My Awsome New Camera!

I am just having fun with my newest camera, a Canon Ixus 210. :D

It has a few additional features to play with. One of my favorites is the 'miniature', a.k.a. Tilt Shift photo feature. :D

It turns ordinary picture into a fake miniature shot. :D It's quite fun.

Ordinary max zoom picture (because I took this picture from my 22/F flat. I must say the zoom quality of the camera is awesome too! :))

Now this picture is taken using the tilt shift feature. :D Can you feel that you are looking at a model driveway instead of zoom? :D

Here's a another miniature feel picture :D

The above pictures were all taken with the max zoom possible on my camera. They are taken on the 22nd floor actually. :D

I will show you the normal view from my home looking down the entrance of the drive way. :D

without zoom

tilt shifted

Max zoomed :)

The best Uni I have ever tasted! :)

After my internet is back to normal, I figured I should celebrate! :D

My usual means of celebration is to eat! :D Eat something good that can cheer you up, that's the key! :D

Did you know that those Japanese grocery stores would slash their prices drastically near closing time? :D Last Saturday, with the internet problem nearly resolved, I figured I'd visit Jusco after work at 10pm to check out the crazy closing of the day sale. :D  It was such a blast!!

Let me show you what I got.

Sea Urchin from Jusco store! they are called Uni in Japanese. :D My dad was holding this for me so I can show you how big these are!! :D They are like 2.5" long, 1" wide and almost 1/3" thick!! Original price was HK$130, but due to price slash, now only $90

This is a picture with the same Uni, just with flash and close up. If you click on the photo, you can see the little individual sacs of the uni still intact. It's so fresh and sweet and a little sea water bitter taste. Ohhh it's heaven.

I must say these sea urchin are much better than the ones Mike and I had in Sai Kung. Those local grown sea urchins were too skinny when we went this March.

Live sea urchin from Sai Kung, Hong Kong

The ones I got at Jusco are flown from Japan and it's as fresh as getting them in Japan.

Talking about Japan, even the Uni we got from the fish market wasn't as fat as these one I got at Jusco!

Mike and I tasted our first good uni in Tokyo. The uni is hidden in this bowl. :D Can you find it? No? Let me zoom it in for you. :)

Looking at this picture makes me hungry. :)

Well, I must say, no matter where the sea urchins are from, either it be from Sai Kung, Tokyo or Jusco, they are all good.

Good in different way. If I were to rank it, I would still rank the sea urchin from Japan and Sai Kung better.  Not because they taste better, but because I had those with Mike when we had vacation together so I score them better due to sentimental value. :D hehe

5 big bucks! :)

Below is proof that I have filed tax this year. So no more mistake. :D

This year, I have to pay a huge sum of $5 in total. :D hahha... I better start saving up now....

D Day! Liberation! Rejoice!

Finally!!!!

My Internet is fixed! My days of mumbling to myself is over. Well, I'll still mumble to myself like usual, just not as much. :D

The technician has come this morning, as predicted, they had to do some re-wiring to make it work again. Now instead of hidden wire in the wall, it has a cable crawling on the wall pass the hallway to reach the modem.

After 3 weeks suffering 10kbs Internet at home, suddenly, everything is so smooth with the 10mbs cable.

From now on, I will count the days the contract with this shitty company is over, then I will shit to another maybe shittier company. 

The manager at i-cable called me back and ask how I am doing. I said I am doing fine now, but they are not forgiven.

The rewiring procedure had cost me $200 which I am asking them to compensate me. The manager will call me back this Thursday to confirm whether they can waive that charge for me.

I am not done pissing off with them yet. I am armed with the knowledge I learned from my complaining customers and I am using those skills to get my way. Hopefully, I can annoy this manager enough that they either want to terminate my contract early or pay me the $200 back. :)

My mom wants the icable to compensate her for the trauma she had gone through this morning when we had to disturb the ancestral shrine too! :D 

We had to vacate the Buddha and goddess and grandpa and grandma and the deity of earth so to give access to the cable people to fix the cable connection.

