Will you spend RM 1000 on firecrackers and fireworks??

Even though people have been lamenting about higher price for goods this year but there seems to be no decrease in the fireworks and firecrackers let off during New Year Eve.
Don't ask me how those firecrackers or fireworks reach Sarawak shore ( maybe by submarines lor) cos I never ever spend a single cent on those goods. Heard that there are people who even spend RM 1000 just on those, which I really think is literally burning away the $$$ !
But in a way thanks to those generous people too, for imagine if there is no firecrackers or fireworks on CNY eve, how dull the atmosphere will be!!

Chinese New Year 2008

Chinese New year was here and now it is nearly over , being the fourth day today and it is back to work tomorrow. Guess what we are discussing... what to do next New Year liao..where to eat for reunion and where to go for CNY next year...hahaha

Okay we had our Reunion dinner at the Hongkong Noodle House@ 438 per table

Menu and food for the night:
1. yee sang

2. cold dish
3. shark Fin soup
4. Steamed fish
5. Buttered prawns

6. herbal chicken
7. Mixed Mushroom
8. Seafood noodles

9. The finale of the night was the appearance of the "God of no prosperity" which gave every table a 6D toto number in the ang-pow packet . Why god of no prosperity..cos there is lots of doubt in the toto number .....the winning number ( with prize money of RM 5 million) was known at 7. 15 pm but the number was only given to the patrons at 9.30 pm ..alamak next time if give , give numbers that are not drawn one lar....

Malaysian houses vs English houses

I was doing my once a week cleaning yesterday and in my mind I am comparing Malaysian houses to Engish houses.


1. Super Small, narrow and an super steep staircases in English houses. So small and steep that if you are carrying a big suitcase upstairs, it will be a big problem. As for the furniture, most of them buy those detachable type or else there is no way to bring a fixed big cupboard upstairs.



2. Nearly the whole house is carpeted so there is no need for indoor broom or mop like the one we have at home. A vacuum cleaner is a must get item there.

3. In Malaysia here when we clean our bathroom we can splash and brush everywhere with water, but not in UK houses because the floor is made from oak wood . Everything need to be wiped and they bath with shower curtain to prevent water from splashing on the floor.




4. Another funny thing about UK bathroom cum toilet is everytime you enter. you need to grope about for that long piece of string hanging from the ceiling in order to switch on the light and the ventilator at the same time. Hre, we just look for the switch near the bathroom room .

4. We have big car porch for 2 or 3 cars , most UK homes has no car porch at all, except for those super rich ones.

5. Where to dry our clothes in winter? Here:



On the heater, and surprisingly it dries pretty fast and the clothes are really crispy( like keropok) after drying and we can just put layers and layers of clothes to be dried here.

6. UK's kichen does not have tiles , instead they are using oak wood too.

Sweet IM

Nice or not? This is what I get after I install sweetIM. Very refreshing as compared to the old goggle search screen. The thing I love about SweetIM is the new and cute emoticons and winks.



The best thing is, it is free and it is fun. Try it for yourself.

Chinese New Year 2008

Chinese New Year is just round the corner, less than 3 weeks away, but I am super duper free because this year there is

- no CNY shopping to do
- no cookies to bake
- no cakes to make
- no concrete pavement to clean
- no cushion to change
- no CNY decor to put up

Muahahar cos this is my CNY plan:

Reunion Dinner - eat in restaurant,

First day of CNY - after eating breakfast at my SIL's place then go to temple to pay respect to my late MIL, then zoom we drive to Sarikei ( my hometown).For info , I have not spent any CNY in Sarikei for the last 28 years, since I married into the Teochew's family.

Second day of CNY - drive to Sibu to attend my husband's niece wedding which will be on the third day of CNY

Third day of CNY - attend wedding in Sibu

Fourth day of CNY - drive back to Kuching which will take us 6-7 hours of driving

Fifth day of CNY - back to school to teach lor.....

So while everyone rushing here and there to buy CNY goodies and shopping, I can afford to goyang my kaki at home....hohoho..

Kids and parents nowadays......

I was driving passed one of the Chinese Primary school this morning and it was recess time and I saw a lot of parents bringing food to the school for their kids' recess. I was thinking to myself:
Is this necessary? Why don't they just let their kids ta-pow the food to school in the morning rather than sending the food personally to the school for their children's recess time. The parents not only causes traffic jam on the road leading to the school , they also spoilt their kids like that.And many of the parents I saw are working parents who specially takes time off to see their kids during recess time and I have been noticing that, this is happening the whole year round and not just at the beginning of school terms.
I was thinking, when we were young our parents never ever send any food to us when we were in school , be it kindy or primary school. Most of the time we were just given 10 sen to buy whatever we think we want to eat in school so don't you think the children nowadays are too spoilt by their parents? Or is it because parents nowadays are more free when compared to our parents at our time?

