Happy birthday to Tintin's 'daddy'! Herge, the cartoonist who created THE thing i grew up on would've just turned 100 if he were alive, and let's celebrate this wonderful cartoonist's greatest achievement!

First seen in a French newspaper in 1929, the Belgian cartoonist's reporter hero and his wonderful companion Snowy brought humour into more sensitive political topics like the Soviet situation back then and through some imagination tranformed them into wonderful adventure stories suitable for children and adults alike. 23 comic books were released in total and yes, I've read them over and over and over again. By the way I've got the 75th Anniversary DVDs for the whole series! WOO HOO!!


Anyway, plans for making Tintin into a movie has finally gone underway and at least 3 Tintin adventures will be brought to the big screen by Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson. According to reports real people will actually not be used in the film to stay true to the Tintin characters' appearances. However it will still be made to be as realistic as possible. Can't wait to see that!Also, to commemorate 100 years since Herge's birth, a Herge museum will be built in Brussels Belgium, which is his birth place. Happy birthday Herge!

For your information the following few entries should still all be backdated ones because I haven't updated this site for a long time...

Anyway! I finally got to see what the big deal Botak Jones was about. Turns out it wasn't that great a deal. Was at the Clementi outlet like a month ago for dinner, and boy the whole coffeeshop's business practically belong to them.

I forgot to take a picture of the ordering queue which was just outside the coffeeshop, but what I can tell you is that there are people perpetually queueing for the whole hour odd I was there. It takes roughly 10 mins to get your order in.

So the food arrives in another 20 mins and abit, and our Fish & Chips, which was supposed to be their 'signature' and the Double Botak Burger, which was in essence 2 pieces of bread, some veggie and 2 huge chunks of beef patties, were up.

First up for scrutiny, the Fish & Chips. Actually not fantastic, but as far as frozen dory goes it's fresh enough, as in the flesh is still white compared to some frozen fish where it starts to grey. All in all it was just an above average dish, but I love the tartar sauce!

Probably had some pepper or something inside, I thought it tasted really good with the fries, which I liked too. $6

Next up, Double Botak Burger! With 2 150 grams of beef patties, I thought I could've conquered this without breaking a sweat, but I was wrong.

It might be due to the fact that the meat wasn't soft enough or it got cold or I was just abit picky, but I don't think it was the last reason. Somehow it was difficult to finish all the meat. It got pretty dry as the dish cooled down, which wasn't exactly piping hot when it arrived. The beef feels like eating 2 chunks out of a meat loaf, which is supposed to be almost a meal in itself. But the first half of it was satisfying, so you could probably go for the single patty version. $9.50 for burger with fries, $1 extra for cheese.

So year 1 sort of ends for me while I walked out of the exam hall today afternoon. Why sort of? Because I freaking fell sick! And missed Physics 2. Which effectively means i da bao-ed it Again. Damn it.

Ok to hell with that, what I need to say is I realized what good friends there are around me. Thank you for putting up with my whining and half dead face and everything else. So thank you CK, GR, Darren, Huiyun, Britney! Whoever said that friends in uni were only on the surface? :)

Anyway to everyone whose exams have ended or ending soon by now, remember to say your prayers so you miraculously get a 5.0GPA and have yourselves a smashing time working and having fun for the 3 coming months! WOO HOO!!

The IT show is back at Suntec City from today till Sunday, noon to 9pm!

I haven't been to the show yet of course because it's an hour before it actually starts, but let's look what good deals and nice stuff some companies have released to the press so far!

Notebooks
Lenovo N100 $1469
Great value entry level Vista notebook, with Core Duo processor, 80GB HDD and 1GB RAM.

Packard Bell BU45 $1998
Touted as the most affordable 12.1" laptop in the market, it's hardly the most eye catching. But if you don't need much style or the tablet form factor, this one gives you similar power to the HP tx1000 with $300 savings.

Asus A8Jr $2098
Headline specs include Core 2 Duo processor, new ATI Radeon X2300 graphics, 1.5GB RAM after free upgrade and freebies that include a tv tuner and Altec Lansing speakers. Effectively makes all their other models look ridiculously overpriced.

HP Pavilion tx1000 series $2298
Specs wise it's like a Pavilion dv2000 but in a tablet form and a 12.1" screen. Processing power comes from AMD Turion 64x2 instead of Intel's Core 2 Duo though. Comes with Vista Home Premium and a free 6 cell battery pack.

LCD Monitors & LCD TVs
Samsung 940NW $299
Viewsonic VA1912wb $299
BenQ FP92W $299
Hanns.G HW191 $299
19" widescreens, all but the Samsung model supports DVI input.

Akira 32" LCD TV $899
It's HD ready and based in Singapore!

