Musings of an endless dimension

Benvinguts a Barcelona

2011-07-16T11:45:00.000+08:00

I woke up really early at around 3am to pack my things and prepare to depart the place early so as to ensure that I get to the airport on time. I settled all the immigration checkpoint matters and had around 45 min to spare at the transit area. The plane was supposed to take off at 7.45am but it was delayed. Spanair operates as an internal carrier around Spain and it is somewhat like a Spanish version of Air Asia. The flight to Barcelonna took around 1hr 15min. Once I touch down at El Prat Airport, I proceeded straight to find and purchase the Barcelona Card. Unlike Madrid, the Barcelona card covers all transportation and includes some discounts for attraction too. It seems that the cost of a train ride from the airport to Barca’s city centre is around 10 Euros. That’s a lot compared to Madrid where I pay a mere 2 Euros to get to Barajas. Since I have the Barca card, it’s included inside and I guess I’ll need to pay that 10 Euros when I return.

The first impressions of Barca that I have is that the weather is gonna be as hot as Madrid. But the main difference that I spotted instantly was the presence of palm trees and I remembered that Barcelona is a seaside city. I reached the city centre station at around 10am+ and transferred to another line. Even by just looking at the train lines, I can tell that Barca is a much of messy city than Madrid. The trains in Madrid are operated under one standard Metro company but in Barcelona, there are different types of trains – much like Malaysia’s LRT and Monorail. For the stop that is the nearest to my hostel, I have to take the FGC train. These FGC trains are a lot older than the Metro trains and they look rather run-down. By the time I made my way to the El Putxto stop, which is where I’m supposed to be at, it was already 11am. I thought that it would be a jiffy to search for the hostel and it wouldn’t be too hard but it turned out that I was taking things for granted by not checking properly on the exact location. I didn’t even write down the proper address! I circled around the area for countless amount of times. I was on the right street but somehow, I couldn’t find the correct shop lot for it. Without the proper lot number, it’s gonna take ages and I can’t find any free internet nearby. I was on the verge of giving up when I bumped onto the correct door. This is crazy. The hostel is so inconspicuous and there’s not even a proper signboard. I went up and the reception front door was big wooden door which was locked. I had to bang a couple of times before somebody responded to it. Ahhh, it seems that this so-called hostel is actually a university residence. My room has nothing except a bed, a table and a cupboard. There’s not even a fan, which is not good news for a weather like Barca. The funny thing is that it has a fridge inside the room of all things. Oh well, at least I could store some cold drinks inside or chocolates. In addition to that, there’s also a familiar smell of basic uni hostel accommodation which I’m very acquainted with during my first two years of undergraduate studies. Toilets are shared and they are located quite a distance away. Woahh..the standards here are certainly a far cry from the one I stayed in at Madrid but I gotta make do with it since I wanna save money. The only extra good thing that this hostel has is that it has a kitchen with water dispenser and microwave. This provided an avenue to actually buy raw food from supermarket and heat it up myself. That is really a useful money-saving tool considering that I am confident that I won’t be able to find a Museo Jamon clone in Barca.

I was pretty exhausted and would wanna sleep for a while after searching so hard for the hostel. However, I also knew that I had to cover some ground to ensure that the free coupons from my Barca card are not wasted. The first destination that I’ve decided to go is CosmoCaixa – which is somewhat like a science center sponsored by the Spanish Caixa Bank. It turned out to be further away than expected from the FGC station and I had to walk up a steep luxurious neighbourhood to reach the CosmoCaixa. The interiors look superbly new and modern plus the aircon is blasting high. Ahhh, the aircon is most useful with the burning Barca heat outside. There was much to offer in CosmoCaixa for people of all ages and I’m quite impressed by the range of scientific exhibitions that they have there. There’re dinosaur bones, strange marine creatures, recycling models, and physics exhibition. The most impressive one for me was the presence of an Amazon rainforest right smack within the building itself. It was built in such a way that one can have a cross-section look of the rainforest through the glass windows. Once I’m satisfied with exploring around, I made my way down the hill and took the train back to city center to get dinner. In the process, I took the opportunity to explore the city centre too. Hmmmm..for some reason or so, the supermarkets were closed early so I had to pick one restaurant outlet to take away. I decided to try the Pans Company because it looked pretty much like an ubiquitous Spanish Subway company. I didn’t try it in Madrid, so I thought that maybe I could give it a shot here. It’s not exactly cheap food but at least it fills the stomach. Anyways, I got myself an early rest on the first day as I try to figure out how to spend as many coupons from the Barcelona card as possible.

For the second day of Barcelona, I started off with the La Familia Sangrada which is a basilica that is still under construction even after more than 100 years! Work had began in 1882 and it’s completion date is purported to be 2026. The queue to enter the basilica is extremely long and I had to queue for a good 45 minutes before I could buy tickets to enter. The entrance fee ain’t cheap too but with the Barca Card, I got a small discount off the original price. The inside of the church is magnificent, with a myriad of bright colours juxtaposing against the white marble background. There were plenty of visitors but somehow this gigantic structure still had plenty space for visitors to walk around. One of the interesting monuments in there is a giant slab which contained the Lord’s prayer in various languages and I could find Bahasa in there..haha! There was no time to waste after I’m done with the Basilica. I was tempted to pop in for a buffet lunch at a restaurant opposite but then I realised that I do not have much time left to explore if I spend the time munching on food. As usual, two Hamburgers from McD will do the trick for lunch and I headed straight to find the music museum which is located in Auditori. On the way, I had the opportunity to bump into Barcelona’s bullfighting arena. It looks almost the same as its Madrid counterpart but is now defunct as far as bullfighting is concerned since the sport Is banned in the Catalan region. Anyways, it’s free entrance through the Barca Card for the Museo Musica. Plenty of musical instruments to explore and see and exhibits are arranged according to the individual cultures that they come from. There’s also another section which charts the evolution of music throughout the ages. Not many people were present there because I guess it’s not a popular area to visit unless you’re really into playing musical instruments. Time is ticking, so I hastily made my way to the chocolate museum to ensure that I have ample time to explore it before it closes in the evening. The chocolate museum is another free entrance case and the ‘ticket’ that I received is actually a bar of chocolate! Mhmmm..the chocolate museum is not just a place that exhibits plain old chocolate bars or just mention about the history of cocoa. This little museum houses artistic confectionary masterpieces made entirely from just chocolate! These artisan chefs do not see chocolate only as a delicious source of food, but also as moulding materials like clay. Visitors are treated to a wide array of plain brown chocolate sculptures and also colour painted ones which features well-known characters such as Asterix, Tintin and Bambi. The impressive thing about these sculptures is that they look exactly like the 3D version of their print/screen counterpart. They look almost too good to be eaten..haha. I stayed there until the museum is closing for the day. There’s still some daylight evening time left, so I head off to the docks to find the Columbus Column. This column is located at the end of the La Rambla stretch. The highlight of this place is that one can take an elevator up to the top to have a bird’s eye view of Barcelona city centre from the coast. Entrance is free from the Barca card. There was a short queue to board up the small elevator where only 4 people can go up at a time. The elevator sorta reminded me of the elevator in the Merlion. The space to move around the column at the top of the column is extremely narrow. It has just enough space for a one lane circumference. If one is too fat or is claustrophobic, this place will definitely be a problem. Nevertheless, the view from up there is fantastic. Besides the city centre on one side, I can also have a bird’s eye view of the docks, the World Trade Center and the ships parked near the coast. When I’m satisfied with the pictures taken at the top, I returned back to ground. It was nearing evening, at about 7pm and I was contemplating whether to take the boat ride today or tomorrow. Finally, I decided to take it tomorrow instead as a form of finale to the Spanish voyage. Meanwhile, I walked along the docks and checked out the Barca beach and its seaside attractions. I couldn’t walk the whole coast of course, so at some point of time, I did a u-turn to return back to La Rambla. By then, shops were already closing and I spotted a Carrefour there. So I went in to see to find whether I can get anything to eat and I had a hard time deciding. I bought a raw pizza in the end because I thought that I could bake it in the oven in the hostel. In addition to that, I bought a packet of chips too because it was on promotion. While looking through the shelves, what attracted my attention was bottled Sangria being sold in supermarket shelves. Woahhh, in England, this is like cocktail which can only be obtained in bars but yet in Spain (the country where Sangria originates from), Sangria is just dirt cheap and although it is alcoholic, it is bottled like fruit juice! Carrefour even has its own range of Sangria in box packets. I grabbed one 1.5l bottle and since I have a fridge in the room, I’ll place the bottle in to chill it and drink it for dinner the next day.

On day 3, it’s the moment I’ve been waiting for – it’s time to head off to Nou Camp! I was supposed to start moving in the morning but slackness dragged me on my feet and by the time I reached Nou Camp, it was close to afternoon already. Nou Camp is located on the outskirt of the city centre and it’s literally a Barca sports village by itself. As I was walking to the stadium, I passed by what I believe to be one of the facilities used by the legendary Barca academy to train their young kids. Once I reached the main compound of the stadium, I went straight to queue up for the tickets. There were loads of people snaking to go into the stadium, even more than the Bernebeu I would say. If you thought that Bernebeu’s 16 Euros was expensive, wait till you hear Barca’s entry price of over 20 Euros. Since I had Barca card, I managed to get a small discount. Ughhh..expensive, but it’s a once in a lifetime experience. After getting my ticket, I joined the long snake by going up the escalator and crossing the overhead bridge which brings me directly into the stadium museum. Like the Bernebeu, this stadium tour is self-service. Visitors can also get a free audio guide to accompany them during the museum visitation. Since the museum extremely crowded, I just had a look at the exhibits and let the audio guide do all the talking. At the end of the museum trail, visitors can enter into the main stadium arena with the playing field where the magnificent ‘Mes Que Un Club’ slogan laid majestically among the seats across the other side. Bernebeu feels squarish and high but Nou Camp is more on the rounded side with a lower and its seating arrangement spreads out.

I took my time to savour the view from my place and at the same time, tried to scout for any appropriate candidates among the other tourists to help me to take a photo of me with the stadium. It was quite a chore to cycle a few bunch of people before I managed to get a satisfactory shot of myself with the stadium. I continued to follow the route of the stadium which also leads to the area of the press box where the TV commentators sit. I was keeping track of the time very closely and I try since I had a few other destinations in mind to complete. After feeling satisfied with Nou Camp, I made my way to another sporting venue – the Barcelona Olympics Museum. Since Barca hosted the Olympics in 1992, the Olympic Stadium would still would have been there. The Olympic Village (where the museum is located) is located at the top of a hill and I had to take a special FGC funicular tram to reach the top. This special FGC funicular tram looks exactly like the Penang Hill trams, only more modern. The ride did not take long and from the summit station, I had to walk around 5-10 minutes to reach the museum. The Olympic Museum had various exhibits on the origins of different sporting events. I did not stay long to read the long narratives, so I just skimmed through the areas which are interesting enough for me to explore because of the time. The quick browse of the Olympic Museum was over quickly and I’m off to have a look at the Barcelona Olympic Stadium. Hmmmmm..it still looks well-maintained despite it being mostly devoid of any activity apart from the tourists. My next area of exploration was kinda discovered by accident. Nearby to the Olympic Village was the Castell de Montjuic which was actually a 17^th century military fortification overlooking the Barca coast. As this castle is located on the highest point of the hill, visitors can basically have a bird’s eye view over the whole of Barcelona city centre. It offers an even wider view compared to the Columbus Column. The only setback is that there’s lots of smog permeating the air, and as a result, the camera couldn’t capture a good overview of it. Climbing up and down the various spots in Montjuic is very physically demanding and tiring and by the time I reached the base of the hill, I was brimming with exhaustion. There was still one last thing for me to complete and I’ve just arrived in time before it is closed for the day. It’s the free boat ride along the coast of Barcelona courtesy of the Barca card! It’s an old ferry but the ride was very relaxing. It went past the cargo bay area before making a u-turn back to the docks. Along the way, the little old ferry passed by the gigantic cruise ships too. I think it’s a fitting finale for my time in Barca – to end it off with a boat ride in the evening. For my last dinner, I just grabbed some pasta from the frozen section in the supermarket and reheat them using the hostel’s microwave. To top up my meal, I also have a bottle of ice-cold bottled Sangria which I’ve placed inside the fridge the night before. Ahhh, looks like I’ll drink myself drunk and just fall asleep on the bed. Mhmm, I remember feeling very sleepy at half a bottle and then I dozed off.

My flight back to Leeds is scheduled to be at 12.45pm on 13^th July. I’m not going anywhere on the last day and the morning shall be reserved solely in getting ready for the flight and making sure that I don’t leave any valuables behind. I woke up considerably early and started packing up and took my time to wash up. My time estimations were all spot on and I was at the airport way before time. 3hrs on, I’m safely seated back in my base of operation at Leeds. Well, that concludes the first half of my European voyage. Right now, I’ll take a nice break first from all the travelling and look forward to Mama’s arrival and graduation!

Viva La Madrid!

2011-07-15T22:14:00.002+08:00

I had been trying to piece together a trip to at least one of my targeted destinations in Europe before the arrival of Mama and graduation. Now, I definitely do not want to be caught in a situation where I ended up travelling alone to these places. I dread thinking of the fact that I may end up getting lost alone in Europe. It’s always better to have a 2^nd person since that would mean accommodation would be cheaper and taking photos would not be such a hassle. Leo joked that I should do a ‘Carrie’, in reference to our mutual female friend who had travelled around England and Europe by herself. Ahhhhh,,I’m trying very hard not to go down that road!

After much deliberation and checking, I decided to make Spain – Madrid and Barcelona as the destinations to go to during this early July period. I did a couple of flight checks to get the best pricing and in the end, the cheapest combo that I could come up with was to start off with Madrid first using Easyjet from Manchester, followed by a connecting flight in midweek via Spanair to Barca and returning back to Leeds from Barca via Ryanair. With that settled already, I went around, asking in desperation for people to join me. The response was not very good though, as people were either not free, going with parents to the destinations I am going or have gone back to Malaysia. In the end, I got quite fed up asking people or waiting for their replies. I made the final decision, albeit reluctantly, to go ahead with my plans alone and to book the necessary accomodations.

The flight from Manchester was in the evening on 6^th July and when I reached Madrid, it was already 10pm+ or so. When I walked out of the plane onto the Madrid runway to take the transit bus to the terminal, I could feel the Spanish warm air. Ahhhh, it looks like somewhere in Europe, there’s a place where there is tropical Malaysian weather! Naturally I was delighted because I could get rid of the Northern European cold for once. The hostel that I booked is in the region of Barajas, which is where the airport is located. I decided to stay near the airport since my Spanair flight is early in the morning at 7.30am. The area where my hostel is located looked a lot like some small town in Mexico..lol. I think that’s how the Spanish influence the Mexican in terms of town planning. I was quite surprised to find a Chinese provision shop near my hostel too. Hmmm..seems that the Chinese are everywhere! I managed to find my hostel without much problems and my room is actually located in a separate building from the reception office. I was quite surprised at the size and nature of the room though because it felt like a hotel room and the toilet inside the room was quite nicely decorated with marble tiles. There was air-con and Spanish cable TV, so I ain’t complaining much about it. The only left to do is to get a good night’s rest and prepare to explore Madrid the next day.

On the next morning, I headed straight to the train station to purchase the Madrid transport pass which enables me to have unlimited travelling on buses and trains for 3 days straight. The first destination that I had on my card was to head towards Puerto del Sol, which is the main square for Madrid. I was supposed to be there early for the free tour but because of my lateness, I had to go for the free tour in the evening. So, with plenty of time for me to burn, I did a short exploration around the central square before heading to one bakery stall to get some food. I got myself a jamon, which is someone like a raw cured bacon ham in a croissant and it costs only 1 Euros! I topped it up with some juice from the supermarket and that was good enough. After the small lunch, I decided to head off first to check out the Chamberi Train Station, which is one of the ghost train stations in Madrid. One of the reasons why I started from there is because it’s free too..lol. Chamberi is a train station that’s abandoned for decades and has just recently been reopened as a small museum. It’s interesting to see the retro ticket barriers still in place and some of the painted rail map is still in existence. I head back to Plaza Mayor to join up with the free tour group. As usual, we had a basic run through around some of Madrid’s main attractions. That gave me some idea on where to go and what to plan for the next few days. As you can see, I’m pretty impromptu coming into Madrid with not much expectation or plans on where to visit except for the Santiago Bernabeu stadium.

For the 2^nd day, I decided to start off the day by heading to bullfighting ring at Plaza de Toros. Bullfighting is a controversial sport but it is part of the Spanish cultural heritage. There are occasional bullfighting matches in Madrid but it is totally banned in Barcelona. So, if I wanna have a chance to see how the inside of a bullfighting arena looks like, this is the best opportunity. I went to have a look at the museum first which is free and it exhibits a lot items related to the gory sport. There are bull heads, matador costumes (including one which still has blood-soaked stains), weapons and portraits of famous matadors. After feeling satisfied exploring the museum, I headed out to the main gate and purchased ticket for the tour. It was very much like a stadium tour as the guide brought us around the arena. He had to speak twice though, once in Spanish and another time in English. The waiting areas around the arena are somewhat like a football stadium, they do sell snacks and drinks. We did go down all the way to where the bullfighting takes place and it’s nothing but sand and dust. After bullfighting business, I went to check out the Vincenzo Calderon Stadium, which is Athletico Madrid’s stadium. From the distance, it looks rather huge and impressive. I tried to search for a main reception area (like Anfield or Old Trafford) but found none. It seems that outside the stadium is quite plain. The interesting thing about the stadium though is that it has an active road traffic running under the stands. Athletico certainly has a bigger and modern stadium than Anfield and I wonder what Torres thought when he first transferred over..haha. I didn’t have lunch or anything yet, so I went to search for El Tigre bar which I read on the Internet serves free tapas for any drink that you buy. It took me quite some time to search for it because it was hidden in a small alley. I came at the right time around 4pm-ish where the crowd is the least. I ordered cider, thinking that they will give me the typical English cider. Instead, they gave me somewhat like a dark red Spanish cider cocktail with peppermint leaves. It tasted quite good and refreshing actually, especially under the hot blazing cloudless Spanish sun. I was given free tapas as expected and it’s quite a generous portion of paella and meat. My drink cost 5 Euros, and I suspected that I may be overcharged as a tourist but I still think it’s worth it if I were to put the meaty tapas into consideration. In the evening, I went to the Madrid Maritime Museum. It was listed as free on the web, but when I went there, I was requested by the guard to make a ‘donation’ of 3 Euros. Ahhh, I paid up anyways since I’m curious to see the artefacts of the Spanish as a former seafaring colonial power. They would have some remnants about Isabella being pwned by Elizabeth during the Golden Age..lol. I stayed until the museum closes. My free tour guide told my group the day before that Madrid has the largest collection of art pieces in a city. It would be a waste if I don’t visit at least one. Apparently, some of these world famous museums do offer free entrance at a particular time. I picked Museo del Prado as it has free entrance from 5pm-6pm and it fits in just nice with my schedule. Inside Museo del Prado, there’s hundreds of Biblical themed paintings. With such a short span of time, obviously I can’t finish seeing everything but it’s good enough to have a glance for a free entrance. I waited for quite some time for the sky to get dark. It’s the peak summer period and even at 9pm, the sky is still bright. Finally, when nightfall did settle in at around 9.30pm-10pm, I walked around the city centre area to enjoy the night lights of Madrid. I went to the Bernebeu for a quick preview and to check out to see whether the stadium is litted up at night. To my dismay, the stadium was pitch-black but outside the stadium were some “pasar malam-ish” food stalls. Oh well, looks like I’ll have to wait until tomorrow to get the full view of the stadium.

