Collector's Item

We were talking about liquor collection, and mum mentioned she has a bottle of hennesy 30 years old! 30 years?! No joke.. Apparently this is now a collector's item, as this was one of the earlier batches of hennesy produced (according to mum).


The bottle of Hennesy looks nice, and mum was jokingly saying that she wants to auction it off at Christie's. Don't you think it looks a bit like a bottle of soya sauce iso of Hennesy?

Wonder what might be the market value of this bottle of Hennesy? Can you "guesstimate"?

Mood: Silence is not always welcomed..

Me trying out photography shots

Haha. Inspriration struck last night so I experimented with the camera, and the results... ta da!



I know, I know.. don't quit my day job.. but I kinda like the photos..

Mood: Ulcers are killing me, and I am demotivated.. and stressed..

Latest Bridge Score

Hi all,

If you have been following my posts you would know that me and 3 of my close friends meet regularly to play the game of bridge. We are very professional players (by our standard, of course.. haha..), to what extent you may ask. Well, we respect the game and the playing cards so much that we automatically will wipe and clean the table before we place our sacred playing cards on the table. And we try very hard not to stain the cards, we always joke that it's lucky to be our playing cards as we take good care of the cards.

Anyway, as the title suggest, I am here to update the latest bridge score as we near the end of our 2nd "buku 555". Without further ado.. let me present to you the scorecard:

ST - 461

CM - 426

KB - 412

WY - 425

And in case you still have doubts or think that I was joking about the "buku 555", here is a photo of it.. hehe.. :-)

Mood: Headache because of the intense heat outside the office and the freezing temperature inside the office.

We Worry Too Much..

In last week's Sunday mass,
Pastor touched on the topic of human
beings worrying too much.




According to a survey, humans worry about:
40% of things which will never happen
30% of things which happened in the past
12% - I forgot about this one, sorry...
10% - health problems
8% real problems

So according to Pastor, if we can change our attitude and mindset, we would be worrying at least 70% less! Why worry about something which will never happen? Why worry about things which have already happened in the past? True indeed.. but I guess it's easier said than done. I am trying to remind myself not to worry as much, and take each day as it comes, but sometimes the 'what ifs' are too great for me to resist thinking about them.

Don't Worry, Be Happy?

Mood: Sleepy and bored..

No title yet

Haven't thought of a title for this one.

Basically I have a few moments to share, and thought I can quickly do some updates here.

My labs have all been completed! Hooray...! Definitely something to celebrate.. I can look forward to going home at a more reasonable hour now. I remember half way through the lab, we thought that going home at 10pm or 11pm was early. Crazy isn't it? Shows that humans can be "conditioned" to behave or think in a certain way.

No photos to show today because... you guessed it - The camera is not with me, and I blame my recent lack of new posts entirely to the absence of the camera, and the person holding onto the camera.

Alright, nothing much to update except that I will be travelling (for work) alot from June onwards. Looking forward to them!

Api-Api

Do you know what is api api?

Apparently that is the original name of Kota Kinabalu, or in chinese Ya Bi. I never knew that! One of my colleague told me that even Chinese tourist knows about it, what a shame, being a Malaysian and not knowing about it.

So I looked it up in Wikipedia, and true enough it was there. I also found out that KK has a couple of other names besides Kota Kinabalu, Jesselton and Api Api. Let me extract that info and share with you here:

From Wikipedia:

Kota Kinabalu

Original names
Besides Jesselton, there has been a number of other claims as to the original name for Kota Kinabalu. The most popular, as mentioned above, is Api-Api, or sometimes simply Api, which is a Malay word meaning 'Fire'. It was apparently named as such by the mainly Bajau locals to denote the blazing of the British administrative office in Pulau Gaya instigated by Mat Salleh,[11] as well as other blazing incidents normally perpetrated by pirates. There were claims however that it was actually named after a nearby river called Sungai Api-Api. Another theory states that "Api-Api" is the local name of the common Avicennia tree found in abundance around the area.[12] Transliterated into the formal Chinese name of Ya Bi (亚庇 yà bì), the Hakkas here too adopted this name and some still use this name to this day.[13] Besides Api-Api, another suggested historical name was Deasoka, which roughly means "below the coconut tree" in the Bajau language.[12] The Bajau locals purportedly used this name to refer to a village on the southern part of the city which was filled with coconut trees. Another name was Singgah Mata which literally mean "transit eye", but can be loosely translated as meaning "pleasing to the eye". It is a name purportedly given by fishermen from Pulau Gaya referring to the strip of land of what is today Kota Kinabalu city center.[14] Today, all these names have been immortalised into names of streets or buildings around the city. Some examples are: Lintasan Deasoka, Api-Api Centre, Jalan Singgah Mata, and Jesselton Point.

