Nyin's Xanga

Trip to meet Mr. Lee in Penang

Sat, 17 Jan 2009 10:02:04 GMT

So this will be my 1st post of 2009. I skipped my Christmas and new year's eve post but in
short..I'll just say I have been partying and meeting some new friends. It was a great 2008.
And my new year's resolution? ...I haven't really think about it yet. So let's skip everything
and jump into my 1st trip of 2009. I was lazy to post about it, but because my friends were
requesting for some penang pictures...so here goes.

Yea...this trip's objective is to meet Mr.Lee again. So long didn't see him and we all miss
him, don't we?..haha. Those who didn't know who is Mr.Lee or sometimes we call him
"Lei Siang", he use to hang out with us when we were in Melbourne. Actually I planned this
trip cause Alex Au, from HK, came down to KL. It's been 2 years we were apart and
finally we meet up again. He was a good friend of Mr.Lee. So I thought maybe they would
like to meet up and since I haven't been to Penang for so long, so it's a good time to go
Penang. Really glad that Ying Ming and SaiVin manage to join us on the trip too.

-------------------------------------------------1st Day-------------------------------------------------

We went there by AirAsia cause I didn't want to waste 4-5 hours on the road. We reach
there at 4pm, Sunday. It was a gloomy day when we reach there. Lee picked us. Good
thing Lee manage to take 2 days leave and drove us around Penang. Actually we force him
to take leave....Yeah~!

After leaving our luggage at our resort, we thought of going for a walk and have dinner at
Gurney. Unfortunaly, it was raining. So we ended up in Plaza Gurney. Lee brought us to
Breeks Cafe to have a little tea time and we were hoping the rain would stop. But it was a
long freaking rain! Anyhow..we enjoyed our tea time. The food was really good. They
should have Breeks Cafe in KL too! The desserts are tasty and so are their sandwiches.
Look at how hungry we were. Oh...the cafe reminds us of the cafe, Greco that we usually go
in Melborne. They have the curve red leather seats like Greco ^_^.

Can't do anything else other then walking around in the shopping mall. Found this fancy shades.
Guess how much they cost! RM300+ leh...I thought it was just normal party shades. But
ain't they cool! Got blink blink de.

SaiVin wanted to check out this "g hotel". The interior is beautiful.
They still have xmas deco

Lee was really excited with this designer chair and tested it out. I guess he is fascinated by
designer products especially chairs. I remember him collecting a few mini chair models.

The rain did not stop the whole night so we can't have food in Gurney Walk :(
I miss that place. I used to go there to eat everytime I am in Penang. So we have to eat at
some other place. The food weren't so good. And for the very 1st time I tasted Chee
Chiong Fun with prawn paste. It was disgusting! I'm not sure if SaiVin really likes it. Although
he complained about the sticky-gum-like-paste sause, in the end he finished up the whole
plate himself.

Played "Bridge" and play some games in the resort. Had some cocktails for fun.

-------------------------------------------------2ndDay-------------------------------------------------

The next day after a simple breakfast at a kopitiam, we went to Penang's Spice Garder.
Looks like an educational field trip. We even have a tour guide to bring us around and
explain all the insects and plants to us. I hope everyone did not get bored. The tour guide is
so pationate about his job and even ask us if he should explain more. I think I only get 10%
of what he said. But I've got to give him credit cause he explained everything really
detailly. Just that I did not pay attention and was bz snapping pictures.

The garden was neat and well organised. Every plant and trees are labeled properly.

Oh..I remembered one plant the tour guide showed us cause the name is easy to remember.
It's called the DUMP CANE. And it is very dangerous. Some people might have planted
this in their house so have to becareful. He said if you got cut by these leaves, we'll get
poisoned and become dump! Well, Alex Chai there doesn't seem to be convinced by him.

He also showed us the Penang tree which is the symbol on the Penang flag. I thought it is
a coconut tree. I think he mention that there is some nicotine in the nuts that can make people
go high? And are banned in some countries??

Look at how they decorate their table at their mini cafe on their hill. Cute~ ^_^

I've read alot of review about this Asam laksa and finally I'd tried it. I'm not used to the taste.
It's too heavy for me. Saivin seem too really love it. I'm beginning to suspect he just love all
foods cause he'll just finish everything up. He cleared every single drop of soup in his bowl.
I think that's why he got sick . Alex Au think it has weird taste but he manage to finish up.

