Welcoming Year of Rooster!

CNY is 10 days away! YIKES! time flies!

Haha, same reaction year in and year out (read here , here) 

Oh well, people are often driven by deadlines. The nearer the deadlines, the more efficient the person will be!

Last weekend, my mum and I did a lot of tidying up. My mum did the most though.

We had our home cleaned. The 1 inch thick dust was finally removed.

We had our algae-covered cement floor, wall, fence and drain cleaned. 

We bought some pineapple tarts, cashew nut cookies, kuih momo, sambal rolls, cheese sticks from hardware store where we bought paint and brushes.

We painted our washed-out wooden fences. It was harder than imagined. No wonder people always say, you don't know how hard it is until you have done it yoursef! INDEED. I will never ever underestimate anyone's work from now on.  We did regret starting it but... once we saw the result, we were glad that we had started it.  

Although i feel super duber tired after all these cleaning, but deep inside, i feel good to see how our poor old house now shines. Although it isn't professionally done and we didn't cover many areas, but at least it now looks more decent than before. And for some reason, i sort of feel that our poor old house which has given its live to provide a home for us, is now smiling happily..... hahahahaha, too much cleaning must have made my imagination a bit wild :P

Now I know i could accomplish a lot if i want to even when i don't know how to. If you never never do, you will never never learn. If you never never do, you will never never realise your strength. 

When there is a will, there is a way. Indeed 

Partly painted fence
Not so professionally painted;p

Goodbye 2016, Hello 2017!

2016年即將結束。
我來好好總結一下我的2016年。

這一年發生了很多事。對我來說，都是新的學習，新的體悟。
人生不可能永遠沒變化。有些事情的發生，是提醒自己是時候要改變了。

有些事情，讓我知道自己的不足。我會努力提升。
有些事情，提醒我這就是人性。不必太介意，因為大家為己利益，是大家自然的自我保護動作。

我的付出或許不被讚賞，感激或認同。不必太傷心，因為人本來就很難被滿足。或許我的付出對他人來說是多餘或是困擾。我會努力改進我的方法。

怨天尤人我不喜歡，也不會帶來任何好的改變。
記得有次看到這樣的一句話：改變自己比改變別人更容易。
太多人想要改造別人。其實為何不從自己開始？

對的，人不為己，天誅地滅
（p / s：不要再誤會這句話的意思哦。這指的是，人如果不先自己修身，那麼就會為天地所不容。)

祝福大家2017金雞年快樂！願大家身體健康，幸福圓滿一整年！

My creation!

All of us have different ways of keeping our secrets.

Some write them (but do people still use their hands to write?) in their diaries. Some tell others about their secrets. Some prefer to keep them deep inside their hearts.

I used to write my secrets in my diaries and naively thought that they would be safe from intrusion for I had them "well-locked". 

I also tell people my secrets.... but only when I decided that they are no longer secrets :P

I also keep them deep inside my heart but i try to avoid this method because they take up the 'storage' space. It's a pain having tode-clutter it. 

So instead of burying them in my heart or jot them down, I now have a new method... that is by burying my secrets in the garden! hehe...

Haha, this is my little secret garden.

I have never liked gardening before although i love flowers and fruit trees. I don't understand why people would want to cover their whole backyard in cement. It just feels 'cold' although it's actually producing a lot of heat during hot days. 

I am lousy at planting. I used to have a few cactus in my office but they all became jelly-soft and died after a while. I suspected they died from radiation overdose.

10 years ago, i saw some colourful cactus in the market. I couldn't resist and bought one.  It didn't die! BRAVO! All because i gave it the correct soil and fed it the correct amount of water. It even  flowered! oh man, i didn't even know my cactus can last that long, let alone flowered!! Then i learned that, plants are just like human beings. In order to live long and stay healthy, they need what they need and not what we think they need. 

gardening tools must be flowery too hehe

People say, one's hobby changes from time to time. It's true.... I analysed my posts for the past 9 years and found that, one of my hobbies was eating, then it was cooking (or reading and keeping recipes). Then I sort of didn't have any hobby for a while and now it's gardening. I don't know how long this hobby will last but for now, I kinda enjoy the little secret garden i have created with my own hands. 

