Coming Down Very Hard

I don't know which bastard serves me with unproperly cooked food that results of me getting Salmonella. Yeah! Food poisoning. As explained in Wikipedia, Enteritis Salmonella (e.g., Salmonella enterica subsp. enterica Serovar Enteritidis, for short Salmonella enteritidis or Salmonella typhimurium ) cause diarrhoea which usually heals spontaneously and does not require antibiotic treatment. However, people at risk such as infants, small children, the elderly, HIV patients and those with suppressed immunity can become seriously ill (general infections). Sources of infection includes unclean foodstuffs, particularly in institutional kitchens and restaurants and etc. It started rather quickly as I was explaining my Gundam models to Cindy and my mom, then I felt sudden chill across my body and stomach ache. As I sat myself on the toilet, I broke into cold sweat instantly. Something is not right... something is definitely not right. I suspect the food that I take this morning, Dim Sum opposite Umno building must be either not properly cooked or handled uncleanly. Curse you!!

Mom sent me to the clinic to see the doctor. The doctor didn't explain much so he just gave me medication, and of course a one day medical leave because I can feel that I won't be able to work when I need to run to the toilet so frequently. 4 types of medication, ORS for curing dehydration, fever medication, vomit medication and diarrhoea medication.

Fever broke after I return home from the clinic, and vomitted several times as well. Whatever goes in, came out yesterday. I spent my entire day at home sleeping today and trying to break some sweat to ensure the fever quickly goes away. Those were the days where you came down really hard for putting something into the mouth that you don't know if it's properly handled. Now a lesson learned, a place where lots of people eat doesn't mean it's clean and I am one of the few unlucky ones. For the next couple of days, I guess I will have to resolve to Milo and bread as my daily staple until my stomach is doing well again.

Teluk Kumbar Seafood

Okay... 2 weekends in a row. Seafood, seafood and more seafood! So where did I go to this time around? Teluk Kumbar, south of Penang island, somewhere in between Bayan Lepas and Balik Pulau area. You will never know there's such a place there admist so many Malay Kampung's around. If you drive by the place and you don't look around, probably you will miss it on the fly. Thanks to Cindy's family coming to Penang, the past weekends has been nothing but rather eventful one. This place was eventually recommended to me by Hui Koon and Choon Guan a long time ago.

What can I tell you all about this place? It's a seaside restaurant with lots of fishing boats anchored around. It's a very calm area whereby you can eventually hear the sea slapping the shores while you can see airplanes made their approach to the Penang International Airport that's not too far away from this place.

Mom and Cindy being hard at work choosing the right amount of seafood to serve for 11 hungry stomachs.

I managed to order some Satay where it disappears from the plate on a fly! 30 sticks isn't going to cut it. So we backordered another 20 just to ensure everyone had enough of it. The Satay is really mouth-watering as you can see it. The Satay sauce is covered thoroughly on the Satay itself, making it rather irresistable. 70 cents for each stick, now where can you go find such delicious Satay that only offers plenty of chicken meat and not the fat?

A generous serving of deep fried squid... my favourite!

Cockles that has gone through steaming and served.

Fried Lai Liu Ha (a type of prawns) covered with egg.

Chuk Than stirred fried with charlotte and ginger.

Fried La La Kam Heong style (spicy style).

Deep fried Man Tou buns that goes very well with the Spicy Crab.

Prawns steamed with salt.

And of course, fried noodles.

There's actually more dishes served on the table than what you have seen on the pictures posted here. I was too busy indulging myself with these scrumptious food til I forgot to snap more pictures. The food is really nice, I'm giving this place a Rating 8 out of 10. Everyone walked away happily after meal, only to realize that tonight from 8:30pm to 9:30pm, its the Earth Hour. As we made our way home, we tried to look around if the Penang state did it's part to save the planet. Most of the national monuments turned off its lights; much to our delight that our government does care about the current global warming crisis.

Think Before You Do Something On The Road

While I was on my way back home today around 7pm, I got stuck on the Coastal Highway again. Another day on the road... but with an incident for me to talk about right now. Today's traffic was not the worst day to be on the road but there's still congestion as I head from Bayan Lepas Industrial Zone back to town. As the light turns green, everyone will move down the road and merge back to the remaining traffic at some point. From my work place, I'll definitely have to pass at least 3 traffic lights before getting to the highway. After passing the first of the 3 lights, I found myself stuck back into the jam. However, as the front traffic moves, I follow suit...

