Company Car

Was told I'll get to drive the company car during the international audit. But since the audit has not started, I didnt bother checking if I can have it earlier until i asked the secretary. And viola! today the secretary called me up and told me I can have the car. Was kinda excited, but the excitement died down when I saw wat kind of car it was... a FORD FALCON XR6! Its like a half sport car, half sedan. Damn huge! Gonna hv a hard time navigating it, esp in Sydney city.

Pray that I wont have 'incidents' for the next 4 wks.

Crazy about scheduling

I've been going head over heels over juggling multiple priorities from work, family and education. Yes I am continuing my lifelong dream in pursuing Master certification. It has been a roller coaster journey for me, starting up this plan and getting this funded.

Now that I am doing it, I feel that I do not have enough time for anything else. My schedule is packed with work, and studies to a point that I'm neglecting my families and my relationship.

Yes, everyone should have a goal. But to reach it, does it mean that it is ok to neglect other things? How do you find a balance?

Barrys Farm - Monster Laptop Sleeve

A friend showed this to me.. its a hand made laptop sleeve.. made to fit your laptop accurately. So cute!! Comes in a variety of design and colours too. Check it out on their website.

Sydney GOod Food Month

This month is Sydney's Good Food Month, thus there is alot of food activities being held in the city. For example, there is the Noodle Nite Market which is currently being held in Hyde Park. If you dont know, I'm staying in Sheraton which is just beside the park!!

Ok, so me took the opportunity to check out the stalls few nights ago. Thinking that I'll find some interesting food to eat. Dont hv to worry about food. On a whole, it was a disappointment to say the least... why? Cos all you can find is Thai, Jap & Chinese food!! Its fine if the quality of the food was good, but imagine paying at least AUD 8 for westernised asian food. And they dare to advertise that its 'the best in Asian and Asian-inspired food'!!

I got myself a plate of chinese noodle (which was too dry! Can choke on it!). The noodles came with (tasteless) fried squid. Then on top of that I got a fried chicken wing (malay style, bought from a muslim store). To make myself feel better after having low quality asian food (and paying a total of AUD 16) for it, I got myself a scoop of au natural ice-cream...(which was quite nice).

I'll never go there again for sure... although there was this odd store which sells Danish pancakes covered with different types of toppings. Looks tempting... but will see.

Today for some strange reason I decided to head to the gym, was on the treadmill for 25 mins and the walker for 15 mins before cooling down on the balancing ball. Then head to the sauna for another few mins before taking a shower. When I came out my whole body was RED! It was a good exercise. But I think the effort went to waste as I decided to go for the hotel's dessert buffet! (part of the good food month festival). Although it's called a buffet, there wasnt much selection to begin with... but I do want to mention this, the Creme Brulee was EXCEPTIONAL!

Am looking forward to the weekend already.. a colleague (soon to be friend) has graciously offered to bring me to Hunter Valley (famous wine vinyard in NSW). Although I've been told Barossa Valley is much better, no harm going there to have a look since i've never been. We'll be sharing the responsibilities on driving as it's quite a distance up north (abt 2.5 hrs drive one way).

We were looking at going up north to Port Stephens as well. But that will have to be a weekend away trip, with one night stay along the way. Need to do more research on that.. but havent got the time. That's all the update for now.

For all my friends in Sydney... make sure we catch up soon... :)

Thousand apologies!

Couple of files for this blog that determines the look and feel resides in my paid hosting site. The hosting provider is moving server at the moment and it seems to have affected the blog. Hopefully, this will be fixed by tomorrow morning. In the meantime, we'll be using the standard templates within Blogger.

In another note, I'd like to add in a few comments about Steph's previous post on the ride in the funfair, Fun Park. Although the ride 'Top Gun' was exhilarating, there's another crazier ride called the Vortex.. can someone please try the ride out and let me know how that feels like?

Did I bring the rain??