For the last day, I took the train down straight to the Bernebeu station. The Bernabeu is a massive complex situated in the middle of Madrid’s high end commercial hub. Most stadiums are located in the outskirt but Real Madrid’s stadium is right smack in the city. I proceeded to a long queue to buy the stadium tour ticket and it costs 16 Euros. Unlike the stadium tours in England, visitors to the Bernabeu are allowed the freedom to explore the stadium on their own and stay however long they wish. So, it’s not only the museum that visitors can have the leisure of wandering around, but also the spectator stands, commentator box and dressing room. There are barriers to guide visitors to walk the correct path in this self-guided tour. The first point that visitors came across is the highest point of the spectator stand in the Bernabeu stadium. That point of height is at least 9 to 10 storeys high. Afterthat I went through the museums and the trophy display room. The Champions League sections reminds us that the last time Real had won the CL is in 2002. At ground level, visitors have the opportunity to get a feel of the seats at the substitutes’ bench and of course, Mourinho’s seat. It was there that I got to know for a short time a Bulgarian who strangely had a fancy for Celtic. It was towards the last part of the tour, so he helped me to take photos for the last stretch. After Bernabeu, I went back to the town center for lunch. Once my stomach is filled, I decided to backtrack to some of the places that I came across during the free tour. I came across the Royal Palace but I declined to go in because the price is quite expensive. Instead, I entered inside the Almudena Cathedral, which I thought was a very unique structure. It does seem weird to have a cathedral with an Arabic sounding name but I guess it’s due to the Moorish influence in the past. The interior Almudena is quite impressive while it’s exterior is a reminiscence of Moorish architecture.

My last stop in Madrid is the Buen Retiro Park which is the largest green space available in the city. It houses the monument to King Alfonso XII. Looks like there are plenty of activities to do there. There’s a huge lake in there too where folks can ride a boat around. The most interesting structure that I came across was the Crystal Palace The entire structure was built somewhere in the 19^th century and consisted predominantly of glass. With that, I closed the chapter on Madrid and prepared to go back to my room early to get sufficient rest before waking up early for my flight. My overall conclusion for Madrid: clean, excellent rail service and it certainly did not look like the capital city of a country in debt. I was quite fortunate to have supermarkets selling 1.5l of orange juice for 1.38 Euros and Museo Jamon to sell those cheap 1 Euro croissants. That saved a lot in the food department. Ahhhh, the next stop will be in the Catalan region and I’ll be interested to see how they would differ from the capital city.

By God's grace, it is Classification One!

2011-07-01T18:45:00.003+08:00

As mentioned before, I’ve heard of rumours swirling around in Amsterdam but I did not want to confirm it until I’ve returned back to England. Anyways, I’ve deduced on the possibilities of situation by figuring out that if I had gotten a mere 2:1, people would not have start to message me on facebook with such excitement. There is a high possibility that my results could have gone beyond 2:1. Of course, at the same time, I was also worried and did not want to be so upbeat about it only to find that my deductions were wrong. Afterall, people could be just be nice to offer customary notes of congratulations for doing well for degree at a 2:1. Not only that, mathematically, it seemed very improbable in my prediction of my own marks that I can hit a First based on my own evaluation of performance.

I came back on a Saturday, so there’s no way that I could find out from the law office. The only way to get a clue on that was to check from the online portal to see if they had released any list. There was no list at all, so I searched deeper by going to the LFL webbie where there list career opportunities etc. I checked to see if they had updated my profile and true enough, they did update it! So I read through to result and..and I just went WOW! It wrote down there – Classification: ONE! =D

Let’s start from the main talking point first from the bottom. I’ve always expected my EU Law paper to be a major screw-up and I would be contented just to have passed it. I honestly didn’t think that I would get higher than a 2:2 grade for it but It turned out in the end that I secured a 2:1 for it at 63. The surprising eye-brow raiser was that Jurisprudence was actually the one which got the honour of being the lowest marks at 61. Ahhhhh, perhaps I should not be that surprised considering that I didn’t submit a good performance for the law as fiction question .

Now for the good news for the rest of the subjects which helped me to seal the grade – Criminology was the subject which I placed the highest expectation on and it duly delivered a first class grade as expected at 70. Evidence is somewhat like my A Levels Eng Lit paper – not a guarantee First but a possible one. And yes, in the end it was 70 marks for Evidence for another first grade! Evidence was one subject I would say that I would not have expected to get the first grade but I guessed my focused calibration during preparation paid off in the end, especially with that last minute decision to focus on bad character. The most glorious of it all is of course, my long dissertation – a whopping 73 marks and I’m glad it turned out well after months of working on it. For LD, I already had predicted that I would get at least a 2:1 without much problems and a small nagging feeling that I would get a first if my supervisor sees my work and ideas as revolutionary and fresh. I, to a certain extent, felt surprise at the given mark at 73 because this meant that my supervisor found my dissertation to be much better than the prerequisite first class 70 borderline marks. Like football, additional goal difference is welcomed and having 73 for LD is a tremendous boost for the average marks classification. (A win is 70, anything more is goal difference) Since LD occupies 40 credits, it’s akin to scoring 73 for two subjects. Big gamble to stake two lives with one attempt, but in the end it paid off big time. That additional 6 marks could be used to shore up the deficit in EU and Jurisprudence. Mhmmm..analysis wise on the distribution of marks, it looks like I woke up my ideas for the last two papers and got back on track for my aspired first classification unknowingly along the way.

The final average marks that I’ve accumulated was 6.83/10, 0.02 marks off the guaranteed 6.85 border for First class. It would be inequitable to deny me of the first for that 0.02 difference, but in anycase, my grade was secured by a proviso which states that any average marks difference of 0.10 would see the student being awarded the higher classification which he is eligible for. Furthermore, a student can also score a first if 50% of the credits that he has taken is a first class grade. I’ve scored a First for 80/120 credits that I have taken, so that factor would have secured me the grade too.

I told Mama to keep the excitement down when I saw the results over the weekend since it is not finalised yet. Then today, 1^st July, I popped down to the law school to see the finalised list and praise God, the first class grade was confirmed. It turns out that my fellow Lee sister, WY, got a First too! Haha, I knew it that she would get it! I had the feeling about that in Amsterdam and I’m not surprised considering that she put in quite a lot of hard work into her studies compared to a slacker like me. My average of 6.83 was right at the borderline and if I had gotten anything less in any subject even by just 1 mark, I would have been off the scale. Part of me figured that if I had prepared for my EU paper properly, my average marks would have been higher and I would not have sat at the border. Hence, this gift of first class for my degree can only be attributed to divine intervention and it is only by God’s grace that I have gotten it. Such a small margin, and it could go either way in the slightest change of circumstance. The laurels of being exceptional and being average are just separated by a thin thread. It’s a big difference in future opportunities or the response of the people around. Honestly, I did not really believe that I would get a First Class for my degree. Mama told me to pray about it, but I shrugged it off telling her it’s a mathematical impossibility. Yet again, I’m proven wrong by God for the umpteenth time. O ye of little faith! Is anything even too improbable for God! I felt disappointed at myself for doubting Him but at the same time, thankful and glad that God never stopped watching out for me.

Then, I remembered the words of one of my friends, who pointed out that God will give us the necessary grades that will help us to advance in life according to His plans. I’m not sure why He has given me a First class award eventhough I didn’t do anything to deserve it but I’m certain that it’s a key that He wants me to have it in order to open doors which He wants me to go through in the future. Thank you Lord once again!

I AMsterdam

2011-06-27T19:29:00.003+08:00

It’s time to kickstart my European summer travel plans and the first destination on the list is Amsterdam! I’ve arranged myself to go with a group consisting of Carl, Hannah, Carolyn and Wai Yi. The planned period was from 22nd June till 26th June and we were supposed to take Jet 2 down from Leeds to Amsterdam on the morning of 22nd. Due to some miscommunication (me not reachable because of phone problems), WY did not purchase my tickets since she could not get confirmation from me. I tried to get the same flight on the net but just within the time period of 24hrs, the price had risen way beyond the 9.99 pounds to some ridiculously priced 40-50 pounds. The only 9.99 pounds ticket was the evening before on the 21st. I figured out that I should take a chance with that instead of paying unnecessarily. This leads to two options of either going to downtown Amsterdam to stay for a night a hostel or to sleep overnight at the Schiphol airport. Once again, financial considerations had led me to pick sleeping at the airport but I’m confident that it’s not going to be a bad experience. The key is not to leave the transit area of the airport. I did some research on the net about sleeping at Schiphol airport and the reviews weren’t too bad. I had personal experience at Schiphol’s transit area from my transit time at the airport in September last year and I would say its facilities are top class.

So, on the 21st, I made my way down alone to Leeds airport to take the flight. I arrived at Amsterdam around 6.30pm local time. With so much time to kill, I decided to go around to look for dinner (other than McD) that won’t blow up my pocket. My search was not too successful because in the end I still ended up eating Dutch McD because the other food areas were just too expensive. After eating, I went around to find a suitable place to sleep. I was thinking of the chairs near some bistro which I had seen but the characteristics of those chair would not allow me to lie down. The other one was the lounge area with some comfortable sofas/bean bags but the problem is that it may get pretty congested later in the night and there won’t be any privacy. Somehow I bumped onto a section know as “comfort chairs” (lol) and they are perfect! These chairs are reclined with a leather padding overlooking the runway. The section that I went to was not really populated by lots of people. I spent the rest of the night there with my newly acquired netbook and used part of the free 1 hr internet to log onto FB. The 8hrs of sleep was great as I was the only one in the area and I woke up being greeted by the sunrise at the runway. Voila! One night of accommodation saved!

In the morning, my area became rather congested though because flights are coming in. It was time to shift myself to McD since I’ve told WY that I’ll meet them there. I bought myself a McKroket for breakfast which I was feeling rather curious to try. McKroket is only available in the Netherland. After munching on the burger, I have no idea what filling the patty was, other than the feeling that it tasted like mashed potato fried in breadcrumbs. WY and the rest soon arrived and after breakfast, we checked out of immigration without much problems. The first thing to do now is to take a train down to the city center and look for our hostel. One of the first interesting sights that I saw at the train station was the double-decker train which we took to downtown.

It did not take long for us to find the hostel but we could not check-in because we were there too early. We left our bags at the counter first for them to store and then off we went to the main square to catch the free tour. Just like the one in Paris, the free tour gave us a rough idea on where to and what to expect around Amsterdam. We went back to the hostel to check-in after the tour. The room is quite cramped for 5 people. Basically it has 2 double decker beds and one single bed thrown into the middle. I took the middle bed..haha. It was stated that Wi-Fi is charged but we were able to access it without the password anyways, so charge attempt fail. In the evening, we went to pay a visit to Anne Frank’s house, which is now a museum. It was a long queue to get in and to make matters worst, it was raining with strong winds. My pathetic 1 pound umbrella got destroyed in the process and I had to get drenched with my jacket on. We managed to gain entry eventually. Since the museum does not allow camera, I wasn’t able to get any pictures of the interior. Anyways, the layout inside the house is very simple, most of the original furniture had been removed except for a few. The secret attic chamber is still there. Since there were so much of visitors in the house, it gets rather cramped and very often a long stretch of queue forms as we navigate through the narrow corridors of the house. At some sections, we can’t stop the read because the narrow corridor would mean that we would have to continue moving so as not to hold up the people behind. At the end of the museum trail is a small exhibition on the Holocaust in general. We went back to the hostel pretty early at around 8pm also after getting our dinner.

On the next day, we took a bus down to the outskirts of Amsterdam to have a look at one area with lots of windmills. The windmill is one of the trademark symbols of the Netherlands but it’s not the only thing that is found there. There’s a cheese shop which makes traditional Dutch cheese and also a Dutch clog factory. We did a small walk around the area, filled with streams and rivers before proceeding on to the clog factory. I had the opportunity to watch how a clog was made from a block of timber. After feeling satisfied going around, we took a bus back to the city centre. The group decided to rent bicycles to go around Amsterdam instead of taking the public transport. I was a little apprehensive but decided to give it a try since one of the Amsterdam experience is to try riding a bike around the cities like the locals. You see, the problem with Stan is that most of his cycling days are in a park. I have no problem riding a bike, but add cars zooming beside you and other impatient cyclists along a narrow strip of pathway sound alot like a recipe for disaster. Anyways, we cycled to a nearby park so that Carolyn can have a crash course on biking. That took quite some time and when we were done, we cycled back to city centre to park our bikes somewhere before heading off to search for food. Mhmmm..food choices are a little bit hard because everywhere seems to be expensive but we settled to eat at one Italian bistro in the end.

We started off the 3^rd day by checking out the wet market. It was literally wet because the morning weather was gloomy and it was drizzling all over the place. There ain’t much to see because tulip season is over and most of the stuff that are being sold were gardening materials. We proceeded next on our bikes to the Heineken factory. This was the original brewery which was first established in Amsterdam. Hmmmm..I never knew Heineken was Dutch..lol. The museum was quite interesting as it provides some information regarding its origins. There’s also demonstrations on how beer is created. The room with the giant boilers were preserved for visitors to see and those metallic containers are huge! We get to sample Heineken straight from the tap too. At the end of it, we were given two complimentary pints. We redeemed one only though because drinking 2 during an afternoon may be a little too much. Besides, there is a risk that we may be too drunk to ride a bike too..haha. I got myself an interesting souvenir – a Heineken bottle of beer personalised with my own name on it. It’s only 5 Euros and the only setback is that I need to pay another 5 to transport it across back to England. We returned our bikes to the rental shop at around late afternoon and at that time, I was feeling relieved to be able to walk on two legs instead of man-handling the bike in congested Amsterdam. Nevertheless, I have to say that cycling in Amsterdam itself is quite an interesting experience. We spent the remaining evening just exploring Amsterdam on foot. The red light district was an ubiquitous feature and we were warned not to take pictures of the booths because they don’t like tourists doing that. Other than the red light district, there are numerous shops selling everything related to love-making – condoms, DVDs, live shows. Weed of course is another prevalent substance distributed throughout the city and they can be easily obtained from the 200 over “coffeeshops” spread all over Amsterdam. Some of these coffeeshops don’t only sell weed-smoking services but also various other cakes laced with weed (which they call space cakes) and some weird nonsense known as magic mushrooms.

On the final day, we did a short visit of the city’s Heineken souvenir stall before heading off to the airport to catch a flight back to Manchester. Ahhhhh, Amsterdam has certainly been fun and eye-opening at the same time.

P.S. While I was in Amsterdam, I received rumours and congratulations at Facebook for my exam results. You see, the provisional exam results are to be out while we were holidaying in Amsterdam. While hundreds of law students are eagerly checking their results, WY and I are two law students who are still lepaking in Amsterdam, having no idea or confirmation of our results other than rumours from friends. Now, I didn’t want to get excited over anything while I was in Amsterdam and I shut out any news on the results from others because I really wanna enjoy myself without thinking about exam results. The confirmation of classification will be finalised on 1^st of July. Till then, I ain’t gonna speak anything about it!

3 Doors Down LIVE @ Manchester Academy

2011-06-17T12:55:00.002+08:00

It was Carly who gave me the heads up for this concert a few months before. Since I couldn’t find any worthwhile concerts to attend during summer, I quickly snapped it up online after hearing about it. There were plans to be there early to get the front row, so I booked a 9.30am train ticket to Manchester Piccadily. I met up with Carly at the station and we went to have food at the Arndale shopping mall food court. Since we had lots of time to kill, we ended up chatting for a couple of hours.

We started to make our way to Manchester Academy around 3hrs before the start of the concert. Along the way, we bought our packed dinner from McD to eat. When we arrived at Manchester Academy, there were a few people waiting in line already. Wow, I didn’t know 3 Doors Down were such a big hit in England..lol. Our waiting period was made complicated when it started to rain. It wasn’t a heavy downfall but it was potent enough to make one wet. We squeezed ourselves to the side pavement with a thin shelter. It rained for quite a while before the grey clouds passed away. By then, two queues had already formed, one on the left entrance and we were standing on the right entrance. It looks like one of the lines is gonna get short-changed in entering early. It turned out in the end that my line was allowed to proceed in first! Ah, I felt sorry for the other line because they would have to join my line’s queue which by now would have extended beyond the student union.

When we entered, there was already a first row there which I assume is the people with VIP pass. But we didn’t get it too bad at second row. For the opening band, we had a British hard punk rock band from Brighton called the Crave. Although the doors were opened, 3 Doors Down did not start playing until around 9.15am. Their status as an internationally recognised band is apparent. After the Crave had departed, the stage was cleared of all wires. 3DD’s stage set was clean because all of them were using wireless instruments.

Well, 3DD is one rock band which I would regard as a nostalgic reminder of the high school days of my generation. During the early 2000s, 3DD was prominent with Here Without You and Kryptonite. I wouldn’t say I’m familiar with all of their other songs like how I am with Paramore or Muse but 3DD makes good listening. Another one that’s worth listening to is Away From the Sun. The 3DD band members ain’t young anymore. They look like they’re going into their 40s already and somehow the lead singer Bradley Arnold gave an “apek-ish” aura when he came out in his white singlet. Somehow, the song list for the concert got passed around the audience and as expected, Kryptonite was left to the last during the encore period. I have fond memories of course, of Kryptonite because when I was in Sec 1 at SJI, I saw it being performed live by my Sec 4 seniors. While “Holiday” was the threshold of me getting into the rock scene, “Kryptonite” was actually my personal prototype of that inspiration.

I was getting a bit worried at first on the late starting time because I may end up missing my train at 11.30pm. Thankfully, it ended just on the dot at 11pm, giving me ample time to walk from the academy to Manchester Oxford station, which is of a considerable distance. Ahh, it was a good concert and yesh, yet another one to the list. The only thing that I lament about is that thanks to some bungling up in phone numbers, my new Panasonic FZ45 camera did not arrive on time for the concert. And silly me did not borrow Henna’s camera as a back-up plan, thanks to some bad overconfidence that the new camera will arrive in time. As a result, I had to record concert footage with the lousy video recorder from my Nikon camera. Ahhhh, I’m not pleased. This is not what I envision for my last rock concert outing in Europe. I’ll have to hunt harder on the net for one last big bang rock concert where I can utilise my new HD camera gear at least once.

Shakespeare's Globe Theatre

2011-06-10T14:04:00.000+08:00

It all started out in Leo’s photo album where I spotted a comment from one of my former journalism junior, Clara. It turns out that both of them are mutual friends with each other at NUS. From there, I got to know from Clara that my former JC English Lit lecturer, Miss Kwok is making a trip down to London in June. Arrangements were made on when to meet and it was decided also that we would catch a show at the Shakespeare Globe Theatre. I took a bus down as it is a cheaper option and would plan to return back by bus too. This meant only a mere 13 pounds for a 1 day London return trip. Once I’ve reached Victoria station, I met up with Clara and we went to find Miss Kwok. Along the way, I received news that we’ll meeting a fieldtrip group from my JC and that another one of my former lecturers would be there too. Woah, during my time, the only fieldtrip that we heard of was to Vietnam and now the kids get to fly to England.

