend, why can't i do the same?

"Past memories aren't easy to forget but easy to remember"
"A friend is someone who walks in when the whole world walks out on you"
"Why does most of my friendships started off good but ending badly?"

17 May 2002
More than 2 weeks has passed since the last log. Anyway, today I had Kimia exam and it’s actually easier than I thought. It seems that she's getting prettier by the day. In addition to that, there are about 10 people having a crush on her.

From Elizabeth to Liza to Liz to Lizzie. So many derivations of that name.

"To score in exams, all you need is a boost in confidence"

6 July 2002
It's been a long time since the last log. Exams, Gerak Gempur and the fact that my brother was around stopped me from writing my logs. I've decided that I will not pursue her anymore. I'll have to live with the feelings and hope that time heals all pains. The email for her is almost complete. Need to recheck and reread it a few more times to make sure its easy to understand.

14 July 2002
I've completed the message and sent it to her. Its almost a week now but still have no reply. I wonder if she has read it or not. I hope she did. Anyway, my entire study system is not working and I have now devised a new one. Maximum knowledge and minimum time. My second story is complete and I've named it "Battle for Freedom"

16 July 2002
I came to realise that whatever I do, Lem follows me and tries to get ahead of me. I like Liz and he likes her. I did VB Programming and he too did. I play the guitar, he too does. And now I write stories and he too started his own. In everything he follows, he'll show that he's better than me. Well, we'll see if he manage to get her.

Some collected philosophies:

If you abandon your principles, you stop becoming yourself
Superstition is the religion of fools
Bad company corrupts good character
People who don't do well in studies are not failures
Always have many friends. Each friend is another way out of troubles.

24 July 2002
She finally has read the mail. She thanked me for the advice. I hope that she did not read it the wrong way and get insulted. I hope that everything is fine with her and that she'll be happy every time. If she's happy, I'm happy.

26 Jan 2003
It’s been a year since this log book has started. Its still holidays after SPM as college starts on 10 Feb 2003. I thought Lem has stopped his advances but after mixing around with Mark Ong, he seems to have found the skills to approach her. He said "As long as I get close to her I am happy". He has a folder with her name on his desktop. I wonder what's inside. Oh well, it’s now up to her to choose. It’s time to forget all these things and see what up ahead in life. Perhaps there will be someone better for me?

Thats it for the log book. Didn't really finish the pages on the book it was in. I really can look back through all these experiences and laugh at it. Now after 5 years, I can safely say that I have mended that relationship with Lem and no, he is not chasing Liz and neither am I. I'm glad that things turn up good for me since then. With new friends, and colleagues, I don't find myself that lonely anymore. I'm still looking for "the one" and hope to find one soon :)

Anyway, my intention of posting this log is so that I will still have a backup of it if the log book is lost or destroyed. In addition to that, I hope it helps my readers to know a little bit more about me and my past. I’m sorry for taking up so much of your time to read through the logs.

Accenture BUM 2007

2007-07-08T19:00:00.000+08:00

Note: This post is long.

Over the weekend, I attended my company's annual trip to Somerset in Rompin at Pahang. We got up super early on Friday so that we could be at the Taman Jaya LRT Station at 6.30AM. However, knowing Malaysian timing, we didn't leave till it was 7.30-7.45AM. During the journey, they showed a DVD movie; 200 Pound Beauty. Gosh that was funny. However halfway through the journey, I could not enjoy the movie as we took a turn to the trunk roads and it was really winding; twisting back and forth. Since I was sitting in the front of the bus, I was really uncomfortable and at one point wanted to throw up. Thankfully, the roads started to straighten out and I managed to continue watching the movie.

Day 1

Shortly after that, we arrived at Somerset Resort and we checked in. I hence realized that I've been there before during one of the treasure hunts I participated. Strangely though, I only remembered the floor tiles in the toilet and nothing else. Lol! Shortly after that, we adjourned for lunch in the lobby and I met many people I wanted to meet. People from the TM project, UOBM project as well as people who will be joining the Maxis Project soon.

