Mmm...pancakes <3

The images are rather blurry - I took these with my handphone ^^

Yesterday, my friend and I went to MidValley to try out the restaurant 'Paddington House of Pancakes' (PHOP for short). Currently, the restaurant has a promotion named 'Round the World' - RM 13.80++ for a few selected dishes, inclusive of a drink and ice-cream of the day. The offer is only valid on weekdays, 12pm to 2pm.

Well, we finished class at 12.30, met up at 1.10 and waited for the taxi until 1.40 =.=" This is how hard it is to get a taxi in KL, especially on Fridays T_T We were squirming at the taxi stand, silently cursing all the taxis that either drove by us with passengers in them, or whizzed by us without passengers.

Anyway, we were lucky to meet an Indian girl, who had to go to MV to pick up something, I'm not sure for school or for work...she seemed pretty young ^^ Anyway, she told us that she could claim the taxi fare, so our trip there was free < 3

When we reached MV, it was 1.50pm. Fortunately. Both of us ordered the Tokyo Set, which was part of the promotion ^^ I'm quite satisfied with the dish - it has chicken ham, chicken breast, fresh vege wrapped in two pannkoeuks (It's spelled that way in the menu, for some reason =D), and a generous serving of mash potato < 3

Well, the chicken ham and breast was smothered in some kind of sauce, the one you can find in pasta. I must admit, I'm not quite familiar with the taste because I rarely go for Italian food, but it tastes really nice all the same. The chicken breast is soft enough, the mash potato smells and tastes great, while the pancakes are something I haven't tasted before, but it's somehow quite similar to Indian chapati xD

I cut the pannkoeuks, cut the chicken ham and breast, dipped everything in the sauce and nommed away =D

However, frankly, the highlight of the meal was the dessert - mini dollar pancakes served in sundae (look at the photo) with strawberry syrup and nuts on top. It was heaven - imagine sinking your teeth into soft, fluffy pancakes, while experiencing the coolness of vanilla ice-cream and the sweetness of strawberry syrup at the same time. Yup, both of us certainly had a blissful time eating the ice-cream, although my friend was less enthusiastic about the main dish, as she said that the portion of the chicken was too large.

I have no complaints though - if you have the time, go and have lunch at PHOP~ I would advise that you go for the promotion though, because the rest are costly - around RM 20 and above ^^ Whereas with promotion, I only spent RM 15.90 including tax.

One Movie You Should NEVER Watch in the Cinema

Note that I said 'Cinema', meaning that if you can, god forbid for the piracy and copyright issue, obtain a downloaded version or *ahem* pirated CD which are so rampant in Malaysia of it, by all means, watch it, laugh yourself silly or cough blood, and curse the movie forever.

Now, what exactly is this movie I'm ranting, or it may seem to you, raving about? It's called 'Burn After Reading', a black comedy, starring Hollywood hotshots like George Clooney, Brad Pitt and a cast whose average age is above 40, I guess.

Now, if you are still planning to watch this movie, you might want to stop reading from here, because the following contains spoilers to the movie.

At first, we are exposed to Cox Osbourne, a former CIA agent who has been fired for some reasons. Dejected, he starts to write a memoir of himself, only to have the CD containing it fall into the hands of two gym employees who are desperate for some fast cash.

One of the gym employees who found the CD was a middle-aged woman (Linda Listze), overly concerned about her looks and pushing her employers to subsidise her costs for plastic surgery, claiming that it will 'enhance her self image and help her to deal with customers better, to improve the business of the company'. Unsurprisingly, her application was rejected by the higher-ups. Still, she was obsessive about her body, which 'has wrinkles, extra flab everywhere and sags a lot' and adamant to get the plastic surgery at all costs.

After the two gym employees, Chad (Brad Pitt) and Linda found the CD, they opened the disc in their company computer, and Chad saw a lot of numbers and funny statements without realising that they were part of Osbourne's memoir. Enlisting the help of his friend, Chad managed to find out the owner of the CD, his job, his number and his address. Thinking that the CD contains classified CIA information, both of them decided to exhort Osbourne using the CD.

After that, the plot starts to spiral crazily. First, the CD does not contain any important information. However, the CIA was keeping a track on Osbourne because they want to make sure that he does not exact revenge upon the agency by revealing classified information. Then, there are the two idiots from the gym, wishing to exhort Osbourne on the basis that the CD contains top-secret info, and when Osbourne scoffs and tells them off, Linda and Chad brought the CD to the Russian embassy, wanting to sell it to them.

Things are further complicated as Osbourne's wife secretly plans to divorce him, having an affair with a married guy named, who also has an affair with Linda. Unknowingly, Harry's wife is also planning to divorce him for some reason, and the confusion goes on and one.

