# Time flies

... and I am back in London. Another year of study to go.  :-(((

Wasted 2 hours in the airport immigration control. Strict security has slowed down clearance. I envy those who can go straight to the line of "UK Passport Holders". After waiting for ages, I finally got to get to the passport control desk. But the officer told me I NEED a medical checkup! Bloody hell. He thought I was a first-year student.

After explaining to him and showing him documents that I have had my records with the NHS and he can go check on my health condition if he likes, he let me through. With my stomach growling (I haven't had my dinner), I took the tube home, arriving around 10.30pm.

Took me a few days to clean up my new room and unpack everything from boxes. Now my little room looks more inviting... Here is a 360 degree tour of my little square room. (photos are of not such good quality, I only have my T610 with me so that will have to do)

Here is my work station, with my laptop and board and photos and everything in place, before I make a mess again soon.

Beside my desk is my cabinet which I stuffed everything in there. Next to it - my personal TV in the room! (With the license too! Landlord pays, yea yea)

Next to the TV are the fridge and the little tea corner of mine, with teabags and mugs... Check out the two fish lanterns on the wall, gifts from James, made in Malaysia! Now I miss the Lantern Festival/ Mooncake Festival back there... Anyone doing Lantern post soon?

Last but not least, my sleeping corner. Cosy little bed... Thanks KK for the warm duvet!

Now it's really time for bed.

# Would all the cat-lovers please stand up?

During the SARS period, some people have the mistaken identity to think the ordinary stray cats are civet (thanks Mickell) cats (which is actually from the Rats family) and said that they spread SARS. A massive search and kill was launched in Singapore during that time and as many as 200 cats were terminated per day.

A blog friend of mine, Robin, a good-hearted animal lover, has teamed up with wish friends to provide temporary shelter for stray and abandoned cats, and making efforts either to track down their owners or find homes for them. Their work are time, energy and money-consuming, and needs support from all of us.

So if you know of anyone who wish to adopt a cat, a kitten, or who is willing to support such a cause in animal welfare and protection, please let Robin know.

No cash donations please. Food, kitty litter, toys, shampoo, cat adoption (subject to terms and conditions) and medicines are welcome. Please email Robin.

TO HELP, PLEASE GO TO THIS LINK

Thanks very much!

Paris (Day Two) + Passports Mania

After a long disappearance, built not only on love with Malaysia, but also snowballed on guilt of having not been keeping touch, YD timidly peered out to the windows of blogspere, awaiting angry blows, or worse, disappointed sighs. Have I gone overboard in MIA this time?

Some of you have guessed correctly. Yes I am in love - in love with Malaysia, its food, family and friends, and erm... with somebody. (*blush*) I must admit that I am bad at balancing the time of going out and going online...

Anyway, that's another story. In this post, I have to finish my uncompleted story, which also leads to a worrisome experience in Malaysia.

********************************************

On the second day of Paris, we woke up early to visit the Eiffel Tower. Bustling along with the Parisians on the Metro was an eye-opening experience for me. The people were rougher than those in London, and politeness was certainly not the way to go around in the subway.

After the long ride, we arrived at the Trocadero station, saw the magnificent tower, and proceeded to line up to buy the tickets. It was then we realized the horrible truth - our passports were gone!

The passports, alongside with 100 Euros and 100 Swiss Francs, were kept in our travel pouch, which dad kept in his trousers. Yet it disappeared mysteriously during our morning journey with Parisians in the packed Metro train. Fast like a flash of lightning.

Our schedule was ruined. We rushed back to hotel to double check, just in case we left them in our room, but alas, we didn't. Luckily I brought along the contacts of Malaysian Embassy and made photocopies of passports and travel documents. We called the Malaysian Embassy and was told that we need a valid police report and photos before we can report this case to the embassy.

Well, we went to a local police station, and found out that none of the policemen speak English, and there was no translation service available in the station. We ended up in reporting our case in gestures and drawings, until now I am doubtful that the policewoman who attended to us really understood all our body languages. We spent more than an hour there, with most of the time wasted on trying to understand one another.

