@ Welcome to PicaKok's Blog @
** Fairytales are beyond STORIES **
@ Monkey Business @
** They are written DREAMS **
Wednesday, April 26, 2006
aCtIoN cITy - aCtIon mAn cUp cOvEr
haiz.. lately damn busy with office work, kinda catch-up here n there, coordinate up n down but in fact, i really busy lor.. bUT i dunno what i do over these few weeks
super sianz man...
oh.. i guess my pretty friend 'balenda' lately mood very good lei, buy me the cup cover from action city. she say very expensive one, this shop at orchard heeren only visit by the rich big ah-lian like her, those poor one, cannot afford lar
err.. neh, here it goes :
this is not a normal cup cover, ok... need to train-up on how to use it lei
- made from silica gel material
- must lift e protuding edge to open up
- act as a normal cup cover bUT
- when press downward, it can achieve air-tight sealing
- and the middle opening, is a spoon clip too
u say lei, powder-ful or NOT?
this is the action city, action man! brenda say nice, cute n fat...
oh, only the cover hor, that cup is not lei.
this cup is the limited edition fr lord of the ring the movie, can't buy outside anymore and when u put hot water, a special crafted words (like crafted on the ring) will show up.
lately i'm watching this HK TVB series, ok.. no chinese here as it won't display correctly but direct translation is : Mei Li Xin Tian Di (literally beautiful new place).
interesting to watch, recommended:
sMurFy at ... [ 11:28 PM ]
Sunday, April 23, 2006
onE AmbEr - Above the Rest
this SuNday badminton game a bit late than usual, so early wake-up and got not much thing to do beside makan our breakfast at United SQ, what else we gonna do?
hmm...
stef - why not properties shopping? u guys heard of one amber, just launch only lei
john - where, how much?
loye - district 15
me - waleu, u both damn loaded, i tot u just bought a condo at marine parade, now wanna aim another one again?
loye - oh, near east coast there, freehold lei, nowadays not many are freehold condo available, good for investment mah
stef - john, u wanna share or not? or me n loye get one, then u get one yrself lar, how?
john - for investment, good.. stay nope, cos i'll not retired or stay here for too long
stef - ok lar, we go n have a look
me - price, how much, pricing?
loye - we go there now lar, check it out man!
stef - 2 bedrooms ard 700-800k, 3 bedrooms ard 900k to 1.2 mils
loye - can get the 2 bedrooms, ard 1000 sq feet lei, like a 4-rms flat
john - seems good deal, moreover freehold, worth considering too
me - hdb 4 rms only 170k lei, max 200k
loye - diff, this one district 15 (the 4th most expensive after district 9, 10 & 11)
stef - go, go, go now.. dun make noise anymore
One Amber comprises four 23-storey residential towers with a total of 562 spacious apartment units.
One Amber was crafted with a variety of landscaping and facilities to create a sense of belonging and warmth in a conductive living environment.
we reach there
my buddies are right, 4 ambers (amber one to four) and each design to face the waterfront n pools, but the 2 bedrooms unit are very less, only 2 ambers have 2 bedrooms unit
when we ask on the 2 bedrooms unit, the sales guy caution us - better be quick, only less than 15 units left lei, the 1st day launch... more than 50% of the 562 units are snap away.
err.. sad to say, i can't even snap one, probably can snap the toilet of a unit only.
poor guy like me can only afford a hdb flat, haiz... so disappointing, so irritating.
ok, lemme do some calculation here.
assume the condo unit is SGD750k
assume yr cpf got 100k
10% downpayment = 75k (5% cash - 35k)
all those stamp, misc fees = dun dare to calculate
interest rate = 2.6%
repayment over 30 yrs period = almost 2.7k monthly
this not inclusive of the monthly maintenance fee, assume it is ard 300 bucks, so the monthly replayment is ard 3.0k
so SGD3000 is the monthly repayment
ok lor.. if the couple earning ard 10k monthly, then can think of it.
only if u earn 10k total monthly income, then u're comfortably one one of the unit at amber one, agree?