The best thing I've had so far is the Cendul here. I love cendul ^_^

We wanted to visit this mansion call Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion that day but we
were abit too late. So we went in on another day. I surely do recommend anyone
who visit Penang to visit this mansion. It is really interesting. I pay full 100%
attention this time to the lady tour guide whom brought us around the mansion.
She tell us the story of the person who build this mansion and discribe the architect
of the mansion. Amazing~ No pictures were allowed to be taken in there. (So
maybe that's why I get to pay full attention XD)

I've been on these ferries when I was a kid but I don't really remember the experience.
I'm so excited that we get to take the ferry again

Oooo..Ying Ming found her ship! I bet it's carrying chocolates from langkawi
(Actually it's suppose to be Yang Ming)

We had seafood at Bukit Tambun. I think we placed too high expectation on the seafood here
as Lee told us that all Penang locals will eat here. But I find it just ok.

-------------------------------------------------3rd Day-------------------------------------------------

After checking out from our resort, we went hunting for food. One really funny thing I found
out is how come we have difficulties finding food there in Penang. People say Penang is the
Food Paradise. We've drove around a few roads and checking out a few restaurants then
only ending up in this Nyonya Cafe in New World Park. But unexpectedly, this is the best
meal of all the meals we had in Penang. Most satisfying. Oh.. the restaurant gave SaiVin a
CNY complimentary gift.

After the Nyonya meal, we went to visit a nyonya mansion. The Peranakan Penang
Mansion. This time we are allowed to take pictures inside out. I actually wanted to go to
the Penang Hill and take their tram. But the weather is too hot to go up there.
(Hey! Spot the 2 person which is not suppose to be in the picture. I cut and paste them
in..hehe :p)

Very interesting crafts they have on their doors, walls and furnitures. The stuff
they have in there came from the Chinese, Malays and also English people.
Amazingly they blend well together.

We were all not paying attention to the tour guide that brought us around the house. Instead,
we played around the house and took pictures to entertain ourselves.

The last stop we went is to this cool place! I think it's call QEII. But we went on the wrong time.
It's a place to hang out at night. We would stay and wait for the night but we'll have to leave to
catch our flight back.

Thanks Lee for bringing us all around Penang. It's really great to meet Lee again. Next time we'll
have to choose a better weather to go Penang. Everyone got sick after the trip.

AsiaWorks : Self-development Training

Thu, 13 Nov 2008 10:25:58 GMT

A month plus ago, I've attended the AsiaWorks Basics training. It is a self-development training
which is also recognised in a few countries such as Hong Kong, Singapore, China and Indonesia.
The basic training is basically a place for you to discover yourself. It is like a mirror to reflect
who you really are and what you didn't realise about yourself. The purpose of people joining
mostly are because they want to improve the quality of their lives. Mostly in career and finances,
some in relationships and also in health. And some are just pretty lost of what they really want..
haha. People in there came from all walks of life. From young to old, from housewives to a
successful career man, children and parents and some with health or mental abuse problems.

The reason why I joined is because my brother and Hendrik asked me too. My brother have
finished all 3 levels (Basic, Advance and leadership programme). While Hendrik finished till
advance and I can see changes in them. Full of confident and motivated. They feel it is a really
good training that everyone should attend. They kept convincing me to join and so after 5
months I finally joined cause I'm curious and thought maybe I will really discover something
new there. Actually my biggest objective there is to know some new friends and thought i
could have some fun..... I know I know...I shouldn't join because of these purposes.

In this training, it's not all talking and listening. We did alot of fun and exciting exercises which
helps individuals realise their own behaviour and realise how it reflects on our lives. Most of
the exercise could make people really emotional and some might make people really mad.
You'll see alot of tears rolling down. Yea...I did cried at one exercise. I cried cause I'm
touched and not because I'm sad. Even some guys which say they never cried since baby had
actually cried infront of everyone. You really can't imagine what's going on in there. Everyone
has some confession to make, some secrets to tell and some burden to share. You can say
it's dramatic.

So what do I think about this training???
It's totally an eyeopening experience where you really feel the presence of everyone being so
warm hearted and caring. We all become close friends in just 5 days! But honestly, I don't
feel that I need these trainings as I feel I'm quite aware of who I really am and I feel all the
values that they are trying to give is already planted in me. I'm not trying to be over
self-confident or think that I'm a perfect person. I just think that I'm learning along the way and
I am really blessed that I'm brought up in a good environment with alot of people supporting me.
People who join the training discover different things. So it's not to say that this training is
worthless. I do feel some kind of a new energy emerging in me after this training. But, they say,
in order to maintain it and go to a higher level...we have to go for the advance level! ahekk~~~
no thank you. Maybe next time. Let me do it on my own. I believe I can do it.