The helpful police officer.

After getting our police reports and photos done, we rushed to the Malaysian Embassy, as the time was running out and the office would be closing soon. After a journey which seemed like forever, we reached the station, and literally ran all the way to the embassy.

The office hour of the embassy has ended (3pm), and the staffs were actually having a farewell party for an ambassador. We begged the clerk and explained our situation to her (we have to depart for Switzerland tomorrow), and she, being such an angel, decided to help us out. Thank god!

The clerk (a.k.a. the angel) gave us many forms to fill in, including the one to report loss of passport, one to apply for emergency certificates and one for records. While we were filling in forms, the angel went to persuade the officer who had initially declined our case since it was past office hour. Thanks to her help, the officer nodded ok.

The long wait in the embassy.

We were very lucky to have such great help in foreign country. We were luckier to have an emergency certificate processed immediately and given to us by the end of the day. We settled everything at around 6pm, thanked our angel and the officer again and left the embassy.

The rest of the trip was brief. Our original plans of spending a day in the Lourve was cancelled. We persisted in going up the Eiffel Tower, but when we came down, there was a downpour, which lasted for about half an hour. Luckily the day was longer during summer, so we had more time to spend outdoors before bedtime. We spent a short time OUTSIDE the Lourve (it was already closed), where dad did his Tai-Chi routine and drew attention of many other tourists. hehe...

While dad was doing Tai-Chi, I decided to have some fun with the Lourve.

We spent the evening in a quiet little restaurant and enjoyed the Poisson soup, then we strolled along the Seine, onto the island, passing the Notre Dame and the Latin Quarter. It was a tiring day for us, but yet we relaxed as we walked along the river, in the romantic atmosphere.

Our saviour of the day - our emergency lunch which lasted us the whole day

This is indeed a memorable trip to Paris. Dad, who already disliked the haphazard traffic and the rude culture, and now coupled with this misfortune, decided that this might be his last visit to Paris. The silver lining of the cloud, is the warmth and the helpfulness of the many angels we have met in the city - the hotel staffs, the police officer and the embassy workers. Thank you very much for your kindness.

********************************************

Update:
The passport problem dragged on until we were back to Malaysia. To reapply for new passports, we were told to refill the same forms we filled in while in Paris, due to the lack of coordination of the local imigration offices with overseas embassies. The local imigration officers told us that the process of reapplying new passports could stretch more than one month, and we needed to translate the police report into B.Malaysia, take oath in court, and wait for the HQ to assess our application. Worse, we would be black-listed for loss of passports. But the most frightening prospect was that I might not be able to get my UK Visa in time to go back to London, with this hullabaloo stretching on...

Update 2:
We were lucky again! Someone found our passports (without the money of course) and handed back to the embassy. And thanks to the angel (the clerk) again, she managed to arrange a fast delivery of our passports to us. After the many visits to the imigration office, and the visa centre, I finally got my new passport done, and my UK visa renewed just in time! Phew!

I must really thank all the angels who helped us out. Without them, we would still be stuck in dealing with the immigration office now. In our life, there are so many people who have crossed paths with us with just brief encounters, yet, their impact in our lives are profound. Their kindness touches our heart, their helpfulness makes the world a better place.

It brings me to think about the many friends who have always been there, who care, who watch out for me. It brings me to think about you guys who are reading right now. I am very lucky to have met you in this path of life, and I thank you for your friendship, your care, your kindness. Thank you so much for being there.

# Paris (Day One)

(Note: I won’t put up the a lot of the photos of the famous tourist attractions, I believe we have seen them too many times on TV/ Internet/ Magazines. Hence lots of the photos would be from some small things observed in the trip)

Arriving at the ever busy Gare du Nord made us realize how foreign we are. Everything is in French! We got our Carnet and headed for our Hotel.