After lunch, we adjourned to the Octopus Hall for the opening ceremony of BUM 2007. The committee put up a presentation for us with Beng Choon appearing as Jack Sparrow to officially launch BUM 2007. After a quick speech, we all split up to our individual departments and have a short community meeting. I left the meeting early after Janet gave us the green light to go for our new-joiners performance rehearsal.

The Dining area at the beach

My group met up in the beach with our props and we ran through our lines and I tried to get everything thought up. Problems that could occur like is it too windy? Will the sound play? What if the music suddenly stops? Will the slides come in on time? Eventually our time came and we hence had to perform. Our group was asked to perform under the category of "others" and given a theme of "JAWS"

Our performance is supposedly a fashion show with a small twist. It's basically a fashion show with a mini skit in it. Let me try to run through the performance with you all. It starts out with a fisherman going out onto the stage and says "Haih, Saturday also have to work". The screen shows "Oh no, it's Just Another Working Saturday". (Do note the Acronym of JAWS). Then the fisherman continues "Eh where are all the fish?" At that moment, our narrator will then say "Unknown to him, some sharks decided to have a fashion show where he is fishing. Presenting the various species of sharks". At that moment, the next slide comes in with the music of "Tiesto - He's A Pirate (Remix)" playing in the background.

The narrator continues by saying "Great White Shark". At that moment, our great white shark will come out acting super aggressively in front of the crowd. After some parading, he will stand beside the fisherman. Next is the Hammerhead shark. We got one of the girls to do this role with her hair tied up like pig tails on the side. She comes out and looks really cute with her prop attached on her head. Next is the Tiger Shark. This time, a guy comes out with a golf stick and takes a swing on stage. (I hope you guys get the joke :P).

After that, the narrator says "Now presenting, the latest species of sharks... Loan Sharks!" The 2 loan sharks goes out with the song of "Lil Jon and the Eastside Boyz - Get Low" playing on the background. One of the loan sharks was me and we both try to act like some hip hop rapper or something like that. Once we reach the front of the stage, the music stop and one of the loan sharks goes, "Yo yo yo! Whats up? Are you guys in debt?" This is followed with the other loan shark saying "Do you need money? Don't worry, because all you need is us! Cause we Janji Ada Wang Selalu" (Do note the Acronym again) This is then followed by the other loan shark saying "Yes That's right. There is no need for Form J, Guarantors or 6 month of account statements". Then the other loan shark will say "But! If you don't pay! We Janji Anda Worry Selalu!.... Like you! where is the money you borrowed for the 37" LCD TV?" Then the other loansharks says "You! Where is the money you borrowed for the BUM alcohol fund?". We both then turn to the fisherman and say "YOU!!! You can't run now! We got you!" We both run to him and chop him with out makeshift parang. The sharks around starts sniffing and then smelling blood shouts "BLOOD!" and chase all of us down the stage.

That ends our performance. I find it really good but unfortunately, we didn't win any prize due to the fact that I actually forgot a line and froze in front on stage and also our presentation was a little short. Oh well. Never mind. It was good fun anyway :)

Avoid the pool

After the performance and dinner, the dunking session opened as well as the drinking session opens. I went to my project's table and immediately was forced to down a glass full of Chivaz in one gulp. I don't know why but I did it thinking that it would be less stressful if I were to down it all at one shot. I quickly left the table after that. Since I didn't want to be dunked or get drunk, I started walking around making sure that I'm about 20meters away from the pool.

Someone lit up a Campfire

Walking around, I composed the following on my phone.

Here I am alone, walking around composing this message while the song Valentine's Day by Linkin Park plays. Far away I hear cries and screams of various people getting dunked into the pool. I cannot go near there as they will either dunk me or force me to drink up the various alcohols available on the table. I dislike the idea of getting dunked and getting drunk. Is this considered fun? If the people are enjoying it, why can't I enjoy it? Is this the change I'm talking about? Am I supposed to follow the trend/flow of change? But if I don't like it should I follow them?

After composing that, I walked around the beach to see what is going on. I was welcomed by really loud music and the various people dancing to the music. It really looked like the scene from the Basshunter MTV video clip. I couldn't stand the loudness of the speakers and I went to my room. I fell asleep shortly hoping the next day, I wouldn't feel like this; longing to be with someone, someone to talk to who share my same ideas/opinions.

