Tsunami Aftermath

I didn't know that the Tsunami over at the Indian Ocean hit the Malaysian shores till the next day. In fact, I never thought it would ever happened here. I've heard of rare occasions where we felt slight tremors, or hails, but never Tsunami. And I happily walked into the office Monday morning (post Christmas mood) till I saw the headlines of The Star, which then my colleague Yati told me about it.

I was shocked, really. The first person I thought of was my ex-colleague, Emily. She lives in Penang. Frantically SMS-ed her, was so glad to see her online after that! Later that night, heard from sayang that his friend, Leong was already in Banda Aceh on Monday morning itself to help out. Apparently, he was the first medic doctor who arrived there under Mercy Malaysia and he appeared on CNN. According to him, it was a total chaos there.. Not enough water, not enough food, not enough medicine.. I just couldn't help but to pray for them.. Daddy went to the Maha Vihara Temple on our behalfs to donate $$ and some of our clothes for the Sri Lankan victims. It may not be much, but I hope it will help them one way or another.

It reminded me of a song we sang during our PBSM days way back in primary school. It was for the Child Abuse campaign back then, but I guess, it is still applicable for incidents like these.. Hopefully everyone would just stop pointing fingers at each other, but put the effort to make this world a better place instead.

Ingin ku nyanyikan
Sebuah harapan
Sebagai pesanan
Ager berkesan di hatimu

Wahai anak dunia
Mari kita berdoa
Untuk sebuah dunia
Yang damai sejahtera

Walaupun kemarau
Tidurmu meracau
Bangunlah kemudian
Bersihkan hitam di kakimu

Wahai anak dunia
Mari kita bersama
Berkumpul bermuhibbah
Lupakan beza rupa

Di mana kau ada
Bumi tetap sama
Langit biru indah
Bukankah semua milik kita

Wahai anak dunia
Mari kita berikrar
Esok kita membina
Dunia yang lebih sempurna.

~~ Ruhil - Buat Anak Dunia ~~

Revolving Christmas

Christmas is always a sentimental and romantic celebration. Last minute gift-shopping for loved ones. Christmas songs being played over the air. Decorations and bright lights hanging everywhere. Family dinners to make the picture perfect.

We had that. Bel's bf, Kenny came down from Hong Kong yesterday for the weekend. We took that opportunity to go for the Christmas buffet dinner over at the Seri Angkasa Revolving Restaurant in KL Tower. It was a lovely restaurant. There were tables for two by the window glasses, overseeing the whole city as the tower revolves. Definitely the most romantic place in Malaysia. Hint for guyz who want to propose to their gfs, or at least, to make an impression to their ladies on their first dates. *wink* Although, it can be a rather expensive one.. It costs at least 90 bux per person on Christmas!

Bird's eye view of KL

Don't worry about the $$, the setting was lovely (Christmas trees and decorations every where), the buffet was marvellously yummy, especially the desserts... Creme brulee.. Caramel pudding.. Hehe.. I'm a bigger fan of the desserts rather than the food, actually. ;) After a round of Christmas songs, there was a live solo, singing lovey-dovey songs (like "Wonderful Tonight" and "Forever Love") as he plays the piano. How romantic can this NOT be?

With fluffy Santa Claus

And before we left, a complete family photo to remember the night...

From L-R: Sayang, me, Daddy, Mummy, Bel, Kenny

Lovely... Absolutely lovely... Merry Christmas. :)

Opening the Wine Bottle

A pre-Christmas "humour" (if not, a lame one)..

What happens if the R&D dept receives a hamper and there were no bosses around?
Answer : Open it.

What happens if the hamper contains a bottle of wine and there's 2 and 1/2 more hours to go till the Christmas weekend?
Answer : Drink it.

What happens if there is no bloody corkscrew around, not within the dept room, nor the pantry, nor any other depts in other buildings?
Answer : Just do it (the typical engineer way).

How?
Answer : Get 2 long screws, 1 screwdriver (or testpen), 1 pair of pliers, 2-3 pairs of hands, and the rest as cheerleaders. Drill the screws deep into the cork. 1 pair of hands use the pliers to pull the screws out (hence, pulling the cork out) whereas the other 1-2 pairs of hands hold the bottle. Pull as hard as you can get, and *wah lah*, the cork is out.

The cork
Like I said, typical R&D engineers' way to open a wine bottle without a corkscrew. Hehe..

Merry Christmas!

It's Christmas Eve and despite being a Christian company, they're not letting us off early today. :( Oh well... Am blasting Billy Gilman's "Jingle Bell Rock" now. I don't care if anyone's gonna be mad about it! It's Christmas Eve!!

I've always loved Christmas rather than CNY. CNYs are mainly "dong dong chang" and there's always the expectations of giving angpaus, exchanging oranges and all. No doubt, I'm not exactly a Christian.. But somehow there's something melancholy about Christmas - the Christmas tree, carols, bright lights and cottony snow. Even the songs are sentimental. No expectations whatsoever, but merely the companionship of family and friends. I miss the days when I used to attend Sunday School, and we would go around the nearby housing area singing carols while holding lit candles.. That was, what, almost 15 years ago.

