D-Day

Just replace Hobbes' first dialogue with 'Have you started studying yet?'

3 more weeks to go..... Gaaaaaaaaaa........... -plop-

*sigh* Good luck, all fifth formers.
-disappears to find inspiration, motivation and discipline to last til' December 8th-

The Case of the Elusive Pendrive

One week ago:
Mum: Hey you. You left your pendrive in your shirt pocket lah... I didn't see it, so it got a thorough washing from the washing machine.

Me: What? *completely surprised, having not even noticed the pendrive was missing in the first place*

Mum: Yalah. I always check your skirt pockets, but not your shirt pockets. Mana tau you keep things inside there and forget to take them out... *hands me the pendrive* Anything important inside or not?? When I shook it, water droplets were still coming out from it... Scared later spoil ledi...

Me: Oh, uh. Nevermind... I have the files saved in my computer.

Mum: Aiyah. Go and dry it and try and see if it can still be used or not... *shoots me a look that seems to say '17 years old nya, forget things so easily ledi... haih...'*

After plugging it into the computer, I found it to be perfectly fine, thank goodness. Plus, it's really clean now.

Today:

Me: *searching high and low* Oh noo... *goes downstairs* Ma, did you by any chance see my pendrive? I think I left it in my shirt pocket again... *sheepish grin*

Mum: Really? Go and check. I didn't wash the clothes yet.

Me: *searches* Don't have wor......

Mum: Where did you last have it?

Me: I KNOW it's not in my KRS shirt pocket because I didn't bring it to school yesterday. So it must be in the white shirt...

Mum: Maybe it dropped somewhere?

Me: Maybe ar.... but I KNOW I didn't bring it to school yesterday... so it must be somewhere around... it's DEFINITELY not in my KRS shirt loh........

*after mum and dad help search around for a while*
Me: Oh well... nevermind. It'll turn up....

Later:
Mum: Oi! I found your pendrive!!

Me: Really?? Great! Where was it??

Mum: In your KRS shirt pocket.

Me: Oh. Oops.

Mum: Keep insisting it's not there summore. Haiyah you...

-----------
Moral of the story?
When your daughter tells you she 'DEFINITELY didn't put it there', ALWAYS check 'there' FIRST!

:P

Boing!

Season Six! Season Six! Season Six!!!

*Boing*Boing*Boing*Hoppity Hop*

Season Six! Season Six! Season Six!!!

[SPOILER SPACE]

Wheelchair! Scruffiness! DL, DL and more DL!
Reckless suspect chasing -again-
Obssessed Mac 'Tempt not a desperate man...'
Adam and Stella... *blek*

Season Six! Season Six! Season Six!!!

'I'm not inclined to resign to maturity' ;-)

Wheeeeeeeeeeeee!!!

Tag: 36 things I have come to realize

1. I’ve come to realize that my chest-size. . . is perfectly fine the way it is.

2. I’ve come to realize that work. . . can be fun and a nightmare at the same time.

3. I’ve come to realize that when I’m on the road. . . I get pretty nervous. :P

4. I’ve come to realize that I need. . . to start revising consistently for SPM. *snort*

5. I’ve come that realize that I have lost. . . I agree with the one who tagged me. Too many marbles.

6. I’ve come to realize that I hate it when. . . people prefer being carbon copies of others than original copies of themselves.

7. I’ve come to realize that if I’m drunk. . . I would be in biiiiiiiiig trouble.

8. I’ve come to realize that money. . . is something I save very well... until today. XD

9. I’ve come to realize that certain people. . . are just wired that way.

10. I’ve come to realize that I’ll always. . . be an OCD donkey.

11. I’ve come to realize that my sibling(s). . . is one awesome bloke. Well... I've always known that... -awwwwww-

12. I’ve come to realize that my mom. . . is my best friend who is not imaginary (see previous tag). XD

13. I’ve come to realize that my cell phone. . . wait, isn't this a repeat question? Uh. Is acting weird, but nothing serious.

14. I’ve come to realize that when I woke up this morning. . . the holidays are zooming past so fast, it's not fair.

15. I’ve come to realize that last night before I went to sleep. . . Bill Watterson never allowed Calvin and Hobbes to be merchandised, otherwise there will be Hobbes stuffed toys every where. I know I'd want one.

16. I’ve come to realize that right now I am thinking. . . why tags are pretty pointless, and yet so fun to do.

17. I’ve come to realize that my dad. . . is someone I haven't played Scrabble with for a very long time.

18. I’ve come to realize that when I get on Myspace. . . I only do so to check out Ceesau's page.

19. I’ve come to realize that today. . . was the first time this holidays I actually went out to the mall. Or anywhere other than tuition for that matter.

20. I’ve come to realize that tonight. . . Youtube just isn't cooperating. I'm switching to photobucket to see if it's Youtubes fault, the internet's, or my music video...

21. I’ve come to realize that tomorrow. . . is another tuition day and I haven't finished my homework yet. And don't intend to tonight...

22. I’ve come to realize that I really want to. . . extend this holiday.

23. I’ve come to realize that the person mostly likely to repost this is. . . anyone. It's the holidays, so it's fair game.

24. I’ve come to realize that life. . . is too short to get all philosophical about life.

25. I’ve come to realize that this weekend. . . is another step closer to the end of the holidays.

26. I’ve realized the best music to listen to when I am upset. . . is 'Smile' by Uncle Kracker. Even better, watch the DL video I painstakingly built around it. XD

27. I’ve come to realize that my friends. . . are pretty awesome. Most of the time. XD

28. I’ve come to realize that this year. . . was full of surprises.

29. I’ve come to realize that my exes. . . my what?

30. I’ve come to realize that maybe I should. . . seek professional help about my infatuation with CSI NY... But whenever I think about that, I just pop in a CSI NY DVD and the thought goes away.

31. I’ve come to realize that I love. . . rainy days curled in bed with a good book. Who doesn't? (HAH! Got ya! Bet you thought I was gonna say something CSI NY related. XD)

32. I’ve come to realize that I don’t understand. . . a lot of things.

33. I’ve come to realize my past. . . is in the past.

34. I’ve come to realize that parties. . . are not my thing.

35. I’ve come to realize that I’m totally terrified. . . of watching horror movies. Because I'd get so totally terrified afterwards. :P

36. I’ve come to realize that my life. . . is nothing to complain about so far. :)


Youtube is not cooperating. I give up. Arggh. :P

Tag... because I'm being forced to...

Tag time! I have two tags to do... all thanks to the same person... :P

By the time I finish answering these tags, the Danny/Lindsay music video I made had better be uploaded on Youtube, because I have been unsuccessful thus far. It is KILLING ME that the dang thing is not uploading because I'm so happy with it and I invested so much time in it (Don't I ever learn???? :P), but can't post it up (*cough* show it off *cough*)!!

1. I’ve come to realize that my last kiss… is non-existant and I think my parents prefer it that way. :-)

2. I am listening to… the sound of falling rain outside my window... -poetic tone-

3. I talk… to myself an awful lot.

4. I love… CSI NY. Oh, I'm sorry, tired of hearing that? Okay, Carmine Giovinazzo! And Uncle Kracker's new song, 'Smile' (Hence, the DL music video...)

5. My best friend/s… are imaginary. Haha... just kidding. Make life a whole lot easier.

6. My first real kiss… is not gonna happen until I can actually answer number 1.

7. Love is… Danny and Lindsay.

8. Marriage is… Danny and Lindsay. Finally.

-I'm doing my 'evasive-answers-when-questions-are-too-personal' thing again. XD-

9. Somewhere, someone is thinking… of me. Lol. First sentence that came to my mind.

10. I’ll always… remember the 1 a.m. study sessions the next time I consider procrastinating on revision again.

11. The last time I really cried was because… Marley the dog died. :-(

12. My cell phone… has been acting weird lately, but nothing serious.

13. When I wake up in the morning… I walk to the bathroom with my eyes glued shut.

14. Before I go to bed… I read. Always. Reading helps me fall asleep. Unless it's a really good book, then reading keeps me up longer than I intended to...

15. Right now I am thinking about… why errors keep on occuring and the music video won't upload...

16. Babies are… adorable, especially Lucy Messer! :P

17. I get on Myspace… never.

18. Today I… left the house to go somewhere nice for the first time this entire school holidays. Seriously.

19. Tomorrow I will be… going out for the altogether 3rd time in the past 6 days... to go to tuition. Bleh.

20. I really want to be… in some cool secret spy operation. Lol. Just watched G.I Joe...

Which CSI NY character are you?

Which CSI: NY Character Are You?

More on CSI: NY. Created by BuddyTV

Can't say I'm surprised... after reading the description. Pretty accurate. XD I'm such a boring dud. Rofl. I knew it was a 'no go' on getting Danny Messer, based on my answers and the answers I knew a Danny-like person would give... :P

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CARMINE GIOVINAZZO!!!

Just for fun, I manipulated my answers just to see if I could get Danny. If anyone needed any more proof on how freakishly well I know the guy, I got him on my first attempt. ;-)

Which CSI: NY Character Are You?

More on CSI: NY. Created by BuddyTV

Freedom

EEEYAAAAHOOOOOOOO!!!!!
SPM TRIALS ARE FINALLY OVER!

Excerpts from two really tough weeks... partly our own fault for our usual procrastinating habits, partly because our school was one of the few who took the State Trial papers, so our trial was one month earlier then we expected...

Day before a certain paper;
Me : Faktor-faktor tercetusnya nasionalisme... uhhh... -stares at page until all words become blurry-
-phone rings-
Tricia: Fern ah! I dunno what to do ledi arrrrrr!!!
Me: Me also lah....
Tricia: There's so much to study arrrrr!!!
Me: I know lahh... cannot sleep tonight ledi lahhh...
Tricia: *Whines* I wanna cry ledi lahh....
Me: So do I lahhh... Die ledi lah...
Tricia: Yalohhh... how ah????
Me: I dunno lahhhhh....
- The rest of the conversation is pretty much along the same lines, along with strategising on what we can afford to skip so we could sleep earlier than 2 am that night...-

Lesson learnt/Not learnt:

Form Three
Tricia: Aiyoh... next year Form Four ledi... must not study til' last minute... must study consistently.
Fern: Yeah, yeah. True.

Form Four Midyear Exam
Tricia: HOW TO FINISH STUDYING!!! We were supposed to start studying consistently! Where did all the time go??!!!
Fern: Nevermind... we have learnt our lesson. We must start studying early for the final exams.

Form Four Finals
Trica: -See above-
Fern: Yeah, yeah... we all very teruk wan hor. Haih.... Nevermind. Next year, Form Five, must really really work hard from the start.

Form Five Midyear
Tricia: HOWWWWWW?????!
Fern: I know, I know. *sob*
Tricia: How come we never seem to learn our lesson wan!!??? Trials must seriously start studying early....
Fern: Yeah, at least we have the August holidays to study more.

Before trials:
Teacher: Exams have been brought forward by three weeks.

Cue, Ms Chow:

'Ok, this is the concept of half-life. Like you all lah! Trials brought forward, you all look PUA-SI (Hokkien for 'half dead') like that! Haih.... poor, poor, little girls... -shakes her head- Everything also mong-cha-cha...

Trials:
-Refer above-

And that is the story of our exam life. It's a miracle we actually get through the actual papers well enough. I for one, am very thankful. Yes, guys, first in class doesn't mean the most disciplined when it comes to studying okay... In my case, far from it...

SPM in about 3 months. And one final event to worry about, PROM 2009 (bleh :P). Here goes nothing.

Fellow Form Fives, enjoy this week's holiday, alright? It's way overdue... XD

Drama Madness

Just when we thought the drama headache was finally over for good, along came English week and the fact that we had to perform one more time... in front of the whole morning session!

I wasn't that eager about it. (Come on, who wants to wail like a maniac in front of all your school mates and teachers?) And the week before was photoshoot week, so we had a lot more work on our hands (when have we ever not? :P) to concentrate on. The laziness factor was definitely there, with most of the drama team in low spirits about the performance. Add in our semi damaged and missing props along with the fact that we merely 'practiced' (in the most loose meaning of the word possible) once by running through the lines, I was really dreading the performance.

It was seriously chaotic. You people in the audience have NO idea what kind of havoc was being wrecked backstage.

No curtains, no bathrobes, no support stand for our kitchen wall (Thanks, Shu Zian and Renee for holding it up!), no broom, no 'umbrella stand', no white cloth to cover Jonie. For that, we ended up using the fancy table cloth Pn Yon brought instead. Hence, no fancy table cloth. XD

And the mikes were placed in really awkward places we couldn't reach. It was so hilarious when a couple of Form Four prefects 'sneaked' onto stage to pass us the mikes. Jonie and I couldn't hold our laughter in at the sight of them walking right onto stage in the middle of the performance to pass us the mikes and acting as if they hope they were invisible.

We ended up not using the mikes anyway. Which was why towards the end of the performance, with the heavy yelling part, you might have noticed my voice was sounding pretty strained. Heck, exactly one week ago I missed school cos' I was in bed with the flu. And there I was yelling my head off, praying I don't lose my voice the next day.

But at the end of the day, it was an awesome experience. Performing in front of people you know is actually a lot more fun. The audience responded so much better than the audience in the competition. During the competition, the audience was so unresponsive I was half wondering whether we weren't loud enough that they couldn't hear us.

Here in school, everyone was laughing every few lines and it was a great feeling to be up there on that stage. But the best part of the day was the scene where Jonie's character was supposed to die. When on stage, I never got into the habit of observing audiences, so I saw nothing. But after the performance, I was told that A LOT of people actually had tears in their eyes. Especially quite a few of the teachers.

O.o

There are no words to describe the feeling. At the very early stages of preparing for this drama, I never imagined that it could touch people so deeply. And heck, I was burying my face in Jonie's shoulder thinking 'This is stupid, this is stupid... when are the bloody angels coming? I'm so tired...'. Of course, having done the scene a bajillion times already, I'm of course pretty jaded...

But seeing a response like that from the audience, and hearing all their comments and praises later about it, it really puts all the work and commitment we've been putting into this drama into perspective. From yesterday alone, all the hours we've logged into this drama project really felt worthwhile. I felt even happier about the whole thing than the State Level competition where I won 'best actor'.

Granted that we've put so much effort into this drama and all we got to show for it on paper is '1st at Zone level', which isn't much. But in terms of experience, fun and lessons learnt, I think what we've gained from this is far more important than any dang Ko-Kurikulum marks.

I really wished I saw the teachers -secretly- dabbing their eyes with tissue. XD

Xin Fang: Teacher, you cry ah??
Ms. Chow: (bravado tone) NO LAH! My eye got problem lah! Drama-nya, why would I cry?!

Hahaha...

And now the whole morning session is looking at their Head Prefect and the rest of the cast from a whole new angle. As Pn Chang said, "Saw a whole new different side of you. Last time, I never even heard your voice. Thought you were a very serious person..."

SERIOUS??? I'm insulted.
Ask my mum when I fast forwarded though the CSI NY episodes on DVD just to show her the DL parts, squealing and laughing giddily.

Me: Ma, ma... show you something. -fast forward to DL wedding- Romantiknya, right?
Mum: You fast forwarded all that just to watch that part? Siao lah you! -slap-
Me: OW!

and...

Me: Ma! Wake up! You fell asleep!
Mum: No, I didn't! I was watching.
Me: No! You slept!!! -picks up remote and rewinds- show you again!
Mum: Haiyah! Yah, wat! I saw that part!
Me: No you didn't! -bey kam wan (not satisfied)- -rewind rewind rewind-

But I digress.

Thank you to Pn Yon for her constant drilling until we were all sick and tired of drama. XD. And thank you also to Pn Gan and Ms Leong for their suggestions as well. Also to Ms Poon for babysitting us so kindly.
Thank you to the wonderful drama team who was willing to sacrifice so much into doing the very best we could. MUAKS!

I'm so glad it's over for good. But I'm so glad we took on the challenge in the first place. :-)

NS... Kena tak Kena

The school was all abuzz today. For the first time, Michael Jackson's death was not the topic everyone was talking about. (Rest in Peace, King of Pop.)
Instead, every Fifth Former was asking every other Fifth Former they met:

"Did you check ledi?"
"Send in SMS... can check ledi..."
"What???!! It's out??!!!!"
"So-and-so kena you know! Hahaha...."
"Don't laughlah! Why I so suay (Hokkien for 'unlucky') wan..."

That's right. The list of 'lucky' 1992 kids chosen for NS is out and available for checking.

It's quite interesting to me. Even as late as the past week, NS meant nothing much to me. To me, it was "Oh, NS... okay..." It's one of those things that I just never thought much about. And somewhere, in the depths of my mind, I had this weird feeling of acceptance that I'll never get chosen for it... No idea why... it was just there.

