Moments

Sometimes, we just need to stop thinking too much and enjoy the present moment while it last.

Who is John Galt

Who is John Galt - It's a character created by author Ayn Rand in her novel Atlas Shrugged. The novel portrays how society changes from little to mature and eventually collapse due to excessive control over how things should be done. Below is a quote by the author at the end of the movie:

"Money is the barometer of a society's virtue. But When you see that in order to produce it, you need to obtain permission from those who produce NOTHING... You will know that your society is DOOMED"

 - Ayn Rand

Fitness and Target

Yesterday was my first time in life enjoy going to gym. In the past, I regarded gym as boring, dull and not interesting. I participated in activities that requires rigorous body and muscles movements, such as badminton, basketball and volleyball. However, that was in the past when I was still studying. 

Nowadays, I am working with a semi-government body and my daily routine would be wake up in the morning, get ready and start driving to the office before 7 a.m. in order to avoid the morning rush on the road. That will allow me to arrive at the office before 8 a.m. my working hours would be from 0800hr to 1700hr. If I go back on time, I will stuck in the jam for a good 1.5 hours (best scenario) to a 3.0 hours journey back home. 

A few days ago, I started thinking of how to utilise the hours I lost due to jam in a more productive and positive activities. Then come about my friend whom loved jogging since her university years, E. E joined a recent marathon in Bukit Jalil for a 10km open. And to do that, she would need to train her stamina and strength to achieve her target. I then realised that this is exactly what I need to boost my motivation to fitness in the long run. I need a target and a sport that is easy and simple like running, jogging, sprinting etc. 

So today marked the second day I used the gym to do my routine. I followed a simple and easy routine for a start as a way to let my "hibernated" body to accommodated to the sudden activities at such hours. It was a real achievement and I am really really proud of myself for the very first time.

Now that target is set. All I need to do is to achieve it. All the best to me and to people out there having the same problem before. 

Are You a Thinker or Just Simply Memorizing?

“How do you know when you are thinking?” 

This is a question asked by one of my facilitator during a recent course I attended in Malacca. My answer to that question was simple, I said “ I think all the time” with pride and confidence. And to my surprise, the facilitator replied to me with a “Wrong and let me tell you why you are wrong”.

He then proposed to me to answer 3 simple mathematical questions as an example. First he asked “ What is 5 +5 and 40-20 respectively?” and I answered it correctly since it is a simple question. Then he asked “What about 34 x 4532?”. I was stunned for a moment and thought I needed some time to do the calculation in my head. Then he stopped me right there and said “ Now you are thinking, for 2 seconds!”.

I was dumbfounded and he explained the meaning of the scenario. The previous questions were regarded as simple due to many encounters we had with the same mathematical questions. As a result, it was stored in our memory which will allow us to give an instantaneous reply with a correct answer without the need to think critically. However, the latter question posed a challenge to us and needed our brain to compute the calculation in order to provide the correct answer.

It is true that sometimes we take the word “thinking” for granted and do not understand the real meaning and importance of practicing it.  

End of Chapter 2012

One simple question I always asked myself this time every year. What have or haven't I accomplished for the year? Well, the answer is Yes and No. Why so?

Yes for:

1. I've managed to get my final year and overall degree results with distinction and I managed to obtain an indirect PhD offer from my supervisor in uni and I am graduated with honours from one of the most prestigious university in the world. 
2. In addition to that, to my personal gain, I became an emcee for a wedding for a very first time and that was really fun and eye-opening to myself and my self-confidence. 
3. Apart from that, I've also broke my comfort zone by venturing europe alone for 12 days across 5 different countries. It was an amazing experience where I met people from around the world and interacted with decent and less-decent people. 

No for:

1. I can't accept the PhD offer due to my bond with my education sponsor (sadly). 
2. I have not done anything other than academics throughout the whole academic year. 
3. I didn't went for my Graduation in the UK due to my bad financial background and also because it is dead expensive to fly there, it was a pity, really.. sobs

What was basically all I have and have not done in a year. Not that much but I hope next year would be a better year and it will be. 

