Outing with IH Newcomers

The City of Sydney held a Malaysian exhibit 'The Story of Malaysia' to promote the Malaysian culture yesterday, and I decided to go to support my countrymen. Neil and a bunch of IH new residents came along with me [I think because they had nothing better to do...]. Though the exhibit was rather a disappointment as it was small and lacklustre, I thought we all enjoyed ourselves just fooling around. 

I borrowed Jun Ming's Sony NEX-5N with a manual Voigtlander 35mm to play around with for the outing. I loved the manual lens, so fast and so surprisingly easy to focus! It was a shame though, that the 5N had a crop sensor so the effective focal length was actually 52mm. These are the resulting photos. 

L: The Layout of Sydney City inside Customs House. R: Sydney tower!

Met some friends from Macquarie University

Getting bored with the exhibit

Congkak

The City of Sydney

Left to Right: Don, Yang, Motoya, James, Marvin, Jun, Neil

Public buses catered for sightseeing tourists

SSS Weekend Afternoon Sports

Beach Coastal Walk from Bondi to Coogee

It may be Good Friday today but unlike my usual disciplined self, I woke up extremely late -- perhaps that's why it's called 'good' Friday. After lunch, I decided to head to the Eastern beaches for the coastal walk with Han since there wasn't much to do on a public holiday that I didn't celebrate. 

The total distance of the coastal walk was around 6 kilometres. We started at Bondi beach, went by Bronte beach, and ended at Coogee beach. It was a cloudy day, so the temperature was around 22 degrees Celsius, just perfect for an autumn day. The walk itself wasn't exactly rigorous, and we got to enjoy the coastal scenery with wind blowing into our ears. I didn't grow up in cities with beaches, but I find it a rather common pass-time for Sydneysiders to hike around the beaches and enjoy the atmosphere. 

Enjoying It So Far

Despite feeling reluctant to come back to Sydney, I have had quite a lot of fun in the past three weeks -- more fun than I had anticipated. Seamlessly, I have adapted back to living like a young adult -- meeting friends, sports, internet usage, etc. Of course, there are definitely days when I miss my family or worry about my grandparents, but overall it hasn't been as bad as I anticipated.

I still live in International House, though this year's different from last year as I share a room with a fellow resident friend. So far, I have adapted well, as I get a bigger room and I like the new set up of the bed and table compared to last year's single room. My roommate hardly stays around during the day so I tend to get the room all for myself. I also like my room because most of my closer friends live close by. Every time I go for meals, I pass by their rooms and I like to knock on their doors to ask them to come along to the dining hall with me.

This week is the third week of school and as always in university, because everything moves in such a fast pace, I feel that I am already falling behind. With all the O-week distractions, I haven't been able to concentrate well and I find it hard to revise lectures efficiently. My absorption of material has been weak and sometimes I feel like I lost a couple of precious IQ points over my three months summer break doing almost absolutely nothing intellectual. But I'm sure it'd be fine soon enough as my mind assimilate to the studying routine.

During my summer break, I thought that like last semester I'd be working out every morning again with Bo An and Han, but we mutually gave up on that plan and went our own ways to gain fitness. I go to the gym now, at least twice per week, but with the hope of going thrice per week. The gym I go to is actually in a hospital and it costs only $5 per week. But because I tend to work out at night when the staff has long gone home, I have been surreptitiously 'borrowing' my friends' cards for entry. In addition to working out, I have also been trying to play badminton, soccer, and tennis weekly. I seek to gain 5kg by the end of the semester, through however means -- muscle mass or fat mass, it doesn't matter.

Haven't been doing much photography lately. Deep inside, I feel a little guilty. So much equipment, but such low utilisation. Definitely would like to start on something in the coming weeks. For me, the most challenging hurdle to a project is to find models willing to pose for me. Sigh, but honestly, I haven't even tried to ask people. I guess it's mainly my laziness to ask; I should definitely get on with a project and stop complaining.

Good news came last Friday that my application to be a student ambassador for the University was successful. I was happy, as that meant that I can quit my previous photography retail job for this new, refreshing, yet flexible job. I also get to move around more, as well as help prospective students who may need help. Definitely got to thank IH for endorsing me to represent the House to be an ambassador, and I look forward to experience the new job at the end of this week!

I guess that's all, for now.

Birthday Boy, Victor.

