Thing turns out better if we less expecting it to be?

30 NOV 2008: It was a lovely Sunday where I've spent another whole day with family. I do noticed that I've been spending less time with family lately especially on weekend due to some personal stuff, and I do felt sorry about it. Being together with them during these 2 days made me realized how important are they to me, and how much joy I've been missing for the past few weeks. Guess I'm another family man...:)

Anyway, we went to A Yat Abalone restaurant in Avenue K for dim sum breakfast. Frankly speaking, I didn't really expect the dim sum to be good as dim sum isn't their specialty by looking at the restaurant's name itself. However, it turned out to be so good that dim sum was fantastic and fresh with good services given by the waitress. Hence, I couldn't help but wonder whether thing normally turns out better if we less expecting it to be? There were times where I had very bad disappointments when I put too much expectation on something that ended with disasters. But a friend of mine used to tell me, life without expectation is like a sea without wave...we ain't go anywhere.

Anyhow, the breakfast cost us a bomb, but it was priceless to be together with someone we love.



We hopped over to KLCC after the breakfast for some foot exercises. There's a gigantic nicely decorated Christmas tree at the Center Court of KLCC, which has attracted huge amount of tourists for photography. And I did take some photos for sure. This is the biggest Christmas tree I've seen so far for this year. Do you know anywhere with bigger Christmas tree?

Gloria VS Alex

29 Nov 2008: I have no idea what I've been busy with for the past whole week until I have no time to update my blog. I tried to recall, but nothing significant happened. Yet another week has just gone. Early Saturday morning, I went to 1U for shopping with family after our breakfast at Cheras. Spent almost a whole day there (10am - 4pm) but end up bought nothing. Initially I thought the so called Malaysia Year-End sales were supposed to start today, but I couldn't see much sales going on. What a disappointment I should say.



Finally I've got a full collection of Madagascar headgears. I’ve been gone through mountains and rivers to get the last 2 headgears. The stories started with Alex that on the last selling day of the headgear (26 Nov), I went for lunch with colleague at nearby McD purposely to get it. But the journey ended up with disappointment that the headgear was sold out. It is fine I was thinking as I will go PJ at the end of the day that I can try my luck again.

So we went to McD in SS2 after dinner but yet another disappointment happened that it was sold out as well. Damn, is it really that tough to get this Alex? With such a sorrow that I probably wouldn’t have a full collections, I suddenly saw someone look-alike Mr. Anton. Therefore I dropped him a call to verify it but ended up it was another mistake. I shared with him about my poor situation that he said will try to get it for me around his area, and he really did get it. Really thankful to Mr. Anton for his help, or else I couldn't have such a camwhoring opportunity with these Madagascar headgears again...Hehe.

3D2N Pusing/Ipoh Trip

21 Nov 2008: I worked from home today as I knew that I have to drive off from home at 4pm. I was the driver of this trip accompanied by 3 other passengers. We started our journey to the North at around 5pm from Kota Damansara and reached Pusing at around 8pm with a stop in between for toilet and snacks. After several calls with the groom and some wrong turnings around Ipoh, we finally reached Pusing. We waited by the road side where groom drove out to guide us to his house. Lovely and quiet housing area it was. Bachelor night was nice with a lot of relatives (Well, really a LOT) and good food but most importantly was the company itself. Groom has rented a double-storey house nearby specifically for us, which was a very clean and comfortable house.

22 Nov 2008: Woke up at 9am for simple breakfast at groom's house. Since they didn't serve coffee, we drove out for another round of drink and some morning look-around. The town was totally different from the night before, with a lot stalls and coffee shops operating at daytime. Started our journey to bride's house at 11am where it took us almost 4o minutes of drive. As usual, played some games prepared that weren't tough enough for us, I should say. As we supposed to follow the groom back to his house, but we didn't that we drove to Ipoh old town for white coffee and chee cheong fun. I just love the food in Ipoh. Will definitely come back again someday.

Went back to Pusing at 4pm and had some rest before drove out to the restaurant at 6:30pm. Reached the restaurant at 7pm and found out that most of the guests were there. Seems that people in small town has better punctuality than those living in city. I was very hungry, but still I've taken a opportunity to snap some photos around. Dinner officially started at 8pm and the foods served were simple but tasted very good.

