Void

U ever heard about black hole? That's what I am feeling right now. Big void but I am not sure why. Feeling down but can't really explain. I think I am playing self-blame game now. Sigh! I hate this feeling. I don't even have the mood to post on my Bangkok experience.

One thing I really can't understand is, why can't I really smile in office? Why must I turn very serious at work? Can't help it. Seemed like double personality ya, serious at work and playful. Oh, I also don't want to face people with very serious face but it's on auto mode. No matter how hard I tried, in the end it still goes back to square one. Sigh!

I just miss Bangkok this moment. I miss the lotus pond of my hotel lobby. I miss the 'close to nature' feel. I feel like just sitting quietly doing nothing, perhaps gazing at the starry night while getting some mosquito bites on and off (well.... perhaps not the mosquito bites).

flowers in the hotel lobby toilet

the lotus pond in my hotel lobby

at benjasiri park a.k.a queen's park

we have these in the hotel's lotus pond too, this was taken in front of a bank

U will know what I mean when u see these pictures below. I wanna become like this when I return to office. Why can't I? Sigh! Heavy responsibility? Nah, all this while I have been handling the same responsibility and obligation. No one to push me around? Nah, I can still push myself. I think I am blaming myself.

acting like a gangster, squatting by such a beautiful pot of flowers, ironic isn't it?

ya, this is what i need. a loving smile!

'fragile like a tofu' baby

Now not even the kids at my home can cheer my up currently. Sigh! I need to regain my positive energy fast!

p/s: I think to write a post without photo is so so much faster and hassle-free!

MIA for almost a MONTH

MIA for a month (MIA stands for Missing In Action). Where have I been to? To the City of Angels, or more commonly known as Bangkok. I knew many new friends and definitely have so much fun there. Don't get me wrong, I went there for training purpose, not for vacation ok? 3 weeks is too short for the training but at least, I get the chance to go there. So I shall count my blessings.

There are some sweet and sour moments while being there, but most of them are sweet memories (thank God!). From having diarrhea to visiting places which I definitely love, from massage to shopping, you bet I am having my fun there. But one thing for sure, I did miss M'sia food as most Thai food esp. the hawker food is either sweet or spicy. I actually prefer some saltiness in the taste.

Imagine my reaction when I ate a sweet char koay teow (they call it pad thai). Back in M'sia it's more towards salty rather than sweet. Mr Roy, our trainer mentioned that we must have stainless steel stomach to take the roadside hawker food. I agree with him but some of the roadside stall is too tempting to bother about that. Hence, my 2-3 times experience of stomach upsets.

I even had fever during my first Friday there. Haha! Now that I come to think about it, there are many more stories I would like to share. Some funny ones, some spooky ones. So stay tuned for further updates in Aug then. I shall post one by one. In fact, I had already lined up the stories I wanted to write about. I thought I will miss Bangkok a lot when I come back to M'sia.

But I realized that I am still OK with it. Instead, I keep on seeing my UFM friends posting the 'miss Bangkok' phrase. I like this experience and I am glad that I am going over to Bangkok again in October.

No More Friendster For Me

Shit! Lucky I transferred my blog over here. Last few weeks I heard that Friendster is going to change to a new face and some features including the blog is going to be deleted off just like that. I didn't know when but boy, am I glad that I take an action.

I signed in into Friendster just now, with the intention to post one final post to inform that I will change blog address, and I got the shock when I saw that Friendster really changed into a new face, dedicated more to games now rather than a social networking site.

I am not frustrated because Friendster is changing face. Who uses Friendster nowadays anyway? I care because my blog is there and I SUPER LIKE the design layout. The only reason I use Friendster would be solely due to the blog alone. Now it's no longer there.

There are actually 2 main reasons I changed to this blog:

a) I heard about Friendster going to delete off the Friendster blog.

b) I had been getting quite some spam comments lately. Looks genuine but somehow they really look like spam. Now I don't have to worry anymore.

Now I guess I had to notify some my friends who had been following my Friendster blogs all this while. But then, how to tell them? It would be weird to inform them and the reaction u got will be something like: "I couldn't even care less." Awkward huh?

I think I will inform only a few close friends. That is more than enough I guess.

Mixed feelings again

Quite overwhelmed currently. Gonna be off to Bangkok this Sunday yet there is still lots of things to settle here. Lucky my colleagues are not bad and can help to follow up. Hopefully nothing serious gonna happen during the 3 weeks I am not there. I hate it when I feel helpless, just like what I am feeling currently.

