Two Thousand and Eleven

It's 2011 already, just came back from the fireworks. Went to two - 9pm at Darling Harbour and 12am at Circular Quay for the Harbour Bridge fireworks.

And I'm coughing my lungs out now.

Happy New Year p e o p l e  . . . . . .  It's 2011!

你的普通话说得真好

I've lost count of how many times I came across this sentence whenever I say I'm from Malaysia. And it follows with explanation that we started learning Mandarin, English and Bahasa since primary school. People will think you're awesome because you speak few languages including different dialects. I thought I'll be in Nanjing traveling by myself, ended up we came here in a group of 10! The mates have already left to Chengdu 3 hours ago and I started to miss them as soon as they hopped on the cab. Without their companion, my Nanjing trip wouldn't be that meaningful. I mean it! :) It's already 22 December, today. Oooopsss.

 

I'm... Amazed.

Me, Mel and Christine were at the China Pavilion and unsurprisingly there were people surrounding us asking whether we want to get the ticket from them with 5 yuan extra to avoid the long queue at the ticket booth. And this guy came over and said, "how much does the foreigner pay you to bring her around? She must have paid you for being her tour guide and translator."

I said no, we are friends!

He said no way! Insisting his "belief", I must have been paid!

I said no, he said yes. I said no, he said yes. WTF. I should have said YES.

This morning I went to the bank for currency exchange. Yes, my pocket is draining. I sat down at the counter and passed the teller the money. Suddenly one woman approached me with a bag, asked if I'm doing the exchange.

She said, "what about you do the exchange with me? Let's see what's the rate they offer you, I'll offer you a higher rate. Ok? Ok? Ok?"

I was stoned.

And the teller greatly told me the rate in Shanghainese dialect. I was like "huh? I don't understand."

Then the woman said, "she gives you 6.34. I'll give you 6.40. You can get few tens more. Deal?" I shook my head. She continued, "I just withdraw the money out from the bank. Don't worry." Apparently she knew the main concern is whether it's real or fake notes.

To my surprise, the teller remained silence and she was just looking at me while waiting for my decision.

I looked at the teller, "I'm dealing with you."

The woman walked away back to the waiting seat, waiting for the next target I supposed, throwing the last sentence, "you don't want? 算了."

The bank is empty, I was the only customer inside. Hellooooo where the hell is the security? Or they don't need one eventually.

Oh China. 我真是大开眼界，谢谢你！

Sent from my iPhone

这雪下得不是假的！

It takes forever to attach one photo. I thought of uploading three, apparently I'm losing my patience. Anyways, it was snowing... for real! It feels like Christmas! So.. it's snow, not rain.  It will get warmer starting from the day after tomorrow :) xoxo

 

下雪了

Not a big heavy snow that you can see a white layer all over the places, still... it snows, in Shanghai, light snow!   We checked the weather forecast yesterday and it showed "snow with rain".   So after finishing an article reading, I was walking by myself around the rural area nearby the university to take some photos. On one side, you can see all the skycrappers buildings; on the other side, it's the poor side of Shanghai. A big contradiction indeed.   We are advised not to eat the street food just to avoid getting food poisoned or anything. Yea, I think no one would like fully utilise the travel insurance that we bought. But looking at those "household industry" selling along the streets at 0 degree celcius, it's not the food that tempted me, it's more like a support to them, trying and tasting what they have usually as opposed to the other side of Shanghai where people usually dines in classy restaurant.   You can pay for 35 yuan for 6 dumpings or buns in Din Tai Fung, yet you can also pay for 1 yuan per dumping or per bun at the street stalls. The quality of food is negligible, they are yummy.   Yea, "snow with rain". I tried to make sure it's snow, not rain - just don't want to be fooled by myself. So when the snow gets a little heavier, I'm sure it's snowing, not raining. Double confirmed when I heard someone saying, "下雪了!"

 

Happy Birthday Mommy!

