Merry Christmas and party on into the New Year!

I'm back in London and recovering from busting a big hole in my bank account with the unbelievable amount of shopping I've done. New York (and New Jersey where there are no taxes) has drained me of almost all my living expenses!

Do not judge me until the Harrods sales are on.

Will regale you with stories of Nine West shoes, frustrations of the New Yorks strikes and unbelievably stupid Americans later. Right now I've just gotta get my jetlag fixed.

Hope you had a Merry Christmas. And may it snow tomorrow. (Come on, just a little, pleeeease?)

Coming to you live from Chicago!

The funniest bumper sticker I've seen so far:

Nobody died
When Clinton lied

It's an average of -8C here and we're in my granduncle's apartment facing a very beautiful (and I might add frozen) Lake Michigan.

A quick run down of our last two days would be:
Heathrow - Charles de Gaule - JFK - New Jersey (CHEAP Cheena food!!! and NO TAXES!) - La Guardia - Chicago Midway - Vietnames Pho - High School Band concert (my uncle who's 16 plays the tuba which weighs 25 pounds) - Express tour around Chicago city in my uncle's warm car - Pompeii exhibit at the Field Museum (Charl: Who's Pompeii? Lionel: It's a place, not a person!) - Jazz band at the Green Mill club - Decorate real live Christmas tree while sipping mugs of hot chocolate and popcorn

And that's about it

Any last orders?

I'm leaving for New York on the 15th. Will be in Chicago until the 20th. Then back to New York and then back in good ol' London on the 28th.

This is a last call for addresses if you would like postcards/Christmas cards/Thinking of you in this freaking bitter cold weather cards!

This is also a last call for anyone who wants to meet up in New York/Chicago or wants presents from New York/Chicago! Nicole's birthday present is already on the list.

And a very desperate request for anyone who's able to house Lionel and I on the 15th for one night to avoid us having to spend the night at JFK airport, on transit to Chicago the next day. We sleep on floors, own a sleeping bag and are generally clean and well mannered.

Ah, the life of a backpacker on a shoe string. My granduncle sponsoring my air ticket and my EEE department tour guide income only just manages to cover my accomodation! How many more snotty A-Level kids do I have to entertain to earn enough money for a decent holiday? (Although in all fairness, they're not snotty... except the ones who would rather go to Oxbridge)

p/s: London folk - keep New Year's Eve free! And vote for a) Popiah party, b) Charlotte's various (and suspicious) finger food recipes or c) 2 mins in the microwave Iceland frozen food packs OR d) all of the above!

The Leader?

This so cracked me up in the midst of my coursework fury!

How a poem like this could be printed in a Pakistani school textbook is both a mystery to me and to the Pakistani government! We're not the only bumbling education system in the world, huh?

THE LEADER by anonymous

Patient and steady with all he must bear,
Ready to meet every challenge with care,
Easy in manner, yet solid as steel,
Strong in his faith, refreshingly real.
Isn't afraid to propose what is bold,
Doesn't conform to the usual mould,
Eyes that have foresight, for hindsight won't do,
Never backs down when he sees what is true,
Tells it all straight, and means it all too.
Going forward and knowing he's right,
Even when doubted for why he would fight,
Over and over he makes his case clear,
Reaching to touch the ones who won't hear.
Growing in strength he won't be unnerved,
Ever assuring he'll stand by his word.
Wanting the world to join his firm stand,
Bracing for war, but praying for peace,
Using his power so evil will cease,
So much a leader and worthy of trust,
Here stands a man who will do what he must.

It's the most wonderful time of the year

When the workload is piling and winds come a-calling and deadlines are here!
It's the most wonderful time of the year!

Does anyone feel like it's spring? After the last 2 week's worth of frost and bitter cold, this 'warmer' weather and the few trees that are still green are a welcomed change. Now THIS is what autumn is supposed to be like!

Let's paint a bull's eye on Queen's Tower, aye?

DSP coursework - compiled, proof read and printed an entire day before the deadline! Boy do I feel a smug look coming on.

In other news, I will be in Chicago on the 15th, then in New York on the 20th, then (fingers crossed) at Harrods during the boxing day sales with my hands on a good coat. Who says one can have too many coats? One cannot have enough coats in a lifetime. Nor boots.