As a uni student now, I suddenly felt quite old looking at the JC kids in the group. 3 years ago, I was at their stage. We hang around the group for a while before moving off to our own directions. We proceeded on to have lunch at one of the Spanish BBQ stalls near the Thames River. We had 2 bowls of paella shared among ourselves. After lunch, we took a slow walk to the Globe Theatre. I’ve heard of the Globe Theatre (from playing Civilization games) but never seen it personally myself. Apparently this famous Globe Theatre in London is merely a reconstruction of the model that Shakespeare had during his time. Clara booked for us standing tickets for “All’s well that ends well” and it costs just a measly 5 pounds! That’s really a value deal for a unique experience of a lifetime. Wow..apparently the more expensive tickets are the seated ones but the irony is that the standing area is the actually the better experience. This is because the standing audience get to be as close to the actors as possible and we get to have an experience how an open-sky theatre feels like.

The Globe Theatre management were strict on camera policies – no video taking or cameras during performance time. During the performance, I could see that Shakespeare plays were the medieval cinemas of his time. It was like watching a film, except that very old English was used and live music were played. There was a slight drizzle at the interval but thank God there’s no heavy rainfall. Anyways, it was a very good show and kudos to the actors for bringing out the comedic effects of the character.

After the show we had some ice-cream before sending Clara off to the tube station since her bus is coming earlier. I accompanied Miss Kwok along the Thames River for a short walk before heading off to Victoria Bus Station myself. It was great catching up with some of the old people from my previous stage of life and I certainly never expect us to meet up in a foreign land – of all places..lol. The irony is that we probably wouldn’t be able to find the occasion to meet up at Singapore itself. Nevertheless, Miss Kwok pointed out that it’s always nice to share moments of exploring a new place with her students. In any case, Miss Kwok herself has always been one of the lecturers that I personally respect because of her passion and dedication in teaching English Literature. Even after years later, I still find her passion for teaching English Lit is burning as strong as ever and I’m indeed thankful to be able to learn under her during my time in JC.

The Brontës and Haworth

2011-06-08T15:48:00.002+08:00

Ever since I had found out that the Brontë sisters had originated from West Yorkshire last year, I’ve been interested to make a trip to check out the house in which they had grown up. The village which the sisters grew up in is called Haworth and it’s situated very near to Bradford. It is reachable from Leeds with a bus ride away. As a former English Literature student, this is definitely something not to be missed with me living so nearby. On the week before, I sent out invitation to as many as possible to see who’s interested and in the end, only two responded in coming – Leo and Xinzhe. The bus trip took longer than expected and we had to change at Keighley bus station for another bus which heads into the village. Haworth used to have a functional rail station but right now, it’s just for aesthetic fun for tourists who wanna experience steam trains.

One of the locals had overheard us in the bus that we were heading to Brontë Parsonage and offered to lead us there since she’s working in that area. The parsonage is a simple house, nothing grand about it but it is worth noting the words of Charlotte Brontë describing her dwelling place. Inside the parsonage, we get to see the layout of the house – the kitchens and the important rooms. Some of the personal belongings of the family were placed on display. It is quite interesting that among the belongings of the father, Patrick Brontë, were locks of Charlotte’s hair sealed in a locket. Now we know that hair do not decompose and it’s always one of the last things that remain after a person is long gone. So, if we were to take Charlotte’s hair and subject it to some DNA testing, I bet we can find out a thing or two on her family lineage and the reason for the sisters’ early demise to diseases. Another peculiar exhibit was Emily Brontë’s room where pencil scribbles on the house wall were preserved. There were also works of the sisters on display and I’m amazed how they had actually squeezed all their writing in mini-books which were only readable by a magnifying glass. The parsonage does not allow cameras in the house, so it’s unfortunate that I could not take pictures of the interior to share.

After going through the whole house and reading accounts on how life for the sisters were like, I can’t help but feel that the parsonage has an air of tragedy about it. It is interesting to note that Patrick the father survived the longest, outliving his wife and children to a ripe old age. I guess it must have been painful for him to live through the remaining of the years, especially after the death of Charlotte and to see his loved ones wither away while he remained alive. Nevertheless, within that short period of time, the 3 sisters had produced literary works which remained very much respected within the domain of English Literature scholars today. My first encounter with the works was on Wuthering Heights which was briefly touched upon by my primary school English textbook and I had heard of Jane Eyre before. I had never really gotten down to read the books though and maybe after this trip, I should check them out.

After the parsonage visit, we went to check out the surroundings. There was the Haworth church where Patrick used to preach and inside the church is also the Brontë family vault where the remains of the family were laid to rest there with the exception of Anne who was buried in Scarborough. Then there’s the surrounding moorlands where sheep were grazing peacefully. We checked out the small town center of Haworth and proceeded to have lunch at one of the shops over there. After lunch, Leo suggested that we go explore the Brontë trail which stretches deep into the countryside where we will come across a waterfall and streams. That was something which I did not thought of and I was kinda lazy to walk long distance but since we were already here, might as well go taste some Yorkshire countryside. We went to ask for directions in the parsonage shop and we were told that it would take at least 3hrs to go back and forth and one way would be about 5.6km. Wow! It was almost 4pm when we set off but since this is summer time, we need not worry about getting lost in the dark since the sun sets only from 8/9pm+. We had to walk almost 30 mins along the main road before even hitting the start of the trail..haha. As we walked through the dirt path that cuts along the moorlands, we went through plenty of sheep (hence the reason why the United faithful always sing about Elland Road being full of sheep). The terrain gradually became less flat and smooth as we went on and there is a need to climb through rocks and jump across muddy patches. Bronte falls came into view and we had a small wash over by the stream. The water is terribly icy and yes, one could imagine the sisters coming over here for their daily evening walks. But this is only halfway! There is another half more to complete and the end destination in mind was the old willow tree and house on top of a hill which was Emily Brontë’s source of inspiration for Wuthering heights. From the falls, I could spot the willow tree in the horizon. It is quite ubiquitous in its surrounding and there’s a house beside the tree too. There seems to be a strange aura surrounding the tree.

After the rest, we proceeded on by climbing up a steep rocky slope. My mind kinda wondered what would that mysterious house turn out to be. An empty haunted wooden house? A shop? Toilet? Or a place with vending machine? I was joking to the other two that I hope someone would be making us Yorkshire tea at the other end. Part of me hoped that my joke was true because by then, I was extremely thirsty and I didn’t bring any water bottle with me. The house became larger as we moved nearer. It was interesting to note that there were signboards in Chinese. I see that the house has somewhat become an international pilgrimage site for literature lover..lol.

It took quite some time but we made it to the top in the end. And the ‘house’ turns out to be made of stone rather than wood and it lies in ruins without a roof (although from the distance, it looked like it had a roof). There’s still a structure outline of the house and what remains of the living hall is a square filled with plants and weed. There’s a plague which was laid on one of the house walls which mentioned about it being an inspiration to Emily Brontë. What a mysterious house indeed! Who would live all the way out here in isolation and how would life be over here in the 19^th Century? The oak tree beside the house looked like a wrinkled gargantuan trunk, and I presume it’s also at least a century old, sitting there through the sands of time in blissful isolation as the world outside of the Yorkshire moorlands crashes to its knees. Anyways, the scenery up there at the house is amazing. I could see vast masses of land in the horizon with nothing but sheep and grass and some modern windmills. Once we were satisfied in exploring the place, we started to descend back to the way we came from. The oak tree started to look smaller and smaller until it became a merely a speck in the horizon. I just can’t help feeling an aura of tragedy swirling around that tree as I watched it from afar. The journey back felt shorter and at the bus-stop, I was thirsty but only had Leo’s potato chips to munch on.

Overall, it was a memorable and reflective journey. The Brontë sisters may have tragic lives but they left behind a legacy in the English Literature world. The track across the countryside was not on my original list of agenda but I was glad to have tried it. Nobody should leave Yorkshire without experiencing its countryside..lol. Looks like I can give another tick now at the list of things-to-do for English Literature!

Liverpool Tour

2011-06-03T13:10:00.000+08:00

There was one of my high school classmates whom I’ve not seen for almost 6 years already. After O Levels, the class didn’t really know where he went too. As usual, with the wonders of FB, I managed to find him and discovered that he’s studying law in Liverpool too. I thought of paying him a visit over there before he goes off for holidays. I’ve intended to visit Liverpool at some point during summer, and it would be good to have someone familiar with the place to bring me around.

The journey from Leeds took around 2 hrs plus and I reached Liverpool station at around 8am+. We had breakfast at McD and catch up on some lost times. Apparently he was in the UK doing A Levels instead of JC, and that explains why none from the class was able to contact him. After breakfast, one of the first stops that we went to was Albert Dock. I’ve heard of Liverpool’s reputation of being filled with council houses. The city centre itself can be seen to be renovated although there are pockets of rusted gates and mossy statutes which still show that the process is not complete yet. Nevertheless, the city centre looks more interesting than the one in Leeds. Partially because in Liverpool, only two things stood out – Liverpool FC and the Beatles.

Anyways, Albert Dock was nice and it’s great to experience a UK city with a waterfront. The Beatles museum was located there, so I took the opportunity to explore it. There are lots of Beatles memorabilia there, and basically you can get to know alot about the band’s history over there. After that was done, we went to have a look at the University of Liverpool and it’s interesting that they actually have something like a mini science museum inside the main building. I guess this must have been a common feature of UK universities, since Uni of Leeds has a Marks and Spencer museum inside its main building. I had a look at the law school too and thought to myself that if the UCAS and scholarship matters had dictated otherwise, things would have been very different indeed. But overall and looking back, I’m still glad that I chose Leeds :)

At night time, I had dinner at one of the Italian restaurants followed by a casual walk to see some of the bars. I tasted one of the best ciders so far in Europe and it’s Rekorderlig Apple Cider from Sweden. On the next day, it was Anfield stadium exploration as I’m curious to see how our arch-enemy’s Kop looks like. We took a cab down since it’s located quite far off the city center. From the distance, the stadium looks intimidating, in the sense that it’s large structure overpowers all the smaller shops and cottages around it. But as one approach closer, Anfield is not exactly that big. There’s no hint of any grand compound at the front entrance. So, we bought the tour tickets at 8 with the student price. Not too expensive compared to United..haha! Anyways, the Liverpool museum is only one storey high. I tried to find the Premier League trophy but couldn’t find it anywhere. At the center was only the last old Division 1 trophy which the Kop had treasured for 20 over years.

We had a guided stadium tour and both of the tour guides have strong Scouser accents. At the entrance to the players section of the stadium, there was a giant gate with barbed wires. For a moment, I thought I was in a prison camp. We navigated through the players lounge, the dressing rooms and the press conference box. All of them are noticeably smaller than those at Old Trafford. I had the opportunity to walk down the very very narrow tunnel with the “This is Anfield” sign. I’m pretty sure many Liverpool fans in Southeast Asia would want to exchange places with me right now. The field and the seating area are much more impressive and I did go over to the Kop end. You can literally feel the aura over there even without the crowd being present. Like Old Trafford, the scoreboard is still traditional, unlike the megascreen one at the Emirates. After feeling satisfied from visiting the stadium and buying gifts for my friends who are Liverpool fans from the megastore, I went walked to the back of the stadium where the famous Paisley gate is located. It does seem a bit odd that the famous Paisley gate is not considered as the main entrance.

As were walking to exit to the main road, I suddenly realised that I’m in a council house area. It’s as though I am transported to another planet and I’m pretty sure that Liverpool fans from other parts of the world would get a culture shock looking at the surroundings of Anfield. Cracked roads, dodgy houses that are boarded and ill-maitained buildings were the characteristics of the street beside Anfield. Now I know why the Stretford End sings very often about the council houses..lol.

Since Goodison Park is just a 10-minute walk away, I decided to pay it a visit too. On the way there, I passed by Stanley Park, supposedly the area where the New Anfield stadium is supposed to be built. I’m of course amused at a park with my name on it. Anyways, Goodison Park is located in a much cleaner area but nobody seems to be interested to hang around the stadium unlike Anfield where at any point of time, you’ll find visitors lingering around. We took a cab back to the city centre afterthat where we had a tapas lunch at a Spanish restaurant.

I’m pretty pleased with this Liverpool trip – I got to meet and old friend and at the same time, explore one of the most well-known cities in the UK :)

Man Utd Champ19ns Parade

2011-05-30T21:34:00.000+08:00

More football moments to follow up as I head down to Manchester for the 19^th titlebus parade. Manchester City had held theirs earlier last weekend for their FA Cup win, so there is no way United is gonna let this opportunity pass after permission to parade the Double in 2008 was denied. In the morning, I missed my intended booked train as I had overslept past my alarm. Arghh! £5 ticket wasted and another £10 on-the-day ticket needed to be bought. When I reached Manchester, it was already drizzling. Looks like today’s parade is gonna be very wet. It was quite early when I arrived so I took the opportunity to scout ahead for the parade route and decide where would be the best place to stand. I took shelter under the bridge for an hour from the rain and then proceeded to stand near the main road when the time for the start of the parade drew nearer.

The rain certainly did not draw a big crowd to wait at the side of the road. It’s quite a hassle to hold the camera and the umbrella at the same time. It was only around 11am that the bus started to move from its starting point in a small crawl. As it draws nearer to where I’m standing, the crowd surrounding it began to grow larger. I managed to get clear glimpses of the Da Silva twins, Park, Nani, Berbatov, Ferdinand and Hernandez as the bus moved right in front of me. The good camera that I have enabled me to get a few good close-up shots. Instead of just standing there as the bus begin to pull away, I followed the crowd to march alongside the bus. It’s pretty much like looking at the incoming crowd and getting swept away by the incoming torrent. Because the bus is moving so slowly, I had the opportunity to circle it a few times to get various angle shots of the bus. On the other side which I did not capture initially was van der Sar, Vidic, Owen and Scholes. I saw Bebe perched in the centre beside the trophy and I’m sure many watching the parade will ask,”Why are you there, Bebe?!” Lol. One of the noisiest among the bus crew is Evra who’s like cheerleading captain who rouses the crowd below to do a couple of chants.

There were a couple of times when I was in danger of lagging behind because of the crowd blockage in front but I make several detours from time to time to keep up. The bus then went to the highway connecting the city centre with Trafford. The drizzle intensified a little but the crowd marched on. There was once when one of the MUTV video camera seemed to be pointing my direction..lol. Looks like I’m going to be on video after all! It finally came to a point where I can’t tail the bus anymore because a large crowd was already waiting in front of Old Trafford. The chasing pack with the bus was redirected to another road where we saw the team disappear into the waiting crowd in front of the stadium. Ahhh, that ends my walk in the parade. I can’t believe that I’ve walked an hour from the city centre to the stadium! Because of all the excitement, I didn’t know how far I’ve walked too.

In any case, I can’t walk back the same way so I took the standard tram back after buying some stuff at the official merchandise shop. I kinda placed my train a little too late ahead just to ensure that I don’t get caught out. Since I’m there 2 hrs early, I just sat down at the seats and dozed off. When I woke up, I left my seat and forgot that I bought a poster from the Man Utd shop. Darnnnnn, when I realised that, I went back to find it but apparently someone took it away. Gahhh, that’s 3 pounds down the drain! Despite my several minor mishaps today from missing the train to losing my poster, it’s still a memorable rainy day. Yet another milestone achieved in England itself, and it’s a feat which may never be repeated by other Malaysians – to march alongside the Red Mancunians under the rain for 19^th title parade.

Just a little reflection here, considering that I didn’t blog about the historic milestone given that the trophy ceremony fell very close to my exams. In knocking off Liverpool from their perch, United can be officially considered now as the most successful domestic English side. But cynics have noted throughout the campaign that this 19^th-title winning squad is one of the weakest that Fergie has fielded. There was discontentment to deal with from Rooney, and the general perception was that the team lacked the star power. Looking back, it’s quite amusing really to see that the other rivals ended up performing worse than this so-called lousy team..haha. In the end, this team also made it to the Champions League final, something which a certain Spaniard striker failed to do for his new Blue team. It’s not a star-studded team, but it’s certainly one which worked hard. Ultimately in the end, Fergie knew he had to inject in new talent. Teamwork is already there. Now there’s a need to reinstall individuals that can make things happen. The current team has the traditional values of an English team, hardworking and determined but it fell short of the star power requirements in elimination cup games as shown by the two defeats in the FA Cup semis and CL Final. With Paul and Edwin retired, it’ll be interesting to see who’s coming in next to Old Trafford.

Adventure in Wembley

2011-05-29T07:45:00.006+08:00

I didn't get a ticket to enter the stadium to watch the Champions League final, but that shouldn't stop me from making a trip down to London to soak up the atmosphere in the first place. There is never a better coincidence than me being in England and the Champions League final being held in London at the same time. I don't think I'll ever live to see another coincidence like that. Since I was occupied with exams earlier, I didn’t book any early train tickets to London. Apparently the rail authorities knew that there is gonna be a Champions League final and even though I attempted to book it one week earlier, the prices are still exorbitant at around £25. With that amount, I could easily fly to Europe! Where were the £6.50 tickets that Leo had booked earlier? Arghhh..the best I could do to save cost was to get the earliest bus at £17 and then a return train ticket at 10pm at £13. If I had booked the coach earlier, it would have just been £6.50. The whole planning of transportation this time made me realise that Brits always plan their journeys in advanced – by weeks so as to save cost.

Anyways, the bus was scheduled to leave at 5.40am and I didn’t really sleep much for fear that I may get stuck in a deep slumber. I decided to make a move earlier also because I needed to get the train tickets from the Leeds rail station. Once I’ve gotten there, I went as usual to the machine to get the tickets but to my horror, the machine started demanding a reference number which I’ve never encountered before. It seems that such occurences exist if I had booked more than 1 destination. Argghh..it was a moment of panic because in 15 minutes time, the bus is leaving. The ticket office can’t do anything without the reference number and my only saving grace was the phone internet that I have which I can use to log onto Gmail to retrieve the reference. But logging on also need time, and I don’t have that. I started to smack myself at that time because I could have picked the collection point at King’s Cross Station. It was pointed out that we are not allowed to pick another collection point other than the one selected online. This would ultimately mean that my return tickets are nullified and I may have to purchase new ones. Greatttt…more money is gonna get wasted, and not only mine but also JP’s. In the end, I resolved to run off catch the bus instead and chose to bank on a slim hope that I may still be able to retrieve the tickets from KC station. I calculated that it makes no sense if one is not able to collect from the station one is leaving eventhough a different collection point is selected.

I slept for the whole bus journey and the 4hrs just went away. When I woke up, I found myself in London. I quickly made my way to the Victoria Tube station as the first priority now is to get to KC station to resolve the ticket issue. We need a way back home! Inside the Victoria tube station, there were Barca fans everywhere. It was as if the whole place just turned into a Catalan Metro. Once I’ve reached KC station, I went to the machine and punched in the reference number ( I managed to went online in the bus). And to my relief, the machine printed out the tickets! WHEW! Thank God! It was fortunate that we kept calm and did not rush to buy another bus ticket to return. With that issue firmly solved, we could now properly direct our attention to enjoy the Champions League final atmosphere in the English capital.

