2nd year's thought

Honestly, have you ever thought that you had chosen the wrong course? Are you envious ? " I wish to be like him/her because he/her did the right choice of studying what they like?"... hmm.. what about if I could make a decision again?

....Random thoughts.

In primary school,
Chinese primary school is nightmare for every student I guess. Its stressful for a kid, who should be growing up in their lovely wonderland, but... just for that UPSR, we had the longest class time. The longest class hours I ever had in life, especially 全日制 some sort of whole day system. We had to study from morning 7.45am till 5 or 6 pm, 4 days a week.... Wtf is that.
Worst still is the cruelty, children now are so lucky because they wont have it now. We got punished not because we are naughty, but we were not perfect in our practices.
Practice makes perfect, but canning makes practice perfect! That is those sort of character we were shaped, and those characters we carried with us...Well I brought it to secondary school; to university now. I am still a perfectionist, those who don't favour to accept people's idea.. I believe that if I work hard enough, I could accomplish without needing to rely on others. Academic wise this is like the "ISO certified mind", I never fail to express this strong stubborn character. Not too bad, this had brought me so far, so good.

I can clearly remember the tone sounded from Cikgu Koh (our malay teacher in primary 6B): "Siapa salah?!"
Guess what, a number of student would stood up, and she went around the desks, delivering a powerful whip of rattan strike, hopefully the pain and fear will make sure for life you wont do the same mistake again. This was the story: while we were doing past UPSR year papers, she would discuss the questions and answers 1 by 1. We were marking our friends paper. So whoever who did a mistake in a similar question that were taught before, we got punished. Phew, I remembered there was this time, I was too tired to study my spelling and fell asleep on my bed, and I got only 3 out of 10. Then 7 hard strokes came on my left palm. I had a blue black, numb and swollen palm for 2 weeks. I didnt dare to tell my mum or dad about it. I kept my palm hidden or in my pocket all the time.....


In secondary school,
Self motivation was needed. During form 5, really thought SPM would be everything.
Its like after achieve good results, I can get scholarship or get good good future plans, which I would have to worry after that whether I get distinction or not. Exams wouldnt be scary and stressful after that. I just need to pass everything and thats all.

Together with my good gang of friends, we mug and compete to nerd even more... (seriously, SPM was the only time that I studied the hardest). It turn out not bad, and so what? It didnt really seperate and grade us well enough to get us what we wanted. Disappointed and ok I was wrong.


In A levels,
"Ok, this is really the final final 1. Study hard to get into university and course you wanted, and that's it! Time to relax and pass the exams. Life after would be so much easier because I would be doing what I am interested in isn't it? Dont have to force my mind to memorise every single word in the Sejarah text book, no idiotic moral subject or EST... Its just like you are free to do what you like, listen to subjects that even you dont go lectures you would read up urself in wiki."

Well, study study study for A levels, trust my thoughts for 1 last time .....and poof!!

Present...
"OMG... Why am I studying this? Its just feels like SPM where we were forced to study this subject because it is part of the course, part of what we had to go through to get to higher education." I choose this ! wth ?? Did I really choose this?



Main topic of the day, how do you define your university education?

The formal kind of university defination... (when I say formal, I mean this was the kind of thought of parents, people around me, even I myself had this mentality up till A levels and the time I choose my course) :

-University is the time you choose your career.
-Choose WISELY, think twice because its gonna be your lifetime dealing with this (whatever you specialise in university)
-Its final and completion of your sweat and stressful education journey. Without university degree, you surely wouldnt worth a single bit in working society.


I believed that most of us "regretted that choice" in university. You might think of what would that course be like... (visualising yourself sitting in the theatres, looking at the slides randomly generated from your cerebral cortices...) Then when you get in, you get some greatest shocks of life to find that its totally different from expected, even more as you progress through the years.

Definately, these were my past experience. Refused to convince myself that I did a wrong choice, I came up with my version of philosphy, a thousand reasons why I am lucky that I ended up here. despite the f**cki*g truth that I went to a shit gay college with gay course

I realised that , you dont and most of the people dont, have to go for a lifetime career which revolves around what your degree. Its always easier said than to have this concept implanted into your mind. Say for example, you study medicine or engineering. I wouldn't want to spend rest of my life till age 50-60 by going to the engineering firm/clinic every weekday morning and come home in the evening.