So today I found out a bunch of my friends like PC, Xin Fang and Esther got chosen. Once I got into the car, I told my parents, "Hey, guess what? So-and-so got NS..."

And my dear mum said, "Really? So did you!"

-Stunned silence-

"WHAT??!!"

"Yah! I saw the article in the newspaper this morning and I kay-po mah, so I smsed in loh..." she handed me the phone showing the message.

'Tahniah. Selamat Maju Jaya.'

Oh. Har dee har... Was that the depths of my mind rolling around in laughter over the irony of it all?

I came online to check the website and boom... there it was again. 'Tahniah. Selamat Maju Jaya.'
Yeah, yeah, yeah... thank you... :P

I'm more shocked than anything. I know a lot of people dread finding out they were chosen. But after surfing around online, it is quite clear that the ex-NS trainees did really enjoy themselves there.

Two of my cousins went for it before, Vern (Kooky Jar) included. And after reading around many blogs, I see that it really isn't something to be miserable about after all. In fact, it does sound quite fun and it is really a once in a lifetime experience. Provided none of that NS camp 'horror stories' happen lar, of course... :P -choi choi touch wood-

We'll see how things go... muahahaa.... :-B

Tag 'I...'

Complete each sentence.

I am: supposed to be writing a speech for Teachers' Day right now. But I am not, obviously.

I think: this procrastination thing really has to stop...

I know: that just as you close the chapter on one busy stressful week, another one begins almost immediately.

I have: too much work. (refer: 'I am:' and 'I think:') XD

I wish: to jump over the next two days and go right into the holidays.

I hate: being unable to fall asleep quickly at night and being so sleepy in the morning because of it. -screwed up biological clock-

I miss: Dhivvya and Maria. :-)

I fear: missing a couple of upcoming tight deadlines.

I hear: nothing quite often. Have patience if you have to repeat something several times.

I smell: I dunno. You tell me.

I search: my soul. -snort- Sounds like lyrics from some song... first thing that came to my mind...

I wonder: what it would be like if we changed the names of everything into other names?

I regret: not doing the speech right now. Or at least I will regret it tomorrow.

I love: CSI NY. 'Nuff said.

I ache: I'm not sure how to complete I ache. All I'm thinking is 'I ache' Full Stop

I am not: the only one who has OCD.

I believe: there's nothing wrong with doing donkey work, just know when to put the Full Stop.

I dance: like a person who has never danced before.

I sing: very often when alone and I enjoy doing it.

I cry: on stage because I have to. Or at least I try to. XD

I fight: pretty well on PlayStation fighting games...

I win: today/tomorrow.

I lose: tomorrow/today.

I never: say never. Hardeehar.

I always: over-analise the sentence 'Never say never' and so

I confuse: myself.

I listen: as well as I hear. XD

I can usually be found: in my room.

I am scared: of a lot of things. Who isn't?

I need: a machine that churns out great speeches automatically.

I am happy about: the 2 week holiday in 2 days.

I imagine: I better go and finish that speech now... :P

Midway through Midyear

We're all tired. No other way to describe it. So much for my much earlier post on exam breeds... Told ya' not to hold me up to studying early... :P

I am consistently avoiding the consistent study habit. Most studying was done on the day before the subject itself and all the way til 1 or 2 am. It's just hard to find the 'mood' sometimes. Add in the 'drama mania' which only ended a week before the papers began, we were tired every single day , went home late from school and conked out for the rest of the day.

Oh well, lesson learnt. The next exam is the trials. Definitely not something to mess up... XD
Hopefully the midyear papers went 'relatively' well for the rest of you. I'm just glad we won't know the results until after the holidays.

Like Pn Hafizah said, we get to enjoy our holidays, but the poor teachers have to spend it ploughing through all the rubbish we gave them. This includes:

- Chicken-scratch writing from having too little time
- Made up formulae and facts
- Correction tape all over the papers making everything extra messy
- Careless mistakes that will either make them laugh or cry...

But anyway, three more papers to go and at least the weekend is here. Recharge time! Plenty of sleep and plenty of TV. I missed House, CSI NY (THE FELONY!!!!!!!), CSI and the American Idol Finale. Gonna sit in front of the TV until my butt sticks to the couch. Then unstick it to practice Add Maths and Accounts. :P

Exams aside, plenty of other things have happened, like:
- I passed my driving exam about a month ago. But up til' now, I have yet to pass the Daddy Exam. I torture him emotionally everytime I drive. He gets 'kin-cheong' until his knuckles turn white. Rofl. I'm even further behind on the Mummy Exam. She has yet to dare to sit in the same car when I'm behind the wheel. :-) Oh well, soon!

- For the first time in my life, I took on the main role in our school's drama team, as a male character. We managed to get to state level, but only got Consolation Prize. Unfortunately, (or fortunately?) we won a special award. I won Best Actor. As if that wasn't embarassing enough, the emcee pronounced my character's name wrong. It's supposed to be Phillip.
They announced the Best Actress Award first. So we thought that was the end of it, we didn't win anything. And then...

Emcee: And the Best Actor in the Penang State Level Drama Competition is.... Philleeeps! From, SMK CGL.
Me: GAK!?!!
Team mates: -Starts applauding and laughing madly in their seats-
Audience: -Probably puzzled why there is a 'Best Actor' in a Convent school...-

So I am now the proud owner of a certificate that states I am the 'Pelakon Terbaik'. Bleh. Try explaining that to future interviewers/employers... :P

-Teachers' Day is coming up. Busy busy.

-The Twitter phenomenon is spreading like wildfire. But I resist. I'd sooner get Facebook than Twitter.

- Kris Allen's big Underdog Win! Not that it matters much to me. I don't like either of them much.... XD -ducks rocks being pelted at me by Adam Lambert fans-

- Kevin Cowherd's 'Don't Get Me Started' column has been discontinued because he went over to sports writing instead. Now there's nothing in the newspapers on Tuesday and Friday to make me snigger to myself like an idiot anymore. :-(

- *CSI NY SPOILER*
We welcome little Lucy Messer into the CSI NY family on May the 6th 2009. Danny's little girl... 'Daddy's little girl.' Geddit'? Geddit'? -snorts geekily-
But here in Malaysia, we won't know about her until June 16th. -Torture...-
Although I've already seen all the relevent clips, I always look forward to watching it on AXN with my mum.
Everytime I over react about CSI NY (all the time then...) she'll always give me that 'look' and say, "Siao ah you?" or "Fern, I think you're a little crazy..."
Ergo, I can't wait to see her reaction to me reaction during the whole 'DL Baby' storyline.

The bed beckons. Goodnight. :-)

Maths Homework

Jonie: -walks in- Class! Ms. Ho isn't here today.

5 Airf: YAY!!!!!! (No offence to all teachers, it's just a normal reaction... XD)

Jonie: But, she left us homework. Take out your Maths textbook!

5 Arif: WHAT???!! Awwwww...
A: Whatlah... got h'work summore...
B: Yeeer... cannot finish Physics report.
C: Aiyah... thought got free period....
-general grumbling-

Jonie: Oi! Fasterlah! Take out your Maths textbook! I read to you.

D: Write on the boardlah!.

Jonie: No marker pen. Take out Maths textbook!!

-the few who didn't grudgingly walk to their bags to take the book-

D: Nah. Marker pen.

Jonie: Ok. -Proceeds to write on the board-

'MATHS TEXTBOOK'

5 Arif: -Sighhhhhhh....-

'PAGE: APRIL FOOL!!'

5 Arif: -dumbfounded silence-

"JONIE!!!!!!!"

Jonie: -collapses laughing-

5 Arif: -goes beserk laughing and yelling at Jonie for the next 10 minutes-


Kudos to our class monitor for successfully fooling the entire class in one shot. XD

And for the rest of the day:
Jonie: Class, Pn Chang isn't here. Bio in class.
5 Arif: Sure wan ah not?! You tipu us ah, Jonie?! We don't trust you anymore Jonie!
Jonie: AIYAH! I'm not lying lah this time!!! -laughs again-

Happy April Fool's Day. :-)

Getting 'Retricked'

So, who knew for sure that 'retricked' is not an actual word? All of you did? Good! Why didn't you tell me a week ago?!
Of course, you needn't tell me that if I was not so blur as to think it was an actual word... it cost me about 82 friggin' points! Bleh... Sthooopid (re: Post on Prefects Camp)!!

I'm talking about the Scrabble competition last week. All in all, it was seriously fun -geek-. Although by the end of the day, we were all pretty knocked out. Who wouldn't be after 6 games?

We were matched according to our spreads. I did pretty good for the first 3 games, got trashed on my fourth game and everything pretty much went downhill from there. XD My fourth game was against Ms. Retricked. 'Dang it, girl, I gotta shake your hand. You re-tricked me!' -curses stupidity- I went from a positive spread to negative in that one game. Trust me, you don't want to know anymore than that. My opponent meanwhile, went on to win first place. Haha. I hope she remembers my contribution to her. She owes me biiiiiiiiiig time.

But anyway, Xin Fang placed no. 5, which is awesome because she will get to represent Penang at national level later on. The others also did great. It was indeed an interesting experience, as we got to meet and play against all kinds of people with different habits when it comes to playing.

And of course, there's that adrenaline rush whenever one tries to play nonsense words, whether intentionally or otherwise.

There is a certain air of vindication whenever one gets challenged on a word that one knows exist.
A: -places word 'Lavalava'-
B: -eyes you suspiciously- Challenge.
A: Sure. No problem... -Struts confidently to computer and hides a smirk when word is accepted-
B: -completely baffled- 'Lavalava?????'

Of course, it sucks when you think it exists, when it actually doesn't...
B: Challenge.
A: Sure. No problem.
B: -types word into computer- Not accepted.
A: WHAT??!! But... but... I thought... but... WHAT?!!! -sigh- -walks over and removes letters from the board dejectedly-

But sometimes one doesn't get challenged at all.
A: -Places 'ac' on the board- -stares at opponent, ready to be challenged-
B: -Goes on with his turn-
A: -Heaves a very silent, but very big sigh of relief- 'Sucker... -snicker-'

Then there's that obligation on ethics when it comes to being fair when using the clock.
-B doesn't press the clock eventhough it's A's turn-
A: 'Hmmm. Tell or don't tell? It's his own fault for not realising it... Hmmm... I'll just wait a moment more... Ladeedadeda' -takes own sweet time shuffling tiles-

At the end of the day, our minds were so 'scrabbled' that nothing but Scrabble tiles and Scrabble boards loomed in front of our eyes.

"Time to go home."
"Home... H-O-M-E. Home. 9 points..."

But heck, I wouldn't mind doing this all over again. :-)

Scrabble-d

Oh, lookey here... two posts in one day. I'm on a roll, baybeh.

I just stumbled upon the official Scrabble website and found the history of Scrabble on it.

Scrabble-Mania just started in me this year ever since I signed up for the Scrabble team, which I'm still not confirmed to be in yet or otherwise yet, fyi. but I'll know that for sure tomorrow.

One of my most vivid memories of Scrabble would be playing it with my mum and dad when I was much younger. I kept wondering why my dad could score so high marks and I was so pathetic. Sometimes, I even played it by myself... yeah, against myself. :P I always gave up halfway because it got too boring.

Back then, I played the game in the simplest way possible. Just place words on the board and count the points. I usually placed the first word I could think of and that was that.

But this year, I'm suddenly exposed to the world of Scrabble with heavy strategies. New terms were introduced to me by the school Scrabble Gurus like Xin Fang and seniors Yi Lyn and Audelia.

Front hooks, back hooks, stacking, and lists of 2 and 3 letter words, lists of Bingo words, etc. etc. Whoa... is this Scrabble? And dang, I'm having a blast. There's something really fascinating about watching these Scrabble Gurus tossing around tiles and explaining strategies. Who knew there were people who could make shifting tiles on the rack and tossing tiles on the board seem so intimidating and cool at the same time?

Anyway Jess, you asked you wondered what the history of Scrabble was, and whether it was designed by someone named S.C. Rabble.

Allow me to correct that sentiment. XD

Scrabble was started by this architect in Poughkeepsie in New York State named Alfred Mosher Butts. (I'm pretty thankful the game isn't called Buttler or Buttable...) And I quote the official Scrabble website;

Mild-mannered, bespectacled Butts disliked dice games. They were all down to luck. On the other hand, he felt that all-skill games, like chess, were too highbrow for the general public.

Yep. I don't know how to play chess... and have no intention on learning. XD

Anyway, during 1931, in the midst of the Great Depression, he developed the initial idea for the game, which he called Lexico.

'Lexico was played without a board and players scored on the basis of the lengths of the words formed. There were additional scores for words employing 'minor honours' (B, F, H, M, P, V, W, Y) and a higher additional score for major honours (J, K, Q, X, Z).

Butts calculated the letter frequency and value of each letter of the alphabet by meticulously combing the front page of the New York Times.

He reasoned that too many S's made the game too easy. So he reduced them to 4.'

However, the patent board did not like his idea much. He did a little more tinkering here and there, changing to names like New Anagrams, Alph, Criss-Cross then Criss-Crosswords.But all were still unsuccessful with the patent board.

'Then came the big breakthrough in the shape of James Brunot, an owner of one of the first Criss-Crosswords games.

The Brunots decided that the game needed a few finishing touches.

They rearranged the premium squares and simplified the rules, which were overly long and reconsidered the name of the game. Then they lodged a Copyright application, which was granted on 1 December, 1948.

Soon after, came the all important name change ! After much searching, they decided upon the name Scrabble for the game and managed to register the trademark on 16 December, 1948.'

The popularity of the game grew and never stopped growing. Ta-dah! And that's the history of Scrabble. Oh gee, is that the word 'Geek' written across my forehead? Oh, no. It's been there for a long time already. XD. Gonna go explore more of the Scrabble website now.

Fan Girl-ly Moment

CSI NY SPOILER ALERT

Not that it really matters... those who don't care for CSI NY can just turn away from now. Those who do care already know about this... :P

-Throws all dignity aside and starts squeeing and flailing- Yes, for those who don't know, I am actually extremely capable of that.

If I wasn't clear the first time, SPOILER ALERT.

For the first time ever, we have a CSI wedding. Yeah, I suppose it's still called a wedding if the wife-to-be is already 7 months pregnant, the couple tied the knot in jeans, and their two bosses are their only guests (One of which is dressed even more smartly than the groom, by the way...).

The Danny/Lindsay relationship has long been a hate-it-completely or OMG-I-love-them with the fans of the show. It's only one of the two extremes. And in case you haven't picked up already, I'm a die hard fan. As in, the kind who remembers all the dialogues and has all the videos.

CSI's got the bug-man, Grissom, recently featured in Star Two. CSI Miami's got the H-Man and his Mighty Black Frames, Horatio, who has also been recently featured (and mocked) in Star Two as well... Remember the CSI Miami movie featuring Horatio's glasses? XD And now CSI NY's got a shot gun wedding between the show's Drama King and country girl. Geez. Gotta love the franchise. XD

Check out the promo, it made me almost get teary-eyed. Almost...




Right. With that enthusiam out of the way, subject shift.

The first term exams just ended and the momentum has shifted to competition season. It's time for the students to disappear regularly from class and for the respective teachers to start complaining about the fact.
It's time for students to start strategizing which lessons they can skip and get away with, and which lessons have teachers who will make students sorry they ever bothered to ask to be excused.

And then, it's also Sports Day season. So we have marching fever, banner painting mania and a whole load of running around. Ain't school life grand? (Depict that sentence in whichever tone you want.)

But seriously, I believe in living this final year of school to the fullest. And if that means I have to balance Drama, Scrabble, societies, prefect duties and studies all in one and pass out at the end of each day, then so be it. Patsy's latest post (Check the side links) on loneliness in a new place really meant something to me. While leaving Form 5 may be the start of a brand new wonderful adventure, it also means leaving behind some of the best times of your life.

So for goodness sake, just cos' it's SPM year, don't bury yourselves in books and forget to really live. For your own sake, and your high school friends. :-)

THERE! I finally posted a REAL update. Now quit bugging me about me about blog-updating. XD

'H' Tag

Eevy tagged me. And I wouldn't even have known it until she told me in school. That's how good I am at keeping up with my own blog and others these days.

