Tuesday, October 30, 2007

梁靜茹 - 今天情人節 2007

Fish Leong

looking for close friends (any girls? =x) who like Fish Leong's songs to watch this concert with me!

she will be holding the concert at the SIS, 29 dec 2007 at 8pm.

anybody? I need to book soon (most likely getting CAT 3 seats, $118/pax).




i released much stress after watching this mtv. That few lines in it triggered memories and made me tear. But it was more like tears of relief. Although men should "liu xie bu liu lei", but oh well i concede i'm one of the guys who can never be like that. I'm not made of metal~

i very much want to stand by her, share the troubles but my hands are tied these 2 weeks. *fat* girl plsss help her wherever you can!!

Sunday, October 28, 2007

waters are overly calm

settled all the little outstanding stuff today. Even went back to NYP to settle some paperwork for the coming audit, luckily there is supply of cold air. Where, it remains a secret =x

went over to blk M and Q to note down the configuration of 7 labs, saw some unusual peeps - i knew a girl from dmd, and she was in the fypj lab happily looking into her dual screen Mac G5. With the lights off. I thought i saw a ghost =x

then another guy walked pass me at blk M's level 4 entrance, then we met again at blk Q level 3's entrance. His card obviously couldn't enter ELQ, so he waited nearby for me to tap mine. Actually i was afraid mine won't be recognized since i've not tried accessing on a sunday, but the reader gave the nod. Heng ar...

the strangest thing was that he is a student, looking for labs to use. Fine, but on a sunday? Where on earth did he get the idea that school is open?

then a couple knocked on my door while i was peeling my prawn just now. Didn't inform me.. *bish* at least i can put some air freshener, tidy my table, etc. lolz. I soon discovered their real purpose...

Notice what's on the screen? Patches of green.

2 pairs of eyes on the greens -.-"

wenqun and i gossiped over relationship stuff, what's happening on my side. Teacher agreed with me; there isn't something called an 'ideal' lover. Policeman kinda asked me why i'm so stubborn after so long... it's built into myself i guess. Borrowing the priority-and-options phrase from someone to sum up, i'll say that i'm not treating her as just an option, but also not the highest priority for now. It has to be a mutual thing. Prefer to let things flow slowly.

i can feel my temper getting worse lately (maybe this explains the need for a girl to be with me =x). At cwp, 3 boys reset the selections on the lift controls using the well known trick. I nearly snapped at the 3 of them. Then my hand went forward to press my floor again. Figured out that if i couldn't control myself, i will punch the controls, pull one of them back and yell.

both of them are bad. Teased me on my football knowledge =p


waixin just told me that the one-off online S/U revocation system is available to login. I was thinking; if i got a D for MA1505 i'll seriously consider to un-S/U my grade. But, the grade is worse - F.

MA1505 and ST2334 will be my nemeses in NUS. But i must conquer them in the next 2 (and my last 2) semesters. *sigh*

Saturday, October 27, 2007

Korean War

this is a response to the seafood soup i had yesterday at the korean stall - i decided to read up past Presidents of Republic of Korea (South Korea), which i eventually read about the Korean War too.

brief facts:

Korea's annexation by Japan
- China was defeated by Japan just before the turn into 20th century (1st Sino-Japanese War).

- Japan in return gained control of Korea (annexation) from 1910-1945.

Separation of Korea after WWII
- At the end of WWII, Japan surrendered Korea to US and Soviet Union (Russia), both of them kept their forces close to the 38th parallel. 38th parallel is the demarcation line between the 2 Koreas today.

- US had supported an election in whole of Korea, as Koreans had opposed another round of foreign control after Japan. Soviet feared that the election was in favour of South Korea, thus North Korea boycotted the election.

Rise of ideological dictators
- Syngman Rhee, the 1st President of ROK was elected in 1948. At North Korea, Kim II-sung was endorsed by the Soviet to be the first communist hardline ruler. With two dictators with similar ideologies to unify Korea, skirmishes began.