For the past 3 weeks, it feels like months, it's not 度日如年 anymore! I have never been so fully utilising my time ever, or at least in this 2010. Wake up no later than 8.15am - and occupied till the bed time. The cycle goes round and round, and now everyone came to realise that we have not much time left. Oops. Time shoooooooots. Happy Birthday Mommy! This is the first year I'm not home to celebrate your birthday and I can't bake you a birthday cake too :( I missed out dad and the brothers' birthdays since I came to Australia, but at least I could be home on the 13th of Dec each year. Sadly, not this year. Anyway, still... HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOMMY! ❤❤❤❤❤

 

塞翁失马，焉知非福

Hahahahahaha I'm so freaking happy!! Hahahahahahahahaha. I'm surrounded with all the professionals everyday and things are interesting here. Listening to their experiences, it's something really special and amazing! At least for me, it's something that I have never expected, ever. Or, it's like.. a fortune teller would never be able to tell that I'd be here today and doing what I'm doing at the moment. ❤ Joe

 

Be sane

I actually have this thought of doing grad law or JD after I'm done with this while I'm here in Shanghai, tell me am I crazy or what?! No, I must keep telling myself I'm sick of studying. This must be a joke to myself. If this is the case, I should have decided to do the combined degree three years ago or I just didn't have that courage back then. No I'm not gonna do that. Be sane. I think this three-week would be the period that I have the most Chinese tea ever. Tea for every meal and tea for every section of the class. But you know, the plastic cup is sooooo thin, only if it doesn't melt with the hot water pouring into. Talking about plastic. They charge 20 cents for a plastic bag in Carrefour at the check-out counter, and they even have barcode on the plastic bag to be scanned on if you ask for one! Cool? Not at all. What's wrong with plastic!? It's you yourself that need to be educated but not overreacting on this innocent non-biological thing. Plus, plastic nowadays could be biodegraded, people!

 

Greetings from Shanghai

Thanks to the extreme restriction I've over here, I gotta start writing diary, a daily one! And I can re-post it here when I get to access to the Blogger. Hopefully I manage to do that if I'm not too lazy, I hope. But I doubt that in a way, hehehe.  Meanwhile I should also try to bypass the restriction, or get someone to help me to bypass it. I heard from Christine that someone knows how to do it. Yea, I should get him to help me probably. Or if you know, feel free to email me please. Haha :D Oh by the way I'm updating using email. I can do it for every post but... I don't think I want to. I wanna get the posts with pictures and captions instead of just words and craps with whole lots of random photos. I love perfection. Arghh I didn't get the email notification for comment done before I came here. That's stupid, isn't it!! Whatever.. Now I miss Hong Kong, absolutely! It was just plain awesome! Okay, diary time! Buhbyeeee.

 

A sneak peek of the first day in Hong Kong

Me, Liz and Ronald

Thanks Albert for the photos! I received it early in the morning from Liz, so efficient wooops!! :D Ahhhh I woke up for thrice in the midnight, was it the effect of the milk tea from last night's supper? Or I'm simply too excited. Teeheehee. I'm super energetic now.

The journey begins

Wahahahahaha I'm in Hong Kong. It's like... FINALLY!

From this point, the journey begins...

and I meet up with the uni buddies in HK! Ronald and Liz!! Okay I don't have photos with them yet, how come!! I don't know why I'm so excited at the moment but I guess it's normal. LOL. Had a super yummy toast and scramble egg for supper just now at one 茶餐厅 at Jordan, BUT AGAIN no photo! Toast is simply so good, scramble egg is definitely yummy because of the generous amount of butter! 

It is almost 24 hours since I woke up for to get myself prepared for the flight in the morning and I seriously can feel the world is spinning now. 

BUHBYEEEEEE.

Habour Bridge Walk

I think I have taken 5 meals today... so much guilt! A two-hour to and fro Harbour Bridge walk, I hope it makes me feel better, a little bit at least.

The moon and the Opera House

Opera House view from Harbour Bridge. The white dots are stars!!

