Hmm. Due to some things here and there that I might have written, I'll continue sharing and laughing and composing some other pieces at this log.


So.. yeah. End of announcement =D

Toasts and cheers!

Tired.

I don't think I had a recess week. Usually, during recess week, I would go around Singapore for fun or to do some grocery shopping, alone or with friends. Now? NONE OF THOSE THINGS HAPPENED.

It was either working in my lab, finishing the project, spending my day writing some reports, attending training in regard to a lab module that I'm currently teaching, revamping the fellowship's blog (haha, they really taking advantage of having a blogger inside the team ;p) or doing things for the fellowship camp committee. I seemed to be busier than usual, even though I have much less modules than usual. (Yaaaa. I don't recommend doing serious research together with taking modules!!)

Seriously, that's a LOT of things to do. I even didn't have time to study or to do my own stuffs. I even slept so late everyday. But the good thing is my bio clock has been going to normal :D Finally! I also crossed out everything in my to do list. So happy! (:


There are 2 days left before this break is over. Time to catch up on my studies.. Yosh. Last sem with mods!!

The quiet place

Just want to share this link:
http://amitaytweeto.com/thequietplace/

"From time to time, stop whatever you're doing and go to your quiet place..."

Semi-hiatus

Uhm. Yeah. So. Sorry for not really posting lately. I am reaaally busy. Quizzes, labwork, lessons, CCAs, teaching.. etc. Now I really do hope that I can finish my labwork fast, so I'll have more time to do everything, to rethink everything, to plan for everything, to study everything I can study (yeeaaa, Asian, I am! =D), to check my photographs..

And how everytime I've planned something, other things will ruin it for me. Good. God, be on my side won't You? ;p

So yep, it's my final year as an undergraduate student now, so I must do my best with the labwork and modules left. Won't post a lot at this moment, but I'll return. I've had some posts in mind, and some posts in the draft waiting to be finalized, and I'll take care of them once I have free time and free mind =)

And my tumblr is ofc still quite active and besides I post a bunch of semi-emoticons there, so if you need to know what I'm currently doing or if I'm still alive.. Just check on it. Or just check if something changes on the right-bar here.

See you, then!

sleep

LOL, yeah, I think it's true for me, especially in the afternoon, in class or lab, waiting for stage #3 to happen soon but apparently it doesn't until the break or until the end of the class! =D

But anyway.. For me, I need enough sleep (6-7 hours) every night for my body to function well. And yep, I am still working on repairing my biological clock so that I go to sleep, wake up and do everything in normal timing. Well, this is just my nature to be a planner, maybe.

I don't really understand how some people here can manage to go to sleep for only 3-4 hours or so? Or to wake up late at 10 or 11 in the morning everyday, even near lunch time, and to go to sleep at 3 or 4 or 5 am? Or maybe I just overrate this. But are they still functioning well and healthy?

See what I've found in google...

The most famous Marcella is probably "the most beautiful creature ever sent into the world", in Don Quixote by Cervantes.

*holding breath*

HAHAHAHAHAH!!! <3

Career planning in 60 secs

and many, many more to think about.



Life's hard. Choosing is hard.

Being picky is hard, specially when people's opinions must be taken into consideration. Even though my intention is not being picky nor arrogant. It's jut not me. It doesn't make me happy nor I love. And furthermore, it doesn't pay well, too.

The latter isn't really about career, though, but I am fed up with people's judgements and whispers behind my back, even though, it's true, they don't harm me, we're still in good terms but it's like having thousands of pair of eyes prying on me because I don't do what they expect me to do. Now I feel like my life, my opinions, my choices must really be influenced by those of others', otherwise I'm wrong. Like, I don't have some says about my own choices. Facing them is wrong, running away is wrong as well. And it's like having no one to trust and no one to talk to.

~lalala~

The reward of patience and perseverance!

It's been a long time for me not to post anything here. I was busy the whole summer with my labworks and report (I slept at dawn for a few days at the last weeks). But then, good things happen to those who wait. And my reward (beside 12 hours hibernation after poster presentation of my summer research work) was...



Yep, I've got a lomo. Supersampler, to be exact.

But why do I suddenly have it? Am I going back to the stone age of taking photos with film (in this case is the 35mm one)?

One friend was giving away a few stuffs because he was going to moving to another country.. The supersampler is really old, he had this when he was still in school in Indonesia. He doesn't use it anymore now, so he decided to give it to this girl, a junior of his, who was quite into taking photos, for FREE =D It's a multi-lens camera, so the result may be really unpredictable because I haven't found any information on how it exactly works. I'll only see how they turn out to be after the 36th exposure and taking them to a developer, which may happen sometime between 3 to 6 months later (I won't take photos so often with it, only on special occasions or if I find nice objects) so we'll see =)

IMHO, even though digital photography is of course much less costly and easier (e.g. people can erase the bad shoots and enhance the acceptable shoots), film photography is irreplaceable with its certain effects (to be exact: its unknown, sometimes-unexpected turnout) and the mindset of to shoot correctly, every-shoot-counts feature. The latter is what I am trying to do with my digital camera as well: to take photos correctly everytime so all my shots are acceptable and free from significant enhancements afterwards.

