Thoughts to blogs

Power of Internet

2011-05-17T07:47:00.003+08:00

Nowadays knowledge are really at our fingertips and internet is a very powerful tool to find answers to our questions. Last 2 days I received a missed call from one number , not wanting to waste my money to call them - I google searched the number and find that it is from one of the bank telemarketing, hence I can just ignore that call since it is promoting some of their new products to me. Thus, internet is really a very helpful tool indeed.

Recently, one of my students who will be going for her medical interview soon, asked me what will the most probable questions the panel will ask. From my knowledge of interview, the most common questions they will usually ask in any interview will be questions like :
1. Telling about yourself
2. Your background
3. your strengths and weaknesses
4. And of course - why choose medicine?

True enough, after goggling, I found this website:which offers a lot of free advice and information on consultant interview course, medical management courses, medical teaching course and also teach the teacher course.

This does prove how useful internet is , provided we use it wisely and correctly.

Address plague

2011-01-08T17:40:00.008+08:00

My friend is moving to her new house soon and she invites me along to see and survey for her home address plague. I loved to shop and survey for address plague. Personally whenever I went round the neighborhood, I always like to look at others' address plagues. By looking at the address plague you can tell how artistic the owners of the houses are. These are some of my neighbours' address plague

Actually nowadays you can even order address plague online.If you browse through the website you will find quite a lot of artistic design for your home address plagues. Chinese new Year is just round the corner so are you contemplating of changing your super old address plague. After surveying with my friend for her new home address plague, I too am going to change my 10 years old address plague so are you going to follow me too?

Taiwan tour - Day 4 Kaoshiung

2010-12-20T19:06:00.019+08:00

Morning call 6 am. Breakfast 6.30 am and leaving hotel at 7.20 am for FoKuangShan 佛光山 which is one of Taiwan largest temple complexes and the island centre for Buddhist scholars.

Inside the temple I was so worried that my camera will fail me again since the last time when my Sony camera failed me was when i took the monk statue photos in Phuket. Luckily it didn't this time. we managed to walk all the way up till the huge Buddha statue.

Love the writings here , very meaningful as we journey on in life.

At the highest part of the temple:

Lunch here, near the temple.

Surprisingly they serve non vegetarian food.The tour leader told us we would have lobster and abalone for lunch, at first we thought he was joking because near the temple where got nice food like that but true enough there was lobster and abalone

Next stop: Mei Hon Hakka Village to see the traditional Hakka handicrafts like hand made umbrella and selling liu cha - Hakka favourite food

This old man is a superman, he can make music with anything, pipes, toothpaste holder, etc etc

Dinner here:

This is the lousiest dinner that we had while in Taiwan. The place used to be for holding wedding dinner but it seems that they have converted into a huge eating place for tourists who arrived in buses and buses. Luckily after this we went to Leo Ho night market so we could fill our stomach at our own expense.

The worst dish we tasted in Taiwan: Pig's blood...I didn't even try...thinking of it already makes me lost my appetite!!

Next Dream Shopping Mall. Nothing much in this mall. Instead we went to have free food testing at the ground floor selling Taiwan products.

Last stop: Leo Ho Night Market.

Giant crab legs sold here:

The Taiwan famous oyster pancake: Comparatively I still like our Malaysian version, crispy and not like the Taiwan version sticky and watery!!

Love this peppered biscuit which is the foochow kompiah but baked with meat filings inside. Very nice when hot and fresh from the baking stove. Long queue here so need to be patient.

Look at the biscuit stuck at the walls during baking ...just like our kompiah.

Hotel for the night: Shi Hzuwan Hotel, Kaoshiong. This is a very nice hotel. Very new, very clean and best of all have a washing room at floor 12 plus drying machine too They even provide the powder detergent in that room. The only thing is the drying machines are not too hot so it took a long long long time for our clothes to dry, around 3 hours to dry!! since it is free so betetr don't complain, right?

Taiwan Tour - Day 3 - Nantou, Sun Moon Lake

2010-12-19T19:07:00.021+08:00

As usual breakfast 6.20 am , check out hotel at 7.20 am. Today we went to the biggest lake in Taiwan - The Sun Moon lake. There is an island right in the middle of the island called Guang Hua island where an old woman lives and makes tea eggs for a living.

Since it was neither sunrise nor sunset so the lake looks so so to me only!

Wen Wu Temple is just nearby the lake , a shrine dedicated to Confucius., Guang Kong and Yue Faye.

Stalls at Sun Moon Lake selling local products:

Next stop is the free peacock Garden...just a few pitiful peacocks nothing much to see at all. Luckily it is free entrance or else I don't think anybody will go.
Here a bottom up peacock:

After that we visited the King Mao's shop selling lingzhi - 「毛王爺」─ The New Leader of the Thao Tribe.

Lunch at some underground restaurant:

Last stop of the day is Formosan Aboriginal Cultural Village where you can take cable car to enjoy the view of Sun Moon lake from the cable car. Here you can see the living museum of the nine principal aborigine tribes of Taiwan . There is also outdoor water roller coaster and the indoor Maya roller coaster and an European garden, all inclusive in the entrance ticket of RM 70 per person.

Entrance to the park:

Trying to make muachi:
Live musuem:

Cherry blossom pond:

Day dreaming in the pine forest:

@ European Garden:

Special dinner tonight at WC restaurant, Taichung:.

we had heard about this over TV and newspaper but experiencing it is completely different feeling...shocked, fun and interesting. One of my friends say she had goose pimples all over thinking of her curry ( yellowish and mushy) served in toilet bowl.

Our tour guide kept everything very secret without telling us where we were going to have our dinner. I being the first to go to the toilet saw a golden toilet bowl...my feeling was...WOW....

then it came to my mind that this must be the toilet restaurant since the toilet was at the entrance while the restaurant was after the actual toilet...feng shui???

My yellowish and mushy curry:

Dessert:

Nice collection of toilet bowls:

Very last stop after dinner is the Jing Ming 1st street 精明一街: at Taichung, where nice plants are displayed on the street walks without being disturbed even at night. If in Malaysia, all the plants will be gone the very next morning!!

JingMing 1st Street is among Taichung's best-known attractions with local and foreign visitors because of to its unique European-style cafe street-like ambiance. Created in the early 1990s as part of a private residential complex, the 60-meter-long pedestrian-only street includes sidewalk cafes and teahouses, which has led many foreign residents to label it as "tea street". There are a number of boutiques and shops selling medium-to-high-end clothing, jewelry, beauty/health products, fashion accessories, handicrafts and art. Shops and restaurants continue along the roads on both ends of the street. But things are expensive here so can only shop with eyes but not with wallets.

Hotel for the night: DeBao Hotel, Taichung, clean and superb breakfast.

Taiwan tour : Day 2 : Yeliu and Chiufen

2010-12-18T16:42:00.024+08:00

First stop: Taoyuen Railway station.

We checked out from the hotel at 7.20 am after a nice breakfast of western and oriental breakfast. We had bought the high speed railway train to Taipei @ TWD 150 each where we would have a whole coach to ourselves.

But because of the fly over construction on our way we reached 5 minutes late, luckily the ticket can still be used but we have to mix with the public ...No more private coach to ourselves!!! and luckily for us too there is still ample space to sit in that train. Nothing impressive about the train ride since it only reached 250 km/h , much like our own LRT in Malaysia, just that it was a lot cleaner inside the train.

Reached Taipei railway station, but still need to wait for our bus to come so we explore around the railway station.

Next stop: National Taiwan Democracy Memorial Hall built in memory of President Chiang Kai Shek. Witness the changing of guard at the Memorial.

