Stop to think

What are things that are special to me?

When you ask yourself that question, what's the first thing that pops into your mind?

To be honest, for me, the first thing I thought about was "Friends. Definitely my friends.". However, when I stopped to think for a while, I questioned, "Why didn't I think of my family first?"

Did I, subconsciously, place my friends in higher regard than my family? No, I don't think that's quite the reason.Was it then, that I thought my family wasn't special? A mother, a father, and sisters. Teachers; white collared workers. Maybe that's why, when you look at it that way, my family just seemed normal. But I doubt that's the reason as well. Maybe it was because, it was understood that every family is special and therefore, when you asked "What's special?", "family" was excluded from the answer because, well, it's a given that family is special. A "well, duh" kind of answer, so nobody bothers to think of their family first.

But that's not true. I admit, when I really thought about it, my family was nothing special. They may not be rich, they may not be poor, but we get by. But that's beside the point: they're my family, and that's all that matters, isn't it? They don't have to do anything to be special, because family is always special.

Another few days in K. Lumpur

After extending my stay from Wednesday to Saturday to hang out with some of my friends...

***

On Friday morning, Mr Manan (my uncle's driver) and I went to pick Glenn and Thim Seng up from the Bukit Jalil bus station. Then, he dropped us off at Sunway Pyramid (we had to lompat pagar, lols) and we started walking around. After a few message exchanges with Jia Lin (I sent a message to her, and she replied to Glenn. ... ... ), we met up with her. And you know, the first thing she said was, "Hey Foo! You've cut your hair." I don't remember when, I don't remember why, and I sure don't know how she was influenced to do it, but she started calling me Foo! as per Isaiah. Well, never mind that. It's not like I'm... not okay with it.

At any rate! After gathering, we walked around some more, stopping by sports shops along the way, and moseyed on to the directory. After some shirking of responsibilities, we finally decided on eating at Dragon-I. Well, the food there was.... not as good as I expected it to be (or maybe because I had too high an expectation). I ate.. er... braised pork La mian? Glenn and Thim Seng both ordered some other variations of the La Mian. Jia Lin ordered the small soupy pao. (Correct me if I'm wrong, but xiao long pao?) Also, Glenn and I ordered the Dragon-I specialty drink, Dragon-i. It was... well, my first impression was air bandung. But when I drank more, it actually tastes pretty good.

After eating, Jia Lin exchanged some messages with Jasmine (she was in Sunway with her, well, according to Jia Lin, other friends.) She couldn't join us, sadly. At any rate, we walked around some more and then decided to go Ice Skating (Thim Seng really didn't want to go. HAHA) We bought RM5 gloves at Daiso (as opposed to RM8 from Sunway) and went skating.

Ice skating. I wonder what I should say about it. Fun? Well, yeah. I guess it was, once you left the safety of the wall and started... skating. We took a few photos (not all of us could be together in the same picture, because, well, technically we shouldn't have been snapping photos while skating). Jia Lin fell down once, but it wasn't a really bad fall. After a few hours, (I think it was about 90 minutes), all of us went out of the ring and sat down. Jia Lin needed to go back, and so we parted ways at about... 4:40pm. I took off my skating shoes and damn, not only were my socks dirtied, but my feet were totally in pain. We (Thim Seng, Glenn and I) were all walking funnily for a while after that.

The Three Great Guys

Dude give me some support!

After that, we went to meet up with Matthew Lee and Matthew Chan ( did I mention we took the scenic route to meet them, despite our legs hurting so much?)

We walked over to Sunway University and rested a while in the library's discussion room (we were talking quite loudly). Then, we followed Matthew Chan's car and went to Taylor's University. There, we met up with Vincent, Zhong Wei, Sebastian, Han Yang and Aaron. Then we went to eat dinner at er.. some Pan Mee restaurant. We were later joined by Carol, Jasmine, and... Karen?

*Carol sat beside Glenn.

The food was, well, hmm, average. But it wasn't too pricey so I guess it was alright. After sitting down and chatting for a while, they (namely Teng and Han Yang and Jasmine and everyone else who were studying) needed to continue studying til 11pm, we separated. Sebastian stayed back with us (What a guy ♥) and let us crash his room for a while.