Circular Quay view from Harbour Bridge

I am still very f u l l . . .

b a k e b a k e b a k e

Puffs, again

Banana Crumb Cake

I miss the banana cake so much so much so much. I don't miss the taste but I just miss the aroma in the house when the cake is still in the oven, I t h i n k . . . So I made it again today because there are people in the house to finish it. Heehehehe :)

Time is ticking f a s t . . .

Finally a grasp of fresh air

After weeks of worm's life crunching on books and books, my brain needs some fresh air. 

Had a walk to Royal Botanical Garden which is so near about 30 minutes walk from where I'm staying but I've never been there although I'm here for 9 months already. Such a shame if I don't pay a visit before I leave for good.

The Art Gallery of NSW

Flowers and flowers, they know me but I don't know them.

I am super duper tired, haven't got a good good rest yet. My eyes are closing. BYE. I've many many things in my mind now I gotta sort them out. Time is running out. Time shoots WAY TOO FAST. Goodnight. I love tiredness I can doze off in minutes which gives me no pain on rolling right and left besides 12345-ing sheeps. CIAO!

I'm fully occupied

until next Wednesday.

Can't wait for the clock to strike 12am every night because it's reasonable for me to leave the desk, yet I'm far behind the schedule that's telling me I'm not eligible to. Tell me how to solve this contradiction.

Too many things in my mind, too many things to do, too many things to arrange, too many things to plan, everything seems to attract and interest me but if priority comes first, none of them tops the list.

It is always the case when I'm not supposed to do all those too-many-things.

L   I   F   E

My ear plugs collection

It's interesting that I actually have a small ear plugs collection :) As small as the collection is made up of three little ones only. Perhaps you think that I'm suffering from severe sound pollution until I'm at this stage of collecting ear plugs. But helloooo I'm still alive without severe sound tortures. Super duper fine.

The orange collection

The first one I got from Grace, she has a lot to fight with her inconsiderate housemate! Lol. I'm very thankful I don't have such problem. (Yes meizhi you don't 对号入座, you must be thinking I need all those orange thingy because you make any noise XD)

The second one I got from Mao, I wonder where he gets that from, he seems to have unlimited supply of that.

The third one SK posted for me, apparently he got it from his office. Hehe.

The ultimate reason to live with ear plugs is because of the location where I'm staying now. Thanks to the merry merry city. Police, ambulance and fire brigade sirens come on and off, few times a day, uncountable times on weekends nights, worst case on Friday and Saturday. While I'm typing, yea I heard the monorail passing by.

I don't know what's wrong with the wind lately, I was actually waken up by the wind 6.45am early in the morning because my door kept shaking. It was sooooo annoying so I went to get the ear plugs and yess.. dozed off again peacefully.

Again, the monorail passes by.

You can hear people screaming nonsense on weekends party nights, the sound of bottles rolling like somebody purposely kicks it, and 3453205809 bottles rolling into the big trash barrels after party somebody is clearing...... 那声音是多么的清脆响亮~

I remember for once I was actually waken up the parades ongoing in the city, it's just right behind where I'm staying. Oh yes it was Anzac Day. All those school bands blablablablabla plus the echo in the city, it was really driving me nuts. By pure listening to the percussion you might think wow they sound so good so solid so cool, they must be really good school bands. Blame the echo.

Hello monorail...

After blabbering and I realise.. omg, is it the sign of getting older? :S

Better not. It's November 2010 already. Goshhhh.

The sign of getting older worsens to the extent that I need to "command plus +" to zoom in the webpage eg. reading Kwong Wah news, some food blogs, and the worst case is I zoom in Facebook page too. :S The thing is, self-comforting goes here by telling myself why was I so dumb that I never thought of the zoom function and I've been suffering with the mini mini fonts for so long, plus I actually bring the laptop much closer to my eyes or lay myself forward closer to the screen.

I need to have an intensive eye check when I'm home, definitely. Or, perhaps laser. Yes!