This is Sydney's forecast for this week:

Forecast for Tuesday Mild.
Cloudy periods with a shower or two.
Freshening N/NE winds.
Precis: Cloudy. Shower or two. N/NE winds.
City: Min: 15 Max: 22 Parramatta: Min: 13 Max: 23
Terrey Hills: Min: 15 Max: 20 Penrith: Min: 13 Max: 24
Liverpool: Min: 12 Max: 23 Richmond: Min: 12 Max: 23
UV Index: 8 [Very High]

Wednesday Chance afternoon shower/storm.
City: Min: 18 Max: 30 West: Min: 15 Max: 34

Thursday Chance afternoon shower/storm.
City: Min: 19 Max: 27 West: Min: 14 Max: 31

Friday Few showers developing.
City: Min: 18 Max: 28 West: Min: 14 Max: 30

Saturday Few showers.
City: Min: 15 Max: 21 West: Min: 12 Max: 21

Sunday Shower or two.
City: Min: 15 Max: 21 West: Min: 10 Max: 21

Monday Possible shower
City: Min: 15 Max: 22 West: Min: 9 Max: 23

New home for the next 5 weeks

Yes, the travelling has started again. This time I'm in Sydney and will be here for a good 5 weeks. Touched down about an hour ago, checked into Sheraton on Eliz Str and currently having a light dinner in the hotel (the caesar salad is quite yummy!).

Hv not been blogging ever since our Cambodian trip because
a) dav busy with bro's wedding which was held yesterday
b) i've been helping out in the wedding :)

Some updates. As I was getting ready for this trip, dav have been busy helping his bro with the wedding preparation and also with moving the hse. Yes, they are moving much further away from PJ. I've also just got my brand new blackberry. Still learning how to use it.

Besides all these excitement, we managed to squeeze in a trip to the Euro Fun Park (ie fun fair) which is currently held just beside 1 Utama. This is definitely a trip worth mentioning in the blog!

We got free/ complimentary free rides for the Fun Park cos 1U was having this promotion where you'll get 5 free rides if you spent above RM50. Since we spent quite abit (clothes for the wedding), we got quite abit of coupons. In which majority of them was given to my younger sis.

So I only had the intention of going on the Ferris Wheel. Dont ask me why, but I always have a 'thing' for the ferris wheel. Plus, this one is HUGE!! Its like the highest ride in the whole park. So that was the first ride we went on. The ride was pretty long.. until Dav was bored. Then he saw the 'more' exciting rides and started making plans to see which one to go on next.

Being an 'older' me, I've already lost the desire to seek thrill and adventure in theme park rides (aka its looking much scarier now!) Therefore, I only wanted to go on less 'adventurous' rides. But somehow, yet again, dav managed to pursued me and we went on this ride called 'Top Gun'. This ride would be much better if it hadnt take like 5 minutes to complete. Imagine being thrown around 360 degree for 5 mins! I even lost the energy and voice to scream after like 3 mins. The whole time I was hoping it would stop soon.

Both of us felt quite sick after that... luckily I didnt eat anything before that. So even when I felt like vomitting, I cant. That kinda save some energy. It was really bad...

Before the ride, Dav told me that he likes these rides because it makes him feel 'ALIVE' .... at that time, it kinda make sense. Most of the time ppl take things for granted. So when you're put in a dangerous situation and live through it, then you'll appreciate life better. But honestly when you're up there ... its not the best feelings in the world!

Shites! The image upload is not working. I have uploaded the pics on Flickr. Have a look there.

Canon Digital Ixus i-zoom camera accesories

u know how my camera was stolen? well, they only took the camera.. LITERALLY..

so, I have a whole bunch of accesories which I dont use anymore. Tryin to sell / give it away.

Everything u see in the picture is available except for the camera, landyard and CD. Let me know....

Siem Reap & Phnom Penh photos!

This trip was really an eye opener to me. As we sit in a bar sipping cold beer - away from the scorching heat, there are people loosing their limbs/lives, kids begging on the street, and corruption in every places.

Yet, I see people with genuine smiles, beautiful countryside, and an amazing but gruesome history. I would have thought I'd see people with blank steely eyes and with very little to live for, yet they are so full of life. I can't help but be inspired by all of this.

Be thankful with what you have. No matter how hard life is and how little you get out of it, there are people out there that have been through worst.

Click on the photo below to view the photo album.

