Fierce

Met a fellow Singaporean at the hostel while cooking a couple of days ago. Chatted a bit, and asked if we were serving NS before school started. So we both said yes, but he ORD last Sept. Then he asked, "You were a 'sa tiao' (meaning sergeant) in Army right?" I was like "Ya", thinking he saw me before somewhere or what, I asked, "How you know?"

Then he said, "Oh, you got the face."
"What face?"
"The 'you don't mess with me or I'll f*** you' face"
"..."

Haha, I know I have the face, but coming from somebody I barely knew for 5 mins is unexpected. It's either I'm really fierce or seeing fellow countrymen overseas make you quick friends or his EQ is low. I think it's a bit of everything. Haha... And I love the face he gave when I said I was from Guards, HAHAHAHA!! Made all the suffering more worthwhile. Hehe..

Confirmed yesterday that one of my SISPEC platoon mate was here also. Met him 2 weeks ago but didn't ask him on the spot. Saw him in library yesterday by chance and approached him. He forgot who I was le. Haha, nvm. But it was great catching up, and yet another guy who paid homage to my NS life after hearing I'm a Field Engineer posted to Guards by saying "Wa, li si gan sway ah." (means you are f***ing sway). Haha... Oh well.

Of names

Watching a Test match between Wallaby and All Blacks now. All Blacks is leading 19-17 right now, fight back from 10-0. I'm starting to like watching rugby even more, realised this during last year's rugby world cup. One of the beauty of it is seriously how the players do not argue to refs. If there's a dispute, only the captains talk. Think it's a mutual respect, last week Wallaby and South Africa's match, the ref did apologise for a mistake in giving the commands during a scrum, which led to its collapse. The ref said, "Sorry guys, it's entirely my fault.". Think it's cool their mic is wired for the mass audiences to hear exactly what they say.

And why my nick. There's this All Blacks player named Andrew Hore. And his position is Hooker. Enough said.
As I'm typing the last sentence, Wallaby has taken a 24-19 lead.

*post-edit:
Just wanna share this. It might be a bit of home sickness sinking in? Here's the story. I dreamt about normal things last night, well, things in Singapore, like how I live life in Sg. It's not the dream that may be proving I'm home sick or what, it's the instance when I woke up. I opened my eyes, I saw the cupboard, I was a little shocked and I thought "Where the hell am I?!?!". I was expecting to see the cupboard of my own room back in Sg. It was not till I turned my head left and right and 3 seconds later, it sank in "oh ya, f***. I'm in Brisbane." Maybe not so much home-sickness proper, but I think the brain was in Sg mode from the dream, and then when I wake up suddenly just change of script. Haha.. Got a shock myself.

Well, it may be just natural, considering 3 weeks is the maximum that I've been away from home alone so far in my life, I think. I will survive. =)

Guess who came to town...

Haha.. Had a fulfilling day yesterday, both "emotionally" and stomach-wise. Ms Ng came to Brisbane! Wohooo!! Great to be seeing her man!! It's always nice to have people close to you to visit. It's like half of being back home. =p And things were made better cos she had brought me stuffs from home. Hehe.. Thanks budd! =D

In returning her the favour of helping me save nearly S$100 on one textbook, treated her to fish and chips. Sorry dil, outta budget ah, if it didn't rain and we went to South Bank for cheaper fish and chips, could have treated you also!! Ju Leen la, come then rain non-stop!! Haha. But you know what! Southeast Queensland has its dam up one more level, so their gonna lift the level 6 water restriction to level 5! Haha.. So budd, you are SE Queensland's unsung hero.. ine. Hahahaha!

Pancake house has the most devil-ish pancakes. They're so good and so sinful to eat. The choc pancake, you can really feel the cocoa in the pancakes. IT IS SO DARN GOOD!! So much so that budd happily declared she'll come back to Brisbane for pancakes... NOT FOR ME OR DIL! U good!!! Hahaha.. Anyway, pics!

The Great Court after school reopens-filled with people sitting on the lawn.

