Friday, May 30, 2008

BuSYyy...

i was so bored that day doing the research that i went to look around on this website... and found this new jap drama called absolute boyfriend... and guess what... the lead character is this really cute guy which i liked from gokusen 2... hayami mocomichi!!! haha... wonder how many how many episodes there are in the show... watched rogue assasin that day and the show was ok... prefer jet li to act in chinese martial arts shows more cos he actually has kungfu stunts in those shows but in the english shows, he used guns and swords... not much kungfu stunts... heard that the show fated to love you is really nice, i am so waiting for the show to end... so hard to resist the temptation...

wednesday we drove up to blue mountains wentworth falls for the interview... the drive there took about an hour and a half... the air is really fresh but nothing really much to see... trees and more trees... and speaking of interviews... i have like 6 people participating in the study... which is really good compared to the one i have last week... and it's all thanks to our coordinator... she helped me to recruit... i really have to thank her cos she really helped me alot and she did not have to do it... in fact i think she's done more for me than my supervisor...

anyway, after driving back from the blue mountains, prisy and i decided to go karaoke in the city... haha and the only thing was it started to rain when we arrived... so it was really cold as well... but it was nice... but it was weird how i used to have endless songs to sing before but now i seemed to have so few songs and prisy has more songs than me...

Monday, May 26, 2008

WeEk 12 ALreADy...

auntie and uncle are back from singapore... appareantly it was really hot over there...
the week following camp... nothing much except same old boring stuff again, but finally out of the 20 emails that i have sent... one person emailed and said she would like to participate in the study... seriously... why can't more people be like this lady? it's only a miserable hour out of their schedule... not like i am asking them to give me half their days... and plus, i am going to them so they dun even have to travel...

went to uni on thursday... met up with zz... had lunch and went to do our stuff in the library... the plan initially was to go hang out at their house and watch movie... but they were all busy with their assignments... and saw my supervisor on my way to the library... and she asked me if i could wait for her till 4pm cos she wanted to catch up... 4pm went and passed and it was like 430pm and she still has not msged me... so i decided to go look for her... and if she was not there, i am leaving... when i went to her office, she was there and we went through my draft writing and talked abt the camp... and the interview on wednesday... we left ard 5pm and went to zz's house... watched stardust (i think this must be my 3rd time) with silvana... actually quite liked the show... had dinner with the girls... felt paiseh cos they were all busy doing their assignments... their lives are so much more exciting and happening than mine... sigh... wished i could travel ard like them... oh and we finally caught up on our backlog of csi and medium...

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

NErD cAmp PARt 2...

Oops... accidentally pressed the post button...

anyway, it was really nice scenery once you get up there... but nothing really much to do at night... so we had dinner and played some board games like balderdash and taboo... and the bed was alright, they provided us with 2 blankets, but the pillow was so flat, it was literally non-existent... i could not sleep for the first night and plus, it was a double bed and the person sleeping above me kept tossing and turning and the whole bed kept shaking... it was horrible...

The next day, it was a full day from 10am-6pm... my brain felt like all the brain cells were dead and i had such a bad headache at the end of the day... and the food was bad... and cos i helped to prepare dinner... which was a bbq... i was assigned to cut the onions... i was like shit i have never cut onions before and i dunno how... and this girl was like oh just cut them into rings will do... crap, i dun even know how to do that... so i just did what i thought was supposed to be right... and thankfully, it still came out okay... and tears were like flowing from my eyes... the food also sucked... after dinner, we had dessert and we played uno and bluff and poker... but after awhile, i went to bed... it was too much for my brain... the second night seemed better and bcos there were 6 of us sharing a room, the rest woke up so early, like 730am and i had to wake up too cos of all the talking and moving around...

the second day was not as draining but it was so boring... and i had to do my little presentation on qual analysis... i honestly think that the camp is not productive for me at all... cos i dun have my materials and my own environment... so really i did not do much writing... and most of the girls also thought so... but when we mentioned to annie about maybe instead of having a camp, just do like a whole day at uni, where we dun have to sleep over... she did not look too happy... anna and i both agree that the most productive thing to do next semester was instead of having tutorials every week, we should just have individual consultations... i think that would be much more helpful...

it was good to be back after two days of being in the middle of nowhere and be among civilisation again... and of couse, sleeping in my own bed, with no one moving the bed the entire night...

NErD cAmp...