Being clumsy

Fist-bumps to the birthday boy

Food at Sydney's Mamak! Mee Goreng, Nasi Lemak, Maggi Goren, Roti Telur!

Shy Chinatown Outing

Angry Chinatown Outing

Chinatown

Saturday Afternoons and Bananas

Hey all,

It's Saturday afternoon, I just came out from the showers and I'm about to eat a banana.

Banana!

Yup. I just needed an interesting title. (The banana's really good by the way!)

Anyways... as you might have already observed, I'm updating my blog almost every week and I will continue to do so unless circumstances stand in the way where I am unable to  -- exams, trips, memory failure...

Coming back from Easter break wasn't as hard as I thought it'd be. I find myself to truly enjoy university life. It's different from high school in that you get much more free time to study on your own. That doesn't mean you study less, you just study more efficiently since you get to choose the hours when you're not asleep to study. Living in a dorm's really awesome too. Surrounded by a community of intellectuals, help is always just around the corridor.

In terms of classes, economics' becoming more theoretical. I've never really seen myself as a theoretical guy but I'm determined to major in economics so regardless of how I am at it, I'm going to work hard and try to get a good grade. Philosophy lectures are killing me. This week's topic is reality, where we questioned about identity and God's existence. It's really hard to follow and once you lose a step, you lose the whole lecture. That was what happened to me in all my philosophy lectures this week. Other classes are alright.

Me, during philosophy lectures

In terms of assignments, I'm quite busy at the moment. Well, I'm supposed to be busy at the moment but for some reason I've been quite involved with other things. I've got a philosophy essay on ethics due Thursday and two other essays (psychology and sociology) in the following weeks. Econometrics midterms are on Wednesday and economics midterms are held next week. So yeah, lots of work to do!

But in contrast to how busy I should be, I have a weekend schedule packed with things other than schoolwork. I got tennis, squash, table tennis tournament, IH Idol hosting, TED IH talk on photography... all packed in two days! I'll handle it I guess.

Ok. It's 12.30am now so lunch's served. Got to do laundry too (first in 2 weeks =D). And get some groceries maybe...

Oh by the way, speaking of groceries, I'm super broke now that I paid something like $30 to watch Titanic 3D at the world's largest IMAX (which coincidentally is in Sydney's Darling Harbour!). The movie was great and I accomplished my dream of watching the epic movie on the big screens lol! But otherwise, it left me guilty spending so much money on a movie... Oh well, I'll compromise with other things... like doing laundry once every month or something.

Titanic 3D! Look at my eyes! It was THAT good!

Alright, time for lunch and laundry. Have fun guys cus I sure will! Update me~

My Easter Break

Hey all,

After reading and getting updates from my friends' blogposts this morning, I realise that I haven't been updating them on my life much on my blog anymore. So yeah, I'm back to Blogger blogging and compromising on my study time -- which isn't too good an idea when you consider I still have a lot to catch up on and school starts tomorrow!

At the beginning of Easter break, I didn't feel particular excited. Simply because I didn't have any solid plans while many other people in my dorm were leaving back to home or some other places for vacation. I thought that I would spend most of my time this break catching up on school work and perhaps forcing myself to engage in more sports and exercise. But this feeling gradually faded after I decided to be proactive and made a list of things that I wanted to do in Sydney this break:

1) Go to a beach
2) Walk on the Harbour Bridge
3) Go to the North Shore suburbs (past the Harbour Bridge)
4) Take a train

And in the afternoon that I made the short list [yes, I know it's short but to me, it was tough even to get everything done...] I already accomplished one of my goals: walking on the Harbour Bridge. It was really spontaneous really. Jamie and Tim just felt like running across the Harbour Bridge and after reflection on my boring and empty schedule for the day, I decided to do it. I did know that the Harbour Bridge was something like at least 5km away but I didn't care. I just didn't think. It was a chance for something fun and different, and I was ready to take it, regardless of how tough it was going to be.

And so we left for the Harbour Bridge. I was a little fatigued from my morning run as well as a brief game of squash before the run. But I didn't mind it because my mental determination to do something fun and different. We ran past the Sydney fish market, Darling Harbour, CBD and up to the bridge. All we brought with us were our bus tickets [in case we got too tired and decide to take a bus home...] and our student ID. Tim also brought his phone, which proved useful later on.