The fact is, in our famous amous Engineering college here, most students actually intend to go into investment banking after graduation. Degree is just their platform or passport to go to banking. Ironically, when there is a career fair, we (as bioengineers) would be rejected by 100 of engineering firms, and always welcomed by banks and investment companies and even law firms.

Now, me defination for university has completely changed. It is my higher education, a must in my life. I dont or never relate my degree with my work or worst still incomes. What ever I learn will be my knowledge. Its essential for me to pick up knowledge in various disciplines. Thats why I never complain to study some boring modules. University is a maturation state of education life. This is where passion, enthusiasm and thirst for knowledge can be seeked. Nobody forces you to study in university, nobody stops you from being successful in life for not going to university. However, wouldnt you think that its a waste in life not to go for a higher challenge than giving excuses of why you cant achieve better?

So how about change of course?? Nah! I still reckon ts made a bold decision of changing from pharmacy to business and economics. He sacrificed time and money to study what he is interested in. I would like to do biology if I had to choose again. We shouldn't care what people say right? What course is shitty, no jobs, no good future.... all nonsense!! I do what I do and I follow my passion.

ts: " Which 1 should I choose? Australian based or UK based?"
me:"Which 1 harder? Go for that one!!"
ts:"That is always u"

CNY is round the corner. From a person who cant celebrate cny, I wish everyone a happy, prosperous and productive bull year ahead!!

Edinburgh and Stockholm trip

Just 3 days after my resolution post, I am off for the 1st adventure of the year. Wow, did I plan to write my resolution so that I can achieve it right away ?? hahaha...

This time is a 5 days trip to Edinburgh of Scotland and Stockholm the capital of Sweden.
Its a budget one, backpack, and organised by ourself just by checking on the internet.
Flight from London to Glasgow (5pounds), Glasgow bus to Edinburgh, Edinburgh back to Glasgow, Glasgow flight to Stockholm (10pounds), Stockholm back to London (10 pounds).

Edinburgh is a very pretty town, with very nice feeling. It feels like its tranquil, quiet, less busy and the town just give a very harry potter like feel, castles, old english buildings etc..... I like Edinburgh alot better than other city I been to so far. It is also relatively cheaper. I prefer to stay there than London. Just that some Scottish people are abit lansi, so are the london ppl here.

I think this will be my post with most pictures.







First, was the day I arrived in London Stanstead Airport, with snow n frost on the ground, never seen that happened in London before, so took picture of it. ( Since when london became so cold?)

2 hours later, we landed at the Glasgow airport. Below is the train station from Glasgow airport to its city centre. For geographical facts... Glasgow is the largest city of Scotland, while Edinburgh is the capital of Scotland. Scotland itself is a country and part of the UK.

Here is the picture of the central train station in Glasgow.

The city centre view of Glasgow. Guess what, the buildings shown below are actually the Borders bookshop. Nice architechture and design from the outside. Actually in these places ie(Edinburgh and Stockholm), even Mc Donalds can look like this in the outside, but you go inside... za dao... its mc donald.. haha

Mac Donalds??? I wonder y they dont have a better name, it sell furnitures here.......

This is the city of Edinburgh.

The 2nd day of trip, we visited around Edinburgh. It was misty and cold, well it snowed the day before when we reached. Winter is not too great for trips.... Daylight too limited, wake up 9am, walk half day 4 pm dark. Its even worst in Sweden where they have 6 hours of daylight only. Then, when you walk out the whole day in winter, the wind will make ur face red like sunburn, but its more like "frost burn", dry and peeling off skin. The lips are just the most painful 1, as i thought my lips are already immune to cold, well still bleed here... And I had to buy a lipbalm from pharmacy here. Drink water also pain..... no choice la trip wo. Enjoy only....

We tried to visit the Edinburgh castle, but ... we found out there is a cheaper offer when we buy the tour ticket which gives more entries to few more sites + bus rides.

So we went to the tourist information centre. The best place to be if u r lost.

Bought tickets and hop on to a double decker tour bus. Sat on the upper deck, and enjoy the view and wind. STupid wind...

The first stop was the Royal Botanical Garden. Claims that they have the most collection of China's plant outside china.

I have a feeling that we were wasting time here. It just look like another park in London.

