Girl in car vs police officer

An interesting thing happened today.

I was driving back from work, while talking to a good friend of mine. About 5 minutes from the hospital, a police officer on a motorbike showed a signal for me to pull over by the side of the road. At that point I realise...Owh man, am gonna get a summon today...

I stopped my car by the busy road, near Berkeley Garden. He got off from his motorbike, and circled round my car. Not quite sure what he was looking for. Probably trying to figure out where I'm from based from my licensed plate.

I took out my driving license before he could even ask and passed it to him. I apologised profusely for commiting the offence and flashed a smile at him. Haha. Was really hoping that I won't need to pay any duit kopi to him..

I committed 2 offences:
1. Driving + chatting on the phone without a hands-free
2. Not wearing a seatbelt while driving

At this point, he was asking me about the phone call that I had and where I was from. This was when I worked my charm. Told him that the call was an urgent call from the hospital, and it was from a collegue of mine. As soon as I told him my profession and showed him my ID as a proof, he immediately soften up. Haha. Mission accomplished.

We had a small chat after that, he let my off with a warning..


Moral of the story: Always keep my ID in the car. Will never know when I'll need it next. It works as a charm. Splendid.

Bandung

I'm back!

Went to Bandung, Indonesia on 3rd day of Raya and spent 3 nights there. One word of advice, don't go to Bandung on Hari Raya week! The town was full of people, most of them being tourists from Jakarta. Turns out that they get one week of holiday for Raya Aidilfitiri (or Lebaran according to Indonesians), and the people from Jakarta will spend their holiday in Bandung as the weather is much cooler.

The factory outlets were like on sale and the cars were bumper to bumper on the streets. Hailing for a taxi was really difficult. The worse was on the 3rd day of Raya. After we went to one factory outlet, we were already so exhausted. It was really crowded!

Well, I was generally satisfied with the trip as we managed to shop and go for sightseeing. I'll just briefly go through the places that we went.

Mt Tangkuban Perahu: It was cool to see an active volcano for the first time. Smoke could be seen from far, and the stench of sulphur was bad but still bearable. We had the option of going round the crater but we decided to save our energy for other activites that day. Many vendors could be seen selling souvenirs around the place. They will come and persuade you to buy their goods. Got irritated at one point coz they just didn't get it when we told them that we were not interested. My sister went on a horse ride. It costs 15000 Rupiah for one trip. Dad bought belerang from the place, one mineral water bottle full, which they claimed is good for the skin after mixing it with baby oil.

Strawberry Park: The strawberry patch was within a fence and a restricted area. We only saw the garden between the bamboo shoots that were used as the fence. The main attraction of the place was the restaurant and it was full of people when we went. We only spent about 10 minutes at this place.

Kampung Daun: This place is just superb. It is actually a restaurant, about one hour from town. It's a big makan place, with lots of huts among the waterfall and hillside. It's good to go to this place in a group, as each group will get their own hut to eat in. The atmosphere was just amazing. The food was just top notch. The presentation was great and the food tasted good too! Even a five star restaurant could not beat its quality.

Shopping:

Rumah Mode: It's actually pronounced in bahasa baku. Not how we pronounce mode in English. Everybody who has gone to Bandung recommended me this place. Well, personally I didn't find it a really great place to shop at. Only bought one top from here. The place is huge compared to other factory outlets that I went. The place was so crowded and I had to queue up for half an hour to pay for my clothes. Great family spot as they have women, men and kids section.

Heritage: The place is famous for it's historical building. I like this place better that Rumah Mode. My sister bought 6 clothes from here.

Blossom: This place is along Dago Street. I like this place as the price is reasonable, and it seems to be more organized that the other factory outlets. They arranged the clothes according to colour or type. I bought shoes from here and I love them to bits! They have another branch along Cihampelas, in a shopping complex, but it's called Blossom and Friends. The selection of clothes here were not that great.

Cihampelas Street: So called 'jeans street'. Yes, they do have a wide selection of jeans to coose from, but after going to factory outlets, you will find the goods are of poor quality. The place is almost similar to Rantau Panjang, Kelantan. The interesting thing about this place are the comic figures that you see on their signboards. It's actually 3D and each comic figure appears to be jumping out from the signboard.

