Thursday, June 28, 2007

Work Overtime 2

Sigh. For some unescapable and unforeseen reasons, I'll need to work this saturday again.
My naughty boss said that he'll drop by in the evening just to pick up the results o.O"

I think i'll ask for a laptop so that I can work from home...
(why lah.. whole office only I need to work on saturday...)

Friday, June 22, 2007

Work Overtime

2moro will do OT, something tat is quite rare in my company =P
well, my naughty boss has set some tasks for me, and he wants the outcome by monday morning...

i hinted him tat i cant finish by today...
so he hinted me back tat i should work 2moro...
so no choice... =P

Thursday, June 21, 2007

Work Life Balance

My head is totally blank now, when i get home from work. Thats a prob to me. I need to figure out a way to draw a line between my working and non-working life. Well, now I can say that I'm partially succesful in doing so, but the side effect is that I'm roaming around the house with a blank mind. even when I read the papers, words just dont seem to register into my head.

help...

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

Working Life

Today was my 2nd day at work. Well, my starting is a bit adventurous. Yesterday I reported to 2 places, and today I reported to the 3rd location, and this is where I'll be working for at least the next coming 2 yrs.

Feel really exhausted now. I think my stamina and working capacity have dropped seriously after my 2 months break. Guess i'll need some time to allow my body to adjust to my new life style...

Overall I'm quite happy with my job now. The company is taking good care of us, the colleagues are all very friendly and helpful, and my job seems to be quite interesting and challenging...

But anyway, i'm just too tired to write anything interesting now. Nitez...

Sunday, June 17, 2007

Father's Day

Today is my last day before my working life starts... Spent whole day in Klang + Subang Parade...
Well, spending money always makes me feel happy =P
and today I spent Rm180 for my new pair of Nike...
I just need it, before i can go for any trials at gyms.
And i just got myself a free 7 days pass @ Celebrity Fitness Subang Parade =)
hopefully will be able to go there this coming weekend. I'm allowed to bring guests, so anyone who's interested pls sms me XD
OK. Back to topic. Father's Day. and so 3 aunties (including my mum) decided to buy 3 dads a dinner. And so we went to the new Restaurant Laut Sungai Yu @ Klang. The business is so good, until all the tables were reserved, and they had put their customers on schedule. 5.30pm one round, then 7pm another round. (same thing happened with our seafood dinner on mother's day) and they rejected at least another 10 tables of walk in customers, cause they just dont have enough tables.

Most of the dishes are normal stuff, but they're good =)
Fried Long Bean

Fried Mantis
Lala Fried Meehoon
Fried Oyster
Teo Chew Style Steam Fish

Fried Crab with Belacan and Curry leaves
OK la. That's all for tonight. Gotta go sleep and have a fresh morning for the new chapter of my life =)

Thursday, June 14, 2007

On-boarding

Yay... finally its officially confirmed... I'll start working on 18 June =)

Just cant wait to end my procrastination, which I felt had made my physical fitness far worse than when I was in my final semester. Been sleeping and eating too much, and zero exercising ever since I left Skudai... and i'm gaining weight..

New phase of life is going to unfold...

OGA 2007

Yesterday I have visited one of the most luxuriously decorated exhibition that I've ever seen. Probably that's because most of the time, I only visited some general themed expos such as the Matta Fair and Career Fair...

OGA - Asian Oil, Gas and Petrochemical Engineering Exhibition
13-15 June 2007
Kuala Lumpur Convention Center


I found out bout this expo from the paper, and coincidently Az sms me the same nite asking whether I'm attending this expo, and he said he's gonna buy me lunch =P Well of course with a free lunch awaiting (and I myself wanted very much to visit this expo), and according to az, plenty of freebies awaits... Haha...


I got there around 10.30am. The expo opens from 10am to 6pm on 13-14 June, and from 10am to 5pm on 15 June. But I had to queue up to register myself and redeem a visitor's pass, and the queue was almost half a mile long!!! (according to some Scomi ppl...) It took me one whole hour to line up just to get the entry pass... And I was already half dead when I got hold of it... (I was wearing high heels and office wear)...


