** reminiscence **

~Daylight Saving~
Wednesday, March 29, 2006

oooh.. Daylight saving.. My first time experiencing it. Alright, im making it sound like some big deal but still, it sounds so interesting. On Apri 1st 2006(the first sunday of Apri) at 2am, the time will leap forward by 1hr. So in a few minutes time, i'll witness how the clock on my laptop jump from 1:59am to 3am.

Alright, so i have one hour less to sleep. But wait... it also implies that i get to wake up earlier for breakfast. oh man, what has become of me to think of nothin but sleep and eat?! Anyway, it won't affect my sleep much because i have to stay up to complete 2essays due on monday. Still, it means that i have an hour less to complete my assignment.

hmm, i wasn't here when they added one extra hour to the clock during winter. heard it's fun because you seem to have 1extra hour in ur life. heehee. ok, shall wait for the clock to continue ticking and soon, the hour-hand on the clock will start spinning 360degrees in a split second at 1:59am... haha! and afterwhich, Singapore will be just 12hours ahead of Canada!

â§_____that's all folks_____â§~ [[ 10:35 PM ]]

The long-awaited PARCEL

Yayyy!! waited for more than 2 months and it's finally here!!! Came home and saw a BBBBIIIIGGGG box sitting on the table... Jumped onto it when i saw my name!!! As you can see from the contents of the parcel, this parcel is supposedly meant for Chinese New Year (during Spring)! Hey, but ironically, the spring for Canada has just started! So just in time to celebrate SPRING.

So there are lotsa chinese new year goodies for me to share with my housemates and friends, sleeping bag which i don't really need now, "ba gua"(pork jerky), "ang baos"(red packets) and laminated PROGISTICS TIMES. Thanks fellow progisticians... The effort is much appreciated and im glad that the ship has managed to sail its way through the frozen sea despite the winter. Yah, wonder if it can still be eaten but don't worry, i'll force it down my throat even if it's bad! Alright, time to start munching the goodies!!!

â§_____that's all folks_____â§~ [[ 1:49 AM ]]

Exam is coming...
Tuesday, March 28, 2006

First paper on 3rd Apr and followed by a long break of 10days! Engineering professionalism . Quite a dumb subject, learning about ethical and political theories. Alright, maybe im just not into philosophy. Class attendance and participation is 15%. No wonder the canadians talk sooooo much during class. Way too much that they tend to speak more than the lecturer. Perhaps that should be the way. So for joo and myself, 7.5% gone bcos we'd never spoken anything EXCEPT on the 1st day when we rushed to the front of the room to purchase the textbook from the lecturer, which is about $40cad cheaper than usual. Yah, so that's about it. Typical Singaporean's "kiasu-ism" hitting me. (kiasu = afraid to lose out)!

And guess what? 20% of the coming exam goes to an essay question which was given to us to prepare beforehand. So once again, the canadians in class start to speak again," so are we allowed to perpare at home and bring to class?"... i thought that the answer is pretty obvious: OF COURSE NOT!

At the end of the last lesson, we were supposed to evaluate the strength and weakness of the class. "highly interactive" and "over-interactive" are what i've commented. (lame, i know)

â§_____that's all folks_____â§~ [[ 2:59 PM ]]

Last WARRIOR WKEND & reveal of my short hair
Monday, March 27, 2006

Wanna see my ugly short hair right?! haha ok here you go...
Anyway, "Warrior Weekend" was held Last friday and Saturday and Student Life Centre. Not trying to be lame but it really has so much LIFE because of the events that has been going on frm the beginning of the semester. Sara, Joo and i were so excited because based on our previous experience, we get to enjoy games with great prizes and chocolate fondue(past entry on the blog - Feb 2006). So this time round, we attended both days!!!

::What are the FREE food offered::
PIZZA of more than 5varieties, popcorns, Cookies, muffins, pop, milkshake of 3different flavours and cotton candy which has stopped distributing aft 5mins because it emits too much smoke and they didn't want to alert the fire alarm.

