Vivi's Book of ShAdOwS

Yes we've booked!

2010-11-17T19:50:00.003+13:00

We've finally booked a venue and a date! The last two venues we were tossing up on were either Copthorne at Hokianga or Castaways at Waiuku. It was either going to be a small quiet wedding at the beautiful location of Hokianga or a larger wedding at the West Coast of Auckland. The final decision however were made purely on practicality, as we do not know where Danny will be working in the near future, in the event it's out of Auckland, I think it's fair to say I would not want to drive 3 hours to and back for the wedding planning. On top of that Castaways helps with table settings etc, which just make things a bit easier. Check out the website if you are interested. :) http://www.castaways.co.nz/

Anyway, the date we've settled on is 05 May 2012! Mark it on your calendars :D

Hunt for a Wedding Venue

2010-09-12T19:29:00.004+12:00

Seeing Danny and I are and will be spending quite a bit of time and effort planning our wedding, I decided to document our adventures in planning quoting from Emily 'the biggest party of our lives'.

First logical on the agenda is venue. I have this 'obsession' of getting married next to the sea. I guess living close to a beach, I just love how the water colour is ever-changing. As we are not religious by any means, it makes sense for us to have the ceremony and reception at the same location. So with that in mind, our absolute criteria for the venue are:

to be next to the sea or have a seaview
need to have place for both ceremony and reception
need to have a rain (back up) option for the ceremony
a good room size to fit approx 80

We visited or have looked at almost all the venues around Auckland and below are our review for the venues we physically visited.

The floating pavilion
One of the more unique venues we've visited, it's the only floating venue that we are aware of. The venue is currently 'floating' next to the viaduct carpark, the view is very much a mixture of metropolitan, industrial harbour feel. I was told by 2012 part of the ship container's yard will be the new 'party central'. The venue itself can comfortably sit up to 120 guests, catering, standard chairs,tables, table linen and cutlery are provided. We decided not to go with this because it doesn't have the 'vast' seaview we are after, and it lacks a ceremony location.

Romfords
Part of the Tamaki boat club. It has two rooms, the Romfords room (seat up to 80) which is on the seaside, and the bigger Commodore room (seat up to 120). The Romfords room has absolutely amazing 270 degrees of seaview that look over the Rangitoto Island! catering, standard chairs,tables, table linen and cutlery are provided. Unfortunately this doesn't have a good ceremony place, and the Romfords room which we like can only fit in a maximum of 80, which can be a problem if our guest list increase in the next year or two.

The Wharf
Situated at North Cote ferry terminal. Amazing view again, one side you have the serene beaches of the North shore, and on the other side, a total metropolitan view of the harbour bridge and the city. Again two different room option, The Grands is the one with most of the seaview so I will only review this one. The Grand which is a circular room with clever two circular level design around the windows, the middle of the room can fit in more tables, or a lounge area for smaller wedding, and on the inner wall the bridal party table. Very cleverly designed in a way so all the guests can see the view, and the bridal party and vice versa. The interior were very well designed by architectures, definitely the most 'luxurious' place we've checked out. There is a place for ceremony overlooking the harbour bridge, but it is rather small, i.e. for 80 guests most will have to stand. The pricing is also quite expensive, so we decided it wasn't worth the extra money for a less than perfect ceremony location.

McHughs
Two locations, both situated at Devonport. We were most impressed with the Cheltenham so will only review this option. Again STUNNING location, right by the waterfront overlooking Rangitoto. Apparently it's a popular buffet lunch restaurant, my parents have eaten there and quite liked it (so you know it'l have a good food). Quite a comfortably large room, reasonably well decorated interior. Again no place for ceremony, and plus because it opens for lunch everyday, we cannot access to the venue until after 4pm (which both Danny and I feel would be a rush to have the place set up.

The Dunes
Situated at the lovely beach of Onetangi beach at Waiheke. Excellent service I must add, they paid for our ferry ticket plus picked us up from the Ferry terminal. Very generous! The venue is right across the road from the beach, but it was very cleverly designed in a way where looking at the sea from in door, the road was completely blocked out by the fence, and the colour deco all complimented the view very well. It has a back garden with a waterfall in the middle where ceremonies can be held. Very rustic, cosy feeling venue. Catering, table linen, cutlery included but decorations is up to the bride and groom. It doesn't' have a very good rain option, and Danny and I felt for the hassle of organizing ferry and transport for our guests, it wasn't worth having it in a less than perfect place. But this was definitely one of our top choices.

So what did we end up going with? well.. undecided.... wait for the next entry for our top 2 choices :D

Last ride in our First car NZ

2010-08-01T19:28:00.002+12:00

After 15 years, dad finally decided it's time to sell our Mazda MPV. Truth be told it has been somewhat deserted in the past 2 years, except the odd occasion where we needed to rent a trailor for our garden waste, the car stays under a car cover most of the time.

Last week dad put our car up on trademe, and it is pretty much sold within a week. So today dad decided to drive it out for one last time. The thing is, altho it is somewhat 'abandoned' for the past few years because we have since gotten much smaller cars that are easier to drive and more cost efficient to run, that car hold many many great memories.

The times when my aunty's family still live here, when both of my grandparents visited, we (8 of us) crammed into a 7 seater van, where i took a wooden stool and placed in the gap between the door and the second row seat as my own personalized special seat. We went to many holiday destinations in the car, where many hours of cassette music played, many hours of good conversaion held, and good snoozing occured.

Then there was the first three year of college where I spent every wednesday night dinner in the car. Mum would pick me up after school in the green van, and go straight to piano class. Then from there mum would drive me to orchestra practice, and on the way pick up Mac's wednesday special mc chicken. And just like that was how i spent my wednesday dinner for 3 years.

Our old mazda MPV... I will miss you. I hope you will hold many more create and hold many more fond memories at your new home with your new family.

The White Rabbit Trail

2010-05-30T22:00:00.003+12:00

A week before my birthday, I received gift from 'White Rabbit committee' member no. 1

What was odd, was the enclosing card had a enigma message... follow the white rabbit???

I (and my mum) spent some time pondering this. Sure there was a white rabbit on the front cover of the rabbit, but it certainly doesn't look like it is going anywhere.

Sure enough, two weeks later, a white rabbit showed up at my letterbox.

and what does the white rabbit tell me to do?? Have ramen with Dan... well.... not often I have the pleasure of following instructions given by a white rabbit, when such opportunity present to oneself, what does one do?

Here's Dan, eating ramen, (p.s. thank you so much for agreeing to have this photo taken). and as so happens, he presented me with....

A lovely (and stylish) card written by all four members of the 'White Rabbit committee". There were the usual encouraging words such as repetition of the words 'old', 'wise' and 'wrinkles'. There were also very heart warming birthday wishes.

The White Rabbit Trail crosses 2 countries, 3 cities and exchanged hands with 4 people (5 including mine). that is no easy feat.

Thank you so much for all the people involved. It was mysterious, fun, thoughtful and frankly pure genius! I had so much fun guessing what was coming next. Thank you so much for these wonderful gifts, I feel grateful to have friends like you. :)

Sometimes i wonder...

2010-05-17T22:06:00.003+12:00

If it is worth working fast... wanting to get things done... having short lunches, not taking tea breaks...

Thinking to myself that i should finish things faster, just in case there will be more just around the corner...

then comes Monday meeting... board blank.. with manager wondering why I haven't got much to do....

sometimes.. maybe.. just maybe it's better to do things slowly.....

Birthday Photos

2010-04-15T19:35:00.002+12:00

This year my birthday somewhat didn't go according to plan. Just as well my birthday plan consisted of bumming around, taking dad to meet Danny at Lloyds Elsemore so Danny can show my dad how to operate his motorbike. Then go to Vinnies for dinner with parents and Danny.

The plan was disrupted when Dad decided to strip down our wall the day before my birthday, so on my birthday he needed hire a trailer and dispose of the wall. Meanwhile we had to clear out the plants that has been growing for x number of years between the striped down wall and the retaining wall. So on the morning, I got all suited up in mum's work cloths, with a garden knife in one hand and started chopping down the plant. One embarrassing scream and two bugs on me later, uncle Dean who came to help Dad carrying the wall rescued mum and I suggesting we should hire equipment to get rid of the plants instead of doing it by hand (yay for uncle Dean). I then happily got placed on lunch duty and made lunch for everyone. Needless to say kitchen is a far happier place for me than garden would ever be.

Dinner went according to plan. We went to Vinnies on Jervois road which my colleague raved about few months earlier. I have to say, I was impressed. I've been to a couple of fine dining before but the service of Vinnies just brought it to a whole new level. Each plate that was served were explained in detail what the dish is. It just add a wow factor to the whole dining experience.

The entree came and went before I remember to take photos. I had scallops and crayfish with an amazing lobster bisque sauce.

then there's our main (notice my mum and i are wearing matching colours. I had venison that was cooked perfectly (medium rare) with things i can no longer remember. lol

then came the dessert platter. there as lavender creme brulee with a wonderful flavour of honey. a trio of ice cream, garden mint and chocolate chips, somethign i can't remember and buffalo yoghurt. then on the right corner is parfeit with meringue, and finished with chocolate fondant on the left.

then the restaurant gave me a special passionfruit marshmallow with a little candle on top for my birthday (how sweet). what a nice way to finish off the night.

You know you are a carnivore...

2009-11-17T21:38:00.001+13:00

When you haven't eaten meat for the whole day, then at 9pm, you sneaked into the kitchen and ate half-defrosted smoked salmon....

A less geekly blog...

2009-11-15T16:30:00.002+13:00

More precisely a photoblog!

of the cake I made when I went to Danny's house for dinner. Moist chocolate cake with mascopone cream with strawberry and pomegranate topping. :)

Games

2009-11-09T19:38:00.003+13:00

As many of you who knows me will know gaming is a very big hobby of mine. I guess my fascination with games begin when I was young, my grandpa used to have a Nintendo sitting in the corner on the top floor of our apartment. The Nintendo sits on a little wooden table, and we used to sit on little stools watching my grandpa play Mario. When we were a little bit older we started joining him in playing games.

Then my dad invested in a SEGA. I remember countless nights sitting on my parents bed, watching my dad playing driving game (which he never manage to finish) while munching on cheeseball. Or many weekends spent on the very SEGA watching my cousin William and Emily playing co-op Sonic, racing to the finish line.

I guess the first game I ever played by myself was princess maker II, I don't know how many hours I spent on in, trying to get all sort of different endings. Then a long came my first RPG game on the computer "pal", and I was forever hooked. For the first time, I experienced gaming like never before, not only was the game about 'completing' or 'killing that monster', it had the most captivating story that went a long with it. Since then, there were many years of playing 'incomplete' games, which were the unfortunate result of buying 'jumbo' game discs, where the seller try to copy as many games into the disc as possible and due to many problems (possibly due to the incapability of our computer), the games either doesn't play at all or would suddenly freeze at certain point in the game and that was that.

And then.. came along PlayStation. I am not sure how I manage to convince my mum to get me one, no doubt my dad had a say in it too. In the first few months of getting the ps, it didin't gain much popularity in our house, because my poor mum who knows nothing about games made the purchase for us, and no doubt the shop keeper took advantage of her lack of knowledge and recommended a bunch of very old or poor selling games. Things of course changed after dad and I went back to Taiwan and bought a handful of games. That was the first time I was introduced to Final Fantasy. I still remember when the store manager recommended it to me, he said it was very popular. I didn't think much of it at the time except noting that the game was 4 cds long, and the drawing on the front cover was very good, A LOT better than anything I have seen so far.

Then that summer I think my life changed, who knew anyone could get hooked on a RPG game when it's in a language that he/she didn't understand... but I did. I had pages of print outs of translations, guides, and many many hours of running trying to figure out where I was suppose to go. That was definately a turning point, because for the first time, I start to anticipate the moment dad would go upstairs to sleep freeing up the TV, because only then can i start playing. For the first time I start sleeping late from time to time because of gaming (usually because I couldn't find a save point), and probably it is around that time ppl in the family start saying things like "omg you are playing games again?!?!" for the first time I was labelled as 'gaming geek' in the family. LOL luckily due to long game release time between each game title that I am interested in, I manage to keep big rpgs in summer holidays only which definately kept my grades at bay. FF8 in summer 1998/99, ff9 in 99/01, chrono cross in 00/01 so on and then on my ps2 which I spent my entire year's savings on, Kingdom heart, ffx, ffx-2, ffxii and KH2.

So you can imagine my shock, after having to defend playing games for 10 years now, to see my entire family (aunties/mum/cousins) all started playing game that I play on facebook. Not only do they play, they are playing a lot harder than
I am.

Life has a funny way of turning things around...

Either that or facebook games has a way of reaching out into the public...

Or perhaps I prefer to think that the era of gaming has finally reached the general public, and we, previous being branded as gaming geeks were just the trendsetters, the pioneers of entertainment of tomorrow. or maybe not :P

A most interesting entry....

2009-11-06T20:32:00.001+13:00

Someone keep asking me why I haven't update my blog, so here's my message to her.

"Hi sis~~~~"

and that concludes my entry... for now. :)

親愛的外婆

2009-07-23T18:44:00.000+12:00

想起您最後微笑跟我們說再見的身影思念的淚水就這樣一發不可收拾

相信您已經了無牽掛身上的病痛也已經解脫您安詳的離開了卻留給我們無盡的思念

回想小時候每次到外公外婆家桌上總是擺滿了豐盛的菜餚您總是慈祥的笑著問我們有沒有吃飽您最擔心我們會餓著凍著累著. 我還記得我們上回的電話聯絡正好是我要去基督城出差的前一天你當時還躺在病床上卻還只關心著我再次的要我帶足夠的衣服以免感冒. 您永遠都是把您的孩子和孫子放在第一位

想念跟您一起做水餃和包子的時光每次都是您一個人擀皮我跟妹妹在旁邊包我們七手八腳的老是包的沒有您擀的快我們說外婆擀慢一點您只是笑呵呵的說怎麼趕不上啦手卻還是拼命的擀惹得我跟妹妹哇哇叫我彷彿還可以聽到我們的嬉鬧聲可是您卻已經不在了

記得有一次我跟著您和媽媽去散步媽媽一手摟著您一手摟著我說這是她最幸福的時刻她不知道那也是我最幸福的時刻有您和媽媽在我身邊一邊聽著您說著您在哈爾濱的故事一邊欣賞太陽西下的風景那個時候的您還健步如飛怎麼一轉眼您已經離開我們了

去年我結婚的時候您來參加我的婚禮我真的好感動那天您真的好美

我相信您已經去了

有人告訴我喪禮不是去悲傷失去一個人而是對生命的禮讚外婆您已經優雅的走過了您的一生也堅持的排除所有會影響您達到目標的障礙當社會上大部分女性都沒有受教育時您完成了大學學位在八十歲高齡還很健康的到世界各地探望您的子女您的事蹟是我們的榜樣讓我們在人生的道路上抬頭挺胸勇往直前外婆我們懷念你也感謝您留下了這麼多美好的回憶及教誨給我們.

外婆…我們會永遠記得您得.

Co-written by Emily and Lucy

Head and Heart

2009-06-27T09:31:00.004+12:00

My head tells me the sooner it ends the better it is for her. The shorter time she has left means her suffering will be less...

My heart feels guilty that my head is thinking that way, because in thinking that way I am essentially wishing for her death which I don't...

and do....

conflicted

confused

then I realized however I felt, or think has no influence whatsoever on what is going on..

all I can do, is hope that when I make the call to the other end of the world, although all I can hear is the oxygen mask, that my voice still reaches her. That for however short/long period of time she has left, she knows that she is not alone. That love is around her, her children and grandchildren.

That is all that I can wish for... hope for...

Head and heart.

Religion

2009-06-18T20:52:00.002+12:00

Religion is such a funny thing. My grandma (dad's mum) had been a Buddhist all her life, whilst she was not devoted one, she certainly never missed giving offerings on special occasions such as chinese new year to Buddha. Until few years ago, she walked past a Christian church and was offered to learn about God.. for free that she was converted. Now she is a Christian, everyone Sunday a volunteer comes to her home that reads bible to her. While she doesn't pray before her meals nor prays everynight, she believes there's a place in heaven for her.

