Travelling through time

Chili's for birthday.

Yeah, chocolate-flavoured snot. Thanks, Pei Hau.

Anyway, last Saturday was my birthday. Now, I didn't want to do anything fancy this year, but then Priya called, saying she wanted an outing. Have to please a friend, no?

So fast forward a few days later, me sitting in a Starbucks outlet at the Gardens at five in the evening...


...with Philbert and his gorgeous new MacBook. I feel outdated already.




Now, being anal and suffering from a severe form of OCD, Philbert is very, very protective about his 'Book. Nevertheless I managed to have a go.


Soon, Starbucks turned into an impromptu studio. I whipped out my tripod and we started shooting, experimenting various techniques. Admittedly, however, they were mostly rubbish.



Eventually we got bored of taking pictures. So we went back to the Boulevard. And took some more pictures.




While I was busy taking pictures, Philbert caught a glimpse of Priya. So we decided to surprise her with our camera flashes. She was clearly not happy.



After a bit of a telling off, we were ushered into Chili's to meet up with the rest - Asmath, Beth, Brigette, Pei Hau, Choo Xiang, Suwarna, Amelia, Michelle and Ayesha.





The food was fantastic. Nachos for the appetiser, chicken quesadilla for the main course...

... and guess what we had for dessert.


Yup. A giganormous piece of Secret Recipe chocolatey goodness, brought out by some waiters singing "Happy Birthday". Which turned out to be kinda funny, because minutes later they carried another birthday cake to a girl sitting on the opposite table. Okay...



Needless to say, not a lot of the cake ended up in my mouth. Ayesha smothered my face with chocolate and, just as I've washed my face and was about to tuck in, Pei Hau did the inevitable.

Oh, and if you were looking for any photos of that particular moment, tough luck. Camera was with me. Sorry.

Cakeface shenanigans aside, the rest of the evening turned out to be rather enjoyable. Chit-chatting, gossiping and much joking. Most of them aimed at Priya.




After a while the bill came. And what a bill it was. We somehow managed to sink ourselves into a RM250 hole. Luckily, there were eleven of us (Choo Xiang left early), so it was considerably easier to swallow.

Just before we left, a woman came up to us. Uh oh. We thought we were in trouble. That we've made so much noise that we were going to be given the single biggest telling off in the history of mankind.

And you know what she said?

"This is what Malaysia should be. I love watching you guys. Remember that, after 20 years, we are still Malaysians."

What a nice lady.

P.S. Thanks Priya. Without you I wouldn't have that much fun on my birthday.

Smile!

Yes, I finally broke down and replaced my old, broken Casio camera. And given that I wanted to take up photography as a hobby and since everyone left, right and centre seems to be going for a DSLR, I might as well get one myself.

But while everyone else has bought either a Canon or a Nikon, I went for the left field choice. That camera I'm holding in that picture above is a Sony α200.

Why? Value for money. A Canon EOS 400D with an 18-55mm lens currently goes at around RM2,499 (Philbert got his for somewhere in the region of RM2,800). The Sony - even with a slightly better-specced lens - is yours for RM1,999. Toss another 500 quid at your dealer and you can even get an additional telephoto lens.

So, two lenses for the price of one. Handy, eh?

Thank God it's...um...Monday?

So this is it. The white-knuckled, heart-in-mouth ride through Form Five has finally (officially) come to the end.

No doubt many of the Form Fivers have been waiting in anticipation for the simultaneous release (well, we got ours a bit late, but that's beside the point) of the slips of paper that would determine the future of every 17- and 18-year-old in the country.

Me? I didn't give two grains of rice about it. Somehow I just didn't feel the slightest bit anxious about taking my SPM results. Then again, I'm not getting something like a MacBook if I got straight A's.

Then came the 12th of March. Suddenly I was in the shoes of everyone else. Thoughts were swarming around my head about failing my Additional Mathematics yet again and getting screwed over and over by every single relative and teacher I've ever known. But it was too late to do anything about it, because Pn. Chang was already sitting there with the results slips. I therefore gulped, took a deep breath and went straight to her.

Not a 9G in sight. Good. First goal checked.

A 3B in Malay. Phew, thank goodness i didn't flunk this. I thought I'd do much better than last time since I actually finished the essay, but this was way beyond my expectations.

A 1A in English. As expected. Plus a GCE O-Level 1A. Added bonus.

A 3B in Moral. hated the subject in the first place, so couldn't be arsed.

A 4B in...wait a minute, a B in History? How the fuck did I pull that out of the bag? Not when I skipped questions and bullshitted the rest. No fucking way.

From there on forth it just got better.

A 3B in Mathematics. Could've done better, but I still can't complain.

A 3B in English Literature. Brilliant. Very, very pleased.

A 1A in Physics. Finally. A result I've waited ages to get.

3B's for Chemistry and Biology. In this company, deeply average. But there's nothing wrong with it.

And then came the show-stopper.

A 4B for Additional Mathematics.

I almost fainted. Then I compared my grade with others, and I almost cried.

But as always, there's something to spoil the party. I arrived at school expecting a 1A in EST to be in the bag. I got a 2A.

What. The. Fuck.

Alright, I'm being melodramatic. But come on, that paper was shit easy, so getting something slightly off-target when everything else was so gloriously above my expectations is a pretty big anti-climax.

That aside though, I'm extremely happy with my results. And this wouldn't have been possible without the help of everyone who guided me for the past two years. So I would like to thank my teachers - whether school or tuition - and my parents who had the patience to sit through my absolutely lackadaisical attitude towards studying and got to me and woke me up when I needed it the most.

Oh, and one more thing. Those who aren't happy with their results, cheer up. It's not the end of the world. And even if it is, there's always next year.

Who's in Padang Rengas?