And finally...




Aiya... wrong spelling of my name pulak... But I felt really happie to see my company's name =P



So I waited for Az and Usop to get their tags and we entered the expo. The 1st thing that I said to Az was..."see? SLB is always the biggest..." (he's gonna work for SLB)

SLB Booth

Honestly saying, this was the 1st time that I saw booth with 2 levels... maybe I'm too sua ku =P
I wonder how much they paid for this booth; they had a lounge on the 2nd level with couches, and they're giving out free coffees. On the ground level, they have their product and model displays and a counter giving out freebies (bags and pens).

Shell's booth


Very futuristic and classy booth, but probably because it's too spacious (and shell's not giving out freebies), it had less visitors. But it has a lounge and coffee counter too =)

Petronas' Booth

I think the most interesting part about Petronas' booth is their F1 Driving simulator. Anyone can try out on the simulator and the best driver of the day will win a prize =)
and the 2nd most interesting thing would be the complete map of Malaysia indicating all the oil and gas blocks along with their operators. That was really informative, especially for newbies like me...

Technip's booth

They've got a very nice SPAR model on display, and if you go near to it, one of their managers will enthusiastically explain to you how special their SPAR is, and how their global analysts team have made their SPAR stable itself without the need of mooring lines =)
And oh ya, their HR ppl asked me to promote on this - pass your resume to them and they'll give you an optical mouse for free!!

It was indeed a fruitful visit, not only I got to see all these interesting technologies, I also managed to meet up with friends and Gouramians =)

Monday, June 11, 2007

Bali Travel Diary - Day 2

Day 2

Woke up at 8am, changed and packed my small backpack, and went for a walk around the hotel. We spent our 1st 2 nites in Green Garden Hotel, a small yet beautiful hotel located in Tuban area. I was very amazed at its architectural design, how the designer cleverly fitted so many rooms and a lovely swimming pool in such a small piece of land (which i think could fit a lobby for a normal Msia hotel).

View of the hotel from my room balcony

Reception cum restaurant

Looking up to my room from the poolside

Lovely swimming pool

Buffet breakfast - eat all you can =)


After breakfast, me and garfield decided to folo Bao to tour around Denpasar, while the rest of the tourmates decided to walk around Kuta area on foot. and so we went to look around at the small shops around the hotel area while waiting for Bao and our transport to come...

Actually all these shops sell similar products, like clothes, surf pants, wood craft souvenirs...
I got mouth-itchy and asked for the price for surf pants... then it started... the lady keep stopping us from leaving, price for the surf pants dropped from 60k per piece to 100k for 4 pcs. So we "thought" that the deal's not bad, and so we bought them. (and later in the afternoon, we realized that some place is selling at 25k per piece o.O")

Finally when we met up with Bao and her bf (and of course the pajero), we headed straight for lunch around Denpasar area...

the famous Babi Guling - different parts of the pig, cooked in 7 ways
this meal cost around IDR 16750 per pax, inclusive of a fruit juice

After lunch, we moved on to a popular spot for souvenir shopping - Denpasar Art Market.
But unfortunately...


Everything above 2nd floor got burnt till nothing left... and it just happened a few days ago...
But we had fun visiting their local wet market, which is very similar to what we have in Msia...

While we're eating all the big big fishes in the restaurants, this is the only kind of fish that I saw in their wet market...

Almost 30 % of the stalls are selling items that are used in worshipping...


Fresh Flower petals for sale... buy a bag then you can have your own flower bath in hotel =)

Yummy roast chicken...

Some delicious looking local delicacies that we didn't get to try...


Cute aunty... haha...


-to be continued-

Bali Travel Diary - Day 1

I know this is a bit late... but i just got really lazy as i'm 90% done with the chinese version of this travel diary =P
But now with only a few days left before I start working, I just gotta finish up all these unfinish business fast...