I'm still on training to do film (35mm) photography, though, because the last time I took photos with PnS, 35mm film cameras was about 10 years ago before finally my family moved on to digital cameras because of the cost.. So I still need to re-train my hand and my head to prevent those shaky, blurry, useless images as well as to load/unload/rewind/advance films and shoot correctly, get a nice object with good exposures etc.

"Think before you speak, act, and shoot." - Me.

Anyway, these are the complete squad of this thing:


I have two films. Below is the one that the past owner gave me:


Expired film!
Yeah, welcome to the world of weird colors. Don't know what I'll get =D
The other one was a new film I bought recently due to some accident and youtube advices.. Good thing is that the advice was true and do-able, otherwise my S$5.50 would have been gone useless. I wanted to buy the provia film instead but the seller didn't have it.

Next target? SLR camera. I hope the ones at my home in Indo still work =) And maybe some darkroom skills, at least to see if the synthetic lab training (and soon-to-be-teaching) has any use for this.

Anyway, once I found out that the old supersampler could work and after reported it to the past owner, I called my dad, who is into photography as well (is interest inherited by genetics?). I told him that his little girl had just gotten herself a 35mm film camera.

His initial response? "HUH?" in a surprised, worried-about-the-cost way.

childhood memories

I spent this evening procrastinating with old Indonesian-dubbed anime soundtracks. They really bring back old memories when I and my friends patiently sat in front of TV after school or before Sunday School, at my or my friends' houses to catch up on the new episodes.. Sorry if some of the titles seem lousy today, but they are definitely better than Indonesian soap operas (anyway, a few 90's Indo soap operas were good as well! haha) and Disney's lousy series/musicals aired nowadays. Anyway, here they are~
























and a few songs whose "official" Indo version couldn't be found:

It all ends

cr: nathan the nerd


Thanks, for the fantasy. Thanks, for the great series. Thanks, for the hype. Thanks, for the laughters and tears. Thanks, for the childhood. For saving me from only knowing Twilight, Lady Gaga and Katy Perry =D Thanks, for Hogwarts that will always be there to welcome us home.

I typed 'fox' in google search, and then...

That keyword is really ambigous. It is a name of an animal, a broadcasting company that airs some of my favorite series and a clothing shop. It is also the last word in one of a renowned manga reader site's name.

And which one appeared first in google in this attempt of searching?


The clothing shop. Surprisingly, not wikipedia. And thankfully, not a FACEBOOK link.

Alright. Thanks for reminding that I've already shopped a lot (after a few extra cash coming and foresee-ably coming lately).

Uh anyway.. Thank God for several opportunities for extra cash and a bunch of extra new experiences!~

bubbleteaology.

While browsing through tumblr and flickr, I found these two photos in this post. Apart from the nice photo people able to create (everytime I took photographs from my room, I don't think they are very nice. It's unknown whether it's my lousy skill or my desk's unattractive appearance). Anyway, this is about that thing there. Bubble teas receive a huge craze in Singapore. It is quite easy to find places who sell bubble teas, starting from small shops in MRT stations or neighborhoods or school until a well-known (and mostly expensive) brands such as sweet talk, each a cup, happy lemon, KOI and gong cha. And people do queue to buy them. Just like what they do when they want to top-up their bus passes during the peak hour at MRT stations and bus interchanges. Just like when there are freebies giveaways.

I have one post on my opinion on bubble tea in my tumblr blog, but since I like to write better in blogger (for me tumblr is only for short comments and photographs and "scrapblog") I will rewrite it in my lengthy, thoughtful style here.

I actually don't really into the bubble tea craze. Of course it's nice to drink them once in a while, because they are light and refreshing. A lot of my friends seem to like them too. But I don't really know what is so special about them, I think I posted this here after I drank KOI for the first time. Some of my friends, be them Indonesians, locals or other international students agree with me that it is the bubbles/chewy black thing at the bottom of the glass that make the drink delicious.

In general, I don't really like the hand-made teas commonly available in Singapore. Most of them are served in milk and I don't really like milk tea be it cold or hot. I strongly prefer the teas served in Indonesia back then, they are tea only, without milk, and the taste of the tea is just.. like that. They are different than those blank tea (teh kosong) served in Singapore.

As I said previously.. I am on the side which think that the bubbles is what make the drink delicious. I found some other drinks also put bubbles inside, like some brands of soymilk.. And yeah, I'd prefer those than the sweet, diabetes-inducer, not-so-satisfying drink that I've been talking about. Besides soymilks are indeed healthier.