Bandung Super Mall: Some may say that going to a shopping mall in Bandung is a waste of time, but it's interesting to see the brands that they offer in Bandung. It is the biggest shopping mall in Bandung. I would say that the size of the place is the same as Sunway Pyramid. There's a nice batik shop here, called Batik Keris. Dad and Tokku bought batik shirts and songkok from here.

Pasar Baru: This is a place for mothers and older teenagers. It's a good place to purchase kebayas and nice telekungs. You need to haggle for a good price.

Danar Hadi: This is a famous boutique which sells batik. Tokku bought a nice silk batik shirt from here which he is so proud of. Good place if you're looking for good quality batik.

That's all for my review of Bandung. Would I go there for the second time? Well, maybe next year, definitely not after Raya...

Strawberry Park- The strawberry patch is behind the fence

Kampung Daun

Nasi Goreng Kampung Daun

Tangkuban Perahu

Day 1 of Raya

This is the first time in 25 years that we're celebrating Hari Raya Puasa in Shah Alam. Why? Coz most of our cousins are sitting for exams after Raya, and tokku decided to come here for Raya. So the ones staying in Shah Alam and KL didn't go back to KB and the ones currently in KB remained there.

The schedule for first day of raya was packed for us.

Morning: Solat Raya Aidilfitri, breakfast, brunch as Opah's house
Afternoon: Lunch at Ayah Ching's place
Evening: Tea at our place plus at Auntie Syam's and dinner at Nda Chik's

I can't even remember when was the last time we had a family event like this at our house. Most likely when I was still at SAAS. That was at least 8 years back. Really, I'm not kidding.

Our Menu for tea:
Main Course: Nasi Dagang (thank you Kak Mi for this), Sate Hj Samuri, Nasi Impit and Rendang (by Nda We)
Dessert: a couple of cakes, contributed by dad's friends
Drinks: Punch (by Ku Yea)

Our maid wasn't around so everything had to be done by ourselves. Well, not really the cooking bit, but heating up the food, making the drink, and preparing the table etc. Not as easy as I thought it would be.

Our table was full, but the guests didn't eat much. Can't blame them coz we had a scrumptious meal at Ayah Ching's house earlier. One of the cakes was even untouched.

Even though my sister and I were most of the time in the kitchen, it was fun coz our cousins and aunties helped out. Shiqin helped to make the coffee (thanks to much! u're a life saviour!),Nina with the Kopi O (I wasn't sure how many coffee bags to put in the jug! Embarrassing but true) and Nda We helped with the dishes.

The satisfaction was there after the event. Tiring but fun coz we had the chance to spend time as one whole big family at our place. I don't even know when will be the next one.

Cousins-just the girls

besok raya!!

Wireless at last

This is the first time I'm posting a blog from my laptop..We finally have wireless at home. Dad's tech guy came to the house this morning, and he completed the whole process in TWO hours. I know, two hours is really long right...Allow me to ellaborate.

0830: The guy came to the house and I was forced to get up from bed in case he needed any assistance.

0840: He installed the 3 Com Wireless Router on our desktop without any difficulties.

0845: This was when the problem started. In order to use the router, we had to enter the streamyx password. None of us remembered what the password was! We searched through all the old streamyx documents that we had but none of them had the info that we needed.

0900: I finally thought of calling TMnet for the password. Turns out somebody had changed the password (most likely my brother who was currently at school) and the default password could not be used. Hence, she had to reset the password and a new password was then given to me. The new password can only be used after half an hour.

0930: We finally managed to be online, using our desktop.

0935: The guy wanted to test out the wireless function. I took out my laptop for him to use.

0940: Again, problems arose. Somehow, my laptop could not detect the wireless connection. I found it puzzling coz I was able to go online without difficulties a couple of months back at Starbucks.

1000: Still trying to connect to the internet using my laptop. At this point, he is suspecting a possible viral infection on my pc and he's trying to uninstall possible programs that may have been infected by it.

1005: He wanted to uninstall my antivirus program, ie. symantec antivirus, but I was unlucky enough that a password is required for that. AAaaargh! Not another password!

1010: He was about to give up at this point. He asked for another laptop, but the only other laptop available was my sister's, and her charging cable is malfunctioned. Great.

1015: Aaaahhh...finally I'm able to go online using my laptop. Somehow, he made some modifications here and there and so called virus was defeated.

He installed the AVG Anti-spyware on my laptop, which will locate the 'trojans' and hence will make my laptop run faster.

1020: Went to all the rooms to try out the wireless function. Even my maid's room had internet access now. Cool!

