Note to self

Ever since I came to Australia, I was starting to like drinking and I think I'll go overboard if the opportunity presents itself.

But after reading an article at The Star, I'm starting to realise how important it is to drink responsibly, as stated by MRS (Monash Residential Services) in their booklet, Responsible enjoyment and consumption of alchohol.

After all, I won't wanna end up like them:
Baby dies, drunk parents forgot to feed him


This is also a friendly message to my fellow friends to be responsible drinkers.

And even if you don't drink,

DON'T FORGET TO FEED THE BABY!!



Enjoy! =D

Matthew's 19th Birthday

Short Talk: So I decided not to blog about drinking after all... lol =)
You can still see the photos at Facebook though. :)


OMG did I just say 19th? Yes he's only 19 this year and undertaking his 2nd year in Bachelor of Business. Apparently, he started his primary education at the age of 6, and took SAM as his pre-U studies. Figure the rest out yourself. =)


Matthew is the one who's walking like a 'King of the day'! =D

We were planning to eat Nando's at first but we already ate there for Jia Wei's birthday. Btw he's not Lee Jia Wei in case any DU-rians are reading my blog. So the whole bunch of them told me they were going to Glen Waverley (Asian town) to eat.


See his excited face as we head to the bus stop =)

As usual, they didn't plan for a specific place to eat. And as usual again, we just walked down the street and entered a random restaurant with decent prices. Oh but later on I found out that Joshua and Matthew ate there before... Paiseh... haha =p


A little blur... But it's the only group photo I have... =/


Ok I'm not gonna use 'as usual' again... lol


As always, the portions served here in Australia are EXTREMELY LARGE!!


See how Adrian was struggling just to finish a normal rice and vege dish?

On top of that, they ordered some rice with lots of cheese. Imagine the amount of cheese we get on a large pizza at Pizza Hut in Malaysia. Then put all those cheese into a single dish. Finish it if you can... Lol... =)


Mae Eve actually managed to finish the whole dish! Considering all the rice, meat, mushroom and cheese in that dish, even I couldn't finish it unless I was starving for 3 days. =p


Eve's plate was as big as Matthew's.
Matthew shared. Eve ate alone. 'Nuff said.


From left: Boon Seng, Jia Chen, Me =)

After everyone was almost done eating, we sang a birthday song for Matthew. We sang as though the restaurant was own by us but luckily people here don't really give us that weird 'wtf' look. Some of them even smiled! =D

The birthday song was not the most embarassing moment yet. We even 'forced' Matthew to give a speech standing up!! Lol... =)


A quick snapshot while Matthew was giving his speech! =D


All in all it was an enjoyable night out with the gang. Although I was supposed to be absent together with Kok Wee and Jia Wei to discuss our project, but it was all worth it. =)


Tomorrow is Friday night and Boon invited me to his place for house warming. Oh we'll really heat up the place... With booze, that is... Lol... =p


He was drunk. Negaraku was played.
Can't wait for tomorrow night! xD


Till tomorrow night, enjoy!! =D

Broken!!

The photo speaks for itself:



Solution?




Hope this works coz this sunglasses was one of my farewell gifts before taking off to Australia.


For now, enjoy!! =D

Espresso: You failed me

Short Talk: I bought a new Digital Camera bag and the strap that came with it don't seem to fit...


Shortly after classes began, I started to rely on espresso to keep me awake. But today it finally failed me. I slept throughout the 1-hour lecture and only woke up when the next lecturer entered.




This was how it began:

Yesterday was St.Patrick's day (duno celebrate what) and we had a BBQ dinner at the courtyard. After the dinner, the gang decided to go drink at St. John's Bar in the campus centre! That's really the first time we went out, JUST TO DRINK! =p


So we walked about 15 minutes to the campus centre despite the chilly weather and piercing cold winds. When we arrived, the bar was packed with students and there was hardly enough space to walk. Consequently, it took us at least 10minutes before it was our turn to buy beer.