Overall baking lab progress is good, though there seemed to be some hiccup in the beginning. Nevertheless, I think I need to improve my EQ and the way I communicate with my staff. Bad habits die hard. I am used to be very serious at work and tend to pull up a serious face most of the time. Well, I guess I won't be happy if my boss were like that. I keep on reminding myself but.... the rest is history.

Today we did series of end product testing, namely roti canai, bread, steamed bun and noodles. Everyone was excited especially during the roti canai dough throwing session. Not an easy task and I do salute the mamak stall guys who make roti canai throwing looks like a super-duper easy task. Bravo to them!

The best part was when we fried the roti canai and almost 30% of the staff get to taste it. Everyone was excited and happy with the 'first production' of the baking lab. Even the boss was feeling a bit excited and awkward at the same time. I had been a bit rough with the boss recently, now is the time to patch up I guess....

Yesterday gathered with Turtle group (told ya I am very fascinated with turtle, my Turtle group is the living proof) and overall it feels nice (though tired) to be able to meet up again since we are in the northern and central region. Met Ah Hong, ZN's soon-to-be hubby. Niu announced to us that she is getting registered in Sept in HK. Congratulation ZN!

None of us planned to fly over to HK for her ROM but we did promised to attend her wedding in HK 2 years later. Sure la, such a big day for her! We also planned a farewell gathering for ZN in Aug before she depart to HK for good. So happy for her. She knows what she wants and oh, she is going to further her study for Master in Education. Really glad for her.

All the best to u, ZN! Turtle group will love u forever.

My fascination with turtles

Today I went to Pantai Keracut for hiking with my fellow friends. And a trip to Keracut is never complete without visiting the so-called turtle sanctuary. Took quite some photos about turtles, which prompted me to write this post.

See? One look at the fence is sufficient to tell u that u have reached the turtle sanctuary, and I super love this fence.

These are erected to prevent the newly-hatched turtles from heading straight to the sea.

 

Each 'cage' is clearly identified on the laying date of the eggs etc, to clearly define each batch of hatched turtles.

Obviously that's not me taking the photo :)

There are quite a few of those 'cages'.

There was a demo on how the baby turtles crawl out from the hatched eggs, up to the surface. We were told that the temperature of the sand is imperative. If the temperate is not suitable, the baby turtles could even die during their quest to the surface.

Hatched baby turtles will be kept in a small container in the sanctuary for 1-2 weeks time before they are being released into the sea.

Those who know me well will know that I really like turtles. Why? Cos they are cute. And actually the only animal which I can draw decently where others can recognize easily is turtle. So that's why I like it so much. Even my email and my blog has the word 'turtle' in it. And oh... I always ask friends to get me something to do with turtles when they are travelling elsewhere.

See? Thus far, these are the turtles I managed to collect, by requesting my friends to buy for me when they travel out-station, only when they asked "What do you want?" of course. Oh ok, even when my close friends didn't ask, I will put up the request if they go to beaches, cos I know it would be easy to find there. But u know what is more fun? When my friends buy for me when I least expect it. E.g. Mei Yong, she took her own initiative to buy turtle necklace and turtle key-chain when she went to Malacca and Sarawak previously. Thanks a lot, Mei Yong!

#111 - Happy Father's Day, Daddy!

18.06.2011

Tmrw is Father’s Day. Every 3rd Sunday of June is a Father’s Day. Most families will either be busy celebrating it or won’t bother about it. As for me, I won’t have the chance to celebrate, not even once. When dad was here, we didn’t really bother to celebrate cos I was thinking: “I can celebrate it once I started working.”

In the end, who knows, God has better plan for him. Dad left us when I was in my first year in university. It came as a surprise to us but at least it’s comforting to know that at least he didn’t suffer for long and the moment just before his departure, he was actually having the fun of his life, laughing his heart out.

I still rmber the moment when sis bought him a Father’s Day cake when she was staying outside last time. It was not really a celebration, sis jz bought the cake and Dad happily cut it. That’s one of the rare moments in which Dad wasn’t able to contain his excitement. Well, we are never an “expressive” kind of family, so we don’t really spill out our emotions easily. I do miss my Dad.

Despite the “mouth wars” we used to have back then, I know that it was meant as part of our communication, especially since I was still very ‘green’ that time. Sure sure, young blood tends to lost control of their emotions or easily felt challenged back then.

