Ryan Carter | Gravity Modulations

Gravity Modulations

Have a listen to it, for a piece of contemporary classical music it's pretty nice to listen to and easy on the ears too. In fact, I'd say most of the pieces he composed were gorgeous.

I had the luck to come across a concert and go in for free when I was in Heidelberg, Germany. They performed 4 pieces in the concert - one from Beethoven, another from Mozart, while the other two were compositions from featured young composers in the whole music festival.

Honestly, I was a bit apprehensive before actually listening to the piece, as the 2nd performance, also modern classical music, was crap (to me). I mean, I know you can argue that the composer knows the piece best and everything, but who writes a piece of music and insists on playing the solo himself? Especially for a composer - don't you have to make sure that other people are able to understand and perform your piece? Most of our applause were just given out of politeness (compare the polite clapping with the enthusiastic cheers and whistles given to the others), and even so, I think most part of the applause belonged to the orchestra who worked so hard to play your piece, the concert master to the extent of breaking his E string. And after the concert, when someone praised your composition, you had the nerve to go and say 'Yeah, I know (it's good).' Well, these are just the thoughts (and rants) from my puny, insignificant self who's unable to appreciate 'too elite' contemporary music.

Now, Carter's piece is a different story all together. The people playing it, the Szymanowski Quartet, already looked happy when they were seated on stage, even before playing the piece. The piece itself has a nice ring to it. Although there's still heavy use of dissonance and high pitches, it doesn't hurt the ears as everything converges beautifully together in the end between the four instruments. And the guy wasn't such a show off too. He didn't blow flying kisses to the players nor fake humbleness.

Anyway, I'm just saying - don't blow your own trumpet and praise it.

Insensitivity

http://thelintinmypocket.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/no-stupid-people1.jpg

A few days ago, the north-east of Japan was incapacitated by a monstrous calamity - a 8.9 magnitude earthquake that subsequently triggered giant waves (tsunami). After the incident, text messages were exchanged about the disaster.

Well, you'd expect the text messages to be about how serious the disaster was, how to help the Japanese and all those, but no.

They were jokes. Bad, tasteless jokes about the disaster. Sent by freaks who think that making jokes at someone's suffering and pain's expense is funny.

Two of the jokes I saw were something like these:

1...
'My Japanese girlfriend dumped me. I'm sad, but it's okay, there are still many more in the sea.'

2...
'The Japanese Olympics 2012 windsurfing team sure are enthusiastic. It's not even 2012 yet but they've already arrived on the shores of Dover'

One might argue that these jokes were harmless, just made for laughs with the opportunity of a subject. However, in truth it just shows the immaturity, insensitivity and incapability to empathise and sympathise of the sender. The people who came up with the jokes are the most to blame, but the senders too, have extremely bad taste.

Creating jokes out of something that brought death to thousands of people and massive destruction is just plain stupid. There's nothing to laugh about natural disasters. How would you feel if someone cracked a silly joke at your dad's funeral (putting aside cases where you don't love your own dad for any reason)?

Japan might be far away from England, but still, we are all people, we all live on the Earth, we all are humans. Is it too much to ask for, for one to show compassion and sympathy to another fellow human being who has done nothing wrong? Also, there are Japanese people in England too, how would they feel if their family or friends died in the tsunami, and they come across such a text?

If you have time to create and send stupid text messages, use the time to do something more worthwhile such as sending texts to ask people to donate money for the victims, or informing people about the magnitude of the disaster, or if you don't have the mental capacity to do that...

Just. Shut. Up.

Caledonia

I don't know if you can see
The changes that have come over me
In these last few days I've been afraid
That I might drift away
So I've been telling old stories, singing songs
That make me think about where I've came from
And that's the reason why I seem
So far away today

Let me tell you that I love you
That I think about you all the time
Caledonia you're calling me
And now I'm going home
But if I should become a stranger
You know that it would make me more than sad
Caledonia's been everything
I've ever had

Now I have moved and I've kept on moving
Proved the points that I needed proving
Lost the friends that I needed losing
Found others on the way
I have kissed the ladies and left them crying
Stolen dreams, yes there's no denying
I have travelled hard with coattails flying
Somewhere in the wind

Now I'm sitting here before the fire
The empty room, the forest choir
The flames that could not get any higher
They've withered now they've gone
But I'm steady thinking my way is clear
And I know what I will do tomorrow
When the hands are shaken and the kisses flow
Then I will disappear

***

I've had this song playing on loop on my laptop for a week now, and I never get tired of it. The original song was a Scottish folk ballad written by Dougie MacLean.

