PHOTOS: NY2007 @ Somo

As promised, here are some handpicked New Year's (not Chinese, those will come later) photos, courtesy of SweetJo, whose Multiply site is linked on the right of the page.

A big thanks to her for not putting up compromising photos of me :P



SweetJo and moi.


SharryBerry and me looking a little too happy to be 'normal'.


AAJase destroying poor Fatt's cute face!


Fatts getting his own back. And Gary looking awfully macho.


Chia looking like he's predicting the future of carrying me back to Sharry's!


All of us - and my Big Foot.


Gary looking a little worse for wear.


OMG... ME looking a little worse for wear.


FairyJoyce and SweetJo sharing a cheesy moment.


Boys taking the photo op to grope each other again, as usual.


What am I doing? I don't remember. I think Teng's trying to avoid me in that mood too.


Happy friends.


Jess, Sharry Berry, me and the Stryker.

Photo opportunity

Time to Wii

Was at Fatt's house last night playing with Nain's new Wii.

My right arm now hurts SO BAD from playing tennis! Fun games but I don't find them very addictive. The thing about the Wii is that it's physical, so you can't really be playing it nonstop for hours like how you can with other consoles.

Wii design is really nice and sleek though, almost (dare I say it) Mac-like.

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I'm getting quite fed up about thinking of the best dates to celebrate my birthday next month. I've 3/4 of a mind to just cancel the whole bloody thing and ask Malaysian Devil to come up for the weekend!

PHOTOS: At work and at play

Pics of me working during my stint at 789, the bartender par excellence :P

Haven't been there in a while now but I love the peeps there, so friendly, so... as Mel would say, "Cappucino!". Mumsy Bumsy was so great to ask them to celebrate my birthday early during my shift. I rarely get huge birthday surprises with so many people so it was brilliant! After our briefing for the night ahead, they asked us to wait a bit, and then out came a huge brownie cake JUST FOR ME! Wowowow :) Thanks Mumsy and all you guys at 789! It was special!

Liza, BabyAmanda, Sham, Mel (behind), me and Mumsy Bumsy.

Liza and moi. Great chick she is.

Me and Atun, I call her Big Lady Boss cuz she always knows everything that goes on.

Professional bartender me.

CoolFrankie the bartender who won 2006 Cocktail of the Year. Love that guy.

PHOTOS: Official Launch of 789 @ Ascott KL

April Fool's Day 2006, official launch of 789, the chic new resto/bar in town.

The theme was white and boy, oh boy, was it dazzling and dripping with beautiful people! I didn't take many personal pictures. I remember taking a picture with Elaine Daly but can't remember which party at 789 that was. Think it was a watch (clocks and watches) party.

Anyway here are some beautiful people...

Some weird space vintage creatures from Planet Aluminium et moi. Love those slippers. Unfortunately I tore them apart a few months ago.

Dancers from Planet Plastic. What the heck are they using as props? Still, they were funny.

Edwin Sumun and me being all intoxicated and stuffff. Sexy!

Don't sue me, these two may not have any relation to each other at all, but don't you think they're so good-looking they belong together?.

Sofia and Julia who were seniors in my school although they probably don't remember lil ol' me.

To old friends!

So I hear that old Kiangs is back for a bit.

I haven't seen him in years! Fatts says they're going out tonight for dinner at Mid Valley. Tempting, but... I'm off to Penang tomorrow for CNY with dad, so need to pack, spend some time with Mumsy Bumsy and spend the rest of the time with Heroes and Elleh Bo Belleh.

Hey, Sharry Berry and all ya peeps out there, call me for drinks/partying with Kiangs... cuz I'm FREE I'M FREE!!!

OTE closed yesterday during normal working hours (gasp!) and I was in such a good mood yesterday I patiently let several cars into my lane after work. Which, I might mention, didn't even receive a single wave of thanks from them rich buggers (all in BMWs and Mercs... unforgivable!).

Oh before I forget, I must display my first OTE cover here for all to see. Hmm, I guess I'll put it on the sidebar like Nicky C does on his egomaniacal blog - can't remember the URL now, refresh my memory!

Cheers all! (in a relatively good mood today)

Bienvenue à Asie, Charly!

A big shout out to Charles who has just stepped foot into the jungles of Southeast Asia for the next 6 months.

HELLO CHARLY! WELCOME! SELAMAT DATANG!

I will be coming to see you soon, at the end of March. Quand tu habite confortablement dans la Singapour, viens me visiter, ok?!

Another round of the Birthday Wish List!

As my birthday's coming up soon and people will be asking what I want, here's the Ultimate Birthday Wish List of the Year of the Boar (for me, anyway)!

In no particular order...

Birthday WIsh List 2007 #1

• A standalone oven big enough to bake cakes and muffins
  
• The new iMac desktop
  
• Funky or vintage home decor
  
• A payrise
  
• Lots and lots of interesting, humourous books to read à la Jeremy Clarkson (but I've read those already) and Susanna Clarke (also read both books)
  
• Venice and Paris again. Alternatively, another romantic place in Italy or Mykonos in Greece.
  