Then they claimed to have the largest hothouse, n we paid 3 pounds for it. WEll it is quite large for the glass house, but, why the heck we pay 3 pounds just to see some random ponds like the one beside the road in Malaysia ??

Does this kinda place look familiar ?? Beside mrr2 road also got la.... Zzzz

Lol, banana trees, bushes, and the glasshouse is so warm.... from outside 0 degree come in 30 degree.... Zzzzzz...

The next stop is the Royal Britannia Yatch. The 1 that the queen and the royal family of Great Britain travel with it. To me, it is not that interesting, but we still wasted time with this yatch. So below are some pictures I took... (if you do find it attractive)

The captain's dinning place.
the queens's room.
The place where crew sleep in.

Then, its near dark already and its only 3.30pm.... most of the tourist sites are going to close. But we still manage to visit the Palace of Holyroodhouse. I dont know what is it, but no pictures are allowed inside. It must be some sort of place where the old time King and Queen stayed in it.

Above is the picture of the palace.

the Scottish Parliment. The building won the best architecture award.

We were surprised that they let us in to listen to the parliment, real 1 le..... they were discussing about some education act. The next day the act was approved n it was in the papers.

One of the restaurant/cafe here. It was one of the earlier place where JK Rowling wrote her novels in. Not quite sure if its Harry Potter. It was fullhouse, so we cant get in to eat...

That night we went for a very special tour. The Edinburgh underground ghost tour. It was not scary, but I enjoyed it. The person who was guiding was interesting. He wore those long robes and a hoody and he is good in telling stories and make those atmosphere. The scary thing is, we actually went to the graveyard and he told us some stories there.

The 3rd day was a fine sunny day, good that we visited Edinburgh Castle at that time. One of the best place I visited in this whole trip, the only place in my mind that I visited. Well, I want to visit lochs and other castles in Scotland, but my friend say its stupid to go there see lakes.... I m totally speechless.....

Alot of nice views around the castles. There were exhibition inside the castle, once again I find them fake and not interesting. Most of it are like models in museum.

This is the prison in the castle. Well all fake models.... doesnt much fascinate me.
However, I do like the castle design and architechture. Its really awesome.



Ok, time to leave Edinburgh after that.

This is the outside look of the backpacker's hostel we stayed in. The 1 wif green door and sign. Cool place right?

Sweden!! The place I say has the friendliest ppl in the world. Almost all of them speak fluent english. When we were there, at bus stops or station, people would come and approach us, say hi, and ask if we need help or directions. Besides, those people who gave directions will slowly entertain us while making sure that we would get to the place clearly. So we came out with 1 theory, the place with less chinese, is the place that we would be treated well. Imagine Malaysia.. hahaha. would that ever happen?

Stockholm is even more expensive than London. Their currency is Swedish Kronos. RM1=2.3 krono. Well, 1 burger king meal cost u 40-60 kronos...Most their residence are older generation. Retired ones I have to say. The city itself consists of many islands. Just like a city on water, very beautiful, (but I didnt get to see much.. eh why?)

The swedish lift. Not a blackjack table! When u hit, the card doenst come to u, but the lift will. The dorr will open the door for u. If you dont press the dorr, the lift door wouldnt open, no matter how hard u pull.

The map...

Below is the hostel we stayed in. By the way Stockholm were covered with snow and ice. We were lucky because right before the night we landed, there was a few days of snowstorm, where the temperature dropped to minus 19 degrees. The locals said: " why did you come to Stockholm during winter??" But still the time we were there was the warmest they said. Temperature was well above 0.

The 4th day, we visited the cultural museum in Sweden. The building is nice from the outside. But inside is crap. Luckily under 18 admissions are free. Well ... I am under 18 of course hahaha!

Inside they show u design of sweden... arent those Ikea chairs ???
The view from the 4th floor, the main architechture of the museum is wonderful, the exhibition is really crap... and waste of time.

Then, we paid 7 pounds to visit the cultural village, mostly dead in winter. wtf .... waste of money and time. These are what inside it.

The old cash machine..
Dead rose gardens

They even have a small zoo... only see tis guy there eating dry sticks.....

These are some of the land views in the so called village.


Some goose walking on the road.
A view of Stockholm from top the hill.
And a small tobacco museum inside which planted 3 tobacco plant. Wow, never seen tobacco plant before.... here it is ...........