'Caledonia' as a song is really relaxing and calming to listen to - I particularly like the version by Celtic Woman simply because the lead singer has such a soothing voice, and the background singers do a great job of supporting the vocal too.

But what really drawn me to this song is the lyrics. They are romantic, yes, but they're not mushy and sweet like marshmallows. The lyrics are more like matured wine, to be savoured and enjoyed slowly no matter how many times you sip it.

'Caledonia', if you don't know, means 'Scotland' in Roman. However, I think that everyone will have their own Caledonia, which makes the lyrics more meaningful. Thinking about it, Caledonia can also be a person, but that's probably massacring the lyrics a little :p

I know what and who my Caledonia is...do you?

Weird Dreams

People often say that dreams reflect something that might happen in reality. Some of us can remember our dreams quite well, some of us can't. I belong to the former category, since I could recount a number of dreams I've had for the past few days.

These few days, I've had several weird dreams, and for three days in a row, I dreamed about the same person. Let's just call the person...D.

Well, I see D almost every week, I don't know how to describe our relationship, we're probably friends I think, hopefully. Sometimes I can't help but wonder, since D and I come from quite different backgrounds, maybe D just sees me as a strange person. When we see each other, sometimes we greet each other and chat, sometimes we don't.

Well, I'd love to chat with D every time we meet, but I'm the sort of person who's too shy to initiate a conversation, well, unless I'm feeling hyper or tipsy or something. Usually, D will just go 'Hey, how are you?' or 'Hey, you all right?', which is a standard greeting here in the UK. And then we will chat for a bit.

However, recently, D seemed to be a little distant for some reason. Maybe I've done something to offend D, maybe D is just stressed out from life, studies, etc. And I feel like I haven't been myself in front of D, I'm usually more jumpy and quiet and nervous.

Why am I talking about all these? Let's move on to those weird dreams now...

Dream #1:
D was sitting on a windowsill, and I happened to go into the room. D saw me and said 'Hi', but D didn't smile, so I got annoyed and walked out of the room. The End.

Dream #2:
D, Alicia (my friend) and I were sitting in chairs in a room. We were casually chatting about various things, and suddenly I just talked about my assignment marks, which were quite high despite me doing them at the last minute. Suddenly, Alicia told D that 'she must have gotten quite high marks because she was looking at pictures of you while doing her assignments'. I choked on my drink, and D just laughed =.= The End.

Dream #3:
I went back to my secondary school, and D was somehow with me. We were in one classroom together, when I had to attend a function in the school hall, and D was left in the classroom with some of my friends. D borrowed one of my erasers to do something. I was then stuck in the function for two hours, and when I came out, D had already disappeared. However, D put my eraser in a big brown paper bag and passed it to my friends to return it to me. The End.

Now, how much weirder can dreams be? And how many times can the same person appear in a dream? :O

A Fruitful Day Indeed

29 January 2011

I woke up feeling pretty nervous, as I was going to play in the Viola Day afternoon concert at St Gregory Centre at 2pm. The two songs I played were both Dvorak's, and the second one was a bit difficult (imagine alternating 4 and 7 flats and slides from 1st position to 5/6/7th).

Anyway, I think I did an okay job for both songs (at least I didn't screw up too much and sound like a banshee). My hands were shaking slightly when I was playing the first song - nerves got the better of me, but I settled down fairly quickly. And the second song, Dvorak's Quintet in E flat major was just fantastic (thanks to all the other 4 players of course).

I managed to get some pictures with my dear friends too!


And then, Alicia, Daniel and I went to town and we took more pictures (on Facebook).

After that, I went to Dyana's house and had bihun soup (rice vermicelli soup) with Ruzel, Teha, Hans, Mira and Seha. It was soooooo delicious and sooooo Malaysian~ We then went to ASDA and bought some groceries in preparation for Chinese New Year.

My arms then tired themselves out making a batch of cookies. They're called Melting Moments, as they supposedly melt in your mouth XD It's just cornflakes, raisins, sugar, butter and flour though :D


I'm gonna bake batches and batches of them and pack them in decorated containers for my friends before Wednesday!

Ruzel, Dyana and the gang baked a chocolate cheese cake too!


And I'm almost 50% done digitally painting a chrysanthemum for a virtual CNY card for my family and friends.