Ok. So answers starting with only my initial. Why not 'F'? Actually, might be harder... XD

1. What is your name: H. Fern

2. A four Letter Word: Huge

3. A boy's Name: Harry... Harold... Hill Harper... Howard...

4. A girl's Name: Haylie... Helen... Hannah...

5. An occupation: Housekeeper... Hairdresser... Hawker...

As you can see, I tend to overdo things.... XD

6. A color: Hitam! Rofl... Hazel counts I guess.

7. Something you wear: For people with accents... 'H-underwear...' No? Ok. Hats.

8. A type of food: Hamburgers... Hotdogs... Hokkien Mee.

9. Something found in the bathroom: Hair-removal cream? Hair gel? Hairbrush...

10. A place: Holland... Hamburg (I hope I spelt that right...)... Hoboken, Hong Kong, Haiti.

11. A reason for being late: Had food poisoning. Hit by a car/bus/motorbike... -choi!-

12. Something you shout: Hey! :P

13. A movie title: Honey I Shrunk the Kids... Harry Potter and the -insert whichever movie here-

14. Something you drink: Hot coffee. XD

15. A musical group: Gaaaah... I'm blank other than Hannah Montana. And she's not a musical group. Oh wait. Got it: Hillsong United.

16. An animal: Horse. Hare. Hound.

17. A street name: Hamilton Road. Muahaha.

18. A type of car: Hyundai

19. A song title: Hey There Delilah.

20. A verb: Hug

Ok. Done.

Tag No. I Lost Count

School's out for the week. To heck with homework! (At least for today... -weakling-)

Time for a long tag. Snagged from you-know-who. XD Not Voldermort, silly...

How many keys are on your keychain?
I have loads of keychains, but no keys on them. They're all stuffed in a small blue container and I'm running out of space...

If you were given a canvas and watercolors, what would you paint?
BWAHAHAHAAA!!! Me paint??!! Me???! Paint???!!! -collapses laughing-

What do you regard as the most repulsive form of music?
I've told Jessica this before. Songs that spell words. XD It annoys the heck out of me. We want to listen to lyrics, not spelling lessons of a single word, over and over again.

Whose mind, besides your own, would you like to control?
Um, somebody that I want something from? :P -devious-

What is the most dangerous occupation?
According to my English teacher, being a teacher or a prefect should students ever be allowed to buy guns in Malaysia.

What is the first thing you do when you get out of bed?
My bladder makes me go to the bathroom.

What do you consider the greatest threat to mankind?
People. XD -'I love mankind, it's people I can't stand.' -Linus, Charlie Brown-

If you could project yourself into the past, where would you go?
I've watched enough of Hiro Nakamura to say it's better off not going anywhere.

What are you thankful you are not doing right now?
Agree with the person I took this tag from. Homework.

What is your favorite kind of candy?
Don't have any preference, really. I eat candy if I somehow obtain it, but I don't buy candy. XD

What is your favorite thing about the beach?
Tiny little crabs that one can chase in the early morning. And then sitting on the sand watching the waves splash in while trying not to get one's butt wet.

If you were invisible, where would you go?
I don't know yet. Wait til' I'm invisible, then I'll come back and tell you where I went.

What is one object in your home that you are embarrassed to own?
If I'm embarassed to own, why the heck would I want to tell the Whole Wide World?

Fill in the blank; When I dance, I look like:
Someone who's never danced before...

Who is one person you wish you would have never met?
Like I'm gonna tell yoooouuu.... XD

What is your favorite fruit?
It used to be apples, but when I got my braces, I couldn't bite into them without yelling out in pain. But now that my braces are gone, I guess it's apples again.

What is your favorite kind of cookie?
Butter cookies. :-)

If you were an evil dictator, where would you rule?
Like the person I tagged this from, wherever people will not rebel against my evil dictating. XD Dictating......

What do you need to get right now at the drug store?
Mosquito repellent. Nasty little buggers. Bleh.

What song do you keep hearing over and over again?
David Archuleta's Crush. I used to like the song... before they played it a bajillion times.

What was the happiest age of your life?
Aww, every year has it's ups and downs...

What is your favorite piece of clothing that you own?
My loose, comfy school T-shirts.

What two words describe your lifestyle?
Currently? Um... Rush Hour?

Which ocean creature fascinates you most?
The Lochness Monster and other mythtical sea creatures out there. Lol.

On a scale of 1-10; how religious are you?
I'm thinking 6...

What historical figure would you most like to have a discussion with?
All those smart-alecs that did/came up with all kinds of things that we have to study now. WHHHYY?? :P

What color looks best on you?
White, black... red.

What is your favorite thing about being sick?
Nothing. It sucks being sick. You feel like crap all day and when you recover, you feel like crap all over again when you see all the work you have to catch up on...

Whats new?
Lots and lots of burfday pwesents. Boing!

Why are you here right now?
Because it's a whole lot more fun than doing Add Maths, Moral or Accounts homework. Plus, I wanted to book cinema tickets online. Unfortunately the reservation tickets were all gone. So I'm just gonna have to wing it tomorrow. XD

What commercial do you find most annoying?
Those that belong to companies that sponsered the show. Which means their commercials start and end every single commercial break. Yoiks.

What was your favorite meal growing up?
McD Happy Meal. Isn't that everyone's? Haha.

If you had to spend the rest of your life in one place, where would it be?
My own room. That is, if new books/computer games/DVDs are brought in at a frequent rate.

Fill in the blank; I am so much smarter than:
Whatever inanimate objects with no brains. Except robots. Robots have outsmarted me and two other friends of my before.

What one person or thing reminds you of the 70s?
I'm Era-Ignorant. I don't know.

What is college really good for?
It's like experiencing school life all over again from the beginning. Only better.

Where is the most beautiful place you have ever been?
There were several places in Europe that were amazing. Only I don't remember the names right now. One was a waterfall. The other was a cablecar ride down Mt. Titlis in Switzerland. It was so green! And the air stank of cow dung. :p

What body part aches you the most right now?
My arm, thanks to playing lots of badminton after a long time of non-activity.

When is the angriest you have ever been?
Angriest, I'm not sure. I've been angry plenty of times, but the level was pretty much the same. Most recently, it was this morning during a certain period. I won't say anymore here in case I get in trouble. XD

What do you waste your time doing?
Going online answering super long tags?

On a scale of 1-10; how much do you trust people?
6. :P

If you were forced to choose your own death, how would you die?
Quietly in my sleep.

On a scale of 1-10; how photogenic are you?
I'd say 2. But that's just me.

What aspect of your personality could use a little work?
Patience. And procrastination. Oh, and my introvertedness. (Is that word right? :P)

What is your greatest addiction?
CSI NY. No freakin' duh. XD

What issue are you sick of hearing about?
SPM. Although granted, what I heard this morning in said class back in the question about anger, was a very different way to hear about SPM.

If you were a professional wrestler, what would your ring name be?
Evil-Dictator. So help me, I'm out of ideas.

What language would you like to master?
BM. Hahahahaa.

What is your favorite dish at a Chinese restaurant?
No idea. I'd eat anything.

Who would you least likely expect a phone call from?
Carmine Giovinazzo? Heh. That answers the above question as well as 'who would you want to receive a phone call from?'

What is the longest you have ever gone without a shower?
I think a day. I'd die if I have to last any longer.

What is the saddest movie you have ever seen?
I actually got teary-eyed from watching Adam Sandler's 'Click'. Not from laughing. I would like to say Marley and Me, but looks like it;s not going to premier in M'sia. Triple Drat.

What time do you usually fall asleep?
Once upon a time was past midnight. For the past week, I'm off by 10.30.

Where is the worst place to be stuck waiting?
Anywhere that doesn't have a toilet and you need to go super urgently.

What is the cutest animal on Earth?
Puppies!!!

Name one celebrity that has no right being a celebrity.
I can think of quite a few. But I better watch it in case fans come after me.

What hobby have you always wanted to pick up?
Karate. Too late now. XD

You guys are too awesome...

What in the world have I done to deserve friends like you lot? XD

My 17th birthday was a really great one.

Thanks, 5 Arif, for the birthday song.
Thanks to the many people with their birthday wishes.
Thanks to The One-s for their wonderful birthday card.
Thanks to Nadzira for her very early present XD (December!).
Thanks to my big brother, for the Friends' DVD collection, MUAKS!
Thanks to Hui Lynn for the cake(s). Thanks to Jo and PC for the books, muahahaha.
Thanks to you three plus Tricia and Esther for embarassing me in Ms Lee tuition. :P
And of course, thanks to mummy and daddy for a great lunch, dinner and cake!
Thanks to Jess and Tricia and Amanda for the presents in advance.
Thanks producers of CSI NY, that what I've been waiting for all this while is finally going to happen.
-Hugs you all-

With four new books and all 10 seasons of Friends to watch, it'll be a wonder if I can actually finish any homework this week. And if I do, I probably will not be sleeping much.

Happy CNY, ya'll!

Driving Round the Bend... Soon...

Wa-hayy! Only two more weeks of holidays left... then it's back to secondary school for the very last time.

The friggin' internet connection keeps going out on me. I have refreshed the 'Whose Line is it Anyway' videoclips on YouTube four times already. It's my latest addiction. If anyone passes my room and hears maniacal laughter from inside, do not fret. It's just me laughing at four dudes, occasionally three dudes, one dudette, spouting hilarious (if sometimes dirty) roll-over-on-your-stomach jokes. They're geniuses I tell you!
Ah... turns out my brother turned off the modem. :P -Refreshes for fifth time-

This has been a dead blog for a while, because nothing much happened over the holidays, except occasional SPBT work with Ms Koay (fun, fun, fun! O.0) and watching CSI DVDs and of course, Whose Line.

The most eventful thing this hols so far, is me signing up to get my driver's license. As my birthday is in January, my parents thought it easier for me to get all the tedious theory parts out of the way while I am free so I can jump straight to actual driving once I turn 17.

Tedious is right. The first step in this teenager rite of passage is to sit through 5 hours of lectures. The first guy that came in to speak went on describing various road accidents because of careless drivers etc.

-whoops! and there goes the internet connection again!-grrkkksss-refresh, refresh, refresh-

The second guy, was an ex-military man. Needless to say, he was kinda scary. XD What was worse was that he spoke pretty fast and not too clearly. So while you're straining hard to try and decipher what he was saying, he is suddenly staring at you expectantly for an answer to the question you did not hear.

After the lecture, it was time to head home and study the KPP, Kurikulum Pendidikan Pemandu. One and a half weeks later, I headed to the computer centre right opposite Pn Gwee's house to take the computer test. It was pretty late when I got there and there was a whole bunch of people waiting for their turn. So I pretty much spent the time staking-out Pn Gwee's home. :P Whoops!

It was two hours before I got to go in to take the test. I finished the test in 9 minutes (I guess I just wanted to get the heck outta there... :P). Ta-daaa... a nice Saturday morning gone just like that.

One week later, it was time for yet another lecture. Three hours this time. And I had a fit of panic because I was apparently still underage and not supposed to be there. Pfft. And it was that military man delivering the lecture again. Thank goodness I wasn't kicked outta there, and my three hours was logged in officially anyway. -phew-

The conditions for passing the computer test were pretty lenient. But the actual driving test itself sounded pretty tough to me. Or maybe it was just because of the way the lecturer talked about the ways one could fail during the testing in the circuit... :P Either way, I'm pretty nervous.

But there's nothing left to do but wait until my birthday. I can't get my license til' then and duh, I can't get into the driver's seat until then. Ergo, it's back to boredom. Interestingly, it's not from the lack of things to do, it's more of the lack of things I want to do. Yes, every one of us probably remembers our teachers' dire warnings to study during the holidays....

But hey, it's called a holiday for a reason right???

Hyuk, remember Ms Chow's conversation with us after she gave us our absymal Physics marks. I think it went something like this:

Ms Chow: 'W' equals?
-class stumped-
Ms Chow: What lah... cannot even tell me the answer! Watch TV summore lah! Watch that, what ah... Astro On Demand wan... Gem something...
Ee Vern: The Gem of Life?
Ms Chow: Hah! Yes! Gem of Life. See?? What did I tell you? -asks Ee Vern- 'W' equals what?
Ee Vern: Err...
Ms Chow: See lah! I never ask you also, you can tell me Gem of Life! Ask you 'W' equals what also dunno...
Ee Vern: Oh! Mass times gravity!
Ms Chow: Haaahhh. Good. I'm not saying cannot watch TV, but don't watch so much lah. Watch maybe one hour a day will do. Don't be like me, watch Gem of Life back to back episodes all night long wan...
-class starts laughing-

It's memories like these, and when I'm lying on my bed in a trance of pathetic boredom that make me almost wish it was time to go back to school. Almost.

On the bright side, I'll be heading to KL tomorrow to catch Mamamia! the Musical with my mum and aunt and cousin, whom I haven't spent time with in a long time. Looking forward to it!

Til' then. Buh-bye!

The Big One Zero Zero

I don't know about other shows, but the CSI franchise is big on celebrations when they hit their 100th episode. CSI's 100th delved into the world of transgenders, CSI Miami meanwhile, has, and I quote Kristine Huntly (resident reviewer of TalkCSI), 'has all hallmarks of the show: Horatio's heroics, a child in danger, meddling government agents, scheming rich people, strife among the team that ultimately gives way to cohesion and a daring final rescue.'

If we were in the US of A, the 100th episode of CSI NY will be premiering in two hours. Or rather, 12 hours, if we were to really follow their time.

I am not being biased when I say that CSI NY has the most interesting 100th yet. Really!!

Excuse me:

Some maniac is going around killing all the Mac Taylors' in the city.
Guest stars include: Nelly, Chris Daughtry, Rumer Willis and Scott Wolf. Like, can I get a 'woot!'?

And the guest star list on TalkCSI is just hilarious to read:

• David Haley as Macdonald Taylor
• Mark Musashi as Mackiyo Taylor
• Chris Daughtry as Machiavelli Taylor
• Scott Wolf as Mackinley Taylor
• Rumer Willis as Mackendra Taylor
• Ryan Happy as Macabee Taylor

Throw in McChicken, McFlurry and Big Mac so we can all have a party!

Check out the promo:





(Chris Daughtry) Mac Taylor: Sorry, I didn't get your name. I'm sure we'll all like to know the name of the officer who understands our frustrations...
(Gary Sinise) Mac Taylor: I am Detective....... Mac Taylor.

Hyuk!

Now we just have to wait until April next year before we actually get to watch it.

The Missing Page

This is for you lot, whose edition of the school magazine 2008 did not have the article on Choral Speaking. Oh wait, that's everyone's!

Ok. I just had to get that bit of sarcasm out of the way.

Seriously, ignorance really is bliss. I had absolutely no idea that the article I wrote got scrapped until this morning when I was flipping through past year magazines and came across the Choral Speaking article there. I forgot all about it. Now I can't believe I actually forgot all about it. And so silly me just had to wait until the school holidays before realizing it.

The choral speaking article has always been in the magazine dang it... Of all years they decide to cut it out, it had to be this year?? And without at least letting me know about it... -does the Fern derisive snort that some of you will recognize, especially Jess-

This bothers me because choral speaking was one of this year's happiest memories for me. I've always enjoyed reading past teams' achievements in the magazine and was looking forward to present an article of my own. Bleh. Now that article isn't going anywhere except this post, read by you patient people who have been putting up with my ranting for the past few paragraphs. Thanks, by the way. :-)

Article:

The words ‘choral speaking’ and ‘victory’ have always come together in the same sentence year after year for CGL choral speaking teams. Naturally, when our turn came to take on the competition this year, we felt tremendous desire, not to mention pressure, to uphold that great CGL legacy. Our team of 4 Arif girls braved the task and set off on a journey to try and defend our ‘champion’ spot in the Kelompok Level with our piece entitled, ‘Senses’.


We had so many practice sessions to the point that we could probably recite the entire script in our sleep. The Kelompok Level competition was held in the afternoon at SMK Heng Ee. Every team present performed to their very best that day. All our hard work and preparation for this day paid off as we performed flawlessly and captured the attention of the judges. As the results were being announced, our team basically formed a long chain of held hands and prayed as hard as we could. And, what do girls do when they hear great news? They scream, of course. And scream we did. We only gave the emcee the chance to announce up til SMK Convent- before we drowned out her voice with our cheers of happiness.


Now we were headed for State Level, where the competition would be much fiercer with heavy contenders like SMK Convent Bukit Mertajam and St. Georges’. There was no doubt that we threw our hearts into the performance and did the best we could do. Once again, when the results were announced, we held each other’s hands until all blood and heat drained from them. The teams were announced one by one for the consolation prizes and our heart rates increased for every team called. Finally, the top three positions were between us, St. Georges’ and Convent BM. The emcee’s words were purposely slow and torturous for all of us.


She announced St. Georges’ ‘Help! I’m A Teenager!’ as third place and our team started whispering hurried last minute prayers and mixed ‘Ohmigod’ and ‘Please... please... please...’ and so on. Alas, she announced our team next for second place and our faces fell in disappointment. Convent BM claimed top spot with their piece, ‘Sweet, Bitter 16’.


