Elvin's Arena

Blogging is hard work!! LOL

2010-07-25T21:22:00.001+08:00

Hey guys,

Its been a while, make it an ice-age since I blogged and I definitely do not want my baby to sit here and rot so I shall blog once more. I know im defying the laws of writing by not emphasizing the subject matter of my post in my title and people like Qisti who is an Ed-Board veteran would strangle me for doing this but its a fact haha.

I've been in Inti for 2 years and what a wonderful 2 years it has been. I said this at the previous farewell gathering I attended last year and I'll say it again, its been a wonderful experience studying here and Im really going to miss ICSJ and all my awesome lecturers and program advisors, program director and dean.

I really feel grown up and able to live on my own, for a while it seemed that I would never actually know what its like living on my own and being my own man. Being independent some what and looking out for myself but the reality is slowly but surely solidifying in front of my very eyes. My friends from the senior batch all began leaving and surely all of them were in the states by Fall of 2009, inevitably the same will happen again when my batch-mates began leaving early this year for the Spring intake for their universities in 2010 and the final few left as well as many others will disappear in one fell swoop to the States clearing off my batch entirely.

I love my friends and I made so many of them while I studied here, sure I had a few sour experiences but I've learned to learn from them so I can improve in the future. I made friends with quite a number of juniors as well and I really can't thank them enough for their friendship and kindness.

My birthday is coming up and for once I wish I could celebrate a party with my friends, just going and having dinner with them would be more than enough for me. It would be the absolute greatest memory I would have before leaving here. I know I can't say, eh throw me a birthday bash and Im not Mr. Popular to a very big extent. In a way I blame myself because I have found it quite hard to keep in touch with many of my friends and I hope they'll forgive me for it. I never meant to ignore them and I do my absolute best to keep in touch with them.

Going to the states, I have to assume a lot of responsibility and give all my efforts plus more because my parents are utilizing their hard earned financial resources to fund my education and I am ever so grateful for it. Hopefully during my time their, I can aid my parents by offsetting some of the costs via scholarships and so on. Of course, I should work hard but it doesn't mean I must lock myself in my room 24-7 and not have a life, I need to explore and experience the culture and going on's in the United States and hopefully it'll make me more well rounded not in terms of physique but overall knowledge of the place.

What happens after that I don't know but God willing, I have a good future ahead.

Last but not least I want to thank all my friends for everything they have done for me, God has given me so many gifts and I treasure each one of them (makes you wanna cry doesn't it?) =')

Vinoad's Dinner gathering

2010-02-22T08:34:00.001+08:00

Hey gals and guys,

Another interesting post from yours truly haha. I don't often get the mood neither do I get the chance to blog so when both factors do coincide, the iron must be struck while its hot.

This happened ages ago but I guess I'll blog about it now. It was in December last year, around 2 months ago when Vinoad planned a special get together for us before he and a few others were leaving to the states.

We met up on a Sunday and unlike the last meeting, getting a cab was significantly easier on this occasion. I met Vinoad and a couple of the others near the Nike Shop in the new wing of Sunway Pyramid. Joining us for the dinner was Carissa, Amos, Qisti, Kristy and Zjen Thak. Khidir, Aaron and Farina were there too on that as well as Jillian but they unfortunately couldn't have dinner with us that evening.

We went to Papa John's, a nice Italian restaurant in the new wing. The food their was pretty delicious and I for one enjoyed it. We ate, talked and had a good hearty laugh or two in between chomping down morsels of delcious Pizza and a Casserole like dish that looked like an oversized curry puff but nevertheless very tasty I might add. One funny incident that happened was that Amos ordered onion rings as an appetiser before the meal. His appetite was voracious and that was meant solely to quel his hunger before the mains were to be served but the weird thing it didn't come even after we finished our meals. After Vinoad asked one of the waiting staff why it hadn't come they went to the kitchen and came back simply saying "We're out of stock". What the hell man, can't they say that in the beginning itself? Vinoad was quite outraged and complained so the manager agreed to give us a round of free drinks from the menu and we could choose whatever we wanted. Once again I escaped paying for a meal, Vinoad decided to pay for all of us and despite us offering to pitch in, he refused to accept our contributions. That was very nice of him and I highly appreciate the treat he gave us.

After the meal we took photos, photos and more photos. They're on my Facebook profile page, ill try and upload them here if I can haha. After messing about in Pyramid we drove back to college courtesy of Kristy and Amos haha. Qisti and Me were in Kristy's car while Vinoad, Carissa and Zjen Thak were hitching a ride with Amos.

Upon reaching college, the place was really seriously packed but we were lucky to find parking, Amos on the other hand was having trouble getting a place but eventually managed obtaining one. We went into college once presenting our ID's, and just mucked around there. Carissa, Vinoad, Zjen Thak and Amos wanted to go to the washroom and they were taking an unusually long time and we soon discovered that the 3 stooges Amos, Vinoad and Zjen Thak were snapping their pictures in the girls bathroom..........LOL what the heck haha. After that Zjen Thak wanted to get his stuff from the hostel, a pillow and a toaster.....haha.

After taking a whole load of photos and doing all sorts of crazy stuff we decided to call it a night and head back home. Kristy was taking Carissa and Qisti back and we all said our goodbyes once we left. Amos offered to give me a lift back home and I greatly appreciate it. Zjen Thak and Vinoad along with me hitched a ride with Amos and they dropped me back to my place first. The feeling was slightly weird, this was possibly the last time I was going to see the three of them and it honestly was very saddening to see them leave. We were all in the same intake and seeing them leave earlier was hard to stomach for me but I told myself I'd get used to it eventually.

I guess that's how life is, I find it so hard to keep in touch with many old friends that I loved hanging out with and yet they soon become a part of your life that was, if you catch my drift. I really feel bad about this and hope to keep in touch with them as much as possible in the future. As for these 3 jokers (Vinoad, Zjen Thak and Amos) and the rest leaving for the United States. I wish them the very best and hope they have bright futures ahead of them. My turn will be coming soon and hopefully all goes well and I make the right decision in finalising which university I decide to go to.

Elvin

Pyramid Outing!! Watching Avatar!!

2010-01-16T18:29:00.001+08:00

Hey guys,

It was a Thursday and i was attending maintenance class for driving. That day, Carissa and Pei Wen invited me to join them and the others to go to Sunway Pyramid to go for dinner and watch Avatar. Now during the period of December, every Friday was a public holiday so essentially almost everyone gets a three day weekend which inevitably entices people to want to go out.

I was no different, I was really looking forward to meeting up with guys as some of them were leaving to the States for the Spring intake. After class was over, Dad came straight over from work to come pick me up and unfortunately for me the jams were really starting to build up. After I reached back home from the congested traffic, I quickly showered and wanted to call a cab. My Dad had plans for the day and wanted to go out at 8:30pm but unfortunately that was a bit late so I decided it would be best to call a cab. Unfortunately during times of heavy traffic or even rain, cabs I have no idea why, refuse to come. It was so frustrating, I called every cab station possible and no one would come. At last at 8:30pm, Public Cab said a taxi was on the way after I had offered RM5 extra in addition. Apparently no other cab stations wanted the extra 5 bucks saying there was "No Taxi". On the other hand, calling Public Cab wasn't an easy task either, The first 9 out of 11 times i tried calling them, the line was engaged, the following time someone picked up but the hung up immediately without uttering a word. The last call was the most meaningful, i got a cab but they said it would arrive in 10 minutes.

My Dad had just finished getting ready at the time to go out and offered me a lift. I was more than happy as I could get out of the house as soon as possible so I cancelled the cab and left and arrived at Pyramid by around 8:50pm. I went to Manhattan Fish Market to rendez-vous with Carissa, Emmanuel, Charles, Vinod, Wesley, Yih Haur and Pei Wen, I was feeling really bad for making them wait like that but fortunately I wasn't the latest in arriving for the outing. Yong Chyi and Sien arrived shortly after I did. Since I was quite late, I ate what was already ordered and the group ordered those combo platters meant for 3-4 pax which contained, calamari rings, prawns, scallops, french fries and rice. I admit I had quite a decent portion but at the end of it, I ended up eating free. Ok now I know I should be thankful for not having to pay because frankly speaking, I don't get free meals all the time when I go out to eat with friends and stuff and to top it off, I felt kind off bad for not contributing my share but still I'm thankful to the guys for their generosity, no sarcasm intended here.

We soon left and went to the Cineplex where Vinod was waiting for us to pass us our tickets to the cinema. The movie had already started, but luckily we were only 10 minutes late but I don't really like to miss the beginning of the movie which is why I plan to download and re-watch Avatar. Never the less, the whole point of the outing was the experience and the fun I was having with my friends and not just to watch Avatar and nothing else so being late was something that I could overlook. The movie was entertaining and quite meaningful although I wish they'd translate what the Na'Vi people said in their native tongue. For those of you who haven't seen it yet, it is definitely worth a watch. The last time I could remember a movie play this long was Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace. I do go to theaters on the occasion but unfortunately I don't get the chance to frequent it too often. Ill give the movie an 8 out of 10 rating. The CGI was amazing and the storyline overall was pretty good although not 100% creative but nevertheless not too cliche which was the fate suffered by the GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra storyline.

After the movie was over we came out of the cineplex and were paying for our individual movie tickets. Carissa was collecting the money and I went to pay her. The movie ticket was RM12 and I paid RM50 and got RM40 back. I was then confused and asked the price again and she confirmed it was RM12 and she didn't have small change to give me RM38 back exactly. I had the "i feel bad for paying less for my movie ticket" look on my face and Carissa reassured me saying "Really its ok Elvin, don't worry about it =)". I was honestly feeling cheap now, its not like I didn't have the cash on me but I still couldn't pay the full price of the ticket. It's one thing to get a free dinner and not a shabby one I might add, I still had a very decent meal from that combo platter. I couldn't stand it so I went around asking a couple of the guys whether I could get one of my RM10 notes changed into an RM5 and five RM1 notes and luckily for me Charles had change on him as quite a few of the others did not. I went and paid Carissa and she was still like "No lah, its ok =)" but I insisted on paying and to my relief she took the 2 ringgit haha. The lot of us then stood around, talked for a bit and said our goodbyes before heading back home. I gave Vinoad a hug before he went because I wasn't too sure if I could meet him again before he left.

The outing was great and I really enjoyed myself to the max. It was so good to be out with friends after quite sometime.

Ill do my best to finish up some remaining blogposts. Till next time.

ICSJ AUP Farewell Gathering December 2009

2009-12-19T18:17:00.054+08:00

Hi guys,

This post is going to be extra special and I will try my best to be as meticulous as I can with details where possible. This is about the AUP farewell gathering that took place last week in ICSJ's AUP Office and ended at ICSJ's beloved concourse hehe =)

PART 1: What Happened?

The day began with me going to Inti at 12pm, something I don't often get the luxury of doing as I'm always sitting my ass at the concourse by 7:30am lol. I went to AUP thinking I could stash my bag there and go to FTZ to just chill out for a few hours. I then instinctively pulled out my mobile phone to see if I had any messages ONLY to trigger a memory of KC replying to an SMS of mine saying I could bring paper plates and forks and spoons for eating haha, that's a relief.

I was preparing myself to go all the way to Carrefour when Qisti told me then that the Nice Shop which is waaaaaayyyyy closer to college sells these things. Slapping my forehead, I made my way to the nice shop to get our eating weapons for the mighty feast that was coming.

I spent around RM8 to buy the stuff and when I came back Qisti was frisking some of us for donations for the pizza haha. Naturally even though I contributed something out of my own pocket for the potluck party, I was not entirely satisfied with what I had given even if KC would have told me it was enough. So Me, Jessica, Qisti, Ryan and Ms. Lim pitched in and got 6 large pizzas and some garlic bread from Canadian Pizza for around Rm113.00. That's quite a bargain if I do say so myself.

After going a few hours to FTZ, I came back and sat with Jessica helping her trying to locate somewhere to stay and it was pretty funny seeing her freak out to get accommodations in New York haha. Let me make it very clear that I do not take pleasure in seeing other people's misery or misfortune, Jessica just makes everything funny lol XD.

Then later Qisti, Me, Vinod, Amos and Sie Hui headed out to AC to have lunch, I tried to drag Jessica with us but she was too worked up about the accommodations so we left her to her cup of coffee and laptop to continue her long and wide search. I was thinking that it may not have been such a good idea to have lunch at this time (4pm) because there probably would have been a humongous feast later on (I was right XD).

After lunch, we headed back to college and were halted at the edge of AC's shades to find it pouring down heavily. What could we do? Just stand there and vegetate? We moved as fast as we could, fast enough to avoid getting wet as much as possible but not too fast as we would probably slip lol (precision applied to daily life). Vinod was rushing and forgot his delicious gingerbread biscuits at the guard house which I hijacked and took a piece before returning it too him hehe.

We got into the warmth of AUP (as if this country isn't warm enough already haha) to chill out and shortly there after Qisti and KC went out and arrived back with the Pizza's. (Sniff, mmmmmmmmmmmm)

PART 2: The FEAST

Many of them arrived a little late but for those who were there at the present time, that wasn't enough to fight off the hunger pangs in many of Inti's HUNGRY students (hunger for food, not knowledge) haha, everyone started eating by around 6pm. It wasn't early but not too many of them had arrived yet. I was hoping that the food wouldn't finish off to quickly for the sake of the others (see how nice I am lol) but I was happily mistaken in this case. At the end of it all, there was still a lot of food left over.

The various dishes on display included Shane's Garden Fresh Salad (VEGETABLES people!!! yes IT'S GOOD FOR YOU, im not kidding, ask Shane), Wai Ling's Home made fruit Jelly (a.k.a. Silicon according to Jessica), Carissa's delicious home baked Cake, Pizza, Chips, Sue Yen's Nuggets, Amos's Curry Puffs (Famous Amos Curry Puffs????? hmmmm), Sausages, Chicken balls, Tuna Sandwiches made by April as well as an array of expensive and imported Champagne.............................................................................. i mean sparkling juices haha.
Basically we had a spread that would rival a Hogwarts feast ahaha.

Eventually most of them had arrived and we rounded up a pretty decently sized group however, many of them didn't manage to make it. It was still however quite enjoyable and I had a good time. The AUP office was bustling with activity with everyone talking, joking, laughing but I didn't see any crying however I'm sure a few of you as well as myself I admit shed a few tears for all those who are leaving.

Part 3: Speeches, Desert and More good stuff =)

The highlight of the evening had to be Vinod's and Amos's speeches. Amos's was more formal but nonetheless entertaining to hear and Vinod was anything but formal but made it very hilarious and interesting to listen too. The evidence was provided by everyone's constant laughter. For those of you who missed his or Amos's speech that day, you can check it out on my FaceBook page, IT IS A MUST WATCH HAHAHAHA. Vinod's speech was a bit long, the first 2 parts were recorded by Shane and part 3 was recorded by me. It was a nice touch and I enjoyed listening to both Amos and Vinod =).

Ms. Khor then said a few words as well to those who were leaving next year in January to the United States and wished them the very best as well.

Ms. Khor giving her speech

Amos being formal (im sure Ms. Kalai would have been proud)

Vinod being NOT so formal (the students are so proud XD)

It was getting late and we cleaned up and shifted the remains of the buffet from AUP to the concourse as Ms. Khor said it was time to lock up the AUP office. Being past 9pm already I couldn't really blame her for wanting to go home sooner as she still needed to work during our break but despite the fact, she could still join us for a good portion of the farewell and that was really cool of her to do so. =)

Finally a few of us went to the concourse and we were stoning there, sitting down after all those hours of standing in AUP and waiting for everyone to come. The group got smaller however as some of them needed to head back home.

I was sitting there with Qisti and Amos for a couple of minutes thinking about the reality of my friends leaving and despite the fact that I'll be transferring to the United States, I may never see them again. The very thought almost made me.............well let's leave it at that. It was very saddening but just then I decided not to think about the future for a few minutes and focus on the here and now where things were just perfect.

We sat in a circle and KC served us desert courtesy of Pei Wen and Pui Man working so hard to make us cupcakes, it was like a mom feeding her kids with desert haha joking =P. However KC's container was empty by the time she got to me haha, no worries Pei Wen gave me 2 cupcakes in a container to go home and eat and they were mighty delicious. Wow I had too much desert today and all of them were brilliant haha =d.

We then started with saying a few words about everyone and it went around till it came to me. Like i said my speech was not super creative but I hope it was enough. If I were to put together a stupendous farewell speech, I would have to write it down on paper just as Amos did and then say it out lol.

We then concluded the evening with a group photo, Sien assisted us in taking group shots with several of others cameras and he got mighty confused when using my phone to take the photo and didn't realize that he took like 6 shots but luckily, one or two of them came out alright hehe.

After the festivities I was giving hugs to my friends leaving on my way out. While I was standing outside waiting for my Dad to come, Amos asked me to join him and the others in going to Asia Cafe. I was actually initially thinking of just waiting for my Dad assuming he'd reach in another 2 or 3 minutes but when I got word that he'd be like 15-20 minutes late, I thought why not just go and chill with my gang hehe. I sat there with Carissa, Charles, Vinod, Pei Wen and a couple others for 15 minutes and we all talked for a bit in the crowded and noisy atmosphere of Asia Cafe and soon I received the call. It was time to go home, sadly enough I didn't really want to go but I guess I had to some time.

During the ride home I was deep in thought. I was sad but happy at the same time, it was bad enough that so many of dearest friends were leaving but to be struck with conflicting emotions didn't really help me out that much either. I was sad my friends were leaving to other places but happy I at least had the opportunity to meet up with them for one last time with most of them.

I got home, headed upstairs and sat on my bed after a long day; I fought back to hold in my sadness despite the fact that I was in the solitude of my room. I then told myself to cheer up and smiled thinking about the prospect of new things to come and perhaps being able to meet up with my friends in the future. Before hitting the sack I remembered bringing the cupcakes home that Pei Wen gave me. I opened up the container, took a bite out of one and it really did cheer me up, sweet things really can help sometimes (not advisable all the time hehe).

Now this is the part where I stop narrating what happened and say a few words to all of you who are leaving. If I had left out anyone, I sincerely apologize.

Part 4: Epilogue

Last semester was really a blast, I took subjects which I liked, made new friends and had two fantastic lecturers teaching me. To top it off I was quite happy with my grades so what more could I have asked for. I am really glad I joined Inti. Everyone made me feel so much at home here and I had more time to mature and grow that I really needed, a few more months and I feel that I am more confident and prepared to study overseas. I'm really thankful to all of you whom I made friends with. So many of you helped me become what I am and I indeed am eternally grateful for it. I have learned so much and am blessed with the knowledge and friends that God has bestowed upon me.

I will really miss all of you so much, it was an absolute joy and pleasure getting to know you all. I realize I don't go out all that much and don't join so many of the outings or events going on but I have to say that whatever outings I have gone for or events I have attended was absolutely the best ever =).

Fang Kai, Vinod, Amos, Patricia, Zjen Thak, Carissa, Boon Han, Chew, JC, Jessica, Yann Huoy, Ryan, Yen Loo, Pauline, Wai Ling, Sue Yen, Xiao Wei, Charles, KC, Daryl, Kah Xin, Emmanuel, Khai Venn and the others, I love each and everyone of you and I am honored to have been able to be friends with you.

I want to write a few things about my friends here, I'm sorry this post is so long but its a sentimental one for me and I hope you'll understand

Fang Kai, He's one of the first friends I made in Inti and although he looks like a shy guy, I'm sadly mistaken about that. He's super friendly and came up to me and said hello and introduced himself. He's a really swell friend and one of my closest and best friends in Inti. Although we have not spent an enormous amount of time together I have made use of the time we hangout to bond with him. He's a great guy and very confident which I admire about him. I will miss him a lot. I enjoyed studying with him and appreciate all the help he has given me =)

Vinod, I met him first I think in AUP, he was one of the most talked about so I just said hello to him, introduced myself and we went on and on about football. Even though he's a Man Utd supporter, he's a still a good buddy of mine and he always cracks me up with his jokes. His stories have never failed in entertaining us. He can be super perverted at times but super friendly and a great guy to make friends with =)

Amos, I thought he's innocent but he is evil haha, im kidding. He's a super friendly guy and always looks to the positive side of things, very optimistic. He was with me first in my ENL, Psychology and Calculus 1 class in the first semester. I wish him the very best for his studies.

Patricia, most of you will address her with the name May Chong. I met her first in Public Speaking class in my first sem. She's a very friendly, sweet, super adorable (despite she denying it haha), very elegant and a forthcoming individual who happens to be sharing my major, I hope we end up in the same uni. She's a great person to talk too and I am so happy she and I are such close friends, she has a fantastic personality overall =)

Zjen Thak, I met him first in Psychology, Cal 1 and ENL class. He is on rival positioning with Kiet for being the nicest guy in college. He is extremely friendly and may look shy at first but he can be quite bold as well, I'm sure his latin dancing and Wushu quite rightly expresses my statement hehe. He's an awesome guy and I am so happy to have made friends with him from the start

Carissa, I remember meeting her in my first semester in Macro Economics class. Understandably, I was kinda shy to approach her and talk to her but truth be told she is simply the sweetest, nicest, kindest and most bubbly girl I have ever met. Her smile is like sunshine on a cloudy day and I'm sure many of you will agree with me here hehe. She has an amazing personality, she's very intelligent, she is super friendly, she's very beautiful, very nice to talk too and she's a very dear and close friend to me. She brightens up everyone's day and I will truly miss her a lot.

Boon Han, I met him in Macro Economics class too but we only really became closer friends when we were in Anthropology class. He was my group leader for our Anthro field work assignment for going to Malacca. I blogged about this in a previous post (if you would like more info haha), we went there to find out information on the Portuguese settlement for our Anthropology Field Work Group Assignment. He's a very straight forward and intelligent guy. He's helped me out and taught me a couple of lessons that I cannot thank him enough for. Thanks for everything buddy =)

Chew, he's a great guy. A fellow Liverpool supporter and a rather quiet individual but he's great to talk too and he can really crack me up with the jokes he has in store. I met him first in Cal 1 class if im not mistaken. He's been really helpful to me to in class and I miss my little buddy alot haha. =)

JC, sometimes he's sane, sometimes he's insane haha but nevertheless he's a great guy to be friends with. He along with Vinod used to cause quite a bit of chaos in AUP and it was simply hilarious to watch. I met him first in ENL class. Thanks for all the laughs JC haha, he's a real clown =)

Jessica, I met her first in a class I didn't really like (hint: it involves drawing), this was most unfortunate because my feelings toward Jessica are quite the opposite of _ _ _ Class haha. She's a very sweet friend, always makes me laugh and is super nice. I find it quite hard to believe when she said she's quite anti-social initially. Looking at another perspective, she is very friendly and forthcoming to other people. I simply love talking to her and ill miss her a lot =)

Yann Huoy, she's also a very nice friend. She's helped me quite a bit too when we're in Calculus class and I'm really glad to have met her =)

Ryan, he's also a very nice friend and can be quite hilarious at times. I wish him all the best in the United States.

Yen Loo, she's very friendly and nice to talk too. Wish her all the best as well =)

Pauline, I met her through my friend April, she's shy but very nice. Wish her the very best as well =)

Wai Ling, Haha met her when I was in DE class again thanks to April lol. She was very helpful and I'm glad to have met her. Wish her the best when she goes to the States. =)

Sue Yen, we first met in Macro Economics class. After the first 2 classes I actually went and sat in her row and then April actually first said hello to me and introduced Sue Yen and we all became friends haha along with another one of my friends Tracy. I first talked to Tracy and then sat with her and Sue Yen automatically placed herself in the seat next to mine lol.

The introduction was quite lighthearted, I sort of remember the conversation:-

Elvin: Hi, im Elvin =)

Sue Yen: Helllooo =)

April: Hi im April, this is Sue Yen. You can call her Yen Yen.

Elvin: Haha, Yen Yen?

Sue Yen: Just ignore her please. She always like that one lah haha

Elvin: haha

Simple but memorable haha. Sue Yen's the quiet type but she can be super mischievous haha. She has doodled on my textbooks, papers and other study materials haha. She's a very nice person and I'll miss her a lot, she's one of my closest friends along with April =)

Xiao Wei, I first met her in Physics 1 class but I only got more acquainted when we were in Physics 2. She's a very nice friend and wish her all the best in the States =)

Charles, the boss haha. Met him first time in my 2nd semester. I could always remember seeing him do Calculus 2 in AUP. I know Vinod already mentioned it but the memory is so vivid in my mind that I can't really forget it. He's a great guy and an awesome friend and great to hang out with haha. I wish Charles the very best.

KC, met her first in Anthropology class. She's very friendly, intelligent and a capable person. She's also very helpful and I really thank her for the help I got in Philosophy and Art class whenever I asked her any questions. Wish her all the best as well =)

Daryl, he's super hilarious. We first actually started talking in Physics 1 class haha. He's an awesome guy and I enjoy talking to him and hanging out with him, he can never leave a class without making somebody laugh even once. I appreciate all the help he has given me too in class. Take good care buddy =)

Kah Xin is one of the nicest girls i've ever met. I actually feel bad for not really talking to her initially when we were class mates. She was with me in my Psychology class and ENL class but we never even talked once =/. But it changed when we were in Public Speaking class. I then realized she and I shared a huge interest in common, football haha. How often do you meet a girl like that? haha and she supports Liverpool too. She's a very nice person and I enjoy talking with her so much. I really will miss her a lot.

Emmanuel, met him through Fang Kai and we instantly became friends. He was in my group for the ENL group assignment, an assignment I had been in which had NO group leader haha. We had a lot of fun times playing Futsal, FIFA and hanging out. He's a great friend and I wish him the very best in the states

Khai Venn, another one of my fellow Liverpool supporters. We first met in Calculus 1 class and became good friends as well. We went for Futsal, FIFA and also hung out together. Wish him the very best in the US. =)

It was long but I haven't covered every body, not nearly. I sincerely apologize if I left anyone out. To all those who I mentioned and to all those who I unfortunately did not, you will all have a special place inside me. Thank you for the impact you have made in my life and thank you for making me a better person and hopefully I have at least made a small one in all of yours as well. I will truly miss you and pray for nothing but the very best in your futures. May God Bless all of you and I wish you all the very best in your studies as well as your careers there after.

As a friend of mine said very simply but sincerely, "THANK YOU AND I LOVE YOU ALL". I most certainly hope our paths cross again, till next time it's goodbye FOR NOW. I'll see you later =).

Last day of my previous semester

2009-12-18T16:44:00.005+08:00

Hi guys,

I know I am super ULTRA late for posting this but I guess its better late than never. This is a blogpost on the last day of previous semester. The day began with me ambling into AUP and straight taking out my CSC 101 textbook. Regardless of the fact that everyone was telling me that finals would be damn easy, I didn't want to take a risk. So I sat and read and read and read and literally burned myself out. The exam was scheduled to be at 5:00pm - 7:00pm that day so i had quite some time in my hands. I revising my ass of and was later joined by some of my class mates. Qisti was making fun of me for actually revising for CSC101. Even the great Lik Pang was shocked that I would ever even consider over stressing myself for the CSC exam.

Lik Pang: I can't believe im hearing this!! Elvin; you of all people are stressing over the CSC 101 exam? You disappoint me.

Elvin: But but...........hmmph!!

Bummer for me but I didn't listen and 1 hour before the exam started, the skies opened and it was pouring rain and there were thunderstorms with it too. Considering the fact that I shouldn't be revising at the last minute I put away my stuff 15 minutes before the exam started and later headed up to the exam hall on the 8th floor with Sathish, Avanda, KT, JJ, Elcy and Joel.

We reached the 8th floor to find it swarming with students like bees in a bee hive with quite a big similarity too. Just as the bees, all of them were being extremely hardworking with so many of them discussing important topics, doing last minute reading and quizzing one another with various questions. I took a few breaths and entered the exam hall wishing my group mates as well as my classmates the very best before they sat for the exam.

I sat telling myself, I can do this man, I can do this. Surprisingly enough, my friends were right haha. The exam was quite simple and I was satisfied with what I had filled the paper out with. Midway during the exam though, music was blasting from outside. In turned out that Taylor's was having a huge halloween bash while our exam was happening. After our exam was over I was thinking of maybe rallying everyone together to go for dinner. I tried to get as many of our classmates together and so Me, Avanda, Sathish, Alina, Kesavan a.k.a k7, Nadia, Joel, Joey, Harith, JJ and a few others met up at Old Town Kopi Tiam.

It wasn't as straight forward as it sounded though. We initially thought off meeting together at Pepper Corn, a restaurant in the row opposite Old Town. What happened was when we were initially at college, JJ and I saw Mr. Ryan waiting at the gate with a stand still line of cars waiting to move so we went to him and decided to just chat with him for a while. 5 minutes late the traffic started moving and we bid Mr. Ryan adieu and happy holidays. I then realised the rest of them had already made their way out of college and so I called Joel to find out where they were. He told me that they would all be at Pepper Corn and so I acknowledged and JJ and I made our way their. On our way, we saw an army of face painted zombies, ghouls, monsters, ghosts and other scary incarnations of the dark make their way towards Taylor's Main Campus for the halloween bash from Taylor's Business School. It was quite a site to see this parade haha. When JJ and I reached Pepper Corn, we realised it was closed, either completely or for the day, I couldn't really tell. I then attempted to contact Joel several times but to no avail and thus JJ and I were left marooned there haha, that ass lol. Shortly after, around 2 minutes later, I received a call from Nadia saying that they settled to eat at Old Town While Coffee:-

An unknown number called my mobile phone

Anonymous: Umm is this Elvin

Elvin: Umm, yes, may I know who's on the line please?

Nadia: Elvin, its Nadia....

Elvin: Ohhhhhh

Nadia: Haha yeah, we're at Old Town White Coffee

Elvin: What the.....? Joel told us to go to Pepper Corn....

Nadia: Yeah but its closed..

Elvin: Ya think? Haha ok ok, that fellah Joel told us to go to Pepper Corn

Nadia: Sorry sorry

Elvin: Haha no worries, we'll be right there, Common JJ, let's go Old School, or should I say.................OLD TOWN haha, that was lame =P

JJ: (Goes berserk for a few seconds)

We reached Old Town Kopi Tiam to see the gang seated there and so I was pretty relieved and was looking forward to dinner. I was honestly very hungry and ready to order when i noticed that Avanda and KT were not there. Neither was K7. I called Avanda asking where she was and she unfortunately was a tad bit lost (direction wise) when I said we were eating at Old Town, she sounded damn cute hehe (huh? where is it?). So I told them I would rendezvous with her and KT at Pappa Rich and she agreed. I went to Pappa Rich to "fetch" the both of them and instinctively, I like to sometimes fill a persons life with a little bit of thrill and excitement by giving them a right hearty good scare XD. I hid myself behind the potted plants facing the car park and waited for them to pass by my location before I came out undetected. My clothes were navy blue and black so seeing it as this time of night was a bit difficult as I didn't get complete cover. Furthermore I was facing away from the 7-11 direction and faced towards the junction entering ss15/1. I waited for them and I saw Avanda with K7 and Harith. Damnit, my plan failed haha. As I came out of hiding, Harith spotted me lol. Damn wasted, then the group of us made our way and sat ourselves down and ordered. We all had a good hearty chat while eating our meals. As we stepped outside, we were wondering what to do next, some wanted to go home, some wanted to go to Asia Club and some of us wanted to go to FTZ. On the way there, someone I don't know who pointed out that there was a cockroach crawling on the pavement and a high pitched scream was let out. I immediately turned around with the "What was that?" look. Avanda got the fright of her life when she saw the cockroach, she obviously does not have a disposition towards insects hehe. We all walked together towards Asia while indirectly admiring the Halloween Bash going on at Taylor's. K7 broke away saying he wanted in on the action and so we said our goodbye's to him and eventually said our goodbyes to each other and Joel, JJ, Harith and I went to FTZ to play FIFA 09.

