An Ordinary Monday

If you see a foreigner dashing, running to catch the train, you know that person had been in Japan long enough! to realize! that it wont be another train for the next 4mins 32 seconds!!!!!! O_o" !! cheers.

An ordinary Monday, it's always good to see two great mind come together every Monday early morning, arguing with each other in a positivity-stimulation way, my two professors debating on students' presentation during weekly seminar. You can see their oversize brain sending RF wave, pumping stimulant, the chemical reaction serve as the catalyst to motivate you not to not ganbatte on your research throughout the week.

Somebody please fetch me my pina colada. :(

Merry Holiday Season

Recently my life has really been centered around school, lab and assignments. So, I have no photos and updates to show you.

Except if you wanna know that graffiti is kidda a major problem in Japan, or someone has forgotten their keys.

Or, you wanna see the massive choices of drinks from vending machines and yet, I am addicted to coke.

Or maybe you wanna see my pissed-off face in a cold weather... Yea! It's friggin cold and I dont like it! I desperately need to bask in the glorious sunshine, best is the tropical sunshine with thick slap of sunblock... good old days.. good old days...

Or worst come to worst, I can show you the best pictures of all time from my blog collections, the Ueno zoo's awesome-kick-ass ape's butt.

The thing is, I made it a point not to mix up work and play. That's is the reason why you dont often see me blogging about my lab, research, and school. In addition to the reason that actually my lab is working on a super-secretive-world-domination evil project, I don't wanna reveal any secret that cost me my head. YOU DONT PISS IN THE WELL YOU DRINK!! (Oh! Maybe the last sentence here is not related, but I am just finding an opportunity to yell it out!), YOU DONT PISS IN THE WELL YOU DRINK!! (again...) but I really really really need to update my blog, so...

*Gulp Gulp Gulp*, three naughty bottles of beer boycotting Miss Orange Juicy Sunshine.

It was the year-end party celebration last Saturday. Everybody was suit up, ready to mingle in an environment where research was not the main topic of conversation.

Me and She-san in her fabulous cheong-sam.

We were jealous bachelor students had a group picture among themselves so we gather all master first year student and took this happy picture.

Saeki wanna steal all the spot light from us so we kicked him!

Because the alumi were all there, so we had to introduce ourselves. I was speaking in Japanese, but by the look of my face, I think I was too nervous and I crapped my pants.

And I think this guy found out, he cant help himself laughing his guts out.

Well, who cares, more alcohol please!

It was awesome fun sitting on tatami floor, the food and the drinks and the chatting, the accompany with lab members was beyond joyous, Happy Holidays!

Disappearance

If you have been reading my blog, you would kidda notice that I disappeared from the blogger scene since ...well, 10 days! Like I have dissipated (No, not constipated), like I have turned into cloud of smoke and gonE FOREVER!!!

What? I have a life in the real world too you know! except blogging and facebook-ing!

nah, I dont have a life except blogging and facebook-ing! :)

Ando and Hirokawa Lab

It's a yippie day today! Coz I finished my final's papers! So I put my awesome lab group picture with all the happy people!!

Home Party

9th March 2009. (Monday)

Professor Ando invited all the members in the lab to his house for dinner. It was an amazing night with delicious food, tons of alcohol and huge dosage of laughters.

OWARIMASHITA!!!!!!

FINALLY!!!!!!!! After months of preparation!

I still havent calm down from the interview half an hour ago. I was so freaking nervous my bp shot up to 200/200. Me alone facing 7, 8 professors in a long table, including Professor Ando and Professor Nakagawa who I attended his class as a revision. I think it will take a while for me to cool down.

Maybe hot spring will help!

Till the result day, for now, it's YIPPIEEEE!!!!!!!

I-su-ra-mu

Had a tea party with my Science Technology Japanese teacher Nishina Sensei 仁科先生　after the course final exam. All her 6 students gathered in her room and we had cakes, tea and strawberry. Yeap, good life!

One of the topic we brought out was about the Islam religion practice in Japan. One of the student is Indonesian and she told us about her difficulties in practicing Islam prayers in Japan. For example, her experience of getting stone early in the morning 5am outside her balcony by Japanese kids because they thought they saw ghost in a long white hood, or how she had difficulties in praying when she was in Shinjuku during prayer time, where she couldnt find a suitable spot for prayers.