Day 2

I woke up and headed for breakfast. I met up with some UOBM project members and had lunch with them. After that, we adjourned to the beach to find our game team members. There were 24 game teams in total and even with 4 teams at a game each time, it was all coordinated very well and for once I'm not complaining in the games session of a camp. Thumbs up for the committee. After a tiring and fun time, we headed for lunch.

From Left: Lai Ling, Vincent, Eileen, Lai Yee

After lunch, its an optional choice of activities to be done. You can choose whether to play the court sports like badminton, tennis, ping pong, water polo, and some others or go jungle trekking or canoeing or kayaking or cycling. I met up with Eileen and she wanted to play volleyball. I have no idea how to play it but decided to join in for a while and try to learn the game. Sadly to say, I have a problem playing that game as

1) My hand eye coordination is bad. I tend to miss the ball when I try to hit it
2) When the ball is near me, I tend to run away from it

My project members playing volleyball

So I just observed the game and took some pictures of the people playing it. I walked around and took more pictures. While going around, I found Wai Kit and we went to his room to rest a little while. At 3pm, we decided to head out to the beach as there will be some various games where one could win some prizes. One of the games was to blow 3 balloons and let it burst. The game already started when I was there. It was quite funny to see some of them struggle to blow the balloon and some of them struggle to get it to burst even when the balloon is awfully big.

The balloon blowing/bursting game

While watching, I met up with Eileen and she asked me to join her and Lai Ling to go on a bicycle ride. This is the first time I rode a bicycle after many many years. I think the last time I rode a bicycle was when I was primary 6. Anyway, like driving, once you learn it, you won't forget it. I got the grasp of it and started riding with them around the resort. We explored around and found a NS camp there. We didn't enter as we don't want those NS recruits to randomly shoot a bullet into our heads :P

We cycled past the canoeing/kayaking place

We headed back and as I was getting off, I lost my balance and fell off the bike. Gosh it was quite embarrassing. Thankfully, there weren't any injuries. Lai Ling invited me to play carrom with her and it was a really frustrating game as we tried really hard to pot the seeds into the pockets. Eventually it was almost time for dinner and we went back for a shower and then had dinner at the beach.

This time I decided to hang out with the UOBM guys as most of them don't seem to be the one who drinks nor dunk people into the pool except some few cheeky ones :) Just need to avoid getting close to the pool with them behind me and never let go of the camera.

I eventually joined Kok Sheng and 5 others in playing this card game called "Bang!". It was fun as we try to kill the sheriff while the sheriff tries to stay alive and kill all the outlaws. After learning the game, I played 2 rounds and then left at 12am. Shortly after a walk around the beach, I went back to my room and fell asleep while watching a movie. A good day and a good night.

Day 3

Woke up at 7.00AM and headed to the dining hall for breakfast. I can't believe that there was no one in the dining hall. I hence went back to my room and watched a little bit of TV till 8.30 and then headed out. This time there were a lot of people and after eating with Zi Qian and Wai Kit, I left to get my bag and headed to the hotel porch to get on the bus to get back to Taman Jaya LRT station.

The bus journey took 6 hours as we were stuck in a jam in every highway we got on. Got back home at about 4pm and only had lunch then.

In Summary

BUM was fun but tiring. It might be more fun if you drink and if you welcome yourself to be dunked. (Although I still don't think it is).

Anyway, that's it! I hope I didn't bore you all to sleep. :)

Events Leading to Transformers and Beyond

2007-07-02T23:18:00.000+08:00

The news of my colleague leaving back to Singapore prompted me to meet her for a dinner before she leaves. I checked my calendar and found that I was free for Thursday and Saturday. Hence I asked her on the day that she's free. At first she said Thursday but later as I asked another friend I realized that their entire project is going for a movie on Thursday. They're going to watch Transformers on the day it premiers and surprisingly, someone has already bought the tickets. She later confirmed and moved the plan to Friday.