It was intense session of FIFA but was awesome. At the end of the long session I ended up going back at around 12:30 a.m. I reached college around 12:10am after FIFA'ing and had a good chat with my buddy Charles. He's going to flying school to learn to become a pilot. Wish him the very best.

The semester was overall quite satisfactory owing a huge part to my classmates and in class experiences. Although not all were as pleasing to the pallete as I would have hoped for it to be, nothing is ever perfect and we have to rely entirely on ourselves to look at the positives to make our experiences a perfect one. I made so many new friends and enjoyed every minute I had with them. Till next time peepz. Take care.

Premier League Review

2009-11-04T09:10:00.004+08:00

Hi guys,

Yes, I AM FINALLY BACK AGAIN, to fill your life with more entertainment haha. Yes, I know one of my buddies will probably slap his forehead saying, oh gosh, NOT ANOTHER football blogpost BUT i can't help myself. I thought I could blog at least a little bit during the short semester but I just couldn't do it and so now here I am. A month after the holiday started and things are ok now but I was already bored out of my skull after the first weekend passed. I shall talk about my final day of this semester in the next post.

For now, welcome to the Barclays Premier League Review blog post with me, well who else could it be. Now the norm would be for me reviewing each week's matches but this post will be a little different. I'm going to be doing a performance review of Liverpool's season thus far.

As many of the pundits had said, last season which was the 2008/2009 Premier League season was one of Liverpool's closest chances at winning the Premier League. Despite their greatest efforts and only sustaining 2 losses in the Premier League in total, both away from home, they still did not win the title. One very good reason for this being is due to the number of draws they sustained. It was a thrilling race between Liverpool and Manchester United but somehow or another, the Red Devils kept managing to grind out results week after week, on quite a number of occasions winning by a thread to snag them the 3 points. It's a big dissapointment for me but I can proudly still say that Liverpool performed brilliantly last season.

As for this season, the scenario is very different. As Spencer Robinson, one of the pundits on Football Focus with John Dykes mentioned last month, it is hardly November already and Liverpool have already been hit with 5 defeats. Their worst run in over 2 decades is painfully unfolding. This excludes, the Champions League where they have lost 3 matches and the Carling Cup where Arsenal's young guns won against our youth team but a narrow 1 goal margin in a 2-1 victory. Hopes of winning the Premier League title this season are slipping away again and personally I, as a Liverpool fan am getting very frustrated. I've seen Liverpool lift the Champions League, the Carling Cup, The FA Cup and even the Community Shield but I have yet to see them win the Barclays Premier League. They began a good run of form at the beginning of the season but recently it all started to go horribly wrong with Liverpool spiraling out of control with consecutive defeats. Perhaps now would be best if they focused on the other tournaments and see to their immediate priority which would be to bring silverware to the Anfield trophy room. They can still get some grace if they absolutely give it their all in the FA Cup as well as the Europa to partially quench an incurable thirst for Premier League glory that so many have longed for.

Despite this, I am not simply going to support another team just because they have a better capability of winning championships however I want to make myself heard that Rafael Benitez has indeed made some big mistakes in regards to the players he has cost the club. Liverpool are now suffering from a shortage of high impact strikers, Fernando Torres being the best of them all. We have Andriy Voronin, David Ngog and Ryan Babel but they aren't the best strikers in the world although quite promising. We are currently also having a major injury crisis with possibly 10 players suffering physical disabilities through injury although the number is slowly going down. Also now that Alberto Aquilani has recovered from injury, he is not sufficiently being used enough and agreeably he does not have enough experience yet but the question then arises, how does a player acquire experience if he's not being used to begin with? Lucas is slowly improving but still not a promising replacement for Xabi Alonso.

The following list comprises some of the biggest losses Liverpool F.C. have encountered in the recent past

1. MICHAEL OWEN- Despite his proneness to injury, he is never the less a good striker and could provide a respectable number of goals. Rafa did not sign him back given the recent second chance he had. Owen was out of a contract and Liverpool had a financial crisis in their hands so an out of contract striker also meant a FREE transfer but it was not done. So what happened, Ferguson having a HUGE bank balance after unloading Ronaldo took him on board.

2. PETER CROUCH- A promising prospect, who kept improving season after season and has rescued Liverpool from a number of messy situations and has added to Liverpool's aerial threat factor, he should have not been sold off.

3. JERMAINE PENNANT- A fantastic winger which could provide very good penetration against tight defences and could score goals as well

4. ROBBIE KEANE- Not using him was a big mistake, he should have been played match after match till he got used to playing with Liverpool's squad. He was totally underutilized and it cost us one very good striker.

5. XABI ALONSO- No doubt one of the biggest losses Liverpool has encountered last year. Benitez's obsession to replace Alonso with Gareth Barry cost us a solid and world class midfielder that had the capability to fill in Steven Gerrard's role in his absence during injury or suspension.

6. SAMI HYYPIA- Another very huge loss, I didn't see Ferguson selling off Rio Ferdinand who is one of his oldest defenders. Sami Hyypia was still at the top of his game and due to underutilistation and few starts, he was forced to take his career elsewhere.

7. LUIS GARCIA- He had a magic touch as well, something similar to what Yossi Benayoun possessed. I understand he needed to be traded in order to get Fernando Torres but perhaps another financial route should have been taken to get Torres into Anfield.

If these 7 were still in the squad, Liverpool FC would with absolutely NO DOUBT been twice as strong as they are now. Let's see the replacements that Rafa has gotten. Fernando Torres was brought in to replace Michael Owen but we still have a shortage of good strikers so not taking back Michael Owen when he was a free transfer before the start of the season and to top it off, losing him to our fiercest and bitterest rivals was simply inexcusable. Peter Crouch, one of our aerial attack forces and a good striker has not been replaced. Robbie Keane, another good striker who has the capability of performing has not been replaced as well. Ryan Babel actually is a good striker but even he has limitation in his ability to perform. Jermaine Pennant somewhat similar to Yossi Benayoun provided double the penetration as well as creativity when they both played, unfortunately we lost one, Garcia also being a loss in this context. Alberto Aquilani was supposed to take Alonso's place BUT it is a big place to fill and I am still not to sure about him as I have yet to see him play. Alonso was a like a tank, able to come back match after match but Aquilani seems to be the exact opposite being quite prone to injuries. Xabi also had cannon like shots and pin point accuracy to pick out players with his breath taking long range passes and lobs. Finally Sami Hyypia; I don't think there is a Liverpool defender who had the Aerial prowess Sami Hyypia possesed especially in set piece situations. There was always more than a 95% chance he would win the ball if he was there. Benayoun is filling Garcia's role but it would still pay off to have one more good and creative player.

Also in our youth squad, Ryan Flynn had been sold off and Krisztian Nemeth is on loan who are 2 of Liverpool FC's star youth players and they are not where they are supposed to be right now.

Although we have lost these players and if I had every chance to bring them back into the squad, I would most certainly bring back them back if I could but the sad fact of reality remains that nothing can be done to do so and I can only hope and pray that Liverpool gets some outside investement to help make them a strong and formiddable team and not sacrificing so many good players. We would have been a much stronger team to contend with against other teams and practically for most purposes, 2 good full squads.

There season has been going on quite inconsistently and although I am happy with their recent 2-1 win over Wigan Athletic at Anfield, I was hoping for so much more this season for Liverpool. They were so close to winning the Premier League title last season and tripped up simply because they conceded far too many draws. Another important key factor I hope to see revived in Liverpool's squad was the hunger they possessed last season when they played every game. They gave it their all in almost all games and did quite well. Now I hope to see them give it their all in EVERY game next season in order to win the Barclays Premier League. For now I can only hope that Liverpool achieves Champions League qualification for next season and maybe bring back the FA Cup and Europa League trophy to the Anfield trophy room.

E.A.'s break

2009-08-29T18:17:00.002+08:00

Hi guys and gals,

Thanks again for stopping by ma peepz. I have some news in regards to updating my blog. Whether its 1 reader or a thousand readers, this news is for everyone. Due to the fact that I have now been given a big responsibility which I am honored to receive from ICF, I don't think I will be able to update my blog as often as I possibly can and seeing as how next semester will be a short semester, it will make it even harder. I will try to update the blog once a week but even that may seem impossible from what I can see my schedule to turn out eventually but all I can promise for now is that I'll do my best. I'll be pretty busy with updating the ICF blog, sending emails and helping with publicity. But before the new sem starts i'll try and put up one or two more blog posts. Peace out.

Nomad

The Season's Back Again

2009-08-22T16:43:00.003+08:00

Hi guys & gals,

I humbly thank you for coming back for more blogging action to Elvin's Arena, whether its 1 reader or 1000 readers, we're doing it big, uh huh, that's right. Straight down to it.

Welcome to the Barclays Premier League review with me Nomad. I'm a little behind actually but i'll be covering most of the action that has happened thus far. The Premier League is already well underway with quite a few teams having already played twice within a span of a week. As usual i'll be mainly focus on the Big 4 which are Liverpool, Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester United but rumors are spreading around in the media that the Big 4 of the Premier League could soon become the Top 6 including the likes of a financially unshakable Manchester City and a very resilient Aston Villa. My hunch is that it could become a Top 7 including the like of Tottenham Hotspur because with Harry Redknapp in the driving seat at the beginning of the season, spurs could be well on their way to be trying to qualify for the UEFA Champions League.

Now it's time to head to the matches. Starting of with Liverpool in their match against Tottenham. The Reds travelled to White Hart Lane in expectation of getting 3 points from Tottenham but they would have to fight a tough battle against a newly revived Tottenham side who aren't about to go down without a fight. Liverpool didn't look to be in the game all that much, I have to give them credit for trying but it seemed as if the summer break took its toll on the players as the first team really weren't on form against Spurs. . I agree Tottenham has not played all during the Summer but most of Liverpool's first team wasn't used for quite a number of the pre-season matches meaning that Rafael Benitez choose to put his juniors to the test on quite a few occasions. This explains the dip in form and the bad start. Chelsea on the other hand grabbed all 3 points with a 2-1 win over Hull City at Stamford Bridge. Didier Drogba won it for Chelsea by scoring both goals after Hull drew first blood. Next is Arsenal absolute destruction of Everton scoring 6 goals to Everton's 1 consolation goal. It was absolutely gobsmacking that Everton could lose so badly especially after all the progress David Moyes made last season but credit to Arsene Wenger, he's creating a team of youngsters who can win and play the game beautifully. Finally it's Manchester United's game against Birmingham City at Old Trafford with the Red Devils scraping through with a 1-0 victory.

Now midweek action was different and I was happy this time because Liverpool had clearly put the defeat behind them and were focused on winning. They met Stoke City at Anfield and this is a team that Liverpool drew twice with last season. However this season, it wasn't to be as Liverpool won with a comfortable 4-0 victory over Stoke with Fernando Torres scoring in the 4th minute, Glen Johnson scoring the in 45th minute, Dirk Kuyt scoring in the 78th minute and David Ngog scoring in the 93rd minute. Chelsea came from behind yet again to win against Sunderland in a more comfortable 3-1 victory at the Stadium of Light. Manchester United however endured their first loss against Burnley losing 1-0 away from home at Turf Moor. Now you're all probably scratching your head when I mentioned that name because it isn't one I mention often haha. . Turf Moor is Burnley's home stadium. Arsenal didn't play in midweek as they had a Champions League qualifier against Celtic and won 1-0.

That's pretty much the main football action that's been going on so far. Liverpool didn't get the perfect start to the season like last season but they did bounce back quickly and reassuringly. Now they're in 4th place after only their 2nd game and hopefully they will win and move up the table this week as Liverpool take on Aston Villa at Anfield.

Keeping In Touch

2009-08-14T12:09:00.001+08:00

Hi Guys & Gals,

Now I noticed from my fellow bloggers that almost everyone of them has at least one EMO post in their blogs. From what I can remember, most if not all of my blog posts are free of emoness. Well one reason is because I figure that at least one or two reading my blog may have had a bad day and if they were to read an emo post, it may make them feel even more down in the dumps than they already are so I decide against it most of the time. This post I feel is quite important, it's not emotional in the sense of anger or utter distraught but it's something to help us develop a sense of importance towards.

As you can read from the title, keeping in touch is very important. I know I may sound like a hippo-crate because I myself can't seem to keep in touch with every single friend I have ever made. I'm sure at least one or two of you amongst many also will have this problem. Many of us will find it hard to keep in touch with our friends from school and even in college, you probably won't even be in touch with some friends you made in the last 2 semesters. It's not because you don't like them, the thing is that our lives are so busy, hectic and just so packed that doing that sort of thing is not to feasible all the time. Of course we do keep in touch with our friends, you'd have to be seriously anti-social not to at least keep in touch with 2 or 3 of them but most of us prioritize on who to keep in touch with. Many of us will keep in contact with friends who share things most in common with us, for instance if you take the same subjects during a particular semester, if you're in the same course, if your sharing a major and perhaps if you and your friend(s) are in a particular Extra Curricular Activity Club. It all depends, we all may have other criteria but to many of us priorities are a major factor to who we keep in touch with most often.

Sometimes, I see some old friends on msn and even then to just say hello and talk to them may seem like a chore, I mean this particularly in the case if your doing something else like work on your PC or whatever. Maybe many of you don't have this problem but sometimes it gets the best of me. I do however talk to friends I don't often keep in touch with when I'm having a semester break or some free time. It's not that I don't want to talk to them, if I had one wish I would love to keep in touch with most of them everyday but the reality is that it's not a practical option and sometimes during our age, when we just don't feel like doing something, we won't do it.

Life is precious as is friendship, you do need it in order to exist. Friendship is a resource that is available in abundance but true friendship often come in handfuls. To some, they come in even more minute amounts like gems. I have to confess, there are many people I haven't kept in touch with for a long time and there is a feeling of regret that lies deep within me for not having done so. I guess it just happens to all of us. Almost everyone of us have battalions of friends and it's alright for us to try our very best to talk to them as often as possible and let them know your there for them which is sort of the implied intention we normally put forward when we develop a relationship with that person over time. However this problem doesn't just base itself upon one individual. Let me explain, for instance, if you feel you have this problem and I mentioned that many do, then all your friends will be having this problem too so it multiplies exponentially. The fact remains however that we must do our best to keep the friends we have and to talk to them when we can. Friends aren't replaceable no matter how old they are or how long you've known them. Friendship is like a bridge, after it has been constructed, it needs constant maintenance and in truth this is a duty that must be shared between you and your friend, if you and your friend maintain it regularly, traffic flow will be smooth and the bridge will be in brilliant condition. If only one of you maintains it, the bridge will be in a satisfactory condition and traffic jams may build up and if neither maintains it, it will eventually collapse and sink into the deep sea below.

I understand that we all have our own priorities and goals in life and it is important to adhere to them. Along the way we may tend to choose more from a group of friends that can help us achieve our goals, this is good in certain ways but not in all ways. We may have regrets for not keeping in touch with certain friends due to the fact as a result of not doing so may result in the consequence of your friend not seeing you the same way again but if that were to be the case, they aren't your true friends after all. However this isn't the case most of the time, many of them do tend to understand as they're having the same problem as you are right now. I just want to thank God for blessing me with so many friends and I also do want to say sorry to all my good friends that I haven't kept in touch with for so long. I hope to keep in touch with them more often in the foreseeable future but for now I'm working at this one step at a time and taking life and the goals I have set for myself as I travel down life's highway.

Rokeach Value Survey

2009-08-10T01:31:00.001+08:00

Hi guys & gals,

Welcome back to another life changing blogpost by moi. Now your all probably wondering what the heck the Rokeach Value Survey is but for all those of you who took Philosophy class, you'll probably know what I'm talking about. It's quite interesting and just take the survey for a few minutes if your free. If you wish wish too you can copy, paste and print out the survey, it's pretty cool I assure you. The instructions are as follows

Now below are two lists, each in alphabetical order. Each value is accompanied by a short description and a blank space. Your goal is to rank each value in order of importance to you for each of the two lists. Study each list and think of how much each value may act as a guiding principle in your life.

To begin, select the value that is of most importance to you. Write OR Type the number 1 in the blank space next to that value. Next, choose the value that is of second importance to you and write or type the number 2 in the blank next to it. Work your way through the list until you have ranked all 18 values on the pages. The value that is of least importance to you should appear in Box 18.

When you have finished ranking all 18 values, rank the next 18 values in the seconds list in the same way. Please do both lists separately.

When ranking, take your time and think carefully. Feel free to go back anc change your order should you have second thoughts about any of your answer. When you have completed the ranking of both sets of values., the results should represent an accurate picture of how you really feel about what's important in your life.

LIST 1

Ambitious (hardworking and aspiring)

Broad-Minded (open-minded)

Capable (competent; effective)

Clean (neat and tidy)

Courageous (standing up for your beliefs)

Forgiving (willing to pardon others)

Helpful (working for he welfare of others)

Honest (sincere and truthful)

Imaginative (daring and creative)

Independent (self-reliant; self-sufficient)

Intellectual (intelligent and reflective)

Logical (consistent; rational)

Loving (affectionate and tender)

Loyal (faithful to friends or the group)

Obedient (dutiful; respectful)

Polite (courteous and well-mannered)

Responsible (dependable and reliable)

Self-Controlled (restrained; self-disciplined)

LIST 2

A Comfortable Life (a prosperous life)

Equality (brotherhood and equal opportunity for all)

An Exciting Life (a stimulating, active life)

Family Security (taking care of loved ones)

Freedom (independence and free choice)

Health (physical and mental well-being)

Inner Harmony (freedom from inner conflict)

Mature Love (sexual and spiritual intimacy)

National Security (protection from attack)

Pleasure (an enjoyable, leisurely life)

Salvation (saved; eternal life)

Self-Respect (self-esteem)

A Sense of Accomplishment (a lasting contribution)

Social Recognition (respect and admiration)

True Friendship (close companionship)

Wisdom (a mature understanding of life)

A World at Peace (a world free of war and conflict)

A World of Beauty (beauty of nature and the arts)

Well there you have it, 2 lists consisting of 18 items each. Rank them how you will and remember one very important piece of advice. These are lists down to the individual. There isn't a right or wrong. We may all rank it differently and perhaps some of us may think that the others order of ranking may be completely off or totally out of line. The most important thing is to respect one anther's opinion and what values they regard as priority over the other. There's nothing wrong with being different, it is in fact that we being able to possess this sense of uniqueness that makes us special, that make us human.

ICF Final Meeting- July 31, 2009

2009-07-31T21:12:00.011+08:00

Hi guys & gals,

WAIT, your first thought is probably, hold on this guy has always started his blog posts with "Hi Guys", well the thing is, I don't want anyone to get an incorrect notion that when I say guys, I'm only referring to dudes, i'm referring to the girls as well. I'm not saying they are guys OK?? It's just a general way of addressing only. So in light of that, I shall be starting my blog posts with the guys and gals intro.

Now down to the subject, yet another semester has come to an end and ICF had it's final meeting of this semester last Friday, July 31st. It was also the day that we would be bidding farewell to 4 of our dear ICF members. I have to admit, seriously I'm not simply saying this to please anyone but honestly it is very saddening to see people leave. Sometimes you wish there was that point in your life which you could freeze and make it last forever right? Well there are pros and cons to this. The pros are you'll be able to live in the time you really love for so long till you can fully say that you embraced the time. However if you freeze time at what specific part of your life, one can't help but wonder whether a better time could be laying ahead as well.

Anyways, back to the subject, the final ICF session for this sem, the day started with the usual prayer worship and we started with the songs session. Now this time I had prepared the slides well in advance, went through the songs in the video and sequentially constructed the lyrics till they were in perfect order. I didn't want to trouble Nicholas this time, I just wanted him to relax and not worry about a thing for once instead of coming and bailing me out like he does on quite a few occasions. We started with, a slow song and ended it off with a bang, a song to get us in the high spirits titled "Counting on God" by Desparation band. It was awesome song and the power point was almost perfect but it went pretty smoothly nonetheless, PRAISE THE LORD!!!

After that we had a games session playing Napkin Relay =P and Later Air Ping Pong. Your probably wondering how the 2 games are played right? Haha well, the Napkin relay is like a normally relay only it involves blowing a Napkin instead of handing of a batten. Air Ping Pong involves the use of a ping pong ball but it must be blown back until it goes over a person's side of the table, Jessica so successfully somehow managed to make it blow to her own side. How she did that I will never know hahaha LOL. The games sessions was awesome and we all really had fun with it.

After the games session was over, we sat down to watch the video made by CF. I sat down with Angeline and I realized that she straightened her hair. Man am I blur BUT she looks great with straight hair and I mean WOW haha. Hohoho, i've been a very bad boy wahahaha XD. Any who, the sold out crowd at CF sat down to see a video on CF's visit to the Crisis home which looks after the welfare of HIV patients. Next up it was a sharing session by all those who were leaving namely Nicholas, Alexis, Dana and Kylie about their experiences and how they felt about their time in college and in CF, it was quite sad to see them leaving so soon. It's literally as if time were flying right out the window. Soon enough it was time to chow down, Brian said Grace and we ate. There was a buffet on display and it was better than Hilton's haha, at least we didn't have WILD of MUHSROOM soup. There was pizza from Pizza hut, home made frankfurters, egg sandwiches, curry puffs and drinks. While eating, the cameras were brought out and I made sure I took photos with Nicholas, Kylie, Dana and Alexis and I managed to do just that =). Anyways here's a group shot from our last CF, the rest of the photos are on Facebook.

The Spread =d

Kylie, Dana, Nicholas and Alexis

GROUP SHOT

CF this semester has been amazing, it's improved and grown so much and once again I would like to thank God for blessing me with this gift which gave me so many more friends and a great place to hangout. It has taught me a lot and also brought me closer to God. What better way now to close out this blog post than say Amen.

ICSJ's Inti Ball 2009 - Mystical Illusion

2009-07-18T22:02:00.037+08:00

Hi guys,

This is arguably the BIGGEST event on Inti College Subang Jaya's (Laureate International Universities) calendar and who would have thought that the very hotel my parents first stayed at when they first came here to Malaysia over 20 years ago is where I would return years later for one of the most special occasions of my life.

ICSJ's annual formal bash a.k.a. Inti Ball was on Friday, July 17th, 2009. I have a funny feeling that this maybe a long ass blog post and I'll be late in publishing it. Mind you though, that I have taken care into meticulously adding detail into this post and it has been proof read for grammatical errors to ensure a very pleasurable reading experience haha. I'll do my very best to describe it to you in detail and make it entertaining to read at the same time.

First of all, may God Bless my keyboard, one of my many flaws is that I tend to WHACK my keyboard when typing. I think I learned that tendency from my dear old Dad who gives the keys a good going over as well, also another fact that I share in common with my pops is that we both are allergic to cigarette smoke.

Ok BEFORE you go on, I will confess, I have hijacked quite a number of these photos from FaceBook haha so I am telling you this right now about it. I couldn't get all the necessary photos that I needed for this blog post and I would like to thank my friends for providing me with the necessary resources hehehe.

PART 1: Classes as usual

Anyways back to the topic, 17th July 2009 was indeed an amazing day, it started with the usual, getting up and getting ready for college and heading there to begin with. First order of business was to revise and recap some of the tests for series for the Calculus quiz. After finishing half an hour of our 1 hour lesson covering Hyperbola's under Conic Sections and Polar Coordinates, we proceeded with our quiz. The quiz wasn't too bad but I hope I can score in it. After leaving Calculus class, I headed too History class and we had our usual lecture but our lecturer Puan Liza had a surprise in store for us, in the last 45 minutes we had an in class assignment to finish up. Our in-class assignments normally take sometime to finish so I went coops. Shaza and Associates joint ventured with Elvin & Co. to devise a plan to tackle Ms. Liza's challenge in record time! We normally need over one and a half hours to complete it so what we did was me and buddy did the even numbers while Shaza and Hafizah did the odd numbers and we worked our way through the true and false........well sort off hahaha and it was completed within 1 hour woot XD

PART 2: I'm off to CF

Classes were over for the day but it ended 15 minutes past 1pm which was supposed to be when our history class WAS supposed to end. I then rushed off to Block B's music classroom where CF is normally held and got behind Christine Jr's. laptop and revved it up. I made some slight modifications to the slide show of the songs that we were going to sing. Sigh my timing was way off and I really need to master the cues that the lead singer gives me. I really want to thank Nicholas for helping me out during the songs session. However we had the games session first, I have no idea what they played as I was busy with the PowerPoint and Nicholas was explaining the game to the CF members but whatever it was, it sounded a load of fun but I didn't get to take part so I just watched with Nicholas and the others prepping their instruments. All I know was that Kevin was doing something while Swee Ling was trying to imitate him and it was kind of hilarious lol.

Nicholas blessing us with wisdom to play the game haha!

Swee Ling and Kevin imitating one another and causing a ton of laughter!

After the songs were over, it was time for our special guest Pastor, Sandra to share some words of wisdom with us. She went with the theme "Why Love" and shared with us on girls getting taken advantage off by inconsiderate guys who demand them to prove their love by sacrificing their virginity to someone they have not permanently committed themselves too and finally getting dumped. She was absolutely right about this, this happens to so many girls around the world and as she rightly stated, all we need is the love of God to help us control our drives and bring us happiness. It's true we have sexual drives, especially at this time of our lives and age but we cannot let them get out of control. As pastor Sandra rightly asked us "If you drive down hill in your car, will you step on the accelerator or the brakes?" It's not worth giving up something so precious for a 2 second stint of pleasure. Sex can and must only be enjoyed between a married couple who have whole-heatedly committed themselves to each other and have made a vow to be faithful to one another.

Part 3: LUNCH

After CF was over, we rearranged the room and I took the bag of cables back to the Maintenance Office while Joel headed over to the SSD to put the keyboard back and by this time, I was seriously HUNGRY, i needed to eat as I hadn't had the time to eat a proper lunch all day. I had another a small problem during the day as well, I thought my phone battery was sufficiently charged but it was like it suddenly drained away in a flash and it was totally dead later in the afternoon so I first borrowed Nicholas's phone to call my mom and later April's to confirm what time my mom was coming, I want to say thanks a lot to both of them for saving my backside haha. I then met up with Joel as soon as we put away the stuff and we both headed too Asia Cafe to have lunch, we ordered Wan Tan Mee but Joel as usual was not satisfied with the meal, you see it's not the taste that was the problem, Joel has a very high metabolism which basically means that when he eats, he really EATS and in BIG portions and doesn't gain weight haha, how lucky can you be. However one Wan Tan Mee was enough to satisfy my appetite but somehow I have this thing nowadays that I happen to get very hungry particularly during the morning hours of the day haha so I guess we're both hungry in slightly different ways hehe. While we were chomping away, Isaac joined us for a while and after I finished my meal, I bid both of them farewell to head back home and get ready for the big night ahead.

Part 4: Let's get READY

After reaching home, I wound down then headed straight to put my freaking hand phone for charging and then to the bathroom and shaved. Normally, I shave once a week and that would be on a Sunday, right before the college week starts but this week, I didn't have a choice because I need to be clean shaven when I go for formal events like this. Joel said it was ok not too shave as the rugged look was good for me and it would impress the ladies. This was obviously not applicable for a formal evening as Christine Jr. so rightly pointed out and so I shaved, then showered up, got ready and went through my checklist (you'll know what it is soon enough). I looked at the mirror just to see how I looked after getting ready and it wasn't too bad, not amazing but alright. Now this is the part where I have a small flashback of the events that lead to my preparation for Inti Ball and now the moment you read this, your probably like...........oh crap. Don't worry, i'll make it as short and sweet as possible lol. Normally I know preparing for events like these doesn’t seem very much like me but formal events like these don’t come along very often plus my mom was adamant that I go decently.

FLASHBACK (road to Inti-Ball)

Sunday- 11/07/2009

Today I had gone out with my folks to go to Church but on our way there we obtained a puncture on our front left wheel but luckily we were quickly assisted by the highway patrol personnel that assist drivers in their times of need when they encounter car trouble. Later went for shopping for Inti Ball, my Dad bought me a new pair of pants. Surprisingly I can easily fit into a size 34 with a slim fit cut AND with room to spare.............woo hoo, i used to wear a size 38 so its pretty good. I also bought a new tie as well, its my first tie..........yipeekiyay =P.

Wednesday- 15/07/2007

It's midweek on Wednesday and mom's taking me shopping for a few more items before the big prom on Friday. Just got out of college after going for the Clinique Self Grooming workshop which was in conjunction with Inti Ball. Went for it MAINLY to give Felicia some support hehe. Clinique said they were giving an RM200 goodie bag but it seemed rather..........empty. However considering the fact that cosmetics cost so much, I guess its ok and im going to give it to my mom anyways haha..... I went to Mid Valley to get a few more items to complete my suit haha. Went to Raoul, I really like that brand for their shirts and I bought a pair cuff links to go with it too. I also went to buy a new pair of shoes, I really did my best and got a reasonably priced one plus there was discount so I got the shoe at a good price plus I'm picky on the design so it took me a little while to choose but I chose one I really liked. Looking good so far but something's not quite right yet, something's missing......

Eugene being used for a demo haha

All HAIL Raoul for their shirts!!!

ooooo, cleverly designed respiratory duct constrictors a.k.a. TIES

Thursday- 16/07/2009

Ok Inti Ball is tomorrow and i figured out what was missing..........I STILL DON'T HAVE A FREAKING MASK, but luckily i sms'd Cezlynn the day before and she was selling some. There were two types, plain design masks for RM6 and glittery masks for RM10, since I'm neither a fan of glitter neither am I a fan of BRIGHT and ELECTRIC colors, I got a simple black mask, not a full faced type but the masquerade types which just goes over your eyes and nose hehe. Thanks for saving me lil Cezz =) So let's go through the checklist (told you you'd see a checklist soon enough)

Coat- CHECK
Shirt- CHECK
Cufflinks- CHECK
Tie: CHECK
Pants: CHECK
Mask: CHECK
Shoes: CHECK
Underwear: CHECK......................................ok im just kidding =P

FLASHBACK END

Part 5: Let's do it 5 STAR style babeh

So after getting ready I called a cab and surprisingly I managed to get one after 2 calls, it normally would have taken way more attempts plus paying extra to get one on a Friday. Anyways, there was an added advantage of the prom being at PJ Hilton, it was close to my house so it was easy for me to get there as it was pretty close to my house. I hadn't been to the place in over 10 years and boy has it really changed on the inside (still looks the same on the outside though hehe). I arrived their and went up to the concierge to find out where the Ball would be and the gentleman at the counter directed me to the Kristal Ballroom on the first floor.

