In Scotland, do as the Scots do!

Well, maybe not all Scottish people would enjoy it but I just got back from my very first Ceilidh :)

Ceilidh is a gaelic word.. and it's pronounced like "kaylee" ... According to wikipedia a Ceilidh "is a traditional Gaelic social gathering, which usually involves playing Gaelic folk music and dancing"

When I first heard about it I was kinda apprehensive.. i've been told i'm a very stiff/robotic person and i don't think i've ever been good at dancing.. the moves i know are..unmodern and simple -.- .. but since a friend of mine was going i decided to go as well.. at least i'd know somebody there!

The Ceilidh was organised by the chaplaincy and 2 churches came, one to play us the music and another to supply us with food.. (a live band is always a plus for me :3 )
There was a guy who taught us the moves.. and he wore a kilt! and he didn't look funny at all :) .. either that or i've gotten used to seeing men in kilts XD ..

The dance moves were pretty repetitive from dance to dance so you kinda get the hang of it after a few repeats.. i can't quite remember the names of all the dances but we did a Gay Gordon, Flying Scotsman..there was one waltz... and i don't remember the rest of them ._.

Halfway through they let us have a break.. have some sandwiches and scones and other food prepared by one of the churches :) ..
To close off the ceilidh we all joined hands and sang Auld Lang Syne...

I made a very big mistake in my diet today though... i had my coffee at around 5+pm .. and i wasn't hungry before the Ceilidh.. so i went with caffeine in my system.. and i hadn't taken a lot of water today... so it wasn't surprising, given the amount of exercise i WASN'T doing and the caffeine and lack of water, that my legs got a little cramped during one of the dances ._. .. but thank goodness it was towards the end :)

All in all, I had a surprisingly good time tonight! Lots of jumping around..and even if i had sucked at the ceilidh, it didn't matter coz most people were pretty new to it and everyone just wanted to have a good time :D ..

So, if there were another Ceilidh the next term, i'd definitely go!

And i think i really should start exercising coz the feel good hormones really do make you feel happy :)

And now it's time for a shower!

-llen-

skyping with mum....

is mainly how i get updates on family news :) .. and also mum's way of checking up on me -.- ...

the other day i asked her about grandma..

Me : So did you visit gua ma?
Mum: Soon I will.. I'll tell her you went to UK to study..
Me : Ok...good.. how to say england in hokkien ahh?
Mum : "ing kok" loh...
Me : oh.. ok.. *pause* ..but.. i'm in scotland.. how to say scotland in hokkien? :D
Mum : ..... aiyah... nobody wants to know wan lahh just say england can already!!

(-.- .. so if you know how to say scotland in hokkien please let me know..when i said scotland in mandarin mum even asked me not to coz i sounded like i was saying a certain not so nice word ._. )


-llen-

the first fire drill.........

It's not really the first but it certainly is the first that people are taking seriously...

They put up a notice asking us to take fire drills seriously just a while ago and many times they have rang the fire alarm but they always shut it off in about 3 minutes so ..no point responding to that...

Anyways.. I went to bed at about 1am last night.... and it was a very good sleep... and suddenly the alarm went off... i tried to ignore it, hoping they turn it off like they always do.. but i couldn't...i got up, pulled up the blind to see if anyone was escaping the building yet and for the first time i saw a whole bunch of people gathered on the field.. so i checked the time (7.22am), grabbed my jacket, keys, and went down XD ..

Outside, the wind was blowing and blowing and blowing... and i always sleep in shorts -.- ..... a friend of mine wore a nightdress and thank goodness she grabbed her hoodie before going out XD .. there we all were...shivering in the morning while the birds gave out an occasional chirp.. and some dude even brought his cigarettes and a lighter (and i thought i wasn't taking the drill seriously -.- ) .. but if there really were a fire..and if it were a not so big fire.. i think we should be gathering round the fire -.- .......

And now i can't quite go back to sleep yet coz i still feel cold... urgghhh... they just had to pick the day i had early lectures -.- ......


-llen-

joy, deflated..

(A long story about Hitman coming up....don't bother reading if you're not a fan of Agent 47 XD )

From the very day my bro played Hitman 4 and i was his spectator i fell in love with the game..

I wanted to be Agent 47 too! and so i did... the guns and the fibrewire.. the sneaking the mass murdering...good good fun....