I decided to recount the entire 3 days 2 nights camp that was like a nightmare from hell...
okay, left home on sunday afternoon to meet up with anna at west ryde cos initially the plan was to catch public transport to church point wharf... but anna said she would drive instead, so i caught a lift from her... and at west ryde woolies, i went to get all the foodstuff that i was assigned to bring... which was 2l of milk, 2l of tomato sauce and 4 humongous onions... so i was lugging like 5kg on each hand... 5kg of food, another 5 kg in my bag cos of the laptop... remind me never to bring my laptop anywhere ever!!! and a bagpack...

on the way there... we almost overshot my destination cos when we passed the marina and went further away from the water into the forest, both of us were like okay we better pull over and see where we were... and true enough, we passed the marina and was driving into the national park... so we had to reverse and drive back down... and the journey there took us about an hour... and bcos the parking there had to pay... anna parked like on the roadside which was a 10 min walk from the wharf... my hands were red already from carrying the food and my bag from the car to the wharf... got onto the ferry, when we arrived at Hall's wharf where the hostel was, it was like pure hell... we had to climb uphill for like half an hour before arriving at the hostel... i almost died on the way up... i was really exhausted from carrying all those heavy stuff... i was really tempted to just dump the food bag... i swore never to go there again!!!

Friday, May 16, 2008

PAiN in tHe A**...

on wednesday, it was a rather routine day for me... doing my research stuff at home and then ard 5pm, got a call from michelle and prisy asking if i want to join them for dinner and movie... i was like hesitant cos it was getting late and the movie was like at 9pm... but somehow, i got persuaded to go anyway... we drove to the city and had dinner at this rather posh place called Alio... where apparently, they have hand-made pasta... and in the car, michelle was like telling us how nice and yummy the food there was... at the place, i had a look at the menu and could not understand what it was talking about... anyway, the food were all given some very fancy names... so prisy recommended that i order the gnocchi... which is like some potato thing stuffed with cheese, i think... i did not really like it in the end, cos there was a strange taste which michelle said was the cheese... anyway, i was so full after cos i had a late lunch that day...

after dinner, went to watch iron man at the ritz... which is like this olden days movie theatre, where we went to watch beowulf that time... but the theatre that we went to was really nice... felt like i was going to watch a concert rather than a movie... and the movie was nice than i thought... really cool technology... and it was funny as well... i would give it 8/10...

anyway, break time over... back to boring stuff again... i was browsing through this article talking about doing research and something said in the article really had a deep impression on me... it went something like doing research can be hard work at times, even though you are doing something not related to your research or trying to relax... you always have the research at the back of your head... no matter what you do, it is like a cloud hanging over, so you can't truly relax and not think abt it...
which i thought is so true of what is going on for me now... even though say i am watching tv or doing something else, there is always the thought of the research at the back of my head... and it's already may, and i still have not started data collection... how...

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

SUn dAy ouT...

on sunday, in order to fulfil the girly theme, i asked prisy to put make up for me... and after that, caught a train to the city and met up with the girls... when i saw them, my first thought was wow... they all wore something different than what they usually wore... and then we headed to my fav korean spicy beef place to have lunch... we ended up all ordering from the korean stall... hmm... the spicy beef with rice is still so yummy... and after lunch, wanru whipped out these pieces of paper with cupcakes and dung drawn on them... and then she explained the rules of the voting game that they thought up... so we each had to give the cupcake to the person who we thought exceeded our expectations in terms of the way she was dressed and the effort she put in... and the dung to the person whom we thought could improve further... well... thanks to prisy's skills... i got two cupcakes and a cowdung...

after our voting game, we proceeded to big echo... and for some reason, we had 7 people so we could actually sing for the whole day but they refused to let us... so we could only sing for 3 hours... which i thought was bullshit... and the room that they gave us was shit man... looking at the seats made me think of amelia... cos she would refuse to sit on the seats that had patches... it was quite funny... i think we all had fun singing our hearts out... going karaoke with the girls are very 'energising' as they would actually stand and dance to their fav songs... and not just sit there passively and sing... haha... too bad i had to leave early for work... hopefully we could all go again and we will get to sing for the whole day next time...

and on the train, i had a nap and cos i did not have a mirror on me, i did not realise that the eyeliner had smudged the whole bottom part of my eyes... and i walked all the way to work and through woolies and only when i got to the washroom, looked into the mirror and went oh crap...

