Lah...

It's amazing... no matter where the students come from, after just one semester of study here, their conversations will be peppered with 'Lahs', 'Lehs', 'Mahs' and the many other different permutations of our Malaysian interjections :) Something to be proud of?

Also, did anyone read the suggestion by one minister to play the Negaraku before movies are shown in cineplexes? I really am so dumbfounded. Rationale being that the appreciation of the national anthem is waning. Now, waning according to? Some people do things very obviously for attention... must have been sad lonely little kids.

It's here!





Hilarious stuff but too quick a read. Finished both books in 20 minutes and at RM26 a pop, not particularly cheap. It's great material for classes so not too bad although it's very difficult to find an answer to the question, 'Why are the cute little bunnies trying to kill themselves?' followed by innocent wide-eyed looks.

Top 10 Things I've Learned from Teaching Children

1. Girls are meaner than boys.

2. Sarcasm is not lost on young children (and they can very easily throw it back).

3. Saying 'No' creates an overwhelming curiosity to find out more.

4. When learning new words, never let children choose their own words from the dictionary unless you are prepared to explain what 'puberty' or 'copulation' is.

5. Girls definitely mature faster than boys do, and that is not necessarily a good thing.

6. Flirtatious nature really begins in childhood, innocent as it may be.

7. Children will do all kinds of things to get attention, including squirting soy milk through their noses.

8. Never give children soy milk until they have finished their work and have cleared the table.

9. Children remembers everything except what you want them to remember.

10. Teenagers may act like adults and even look like one but deep inside, given the chance, they are still very much children.

I love a stocked fridge

Am on leave taking a break from work to focus (albeit unsuccessfully) on my assignments. Ended up spending most of the time going shopping, doing errands, and playing with new bunnies. One good thing though is that I manage to stock up my fridge and am just so happy! Hahaha... I have:

- 24 cups of yoghurt
- 2 kgs of mango
- 2 kgs of grapes
- 4 types of jams, peanut butter and marmalade
- durian!
- 1/2 kg of sandwich meat
- frozen chicken fillet
- pita bread
- frozen chicken pau
- loads of soy milk

and on a different vein, 30 kgs of rabbit pellets. Am a happy happy boy :)

New Bunnies!

This is Mocha, the rambunctious female:



And here's Caramel, the shy reserved bunny with a cleft lip (which I hope has no long term implications):



:) I have also ordered two books: "The Book of Bunny Suicides" and "Return of Bunny Suicides". hehehehe...

Blardy Heck

I was supposed to abstain myself from Yahoo! today because of the Amazing Race Finale tonight and I didn't want the disappointment of knowing the results beforehand. Unfortunately, I forgot and the results were splashed on the front page. DARN IT!

(oh well, at least the winner was the team I was rooting for)

CreativeKids has new team members!

Hilmy and Chun have joined the CreativeKids team kicking off their Conversational English for Adults this coming Monday. They have a family of 5 kicking off and it should be interesting. :) Night classes are now in full swing every day of the week. Now, if I can get someone to do afternoon classes... pretty tough finding a Creative Writing teacher who shares the CreativeKids vision though...

Also, the CreativeKids animal team will be welcoming TWO NEW BUNNIES! :) Hoorah... so excited... they are coming tomorrow. Watch out for pics on Thursday then!

Let's do the boogie woogie...

Life is weird right now. I always feel strangely surreal when I'm peaked out with work. Must be a coping mechanism! Hours and minutes seem to drift by in full stereo colour with dreams maxed out on weirdness, all until I get my work back on track, which in this case will be my assignments. Very far behind but am so close to finish line to give up my quest for HD's... (high distinctions). Thus the curse of the quest for perfect CGPA.... misery...

Talks went well but turnout was lacking. It was kinda like a MMU reunion though what with Aimo, Soph, Chuan, Zeke, Justin, Jon, Hilmy, and GJoe in attendance. Pretty fun catching up :)

Had a massively disturbing dream involving a manhunt, resurrected ghosts of dead soldiers, murder, swamp monsters, huge 4-wheel drives, and bunny rabbits. Strangely though I managed to keep composure and actually enjoyed the dream. Hope I'm not breeding some psycho-derangedness stuff... muahahahahahaha....

CreativeKids is back in marketing action after a 5 months hiatus! 4000 flyers will be out spamming USJ mailboxes this week. Fingers crossed...

Zombie Mode Reactivated

I have to say, I've not been very productive. Read somewhere that guys are horrible at multi-tasking and it seems to be ringing true. The more work I have the less I get done. If only things come to me one at a time. Groan... among the list of things I have in my mental inbox:

1. Finish assignments for Masters.
- one interactive educational website
- 1000 word progress report on website
- 2000 word report on academic evaluations
- 1000 word review on different evaluation aspects, including objectivity, styles, and application.

and that's mostly due in the first week of May... groan...

2. Finish the 500-page LAN documentation by this Saturday. I've done about 50 pages.

3. Prepare the staff for Macromedia Certified Expert training.

4. Resolve the last day of the talks.

5. Prepare CreativeKids syllabus for May.

And on top of all this, there's the usual day-to-day classes, marking, and my parents are coming up this weekend. I am going to die under paperwork... no wonder I'm losing my hair.

Wot u speak?

