How was your day?

There are days when you woke up on the wrong side of the bed. You leave your bed with little motivation and enthusiasm to go about your day that although nothing bad happens, (your day) just lacks that umph.

Other days, you wake up the moment that alarm clock rings and you immediately hop off the bed, sing or dance in the shower and proceed to have a mini-adventure of your own later that day.

I think I just had one of those days where I felt alive and chatty.

I had all reasons to be grouchy because I had to wake up at 5am just to make sure that I finish my work before 7am and have it ready for the boss to go over at 10am.

Plus, I had to rush all the way to Bandar Baru Sg Buloh to meet a class or Fifth formers who published a book, which is now in its second print. I’ll blog more about that some other day.

And then, I had to take the komuter to go back to the office and finish another piece of writing to be submitted before my sub leaves the office and takes the day off tomorrow.

But today, I also have a lot to be thankful for.

I work up at 5am and managed to finish my work within two hours  —  just like how I had planned. Normally, I would set the alarm at 5am and would hit the alarm and go back to sleep.

Then, my husband was free to send me to Bdr Baru Sg Buloh, so I didn’t have to take the train because I was running late anyway. We got to the school without any problems because I could find the school in the GPS and it took us right to it, right on time.

I had a blast talking to the students and some of the teachers who treated me to lunch. And then, one teacher — who was on the way home — was very kind to give me a lift to the komuter station.

I had to wait for only 15 minutes for the train to arrive and had a good chat with a Sixth former who was going back to her boarding school in Seremban. Before I alighted the train at KL Sentral, she actually salam-cium my hand as a sign of respect because earlier I had told her I was older than she thought. She thought I was a college student. Haha! That made my day 🙂

I got back to the office just in time to write the piece and still managed to leave the office at 6pm.

And when I got home, my mom-in-law had cooked yummilicious nasi ayam and I had that for dinner.

My day couldn’t be any better, really!

So I wonder what kind of day is in store for me tomorrow? Whatever tomorrow lies for me, I’ll start the day with a prayer and a rock-out session with my Disney princesses Miley Cyrus, Demi Lovato and Selena Gomez.

I love my manufactured pop and rock songs 🙂

Thank you from the bottom of my heart!

I received a parcel yesterday morning. It contained a small box with a 4gb pen drive inside of it storing some pictures for my articles. The best thing is, I get to keep the pen drive. AND it comes with a warranty. Cool!

When I saw the envelope on my desk, it reminded me of a “little something” that the good people at Jamsbio.com said they would mail me. I had a feeling that I would be getting the parcel yesterday.

Guess what? It did arrive… yesterday!

My large parcel

A huge Ready Post cushion mailer (padded huge envelope) with my name on it and a return address to Houston, Texas, USA.

When I saw it, my husband immediately snatched it from me. I didn’t get a chance to see what it was. It felt like a t-shirt, so I thought, “yeah, they gave me a t-shirt. That’s nice”.

And then when I finally got my hands on the parcel, I saw a green note which said “1 t-shirt, 1 dvd and 1 cd”. Dvd and CD?

I would never have guessed in a million years…. that they would be NKOTB merchandise!!!!!!

In the parcel was NKOTB Greatest Hits: The Videos (DVD) and NKOTB Greatest Hits (CD). Here’s the not-so-cool part. There was no t-shirt.

It says: 1 t-shirt, 1 DVD, 1 CD

Someone stole my NKOTB t-shirt man!!!!! Well, I assume it’s a NKOTB t-shirt because everything else was NKOTB-related. I almost cried okay! I mean, how can these people at the immigration or postal department do this to me?

Should I consult Sy3d Faisal (our former ceo who is now with the postal department) about this? I’m really upset because this is not the first time and I’m not the first victim.

I’m embarrassed to inform the good people at Jamsbio.com , but I think they ought to know that while I got the DVD and CD, the t-shirt is missing.

Anyway, I want to thank them so much for the gift. I know my Law of Attraction book says never turn down free gifts or offers to buy me lunch (or something similar) but you guys shouldn’t have! But thank you. It’s very sweet of you!