1030: Everything's done. The tech guy left and I continued surfing the net..

2 movies

I watched two movies yesterday. At the cinema, not on dvd, mind you! Need to grab the oppurtunity before I start work in 2 weeks time..

Watched the first movie with my sister in the afternoon. Should have watched this one much earlier, but only had the chance yesterday. It was my sister's second time watching it and the first one for me.

It was a great movie overall. Loved the dance moves and music, and the casts were talented. My personal favourite was Zac Efron..Ya, i know he's young and all but his eyes are his best feature...:)

Later that night, i watched another movie with a friend of mine. I've actually seen this movie earlier but it was my friend's first time. The movie was full of X rated jokes, and I'm surprised why our local censorship actually allowed this movie to be aired here. Probably coz they only focused on the visual bit.

Adam Sandler was perfect for the part, and I had a couple good laughs watching this one. My favourite scene was when there were in court, towards the end of the show. They were best of friends and sounded so gay at the same time.

Jessica Biel was super hot in this movie, but too bad she's not a good actress.

From Dim Sum to Pancakes

Went to Plaza Damas with my best friend last night. The original plan was to have halal dim sum for buka puasa (even though we both were not fasting!). She was not sure of the exact location of the restaurant, i.e. Yam Cha, so went round and round the boulevard, looking for the place. There were so many restaurants and cafes but the place that we were looking for were nowhere in sight. After half an hour of restaurant hunting, we gave up and decided to have pancakes instead.

I had a Seattle, which is actually like a pepperoni pizza. A pancake as a base, with toppings, i.e. beef pepperoni, tomatoes, mozarella cheese, sprinkled with pepper. It was excellent. My best friend had a seafood dish and her boyfriend had a Mexico. Managed to get a mouthful of each, and both dishes were just as good.

Wouldn't mind going there the second time. Maybe will try the Dollar Pancake, a famous dessert at this place, the next time around.

Dollar Pancake

My Mio-My PDA

MIO 169

At this point, I miss my PDA. It has been with me since last year, a gift from my dad. Never actually used it coz it's kinda bulky and heavy too. During my break, i realise that it's time for me to make full use of it. Passed the PDA to my dear friend, as he 'volunteered' to help me install whatever programs that i need. He successfully installed essential medical programs that I need, which is the main reason why I need a PDA for work.

While I was surfing the net yesterday, i realise that I PDA is not wifi and bluetooth enabled, which I find it puzzling. It is able to function as a GPS, and yet, it doesn't serve as a pda with wifi. Turns out that i now need to purchase a wifi sd card -RM 150-in order to use the function. aihh...looks like I've to go gadget hunting again.

Looking for the pda case is also another pain. Went to the IT section in Midvalley, they gave me this look when i mentioned my PDA brand. Like it's non-existent or something. Guess I've to make do with whatever PDA case i could find.

Can't wait to get my hands on my PDA.. My friend is still having fun with it at the moment. Trying out the GPS and all..Hope I'm able to find some space in one of my lab coat pockets, which are already full as it is..Need to carry this PDA around at work daily..good luck to me.

1 pass, 1 fail

I recently sat for my post grad exam. 4th of September to be exact. Had about 2 weeks of study break to burn the midnight oil to study for it. I considered myself lucky to be able to get my leave approved. Had to sacrifice 10 days of my paid leave, hoping that it would be worthwhile.

The exam was not an easy one. Paper 1a and 1b. After coming out from the exam hall at NUS, I felt that I had a very high possibility that i'd flunk the exam, but at the same time, having that tiny wish inside me that i'd pass both papers.

Results came out today. I was happy and sad at the same time. probabaly 60% sad. Kept on thinking that i failed that second paper..

Sometimes, the way you feel about the bad things in life depends on how your mindset is and how you look at it. I changed my perspective and and immediately planned my next step of action..

I just have to re-sit the exam! What's so difficult about that, right?

I'm just praying hard that I'd pass the exam the second time around..January 2008! Here i come!

I'm making a come back

i was about to post a comment on my cousin's page when i realise that i wasn't logged in yet. i couldn't recall whether i had an account at blogspot, but i tried to log in anyway.
Waalllaa! i actually had an account here and i've actually made a couple of posts....amazing how your mind can play tricks with you.

was just reading my first post. funny. who would have known that i'm now working in the paeds ward of HTAR, the place that i dreaded most 2 years ago!