At the moment we stepped into the Metro subway, we noticed the mass of people, from all backgrounds, all classes. Unlike what is normally portrayed in advertisements, Paris is not as romantic as the public think. There are beggars, street people, gangsters and lots of dodgy-looking people – certainly didn’t paint a very good picture for Paris

Unlike what is said by friends (“Nowadays all French speak English!” They assured me before I went), most of the people we encountered, except for the well-known tourists attraction sites, speak French and no English. There were some unpleasant encounters where some people are very unfriendly knowing we do not speak French, but overall, the people are still ok.

The traffic/ driving in Paris certainly terrified me. I mean, having got used to the polite driving in UK, where pedestrians rank first, I am quite amazed seeing cars zooming past us while the pedestrians’ light is green; or cars cornering and nearly hit down a bunch of people by roadside, then hooted as loud as they could; or cars bumping other cars many times before parking into a parking bay (Now I knew why it’s called a car BUMPER!)… Priceless experience.

The streets are not clean either, except, again, for the main tourists attraction sites. But looking on the bright side, it’s much better than our own country. Our spirits died a little after looking at the dirty streets/ crazy traffic/ suspicious-looking people/ etc… but we reminded ourselves that French cars are one of the upper range cars in the world market. Dad likes French cars a lot…

Off we went to our first stop – Sacre Coeur, a neo-Byzantine Basilica famous with the beautifully adorned dome. It represents the national reconciliation of and hope after the defeat of France in 1870 War against Prussia. The basilica took 45 years to build, and its interior is decorated painstakingly with a myriad of mosaics. Inside Sacre Coeur, religious believers were praying silently, while the painting of Jesus on the ceiling glowed in soft golden light. We took our time to savour the beauty and calm our minds.


A path by the side of Sacre-Coeur brought us to the Montmarte area. We arrived at the place Emile-Gourdeau, the authentic art square flocked by artists.


No, we didn’t manage to get our portraits done, but we did have some French crepe for tea, and got “robbed” for ordering a €3.00 500ml mineral water! One thing that fascinated me a lot is the culture of Parisian to sit by the sidewalk, under the sunshine and watch the world goes by. Reminds me so much of our “mamak stall” culture. But more interesting in a sense that they all faced to only one direction – OUTWARDS – looking into the streets. We followed their gaze to see what they are looking at, only to find another stretch of cafés opposite, full with people gazing towards this direction!


We found Moulin-Rouge later after getting lost in the small winding streets in Montmarte. The time as well as the price of the cabaret shows put us off, since our hotel is at a more quiet (and far) part of Paris, and dad has seen cabaret show in L.A. before anyway.

We got to Concorde to admire the impressive square with its obelisk and two fountains, which are gifts from Egypt in 1836. Jardin de Tuileries is lovely, but we were a bit surprised to find walking path covered in sand (quite messy to walk in). Only later we found out that ALL the pavements in the parks in Paris are covered in sand. How interesting. I guessed I have got too used to the tar/cement walkway in London parks. Reading the signboard enlightened me that Jardin de Tuileries is in fact one of the UNESCO World Heritage List for its cultural/ natural value.

We walked along Les Champs-Elysees, which as usual, was full of crowd, and lots of cafés, banks, cinemas, car showrooms, branded stores, etc. Apparently this street is the favourite hangout place for Parisians, but I lost interest after a few minutes. Just like any other shopping streets in the world – crowd, shops, sales, sales, sales. I quickened my pace to reach the end of the walk.

(One of the few things that managed to catch my attention while walking along Les Champs Elysees - the little girl admiring herself in the mirror in some branded shop... I forgot which)

At last, we got to the Arc de Triomphe at the end of the street. We passed through an underground tunnel to get there – it stinks so badly of urine! Commissioned by Napolean, the monument was dedicated to the memory of an unknown soldier who died in WW1. The Arc is certainly magnificent, though I am still haunted by the fragrance in the tunnel.

(Dad and I! Tadaa!)