My other grandma had been an atheist all her life, but she was taught by Russian nuns in her primary school days that she had always been more lenient toward Christianity. My mum has been Buddhist for most of her life but whenever mum mentions it, grandma had always shown certain dislike towards it. Few weeks ago whilst in hospital, Buddhist monk was visiting patients offering to pray for patients. Now as she lie onher bed with a small mp3 that plays monk's chants hanging from the side of the bed, and Buddhist beads on her wrists.

Religion... is a funny thing. Perhaps what we choose to believe depends on our family background, and what is presented to us at the right time. Perhaps certain religion resonates more strongly with certain individuals so no matter what religion they started with, they'll eventually ends up with their destined religion.... Who knows.

The BEST of Auckland

2009-05-17T20:44:00.002+12:00

I went to the butcher shop on Ti Rakau Drive today and saw a billboard advertising for the Butcher.

"Voted the Best Butcher of Auckland - by the Owner"

hahaha I can't believe people actually advertise the 'owner's opinion' I mean, of course any owner would think their shop is the best. LOL

Yummy~~~

2009-04-26T09:32:00.002+12:00

I had my first buffalo wings last night. Actually I made Danny cook it for me and it was YUMMY~~~~ The skin was perfectly crispy, even after drenching in the tangy sauce. It was finger licking delicious!!! and really it was quite simple, just takes a while because you have to steam it and then bake it. It was so good that neither of us remembered to take pictures of it before it was all gone!!! HAHAHA OOOOOPS

I've been to a couple of nice restaurants recently so I thought I'll write my litte own restaurant review.

We went to Soto, a Japanese restaurant in Ponsonby. The food their is really nicely cooked Japanese cuisine but served in a rather European way. In fact, it is probabily the most fusion fine dining Jap restaurant I've been to. But the food is absolutely delicious!!! The most memorable dish had to be good old teriyaki chicken sushi which usually I am not a fan off. It is usually dry and hard, I would go for a fish one anyday. But the one at Soto was so juicy and succulent, and they had just the right balance of sauce and the rice. It was yummy!! Another dish I really liked was tuna steak with sliced courgette. Tuna I guess is quite a rich fish, the courgette lightened the whole dish up, giving it a really refreshing touch. Overall great restaurant but the price is on the high side even for a Japanese restaurant, good thing the company paid. :D p.s. I've noticed it's on the new entertainment book this year!!

For our 4th year anniversary, Danny and I went to Dine by Peter Gordon. The first thing I noticed about the restaurant is the decoration. I think it's a really classy form of American bistro style with cushiony seats all along the both side of the wall, and nice leather couches in the middle. And there were 2 huge lighting hanging from the ceiling which were just amazing piece of art. Each light formed a huge ring hanging in mid air with little spot lights all around it's ring. The food itself is heavily oriental influenced. Across the whole menu you could see Asian ingredients used in almost every dish, miso, curry, soy sauce etc. The service was awesome, we ordered an entree to share, and they actually served it to us in 2 seperate bowls! The food is great, I really enjoyed the whole fusion of western and eastern cuisine. The food was a little salty for my liking though, but overall a really nice dining experience.

The last place restaurnt is Toto, an italian restaurant in city, which mum and I sampled for my birthday. The decoration is again quite something. I am by no means expert on artchitecture but it definately looks like something you see in a period film in the movies. The food is fantastic, and the service is awesome. We ordered an octopus caparccio for starter and it came on this huge glass plate with thin pieces of octopus layed out beautifully on the bottom of the plate. It almost looked as if it was part of the mosaic pattern of the plate. The gnocchi and the snapper we had for mains were really tasty. The snapper was pan fried and served with cous cous in a light fish broth. That had to be the first brothy application I've tasted in a Western style restaurant and it was light and fresh with a slight hint of the sea. :)

And that concludes my 3 very brief restaurants reviews... bye bye for now. :D

Thanks everyone

2009-04-14T20:43:00.002+12:00

Thank you everyone who sent me birthday cards/txts/emails etc, I really appreciate it. :) This year I had a real quiet birthday spent with Mum on good Friday. Just as well I was real sore from going to a pump class (weight lifting) the day before. In fact, it was so painful to go up and down the stairs, I had to hop around. Hahaha oops. Anyway.. just want to give ppl a big THANKS for all the birthday wishes :)

Renovation Final

2009-03-29T15:28:00.006+13:00

This post is long overdue, as I keep telling ppl to come to my blog to check out my newly renovated house, when I actually haven't posted them up yet. :P Ooops my mistake. Anyway, enjoy the photos. :D

The front entrance

The living room

The dining room

The kitchen

Window side of kitchen

The family room

My bedroom

Emily's bedroom

Staircase

The guestroom

Dad's study

Master bedroom

Renovation Part 2

2009-03-08T11:18:00.005+13:00

I haven't had access to my computer for a few days so I had forgotten which 'day' of the renovation these photos were taken, but I am sure it was last weekend when stage 1 of renovation is completed, and we were emptying out furnitures in stage 2 rooms into the newly completed stage 1 rooms. :)

Living room in it's serene green colour.

Extending to the kitchen, with new cupboard doors (not shown) and our new fridge.

Same green colour going all the way to the family room.

The hallway and all of the 3rd floor in its glorious modern grey.

Emily's room (my old room, which was also her old room... ok long story) is done in a pale pink.

And that's the same room when some the furnitures has been moved into it. I can assure you it's a lot more cramp now than it was whe the photo was taken. :P

And the next room is all emptied out for a make over. :)

There are many happy thing that I am super excited about in this renovation. Our guest room will no longer have seasame street wall paper and a bright blue curtain with ducks and farm houses. Our kitchen sink is going to be replaced with a bigger one! (try washing a pot that doesn't fit into the sink! it's a nightmare!!!). New carpets!!!! and no more plastery ceiling which from time to time falls down little pieces here and there.

Heheh more exciting updates when ... I get around to it. As things stands this shoudl all be completed by next weekend. YAY~~~

Renovation

2009-02-23T20:34:00.003+13:00

Renovation Day 1

Renovation Day 7

Ceiling is done

Walls had 1 base coating

and 2nd layer plastering.

More update soon. :)

Valentines 2009

2009-02-19T19:14:00.004+13:00

Valentines 2009

Watched 75mins of good entertainment.

Watching Suzuki Swift soccer game.

Time spent with my darling (photo not supplied)

Holding 99 handmade roses.

What more can a girl want?!

^___________________^

Happy

2009-02-07T13:01:00.002+13:00

Yesterday we had dinner at a food court at the hub. As I was selecting my drink, something caught my eye. Virgin cocktails! Made in New Zealand. In Cosmo, Pina Colada and Mojito flavours. Immediately I know I was picking up a product we helped developed mid last year.

6 years of planning, 4 years of studying, 11 months of working, and there it is.... something I've always dreamed about. Being able to pick somethign from the supermarket and be able to say I developed it. Granted... I didn't find the product on the supermarket, and I only helped developed it. In fact the whole project was so confidential that we didn't know who was the client..... that's why I got a huge suprise when I saw it on the shelf. But nevertheless...

*happy*

^______________________^

Inspired

2009-02-02T20:15:00.003+13:00

At the end of last year, we had this dairyfarmer came to us with this product he developed himself, asking for advice and suggestions. This was a guy who had no background in science or technology. He started with a great idea. He took one step at a time, solved problems as he goes. During our one hour meeting, I was inspired, by his enthusiasm, by his confidence and optimism. They say NZ businesses are largely entrepreneurs, I guess it's ppl like him, who have great ideas, have big dreams, and not afraid to face on any challenges that comes his way.

I wish him best of luck with his product! May it be successfully developed and launch in the near future.

I love New Zealand

2009-01-31T16:48:00.004+13:00

I love New Zealand! The way how any random photo is post card perfect!

ok... I will admit I used the 'painting' option in my phone for more artistic look to some of these photos.
But scenery after scenery, NZ is just too beautiful that it shows up so amazing in photos.. even if the photographer is crappy like me.

I love New Zealand... :)

Wedding Photos

2009-01-07T12:44:00.005+13:00

Me being me (slack as usual) have been putting off writing a photoblog until now. so enjoy Emily's wedding photos.

Me walking down the scary isle

Here comes the bride.

They are signing their life away. :P

Beautiful table settings.

The main table. I have been conveniently cut off :D

Me giving the speech.

Wedding cake!! yum!!!

Mr and Mrs. Leung are currently living 'happily' in Hong Kong.

She Left

2008-12-23T18:55:00.002+13:00

She left... but how come it feels like she is still going to walk through that door at any moment.

I am supposely officially taken over her room, but how come sitting here I still feel like I am sitting in hers.

Her pink stripy sheet is still laying on her bed. Her pink pencil case is still on her desk, right next to me. Her perfume smell still lingers.

She said in her wedding MV, what is she going to do without me. I didn't doubt then, that she will just do fine without me. But then it hit me with a realization that what am I gonna do WITHOUT her.

How many times have I relied on her to help me with my make up. How often had I asked her opinions on how I should wear my clothes. HOw often had I relied on my wise sister to come up with an intelligent solution to my problems. How weekly I expect her to sleep in on weekends, I can I lie next to her, sleeping in together. How frequently, I would grab something in her wardrobe to complete my outfit, and watch her to the same with my clothes. How everytime mum tell us to drop somethign off at her friend's house, we would endlessly argue who should go, and ended up going together because that's the only fair solution. How everytime parents goes away for a few days, we talk of going on diet and eat somethign healthy, and yet always ended up buying takeaways or fast food.

What AM I goign to do without her, when she's not in the next room, not the next house, not even a drive away, but 4 hours phone call away.

Above all that, I SHOULD be happy for her, i AM happy for her, unfortunately that happiness will just have to kick in a bit later, because her little sister is selfish, and all she can think about is what the heck is she going to do without her sister.

I am...... lost....

less than 2 weeks

2008-12-08T21:30:00.002+13:00

It's less than 2 weeks till the big day. I think I am still in denial, but as I see more and more things getting organised and everything seem to be all happening, I can't help but face the overwhelming fact that this IS happening.

I am happy, yet I am sad... I think I am gonna cry.

I decided to give a speech. Mad, I am probably, but I thought no one else could write a speech Emily better than I can. hopefully i can overcome the nerves to deliver it well on the day. Wish me luck.

Leave it up to your imagination

2008-11-26T12:55:00.003+13:00

Yes I know I have to update sometimes! But really nothing is spectacularly happening in my life. Moving rooms to Emily's room since grandma is coming to visit tomorrow. Also I guess that means when Emily leaves I'll be already partially moved into my new/old room.

Anyway... thought I'll leave you with something to ponder about.. kinda gross no matter what sort of scenario I can come up with. Anyway, just this lady from a Pathology lab bought some peppermint flavour from us. @___@ why the heck would that need that?.... My colleagues and I had goosebumps thinking of the possiblities...

Emily's Wedding reception round 1 - Taiwan

2008-11-04T19:41:00.005+13:00

On 4th October 2008, our family held a dinner banquet for our family and close friends in Taiwan to celebrate Simon and Emily's union.

The Location was a Cantonese restaurant that was carefully selected by Dad's close friends. The size of the room was perfect for our number of guests and the food was really exquisite.

My job of the night was manning the reception.

Introducing Mr. and Mrs. Leung.

The night went smoothly, Emily and Simon looked absolutely stunning! Simon made a short speech (in Mandarin) which he spoke very well. I think our family and friends were very impressed and happy for the couple.

Another mission for Emily and Simon this trip to Taiwan was to take professional wedding photos. So below is a selection of photos they took. Enjoy ;)

Ooopsy

2008-10-01T23:22:00.003+13:00

It was my last day at work before my 2.5 week holiday! So I was tidying up my stuff and wrote an email to all my colleagues (not bosses) about various stuff that might come up during my absence. On the last 'bullet' point this is what I wrote "...and I didn't tell you about the chocolate in the usual secret place"

2 hours later, my boss came into the lab and told me to sit down... then he said
"so.. what is this about a secret chocolate"

what secret chocolate? la la la~~ anyway, it was quite sweet of him to come and wish me a good trip. ^____^

Anyway.. off me go, flying off to my lovely holiday! Take care ppl and i'll update when I get the chance :)

Turkish Extravaganza

2008-09-28T15:55:00.003+13:00

I am home alone this weekend, and my darling Danny decided to be sweet and volunteer to make me dinner. Me being adventurous and difficult gave him the task of making turkish food... a cuisine i am intensely intrigued by and yet have no idea how it is made.

The results? well.. I'll let the pictures speak of itself.

Kofta (lamb kebab) on a tortilla wrap finished with mixed herb salad and greek yoghurt.

finished with....

Baklova which is filo pastry filled with a spicy nut mixture baked with honey syrup.

^____________________________^

Me Time

2008-09-20T19:41:00.002+12:00

Mac donald burger.... $4.20

Petrol... $2.00

Enjoying me-time by the beach... priceless.

pics

2008-08-24T11:33:00.005+12:00

Here are some random pictures of our Whakapapa/Tongariro trip 2 weeks ago.

Interesting...

2008-08-13T13:03:00.001+12:00

Yesterday on the Olympics medal table, Taiwan was named.. Taiwan.. Funnily enough, today it is now called "Chinese Taipei" ....interesting....

Title-less

2008-08-08T12:21:00.002+12:00

It's title-less purely because I can't think of a title for it. Hahaha I am going mad. I have deleted the last post because I am pretty sure I have made no linkage to my blog and where I work, sometimes it pays to be a bit more careful I guess. Plus I am really not that mad at them anymore, plus something is done about it. :D

Olympics is tonight, it's funny my colleagues come in and tell me it's a lucky day, and there I was thinking... is father's day meant to be.. lucky? I guess with the whole 08 08 08 thing. But you know, according to Taiwanese culture (or perhaps other countries too?) all auspicious days run according to the lunar calender, so today is still July... which is like the 'ghost' month when dead ppl come alive and haunt you if you dont' respect them etc. It's a time when you are not meant to launch any new products, new shops, new anything. Hahaha, how ironic. Maybe it's just our custom.

Anyway, really just blahing on, going to buy new toffee pops for work now~ bye~

Silly Things

2008-07-23T21:16:00.002+12:00

Recently we have a project to bake biscuits. The formulation specifies the use of ammonium bicarbonate which according to good old wikipedia can be replaced by baking soda. But whilst I was waiting for my other sample to arrive I thought i'll order it anyway, woudln't hurt right.

So I called up xxx company asking for 50-100g sample and this is what I got.
"hm sorry we've ran out of our samples, but I have gotten permission to give you a 25kg bag"
" say what? 25kg? I don't need that much, you can just give me a little bit from that 25kg"
"no sorry, we dont' do that here, we can only give you 25kg"
"er... sure... if you don't mind"

And upon thinking about this after I hang up the phone, I realized how ridiculous this all was. 25kg is HUGE, cramping it into my already limited space storage is a pain. Not to mention that it would take us 100+ years to finish that amount of sample! and I am sure it's not the type of chemical that you can just chuck into the bin. So anyway.. cancelled the sample and just stick to baking soda in the end. Isn't that funny how ppl would actually give away 25kg of things... for free... plus delivery, to someone whom they obviously know won't ever buy that sort of stuff from them... oh well~~ Nice for them to help anyway.

In other news... I have been branded... with a letter "F". So the story goes I found I had a little cut (infected I might add) the other day which I have no idea where or how I got it. But as I examined it closely, it's like perfectly shaped like the letter F. Like honestly, I am talking about sharp right angles.... Random right?

Seems like an odd place to stop here, but heck, got nothign else interesting! That's all folks... for now! :)

Conference

2008-07-02T19:42:00.003+12:00

Yes I know I haven't been updating.. I am not good at updating my blogs now~~ What can I say, life is keeping me busy.

Had to say a lot of goodbyes lately, I think I have come to a point where ppl around me finally has the ability to go and explore anywhere they want. A bit sadden by all these but what else can I say except to wish them best of luck? and secretly hope that they'll be back. *nod nod*

Anyway, went on a 3 day NZIFST conference last week which was held in Rotorua. That would've been my officially first ever business trip!! That sure was exciting! Especially when I know I'll see quite a few of my uni friends there. It was also a great opportunity to put some client's names to faces. I've been developing/sending samples to these ppl and it's really great to finally get to meet them. I have to say however, there were very few of our clients actually present at the conference. Given the topic this year is out sustainability, and that is mostly irrelevant to most product developmentalist, for the most part all we saw was heaps of ppl from the dairy and meat industry. It was definate a mission trying to get exposure to potential clients when you find out they run a slaughterhouse, or at one point I was talking to a guy who works at a company that produces filters?!?!?

