Alrightymo! There you have it. Oh. Yonghui was also offered. And we studied for this module (as do other modules) together! The pact is made. Looking forward :)

Just returned from Belgium. Saw loads of Tin Tin stuff! Also bought loads of them. Anywayz... pics will follow soon. But before that, an e-mail that brought me mixed feelings. On one hand I thought it was a good thing, while on the other, I am clearly reluctant to take up the commitment. Well, this will bring my wish of becoming a tutor to screw up the students' minds forward (I was thinking of becoming a part-time tutor for design after establising a career...) Then again, how hard will it be to teach our juniors to be exam smart and learn all the questions that our dear Prof Lim will set for the exams (they are repeats anyway).

Sigh... Scared! But... I want to spend all my spare time with my friends and family. So I think I will turn it down... as did our dear Mr San who also got the invitation. Coincidentally, we have a better person in mind to be a constructions T.A. So Ju / CM, I hope you take it up and bring light to our juniors!!! We always ask u about our constructions stuff anywayz, might as well right???


Fans of Ghost In the Shell rejoice! Really looking to this baby's release. Full diecast model of all time favourite mecha Tachikoma, which comes with its own accessories, including a fully poseable Motoko Kusanagi (Major, Section 9) with her own accessories! This is it! Buy of the year for 2007! June come quick!

Today is the second time I got scolded by a Dutch old granny... Here are the detailed reports:

Incident #1 _ Cycling on pedestrian path

One fine afternoon after studio I was cycling back to my apartment. After 5 minutes of peddling, I finally reached the road right in front of my block. Only problem is... a car was approaching from ahead and the road width was too narrow to accomodate my bike, the approaching mini, and a parked veh. Wat to do? Lift up the front of the bike (still cycling, jhee agile~), mount the curb and dash into the pedestrian path. Only to meet a Dutch old granny who was a good 10 metres (no kidding) away from me.

What I did: Slow down, maneuver the bike to the extreme right (already brushing against the bushes), and give her enough space.

What she did: Thinks that I have violated her air space, raised up her walking stick with her left hand, used it to block my way and stop me from advancing.

What I did: Stop. Bo pian... unless i crash into her stick... her walking stick.

What she did: SCOLDED ME LIKE MAD. Her tone was stern and reprimanding. Her stare were like the sun piercing through cumulonimbus. Her voice, loud like thunder. With her left hand she raised her stick... her walking stick, and pointed it at me, and poked my bike's front wheel (ouch... ramble ramble ramble... ouch...) She was obviously upset that I have mounted the pedestrian path.

Incident #2 _ Parking beyond designated bicycle parking

Today I went to Dynabyte (where I bought me new ASUS) to get my free ram upgrade (mine was the last set in the store on display, flashing Dynabyte commercials for 2 weeks +/-. After some negotiation with the store employee, he agreed to let me have it, and give me a free 1GB ram upgrade when his ram sticks are restocked). Parked my bike outside the store right beside a brick wall clearly out of the way of any living organism imaginable (from ants to elephants), and happily strolled into the shop. What I did not know was a Dutch old granny was following me into the shop!

What I did: Saw the store owner, greeted him "Morning Hans!" and he recognized me and waved back as he bent over to pick up the brand new ram sticks from his counter. I walked over to where he was standing and took Zelevol out of my bag.

What she did: Interrupted me conversation with Hans the shop attendant and SCOLDED ME LIKE MAD. Her tone was stern and reprimanding. Her stare were like the sun piercing through cumulonimbus. Her voice, loud like thunder. Thankfully, she had no stick... err... walking stick. She was obviously upset that I have parked me bike illegally, so the speak.

Postmortem

Here's the funny part. For both incidents, the Dutch old grannies spoke in Dutch. Yep, the older generation can't speak english. So all I could do was stand down there and guess what they were trying to tell me and... SMILE! Which made them more furious I guess... Larki they don't have high blood pressure... else they would have coughed blood and I would... have to do extra laundry.

Anywayz... another attendant in Dynabyte came by from the corner of the shop to the counter and asked me, "So what'd she want from you?"

"I owe her rent money..."

"Serious?"

Hans said, "No. You parked your bike along the pedestrian walk way."

"Oh... Really now..."

Interim crit is just over. Well... the crit panel was very critical. The external tutor in the panel only talked about what was bad in the design, which was a good thing I suppose. Gave a short and to the point speech, being the last to present. Got some pretty decent feedback but I don't think i will want to change much, since submission is in less than a month's time. Below are some images. Of one of my galleries, and err... my panel 2 (panel 1 was all the plans). It is quite a big scale design (10,000 sqm), of an artist village (jhee cliché) haha... Enjoy! Comments welcome. Give some ideas leh...

It's Elita's birthday today. Happy b'day gal. It's the last b'day amongst the 3 of us who are spending our b'day here (zongye, tata and meself). Oh, point of interest: all 5 of us here are the youngest in our families. Hohoho.

Took these photos while I was cycling behind Tijl and Elita. He was carrying a cardboard roll, which we used as our column for our technical studies model. Heh, quite a stunt! Most Dutch roads have bicycle lanes.

Check it out.
Computer Brand: ASUS
Computer Model: Z92Je-AP009M
Computer Name: Zelevol
Computer Description: Keguang's Might
User Name: Keguang
Ram: 2GB
Processor: Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T5600 1.83GHz
HDD: 120GB
Graphic Card: 128 MB ATI X1450 (up to 512 MB Hypermemory)
Price: I'm not tellin' you?
Built in 1.3 Megapixel webcamera.