Newton 3rd Law in Life

Have you ever heard of the Newton 3rd Law from your Physics teachers. Well, that theory doesn't just apply to physics or science alone, but it does happen in real life. Just today I went to the bank to collect my card and unfortunately, the name printed on the card was a little off from the exact spelling I wrote in the application form. So I went to the person in charge and ask with a nice and warm smile ( at least that is the impression I thought I gave that lady) and asked for a replacement. She apologise and told me that the replacement will be placed under the "Urgent" status due to their mistakes.

This might sounded as an ordinary scenario but if I had reacted differently to the misspelled card, that lady might not be so nice to me and place my replacement order under low priority status. So, the moral of the story is, be nice to people if you want them to be good to you. This is like the physics law where applied force equals to the reaction force.

[I think this post is crappy, just felt like writing something due to extreme boredom] 

Euro Trip Plan - Slovenia, Italy, Czech Rep., Austria and Hungary

Last week at this time, I was thinking if I should go travel in the Europe. One of my housemates went travelling with family and the other with her course mates around Ireland, Eastern and Western Europe. So that left me alone at home but I had a wonderful trip to Seven Sisters near Brighton but that was only for a night stay, though it was very fun.

So, back to the question of whether or not I should travel Europe. First question I asked to myself - Am I willing to spend some money for this trip. After much consideration, I decided to put a sum of budget and work things out from it. I started to look at the places around Europe especially Eastern Europe cause it's relatively cheaper in all aspect - currency, foods, accommodations, etc. After much of reading and research, I finally came out with a list of places that I will be visiting in my 13 days trip and can be illustrated below.

Euro Trip - 13 days

My first destination is Bled and Bohinj in Slovenia. These two places are very popular with their beautiful lakes and surrounding areas. I will be touching down at Trieste Airport at around 1435hr, which leaves with two options. First wait for 6 hours in Nova Gorica to board the train (Euro 5.00) to Bled-Jezero OR take a bus to Trieste then change to Ljubljana and take a train to Lesce-Bled which in total cost about 20 Euro. Obviously I am not going to just sit around and do nothing, so I've decided to take a longer route which will allow me to explore Trieste town before heading to Ljubljana. 3 nights will be dedicated these two places.

The next stop would be Venice, Italy. The accommodations here are expensive - as a backpacker, I always look for cheaper alternatives. Fortunately I found one but the location wasn't that great. It is called the Camping Jolly. This place will have facilities such as the swimming pool, open door gym great for relaxations.

The next day I will be travelling to Lake Como via Milan. From Venice to Milan, I booked a train which only cost me for 9 Euro under the Super Economy ticket category trenitalia.com . A regular ticket would have cost me 35 Euro. Lake Como is located near the Switzerland-Italy border. I am planning to rent a bike to tour around the lake and provided I have enough time, I will try to cross border to Switzerland and bike around Lake Lugano.

On the next day early in the morning, I will be heading to Bergamo by train and then transfer to the airport to catch my 1205hr flight to Brno. Upon arrival in Brno, I will be heading to Prague by bus. The bus that I am taking in no ordinary bus. It has very advanced entertainment system on the bus with free coffee and tea provided to all passengers. The company that owns this bus is called the Student Agency bus, first founded by students.

After Prague, I will be staying one night in Vienna, Austria and head to Budapest for the Saturday night thermal bath event before taking a train in the morning to Siofok, Hungary which is located near Lake Balaton. In Budapest, one of the most popular activity is spa and public bath. I am looking forward for a good experience in this. Also, they have quite good party locations around the town.

Until then...

Brighton and Seven Sisters

Over the past few months, life had been a little bit hectic with all the coursework and preparation for my final exam followed by the completion of my final year project report and presentation. I realised that after the exam and all the coursework will be a period of transition between the old and the new chapters of my life. But before that chapter arrives, I am planning to use the time wisely - treat myself something good after the 4 years of hardship in Imperial, hence decided to do a 1 night trip at the Seven Sisters with some of the Mech Engers. This is an all guys trip to Seven Sisters, located approximately 30 km from west from Brighton. The original plan was to catch some fish and BBQ them have a short nap in the car and camps before heading back to London. There were 7 of us headed for Brighton from London, took about 3 hours of slow drive (stopped by Croydon to buy a 4-men tent). One of us has his own car and we decided to rent another ZipCar from London. It was a fun journey on the way to our destination. We first head to do some fishing and catch as much mussels and crabs as possible for dinner. 