The presentations, or sessions were mostly very boring, with a few exceptions of course! Saw 3 our of 4 UoA students presenting? including Christine! I think all of them did very well, and trust me, some of the questions they got asked were not easy! I thoroughly enjoyed all of them! Well done girls! The sessions on sustainability were.... er..... well... totally irrelevant and almost falling asleep boring. The only interesting fact I picked up from it is how the carbon emission of most products sold in UK had a lot less carbon emission than the same products produced in UK, even when taken into the account of freights. It's amazing how energy consuming chilled storage is! and also how efficient NZ can manufacture our products.

Other than that, it was great fun catchign up with all the uni friends. It was the first time Hui, Christine and I were at the same place! Then there were all the Massey classmates, which I think contributed to half of the FGTP ppl. It really did feel like a big reunion for me! :)

OH~~ and I got to stayed at my own hotel room! on a king size bed (which might as well been a single since I didn't even touch the other half....) It was definately a very nice hotel, got everything a person could ever need from a hotel. Though, first time staying at a hotel by myself, I had to turned the TV on most of the time to kill the silence :P

Anyway, conference was loads of fun! hope my boss will be nice and send me next year which is gonna be held at Christchurch!

That's all for now. :)

Graduation, Finally

2008-05-25T15:50:00.004+12:00

9th May 2008, I Lucy finally graduated, thus drawing an end to my academic life. I received my Massey graduation certificate a few days before my ceremony, which makes my graduation day a proper finale to my university life.

If I am totally honest, having deferred my graduation for a year makes me feel less excited about it all. Almost felt as if I was attending someone else's graduation. Most of the ppl who I studied with weren't there, but I am still grateful that ppl went in lengths to make it a special day for me. Like my mum convinced me that we should get a professional photos taken. Daddy who shouted us a family dinner afterwards. Emily who took half day off work so she can attend my graduation. Simon who had to rush from Downtown to Townhall to catch me before my ceremony, and many friends who couldn't be there with me, but had express their congradulations through calls/txts/emails. I really appreciate them all! Thank you so much. Then there is Danny who volunteeringly became my stuff carrier and camera man for the day, and trust me! he had a hard job. There were times where he had to juggle 2 huge cameras, 3 bags whilst taking photos (which he had to held using 2 hands).

So here's my round of applause to my darling camera man/luggage bag for the day.

The day started with a march, which due to the rain I was almost were not going to attend at the last minute. But Candy convinced me otherwise. Had a pleasant walk from Albert park to Queen street catching up with a few ppl. The rain hold out for most of the walk and only started to spit towards the end of the walk.

Candy and I at the front of Aotea centre.

Whilst dispersing at the end of the march, I had a little catch up session with few ppl from the "chemistry group".

Then it was almost time for brunch, but before that I made a desperate call to go to Hannahs and got a party feet for my poor feet that was already suffering in Emily's shoes.

I first made a visit to the BSc brunch at the marquee, and on the way there I saw Pam, who told me that the Chemistry brunch is at the Science Centre... make sense I just totally forgot to check the finer detail on my brunch invitation. But walked to the marquee regardless to pick up my grad bear (thanks Danny) (which according to the Food sci director when I was taking a photo with him, is the "most important thing") Anyway, from the walk to science centre, I bumped into 2 of my college mates whom I have not spoken to since well.. college. It was a pleasant surprise and great to see they are both doing well.

Gemma, me and Grant outside of the marquee.

Whilst outside Thomas building, I coincidently got a txt from Dan and said he'll catch up with me if I have time. So I promptly called him... and there he is. World knows how..er... camera phobic (ok maybe that's an exaggeration) Dan is, but he took a photo with me anyway.

But Dan wouldn't be Dan without... while.. I think the photo speaks for itself.

A big disappointment of the day I guess was when walking into science centre and seeing... all the free food I been dreaming about is all GONE!!!! except for 4 tiny pieces of carrot cake. I crawl my way to devour 2 pieces of carrot cake, I was damn starving by then. I was hoping to see more of my classmates at the chemistry brunch, but to my disappointment, I didn't see ANY! Had a chat with my lecturers non-the-less and Sajith who was my ex-colleague/ex-demonstrator. Then, it was on the run to meet my family and get my photos taken at the Townhall.

Again, thanks to Simon for walking all this way to see me (and the flower which..... that was probabily the last I saw of it :P), Emily for taking the day off, and Danny whom finally had a chance to get a tiny break from the camera and all the stuff I was carrying.

The ceremony was.... probably what I expected. I have been in 2 ceremonies, and was fully aware of the long list of names to be called, and sore hands from all the clapping. But at least this time, I get to be applauded to, if only for a few second. I had a huge fear of tripping, or doing somethign embarrasing on stage, but I am glad to say it didn't happen. YAY~~~

After the ceremony, my day was drawing to an end except for one last mission. Take photos with Tina!!

and here it is! her parenst got her a huge spongebob! isn't that sweet. By then the weather had turned for worse, at least I was glad I could wear my trencher, which turned out to be quite water-proof.

That pretty much concluded my graduation. It ended with a very nice family meal, several more camera shots and...

What's more important in a special occasion like this, than spending quality time with the family.

Hm...

2008-05-23T11:42:00.001+12:00

There’s 50g of failed batch of chewies sitting on the bench….I think I am anticipating a sugar high sometimes soon.

Car Surgery

2008-05-22T12:45:00.001+12:00

Few weeks ago, my car had its cam belt replaced, and after that my car became very temperamental. It didn’t respond to accelerator as well as it used to, and it vibrates quite vigorously. I was all upset about the car, dad was wanting me to get a new car instead of having a cam belt replaced, thinking that Cedia isn’t the safest car around. But I didn’t think I am at the stage where I am capable financially to buy a new car. So there I was thinking why didn’t I just listen to dad and get a new car.

So I went back to the shop that replaced my cam belt, they actually noticed there’s something wrong with my car, and insisted that I need to get my transmission flushed. Which wouldn’t make sense at all because my car was fine before the cam belt was replaced. So I questioned them if they accidently touch it while performing their ‘operation’ and he just brushed it off saying cam belt has nothing to do with transmission.

All the drama was escalated by my car having a ‘heart attack’ early one morning when I was about to go to work, the whole engine just died on me. @__@ Was freaking scary. So finally, we took the car to this other guy to see what was wrong… and I was telling him about the symptoms of the car, and he was brutally interrogating me because he reckons the problems I am having with the car has nothing to do with the replacement of the cam belt. After numerous confirmation from me that the car only started having trouble after the replacement of the cam belt, he reluctantly say he’ll mimic what they would’ve done while replacing the cam belt and see what happens. 2^nd day I got my car back…. So apparently they didn’t install the cam belt properly. I am just glad my car is back to normal again J

My car passed its wof this Monday… I am so proud.

Anyway…. Got my company credit card today, feel very grown up.

And I will upload some grad photos when I get around to it… (whenever that is)

Postage

2008-04-18T10:10:00.001+12:00

Ordered some courier envelope and ticket yesterday.. and OMG the bill came to $300+ @____________________________@ *cold sweat* Lucky me having 3 directors to ask money from (A) coz last time we ordered some courier stuff, one of the director was not happy. Oh well….

On an interesting note, had to order some samples from one of our competitors, well ordering stuff that we don’t sell, I was sooo surprised that the sample was here this morning… I think our competitor have a much better efficiency when it comes to sending samples… la la la~~

Got my first own first business card today~ feel so grown up~~ :P

Spoilt

2008-04-08T13:59:00.001+12:00

Feeling happy and content. When I asked for leave for my graduation, my business development manager ripped up my leave form and say I can have the day off and it wont’ count as my leave. Feeling awfully spoilt at work, everyone is sooo nice to me. Like we had an end of financial dinner last week, and my boss actually remember me saying I have a low alcohol tolerance in my interview, when he was pouring wine out for me, he said “Now Lucy, just tell me when”.

On the subject of spoilt, had a really nice reunion with ex-colleagues from Agriqualtiy, well, what is now called Asurequality. Anyway, met this girl who’s 3^rd year food science student at AU, and she was telling me how she feel confused about the course, how it’s very broad etc. So I asked her what she wanted to do? She replied “I don’t know” I was sitting there thinking… if you don’t know what you wanted to do isnt’ a degree that covers a wider range be beneficial? So anyway, I probe her around the subject a bit, and then she revealed that she choose food science because “it’s easy to get a PR if you do food science”.

I got annoyed at her after that, thinking how she’s just doing whatever she can to get a PR here, how a waste of life it must be to do something you probably don’t really like. But then…. I realized.. maybe it’s just me, spoilt of knowing what I like, spoilt of having the support and capability to follow whatever I want to do. I am indeed… spoilt!!!

Update! Finally

2008-03-20T16:15:00.001+13:00

I’ve always hear ppl who are working full time that there isn’t really any time during weekdays to do anything. I have to definitely agree. I feel like the past 2 weeks just flew by, without much time to relax at all. Granted I was sick through most of last week.

My job is great! Learning how to make lots of things everyday, like today, I’ve made more alcoholic drink with really refreshing ‘new’ flavour combinations, learnt how to make batters for fries and chicken, and fry them. I was really amazed at how crispy the crust is! Amazing how research can significantly improve the taste of food. And well.. learned how to send out flavouring samples… which admittedly isn’t that interesting at all. EXCEPT I am somehow addicted to the type writer ^^; it’s so old school and everyone is hating it. In fact they are going to replace it with an electronic label printer sometimes soon… but for now~ that’ll be my little toy.

Went to a company dinner on Tuesday night at Euro at the Viaduct. Man, we are talking about fine fine dining!!! The prizes are really much above anything I would normally be able/willing to afford, but the food is divine!!!! And I will stop here for now because it’s ‘Friday’ and we have ‘Friday’ afternoon drinks. Will add on later~

YAY!!!

2008-03-01T10:10:00.002+13:00

I've got a job offer~~~ ^_____^ and out of all the jobs I've applied for this is the one I really wanted. Well.. it's a little different to the sort of job I wanted to get, that is working for actual food manufacturers, but after a few interviews, I came to the realization that a lot of the pd jobs comes attached with a lot of process improvement projects..which I am not overly excited about.

I'll be workign for a food ingredients distribution company. They provide technical support to their clients, which would be my role. So i'll get a variety of projects, granted they wont' all be pd projects, some maybe as simple as fitting suitable ingredients into their existing formulations. But it's good in that way since I'll get to work with a huge variety of food, and plus given the small company structure, it'll mean I'll get to get involved with more aspects of the industry.

I am so excited about my new job.. well.. excited and nervous. But I am officially sick of being a bum, so it's definately good news for me that i'll end my 'professionally bumming days' ^_____^

titleless

2008-02-28T10:52:00.002+13:00

Wow, I relaly haven't blogged for a while :P but to be honest, there's nothign exciting in my life right now to blog about. Except that mum sort of made me the cook of the house, so i have to well.. cook lunch and dinner now :P till I find a job anyway.

Other than that, I enrolled in a community fitness programme, so basically a combination of aerobics and stretches. I thought it's a good opportunity to start exercising again, and good thing to do with Emily, you know, before she becomes Mrs. It was a good idea until.... I saw my friend's mum there too....... that was... downright... embarrassing... let me burn in the flames of embarrassment for the next 16 weeks *dies*

ANNOUCEMENT!

2008-02-13T11:37:00.000+13:00

A baby rabbit DESPERATELY needs a home.
Show your compassion!! Adopt a cute black baby rabbit today to save it from being put down!

Contact me if you are interested!

Chinese New Year Feast

2008-02-11T10:48:00.001+13:00

I know being in NZ, Chinese New Year never feel like much, life goes on as usual, ppl still have to work or go to school etc etc. But mum always try to make a festive atmosphere by making a table full of traditional yummy foods!!!

Seven dishes plus soup! not too bad ya?

Especially when dish like this is really many dishes in one.! (assorted of stewed goodies)

This is "lion head" meatballs, which is also called 4 fortune meatballs, as the name suggests very auspicious dish.

Then there's.. sharkfin soup, heheh it's our very last stock too~~ no more sharkfin next year :'(

And of course, CNY woudl not be complete without a fish course! Yummy whole fish drizzled with a sweet and sour sauce. ^^

And the evening would follow by red pockets from parents, and in the recent years, we'll play mah jong. I know in NZ, CNY will never be the same as those in Asian countries, we dotn' have fire crackers going off, big family reunions, and the food is not comparable as what you can get, but in my opinion, this is how I would like to spent mine. Good tradiational food made with love, and good family companiment. What else do you need. ^^

Long time no see

2008-02-04T15:39:00.000+13:00

I met up with someone I have not seen for 9 years last weekend. She used to be a really close friend of mine during intermediate, we had similar backgrounds and she was an active supporter of my 'speak english only in school' campaign. We were really close back then, but since she had a really strict mum, we only hang together during school time, and we virtually never seen each other outside of school grounds.

Then she started changing, towards the 2nd half of form 2, she became really absorbed into homework. Back then, getting good grades meant very little to me, I neither thought I had the ability to achieve well, nor really cared since the grades doesnt' matter anyway. But it was different to her, she works really hard, during the breaks, and we started drifting apart. Back then, I took it as a sign that she no longer thinks our friendship was important, so I too, started keeping my distance, but deep inside I was afraid of loosing her.

And I did, she didn't attend the same college as the rest of us, and soon we heard news that she went overseas.... over these 9 years, although I have never met her, nor spoke to her until recently. For a long while, i thought that was the end of my friendship with her.

And there we were, seeing each other for a long time, I came to the full appreciation of how time does to us all, we no longer know anything about each other except the 2 years that we were in intermediate, I didn't know what she likes, what her style of clothing was... it was weird, awkward almost, but most importantly it was filled with the possiblities of the beginning of something new. I guess just have to wait to see how everything turns out.

Anyway, I doubt she'll never see this entry, but if she did, I just wanted to tell her I am sorry about trying to keep my distance back in the days, and I may have said things I didn't mean. I regretted what I did, and as a good friend, I really should've been more supportive of you striving for better grades. For the past 9 years, I have missed you, and had always wondered if I had tried harder, we wouldnt' be completely out of touch for so long.... and lastly I just want to say thank you, for meeting up with me, thank you for giving our friendship a 2nd chance.

Paris- Museum d'Orsay

2008-01-23T15:37:00.000+13:00

This is the last entry on my Paris trip. On our last day, we visited the museum of Orsay and Versailles (covered in previous post). Contrasting with the Musuem of Lourves which exhibits ancient and classical arts, Museum of Orsay contained many contemporary works including arts from schools of impressionist, naturalist, symbolismnist etc etc.

The museum itself used to be a railway station.

Even today, the grand clock stands proudly at the most visible place in the museum.

The museum exhibits some very well known paintings by extrodinary artist from early 20th centry, such as Monet, van Gogh, Renoir

My favourite painting is this one, can't remember the artist, but it's called the 'Wheel of Fortune' from the school of symbolism. It signifies how fortunes goes in turns just like the wheel, sometimes you'll be on top, and sometimes you'll end up under the wheel.

At the end of the museum, there's a whole model of Paris under glass-panel floor.

Museum of Orsay is really a spectacular museum, unfortunately me being an idiot when it comes to art, I dare say this would've been a much more enjoyable trip for ppl who understands art better. It did inspire me to well, take new approach to things, as contemporary arts isnt' about what's in the painting, but rather the meaning, or the feeling behind it.

What other ways to end my Paris trip with a shot of food right? What you are looking at is authentic French cheese crepe. As expensive that thign was (about $7 euro), it was certainly satisfying and absolutely loaded with cheese!! Yummy~~

And on that note I've finally finished my travel blog on Paris! It was truly an eye opening and extraordinary trip! I would recommend everyone to go and have a look, but perhaps wait till sky rocketing euro dollars drop a bit :P

Short Note on 2007

2008-01-15T10:04:00.000+13:00

I was in the midst of writing an annual reflection as I normally do, then I came to the realization that I have already done that countless time last year, that an annual reflection would make it redundant and repetitive.

