Milkshake FTW!

Yee ha! In my last post, I mentioned that my band, Milkshake will take part in the Rhythm of the Champions in my college, ne? So, here I am with updates of the results and details of the competition~ (It's kinda late, I know)

Anyway, the competition was held on the 29th of April 2010 at IPG KBA's auditorium, from 2.30pm to 5.00pm. Apart from joining the competition, I was also the organiser of the competition -- multitasking is my middle name.

Well, to cut the story short, Milkshake came in 3rd place in the competition. Some might laugh at the results, as there were only 5 bands in total competing, but still, it was a pleasant surprise to all 5 of us.

The 2 songs we played were 'Seize the Day' by Avenged Sevenfold and 'Silly Lily' by Bunkface. As for the intro, we extracted a small part from Canon in D Rock. As we were all beginners at the instruments we were playing except for Alif, who has been playing the guitar for quite some time, everyone said that we were taking a huge risk by playing all difficult songs. Especially me, the lead guitar, who has to play the solo for all 3 songs. And let me tell you this, it's not easy...

Anyway, all of us were quite nervous as we were the last band to perform on stage on that day. I myself was so unfocused that I forgot to adjust my guitar strap properly, resulting in me having problems playing the high notes on the guitar (LOL). For all 3 songs, our tempo was faster than how we usually played during practice, and that made it harder for me to play my solo xD Also, during 'Seize the Day', our vocalist Alif wasn't in his best condition, and he hit the high notes EVEN higher =.="

Silly Lily was a good performance though. Although we went a little too fast too, but we were very active on stage, moving and jumping, and the vocalist for this song, Akmal, did a great job too. Besides, the audience loved the song and was well entertained~

Anyway, for our performance, I would say...
'Better aim high and miss, than aim low and hit'

Our song choices might be difficult, but we pulled it off pretty well.

This is US. Not Susu Kocak, but MILKSHAKE (our tagline xD)

From top left:
Abang Long Safwan (Bassist)
Yukina-Rei (Lead)
Akmal Hazimin (Rhythm/Vocal)

Bottom left:
Alif Aguero Alias (Vocal/Rhythm)
Syed Adiey (Drummer)

P/S: I will upload the video soon, once I get my hands on it :P

Heaven and Hell Against You?

For simplicity and to reduce annoyance, all references to people will be 'he' instead of 'he/she' or 'one' or so on. No gender specification - 'he' refers to humans in general =)

Self Pity - probably one of the most destructive emotions one could ever have.

According to the Collins Cobuild Dictionary 2006, self-pity is defined as a feeling of unhappiness that you have about yourself and your problems, especially when this is unnecessary or greatly exaggerated.

People come across problems all of the time. From kings to vagabonds, geniuses to dumb people, everyone encounters some obstacles at some point in their life. That is not a cause to whine and complain and expect sympathy from everyone else. This might sound selfish, but YOU are supposed to at least try to solve your problems before asking for help. That is why it's called YOUR problem, not MY problem or HIS problem or HER problem or THEIR problem.

Sure, acting like a damsel (or a male equivalent of that) in distress might seem cute initially. Still, after a while, most people get irritated and annoyed when you put on a sad, emo face and seek for comfort from them all the time. Do remember that some people will have their own problems, and they might not have the same tolerance other kind souls might show to you.

I'm sure everyone has their favourite activities and pastimes (hobbies, okay). So, compared to brooding and stewing and whining which get you nowhere, why not go indulge in something more beneficial for everyone?

Also, humans are individuals. Obviously, the choice of giving you sympathy and taking care of you is up to them - it is NEVER an obligation.

In brief- Do I look like I care, when I'm already burdened with so much of my own?

***

On a side note, my newly formed band Milkshake is going to enter a band competition at my college. I'm the *coughs* lead guitarist (who has been playing the guitar for only 3 months) o_O

Wow?

Buying A Violin...

Buying a violin is like getting married.

First, you have to pick out your possible partner, i.e. the violin. You scout for it at certain shops. Then, you wait for one that shouts 'love at first sight'.

