Lost In Translation

Hey there little boys and girls,

It's high time I got my internet at home, and boy a good connection it is so far.
As of today, I've officially moved in to my new place in North Melbourne for 10 days now, and so far, it's been pretty nice. To the uninformed, my absence online has been greatly contributed by the perils of my juggling between starting uni and doing my homework there and moving homes and sorting out all the moving errands (ie tel, water, electricity, gas & internet connections, $$, movers, clothes, furniture, etc). And just about 3 days ago, my brand new internet connection came in. Something to rave about later about it being ADSL2 in 3 months' time or something like that.

My room is still currently filled with boxes and I'm sleeping on a mattress on the floor. But all's pretty cozy for now. I'm actually very tempted to not set up the bed at all. Sleeping on the floor is actually pretty cool. Heck. I might not do it at all. Well, as long as this will not in any way damage the mattress, that is. I mean... I'm saying this only because I really don't know. But would there be a difference between sleeping on a mattress on the floor and sleeping on a mattress on bedframes? O well.

Locationwise, it's got its pros and cons. Pro being a simple 15 minute walk to uni, about 7 to the law building. Con being a little further away from the city, and further away from Ai Ling & Esther's place (because we usually cook/have dinners together, leading to a longer walk or so at night). But it's still close to VicMart, it's got a SUPER cheap DVD rental store 2 minutes away, a La Porchetta a half a block away, and a Nando's a block away. It is also a 2+1 bedroom apartment with a carpark, meaning that we have a study room now, and we have a storage space by the carpark. The pros overcomes the cons. I'm happy.

As for now, the place is a little packed. Esther's moving as well, and for now, she's in between places. In other words, she's moved out of her old place, but has yet to move in to her new one. So she and her sister now are bunking here - fulltime. Which isn't really much of a difference from before, really. I just thought it'd be interesting to note that.

So there you go. My life so far has been busy busy busy since the day I set foot on Australian soil after being back in beloved Malaysia for 3 weeks + (which was a blast!!). More updates will come with pictures soon! Till then, goodnight, folks.

You know you want it.

So as I was walking along Flinders Street today, it was hard not to notice, from Swanston Street onwards towards the East, a seemingly endless line of yellow. Taxi cabs by the dozens were double-parked along the entire street where at FedSquare, shutting down their services within the inner city. There, hundreds of cab drivers (particularly Indians), were raising a protest, voicing their anger in regards to their work conditions, safety, and discrimination, triggered by the recent murder of a cabbie a few nights ago.

Excited by the commotion, I was deeply disappointed I didn't have my camera on me at the time.
What could I do if not just watch and be amazed at the crowd?

I went home and got it!

Interesting, ay? They've apparently been there since morning, and would last till nighttime. When I was there, it was pretty tame in the beginning. But then a couple of them got a lil' excited (I speculate) and decided to run across the street and blocked trams. This was followed by the police butting in to calm the crowd and bring back order, of course. Nevertheless, pretty amusing stuff.

... or at least I hope it was.

I cooked bah kut teh tonight with the help of Esther for the Keoh's. I rang them up earlier in the week and invited them over for dinner tonight. I was to cook the bah kut teh, they were to bring the desserts. Unfortunately, it somehow didn't cross my mind to take any photos of the bah kut teh itself. Not even the yew char kuey's. Silly me. But I did take a few pics of the desserts and Max my favourite doggy, though. So maybe that could be of some consolidation.

No, it's not.

Nevertheless, Esther and I got to work at about 4:30p.m. A good 2 hours+ before our guests would actually arrive. The packet brought back from Malaysia is really misleading. It said that a packet of it would serve two. Two families would be more like it. One packet served just fine for the 7 of us dining tonight. Thankfully, I was sceptical of the Malaysian-written instructions, and hence, rang up mum back home in Kluang to clarify. She even gave tips on how to cook the tofu.

Spot on at about 7:00, the buzzer rang and the Keoh's were here. And boy were they not kidding when they said they were gonna bring dessert. Cakes, tangyuan (I think), and 2 bottles of wine.
We were a happy bunch.
So after a hearty dinner (actually not quite. a lot of the soup evaporated 'cause I left it to cook for a bit too long), we didn't hold back for desserts.

I even opened up a bottle of port Uncle Boon had given me a couple of months earlier after sitting in my freezer for ages. That, being as sweet as the definition of 'sweet' could be, had to be neutralised by something else, and that something else could not be anything better than me self-imported Kluang Coffee.

*Burp.
Sigh. The life. Am I just living it or what? Sometimes I enjoy myself so much like that I feel guilty. It's as if I've been 'too happy' with all these stuff that I haven't been suffering enough on the uni side of things; meaning that I haven't been putting enough effort into my studies. Which to be honest, I guess I haven't really yet this semester. And it doesn't help too that I actually DO have an assignment due on Monday which I have to get to very soon. Oh dear. Everything's just happening too fast. Or am I just blind to notice what's going on in uni? One minute I've just pretty much settled into my new apartment, the next, I have assignments due, church is asking me to go to camp, and I'm cooking dinner for the Keoh's and getting tipsy on wine and port.