Printers
Dell 926 AIO $99
HP F380 $99
Epson Stylus CX2900 $98
Brother DCP115C $88
Print, scan, copy. All for under $100. Dell should work out to be the most expensive overall because of the lack of third party compatible ink.

Samsung ML1610 $99
The cheapest mono laser printer out there, and yours truly bought one at the last show too. No duplex printing mind you, and printing on both sides is a pain in the ass. But it is so affordable, well built and quick.

Digital Cameras
Ricoh Caplio R5 $599
If I'm not wrong, the cheapest 7x optical zoom compact camera currently on sale.

Casio Exilim Z70 $399 (trade in any old digicam)
Save $100, and bag a rather stylish 7.2 megapixel slim shooter with 3x zoom. Casio's anti shake is rather useless, but it does feature in this model.

Fujifilm Finepix A610 $199 (student offer)
6.3 megapixels, 3x optical zoom, fully auto point and shoot. Accepts both xD and SD cards! Seriously anyone who uses xD cards on this camera is plain stupid or has too much money to spare.

Pentax Optio M20 $199
7 megapixels, 3x zoom, 2.5" screen. But I think the Finepix is a better choice as a digicam despite looking a tad hideous.

Portable media players
Creative Zen Vision M (3oGB) $399
Creative Zen Vision W (30GB) $499
Creative Zen V Plus (8GB) $299
Local, competitive with the best products in its class (Vision models) and well priced!

Archos 404 (30GB) $399
Wider and longer but slimmer than a Zen Vision M, its 3.5" screen makes it more a full media player competitor for the Vision W but without the widescreen display. Definitely worth checking out.

Others
Windows Vista Home Premium Upgrade / Office 2007 Home & Student Edition
$99
Limited copies!

Anyway look out for the Sony PS3 local launch ($799), Sony Cybershot T100 (the first in the series to have 5x optical zoom), Sony Vaio L Series laptop-desktop hybrid, Panasonic's 103" mammoth TV and Canon IXUS 70/75 that now comes in 2 colour options.

I seriously hope iriver and Cowon are there too. Desperate to play with their new players. Have fun at the show!

Ok, the title is not totally true, because just 2 of the 3 pictures were taken on a rainy day, and they were taken on different rainy days. Get what I'm saying? Anyway, let's move on.


The heavens seriously wept and wailed on my last day at Al Dente, but unfortunately it was before operations so there was no 'ooh where on earth can we put our customers?' frantic show. The flood was worse than what the picture shows cos you could've covered your whole shoe in the water.


Lai ang ah! Yesterday saw a huge sea of red in the auditorium building as we were packing goodie bags for the openhouse coming Saturday. What you see here is probably 60-70% of the bags we packed (my camera couldn't fit everything in its frame). So thousands of people, you better come, cos packing these bags for you was a sucky job.


Finally as I always say, go to the expression board at the canteens to get your daily laughs. Winner of this issue's pick of the board: 7-9! A good jab at the 7-11 here that opens till 9pm on weekdays and closes during weekends, you win for yourself exposure in my blog! So congratulations to whoever you are.

各位好久不见了 ! 最近比较懒惰，所以没有在网站上增添新的内容。情人节本来打了一小段东西，可是因为没有上载照片在电脑里所以也没发表了。既然情人节也过了整整一个星期，那则应该可以删除了吧。

好，废话不多说，赶快进入正题! 大家因该在想，我这次怎么用华语啊？当然是因为现在是农历新年咯！先祝大家新年快乐吧！接着祝 身体健康，学业进步，风调雨顺，国泰民安，年年有余，心想事成，万事如意，恭喜发财，风和日丽！哈哈哈！（请找出不恰当的贺词。哈哈！）

今年是猪年，就在这里也祝肖猪者的运气可以特别好！考试拿满分，买马票中头奖，下雨走路不要跌倒！哈哈哈！

到头来还是说了一大堆废话。咳！没关系，总之猪年大家旺旺旺！！

In case you haven't noticed, I like to walk through carparks A and B when getting to tutorial rooms or lecture theatres and stop at the expression boards when going to canteen A or B because there's always something interesting (meaning funny, ridiculous or plain odd) to see.

This week's find is this white Mercedes C Class. Look a little closer and you'll find that it's not just the body of the car that's white, the rims are white (instead of metallic shade of silver) the seats are covered in white slip-ons (instead of the original fabric or leather) and there's a pair of white Dior shades sitting atop the dashboard. Talk about favourite colours. I don't think there's anyone who so clearly has a favourite colour.

Overly in love with white the owner may be, but think how easy it'd be to get him/her a birthday present! Just any crap that's white in colour will do.

Oh and another point, making a car That monochromatic clearly shows the difference between taste and money. HA!

Wow what's the newest queuing sensation in town, you say? You want to check out what everyone is queuing for too?