First up, we decided to go to Hyde Park to visit the free Champions League Festival exhibition there. Today is the last day it is gonna be up and we thought that we should definitely get going there before it closes at 5pm. This is only the 3^rd time they are holding such an exhibition and it features lots of stuff relating to the elite European football competition. The Champions League trophy will also be on display and also other museum pieces from the former players. When we reached the site, we could see that the whole area is flooded with either United or Barca fans. One of the first areas we went to explore was the ‘Champions Theatre’ where it’s something like a movie theatre which showcases prominent matches and players. Afterthat, we checked out the rest of the exhibits such as the players museum. I wanted to take a photo with the Champions League trophy but the queue is just too long. Another interesting that was going on in Hyde Park was a futsal match which was held in a “mini stadium” in the middle of the festival. It involves past stars where England XI is pitched against The rest of the World XI. Andy Cole, Sheringham, Dwight Yorke, Dennis Wise, Cafu, the de Boer twins, Darren Anderton and Jay Jay Okocha were some of the famous names that were there. The line queue to the souvenir shop was super long too but I managed to squeeze in to grab myself an official matchday scarf to commemorate the day. Once we are done exploring the festival, it was time to make our way to the venue itself – Wembley Stadium.

It wasn’t easy getting onto the trains because scores of Barca fans are being loaded inside. There were some United fans but a majority of them are Barca. I figured out that the higher amount of Barca fans in the train is due to the fact that the Spaniards are travelling from abroad while the English United fans basically just have to drive down the highway using their cars. Upon reaching the Wembley Park station, I could feel the chaotic rush surrounding the station. In the horizon as seen from the station was Wembley Stadium and the entire path leading there was just filled with tons of people. It could easily have reached more than 100k people at that place alone considering that Wembley’s capacity is at 90k. It seems that we are not the only ones without tickets who are going to linger outside the stadium just to get a feel of the atmosphere. The weather was pretty bad as it was drizzling all the way but it’s not that heavy to the extent that an umbrella was needed. I attempted to get the matchday programme on the way to the stadium but it seems that they were all sold out. I had to go right to the outside of the stadium before I spotted a booth with new batches of matchday programmes coming in. UEFA is definitely making money out of this – each programme costs £10! Ahhh, it’s an important historical document for me to archive, so I didn’t mind getting one for myself.

After feeling satisfied absorbing the atmosphere and taking some good photos in the process, we made our way back to KC station. We planned to watch it at a nearby pub near the station so that once the match ended, we can easily get onto the train since we don’t have much time between the final whistle and train departure. We didn’t really scout the place and we weren’t even sure if we could find one. Fortunately, we managed to grab a spot (one of the last areas) at a restaurant near Euston Road Premier Inn. I bought myself a pint of Pepsi and some wedges and I’m ready for the match.

To be honest, I’ve always felt United to be the underdog in this match given the composition of their squad. As such, I wasn’t surprise when Barca first took the lead through Pedro. Just like in 2009, United had started the first 10 minutes well, but somehow Barca still managed to dominate in the end. Rooney’s equaliser brought fresh hopes that United may just turn it around. But it wasn’t to be. Messi dazzled the crowd once again when he fired one from outside the box to give Barca the lead. One could said that van der Sar should have dealt with it better but I say that it’s one piece of magic from the Argentinian maestro that nobody could stop. David Villa put a definite end to any hope on United’s part to equalise when he slotted in the 3^rd. Once again, United did not have enough steam to deal with the Catalan juggernaut.

The Wembley adventure did not just end there. A rude surprise awaits us at the train station when we found out that the train to Leeds is cancelled and the next train would be the next morning. A group of folks were furious as they gather around the train office. The train company offered no definite solutions, and their suggestions required us to fork out some money and they reimburse us afterthat. I know very well that red tape will mean that reimbursement will take forever. The group of us continued to pressure the office until they relented to provide us with free taxi rides home from a designated train station. All the commotion saw us reaching Leeds Rail Station only at 2am in the morning, 2hrs after the original scheduled arrival time. Ahhhh, messy..but no complaints there though given that we were reimbursed with a free ride to the station. Overall a tiring day but still a rewarding one indeed to have been there to step onto the venue of a Champions League final.

Finishing it with a bang

2011-05-26T03:39:00.002+08:00

It took quite an effort to muster back some morale to continue on with the remaining two papers but it had to be done. I have not touched criminology for the entire revision yet and friday after EU Law was the first time I am glancing at it. To some extent, I am not so worried about it because it has no cases for me to memorise and it's just theoretical contextual knowledge. The only issue is to ensure that I do not overprepare for it since I also need the extra time to shore up my evidence revision. Looking at the past year paper, I did some question spotting by checking the pattern. I figured out that feminist questions would definitely be out since it has appeared in every single year. Left and right realism appeared to be that too but I have to pick only one to concentrate on. At first, I was thinking of right realism but after figuring out how complicated the essay would be, I switched to left realism. In any case, I was quite assured that both will come out as it was for the past years. On the day of the exam, feminism came up as expected but I did not expect right realism to be omitted. This meant that I had actually switched focus at the most appropriate time. At the same time, it could have so easily been the other if not for divine help. I thanked God quietly at the end of the exam for guiding me in the right direction. It was a minor morale boost after the criminology exams but it's not all over yet.

The biggest challenge ahead has always been the evidence exam and I've been shoring up since Sunday for it. The lecturer for this subject had been really miserly in giving any sort of hints. Once again, it's time to spot the pattern in the past year exams. It's a dilemma actually, which is to cover everything on a wide scope and end up forgetting a big part of them or to cover specific spotted areas and remember everything but with the risk of losing big if the gamble fails. I opted to go for the bigger risk and gamble and based on my calculations, it would be burden of proof essay (because it came out for the last two years) and bad character essay (came out every year). I took confessions, hearsay and silence and insurance. Initially, I had wanted to do problem questions but after thinking awhile, I figure out that essay questions would demand less memorisation of cases. Evidence problems have a knack of attracting more than 2 topics together and that could prove to be fatal. Although this meant that I had to start from ground zero in refocusing efforts to these two questions which was not touched in the initial stages, I went ahead with it. And it did paid off in the end. The night before the evidence exam, I was at the height of nervosity. This is the last hurdle for undergraduate studies and the tension was intense. I downed 3 cups of coffee to keep myself awake. At first, I was thinking of staying up all the way until the exams are over and then take a deep slumber afterthat. But after a while, I figured out that that may be risky since I may end up falling asleep during the exam. I took a 2hr sleep and even then, the cases are still running through my head. In the morning, I continued to rinse and repeat my self-made notes. It came to a point where I can no longer put anything more into my brains because of the tension. I was feeling a little worried because I felt that the amount of cases that I have in store were not adequate. However, since I'm banking on essays, I felt that I might just pull it off. At 1 pm, it was the hour of reckoning. I flipped open the exam questions the moment it started and I did a quick scan on what's on the paper. I paid special attention to the essay questions. Pap! Burden of proof in! Pap! Bad character is in! Two spot on already - and for the third, I hope that it should be an essay either on hearsay or silence. However, it turns out that the third essay question is on cross-examination of rape victims. That was a major surprise for me because that topic has never come out as an essay question before. So, this means that I can only rely on one of the two problem questions left. To stop myself from being distracted, I dashed straight away to pour out what I know on the two essays first and hope that when it's time for the third question, at least one problem question would be doable. The two questions were good as I rampaged at least 4 pages of content. When it was time for the third question, I read through the two problems and the first one was just too confusing with all the hearsay rules. This left only one last problem and it turns out that the 2nd problem is on the easy peasy confession and silence. Everything there was just direct and I could recall back all the important cases that are needed. At the end of the whole evidence exam, I had a very very good feeling about the paper.That's the irony of it - the hardest paper turns out to be the best work that I've turned in. The exam period may have started off rocky with juris and EU but I would say that 2.1 may have a good chance of being salvaged given the better performance in the final two. I gotta really thank God for pulling me up for the remaining journey.

With the end of the evidence exam, I realised that it's the end of my 3 years in law school too. That flew past by me in a breeze without me realising. I updated about it in FB and lots of people are surprised about it too. It's a journey that started from mid-2008 and the undergraduate journey now ends in mid-2011. I hope it's all worth it in the end.

Heading towards disaster

2011-05-21T14:20:00.002+08:00

Angry. Frustrated. Fling. Flang. Flung my last question in my EU Law exam. Didn't finish writing. Don't know what I'm writing. Gah. Could I have prevented it? Yes. Did I do anything about it. No. And I might just pay the consequence for that. I just do not know why I ended studying for an extra problem question which need not be used in the end. In short, my 6-8 hours invested in EU Competition Policy just went down the drain because I only need to rely on both Free movement of Goods and free movement of workers for the problem section. The other two essay section questions were on directives and human rights. Human rights I had skipped in mind but I could actually have done alot more to study for directives. The whole lecture room was warned before hand about directives and human rights coming out exclusively as an essay question but I have absolutely NO IDEA why I just ignored and bypassed it during revision period. WHY SO STUPID? ARGH! Directives could have been strengthened as a solid insurance..but instead I chose to put Competition Policy as the strong one instead and directives ended up as the weak one. And to think that I actually spent the extra hours grinding the morning before on Competition Policy when I should have devoted the time to directives. Too late. Fatal tactical error and a stupid one to make especially in an open-book exam. Everyone else probably knows about it except me. I hate it when there are some things that I could have prevented with ample time but I end up going to the wrong direction. What was I thinking?! The best that I could do to salvage the last question attempt was to copy out textbook explanations on the relevant portions. But even then, the essay demanded a long critique of 2 cases, I managed to pathetically finished one while the other is just a few sentence long. No conclusion.

For the first time of the year, I felt my 2.1 classification under severe threat. My jurisprudence paper on Wednesday wasn't the best of attempts too. The question on religion turns out to be easier than the one in fiction. I can only hope that she won't mark it too strict and it doesn't help that my coursework had just scrapped into 2.1 with just 2 points to spare. And now, EU is just a whole lot of mess with 100% counted not because I didn't study but because I made some wrong stupid tactical decisions. It's not looking optimistic with criminology and evidence left. I'll probably be able to squeeze thrugh for criminology but evidence by far is the most daunting task ahead. 2 down, 4 days left. 2 more to go. And it doesn't look good. I'm extremely demoralised and shattered after the EU Law paper but I recognise that I have to remain strong to at least redeem myself in the remaining two. 2.1 is still not out of reach yet but it's slowly slipping away if I screw up the next two. God give me strength!

3rd place winning entry!

2011-05-07T13:28:00.003+08:00

Earlier this year, I submitted an entry for the Leeds Uni Global Perspective Short Story Competition where I'm supposed to write a 3000 word short story based on the culture that I've grown up in. The first prize is £50, so I thought that I might as well give it a try for some extra cash in hand. It's not easy to squeeze in between time to finish up my dissertation and attempt to tap into my creative brain for fiction writing at the same time. But somehow, I managed to obtain sufficient inspiration to put out a masterpiece after viewing one of my friend's grandparents wedding anniversary video and drawing upon my own experiences with my grandfather. I would say it's my most mature piece up to date, a culmination of styles that I've experimented on during these few years and since the commended entries that I've written for the Commonwealth Essay Competition in 2005 and 2007. I liked this latest piece of work personally, and was rather pleased with my progress in fusing a variety of writing styles into a short piece. Another inspiration that I've gotten from is Tash Aw, although I have not read any of his works yet. It kinda spark an interest in me that perhaps I can consider venturing into the untapped market of Southeast Asian literature. Afterall, there's not many English fiction writers in the Southeast Asian domain.

I had a good feeling when I submitted it but it was quite some time before I heard some news about it. In between those times, I thought that I didn't win anything afterall. However, somewhere in early April, I've received an e-mail saying that I'm a finalist for the competition and there's an invitation to a prize-giving ceremony held at Blackwell bookstore. I'm delighted when I read that but at the same time I'm wary in not having overexpectations for it. The last time I'm told that I'm finalist (for a legal writing competition in Malaysia), I received a rather inconsequential prize in the end which is not proportionate to the amount of time and effort that I put in to go to the venue. So, I arrived at the Blackwell bookshop venue just on time before the announcements start and as each of the names of the finalists are read out, there will be a short description of what the essay is about and the judges' comment. Anyways, after all of them were read out, my name wasn't called out in any of them. For a moment, I thought - Ahhh, not again! And then the announcer proceeded on with reading the ACTUAL winners and starting from 3rd prize...that's me!

Woohooo! I was jumping up and down in my mind already as I walked out to receive my cert and prize which consist of a £25 book voucher and one annual 2011 UK Writer's Handbook. I would say that I can't hide my wide grin as the announcer described the content of my work and the judges' feedback on it. According to the judges, my story although distinct in terms of cultural reference has a universal theme that permeates through it on generation gaps. I had a chat with one of the judges after the prize giving ceremony and he happens to be the chairperson of the Writer's Circle in Leeds. Well, he commented that he enjoyed reading my work and he found it to be a standard of high quality. Hahaha..of course by then my grin has grown as wide as the Cheshire cat's already. To be recognised by a fellow writer is one thing -but to be praised by somebody abroad and especially by a meticulous Brit is a double bonus..lol. In any case, it looks like the years of studying law has not eroded my creativity all these years but has enhanced it. One thing that I observed at the prize-giving ceremony is that I'm the only Chinese and Southeast Asian in the venue. It does look like I'm the only one among them who had the penchant to engage in this type of things in the uni and parachuting in some strange events in the end! I took the opportunity to gulp down some free wine offered at the reception before heading off to library, containing the little victorious cheer that I have within myself. I had planned to study at least 1hr in the library before going for cell group but it seems that I have trouble concentrating in the end because of the excitement that is swirling within me..haha!

I'm really thankful to God for this gift that he has entrusted on me. This episode has confirmed yet again of the writing potential within me and I'm very encouraged by it. Thank you thank you dear Lord! The timing couldn't be much better and it's an excellent morale boost that I need for the exam revisions.

Memorable European Night

2011-05-05T21:01:00.001+08:00

Wembley! Wembley! We're the famous Man United and we're going to Wembley!

No personal experience at Old Trafford is complete without the attendance of a Champions League match in an European night encounter. I had stalled buying any tickets for Champions League, waiting and risking elimination with hopes that Man United will encounter a famous European opposition. Marseille was not glamourous enough while quarter-finals with Chelsea felt a little like a Premier League encounter. I was hoping that Inter Milan would go through but Schalke was the one that managed to squeeze through in the end. Although Schalke is definitely not the glamorous European opponent I had in mind, it was a good enough of a match to go for since it's already the semi-finals. I definitely won't be able to get tickets for the final since the seats are reserved only season ticket holders. So, it's now or never. Anyways, I didn't manage to get the tickets through the regular ballot so I secured mine through the ticket exchange instead.

I had planned to go there early to collect the tickets because it seems that they don't post Champions League tickets to one's address. Before I board the train, I had to print out the e-mail with the payment details so I went to uni library to do it. And once again, Murphy's law came into play. Of all days and times that the printer network could break down, it broke down when I'm trying to print out my ticket. Since it's the network, every single printer in the uni is affected. I had to miss my initially planned 3.40pm train but that's alright because mine is an off-peak ticket. The only thing is that I won't be able to get a guaranteed seat. I started phoning up some of my Malaysian friends to see if they are at home but most of them are outside in the library. Anyways, I held out and eventually the printers recovered and I managed to print the vital ticket confirmation e-mail slip by 4.30pm. I reached Manchester Piccadily station at around 6pm+ plus and took the tram to Old Trafford as usual. This time, instead of English fellas waiting for the train, there are hordes of Germans muttering Deutsch. Wow, it's impressive to see that there are some dedicated Deutsche fans who flew over for this occassion. Even in the tram, the battle had already started. A bunch of Man Utd Brits started inciting a group of middle-aged Schalke fans into a chanting war. Of course, ze Germans understand both English and Deutsch so they can start talking in Deutsch so that the Brits don't understand them. On the other hand, the Brits could just shoot back in English. The Brits were singing the Viva John Terry tune and Build a Bonfire while the Schalke fans sang their German version of it. The exchange was going on well until one Brit threw an awkward line in,"We beat you in 1945!". And then both groups became silent out of a sudden..lol.

Once I've reached Old Trafford, I immediately made my way to the ticketing office. Even with 10 counters operating at max capacity, the queue snakes out at 5 to 6 lines. Fortunately, the line clears up fast. While queueing up, there was one Schalke fan who was not given the ticket because the office expressed doubt of the verification documents that he had produced. He starts getting angry and kept insisting that he should be given the ticket and suddenly, he just bursts out saying that he is a Man Utd fan. The Brits behind the ticket counter were not amused and they just kept staring at him and said no. I had no problems with my paper verification and within minutes, I was already marching out with the ticket. The ticket design is different from the regular Man Utd ticket with the blue tinge on it.

Before I enter, I took the opportunity to go to the megastore to get myself a proper official United scarf for the game. Once that's done, I went through the ticket gates and my seat this time is on a much much lower tier stand compared to the two previous times I'm there. It's good enough for me to zoom in and take a close shot of the players. My seat is also near the away section which meant that the chants of the opposition Schalke will be quite audible. As I settled down to sit, the Que Sera Sera song was played by the stadium PA system. It's not the regular lyrics of QSS, we're going to wembley because it actually contained lyrics that are tailored specifically for tonight's match. That's what I call awesome customisation..lol. It was only nearer to kick off time that I realised that the section I am sitting at is the family section filled with lots of old age pensioners and middle-aged couples. The people around seem to be pleasant but they don't certainly look like the bunch in the Stretford End that will raise the roof. Oh well, at least I'll have to be glad that I'm not sitting around swearing hooligans..lol. Another thing which I've noticed that the people sitting around me seem to be good family friends with each other too. There was a sense of warmness that surrrounds them whenever they greet each other. I think that's some good community spirit going on there! I'm particular impressed with one middle-aged woman who accompanied her husband for the match coz she starts babbling during half time about what Anderson should be doing and what tactics Fergie should be employing..haha. Prior to the start of the match, the whole of the north section and parts of the east and west section were scheduled to form a giant scarf mosaic of three Champions League trophies - 1968, 1999 and 2008. Woahhh, I'm so excited that I get to be part of history! woohoo! I'm so definitely gonna keep that plastic sheet as souvenir. It has the name of the match and the date to commemorate the occassion.

I actually didn't expect such a goal feast. The previous two times that I'm here only ended in 1-0 victories. And I'm not hoping much with a second string team that Fergie put out which included Gibson and O Shea as captain. But I was wrong, in fact it was Mr Gibson who pulled the strings for the first goal for Valencia. From my position I could see the ball going through Neuer's legs and as it crossed the line, the whole stadium erupted into cheers. 3-0 aggregate! No way back in for Schalke now. Gibson then scored one himself afterthat and that ball actually looked unexpectedly goal-bound but it went in anyways. The best thing was our section started chanting sarcasticly "Who are ya? Who are ya? Who are ya?" hahahaha. However, Schalke popped one back immediately to make it 2-1 at half-time.

Goal line technology from my camera - Gibson's goal

For second half, the two teams changed playing sides and now I can focus my lens on Edwin van der Sar and the defenders. I'm priviledged to have Raul coming to my side to take a corner kick too. There was more attacking intent by Schalke in the 2nd half particularly with the introduction of Huntelaar but United continues to add on to their deposit. In 127 games for United, he had only scored 2 goals. In the space of 4 minutes for tonight's match, he had doubled his United career goal tally. Magnificent. Fergie is now reaping the harvest that he has sowed and his insistence in retaining Anderson all these years did pay off. Perhaps Anderson would finally be the successful Brazillian import that the United fans had hope for, other than the Da Silva twins. At the final whistle, it is 4-1 and it's United who are through to the finals! Wow..Fergie's record is impressive. In the space of 4 years, the Scot has guided Man United to 3 Champions League finals.