So I will summarise the big lessions I've learnt last year.

That the meaning of home doesn't mark the place where I was born in or brought up in, but it represents a place where I feel most comfortable. That comforts comes from the people that I love, family, friends etc etc. For the whole year I've dreamt of coming back to Auckland, because that's where home meant for me. But now I realize, Auckland isn't the same place as I left it, many ppl have left, and many are leaving, it's just another thing I have to face I guess.

Another thing I learnt, well something that we all know, but I guess I truely appreciated last year is that no one is perfect. Flatting with ppl you'll have to put up with a lot of ppl's habits that is different to your own, just like how they have to put up with yours. No one is in the wrong, but we are just different.

That's all folks! more travel blogs awaits!

Museum of Lourves and Palace of Versailles

2007-12-29T16:40:00.000+13:00

It is safe to say that two of the must see places in Paris are the Lourve and Palace of Versailles.

The museum of Lourve is famous on it's own right, but recently popularised by the "da vinci code" At there, I met a Caucasian who speaks the best Mandarin (the lady in the middle)! and most importantly, it was with a Taiwanese accent. When she started talking, i was shocked for a few second cause I am really not used to seeing a Caucasian speaks such fluent mandarin. As it turned out she spent many years in Taiwan, and had taught my dad 1 or 2 days of French when she was there...small world huh~. Anyway... I just love the glass pyramid! I am sure it'll look spectacular at night as well, just sadly didn't get to witness it. The inverted pyramid instead is very unique, but I guess I can't help thinking about the last scene in Da Vinci Code.... :P The thign about Lourve is that it's not just the artworks that's worth seeing, the architecture and interior design is absolutely amazing! My favourite will has to be the rooms renovated during residence of Louise XIV, just look at the details put into the ceilings and the walls. Not to mention the whole room is lavished with gold.

The famous artworks in Lourve include the statue of Venis (Venus de Milo)

and of course the Mona Lisa. The Mona Lisa is actually a lot smaller than i imagined, it's even smaller than the wall scrolls I have in my room. and it's protected by I dotn' know how many layer of glass and alarms. It is also the room with a huge crowd of people. I had to literally push thru mountains of ppl to take this picture. I guess the special thing I found with this picture is that no matter which angle you look at her, Mona Lisa smiles right back at you, kinda.. ghostly actually. My favourite picture has to be "The Coronation of Napoleon I" because I just love how realistic the velvet robe looks like. In fact, think I saw this painting in one of the films I saw recently.. was it Shrek 3? or Enchanted.. hm.. can't remember :P Just outside of the Lourve is another arc of Triumph, a smaller version of the one at the end of Champee Elysees. The 3 arcs (including La Defence) form a straight line. Isn't that just a perfect platform for treasure map etc? :P

The Palace of Versailles is another must see in Paris. It's a place reside in the town of Versailles. It was renovated by Louis XIV after visiting a Chateau of his finace minister, he felt he's residence back then (Lourve) was nothing in comparison. So he picked a hunting lodge at Versaille and began its expansion and renovation, which later became the well know Palace of Versailles. Unfortunately the exterior of Versailles was under maintenance so we coudnlt' take a good photo of it, so here's a picture of the back :P
I really like the design of the palace, because the same extravagance design of the ceilings renovated by Louis XIV was echoed through the Versailles. This photo shows the hall of mirror. What I love about the palace is that most of the rooms have a theme, and that all the decorations were carefully design to suit that theme. For example, the room of Saturn (in Roman mythology is associated with agriculture and abundance) so the entire ceiling had pictures showing Saturn at the time of harvest. It is again unfortunate that there were special exhibition on display during our visit, so we could not take photos in those rooms. The above photo shows the game room I think. And here's a picture of the queen's chamber. On the left (not in the photo) there's a little side door which connects to the King's room for er.. convenience and privacy.

And what is a palance without a grand garden right? the garden of Versailles honestly stretch out over the horizon! but I guess having visit it during Winter it's not overly exciting in my opinon.

Lourve and Versailles is definatley a must-visit in Paris! it gives me a feel of what it feels to be royalty in those days! it is honestly Awesome!!!

Paris

2007-12-27T20:18:00.000+13:00

Paris is definately a city enriched with culture, style, history and amazing architectures.

From the ancient design of Basilique du Sacre-Coeur or the Basilica of Sacred Heart situated at the summit of montmatres (highest point in Paris). A Roman-style cathedral.

and the Arc of Triumph.

to the decidedly more modern arc, Le Defence,

to the most well-known landmark of Paris, the Eiffel Tower (which gave countless opportunities for shameless lame poses)

at the top of Eiffel tower, the lame posing continues...

The night gives Paris a total make-over, revealing its beauty under shimmering lights.

The Eiffel tower, standing tall, claiming its place in Paris landmark even at night.

Arc of Triumph viewing from Champs Elysees.

The arc of Triumph looks different, somewhat familiar under its yellow coats.(p.s. to ff8 fans, can you recongize this from one of the areas in ff8? ;) )

Interior of Lafayeal

The department stores takes the opportunity to show off their extravagance, lavishness and luxuriance during the xmas season. (

LV orginial shop

While some other shops relies on its orignial products for decoration

The fact is, Paris is a stylish city no matter how you look at it, for example, in the picture is a building under construction, the wacky building is the design of the covers over the building.

Even the entrance to the Metropolitain is screaming with stylish flair.

Paris is definately a city worth visiting.

France- Orleans and Chartres

2007-12-27T18:52:00.000+13:00

Orleans is a city Southwest of Paris

It is famous for the house of Joan of Arc (can you see which one is joan's house?)

and the Cathedral of Orleans

The Catherdal has everything I would expect to see in a cathedral...

beautiful glass windows that depicts stories from the bible, or in this case the story of joan of arc.

confession chambers
and HUGE AS organs.

and If i am perfectly honest, my impression from the 3 cathedrals I've visited from this trip is that it's all very dark, almost hauntingly ghastly, not to mention the coldness in the churches. It's nothing like the nice central heated churches you find in NZ. I guess me not being a Catholic may affect my feelings towards cathedrals, but upon entering those buildings, I feel like I might attack by devils at any second ^^;

Later we visited the cathedral of Chartres. It's signature two high vaults were results of a fire which burnt down half of the cathedral, a second vault was thus built in the 'Gothic' archtecture style.

The very special part about this church is the use of light blue stained glass on Mary which was very rare when it was constructed. The blue was hence named "Chartres blue".

And ending on that note, our next destination take us to Paris! for real this time. (think i'll make that separate post) ^^

Merry X'mas

2007-12-24T23:52:00.000+13:00

Just want to wish everyone a most Wonderful and Safe Christmas!

Tours - France

2007-12-23T14:04:00.000+13:00

We arrived at the Charles De Gaulle airport nice and early in the morning. The airport was absolutely huge, it took the plane a good 20 minutes to travel to the arrival gate after landing. And even after that, walking from the gates to the customs require going through tunnels and tunnels of escaltors!! At some point, it almost looked as though we were walking through a real life version of a huge aquarium, without all the fish and the water. While we are on the subject on flying, I just want to point out that Malaysian airline is like.. way better than EVA and air New Zealand in service!

Our first days schedule is to drive pass Paris to Tours to visit two castles. There are over 3000 castles along the river Loire, according to dad, all the old castles (chateau) has to be close to a water source so that the human waste can be dispose of easily.

Driving along this peaceful, almost enchanted path we arrived at our first destination - Chateau de Chambord.

The chateau is absolutely amazing! the exterior looks like everythign I would imagine what a chateau would be, and this one even got a bit of a hauntingly feel to it just like the caslte in 'Beauty and the Beast'. Apparently the exterior design is a blend of traditional French Renaissance and Medieval architecture. It as over 300 chimney.

Chateau de Chambord was built by King Francois I as a hunting lodge. Which meant that apart from a few game collections, the castle is almost empty because the chateau would only be decorated prior to arrival of the king. Due to the relatively early ancient in its design, the castle is absolutely freezing (despite having over 300 fireplaces).

The only interior design worth mentioned of is Da Vinci's double helical staircase, which Da Vinci specially designed for King Francois I.

The whole point of the the staircase is that whilst you can see the people from the other side of the staircase, in reality you can never meet them.

After our morning exercise around the castle, we arrived at this little cafe "Cafe du Midi" in the little town in Tours. The cafe has got a real homy feel to it, with a humourous owner.
We got to try some of the real local cheese that France has to offer!

Next up, we drove across the country side to our next destination. The country side of France is completely different to what you see in New Zealand, its old and yet peaceful, as if nothing in the world has disturbed its tranquiality since hundreds of years ago.

Our next destination was the Chenonceau Castle, which was a castle built over the river Cher. Unlike Chambord which was rarely occupied, Chenonceau was home for 6 mitresses in the past including Henry II mistresses Diana de Poitiers and Catherine de Medici and the wife of Henry II Louse de Lorraine. Each occupants has expanded/renovated it.

In the beginnng, it was just a river mill (the little building on the right), but eventually got expanded to a whole arch spanning across the river.

Due to the constant occupants in the castle, there were a lot to see within the castle, there was a chapel.

Furnitures and paintings.

A seeminly haunting stairway to the basement which would leads to a ...

fully equipped kitchen.

There is even a maze outside of the chateau.

But I guess what is most memorable about Chenonceau is the stories surrounding its occupants, like the love triangle between Henry II, Catherine and Diana,

...and the sobering widow Louise (the White Queen) for her early deceased husband, who decorated her room in complete darkness with silver paints as symbol of her tears.

And that concludes our trip around Tours, next up is Paris!!

Kuala Lumpur

2007-12-17T21:07:00.000+13:00

Our first destination of our 8-days Paris trip was to Kuala Lumpur because we took Malaysia airline, and since we arrived in KL in the morning, and the plane to Paris doesnt' leave until 10pm, we spent the first day of our trip in KL. It's a really great opportunity to see what many of my friend's hometown is like. So..er.. to all my Malaysian friends, if you find any mistakes/things I can't put a name to in this post, please let me know, coz I really can't remember :P

KL airport is an uniquely designed airport in the way that there's a jungle in the middle of the airport. Later the tour guide explained that is in symbol of the great natural resources in Malaysia.

My first impression of Malaysia out of the airport was.. the HEAT!!!! It was hot, humid, almost suffocating. I was glad.. it was only 30m walk to the tour bus.

Our local tour guide first took us to this restaurant close to the airport, which was apparently commonly know as Asian Hollywood or somethign, coz a lot of Asian stars dined there before.

I couldn't help but order a nice coconut to cool down. The coconut was probably the best I've ever had, the juice was a lot sweeter than any coconut I've had. It was weird however, how on the the coconut it stated "from Thailand"... guess that coconut wasn't from Malaysia afterall.

The toilet in that restaurant is beyond shocking! it was old! not to mention the squatting toilets (horror!!!), the entire toilet was wet (in fact.. all the toilets i've visited in Malaysia are wet) and well.. think I'll stop there. :P

Next stop was the Perdana Putra, or the Prime Minister's Office complex

It's apparently built to seperate politics from the business centres to prevent overcrowding in the city. The building design is quite well thought out, like how from the prime minister's office, you can see the entire complex. The infrastructure was also designed in a way to accomodate the three ethnicities.

Our next stop was Dataran Merdeka or independence square

it is literally.. just.. a square patch of grass. I guess the symbolism is greater than what it actually is... but across the street from the "patch of grass" is the building where they filmed Rush Hour 3 which i thought is worth mention of (thus the goofy pose)

Then we visited the Petronas Twin Towers. As ignorant as I am.. i never heard of the Twin Tower in Malaysia until this trip. It is quite a masterpiece, two huge towers with a bridge (or 2) conneting the two.

A lot like Taipei's 101, there's a shopping complex right next to it.

We had about 90mins to walk around this department store before dinner, and what did we use this opportunity to do?

FOOD!!! hahaha should've guessed right? THe thing about food in Malaysia is that it's CHEAP AS!!! seriously, you woudl think food from a department stores would be higher priced than usual... but all the food we bought were really cheap. first up was some sort of curry noodles, it was really really flavourful.

Then there was laksa which was too spicy for my liking.

Then we had this char koey teow (thx c for the name) which Hui told me I MUST have in KL... which I must agree, it's really really tasty. Not sure if it's the food we ordered, but the impression I got from the Malaysian food is that it's all very strongly flavoured and tend to be on the salty side.

In our attempt to find Roti (another recommendation by Hui) we found... this... which I can't even remember what it's called, but it wasn't called Roti, It's got masala inside. This was a bit of a disappointment, maybe after all those heavily flavoured food, this comparatively was quite blend.

This was followed by ICE!!!! YUMMY

And it didn't stop there, we went for some more mango delights!

Lastly there's leh tea (or pull tea) which was another food item recommended to me. It's basically milk tea, but they mix it in a funny way (from cup to cup over an arm's distance) I have to say I can't taste anything particularly special about this tea. About few weeks later I also found leh tea in nightmarkets in Taiwan, but again I fail to er.. appreciate it as how Hui described it... I blamed it on the ppl who make it :P

And that concluded our 1 day trip in KL... next up is Tours in France

Taiwan - South

2007-12-15T23:38:00.000+13:00

Hey ppl~ I am back to Auckland. Guess in the next few days as I sort out my travel photos, I'll post them out there, so expect ot see a lot of photoblogs. I'll try to do it chronologically so here's my first trip. For some reason my parents have the notion that since i'll start working soon, the chances of me going back to Taiwan is pretty slim. So they took Emily and I along with 2 of their best friends to a trip to the South. The trip was really nice, nice to revisit places that I haven't visit for a while.... in fact, the last time I went to those places was during the study tour 2000.

Anyway, our first stop was Lukang (鹿港). Lukang is most famous for its 天后宮 which is a Taorism temple. Almost all the cities in Taiwan is associated with some sort of local snack, this was the same for Lukang, as it was equally famous is the foods sold infront of the temple.

See all the names of food advertised on the temple gate.

We arrived around lunch time, so it was the perfect chance for us to eat. :D

Introducing oyster noodle soup . This is different to the normal ones because the soup is clear and not viscous like the normal ones. Think i would prefer the normal ones tho.

Then there was my favourite oyster omelette. This one is special in that they gave you 2 different type of sauce! YUMMY

And lastly, there's this... oyster cake thingy... it's made with egg, oysters, herb fried together. I've never had this type of snack before, but according to dad, it's a very traditional local Taiwanese snack.

Next we visited the temple, it's quite a historic temple, and like most Taorist temple it's got lots of statues. This is the more popular one "月下老人" which is the 'god' you go to if you want to find your better half, or anything regarding relationships.

After that we took a walk in the historic streets in Lukang.

There's the famous half well, you can't see very well in the picture, but this is the view from the street. Basically on the other side of the wall lived a really rich family, and in those days only rich people can afford to have a well. So basically they designed the well in the way that their neighbours can also share the water.

In Lukang, you can join a tour where you get taken around in a bicycle like this. Pretty good for a hot humid day I'll say.

Our last spot was the historic museum, basicallly it was a mansion that was donated, and well, it's got heaps things that ppl in those days used.

After that we drove further south. We went to Tainan and visited a bunch of relatives I've never met. They were my grandpa (my dad's dad)'s elder sister's family. my grandpa's sister was really old when we met her, she couldn't move nor talk. It was really sad, there were nothing wrong with her in terms of illness and stuff.. it's was just all muscle deterioration due to old age. She also passed away just last Wednesday, according to my uncle, she passed away peacefully.

Then we went to Kaoshung night market for dinner, I LOVE night markets ^^ food, clothes, accessories, all the SHOPPING ^__^

The second morning we visited the Love River in Kaoshung. In a few years back it was a seriously polluted river, but now it's really clean which is a great sight to see.

Then there was the salt refinery, it kind of reminds me of Chelsea sugar refinery, just piles and piles of salt. :P

and here's more salt. They were even selling salty ice cream :P which was not too bad, the salt just enhanced the flavour.