10k - 20% cpf = 8k
a normal family car monthly repayment = 1.5k
condo monthly repayment = 3k
so total useable disposable income = ard 3.5k (food, insurance, misc, etc... )
u think enough?
hmm... my those idiotic buddies, walau... damn loaded lei
guess it is time for me to find a loaded girlfriend, die-die also at least earn ard my salary or.. the more, the merrier
not pretty nvm lar, rich good enough liao.
sMurFy at ... [ 11:59 PM ]
cOUgH oUtBreAk?
mayday, mayday...
lately in s'pore, many ppl infected by sore throat n cough, is this kinda mild outbreak? i really think so lor, if not.. why so many ppl coughing around?
weather change or poor air quality?
i guess i should really try get some ginger n make ginger juice n drink, this is the last resort... u know how irritating when u cough at night and can't even sleep properly?
i see doc again last week, same lar... doc say must rest at home n take MC but how can, my boss not in, then i need to meet-up with so many supplier n vendor n even contractor to follow-up some thing, haiz...
n surprisingly, the doc also cough... waleu... win lor like that
Firewall/Kidnapping - the movie
what a disappointed movie of the year, u know what is a firewall?
tHe stupid Hollywood guys have no time enough to make mistakes about computers and hackers, cos the main plot of the movie isn't hacking or computing, it is kidnapping!
a security expert has built his career n reputation on designing e most effective anti-theft computer systems in industry, protecting e bank's financial holdings from e constant threat of increasingly sophisticated Internet hackers with his complex network of tracers, access codes n firewalls.
so over a year, he is tracked online/offline untill his thieves finally spring into action...funny right? those bad guy can hack into his office system but cannot do anything?
then harrison ford can suddenly rip off a fax machine scanner and wired it into an ipod (attached to the bank terminal screen) to scan all the rich clients account no and store inside the ipod hard disk.
walk out from the bank, use a OCR software n convert it all to text file and then can suddenly somehow hack into the clients account n transfer 100k from 100's richest customers to the offshore account, huh!
is Firewall involve at the 1st place?
sMurFy at ... [ 11:02 PM ]
Sunday, April 16, 2006
cOld laZy sUndAY
lately is rainy season, imagine bedok also flooded, this is very interesting lei. i still remember 2 yrs ago at my workplace in shenton way (between dbs building twr 2 & sgx building), flooded man.. cbd area also flooded.
next day, newpaper got a coverage on that.. too bad lar, that time am still holding a sony ericsson t610, photo quality too pathetic to upload here
as usual on sunday, i'll sleep late before playing badminton.. n imagine this - receive 2 sms at 7am sharp 'wanna breakfast?' & "i at raffles place take photo", later call u. huh, what to do, my photography fanatic buddies lar, hanging around his neck is the heavy nikon d70s.
my dSLR, wait for me... i'll be getting u soon
maybe i'm right, rainy season.. bird n ants, all move their nest to a safer place, no wonder those stupid bird always eyeing on the shelves of my aircon, damn it. lately i also notice there's some ants ard my study table.. i already try my best to dig, sneaking ard & even mop my table n the things around with dettol, but the situation still didn't improve lei.
bo-pian lar, go cold storage n scour ard for ant bait.. wakakaka, u cannot blame me lar, u offend & terrorize me, my turn to ??? if u don't be so greedy, u're safe, my little ants.. but if u're greedy n take the bait.. yr queen also suffer lei.
here boy, here's the photo of the mortein ant baits.
oh.. this is my electric burner, bought by my sis for me lar, say can destress when u put in some kinds of essential oil. yalar, i so stress, time for me to destress n improve my sleep routine at night too. this is much better than the candle burner, later burn, burn n burn, the whole apartment also kena burn down, so scary.
