Good Bye 2006, Hello 2007

2006 Year End Celebration

Goodbye, farewell, 2006 has passed. Goodbye tragedy, goodbye evil thoughts, goodbye nasty events, goodbye things that bugs me. This is 2007 and it’s going to be me and the rest of the world; not the world on me.

Went Sg Wang out of impulse at 5. Reached there at 7 and it was already packed. Fireworks don’t start 4 hours later. Nothing left to do but to enjoy concerts, tea and good friend’s company. Not to mention getting molested once in a while by total strangers :P

Likewise, it’s totally different from what is being shown by those TV crews. At least they weren’t mobbed because they were sitting high and safe ontop of their transmission vans. Those small crowds you see are only for losers that didn’t get the best spots. TV Crews included.

Us gung-ho people who reach at 7 had the best spot. Right in the middle of a 3 lane crossroad. With Dior, Kelvin Klein, Rolex and McD ad boards next to us, counting 4 traffic lights, it’s truly a once in a year experience. With such a strategic spot, Starhill and KLCC is within sight (though both are in opposite direction).

At 8-10, Sg Wang had the best street side concert with people packed from Starhill to BB Plaza and beyond (lorong’s anyone?). In fact things were so bad that though the main entrance were open, no one could get in or out. So we had to take the reccon exit through the carpark side door.

Artists partaking the event were mostly canto pop singers. A Du, Jing Sha and some which I can’t recognise their face.

By 11pm things start to get wet. Both from strangers armpit sweat (lucky I’m tall) and the chemical cocktail of fake snow being sprayed all over. By 11.30pm things were at a standstill. Because nobody can move an inch to take out his/her handphone without poking someone in the eye with your elbow. Thanks to us being cramped up. You guys in front of your tv sets can get those new year messages sent by other tv zombies.

Come 11.45pm, were practically cheering everything that moves or come within sight. Monorail trains, Intrakota busses, the garbage truck, and other strangers that ended up being Frosty.

MIDNIGHT STRIKES! People go mad, foams cover the sky, cheers ring out loud! People start rubbing and hugging each other. Girls go crazy over me (I wished hard for this since 11.50) yay!!

Then the fireworks come. Blast after blast of pure destructive floral patterns emerge from the sky as everyone ohh and ahhh-ed. Those with camcorders and cameras recorded. Those without provided comentaries for those that have.

“Ohh.. look at that pretty red fireworks with acute similarity to Einsteins fractal predictions!”
“Ohh. I have nothing to say but waaa.. so nice!”

Surprisingly, 10 minutes after that people started partaking in another form of rush. The kiasu rush to get home before everyone else. Yours truly included. But we’re not that interested to get home. Just a nice spot to take pictures of other TRYING to get home. What a perspective.

Anyway thanks to Jeannie for the invite, Justin and gang from Terenganu for the company, Lisa for the humor and everyone else for the night!

Happy 2007!

Things I don’t understand

Why when filing complaints, people don’t target the culprit themselves but their head/superiors/manages/boss? You can see this happening more often in the media where big cases happen.

Is it because of the deeper pockets of their employers that they can claim more money? Or is it because of their higher authority that they felt they can get some action done?

J2EE Day 1

Below is a transcript of how I spent my first day on J2EE training. It’s a 10 days course but because there are some that are totally blank on what Java is, the trainer decides to use the first 2 class as a prep for them. My thought is how much can you learn in 2 days that can prepare you for the advance stuff the rest of the training? Well, I couldn’t be bothered to know.

The class is sponsored by MDEC (Malaysian Developement something-something, again, not bothered to know). It’s an initiative for people who wanted to get certified as a Sun/Microsoft/Oracle/SQL programmer/developer/consultant that kind of thing. While anyone can join in provided they pay, we students are only entitled for 1 free training as it’s sponsored by the Gov. If anyone is interested in other courses they’ll have to pay up something in the range of 5-10k to get certified.

Anyway I’m lazy to write my notes using the supplied testpad. So being lazy and high tech I’ve decided to post all the learning notes online at THIS PAGE. That way I don’t have to carry all those books and papers with me. The power of Internet.

Ice shelf breaks off (again)

Yahoo again reported that another piece of from the the Ellesmere Island (Canadian Arctic). Previous breakaways are usually just mentioned in the sublines but this time it got the honour of being in the headline, picture with a polar bear included. See HERE.