Friday, May 09, 2008

Out WiTH tHe oLD, in wiTh ThE nEw...

one week now, and i am still waiting for the people to email me saying that they are interested in participating in my study... alamak... starting to panic... what if I don't any replies back??!! (deep breaths andrea...)

last weekend, when i went to work, found out that our top 2 supervisors are leaving permanently... not that i "bu she de", it's just that they have been there since i started... and now more new faces in the store than "old" faces...

prisy came back early from work that day... and we drove to rouse hill... just the two of us... i like the drive there bcos the air is so refreshing and you can admire the houses and not much traffic... like going on a mini road trip... went to the city to get the digital voice recorder for my interviews... quite cool, works like an mp3 player... but this can only record voices... went to uni yesterday for tutorial... got back the feedback for my presentation... and one of the things i got marked down for was bcos i wore trackshoes... apparently it was not formal enough... i was quite annoyed... it was not even like a formal presenation anyways... and after that, went to zhenzhen's surprise party... ate cake that silvana baked... two actually... then had dinner and chatted... quite looking forward to this sunday... hmm... girly theme huh??

Saturday, May 03, 2008

HeLLo MAy...

the next day after uncle and auntie left for singapore... the green car cannot start and we had to call the insurance company to come change the battery... and we were saying how things always are breaking down on us when uncle go away... cos the last time this happened, it was also when they left...

went to lunch with amelia at the korean place at epping... i did not really like the food, it was like soup and vegetables more than anything else... and it is quite expensive... still thought that we have finally found a nice korean place to eat rather than having to go all the way to strathfield... but ceci's still better... and then went to service my car... apparently i was a month late and they rang me to inform me that i have to bring in my car for service... had to wait for like 2 hours, so i decided to catch a train down to hornsby rather than just sit there and wait... and the service was really expensive... imagine me having to pay over $200 every 6 months...

went to uni on thursday for tutorial and to meet up with my supervisor... we finally were given the green light to start recruiting the participants for the study... so i have already emailed them and hopefully they will reply within the next few days... and i also have to go get the equipment... hopefully i will get 10 people to participate... cross my fingers...

been watching this anime called vandread... it was actually not bad... the fighting scenes were cool and it's like transformers... and a few other movies... like doom, alien vs predator 2 , resident evil 2, arthur and the invisibles... and amelia lent me a few shows as well... but they are all quite old... will have to control myself...

Monday, April 28, 2008

EVentFuL Week...

zhenzhen and chunyi came to sleep over that day cos they were planning to go to the central coast the next day... so they came and met me at woolies and went back home together... watched miss potter with them... on hindsight, i never would have dreamed that they would actually be here in woolies... it's just really weird... and on tuesday, i went to sleep over at their place cos it was quite late after dinner so stayed over for a night... it was nice, just hanging out, having dinner, catching up with them, cos they are going back soon and i have not really seen them since uni started... had wraps and pumpkin soup for dinner and bavarian for dessert... i was so full that night...

went to uni on thursday... planning to organise a farewell party for them sometime in june... saw some people whom i have not seen or spoken to for awhile... and i am still waiting for ethics to get back to me... and in the meantime, i am planning to invest in a good gps... i think it would really make my life easier...

it was the anzac day holiday on friday but i was not rostered for work... so prisy and i initially planned to go to the city for karaoke after facial... so we went for an early morning facial and we found out that alot of the road in the city were closed for the anzac day march, so thank god we checked before going... so in the end, we went to strathfield for lunch... hmm... ceci's korean food... and it was raining quite heavily that day... a nice day to stay in and have some hot and spicy food... the facial lady actually recommended a new korean place at epping where she said that the food is not bad... but too bad it was closed that day... so in the end, after lunch, we just went back home... watched this new anime that prisy recommended... and we went for dinner... supposed to be a surprise dinner for one of my uncle and auntie's friends... the food was not too bad actually... the only thing was the steak... it is just my luck... of all the steaks, mine was the really bloody one. it was dripping with blood... i was so grossed out but i did not want to appear wasteful, so i just tried to ignore the blood and shoved it down... and we stayed at their place till quite late... i was really tired by then and cold...

Saturday, April 19, 2008

RAiniNg All dAY...

nothing much happening this week... but it has been raining practically every day... and the weather is becoming cold as each day passed... did my pilot interview a few days ago, and i thought it went quite well... and I am not that pressured anymore... before, i was quite pressured cos everyone else has already started data collection... so hopefully, I can start the real interviews soon... still stuck trying to write the lit review... it is really hard... cos everytime, i have a different idea of what i think the focus of the research study is... and i keep changing the stuff i write...
anyway, i shall quit whining about this boring stuff...

bought a new external hard drive... was not planning to buy one, but after the advice and horror stories i heard from others, about losing their documents, i decided to invest in one... just for backup in case...

and i finally finished watching the anime... thank god... it's out of my system now...