Our dinner - Fish n Chips, Grilled fish and Risotto

Dil and Budd! "Good Times!" (Dil, since dunno when)

Pancake house indulgence. The choc one gives u a sugar rush, trust me. Wonder how Daryl finished it alone when we came to Gold Coast last yr!

Yiling... -.-"

Little "gift" from Budd. I'm happy!!!

Back to School

Ok, this week was back to school. It's Tuesday already. 2 days of school.. Seriously, I'm quite awed. One of the modules is a seeming killer, that I'm considering dropping it for now. First sem is not a good time to do some killer courses, seriously.

So school went alright so far. All starting light, just telling you what to expect for the coming weeks. And I'm already pissing my pants. "Army makes you stupid" is somewhat a sweeping and unfair remark. But the 2 year lay off does make you slow in trying to click back to studying mode. I just have to try to survive I guess. Argh.

The fire alarm went off again, in consecutive days. I wonder if the people really do pay, and what goes through the minds of the fire brigade people when their alarm sounds. Is it "Oh, money for bigger fire engines again!" or "Dammit, the stupid student hostel again.." Haha, really worth a thought.

Sleeping In..

As the Chinese saying goes, "dong1 tian1 bu4 shi4 du2 shu1 tian1" (Winter is not the season for studies). Or is it Spring? Whatever, in this cool weather, sleeping time goes way beyond normal. Now you know why animals hibernate in winter, human included. Haha..

The fire alarm in my lodging went off for 2 nights in a row. People try to cook extravagant stuff in their room and end up triggering the smoke detector when the food burn. Haha.. Damn jialat. And a visit by the fire brigade costs A$970, if it's a false alarm (meaning not fire). Think the fire dept loves my lodging man.. A$2000 earned for a combined of 1 hour of work. Haha...

Nothing planned for the day. It's boring. Haha, might check out the casino later.. Sign up as member and can go have free drinks when I'm bored, have cheap nice meals. Heard chicken chops are at $6. Not too bad! =) Photos as promised.

The fire brigade downstairs last night.

Ferry stop at school. City Cat is the name of the ferry service. Hehe.

River with a view. Quite a lot of construction going on in Brisbane. Much like Sg..

Beautiful Great Court in school.

Found this on the Great Court grass patch. Wth!!

Orientation..

This week is orientation week. Eh, it's nothing the sort of JC orientation when it's basically having fun. Well, this one was more seminar like. Formal welcome, tells you what to expect etc. They did a nice thing in going through a list of the countries where all the international students come from, from country A-Z, one by one and telling the total number of intl students they have from that country.

The top 2 on the count of intl student population has got the looks of the Olympic medal rankings. USA and China. If the 2nd runner up nation is to be included, it'll be an Olympic medal rankings that I'm be hoping for. It's Singapore! Haha. We've got a whopping 182 students. Just 10 less than China, and USA was the only country to break the 200-count, with around 220.

Took the ferry to school. It's beautiful. And the prospects of taking ferry to school daily still excites me somewhat. *cheap thrill* But it does offer a good alternative that will make sure I get to school on time during the morning rush hour, because there'll be no traffic jam. Will post picture at a later time.

On a side note, somebody set off the fire alarm in his room just now on the 8th level when cooking. He burnt something I think. The fire brigade came. I hope he had really set something on fire, cos if it's just smoke and considered to be false alarm, good luck. He'll be set back by A$970. And I wouldn't have known the alarm was off if I hadn't came back to my room to get dish washing detergent. Cos I was on level 4, where the common kitchen is, and we could hear nothing. So guess what, people evacuated, via lift (brilliant right?). How did I know? Cos I took the lift down too! To Level 4 to continue with the dishes. =x

First Week

So, the first week is over. Time flies.. The winter really zaps alot of time off. It's so cold in the morning that you just want to stay in bed, and by the time you get out of it, it's already 10 or even later. Then it's brunch, then do whatever the day beholds, and in 7 hours (ie. 5pm), the sun sets.. Then it's dinner, wash up, computer, tv. Then to sleep, and the cycle continues..

The first week is over, I missed the entire programme that has brought me here this early in the first place. But I guess it's a trade off.. I'd really underestimated the need to get accustomed to a foreign place and living on my own.. If not for being "bluffed" here to attend to the programme, (well, by myself), I'd probably have to struggle through orientation and settling down.. Now, I'm actually praying that I've more to do.. =p

More photos for now.