I'm surprised that I could do so much and feel so satisfied and fulfilled in a day.

All together, it was a really productive day indeed, and it makes me cherish my dear friends and family more as without them, I wouldn't have been able to do all these!

xxxx

Contemporary Music

I went to the International Composer Pyramid Finals at St Gregory's Centre in CCCU today (it was a competition to showcase the compositions of 12 young composers)

but frankly,

I can't understand it at all.

To me, it sounds as though all the composers had the same teacher as the style of the music is almost the same -- firstly and obviously, the melody does not follow the normal classical music structure, the notes and harmony are randomly organised (yeah, oxymoron intended) and there are loads and loads and loads of harmonics, high notes and running notes and all those stuff that is (sorry) quite unpleasant to the ear. To add to that, out of nowhere comes strange noises which make you feel as though you are in a metal jungle. The rhythm is also extremely inconsistent. In fact, I feel like it's just a whole bunch of notes with no time bars and you just play it whenever you should. There's no melodious sense at all - everything is just a bombardment of notes and sounds united by the conductor.

To be fair, I have not studied composition, and I know nil about contemporary music other than it is the product of this century (compared to Baroque and Classical and Romantic), so I probably can't tell the difference between songs No.1 and No.2. Besides, I haven't played any myself too, and that's probably why I can't appreciate it. To use an analogy by Philip, my partner in orchestra, it's like listening to a beautiful poem in a totally foreign language. It only shows its full beauty to the people who understand the language.

Not all is lost this night though. The 8th song I've heard had a very creative touch where rock drums were incorporated at the very end, which came as a pleasant surprise to everybody. Besides, this was the first time I've seen sounds and noises made on the violin in so many places.

However, if I, a music player feels this way about contemporary music, I would imagine that the public will feel about the same way too. And I don't get why contemporary music insists on being different. Once you insist too much, it becomes a priority, and it is different mainly for the sake of being different. To me, that spoils the whole essence of music really, as music should be a pattern of sounds instead of a jumble of noise and sounds and goodness knows what. I can even relax listening to Rachmaninoff, but after listening to contemporary music, all my muscles just tense up, and I feel like I'm going to have a nightmare tonight ;/

But then, I digress. Contemporary music might be just one elite culture that I can't ever get.

100th Post!

And My Heart Will Go On



and on, and on... :D

I Talk Too Much

Or rather, Malaysians talk too much.

When we first arrived in England, our lecturers told us, 'Go ahead and make friends with the locals. Don't be discouraged if you find that they're not as friendly as you hope, because British people are generally reserved and take some time to open up.'

That's true in some cases.

However, the lecturers forgot to mention that compared to British people, Malaysians talk a lot. In fact, I think we talk too much. And maybe it scares them a little. Or a lot.

In my case, since I'm a Gemini (yeah well, blame it on the horoscope), my mind works a little bit differently and in a conversation, I veer off in many different crazy directions that I forget what the conversation was originally about. And sometimes, I get so engrossed in talking I just go blabbering on and on and on and on and on and on. I once recounted one of my conversations to my friend, and she said 'If I were the person, I'd have punched you in the face for talking too much.' {=_=}

Still, there are people whom I enjoy talking to and who enjoy talking to me. And those conversations have a tendency to be punctuated with lots of laughter, which is good. I still have to remember though, about 85% of conversations in England, or at least in Canterbury, start off with 'Hey, you all right?'

In general, maybe I should learn to control the amount of things I say (well, people's minds work differently, and most of the time they can't catch up, or can't see the link).

On the other hand, this is actually good practice, as I'm going to be a teacher, and I need to talk a lot anyway. ;)

Ciao!

~Culture Shock in the UK~

It might seem a bit late for me to write about experiencing culture shock in the United Kingdoms now, since I've already been here for more than a month. However, it also means that I've already had enough time to settle down and observe the things here in Canterbury that's so different from what I'm used to in Malaysia.

1) Dry Toilets
All the toilets here are well-furnished with toilet papers and a good flushing system, but no WATER TAPS/HOSES!!! For us Malaysians who are *ahem* used to cleaning ourselves using our hands rather than the toilet paper, we had to take some time getting used to using the toilet paper (and slowly killing Mother Nature) instead.

2) Traffic and Rules
When the light flashes red in Canterbury, the drivers actually STOP. No, they don't see the yellow light and ram on their gas pedal to speed towards their destination. They slow down, and they stop for pedestrians to cross. Also, drivers give way at any zebra crossings if they see people waiting to cross the road. That's how courteous they are. In Malaysia, you are already risking your life by crossing even when the light is red, just because there will always be one or two motorists who can't wait for one single minute for their turn to move.