Once you've got an eye for the violin you want, you start to consider the possibilities for you to be together. The most pressing matter to consider is whether you can afford the violin and its maintenance, parallel to whether you can afford to lavish your money on your newly found 'girlfriend' or 'boyfriend'.

In the process, you try out your compatibility with your violin - how can it adapt to you, how good you feel being with it, how you 'click' together and how you pair together to produce beautiful music.

After everything's done and you have decided on your violin (the financial factor plays a great part too), you can propose to your violin, get married and bring it back home.

However, that is not the end of the story.

After marriage, you have more maintenance to do. Buying accessories for it (like the bow, casing, rosin, shoulder-rest and stuff), change some of its' 'clothes' (bridge, strings, knobs, chin-rest...) and taking good care of it (wiping it after use, polishing it and more). If you don't do all that, your violin will get angry with you after a while, and it won't serve you any more.

Also, if you decide to 'play three sticks' with it and place your attention on another violin instead, chances are, if you ignore your violin for too long, it will get spoilt after a while too.

The only thing that makes violins better than a husband/wife is that if you change your mind and want to divorce your violin for another, you can easily do so without much complications. Beware of your finances though - a new violin will suck your money faster~

*all these came to mind when I found out that, in order to replace my violin strings with the same brand, I need to fish out RM198. It's like buying a new guitar =.="*

New Gadget in my Blog, New Things in My Life

Well, if you look to the right, you can see advertisements by Nuffnang on the gadgets bar. I didn't really place it there to earn money, just for decoration, but if you feel like clicking on it and help me earn some extra pocket money...well, I wouldn't say no ^^

Some brief updates in my life:

1) My sister's boyfriend - Eddie's eldest brother just passed away recently. Although I haven't met him before, I still felt sad for him and his family, especially for Eddie, who suddenly has to take on the responsibility of being the eldest son in the family. (This is particularly important in Chinese traditional families). May his brother's soul rest in peace, and may his family be strong enough to accept his fate.

2) I started to become addicted to Neopets once again. This, too, will come in another post - - note the word 'brief'.

This is my pet Wocky, with the funny name 'Foxy 211999'. Oh well, I adopted it when I was 13 years old ^_^"

3) I met my cousin Teng Hock last Wednesday afternoon. He treated me to Vietnamese food all the way in One Utama. I had the chance to sit in his white Honda Civic R-class, which he named 'Super White Rabbit' (LOL, you will know what I mean if you translate it to Chinese). To think of it, this was the first time I've met him in many months - I didn't even see him during Chinese New Year. However, it was quite a pleasant outing with him - it got me thinking, having relatives isn't so bad as I thought.

4) This is an effect from number 3 - I think it's time to get more acquainted with my relatives, especially those in my generation. At least, when we are grown up, we won't become estranged like what we see in family dramas.

***

By the way, a Polish plane to Russia crashed, bringing down the lives of Poland's President Lech Kaczynski, his wife and other senior political figures. Whether it's a pure accident or it's a conspiracy (from what I've read from BBC, Kaczynski is rather well-known for his right-wing governance) is yet to be known. Add to that the fact that the plane crashed in Russia, where they were going to visit a World War II memorial place. I was just wondering though, talking about placing all your eggs in a single basket, why would they travel together on the same plane in the first place? It's kinda...dangerous. However, Poland has to be strong (yet again - it's always these few words when dealing with deaths) and refrain from creating chaos even though they lost *I don't know how many percent* of their government in that plane crash.

Oh well, these days, nobody is too young to deal with death. So, everyone might as well accept the fact that people are going to die, anytime, anywhere, anyhow. The deal is to live your lives as happily as possible ^^

There's No Way to Fully Please a Woman...

A group of girlfriends is on vacation when they see a 5-story hotel with a sign that reads: "For Women Only." Since they are without their boyfriends and husbands, they decide to go in.

The bouncer, a very attractive guy, explains to them how it works. "We have 5 floors. Go up floor by floor, and once you find what you are looking for, you can stay there. It's easy to decide since each floor has a sign telling you what's inside."

So they start going up and on the first floor the sign reads: "All the men on this floor are short and plain." The friends laugh and without hesitation move on to the next floor.