It was a wedding reception that supposingly groom should've got drunk, but he didn't. Hence, we proceeded with a 2nd round of drink at groom's house after dinner until 2am. All of us were happy finally as we’ve finished all 11 bottles of brandy and seeing a drunken groom.

23 Nov 2008: Woke up pretty late (9am) as we stayed until pretty late the night before. We went to Ipoh town for their famous dim sum breakfast and apparently Ipoh bean sprouts/chicken an hour later after dim sum. Drove back to KL with a heavy stomach and reached home at 3pm.

Basically, it was a tiring but happy 3D2N trip. I really enjoyed the company of those close friends as we could rarely get a time for outing all-together. Besides, we’ve got to know some new friends who are so fantastic and playful. Hope to catch up with them again someday in KL.

Anyhow, how was your weekend? Hope you had a wonderful weekend. :)

Smoking habits in Czech Republic

20 Nov 2008: My Company has a development center in Prague, Czech Republic where some of my colleagues were so lucky enough to be sent there for training. While some of them (Czech) were here as well (My lady boss was here early of the year and we had a wonderful week together). From my observation, most of them are smokers where it wasn’t a surprise for me as smokers are just everywhere. I believe you can simply find one by looking around you. You can even smell or kiss them (If they are good looking) to verify it, just if you want to go further.

Speaking about Prague, I’ve got a gift from Mr. D who was back from Prague few weeks ago. Guess what, it’s a match-box containing matches of course (What else to put inside there? No more lizard please). Nothing spectacular about the match-box but I’ve received quite a similar thing from another colleague of mine (Ms. E) a year back. I couldn’t help but wonder whether match-box is the best gift they could ever get from the country itself. I’ve been looking around the Internet to justify this and found out that around 30-40% of adult there are smokers and smoking caused a total of 18,000 deaths in a year. Aw, this could be a very sad statistic at least for me though I’m not the citizen of the country itself. The curious me was wondering whether their government has done some GOOD actions to reduce the amount of smokers. Maybe they can learn from us by keep increasing the price of cigarettes and start printing some photos and warning on the box itself. Can anyone tell me whether this helps? Looked around again, yet I still saw some peoples smoking out there.

Time really flies that it’s Thursday today, without much realizing it. I’ll be heading to Ipoh tomorrow late noon. Guess I won’t have time to update this over the next few days. I’m gonna miss every one of you and hell ya, I will snap some photos there to be shared here. Take care and enjoy your weekend!!!

Can a car hit a flying bird?

19 Nov 2008: You know what, I always envy of bird as they can fly around so freely around the sky without having to go through any accident unless there's an air crash with airplane that could rarely happens. Not until today that my team mate came to office with a shoe box on her hand. As she appeared out of sudden beside of me with that box and asked me to guess what was inside there, I was seriously kind of freaked out as I worried it was a lizard in there (Yeah, I just don't really like lizard). Apparently, it was a bird, which was hit by her car. Wow, how fast she drove to hit this flying bird I was thinking. Guys, never ever look down on those lady drivers. :)

Anyway, that was really kind-hearted of her to bring the bird back. The bird looked so calm that one of his leg was broken. My team mate planned to bring him for medical check-up. She is such a lovely lady I was thinking. The funny thing was that they left a note on top of the box during lunch time that reads "DO NOT OPEN!! INJURED BIRD INSIDE", which I've made a good laugh on it.

Considering that the bird might need some loves, and since I have lots to offer...please accept a kiss from this little brother.

Coffee drinking with Alex, Marty, Melman & Gloria

15 Nov 2008: Received a call from Mr. I while driving back home to meet up at McD, where I said yes without think twice. Since the McD is located nearby my house, I reached earlier and got myself a cup of coffee (Caffeine at 11pm, not bad huh). A cup of black coffee (with 2 teaspoons of sugar and without creamer) was enough to make me feel so good. What made me happier was that I've got a company from Alex, Marty, Melman and Gloria.

Mr. I arrived after 15 minutes and gave me this red bomb. Therefore, I have to drive up to Ipoh next weekend for the wedding dinner. Any recommendation for food and "fun" in Ipoh?