Anyone noticed that Imperial College has been in the lime light recently? For all the wrong reasons! Thanks to the Rector's ban on hoodies, face veils and scarves that hide ugly braces we've become a nationwide controversy! We even appeared on the evening news! Everyone loves a good scandal.

Now it's not like anyone's really abiding by the new draconian laws. Sure the security guards tried to stop me once for not wearing my ID tag. But how much harm could I have caused? I was trying to leave the grounds, not get in! But that was just an isolated incident and since our own campus shop sells hoodies with the IC name proudly stitched on, no one's really bothered.

Except for the bunch of amnesty international and other monkeys from jobless human rights societies. There they were, right outside the Faculty building, protesting and waving placards calling the Rector out on account of Islamaphobia and Hijab-phobia and what not. And here we were in German class trying to understand genitive cases and adjectival nouns and not being able to hear a word of it due to the inconsiderate shouting outside.

Now, I think it's incredibly immature and petty. The rules were enforced two weeks ago. And it's taken 2 weeks to round up enough protestors? Come on, why wasn't this done when the bun was still fresh out of the oven? Most students don't seem to be affected by it, let alone feel strongly about it. My Malay friends, in headscarves nontheless, aren't the ones running around with placards. In fact they're pretty passive about the whole thing. After all it was a rule disallowing the wearing of hoods which hides the face from security cameras in the event of a break in or theft, which has been plagueing our halls and campus offices recently. No one even brought up the topic of banning headscarves.

But along come the do-gooders. Making something out of nothing. I personally think all this attention we're drawing is making us the perfect target for a terrorist bombing. Way to go Imperial. It's not like we don't have all the stuff to make our own bomb right here on campus!

Kumpulan Orang Biru, and other Christmas thoughts

It's been threatening to snow. But it hasn't yet. I've forgotten what it's like to have feeling in my ears. Thus all I would like to have for Christmas (and preferably before) is this - warm fluffy (and preferably pink) ear muffs!

Alternatively, I will also settle for:


Mini tabletop vacuums!
Available at Robert Dyas for only 4.99, and come in an assortment of cute animal shapes too. Personally I'd like a little pink pig. Wouldn't you?








Christmas presents aside, we spent last night watching the Blue Man Group, which is really hard to describe so go here and read about them. And you'd better not miss out on the videos! I really can't decide if the best part of the night was having to wear ponchos throughout the show (ah, memories of rainy Odac days) or getting teepeed by humongous rolls of toilet paper. If you've never tried swimming in a sea of toilet paper, go watch the Blue Man Group instead of buying more Kleenex!

Above on the left is just one of the three men in blue (MIB), and frankly I find anybody covered in a latex layer of thick (and still wet) blue paint to be rather creepy. But covering an audience member in blue paint, hanging him from his legs and swinging him face first onto a white canvas is surprisingly rather artistic. So are flourescent UV pipes!

Me, Lionel, Lu and Grace with The Band!

Chien Liq and his prized Blue Man saliva painting,
lovingly spat onto a blank canvas for him

And Matt, who got Blue Man-handled!

As the busy bee

Some of us have discovered the tricks of the trade on Bullbearings. Some of us have just learnt how to outscheme the computer program. *cough* I've just been trying my hand at it and earned 40 pounds in half an hour just from trading US Dollars and Japanese Yen. Now if only I could cash it in for a new pair of leather boots!

Have I ever told you how easy it is to make wontons? And how easy it is to overcook them?

Need to run now. I did say I was going to get started on DSPs about 6 hours ago!

Mr Newell, you are SO not a Harry Potter fan!

I'm going to spoil Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (HP&GoF) for you if you haven't watched it yet so read at your own peril.

I'm gutted! Where was the Quidditch World Cup match? What happened to all the obstacles in the third task? Why were the triwizard champions made such shallow characters instead of the extremely talented wizards/witches they were? Why didn't they show Harry picking up all those neat charms and spells for the triwizard tournament? How could they completely write off the house elves and SPEW? Why did Rita Skeeter disappear halfway through and why didn't they show Hermione bottling her beetle animagus in the end? That would have made a much better ending than Hermione's melancholy theatrics in that 'trying too hard to be bittersweet' ending.

I take my Harry Potter much too seriously. But anal retentiveness aside, it was an amazing movie. I'm not trying to nitpick on the details. I'll admit the CGI was perfect, the magical creatures were spectacular, the setting would make Peter Jackson weep, and I cried when Cedric Diggory died.

