Prawn, anyone?

My dad is really big on family bonding, he likes to spend as much time as possible with us. Even for groceries shopping, he and my mom would wait for us to wake up late at noon without a single complain. My parents really pamper us too much.

While my mom's idea of bonding is baking, my dad's idea is slightly different. His version of bonding is prawn fishing. I know, fishing sounds boring. But trust me, it isn't. It was fun and addictive especially when you caught the prawn. 

My brother introduced this prawn fishing pond to my dad. Basically, it's a shop with man-made ponds (or is it bigger tub?). You rent the fishing rod and they will release the prawns into the pond, then it's up to your skill to catch those.

Our prawns

Doesn't sound challenging much? Well, you can try the pond with the lobsters, it was almost impossible to catch one, for us beginners at least. But for a beginner in a small pond, we were doing good, 800g of prawns in 3 hours. Not bad, right? 

We had been going there for 2 days straight and spent 3 hours, just fishing. I never thought that I would try fishing before. Well, the idea of sitting and waiting for the fish/prawn is not too appealing to me. But I totally changed my mind after I caught my first prawn. It was totally exciting. Seeing my dad so excited in teaching us to control our rods, taking off the prawns from the rod and putting on  baits made it all worth it. Quality time with the loved one, I'm contented. :)

Catching up

For the past 2 weeks, I'd been making good use of my time to catch up with my high school friends. Universities are on their long holiday, so everyone are back home. Plus Sara is back from the land far far away. She just finished her degree at UK and now she's back for a while. 

Me and Sara

I haven't see her in 2 years. I was kind of expecting some awkwardness when I came fetch her but how wrong was I?  Nothing is changed about her. She is still the very same girl that I'd grown up with. The chatty and bubbly Sara :)  

Hoe and Miao

Hoe is entering a singing contest which is organized by The Queen Bar and Lounge. We went there for his semi-final last night. He was doing great but too bad he got dragged down from a 2nd place to 5th place currently. The final is in two weeks time and I'm sure he can pull it off during his big night. Finger crossed for him.

I couldn't help but feel like Sibu is such a small place. I kept bumping into the same person everywhere I went. Next thing I know, this friend is a friend to my friend too. Just realized I shared lots of mutual friends with my friends lately. What a small world, eh?

Last Thursday I went to catch Laddaland, a Thailand horror movie with my little sister. It was a good movie, gave us quite a goosebumps. I had quite an unpleasant experience with the cinema here. Let's just say, they are very rude, kept us waiting like crazy for 2 hours because the management or more like the counter lady was taking her dinner time. What kind of service is that? Closing the counter just like that? Apparently we had nothing better to do except exploring the night market nearby and camwhoring.

Sisters

Besides catching up with friends and family, I had been undergoing a training too. Will fill you guys with that later on. Stay tuned :)

Say cheese

I swear I'd gain some weight since I'm coming back home. My mom is being such a wonderful mom lately, she had been pampering me with delicious and fabulous home cooked meal. The other day she was making steak for my lunch. And for dessert, she was making cheese cake and batang buruk. 

Sigh, how could I not gain weight with all the food that she prepared for us. Since her first cheese cake was a success, she was addicted ever since. Everyday, she would go shopping for different kind of ingredients and would pester my little sis and I to make the cheese cake.

Forced labor. 

I much prefer the manual way of "beating" the cheese cream instead of using the beating mixer. The texture was creamier with the manual way, plus I get to work those flabby arms. Killed two birds with one stone :)

Chocolate and green tea layered cheese cake

This was my first cheese cake and it taste so good, so cheesy. It was the best cheese cake I ever had, despite the not-so-good look. I'm not saying this because I made it myself, even my sister friends said it was good. Well, they said my mom's cheese cake was good too. I didn't have the picture of my mom first cheese cake because I was busy eating it. 

Yesterday evening when I came down after napping in my room, I found another cake in the fridge. My mom was really going crazy over baking. In just one week, we had made 3 cheese cakes. 