Sensei said, in Japan, there's a law saying that everyone has the freedom to choose their religion, but officially, it is not allowed to practice it anywhere especially schools or government building. However, considering Muslim student, surau are set up for them to do their prayers. And so, some may argue, if Islam are allowed, why doesnt allow the Christian to do the same, or the Buddhism in school? They called it cult if you try to convey religious message in school/campus ground, heavy punishment might occur. Same case in Turkey, they are arguing whether to allow headscarf in a government building or universities. Currently, it's not allowed.

After further conversation, we found out that her parents are actually Christian, her grandparents are Catholics. She embraces Islam after she found peace by practicing prayers with her nanny. And that, in Indonesia, there are no rules saying that students are required to wear headscarf in primary school or secondary school.

This got me thinking.

The way Muslim practice Islam in Malaysia are way more stricter than Indonesia. They are rules in school whereby Muslim girls have to wear headscarf, what more government building, even the women in police force have to wear headscarf along with a hat. and yet, the Indonesian girl made me speechless by telling me that she came to KL, and she saw girl with headscarf kissing another guy in a shopping mall, and then, Nishina Seisei told me she went to Malaysia for a conference, she was surprised for the relatively long prayer before the conference. So I said, Islam is the national religion of Malaysia, no question about it. Every Muslim are born Islam in Malaysia, there's no freedom for them to convert or choose their own religion either. I dont find anything wrong with this statement, but it made them so surprised.

The conversation continued till the extend I was questioned why I aint wearing headscarf, what religion am I. I say no religion, but I have a set of believes:

I believe Maxwell equations are the root of evil in making me constipate, I still hate Newton and the apple, damn Einstein for E=mcc! And the Hindi conversation in Slumdog Millionaire are making me addicted in perfecting my head shaking technique when I speak and spoken to.

I think I am definitely burning in hell.


There's probably no god, now stop worrying and enjoy your life.
::Atheists in London promoting their new slogan in London city busses. ::

Chinese New Year 2009

I had never been through such a lonely Chinese New Year my entire life. Last year, I lost my grandpa, so we were not celebrating Chinese New Year, it was lonely but I had my family with me and this year, I am not celebrating either because I am stuck in Japan preparing for exams.


Penang Kek Lok Si Temple

It gets most lonely when you look at home country news and everywhere is showing the CNY decoration at home. How Midvalley, KLCC and Pavillion are competing in turning their main lobby into huge giant lantern or plum flowers. How Jenjarom Dongzen temple Flower Festival for the ox year gonna be like, a glimpse of the giant ox with happy monk and laughing children infront. As though they are laughing nincompoop like me who couldnt celebrate CNY this year.


Midvalley Kuala Lumpur, decorations for 2009. Photo by SooHK, Flickr

I decided not to call home during the reunion dinner. I dont want to hear the gathering knowing that they are having delicious home cook cuisine and I am not there.

Side story, I had my Japanese presentation for my Japanese Science Technology class. I presented about basic antenna and electromagnetic wave. Nothing fancy, just about how wavelength related to antenna length. I did the whole presentation in Japanese, it took me more than 1 day to prepare the slides, and script. (Nope, I cant present impromptu without script). In the end, i forgot most of the script and speak like a layman beginner. Kore wa antenna desu. (This is antenna). Sore wa tokyo tower desu. (That is tokyo tower). I felt myself such a failure after almost 1 year, I still couldnt speak Japanese like I should have.

Anyway, learnt some Japanese related to EM waves:

Frequency 周波数　 しゅうはすう　 syuuhasuu
Frequency Band 周波数帯　しゅうはすうたい　syuuhasuutai
Wavelength　 波長　 はちょう hacyou　
Speed of light 光速　 こうそく　 kousoku

以上です！

Lack of Update-ness

Please forgive my lack of update-ness for my Sheepish blog. Been up to nothing much recently. Winter semester had started, stress is hitting hard on me now. I feel the need to excel among a bunch of elites.

Ando Sensei wanted me to translate his lecture notes from Japanese to English, so, I am hook up with this task. Also, busy 'trying' to revise my Japanese before the starting of regular class next week.



Lab member photos. Taken today lunch time after a 5 minutes late into my first official seminar. Front row, are the to-be-graduated Master and PHd student for next year Spring semester.

Summer Camp 08, Kusatsu

When I first heard that Yuen Feng might not able to make it to the 3 days 2 nights summer camp'08, Kusatsu (草津), the first thought came into my mind was GOSH! ME THE ONLY GIRL!

However, the camp turned out to be one of my best experience ever in my Japan life. Not only I can finally experience the typical Japanese students way of life, I could also see how students and professors communicate with each other, during play time and during serious time, which are very worth learning.