3) Recycling
The government, or rather the city council here places a lot of emphasis on recycling. All food packaging are labelled clearly whether they could be recycled, and the council sends workers to pick up recycled stuff once a fortnight. You can argue with me that Malaysia has the 3-coloured bins for recycling too, but frankly, we are still a long, long way behind.

4) Greetings
Somehow, I find the locals here a little 'on the surface'. Sure, they are friendly and everything, but somehow it doesn't go deeper than the surface. For example, when you meet them, they smile at you and say 'Hey, you all right?', but they do not actually wait for an answer. Somehow, I'm baffled as I always tend to answer the question. However, a little more than a month is too short of a time to gauge how friendly British people are, and things might change :D

5) Lack of Bolsters
Bolsters. Hugging pillows. Whatever you call them. No, I can't seem to find any in Canterbury. I miss having something long and soft to hug at night. Oh well, when I get a little richer, I'll try to get one from Ebay.

6) University Culture
Here, people address their lecturers by name, regardless of their position and qualifications. The lecturers treat us as mature adults, and there are not so many restrictions on whatever activities the students want to carry out. No paperwork, no invitation cards, none of the jiggly-wabbly-wasteoftimeandpaper-thingy all students have to go through when trying to organise anything in Malaysia. Now, this is what I call true democracy, and true support for learning.

Anyway, there's more, but these are the few main ones I can think of right now. Ciao!

~Happy Re-Birth Day, Me. 07.11.2010~

It started off as a practical joke...I changed my birthday on Facebook to the 7th of November just to see how many people will go 'Happy Birthday' on my wall XD

Not surprisingly, I received a lot of birthday wishes, some even from the people who've wished me on my real birthday - 3rd of June. That's really funny, and it shows how much people depend on Facebook these days to remember their friends' birthdays...but there were some who remembered though <3 And I can't really blame those who just added me recently either, since they probably don't pay attention to or won't remember birthdays :P

However, after the joke progressed and I read through all the birthday wishes, I felt as though it was really my birthday. Firstly it's because I didn't do much on my real birthday as I was in a camp (BTN) and there were no cakes or stuff. Secondly, it seems like a long time since I've been in Canterbury, and lots of things have happened. Next, birthdays are fun =)

At the same time, I've finally sorted out my feelings and thoughts. It didn't happen gradually - it was more like a flash since I discovered the way out. Before this, I would be dwelling over trivial things, such as other people's selfishness, bad ways, stupidity and such. Those things range from irritating me to making me angry to making me stew in solitude or disturb my emotions in general. Also, I tend to get obsessed over things that I cannot have, at least, not in the near future.

However, now, I've figured out (at least I hope I have) a way to work around these negative emotions. The principles are:

-Smile (and everything will be all right)
-Don't do upon others what you don't want done upon yourself
-When someone does bad things to you, it's not necessary that you should act the same way back
-Go with the flow
-When you can't get/do something, you can always get/do something else to replace it
-Loss of things, as long as they are not lives and your loved ones, are replaceable
-Money hoarded is not happiness
-Remember that not everyone is born with the same strengths and weaknesses as yours
-Don't be jealous of other people, as they might envy some things you have that they don't too
-Forgive and don't hold grudges
-Help people as much as possible without expecting anything in return

So, the 7th of November, 2010 is going to be marked as my REBIRTH DAY.

Let me gain the strength to close the chapter of the old, calculative, sensitive, lazy me, and begin a new chapter of an optimistic, happy, helpful and better me.

Keep on Going~

It doesn't matter if people do not like your music.


It doesn't matter if people do not like your wallpapers.


It doesn't matter if people do not like the things you write.
http://www.fanfiction.net/u/863421/

It doesn't matter if people do not like the things you say.


It doesn't matter if your first few attempts are rejected.

Coz' the important thing is -- you loved doing all those things. You feel happy. You're satisfied with what you've done. That's all that matters.

Ha. Hi. Hu. He. Ho. Manual.

Haha. Hihi. Huhu. Hehe. Hoho. Ahaha. Ehehe. Ohoho.