But it wasn’t over yet. The emcee announced there was one more prize to give away. ‘And the Best Conductor award goes to... Lee-


Cue the familiar screams of CGL girls again that successfully prevented the emcee from finishing her sentence. Thank goodness there weren’t any conductors other than myself who had the surname of ‘Lee’. It was truly a wonderful moment as I went up to collect the trophy amidst the cheers of my classmates. The cacophony was amazing. It was almost as if we actually won.


All in all, second place isn’t bad anyway. We managed to get this far, and we get to return back to school RM600.00 richer. Puan Gan, thanks for your never-ending support and advice. We really appreciate all you have done to help us. Also, thanks to Pn Lim Yen Lee and Ms Leong for being at the competition as well to provide moral support. And to all the other teachers, thank you so much for your advice, patience and allowing us to have your lessons to practice.


Truth be told, we really did win during this choral speaking competition. It didn’t have to be the certified, champion-of-the-state kind of victory. The fact is, through this competition, the bonds of friendship between us were strengthened tenfold. We helped and supported each other with complete sincerity whether during the happy or sad. We defined the meaning of teamwork and what it meant to have love for each other and love for our school. And that, is a victory in itself.


Ohmigoodness. I just realized I didn't get my prize money either. Good grief. XD

Masters of the drinks stall

I'm not really sure why we volunteered to help out in our primary school's 'Fun at CGL' fair today. Gratitude to them for the first 6 years of our schooling life perhaps? XD Ah, whatever. We're just funny that way. Lol. It was quite a lot of fun anyway, other than the usual tiredness (and constant complains as if we are being tortured :P) from standing so darn long serving drinks to people. But that was an experience within itself, where plenty of lessons were learnt. Lessons that we don't learn in the classroom. Among them are:

1. Pearls (those round chewy bits of tapioca found in 'Bubble Milk Tea') get really, really, really sticky when left out in the open air for too long a time. And two flimsy plastic spoons are definitely not the solution to that problem.

2. The reason as to why those things are called 'Pearls' is unknown to me. But there is quite extensive info on 'Bubble Milk Tea' on Wikipedia (Is there anything that isn't in there??) so check it out if you have nothing better to do... Whoops. -Siapa yang memakan cili, dialah yang rasa pedas-

3. I'm downright clumsy when it comes to filled paper/plastic cups. I managed to knock over about 5 cups in about 2 hours. All in front of dear, patient Pn Rajes.
Me: -knocks over cup- Whoopsss!!
Pn. Rajes: Nevermind, nevermind... -proceeds to wipe ice off the table patiently-

4. The drinks stall does not have enough space for 5 teens to prepare drinks.

5. Not closing the cover properly of the container used to shake the 'Bubble Milk Tea' provides an entertaining show for awaiting customers.
Jonie: -Shakes viciously, pink juice flies in every direction- ARRGGHHH!! -juice dripping from her face-
-Phaik Chern, Jo and I, who were nearest, gets splashed on our backs and hair- AAHHHHHH!!! J0-NIE!! -freezes in whatever we were doing to stare at dripping Jonie-
Customers: WAHHHHH!!!!!/OOHHHHH!!!/HAHAHAHAHAHA!
-Tricia scuttles by carrying a huge jug of crushed ice-
Tricia: -gleefully- I didn't kena! I didn't kena! Hahaha...

6. Hui Lynn is one dang -greedy- bargainer.
Hui Lynn: More pearls!
-Jo empties a spoon of pearls save for two-
Hui Lynn: Oi! Why you leave behind two wan?!
Jo: Ok, ok! -empties the rest-

7. Teachers have more energy than students do.
Long after we had collapsed onto chairs, exhausted, the teachers were still on their feet, hard at work.
Jo: Why you so active wan??
Jo's mum: Why you so half dead wan??!

8. No matter how systematically we plan things out, everything just becomes a mess later.
H2O cup! ICE! ICE!
YAM! GREEN APPLE!
HOW MANY?
Uh.... DOESN'T MATTER! JUST MAKE LAH!!

9. Quality control of products isn't very good.
Jonie: Put syrup ledi ah not?
Jolene: Uh..... dunno, dunno...
Jonie: -contemplates cup for a moment- Ah! Whatever lah! -pours in syrup-
Esther: OI! Put ledi lah! You want to give me diabetes is it??!

10. People just disappear. It just happens.
Phaik Chern: Yam, yam! Who ordered the yam?! -waves cup around-
-No one answers-
Phaik Chern: What the-???? I thought...??? Argghhhh.....

11. Many kids need a lesson in 'Correct Names To Call Elders'
Kid: Aunty! Aunty! Milo Ais one! O.o

12. We all have different reactions to the same stimulus.
Kid: Aunty! Aunty!
Me: -other than a tight smile and 'Call me 'Aunty' one more time....' running through my mind, does not react, cos' I'm just nice that way (Yes, Jess. :P)-

Kid: Aunty! Aunty!
Someone else, though I'm not sure who: I'm going to pour syrup on the next person who calls me that...

Kid: Aunty! Aunty!
Jolene: -holds back cup- I'm not giving this to you until you stop calling me 'Aunty'

Kid: Aunty! Aunty!
Shankeetha: -Serves the kid and waits until the kid leaves- BWAHAHAHA! She just called me aunty! I am so insulted!!
-Jolene's mum bursts into laughter in the background-

So, ta-daa. Many lessons learnt. So glad it's only one week left of school to go. Catch ya' later.

Exams over. Time to answer tags

THREE SCREEN NAMES YOU HAVE HAD :
- PRTFCSI (don't ask... I was 11 for crying out loud...)
- DAnNSfreak
- Fern (No duh...)


THREE PHYSICAL THINGS YOU LIKE ABOUT YOURSELF :
- My guitar-hardened fingertips. I was so proud the day pressing guitar strings didn't hurt anymore. XD
- My height, can't complain...
- My eyelids, cos' they're weird. XD I have a double eyelid one one side, but not on the other.

THREE PARTS OF YOUR HERITAGE :
- Uh... Hokkien? Full stop?

THREE THINGS THAT SCARE YOU :
- Upcoming results, especially BM since my entire karangan's isi might not be accepted...
- Heavy rain on a night with CSI NY on Astro.
- The computer hanging when I have multiple tabs open. Seriously, it just happened a minute ago. Thank goodness I didn't have to restart.
There are other stuff, obviously, all of which are too private to state here.

THREE OF YOUR EVERYDAY ESSENTIALS :
- Sleep
- A bath
- TV/Internet/Music/Books (NOT EXAM BOOKS!)... any one of those four.

THREE THINGS YOU ARE WEARING NOW :
- T-shirt
- Pajama bottoms
- Glasses
Once again, I wonder what the whole point of tags are...

THREE OF YOUR FAVORITE BANDS OR MUSICAL ARTISTS :
- Sister Hazel (Thanks, Jess!)
- Jason Mraz
- Ceesau (Hyuk. Bias much?) Fine. Planet Shakers

THREE OF YOUR FAVORITE SONGS (RIGHT NOW) :
- Rule the World (Take That)
- Next Plane Home (Daniel Powter)
- Baba O'Riley (The Who)

THREE THINGS YOU WANT IN A RELATIONSHIP :
- Haven't thought about it really... Singletons rule, baybeh!

THREE PHYSICAL THINGS ABOUT THE PREFERRED ?? SEX THAT APPEAL TO YOU :
- Glasses! Like Esther, but I have a very obvious reason. Hey, if a guy can make glasses look good, obviously he looks good. To me. :P
- Neat hair (Re: Danny, although, lately, he needs a haircut... :P)
- Medium build (Re: Danny. Again and again and again.)
Sorry, Esther. Very much like yours.

THREE OF YOUR FAVORITE HOBBIES :
- Whatever to do with CSI
- Writing (When the mood's there.)
- Playing guitar (And piano sometimes)

THREE THINGS YOU WANT TO DO REALLY BADLY RIGHT NOW :
- Meet Carmine Giovinazzo
- Watch the episode of CSI NY where Danny finds out that Lindsay -bleep. in case you don't like spoilers- And yes, the episode probably hasn't even been shot yet.
- Burn the four titles of essays for Moral and not suffer the consequences.

THREE CAREERS YOU’RE CONSIDERING/YOU’VE CONSIDERED :
- Forensic scientist (No duh)
- Journalist (Or something in the writing field)
- Vet (Back in primary school)

THREE PLACES YOU WANT TO GO ON VACATION :
- New York City
- Staten Island in New York
- New York State
Pfft. I will one day. When I can convince myself that I'll survive the plane journey.

THREE THINGS YOU WANT TO DO BEFORE YOU DIE :
- Meet Carmine Giovinazzo (I might live forever! Bwahahaha)
- Go to New York (I hear Jess say 'Let it go, man...')
- Can't think of anything else that's not too personal... Haha

THREE WAYS THAT YOU ARE STEREOTYPICALLY A GIRL/GUY :
Yes, Jess, I find this question hard.
- I have plenty of criticism for plenty of guys (Right, Tricia?)
Oh gosh. This is hard...
- Like Esther says, hygiene is very important for me.
......
- I'm not into cars nor football.

THREE WAYS THAT YOU ARE NOT STEREOTYPICALLY A GIRL/GUY :
Ah. Now this is easy.
- Dresses, skirts, earrings, nail polish, handbags? Nada. Nein. Nope. Zipzallyzero. No way no how. You get the picture.
- I don't scream when I see bugs/lizards etc. (Ah-hah. I have proof. A huge bug just flew in through my window, buzzed around, and hit the fan. And I am still typing here, unfazed)
(Ok, I just got up and smashed it with my Moral notebook and dunked it into the dustbin. The end.)
- Other than football and racing cars, I enjoy other boy stereotype interests like guitar and playstation.

FIVE PEOPLE THAT YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE TAKE THIS QUIZ NOW :
Do it if you want. :P

Exam Breeds

I see that people tag me just to see me update. Hyuk. What? It's exam season. And I have spent the last few days liberally burning jars and jars of midnight oil despite the fact that the Earth's oil supply is slowly running out...

The worst of the papers are over so now I can look back and see how humorous the whole thing was. Of course, it wasn't at all funny at the time...

EXAM BREEDS
(based on what I hear and experience myself, so I've probably missed out some other kinds)
- The disciplined, kuai-kuai, good girls
They have the sense to study early and sleep way before 1 a.m. They know how to arrange their time well, they started studying about a month ago (maybe two) and they are the most calm before the papers.
dot dot dot
-Bursts out laughing- I'm sorry... know anyone like that?

- The Pull-All-Nighters and Sleep-All-'Day-ers'
You know who you are. :-) I found your recap of your sleeping schedule very interesting. All night long on Sunday, all night long on Monday, slept all day long on Tuesday and studied all night long again. Lots and lots of coffee involved. I'm admire that you actually look so fresh and bouncy in the morning. But then again, you look fresh and bouncy every morning. And mostly throughout the day. Especially when Meryl Streep is around.
Now everyone knows who I am talking about. MUAKS, darling. I don't find you amusing. I find you interesting and a very fun character. I can see you giving me the death glare as you read this.
But I digress.
Despite all this, these kind of students still do perfectly well in the exams. Hence, the last-minute studying theory works for some but doesn't work for others. So choose according to your needs! :P (trying to make sure I don't get in trouble here...)

-The Doze-Off-and-On-Regularly-Through-the-Night-With-Textbooks-Covering-Their-Faces
or
-I-Will-Do-This-No-Matter-What
The name speaks for itself. Stamina not as high as the all-nighter one. I think the little naps count for small recharging times... Gotta admire your will power. Again, you know who you are.

- The To-Hell-With-It-I-Don't-Care-Anymore
Hehe. Again, you know who you are, having said those exact words to me. These kinds study well, but when a certain 'boiling point' is reached, books get thrown aside with a 'blah!' and they go online and channel out the frusrations.

- The Study-Until-the-Very-Last-Minute
Very common I would say. Books stay glued in the hand from the house (even when changing and brushing teeth perhaps...) in the car/bus and all the way to class, up to the moment the exam starts. Many discussions are held with fellow students, checking facts with one another in a frenzy. I think there's a bit of that in all of us.

Then, there's me. At least it was like this for this exam. Mid year was kind of similar but not as bad. I think this week was the worst for me. But as I said earlier, looking back, I can laugh. Although at the time I probably felt more like crying. XD

I think I'd call myself the:
'Insaf'-Procrastinator-But-It's-Too-Late-To-Be-Sorry
which results in:
'The-Exam-Strategist- (Which I see in a couple other people too)

First, I have said this to myself half a dozen times in the past week, at 1 a.m in the morning:
'Whoever is listening up there, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry... I will never, never, never ever (don't hold me up on that though... :P) leave revision this late again!!' -sighs and flips textbook page with an expression of utter defeat-

And then, the desperate strategist kicks in.
'Ok, if I wake up at 3 pm, I can finish 3 chapters before dinner (provided I hurry). After dinner, I have to finish another 4 chapters (starts to panic). I should be done by 1 a.m, because I wouldn't be able to last any longer. I can go to bed and wake up at 5 a.m and finish reading Chapter 9 and 10... then, I once I come home from school, I am going to sleep for an hour and begin the same cycle all over again. Alright. Let's go.' -cracks knuckles, all gung-ho-

Therefore, I have come to the conclusion that exam season also bring out the best strategists in the worst of procrastinators.

School life is great, ain't it not?

Pffft.

At the end of the day, exams? Unavoidable. Swotting hard? Inevitable. A few years off our life span? Probably. Or at least a few more white hairs.
But heck, it's school life and every moment should be taken as a blessing. Or at least, take the fun moments as the blessing and blank out after exams by writing a long post laughing about it.
How we face the papers are one thing. The results are another, but now is not the time to discuss that.
Heh, come to think of it... we suffer now, the teacher's suffer later. I mean, our papers have to end up somewhere while we celebrate, right? Kinda makes me think of 'Energy cannot be created or destroyed, but can be converted from one form to another'

Student stress + Exam papers --------------> Teacher stress + Exam papers

Heh. This looks like precipitation through double decomposition.

ARGHHH!! STOP! STOP! It's over for goodness sake.

And I'm not doing the tag yet btw. Gonna go eat dinner first. And sleep for at least 12 hours tonight.

Live, Learn, Grow

There it is again... the theme for last year's school mag. Except they turned it around to Learn, Live, Grow for God knows what reason :P

I had just been going through the blogs of my BRATs mates tonight. Again, -Si Pemalas- I don't make it an actual point to check other people's blogs regularly so I tend to be a little behind on things. It gets even worse when I happen to not click on a certain list of links for months and the next time I do, I pretty much drown in other people's news on their lives. This is what happened to the BRATs people that I have been spent four awesome days with, back in... uh... -shoot!- March? Or May? Oops. See what I mean?!

So anyway, I haven't been in contact with any of them for a long while now. Looking at their blogs, it's pretty obvious a lot of things have come and gone. Some BRATs have actually gotten together a few times since. Some have -like yours truly- have disappeared off the radar- I guess it helps more when one lives in KL (where a honking huge majority of the BRATs come from), and is independently mobile -chants- "One more year, one more year, one more year."

Anyway, I just wanted to post this for you lot who happen to check in on me to see whether I'm still alive and kicking or not. Here's wishing you all well in whatever lies ahead. College Exams, Uni Exams, SPM, jobs etc. We may get caught up in our own lives, but I'm sure we will definitely never forget those four great days spent together.

Sand, you should have gone to Queensbay Mall. At least there, the North, South and Centre Zones are labelled and colour-coordinated properly XD
Yew Chong, you're never online! Did I type in the wrong msn by mistake or do we just keep going on at different times?
Michelle, great new hairstyle!

Back to the books. Bleh.

Fellow bloggers, do you guys have any trouble uploading pictures? Mine seems to take forever. >:/

Si Pemalas Finally Updates

BEFORE anyone says anything else, the Si Pemalas term I am using here is in reference to my blog updating frequency, ok. Don't you get started on that 'If you are lazy, what am I?' stuff again... :P

Ok, the latest news (or stale now, in this case) is of course, Negeri Sembilan. I will once again prove my wonderful hardworkingness by not writing about those four days spent there. Instead, here are the links to the people who have been hardworking enough to write about our time there.

(Most) Pictures courtesy of me, by the way. :-) (Since no one had been kind enough to credit me for the painstaking picture taking... hyuk! XD)

http://emotion-full.blogspot.com/2008/08/negeri-sembilan-digi-ad.html
Esther's Digi Ad... thanks a lot. Now the tune is stuck in my head. :P

http://caramelapples11.livejournal.com/75552.html
Phaik Chern's picspam.

Ah well, it was fun in some parts. The only all girl team, the only English sketch, probably the noisiest dorm... It's pretty cool that we brought a nice 3rd placing back.