I went up and to get my ticket punched BUT there was a problem. I don't normally carry my Student ID around with me unless its for college, apparently its a good idea to do so so that you can get discounts for movies and what not but anyways, back to the subject. I didn't have my student ID with me and it looked for a minute as if I wasn't going to be allowed to attend the event. Well I cannot entirely blame them for being cautious but what annoyed me was that they didn't immediately give me a solution to the problem as I expected them to. I stood there listening and gave them a fair chance to explain but I wasn't getting any answers. This was a special event for me and I was determined to make it as perfect as possible and I wanted this minor obstacle to be sorted and luckily after I HINTED it to them, they told me it could be as I needed to pay RM10 as a small fine in order to get in and luckily I had some cash on me so I paid the fine and got the chop.

Luckily I didn't loose my cool because that would be extremely unprofessional of me and on top of that it would make me look like a fool in front of everyone. Besides that they gave me a receipt enabling me to get a refund from INTIMA later so it’s not a total loss plus they were polite so I accordingly reciprocated, cooperated and kept my cool although I admit I did get slightly annoyed, I’m only human after all.

Part 6: Helping my Christian brother

Here's another thing that I got annoyed about the Student ID issue, it's not only the fact that I was looking forward to this event, I was also hurrying to get to Hilton to see my bro Zlwin before Inti Ball officially began and to pray for him to help instill some confidence within him as he was the emcee as well as magician for the night woohoo =). On top of that I thought I was late when I arrived at 6:30p.m. and this matter with the Student ID wasn't really helping me that much either. I hadn't seen him in quite a while and luckily the ticket matter wasn't much of an issue and I resolved it quickly without getting into a heated exchange with the student helpers at the ticket counter. Zlwin was inside the hall and no one was allowed in just yet. When I went to ask Charles about it as he was one of the Inti Ball organizing committee members he told me he'd do his best when I asked him whether I could meet Zlwin for two minutes but after seeing Charles in this situation and how much pressure he was under, I knew he was really preoccupied and I didn't want to trouble him about it so I told him not to worry about it and called Zlwin on his phone to come out of the Ball Room so I could see him.

With my bro Zlwin

Zlwin, Jolene and Simon

Shortly after, he along with two of his friends came outside with him, their names are Simon and Jolene. It was nice to meet both of them but I felt slightly awkward for a minute, the reason is because I told Zlwin that I would pray for him and it would look slightly odd if his friends were just looking at me and him while I was praying with him but thankfully they were Christians too and they joined in as well and I was more than happy to have them here with us =). I said a prayer for a reasonable length to help instill courage and confidence within Zlwin to face this event head on and perform well, he really appreciated it a lot and gave me a big hug and this really meant a lot to me. Although I have only known him, for a short length time, I took note in particular that Zlwin possessed a very forthcoming, understanding and warm demeanor and I really appreciated him for accommodating me into his world and becoming such good friends with me so quickly. I took a few photos with him, he thanked me for the prayer which I was more than happy to do for him and Zlwin, Simon and Jolene headed back into the Ballroom.Right after that I bumped into a couple of my lecturers, my Physics lecturer, Ms. Jerry, My Calculus lecturer, Ms, Shanta, My public speaking lecturer Ms. VG, my history lecturer Ms. Liza and all of them were looking absolutely stunning in formal wear. They commented saying that I was looking really nice but I thought I just looked ok, plus the coat I was wearing was huge for me now as it was too lose due to the fact that I lost weight hehe.

Part 7: It's time to play the GAME

I was walking around and headed downstairs back into the lobby bumping into a few friends on the way and met Joel. Soon Nicholas joined us and we went sitting at one of the cocktail lounges opposite the restaurant waiting for our ICF peepz. I was wondering why Joel wanted to wait as I suggested him going upstairs to get his ticket chopped but he was waiting for Brian and the others to get here so that he could get his mask and give a real scare to someone. I don't think he managed to do so but he did get his mask haha. After the guys arrived, we took some photos together and I headed out with Brian to his car to get the tickets. We then went back from the car park to the lobby and we all went upstairs to the ballroom together and after everyone got their hands stamped and their tickets chopped, we all headed in soon enough towards our table.

Part of my crew from ICF hehe =)

The CF Gang =DDD

ICF booked two tables, one with Sarah, Amy, Swee Vien, Sheryl, Sean and some other girls while I was sitting at our other table seating Brian, Christine, Britannia, Swee Ling, Kylie, Arielle, Nicholas, Brandon, Joel and myself. We were right in the front close to the posh looking VIP tables and uber posh VVIP table as well the stage and the big LCD projector screen so we had a pretty good location.

There were essentially, 3 types of tables. The first being the standard tables which were mainly for students, then 2 VIP tables for lecturers and finally the VVIP table for The President of the Inti Education, Mr. Tan, our Principal of ICSJ, Mrs. Joyce Yuen, the deans and program directors from other programs, among them were Ms. Khor Kheng Leik, program director of CAE and Ms. Vijaya Sooria, the Dean of EIP and INTIMA President Joshan

The evening started with the welcoming of the VVIP's by Zlwin Chew, our emcee for the night and the rest of our college mates followed suite with applause. Next was a short video made by Emmanuel and Fang Kai which from what I understand, they both toiled over it. Check Emmanuel's blog site for more info on this. It's on my blog list. I got a peek of the video when Emmanuel and Fang Kai were reviewing it at the CAE/AUP office on Friday itself but later decided not to spoil it for myself so I turned away haha. The video in my opinion was very good. Despite Emmanuel's criticism of it being mediocre, it was very well made and I really appreciated the hard work and effort he and Fang Kai put into it, they both really have a talent for making videos. Then came the opening speeches by the President of the Inti Education, Mr. Tan, our Principal, Mrs. Joyce Yuen and Joshan. The evening then continued with a little intro by Zlwin and dinner. It was a buffet and Christine could not simply comprehend the word “buffet”. Judging from her expression, she has never really eaten buffet style and has done a la carte for most of her life hahaha. She thought we were going to be served but in truth, I didn't expect any waiting staff to serve us our dinner considering the fact that we didn't exactly pay a small fortune to be here lolx.

Zlwin on stage

Zlwin with his magnificient snowflake effect!

For starters I had salad with a balsamic dressing followed by a main course of Lamb, Spaghetti with Bolognaise and Cabonara sauce, a small filet of Seabass in a cream sauce and mixed vegetables. Now you all are probably drooling over what I just said if your hungry but don't be fooled, the food wasn't amazing. In truth, it was far from it. Now I'm not the type of person to overly criticize something, I will give credit where it is due but the food was far from being what is considered to be "5-Star Hotel Cuisine". Seeing as how long this hotel has been around, I would have at least expected them to maintain a reasonably good standard of the food but I was mistaken but then again as I mentioned, how much we paid to attend this event could have had some influence over this haha =P.

The spaghetti with the 2 sauces as well as the vegetables were alright, nothing amazing but just nice. The lamb and fish however were not ok. The lamb had too much fat stuck on the meat, the meat itself had a slightly rubbery texture although not to the extent that it could not be chewed and it was not properly seasoned. The fish was just horrible, it was dry, bland and absolutely unpalatable indicating that it was so obviously overcooked. It was not succulent and juicy as how you would normally expect when you eat properly cooked sea bass, now I can perhaps understand why Gordon Ramsay erupts when his sous chef's over cook fish.

WILD of MUHSROOM soup??? (It's supposed to be CREAM of MUSHROOM soup sigh, GOD, can't these people even use spell check before they print that out, it's not really noticeable but small details like these still count =.=')

During dinner there were performances by some bands from Inti, some dance performances including a latin dance performance by Zjen Thak and a girl from Taylor’s, lucky draw contests, an awards ceremony for Extra Curricular Activity Clubs, a magic show by Zlwin and the Prom Queen and Prom King contest. Also they surprisingly of all the songs played "You'll Never Walk Alone" by Gerry & The Pacemakers during the course of our dinner, i just couldn't help myself and sang and entertained my friends at my table haha XD

Zjen Thak in action haha!

I am proud to announce that ICF won the award for "MOST CONSISTENT CLUB" in Inti College Subang Jaya and its all thanks to the hard work and dedication of the members and committee. One thing that really pulled my trigger was the printing on trophy, I never knew the word consistent was spelt "C-O-N-S-I-S-T-A-N-T". Sigh but anyways I'm grateful to God that we won that award but you would have thought that they at least would get the spelling right but nooooo lolx.

Brian receiving the award on behalf of ICF for the "Most Consistent Club" in Inti College Subang Jaya from our Principal, Mrs. Joyce Yuen

Part 8: Stepping into the spotlight

Zlwin performed some magic and called me out on to stage as a volunteer along with Ms. Kamala and another girl named Belle for one of his illusions. The magical demonstration (no its not a trick, Zlwin does not like it being called a trick as that word is associated with negative entities) drew inspiration from the Russian Bullet trick which involved a gun but this nail demonstration was slightly less……….risky haha. This illusion consisted of 4 paper bags, one of which was hiding a brand spanking new thick 5 1/2-inch long SHARP nail which was held standing by a wooden base support. The idea of is that, if you are lucky, the paper bag upon which our hand is placed to be crushed by our hand should be empty and you should be taking home a Starbucks voucher and Zlwin's card, if your unlucky on the other hand you will be taking home a 5 1/2 inch thick nail driven through your hand. Hmmm....sounds like a heck of deal right?

Zlwin showed and identical nail and with an apple pierced right through. Now we were given 4 envelopes and I was getting a little nervous because this was honestly not an easy illusion to perform. We had to choose one of 4 envelopes, each of which contained a number. Belle chose the first number and got number 4, Zlwin took her hand, placed it on the bag and pushed it straight down and she ended up going home with a Starbucks voucher.........haha lucky her. Next I decided to be the man and step up to the plate, I let belle go first because since there were more bags, her chances of imminent danger were lesser =P. I chose another of the 3 remaining envelopes but before the envelope was opened, Zlwin was building some anxiety by asking me whether I was sure. I said yes after a bit of hesitation and I chose the number 1, people were laughing at me as I did so well to HIDE my nervousness lol. My hand was placed over bag no.1 and my hand was driven straight through and I didn't go home with the nail, aww shucks……maybe next time LOL, nah im kidding. Next was Ms. Kamala's turn, she chose the number 3 and her hand was driven into the bag to come away with a Starbucks voucher. He then called the 3 of us to put our hands out to catch the number written on a piece of paper which was contained in the final envelope and on it was really written, the number 2 and Zlwin asked me to read out the number in the remaining envelope. That was indeed brilliant, he revealed the 5 1/2 inch nail under the 2nd bag and slotted another apple through it like a pin pricking through tracing paper, it was indeed brilliant and I truly applaud my friend for performing such a wonderful piece of magic. After that I headed back to my table and continued to chat with Brian and the guys and we were soon joined by Zlwin, Jolene and Simon. It was awesome having him during this event and all of us had a great time together. It was great to see Zlwin again after these last few months and not only did I get to see a dear old friend again, he helped me make 2 new ones as well, Jolene and Simon, what a pal. =)

The paper bags of UNCERTAIN doom!!!

Zlwin, explaining the process of the illusion!

Further explaination...

Belle escapes....................=O that was close

It's time for me to go face to face with JUDGMENT...........GUILTY OR INNOCENT??

INNOCENT haha =D (Ms. Kamala laughing her head off in the background)

The NEXT Criss Angel......Mr. Zlwin Chew

Part 9: A new Queen and King will rise

There were lucky draws in between and also the other main highlight of the night ensued which was the Prom Queen and King competition, and as I expected, Carissa and John won so I would like to say a hearty and well deserved congratulations to both of them. They both did a samba dance for their performance and Carissa and John danced very well in my opinion. John got creative by putting the stem of a rose in his mouth which was a pretty nice touch lmao. The only other 2 candidates who matched up close was Natalie and Ashok.

After the performance segment of the Prom Queen and Prom King competition, each of the 5 couples had to answer a question and there were 5 different envelopes containing 5 different questions for each pair. Carissa and John were asked the question:-

"Which part of your body do you like the most?"

Carissa answered saying she liked her feet as they were unique in terms of them being a size 3. Did she say SIZE 3??? WOW, my goodness me, Carissa brings new meaning to the word petite haha. Even Christine and Swee Ling who are 2 petite girls I know were stunned. Well I know Carissa personally as well and seeing those 2 shocked was quite something to see. Wow this makes me look like big foot as the Reeboks I wear right now are a SIZE 13 haha.

On to John, he answered saying he liked his hands and the reason being is due to the fact that he can do "stuff" with it lol, I'm sure we would all love to know what the implied meaning behind that was haha.

Natalie and Ashok had to answer the question "What was the worst date you have ever had?". Ashok told one experience when he and the girl he was dating was eating at one restaurant one day with her family sitting at another table in the SAME restaurant near the door XD.

Natalie said that none of her dates have ever gone badly and I think that's very nice of her to say that =).

However, amongst all of the candidates, Carissa and John were very deserving in winning their titles of Prom Queen and Prom King respectively. Ashok and Natalie weren't too bad either and matched the up closest to them in my opinion.

Carissa and John having won both each received a 2 years supply of New Zealand natural ice cream along with other prizes as well. Carissa also won a tiara, im not sure if John got one as well? Woohoo, if I’m lucky, Carissa will share some ice cream with me too yahooooo XD.

Our Prom Queen and Prom King (why doesn't John get a Tiara?? hahaha)

My thoughts on the 2 candidates are this. John, what can I say about this guy? He's a clown for sure but in a good way though lol, he's quiet but can be hilarious when he wants too haha. He, I have to rightly point is one of the main reasons along with a few others who keep Ms. Jerry and the PHY212 class entertained during the course of almost every lesson. Congrats Johnny boy haha.

Carissa really deserved this title, she performed well and her answer to her question was pretty good considering the circumstances of having to think of one impromptu and in front of so many students, teachers, staff and not to mention Inti Corporate watching haha. In terms of what I think of her, she falls under the category of a girl who is both very attractive and has style and substance meaning she’s got a great personality and a respectable attitude. She's a very down to earth type of girl and an extremely SWEET friend =) (WARNING- She can give you tooth decay more than the 2 year supply of New-Zealand Natural she won will haha =P). She’s a very kind person and I will really miss her a lot as this semester will be her final one here in Inti and she’ll be transferring soon to the United States to pursue her major.

Carissa, winning the title of prom queen (woe, she's carrying a 2 year supply of ice cream in one hand!! Looks like someone has been weight training at the gym =P)

Our lovely Prom Queen and I

Part 10: We're closin it out!!!!

Now seeing as how this is a special day, you would naturally expect me as well as many others to take ALOT of photos and I did. I fought my heart out to try and snap photos with as many people as I could and naturally, getting photos with everyone of your friends is near impossible. Although I did get shots with a good number of my friends, there are still far too many I didn't get shots with and I would like to sincerely apologize to all of my dearest and wonderful friends who I did not take photos with namely Li Wei, Cezlynn, Fernie, Zjen Thak, Felicia, Ui Tee, Gabriel, Nicholas Tan, Wilson, Jillian, Charles, Celine, Clarissa, VG, Paul, KT, Pei Wen, Suting, Ashok, Qisti, Lik Pang, Han Sen, John, Willie and so many more. Some of my teachers I didn't snap shots with were Ms. VG, Ms Jerry, Ms. Shanta and many more but I did manage to snap a photo with Mr. Sam to be more positive haha.

The lovely lecturers of our college (Ms. VG, Ms. Liza, Ms. Jerry, Ms. Shanta, Ms. Mathuri, Ms. Prescilla, Ms. Kalai and Ms. Michelle)

Another problem in regards to this photo taking was my camera, after taking only 8 shots, the low battery warning indicator was blinking on the LCD. I thought this battery was charged as I had reminded my pops to charge them and what surprises me even more is that these AA batteries are ones with high charge retention capability and will not run out very easily even in the most draining of electronic devices which run on Double A's. Regular Double A's have a charge of over 1,000 mAh (milli-Ampere hour) where as the Uni-Ross batteries my Dad purchased had a charge rating of 2,700 mAh meaning that with these batteries fully charged, it could have easily lasted me through the night. Even if I was snapping photos off to glory, a low battery warning would have, perhaps maybe after quite a number of shots. I really thank God that the batteries didn't run out on me as I was being as prudent with the remaining energy that was left within them. The hassle of having to buy new Double-A's was not something I was willing to endure on this particular night. Well I guess accidents happen but luckily nothing major came up.

Anyways, back to more enlightening news, most of the night was spent taking photos with friends and chatting and laughing away in merriment lolx. I feel kind of bad for not informing my parents as I told them that I would be more or less done by 11:30p.m. but I ended up staying their till 1:00a.m. My Dad ended up hunting me down by charging into the hotel to find me but thankfully he didn't give me the going over that I was expecting. My mom on the other hand was fuming but I know she did it because she cares about my well being and safety. Overall, the night was super enjoyable and I loved every moment of it, many of my friends didn't manage to come for the event and the night may not have been 100% perfect as I would have hoped for but nothing ever comes 100% perfect, it can near perfection but being perfect is not possible however I am grateful for what I receive. I really enjoyed the overall atmosphere; the performances were good and most importantly seeing old friends and spending quality time with them.

In general, I really had a fantastic evening and although it had not gone exactly the way I would have wanted it too, I still had a great time and that really says something to me, that it wasn't too bad after all. To all my friends who I didn't managed to meet that night, I really pray that they enjoyed their evening and had a blast as well. The last formal gathering I had been too was in my school a couple of years ago, it was satisfactory but nowhere near as close to how Inti Ball turned out, this is one night I would never ever forget. May God Bless all of you and take care.

Lots of Love
Nomad

It's a Nomad's life

2009-07-11T17:26:00.004+08:00

Hi guys,

You're probably wondering what's with the title, well I thought I'd put something a bit different for a change. Now to start with there are a couple of things I'd like to blog about that happened in the last couple of days.

First of all, many of us know Raymond Tan. Our tall and intellectual Intian who's a devoted supporter of Chelsea FC haha. He has left Malaysia to continue his studies in Australia. He will be studying at ANU in Canberra and his first impressions upon arriving there are "Damn its dark....." lol. When I was chatting with him it was only 5:30p.m. and it was already dark. It also turns out that Aussie's in his area and pretty environmentally conscious and switch lights on a need only basis haha. Anyways, Raymond is a-okay and that's the most important thing. I just want to say how great it was making friends with him and how awesome it was playing Futsal with him on many of our gatherings. We first became buds when we met last year in 2008 as we both took Public Speaking class, that as it turned out happened to be the most relaxing and most enjoyable semester I have ever had. The short semester isn't as bad as well all think it is, you see we only have to study 2 subjects in 9 weeks but the long semester is only 13-14 weeks long and you have to take an additional 2-3 more subects which actually makes the long semester quite hectic in truth. Then during the 2 months holidays after my 2nd semester we went for a lot of Futsal meetings and Raymond so kindly asked me whether I was interested in joining his team when the Inti Closed Futsal tournament took place in sports planet last semester. I have blogged about this in a previous post so check it out for more details. Anyways, I'm going to miss him alot, he's been a great friend to talk and hang out with. Take good care of yourself bud =)

The next was Gabriel's Birthday, I happened to be in INTIMA at the time playing FIFA 09 on Nicholas's laptop and then of course watching him play. He as I suspected loves the passing game and it's stringing beautiful passes for him that gets him on a high haha, somewhat similar to Raymond's style of playing. Many of the guys pitched in to buy an acoustic guitar for Gabriel and got him some mouth watering doughnuts from Big Apple. It looked really good haha but I'm on a diet hehe. Gabriel played a song for us, we gave Gabriel a funny card, a barrage of photos were taken by many of us, Ms. Jerry dropped by for a visit and the rest is history haha.

Gabriel shaking hands with Ms. Jerry and holding his brand spanking new guitar

Finally Trazzle 2- An Amazing Race was held yesterday which basically is a treasure hunt. Aslam selected me for his team which consisted of Aslam, Me, Guo Yi, Shun Kit, Shaza and Jerusha. Due to the rain however the treasure hunt had to be condensed or actually would have been much longer. This treasure hunt was quite challenging in certain parts as 1 or 2 clues were quite difficult to figure out. The most horrendous thing we had to do was eat RAW garlic cloves but the crackers with wasabe paste wasn't so bad. Each team had to eat a thermocol container containing crackers with wasabe paste, around 15 garlic cloves, a raw onion and 2 wedges of lemon. I couldn't stand eating the garlic cloves, I was jumping up and down like an idiot and nearly gagged twice so I spat it out. One of the clues that we needed to solve took us to an area you would not normally go to. It is on the 5th floor but it isn't the library, this is considered the back area behind the library which can only be accessed via the back stairway or the elevators that take you to the hostel. In this location awaited Jonathan Lee with clues to the next challenge. Another one of the clues was pretty funny, we had to sing any song to one guy to cheer him up, he has a quiet personality and a low profile kind of person who is at the base of Inti and it turned out to be Kah Wei who was sitting at the concourse. Kah Wei as well as I being Liverpool supporters, I sang "You'll Never Walk Alone" to him and he easily gave me the clue hehe. The last leg of the raise required us to start from the beginning of the basketball court. Each team had to stand in a row and tie our legs to one another's legs and walk together in unison in a race to reach the concourse. It was painful and we didn't win first place but we got 2nd runner up and won a little cash so it wasn't a complete waste.

Guo Yi on the left and Aslam on the right trying to figure how to split the prize 6-Ways XD

Later Aslam, Shun Kit and I headed to FTZ to chillax for a bit and get some gametime. Then I left the two of them to their game of Dota and headed to the bus stop to catch my bus home. The effects of eating raw garlic still lurched within my oral cavity and not to mention my stomach so I tried dampen the effect by purchasing a Slurpee in 7-11 but the precious one or two minutes I spent taking the Slurpee and waiting in line almost cost me. As I saw my bus in the near distance, it left already assuming no one else was coming which was a BIG error. I needed to go home so right now I had 2 choices.

1. I either lazily accept what happened and ask my pops to fetch me later or

2. I cut through the shop lots and intercept the bus as it takes the same initial route every time.

I went for choice no.2 and managed to stop the bus in time. Despite all odds off going through a treasure hunt which had me running a lot, carrying a heavy bag and having to run in the heat to get to my bus, it was worth it hehe.

Random picture of Sue Yen trying to pose hahaha, I think April took this with my phone yesterday haha

Overall the week wasn't so bad, Inti is now brimming with one activity after another and its damn hard to keep up. Oh crap, I just remember about the Beau Bristow concert. I'll blog about that real soon I promise. Take care peepz.

Michael Owen

2009-07-04T16:46:00.004+08:00

Hi guys,

Sigh as if the passing of Michael Jackson wasn't depressing enough, news on another Michael that was published this morning shocked me nearly quite as much. Michael Owen, a Liverpool legend and the 7th highest all time scorer of the Barclays Premier League has joined a team I wish he didn't join, in fact it was a complete nightmare for me. In all honesty, I was waiting for the time Michael Owen would return to Liverpool and partner along side Fernando Torres to make a formidable striking partnership but that didn't happen. After he was sold off back in 2004 from Liverpool to Real Madrid, I thought the long wait would finally be over. This year would have probably been the best time to take a calculated risk and buy back Michael Owen in order to ensure Liverpool's domestic title hopes in the Premier League. Here are my reasons for this, first of all Liverpool are encountering financial difficulties and have a very limited budget to spend on transfer signings, Liverpool need a new striker to help Fernando Torres, he's doing a phenomenal job but even he needs help and Michael Owen's would be able to come back to Liverpool on a free transfer, a GOOD striker for FREE. Is that so hard to comprehend, is Rafa blind not to make a move on this. I know Owen is injury prone but common, give him a shot.

Instead of heading back to the Kop, he will now being waving to the stands of Old Trafford as he has now been purchased by Manchester United, one of my worst nightmares came true. Michael Owen who was amongst my favorite players of all time is playing for a team that are Liverpool FC's biggest and fiercest rivals. I simply cannot bring myself to accept this, but I guess I don't have any other choice. Regardless of him being at Manchester United, he will still be my all time favorite striker and I do certainly hope he regains his form again and becomes much better than before. Now there is ONLY ONE player of Manchester United that I like and his name is MICHAEL OWEN. In a sense I'm happy for him, if it helps him regain his form to become better then I'm glad. I was hoping to see him in a big 4 team although preferrably it would have been Liverpool instead of Man United. Ferguson was adamant on signing Fernando Torres to his squad after getting a huge £80 million transfer fee after selling Ronaldo off to Real Madrid. I was hoping it wouldn't happen and thankfully it didn't but Ferguson has hit Liverpool fans such as myself hard where it hurts by taking a Liverpool legend on to his squad for absolutely free, he didn't pay a penny as Owen's contract had expired. I can't however blame Ferguson entirely for this, he saw potential in Owen and grabbed him with both hands. Benitez on the other hand was too stubborn and never even considered bringing back our old hero so I case he will be the bigger villain in the eyes of many fans.

Well, what's done is done and all I can hope for now is that Liverpool continues to put in their best efforts, maintain their phenomenal form from the end of last season and perhaps improve it even more and hopefully win the Premier League in the upcoming season.

As for Michael Owen, I wish him all the best and he is one exception in the case that should he and I only mean he alone should happen to score against Liverpool in any of their encounters next season, I shall be happy that he scored. Whatever happens, Michael Owen spent the majority of his footballing career in Liverpool including his youth years and will always be a Liverpool player at heart.

Michael Joseph Jackson (1958-2009)

2009-06-29T19:30:00.005+08:00

Hi guys,

I know I am way overdue in publishing this but my schedule has been quite packed in the last week and has not permitted me to do so but now that I have a little bit of breathing space I shall duly oblige in writing this blog post and I sincerely apologize to all for not publishing this on time. Last week was a sad week for the music industry and the entire world as a musical legend and phenomenon had left us and gone to a better place. On June 22nd, 2009, Michael Jackson was declared dead by medical officials due to cardiac arrest.

This post is to honor the King of Pop and one of the greatest music artists that has EVER lived....period, his name is Michael Jackson. On the 29th of August in 1958, God had blessed the world with a gift......a person who would truly touch the hearts of millions through one of the greatest inventions of the human race............music. He was blessed with a gift to sing and dance and bring smiles to all that saw him perform. Even as a young boy, Michael among his brothers was an outstanding singer and performer in the Jackson 5 group. Later in life, he decided to pursue a solo career and established himself on the world stage.

Michael Jackson is also the only artist in history among many other solo performers, groups and bands in the industry holding the title of having "The World's Best-Selling Album Of All Time" which has sold over 100 million copies titled "Thriller" which was released back in 1982. Michael Jackson has made it in the industry as an entertainer, recording artist and businessman.

Michael Jackson is a man who has seen success and taken it to its very limits but it hasn't been all sunshine and roses for this superstar. Normally in most cases, when a person seems to have an unprecedented amount of success, talent and seem almost perfect in every sense and appear to be living the perfect life, it isn't usually according to the case we see. There normally almost always is an Achilles heel as some of us would like to put it for everyone. Michael Jackson's social life has gone upside down and topsy turvy for a major length of his life. He has undergone physical and verbal abuse as a child and he himself has been accused of sexual abuse. He has also gone through several lawsuits and has been bled of his hard earned money by a battery of lawyers promising to get him of the heat. Bad investments and his urge to spend like a star has also gotten him a great degree of debt. He also underwent surgery to bleach his skin to make it white as he wasn't proud or happy with his skin color and gave into pressure from the public. In my opinion I believe it was all this stress and harrowing experiences that resulted in the death of a real legend.

Regardless of his social life, I'd like to take a moment to reflect on the positives, despite all that has happened in his life and whatever he has done, I know that deep down inside he was actually a very good, kind and honest individual. Given the hardships he had suffered through childhood, I'm sure almost any individual would probably have a clouded sense of judgment and gone slightly astray if they had gone through the same trauma's that he had been through. He has given millions of dollars to charitable foundations for homeless children, children suffering from certain diseases and various other organizations and that must not be forgotten.

Michael Jackson's name on a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame

He is an incredible singer and I respect him from the bottom of my heart, I really love his songs and he has truly given me an appreciation for music. I even had the honor of doing a project with 2 friends of mine back when I was in school. His songs have good rhythm, tune and lyrics and who can ever forget his incredible ability to dance and of course we all just lived to watch him do his trademark moonwalk. I will really miss him, the world has truly suffered a great loss but I'm sure constant mourning and sadness over his passing is not what Michael would have wanted for any of us but he just wants us to have comfort in knowing that he's watching from above. He's a truly great individual who will go down in history as one of the greatest music artists that has every lived. He may have left this world but his name will remain immortal, as long as music exists, Michael Jackson will always be a significant part of it. May God Bless his family and take care of them in their time of need.

American Idol Season 9

2009-06-22T13:50:00.004+08:00

Hi guys,

Alright, this is kind of old now as it happened many weeks ago but I'm way overdue in publishing this blogpost. Now many of us watch American Idol and this season is no different. With the producers of the show giving a twist here and a turn there, they in a sense made the show more exciting and a bit more fun to watch. The most notable feature is the saving ability by judges to keep contestants in the game so if you by chance were supporting a contestant who has been eliminated, the judges have the ability to bring them back to the wild card round to give them a chance to stay in the game.

Another notable addition to season 8 is the recruitment of 1 more judge by the name of Kara Elizabeth DioGuardi. She's has a tenacious personality who can be your best friend or worst nightmare. Notably after Simon, she is the most shrewd character but also can be sweeter than honey if she wants to. Simon Cowell also has notably mellowed down this season and has become somewhat nicer making Randy Jackson look like the villain at times during the season.

Now to be honest with you, I did not follow American Idol so comprehensively this season as I did in season 7. I followed the contestant I was supporting namely, David Archuletta from the audition stages itself. This time I only managed to start watching from the top 5. I also managed to catch the finale which is what I would like to talk about which was a showdown between Adam Lambert and Kris Allen.

In all truth, Adam Lambert was vocally superior to Kris Allen, Kris Allen in truth wasn't bad either but did not possess the vocal prowess that Adam Lambert had within him. But in the end as Vin Diesel said in The Fast & The Furious, "It doesn't matter whether you win by an inch or a mile, winning's winning" and indeed it was. America spoke and Kris Allen was crowned this years American Idol, I think part of the reason as to why Lambert didn't make it through was due to his apparent sexuality being gay and what not. The American public must have been biased towards Lambert due to this fact and to top it off, there was a big conspiracy of AT&T getting involved according to what I read in Yahoo! news going to Kris Allen's home town and distributing mobile phone test models at various Kris Allen celebratory party's that enabled power texting which registers 10 votes and one push of a button. Regardless of Lambert's sexuality, he is a good person on screen and is a great singer and after all, America seems to be the most tolerant towards gays and their customs more than any other country in the world yet something like this happened.

This is a singing contest to plainly state it and it should be judged on the basis of how the contestants sing but nevertheless, Lambert did win alot of great prizes and true enough, winning the title of American Idol does not necessarily prove that you will become a very famous singer, just look at what happened to Chris Daughtry.

All in all, the season wasn't bad, those changes made to the show were needed as the format of the show remained monotonous for 7 seasons so it was good to see them instated. After listening to the mp3 of the studio version of "No Boundaries" sung by Kris Allen, it isn't so bad after all, this guy may actually have a bright career in the singing industry after all and as for Adam Lambert, I'm sure he has one heck of a prosperous singing career ahead of him.