I just wish it had been more magical than a display of special effects. Shame on you Mike Newell. You ought to know your Harry Potter better.

Fiesta Pina!

It was pineapple day yesterday. Don't ask me what that is, I made it up! We had 2 pineapples in our kitchen yesterday because it's 1 for 1 at Sainsbury's.

So I made pineapple fried rice (Amar you would have loved it, and cooked it better probably!) and pineapple curry with fish! Mmm mm mmmm! It was a dinner worthy of inviting Justin over for.

Justin for some strange reason thinks I'm an amazing cook when all he's ever tasted is my Tiramisu. Apparently Lionel's been telling him that he'd rather eat my culinary concoctions (or disasters) than eat out at any Chinese restaurant. My explanation of that is 1. If he doesn't say so he won't have ANYTHING to eat at home and 2. Have you ever tasted Chinese food in London? It's rubbish with a touch of ajinomoto (MSG) 3. He seems to have mentally blocked out the time I served him very hard, burnt fried rice way back in the first year.

But since Justin is taking Lionel's word for it (and the rest of the emperor's gate folks who only say I cook well because they don't want to cook themselves!) I'm still trying to find a day when I can proudly invite him over to taste my 'wonderful' cooking.


Here's all that is left of yesterday's pineapple rice. It has thus become my lunch. Yes I'm gonna eat out of the frying pan. I'm lazy to wash up more plates.

Alcohol makes me blush

I love a good photo. Especially one taken after downing a Smirnoff. We're so red... and I'll blame the red light bulbs at Sanjeev's 'Heaven or Hell' house party. We're in the hell part of the house. It must be hell when Andy's multiple personalities (hyper vodka chugging Andy and zoned out Andy) start showing. He managed to take a lovely photo though... and even caught the incriminating Smirnoff in Lionel's hand. I made him hold it 'cos it's girly.

Illustrations...

The Christmas feeling is in the air. I know it, because Starbucks and their red cups are telling me so. It's just me and my Gingerbread Latte on this cold November evening. Mmmm, I've gotta fashion some Christmas deco for my room to make it a little more festive.

Christmas would be really nice if only I didn't have a mountain of courseworks blocking the view. Like right now.

I think Amar has the right idea though

by the way...

things I forgot to mention which I think are worth mentioning...

1. Guy Fawkes Day was a blast! Quite literally
2. Maomao, I will never forgive you for sending us the restaurant game! I can no longer do courseworks normally, or start them for that matter.
3. I have to get my eyes checked. Nicole just found out she's short sighted and that made me put abit more thought into those blurry looking lecture slides.

So Exciting!

No time to sleep. It's overrated anyway. These eyebags aren't disappearing no matter how many hours of snooze time I get. What the...

Raya weekend was, all Amar. Spent it at house parties (Sanjeev's and Yunju's) and I can't even remember what else on the weekend. My memory is going. How am I going to finish my courseworks like this?

Pasar Malam gave me a cold and a new addiction to mehndi tattoos. I should post up the designs Sau Yin and I drew. Gorgeous dragons, pheonixes and waterlilies. Want a tattoo? You know where to find us.

I wanted to blog about an article in November's GQ. About this guy who was bashing a Perodua Kelisa with a mallet. Amar if you still have the issue, put the photo up. I think it's a lovely bash to the heads of our egotistical national car producers. The Kelisa isn't a car. It's just a reason to generate a national economy. (I also believe it is the main reason for the high accident rates during Hari Raya, but lets not go there)

I have such an exciting week ahead. Watch as I rush to make deadlines and burn the midnight oil (and then start lighting every flammable object in my house that will create light) to cram numbers and German into my head. Do applaud me if you see me hand in everything on time.

Otherwise, I need to get Fidel's guitar fixed. Two of the strings have snapped and I can't improvise on three strings. And I need to pick songs for bible study group and practise before Thursday. Yeah, I'm being good. I'm going for bible study now. My mum can't stop smiling.

It's me again

We've finally got internet at home, and all is right with the world again.

Well not particularly so. Fiery riots in Paris and now Argentina makes you think that people never learn. Aggression is trendy. Forget about helping the Asian Earthquake appeal (which I did, mind you - I bought a couple of cupcakes and gave away all my cash). Lets just burn stuff down to show everyone we mean business. Even if it's in response to an unconfirmed claim as in Birmingham; sparked off by a rumour which proved to be untrue. They're pretty thick in the west midlands aren't they?