Overall, it was a fantastic and memorable European night. I couldn't ask for a better one. With this match, I've achieved one of my primary objectives which is to attend every single main competition match - that is the Premier League, FA Cup and Champions League. The only other objective that I may not be able to fulfill is to watch United take on all top three competitors. I've only managed to watch United taking on Arsenal and Liverpool and it seems that the Chelsea game will slip under my fingers since ticket exchange listed it as sold out. I had also wanted to attend the final game vs. Blackpool because there may be a Champions party then but unfortunately, either I'm slow or dreamy, ticket exchange also ran out of tickets for that and I didn't get in through the first ballot. The only slim chance that I have to get myself in is the second ballot which I'm not very optimistic of. Oh well, looks like I've gotta watch it on TV instead then.

Anyways, back to Champions League, I guess that could be my last game in Old Trafford for the season and I hope that I can at least get the chance to attend the first few matches of the incoming season before I fly back home to Malaysia. Oh, before exiting the stadium, I also took the opportunity to grab as many plastic sheets I can so that I can distribute it to my friends in Malaysia who are Man United fans and they can get a piece of history from Old Trafford too! I was quite surprised that the queue to go back to the tram was not as long as I had expected. It was definitely way shorter than last year when I was there for the Arsenal match. I was still stuck at the tram area at 11pm last year. However this time, by 10.20pm I'm already at the Piccadily station waiting for the train back to Leeds. Ahh, this shall be one of the nights I'll remember for years to come :)

So, the Champions League final in Wembley 2011 will be Manchester United vs. Barcelona - a delicious match-up of footballing giants. Fergie and United would remember the bitter memories of losing to Barca in Rome 2009. I'm thinking of sneaking into the outskirts Wembley stadium on the 28th to soak in the atmosphere. How often are the chances that the Champions League final is in England at the same time as me? xD

Dissertation Completed!

2011-05-03T20:12:00.003+08:00

6 months. 12700 words. Finally done. It was a nervous rush from the time I'm back on the 30th till today. What I had left to do was the introduction, conclusion and some bits of the chapter on reform. Not only that, there was also references to tidy up, a 500 word extract to work on and proof-reading to be done. By Monday night, I thought I had done everything I should in terms of the essay content but it seems that I still have lots of admin work to tidy up in terms of formatting, putting page numbers, content page and listing out the table of cases and statutes. Proof reading took me longer than expected and I had to take 1hr to read through the 12700 mammoth essay. As of this morning, I was still furiously typing away to tidy up my essay. It got me into a minor panic because it was like 4hrs to dead line and I'm still typing away. My plans to go to uni to print at the cluster at 7am went down the drains. But thankfully, I completed all tidying up by 9.30am and promptly submitted it online first. I head out to uni immediately afterthat to get my paper printed. I was crossing my fingers and was hoping that the computer clusters wouldn't be too crowded with other 3rd year students who are thrown in a massive panic. I purposely went to the Cohen cluster in the Chem department since that's the last place that a student would think of going.

The total amount of pages to be printed after all the double spacing was 66. It costed me close to 3 pounds just to print a hard copy of the dissertation to submit but it's neccessary. As I was walking to the law school to submit my dissertation, a sense of accomplishment dawned upon me. And when I handed it up at the reception desk, I felt a huge stone being lifted away. Now it's just settling exams. I was quite amused at how I managed to complete it in the end despite spending like 4 days of the crucial period to travel. This meant that if I had not chose to travel, I would have completed way earlier. But then again, knowing of my tendencies to procastinate, I might have took longer if not for the pressure bearing down on me to complete my work.

Later in the evening, there was supposed to be an International students tea party organised by the law school but it turns out that I'm the only Malaysian student there and there are a small handful of African students. The majority of the people there are actually the lecturers. How awkward. It's either my fellow countrymen are too shell-shocked from the dissertation dateline there or they are catching up on lost sleep. In the end, I just had some small conversations with the lecturers there, eat my share of free food and head home to do revision. Ahhh, I'm trying not to be overly enthusiastic on the completion of the dissertation because I can clearly feel that I'm getting too carried away in relaxing as if there are no more exams. I have to get back to ground and start turning on JPA MODE 3.0 to turbo speed already!

Bonjour Paris and the Royal Wedding

2011-04-30T06:48:00.007+08:00

It's a very very risky thing to do but I did it anyways..haha! I guess that's the thrill of it. A week before the deadline of my dissertation, I've decided to hop off to Paris for a short break with one of my friends from Singapore, Leo. I had actually planned to finish everything before I fly off but that didn't go as well as I planned. At the time of boarding the train to London, I still have my introduction and conclusion plus bits of pieces of the chapter of reform which has not been settled. Since I won't have a laptop with me on the trip, the only time I can proceed back with the work is during the 29th when I come back. To compensate for that, I've brought along my revision notes to study so that I can have headstart to exams preparations.

The journey started off with a train ride from Leeds to London at 11am in the morning. We reached London King Cross at around 1pm and it's my first time stepping foot in London too! 7 months in England and I've never entered London before..lol. We had planned to visit Madame Tussaud's first since I have a 2 for 1 coupon. However, when we reached there, we found out that the queue is super long and since we have to leave for London Luton airport by 4pm+, it does seem unwise to queue up for it since we would have less time to go around. In the end, we just settled to walking around Westminster and Big Ben before boarding the train to the airport. It seems that all budget airlines operate at the outskirts at Luton airport and not Heathrow. By the time all the air tickets and transiting trains prices come together, it's actually better just to take the Eurostar train from London.

We reached Charles de Gaulle airport at close to 11pm Paris time and we had to take another train down to the city center. More money is spilled again. One of the first thing I realised when I reached the Paris Metros are that they are quite dirty, old and rather unmaintained. By the time we settled into the hotel it was already 1am. The room's not too bad for a 2-star hotel and I'm impressed that they have a flat screen TV for a low budget hotel. I watched a little French TV before going to sleep. On the next day, we started by walking to the Pantheon. We had breakfast at one of the French cafes before continuing our walk to St. Michael's square to get a free tour of the city. A morning walk around the streets of Paris is refreshing. The buildings look beautiful and their traditional architecture style is maitained. The free tour lasted for 3 hours and afterthat we went on our own way to the Arc De Triomphe which is actually now the center of a giant roundabout. There's an eternal flame for the Unknown soldier to commemorate all those who have fallen for the French Empire. Next up is the highlight of the day which is to head to Eiffel Tower and it took us quite some time before we reached the monumental site of the Paris icon. When I gazed upon the Eiffel tower with my own eyes, a part of me felt a sense of thankfulness and gratitude to God for bringing me this far. I would never have imagined such an opportunity 5 years ago.

As a result of the intense phototaking, our camera batteries were close to zero and we decided to return back to our rooms to recharge the batteries because there's still the night camera shots to consider. We had dinner in one of the kebab stalls and we proceeded to go around Paris at night to take night shots. I'm rather impressed with the night life in Paris. The cafes are still opened at night and people are actually having proper meals and proper conversations. This is unlike the streets of England where you see partying, clubbing, binge drinking and drunkards sprawling all over the city and roads. It's nice to walk somewhere at night where it is drunkfest free. Anyways, The longest walk by far is from the Louvre to Eiffel Tower. On the map, it looks 15 minutes but actually it's almost 1hr of walking. We were so exhausted from walking that we just opted to take a taxi back to the hotel.

On the next day, the weather was not so fantastic. Gloomy, cold and cloudy, it didn't seem to look like spring at all. Nevertheless, we made our way to the Notre Dame first as we wanted to see how it looked like inside. It' a grand Catholic Gothic cathedral and at the doors are decorated with the statues of the saints and I'm amused to see one where St. Peter is depicted holding a giant key. Ahh, I guess that's where he is guarding the Pearly gates. The queue is long but it took just 5 minutes to for it to clear up before it's our turn to enter. Inside the Notre-Dame were hundreds of visitors but somehow the church is so big that there's still plenty of room space to move around. And the surprise find over there was the statue of Joan of Arc, one of my favourite historical figures! We spent around 30-45 minutes in there and I got myself one commemorative coin for 2 Euros. We had intended to go inside the Louvre but seeing how long the queue was and how short of a time we have, Leo declined to enter while I'm ok with missing it since I'm coming back with Mama anyways in July. We continued going around Paris randomly and when we chanced upon a Jewish museum, we entered to have a look around. Since the weather turned for the worse with drizzling, we also stopped short of walking to the Basilica. We went to another kebab stall for dinner to take a rest from the still aching legs and we proceeded straight on to take the train to the airport. That concludes the Paris leg and it's a really short but important scouting trip to ensure that my next trip there is smoother.

A few pointers that I have from Paris is this:
a) People there will speak French to you eventhough they can see that you are Asian. Just start pointing and use sign language if things are desperate
b) Gotta be self-sufficient and rely alot on maps. You'll be surprised how far the maps can bring you around
c) If you're on a tight budget, go for McD and Kebabs. McD hamburger is available at 1 Euro each and water is free.
d) EU-country students can enter free in almost every museum in Paris but your parents will not have the same freebies
e) Don't sign some weird petitions that people ask you to on the streets of Paris

Despite it being a short trip, I can definitely see why Paris has its charm and is called the City of Lights. I'll definitely consider this as a honeymoon place in the future ;)

So, we're back in England after the flight. At the immigration gate, I handed my passport to the British immigration officer and she seemed confused for a while that I was granted a one-year visa. She asked me what course I'm studying and I said "Law in the Uni of Leeds". And afterthat, she just gave the biggest wide-eyed stare at me in disbelief. Abandoning all sense of British proprietrieness, she asked ,"Is your English level up to standard?" I was amused at her question/suspicion but as I'm tired, I just muttered a "Yes". If I had been more energetic, I would have shot back ,"It's perfectly alright Mad'm". Gahhhhh..anyways, we put up for the night in the house of one of Leo's Singaporean friends in London.

The next morning, it rise and shine early as I get ready for the biggest day in the British calendar this year. I happened to be in the right place and right time and it's the Royal Wedding! How often are the chances that you're an International student and the year when a royal wedding happens falls with the same year of your studies! The last time celebrations were as this big was in 1981 when Princess D got married. I had intended to at least stand by the procession route but it seems that the police had already cordoned off the area. People have been camping there since last night, so I have to settle with watching it from the big screen with hundreds of others at Trafalgar square. It was certainly a momentous occassion as free Union Jack flags are handed out. From the place where I'm standing, I could see Westminster Abbey in the horizon and coincidentally, the tourism Malaysia office is nearby, so the Malaysian flag was actually up at Trafalgar square with the Union Jack during the wedding procession. We went for lunch later at one of the Chinese restaurants and I'm surprised to see the big portion of food that London restaurants serve. While we were at the restaurant, we watched from the TV the infamous kiss of the royal couple at the balcony of the Buckingham palace. The evening was spent walking to sightsee London such as the Royal courts and alongside the Thames River. I also had dinner with another Singaporean friend of Leo's. This dinner place serves Japanese food like the Sg food court and at 4.50 pounds, the portion is quite huge too. We were back at King Cross on time at 9.30pm for the train back to Leeds.

The giant screen and crowd at Trafalgar Square

Overall, it's a tale of two capital cities and I had a fun time going around the few days. Special thanks to Leo for planning everything and freeing me up the time to study. This will not be the last time I'm travelling those two places as I'm intending to return there to properly enjoy the places after my academics are done.

Good Friday and Easter

2011-04-25T05:22:00.002+08:00

It's the first Holy week that I'm experiencing abroad and it was quite an interesting experience. On Friday morning, I had already planned to go to St. George's for the Good Friday service. I was rushing up on my dissertation as usual when I received a call from Vincent asking me whether I want to play drums tonight for combined cell at the Chinese Church. I answered yes right away as it's been a long time since I've been at the forefront with the worship team. Anways, I went for service on time and it's the traditional Anglican service with hymns. It's quite an interesting experience although it was solemn. Right afterthat I went back to rest before heading out again this time to Montague Burton to meet up a couple of the people there for a laksa/hokkien mee party.

It's the second time I'm having a makan gathering with Ling Wei and Qing Wei's gang and I've enjoyed myself during the two gatherings knowing more friends in the process. Best of all this time, I get to taste laksa too after more than 6 months. I had to cut the party short because I had to go for worship practice before the Friday combined cell session. Ahhh, this is something I miss doing back in Malaysia - going for worship practice..haha. The church doesn't have an acoustic kit and it's an electric drum which was gathering dust for months since the last drummer left England last year. I was the first drummer to touch it since then..lol. Of course an electric is no substitute for the real thing but when you're deprived of whacking drums for months, anything would just be fine. We had a sharing by one of the Malaysian missionaries in Thailand whom the Chinese church is supporting. Her sharing kinda brings back memories of the mission trip I had in Chiang Mai back in 2003.

Easter Sunday morning was spent at the Chinese Church and they had a baptism service for two members. Lol, somehow today's after service food is more bountiful than usual. At night, it was the St. George's Easter Service which was more contemporary. I guess the traditional one had already happened earlier in the morning. Overall, it's quite a reflective Easter and it's always a good time to remember the ultimate gift that Jesus has given to mankind. As of now, I really needed to rush to complete my dissertation as much as possible before I go to London tomorrow to fly off to Paris.

Crossroads

2011-04-19T20:15:00.000+08:00

I thought I have dealt with my crossroad issue already. Since the beginning of April, I already had resolved to go back to Malaysia to do the CLP and decided not to try for clearing at all. This was because after a long and hard period of thinking, I tabulated that the cost of studying CLP in Malaysia is approximately 1/10 of that from the BPTC. The difference is vast because it would either leave a RM50000 spare change in the bank or leave the account RM50000 poorer, even after calculating the cost of the cheaper offer from Manchester. Mama pointed out that she'll be able to pull through without incurring any sort of debts. In fact, she encouraged me to try for it. But in the long period of thinking, I just contemplated on the level of finances after the BPTC period is done. It's not a question of whether I can afford it because the money is there. It's a question of the state of finances after it's all done and how long it will take to recover. RM 50k is alot of money and there are so many things that one can buy with it. A new car, downpayment for a new base in Malaysia, a new desktop - so many choices. I believe that God provides but at the same time, he gives us the wisdom to discern on whether it is a worthwhile investment to make. After deliberation, I decided affirmatively that I want Mama to live comfortably and for me to have a better headstart in crafting my own empire in Malaysia instead. And as I thought more about it, the more convinced that I should be going home instead. The thought of going back to serving actively in the church community, driving, playing drums, mamak, having good food with friends and the opportunity to make more new friends and widen my networking circle in Malaysia and the local legal fraternity gives me a good future to look forward to. I was all set then to balik kampung to Malaysia.

It would just have been okay if things are just left like that. The ball was never in my court anyways. I never received an offer. So that should just be the way it is since there's only one way for me to go. BUT, here's another twist to this episode in Stan's life. I went down today to open the letterbox and guess what came through the mail. A FULL-TIME offer for BPTC at Manchester Met! I should have been happy right? But no, it got me even more flustered and frustrated. I had a small tussle with God and the first thought that went through my mind was ,"You should have given it to me when I'm up for it!". If the offer had came within the 8th of March as it should, I would have accepted it without thinking twice. But this window period of delay had got me thinking again and to clear my thoughts. And now the ball is back in my court again - I actually HAVE to make a CHOICE. So, it goes without saying that I'm back at the crossroad again with the offer. Now I have to admit I'm really really really tempted to say yes. The prospects of living 15 minutes away from Old Trafford the Theatre of Dreams and also nearby to the rock concert events (not to mention another year of opportunity to attend even more rock concerts) is everything I've ever wished or dream for. It was the ideal sort of setting that I would like for my subsequent year of qualifying exams to be a lawyer. A Barrister title and a chance to experience life in Manchester. Wow. It got me wide-eyed for a moment.

Sigh. Why can't life be simpler and less complicated? Why can't I have a scholarship to solve my problems? If I have extra money to burn without jeopardizing my family, I would have also clicked yes right away even if the offer had came late. Was it God's indication that He wanted me to stay with the offer? These questions just kept running around for a while.
Dreams sometimes have to give way to immediate practical concerns. Harsh, but I have to remind myself that I'm not born with a silver spoon. I can't be selfish. I need to think about Mama and all the hard work that she's put in for the RM50k. I need to make sure that whatever hopes that she has placed on me is wisely invested and spent.

And then I thought of what could be God's reason for delaying the offer in the first place? Surely there must be something He wanted me to know or realise. And what I did realise was that God knew that I sometimes bull-charge in some of my decisions. He needed me to have the time to think of what He had perhaps in store for me in the future if I pick to do CLP. And I can see how generous He is too - It was never His intention to close any doors. He knew what was in my heart, he knew that I want situations where I can make my own choice and so that was why He still send along the offer too after I had made up my mind. He had given me clues on which place is better in helping me to multiply the talents that He has given me but he would always give me the choice to pick in the end.

I had not booked any flight ticket home yet. The thought of this is immense - With a click of the mouse I can decide and cause a ripple effect of who I will meet or know in the future. It's just like choosing between Inti or Help college to study law, or to go to Uni of Liverpool for the scholarship or adhere to my strongly-felt choice of Uni of Leeds. If I had chosen the Help path or Liverpool path, I may never have the chance to meet some of the people that I know now. Of course, in choosing the path that I have now, there will be some people in Help or Liverpool which I'm never fated to meet. It's really interesting to think about the people who cross paths in your life just merely by the decisions you make. It's the little things like the decision to miss a social gathering or the decision to go for a function.

Anyways, before I get diverted into the exploration of mysterious concepts and ideas, I would say that I would most probably not take up the BPTC offer for the reasons I have considered in the first place. I will stick to the decision I had made in April and at the same time, trust in Him that He will make it a blessed journey till the end of the road. Well, that should settle any lingering doubts. Now back to dissertation.

First Birthday experience in Britain

2011-04-18T17:35:00.000+08:00

Birthday card by my CG mates

My 22nd birthday this year happens to fall on a Palm Sunday and it'll probably be the first and the last time I'll celebrate in Europe. The day started off with going to the Chinese Church as usual in the morning but I'm told in advanced a couple of weeks ago that there's gonna be a BBQ after church at Springfield. Well, I think it was meant to be a surprise kind of thing but I kinda figured out that it's gotta do with my special day..lol. What I was more nervous of was preparing myself to run away from any potential pranks that my occur on my arrival. Anyways, I'm blessed to have a wonderful weather given by God. It's sunny and the sky's bright.

The BBQ is an interesting one because the place doesn't have a proper BBQ pit. Instead, we used makeshift pits which consist of metal trays, wire sheets and some charcoals. The end result was a few black square marks at the front lawn but aye, I reckon that the grass will grow back. There loads of meat, pork and chicken mainly marinated in different types of sauce. Even with the big amount of people that we have, we somehow had trouble finishing the food..lol. I had a double birthday celebration with Minna, a Finnish girl who's studying Chinese at Leeds and her birthday is 2 days after mine. We grilled until it's close to 6 and then they brought out the cakes for us. I'm very honoured indeed to have my Chinese CG to bake my birthday cake and it's an oreo cheesecake!