We will see.

Tax Season Reminder!!!

Just got an email from the inland renvue to remind me about the tax filing deadline! :D

I must file it once the internet gets back to normal, as deadline is June 3rd + 1 month, but I have no grace practically because I will be in SFO from 4June to 25 June. :D

I think I shouldn't need to pay any tax this year, unlike the last.... :D Last year, I forgot to file tax and result in a very scary tax bill. Good thing is like most of my bad experiences, it got fixed in the end.... :D So end up only paying $200 ish. :D

Won't make the same mistake twice! :D

Doom's Day - Day N+2

Yes, I wrote that I won't be update the blog until I get my normal home Internet back.

No, my home Internet has not been back.

But yesterday, a senior technician visited my house and after some more thorough investigation, he determined that the building's Internet is finally back to normal, but my home Internet still is not. This could only mean something wrong is inside my cave.

He will send someone up again on the 9Th of May to try flush out the mole which has broken my Internet.

I might write this calmly and my mood seem smooth. I must say that knowing the building's Internet is finally okay made me feel better. At least this time I have some kind of answer given to me and another solid deadline to look forward to. The whole process between someone coming up again and the night before was not entirely smooth!!!

The i-cable hot line people are shitty customer service people. As a HKCCA gold award winner, I have the rights to say that they are dirt cheap in terms of their service skills!

When I called them up again on Saturday, they told me they have been checking my cable TV all along since the 25th of April.

All I can say is WTF!

I sure hope they cannot fix my Internet on the 9th, coz then I will have a solid case to terminate the contract earlier than agreed! Justice for me!

Doom's Day - Day N

Sadly, with repeatedly broken promises, my i-cable Internet is still not working!!

Today, I called them again, turns out they were fixing my cable TV which was never broken to begin with.

I will not be updating this blog anymore until my complaint with this i-cable company is resoloved. My next course of action is to terminate the contract with them.

They will be sending someone to my home again to check one last time tomorrow, I predict the outcome will not be satisfactory to me.

I will fight on! May the best cave-woman win!

Doom's Day - Day 8

I am being lied to!!

Still no internet today!!!!

I am escalating my complaint and I will not agree to the terms I agreed to yesterday anymore! 1 extra week free is not good enough!!!

I need written reply this time!!!!!

ARRRRGHHHGHHHHHH!!!!!

Doom's Day - Day 7

I am really like a zombie here!

It's been 7 days since... the Oracle promised the world will begin again today. Unfortunately it is still not the case.

Yesterday, some tribesmen gathered outside my cave digging and probing. Maybe they were doing some ritual to speed up the end of doom but they weren't very sucessful.

I have just summoned the Oracle again, this time an elder Oracle, much more powerful than the normal Oracle...

He told me to wait 1 more day.. just one more day....

Finally, my emotional dam broke! I screamed and yelled at him for lying to me! Putting false hope in my mind and I demand to be compensated!

Originally, they just keep telling me that they would only extend my life for the missing 2 weeks! That is not acceptable.

Using the skills I have learned from my enemies, I escalated the complaint! I threaten to write to the media, write to the HK telecommunication regulatory dept etc.....

Finally, the Elder Oracle agreed to refund me the whole time I loss the internet + 1 week free!  it's been down since the 15/04. It's been 2 weeks + 2 days!

I think that extra 1 week free is nothing! But it's better than none.  I have no energy to fight this battle anymore.

I promised when the world finally become normal, I will never abandon this blog again... :D

Doom's Day - Day 2

To whoever find this note.

It's day 2 (counting from the date the i-cable people told me the world has ended, but this day 2 has happened long after the first day i lose the internet...:D) without normal internet. My world is still dark and eerily quiet. Without any survival skills, I am like a zombie.

This has made me rather go to work early in hope for some civilization than to stay home and do stuff online.....

Maybe it's a good thing. :D But I am extremely impatient and grumpy at work. People has learned to stay away....