Where's the 'equalizer'?

Out of nowhere we decided to cook a proper late lunch/early dinner yesterday and each of us is in charged of one dish.

A table for four, it's too much. :D

Our full course dinner :D

The entree is MeiZhi's 黄金屋 ~ corn and tuna fritters and Mao's 龙的传人 ~ chicken with rosemary, wine and potato. *Guess you've started laughing with all those fancy names*

So I made the desserts~

Mao named it "Joe之恋" Hahahaha ok laugh out loud! So Joe之恋 is a set of dessert, made up of chocolate pudding, fruit puffs and mini chocolate puffs. *Continue laughing* I don't even dare to name it on the caption on Facebook.

My desserts :D

Ok I just love the photos here. Hahahah :D

Blueberry, raspberry and kiwi fruit puffs

The mini chocolate puffs~ taste wise normal to the core.

The chocolate pudding :D

After all these fun playing around in the kitchen, I need to lock myself in the uni lab for the whole day again today.

Only if there is an 'equalizer' reached between the passion for researching/ analysing/ interpreting/ understanding/ concentrating/ focusing on food blog and the passion to... deal with the school works.

Rojak feelings

I'm getting excited for everything that's coming up in a month's time.
Like seriously. LIM LI YIN.
But.. no pain no gain,
Get me through the upcoming awful period first.

Super duper brownie @ Passionflower

Super duper heavy crave for chocolaty desserts ongoing now. Lalalalallalalalaaaa~

Next guests up!

Remember the last time we met in April during the graduation, we didn't know would be the next time we meet. You're in Melbourne and I'm in Sydney. You're applying PR and who knows when are you going back to B'worth, even for CNY we never know. 

We should save those sentences for this time. Till then! Xoxoxoxoxoxoooooo..

The uni lab at night.

The fun and interesting that I came across for staying in the postgrad lab till 10pm:

1. Get the phone numbers of whoever left in the lab when you're leaving the lab for awhile, even if you're going down to the library.
2. You'll get locked out and access denied after 8pm or 8.30pm.
3. Make sure you go to the washroom for the very last time before the clock strikes 8pm. 
4. If you need the security to let you get back to the lab, they will come to escort you plus telling you 'we have other jobs to do, we can't come to get you access to the lab every time you get locked out'.
5. Someone can press the lift at level 3 for you so that you can get up again. We people are so helpful. 
6. If the printer has run out of paper, search the compartments above the computers. Someone might have stored some for emergency/ after hours use. 
7. Found a stack of paper on my compartment, first page is a part from an unknown article, and there goes 'this is not rubbish, please keep the materials'.
8. You'll see all those familiar faces in the lab very very often, like everyday. 
9. There's where you make friends too, because everyone is struggling for the same thing. 
10. I believe butt will get bigger and bigger if I sit in the lab for 12 hours everyday.
11. More to discover, the list goes on...

My superb ahma!

Wooops my ahma is 95 already!

ahma  福如东海   寿比南山

Spot the cake. The agar-agar cake! 

My dad actually had that for his birthday too, lah.

I came across many many of this agar-agar cake on food blogs and it finally "appeared in reality". As in.. not from food blogs but something that appears in my circle. ................ something that "actually exists". 

Ishhh. You get what I mean? Whatever.

My bro said wanna get me one for my birthday next year and within a second I replied, "NOOOOOO.. I don't want agar-agar cake!!!" :P

I know it's pretty. It's really pretty.

全家福

 

 

 

Many many out there were not there, including me me me me me me me me me me. ME!!!!

Duh.

❤❤❤❤❤

❤ my dad's birthday 28.09.2010 ❤

Baron is getting more mature,

Bacon has become darker,

My mom is getting younger,

and

My dad is the cutest.  

Only if I could be home.

A weekend with mi bee~

HE HE HE my bee spent her weekend here for the very very very first time this year, finally she got an escape from Canberra! And my job was to stuff her with food food food and shopping shopping shopping. LOL the way I describe sounds so wrong, she wasn't tortured in Cbr anyway.