It was then I realised that the person who's asking me questions on Springform recently is actually Janice my CG leader..lol. I got a question concerning cakes and present in Springform but I can't gather who it was. Ahhhh, the mystery is now revealed!..haha! Mhmmm..after all the photo-taking and the cake-eating, we cleared up and it was just in time for church service. Yesterday was the biggest group to visit St. George's because some of the Chinese Church pple who came over for the BBQ decided to go for service too since it's so near. Then after service we had another round of dinner at Tong Palace.

Overall, it's a very memorable Birthday. Firstly, I wanna say a big thank you to all my lovely CG mates (Janice, Yee Kuan, Wen, Su Wei, Hannah, Ivan)for all the planning for the BBQ, the beautifully designed card, and the deliciously home-baked cake! I think I gotta thank Janice especially because she really prepared for it very early. I had a fantastic day, enjoyed myself and truly appreciated all of them for the fellowship and massive effort! Thank you to all who attended the BBQ plus those who had contributed for my birthday gift. It was the latest Passion Album CD for this year and I super like it! Feels blessed to know all of you! =D Thanks to those who had sent me SMSes and Birthday FB messages from all over the world.

At 22 year of age, I'm starting to feel old already. What's in store for me for the next coming year?

Heroic Comeback

2011-04-03T14:03:00.000+08:00

Wayne goes for a foul mouth response after scoring his hat-trick

The Premier League is back in action after the International break and Man Utd takes on relegation-troubled West Ham in London. It was great to see Park back in action and it seems that Fergie had opted to start with Rooney as the solo striker. Man Utd started well in general with some good decent chances. However, they soon found themselves in a very bizarre situation of 2 g0als down, thanks to some clumsy defending that resulted in 2 penalties. At the end of the first half, I was just thinking ,"Not another miserable away performance!". If things don't change in the second half, it will mean that Wenger's Gooners will get a good chance to catch up again.

Fergie made a bold change in the 2nd half, opting to sacrifice Evra in favour of Hernandez and placed Giggsy on defensive duties instead on the left back position. It paid off as it was time for Man Utd to throw caution to the wind and give it all they've got at 0-2 down. Wayne was the star man leading Man Utd in the comeback. A superb curling free-kick provided them with the lifeline that they needed and at 72nd minute, Wayne did just enough to control an incoming ball from Valencia to blast it in for an equaliser. That was his 100th Premier League goal for Man Utd. Afterthat, it just went uphill for Man Utd. The 3rd penalty was awarded in the 77th minute, but this time it's in favour of Man Utd. Rooney finishes it off in a cool manner for his hat-trick and it was prime position for Fergie to grab all three points. The contest ended with Man Utd's easy 4th goal by Hernandez, thanks to Giggsy's slicing pass that went through the legs of the defenders. From 0-2 down to a 4-2 win sounds like a good day's work in London :)

The other title contenders must have been jumping in frustration on how the weekend could have been if only Man Utd stayed down. It was a pivotal result, with Chelsea and the Gooners drawing. On the incentive side, Liverpool lost again to, of all sides, Roy Hodgson's West Brom. Ahhh..at least Mr Roy had one over the Scousers for booting him off! lol. Although Arsenal has a game in hand with 7 points off, it's quite a good lead if Man Utd can maintain it until the trip to the Emirates. It remains to be seen how the shattered Gooners will hold on. For Man Utd, it's Chelsea at the Bridge for the next coming Champions League clash!

Hebden Bridge

2011-04-02T21:51:00.008+08:00

I got to explore another English town in West Yorkshire thanks to Nancy from the Chinese Church who had organised a mini "race" to get us exploring around this morning. This town is Hebden Bridge and is about 50 minutes away by train from Leeds. The moment I reached the town area, Hebden Bridge instantly gave an impression that it's a fun town to be in. There are lots of car traffic going in and out in the road and lots of human traffic too on the pedestrian walkways. I see many families and kids in particular. The cars are not cheapo ones - they are the expensive Mercedes, Audis and convertibles. For a moment, it kinda gave off an impression that it's like Taiping, and at the same time modern too like Subang Jaya. I did some research on the Internet and found out that Hebden Bridge is actually a dormitory town - something like a residential town with the equivalents to Bangsar for Malaysia. It's usually where working people reside and the only difference with Hebden Bridge is that it's smaller and it has lots of steep slopes.

Nancy gave us a briefing on what to do and one of the areas that we are supposed to find was the grave of a female American poet who had commited suicide. Instantly, I started to scan my brain for all the female American poets that I know and Sylvia Plath was the only name that stood out. And indeed, it was her! Woahhh! That was a really an unexpected find! Her grave is actually located at the nearby village of Heptonstall which is located on a hill overlooking Hebden Bridge. So, we had to climb up a grueling slope to reach the top of the hill where Heptonstall church is located. It houses lots of old graves outside at the church compound but somehow, English graves are less scary than Chinese graves. lol. Sylvia Plath's grave is actually relocated to a new burial field outside of the church compound but nevertheless situated in a very nice open field. Ahhhh, as a former English Literature student myself, I felt honoured to visit one of the pilgrimage sites of a well renowned literary legend. There are still plenty more to visit, in particular the Bronte sisters in Haworth which is not that far from Leeds too and also Shakespeare's birthplace in Stratford upon Avon. Mhmmmm..I gotta list out all these local English places to visit after exams.

The tragic poet's grave

After the race, we stopped by for lunch at one of the shops there and I had Bacon and Brie paninis. Food pricing there is not too bad actually. In general, Hepden Bridge was more cheerful looking than Saltaire and food is definitely cheaper with more variety. I can't really explain it fully, but there's just this aura of cheerfulness that's surrounding Hebden Bridge. I noticed that there are also alot of freelance musicians and artists busking in the town area. I'm not sure whether it's the Spring weather or the characteristic of the town but I enjoyed myself thoroughly with the hike and sightseeing around the place. I love these kinds of trips. Given my own capacity, I wouldn't have known that such a place existed. It's a good weekend trip to destress before embarking on the long stretch of work throughout the week. =D

The town square

The first day of April

2011-04-01T23:28:00.004+08:00

A sudden hint of mischievious thought descended onto my mind as I walked back to my room on Thursday night. I thought of clicking a button in my profile to change my relationship status for a day. Shortly after changing, I had private chat nudges coming in asking me to clarify the situation..lol. I didn't think that it would invite much reaction considering the day I had picked to change it but still most people are rather confused because I was being ambiguous in explaining. When I went for CG later on, I had to do a little explanation that I'm having a relationship withhhh....Jesus! xD

Anyways, in the age of modern Internet and technology, other websites are jumping in with their own April Fools too. Youtube had a 1911 mode where you can cover the video you are watching with a 1911 styled piano and film texture. It's quite funny and they also had the top 5 viral videos from 1911, with the Annoying Orange and Flugelhorn Feline (Keyboard Cat's ancestor! lol) inside too. Check it out below:

And then there's also Gmail Motion where you're supposed to be able to control your Gmail using real life movement. It was quite obvious that's a joke, butttt..apparently, somebody in Youtube showed that it's possible to do it using Microsoft Kinect sensors. Ahhhh..the horror: somebody's joke just became a reality!

And of course, one of most anticipated sequel to my favourite MMO which is Guild Wars 2, had something up their sleeves too: The introduction of the Commando race where you can call air strikes on your enemies..ahahaha! Geezzz..That'll be too imba..lol.

Have an enjoyable month of April ahead while I'm buried with more books and journals...argggghhhh!

Woahh..That's it?

2011-03-31T23:08:00.002+08:00

It's finally the last seminar for the YEAR. I can't believe this. Classes and lectures in England are literally DONE for the YEAR. That's all the lectures that I paid for and it doesn't feel value for money out of a sudden..lol. Now all that's left is just dissertation and sitting for the exams. Woahh..seriously, what just happened? It felt as if I had just arrived in England yesterday. It really didn't feel like 23 weeks of classes have gone by. Anyways, my last seminar was evidence and evidently, the lecturer wasn't giving any hints on this one. There were 5 British girls in my seminar class and all 5 of them literally attempted to grind him and tried to squeeze some form of info from him. I thought for a moment that he was a witness being scrutinised by 5 lawyers ! There was some fierce questioning in motion and I just laughed in my head watching the fiasco. They were questioning him why family law and other subjects provide some tips on what kind of questions are coming out for each topic but nothing is given for evidence. In any case, he held his ground and just gave his Irish grin, stating that his hands are tied and he's not as nice as the other lecturers! Ishhh! That's so miserly :(

After class, I went back to have a rest before heading to the last Alpha session. There was a bit of a mix-up on the location, but in the end, I found out that it was at the Chaplaincy. Somehow, our last discussion ventured from just British churches to discussion on International Christians and then to the situation in Malaysia. One of the opinions given on the attitude of local Christians is that they are not inclined to make conversations because of the constant worry of "offending people" from a different background. It seems that the difficulty in forming fellowships extend also among their own circles. Hmmm..I guess its really a cultural thing and the response I get when speaking on such matters is that the local Christians are also remorseful once they are made aware of the way the typical Brit culture has become. I also gathered that local Brits who spend the year abroad also approach people differently in general.

Later on, it was Breathe social at the bowling center where the church apparently booked 9 lanes. My group had 8 people, so it took quite some time for us to finish our games. I went to the bar with some of them and we ended up engaging on a debate with someone on the table on where do Christians who commit suicide go. Well, in my view, salvation once given cannot be revoked. Anyways, it was quite a lengthy debate and the table started going on technicalities and discussing whether there's such thing as an unpardonable sin.

I spent the rest of the night rehearsing my guitar for CG. Mhmmm..it's exactly one month to my dissertation's date due. Minus some days for the London and Paris trip at the end of April, I have less than 30 days. I'm sweating already..ahh.

Blog design revamp!

2011-03-25T08:43:00.002+08:00

As you can see, my visitors, that this blog has an extreme makeover thanks to the very talented iBan, Madonna Awa Anak Nobel. The reason why I've not changed from the default design since the creation of this blog is because I like the simplicity and organised layout that is provided by the basic design. I'm not good at designing a new one..and I'm certainly very lazy to adjust the html of the new blogskin to fit the organisation of the widgets that I have in mind. Well, after some tweaking and editing of font values of the redesigned skin, I'm satisfied in going ahead with the changes.

*drum rolls* It's time then for some new clothes! Kudos to the iBan again, and yea, it's unfortunate that she can't swindle any moolah out of me anytime soon because of the Atlantic Ocean xD

Honestly Speaking...

2011-03-23T00:17:00.002+08:00

Yesterday my church in Leeds hosted a presentation made by Friends International, one of the Christian ministries in Leeds that are tasked to help out with international students. I met the head of the team in Leeds, Phil, at the Christian Union Living Room picnic last year in September. Since then, I've been meeting him from time to time to discuss about my experiences and give him feedback on the overall situation that International Christians face over here. So for yesterday Phil invited me to share my thoughts in the event yesterday through interview style and he told me that around 30-40 people will attend. When I was there, it was more like 50-60 people from different churches all around Leeds! lol..anyways, initially, I wanted to launch a tirade and a rant. I had already prepared what to say, but just before I got up to speak, God prompted me to go gentle instead and to rephrase some of the materials that I have prepared. Anyways, here's the full uncensored text that I would have said if there are no time limit or barriers. I used a majority of what I had prepared, with some tweaking and softening of the tone in the end..haha.

What was it like for you when you first came to Leeds? What 2 things did you notice were most different to back home?

I was quite excited when I first arrived because I’ve never travelled out of Southeast Asia before. The furthest I have been in my life is Vietnam. England was the first European country that I had stepped my foot on. The 2 Things that I noticed most was firstly, the highly unpredictable and variety of English weather. The sky’s always gloomy, it’s cold..sometimes it gets windy..there’s snow. There is so much to prepare for and wearing the right clothing is important. In Malaysia, there’s only sunny and rainy weather because it’s a tropical country.

The second thing I noticed about the British people is that social life revolves around alcohol. You can never take the beer out of the British. There’s drinking in almost all occasions, even after church meetings and Christian Union (CU). It was quite an amusing situation for me at first, when we have one of the Christian student leaders jumping up and telling the whole congregation that we are going to the bar/pub afterwards! We don’t have that much of drinking in Malaysia, and we only drink during special occasions like wedding or celebrations. Our fellowship revolves mainly around food because the hawker stalls and restaurants in Malaysia have opening hours until past midnight. We will chat the night away.

How warm/cold did you find people in the UK in general?

I would say that the people in the UK are very polite but not warm. Most are reserved and they rarely make the first move to introduce themselves unless they feel comfortable. Privacy seems to be a very important factor here and people don’t seem to be interested in knowing new people or forging new friendships. They can see the same people week and week out, and they are ok with not striking a single conversation. In the law school, interaction between local students and international students is almost close to zero. We don’t talk during lectures and during seminars, at the very most it’s academic. There’s not even an introduction of names when we are discussing in a seminar group. Even after staying here for close to half a year, I do not know alot of the local British here on a personal level.

How warm did you find people in the Living Room? (International students gathering by the CU)

The living room is one of the first contacts that I have with Christians in Leeds. On the first week, I went for the living room picnic and that was where I met Phil too. I found I always felt that the reception in the living room is always warm because most of the people helping out in there are prepared to engage and meet with international students. I don’t see the same level of engagement for international students from local students in the CU or the church. Most of the time, it’s as if the internationals are invisible and they are usually ignored and left alone by themselves. It was very hard for me to get acquainted with the people in the CU because people in general just stick to their cliques and chat among their groups. I only had the chance to know a few more people during the weekend away. I’m very blessed to know Tim Tucker, the previous president of the CU and I will always remember him for the initiative that he took. He invited me over to his house at the border of Wales and I spent a fantastic 4 days with his family over Christmas. I got to know his family members too and we shared personal experiences with each other. Tim Tucker is one of the few British Christians who’s willing to engage with me on such a personal level. Sad to say, most of the local Christians that I know end up only as a “hi and bye” friend whenever I see them.

What could international students who are Christians bring to local churches that are predominately British?

It will make a strong statement that Christianity transcends culture to both local and international students who have yet to know God. We show that Christianity is not a Western religion because Jesus is relevant in every culture and society. The Malaysian churches and African churches are worshipping the same Jesus that the English people know about. International Christians have different perspectives in reaching out to other internationals which the locals may not be familiar with in terms of language and culture. We present the gospel in a much digestible way which the locals may not have considered.

Here’s something which I felt that is neglected in the international students ministry in England. There are lots of outreaches for international students who have not heard the gospel before but there is little support for Christian international students. You’ll be surprised to know that the population of international Christians is quite sizeable. I can name at least 20-30 international Christians that I’ve acquainted with. We are everywhere. But why are they not seen to be participating actively around in British churches or the Christian Union? As far as I know about Malaysian Christians, most of them are all huddled up in the Chinese church for a couple of reasons. Mainly because of opportunity to serve and fellowship. Firstly, the level of fellowship and bonding from the local Christians are almost non-existent. Let’s take my church as an example. Every Sunday, there’ll always be a group of at least 5-6 International Christians in the church. But no one bothered to talk to them or get to know them better. I go to the small group sessions and Christian Union, and apart from the official activities, none of the local Christians actually bothered to contact me outside of the official activities. I’ll be honest here. It is simply not good enough to ask “how are you, how’s your week, how’s your studies”...or to organise one or two international events and there’s no follow-up. What sort of friendship is that? There is no way you’re going to cultivate a proper fellowship like this. Maybe for the first few weeks, it’s alright. But there are local Christians who have known me for 6 months and all they ask whenever they see me is “how are you and how’s your week.” And then *awkward silence*.

The presumption of all international students are non-Christians or that they don’t know about Christianity at all needs to stop. Throughout these 6 months, I find that the local Christians do not treat the International Christians as equal partners in ministry and very often, international Christians end up on the sideline as mere participants. Local Christians seem to assume in their mind that they can’t handle things or know the scriptures enough. Let me tell you, some of the international Christians studying over here are leaders of their respective churches back home. They have led worship, bible studies, prayer meetings and small groups. Some of us join national Christian conferences, organised massive scale evangelical rallies and are part of the Christian union committees back home. International Christians are uprooted from their Christian circle at home when they go abroad. When an International Christian comes to England to study, he wants to see his faith level increase and his walk with God strengthened and to meet with Christians whom he can form meaningful friendships with. But without the support of the local Christians in initiating fellowship, personal sharing and opportunities to serve, he’ll be a loner. You know Christian living is community living. Without close fellowship with local Christians, where can he find the passion to serve and grow spiritually? I could have chosen the easy path and join the rest of my fellow Malaysian Christians in the Chinese Church. Fellowship is good and there are plenty of opportunities to serve. But I’m determined to be patient and stick to a British church because I want to learn a different perspective from the local Christians during my short time of a year here. Every week, I return back to my room in disappointment because of the attitudes of the local Christians that I see. I try to think the local Christians as being different from the local non-Christians, but every week I’m proven wrong.

Some of you might think, we are British and that’s the way we are. But no, we need to rise above that. We need to rise above the stereotypical notion of our cultures and start to see ourselves as common citizens of God’s kingdom. Leeds is a very special place with so many different nationalities converging in the same place. When you say you want to share lives and share the love of Christ, can you afford to ignore the hundreds of International Christians that are in this city? He/She is also your brother and sister in Christ. You are part of the same family. You don’t even need to send missionaries to different countries. That one international Christian that you touched in Leeds could end up as a renowned evangelist in his home country. Never doubt the investment that you put in an international student. But it all has to start from the bottom - with genuine and sincere friendship which I find many of the local Christians are not willing to offer to the international Christians at this moment.

After I have spoken, there was a hush of silence as I walked back to my seat. All I was thinking at that point of time was, "Dear Lord, I hope I didn't make new enemies today!" After everything had ended, Phil's wife came to me to say that lots of the British folks standing behind appreciated the honest comments that I gave. A few of the British who were sitting near me also said the same thing. Jane, one of the new committee members in the Christian Union walked up to me to say that she appreaciated my feedback and will bring up the issue to the new CU committee during meeting. The most encouraging one was a Christian from Jordan who came up to me and said "You spoke exactly what my sentiments were! It's as if I'm actually up front and speaking the exact same things as u!" She encouraged me to continue speaking on this subject to every Brit that I meet, and said that the local Christians need to have this awareness and reminder every now and then. Wow, truly amazed at God's work! I didn't expect my speech to impact that many. I'm just thankful to be given this opportunity to speak for Him. Hmmmm..I guess that my Mama's hard-earned money to put me through law education ain't wasted at all to prepare me for moments like this.

The bottomline situation is this, the international student work which has been going on around in Leeds is impressive, with many China students getting to know the Gospel and going back home to tell others about Jesus. But I often find that for the International Students who are already long-time Christian, they are in a state of limbo. Very little work is being done to help them to settle down or get rooted into the local Christian community. They have already gone beyond the basic stages which most of the China Students are undergoing like who God is and what is the Bible etc. While it is good that international Christians join these activities to help to spread the Gospel, they also need spiritual food and fellowship to grow in their own faith. But if these International Students join the predominantly British Christian Union and churches, they get the proper teaching that they need but the fellowship component is often missing because the local Brits simply do not have the desire to welcome them into their social circles. I admit that the international workers do forge close friendships with the international students that they work with, but I noticed the pattern that it's only international students who do not know the Gospel. Hence, there's this very bizarre and ironical situation where, it is better for the International student NOT to know anything about Christianity so that they can have the opportunity to interact with the British. And for International students who have already known and accepted Christ, there seems to be nothing else that the local British Christian can offer. This, I feel, needs to stop going on if we are to regard ourselves as one a one united citizen in God's kingdom. For me, I felt that I can't just stand around being silent while injustices like this go around unnoticed.