I miss Dad’s laughter. Don’t know why, he always laugh no matter what, sometimes up to the point where I will think: “Is Dad out of his mind? What is there to be laughed at actually?”. But later on, I realized that it’s part of him. Everyone was so used to his signature loud roaring laugh, up to the point that even a few weeks after Dad’s departure, some customers still asked us about Dad’s whereabouts.

Everyone called him 开心果, though he can be quite fierce at times. One thing I really admire about him was that he seemed to be able to contain his anger quite well. He found his way to walk away when he was angered, which made me felt bad cos it seemed like we were bullying him. Sorry Dad!

Nothing much to write here. Whatever had happened had already happened. Whichever wasn’t being expressed would remain being unexpressed. I hope Dad is living good where ever he is now. I know he would look after us from he was to the best he could. Dad, I am not a good daughter but it’s all a thing in the past. Don’t worry, we will try to take care of Mom to the best we can.

HAPPY FATHER’S DAY, DADDY!!!

Comment:

> 19.06.2011 (leeping)

He is always with u

#110 - The Hints P Had Always Wanted To Know About

14.06.2011

This post is specially dedicated to P. She requested to know before this but I was lazy to tell her then. So now I am finding some time to translate it, with the help of my Chinese-educated colleagues (to tell me the pin yin of some Chinese characters) and Google translator (to translate the Chinese characters into English). Few weeks back, I was caught in the middle of a major decision-making and I had actually resorted to ask for some hints from the temple. Judge me all u want but I did it anyway. I asked two questions, one for career, one for love. How do I do it?

First, take a container full of long sticks (made of either bamboo or plastic) with numbers engraved on them. Then squat down, and ask the questions silently and sincerely in your mind, then start to shake the containers. It takes time, but sooner or later a stick will fall out from the container. Pick it up. There is another red circular probe, with bottom surface being flat but the top surface being concaved upwards.

Just imagine something like a ‘pong piah’ biscuit, only that the probe was split into halves, so u get two half-circles. Hokkien called this as ‘buak pui’. U are supposed to pick it up, pray and ask whether this is the stick meant to answer your query, then throw it on the floor. If both show same surface, i.e. flat vs flat or concaved vs concaved, then it’s a NO. If it’s flat vs concaved, then it’s a YES. Hokkien called this ’seng pui’.

If yes, then only u memorise or jot down the number engraved on the stick. Some said that once u get a NO, then u mz reshake the container to get another stick while some said that u have 3 chances to ‘buak pui’, failing upon which u have to request for another stick. Luckily I got YES at the first throw for both queries I asked. Then proceed to the counter, recite the number and u will be given papers (hints, Chinese called them as ‘qian’) with the specific number u obtained. I got number 47 for career and 51 for love.

MY told me that different temple actually has different hints associated with different numbers. Hence, if u want to check out what the hint says from the Internet, u need to know which temple did u ask the hint from. Nowadays, everything also so hi-tech, can even check hints from Internet. Who would have thought of that back then? But I was lucky cos my sis and mom both knew how to interpret the hints.

Each hint will have a title on top which actually relates to a story. Hence, usually when u see the title, you would have known whether the hint is good or bad. Of course there is further explanation below the title as not everyone will know the story behind the title. China has lots of stories which dates back to at least few hundred years, mind you! It’s quite impossible for u to know all, even for the Chinese-eds, let alone for bananas or papayas like me.

Thus usually we will always read the explanation given below the title to further understand the nature of the hint. So to make it easy, it’s either u get a good hint or a bad hint.

For career, the hint title that I got was 姜女哭到长城。The explanation: 一重江水一重山， 此去崎岖路又艰，任是改求终不过，是非终久未能安。解曰：宅平病延，某难处讼不利。

This is the translation obtained from Google Translate which wasn’t perfect, but I believe one look at this translation, will tell that it’s a very bad omen: “Jiangnv cry to the Great Wall. A heavy weight of a mountain river, the rugged road is difficult to, any request is to change the end, however, not safe non-thy latter end. Solutions said: House ping disease extension, a certain difficulty of First Instance of the disadvantaged.”

Confused? From what I understand was that, there wil be many  obstacles (explained by the water and the mountain to cross), paths which are hard to cross, and unhealthy gossips. P, pls correct me if I am wrong. U be my Mandarin teacher pls. When I got this hint, I was actually quite adamant to stay put with my decision despite the bad omen. But, when I still felt uneasy just the day before I was supposed to give the final answer, I broke down due to pressure and mom decided to ask for another hint for me. It was that hint which further strengthened my mind to reject the offer.