(Some antics we saw at Arc de Triomphe)

So far, our meals have been mostly baguettes, baguettes and more baguettes… I wonder how people bite into the rock-hard bread and still manage to keep their teeth. I would prefer to soak them in hot soup and have it soggy. ;-P

At night, we fell asleep exhaustedly, accompanied by the cacophony of noise outside our hotel, by construction work, by lorry passing by, by people shouting, by baby wailing…
(Our window view - houses with traditional french windows, plus lots of unwelcomed activities at night)

# Out of office

this is a rather rush post, haven't been able to get proper internet connection nowadays, since we have terminated our internet connection. have been busy moving house and settling mundane tasks.

Would be in inactive mode from 30 June - 16 June since I will not be able to get online. I will be back after 16 June. (By then, I would be in Malaysia, hehe...)

Very sorry for the MIA / disappearance. I miss you all much! :-(

# Lazing around

09.06.06. 2.18pm

It was a hot afternoon, a few days after the final exams finished. After all the celebration and gathering, was feeling the laziness creeping in. I just wanna have a quiet afternoon by myself.

Was lazing around on my bed, which is directly under my window. Looking up at the window from a lying-down position sure had a different perspective.

Then I got a bit "wu-liao" and decided to have an upside-down look at our room.

The sunshine was good, so I quickly washed my shoes and dry it on my window panes.

A little bit more eerie-looking from this view.

When I gazed out of the window, I was a bit shocked to notice a "new" mountain suddenly appeared at the far place! Zooming in my camera (sadly it's just digital zoom.. boo hoo...) and taking a closer look, I realized it was just some pinkish clouds! What a deceiving look!

Another lazy doodle during another lazy afternoon...

# Rebuilding the foundation

Friendship is such a beautiful thing, yet it can be so strong yet so fragile.

There has been some conflicts among a few of us friends recently, and everyone was feeling miserable and hurt. Everyone cares for everyone else, but the hurt was deep, hence there was always an air of coldness in conversation.

Today, we thrashed things out. Sat down face to face and each person put down their feelings and opinions. The emotions were strong, yet we felt the care and love too. I was glad that we talked things out. Many things were unpleasant, but I felt it is a good thing that we point out the wrongs, so that in future we can make things right.

In friendship, I believe one of the most fundamental thing is being able to point out each other's weakness and give reminder/advice to each other frankly, with good intention and care. Personally I would rather let my close friends point out my wrongs and give me a wake-up call, than making a similar mistake again and again, causing unhappiness to people around us.

We have built a foundation of friendship over the time, and conflicts have eroded some of the stucture. We knocked down the wall, and rebuilt everything again. And I realized, the foundation is stronger now.

At one point, we have the choices of either letting things go by and maintaining polite acquantaince relationship, or thrashing things out and rebuilding the foundation. I am glad that we chose the latter one.

I feel blessed to have these precious friendships, and even more grateful that I have the friends that can sit down and talk things out, friends that care and love each other. Thank you, my dear friends.

# BANANAS!

(Note: pictures are all from internet for this post)




Due to excessive dosage of freedom, I suffered from post-exam-syndrome, I see bananas everywhere! From moody's chatbox to the local store, everywhere is just full of bananas!

And I think I am turning into one too! Gosh.



Here are some banana treats!

First, let's boogie with bananas!

Some banana astrology...

Some banana nation...

Some banana religion...

Some banana justice...

Some banana kayak, i mean, boat...

Some banana art...

Some japanese dancing bananas...

And some good old fried bananas a.k.a. Pisang Goreng!

Finally, hope this banana baby cheer your day up!

# Final Lap

Final lap today! Going out now for the last paper. Then... FREEDOM!!!

ahhh... I can almost taste it now!

Go Go Go! Affirmative. Cover me. :-) (haha I should cut the CS jargon out)

# Movies!

I know I know I should be studying...

I don't know why but my mind just wandered from calculus, martingales and risk theory from movies. Was recalling some of the interesting movies that I have enjoyed, some made me think, some made me cried, some made me touched, some made me laughed, some were a hit, some were forgotten...