Virus on MSN

##@#@#@&^*#!!!
Got an MSN msg from one of my students just now, something like:
Help me to see this photo( with some file attached) can be used or not?
Being a helpful person, unsuspecting of anything, I clicked on the file and download it, then habis lar...the file generates into an autosend and send to all my contacts on MSN......
First reply I get is luckily from my closest IT savy contact who tells me the photo I send got virus, I say har....when did I send you any photo then my quick mind tells me that it must be a virus that autosend the same file to all my contact on MSN...SI LAR like that..then I quickly type MSN message to all my other contacts on my MSN but too late ...all got virus.....
I scan my computer with AVG but got nothing so if you also got hit like this the best way is uninstall your MSN from your programme, then reinstall again.And that is what I have just done.

Moral of the lesson: You just cannot be too helpful in the cyber world.

Busy time of the year

Haha...after an absence of a week from my blog , I received an email from Russia asking for updates...My excuse is ..this is the busiest part of the year for me

- so many forms to dealt with,

registration forms,

Text-books-on-loan forms.

data conversion forms

name cards forms

- fees to collect

- data to key into the school computer system

-students to dealt with especially when you are given the last class in F2 to be form teacher and just last week, one student in my class was caught with a packet of cigarettes in his school bag and a lighter in his pocket and the same student has ponteng school for the the last two Fridays!!

- every day when there is no new admission I should say a loud " ALELUIA" cos more students admitted means more discipline problems .

Anyway admist the super busy schedule I still managed to squeeze some time to go to the 2 new shopping complex in Kuching, the Boulevard and The Spring to look look , see see.










With all the upmarkets tenants like Habib Jewels, Bonia, Levis, Body Glove, Big Apple Donut, Esprit, Hush Puppies, Manhattan Fish Market, Pierre Cardin, Starbucks, Sushi King......with the low spending power of thrifty Kuching people, I just doubt how long all these tenants will last......

New School Year

Another year gone, and another year to look forward to. I am a person who never make New Year resolution.

School have started and now seeing a completely new group of students again , hence now is the time to delete all those 2007, 200+ names from my memory bank and saving new 200+ names into my 256MB brain space...as age is catching up , I found that I am slower in remembering names as compared in my younger days!!

Aisehman ....28 years of teaching life has gone and just 6 more years to go......but life is getting better for us now cos this is the first time in 28 years that we are asked to teach 20 periods a week instead of 25 periods as in the last 28 years.

Another good thing to begin the school year is there are only 27 students in my own form class...so good now I can bring them wherever I want. That day I brought the whole class to the textbook store to get the free textbooks for them all since there are 15 textbooks for each of them . This is really a relief as compared to 50 students per class years back...

New year countdown

Was at Damai Resort Executive Suite which cost RM 400 per night for the New Year Eve, per kindness of Hubby's nephew who booked and paid everything and invited us to join his family for New Year Eve's dinner and countdown.

View of the rolling sea from the suite. The wind was so strong that you can hear it howling through the spaces in between the glass door the whole night.

Too bad cos the sea was so rough that we cannot swim in the sea at all!
Anyway it is still good company , good reunion and good food .

A long long journey home

Aisehman ...time really flies . It was like 9 days since my last post. Okay a quick recatch of what happened in the last 9 days.

24th Dec ( UK time) - left Burnley to Manchester via so many towns like Accrington, Bacup, Blackburn, Bury and Bolton. Reaching Manchester National Express station at Chorlton street at 12.15 p.m

24th Dec ( UK time ) - Reach Manchester airport at 12. 45 pm .


After deciding to cancel our stay at Holiday Inn Manchester Airport, we rough it out for the night at Manchester airport by sleeping on these pink cushion chairs


instead of hotel beds which will save us RM 500. We were not alone, they are many others who also rough it out at the airport with us since there was no transport to the airport on Christmas and Boxing Day unless you hire a taxi which will cost GBP 70 !! At least we are fully equipped with bread and chicken for the night. One ang-moh char boh was so hungry cos all the shops at the airport was closed that I spare her some Christmas ginger cake of mine

25thDec ( Uk time) left UK @ 8 pm for Dubai by Emirates Airline

26th Dec ( Dubai time) - reached Dubai @ 6.50 am .