My family is definitely not Christians, but we do put up Christmas tree every year and decorate it with colourful ornaments, bells and candy sticks. Plus, our tree is the fibre optic one which looks like this, well not exactly, something like that. Will take a snapshot of the tree later.. I would try to buy them Christmas gifts and we would go for Christmas dinners, just the four of us.

This year's Christmas, I got to dress up as Santa Rina for my company's Annual cum Christmas Dinner. It was fun "Ho ho ho"-ing at my colleagues and distributing gifts with another colleague, Santa Paul. Although we were all required to bring a gift worth at least 10 bux, it was nice to see their excited eyes as they select their gifts. Yeah, I let them choose their own gifts (they suka big one, then take the big one lor). We played games, sang carols, performed a comedy skit ("The Elid Story") and had lucky draw. I hope everyone had fun there.

As for my family, Bel's bf Kenny is down from Hong Kong for a short visit. This year, it's gonna be the 6 of us having our Christmas dinner in KL Tower. Hopefully the sky is clear tomorrow night and we'll get to see some fireworks. :)

"And so I'm offering this simple phrase
For kids from one to ninety-two
Although it's been said, many times, many ways
Merry Christmas to you"

Here's wishing you a marvellicious Christmas and may you have a much blessed one, surrounded with loads of love, joy, and don't forget this, as I quote Sir Cliff Richard, that Christmas is "a time for giving, a time for getting, a time for forgiving, and for forgetting".

Merry Christmas. *Hugz*

Anyone Feeling Like This?

Got this through my colleague, Swee Ling..

"I WANNA GO ON HOLIDAY NOW!!!"



Hehe.. I'm already on the holiday mood.. Are you?

Shaolin Kung Fu Masters Return

I went for this last night!! Sayang got the 70 bux tickets from his colleague. It started at 8pm, we were late and I guess we'd pretty much missed the lion dance. His colleague managed to get us seats near theirs. The stadium was awfully packed, probably coz they only perform for the past 2 nights?

The exponents were really superb! They had group demonstrations for animal styles and drunken fist, spears on the throat, knives on the abdomen, etc. I particularly was looking forward to the needle piercing through the glass pane act. The practitioner was supposed to use Qi Gong to pierce the glass pane with a needle and burst the balloon at the other side of the pane. He took a few tries and in the end, managed to pierce the pane, but he did not burst the balloon. Still.. It was a superb try. Another practitioner managed to push a van by using a spear against the throat. It looked sooooooo painful to me, imagine having the pointy tip over at your throat, the van in front of you, pushing the van backwards and therefore, pushing the spear deeper onto the throat. But he made it feel like nothing only! *Gasp*

Oh, there was this other fascinating act - Log ramming against the abdomen. They asked the audience to go onto the stage and hit the practitioner's abdomen. Most of the ppl that went up were kids. Hehe.. One kid kept wanting to hit, most of them left with the look on the face, telling us that their fists hurt, and there were some adults showing off kung fu style lar, taekwando style lar, and whatever style.. Just to hit on the abdomen. Hilarious!

Managed to buy a copy of the Shaolin CD from one of the exponents. 40 bux for a 2-hour disc!!! Seems expensive, but then again, nevermind lar... Consider it as a donation to the Tung Shin Hospital lor... We had to leave early though coz sayang was really exhausted, so we missed the closing ceremony. Nevertheless, I had a great time there. Truly wonderful experience. I don't mind going back to watch it the next time they come down. ;)

My Christmas Song Listing

Since Christmas is just around the corner, thought of sharing my Christmas song listing.. Contemporary ones though.. Am gonna play these songs for my company's Christmas dinner on Friday. It's a short list for now, will add more to it later.. Feel free to use the list. ;)

Billy Gilman - Warm And Fuzzy
*NSync - Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire
Backstreet Boys - Christmas Time
Olivia Olson - All I Want For Christmas Is You
Brenda Lee - Rocking Around The Christmas Tree
*NSync - The First Noel
Jewel - Winter Wonderland
Clay Aiken - Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas
Billy Gilman - Jingle Bell Rock
Jackson 5 - Santa Claus Is Coming To Town
Cliff Richard - Mistletoe And Wine
Debbie Gibson - Sleigh Ride
Britney Spears - My Only Wish (This Year)

I'm gonna be playing Christmas songs whole week long over the speakers.. My colleagues will all be sick of them by Friday. Muahahaha...

Baby Andrew Ng's Arrival

A huge shoutout of CONGRATULATIONS to sayang's family on the arrival of Pik Ngan & David's firstborn, baby Andrew. What an "ong" date to be born on.. 12th of December on a lovely Sunday afternoon!! He was born 18 days earlier and until today, the gynae still could not scan for the baby's gender. So you can imagine the whole 9 months of "boy or girl ar?", "I think boy/girl lar", and all the midwives' stories of telling whether it's a boy or a girl. To me, all along I knew it would be a boy, coz I did the pendulum divination thing, and it told me "boy". That said, sayang is now officially a "dai kao fu" (Big Uncle).. Hehe.. I may have been an Auntie years ago - from my many cousins' children.. Err.. Roughly 20 of them now, I think! But then again, they're not directly related to me. So it's different. And I still make all my nieces and nephews call me "Jie Jie". *lol*

Went to Assunta Hospital as soon as we came back from the Sepang Circuit to visit them. Gosh... Baby Andrew is sooooooo cute and he smelled sooooooo nice.... And very active! He has been awfully active since his "womb days".. I have a great feeling that he's gonna be spoiled to bits by everyone - the great grandma, the grandparents and both the uncles. Hehe..