But if I had to choose to buy some drinks in a hot, hot day, I'd definitely go for Starbucks. The places are nice for hangouts or sit-and-talk-and-wifi or study, too! A cheaper option would be McCafe. But yep, McCafe is still expensive for me, so I'd go with bottled green tea instead. Or, being the mostly-occuring case, a chilled mineral water. Anyway, this post won't pose any offenses for those bubble tea lovers.. But yeah. Not everyone must agree with the majority, isn't it? =D Afterall, I do drink them once in a while.. And hey, they're nice photo objects too!


cr: flickr
.
PS. Anyway, one day after I posted in my tumblr about the bubble tea craze.. My lab decided to buy KOI. And... Yeah. I participated. What a mouth --a

Lonely

Seeing my graduating friends leaving hall one by one to their new places, cardboxes moved out of the rooms and out of the hall gate forever, lorries and taxis coming to and leaving the carpark, and doors and trunks full with cardboxes and bags being closed, I can't help but to feel sad. Yes, I am joyful that they are going to graduate now and some of them are currently pursuing their career. But then, the fact that we won't live so close like we used to be brings mellow-ness to me.. It's not only that I lose friends to eat together sometimes (because most of the time I have my dinner at my room while watching TV series.. LOL) or to hold a spontaneus gathering or late-night chatting or to watch TV series together in one room. It's not the physical absence that bothers me, since we are only a gtalk/MSN chat/google buzz away to keep each other updated on what is going on, and some of us still can meet at church every Sunday and head to town or nearest hawker center afterwards.. It's the knowledge that they are not near anymore, that we can't just call or text each other to eat or to gather in someone's room ASAP or to borrow something or even to get some people to help in doing something.. Those little things, even the most annoying things that you're going to miss when they're not there.

This is if your close friends are one year your senior.

MILO?

The Italian girl who is residing in Germany and is undergoing exchange programme to my lab did not know what MILO is.

I thought the brand was known worldwide? Especially it's from Nestle, which originated from the Switzerland, which is a member of European Union as Germany is?

Oh. If MILO isn't sold there, then you've missed a really nice drink which makes you fat if you regularly drink it everyday.

Yep, coffee's good for your heart, but not too much..

Coffee Heartrate Peaks Graph
from coffeebean.com

Lab rules violation

Hey, anyway, hello Mr. Jack Hodgins. Looks like you’ve violating a rule in the lab: sleeping in the wet lab. Even though your lab is mostly bio.. But I think it’s still against the rules since you might inhale quite a lot of unhealthy substances since your solvents, they’re chemical. And, in addition, it’s your PREGNANT wife whom you set the sleeping bag/portable bed/matress for, dear. As someone who has 3 PhDs in sciences (which I can't really remember..), you ought to know..

Anyway, it’s quite pathetic to literally sleep at night in the lab, you know. Or just, living out your life in lab, whether it is for work or leisure purpose (e.g. internet connection and pantry and air-con and computer and toilet of your lab). This doesn’t apply to Hodgins though, but I hear some people do this practice and all I can say is.. "I wish you'd gone home". Well, unless the lab is your home.. But how if there's nobody there, only you? Can you still call it "home" and your set of machines, apparatus, solvents and materials as family members?


Eh, anyway, letting the romantic-sappy side of me out, I did hope that Hodgins' answer after Angela told her that she'd wish he'd gone home is "Well, I'm there. My home.. It's YOU". Kyaaaaaaaaa >.< If only the situation wasn't this.

A quote that describes my feelings right now

"This thing doesn't work. It started out alright, but now it's.... *shaking head*"
-Wendell Bray, Bones 06x23

Doing an art thing, engineering style.

Late night series

The more I watch Bones, the more I find the resemblance between their lab and mine. And even those techniques and machines I know exist in the division I am studying at. Micropipettes, GC-MS, and today, I saw the plastic petri dish. Which, I am definitely using. Oh well. Luckily Jack Hodgins is that funny and different from those people in my lab (which are.. equally funny in other ways. And LOUD). If he is similar to any person in my lab.. I might be going to puke. It's like seeing them for 7 days a week for non-stop.. Well, no offence, I like those people in my lab, but I need my life aside of lab-bing and stuff. I guess everyone does.

Anyway lately I find that several people have weird preferences for TV series. Like, guys watching Gossip Girl and Desperate Housewives.....?

current mood: pathetic

Ok. I'll promise. If my experiments until FYP is finished work well, I'll pay more respect to Italian national football team. At least I won't say any curse words or bad opinions or whenever they are playing, especially plays against Germany. Let whatever happens, happens. This is for the sake of my super-patient and genius Italian mentor.

Anyway, by this, doesn't mean that I don't support German national football team wholeheartedly anymore. I love die Mannschaft with all my heart. Really.