A Sudden Rush

2009-06-15T19:21:00.006+08:00

Hi Guys,

Boys and Girls, welcome back, it is that time again. YESSSSS, its time to UPDATE my blog. Late last year I was suddenly so eager to update my blog and it wasn't just like a blog post every couple of days, more like a couple of blogposts per day. I admit I was in hyperdrive mode because of the 2 month end of the year break that I will be getting again this year. Now with the current semester well underway and practically half finished I haven't exactly stuck to my word and updated my blog have I?

I promised that I wouldn't keep it stagnated since that 6 month plus break E.A. went on last year when back then it was called World Of Elvin. I'll do my best to update my blog every week, at least once. I know I have to study but my friends are blogging as well and I can't say they're bumming around doing nothing, of course they're busy as heck as well. Another thing I want to touch on before we go on is that blogging has now become a trend, God only knows hundreds of millions if not billions of blogs there are on the World Wide Web today, many of my friends also joined the ever going army of Google Blogger as have I while there are still other buddies of mine with the opposition forces like Wordpress and Blogdrive.

Now back to the subject, what do I mean by a sudden rush? Well hmmm let's see. Could it be that I have become hyperactive and started pissing the crap out of everyone. NOOOOOO, of course not although I may have but I promise its more controlled this time compared to the annoying pest I used to be. What I mean by the sudden rush is the EVENTS going on at Inti College Subang Jaya (Laureate International Universities). Before I can even BRAWLER blink, there's already a new booth in the Lift Area behind the front reception office in the new building promoting yet another event. Events like Orientation Night, The Idol 2009, International Cultural Night, ICF's camp and of course the main highlight of it all, the INTI BALL which is going to be at PJ Hilton. Now to put a little comment about this, I was sort of disappointed to know that it was going to be at this venue but hey, location wise it's really convenient for me as I can reach the place in under 10 minutes from my place. The thing is PJ Hilton is a rather "OLD" 5-star hotel so to speak, it's been around here for ages.

This is not the Hilton hotel in PJ, it's just an illustration of the OLD

Let me put it to you this way, I was born here in Malaysia and my parents came to Malaysia before I was born in 1988 and during the first 2 weeks of their stay in this country, they stayed at PJ Hilton. YES, IT IS THAT OLD! However I haven't been to the hotel in years, I daresay that I haven't stepped foot in the place in over a decade (man, that makes me feel old) so maybe it has changed and become nicer on the inside although it has stayed relatively the same apart from perhaps a few eency weency little changes on the outside. I was hoping the venue would be in some hip NEW hotel in K.L., something like J.W. Marriott or Renaissance. Okay, maybe their not really new but they're defintely newer than PJ Hilton or if not, definitely hipper and possibly.............wait for it................here comes the not so nice part.............MORE EXPENSIVE.

Again, it's an illustration of the NEW

But unfortunately I'm not arranging the venues so i'll just be happy that I'm going anyways and one thing i'll be happy with is that my coat which I bought when I was in Form 5 and have preserved still fits me after all these years, in fact its BIGGER for me now. No I'm not crazy, I was way rounder and bigger than this before in my school days and I really thank one of my close buddies for really pushing my UH UH to become what you see me as today........................well not entirely but im getting there haha. However the IntiBall is next month so maybe I still have time to get myself shaped more but then again I could be mistaken lol.

My fitness Role Model, Mr. John Connor himself.....Christian Bale (hope to be as dashing as he is)

Now onto the other event that is normally suppose to be held in the 2nd week of the semester namely Orientation Night but has undergone slight postponement due to the economy and will be held this week Friday......................the 7TH WEEK. It doesn't really feel like Orientation Night anymore does it? The kiddies who just joined probably know and understand Inti better by now than some senior students do hahaha. Now I was wondering whether I should go and I pondered it over. First of all, I have already been to my Orientation Night during my first semester at Inti which was the "Wild Wild West" Orientation Night organized by Stact club. Then in my 2nd semester which was a short one, I don't think there was an Orientation Night so I thought i'll go one last time last semester which was my 3rd semester and help my fellow AUP Underground organize and so I did, so being through 2 Orientation nights, I don't know whether I should go or not but I guess I'll ponder over that later.

Apart from that, life's been going as usual. Yes there are the usual coursework and assignments coupled with tests etc etc but that's how it goes. I've been really involved with ICF this semester and boy I can say that it has come a long way from where it was last time, it's bigger and better than before and I'm really happy to see that and I've really enjoyed myself during the CF sessions and I try to make it fun and lighten it up for everyone as well. As for rest, it will come with time, right now I'm taking life as it is, one step at a time with our Almighty Lord watching over me. Thank you for all the blessings you have given me. Till next time peeps, take care =D

UEFA Champions League Finals

2009-05-29T20:04:00.005+08:00

Hi guys,

First things first, I would just like to tell all the arrogant and cocky Manchester United fans that Barcelona whipped the Red Devils. However this isn't for any of my Man Utd friends who have been rather humble and saying its going to be a close game. To the diehard Red Devils fans who proclaimed that Manchester United were going to destroy Barcelona, the exact opposite happened so boohoo for you hehe. I know Liverpool didn't make it to the finals but I'm confident that they would have put up a better fight, I'll explain my reasons for this.

First of all, Barcelona's football was so unbelievably amazing even the most dedicated Manchester United fans called it nothing short of stunning. They absolutely 150000% deserved to win. I admit, I really like Barcelona now and they're team chemistry, passing, shot accuracy and skills are just simply magnificent. Manchester United in all honesty only dominated the first 10 minutes of the game, after which Barcelona kicked it up a notch and made the Red Devils look like a college football team trying to play one of the titans of Europe. Please note that Barcelona were using a make shift defence and still stopped the Red Devils so if Carles Puyol resumed his position as Center Back with Toure and Dani Alves as one of the full backs, I don't think Manchester United would have managed to get through all that much at all.

The Champions of England, the current Barclays Premier League champions playing in the Barclays Premier League which is the best league in the United Kingdom overall were reduced to a pile of rubble by a terrorising Barcelona side who could have easily won by 4-0 before full time and ripped them to shreds. But hey, ill try not to be too impartial, Manchester United after all are not to bad either but Fergie made the biggest error he could have ever made of all and mind you this is only one error............Cristiano Ronaldo. Putting Ronaldo as a center forward was a joke, he is known to be a ball hog and not a team player who naturally expects Manchester United to revolve around him. If the Red Devils were going to stand any chance at ALL against a Barcelona so powerful that they make the best of the best look like school kids, a 4-4-2 probably is a better formation to have been used if they even wanted to retain their title.

The 4-3-3 formation works superbly for Barcelona but its not exactly a formation that Manchester United should be toying with, especially not against Barcelona. Still, Fergie opted to have an attacking side BUT a FULL STRENGTH supposedly ROCK SOLID defence with Rio Ferdinand and Nemanja Vidic as center backs with Evra and O' Shea as full backs still didn't stand a chance.

Might I also remind you that Liverpool ripped Manchester United apart 4-1 at Old Trafford when they were supposedly on top form at that point of the season.

Barcelona performed valiantly and I salute them for their brilliant and outstanding football, they are true composers of the beautiful game

Liverpool FC's Legendary No. 4

2009-05-26T22:47:00.004+08:00

Hi guys,

This post is a tribute I am paying to a great man. A man who has served as a rock solid pillar in Liverpool Football Club's backline for a decade. Standing at 6 feet 4 inches, he is none other than Sami Tuomas Hyypia better known as Sami Hyypia or by his nicknames, Big Sami and the Tower of Power. Sami Hyypiä moved to Liverpool, the team he supported as a child, in a deal worth £2.6 million. He quickly established himself in the first team, partnering Stéphane Henchoz in defence.

By 2001, he regularly captained the team and that season Liverpool won a slew of honours: completing a cup treble of the Football League Cup, FA Cup and UEFA Cup, in addition to winning the UEFA Super Cup and FA Community Shield. He became full-time captain in the 2001–02 season and was part of the Football League Cup winning team in 2003.

Steven Gerrard superseded him as captain in 2003 but he occasionally captained the side in his absence. Hyypiä won his highest football honour in 2005 as a part of Liverpool's victorious 2004–05 Champions League campaign.

Hyypiä has been a prominent figure in the Finland national team and has been selected as the Finnish Sports' Journalists and Football Association Player of the Year numerous times. He made his debut in 1992 and since then has captained the team on various occasions, fulfilling the role of second choice captain. He is the third most capped Finnish player after Jari Litmanen and Ari Hjelm.

He is indeed a superb footballer and a defender I have idolized to become like ever since the day I started watching and taking a real interest towards the beautiful game. I play as a defender and hope to become somewhat like Sami is right now. If there was any other player you could call a faithful and dedicated Liverpool player just as much as our beloved Stevie G or Jamie Carragher, it's none other than Sami Hyypia. His last match was in the Barclays Premier against Tottenham Hotspur at Anfield in Liverpool but unfortunately he only made the the bench that day.

Rafael Benitez's intentions were to bring on Sami Hyypia in the very last minute of the game but intense pressure from the Anfield stands made Rafael Benitez substitute of the captain Steven Gerrard, another footballer I really admire and instead of giving the arm band to Jamie Carragher who is Vice Captain as Steven always does, Stevie went up to the touchlines and respectfully and humbly put the captain's arm band on Sami Hyypia's massive arm.

Every game Sami played this season turned out to be a good one for him and even at the age of 35 years, he is still at the top of his game. His best performance of the season by far had to be Liverpool's 4-1 mauling of Manchester United at Old Trafford when he took Jamie's Carragher's place in Central defence with Carragher shifted to fullback after Alvaro Arbeloa sustained an injury during the warm up session. During the Tottenham game, the "we want Sami" barrage was booming. Surely Benitez could risk it having a 3-1 lead over Tottenham. Vedran Corluka was booked for a foul on Gerrard and at last Hyypia was allowed to take off his training top for one last cameo appearance.

The Liverpool faithful pay their respects to Sami =)

Steven Gerrard, Liverpool's current Captain respectfully puts his arm band on Liverpool's former Captain, Sami Hyypia

Sami gets a good header in on target and is denied just of the line

Sami and his Liverpool team mates celebrate after winning their last game of the season.

Hyypia almost scored with a typical flying header from Aurelio's corner which would have written him a fairytale ending to his incredible and outstanding career in the history books of Football and at the end he was carried off by his team-mates at the end of a career that makes him a Liverpool legend. Even though Liverpool has fresh blood in terms of the Center backs for our defense, tears came to my eyes and streamed down my face in sadness after the full time whistle blew and it was finally time to say one last farewell to Big Sami. We all love footballers who score goals, Fernando Torres, Wayne Rooney, Didier Drogba, Robin Van Persie.....etc but I have nothing less than the utmost respect, honor and pride to call Big Sami my footballing idol. He has made just as big a mark on football than has on Liverpool Football Club itself.

After a wonderful career that saw him winning the UEFA Champions League, the UEFA Cup, two Super Cups, two FA Cups and two League Cups it was finally time say goodbye for now. We have awesome central defenders, but none as great as the Legendary Sami Hyypia. On behalf of all Liverpool fans, we hope you come back to Anfield someday. Take good care Sami.

Restaurant Review: Tony Roma's

2009-05-09T16:25:00.005+08:00

Hi guys,

I'm going to be doing a review on a restaurant I just ate at today. It's called Tony Roma's and I visited the branch at Mid Valley Megamall. This is my first visit to this restaurant and I really enjoyed it, the atmosphere was awesome, the food was magnificent, the service was excellent and the price was really worth it. This is the kind of restaurant that falls into the class of TGI Friday's, Chilli's and Swensons but it was one level above the competition, as you can remember from one of my restaurant reviews on TGI Friday's, it only got an 8.5 which isn't too bad. There is one more factor I will be taking into consideration from now on when rating restaurants which I feel is also important which is the decor. Anyways, here are my ratings

Atmosphere: 9.5
Decor: 9.5
Food: 9.8
Service: 10
Price: 9.5

Overall: 9.7 out of 10

Now for the real attention getter, you can see that I put a perfect 10 for the service and I'll tell you exactly why I did so, normally the maximum I would give is a 9.8 even for a really good service but the service in this restaurant was exceptional, never have I gone into a restaurant with a waiter explaining to us with such devotion to want to make the customers experience even better than what you would have expected. Our server explained how the dish was cooked and the various herbs and spices used and what not and suggested certain dishes which were excellent suggestions I might add. Even something as simple as the Ice Lemon Tea I ordered for a drink tasted better than what I would get at another good restaurant. I ordered a grilled rosemary chicken with roasted garlic and a light sprinkling of cheddar on top. I was really soaking up the atmosphere and enjoying myself and another server came and she apologized to me for bringing my drink a little late. It wasn't even late for pete sakes, it was like 3 minutes after we ordered and I didn't even mind. I admit though that she was pretty cute and looked like a part time college student so I gave her my trade mark smile and said, "No, it's ok" and she lightly bit her bottom lip, smiled shyly and went off LMAO hahaha.

The food was prepared very quickly and was simply brilliant.

The decor was also very nice, simply yet attractive.

The price is somewhat similar to what you would pay in TGI's, Chilli's or Swensons and even though these 3 are really good restaurants, I feel the value is given back even more here.

The atmosphere also was excellent, I really loved it.

There is absolutely nothing I can really critcize about this restaurant and even with this economic crisis, I have a good feeling that this restaurant will continue to have a great future ahead.

The final lengths of the title race!

2009-05-09T15:52:00.002+08:00

Hi guys,

As the final lengths of the title race draws ever closer, Liverpool is still fighting hard to try and get on par with Manchester United. The Red Devils in mid week inflicted Arsenal with a heavy defeat seeing them through to the finals of the UEFA Champions League and now the Catalans have a chance to get even with the Red Devils by possibly making them trip at the last point in the Champions League race.

Meanwhile on the domestic fronts, Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal and Manchester United all picked up 3 points in their matches respectively this weekend. This still leaves Liverpool 3 points agonizingly behind league leaders Manchester United who STILL have a game in hand. Liverpool won their game against Newcastle United very convincingly with a 3-0 victory and also hitting the woodwork 3 times. Chelsea beat Fulham 3-1, Man United won 2-0 against Middlesborough and Arsenal put up yet another stunning display of football in their win over. This weekend Liverpool play face West Ham again but it will be the Merseysiders going to Upton Park. The last meeting between Liverpool and West Ham fell among long list of draws. Hopefully this time, Liverpool's gain in form and significant improvement helps them along with the hard work they put in and pick up three points. I certainly hope Liverpool do manage to stay in 1st place at the end of this weekend in the Barclays Premier League.

Movie Review: Iron Man

2009-05-01T22:28:00.006+08:00

Hi guys,

I'm going to be reviewing another movie I saw during the holidays named Iron Man. Now I know this movie is kind of old being played last year and all but seeing as how much I am able to go out to the theater, I watched it at home instead, DVD Quality right on my PC. Let's get down to it.

First of all, a little information on the movie. Iron Man is a 2008 superhero film based on the Marvel Comics character. Directed by Jon Favreau, the film stars Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark, a billionaire industrialist and master engineer who builds a powered exoskeleton and becomes the technologically advanced superhero, Iron Man. Gwyneth Paltrow plays his personal assistant Pepper Potts, Terrence Howard plays military liaison James Rhodes and Jeff Bridges plays Stark Industries executive Obadiah Stane.

The film was in development since 1990 at Universal Studios, 20th Century Fox, and New Line Cinema, before Marvel Studios reacquired the rights in 2006. Marvel put the project in production as its first self-financed film. Favreau signed on as director, aiming for a naturalistic feel, and he chose to shoot the film primarily in California, rejecting the East Coast setting of the comics to differentiate the film from numerous superhero films set in New York City-esque environments.

During filming, the actors were free to create their own dialogue because preproduction was focused on the story and action. Rubber and metal versions of the armors, created by Stan Winston's company, were mixed with computer-generated imagery to create the title character.

Marvel Studios and Paramount Pictures, the distributor, planned a $50 million marketing campaign for the film, which was modeled on Paramount's successful promotion of Transformers; Hasbro and Sega sold merchandise, and product placement deals were made with Audi, Burger King, LG and 7-Eleven. Reviews were mostly positive, particularly praising Downey's performance. Downey, Favreau and Paltrow will return in the sequel Iron Man II, scheduled for release on May 7, 2010. Downey also made a cameo appearance as Stark in The Incredible Hulk.

Now, after watching this movie, my personal opinion on it was that it was simply phenomenal and judging by the gross revenue of over US$580 million dollars which is over half a billion dollars, I'm sure many others liked it too. Robert Downey Jr. in particular did an incredible job playing his role as Tony Stark in this film. He plays a cool and sociable businessman yet a serious one also when it comes to his work and never stresses himself out too much on anything in particular and his character is the perfect example of a successful individual who works hard and plays hard. In the movie, he graduated Summa Cum Laude from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The dialogues though casual were very attention grabbing and his laid back approach and cool style in his character makes him very likable among viewers, he is the example of the kind of person we would all love to become, wealthy, academically brilliant and all round entertainer. The special effects were brilliant and so were the fight scenes in the movie including the one towards the end. Another very attractive feature in the film was his house in Malibu, California itself, a modern design house high up above on the cliffs overseeing the ocean and run by a state of the art, Artificial Intelligence program created by Tony Stark himself who acts as a butler and assistant to Stark. Pepper Potts is also another very cute and likable character in this movie who is the Tony's personal assistant in the movie. His partner in the business helping Tony run Stark Industries is Obadiah Stane, a seemingly kind but in actual truth, cunningly sinister due to his involvements with terrorists and wanting to eliminate Tony Stark out of the picture. Tony's friend in a way is Lt. Colonel James "Rhodey" Rhodes: a friend of Stark's, and the liaison between Stark Industries and the U.S. Air Force in the department of acquisitions.

The story is well constructed and is balanced between being lighthearted as well as serious, it basically talks about Tony Stark, an easy going yet intelligent businessman who sees his own countries soldiers and military being killed by the very weapons his company had made to help them. After seeing this while he was in captivity, his eyes were opened and he saw a new perspective and once he was rescued and returned safely back to the United States with the help of one man held captive as prisoner by the 10 Rings terrorist group, he decides to shut down weapons manufacturing and instantly makes a decision to do something about the war situation himself by creating a state of the art suit made of out Gold Titanium which is resistant to the firing from guns and cannons to a certain extent and is armed with tactical vision and weapons. This suit also helps him fly at supersonic speeds to get from one place to another in a real hurry. He was captured when his Humvee escorts were ambushed and he metallic shrapnel penetrated into his body possibly resulting in him getting Cardiac Arrest but with the help of a miniaturized arc reactor which he built, the metal in his body is kept out of his heart which essentially keeps him alive. Once he is back home, he creates a newer more powerful model of the miniaturized arc reactor which he replaces with the help of his assistant Pepper Potts which will enable his new Iron Man suit to have ample power. In the end Obadiah Stane steals it and Tony salvages the older arc reactor and goes out to stop Stane who is in his Iron Monger suit which is significantly larger and more powerful than Iron Man's suit. After a brutal fight, Tony Stark comes out on top and Stane is stopped once and for all.

Storyline: 9
Content: 9
Entertainment: 9.8
Music: 9.5
Acting: 9.5

This movie in overall gets a 9.4 out of 10

This is definitely a movie I would recommend all of you to watch in case you haven't done so already. See ya =)

Movie Review: Slumdog Millionaire

2009-04-30T20:20:00.008+08:00

Hi guys,

As the title suggests, I will be doing the above on the said movie. First, a little information about the movie. Slumdog Millionaire is a 2008 British film directed by Danny Boyle, written by Simon Beaufoy, and co-directed in India by Loveleen Tandan. It is an adaptation of the novel Q & A (2005) by Indian author and diplomat Vikas Swarup. Set and filmed in India, Slumdog Millionaire tells the story of a young man from the slums of Mumbai who appears on the Indian version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?

Slumdog Millionaire was nominated for ten Academy Awards in 2009 and won eight, the most for any film of 2008, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Film Editing, Best Sound Mixing, Best Cinematography, Best Original Score and Best Original Song. It also won five Critics' Choice Awards, four Golden Globes, and seven BAFTA Awards, including Best Film. Slumdog Millionaire has stirred controversy concerning language use, its portrayals of Indians and Hinduism, and the welfare of its child actors.

I have watched the movie and my personal opinion of the movie is that it is thoroughly over-rated, only the 2nd half of the movie was ok but even still I don't feel it deserved this much recognition. I can't understand how it possibly won 8 oscar awards which was more than The Dark Knight when when it raised over US$300 million where as the The Dark Knight earned over US$1 billion in gross revenue. Perhaps in a sense, it maybe appealed to the movie industry as the movie perhaps made them show pity upon the small minority of Mumbai in India living miserable lives in the slums. I am not trying to be critical of people here but many individuals tend to stereotype India in general to be living in such conditions. This is absolute rubbish, of course there are a number of people living in poverty but there are a huge number of them living very decent lifestyles, having luxury houses, driving good cars, buying their clothes from designer brands and what not. This movie does to a certain degree tell truth to the people living in the slums outside the city in Mumbai but the depth to which it went was shown was a bit extreme. In truth, this movie was utter crap. I'm not saying this because its my country but normally no movie regarding showing poverty of a country becomes so high profile and exposes this much. Of course there are movies about other things like drug abuse, AIDS....etc etc and of course they could have stuck with showing some of the movie in the slums but the producers could have been a bit more discrete instead of showing every single detail. It's not entirely true to certain extents. What's more, like I mentioned, many people around the world don't really know India that well and tend to think that they live in poverty almost entirely and with the amount of media coverage this movie has had, it stiffens the belief and stubborness even more of people around the world toward the fact that there is a good majority of the population of India living decent lives. Almost every country has a problem with poverty including the wealthy super powers. What's more, the movie is sickening to a certain extent and the actors were nothing more than mediocre.

Storyline: 4
Content: 4.5
Entertainment: 2
Music: 3
Acting: 5

I think its nothing more than the sympathy and pity perhaps given by the world which was probably expected by the producers of this film that made this movie receive this amount of publicity and fame that it did. Apart from that, I could have made a better movie in my backyard with a video camera and some of my friends helping me. I hate to criticize movies so much and I don't normally watch movies which I know I may not enjoy but seeing as how much publicity it received, I thought I may as well and I didn't enjoy it one bit, not because it involved the country I am from, but because the movie was so poorly made.

I'm giving this movie which won 8 oscars which so happens to be the most prestigious award in the movie industry a 3.7 out of 10.

Updates

2009-04-29T13:13:00.005+08:00

Hi guys,

Welcome back once again to another meaningless and pointless blogpost, written by moi, ok im kidding. Let's move on shall we. I'll just blog about a few things that have happened in the past week.

1. Painting the ICF Banner
2. Zero2Sexy
3. Dreamz

The first is quite straightforward, I went the other day to college to chill at FTZ playing FIFA as usual. It was really entertaining and there was one team I had yet to play which was Porto. Now I agree I am not a pro in FIFA and the difficulty level I was normally comfortable with was Semi Pro but this time I decided it was time to upgrade or else I wouldn't really improve that much in FIFA so I put the difficulty level settings one notch up to Proffesional for both the keeper and the team.

This was a whole new thing for me and after a grueling match with Porto, I manage to win the match at the Dragao only through penalties after a 1-1 draw with one of the Porto players scoring a mirror image of the goal I scored from long distance using Gerrard, that made it even more irritating. I tried again playing away from and Porto were a real pain in the a$% as breaking down their defence was just to damn hard but after a grueling battle, I manage to come away from the Dragao winning 3-0, scoring with Torres, Alonso and Gerrard. Using Rafa's 4-5-1 formation is actually quite good because in a way it helps reinforce the defence although I notice there was a slight difference in the midfield positioning as the CM position was rather defensive too where as Rafael Benitez would give an attacking role to that position and only after my FIFA session did I notice that you could make custom modifications to formations in the came like changing the position of certain players, damn smart. I then took a risk a played Manchester United which is I admit one of the best teams in the game and this time I was playing them in professional and I knew it would be much tougher so I gave it all I had and won ironically won 4-1 at OLD TRAFFORD, with Ronaldo scoring from a FREE KICK for MU and I scoring 2 goals with Torres, 1 with Gerrard and 1 with Carragher. I forgot to play Chelsea but i'll face em next time. I then faced of against Barcelona at the Nou Camp. This was really tough, if you accidentally blink for 1 second, it is good enough to unleash Henry or Eto'o to unleash a punishing move on you. Lionel Messi as you would expect was a bit tough to dispossess but I could handle him reasonably well with Dossena. It was very frustrating, I played Barcelona a total of 5 times. The 1st time, I lost 3-1, the second time I lost 2-0, the 3rd time, I scraped though with a 1-0 victory, the 4th was a 3-3 draw and the 5th was a 4-0 win for me. It was tough and even the getting the 4-0 was hard. Well it's my first time so I guess I can improve better later on and work my way to the World Class difficulty level.

Later on I headed over to college and helped my ICF buddies paint a banner for the upcoming semester. I am not a fan of painting but here's what it looked like half finished.

ICF Banner

Looks really cool but just wait till you see the finished product later on. Ho ho, this all sounds simple but it actually wasn't. Let me begin with what happened, we actually wanted a wooden board to put the cloth on to paint so that the paint wouldn't seep through the banner on to the stage so we managed to get on from one of the supply rooms in the old block. Normally people would use newspaper to lay down before painting banners but we're one step ahead so we decided to use a wooden board. Of course, whenever something is handed to you on a silver platter, it usually is a rare experience and this board looked to be in good condition and true enough, there was a catch, it had nails driven into it and quite a few of them were rusty and what's more removing the nails by hand proved to be quite a task and we didn't have a hammer to boot. So we tried removing the nails with something hard which we could lay our hands on, Kylie used a piece of plastic piping, I don't know where she got that from lol but it didn't help as the stubborn nails just pierced through.
Then a certain GENIUS (I will not mention names) used a CAN of SPRAY PAINT to hammer out the nails. OH, did I also mention that this same GENIUS didn't use the lid, he used the cylinder containing paint which has been pressurized and it punctured, not only is it corrosive but it can be flammable so i panicked to get the damn thing away and we stained a bit of the floor in the concourse with blue paint but managed to clean it out later with paint thinner. Thank God i decided to wear a black t-shirt instead of a white one that day, I wonder what made me change my mind. We managed to clean up the mess and the paint F%&$#@D my watch, my glasses and my arms and it took me 45 minutes using turpentine to get the paint of my watch, and another 20 minutes to wash my hands, not to say the paints fully gone though. Anyways after all the fuss, we never used the freakin board =.='. Anyways we got down to painting and made some good progress that day.

Now the Zero2Sexy was some promotional campaign by Triumph promoting their lingerie products and why would I be talking about that? No, ladies I am not being perverted. The other day I went to 1U and Triumph so happened to be having this campaign going on in 1U they day i was there. I was hoping I could stay for the fashion show ;) but I couldn't but what really got my attention was the LED displays. Check it out....

Look awesome don't they, it just gives it that awesome High Definition, something like WWE's Titantron look and the whole thing is made by smaller led panels which can given any colors, patterns and designs you want. It looked pretty cool so I just wanted to take a few pictures of it.

Finally, I'll be taking about Dreamz, a production that commenced about a year ago created by Genting City of Entertainment. As hard to believe as it may seem, unlike any other show that Genting has ever shown which normally lasts for a month or a little longer, this has lasted for over a year and people even now still flock to Genting Highlands to see it. The main storyline is talking about a Princess in a dream land, who has 3 individuals fighting for her affection, a magician, an animal trainer and a boy............ It is I believe one of Genting's most successful productions to date and it is playing every night at the Pavillion at 9pm.

Sneaked a piture of the audience before the show, still can hardly see nuts

If you ask me the show wasn't incredibly amazing but it was indeed quite attention getting, it wasn't entirely about magic but contained comedy and animal displays as well. This show since beginning one year ago as undergone modifications and additions to the performances and has captivated audiences longer than any show in Genting's history. It is so incredibly popular that according to the Star newspaper, the show will be extended indefintely which means none of you have to ever worry about the show every stopping and can go at your own leisure because it will keep playing every night at 9pm, on and on and on and on hahahahaha. Well I can rate this show for you based on content, the Set and Backdrop, entertainment, costumes, music and lighting.

Content: 7.5
Set and Backdrop: 9
Entertainment: 6.5
Costumes: 9
Music: 9.8
Lighting: 9.5

Overall: 8.6 out of 10

Premier League update

2009-04-28T15:36:00.002+08:00

Hi guys,

Welcome to the Barclays Premier League review blogpost, after a disappointing 4-4 draw to Arsenal, Liverpool bounced back quickly with an awesome 3-1 victory at the K.C. stadium over Hull City with Kuyt scoring twice and Xabi Alonso scoring the match opener. It was a good performance in the 2nd half following a shaky start in the 1st. Liverpool earned 3 points from that match which saw them go top temporarily on goal difference but Manchester United after going 2-0 down at Half Time to Tottenham Hotspur came back to win the match 5-2. Chelsea also won their match 1-0 against West Ham United while Arsenal won with a comfortable 2-0 victory over Middlesbrough.

The season is coming to a close but I along with many Liverpool supporters have faith that Liverpool can still win the title even though we're 3 points behind Man United and also given the fact that Manchester United have 1 game in hand. Liverpool have worked really hard this season I really feel that they deserve to win this years title although Manchester United have been on good form, it's a matter of time before we can predict whether the title is within our grasp. Keep going Liverpool, you guys can do it!

The Apprentice

2009-04-28T15:35:00.000+08:00

Hi guys,

Here's another one of my favorite shows, the Apprentice. The Apprentice is a television franchise that originated in 2004 in the United States. As originally conceived, the show depicted 16 contestants from around the country with various backgrounds competing in an elimination-style competition to become an apprentice to Donald Trump. They would have the opportunity to work for him as the president of one of his companies for at least one year with an annual salary of $250,000. The Apprentice was developed by Mark Burnett, who successfully brought Survivor to the US. Since its premier, the show has spawned many licensed international versions as well as several imitations.

During the course of the competition, the group of contestants will be split into teams based on gender namely having a womens team and a mens team but if circumstances were not to favor such a selection, the teams would me a mix of both genders. Each team will have a leader overseeing the duties performed by his team mates. There are several rounds in the competitions, each round consists of a task which both teams have to complete and finally will be judged based on a certain criteria which most of the time is the amount of money a team makes by Donald Trump and 2 other individuals which normally are his son Donald Jr. and daughter Ivanka Trump or his company executives. The winning team wins a prize money for the round and the losing team will have one team member fired based on the inefficiency, lack of cooperation and/or other criteria. This carries on and on till the end of the season until 2 contestants are left who duke it out in a task to see who wins the title of "The Apprentice".

Also during the course of the competition, the contestants are given luxury accomadations in the famous Trump Tower in Manhattan, New York. Many of the tasks in the apprentice involve other famous companies such as Planet Holywood, Dominos' Pizza, Lamborghini, Microsoft and many others.