- Notably, Soviet was not too intent on supporting Kim, as it would mean war with the US. However, Stalin decided to approve an attack by Kim into South Korea, before the latter became strong enough to defend itself. North Korea started the Korean War in 25 June 1950.

- The communists gained control of Seoul in just 3 days, on the 28 June 1950 thanks to good planning and superiority in armour and artillery.

UN rushes past 38th parallel and occupies Pyongyang
- In reaction, UN drafted a new resolution which enabled US to intervene. For nearly 2 months, UN had little success and in control of only 10% of Korea peninsula. However, the combination of US air raids and influx of Japanese soldiers bolstered the morale of the UN troops, which launched a counterattack in early September 1950.

- The UN troops drove the North Koreans back past the 38th parallel. However as US desired the goal of unifying Korea, they pursued a rollback policy, which China saw as a threat since US will inevitably attack China's bases that are supporting North Korea. The UN troops occupied Pyongyang in October 1950.

China fights back, communists occupies Seoul
- US underestimated China's ability in the war, and thus was roundly defeated with heavy casualties. Humiliated, it retreated to Pusan. Seoul was recaptured by communists in January 1951.

US reassembles Eighth Army, UN reinvents war strategy
- Over several Operations (Ops Roundup, Killer, Ripper, Courageous and Tomahawk), the US army pushed themselves northwards, despite similar offensives by the Chinese. US did consider using atomic bombs, which was infamously used to force Japan's surrender in WWII.

- UN troops stopped at Line Kansas, just northwards from 38th parallel this time.

Stalemate
- Little movement were felt from July 1951 to July 1953, and military troops on both sides attempted to regain all areas around the 38th parallel.

- Eventually a ceasefire was established; with North Korean troops on one side and South Korean plus US troops on the other.

- There have been no major incidents since, however both Koreas are still technically at war. This is because strongman Syngman Rhee didn't sign the armistice agreement together with US and Pyongyang.

Irony
- The cross occupation of Seoul and Pyongyang in just 2 years is intriguing. My admiration for all the troops that really persevered.

- I read with interest that South Korea's economy was in greater shambles compared to the northern neighbour after Korean War. North Korea's recovery was faster until 1975. Although Syngman Rhee was a strongman dictator, he apparently led a clean government towards modernization and industrialization, leading to today's successful South Korea.

- US probably wanted the world to forget its humiliating retreat midway Korean War - the latter is also known as the Forgotten War.

Afterthoughts
- Being a Singaporean born in the 1980s, i have not tasted any war in history. Of course, i'm not for any war to break out, but would want to understand and appreciate hardships suffered by forefathers in earlier years. Despite the strong economy in Singapore itself, we must be aware that many global situations are not within our control - someday we will be in trouble. Thus my message to friends and myself is not to be overly complacent of ourselves and forget about the past.

buses brief - SBST fleet renewal

recently everyone would have observed SBS Transit's new fleet of double deck buses.

Very visible at YCK Interchange - 72 and 76 has lots of them

No, this is not the WAB model - B10TL that came before B9TL.
Recognized by its loud radiator on the right


although the common name would be WABs (Wheelchair Accessible Buses), these double decks are technically known as Volvo Olympian B9TL. The bodywork is assembled by ComfortDelgro Engineering (CDGE), which is a subsidiary of ComfortDelgro. If you're not aware, SBS Transit is part of CDG too.

the B9TL, being the latest generation of buses in SBS Transit and Singapore presents these new prominent features:

- Climatic controlled airconditioning by Denso (?)
- Fully wheelchair accessible with wheelchair ramp, zero-step entry
- Outswing "plug" doors for smooth exit
- Vogelsitze passenger seats for comfort
- improved driver's cabin in terms of seat and space

- EURO-3 emission standard
- electronic transmission; 6 speed gearbox by ZF, or 4 speed gearbox by Voith

the buses are registered in the range of SBS 7300P to 7499A, meaning a total order of 150 initially, with option of 50 more (already exercised).