Saw a group of old men outside the park under the care of Filipino maids:

Next transfer: Yeliu Geopark which reminds me of Blackpool in UK since people here also do half a year business. Here there is spectacular view of the Pacific ocean. the rock formation are spectacular namely the candle, the hippopotamus and the Queen's head.

Candles and the hippopotamus:

Me and the queen's head:

Next stop: Chiufen to shop for pineapple tarts and muachi . Chiufen is built of closely packed houses clinging to the steep mountain sides. Lots of tourists here!!

At Chiufen , we tried the famous beef noodles @ RM 9 per bowl, dessert @ RM 4.50 and prawn balls ( forget how much liao!). We need to queue up and wait even though it was a Tuesday. The tour guide told us if it is weekend it will be worst.

Fast way to count for the beef noodles stall because business is really really good.

Last stop: Taichung - to enjoy Shabu Shabu for dinner

Last stop before we checked into the hotel - Fong Jia Night Market

Hotel for the night: Ful Won Hotel, Taichung. Quite a nice hotel , again the breakfast consists of westeran and oriental food.

Tawian tour - Day 1 KK to Taoyuen

2010-12-12T20:21:00.020+08:00

Day 1 : Left Kuching on 29/11 bound for Kota Kinabalu by 10.50 pm flight. The flight timing is damn lousy traveling at night and reaching KK at midnight, hungry and cold.
What a way to start a vacation!! check into Mega Aru hotel at 1 am and caught 2 hours or so of sleep since we need to go back to KK airport to check in for our flight to Taoyuen @ 4.30 am !!This is the problem with Air Asia ...very very odd traveling time.Because of that odd traveling time it meant that this is Day 2 of our tour already!!
@Mega Aru hotel

On reaching Taoyuen, we were driven to a restaurant to have our lunch

and then off we went to the Floral Expo. We started with Xinsheng Park Area

We only managed to go to 2 of out 4 pavilion since all the appointment tickets are all taken up already. This is because the expo authority is limiting the number of people entering the pavilion. The 2 pavilions that we went to were Pavilion of the Future and Pavilion of Regimen. Inside the Pavilion of Regimen , no photos were allowed since there are priceless bonsai plants inside.

The area is huge and it was very tiring walking here and there. After going to the 2 pavilion we decided to walk over to YuanShan Park Area. Again no appointment ticket we could not go into pavilion of culture and new fashion. We wanted to see Theresa Teng 's collection at Celebrity's House but also cannot because all the appointment tickets for that were also taken up already!!!

Next stop at the Floral Expo is the YuanShan Park Area. We wanted to go to see Theresa Teng's collection but again all the appointments tickets are taken up except for the DVD show....so why waste time watching DVD since those DVD are easily available in shops and can listen at home> moreover our time at the expo is so limited. We did go to EXPO Dome, which house floral art competitions and indeed is one of the most stunning exhibition halls at the Expo.

Pavilion of Fashion and culture are all full of people so no chance for us at all.

Night programme: Visit Taoyuen Night Market where the things sold are very old -bags looks old handbags looks old and the people there looks old too! The night market is not crowded at all. we tried the pan fried oyster, the big intestine wrapped with small intestine , almond tauhu. Nice food.

Night accommodation: Taoyuen Hotel.

Recover deleted photos and video on your memory card

2010-12-07T19:28:00.004+08:00

How do you feel if you accidentally deleted all your holiday photos? sad/ disappointed/ lost/ angry?

I was quite down last two days because when I deleted one of the photos on my camera I wrongly deleted all the photos on my holiday in Taiwan since before deleting I put all the photos in one folder so when I deleted one, I deleted all...moreover all those photos are taken by my husband...scary hor .

At first I didn't dare to tell him. I tried all ways and means while on the tour bus but I just couldn't get his photos and his video back. so when he asked to take his camera to see his video , I told him innocently that I have accidentally deleted all his photos and videos........

When I came back home and after a good rest, the first thing is ----I goggled search on how to recover deleted file on memory card. I found this page: I tried free smart recovery 4.5 and it took me around 3 hours to get that 96 photos in my folder but at the end of that 3 hours, I still cannot view my deleted photos and videos.

I tried and googled search again and and found this page .

As for the model name it is the found on the first line at the back of the memory stick ( MS-MT2G) and the serial number is the second number of the three rows of number shown here (C903L5L) . After that , answer the questions asked and download the software and then connect your memory card to the PC either via camera or card reader and tata.....after 7 minutes I got all my deleted photos and video back ...so happy now!!!

The best thing is everything is FREE...this is the best Sony e-support I have encountered.

Oh....those heavy bags....

2010-11-03T07:47:00.002+08:00

Last week or so I saw Michael, one of my students carrying such a heavy school bag which made his young and tender backbone bent. I was thinking to myself, oh my God, if he carry on to carry that heavy bag till Fifth form then what will happen to his posture? Usually for the academically better classes, the students will bring all the necessary books of the day to school as compared to the weaker class that will bring the bare minimum to school.

For a long time already, schools has been talking about building lockers in school for the students to put their books. Our school did try out a pioneer project where students who are interested can rent the lockers from the school authority, but the project failed after a while because the lockers are broken into and also the students are too lazy to walk up to the top floor to keep their books there since for security reasons lockers has to be placed in the less accessible part of the schools , that is at the top floor to prevent vandalism.

Talking about locker, I surfed and found that are a wide variety of school lockers and also even gym lockers available online . we just need to choose the lockers, order, paid and they will shipthe lockers to us. Life indeed is becoming easier and easier.

Retirement plan

2010-11-01T14:40:00.003+08:00

Just 3 more years to retirement, it is time for me to plan for my retirement. Home tuition is good income but we will be very tied down with our life and our holidays trips too...meaning that we cannot get those cheaper off season holidays but instead need to join the crowds during the school holidays since only during school holidays there will be no more home tuition.

Hence we are planning maybe to set up online tutoring like this one which offers science homework help, helping students to balance equations in chemistry which is really difficult for some, and also ionic compounds in chemistry.

With online tutoring, we can mark and tutor our students anywhere, anytime and at any place where there is internet connection. With that our work routine will be more flexible and the students can also learn at their own pace and time. Online tutoring is really a good field to venture into after my retirement.

yippeee...the year is ending

2010-11-01T14:11:00.003+08:00

Happy mood cos I have just

- finished marking all my end of year test papers

- finished keying in all the marks in the SMS ( school marks system )

- finished keying those same marks all over again in the another system - SAP system and which we know very well nobody will ever look at it...just because somebody want that system and we poor teachers have to key in the marks there

-finish typing all the answers on power point for checking purposes with the students

- but then it will be much harder to control the students after the examination.....3 long weeks...alamak

but thinker of the positive side, one more year down and just 3 more years to go...

Plants vs zombies

2010-09-08T11:06:00.006+08:00

I was recently very addicted to plants vs zombies game and while I was stuck at level 6 , I searched Google to find out how to get over that level so that those zombies will not eat my brain...funny enough while looking up from Google, I discovered that we can even buy plants from eplanters for both outer planters and also indoor planters and they even ship it over to us with charges of course.

Eplanters has a huge range of plants , by types, locations, colors, shapes and sizes. You name it, they got it. They also has planters accessories too.

Haha.. I think I need to send out this note to my zombies friends:

Hi my zombies enemies- especially those irritating bungies jomping ones, dun eat my plants again or else I need to buy more outddor planter rather than those beanz or maize plants to shoot u don and plezz dont ever com in to eat my indoor planter, I wud rater u eat my brainz than d plants....FYI, there are more outddor plants at eplanters than my backyard and rooftop. Do go and check it out.

Making sugar free peanut butter

2010-08-12T09:27:00.003+08:00

I love peanut butter but 2 things put me off and make me guilty whenever I want to buy peanut butter.

