Monday, July 25, 2011

Do something with your life. And Skype-ing with Arran on Asha's birthday.

I've decided.

I want to make a mark on this world.

Hearing so often now of people dying all over the world (think Oslo, Amy Winehouse and Bersih 2.0 for instance) makes me think about life and death. Most of the people who died in Oslo didn't get a chance to make much of mark on the world compared to Amy Winehouse, but I know that every single one of us has the ability to do so.

So while I'm still here, I'm going to make my life worth it. Someone saw fit for me to be in this world, and I'm going to make sure I'm not just this existence who lives, works and then dies with nothing to her name, but someone who made a positive difference in people's lives.

I can start by getting off my ass and doing some hard work ;)

---

Last Sunday, I Skyped with my dad and family back in KL. It was Asha's birthday that week, so my aunt and grandmother were over for dinner. I Skyped with them after their dinner and got the chance to celebrate my sister's birthday with the family. It was really nice :)

They placed Asha and the cake in front of the webcam and invited me to start singing first. I'm pretty sure there was some lagging in the sing-along, but it was nice to be part of it.

I made screenshots of the 'party', but they're on Schrobbenmaster's laptop and I'll add them later. I was using his laptop because I wanted to take my family on a tour of the new apartment. They seemed impressed and my aunt was just confused as to why we had to pay to change the kitchen cabinets. That confused me as well until she said, "Why doesn't your landlord pay for it??". My stepmum helped to straighten that little misunderstanding out.

Then I showed Pim to my aunt, and she says:

"Why did you get such an ordinary-looking cat? He looks like a cat you can get in Malaysia!"

So I had to explain how Pim entered our lives, not by choice, but through an unhappy situation :( ...  I'm glad we have him though!

It was finally bedtime for the kids, so everyone said goodnight, but somehow left the Skype chat on. Only Yelleh Belleh and Arran were left at the computer, and the normally silent Arran, who only reacts when I stick my eye right into the webcam to make him laugh, suddenly started talking to me animatedly - about spoons.

"Che che... can you see my spoons?"
"Yes..."
"I have spoons."
"I can see..."
"I like shiny spoons."
"Me too."
"Do you have spoons?"
"Yes... and a fork."
(I showed him the fork I had used to eat a cake I happened to have in my fridge, which I pretended was Asha's birthday cake)
"I have... 1... 2... 3... 4... 5 spoons."
"Niiiiice."

And so forth.



I love speaking with children. They're so random and fun.

I can't imagine what Yelleh Belleh was doing the whole time next to Arran, but I can't imagine it was stimulating enough to keep her riveted to the chat :P In the end, I had to say Bye to Arran and his spoons because it was time to head to the final instalment of the Harry Potter series. Sad and sentimental :( But I enjoyed the show!

Sunday, July 17, 2011

Who is the bestest market of them all?

I just got back from a whirlwind visit to the Swan Market in North Rotterdam, my most favouritest market of all.

I'd been to it two months ago (they have it every 2 months) and really enjoyed it, buying 3 handdrawn postcards (which I seem to have misplaced...) and a cute green handbag with the € 10 cash that I had. This is why I love markets. Good stuff for low prices!!

It was a whirlwind visit today because I had to come back in time for my Skype date with the folks back home. I had only 30-40 minutes to look at everything and decide if I wanted/needed anything. In the end, I purchased a nice mint green blouse for € 5 from a very nice-looking girl who has a Facebook page that I intend to visit once I find the card she popped into my bag along with the blouse.

However, the weather has been really horrible and mood swingy the whole week. It rained all day Thursday, was incredibly beautiful on Friday and then rained all day yesterday again. And today it's off and on, like the sky can't decide what it wants to do. So while we were walking around the market, all of a sudden it started pouring and Schrobbenmaster and I ran under the tent of the stall I was touching clothes at. Which was the stall I bought my mint green blouse from :P

Anyway, since I didn't bring my camera today and I lost my photos from two months ago, I stole some photos from the Swan Market website... heehee. These are from the two previous markets.




I really like the way they displayed the oils for sale!


I like her yellow stuff!!


It's more crowded than this. This set of photos were taken at the end of winter, at their second edition, so I think they just needed more publicity.


The photo set below is from the first time I went.



I must say, these buddies are rather expensive for what they are...