"VROOMMM!!!" A white modified Proton Wira, suddenly came out of no where at high speed on the left emergency lane. I happened to be on the right lane at that moment so I managed to catch the entire incident with my own eyes. As the car zipped pass a car or two, only to find itself closed down by the traffic and finally a loud breaking screech follows by a loud crash. The white Wira banged into a Perodua Kenari on the left bumper really hard. The impact on the Kenari was so big, it moved the car to the front hitting the next car... a Nissan Sentra. 3 cars involved in the accident as I slowly moved away from the area. I never manage to catch a glimpse of the person who drove the Wira, but it should be a young malay guy. Most of the young malay drivers will normally modify their poor cars into something that doesn't even look like a car.

I just would like to say a few words about how poorly some people will drive on the road...

• Look at your surroundings before you decide to rev up your speed. Don't be foolish to do so when you have cars all over the place or when you are in the midst of a traffic jam. When you are all clear or other cars seemed to be far enough, I think it'll be reasonable enough for you to do so.

• There's a reason left/right signal indicators are been put on the vehicle. Use them! I've seen so many people either wanting to make a turn or just to move to another around the road doesn't put on their signal indicators before making their move. Are your hands really that heavy to turn on those indicators?

• Your car is not an F1 car, so don't be stupid enough to race a car twice the horsepower of your own. If you happens to be driving a Perodua Kancil, if you are thinking to race a BMW 5 series or a Mercedes C230 who just overtook you, don't be foolish. Your car maybe small enough to weave through the roads, imagine if you bang into that car, the damages you will need to pay for their car is more than what you need to pay to the bank monthly for the car installment.

• A car is a car, not a motorcycle. You don't weave left and right like one. Either you'll bang yourselves into a motorcycle, a car or if you are extremely lucky enough, A TRUCK OR A BUS!

• Traffic light is where you need to stop when the light is red. Don't be so foolish and be a hero to start passing it when there's no incoming traffic. You maybe lucky not to get bang right now, but once too often, either you end in the hospital or 6 feet under.

• Drivers behind modified cars are no better than a psychopath behind a wheel. They think that their cars can fly like an airplane after extreme modification, so don't try to do anything stupid with them unless you are capable of doing so.

• A double line is there so that you are not allowed to run over to other side of the lane. I always like to shout "STICK TO YOUR SIDE OF THE FREAKING ROAD" when I see a driver trying to overtake me on a double line.

• And of course, drive like how you normally drive on a normal sunny day during the rainy days. You are causing a bad traffic when you decided to drive 40kmph on a 80kmph road. If you can't drive in the rain, ask someone else who's more than willing to do so. Oh! I almost forgot... if you decide to drive slow, do it on the left lane, not the right. Didn't JPJ (Malaysian Road Authority) teach you guys that the left lane is the slow lane? Or perhaps you were sleeping in class? I've seen way too much slow drivers on the right lane these days.

So... please use your head when you drive. Don't do something stupid on the road that may cause a lot more inconvenience to other drivers.

As I Rambles On And On And On...

I know some will not be entirely happy that I've blogged nothing about myself as of late. Life has pretty much being the same as usual. You sleep, you wake up, you go to work, you eat, head home after work, do some house chores and back to bed again. The vicious cycle of life... so dull, so boring. Yeah! I know it is. But hell, nothing changes unless I strike the grand prize on the monthly lottery.

For me, I've been living my life pretty much the same. My dear is not around with me, my closest friends are far enough to ignore me at times and my colleagues have their own families to go back home to. As for me, I've been going back to an empty home most of the time... sad isn't it? A guy like me to have everything he wants in the world but never to have a full family to go back home to. A nice warm meal that my mom will cook or someone like my dad to talk to or perhaps my sister and my little brother to tease and joke around with. People envy my family at times but they didn't know the truth that most of the time I live my life rather quiet and dull at home without having any of my family members around, sometimes for days, sometimes for weeks, it can go up to a month or two as well. Harsh realities of life does comes at a heavy price, for money can buy happiness... but the question is; how long can you buy out this happiness for?

