Time Elapsed

:p sudah lama aku tak ber-blog. Sorry! Merry Christmas, Happy New year, Happy Chinese New Year, Happy Valentine’s day and all that shiz.

Edinburgh is still lovely, and less cold than when it was in winter. Nothing beats my experience in a Canadian winter, though. Haven’t even used the winter jacket I brought over–it’s now dumped into storage in the living-room closet.

My punter & I on the river Cam! He wasn't too happy about looking unglam in the life jacket.

I’ve been travelling a LOT. I went to Cambridge to visit a friend, and was awed by the 36 different colleges and how they fit together as the University of Cambridge… It’s a very pretty and quaint town, and punting on the river Cam was cold but fun. :) We also went to a beautiful orchard in Grantchester–which was, unfortunately, quite dead at this time of the year! I’ll be back in summer to have tea there again.

Portree harbour, Isle of Skye!

The flatmates and I went on a crazy impromptu roadtrip to the Isle of Skye! :D We saw highland cows, heaps of sheep, waterfalls, cliffs, rolling hills, countless lochs… Photos are on fb. Apart from that, it is a year of musicals… Since coming to Edin, I’ve watched this Glee tribute show, The Secret Garden, HAIRSPRAY!!!!, Annie, and am going to watch Fiddler on the Roof today, as well as Footloose tomorrow :)) Excitement excitement!!

Steph & I strutting the scrubs. Yeah, I'm having stress zits on my chin.

Have gone through my gastrointestinal and locomotor rotations and emerged (somewhat) unscathed! Hallelujah and praise God for the results I managed to get :) Still need to work on my clinical skills, but at least my theory is solid enough. Currently on my cardiovascular rotation, which is quite fun. :) Have an AMAZING professor guiding us (not that my previous two weren’t equally amazing).

Daniel and I were fairly amused that one of the cardio consultants we shadowed for an evening still games (WoW, Doom, etc)… FULLY INSPIRING. :) That has made up my mind to purchase Starcraft II after my cardio exam on the 11th of March.

My Valentine's surprise! :) a hand-made pendant, from old silver rings.

I had a good Valentine’s day :) received stuff that made me smile in the post, and had a nice long skype call.

Not much else to say, apart from the fact that I’m finally fitting into church and cell and whatnot… a year of new ventures! Instead of singing on the worship team, I am playing the keyboard (albeit somewhat badly). Everyone is very nice and forgiving :p

Till next time! xx

Happy Tiger New Year!

New year brings with it new things–some expected, some unexpected. 

Hope it’s been a fruitful ang-pau collecting period for all unmarrieds, and a very cheerful giving season for the marrieds. 

And I hope none of you stinged on loved ones just because Valentine’s day happened to fall on day one of the new year… Shame on you if you did! :p

CNY ’09 : Moo-ness, Money, Music & Mingling

Now that CNY is fully over, as promised, here is my massive catchup post about Chinese New Year and the wonderful times I’ve had so far. Unfortunately, the holidays are over, and it’s back to CVS and reality…

I’m having problems with posting pictures in wordpress, so there will be none here…

This year was more relaxed than the last, but we visited a lot of houses! A typical CNY for me would have the first three days filled up with visiting relatives (and collecting the redly-packaged blessings, hehe).

First day saw me decked out in a white cheongsam with blue trimmings–it’s actually one of mum’s new cheongsams, but she let me have it. Thanks mum! Second day, I wore my mum’s dress (the same one she wore to the marriage registry yeaaaaars ago). Third day was a new beachy dress I picked up from Monizal, a boutique in Amcorp Mall. It’s awesome being the same size and height as your mum, haha.

I made it a point to take as many pictures of the festivities and fellowship at the different houses this year, because when I looked back at last year’s CNY pics, they were few and far in between. No vibrancy, no energy, no stories hidden within them. SO this year, I have many many more candids, and I rallied more family to take photos together. :) We also visited my mum’s side of the extended family tree for the first time–my maternal grandfather’s sister-in-law, who lives in Kundang, which is on the way to Rawang. I discovered a bunch more cousins I’d never met before in my life…

Besides that, my elder cousins on my dad’s side saw it fit to begin passing down the skills of chor dai di (big two). Haha! Kong Jin & Kong Qian taught my younger cousin, Kok Weng, how to play. :P And there was another cute kid that was the son of one of the other relatives who came to play… His dad also was coaching him. Dai tao har la, all these people! But it was all in good fun. Kong Qian kept bringing up the notion of playing with money, but it didn’t happen. Awwww.

Once again, it was food overload. One of the dangers of CNY is that if you don’t regulate your snacking at every house you visit, you’re bound to gain a lot of unwanted physical bonuses by the end of the celebrations. Cellulite anyone? x__x Economic recession my FOOT, because we were still fed extremely well at each house we visited! There was abundant yee sang, pineapple tarts, cookies, har pang, nga ku, steamboat, mandarin oranges, vegetarian dishes, noodles, ice cream, savoury treats… Whoo. I had to restrain myself from over-eating, even though ALL the foods that pop up during CNY are among my favorites.

Ang pau earnings were a larger haul than before. :) Hooray for being unmarried & Chinese! Let me ask you this, though. ;) What does a girl do with all the extra pocketmoney she received?

Give up? :)))

Well… Click to read more.

Happy Lunar New Year!

Sorry I haven’t been blogging much, been fairly busy with uni / orientation prep / outings / errands… Have to a do a few catchup posts of the KL weekend with Jo, Cecilia’s farewell and afterparty, and many more fun moments.

BUT NOW:

:) Just a quickie to wish everyone a blessed Lunar New Year of the Ox! Gong xi fa cai! Please have safe journeys to and from your hometowns, and eats lots to get that prosperous look~

For the young ones (like myself, ahem), may we have a wonderful time receiving those well-loved “blessings” in tiny red packets, hee hee.

And for the older ones, let it be a time of fun, family, and friends–aaaand sharing of the blessings of the previous year.

:D Can’t wait for the yee sang and mahjong. Wheeee~

p/s – Ladies’ night on chor 4 of New Year, are we up for AHR? Heh.