I decided to jot down a few to recommend to friends. A good practice would be to write down the movie reviews and my feelings and thoughts about them, but I think I shall add on to this only at later time, after my last exam. :-)

- Ladies in Lavender
- The Colour Purple
- Whale Rider
- Choristes, Les (The Chorus)
- John Q
- The Laramie Project
- Rabbit-proof Fence
- Schindler's List
- Hotel Rwanda
- Dances with Wolves
- Ray Charles
- Joy Luck Club
- Soong Dynasty
- Under the Tuscan Sun
- The Manchurian Candidate
- Mona Lisa's Smile
- Shipping News
... ... ... ...

and the list goes on...

Can't really recalled all, so I think I shall stop here for the time being. I shall be very delighted if anyone could recommend other good movies.

# Sipadan Damage

When I saw this news, I was dumbfounded. Gosh you can actually feel that sharp pain in the heart!! I actually can't stop my tears running down as I read on such irresponsible act.

I am too heavy-hearted right now to write a post about this yet another heart-breaking "human kills nature" story. It's about our beautiful Sipadan Island.

Here are the links... I really need to cool down before writing a post on this. These bastards have just overdone it! .... Damn them. (Pardon my language...)

Source from Wild Singapore

News in Yahoo

When did human ever learn??!!!

# Have a break

Another small break before a BIG paper tomorrow - "Stochastic and actuarial methods in finance".

I had a kitkat, as recommended by chen, and as soon as I peeled of the wrapper, I can't help but smile at the words printed on the chocolate bar.

"Shut down for essential maintenance"


It somewhat reflects how my brain feels right now. :-)

I checked the multipack wrapper, and saw another "Quote of wisdom":

No one's final words were ever
'I wish I'd spent more time at work'


Kitkat, has become a culture on its own.

# Ding Dang Dong

Taking a break from exam preparation... so...

DING DANG DONG WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS!!!

Yup, it's the crazy frog in action again! now it is singing the song "we are the champion" for the world cup... here is the video clip.

We are the champion (Ding Dang Dong)

for those who hasn't got to know him yet, here is his famous song that once topped the chart in UK.

Axel F

And this is the very very early version of this annoying thing

Annoying Thing (early version)

and here is him trying his hand in DJ-ing, featuring the "Popcorn" (Thanks much moody!), hehe... (ahh... the good old days of digdug game...)

Popcorn

His christmas special

Christmas

and his underwater adventure

You can't touch this

Enjoy! get annoyed with the annoying thing!

# Cloud Craze!

To show support for the "save-the-cloud-post" petition, I decided to post a few random clouds picture I took in UK. Not as colourful, but these are the better clouds I see in UK rather than the greyish rainclouds during most of the time. hehe...

Camdem Town

Taken during regular visit to Camdem Town, one of the most interesting local markets in London. The punk culture there is very strong, so it's fun to see all sorts of "self-decoration".

Battersea Park

Taken during summer outing to Battersea Park, outer London. That is the hottest day I'd ever experienced in London.

Plymouth

Taken during trip to Plymouth, Southwest England. Yes, the Mayflower steps are here, where the Pilgrim Fathers first embarked on UK.

Stonehenge

Taken in car during the journey to stonehenge.. Not sure of the exact location. the clouds a bit "senget" due to car moving.

# Exams...

Final exams is nearer than I thought!

Would be doing less posting... to concentrate in doing the final preparation.

I will be back. (Terminator)

Ganbate!

# City of Bath

Continuing from the post about Stonehenge...

After visiting the mysterious stonehenge, our next destination is the City of Bath - one of the oldest city in UK.

One of the most significant landmark is the Pulteney Bridge and the Weir. We took a stroll along the river. Watching the ripples at the weir is definitely a great relaxation!
(To get the weir into the pic, I had to extend my already-freezing hand over the edge of the bridge walls, nearly dropped the poor camera...)

