Update : Lightning Striking Twice

The robber(s) went in through the front gate - a gate door made from stainless steel. Dad said they snapped it open and later pried open the wooden door as well. The whole house is in a mess again now after being searched. It happened while my cousin was in my aunt's house , so it must have happened between dinner time and 11pm. The neighbours must have heard some sounds, but decided not to help. A spirit of neighbourliness or selfishness here?

My cousin decided not to report to the police since they didn't do anything during the last time of report anyway. But at least if they report, that would add onto the statistics and HOPEFULLY ( with caps on) someone would notice the rising numbers of neighbourhood crimes. Unless someone makes an action, this case remains another number which adds on to the statistics. But my best guess would be that they would just add the number of police beats around the area ; to catch the thief would be like searching for a needle in the sea - these guys are faceless and too smooth.

Poor security everywhere nowadays. Sighhh...

Happy Birthday Jun!

Happy 23rd Birthday , my dear Jun! Have a blessed year ahead. Hope that this year's birthday is a memorable one for you. Wishing you a year showered with lots of love, happiness and blessings from our dear Lord. :D

Yuen Yee's 21st Birthday celebration

A bit too late to update this - I should have done it long long time ago. Everything went well - we had more than 50 guests coming... it rained in the evening and at night, but stopped later.

Coincidentally, one granduncle passed away on Friday night , causing a few aunts and uncles to abstain from the party because of some superstition that "red and white events cant mix". Birthday parties are red events while funerals are white events. I thought they could attend YY's birthday party first and then attend the funeral at night ; but since granduncle's rank in the family is higher, he gets the priority in any family event. Attendees of the funeral normally do not attend both events together in case it brings bad luck/ bad omen to the one who is hosting the red event.

YY seemed disappointed that night as we expected a big turnout , especially when we're such a close-knitted family - but we couldn't change the fact that Chinese are still superstitious lot when it comes to things like this. Lots of leftovers that night , but nevertheless we had a real good time celebrating her birthday and also her "present-opening" ceremony. Hehehhe..........

p/s : So you're 21 now huh! Now you has the license to kill.... err, I mean - thrill!

Lighting can strike the same place twice

Mum and Dad just got out of the house minutes ago, very unlikely at this hour as it is already nearing midnight - Cousin's house got robbed again. The last time it got robbed was one or two months back - can't really recall the exact date. The robber came in through the roof after climbing the phone pole just right behind cousin's house . I remember Big Aunt asking Dad to get help to remove the metal bars which are attached to the phone pole. These metal bars were actually easy stairways to allow anyone to climb up to the rooftop. Removing them would help not onlyto safeguard my cousin's house , but the surrounding houses as well.

I wonder how the robber got in this time. This incident really would put Big Aunt into uneasiness... :( Just wait for Mum and Dad to come home to find out how.

Tomorrow

It's Yuen Yee's 21st birthday celebration tomorrow! Her birthday isn't tomorrow, but since her actual birthday falls on a weekday and knowing that everyone would be too busy to attend a weekday birthday party, Mum decided to have it tomorrow - the 8th of October. So all the preparations were made weeks before - the list of guests , the food , the present, the cakes . The guest list is shorter this time as YY will not be inviting any of her friends , save her "special friend" ; not because she doesn't have any friends, but because they are all non-locals and do not have a place to bunk during the weekend after the party.

I'm going back tonight to help her to make the jellies for tomorrow's party. Gotta remind her to put some coloring into the mixture so that it doesn't look so pale. It's also much easier to clean the mould containers after removing the jellies since you can actually see the jelly leftovers stuck in them. This comes from experience!

Bought her a gift , hope she likes it. I know I like what I bought very much... hehhehe... If she doesn't like it, I'm glad to take it back :) *Buruk siku!*

Forwarding emails

This morning I received an email about a girl who lost her parents in the recent tsunami which hit South Asia in the beginning of the year; she has no recollection of her name nor her own family , she has lost her parents and now still remains at the Phuket Hospital. The email pleads that its recipients would forward it to all their contacts :

Please don’t just delete this - your contribution could be the one that solves this little girl’s problem. Even if you are one of the people who believes that it is always someone else’s obligation to help the misfortunate, please know that forwarding this will cost you nothing. Let’s help!! Forward this to everyone you can.

I wonder if all these emails are genuine, or would it actually achieve the objective in finding her parents... Perhaps they do, I've no idea... but I just don't forward emails like this.

Would you forward emails which asks for blood donations ? Perhaps I would , if it sounds genuine enough. What about those which promise monetary rewards - something like Microsoft would reimburse you with a fat paycheck when you forward the email to everyone you know --indirectly becoming a spammer for someone smarter? Perhaps it really sounds silly - but let me ask this : Has anyone really become richer by just forwarding emails everyday?