Knowing me, I'll probably disappear for the next month again. Ta ta til' then.

Words you can't find anywhere else

We are creative people or rather, we are dumb and weird people. Whichever of those words you use, you'd be right. That's why a whole new different vocabulary exists in our conversations with one another. Here are the most well-used words. Expect them to be in the next edition of the Oxford Dictionary, as I will be submitting them in. Dot dot dot (see below).

1. Stuuu

As in: "Aiyah! I'm so stuuuu!" "Why so stuuu?" "Arrgghh! So stuuuu!!"

It is actually the abbreviation of the word 'stupid'. Created by our very own class monitor, Jonie, it's not actually used by anyone except herself. But she uses it so often that everyone of course knows the word. The usage of this word increased rapidly this year when she gained the post as monitor. We can only guess how much stress the poor girl goes through trying to control us. Hence, stuuu.... (Best uttered in the most 'Canto' manner possible)

2. 'O'

As in:
"I can't stand all the books arranged so messily..."
"Hahaha.... you are so 'O'..."

Short for OCD, which is short for Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Tricia started calling me that ever since she came over to my place and saw that I arranged my CDs in alphabetical order. (Don't you start!!)
My 'O'ness has since become a source of great fun for her. Whenever I was not in the room or when my attention was diverted, she and Jolene tried stuff like rearranging my CDs upside down, rearranging the position of my stuffed dog and cat, shifting the arm of my Snoopy Statue of Liberty so the torch was pointing towards it's butt, and worst of all, taking all my colour pens and hiding them all over my room. Bleh. Mind you, she's 'O' too. At least I don't rewrite my entire Maths homework paper because there were small smudges on it. XD
Since that day, any slight display of a tendency towards neatness will earn that person the declaration of being 'O'.

3. Du

As in: While doing Differentiation work: "I can't do this anymore! I feel so du!"

Relatively new. I just came up with it yesterday. Means 'gone blur' or something along those lines. Only applicable when one is doing Add Maths, Differentiation. Originated from the formula du/dx. Uttered when one goes completely confused with the question and starts to see du/dx and dy/dx everywhere.

4. Kabur... 'plat'

As in:
Somebody does a mistake indicating pure blurness.
"Hahaha..." (points and laughs) "Kabur... plat."

This phrase came about a long time ago. In fact, I think since primary school. Not sure who came up with it, I think Jess. Kabur is of course, 'blur' in Malay. This phrase is always accompanied by mimicking the action of scribbling the word 'kabur' on one's palm, and 'pasting' it onto the blur person, (hence, the 'plat' sound). Not so popular anymore, but I still find it funny anyway.

5. hah?

Universal. Everyone knows this. Everyone uses it, especially after a particularly confusing lesson. Means confusion. Of course. Can be used as a monosyllable word, "hah?" or can be dragged on for a long while, usually when one isn't really concentrating on what the other is saying, "Haaaaaaaaaaaaaah.....?"

6. Ro

Not exactly an invented word, just the history behind how we learnt this word was funny. Ro, in Physics, is used to represent density. It's actually the 17th letter in the Greek alphabet, written like a 'p'. Here's how 'kabur... plat' we were.

Ms Chow: -writes symbol on the board- this is 'ro'. What is it?
Whole class: -dutifully- Ro.....
Ms. Chow: Haiyah! I knowlah, 'ro'! What is it??
Whole class: Hah?
Ms. Chow: Density lah!!
Whole class: Ohhhhhhh..... -starts laughing-

Priceless.

7. Dot dot dot

As in:
-random thought- "I like bananas. Do you like bananas? I like bananas."
"Dot dot dot"

Comes from chat speak, '. . .' Only, we can't type that in real conversations right, so we say it out loud. Dot dot dot. Usually used when one thinks the other has said something weird and has no reply to his/her strange statement.

Ok, better get back to my homework now. Buh-bye.

Tag 2

Hehehe. I'm in a 'tag' mood today. Just found one that's quite fun. Anything to keep me preoccupied for an hour before the premier of the best TV series in the world (Strictly my opinion...).

1. What curse word do you use the most?
Thanks to Ron Weasley, I use bloody a whole lot. I say 'toot' a lot too, without actually having any foul words in mind. 'Toot' represents everything.

2. Do you own an iPod?
No. But I have a Walkman phone, which is good enough.

3. What person on your Flist do you talk to the most?
Not one particular person, really. Since it's Flist, so I guess it refers to online, so... JQ and PC.

4. What time is your alarm clock set to?
6.25 am. And I'm in school by 6.50 am. Kewl, eh? And I quote Lightning McQueen from Cars, "Speed, speed... I am lightning..."

5. Do you still remember the first person you kissed?
Might have been mum, might have been dad. I can't remember. -_-

6. Do you remember where you were on 9/11/01?
At my aunt's house.

7. Would you rather take the picture or be in the picture?
Take the picture.

8. What was the last movie you watched?
Um....................... nothing recent at all. Stuart Little on DVD I think. Very weird to see Hugh Laurie in such a nice-guy role.

9. Do any of your friends have children?
No. Us classmates formed our own families in primary school tho'. Right, Uncle Binky?

10. Has anyone ever called you lazy?
I call myself lazy, to which friends immediately scream 'If you're lazy, what am I?'. Sheesh.

11. Do you ever take medication to help you fall asleep?
Nope. I just lie around restlessly for an hour, then suddenly the bloody alarm is ringing.

12. What CD is currently in your CD player?
Planet Shakers, Pick it Up.

13. Do you prefer regular or chocolate milk?
Either. As long as it's not Fernleaf milk. Ironically, I get stomachaches when I drink that. Wonders of all wonders. XD

14. Has anyone told you a secret this week?
Yeah. Just now in school. Muahahaa.

15. When was the last time you had Starbucks?
Unless you count sneaking a few sips of PC's drink last Thursday, not in recent memory.

16. Can you whistle?
Sometimes. I try to imitate Danny Messer's cool cop whistles.

17. What is the first thing you notice about the opposite sex?
The face. Cue the 'oh wow... he's hot'. XD

18. What are you looking forward to?
CSI NY! 40 more minutes!!!!

19. Did you watch cartoons as a child?
Of course.

23. Do you own any band t-shirts?
No. =P

24. What will you be doing in one hour?
Watching CSI NY! Wahoooo! -does cartwheel-

25. Is anyone in love with you?
I wish.

26. What was the last song heard?
Carry You Home, James Blunt, in the car

27. Last time you cried?
I can't remember. a.k.a None of yer' business.

28. Are you on a desktop computer or a lap top?
Laptop.

29. Are you currently wanting any piercing or tattoos?
Mum's dire warnings of me without earings on my wedding day are still ringing in my unpierced ears. Tattoos will be cool. Just a small one. Not those honking huge, all over the arm ones.

30. What’s the weather like?
Damp. Thank goodness it's not raining. If not Astro will have the 'tau kua' again, as my parents call it. (That dang yellow square that comes with 'services currently unavailable')

31. Would you ever date a girl/guy covered in tattoos?
One tattoo. not covered. Not nice ledi. If it was something like Carmine's, then yes. XD

32. What did you do before this?
Dinner.

33. When is the last time you slept on the floor?
Prefect's Camp in January. Lucky me.

34. How many hours of sleep do you need to function?
I've gone around a whole day with 2 hours of sleep before. Again, Prefect's Camp. But I need a whole afternoon's nap to recharge after that.

35. Do you eat breakfast daily?
When there are no more biscuits to bring to school, no, much to Jessica's dismay. You should hear her lecturing me.

36. Are your days fast-paced?
The holidays were nice and slow. Now it's all one thing after another again. But then again, if I can find the time to do this tag, guess it's not so bad...

37. What did you do last night?
Did Mts and Add Mts h'work. Watched House on AXN. Read The Rainmaker. Slept.

38. Do you use sarcasm?
Yep. Gives conversations so much more variety.

39. How old will you be turning on your next birthday?
Old enough to drive. Hahaha.

40. Are you picky about spelling and grammar?
Not until I

41. Have you ever been to Six Flags?
What's Flags?? No idea what that is, forgive my ignorance.

43. Do you get along better with the same sex or the opposite sex?
I've spent a whole lot more time with the same sex. But since the BRATs camp, I find conversations with the opposite sex pretty nice too.

44. Do you like mustard?
Haven't had enough mustard in my life to say.

45. Do you sleep on your side?
Yes. Every night. I get dizzy if I sleep on my back. Really. Add that to my list of weird medical conditions, along with the fact that I get the flu every time my fringe gets too long. Really!

46. Do you watch the news?
No. I read the news.

47. How did you get one of your scars?
One on my knee, I fell down on hard gravel when I was really young. Cried for days. XD

48. Who was the last person to make you mad?
I can only remember the last person our whole class made mad. Our Physics teacher. This morning. It was scary. =P

49. Do you like anybody?
Of course.

50. What is the last thing you purchased?
See? This tag is so fun. XD Food before Accounts class today.

26 more minutes! Yahoooooooooo! -grins manically-

Tag

Been tagged by someone who doesn't think I update often enough. XD

Tag 8 people in your links list at the end of your post.
It says link list, right? So everyone in my link list. I don't think there's even 8. How sad.

1. What do you want the most now?
10 pm to be here. CSI NY Season Four! I've been counting down since this morning. 1 hour and 20 minutes! Oh, and also for an Internet connection which doesn't get hiccups every time I visit certain sites and transfer files.

2. What do you want to be when you grow up?

You mean I haven't grown up yet? 'Cause it's now or never... Probably never. -boing!- Either an officer standing inside the yellow crime scene tape, investigating a crime scene, or the reporter standing outside the yellow crime scene tape, investigating the crime scene. Hyuk.

3. What would you do if you’ve lost everything in one shot?

Choi! Touch wood, touch wood.

4. What are you afraid to lose now ?

The people I love. (Ok, that's more long term than 'now'...)

5. Do you believe in being in love forever ?

If you're lucky to meet your ideal guy. But even then, nothing's guaranteed.

6. If you meet someone you love, would you confess to him/her?

I'll let you know when the time comes. :P

7. What would you do when you’re feeling down and depressed?
Jump off a bridge. I'M KIDDING! I'M KIDDING! Watch CSI NY.

8. What are the requirements that you wish from your other half?

Must not be empty 'up-there'. Doesn't mind me sharing my affection with Carmine. You know I never answer these kinda questions seriously. XD

9. Which type of person do you hate the most?

Those with only the word 'I' or 'Me' in their vocabulary. Those supreme kiasuists.

10. Do you cherish every single of your friendship?

Sure. It's good to have friends. :-)

11. Do you believe in God?

Definitely.

12. What do you think is the most important thing in your life?

Family. They double as friends too.

13. Do you find it necessary for you to have a boyfriend/girlfriend?
No. Independence, baybeh. But yeah, it'll be nice just to experience it... I'm not that much of a fuddy duddy... (Heheh. I heard this word today and had been itching to use it.)

14. What do you want your friends to be like ?
Can't exactly change who they are, right. So what's the point of answering this? But love you lot anyway. (Most of the time XD)

15. What kind of friend do you hope to be in your friend’s eyes?
One they know they can depend on, laugh with and just be a good part of their lives.

16. If you can have a change, which part of your character would you like to change ?
Procrastination. I'm getting worse, dang it. And it'll help if I don't let certain little things get to me so easily.

17. If you’re feeling low one day, who will you go to?
Mac, Stella, Danny, Lindsay, Hawkes, Flack, Sid and that dead body with a bullet hole in his right temple. ;-) Ok, seriously... mum. And the few pals I have that I can really depend on.

18. Would you die in order to save the ones you love?
I agree whole-heartedly with the answer given by the fellow who tagged me. If that ever happens, I hope I have the guts to.

19. Would you kill in order to save the ones you love ?
Yes. And as I have said so many times already. I've watched enough CSI episodes to get away with it. Again, don't take this seriously. rofl.

20. If you have a chance to change the past, what would you change?
Never doubt, never look back.

The Law No One Understands

Physics theories, Bio facts, Maths formulae... they may be hard at times, but sooner or later we somehow understand it -underline: somehow-.

But there's one law that nobody is spared from and yet no one can understand it. Time.

Why is it that 2 periods of Moral class seem to last half a lifetime but 2 weeks of school holidays seem like only a minute?

The second semester begins tomorrow, which brings forth the exam results from our mid term exam. I guess it's too much to hope that the papers have drowned in spilled-coffee incident, or got eaten by some dog, or got cut into shreds by a naughty toddler son/daughter with plastic scissors, or mysteriously got stolen by cat burglars who love looking at student statistics...

No?

Oh well.

Holidays sure have a way of putting students off track. Or rather, holidays bring out the best in students as they compete to emerge as the champion procrastinators of the season. No prizes given. Just a good, manic jolt to the heart on the Sunday night before school.

'Maths work? What Maths work? We had Maths work? -pause, sudden memory trigger- Arrgghhh!'-

'Done Civics work yet?' '-oh-so-confidently- Nope.'
(frantically flipping through newspapers for articles on 'isu-isu remaja'. -guilty- :P

'Any work for Bio? Any work for English? What must we pass up tomorrow ah???'

'Tomorrow's school?? I've only begun my holidays!'

'Oh gawd... -stares at Add Maths question which could have been answered in 5 seconds during exam season- How the heck do you do this question again?'

Sigh... good ol' school. XD

But one great thing about time flying now is that CSI NY Season Four is finally premiering this Tuesday! Same day as Physics and Chem results. Oh vey...

Update

Oh hey, look. I'm still alive. Heh. So I'm back from the BRATs journalist camp. Despite being a Penang Workshop, Penangites are the minority. Most are from KL, with a few from Sarawak, Seremban and Terengganu as well. So, I went into this camp to find out more about journalism and to see if that's a path I want to take. Uh... I'm still not sure. Haha. From the four days in Sunway Hotel, I found out that there's so much more to this than meets the eye and I still have a bunch of things to learn. But one great thing from this was that I've learnt a bunch of new games and riddles to drive the rest of you nuts. I also gained a ton of new friends -Hi sayangs! XD- and I have to start tracking down your blogs and listing them here soon.

Oh, and I'm sick of New World Park food court, as I worked til the wee hours of the morning writing an article about that place. Earrgh. For you guys who saw the paper last Monday and read all about us being Steven Spielberg, believe me, it was as fun as it was stressful. We were the first batch that they gave so many assignments to take care of so the last night was quite hectic. Imagine previous seasons of American Idol where they had to do group singing during Hollywood week. Imagine all those people both laughing and yelling at one another throughout the night. Imagine those groups that seeked out every corner of the hotel for a quiet place to work. Yeah. It was just like that. Sure, we have been told to not stress ourselves out and have fun, but naturally, we couldn't help it. But we still managed to put together decent pieces of work. So, great job to all of us. And it wasn't all stress. There were a lot of fun moments too, especially the games and riddles (I still can't figure out a couple of them. yeeesh.) we played with the four seniors and well, gossiping with my roomies.
All in all, gotta love BRATs and after reading about them in the papers every now and then, it's really great to be finally one of them.

I initially wanted to talk about Choral Speaking, but I guess that's pretty much old news by now. And other bloggers like Carmen and Renee have already mentioned it and posted pictures -extensively-. Also, I already wrote about it for the school magazine, so all I wanted to say had been said.

Let me just add this little bit more. Choral speaking had always been a CGL forte. We stepped into it this year with a lot to live up to. And thank goodness we kept up the tradition of victory. Yes, we didn't win champion of the state, but hey, second place isn't bad at all (Where's our money by the way? XD). In fact, as we know, even the judges thought we were really good (cough).

Right after our performance, rumours actually circulated that I was in tears because we were apparently so lousy. Please let me know who started that rumour so I can slice their heads off. And I've watched enough CSI episodes to get away with it too. Just kidding. Heh. But for the record, I did not cry and I was certainly not pissed with you lot. Why would I be? Siao. Pn Gan said that performance (finally) gave her goosebumps, so yeah, we were really good that day. Maybe we didn't feel it was so because we were too jaded thanks to so many practices already. XD

And well, I won Best Conductor. Hahaha. When my name was announced and I went up to get the trophy, looking at the crowd from the stage was one of the best sights ever. What I saw was you guys, screaming and shouting and cheering your heads off. And let me tell you, your support made it feel like the ultimate victory. As a matter of fact, I guess it was. :)
Ah, won't say no more here. Just read the school magazine for all the heart-warming details. Pffftt...

Happy Holidays. Or what's left of it that is...

Relief... sorta

And I quote Phaik Chern: IT'S OVER. OVER, OVER, OVER, OVER...

