Sizzling Texas =D

Had a great time hanging out with the Texas people. Happy to meet up with you guys… Learned to play mahjong! Realized that I am truly gifted at mahjong. Won a fair number of times. Were introduced to Sonic(fast food) and Rudy’s(yummy BBQ). Thanks for being such great hosts!

May 23

Flew to Austin, Texas! Reached at about 11 pm.

Went to Joo May + Ken Yu’s place. First thing that came to my mind when I saw their apt? WOW, SO NICE!! Their apt is VERY well decorated! Has AC somore! Not to mention their rent is almost half of ours… Envious envious.

May 24

Drove to Dallas, which is about 3 hours from Austin.

Excerpt from Wikipedia

School Book Depository, from which, both the Warren Commission and the House Select Committee on Assassinations concluded, Lee Harvey Oswald fired a rifle that killed President John F. Kennedy….
… is now the home of the Sixth Floor Museum, a place of remembrance of the events in Dallas and a tribute to the legacy of President Kennedy.

I believe that the fire was shot from the window which is the right, second from the top.

The “X” on the road is the approximate location where one of the shots hit JFK

We then headed to Fort Worth Stockyards, a National Historic District. There are restaurants and shops selling tourist stuffs in this area.

Excerpt from Wikipedia

…the area has a Western motif. There is also an opry and a rodeo. The Fort Worth Stockyards are the last standing stockyards in the United States. Some Fort Worth volunteers still run the cattle drives today. They do it so that people can see what it was like in the 1800’s.

Colorful children boots. Cute + pretty!

Eric doing his thing. He was’t too good. He did not stay on the cow for more than .. a few seconds?

The weather was so hot that we kept trying to go into shops to enjoy the AC. The temperature around Austin and Dallas whenwe were there were between 34 to 38 Celcius, hence the title of this post. Now, you know why I am complaining! Heat = bad mood for me… hehe

Botanical Garden

Played mahjong at night.

May 25

Headed to San Antonio, which is about an hour drive from Austin.

Excerpt from Wikipedia

The Alamo (San Antonio de Valero Mission) is a former mission and fortress compound, now a museum, in San Antonio, Texas located at 300 Alamo Plaza.^[2] The compound, which originally comprised a sanctuary and surrounding buildings, was built by the Spanish Empire in the 18th century for the education of local Native Americans after their conversion to Christianity.^[3] After its abandonment as a mission, it was used as a fortress in the 19th century and was the scene of several military actions, including most notably the 1836 Battle of the Alamo, one of the pivotal battles between the forces of the Republic of Texas and Mexico during the Texas Revolution.^[4]

San Antonio Riverwalk. I guess this place is really happening as the the restaurant where we had lunch apparently open for 24 hours. Had the best quesadilla ever! Hmm, feel like making quesadilla some time soon.Tourists can take a cruise along the San Antonio Riverwalk. Notice the cruise boat at the background.

Grainy Dipping dots ice-cream. Recommended by Eric. Basically it is the usual ice-cream but is freezed into grains, bubbles, balls or whatever you are want to call it. Trolley car at the background.

Market Square. This place is like Pasar Seni. Selling lots of interesting and colorful trinkets. The merchandise sold are similar from one shop to another.

And.. we continued our mahjong marathon again. This time until 6 am. It is addictive!

May 26

Woke up fairly late, at about 12 pm and went to Rudy’s for lunch. It is a fast food BBQ place. Yummy-licious!

The original plan was to visit Texas State Capitol and 6th Street, …. but we met with an accident. No one was hurt. Poor Eric, his car is new! Went to the airport after settling the formalites with the police. Both of the police were actually really nice!

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During the flight from Austin to LA, I witnessed flirt-and-ignore-sessions, starring an air steward. Basically he flirted with two giggly-ladies. Actually, that is fine, as this made the flight experience more interesting. Some of the passengers would say that it was quite noisy. He stood near giggly-ladies to chat with them, gave them extra cup of drinks and much more peanut snacks compared to other passengers. Sigh, I guess being extra friendly is a superb idea to get more food in the airplane. I am fine with all this flirtings, but was a bit irritated when the air steward chose to ignore an old-man which was seated near the ladies. The air steward saw the old-man pushing the attention button, but the air steward blatantly ignored the old-man when he passed the old-man ’s seat, TWICE! Can you believe it! The old-man’s patience was tested to the max, and in the end, he has to speak up and flag(action you use when you want to flag cab) the air steward. Ish ish

Note: During this trip, I realize that I have a really soft voice, compared to Joo May’s. Just a random thought.

OPT and visa

Still waiting for a CIP code for ECE from my uni.

Currently exploring other alternatives should the CIP code for my major is not released before my F-1 expires, which is quite soon. It is just confirmed that I can not apply for a work permit in Canada as I would be a few days shy of 1 year working in US.

My current options are UK and Malaysia.

The Ring

Upset coz one of the gems is missing! This is a gift from my grandma

Plastic Surgery … anyone?