In case you haven't guessed, these are the 'words' most of us young adults, teenagers and kids use very frequently while typing in chats, texts, messages and stuff. Of course, there are more evolved types of unvoiced laughter such as 'kahkahkah', 'kuikuikui', 'muahaha', and the list goes on and on. However, this post shall only focus on silent laughter that has the letter 'h' as the first or second alphabet. Besides, I will endeavour to classify the emotions of the speaker while using any kind of laughter and also name the people who usually use that kind of laughter.

Now, this is my attempt to decipher what another person means when he/she is laughing on a chat box. Feel free to feel differently, as this is just a result of my perception + my experience of the words.

I shall start off with laughter that begins with 'h'.


Haha - the most conventional laughter. Most people sound like that when they are laughing (which means if you want to be unique, don't use this one). Use it to show happiness, joy and a little surprise. Since it's the most conventional one, it does not belong to a specific group of people.


Hehe - More often people say 'hehe' to show a sense of pride and self-satisfaction. Of course, you can also use it to hint 'serves you right', 'yeah, I'm awesome', 'smirk' and similar things. 'E' is a common vowel across many languages, so it's not strange to find people of all origins using 'hehehehe' too.


Hoho - Most commonly associated with the white-bearded, red-cap-wearing old man, or else known as Santa Claus. As the 'ho' sound needs relatively more air and energy to emit, usually people use 'hoho' when they want to show that their mouths are in an 'O' shape. If not, stick to 'haha' and 'hehe'.

interesting image, isn't it?

Hihi - The mouth stretches wide into a 'eee' position and the teeth is more clearly seen with this laugh. Usually used by cute people, cutesy people and people who try to be cute or cutesy. If you think you fall into any of the categories above, go for 'hihihihihi' and add a wink ;) or a smiley :D


Huhu - Used to show embarrassment or uncertainty. However, it's most common among Malays, Indonesians and the sort. Use it on people from other parts of the world and they will think you are going 'huh?' instead.

******
Then, there are types where you start with the vowel instead of 'h', such as...

Ahahaha - To portray 'Ah, I see + laughter'. Used to show comprehension. More commonly used by Italians (I noticed).

Ehehehe - To show a little bit of embarrassment and shyness. More commonly used by Japanese and Italians.

Ohohoho - Try saying it. Yes. Ohohoho. That's just plain evil, foxy laughter. Use this to show that you are scheming something (but if you are really scheming something, why show it? :o)

******

THE END

P.S: All images (c) their owners.

More on BadaBimBumBand

I can't start to explain why I like this band so much. Maybe it's because of the amazing choreography, maybe it's because of the creative way they strut their stuff, maybe it's the way they coordinate and cooperate to perform, maybe it's the way they arrange their music to be so vibrant and spirited, maybe it's the way they interact with the audience despite being able to speak little English, maybe it's the way they're all men in unitards dancing around in the streets...

:D

Anyway, I've found more videos in my camera on BadaBimBumBand (easier said than typed), so here goes -- just to share with my readers ~

P.S: All of them are around the Canterbury city centre, since I'm relatively new in Canterbury and only managed to figure out where 'Dane Johns Garden', the castle area and castles grounds after the whole affair xD

1.



2. Jumping and galloping around?



3. Marching through the town (I was stalking behind :P)



And lastly, a group photo I snapped ~



This is my new favourite band :D so I'm gonna keep an eye out for them whenever they have street shows in the future....for those interested, here's their facebook group page link:

BadaBimBumBand

Something Exciting in Canterbury (BadaBIMBUMBand?)

I've been in Canterbury for so long, and yet I haven't found something really exciting to post in my blog about -- I mean, you wouldn't be interested to see photos of my room, my kitchen and the substandard food I've been cooking for myself...if you'd understand what I mean :D

Anyway...I've finally encountered something that was quite out of the ordinary while taking a seemingly eventless walk to town to set up an appointment with HSBC.

So it happens that it was the Eurofair in Canterbury from the 24th to the 26th of September (for more details about the Eurofair click here)

While walking around town in the afternoon, my friends and I did not notice the hubbub in town as something unusual since it was a Friday. I bought some strawberries, tried on some trench coats and boots and made an appointment with HSBC to set up a bank account.

Suddenly, I got drawn to music playing somewhere around the center of the city, and my friends and I made our way towards it. I was then surprised to see about a dozen men, all dressed in white jackets and pants and shades playing some brass instruments.

Upon close inspection, I noticed that they were all saxophonists with the exception of two guys on the drums. The music was indeed great - harmonious and clear, but what made it even more awesome was the fact that they were dancing while playing, and the arrangement was so nearly flawless that I could only hear a few blowing mistakes here and there.