I have so far seen one season of "The Apprentice" which is "The Celebrity Apprentice" which was won by Piers Morgan, a judge on the show called "America's Got Talent", a somewhat familiar reincarnation of Simon Cowell. It was indeed a thrilling series to watch and I loved it every bit. This is another show I'd recommend watching as well. Simply Brilliant, leave it to Donald Trump to make watching a show about business and money making actually very entertaining indeed.

Reaper

2009-04-28T12:22:00.000+08:00

Hey guys,

Imagine that one day some guy came up to you in a suit and said that you were to be his employee. You never submitted any application form and yet you are curious to know what this person wants from you and why he wants you working for him in the first place. What comes to mind then is that he probably needs a secretary or some crappy boring post with a mediocre pay to be filled out but if he then told you that you would be catching escaped human souls from the Unholy Underworld who are aimlessly roaming the surface of the earth, that would rather make your eye twitch. This is exactly the situation Sam is caught in.

Reaper is an American Television comedy drama created by Tara Butters and Michele Fazekas. These two also serve as executive producers along side Mark Gordon, Deborah Spera and Tom Spezialy.

Characters:- The main characters in the story of Reaper are Sam Oliver who is the protagonist of the story played by Bret Harrison with his best friends Bery Wysockie a.k.a Sock played by Tyler Labine and Benjamin Gonzalez a.k.a Ben played by Rick Gonzalez. Then there is Andi Prendergast, Sam's dream girl played by Melissa Peregrym and finally we have the Devil who's Sam boss played by Ray Wise. Some of you Command & Conquer fans may find that name a bit familiar as he played U.S. President Michael Dugan in Red Alert 2 and the expansion Red Alert 2: Yuri's Revenge.

Bret Harrison (Sam Oliver) - the main character in the story

Missy Peregym a.k.a. Andi Predergast- Sam's girlfriend (She is SMOKING HOT) WOWOW!

Tyler Labine (Sock)- One of Sam's 2 best friends, always looks for the easy way out and knows how to have a good time.

Rick Gonzales (Ben)- The other's of Sam's 2 best buds, over cautious and a perfectionist at times

Ray Wise (The Devil)

Plot:- The story starts with Sam Oliver on his 21st birthday. Sam in general is a laid back and easy going individual who work's as an employee for a hardware company called the Workbench with his friends, Sock and Ben along with his long time crush, Andi. He works under his annoying and tyrannical boss Ted who's life revolves around the "Bench" the store is called being perfect in every way. On Sam's 21st Birthday, the Devil who goes under the alias of Jerry Belvadiere appears to him in human form and tells Sam that he is too work for the Devil whenever he is beckoned as a bounty hunter to capture souls that have escaped from hell. The story behind this is simple, Sam's father sold the soul of his first born to the devil as the devil himself promised to cure Sam's dad of a fatal illness that doctor's couldn't heal. Sam's father then decided not to have any kids and the deal would be off. Sam's father went to the extent to take his wife to the doctor's to have a pregnancy test and it supposedly turned out that Sam's mom wasn't pregnant but it turned out they did have kids even when the doctor's said that they wouldn't. The reason being is because the Doctor had a gambling problem and the Devil agreed to pay of the Doctor's debts if he promised to tell Sam's dad a lie about hi with the help of a "Vessel"- a device that usually comes in the form of everyday objects like a toaster, baseball.....etc etc which enables him to capture the soul within the confines of a container. Once he does so, he sends them on a portal to hell for e.g. the Department of Motor Vehicles on Union Street on the show because apparently, according to the devil, whatever place on earth that seems to be "Hell on Earth" really actually is. Sam goes bounty hunting with the help of Sock and Ben to capture these rogue souls and always comes out on top and occasional outsmarts the Devil in certain aspects and has to continue capturing escaped souls for the rest of his life till he dies either on the mission or of old age.

Sam however still longs for a normal life and tries his level best to get out of his deal with the devil. He does everything he can by looking at his contract which is 5 times the size of an Encyclopedia. In the mean time he is resigned to his fate to capture souls when it escapes from Hell.

It's a great show with action and humour and one I would definitely recommend watching.

17-0

2009-04-21T14:00:00.007+08:00

Hi guys,

No, I'm not talking about a football scoreline, 17-0 represents a winning streak, a winning streak that no other man in the history of World Wrestling Entertainment has managed to accomplish, winning matches at WrestleMania for 17 straight years. The Undertaker also known as The Deadman or the Demon of Death Valley is a Phenom in the WWE Universe, a status that has only been acquired by very selected wrestlers in WWE History and he one of the most predominant and feared in ring competitors till today.

He is a truly respected man and a legend in wrestling. Here are the list of people he has managed to conquer in 17 years of WrestleMania history:-

WrestleMania VII (7)- Jimmy "Superfly" Snuka

WrestleMania VIII (8)- Jake "The Snake" Roberts

WrestleMania IX (9)- Giant Gonzales

WrestleMania XI (11)- King Kong Bundy

WrestleMania XII (12)- Diesel

WrestleMania 13- Sycho Sid

WrestleMania XIV (14)- Kane

WrestleMania XV (15)- Big Boss Man

WrestleMania X-Seven (17)- Triple H

WrestleMania X8 (18)- Ric Flair

WrestleMania XIX (19)- Big Show & A-Train

Wrestlemania XX (20)- Kane

WrestleMania 21- Randy Orton

WrestleMania 22- Mark Henry

WrestleMania 23- Batista

Wrestlemania XXIV (24)- Edge

WrestleMania 25 (25th Anniversary of WrestleMania)- Shawn Michaels

It is indeed and impressive record but no doubt there are 2 WrestleMania's in between which Undertaker has missed namely WrestleMania X (10) and WrestleMania XVI (16) but this indeed has helped the Undertaker achieve his status as a Phenom and a very respected competitor by all. His latest opponent this year at the 25th Anniversary of WrestleMania was none other than Mr. WrestleMania himself, the Show Stopper, the Headliner, the Main Event, the Icon, the Heart Break Kid, Shawn Michaels. It was labelled as the greatest match in the history of World Wrestling Entertainment or maybe even the Wrestling in itself and it looked as if the Shawn Michaels would end the streak but it wasn't to be. Both of these legends gave the match nothing less than 1000%, yes ONE THOUSAND PERCENT of their guts and their glory but the Undertaker was just a tad bit better and manage to pick up the win and a great win it was indeed.

Now the question remains which many have asked, can anyone defeat the Undertaker and end his winning streak at WrestleMania?

I have rounded up a possible list of candidates who maybe able to do so from the current WWE Roster (21/04/2009) which includes RAW, SmackDown and ECW. These candidates include

RAW

John Cena
Matt Hardy
Mr. Kennedy
Triple H (2)

SmackDown

Chris Jericho
CM Punk
Jeff Hardy
John Morrison
Rey Mysterio
Shelton Benjamin
Umaga
The Great Khali

ECW

Christian
Finlay
Vladimir Kozlov

Now the reason why I put Triple H again is because
1. He is a much better wrestler and has improved significantly from his Evolution days
2. He does not use illegal weapons anymore unless his opponents confront him with one or he is being ambushed
3. If Kane could get 2 shots at him, why not Triple H?

Unfortunately I don't think Shawn Michaels, Edge or Orton would be counted because they all faced Undertaker when they were on their best forms and beside seeing how many potential candidates as of now could face plus additional younglings on all rosters who could develop into huge superstars, there is still a huge list of possibilities as to who could end Undertaker's streak.

Favorite

2009-04-19T22:17:00.003+08:00

Hi guys,

I'd like to blog about a certain favorite subject of mine which I don't really like or won't mention too much and I shall put it in the context of a football match final.

During this course, I had 3 major hurdles to overcome and the final exam of course, at the start of the course I was conceding goals.

When the first assignment dawned upon us and after listening to all the things we had to do I was 1-0 down. After that there was another section of our course which had 2 parts and especially considering I was king of procrastinating, I conceded 2 goals.

Half way through the semester (Half Time) I was down,

Elvin 0 - 3 XXX

But I did my best to do whatever it takes and I finally finished it slowly but agonizingly i did it, one of the assignments was done quite comfortably after many passes and one fantastic cross, ELVIN HEADS IT IN YEAAAHHHHHHHH and the crowd goes wild. The next part of our course which came in two parts, through pass to Elvin, he runs into the box, he's been brought down, ITS A PENALTY. Elvin steps up to the spot, will he be able to finish it................GOAL YEAAAAHHHHH and Elvin is making a comeback. It's incredible, 10 minutes left on the clock (2-3 weeks left). Beautiful pass to Elvin, he side steps the defender, he's on goal, the keeper is trying to get him, Elvin sets up a shot and GOALLLLLL YEAH. Can you believe it, Elvin back level. Elvin's team sets up to defend in the 89th minute from a corner, XXX takes it and nicely headed away and OH ITS A COUNTER-ATTACK, Elvin's team charges up forward, nice interchanging and beautiful passing, one more through pass to Elvin and he chips its over the keeper YEAAHHHHHHH. (The last goal is for finishing the finals). We're in the closing moments of the game, as Elvin's team have the ball, they have the time, they have the lead (referee blows whistle) and THEY HAVE THE WIN. Elvin's team against all odds overcame their opponents and won before fulltime, its a spectacular win that will go down in history, the final scoreline is Elvin 4, XXX 3

Elvin 4 - 3 XXX

WWE WrestleMania 25

2009-04-19T14:59:00.004+08:00

Hi guys,

I know I haven't blogged about WWE PPV's but since I have the time now I shall do so. WrestleMania of course cannot go without being blogged about. It is the biggest event in WWE's calendar and as they claim, the biggest spectacle in sports entertainment. Wrestlemania 25 or the 25th Anniversary or WrestleMania .

It was held in the Reliant Center in Houston, Texas and was SOLD OUT as usual with 77,744 people in attendance.

Here are the match results:-

WWE Tag Team Champions def. World Tag Team Champions (New Unified Tag Team Champions)

CM Punk wins Money in the Bank Ladder Match

"Santina" Marella wins 25-Diva Battle Royal for title of "Miss WrestleMania"

Chris Jericho def. WWE Legends

Matt Hardy def. Jeff Hardy (Extreme Rules Match)

Rey Mysterio def. JBL (New Intercontinental Champion)

Undertaker def. Shawn Michaels

John Cena def. Edge & Big Show (New World Heavyweight Champion)

WWE Champion Triple H def. Randy Orton

First of all, it's kinda rare and I'm in a way happy that Carlito and Primo won the World Tag Team Titles and put John Morrison and The Miz in their place.

CM Punk winning the Money in the Bank Ladder match was awesome, it was a high octane match and he thoroughly deserved it.

Santina Marella winning the Miss Wrestlemania battle royal was kinda stupid, anyone knows by now that it actually is Santino.

Y2J defeating the WWE Legends sucked, I know he's a great wrestler and a definite hall of famer but I don't like the fact that he had to fight those old timers.

I was also hoping that Matt and Jeff would never square of as enemies and looks like Matt came out on top as the better Hardy Boy.

Rey Mysterio defeating JBL for the Intercontinental Championship was awesome, Rey did it in record time and JBL quit lolx.

This was truly the unspoken Main Event of Wrestlemania. Mr. Wrestlemania a.k.a. Shawn Michaels vs. The Phenom a.k.a. Undertaker, it almost looked as if Shawn would finally end the streak but Undertaker came out on top at the end so now its 17-0

I am seriously happy that John Cena won at Wrestlemania this year, actually John could have gone undefeated in Wrestlemania too if it wasn't for the crappy Triple Threat match last time around but John Cena showed us exactly why he is harder than nails and won the World Heavyweight Championship at Wrestlemania.

Finally it was awesome to see The Game come out on top against Randy Orton, simply fantastic.

It couldn't be closer!

2009-04-19T12:57:00.003+08:00

Hi guys,

I AM BACK AGAIN for more of your blogging needs. Now before I go on to any other blogposts, this one is absolutely essential. WELCOME to the Barclays Premier League and Champions League review blog post.

UEFA CHAMPIONS LEAGUE

We'll first start with what happened with the Champions League. Liverpool unfortunately did not managed to progress as Chelsea came out on top after two legs. Chelsea dominated quite a bit in the 1st leg and won 3-1 after Liverpool conceded 2 cheap goals from corners but I salute Liverpool for the valiant fight they gave at the Bridge, they really fought Chelsea with everything they had.

After Half Time at Stamford Bridge, Liverpool were leading 2-0 and Chelsea were hanging by a thread onto their Champions League hopes and dreams but unfortunately Chelsea stormed back into the game and drew the game level at 2-2 but the battle at the Bridge continued on and on till Liverpool lead 4-3 and just needed one more goal to have a chance of going through but Chelsea got the equalizer and it was a 4-4 spectacle which Liverpool just so happened to do without Steven Gerrard. The overall match aggregate was 7-5 to Chelsea so kudos to the blues, they look really dominant now and I have a feeling that they will give FC Barcelona a run for their money in the semi finals.

Arsenal won their 2nd leg match against Villareal proving their quality of play and Arsene Wenger's gamble of using youngsters in revamping his squad finally paid off as Arsenal seem to be on a real roll here. They drew 1-1 at El Madrigal but after the facts had been proven that Villareal cannot really function without Marcos Senna, Arsenal really worked their magic and won 3-0 in a fantastically played match at the Emirates. Manchester United had a job ahead of them as they drew 2-2 against Porto at Old Trafford after quite clearly dominating Manchester United in the game but at Estádio do Dragão, the Red Devils really took the fight to Porto and Ronaldo hammered in a really good from shot from long range and it allowed Man United to the semi's against Arsenal.

Barclays Premier League

After their 3-1 defeat at home to Chelsea, Liverpool quickly bounced back and won with a quite a comfortable scoreline against Blackburn Rovers of 4-0, with Torres scoring 2 brilliant goals, Daniel Agger scoring 1 breath taking goal from long range and David Ngog scoring the final goal. Chelsea just won by a thread after Bolton began the staging of what would have been possibly one of the greatest comebacks in the history of the Barclays Premier League, after going down 4-0 against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge with Drogba scoring 2 goals, Ballack scoring 1 goal and Lampard scoring from a penalty, you would have thought it was all over but Bolton kept pressing and the score became 4-1, then 4-2 then 4-3 and Bolton Wanderers SO NEARLY made it 4-4 with if I'm not mistaken Tim Cahill accidentally deflecting his own team mates shot off the line after he tried to move out of the way. I salute Blackburn Rovers for their heroics and I seriously didn't think Chelsea deserved 3 points as Bolton deserved at least 1 point from the game.

Arsenal beat Wigan quite comfortably with a 4-1 scoreline and Arsenal thoroughly deserved the victory, they were simply brilliant. Manchester United just barely escaped by skins of their teeth after they were dominated by Sunderland at the Stadium of light with Macheda getting a goal late on in the game for the Red Devils. It was very unfortunate as Sunderland I feel should have won but you got to admit that the Red Devils are pretty good when it comes to getting the job done. Well the Premier League table stays as it is. Liverpool still in 2nd place trailing just by a point to Manchester United who still have a game in hand.

Liverpool have really worked hard this season in the Barclays Premier League and I really hope that they can win the Barclays Premier League, who knows, things may change but the title race is sure heating up as we getting into the closing weeks. From me Elvin, its goodbye for now

ICF- Final Log for the semester

2009-04-04T15:47:00.005+08:00

Hi guys,

Yesterday was the final CF for the semester and as I was sure glad I attended. It was really awesome being there and I wouldn't miss it for the world as some of my dearest CF friends were going to be leaving namely Sarah, Fiona, Amy and Swee Vien. There was another dude their named Adrian who was leaving as well but sadly it was the FIRST time I actually met him, sad =.='.

It was really hard to swallow and accept that they we're going to leave but I guess it would happen sooner or later anyways however I'm really happy to have known them for sometime and they have been super nice to me. Adrian is a friendly dude as well so it was great to meet him too. For the past few weeks, I have been a little late to CF and Christine has been so kind and magnanimous to overlook my tardiness due to the reason that I was either just coming out from college or from FTZ after a FIFA session with my buds.

Yesterday however I was so fortunate to have attended an extra art class which so happened to be right next to our regular ICF venue and since I was only 95% ok, it was ideal for me so I wouldn't run at a 100 miles per hour. I went in and the usual buzz was going on with people inside and it was great to see Erica there as she unfortunately couldn't make it last week. Nicholas was out and about unleashing his humor and his barrage of jokes and comic impressions, he's hilarious that guy and Sean was causing havoc as well haha. The Boss came a.k.a. Charles, I was happy to see him join us and I discovered that he has a magnificient talent and skill in playing the piano.

We then started with the songs and had a really good singing session. I really felt the intensity in which people were singing, it was really something. After that we had a game session and it wasn't like the usual creative and innovative type that was normally played and being the final session we decided to go old school and play charades. The entire group was divided into two teams with names which were Tapo (which means boys in hokkien) and Cabo (which mean girls in hokkien) and not only did we play a retro game but we went old school on making teams going with the old Girls vs. Guys thing =P and Solomon made a joke asking me when the guys and girls sat in opposite corners whether we were going to war, sigh only he can think of jokes like these haha nah im kidding. Nicholas was on the edge of his seat and thrilled at the prospect of having a battle between the sexes in his usual joking manner. Christine was the adjudicator and the basic idea was that one person from a team had to come out and act out a movie's name or a person's character from ICF. It was quite hilarious and the guys won with a landslide victory haha =P.

Brian was keeping score and doodling some funny pictures on the scoresheet. After the game session, we prayed for those who were leaving and I wish Sarah, Fiona, Amy, Swee Vien and Adrian the very best for their futures. It was truly a sad moment, but as the saying goes "Everything that has a beginning has an end" but to every end there is also a bright new beginning. After our prayers and Christine praying for the food and our stomachs hahaha, we chowed down on food that was their, one of the specials on the menu was Sarah's Potato Salad which was quite good even though it was a bit chilly as it came out from the fridge moments ago haha.

Group shot!

Everyone feasting on the delicious goodies

A random group shot (The Clown in blue in front is Julian) haha

Another group shot

Once we ate, there was just the normal buzz going around and I just mucked around posing in pictures with the gals haha. We also had a group shot which on its own was a gargantuan feat to achieve but we did it anyways.........PRAISE THE LORD hehe. Our father is truly magnificent and awe inspiring and I thank him for the wonderful time he gave us yesterday. Thank you God for my wonderful friends in ICF and the ICF itself, it's truly a one of a kind experience. Amen.

It's a long 2 weeks

2009-03-28T14:38:00.004+08:00

Hi guys,

What does the title mean you all ask? Well, I'm not getting a 2 weeks break but it the break all the football players will be getting as they are away on International duty. Welcome to the Barclays Premier League review blogpost with me your writer Elvin.

It was yet another great weekend for Liverpool FC. Ever since their win over Real Madrid, they've been firing up all cylinders. They just capped the weekend with an emphatic 5-0 victory over Aston Villa, a side really fighting with Arsenal for a Champions League qualification spot. The goal scorers were Steven Gerrard with a hat-trick, Albert Riera and Dirk Kuyt. It was a phenomenal win which reduced the gap between them and the league leaders Manchester United by just 1 point after united suffered a loss against Fulham at Craven Cottage with a hard fought 2-0 victory. Manchester United irritating still have 1 game in hand so it can prove to be useful. Still I am happy with Liverpool's performance although I wish this sudden surge of energy happened earlier. Still even with many people writing of Liverpool from the title race, Liverpool now really do have a chance to take the lead after the next game. Ironically Liverpool will be playing Fulham in the next fixture at Craven Cottage while Manchester United will play host to Aston Villa at Old Trafford. A coincidental reversal in fixtures but I most certainly hope not momentum. Credit to Manchester Unitedm they are still very dangerous opponents and not to be taken lightly at all.

Chelsea ironically suffered a 1-0 loss at White Hart Lane to Tottenham Hotspur with Modric scoring the only goal of the game leaving Liverpool with a chance to compete with United. Arsenal also got a comfortable 3-1 victory over Newcastle United at St. James's park.

Liverpool are now doing very well and as Steve McMahon said, I really hope that the international break does not wear the players out and I really hope Liverpool continue their momentum and can win their next match. Fulham will be tough opponents as they have already held Liverpool to a draw at Anfield and beaten Manchester United at Craven Cottage. I have confidence however that Liverpool will play a great game of football and will put up a real battle against Fulham at Craven Cottage.

Dreaded ORANGE!!

2009-03-23T19:06:00.002+08:00

Hi guys,

Sigh, I am damn emo today but what I did was for the sake of my CGPA. I go to the AUP office and what I see before my eyes shock me. A SEA of orange forms either being filled out or waiting to be filled out. I need to retake my Calculus 2 because my coursework isn't high enough, it's the dreaded test 2 that broke many of us but hopefully our wounds will heal in time. Ms. Shanta has been very kind to allow us to continue attending lectures till the end of the semester so we can learn and be more prepared for the next semester so when we come back, it is a matter of revising really hard, practicing like no tommorow and making sure we score bloody high in all our tests and quizzes. No screwing because this is serious stuff.

It was seriously painful to pick up the dreaded Orange Form. Honestly my heart broke into a thousand pieces, it was just too damn difficult filling out the form. It hurt even more to call my father to tell him that I was going to drop the subject. For me seriously it is unthinkable, I can't bare it but I have to learn from my mistakes and improve and continue to grow. Who knows, it may benefit me in the long run.

I swear that I will not touch another orange form ever again...

Premier League review

2009-03-15T14:36:00.011+08:00

Hi guys,

Yes I am doing an early review today because I'll be pretty busy for the rest of the week. The match of the week if not the year has to be Liverpool's match against Manchester United at Old Trafford. Full marks to Liverpool as Andy Gray would say and I hate bragging but let's admit, Liverpool MAULED Manchester United at Old Trafford, they absolutely tore them apart in their 4-1 demolition of the Red Devils but needless to say Manchester United had their strongest players in the match and played very well creating many opportunities that they normally take against other teams.

Liverpool played very well indeed and did not get demoralized early on and just pushed on and capitalized on practically every chance. Liverpool's defense fought valiantly and the last minute inclusion of Sami Hyypia due to an injury obtained by Alvaro Arbeloa proved to be a great move as he was on top form in the game as well. Jamie Carragher was shifted to the right back position and the towers of power Sami Hyypia and Martin Skrtel held solidly at the back.

Cristiano Ronaldo scored the first goal of the match for Manchester United in the 23rd minute via a penalty shot after Pepe Reina brought down Park Ji Sung in the box and statistics have shown that every time Cristiano Ronaldo scores for Manchester United, they have gone on to win the said match but it wasn't to be this time as Liverpool turned the game around. You can't exactly blame Reina as he was doing his best to stop the attack as early as he could and when the shot was taken Reina did his best and dove the right way but just missed the chance to push the ball out by an inch or so. Torres turned the tides on United 6 minutes later by making Vidic stumble and look quite foolish after easily dispossessing him and taking Edwin Van Der Sar one-on-one to score the equalizing goal with an immaculate finish. Liverpool then got a golden opportunity to lead at half time with a penalty when Patrice Evra tripped up Steven Gerrard in the penalty box after making a fantastic run and our beloved Stevie showed Ronaldo that you don't need to use net breaking power to score a penalty as he coolly finished the penalty shot with little power and more accuracy.

In the second half, Liverpool continued to put pressure on Manchester United and wanted to finish the game off as Steven Gerrard saw an opening to burst forward but unfortunately was brought down by Nemanja Vidic who then got his second consecutive Red Card against Liverpool this season after a sloppy and very clumsy challenge and was inevitably sent off. Liverpool then took the free kick but Stevie gave way for Fabio Aurelio who nailed the free kick in the 77th minute with such precision into the net with his left foot curling it so beautifully over the wall. Van Der Sar never even attempted to dive for the ball. Later on in the match Steven Gerrard had a chance to get his second goal after he was clear through with a beautiful back heel pass from Ryan Babel but unfortunately used too much power sending the ball above the cross bar.

All doubts were sealed once and for all with Andrea Dossena chipping the ball over Van Der Sar and into an empty net in stoppage time.

This is their 2nd huge win this week after their 4-0 victory against Real Madrid in the Champions League at Anfield in midweek and hopefully Liverpool will continue to put more pressure and play well in the rest of their games this season and pick up straight wins.

Liverpool now face Aston Villa at Anfield in the next Barclays Premier League encounter and it indeed will be a tough match as Aston Villa are a good team but I have confidence that Liverpool will play a good game. For now I am really happy and satisfied and hope Liverpool continue to show this sort of performance in every match. This victory pushes Liverpool to second place for now and reduces the gap by 4 points but Manchester United still have a game in hand but things are good for now.

One more thing I appreciate is that Alan Wiley showed one of the best refereeing displays I have ever seen this season which only matches that off Howard Webb's. He was strict and tolerated absolutely no nonsense from either sides. I was really thankful Mike Riley wasn't referee as he was the official at Liverpool's last encounter at Old Trafford and after Xabi Alonso and Fernando Torres endure gruelling tackles from Manchester United players, they get the booking and Mascherano gets unecessarily sent off. There was clearly something wrong in that match and Wes Brown's so called goal should not have even been allowed. He used Carragher's shoulders to leap up into the air and score. That along with the unfair refereeing and sending off of Javier Mascherano all but sealed it for United but it wasn't to be this time as Justice was served and Alan Wiley refereed the match beatifully as the panel of pundits on Football Focus including John Dykes discussed about.

Rafa braces himself for another encounter with his team's arch rivals

Fernando Torres and Steven Gerrard kick off after Liverpool conceded from a penalty scored by Ronaldo

Torres celebrates after scoring the equalizer in style

This time Liverpool gets a penalty after Evra trips Steven Gerrard in the penalty box and he places it.....

.....into the bottom right hand corner and its a.....

........GOAL!!!

Stevie G. celebrates after coolly scoring a penalty against Van Der Sar

Vidic unfairly brings Steven Gerrard down hard and he's already been booked in the match which means.......

It's RED and he's OFF!

Fabio Aurelio celebrates after scoring a beautiful curled free kick into Man United's net thanks to the after Vidic's foul.

Fabio Aurelio's team mates congratulate him for giving them a 2 goal cushion

Andrea Dossena seals the deal with an AWESOME chip over Edwin Van Der Sar

The final scoreline at Old Trafford

One more thing I want to nitpick about is regarding Manchester United's so called squad depth that Red Devils fans normally argue about saying that Liverpool don't have. Rafael Benitez has proved once and for all that Manchester United's squad depth is a factor that can be overruled. The red devils pit their strongest squad against us and later brought on Berbatov, Scholes and Giggs as substitutes and still failed to make an impact. Liverpool were missing the likes of Alonso, Arbeloa, Benayoun and Agger for starters and yet we still managed to perform well so no more crappy excuses of squad depth.

The final scoreline, its Manchester United 1 Liverpool 4.

English Day!

2009-03-13T20:14:00.007+08:00

Hi guys,

It's tough, the pressure builds on you every moment that passes by and the fact that others are vying for the same prize. You need to get it done and fast. What in the heck am I talking about? I would first of all like to thank Ms. VG for teaching me to write like this hahahaha.

Today was a day, Friday the 13th yet again and I'm not a HUGE believer of superstitions but I believe I mentioned in a recent blog post titled Free Hugs Day which happened to fall on Friday 13, February 2008. This time, this ominous day played host to 2 big events as far as Inti College Subang Jaya is concerned. Number 1 was English Day hosted by the English Language Society and Number 2 was White Valentine's Day hosted by the Badminton Club.

I attended English Day today and took part in the all famous treasure hunt which constitutes a big part of English Day. The rules of the treasure hunt are easy enough to understand. You have a number of teams taking part consisting of 3 members per team which can be All Guys, All Girls or a Guy-Girl team combo. Mine falls under category number 1 and my team consisted of 2 really close buds of mine, Fang Kai and Kah Wei. Despite the fact that they were performing in a sketch they still agreed to join me and I'm really thankful to them for that.

We really broke our heads on some clues because they were so damn tricky. One particular clue that we couldn't solve was the one hidden in the bubble tea shop. We had no idea and one of the places I went to was the marketing office as the clue mentioned, "serving you with a smile" so i assumed it was the marketing guys because they naturally need to please people and smile in order to get students enrolled as one of the factors apart from Inti-Laureate being a great institution on its own of course. The other clues were located in Subway, the first aid room, Lift 6, the library......etc etc. It took alot of energy, guts, sweat and grit and rock solid team effort and coordination helped us come out in end with a little brawn of course. I really want to thank Fang Kai and Kah Wei, both of them were truly outstanding and we made a fantastic team. Looks like Friday the 13th didn't affect us at all hehe.

It was a gruelling battle involving brawn and brains, I would like to congratulate the other winners and teams who took part.

Here are some photos we took:-

The Global Treasure Hunting Federation (GTHF) Championship =P

My team mates and I (L2R: Me, Fang Kai & Kah Wei).......THE CHAMPIONS =D

Champions League- The English march on!

2009-03-12T19:25:00.005+08:00

Hi guys,

I'm feeling a little down right now but I'll blog anyway for your never ending enjoyment. This weeks Champions League comes to a close as the Round of 16 ends with an emphatic finish and the quarter finals drawing ever close on the horizon. As always the main highlights will be on the English teams.

First of all, here are the big results:-

Santiago Bernabeu: Real Madrid 0 - 1 Liverpool
Anfield: Liverpool 4 - 0 Real Madrid

Aggregate: Liverpool 5 - 0 Real Madrid

The Emirates: Arsenal 1 - 0 AS Roma
Stadio Olimpico: AS Roma 1 - 0 Arsenal

Aggregate: Arsenal 1-1 AS Roma (Arsenal win 7-6 on penalties)

Stamford Bridge: Chelsea 1 - 0 Juventus
Stadio Olimpico: Juventus 2- 2 Chelsea

Aggregate: Chelsea 3 - 2 Juventus

San Siro: Inter Milan 0 - 0 Manchester United
Old Trafford: Manchester United 2 - 0 Inter Milan

Aggregate: Manchester United 2 - 0 Inter Milan

Stade Gerland: Olympique Lyonnais 1 - 1 Barcelona
Camp Nou: Barcelona 5 -2 Olympique Lyonnais

Aggregate: Barcelona 6 - 3 Olympique Lyonnais

Estadio Jose Alvalade: Sporting Lisbon 0 -5 Bayern Munich
Allianz Arena: Bayern Munich 7 - 1 Sporting Lisbon

Aggregate: Bayern Munich 12 - 1 Sporting Lisbon

Now the most notable among all the scorelines as I must admits is Bayern Munich's. It isn't just a win. Sporting Lisbon were RIPPED TO SHREDS by Bayern Munich at home and away from home. An aggregate scoreline of 12-1 is possibly the most indescribably humiliating way to exit the champions league. It was a demolition beyong belief. Whatever it maybe, Sporting Lisbon may not be a team as remotely as strong as Bayern but qualifying for the UEFA Champions League tellls everyone something, that you are amongst the best in Europe and you have fought for your place and a right to win the whole tournament and of course there will be teams that lose but not with such an enormous scoreline.

Liverpool's victory over Real Madrid is very notable as well. They drew first blood from Real at the Bernabeu but finished the job at Anfield with a more than convincing victory of 4-0 winning 5-0 overall on aggregate. This too I have to say qualifies as a thrashing. Real Madrid are a world class and of course they didn't just play against any ordinary Champions League team and I sense that Juande Ramos understimated Liverpool and were overpowered by a determined Liverpool side.