The highlight of the movie is probably when Brad Pitt died abruptly and shockingly. He broke into Osbourne's house, trying to find more 'CIA inside information' and has to hide in a closet when suddenly, Harry goes into the house after a rendezvous with Mrs Osbourne. When Harry went to get clothes from the closet, Chad gave him a big shock, the gun went off suddenly and...he died.

Ah, I forgot to mention another guy, Ted, who was the manager/owner of the gym Chad and Linda work in. He has a crush on Linda but is too afraid to make it clear. Out of love, he helped Linda look for Chad (she thought he was missing when he was dead), and even broke into the same house again. This time, he met Osbourne, who was drunk and agitated for his wife has already withdrawn all money from their bank accounts, leaving only 100 dollars. Osbourne shot Ted in the head and chopped him to death with an axe.

The greatest irony came in the end of the story, where the Russian embassy denied the usefulness of the CD while the CIA kept a close eye on all those involved in this case. At last, they apprehended Linda, one of the police shot Osbourne after seeing him kill Ted and wondered what actually happened. Linda actually had the guts to request for them to pay the bills of her surgery, and it got ACCEPTED!

Everything, deaths, conflicts and confusion over a stupid memoir which was worth nothing. Actually, everything here stems from Linda's selfish and one-tracked desire to make herself look prettier, forgetting that real beauty comes from the soul.

When the movie ended, my friends and I were extremely dissatisfied, and all of us had the 'WTF' look on our faces. The ending was too abrupt, the loose ends wasn't tied up properly and there was no real moral value to that story. Even one CIA chief was seen saying 'I don't know what happened. Let's learn something from this - never do this ever again.'

WTF??!!! The ratings in one newspaper is quite good though, 3.5 out of 5, although I personally won't give it even 1. Despite that, it all depends on personal taste.

Food - Cheap and Delicious etc...

There are two cafeterias near my hostel. One is located at the base of Block 4, run by a man whom we addressed as 'Pak Lang', and sells fried rice, noodle, vermicelli, etc, and if you are lucky, you might get to eat economic rice, leftovers from lunch =.="

Then there is Skudz, somewhere near the hostel entrance, where there is no economic rice, instead they sell wonderful nasi lemak and equally appetising fried stuff. Oh, they also sell burgers too, just that I haven't tried them yet.

To be fair, the price of the food in 'Pak Lang's cafe' is slightly cheaper than the one in Skudz by some thirty to fifty cents, but the food portion is abysmally small, the kitchen is severely overstaffed and hygienic conditions are worrisome. If you look really carefully, you might see yesterday's leftovers on the utensils you are using. Talk about losing your appetite o_O Moreover, the cashier is inconsistent, i.e. he/she or whoever that is sitting at the counter will charge any amount they like for the economic food we students take.

In comparison, the kitchen at Skudz is open-air, people can see what is happening inside, the workers are friendly and efficient, and the food is worth every cent we paid ^.^ My personal favourites are nasi lemak and pattaya fried rice < 3 Mmmm...


This was my dinner last night - nasi lemak. RM 2, which I consider cheap looking at the amount of rice and the extra black thingy she gave me for being a faithful customer ^^


My friend ordered Pattaya fried rice, which looks nice too, but costs more. RM 3.80. The shape looks great =D



After dinner yesterday, we went to KLIA and sent off our seniors who were going to the University of Auckland, New Zealand to continue their TESL course there. I'm in the photo - just guess which one I am ^.^ I won't admit until you guess correctly in your first attempt though~

*sigh* the scene at the airport was really emotional, with parents having to say goodbye to their kids for 2 years o_O I wonder how would I be like next year, when I have to leave for CCCU in UK for 3 years?

Hunting the Elusive

When I was googling the images for the art book 'The Jewel Box', I came across this fantastic blog - Hunting the Elusive. Not only this blog has fantastic content in it, the language used also aesthetically suits the content.

Hunting the Elusive has a massive collection of scans from beautiful art books. Some of those books are rare and few in number, hence the title of the blog. What that amazes me is that the quality of the scans are top-notch - icie spent considerable effort in guaranteeing us that. Next, all the scans are free to download, and for our convenience, the scans are usually packed into rar form. Besides, there are no annoying advertisements, nor pleas to ask you to donate.

