Boring Christmas

Christmas in Manchester -- no white Christmas

Christmas Dinner (16th December 2008)

Me and May and Alex

Christmas Cracker..*woot* (nail clippers inside)

dear and I

Jessica and May

Jessica is damn happy



Cheers!


note what's on his hair

Jessica's fluffy fluffy~

Alex, me, Kiran, May and Jessica



after dinner.. Jessica's room

curling my hair.. but failed

May couldn't resist the temptation to paint her nails

then had her hair curled

showing off the hair.. mine was a failed product

Tang Yuan Making (21st December 2008)

Master Chef

Jeffery and dear

Jeff, dear, me, Min Hong and Bryan


putting nutella in the tang yuan


jean and Min Hong


sorry Jeff...

little Bryan with dear

little little little Bryan with Jeff



my dear 'tou chi'

done!

Went for movie during Christmas Eve, watched transporter 3-- not too bad. The streets were so damn quiet. No buses, no people.. everyone celebrating with family.. apart from us, celebrating in Pizza Co.

Christmas Day -- Quietness again. However, my dream came true-- celebrating Christmas in UK with my dear. Anyway, it is damn boring. No bus, shops not open, no one on street, no snow, no turkey, no Christmas Service like Malaysia churches.... one word----Boring..

These sum up CHRISTMAS in UK.

Christmas Christmas!!!

Jingle bells jingle bells jingle bells rock! Christmas market is one of the highlight events in Manchester for Christmas. It feels like the temporary stalls in Miri City before Chinese New Year. Ooooo... Love it. Waiting for Christmas to come! Ho Ho Ho!!

Dear, Min Hong and I went to the Christmas market last Saturday. That was my third time there. It's in front of the Manchester town hall. I felt extremely delighted and excited. Christmas is my most favourite festival, after Chinese New Year. It's special this year as I will be celebrating it in UK!! Christmas songs everywhere, and sometimes you can see chefs of restaurants and shopkeepers singing and dancing along with the christmas songs.

It's as crowded as the New Year Market in Miri. But the stalls here are proper, all are little wooden huts and they even turned it into bars! Most of the people there had a glass of wine in their hand. I was walking in the crowd and one Caucasian smiled and said to me, 'ni hao!!' Haha

walking towards the market

street lights became like this

flooded with people but that's how the ambiance should be like

the city council made a lot of trees like this



they sell hot coffee and chocolate with wine.. had the latte with bailey.. mild one


it's actually a carving, with little Santa Clauses inside

bar at the back.. it's always full

All kinds of strudels

I had apple strudel... yummy with the custard

Dear and Min Hong

big fat santa

busiest stall selling German sausage

with my 'Super Bratwurst'

chocolate coated fruits--i think those are strawberries

all kinds of nuts

and my hazel nuts

look at the clock at the bottom left. it's made of the bulbs we use for CNY electric fire crackers.

look at the crowd

second german sausage dear had, after his beef burger (couldn't resist)

painted glass

for people with sweet tooth

decorative ornaments

liquorice

Had the mini pancakes last time which was really expensive. Eight really mini pancakes about the size of 50 cents for 3 pounds... but it tastes so great.

Went back and played table tennis for an hour then watched movies with jean, jeff, min hong and dear--doomsday.. what a sickening movie.. til 3am...

Went to church on Sunday and there was a christmas celebration. Kids were singing and dancing. They were so so so cute..

You better watch out,

you better not cry,

better not pout I'm telling you why,

Jesus Christ is coming today~~

The little boy in front was so cute and chubby, and naughty...

Anyway, afterall, CHRISTMAS IS TO CELEBRATE JESUS' BIRTH. That's the most important purpose of Christmas which we must never forget. It's because Jesus came to us to be our Saviour, and we celebrate to thank Him for coming and giving us eternal life. CHRISTMAS IS FOR JESUS! I enjoy Christmas so much until sometimes I don't know why I feel like crying when I listen to Christmas songs. Such a lovely festival.

I remember when I was young I loved to imagine myself as one of the kids playing with snow and Santa Claus during Christmas in the movies. Singing christmas songs.... in the winter wonderland. So beautiful.. I wished someday I would be one of them. My dream... And now finally I'm in UK. However, it feels different. Even though the dreams embedded in me since young is still fresh and clear in my mind... it feels different. Maybe I'm not a little kid anymore. How I wish I could wind back the time, celebrating Christmas in UK or somewhere else with snow 'as a little kid'.

Christmas Party cum Dinner tonight~~

Random

A guy from China in my course said,

‘这些新加坡人，讲的中文怪怪的。’

(These Singaporeans are speaking strange Mandarin).

I said,

'他们不是新加坡人，是马来西亚人。我也是马来西亚人。你怎么可以在他们面前这么说呢？万一他们听到怎么办？'

(They are not Singaporeans but Malaysians. I'm a Malaysian too. How could you say that just right in front of them? How if they heard what you said?)

He said,

'听到就听到。哎呀，英文更怪啊！'

(Who cares if they heard it? Their English are even more strange!)

‘最近和香港人在一起多了，我的中文也不好了。’

(These days I've been mixing with those from Hong Kong and this made my Mandarin bad.)

(speechless).......................................................................................................................................................

Tiring Thurday

Thursdays are always tiring as it's a full day. So far, I have three courseworks to be completed. Went for an industrial visit yesterday to Cargill. The introduction was- 'Cargill -- one of the largest global company that you may have not heard off'. The plant was so big. The employees guided us and showed us how the machines work, and the processes of making glucose and the very viscous glucose syrup. There were 6 guys only and 3 were named Robert..

in the toilet

Thanks Kevin the chef for giving me a treat after a tiring day. He gave me two pieces of salmon of about one inch thick each. I'm a huge fan of fish especially salmon, and also I've not eaten fish for a long time apart from the fish in fish and chips.

It snowed in Manchester few days ago. Not those kind of thick snow though. I went out to look at it at 6am. It felt like ice.. Dear went to Bolton to represent University of Manchester for Engineering Design Competition and got third. So proud of him. He said it was snowing quite heavily there. Ah.. I'm desperate to look at thick snow on the ground, unlike the one in Manchester-----

just a little bit of snow.. taken at 11am from my room

I was so desperate of chocolate too. Got 4 doughnuts from the famous Krispy Kreme. 4 doughnuts cost 5 pounds which is about RM30. Haha. Anyway, you can't convert the cost of food in UK or else you will never eat anything. Well, to be honest, these doughnuts are actually quite expensive but it's so nice until it's worth eating ONCE IN A WHILE.




Hey.. So many people are back in Miri and some are going back to Miri. I want to go back too but thinking of the flight which takes a day puts me off. Felt really uncomfortable on the way to Amsterdam in the plane. But I want kolok mee, laksa, lutong porridge, fried kueh tiaw, roasted duck....................................................................The worst thing is, during CNY there's exam going on!!!!! Nonetheless, I will go to Chinatown to have a look at how they celebrate it here. To see if there's any Lion Dance.. haha!

New Blog Skin

Tada!! New Blog Skin! Thanks to Michelle for teaching me about this blog stuff. As a result, I made a blog skin myself. It's still not that satisfying yet.

Ah.. why are so many people back to Miri or going back to Miri?? I want to go back for CNY!