Ants Vs Me

A new clean home is usually free of pests like ants and cockroaches. It was probably due to the persistent paint and cement smell which was more endurable by humans.

But after 2 years of occupying this house of mine, i begun to see new unwanted visitors. The cockroaches remain shy from entering but the ants are a bit thick-skin. They took a taste of my bread, my candies, my snacks without my permission. What’s worst is, they have also decided to make my house the perfect place to live in; especially the area around my dining table — far from the kitchen!

Seriously speaking, i’ve been observing the ant colony’s movement for weeks but yet i couldn’t trace where the source of their nest is. They might be migratory ants but who knows. Sometimes they appear in the toilet, sometimes in the kitchen….
The usage of Combat Ants Stick Pads all over the place yielded a fruitless harvest. None of the ants took up the bait. Perhaps i should go and buy an Ant tunnel (think can buy from Science Centre) and trap them inside for good!

Credit: Ant Pic from mwkw

Saturday

New Shirt

I wore my new shirt today. This new shirt looked kind of weird on me. It’s pretty long but it matches my tights well. The words imprinted on it are ‘Love All But Trust a Few‘, so short yet so true.

Lovely Colleagues

Today is not our usual Saturday. On normal Saturday mornings, we usually went over to my in-laws place for lunch. But today, we were invited to a colleague’s place for lunch. In the past, i had never been close to colleagues, nor have the mood to go out with them etc.. To me, work is just work and colleagues are just people that i usually mingle around discussing work-related stuffs.

However, the colleagues whom I’ve made here seemed very different from those I’ve known in other industries. I can feel their sincerity to know more about one another. When one of us is in great distress, the rest will help out no matter how tied-up they are in their own work. What’s more strange is, they don’t like to claim credits. Whenever they’ve given a great idea/solution to me, they will make remarks like ‘Please don’t ever tell boss this is my idea k? Thanks‘. Will you see this kind of reaction in other places? Rare.

Probably the absence of competitiveness in the workplace contributes greatly towards this kind of phenomenon.

I really treasure this bunch of colleagues

On Course

I am on course these two days. Ah, i really loved this course. It’s on Basic Systems Thinking held at Civil Service College. The instructor is really a jovial guy and he is one of those rare facilitators or lecturers that could actually keep me awake for 8 hours! I always fell asleep during lectures/tutorials during the Uni days. I find most of them boring. Usually, 80% of what was being taught went into one of my ears, and 60% went out via the other ear.

Entertainment aside. What’s best about this course is, it has NO EXAMS! Things will be real different if there are exams right? I would most likely spend a huge chunk of the time ‘memorizing’ and taking down whatever the instructor says without actually deciphering what he really meant. That was the trouble of the education system during my time. It has trained all of us to be exam smart- to the point where we ace in studies, got the best grades but seriously lack in creativity and human skills.

Right now, i noticed that most of the exams had evolved over the years. The new examination styles are crafted in such a way that there’s no way a student could regurgitate whatever they have memorized.

One of the famous styles is:

The Open-Book concept

I detest this to the core! The exam papers are real tough. Open book concept sounds like a godsend exam for people who simply cant memorize things for nuts since secondary 2 like myself. Ah-hem. But, what’s the use of open book when there’s nothing you can refer?? I used to bring in all the tests papers, thick textbooks into the examination halls for open-book papers, but 99% of the time, there’s not enough time to even touch those resources. It takes me 30 seconds to find the page that i want to refer and another 5 mins to digest the information. Those minutes are important in the exam!!

Aww.. i think i still prefer close book examinations. They seemed to be easier.

Kiss Him Goodbye

After reading the horrifying adventure of the The Ruins, i guess it’s time for a refreshing change. I borrowed a new book entitled Kiss Him Goodbye from the library and i learn a few things from it:

• Do not over-rely on a boyfriend who has yet to make a serious commitment
• Do not doll yourself too much just to please the guy. Show him your true self!
• One needs to have a goal in life. Be it BIG or SMALL
• Enjoy and meet more friends
• Take things easy…
• blah blah blah …. shall skip the spoiler

What i like about this book is, it makes me reflect upon my past relationships-with people. Over the years, I’ve grown from a hopelessly dependent-on-people girl to a more independent individual.

I guess there are times when a girl still needs to be vulnerable and dependent. For me, it’s really tiring to be independent all the time.

Occasionally, i do love to snuggle at some comfort zone, with people around me doing things for me.

Picture from Antani77

Graduation 2008

My third batch of students graduated successfully today. How time flies, i had been with this school for 3 years ++ and i’ve taught hundreds of students here. Most of them managed to find a good job; be it part-time, contract or full time. 

It’s nice to see how one grows up in the school system. When they first entered as Year 1 students, the kids were so innocent and shy. Upon reaching their third year in school, they begun to build up confidence in their presentation skills and are able to justify and bring their ideas across in the classrooms.