Ah-so-neh... now I know.. You learn something new everyday!

Mood: Good!

Tai Ping Ho Chiak? Not...

Went to this restaurant in Sea Park yesterday night with 3 friends for dinner. It is located opposite the old Ruby Cinema, ame row as the KFC. Restaurant name is Taiping Ho Chiak, literally means Taiping Delicious, or so we thought.


Our unpleasant experience begun with 2 of us arriving first and choosing a 4 person table. The waitress came over and asked if we were ordering rice and dishes, and suggested we move to a much bigger table (enough for 6-8) as it would be more spacious. We were apprehensive about it first, but she said that it's ok since it was a rainy night and there were not many customers around. So we shifted table, and while waiting for our 02 friends to turn up, more patrons turned up. The lady captain came over and asked how many of us and wanted us to shift to a smaller table, I told her in an unfriendly manner that her colleague recommended this table to us. To cut the long story short, we changed to a smaller round table later (which was bigger than the one we first picked out). We got down to ordering our food after settling this issue.


We ordered a set menu for 3, comprising of the brinjal, soya pork and sambal prawn, and added acar and popiah. We also ordered herbal drinks. By this time, the restaurant was full, and crowded. Obviously shortage of manpower, the service level became unbearably slow. Our food took about 40 minutes to arrive, with no cutleries nor rice to go with the dishes. We had to ask for it. Half way through our meal, I thought something was amiss and asked for the menu, true enough, our set was supposed to come with soups but they have forgotten all about it. We highlighted it to them, only then did they bring the soup. Were the food delicious? It's alright, to the point of being so-so only, I mean I wouldn't drive all the way there just to have dinner. When we were almost done with dinner, we realised that our popiah has not arrived and again, had to tell the waiter about it. We wouldn't have missed anything great even if it didn't come because the popiah skin was too thick, and it was kinda bland.



My friends and I decided that we probably wouldn't patronage this restaurant again, not because it was that bad an experience, rather we just felt that we could be treated better elsewhere.

Clockwise from top left: Brinjal, Acar, Soya Pork and Sambal Prawn

Popiah

Taiping Ho Chiak?

Mood: :-)

0 KM to Kuala Lipis??

Have you ever seen something like this?

I was told that the location of Kuala Lipis is at the center point of Peninsular Malaysia, all measurements of distance start from here, hence there is the 0km signage, which is unique to this place. I mean, where else in this world would you find this?

I tried to upload a map of Peninsular Malaysia with Kula Lipis marked, but it was too small, doubt you will be able to see it. You just have to take my word for it, or google it.

Conteng..

I am still trying to decide whether I have mispelled this in Malay. Can't believe my Malay language has deteriorated so much..

Anyway I drooled this last night in the lab when I was bored.. I know it looks like a 3 year old's drawing.. but what the heck? We can have a good laugh at my lack of talent in this area.. if I can draw well, I would have become an artist.. haha..

p/s: Yes, that is Donald Duck on the right there.

Mood: Lousy, too many hands in the pot, spoiling the broth

Outrageous price for a packet of chips

I was at Starbucks today, and I had a frappuccino and a chicken sausage puff for lunch.
I wanted something to munch after having my lunch, and walked over to the counter to browse for items.

I saw some potato chips and grabbed one packet without asking for the price, thinking that it couldn't be more than MYR2-3 (or maybe even MYR4), I got a shock when the cashier told me that it costs MYR6.20 inclusive of tax! Turned out that the Kettle chips costs MYR5.90 per packet and with tax it's MYR6.20. I cancelled my order immediately, there is no way I am paying MYR6.20 for a packet of chips (unless it is Walker's Chips, read earlier blog on " My Favourite Potato Chips" if you are puzzled), I mean, my chicken sausage puff only costs MYR4.80 before tax. Would anybody pay that much to buy Kettle potato chips?