::What games do they play and what are the ATTRACTIVE prizes::
1) Rock, Paper, scissors: the top prize is a DVD player, then followed by a toaster. I've never thought that playing this childhood game can be so stressful. Damn, i was lost to a guy who kept 'throwin' rock. What a trick. There goes my DVD player.
2) Jenga: This game is rather slow-moving. the top prize is just a monopoly set and you get to keep the jenga. nehz - not interested!
3) "Price is Right": Have you seen this game show on TV? the organizers really put in a great effort to make it look like the real thing. Basically you are supposed to guess the price of a product and the closest guess (without overshootin) will have a chance to go into the bonus round to win something and entitled to get into the next stage. Since there are 4stages, the final one is the GRAND PRIZE - IPOD NANO!!! Other prizes include refrigerator, oven etc. None of us was lucky enough to be called up to play. sigh...
p.s Oh man, i wonder who did the marketing for this event to get such good sponsors.
4) CAMPUS COVE: This is the arcade located within the school campus. On friday from 9pm-2am, we get unlimited play!!! oh yayy, 2 of my favourites are available - photohunt and "bishi bashi". haha. It's so fun hitting the "start" button without havin to pay. no pressure at all when we are about to lose. Made many attempts to break the high score for photohunt with 4pairs of eyes but failed. arghhh!

::What can we learn to make from the "CRAFT CORNER"::
1)Scrap book - didnt know what to do with the pretty papers and so this is the best i can do.
2)Made stress ball which looks really bad.
3)Learn to make animals with balloons. This is nothin interestin but the key thing is: Joo, sara and i think that the guy teachin is quite cute <-- So that's the whole idea. haha
4)Painting photoframes <-- This is where we spent most of the time. We stayed from 10pm-1am, just to paint the frames since they have so many leftovers. haha!! 4 each for Joo and me.

::What movies are they playin::
So they were playing "Fun with Dick and Jane" and "Memoirs of Geisha" on Fri and Sat respectively. But since we wre more involved in the above activities, we gave both movies a miss... heehee

::others::
They have corners teaching "how to knit", "how to hip-hop" and "how to wear a tie".

Great event and effort put up by the commitee. Apparently, some of the students here don't even know about this event. What a waste! heehee :P

See what Joo did to me?!!?!? She keep saying my face is round.. I wonder how many similar shots we took.

â§_____that's all folks_____â§~ [[ 12:56 PM ]]

St. Patrick's Day
Friday, March 24, 2006

So what's this day all about? the culture here isssss... Dress in Green... real green... have some booze and get drunk... sleep/laze your whole wkend away on the sofa(which is what Tom did). haha, Saint Patrick's Day (17/03/06)greeted me with a call from Village 1 cafeteria, saying that i've won a jar of chocolate coins. A few days ago, joo, sara and i participated in "guess the number of chocolate coins" and apparently, my guess was the closes though it's still 50less than the actual number. A total of 208 pieces. It's quite a good souvenir as it's the print of one-canadian-dollar coin but too bad, the chocolates are all gone now.

Then i was surprised by the crowd at bombers(club in school). A long queue of people waiting to get into the place since morning. Almost everyone dressed in green. haha. There are people who painted their face green, wear green hat.. haha.. (the chinese believe that if guys wear green hat, it means that their girlfriends are doing seeing someone else behind his back). Adam did suggest to 'paint' his goatee (which seems more like beard now) green but no action afterall.

Went to downtown Toronto with Giselle and sister, janice to catch the Saint Patrick's Day parade. It's really chilly standing there to wait for the different 'floats' to drive pass. Decided to get a cup of hot beverage from Timmys and yayy... won a cup of free coffee from Roll up the Rim. alright, as you can see from the pics, this parade is really small scale and so, the designs of the floats are not very impressive. The Irish music played during the parade sounds cool though.

Interesting things that i saw:
1)A topless guy doing pumping in the middle of the road when i'm jumping around in the cold
2) A really tall grey dog. Hasn't seen any bigger one yet
3) A really long limousine..
4) when they say Saint Patrick's day must wear something green, some canadians will dress up really green. With a green hat, a green top, a green bottom, green pair of socks and green lipsticks.

â§_____that's all folks_____â§~ [[ 4:08 PM ]]

"freebies"-saturday

Last Saturday at mississauga, i started off my day with a "free" haircut from Michelle(Giselle's sis). I would say i'm pretty daring because Mich has no hairstyling background at all. i look as if i have a watermelon head in the pic. anyway, I admire my courage and was wondering why i even suggested that time. probably i'm really dying for a new look. Ok, ermm, the haircut, ermm, wasn't tooooo bad, just that i'm not very used to it and not the desired style that i hope for. Nonetheless, we had fun exploring and playing around with my hair. ok, now i have reali short hair, making my face looks even rounder and fatter. :-( booo

THEN we went "Punita's Henna" for threading. haha... basically it's the indian-tranditional way of trimming eye brow wth thread. it's cheaper than i expected. $3cad and neat pair of eyebrows will be done in less than 3mins. So Giselle, Mich and i had our threadings done followed by a free Henna offered by the indian lady who's also an artist. *i took a video of the process and i find punita's neck movement during threading hilarious. but i can't upload the video. sigh!!! ok, she's "attracted" to Giselle and Mich's hands and asked them to be her hand-models. ok, thanks for her 'sensitiveness' by saying my knuckles are big like hers. i agree too though. Blame my dad who taught me how to crack my knuckles when i'm young!!! Since i'm bored when they are exchanging numbers and scheduling a time for photoshoot, i started taking pics of Punita's pet.