Friday, April 11, 2008

ANime mAraThON...

went to the new shopping mall which just opened a few months ago at rouse hill... it's different from the usual malls in that it's open and not enclosed within air conditioned surroundings... and the drive there is quite scenic if you are driving during the day... cos you will get to see lots of nice mansions with huge spread of land... and if you are lucky that day, you can even see a few cows and horses along the way... sigh some of the houses there are really nice... with nice lawns... but maintenance will be a nightmare, but they probably are rich enough to hire professionals to do the job...

and these past few days, after prisy's constant nagging to watch another anime, we decided upon this really old (according to her) anime called fushigi yugi... and now... I am so addicted to the show it's not funny... and if you are a female, you can't not like tamahome, one of the anime characters... i have not read of anyone who does not like him... but the lead female anime character can be really annoying sometimes... and the guys in the anime all happened to like her... even though she is so annoying sometimes... but i have to say, i liked the show even though i have not finished the show and I read that it was going to be a sad ending... and i blame this all on prisy... she keeps asking me to watch these animes and then i get hooked on them and i can't concentrate on my work... prisy, it's all your fault!

Saturday, April 05, 2008

AUtuMn's HeRe...

it's been sian these past few days... nothing really happening... but for the past few days before thursday... I have been having some pretty freaky nightmares and after waking up from the nightmares, it was so hard for me to go back to sleep... and i suspect the dreams are bcos of the presentation that I was preparing for on thursday... and it's really weird cos they seemed so real like they actually will happen... touch wood man... but I slept really well last night after the presentation which led me to confirm that these creepy dreams were a result of the stress over the presentation...

did not do anything much, except working on my lit review... helping out with anna's lifting project... and watching this new anime that prisy introduced... called last exile... it was quite boring initially but after the first 2 episodes, it got quite interesting... and when we finally finished the anime today, and prisy was like... see i told you it was good...

and autumn's finally here... temp these days are like around 20 degrees and it's going to rain the whole of next week... miserable... you won't catch me anywhere outside unless I have to... haha...

Thursday, March 27, 2008

PRos & cOns...

let's see... my easter weekend... was spent working... thurs, easter sat and monday... the rest went on a drive and picnic on mon but i decided to work that day cos got extra pay, and guess what, i worked 10 hours that day and i was absolutely exhausted that day, physically and mentally... and i slacked around on fri and sun... cos it was raining and it's the holidays, so i decided to give myself a few days off...

i have been thinking about my honours project these few days... whether i have made the right decision on doing it... well... the pros is that it really depends on my own motivation, i only have to depend on myself to get the work done as opposed to having to work with people in a group for groupwork... which i know most of the electives this year require... the cons are that sometimes it can get really frustrating and lonely... cos no one really knows what you are doing and most of the time, it's just hours and hours of mundane reading, in front of the computer... till my eyes start to water... and sometimes i am just staring into the screen without really processing what the article is saying...

Friday, March 21, 2008

watched a few movies this and last week... working on my lit review during the day and watching movies at night...
the kingdom was not bad, i would say 6/10, quite boring initially and the action only started late in the movie...
perfume... never heard of it... but prisy said her friends who watched it said it was quite good, so we decided to try watching... the lead character is quite scary... but other than the weird aspect of the movie, it rated a 6/10 on andrea's movie scale...
zodiac... ohmigod... pls dun waste your time... i cannot believe i wasted 2 precious hours of sleep on this dumb and boring show... and the fact that it has jake gyllenhal and mark ruffalo made it even worse... such good actors acting in this stupid movie...
tristan and isolde... apparently it's like romeo and juliet but i thought r&j was more sad... but the show is not bad... 6.5/10
juno... was quite reluctant to watch it when prisy asked me to watch... but it turned out to be quite good actually... the lead actress really sounded and acted like sarah sidle on csi... and jennifer garner was in the movie... i would give it a 7/10...

nothing much happened except i am still working on the lit review... and my presentation... tomorrow is the start of the easter holidays... for a week... no plans... and it was so busy at woolies today... for some reason, i was down for a shift today and it was so busy that we only closed at 10 past... we did not even have time to clean so we had to stay back to clean and stuff... and sat will be the same situation cos we are also closing early...

went out for lunch with yochi and the rest in the city... the plan initially was to go somewhere nice in the city like pancakes... but then they decided that they did not want to eat there so we ended up eating in this irish pub which has set lunch at $6... the food was okay... and after that, we went for dessert at macdonald's... just sat and talked... do some catching up... we made plans for the next outing to be at pancakes and the dress code has to be formal... hopefully more people can come...