So as usual the planthora of scientists claim that it was another sign of Global Warming. Fair enough. But don’t we know it already? There’s a difference between ignorant and being insensitive (ignorant=not bothering to know; insensitive=knowing but not helping out). I’m sure all who frequently checks online portals are aware of what global warming is. How about them stop wasting time here and do their campaigning on some other ground? This slice of the demographic pie already got the message.

..and I’m sick of hearing a scientist reiterating how serious Global Warming was everytime a natural phenomena occurs. Not sure if it’s the scientist lacking anything better to say or the reporter insisting the good fellow say something on global warming for his/her article. My rant. Check 2nd paragraph.

So now things are breaking off, floods are mor frequent, draught is encroaching, yea, we know all that points to global warming. In fact I believe Global Warming is real. I fully support any effort to reduce it’s potency. I myself am well aware of the consequences of an uncontrolled chain of natural disaster after another. See floods in Johor.

Anyway I read yesterday that bloggers are complaining that they can’t blog and people are complaining that bloggers are complaining that they can’t blog. Well, it all depends on who’s (where) your host is and how dependent you are on your blog.

Me? I’m just happy that I’m unaffected. Sorry guys.

I’ll be starting my Java class today. Will write more later in the afternoon.

Looking back, moving forward

Christmas has passed and staffs are now probably busy replacing all the Christmas bling for Raya blings. All my friends are probably still working hard looking forward to the new year where they’ll be able to afford that (probably) super-expensive-ultra-exotic class trip. I can’t believe Cher actually am happy that she worked during Christmas night for the triple pay. Was it really worth it?

Lucky she’s not stationed in Bangladeshi or the following cartoon fits to a T.

Actually I worked too. I’d work hard enough to afford a trip and now am spending time out to blog at home. Unlike others I’m pretty contented with life right now. No classes, no exams, no assigments, no responsibilities, no girlfriends, no more birthday parties anymore (yay, I’m evil).

The only thing bugging me is probably the lag I’m getting using Streamyx. But can’t blame them for that as things in Taiwan are much worst off. Although slow but at least still bearable here, much more so since I’m using a proxy in Australia to redirect my traffic over there. Many thanks to those dudes in LowYat forum. Hopefully someone can teach me how to hack an Astro dish to send broadband signals then I’ll be happy.

Anyway New Year’s almost coming up. Looking back, I’m glad to see that “most” of my items on 2006’s resolution are checked. Mistake I made last year is setting somethings too high. Made me spent too much effort working for nothing. Case in point is item #23: To master Java up to equal level compared to C.

Turns out easier said then done. When given a chance to pick a programming language I choose everything except Java. Turns out I’m the type that need to separate “learning” from “work”. I don’t like applying things I’m learning onto something that I’m working on. It’s just like using VB for your project while learning VB (which happend VERY frequently during college assigments). I don’t like the lack of foresight on what the language can do and what are it’s capability when deciding on functions to build using the said language. Reason being I’m still learning it in the first place. :P

However that same unfinished business is again on my 2007 resolution. And to make sure that it will work out this time, I’m going for a 10 days course courtesy of the M’sian Gov in my own college stretching from 30/Dec to 27/Jan. Hopefully I can strike it off come 2008.

While looking back I also notice that I didn’t gain any weight at all. Kinda sad cause now relatives are asking if I got enough to eat! OH MAN! I can’t help it. It’s been like this since I’m born! BMI is great at a comfy 22. Just that being taller has made me seem kinda skinny. The doctor is right. I have a crazy high metabolism rate. I can chow down 3 plates of pasta and 3 hours later will feel hungry again. In fact sitting still for hours on games doesn’t lessen the fact that I’ll still need the same amount of food a lion gets per day. Some how the feeling of hunger is so norm for me that I’m actually worried if I’m getting used to the sensation. Maybe my ok is hungry and my hungry is your starving. I’m also worried if some parasite is getting all the nourishments I’m getting :P

Looking forward I predict the same hectic timetable. Less classes per week; more assigments per class. More lab ghosting and less image creation. Earthquake in June (serious, I got a feeling) and more flooding in September (I felt this too!). Pretty norm. However as this year would be the last year for all of us, I have a feeling all our birthdays are going to be as grand as this years. But please make it a group celebration or else we’d go pokai again. :)

PS: I’ve finished re-structuring the blog. Made some improvements on the categories, minor change in layout and major change in the way pictures are being displayed. Thumbnails are working! Yay!

Signing out year 2006
ωϊΪΪϊαm §öö