*Glenn accompanied Carol back to her room.

In Sebastian's (shared) room, we met Alex, one of the room mates from Johor. He was a pretty cool guy, who invited us to swim with him at 11pm at night. Hah, joke.

Not wanting to bother Sebastian any longer (he wanted to study too, I guess, because after we left he grabbed his student ID and went to the library), we followed Glenn's cousin's car back to his house and stayed there for the night.




***

More to be updated soon.

4 (good) days spent in K. Lumpur.

Long post, and some photos coming up probably.

Sunday morning, slightly shy of 10am, I followed my uncle up to Kuala Lumpur, Le Capital City of Malaysia. Well, since it was Sunday, most of the universities were probably not opened. So, I picked up a good book (Tuesdays with Morrie) and finished it. My uncle's family brought me to dine at Chilli's Bar and Grill, in 1Utama. I must say, they really ordered too much. Since, besides my uncle, I was the only guy, I was (somewhat) forced to eat everything. Sadly, I couldn't finish everything, though I think I did justice to most of the food.

[Photos coming here]

The next morning, I got up at 8am and had my breakfast. I ate roti canai. After that, my uncle and I went to Taylor's to enquire (inquire?) about the A-levels there. I thought of meeting Carol there, since she said she was free, but by the time my uncle and I were done, she was busy again. Then, I met Jasmine. We spoke a while, but I didn't want to hold her up, so I bade her farewell after a minute or so. (I forgot to wish her Happy Valentine's, sadly. And I still owe her a drink.)

Then, my uncle and I head back for lunch. Chinese Hawker food. After that, we went to HELP to enquire about the A levels there too. At night, we went to The Gardens of Mid Valley Megamall. Really, we wanted to eat at the Garden restaurant, but we were turned away because they reserved lots of tables for couples only. Sad. Then we went to Tony Romez, and they too, only served couples that night. Finally, we went to the German Beerhaust. Ate lots of MEAT over there man, til I was nearly sick, to be honest.

Tuesday, I realised, was a public holiday. Still, my uncle and I went around to INTI and it was opened. We talked about the American Degree Programme ( or Program, in US).

Will be continuously updated.

Taylor's and HELP University

Today my uncle brought me around to look at universities. But we spent too much time at Taylor's and HELP, we didn't really get to look at the others, which wouldn't be neccessary, according to my uncle, as the top universities for A levels are generally these two. And even between them, the A levels are completely different. Taylors are doing Cambridge A levels (CAL) and HELP is doing London Board of Examinations A levels, or EDUXEL.

At any rate, in the morning, I got up and got ready, our first stop was Taylor's. When I reached there, I was planning on meeting Carol (she said she had a break in 20 minutes). I went to the Enquiry and Admissions office, and was introduced to a certain Mr. Koh. He was very helpful, explaining to me and advising me on what subjects would be preferable to take for A levels, and to which universities I may further my studies in later on. Basically, his suggestion was, to take Maths, Further Maths, Physics, and Economics. That way, I could st ill do engineering if I so feel like it, and I could also do Economics( and try to be rich), and maybe go to LSE (London School of Economics). The problem was, Taylor's didn't offer those subjects in the March intake, meaning I had to give up Further Maths in lieu of Chemistry. So, according to his suggestion, I should enroll this Wednesday, and join the classes of the January intake. His reasoning was these: You would only be behind them for 15 days, in which, if you put in extra effort, could catch up easily. And, your classes would be only from 8-3.30pm, instead of going for a March intake ( and have classes until 5 or 6pm everyday for 6 months). We spoke for roughly 2 hours, albeit less.

When we were done, I messaged Carol again, but she said she already had classes. Oh well, I thought that I would like to see at least a friend in Taylor's, since many of them went there. However, (and much to my delight), on my way out, someone called me.

"Terence! !" she shouted from across the building (literally), looking flustered and carrying a myriad of things. There was Jasmine, smiling(?) and on her way to her next class, I presumed. I spoke with her for a while, maybe a minute or so, but I didn't want to bother her (were those her friends waiting for her a little bit up the stairs? I didn't really pay attention). After a few minutes (maybe it wasn't even a minute), I bade her farewell, to which she replied, "See you soon."