this electric burner use light bulb to heat the oil, can even control the brightness n heat, so interesting, n easy to maintain too.
sMurFy at ... [ 11:41 PM ]
Saturday, April 15, 2006
office reno & pabx system upgrade
haiz.. dunno why suddenly i'm in-charge of the office renovation work, so come back over the weekend. while it is time for me to sneak home, suddenly heavy rain, downpour and the whole damn place here is so dark, so eerie n scary.
ah bread should be at home lazing ard in comfort, haiz...
tell u something - raining here is so different (my work place, tuas) from other places in s'pore, the whole sky turn into moody dark and the rain just pour down, splash hard into your face.. no rhythm at all (so the rhythm of the rain doesn't apply here).
dammit.. what can i do beside listening to music (thru my pathetic laptop speaker), drinking plain water, munching dry 'sor tar pia' biscuit and walk here walk there n act like supervisor? no choice lar.. supervisor need to walk up n down, to monitor other ppls work & take some photo too, wakakaka
here's are some photo of our office during the renovation.
need to follow up a lots of stuff, headache now..
today go tabao for lunch, n guess what? when the cabling guy ask me to go out for a cuppa coffee around 2.30pm, haiz.. walk so far, the canteen close, dammit
got such a thing meh, wah.. like that win lor, so hot, so far.. all the way there then close, argh.. i guess i long2 time also didn't work in tuas already, aiyoo.. i can't believe this can happen in s'pore, i really disappointed n give-up.
walk back to office, tot can relax a bit n drink my expensive espresso from office pantry.. damn, the renovation workers dismantle all the stuff n painting at that moment! so? suddenly tot of banging my head over that espresso maching!
nah, photo of the hawker on SAT here, not much ppl here right? 
ok.. the ah kok supervisor now walk down to prod/warehouse office to see2 look2, hmm indeed the office is much better, much lively and the color is quite good with e new furniture too.
actually they should take out all the binder, replace it with strip on all the glass windows, much nicer and better.
taking out 2 workstation, the office is much better n spacious too, very bright n good. e new table seems very big lei, like double my table.. wah, time for me to change my table lor
sMurFy at ... [ 4:57 PM ]
Friday, April 14, 2006
Immortality & Aging
look at the title i'm gonna blog today, chim or not? interesting or boring?
no choice lar... men reaching 30's are mostly in mid-life crisis now, think a lot, talk a lot but action, none (although some does but rarely lar).
tdy gd friday, sick & heavy rain whole day, rest n sleep like a dead log at home n do nothing, tt's why got time read newspaper n rubbish lor
Immortality normally link with - an important but damn sensitive issue, RELIGION. different religion see immortality differently, right? nope?
look at every sect in Islam, Christianity, Judaism and Hinduism. the hebrew patriarchs and their like-minded descendants believe that life/existence was originally a gift of GOD, that e gift is permanent & irrevocable, hence humans will never really die in the sense of non-existence.
Buddishm's concept of immortality is as part of a cycle involving death & rebirth, kinda reincarnation.
lately i remember 2 movies i've watch that talk about immortality (photo attached)
- The Myth (by Jacky Chan & Hee-seon Kim)
- My Date with a Vampire (I-III)
if u can live eternally but yr love one leave you, what will u do? keep waiting? eternal love? and somehow i find the movie "my date with a vampire" is very absurb & pure fantasy but it teach us some meaningful lessons too...
if u can live forever/eternally, r u able to watch yr love one (sick, old & die) one by one? because u can't die, u live forever...
u dare to dream? because every dreams u've dream, will come true over time
do u know yr objective of the existence in this world? u live forever, then what r u gonna do beside yr routine cycle?
i'm a science student.. and i'm not into any particular religions. dun forget i'm born in a multi-racial country where islam, buddhism, christianity & hinduism is a norm here. i even got time to go thru quran, bible (new testament), taoism n buddhism's various references.