Ando Sensei

I was so fortunate enough to have Ando Sensei, Sakurai-san and Hirano-san to be my tour guide in the city of Kusatsu. They had been there a few times and main aim was for the onsen (温泉) and skiing during the winter.

Yubatake

This is Yubatake (湯畑) or hot water field. It's the main source of most of the hot spring in Kusatsu. The water is bubbling at a steaming hot 70 degree celcius with a strong sulfur odor. Then flow and distributed to various public baths.

温泉たまご Onsen eggs

Onsen eggs are one of the famous products produced in Kusatsu. It was first cook in the normal way for certain time and certain degree. ( I forgot the details), then soak in the hot spring water for 2 hours.

Kusatsu International Ski Area

During the winter, Kusatsu is famous for the ski. Imagine the whole place was covering with snow. There's a crater lake located 2100 meters above sea level there.

I had to do a presentation about myself. I was struggling with words in Japs when I wanted to say, 'The maximum length of the world's biggest flower in Msia is 1meter'. Then after that when I asked permission to present in English, I was struggling the vocab to finish my sentence 'Objectives of my final year project was...... ' Now my English is deteriorating, Japanese is impossible to speak, stuck in the middle.

Open air hot spring

One of the most unsual Japanese custom for me, is definitely the public bath. Until now, I havent totally get used to it. In the summer camp, I always wait till the bathroom is empty, then I rush to get my shower, get a quick dip in the hot bath inside the bathroom (Yeap, you have clean your body then could only enjoy the hot bath). But I finally cant escape the nudity when everyone decided to soak in hot spring the next day.

It's of course guys and gurls seperated. Although open air, but the gurls' area are properly secluded. They dont use big towels to wrap yourself before soaking in, just a tiny towel to cover. This time, you should decide, to cover front or back, up or down. Hahahah!!! Some people dont even care covering, walking nude like no big deal. In the locker area, I seriously cant have a peace of mind, but after getting over the mental obstacles, soaking in onsen, is definitely one of the most relaxing experience.

Food on stick

Walking on the streets of Kusatsu also, is the best thing to do. They will just stuff you with free food, and free tea. After you eat the first one, you can take the 2nd one, 3rd one... We walked pass the same shop 3 times, stuffing ourselves with Manju まんじゅ without buying until the very last day.

Breakfast

Except that, Summer camp made my life healthier. Not only the food are typical healthy Japanese food, for breakfast, it's raw egg, nato, miso soup, nori, fish, ham, rice, salad. Dinner was syabu syabu one night and BBQ one night, but also corrected my haywire sleeping hours. Breakfast was strictly at 7am, lunch was 12pm, dinner at 6pm, light off at 11pm, and no late night chatting and no internet!

Dinner - Syabu Syabu

Lab members

Also watched Olympic closing ceremony on a big TV (A REAL TV!!! GOSH!) with Ando Sensei sitting beside shouting Sugoi (great!), and join in their nomikai 飲み会　(drinking session that involved loads of alcohol!), picking up a little of badminton since I last played centuries ago . It was good time. :)

Finally...

I am feeling touch! I feel like crying! No words could describe how on cloud-9 I am now.

We are on could nine

Me... Me... Me

FINALLY graduated! from Japanese intensive course!

Graduation class photos. Sarah's Afro-and-Sailors are good friend fan.

The certificate we received, Proudly, I held up on my hand, gazing at my name, together with the signature of The Man - President of Tokyo Institute of Technolgy. Once again, my tears started to roll down my cheeks. All my hardwork are not wasted!
(Seriously speaking, the Certificate is better than my MMU graduate cert.No pictures, I left my cert with Siska after the Karaoke.)

Thank you Saitou Sensei.

Saitou sensei with bear bear honkan.

Thank you Yamashita Sensei

Yippie.....!

Also Thank you Ishida Sensei, who always expect greatness from us. But we still fail her time after time.

Closing ceremony party.

Finally, not forgetting super cute Little Ishida Sensei!!

Who inspired us with their ambitions to be bread-shop-baker, and flower-shop-florist.

Yet, I will miss my dearest classmates so much. No matter how they hate me, they still have to tolerate seeing me every morning from 9 to 12. This, I cant appreciate enough. We have definitely come a long way....

We a.i.m.e.d to get drunk in the Asahi factory tour.

We silently covered for each other for stealing snap-shot of Asahi beer production.

We experiment all types of jump. Just for Ahmet's future jumping style collection book. (It's gonna be a big hit)

We went Karaoke then room turned Sauna together.