"See you soon", eh?


After that, my uncle and I went to have lunch. The food in KL isn't that much more expensive than in Melaka, but I think it taste better. Or at least, the food I ate tasted better.

Then we went to HELP University College. I was informed that HELP is the biggest A levels centre in the world for the EDUXEL A levels programme. Halfway through, another counsellor came and started talking to me. He shared my interests in books and literature, and gave me a lot of questions to ponder on. He said that, education isn't about knowledge. It's about character building, it's about the process that leads to the knowledge (why does this seem so familiar?) His name was Mr. Lee. He spoke with an accent, that was, at first, hard to understand. However, he and I were very much alike, in many ways. In the end, we talked alot about books and the wonders that they brought. However, he also advised me on what I should do, which is to make an imformed decision, that is, to do a lot of research on the various choices that I might make, and be able to say confidently, "Yes, I choose this path," and be able to say why I didn't choose the other. Critical thinking.

All in all, today has been a very insightful day. I learnt a lot, and met a great person. Today would be the second day that I am staying at my uncle's house. There really isn't much to do here, so I bury myself in books. Lately, I've been reading quite a number of Mitch Albom's books. They really are great, and I really should have picked them up when Jasmine recommended them to me about a year ago. Another author that has caught my interest is Nicholas Sparks. And thankfully, since my cousins are all big readers, my uncle has a collection of such books all in his house.

Morning Jog #2 (?)

Ahhh... too tired... wait... 10.1k steps this morning.... will update.. later.

I got up at 6:30am; bathed and changed, reached the fields on top of DP at about 7.05am. Met Isaiah at roughly 7.08am, and we walked over to Glenn's. Reached approximately 7:40am give or take 5 minutes, Glenn was bathing, so we asked his mother to tell him to go to Jasmine's. Walked to Jasmine's house, saw Jia Lin walking there too. Met up with Jasmine and Jia Lin, and we started to jog (less than 1 minute again, this time, I think). Glenn rode a motorcycle and joined up with us, for a while. We walked along the sea side again, stopping by CCS for a while, before Jia Lin brought us to a store. The MoFoS. HAHAHA. At any rate; Jia Lin treated all of us to breakfast (Glenn rode off to school then) and then we walked around some more. I felt a little bad, because I still owed Jasmine a drink (refer to the chat box), but then again, maybe I'll treat her to something better another day.

We went to a playground, then Jasmine, Isaiah, and I rode on the swing( I-Z was totally shaking the whole swing), Jia Lin just sat down. (She was tired). Then, Isaiah found an old ( and probably dirty) ball, which we used to effectively play basketball/netball. After a few 1-on-1s with I-Z (which I lost), I invited Jasmine and Jia Lin to join us (Jasmine was a netball player). It was... hilarious, to say in a word. But it was most definitely fun. Jasmine was explaining to us the rules of netball, and we decided that it was just too stiff, so we made a hybrid of it, mixing some netball rules and basketball rules together.

After about half an hour or so, the Sun came up, and since I was wearing totally black, from the tip of my head to my toes, it was hot. We walked (in the Sun, ugh) over to Jia Lin's house, where Jasmine commented that Isaiah and I seem to "have conversations that nobody else could understand". After reaching Jia Lin's house, we washed our hands and helped ourselves to some 100plus (courtesy of Jia Lin, again). Then, she brought us upstairs (the stairs were really scary) and showed us some of her photos. Then, we went to her room and Isaiah took some stuff from her computer. Then, she challenged me to a typing speed competition, which I won (at 75WPM, I think). After that, we took a few photographs together, when Jasmine had to go back. We followed Jasmine's car back to her house, after thanking Jia Lin and her family. Then, we (Isaiah and I) took our farewells of the Lady Boss (she is going to Taylor's the next day, to study). It was a rather emotional moment for me, I guess.

Then, my father picked Isaiah and I up, and we went back home.

Simply fish is simply expensive.

Ugh.. another one to my load!

Happy (Chinese) New Year!

Oh damn, another long post, and I haven't even finished my other one yet!~