Our last destination was the seafood market in Taichung. Dad goes there everytime he comes back to Taiwan to buy heaps of fishballs to take back to NZ. :P

And that concluded the trip to South of Taiwan. It was a really pleasant trip to revisit many places as well as tasting delicious local snacks.

Exam

2007-10-30T10:20:00.000+13:00

I really really love how Massey sets their exams questionsm it's so relevant, and it really test on how you can apply the knowledge you've learnt... but it's so freaking hard!

For instance
"you are making a canned pet food and wish to ensure the chunks of meat remain intact through long retort cookign cycle, what's the technological function that needs to be performed, and identify the suitable additives to be used"

See with the same material... from UoA the quesitons will be something like

"write an essay on the functionality of hydrocolloids and how it can be applied in a food system"

so different!

Photoshoot

2007-10-23T21:02:00.000+13:00

In response to c's msg on my tagboard... THIS photoshoot.

Each year the 4th year's pd products gets put onto a Massey calendar to promote their Food tech degree. This year is no exception

So there's our wonderful product! looking very flash if i say so myself~

Us starring at the product.. lost for what we can do.

First we tried to look intimidating.. and of course me being me.. that didn't work out too well.

Then we pretend to 'study' our product...

Then we tried some darn weird poses, I swear we look like a human pyramid.. almost

We tried to 'enthusiastically' posed with our product.. of cousre being the shortest one there, the product was covering my face *blushes*

Then came the bread. you can' treally tell, but those breads were actually moudy! thank goodness we covered it up with our spread. :P

And with that.. after 2 presentations and 2 reports that we polisehd off today, that concludes the paper for the year... I can't believe it! It's been a loooong hard year's worth of work, but in the end I think it's all worth it!!! The guy's calm and relax nature makes everything so easy. I can seriously say we are the only group that haven't had a single argument throughout the year. We just debated, take general consensus, and that's it. sweet!! Kinda a bit sad that we didn't have a proper farewell today, but we had 1 group member missing, and it was late, everyone just wanted to leave after the report was printed. Who knows when will be the next time we'll see each other again. Don't want to think about that right now~ All I wanted to say was.. I had fun, It's be great.. more than great.. it was excellent. We made a product that I was really proud of.... and this will be somethign I'll remember for the rest of my life.. The story of the development of a 3NutButter

Cruuuuuuuuuuuunch crunch

2007-10-22T10:47:00.000+13:00

Hahah haven't update for a while. Been in crunch mode like crazy, but at least things are ALMOST there.

Have HUGE as presentation tmr to Watties ppl~~~ wish me luck.... and my last wisdom tooth decided this is the PERFECT opportunity to start pokings its head out. And then somehow it start kinda makign my top wisdom tooth biting on my cheek... so now i have a huge ulcer. HAHAHA which is really excellent because when it talk, it sound like there's a lump in my mouth.. wait.. there IS a lump in my mouth. HAHAHA

Oh well.. at least things are almost there ^____^

My first pilot plant production run

2007-10-15T21:33:00.000+13:00

Baking 24kg worth of nuts took 3 hours straight!

Just weighing out the roasted nuts into 6 batchs is a daunting task. Look at Rupert (white) calculating hard and Jay (blue)..well... inspecting the nuts.

Grinding the nuts was straining on the machines, our large-scale blender surrendered due to overheating after struggling 3 bucket full of nuts.

So we had to resort to the DISTINTEGRATOR. It is actually really great, it produced really smooth nut butter, only trouble is it can't seem to disintegrate the whole batch, large chunks keep sticking to the sides that we have to constantly stirr into the mix (What Rupert is doing in the photo).

I got the easy job to test out the viscosity of our spread.

After 10 hours, seeing our spread in one huge container, we coudln't be happier
That is until we eventually realize filling the jars would eventually take us 30 mins.

The beginning

2007-10-14T09:46:00.000+13:00

The txt msg I received yesterday

"beautiful baby boy born 12:14, 8 pound 4."

^_____________^

My groupmate is officially a daddy~~~ so happy for him~~

Freaky

2007-10-12T15:29:00.000+13:00

Before I start this, I just want to assure ppl, especially to Danny that I am currently safe and sound in my flat. So there's nothign to worry about, coz nothign happened! I wanted to txt you earlier, but I didn't want you to worry (coz i know you'll).

I had early class this morning, and as I dont' normally catch the early bus, I went a bit earlier just in case if I miss it. While waiting for the bus, I was had my fone out coz *cough* was playing sudoku. Then I saw this guy walked across the road, and was askign me questions.

It was a windy day, I coudln't hear him very well, I had to ask him to repeat it 3 times, by the third time he asked me, he was literally 10cm away from me.

He asked me where's the nearest pub. I was there thinkign, omg, which pub woudl open at 7:30am, but I told him, and gave him directions. Then he started chatting. AGain the wind was really strong so i coudln't hear him very well, but he was talkign about how he's really wasted (makign me think, omg, why the heck woudl you watn to go drink some more), then he was on about "straight up" which I thought he was on about what he was drinkign last night.

Then he started askign why I was standing there, and I said, I was waiting for the bus to go to Massey, he told me that he's going to Massey too, to the dairy farm site, and he asked me why take the bus, how far it is. And i said.. 40mins walk, i have to take the bus, or else i'll be late for the class. And then he keep telling me how i have nothing to worry about, and i shoudl walk... By then I was getting a bit annoyed, and was constantly looking on the distance for signs of the bus.

Then.. he freaking touched my bum! this was followed by him keep telling me "why dont' we go and have some fun" and immediately, alarms was raised in my mind. All those news article danny sent me about rapiest in Palmy was flashign through my mind, I was.. afraid. Then logics kicked in, it was 7:20am in the morning, there were constant traffic where I was standing, not a lot, but for sure every 30s, at least a car will drive pass. The bus should be there within the next 5 mins at the latest. I knew i couldn't outrun him if i had to, so my best options were to keep calm, not ticked him off into doing anythign rash, and more importantly, if i Had to.. the main street was 2 mins run away. I was bankign on the bus coming, someone else coming to wait for the bus.

For the next 3 mins, there were numerous strategic back step to keep my 1.5 m from him. And me constantly telling him NO I HAVE TO GO TO A LECTURE!. Then, I got really fed up with his insistence that I told him "look, if you watn to go to the pub, it's that way, have a nice day" and to my relieve... he walked away. I wasn't sure if it's coz of what I said... but 5 second later, this other student came and waited for the bus with me.

That... was.... a really freaky experience. And yes for all I knew he could've really just wanted to 'have some fun' but still, the possibility of being attacked was so overwhelming. But at the end of the day... I am just glad nothing happened, and that I had 3 scoops of ice cream during lab to comfort myself with.

Presentation day

2007-10-11T19:14:00.000+13:00

Today is the first day of presentation for th 4thyear individual projects, I went and showed my support. There are some really interesting projects, ranging from developing products with reduced salt and no MSG, detecting milk damage, water treatment options investigation, and gluten free bread. Particularly, one of them was on detecting campylobacter on real time pcr. I know that girl quite well, she has repeated told me that food techi have vertially no background on campylobacter and PCR, so she had real trouble preparing her presentation for an audience who just didnt' have a clue.

Which come to a point, because I did, I knew what she was talkign about, admittedly not as good as Miss Hui-who-majors-in-biotech. But the point is... so what if they have no idea, in the food industry, unless if you end up doing some micro quality stuff, you'll probabily never run into basic bio methods such as PCR or what not. At days like this, I can't help but thinking if the choice I made 4 years ago was the right one.

Yesterday I had one of the most enjoyable lecture on ice cream. It was NOTHING like the version laurie gave us last year. Things that I had wondered about during his lecture and the field trip were now explained. They even went into details on the difference between premium ice cream and normal ice cream. And the lectuerer HAD a lot of experiences with ice cream and he could tell us a lot of standard practices based on his experience. It was really brilliant.

We had entire 4 weeks worth of lectures on colloids (sry this is gonna be a bit technical). The only thing that I've learn in Auckland was laurie's *cough* wonderful tables of different emulsifiers, and a chemmat lectuere mentioning things on laplace pressure. But what I got this year, was soooo much more indepth, and I can go on and on and on about this, but I will not bore you with the details.

My course coordinator half jokingly said to me on our 2nd meeting "didn't you wish you were here" I replied him "things would've been a lot different" and indeed it would've. I would not have many of the friends that i treasure, woudl've met Danny at all... so how can I say that things would've been better right?

All I am hoping is that I will be equipped with more food techi info that AU students lacks, and more general bio info that Massey students lacks, that makes me an unique, all-rounded food technologist that employers will want to hire!!! HIRE ME PLZ!!!!

The perfect job!

2007-10-10T10:24:00.000+13:00

I've got this forward mail from one of the lectueres today

"XXX

See attached a fixed term contract for 6 months to cover maternity leave for XX. It is working for me at XXX site at Ncompany.

This would be an ideal opportunity for someone who hasn’t got the best grades and/or interview technique to prove themselves in the role. At which point with the continuous turnover we have in tech positions they would probably easily find a permanent position."

HAHA isn't it just brilliant the way she advertise it? :P OMG! ok WHILST it's nice that she's giving ppl who probabily doesn't look that impressive on a cv a chance to work? does it not make that role very... unimportant. And more importantly, she expects whoever get this job can easily find a permanent position due to the HIGH TURNOVER, now which means no only is this job unimportant, it's so boring that ppl always want to leave. Hm..... makes you think doesnt' it. hehehe I'll certainly wont' be applying... well.. for one thign it's not in auckland, and it' a process tech job. HAHA.

Quality paper reflection

2007-10-08T14:38:00.000+13:00

I just handed in my last quality assignment on Friday. Feel great, that's 1/4 of my course done, officially. The last assignment was a reflection assignment on what i've learnt etc (don't ask me how the heck the lecturer is gonna mark that).

I choose to do the Quality paper because my course coordinator said "looking at what you've done, you never done anythign on quality systems, so I think it'll be quite a good paper to do". Granted I have vowed not to get into QA or QC stuff just having worked as a QC technician for almost 2 years part time allow to me to discvoer that, that is not where my passion lies. But it did gave me I guess curiousity to what Is quality, and how it is maintained.

The quality paper was certainly intersting, for starters is part extramural which means NO LECTURES! and since I am an internal student, I get the privilege to have a meeting with the lectuerer weekly to discuss my progress. All I can say is. thank goodness for those meetings, or else I'll never have the self-displine to do a bit of study every week. But most importantly, it is really not close to ANYTHING i've done before. For once it wasn't about soaking up all the information, it wasn't about regurgitating, it was all about critical thinking, and what I think is right. I seriously have major headaches when I have to do quality assignments, just on the basis of how hard I had to think. And at the end of the course, while I can't say still that quality is somehting I like, I really feel like I've learnt a heck of a lot. This just to showed.. 2 years experience at AQ taught me nothing about quality systm. just as well as i was just a technician.

Strange Stuff Cont.

2007-10-06T13:39:00.000+13:00

Hehehe Just thought I'll keep you guys updated on what I end up doign with the last 1/3 of my purply cauliflower

Cauliflower and cheese sauce.

And actually.. it wasn't bad at all~~~ I guess cauliflower and cheese is the perfect marriage.

Strange Stuff

2007-10-01T19:13:00.000+13:00

So the other day, I went to the morning market and saw this ....

A Very Very PURPLY cauliflower.... I just couldn't resist to buy it and try what it's like. I picked this up for $1 too! what a bargain!

So.... I massacred the cauliflower, to make myself a nice stir fry with chicken.

To my amusement, the purple colour intensified during the cooking process, and what I was left with was a very purply cauliflower indeed.

And dinner was served.! And I am sure you are all dying to know what it tasted like. It's kinda a cross between a broccoli and a cauliflower, but a bit tough. I guess I didn't stir-fry it for long enough. But this meal have taught me a very important lesson! What ppl say about you eat with your eyes? TOTALLY true! THe cauliflower was just normal tasting, but by the end, I was gettign an overdoes of all the purply bits, especially when you associate purple like that with poison, it did make it hard to swallow towards the end.

So I've learned, and made tomato pasta with it. the redness really mask the colour well. But the trouble is.. what shoudl I do with the rest 1/3 of the cauliflower... hm.....

2007-09-28T20:06:00.001+12:00

24Kgs of nuts

10 hours later

We made 62 jars of 3NutButter

^_______________^

Field Trip

2007-09-28T12:38:00.000+12:00

Had a 2-day field trip earlier this week, that makes a total of 6 factories I've visited so far. Every factory is so different... it's really quite interesting.

First up, our course coordinator thought it'll be brilliant to start scaring us off by visitng AFFCO, the meat slaughter house. Yup that sure was.... interesting to say the least. It didn't smell as bad as I thought... and the whole process involves A LOT of labour.. but it was really really efficient. I dared not look at the part where er... sheep was getting killed, coz everyone that walked out from there had blood all over. But from what I've heard, it's really humane!. Basically they shock the animal with electricity, and then their neck is basically being chopped.. off.. ok.. chopped half. Our lectuere said ideally they'll want to just have one clean cut on top of its head so the animal's brain and heart will stop at one go. But because it has to be halal certified, the animal has to be able to revive after 45sec if left alone or something.. so that's why thye had to do it in 2 steps. AFter that the animal is pretyt much skinned, had various parts removed, packaged... and well... all done. It's unbelievable how clean the factory is, ok.. excpet for the fresh blood etc..

After that we visited REMCO which is a little factory with... 10employees which produces the rennet for cheese manufacture. The factory is small, and basically consist of huge tanks and pipes. It's a bit difficult to see what goes on when all you can see if... well.. stainless steel.

We had dinner at Hawera, we had to visit 3 restaurants before we found a place to eat coz.. well.. the town is so small, most can't cater for 24 people in one go. We stayed at a really nice back packers... my classmates were getting high from playing 4 kings. Amazingly my lectuere/supervisor joined, and was really good at the game. After 12 we drifted into sleep.

2nd morning, we visited the Whareroa Fonterra site. It was HUGE, they process 1/4 of all fonterra's milk.... whcih si just insane if you ask me. They have HUGE spray dryer that's 5 stories tall, which process 20 tonnes of milk powder per hour? or per day? hm.. can't remember... but that's only the 3rd largest in the world. The first was in Christchurch, 2nd in..er... can't remember where. Isn't it amaizng how the 3 largest spraydryers in the world are all in NZ? no wonder we are such a dairy country. But the lady was tellign us that in Europe, when they have excess milk, they generally make it into cheese, that's why fonterra make it more into.. milk powder, just so the ocmpetition is less fierce.

Lastly we went to another Fonterra site.. this one specilise in producing lactose. At first I was very... doubtful why anyone woudl ever want lactose, but as it turns out, most of the pills are made out of lactose. The lady that showed us around were superly enthusiastic... it's sad to say under the conditions of HUGE machines operating and ear plugs, i really coudlnt' hear much what was goign on :P good thign our group isn't presenting on lactose (A)

So that was the trip in a nut shell...I'll add more stuff in when i have the time ^^

Sakura Festival

2007-09-24T17:03:00.000+12:00

Saturday was Sakura Festival at IPC (international pacific college). It was a huge event for a small town like palmerston, so I just had to check it out.

Please note, since the only camera I have in palmy is my er...fone... so all the nice pictures here were obtained from Hui using her super pro-looking camera.

IPC is really a pretty campus, it had a whole row of sakura just to accomadate the Japanese students. IPC is basically an institute that target largely Japanese oversea students. A lot of 'rich' Japanese students like to get some overseas exposure, so their parents send their kids to IPC.

I heard rumours that IPC is like party town everynight, which seems almost weird given how peaceful and 'country' like it looks.

There were displays of Japanese doll collection. I remember studyign about them in form 4 but never had the opportunity to see a real life one. Though I must say, the ones in the textbooks looks nicer.

Among the activities, there were the Japanese drum performance. It was awesome!!! really really awesome!!!! You wouldn't expect an institute team like this to be so professional. Every bean, every movement was so uniform! and the way they danced around the drum while keeping to the beat is nothing short of spectacular. I heard from someone that this drum team performed all over New Zealand professionally.

And what would be a festivale like this without the food stalls!! Although, the food isn't particularly special in any way, and I had.. the worse rice burger ever!! Though I did try this Indonesian thing called masabak or something. It was basically egg with peas and onions etc wrapped in some sort of pastry and fried. Not too bad, but definately greasy.

