Dance competitions

It was such a long while since I last competed. Peter said, just pray that you are able to give your best and let God judges.

Tomorrow, there will be a dance competition in Shangri-La hotel...Asia Pacific Dance Masters. I'll participate in line dance category, my very first time... interesting fact about line dance is that, the choreography can be read from something called "step sheet". Hence, internationally a piece of music is danced in similar way.

On July 15, there will be ballroom competitions held in Shangri-la hotel. Somehow, I still dreaded to go for Latin dance competitions. I will rather sit on the audience seat and enjoy the dances, music, people and cheers for the performance. Well, I shall not seize praying and honour God for whatever happens, hope the same for you too ;).

Money Money Money

I have just been to a networking dinner of a special ceremony. The attendees are mainly entrepreneurs, corporate leaders, some 'secret' top official, professors etc. Furthermore, the table I joined in, was reserved mainly to people, which, for some reason has to be a millionaire. Although I never thought it's hard to earn the first million ringgit (not if I stick to what I was doing), somehow hmmm...the whole night I was feeling uneasy, I'm just a nobody there! Oh yes, I went all alone for a different mission.

This person who is an author himself was telling me and another single woman how smart his niece is, by marrying a rich man. He said his comment to her was, "Gal, you are the smartest in our family, it took me 10 years to be this rich, and it only took you 2 years." I responded, "If one don't earn his/her way in getting something, he/she won't attain the great joy from the achievement." He said "Then just enjoy your husband lah." I actually find the phrase quite sticky. Ah, who does not wish a fairy tale come true.

On an unrelated occasion, I was talking to Eva about saving fuel.
Eva: "With your 'influence', I start to drive slower, and use free gear when going down slope."
She is currently in a very tight budget for everything BUT facial make-up gadget and pedicure etc.
Me: "As the house I live, is on the peak of the slope, I too use free gear to slide down, either to the studio, or to the shopping complex on the other end."
Eva: "Gosh, you are not driving the car, but rolling, to the destination!"

We talked about money sometimes, some good tips for her before she start working after graduation. As for me, no choice, I'm on 'early retirement'... muahaha.

By the way, the networking dinner, my mission has got nothing to do with finding richman husband.

Trying to relax

I feel really apologetic while writing this entry... you know I know lah. So sorry for no updating for 3 months! My buddy Eva nagged me a few times, trying to make me feel as guilty as possible.

In brief, I'm still jobless. Don't ask how's my job hunt, because I didn't and don't plan to look for job. Am I being "sponsored" by some guy? No! Crazy ah?! How to close one eye and sleep with the man that you don't love? And if you thought you'd wish to have a father like of mine, hmm...honestly I'd tell you I despise people that takes advantage of others.

I'm relying on my savings since, still in the midst of working out something. Something err... that's known between my close friends, family, and of course, God and I. Something I dream of doing since year 2003 while I was still working in UK. And then, the rest of my time is all about dancing.

Right now I don't have a laptop, so I got online less frequently. Actually I'm quite tensed, activities like blogging seems like a luxury, so are shopping, yumcha and travelling etc. I am alone most of the time, doing things that I like, I'm feeling excited and nervous for the new experience. I think and worry a lot, but good thing is I pray more often.

I've started serving in the church's children ministry, and another ministry which is about to start. Nothing to shout about. But at least I'm happy doing it. The rest of my time which I enjoy most is spending time with my niece, she's such an angel. She inspires me in many ways and she's my best 'tranquilizer'.

I'm not sure whether my cholesterol level has any improvement. I thought, getting myself relax is the best remedy.

My friend who just resigned and got a new job said, "走出去就有路，明天会更好". I truly believe so. I thought to myself, things will always be better especially when you follow God's plan.

Blend in some flavor of shanghai

I decided to get myself blended in some shanghai flavor. So i took the courage to have my hair permed. Then I got my hair stylist colored and highlighted them. I love my new hair look!

They were really professional, I enjoyed the service so much in the salon. The hair wash, cut, blow, "digital" perm, color, color highlight and hair treatment (plus hand massage, which was done for fun), all should cost near RM1000 in a good salon in Malaysia, and I paid a quarter of it after some bargaining...what a deal! Not too bad my negotiation skill!

The salon is in the middle of Zhejiang Rd, in between NanJing Xi Rd and FuZhou Rd. Fayuandi, tel 021-63506609. Must look for the hair stylist Ah Qi, he did a great job on my hair cut, and my favourite perm + color expert is Yan Jie, a lovely 'boy'. He kept bugging me to insist for the color highlight because he is so convinced that it will look fabulous with it although I knew he gained nothing from doing it...Friendly people!

If I were to find any fault, it will be that they keep talking to me, leave me with no rest. But in return, I got to learn from them some of the names of food and animal in the pictures I took. I shared with them my latin dance video too...haha. I did have a great time, though I spent 6 hours in the salon...from 1.30 to 7.30!