Here are some pictures taken on the graduation day.

I'm really happy my family manage to attend too . They actually feel kind of awkward as it's
only a 5 days training. They have no idea what is going on. Many of us was hugging and crying
when they see their family and friends which appears without us knowing it. Actually I know
they are coming laa...cause I attended my brother and Hendrik's graduation ma and know
what's going on already. So I did not cry...cause I wasn't surprised??

Also meet my new friends~~ . Mission accomplished

You can check out more about the AsiaWorks here.

Above the Clouds of Sungai Lembing

Sat, 20 Sep 2008 14:57:41 GMT

Last 2 weeks, I went on a hiking and photography trip in Sungai Lembing, Pahang
with a bunch of friends including new friends and friends from Sweden. It was a
2 night 2 day stay there. Went there on Friday night and return on Sunday evening.
Seng Kit organised the entire trip for us. He had spent some time planning for the
itinerary and accommodation for us. We prayed hard that it won't rain and we were
lucky it didn't rain in the morning.

We reach the wooden guest house at 1.30am. We slept less then 3 hours and then
we need to wake up to start hiking for about an hour to catch the sun rise. It was
dark and abit scary on the way up. We all have our touch light to lead us.

I've uploaded the pictures I've took up there in this link :
www.leenyin.com/sglembing

The next morning, we wake up early again to hike to the Rainbow Waterfall. We had an hour
of bumpy ride on the back of a lorry and then climb for an hour to reach to the waterfall. The
journey to the waterfalls was so slippery and dangerous! We have to cross the river and use
our hand to climb up the rocks. The water level was until my waist! I forgot how many times
I fell on the way up there. You won't wanna see how many blue blacks I have on my leg.
My shoe even spoiled. Luckily Lichin have a spare shoe for me.

We weren't so lucky cause we couldn't see the rainbow. The sun didn't appear and the wind
was blowing quite strong making too much mist in the air. It was super cold! We can't bring
our cameras out from our begs as the environment was too wet. But there was nothing to shoot
anyway. It was too misty. The guys swam under the waterfalls for awhile until they couldn't
stand the cold.

But it was all cool! At least we all got back down safe and sound and there were no leaches.
Phew~~ Thank god.

We manage to snap a few pictures half way down from the waterfall. We were all drenched
and exhausted.

Overall, it was a fun and adventurous trip away from the city. Reallybreath taking. Never
had experience such a trip .

You can view more pictures in my friends' blog :
Sengkit : 林明。映象II - 悠閑的一天(1)
Sengkit : Sungai Lembing
Charlie Chan : 纯。朴。林。明－预告篇
AhBak

My Birthday haven't end yet!

Sat, 16 Aug 2008 15:42:11 GMT

I'm still receiving birthday presents! Haha..some still on the way...i hope~

Hazmer aka kor got me a perfect present to help me in my design!
I always wanted a WACOM and finally I got one! Thank you so much kor!
I got the black colour one to match my black HP PC ^^. Hope to get use to
it soon then I can forget my mouse.

I actually have a mysterious present. Then later only found out it was from Hendrik's sister,
Fiona. It's a black cup printed with my picture on it. It was ordered online and custom made.
She haven't see the cup before. So here's the picture of the cup Fiona. Sorry for the delay!
And Thank you so much~ ^^

I still owe some pictures for my Birthday post. Some pictures taken in my Pre-birthday
party in Redbox Plus, Pavillion.

It was an entertaining night~! Well..no body got drunk luckily...cause in another few hours,
we need to go hiking!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WHAO~~~ I sure do blog alot today. I still have one last entry. But I'm damn freaking tired
already. But if I don't get it done by tonight, I will have no other time to blog. Cause my
activities keep increasing~ haha
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mystical KL : Behind the Scenes

Sat, 16 Aug 2008 13:24:24 GMT

Mystical KL

Sat, 16 Aug 2008 11:36:16 GMT

This morning, I went to the center of KL, Petaling Street with Seng Kit and Wai Yee for a
photography outing. Seng Kit say this is my fastest post ever..haha. Normally I take ages
to post. Well it's because we were all so excited about sharing our pictures! Even though I
am so exhausted, I have to keep up with them. Without resting, we all went online an
exchange pictures we took.

I am not quite happy with my result. Most of the pictures I took is again out of focus and
yea...i admit I am bad in compositioning! Have to learn more from SK and Wai Yee. They
have such a good eye in details and focus point. We'll have more photography outings yea!

I picked a FEW of the good ones from the hundreds pictures I took and have to depend
on photoshop to twick the saturation and brightness.