The DVD and CD

I watched the DVD — which has NKOTB’s music videos and live concert performances — from start to finish. I appreciate the fact that the DVD has a music video and live version of Tonight which is my husband’s favourite NKOTB song. I’m sure he enjoyed it because he stopped whatever he was doing to watch it and sing along. I haven’t seen many of those videos in a loooooong time, so they brought back good memories.

And that’s what Jamsbio.com is all about to me: revisiting long forgotten memories that seem to be triggered by the sound of an old favourite tune or the sight of an old favourite video. Meet like-minded people who also grew up listening to the same stuff that you did there and … I don’t know… network I guess. It’s really up to you… the possibility is endless 😛

The video and cd are just what I need to get myself psyched for the real concert. I know that NKOTB will come to Malaysia. I don’t know when but I know they will. At least I know I’m going* (wherever that concert may be) 🙂

*Practising the Law of Attraction here.

Post Hong Kong

I’m back people!!!

My working trip to HK was — in short — successful, inspiring and memorable. I met really nice people there, was wowed by the efforts of the teachers who attended the forum and amazed by the sights and sounds of Hong Kong.

There were nine of us from Msia — 3 media reps, 3 moe reps, 2 ms reps and 1 teacher/quarter-finalist. Most of us had only met for the first time at the airport. Having gone for the regional event in Hanoi in April, I was already familiar with the 2 MS reps and teacher. It turned out that one of the media reps was formerly from BH in JB (hansolo, I’m sure you know who she is because she left the company a few months ago to work in KL). We had met each other perhaps a couple of years back but both of us couldn’t remember what assignment or occasion it was. We became fast friends anyway.

We left Msia at about 9.30am. That meant leaving the house at about 6.15am to check in by 7.30am. I had omellette and watched Baby Mama on the plane. I really recommend this movie because it is funny as h3ll!! I laughed and cried watching this movie — the guy sitting next to me probably thought I was crazy. If you’re into spoilers, read all about Baby Mama here.

I could relate to the movie because I’m trying for a baby myself. It hasn’t been particularly easy for me so this movie, about a successful business woman who’s trying to have a baby alone at 37, hits a chord with me. Tina Fey and Amy Pohler were both hilarious and excellent actors. I knew that they were funny from the Saturday Night Live days but I never knew that they could do drama as well. Believe it or not, the movie was categorised under Drama under the Movie on Demand list. The script is brilliant at mixing hilarious moments and touching ones all in one scene.

I loved the film so much that I recommended it to the former BH girl but too bad the movie was removed from the play list on our flight back to Msia. I wanted to watch it again but because it was no longer available, I decided to watch Wall-E. The missing narration makes it a bit boring but I still think it’s a sweet movie. I must be really hormonal then because not only did I cry watching Baby Mama, watching Wall-E go about his work all alone on Earth too almost moved me to tears 😛 I loved the movie. Well at least I didn’t fall asleep watching it as I did while watching The X-Files right after Wall-E. Not that it was incredibly boring or anything. I think I was just tired by then.

My stay in Hong Kong was wonderful. I would have loved to do more shopping but I find HK to be rather expensive. I mean, a bottle of Evian costs RM5 there. A bottle of regular mineral water costs RM3. So you can pretty much tell how expensive other things can be. It didn’t help that our hotel, The Langham in Tsim Sha Tsui is right across a Louis Vitton boutique. It was an exclusive area, so shopping around the jotel area was limited.

But Ladies Market was just four MTR stations away. I didn’t really like it there because I found the bargaining process really tiring. Some of the proprieters are rude — they just shoo you away. But I managed to get the usual souvenir stuff — fridge magnets, t-shirts etc — for not-too-bad prices. The t-shirts were of good quality so I’m happy with that. I wanted to buy a bag for myself but I ended up with a pair of flat shoes instead. It was for RM32. I’m happy with that because it looks good with my jeans.

I loved watching the young women in HK. They dress really well, very trendy with their calf or knee-length boots. HK this time of the year is slightly cooler than in Malaysia and less humid too. You don’t need a coat or anything. You’l be fine with your t-shirt. But if you were to wear your jeans and t-shirt, you’ll look slightly out of place in Tsim Sha Tsui area where the girls were shorts, dresses or pretty blouses with skirts and boots. Sure, there will be people in just t-shirt and jeans but they’re mostly guys 😛

Books in HK are pretty expensive too. If you think your RM34 paperback is pricey, wait till you have to fork out RM45 for the same paperback in HK! I’m never taking book prices in KL for granted anymore. Of course, I’ll buy them online so I’ll get a 30 per cent discount.