Just some observations to the strategies they use :-
(a)Threaten(punishment)==> You'll have bad luck for the next 7 years if you don't forward them. Unlucky for them, they go straight into the trash bin.

(b) Soft stance(reward) ==> Some goes by softer stance of saying that you would be blessed by God if you forward those emails. I wonder if God would.

*Ok, time to check my next forwarded email.*

The Ignatius Trail

Well, apart from the little misfortunate incident which happened today, I was glad that I met up with Jennifer for a play at The Actors Studio, Bangsar. She was kind enough to invite me to The Ignatius Trail, a play from Scotland which won the Edinburgh Festival 2004 award.

This was my first visit to the Actors Studio since 7 years ago when I attended my first ever play in Dataran Putra which was right beneath Dataran Merdeka. I still remembered watching Edwin Sumun and Jo Kukathas but don't ask me the name of the play, cause I can't remember! Edwin Sumun wore this pair of jeans which got a big hole at the butt ; GOSH! That's why I can remember so well :) Hahahhaha~

Anyway, the play was a light one about peace-loving pirates (I'd call them wimpy) of a ship called the Yellow Flower ( since when pirates have ships which sounded so feminine?!) who met a pirate inspector called Celia Salt(do not call her "c-salt") . She had a plan to turn them into bloodthirsty, ferocious evil pirates .... and the laughter began...

The crowd - full of kids who are probably International School kids who are having their summer holiday right now. They just laugh their hearts out and scream when they want to durnig the play - happy kids:) Ohh, we even saw Ahmad Izham, the 8tv CEO who brought us Malaysian Idol into our idiot boxes!

Interested about this play: Go here--> http://www.gardnerandwife.com/

When the going gets tough...

I hate making this site sound like a complaint site - but nothing is worst than this:
I was attending the e-security seminar today in MINES Convention center . My boss and I were walking up to the elevator towards the small seminar room which had a talk about WIMAX when suddenly my white sandals decided to give way and SNAP!!! To my horror, the white piece of PVC where I slip my toes in between was torn into two pieces! Really, THAT was the one and only link which makes the sandals wearable!

OK, there I was - stuck- because I can't walk any further, not that I didn't try , but really I can't, plus I wasn't driving this morning, so I had no extra pair of shoes which I can change into. My boss is with me, but he isn't a female, so he won't be able to help me buy a new pair of shoes in Mines shopping mall. The mall is at least 5 minutes of walk away...

So what did I do? I took off my sandals, and walked BAREFOOTED all the way from the convention center to the mall which was 5 minutes away, saw a shoe shop and walked straight into it and bought the first pair of shoes I saw! Didn't care about the comfort - just needed a pair of shoes!

Thank God I was wearing a pair of long black pants and there was Mines to the rescue. I'd be in deep trouble had the expo been held in some unknown convention centers without any shops! His grace is sufficient! Hehehehe... :)

Umm.. the whole episode was kinda comical - I think my boss was about to laugh at me :'( ; not mentioning all those macho guys who probably must be thinking that I'm some siau girl- "What on earth is this girl doing walking around barefooted in public? We only see this in Thaipusam right?!"

Talk about when the going gets tough!

Future?

Where do you see yourself in 5 years time? What are your plans? Where do you plan to go from here?

Any answers?

No. At least not today. Hopefully I know it in the not-so-distant-future. I need that direction.

A string of events

This month doesn't seem to bode well for my dear one. Firstly an accident involving three cars while we were down in Melaka on the first week of August , then another minor crack at the windscreen last week on his way to JB due to a blind little stone and now the side window was broken by some thugs. This is the best part : why would someone want to steal your road tax?

Beats me. :(

A world of criminals.

====

The world is really unsafe nowadays. Just a few weeks ago, 4 cars in my neighbourhood were broken into - as you'd already guessed, they targeted cars with CD players. One pretty Toyota Camry which belonged to the neighboor a few doors away had its side mirror removed pretty perfectly and not smashed. Wonder how these guys had the time to actually do that?! Another absurd thing : A Kancil got robbed as well , for coins which probably didnt make more than RM10. What's in the mind of these criminals?! Plenty of fish in the sea and they chose an anchovy?

What am I busy with currently?

Currently deploying an antivirus solution to the entire network -this new toy is pretty cool because the new version is not only more canggihfied, it also comes with the ability to track down files which are infected with trojans, and it has realtime protection which means that I'd receive an alert every time a virus is detected , unable to be disinfected and therefore deleted. Mailbox has tonnes of emails like that! So my typical day would be sitting at my workstation , working on the Administration Kit (a network control center) and deploying antivirus software by using the PUSH method , unlike before this where we would need to go PC by PC to do so. Don't play play with the Russians when it comes to antivirus solutions.... it's not your typical Symantec or McAfee yeah!