Day 1

7am - 9 of us (7 coursemates plus Bao and her bf) gathered at KL Sentral. We then took a bus to LCCT, paid RM 8 for that. Plenty of buses there, apart of the services provided by Airasia, also got other operators such as Aeroline. So no worries if you plan to travel to LCCT by bus.

Almost 8.30am - 5 mins away from LCCT, we suddenly get a call from AZL. "Take ur time, no hurry to come to LCCT, cause.... flight delayed by 2 hrs."
Sienz... 11am delay to 1.10pm.... There goes my well-planned lunch at Bamboo Corner (we still managed to dine there, check out Day 2 dinner)

Spent whole morning berborak-borak and loitering around LCCT. Then when we checked in at the counter, a bigger shock came - one of my tour mate's passport's validity is less than 6 months and he's not allowed to board the plane!!!!

o.O"

I got pretty down at that time, felt really bad about this "good" start of our tour...

And so our dear KF quickly changed his air ticket to the next day's flight, and he rushed right away to the Immigration Dept in Damansara to renew his passport...
(thank God he managed to renew within 2 hrs, mind you the time he left LCCT is almost 12pm ady... that's quite miraculous and he joined us on Day 2)

And finally.... finally... we boarded the plane and took off for paradise...

Postcard that I got from Airasia =P

The flight took approximately 3 hrs. At 4pm, we landed at Denpasar' Ngurah Rai Airport. Then 11 of us picked up our luggages and rushed to the "karma kecil" (toilet)... imagine a bunch of sua ku looking youngsters gathered outside of toilet with tons of luggages... haha..

Then we quickly rushed out (rushed again) to find our tour guide Beni as we have the "sun" to catch. We're supposed to reach Uluwatu before 6pm in order to catch the sunset and have enough time to loiter around the temple. and indeed as Beni has promised us, his blue van is really comfy...

Our nice blue van (with Bao and HY posing in front of it)
1 day rental - IDR 500k
half day rental - IDR 300 k

On our way to Uluwatu, Beni keep reminded and warned us that the monkeys at Uluwatu are no friendly creatures that love to steal things from the visitors, and they really fancy about glasses... And so....

Our macho men have all got themselves a stick to hit monkeys...haha... (scare them actually). and thanks to them, we had a safe journey around Uluwatu...
But of course with plenty of shouting... wei wei monkey behind you... on the tree on the tree...
By the way, the entrance fee to Uluwatu is IDR 3000 per pax...

But the scenary there is really captivating...

We left Uluwatu at about 6.30pm, and we headed to Jimbaran for the famous beach front seafood dinner. Some of my tourmates had complaint that the dinner is too expensive compared to the quality of the meal, well, me and Bao ady knew about that, but we thought that dining on the beach is some experience worth trying and we were prepared to spend that sum... So to me, its pretty cool to eat while watching the waves splashed several meters away from me... And the live band is so cool....


Err... i know its blur... forgive me for not being familiar with the camera and hence produced such lousy photos =P but at least you get an idea of how we were seated... long table and everybody was facing the sea...

Err... i know its blur again =P that's the live band performing...

Beautiful crab... but shared by 5 person due to its high price tag =P


We ordered a total of 1.3 kg of squid... shared among 10 person...

Ikan Bakar...

We spent a grand total of IDR 577,610 for this meal... shared among 10 pax...
kinda expensive ler, somemore the seafood is not really that special... But i still enjoyed the ambience... superb for couple/newly-weds =)

And so after the dinner, Beni sent us back to our hotel and we checked in at about 9pm. Since there's still an hour before the shop closes, we went out to walk around Tuban area right after we dropped our luggage into our rooms...

There are a lot of small shops along the main street, and after walking for about 5 mins, we arrived at the famous Discovery Mall...