1. I can only eat sugar free peanut butter which is quite difficult to find.

2. Are mouldy peanuts used in the manufacturing of peanut butter? Because if they are mouldy, it can be carcinogenic.

Recently I have just learnt to make my own fresh, sugar free peanut butter. Free and easy method to make it.

1. Check through the peanuts and throw away the mouldy and the not so good ones. Don't wash the peanuts

2. Deep fry the peanuts in oil till light brown but not too brown because the hot oil will continue to brown the peanuts.

3. Take peanut out from oil. No need to skin the peanuts because blending will grind the skin and also give the peanut butter the brown colour.

4, Add some butter to the hot oil.

5. Blend peanuts with the oil from step 4.

Then enjoy the sugar free peanut butter with your bread or crackers

Translation from English to Chinese

2010-07-30T16:42:00.003+08:00

Being English educated, I always have problem to translate from English to Chinese. That day while I was watching a Chinese drama series, my niece MSN-ed me and asked me what I was doing, I told her I was watching a Chinese drama series and when she asked me the title I just simply cannot tell off hand to her since my command of han- yu- piyin is really poor. I am really at a loss of how to tell her the title of that drama show in Chinese over MSN because when I told her from direct translation, she will also not understand what do I mean by it because in English it is "walk west mouth" well as in Chinese it is actually "走西口"

Hence I always have to resort to Internet to help me to do translation service s. One of the website is World Lingo, Goggle Translate which are free to use but it can only translate phrases. When we want to translation service like translate an article then we need to use online translation services like Translia which provides very professional translation services and they can translate nearly all the languages spoken on planet earth. Check out their language translation services

Golden Way to fight inflation

2010-07-21T10:10:00.003+08:00

The government has just announced the the price increase in sugar, petrol and gas due to the reduction in government subsidy on sugar , petrol and gas. With this increase , it will definitely result in inflation . Hence the wisest way is to invest in gold , as my friend told me the other day since gold is said to be the most liquid investment.
As an Internet savvy person I searched the Internet and found this website called Gold Coins Gain that sell and buy Gold Bullion coins. From the website , I found that we can buy bullion coins and then sell them anywhere in the world. This website has a great variety of gold bullion coins for sale like American Buffalo, Australian Gold Nugget, China Gold Panda and son on for sale at quite reasonable price. We can buy these bullion coins for keep and also for investment.There are many other similar website like this on the Internet. Do choose a reliable one wisely if you are interested in gold investment.
These are my food for thoughts at this time of inflation and world's recession if I do have lots of extra money for investment.

Football World Cup 2010

2010-07-11T20:33:00.002+08:00

Is that an octopus on top of Spain's flag?

Air Asia food

2010-06-21T19:38:00.007+08:00

On our flight to Macau, per kindness of Borneo Exploration we are given complimentary meals from Air Asia. Borneo Exploration ordered Chicken Rice when we flew from Kuching to Macau. The chicken rice tastes good and the rice is soft and the chicken are soft and juicy too.

My whole group enjoyed the chicken rice.

But on the way back from Guangzhou to Kuala Lumpur, again Borneo Exploration gave us complimentary meal and this time they ordered fried rice with satay. As usual satay taste nice but not the fried rice , it was hard and plain, fried with nothing like mixed veggies. It is rice fried with rice and with some ikan bilis as decor. My advice is next time don't order fried rice cos it is not nice at all.

Shenzhen 3.6. 2010

2010-06-21T08:23:00.027+08:00

After Hong Kong Ocean Park, Ladies street and dinner we crossed the Hong Kong Border and reentered Shenzhen border which is just an hour journey away including the Immigration clearance at both sides. Since we were travelling on group visa , clearance was pretty fast but the only funny thing is our passport were not stamped at all so how how we to account on the 2 unstamped day at Hone Kong? if somebody checked our passport thoroughly that may think we had been abducted by the aliens for 2 days....We rechecked back into the Holiday Inn Express Hotel Shenzhen which everyone in our tour like and slept well.We just love those rib boned pillows and bed sheet. and the semi transparent bathroom.

The next morning after the early morning call we had our breakfast and then off we go with our luggage in the tour bus to Shenzhen famous Window of the World.

It has all the replica of the famous wonders, historical heritages and famous scenic sites. The entire masterpiece is built at ratios of 1:1, 1:5 or 1:15. It make me wonder do China need to get copyright to do all these replicas of the world? Someone told me no need to get copyright but just need to get permission.True or not , I don't know.

As usual to save time and to prevent the missing member of our group, the tour leader suggested that we all took the small train ( RMB 20 per pax)to go around the park and we only stopped at certain strategic spots to take photos but we only stopped for a mere 5 minutes!! We really rushed through the whole park missing my favourite Japanese Garden!!

So all these are replicas of the world's wonder :

There I was in 'Egypt'

We continued our journey to different world's wonders:

In 'Niagara Fall'

In 'Holland'
In 'UK'....
In 'Italy'.... leaning tower of Pisa

We even took the 2 level lift( RMB 20 per pax) to go up the 'Eiffel Tower'

These are the views from the tower:

After the 'Eiffel Tower, we rushed our way to find 'USA' since we only have 15 minutes left on the Park...

We found people selling 'lycees in the Park , then we saw lots of lycees trees in the park.

Some more of 'USA'

'Easter Island'

'Statue of Liberty'

They even has this too:

Lunch time:

After lunch we proceeded to Guangzhou since our Air Asia flight back to KL is from Guangzhou
. On the way our tour guide 'smuggled' us to a Bee Farm which is not on our itinerary at all. Just because we turned down his night optional cruise of Pearl River at RMB 200 per pax , he took us to this farm to earn extra commission. Even though he said this is required by Chinese government but we do feel that a lot of this side shopping is their own doing just to earn commission.

At the bee farm where many of our group bought pollens which are extraordinary big and looks suspicious to a science teacher like me. And also those royal jelly...I only see a few small bees around but I do saw lots of royal jelly in the bottles for sale and that equals = ?????

Never mind about that, because people need earn $$ to survive, right?

Nothing much to see in Guangzhou, except this:

still using the traditional weighing method:

Look at the fan cover...used to cool chestnut, chinese people are really frugal:

Dinner time:

This is the dinner in Guangzhou that made many of us having stomach air and diarrhoea. My tour mates when went to the restaurant toilet nearly vomitted so we suspected taht teh food were not prepared hygienically:

After dinner we went shopping at Shangxia Jiu Lu Pedestrian Street for our final shopping. I bought 2 shirts from there cheap cheap ..our $$ only RM 19 where I saw exactly the same shirt sold in Miri for RM 75

After a very rushed shopping, we checked into Rosedale Hotel, Guangzhou

and we are given a suite like this:

Calling Rescue 999.....

2010-06-18T16:18:00.003+08:00

So what are these Rescue 999 doing in my house and on my roof top?

Oooooops...it is because of this wasp nest that we only realised because it cannot be seen from our house but was seen by my BIL who is living next door.

We waited till our trip back from Miri then we went to the Rescue 999 centre to seek their help by showing them the photo that I had taken. They estimated the size and asked us to buy 5 tins of Red Ridsect because according to them the Red colour type is more effective in killing the wasps. With the Ridsect bought we waited for them to come and punctually they turned up to help us to eliminate the wasps' nest.

Only after that they found out that it is an empty nest for maybe the queen wasp has died

Nice design and pattern on the nest hor....
so now I am stuck with 5 tins of Ridsect or is it 3..... after giving 2 to the rescue 999 man. What a false alarm ....wasps wasps next time you already move house you either sms , or msn or ym or leave a msg on facebook lah!!