SBS Transit is not stopping here! It has ordered from Scania, another whopping 500 new single deck buses, codenamed K230UB. The purchase is to primarily replace the aging single deck Mercedes MB0405s and Volvo B10M Mark IIs that are running around Singapore since 1988-1990.

Going off soon to the scrapyard - Scania N113

Many have already been scrapped - Volvo B10M Mark II

Going off soon to the scrapyard - Mercedes MB0405 (Alexander bodywork)

Going off, too - MB0405 (Duple Metsec bodywork)

for the Scania K230UB, the bodywork will be produced in Malaysia, except for the demonstrator buses that are already built by CDGE. The demonstrator buses will be out very soon, so watch out for them.

Getting ready for revenue service

K230UB's rear

some trivia, the only 2 bendy buses in SBS Transit disappeared a while ago - both were sold to Bayes Coachline Fleet in New Zealand as school buses. o.O

things are going very slowly at SMRT Buses. It's hard to understand why they have not expanded their fleet since 2004, despite increasing demand for popular services under their charge. The worst thing they have done is to close down City Shuttle Services (CSS), then transfer the really old fleet to SMRT Buses. Some people don't even know where to press the bell!

they put up a tender for 66 new buses, which will most likely be from Scania. Mercedes Benz will be preferred since their engines are robust, but these are expensive stuff. No matter which brand, these buses better come quickly.

catty finding

we have been observing this cat yesterday and today. Apparently it has a liking for cockroaches! O.O

thurs night - getting comfy at the dustpan

he's back! fri night - so fierce sia

Yes, he was running after roaches. Even did somersaults to get this

The thur roach survived, unfortunately fri's did not.
Another corpse nearby

*AHH i'm tired of licking roaches. Back to zzz.*

the cleaning guys awarded him with a prawn on thurs night, while he was at the dustpan. However he kicked the prawn away because the shell was not peeled - so proud! The cleaner then deshelled it, and the cat confidently stood up on 2 legs to catch it from the air!

*_*


earlier on i was at simlim with zw, to have korean food. He wanted to look for his mouse, so he killed 2 birds with 1 stone. I'm interested to ask the stall owner about her nationality - she speaks perfect korean, yet perfect chinese too!

Yup this is the one i have been loving for since 2002

960 was jam packed. 2 even complained to driver.


whenever it comes to handling issues concerning her, i can't help being pessimistic. Maybe it's "once bitten, twice shy". Going by this phrase, what will be the third?

sigh.

Friday, October 26, 2007

NYP's syllabus outdated

just finished installing the latest version of Glassfish (Sun SAS v9.1) on my server - it's a notch up from v9.0. Together with Netbeans v5.5.1 the dice example seemed alright, although the latter was created in Netbeans v5.5.

after my exams i'd consider deploying the aHRM system on my server. I think it will be alright.

let us consider the release periods of EJB and .Net specifications:
- EJB 1.0: Mar 1998
- EJB 1.1: Dec 1999
- EJB 2.0: Aug 2001
- EJB 2.1: Nov 2003
- EJB 3.0: May 2006

- .Net 1.0: Jan 2002
- .Net 1.1: April 2003
- .Net 2.0: Nov 2005
- .Net 3.0: Nov 2006

why is NYP still using the 4 year old EJB 2.1 for instruction? SIT is supposed to be the latest in adopting new technologies; the use of EJB 2.1 is embarrassing. Back in 2002, i still remember the push to learn .Net although it was in 1.0 Beta. What has happened to the management now?

EJB 2.1 is outdated; i don't see the need for students to be learning it unless the aim is to support companies that are using older J2EE applications. Furthermore over at the .Net side, major project modules are already at .Net v2.0.