Mavic, my brother was shocked to see me. He blamed me for over spending. But then he commented that my old hairstyle makes me look old...kaka! Ah, it just make my day!

Some of my Shanghai pics are in http://flickr.com/photos/conniexan

Shanghai

Hello from Shanghai!

Went for a day trip to ZhouZhuang today. It is a village surrounded canals. There are boats on the canals, selling goods, and mostly filled by tourists for sighseeing purpose.
Here's my picture for sneak preview :-P
More to update!

By the way, the weather is ok, but it's too cold. About 0-9 Celcius. I shiver through the windchill.

Preparing for Shanghai trip

Will be in Shanghai for 12 days. My flight is at tonight 1am. I bought the tickets from MAS during a fair for RM1400, tax inclusive. Since my accommodation in Shanghai is dealt with - to bunk in my brother’s small apartment, I have only to worry about the journey itinerary.

I’ve got some RMB (china currency) in hand, the conversion rate is 2 times of Ringgit, and will be bringing along some USD. My poor brother is working like a cheap labor there (as a graphic designer in an advertising firm), hence our Hangzhou 2 days-trip likely I will have to sponsor him too. The rest of the 10days I still got to plan the itinerary and do lone travel.

Wasn’t excited about the trip at first. Just plan for a get away and leave my troubled mind behind. I’ve tendered my resignation to my job, as of good will, my manager decided to hold the post till I get back for a final decision. I’m rather lost for what I want to do next, none of the ads in the papers sound attractive to me. But that doesn’t mean I will stay for the current job. Still feeling depress over my past relationship, I packed my travel suitcase with a heavy heart. That’s a lot of question marks for my next life journey…at least I have some thing to look forward for now.

It’s a surprise discovery when I found out about the Latin dance scene in Shanghai, the LatinGroove site tells how popular the event is, in Shanghai.

Anyway, the history tells that during its heyday, Shanghai was the place to be -- it had the best art, the greatest architecture, and the strongest business in Asia. With dance halls, brothels, glitzy restaurants, international clubs, and even a foreign-run racetrack, Shanghai was a city that catered to every whim of the rich. But poverty ran alongside, and many of the lower-class Chinese provided the cheap labor that kept the city running.

(quoted from fodors)

Hence I packed my dance shoes along, hoping to get some fun from the nightlife in Shanghai. OK lah…u can call me gatal, whatever.

What I have in mind is:

Day 1 in French Concession for a walk in backstreet for sight of faded 1930s architecture, boutique shopping at ShanXi, and maybe silk market at Dongjiadu. I was thinking of buying or tailor made a qi pao (cheong Sam), then spend the night in a Salsa club.

Day 2 started from a stroll in Bird and Flower market near Renming square, maybe visit Shanghai Museum, shopping at the famous NanJing Dong Lu, ended up at the bund for the beautiful night scene, and hopefully on the river night cruise.

Day 3 to Day 5 will be spent on sightseeing trip in JiangSu, places like ZhouZhuang (Venice alike), TongLi, and WuZhou, SuZhou. If it’s safe, I probably stay over in NanJing. There are sightseeing tours with a guide departing daily from Shanghai. So, I hope I could just hop in and follow without much planning and thinking.

Day 6 is a Saturday. Brother will be joining along to HangZhou. We’ll be back on Day 7. And hopefully I got a chance to go to Zapatas. Oops did I say it’s a latin clubbing night? :-P

Day 8 – I will goto Yuyuan garden, have some snacks at bazaar, and sip tea at the teahouse. Might take a stroll to DongTai Lu for antique market. If you read the Star newspaper, you will see the beautiful picture of Yuyuan garden decorated with lanterns, with light reflected from it’s lake.

Day 9 – 11, haven’t got a firm plan. Places I have in mind to visit will be JiaDing, SheShan, Hongkou district for the Synagogue, DuolunStreet etc.

Day 12 journey to home! (Uh..my heart drops when I write to this point)

Most of my travel reference were made from Lonely Planet (I borrowed the China’s from my friend Alwin), and Virtual Tourist, an awesome travel guide website!

Well, wish me a safe journey yeah…I shall share my journal with you when I get back, with loads of photos of course!

Create an image using mandarin orange skin

I got tagged by AceOne118 because he jia ba pang sai eng eng (hokkien, go figure). He was part of the trail in blogsphere tagged to create a mandarin orange art. It was very "thoughtful" of him to tag me along.

He introduced me by saying I look like Charmaine Sheh wor. Erm...tell me what you think lar. He also said my blog ada macam macam. My explanation would be that, it reflected how complicated I am loh, I am a female, an engineer and a dancer, that's why.

Anyway, this year I end up not eating a mandarin orange, but peeled one. This one is rotten which I found from the beautiful basket in my living hall. It's the 6th day of Chinese New Year, that's why!