Anyways, recently, I noticed that in these past few years, I'm inclined to advocate for different concerns and pushing for reforms on different fronts. There are undercover campaigns to reduce passivenes in Christian walk, active serving in church, planting seeds in people's life who have yet to know Christ in an effective way, having a Christ-centered path in the legal fraternity and law departments and right now, international Christians integrating with local Christians. At times, I do feel stretched fighting silently on so many different fronts alone and I often wonder whether there are those around me who share the same concerns or they had just chosen to ignore it. I felt the weight on my shoulders on these so many concerns that I have but yet I find myself not being able to fully commit to the full cause because of the studying commitments that I have. I hope that one day, when all these studying and academics are all gone, I'll have all the time and resources to campaign for all these things. As for now, I'm just grateful that God has given me strength to actually speak up on these things despite all the academic stuff that are piling up on me.

Draft Gaffe

2011-03-21T09:33:00.002+08:00

Ughhh! I wanna shoot myself for wasting my final dissertation meeting with my supervisor. Thanks to some miscalculations and bad planning, I ended submitting my draft later than expected. Somehow I couldn't formulate the words that I wanted to put inside and this caused me to take a longer time to organise my thoughts. The time slot that I picked to meet my supervisor was wedged in between my jurisprudence class and the final year students photo taking session. I had to rush to the law school building after lunch. When I met my supervisor, she said she hadn't had the time to look at it and also because it was the weekend. So she had to read on the spot instead of properly perusing over it. I gathered that she managed to read through my first draft in the previous meeting because the previous meeting fell on a Tuesday instead of Monday.

I was constantly looking at the clock, having the dilemma of whether to stay longer to grab as much guidance as possible or to end it and rush to the library before the photo-taking session is over. In any case, there was only a limited amount which my supervisor could analyse on the spot and I was already smacking myself because if she had the proper time to look through it, more could be discussed. We ended on the dot like a few minutes before the meeting time for the photoshoot and I had to make another mad dash down to the library steps. Thankfully, the photoshoot was still on because the photographer was still busy arranging people..lol. After the photoshoot, there's supposed to be Evidence lecture but the evidence lecturer apparently ended his session with just 15 minutes! Ahhhhh! If I had known better that he'll do that, I would have scheduled my dissertation meeting during that slot. Or any other time for that matter so that my supervisor could have gotten a good read of what I have written! And then I thought that I should have suggested another day to meet her once I have gotten to know she had not read it yet. Argghhhhh..Too slow and too late for such an idea! Why didn't I thought of it earlier?!..I've just wasted the last opportunity for free tips and hints. I could still e-mail my supervisor, but only questions on technicality can be asked and not about the content. Oh wellll, looks like Stan gotta continue the rest of his dissertation in the dark with his eyes blindfolded :(

Half-closed door

2011-03-15T01:49:00.004+08:00

It's a week now and there's still no answer. The results of the Bar Course application was supposed to be out last week but for every of the Malaysians that applied Leeds as their first choice, their application still has 'processing' as the status. Well, it's not technically 'rejected' but the system did warn that 'processing' also means that no offer will be given. All the rest who picked Northumbria, UWE Bristol, Nottingham and even 2nd choice of City Law School has been given an offer. I could put any of those choices but I've decided early on that it's either Leeds or Manchester. London is a nono because it's too expensive for my finances while I don't really fancy staying in other cities. Actually I got accepted for part-time at Leeds but that was of no use because Post-Work Visa is gonna be scrapped soon. As I had said before, if I don't get any of the full-time offer at all, I would take it as God's answer for me to return back to Malaysia.

For the past week, I've been hoping that it could just be an admin fault. A part of me just wants the ball to be in my court for me to make the decision. However, I know very well that it is ultimately God's decision in where to place me rather than what I want to choose for myself. I know I'm setting myself up for a high risk of not entering into the English Bar Course when I limit myself only to two institutions. But I'm adamant to hold that if I'm paying that much to do Bar, I want to be in a place where I really want to stay instead of just entering any Bar school for the sake of it because some of it are actually not as reputable as it should be. Leeds was first in my choice because of the network of friends that I have made and I want to develop it further. Manchester was the only alternative because it was the cheapest. I would definitely have picked London if I'm rich enough but alas, I recognise that I'm not. A 'Barrister' title is delicious when it is included beside your name in the future but I'm not gonna bleed my mother financially dry to go somewhere that I do not feel strongly about.

I phoned up the Leeds centre earlier and received my answer that it's not an admin problem. It is indeed true that all the Malaysians did get rejected from the pool of Leeds for the Bar application. And I was told that if I want to try again, I would need to wait until April for the clearing and not even the first choice reasoning that I had placed in the first round could help in the application. In other words, chances are slim for clearing. And not getting a reply for Manchester also meant that an offer was also not given there. This is annoying, because I wasn't rejected outright and there's still a chance in the clearing. This meant also that the door is half-closed. Not totally. I'm effectively forced to push all my Inn applications to later if I somehow got in the future. And I can't even make plans to travel home to Malaysia for good because I have to make sure that all doors are effectively closed in the clearing period. It seems that many of these applications were not taken up during the first round, so there may be a chance to enter Manchester given that they have close to 200 over places.

Anyways, on Sunday in church, we learned about feeling bold to really narrow down our prayer requests to specific things to really see the direction that God wants to move us in. So, this made me even more determined that I made the right choice in narrowing it down as tight as possible just to discover whether it's God will for me to stay in England for another year and not whether I myself wanted to do the Bar course. So dear Lord, is my work for you in England completed? Please give me an affirmative answer. I hope You'll answer it soon in April.

In his heart, a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps - Proverbs 16:9

Same Old Arsenal, Always Losing

2011-03-13T02:50:00.004+08:00

Mission Accomplished by one of the twin terrors

Old rivalries between Fergie and Wenger are renewed but both old foxes recognised that they are battered old men too for the past two weeks. Wenger found himself kicked out of two competitions following an embarassing winning goal scored by Birmingham in the Carling Cup final and outplayed by Barca in Nou Camp. His boast of a Quadruple was silenced to a mere possible Double. On the hand, Fergie found himself outplayed by both Chelski and the Scousers at Stamford Bridge and Anfield respectively. It is clear that both needed a massive Cup boost and the loser from this knock-out round will surely be damned badly. The stakes are high. Loser goes home with a huge moral deficit to make up for. Fergie is known to have placed some of the wackiest line-ups, such as putting Fletcher as right-back, Carrick as a center-back or Evra as a left winger. But no one was prepared to see him field a total of SEVEN defenders. Brown, Smalling, Vidic and Evra in core defensive duties. Twins effect Rafael and Fabio will occupy the right and left wing. Jack-of-all-trades O Shea goes to the center with Gibson. You could say that the entire midfield is an untested combination overall.

In any case, the Gooners could not handle the makeshift midfield or the substitute striker pair of Rooney and Hernandez. It is very bizarre to see that the da Silva twins actually performed better as wingers rather than standard defenders..lol. In the 27th minute, Hernandez forced Almunia into a save and the ball spilled onto an incoming Fabio who delightedly put it into the open net. Rafael was the architect in the 2nd goal at 48th minute of the 2nd half. Hernandez was again in acres of a goal-scoring opportunity when he was robbed of the ball but fortunately another player was there to pick up the remnants again and it's Rooney this time who scores. Wayne's recovery back to the goal-scoring trail looks to be good. The Gooners couldn't find a way to overcome the score and with the final whistle, Wenger is condemned to the fact that the Gooners are kicked out of a third competition in 3 weeks. Now, all that's left is the Premier League or nothing. Incredible, from an audicious claim of Quadruple, Wenger was forced to eat his words. The mental strength of the Gooners are all in shambles now.

I believe this would be a massive boost for United in their next few matches, most notably the one against Marseille this Wednesday. I have a vested interest in this because I want to watch a Champions League match live against a massive European opponent! So, come on United! =D

Under:Stand:Up

2011-03-09T21:36:00.003+08:00

The Christian Union meeting took a break from it's regular schedule to have an inter-faith night instead known as Under:Stand:Up which consists of students from the CU, Jewish Society and Islamic Society. No doubt the polytheistic groups are excluded since they are a minority over here, so it becomes more like a gathering of Abrahamic societies. All the sons and daughters of Abraham under one roof..lol. The main guest-of-honour of the night is the stand-up comedian Imran Yusuf and he's really really goood with his funny materials. One thing that I respect him about is that he is able to poke fun at his own heritage in a graceful way. As I made an observation, quite a number of the Muslims in Britain are Pakistanis by origin. Mhmmm..I would like to touch a little on multi-culturalism in Britain since I'm on topic about it. Recently, David Cameron, the British PM declared that multiculturalism in Britain has failed. Of course, he refers to the extremist and terrorist elements but there are some elements in the truth of that statement even in the standard British community.

As somebody coming from multi-cultural Malaysia, I find the Brit's idea of multiculturalism to be a very different form. To them, it's just migrants coming in and living in a tolerant way towards them. Little attempt is made to understand them better because they just don't find it neccessary. It is true in Malaysia that the 3 main races don't always get along so well with each other but underlying all the politicised tensions, the common average Malaysian folk actually has a decent amount of knowledge about the other races and we often infuse our cultures together to make it uniquely Malaysian. Every Malaysian is comfortable with Nasi Lemak and Mamak. We speak Malay and even adopted some Malay words into the Chinese dialects. We get to experience the festivals of different races in Malaysia too. Every Malaysian is usually accustomed to knowing more than 1 language. The Indians happily waltz into a bak kut teh stall while the Malays are perfectly alright in dining at a Halal Hainanese Kopitiam.In comparison at Britain, most of the local Caucasians know only their English culture and 1 language - English. There are minorities living among them - the Punjabis, the Pakistani Muslims and to some extent the Hong Kong Chinese. But ask the Brits about even the most simple thing about their minorities, they are almost clueless about it. The only thing they know about the Chinese is "Ni hao?" and the Indians are curries. Even among the minorities, they have little idea about each other's group. At least the two main minorities in Malaysia, the Chinese and the Indians, interact constantly and they are comfortable and do know much about each other. The new generation of Brits has little inkling about the former colonies of Britain and they don't even know that Malaysia and Singapore are former British colonies. If one loaths about racial segregration in Malaysia and how the different races actually restrict themselves only to their own circle, it's the same over in Britain. But I would say that Malaysia is better than Britain in the multicultural level because at least we have the opportunity to meet and interact with other races. We get to know about other religions and cultural practices. We are so diverse and yet we still try to learn from each other. I find the local British to be lacking in this adventurous spirit of learning about other cultures. Hence, this also contributed to the low levels of welcoming spirit by the Brits in addition of the subtle xenophobia that may be present in them.

Well, the interfaith event organised by the societies are a good first step to encourage integration and understanding. I think that it will be harder to organise something of a similar nature in Malaysia due to the sensitive nature of religion in the Peninsula. A similar idea based on inter-ethnic relations could work better for Malaysia but the inter-ethnic approach may not work as well for Britain because the ethnic communities there are not as intergrated and overlapping as the ones in Malaysia. Anyways, I'm very thankful that I'm raised up with a multi-cultural perspective attached in me in a different part of the world known as Southeast Asia xD

Kuyt and Bashed

2011-03-07T06:33:00.001+08:00

It was another miserable away outing for United as they got their brains bashed by the Scousers at Anfield. When I saw Brown at the starting line-up, I knew we were going to have a hard time to hold the line. Brown had only played 3 games this season while Smalling is presumely still rocked by last week's performance. Vidic's absence was certainly felt as United were literally ran ragged by Suarez's silky moves. He waltzed past 4 United players to set up an easy goal for Kuyt to tap in. If Mr Vidic had been there, he would have given the Uruguay fella a nice authoritative slide tackle. The 2nd goal was one of stupidity and a giveaway. For some bizarre reason or so, Nani's header ended up directing the ball to Kuyt who promptly connected it with his head. Nobody knows what he was thinking and by this time, the United players knew that the contest is almost over. You don't go down 0-2 at Anfield and recover from that easily.

Melee is plenty and this fixture is probably more heated in more recent years because of what is at stake for United. At around the 44th minute, Carragher lunged at Nani with a horror tackle which could essentially see Nani out for quite some time. The seriousness of the injury was not apparent until after the match when pictures revealed that Nani actually had a deep gash wound which split open the flesh. While watching the match, it looked for a moment as if Nani was crying wolf again and his strange motion of getting up and falling down again looked like one of his usual diving antics. But as the medical staff rushed onto the field, Nani was clearly seen to be in real tears and I was wondering why he was sulking like a prima donna. Nani was almost on the verge of wailing as he stared back at Carragher as if he had made a career-ending tackle. Now, all that drama turned out to be quite serious in the end and I'm sure the United players were not pleased with Gerrard screaming at Nani to get up with his bleeding leg. But that was not the end of the melee, Rafael got into a bad tempered clash with Skrtel barely minutes after the restart of whistle when Nani was stretchered off the field. Red cards could have very well spammed all over the place but the referee opted to keep the players in. Well, some could have argued that Carragher should have been sent off but I reckon that still wouldn't have change the result because United was playing poorly overall.

Any chance of comeback went up in a smoke as Kuyt did what Berbatov did to them at Old Trafford - a hat-trick. The 3rd goal showed how off-duty the two center backs were and Kuyt was literally a free man to pump the ball into the back of the net. Hernandez in the dying minutes put in the consolation goal and that's about it. One would have wondered whether the situation would have been different if Berbatov's chip had not hit the post earlier.

Two defeats in a row. I felt that Fergie should have started Fletcher instead of Scholes because the old gun was not of any use during the match. They would have needed the extra physicality present in Fletcher to combat the Liverpool midfielders. United were fortunate that the Gooners did not overtake them because of the draw that the Gooners had with Sunderland. At present, it means that if the Gooners had won their extra game in hand, they would be level on points with United but United will still come out tops because of the goal difference. This makes the match at Emirates even more compelling as it could be a season decider. In any case, what's done is done and I hope United don't take long to start winning again. It's not easy when the team has the big threes in a row on consequtive weeks but it is essential that they overcome Arsenal next week to inflict psychological blows on Wenger. United really have to ensure that their season don't continue to derail badly.

CG Bonding and Guitar Debut

2011-03-06T10:07:00.003+08:00

I've been spending some quality time with my Chinese CG for the past two days. We had a dinner at outing at Tong Palace after our Friday seassion and I can't believe we just chatted away the night till 1.3oam! We were clearly the loudest table in the restaurant especially we started discussing what medical students do during placements in hospitals. On the next day on Saturday, we gathered at Springfield for an advanced pancake day gathering and bookmark making session. The girls tried two types of pancakes, the thicker American type (which you can find in McD) and the thin British type (which is known as crepe). At the end of it, we were just bloated from the pancakes..lol. These may just be very simple gathering of dinner or making pancake but it's good fellowship time. This is perhaps something which the Brits will take some time to comprehend, which is the importance of meeting up and doing little things together outside the official allocated time.

Mhmmm..this is an overdue update and it was supposed to be included in the previous entry but somehow I forgot to. But since I'm on the subject of Chinese CG, I might as well include in here. Last Friday, I played the guitar for an entire worship session for CG! I know only the G chord family, so I made sure that I transpose all the songs to G. I gotta thank Janice for giving me the opportunity to play because I wasn't sure about it at first but nevertheless went ahead with it. I have to say the experience was great in the end and I've discovered a few new things in the process. First was that I could play C, E Minor and D in an easy way without shifting my hand position too much. Secondly was playing with the use of the Capo. And lastly was that being a drummer help alot in the rhythm strumming as I had no problems in keeping up with timing. So, the only thing I gotta work on is pressing right keys at the fret board. At the end of the session, my left wrist was literally strained from the bent position that was adopted and even prolonged hours of drumming has never strained my wrist like that! lol. Hmmm..looks like God is putting me in a new secondary musical role to play guitar given the absence of drums. I'll certainly be looking for more opportunities to serve in the guitar region if given the chance!

A miraculous return

2011-03-03T07:03:00.001+08:00

Some of you may recall the loss of my beloved 7 year old pencil case 5 weeks ago. I've been looking at the same spot every week in a row. This same spot is the dark lost and found storeroom which stores all the things that cleaners found lying around in the conference auditorium. Every week without fail before EU lecture on Wednesday, I would pop in to rummage through the things but nothing came up so far. I did that for 3 weeks continuously but nothing was found. So I gave up on the 4th and 5th week. But yesterday was apparently the last week of EU lectures (actually it was not in the end because the lecturer couldn't finish in time and had to drag on next week too). So, in any case, I thought that yesterday would be the last time I would be at conference auditorium, so might as well try for one last time. So I opened the storeroom door as usual, with little hope placed with the same routine and bent down to start feeling some of the pencil cases on the floor. Suddenly, I felt something familiar which I recognise for years. Could it be.....

I pulled the item out and straight away I had a huge exclamation of joy. It IS my pencil case! Wooottss! Thank you Lord! Fortunately I did not fish out some Queen's pounds to buy a new pencil case yet. I did an equipment check and everything looks to be in order with no items stolen. The pencil case was once lost but now it's found. I'll definitely be more careful in the future :)

Blue-faced encounter

2011-03-02T18:38:00.001+08:00

Chelski may be too far off to retain the title but that won't stop them in spoiling the party :(

Man Utd's bad run at Stamford Bridge continues. This fixture is a rather strange one considering that the Blues are virtually out of the title race this season. But they posed the greatest clog in United's march to the title and they have proven so. Fergie had opted to maintain the same away team that smashed Wigan 4-0 for this match and Rooney seemed to be starting a run-up of good performance by putting in a ballistic shot from outside the penalty box to put United 1-0 up in the first half. Everything looked to be in order when half-time approached with consistent pressure being applied to the Chelsea goal and Fernando ain't looking like scoring at all. And in the second half, everything just fell apart. United paid the price for sitting back even by a little. Chelski's very own energy ball David Luiz popped in an equaliser. By the time Zhirkov and Drogba came out, United's attack were almost faded away. Hernandez was outmuscled totally by Terry and Berbatov as a replacement did little to change that. Smalling, who have been performing well in all of the matches that he had started, ran out of credits in the 2nd half and commits a grave mistake by conceding a penalty. Zhirkov capitalised on his inexperience by charging at Smalling's sticking out leg and falling flat on the ground afterthat. Lampard finished the penalty and Chelsea completed a 2-1 comeback. To add a humiliating sucker punch to United, Vidic was sent off in the dying minutes, leaving United in a little center back crisis.

In any case, the away support was fantastic with their "Chelsea Rent-Boy" chants. The few thousand minority were louder than the majority Stamford Bridge fellas who were just sitting there warming the seats. Obviously many of them won't forget Fernando's association with the Scousers, so all the anti-Liverpool chants were rained on him too. Of course, the two jokers on the field are Wayne, who elbowed a Wigan player during the weekend and got away with it and Cashley Cole who shot a poor boy with his air rifle and he got away scot free too..lol.

