It's his birthday

Not today, but next Tuesday.

Blessed birthday, Sweetie.

xoxo

(why such an early post? That's because I won't be in the country to announce this)

I am taller than 160cm

Things I've learnt over the oh-so-sumptious-roadtrip and shouting-cheesy-songs-to-the-mic weekend:

1. I can eat seafood without staining my clothes.
2. I am taller than 160cm.
3. I can sing out of tune effortlessly.
4. I've the smallest breast size compared to my friends.
5. I can remember the lyrics to Lemon Tree, Barbie Girl and Everybodyyy ya.....
6. I love hanging out with my beary girlfriends.
7. I AM 48kg!! (ask Daniel, he saw the scale I weighed on)
8. All my girlfriends have UOB Lady's Card except Janet.
9. All my girlfriends have Carebears FB application except Janet (get the hint, jan?)

Woman vs Pest

It was the final show down today. With weeks of sleepless nights, i had had enough!!! It was woman vs pesky mosquitoes!

Imagine the scene of 2 Texan cowboys on opposite end of each other in a deserted town and a small bundle of hay blown in and rolled in between them...


Profiles:
Woman
Height: 160cm
Weight: 48kg
Weapon(s): 750ml Shieldtox Attack; 15x7cm, 144-page Sudoku on the Go book; a pair of strong hands
Strength: Could stand a room densed with aerosol; lower EQ, hence the anger

Mosquito
Height: between 0.2 to 0.5cm
Weight: Not disclosed
Weapon(s): Sting, wings
Strength: It flies

I walked into my mosquito infested room with my shiny bottle of SA. I knew I was going to taste victory very soon. I stood in the middle, lifted my SA and held the actuator down for as long as i could. The mosquitoes were alarmed that there was an attack. It marched out from various corners. I was surrounded. They came even closer to me, hoping that I'd spray on my face accidentally. How smart! I targetted on every mosquito individually. There was a one to one battle. Man, they were strong. They don't drop like how the TVC showed. But they were definitely weakened. They flew slower. A little disoriented. That was when my Sudoku comes in handy. A swap and that was the end of one of it. Had another 5 more to go. I came out from my room after the 20 minutes ordeal. I won. I smirked.

Kung Fu Fighting Panda

I watched it with Daniel over the weekend. And this is way, way better than Happy Feet. The story is not fantastic but bearable for a movie that runs for 1.5hours. The plot's easy to follow but also questionable. After all, this movie is made for kids.

But I'm surprised that the government didn't ban the movie seeing that there are so many pig characters in it (remember those days when the g'ment censored part of the Dragonball series on TV because of the pig character?).

And to those who had watched and stayed till the end, YES, we did stay till the end :)

Infested!

Lately, mosquitos have infested my house. And i reckon these are not the regular mosquitos which could be killed with the trusted Shieldtox or Ridsect. When i put on the electronic mosquito repeller, it doesn't work either!! What's more frustrating is that these maggots fly in pairs, waltzing around the mosquito repeller. How disrespectful! Mosquito has just entered my most-hated-and-will-make-sure-that-it-will-die-a-painful-death list.

It's so hard

Sarah posted this on her Facebook:

life is too short to hold grudges, to stay angry
life is too short to be bitter
you COULD stay angry but what is the point?
just wasting energy

It's true that life is too short to be wasted on things that could only make you look ugly and bitter. But guess what's even harder - to make room for forgiveness. Nevertheless;

forgiveness is hard at first but it gets easier
slow to get angry, quick to forgive
love harder, and laugh louder
spend the time wisely
you won't get it back

Lord,
Help me to be a nicer person. Help me to let it go. Help me to release my bitterness. Help me, please. It's just so hard but i really want to.

It trots out of my shelf

My kids were snickering while flipping through the pages of this book. I thought if this could amuse them that much, it should be a good read. Man, i was really in for a surprise. I was lost as I slogged through the pages.

This is a parody of Harry Potter (you see the similarity in the names? Harry Potter, Barry Trotter?). Only difference is definitely NOT child friendly. Too much filth. No wonder my kids snickered!


To begin with, I'm not a huge Harry Potter fan. I can barely remember like 3 names - Harry (duh!), Ron, Hermaine (see, I can't even get the spelling right). As this is a parody, Gerber changed the names by a letter (or two), and by the 4th character introduced in the story, i was lost.