Nothing really that special about this mall, except that we found Rotiboy here... what a surprise... Shops inside are very much alike as those shopping malls in Malaysia... and things are of course much more expensive compared to those street-side shops...

.....end of day 1....

Super Luxurious dinner @ Ah Yat Abalone

For the past 8 days, we had 5 visitors from China - our relatives from our kampung...
4 of them are about the age of 50s - and they're my cousins...
1 of them is younger, age 34, and he's my nephew... (i'm old...) haha...

And so my uncle decided to bring them to Ah Yat Abalone Forum Restaurant at Swiss Garden Hotel for some really luxurious food... and he invited our family to go along... yum yum...

It's a set dinner, one of their current promotion... Rm 99++ per pax...
But for some unknown reasons, the dishes that they served to us are very different from the ones listed on this board...

I really looked forward for the meal, particularly after watching "Heart of Greed" (溏心风暴), a TVB drama about a rich family that sells abalone...

The interior of the restaurant...



1st Dish - Double-boiled Shark Fin's Soup with Ginseng and Chicken
(花旗参鸡炖翅)


2nd Dish - BBQ Whole Suckling Pig
(鸿运片皮乳猪)
We only ate the skin, the whole piggy is then taken back to kitchen and later you'll see it again...


3rd Dish - Whole Abalone (4 ppc) with Fish Maw
(四头鲍扣花胶)
First time i'm eating real whole abalone...


4th Dish - Fried Crab Meat and Conpoy with Egg White
(蟹肉瑶柱炒蛋白)


5th Dish - Black Pepper Alaskan Crab
(黑椒阿拉斯加蟹炒冬粉)
Really strong black pepper, the crab is very fresh...


6th Dish - Stir-fried Squids and Sliced Fish with X.O. Sauce
(XO 酱花姿凤片)
This is nice, a bit spicy, and they fried together with celery...


7th Dish - Steamed Tiger Garoupa
(清蒸老虎斑)


8th Dish - Stir Fried Piglet (this piggy is the pig that we ate its skin...)
(椒盐炸乳猪)
This is really nice, especially if you eat it while drinking wine...


9th Dish - Fried Rice with Shrimps, Conpoy and Abalone in Lotus Leaf
(瑶柱鲜虾荷叶饭)
This dumpling is really nice, they put in a bit of jagung in the rice...


10th Dish - Dessert - Milk and Egg White Pudding Double-boiled in Thailand Fragrance Coconut
(香椰炖鲜奶蛋白布丁)
This is really really really nice, imagine the creamy mixture of fresh milk and egg white that is full of the scent of fresh coconut... This dessert is certainly heavenly...


This meal was really enjoyable, and a truly luxurious meal compared to normal hotel buffet dinner which would have cost almost the same. When they served every dish, all of us just kept discussing and guessing on the ingredients and how they cooked it. I really that its a great way to pamper your parents =)

Buffet dinner @ Eastin Hotel

Actually this dinner took place 2 weeks ago, but i was too lazy and only managed to post up the pictures now =P

This dinner was meant to celebrate the birthdays of 3 uncles... one of them is my dad... keke...
and so 4 families gathered at Eastin hotel for a buffet dinner...
the price was supposed to be RM68++ per pax, but they gave a 20% discount to those who are using a Hong Leong bank credit card...

Appetizers - mini sandwiches... with all sorts of topping such as olive, cheese, ham...

Appetizer - Sushi and sashimi...

Main - Curry fish head (this is superb) and abalone...

Stuffed mussles - the mussle "meat" is being taken out and cut into smaller pieces, fried along with crushed cheese and other unknown ingredients... very very cheesy...

Fried spicy seafood platter - this is fun, they put up all sorts of raw seafood on a counter, where you can mix and match yourself, then order the chef to fry it for you with your desired flavour...


4 aunties and 4 uncles from 4 families...

Me, my sis and my bro...

After the dinner, all of us went to uncle Phua's place for birthday cake... and also wine...

Birthday "boys" with the Secret Recipe Moist Choc cake...