Student's English fluency is really getting to me. I am making, on average, 1 student cry per fortnight because of my nagging tirades on why they must improve their English. It's getting more than annoying but debilitating. There is simply no way to learn in a class that is conducted in English, in a communication-driven subject like Advertising, and when you have to write reports and proposals. If you ever read of students being thrown down Summit USJ by an insane lecturer, you will know who it is. Muahahahahahahahaha!!!

Anyone wants to teach conversational English?

CreativeKids has been getting a few enquiries on classes for conversational English for adults. I don't have the time to take this class on, so anyone interested? :) If you can spare 2 hours a week and if you feel your 'speaking' is up to par, let me know.

Come one, Come all!

I've been back breaking the whole week getting posters out, invites sent, and things in place so everyone, come come come for the talks! At the very least, there's always the free food :)

Coming?

For more information, visit www.msccollege.edu.my/digitaltomorrow.

Sunrise at a hill in Melaka during Qing Ming...



Sunset at the Kesas toll plaza near USJ...

Caught on AXN

In an episode of The Contender:

"Let's get a drink and have a toast!"

And the subtitles read:

"Mari kita minum dan makan roti bakar!"

What kind of idiots are they hiring to do subtitles? Stupid stupid stupid...

Yawns...

Am sooo sleepy. Been having late nights no thanks to a flurry of assignments. One of them was a group one to develop a WebQuest. What's a WebQuest you say? It's basically a series of web activities to support classroom learning. Anyways, in my group, I was assigned the job of web designing and that was fine by me. In the open critique with the rest of the class, my group was unanimously voted for best web design! Muahahahaha... am so happy... unfortunately good design carries no mark... groan...

One more assignment due tomorrow before I have ONE grand week of rest before the next flurry of assignments shape up. Will be good because I need to plan for a series of talks I'm organising on the 30th. All are welcomed and we will have some of our good friends speaking :) Details to come.

Respect!

I had my group presentations last night for my class Business Management for Designers at The One Academy. I was expecting a dull half-baked affair where students will regurgitate notes to meet the requirements. What happened instead was just a big WOW!

They did:

1. A broadway musical.
2. A hilarious anime-infused modern Wayang Kulit production.
3. A sock puppet show.
4. A shadow play about Britney Spears and the recording industry.
5. A Blair Witch style documentary.
6. A recorded tv soap drama.
7. The life of an animation company (complete with Maya demo).
8. A choral speaking session.

All about Business Management. It was really a tremendous output of creativity, effort and content. I see The One in a much different light and I can't wait for my copy of the recordings so I can watch them all over again!

Tearjerker...

On Saturday night I dreamt of my late colleague. In my dream, it was a regular day in the office after the funeral and out of nowhere, she appeared to me and said,'Goodbye... don't be sad.'

It was such a heartbreaking dream and seemed so real. Even in passing she's worried about the rest of us. Sigh... but strangely, I feel so much better now to at least have had the opportunity to say goodbye, even if it was a figment of my overactive imagination.

Goodbye Yeen... take care...

After effects

Work is getting some semblance of normalcy... cremation was yesterday so the funeral ceremonies are finally over for us. Quite touching to see how many turned up. Posted emails to staff and student to gather and over 100 turned up. A convoy of over 30 cars drove in unison to the home. Quite a spectacle, too bad didn't have a camera with me.

Anyways, moving on from it. Being home alone last night was quite an experience though. Am such a big chicken.

On other things, went to AMP Radio yesterday to tidy up college's radio ad. The place is quite impressive and I saw the recording booths for all the stations! Sheepishly waved at Richard Ng and Shazmin though only Richard waved back :) Cheap thrills...

Recording engineer who assembled our clip was darn competent. Fingers flying all over the editing console. Incredible. What he did in 3 minutes I would have taken 30... Respect...

And voice over artist was darn cute... sigh...

Transience...

In each of our lives, there are always those who seem to be placed here on Earth for reasons greater than life. They breathe joy into those needing it, stand as pillars of support when all about are in turbulence, and through it all, they seek out the treasures of hope within us all.

My colleague, Yeen, is a person like that. Her presence is not just seen but felt. Her laughter ripples through all the tiredness, stress, and apathy we sometimes feel at work. Her outlook of life raises us up to greatness... a leader leading by light. Sadly, this morning, she has left us... at the youthful age of 28.

It is a very raw moment for all of us, as each of us has been touched by her kindness and grace, and now, her friendship remains but a memory. Like me, she was a graduate of MMU, 2 years my senior. She had plans to marry and she wanted to leave her work to take time to enjoy life. It feels unjustified and unreal and all of us who know her are creeping towards the reality of it all.

Times like these, the transience and fickle nature of life strikes loud and clear... I just feel privileged to have known her and to have the honour of calling her a friend. She will be missed and always remembered....

Insanely entertaining, especially if it's true!

Check it out: http://www.zug.com/pranks/powerbook/index.html

Also, Popular Bookshop in The Summit USJ is having a clearance sale and by sale I mean SALE!!! Great books with 90% discounts and the Lord of the Rings box set for only RM29.90! That's cheaper than a single book! Great stuff... in an hour I bought 60+ books for only RM270... most at 90% discount which means I saved RM2500 :) Go check it out... good books are going fast!



My mini library, of which about 80% has been stocked by shopping visits to the Popular clearance sales!

And a snapshot of two of my colleagues :)

Who am I?

Thanks to Chun, I've spent 5 minutes of my life doing this:

Take the quiz at dicepool.com

Hehehehe... :)