1 month overdue...Malacca gathering

Yes, this post was meant to be published like 1 month ago as it marked one the most memorable event in my life (it was delayed due to of some person 'you-know-who' being lazy lah :P); the gathering of my old uni buddies. This plan has been suggested long ago by our gang boss ah gene. Alas, many difficulties had arises back then where we have to deal with our hectic working and life schedule. However, after much compromises from each and everyone of us, we finally came to a conclusion that this much awaited and needed gathering shall be held in Malacca on the July 10th, where everything began, although it will be only a one short day trip.

Make no mistake, this is in no way an easy plan, since we have buddies from far up north (Penang), Central (KL, Selangor) and all the way to far south (Singapore in my case) to meet in the place which happened to be the middle point of both extremes just for a single day trip. Thanks to everyone who made an effort to make yourself available on that day. This trip mostly re-visited all the good stuff in Malacca where we used to study in, namely the food so there will be plenty of photos depicting foods so let's get going.

Since i'm departing from Singapore, i'll focus the story primarily from my point of view. I departed Singapore in the morning at around 7am int he hope to arrive in JB on time around 10am where my friend Ong Bak will pick me up and drive back to Malacca. On the other end, bagene and the penangites had departed somewhere around 5am. We had agreed to meet up in a old familiar place in Malacca, EP around 12pm for lunch.

It turned out that Ong bak, which was accompanied by his girlfriend, didn't feel so well so i had to be the driver instead, pffft. Well, since i had the power on the pedal, i practically flew all the back driving at an average speed of 140km/hr. lol! We reached our meeting place EP, a little ahead of schedule at around 11.45am only to receive a call from our Northern friends saying that they have just arrived in KL to pick up a few other friends on their way before continuing the journey. Wtf? Does that means they will be arriving late? No matter.

We waited until 12.30pm when we finally gave up waiting because we were hungry like nuts and wanted to eat the good ol' chicken rice balls which was well known of being sold out even before lunch time even starts. Not wanting to take the chance, we went ahead to find the shop in the hope that they are still open for business. I guess lady luck is on our side this time, because it was indeed still open although we had to wait like 10mins before we were able to find an empty table and settle down. It was packed as with people as usual.

Soon enough, we all became so full and is ready to go and meet with the late comers :P Surprisingly, we also received a call from them saying that they have just arrived and were waiting for us but of course, little did they know that we abandoned them for the rice ballzzz! And we decided to keep that to ourselves for now. Hey, it's not like we were at fault now, you guys were the one who came late :P

Left: Boss in the center Right: That smart looking guy looks like some sort of gangster member

Left : gh3yliam 'infamous' bicep v2.0 test by curious onlookers Right : I'm always the one who do the stupid posing

Left : Me and boss (the 'gene' duo btw), again trying to act funny Right : Our 'xiao zhi' otherwise known as emo-king


















From left : "Cao cui" king, xiao-zhi, xiao-zhi's gf, gh3yliam, my brother Ernest

















Left: That's my new baby, Galaxy S btw! Right: Tard hiding his face.

















Left: Ong bak seems like he wanted to eat those biceps so badly Right : Guys, get ready for a group shot

















Left: Woi, i kena block la, wtf ! Right: Groupshot 3rd attempt - Now this is much better :D

Also to recap, from the left : mafia member, tard, caocui king, boss (bagene), my brother, me, ongbak, xiao-zhi aka emoking, gh3yliam, sookwee (ongbak's gf).

Without wasting too much time, we went for a second round of lunch, since I almost forgot that the rest did not have their lunch yet due to their late arrival. This time we choose a good old tiny stall by the side of the road where we had very simple maggi goreng noodles, fried bee-hoon and some desserts! Yummie!

Guess what, we were suddenly interrupted when everyone shifted their attention to the arrival of our VIP, the oldest and most original Malacca native yet, Kian Way!! A guy known for his intelligence and kindness when comes to sharing his trusty solutions to our unending assignments during uni time :P. (Actually, we were just copying his work and then added our own flavors to the solutions to prevent cloning detection, pretty smart eh?)

Preeeeseennnnntttttttinggggg Kian Way! (as he march gracefully marches towards us)

After a few hand shakes and pats in the back, we resumed our mission, which was to find the location of our accommodation for the night. Don't worry, our boss had already settled everything in advance, all there's left to do was to locate the place.

Left: Boss holding the key to the location of our stay for the night Right : Hmm, do we have a map here? Or at least a compass? How do we read this thing?

