iStockphoto failed me the second time. =( *sigh* Far from a jack, what more a master. I pity the camera.. its capability of capturing breath-taking photos not unleashed in my unskilled small hands.

I’m sorry, Nikon D50.. I’ll try harder.

happy birthday, jon! =D hope you like ‘em cuppycakes!

I greeted my new orchids with the camera this afternoon! =D Loitered in the Flea Market in Amcorp Mall with my cousin yesterday evening.. I LOVE flea markets. =) People selling lots of interesting items like their own antique collection, accessories, clothes, bags, tinysmalllittle hand painted miniature ceramic teapots (really wan!), pets, shells, plants.. the list goes on. Plus, you can even make friends with the sellers. =) They’re really friendly, and they know what they’re selling. Most of them are hobbyists, so they can tell you a long story of their items. =p Interesting too, because if you talk to them, you may learn that some work in offices on weekdays and sell things in Amcorp on Sundays.

I didn’t know Amcorp Mall’s flea market starts on Fridays already. Previously it was only on Sundays. We came across this stall where this guy draws designs on jeans with 3D fabric paint and sells the jeans. Pretty much like mine, if you’ve seen it, but this guy is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay much better than I am. I mean, I only can draw spirals and flowers, but this guy draws bigger but more detailed and more colourful motifs. It’s so amazing.. every piece is unique. And this other stall sells music box mechanism.. and there was a selection of songs to choose from! I loved the the ones which played ‘Beauty and the Beast’ and The Sound of Music’s ‘My Favourite Things’. =D

I went home with two pots of … orchids! =D Sorry, guats!! I know I know.. I’m supposed to nurture and take care of my dog-bitten one at home, but I couldn’t resist! >.<

I know it’s a dendrobium hybrid! =D Tinkered with Jeff’s 50mm lens, I’m no pro yet.

The other pot I purchased is a coelogyne, I think. That one is still sorta unidentified. I pored the orchid encyclopedia I bought in MPH and the closest I could come to is, well, coelogyne. It’s a hanging plant with delicate little pink blooms.. I hung it on my laundry line. Mum is paranoid that the weight would snap the lines.

A friend of mine got married on the abovementioned date.. nice number eh? =)  Went to witness the signing of the legal papers in KL. Since it’s a special date, a LOT of people got married on this day. It was pretty crowded in the conference room. There were three long tables and 21 couples for that SESSION only. Snapped 200 over pictures, but posting less than 10% of it here.

My friend’s bouquet was flowerless. It was filled with many pairs of teddy bears of sticks, the main bears being the one pictured above. =)

An extravagant kolam at the entrance of an Indian wedding luncheon. Many Chinese newlyweds posed for pictures beside the kolam.

On our way back from KL on Jalan Tun Sambanthan, there was a massive
traffic jam. When we wondering why the army people who were controlling the traffic wouldn’t let us pass (after missing three turns on the traffic lights),  we saw what was holding up the traffic. A mass Buddhist wedding. Quite exciting to watch. =)

 The kompang boys..

.. and the newlyweds from the mass wedding. They saw me in the car, with the window wound down, aiming the camera at them and they just smiled and waved. =) So cool. I became more excited and shouted congratulations to them and waved as well. =)

More happie happie newlyweds traveling in nice nice vintage type of cars! I won’t be able to tell you what cars la.. cuz I dunno. But I saw lotsa Mini coopers though! =D

Some even traveled in trishaw! This is the road beside the KL Sentral Monorail Station.

 
Teeyee and Yenteng, the buddies who were there with me. =)

Next year, 080808?

Nadin said that hermit lifestyle is not good, even if it means working part-time in your home on Microsoft Excel. I must admit I feel more comfortable alone at home, but at the same time, I find it more difficult to talk and socialize with people when I’m outdoors.

I need to get out more often and talk to human beeeaaaannnsss.

I still have my fears of the working world ‘out there’. Mum’s constant nagging, telling me that I MUST have a permanent job NOW and that I’m not small anymore and that she doesn’t understand why I’m not job-hunting is not helping at all.

I’m just scared la. =s

I was surprised that it was a press conference.

Being five minutes late to the function, I rushed into the conference room in Petaling Jaya City Council headquarters. Upon arrival, three VIPs were sitting at the front row, chatting amongst themselves. One of them was YB Dato’ Dr Wong Sai Hou, Ahli Dewan Undangan Negeri (ADUN) Kg Tunku. I was like, “Shucks. Even the VIP is earlier than I am!”

I made my way timidly to the back of the rows. I couldn’t tell the press from the winners. I mean, everyone looked the same, dressed the same, and had the same expression. But those with huge DSLR cameras were quite obvious la.

In March, there was an event in Taman Aman called Karnival Mesra Rakyat by MBPJ. The highlight was a human chain around the lake and there was also a photography competition going on. The criteria was anything colourful during the event. I armed myself with my mum’s company’s old Fujifilm Finepix S6900 and my Canon Powershot A430 and treaded alone into the crowd. I remember mum didn’t want to accompany me and I was going to give up already.

Came April, I submitted five shots. And had been waiting for good news since then. If there was any. So there, a li’l history of the photography competition which yours truly entered. =)

I expected it to be a small quiet prize-giving ceremony in one of the rooms in MBPJ, but noooo.. the press was there! And so was the Datuk Bandar of MBPJ, Yang Bahagia Tuan Haji Mohamad Roslan Sakiman. Heheh.. I found it quite exciting. Summore plus the anxiety I was feeling at the same time, anxious to know what prize I was going to win.