Well, except for those of you who have your final papers on Tuesday, to which I say, IT'S NEARLY OVER, OVER, OVER.... You get the picture.

Not that the mid year this time round went particularly well, but of course, that's expected. :-p But the freedom from revision definitely lightens the mourning over the horrible Physics and Bio papers. -no, no, no, don't think about it... whacks self-

But gone with the exam season, here comes the next busy season, preparation for Teacher's Day. Then, there's a whole bunch of stuff to finish up for school societies and what not... and robotics competition (a.k.a Grown-Up Lego XD) coming up. And I wanna talk about choral speaking (sighs happily) here as well. But, now is not the time, as I have many hours of sleep I need to catch up on, as well as books that have nothing to do with school subjects to read, and yes, Jess, Chapter 14 of 'Heroes' to write... Ok, ok! I'll get to it... yeesh.

Oh, and guess what? I got into the Penang Brats Workshop! Fun, fun, fun! XD Especially because it's on Merentas Desa Day... muahahahaha.

Until next time, where I shall talk about the 4 Arif choral speaking journey, and introduce 'Stylo Man'. Hehehee... You'll see.

Senility

Couldn't figure out how to turn on the sound for the powerpoint during Physics...
(neither could the teacher and two lab techs btw...)
... turned out that we didn't turn on the switch for the speakers.

-----------

Worried the heck out of myself that had I passed up my Add Maths notes without underlining at the end (you know how Ms Ho gets about lines)...

... was debating how to get the book back as inconspicuously as possible...

... lifted my text book to find my notes lying right below it.

-------------

Forgot my Maths 5 ... for the second time in two weeks...
(At least I realized it this time. Last week, I didn't even know I didn't pass it up until she called out my name...)

-------------

Said 'Bye' to Jess on Google Talk when the message was actually for Phaik Chern...

fern: haha. bye

Jessica: bbs

fern: whoops.

wrong place

Jessica: ?

fern: i was saying bye to phaik chern

not you

hahaha

Jessica: sheesh

------------

Left my choral speaking script and notebook full of choral speaking reminders (not to mention a load of other school stuff...) in the school hall...

------------

Went to my room and back downstairs, forgetting what I was going down to do...

-----------

Two and a half weeks til' the mid-year exams and I am going senile.
How are you doing?

Tagged Again

I have nothing much to write on these days, so I'll just do memes... :-p

A. People who have been tagged must write their answers on their blogs and replace any question they dislike with a new question formulated by themselves. Tag 8 people.

B. These 8 people must state who they were tagged by. You cannot tag the person who tagged you. Continue this game by sending this to 8 other people. People who are tagged will be blessed and their wishes will come true in the future...Just like all your wishes have come true from all those chain e-mails you used to send. ;)

"I was tagged by esther"

I hereby tag: (ATTN: You MUST do this... if not prepare to face the wrath of.. nvm)
1. Messages in a Bottle (As usual...)
2. My Kookie Cousin
3. Maria (whenever you come home ;-p)
4, 5, 6, 7, 8.... I have just realized how few people I know, seeing that the rest of them have already done this meme. How pathetic.

1. If your lover betrayed you, what will your reaction be?
You know, Carrie Underwood's song, 'Before He Cheats'? I might just do what she sang in the chorus. Sounds so fun.

2. What would you do with $10,000?
$10 000 USD times 3. something or other... approximately RM 30 000. Woot. I'll fly myself to US and get the following things:
- The CSI magazines and subscribe to the future ones.
- Ceesau's CD
- CSI NY merchandise from CBS.com.
*Hint*Hint* XD

3. Have you ever seen someone die?
Sure! Over 200 episodes of CSI! Of course!

4. Are you confused as to what lies ahead of you?
Yes. Tuition Add Maths paper that I'll be doing tonight. I don't get it at all.
Ok, ok... seriously. Not really. Just going with the flow, like Esther says, trust God.

5. What's your dream relationship like?
Like Danny and Lindsay! Heh. Which is, being new in a workplace, meeting this hot, smart guy who bugs me alot and gives me a nickname based on where I come from. (Urm... "Hey, Penang! What are you doing?" Ok, scratch that...) And he is willing to travel half way across the country to give me moral support when I'm testifying against my friends' murderer. (Choi! Choi!) And he must have a pool table. XD

6. Which is more blessed, loving someone or being loved by someone else?
It is a nicer feeling being loved. But loving someone is just as meaningful.

7. If the person you like does not accept you, would you continue to wait for them to change their feelings?
"Ya don't know what yer' missin', mister. -sticks out tongue-"

8. If the person you secretly like is already attached, what would you do?
Yeah... like I'm gonna become a stalker and murder his significant other or something. Hmmmmm.....

9. Is there anything that has made you unhappy recently?
Recently? No. Because tuition had just been cancelled. Which is why I'm here. XD

10. What do you want most in life?
Personal question. And I can't think of anything funny to glaze over it. Skip. :-P

11. Which of the 7 Deadly Sins do you think you relate to the most & why?
Gluttony, because I declare it so often with Phaik Chern. But seriously, sloth. Because I should be doing add maths homework right now.

12. If you find out that your best friend is going out with your boyfriend, how would you react?
Uh, refer to answers for questions 1, 7 and 8. Haha. Just kidding.

13. Who is currently the most important person to you?
It's never currently. It's always ongoing. My family duh.

14. What kind of person do you think you are?
A person who strives on originality and can be a clown at times. That's what my birthday keychain says. Which is actually very true.

15. Do you believe there is nothing higher than human kind?
There's God. Sometimes, that question should be rephrased as 'there is nothing lower than human kind'. Heh.

16. Would you give your all in a relationship?
Don't know. Haven't been in one. Don't think so.

17. Do you have a motto? If yes which one?
Swing life away. ;-)

18. What type of friends do you like?
Those that bring a lot of laughter, a lot sincerity and a lot of good faith. Also the ones that I can always learn from.

19. Do you have an all time favorite song?
Baba O'Riley (CSI NY theme song). Ok, I'm being biased. But I have too many favourite songs.

20. Name things you like about yourself and things you wish you could change.
Wish I could be more tolerant of some people, or rather, not let them get under my skin so easily. And I could be a whole lot less of a procrastinator... XD What I like? Uh. Forget that. Don't wanna sound perasan. =D

Letter Meme

Comment and I'll give you a letter; then you have to list 10 things you love that begin with that letter. Afterward, post this in your blog and give out some letters of your own.

Phaik Chern gave me 'L'.

Gotta get this done before I disappear into the world of studying for the next week or so... hm, ever notice that the world 'studying' has the word 'dying' in it? XD

1. Lindsay Monroe. Duh.

2. Life. (not right now... but generally, yes, I love life.)

3. Lambs. (aren't they cute? I have a lamb plushie that my cousin gave me when I was 10. So kewt!)

4. Lisa Edelstein. Geez... 'L' is hard...

5. Lions...

Good grief.

6. Literature. As in books. Not English KOMSAS.

7. Laughter. Of course.

8. Love. Why not... plenty of M&Ms to go around. :P

9. Luck. One of the most important factors in life.

10. Leek... ish. I dunno. bleh.

Buh-bye. Back to life. XD

An Ode to Thee

Teacher... the Geography test will be hard, ah?
No... it will be soft.

Fellow 3 Biruans, you know what I mean. Our ex-form teacher will be retiring tomorrow. Oy, jangan berpura-pura... don't act macho. You know as well as I do that we will all miss her terribly.

Who can forget the numerous sarcastic remarks that she comes up with?
Hey, so-and-so, write faster! Am I going to have to wait for you until tomorrow ah?
(Or something like that... I don't remember the exact words. Let me know if you remember other sentences she said.)

Or her most popular phrase:
Girls, ahhhh.......

Or even those most unteacher-like moments...
Chapter 16... -flips through pages- all boring crap...

Can we ever forget the time when we first met her, and were so surprised when she pulled out her glasses from what we thought was a container for a pen...
Did you see her glasses?? So THIN!!

But best of all, (or perhaps worse...) was when she got so angry at us on the day before Teacher's Day for being unresponsive that she started teaching without actually talking directly at us. On Teacher's Day, we sang her an apology version of My Chemical Romance's 'The Black Parade'... wait... I can still remember a bit of the chorus:

We're really sad,
We've made you mad,
That was not our intention,
We didn't mean for this to happen,
No not at all...

And she said it was the most beautiful speech anyone had ever said to her. And she got teary eyed, and all us macho teens got teary eyed. She talked to us for awhile, and thankfully, she was so distracted that she forgot all about scolding us about the brooms and dustbin lying all over the place... (which was what she was going to say, before we started singing... :-p)

There's also the card we gave her when she wasn't feeling well for a few days.

And after the Teacher's Day session, lessons with her got considerably a lot more pleasant. We laughed more over Robinson Crusoe, Rudolf Rassendyll and where Bangkok is on the map.

So now she's off to a much more stress-free life, as our headmistress said this morning. Perhaps she's going to travel the world and take a more up-close-and-personal look on the subject she loves so much.
(Thank goodness we had a 100% pass rate for PMR Geography...)

*Sigh* I might actually cry tomorrow... seriously... XD

Sweet 16

Thanks to Jess, everytime the word 'Sweet 16' is mentioned, screaming, completely blonde girls come to mind (which I detest... you know, those: 'Like uh... and she was like uh-hh... and like, ohmigawd, he was being totally uhhh...' -shudders-) Then, comes the name of one the CSI NY episodes in Season Three (where a millionaire gave his daughter a luxury car... but that's besides the point).

But all presumptions of 'Sweet 16' aside, today, really, was a sweet 16. In the most unblondish way possible.

So, I have a few thank yous to dish out.

To my cousin Wei Vern and buddy Jessica both fed my guitar fetish with a box full of guitar picks and a set of new guitar strings respectively. Thanks! -plunk-plunk-plunk-strum-strum-
And also 7ee, for the Body Glove backpack I've always wanted.

Jolene, thanks for pulling a Hermione and getting me an organizer. But since it combines two things I love so much, New York and Dogs, it ain't so bad. XD.
Also, thanks for the card and 'The Anything and Everything CD- the Carmine Giovinazzo very, VERY limited edition' with VCD tracks, DVD tracks and Freebies including Danny's 100% original glasses.

Conveniently, the CD was out of stock and all she got was the Adobe Photoshopped CD cover. -insert massive eyeroll here-
Ah well, one can dream. XD

Phaik Chern, thanks for the book. 'The Wicked Wit of Insults'. Very amusing book. So if you're going to brainwash me into becoming like you, might as well make me laugh while at it, right? ;-D

Mum, for a nice day in Queensbay getting my New Year clothes and a treat at Paddington Pancakes. And also another organizer. Geez... do you people think I'm that messy and disorganized???? :-p

Dad and my aunts, for the ang pows! -kaching!-

Bro, for the Body Shop 'Invent Your Scent Collection Pack'. Muahaha... turn green with envy, Phaik Chern...

Renee and Ee Lynn, for my birthday muffin. Yum!
And Ms Lee, for so much Maths and Add Maths homework...........

Tricia in advance. I seriously don't know what more I want, ok.

And everyone else (Nadz, Maria, Jonie, Dhiv, Esther) for their birthday wishes (Korean birthday wishes for Maria...). Anyone else I missed out, forgive me and thank you as well.

Without friends like you all, my world will be as boring as being eternally trapped in a room with nothing but Siviks and Moral textbooks to read.

Thanks so much. Love ya' all.

Like I said, today is a really sweet 16.

Off I go to watch Heroes Season Two... But I'm so far behind... even my English teacher has watched this season already. Hooor! Beli pirated, ya!!

Together We Are Three!

Last day, and aren't we all relieved. Not sleeping properly, not bathing properly, missing almost a pint of blood thanks to those mosquitos... and school the very next day... what more can they throw at us?

I was up early, again... While Nadzira and Jo slept on, I walked around aimlessly debating whether to wake up Jess or not. It was 5 am... I decided against it for two reasons. One, she probably won't be pleased after the hellish Saturday night sleep she had. Two, I'm not really sure which tent she was in anyway. How would it be if I shone the bright torchlight into the wrong tent and woke up the wrong people... whoops!

So I went back to bed/cement floor, dozed for an hour, then only did I wake her up. Thank God I did get the right tent...

We sat at our familiar haunt again. Exercised again, as well as practiced the self-defence moves Mr. Michael taught, then had yet another Twinkie. After that, pack up. Tents came down and were stuffed mercilessly back into their bags (good riddance!), bags got shoved into one of the rooms, and we lazed around until we were called back into the hall.

Pn Sarimah read out a list of 'possible scenarios or problems faced by prefects' and we took a poll to see which problems were a... well, problem to us.

Then, out go the Form Fives and we Form Four prefects had to take a rules test. Don't scorn... we'll all have to study the school rules for our Civics exam soon! After answering the paper, the Form Fives came back in and the awards presentation began.

Pn Salmah and Pn Su both made speeches then, the food hampers were given out.

Best Team in Challenges: Lincoln
Best Team on Frat Night: Ghandhi
2nd Overall Best Team: Mandela
Best Overall: Mongkut ;-)

See! Best quality Mangkuks, tau! Made in China... uh... Thailand.

We were finally dismissed. Homeward bound where our lovely soft beds and hot showers were waiting for us. I slept the afternoon away and did not rise til' dinner time.

For all the whining I'm doing, I have to admit, this camp was a nice experience. For one thing, we've learnt to laugh at each other and ourselves. We've learnt how to handle many rule-breaking situations and we've gained quite a lot more friends. Hey, when we spend three days together away from civilization and are forced to come up with nonsense sketches, deal with hooligan-ish students, race for toilets and so much more, we're bound to end up much closer to each other.

Prefects Board 2008, together we are one! ;-)

Off to climb the Bt. Larut pile of homework. Thank God it's Sunday tomorrow. Nites!

Together We Are One... uh... Two

Sorry if you had to wait forever for this post. Whoever said Form Four was a honeymoon year should really reconsider. Ah-hah! They should be sent to school with us and live through the never ending piles of homework, tuition after tuition, sports practice, club meetings and extra periods and school on Saturday! Fan-TAS-tic...

But you don't want to listen to our 15-16 year old young lady-like complains, so onwards with a full day two of prefect's camp! Hmm... it just occured to me, exactly a week ago at this time, we were in Pusat Sukan Air Pulau Pinang... eating dinner I think.

Ok, so we last stopped the story back at 4 am in the morning where I had a grand total of 2 hours of sleep last night. I think Julin as well but she actually can't sleep bacause she was too EXCITED and HYPER about it... go figure. Then again, don't bother. It's Julin, nuff' said. XD

All four of us in our camp crawled out of bed (or more accurately, crawled off the cement floor...) and like I said, sat at the edge of the camp area and enjoyed the sea breeze.

At 7 am, we gathered in a circle for morning stretching. Or what can only be categorised loosely as morning stretching. 1, 2, 3, 4... zzzzzzzzzzzz... -arm plops down pathetically-

Different people have different bathing strategies. There are those prefects who wake up in the middle of the night and bathe before everyone else, there are those who wait til a more rational hour and 'keh sio' with everyone else. Then there's those who don't bathe at all. I choose not to name individuals *ahem*.

Breakfast right after that. One...uh... I'm not sure what it's called, though everyone knows what it is... those Gardenia buns with some kind of flavoured cream in the middle? I always thought of it as Twinkies, dunno why. Correct me if I'm wrong, kay?

Next was the How to be a Good Leader by Mr. Michael Ng, whose credentials are very long and impressive. He's a really cool guy. You know those types of motivators you can't help but listen to? (As opposed to the types where you just nod off 5 minutes into the program...) After his teamwork and leadership talk as well as a singing session of Hoobastank's 'The Reason', he set us to work on our specific prefect unit's visions and goals.

Then, tea break where I had my 2nd Twinkie of the day. After tea, we presented our unit's goals and how we're going to achieve them. (Are we carrying out those goals now I wonder?) After that, self-defence with Mr. Michael. We learnt three basic but effective (especially the third one, right, guys?) defensive moves. Very fun. HIAH! :-)

Lunch time. Ta-pau food again.

Next activity on the list was called Challenges where the committee members acted out all kinds of scenarios that could occur in school and we were supposed to show how we handle them. Geez... the way they did it, it was as if our school was full of hard-headed hooligans. The bonus scene especially, where chaos simply ruled. There were people running around, people 'dying', chairs almost flying, screaming...

Tea break. 3rd Twinkie.

Now it was time to prepare for frat night and the BBQ dinner. Frat night... the time where we had thrown our dignities down the drain and concucted crazy sketches that made little, if any sense at all.

We had our BBQ first. Yummy, thanks to Pak Cik Din as well as Jannah and Shankeetha who did the barbequeing.

Then, we gathered in the hall and prepared for the grand show down of senseless sketches.