I wouldn't, period.

New Sakura - well worth it

Over the weekend, Abi and I went down to Singapore. We went out to New Sakura with his sister and family to New Sakura for dinner. New Sakura is like Saisaki in Malaysia, or Sakae Sushi but buffet style.


For SGD24.00++ (additional SGD2 for public holidays and weekends), you can eat all you can! The variety is good, and the sashimi is so fresh!


We had a really good time enjoying the food, it was simply fantastic! I highly recommend the place for dinner. Try the durian puffs and the cheese cakes while you are there, fabulous. I can go on and on about the delicious food but I shall not, instead I will post the photos here, you can judge if the food looks nice enough for you to try out the place.


I will definitely go back there the next time I am in Singapore.

Cheese Baked Oyster

Mussels

Herbal Prawn

Durian Puffs

Cheese cake, Layer cake, mango cake, moichi and chocolate

New Sakura restaurant

Mood: Waiting to go home.. tired already..

Turkish Delight 2

If you were reading my previous blog, and thought that 11.30pm was late for leaving the lab, I left at 2.00am and 1.30 am for the next two days. The good news is that that lab has ended, the bad news is that the other lab was extended so it's never over until it's over (will it ever be over?) And there are still more labs to come till early May.. someone help me.. the hours are insane, and the labs are intense.



Oops, I am way off topic, anyway I just wanted to post the photos of more Turkish Delight given to me by my colleague based in Turkey. Yes, the same one who let us tried the earlier Turkish Delight. This one is slightly sweeter, so I like the first one more. Heard that there are many flavours, and pistachio and chocolates are nice! When I do visit Istanbul, I will make it a point to try them.

Someone actually commented that it looks like something which has gone bad.. haha.. think it does look like that in a way, but I assure you that it tasted good and I didn't have any stomach upset. Apparently if you keep it in the fridge, you can store it for 1 year!

Mood: Can't wait to go home..

Turkish Delight

Lab is half way through, last night was the latest where I left work at 11.30pm while my lab members were still hard at work. I felt bad for leaving earlier but I need my sleep, and I saw no reason for me to stay at the lab further since they were basically documenting items into spreadsheets and powerpoint. (ok fine it's just my excuse for wanting to leave..)

Anyway one lab member from Istanbul brought with her some Turkish Delight, and I was pleasantly surprised as we didn't expect it. My cousin was telling me so much about it that I felt privileged to be able to try it in Malaysia. If I do visit Turkey, I would be trying it again because it tasted really nice, not too sweet, just nice. Perfect for a tea time snack or for coffee breaks.

I told my cousin I took a photo of the Turkish Delight and will be posting it on my blog, and she almost wanted to kill me over the phone. I am still doing it.. hehe..

Well, here it is, Turkish Delight.

p/s: cousin, please don't kill me.. hehe.. and thanks to abi who corrected the typo error..

Mood: So sleepy...

Escaping from the 8x5

What's an 8x5 you ask?

It's the small little cubicle which you head to, normally 5 times a week and officially 8 hours a day. Yes, it's your work station, work area, work place, whatever you call it. Why do I call it 8x5? I don't really know the exact measurement of the cubicle, but I just made up the length and width and call it an 8x5. Well, currently I do not favour my 8x5. Actually I don't think it is the cubicle, it's probably more of the nature of work that I am currently handling.

I very nearly ran away from work today, to avoid the task at hand. But I didn't in the end, I stayed put and instead bought a big packet of potato chips to munch while trying to absorb what all my datas are trying to tell me. This diagnosis and prognosis thingy is not easy man...!

Countdown to lab session, 5 days and I've got 4 routes to do. Man this is going to be difficult, and tough.. This is the time to ask for divine intervention and reinforcement.. Help!

Lord, please help me with my data analysis and prognosis and super reading power and microsoft office skills and stamina and.. and.. and...... could you just make the labs disappear instead? Amen...

:-)

Look at those cars!