Mich works in a cinema. How cool! Her whole family gets to watch movie for free and she can bring a friend along everytime. All you need is a call to inform them that you are going over to watch a particular show. So upon reachin there, we just walked in like a celebrity without any tix while Mich's colleague tell us "theatre 18". haha. FINAL DESTINATION 3!!! oH, and i stayed up tt night to watch The EYE 2 on TV and it's realli bad. So different from The Eye... disappointing...

ok since i have short hair now.. which im still not used to this "boyish" look, i shall appear less on photos now.

â§_____that's all folks_____â§~ [[ 12:58 AM ]]

~poem~
Monday, March 20, 2006

This is an original poem from the 3 sisters whom i spent my last wkend with... All for their daddy on his 50th birthday... check it out...

Giselle: Daddy daddy dearest
You have turned the old 50
It all makes sense now, lately
Why you’ve seemed to be a little shifty

Michelle: So here’s some words
From your first two
The women we now are
The little girls you once knew

Giselle: We could tell you time flies
But who knows that best than yourself
You used to tell us stories of the bear looking for his honey
Now… we discuss…boys and money

Michelle: We remember each night,
You held us both in either arm to keep us from fights
We played with your belly
You shared with us tales of the 1001 Arabian nights

Giselle: I don’t know much else,
But I saw you there taking the back seat at my graduation
It happened all too fast,
The once bold man seemed grief stricken
I had to let you know,
Going to bed in a house away from you is not slumber
I thank God everyday
For that magical toll free number

Michelle: Old man! I can’t even call you that,
You’re my gym buddy and my skiing partner!
There’s so much I take from you every single day…
The strength, the wisdom, the way.
I find you in the most wonderful places in my life,
And even when you’re not there, your words find me.
I still have a lot more to learn,
So keep on going daddy.

Janice: You better keep on going,

I’m sticking around for a bit

I hope you didn’t forget me,
I know I can be a little twit
Words can’t even describe all the things you’ve done for me,
Whether it was cheering me up, or fixing a scrape on my knee

And because it’s your 50th birthday,

I can forgive you for all those times you stole the pickle off my plate,
Without you, with whom would I have my movie date?
Thank you for everything
You’re all our little hearts can hope for
We wish you good luck with the rest
‘Cause when we asked for a father, God delivered the best
Happy Birthday!!!

â§_____that's all folks_____â§~ [[ 11:44 PM ]]

Happy happy 50th bday...
Sunday, March 19, 2006

Last friday, Giselle kindly invited me to her dad's 50th birthday party, or rather i wanted so much for her to bring me along. heehee. Thanks Giselle. Alright, im sure you guys will think that it won't be interesting to attend a 50th bday party BBBUTTTTTT you are wrong! I'm so impressed by the way it is run and the preparation work that the family did!

The 3sisters prepared a lovely bday present (photoframe themed "from little gals to young women - all because of you" and a touching poem) and decorated the basement with balloons and photo collage of the dad's 50 golden years. Oh man, i feel guilty at that point in time. better go home and get my bro and sis to 'WAKE UP' and learn!!! At the end of the day, all they ask for is just their father's appreciation... emotional scene...

Guests start to come in and check out the amount of coats and shoes 'FOR SALE' !!!

The usual practice for their party is: hug around to say hi, chat while enjoying some drinks/wine, banana chips and baked nacho. Afterwhich, it'll be cake-cutting session and the daughters demanded all 50candles to be lighted. Strawberry shortcake.. wooo (*yes mavis, i take strawberries)

Alright, eating time!!! ok, there're lotsa curry. i tried almost everything since there isnt lamb nor beef. haha. didnt have such wonderful home-cooked food for awhile... yummylicious! CHECK out how the food is nicely displayed on the table and the presentation of the salad. so professionally done. Curry chicken, lasagna, salad, curry pork, curry spinach.. ok, basically, lotsa curry with different kind of spices.

ok, the woman behind all these hard work haha! she did all these by herself... her effort indeed paid off as it's obvious that the guests enjoyed the food. oh by the way, we had dinner at 10:30pm.