Troubles mount here... there... everywhere! At work, some say that I am lucky enough to still have a job to work for. Yes! Thank god for that... but the dark side of being at work is this, can anyone stand the mounting pressure pushing from all directions as they expect you to give the best for them? 100% is not enough, they wanted blood... they wanted 101%. Need to be committed to this, need to have your word on that. There's just so much to complaint about work but things wouldn't change for the better overnight. I guess all I need is just a break from work. I really do... and I am not getting it yet. Perhaps I am just on the verge of breaking myself into pieces and I can foresee that I will be... sooner or later. Time will tell.

Cherudim Gundam

I've spend my weekends couped up at home most of the time during the day, and gone out to enjoy yummy stuffs at night. Sounds funny isn't it? Well, life is very much the same everyday during the weekends. Either the TV or the housework, nothing much to do basically. Sometimes on the phone with my dear, sometimes sleep. So to eventually kill boredom, the only way to kill the weekend time is to go and blog, or to indulge myself into my hobby... building Gundam models.

This is the mess I will eventually create at the dining hall once I begin work. My parents will normally be naggy when I made a mess at the dining hall. To me, messy or not, once everything is settled, cleaning up is a must. Who wants to leave a pile of mess right? Anyway, this is the posting for my weekend build.

GN-002 or known as Gundam Cherudim. Gundam Dynames successor, which like the Dynames can use a Sniper Mode, by exposing a forehead scope used specifically with a rifle-like control device within the cockpit. The cockpit also contains a customized dock for Lockon's orange Haro.

The Cherudim is equipped with a dedicated precision targeting camera located in its head, above the V-Fin, similar to Dynames. In addition, during Trans-Am it deploys a HoloScreen, a targeting unit stored in the backpack which is used to boost Cherudim's accuracy by increasing the speed at which it processes targeting information.

The Cherudim's primary armament is its GN Sniper Rifle II, which is stored on the right shoulder. Folded in half for storage, it can be used in this configuration as a short-to-medium-range three-barrel Vulcan gun. Its other main weapons are its GN Beam Pistol IIs stored in its backpack. Unlike the Dynames, the Cherudim is not equipped with Beam Sabers. However, The GN Beam Pistol II can serve as its melee weapon, sporting an anti-beam coating capable of blocking enemy beam sabers and can be used as an axe. The 4 GN Micro Missile Pods that make up the front skirt armor house 8 GN Micro Missiles that are identical to those used by the 0 Raiser.

Finally, the Cherudim is equipped with the Shield Bit system which allows all nine GN Shield Bits, two of which are mounted to the left shoulder as a shield, another two on the knees and the others mounted around the GN Drive on its rear waist to be remotely controlled and used for defensive purposes, though they also store a beam gun for offense as well similar to the Throne-Zwei's GN Fangs. Four Shield Bits can combine into one in order to emit a more powerful beam. The name of this unit could have been derived from the word "Cherubim", an angel with four wings, possibly a reference to the four weapons in Cherudim's arsenal

World War Movies

The title might seemed to be eye catching eh? Well... it's Monday, time for me to review about the movie that I managed to catch during the last weekend. Now who wouldn't agree with me "Saving Private Ryan" so far has been THE BEST war movie ever made? There are plenty more World War movies out there, from Pearl Harbour to The Windtalkers... from the classic to the modern... watching war movies recalls our darkest moments in the mankind history where we learn from our past to never repeat again in the future.

Name: Valkyrie
Language: English
Date of release: 25th December 2008 (USA)
Director: Bryan Singer
Starring: Tom Cruise, Bill Nighy, Tom Wilkinson

The story basically tells about the Nazi Germany during World War II, as the tide turned in favor of The Allies, a cadre of senior German officers and politicians desperately plot to topple the Nazi regime before the nation is crushed in a near-inevitable defeat. To this end, Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg, an Army officer convinced he must save Germany from Hitler, is recruited to mastermind a real plan. To do so, he arranges for the internal emergency measure, Operation: Valkyrie, to be changed to enable his fellows to seize control of Berlin after the assassination of the Fuhrer. However, even as the plan is put into action, a combination of bad luck and human failings conspire on their own to create a tragedy that would prolong the greater one gripping Europe.