On Wednesday, another colleague of mine in that same project who will be going to watch Transformers on Thursday MSN'ed me asking me if I would like to join for the movie as one of their member was unable to attend. I barely hesitated and accepted the offer. It’s rare to get to watch an epic movie on the day it premiers as well as joining other people's project team in their event.

Hence the day arrives. I told my supervisor that I'll leave office early to catch the movie at 7.45pm in KLCC. I used Google Earth to plot my way to KLCC from TPM. I found the route I wanted to take and started work. The day went by slowly as I count the hours to 6pm. I left the moment it hit 6 and rushed to KLCC thinking that it will be jammed on the highway.

I hit the KL-Seremban highway and found out that I could actually use the SMART Tunnel as it exits on Jalan Tun Razak which is where I wanted to go. I went slow, trying to not miss the turn to the tunnel. I found it, paid the RM2 for it and went on it. Sadly to say, I was very disappointed. Apart from the fact that it was bumpy, there were little to no road signs. And when the sign came up to notify the drivers on which exit to take, its like 100m from the exit.

Thankfully, I was on the right lane and exited correctly without much fuss. However, upon the exit, I was greeted with a minor jam on Jalan Tun Razak. It was quite short as I shortly turned to head to the underground parking of KLCC. Upon parking, I went up to the central court and met up with the project team. We ate at KFC and then wound up at the theatre at 7.30pm. Bought popcorn and headed in for the cinema.

Upon 5 minutes into the show, suddenly the lights came on and the screen went black. The people in the cinema showed their anger but shortly a voice came over the speaker "Ladies and Gentleman, we regret.....*static* *static* *clicks* *crackle*..." and then silence. Shortly, the door opened and someone said sorry and apologised. We waited for about another 5 minutes before the movie came back on and it was smooth all the way. It was really an awesome movie. Although the fight scenes are a little too fast and confusing at parts, but the movie is still awesome nonetheless. Thumbs up for it.

After the movie, I had the chance to fetch two lovely girls back to their homes. Although a little apprehensive, I did it anyway as I have to eventually get over this fear in me. The drive was quite scary and weird. For starters, I was not very sure of the road out of KLCC. I just know that I need to head for the Jalan Tun Razak exit. I eventually reached there and drove them back. However while driving, I just couldn't feel comfortable. Its like I have my parents sitting beside me and pressuring me to not drive fast, to avoid the potholes etc. I suppose it’s my responsibility to ensure that my passengers feel comfortable in the ride.

I dropped one off at 1 Utama and another at a condo facing the LRT terminal. (Sorry, I can't remember the name of the place as of now). All in all it felt great fetching them back as I'm one step closer to overcoming my fears. I sighed in relief as I left her place.

Afraid of Changes

2007-06-26T23:47:00.000+08:00

Well, it is quite obvious that I do not like changes. As heard from the song Stay the Same by Joey Mcintyre: "And I hope you always stay the same.....". Lol. Anyway, I'm not too sure why, but I do agree with the song as to not want to see people change nor see myself change too much.

A few examples of change which I may not like:
1) Change of fashion
2) Change of music style
3) Change of favourites (food & beverages)
4) Change in people.

Why is it that I can't accept the various change in times and move on with the flow? Why do I not like the music being played on radio? Why do I not want to change the food that I order in a particular shop? Why do I not want to see the person I like change?

Is it because they are already fine the way they are? Is it because I like the way it is soo much that when it changes, I may not like it? "But everybody's changing and I don't feel right" as heard from Keane in Everybody's Changing. We all know everyone changes over time. Perhaps its the fear of the unknown then. The fear that the things we like may change to be bad or change into something we can't accept.

Oh well I think I'm thinking too much, but then again, if there's nothing in my mind, then I'll be a mindless automaton :). Anyway I apologise if this post makes little to no sense. It actually kinda feels like I'm talking to myself when I'm writing this. Haha!

Anyway, in conclusion I think all I can do is pray that God will perform his will and help me to accept the reality that some things needs changing. For example, sins. We all should change ourselves to not continue sinning but instead strive to be christlike and walk in the light. I just have to have faith that everything is in his hands and whatever change in things are for the betterment of me. And I pray also that I will learn to accept the various changes in life, myself as well as others especially the people I care about.

