Blogging ah...

I’m lazier from day to day to update this blog. It’s right what the newspaper said. Creating a blog is just as easy as 1, 2, 3. But maintaining one is hard as you need to have the time and energy.

First time ride motorcycle

Today, I rode on my mother’s motorcycle on my own for the first time. I need to learn how to balance myself on the bike before going for riding lessons at Sentul. I learned for an hour. While I was learning, an Intrakotar bus driver (their depot is near my house) passes by. He looked at me and smiled at me with a scared expression (like what you see in comic – hands near your lips).

Conclusion of riding motorcycle = it’s more relax and easier to drive a car.

Banana

Today, father harvested the banana in front of our house. We were like a belated Santa Claus giving away the bananas to 7 families and there are still 2 combs left. I really wished I have a digital camera, then I can let you guys see how it looks like. But you still have a chance to have a look at the bananas because there’s one more tree waiting to be harvest in a few weeks time.

CNY

We went back to my parents’ hometown in Ipoh, Perak on the eve of Chinese New Year. Before the first ray of sunshine was out, our 5 month-old Proton Waja was already packed with 4 big-sized human and a boot full of luggage, sluggishly moving along the North-South Highway.

Before going to my paternal grandmother’s house where we were supposed to stay for a week, we headed to my maternal grandparents’ house first to collect some miscellaneous stuff since we were not going to spend holidays there anymore (grandparents are currently staying with their only son in PJ). The house was in a terrible mess, cobwebs everywhere and you could write with your shoes on the floor. Can you imagine that? It was a miracle that I didn’t sneeze. We met my youngest aunt there as pre-arranged, received from her a few tins of New Year cookies and got back my first 3 books of the Harry Potter series from my cousin brother. ^ ^ At last, I now have something to pass time. Oh, I have got an early ‘ang pau’ from her too. After having a nice little chat with my aunt, we went separate ways. We go to my paternal grandmother’s house while my aunt and her son go to their photo shop.

As usual, my grandmother’s house needed thorough cleaning. But I managed to escape after cleaning the louvers. I helped my mother prepare lunch. I complained all the way through chopping garlic. Why? Because the chopper was blunt and the chopping board… Sigh… I don’t know how to describe. It’s 100% not at home! I even told my mother I won’t help out next time if she didn’t bring back our chopper and chopping board from KL. Maybe that was why mother didn’t ask me to help out for the next few days.

Around 5:30 p.m., the fan in the living room started to drip oil all over the place, forming a 2metres in diameter circle. Someone might take it as a bad omen since CNY is just a few hours away. So, my father straight away went to buy one back with my youngest uncle. They went to Tesco, Macro and finally found the suitable one in Jaya Jusco. Father then called up his ex-classmate cum neighbour who is an electrician to fix the fan after dinner.

Midnight came and my grandmother lighted up a lot of joss-sticks for ‘welcoming the God of Prosperity’. My mother asked her not to burn too much of the joss-stick as both of us have very sensitive nose. Firecrackers could be heard for almost 10 minutes. And different from the years before this, people were using fireworks instead of firecrackers. Personally, I think they are polluting the air.

On the first day of CNY, mother reminded me that whoever I saw that morning I must greet them with a ‘Gong Hei Fat Choi’ before saying ‘Good Morning’. Honestly, was that necessary? Don’t know, maybe just to please the old folks.

Anyway, after having a vegetarian breakfast, we start to go from house to house to ‘bai nian’ just like marathon. First stop was my second uncle’s. When we reached there, no one was at home. Their neighbour kindly called my cousin on her cell phone and managed to trace them – they when out to have breakfast at the market. What really shocked us was, the neighbour found out that there was a boiling kettle on the stove. All of us was like – WTH, leaving the water boiling while you go out? Nuts are, you? Luckily, they were back after 3 minutes. So, after taking off our shoes and got into the house, it was ‘ang pau’ time. Children got to get ‘ang pau’ happily while the adults will be crying in their heart for the money they need to fork out.