After dinner, the birthday 'boy' will lead the adults for a game. i thought it was funny initially bcos my dad will neva do this. BUT, they were saying that it is normal to host a few games

during parties. Giselle's dad is rather whacky... haha.. did almost everything that the guest dared-him-to (shan't go to details) and face being dirtied by cake on-purpose by the children. i think my dad will punch me if i ever do this.

There are still dessert served: fruit salad, pudding with jell-o, mango pudding and the birthday cake. wowowow. good food keep streaming in..

By the time the party ended, it's already 1:30am. ok, time for a gd sleep aft eating so much... once again, thanks D'souza-family for such a wonderful experience. heehee

â§_____that's all folks_____â§~ [[ 9:12 PM ]]

Planning for Europe trip

today is the first day of spring... i wonder why they have a day to represent it but nehZ,.. it's still cold and windy. weather-network forecast that there'll be snow in a couple of days time..

Have been planning our trip for 3days last wk, HOPING that we get the best deal... So we decided to start off with booking our air tickets within europe since we heard that budget airlines are cheaper than taking rail. Yayy!!! finally decided and our destination is shown on the map below.

LONDON -> BARCELONA (SPAIN) --> PARIS (FRANCE) --> LONDON --> SINGAPORE

ok, this sounds crazy for 1wk. people travel for months while joo and i are going to do all these in a wk. HECTIC... haha.. but still, we are so looking forward to it. All the air tickets with airport shuttle should be around SIN$300. Good deal? :-)

alright, now we shall concentrate on accommodation and our 3wks of travelling to the EAST COAST of States...

â§_____that's all folks_____â§~ [[ 8:09 PM ]]

uncovering the secret recipe
Friday, March 17, 2006

Someone is so gonna 'KILL' me for exposing his so-called recipe which he actually just photocopied it from a book. So... i shall publicize this 'secret' recipe of PECAN PIE. i shouldnt 'fully-exposed' the secret so i shan't mention the actual amount needed for the baking (*actually it's just me who can't remember the exact quantity). So these are the ingredients needed...

Before we start, preheat the oven at 300 degrees celcius. So...Firstly, we have to do the crust. Mix flour, salt and lard... YES!!! I MEAN LARD.. oh man.. im eating lard like that btu since Adam promised a good pie... shall excuse myself. So we are supposed to mix till lumps are formed and there won't b any sign of flour. Roll it into a ball and flatten with palm. Refrigerate it for 10mins.

Meanwhile, the fillings have to be done. Adam ingeniously combined 2 recipes after some past experience, though there's not much difference to me. Anyway, Mix the melted butter, beaten eggs, sugar and vinegar. Pour a generous amount of corn syrup and stir in pecan nuts. Everything must be mix evenly. Assumption: 10mins has passed when these are done. ASSISTANT CHEF from Canada will then Bring the dough out of the refrigerator & HEAD CHEF from Singapore will flatten it into a thin and even sheet since we don't want to have a thick crust. Lay it nicely on a shallow bowl. The excess will be used to make a mini pecan pie. (continue the trend from previous experience when we baked a mega-sized chocolate chip cookie with the leftovers)

After an hour, the fillings start bubbling up nicely to the brim and everythin starts to turn slightly brown. pPPeerrffeecttTTT!!! Hot from the oven but not ready to be served. Since he said that the pie will taste better aft a few hrs... i shall wait... but hey, this baking session happened a wk ago, so i've tried them. this PECAN PIE is yummy!!!! 90/100...

â§_____that's all folks_____â§~ [[ 1:44 PM ]]

ICE hockey Match
Tuesday, March 14, 2006

ICE HOCKEY --> Canada's nationl sports. Our tix costs only $10cad because it's just a small match between Kitchener Rangers and Sault St. Marie Greyhound. I heard that the popular match will cost up to $50cad. well, it's just for experience...

Sara and i research about ice hockey 1 hr before our departure from Village 1. Hopefully we'll get a crash course and will be able to understand the match better. Since it is a small match, we guessed that the crowd will be pathetic. Took a longggg way to Kitchener Memorial Hall because we hafta collect our tix from illed kristina and her house is really OUT-UF-THE-WAY. did so many transfers when the place is not far.

I wanted to upload all the clips that i took but having so much trouble to do so. sigh, forget it! so use your imagination as i described my experience to you... This is the only one that i manage to upload BUT, it doesn't mean or show anything. heehee.
P1080259.MOV

When we reached there, i'm impressed with the crowd. They had it announced that there were 6067 audience present. Cool...Canadians are so supportive of this sports and even kids were seen cheering for their favourite team. Wonder how many people will be there to watch a simple soccer match by Geylang V.S Tampines (2 areas in Singapore). Anyway, we bought our popcorns and waited for the match to start.

