cny goodness!

so it's reading week... and also chinese new year... so i decided to make pineapple tarts! didn't want to spend hours cutting pineapples by myself so i opted for the canned stuff (trying to make it look more 'authentic' in the photo lol. and hurrah for modern conveniences - the blender! but nothing could save me from the 3 hours of boiling and stirring on tuesday night to make the jam. God knows how it goes from that sickly yellow colour to the golden orangey jam... then the next day wenling came over with her pineapple tart cookie cutter! yay. so i could make pretty ones instead of something to the effect of pineapple thumbprints =D and oh-so-pretty they were! (i also learnt that i can't seem to apply pressure evenly hmmm.) filled them with jam and - just for kicks... put smiley faces on with the extra dough.. which was incidentally the most time consuming and most happy-fying part of the process.
and voila! yumyum. maybe i should sell them next year... after i buy my own cookie cutter. hmm =)

song for the moment

hmmm

today @ ocf ... i felt this odd sense of not belonging.

and then i was sad - cos i wondered if i had spent the last 2 years simply not-belonging

and wondered if it was confirmation for my decision to get involved in church and out of ocf

then i came home and i was just... lost... for lack of a better word

and then i heard in my spirit

you belong to ME.

ah yes. how could i forget.

what God does to cheer you up

i just had an ultra kuku/ sotong/ blonde/ bimbo moment.

lecture today is at 10am.
i walked in at 9am thinking either that lecture was at 9 or that it was 10 am i dunno.

the thing is that i sat there for a couple of min messaging junli and wondering why everyone looked unfamiliar wondering if it was because today we split and have lecture in two different rooms.. and only realised it was 9+ and not 10 after junli messaged back.

fail. hilarious.

i seem to have this bad habit of building walls when certain things happen

especially when i actually need human contact...

but then i shut up when it's most important to speak up and the moment passes.

and i steel myself knowing that Jesus will take care of it... and life goes on.

but it's all falling apart huh. more so than before. please please don't die on me.

all things egyptian (20/12-23/12/09)

day 5

started off the traveltalk tour and saw all things touristy and egyptian. lots of sand, pyramids (the great pyramid), sphinxes (the great sphinx) and lots of myths and weird stories... like the sea giving birth to the mountain lol.

i climbed the great pyramid - not the steps... the stones... and they were huge. the ones on the base were about as tall as me... and yes i blatantly disregarded the 'no climbing' sign... just like a lot of other people haha. Seeing these things up close was pretty amazing - guess that's why people say that the ancient Egyptians must have been aliens or something
one thing that detracted from the experience were all the 'helpful' tourist touts. for example this guy that i took a picture of asked me to take a picture of him then demanded i give him $10... i gave him 1 EGP (lol. so mean rite.) but i was just so sick of people trying to take money from me in 'legal' ways.

i randomly walked to this part of the ruins in front of the great pyramid and a guy in uniform came chasing after me and wanted to show me around... no doubt trying to get more money -.-this was a tomb - haha there was a sign at the end of the corridor and i would have taken more pictures if not for that guy offering to show me around. maybe they're genuinely kind but ugh. too many $_$ people
got my postcard-type picture of the great sphinx... and a couple more crazy ones which are in yiang's camera unfortunately. then we went back to the hotel to freshen up and off to the overnight train we went. the train was horrible with non-reclining seats but zhen somehow managed to sleep through everything! oh and our poor cabin-mate had food poisoning on the train.... poor thing. at least she had her husband with her...

day 6

arrived in aswan and went off to see the high dam - which was pretty impressive but well. we were in a military zone and it didn't make for very nice pictures. and then we saw the unfinished obelisk from the tour bus window (haha.) cos it just wasn't worth the money to go in... pay 50egp to see a piece of cracked rock? no thanks. after that was the Philae temple... which required a short boat ride to and fro (it didn't have lifejackets lol) and where my camera ran out of battery ohwell.

day 7

woke up early to get to abu simbel like around 3am -.- zzzz. but well... blessed - we were the first bus on the escort so i managed to get a couple of people-less photos! and it was really really really crowded by 7am. caught a photo of transportation (ie. camels) on the way back to the cruise boat then we set sail - which took another 3 hrs of non-motion cos the boat needed repairs lol.

abu simbel's story is actually quite amazing. first the ancient egyptians carved a mountain into a temple such that sunlight hits the back of the temple two specific days a year. and then the modern day people moved the whole mountain so that the temple wouldn't flood cos of the rising water level due to the high dam. cool huh.

managed to get to Komombo just after the sun set... was a bit sick of egyptian history by then. but some of the carvings were really interesting - you can spot the interesting thing in the picture below lol. then we had a 'egyptian party' on board the cruise - which basically involved really interesting 'adult' games and ppl getting high on alcohol and doing weird things -.-"

day 8

woke up early again ugh. but in return got a horse-carriage ride to edfu temple which was probably one of the most interesting parts of the trip. for one, the carriage driver made the horse go really fast and was going 'mustafa! ferrari!' as we overtook the other carriages one by one. haha. and THEN he asked for money -.- ah well. zhen refused to wake up for this one... haha. it probably was a good decision on her part, it wasn't all that fascinating a place... though it was really grand. we then went back to the boat and continued sailing to luxor. ultimate nuaness!

oh man...this is so geeky that i really want it! =P

free first class tickets

yo. anyone want some free first class tickets on a guilt trip? i don't want the ones my parents gave me. =P