The sign on the second floor reads: "All the men here are short and handsome." Still, this isn't good enough, so the friends continue on up.

They reach the third floor and the sign reads: "All the men here are tall and plain."

They still want to do better, and so, knowing there are still two floors left, they continued on up.

On the fourth floor, the sign is perfect: "All the men here are tall and handsome." The women get all excited and are going in when they realize that there is still one floor left. Wondering what they are missing, they head on up to the fifth floor.

There they find a sign that reads: "There are no men here. This floor was built only to prove that there is no way to please a woman."

I wonder how many of us womenfolk would walk up to the fifth floor? I know I would, just to satisfy my curiosity of whether it's the extreme handsome or extreme ugly waiting there :D

And yeah, there's no way to completely please a woman...that's what makes us women~

From http://www.helium.com/items/693485-jokes-blonde-jokes?page=4

Shocked. Seriously.

It's not my style to post the everyday stuff I see or hear in my life, but this was really shocking. Probably to some of you, it's something normal (I'm not going into a long post about culture, communication and more) but in Malaysia, especially in a teacher's training college, I did not expect such language to be used in public, and what's even worse - it's not just spoken, but shouted at someone else.

The first thing to remember is that being a senior does not automatically grant you the right to do anything you like. In fact, the more senior you are, the more matured you should be, and I assume that being so old, one would know that it is extremely rude and inappropriate to call another person a bitch, especially when she has done nothing wrong.

The story goes like this: (M is the nickname of the senior)
At the block 4 common room, three groups of people were having their discussions. Two came from the PPISMP TESL group who were probably talking about their choral speaking and activities during their English Camp, which will be held next week. For my group, I was involved in the story telling during English week, which will be held the week after. Of course, having so many people in a small, closed space, we could hardly hear ourselves talking. Still, it's possible to move closer to each other in order to hear them speak.

Suddenly, in the midst of chastising us for being late (yeah, it's our fault for being late, but that's not the main point), M suddenly yelled 'Can all of you SHUT UP and do your discussion quietly?' Someone from the choral speaking group spoke up, albeit less loudly, 'You shut up too.'

Then M lost control and started shouting, 'You SHUT UP, BITCH!' That was the most shocking part of the whole incident. I mean, if you want to argue, fine, but if you start to degrade other people by calling names, you are just showing how low you are. I guess the rest of the juniors were just as equally surprised, as they kept quiet and whispered among them after that.

M then continued, 'I'm very angry now...so you all better keep quiet, blah blah' (the rest of my memory is blurred). And then I start to wonder.

1. The common room is a place for everyone to use, and unless you have officially booked it, everyone should be allowed to make noise or do whatever in it.

2. If you really require somewhere more conducive for a meeting, the logical thing to do would be for the smallest group to move somewhere else (we were the smallest group there) since it would be easier for us to find a place.

3. The junior was not wrong to ask you to shut up, since you started the rudeness, and she just gave an eye for an eye.

4. (As posted in my FB) 'bitch' not only means a woman who behaves in a very unpleasant way, but it also means 'female dog'. In this case, I think M fulfilled the criteria better, judging by the way she acted.

5. What's the point of the sentence 'I'm very angry...' Should other people even care that you are angry when you behave this way? And I place this statement under childishness, if one thinks that other people should comply with them just because they are angry. Besides, being angry does not give you the right to let someone else be the brunt of your anger.

6. It wouldn't have sounded so harsh if you spoke to her in a common tone. Did you really have to shout something so rude? I wouldn't have qualms using these words in a joking tone too.

Probably the words 'shut up' and 'bitch' are very commonly used overseas, and this M picked up the habit of using them. However, to cite a Malay idiom 'masuk kandang lembu menglembu, masuk kandang kambing mengembek' (it means one should learn to adapt to the culture wherever they go). If you want to behave so outspokenly and straightforward in a culture that accepts it, fine. But once you come back to Malaysia, it would do you well to remember 'budi bahasa budaya kita', that we want to encourage and nurture good manners and etiquette among the people we are teaching. No use being a hypocrite, acting all cute and good in front of the children; and throwing it all to the wind behind them.

