It’s been a while

No, it has been four long years. Hello there, I’m back here to peek for while although actually I’m in the midst of my trials. I’m also very relieved to find that although left untouched for a long period of time, everything is still the same here.

Four years. Wow. I had many blogs back then but normally I don’t post new entries there and just leave it in an ‘abandoned’ state. I cannot do the same thing for this blog because this will remain as my permanent base, since I still adopt the pseudonym Winged Puff (wow I’m actually talking crap

Anyway, life is still the same for me since the past four years.  Although, for me, the years back then seemed very distance and unreachable. Currently, I’m still wandering towards the depth of ACG field, an avid cat lover, and still loving myself. Luckily, the future is full of unimaginable possibilities and chances, it it clearly up to me whether to grasp it whenever a spark is ignited.

-P

Things to say

There are so many things to talk about the CNY I had. I’ll summary up one by one in detail.

22/1/12 (CNY eve)

1) 1pm – On the way to my father’s hometown in Pekan Jabi, Segamat. Saw my first police road block along the Kuala Lumpur – Seremban Expressway that leads to the SMART Tunnel. The police were doing their job, carrying out the Ops Sikap to prevent road users from breaking the rules and ensure safety on the road.

(CONSULT GOOGLE OR WIKI FOR THOSE STRANGE AND UNFAMILIAR WORDS, THANKS :D))

2) It’s smooth along the way but traffic was slow from Seremban to Nilai. The duration was about 15 minutes.

3) Saw a small hill with many big natural rocks on it in Gemas, Negeri Sembilan. Failed to capture a picture of it. It’s very spectacular.

4) Passed by the Natural Feedlot Corporation in Gemas too. But I failed to see how it looked like. 😦 That company is the one that caused a lot of commotion in Malaysia owned by the husband of Minister of Women, Family and Community Development.

Her family were alleged of misusing the public fund granted by the government for the corporation’s development. They used it for luxurious cars and travel instead.

5) Reached Segamat at about 4pm. Ate reunion dinner at Koko Tree restaurant at 8pm. My father’s household is a big one so we occupied 5 tables, each table sat approximately 10 people .

List of dishes:

• Leng Pen （冷盆）
• Cabbage
• Prawn
• Steamed Tilapia Fish
• Fried Chicken (No bones)
• Ostrich meat (Not sure if it’s true or not)
• Cuttlefish (Sotong)
• Yam Basket
• Longan dessert （龙眼甜品）

6) A magnificent fireworks set off during midnight by the neighbour at the front street. But it’s slightly later this year and the fireworks that neighbour set is much lesser.

7) Received angpaos from second uncle’s wife and fourth uncle. Curious why they started giving angpao during CNY eve.

23/1/12  (First day of the first lunar month or first day of CNY)

Received angpaos from all the uncles. Went to the usual 2 houses to ‘bai nian’ and take angpaos. But I just go there to eat and drink. Haha. Ate some weird biscuit from Thailand, prawn crackers and drank chrysanthemum tea, sea cucumber tea and Ribena. #likeaboss.jpg Before going back to grandmother’s house, our family went to the shrine to pray for good blessings.

24/1/12 

Mum’s back pain worsened. Left grandmother’s house at 1pm. Reached KL. Clean the house and clothes before going to popo’s (maternal grandmother) house (7.42pm). It’s almost 11pm when we reached there at Menglembu, Perak. Popo’s watching Dicey Business that time. Learned that gong gong (maternal grandfather) went back with yiyi (aunty) to KL to treat his unknown illness.

25/1/12

1) Ate noodles at feizai’s. I bought a pink shirt with frills and ribbons. My father bought 艾炙 stick + re-fillers for RM70 at the market. (LOL)

2) Tried to fly our kite in evening outside the house and at the road, FAIL.

3) Mum went to have  a gathering with Shirley and her other friends.

26/1/12

…

27/1/12

….

-P

Chinese New Year’s Atmosphere

The school is playing CNY songs during recess time and everyone were like THE SCHOOL IS GOING ON  A MORE TRENDIER PATH? It seems like good idea to promote Chinese New Year. -_- But you know that during recess time, it was so noisy already and you still wanna play songs in a maximum volume mode? Ridiculous. For those who wanted to have some concentration reading or doing homework or whatsover, will be grumbling. Yeah right, good work.

When come to CNY, people will be rushing back to their hometowns to reunite with their family and loved ones. And here’s one tip – don’t rush and drive at maximum mode to go back because your loved ones will be waiting for you no matter what. You don’t really want them to cry over your dead body, right?

Another great thing about CNY is food and ‘angpaos’ (or Red Packet, is a monetary gift which is given during holidays or special occasions.) You have Mandarin Oranges, Yee Sang, Nian Gao, noodles, fish, sweets and many more cuisines. But I love Egg Roll the most, it’s called ‘Kuih Kapit’ by locals.

(Go Google for pictures. Thanks :))

Many children love to receive red packets during CNY because it’s a great opportunity to ‘earn money’ for them. The delightfulness of receiving money is hard to describe. It’s a mixture of happy and just happiness of I CAN BUY THE THINGS I LOVE (but not me, duh). I also love to collect red packets because of the beautiful designs on them.

I’m not sure if I’m going back to my father’s hometown but I can be sure that the CNY this year will not be a happy one as expected because of alot of grumblings and all.

SO HAPPY CNY, FOLKS!! 😀

-P

Colony of weaver ants

UPDATED 20/1/12

Weaver ants are very common ants in Malaysia. They are always mistaken by locals for ‘fire ants’  because of the colloquial name in Malay is semut api that bite people. But the truth was that the fire ants are a different genus to weaver ants and are harmless to people.

Weaver ants make nests in trees made of leaves stitched together using the silk produced by their larvae. During the day before yesterday, mum found a colony of them at the plants in front of our house and she was very furious.

She threw them into the drain and my sister was like ‘AHH’ and cannot do anything about it. My sister then try her luck to find another colony of them. After a long find, she found two colony, one big and a small one.

My sister stored the big colony in two long water bottles, both connected to each other. I enjoy seeing them crawl over the leaf and over the bottle, it’s like NATGEO in front of your very own eyes! I’m sooo excited. *blushes*

We reared them for approximately five days. The ants lived because my sister gave them food (honey, ants, CENTIPEDE) and water. Later that, we put them to free at a tree not far from our house.

#1 It’s the insect version of squeezing glue from a bottle.

This adult weaver in Australia holds a silk-producing larva in its jaws, spreading the larva’s sticky secretions to bind leaves for the colony nest.

Few animals match such intricate homemaking techniques.

(A weaver ant holding a larvae.)

#2 As weaver ants build a nest in Malaysia, they must pull one leaf toward another.

A long body—about a third of an inch—is a boon, as each ant grabs on to adjacent leaf edges with feet and jaws. If one body isn’t sufficient, the insects interlock to form chains.

(Weaver ants work together building their nests. That’s what you’ll see in my photographs too. It’s like Nat Geo in your hands!)

Photography by Mark W. Moffett, captions courtesy of National Geographic website.

-P