Cooked lunch with Ancella. Middle plate (dark sauce minced pork is by me! My fav!) Kelly Chai Hui Bi, I COOKED OK!!!! =p
Preparing for steamboat at Ancella's friends' place
Guess what?! My soya milk fix!!
Laudry day means utilising whatever space available to dry clothes

Day 4..

It's been 4 days since I touched down in Brisbane. Still getting used to everything, really. The past 2 days was spent at "supposed to go school" and ended up sleeping in and going to Queen Street Mall instead. No excuses here, but I think the sleeping in was due partly to the weather. It was still alright the first 2 days, in terms of coldness. But it rained yesterday morning and it got quite cold. Today was worse, even the locals feel cold, needless to say about people like me who had barely even gotten used to the 10+ deg C weather. It's 11.7 deg C now, according to a website. The forecast says it'll be pretty much the same tml, but the weekend will be warmer.

Met up with Ancella today and got to know one of her pals who is here too. Had pho bo (viet beef rice noodle soup), but it pales in comparison to Vietnam's one, of course. And I finally stepped into school today! It's beautiful.. Really like it. Probably ask my sis to bring the SLR when they visit so that I can take beautiful pics! Hehe.. The idea of going to school by ferry excites me, I've yet to try that. And judging by the traffic jam I had to endure while going back to hostel during rush hour, I guess the ferry service will come in handy at times. And I've got my student card! Yessah! Can travel at half price, buy cheaper meals at some places etc. =)

Right now, waiting for the academic exemption to be confirmed, that can be quite a bitch.. Judging by the receptionist saying, "we'll try to get it done by next Friday" Wa lao, try is not a good word. Although it's not the absolute latest to enrol next Friday, I don't really want to change course after school has started on the following Monday. We'll see.

For now, I'll leave you guys with some pics of my settling down in the past few days. =)

First grocery shopping. House brand galore!

My KAYA!!! Bought it at an Asian Mart near my hostel.

Packed cupboard.

The beautiful UQ. =)

First Post from Down Under

So, I'm sitting here, right smack in the centre of Brisbane, typing my first entry after leaving Singapore on the 6th floor of a 26 storey lodging building.

Firstly, THANK YOU to all who bothered to send me off. Really appreciate it, be it those who arrived so early that I haven't checked in yet or those who caught me at the last moment before I went in. Thank You!

The flight was alright. But I found the seat to be rather crammed. See, I was put alongside 3 other Aussies in the centre portion of the flight. So it can't get worse, in terms of having all 4 big sized pple together, I was probably the smallest sized one. Dammit. I swear to ask for window seat the next time I fly.

Went around the town getting some necessary items, and boy am I so glad that I did so. It's quite cold now and I'm sure it'll only get worse in the middle of the night. Got a good pillow, and a reasonably warm quilt. They're supposed to last me through the entire length of studies, so I paid A$70 for them. Lucky I never gei kiang go buy some chui blanket, if not tonight can shiver like I did in Thailand outfield. =p

So basically met this guy from Sg and did all the shopping, lunch and dinner with him. Other people has been hi and bye so far today. All seems to be in a rush to go somewhere. Probably the 2 of us seemed the same anyway. So, hope to see more people? =)

The calling card here rocks. A A$10 card can give me 20 hours of calling time to land and mobile lines in Sg!! Wohoo!! So I guess I'll be the one calling already basically. =)

Guess I'm gonna have an early night. Haven't slept much since couple of days ago, trying to squeeze each minute outta my time left in Sg. And needless to say, the overnight flight didn't help too much. So, I'll leave with a couple of photos I took of my lodging. I'm still left with clothes to unpack cos I wanna clean the wardrobe first, though everything is generally clean. But well, 15 mins of cleaning to put my mind at ease for 5 months isn't too bad I guess. Hope to be able to get a rag tomorrow. =)

My room in its current state, ready for sleeping! =)

View from my window

The dining table, tv, kitchenette is beside the door, and toilet is behind the tv.