We had a great time walking around the city, exploring every corner of the streets, tunnels and shops. The sunshine was extraordinarily good for UK weather, and it seems like almost everyone in the town has come out to have a nice sun-bathing. We explored some local markets and shops. There was once we saw a "White Shop", which sells everything in white colour, and before long we saw a second shop called "Yellow Shop". Here's the "white" shop... (some ppl might argue these shops contain elements of racism)

We did not enter the Roman Bath House and the Pump Room, due to its unreasonably high price. It was a bit disappointing because I have done quite some research online about it before coming, but the 8.50 pounds is quite a rip-off for a short tour around that place. But anyway, reading about its history online, and looking at the abundant photos online, has more or less provide the picture about the place, so we didn't feel too bad.

We went to other attractions like the Royal Crescent, Sally Lunn (the oldest house in Bath from 1482), the markets and many other interesting small shops.

Instead of focusing on the normal "tourist attractions", I think I shall post some photos of the not-so-normally-seen-corners of Bath. These little discoveries, many of them normally unnoticed, certainly brought surprises and happiness to us. Perhaps, you have noticed the little things too, during your trip there? *^_^*

For example, not only that the shops have peculiar names, even the streets too. Should we keep our voices down when walking on the Queit Street? And the Gay Street sounds interesting too...

Check out the allocation of DOORS in unexpected places! The top part of the photo shows one which is located right next to a roadside stairs. The bottom part shows a very random door which appear in a wall (double-storey high). Imagine walking out of that door and realize, "ooops..."

and how about Jane Austen's centre?

Also, remember to check out the many interesting small shops around the city!

One of the best surprises we got when roaming around the markets is to find our country flag! There is this small but wonderful shop which sells the flags of all countries in the world! (the owner claims so). Well, I found mine!

# The Queen at 80

(Photo from BBC)

Today is the Queen's Birthday! and boy, she looked lovely in pink!

A friend and his wife has gone to Windsor to (hopefully) see the Queen, we did not manage to go, but were equally excited for this event!

Happy Birthday Queen!

BBC Full Report (with videos, pictures and news in depth)

# Thoughts on Easter Island

(Photo from www.zeigermann.com)

This is a rather small post, for it is just a few scribbles of thoughts. Panda's comment in Stonehenge post about Rapa Nui reminded me about the downfall of the civilisation on the island, and the destruction of the Easter Island.

From the original lush green vegetation to the dry empty land, how could this happen? I am sure that the people are aware the depletion of the resources as the activities of deforestation goes on. I have heard before that the island is so small that one could stand on top of the mountain and see every corner of the island. But why have they not done anything to preserve the rescources before none was left?

As the resources continued to diminish, the dominoes effect comes in. The Islanders are trapped in a self-inflicted environmental collapse. With no trees, no boats can be built, hence they were cut off from the outside world. No more erection of the moai, hence the collapse of the belief systems, then social organisation. Then the meaningless destruction of the ahu among opposite clans, then war, then...

This looks familiar! Well, we do see them even in today's world! Look at how human consume the resources in the world, and we will know Easter Island has just provided a model of what-could-have-been. The set-up of the model is strikingly similar to the world we live in now - limited resources, unlimited wants. Throughout the years of human history, people have found ways and means to extract resrouces to sustain population growth. Yet, have we devised a system that actually conserve the environment and preserve the resources? Have we found a way of living that does not irreversibly damage our life support system?

In the Easter Island history, we saw the ugly nature of human of fighting for survival, and a scarier thought is that human has not even remorsed even until the final fatal end of the civilisation. If this is how human act, this would be a very scary reflection on today's society. In every aspect of our life, have we gone too beyond the turning point? Do we still carry out acts of destruction though we are well aware of the consequences? Do we ignore the warning signs and hope silently that the comeuppance will not fall on us, but on OTHER people?

Unfortunately, in most of the times, we do. And I am not speaking onlt in environmental terms. Major decisions in all fields - politics, economics, society, humanity... Have we not come upon some hauntingly familiar scenarios? Do we learn? Do we take different action?

Let's pray for a better tomorrow.

... ... ... ...

Okay, I should stop rambling before I go into a rattling mode.

Quote of the day:
"If we forgive God for his crime against us, which is to have made us finite creatures, he will forgive our crime against him, which is that we are finite creatures." - Simone Weil (1909-1943), French philosopher.