all these teaching only got 1 objective - is to lead their followers into a right path.
to me, our existence in this planet (or shall i say universe) is plain simple, is to reproduce. we human is no diff from other animals or even insects, is to keep reproducing, and our desire to live and to continue to breed is so strong. travel around e world (especially in those 3rd world countries) and u'll know exactly what i'm trying to say.
so all the guys out there - dun blame yrself if u think that u're a 'horny bastard', not yr fault, really not yr fault.
since we can't live eternally/forever and everyone of us scare of old age, what we can do? my suggestion is to age gracefully lor
healty aging - can u believe it?
haiz.. i still can't accept that i already exist in this world for 30 years, and achieve nothing, but think of what i've just blog, what i wanna achieve? money? status? so important now? my boss say it is important but keep it low profile, dun be an arrogant chap, help ppls, do some good deeds... aiyaa, i also dunno what i want lar, enjoy life?
k.. guess i shall follow the rules i lay down here myself in ageing gracefully lor
DIET - healty eating. fresh food n lots of fruit n vegetables, cut down on animal protein (except fish). avoid fast food & processed food (err.. u think i so free go home n cook daily meh?)
EXERCISE - increase physical activities (but dun overdo it). u know lar, old man over exercise may damage joints, muscles, bones, etc... go for rigorous walking (hello, i'm doin' that. the coming big walk 10KM, will be my 3rd time in my life, big deal right) n strength training weekly.
badminton - consider what type of exercise?
SLEEP & REST - this is what i need/lack, time for me to have a proper schedule lor. must improve our quality of sleep n rest cos impt to let our body n mind rest, gd also to have a powerful afternoon nap (working hours, sleep inside the toilet cubicle meh?)
BREATHING - practise gd breathing, interesting exercise.
place e tip of yr tongue against the back of yr front teeth, slide it just above e teeth until it rests on the soft tissue between e teeth n e roof of e mouth.
exhale completely thru yr mouth, making an audible whoosh sound. close yr mouth n inhale quietly thru yr nose for a count of 4
hold yr breath for a count of 7
exhale audibly thru yr mouth for a count of 8
repeat 4 cycles, then breathe normally
do it twice a day
STRESS - learn methods to protect yr body from stress, can we? complete stress elimination is not an option in this day n age, so learn to respond in an appropriate way.
example like thru breathing exercise, yoga, floating in water or simply stroking yr beloved cat or dog, etc...
watching vcd & laze around my bed - dunno consider destress or not lei?
sMurFy at ... [ 9:44 PM ]
Wednesday, April 12, 2006
sick - picakok - sick
haiz... lately picakok got no mood to blog, to talk, to chat, to ???
sick, damn sick... cough, kinda long sickening cough, see doc also no use, what happen?
ppl say cough also got 2 types, dry cough and wet cough, wasei... v chim lei?
now getting worse, cough at night.. can't even sleep well lately, whata poor picakok!
sMurFy at ... [ 11:35 PM ]
Sunday, April 09, 2006
Birds & Ants
birds, crows, etc.... imagine these are consider pest in singapore, and govn in m'sia & s'pore spend great amounts of money and effort in controlling the populations of e crows.
crows are a public health nuisance, scavengers and also known to attack innocent passerbys when their ensting boundaries are intruded upon.
e main problem is - human think differently, some feed the crows and some kind hearted person even go to the extend of feeding it daily, and think that killing/culling crows are evil, unacceptable.
lately i also being irritated by a stupid bird that make a nest outside my aircon shelf. u know the place that i say is an old apartment, haiz... aircon also antique lor, here's my antique aircon outside the house, argh!!!
so?
today onwards, i'll officially declare war against that idiotic irritating bird, dammit. some1 comments that i swear a lot lately in my blog, he/she's right, i really need to swear n curse that stupid bugger up n down!