Looks absolutely delicious!



So nice!

Saturday, July 16, 2011

Single female's day out

I love having days being on my own. I used to have loads of them in KL and for the most part, I wouldn't notice it, but just sometimes, I would realise and enjoy the independence and freedom I had as a young, active female in the big city.

I don't get it much these days, of course, but just occasionally, when Schrobbenmaster is out of town, I get the apartment to myself for 2 nights and I really do enjoy it (especially in summer).

My day started like this:

  1. Woke up with Schrobbenmaster getting ready for work
  2. Fought a battle with Pim, trying to give him his chill pill (it gets harder every day)
  3. Said farewell to Schrobbenmaster and started my ritual of Gmail and Facebook
  4. Showered and got ready to head out for some shopping
  5. Checked Google Maps for the best way to head places
I first stopped by Witte de Withstraat to get a birthday present for Doc Vicky. Something we'd seen a few weeks before, which she was pretty fascinated by. Foot reflexology socks. She had apparently never heard of foot reflexology and how massaging certain points in your foot can affect different organs and parts of your body.

I didn't take a photo of the socks unfortunately, nor the excellent giftwrapping, but here's an excellent photo of it that I just found someone selling on eBay UK.


Anyway, after that stop, I biked to De Bijenkorf with my handy shopping list ready.
  • Hand towels x 3
  • Shower mat x 2
  • Long handle toilet brush
  • Pizza cutter
Okay, so the last one on the list doesn't fit in, but I only added that after ordering pizza to take away from Little Italy and the guy had again forgotten to cut my pizza into slices.

I ended up purchasing:
  • Hand towels x 3 (good job, JY!)
  • Shower mat x 1 (one less only because of the next purchase...)
  • Bathrobe x 1 (and...)
  • Glove towel x 1
  • Long handle toilet brush (good job, yet again, and on sale too!)
And I decided to skip the pizza cutter because I figured saving the € 5 on the pizza cutter would somehow make me feel less guilty about buying a few extra things that were not on the shopping list.

I read in Glamour today that shops and supermarkets hate people who bring shopping lists with them because they are less likely to buy random things that profit the shops. And I completely agree with that. Although I had bought some things not on my list, they were actually on my 'invisible list' (except for the glove towel, but that was only € 1,50), so all in all, I actually didn't overspend.

Contrary to what I did after De Bijenkorf without a shopping list. Which was to head to the supermarket around the corner from home and instead of getting only a face sponge (which they didn't have), I purchased a fruit milk drink (so thirsty lah), a carton of milk (on the fridge list) and a can of Pringles (damn!).

After dropping my purchases at home, I waited for the real estate agent to drop by to pick up a set of keys they had wrongly passed to us... yes, they passed us a set of house keys belonging to another address. Go figure. And for the guy who measured the windows for new curtains.

When they left, I headed out on my bike again to the cinema to catch the movie, Bridesmaids, with Doc Vicky. It's quite a weird show, I must say. Quite disgusting humour, but I think Kristen Wiig did a pretty good job in her role.

As usual, I felt lazy to cook for only myself tonight. Usually when Schrobbenmaster is away, I'll just have some leftovers or frozen pizza, which I never have on normal days. So off I went to the supermarket again.

And came out with:
  • Frozen pizza (of course)
  • Roomboter koekreepjes (some deliciously unhealthy full butter cakes that I've never had the pleasure of trying because supermarket visits have always been functional with Schrobbenmaster)
  • Bananas (trying to make up for the pizza)
I'm beginning to think that it's a bit sinful to have the supermarket so close by. And such a nice one as well.

The sun was still shining gloriously when I got back, so I opened my packet of butter cakes and snuggled in the big red chair by the window with my Stephen Fry book.


Pim decided to come and see what I was up to, and since I was already on the ground shooting the cakes with my camera...









Him in his full glory.

He had come to sit with me while I read, but I think I snapped one too many photos of him and he promptly left a few seconds after my last shot.

And now the sun is setting and I have to get on with my just-out-of-the-oven pizza!

Friday, July 15, 2011

House cleanup, cake and a mushroom chicken dinner

Okay, so we've already moved into the new apartment, and I've promised not to show any photos of the apartment here, but here's a little peek into the cleanup of the house a week ago.