Green House Cafe @ Rubber Road Kuching

2010-06-18T16:00:00.004+08:00

My friend found this new cafe and sms-ed me to go for lunch yesterday. Actually I saw this cafe a few times already with lots of cars parked outside the house next to ING insurance at Rubber Road, that is opposite Ting Pek King's Original Carwash. Being alone I never dared to go in and try, so when my friend asked me , without thinking I replied her sms - ON.

Nice air conditioned atmosphere inside and a lot of tables are reserved already meaning that business is good here.

We ordered quite a few dishes to try out even though there was only 3 of us.

Indian Rojak( RM 4) Nice but portion is small.

Penang Laksa ( RM 4.50). Very tasty and the fish used is very fresh with lots of onions, yummy.

Nasi Bryani with honeyed chicken ( RM 6.50) . The Indian smell in the rice is pretty strong. This is also the chef recommendation of the day.

Nasi Bryani with curry chicken ( RM 6.50)

Murtabak ( RM 4) Nice beefy taste.

They also have toast so it will be a good place to go for breakfast too.

Hong Kong 2 June 2010

2010-06-17T20:37:00.024+08:00

Wake up early, check out from 'L' Hotel, to beat the traffic jam. For breakfast we are eating the famous Hong Kong Dim Sum.

Maize porridge:

har kaw with real fresh big prawn inside:

Char siaw pau

Carrot cake

Fried popiah:

After breakfast we have a full day schedule ahead of us...pitiful thing is it rains and the wind is very strong....

First stop: Golden Bauhinia Square

Next: Repulse Bay.

from Repulse Bay we can see Jackie Chan's house:

Repulse Bay is the home of Kong Kong rich and famous. There is free wireless connection right from the beach to the washrooms!

Next: Victoria Peak.We reached Victoria Peak after crossing the Cross Harbour Under Sea tunnel. We reached the top of the peak but too bad the rainy weather spoil everything because we only experience super strong wind and misty view at the peak.

We are supposed to see view like this:

But we saw this from the photo:

and this is what we actually see......

Next stop :Lunch

After lunch we went to JC ( Jackie Chan) jewellery shop where we saw the world biggest amythyst geode with its weight of 1239kg!!

Next place:Hong Kong Ocean Park

We reached there quite late because of the extra time spent at JC jewellery. hence only have 3 hours or so for the whole park.We wanted to use cable car to go up the hill but unluckily because of the rain, the cable car service was suspended so we need to go up by the ocean express train.

Sea jelly spectacular:

Next stop: Dophins and sea lion show time:

Roller coaster that we can see only but cannot play due to weather and time constraint. 3 hours for the whole park is really really not enough!! You need at least half a day there to enjoy the whole park.

Ladies street @ Hong Kong:
After rushing through Ocean Park we landed at Ladies street. First thing we tried is the smelly Tauhu where the smell can be smelled( Like the duck's intestine smell) a few streets away but nevertheless we still try it

This guai-lin-guo costs me HK$50 (RM 25)

How to survive in Hong Kong?? Things are so so expensive there!!! The tour guide told us that the pensioner are receiving HK$1000 a month which is only enough for them to buy fruits to eat!!!If we are not following tour , we will be burning a big big hole in our pocket for food, accomodation and entrance fees to Disneyland and Ocean Park!!

Last thing we do in Hong Kong before leaving for Shenzhen-dinner

When we reached Shenzhen one more thing we do before we checked into Holiday Unn Express Hotel shenzhen - shopping at Dong Men street. Nothing to buy there in Dong Men street , moreover after hearing so much about the Mainland Chinese tend to change your money to fake money during the transaction of goods, we are quite wary so we tried not to shop too much unless necessary and also from reliable shops like 7 eleven and Watson
Cute doggie I saw at one of the shop at Dong Men street. It pose for me when I took the photo but when the flash light hits its eye, it started to bark fiercely at me!!!

Why we never write 1x but x ?

2010-06-17T17:05:00.003+08:00

Algebra is something that my F2 students have big problem with. They cannot understand why we never write 1x but instead we write x which means when the coefficient is 1 we never write it.

Another area of common mistake is x+x , they tend to get confused with x X x which is x square.

Another area of difficulty is (2x +4) /8 and (2xX4) /8

Solving linear equation is even more difficult for them to comprehend especially when you have unknown on both sides of the equation 4y +10 = 2y - 4

Over the Internet there is a lot of help for Algebra explaining the common mistakes made by students like this Paul's Online notes that explain clearly common mistakes made by students.

Beside this page there are many others like online help in Algebra 1 which covers topics like
(for students of Grade 8, 9 and 10 ) like Exponents, Linear Equations, ratios, Real and complex numbers, quadratic formulae, Radicals, Polynomials and functions.

There is help for Algebra 2 which covers topics from Quadratic Equations to Quadratic Functions from Linear Equations to Polynomial functions, sequences and series, relations and functions and factorisation.

They offer Algebra 1 help, answers and problems and also Algebra 2 help , answers and problems.

Do check them out if you too have algebraic problems.

Sony or Sony!!!!

2010-06-17T16:19:00.004+08:00

I send back my Sony DSC -T300 for repair again!! It vibrated non stop when I reached Hong Kong on the 1st June 2010. With my eyes looking at the beautiful scenery but I just can't captured it on my screen. This has happen before before my warranty expired last year. They just lubricated the lens when I send back for repair last year. After coming back from Hong Kong I emailed Sony Customer service with all my camera model number and particulars but up to today (after 2 weeks) I still do not have a single reply from them......

I search the internet and found that T300 do have a vibrating problem. I brought it to one of the shop in Miri Bintang Mall and the Sony man told me that it can be fixed by bringing it to the Sony Service centre in Piasau and the friendly man told me that it will not cost me much even though the warranty has expired. Hearing him saying that, I felt assured and happy, at least my expensive camera can be fixed .

Since I need to be back to Kuching I thought that I can have it done in Kuching since Kuching is the capital city of Sarawak so service should be better. I brought the camera to Kuching Sony authorised Service centre( the only one in Kuching) and the lady at the centre told me that they can only lubricate it like what they have done last year. I told her that over the internet they say something is wrong with the manufacturing just like Sony DSC T20 where now Sony offers free extended repair till 2011.

Looks like whatever I told them are falling on deaf or is it dead ears!! This morning I got a call from the service centre telling me that my camera is ready...I was thinking arrrh...so fast??
True enough when I collected the camera , the Sony technician ( a man) who is not so friendly told me that in Kuching they cannot do anything except lubricate the lens and that costs me RM 50 with warranty of 3 months. When I told him what I read on the internet about vibrating Sony DSC T300, he told me he is not an engineer!!!Doesn't Sony send their technician for courses??

He asked me to test the camera but how to test? For the vibrating problem will only come when you go travelling and taking photos continously then it will start to vibrate non stop ( just like the vibration in the mobile phone). My son told me I have bought a vibrator instead of a camera.

I really regret for buying this Sony DSC T300 ( for RM 1400). This vibrating problem has been happening so many times already on my trip abroad!! Now even if I want to change camera , I am stuck with 16 Gig memory card and one spare battery for that vibrating camera for I will never ever buy any more Sony camera in this life!! Poor customer service is one reason, lousy camera is another reason and slow to admit their fault is another reason!!

Going down memory lanes....

2010-06-17T07:33:00.007+08:00

I was back in Tanjong Lobang College, Miri aka Kolej Tun Hj Bujang Miri last weekend after leaving the place in 1977 that was 33 years ago.

I attended my Form 6 in this college. Life was hard...very hard then. No allowance from home or from anybody, surviving on the hostel food where they cooked super hard rice for us then but they do gave out biscuits and tea at night as nightcap.

What a great diffrence the College has become after 33 years! The nice row of trees is still there but not as many trees as years back. I asked the security guard about the famous cliff (where I and my friends always go to to shout to release tensions after studying for hours and hours) is gone.