I guess we'll find out on Monday.

I've been really busy lately. Not necessarily productive all the way, I must admit. But nevertheless busy. Uni has been one factor. I've realised that despite moving in way closer to uni now (walking to the law library only takes about 7 minutes), I still fail terribly in being on time for my first classes of the day.

Take Mondays for example. My first class starts at 4:15p.m. It's 4:15p.m in the friggin' afternoon! And yet, I am somehow able to rock up only at about 4:20 onwards. Never punctual. Well, except once, maybe. But I think I ran that time. What more to say on Tuesdays when my classes start in the morning. I am definitely never on time for those ones. With that, coupled with my statistic classes recently, I guess I can safely say that the fact that I've moved closer to uni and the fact that with that, I take it for granted that I don't have to worry too much about getting to classes late and therefore slack, are positively correlated.

Late classes aside, I've been thinking of picking up my bass again. Well, they're just thoughts running through my head right now. No real acts or even considerations of commitment yet. My bass is still broken at its neck and I still have no intentions of fixing it, let alone get a new one. But I am thinking of playing again. I just don't know how. If I did have a working bass, who would I play with? What would I play? Or more importantly, can I still play? I haven't touched it in more than a year now. I'm bound to be rusty as. Oh well. A thought's a thought.

On a more serious note, as some of you may already know, I'm actually thinking of deferring a year of uni to work full time in a co-op program. For those of you who don't know, a co-op program is an internship program that lasts for a year. It's basically the most basic of tasks (I think) as I'll be trained and will work alongside (or should I say 'for') more experienced accountants for a year. Why do it? Well, I think it'd be a great experience to work fulltime for once. You know... get to know what working fulltime really is like. There's always the option for vacation work (which I'm applying for as well, just in case), I know, but I'm worried that just 2 months+ of work will not be enough to capture the whole momentum of things and how work is really done, you know? So yes. 1 year. It's kind of a big call, I guess. But I really do hope I can get an offer. Perhaps some prayers could help?

As for now, I can only wait and see. Applications have closed last Friday, and as for now, I've only got one call for an interview this coming Friday. With fingers crossed and some backup prayers, I can only hope I get through.

Till then, I can't wait to watch this.
As silly as it sounds and looks, I've been waiting for its release since I heard about it almost half a year ago. I so can't wait to see Sam scream:

It's currently about 2:30a.m. I'm supposed to have started my Finance assignment by now, but that has yet to happen. Currently, I have about 4 assignments to complete within the next 2 weeks, which one - this Finance one - is due this Friday, 2 mid sems to prepare for which start next week, and about 8 (I think. Have yet to really count) companies to apply for Vacation positions, which by the way, applications happen to close on Friday as well. I've sent in one. It was the only one which didn't require me to fill in an application form but simply submit a CV and my academic transcript.

I forsee doom.

I'm tired. But I don't have a choice. 2 applications are 'almost' done, left to be polished. I'll leave that for later, perhaps, as I don't think I'm fit to write about why I love Deloitte or choose Auditing in Horwath right now, considering how I've just spent the last 30 minutes hunting high and low for my VCE results (which one of the companies required me to enter in detail), only to realise much later that it's online, on my very laptop I've been working on.

Finance Assignment. I have no clue where to start. Apparently it's not that hard. I should be able to finish this within 2 hours. A friend finished it in an hour and a half. But that's 'cause she's smart. So I'll probably take half an hour more, because I reckon I'm simply 1/3rd dumber than her. Nevertheless, it's effort. And effort is something I'm running out of along with motivation at this point in time.

But again, it's okay. There still are a few MoMu-ians online whom I can rely on to chat with and keep me motivated. I hope. If all else fails, I've got Ok Go playing on iTunes. They are so hot right now. Like Hansel. Especially with their dance moves and all. Totally geeky. But totally cool. And to keep myself enlightened when I'm on my breaks, I've got Calvin & Hobbes to keep company. I've never actually realised how deep and profound C&H is. The last time I read C&H was probably about 4 years ago on the Star Newspaper. Reading it back now, I'm taken aback by just how crazy Calvin talks and fantasizes about life. Especially as a 6 year old.

Gah. Why am I babbering about such nuisance. It's time to get back to work. I think. Damn... It's almost 3 now. And I've got class at 11.
Life.
Goodbye.

[edit: I didn't get into the co-op program. Which really upset me. But it's okay. I'm consoling myself 'cause my friend, who's being called in by every major firm she's applied to so far (which are bigger than the one I applied for) didn't get called back by them too. So I, or rather we, can't be the problem. It's them. So it's cool.]