Much of the story reflects quite closely to the original but with a little more twist and scandal to it. And because it's a parody, the plot was loosely built, expecting the readers to understand the why's and how's of the story. I've never read any Harry Potter books and have only watched 3 of the 5 movies and am still trying to make sense of the last sequel i watched, you can perhaps imagine how confounded i was.


You'll probably love this book if:
1) you're a guy
2) you hate Harry Potter
3) you want to put yourself to a challenge (like i did)

Ya, semua mesti ubah gaya hidup

Fuel crisis

I'm seriously feeling the pinch in my pocket. Never in my life have i felt this poor. Not that i don't have money; i just feel that no matter how much i have, it is not enough.

The road was pleasantly empty today. Which helps as i don't have to burn more fuel while being trapped in the jam. Daniel took the bike today and he was in for a surprise. There were more bikes on the road today.

Taking the lift to college, I shared the lift with another man who was holding a squarish looking Tupperware. I believe it was his lunch. The food stalls outside our college was EMPTY during lunch time. That was a depressing sight.

Personally, I've nothing against the price hike per se. But I've everything against how the government implements it and not providing a substantial compensation plan for us. After all, with the billions saved from fuel subsidy, what do they plan to do with it? Are they going to build another white elephant monument? Or is it to sustain a certain minister's wife's shopping addiction?

From the last election, I've never agreed with the current federal administration. And this fuel crisis further prooves my point. It doesn't suck being a Malaysian or living here. It sucks having a weak and ignorant leader.

Almost a birthday surprise

We had Daniel's early surprise birthday dinner yesterday. Well, it's almost a month earlier. Because it's a month earlier, he was supposed to remain unsuspicious UNTIL a few friends accidentally let the cat out of the bag yesterday morning. The classic one was when a friend came up to him in church asking if he was going for the surprise party. I thought it was hilarious when the rest of us tried to control our expressions when Daniel came asking us about the surprise party.

So in the evening, I drove us both to the restaurant. As it was meant to be a surprise, i tried blindfolding him. He refused and i refused to drive if he didn't put on the blindfold. He relented for a while but it didn't last long. So we agreed that he should recline the car seat all the way back and lie there with his eyes closed while i drive.

I took him on a 30 minutes drive while the restaurant is actually 10 minutes drive away from where we took off. I parked my car in the residential area. When he opened his eyes, he had this S.T.U.N.N.E.D look plastered on his face. He kept uttering how he will refuse going into any of the houses there. After a short walk, he saw the familiar restaurant. The surprise element began to fade off when he saw his friends' cars parked around the restaurant.

Anyhow, it was almost a surprise and he was almost surprised. And i think we did a pretty good job keeping it from him for close to 3 weeks *teehee* Not forgetting that the dinner and company was fantastic!

Love you guys for making this possible!

Red One and Two

I was blogsurfing and found this on Phoebe's blog:

Once upon a time there were two little girls named Riding Hood, both with red hair. They were cousins, and they were so alike in appearance that people took to calling them Little Red One and Little Red Two.

One day, each Little Red was asked by her mother to visit their common grandmother. She lived the other side of a wolf-infested forest. They were to deliver home-made cider. Grandmother had quite an appetite for refreshing alcoholic beverages. Wolves were known to also crave home-made cider.

Now...why any mother would send her little girl into a wolf-infested forest is unclear. But both girls accepted the errand. However, their approaches were distinctly different.Little Red One was an old hand at forest-crossing and wolf-evasion. Little Red Two viewed the tast as potentially dangerous. She did basic research on "safe paths through the forest", and "wolf psychology and behaviour". She also sat down and designed a WRB (which is a modern acronym for "wolf response basket"), a device patented by Little Red Two.Little Red One was amused by all this. "What a lot of crap", she said. "There's no wolf worth this much worry." But Little Red Two went ahead with her planning process anyway.

Off they went on their respective journeys to Grandma's. Little Red One was accosted by a wolf almost immediately. She lost all her cider and had to go empty-handed. The wolf then confronted Little Red Two, and grabbed for her basket (full of jars of cider). He was blown away by a double-barrel shotgun concealed in the basket.Grandma enjoyed Little Red Two's visit.