It is a good computer, at a decent cost... Sigh. The best case scenario of me using Rickass's old Acer didn't work out... So... I guess this is the most straight forward solution to my month-long misery...

And with a new computer, we can have more chat w/ chet sessions :) and save money on calling on the phone -.-"

A typical scene at Craig, Elita and Ju's place... workaholic Singaporeans who have forgotten that design is S/U. Really, we just full time design whole day! Sigh. Oh see Ju's Robin Hood cap he bought from Nottingham!

Thanks to my family who supported me through the whole laptop ordeal... and thanks dar~

Rest in peace Acer. Your motherboard is declared "unrepairable", and ur HDD is far from corrupted.

Decided to buy a new laptop here. Asus, here I come!!!

Computer is "repaired". 100 Euros change of harddisk (upgrade from 20GB to 40GB).

Install windows half way hang. Off computer, on again, resumed installation.

Install service pack 2 half way hang. Off computer, on again, see Blue Screen of Death. Off computer, format computer, restart everything again.

Managed to get everything installed finally. Tomorrow bringing back to computer shop for an explanation. That's what one year's worth of warranty is for... right?

Tormented. At the mercy of the com, which can crash any instant, deleting my hardwork. Should i install photoshop and sketchup? I wonder... I really need help. School com can "install" sketchup, but... each computer can only use 480 minutes. Can't get it to authorize... Sigh. I am in trouble. Very stressed out and unhappy over this computer ordeal.

Tormented.

Fallen ill. Slight fever and flu. Must be the dirty London air. Pics from London are up! Text to be followed later when I am more free... Oh, laptop crashed on me again. This time, I think will have to change the harddisk... Sigh. Life w/o computers suck... Damn unlucky these days. Interim crit in 2 weeks! Must piah~!

Chill...

As mentioned earlier... We didn't really stay as a group for the trip. First there was 4, then 5, then 3, then 2... then for Nottingham it was 3 again (Ju, YW and myself). After coming back from Nottingham, I thought I wanted to see more attractions while Ju and YW wanted a good chinese lunch. Well, I'd love that too but I didn't have any pounds left so... We parted ways and I went solo to the follow destinations!

First up is Wellington Arch. Err... Nice hor? Well I didn't know why I went there. It was a nice icon on the map and I thought, alright... Maybe I'll just... go... take a look?



St Paul's cathedral is a definite must go! This 17th century building was stunning! I went in and took a photo, before seeing the "no photography allowed" card. Well, I didn't know so... it wasn't me fault! Look at the tall columns supporting the naves! The entrance fees was too expensive, even for students. Remembering that I didn't have a penny on me, next stop... Millenium Dome!





Renzo Piano's Millenium Dome. Closed! For renovations. Peng told us that since we intended to go earlier on, but left it out cuz we thought it was closed... Well I thought I'd still love to catch a glimpse of it fro the exterior...

Took a train from King's cross to Nottingham. Nothing much to do for the hour long journey... 'cept listening to my creative Muvo and do some sketches for Design. Boring right... Sigh...



Nottingham, made famous by the legend of Robin Hood! Yea, Kevin Costner one. Come on, the rest weren't that good... Right...?








There weren't many attractions in Nottingham, except for the castle (a majority of which as been torn down), and the geek kingdom of Warhammer world. Well I couldn't relate to all the other models in the gallery, except for the LOTR ones... So check it out Linghan. Pretty wild eh?

For this London trip, we didn't stay as a group all the time. Of course, when we arrived there were four of us. Then Ju's friend Youwen joined us, so there were 5. Then we split up to 3-2 cuz Ju and YW went to meet their friends. Today, Craig went to meet his friend living in London so that leaves the 2 of us. We checked into the penthouse of 196 Bishopsgate service apartments, rented to us free of charge by Peng. Sigh... Thanks for your generosity!! We checked in and went straight to Spitalsfield where the shopaholic went err.... on a shopping spree!




More Norman Foster's works, 30 St Mary's Ax, the Swiss Re building, called the "gherkin" by locals because of its shape. Opposite it stands Richard Roger's Lloyd's of London building, which reminds me of centre Pompidou... Hoho...







The famous London Eye (soon to be copied by Singapore) and Big Ben, which we passed by on our way to Westminster's abbey, which was closed on Sunday. Darn! The poppy flower is in remembrance of the British ex-servicemen who served in the world war. We donated and pinned ours to our jacket!







Buckingham Palace, with the Victoria Memoria standing in the centre of the public square before it. Great open space where crowds of locals and tourists alike linger and chill out!



Then we checked out the V&A Musuem, where there was a photography exhibition and a da Vinci gallery showing the originals of his sketches (on human anatomy, geometry, inventions, etc). Not very worth the time and money imo... haha. Below is the natural history museum which we walked by but didn't enter. To see what's inside, you must visit Ju's blog!


As the final leg of today's initerary, 2 of us made a stop at Trafalgar square where Nelson's column stands. Like all other public spaces in London, it's just nice to be in and spend your time looking at people and all... The pic above was taken with my camera balancing on the round tip of a circular balastrade. Pretty good~




Here you see our favourite pastime at night. It was basically a television quiz show which makes money by asking seemingly simple questions and get the public to call in, hoping they will win the 5000-20000 pounds cash price. We even made a mock model for the 2nd night's question! A damn bloody waste of time, but we just needed to know the answer. The host was this gay faggot who keeps going "oh my god, people are guessing. You don't have to guess! The answer is on the screen"... Yea right.