For the frequent goers, the novelty of drums and the displays have faded. To them it was just a brillliant day to enjoy the picnic under sakura trees... like how it should be celebrated.

As for us.. what's a better excuse to take the day off and just relax...

%@$#@%$#@

2007-09-23T10:22:00.000+12:00

I thought i'll give them the credit of a doubts. I tried! You wouldn't expect North Korean ppl to lik South Korean ppl, to some extent that's what you would expect from Taiwanese and chinese ppl! Just to achieve what they want, they've stripped us of so many things! But I gave them a bit of doubt, that they are too, ppl just like me, that maybe they dotn' like how their govt are run, that's why they are here. I was willing to be friends with them as long as we keep away from politics....

When they came and looked at the room, I had a say in whether to let them stay or not, the landlord called me and asked what they were like. I could've said something against them, but I didn't, because they were genuinely desperate for a place to stay.. just like I was.

When they didn't know where to catch the bus, I told them all I know, even gave them my bus timetable.

I've moved my dinner time 15 mins earlier so that we won't need to clash when we use the kitchen.

Even when they briefly commented about tw and china... i kept quiet.... because I wanted to live in an environment that is not tainted by politics.

AND THEY FREAKING FALSELY ACCUSED ME AND BACK STABBED ME!

%$@!#%!#$@!$$!@#!@%!@#!@#

When my eggs were missing... i gave them the credit of doubt that maybe they mistakenly took it, or maybe they were really desperate for eggs... sure enough 3 days later the eggs found it's way back.

When he had 3 guys friends stayign over all the time, and hogged up the bandwidth... I kept quiet knowing it's only temporary

When xxx used the recycle bin like a rubbish bin, I stick up the 'what can be recycled' pamphlet from city council, and subtly told her that hey.. i didn't know number 6 plastic can't be recycled....

When xxx chucked the whole recycle bin into the rubbish bin... I felt disheartend.. but kept quiet... you can't make a person environmentally friendly.

And they came back and do this.....

a bunch of deaf communist!

New tool for investigations

2007-09-21T19:52:00.000+12:00

Watching the news, I've noticed a interesting new trend. Police are starting to use internet diaries and networks such as blogs, facebook and bebos etc as a tool to investigate into the lifes of the suspect/victims. Last week, the bebo were on the news as tools to find out the final moments of Augustine, and just today Xue's blog was on the news to find quotes related to this artist that she liked.

I wonder... if any thing i documented will be used against me in the future.... it makes you wonder right? Say one day if i died tragically (or else i wont' end up in teh news) i wonder if ppl will dig out random stuff that i've written, and flash it on news.... I guess we now enter an age where public blogs are really public, people and authorities are now realizing that this is a great source of information directly from the person of interest.

I guess it is time that I start be really careful what I write, the possiblity of the internet is endless.. who knows who'll end up reading it.

What is happening to this world

2007-09-18T20:14:00.000+12:00

It makes you think, when there's a reality tv on how to help your PET loose weight!!!!! IT makes you think doesn't it? we, as a population with sky rocketing obesity, we not only struggle to control our own weight, but our pets are also taking a toll. Me never actually had a pet myself before, but seriously how hard can it be to... give your dog less food for one day? I mean.. it's not like the dog have unlimited access to its food source unlike us? right????

And the fact that they actually have a programme on that!!! it's like.. are we all so sick of watchign HUMAN weight loosing programmes that now we have to switch attention to our furry little friend? The world.. is a very... very... weird place.

In other news.. my groupmate is gonna be a daddy very soon. He is now walkign around, holidng his cell fone like the most precious thing in the world. Hehehe really can't believe it~ the guy who can never resist chucking peanuts into the air before it lands (or miss) in his mouth is actually.. gonna take up the responsiblity of a father! and he's only 1 years older than me too!!!!

I made scones

2007-09-15T14:20:00.000+12:00

Like the title said... woke up, start laundry, start making scones, and just as teh scones were finished, my laundry were done, and all my flatmates all woke up to er.. help me finsih some of the scones. HAHAH good timing right?

Must say I've never been a big fan of scones. But I had heaps of dates which been sitting in my cupboard for.... 3 months.. so I was askign Annie waht i can make using dates. And she suggested scones. And it was the perfect idea. 2 months beforee I officially move back to auckland... I have a huge bag of 1.5kg flour, 150g butter, more baking powder, sugar and cinnamon than I can finish.. So it was perfect, seeing how i'll need huge amoutn of flour and bakign powder vs butter (which is gonna be so expensive from monday onwards)

Amazingly,.. scones are so easy to make... granted the utensils and equiptments were a bit hard to clean coz teh dough was really sticky.. but I liked it.. my flatmates "said" they liked it.. so it's all good ^^

AHHH I LOVE FOOD~~~

The Psychotic me!

2007-09-14T14:14:00.000+12:00

Been wanting to post this up for a while now, but having stuff coming up, and most important I don't want to come across as being depressed or anything!! coz i am not!!

For a while now I've always wondered why sometimes I come across as having lots of complaints when I am really not complaining at all... Like.. Danny always tells me I complain too much, but really, half the time I was only describing things that happened to me.

Then something struck me, durign the fonterra assessment day, when I realized there is something... very psychotic about the way I look at life... ok.. psychotic is an exaggeration, but it's really.. bizarre.

I dont' know when exactly this way of thinking began... I guess me being a.. cartoon freak, it must've sprouted from there. As a kid, I watched cartoons/dramas etc about amazing heros and heroin who survived horrible events that happened to them, protecting earth from alien attacks, ppl being mistreated unfairly, ppl sabatage each other etc etc. So instead of tea parties, we used to play role playing games, and it woudl always involve certain types of struggle before we stood, as heros and heroins at the end of our role play.

Then biology came along.... when we were taught about the survival of the fittest. How the strength of an organism depends on it's ability to adapt and survive, whatever environmental changes come along their way. Before I knew it... I was crafted into this person who just... simply survives.

Of course there's one.. problem with this mode of thinking, is that heck my life has been so great that I didn't have anythign to survive way through (see how bizaare this is), and in many ways, it makes me feel undeserving, like on my little heroin scale, I am close to the bottom. I guess this is why I never feel like i deserve any compliments. I've notice this about myself heaps of times, when ppl compliments me on stuff, i'll try to convince them otherwise, and if they are persistent enough, i'll try to compliment them back, just to proof that I am not as great as what they think I am? Afterwards, I've always wondered why couldn't I just accept my compliments gracefully, but it's because I dont' htink I deserved it, every good things that has happened to me were given to me, not because I've earned it.

AND if that wasn't twisted enough, in order to boost my own morale, I started looking for 'hardship' in life for me to... survive through. "I have mountain loads of assignments, it's inhumane for the lecturers to give us this much work" I say thigns like that so that when ppl agree with me that those are indeed not easy task to complete, I feel better about myself, because on my little heroin scale, it's pointing a bit higher.

So here's the thing, I really really dont' want to feel this way anymore. I dont' want to just survive anymore! my life is great! it's too brilliant for me not just survive it, but to live it. I guess it's great to have ppl around me now who are... I guess.... really living their lifes, and I hope I can use them as a reminder to myself that I too deserve to live.... not just to survive.!! I AM living my dream! if I can't even enjoy that, then I am really wasting my life away.

p.s. this post was not intended to some depressing or anythign, if it come across that way, it's just coz I am psychotic.. hahaha

Sem break is over!

2007-09-11T16:45:00.000+12:00

Danny left this morning, and that marked the end of my holidays! So I guess it's a good tiem to update stuff we did during the 2nd week of the holidays.

First... is our collection of.. random meals

I was fascinated with the idea of putting chocolate with meats, I've seen ppl do it on Masterchef, and was aching to try it myself. So I captured my perfect guinea pig when I made this...

Lamb steak with chocolate merlot wine, with beer battered fries and 'seasonal' boiled veges.

So what does that taste like? ... well... like... chocolate with red wine! it's hard to explain it, it's like you can definate taste the 2 distinct taste. I woudln't say I really enjoyed it, it's really different, it's not that it's bad, it's just, i guess I am more used to the conventional gravy. And since we had no idea of the portion size... we made too much gravy... so...

We decided to put it on beef steak, which I think goes better with teh sauce than the lamb, coz the distinct lamb flavour was kinda, interferring a bit with the sauce. Hm... I still have some left-over sauce.. what should i eat it with... hm...

Then.. in one afternoon.. we made...

NACHOS!!! heheh never realized how easy it is to make nachos.. but yea.. that tasted really great.

On saturday, seeing how we have the car from Annie again, we decided to go for another trip to Wellington. On the way, we found Lindale, which is like the kapiti shop thingy, along wiht other specialty shops. Was rather disappointed that they didn't have their award winning flavours, but guess their ice cream is nice, very gourmet stuff.

Such a nice day to visit welly too

I must say after visitng welly for the 4th time.. I am so done with welly... not that it's not a nice place or anytign, becuase it is! but just that i've visited all the tourist spots... and well, shopping is comparable with auckland so I guess there's nothing special left ot mention about wellington except..

I don 'tthink i'll ever get sick of the gelato from Koffee eise! it's sooooo nice and creamy, and their flavour range is just awesome! gingernut, coconut, fruit and yoghurt, pistachio, etc etc etc.... *drools* and yup, tha't the 2nd serving of ice cream we had for the day.

On Sunday night... we went ot this real fancy restaurant up in the summerhills, It's called Rendezdous or something, it's basically a real fancy restaurant/bar.

We start off the night with bread topped with olive and tomato chutney and drizzle with olive oil. It was really nice, i almost forget how good olive can taste like.

Then there was...

Hot pot, which is kinda like a fancy steak pie, nevertheless it was really well made. The gravy is amazing, and the meat was really flavourful.

Danny had xxx sausuage pasta, which was really really nice too.

Then... we had this really really amazing cherry cream brulee. Now I am not a big cream brule critique like c, haven't never eaten cream brule outside of NZ. But I can definately say it's the best cream brule I had ever! The caramelised sugar was crunchy, the custard was rich and creamy, and to balance it out, the cherry(not artificial ones) really does a good job to cut through the richness. The ice cream complimented it well too, not sure if it's jsut a kapiti ice cream, but you can see HEAPS of vanilla pods in the ice cream.

So that sums up a pretty good holiday I think, and of cousre I am excluding all the details about my boring..er.. assingments etc.

Hope everyone had a nice holiday too.

Air ticket time may be changed... there maybe hope yet.. keepign my finger crossed

Napier Day Trip

2007-08-29T14:00:00.001+12:00

My last blog entry was a bit depressing for my liking, so I am gonna push it to the bottom by filling with highlights from the Napier day trip.

It was one of those...days when we were working hard out towards the final week before the sem break, hui came up with her spontaneous idea. "hey! let's go napier to celebrate our sem break, i'll get hold of a car"

So off we went, nice bright and early on a saturday morning. The weather seemed to be on our side too, it was sunny for the entire day.! The drive was 2 hours long on a.... very questionable manual car with the back seats jammed packed with JUNK FOOD.

Introducing the paricipants

From left: Chong (1st year Horti,) Hui (4th year food techi), Brad who's got blocked by my big head (4th year mechatronics) and me.

First stop: The beach!

sry for the quality, but this was taken using my fone. The beach was nice~ especially on such a nice day. But what was funny about the beach was that instead of the usual sand, the beach was covered with gravels, it was really bizaare. But I miss the water so much, so it was nice to see the sea again.

Beside the beach was....

A 'Sunken Garden' and yes that was the name of it. I thought perhaps the ground got 'sunk' because of the earthquake or something, but the lady at i-site it was just the part of the design when the architect designed it. It was a really special garden in my opinion, quite small, but had really artistic fountain and really nice sections seperated by channels of water.

With noon approaching, our stomachs were rumbling, we met up with Brad's friend Mark, and told him to find us a cafe with nachos (Brad was craving for them)

Hui and Me we our lunch. MUNCH TIME!

And.. that was our lunch, nothing fancy really, kinda like.. takeaway/cafe kind of place BUT Brad got his nachos, and the meal was cheap. ($6.50 for a roast pork meal) So it was all good. ^^

With a tour guide under our disposal, we gave Mark a map of Napier with circled marks of where we want to visit.

First there was the Art Deco. It's basically.. just an art shop. But the artworks are there to preserve the artworks from the period which Napier was struck with the earthquake. So it's very... early 1900s. Not really my style, but it was worth a look.

Then there was the theatre, again, nothing spectacular, but perhaps looking more modern than I would expect. I've taken this particular foto because I thought the design look hauntingly like the theatre in the game Shadow Hearts (which i only played for teh first 2 hours) BUT it did make me have chills down my spine when we walked in... the theatre in Shadow Hearts had zombies @_@

We were aware there was an aquarium at napier, but non of us were overaly excited about it, until Mark said "it's the national aquarium, they recently renovated it, you should go check it out"

Me force feeding Hui a chocoalte fish.

The aquarium... well... In terms of the fishes on display, it's nothign better than what's at Kelly Calton. The lady at the reception made a huge deal about how there's a feeding time at 2pm. And well.. what exactly is the attraction? a diver.... chucking pieces of fish fillet at the fishes in the tunnel thing.

My attempt to take a pic of Dory~~ but it was just swimming too fast

What I did enjoy from the aquarium was seeing Kiwis for the first time... yup... I've never seen Kiwis awake and running out of all those times I've visited Auck Zoo. But this time.. there were 2 of them.. running, chasing each other, digging for things. It was really great!!! I guess with all the recovery programme of kiwis, and the fact that they carries the largest egg in propotional to its size, i've always imagined kiwis slow, fragile birds, but in fact, they run around quite fast and agile. Seeing kiwis.. that along made up for.. the rather disappointing aquatic life display at the "NATIONAL" aquarium.

Next we went and found a look out overlooking napier port.

As expected from a port, there's nothing pretty about it, except hey.. it's so much smaller compared to auckland one and... the scenery behind sure is pretty.

Then there was... a Botanic garden

Which is questionable as a garden, because it had.. heaps of... cages with different types of birds. Hahaha, there was not much there.

As Napier seemed to have, nothing else to showcase, we went to Mark's place, and started shooting glass bottles with his air gun.

Muwahahaha... glass bottles, I SHALL TERMINATE YOU!

I did manage to shoot a bottle, after gazillion trials :P

That was the end of the trip, it was then another 2 hour long drive back to palmy... this time however, the drive seemed longer as our car was thirsty for petrol, and there were no petrol station for about an hour after the car is giving us signals that it's thirsty. We made it to a BP though (quite miraculously) I think.. the car fuel detection thing is coo coo, so it probabily started giving false signals earlier than it should've... thank goodness for that though, or else it'll be a super long walk back to palmy.

Explosion!

2007-08-26T22:31:00.000+12:00

One plane exploded in Japan... my perfectly planned holiday plans is literally been blown away.

I have wonderful friends, I hope it's because I've treat them well, they have never ask for my allegience....

I have a wonderful boyfriend, who also respect me enough to.. never ask for my allegience..

But never have i thought.. that the one place where I would've ever imagined ask where my loyalty lies...ask me the exact question....

"you want to go europe, can't you see how much sacrifices we are making to make that plan come true, then you want to go road trip with your friends too, it's time you choose what is more important! your friends or your family! "

guilt... i feel really guilty.... YES i want it all!!! I want a nice last family trip!!! who knows what will happen when emily gets married.!! and YES I want to spend time with my friends... who knows when will be the next time we'll be together. YEs i AM greedy! i want to savour the last moments while it lasts. But sometimes.. life isn't really about what I want, the world does not revolve around me.

"I'll pay for the extra cost ok, let me go back later"
"what if the plane blows up again"
"what kind of stupid airline would let planes blow up within such a short time"
"if it happens once, it's bound to happen again, what is more important than your life or your friends?"

Sometimes... even when we are willing to risk our life for something...it's too precious that ppl will not let me take the risk

even it it is.. the only thing.. that truely belongs to me!

INTERNET IS BACK!!