Fab the Pro

Unfortunately, I am not a pro in shore fishing, so as expected, we failed to catch any fish. But Fab, my Italian friend was very skilled in catching mussels and crabs, showing us the bunch of Asians on how to do it. We next drove to one of the national reserve - the Seven sisters. There is a reason why this place is called the Seven sisters. Look at the picture below. You can see 7 bumps at the cliffs in the picture shown below.

The Seven Sisters

Upon arrival we set up some of the cooking facilities for BBQ and tent. Weather on that day was wonderful and we did not face any problem cooking near the beach. It took us awhile before we could sleep at night. Looking up the sky and talking like we know how the future will be. At the same time, we competed on counting the shooting stars that entered in to the atmospheres and eventually slept without knowing. Next morning, I woke up at around 0500hrs, took a short walk around the area and decided to snap some photos of the morning scenery. That is me in the photo trying to be in the picture while setting the camera on timer.

The river and Me

City-Get-Away house

The river bank with man-made structure

River towards the sea

The path along the river

Around Seven Sisters

Where all the rabbits lives

Went fishing around 9 am. Super sunny. That my friend trying to fish.

 

Tired of fishing, we decided to take a break

We decided to stop by Brighton for lunch before our journey back to London

Most of us took the Harry's Challenge.

Our Winner of the Harry's Challenge

 

My checklist

Here are a few stuff that I have and haven't accomplished:

1. Final year examination = DONE
2. Final year report submission = DONE
3. Final year project presentation = DONE
4. Hangout with the Mech Enger's at BBQ = DONE
5. Mech Eng trip to 7 Sister's = DONE

So now, what is next before I start my busy working life back in Malaysia? More hanging out with friends before we part our ways in pursuing our new dream, which are making loads of money and building a happy family. What will things be after 10 or 20 years. I hope all of us will still be in touch with each other on facebook (if facebook still exists at that time). 

The morning of Advanced Stress Analysis Paper

Woke up in the morning, felt OK with a bit of confident

Walked to UNI, arrive chit chat with some friends feeling confident..

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Enter the exam Hall

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First Question!!!!!!

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By the end of the first Questions

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By The End of The PAPER!!!!!

New Obsessions

During the time approaching exam, I tend to have obsession on certain activities. An example from last year was “reading Bloomberg every day during meal time and before I sleep”. For my final year (which is this year) my obsession changed and expanded to a few activities. First is playing HON, also known as Heroes Of Newerth. This is a game similar to DoTA but I found it very interesting, mainly due to the new hero concepts that differentiate this game from DoTA. I tend of make excuses to myself that I am allowed to play 1 or 2 games every time I finish 3 chapters of revision. But to my surprise my obsession to this game has no limit. I always end up wasting 4 to 6 hours playing the game. I am going to delete the game for the time being and resume after exam -  that’s if i am still interested to play HON.

My second obsession is playing basketball. Early in this academic year,I started joining the Malaysia Society Basketball sessions. I realised that I knew nothing about basketball apart from throwing the ball into the basket. So I start to research on the fundamental on how to shoot the ball in a consistent manner, drills for ball handling, offence and defence strategies and learning some of the wonderful signature moves from popular basketball players such as Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan. I have a lot more to learn but that will take time.

Alright enough of confessing my obsessions. It’s time for me to get serious on revision.. BACK to REVISION!!!!!

Bad Luck Again

Couple of months ago, I’ve encountered many strange and less fortunate events. For starter, I have my bike stolen and then returned the next day at the place I parked it. How strange was that? And on top of that, I bought a new bike for GBP36 before I recovered the stolen bike. Never mind that. Just a day ago, the first day of term in 2012, I was surprised to find that MY BIKE WAS GONEE!!! The bike lock was found with a clean cut. I really love that bike very much. There is nothing I can do about it but to grieve.. How sad.. I hope that this person (The Thief) who stole my bike will be punished and feel sorry for what he or she had done.