Being a silly Marty

13 Nov 2008: Went for lunch at Alamanda with colleagues as one of them wanted to buy the Madagascar headgear for her daughter (She wants to collect 4 of them). Since they started selling headgear of new character (Marty) today, I therefore bought one as well.

Marty, the funny zebra in Madagascar. In the first movie, Marty was the one who suggested them to go back to the wild that city wasn't their real home. A real silly him to come out with such idea but I do admire him a lot. How many of us really dare to make such dramatic changes and willing to bear all the consequences? Being in the place that you hardly know whether you can survive is definitely a huge challenge. Would you take such challenges in your life?

James Bond : Next Generation

Just a little quiz here:

Who is the next generation of James Bond?

Tips:

1) He has sexy eyes, just like his father does.
2) He enjoys being naked too.
3) He doesn't like alcoholic drinks.

The answer is:



He might be too old (58 yrs old) as the son of James Bond. Perhaps father?

Santa Claus is coming to town

8 Nov 2008: Drove to Pandan Indah for spicy pan mee with Meg and proceeded to Pavilion after lunch (Sounded like I'm a frequent visitor there). Without any motive, we just walked around and surprisingly that we saw some human statues in front of Tangs. It had attracted quite a lot shoppers and even caused some human traffic. I was thinking that it's not an easy task to attract customers nowadays that they have to do use such a marketing strategy. However, those models are very good looking bunch of peoples :).

Before our stomach was able to digest the lunch taken, we went to Izzi for dinner where we've ordered quite a lot of food that cost us RM60++. I wasn’t felt so good during the dinner as I could felt a minor sore within my throat, which I normally ignore it until it gets worse.



9 Nov 2008: As expected, my sore throat is getting worse after a night of sleep. On top of that, I’m having flu and cough. Ah...after so many frequent but short visits of my best friend (flu), I think he's planning to stay longer this time around. Anyway, I went to a nearby Jusco with family for some groceries shopping and saw some Christmas decorations around the mall. Even though I'm not Christian, I do like these kind of Christmas decorations very much especially the Christmas tree...love the colors.

I and a group of my friends have an annual tradition to go for a dinner together during Christmas Eve, which had never failed for the past few years. As far as I'm remembered, 2005 and 2006 were at The Ship (Uptown) while last year was at Tony Romas (The Curve). The dinner normally cost us a bomb but we're trying to keep this tradition every year and hopefully for years to come. It's always not easy to get some friends that we could get along very well with and I'm very glad that I'm having few of them.



P/S: By the time writing this blog entry, I was stuffing my running nose with some tissue papers so that I wouldn't wet the floor. Hopefully after a nice sleep, it will get better.

I Like to Move It, Move It

7 NOV 2008: After 2 days of compassionate leave, today was my first day back to office. Everything remain unchanged...my cube, desktop pc, coffee cup etc still located at the place where they used to be. It was another usual "lazy" Friday where I went off a little earlier than usual from office heading to Loreal warehouse sales at Jaya33. The crowd wasn't as bad as expected that I still managed to walk for few rounds and bought some skin care products. They have quite a number of brands there included Biotherm, Lancome etc. and the products sold are kind of cheap comparing with normal price. We (My sister and I) didn't spend too much time there in order to avoid heavy traffic on the way back home.



After taken shower, I went for dinner with dad and sister at McD. It has been so long since the last time we had fast food together as my dad isn't a fast food person. The childish me bought a Madagascar headgear (It's Melman until 12th Nov) for RM5.90 and had a wonderful self-enjoyable moment with it (Meg called this camwhoring..hehe).

She gave up finally...

4 NOV 2008: After years of fighting with her sickness, my grandma finally gave up this morning. She has left us permanently, but every part of her will remain in our memories forever.

And I noticed that I don't have any photo taken together with her alone :(

New haircut and candid shots with nephew & niece

3 Nov 2008: Drove all the way from Cyberjaya to Kuchai Lama for my monthly haircut. This is the outcome after an hour in the hair salon. What do you think?

My lovely nephew and niece were around when I came back home after the haircut. Therefore, I just took a quick dinner and snapped some candid shots with them. My nephew is always that energetic and playful and his sister is following in his footsteps :). Guess I won't be able to handle both of them together in the near future.