it is perfectly alright to build a nest within the shelf of the aircon, ok, fine.. go ahead. but the problem is - bird bugs! have u guy/gals ever heard of it? u know what is a bird bug? ever saw it in yr whole life? nope?
it is kinda white small little bug roaming around, won't bite but so many of them. small, very small, hard to notice via naked eye, n less than a mm in diameter, can u imagine it?
it infected my study table (somehow just below my aircon) and my laptop, make me so angry... what can i do beside mop my whole room with dettol and clean up the aircon & spray with whatever i can get in my house?
it is such a nuisance, argh... really spoilt my weekend and i'm damn tired, should rest well after my badminton sessions but instead, extra cleaning here n there
sob..sob..
any solutions, any? please help me...
am now rushing to the home pest section and try to get something, huh!
sMurFy at ... [ 6:40 PM ]
ITE Dover vs Ice Age 2
after our tiring sleepy class of programming in VBA today, we rush out to gasp a breath of refreshing air but what we saw are heavy downpour outside.
damn, i need to walk all the way out to the bus stop, then take a bus to the buona vista station.. but in this kinda heavy rain, haiz.. what to do beside crouching in those canteen table and wait? but luckily the lecturer and some of the students (huh-the students who take the vba course with me) offered to fetch us out.
v paiseh lor, most of them drive while i'm on 'walks-wagon', very kek-shim, haiz.. work so long, still can't afford a car, am i such a disappointment? am i a loser? i truely feel this way, such a loser, damn it. both my buddies are driving now.. but it also help me, remind me to work harder, smarter to earn those.
i already promise myself, hopefully within these few years, i'll get myself a flat and a car... all the best picakok, all the best.
oh.. here r the photo of the ITE Dover, taken in heavy rain
after a late lunch & nonsense chat with buddies, i went out with a gd friend later for dinner cume ice age2, and as usual.. that fella late again lor, always late and still got so many excuses even she's late, i really take my hat off for her.
Ice Age: The Meltdown (2006)
The Ice Age is coming to an end, and the animals are delighting in the melting paradise that is their new world. Manny, Sid, and Diego quickly learn that the warming climate has one major drawback: a huge glacial dam is about to break, threatening the entire valley. The only chance of survival lies at the other end of the valley. So the three heroes, along with a mammoth named Ellie and her two "brothers" -- possums Crash and Eddie -- embark on a mission across an increasingly dangerous landscape towards their salvation.
Kids will love this movie. However the rest of the audience may have different reactions. The little squirrel (SCRAT - Scart the saber-toothed squirrel still chasing the ever-elusive nut, this time through a watery, muddy mess) is hilarious and probably has the best parts in the movie. The rest of the story is a little shaky, and I am not talking about the melting ice. The movie is definitely for little kids, but it just does not have the hilarity of the first one. If you are looking for a funny movie and are part of a family who loves ice, or loves kids movies, then this is the right movie for you. However if you are 10 or older and are expecting the same genius creativity that the first one has, then you might be dissapointed.
sMurFy at ... [ 12:47 AM ]
Saturday, April 08, 2006
ITE 2nd Lesson
argh.. today also damn sleepy, gonna wake-up early and take a cab all the way to ITE Dover and each time, need to repeatly tell the taxi driver "uncle, ITE Dover branch, near the Buona Vista there hor".
imagine 9am+, there are so many fellows already wake-up and login into the msn one by one, wasei... got time sleep more lar, wake-up so early for what?
tdy super sianz, as usual with some data entry on some basic programming on visual basic, sleepy n lazy, off mode.
here's the stuff, understand or too small, can't see it properly?
but the lecturer told us not to skip next week cos he's teaching us the if, for, etc.. looping, more interesting and good to learn, won't be boring anymore.
argh, while msn n checking emails, i go thru an interesting articles on "top reasons why gals are still single", interesting read, hence share out lor
Top reasons why ladies today are still single!!
The nice men are ugly.
The handsome men are not nice.
The handsome and nice men are gay.