Sunday, March 16, 2008

UNproDucTiVe...

second week of uni... was quite unproductive cos my granduncle and aunite came to visit for a week... and cos my grandauntie loves to watch korean shows so i introduced her to my name is kim sam soon... and soon after, all of us became addicted again to the show... and we went out for dinner almost every night... which was good...

work was okay, nothing much changed... the store in dural had a makeover and it looked much neater and clean... wonder when our store will also get a makeover... well easter is next week, no plans at the moment yet but i will have a week long break... but I have to prepare for my presentation after easter, so what a bummer!

Sunday, March 09, 2008

CRappY...

the first day of 4th year semester one was one of the worst days ever... left home at 715am and only got to uni at 830am... a journey that usually only takes me 45 mins took an hour and a half that day... so i was walking to class when i saw through the window that the class was full... there were no empty seats at all... and i did not want to disrupt the class when i was so late... so i told myself ok i will go to the main campus to collect my student card...

so I walked to the station to save my 80cents... caught a train to the main campus and when I got there... the guy said my student card is at lidcombe... I was like you are joking, I did not receive any email saying to collect my card at uni... so I had no choice but to catch a train back to lidcombe and walk back to uni... I was so freaking hot and sweaty by the time I arrived at uni... and then have to queue at student central to collect my card... I was so pissed by the time I could finally sit down and rest... definitely my worst day ever... i hate my uni...

and on thurs... my timetable showed the wrong classroom and I was like looking all over the place and calling people for the right classroom... when I finally got there, the table was full and I was like 15 min late... and we had to do a presentation on our projects... and when I finally got the paper... there was only one slot left and I was the first one to present... how shitty can my first week of uni be...

Wednesday, March 05, 2008

ENd oF hoLidAyS...

the last week of my stay in singapore... met up with the family, went bowling with the cousins, met up with friends... went karaoke and ate some of my fav stuff... too bad I still did not get to eat my ben and jerry's... played mahjong... haha...

on the flight back to sydney... the person sitting in front of me was so freaking inconsiderate and rude... he pushed his chair all the way back and I was still eating... and how was I supposed to watch the screen if the screen is right in front of my eyes?!!? so I asked him politely to bring his chair forward abit, he mumbled something but brought his chair forward alittle... everything was ok for awhile and then he did it again... and I asked him again to bring his chair forward... and you know what he said?? he refused to and was mumbling something as if it was my problem... stupid man... what an ass... ruined my whole flight...

and when we arrived in sydney... and stepped out of the airport... it was so cold that it was not funny... when we finally got home, after unpacking, all of us went to bed...

Sunday, February 24, 2008

The miniature version of the colisseum in fisherman's wharf...

At the foodcourt in the venetian macao...

The gondola rides...

HK trip Day 5 & 6...

today is the day trip to macau... and the annoying thing is it was raining that day... we caught the turbojet to macau... which took like an hour and during the turbojet trip... there was this 3 really stupid women who kept talking the whole freaking way... and here I was trying to sleep and these 3 people kept talking... i was really tempted to turn back and give each of them a slap...

our first stop is fishermen's wharf... when we got there, it was so deserted... it was supposed to be a theme park but bcos it was raining, everything was closed... i was really annoyed... so we had no choice but to head to the Sands casino... the air in macau was really smoky... the air there was even worse than HK... nothing much, it's like a hotel and casino all in one... after that, we caught the shuttle bus to the venetian macao... ohmigod... it has got to be one of the nicest hotel and casino i have seen... besides the fullerton hotel... the foodcourt was nice, the decor of the place was nice, the toilets were nice, and they had the gondola rides... but it was so expensive... so we just walked around the place and took alot of pics...

after that, we went to mongkok to shop... and it was so crowded... and smoky... walked the markets... bought a bag for my sis... nothing much after... had mcdonald's for supper after...

Day 6... our last day in HK, we had to check out at noon so we were packing in the morning... after that, we went to harbour city for lunch and hung around till 4pm... on the way back, we caught the wrong bus back to the hotel... and we had to walk all the way back from the ferry terminal to the hotel...

Friday, February 22, 2008

The really huge buddha statue at Lantau island...

The tram that goes up the peak...

the HK night scene...

WOrLd CuP FeVEr...

World Cup 2022, held in Qatar this time around, has been full of shocks and surprises... the underdogs are definitely Morroco and hopefully ...