Honestly, United didn't play too bad in this match. It could have gone either way. They had several chances which could have worked but didn't have the fire in the belly to finish it up. I can spot 2 chances where Rooney had given a diagonal pass across the goalmouth and a incoming charging player could have easily given in a tap in into an open goal. But on both occassions, the charging players did not go all out to chase the ball. Dissapointing result but the week of reckoning is not over yet. There's still Anfield coming up and the Scousers, no doubt are having some sort of erratic form under the Dalglish, could pose a similar threat. The golden question is, who's gonna be filling in the center back with Ferdinand, Vidic and potentially Evans out of the picture. Smalling will definitely have to play, and this leaves either John O Shea or Brown who are capable to take over. In any case, Andy Carroll will look forward in exploiting that soft center.

The results leaves Arsenal 4 points away with a game in hand, which potentially means a point gap in the end. And United, other than going to Anfield, still have to visit the Emirates. However, injury rocked Arsenal can also prove to be shaky where Fabregas, Van Persie and Walcott out and it remains to be seen how they will perform in their remaining sessions. The title which seemed to look like Chelsea's at first, and then to United's later, is now up for grabs again.

Fictional Law

2011-03-01T07:10:00.002+08:00

The past week has rather been quite an uneventful period, with just classic work and work occupying my weekends and weekdays. I would say I finished up alot on the things that I have set out to do, like completing a few articles for my paid writing job, crafting out a birthday present for one of my friends and sending in a global short story competition entry which is organised by the student union. I also took some time to catch up some overdue experience farming run for one of my characters in Guild Wars. So, last weekend was one of the most relaxing and free weekends I have because I've completed lots of stuff already and I'm partially saved by the fact that my dissertation supervisor had not ring the battle calls for the 4th meeting yet. But I bet it's gonna be coming soon and I need to push myself to prepare another further 3000 words again.

The last week or so also saw me receiving my assignment marks back. I was pulling out my hair over a slight miss over the goal mouth which saw my criminology assignment falling short of 1st class by 2 marks. And I was also dissappointed in the assignment marks for jurisprudence which I had expected to get better but in the end, got less than my criminology. Well, both assignment marks are in the 2nd upper class range but I had expected better returns. It seems that after looking through my juris paper, I find it to be a little like the silly last minute goal that Arsenal self-destruct themselves in the Carling Cup Final. It started out well and superb but just couldn't hit the crux when it matters the most, and I'm lamenting the fact that I didn't spot the need to rephrase a couple of issues around to give myself a higher chance to score. But such is the nature of the Arts subjects, and jurisprudence being philosophy is the closest I have to Arts. I felt that I've presented my case which I believed was the strongest at that time of writing but the examiners didn't buy it or see it my way. In Arts, you can either be a genius on one occassion or be a fool in another. It's a random shot. One can only hope that if he's off-mark, it won't fall on the paper or marks that matters. Suddenly, my criminology marks didn't look that bad all, but a mammoth effort is gonna be needed to get my juris back on my targeted goal, especially with law and religion looming around unfavourably. I have to admit, that I get frustrated and pissed off easily whenever I don't meet the high targets and expectations that I set for myself or when things don't go the way I want.

On a brighter note, I've enjoyed a change in module for jurisprudence with the start of Law and Fiction. I've seen more of the familiar faces of Malaysians and Singaporeans joining the class instead of me sitting all alone in the class with Ang Mohs. And I foresee myself becoming good friends with this Law and Fiction module after my experience with English Lit and literary analysis. I hope I can smash as high as possible for this one to make up for the potential deficit in L&R and the assignment. And another thing to look forward to is the end of EU law lectures because this week is the last! Looks like Wednesday is gonna be a free day in the coming weeks!

Wayne's World

2011-02-13T00:41:00.003+08:00

The iconic photo that will stay in the minds of many United fans for years to come

It's a Manchester showdown which I had considered to attend, but declined to do so in the end because I was thinking of saving the money for a bigger Champions League match that is coming. (that is provided United did come out victorious against Marseille..lol) In any case, United faces the strongest City side in the recent decade. Even Dennis Law said its back to the history books when City challenged United for supremacy at the top. City at this point are 3rd while United are at the top and they would definitely be doing itself and the other rivals by clogging Man Utd's charge to the title. Fergie did made a bold decision to leave out Berbatov in favour of a solo Rooney upfront.

From the start, City were determined to make a statement against United. Just inside the 3 minutes mark, David Silva threatened to put City up and he was just inches away from doing so because van der Sar was clearly beaten. The two halves of Manchester continued slogging hard until the 40th minute when Nani did a brilliant run to go on a quick 1 v 1 with the goalie after a superb pass by Giggsy. United entered halftime as the leading side and that was a major psychological boost. However, City sent in Dzeko as a substitute when it was clear that traitor Tevez was doing no good and in the 64th minute, he orchestrated some weird equalizing goal. It was down to luck rather than skill. But nobody would have expected the momentous occassion in the 77th minute featuring Wayne as the main star. Fergie had earlier opted to leave Rooney on the field despite him looking rather like another lacklustre figure on the field and the old Scotsman faith in his striker paid off. In the 77th minute, Nani drifted a ball into the box and Rooney responded by executing a perfect bicycle kick to settle the derby. It was described as the best goal of his career by Rooney and indeed, to execute such an audacious bicycle kick in pressure and during derby is nothing short of a genius footwork. As the old saying goes, form is temporary, class is permanent. For all the trouble that Wayne has gotten himself into earlier in the season, he is slowly winning the Old Trafford faithful back. Even Mancini conceded defeat, because this was a score settled by a moment of brilliance and nothing much could have been done about it.

This win would put United in a prime position to reclaim back the title. City thought they could exploit Smalling and United's dissapointment at a record broken at Wolves but they are severely wrong about that. City at 3rd place is quite far off at 8 points and a game in hand for United. Chelsea were just thrown off orbit with a string of crappy results and they sit dangerously for the first time in many years of losing out in the prospect of qualifying for the Champions League. The amazing thing about this United team is that they played really so crappy and yet by some funny circumstances, their rivals were even more nonsensical than them. Hence, the strange top position that United find themselves occupying since December.

CU Events Week

2011-02-12T01:12:00.003+08:00

It has been a productive week for the Christian Union in the Uni. For the past week, we had events week and had established a free marquee cafe opposite the library. In the afternoons, there are different talks by different speakers on some challenging Christian topics and the public is also invited to ask questions. It reminds me alot of Christian Awareness Week back at Inti 2 years ago. I took the opportunity to help out whenever I can after class by serving drinks, making soup and giving out flyers. There are also programmes in the evening which I attended- Celidh on Monday, movie screening on Tuesday and Alpha Course on Thursday night. Breathe* no longer runs on Thursday anymore as the whole team's effort will be redirected to join up with the CU and other churches for Alpha Course. My table became a really awkward place for a moment because we ended up having 7 Christians and 1 non-Christian. Alpha Course is really basic information on Christianity and of course, if one is a Christian for a considerable amount of time - it would be more of a refresher course rather than anything new. But then I realise afterthat the Alpha course is also a good way to have some starting information on what to tell people about God because there are many times where I don't know what basic ground I should start on. The interesting about Alpha Course is that it looks alot like a chill out session rather than an event organised by a Christian organisation. There's some soft jazz music going on and there's no prayer or any worship session and this should encourage people to ask questions that they don't normally ask. Not only that, there's a free small dinner and lots of mini babybel cheese! This is my first time having it and it's a very unusual cheese snack in the sense that it's a miniature version of a real cheese encased in wax. I was definitely drunk on cheese on Thursday night as I kept munching on them away. I popped by at the Living Room for a moment, something which I had not attended for a very long time because of the clashing of timing with Breathe*. Anyways, the events week run until Friday but I took time off to join up with some of my classmates for a potluck gathering at one of their house. That sums up my week in general..lol.

Chinese New Year Abroad

2011-02-09T19:46:00.004+08:00

It's my first time having Chinese New year outside of Southeast Asia and indeed, it's a very strange experience with no CNY songs being played at shopping centers and no red decorations everywhere. It was business as usual at England. Classes go on and there's work to be completed. And I had my dissertation draft to rush which I had to finish before my meeting with my supervisor yesterday. Anyways, Miss Sucy, one of my law lecturers from Inti came over to Leeds for a visit last week and it was nice of the Uni to arrange some food and a room for us old students to chat with her. That was on a Wednesday evening and it was a time where there was supposed to be a reunion dinner but for some of us, it was a dinner with our motherly lecturer at Picture House. On Thursday night, I went for the last Breathe session of the term before they break off to combine with the CU for Alpha course starting from next week. Afterthat, I popped by for a short visit at Tim and Serena's flat at concept place. On Friday night, the Chinese Church CG had a Chinese New Year potluck gathering, so there's at least one occassion to cheer about in my very first quiet festive period. I also went for the MASSoc dinner at one of the Chinese restaurants on Saturday night, so I had a go at one proto-version of a reunion dinner..lol. The duck was one of the highlights of the dishes and I'm certainly missing roasted pork! I certainly missed the Kluang adventure that I had with some of the ICF folks last year. I would say the general atmosphere for myself for this CNY is more like Chinese Culture Appreciation Week because of the lack of visitation that we do every year. Well, that's life in ang moh land. Gotta make do with that! xD

The Scottish Border

2011-02-06T18:59:00.004+08:00

Another round of thesis rushing, another period of time to have a break. This seems to be a never-ending source of revolution. And once again, I managed to squeeze some time to update on what had happened recently. Anyways, last week, I went to the Breathe* weekend away at the Scottish border. The accomodation was perfectly good with excellent heating compared to the other two that I have went. Teaching was also fantastic but I was slightly dissapointed on the fellowship side because I'm quite surprised that some of the Brits at this camp were much more clique'ish that those in the Christian Union. To be honest, I've actually expected the integration process in the church student group to be better than CU but it didn't happened that way. The good thing is that I was not the only Asian student this time in a Brit Camp as I'm joined by a diverse range of other Chinese - Qing Wei my Malaysian law classmate, Leo from Singapore (who knows Mr Mao and Rachel), Cameryn from Canada, Xinzhe from China and Shin Roo from Taiwan. But looking at the pattern of interaction, the Asian bunch were mostly left alone to interact by ourselves except for some occassions when the pastors sat near us to have a chat. In my case, I knew Jonny and Pete from CU, so I conversed with them most of the time. It gets really tiring to have to take initiative all the time with the Brit Christians and I just felt that not many other international Christians have the patience to hang around. I think it's gonna be a massive mammoth effort to bring awareness to the Brits to embrace and welcome their fellow brothers/sisters from other parts of the world.

In any case, I did bring some postives from the camp. I've enjoyed the natural landscape of the Scottish highland and although it's freezing cold outside, it was worth the walk to see gigantic fir trees and frozen lakes. The other one was much more innate, where I kinda felt that I should get more involved in serving in the international students scene. I find the church's upcoming vision of sharing life in Leeds to be a good one but I felt that there are many international Christians in the city who don't feel a sense of unity and community with the Christians in the host country. More has to be done on the follow-up and a genuine desire to share lives. There are only a small number of dedicated Brits who are willing to work with International students and the majority of them are still very much unwilling to step out. This place is filled with so much of potential, with people from all four corners of the world congregrating in one place. For all you know, that one person may be touched by the Gospel and will be inspired to carry the passion and chain of reaction back to their homelands - if only the hosts are willing to step out from their comfort zone. Oh well, I hope that God will use me in various means to raise awareness of these to those around me.

Farewell Pencil Case :(

2011-01-28T22:19:00.002+08:00

I shall write an obituary for my lost pencil case which has served me faithfully for 7 years. I still can't believe that I could be so careless to leave that in Conference Auditorium 2 after my trial exam! Why didn't I check my bag before I leave the area? I only realised my missing pencil case at 10pm on Wednesday when I was searching for a pen to jot down some cases. That's way after classes have ended. So I checked the auditorium scheduled and apparently there's only 1 class after mine and some long stretch of open day event, possibly for the public. I went to class early the next morning to check CA2 before the first class commences at 9am. It's not there! I was thinking that the cleaners might have passed it to the security guard so I asked the security guard and he pointed me to search in this cupboard filled with left belongings but my pencil case is not among them. So I went back after class, and searched my room once again just in case I might have misplaced it. Not present at all. The last option was to ask the security office today and they too gave a negative reply. I don't have anything particularly valuable inside because I so happened to take out my regular G2 pen and two functioning highlighters outside before it went missing. But the most dear item was the one attached to the pencil case, which is a wooden carved keychain with my name on it and it's similarly 7 years old. I do not know where I can get it again.

I'm really hoping that someone wold return it instead of keeping it because there's nothing worth to keep inside a pencil case filled with loads of used highlighters unless the person who took it is Stanley or knows somebody by the name of Stanley. Ahhhh..I will try from time to time to look at the cupboard again but it seems to be quite futile. Looks like the buck stops here as my pencil case meets its demise in England :(

Liberty Building

2011-01-25T23:46:00.005+08:00

The Liberty Building

The first week term of semester goes underway and the first class up is my first jurisprudence elective which is law and religion. I picked that option since I thought that with some knowledge on the syariah law and also info on separation of church and state, it would be an interesting topic. But I forgot that it may also come with a heap load of cases to memorise and apply. On the night before, I realised in horror that I had just made one of my juris exam questions into a case-based problem. It's as though as I didn't have enough of burden with the cases in evidence and EU Law! A part of me was just wondering what in the world made me chose that option in November when I could just get away with Liberal Theories of Justice. When I looked through the exam questions of liberal theories, it's literally a freestyle question compared to law and religion which required me to do some substantial heavy reading. Argghhhh..I just shot myself in the foot even before exam begins. And when I attended class in the morning, I only saw 1 other Malaysian. It looks like Stan has yet again ended up in an isolated choice which only ang mohs would pick and no Malaysian would consider. Too late to turn back, just gotta make do with what I have.

I had my first look of the new law school building when I went there for my first EU seminar of the semester. It's a very impressive structure with a catchy name (Liberty Building) and I would say a worthy home for law students after being holed up in the old grizzly Victorian cottages at Lyddon Row. The engineers have their own building. The medics have their own building (and multi storeyed too with lifts!). The Business School building is a refurbished modern center. Law students in Leeds have to be contented instead with a cramped undergraduate room and musty old Victorian smell for years. It's like Arsenal shifting form Highbury to the Emirates. I'm indeed fortunate to come at the right time. One of the first noticeable change is we have a super enlarged undergrduate room with glass walls. The reception area looks very welcoming and the roof is also glass panelled to allow natural sunlight to come in. All of my lectures are still all over the place, so the only classes that I have in the Liberty building is on every Tuesday, which is either my EU Law seminar or Criminology Seminar. Oh well, at least better than nothing..haha. Meanwhile, enjoy a few snippets of photo that I've taken from the Liberty Building on my first visit there.

The entrance: Check out the revolving doors..lol

Decoration at the reception

Interior main hallway

Salty Saltaire

2011-01-23T08:42:00.006+08:00

View from the river

I had a half-day trip with Kington, Van and Wai Yi to a small village called Saltaire. My first thoughts when I reached there is that it reminded me of some random small Perak town that you would stop over for a short meal along the highway. Although it's peaceful and seem to be kid-friendly place, I can imagine myself dying of boredom there as a resident. Apparently that village is founded by the wealthy Salt family and they run a textile industry during the olden days. (It has nothing to do with cooking salt..lol) The large textile mill stood looming over the small village and it has since being converted into an art gallery, bookshop and various other shops after some refurbishment following years of abandonment. Saltaire is listed under as one of the Unesco Heritage Site and that explains the crazy long periods that we took to find decently priced food in the village. There's less than 5 eateries available in the village that is fit for lunch consumption. We wanted to go to the riverside pub at first but the fish and chips there are priced at an astounding 10 quid! We finally settled for an underground Victorian tea house and I literally had veggies stuffed up my mouth with my turkey ham sandwich which had more veggie than meat. We went to explore the mill after our meal. It was around 5pm when we decided that we have explored all we wanted at Saltaire and we went back to Leeds to have dinner.

The textile mill

Last few moments of winter break

2011-01-21T07:10:00.005+08:00

This week's Monday and Tuesday were the datelines for my Criminology and Jurisprudence assignments. I've actually hit the panic button right after the Christmas period. I figured out that I shouldn't be maintaining my last minute habits at Inti considering that this is my final year already. With some torturous pushing and discipline, I got my Criminology assignment done with before 9th of January. And I continued slogging through to complete my Jurisprudence, bearing in mind of the 18th Jan dateline. Thank God that I've completed it by around the 16th and tidied up the referencing etc on the 17th. So while people are rushing to complete it in the early morning of 18th Jan, I was busy busting and zapping Zerg on the Planet Char with Jim Raynor. A massive change compared to my old days at Inti..ahahaha.

I'm quite amazed really at how I've managed to complete the two assignments way before time considering that I did not write anything substantial for either papers before the Christmas period at all. In fact, I would term it as something like lazing towards the finishing line. I was attending church and activities as usual, and even spent the whole day at Manchester watching a match and walking around in the city. I took some time off completing my BPTC application and spent time uploading photos and editing videos on Facebook and game for a couple of hours. There are days when I wrote only 100 words and I feel asleep, without doing anything productive for the day and yet I could still come up with the goods at the end of the day. Where did all the time come from? Well, I really thank God for guiding me through and this proves that putting Him first in my life will never put me at a disadvantage. Somehow, there's this deep desire to really want to show some of my peers that I do the same thing as them and get the same amount of busy schedule as them and yet, God is never out of the picture for me. In other words, to put it bluntly, there's really no excuse to skip church. I think it boils down to a question of committment and a little discipline personally in dedicating time for God. I'm quite slackish when it comes to studying and my motto is to study only when I'm called upon or when the war drums of exams are near. Any time other than that, the notes get cobwebs. The result is often I ended up doing some last-minute cramming but still, no such thing as skipping church. In fact, I think church gave me the sense of calmness to study better. So, I really don't understand how some of my peers have difficulty giving a minimum committment in going to church every week, citing busy-ness as an excuse or having something on. What if Jesus comes tomorrow and ask them 'What have you done with the talents I've given you"? Will they tell him that they're too busy to bother? I think there's only a certain amount of guiding and encouragement that can be given. The rest is up to personal willpower. Quite difficult if he/she does not want to change in the first place :(

Ahhhhh..enough of the rantings. Anyways, on Tuesday, I had dinner with Kington and Van at Las Iguanas, courtesy of Kington's 50% discount off from the bill. It's certainly worth to call the expensive dishes with the price the cut and I went with the beef steak fajitas. We also ended up having double cocktails each because of the mis-interpretation of the 2 for 1 offer..haha, but the deal's still good. It's great way to chill out after all the essay assignments and it's kinda like a little celebratory meal time. And then on Wednesday, I went to catch a movie (127 hours) at The Light with them and Wai Yi and the price of the tickets are at 3.30pounds each with the Orange discount. Kington and I could have gotten it for a further reduction at 2.80 pounds student price if I had arrived earlier..lol but still, it's still cheaper than Singapore cinemas at this rate. I thought it was 5 pounds per person originally. At 2.80 pounds for Wednesday movie nights, that's about the same price as our dear cinemas at Mid-Valley or One-Utama on the weekends! Time to start paying attention to more upcoming movie titles at The Light! xD