Wedding Marathon

1 Nov 2008: I’ve received 5 wedding invitations for the month of November till January 2009, where the very 1st of them was held on last weekend. No more unexpected invitation for me hopefully. Speaking about the wedding ceremony last weekend, the groom is my ex-colleague cum close buddy of mine. He is the youngest among few of us where we used to tease him a lot, as he was so desperate of getting a girl friend. And now, he’s the one who tied the knot earliest among us that I’m really proud and happy for him.

Well, never ever ask when would be my turn as this could be the toughest question that I’ve never thought of. Sometimes, I just think that I’m not the marriage type of person…I’m just too used to be single.

As I was one of the chosen “Heng Tai (Brothers)”, I woke up at 6am as I've to reach the groom’s house in Kota Kemuning at 7:30am for some preparations and breakfast. Pink was the theme where all of us have to dress in “PINK” (I felt like a pink panther). At 8:30am sharp, we drove off from his house to USJ to pick up the bride. Couldn’t avoid some games prepared by those sisters that involved some push up, tasty food and drink, singing etc. Generally, it wasn’t so tough but fun. Thanks Angie and Lai for their kindness of not gave us a tough time. Back to groom’s house for some tea-drinking ceremony before we called off for the day at around 2pm.



While on my way back home, I received a SMS from Meg asking for dinner at Sunway Pyramid. I accepted her invitation where I joined her and Mr. Lee for dinner at Italiannes Sunway Pyramid right after I went back home for shower. Always enjoy their company.

2 Nov 2008: It was time for the wedding dinner. In order to save petrol and tol fare, we've decided to car pool to the Subang Imperial China restaurant. Therefore, I drove to Chak's house with my dress-up after taken 2 hours of noon-nap (Went for Terry Fox run ealier in the morning). We reached the restaurant at 6pm to help on some preparation before the dinner started at 8:20pm. It was an 8-course dinner set where the food was just average. However, it was fine for me as I was walking around most of the time for “Yam Seng (Toast)” with his friends and relatives. Guess that’s the purpose of being a “Heng Tai” to make sure the groom won’t get drunk before the dinner ends. It took me around 5 hours in the restaurant itself before we had our brotherhood’s toast with the groom and back home to hit the sack.

However, it’s kind of bothering me on the real purpose of wedding dinner nowadays. Would it be a sharing of joy and happiness? Or is it just a ceremony to show the engagement? And does it really necessary?

Anyway, I’m truly wishing YF and Eunice a happily ever after married life. You really made it my buddy. :)

Terry Fox Run 2008

2 Nov 2008: This is a once a year event where I have to get my ass off the bed at 5:30am. After done with all those morning routines, I drove all the way to Lake Garden where I have picked up my buddies at Bandar Kinrara and Taman Desa along the way. Looking out through my car’s window, this is a lovely morning I was thinking. I can feel the chilling fresh air running through my face, making me sneeze occasionally. I couldn’t remember clearly the last time I woke up and drove out at this kind of hour, perhaps was 5 months back during the Cameron trip?

Due to the smooth traffic, we reached Lake Garden 5 minutes before 7am. However, guess it wasn’t early enough that the nearest car park was already full. This gave us no choice but to go for 2nd nearest car park where we have to walk for around 1km before reaching the starting point. Perhaps we were kind of too early that the crowd wasn’t there yet. While waiting for some other friend to reach, we took our breakfast as banana and mineral water were provided. Apparently, the place started to fill up with fellow participants at 8am++. The host of the event was Yasmin Yusoff where she has given some speech and led the warm up exercise before the run started at 9:15am.



It was a fun walk and run of 3.5km where I’ve started with walk for the first few hundred meters due to heavy human traffic. It took me less than 30 minutes to finish the run before I could enjoy some free food again where I’ve taken some muffins, curry puff, and Milo this time around. I felt good every time I finished a run that I could feel myself a few kilograms lighter. Unfortunately, my group of friends is so into food that they’ll normally go for heavy meal after the run. It takes less than an hour to wash away all the effort, perhaps gaining more than that. Maybe I shouldn’t join them for food next time around, should I? But good food, how could I resist it?