The handsome, nice and heterosexual men are married.
The men who are not so handsome, but are nice men, have no money.
The men who are not so handsome, but are nice men with money think we are only after their money.
The handsome men without money are after our money.
The handsome men, who are not so nice and somewhat heterosexual, don't think we are beautiful enough.
The men who think we are beautiful, that are heterosexual, somewhat nice and have money, are cowards.
The men who are somewhat handsome, somewhat nice and have some money and thank God are heterosexual, are shy and NEVER MAKE THE FIRST MOVE!!!!
The men who never make the first move, automatically lose interest in us when we take the initiative.
NOW, WHO THE HELL UNDERSTANDS MEN?"
Men are like a fine wine.
They all start out like grapes, and it's our jobto stomp on them and keep them in the dark until they mature into something you'd like to have dinner with."
sMurFy at ... [ 10:56 AM ]
Thursday, April 06, 2006
What is love & what is marriage?
A student ask a teacher, "what is love?"
The teacher said, "in order to answer your question, go to the padi field and choose the biggest padi and come back. But the rule is: you can go through them only once and cannot turn back to pick."
The student went to the field, go thru first row, he saw one bigpadi,but he wonders....may be there is a bigger one later. Then he saw another bigger one... but may be there is a even bigger one waiting for him.
Later, when he finished more than half of the padi field, he start torealise that the padi is not as big as the previous one he saw, he know he has missed the biggest one, and he regreted !!!! So, heended up went back to the teacher with empty hand.
The teacher told him, "...this is love... you keep looking for abetter one, but when later you realise, you have already miss the person....""
What is marriage then?" the student asked.
The teacher said, "in order to answer your question, go to the cornfield and choose the biggest corn and come back. But the rule is: you can go through them only once and cannot turn back to pick." The student went to the corn field, this time he is careful not to repeat the previous mistake, when he reach the middle of the field, he has picked one medium corn that he feel satisfy, and come back to the teacher.
The teacher told him, "this time you bring back a corn.... you lookfor one that is just nice, and you have faith and believe this is the best one you get.... this is marriage."
sMurFy at ... [ 11:14 PM ]
Tuesday, April 04, 2006
Tiger in a Doggy Year
during the CNY 2006, we all very kaypoh as usual and pay a visit to chinatown to read our chinese horoscope, basically wanna know how well our wealth, health & career are.
overall isn't that bad actually beside being wary of bad omen and back-stabber in the 1st half of the year and prevent injuries
(because black stars more than the good one lor, so?)
2nd half is much better with a good sign in wealth, health n career.
as usual, we just read for fun & dun give a damn but this year the reading is exceptionally truth to most of my tiger buddies, damn it man!
i go thru bad patches & bumpy ride here n there at the beginning of the year, my 'harimau' buddy's company (IT team) close down & his child got many sickness, my 'ah bear' buddy car kena kiss again just after send to Vicom for inspection and today he curse n swear, he lost his beloved Moto A1000 PDA while doing his big business in his company washroom.
he forget his PDA while on his way out from the washroom, so? after the tammy incident, we all scare that our data will be compromise, etc.. and he got so many confidential data inside his PDA, haiz.. he's so agitated n angry!
and picakok also sick now, bad cough and sore throat for few days, yet recovered and make me can't sleep well in the night, argh... what a bad period?
or shall i blame it on the stupid irritating hot weather? time for the aedes mosquitoes to be active again?
my usual morning espresso are not being replace by 'liang char'/cooling herbal tea and my unique cup (lord of the ring - e ring pattern only come out with hot water, got it?) are now fill-up with plain water lor
luckily my office xiaomei balenda got the 'liang-char' for me, but the cough still didn't go away despite sucking so many tablet of Tussils 5 Cough Relief lozenges... if overdoze, guess picakok also cannot survive
today also mark our ah-poo last day working as temp in our company, we miss him greatly.. a liverpudian who's talkative, funny and interesting.