What Did I Do on the Weekends?

2007-06-18T01:54:00.000+08:00

Saturday
The first thing to do is to sleep as much as possible to try to recover whatever lost sleep I missed on the weekdays. Thus I normally wake up at 2-3pm in the afternoon. But that’s also because I normally stay up to 3-4am in the morning before that.

After lunch, I stayed at home and played some computer games. Now that work has started, I can't get to play on the weeknights. So all the playing have to be done on the weekends. It was soon 5.30 and I had to prepare to go to church at 5.45. Had dinner at 6 and was at church at 6.30.

After church at 8, Mark was at my house to wait for Vincent who was having dinner with his parents. We later adjourned to Mark's house and watched Shooter the movie. It was quite good as it’s a movie about a master sniper. Shooting people at 1+ mile is really amazing. I recommend you guys to watch it if you have not.

Anyway after that, I got home and continued playing some computer games and then slept at about 2am. I wanted to go for the 11AM Young Adult's meeting thing, but no one reply my SMS'es as well as no one wanted to follow me. Hence I slept in till about 2pm.

Sunday
Woke up at 2pm and started working on some left over work from Friday. Basically I had to add in some codes to some functions as well as find another way to make the function more optimized/efficient. It was not a big deal and it was done at about 6.

My family went out for dinner with Lemuel to Bibi Chik. The place serves Nyonya food which was quite good but the weird thing is that there is one corner where there is this guy who's holding a guitar with a kick and a hihat singing oldies song. Imagine yourself playing the guitar, singing and using your legs to play the drums to get the beat all at the same time. It was really amazing.

After that, we came home and Mark called me up and said that he and Vincent wanted to watch Austin Powers 3. I took my hard disk and went over to Vincent's house this time to watch the movie. The great thing about having a DivX HDD player is that you can go anywhere and plug that thing to any TV with RCA slots and it will play whatever movie I have in the hard disk.

Got home, read emails, read people's blog and decided to blog too and thus this post is created. Now its really late and its time to sleep. Some of you may find that my blogging style has changed, but its basically caused by the fact that I don't have much to blog about. I will blog if there are interesting things that happened, but if not; I'll just put the updates of myself.

Updates...

2007-06-13T11:27:00.000+08:00

Wow! It’s been 10 days since I last blogged. I wanted to make it a point to update at least once a week. I guess I got caught up in work and all. :) Anyway, I'll just put a little update here on how I've been doing.

It’s been 3 months+ now since I started working, and surprisingly I can say that I'm enjoying it. As of now, I've not been in much stress.... yet and I hope I won't be in one. Some even say that I'm makan-ing gaji in my workplace, MSN-ing whole day and always on online mode.

Well, to clarify that, I do work, but it’s just that whenever they chat with me, I have nothing to do. Sometimes the day is a bit slow and there's nothing to do because you're waiting for someone to hand you their release so that you can work on it. There are times when I had to put Busy mode for a while, though it normally lasts for 30 minutes or so. :)

As for CG, I'm really enjoying this CG I'm attending. Now it seems that there is more and more events being planned every week, which is actually good for bonding between the members especially those fellowship outings. Just last Sunday, we all had Dim Sum in this place in SS2 called "My Little Dim Sum Place". The food is actually quite good though a bit pricey, but that’s what you get if you want an air-cond place on a hot Sunday afternoon.

So far all is well, and I hope it continues on like this.

PS: All the best to everyone having exams :)

A Little Bit About My Upbringing

2007-06-03T23:03:00.000+08:00

Recently I've been flooded with lots of emotions ranging from love to disappointment and to sadness. Probably one of those phase again where I'm just emo-ing. I know its not good to be pessimistic about myself and all, but sometimes it just happens. I would like to take this opportunity to share a little bit about my upbringing.

