Family time + yummy food!

Just finished Specials Week 1 (Dermatology) so am just chilling out in my room for the weekend. Went for lunch in Hahndorf with Jeremy, Joanne and Clara yesterday. The first thing that comes to my mind when I go there is huge-ass platters of sausages and pork. And mustard. And more pork. Anyway.... I've kinda gotten over that initial homesick + depressed phase. I need to look ahead now! I forsee big headaches abound for internship applications and graduation. Also am planning to get a car. But being someone who knows nuts about cars (don't even know how to change oil for God's sake!), that's going to be a challenge.

Planned to put these photos up earlier, but my sister beat me to it. I'm still going to post them anyway. Here are some photos of the good times during my summer holidays. Seafood lunch with my family Greenview Restaurant. Overall it was quite good, the salted egg yolk crab was heavenly! Now if only I could find some live mud crabs in the Central Market...

The way they tie up mud crabs is so cute! It must take some skill and creativity to do this. On a side note, *PLEASE FEED & PLAY WITH MY PET CRAB, KAM HEONG! He's located at the top left column of my blog.*

Papa and Mummy.

My youngest sister, Yi Lynn and I.

My dad's favourite vegetable: sweet potato leaves.

Fried crayfish!

...and the salted egg yolk crab.

Ye olde Crab Mallet.

A few days before my flight back to Adelaide, Papa decided to take us Sango at Crystal Crown Hotel for dinner. Sango is one of the best Japanese Restaurants I've ever been too. I remember the last time we went there, Papa got us a private room and the chef cut out the THICKEST, freshest SLABS of sashimi I've ever seen. Absolutely delicious. This time, we ordered more of the set meals instead. Still good, though. Too bad their famous chicken wings were sold out. My other sister, Kah Men wasn't around for this dinner either! Poor Kakh. But she's now in Japan for a WHOLE YEAR. So I'm sure you're having the time of your life there right, Kakh?

I'd love to try some good sake one day. ^_^

These are Japanese burnt rice balls. I was really surprised 'cos they tasted really good! I wanna try making these sometime soon.

Grilled Shishamo. These were all pregnant fish stuffed full of eggs (hence they'd be called komochi shishamo? Correct me if I'm wrong). They are usually cooked and eaten whole. This is one of my favourites next to Sashimi and Ikura.

Feast your eyes and be hungry.

Robbery in Taman Maluri, Cheras

Before I put up more emo posts bout missing my family, friends bla bla... I'd like to share with you something my dad sent to my via email just now... This robbery occured in a house....right behind a police station in Cheras. The crime rate in Malaysia has been going from bad to worse. If this isn't proof that The Powers That Be in Malaysia aren't doing squat about our security, I dunno what is.

Fat vs. Fat

Whilst I plunder through my belongings and make last minute additions to my already exploding luggage, here's a question for you, Dear Reader: Which of these pets is fatter (so jakun right this question)?

Is it: (a) Oscar, the Geriatric Dalmatian? At a ripe old age of 11 years, Oscar enjoys lying at the front porch of Xian-Nian's house, in the same sideways position every day. Hardly moving, he doesn't even bother to get up and chase me anymore. I always wonder if he would eventually get pressure sores. Note the huge belly (this photo doesn't do it justice!) and layer after layer of fat rolls. I have been to Xian-Nian's house countless of times during these past 4+ years, and 9 out of 10 times Oscar is lying there looking at me in this exact same position.

...or is it (b) My Auntie's cat? Sorry, forgot her name already. I think it's Meow Meow or something like that. Anyhow she seems to have gotten fatter since I last saw her during CNY of 2005... And yes that is her favourite position.

So there. Do post your comments here regarding this pointless discussion. I shall be now frantically packing and feeling all emo about leaving everyone I love again.

Grand Theft Auto Board Game

Wank and ride

This happened to my mom yesterday afternoon.

My mom went to a friend's house in USJ13 yesterday for potluck lunch. After the lunch, she and her friends walked to their cars outside the house. Mummy was passing some cash to her friend in a car. Then this young Malay man on his motorcycle came riding along. At first she thought the guy was going to rob her or something so she quickly walked back to her car. The guy rode past her and as she reached her car, he made a u-turn and rode towards her again. My mom turned and saw the guy had.....


....one hand on the motorcycle handlebar and one hand clamped around his errected penis. Wanking away at her!

Somehow none of my mom's friends saw that. I told her at least he didn't attack and ride off with her wallet.