Annoyed

Today I felt so annoyed with everything and anything that’s around me. Woke up in the morning (oh well sort of in the afternoon) tried to use Skype to call the UK German Rail Agency to purchase the Inter-Rail Ticket but failed due to some stupid issues between skype and 0871 number. So then I use my mobile to call. Guess what, no one pick up my phone for almost 5 minutes and I tried calling again and again and eventually paying 6 pounds without gaining anything from it. That really took my mood off for the whole day while having to completed a few planned activities.

Lost and Found

It had been a busy week with all the research for my final year project, meetings, lectures and preparation of my project plan report. Just last Friday, I lost my bike but I found it a day later. This is what happened on that day, I woke up late and rushed off to Uni. Like every other day I cycled my 2 years old bike there and it literally took me about 5 minutes compared to 15 to 20 minutes of walking. So I parked my bike at my favourite spot in that particular morning. Things went well for the next 8 hours and when I was heading back home, I couldn’t locate my bike at the bicycle parking lot. First thing that struck my head was, “Shit I lost my bike”  and I came up with a few theories:

• I did not lock my bike properly in the morning.
• So then someone saw it unlocked and decided to get him or herself a free ride home
• OR Someone saw it unlocked and decided to hand it to the unversity security guard.

There was nothing I could do at that time so I decided to look for a new bike from EBay. I found one bike in good condition that cost me about GBP35. I was still hoping that someone was just putting a prank on me and gave me back the bike the day after. On Saturday, I walked to Uni in the morning to check on the same parking lot before head off for a group discussion in my department but my bike was nowhere to be seen. So I thought that it is time to just buy the bike I saw in the EBay. So I bought it for GBP 35 and it required me to collect the bike from Isleworth, some place west of London near Heathrow.

On my way back on Saturday, I decided to check on the same parking lot again. And to my surprise, I saw my bike parked there unlocked. I was very confused and mixed with a little bit of happiness because I found my bike back but also regret I spent the money for a new second hand bike. Question is, what happened to my bike? Till now I still cant solve this mystery.

Beautiful Sunday morning

Last Sunday, sawo and I decided to take some time off from doing work and head to the Malaysian Hall (a place you can find authentic Malaysia Food). We took a slow walk across Hyde Park passing by the Round Pond. I am still see the wonderful autumn trees..

A beautiful day in the town of Eel

Last week was beautiful. Sawo and I explored the Ely in Cambridgeshire UK. We had been planning for about 2 years before we finally managed to execute the plan. We took a train to Ely from Cambridge; 15 minutes journey through the national rail network (check it out in www.nationalrail.co.uk) which cost us about GBP 4 for a ‘day return’ ticket.

During the journey I took a picture of the tranquil scene of a beautiful blue sky and a dark landscape with my iPhone 3GS camera.

So we arrived in Ely and started to explore the town. At first I was thinking of taking a bus and get to the town centre (where the cathedral and the house of Oliver Cromwell located) but I came to think that having a slow walk there would be more rewarding.

I managed to do some research on the locations to be visited. First off, the Peacock Tearoom; we had some fantastic breakfast with the complement of a wide selection of tea. I started with the Sherlock Holmes (Earl Grey with Lapsang Souchong; our own mix: its elementary & good) and my Sawo start off with the Pleine Lune (Our favourite French tea; almonds, vanilla, honey etc; OTT & wonderful.).

 

After a great great morning breakfast, we head off towards the town centre directions. Stopped by an antique shop and a Saturday market I believe – near the Ely Cathedral and finally we arrived at the Apple Market of the year. This market is located very new to the cathedral. We were very lucky to have such unique chance to be part of the event.

Basically, the Apple Market will have some fun special events such as children apple and spoon race, longest apple peel and the apple shy. There will have food stalls selling sausage-like-burger served with apple sauce, story telling to the children of a story from long long time ago. I was amazed by the participant of the Apple Market and hope for it to go on for years to come.

We went to the Oliver Cromwell Museum (located not too far of the Apple Market).