But you know... everything in Sydney could be so cheap if you compare it to a sorta 'monopolistic' market in a-lil-bit-ulu place. Like Newy!

Coincidenty the Sunday was Malaysian Festival 2010 at Tumbalong Park! A must-go to go even though you know you couldn't expect much from the food there. But that's how you get surprise sometimes. Hehehe.

The Penang Hawker that served not very authentic char koay kak.

While I was lining up for the Penang Hawker this girl went straight to queue at the stall beside to grab her favourite muah chee when she found that out. I could sense her strong craving seriously. Hahaha :D

This was where I got surprised from MFest this year. The PappaRoti mexico bun!

Papparoti~~~~ ♥

Yessss very homey taste of Papparoti! I even asked if there is any branch in city. LOL~ well well, market respond is what they need.

I have been watching quite a lot of 康熙来了lately and that's where I learnt about 大肠包小肠. Rupa-rupanya it's something like this.

大肠包小肠

I think I'd be a real bad food critic if you want me to be one. Because I'm not gao zeh enough. As long as it's edible, I will pass everything.

Tak sabar nak makan.

Gosh.. look at her expression. How satisfied she was!

When are you coming again? I think you should really come more often until.... you know when.

KOKOBLACK from mi bee ♥

The freshly baked cookies is expiring soon. T-O-M-O-R-R-O-W! We gotta finish it fast.

Many many guests in Sydney. Next one up.. who wants to be my guest next?

月圆人也圆

中秋节快乐 cheers!

Next year, next year!! I will eat till gao gao.

No lantern no tanglung and I didn't see moon. This is the downside of staying in city, you see only lights from the building which substitutes and multipliessssss your 八月十五 full moon. But I have a warm celebration with friends, that compensates.

I have not been eating my most beloved homemade mooncake by mom's friend for 3 years. Darn. NEXT YEAR NEXT YEAR I SWEAR I MUST EAT IT AT HOME, AT HOME... AT HOME!!!

到时候人圆也管不了那么多了... 虽然现在也不扁 :)

Sydney, in my dictionary, partly.

This is Sydney

 

where you can find something different

something vivid and magnificent

something that attracts you

which, at least for me myself, I think

 

there is always something randomly extraordinary

that sums up the beauty of Sydney!

My 皇帝脚

I kinda salute with myself for being able to spoil a bedroom slipper to this extent, such a big hole that a finger actually fits well through the hole! Plus, my house is fully carpeted except the kitchen and bathroom.

Salute me!

Hello to my new Paul Frank bedroom slipper!

It's an emergency to stock in another one once I found out that the pink one has 'severely' worn out.

I can't live without bedroom slipper, like seriously! Even back at home, I'm the only one who is with slipper on at anytime. :D

.......... I wanna buy shoes, I wanna buy flats! But nothing attracts me yet because they hurt! Either they hurt me or would definitely hurt my pocket for the super duper comfy one. Aiyoooo...

Swan and Duck

Healthy people healthy life. A morning walk at Centennial Park, yes.. 9.30am is still considered as morning, definitely; unlike back at home, when we say 'morning walk' - it means 6.30am or 7am - who wants to walk under the sun at 9.30am, only if you think you're not tanned enough or you enjoy being burnttttt.

The black thing is damn fierce man. Stand closer to the grey ones if you don't mind being attacked by the black one, it'll make full use of its beak to tok you. Zzzz...

We really really really thought they are SWAN. I mean the black ones.

Aren't the two black ones look like swan with the super long neck and the curve shape? Plus, if two combine they form a love shape, isn't it? That's how we drew the swan when we were little. Plus! We always came across the cystal-like-swan decorations in gift shops in the old times.

But I see only...

Not a word mentioning SWAN. Quack quack quack...

UPDATE: CONFIRMED - IT'S BLACK SWAN!!