Anyway I thought this silent movie from Vidu was interesting. The comment box is free for your interpretations; random, disturbing or otherwise. I promise there's nothing Freudian about it.

I know I've been hiding here in my little (or not so little) part of London, ignoring several birthdays. I haven't even had the time to cancel my contract line, let alone look for birthday cards (or addresses for that matter). And so, in a very belated (and sheepish) shout out:

Happy Birthday Yin Tse, Maomao, Kim, Jilly and my Grandpa (who doesn't read my blog but knows that I write. Alot.)

There's no need to wish Ayish, after all her 21st birthday party must be one she'll remember for a lifetime. Lets just say that the invitation strictly insisted on everyone dressing up for a black tie evening and that dinner would cost no more than 5 pounds at a secret venue on Knightsbridge that the birthday girl herself did not know off. So imagine the utter shock and horror of 30 elegant suits and gowns entering a private room at McDonalds with a rather, erm, tipsy Ayish. Hopefully the alcohol helped to numb the shock a little. The very amusing things Linsteadians do. I'll post up Nicole's photos when I get the chance.

I wish I had photos of my night at Lehman Brothers though. Imagine being on the top floor (that's 31 floors above ground) overlooking all of London and the Thames with fireworks going off opposite the South Bank! Whipping out my camera phone at that time would unfortunately have been most unappropriate. I just took a mental snap shot - Kirsten Dunst style. Watch Elizabethtown. That's my advice for the week. I got free preview tickets but I would have gladly paid for it, if only for Kirsten Dunst. What Orlando Bloom? Let's go on a roadtrip, just you and me.

Amar's here for the weekend. Enough said.

Spank me!

Erm, no... not really...

But some one should if I don't sit my ass down and finish this stupid comms systems coursework by today! It's only due tomorrow at 5pm, but tomorrow being commemoration day it means everyone gets a holiday and I'll have no one's coursework to copy! Bah!

It was a bloody waste of time dressing up for year rep elections. Yeah, I am year rep, but it's a joint year rep position and thus was won by a general consensus that everyone agreed to having more than one (or rather we agreed NOT to vote out anyone) due to the wide spectrum of ISE courses the year reps would have to deal with. So what was the point of Chien Liq and Wei Kiat educating me on how to use my feminine charms on the largely male population of ISE again? Such a waste of hair combing, lip rouging, cleavage plumping, etc. etc. I still hold that I'm the prettier year rep anyway.

I've gotten myself dragged into the IBM university business challenge. In other words, I get to run an imaginary alcopop company for 6 weeks. Ah... my dream career.

I want to go check out the Alien exhibit at the Science Museum tomorrow. Provided I finish and hand in my coursework. Then it's shopping at Harrods, and Death of a Salesman in the evening with Fidel.

And this is why I love London

A First Lady, fondly remembered

My mother sms-ed early this morning, or perhaps late last night. The news that our first lady had passed away obviously could not have waited until I'd woken up. But that's how much she means to us and how much we've grown so fond of her.

For a family that has grown up in the arms of the civil service and government forces in Malaysia, it has been truly difficult to take a liking to anyone of 'them'. Respect, maybe, but like is a an estranged word when it comes to anyone in the government and their respective family members.

But we really liked Endon. Oh, we so did! Maybe we feared that she would never hold a torch up to Tun Dr. Siti Hasmah, but she's carved her own niche into our hearts. She's been the gentle caring, giving, loving, favourite mother of the nation, whether in Bakti or batik. She was fearless in the face of cancer and a shining example, even to my own father in his period of recovery.

And she will be so missed. Thanks for staying awhile to touch us hard of heart, Malaysians. Yours was the hardest battle to fight.

Neither here nor there

So it's the beginning of week 3, and I'm not quite sure where week 1 and 2 have gone. I wish I could say it's been due to a hectic schedule of debauchery and wild freshers events, but sadly this is me and as much as my lovely PJ friends would like to believe that I'm an alcoholic, the only alcohol I've had all week is a glass of fizzy lemoncello while watching some documentary on the telly.

My courses are all a mess. I thought I had them sorted out after meeting with my personal tutor, but it isn't very helpful when he keeps saying "Come on, with your grades you can do anything you want!"