EJB 3.0 is way enhanced by removing the technicalities off programmers.

last year when i was reading CS2261, A/P Danny Poo was teaching us based on the EJB 2.1 spec. After that, he migrated the teaching materials to EJB 3.0 - the following book he published based on the new EJB spec is 50% thinner! That's a sign that EJB 2.1 is excessively laborious and induced much of the hair pulling last year.

those doing Jedev should boldly suggest to use a later EJB version - it saves you trouble and time understanding EJB 2.1. If the lecturer refuses, feedback the suggestion in course feedback system. Things have to change somehow. I shall find a chance to speak to somebody who can help me understand the rationale behind teaching an outdated module too.

Thursday, October 25, 2007

CS3214 report submission

After the system proposal 1.5 mths ago and the first system release 3 weeks ago, we are going to submit our 3rd deliverable later - system analysis report, 3pm at CH's room. The 4th and last deliverable is of course the final system release (50%), in mid november.

CS3214 - nightmarish yet satisfying

shown the draft to CH on monday but i felt the standard was lacking - some many notations were not standardized, UML arrows missing, even some sections such as TOC, Introduction were not in =x sorted them in an 6hr marathon on tuesday night.

luckily i was able to catch the last 963 bus. Since i slept at around 4am for sunday, monday nights, so i finally couldn't take it anymore. Crashed after that, all the way until 12pm.

printing and binding were done in NYP. 130 pages of goodness, i hope it's not too much nor too little. I prefer "quality over quantity".

for the 1st time since 2003, i did business with the pretty auntie at the photocopy shop! Gotta say she's pretty, otherwise she would tear my report into pieces. Zw asked me if she's still there, yup and her pictures are still up at the wall too. The only change with the shop is the addition of a printing PC and glass partition.

sorry vicky if i appeared to be angry at you. Her sms kinda turned me off. =(


arrived an hour late at the GEK lecture. Tony Chew was coming down hard on us again. This time i heard them saying that he blabbered a sentence that "NUS students are stupid". Unbelievable to be hearing that from a guest speaker.

then zw and i went to West Coast Road to makan. The prata shop beside Fong Seng, the famous nasi lemak for our fellow peeps. There are so many rave reviews on it, just google it! We went for the prata instead of FS though, because i ate before going for the lecture.

Chicken murtabak, mushroom and egg prata for me

Yup, this is the shop's banner.

i have been thinking of blogging about my childhood photos and my previous overseas travelogues to Shanghai and Penang for some time. But this is not the time to do so; i'll work on them after exams. Went through some photos i took in Shanghai.

wonder how is the weather there now?

Shanghai is actually very westernised due to historical reasons

This is the Shanghai 'tan', 'waitan' or Bund that many of us see in the movies/dramas

Testimony to Shanghai's blistering development

Futuristic looking Tomorrow Sq.
This is just one of the nice buildings in Shanghai.

As usual Singapore Inc is always looking for expansion overseas

Enhancement to their metro stations - their metro network is exploding - 11 lines by 2009!
Singapore? Our Circle Line is not even complete by then.

Do you see CHINA in the picture?

The trip was incomplete if i didn't go for tech stuff.

some little trivia, Kym Jin Sha is a Shanghainese too. She's really pretty! *_*

You've seen her locally in Jean Yip's commercial.

will publish my travelogue next month. Stay tuned.

Tuesday, October 23, 2007

misc

life has been slow on sunday and monday.

sunday was spent sneezing and wheezing, then i couldn't take it anymore. Actually i was refining my CS3265 report and decided that enough is enough. Have already refined until my blood was everywhere on the floor. Went off to Chinatown to get my hairgel, blackhead remover plus soap. Really cheap, that's why i find it worthwhile to make the trip down.

after that was minor window shopping at Funan, since i wanted to unwind. Walked around happily with a cup of Mcd's ILT :) although i was alone la. Then i took a slow walk from Funan to Esplanade, across Padang. I felt really good; even sat down near Esplanade bridge to open my eyes and ears to the tranquil surroundings.