Many years after i completed my missions (very badly too coz i have not harnessed my true skills :P ) i decided to learn about Agent 47's past by playing the earlier series... (yes, many years after i was still amazed by Agent 47's coolness)

And so i did..... i played 2 and 3 coz bro was telling me hitman 1's graphic is probably very very.... not so good... (but now i think i really should play 1!)
so when i played hitman 2 and 3 i was older, wiser, stealthier... i could use my brains to figure out how i would execute my mission.... (believe me, it does take some thought on some missions)

After completing 2 and 3 i was hungry for more hitman! i searched in hopes of finding out when hitman 5 would be released... but to no avail... and the only rumour i heard was that hitman 5 would be released the same time as the second hitman movie... (the first hitman movie sucked but i'd still watch the sequel anyway to see how badly they're going to make agent 47 look -.- )

worse off.. bro was saying that the game company had other plans for other new games... and hitman probably was gonna take the back seat D: .. bro was telling me to dream on and there probably isn't going to be another hitman anymore..and so i gave up looking and decided when the time came, i'd know...

BUT!!! bro was so nice in telling me about something he read today :3 .. the voice actor for agent 47 was asked to remove details on his website regarding work on hitman 5 but he confirms that a sequel is coming up!!!

SO.. the very excited me went googling and the first thing i read was that it's coming out late 2010.. and late 2010 is almost here!!!!!! what followed was a lot of hysterical "AHHHH!!!!"s to my bro through msn....
but...... it turns out due to some issues, we'd have to wait till AT LEAST christmas 2011 before Agent 47 is back :( ..

and just like that... all my excitement and joy went *poof* ....... D':


BUT... assuming it does get released in christmas 2011... christmas 2011 is gonna be gooooooood :D :D :D ...

-llen-

Blog Action Day 2010...

Once again we have come to the annual Blog Action Day! And this year's topic is water....

With water being so important in our lives, it's surprising how little of it some people consume and how much of it people waste..

Normally people would tell you to drink at least 8 glasses a day but I doubt many people actually do get enough water in their systems (in fact, i have to remind myself to drink more water sometimes too) .. we are fortunate enough to have clean water supply and yet we seem to be taking it for granted... In Africa, women walk up to 40 billion hours each year carrying cisterns which on its own already weigh up to 18kg to carry water which is usually not even safe enough to drink yet.. And due to the water's unclean nature, many people die from consuming it too..

And this led me to wonder, shouldn't access to clean, safe-to-drink water be a basic human right? Shouldn't we all be granted this basic necessity?
It was comforting to find out that on 28 July this year the General Assembly of the UN declared that "safe and clean drinking water and sanitation is a human right essential to the full enjoyment of life and all other human rights". It will probably take a long time and a lot of effort to make this come true but thankfully organisations such as WaterAid and TheWaterProject have already got the ball rolling. :)

So, what can we do to help?

I for one can't think of what we can do to directly help the lack of clean water supply in certain areas of the world apart from making donations or volunteering but i suppose we could at least consciously appreciate our water..

Simple things like turning off the tap when it's not really in use, turning off the shower while you're applying soap on yourself, preferably use a bucket when washing the car instead of a hose and not watering the garden when it rains, using the water you washed vegetables with to water the plants, use the water you used to handwash your clothes in to wash the toilet floor..etc etc... Apart from saving water you get to save on your monthly utility bill too...

And another thing we can do is dispose of waste properly... This page from the NRDC explains what we can do on a daily basis to keep our water clean...

Before I end this post i just wanna say, yes, I'm grateful for the clean water i get everyday but, I'm still waiting for the day Klang River becomes clean and sparkly :D .. i have no idea how long i'll be waiting for this dream to come true but it'd be nice to see a clean river whenever we go to the other side of Klang.. someday..

-llen-

been almost a month...

Time really flies!!

Been staying here for almost a month now and have quite settled in...

am starting to get used to the fact that i need very little time to get to classes in the morning coz it's all so near -.- ..

getting used to the weather... and enjoying watching the leaves turn from green to yellow to orange and falling off....waiting to see bald trees... am anticipating winter :)


and today it finally hits me, what being away is all about...
I must admit, i haven't really felt any homesickness but that's not the point...

being away for a considerable period of time means missing everything in between...

First, i thought about how i'd be missing Nicole's first birthday (coz i already missed her birth by being on holiday last year) .. And then slowly as the birthdays of people i care about come around i realise, i can't be there for them! i'm not trying to say my presence is important lah but it'd be nice to be able to give them a gift, a hug, a card, a cake!! (damn it i used to bake cakes for people!!) and now all i can do is pour out my wishes into an sms ._. .. and if i hadn't had a laptop upgrade i'd have at least some pictures here to enable me to do a slideshow or something to send by email -.- .. (but then i'd be stuck with a horrible lappy so.. :/ )

and now i've kinda lost my train of thought coz i just got back from having dinner -.- ..


-llen-

day out..

So today has been a rather productive day :)

Eating cafeteria food continuously during the week gets a little boring.. so Rachel (my malaysian neighbour, not my niece XD ) and I decided we'd go to the city and try a Malaysian restaurant..