What NOT to get

• Earrings
  
• Photoframes
  
• Damned useless and ugly ornaments
  
• Food
  
• Cups and mugs or any other cutlery and tableware
  

Yves Saint-Laurent or a wooden contraption?

The word YSL crossed my mind this morning and got me thinking.

Do we all have to pronounce it as individual letters à la "Why Ess Ell"? Can we start pronouncing it like how it's spelt, ie "Eezel"? And if it's pronounced "eezel", doesn't that sound like another word - "easel"? And if the word "easel" can be spelt with 60% of the letters (meaning 3 letters instead of 5, tsk!) and still be pronounced the same way, why didn't they spell it that way? It'd be easier to engrave (18th century), easier to write (19th century), easier to type (20th century and onwards) and on the whole, much bloody easier to remember during spelling tests...

Maybe someone should petition the Royal Academy of Spelling to change the spelling of "easel" to "ysl". Then maybe someone in Hong Kong can start a clothing brand name called "YSL" and if he gets dragged to court on copyright issues, he can just claim that he wanted to use the word "YSL" in the sense that it is a wooden contraption used to hold canvases for painting.

But why go through all that trouble, actually? There are probably a dozen "YSL"s already in Japan.

Blood Diamond

Watched Blood Diamond last night.

It was so stirring and I was still deeply affected by the scenes of rebels and the plight of the refugees and victims in Sierra Leone when I was trying to sleep later. Blood Diamond is a really powerful movie and shows the atrocities of civil war and the horrible realities of neighbours killing neighbours. I would say the worst situation pictured in the film was the situation of child soldiers being brainwashed and used to kill fellow citizens. And I mean child soldiers, children as young as 8 or 9 being dragged away from their families. And other children being massacred on the streets just because they were born in that country.

The Sierra Leone crisis may be over but you can help those in Iraq and Sudan now by visiting the UNHCR Donation site. UNHCR is the United Nations Refugee Agency. Can you imagine your city being ripped apart and being all alone, separated from your family? A one-time donation of USD50 registers 150 exhausted refugees in order to assess their needs and trace their families. Families' names are printed on several lists and fortunate people who manage to find these safe refugee areas are given the opportunity to look for their family's names and be reunited with them.

If you're thinking, 'Why should I help people so far away when there are people suffering in my own country so close to me?", then don't be like the majority of people out there (including me, embarrassingly), just feeling a bit of heartache when you see a slideshow, visit the Malaysian Charities directory and scroll down for a list of charities you can help.

Oops! They did it again!

The lawlessness of motorcyclists in KL has found new bounds.

This morning I was in my car, waiting at a red light. It turned green and the cars started moving. I was probably about the fifth car in line and just before I passed the traffic light, a motorcyclist comes from another set of red lights slowly, while holding up his hand to signal me to stop - WHILE HE CROSSES RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME! Do I even have to mention that my light was still green?

What the hell is his problem? There are TOO MANY reasons for me to toot my horn these days and it annoys the living daylights out of me. Yesterday after work, a van cuts into my lane, just milimeters apart from my own car. And he got it. The big HOOOOOOONK.

Back to this morning and I'm just round the corner from my workplace. In front of me is a taxi who's squeezed as near as possible to the left side of the road as he can. And going at 20km/h. Man, the bloody driver may as well get out of the stupid taxi and walk. Then he can at least do his part in saving the environment, even though he IS a taxi driver. KL taxi driver, that is. And yes, you may argue that he was squeezing all the way to the left, but what difference does it make when the lane itself is only 10 inches wide?

Can this situation ever, ever improve? Only if these irresponsible road users cease to exist. And so, what a good idea it would be to put them all in a roundabout, close off the other roads, put up some cameras for live feed, and watch them drive over each other?

MPPJ Sucks!

MPPJ has the uncanny ability to choose the best times for their damn road works.

Thursday morning, 11am - A workday. So why the hell are they blocking off 2 out of 3 lanes on Jalan Gasing, an extremely busy road, without any warning? Radio, newspaper, TV announcements I don't care about. But the right thing to do is to place signboards AT LEAST 500m (1 km would be better) away to inform road users of the impending bottleneck so that they can turn off and use another road if they want to.

Why are there always incapable people in such positions? People who don't know how to use their brains (or perhaps don't want to because they're not expected to) and who are so bloody inconsiderate and self-centred. Can we please get more people-friendly employees in power for the MPPJ?

PLEASE?

Thank you Astro!

Hooked on the BBC Entertainment series, Judge John Deed.

It's not a reality or talk show like Judge Judy et al, it's an actual 1 1/2 hour long series with a brilliant storyline, great characterisation and awesome acting by Martin Shaw (John Deed). I've only seen 2 episodes but it's got me by the collar and it won't let go :P

Another series I'm starting to get hooked on, embarrassingly, is Waterloo Road, which is *gasp* a soap! This is horrible! And there I was, sniggering at those Cory and Emmerdale freakazoids. Admittedly, Emmerdale is worse than Cory, but only because of the awful accents. Completely hideous.