The plot of this movie really comes thick and thin so fast, I had no time to gasp for air! I was just joking. I never liked the Nazi's ever since the day I got to know more about the World War II events. But for this movie, I never knew there were so much internal happenings that takes place in the heart of the Nazi power. Looking at Hitler which were potrayed as a cold heartless animal in this movie really makes my blood boils at some stage that I myself would like to join Stauffenberg to kill him. Every plot of the movie has its own meaning as the rise and the fall of Operation Valkyrie are slowly being unveiled to the audience. The effort is really knee deep for Stauffenberg as he tries so hard to this kill this ONE MAN... and yet, things went disastrously wrong for him when its time to execute the kill. I got to hand it out to Tom Cruise, a really good actor despite his mouth stinks in the public at times. Stop talking and make more movies Mr. Cruise.

Rating: 8 out 10 stars

Canton-i

Saturdays are always fun-filled especially when you know what's coming. For this week, let me introduce to you a place where you will really indulge yourself into tasty food from Hong Kong which is made available in Queensbay, Penang. This place is also known as Canton-i.

According to Canton-i's website, it mentions that the restaurant has invited renowed chefs from Hong Kong and Guangzhou to prepare a wide variety of authentic dishes to offer a true taste of Hong Kong. This restaurant chain has four outlets which is located at 1 Utama Shopping Center, The Gardens Midvalley, Sunway Pyramid and Queensbay Mall.

As you stepped into the restaurant, it offers a very fresh look of white walls and pink ceilings, with plenty of mirrors all over the place, and of course... a dash of lush green behind the glass which is used as wall partitions.

When I've seated down, I was thinking to myself that should the food be as good as the environment? The only way to find out is to put my taste buds to the test. When I was presented with menu, my mouth were filled with saliva. So many choices to choose! Oh my!

After we made our order, time to fool around with my camera with some people shot. From left, Cindy, my mom, my little brother and myself.

The orders came one by one. First up, Hong Kong style Egg Tarts.

Roasted Pork Belly and Barbeque Pork Rice.

Pineapple Style Bun with Butter.

Steamed Custard Bun.

Shrimp Wonton Soup.

Fried Carrot Cake in XO Sauce with Prawn and Fried Fish Cake.

Hong Kong Style Iced Milk Tea and Hot Yin Yong (Mix of Coffee and Tea).

Fried Rice with Diced Chicken and Salted Fish.

And of course... dessert!!! Ice Blended Mango served with Pomelo.

A picture with our guests; Mr Chiam and his family, who came to Penang from Johor for a holiday visit. I've never been so spoiled on both the tastebuds and stomach before. It's evil to be eating so much on a Saturday night. The food are just too good to refuse. It's a sight for sore eyes looking at so much of those delicious food they had to offer on the menu itself. It really gives you the pure satisfaction on the things that you ordered, every little thing tastes different. Although the price that you will pay for the food you ordered is extremely heavy to your pocket; What's the worth over delicious delicacies that's not only catches your eye but your mouth as well? It's really worth it! I'm giving this place a Rating 9 out of 10.

Seafood Galore

Soo Bing sent this email to the team requesting dinner...

****************************************************************************************************************
Hi all,

I know now is critical period, but lets forget about Pass 6 for a while, assuming there are no (project name) this thing in your world.

OK, now you can read this:

This Friday we plan to go for a seafood dinner after work, the venue is at Tanjung Tokong (highly recommended by HuiKoon, yes, is HUIKOON, no need to rub your eyes), there are famous of Crabs and Prawn.

Please reply by using the voting buttons. :)

Regards,
Lim SooBing
****************************************************************************************************************
(This email content has been edited to suit for public reading, I do not want my company to file a lawsuit against me for revealing the current project name).

Then the votes came in. The response were luke warm, a lot of the team mates shunned his idea for dinner. It doesn't stop my surrounding cubemates though, we loved the idea so we voted Yes. We head off from work around 6pm, only to found ourselves in the midst of a very bad traffic jam. Friday traffic is extremely crazy where a small little accident either along the coastal highway or the bridge, will grid lock a quarter of the islands traffic. It's the dinner that brings the jovial mood, so no matter how bad the jam turns out to be, our minds has already been poisoned; serenade by the thoughts of crabs and prawns awaiting for us to indulge.

As we arrived to this place located in Tanjung Tokong, I kind of like this place. This little fishermen's village eventually survived the 2007 Tsunami sweep. I've managed to take pictures of the surrounding area while awaiting for the rest to arrive. The view of the sea is not much of a view though.