I was on my way to work this morning, and I was coming to a cross junction with traffic lights. Like a law abiding citizen, I stopped at my junction while waiting for the traffic lights to turn green, before the yellow box. I know I caused some traffic congestion at the back because I didn't move into the yellow box, but hey, I wasn't committing the crime, I was merely following the traffic laws!



Then along came a few cars, which overtook me from my right hand side and went straight into the yellow box! I was quite pissed actually, for one they have cut my queue, and they are now in my way. And it is definitely not fair for all of us who were waiting in line. Luckily I had the camera with me, and I snapped photos of them traffic offenders. I wonder whether these photos are enough to penalise them?

This was the traffic condition at the cross junction. Notice all the cars in the yellow box?

This car cut right in front of me, notice how he is very much in the yellow box? Can you read the number plate? Good....

There were more cars wanting to cut queue (notice the car to my right?) while other more civilised drivers were patiently waiting outside the yellow box (sort of outside lah..)

If you are the car owner featured here, you should be ashamed of yourself. Let's try to be civilised drivers out there shall we?

Mood: Bad.. lab session starting next week, and hearing nothing but bad news..

London Transport Awareness Ad

I got this from my friend's blog, and I thought that this ad is brilliant. Thus I posted it here on my blog.

Do check it out.

http://www.dothetest.co.uk/

Mood: Busy, busy.. and so not looking forward to next week's lab session... :-(

Bridge score!

Haha.. if you are wondering what this is about.. it's about 4 of us friends who are crazy about bridge. We meet about twice a week to play bridge, and we keep a score sheet on the winnings. (yes, we are that crazy about it).

We started playing bridge since June last year, and I am going to announce our scores so far here. Oh dear.. I typed out a table in excel but somehow the table didn't transfer over here well. Guess I will have to type this out.

For year 2007 (June to Dec)
Total number of games played: 1154

Number of wins
ST - 630
CM - 532
KB - 580
WY - 566

For 2008, during the first 3 months of this year, we played 603 games already!
And the scores, thus far, are:

ST - 320
CM - 301
KB - 280
WY - 305

I know it is just a matter of time before CM or WY catches with me on the score, so.. I will treasure the lead while I can.

Bridge is a really addictive game, the only down side is only a maximum of 4 players can play. Actually you can only play when you have 4 players. Funny how bridge is often thought of as "old men"'s game, when it is so challenging and exciting to play. Of course you'd have to have the patience to sit there for a couple of hours to play, chatting nothing but the strategies of the previous game, and how bidding could have been improved with your partner.

I am glad I found 3 other friends with such passion about the game as I do. Let's not let the playing stop.... ever...! (haha.. I can hear someone fainting..)

Caramel Bread Pudding

I made this after the ginger egg pudding as we had some milk left so decided to make the caramel bread pudding.

I will not elaborate on the process. Just to share with you what the end product looked like.

Oh, someone took the camera back from me so I will not be able to snap as many photos of my activities in the coming days.. so.. blame him..

(hint hint: I want the camera back when you are done with it... :-P)

p/s: looking forward to the bridge session tonight!

Ginger Egg Pudding

My plan today is to go pasar tani with mum, buy wall fan for the kitchen, and make ginger egg pudding.

It'd be my first attempt, not sure how it will turn out. As usual, I will try to take some photos of the process and show you the outcome. That's the plan...

Oh, aunty is here. We should get going now..

Ta!



Ok, as promised, here are the ginger egg puddings.. the puddings turned out great! It tasted fantastic as well, but unfortunately, everyone only had stomach for one cup of ginger egg pudding. Luckily I only made one recipe.

Love this art!

Ever heard from "Shui Jing Nei Hua" (Literally translation means Drawing Pictures Inside the Crystal)? Well, It is truly an art in itself, and one that I appreciate and enjoy so much!
I made the discovery during my Jan 08 trip to China, and it was in Nanjing that we saw this form of art. It takes tremendous amount of accuracy and perfect timing, coupled with stable hands and artistic imagination to complete every piece of artwork. I am truly amazed and fascinated by it, and I can stay there and watch the sifu at work the whole day. Unfortunately, because we are on tour so we could only stay a while, but I took quite a fwe photos of the crystal. You will surely be impressed by it.
Here are some of the photos of the crystal:

Notice the detailed artwork? Amazing isn't it?

In the form of teapot

I love them...!