We adopted a pet name ducky and fishy name fish fish.

I will never never gonna forget the Bazooka under the table too.

Best wishes to everyone!

P/S: Actually this post is not as sentimental as it seems to be. I just got nothing else better to do. Maybe I do, I should learn how to tie my Yukata for the Hanabi coming Saturday. :D

Hp's vacation

Did I mentioned my mobile loves Fukushima so much that she decided to ditch me, stay a lil` while longer in Fukushima. Bad Mobile! Bad!

However, she is back. In an envelope. Found her lying in my mailbox this morning.



With a lil note.



::wink::

Just got back Karaoke with classmates. Awesome session. First song was Christina's Reflection and all of us was screaming our lungs out for Pink Floyd Another Brick in the Wall. I must admit Kaiser Chiefs Ruby Ruby Ruby was a bit tricky. I realised I didnt have Yours truly Angry Mob in my Winamp. So sad.


Elephant says hi.

I so wanna get this to hang outside my door. Maybe changing the 営業 (on business) to 休む (vacation) .

Scribble

::Poisonous Cartoon::

Quiz from lesson 4 to lesson 6 finished today. After quiz teacher fed us with poisonous Japanese-children-bluffing anime. First story about how a poor man became rich man by sleeping in front of Buddha, second story about Paddy-Field-God came to live singing haunting Japanese Folk Songs while working in the paddy field. Lunch time, Ahmet brainwashed me again with Spongebob Squarepants with his sparkling super cute Spongebob keychain flashlight! Evil Plan still rulez!

::Spicy::

I lost football bet to Lee. In return, he brought me to this extra spicy Nakamoto Mongolian Ramen in Shinjuku. Waited in line for 30 mins, came out with both lips looking like sausages, along laughing at other Japanese who lined up ages to get themselves tor.tu.re.d. Lee ordered the most spicy dishes on store, I played safe, ordered the middle spicy. Concentrated on the food... tried to hypnotize myself noodle taste like ChupaChups. When I look beside, I saw human water drainage machine, Lee just took his bath with spicy noodle. Funny!

::Krispy Kreme::

Ate it.

When lining up, they gave each fella one original flavoured doughnut. I don't mind queue and queue again before reaching the ordering counter. *wink*

::Kabuki Chou::

Wasnt disturbed by the Yakuza, or pimps, or host (Gigolo alike). Maybe I looked too "Ah-Lian". Not la-la enough.

::Yawn::

Professor wanna judge my 'ability' by forcing me to take August entrance exam. According to him, it's pre-entrance exam! Official exams still in February. What the heck... How many exams I shall take!

::Long-time-no-see::

Today made a grand appearence to my lab. The last time I appeared was 3 months ago. Found out my Senpai learnt how to curse Fuck. Both guys talking in extreme speed of Japanese, I understand nuts. But, he emphasis the Fuck very much that i realised it was English! Maybe because he just got back from Spain last week, and going to US tomorrow, the word Fuck comes in handy. :)

Yes, all PHD students get to travel the world with Professor Ando. Free trips!

::Drama::

Following Malaysian politics. Anwar's sodomize case, Najib denying affairs with Altantuya. What now?! nobody cares about price hike-up no more? Petrol price, and Global Warming and SAVE THE Panda?! Bunch of idoits.

::Naked::

HOT HOT weather! I can soak in ice water whole day...... Melting........

::The End::

The Embarrassing Hulk.

Today, I told my classmates your jokes about The Incredible Hulk over the lunch table:

"Why e.very.ti.me when the incredible green hulk turn into an enormous size hunky, only the shirt was shattered into pieces but not the pants?!"

Everybody was laughing like hell.

In the end, We came to a Solid and Solemn conclusion!! THIS IS VERY SERIOUS!

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

The Incredible Hulk was wearing RUBBER PANTS!

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

OFF COURSE! It all make sense now! :)

Jap Class Classmates

After midterm test. Everybody just happened to be in front of the International Student Center, It Just-so-happened that Siska had a camera, and it also just-so-happened we acted weird, Release tension, you dig what i mean?!

Oscar was doing a triple-flip-legs-folded-jump. His jump was so sophisicated, it's no point mentioning I was blocked by him.

Ahmet came running to Siska (Holding camera).

Me and Sarah remorsing for our imbecile-ness in Jap paper.

Me still remorsing......

Class picture. Siska, Sarah, Sancir, Ahmet, Alfonso and Oscar. Lacking Badar and Carlos.