First up was team Ghandi, with their sketch about twin sisters Kiki and Lala. Obedient, smart Kiki (or Lala?) was hoaxed into going to school in bad-girl Lala's place (or Kiki? Ah... wateva...) to take an exam for her. There, Kiki bumped into a boy and it was love at first sight. Or rather, a symphony of Kutch-kutch Hotta Ay (I KNOW I spelt that wrong. Don't laugh...) at first sight. Head-over-heels in love Kiki messed up the exam and mum had a near-crying fit back at home. The End.

Next, was team Mongkut! -applause- :-)
Ours was a Tarzan and Jane story. Tarzan was best friends with a female gorilla but immediately falls in love with Jane. Gorilla gets mighty jealous and plans to get rid of Jane. (I don't think about the PG13 implications behind this...) Two Mission-Impossible-but-not-too-bright types of hunters came up and shot Jane, mistaking her for a gorilla. See what I mean? Along comes the Jungle Bomoh and her trusty assistant. After many trials and errors involving no Holy Water, no Coca cola and no Sprite, they finally revived her with Spritzer water and the chant 'Cawanmushimashimaro Ajinamoto!'. Tarzen meanwhile becomes hysterical over the loss of Jane "GO AWAYLA! YOU'RE NOT JANE!!!" and Jane comes back and they marry and live happily ever after. And Gorilla found a new mate. The End.
Tarzan's performance (Senior, Florence) earned her the I Am Legend title at the end of the camp. The Bomoh (Min Yan) won Hidden Talent.

After that, team Mandela. They went creative and made 'The Making of...' version of our camp. They had a bossy director with a torchlight camera and an assistant using a biscuit tin as the uh... black and white 'Action! Kiap!' thing.... Geez... what is that thing called anyway??
The team captured a lot of hilarious moments like all the hysteria on Pulau Jerejak as well as imitating a few memorable quotes and actions from different prefects throughout the camp.
The story ended with the whole cast quiting and the director trying to do everything herself, finally confessing all she could do was say Action and Cut. The cast returned in the end. The End.

Finally was team Lincoln. They presented their version of 'So you think you can dance'. There were ballet dancers who couldn't do splits, clumsy hip-hoppers who slammed into everything (at one point, one of them slammed into a table, hard. And it might not be on purpose...), two girls doing the tango (a lot of falling down) and the Indian dancers (who won...). Cue the 'Oh, Muthu!' and 'Oh, Minachi!' and slow mo running. Also, Muthu kept on confusing names and kept trying to hit on one of the judges 'Jangan lebeh-lebehlaaaaa!' This judge, Yusmawarr, won Personality Make-Over.

When it was over, we had our laughs, now it was time to cry. The radio turned on and we attempted to sing some songs. Seniors started hugging and crying and it was so darn touching. If I cry next year, no one is allowed to snap pictures. XD. So the singing session didn't really go on after all. We ran off back to our favourite bench and sang as a little group to the sea.

Sleeping that night was a bit better since we were so darn exhausted. instead of two, I had maybe... uh.... 3 hours. Ah well... it's an improvement. And I caused Jess to have to bunk in with Phaik Chern as I had rolled over to her spot while asleep. But I think we were all more comfortable that way.... hehehe. It rained sometime during the night as well.

I gotta mention a few things that happened in my tent, just for laughs.

Incident number one: Ajinamoto.
We were lying down in our tent talking when suddenly in mid sentence, Jessica stretched her hand out with amazing speed, made a grabbing gesture and screamed "AJINAMOTO!!!!"
She actually said "I saw a mosquito!"
Now her new Japanese war cry is Ajinamoto. And she does it amazingly Japanese-like.

Number Two: I'm so STHOOPID!
I was murdering mosquitos everytime I see them. Again, lying on our backs, I saw a mosquito flying past overhead. WHAP! I killed it. Then, I did the stupidest thing ever. I opened my hands and the mosquito carcass fell onto my face.
Me: Must never do that again.
A minute later, another mosquito flew by. WHAP! And I opened my hands again. One spilt second later...
Me: ARGGH! I'm SO STHOOOPID!
And Jessica bursts out laughing.

Number Three: Nadzira's strange sleeping habits.
On the first night, it got windy. Jess, Jo and Nadz were asleep. I wasn't. One part of our tent began flapping around, making quite a noise.
After one terrific FLAP!, Nadzira bolted upright, looked around for all of three seconds with half-lidded eyes, then slammed her head back onto her pillow. I thought she was awake now so I looked over. She was asleep. Sleep-sitting? Creepy.......

Ok. Part Three soon. School tomorrow. Better head in. Nite!

Together We Are One

Prefect's Camp 2008. Time for 59 of CGL's finest *ahem* to be dragged off out of civilization to learn to be more... well, civilized people. No phones, no computers, no MP3s, hard gravel/cement beds under the stars and filthy bug-filled bathrooms for three days. Survival of the fittest, baybeh. Ok, perhaps 3 days isn't that bad. But since we're all tired and snappy and sleep deprived, why not complain anyway. It's human nature. XD

Since I'm not allowed to be liberally humourous and whiny in my report for the school magazine, I'll be liberally humourous and whiny here instead ;-).

Everyone met up pretty much on time at 8 am Friday morning at the Batu Uban Jetty (there's a Batu Uban Jetty? Yes there is.) to ferry across to Pulau Jerejak (there's a Pulau Jerejak? Yes there is a Pulau Jerejak too... again, how dare I call myself a Penangite... :-p) Heck, before this, I never acknowledged Pulau Jerejak as more than 'the big island opposite Queensbay Mall'.

We were divided into four groups, named after great leaders. Mandela, Ghandi, Lincoln and Mongkut. I'm in Mongkut and if anyone dares to make another crack about Mangkuks, I swear I'll get Chow Yun Fatt as King Mongkut to give orders to behead you all.

Once at the island, we divided into 7 teams to play the three telematch games on the beach. Passing water balloons (wheeeee... O.o), searching flour for sweets with out faces only (and imerging looking like snowmen as well as inhaling a load of flour) and the mad bull race (spinning round a cone 9 times and running across the beach (hilarious... we had a bunch of drunkards running haphazardly down the beach, falling down and getting sand on our faces to join the flour).

Then, a walk across the suspension bridge, a test of bravery and steadiness. Some prefects just waltzed through like it was nothing while others were screaming and edging along the bridge inch by inch. More often than not, the braver ones were the ones thromping down the bridge, causing it to wobble left and right, scaring the one's behind her witless. Poh Ean did an amazingly accurate impression of the screaming prefects later on during Frat Night.

Next was the Flying Fox activity. Again, some leaped off the surface and slid down the rope like they did it everyday while others... AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!! -reaches platform face completely pucat-
You get what I mean...

Lunch was next. And everyone was impressed. Instead of the usual ta-pau food you come to expect during these camps, it was a hearty buffet lunch. Everyone had great helpings of everything... but not overdoing it as we had abseiling afterwards.

Abseiling was where we climbed up high to the top of a metal platform and made our way down on a rope. Once again, there are various breeds of prefects. The quiet, steady 'whoosh' down the rope with unreadable faces, the 'WOOHOO' types who slid all the way down without holding the rope, and the 'Sob, sobs, sobs' ones who can't seem to let go of the rope for more than half a second.

And when it comes to the instructors who were supposed to be supporting our weights on the ropes so we wouldn't fall, a bunch of us were telling them how to do their jobs...
Us: Abang, pegang ya!
Abang: Ya...
Us: Pegang tau!! Pegang!!
Abang: Ya, ya... saya pegang...
Us: Abang!!!!!!! PEGANG!!!! Jangan bagi lepas!!

After that, we piled back onto the ferry and headed back to Penang Island, onto the bus (whose air-cond doesn't seem to work) and off to Penang Water Sports Centre in Batu Feringghi.

Teams got to putting up their tents, while others looked on, due to the lack of tents. After some chaos in trying to find accomodations for everyone, the 100m dash for the toilets began. I always got to the shower early thanks to the close alliance with the all-round champion-sprinter for-toilets, Jessica. XD.

After washing off the dirt of the day, (or as much dirt as possible) we had dinner, (now the basic ta-pau camp food) and laid out our beds. If you call a blanket and a folded up towel which served as mattress and pillow respectively a bed... Then, housekeeping, where rules of the camp were explained by commitee members, ties were learnt to be tied and a group discussion for school rules were held. Then, off to bed.

We're ahead of schedule by a more than an hour, and weren't we glad. Piling into our tent, we tried to go to sleep. Tried. My tent's location was as bad as it could be. Right beside the toilet, so footsteps trudging noisily through the gravel could be heard all night. One hour past, no one in the camp could stop talking. It was hot. There were mosquitos feasting. 2 hours. Noise died down a little. Exhausted, but still no sleep could come. 3 hours. 1 a.m. Jess and I got up and sat at the bench outside for a good long while. Nadz joined us for awhile and so did Julin. Went back to sleep and kept on waking up in regular intervals all night long. Thunder rumbled, Mat Rempits roared, waves pounded the shore, more footsteps going to toilet. All through the night. I heard it all. I envy everyone else who actually slept more than 3 hours. I had 2.

Climbed out of bed at 4. Stayed out on the bench by the ocean, just enjoying the breeze and waiting for the sun to rise. It is really peaceful and beautiful and you curse the fact you didn't have a camera...

I'll write day two when I can. This is getting quite long and I don't want to overfeed you. You'll get tired. I am... XD
Bite sized chomps, yea. Til' next time.

Vivid Crimson out.

Night Before Results

T'was the night before results,
And all through Penang,
PMR students
Lie in their beds.
While results were sent to schools by JPN,
Or at least I think so, I really don't care.

The students were nestled,
All snug in their beds,
While visions of straight As,
Danced in their heads.
Dreams and nightmares
Attacked our heads,
One after another woke up drenched in cold sweat.

All over Penang, even teacher's weren't spared,
Dreams of 'Purata 2.0' gave them quite a scare,
Away to the kitchen, for some strong herbal tea,
Given on Christmas by Aunt McBee.
Fine, I'm kidding, I tend to exaggerate,
Please don't hit me, I tend to bruise real quick.
The syllables in this song are getting really wild,
It's not sounding like The Night Before Christmas anymore.

Right I better get right back on the track,
10 am tomorrow, we will gather.
Some will shout and squeal in delight,
While others will moan all through the night.
How was BM, and English and also Science and Maths?
How bout KH, and Geo and Sejarah and Islam?
From 300 word essays to 60 objective questions,
Now hurry up, hurry up, we can't wait no more.

3 am past, and an hour more,
We still lie awake, partly cos' our sisters snore.
Where did the blissful month go,
When we 'holidayed' our life away, it seemed barely a mo',
Now one week remains, and back into school,
That is if we're still alive,
Once our parents are done with us.

This is turning to be one really long song,
And I have to get going for a haircut now,
So I'll cut this short just like my hair,
And wish everyone all the luck I can spare.
See you tomorrow, early and bright,
May we all hopefully be screaming to our hearts delight.
Merry Christmas,
And good night.

*Ahem*
Yeah, someone had nothing better to do... =p
Good luck and best wishes to all, anyway. :-)

Happy Holidays

Am I not spending enough time on TV or are they not showing this on Astro?

Watch out for Carmine's snort... -falls over laughing-

Travel Ramblings of a Mentos Addict, Part 5

Ok, I better just post this up quick before Jessica gives me the silent treatment. Heh, which is the latest fad nowadays when you think about it. (Like I said, 'Teacher, we can't help you with the SPBT books anymore. We're not talking to each other due to Kitaro and casinos and wineries...')

Final day in Australia. The week flew by. This last day is going to be spent on Great Ocean Road, which has the greatest collection of natural rock formations I've ever seen. I'll even say that even if they weren't the only rock formations I've ever seen...

Once again, we rise early in the morning and climbed onboard the bus for another long journey across the great lands of Australia. Remember our Form 2 Geography book that says Australia is a country that is 'kurang penduduk'? Darn right. Maybe the sheep and cows actually outnumber the humans...

After a long while, we arrived for a fish and chip lunch (western food! Finally!) and a shop in a small town. The lady in charge sure got up on the wrong side of bed that day... :-p.

Then, Great Ocean Road, where each formation is more amazing than the next.

As you stand there, at the top of the cliffs, and look down at the furious waves, slamming against the rocks, and feel the cold ocean breeze... (and swat at a bunch of flies) then you realize how the little things seem just that. Little.
And forgive me for saying but I'd like to give a few grumbling people onboard the bus a big telling off for thinking all this scenery isn't worth their time climbing down from the bus to see. (Shopping, I ask you! Why buy pleasures when you can witness all these beauty for free??) But hey, that's just me.

First stop was the 12 Apostles (the way our tour leader pronounced it... I could've choked... 'apotions'). These '12' limestone rocks were previously known as the Sow and Piglets. Apparently the name wasn't glamorous enough so they changed the name to the 12 Apostles. Now, don't bother counting. These are limestone rocks, and as we learn in Geography, hakisan ombak is at work. There are only 7 or so left.
The Twelve Apostles

One of the lookout points

Next, was the Loch Ard Gorge. This one was named after a ship, Loch Ard, (Duh... :-P) carrying 54 people aboard on a journey from England to Melbourne. But the ship capsized and 52 of the passengers died. Only two 18-year-olds survived and found shelter in a cave. Very Robinson Crusoe...

Lastly, was the London Arc. Previously known as the London Bridge, looking like it's namesake in London, one of the arcs broke off and collapsed back in 1990, (leaving a couple of tourists stuck on the remaining arc... they had to be saved by helicoptor later... XD) and so it was renamed London Arc.London Arc... imagine being stuck on that remaining piece for hours...

Our tour leader told us to keep the pictures safe, as word is this remaining arc might be falling apart soon, so we could get a lot of money from the original picture. Heh.

Long drive back to town to a souvenier shop where everyone spent a small fortune. And then to dinner, at the Crown Casino. Another buffet meal where more than one stomach (and filled wallet) was needed. The place was packed. Again, very Vegas-like, filled with slot machines for lucky people to win money, only to spend it all away on the designer brand shops lined up on the ground floor.

After that, time to bid Melbourne farewell and off we go to the airport for the late night flight back to Singapore, then home sweet home, where I slept most of the weekend away. :-)

Gotta love the holidays.

Note: Thanks Jess, for helping me upload the photos... bwahahahahahahahahah!

Travel Ramblings of a Mentos Addict, Part 4

Day Four

Whoops... took me a long while to get this up... heh. But hey, it’s up now.

So, first day in Melbourne, where the weather was thankfully tons cooler, but that does not deter the flies... obviously...

Our first stop was Victoria Market, where they sold everything from fruits to T-shirts. Just when you thought there were plenty of nice souvenirs to take home, you flip that key chain over and lo and behold, Made in China. But still, there were plenty of fascinating things to see.

After an hour there, which sadly wasn’t enough for many, (that’s the Malaysian shopping spirit!) we headed for the Melbourne Aquarium, which wasn’t really all that cool. Kind of over rated. The Penang one had tons more fish. But, yes, Jess... plenty of sharks in captivity. J

Then, onwards in the City Tour to the likes of the Parliament House, St Patrick Cathedral, Art Museums and a really nice park (Melbourne is called the Garden City as there are really a lot of gardens and parks...) where Captain Cook’s parent’s cottage was located.

Toilet break for all as we’ll be journeying on yet another long road trip towards Phillip Island. By now, highways are fairly predictable... cows... fields... horses... fields... more cows... more fields... and bundles upon bundles of rolled up hay.

After plenty of snoozing and developing stiff necks, we stopped at a winery for a wine tasting session. I can’t say ‘yum’ cos’ it wasn’t to me. I think Phaik Chern would have enjoyed it though... heheh.

Everyone climbed back onto the bus a short while later, some more tipsy than others, and after an hour or so, we stopped for dinner at a restaurant just outside the bridge towards Phillip Island. Lobster baybeh! Ok, fine... half-a-lobster-each baybeh!

Finally, we arrived at our destination. Just in time to watch the Penguin Parade. In fact, more than in time. We were a good hour ahead of them. A good freezing cold hour.

The penguins here are the tiny types. No more than a foot high. What happens is mummy and daddy take turns going out at day break, hunting for fish. They return at sundown (hence, Penguin Parade) to the sight of hundreds of excited tourists staring and pointing at them, and return to their burrows.

One wonders, as one stands with jacket fully zipped up and hands stuck in pockets in the make-shift stadium-like area where everyone sits to watch the penguins come home, just how much money these people were making off these innocent penguins.

One wonders, why so many people would come all the way from Melbourne (3 and a half hours away) and wait out in the cold for hours just to watch 5 minutes of tiny creatures waddling up the beach.