Sasa in HK is cheaper (certain items) and bigger. I almost bought a Sasa-brand lengthening/volumising mascara for HK$98 (98xRM0.46= about RM45) but decided against it. I didn’t really need it. I already have my Maybelline mascara that does the job for less than RM40. Never mind that I still think about it now (I think I’m in love), enough to make me want to go to a Sasa store and see if they sell it here too. But I bought 3 miniature perfumes — Eternity (15ml) and two Burberry Weekend (5ml) — for RM50 from there. Not bad eh?

All this talk about shopping makes you wonder whether I did any work at all in HK. Of course I did 🙂

I was there to cover an international forum for innovative teachers and met teachers from 60 countries who are not short of inspirational. If all these teachers were to work in one school, that would be one heck of a brilliant school. These are teachers who worked outside of office hours to create games, movies etc to enhance their teachings. You will be amazed by what these teachers can do. Some of these schools are rural ones that have no Internet access at all. Yet the students learn with the aid of technology everyday.

I really want to do justice to the article which I will prepare in the coming days. I hope I will do a great job at it.

Anyway, after spending four solid days in Hong Kong, staying at a 5-star hotel with great breakfast and company, it still feels good to be back in the comfort of my own messy room and table writing this entry.

Oh, that just reminds me of something. I need to register the free MS Office One Note 2007 software I got from the forum online and also check out Piggley’s blog. Piggley is the mascot of a school in rural Nothern Ireland. From his blog, I could see that he had a whale of a time in Hong Kong. Read all about him here and also notice how Piggley asks the students to look up some information on Hong Kong and its culture. This is the kind of learning that these teachers are promoting. Fun, isn’t it?

Well, I’m signing off too. I wish I could have done a day-to-day blog like Piggley but to tell you the truth, the Internet charge was too expensive and I frankly didn’t have the energy to even switch my laptop on at the end of the day.

Anyway, see you soon!

P/S: No pictures yet. I’ll probably transfer some photos tomorrow and I’m also waiting for some REALLY good pictures from MS representatives. More of that next week I guess. I’l probably upload them on FB. Later!

Coming to Africa

Here’s the thing. I’m travelling to B0tswana on Thurs and I can’t even be properly excited about it *lol*

I’ve been so preoccupied with a lot of things – work, social life etc – that I hardly have the time to take a deep breath and stop to ponder about what’s going on around me.

Anyway, I’m travelling to B0tswana to cover a graduation ceremony. Yep, I kid you not. I normally get super excited about my trips and start googling all the travel infos that I can possibly get from the internet. But these are the things I managed to find out so far:

a) Where B0tswana is situated in the world map (above South Afr1ca, if you’re wondering)
b) Gab0r0ne, the city where I’ll be travelling to, is quite the metropolitan with a large expat community.
c) That the currency is called Pula and the exchange rate is RM1: B0tswana Pula 1.8 (roughly). But I’m sure they use USD liberally there.
d) That it is quite cold over there. Lowest temperature is around 15 degrees celcius. But I have a feeling that next week, the weather will get warmer. But I expect some precipitation going on.

Other important things I found out about the trip:

a) There will be at least 2 other Malaysian reporters. Woohoo!
b) I’m flying SIA up until Johannesberg, South Africa. From there, I’m flying South Africa Air. Coolness!

Dalam pada tak ada masa tu, I managed to do some important things like:
a) Request for advance. I’m not ashamed to admit this. I’m always broke and trips can come at the most inconvenient time.
b) Get roaming for my postpaid Digi line.
c) Get new call cards that I can dish out liberally over there. Kidding!
d) Charles and Keith’s store at Changi Airpot is open at 6am. Nampaknya, I can finally get to see the shop which my neighbour Racha3l often raves about. She recently bought a very nice bag from there. Before that, she had bought a really nice pair of shoes. Since then, I swore that I will get my own C&K bag/shoes the next time I’m at Changi or Spore. Initially, I thought that I would not have the privilege to do so because my transit times are so off (11pm on the way to B0tswana and 6am on the way back home). But Racha3l assured me that it’ll be open at 6am because she asked the salespersons 😛

Bak kata Janet Jackson, “That’s-a-it” about the trip that I can update you with so far. Obviously, I haven’t packed but I’m quite an expert at that already thanks to all my trips all these years. So I’m really not worried about overpacking and exceeding the baggage weight limit. It’s such a short trip anyway. Fly there for 10-11 hours, sleep, attend the graduation ceremony and do some campus tour or something, sleep and check out of the hotel and head for the airport the next day. Wham-bam-thank you-mam.