When I was in form 2 or 3, I have a friend who started drawing a comic on Starcraft. I saw that it was quite interesting and thought that I would try to make one myself. Although I may lack the drawing skills, its about the story that matters. I took a few A4 papers, folded them in 2 and stapled them to make it a book. Upon completing my homework that day, I started drawing bit by bit. I sucked at drawing and hence drew 2d images instead of 3d or perspective drawing. So everything is stickman-ish and very plain. However, the main plot is the story and as I was about to conclude the whole story; while drawing the nuclear symbol with my compass, my mom stepped in and saw me using the compass and came over to see me doing my comic. Without looking at it I was scolded and was asked to throw the whole thing away and to study. It was about 10 pages long and down it went to the rubbish bin. There goes the chance to improve my art skills, yay!

With the constant drill to study everyday, there is little time or chance to expand or try or do other things. There is little to no opportunity to find out what I like to do or what I'm good at. I know that I'm a little lazy sometimes idling time away but if you look at it, if I'm expected to study, what can I do on the free times? Any activity will take time and hence you'll get the "Go Study Now!!" phrase from parents. Thankfully I actually had a talent in programming and computers that I was able to complete the Computer Science course. If not, I really do not know what I would end up.

Another thing I would like to share is the lack of support and encouragement. There are countless times when I would come home and report some of the problems I faced in school. One of the examples is when I had a fight in school with some kid. I tell them that and the first thing they would say is that "Oh it must have been your fault" or "You must have started it or aggravated him". Without even hearing the whole story and to know that most of the time it was the other guy who started hitting me first, they would say those phrases and not show the attention or give the support that I was seeking for. I mean even if I'm wrong, at least I expect them to support me and say it in a positive way like "Oh maybe he's having a bad day that’s why he hit you".

I don't really blame my parents for all these since they do have their good points and also because "it’s for your own good" which is sometimes quite true. Oh well, just wished that I did have that support and sometimes how I wish I can relive the past and try to change who I am today. Anyway, it’s only a phase of time. I will eventually forget about this and go on with life. I just hope that I don't remember this that often.

Hy Heroes Theories

2007-05-25T10:53:00.000+08:00

Note this post contains spoiler for Heroes if you have not watched it yet.

After the season finale, many questions were raised as to how did the first season ended. The questions were namely:

Is Sylar dead?
Is Peter Petrelli dead?
What about Nathan?
Why or how did Hiro ended where he is now?
Does the cockroach play a significant part in all of these?
Who is scarier than the bogeyman?

Well lets try to answer them one by one. But do note that these are my assumptions and none should be taken as if its what has happenend.

Is Sylar dead?

Frankly speaking, I don't think he can die from a stab wound. I was kinda hoping that Hiro would stab and then slice him as it is a katana which is used for slicing things.

Is Peter Petrelli dead?

As seen from the previous episode, in the future, we get to see him even when he did blow up. So he should not have died.

What about Nathan?

He won the elections and flew with his brother to the sky so that he can blow up safely. The thing is, he can fly pretty fast with the "poof" cloud. So it is possible to fly Peter really high up, let him go, fly to a safe distance before the explosion hit him.

Why or how did Hiro ended where he is now?

How did he end up there? Well, my guess that in desperation, he just wanted to teleport to anywhere rather than to hit the building behind him. Since he's so fascinated with the Kensei story, it is only fitting to see him go there where the battle took place.

Does the cockroach play a significant part in all of these

This is one of the toughest question. This is because the cockroach actually got a lot of screen time and its normally seen with Sylar. My theory is that since Sylar can look through the details and know how things works. It is possible that he has like some kind of resistance like any cockroaches. Whether it involved him eating a cockroach or not, I don't know. But my guess is that he could possibly be alive because of this resistance kinda thing.

Who is scarier than the bogeyman?

I don't know. Thats all I can say. But she is a small girl. Maybe its not that scary. Maybe she's found another person who can track people as well. I mean, Sylar eats brains and take their power. But what can this one do?

Well thats it for now. Do feel free to add in your own Heroes theory in the comments. The tagboard is not good for such things.

Heroes Season Finale

2007-05-23T09:45:00.000+08:00

I was waiting and waiting for the hour, the minute for the torrent to be released. At 10.15 AM I was frantically refreshing my torrent search page every minute. Finally it came out on eztv and I tried to get it.