If the hint above was bad, this one is even worse: 龙虎昆深山。I didn’t have the explanation as the hint was with mom. But basically it says that “dragon and tiger are trapped in a mountain”. Now that’s a very bad omen. For Chinese, we always associate dragon and tiger with strength, mightiness and power. Entrapped in a mountain will portray that both these powerful animals are helpless. I still rmber one of the explanation which says “neither here nor there”. That is good enough for me to reject the offer adamantly. I am not a superstitious person but I do believe that we should have some faith or belief in something. It is this faith which keeps us going in times of adversity, along with other factors of course!

For love, it’s a total opposite. Meaning I got a very good hint: xi交葵na绣球。(sorry, I couldn’t find the word based on my colleague’s pronounciation, so I jz used the pin yin, easier). The explanation: 于今此景正当时，看看欲吐百花魁，若能遇得春色到，一洗清吉脱尘埃。 解曰：某望成百事吉，宅利婚就。

From Google Translate: “Today this scene is the time to see flowers Kui Yu Tu, if the event was Spring into a guitar off the dust cleared. Solutions said: a look into the Pepsi Kyrgyzstan, home to facilitate marriage.” I don’t know how to explain this sentence by sentence as I don’t even understand one bit of it. But suffice to know that is a super good hint for love.

‘Xiu qiu’ is actually related to wedding. If u watched old Chinese drama, u will see that the groom will usually wear black samfu with red trousers with a big red flower in the middle of his chest. That’s the xiu qiu. Also, there was this culture last time where bachelors will compete with each other to grab a rattan ball in order to win the heart of a lady. The lucky guy who managed to get hold of the ball will marry the lady.

Very good hint huh? Wuhoo, felt excited already! But… I am still wondering actually, hmm… where is my Prince Charming?

p/s: Melvin, if u are reading this, please take the trouble to explain it to me, via email. Thanks!

#109 - My Own World

10.06.2011

Awkward… close yet not close. Familiar yet so distant. It’s a weird position to be in. Which somehow makes me retreat back into my previous world. It’s heavenly when u manage to find some leisure time to catch up with some readings. The pleasure and the isolation u felt while indulging in ur own world, couldn’t simply be described through words. I admit I am a bit of an introvert sometimes. As it goes, I do feel that I should treasure this moment as I wouldn’t know what might come next for me.

The other day WY analysed and told me, I am the type of person who needs some private moment to myself rather than mixing with ppl all the time. Sociable but introvert. I strongly agree. WY is the type who likes to mingle around with others and wouldn’t mind if there is little time left to herself. I can’t. I like to sometimes contemplate in silence, doing whatever I want to, in a split second. That is why sometimes I will blog that I feel like walking by the seaside etc. I know, I know, I am weird! That, I admit too. 

I do need to feel satisfied, of which I don’t feel so currently. Never mind, I know I will be able to source for satisfaction sooner or later. The easiest way for me is through books and sports. I wouldn’t want to bother about other stuff anymore… I want to retreat into my own sweet world, a world of my own, couped up in my own comfort. It feels nice when u don’t have to bother with whatever is happening out there. I want to keep an eye shut and pretend that nothing had happened at all.

Comment:

> 12.06.2011 (leeping)

i want to watch super 8 ….

 

> 14.06.2011 (ecodiaxia)

I find myself coming to your blog more and more often to the point where my visits are almost daily now!

 

> 14.06.2011 (ecodiaxia)

I just sent this post to a bunch of my friends as I agree with most of what you’re saying here and the way you’ve presented it is awesome.

#108 - Empty Shell

10.06.2011

Now I have reached the path where I am feeling contented yet there seemed to be an empty shell waiting to be filled up. Hmm, I don’t think this is what I want. Yes, I am being very diligent to read TIME magazine after work but somehow I think I placed my priority in the wrong place. Instead of TIME magazine, I should concentrate on technical reading since that’s the only way I can increase my self-worth to my organization and climb up the career ladder faster.

Action speaks louder than words. I still can’t make myself to do technical reading. Humans will always spin out thousands of excuses when they don’t feel like doing it. I am a good example. Sigh! Couldn’t help it. When I subscribed I didn’t really notice that it’s a weekly subscription for TIME magazine. Hence, I have quite a backlog of TIME magazine to catch up with and it is really worth the time reading. I learned more about international news through TIME.