Chelsea won with a tight scoreline against Juventus however of 3-2 on aggregate but nevertheless Chelsea is notably improving and playing like the strong side they were under Jose Mourinho.

Arsenal on the other hand just barely scraped through against AS Roma by winning 7-6 on penalties after an aggregate scoreline of 1-1 with both teams scoring initially on their homegrounds respectively.

Manchester United also won convincgly and looks like the jinx between Mourinho and Fergie ended when the red devils clinched a 2-0 win at Old Trafford.

Barcelona also won their match at Camp Nou very convincingly and they looked extremely deadly in their performance, their tactical play was immaculate and finishing was brilliant. As usual little Messi was their slicing through the defence like a hot knife through butter.

Now ever though all 4 English teams have made it to the quarter finals, the most deadly amongst the last 8 I would have to say are Bayern Munich and Barcelona. These 2 appear deadly and it will take some firepower to stop them indeed. The draw will be coming up next week and hopefully Liverpool won't get one that is too difficult for them to face right now.

Liverpool now face Manchester United at Old Trafford on Saturday in the Barclays Premier League and this will be no easy game. The win over Real Madrid has given them good confidence but this is no reason to be too confident as Manchester United have proven to be a formiddable opponent in the past but Liverpool's 2 - 1 victory at Anfield against the Red Devils last year during this season was a convincing one. I don't want to say that Liverpool will win undoubtedly just because they beat a team that has won the UEFA Champions League 9 times but I have confidence that Liverpool will play well and put up a good fight against Manchester United and hopefully all goes well and Liverpool gets a good result.

Duke Nukem: Manhattan Project

2009-03-04T20:15:00.008+08:00

Hi guys,

Here's another game review and I'm going to do one on quite an old but entertaining game called Duke Nukem: Manhattan Project. It is a "Run and Gun side scrolling video game developed by sunstorm interactive and published by ARUSH Entertainment. Now many of us know about the old glory days when Duke Nukem first came out in 2D and what he does, he's a kick-ass action hero who gets the job done no matter what, the toughest son of a b#&@% this side of the gaming universe. Absolutely nothing seems to be able to hold him down unless you accidentally get him killed while your playing this game of course but no worries as there is a magical feature in many of these action games called "RESPAWN" hahaha. Now Mr. Nukem is back in 3D for the 2nd consecutive game in the series and it is most refreshing to see him in the light of day in 3 Dimensional Graphics.

Now as I was saying, Manhattan Project features the humorously chauvinistic action hero Duke Nukem, this time fighting Mech Morphix, a mad scientist who is using a radioactive slime dubbed G.L.O.P.P. (Gluon Liquid Omega-Phased Plasma) to mutate creatures into deadly monsters in order to take over Manhattan island, New York City. These enemies include mutated alligators (looks like alligators do live in the sewers of Manhattan), giant cockroaches, and even the Pig cops (Do you want to end up in in a can on the shelf or as frozen chops in the supermarket) from Duke Nukem 3D. Duke also faces a few enemies who are not mutants, such as Fem-Mechs, lethal whip-wielding female physique based cyborgs. Levels in the game contain recognizable parts of New York City. The game is a side-scroller game but it is built around a 3D engine called Prism 3D: Levels and characters are fully three-dimensional, and both the camera and Duke can move along any axis, although the paths are fixed. It is not a direct sequel to any earlier Duke game, however each earlier game in the series featured a completely different story and a new enemy force for Duke to mess up as well, with only the second and third games directly connected chronologically. As a result, Manhattan Project is much like the original Duke Nukem due to its many similarities such as 'Mech Morphix' looking and acting very similar (eg. half a metal face and also a mad scientist) to 'Dr. Proton' the main antagonist of Duke Nukem. The side scrolling element also pays homage to the original. Duke's primary enemy in the game was originally supposed to be his old arch-nemesis Doctor Proton, but this was changed to avoid possible continuity clashes with Duke Nukem Forever.

Now enough of the introduction and time for the review, the graphics of the game is pretty cool, I have not played Duke Nukem 3D so it was refreshing to see Duke in a whole new perspective, I especially liked the intro where they show Duke Nukem's picture in 2D like graffiti on the wall on the top of a building in Manhattan and suddenly rotating the camera to see Duke kick a door down and seeing him in 3D. The game is much more fluid compared to Duke Nukem 2D although it isn't the type of shooter which allows you to move in all directions at any one time but travel along a fixed path which is what makes Duke Nukem unique in a sense. The detail in the levels is quite impressive as well from the rooftops to sewers....etc etc.

Now onto the game play, in the game there are many stages you have to go through with each stage having 3 levels. Their names are quite catchy with each having 2 words starting with the same alphabets namely Rooftop Rebellion, Chinatown Chiller, Metro Mayhem, Unholy Underworld, Fearsome Factory, Tanker Trouble, Deviant Drilling and Orbital Oblivion. These are all the levels in their respective order. Now from Metro Mayhem onwards till unholy underworld, you won't really see the light of day being stuck in underground subway stations and sewers ALOT but it really isn't that pretty in the G.L.O.P.P. factory or Morphix's tanker either so Duke may want to work on his tan in advance before proceeding but it will be a feast for the eyes to all you nocturnal gaming junkies. Each of these stages contains 3 levels in which you face enemies along the way, find bonuses and key cards and finally face off against a life threatening boss. In the game there is a reasonable array of weapons to choose from namely the Golden Eagle, Duke's trustworthy and loyal primary weapon, a potent handgun, a shotgun, an assault rifle, pipe bombs, G.L.O.P.P. Ray Gun, Pneumatic Rocket Propelled Grenade Launcher, a pulse cannon and finally the X3000 which can only be unlocked when playing by finding all nukes on the Hard difficulty level, this unbelievably powerful weapon pulls down lightning and blows up all enemies on the screen and one cool thing is that when you have it out, thunder can be heard in the background, even during cut scenes, BUT it does not work on multi-stage bosses. Funny as it may sound, Duke's Mighty Boot is considered a weapon as well being able to kill enemies quite effectively, breaking down doors and other objects....etc etc

In each level there are various small bonus items to that you can pick up namely Jetpacks, Double Damage, Forcefields and Nukes, Nukes as in not real bombs but special bonus items as well as keycards you need in order to proceed to the next level. Jetpack bonuses allow Duke to fly around for a short periods of time across huge voids or hazardous areas while the Double Damage gives you freakish strength not to mention increased firepower when combating enemies. Also the force field bonus gives invincibility from any sort of incoming fire Duke may take, again this is for a limited time only so eliminating your enemy especially the ones that pack a punch is key. In terms of Duke's health points, he doesn't really have any, the creators of the game choosing instead to let his EGO fuel him. Basically the higher number of ego points you have, the better condition he is to fight in. It can be replenished with health bonuses on the way as well as vending machines which dispense energy drinks (I'm serious). In case your ego points get too high though which is a rarity in the game unless you use cheats, it will automatically get lowered down till it reaches a stable level. In each level there are hot babes around who are strapped to bombs that Duke can easily diffuse and get some unadulterated pleasure from the stress given to him from his environment hehe, these are bonus objectives and Thank God they are not mutants. You know that there are ladies around because they'll be cryng out for help saying "Somebody save me!!!" or "Save me Duke" in their sexy feminine voices.

At the end of each stage, naturally as you would expect, you will face a boss and some of them are the conventional gigantic massive bombardment type of boss that you have to outsmart and not to mention out grunt. However I found that Stage 2's boss was one of the most interesting and challenging opponents to face. It was a mutant kung-fu crocodile armed with 2 sub machines guns, He has slick maneuvers and can drain your health away faster than you can say "Son of a B%@&#" as Duke says most of the time after respawning. You need good movement, good reflexes, timing and strategic play in order to beat this boss effectively. The final boss Duke will face is Duke himself, except it's a gigantic metallic and destructive version of himself controlled by Morphix to be launched out of the space station to earth, this is in Orbital Oblivion by the way and one good thing about this level is that gravity is very low as Duke is on a space station which allows for higher and longer jumps. Mind you though that as you make your way toward the end of the game to face the final boss in Orbital Oblivion, you will stripped of all your coveted weapons you collected with the help of a special disarming chamber that YOU MUST pass through in order to progress and all you'll be left is your faithful Golden Eagle (with the bare minimum amount of Ammo if im not mistaken). This is the downside but the good thing is that there are so much ammo bonuses and pipe bombs you can collect and stock up on before you face Morphix himself BUT rules are meant to be bent or broken as they all say, this basically means you can use cheats if you wish to get back all your wonderful weapons and to ultimately show that some oversized dishwasher called a disarming chamber won't stop you from taking back what WAS yours hahaha but to be more professional, just go with the flow, it did take me longer to fight the boss but it's more thrilling that way. The cut scenes in the game are pretty good although it maybe as what some extreme gamers may describe as cheesy but I enjoy it nonetheless.

The Interface is also pretty cool and user friendly too and nice to see as you constantly see some simulated game play in the background.

In terms of its features, the game doesn't have a huge plethora but this is definitely not something that would add to many plus points to the game. It is a game that needs to be enjoyed in single player mode.

Finally in my general opinion, I have enjoyed playing Duke Nukem from the beginning and this game has won me over as well, it's a fantastic and enjoyable game with lots of action and a good share of swearing but i wouldn't have it any other way.

Towards the end of the game after Morphix has been defeated and the Space Station begins the process of self distruction with other minor explosions and shaking in the background, Duke makes a run for it to emergency space capsule used for evacuation and returns to earth and upon his arrival he is given a heroes welcome to congratulate him on ridding the earth of the villanous Morphix once and for all and is flanked by dozens of hot girls that he rescued and has once again engraved in history and truly proven himself to show everyone who's the best and he can rightfully and proudly proclaim that he is "THE KING OF THE WORLD BABY"

Graphics: 8.5
Gameplay: 8.5
Interface: 9.0
Features: 7.5

Overall: 8.4 out of 10

BPL Update!

2009-03-04T08:37:00.002+08:00

Hi guys,

Welcome to this weeks Barclays Premier League review post with me your host Elvin, I'll be covering 2 weeks worth of Premier League action. Now what happened during the weekend and premiership midweek. Liverpool unfortunately crashed to one of their worst defeats of the season losing 2-0 away from home to Middlesbrough at the Riverside. I seriously got pissed of at this. The entire squad looked exhausted and exasperated from the starting of the match itself and played only at 30-40% operating efficiency. Alonso's own goal was what started the start of a bad day followed by a well played ground pass into the box for Mido to score. Honestly Reina is not to blame for these goals, he does his best and there is only so much a keeper can do to stop his opposition and so far he has been extremely unlucky on a number of occasions. The goals scored against him are ones other goalkeepers would fine notoriously difficult to stop.

The conflict within Liverpool's boardroom seems to be affecting their performance especially considering the fact that Rafa's contractual issues still hang in the balance. However they made up for their embarrasing loss with a decent 2-0 victory over Sunderland with goals from Yossi Benayoun and David Ngog. Ngog is a very promising youngster and one I feel should be given more starts with the Premier League's squad. His playing style is similar to Torres and I feel he has the potential to score a lot up front and perhaps make a good striker partnership with his spanish teammate.

Chelsea won both of their games in the week with a 2-1 win over Wigan Athletic and a 1-0 win over Portsmouth so they seem to be slowly bouncing back into the title race. The pressure seems to be mounting on Manchester United now but its just to early to tell as of now as the Red Devils still have one game in hand.

Arsenal also bounced back from their 0-0 stalemate against Fulham to win 3-1 against West Bromwich Albion.

Liverpool may have won now and close the gap between them and league leaders Manchester United by 4 points but not forgeting the Red Devils have one more game in hand but knowing that a football is round you never know when it could go wrong for Manchester United. However it went well for them during the weekend after their win in the Carling Cup finals against Tottenham Hotspur after winning it 4-1 in penalties. I salute Tottenham for their performance, they fought their hearts out and I guess the victory may not be justified in all senses but Manchester United ended up winning their 2 trophy of the season and now there is alot of speculation of them winning the Barclays Premier League, UEFA Champions League and FA Cup but I have faith that Liverpool can grab their share of silverware this season and improve to win more next season but there is still a long way to go.

Liverpool now face Real Madrid at Anfield in the 2nd leg encounter of the Champions League Round of 16 knockout stages and have a 1 away goal advantage at the Bernabeu and I have confidence Liverpool have the ability to work hard to win and progress to the Quarter Finals of the UEFA Champions League.

Champions League encounter

2009-02-27T09:51:00.002+08:00

Hi guys,

Yes its time for a review for this weeks Champions League and I'll be squaring it down to the Big 4 like I normally do. Here are the matches and respective scores. I'll be doing my football reviews in a slightly different and much neater format if I may add to give all of you a much clearer perspective.

Venue Match & Score

Santiago Bernabeu Real Madrid 0 - 1 Liverpool

Emirates Arsenal 1 - 0 AS Roma

Stamford Bridge Chelsea 1 - 0 Juventus

San Siro Inter Milan 0 - 0 Manchester United

These are the matches and now here are the comments I have. Firstly I am absolutely glad Liverpool won their match against Real Madrid, no doubt Real Madrid were dominating the match but in comparison to the ratio of the total number of shots each team had to the number of shots they had on target, Liverpool were much better. Liverpool were at a major disadvantage playing Real Madrid without Steven Gerrard and I salute the brave defending by our defenders and the solid and rock steady goal keeping of Pepe Reina, he has proved to be better than his country man's no.1 in goal Iker Casillas. Yossi Benayoun was the hero of the match scoring a goal after a beautifully taken free kick from Fabio Aurelio and a powerful header from Benayoun past Casillas into the net. Although Real Madrid did dominate in terms of possession, their finishing was sloppy. Unfortunately during the match, Fernando Torres twisted his ankle and is a doubt for Liverpool's next upcoming match against Middlesbrough in the Barclays Premier League however with Liverpool scoring in the 1st leg of the Champions League round of 16 away from home at the Bernabeu, it is a major advantage for us however we musn't forget Liverpool's curse of facing Spanish teams at Anfield but I have confidence that Liverpool can hold together and break that jinx once and for all and progress through to the next round.

Arsenal did well by winning AS Roma thanks to Robin Van Persie to give them the aggregate lead at the Emirates but needless to say, Arsene Wenger satisfied with the victory as it was a very slender one and now with mounting injuries to add to his list of problems, Wenger has a lot to think about ahead.

Chelsea also played really well and Arsene wasn't the only manager unsatisfied as Guus Hiddink feels his side could have done much better than just picking up the 1-0 victory at Stamford Bridge but kudos to Didier Drogba for scoring early on in the match.

Manchester United on the other hand will be dissapointed they didn't pick up the victory against Inter Milan after they dominated the match and still ended the match in a goalless draw and Fergie will be fuming to know that he hasn't closed the gap that much more in terms of wins against Jose Mourinho.

Well this is what happened in the Champions League this week and Liverpool have done well to bounce back after their stale mate with Manchester City in the Premier League and hopefully they can maintain consitency and pick up another 3 points by any and all means necessary against Middlesbrough this weekend. For right now, I'm satisfied as the final score is Real Madrid Nil, Liverpool ONE.

Time for an update!!

2009-02-26T20:11:00.002+08:00

Hi guys,

What's up! It's been sometime since i put a general update as many of my fellow bloggers do on quite a regular basis so to keep this blog fed and alive, I shall put not 1 BUT 2 blog posts, but one will involve football hahaha.

Now what happened this week, a couple of things actually and one of the would include Inti's Closed Futsal tournament. Here teams made by students from Inti will join and fight for the RM400 grand prize. Needless to say, the competition was intensely tough and the only problem our team lacked was team chemistry. My team consised of Raymond, Sahil, Adrian, Willy, Ui Tee, Eugene and myself . We had to play more often in order to gain chemistry.

Where as we lacked the advantage, quite a number of the other teams already had that under their belts so to speak. Some teams have had experience in terms of years where as my team had got together in only a matter of days. This was my first time in a Futsal competition so anyways it was fun although it didn't go to well but it was a learning experience and I really appreciate my buddy Raymond for including me in his side to play. I have to say though that the intensity of any and all Futsal matches I have played before cannot really match up to what I faced on Wednesday. Problem is I don't go for Futsal nearly as often like Vinoad, Raymond and the other dudes so that's one part I lack and of course the practice comes along the more you play. As wherever you read online, writers will always tell you that you gain skill and awareness with experience.

The match of the day needless to say was Sam's team vs. Vinoad's team. It was amazing to watch, the play went back and forth and back and forth. It was a display of amazing tactics, brilliant skills, fantastic attacking and rock solid defending and goalkeeping, something like watching Barcelona vs. Man Utd. Both goalkeepers performed outstandingly and the match between the 2 TITANS of the tournament ended up in a 0-0 draw. I met Sam for the first time in the tournament. I had heard alot about him from everyone and my first impressions of him is that he is a very nice person. I really appreciate his polite and forthcoming demeanour but needless to say he is ferocious on the court with his fantastic skill. As a matter of fact, every single player in Sam's and Vinoad's teams were outstanding so kudos to them.

Overall it was an enjoyable experience being in the tournament and hopefully I can gain more experience and play more Futsal as time goes by.

Free Hugs Day- February 13, 2009

2009-02-15T15:00:00.004+08:00

Hi guys,

A hug, there's nothing like it to make you feel good. Well I'm sure most people would agree anyway. Last Friday, on the 13th of February which is normally known as Black Friday was also free Hugs day. This move made by the Free Hugs Society was a daring yet wise move indeed. On a day when bad luck could strike you and the whole world may seem to be collapsing before your eyes, there is nothing like a hug from a friend to make you feel good.

Contrary to what most people think, Friday the 13th is not necessarily a day of bad luck, it can be one of ridiculously unexplainable good fortune. That's right folks, you can either have Bad or Good luck on Friday the 13th. Some people think it may happen at random but I don't believe that is the case. It is what you believe and what you think and visualize that really counts and truly manifests your universe, which is why if all of you are dreading Friday the 13th from now on you may want to reconsider.

I tried to eliminate any and all negative energy around me by giving as many friends as a I could a hug on the day. Amongst the many would include Patricia, Kah Xin, Hui Yin, Fang Kai, Qi Quan, Zjen Thak, Seng Kiet, Jay, Celine and many more haha. I wanted to give my buddy from Art Class, Jessica a hug too but was unsuccessful so she owed me one and I wasn't gonna take any shoddy hug. So when I came back on Monday and after the art midterm paper she and I gave each other a big bear hug, I think she temporarily lost her breath for a minute haha.

So anyways, I liked the concept of Free Hugs and although some people may find it odd, I still really like the concept. I mean common who doesn't like a hug although many people may deny it. Maybe some truly don't but I know there are a good share of us who do appreciate it. Some people can't openly hug their friends out of awkwardness or embarrassment that others may laugh or what not so this day is a good opportunity to give all your wonderful friends what you've been wanting to give them for sometime.

To top it off, these hugs are FREE OF CHARGE but they are worth their weight in much more than the value of Diamonds and this applies to everyone who gives them. It's a simple concept but a great one. In a world like ours where violence and chaos lurk at perhaps any unexpected corner, this is one of the few scarce remaining resources to eliminate all that negativity and put a smile on that special someone's face. So what do you have to lose? Absolutely nothing....not only does it make your friend, sibling or loved one feel good, it makes you feel good too. I'm talking from experience and there is no other feeling like it =)

The Adventures of ANT101-JAN09- Chartering into the HISTORICAL state!

2009-02-14T12:27:00.023+08:00

Hi guys,

I wait amongst a huge crowd with my comrades, in anticipation of what is to come. After all that we have been told of what could happen out there, I was always on my guard but I wanted to have some fun as well. I was also on my guard for unsocial elements trying to explore anyone of our pockets. Now you all ask, What exactly am I talking about here? This is what it's like when your waiting at the Pudu Raya Bus Station in K.L. No we're not doing our fieldwork here. We're waiting for our bus.

Just the day before, I was finalizing everything to make sure I hadn't left anything behind at all which includes my Camcorder for some video shooting and the charger, its very important that we have the charger. No offense or anything but my Dad always has this bad luck, sort of a jinx I might say that at almost anytime no matter where he travels, he will forget to bring at least one charger for one of his electronic gadgets and usually it's the very important ones like the DigiCam. I was determined to make sure that it wasn't going to happen to me so I double checked to make sure I had everything packed up. The next day, after all was packed, I headed to college with my luggage and after class was done for the day I headed straight to the AUP office to dump my baggage there. I chilled out and surfed the net for a while and later I went and hung out with Sahil for a bit going for a small pool session and I have to say I'm not to talented at pool as I only go once in a blue moon but just thought i'd chill for a while and midway through our pool game, Mr. Nipun crashed in on the action and got his lion's share of the game as well. I then got a message from my group leader Mr. Boon Han to reschedule the taxi that was prearranged for us to go to Pudu. That was when I freaked out. This cab I arranged normally goes for fixed appointments so I can't really reschedule when I feel like it. I tried to frantically call my mom but of all the days, she forgot her mobile phone at home and went out but nevertheless it was all sorted out, thanks a lot Boon Han (for the added stress)! Haha I'm joking man, its all cool and part of the experience. Now as for getting to Malacca a.k.a The HISTORICAL state we split up into 2 groups of 3 and 4. The 3 of us, Boon Han, Calvin and I had to go by bus while the other 4, Ming Zhe, Sudha, Charlene and Yee Ling including 1 extra dude, Mr. Chee Yong went by Ming Zhe's car.

We managed to get another Cab for Pudu from Inti and as always the Friday Traffic Jams was starting to build up. We reached Pudu at around 4pm and the place was in a state of Pandemonium.........well the usual Pandemonium, Pudu was JAM PACKED with people and of course since it was going to be a 3 day weekend coming up, many people took this opportunity to go back to their hometowns. We took advantage of it to give us a little more time to do our fieldwork. We went to the ticket counter and got 3 tickets for the KL-Melaka express and surprisingly there wasn't a soul at the line except the lady at the counter selling tickets..........hmm, something to think about indeed. After buying our tickets we went to the KFC outside to have a little chow, well just me and Calvin anyways. Boon Han finished his lunch so he just had a slurpee. I wanted to order the toasted twister like i always did but it wasn't available and just as I was about to order the Alaskan Fish Burger, I thought to myself, why bother....that's not something they would have either and I realized that the things they sold in this KFC opposite Pudu Raya would be the stuff that most people would purchase more frequently so I ordered a Zinger Burger and a 6-Piece Nuggets. After we were done with our meal, we wanted to use the toilet but mind you, I will give everyone of you a clear warning before you even think of venturing into the toilets of the KFC opposite the Pudu Raya Bus Station. This is what they should put on the door, at least for the gents...

It absolutely stinks, it reeks, its putrid. I wouldn't send my worst enemy in their or then again..........maybe I would but the fact is that it is horrifying unless you've lost your sense of smell. The odor smells as if the washroom has not been cleaned since 1970.

We headed back to the station and waited for our bus as it pulled in. Thinking about it at first, paying RM12 for a bus ticket to Malacca got me wondering whether the bus we were going to be traveling in would be a potential deathtrap on wheels in terms of its maintenance and condition so gripping tightly to our sweets and peanuts packets, we boarded the bus at around 5:15p.m. and the bus pulled out of the station at around 5:30p.m. Now another thing some of you would have thought would probably be was..........HOLY S*%&. These guys are going on board an express bus, WHAT ARE THEY NUTS???!!!...................Well no worries, the ride was very comfortable and our driver drove carefully and never over sped at all. If it did turn turtle, I may not have been here to write this post right now.

On the bus Calvin took the opportunity to take a nap having suffered from INSOMNIA the night before while Boon Han and I went on and on about football, practically the whole trip but of course we had our personal discussions as well about our social lives and what not haha. We reached the bus depot in Malacca at around 7:40p.m. and now the next challenge was looming over us. How in the world are we going to get to our hotel without getting ripped off? Luckily we managed to get a cab at a pretty reasonable price. We were neither in the appropriate place to ponder too much nor were we spoilt for choice so we got an offer, negotiated and got one we thought was alright. We reached our hotel at around 8:15p.m. It's called the Hallmark Hotel and it's a pretty decent accommodation for a good price. Leave it to the queen of hospitality and tourism, Charlene to choose a good place for us hehe. Speaking of which, we received a text message from her at around 6:30p.m. saying "haha we reached here first", well a car and a bus really can't race side by side now can it hehe. Fair contest no doubt pfftt....

There were 3 rooms booked in total, one of them were for 4 of us guys, Ming Zhe, Calvin, Boon Han and I all sharing it. Well we're trying to economize as much as we could otherwise accommodation was going to set us back by quite a bit. It was late evening and we all planned to settle down first, get everything in order and plan a bit for the next day. After showering up in the clean and decent bathroom provided to us, we stepped out for dinner and to get an orientation of the place.

In the Hotel Room!

We were now thinking, there were 5 people who came to Malacca in Ming Zhe's car and now the 8 of us would have to somehow pack ourselves into our mode of transportation like sardines in a can. It was the first time I saw Ming Zhe's car up close. It was the latest Honda Accord model and it is the first time I have appreciated an Accord, I was always with the Camry faction but seeing as how the new Accord is more powerful than its counterpart from Toyota with the same engine displacement, its fuel consumption is 17km per liter and not to mention it looks very sleek and stylish especially being it black really got me thinking. I really like the Camry no doubt but honestly it is the white collar working man's sort of car but if you want a luxury sedan with good fuel consumption and more style especially being a teenager or young adult who's a student or could be working, the Accord is the way to go. We somehow squeezed inside with Calvin taking the front seat, Boon Han getting a permanent place on my lap at the back, Charlene sitting on Chee Yong and Sudha and Yee Ling managing to sit side by side in the rear seats. I was now thinking, with the car having 3 more people than the actually seating capacity, the performance would dip but the Accord's acceleration was effortless and the ride was as smooth as silk. Not to mention, the car's ominous silence while driving, ahhhh..........sheer bliss.

We went out pretty late and by that time quite a few restaurants were closing up but we managed to find one pretty fancy shindig called the noodles bar, not the sort of Michelin candlelight table kind of restaurant but something like a lighted up modern design sort of restaurant. I am perfectly okay with Chinese Food by the way, I am open with eating other foods as long as its not too bizarre. The prices were pretty reasonable and the food quite decent and the most hungry of the lot, Sudha got her food the last lol. While we were waiting for our food, we we're being entertained by the restaurants television showing a trailer for the Discovery Channel, swt =.='. Boon Han and I ordered the same dish which was Tom Yam noodles but it had one big difference, that dish along with an ice lemon tea was good enough to satisfy my appetite BUT NOT Boon Han's, where I found it a decent meal he found it as crap. He was still hungry and wanted MORE so he ordered another dish and devoured it as well hahahaha.

After paying we left and walked around for a while, headed back to the car, packed into the same configuration and went back to the hotel and dropped off the others while Ming Zhe, Calvin, Boon Han and I navigated our way to Jonker Walk and went for a short exploration in order to find a gift for the chief but unfortunately we didn't and had to leave that task till the next morning.

First time at Jonker Walk

When we arrived back at the hotel, we walked to the 7-11 up the road and bought some coffee for the next day. Some of the guys bought coffee powder in sachets and wanted to make hot coffee in the morning but I just bought mine in a can and it was so convenient. After all it was a matter of only a day or so. We then went back to the room and chilled out and Boon Han and Calvin taught me to play a few card games, black jack and Texas poker, we then played some high stakes games with as much as RM1.00 in the pot, that is big bucks haha. We then went to bed during the early morning hours of Saturday at 1a.m.. It was a double bed so the 4 of us were sleeping on it sideways to accommodate everyone and I kinda felt sorry for Boon Han because he needed to constantly get up to adjust the air conditioning because it got to cold. Also, before we went to bed, he covered the mirror facing us with a towel and we slept the other way so as not too face the mirror. This is based on a superstition stating that the mirror is some sort of gateway to an alternate dimension and you don't want to get up seeing yourself in the mirror as something or someone else and I guess it makes sense because if you wake up half asleep, you may tend to see some crazy s%@* like that sometimes.

We got up the next morning had our coffee and I couldn't have appreciated the coffee in a can more as no preparation is required. We then headed out for breakfast and as it turns out, the hotel only gives free breakfast to only 2 people per room but there were 4 in ours. The spread wasn't so great anyway, all I saw was a HUGE stack of High 5 bread. So we headed out to a nearby stall and had some Dim Sum for breakfast. When we hit the road, our first stop was Tesco, I did not come all the way here to Malacca just to go to TESCO!! Ok I'm kidding, we needed to buy a gift and got a basket of fruits as a gift for the village headman. Considering his age, I don't really think a box of chocolates would have been a great idea.

Tesco in Malacca; in the produce aisle!

I'm bored! Didn't intend on any grocery shopping!

We then headed off to the Portuguese settlement where we were going for our fieldwork but honestly navigating is not an easy job but thankfully Ming Zhe brought along his Garmin Nuvi GPS which was lagging a little bit initially but with a magic touch of my hands (tampering with the settings) it functioned smoothly. I'm not trying to show off, I just like gadgets and stuff.

Ming Zhe's Garmin NUVI GPS

We reached the settlement walked for a bit and thought of asking for directions from a shop we saw and asked for Mr. George, the dude then looked at us in a funny way and here's how the short yet odd encounter took place

Boon Han: Excuse me, are you Mr. George

Man: How do you know my name? (Gets edgy and moves back slightly)

Elvin: We're sorry to bother you sir but we are here to do a little research on the Portuguese Settlementt

Boon Han: We are students from Inti College Subang Jaya and made an appointment to see Mr. George for an interview

Man: Oh, I think you're looking for George Ovaree!

All of us: Sorry to bother you, thank you!

Hahaha, it was hilarious at the way he looked at us but we reassured him that we were just in the area to do some research for college and told him who we were looking for and apparently it wasn't him............bah go figure!!

We headed to the museum in the settlement with its adjoining meeting room where the committee members of the village congregate every month and met Mr. George Ovaree a.k.a. Mr. Edwin (Deputy Secretary) and Mr. Peter Gomes (Chief of Portuguese Settlement). After a long interview session we went saw the museum which isn't as big as I thought it would be and later headed down to a restaurant in the settlement itself for lunch. We then remember we forgot to ask about the popular cuisine in the settlement. After eating and paying, we went back to ask Mr. George about the popular cuisine and it so happened that the restaurant we just had lunch at serves the best specialties of the settlement. Talk about lucky, the food was good and not too greasy at all.

The Sri K.L. student a.k.a. Calvin

Another thing that so coincidentally happened was that so many other uni's and colleges happened to drop by on the day to do fieldwork as well so its a good thing we came earlier in the morning. Our next stop was the police station to get some statistics on the Portuguese settlement, there was an eery feeling being inside the police station but nothing amazing happened, Charlene was getting nervous seeing all the guns in the holsters lol. We then headed back to our hotel and were finally relieved we were done with the research. We chilled out and Boon Han crashed taking a long nap that he deserved after the disturbed sleep he received. Ming Zhe was chilling out as well busy messaging his special lil someone haha and so me and Calvin were busy playing cards and just chilling for a while. Then Chee Yong came in and joined us for a bit and after 3 rounds of black jack he surrendered and went back to his room, fyi there were no bets involved, we were just playing for fun. Talk about K.O. man!! I then went to shower and at around 8:00p.m. Boon Han came to consciousness and we went for dinner to a Chicken Rice Ball restaurant in Jonker Walk. Jonker Walk was packed with people so that on its own is a sight to see.