Here goes! Feel free to leave me any comments

Supposingly this picture is in colour. Wai Yee say it look better in Black & White.
So I use photoshop again to make it b&w. Yea! I think it feels better

My Birthday :3

Sat, 26 Jul 2008 16:46:27 GMT

It's my birthday again! And as always, it's always happy ! I celebrated my birthday
for a few days starting from 19th - 22nd July. My activities was packed and full! Oh..
22nd is my actual day if you don't know ^^. But I will still accept presents after 22nd
if anyone still owe me one.. haha.

Normally I would have a party where all my friends would attend. But this year is
abit different. I had separate little gathering with different group of friends to have a
decent birthday. I've been busy to do any plans for my birthday and I was really tired.
I find out having birthday with small group of friends is better. I can focus on each of
them more unlike in parties, there is not enough time for everyone! Haha...sounds like
I'm a celebrity or something. Got so many ppl to entertain. But I cannot be humble on
this one. I've got too many good friends!! Let me see...1,2,3....15..err. Yea..you guys
admit yourself if you are my good friend ok. Even if you didn't show up on my birthday...
I know there are still many of you out there..rite rite??

Anyway, here comes the picture!

Above is Seng Kit, Stella, Wai Yee aka Charlie and Angel. This meal was to celebrate
Seng Kit's birthday too which was on the 15th July. Seng Kit bought me an expensive
present. I actually told him that I needed an extra battery for my 400D camera and he
really got me one! Thank you so much! I will bei sum gei (focus) take more beautiful
photo ger la. Stella got me a Q10 mask to maintain my youthfulness (needed that alot)
and Charlie gave me 2 T-shirt where I wore it instantly for hiking the next morning.

It's Saturday night...so later, we went for K in Pavillion Redbox. There we met up with
my brother, Hendrik, Kok Hong and Kenny and K till 2am! Need to get the pictures
from Hendrik. I woke up at 5.30am to go hiking in Cheras, Gunung Putih / Ah Pak San.
Really damn tiring! Slept for only 1.30 hours! Then climb for 4 hours! I'll talk about
hiking in my other post.

Felt really lucky cause Stella finally get to celebrate my birthday for the first time! She came
back to KL for 5 days to celebrate my birthday! I dowan to explain why she couldn't make
it to my birthday for the past few years, but really happy that she was with me to a few of
my birthday gathering this year.

As usual, I always get some purple stuff from my friends as they know my favourite colour
is purple. June and Jin Choong bought me a unique butterfly shape necklace. Match one of
my earings! And from Ying Ming, I got an elegant silver pair of earings from Perlins Silver.
Thanks guys! Love them lotz!

Saivin came back that weekend too!...but for something else actually......but happy that he
get to wish me Happy Birthday personally ^^. "Don't forget my present ar, Saivin!"

Wahhhhhh~~This one really geng lo. My 1st birthday surprise ever from the Jalan Ipoh gang
and Hendrik from Cheras. They suddenly appear at 12am, 22nd July to give me a birthday
surprise. Really pai seh pai seh loo~ I wasn't prepared for it at all. I was waiting for 12am and
I thought I'll blow my candles with my family only. I was slacky with a pin on my hair. Thank
you you bunch of entertaining fellows. Make my birthday a memorable and fun one! Hendrik
actually baked the chocolate cupcakes and they taste really really good! Yummms~~~

Had to do a little bit explaination as people suspect that the cake were bought and not
baked by Hendrik hhaha.. I guess they look too good to be believable that they were
baked by Hendrik. Those colourful and fancy ones were actually bought somewhere laa.
But those at the four corners, full chocolate are the genuine cupcakes baked by Hendrik.

On the actual birthday night, where my parents flew of for vacation, I treated both my sisters
a meal in Cava @ Bangsar. A peaceful birthday night with delicious food. I'm beggining to
enjoy the slow and queit life......... Am I getting old?? ...
"Ofcourse I am!"

Short break at Singapore

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 18:41:23 GMT

Stayed up late to update this entry. If not, I'll never be posting this happening weekend
I had .

It was a sudden plan to go Singapore. Went there with my sister and Ying Ming and then
meet up with the rest there. Needed a short break and didn't want to spend too much.
Good thing is that we don't have to pay for our accommodation. Ying Ming's cousin offer
us one of her room to stay for 2 nights ^^.

It was a great break! Get to shop, eat good food (didn't expect I could find good food in
Sg this time .), meet up with my good friends and get to club in MOS!