They had a good way of interacting with the audience too. In one particularly mischievous song which was the one before the last, they spread out and tried to intimidate the audience by going as close as possible to them. Of course, ladies squealed and men chuckled as they tried to avoid being in the way of this marching street band. After deciding that they have scared the onlookers enough, they made their way back into a straight line and composed themselves for the next song. Amazing choereography and idea, I must say.

Anyway, after their show I had the luck to get a photo with a few of the band members before it started to rain. Here's the photo...

and the video...

Cheers!


P.S: I might write more about my daily life in Canterbury and the differences between it and M'sia if I suddenly decide that it's not too boring to read :D

Just a short post about dickless bastards.

Image from Kenwooi.com

...about the inconsideration and selfishness of some individuals.

Place: KTM Kuala Lumpur Station
Date: 22nd August 2010
Time: Approximately 5pm

The KTM train recently launched a new system - they turned the middle coach into females-only coach.

So one fine day, after getting down from the bus, I went to the station to take the train back to KL Sentral so that I can go back to my college.

However, the first train that arrived was so crowded and many passengers were already waiting to board i.

Of course, there was a big scramble to get on the train first (imagine all the people in a Mega Sale with 80% off Burberry). I, being a female, made my way to the coach that says 'females only'.

The coach was tooooooooooooooo full to make way for my two bags. Okay, I can understand that. But, inside the coach, there were a few guys staring innocently outside, probably feeling an odd sense of satisfaction for being to get into the coach on time instead of having to wait for the next train. They even had the gall to smile indulgently at me when I had to hop out of the train to avoid being turned into minced meat by the sliding doors.

I just want to say...

Female-only coaches are FEMALE-ONLY coaches. Unless you suddenly sprouted a pair of boobs or got castrated or really had to hurry to take the expressway to hell or you are a lady disguised as a man...

You. Men. Are. Not. Supposed. To. Get. On. Female. Only. Coaches. You. Dickless. Bastards.

What does it mean to love your country?

A story about a mouse, a cat, a dog

and not forgetting...

the bird? o.o

Disclaimer: This story is not original, I merely adapted, translated and renovated it from a Chinese article I read on Sin Chew's Daily today (>_<)

Once upon a time, there was an old, old lady who lived alone in a cottage on top of the mountain. She was a kind, gentle soul who always feeds half of her meals to the animals around her. Besides, she showered the animals with compassion and love, and hence, the animals came to love her in return.

Among the animals closest to her were Bow the dog, Mew the cat, Chit the bird and Tippy the mouse. Every day without fail, Bow, Mew and Chit would flock around the old lady, waiting for her to feed them. And when she did so, they would express their gratitude - Bow by wagging his tail energetically, Mew by rubbing itself against the old lady's legs and Chit by fluttering and twittering around her. However, Tippy did not accept food from the old lady. Instead, it burrowed into the ground, found some plants or grubs or whatever and fed itself. Only after it is full, it will curl up silently by the old lady, waiting for time to pass.

Days passed, and the animals found out that the old lady's birthday was almost approaching. Of course, the most excited among all the animals were none other than the four. Enthusiastically, they went into the forest and started collecting flowers. Bow found some blue bluebells, Mew found some yellow daffodils while Chit found some red hibiscuses. The only odd one out was Tippy, who was burrowing for his food as usual.

"What an ungrateful soul you are, Tippy!" Bow growled at the mouse. "Yeah, we are here, all busy preparing a birthday present for our lovely old lady, but you're just being selfish and minding your own business!" Chit chirped angrily. "I really feel sorry for her...how would she feel if she knew that you don't appreciate what she did for you all this while," Mew purred, smiling nastily at Tippy.

Tippy heard the insults from the three animals, and it paused in its process of food gathering.

"Well, I am different from all of you. Although now I am not preparing a birthday gift for her, that doesn't mean that I'm ungrateful and selfish. Think of yourselves...every day she has to sacrifice half of her meals to feed you, and hence she goes hungry most of the time. On the other hand, I don't depend on her for my food, instead I hunt for them myself. To me, that is the best way to repay her kindness instead of fully depending on her, and showing your gratitude once a year with a flashy, lavish birthday present."

~-~-~

So guys and girls, loving our country doesn't just mean waving or hanging enormous national flags, singing patriotic songs, etc. Sometimes, being independent and resourceful and self-sufficient is the best you can do for your country, as opposed to taking it for granted and just using all the advantages available here.