Singapore External Elective (part 3)

Lazy wanna elaborate too much already. The 3rd and final part of the Singapore photos. Xian-Nian came over one Saturday and we spent a night in Novotel Clarke Quay. Had some delicious Japanese food and soaked in the city's nightlife. In my final week, I managed to go to the Night Safari and Zoo. A bit expensive, but it was worth it. =)

Singapore External Elective (part 2)

This is what happens when you dump me in a vibrant place like Singapore for a month. I'll take a gazillion photos and can't decide which to put up. Part 2 of the Great Photo Upload! Went to Sentosa Island with the other plastics elective students + a few others like Su Chuen (my IMU batchmate in Adelaide) and her boyfriend, Wen Hao. Also Valentin, a German med student on General Surgery. I loved just chilling by the beach with a Pina Colada in hand.... *sigh*. As most places in Singapore, Sentosa is very well maintained with lots of places to go to. The beach, as clean and spotless as it was, didn't quite impress me. I still yearn for Redang and Perhentian.

At one point, the elective students on plastic surgery consisted of 5 ppl: Sangeetha (Imperial College), Shilpa (also Imperial College), Mei (University College London), Felix (from Germany) and me. Head of Dept. will never remember our names as we are just students, so he referred to us as The United Nations. -_-"

At Chuen noticed, I spent A LOT of time in Chinatown. Mainly 'cos it was pre-CNY, and it felt good getting lost in the crowd there while absorbing the festive atmosphere. I've been deprived of CNY for about 2 years now (the full-6-years Aussie students have it worse I'm sure). So even if it meant half-suffocating in the crowd, it was good enough.

After my 2 weeks in plastics was up, I moved on to the Accident & Emergency Department. Was pleasantly surprised to meet Diyana there. Seems that heaps of Adelaide Uni ppl were doing their electives in SGH. Also met a bunch of college guys doing minor attachments there. Hari, Gabriel and... this other guy (I'm so sorry I can't remember your name!). Anyway there were some fun times. One of the ED consultants took us on a little field trip to the ACLS Center in Bukit Merah to sit in on the re-accreditation exams there. In the afternoon, we all hitched a ride at the back of a delivery van (belonging to the consultant's good friend). ^_^

There. I've babbled along enough. To be continued. :P Mouse over the photos to see the captions. Click if you want a larger view.

Singapore External Elective (part 1)

*Takes a deep breath*

I've been putting off blogging for wayyy too long now. I'd better start at the begining: Dec 2008, post finals. After bumming around for a few weeks and basking in the glory of doing absolutely nothing, I embarked on my journey to the neighboring country of Singapore for a month-long medical elective in Singapore General Hospital. Was attached to the plastics, reconstructive and aesthetic surgery department for 2 weeks and emergency department for another 2. Actually the elective was 50% learning experience and 50% convenient excuse to tour Singapore. It's been nearly 10 years since I've been there! The only thing I remembered from my childhood trip was Haw Par Villa (back then it was a cool place to visit, the new Haw Par Villa is just sad). I stayed at Jeremy's father's church friend (such a mouthful) for the 4 weeks. It was a good thing Jeremy helped me out. If he didn't I would have been forced to rough it out in this backpacker's hostel near Geylang. -_-"

Spending New Year's Eve in Singapore unfortunately wasn't as fun as partying with my Subang friends. Cynthia did invite me to join the party at her place, but there was a bit of a transport issue. So instead I wandered over to Marina Square to catch the fireworks display. Eventually found a place to park my camera and tripod at the fire escape stairs at the top floor food court. It sounds pathetic but it's way better than getting groped in the heaping millions on ground level. Had some nice meals with Jeremy, Jason & Cynthia. Visited one of the newer clubs there and did a lot of random wandering after hospital hours. I managed to cover most of the 'touristy places' in my month there, thank goodness.

The plastic surgery team was generally nice, albeit busy and overworked (like most doctors in Singapore). The department deals with all sorts of things from reconstruction post-cancer resection/trauma to burns and elective/asesthetic surgeries. A bit disappointed that I missed the chance to watch 2 really cool surgeries: one was a female-to-male reassignment surgery and another involved the Singaporean MP who was set on fire. To my surprise, the consultants enjoyed teaching students. It's really amazing how wide the field of plastic surgery is. Like, they can pluck out a piece of meat from somewhere and stick it into a defect, and the patient feels whole again! Well... something like that la. Anyway the most important thing I learnt from my little posting there is There is no such thing as perfection. It's so difficult to balance out function and aesthetics. A lot of it depends on the patient's expectations. Happiness really is a state of mind.

OK.. here's part 1 of my Singapore photos. There's just too many of them, even after serious cropping and editing. Please mouse over/CLICK the photos to get the captions (if any).