FIRST DAY | ( Friday ) 11.07.2008

Reached there at night and went straight away to Clark Quay to meet up with my friends
and had dinner in a Japanese restaurant. They say in Sg, Japanese and Korean food never
go wrong.

Yeap..and they taste really good~!

SECOND DAY | ( Saturday ) 12.07.2008

Woke up early next day to go to Botanic Garden nearby Ying Ming's cousin's place. It's
like our Lake Garden but 10X more beautiful!!! Wish the garden is next to my house. I love
the grasses and the tress in Sg.

Sai Vin came to join us too and treated us a breakfast in the garden. Thank you Sai Vin!

Below are some pictures taken by me and Yean. Time to practice with our SLR cam..hehe

Later in the afternoon, we went to Orchard Road to meet up with the rest for lunch. Hazmer
aka kor came to Sg to join us too.

We promise Ying Ming that we'll go to Max Brenner for her chocolate drink and so we went
all the way to Esplanade for it. She finally got her drink and she was a happy girl...lol.

We were about to leave Esplanade when we saw the air show rehearsal for Sg's national
day. It was really amazing and everyone on the ground was watching it with awe.

Preparing for clubbing! Presenting Stella, the makeup artist. I didn't bring my camera to
MOS. Will upload more pictures when I get the photos from June.

LAST DAY | ( Sunday ) 13.07.2008

On the last day, we went to Vivo City for lunch. Supposingly plan to visit Sentosa too.
Haven't been there before. Because everyone woke up late, we didn't have enough time.

Will be back for another break~~!

Old news :/..but still a news!

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 13:27:19 GMT

I was in the The Star newspaper for the 2nd time and 1st time in a game magazine,
GameAxis last month! Thanks to my ah kor, Hazmer who involve me as part of his
team in his game designs and now made me a little bit famous among gamers...
hahhaha. I bet most of my friends were not aware of the news cause most of them
are not gamers....not even me .

I've been in a team with my ah kor to build online casual games to participate in an
international game design competition, JayIsGames. And we won 1st and 3rd place
for 2 games we submitted. He is the the manager of the team, game designer and
the programmer and I am his graphic and interface designer. Yean join the team too
to help out with the game graphics recently.

Read more from my ah kor's blog HERE or read TheStar online HERE.
You can play the 2 games here if you are interested :

>> BallisticWars (I'm involve in this one ^^)
>> The Last Canopy

I took the above scanned images from ah kor's blog. He blurred the text because
he worried of copyrights issue.

I have a Canon 400D!

Wed, 11 Jun 2008 14:12:32 GMT

After envying so long and so many of my friends who take cool pictures with their
SLR cameras, I've finally got one myself! A brand NEW Canon 400D SLR
camera! Luckily Yean decided to share it with me. If not, I'm forever not going to
have the chance to get in touch with it. We will treat this as our own birthday
present for this year... just not to feel so guilty for spending so much .

I thought of saving more before getting the camera. But because there was a
Canon fair in KLCC last week with great offer, we decided to buy it on the spot.

I shot the above picture with my dad's Nikon Semi Pro camera. Not bad
also ho.

Ain't they cool! I thought I'll have to safe my whole life to get another lence.
Luckily my dad owns a canon SLR too! But the old film type wan la. I didn't
know he got so many treasures. I should have told him earlier that I'm planning
to buy a SLR camera. So that we don't have to get the 18mm-55mm lence.
Anyway, he gave us his lences and so total we've got 3 types of lences.
Hurray!! A 28mm-80mm lence and a 100-mm-300mm teleport lence which is
supper dupper cool! It can zoom so far away! Oh..and a flash too!

The lence on the most right belongs to Seng Kit. He borrowed me to experiment
with it. Seng Kit will be my SI FOO(Master) in photographing. Tripled the
excitement! I requested to have product shooting on the 1st day of class last
weekend. He said I jump-Q wo. Shouldn't start from there. But because I've got
a job coming soon which required product shooting, so he thought me anyway
and he thought me well! He even borrowed me his light. Look at my mini studio :

We got ourselves a few studio potraits from the Canon fair and it was FOC .
This is our 1st studio pictures .

Below are some of my few succesful experiments with the new camera. Still
can't get use to the settings. But so far so good la..haha.

This coconut tree is opposite my house and it's very tall. And so, to get the coconuts,
I'll have to use the teleport lence. See how far it can go.

This is my favourite picture. It's on my desktop wallpaper now. Just love the
depth of field .

I went to Lake Gardens with my parents and sister. Here is a picture of my dad
winking at the camera while exercising his neck.

And this is my lovely little sister, Lee Chian.