The owner of the blog goes by the nickname icie - I can't really tell whether it's a male or female name. Reading a few posts by icie, I was amazed by the language (Yeah, I'm in TESL, hence I look at the language first). Compared to icie, my level of English proficiency can be rated mediocre at best, and I feel guilty calling myself a TESL undergraduate o_O

Still, reading the blog gives me the motivation to do better, and by analysing the diction, style and flair of the blog, hopefully I can improve on my own writing as well. The extra art book images acquired during this process does not hurt either =D

Out of 100 marks, I might give this blog 110. Really. It's just that good. (From the perspective of an anime/manga lover + TESL student)

P.S: If you visit that site, make sure you check out the 'What is Pireze' part, and also search for Onineko if you are interested in graphics *.*

Dangerous Buildings o_O

Last Wednesday (I know, I'm awfully late at blogging), we were having our Language Description (That's grammar for you) classes when we suddenly heard an awful male shriek/groan from nowhere. The class was held at the library, our surroundings were eerily dark and besides our lecturer and us, there was nobody else present. Everyone got a jolt from that sound, and someone recalled hearing a similar sound the day before at our lecture halls, albeit female. Then, Language Description class transformed into 'Horror stories sharing class' momentarily, when our lecturer, Madam Norhazian started telling us all the supposedly ghost sightings around our academic building and also *gasps* our hostel.

Actually, the ghost stories weren't so scary compared to the real story Madam Hazian told us. Apparently, there were two sky-high apartments in construction near hostel blocks 3 and 4. She said that she gets the shivers every time she looks at the construction site, primarily because the ground was steep, looked unstable and the buildings were very near our hostels - too near for comfort. Take a look at the photos up there to see what I mean. If there's another earthquake in Sumatra, the aftermath of the shakes might possibly reach Penang and judging from the state of the weak foundation, the apartments will just topple over and crush our hostels as well as Pantai Hospital, which is just next to it.

Putting aside the concern for my safety, I'm disappointed with whoever that gave this project the thumbs-up. Even non-experts like me could see the potential danger of having such tall buildings so near another building, and the fact that the ground is not properly flattened does not help either. What's the point of earning money from new tenants when the building might collapse and take thousands of lives with it? Think of the teacher in trainings living in the hostels, think of the patients at Pantai Hospital, think of the future tenants of the apartments - is any amount of profit worth it to endanger all those lives?

I might be overly dramatic here, but in this world, anything might happen, and the fact that there are corrupt politicians who approved this project, immoral developers who carried out this project and other people who supported this project makes them scarier than ghosts and spirits. This is also why I chose not to focus on the numerous ghost stories shared during Language Description, but rather on the potential danger.

A *Heroic* Expedition

Gah, the internet in my hostel was down for the whole weekend, hence the sudden silence in my blog xD Anyway, last Saturday, I with another four friends went to the Jalan Imbi area, namely the Low Yat Plaza, Berjaya Times Square and Sungei Wang Plaza. The group was composed of three girls and two guys.

We started our expedition at 12.30pm sharp, took the LRT to KL Central and Monorail to Jalan Imbi. First, we went into Low Yat Plaza, where we scoured around for cheaper prices of Canon printers. One of the guys who bought a tablet at Low Yat before told me that the shop was at the 5th floor, so I didn't really pay attention towards tablets until I saw one box of it at Star Tec. Then, we inquired the price and found that it was much cheaper than what my friend got it for =D So, I bought the tablet there and then.

Next was the printer, and my friend was also looking for a headphone. We decided on a Canon Pixma ip1880 model at another shop, and she also bought one. The printer itself was kinda cheap, but the cartridge not bundled together was more than half of the printer's price =.=" Still, we had to buy another cartridge because the original cartridge provided was only half tank full and not refillable D=

You might be wondering why we bought the printer first instead of going to the other places. Well, there were two of us who wanted to buy printers, and there were two guys following us who will help us carry our printers xD The first guy had to go back before 4pm so that he can meet his girlfriend in MidValley. However, after we bought the printers, he said that he would go straight to MV by monorail, so we had to carry one of the printers. Another guy originally wanted to go back with him at the same time, but then he said that he had something to buy in Times Square.

So, this is how we formed the new culture - Printer Lolita, involving youngsters lugging printers around and shopping for clothes, shoes etc xD It was quite good though - the four that remained of us had lunch in Sushi King *yummy* and the guy, gentleman that he was *cough* did not complain about us going on detours and getting sidetracked by everything we see ^.^ I also bought some stuff out of my budget, resulting in me getting broke o_O

Photos of my power-up items:



Canon Pixma iP1880 - RM 115
No. 40 Black Ori Cartridge - RM 63
Kaze no Stigma Artbook - RM 29.90
Wacom Bamboofun Tablet - RM 334
Not in the photo (just for fun):
Sunsilk Hair Conditioner - RM 7.80
Transport - RM 7.40
McD Apple Pies - RM 3.15
Gardenia Wholemeal Bread - RM 3.00

Count the total yourselves xD

We arrived back in college at 9.30, which makes 9 hours of straight shopping O_O Our legs were so tired, they were about to fall off *.*

Another randomness:

These are the bookmarks I've made for my friends and myself. Just thought that they looked good in a row ^.^

Fancy joining me on my expedition next time, folks?