But of course, contributing to your country will be an added bonus :D just like negative, neutral and positive, get what I mean?

The rollercoaster journey to UK Visa

So it happens that I'm going to CCCU soon, and so it happens that if I want to study in the UK for more than 6 months, I have to get a visa. Sounds simple, doesn't it?

Then, I found out a visa is not just a visa - it's made up of various documents, forms, some trivial and not-so-trivial stuff to be collected, photocopied, filled in and whatnot.

Lemme describe the excruciating process of getting a visa together with the rest of Da Demotivated Retards (Alicia, Daniel, Yuges, Banu and yours truly)...

1st step: Forms, forms and more forms
One would have thought that in order to get a visa, you have to fill in just the visa application form.

WRONG!

There are a total of 4 forms for visa alone, and another form for the supporting documents...
- Visa online application form (VAF9)
- PBS Tier 4 Appendix 8 for General Students
- CAS (a checklist for all the documents)
- Student survey

Before doing our visa, we have to get a Certificate of Good Conduct from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, so that's another form.

And we did the MAS Grads Card (which enables us to bring an extra 10kg luggage) too, making another form

2nd Step: Wasting paper, killing trees and destroying the environment
The forms are printed out. For all three applications, supporting documents are needed. Innocent papers are used to photocopy the originals and backup forms. That's all.

3rd Step: Journey around Kuala Lumpur
This was the most fun part. On the first day, we went to get our Grads Card and bank draft done. It was quite an easy process as we just needed to bring along RM 976 in cash to CIMB and some documents to the Enrich Centre. The whole process took about 3 hours and didn't cause any headaches at all.

It was a whole different story on the 2nd day. The schedule was to get a stamp and signature from a commissioner of oaths, then go to the MOFA to get our Cert. of Good Conduct. The commissioner was located in Damansara while MOFA was in Putrajaya. So, what did we do?

First, we woke up late, and gathered at 10am. Then, we took a taxi to Damansara and got our forms stamped. Had lunch at KFC while waiting for the uber-famous 'government lunch time' to pass and made a move to KL Sentral. From there, we took the ERL to Putrajaya Sentral and hopped on a bus towards MOFA. The whole trip took about 1 hour and when we arrived, we still had to wait for the doors to open at 2pm. The application process took another hour, and then we took the bus back to Putrajaya Sentral, and another bus back to KL Sentral. Except that we missed the stop and ended up in Pasar Seni, making an extra LRT station x) By the time we got back in IPBA, we were all so tired we could just curl up and sleep on the floor.

On the third day, we finally went to Ampang Park by LRT to submit our application at the UK visa centre at Wisma MCA. It wasn't so tiring as much as unnerving, as there were three security guards at the entrance, and we had to go through body scans and stuff. Comparatively, it was a simple process though, and took just a little more than an hour~

Step 4: Free for All
Yeah, after submitting the visa application, we are basically free to do anything we please. So then, see ya =)

False Alarm O-o (and I'm a No0B)

My trustworthy Dell laptop (Inspiron 1420) has so far given me minimal problems after two years of using it. The only beefs I have about it is that it's too heavy, not fast-performing enough and the Window Explorer problem.

Today, I switched on the laptop as usual and left it on the table while I went and tinkered some on my piano <3>"Interactive logon process initialization has failed. Please consult the event log for more details."

The first thing that came into my head was 'How the heck am I supposed to consult the event log when YOU won't even let me look at my FRICKING desktop!' (Of course, I didn't say this out loud ^^)

Then I started to panic. I've heard things like this happening to other people, but never me. I think my laptop is clean enough (at least I've never had to send it for repair before) and I use an antivirus, don't surf suspicious websites and all those, so I don't think there would be any major problems with it.

Anyway, my initial reaction was to shut down the laptop forcibly (i.e. by switching off the power source and pulling out the battery). Now that I think about it, that was incredibly stupid. It's just like showering halfway and having no water while shampoo and soap bubbles are still all over you, or watching a movie and having a power outage just before your favourite scene, or...well, you get the idea xD My point is, this is an idiotic, thoughtless thing to do, even to a lifeless laptop.

So, I turned on the wireless Internet in my house and surfed the Internet using my phone (bless the Nokia Xpress music 5800) for any tips to solve this problem. First thing I saw, I wasn't the only one who experienced this on my laptop. So, I went and dug out all the manuals and backup discs that came with my laptop just in case they could be in handy.