Left : Worry not! Let me find it on google earth with my ultimate 3G mobile internet (only to find out there wasn't any 3G network in the area and the net was slow like shit)
Right : Example of two non-contributing member. Still fooling around. Haih.. :P

Of course, we managed to find the place in the end, and in contrary to my expectation, this place looked rather isolated and worn down at least from outside to be honest. However, i must say that the interior unit was pretty decent! We quickly picked and setup our rooms while one noob even went to bed for a nap right away. So much for a gathering. C'mon we have an entire day ahead of us!

Left : Yeah, now that's the noob i'm talking about.

We rested a bit, played a few rounds of card games with of course some stakes involved to make things more interesting. It was pretty hilarious to see the overconfident xiao-zhi losing his money like no tomorrow when the luck did not side with him :P Steady yea! Me? Well, I lost a little, but hey, afterall it was the fun part that counts right? Ahahahah!

Left : xiao-zhi, simply epic LOL!

After the short break, we were ready to go again. This time we went to Jonker Walk to burn off our calories from our lunch earlier.

Then we went to this little shop very well famous for its cendol and its heavily coated "gula
melaka" topping or Malacca's sweet syrup. As usual, the place is crowded like hell. I ordered myself a durian-cendol and it's frikin' awesome!

Right: Boss - Are you guys ready for some awesomeness?



































Left : I have absolutely no idea what are these old junks doing here. It's part of the decorations :S I guess it added to the mood.




































































































While we were eating, we were greeted by yet another very good friend of ours and this guy is even more legendary compared to our VIP earlier. Introducingggg............... CKKKKK!!!! in bright yellooowww!!

The ever cheerful CK! See those smile? Man, it's just simply not him without those smiles!

We continue walking around the dessert break and had some good talk and laugh and before we knew it, we were starting to get hungry again and will be heading to our next destination for dinner soon, le "Satay Celup!"

to be continued....

Mini Reunion

Went back KL last week, met and had real good fun with some old high school friends, went for movies marathon (which i regretted, because it was so damn tiring even after the first movie) of Karate-Kid and A-Team; A-Team being the much superior one. Then had a late night BKT (Bak Kut Teh) at this one shop near Chow Kit which was just as awesome as it was 5 years ago.

The very next night, went out again to chill out at The Laundry @ The Curve, had some drinks & snacks, chit chat and caught the Argentina vs Nigeria opening match. Don't get me wrong, i am not usually into soccer and stuff, but World Cups had always been exceptional and somehow, i think i have a thing for World Cup :P

After the match, we went to another food court in Kota Damansara yet again, for another round of yum cha. This time in a better environment, unlike The Laundry which was so noisy with music blasting and cheers we literally had to yell to be able to hear each other.

Seriously, (BKT + Drinks + World Cup)xTalking Rubbish = Best combos ever! What more can i ask for? Thanks guys and ladiesss! I definitely am looking forward to this sort of gathering again! =)

Feelings and doubt

Are "feelings" really that short-lived these days? Or was it simply overrated? For a start, it could have confirmed my doubts because i thought i was overreacting initially. Have anything you said or done ever been real before? Or was it all just an act? Why are you doing this? Did the past 1 month means anything to you, at all? There were just too much mysteries surrounding you that i can't help but continue to wonder.

During this past short month, i might have acted a little bit cold at times, acted like i didn't care, might have seemingly ignored things you said that i had, in actual, engraved in my heart. It hurts.. you know, for not being able to return these feelings freely; not because i did not want to, but because i resisted. You could say that i think too much, but seriously, i don't care. If possible, I just wanted to take away all your burdens so that you do not have a single worry for the rest of your life.

Honestly, I was amazed, how could one mere month left a mark like that in me, although it wasn't as deep as i feared it would be, fortunately; but still enough for me to stop and think, to pen my thought which i don't usually do. Everything that i did, i did for a reason; I just wanted to know if you really like me for who i am, and not because of what i do or say. You know, i don't want to be just another guy who happened to pass through in your life.

However, it just get harder to resist the more and the longer i know you. In another word, i can't help but keep liking you more and more. It may sounds stupid to you, but personally i think this is the only way answer certain things that i needed to know, if there was any. Indeed, it did prove something, which i was still hoping that it'll turn out to be wrong one day.