It's truly horrible.

I hope the beginning of a new world will come soon....

Doom's Day - Day 1

Doom's day era has begun.

The world ended about a week ago. I am now hiding in my desolate pro-apocalypse cave, documenting the tragic event after my internet world crash down on me.

It's so quiet and dark out there.

Yesterday, I was visited by the i-cable tribesman who assured me the beginning of a new happy era is in sight. He assured me that today, my world would become normal again.

But when I opened my eyes this morning, the darkness which domed my internet has not subsided. The i-cable oracle predicts the apocalypse age will last for another 4-7 days.

What am I to do!!! Am I to invade a neghboring cave and rob them of their life and internet so I myself can survive?! Should I choose this corrupted raging path or should I just sit this fiasco out and hope for the best?

Tickle's log ends. Let's hope there is still tomorrow to come.....

Dawn is nowhere in sight......

The cable techie has come today at 5pm. He dinked around my modem and the switch board outside my flat for like almost an hour and finally declared I was not insane all along. This means my internet is really broken, and I am not delusional!

It's the end of the world! :D

Well.. the switch board has problem! For a week! Now he has called someone else in the mainframe and seems they have to reboot it and then send someone to my flat again later tonight to mess with the switch board.

Sigh..

You would probably ask, if I couldn't connect to the internet as we speak, how am I writing this post!?

Well I have my mobile flash drive which usually reserved for my netbook outside the comfort of my home.

So, if I have access to a backup internet, why am I going crazy about losing the home connection?

Well!!! Somehow, the mobile internet goes with the mobile phone company, which goes through a 3G network. My home's 3G seems unstable! So the connection is freaking slow and choppy....

I can't bear it!! :D It drives me nuts!!

If by tomorrow I still don't get a normal fast connection, i-cable's hotline should expect me to raise havoc! (一埸腥風血雨將會發生!!!!) Good lucky to them! :D

ARRRGGHHHHHGHHHHHGHHH....


Here's the techie. :D He is contemplating whether to send Neo in to save my internet! :D

You can see a little red x on the corner of my monitor.. that is the proof that my internet isn't working.

Internet Apocalypse!!!

It is truly the end of the world!!!!!  2012 has come early!!!!

I have been without normal fast home Internet for > 1 week!!!! I had to call that stupid i-cable hotline like 5 or 6 times the last week to finally get someone to come over to my home to look at my Internet connection!!!!!!

I had scheduled the techie to come up to my home tomorrow (Friday 2-6pm)!!!!!! The schedule was offered by the hotline staff!!  But guess what!!! Just like that freaking Peking duck dinner mishap, I've got a call this evening at 5pm and the guy at the other end of the phone told me he's coming up to my home at that moment!!!

WTF!!! I couldn't help but yelled at him in my cell phone at work, in front of all my colleagues which undoubtedly showed my peers how crazy I can be when it comes to losing my Internet connection!! :D

Well not like they didn't know how crazy I can be anyways.  I guess I just yelled more fiercely at the cable guy compare to my usual yelling at my subordinates (Which could be quite harsh also).

Geez!! I am such a byetch!!! :D

Anyways, I hope tomorrow will start the dawn of new age after this devastating apocalyptic catastrophe.

Delayed "Staycation" journal. :D

Day 3. :D


I think it's the tightest / rushy day we had for the entire trip. It's my fault to underestimate the breadth of the Hong Kong Museum of History.


We set out pretty late and unprepared that day. We arrived at the museum at around 1pm that day. Owing to the fact that we had lots of fruits and nuts after breakfast, we didn't feel quite so hungry for lunch yet at the time. I thought it would only take us 2 hours max to stroll through the whole exhibition, we figured we'd have a 3 o'clock tea instead of lunch.


I am surprised that being such a history enthusiast that I am, I haven't been to this museum ever!!


I took like more than 300 pictures inside the exhibit! I would have taken more if we had more energy and time to look through the whole show thoroughly.