And here, we are not talking about a positive culture such as a foreign accent, cleanliness, free thinking and stuff, we are talking about something offensive, which would be considered rude in a Malaysian context. Even on internet forums where nobody actually sees or hears you, I've been trained not to 'talk' that way. If that is what one brings back from overseas, then what is the point of going overseas?

I've ranted too much in this post. I just hope that this post will be a reminder for me to stay true to my roots and remember how to absorb good values and stay away from bad ones, since I will be going overseas in a few months time.

Till then, adios!

P.S: This post is not meant to be offensive to any party. I'm just recounting the events that happened and stating my point of view on them.

^_^

Just a Random Update

ULTIMATE LAG!!!

This post is more for the sake of my friends at Animepaper, although I doubt if anyone from there reads my blog except for Misao-chan and Bo-chan, lol.

Anyway, upon logging in to AP, the first thing I noticed was that my last wallpaper was 6 months and 2 weeks ago ^_^" Actually, I still have a whole folder of WIPs (wallpapers in progress) which I work on...occasionally.

Then, I went to the main page and saw that my AP friends uploaded a load of awesome wallpapers, and also some of which scans are the same as those in my WIP folder. To be exact, my most recent 'Thumbelina' wallpaper was the only one I've made since I was promoted to the senior member status on AP...I should be demoted to community waller =.=" Of course, I tried to set deadlines and wanted to make wallpapers for Chinese New Year, Valentine's Day and the Chinese Valentine Day, which failed miserably xDD

To tell the truth, my life is not that busy to the extent that I don't have time to make wallpapers. Rather, I fill my free time doing other stuff now than sitting in front of my laptop with my tablet xD My newly found favorite activity is badminton, and when I'm in college, I usually go to the court on weekdays from 5pm, and 'lepak' there until around 8pm. After that, with a shower and dinner, it would already be around 9.30 pm. Sometimes, MUSICA has drum, guitar or piano classes at night from 9-10pm, and there goes another hour of my time. As for weekends, I'm usually busy trying to complete assignments at the last minute, so there you go. If not, I usually sleep and wake up late, either lurking around the Net or playing games on my laptop~


Anyway, this is one of my most recent WIPs which I managed to gather the energy to 'try to complete' this holidays. Everything is painted except for the girl who is vectored, and I will edit some parts of the ocean to make it look, well, more like an ocean. I will try to submit this in time for a friend's birthday on AP ^^

Any comments, anyone? And any ideas on how to motivate myself in completing more wallpapers from that junk of a folder I named WIP?

=p

What is a Blog?

It's just something random that popped up in my mind.

Some people use their blogs as a place to rant, rave and express all their negative emotions (i.e. ke-tidakpuashati-an)...

Some people use their blogs as a diary, making known to the virtual world what they've done in the past few days.

Some people use their blogs to write about interesting stuff they have come across, and usually these posts are peppered with a lot of photos (either self-taken or copied from another website)

Also, there are 'otakus' (the term here is non-derogatory, in fact it's more of an admiring tone) who post reviews of anime, songs, movies, games and more so that people can read them and decide whether to get the CD/DVD they have been eyeing for some time~

Well, I don't have a tracking device that counts how many visitors who have visited my blog, nor do I know where my readers come from ^_^ The only way I can find out is when they leave a comment on my post or shout in my chatbox. Still, I try to keep my blog as non-offensive as possible, and I also try to make sure that it can be understood by people from all around the world --> it means using standardised English or providing translation for local slang we commonly use.

And if anyone has noticed one of my status updates in Facebook, it says:

It's 'DO you agree', not 'ARE you agree'. And it's 'MU might LOSE the match tonight ', not 'MU might LOOSE the match tonight'. 'YOU'RE sexy', not 'YOUR sexy'. =.="

Those are just some of the common errors in English that bug me ^^ That, and spelling errors too.

P.S: I'm currently reading 'The Lost Symbol' by Dan Brown. It's an addictive read, and I can't help but be fascinated by all the symbols, myths and legends contained in the story. For one, it proves that the writer respects his readers and makes the effort to research deep and seriously into what he's writing =)

P.S. 2: My blog would be a combination of those mentioned above, no?