Also playing with the new phone - bought a Sony Ericsson k700i. The camera's not that sharp , but acceptable la.. I found out that the SMS writepad is not as great as Nokia 3310 (my old phone) because I can't write beyond 160 characters like how I did using the old phone. Need to get a Bluetooth device to transfer files , else this Bluetooth is as good as a white elephant. Saw one at Lowyat , which can be plugged to the notebook for transfer , it's about RM80. See la, one of these days.. Phone book is great ; I can insert pictures, ringing tones, email address, company name, home address .. all the information you want to know about a person and more. With 41MB of memory (unexpandable,mind you), I can store more phone numbers than I'd probably need :)

A world of technology.

P/s: Condition of the neck : pain as hell now... Need a massage badly. Condition of the leg: Still painful when I walk. Sprained it a little while jogging in the gym. Effect: Out of the gym for 3 weeks now. :(

Pekeliling is Shifting - Part 2

This is one fond block of memory which I'd like to keep in my little brain for as long as I can. Unfortunately , it's going ... but when ? I've no idea. Blocks A and B are already emptied out, leaving a few other blocks which are still being occupied until further notice. Two aunts who are still staying in Block C and G are still hanging around. Most of the occupants in Blocks A and B are allocated units in newly-built government apartment blocks at Sri Rampai, Setapak. I've been to that area before ; it's pretty convenient because there's ready buses available as well as a market , shops and some eateries.

But there's a hitch in moving all the occupants from Pekeliling. The Government didn't make enough units to place all occupants in one single area in Setapak. Each new block can only house half of the occupants in the old block - what a hiccup!!! Didn't they calculate properly how many units they had to build before even deciding to move people from their homes?

According to Aunt #3 who rents a flat unit from DBKL , she is trying to apply for a different flat unit which is around the Jinjang area because it's more convenient to her in terms of transportation , to pay her bills and to move around. Wonder what she means - because there's no LRT stations in Jinjang, unlike Setapak where they have a Wangsa Maju Putra LRT station. And hey, comparing Jinjang and Setapak , perhaps it's better to stay in Setapak - the name sounds more glamour at least heheh....

Aunt #2 faces the agony of staying alone if renting occupants start moving out of Block C. Hers is a bought unit, and occupants who bought the flat units a long long time ago still has no where to go until this point of time. She'd probably have to move in with Aunt#2 if that happens, because it's simply unsafe for her to take the lift up and down in a quiet Block C. I could imagine how Block C would be - ghostlike just like Block A or B! Those blocks are all dark and quiet, the only good thing would probably be the clean streets down at the pavements because for once, they are litter-free since the blocks are people-free. :) Even the carparks are empty ; no cars parked at the parking grounds. Even though it is orderly , it never cease to give me this eerie-creepy feeling everytime I look at them on my way back from the office in the evening....

PC restarts every time I...

The PC has always been restarting itself once in a while ever since I bought it. OK, back track a little ; bought this PC last year when I just started working so that I am able to store my mp3 files and photo files just before I need to return the notebook to the company which sponsored me.

Anyway.... the history to this PC is this : ever since I installed Azures to download files from Bit Torrent and play them on my Real Player , my PC has been restarting more often now... I'm suspecting it's the downloaded files which have probably somehow corrupted the Real Player , because every time I try and play those files in Real Player, it would restart the PC. I've now resorted to playing the music files with Winamp - so far so good as the PC is still running good while playing the music files. I'll monitor the PC for few days and see if it still reboots while playing mp3s. Hopefully the problem would be because of RP.

Feeling lost without the Lamb

What qualifies us to enter the Kingdom of Heaven? Is it by attending church every Sunday, attend every CG meeting, participate in every prayer meeting , have many Christian friends , sing praise and worship songs, wear a cross which symbolizes our status as a Christian , read the Bible everyday?

Of course, all these are great ... but what actually is it that makes God want to smile at me? I believe it is the heart that counts more than anything else. The heart to continually seek Jesus as the Lord of my life, the First Love .. because He first loved us. We could all be Christians of 5 years old, 10 , 15 , 20 or even 50 years, yet do we miss the point of what Christ is all about? I ask myself this question all the time .... and as I look at myself, I realise that it makes no difference whether I started believing in Christ many years ago , or I only begin to know Him yesterday - because God does not see us by looking at the number of years we proclaim to be Christians.

And no matter what I do, or how much I accomplish in helping others will buy my a ticket to Heaven .. because it is not by deeds that we are saved anyway. Only by faith in Jesus Christ will I be safe.

The test of Our Religion

Imagine that you are making application for heaven. What would you list as your qualifications?