Ok, now I’m rambling. I better get ready for dinner. Talk to you later!

Sunday

This is weird.

Dexter and Deedee are sleeping earlier than me. As I write this, Deedee is curled up at her favourite spot – the roller ball – on the first floor, whereas Dexter is on the ground floor sleeping next to the food container. Hmmm… I thought hamsters sleep during the day??

Anyways, I am tired but not sleepy yet. Just came back from bant1ng where my husband spent the entire time babying the pet monkey his cousin’s uncle keeps. They named the monkey (kera) Bu/sh after Ge0rge Bu/sh. He’s the cutest little thing. He’s less than six-months-old I think and is absolutely manja. He is so childlike and by that I mean like a human child. He gets upset if he thinks that my husband is leaving his side and insists of literally hanging on to him. So by the time we came back to SA, both of us smelled of monkey and by that I mean of mild BO. It’s true! That’s the only way I can describe the smell of a monkey.

So both of us duly showered to get rid of the “stench” once we got home.

It has been a long day because we’ve been out of the house since noon. We went to the family carnival organised by B/H and had fun. They cancelled the married couple karaoke contest because the organisers were running out of time. I just wished they had made official announcement to inform that it has been cancelled, though. But I’m glad I went to the family carnival because I got to see performances by An1ta Swk, M1sha 0mar and Datuk S1t1 Nurhal1za. An1ta or kak n1ta as she is fondly known amongst her fans is so small in person. She has the figure of a girl in her late teens/early 20s, I kid you not. And she is what… 65?

I’m glad I got to see M1sha 0mar perform live for the first time. I really love her voice. But I thought she chose the wrong song to perform. She should have sung Nafas Cahaya after she did Berdua Lebih Baik, that Indonesian number, instead of Ku Seru the sequel to her famous Pulangkan. The song is too slow for a family carnival.

And it is also nice to see S1t1 Nurhalz1za perform. She looked AND sounded great. She sang her Siti Situ Sana Sini, followed by a number written by Yassin and duetted with our topmost boss on My Heart.

Speaking of duets, BH’s big boss duetted with the vile Maw1 on the song Lagu Cinta. Yes, all our bosses are gila glamour great singers. Seeing Mae1 needing “high” security made me want to hurl. Like, please lah! But people were crowding him so I don’t blame the fella. But his popularity was clearly overshadowed by S1t1 because people were literally crowding the stage to take pictures as she sang. People only crowded around Maw1 AFTER he sang. So what do you think of that Maw1? Still think you’re the biggest thing in Msia?

Hehehe… Emosional pulak 😛

So that was basically my Sunday.

P/S: Deedee and Dexter must have been sleep walking because now they’ve moved spot (on the same levels which they were on earlier) and they are back to sleep again.

Call me karaoke queen

Why? Because I’ve made a vow to enter all the amateur karaoke contest (especially for media) that I can 😛

After the NPC-D1g1 contest which I entered last month — in which I won third place 😦 — I signed up for another competition taking place tomorrow. BH is organising its family carnival in conjunction with its 50th anniversary tomorrow and they are organising lots of activities for the entire family. One of them is the husband-and-wife karaoke contest 😛 I have no idea what the prizes are (I hope it’s cash and lots of them) but I had convinced my husband that we must, absolutely must enter. When I signed up, there were only about three or four other couples. I think they’re looking for 10.

It’s funny though because no one called us to reconfirm the details, although I had left our details in the form. All I know is that the contest starts at 2pm. So, we’d better leave the house tomorrow just before noon. We’re probably going to sing Jangan Ada Dusta, a duet by Broery Marantika and Dewi Yull. It’s a slow ballad which is not so hard on the larynx – because husband can’t really hit the high notes – and soothing to the ear.