Logo Making, Card Design and other Graphic Design Service Available

As the title suggests, I'm currently offering my services for graphic design - if you need someone to create logos, wallpapers, photo frames, name cards, invitation cards, posters and such, you might wanna get in touch with me =) *actually, I'm just bored and don't know what to do with my spare time*

Some examples of my work:

Logos

PISMP Cohort 3 Logo Sample 1 (Done on request)

PISMP Cohort 3 Logo Sample 2 (This was chosen as the majority favourite)

PISMP Cohort 3 Logo Sample 3 (My personal favourite, but it's too complicated)

IPBA Futsal Club logo (Done on request, incorporated into name cards)

The 3 Missed Calls band logo (incorporated into name cards too)

Bookmarks

Bookmark for C2C3's The Merchant of Venice play fund raising

Bookmark for C2C3's The Merchant of Venice play fund raising

Couple bookmarks - can be separated or kept as one whole piece =)

Couple bookmarks - can be separated or kept as one whole piece

Simple floral-themed bookmark

Name Cards

MUSICA's official name card

IPBA FC name card

3 Missed Calls name card (Just for fun)

Photo frames and calendars

2010 Calendar (pocket size)

2010 Calendar (4R size)

Photo frame *integrated into photo* (just a random photo snapped after our performance)

The above are not all of my works yet. If you are interested, get into contact with me and I will show you the rest of my completed works or incomplete projects ^_^

By the way, if you are interested in my anime/manga graphic works (which uses images from copyrighted anime/manga - visit my Animepaper account at http://yukina-rei.animepaper.net

Stupidity and Childishness

I felt remorse when I accidentally stepped on a caterpillar on my way back from Ali Cafe; but I won't feel any guilt if the moron committed suicide in front of me. Yes, that's how despicable the lecturer is.

MUSICA's launching on 4th March had been a great success despite the many obstacles we faced, including lack of equipment, time constraints and stuff. The time constraint is understandable, since the launching is combined with the Watikah Pelantikan MPP and the launching of the Citra Guru project. However, the lack of equipment should not happen.

First, the performances held by MUSICA consists of two songs from the choir 'Voices of MUSICA' and another song combining the choir and the band 3 Missed Calls. To put up a good show, we need a piano, decent amplifiers and a drum set. Well, we have small amplifiers and a drum set, so to give and take, we just requested for the Clavinova from the Tuan Syed a.k.a. the music lecturer holding the keys to the music room in the Administration Block. However, he was full with moronic, idiotic excuses.

Stupid excuse #1: You are not holding a concert - why should I lend you the instruments?
We are holding a concert dummy. It's held in the main hall, and we are performing. Though I doubt that even if we are holding a real concert you would lend us the instruments anyway.

Stupid excuse #2: You have your own piano, why should I lend you mine?
The one Musica has is called a KEYBOARD, not a PIANO. For choir, we are supposed to accompany the singing with a piano. And you call yourself a music lecturer.

Stupid excuse #3: I'm not the advisor for Musica, so go and ask Mdm Khalijah for the instruments.
We actually invited you to be the advisor for Musica, but you declined. Then, you fully well know that you are hogging the music room and won't let any other lecturers touch the instruments. Well, maybe young, pretty, female lecturers can, but not your rival music lecturer who is more popular with the students.

Having no choice, in the end we addressed a letter to Dr Sofi (the director of IPG KBA) himself, officially requesting to borrow the instruments from Tn Syed. It was nice to know that Dr Sofi approved the request straight away - at least it shows that he supports Musica. However, you wanna know what the idiot did?

He disappeared for the whole morning until the event was over. Since the idiot had no mobile phone, he was virtually unreachable, and even though the lecturers were searching for him all over the college, they couldn't find him. Coward.

In the end, we settled for the smaller and softer Yamaha keyboard, but at least it's better than the Casio keyboard with no touch volume function ^_^ And everyone praised the Musica performance too~

Let me end this with two rhetorical questions...

1.If we could achieve this level with substandard equipment, imagine what we can do with proper equipments?

2.Why does he monopolise the room when he doesn't own anything in it, and what right does he have to deny us the instruments when we already have approval from the director himself?