If only I can devote such an enthusiasm to the technical reading which is eagerly waiting for me. Perhaps one of the reason would be that I didn’t pay for the technical books. Lame! Speaking of which, I no longer visit bookstore as frequent as previous time. One, I seldom went for shopping with my friends (hence, less visit to bookstores in the mall) and second, I know I can’t resist the temptation to buy fictions. I had more than enough fictions in my cupboard waiting for me to read.

Recently, I read about peak performance fitness program. It is something like a repetition of fast and slow intensity for whatever exercise program u have. E.g. start with a 3 min warm up, then do 1 min sprinting, followed by 3 min slow jog. Repeat the sprinting and slow jogging for about 8 times, then warm down for 2 min. For new beginners, it is recommended to do 3 sets of repetition so as not to push urself too much. Sounds easy? It is very tiring! I didn’t try it though. I am more of a slow exercise type of person.

It was said that 20 min of such a program beats a 1 hour jog in terms of calories burnt and the metabolic rate is still high even after 8 hours. The theory behind it was that humans have slow muscle, medium muscle and fast muscle. Perhaps the term I used is wrong, but just assume I am explaining in laymen’s term. We always exercise and trained our low muscle in daily activities and sports, leaving fast muscle under-trained.

In fact it’s the fast muscle which should be trained if we want to burn calories fast. Just imagine this: a marathon runner and a sprinter. U can see that though marathon runner has toned muscles, they can never achieve the body figure as a sprinter. That’s one easy example to describe the difference between working out the fast and slow muscle. Not sure if anyone reading this will understand but I had tried my best to explain.

I don’t think I will try this out but I will surely keep this in mind. As the age gets older, metabolism rate tends to get lower but my appetite tends to grow bigger. Can’t help it, I tend to take huge servings of rice, no matter how I tried to remind myself to reduce my carbohydrate intake. I had this ‘unspoken love’ for rice. One day without rice and I will feel as if I haven’t taken a proper meal. But at least I tried to exercise at least once a week, either jogging, badminton, hiking or cycling.

Perhaps will resume my yoga lesson in Sept. Yoga really makes me sweat and I feel comfortable after sweating out. But…sure whole body will ache cos my body is quite rigid when it comes to bending especially when it involves the lower part of the body. I am pretty hopeless when it comes to waist downwards, perhaps due to my bad posture. Posture is really important and whenever I saw any young kids hunched, I will always correct their posture.

One thing for sure, after babbling for so much, I still couldn’t figure out what’s the empty shell all about. I am flying to Bangkok in July for training and hence I should be busy with all the preparations in June but here I am still figuring out how to fill up the empty shell. Perhaps I am too lacking in technical knowledge, which makes me feel dissatisfied and insecure? Satisfaction is very important to me. Now I must try to find that SATISFACTION which I am guessing is the source of my empty shell…

#107 - Bitten by Travel Bug

04.06.2011

Couldn’t help it. I am itching for travelling again. But… I vowed not to have any travel out of Malaysia in 2012. So how ah? Maggie jz came back from her Cambodia trip, which really makes me feel like wanting to go there. I have always wanted to go to Angkor Wat but don’t know who on Earth told me that Angkor Wat is closed for restoration undefinitely.

I will arrange for Cambodia in 2013 then. Meaning I will need to wait for Air Asia zero-fare promotion to book flight to and fro from Cambodia and my main target will be Angkor Wat. I do hope that I can find ‘kaki’ for this trip. If Chanuri and Tha Nung agreed to this trip, then it will be fun. Still thinking who else to invite. Suddenly I rmbered that I mentioned a Spore trip to MY before. Oppss!

I also had the urge to try Skytrex in Taman Pertanian Cahaya Shah Alam. Ever since I missed the trip during my 1st year of working, it had always been my intention to visit that place. Since it’s not easy to find ‘kaki’ and to arrange for the transportation, it’s quite tricky. The same thing goes for hiking at Sg Belimbing, Pahang. They call it as Panorama Hill, if I am not mistaken.

Also in my list will be Taman Negara (Pahang) and Gua Mulu (Miri). Batu Caves, Teluk Intan and Taiping also in my wish-to-go list. Concentrate to trips within M’sia first I guess. So greedy, wanting to go to so many places. How to save money if like this huh? Haiz…

Comment:

> 05.06.2011 (name me)

it’s possible if you plan it right, year by year. unless your work takes you there.
teehee