Steamboat < 3

Well, I celebrated Chinese New Year a few days ago, and now, I'm already back in college ^_^ On 29th January, I went to a steamboat at my aunt's house. It was more of a housewarming celebration rather than a Chinese New Year celebration, though there were kids playing with firecrackers, the house was mainly decorated with red and people were all passing ang pows (red packets) to the kids.

If I have to be honest, the steamboat was just average. I mean, the food was more than enough for everyone, but it's more of a quality versus quantity thing xD As you can see, or you might not see because of the sucky photo quality, from the pictures above, those are the food we ate.

How do we eat steamboat:
1) The soup is prepared, normally by cooking chicken/pork bones to get the right flavour.
2) Then, the utensils which you put the ingredients in are heated up. In this case, we used the traditional way: coal and fire.
3) Then, you wait for the soup inside the pot to boil for a while before adding the ingredients.
4) You wait.
5) You wait.
6) You wait.
7) When you are about to lose your patience, somebody lifts the cover of the pot and announces that the ingredients are *finally* cooked.
8) So, what are you waiting for? You just take whatever you want from the pot and dig in =D

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that, my aunt also invited a married couple from China. It turns out that they were related under the 'Choong' clan, and their ancestors were brothers (?) I think. At the round table, I was sitting between my father and my mother's brother (uncle, or jiu jiu). On my opposite was a lady related to my mom, her husband and three kids. In the middle of the dinner, the woman from China walked around, passing out ang pows to all the kids. Eventually, she dropped by my table, passed three ang pows to the three kids sitting opposite of me, and walked away.

She walked away! D= I didn't get my ang pow from her T_T Anyway, after thinking about it, I think she might be confused, since my uncle was sitting beside me, and he didn't bring his wife and kids. So, she probably thought I was married to my uncle or something =.=" *shakes fist at uncle*

Still, it turned out to be a good joke, and my parents and I laughed at it for quite some time after the steamboat dinner xD

The moral of this story is, choose carefully who you sit with at a table, especially during Chinese New Year =D

P.S: In the pictures above, I'm not in the photos, because I'm the one taking them ;)

2nd Month since I really used Blogger~

Nothing much about the title, really, just an anniversary kind of thing ^_^

I saw in my shoutbox that Misao tagged me. Before that, I was at Queensbay Mall shopping my legs off and talking my head off with my friend. Yeah, we always do that during our holidays - meet up in a shopping mall, spend a long time eating, talking and shopping < 3

Back to the tag thing, I never had anyone tag me before, and I was like: "Huh? Do I have to run? My legs are really tired..." =.=" Still, it turns out to be this...

16 random facts/habits/goals in my life:
1. I love Eyes Rutherford.
2. I love Eyes Rutherford.
3. I love Eyes Rutherford...

Wait, this doesn't seem right =D *checks Misao's blog again* Oh, I don't think the 16 facts are supposed to be the same ^_^

Ok, here goes:
1. I love Eyes Rutherford more than any guy in the real world (He's from the manga/anime Spiral: Suiri no Kizuna, in case you don't know, and he's the guy in my avy and banner)
2. I love playing the violin and piano, and I can't say which I like more.
3. I rarely watch TV unless I'm watching anime, or The Nanny, lol.
4. Fall in and out of love really easily, quickly, painlessly and effortlessly, except when with Rutherford :3
5. I like cats more than dogs, though I only had a hamster before.
6. I prefer fish over chicken, unless it's McChicken Burger to Fish Fillet.
7. I like kids (more like infants) until they start to talk nonsense.
8. I don't mind working hard when I'm asked to do something, but when collaborating with someone else, I expect the other party to work equally hard as well. *That's why I'm known as the grinder O_O*
9. I love guys who will 'kiss first, ask later', rather than guys who go 'may I kiss you before kissing'. *note: not that I've tried it before.
10. I'm Buddhist on the outside, and half atheist at heart.
11. I'm not against cohabitation and premarital sex. Just go with the flow is my motto.
12. I wish to slim down =o
13. I want to do better on my assignments and improve my English so that I can write better stories/fanfics/novels.
14. I dislike people who don't think before opening their mouths, or typing something, as in the case on the Net.
15. I go for tall, dark (not skin dark, but expression dark), dangerous (also expression) and relatively aggressive men.
16. I'm generally seen as a cold, unfriendly, selfish, calculating person to everyone else except for my friends =D

DIRECTION: Once you've been tagged, you have to write a post with sixteen random things, habits or goals about you. At last, choose five people to be tagged, listing their names and why you chose them.

*Looks at pitifully short Bloggermates list*
I tag Popiah, because she's my dear little Bo-chan.
I will tag more people later once I get links to my friends' blogs x)