Such a big mess :(


A peek at the dining table we purchased together with the apartment. It's nice eating at a dining table again.


Two cans of friggishly expensive paint. When I was painting the toilet and had literally just a square foot (or 1/4 square metre) left, the paint ran out completely. Had to buy a whole new 1 litre can for € 24. I didn't know the price btw, because Schrobbenmaster had bought the whole set when we first went. Luckily Doc Vicky was keeping me company that afternoon while I was painting and offered to run off to get me the new paint while I scraped the little that was left in the can. Thanks!


A rather larger peek at our hallway and a bit of the office.


The awesome IKEA shelves that Super Harry and Doc Vicky helped us build in our basement. Another big thanks to you guys!

Last weekend, we had a few friends over, including a classmate from my Dutch class, Slovalenka, and her boyfriend, (Slova)Lanky. Hehe to the nicknames. Those who have met them will know what I mean :P

Anyway, we had met for ice cream earlier in the week and Slovalenka offered to bake a cake for us and for the new apartment. Very sweet girl.


Chocolate cherry cake! What a perfect summer cake. It was light and fluffy... the whipped cream was actually yummy (courtesy of Albert Heijn) and the chocolate was the perfect balance between sweet and bitter. I must say I enjoyed this incredibly more than the pasta she cooked for us some months ago... *ahem*

And tonight, in fact, right at this moment, Hanselem is cooking a mushroom chicken piccata for us. His very first cooking night in the new apartment. Ah, making new memories is always nice :)


Taken just before we tasted the gravy, which was a little too vinegary - although we hadn't put any vinegar in it. We have now just added some salt and breadcrumbs to the chicken while the fries are baking in the oven.


This is what I call live blogging, yo. First time ever!

My stomach is pretty much suffering right now, it's already 9.23pm and I haven't eaten since a piece of bread at 4pm. So I'm signing off now and hoping for the best with this dish.

NEXT DAY UPDATE:

Here's how the meal looked like!

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Time to memorise the new address

We have moved!

This post comes two days late, as I haven't really been able to sit down in front of the computer for more than 10 minutes the entire weekend. And unfortunately I have no photos of the whole moving day last Saturday because I didn't want to be taking photos when other people were helping us out with the house mrgreen

Speaking of whom, everyone who turned up on Saturday to help us is awesome! Thanks so much for the help, it's really, really appreciated! biggrin

Tonight will be the third night in the new place and it's still exciting as heck!

Things I love about the new place:
  1. Walking out of the bedroom into a massive open space
  2. The view, it's glorious during summer
  3. Eating at a nice big dining table
  4. Cooking at a kitchen that's easily accessible and move-aroundable
  5. Weirdly, being able to unpack things and put them in the perfect place cool
Things I don't love about the new place:
  1. It still is full of boxes and crap
  2. I don't have all my cooking utensils with me yet
  3. Have to watch nightly shows on a laptop because the projector is not up yet
  4. No curtains in the bedroom, hence waking up super early with the sun
  5. Everything is mechanical so we were nearly locked in when we misplaced the car park door's remote control (on the other hand, I also love that everything is mechanical and automatic wink)
I think I'm having a sort of burnout from the stress of moving that I haven't felt creative for about a week now. I hate the feeling. Time to grab a book and head to bed early!

Thursday, July 07, 2011

Poster project

Omagad, this is so fun! I find myself trying to think of something else to post so that I can use my new emoticons mrgreen

Although based on what you've seen so far, you probably think I have only one.

Anyway, I DID find something to post about. Did I ever 'advertise' my Tumblr site here? It contains all the eye candy goodness the design world has to offer, at least the things that I stumble on.


Let me also take this opportunity to show my latest poster from my poster project.

Damn, with this old editor I can't resize images the way I can with the new editor. Dilemma! Emoticons vs. images.

Which should I choose?? eek

The moving procedure...

It's Thursday, two days before the Big Move (when everything has to be in the new place).

We have fallen waaaaay behind schedule, mainly because we expected to get the keys to a gleaming, nice apartment, but got the opposite instead. Poor apartment, it's not your fault, it's your previous owner's.

I suppose we were being too optimistic to think we could have done everything in a week, but there you go. I think it's a whole long process, this moving house thing, continuing even after the Big Move. But Schrobbenmaster has been really stressed out about it because he had planned things down to the second (well, sort of) and nothing is going right.