In the end, we spent like more than 4 hours inside and we didn't even finish looking at everything.

The exhibit was divided into 8 parts; spanning from stone age to 1997 and life and culture of Hong Kong. My favorite section was the #4 Hong Kong's culture. It showcased different ethic groups of Hong Kong and their way of living.

Believe it or not, before becoming an international financial hub, Hong Kong was a fishing village. Fishermen live their live on boats and barely set food on land. Here's a representation of a fisherman lady mending blankets for her family on her home. You can see she's on the boat if you look closely at the far end window. :)

Then we had come to this wedding ritual section. :D It's my favorite's favorite. :D These Chinese wedding gowns are so pretty. It is carefully embroidered with gold and silver threads. It's less crazy than the traditional red one. :D

This wedding ritual section is rumored to be haunted too. :D According to this urban legend, the mannequins below would actually move when you least expect them to. :D Possessed or not, these mannequins are quite eerie looking!

The exhibit is really amazing, it even produced a replica of the Cheung Chau Bun Festival for visitor who can't attend the event themselves.

By now, we had only seen through the first floor of the exhibits!!! In the end, we had to rush through the 2nd floor just so we can get out and have some food before we faint. :D

I have to mention one thing important on the 2nd floor....

My high school, St. Clare's Girls' School was listed in the "Exiting Secondary Schools for Chinese Students Established Before the War"!.

There are more pictures to see in my shutterfly pictures page if you are interested. :)

At around 5:30pm, we decided we really must go eat and departed the museum reluctantly. I would tell you more about our dinner that day, but that was so awesome, it deserve a separate post! :D

Van Gogh LaBean

Hehehe.

Being sick and tied to the bathroom, I drew this with my cell phone. :D

It's hard to draw stuff on a tiny 3" x 1.5" screen. If you squint your eyes, the picture would look a bit better. :D

You can check out my older work by visiting some of my older posts. hahaha. :D

A day at the racecourse

I never knew watching the horse racing was so much fun. :D

Today's race is situated at the Shatin Racecourse. After lunch, we rode the bus to cross the harbor and then took the train to the race course. It's so easy and fast to get there from causeway bay, it only took about 40 minutes the entire trip.

When we got there, it's still early. The 2nd race had barely just ended, so it's not that crowded at that time.

We took some pictures around the area and found interesting painted horse sculptures all around the venue.

After we found our bearings, we decided to beg some of our hard earned money on horses. :D

Since we are horse betting virgins, Mr. M decided to study some first.

You can see the ticket in the front and a leaflet which explains the rules at the back. :D I left the explaining to Mr. M. I just bet the basics :D

In total we bet 3 races. Which means we actually stayed at the racecourse for about 2 hours. Mike got some tourist luck in the end and won like a $15 bucks. (Let's not say how much we had loss in the process. hehe hehe :D)

It was kind fun being in the crowd instead of watching the horse race on TV. I don't watch those on TV anyways.. Most boring thing shown on TV for me. But when you are in the crowd with people cheering and swearing next to you, the excitement spreads.

This guy looks like a professional horse better. :D Special paper printed with the horses' info are sold to those avid gamblers. :D I'd say this guy has a PhD in horse racing.

We promised ourselves if we won something, we'd take pictures with the silly horse mascot. :D

I will show you this funny posing of some other people instead. :D

All in all, it's a fun experience. :)

After the race, we went to a Temple and a mall and then had dinner with my folks. :D Will show you those pictures later. :D

Eating Sea Urchin at Sai Kung.

Have you ever had a living sea urchins opened in front of you and scoop it up to eat with spoons? :D

That's just what Mr. MonkeyMan and I did this evening.

It was a fun trip. We took a 40 minutes bus from Tiu Keng Leng to Sai Kung. The bus ride was quite rocky and Mr. M felt a little motion sick afterwards. :D

Fortunately, after about 15 minutes of sitting down on a bench, we were well enough to walk around the sea side walkway until our ferry arrives at 5:30pm.