Gotten the tree cutting men to chop fallen trees into chunks

My car actually "sank" a bit because of the weight! hehe

It makes me happy to see the plants being so healthy. It's joyful to see flowers blossoming. It's wonderful to be able to pick up something i've planted to make drinks for my mother and myself. 

I love how the plants are expressing their appreciation when you treat them well. No poker face, no taking you for granted. They love you the way you love them. Ahahaha, ok, i'm a bit out of topic but it's amazing that gardening can increase wisdom too! :P

What's your IQ level?

When you see this label stuck on a food packaging, what do you think it means?

RM3.50 per pack and expires on 30 December 2016 right?

If so, you are just like me. Like the shop called me '头脑进水'. In simple English, it means stupid or moron. 

My overseas friends were visiting in  mid July and asked me about the candied coconut strips. 

I used to have these when i was a kid. It was common and i remember having these during movies. Time has changed and kids don't eat these anymore. I couldn't recall when these started to become uncommon so when my friends read somewhere that these are the local candy to get, I went everywhere looking for them.

When i finally found this shop in Padungan, a few shops away from the police station, i was sOoooo happy! I was even happier when i found that they could be kept until 30 December 2016. I immediately bought the remaining 7 packets. The lady boss told me they could be the only shop selling these and these are made by an old grandma. I felt so lucky.

After 3 weeks, the night before my friends' departure, they returned the candied coconut strips to me and said they are not bringing them back because the coconut strips are mouldy. I was shocked and embarrassed. Shocked because i was 'told' that they would be good until 30 Dec! Embarrassed because I had given something foul as gifts @-@

Initially I thought of just throwing them away since it's not a lot of money. Then I thought i should at least let the shop knows in order to improve so other customers do not suffer the same... 

One lunch time, I decided to quickly drive to the place to give my feedback. I showed the unopened packets of mouldy coconut strips to the owner. She was unhappy and said i should've gone back after 3 days of purchase. She said she can't do anything now. I told her nicely that, i didn't return within 3 days because they weren't mouldy yet. And the fact that her label indicated that these could last until 30 December, they should rightly stay good until then. Thus it doesn't matter when i come to do the return as long as it's before 30 Dec 2016. 

Then she raised her voice a bit and said i shouldn't believe the date on the label because they couldn't leave that part of the label blank, so they "simply" put something. I was a bit shocked to hear that honestly. SIMPLY put?! Is that even a valid excuse? Instead of being apologetic, she BLAMED me, the consumer for TRUSTING a label put by her shop. Is this even logical? 

I looked at her with disbelief. Does she know what she is talking about? I could've reported such irresponsible act to the consumer protection agency! 

One of her staff then came to me, TRYING to EXPLAIN to me about their SOP.

She said that the goods here are handmade. They label the packets themselves. Apparently, they needed to put "something" on the top of the label so at that time, they put 30.12.2016 BUT that DOESN'T mean these things can last until that date because they are handmade and they don't use any preservatives, so we CANNOT expect these to last until the stated date. 

I see... So i have been misled and it is my fault.

She further pointed out that I SHOULD HAVE put these in the fridge if I don't consume them in the next few days after the purchase because these are handmade and don't contain any preservatives (yep, she kept emphasizing on this). Great, I didn't know that, to buy from this shop, I SHOULD know many things which are NOT made known to me.

Hmmmm... Somehow these explanations didn't sound convincing. It puzzled me even more,  if they know that these things couldn't last that long, i don't understand why they would want to put a date which would mislead consumers.

I'm not an expert in this area and definitely rely on their labels. I SINCERELY put my trust on them. 

But the staff wasn't happy that I believed what was stated on their label. She called me ‘tou kak gim zui' (hokkien for 头脑进水, stupid/moron) for being so naive.

At this point, the lady boss shooed her away. She told me to ignore her staff for she is a bad tempered person. Well, whether bad tempered or not, i do not care. i just think it's interesting that there are people out there who say the weirdest things and still think they are right. 

Or am i really the weird one in this case?

I decided to verify my IQ level. I showed this to my colleagues and friends and asked what they think this means. Sad to say, we are all a bunch of  头脑进水 (stupid/ moron), as the staff puts it.

Are you in my club too?

p/s: i don't usually complain. Look, i don't even have a proper post labels to label this post! haha...

Luck or Fate?