Dried strawberry batik cake

I told her to slow down a bit in baking because after having cheese cake for the whole week, I was kind of sick of it. You know what she told me? She said she was practicing for Gawai next year, which is like a year away ='= 

She loves baking it but she do not eat it. So, guess who will finish it and gain weight in the end? Moi. Sigh, I really should start jogging now. 

Daddy's day

Happy father's day!

This year Father's Day is a special one because I'm home to celebrate it with my family. Unlike previous years, the closest celebration I had was having my sister tagged me in their celebration pictures in Facebook. Pfft But now no more. We got our dad an ordinary chocolate cake the day before and instead of writing the wish in English as we normally did, we changed it to Iban. "Selamat ari apai, kami sayau ke nuan" = Happy father's day, we love you. Notice the smudge at the word sayau? That was because they spelled it wrongly. Instead of sayau, they wrote sangat. We demanded them to change it and customers are always right ;p

Growing up, my dad is a very strict father. He set a schedule for us when we were young. Our sleeping time was 9pm, right after Buletin Utama on TV3 finished. Sleepy or not, we must tucked ourselves in and this continued till I was in Form 1. Back then, my play time was from 5pm till 6.30pm. I cannot step outside the house before 5pm or else he'll have my mom to chase after me with hanger. ='= tough life,  I told you. After that, I must showered and had my dinner because at 8pm sharp, I must do my revision, exam or not. My friends were not allowed to call my house after 8pm and boys were not allowed to call me AT ALL. 

After entering high school, the rebel in me started to show. I sneaked out at night, lied about my whereabouts during weekend, snapped at my parents when they asked me anything. I don't know why am I such a grumpy teenager? Blame the hormones. But my dad was very patient in handling my rebelliousness. After high school, I was chosen to join National Service and that's my turning point. Being away from home, I learnt to appreciate my dad more. I would called him in the middle of night just because I was scared to sleep. Sleeping in an almost empty army style dorm room up on the hill with nobody you know was spooky okay! 

Being the strict dad that he was, he never love me any less. Trust me, I'm his spoiled little girl. Anything I want, 90% of the time, I got it. But fret not, I'm not a demanding daughter. I know my limit. He is my pillar of strength, my biggest supporter and my role model. We don't talk much, my dad is a man with not many words. Sometimes, we would watch the telly together without saying a word. But deep down, I know he loves me and I love him. 

Cheers to the most important and greatest man in my life.

This picture didn't do my mom's justice. She was hidden behind my dad.

Here's a better one

But she was looking away. Sigh, mom cared more about the television show than taking picture with us.

Let me introduce you to a new semi-family member,

Kirby! She's my brother gf's.

But sometimes, she stayed with us, to accompany Pino.

That's why she is semi-family :p

Homemade steamboat

Finally, I met up with my HEMAS friends. Harold suggested we do steamboat on our own instead of going to our usual steamboat place. I never had steamboat at home before so I'm quite excited about it. We prepared everything from scratch and it was awesome. 

Shopping for the ingredients

It was more than enough to feed us.

I love the hot dog cheese, so chessy

Thanks Lulu for introducing this :)

I climbed on the chair to get the full picture of our food. Sigh, life of a dwarf hahaha

Poor Amy sprained her ankle and it looked serious. 

Get well soon dear

Mirror, the best prop.

This is the picture that I tried to take when climbing on the chair and the set up for the steamboat wasn't even complete yet ='=

Our soup that night was Tomyam and it was extra hot but yummy to the max

After such a filling dinner, they played Saidina, a game resembles Monopoly. But yours truly skipped the game. A happy tummy made me a lazy girl. 

Armed with the fluffy pillows, yours truly lied comfortably in front of the TV and dozed off completely

So far, my stay here was fantastic. I really brought spending-as-much-time-with-my-friends-as-possible plan to a whole new level. Dinner plan, tea time, party and barbecue plan, meeting nephew before he flew off to Johor, movie, clubbing, you name it, I squeezed it all in my schedule. 

Doing it all for 6 days straight with only 4 hours or less sleep every night kinda taking it toll on me. So I'm taking my night off tonight, just chillaxing with the flatmates and catching up on my sleep. I miss a proper bed. 