I still remember when I was there, during weekend we always climbed down the cliff to go to a beach where there was a Japanese warship which can be seen at low tide. But everytime we went there we had to be back before the tide rises or else we would be stranded. Sometimes we also go the other way to enjoy Luak Bay which is now private property.

This place has really changed and so have I !!

Hong Kong 1-2 June 2010

2010-06-16T13:01:00.012+08:00

Left Shenzhen after breakfast for Hong Kong. After reaching the Shenzhen border there was a huge crowd being Children Day that day but the Immigration Dept is super efficient so long queue is cleared within 30 minutes. After the China Border we boarded the bus again and reach the Hong kong border. again , clearance is quite fast. the bus brought us to "L" Hotel we check in and dropped our luggage there before we head onto Hong Kong Disneyland .

View from my room:

Wow...Hong Kong hotel is so expensive!! 'L" hotel is at HK$ 1400 per night for the harbour View which is the one we stayed. Very nice hotel indeed.

We have pork burger for lunch and dinner since food is so expensive here.

Pork Burger with french fries minus drinks is HK$ 40 = RM 20 FYI<>

Firework display at 8 pm. I really felt that I was in fairy land with the atmosphere and the music and fireworks. Before get this is the toilet bowl in disneyland. After taking photos with Donald duck, we peed on him..

Online tuition anyone?

2010-06-16T11:50:00.002+08:00

Nowadays I observe that parents are sending their kids for many tuition be it science, Mathematics , English or Bahasa Malaysia. And many parents are complaining that sending and picking the kids up are big problem especially when both parents are working. some of them are luckier to have their grandparents to help up in transporting and picking the kids from the tuition centres.

Because of this many tuition centres are going online. They have online tutors offering free online tutoring. I noticed that they also offer online Maths tutor for maths help and maths problem solver.

Even though they are well covered academically but I still personally think that- personal touch of Maths tutors are very important . Interaction with the Maths tutor online is very important to help the kids to improve their Mathematics .The children must also be very disciplined if they are to take Maths tuition online . Anyway this is good food for thought for our new generation kids.

Zhongsan - Shenzhen Splendid of China, 31.05.2010

2010-06-10T18:55:00.020+08:00

On the way to Shenzhen, splendid of China we stopped at 2 places in Zhongsan:

Sun Wen Garden aka Zhongsan Park built in honour of Sun Yat-sen, better-known in Chinese as Sun Zhongshan, who is considered by many to be the "Father of modern China". Currently there are more than 40 Zhongshan Parks in China, and some in oversea areas. Zhongsan being his birth place.

Zhongshan Zhan's Garden, with another name as Zhongshan Da Zhai Men (a big house in old-style), is located at Beitai in the Southern District of Zhongshan City and also the largest private garden in classical-style in southern area at present.

Zhan's Garden, designed by the owner, Huang Yuanxin and built by hundreds of skilled craft men in gardening from all over the country, covers about one hectare and took 5 years to finish the construction.

The garden was built to provide a quiet and comfortable place with elegant environment for his mother, Ms. Zhan. Moreover, the early Zhan's Garden, today's backyard was the place where Ms. Zhan enjoyed her living with her family, and the utensils has still remained the same even since Ms. Zhan moved away. .

Built in 1998, it is the largest private garden in southern China. About 100 craftsmen was employed from Suzhou and worked for this garden more than five years. The park is based on the style of Suzhou gardens and also referred to traditional Chinese and western architecture style.

After the visit, I was thinking Huang Yuanxin must be a crazy rich man by building such a super huge dwelling place for his mum as a sign of being filial. We were wondering is it happiness to stay in such huge house compound or it is a big burden to keep that big compound

Next stop at Zhongsan is to fill our hungry stomach......lunch time:

After lunch we proceed on our journey to Shenzhen Splendid of China where all buildings are scaled down replicas of China's historical buildings, wonderful scenes and folk customs. The scale models are in the main in a ratio of 1:15 and the exhibits are positioned to replicate their geographical locations.

Here you can see replicas of many of the most famous Chinese buildings and landmarks and a great deal of attention has been paid to detail so as to ensure the miniatures truly represent their originals.

Admission Fee: RMB 120 (including the ticket for China Folk Culture Village)

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After going round the park on train, we went on see the horse show:

Next on the agenda is cultural show in the theatre:

Then we went out for our dinner at a nearby restaurant for dinner:

After dinner we went back to the Splendid Of China for the second open air but shaded cultural show which is so wonderfully done that we practically do not have enough eyes to digest and see everything.

After an eventful day we finally head for our hotel, Holiday Inn Express Hotel in Shenzhen. Everybody in my group likethis hotel and also its breakfast.
Bed for my big baby:

Zhuhai - 30.5.2010

2010-06-10T16:49:00.011+08:00

Zhuhai is just a walk away from Macau after the Macau Immigration . It is a much smaller town as compared to Shenzhen. Our first stop after meeting our tour guide, Kenny is the Shijingshan Park to see the view of Zhuhai from a hill top via cable car at RMB 20 per person for a return journey where the downhill way we can choose cable car or the roller coaster type of vehicle to go downhill

Nothing much to see or do at the hilltop , exactly we don't intend
to go up the hill but before we say NO the tour guide already purchased our ticket so what to do...maybe he want to get his commission lor.

Next stop: Fish Girl sculpture

Lovers' Road

My stupid Sony DSC-T300 broke down again...It vibrated non stop ...so frustrating...so didn't take much photos here! Luckily I brought a Nikon coolpix along as backup.

Dinner time:

Here we watch the chef coking fresh abalone:

We side order fresh abalone at RMB 38 per piece. Not bad the price for fresh abalone

When this dish came out , it was delicious so we started to enjoy it but then while eating, suddenly the waitress came out and told us that we only had 8 of us so we were not entitled for the extra one so she took away the extra one and put it on the another side table????? actually we had already consumed an extra one since at first there are 10 there...and the funny thing is she just left the one she took away from us w/o covering it or what...we thought maybe she want to enjoy eating it herself when we left...

After dinner we checked into 4* Jumbo Hotel where the bell boys are just like scavengers , scavenging for our luggage when our bus arrived at the hotel.When we want to took the luggage back from them , the bell boys simply refused us ...what a very bad first impression on the hotel. why they scavenge for our luggage cos they all already had a list of our room number before hand so they would send it room by room and then demanding tips of at least RMB 20 per luggage. hence we asked our tour guide to settle for us cos it is easier for local to talk to local. Thus in the end the luggage was sent to our room w/o us paying those rude bell boys a single cent!!

Jumbo Hotel is only a so so hotel with very dim room and dimmed restaurant with not that good breakfast ....excuse given is they caters for Taiwanese tourists so what the Taiwanese eat is different from us...not quite true le!

Macau - 29 - 30 May 2010

2010-06-09T18:34:00.024+08:00

I am just back from my super tiring but super wholesome tour of 5 places in 7D. Macau- Zhuhai- Shenzhen- Hong Kong- Shenzhen- Guangzhou. it is more like National service ( just my husband said) but cheap ( RM 2388) with 4* and above hotels every night and mostly good lunch and dinner except for 2 places 9 dinner in Hong Kong was only so-so and the dinner at Guangzhou is not good at all! Left Kuching on Air Asia at 4 pm , arrived Macau very late at around 8.15 pm, after clearing the immigration and after one of blurr blurr our tour member running back from the tour bus to the immigration toilet since she left her handbag in the toilet. We reached the Comida A Portuguesa Restaurant at around 9 pm for our dinner.

After filling our stomach we checked into 4* Hotel Royal for the night.