Sure, you are not perfect in many ways. But, so am I. Don't get me wrong, but these flaws are what making you so unique and attractive i find it hard not to like. If you ask me, i'd rather want you to keep them than trying to be somebody you are not. We are human; human make mistakes, there's no stopping to it, but....as long as we are willing to learn from it, it will never be the end of the world.

It was so close, yet so far away. I had a few plans in mind. I was starting to think that you'd make a good partner and i do seriously think that you have everything it takes to be someone who could settle down one day, as opposed to what you might have thought of yourself. I genuinely would like to start that journey with you. Sadly, it didn't happen. Maybe there were simply too much incompatibilities between us.

Or maybe, nothing has even started at all in the first place...

All in all, the best word to describe the experiences that I've had when we were "together" would be.....to put it simply, priceless. Maybe not as much to you as it was to me. For me, it's an another eyes opener after so long and for that, i am eternally grateful for your presence in my life, even though it's only temporary. May you find "the one" soon and live the life that you have always wanted, i knew you would. Remember to always cherish what you have, because when it's gone you'd wish that you could turn back time.

I do really hope that you read this, although it's very unlikely. Because if you do, it only means that another doubt of mine has been disproved.

Regardless, don't work too hard and remember to always take good care of yourself!

*Hugs*

and remember to drink enough water as well =)

Roccat Kave

Roccat Kave, a German products, such a rarity here in Singapore...shame, i spent so much time looking for this monster but to avail. Finally, i got this from Malaysia for about..RM300 i think. To put it simply, you will NEVER get a better 5.1 surround headphone than Kave at this kind of price, heck, or even at a higher price for that matter. Nuff said. No time for a review, but trust me, you can hardly go wrong with this pair of babies monsters, from its build quality to sound quality, i must say it's a technological marvel :)

OBS Day XIII

Here's my next journal entry for my OBS, and this time it's on the Day 13 which was also the first day of my solo camp. So keep in mind that the photos are rather limited for these few days as we were not allowed to carry anything else apart from the necessities which happened to be, insufficient as well. The reason why these photos exist was because of some alien spy who took our picture discreetly and then tried to abduct us at night.

Day 13 - Solo Camp Day 1

Today, morning run was cancelled as not to wear us out for the solo camp later. Great news! Best morning ever. After breakfast, we finalized our packing stuff and moved out to each assigned camp spot.

Stuff that's allowed to be brought to the camp. Yea, it's pretty limited, oh minus the torchlight. Don't know which idiot wrote that :P

The pattern of the camp site choice were such that, everyone were kind of laid out in a continuous line separated probably about 50m away from each other. Yea, it's not that far but at night, you won't feel that way. Worst of all, i was placed at the end of the line which means there wouldn't be anybody after me. Geez..creepy.

Getting excited about going soloooooo!

We were given very limited range survival items and the only source of light during the night time was a piece of candles and few matches (yea, only few, like less than 10 pieces), which i am using now to write this journal. I supposed the candle could last for 2-3 hours of continuous burning but i have to put it out soon since i had already used half of it and i had to save the rest for tomorrow's night! and oh!, torchlight was a prohibited item in case you were wondering why was i being so dumb. I have a long night ahead of me and i don't really know what to do.

I do not have a freaking watch since it's confiscated as well. However, i would guess that it's around 8pm now. Heck, maybe i should just sleep, save the troubles, save the candles. WHOOPS! I've already used more than half of the candle now. Better blow it out! Ciao!

Individual solo tent pic that was taken by the above mentioned alien spy. and if you are wondering where is mine, good news! i'm keeping it until my next entry because it's somewhat..embarassing. LOL! As you can see, some are pretty well done though, damn you people with experience and brain.

Days Left : 8
Mood : Relaxed

Rewind (Continued..)

-19 years ago-

7 years old - Primary 1

Just when i was about to get comfy with my kindergarten life, things got changed again. However, it's for the worse. I had a new school, and it was no longer around the corner of the next street. All my friends which i had worked so hard to gain their trust were gone. I was introduced to something new, something i didn't like; school buses. New uniform, new shoes, new books. I was back to square one. Everything seems so strange to me.

Of course, once again i was accompanied by my mum to the school on my first day. I was shocked to see that the school was so much bigger, even the class itself was 'huge', there were even more people. As usual, i started showing the usual sign, threatening to make a 'scene' if my she were to leave me. I was in the class, there were so much chatter, and yet, i was focused only on one thing; my mum outside overlooking through the windows, smiling as usual and waving at me, hinting that i was going to be alright.