monday was hell of an hectic day though. It's zw and wx's turn to skip CS2250 this week, after my disappearance last week. Only managed to meet them just before the CS3265 lecture. Then we handed up our project report and powerpoint slides. Finally case closed.

met Ben, a freshie and ex-NYPian at the Computing Helpdesk. I almost fainted when he 'reminded' me of a 20% closed book test for CS2250 in 2 weeks time. I couldn't remember there was such a test to start with! How to prepare? Seriously, i need some joss sticks for this test.

there seemed to be some disagreements on the attire to wear for our presentation tomorrow, because some of us are presenting and some are not. In the end, i had to intervene and make a stand, but still couldn't satisfy everyone. I'm sorry if anyone is not feeling at their best of moods. Just have to accept the way it is now.

Inaugural walk up the rooftop

Went to LTL-3 to play with new AV setup. Cool remote~

My favourite Ferrari bus -
this particular one is the last Habit bus shipped from Germany in 2004

just printed my CS3214 report, with a cover page named "Known faults" for CH's note. The 130-page report is 90% ready for Thurs submission. Hope to get rid of the remaining 10% by tomorrow. I hope so!


Happy birthday to Peilin!

Saturday, October 20, 2007

state of homegrown Creative Labs - doom

was munching on fried rice for dinner, when i surfed to Anandtech for some tech updates.

Anandtech has published an article on Creative, painting an extremely gloomy picture on our very local and successful technology company.

sad to say, i have to agree there is a certain amount of mismanagement in Creative judging from their financial performance. If you see their yearly revenue, it was around $700-800m from 2000-2004. Then in 2005, Creative appeared to have turned their tide by earning an extra $408m from $815m. Since then, earnings have went to post-dotcom bust levels.

that's only the revenue - after deducting expenses, the company is in the red. It again appeared to be in the black this FY because of Apple's payout for the patent infringement. Otherwise, losses were potentially higher than FY2006.

Anandtech has cited unsuccessful attempts by Creative to broaden their product lines - we are all aware of Creative optical drives and graphic cards that disappeared from shops long time ago. To make matters worse for their audio division, it will be severely impacted from a new development in Windows Vista. Microsoft has developed a completely new audio stack for Vista due to the inherent flaws of the older stack used since Windows 3.1. This audio stack has removed support for DirectSound and made all SoundBlaster (even their very new X-Fi) cards useless overnight.

technological factors aside, i feel that Creative has been doing badly because of poor customer service. Poor customer service and technical support for everything has drove customers away. Creative is well known for sub-par sound drivers that are sometimes buggy and even then, the next revision took ages to be released. It has appeared 'lost' by Vista's new audio stack, and rushed for software fixes. It's unbelievable for a large company to be unaware of other complementary product developments.

poor management foresight and complacency is to be considered as well. How can Creative watch Realtek take away much of the onboard sound market over the past few years? What has Creative done to differentiate their product offering?

i hate to see Creative going downhill, but it is happening for sometime. Sim Wong Hoo has to do something about it, otherwise it will just sink into the past. Such as IPC and Compro.

hk's new stardom

my kelly's concert went up in smoke! 2 guys actually met earlier and went around arts to search for the ticketing booth. After conquering many flights of staircases (read: NUS = National University of Staircases) and ending up at Central again, we realised one problem after looking at the poster for the 3rd time. The ticket issue was on the 18th, and concert on the 19th at LT27!

2 blur cocks mistook the date!!! One of them is me! =(

nvm, went for lecture. This is the worst lecture i ever sat in, because some inconsiderate peeps were talking loudly as though they own the place. Those darn freshies wake up your idea. *pissed*

CS3265 project discussion was wrapped up just now. Was quite disappointed because i can sense some half hearted-ness in getting the project report done. I can only do so much to straighten out ambiguous statements. I still don't see the point of doing much effort in CS3214, then see the rest of the modules suffer. Isn't it lppl?

actually left earlier to meet the girls for dinner, but due to the bus 95 getting stuck outside NUH i sadly had to tell them to go ahead. Things always go haywire when i want it to be smooth... sigh. Went to simlim to have my favourite korean meal, then HK called me. Went for an unplanned trip to level 4 and 5, then watched him splurge $386 on his new storage case.