Since this is the only night in Macau, we ( 6 adventurous one) refused to tuck ourselves in but instead walk to Casino Lisboa to try our luck.
In Macau they are super liberal with nude show advertisement stuck on those trishaws above.
@ HK$400 per show.

I lost HK $60 at Lisboa slot machine why ??? Because.....
Only realised the next morning that there is a big sword pointing into Casino Lisboa ...so how to win big like that?? My friend escaped the big sword and won HK$ 3000 playing ' Big-small

30 may 2010. Going round Macau as all tourist do starting with the Ruins of St. Paul.

Saw this crypt opposite St Paul Ruin
Our tour bus broke down so we walked to Senado Square:

Then the bus drove us to the 'Ah moh Guan Yin' statue aka Our lady statue. Next stop: Fisherman's Wharf
Nobody knows what is inside the building below: This Volcano is now closed after a few incidents as told by our tourist guide. Next: City of Dreams for our sumptuous buffet lunch and the Bubble show.

Dragon and the Tiger @Bubble show, City of dreams is very very impressive indeed.

Last stop in Macau before crossing over to Zhuhai, China - A- Ma Temple

Yummy hot selling must try Portugese tarts at HK$ 4 each sold near A-Ma Temple

Jade Dragon Snow Mountain, Lijang

2010-02-05T07:04:00.006+08:00

Before I went to Lijang , everyone is telling me how beautiful and cold is this mountain! so going to teh mountain all prepared with winter clothings, scarf, gloves, and even wine ( bamboo wine) in case it is really freezing cold up on the mountain, but when we reach there it was so hot that we even took off our coat and scarf....is it because of global warming or is it because the China Government has closed the upper summit hence we can only reach the middle section of the mountain because according to our Lijang tour guide, the upper summit has been closed ...reason the wind is too strong up there even though we do not feel any wind in the middle section of the mountain. As for the snow, we see nothing but white limestone ...real disappointment!! Luckily the scenery is nice which in a way do make up for the unseen snow !!

Hence we did not rent any extra winter clothing and we did not buy any oxygen can.

Finally......Lijang Here I come...11/12/09 to 12/12/09

2010-02-03T21:09:00.008+08:00

Symbol for Lijang:

It was a long long journey from Dali to Lijang...4 hours by bus. if from Kuming it will be 8 hours . Luckily we took a domestic flight back from Lijang to Kunming 9 which took only 45 minutes) or else it will be a real real long journey back to Kunming.

This very English styled outdoor dining:

Alkaline water sold in Lijang. Lijang tour guide told us that Lijang has very few obese people because water in Lijang is alkaline water with pH 7.3.

China beer taste like shandy minus the sweetness

China cola. In Yunan with all the meals served they will always serve 2 bottles of beer and 2 bottles of cola, which if unconsumed can be exchanged for 2 big bottles of mineral water.

For lunch we ate what the horsemen ate many centuries ago:

this is a very interesting huge claypot where no fire is seen but the soup are cooking in it.I touched the claypot it was not hot but warm only but the soup that came out of it is very very hot!!

see the soups inside............

Our lunch: dumplings

Mushroom:

Noodles:

Chicken that goes to Fitness centre:

A big bamboo pot of rice:

Dali ancient city

2010-02-01T17:26:00.009+08:00

Dali is 2025m above sea level. The weather is very dry and semi desert like. some of my group even got nose bleed due to the super dry weather.

This is taken in front of the city gate:

This city gate wall is 2000 years old.

This is how the old ancient town looks like. I love that crystal clear river

Dali's people are very talented with handicrafts and metal works like doing silver things

Another part of the ancient city with lots of local handicrafts like scarfs, gloves, tea shops , silverware.

Most of the folks in Dali are Bai ethnic group with their distinctive white colour house

Our Dali local tour guide ( Siaw Ping) who is also the Bai ethnic group so her dress is white in colour too.

This is where we eat our lunch at one of the Bai's ethnic village:

Very antique stool with fine craftworks:

Our lunch:

The rich cheesey taste keropok

Dali - 9th Dec 2009 to 11th Dec 2009

2010-01-28T16:53:00.006+08:00

View of Dali town from our hotel:

The hotel where we have our simple but delicious dinner:

simple but nice food:

Er- Hai which ia actually Er Hu but since there is no sea in Dali so they call the lake as the sea. This lake is a important source of aquatic food for people of Dali, in terms of fish and sea weeds

We love Dali's town cos it is very much like Lijang and the hotel is a super huge and nice one . we stayed 2 nights at Dali and visited Dali Ancient City 洋人街 for 2 consecutive nights since the hotel provide free shuttle bus to 洋人街

warming ourselves with "open fire"

"Roti canai- like thing" made from cow's milk

our hotel:

Yunan- part 2....Stone Forest

2010-01-12T07:32:00.006+08:00

We stayed a night at a hotel near Stone Forest, a very new hotel but the breakfast was terrible...the worst breakfast we had while in Yunan.

Stone Forest is really a beautiful piece of God's creation. Sooooooooo beautiful and magnificent!

Lijang- my dream town...

2010-01-05T20:32:00.012+08:00

After watching "one meter sunshine" ( 一米阳光 ) I felll in love with Lijang and it has been the dream city that I have wanted to visit. I made it to Lijang last December and the only problem was the high altitude reaction 高处反应 which spoil my trip as I miss Lijang beautiful night scene since our tour only stop there for a night...... but at least I got to see the day scene of beautiful Lijang.

Day 1 -Yunan tour

Left KLIA at 9 am by MAS airline and raeching Kunming at 1 sth pm and was whipped off to some lunch at the restaurant and from there we went to Western Hill Dragon Gate 西山龙门 and Grand View Pavillion 大观楼

We checked into King World International Hotel in Kunming for two nights.

Day 2 - A'Lu Ancient Caves, Kunming

Stopped at this very interesting village for lunch where they use hay for the floor and they served tuak like wine. The yellow things hanging in front of the restaurants are real corns.Toilets:

A'Lu Caves- 3 caves all in all. First cave need to walk, second cave need to use boat to paddle around to see the stalagmites, third cave need to use cable car.

A doorless toilet:

Our toursit guide from China Express bought these yummy pototoes for us to enjoy after a long walk through the 3 caves:

The dinner is at a restaurant near Stone Forest since we would be going to Stone Forest the next day.

To be continued.............

A Famosa Resort - 2/12/09 to 4/12/09

2010-01-01T18:55:00.014+08:00

I have seen that impressive advertisement on TV about A famosa resort. Since I had so many extra days might as well go there to experience it first hand.

After doing much homework, I found that the easiest way for us to go to A Famosa Resort is to go to Tampin and take a cab to the Resort. That is exactly what we did. We took City Liner bus from Seremban Terminal 2 to Tampin passing through many kampongs and villages. The fare is only about Rm 5 per person. From Tampin bus terminal we used a cab to go to A Famosa which took around 10 minutes only and cost RM 20 per taxi.

A Famosa Resort Hotel

Okay how much I paid for staying here? all in all I paid RM 215 per pax. It was a 3 days 2 nights Fantastic package at RM 165 per person but because only we 2 of us staying in the room we were charged an extra of RM 10 for shoulder season (Since the management encourage minimum of 3 pax in each room ) another RM 40 for peak season since first night is shoulder season and the second night is peak season - so all in all RM @!% per pax inclusive of 2 nights at the hotel ( no meals pun), 1 admission to Animal world Safari ( birds' show, multi animals show ,monkey Island tour and animal safari ) 1 admission to cowboy town with carnival show with fireworks, and 1 admission to water world. Coming to think of it , it is not too expensive cos we watched so many shows especially for the Animal world.

On reaching the hotel at 2 pm we explored around and went to the Cowboy Town at 6 pm which was too early of cos. There was not much to see except for the carnival show which only started at 9.30 pm . We stayed around Cowboy town till we were so bored. Luckily the carnival was interesting with fire blowing and animals parade and fireworks.