While we were walking towards our intended destination we saw a sign saying dim sum lunch and 7.99 buffet lunch.. the dim sum was the one that actually caught our eye so we made a little detour.. and it was well worth it :D .. food was reasonably priced and reasonably good.. of course, not the best dim sum in the world BUT good enough.. i had porridge :3 ..

After a very satisfying lunch we walked around for a bit, bought some fruits and headed back..

Then came dinner time.. we went to the cafeteria and got our food... but.. it wasn't nice at all today.. neither of us felt like eating our dinner but felt more like sushi... so, i'm ashamed of what i did next but you might've done the same too! We dumped our food and went out for sushi ._. ..

Since we bought a day ticket we didn't have to spend anymore on bus fare :) ..

Dinner was ok as well.. and we were supposed to wait for the bus back to campus right outside the restaurant.. but that meant waiting for 20minutes and Rachel was a little afraid of waiting there so she suggested we walk to a brightly lit main street to catch a bus.. and so we did...

And that was the very first time i ran towards a bus :) .. the bus had already stopped at the bus stand and i was afraid it would move away soon so i told Rachel to run!! and it went something like this..

Me : That's 25! come on!! *start running*
R : Ok.. *run run run* wait... don't lah..
Me : *stop* ..huh?? are you sure??
R : ok ok.. run!!!
Me : *run run*
R : wait..don't run.....
Me : are you sure???? it's right there!!
R : ok! run!!!

and luckily the people getting on the bus were still buying their tickets.. *phew* .. and it's the first time i ran in my new sports shoes :3 .. but i must say, it is very exhilarating running after a bus :) .. everyone should have that experience at least once! (ok, maybe not in malaysia -.- )

-llen-

love it hate it

so, some of the things i love~~ about this place!

1. the internet speeed... it's so fast that it's beautiful :'D ..

ok, at the moment that's the only major thing i can think of that i love..uhm..on to things i miss?

1. actually i wasn't really missing family badly or anything.. but i asked dad to send me the pictures from the airport and after seeing the pictures only i started to feel like i miss all of them quite a bit ._. ..

2. being able to walk barefoot.. due to the carpet it's quite unhygienic to walk barefoot -.-

3. food.... today's dinner was curry pasta with meatballs -.- .. i wish they'd just stick to tomato sauce and meatballs but...haih..

4. apples... back in malaysia mum always buys fuji apples.. big, juicy, crunchy apples.. here.. the apples are small..sweet.. but somewhat powdery and not really crunchy :/ ..

5. having a reliable shower... the shower here is so tempremental.. i could be having a nice, temperature-perfect shower and suddenly the water gets super hot and it feels like i'm being scalded.. my hands even turned red like a lobster -.- ... and if it doesn't get super hot it gets super cold...

6. not having to pay for laundry.. haih.. doing laundry is really pricey here -.- ..

7. drying clothes outdoors.. hrmph.. people here use dryers which we ALSO have to pay for -.-

8. taking showers twice a day.. due to the troublesomeness of taking a shower and the fact that i don't sweat here i have decided to shower only once a day :( ..

9. friends.. need i say more? :)

and on to things that are cool ..

1. one of the toilets in the main building is quite new and they put in auto sensors and stuff so i can flush the toilet, the cool way.. B) .. i fist bump the sensor pad and it flushes :D ..

2. we have our very own lake on campus :D .. and a sunken garden.. but i only have pictures of the lake (taken today after the rain and when the sun emerged)..






up until today i don't feel any major homesickness.. maybe coz i like cold weather and i don't mind the rain..but overall the weather here hasn't been too bad..

shall put up pictures of the garden when i go there :)

-llen-

decision made!

Looks like i'll be staying on here :) ..

Am getting used to stuff.. not everything yet (need to find out where i can print stuff for free/minimal fee -.- and i dunno how the library works yet..hmm.. ) but everything will be ok.. i hope...

i think study mode is slowly coming back... hehe.. perhaps because my parents were here to take me around that after they left i still felt like i'm on holiday..haha.. but yea.. reality is setting in now.. won't be long before mid sem exam...then finals then home :D .. and food~~ ..i suspect i've lost weight here but i don't have a weighing machine to check -.- .. and my plans of doing sit ups failed because the floor is all carpeted :/ .. maybe i should try that exercise Syn Joe taught me in Penang :D ..

Many people say Edinburgh is a very boring place -.- .. sure, it's no London but it...has its..good points.. ok fine, the city centre doesn't have a lot to see if you're not going to the museum the zoo or the castle but it's still quite a nice place :) ..

And thankfully my lecturers, the scottish ones, don't have very thick accents so classes are ok! just that they still use Scottish slang words occasionally..

shall update more some other time...

-llen-