Still full of energy, we decided to walk along the riverside, we managed to find a spot for fishing and also very calm for the both of us to rest our legs while enjoying the quietness of the river. We sat for at the river bank for a while before heading to get our second round of tea but this time with different type of tea.

My sawo chose the Marco Polo which she so fell in love with while I tried the Chocolate Imperial. Both were great but one thing about the Chocolate Imperial is that it is not very suitable to be taken with a sweet chocolate brownie. Cause then it can’t be appreciated as much as how it should be.

By the end of the day, due to our satisfaction on the tea from this shop, The Peacock Tearoom, we bought some of the tea for ourselves. So, Sawo chosen the Marco Polo (which cost quite a bit because it is rare) while I chose Sherlock Holmes. The day just passed by so swiftly that the day starts to get darker and darker. This trip has been very fun and I wish to visit another place in the land of England in the near future.

Start of term

Blink blink blink and summer holiday has come to an end. I felt that this summer had been exceptionally short compared to the previous years, oh well I will be starting my final year and it also means that this is my last summer holiday.

Let me summarise what I had achieve throughout this summer. My summer holiday started the moment I finish presenting my DMT (Design, Make and Test) projects in a so called the seminar week in mid June 2011. During that time I was also participated into a teaching/mentoring program with the collaboration with an organisation named Excitecs. In short, I was posted to a local government school near New Cross Underground station for 3 weeks and got paid GDP600. Not too bad I would say. So then I flew back to Malaysia for its wonderful weather. Back for less than a week and I had to start my 10 weeks internship with a company in adhesive industry. In this 10 weeks, I met a lot of amazing people (when I mention amazing in here – they amazed me in many different ways) and learned a lot about how to deal with people from different industries, background and origins. It had been eye-opening when I was given the opportunity to join my boss in a few clients’ meetings and allows to contribute in some of the projects preparations during the course of this internship (not going to further boost my boss). Ha  ha.

So finally busy time is over. Next up was helping my sawo’s dad to set up a website – so here I learned a lot about html and css. Wanna check out the website? www.pkmh.com . But it is still incomplete as for now since I faced some difficulties in arranging the information needed. So that is my masterpiece for the past 2 weeks. Not very impressive but can be improved.

Now, 2 days before going back to the UK to start my final year term. I was thinking of doing something that Malaysia is popular with: EAT!!! FOOOOODDDD!!!!

Interesting blog I found

Recently, I’ve been looking for a travel blog around  and found one with great recommendations. Thought it would be good if I share with the world:
http://barefootirreverence.blogspot.com/
Check it out :)

Cathay Cineplex Promotion

Hey readers in Malaysia, check this out. I found this advertisement by Cathay Cineplex about a promotion for the Platinum Movie Suites. Normal price for Platinum movie suites is about RM40 permovie. Buy hey, check the poster out. Check this out in the Cathay Cineplex Facebook  and also their website.

Teaching Experience

For the past 3 weeks, I had been doing my placement as a student ambassador in a Secondary School. The experience I obtained through the period was very rewarding. It opened my eyes how different the education system in the UK as compared to my home country, Malaysia. Students have more freedom and the education are more diverse with a little bit of everything. In GCSE for example, students are given the opportunity to learn one foreign language; French, German, Spanish and etc. Unlike the UK, students in Malaysia focussed very much on Science and Mathematics. 

I've also managed to taste some of the difficulties faced by teachers in shaping the students into a better future. Like any other countries, students tend to be influenced by the media. There was once I asked a student about what he want to be in the future. Typical answers given: footballer. For the ladies, they love singing and acting.

One of the question that I received from the teachers in the school was, "So, what do you think of teaching as a profession in your future?". Oh well, it depends, I would say it is a good and noble job and your have both hard work and free time. As a teacher, I think the hardest part is to plan a lessons that could cater to the students. Different teachers will have different teaching styles and approaches but has the same objective which is to cover every learning elements for that particular year group set by the national curriculum. All for the sake of preparing the students for that one exam. Overall, I think teaching is interesting and rewarding to a certain extent, but I would really want to get myself involved in a profession I dreamed of in engineering and consulting services.