To call it a ferry is not entirely true. It's actually a Sampan.

Before we board the boat, we walked around the seafood street. The seafood there are huge, fresh and usual. :D

The most unusual I found were the horseshoe crabs. Can they even be eaten?!

The sampan ride was kinda neat. It's very chilly with the sea breeze. The boat ride took about an hour to get to our destination, "The Sea urchin farm" :D

The water was so clean in that area we could spot jellyfish swimming with our boat. it's hard to take pictures of them though.

After 40 or maybe 50 minutes in the boat (Note to self: It's quite cold, so next time, bring a warmer jacket!), we finally get there a little bit after sun set.

We were given a pet sea urchin to play with during our meal and I think it's the cruelest thing we Chinese could do! :D Imagine that pet sea urchin, witnessing its brothers being cracked open alive and eaten by hungry humans.... oh my :D




But as a hungry human, cruelty is not really my concern! :D hahahah

Although it's suppose to be in season right now, the sea urchins we were given weren't too fat yet. I think we are eating the teenager of the lot!

It's not as good as the Tokyo sea urchins, but it's good nonetheless. It's creamy, sweet and a little sea salty. It's so good we both had 4 of them each.

The sea urchin is such a weird creature, it moves even after it's killed!! :D below is a video of the zombie sea urchin at the end of our meal. :D



We also had an abalone each and a steamed fish for that meal. :) The meal was quite over priced but the experience was one of a kind. :)


If you are looking for something to do on the weekend, this is not a bad place to visit.


Tomorrow is the Shatin race course for us. So stay tuned.

One more day! :D

After a horrific 7-day work week, finally, tomorrow, I will start my 8 days vacation. :D

This year, Mr. MonkeyMan and I decided to stay home bounded. :D Hong Kong is big enough for 2 people to roam around and have fun. :)

Working 7 day straight sorta drained me. :D

I hope after this holiday, I will be able to break up with my MOB (my other boyfriend) successfully shall I return to work on the 20th. :D

We will see. :D

Sorry this post doesn't serve much purpose.. except to breath a sigh of relieve

A Haunting: HDTV

Sorry, lately due to breaking up with my other boyfriend (MOB)at work, I was so stressed that I lost track of time.

Refer to my last blog post about our new TV toy, I promised I would tell you a funny story about it the next day, but I can only find time now to write it. :D

Oh Who is my other boyfriend? :D HAHAH that's another funny story to tell. No, I am not cheating on Mr. MonkeyMan if that's what you are thinking. Anyways.. Maybe i will tell you about my MOB in another post on another day. :D

So anyways, I will tell you the story.

One fine evening after work, (which is about 3am hong kong time), my dad suddenly appeared in my fortress and told me, "Daughter, I think our house is haunted."

Being a firm believer of the paranormal, I went, "Huh?!? It's freaking 3am, what makes you say that?"
:D

"Daughter, at about 1am, our new TV suddenly turns on by itself and it's volume blasting like WWII!", my dad replied.

"Hmm...", thinking loudly to myself.

Then with a mischievous grin on my face, "No way!!"

Dad in distress asked, "Would our new TV be malfunctioning already?"

Knowing the answer already but still enjoying the scared look on my dad's face, "No way!" :D

After about 5 more minutes, sensing if I don't give him an answer, he won't go away, I finally said, "Oh!!! It must be the scheduled programing function I was testing 2 days ago!!" :D

Dad said, confused, "Huh?"

"Let's test it out", I offered. :D

After the test, the TV turned on as we asked it to. :D

My dad finally breathed a sigh of relieve and headed back to sleep there after. :D

:D :D :D

This story tells us that not every paranormal activities cannot be explained away. :D eheheeh

虎年第一個 casualty.