It works!

ok.. so, me gonna continue on the story of cambodia. Hmm.. not sure how i shld document it... shld it be just a summary of the experiences we had or shld it be more like a guide to all others out there who would like some pointers if they wan to go to cambodia??!!??!! *tick*tock*tick*tock

Dav says it shld be based on our experiences. Good... so here goes.

We booked our Air Asia tickets yonks ago (almost one yr ago), when they were giving out 2 millions free tickets. A friend took the opportunity and book all of us (3 ppl) onto the flight to Siem Reap. Although it's free tickets, we still had to pay about RM 140 each for surcharges. So it wasnt really free was it? DAMN!

Anyway, nothing was done in terms of planning until the nite before we flew ... usual lor... I was away until the weekend before we flew and Dav & the other friend was busy with work. Then suddenly our friend couldnt make it for the trip due to work commitment. So it's down to 2 ppl. As david works towards the late nite (the day before our flight), I have to read the lonely planet and list out the places to see / things to do.

Before we even started on the trip I have a feeling we both may have different 'views' on where to stay, how to go about the places and where to eat. It's down to the $$$ and the compromise. We came out with a 'rough' itinerary which looks like this:

Day 1 - arrive in siem reap (sp), walk ard town, visit local markets
Day 2 - full day tour of angkor kingdom
Day 3 - visit tonle sap lake & waterfall artisan d'angkor silk farm & workshop, more temples, chill out at a bar
Day 4 - take boat bus to phnom penh (pp) & visit local night club called Spark
Day 5 - visit royal palace, genocide museum, russian market central market, national museum
Day 6 - visit killing fields, old market russian market, genocide museum, independent monument, chilled out at bar
Day 7 - take bus back to siem reap
Day 8 - depart back to kl
(Additional places that we went to are captured in red bold fonts and those we didnt go/do is strike out)

In siem reap, we mainly move around in tuk-tuk (looks like a trishaw but pulled by a motorbike), while in pp, we mainly walked. you can imagine la.. my skin is quite tan now.. even both my legs got a tan line! (cos me wear quarter length pants).

We walked damn alot (by my standard la...). We covered almost 6km in 2 days in pp. Let me show u:

Those in red is the roads we walked. Those circled in blue are the places of interest we visited. It was a very relaxing trip cos we did wat we wanted and dont hv to follow any strict schedule... most of the days are ended with having a beer in the bar cos its very cheap to drink (average RM 1 per mug).

Ppl are generally quite nice except that we are constantly being 'disturbed' by beggars and tuk-tuk drivers. We have to constantly say 'No thank you' all the time! The worse was when we arrived at pp, a whole bunch of them was already waiting for us even before we get out of the bus. Then we were back in Siem Reap, we were sort of being cheated as well cos normally a ride back to town wld costs USD1. But they were offering 100 riel per ride. Then when we arrived, they asked to become our driver the next day to bring us ard. We were already leaving the next day.. so no chance to become our driver. Then the driver told us to pay USD 1!!! What a scam! Anyway being a tourist we know that they are just looking for money to survive. Already its such a poor country.. no point arguing or debating. Just pay.

In terms of accomodation, it quite funny how we started off stayin in quite a comfortable hotel which costs USD 25 per nite then as we travelled to pp, we decided to stay in guesthouse, which cost USD 10 per nite that is situated on top of a 'dodgy' bar (with no air-cond). By the time we were back in Siem Reap for one nite, we also stayed in guesthouse but this time we have chosen a place which cost only USD 8! I guess by the end of the trip we were tryin to save as must money as possible in view that the food n transportation has already costs us a bomb (everything is in USD)!

Please be patience with the photos. Will announce and post it in Flickr once its done.

Bored.. so I'm blog abt cambodia

Dav just told me I can actually post something to the blog by sending email to blogger. So me trying it out now.

 

Test?

Cambodia was great fun

we're back.. and dav has already dive back into his work, while I still have 4 more days to lepak.

we have been away for 8 days, with no access to internet (except for a 30 minute access which dav had to use to check some important stuff). this was meant to be a budget holiday with all the intention to keep the costs to the lowest minimal amount... ie to a level in which we're not that comfortable anymore!

Let me put some pics up... too lazy to write more at this point.

Note: These pics are taken by dav.. but treated using Photoshop


Angkor Wat