I wasn't. And for that moment, i thought i was the only person in the entire class who cried like there were no tomorrow. Everybody stared at me, and it didn't helped. My mum came in, and consoled me, i insisted that she stayed. She said that i would make new friends and that she couldn't be there for me the entire days. It took a little convincing before i finally sort of settled down, yet still on the verge of bursting into tears if i were upset, like a ticking timebomb.

Eventually, she left. First lesson this time was coloring lesson. I confidently whipped out my shining new Staedtler Luna 12 color pencils. There was a coloring book, and i kind of painted everything in brown, the chairs, cupboard, the skies, cloud, and even the people. I didn't quite understand why but i thought i was having some sort of mental breakdown. My teacher walked past through me, surprised and told me that it could more colorful than that, and that i should try to seek for help from my friends.

I turned to my side, there was this another kid who was painting effortlessly with his brand new Luna color pencils as well, only that it was a 36 color set! Wow, i thought! That's a lot of colors, i looked again at my own Luna 12, feeling slightly inferior now, not so confident anymore. I could already felt that the time bomb is ticking quicker. I was green with envy. I asked if i could use some of his color pencils (which i didn't have) to help with my coloring. Guess what? He refused! That's it! I exploded, almost literally. What an arrogant piece of $@#()$*!)@$*.

Win










Lose




It was pretty chaotic for a while, with my classroom teacher trying to calm me down. My mum wasn't there anymore. I was pretty sure that arrogant brat felt really guilty after what he did to me, and decided to lend me a hand in the end. At the end of the day, we became friends :)

Rewind

All of a sudden, my mind drifted back to my good old childhood days. While i tried to recall as many of those fond (and some not so fond) memories as possible, without realizing it, i found that I'm smiling to myself as those thought filled my mind thinking how sweet yet silly it really was back then.

-20 years ago-

6 years old - Kindergarten


Oh no, today is the day i have to leave and be away from home for the very first time for school. I do not like this at all, not even one bit! How far was my school then, one would ask? Well, it is just at one of those houses in the next street around the corner. Yes, it's just some 10mins walk away, maybe 5. My mum even promised to send me to the school that morning and would be back on time to pick me up at noon, not one minute late! Still, i am not convinced, my body and my feet felt heavy as i dragged myself onto the back of the bicycle, ready to be "chauffeured" to the school by my mum. Even the brand spanking new uniform feels like everything else except comfortable.

Will i be able to make new friends?

Will i see ever my mum again?

Can i ever go home again?

What if....?

All these thought flooded my already stressed out little brain. I started to sob as i entered through the gate, refused to let go of my mum. She reassured me, but it only made the situation worse. I started to cry, wanting to be pampered and told that everything is gonna be alright. After a few pushes, i finally gave in.

I saw many other cheerful kids who were around my age at that time. Everybody seems to have their own circle of friends, except me. I felt really left out since i was kind of shy and do not usually approach other kids to make friends. I remember very vividly that my very first "lesson" was clay shaping, also more fondly known as the plasticine class. That's when i would loosened up a little bit and became less paranoid because it was a so fun i wish every period would be the same. Of course, it wasn't.

I finally made some friends towards the end of first day and to my surprise, i found that the boys and the girls had their respective groups and does not really get along with each other. This was when the infamous "hmph, i don wan fren you" threat was first encountered. I often find myself getting distracted and depressed after getting those remarks and soon i found myself working really hard to gain recognition and acceptance from the others. I was worried that nobody wanted to befriend me, and that i would end up being left alone. Everything seems.... so fragile. There were even once that i went and literally beg them not "outcast" me and yes, i cried when they refused to listen to my plead. It went on for a few days when they finally "accepted" me into their group. Yes, it might sounds trivial now, but trust me, it wasn't the case for me, or any other kids of my age for that matter. It was that bad :(

Of course, eventually i grew adapted to the new environment and since then, there have been so many events (most of which i couldn't remember) took place. The sport day, ABC classes, the mandarin classes with homeworks involving unending repetition of chinese characters writing, math,recess time (where i brought sandwiches made by my mum in a little squarish tupperwares, it was pretty decent), occasionally envious of other who got better homemade breakfast.

While i've enjoyed the better most of my kindergarten days, i must say that the thing that I had always look forward to the most everyday was for my mum to show up, smiling at the gate to fetch me home. I would always charge at her energetically like a mad bull whenever i see her. Best of all, she had never failed to show up on time! Early, sometimes. Late, never once.


to be continued...