After filling our stomach with some ‘keropok’ and 100 PLUS + Vanilla Coke, we headed for the second stop – my youngest grandaunt’s house. The same routine happened except for what we ate and drank. Then we went to my eldest grandaunt’s, a granduncle’s and my second grandaunt’s house. We did something special at the granduncle’s house; we plucked about 15 fragrant-coconuts and chopped up a few there and then. Ah… it’s really tasty and refreshing.

Around 1:30 pm, my family went straight to my mother’s eldest sister’s house. Since my maternal grandparents are just like what I mentioned on top (in PJ), my aunt thought that it was her responsibility to ‘lend’ out her house as a gathering spot this year (usually at my maternal grandparents’ house). First thing after stepping into the house was of course the phrase ‘Gong Hei Fat Choi’ and starts to collect ‘ang pau’. My eldest cousin brother’s wife came to me and I said ‘Gong Hei Fat Choi’, she handed me an ‘ang pau’ then shoot a question to me “Only Gong Hei Fat Choi ah?” So, after finding the right phrase in my head for less than 10 seconds I said to her ‘Choi Yun Gong Zhun’. My youngest aunt (the early ‘ang pau’ one) just beside me laughed not stop after hearing it. With a puzzled look, I stared at her waiting for her to explain why she was laughing like that. Then she repeated what I said and I finally got what she wanted to say; because of my ‘banana’ slang in Cantonese. Sign… I haven’t been laughed for years already. At night, the cousin brother I mentioned just now treated all of us dinner. It was a quite sumptuous (shark’s fin, sea cucumber, roast piglet etc.). We retreated to bed at 12 midnight after watching a Cantonese movie on TV.

The second day was quite boring. We didn’t go anywhere. Out of bored, I sms-ed Panda. I even called her using my father’s cell phone. :P Then around 2pm when I wanna have a nap, my aunt (father’s sister) came back from Penang. Mother warned me not to go into the bedroom while someone come. So, instead of having a nap, I stayed in the living room with my eye lids heavy as gold. After some time, a bunch of people came. My father tried to solve out my relationship with them. The result is, I’m their cousin; mind, they are parents now (child in Standard One). Oh, I feel old… Haha. At night, the WHOLE (from the eldest to the youngest grandaunt’s and the granduncle’s + my second uncle’s) big family went to a restaurant to celebrate my grandmother’s birthday. 4 tables were reserved. Food that day was so so only.

We (me, my sis and mother) left my father at home on the morning of the third day of CNY. We went to see a few of my mother’s old friends. There’s one which she never met for more than 30 years since both of them left secondary school. We had lunch at the Ipoh Swimming Club. My mother and I had steak while my sis had steamed fish; quite delicious. After lunch, we went to another friend’s house. By the time we leave, it was almost 5pm. We had dinner at home with my grandmother. At night, we glued ourselves on the TV watching Korean drama – Jewel in the Palace.

4th day of CNY and the last day for us to be in Ipoh. We left my grandmother’s house around 11 am and reach KL at 1:30 pm. From what I heard from others, the traffic on North-South Highway was terrible after noon. So luckily we left earlier, if not we’ll be caught in a traffic jam that won’t let us reach home for another few hours.

Happy Chinese New Year

To all reader of my blog, I here by wish you Happy Chinese New Year and hope the Year of Rooster will bring you endless happiness and prosperity.

Helped my father fill in read packets like last year as my father still needs to work today. I’m going back to my parents’ hometown (Ipoh) on Tuesday and am coming back on Saturday. It will be very hot there.
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No Title

Meet with a few ex-schoolmates at BRJ, Wangsa Maju. Some are studying and some are working. Of course some are moulding at home like me. ^-^ Lee Siong says he will leave his hair grow for sometime and then go for ‘Botak’ to have us shock. His hair is now longer than mine.

Well, had a great time seeing them.

Ant Can’t Cross

This is a phase I learn from Radio 4 this morning. According to the DJ, now we don’t say “bumper to bumper” to describe the traffic jam in KL anymore. The more appropriate description will be “ant can’t cross”.

Admiral Zheng He or Christopher Columbus?

Read today’s newspaper and found this article that shows China found the New World before the Columbus. Gavin Menzies found evidences that support his theory that Admiral Zheng He or Laksamana Cheng Ho as known in our history text book found the New World before Christopher Columbus. I believe few years later, the government will need to rewrite our history text book again.