I read through what the other users did - restored the system, ran the computer on the DVD, reboot, whatever, blah blah...and I went O_O Someone help me ! I'm absolutely clueless on how to do all these x_X

Still, I mustered all my courage to gave it a try. I rebooted my laptop, missed the time where I was supposed to press 'F12' to go into a system, and was brought to the screen where it asked me whether I wanted to start Windows normally or in Safe Mode (prolly because I shut down the laptop forcibly xD).

To be safe, I chose the safe mode :P

Miraculously, I saw my desktop materialise on the screen with the title 'windows in safe mode', without a wallpaper and with extremely ugly graphics. I was so happy I could have kissed the laptop. So then, I ran System Restore and reverted all the updates back to the last point I updated the laptop.

Hopefully this will solve all the problems --> coz' now my laptop is functioning normally, but I don't have the foggiest idea how it would turn out the next time I power it on again.

Till then, adieu~ >_<"

P.S: I know I'm being a little over-dramatic, but my laptop is my love :D

Hypocrites...

-are those who say one thing and do another

-are those who say one thing and mean another

-are those who dresses like nuns yet behaves like prostitutes

-are those who preach religion yet commits heinous acts of sins

-are those who say 'never mind' yet indulge in back-stabbing their friends

-are those who say 'I'm sorry' and don't mean it

-are those who say 'Beauty is only skin deep' and spend hours on makeup

-are those who say their religion are the only true religion and their God the ultimate supreme whatever

-are those who say they believe in religion yet take part in all kinds of superstitions

-are those who pray only to absolve their sins

-are those who criticise others over things they secretly do themselves

-are those who advocate feminism yet gets offended when they're asked to do things guys do

-are those who advocate male chauvinism yet say 'ladies first' when confronted with things guys don't want to do

-are those attention-seekers who do things just to attract people's attention

-are those who wear headscarves yet do not cover their body parts they're supposed to

-are those who blindly imitate what their friends do just to 'fit in'

-are those who labels people with terms like 'nerd', 'geek', 'dumb blond' and so on

-are those who don't swear openly but curse non-stop in their mind for the sake of appearing 'civilised'

-are those who smile while plotting something evil

-are those who discriminate homosexuals just because they aren't one themselves

*and the list goes on forever So, I guess almost everyone is a hypocrite =)

And it's Canaan Online FTW!

Recently, I started playing Canaan Online.

How did I know about the game?
Through an MMORPG site - I was searching for a browser-based game, which means that I don't need to download heavy clients with high requirements that takes up space in my laptop.

A brief overview
Canaan Online is a RPG (role-playing game) in which you assume a character and do quests, have pets, form teams, join guilds and go on adventures. There are four classes - priest (I'm one), ranger, warrior and mage to choose from, each with their advantages. Frankly speaking, I had doubts about the game when I first started playing, as compared to some other games, this one comes across as being pretty easy.

However, once you reach level 30, things start getting complicated. One interesting, but hard thing about this game is that you can forge your own equipment, and depending on the quality of the materials you use, the equipment will be stronger or weaker. Besides, mages and priests share the same type of materials, while warriors and rangers use another type, so it's always good to make friends and exchange materials. Also, the quests start to become harder and harder, so friends are important to help you finish them easier and quicker.

Besides, there are also pets, not to play with, but to help you in battles. Depending on your character class, different pets can either heal you, fight along your side, increase your stats or add to your hp. The pets variety is huge too - almost all the monsters you fight in this game can be captured as pets. Like equipments, pets are divided into classes too, from normal, smart, genius, supreme to ultimate (need I say which is the best?)

Last but not least, there are many small but interesting details in the game, such as dressing up the characters, joining guilds and going into mazes, and marriage (which brings along lots of benefits ^^). Also, I believe that furniture, mounts (vehicles) and houses are becoming available soon.

Plus points
+ Canaan Online is free to play
+ It runs in a browser
+ The controls are easy
+ The graphics...while I won't say dazzling, but they are above average
+ You can level up your character by paying (in-game coins) and leaving your browser open

Minus points
- Sometimes it takes a long while to load the game
- System gifts cannot be traded
- Moving around is slow (but fast with mounts)

So yeah, I have been playing Canaan Online with every spare time I have. My name-in-game is Reicorleone and I'm married to Justinn (which explains my strange status update in Facebook) XD

~C'est moire~