I rather walked on the river bank like this and enjoy the Stockholm pretty water scenary. Iced waters with boats.

But I didnt get to, because my friend wanted to visit the vasa museum. The museum is about a sunken swedish ship. See below how it looks like. The crappiest museum I been into so far. Display 1 wreck ship that we cant even get on to it... n lots of pictures models and videos. Boring hell.. And guess what, they wanted to stay inside for 2.5 hours. I got dulan finally, forced my friend to give me his phone for time and tell them I am going off for my own walk.

Ahhhh the best walk I had in life myself. But only limited time of daylight and one hour as that was 4pm that time. One of the best sunset I had too. Walking along the water of Stockholm is just great. I wished I could have half a day myself to walk aroud Stockholm myself!!

Thats what happen in poor planned trip. I couldnt do so because all the schedules are tight, bus and train times. Then we cant communicate without phones + we didnt know how to meet up when we are lost.

This is the ship in museum. Below are my walk walk photos. Compare urself n tell me which u will prefer.

Some of the ice still float and melting. You can see these birdies stood on it.
Evening on the slippery icy walkway. Its muddy and snowy as well.


There wasnt much people passing by, I sat on the bench and enjoy my time and view.
Then have to camwhore myself, to keep memory that I existed in that place that moment before ..haha.
Ah, as night falls the city glowed in lights.

I think there were much more awesomes sites crossing the river to that side of the island. I didnt have time to cross over there.
Regreted that I had not enought time. 1 hour pass and I had to meet my "friends" back at the museum... arghh...

Their police spelt as polis .. dunno whether they are fat n needs to drink coffee too.

The 5th and final day, not much of time. Woke up late at 10.... everyone too tired for so many days of walking.

These pictures below I manage to catch for the very last hour I will be in Sweden, while running on the streets.

The last place we visited was the city hall. This is where the Nobel Banquet is held every year. Winter it seems empty and closed.

Conclusion 3 weeks holiday visited 3 countries... Not so bad la. Start of term at last, 2nd and final academic term for this year. Have to start working on it.

2009

Every blogger posted their summary for 2008 and new resolutions, so will I......

Looking back, I didnt have much post this last year, sometimes not even once a month. So, here I shall add some bits and that of what happened in a year. Perhaps, I can find my memories here, years later.


2008 is the year spend completely abroad, and just some holidays home. Its been a hard time for me for the big 1st half of the year. Nobody understand my harsh times, but yea.... I think it will be the last time I dropped my tears ....its all over now.

It begins with a countdown at Westminister, the bank of the London Thames river. There were few millions (this estimate is real cause it came out from reports) of people all gathered at that small area that night for new year countdown. The packed feeling, the worst I experience so far. I couldnt move, couldnt see, and it was drizzling. Thirsty, wet, soaky, and stuffy. London's population is definately much more crazy than KL. After that, we walked home and reach at about 5 am, imagine stucked there for 4 hours because of massive amount of people. I shall never go to such celebration again. Its nightmare....
" I'm not going, but you can go there and experience it once I guess. Once is enough....haha" said my cousin brother (2nd year UCL) at that time. Well, for shits... of course!!!!


Then, I had the 1st chinese new year celebration abroad, with friends. We make a super steamboat with all finest ingredients we can find, all the mushrooms, prawns, fish, mussels... roast duck, meat.. cost for the whole dinner goes up to 600 pounds for 20 over people, crazy. Then came the potong stim part. Because I remember it was a weekday (cny eve), our noise annoyed the neighbours. Those british people doesnt know what sort of crazy random party we r having and they complaint. And so, the securities of the hall asked us to stop the party immediately. !@#%%## I who always get annoyed by the British's random party became super dulan after that.

Another memorable thing I did in Imperial college is the participation in Malaysian Night. Its like a yearly culture event for Malaysians in UK. 2 nights of performance which budgeted up to 10000 pounds production. I was part of the dancers and dikir barat ( small role only). About 500 audiences showed up in 1 night, thats alot. Performing on stage is really a different feeling. I remembered we practiced like crazy for all the weekends and wednesdays. It took up about quarter of my free time in 1st year.