Plastic surgery : the elixir of youth and beauty … It is such a BIG thing now! Wanna be taller, prettier, sexier? No problemo!

As expected, people have mixed opinions plastic surgery. Everyone has their own reasons, don’t they?

1. Proponents

• Those who feel great about themselves and became much more positive after the surgeries
• Those who are considering getting one … or maybe two themselves
• Those who know and care about people who underwent this procedures

2. People who look-one-kind at those who had plastic surgery

• Guys who claim that natural beauty is the best and that inner beauty is what that counts (although they gawk over girls who are pretty under layers of makeup or who have nice ..legs, maybe? )
• Believe that it is dangerous. Not all surgeries are successful
• Religious reasons, maybe

3. On the fence

• Those who believe that people can do whatever they want with themselves and who are we to judge?
• People who are satisfied with themselves physically and do not understand why anyone is willing to be sliced with a knife. ( To those who think so, good for you! Why? Because, firstly, you are happy about your looks. And second, well, you must be lucky because, generally you should be at least okay looking to be satisfied in the first place ;P)

Are looks important? Of course they do! Better looking people are more successful! I bet you know this fact already. This idealistic view of inner beauty is more important, well… just does not hold 100% true in real life. Looks matter! Human being are just wired to prefer better looking people.

So what is my stand in this issue? Based on my post so far, you obviously can guess I certainly do not oppose plastic surgery.

I would also consciously say that inner beauty is what makes up a person. But I can’t help it if subconsciously, I prefer better looking people! ;P In my opinion, a person’s body is just like a casing to the soul. No matter how it looks like, the soul is still the same. If making the casing prettier makes a person happier or more successful, why not? After all, inner beauty is what that counts, right? So, why does it matter what a person do to his/her casing?

Note: This post is solely my opinion and my opinion alone

Help needed: What is the English vocabulary for look-one-kind ?

Yosemite Take 2

My second trip to Yosemite! My first trip was in December last year and the view was breathtaking although it was cold, icy and slippery. In this trip, we stayed in a bungalow at Grooveland which is about 3 hours from my place and 1 hour from Yosemite National Park. Well, don’t expect me to camp! I love comfort (bed, heater), convenience(microwave, tv) and cleanliness(restroom) too much.

Welcome to Bear Haven! This house is really beautiful!
Bear Haven really lived up to its name. There were bears
everywhere in the house. There is also a jacuzzi (which is broken),
a large patio and a BBQ grill

In the living room

Yosemite Falls

Mirror Lake

The weather was great! We BBQ a lot, which means we ate a lot. We did not hike up Half Dome. Next time, maybe?

Happy Mother’s Day!

This little reminder was forwarded by our dad to my brother and I . He always tells us that our mom is a great mum, wife and daughter-in-law. **So loving…envy-nye**

I am sure I always make you feel appreciated!

HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY!

me HEART you!

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Note: Posted this today coz I am going to Yosemite for the weekend!

OPT Extension … updates

CMU posted CIP Codes that are eligible for OPT extension on Monday … YAY!

However ECE is not in the list

Called a-helpful-CMU-staff and she mentioned that they are very working hard to include ECE in the list of CIP code, although currently they are tied down with graduation stuffs .. I guess have to wait until after the graduation ceremony for any updates.

Happy Birthday mum!

Happy Birthday mum dearest!

Thank you for everything!

<3 <3 <3

Weekend

On Friday evening, I had dinner at a place called Chelokababi Restaurant. The reason of me mentioning this? Well, it’s name sounds like “Cela** ba**” Haha.. ya syok sendiri

On Saturday, we went to Computer Museum History Center. Boring, you might say… It is INTELLECTUAL. The main reason we went there was because we thought there will be a special exhibition, “The Babbage Exhibition”, but alas, we got the wrong date. It starts next weekend. The museum is quite interesting. List: 1971 machine with over 120 miles of hand-wired interconnections; 1969 Kitchen computer priced at $10,600 for housewives to store and retrieve recipes. The user interface was only binary lights and switches (Not too user friendly) Apparently, there is no evidence that any of this was sold; One of first Google Data Center.

At night, we went to Abyss to work-out.

Everyone looking angelic in white

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Currently reading books by Nicholas Spark. I read “The Notebook” a few weeks ago. I love his style of writing so much that I borrowed all the books written by him from the library. Touching stories.

Delectable fondue

I just HAVE to post these dessert pictures! So pretty! We had YL’s birthday celebration at The Melting Pot a.ka. fondue place.

Yin & Yang : Dark and milk chocolate… Love dark chocolate… Yummy

Mouth-watering desserts!

These desserts made my day! It’s divine. This romantic place is a definitely a great place if you want to impress someone or if there is any special occasion. And of course, if you are rich, coz it is really pricey (for my standard )! In my humble opinion, the cheese fondue is something different but taste alright. For the entree, steamboat is much better!