As their teacher, I do grow up together with them too. And i do not deny that i do learn useful things from the students too. During my course of teaching, I’ve met students who are older than myself. I am truly inspired by them.

I still remembered how i stammered in front of the students during lesson  time on my first day of work. :)  The students, upon knowing this fact, encouraged me to speak ‘properly’ by paying their utmost attention.  So sweet of them. 

Though most of them are not top-notch students in Singapore, i could see that some of them really put in a lot of hard work to make up for what they have not achieved in the past.

For those who had done well, i really want to congratulate them. 

For those who did not do very well,  i hope they do not give up. I believe that if they put in an extra effort, they can do well too. 

Let’s hope this batch of students can do well and be successful in the working industry. :) 

Koibito Yo

Just finished watching this drama series. A very nice, slow and unique romantic show talking about 2 main couples. The relationships between them is so complicated that it can never happen in real life. (I hope?)

Description From DramaWiki: Just hours before two different couples (Manae & Ryotaro : Shoko & Kohei) take their vows, Manae and Kohei discover an untold secret of their spouses-to-be. While they are pondering over their decisions, they meet each other and become friends. Their friendship then extends after their marriages with Manae taking the initiative of choosing her home beside Kohei’s. This move is certainly not to Ryotaro’s advantage, as he is Shoko’s ex-boyfriend and the child she is carrying may be his!

Short Spoiler: The ending is kind of sad.. and i never like sad and draggy dramas. This show has deeply touched my inner self and i will give it a rating of 3 out of 5.

Time to save electricity and water bill

The cost of electricity is on the rise again. This time, they are going to rise it up to 5%! Crap! If only my salary increases at the same rate. *rolleyes*

This makes me even more determined to continue to save and conserve energy in my home.

Some habits i’ve developed over the years on saving up on the water/electricity bill, some of which are influenced by my wonderful mum:

• If you do hand-washing for your clothes, reuse the water by using it to flush toilet between uses. For the water that was used in rinsing the clothes the second time, you can use it to wash rugs or shoes.
• Switch off the lights if not needed. [This is something i must accustom to as i am afraid of the dark]
• Use energy saving bulbs/light tubes
• If you are using your computer and listening to the music on a high end hi-fi at the same time, i suggest you play the music via your computer instead.
• Switch off the fish oxygen pump when not needed. Use a lower end pump for the fish tank.
• Only watch your favourite show on tv and don’t waste time watching those crappy shows.
• Only boil water when needed rather than to use an electric flask that auto-boils itself every now and then.

If you have any other ideas on conserving water/electricity, feel free to email me and i will post it up here.

A trip to Pengerang (Sungei Rengit)

We arrived at Changi Jetty at around 9.15am, and could only get on the bumboat at around 10am. I had the sense of déjà vu when i arrived at the jetty. I saw the familiar arrival and departure hall. I saw the usual queue for boats heading for Pulau Ubin. Nothing’s change after so long – around 3 years?

The queue for Pengerang was kind of strange. It wasn’t as straight forward as Pulau Ubin. The boat owner will only set off when there is a maximum number of 12-13 passengers for his boat. No more or less in number unless the passengers are willing to pay more. They charge us $8 per pax now. It used to be just $7.
The journey to Pengerang was a smooth one, with only the exception of the arrival of unwanted ‘visitors’. The bumboat was stopped by a Police Coast Guard and a few police officers actually came down to search our boat for a very wanted man.

Anyway, we arrived at our destination safely and managed to eat our seafood lunch at Jade Garden Seafood restaurant situated at the town centre of Pengerang- Sungei Rengit. We had to take a cab from the jetty to that place.

I really enjoyed going trips with this clique. I feel so comfortable with them. Even though there might be quiet times when we are together, rather than feeling awkward like how I felt in other groups; I felt a sense of peace and mutual understanding. Who says a nice and close group must laugh and be crazy all the time? We need quietness sometime too.

Picture from the drama series “Friends”

Looking forward to many trips in the future.

In a mood for cooking

I have not whipped up a meal at home for the past 2 months. Reason being that i was tied up with work, preparing for the tour, meeting up with friends etc *excuses* … I had promised myself to cook at least one decent meal at home on weekends but things did not turn up as well as it seemed.

The cooking bug struck me yesterday night (probably also triggered by a MSN conversation with a work buddy) and i urged Hubby to get some fishballs from a nearby supermarket before lunch today.

I simply had enough of packed dinners and lunches. The food sold outside was horrible. Full of MSG and oil.

So there, i had made lunch.

The RUINS, a movie

oh boy, they are releasing a movie on The Ruins - the book i had just read recently, on 4th april 2008 (US time)

I wonder when will the movie reach Singapore. I would love to see it. Sometime, it’s not nice to read the book first before the launch of the movie. You already knew what’s going to happen next and you will probably ended up comparing the book’s content with the movie’s.

More often than not, I’ve got better ‘imagination’ reading the books than what’s showing in the movie itself, and that’s reassuring to know

We shall see what happen when this movie is launched in Singapore.