Time flies, and 2 term of studying in 1st year was over. Which means all the lectures of the 1st year is over... and all left? Revisions and exams and 1st year's done, so fast!! Now I knew studying time in uk is actually that little, only 20 weeks of lectures per academic year. Its about 19th of March when term ends, Easter holidays after that. I had a smashing birthday party this year, sadly 1st time experiencing that. Got eggs smashed on my head and cakes. For the previous years.... I had it normally....

During that time, before the change of winter to spring, London was extremely cold for 2 days. It snowed. So excited for the 1st snow seen in my life, so I just walked outside alone with an umbrella, others didnt care much. Lol. After that, I went back Malaysia for Easter holiday. Didnt study at all back home, just remember lots of mamaking, pooling and some shopping. The only special thing I did was caving in Gua Tempurung. Joanna and Ai Woon had to drive however...skillful. It was quite fun, just muddy and sandy. After that went to Ipoh for nice food, the chicken hor fun and ipoh white coffee. Really nice, missing these flavours now.

Then 2 months of exams period in London again. And I had my 1st guitar performance in the small concerts. It was during the very last of the exams period, so didnt practice well...Went clubbing for the 1st time after exams in London. Went to a place called Bournemouth too. The trip was quite costly, about 200 pounds for 3 days 2 nights. Not a high rated trip...

3 months of summer holidays in Malaysia. Expected alot of fun and things will change. Well things changed, but didnt have fun. Surprisingly, didnt go anywhere, except to go Gua tempurung again the 3rd day I arrived here, then Singapore. Went lots and lots of mamaking sessions. Work for the 1st time in life also, for near 1 month. Found that work is utterly boring and unchallenging. Maybe because I work as a computer servicer, my work is just going around checking computers. Die die also wont take work like this next time, although its easy. Ahh, I remembered the day trip to Melacca. Nice food, but hot hot day. Singapore, might be different; but to me, its just another KL. More organised in the transports, thats all. I prefer KL.
1 more comment bout Singapore, you may find teenagers are mostly girls. woo! Because all males kena NS ..hahahahaha.


Came back to London reluctantly because bunch of friends in Malaysia rocks! Everyday do basic chores, tutorials sometimes and cook. Hate life this way especially with all those shit happening that we need to solve. But in this way time past even faster than I think and 3 months got over again, which brought 2008 to an end. My year ended with the trip of the year... maybe best trip I had so far. A ski trip to France! All white snow for christmas, but not too enjoyable, very special.
Finally, guess what I did for new year's eve ? Sit down in a room, DotA... =.='''' , nobody got any special plans. Since I came here, my years count by the academic year I spend in UK, so the new year didnt really mean much to me already.

Resolutions??

1 simple one. Explore the world in 2009 and do more things in life!! No more regrets. And I must utilise my time more especially during summer.

La Plagne 2008 ski trip

Oh to answer my previous post, I think snowboarding in the snow mountains is seriously extreme, interesting, thrilling, and fun. But, I don't really like it. (awww.....) Well, its challenging and I shall want to do it again, enjoying is a different issue. To be able to enjoy one must snowboard really well!! If not, when u try to appreciate the beauty of the snowy mountains, u will find urself crazily falling down the slopes and hurt ur ass real bad... and just before u fall into the cliffs, u see ur leg and snowboard halfway off the cliff and u came to a complete stop... that is the time u say: "Thank God, imagine what would I be if i really fall down into it!!"
By the way, someone did fall into the cliffs, 3-4m before he landed.


Its a yearly ski trip event organised by Imperial College Malaysian Society, this year, we headed to La Plagne, 1800m, France. Its on the mountainous regions of French alps, and it took us 22hours of bus ride from London and crossing the English channel with the ferry. 6 full days of pure ski and snowboarding. Meal, lessons and transport all included, 500 pounds. Equipments spend 100 pounds. Extra spending in France 100 euros. Total: 700 pounds. Just about the price to go back Malaysia. o.O

Anyway, the place is gorgeos. Its snowy, alpines, mountains, and good snow on 25th the xmas day. Pictures describe best.

A random French view of farmland at a stop beside the highway

Icicles off the roof. Cool! There are actually some people who throw ice cubes to it and make them fall,then pick those sharp long ones for fun.

A view at a higher village centre, La Plagne Centre near 2000m. Ski lift can take you there less than 10mins.

View outside my room's window.