No matter how much time and effort you try to find a lost item, you can never find it. But when you stop trying, it will mysteriously appear. Have you ever encountered this before? 

I have. Many times. I consider that lucky although my law lecturer from Uni thought otherwise. During the last revision class before the final exam, he said "good luck folks! Although luck has little to do with it".  Well, if it's not luck, i think it's fate then.... 

Sometimes i do wonder, if lost item will eventually mysteriously appear when we are not trying, i don't understand why we need to try so hard in the first place. 

Ok, please ignore my nonsense haha... if we don't even try, I guess we will never be able to find it, even if it's right before our eyes. Gosh, i don't know why sometimes i can be so full of rubbish wisdom!......

My friends visited Kuching in July. As I was the host (and a very responsible one), I had to take very good care of them and also showed them the best of the very best of what we have here. I'm glad that they enjoyed it and love my humble little town. 2 days before their departure (and mine too as I decided to tag along to play with them in KL and Singapore), I couldn't find my car key and remote control for the alarm system. The worse part is, the car was parked at the car park. But the fortunate thing about the unfortunate event is that, the car was parked near the hotel entrance. At least there were Angels (aka security officers) watching over it.

I didn't dare telling my parents. They would kill me if I lost the car! So I searched hi and lo, walked back to every possible places, asked the hotel receptionists, security guards, cleaners, waitresses, managers, random people working in the shopping mall, cafes, restaurants, hotels etc. I guess you get the idea. I TRIED all possible ways to locate my keys and for two days, they were no where to be seen. When the hotel receptionists saw me every time i passed by the lobby, they shook their heads without me asking them! Haha, yes, that's how HARD i tried. 

I imagined my poor keys lying somewhere in the dark corner waiting to be discovered. I even hoped they came to my dreams at night to ask for help! Sigh,  IF only they could send me some signals! 

On the day of my departure, my car was still at the car park without any keys. worrying that it would be gone when I'm back from KL/ Singapore after 4 days, I asked the officer at the hotel to tell their colleagues to help watching over my car, making sure that no one drove it off. If so, please call the police for me. 

I think I must have done something good in my past lives because the officer came up with a brilliant idea!

ta- da

They clamped the tire of my car!

I felt so relieved because my car would definitely be safe while I was away having fun hehe... 

Am so thankful for the kind people around!

Guess what happened after that?  Did i get lucky or is it fate?

"Unsafe" Moment

I went to the bank last night.

I saw a lot of people gathering at the entrance.

Did something happen?

I looked from my car, I didn't see any policemen or anything unusual going on. But the crowd kinda made me think twice.  Is it safe to withdraw money here? Maybe I should come back other times, you know, just in case. After all, economy is pretty bad now and people are living a hard life. Robbing and stealing are increasingly common as they seem to be the easy ways to make money (sigh)...

Despite the 'unsafe' situation, I decided to proceed anyway.

People always say, you should follow your guts. if you feel unsafe, avoid it at all cost. But avoiding is not always the best solution. Sometimes you just need to learn to face it in order to become mighty. 

I decided to go ahead, not because I wanna be mighty. Simply because am lazy to come back again or drive another 5km or so to the other branch. Yes i know. My reason is not so mighty :P

I took precautions when i was withdrawing money. I looked around making sure no one was near me, i walked behind another person when exiting so we 'seemed' to be not alone. Smart of me eh? hehe

Only when I was outside did I notice that the crowds each had a smart phone, charged with a power bank in their hands. Then i spotted one person's screen. 

OH MY!

So these people were here, at 10pm something, to catch Pokemon monsters  >__<

The world needs to wake up from this game.

Don't you guys have better things to do?!

Why not catch the real bad guys instead of virtual ones? That would be more meaningful, right?

Meanwhile, my colleague's handmade poke angu kuih is quite delicious :P

She made this to sell too

FB: 三姨

The messages from my body, soul and mind~

聽說，我們的身心靈會告訴我們他們的狀況。

比如，缺鈣時，會突然很想吃cheese cake， 缺鈉時，會很想吃鹹食等等。
第一眼看到或想到的，也同樣是你身心靈缺乏的東西或嚮往的~

那天我逛書店，突然這個角落吸引了我的目光。

你第一眼看到了什麼？

我當時看到的是：

長假.休閒.生活.留住時光

突然，我頓悟了....

正是我目前需要的.......