Who is that...?

Who on earth would be wearing such mis-matched shoes?

Haha.. (that's for being too busy to pay attention to me :-p)

Guess who?

This one?

:-p

Pivot Table

Argghhh...! I am doomed...

I have no idea how to use a pivot table and chart, and all my colleagues are pivot experts. Every excel sheet is presented in pivot as there are lots of data, and I am still trying to figure out the "how-tos" of pivot function.

Tried the Help button on Excel, but it's too brief. I need something that will teach me the ABCs of pivot, to hold my hand and guide me through each step of the way. No wonder I saw a book on Pivot on my colleague's desk the other day. Who wouldn't, given the complexity?

I am off to the bookshop to get myself a book on pivot. I think it is a really useful thing to learn.

Ta ta!

My All Time Favourite Potato Chips

Tada...!

The love of my life

This is my favourite potato chips. I adore it, I abdolutely love it.



I started eating it during my uni days in the UK. When I finished my degree, I came back to Malaysia and that was the end of my romantic interlude with Walkers Potato Chips.



Whenever I know of people travelling to the UK, I would plead/ beg/ shed tears (ok lah, I merely had to ask nicely) for them bring back a few packets for me, but alas the supply don't last long.



Through someone, I currently have some on stock and I am very happy..! I have even taken photos of it so that you know exactly what to buy for me should you be in the UK. Remember, I only like the Cheese and Onion flavours, there is the individual mini packet, and there's the 6-in-1 packet. It is easier to carry the 6-in-1 packet (and of course because then I will have more of it.. >_< hehe) so do look out for it.

(right) The 6-in-1 packaging

Ok, bye for now!

Monday morning..

I am not in the mood to work today....

All I can say is, it is very frustrating when you are not in control of things and you have to rely on others' inputs. All you can do it just wait and wait, and hope that they will be able to deliver what you EXPECT them to deliver.

Yes, I am talking about the external consultants. It has been a very frustrating experience so far, and is causing me to have sleepless nights and awful working days.

I really hope that they finally get what we want, and expect and deliver!

Happy Birthday Mummy..!

On this joyous occassion of my mum's birthday, I decided to make her a cake. So I waited till mum woke up in the morning, and asked her what cake would she like me to make.

Once we decided on tiramisu, we then got down to work. I hear you asking "we"? Thought it was supposed to be me making a birthday cake for mum? Well, you have to understand.. mum is er.. not very confident about my baking.. hehe.. *shy* although I HAVE baked a few cakes before. Plus, mum is an expert in the baking department thus she wants to "supervise".

Mum baked the sponge cake base while I made the coffee liquor syrup, mum basically took charge after that. She delegtated jobs to me and efficiently instructed next moves. And voila...!

The cake is basically done, and we are waiting for it to chill. I took a few photos during the process and I will post it here, together with the recipe. I have not tasted the cake thus I do not know if the recipe is a success.

Tiramisu

Ingredients:

Sponge Cake
3 eggs (Grade A)
90 g Castor sugar
90g plain flour, sifted
*If you have sponge mix, you can basically skip the steps above and use the sponge mix to bake the sponge cake instead. Much faster...!

Coffee Liquor Syrup
250ml (1 cuo) boiling water
2tbsp instant coffee
4-5 tbsp sugar
4tbsp Kahlua/ Tia Maria (coffee liqour), optional

Cream Cheese Layer
500g mascarpone or cream cheese
80g castor sugar
120g whipped cream

Garnish
cocoa powder


Method:
1. Sponge Cake: Whisk eggs and sugar till very thick and fluffy. Fold in flour lightly. Pour into a 22gm/ 9" round cake tin and bake at 190C till golden brown (about 20-25 minutes). Remove, leave to cool and cut into small rounds.










2. Coffee liquor syrup: Mix boiling water, instant coffee and sugar till dissolved. Leave to cool and add in Kahlua/ Tia Maria.

3. Cream cheese layer: Beat cream cheese and sugar till light. Add whipped cream and mix well.











4. To assemble: Line serving bowl with 1 small round sponge, sprinkle coffee liqour syrup generously over cake to soak it.