The beginning of the run was fine; I felt fresh. Running just gives you such a good feeling with its mass production of endorphins. However, there were times during the run when I felt like giving up. Because Sydney is such a hilly city, there were many places where we had to run across steep long slopes. And these were tough, both physically and mentally! But when I saw that Tim and Jamie were so determined, I decided that I should just keep going, for fear of having to go back alone and losing face [Jamie's a girl btw, real athletic too].

Little by little, we finally made it up to the Harbour bridge with its sublime view of the Sydney Harbour. We could see the Sydney Opera House to our right and many other wonderful landscapes surrounding it. The ships, cruises, the city; simply amazing. What made everything even better was the sun and its warm side cast onto the bridge. We stopped a little on the Harbour bridge, partly because we were tired and partly because the view was great. We got some photos of us with Tim's phone.

On the Harbour Bridge! [Photo Credits to Tim]

Luna Park! [Photo Credits to myself with Tim's phone]

After crossing the bridge, we were at the North Shore of Sydney. We were genuinely thirsty, and decided to go find free water nearby. We went around, planning to get a drink from this swimming pool but unfortunately it wasn't open. So in the end, we went to Luna Park, an extremely old themepark that existed even when my father was studying in Sydney back in the 80s, to get water from the washroom taps [just being cheap...I guess]. We also managed to take some photos at Luna Park.

Following Luna Park, we went back to the South Shore and CBD via the bridge, had McDonalds $0.30 ice cream and took a bus back to our dorm because we were simply too tired to run another 5km back.

The next day, my parents and little brother came to Sydney to visit for 3 days. Over the 3 days, we met up with my uncle, who has been living in Sydney for the past 3 years now. He brought us around some of the Sydney suburbs [including Flemington, Chatswood, North Ryde, and Eastwood] for us to explore the quieter places in Sydney. As a result, I achieved my second goal of visiting the North Shore. We also went to Darling Harbour, hoping to catch the fireworks. But unfortunately we missed it by minutes because we took some time finding car park and the fireworks stopped just before we arrived. My parents and brother brought along with them some of my stuff back from China so yay, I got a supply restock! They left on Monday, the 9th and sadly I won't be seeing them until the end of the year...

Parents and little brother at USyd Quad! [Photo Credits to myself]

Over the next few days, I've been doing lots of things that you'd expect from a student. STUDY! I made a schedule on my scheduler about the things I ought to accomplish everyday. For some known reason [procrastination and inefficient use of time] I never get to finish the day's work that I set out for myself. Other than studying, I also did plenty of exercise. I ran in the morning on every other days, played badminton, squash, football [unfortunately Aussies call it soccer too...] and FRISBEE. I feel the healthiest that I've ever been for the past 8 months, where I was seriously deprived of exercise in KL. Entertainment wise, I played with my friend's PS3 on many nights and had 'movie nights' too. But I always feel that they are very much a waste of time because... well it's entertainment and they made me sleep real late -- 2am everyday! We did occasionally go out for a picnic or for a meal outside.

Playing squash with Jensen and Harrison! [Photo credits to myself]

Picnic! [Photo credits to myself]

On Friday the 13th, I accomplished yet another one of my goals: going to the beach! I was going to plan a beach outing but some other friends did it first and it was a totally spontaenous thing. I had 5 minutes to pack my camera, water and supplies [sunglasses, clothes] as well as to change into beach clothes. Luckily for us, it was a nice sunny day and everything went pretty well. We chilled at the beach, taking photos and playing Frisbee. I was planning to get down to the water for a swim but it was cold and my friends didn't really feel like going so I didn't.

You guys have probably seen this photo on my FB page. We be beaching!  [Photo credits to myself]

I love this photo so much...we should totally do portrait collages like these everytime we have something special going on! [Photo credits to Jamie]

Today's Sunday and school will resume tomorrow. I don't think I'll have the chance to accomplish my last goal of taking a train but that's alright as it's only a small goal anyways. Point is, the Easter break hasn't been as boring as I had anticipated it to be. Living at IH surrounding by a community of friends in the holidays = not-boring!

Gah, it took me almost an 45 minutes to write this post. That's like 45 minutes wasted on my readings! And I haven't even had breakfast yet. June just ditched me for breakfast because I was too slow in finishing this blogpost. So I'm just going to stop here. Have a nice day, peeps!