Selling fruits , pop corns and umbrellas too before show since it was raining:

Day 2:
Animal safari where humans are caged and animals are free.

Elephants' show

Birds' show

Multi animals show

Raft ride to Monkey island

Cowboy wild wild west show

The only complaint I have about the resort is expensive food and mineral water ( @ RM 3.50 per 250ml bottle) here is expensive and the ride using banana truck around the resort to go to animal park and the water park are not free...RM 1 per trip per bottom so if you have 2 bottoms you need to pay double. Other than these, all the shows are of high standard and are recommended especially for children.

30/11/09 to 2/12/09 -Seremban, Port Dickson

2009-12-31T17:07:00.012+08:00

People ask me why of all the places I choose Seremban. For the simple reason that hotels in Seremban is much cheaper than hotels in Bukit Bintang and food in seremban are much cheaper too. Moreover I was on my way to A Famosa Resort in Alor Gajah hence that is the most convenient place to stay. Moreover I can easily go to Port dickson which I have never been to before.

Hotel that we stayed - Carlton Star Hotel( @RM 75 per night per room) - cheap ,big room, clean, got wifi ( but signal very weak since we were staying on the third floor) and the hotel is within walking distance to the main bus terminal.
Hotel view at night

While in Seremban, we went to the famous Min Kok for Dimsum. how to fo th Min Kok take the free shuttle bus from Terminal 1 to Terminal 2. Min Kok is just walking distance from Terminal 2

This was what we ordered:

Comment: moderate price but tea is very cheap - one pot of pu er RM 2 only. Outside look deserted but once you went into the restaurant ,lot of people inside.

Port Dickson
Very easy to go from Seremban . Just take the free shuttle bus from Terminal 1 to Terminal 2 and every hourly there is bus going to Port Dickson. Personally port Dickson is not that great. Nothing interesting or unique there... beaches, resorts, stalls selling souvenirs

Seremban famous beef noodle.
we wanted to walk to Seremban Wet Market, asked the locals and they all told us it is very far away. But determined as ever we walked and found that is is only 10 minutes walk from Carlton Star Hotel. We tried the famous beef noodle but husband say the noodle is only so-so , sweet but lack of that beefy flavour. Husband's order:

My order:

We asked around for the famous Seremban siew pow and the locals recommended this shop.We bought quite a few of different flavour siew pow to bring to a Famosa Resort.

Comment; Seremban siew pow are crispier than Kuching siew pau. Taste wise, Kuching siew paus taste better.

Being not very satisfied with the Seremban beef noodle at the Pasar Besar Seremban we went and searched for another famous Seremban beef noodle. Luck was with us and we found it on our way back to the hotel. I bought the famous beef jerky( @ RM6+) which taste nice, beefy taste and soft too. The shop is very nicely decorated with the nicely framed old records and the shop is so clean that it got A from MPS

Being so satisfied with the beef jerky, we went back to Yee Kee again after A Famosa to try their beef noodles.

Verdict: very delicious

Travelling for full 28 days...............

2009-12-31T16:37:00.003+08:00

Have you ever travelled 28 days non stop...hopping from one place to another?

We have just done that. Just returned home and imagine this morning when I woke up I need an extra minute to recall where am I after sleeping in so many hotels for the last 28 days.....?

Left home on 30/11/09 - flew from Kuching to LCCT , took Airport Liner to Nilai and and from Nilai we took City Liner bus to Seremban. We prefer Seremban to KL cos hotel there is cheaper ( Only RM 75 per night) and food in Seremban is cheaper too. We stayed 2 nights in Seremban.while in sremabn we took a dat=y trip by City Liner too to Port Dickson

2/12/09 to 4/12/09 - . From Seremban we took City Liner to Tampin and from Tampin we took a taxi (taxi fare- RM 20)to A Famosa resort in Alor Gajah ( @RM 215 per person for 2 nights stay at A Famosa Resort, admission to Animal world safari, cowboy town with carnival show, and admission to water world)

5/12/09 - went back to KLIA and overnight in KLIA

6/12/09 - 13/12/09 - tour to China - Yunan, (Kunming, Dali and Lijang)

13/12/09- Back in KL and stay at D'Oriental Inn in Petaling Street ( RM 115 per night)

14/12/09 - 24/12/09 - stayed in First World Hotel for 10 nights... I think we were one of the longest staying guests that had stayed so long in a stretch.... our hotel room card was stamped for breakfast and dinner everyday and it was fully fully stamped till the waiter found no more empty space for stamping....

24/12/09 to 26/12/09 from Genting we took a bus to Titiwangsa, LRT to Plaza Rakyat and from Pudu we took another bus to Lumut, alighting at Manjung, a new township near to Sitiawan, stayed at Lead View Hotel for 2 nits ( @ RM 110 per nit). Wanted to stayed on for another 2 nits , pleaded and pleaded but could not get even a single room . Blessing in disguise too cos we managed to get another cheaper and good hotel.

26/12/09 to 28/12/09 . We stayed at Lee Garden Hotel (@RM 55 per nit) . Walked to Manjung Bus station and from there took a taxi (@ RM 10 per taxi ) to Lumut jetty.
From there we board the ferry ( actually it is an Express boat )@ RM 10 per person for a return trip to Pangkor island

In the next few posts I will slowly slowly show you all the details of all these places that I had visited.

A long overdue post

2009-10-09T06:48:00.014+08:00

wow...it takes me 4 months to put up this post....

Was in UK last July to attend my youngest son graduation.It was only a eight day trip inclusive of traveling. So short is the time that jet-lag has no chance to affect me !

As usual we use Emirates to fly from KL to Dubai to Manchester. We love summer in UK so much exotic fruits to eat ...cheap cheap some more.

So short the time that the only place to went to were the Skipton Castle and the Yorkshire Dales...beautiful except for the heavy rain or else it will be prefect

Flowers at Skipton train station:

Beautiful canal at Skipton:

At the Skipton castle:

Sipping English tea on a cold summer morning:
At the Yorkshire Dales:

If not of the heavy downpour, this will definitely be a lovely place for a picnic!

A classical English shop in Grassington where we had our cups of hot English Tea with scones
To get to the Yorkshire Dales we took the train to Skipton then from Skipton we went to Grassington by bus. From Grassington we walked to the Dales.

Giant lanterns at Chin Swee temple 清水岩庙 , Genting

2009-09-27T14:53:00.004+08:00

Went to Chin Swee Caves Temple to see those giant lantern in conjunction of the Mooncake Festival. Actually there are free shuttle buses from Genting Highlands Hotel every hour leaving for the temple but due to the landslide in Genting the service was suspended hence we have to take the Awana Cable cars to go to the temple @RM 3 per person per trip.

Short notes:The best thing is we used our accumulated points collected during our hotel stay at Genting and the points we collected while playing on those 1 cent slot machine to exchange for mooncakes. 12 genting points for 2 Genting mooncakes. I got 6 mooncakes of which 2 are low sugar single yolk mooncake!!

Driving around Putrajaya- built with your $ and my $

2009-09-27T14:42:00.005+08:00

I was in Putrajaya on the first day of Raya. Thanks to my husband niece who drove us around Putrajaya to see how my tax $$ was used by the government.

Then being Najib 's open house at Seri Perdana that day, we drop in at Seri Perdana to join the crowd.

My dream trip to Berjaya Hill

2009-09-27T14:10:00.009+08:00

I have been hearing and reading a lot about Berjaya Hill, hence after a long planning of 3 months I finally reached Colmar Tropicale of Berjaya Hill.