5. Spoon cream layer to cover the sponge cake.
Place another layer of cake on top of cream layer and repeat as before.








6. Finally, sprinkle some cocoa porwer on top of cream layer. Chill in the fridge for at least 3-4 hours before serving as dessert.








7. Decorate as you please (ok, ok, not part of the recipe... I added the sentence..

VOILA!

(The finished product)

I hope the cake taste good, no.., I am SURE it will taste superb! I had fun making tiramisu with mum today. Now you go and try the recipe ok?

Pictures on my blog

Haha.. I am having so much fun adding pictures to my blog I can't stop!



I have added a few more pictures to my previous posts, so do take a look and see if it transformed the posts. I think the pictures are incredible, and have done wonders to inject life and emotions to my blog.



Why didn't I do it earlier.....? hmm... alright, shall strive to do so from now on..

Moody morning..

Why will a good gesture not get you any appreciation?

In all my interations with people, I have always been happy when I managed to help, give a little nudge in their way, give pointers, advise, counselling etc.. but why I don't get it this time round?

Is it because I am asking for too much? Or is a simple word of thanks enough?

What could have made things very sweet was a simple "thank you xxxx".

I guess different people have different views of what appreciation should be.

Oh well.. never mind about that. Shadn't bore you with my sob stories. I am gonna try and inject life into my blog by inserting nice photos! Still can't bring myself to insert photos with me in it (you know lah... internet security is still of a concern) so for now, you will see random photos (which I think are nice) on my blog!

Have a nice day...!

p/s: Cheers to the weekend..

Untitled Post

I will call it untitled post as I don't know what I am going to blab about here.

I am unhappy when you are unreasonable.
I am unahppy when you are unappreciative.
I am unhappy when you raise your voice.
I am unhappy when you argue in "I wanna win" mode.
I am unhappy when you do not take note or take actions on things I have mentioned.
I am unhappy when you feel that my comments are not good enough for you.

I am happy, when you understand what I am trying to get to you.
I am happy, when you realise that I only want to help.
I am happy, when you know that I just want to tell you my feelings, and not pick fights.
I am happy, when you take heed of my advise.
I am happy, when we do not argue.
I am happy, when you are happy.

Quarter Life crisis

Is there such thing as quarter life crisis? A couple of years ago, a few colleagues were discussing about it and I couldn't understand how people so young can have quarter life crisis and what it's all about. Thought only middle age people have mid life crisis!

As I progress further in my career (and age), I slowly came to realise what they mean by having a quarter life crisis. You are in your thirties (or nearing), you are nowhere near where you wanted to be, all those years of dreaming to be rich by thirty or fourty is now haunting you and you suddenly realise, horror of horror, that you might need to work till retirement and still not have enough money to live comfortably after retirement! You begin to "think of the future", probably look for other jobs or look for opportunities to start your own business. That is the problem actually.. when you start to think about this, you start to know that you do not have enough capital to start a business (or you think you do but after doing the maths become incresingly depressed that you are not as well doing as you think you are), but you really do not work for someone anymore.

I am not sure if this is just a passing phase or increasingly becoming a trend. But many of my friends approaching thirties or in their early thirties are not happy with their jobs. I have heard of quite a few who wants to start their own business because they do not want to work for people anymore, they want to be their own boss, dictate their own ways and (drumroll....tada..) become rich. Not as easy as it sounds though, I know some friends running their own business and they are under huge amount of pressures whenever business are slow. Cashflow is a very important word for them..

Sigh... such is the life of a working adult? Is there no way out of this? When can one get out of the rat race and enjoy what they do? I think I am coming to a stage whereby I am willing to forego a higher pay for better quality working life, i.e. get paid less but do something less stressful and have more personal time. Wouldn't you?

Accept Grow-A-Gift & Read Message

Those who are familiar with Facebook will know what accept Grow-A-Gift is. But the surprise was that it came with this poem.
Thought it's a lovely poem sent to me that I couldn't resist posting it up.

I Love you with my pure heart....
I Care for you with all my heart....
I Miss you with my true heart....
I will always love you no matter how hard...
I will always keep my promise to you in my heart...
I will always be there for you my sweet heart....
I live for the reason because you are in my heart...
I wish that these phrases will be forever painted in your heart....

Love,
Abi

p/s: Thanks for sending the poem, Abi..