Wow what's the newest queuing sensation in town, you say? You want to check out what everyone is queuing for too? It's Donut Factory! People have had to queue upwards of an hour to get a donut so don't be surprised if the line takes double that time to reach you when the fad is in full blast. I mean, who buys just 1 donut when they've waited for more than an hour right? Anyway according to a relatively accurate source, it ain't worth that much of your time. Or maybe you'd like to check it out for yourself at Raffles City B1. Odd sounding flavours include wasabi cheese and kaya white chocolate. Of course there're some absolutely yummy sounding ones like apple cinammon, double chocolate and peanut butter glazed too. $10-$11 for a box of 12.


I'm sure by now alot of people already know the existence of St. James PowerStation at Habourfront by now. The old literal power station has been turned into a multi-themed nightspot which has been attracting attention from lots of party-goers. The launch of The Cannery at Clarke Quay did not seem to have bothered St James much, well probably because people have had enough of going to Clarke Quay every weekend night. Maybe the cool stone facade of the PowerStation has some draws too.

Whatever it is, like the Cannery, you pay one fee and gain entry to all its 9 bars, so there's no chance of not finding the type of music you want for a great night out.

As title says, I pierced my ear! And I just realized how much of a wuss I am coz I'm afraid of infections and everything! Haha.. WOO!!

Gotten off Yahoo's website.

This stunningly expensive apartment shows how reasonably priced properties in Singapore are. Welcome to London's Knightsbridge neighbourhood, where this 77sq ft former storage room (or roughly 1/15 of my 3 room flat) goes on sale for the equivalent of over S$510000! Yes, this mousehole which is narrow enough to have a person stretch his arms to his sides and touch the walls was sold for over half a million bucks.

Why so expensive? Because the apartment (or space, or hole) is within walking distance of Harrods and Hyde Park. So the psf price of S$6700 of this space without electricity is good value compared to recent sales in the area which hit $9000 psf. That's 10 times the price of a luxurious district 10,11 condominium in Singapore! And yes, London is home to the most expensive properties in the world.

I'm most probably going for a semester of Spanish lessons once I'm cleared for electives again, so let me start the Spanish culture learning going with their fashion brands! Believe it or not, there're more big Spanish fashion brands sold in Singapore than you thought.



Zara, Camper shoes, Massimo Dutti formal wear, Springfield, Pull And Bear casual wear, Mango MNG ladies' fave, women'secret lingerie, designer label Balenciaga and Punto Blanco men's innerwear are all from Spain! A little surprised? Now you know not all apparel brands come from the US, France or Italy.

We spotted this cute little convertible in the North Spine carpark! Nope it doesn't belong to Darren.


So we all try to think of new fund-raising events, but SMRT's idea is pushing it a little. Pay $5 (if you're a student) or $10 (for organisations) each and you get to squeeze with numerous other people in a train, bus or cab for a transport sardine record! Good if you're squeezing with Christy Chung or Brad Pitt lookalikes but less so if the one right next to you is a sweaty middle-aged uncle!



Laundry disaster! Some may already know I caught a flu, so before throwing my berms into the wash I removed the piece of tissue paper in my right pocket. What I very unfortunately forgotten was there were 3 full packets of them in the left pocket. Results as shown. Advice? Always always ALWAYS check the pockets before throwing your clothes into the laundry.

Create mini fireworks of your own! Ingredients: charcoal, fire starter, barbeque pit, and a strong hand fanning the growing fire. Cool eh?


I love pun! And if you haven't realized, they were trying to nick Nike's tagline. This photo was taken last week so if you look at the promo period it's high time they took it down too!


My aunt bought this cute little cup of "snack noodles" from Hong Kong! There's a Hello Kitty sticker inside (which i already threw away) and the dried fish cakes are shaped like little Kitty heads!

That's all for now. I shall consider whether to post a picture of Huiyun eating with no image in the next post. HAHA!!

Many a times one feels that your boyfriend/girlfriend/best friend doesn't do enough. They never seem to call you enough, never seem to ask you about your day as much as you'd have liked them to, doesn't ask you out as often as you want to see them and never appear to be springing any surprises. We therefore conclude that actually they don't really care that much after all. But is that true? Do they not give a damn or are they just poorer at expressing themselves?

Some people only take action when bigger cracks begin to show. Or when some other events take place that causes separation. Like a break-up threat. Like a long term overseas posting or education. Like when your other half stop bugging and expecting some stuff to come from you. Then when the orange light lights up or just a second before the red one lights up, they suddenly show that they might still care. The common conclusion is therefore this person only treasures something when it is on the verge of being lost. Or maybe not. Maybe these people just have too much pride, or simply have no idea what to do before. So just before D-day, they'll try triply hard to say how much they really care.

Sadly sometimes it becomes a case of too little, too late. But at least if you've chosen to let go, you at least understood and know you've always been loved, except it was not always shown.