Which goes to prove:
- You shouldn't trust little girls with a big baskets.
- Experience is not necessarily a valid teacher.
- If you want to keep your cider, you'd better plan.

I agree with the above 3 points, but I'd like to add that i reckon Lttle Red One is a guy in disguise. After all, guys are usually hasty :p

Of funerals and eulogies

I just got back from a friend's father's memorial service. I know this is an unusual fetish, but I confess that I like going to Christian memorial services and funerals. No, i don't like looking at corpses or seeing people bawling. I just love listening to eulogies.

Eulogies are powerful to me. It's not hyped-up. Neither is it manipulative in any ways. It's just truth. Truth about a person, a person's life, and a person's teaching. It's delivered raw from their memories. And these are usually the most genuine words any human beings can deliver.

I came back from the service very encouraged and at the same time reminded that my life can touch others. Most of all, I'm reminded that we all have the same appointment we've to keep; that's death.

And to Uncle Chan who has passed on,
Though our paths have never crossed on earth, my life has been moved by your works and memories you've left behind. It's my loss for not knowing you any earlier, but I have to agree with everyone who testified that you are a legend. Thank you.

World Refugee Day

Taken from FGA's bulletin

There are an estimated 100,000 asylum seekers and refugees in Malaysia. Around 80-90 percent of them are from Myanmar. They live in uncertainty, are afraid of arrest, imprisonment, whipping and deportation, as refugee status is not officially recognized here. There is a higher incidence of sufferers of torture and sexual and gender-based violence. Pregnant woman, the sick, children and babies are also arrested during Immigration raids and brought into detention. Adults who are able to obtain work are sometimes not paid their wages. When raids occur, families are left destitute when the main income earner is arrested. Some stay in juncgle sites in order to avoid arrest and to get jobs in nearby construction sites. Children have no access to education. They live in precarious lives, suffering from fear and anxiety.

I've not met a refugee in person before, but I've heard of their plights. When they are sick, they can't get proper medical treatment without being arrested. Even if they have refugee status awarded by UN, they are not given accommodations, wages, education and food, and they are not allowed to work too. All they get is free medical treatment and freedom to roam in this country.

I know there are a lot going on in the refugee camps and their lives, but many of these stories are left untold. Nevertheless, we can do our part to be a blessing to this community. In commemoration of World Refugee Day (20th June), FGA has launched its 'Refugee Project' where we'll be collecting donations in kind for refugees in Malaysia.

We welcome the following items:

Clothes - for men, women and children (clean and in good condition), such as formal shirts, t-shirts, trousers, blouses, skirts, jeans, socks, shoes, etc. Plain white t-shirts and slippers are particularly needed in detention centres.

Food - rice, canned foods (within validity date), cooking oil, salt and sugar

Toiletries, hygiene and cleaning products - bathing soap, toothpaste, toothbrush, face towels, bath towels, detergent, sanitary napkins (especially needed in detention centres)

For babies and children - nappies (cloth and disposable), milk bottle, milk powder, talcum powder, baby soap, baby lotion, toys, books.

Others - blankets, pillows, bedsheets, mosquito nets, cash.

Let's take some time and reflect on our lives. We've been blessed in many ways we don't realise. These refugees who came in peace didn't have a choice. They didn't have luxury. They didn't have anything at all. You don't need to be spiritual, godly or to have any religion per se to help these people. We just need compassion - one of the basic fundamentals of human kind.

If you feel led to give, do call me or FGA KL.

Back to blog

I know I'm guilty of not updating my blog. Busy lar.. sick lar... Before you call these lame excuses, hear me out.

I've been pretty busy with work. Kinda. Also with family stuff like chauffering mum around. That itself is a handful.

And I've been really sick as well. I have this H.U.G.E. ulcer on my upper left lip. It sucks. I can't eat; I can't drink. It feels like having rose thorns piercing through your lips. And you know the saying, rubbing salt against your wound, well, I did it, literally, and it hurts big time!!! I can't drink without using a straw. I can't eat without chewing my food using my right molars. It even hurts when I wet my lips. Now, no thanks to that, i get chappy lips! And no thanks to that too, it's too uncomfortable to blog. I rather trade my ulcer for pimple.

So, still lame? Yeahh... i don't think it helped.