Bell was selling Pentium III 600MHz Slot 1 cartridges. Vintage items.

Lethal combo - WD 320GB and 2-bay Firewire/USB storage device

Small, but weighted a ton

One of the drive bay.

The available connectors and drive setup option

together with simon we walked through the suntec food court. I was telling kay that i realised myself unconsciously avoiding some places jun and i always frequented in the past, especially the ones we went just before the breakup. Suntec foodcourt, Kuishinbo, Lau Pat Sat, Amoy Street hawker centre, BJ's kino were some of them. I never stepped into Kuishinbo since my last meal with her there. No prizes for guessing why.

maybe i don't want to affect my own recovery or 胡思乱想. So i guess when i'm ready for another relationship, it's when i will find courage to visit these places again, by myself. I'm well on my way, luckily =)

before heading home went over to jac's place to do the 'door trick'. No more donuts for me cos' her father took the remaining 2. Hiakhiak...

Friday, October 19, 2007

zm fat and thin

actually when i looked at the filming me, gosh i really looked fatter!

argggh. i thought i lost some weight because i'll get stressed during study terms (from nyp experience)?!

went for pizza just now, andrew was at the wheel. Breezed to Thomson Plaza. We were the only customers -.-

This photograph was taken by a tripod. *_*

Yes, by that tripod too. lolz...

vicky reminded me. I shouldn't be travelling from 18-27 dec. *slap forehead*

cherish the times now, since there wouldn't be any chance in few months time. sigh~

Thursday, October 18, 2007

misc

discussion continued just now; on the seminar we are supposed to present during tutorial next week. Had a headache on the way to school, as i was shuttling around in cwp to transfer money between banks. Finally got the battery for my doorbell too.

ZW came up with the itinerary for the seminar ppt.

As usual i'm the 'merger' and coordinator. Timeline~

GEK1531
the evening lecturer is the 4th and the last speaker for the Cybercrime module. He is Mr Tony Chew, a Director from MAS. Yes, Monetary Authority of Singapore.

this section has been edited to reinforce my opinions with examples - to avoid unnecessary trouble. I'm a responsible blogger ;)

authoritative lecturing
thought he was alright, but he sounded very authoritative. He was really full of himself when he told everybody in LT25 this (roughly): "if you don't listen to me in class, you will fail the exams. (duh) If you don't do the tutorials, you WILL fail because 50% of the materials will come from it (duh!!!)"

against the university open learning culture
worse still, i don't know whether he's trying to offload some work meant for him - "if you didn't read my additional materials, don't ask me questions and i will only entertain you if you ask me based on those materials". Wow. Additional materials from God?

The friend in front really wrote the above.

assumptions and distrust
then he gave us a 30 mins break. Why not end the lecture and tutorial quickly? His reason was that we have not done our tutorial, so he gave us more time to do it. Wtf? We became his little students in the nursery!

lack of empathy and consideration
during the mass tutorial, he picked a particular row of students and asked the peep answering his question to stand up. -.-"

since the topic was on the internet banking area, there were questions like 2FA (2nd factor authentication), OTP (one time password) and etc. GEK1531 is a general education and cross-faculty module and there are surely students who're not from School of Computing, or simply do not trust Internet Banking. When the poor student couldn't answer, he had to make fun of the student (while he/she was standing). The guy couldn't answer how DBS' internet banking worked, and he remarked "you mean you have not used internet banking"?