To be frank, I'm not following the elections as religiously as some others. However, there is one seat I'm interested in. No, it's not Seputeh, where I live (yeah, I know, Teresa Kok won, whopee). Nor is it Bukit Gasing, where my parents vote.

It's Padang Rengas. Home of that racist, blind, deaf, fat, shit-mouthed bufoon, Nazri Aziz. Who the fuck decided to vote for him in the first place?

I don't care if the Opposition sweeps the whole of Malaysia. If Alias Zenon (cool name, by the way) fails to topple over that bald pig-face, that's it. I'm migrating I've lost hope in Malaysia.

EDIT: Alas, the incumbent remains. Enjoy your rights to scream "bodoh" in the Parliament while you still can, Nazi Aziz. There's always next time.

Oh.

Now that I finally know what's a memetag, I feel so dumb. Sorry Amelia, should've done it ages ago. Ah well, better late than never.

Five things I found in my bag (if I had one)
1) Wallet. Who doesn't?
2) PSP. Boredom relief.
3) Cheap-ass rudimentary mobile phone.
4) Work pass.
5) Camera (if and when I get one)

Five things I found in my wallet
1) Money, obviously. Not a lot, though.
2) ATM card, now that I work.
3) MyKad. If I ever got into trouble, this will stop me from getting into even bigger trouble.
4) Machines membership card. Not that I've bought anything there since I got my Mac.
5) Student card. For movie ticket discounts (I'm still 17, you know).

Five favourite things in my room
1) Mac. Has to take the number one spot.
2) Creative speakers. Use them for the computer and the PSP.
3) Sketchpad. Explanatory if you know me.
4) Stationary. Goes with the sketchpad.
5) Bed. Ahh...

Five things I've always wanted to do
1) Drive a car. Bet you didn't expect that, eh? Eh?
2) Make it as a designer.
3) Be on the set of Top Gear.
4) Have a really, really nice house. And a really, really nice car.
5) Visit Italy. Clichéd, I know.

Five things I'm currently into
1) Top Gear. Yeah, yeah, season's over and all, but what the hell.
2) House (the TV series, not the music genre)
3) Computer graphics. That's why I semi-regularly change the layout of this blog.
4) Photography (I so need that SLR)
5) Cars. Sorry, had to.

Five people I'm gonna tag
1) Philbert
2) Pei Hau
3) Priya (it's time you started blogging again)
4) My sister
5) Um...

That's all, I guess.

Long overdue update.

I know, I know, I've sorta abandoned blogging for a while. Work, fatigue and general lack of topics meant that this blog has been deprived of some TLC. But never mind, I'm here to show people that I am NOT dead or consumed by cashiering, and since there's really nothing else to blog about, might as well post something about work.

First things first, the working hours. And I'll be honest this time round - it sucks (no, Pei Hau, I haven't been forced to work overtime). Unlike Philbert, who has an office job and can therefore leave his workplace at six-ish, I'm stuck in a shopping mall. And unless you've never been, seen, or heard of a shopping mall, you'd know that it is customary for a shopping mall to be open by ten in the morning and to remain open until it is ten at night. But that's not all. You see, only the store closes at ten at night. The counter closes when it has dealt with all the customers. If you're stuck at a particularly busy section, like the Gents, you'll be lucky to see off the last customer by 10:15.

Of course, by that time you'd expect me to just hand in the money to my boss and leave, right? Wrong. For some reason, we are forced to count our money before handing it in. And as you've probably known, I'm not very good at maths. Fortunately, there will be other people on hand to assist you if necessary, so you'd usually be done counting no later than 10:35. Then the chief cashiers would count the money (again) and compare the total against the readings from your point-of-sale (POS) machine. You can choose to leave right after you've finished counting, or you can stay back and learn whether you've balanced or made an error. If you're willing to let yourself be hurled abuse about the errors you made while cashiering you'll only be able to return home at 10.45.

And by the way, on selected days (the period before Chinese New Year, for example), the store will extend business hours until 11:00 p.m. Go figure.

Then you get to the cashiering itself. Which, depending on where you go, varies from being overly boring to excessively tiring. The latter, especially, makes you more susceptible to errors (I've had to void nine sales once because I was so tired). But most of the people I work with are very kind and are willing to help me out of any difficult spot I manage to steer into. Never thought I'd say this but it actually makes cashiering almost enjoyable.

The pay, on the other hand, isn't. Philbert says he's being paid peanuts because his nine-to-five job pays him just RM800, but I say bollocks - my ten-to-ten (sometimes eleven) job pays me a measly RM600. As though that was bad enough, I have to pay some of it to the EPF. Thankfully, my pay also includes commission for the amount of sales. Unfortunately, though, I get just a piffling 60 sen for every RM1,000. Then again, I've seen people raking in over RM60k worth of sales a day (though I'm struggling to get past 25 grand). Also, if I buy something from Parkson (any Parkson will do, even Pavillion), 20% of the sale will be refunded back to me at the end of the month. It's a nice incentive for employees, although admittedly there is a limit of RM60 per month.

Like I said earlier, my colleagues are mostly very nice people (with the exception of that dastardly Kak Nora, who picks on the new cashiers - she put me in the almost deserted ground floor for three consecutive days!). Many thanks especially to Madam Yong, for teaching me the many intricacies of cashiering.

To sum it up, cashiering at Parkson OUG is a mixed bag. On one hand it can be very tiring and I'm not exactly well paid. On the other, the people there are some of the nicest people you'll ever meet. Plus, nothing comes close to the experience of meeting and dealing with several different people. And you know what? I actually like it.

Oh, and in case you didn't realise, I haven't got the time to put up CNY decorations on this blog. So (yes, I'm late) I'd like to make it up by wishing everyone a Happy Chinese New Year.