2007-08-25T21:48:00.000+12:00

AFter... 3 days of deprievation of internet at flat... it's back on!!! YAY!!! hehe ok.. xtra isn't TOO bad after all, takes 2 days to send us a new modem!! hehehe

Wow~

2007-08-21T09:56:00.000+12:00

This morning, my flatmate Amy, the kiwi girl who moved in.. not too long ago (not the newest one) came and said "oh.. i am moving out today"

@___________________@

Was all excited that i finally get to stay with a... kiwi girl! you know, get to know their culture better and stuff.. and she was gonna be a chef and stuff.. so i thought hey~ great place to learn how to cook nice food. Didn't get to do any of those... she was hardly home, when she was home her bf is here.. then she got in trouble with the landlord... *sigh* oh well.~

Crunch week over?

2007-08-19T20:32:00.000+12:00

It's funny, last week was my crunch week, and was also the last of Hui's crunch week. For the whole week, or weeks before that, we've always said.. hang in there, almost over, after that we are gonna celebrate etc etc. So we did, we hang on hope that.. hey... we can have a break soon.

Funny thing is... somehow... over the rainbow isn't as nice as i hoped it'll be. It's almost like, work I've been putting off becuase.. well.. it was my crunch week are coming back to haunt me~~ hm..... at least holidays is coming up I guess. Somethign definately I can look forward to. Not to mention Danny is coming ^___^ YAY~~~

Oh yea.. to keep ppl update on.. end of the year... Dad booked the ticket alreayd.. so my plan so far is
Exam finishes on 3rd Nov
Will be back in Auckland anywhere between 3rd-10th
Flying away on 16th Nov... and yea I know this is not quite 27th Nov, but it still leaves enough time for us to go on road trips or whatever if that's still the plan ;)
And I'll be back in NZ on 11/12th Dec.

An entry of many things...

2007-08-14T19:36:00.000+12:00

Shuli left today in her tiny car with.... a LOT of luggage.... Had a hardout day at uni, came home and somehow... the fact that her bedroom door was wide open.... her room is empty... there's no shoes on the shelf, and the fact that I was completely alone in the house was just....weird. I wonder if that's how my family felt when I left this year.

~~------------------------------------------------------------~~

Had a talk with one of my classmate friday last week, as it turns out she's doign pgdip like me, and she's a friend of Katherine's, the one doing Masters at Foodsci in Auckland. Apparently she was quite frustrated because no one is willing to help her... and I understood completely, I felt the same when i was doign studentship. At that point in time, i coudln't express how... lucky I am. There's a shortage of Basic strawberry jam in palmy. I coudln't find it in countdown for 3 weeks in a row. I told my supervisor. He VOLUNTEERINGLY went to both Woolworths to check it out for me.. not once, not twice, but three time. while the result is still the same, it's the fact the he was more than willing to help.

My sensory panel, the 3rd years are doign it as part of their assingment... so I told my lecturer about the shortage (the lecturer teachs at Albany, and comes down every monday to teach). She said "that is not a problem at all, I'll go look for it for you in Auckland and send it down" While I haven't got the samples yet... i am hoping that I will in the next few days.

I am... very lucky... and I know it.

~~-----------------------------------~~

900+ applicants, 200+ through to phone interview, 40 through to assessment day.

2 days stress over perfecting CV and cover letter, 1 morning preparing and taking the 30 mins phone interview. 2 days preparing for the psychometric testing. 1 day + many postage from mum to prepare for documents and attire for assessment day. 1 cold for walkign in the rain.

I lost at the last hurdle. Whilst it's not confirmed, ppl who got accepted already knew, I am more than prepared to accept my email of rejection.

In many ways, i knew it wasn't meant to be, when my classmates tell me they found certain tasks in the assessment day 'interesting and fun' when I thought it was just plain stressful. That's solid proof that while they are comfortable what is asked of them, I was doing somethign clearly out of my comfort zone.

In many ways, it's a huge relieve. I found out the programme isn't as glamourous as i hoped it'll be. I found out that another year of sacrifices may not lead me to where I wanted to be. I was unsure if I wanted to spend another year or 2 away from home when my time left to spend with emily is becoming short.

All I want to say is....

AUCKLAND 2008, HERE I COME!!!!

Favours

2007-08-12T10:06:00.000+12:00

Warning, a long-ish post of complaints coming up, so don't read if you don't want to hear my page of.. complaints.

I like to think of myself as someone who like to help others, and I do, imparting happiness upon others is a nice thing to do. Makes me feel important. But I guess I never realize the thing line between doing ppl a favour and feel like being used.

So I have the car this weekend again because Annie is goign up to Auckland. So she ask me to drop her and pick her up from the airport, and as return i have the car for the weekend. It's all sweet, and i woudlnt' even call that a favour I am doign her, because having a car for a once is as much of a favour for me as it is for her.

So knowing i have the car, I asked Hui if she wanted me to pick her up from uni yesterday, becuase i know she have to run her experiments for teh whole day, and the last bus that leaves massey to town is 4:30, and she can't really finsih until 5. Plus I needed to drop off heaps of jam at uni anyway . so it was all set, i were gonna pick her up at 5.

situations like that I am more than willing to help, because otherwise she'll really have to get someone else to pick her up anyway.

So saturday monrings are my grocery shopping day, I woke up a bit later than usual, and when I am ready, Shuli also has to go to work, and she told me to wait for her so we can go together. And so when I walked out and get out my car key. She remembered that I have the car for the weekend, and well, we all drive happily to pak'n'save etc

At 4pm, I received a txt from SHuli to call her at work. So I did... and she said "Lucy~ I forgot to bring my lunch, can you bring it over"
me: ".... where is it?"
her: "it's in the fridge, can you see a box of rice.. can you add like 2 pieces of chicken in?"
me:" don't you finish work at 7? why are you having your lunch so late?"
her :"oh~ coz you know, i forgot to bring my food, and I still have 2 hours... ok ok nvm call you later"
~~ by that time i was not very happy about the whole thing. Because what she's asking me will cause a lot of inconvenience for me.. for her to save waht... $2 for lunch? She works at pak'n'save for cryign out loud! how hard woudl it be to just buy a bread? And plus she really only have 2 more horus to work. realisticly speaking by the time i delivered her lunch, she'll probabily finish work soon anyway.

Then at 5, I went and pick up Hui, she and her friend (who hitched a ride) have a birthday party, so they needed to go to kmart to develop fotos first.... which.. ok.. wont' take long so it's fine. and again they really needed someone to drive them around or else they wont' be able to finsih the present before the party.

At 6:00pm I was cookign my dinner, I received another call from Shuli.
"Hey lucy, can you please pick me up from work today? It's pouring down"
me looked outside, it was indeed pouring down, and if i remember correctly she just chucked out her umbrella last week.
"ya sure, what time?"
"7:30"
ok... so it's all fine... I woudlt'n want to walk home from work at horrible weather like this.. so fine. Even tho it would cause a little convenience since I have a cold, and goign out to a weather like that isn't... well.. ideal.

Then..... 6:30 I got another call from her
"LUcy, you know that box next to the fone, can you dig out my burger king uniform, I watn to return it to my friend. Just take it with you when you come pick me up ok! dont' forget"

Ok.. digging out clothes, simple, and i thought her friend is workign at pak'n'save too. But as it turned out, she wanted me to go to burger king after I picked her up, so it's more convenient for her...... ok fine, while she has her own car, and can go and do that anytime she wants, granted burger king is relaly close to pak'n'save... no worries....

But what really.. makes.. me... unhappy is when we had to walk from pak'n'save to the car... i parked really close, i'll say 15m. By taht time I was gonna take her and Solphie home (who just finished work too) Solphie had an umbrella with her. It was pouring down and she asked me
"hey.. can you like... take the umbrella, get teh car and pick us up at the entrance"
@#%$#@%$#@%$#@%$#@!!!!!

what am i? her driver?

So I told her it's real close and I even pointed to the car.
And she said... oh.... but then we dotn' all have to get wet.
So I put my hood on and walked off... And both of them followed.

Yes I get the logic of 1 person getting wet is better than 3. But it's a matter of principles
Yes, I am glad to help her once in a while, it's rare that I actually have a car to drive, so if she wants me to help her, then fine! but dont' freaking make me feel like I am her servant or something.

*sigh* maybe I have a really low threshold of favours I can happily accept, maybe I just a terribly selfish person. Or maybe I just dont' think we are close enough for me to do the favours she asked me to.... *shrug*

Auckland! here she goes...

2007-08-11T13:47:00.001+12:00

My flatmate Shuli, after much convincing from my part has decided, and is goign to move to Auckland next tuesday. It so happened that she found a place to live for only $70 a week at highland park (dotn' ask me how the heck she manage to find such cheap rate... but she did) So anyway.. if any of you see her shoppign around, walking around, make her feel welcome ok ;)

That's Shuli and her at her farewell part at Halkarnas

That's everyone at her farwell party, from the left, Sandy and Jay who lives in the off section at our flat, then this dude doing comsci, Ellen who just left NZ to go back to Shanghi, Shuli, Dolly (comsci's dude's gf) me, Solphie (who's gonna be my new flatmate after Shuli leaves) and Ginger.

That's Shuli and Ahn, the other flatmate of ours

And that's me with my super nice landlord.

Ants Attack!!!

2007-08-09T20:29:00.000+12:00

Had a.. not so good day today. Because... my refractometer was.. just... jammed packed with ants.

So it all happened yesterday, as usual I had to take the refractometer from the food chem lab to PD lab t make my samples. Then about 2pm, 2 of my classmates go.. oh~ found you, we were lookign for the refractometer, and since i still need it, they thought they'll bring their samples over. And so they did... so both of us were like, sharing the machine. Then I finished first, and the girls were still using it. After they were done, they er..... poured water onto the whole machine, and said somethign along the line how they got honey on some part of the machine. Then they asked if the machine came with a box, and I was like.. ya.. it does, and thought about that they might not know where it goes etc, so I say I'll take it back. so was all good.

Today, I went to get the refractometer form the chem lab, and i was holding onto it. Hui was in the lab and said "oh yeah, was there sugar on the refractometer, there's heaps of ants there" and i looked... and honestly freaked out! The whole box was FILLED with ants, so where the bench where the ants had been, as well as the scale that was sitting next to it @_____@

OMG!!!! it was... really..... really.. not as nice task killign and cleanign out all the ants... especially since sugar water was INSIDE the freaking machine, and there were ants crawling out of the thign!!!!!! and when i say a lot... i mean A LOT!!!!!!! soon after i was smelling dead ants. and was really close to the breaking point. Then hui came and helped me... cleaned up, which was really helpful......

Then i shift the thign into PD lab, and did my experiments... of which durign teh time.. ants here and there were crawling about.

after I finish my experiment, i gave the box and the machine a good spray of insecticide, but i have serious doubt about how well that worked. A the insecticide was a food grade, so was probabily really mild.. and also, as i was carryign teh thign back, there were ants.. crawling.. again..... I am scared to go to uni and find yet another massive ants attack, I really am!!!

Thing is there's.... sugar in the machine, and i really dotn' want to pour more water inside just in case I'll ruin the machinary... what to do.... *cries*

Hidden weapon

2007-08-04T21:43:00.000+12:00

My flatmate got robbed last night while walking home from work, it was on THE main road, close to a Caltex, it was lucky the only thign that was stolen was her keys. Her fone and wallet are safely in her bag. SO scary, and yet she dosent' seem scared at all when she was talkign about it today, she just seemed really angry about it... I guess some ppl are just really brave.

So I was thinking.. maybe it IS time to invest in a hidden weapon in case similar things happen to me. I mean, as much as I like to avoid it, living here by myself without a car, I have to walk home alone in the dark from time to time. Annie and I were tlakign about getting a pepper spray earlier this year.... but non of us end up with any.!!! but then.. where the heck can you get pepper spray from???? so... any suggestion of.. weapons i shoudl walk around with for protection?

Here's a... funny situation.... we went to lone star yesterday, and as .... Lucy's regime to save costs, when it comes to drink, I asked for water.... and this was.. what i got.. "I am sorry, we dont' have water today" we were all shocked.
Waitress: "yea, there's brown water coming out from the tap, so we can't offer any water today, I asked the boss so what if the customer asked for water, and I was told to tell you guys to hassle the local council about it"
LOL
that's just.. funny
and surely enough, when I got home and was burshign my teeth and stuff, the first 5 secs, the water..was... brown.. HAHA

Taiwan = Thai?!?! @___@

2007-08-03T17:14:00.000+12:00

Yup... that's right. I guess I can't blame it on ppl, since palmy is quite a small place with...well.. not that many ppl from overseas.. Ok.. yea they have many ppl from overseas, but not many from Taiwan... the thign is.. when ppl ask me where I am from... I'll say "Taiwan".. and for some reason or another, they'll immediately think i am from Thai @____@ Ok.. so I guess my dark skin doesn't, and strangely southeast asian look doesn't help. I mean... not a single person has EVER guessed my nationality.

So yesterday, I was at Davis trading, which is like a wholesaler which also supply heaps of ethnic foods. There was this kiwi lady who came and ask me how to cool those little dried fish... so i told her blah blah blah... then....

lady" where are you from?"
me:"I am from Taiwan"
lady: "oh~~ Thai~~~ I never been there, but i really like chinese food"
me:"...."

So i guess that's... excusable, i mean.. she probabily can't tell the difference between china and thai... but then.. you woudl think someone from asia woudl be better right????

There's this.. indian lady in one of my class.. i guess she'll be in her 30's.. doign a phD.

me:" Yea.. i am from Taiwan"
classmate :"oh~~~ you know.. i lived in Bangkok for few years, do you know XXXX place? it's really a wonderful country"
me:"......"

see... i was conflicted whether i should correct her, or just let the lie went on... i chose the latter coz.. well... whats' the point really. I guess sometimes i just have to accept the fact that i come from a very.. unknown place. HAHAHa

Growing up...

2007-08-01T22:49:00.000+12:00

We are all growing up, moving onto bigger things in life....
I had tears in my eyes when I heard,
I am really happy for you,
And I am glad to know
I have 2 years left... to treasure what is left....

Finally, a day home early ^___^

2007-08-01T15:41:00.000+12:00

Today is a good day, why? coz for once i get to be home nice and early ;) haven't had one of these early days for ages. ^________^

Started developing our new product yesterday, was cool fun! I am.. truely happy when I get to develop product. Even when we have to taste really really gross things just to know how it works. Like..... stupid Rob got all of us to taste raw soy beans.... BTW dotn' ever try it, in fact, it's suppose to be really bad for you coz it's got protein inhibitors etc, but small amount is ok i guess.... then we had to try roasted soy beans, which tastes way nicer (no grassy, beany taste) but was hard as!!! then we had to try soy proteins in water and oil.... all in the name of reducing the costs of our superly expensive nut spread. But was really happy that the WAtties ppl seemed really interested in our product. I remember our lectuer said "there's nothign like the buzz you get when you see the sales of the product you developed goes up in sales" I guess this is slighly what it's like, approval from INDUSTRY ppl that our product is cool! I am SO glad i am doing the nut spread instead of the.. instant.. jam... mix...

It's interesting... my lecturer for quality, whom i have meeting with weekly suddently became really nice to me when he found out er.. last week that i am the same age as his 4th year undergrads...... so weird....

Anyway, he told me i can drop by his lectures anytime to learn anythign that we didn't cover this year, so i did last thursday, except i went to this 11am session, not the 9am one coz i had another meeting. THEN he was asking the class if they had any quesiton regarding the lecture earlier this morning.. then he said "lucy is not allow to comment coz she wasn't in the morning class" ^^; what followed was me, er... trying to hide from all the cheeky smile from my classmates......

Hm... for some very strange reason.... countdown doesn't seem to have any budget strawberry jams.. checked 3 times in the past 2 weeks, and even asked, they say they still stock them, but it's never there :( what am i gonna do with my sensory next week. Think.. i have to ask my flatmate REALLY nicely to take me to woolworths. *nod nod*

ANyway.... take care everyone, and HP is cool!