In fact I was tempted when I spotted the big fat green pamelo. With the pamelo skin, I will be able to create all the members of Journey to the West including the monk, monkey, sandy and pigsy...But I end up with only Zhu Ba Jie the pigsy. The smiling pig resembles to that in the picture of my previous entry.

Note that it has a black patch on the right corner of eye, it says that it's rotten :-P


The headache part is really who to tag now.

Angel Blue is my "virtual" friend..a faithful one. Known him from mybloglog community, he's from taiwan. I bet he can find a mandarin orange easily.

Eva is my "real world" buddy ji mui. She's a dancer by profession, but now she's back to college life, choked by heaps of assignment n tests. She loves ranting...lol

Instructions from AceOne118:
First you get some mandarin orange skin to peel, make funny object out of it (preferably those related to CNY!). Then take pictures and post in your blog then tag another 3 more unfortunate folks (I managed two).

So AceOne, happy mou? My art is more innovative because got black patch one wor.

You are special, and that attracts…

I have only joined mybloglog two weeks back. This online networking community is mobbed by many blog members, and it started to get me busy.

At first it is rather impressive. Happily I go commenting and befriending, suddenly my network increases, and I discover a few great sites. The community makes the whole blogsphere humanized and buzzing. And I get to interact with other fellow bloggers, share and exchange ideas, of course that includes Zhen Sun! He got me co-authored thelogohomepage.

The cool part of mybloglog is that everyone is special and has own identity. It is interesting to leave your faces (through mybloglog avatar) on the other blogger’s site, and as well as get to know who have been browsing your blog.

I also have stumbled upon some ‘blog’ that has nothing but commercialized statements that were apparently copied from somewhere. Normally these site owners also happen to be spammer spamming across the community.

This has taught me something useful. It all goes down to human nature: We are born to interact, to feel special, and to have own identity!

An essential blogging tip I read from netbusinessblog is to make the blog personal. So much I agreed with the statement: “If people didn’t want your opinion they wouldn’t read your blog, they’d watch the rehearsed, critic-friendly, non-offensive evening news”.

In my real life sales experience, this is called “emotional selling”. A blog has to be a blog, with personal touch, and that is its advantage!

I have seen some sites that gather information like travel, tours or pharmacy??! Basically it sits there without much updated information. There’s no personal review, or stories. The founder probably expects traffic to fall from the sky.
In another word, nothing comes free in life…*wink*

Happy blogging and blog reading! And remember you are special!

Dad and his house

It's Chinese New Year eve. We have a warm reunion, everyone is at home including my brother Mavic who got back from Shanghai.

The boys were spending time decorating the house - pulling wires and hanging the tanglung (lantern), all the big and small ones.


Dad seems to be in his deep thought gazing at the house. Maybe he's having a flash back of his life...feeling satisfied with the kingdom that he built up with his blood and sweat? Or regretting what he has missed during all this while which he spent most of his time at work to keep his family in abundance? I can only guess his mind...

After this new year celebration, he will continue a series of medical treatment due to the occurence of cancerous cell from recent lab tests. What's next, is to determine which type of surgery or therapy is best for him. The future seems a little clouded, we don't really talk about it. It's beyond our control...I just have to pray for him. And hope you keep him in prayer too.

A Year of Boar

Chinese New Year is around the corner. I haven’t really done my “spring cleaning” yet. I’ll be home tonight and clean up my pig squat, in celebrating a golden pig year!

Legend has it that in ancient times, Buddha asked all the animals to meet him on Chinese New Year. Twelve came, and Buddha named a year after each one. He announced that the people born in each animal’s year would have some of that animal’s personality. Those born in pig/boar years tend to have excellent manners, make and keep friends, work very hard, and appreciate luxury. They are very loving and make loyal partners. Oops, I thought I nearly caught one of them too…akaka…

The picture depicts the famous tale “Journey to the West” [西游记] with a smiling pig - Zhu Ba jie (豬八戒).

Happy Chinese New Year!

Wishing you a blessed year ahead filled with joy and fun…and got many many angpau!

Awesome photography of Malaysia

This picture depicted a beautiful sight of Kuala Lumpur...what an exotic view!

Can't remember how did I google into Trey's photo blog.

Trust me, you definitely gotta take a look of his huge set of fantastic photo collection. The pictures are so unique and out of the world! I can't help but to share with you.

Google with missing letter 'L'

Google can never be outdone in adding special touch to their logo in special occasions. For this Valentine's Day, they are showing a strawberry coated with chocolate in place of the usual "g". Yummy...

There's been a few speculations for the missing letter 'L'. Then I read about a reply from the Google's officer to a reader...

From: Laura Ainsworth Sent: 14 February 2007 12:11 To: W******, S***** Subject: Re: Google banner on Valentine's day
You are right, the green stalk is indeed the 'L'.
This is a new and edgy design and i think it looks fab - i hope you agree
L

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