My dad always say, "New things won't come until old ones gone" :D This is always true when it comes to home appliance. :D

Our trusty old tv which was with our family for almost 10 years finally died on the 19th Feb. :D

We blamed this to our cousin's curse on the 3rd day of Chinese new year. :D He said, "Wow, you guys still using chunky type of TV, if it broke, nobody would be able to fix".


Not even 1 week passed, our old TV couldn't resist the jinx it was laid upon... :D

The problem was that after we pressed the on button, it took a long time to really show pictures. Initially, it took about 10 minutes, and then 2 days later, it took 30 minutes or so, then an hour... in the end, it just never turned on anymore. :D

If it's like 2 years ago, my parents would probably find some technicians over to h ave it fixed. But seriously, using this TV for 10 years and the new generation is so much smaller and in HD, it's time we bid farewell to our old friend. :D

So we got this:

It's a Sony EX4, 32". It's really an upgrade from our old 25" box tv. It has built in HDTV receptors. When we first turned it on, we all exclaimed, wow it's so much sharper and clearer than the old one! YAY! :D hahah

We Chinese have a saying: "新屎坑", we couldn't stop admiring our new friend the whole first week. :D

I will tell you a funny story about our new TV tomorrow. :D

[Thanks to Chris, subject's spelling corrected. :D]

I am stinking rich!! :D hahahah 錢! 錢! 錢! 錢! 錢!

Chinese new year season is officially over, I couldn't wait to break open my red pockets loots! :D

I did extraordinarily good this year. :D A total of $2210 was obtained. :D

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Being single has its advantages! :D

討厭的回南天. Annoying humitity!

Hong Kong is such a lovely place if it didn't have such high humidity.

The whole last week was foggy and humid, the walls sweated!

This is what I can see ... or can't see in the afternoon of 01 March 2010. :D

Today is a little better, but still quite humid.

My idea of perfect weather is the dry and warm Edmonton summer :D Edmonton's summer only have about 1 week of above 32 degrees. The highest I had encountered was 36 degrees but it only lasted for 1 week. :)

Edmonton's winter could get as low as -40 degrees though, but that's perfect for me. :D

開年飯. Kick off the new year dinner :)

Sorry was real stressed last week, so didn't update the blog.. again. :D I will try not to slack from now on. :D

The first gathering dinner of the year is very important. It's like the turkey dinner during Christmas, one can't live without :D

My mom's getting older now and she doesn't feel like cooking a 10 course feast for the family anymore. So, this year, we decided we should just spend a little bit more money and dine out instead.

Here's our menu.

I will illustrate the meal with pictures below. :D

This is the Chinese roasted meat combo :D A must have item in any banquets. :D

Lobsters and noodles in creamy cheese sauce.  Let me apologize for not taking picture before it's being touched. :D This picture was taken after everybody had his share of the dish.

Steamed groper which symbolizes plentiful reserve of wealth. :)  The fish was steamed just right! Not overcooked! It was my favorite dish in that dinner.

Spring veggies and Geoduck stir fry. I loved the lotuses, crunchy and sweet.

Golden Cheese shrimp balls :D  This dish was okay.

Everybody's favorite roast chicken :D  It's my 2nd favorite though. The chicken was roasted just right, skin was crispy and the meat was tender.

Steamed rice in lotus leaves. This rice was a bit heavy. I only had a spoonful to taste. I didn't really enjoy it.

Strange sticky rice steamed roll. Some say this is a dessert, I just say it's a dim sum.

Golden Mandarin. My favorite citrus fruit. :D

It was such a hefty meal, although it was set for only 6 people, it's actually good for us party of 7.

In the end, only only these remained...

Someone sucked the head and the tail of the fish. :D only the vertebrae and empty tea pots remain.

Wait... Have you counted how many dishes we had eaten?  There seemed to be missing 1 main dish! :D  When we were all full and about to pay the bill, suddenly the waiter handed us the last dish... which I am sure was lost in transportation and finally found our table in the end.

Abalone mushroom and lettuce. :D  We were so full by then nobody dare touch this dish. It ended up becoming my dinner the next day. :D