• I have always believed in God.
• I'm thought of as a religious person.
• I have tried to live a good life.
• I have been baptized.
• I go to church.
• I haven't done anything really bad.
• I have friends who will vouch for me.

I hope by now you realize that if you were to list any of those qualifications on an application for heaven, it would indicate that you don't yet understand the worthlessness of religion.

The only application that would be accepted by heaven would be one on which you listed your qualifications as follows:

• I can cite no merit of my own.
• I have been a sinner from birth.
• I am coming not in my name but in Christ's.
• I believe He is the Son of God and my Savior.
• I have accepted His sacrifice for my sins.
• I believe He rose from the dead.
• I have put my trust in Him to save me.

This is the confidence of the apostle Paul who, to distinguish between religion and Christ, wrote: "For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works [pure religion], which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them" (Eph. 2:8-10).

Source : http://www.rbc.org/ds/q0206/page10.html

WIll I give You up, Lord? Will You give me up , Lord?

God, I thank you for this burning desire to live a life for You. I thank You for not keeping away during this season of dryness.

I know Lord, that You honour sacrifices made for Your name. I pray Lord, that You will speak truth and life into me... and fill my heart with glad songs again , that I know You are God, and You are near...

I will be still, coz You are near.

War Of the Worlds

"The last war on earth won't be started by Man."

Great tagline for a science fiction like this one. This is one show which got me glued to the screen, and made me feel as though I was in the show itself. Hahahha sounds silly but that's how engrossed I was in the show.

It's a movie with alot of good effects, little talking , only a lot of screaming and yelling , and some good acting. Apart of that, little explaination of what happened, you just gotta make 1+1 and equal it to 2. See Dakota Fanning yelling at the top pitch of her voice and Tom Cruise taking a more fatherly role in his life now - something different from all the macho roles he undertook before this.

This movie really is quite confusing - very little answers ; Why do aliens come? Where did they come from? What do they really want? What do they feed on? Why they die so easily when they have technology to exterminate people so easily?

Let's just wait for WOTW II for the answers. It's gonna be better than this !

When Life is empty...

... fill it with love
... fill it with good thoughts
... look for people
... look for God.

Pekeliling is shifting

Pekeliling no more!

.... after standing tall for over 40 years , finally the City Hall has decided to move one of the oldest government flats in Kuala Lumpur to a place newer , and of course cheaper in land value.

.... It feels sad to see the blocks being emptied out phase by phase - this was where I grew up!!! My playground and my childhood memories were etched in this area. I remember watching The Mall being built, and how the Star LRT's foundations and pillars were put in place ... how this area has changed over the years.

.... I remember that the underpass connecting Block C (where we stayed) to the market place across the ever-busy Jalan Tun Razak used to flood during heavy downpours . Pedestrians who walked from Jalan Ipoh near the General Hospital after work even had to brave through the flood waters to get back to their homes as there was no pedestrian bridges being built. The underpass was sort of a curse and also a blessing to occupants in this neighbourhood because drug addicts and beggars infested this tunnel during night time, and there were horror stories of how people got mugged here. This was why we would avoid walking to the other side of the block during night time and during the quiet times of the day - say early evening. Not to mention, as this tunnel had "home guests" at night, you can imagine the stench emitted from the tunnel since these guests need a place to relieve themselves...hmm, OK, enough said.

.... Something which also didn't change over the years ; the cleanliness of this area, or rather the LACK of it! The place is still littered with rubbish everywhere and the elevators are still dirty due to the low civic-mindedness amongst many occupants. It's the same old stench from humans... sigh... I wonder if this will persist in the new apartment blocks - perhaps it's rather unlikely as it would be the same set of occupants in both areas, isn't it?

Attempt at the Rice Cake

Haven't been to the kitchen for a long time, so now it's going back there to experiment. Saw the recipe in the book yesterday night and thought, hmmm.. since I'm not gonna do anything today, I might as well make some good use of my time to cook something which I like to eat when I was young....

I remember the times when I was still a kid, and how I loved to eat rice cake from the market place in Pekeliling made by this particular grandma. (Wonder where she went to now that Pekeliling had to move) Well, it's not expensive, I think a piece just cost 50 cents in those days... OK, maybe more... A good rice cake is translucent , indicating how smooth the texture of the cake within was... Use a fork and cut a small portion out of the cake before adding a little condiment made of "choi pou"(a type of vegetable) fried together with shrimps ... mmm..

It's just the little things in life which makes us happy isn't it? :)

Why did I like the cake so much? Well, yeah, it's just a simple food since the cake is just made of rice flour anyway. It's the skill to make the cake smooth as silk which amazed me more. Now that I have to learn to make it myself, I realised that things aren't simple as they look! Looks like I've to return to the kitchen to perfect the skill before actually presenting my own rice cake to anyone...