26th Dec ( Dubai time ) - left Dubai for Kuala Lumpur via Changi airport

26th Dec ( Singapore time) - reach Singapore transit hall @8.40 pm

26th Dec ( Singapore time) - left Changi airport @ 9.20 pm for Kuala Lumpur

26th Dec ( Malaysia time) - reack KLIA @9.55 pm

- stayed another night at KLIA

27th Dec ( Malaysia time) - left LCCT @ 7.40 pm for Kuching

27th Dec 10.30pm reached home after being away for 1 month and 12 days........

28th Dec - attended the staff meeting @8 am ,

registration and collecting fees of students @9.45 am till 11.45 am

Thanks to the red wine and beer on Emirates airline to overcome those jetlag or else I will need 2 toothpicks to keep my eyes open during those 2 sessions.

Yearbook of Enlightenment 2008

Was reading this interesting book :

Like to share some of the very interesting quotes that I found in that book, since these are quotes that you and me always say and use.

From the way of Mrs Cosmopilite

1. Mrs Cosmopilite says:

If the wind changes, your face will stay like that.

The correct answer is : Like what?

********************************

2. Mrs Cosmopilite says:

Do you think this is a hotel? You just come here only to sleep.

This one always catches Ms C.'s paying guests by surprise.

***************************************************
3.Mrs Cosmopilite says:
Do as I say, not as I do

The acolyte responds: How do you do?
*********************************
4. Mrs Cosmopilite says:
Enough is Enough

The seeker of wisdom says: And?
******************************
5. Mrs Cosmopilite says
Don't you have anything better to do?

The acolyte responds: I will leave and smell the cherry blossom.
*******************************************************
6.Mrs Cosmopilite says
How many times do I have to tell you?

The acolyte responds: One more time.
***********************************
7.Mrs Cosmopilite says
I can always tell when you're lying

The wise man says: There is no truth.
***********************************
8. Mrs Cosmopilite says
I'm not going to ask you again

The correct response is silence
***************************
9. Mrs Cosmopilite says
If I've told you once.......I've told you a million times

The wise man says; A million is mostly zeroes
*****************************************
10. Mrs Cosmopilite says
If you don't stop crying, I am going to give you something to cry about.

The seeker says: This does not move us forward.
******************************************
11.Mrs Cosmopilite says
When I was your age, I had to walk ten miles through the snow, uphill, by myself, every day, to go to school.

The acolyte says: Did you really live less than a day's journey from a school?
******************************************************************
12. Mrs Cosmopilite says
If you can't say something nice,don't say anything at all.

The seeker says: Why is it so quiet in here?
**************************************
13. (My favourites)
Mrs Cosmopilite says
Go to your room and think about what you have done.

Hu-lin was discovered in a mummified state by Mrs C.'s having gone to his room 3 years previously to think about what he did and never returned, having become engrossed. He had achieved enlightenment but not lunch...hahaha

Source: Yearbook of Enlightenment 2008

Let's talk turkey!

This is the time of the year where you can find turkey of all sizes and types in supermarkets:

- whole turkey, small, medium, large and extra large

- turkey crowns- turkeys with legs removed, to save space in oven and freezer

- turkey joints- whole pieces of breast meat off the bone

I was looking for a ready roast small size turkey at Tesco, Sainsbury's and ASDA but I cannot find any. I am not going to roast one even though there are so many uncooked one at the supermarket since roasting a turkey will take at least 3 to 4 hours and calculating the amount of gas ( kitchen's oven is a gas oven ) used is not worth it at all and gas is expensive in UK.

Then I found this :

When opened up, it looks this big - 700g at 99p which is less than RM 7. It is an extra huge drumstick. I know it is cheap because ang-moh love breast and not thigh. Actually most Chinese love thigh meat better since thigh meat are much tender than breast meat.
It was so huge that I needed to debone it which is quite easy, or else it will not fit into those bachelor's cooking pot here. Then I season it with whatever seasonings I can find in that bachelor's kitchen, organic honey, soy sauce, salt, left over mulled wine boiled with clementines( those small red oranges), big onion, extra virgin oil, hot chilli powder, pepper . Easy , just dump everything into the pot with potatoes of course, and cook for half an hour.Then take out from pot and grill in oven for 20 minutes. That's it, done.
Then cook a packet of roast turkey gravy with the stock and pour over the grilled turkey. Delicious and yummy.
For soup, boil water, put in one chicken stock ( haha, brought from Sarawak) then dump in those fresh mushroom ( 50p for a big packet since it is in season now), carrots( 29p for a big bag too and very cheap and fresh here) beans, broccoli and cauliflower.
Then put these mini rolls in oven and grill with the turkey
Behold another meal for the day. Hohoho..with turkey drumstick as star of the dinner.