Thank you Astro - for giving me BBC Entertainment. And lack of sleep because of it.

Happy New Year 2007 @ Somo

Happy new year everyone :)

I hope you've enjoyed the past year of photos and articles. My New Year's Eve celebration pix will be up as soon as I've got hold of all them people who were snapping away that night. Which might take quite a bit of time, so be patient. We celebrated at Somo, next to Coffee Bean Mont Kiara - I got fizzed with champagne, challenged with tequila shots and various other activities that you can imagine would occur. I heard a guy actually broke a glass table??! I don't remember much from that night but just take it from me - Stolichnaya vodka - HORRID!

Weh Weh!

My good friend Malaysian Devil is finally moving to this part of the world!

I can finally see him more than once a year haha... well, he's moving to Singapore which isn't quite as cool (uh huh uh huh!) as Malaysia but *sniff* apparently I was uncontactable when he wanted to come to visit Kay Elle. He might have moved here instead if he'd seen this super super cool place. :P

February 8, le diable!

Hey amigo, je ne peux pas visiter ton website! Je pense que c'est parceque le earthquake à Taiwan...

It's All About The Music

It's frustrating that I can't connect to the site that I upload music to.

So although you can see there on the right that "Familiar Feelings" by Moloko is playing, there is in fact, NO MUSIC PLAYING AT ALL! Yeeeesssss... ye now know TOO much (in the style of that Scottish hotelier dude in Little Britain)!

Talking about music, I bought the new All Saints album, Studio 1 today. It's less melodious and R&B compared to their last album Saints and Sinners but it's pretty funky. Heard the whole thing 3 times already and cool tracks are Rock Steady (of course), On and On and Fundamental. I should really be putting those tracks on my blog but hey my connection to the site is down and by the time it's up again I'll probably forget.

So settle with Moloko.

This is my job.

I do layout design for a magazine.

According to some people ie. AA Jase and Curly, apparently my job is to put a picture here and place text there, and voila! A magazine sprouts up from there.

Not!

There is soooo much more to layout design than moving pictures here and there - like choosing fonts, choosing colours and even making pictures bigger (or smaller).

Yes, I definitely don't get paid enough to do what I do.

Me no get drunk...!

Last night an institution was born!

It has no name but loads of people are trying to crack it haha...

Last night was the night we discovered I can't get drunk!

AA Jase was buying Flaming after Flaming (while chatting girls up at the Loft) but they couldn't topple yours truly. I was so apprehensive - I hate feeling drunk (I know, I can't get drunk yet I know what it feels like? Yes, I do). Maybe I should have told them that wine does it :P

Tis the season to get merry - and very, very, VERY friendly...

Howdy ho folks! Hope your Christmasses were as merry as they should be!

As for mine, haha! Managed to stay puke-free for another year! Which is great, man... really great, all things considered. I still have to return the favour of two pairs of puke-stained shoes to a certain friend of mine. You know who you are!

Lots of fun things happening around town, one of which was the incident where my car keys and house keys were in a friend's car, who was incidentally completely gone; and my phone, IC and driving license were in a friend's purse (and she was completely gone as well). It was complicated, but with lots of running around (and driving without my license, yikes!) everything was settled.

Basically, it's been a fun Christmas season for partying, but I also really enjoyed the decorations they've made an effort to put up around town. Very nice! And of course, we must always remember why we celebrate Christmas in the first place. I hope none of you missed out on your church celebrations for the birth of baby Jesus with all the boozing you're getting!

I don't have any photos from the parties, so I'm trying to get a friend to send them over to me, hopefully I'll be putting them up here before the next Christmas...

But here are photos from my mum's family celebration last night!

It really bothers me

It puzzles me how people can get so wrapped up and enthralled by feng shui, ba zi and face-reading, future-predicting methods such as these. It strikes me that many people don't want to be religious because it involves self-sacrifice and following a certain lifestyle. But what about feng shui? Does it not involve reading your horoscope frequently, buying ugly ornaments and living your life a certain way, for example, not going out on your "bad luck" days, wearing lots of metal to counter-balance your very earth-heavy element - and those are just the simple things. Do you really want your whole life to be dictated to you just because you have certain marks on your body and because two or three stars out in space have died and no longer shine? And I say dictated because if you don't listen to these signs, the price of petrol may rise yet again next year...

Maybe it's because it allows those people to believe they have some control over what happens to them. Although, most of the things that they believe come true are really self-fulfilling prophecies. Think about it.

What about predictions for the coming year? Will the country be politically stable or will there still be immature bickering among parties? Why ask Joey Yap? Ask a political analyst. Ask an economist. Ask a real estate agent. Ask people who are experts in their field. Why ask the stars, who were put there eons ago and are merely living and dying, not caring what earth people do? Why consult our moles and scars about our future? Does that sound right to you?

A friend of mine who follows this closely believes that her relationships will never be as fulfilling as she would like them to be because of some facial feature or some self-element she possesses. What does that tell me? That she will always settle with second-best. And that she will be dissatisfied but say, "What can I do about it?" then subsequently grow old crying in front of her life-sized, 8-legged golden frog.