My palms were sweaty when they started to announce the winners. The press were waiting behind the front row of seats like vultures to snap photos. I was a little dismayed when they announced my name for consolation prize. There I go again, putting high hopes for top three. Two Chinese UM law students won second and third, and an owner of a photography studio bagged the grand prize and a consolation prize. Each of them won a Fujifilm camera and a holiday package each.

my winning shot. =)

The winners’ works were exhibited in another room, printed larger than 8R, mounted neatly on plastic mountboards and rested on easels. I went to my easel, and examined my work closely. Turned out that my shots were very pixelated. Therefore it wasn’t sharp. I moved from easel to easel, examining other winners’ shots right under my nose. I concluded that, everyone else’s shots were sharp; mine was the most hideous. =S

Met another consolation prize winner.. her name was Ezna. She’s the one who took my photo (above) and emailed it to me. She was such a bubbly woman. I sat with her during brunch and we talked. After finishing our meal, she asked me whether I would like to look at the pictures again with her. I said ok and we scrutinized pictures together.

A Malay guy with an DSLR was photographing our pictures when we were looking at them. He told me he liked my composition. =) Felt happy hearing that. I talked to him and found out that he used to work with the press. He said that I should think about taking photography as a career. It’s playing in my mind a while already.. but dunnolah. So challenging. And there are so many photographers out there who are much better than I am. Even my friends take pictures better than I do.

I turned around to look for Ezna, but she was gone. I lingered around for some time more, and the Malay photographer was gone as well. Didn’t get to say thank you or tell both the Malay photographer and Ezna that it was nice talking to them. Oh, at least I have Ezna’s email. =)

They’re gonna publish our winning shots in the MBPJ calendar! Must get hold of one.. oh, and they said that they’re gonna exhibit them in the MBPJ library too, maybe. Yay! =D

Happy happy day for meeeee..

---

Jeff thinks that putting the following sentence in this entry will make me sound bimbotic. =.=

I overheard the second prize winner telling her friend, the third prize winner in Mandarin, as her head motioned to my picture on the easel, “Na ge bu mei.” (That one’s not nice.)

Wow. It’s okayla. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. I was too happy to feel hurt nor sad nor moody. XD

Jeff messing up the word ‘consolation’ in Malay.
Jeff: Sugahati?
Me: Saguhati lah!

I got curious about how my pets are doing in Neopets
after three years of not logging in. So I did. Well, I found them still
alive, as expected.. as someone told me that they are immortal even
though their hunger level denoted that they were dying.

As I explored the World of Neopia, I found myself remembering how
frustrated I was three years ago, because I didn’t know how to earn
points. I kept wondering how other players can have tens of thousands
of points. I had two pets, an Aisha and a Uni (it’s a unicorn), and 606
neopoints (np). Every day when I came back from school, I’d plop myself
on the wooden chair and glue my eyes on the computer screen, feeding my
pets free food from the Soup Fairy (those with less than 2000 np
qualify. hehe..), grabbing free omelette and collecting my 1 np of
interest from the bank. I managed yeemeng’s account too.. back then he had a pet Gelert called Shadowreighn. =p

I knew why I had so little points back then. I didn’t try my hand at
the games! I was so surprised that I earned hundreds of points just by
playing the games. They’re quite fun too.. not very challenging. Just
the way I like them. Hehe!

The site is very colourful too.. makes it look cheerful. It’s definitely my favourite virtual hangout for now!

     

is right below my chatterbox. I’ve tried resisting to do one myself but after doing other people’s test, it makes me wanna have one as well. Argh.Lemme see you take the test! =D Don’t worry about your score.. You know how forgiving I am, right?

*grins*

Just a little thought.. Looking back at my life which became more significant in 2002 onwards, I felt I’ve changed. For the better or worse, I don’t know. Maybe I do, but I’m not delving deep enough. More significantly, I used to be confident of myself, being who I am and showing it. I used to be passionate in what I really love, but now i feel like I’m cowering. Generally, I can say I’ve toned down. I’m not as feisty as I used to be.

Is this a sign of getting old? Hah. I don’t think so. It’s just me.

I miss those days when I’m really enthusiastic about something. Now, when I’m fired up to start a new project or learn something new, and someone throws cold water over my fire, then that’s it. I’d easily be discouraged and I’d stay away from what was once my passion. I care a lot about what other people think, most of the time I care too much. Looking at it the other end, I can’t completely not care about what others think and ignore them totally.

Must some musings in my head that has been bothering me.

thunderstorm, I was the photographer and Jon was the drawer. *grins*

Okaaay, ARTIST. Though I like to call him a drawer.

I sat at the steps, not knowing what to photograph.. so I looked up and pointed the lens at the trees above me.

Once I reached home and Jon drove back to Subang, the thunderstorm and heavy downpour hit KL and S’gor. According to the Malaysia Meteorological Department.

Camera courtesy of the Fatty. Thanks for your generosity in lending me your camera, once again! XD

Waiyee’s current mood as portrayed by Chelsea

I don’t remember celebrating Father’s Day with you. All I remember is doing craftwork with you and making masterpieces to decorate the walls of the house. I remember you bringing me to the aquarium shop to look at the japanese carps and kois. And I also remember things that I wished I did not … or wished it never happened.

Sometimes hope makes me want to look for you. A friend told me that he believes that I’d see you again, if I keep praying. Sometimes, I even wonder whether you have passed my house before and stop for a moment to look in. I wonder whether you are a Net user, because if you are, you’d stumble upon my blog and find me. I’ve tried searching for you online but I just can’t find you. Hope made me hope that you’d stumble upon advertisements of my performance and catch my name, and find me.

I’m still hoping that one day I’d see you again.. before it’s too late. Time is running out, and life is short. Just like how Ling wished her dad, I’ll do the same. Happy Father’s Day to you, wherever you are.