The people watching a comedy show in Jonker Walk!

For those of you who do not know what Jonker walk is, it is basically, something more or less similar to China Town. The Chicken Rice Balls and Chicken we ordered were very good BUT one of the waitresses tried to rush us out when we got the bill by saying they close at 9:00p.m. That really pissed us off and what did we do? We took our sweet time finishing our food and after that took photos in the restaurant where some fancy items were on display and then walked slowly out the door, there were still other people eating so we carry nothing on our conscience.

We explored Jonker walked and I of course as many of you may or may not have guessed, I bought a cap, a fancy looking one saying "Zoo York", the pirated version of New York but the Big Apple can be like a zoo sometimes so what the heck. We also bought frozen slushy like drinks which had frog balls in them from a stall in Jonker walk which were absolutely delicious. NO THEY AREN'T BALLS MADE OUT OF FROG MEAT. They're just called frog balls because........ok I don't really know if they resemble the "YOU KNOW WHAT" of a frogs but their orangish in color and pop in your mouth and it has some sort of sweet tomato flacored liquid in them. I ordered the blueberry yogurt flavored one and it was tooo damn good. Later my friends and I after exploring the entire Jonker walk headed to a Bistro where they ordered drinks, but I being the so called good boy that I am ordered a Sprite.....pfft. I wasn't alone coz Charlene ordered Green Tea and this isn't the Jus Tea one, it's the teabag type so its the real deal. My other friends ordered their miscellaneous beverages with Chee Yong and Calvin both downing a Carlsberg and Ming Zhe being the one driving us around ordered "Orange Juice- A Cocktail with low alcohol content which looks like orange juice and had an orange slice on the glass" haha. Sudha went all James Bond and ordered a Martini while Boon Han ordered the house special.

Boon Han getting drunk after ordering FRUIT JUICE!

We then headed back to our hotel and at a traffic light there was one driver in a Honda City sort of giggling and looking at us with a stupid smile on her face because of us 8 packed inside. Instantly I was like "What the eff? Stop laughing at us!" But Ming Zhe was so super cool, cooler than a cucumber, I saw him with a very relaxed smile and not losing his cool at all. So I was like ok, maybe ill just ignore that lady. One thing was for sure, the driver tried being aggressive and when the light went green she stepped hard on the accelerator or as the Americans say, stepped hard on the gas and zoomed off but all Ming Zhe did was slowly and coolly accelerate and next thing you know, our overloaded Accord left the Honda City with one regular sized person inside in the dust and left all of us laughing our heads off. The POWER of the Accord...........Ming Zhe's Accord's POWER PLANT smoked that piece of s%&* City's 1.5 liter Cendol Stand generator.

When we reached the hotel, the others headed back to their rooms but Boon Han and I headed to a mamak stall up the road to watch football because our hotel didn't have the Sports Package. So Boon Han and I sat down and ordered 2 Kopi O Ais's and and watched the 2nd half of Chelsea vs. Hull City at Stamford Bridge. It was a disappointing match on Chelsea's part and I was glad in a way that Frank Lampard's Red Card was rescinded by the FA after Mike Riley's rather rash decision at Anfield. Whatever it was, it ended up in a 0-0 scoreline and something for Luiz Philipe Scolari to think about but now Chelsea have Guus Hiddink lined up to guide Chelsea so maybe not so much to think about Chelsea now but as to how he can get another job.

We then headed back to our room and played cards again but the stakes were raised even higher. Allow me to explain, Boon Han somehow got a sugar rush and started acting hyper so I put a bet down. It's actually kinda ludicrous, I said if I lost a hand against him, HE would have to jumped out the window twice, If we draw, he has to jump down thrice and If I win he has to jump down 4 times. The process is simple, he jumps out the window and falls to the ground 3 floors below, he ambles back up to our room after the excruciating pain and repeats the process how many ever times necessary. We finally agreed that the loser must jump down once only (jokingly of course). We played Black Jack and Texas Poker and I so happened to win every single hand against him which was like close to 7-8 hands but no one ended up flying out the window and we went to bed after that. He was annoying me though constantly pestering me about wanting to see the video but I wanted to sleep and so I finally gave into that so he would stop being a pain in my a%&* and let me alwwp. After watching the video he finally went to sleep..........almost. He was still to hyper and knocked on the wall which was apparently not made of steel reinforced concrete but thin abestos sort of material..........I think and so the girls in the other room could hear it all not to mention his loud voice. Even with the rampage the experience is still funny so I thank Boon Han for doing what he did haha. After his rampage was over we finally managed to sleep but at around 4a.m. in the morning I noticed a couple of things that were different.

Number 1, I am freezing to death.

Number 2, The Blanket is missing

and

Number 3, CALVIN IS MISSING!!!

I saw him sleeping on the floor wrapped in the blanket while Boon Han and I were without any blankets at all. What a jackass lol?? Ming Zhe on the other hand was sleeping sooo soundly like a baby wrapped up comfortably in the bed sheet. I had to end up making do with whatever warmth my pillow could give me and adjusting the air-conditioner. The next morning Calvin explained that I kicked him in the N_ _S when I was turning around in my sleep. I didn't know I was so lethal when sleeping. Luckily he was the only casualty and Ming Zhe and Boon Han never sustained injuries..........what the heck?? LOL!!

I got up pretty late at around 11:30a.m. and by that time the guys were already awake, I went to shower and change and we checked out and headed out for lunch to Satay Celuk which is a restaurant which basically serves almost all their food in satay form, basically on a stick with a pot in the middle of the table containing a sauce made out of various spices, sugar, salt and boiling water. The meal was delicious and filling. The 8 of us ordered 2 four person sets as that would we considerably cheaper than 8, 1 person sets and the quantity of food per set was humongous. We ordered the mixed platter which basically has everything like seafood, meats, tau foo, vegetables....etc. I was more than full and satisfied and Boon Han had the lions share of sticks compared to the 8 of us, 25 sticks if im not mistaken. After lunch we headed back to the hotel to drop Charlene and Chee Yong as they wanted to stay a little longer and head back on Monday.

Seeing as how there were now 6 people, we could definitely squeeze one more person at the back but there was a risk that we could have been stopped by the traffic police as only Sudha, Yee Ling and I were strapped into seat belts at the back and Boon Han was without one but we were lucky no such thing happened. The ride back to college from Melaka was very comfortable in Ming Zhe's Accord, it was cruising along the highway very silently and smoothly like an aircraft and I hardly even felt a single bump. The ride was very relaxing and Ming Zhe is a very careful and smart driver, one we should look up to hehe =D.

The ride back home!

The Mandarin Oranges, NO WONDER the car never got possessed! WAITAMINIT, THERE'S NO DRIVER! AAAAAHHHH!!! Haha kidding!

Among its numerous features, the new Honda Accord has one very simple but very cool feature, A MUST HAVE inside a car and one I feel Toyota should stary integrating into their cars, it has a USB port so you can plug in your USB FlashDrive loaded with MP3's and play them in your car. Ming Zhe's collection of songs were brilliant, all excellent choices. Another thing is that for the whole trip, going on Friday, Driving around like no one's business on Friday evening and Saturday and Coming back on Sunday, we only used like close to under half a tank of petrol and given the fact that the car was having 8 people on board most of the time and with bags and stuff inside and blah blah blah, it's pretty damn good. Drive every DROP indeed.

We reached back in Inti at around 3:30p.m. after dropping Boon Han of near his house as he lives in Sunway.

Overall this was a great trip even though it was for the purpose of education, it was very enjoyable nevertheless and I hope to do this again soon.

BPL action...

2009-02-10T20:36:00.002+08:00

Hi guys,

Let's have a look at what happened this week in the Barclays Premier League starting off with Liverpool of course, they now seem to be back on phenomenal form with that awesome 3-2 victory against Portsmouth at Fratton Park. Their fighting spirit is sure showing itself but this consistency must be maintained. Liverpool as I have observed have an Achilles Heel which is defending from set pieces. Their main set piece defender which is Sami Hyypia nick named the "Tower of Power" solved almost literally any arial bombardment they would encounter but unfortunately without him playing at the moment tney seem to be suffering from that current position and it is something I hope Martin Skrtel can soon master and handle just as well as Sami can. In this match Fabio Aurelio scored a cracker form a free kick inside the penalty box with 10 defenders on the line, the next was Dirk Kuyt's absolutely cracking goal showing that he's someone that should be taken quite seriously and finally Fernando Torres struck with a devastating header giving Liverpool a brilliant win.

Manchester United yet again escaped another game with a 1-0 victory thanks to Ryan Gigga. I know they create a lot of chances but these teeth scraping scorelines are starting to cheese me off.

Chelsea honestly had every oppurtunity to win the match against Hull City and John Terry will indeed be regretting that he didn't do better with his chance in front of goal in the first half. Quaresma seems to be quite the breath of fresh air Chelsea required in their squad BUT will it be enough?

Arsenal honestly are just plain clueless after yet another draw, a goalless draw is what ended the North London Derby.

Liverpool seem to be at the moment the most competent contender alongside Manchester United to become champions this season but with one game still in hand, the Red Devils still have an oppurtunity to pull away from Liverpool by 5 points. Liverpool must maintain the momentum and take every chance they have to overtake Manchester United and I have faith that they will do just that. From me Elvin, its goodbye for now.

Barclays Premier League Review

2009-02-04T08:31:00.006+08:00

Hi guys,

Welcome to the Barclay's Premier League blog post on my blog haha. Ok let's get down to the weekend's action and what exactly happened. Now as we speak, Liverpool will be facing their Merseyside Rivals in an FA Cup replay soon this week at Goodison Park while Manchester United have this opportunity to rest players, I hate replays.....

First onto Premier League action, the match of the weekend needless to say happened on Sunday between 2 of the Big 4. It was Liverpool vs. Chelsea at Anfield and this match was going to prove to be a spectacular occasion. Needless to say in their last 2 matches, Chelsea had won both relatively comfortably with a 2-1 win over a very Physical Stoke City and a 2-0 cleansheet at the Riverside against Gareth Southgate's Middlesbrough. Liverpool on the other hand had drawn their past few matches and weren't at the top of the game so Chelsea with their sudden resurgence in form and their impressive away record were favorites starting this game. Liverpool played it safe again with a 4-5-1 formation with Torres in attack, and Alonso and Mascherano providing the cover at the back for the other 3 midfielders to go forward.

Throughout the match it was clear who dominated and as you all can see, Liverpool we're clearly the dominating factor in the game. They controlled the game in practically all areas and created chance after chance, Chelsea unfortunately couldn't get their attack together and so the team of Arbeloa, Skrtel, Carragher and Aurelio were like a brick wall at the back and of course Pepe Reina was as cool and composed as ever. The Reds truly battled it out and put intense pressure on Chelsea and finally scored 2 goals in the dying minutes of the game thanks to the brilliant teamwork of the Liverpool team and immaculate finishing of Fernando Torres. I watched the game that day even though it started at 12 midnight and finished at 2am, it was well worth watching. When Torres scored the crucial first goal, I was on my feet, was absolutely ecstatic and was hoping Liverpool would just hold on the the 1-0 lead but their appetites seemed insatiable as they continued attacking and Torres scored his 2nd goal. 2 beautiful goals in the space of 5 minutes. I hope to see Liverpool play exactly like this even against the smaller teams, this is how they can possibly dominate the title charge. Truly in the end, the Reds deserved the 2-0 victory as they kept bombarding Petr Cech with shot after shot.

Now I am very happy with the win but of course there are certain other issues that need to be addressed. The most controversial of them all was the sending of Frank Lampard by Mike Riley. Honestly that really wasn't warranted of a Red Card but Riley just showed Lampard a straight red and guess who Lampard challenged to get sent off....none other than Xabi Alonso. The curse of Xabi Alonso continues and Frank Lampard is the 5th player to be sent of this season for a challenge against Alonso. Knowing Mike Riley's style of refereeing, he was bound to bring out a card and a yellow card would have more than sufficed but honestly, a free kick would have done the job. Another issue that needs to be addressed was Bosingwa kicking Yossi Benayoun, that on the contrary deserved a STRAIGHT RED card but he didn't even get a yellow. Honestly I'm not a huge fan of Riley and much preferred Howard Webb to be match official, he is a strict and fair referee.

Onto the other matches, for those of you Manchester United fans gloating about getting a victory against our Merseyside rivals, I just have one thing to say, anyone can score from a penalty and it apparently seems to include Cristiano Ronaldo into this category as well. Liverpool worked their legs off and scored the goals against Everton the way it should be, with HARD WORK. Needless to say Manchester United created their fair share of chances but Tim Howard was able to stop pretty much all of them so I don't think it really is a solid victory but it's a victory nonetheless that keeps them 2 points ahead of Liverpool and the Red Devils still have a game in hand.

Arsenal's draw with West Ham United was really dissapointing, honestly, Arsenal were playing the match like they just played another match 5 minutes before, it was slow paced and very unexpected of Arsenal, another dissapointing performance.

Liverpool now have built up some good momentum now into the following weeks and Torres has regained his form. This hopefully will lead to a string of more victories that will increase the pressure on Manchester United's title hopes. Liverpool have managed however to do something the Red Devils couldn't do this season and that is doing the league double over Chelsea. Right now, it's a promising position to be in for Liverpool. The final score, its Liverpool 2, Chelsea nil.

Barclays Premier League- The title race hangs in the balance

2009-01-31T17:28:00.002+08:00

Hi guys,

The premiership title race continues and midweek fixtures are over so i'd like to talk a little bit about them. Let's start with the Big 4 first.

Liverpool with yet ANOTHER disappointing draw. They were leading 1-0 away from home against Wigan Athletic at the JJB Stadium but lost it when Lucas carelessly gave away a penalty. Lucas is a good player don't get me wrong but I just feel he needs more experience and his playing techniques need improvement. The positives from this match was the phenomenal goal from Yossi Benayoun, what a strike from sucjh a sharp angle. Honestly I don't really know what's going on with Rafael Benitez, he should be utilising Keane much more than he is right now. Keane has the ability to play match after match and in my opinion he should have been used in every single match up till now so that he would gain more playing experience with the squad and would possibly have scored more goals.

Manchester United seem to be on fire now, where many teams have weaknesses, Manchester United on the other hand doesn't seem to have many, even with their mounting injury problems they seem to be such a threatening force to all the teams they face, one example would be the 5-0 hammering they gave West Bromwich Albion away from home. One thing I appreciate about Ferguson is that he makes full use of his players. Take for example Robbie Keane's former striker partner from Tottenham, Dimitar Berbatov, he is starting nearly every match and the more he plays, the more he gets used to playing with his squad and now he seems to be proficient at scoring goals for Manchester United.

Chelsea also seem to be regaining form with 2 wins in their last 2 games. They seem to be coming to perspective with things and are favourites to win this weekend at Anfield.

Arsenal, honestly i'm not to sure where they are going, they picked up another draw against Everton who seem to be in good shape right now.

Liverpool now seriously must play Robbie Keane in ALL and i mean ALL games for the rest of the season in ALL competitions, he needs he experience and he need to be used as there are many potential goals that can be scored by him. Sure he misses a lot of chances but Berbatov was not really on top form when he first transferred to Manchester United and now look at him. He was playing in so many games that he has gained rhythm. If Rafa wants a good chance of winning at Anfield which is absolutely crucial this Sunday, he needs to play Robbie Keane and Fernando Torres up front. Not playying it safe with the 4-5-1 but go and attack with a 4-4-2. Play Reina in goal, Hyypia and Skrtel in central defence, Carragher and Arbeloa as full backs, Benayoun and Riera as wingers, Alonso and Gerrard in central midfield and a strike force of Robbie Keane and Fernando Torres.

I am dissapointed with Liverpool's performances but its still not to late to make a comeback, after all...Liverpool are the come back kings so if by chance Liverpool do win against Chelsea and Manchester United happen to draw against an overly defensive Everton, the Reds can make a dramatic comeback into the title race but even if Manchester United win, and Liverpool wins as well, it's still a promising sign. I have faith and confidence in Liverpool that they will play very well and put up a real fight against Chelsea come this Sunday at Anfield.

WWE Royal Rumble 2008

2009-01-31T17:13:00.002+08:00

Hi guys,

Alright I am way overdue for a blogpost and I don't intend to keep my blog in the dumps like i did in 2007, I revived it last year and I plan to keep in maintained and active. So here we go. For you wrestling junkies out there, the Royal Rumble has just finished and the winner is........Randy Orton, you heard it right. I was really hoping it would be Shawn Michaels but it wasn't too be. I am really hoping that he will be World Heavyweight Champion again after all the years he has given to wrestling.

Back to the subject, the legend killer won the Rumble match and in so doing has earned himself a guaranteed Championship match for any of the 3 major titles in the WWE which are the World Heavyweight Championship, The WWE Championship or the ECW World Championship regardless of what roster the current champion is on but needless to say, we all pretty much know who Orton will go for and its gonna be close to home if you know what I mean. If you don't know what I mean, he'll be aiming to win the World Heavyweight title which is on his own brand of Monday Night RAW. The current World Heavyweight Champion is none other than John Cena and he's proving his title credentials like he always does, time and time again.

Onto the results, if you want the pictures, please proceed to WWE's official homepage..

Randy Orton wins Royal Rumble Match

Edge def. Jeff Hardy (New WWE Champion)

World Heavyweight Champion John Cena def. JBL

Melina def. Beth Phoenix (New Women's Champion)

ECW Champion Jack Swagger def. Matt Hardy

These are the results and here are my thoughts. I know Orton is a heel and many of us don't really like him that much but he's still in my opinion has a lot of potential, he's severely under rated and he looks to be the X-Division type of wrestler. I was hoping Shawn would win but unfortunately he didn't so maybe it could be his year next year or he may even win a chance in the "Money in the bank" ladder match at WrestleMania.

Edge defeating Jeff Hardy was stupid, Jeff was dominating the match when his own brother Matt nailed him with a steel chair for Edge to pick up the win and be the new WWE Champion. Don't get me wrong though, Edge is a great wrestler too but I think his status as a heel is making him look like a jobber when in truth he really isn't.

John Cena defeating JBL is no surprise, we've seen the Chain Gang Commander overcome the Longhorn loudmouth on multiple occasions but nonetheless picking up a win over JBL is a good confidence booster.

I was waiting for soo long for some Diva to beat Beth Phoenix, i really couldn't stand the Glamazon and finally Melina, although not the Diva I was hoping would get the title nevertheless got the job done and she is the new women's champion.

I guess what goes around, comes around and Matt never won back his championship either but there was no external interference from Jeff.

Well that's my thoughts on the Royal Rumble. Stay tuned for No Way Out.

CF- Jan 23

2009-01-25T16:16:00.003+08:00

Hi guys,

I'm way overdue for a blog post so here we go. I'm going to be talking about CF on Friday, it was absolutely fantastic. It all started with me bumping into the big boss (Christine) and she said we needed to get some amps to our venue for the instruments. We had to move 4 amplifiers all the way to the music classroom in Block B from the main campus and it indeed wasn't an easy task but luckily for us, we were allowed permission for the utility of the ICSJ transport lorry. Ok its nothing big for those of you who haven't seen it. It isn't a Petr Bilt truck with a 20 ton trailer, its a puny lil lorry but nevertheless we were very grateful that we could use it. When we reached the B-Block, we shifted the amps up to the music classroom and the room was more or less getting setup with the instruments and also being prepped for Banana Foosball (I'll explain later). After the hard work, temptation got the best of me and once Brian gave me the green light, I was playing FIFA 08 on his XPS but here's the best part, since his laptop was hooked up to the projector, everyone in the room could see me playing so losing was not an option. Thank God again I managed to win both games against Manchester United and Real Madrid using Liverpool of course hehe.

Now, the first order of business was to sing songs as usual which we did. But today was special as we had a special guest, Mr. Zlwin Chew. He was going to be sharing with us as well as perform some magic tricks. Now as soon as I heard magic tricks, I was soon remembering the brilliant magician on Orientation Night and thought I would see the same corny BRAWLER. Now Zlwin wouldn't like me calling it "tricks" because it symbolises deceit so I shall just call it magic. I have to say that even though he didn't perform super fancy magic like Moudini did, it was fantastic to watch as his presentation was excellent. His magic was pretty amazing too and given the fact that he was being watched by 30-40 of us in a small classroom, he did astoundingly well and I was very satisfied with his performance. Zlwin then shared a wonderful story with us and he used a paper cut snowflake as representation. The story was basically about a small boy who went bad but was saved by God's love and grace and became a better person. As he told the story about the boy becoming bad, he slowly tore up the snowflake a bit at a time until it was in several pieces. Then when the story got to the part about him being soaked in God's love, he used water to represent God's compassion and put the torn up paper snowflake into the glass of water. At the end of the story, he took out the soaked paper snowflake, clutched it in his hands, took out a foldable type fan and fanned the paper in his hand and out came hundreds and hundres of tiny pieces of paper which looked just like snow fall. It was simply amazing, his story was so meaningful and the representation was excellent and I'm thankful to God for allowing me to be at ICF to witness this.

Orientation Night- January 2009

2009-01-18T14:54:00.009+08:00

Hi guys,

Orientation Night was just last Friday and it was tiring no doubt but at the end of the day I had fun. I volunteered to help out the guys as I really wanted to do my part and contribute. For this semester, the AUP society stepped up to the plate to organize orientation night for the newbies as well as the other students. The theme used this time was an Egyptian one, you know....Mummies, Pharaoh's.....etc.

First onto preparation, the committee for this project toiled long and hard and now it came to the big day, the stage was already more or less setup on the previous day itself and all that was missing was the backdrop and chairs. I along with a group of my buddies helped arrange the chairs and get the rooms ready for the Mr. and Ms. Inti's to change and do any last minute preparations

Now onto what happened, the night even had a nice little storyline. You see every Orientation will see a new Mr. & Ms. Inti be crowned and this time due to the Egyptian theme, they were called Prince and Princess respectively. There was one student acting as the Pharaoh and he is just about to choose his Prince and Princess a.k.a. the new Mr. & Ms. Inti amongs the 5 Princes and 5 Princesses to help him rule his kingdom right at the beginning of the night. Just as he is about to do so, the Pharaoh mysteriously is assassinated even after being protected by "guards" and from that point of time, the fate of the "Princes" & "Princesses" lies in the hands of the "people" a.k.a the students of Inti College Subang Jaya to choose their next Prince and Princess and so a a grueling competition begins amongst the royals to fight for their place as Heir (Mr. Inti) & Heiress (Ms. Inti) to the Pharaoh's kingdom and throne. The current Mr. Inti and Ms. Inti were Ilyas and Jean respectively and were the VIP guests and 2 of the 3 judges seeing who was worthy of their title.

Now before we carry on to that, some of the main highlights were the awesome performances by the band "Bus Company", the Thriller dance, the belly dance, latin dance performance and the magic show by Mr. Moudini who claims to be a student of the world renowned David Blaine. Our beloved Inti Band played as well for the final performance of the night.

Forgive me but the events are not written in chronological order so please bare with me in this blogpost. Please check the programme pamphlet for more info. Now onto the talent performances for the Mr. and Ms. Inti contestants.

Starting with the Ms. Inti's

F1- Angeline played the acoustic guitar really well and she has a nice singing voice as well so kudos to her...THUMBS UP

F2- Sarah did the pink panther dance and started to get "comfortable" on stage by letting go of the tight clothing but unfortunately it was all for nothing as she wearing a t-shirt underneath anyways but still her dancing was fancy as far as I can comment

F3- Kayal as far as I can see was very "flexible", her dancing was very good and she even did a split at the end of her dance segment, must have learnt gymnastics...

F4- Avanda did a ballet dance which is not a talent you would normally see being performed and it was great on the part of it being a bit unique but the dancing was pretty good too.

F5- Now onto Alia's performance, I was looking forward to this as her talent was playing an electric guitar so I was sort of looking forward to seeing an Avril Lavigne type performance but she played the classical guitar attached to an amp so it was ok but not what I expected, also the volume was not loud enough so I can't really blame her for me not being able to listen but I'll give her credit for her effort and the fact that being able to play the guitar is a great talent in general.

Now its time to comment on the Mr. Inti's

M1- Desmond if im not mistaken played a guitar, umm sorry i kinda forgot.

M2- Alex was performing a hip hop dance which wasn't amazing but good nonetheless

M3- Chun Kiat's breakdance was really well performed, its quite a feat to actually be able to break dance so hats off to him plus he executed his moves really well.

M4- Aslam was supposed perform stand up comedy but I wasn't really amused as I'm sure most of the people on the night watching would agree.

M5- Siva was performing juggling tricks and he showed marvelous dexterity with the juggling balls using his hands and juggling a football on his leg.

Now onto the other performances, Bus Company was simply awesome, they played very well and were damn entertaining, I salute them. I've not mentioned this before but people who can beatbox simply amaze me, it just sounds so freaking real like its being electronically synthesised. It is so damn cool to see that and Bus Company's drummer could beatbox at drum at the same time which I think is awesome. The vocals were pretty damn good too and of course the guitarists and bass player were very good as well.

The thriller dance which was choreographed by College Players was very nicely done, all of them danced well although there were too many dancers on stage to the point that Zjen Thak (one of the dancers) nailed one of his steps on the steps.

The belly dance was also really well done, no complaints there, it was a well coordinated dance complimented with colorful costumes.

There was Latin dance performed by our beloved INTIMA president, Patricia and her dance partner Lucos which was very well done as well.

Now one of the sticking points of Orientation Night was the weather, due the rain we had to move everyone into the concourse but by then half of the audience had already been spotted leaving with bright orange bags.

In the concourse, the special magician.....Moudini, was hired to perform for us but his tricks were nothing spectacular as to what his mentor would have been capable of performing. Just regular, run of the mill, staged magic tricks if you ask me. For instance, when he supposedly stuck a blade through a students throat, it was hidden from view because of the harness clamped on to his neck, we all know the blade is bendable. Next was another chopping illusion where Mr. Moudini was going to cut Jean's hand off and he demonstrated that his so called contraption was real by cutting carrots. I can see that at cooking demonstrations, thank you very much. We all know that the blade does not slice through the segment of the device where Jean's hand was locked in, yet it was hilarious to see Jean praying and laughing at the same time hahahaha lol, she indeed has proven to Inti that she has nerves of steel hehehe.

Then our beloved Inti band played brilliantly as well and caught the attention of everyone and the scene looked like what you would normally see at a rock concert with fans jumping up and down. Even Zjen Thak graced the stage with a dance of his own.

The lucky draw was one of the most interesting parts and at least this time, no one bought 500 tickets to win all the prizes like they did last time for Stact Club's orientation nite during May/June last year. I know it was for charity but it was a little too much for God Sake and even with the Charity donations, China with its massive economy is more than capable of supporting the victims without making so much as scratch in their financial economy. Back to the lucky draw, I didn't win anything but I wasn't so disappointed as I only bought 1 ticket and I enjoyed myself during the night and the grand prizes of 2 IPod shuffles were won by Giovanni Winna and one other lucky guy. I only know one of the winners because she is in my art class...lol. There was a special way to win it which was by catching a soft ball thrown by the MC into the audience but a thousand guys (including me) jumped at it like hungry t-rex's trying to get a piece of meat and everyone missed and all the winner had to do was pick it up haha...talk about luck.

Now, about the rain, the most miraculous thing is that only once the Mr. and Ms. Inti contestants were done with their talent performances did it start raining so talk about luck indeed and the rain stopped in time for our awesome Inti band to play in the basketball court.

Notable improvements in Orientation night was ones of the PA system and the volume of the microphones.....at least this time, we could hear the vocal performances clearly and the singers of our Inti band were singing really well so I applaud that as well.

Overall the night was great and I enjoyed myself and I hoped the newbies did too as we seniors put a lot of effort into this and I commend the committee and most importantly the people behind the committee giving their unshakable support. Another job well done indeed.

Barclays Premier League.......the race tightens

2009-01-15T19:36:00.003+08:00

Hi guys,

As you all know, Liverpool dropped another chance to pick up 3 points against Stoke City and had to share the spoils with their hosts as they left the Britannia with a goalless scoreline but Manchester United more than capitalized on their oppurtunity at Old Trafford against Chelsea and absolutely hammered the blues with a shocking 3-0 victory. Manchester United are in top form now I have to admit and look quite likely to draw level with Liverpool's 18 championships. Liverpool really need to start building momentum and picking up victories non-stop if they are going to win the Premier League title this season. I certainly hope the Reds can focus one game at a time, and play with a more attacking mentality and of course still maintain a rock solid defense and work out good tactical plays. Rafael Benitez needs to start playing Robbie Keane and Fernando Torres up front together in a 4-4-2 formation much more frequently if they Liverpool are going to prove to be a formiddable force this season. As a Liverpool fan I still have faith in my Reds and am confident they can maintain a good run till the end of the season. Right now, Liverpool need to focus on their next game which is the Merseyside Derby against Everton and the toffees aren't what they were when Liverpool played them the last time around, they are now on top form and will prove to be a much more formidable opponent against Liverpool and I hope Liverpool start getting consistent wins from now on in all competitions especially in the Barclays Premier League.

1st Half.....DONE

2008-12-29T20:52:00.010+08:00

Hi guys,

It's the end of the year and Liverpool is still in 1st place in the Barclays Premier League. This is obviously a very good position to be in at the end of the year but needless to say it needs to be maintained till the end of the season. Liverpool ended the year with an emphatic 5-1 victory against Newcastle United at St. James's Park. Gerrard scored 2 of the five goals while Sami Hyypia, Ryan Babel and Xabi Alonso scored the other 3. Liverpool were absolutely brilliant and completely deserved the score they got. They bombarded the Newcastle goal in the first half with so many chances which did not receive enough compensation with the 2-1 lead the Reds initially had at half time but they left St. James's with a pretty decent scoreline although we all know it could so easily have been double that for Liverpool.

Arsenal picked up a narrow victory with a 1-0 victory over Portsmouth possibly giving them hopes of still being in the title race. Chelsea also missed a chance to close the gap with Liverpool by drawing in their match against Fulham with the same scoreline. Manchester United grabbed another 3 points with a narrow 1-0 victory as well at Old Trafford against Middlesbrough. As the pundits on Football Focus and other football shows have said these past few months, it has been one of the most competitive seasons in the history of the Premier League, it's practically impossible to predict because you just don't know which team could possibly win. For instance, you'd have thought that the Big 4 could thrash almost any team in the league but the lower teams are proving to be quite a hurdle to overcome for all of them and I salute the other teams for putting up a fight. So here is the current league table at the end of the 1st half of the season.

There you have it. For now it's a great position to be in but the race to crown the Barclays Premier League winner couldn't be closer. I as a Liverpool fan am proud, Liverpool have really worked hard and deserve 1st place but there is still a long way to go in this epic battle. Liverpool have won the Premier League 18 times while Manchester United have won it 17 times so the race is on to keep a 2 championship lead over the Red Devils but for this season they still have 2 games in hand which could secure them 2nd place. I as a fan have plenty of confidence in the reds but Liverpool must not take things lightly, they must continue the good performances, keep winning matches and keep the momentum going. The FA Cup is soon coming into view for the Barclays Premier League teams so it adds yet another challenge.