A quick snapshot of baby Andrew, taken by Khai Wah on his T630.. Sayang & I chipped in to buy the pram for him. Oohh.. I can't wait to see him again!!!!

Baby Andrew on the first day of his arrival

AMF Final Day

It was a lovely weather at Sepang today.. Bright and sunny.. That my whole face, neck and hands were flushed red and itchy.. But on a happier note, I brought my camera! Yippeeee! Sean & Jennifer joined us today. We got a much wider range of cars to look at for the Metal Modders ShowOff. I particularly like this BMW.. Apparently the owner is one of Aneh's friend's bf.. According to Aneh, on top of the full specs of the BMW, the owner spent an additional RM 70k just on the modifications. I don't know what did he do (did I mention I'm lousy at cars?), but it's simple and nice and still as classy.

Aneh posing beside the BMW

We saw the 1/10th Radio Control Car Championship as well for both the eletric and the gas categories. My goodness... I was quite fascinated with it. I couldn't even properly control my Audley Mini Cooper RC that goes like, 10 miles/hour, and the RC cars I saw there were speeding like a jet! No photos were taken for this though..

Next up was the SuperCar Display at the Pit Area. Oh wow.... Damn a lot of 'cun' cars.. And since i'm very illiterate on cars, someone kindly please tell me the full model name of the ones below? Anyway, here were some of the nice cars we took..

Ferrari

Lamborghini Murcielago

Zonda, that was used to drive audience with special passes to get a feel of it

There were many more like Lotus, Bently, Maserati, Porsche, etc. And there were other car booth exhibitions like Hyundai, BMW, Nissan, Mazda, etc.. I think this one below is a Satria?

I like the dragon look

No idea what car is this..

.. Nor this.. Took this with sayang though..

Managed to watch the SuperCar Sunday Time Trials at the Circuit.. Just a glimpse (from where I sat) of the cars that were lining up for the Time Trials..

A couple of Ferraris?

And of course, how could I ever miss taking at least a photo of the "power bomb" models?? Here's one of it.. Sorry lar, I sat at the opposite side of the pitlane, so the pic's a bit small to see..

Guyz drooling over them.. Hehe..

Before we left, we stayed for the Babe of the Hour Search. That particular hour, there were about 5 girls from the audience. I figured that the crowd would have voted for the absolutely well-developed girl (suprise, suprise, she is only 16!), but they gave the loudest cheer to another girl who was just clueless and was doing the "Sunday morning walk" (or that's what I thought the emcees mentioned). Justice was done! *smile*

And then we left. 32 bux well worth spent (despite the sunburn!), considering that there's no way I can ever have the $ to get such cars, so being able to see them right in front of my face is my best alternative. ;) At the meantime, I've got to go nurse my aching legs and toes..

Asian Motorsports Festival Weekend

Went to the BF Goodrich AMF at the Sepang F1 Circuit with sayang & Aneh. I'm not very good at cars, but, what the heck, I wanted to see the circuit! *grin* The entrance fee was RM32 per person for 3 days (Fri - Sun). Went to check out the modified cars, the in-car entertainment sets, and ooh... The 'leng luis'. ;)

Managed to watch the Ultimate 1/4 Mile Clash II Finals at the Circuit, saw a BMW skidded towards the corner and hit the wall. Everyone just cheered when the fire engine, ambulance and the tow truck dashed across the circuit. *lol* Good thing the driver wasn't badly injured, but the car had to be towed back to the pitlane.

Too bad I didn't bring a camera along... I must remember to bring it tomorrow!

This Blog

Little did I know that this blog would ever reunite people, but it did.

Over a month ago, someone by the name of Vandna bumped into the blog and saw the name of her long lost friend, Alison on the birthday listing. She e-mailed me for Alison's contact details. Unfortunately I had lost contact with Alison since, *gosh*, we left Assunta 8 years ago. I replied and said that I would try to search for her. I posted messages on the Assunta forums, hoping that someone out there would know her whereabouts.

So yes, that was over a month ago, no news. Nothing. But miracle happened today.. Out of the blue, Alison forwarded me an e-mail! Couldn't even remember giving her my e-mail address at all! Immediately I replied Alison and told her about Vandna's quest and indeed, they knew each other! Woo hoooooo! I gave them each other's e-mail addresses and they're reunited! YAY!!

I know, it's probably nothing to brag about coz, really, I don't think I did any much help there. But it's a nice feeling, knowing that this blog, one way or another, helped two, long lost best friends reunite. :) So here's to Alison & Vandna, may your friendship last forever!!