The "Thai Pak Koong" temple is located near the seaside restaurant that we were headed to. There's also an arch built at the entrance to the seaside.

This is the seafood restaurant, Sea Pearl Lagoon Cafe.

The troupe that agrees to the dinner invitation, on the left is Wei Theng and Hui Koon and on the right is Soon Hup and Soo Bing. Angelyn came late... very late; because she had to go get a haircut.

What we had was the compulsory prawns and crabs; added fried Hor Fun and also fried rice vermicelli (mi fen) and of course barbequed Stingray, flanked by sweet coconut juice for each of us as we indulged ourselves with the food that we ordered. As we ate, we talked work politics, gossip about others behind their backs and of course anything rubbish that just crosses our minds. We just simply relaxed throughout the evening.

Overall, the food is really simple yet marverllous. What they did to the prawns and crabs are to season it with salt and then toasted. Through this way of cooking, it'll maintian the taste of these yummy yet devilish stuff. The Stingray is filled with spices flavour, which really opens up the appetite as well. There are still plenty of space to improve for this place especially the variety of how they cook their seafood. The fried Hor Fun and rice vermicelli tastes rather poor. The damage from this place is RM240. Having ordered at least a dozen crab served on our table, I think this is a pretty reasonable priced place. I'm giving this place a Rating 7 out of 10.

Angelyn gave us her final words about the meal though. Hehe!

As I drove myself home, I realised that I forgotten to take pictures with my colleagues during the meal. I guess that this picture that was taken seconds before reaching home helps. Silly me!

Seravee Gundam

WARNING!!! This posting might be boring to some readers, so if you are not up to some knowledge reading, you may skip this posting.

I know this posting was late. Sorry everyone! that I have been busy at night. Most of the time, I will spend time at home indulging myself into my hobby, that is building anime robots or widely known as Gundam. What is a Gundam? According to wikipedia, it's a metaseries of Japanese anime, featuring giant robots, or "mecha", created by Sunrise studios. Gundam became a collective term for 7 different time lines, all featuring their own story-lines, with a few common denominators and war machines called Gundam.

I've picked up the Gundam series from Mobile Suit Gundam SEED through to Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny. Current running series is the Mobile Suit Gundam 00. Gundam 00 consists of two 25 episode seasons. The series is set in a futuristic Earth and centered around Celestial Being, a private paramilitary force and their efforts to rid the world of war and conflict with a series of unique and highly effective mobile suits known as "Gundams".


Enough introduction about Gundam 00 series, let me tell you what I have been building. GN-008 or known as Seravee Gundam. Successor to the GN-005 Gundam Virtue that carries over the heavy armament concept and the Trans-Am System. Like the Virtue, it wields four cannons, though they are slimmer. Said cannons are placed in pairs at the knees and on the back of the unit, and a pair of GN-Bazookas. They can also be attached onto the two cannons at the back which can then fire a charged high-density, compressed blast known as "Buster Cannon".

The combined form of the GN-Bazookas is called "Double Bazooka", and can also switch to Burst mode to fire a more powerful shot. If it is fired together with the four cannons it is known as "Hyper Bazooka". Attaching the Double Bazooka onto the right cannon at the back will form the "Double Bazooka Cannon", while switching to Burst mode will become "Double Bazooka Buster Cannon". It is also equipped with a pair of GN-Beam sabers which are attached to the wrists of the unit. The two knee-mounted cannons and the two shoulder cannons hide a pair of hands, which can be equipped with beam sabers.


There is a torso-sized head that resembles a Gundam's on the back of the Seravee, it is a GN Particle emitter and rear view camera, which generates GN Fields when the V-fins split to expose the eyes (known as Face Burst mode), which is actually the Seraphim Gundam. The GN Field produced by it can also be used to focus a powerful cohesive blast, using the four smaller cannons, at the front. While Trans-Am is activated, the GN-Particle output is increased to thrice its normal amount.


The Seravee is also equipped with the "Seraphim System" which is actually the torso-sized head and shoulder cannons of the Seravee, which separates from the main unit and transforms, becoming the GN-009 Seraphim Gundam. The name of this unit could be derived from "Seraphim", an angel with six wings, possibly as a reference to its six arms and GN-Beam sabers. Enough said. Hope that this will thrill you ardent anime fans around. More to come as I continue to build.