he's been temping in our office for many2 months and he told us he need to rest well before suffering in the coming enlistment (ns lor)
we had a great dinner at lot1, and i wish him well.
hopefully he won't be so skinny till left bone after ns...
sMurFy at ... [ 11:17 PM ]
Monday, April 03, 2006
Celebrating Big-Day
nowadays, i mean nowadays... celebrating birthday is a taboo subject for us (us meaning those who born in the 197x), welcome to the 30's. optimistic ppl will say, common brudder, reaching 30's is just a beginning, cheer up!
in economic terms (where supply-demand comes into play), how many productive working years we can contribute? yes, we can beat the youngster in terms of experience, foresight, etc... exercise hard n eat healthy to keep us fit and keep our mind alert but one symptom that telling us the truth is our body itself.
Siddhartha Gautama take so many years to understand or (so call to attain) enlightenment that existence, old, sick & die are parts n parcel of life, hopefully we all can age gracefully.
so on last Sunday, we're celebrating one of our buddies big-day - turning 29 after our usual badminton game, dinner at Ju Shin Jung (a korean bbq charcoal restaurant) at west coast highway, Yess Center.
we gathered at orchard wisma & i snap a photo on the big underwater aquarium on diver's guide (a range of beautiful watches that divers find it useful), as my previous ... is a dive master, an expensive passion that she love till now
here we are, the korean Ju Shin Jung restaurant and are jam packed with human beings even till 9pm+ on Sunday, that's amazing man!
look at the cute bottles that they're using to store the tea & plain water 
this is a pure korean restaurant with many waiter/waitress are korean and one thing good about this charcoal bbq restaurant - haha, they do everything for us and even bbq for us. our task - eat, drink n talk nonsense.
here comes my very own of the side dishes & basically our table are filled with overflowing/overloaded side dishes
n our birthday boy 'yap' and his 'gf' happily posting for photo shot but the bills that come later is not something that he can laugh off, hahaha...
we of course bought him a present, a monopod. he's a photography fanatic and spend great amounts of his fortune on his collections of lenses and camera. of course all e photo taken here r using my pathetic o2 mini camera lar
this is his 1st time poking all 11 candles (2 big, 9 small) into a small chocolate cake, next year.. just 3 candles to summarize all, scary right? as for me, wow.. guess i'll either hide or go out of s'pore, scared i'll smash the b'day cake (because not enough room for me to poke in all the candles).
after our heavy sumptuous dinner and his heavy bills, argh.. Monday is coming, work, work n work again, boring right?
sMurFy at ... [ 11:25 PM ]
The Qingming Festival or Qing Ming Jie is one of the 24 segments in Chinese Calendar. It normally falls on the 4th or 5th of April because it's depended on the Cold Food Day (105 days after previous year's winter solstice). In the old days, Ching Ming was celebrated 3 days after the Cold Food Day but Cold Food Day was shorted to one day and then abandoned. So nowadays, Ching Ming and Cold Food Day fall on the same day although no one celebrate Cold Food Day any more. Ching Ming is also known as "Remembrance of Ancestors Day" or 'Grave/Tomb Sweeping Day'.
I remember when I was little, we have to carry incense sticks, joss sticks and paper offerings like paper money and paper clothes and any other paper accessories, depends how serious your family is with this thing.
Sweeping the graves of one's ancestors is something descendents do as a sign of respect. A proper sweeping consists of three steps: cleaning the grave, making offerings to ancestors and burning ceremonial money.
Cleaning the grave was just what it sounds like - removing weeds, making necessary repairs, and repainting the gravestone engravings. After the clean up, families made offerings of meat and fruit to the guardian spirit of the graveyard (Hou Tu) followed by incense offerings to their ancestors.