Crap the server is too busy... Sigh! Tried the second link which points to mininova. Ya Ta! It works! I hence opened up my remote desktop program to link to my PC at home, transfered the file over and start up Azureus to try to download the file. Success! Grrrr... why is the speed so slow? Why is the tracker giving me a connection error? Azureus finally used the DHT to connect to some clients and finally it started moving. It was slow at first but eventually it reached about 30 and it was constant all the way to the end. However, I can't watch it as I'm in office, so I waited till I got back to watch it.

In conclusion afte watching it, its a good ending to the season. However they showed about a minute or two for the next episode in season 2. Why must they do that? Why show us a glimpse of something and then left us hanging there? Sigh... Oh well, I better stop now before i put up more spoilers... Hehe...

People who are cute will end up dying like Sylar who is evilly cute :)

I need Gabriel Gray

2007-05-18T11:50:00.000+08:00

I've got 2 alarm clocks to wake me up in the morning. One is my phone and the other is a normal alarm clock. Every morning, I wake up via the normal alarm clock as it’s really loud. I'll then check the time on my phone. If its not 7.45, I'll sleep some more till 7.45.

Strangely, for the past few weeks, I've been setting my normal alarm clock to 7.20 and my phone to 7.40, but the normal alarm clock rings at 7.50. This makes me slightly late and got me baffled. Did I wake up and sleep back? Or is the alarm spoilt? So for the past 2 days, I adjusted the normal alarm clock to ring at 7.00 and it rang at 7.30. I'm very certain now that my alarm clock is not in sync with the time it’s displaying.

I need this guy to help me fix my clock

And perhaps he could sell me one of this

As long as he doesnt eat my brains... :P

Project Outing

2007-05-17T10:46:00.000+08:00

On the 15th of May, Tuesday night, my project had a project outing in 1U. The total turn out were 32 people including our Accenture team and the Maxis employees. The plan was to have dinner at Italianies and later have 2 games of bowling. The overall budget allocated was RM1500.

In dinner, we had 2 tables to accommodate 16 people each and we each have 8 dishes (4 pastas, 4 pizzas). However due to the fact that there is a vegetarian and someone not being able to eat beef, none of the dishes have beef in it and many were just vegetarian while some have chickens in it. Oh well, it’s still better than nothing. The final pasta which is the carbonara was the best of all. It’s filling and just very nice. Haha!

Off to bowling we went. The organizer said something about a gift for the best team as well as a gift for the best male player as well as be female player. We had about 8 lanes with 4 people per lane. My name was on the top of the list for my lane and thus I had to start first.

Having not played for like 3 years or so (last played was in Monash first year). So it started with my usual strategy which is to start from the right and bowl the ball to the middle. I decided to use this strategy after looking at those animations on the screen where there is this arrow pointing to the pins as to how it should be hit. I noticed that the arrow is always at an angle to hit the head pin. If you throw the ball straight from the middle and hit the headpin straight, odds are that you will get a split or what I call a goal post. It will be left with 2 pins with 1 on each side.

So if the ball comes from the right to the middle, its heading to the left and if it hits the head pin, chances are that all will fall. If not it will bring down 9 and remain 1 at the most corner of the lane. The problem is that I can't really aim it that well and even though I start from the right, it can sometimes go too much to the left or sometimes just go straight and I will get either 1 pin or 3 pins. Not the result I hope for.

However that night was pretty good for me. In the 2 games, I had a total of 4 strikes and a spare while the rest is about 7-9 pins. The score for the first game was 103 and the second 124 bringing the total to 227 in 2 games. This is actually the few times I crossed 100. Obviously I did not get any gifts/prize as I'm not the best there nor did I help my team much in achieving the best team score. But it’s still a personal high score for me. It was good... :)

Respect or n00b?

2007-05-11T01:41:00.000+08:00

I like to live my principles although there are many situations in life where you would have to cross the boundaries and compromise less you be called a wimp or n00b. Hence this is the case for me lately. My principles tells me that I should not be caught in a situation where I'll be alone with a member of the opposite sex. Be it for a meal together or even a car ride together.