Now the January transfer window is soon to open and new faces will emerge amongst teams and hopefully Liverpool's squad continues to grow ever stronger as they go on a quest to get their holy grail which is the Barclays Premier League title and maybe also work hard enough to possibly win the UEFA Champions League championship as well. For now, things are looking good and I feel that Liverpool have really strengthened the belief that a strong title challenge is emerging from Merseyside in the Premier League. Things are looking good as we head into the new year as we carry on into the exciting and thrilling title race week after week of the Barclays Premier League.

BPL & UCL action roundup

2008-12-23T13:06:00.002+08:00

Hi guys,

Ok, let's gather things up. As Liverpool heads to Christmas, the Reds will be happy to know that their little brothers on Merseyside stopped the blues from snatching first place from the Reds. During this weekend, only 3 of the big 4 played as Manchester United were at the FIFA World Club Championships in Japan. Arsenal and Liverpool faced off in a match that would benefit both clubs in different ways. If Arsenal were to win, they would be just 5 points behind League leaders; Liverpool but if Liverpool themselves had won they would have secured their spot in 1st place before Christmas. Both Liverpool and Arsenal had defeated Manchester United and Chelsea in this season so far, so which of these 2 sides would prove to be the best of the Big 4.

It was a very interesting match indeed and I admit that Arsenal did play well although they created very few chances indeed. As usual, Liverpool had a barrage of chances and I am not being biased but I know that Liverpool could have come away from this match with a very comfortable victory. As it stood by half time, Steven Gerrard missed 2 golden opputunities to extend their lead and Dirk Kuyt had a brilliant strike at goal which almost went in but Almunia managed to keep out. In the 2nd half, Daniel Agger and El Zhar both had good chances as well but it so unfortunately missed. It wasn't a goalless draw however, Robin Van Persie scored in the 23rd minute with his weaker right foot to give Arsenal and early one goal lead but Robbie Keane equalised in the 42nd minute with an absolutely cracking goal that was smashed into the net. Arsenal did suffer 2 big blows during the match as well, Cesc Fabregas sustained an injury after attempting to slide tackle Jamie Carragher to disposses him of the ball and Emmanuel Adebayor got sent off after a second yellow for rough play. Arsenal were playing with 10 men but sometimes, it isn't exactly enough to take advantage of a team. Normally I say that matches end up quite close but even against Arsenal, Liverpool should have taken advantage and won this match hands down. The same goes for their previous matches with Fulham, West Ham, Hull City and Stoke City because it was so unfortunate that the best had to come out in each of these 4 teams goalkeepers, when they faced Liverpool. On the other hand, I guess a draw isn't too bad as well as both these teams have beaten Manchester United and Chelsea and perhaps a draw was warranted. Now with Liverpool ahead of Chelsea with a 2 point lead, it was the Blues oppurtunity to get a win against Liverpool's merseyside rivals and get 3 points but Everton fough courageously to a 0-0 draw which keeps Liverpool 1 point ahead in 1st place.

In the Champions League, the Big are through to the knockout stages starting with the round of 16. Liverpool face a deadly Real Madrid while Chelsea face a ferocious Juventus. Manchester United have their work cut out for them as they face a threatening Inter Milan side and to most it seems that Arsenal have the easiest amongst the Big 4's opponents facing AS Roma in the knockout stages. Right now, the Champions League does not start again till February/March 2009.

As for now, Liverpool need to focus on the Barclays Premier League and really need to work at it and start taking their chances more often and scoring a lot more goals and pick up 6 points from their last 2 games of the year.

C & C: Generals

2008-12-18T09:54:00.007+08:00

Hi guys,

Amongst the array of RTS (Real Time Strategy) games that Electronic Arts have dished out, this has to be one of the most realistic if not the best. One thing I almost always appreciate in a game is it's realism, how much it actually resembles real life and what goes on in our world today. I'm talking about a game in the Command & Conquer universe made by EA called Generals.

Command & Conquer: Generals is a real-time strategy game in the Command & Conquer series. Generals utilizes the SAGE (Strategy Action Game Engine) engine. This proprietary engine is an extended version of the Command & Conquer: Renegade 3D engine. Generals was released onto the Microsoft Windows platform in 2003, and a Mac OS version was released in 2004, marking the return of the Command & Conquer series to that platform. An expansion pack, entitled Command & Conquer: Generals – Zero Hour, was additionally released for PC in 2003, and for Mac OS in 2005.

Now having played Red Alert 2 before and that being my very first RTS game, R.A. 2 is a game I would highly recommend for RTS beginners and I mean ones who really don't know too much about the Red Alert franchise. Don't bother with the first game because it looks boring as hell. Starting with the 2nd one will suffice to prep you for the RTS genre. Back to the subject, in the comparison of Red Alert 2 and Generals, Generals is far more realistic as the units you create are one's that are within the capabilities of creation amongst mankind today and not the Psychic Mumbo Jumbo that was shown in Yuri's Revenge and even perhaps the slightly science fictional twist in the original Red Alert 2 itself. Tesla Troopers? Desolators? Chronospheres, Iron Curtains and Weather Machines? I think we get the point.

Sadly though, even though I love realism, this is the first RTS game in the Command & Conquer series that does not include full motion video cut scenes which always made the game exciting.

Now on to the usual, the game will be rated based on Graphics, Game play, Interface and Features.

The Graphics is decent, nothing jaw dropping but a definite improvement from Red Alert 2 even though they aren't related, I'm just talking progress in general. The infantry looks too plain but the tanks look very realistic and also the aircraft to a certain extent. The buildings look pretty good too and are off like like sizes in comparison to units.

The gameplay is pretty awesome, the speed leaves much to be desired though there is a significant performance increase in it's expansion pack which i'll mention for another time. It will operate fast though as long as you have a reasonably decent system. There are 3 basic factions in the game; the USA, China and the GLA (Global Liberation Army). As you would expect, the U.S. are high on technology and have an amazing air force as well as solid tanks and infantry. The Chinese are more the horde together and assault type where they gather large numbers of troops and attack you. Their tank division is amazing though their air force is not so mouth watering and their infantry are not to bad either. The Global Liberation Army is one which is depicted after middle eastern military warfare where there are units that range from terrorists and angry mobs to bomb trucks and toxin tractors.
The U.S. of A has a lot of nice units I like to use, amongst the tank division I like the Crusader and Paladin tanks, amongst the infantry I like the misile defenders and Colonel Burton and amongst aircraft I like the Raptor but stealth bombers are pretty cool being able to escape detection if possible but the Raptor has a larger payload. Construction of buildings looks more realisitic although of course it doesn't take years to make one building but it actually erects a build site and a "Dozer" goes in to make your respective building, the building you want can be selected from a tab after selecting your "Dozer" or "Slave" in the case of GLA and your buildings will be constructed.

The chinese are all about the tanks but they're infantry aren't too bad either, for everyone 1 red guard unit you train, 2 will come out of the baracks so for a platoon of 50 of them, you'll only need to train 25. Mind you that the red guard use shot guns so even though shot guns do pack a bigger punch than rifles or SMG's that the U.S.A. Ranger's or G.L.A. Rebels use respectively, I suggest using them in large groups, same goes for infantry in general. Black lotus is pretty cool too as she not only can capture enemy buildings but she can do the same for enemy vehicles as well and not to mention steal cash from enemy supply depots if you manage get control of one. The chinese have an average airforce considering the fact that they only have one type of aircraft and carry 2 bombs each, I would defintely insist on purchasing the black napalm upgrade because if you do so, your napalm enabled units can deep fry enemy infantry and do a good sauting for tanks as well and this includes your fighter jets.

The GLA tanks can be chewed up pretty easily but they can pack a punch as well. There is a lot of hit and run tactics. One of their most deadly units is the angry mob. This unit can be trained at the barracks and one mob consists of a small group of angry people who throw torches and various other items at whatever vehicles, infantry and buildings they are attacking. Beware of this unit because if you think you can over run these units so easily with just a few tanks, think again because if your not careful 5-10 groups of these can kick your CENSORED especially if you purchase the AK-47 upgrade for them, that makes them even more deadly than they already are. Even heavy armored tanks like the superior overlord or the mighty paladin can be ripped to shreds with this angry mob unit. Beware though and do try to keep multiple mobs separated or preoccupied with fighting your opponent or else mobs will start fighting one another if idle for sometime.

Each faction have their own array of special abilities and commands you can unlock by earning points for kills basically. The more enemy units and buildings you destroy, the more points you get to get promoted to becoming a higher ranking general with special access to abilities like the Fuel Air Bomb for the U.S.A, the Anthrax bomb for the GLA or the EMP bomb for China but these are only examples of the many cool abilities you can unlock.

Each faction have their own super weapon as well. The U.S.A. go high tech with their Particle Cannon which is basically a super weapon that generates a very deadly laser beam that is shot up into space and retransmitted back down to earth via satellite to you desired location and it can be moved around so you can clear clusters of enemy tanks, infantry and destroy or even cause severe damage to enemy buildings as well. The Chinese go old school and use Nuclear Missiles to nuke their enemies and the GLA use a scud storm device which basically launches scud missilles loaded with explosives and anthrax and in one launch, multiple numbers of them are fired at the same time. One great thing about this game is that it does not restrict you on the number of super weapons you can build although there is an option you can enable to do so but im sure in most cases, that won't be the scenario meaning you can build multiple numbers of Particle Cannons, Nuclear Missile silos and Scud Storms and the number of them you build depends on $KACHING$ your bank account, landspace and power supply but you won't really need that many. Speaking of power supply, the GLA do not need to build power plants for their base to function, it absolutely has no use for them. Only USA and China build power plants. The USA use cold fusion reactors and their power output capability can be increased by purchasing the power plant's control rods upgrade which minimises the need to make too many power plants. The Chinese use nuclear reactors and these too can generate more power but you need to click on the damage feature of the reactor which causes the reactor to slowly get damaged to generate more power which if you ask me is really stupid because the reactor will eventually blow up so i suggest building a sufficient numbers of nuclear reactors.

Speaking of which, in the game, your funding comes in the form of supplies, there are supply docks in and around the map and of course nearby your base so you can build a supply depot have a "collector" to gather supplies so you can get cash. The U.S.A. uses helicopters, China uses lorries and the G.L.A. use slaves again, these are the same slaves you can use to make buildings and all 3 of them collect different amounts of supplies. Mind you that you should purchase the shoe upgrade for GLA slaves because it gives them shoes to walk with and in turn makes them happy from the already harsh working conditions and they will collect more supplies in one go and probably build faster too. Now each of them collects a respective amount of supplies and delivers it to the supply depot to be converted into MONAAY. It's a good idea to build supply depot's nearby supply docks BUT keep in mind that these supply docks WILL run out eventually so you need to find a source of funding after that. Have no fear because each faction have their own way out of this problem. The U.S.A. solve this calamity in the form of supply drop zones whereby planes will fly by every now and then in a repective time period to paradrop you supplies the U.N. gives to fund your war on terror. Make as many of these as you can and the cash keeps rolling in. China does it in the form of hackers, these are units you can train at the barracks and once you do so garrison as many of them as you can into the internet center, they will get right to work and start hacking the internet for money and they won't take up land space and besides, they should go in their anyways but of course the internet center can only hold so many so make sure you take the remaining hackers and put them in one corner and enable the hack option for money on them. They will constantly hack the internet for money and the longer they do, the more promotion they get and the more money they can all hack at once, hackers with the highest veterancy level can get $10 at once but mind you that this $10 keeps coming every few seconds so imagine you having 50 top veteran hackers EACH getting $10 in 2 or 3 seconds which can eventually lead to a lot of money plus the fact that im sure you will look for other supply depots to fund your war effort which is a norm for all factions. The GLA get their fund flow in the form of black markets, every few seconds it mysteriously makes money pop out of somewhere for you so be thankful, probably from all the "deals" that's going on. The black market can be used to purchase many useful and cool upgrades as well so its not a complete waste to make many of em. You also have the ability to capture oil derricks which your basic infantry can do once your purchase the capture building upgrade.

Each faction have their own special elite unit as well. Colonel Burton representing the U.S.A. in one corner who has the ability to levels multitudes of infantry and one that can help you come to terms relatively easily with the angry mob if you know what I mean. He also can plant C-4 and you have the choice as to whether to do it by remote manual detonation or by timed detonation so you can set up booby traps, that's cool!! China's elite is black lotus, beware though because she in unarmed, she just carries a state of the art, high performance laptop having the ability to capture buildings, vehicles and stealing money from supply depots as mentioned earlier. The GLA's elite unit is Jarmen Kel who is an elite sniper unit. He can kill infantry from long distance and when it comes to tanks your probably wondering, how can he handle that problem, well Burton for instance can shoot it or probably detonate tanks with C4 if you can get close enough and escape in time although it isn't a recommendable suggestion. Jarmen Kel has the ability to snipe the drivers inside tanks but he cannot do this non-stop. It is a timed ability so every few minutes he is able to do put a driver to sleep. Once he kills the driver of an enemy tank, you can send your Rebel into the tank as the driver and the tank is yours, its especially cool if you can capture powerful enemy tanks, if you do capture a damaged, rust bucket, send it for repairs before you use it.

Another thing this game lacked were the special movie cutscenes with real actors, here they show animated movies of war going on in the battlefield before they get you started on a respective campaign mission but it is pretty good too.

One thing that pisses me of though in this game is that they do not put so much emphasis on naval warfare. The U.S.A. naval units look super cool and you can kick some serious UH UH with that BRAWLER but you don't have the ability to construct naval units for any faction which is a major drawback and probably the reason Electronic Arts made up for their mistakes, not even in the generals expansion pack although they do allow you use of the navy in the second U.S.A. campaign mission but in Red Alert 3 itself where alot of emphasis is placed on Naval warfare, so much so that you can construct buildings on water. Also the GLA lack the ability to construct an airforce unless you can capture an enemies airfield.

In basic terms, U.S.A. rocks the airforce, China rules for tanks and the GLA blazes with infantry. Although I'm not saying their other units are completely useless but these are their strongest attributes

The interface looks really cool with a background of a battle in progress; there is a location somewhere in the middle east where a USA comanche (something like an appache helicopter) lays crashed in the middle of a town square and U.S.A. tanks surround and protect it while they blast enemy GLA tanks on the outside coming in non-stop. It's quite nice to use and the presentation is good.

The features of the game are nice as well. They have a good multiplayer feature where you can duke it out with other players on the network or even do online battles, downloadable maps are made available and what not. It also has a good skirmish mode for head to head battles with the computer on a few difficulty levels and various maps.

Graphics: 8
Gameplay: 9
Interface: 8.5
Features: 9

Overall: 8.6 out of 10

It's a great game overall and even though it lacks certain features like the in game movie cutscenes that we command & conquer junkies have loved for so long, it really lives up to expectation and it's genre as a REAL Time Strategy game.

Crisis or Crysis!

2008-12-17T21:50:00.008+08:00

Hi guys,

Ok, time for a game review, it's on a game that came out a over a year ago titled Crysis. What is kind of game is Crysis you ask? It is a science fiction first-person shooter computer game developed by German video game developer Crytek and published by Electronic Arts, and is the first game of a planned trilogy. It was released in November 2007 and over 1.5 million copies have been sold worldwide.

Crysis is based in a fictional future where an ancient alien spacecraft has been discovered beneath the Earth on an island near the coast of Korea. The single-player campaign has the player assume the role of United States Delta Force operator Jake Dunn, referred to in-game by his call sign, Nomad. Nomad is armed with various futuristic weapons and equipment, most notably a "Nano Muscle Suit" which, according to Crytek senior game designer Bernd Diemer, was inspired by the United States' Future Force Warrior 2020 program and other projects relating from the Natick Soldier Systems Center. In Crysis, the player fights both North Korean and extraterrestrial enemies, in four different locations: a tropical island jungle, inside an "Ice Sphere" (consisting of the same jungle, but frozen), the alien ship itself (with a zero-gravity area) and a United States Navy aircraft carrier. Crysis uses Microsoft's new API, Direct3D 10 (DirectX 10) for graphics rendering, and includes the same editor that was used by Crytek to create the game.

As usual, I shall be rating this game based on graphics, gameplay, features and interface.

First, the graphics I have to say is breathtaking, the attention to detail they have given this game is amazing. Crysis is a game notoriously know to melt even some of the highest spec'd gaming systems. It is officialy named as the best FPS game on the market today. I have tried playing this game in FTZ's PC's and when I max out the graphics settings, the game runs at slide show speeds. However even on the lower settings in the game, details of the environment such as the enemy soldiers, your own comrades, the greenery and water surrounding the island is stunning to see.

The gameplay is also brilliant. It has a flowing plot to make you go on and on and the game itself is quite lengthy so it does take a respectable amount of time to finish it in singleplayer. The enemy soldiers also behave intelligently by flanking, calling for help or taking cover and not to mention swearing. This game's age rating is 18+. In the story in the game, you play the character called Nomad.

Like mentioned above, he and his team are armed with special nanosuits that has the ability to give them tremendous strength, incredible speed, regenerating armor and cloaking which can be used in combat and can come in useful on many occassions. Mind you though that these abilities do come at a price. The default mode your put in is always "Maximum Armor" mode which gives cushions the blows from incoming enemy fire. Using "Maximum Speed" mode uses up your suits energy even as you stand still but start to run and it depletes much more quickly. The same goes with the cloaking mode, this ensures your not lazy and just able to sneak up on enemies anywhere and anytime at your own leisure while enemy solidiers are mysteriously picked off like flies by some force from the unknown. Also when your too low on suit power, the particular ability you are using from example "Maximum Speed" mode is temporarily disabled and the suit automatically recharges till you just have enough energy, not recharged all the way through to start using the special ability again but do keep in mind that the suit always recharges the fastest in "Maximum Armor" mode so if your low on power enable the abilities display/console, switch back to "Maximum Armor" mode if your using a different ability, take cover and once your full recharged, you ready to kick BRAWLER again.

You also have the ability to capture and utilise vehicles such as Humvees, trucks, tanks, helicopters and motor boats which come armed with weapons but certain vehicles do not such as the black pick up trucks that you encounter at fixed points in the game. That can be used as a good suicide vehicle, for example, there was one point early in the game where I saw an enemy humvee in the distance with a couple of guards standing around it so I got into the black pick up drove as fast as I could toward the humvee and the soldiers and jumped out at the last minute and saw a beautiful fireworks and sound display KABOOM as the pick up went crashing into it, hehe that never get's old. Now needless to say that even though the humvee is armed with a heavy machine gun which you can utlise to level plethora's of soldiers but it's fun at times due to human nature to "blow UH UH up" although it is a good idea to keep changing vehicles in case your's is badly damaged and in case you do change for instance like humvees, make sure you blow the old one up because you never know if its used against you again and in any case you won't need to use the scrap heap that you just make yourself ever again. Vehicles are in plentiful supply in the game so it makes it fun to play. The story is pretty god although it may not exactly be original it's entertaining enough. At some parts of the game, your enemy soldier actually come armed with nanao suits so that is a pickle you need to work out of.

Onto the features, the game offers you a standard array of features but I'm not really up to date on that yet, the multiplayer is not really recommendable as it isn't as entertaining as singleplayer.

The interface is breathtaking and I absolutely love it, it's user friendly and it looks fantastic

Graphics: 9.8
Gameplay: 9.5
Features:8.8
Interface:9.8

Overall: 9.5 out of 10

In general, it is one of the best FPS games I have played and I loved it from the start, it is simply sensational and if you do have an enthusiast's computer, you may just get the best out of it.

WWE Armageddon 2008

2008-12-16T13:24:00.004+08:00

Hi guys,

Now that I've changed the format of my WWE special event posts. I shall be more than happy to finish up Armageddon as well.

Here are the results:-

Jeff Hardy def. Edge & Triple H (New WWE Champion)

World Heavyweight Champion John Cena def. Chris Jericho

Batista def. Randy Orton

Vladimir Kozlov def. ECW Champion Matt Hardy (Non-title)

HBK reveals deal with JBL

CM Punk def. Rey Mysterio (Intercontinental Title Tournament Finals)

Finlay def. Mark Henry (Belfast Brawl)

Michelle McCool, Kelly Kelly, Maria and Mickie James def. Maryse, Jillian, Victoria and Natalya

First and foremost, I want to say a huge congratulations to the Hardy Boyz, they were formerley great tag team champions and now they are great world champions, the 2 brothers holding 2 of the world titles.

WWE Champion, Jeff Hardy on the left and ECW World Champion, Matt Hardy on the right

Here are my thoughts on the results, i thoroughly believe Jeff Hardy deserved to become WWE Champion again as he has been fighting so hard and long to become champion again and I'm also glad Edge lost and was only WWE Champion for 1 week. I'm really happy John Cena beat Jericho again, Jericho has never managed to beat John Cena. I'm also happy that Batista won against Orton after his team's loss at Survivor Series...etc. Now this PPV would have been perfect if Matt Hardy won his non-title match against Kozlov but the Moscow Mauler overpowered the ECW World Champion. It was also saddening to see that HBK was so badly affected like many by the global economic crisis and that he finally revealed to work for JBL. Kudos to CM Punk for beating Rey Mysterio in the finals to face William Regal for the intercontinental title although in this case, either one of these men winning would have been good enough for me. Hats of to Finlay too for his resilience and beating Henry in a Belfast Brawl and finally the Diva team I hoped would win did indeed come out on top, congrats to Michelle McCool, Kelly Kelly, Mickie James and Maria.

Slammy Awards 2008

2008-12-15T10:51:00.057+08:00

Hi guys,

The Slammy Awards just finished last week on RAW and Armageddon is already over so I need to finish this post as fast as I can so I can do Armageddon as soon as possible. Now, the Slammy's is basically an award ceremony where wrestlers are presented with an award for a particular accomplishment like being "Wrestler of the year" or having participated for the "Match of the year" and so on. Now here are the results and winners of the Slammy's and the respective matches that ensued. Now one thing I've decided on discontinuing is putting up photos, if any of you want to see the photos, they are on WWE's homepage.

This will be the new format of how I will put posts on WWE PPV's and special events

Here are the slammy winners:-

Match of the year: Shawn Michaels (Shawn Michaels vs. Ric Flair, Career Threatening match @ WM24)

Superstar of the year: Chris Jericho

Diva of the year: Beth Phoenix

"Damn" moment of the year: The Great Khali (Khali Kiss Cam)

OMG Moment of the year: CM Punk (CM Punk cashes in money in the bank contract to become World Heavyweight Champion on RAW; June 30, 2008)

Couple of the year: Edge & Vickie Guerrero

Extreme moment of the year: Jeff Hardy (Jeff Hardy's Swanton Bomb on Randy Orton from the RAW set)

Best finishing maneuver: Evan Bourne (Shooting Star Press)

Tag Team of the year: John Morrison & The Miz

Best impersonation: Charlie Haas (As the GlamaHaas-impersonating Beth Phoenix)

Best announce team of the year: Matt Striker & Todd Grisham

Best WWE.com exclusive: John Morrison & The Miz (The Dirt Sheet)

Best musical performance: R-Truth (R-Truth's entrance- SmackDown; September 15, 2008

Breakout star of the year: Vladimir Kozlov

Match Results:-

Intercontinental Title Tournament (Semi-Finals): World Tag Team Champion CM Punk def. John Morrison

MVC (Most Valuable Charlie) def. MVP

Chris Jericho def. Jeff Hardy

Finlay & Hornswoggle def. Santino Marella & Women’s Champion Beth Phoenix

Intercontinental Title Tournament (Semi-Finals): Rey Mysterio def. World Tag Team Champion Kofi Kingston

Randy Orton, Manu & Cody Rhodes def. Triple H & Batista (Handicap Match)

Dolph Ziggler def. R-Truth (DQ)

World Heavyweight Champion John Cena vs. WWE Champion Edge (no contest)

Here are my thoughts on the Slammy winners, I think Shawn Michaels rightly deserved the award for match of the year as he is a legend but I didn't like the fact that JBL took it away from him. Chris Jericho really didn't deserve wrestler of the year award as I believe it should have been Triple H or Jeff Hardy instead. Didn't really like the fact that Beth Phoenix won Diva of the year award even though she is quite a dominant women's champion, I wish this award went to either Michelle McCool or Kelly Kelly. The Great Khali rightly deserved his award for DAMN moment of the year haha, he's been smooching quite a lot of ladies for sometime now. CM Punk also rightly got the OMG moment of the year award when he irnoically cashed in his money in the bank contract to face the ultimate oppurtunist at his weakest, good job CM, Edge got a taste of his own medicine. The couple of the year was crap, Edge and Vickie are NOT the couple of the year and neither is Glamerella but there was really no competition here. The prince of extreme rightly got his award for extreme moment of the year, that Swanton Bomb on Randy Orton was phenomenal and that just goes to show you that taking risks can pay off sometimes. To Evan Bourne, hats of to one of the best X-Division type WWE wrestlers I have seen, this young man is phenomenal, he deserves the award for finishing maneuver of the year. I don't really agree with Morrison and Miz as being the Tag Team of the year and I ain't jealous, period. it should have been DX instead. Regarding the award for best impersonation, there was no competition, Charlie Haas was the only guy doing impersonations, this award is kinda silly. As for announce team of the year, I cannot see how the least exciting commentary team in all 3 WWE brands gets the award, the award should have gone to either Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler or better yet Jim Ross and Tazz. Ok I guess I have to give some credit to Morrison and The Miz for best WWE.com exclusive as their's was the most entertaining but if you ask me, the most entertaining WWE.com exclusive of all time is "5 Questions With The Champ". I'm not to sure about musical performance but at least I'm glad that award didn't go to Jillian so congratulations Mr. Killings hehe. Finally for break out star of the year, I guess it has to be Kozlov, he has been pretty dominating, it'll be great to see him and Umaga in match hehe.

I realize it's not proper to put photos of matches and what not unless its something exceptional, it'll save me time too. I probably will however continue photo posting for WWE's 4 biggest PPV's namely The Royal Rumble, Wrestlemania, Summer Slam and Survivor Series. Other than that i'll just put up results and maybe talk about it a little like I did above. Enjoy. =)

PIKOM

2008-12-14T23:20:00.004+08:00

Hi guys,

The Pikom PC Fair is back and in quite a number of places this time meaning different states so the closest one I could go to was of course the one located in the KL Convention Center. Well for most of you reading this post, I'm pretty sure it would be too but for those of you back in your hometowns quite far away from Selangor, maybe not. Anyways today was the last day of the PC Fair at KLCC and it usually is the best time to go due to a very simple fact that on the last day at any certain venue, the dealers at the PC Fair normally give great deals. Going to the PC Fair is like a normal ritual I do with my Dad. I without fail will want to go there if at all possible and since I have missed a couple of PC Fair's before this, I most certainly was way overdue to go for one.

I arrived at the PC Fair at the usual time we'd normally be their which is around 11:30a.m. Now, one significant change I did notice from when I went to the PC Fair last year was that first of all, there would be a sea and I literally mean "SEA" of people heading out from the shopping complex at KLCC and walking through the park and making their way towards the convention center but this time it was so shocking to see only a little over half of what I normally would see. It may seem a lot to many of you first timers but believe me, it is nothing compared to the size of the normal crowd that usually turns up. Even inside the halls, no doubt there was a really big crowd but this time I could actually move around a little more freely than normal which is a big surprise, maybe it's the time I went but even still I would have expected way more people to be their. Another thing I noticed inside was the size of the booths. Went I went to the PIKOM PC Fair last year, the booths for the different companies themselves were marvels on their own apart from the great deals of course. They were huge, for instance Samsung had a humongous circular booth painted in glossy black paint and it look super stylish and most importantly big but this time it was significantly smaller then when I last remembered it. Even Sony's booth wasn't the spectacle that it was last year. As a matter of fact the hall your enter after passing the rotary entrance which I believe is what normally takes count of the number of people who attend the PC Fair is the hall that is normally a marvel to look at, the booths would be nothing short of gargantuan and not only that, the detail given to the aesthetics of the booth is simply something you have to stop and admire for a minute or so but this time, it was rather down scaled if you know what I mean. Also, most booths offered a smaller range of the respective companies products compared to what they did last year.

I seriously should have taken a picture of the hall last year and the relatively measly one I saw this year and put them side by side and you will know what I have meant by it. It's not that they were located at different halls or something, it simply was noticeably smaller this time.

No doubt this could all be a result of the current economic down turn but nevertheless, I was focusing on the hardware on sale. We went around through all halls except one where they were showing a demo for new PC users if I'm not mistaken. Later as my Dad and I passed through the halls in the ground floor, I saw a familiar face in the Kaspersky booth promoting their AntiVirus software and it happened to be a friend of mine from Inti, so I smiled and waved as soon as I took notice and she promptly responded with the expected response of a smile and wave as well haha. She wasn't standing as a model but just as a regular promoter but not to say she ain't pretty and all so don't get that part twisted. Nothing was thrown at me I assure you but now that I think of it, I was hoping that some or at least one of the models that quite a number of companies hired to promote their products would be one of my friends too haha, no harm in getting a snapshot with them and proudly saying, "Haha see, I have a super hot friend and you don't lol".

Ok ok, back to business, speaking of models anyways, the ones I saw were as trim and fit as you could get and quite a few of them had pretty faces on em but some of them were....umm well, not what you would expect I can guarantee that much, again it could be a result of the economic crisis the world is currently facing and seeing as how so many companies have laid off quite a number of their employees, I'm not surprised that all their models were not super pretty as they may have demanded for a higher pay, either that or their auditors don't have good taste. Last year I can clearly remember that there were way more models standing around and 95% or more of them were really pretty. Now speaking of personnel, some of the staff for their respective companies that promote are complete morons in the sense that they promote their products like they were forced to be their, those are the kind's of people I can't stand. Quite a few of them though put their heart and soul into their explanations and they literally pour their life into you so much so that it is so hard to say NO to them. I don't know why but I just feel that way. Given the fact that they did come prepared for this, they get paid for this and it is their job, I still do feel a sense of pity for them because they have to stand their practically all day and get harangued by hundreds if not thousands of people.

On to purchases, my pop's had a few things in mind he needed to get and it wasn't just for the fancy of it. There's no such words in his book, it needs to have some practical purpose(s). He needed an ultra mobile PC and our Camera needed and upgrade. Now onto the subject of the camera, it was way overdue for a much needed upgrade. I ain't using a film camera now alright? It's digital but it's with the old 1-inch screen so we go a new Canon camera for a pretty good deal. One of the great benefits of coming on the last day. Regarding the UM-PC, there were many possible contenders namely Dell, Acer, Lenovo, HP, Asus and BenQ but we finally settled for Acer.

Overall the experience was pretty refreshing as I've been anxiously anticipating to go here all week but it was indeed tiring. The line at the Auto pay machine was also something else, it stretched for a mile and I think the stupid machine conned us of 50 sen, no big deal but the parking fee came to RM6.50 and we only got RM 3 after putting in a RM10 note, it's either that the machine can't properly calculate the parking fees or it's purposely We reached back at home at around 3:30p.m. so we essentially spent 4 hours out non-stop and not to mention we did not stop at any restaurants for lunch or a snack or drink or anything. In a way I wanted it that way because I want to lose weight hehe.