Quickie update

Currently staying at my old flat with Vero and her new housemates which are also my friends. It felt weird to see some of my stuffs still laying around the flat, it is as if I never move out in the first place. The place seems so warm and welcoming, or it's me got over sensitive. But it feels good to be back.

Travelling via road for 7 hours was painful. My butt cramped, my neck hurt from the tilting when trying to get some sleep and my body was dehydrated. I didn't drink much because we didn't stop at the rest stop. For the whole 7 hours journey, we only stopped twice. I was a complete mess, my hair tangled up and I didn't bother to put on my contact lens. 

At night, Victor brought us for dinner at Pizza Hut and Angie joined us short after. It was fun to see the girls again. Too bad Angie had to go back to Miri with her family today, she's probably already at home now. I miss you dayung. After dinner, we went to Waterfront, our usual hang-out spot. Sitting at the bench and people watching as usual. I'm really gonna miss this later on. 

Today, I took a ride with my Uni bus for the first time this year. Vero and I had to walk all the way from our flat to the old campus under the scorching sun. Even with the umbrella, my face still got red and all sweaty. We missed our lunch too because we wanted to catch the 2pm bus. Then we were almost soaked in the rain when going back to flat. Life without car is miserable. Lesson learnt, never take anything for granted. My dad really pamper me by providing all the necessities during my study year, car included. I hope tomorrow I will got my thesis declaration and approval sheet signed by my supervisor and can send it for 'jilid'. Finger crossed. Only then I can fully enjoy my weekend. 

Packing again

I've been back from Song four days ago and now I'm packing again. Guess where I'm going? Nothing fancy tho, I'm going back to Kuching to hand in my thesis. After settling the thesis, I will be officially finishing my degree. Wow, time flies. 3 years of Uni life passed just like that. It felt like yesterday I was still rushing assignments, doing lab reports, preparing for field trips and now I've to the end of student life, which means a new beginning for the real world. I'm so not ready to face the corporate world out there, heard it is mean and harsh!

I will stay at Kuching for a week, just enough time to meet up with my friends. I hope I can squeeze in as much hanging-outs and dinner dates with all the friends, especially HEMAS (H=Harold, E=Emelia, M=Mila, A=Abang, S=Suzi, yours truly) Yeah, we created our own friendship group cause we're cool like that hehe. I didn't get to meet them before leaving Kuching last month, so this time it is a must. But Mila is already back to her hometown T_T I wish to see my munyits too, if that's possible. I miss them.

Coming back home, I thought I could just chillax and enjoy but I did everything but that. Been busy attending the relatives coming back for Gawai, the guests for Gawai festival and all sorts. I couldn't help but feel like I'm living in a suitcase. I haven't been unpack since coming back from Kuching. Now I have 3 luggages laying around my room which served as my closet. My room is in hurricane state, a complete mess which reflects how my life had been lately. I was so overwhelmed by everything that going on around me that I forgot to dedicate some time for myself. After this trip to Kuching, I really should organize and tidy up everything, my room, my life. I couldn't stand the mess, especially my room.

Jong Crocodile

Before leaving Kuching, I managed to explore the place a little bit more. To be more precise, explore Serian actually. Victor spontaneously asked Vero and I to go to Jong Crocodile. I've never been there before, so why not now? It was a fun day. Jong Crocodile is like a zoo but the main attraction is of course crocodile, duh! I thought it was a small place but how wrong was I. We all were sweating bullet from all the walking and touring, and running too (we got scared when we walked through the wildlife pathway because the fence seemed broken and any crocodiles may be out there waiting for their lunch). 

Some of the crocodiles.

They are smelly and lazy creatures

Malaya sun bear

Integration of rabbits, chickens and parrots

The scary otters.

They looked cute but beware, otters are very aggressive. They shrieked furiously when we refused to feed them, we brought no food, so what to do?

The pigs.

Buddha praying area

Yours truly

The company

It was a nice and simple trip. But too bad the management do not keep up the maintenance work. Some fences looked old and I always doubt the safety of the place. What if one of the crocodile make it way out of the fence? Can't really imagine it. The bridge is worn out too. Perhaps with a little effort, the place can be a lot  better. It is one of the tourist attractions in Kuching after all.