My belief is that if I were to adhere to this principle, I'm showing respect for the other party by not compromising each other's feelings and remain professional. Cause many things could happen when 2 members of the opposite sex are placed together. In the lustful world today, even 6 graders could have sex in school what more adults. One thing could lead to another and before you know, you're in too deep. So it is imperative that one should not be caught in a situation like that. Why arouse temptation when it is not called for?

However, many people see this as a sign of wimpyness or not 1337 H4x0r (aka n00b). They could argue that what the heck will happen in that short time spent together? And if one party already has a partner already, it should not happen.

This is why I'm opening the question to you all. Being Uber 1337 H4x0r, I can't be seen a n00b. So the question is this: does this principle show respect for the opposite sex or does it show a sign of a wimp? Would love to hear all your comments.

Wrong Usages for Things Created...

2007-05-07T00:25:00.000+08:00

Haha, about a few months ago a friend of mine told me about something he noticed on certain people using certain things. He told me that he noticed that most people use umbrella not when its raining but when its shining brightly. I belive we've all been taught from young even at kindergardens that umbrella is used for the rain.

Something like this

Ok I'm quite sure most people know where that picture came from. Haha. Anyway back to the point, from there I noticed that there are many things we use but its not originally meant to do. I came out with a list and here goes:

Newspaper is used for shielding oneself from the rain (note the irony of people using newspaper instead of an umbrella)
Fans are used to dry clothes
TV is for console games like PS3, XBox 360 and Wii
Lights are used to scare off robbers

I know that there are many more to add to the list, but this is all I can think off at the moment. Hehe.. Do comment on any things you noticed about people using various things for doing things its not meant to originally do.

And My Heart Burns...

2007-04-30T00:38:00.000+08:00

The past few weeks has been quite crappy for me. I tried to set things right with God and for the first few weeks, it was great. Some might have noticed a change in my character and said that it was good. However, since 2 weeks ago, I changed back to my old self where I'm quick to anger and easily annoyed.

At first, I blamed it on having not enough sleep as the work demand got more and more. But its actually because I stopped wanting to seek help from God and decided to do things my own way. I've been trying to come back but I keep falling. Sigh. Definitely need lots of prayer and help...

On a side note, I'm now assigned to Maxis at Technology Park Malaysia. So now I have to drive down to Bukit Jalil everyday. The distance and the working condition of not ending early will make it difficult to go to Flare and CG which is on Monday and Friday. The jam is quite random as its affected by weather, time and accidents so my trip down or back could take within 12 minutes to like an hour.

Anyway, my latest MSN personalized message is obtained from the song pasted onto this screen. So don't come asking who I'm longing for. Hehe. In a way it reminds me to not be obsessed with the things of the world and know that God will provide my daily needs.

Delirious - Obsession

What can I do with my obsession?
With the things I cannot seeIs there madness in my being?
Is it wind that blows the trees?
Sometimes you're further than the moon
Sometimes you're closer than my skin
And you surround me like a winter fog
You've come and burned me with a kiss

And my heart burns for you
And my heart burns

And I'm so filthy with my sinI carry pride like a disease
You know I'm stubborn God and I'm longing to be close
You burn me deeper than I know
I feel lonely without hope
I feel desperate without vision
You wrap around me like a winter coat
You come and free me like a bird

And my heart burns for you
And my heart burns for you

Finally, A Move to Blogspot

2007-04-29T23:54:00.000+08:00

Ok, this is soooo lame. After almost 10 years of using yahoo, it failed me. I can't login to the site to update my blog there and so I have to move over to here to blog. Haha. Oh well, at least there's now another site to post advertisements. Haha.

Anyway, I would say that its about time to move over to here. This is because:

Its sooo much easier to update my blog here
Nicer interface
No apparent 4.2Mb bandwidth limit
I think you guys prefer a non-flash site anyway
Save me on the time to do a HTML site. Haha
After using yahoo with a stupid password for 9-10 years, its about time someone hacked it. For what reason? I do not know.

Thats it for now. Have to bring in the tag-board and other goodies.