All paper offerings will be burnt for they believe that the relatives can receive the goods and even 'money' this way. Unlike the sacrifices at a family's home altar, the offerings at the tomb usually consist of dry, bland food. One theory is that since any number of ghosts rome around a grave area, the less appealing food will be consumed by the ancestors, and not be plundered by strangers.
As time pass, will this QingMing Festival survive?
On this festival, I still miss very much my close ex-boss who perish in the Asian Tsunami and my ex-colleague who pass away peacefully after suffering from a rare undetected heart attack. Life is so fragile & you won't know what will happen tomorrow.. hence, cherish the present and what had happen is a yester-day.
sMurFy at ... [ 10:40 PM ]
Sunday, April 02, 2006
ITE short courses
their motto - continuing education & training, lifelong learning for lifelong success and they advertise it with an old man with the signboard "lifelong learning from ITE upgraded me from an old economy worker to a new economy talent".
err... what is so special about the courses offered in ITE that can transform some old men (like the ah-peks') to compete with the young one? i'll just give IT industry as example, so u guys out there, must prove me wrong (a valid argument, of course) if there's some old men outside who take some IT courses and make them a new economy talent - n remember, i'm not bias against old people at all cause.
basically on last Sat my colleague Falanshi and myself kena attend a short course every Sat (running 2.5 month consequently man, tough ya) at ITE lor, so just whine here n there lor, and e class is quite small and empty too.
the lecturer say almost half of them attend halfway, then cabut & gone totally... wow, this is interesting man and here's a photo taken during the class.
hehe - remember the ITE motto, look at the photo lor
after e class, i suppose to meet-up a friend for lunch but he 'kena' stuck for his vehicle inspection, at Tampines, damn it.. die2 take a train all the way from BV to Tampines lor. bo-pian lei, after 3 years, need to do this and that, change tyre, etc... recertify at VICOM before can get car insurance, etc...
nah.. here we are at the VICOM center near Kaki Bukit (hear the name also sounds soooo far away man) before meeting up another friend for dinner, that's gone my day lor
oh.. remember that i've mention this Jollibee at Philippines, a direct head-on fierce competitor to McDonalds, before we dash back to hotel for check-out, i manage to steal a couple of minutes and try out their Jollibee lor
they even got chicken, rice, etc.. beside the usual burgers and fries AND here it goes, i order the set meal of fried chicken with rice (they give gravy too) and drinks.
kinda interesting, right?
oh.. that pair of hands that stealing my fries, my boss lar, who else?
shopping in taiwan and philippines (as far as i know lar, not sure much about other countries) are much better compare to s'pore and m'sia, more consumer oriented and gotta lots of lucky draw. (i admit i'm no interest in anytype of lucky draw because i dun have this kinda lady luck).
in taiwan, those shopping receipts (regardless of any amount, ok) will entitle you of one lucky draw and this is a on-going lucky draw, not on special promotion or events.
my both taiwanese friend confess to me that they indeed had a few time lucky to get a few hundred bucks of hard cash, no fineprint or condition at all.
recently at those shopping malls in philippines... even more interesting, buying sanitary pads also entitle you for lucky draw and their prize is an ipod nano and a nokia 6030 cell phone while a pair of movie tickets will entitle you to roundtrip to palawan (3D2N), etc...
here in s'pore n m'sia, if u wear till 'lok2' and wear bermuda and slippers, those sales ppl dun even wanna entertain you or treat u as those thingy lor (qingming period), transparent one... probably they think poor ppl can't afford, they won't buy or ???
hmm.. in chinese saying - pigeon eye?
sMurFy at ... [ 11:57 PM ]
Ah Kok aka PicaKok aka Pica aka ah mun tou
A small pathetic overwork & underpaid IT fella in Axxxxxx
Currently XX yr old in this world (unable to reveal, confidential lar)
Plays badminton & sharpen my photography skills over the weekend...
Loves $$$
Loves bread and instant noodles...but BREAD is the best, pure & YUMMY
Hates idiots
Hates hypocrites