Outside the ski resort

See the ski trails on the slopes?? I think this is one of the easy slopes.

Snowboarding is all about how though ur wrist, ass, back, and knees are. Everybody fall like crazy while sliding down the slopes. And yea, we being so enthusiastic and daring, we hit slopes like this (see bottom) even after the 1st lessons which thought us how to balance and lead our foot to slide.

This slopes is called Collorado if I m not mistaken. There are four stages of slopes:
Green,Blue,Red,Black (in ascending order)
This is a blue slope.Normal and wide so that less likely u will fall into the edges. Red is full of rocks and ices, black is deadly hahaha. Green are for noobs, not steep and perfect for beginners! Actually blue are quite scary for beginners, cant u see ? The worst is when u fall down, someone came high speed n hit onto u down the slope. Ouch!!

This is a place near top of the whole mountainous region I think. U see flat white ground? Not too good coz if u dont gain high velocity, u can't have enough kinetic energy slide through here and u have to take off everything and walk... irritating, but less painful! o.O



These are some kinda slopes that is steep that when u fall, u will keep on sliding. Sometimes u reach the edges... then ooooh no !! Because I didnt dare to carry my camera with me, these pics are taken by other pro skiiers. Bringing camera means confirm gone smashing down. There are some slopes that are full of alpines at the sides, I keep on plunging into pile of snows or bushes. They absorb all the impacts and they are least painful. On the 5th day, I got the mother of all falls, a huge impact on my back straight down on the ground. It took me 10 sec before i can bear the pain and move, then I gone less crazy after that. And now my tail bone of the spine still hurts... ouch!

This is the kinda alpine trailsWe took off the board and walk because its flat, we were not fast enough to slide through this long flat path.Hee he he, snowy sides, those that I and him like to smash into, then leave behind ur shape on the snow.


A view from the gondola which takes you from 1 place to another. It will be the best form of transport in the mountains. Simple embark and disembark while carrying your equipments. Another 1 is ski lift,most ppl hates it. You sit on top, upon reaching, you need to slide down with 1 foot on the board, and most of the times, we just fall down all the way. There is 1 guy(wai kit if u happen to know him, poor thing) fell down and dislocated his shoulder from this, guess how scary it is huh..


This is a picture taken on the ski lift by pros.

We had a scrumptious xmas dinner prepared by the resort. Full of prawns and crayfish, and seafoods. Surprisingly I m the most prawn eaters here. Nobody finished them. Where is aiwoon and ts ??hahaha.

There was this day when some one ask us to try out bobs sleigh. Some cart, u sit inside and slide fast down the ice track of the mountain. This is how it looks like. It just feels like some random genting roller coaster ride to me. But ya, its 31 euros........
Then there was 1 night we had dinner outside some restaurants. We ordered meat fondue, thinking there will be cheese fondue. End up, 4 cheesy dips and some beef oil fondue and salads, wtf?? 25.50 euros gone.

This is actually all meat we had....

Then we went for dessert, I ordered cafe liguer, coffee ice-cream.... looks like starbucks only... 6euros.

The last day we found a small market up the mountain, walk walk, then I bought some candies, some candies are really very special, so I bought to try.

This huge ass strawberry candy, its actaully a compressed meringue.

Then we try out some local specialities! French toast. Real one this time, not from wong kok.hahaha! And of course some baguettes and paninis. The french toast here is full cheese toppings and meaty fillings, yum yum! Smells real good and perfect blend of few types of cheese.

One is definately the orange leicester cheese. The cookies here are awesome too.

And so, 6 days ended, tiring....A very different and special trip for me. Physically demanding after 1 term of boring brainworks. Last day, photo sessions :

Wooo!! Gals.. S.a.d guys, want me to intro? and their boyfriends too ??? LOLss

Finally lets introduce the top casualty of this trip. Actually got 3. Only took photo with 2. The 3rd one was the 1 who fell off the cliff and had a minor concussion then wake up few hours later in the medical centre, and a hairline fracture on the shoulder.

oh he fell down on the last last lesson on his left wrist only, the impact broke his wrist.

This guy most sad case, fell on the 3rd day on a slope, and he is fine. Within 5 sec before he got up, one guy came crashing on to him, boom!! Nth much, just some blister on hand and head bleed abit. Then, still ok, until he took the ski lift hahaha.