So inspired to learn skating by lookin at how flexible and swift the players are. Apparently, Rangers are obviously better than the Greyhounds but the banging against the plastic wall along the ring, the way the skate skidded when the players need to come to an immediate stop or change direction and the fight... yah, THE FIGHT!!! They are such violent creatures. haha. look at the pic on the left. apparently, 1 from each team started

fighting. Perhaps that particular opposing-player is such a pain-in-the-ass that the whole team seize the opportunity to hit him. They even threw their hockey sticks on the floor. Poor referees. Yah, this is only one of the many times which they fought. ESPECIALLY for the 3rd(last) round when the winner is rather obvious, they spend more time punching and pushing than trying to score. In the midst of the fight, the audio system even played the song "why can't we be friends". Great timing. The referees stepped in to stop them aft leaving them to 'settle their own score' for abt 2mins. indeed an eye-opener for me.

The whole event is made evenmore interesting as they have mascot giving out free jersey, games such as giving out free fries to the section which cheer the loudest, lucky draw winners being announced and screening of clips which show faces of the hockey players who scored. :P we got none of those despite me yelling like mad for the fries. The old-uncle sitting ard us are not supportive.

During interval, they have games on the ring though it's not interesting. They even had kids forming 2teams and playing ice-hockey in the ring for 10mins. They look really amusing because they fell down like nobody's business and as one topple, the next one will b affected. The tiny ones were enjoying themselves until they were asked to leave the place for the real show to start.

A nice game and i don't regret taking the super long journey...

â§_____that's all folks_____â§~ [[ 10:48 AM ]]

The trip (part III of III) - Mr favourite of the 3 -->Quebec City
Monday, March 13, 2006

First destination of the day,

Ice Hotel. I have been waiting for that since the very first day. Every winter, they'll sculpt this amazin structure and it'll last all the way till the end of winter(end of march). You can imagine how low the termperature is, which allows the hotel to remain solid in the open. The tour guide was saying that it costs $1000cad per night to stay. Well, i really can't take the cold because there's no furnace in the hotel at all. I'll consider if they pay me $1000cad per night. The sceneries on our way there has already warned me of the cold. . . Snow-capped houses and trees, snowy grounds and gloomy sky... (click on the pics for better view. it's really nice)

How cool can it get?! they even have a nightclub in the hotel. The signboards, tables, chairs, cups, shelves and in fact everything, are made from ICE!!!. duh... it's "ICE HOTEL"!!! haha. The cup of cocktail look so yummy. Nice presentation of colour combination!

Let's see what else they have in the hotel which i didnt expect to be sculpt from ice --> sofa, toilet signs, stage, huge chandelier hanging from the ceiling and beds...

oH YA.. the beds.. they have different suites. Each room has its own theme and so the designs on the walls, the styles of the beds and the furnitures in the rooms are all sculpt in different patterns.

I saw a map of the ice hotel and the word "SPA" caught my attention. i was expecting a sauna for me to take a break from the cold. Well, better than nothin, we found a jacuzzi tub with water at 140degrees celcius. i placed my numb hands in the tub, without feeling the heat at all?! At the end of the ice-hotel tour, my camera has officially passed out(low-batt). time to depend on others' cameras now...

The gate to OLD QUEBEC CITY (the arch behind us)! I didnt realize i actually enjoy old architecture until i stepped into this city. We were given 2hrs to explore the whole place.
Joo and i wanted to enjoy a cup of hot coffee and some pastries by the window and so we headed to a cafe. Don't we just look like we are shooting some advertisement for the place? Check out some of the architectures which look realli cool.

Even for McDonald's - such a simple fast-food restaurant - has such nice outlook. So different from the usual ones.

Right behind us is Chateau Frontignac (castle - the one with green roof). I regretted not taking its night view which is really beautiful (as seen from postcards). We didnt choose to stay at tt place bcos it's about $40cad/person more. Well, Hilton hotel is good enough. Took some of the things sold in the shop. X'mas deco, collectible items, souvenirs, candys etc.

End of our day by chilling out at the Hilton Hotel, finishing up all the chips, biscuits and milo we brought. Oh, not forgettin to take loads of pictures of... THE TOILET. haha. ok, will soon head back to boring waterloo in 10hrs time...

â§_____that's all folks_____â§~ [[ 4:47 PM ]]