Super insanely busy week finally over

2007-07-30T21:42:00.000+12:00

YAY~~~~ hehehe today marks the end of my super insanely busy week, actually make that 2 weeks. the next week is also busy, but not superly insanely busy tho. ^___^

So... er.. if you want to know what i've been up to since week 1

pd proposal
pd proposal orals to the lecturers
pd proposal orals to the watties ppl (today)
pd proposal written to lecturers tmr, which i might add is not finished HAHAHA
conjoint analysis/consumer panel which we needed for the proposal
organise the group assignment for formulation paper which is due.. next week
Testing out new formulations for my pectin gels, since i just discovered i've been making it using the wrong method.
Made up 8 samples, each weighing 1.6kg, and since me so bad at controlling stuff, had to er.. re make 2 of the batchs :P, and note each takes 45 mins to make
Run around to organise everythign i need to make up my samples in pd lab, since.. perviously i was workign in food chem lab. And er.. there are 3 technicians responsible for pd lab, and they keep saying... i dont' have it.. ask xxx, lol
Organise the sensory panel for the lecturer today
Helped Hui doing experiment on saturday, ended up finishing at like.. 8:30pm. But that poor girl won't be able to do her project otherwise, so, guess it's all worth it.

yea.. i think that's the important ones... had meetings here and there. Kinda glad most of that is over... but then it's not really.. over.. is it.... hahaha oh well.

Anyway.. visited Watties today, it's amazing, a huge company like that you woudl expect all their processes to be completely automated, but it's not, there's a lot of manual labour involved. But I guess it's good that it gives them the flexibility to manufacture whatever product is in bigger demand. Hm.... *shrug* guess i shudn't say too much.

First time ever wearing an overall today ^^ was kinda weird... we all looked like.. wompas from the choc factory :P hehe

Anyway.. incredibly sleepy, spent 4 hours on the van today. Nite ppl

Difference between workign with 2 guys and 3...

2007-07-19T11:34:00.000+12:00

OK... see.. when it was just 2. They were nice, listens to me all the time. hahah and then.. the 3rd one comes along, and suddenly their er,, immature guy qualities leaks out. hahaha probabily didn't help that we were in the PD lab roasting nuts for the conjoint analysis. So there was a lot of, er... try to eat nuts after they thrown it in the air, and there were a lot of..er.. bad joke about 'nuts' and... ya... hahhaha guess i am gonna have fun this sem

Scary, but kinda cool~

2007-07-17T19:32:00.000+12:00

Had a really, interesting day today.

First up, PD class, got a new member to our group! an indian dude doing food engine! which is great! coz now we can dump all the processing stuff to the expert instead of doign it ourselves :P

Have proposal due next tuesday, then the following monday, we have a fieldtrip to watties, where we are gonna present our proposal to them too. Our lecturer asked me if i also want to present my individual project to Wattie's since it's kinda.. a side project. I don't know, i mean, if this is Emerald Foods! then I'll be all for it, but this is Watties... dotn' get me wrong, nice company, just... situated at Hastings! that's like.. smaller than palmy @_@ guess i'll talk to my supervisor about it on thur.

Then, well, this was really lucky, but the sensory lecturer, i emailed her last week asking for help with project, she said she's gonna be ing palmy (she's from auckland) today and tmr, and i emailed her for time for appointment and stuff and she never replied. So today, after our group meeting, i took a leap of faith and walked around and.. actually.. did manage to find her. HEHEHE and and and, ok, i was gonna use the technicians as my trained panel, since all 4 of them had been on trained panels before. BUT the lecturer said, I can use my samples on her 3rd year food tech students as part of their sensory lab! how cool is that!!! hehehe, tho, now i am totally paranoid, thinking what if my formulations goes wrong, what if the difference between my formulation is not sensorilly detectable. Hm.... better think about that huh~~

Incidently, I have a paper with the 3rd food tech students this sem... so i have a feeling that... they might be wanting my blood after they are made to taste my superly superly sweet jellies (A) OOOOOPS

Little Welly trip to visit Lil' sis

2007-07-16T19:07:00.000+12:00

Saturday, Danny and I drove to Wellington to visit Alex, that brave girl moved to Wellington to pursue her dream of being a world class musician!

The trip was sponsored by...Annie for letting us drive her car for the day ^__^ thanks Annie

We left the house at about 8:15, and what greeted us was... well...

a SUPER frost up car!! :P

If you look from the inside, visibility is zero!!!

After heating the car for 10-15 mins, we finally hit the road. The great thing about being this part of North Island, is that you get long stretch of super flat, straight road.!!

Here's a.. not so good example of that, but the snowy scenary is certainly nice!

After about 90mins of driving, we see Wellington on the horizon.

We were there a bit early, ok... more like half an hour early, so we decided to take a little look at the cable car look out first!

I thought the scenery here is just sublime!

And of course, Wellinton's famous cable car!

We met up with Alex after that, found her at her hostel. Guess hostel life is a lot different to flatting, she's living with 12 other people, and well, they have a very organised lifestyel I guess, like everyone rotate to cook for everyone else, etc etc. Her roomates and housemates looks nice, and the bathrooms is just so much better than what I get. But guess I can't complain too much. The house she lived in is over 100 years old though, and somehow with the super high ceiling and stained glass window.. looks.. almost a bit haunted for my liking. But she is thoroughly enjoying it, so I guess it's all good. And omg! her rent is so cheap! $140 all up includign food~~ I have NO idea how they manage to keep it so low, coz her location is real close to the university too.

Got Alex to show us Victoria university for abit. ONly took one foto so..er... yea...

Random pic of victoria uni

The univeristy looks nice, certainly look a lot older and.. well.. more victorian style houses I guess. There's also lots of random piece of artwork floating about.. and when I say floating, i meant it literally. THe randomest thing i found, was er... a block of vines (real ones) in the middle of a building, surrounded by carpet etc. hm...

We had really nice yum char, followed by nice home made ice cream. then er.. Alex felt bad about us paying stuff, so ran and bought bubble tea for each of us... the result.. 3 superly full ppl. LOL

Went and visit Te Papa, which was ok, been there before and the exhibition hasn't change

Danny and I at Te Papa

This was followed by a vist to the beehive/parliament, and looked at the national library. In fact, i didn't even know we had a national library. HAHA but you woudl expect somethign liek that to be open 24/7 right? but no! and not even close! it was closed at 1pm on saturdays :P

Alex and I outside the Beehive.

We had dinner at Cha, which is a taiwanese cruisine place, it's not too bad, but then we were still quite full from lunch, so didn't had much food at all. And that concluded our little trip to Welly.

Hm.. guilt of the day. brought brownies (with chocolate, cashew and walnut) for Alex without knowing that she recently, developed allergies to cashews @___@ and she coudln't er.. resist the temptation of brownies so had some.. I hope shes' ok.!!

^_________________^

2007-07-10T12:12:00.000+12:00

Proposal presentation is over and done with ^_____^ OMG~~ I feel like I am flying, I think it went quite well. For our presentation, we were suppose to stand in front after we've done, and listen to ppl's assessment of how we presented the proposal! And that is not really based on the content (for me thats' normally not the problem) but on the presentation style!!! and and and the lecturer coudlnt' really pick out any faults with my presentations!!!!

Ppl know how scared I am with presentations, and how fast i talk at presentations.... i am just..... so happy that at least i seem to be improving. I dont' think I've been ever so happy about my any of my academic performances, even when i got good grades for papers. I guess it's just a sense of achievement...

Just want to thank Danny for listening to my presentation I dont' knwo how many times for 2 days straight ^^ and giving me really good advice and stuff. ^^

Plus I got really good advert for my consumer panel later on this year... ppl acutlaly came and asked to participant!!! YAH!!!! ^___^

only bad thign is.. i kinda.. forgot.. to tell my supervisor that he's suppose to assess me.. verbally too.. and he looked.. quite shocked (A) OOOOOOOOPS

Ants terminator

2007-07-05T10:58:00.000+12:00

Yup.. that's me!!! ok.. our lab is... infested with ants! and i can't blame anyone cause I am the one attracting it all (A) hahah ooops. Ok.. can't help it if i need A LOT of sugar to make up my samples. and.. the ants.. they are just too fast @____@ Ok... say I was washing up some stuff at the sink... and didn' treally clean the sink cause I'll need it later. So i walked off to my bench... and saw ants crawling around things that i might've spilled... so i'll clean it up... walk to the sink.. and ants would be gathered around there. @___@

Seriously.. i have come to a point where I'll never leave any experiment over lunch! cause I am just so scared that the ants will find my samples and er... ruining it!! So sometimes I'll have really really late lunches just coz i dont' want to leave stuff lying around. In a sense I kinda feel guilty tho... it's not the ants fault that they are attracted to sugary stuff... I have used...er... about... 4kg of sugar already.. so that's probabily heaven in ant's worlds... but what can I do right?

Hm.... ok.. so I have a problem...I have to put commercial jam in a container without really disturbing the structure... so after consultanting with ppl, i've come up with a plan to cut the bottom off the container, invert it, insert into the jam, then somehow scoop it out from the bottom. Only problem with that is that the jam bottles are quite narrow, so it's quite difficult to do that with spoon. So i went and talk to the technician today and ask if there's somethign with 2 sticks, attack to a hard bottom so i can slide it in and be able to level the jam out. And guess what he said

Technician:" yea.. i have a thought about your problem.. and i think the best way is to crack the glass open"
me: "?!?!?! eh?!?!?!"
Tech:" yea... i mean, you won't need the rest of the jam right? so it's jsut goign to go to waste anyway
me: "but but.. i'll need a lot of samples"
Tech:" that's fine.. just let me know when you are gonna do it, I can give you a hand"
me:" *still stunned... quite speechless by that stage"*
Tech:"it's a messy job... but I think it's the best way for your samples"

Ok... I have to agree.... i can probabily get the least disturbed gel structure.. but imagine the broken glass.... the jam splattering... the ants.... LOL Come to think of it.. Anathoth's jam is not even in glass jar......... hm.....

TWO SECONDS?!?!

2007-07-04T10:00:00.001+12:00

Team NZ lost by.... 2 seconds... i couldn't believe it!!! omg!!! we went from 135m behind to 46m ahead!!! then due to that stupid penalty, we lost.. by 2 seconds.... you had no idea.. i was like.. ok ok.. we lost... then the surge of wind came, we led..... then... coz of the stupid penalty, we lost.... It was so close too... oh well~~ better luck in 4 years time ya? Though I think the team performed really well regardless!!

See you!

2007-07-02T13:21:00.000+12:00

Hm.... a friend has left NZ for good today, kinda feel almost like a dejavu. Remember when Len left Macleans after 6th form, I feared that what then we called the "Mansfield" group will just dissipated, and it did! It's like, the reason for me to "escape" to Mansfield durign lunch when we weren't suppose to is lost, and i guess for other people too. But at least back then, I know that the year after, we'll all be at one place, and we can again have regular meet ups.

But this is different, this is leaving for good! there's a certain finality to it. It's almost like, if the person want to hide for hence forward, it's so easy to just... loose touch all together. But I really hope that will not be the case... So friend, do drop me a message ok! you had been a really great friend for many many years, and I wish this will not be the end. As for the people who's left behind, I really hope that despite how busy life is... we can still make time to meet up, because soem friends are just too precious to let go.

Back to Reality

2007-07-01T11:07:00.000+12:00

Yup.. my holiday is officially over, all the stuff I have to do before sem2 starts now flooding back. HAHA sometimes reality sucks, but I am soooo happy to had such a nice week off. Really, everyone's been so fantastic, makign time to meet up and stuff. Thanks everyone ^___^ look forward to our next meeting.

And here I'll end the entry, short i know. I actually had a lot of blog entries in mind, but then i guess after a few days, the moment is gone. HAHAHA

Cookie time

2007-06-20T19:54:00.000+12:00

Monday before I was SOooooooooooooo craving for cookies, so yesterday, while my rice and curry was stewing and cooking at lunch, I baked Afghan cookies, ok... with my own twists, mainly due to lack of ingredients and er... miscalculations :P

So for those who doesn't know what Afghan cookies are, it's basically chocolate biscuit with crunchy corn flakes within the biscuit, and topped with chocolate icing.

Yummy~~~~~~

A Clooooooooseup of my yummy cookie (excuse the bad fotography)

Ok.. in honest truth it didn't taste that nice, i replaced the cornflakes with hubbards's honey puff thingy, which is ok, except it made the cookie slighly on the sweeter side even tho i reduced the sugar from 1/4 cup to 1/3 cup. Hm... then i accidently added only half the amount of butter, which meant the cookie itself wasn't soft enough, adding onto the rice/wheat puff became a super hard cookie. HAHAHA silly me~ But well, apart from it being superly hard, it tastes quite nice, cashew nuts (instead of walnut) works really well with chocolate.

anyway.. thats' my photo blog for a while.

Can't wait to go back to auck ^^ yeah!!!!

Oh yea.. for ppl who's got a moment to spare, ponder this past exam question with me.
"... The neuroscientist have developed a method for stimulating brain performance using low amp direct currents. The company (you work for) has found that if they give the patient a drink before the electrical treatment, then they can stimulate a specific part of the brain so that the performance is enhanced. The compnay wants to commercialise this exciting research and have asked you to organse a series of focus groups to identify potential products that could be developed by the company. The company would like you to identify the most appropraite ppl that shoudl be included in each focus group, and why you think theys houdl be selected."

Ok... so first i thought, old ppl like to improve brain performance right? but my classmates reckon, students like us likes to improve brain performance too, which make sense, but i do'nt think students will be running into hospital to get this kinda super new brain enhancing treatments. What do you ppl think? Also the question asks what type of focus groups to use, a full (8-12 ppl) mini (4-5) and telephone. Basically you use mini if you want like.. indepth answers from selected few, and you use telephone if you discuss sensitive issues. Do you think old ppl talkign about their, er.. lost of memory is considered sensitive?? heheh i am stuck.. no common sense :P

Hot water vs cold weather

2007-06-19T09:33:00.000+12:00

This is totally cool/weird/interesting.. whichever way you look at it. So the weather is like.. super cold here, me basically dread goign out of the room coz it's just so cold.

Anyway.. last night I was boiling hot water for my hot water bottle, and I accidently spill some boiling hot water on my hand. It suprisingly didn't hurt that much, but I run cold water on it for about 10sec before i return to my warm room. But while talkign to DAnny last night, I kinda noticed how that area swelled up? ok swellign is not a good word, more like there was a bump, like no pus or whatever you call it underneath, so it hought it's probably gonna develope into a huge burnt blister in the morning... surprisingly, it didn't. IN fact.. it looks perfectly normal @____@

HAhaha.. so the match between hot water vs cold weather, as judged by my own hand!!! COLD WEATHER WINS!!!! hahaha

in fact.. the weather is so cold that Shuli's olive oil gone half solid, first i thought it's coz she put it out in the sun for too long so it's gone rancid, then i was like..wait... rancid doesn't go solid right? :P

Vivi's Book of ShAdOwS

Yes we've booked!

Hunt for a Wedding Venue

Last ride in our First car NZ

The White Rabbit Trail

Sometimes i wonder...

Birthday Photos

You know you are a carnivore...

A less geekly blog...

Games

A most interesting entry....

親愛的外婆

Head and Heart

Religion

The BEST of Auckland

Yummy~~~

Thanks everyone

Renovation Final

Renovation Part 2

Renovation

Valentines 2009

*Happy*

Inspired

I love New Zealand

Wedding Photos

She Left

less than 2 weeks

Leave it up to your imagination

Emily's Wedding reception round 1 - Taiwan

Ooopsy

Turkish Extravaganza

Me Time

pics

Interesting...

Title-less

Silly Things

Conference

Graduation, Finally

Hm...

Car Surgery

Postage

Spoilt

Update! Finally

YAY!!!

titleless

ANNOUCEMENT!

Chinese New Year Feast

Long time no see

Paris- Museum d'Orsay

Short Note on 2007

Museum of Lourves and Palace of Versailles

Paris

France- Orleans and Chartres

Merry X'mas

Tours - France

Kuala Lumpur

Taiwan - South

Exam

Photoshoot

Cruuuuuuuuuuuunch crunch

My first pilot plant production run

The beginning

Freaky

Presentation day

The perfect job!

Quality paper reflection

Strange Stuff Cont.

Strange Stuff

Field Trip

Sakura Festival

%@$#@%$#@

New tool for investigations

What is happening to this world

I made scones

The Psychotic me!

Sem break is over!

Napier Day Trip

Explosion!

INTERNET IS BACK!!

Wow~

Happy