SHEEEEESH!

everyone almost couldn't stand him because he sounded like a discipline master. He is speaking as a distinguished guest in NUS, not some primary or secondary school. Even in poly, lecturers were very humble and willing to go a step lower or further.

etc
he had some odd laughing noise - much like Prof Yu CS, the first speaker. Everyone laughed not because he was funny, but his laugh was really odd.

i learnt some new stuff from this lecture despite so many negative points. Now i know that the security device (that DBS token, for example) makes use of symmetric encryption to encrypt the current date/timestamp into a ciphertext, which the bank will do the same on their side. After the lecture i went down to clarify some concepts, which he answered but had the look of "you should know".

i'm going to give my feedback when the course feedback system is available. By and large i feel that his teaching pedagogy is outdated - i'd compare it to the Israeli way of training soldiers; training soldiers up by breaking them down and then building them up again. SAF have already changed, so must Mr Tony Chew too.

ps: the Israeli way of "breaking" soldiers meant the terrible punishments or training exercises, eg. change parade, 1-min field pack out-and-in, stand-by-universe, blah blah. Even tedious body exercises and swearing of your mother and father are banned in BMT nowadays. Of course the SAF's 8th core value still applies - "you can do anything but don't get caught".

I'm going for the campus concert!
DIEDIE must get tics!

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

CS2250 filming nearly done

skipped school on Monday, as i was very busy catching up after visiting PS in JB. Went to NYP to do my stuff.

vincent cleared some space for me, was very thankful for that. Now my office PC and speaker system is up. The rest will be looked at after exams i think.

tuesday was the official day for filming, so i brought the props - a company logo, sales chart, designation cards, etc. Very fortunately DR1 was empty, which was crucial. It had a very meeting room and Director's office feel.

i was the laughter of so many people la. Yan Shi invited 3 of her uni mates to act as my "managers". Then i spent close to 2hrs getting my lines and temper right. Was supposed to scold them; but couldn't bring myself to =x

yan shi was really meticulous in getting the office outlook right. Additional props such as name card holders, magazines etc were 'stolen' from somewhere else. We even wanted plants and a fake phone. heheh...

thanks to jodi for excellent photography skills!

I'm the Director of FastBread.

Ate too much sandwiches during the filming. NooooOOOoooo...

Presenting the rest of the team. Notice the jeans? lolz..

Sunday, October 14, 2007

day at JB

the day was so rushy because i woke up late. Was rushing like mad to meet the pack at the bus stop outside Sheng Siong, then forgot to grab a spare immigration form from my parents.

heard of many horrific crimes by snatch thefts on foot, motorbikes and cars, so we were extra careful when walking in the open. Actually i was less tense compared to john... heehee. After all i used to visit JB monthly for the first 3 years after moving to Marsiling (96-98). Then, my parents brought my siblings and myself, roaming around downtown JB and some of the further "gardens" (their Taman so-and-so, etc). I still feel at ease now, but took care not to flash my belongings unless i have to.

crimes happened because we have been feeling so normal with our much safer environment - although we are in a foreign land certain behavioural norms are carried over unconsciously as well.

the advice for anybody wanting to travel on foot in johor is to be as simple as possible (in terms of dressing and personal accessories) and cut down your verbal languages to the minimum. Be alert to the surroundings and avoid walking on the road and backlanes, unless there are human activity around.

Some actor from HK was here as ambassador to "Wong Kok Cha Chan Teng"

Much time was spent holing up here

Ordered this; went to JB in such a hurry that i ate only porridge

Heading home by foot - too much people waiting for public transport

This was the way in to the passenger arrival terminal at JB

This is the very typical snapshot from our TV and papers

Nice sunset while walking towards Singapore

WELCOME TO SINGAPORE. Nice Panasonic screen.

heard more details from the suicide; it was due to depression from many problems that her brother sought death as the best solution. He jumped down from a hotel nearby their house, suffering multiple and fatal fractures to the skull, arms and spine. There were many signs in the past few months, such as he bringing out a gas tank from the house. She thought; if they paid more attention to these worrying signs death could be averted. As friends we can only wish her family and her not to reproach themselves for the loss. To me it is also an important reminder that the world around us is getting increasingly complicated. Hope she will move on soon.