Guess this teaches us to be more communicative with each other about each other's plans.

To get my head clear and to not forget anything, I have made a List.


Everything we need to do in three days. Well, two days and an evening.

I like that moving house gives the opportunity to clear out and reorganise everything. You never really feel the urgency to do so when you've already settled in. So I'm going to take advantage of this by taking my time to really figure out what I want and what I don't, and where I should keep them. I've already found about eight spare bulbs, two boxes of fuses and countless sponges and cleaning cloths. Mostly still in their packing. Tsk tsk.

And if any of you are hoping for photos of the new place when it's done, the hoping stops right here. I'm not posting any photos of it. You'll just have to come visit and have the real experience for yourselves.

Updates on the kitchen:

  1. The quote for a new kitchen has come in ranging from € 6000 - 9000, with € 6000 being at the top of our budget.
  2. The reason for getting the more expensive quotes was to get custom-built cupboards that would fit within our floors (the floors are built around the existing cupboards).
  3. If we get a cheaper (smaller) IKEA kitchen, we would need to get new floors, which we've found out costs nearly € 5000.
  4. Hence, we have come up with a brilliant idea - I love it when constraints make you think up creative solutions - instead of installing completely new kitchens, we'll just go back to our existing kitchen manufacturer, Bruynzeel, and replace the less-than-acceptable things and spruce up the rest. Thereby hopefully cutting our cost by half.
  5. We would still need to do the floors though. Schrobbenmaster is pointedly insistent on that point. And I think he has a point, seeing as both he and I have received pointy splinters in our toes at some point.
More updates tomorrow on how the To Do List went... :P
(I wish I had emoticons. Where do I find them??)

Okay, I googled it and just found one recommended by Blogger (dammit Blogger why don't you have one already built-in?), but I can only use the old post editor with it. And this kinda looks uglier and more... old-fashioned.

But at least I can do this mrgreen

The new apartment, a chill Pim, some grammar tidbits and movie stuff

Wow, I didn't realise it had been so long since my last post!

Updates:

  1. Got the keys to the new apartment (rather cool detail, we are moving from number 33 to 333!)
  2. Spent the whole of last weekend carrying boxes, cleaning and painting. It's supremely tiring! I don't know Mumsy Bumsy can do this on her own, very impressed.
  3. The living room is now entirely white, and the bedroom is my favourite room colour: olivey greeny grey brown. It's gonna look awesome when it's decorated.
  4. I'm on the hunt for cheap, nice-looking boxes and baskets to organise all our rubbish.
  5. Went to Xenos (was already closed), Blokker (only plastic boxes), HEMA (ugly un-cheap stuff, but still got some functional coloured boxes anyway) and V&D (slightly nicer stuff but way more expensive and frankly, not really worth it).
  6. Therefore, IKEA is my last option and I hope I'll find something suitable!
  7. We have gotten quotes for new kitchens from 3 different places. Everything looks so wonderful! I hope we can find a suitably-priced kitchen that we both love soon.
On the Pim front:

  1. Pim has been super stressed for a few weeks now because of the packing and moving, and has therefore seem to have lost his ability to find his litterbox. But when he needs to pee.
  2. After consulting with the vet, Pim now has chill pills as part of his daily diet.
  3. He is now a very nice pet to have, as opposed to the monster we had just a second before the consumption of the first pill.
On the grammar front:
  1. I have another tidbit! It seems that these particular 'c' words are very confusing.
  2. First, Mumsy Bumsy went:
Go check the bus stop round the corner, there is usually a conglomeration of taxis waiting.
Now Schrobbenmaster goes:
It's so rare to see such a big congruation of swallows in one place.

On the movie front:

  1. Watched Transformers 3 in IMAX 3D last week and I enjoyed it! Sure, it was the usual story etc, but it was still very enjoyable, mostly because of the quality of the animation, effects and all the little details they pay attention to.
  2. Is € 15 too much to pay for IMAX 3D? How much is it back in KL?
  3. I can't wait for Harry Potter opening in a week!! Love the haunting tinkling melody.
Now I'm off to make fried rice for dinner, before heading over to the new place to start unpacking more things into the new HEMA boxes I bought!