At first, it was just drinking and chatting so we all felt a little bored. On top of that, Jia Chen forgot to bring his deck of poker cards. Then Daryl asked me "eh got any drinking games to play ah?". At first I didn't know any games that don't require a deck of cards.


But like a sudden flash, I remembered the game I played in OBS (OutwardBound School) called "Big fish, small fish". The loser had to finish a cup of water placed at the center of the circle. So we simply applied that game to beer! =D


After numerous rounds, we finally finished all our beer. We were talking about going back. Yes, we were 'just talking' because everyone seemed reluctant to leave. So Daryl took the initiative to buy us a second round of beer! And here we go again! =D


Oops, I was supposed to be talking about coffee right? Sorry got kinda excited when it comes to drinking. =p

*Skips drinking session*

So... We walked back to the Halls at around 10pm coz everyone needed to study. That includes me! After I bathed I started working on my programming questions for the next day, which is today, coz I wanted to follow the gang to Chadstone at 4pm.


My class ends at 4pm but if I get everything done at home, I could go there just to do the completion quiz and leave. Only 3 questions, 2 of them were relatively easy because we need not write a program from scratch. For the last one, it took me all night and I only completed half the question!! So I slept at around 3am.


The next morning, I had to wake up at 7.30am for my 9am lecture. But I snoozed my alarm clock till 8am before I finally woke up!!
Read: I'm too smart to be waken up by your average alarm clock.

It takes me 10-15minutes to walk to campus but I usually get ready 30minutes before classes start. So I took a quick shower and head to the kitchen for breakfast. There was no time for me to eat let alone make my espresso. I rushed to the campus and managed to be 10minutes ahead so I bought a cup of espresso from the campus centre.


Thinking that it was enough to keep me awake despite having less than 5 hours of sleep, I attended my analogue electronics lecture. The subject itself was interesting to me, and the lecturer was not monotonous nor did he make the content sound dry.

YET!! I managed to sleep through the ENTIRE lecture!!

Amazing... Yes I'm amazed too! How did all these positive factors still generate a negative outcome?? Sometimes I wonder how my body works... Sometimes it's 12degrees and I'm still good without a jacket, sometimes it's 18degrees yet I'll be shivering with my jacket on.

But one thing's for sure, I'll never be able to control the bad habit I have for sleeping in lectures... Not even the thickest coffee can keep me awake anymore... I wonder if I could stay awake longer if I ate the coffee... Lol... =p


Enjoy!! =D

New Digital Camera!!

Short Talk: Whoever took STPM 2008 should read this:

The Star: Students’ online application for public varsity tampered with

If anyone had read my MSN, they should know that I intended to buy a new digital camera.


After hours of online research, I've short-listed a few cameras which I was gonna check at the shop. At the shop, I realised that most of the cameras on my list are outdated. As in, they're not in production anymore!! OMG how dumb of me...


Anyways I just tried any camera within my budget which was $200-$300. Basically I looked at the lens, the quality using zoom, image stability with shaky hands, face detection, user-friendly interface, and any other added features.


If you've noticed, I don't look at how many megapixels the camera has. I even compared a 12MP Nikon Coolpix with a 10MP Sony Cybershot and the photo quality really depends on the lens and the camera itself.


My online research was mostly based on Sony Cybershot, Canon IXUS, Canon Powershot and Nikon Coolpix as these were the brands that I had always known. But none of these cameras that were in the shop gave me a satisfactory photo. Some started to blur as I zoomed further, some had image stabilizer (IS) but was not good as the photo was blur when I tried a shaky shot.


Then I came across Panasonic Lumix FS3. I overlooked this camera due to its price which was $199. I'm the kind of person who believes in quality for every penny's worth. But I tried it out anyways. To my surprise, this camera passed every single test I threw at it!