One wonders whether ones hands have frozen in ones pockets yet.

And then, when the penguins come up, and one gets so close to them that one could touch them, ones heart simply melts into pure mush. And it’s all worth it. It’s really all one can do to restrain from catching one and stuffing it under ones jacket and take it all the way home to Malaysia. Heh.

Promo pic I found online... but nothing beats seeing them in person... uh... penguin... whatever...

Sadly, I couldn’t take any pictures. Cameras and hand phones weren’t allowed as the people in charge are afraid the fame and glory of getting their pictures taken so often will make the penguins conceited and demand a share of profits.

Ok, just kidding, it’s because of the flash from the camera that could frighten or blind the penguins.

Good ol' Tony... "Heheh... better check, Nick, or else... Vroom... Creaaakkkeeee!!!"

Ok.. hands up, who winced?? I did.

Another long journey back home in the dark of the night, where we placed all our faith in our bus driver, (Nick) to get us back to our warm hotel beds safe and sound.

Next: Last day, mounds of rocks.

Travel Ramblings of the Mentos Addict, Part 3

Day Three

Sydney city tour. First stop was the Sydney Fish Market. It smells of… duh… fish. But there are plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables as well, along with every kind of cheese in the world, (including a kind called Edith… hehe… tell your sister, Esther.) lobsters, crabs, oysters… seafood haven.

It’s summer time, and it’s hot. Even hotter than in Malaysia… seriously. And of course, flies, flies, and more flies. A walk along Darling Harbour came next. Hot. Nuff’ said.

Next was the building everyone knows, Sydney Opera House. No entry. We just snapped quick pictures outside and quickly hunted down any place there was shade (Umbrellas and a large sign board were among such places…). A little boy from our tour group went missing for awhile and panic ensued. Not sure whether the boy’s parents or our tour leader, Tony, felt more panicked. Hehe.

After that, all aboard on Captain Cook’s cruise ship around the harbour. Captain Cook, by the way, was the guy who brought the first ‘Aussies’ into Australia. Mind you, they were convicts.

Not the best part of the holiday, as I was hit with another round of nausea. So, lesson learnt… rocking ships and A380s… not for me.

Ah… Bondi Beach. Some of you might know what this place is famous for, and for those who don’t, you can guess. It’s to do with a beach, and PG18 material.

Unfortunately, (or should I say fortunately??) it was near evening and the weather cooled down, perhaps a little too cold for any in-the-buff beachwear, so don’t worry, nobody saw anything they shouldn’t. Bwahaha.

Of course, that didn’t stop the males on our tour group, (especially Tony…) from spouting all kinds of PG13 jokes…

Ok, ok… on the right! Ladies, no need to look…

Nah! Nah! On the left! Men, no need to look…

Yeesh…

Dinner was at Star City Hotel. The huge buffet dinner makes you wish you had four more stomachs to sample everything. And after finding out the price for the dinner, you damn well wish you did have four more stomachs to eat its worth.

There was also a casino. Very Vegas. (grins) Although the rules clearly state under-18s were not allowed, I got in anyway, after a quick passport ID with those big, burly, bald headed, bouncer type guards.

That’s all for Sydney. We head for the airport for our local flight to Melbourne. The flight was delayed for quite awhile thanks to incoming storms. But thankfully, we arrived safe and sound in Melbourne. And, in contrast to that afternoon, it was freezing. A good 10 degrees. On to the hotel and off to bed. The next two days in Melbourne made me wonder whether it really was summer in Australia or not.

Next: Penguins! Squeeeeeeee!

Sorry... not pics again. Bad connection...

Travel Ramblings of the Mentos Addict , Part 2

Parliment House, the most expensive building in Australia.

Day Two

I started ambitiously writing what happened during the day every night in the hotel. It worked for Day One. By Day Two, I gave up. Tiredness! Not lack of discipline, Jessica.

Woke up bright and early for the hotel buffet breakfast. Sure beats bread and peanut butter at home. Onwards to the Koala Park Sanctuary. Koalas are even lazier than us 15 year olds. They sleep pretty much three quarters of their day away. They don’t need water, and if they’re not sleeping, they’re munching away on the eucalyptus leaves. What a nice life… XD

Also got to see tiny penguins, (but I’ll talk more about that when I talk about Phillip Island) kangaroos, a very angry peacock and cuddled a humongous wombat. Also, there was a sheep sheering demonstration but no one could really understand what the guy was saying, as his accent was so darn thick. More like, “So ya mrghh-hrggh-furgh-tha-grggh…”

Then of course we clambered back on the bus, smelling of ammonia and dung.

Oh, and one thing I have to mention. The flies. Those bloody creatures are everywhere. Regardless whether you bathed or otherwise, they’ll still come to you, buzzing in your ear and in front of your face. Waving one’s arms furiously in front of one’s face soon became a sort of secret greeting gesture…

The angry peacock, hissing and picking on the poor ... whatever that creature is...

Next stop, ah… the Blue Mountains. We got to sit the world’s steepest railway, the Scenic Railway as it plunges us down to the bottom level of the mountains with a 52° incline down 545 meters. Huzzah.
If you look closely, the darker area there... that's the railway.

And no sooner do you get off the train-thingy… railway thingy… whatever… you get treated to the one of the most spectacular sights, the Three Sisters Rock.

Now listen up, story-telling time, with help from Tony the tour leader and wikipedia… ahem.

The Three Sisters is a formation of sandstone rocks, caused by erosion over the ages. (Geography…) But naturally, there is a legend behind the Three Sisters just to make things more interesting…

There were once three very beautiful Aborigine sisters. They each fell in love with three men from a neighbouring tribe. Of course, marriage was forbidden by tribal law, so a fight broke out. To protect the three sisters, a witch doctor turned them into stone. But he was killed in battle and no one else knew how to turn them back. So here they are, still stuck as stone today.

And Tony added that the tiny little rock beside the three was the youngest, fourth sister. She was the naughty one, who always went out when she shouldn’t, til’ late hours of the night, so the witch doctor turned her to stone too… Heh. Don’t believe him.

The Three Sisters. (And the fourth baby one on the far right... :-) )

After that, we walked through the forest and took a cable car back up to the top.

Next stop was Echo Point, for the best view of the Blue Mountains. Heights do not deter flies, as we were once again attacked by them.

And for the record Jess, the Blue Mountains were blue when I was there:

Why are the Blue Mountains blue? The blue haze is of a different hue and deeper than anywhere else in the world. It is caused by the Eucalyptus trees emitting oil vapour into the atmosphere along with fine dust particles and droplets of water vapour. They scatter the blue light more than any other colour in the spectrum.

What an expert I am, eh?

Ok… fine… that came word for word from a Blue Mountain guide book mum took from the hotel…

Back to town, with a quick stop at the Olympic Stadium, for toilets and photographs.

Then, back to the hotel. Some went out walking around town, but good ol’ Mentos Addict and Tangerine & Ginger flavoured Hacks Lover stayed in our room, watching NCIS and Numb3rs… Heh.

Tomorrow: City Tour in Sydney. Where the weather is hot and flies aplenty.

Travel Ramblings of the Mentos Addict, Part 1

After a week in lovely Australia, I'm back. Well... technically, it's more like five days, four nights, seeing that two more nights were spent on the plane... nasty advertising tactics...

Neways, I'm back in one piece.... although all slush on the inside from exhaustion. But slept the whole afternoon so I'm 'almost' back to normal.

I'm Mentos-Addict, due to the 3 tubes of Mentos brought along on the trip, which me and my mum, Tangerine-and-Ginger-flavoured-Hacks-Sweets-Lover (called that for obvious reasons...), chomped down unmercifully throughout the trip. Heh. I'm serving these posts in bite sizes, or else I'll be typing all day...

Day One (Or should I say, night one?)

Met up with our 21 other tour group members at the airport at 4 pm, as well as our tour leader. 24 in total. First, off to Singapore's Changi airport. Then, aboard the, can you believe it, Airbus A380, only on it's 3rd voyage to Sydney.

But honestly, other than the fact that it is of course, HUGE, there's not really anything else that is special. Ok, I'm saying that cos' I was attacked by nausea throughout the flight and I'm grumpy cos' I was in no condition to enjoy any of the hundreds of music albums and shows they have (including CSI and CSI NY.. ish...)

So, after about 8 hours of sitting uncomfortably in a glazed trance, trying not to gag everytime meals were served, as well as enduring the woman who was blowing her nose in regular intervals behind me, the guy who was coughing consistently in the seat somewhere in front, an the baby who cried all night long, we finally arrived in Sydney, 7 am local time (3 hours ahead of Malaysian time).

No rest for the weary. Off we go through 2 hours of getting through customs, and an hour of waiting for our bus driver, Bill. Finally, we're on our way on a 3 and a half hour journey to Canberra.

Canberra, is the capital of Australia. Stop thinking it's Sydney. Turns out, Sydney and Melbourne were fighting over who gets to be the capital, so they decided to pick somewhere else to develope into the capital instead.

Bill is one jolly guy with quite a thick accent. One hilarious thing was Tony, our guide (whose English ain't too hot), had a hard time understanding him, and vice versa. So one would ask the other a question, and the other will either not reply or answer something completely different.
But they bonded anyway, referring to each other as 'my boy' and 'my man' everytime. XD

Everyone pretty much zonked throughout the journey to Canberra, waking up with stiff necks.
First stop, was the Cockington Green Gardens, filled with minatures of people, buildings and what not. Amazing detail. There were tiny golf courses, villages, football stadiums, castles... you name it. Outside the Cockington Green Gardens

Next stop is the Parliment Building, the most expensive building in Australia. We got to go inside and take a look around. Saw the potrait of ex-Prime Minister, William McMahon, as in Julian McMahon's (of Charmed and Nip/Tuck) dad. Cool or what? Also, we went to the War Memorial, what can I say? It's cooler than the Penang one. Hehe... But as we were 2 hours behind schedule, there wasn't much time to look around. Onwards to Embassy Road, where we got to see all the different embassies, including Malaysia, of course. :-)

Finally, we head back to Sydney, another long bus journey. The hotel bed never looked so good. Zonked out immediately.

Day 2: Blue Mountains.

Will upload more photos later. Connection is nuts right now...

Gila-gila Mentos signing off!

On Hiatus

'I'm leaving on a jet plane... dunno when I'll be back again...'

This darn tune won't stay out of my head.

So you won't see me anywhere around here for the rest of the week, cos' I'm off to Jesse Spencer's hometown. Doubt he's there of course...

Ok, let me clear things up with you guys...

Jo wants me to smuggle a joey home, in reference to what some people call her, "Joey"..

Phaik Chern also wants kangaroos, preferably a pair, so she can breed them and start a kangaroo farm that will be featured in the Star Metro section.

Jess, of course, wants me to smuggle back a cute Aussie guy for her.

Tricia, I'll scout Trinity College for you and warn them all of your arrival in December.

Hope that's everything...

Happy Holidays!!

Got tagged...

Heh. For the first time, I've been tagged. Thanks, Maria... :-p

1. Grab the book nearest to you, turn to page 18, and find line 4.
- In seconds he bounded back up wearing a satchel of tools. Reader's Digest August 1999

2. Stretch your left arm out as far as you can, What can you touch?
- The mirror...

3. What is the last thing you watched on TV?
- House. On Monday night. And it's Saturday today... YOIKS! One hour of TV a week..
who knew?

4. Without looking, guess what time it is.
- 8.50 am.

5. Now look at the clock. What is the actual time?
- 9.00 am... not bad... :-p

6. With the exception of the computer, what can you hear?
- Rain drops outside. And the whirring fan...

7. When did you last step outside?
- Yesterday. To Tesco...

8. Before you started this survey, what did you look at?
- Was at You Tube, watching the latest DL developements on CSI NY... Hence the updated quotes>>>>>>>>>

9. What are you wearing?
- 3 quarter pants and shirt. Geez... what kinda question is this?

10. Did you dream last night?
-Oh geez... I don't remember...

11. When did you last laugh?
- This morning, watching Danny and Lindsay bantering about catapults on You Tube...

12. What is on the walls of the room you are in?
- CSI Season 4 poster, CSI Season 5 poster, CSI NY Season 3 poster. *cackle* Waiting for Carmine Giovinazzo poster...

13. Seen anything weird lately?
- Danny and Lindsay bantering about catapults on You Tube... -somebody stop me... lol-

14. What do you think of this quiz?
- Like Maria said, it's not a quiz... more of a questionaire... and it's fine.

15. What is the last film you saw?
- I think it was the Seeker... on October 5th... yoiks.. where have I been???

16. If you became a multi-millionaire overnight, what would you buy?
- CSI merchandise, completely-up-to-date. Ooh, and a nice Gibson acoustic guitar...

17. Tell me something about you that I don’t know:
- Who's 'I'? Different people don't know different things... muahaha.

18. If you could change one thing about the world, regardless of guilt or politics, what would you do?
- Make them cancel all post-PMR programs and let us play UNO all day long instead. Ohhh... the world? No wars, less garbage and more CSI NY merchandise to reach Pulau Pinang. :D

19. Do you like to dance?
- Depends on the dance...

20. George Bush:
- I know Phaik Chern's weird plans concerning him, but other than that, I got nothing...

21. Imagine your first child is a girl, what do you call her?
- Always liked the name 'Haylie'... but I would go for Aiden too!

22. Imagine your first child is a boy, what do you call him?
- Uh.... DUH..... Danny!!!

23. Would you ever consider living abroad?
- Yes.

24. 4 people who must also do this in THEIR blog/journal:

- I don't know all that many people... um... Esther. Jo. Phaik Chern (tho' you said you didn't want to already, rite? but nvm.. heh.) And Mr. Stranded-on-an-Island. You know who you are. :-)I can't believe you won't let me shoot!
We'll be here all day...

Of Forts and Fish

And I call myself a Penangite. After 15 years of my life on this tiny island, I never knew there was such thing as a War Museum and Aquarium in Penang til' today.

Finally, a post-PMR school activity that doesn't involve sitting on the hall floor until one's legs go into full rigor mortis, and eyes don't glaze over at staring at some slide from the computer.

'Lawatan Sambil Belajar's are always fun. There's something nice about sitting in a bus with your classmates off to visit someplace. Today was no exception. 39 students and 2 teachers were packed off to the War Museum in Batu Maung.

Now, this is the best way to learn History. Rather than cramming pages upon pages of text into our heads, we get great exercise and a fun experience. And yeah, we learn a little something-something as well.

The War Museum was once a fort built by the British from 1930 to 1939. No wonder it took nine years to build... this place is a fair size. We walked for a couple of hours, providing breakfast for the tropical rain forest mosquitos. We got to see tunnels that were 100 feet underground, places where cannons once were, ammunation the size of a medium-sized dog, torture chambers, soldier barracks and offices.

Equipped with torchlights, we got to go through two tiny tunnels that had walls 4 feet thick, which were used for hiding during attacks.

Definitely not for the claustrophobic.

And I learnt a valuable lesson to keep my torch light aimed in front, so that I don't ram into a wall before I actually see it. Also, I learnt not to be possessed by fear so deep that I want to race out of the tunnel ASAP, leaving my poor torchlight-less classmates screaming in the pitch dark.

Heh. Ok... I'm exaggerating. But I'm not kidding when I say the dialogue while in the tunnel went like this:

A (with torchlight): Woah...
B, C, D (holding on to each other's waists for guidance, like a human train): Woah!
B: AHHHHH!!!! Don't WALK SO FAST!!!!
C & D: WAIT!!!!!!!!!
A: OK! OK! (slows down) Turn coming! Watch out!
C (Head hits the low ceiling for the 5th time): Ow...
(seconds past)
B, C, D: AHHHHHH!!!!!!!! DON'T WALK SO FAST!!!!!
A: OK! OK! Solly!

Yeah... something like that.

On the whole, a really great trip. A few things were a little disturbing, like the sex crimes, torture chambers, Yamashita Tomoyuki's boots at the spot he was hung... things that make you think how darn lucky you are to be born a good forty years later.

Now that we've had enough of guns, we head towards the Aquarium, to feast our eyes on fish and corals. God's beautiful creations. Blue, yellow, blue with yellow stripes, etc. Also, we see the impact of Pixar on everyone. Every surgeon fish and clown fish we see is affectionately referred to as Nemo and Dory.

And along with Ms Koay, we mixed and matched the fishes in the aquariums with the ones displayed on the directory. (Some were mysteriously missing though...)

A: Ok, see if you can find the black ribbon eel!
B, C, D stares for a while: THERE! THERE! THERE! (points frantically)

Aren't we an enthusiastic bunch?

What a day. Tomorrow will be another field trip. This time, to the USM museum and gallery. Wheeee!