I don't want to do anything. I want him to specifically tell me if I should drop freaking killer Math for signals and systems and take up crappy no brainer Software Engineering or ditch 9am Controls lectures and do Peter Cheung's Deegital Seestems. Well, he did tell me that Controls doesn't seem to fit in because of my Signals and Comms direction, but I'm happily dropping it because I don't want 9am lectures four times a week.

So I'm running from lecture to lecture most of the time. I'm even recording lectures in Computing that clash with those in EEE. When I have time to breathe, I'm either buying groceries or cleaning the flat, or staring zombie-like at the TV. It's amazing how much time the telly takes off your life. Especially now that we've discovered free cable TV. We're not sure who's paying for it, but we certainly aren't.

But I'm doing an hour of yoga on the side. It's like taking a nap in the middle of a hectic Thursday. Just give me 6 months and I'll be able to contort into a little human cube... or at least finally be able to touch my toes. I want to do Salsa on Tuesdays, but Lionel's not the keenest dance partner. I also want to go for the Leornado Soc sessions, but they're a whopping £3.50! I might go for selective ones, that involve expensive art material.

I still haven't figured out how to bump the other Year Rep nominees out of the race. But I'm taking that easy for now.

The Frida Kahlo exhibition on the last weekend was amazing. I like frustrated artists because I'm a relaxed lazy one.

There's Death of a Salesman next week. Lionel still pretends to sulk about having to give Fidel his ticket. Well, maybe he's not pretending.

Then there's Guys and Dolls to fight for tomorrow. Only 20 tickets. Lionel had damn well better be the first in line. There's nothing that can't be sacrificed for an evening with Ewan McGregor.

I'm done for today.

Rather quiet, isn't it?

London is...

.... just as I left it

The vibrant Earl's Court takes some getting used to, and dodging drunken winos is a skill I need to brush up... but you should just see the view from my bedside window! Autumn English backyards in their brilliant reds and golds are certainly worth waking up for.

First weeks are as usual confusing and utterly fluid. Changing time tables, not knowing which electives to take and not being able to find the right rooms for the ArtSoc meeting. Trying to remember names and faces and the one thousand societies I have joined. Trying to find a new phone plan. Trying to figure out how to fix the latch on the bathroom door and how many boxes of files I had altogether because I am quite certain some files are still missing! Trying to plan how I am going to convince 40 ISE students to pick me as year rep instead of the other guy.

It's a lovely way to start off a new term.

Email me for my new address. I'd really appreciate Christmas cards to brighten up my dreary December days.

ps - I do miss home. I really do. I cried on the way back because I won't see my little sister for a year. She's still crying at home.
pps - 6 weeks of home isn't enough. Whatever made me think I can bear 10 straight months without going home?

All aboard! Destination - who knows?

It's almost second nature to harden myself against sentimentality. To plug up the emotions and look everything in the face with steely coldness.

And so, when I leave tomorrow, when I step out of this house for the last time, there will be no looking back. It's too painful to miss something you've always known all your life. Reason tells me to not hold sentiments for something as lifeless as a house. On the otherhand, I guess it's alright to miss something as full of life as a home.

A home with its white washed walls that for 22 years has played canvas to my fingerprints, and its fading terrazo floor on which I played a secret game of only stepping on particular 'islands' to get to the kitchen for fear the rest of its white vastness will swallow you whole. A room with delicate China blue wallpaper which rocked me to sleep to the sounds of Matchbox 20, and hid all my diaries and poems and sketches from prying eyes. A staircase with my own make belief poltergeist that ran up and down noisily just to get attention. And the very overrated aquarium which has held several generations of goldfish, guppies and parrot fish in its time (my favourite being the gormless looking parrot fish). And the tiny backyard where I used to play with the neighbourhood kittens until my mother educated me on the various types of tapeworm diseases that cats bring with them.

It's hard to say goodbye to 22 years of life. Thankfully my new house with my own room and my own bathroom to sing off key in makes it a little easier. It's going to be bigger with more space for the dog to run around. That is the dog will be running around outside, not in my room. I've picked out a new bed after my mother examined my 22 year old bed which has been threatening to fall apart anytime soon. Built-in cupboards have pretty much been designed, and my piano has a designated spot in the house. It's perfect!

I just hope it doesn't have that 'hotel' feeling when I come home next year.