(Click to enlarge)


It gave me sharp images even at maximum zoom, it could detect multiple faces, it was simple to use with the Intelligent Auto which does all the work for you, and it even gave me nice and sharp images with shaky hands. Even after it passed all the tests, I was still doubtful and went to another shop to get second opinions.


Unfortunately, when I reached the other shop, no one was there to service me so I looked merely at the prices and it was around $280 in that shop. So I figured the previous shop had a better deal with $25 rebate for a memory card. =)


So I head back to the previous shop and purchased the camera together with a 4GB SD flash memory card for $203. The memory card was worth $29 so I had to top up $4 but it was worth it.

Taken using my SE C702 (Click to enlarge)

Enough talk, lets see what this baby can do! =D


First, I tried to zoom with good light conditions:


This photo was taken using maximum optical zoom.

This was the actual distance between me and the switch.
(Yes I know my table is messy =p)

This photo was taken at maximum possible zoom (19.1X)

Zooming out gradually...

Zooming out a little more...

Without any zoom... See how far that was?

Okay I admit it wasn't that sharp if you enlarged the photo but it's good enough for me. =)


Next, we try the Intelligent Auto mode:

This is how the courtyard looks like from my room.


I did a little zooming and it automatically changed the scene to 'Night Scene'.

Not much of a change except the contrast levels but it should be good enough for normal use. =)


This camera is like the perfect camera for me because:
1. It's cheap (Yes money does come first)
2. Focusing and recharging the flash is fast enough for me.
3. The images are clear and sharp in most lit conditions.
4. The interface is EXTREMELY user-friendly.
5. Everything I need and ONLY what I need is in this camera.

I don't need those fancy dials with like 8 or 9 modes where I only use auto and video. This is also the best thing about this camera:

I paid for only what I use.


That is also what I always aim for when I shop for gadgets. I won't want to buy something that has 100 features in it yet I only use a few regularly. It also means that I'm not fully utilizing the gadget and therefore wasting my money.

Overall, I'm EXTREMELY satisfied with this camera.

So here I go snapping away!!

I snapped this using maximum zoom. It's a little blur because I was behind the transparent glass of the shop.


OMG Fiona is sooooo gonna kill me for this!! xD


Enjoy! =D

Expresso: The wake-up pill...

Short talk: Horse bites off mans testicle (ROFL)

It's only Week 2 of my semester and I'm already falling asleep during lectures.


It's really NOT because the lecturer is boring, NOT because the topic is dry, and NOT because I'm not interested...

In fact, I kinda like the subjects that I'm taking...

It's just... I can't seem to keep my eyes open nor my brain awake to listen to the lecture!! It started since Form 6 when I was losing concentration during class. Then I started to fall asleep in PA and maths class. I even slept whenever the teacher wasn't around. Not because I was sleepy or tired, but because I enjoyed the comfy-ness of sleeping... Lol...

Then when I arrived in uni, this bad habit got the best of me when I was sleeping in most of the maths lecture and scored badly in the exams.

Now, even when I'm in Australia, with new environment and all, I STILL fall asleep during lectures!! And to tell the truth, it is not at my will to stay awake or not!! My eyes will automatically shut itself and my brain will go to 'Sleep Mode'. Only after 10seconds when I realised that I'm asleep, then I wake up for a brief moment. This process repeats at least 10 times for a 1-hour lecture.

I figured that I need something to keep me awake. So I tried listening to music in one ear, and listening to the lecturer using the other. Initially, it kinda worked because I wasn't feeling the least drowsy eventhough the lecturer was talking monotonously. BUT, it only worked once. When I tried this method the 2nd and 3rd time, I fell asleep anyway.

So my other option was coffee. One jolly day, I arrived early at campus so I went to the campus center to grab some coffee. The names of the coffee here are somewhat 'special' and you won't understand them unless you try them all. e.g. Long Black, Short Black, Flat White, Expresso, etc.

I was looking for the cheapest option so I took the Expresso. When they served it, I was like "Is this a joke?" The cup was even smaller than the shot glasses and the coffee in it was even less. At that time, I didn't give a damn as long as it could keep me awake so I drank the whole cup. It was actually very, very, VERY thick coffee where the amount of caffeine in this small cup was equivalent to the normal cups.

I went to my lecture feeling TOTALLY AWAKE!! Omg it was a miracle!! I was kept awake the whole day (4 hours worth of lectures) by a small up of Expresso!! =D

I swore I was gonna drink that everyday before lectures. Since it was cheaper to make my own coffee, I wanted to buy the Nescafe Expresso I saw in the supermarket. But a closer look revealed that the coffee inside the jar was not fully powdered and had large grains. I had no idea how to make an expresso and according to a friend, that type of coffee was meant to be made using a coffee machine. =p

Luckily I was smart enough to think before I buy, which is very important here in Australia since almost everything here is more expensive.

Since I don't have any coffee, I continued buying Expresso's from the Campus Centre almost before every lecture (or in between breaks). I tried buying a long black, which is basically a regular cup of coffee without sugar or milk, but that wasn't enough to keep me awake for 2 hours consecutive lectures. To be frank, it only lasted about 1 hour.

So expresso is kinda like my wake-up pill for now until I buy my own 3in1 coffee and hopefully that will be enough to keep me awake.


Sidenote: It was a friend's birthday on Tuesday so I bought beer and we drank it at the courtyard. At the same time, the whole bunch of us were listening to his ghost stories and the girls were scared half to death! =p

Me posing with the beer... Technically it was alcoholic cider, which my friends refered to as "Apple juice with gas". But it was still a 5% alcohol drink so I did get a little dizzy.


Enjoy!! =D

Underwear thieves!!

As the title states, someone actually stole my underwear!!


And this all happened a week ago on Sunday when I was doing my laundry...


It was a Sunday and I got left out because all my 'friends' went to the city without telling me a thing. So since I had nothing better to do on that Sunday afternoon, I did my laundry.


After washing, I put it in the dryer and set the timer to 150minutes. (Trust me anything below that won't do the job) Then I went about doing my own stuff until I forgot about my laundry.


After about 4 hours of putting my laundry to dry, I noticed that someone took my clothes out from the dryer and placed it on the rack. And my clothes wasn't even dried yet... So out of frustration, I took out the person's clothes out of the dryer and placed mine in again. And I left it there until I remembered it again at around 1am. (I know I'm very forgetful, thank you)


This time, it was completely dried and the sleepy me collected it and put it in my room while I went down to the common room to watch Man U vs Tottenham. While watching, I was so tired that I gradually fell asleep on the chair. So I went back up to my room after half-time ended.


On the next morning, it was the first day of classes and I had to fold my clothes before preparing to attend lecture. While doing that, I realised that all my underwear went MISSING!! I searched my laundry and found only one pair of underwear left out of the five that I washed. The weird thing is... My underwear was the ONLY thing that went missing!! All my clothes were still there!!


I tried to stay calm and thought about how it could've gone missing. I searched the laundry room, through every washing machine and dryer, but there was no sign of my underwear anywhere. I even searched my room and wardrobe for the possibility that I forgot to put them in the laundry. But I still couldn't find them.


I kept this incident to myself for a few days hoping that someone mistakenly took my underwear and would return it soon. I was hoping and praying hard, while searching the laundry room every single day.


Finally, a few days had passed and my underwear had not appeared yet. So I had to reveal this embarassing secret as I ask my floormates if they had seen my underwear. I couldn't care less about the shame as long as I got my underwear back. Still, I had to live with all the laughter and jokes yet I am unable to locate my underwear, which puts me at a double loss.


At this point, I had to assume that they are lost (or stolen) and I had to get new ones.


On Friday, I went shopping at Glen Waverley for some groceries and also my underwear. Luckily for me, I found the 3pack underwear which was on promotion and spent a little less on what I could've avoided by just being a little more mindful.


My mum always says "Be mindful, say in your mind, I'm washing my clothes now, I'm putting it in the dryer now, I'm drying my clothes now, another 20 more minutes and I have to collect them."


I always try, but I don't always succeed. My forgetfulness probably arose because most of the time, I don't really think when I do something. The action somehow got through without any processing using the brain. You may say that this is absent-minded, but surprisingly I can do pretty conplicated stuff without thinking...


For instance, while watching a movie at home, I felt the need to munch on something. So I cycled out to the petrol station to grab a packet of chips. Then I came back home and continued watching my movie while eating my chips.

At the end of the movie, I don't remember myself buying any chips, so I thought I had eaten my sister's chips. Eventually, I bought another packet to replace the one I had eaten. At the end of the day, I only remember the incident when my sister insisted that she had already eaten her packet of chips.


I really have to get rid of this habit while in Australia because I have no one to depend on but myself. Apart from my underwear, I had already lost a roll of toilet paper, my table cloth and I almost lost my watch at the beach too.


I hope I can be more mindful for the days to come, or there will be lots more that I will lose.


Till then,
Enjoy!! =D

Big Day Out (Melbourne Zoo)

On Friday, Monash University organized a trip to the Melbourne Zoo which includes lunch and transport for only AUD25!!


Normally, a ticket would cost around AUD23+ so it was definitely worth it.



On the bus... Nothing to do and can't sleep. =p


The lion's den!!

OMG where's the lion... @@



Sleeping!! @#$%^&*@#$%^&*



Remember Timon and Pumbaa from the Lion King?

This is Timon the meercat. =)


Giant Tortoises...



I think one was trying the bang the other when this photo was taken... o.O


Group photo!

Platypus. =)



Fake seals... =p


Me and Adrian

With Mr. Giraffe in the background. =)



Group photo again!



And yet another group photo while resting. =)


This kangaroo is so cool!!

It's resting and posing at the same time!! xD



Ostrich. =D



A friendly reminder not to lean on trees carelessly... =)


Wait for the lights to turn on...

Flashers... XD


Have you seen a wombat before?

Here's some idea of how they eat. =)



There's a Koala on the branch but I bet it was sleeping. =p



Porcupine! =D



Do you believe me if I said



these owls



can BARK?! xD



Sandwiches for lunch... AGAIN!! =X


Group photo~~

P/S: I was holding the camera, that's why I'm not in it. =p



Can you imagine what they would do to a real elephant?? o.O


Otters are really quick animals!!


They come out briefly...


And the next moment they're heading back in again...


Looking for food?? =p



The parrot looked away when I took this photo... =.=!



Butterfly park!! =)


They tend to land on bright colours... =)

Victim #1: Adrian the terrorist. =P



Victim #2: OMG forgot her name... =X



Victim #3: Fiona =)


Adrian and I in the souvenir shop! =D





The girls couldn't resist not to take a photo in this outfit. =p



Dumbo: "Let me out... I wanna go home..."


This Orang Utan is a show off...

It started swinging only when there were people around... xD



Fiona, Adrian and me =)



There are penguins in Australia too!! =D



I R Baboon!!


"Stop staring at my shiny red butt!" XD


What's the only animal whose tail grows in the front?

There's your answer. =)



Weird looking shark I must say... xD



Say hi to ma' brother... =D


I thought they were some species of baboons...



Until I read this:



Our trip ended at 3.30pm and we reached home at around 4pm+.


Since we had the time and the ingredients, we decided to cook pasta for dinner!! =D



Fiona's cutting the garlic and Adrian is staring hard at something... =p



We also had potato salad... More like mash potatoes though. xP


That's all for now!! =)


Classes start on Monday so don't expect frequent updates. =/


Enjoy!! =D