Well that is tomorrow.

Last night, I entered a contest during the Gold3n Hop3 media night and won…(drum roll please) first place! Woohoo! I got a RM500 JJ shopping voucher. Not bad eh?

Two years ago, I entered the same contest, got second place and won RM700 worth of shopping vouchers. Nampaknya, nilai hadiahnya sudah merosot. But at least I got RM500. Who is going to give me that much cash to shop, right?

I don’t have anything specific to shop for. Maybe I’ll buy something frivolous with it like clothes 😛 I heard JJ is having a sale now. Can I say perfect timing?

Lucky day

On Wednesday when I met L1z (formerly from Celc0m), she said something that was so simple, so cliche yet so true. She said: If you wake up one morning and think that you’re going to have a bad day, you will.

So, this morning, I woke up with a feeling that, yes, today, everything will be okay and that it’s my lucky day.

Guess what? I had no stressful drama about my cover story, I managed to have a long lunch at Bgsr V1llage with the company of good friends AND I won something from the lucky draw at the office’s party. Well, technically it’s not actually a lucky draw.

We were each given a form which had 13 questions about the people and things at the office. If we provided the correct answers to all the questions, we stood a chance to win prizes.

So, I guess I provided the right answers. I won the Ult1mate Rad1ance: Complete 1ntens1ve C0llagen Car3 from sw1ssl1ne by d3rmalab box set. It contains about five packs of collagen masks and a collagen cleanser. I gave one pack of mask to my boss (see k-sgor-pictures)

Okay, so it isn’t a limited edition C0ach bag — which btw went to 1rwan the graphic artist; his wife is so lucky and he’s definitely getting some action tonight hehehehe– but I’m cool with what I got.

Anyway, I’m more excited about my free makeover by Laura Merc1er. L+T invited three makeup artists from LM to give free makeovers to the women at the office. I think close to 20 women came to have their faces made up at the adhoc “beauty counter” set up at the meeting room near the pantry. In fact, the makeup artists are still busy applying makeup on some women right now. I think I was the 10th person to be given a makeover.

My makeup artist, M1yuk1 is a Chinese girl with a law degree from the UK. When she was styuding law, she decided she liked playing with colours better than looking at case files. So she took a course at a makeup school which she was in London.

M1yuk1 gave me a look that enhanced my eyes. She applied glittery silver eyeshadow on my eye sockets. She complemented me on my long eyelashes before she proceeded to use an eyelash curler on them.

Too bad I’ve featured my friend (the stylist) as a personality for How Do I Become? Otherwise I wouldn’t mind featuring M1yuk1. She does have an interesting story to tell… since she’s an actress too.

Well, she was in the Malay movie Pal0h, apparently, acting as the younger sister to the lead actress.

You know what? I found a promotional picture of her on the Internet. Click here for the picture. Well, it looks a lot like her anyway.

Woops! My brother’s here. I have to go!

Quick and random updates

1. I practised singing If I Ain’t Got You four times tonight. So far so good. But I think I need to lower the key by a notch so that I can sing comfortably during the chorus. Tak rendah sangat ke? Well, worth trying.

2. Six days to deferred salary and counting. Any extra $$ (read: ching, ching) is always welcomed.

3. Going back to my hometown to pick up my K1nsela books. My husband’s colleague says she has Undomestic Goddes and Can You Keep a Secret?

Can I? Sure, anything to get my hands on these books.

4. I got a cute purple bag from the award night on Monday. Haha. It pays to register at the counter and to be a member of the pressthis button. Bag comes with a cool notebook, mobile phone thingamajig, keychain and a stupid elastic scarf that’s supposed to be very versatile. *Fold and twist it this way to make this* WTF. I still can’t figure out what to do with it.

5. I notice a lot of people in my blogroll have been using a lot of wtf of late. Could aud’s habit of peppering her blog with the three letters have rubbed off on the rest of us? wtf!

6. There is a xmas office party tomorrow. I hope I’ll win that “limited/special edition” coach bag! mspillay won a guess? bag last night during a lucky draw last night at hartamas. The last time she got lucky, I won something too. Could this be a sign? *rubbing hands with glee*

Night night!