Okay.. how to go to Berjaya Hill? Catch their shuttle van service from Berjaya Times Square @ RM 25 per way per person. 2 trips a day: 9.30 am and 2 pm daily. I chose the 2.30 pm trip cos the food up in the hill is expensive so I might as well eat my lunch at Berjaya Times Square food court before my trip.

For dinner I brought along my own bread toaster and bread and cooked chicken bought from Cold Storage supermarket @Berjaya Times Square.
Check in was a mess. We waited for 2 hours and finally get to check in at 5pm . hence I negotiate with the check in counter to let us check out an hour later the next day to make up our lost time...which they agree to.

Our 2 room suite:
Booked through Berjaya website at RM 330 per night.A bit run down but for a night stay it is still alright.

Around Colmar Tropicale:

Next morning we used the free shuttle service to visit the Japanese garden and the Botanical Garden which is nearby each other.

We also took advantage of the free shuttle to the rabbit farm but since it is so hot and there are not many rabbits to see we did not enter the farm.

Whys?

2009-06-23T10:31:00.002+08:00

Why is career life getting more and more stressful?

Why people in higher authority are not thinking about others while making decisions?

Why are there so many changes , moreover changes that are so very unproductive?

Why is there more and more paper work, key in the same data here and there, over and over again?

Remember this wise sayings by my most respected Master Cheng Yen

- Be careful and mindful when dealing with people, but do not be narrow minded.

-Be empathic, be considerate of others while making changes so that they will be touched and think of you instead.

- While you make changes, you are only saving yourself, but when you can influence others , then only you are saving others

I really need a holiday....

2009-06-23T07:17:00.008+08:00

Schoolwork has been real stressful with so much changes ...one change after the other. The problem is they are all very major changes which calls for a very high level of tolerance.

That is my updated career life in a controlled organisation where one sole decision maker can affect the moods, the atmosphere and the way I look at my career and especially this vocation that I once loved and treasured.

So what is better than to go to a holiday to get myself away from this stressful life. Hence I am now planning for 2 upcoming holidays, one for this coming Hari Raya Puasa holiday in September and one more for my well deserved end of year holiday this coming December.

After checking through the website, I discovered that Accor hotel in Kuala Lumpur has the Accor Hotels City Super Sale. Travellers can save up to 60% when they book online between 23 - 29 June, for stays between July 10 and September 30, 2009. Over 250,000 room nights will be on sale, with rates starting as low as US$25 per night.This sale is only for a limited time only!

The timing is just right because I can book now and stay in Accor Hotel, Kuala Lumpur during the Hari Raya holidays from 20th September to 25th September.
my itinerary includes:

20/9/2009 , Have a splashing time at Sunway Lagoon
21/9/2009 , Day trip to Berjaya Hills to enjoy the French village and
the Japanese Gardens
22/9/2009, Day trip to Genting Highlands
23/9/2009 , To Muar to enjoy all the delicacies there
24/9/2009, To Kajang for the famous Kajang satay

so that will be my 5 nights stay at Accor Hotel , KL.

Dresses for girls

2009-06-16T07:02:00.003+08:00

I have 2 boys and never have a chance to dress up for girls. Everytime I saw those beautiful dresses for girls, I do wish I too have a girl for me to dress up too.

Do you know that now you can have a tailored made dress for your girl too, via online site like this one? That is the wonders of technology and the cyber world today.

Very simple steps to follow:
Getting Started

1. Determine which clothing , Casual Clothing or Dress Clothing
2. Then take a few quick measurements of her height, chest and waist.
3. Next, determine her weight.

Use the size information below to pinpoint the right size.

Size Information:

Girls 4-6x
In general, these sizes should fit preschoolers, but can span from ages 3-6 years old.
Weight will fall between 32 and 54 lbs.
Height will range between 39-48 inches.
Here's how the numbers and letter sizes match up: S=4, M=5, L=6. XL=6x or 7

Girls 7-16
In general, these sizes should fit grade schoolers (roughly ages 7-13).
Height will range between 50-65 inches.
Here's how the numbers and letter sizes match up: S=7 or 8, M=12, L=14-16, XL=18

Girls Slim
For girls with a small frame and thin body.
Available for preschoolers and grade schoolers.

Girls Plus
For girls where the weight is heavier than the proportional height.
Available for preschoolers and grade schoolers.

Shopwiki are complete with those finishing touches for your little girls like hair accessories, dress shoes, purses, tights and jewelry too.

Do check out these lovely party dresses for yourself.

Happy online shopping for your little girls.

2009-05-18T20:53:00.004+08:00

This is my most recent philosophy on my surroundings and outlook towards my career. This will also be my philosophy till the day I retire.

so many changes ....let's see ,,,one year 198 school days.....198X4 days only left...ok lar can survive up to then...

Are you so busy?

2009-03-16T19:44:00.004+08:00

Rang up my friend last week ...the first thing she remember to ask me is
" Are you so busy that you did not update your blog?"

Another friend ask " why everyday I see your blog ...only happy cow year one??"

Another one ...my close relative ask..."oooi christina why you no write new thing for your blog liao le????".....

So am I busy ....not really...just a bit lazy to update my blog even though I haven't finished my cruise entry yet .... my trip to Padang Besar, trip to Kuala Perlis, my food adventure in Sungai Petani...hope I can get that done this week (semester break now ) and also I have no more PTK to study ( PTK exam this coming Wednesday)

So what have I been doing that kept me away from my laptop?
Firstly jumping up and down on the rebounder while watching TV

It claims that:

20 minutes of rebound exercise is equal to:

Jogging 3 1/2 miles in 32 minutes
Playing handball for 40 minutes
Swimming 800m in 16 minutes
Biking 5 miles in 18 minutes
Skipping for 15 minutes
Walking 2 1/2 miles in 34 minutes

To burn 150 calories, you can:

Walk for 22 minutes
Swim for 10 minutes
Run for 6 minutes or
REBOUND EXERCISE FOR ONLY 2 MINUTES!!!

The Most Efficient Form of Exercise Yet Devised by Man
The perfect wellness exercise in health and all-weather aerobics, just minutes per day. It helps to strengthen every organ in the body while reducing body fat; firms legs, thighs, arms, abdomen, etc. Increases your sense of balance and strengthens muscles over all. The rebounder provides an aerobic effect on your heart; it rejuvenates your body when it's tired and generally puts you in a state of health and fitness.

Now why I buy this rebounder...after the cruise , after holiday I met an old old, very old colleague of mine , he reminded me that I have become fat ( that was his exact word) and MUST lose weight even though my weight was only 78 kg. Hence I have to be determined and rebounding on this machine everyday, I am now at 76 kg. Anyway it is good to lose weight and to burn calories too...good for my blood sugar level too.

Another thing that kept me away from my laptop is my Nokia E66. With E66, I can chat to my 2 sons for free, can check my emails the first thing I wake up without depending on my laptop. I love my E66.

HaPPy 牛Year 2009

2009-02-01T20:24:00.011+08:00

Decor:

送鼠迎牛Dinner:

Fireworks:

初一:

16/12 - Cruise Destination --- Penang and Captain's Gala dinner

2009-01-15T20:39:00.008+08:00

Excited and woke up at 6.00 am to jog and also to get rid of all those calories from those nice food:

sunrise

Breakfast at Ocean Palace:

Penang:

Welcoming tent, they even have ice cold water to give us after we went round Penang on our own:

Lunch after going to Penang:

Captain gala dinner:

First Dinner on Cruise - 15/12/08

2009-01-03T16:18:00.007+08:00

Everybody has been telling us that there is abundant food on Star Cruise , so let me show you exactly what were served at our first dinner on board and watching sunset while having our dinner.
Ocean Palace : for fine dining:

We choose Mariners since it is less formal dining

View we enjoyed while having our dinner: