A Sinusoidal Fate?

Before I begin.. 2 more weeks and I'll be home!! Wheee!

Alright.. so a LOT has happened since my last post. Wai Kit & I joined a poster competition for the first time.. didn't turn out too well though (we finished 2nd place.. out of two.. wth). We still ended up with a $50 gift card which we're still yet to use.. hmm. Timeline check, this was 2 weeks ago. Now... mark my words.... It only gets interesting from here on.

The following week was pretty good from an academic viewpoint, but the week ended with me left in tatters.... On that fateful Thursday afternoon, my residence was burgled. Gone was my dying laptop, and a pair of earphones. My room looks pretty trashed normally, and ironically this pretty much saved a number of my personal belongings from being taken away as well. My housemates lost quite a few items as well, and the attempts of the cops to lift a trace off the house later in the day proved futile. Oh and did I mention, no sign of forced entry. Either way, we got the landlord to change the locks the very next morning.

But it didn't end there.. The next day, Wai Kit sees a black teenager with yellow eyes knock the window right outside our backdoor (which means he's ALREADY WITHIN OUR COMPOUNDS since we have a backyard), making gestures as though he should open the back door for him.. WTF?? Luckily he walks away after a while. If this was a sign the burglar/s were comin' back, then I figured my desktop which they left untouched would probably rank pretty high on his/their list.. My solution? Pack it up and send it away some place safe.

Since then, I've been left pretty deprived of a computer let alone internet connection.. Life sure isn't the same without it (it sucks o be frank). Hence, my sudden disappearance from MSN, and most forms of communication with the world outside IIT. Terrible times, these.. especially with the finals furiously approaching.

Then came the light at the end of the tunnel (at least that's what I'd like to read of it). The stage is finally set for my dream Champions League final.. Manchester United vs Barcelona in the Eternal City, Rome (which is of course, home of my other favorite team, AS Roma). Tons of drama to precede, but I'm finally going to be able to truly enjoy a dream of a finale when I get back to Malaysia..

Given the pattern of recent events, I'm already preparing myself for another catastrophe.. lol. God willing, I shall get through that and get back here to tell the tale.. Till then... abschied.

Halcyon Days

One more semester draws to an end. If I was to choose my most productive semester, this has to be the one. I was kept on my toes from start to end.. no time for poker and card games, no time for excessive indulgence in flash games, no time for regular outings, no more table-tennis. Yet somehow I always managed to devote some time to sporting competitions (soccer, basketball, tennis, cricket), Bleach, the ISO, blogging (well, occasionally.. lol) and so on. Now that it's all over, a sense of emptiness has began to engulf me. No worries, no stressors, no problems.. The days are serene, the nights are tranquil.. These truly are.. the Halcyon days.

Since it snowed heavily during the week, Kwong Hann and I decided to construct something with the ample snow in our backyard. After hours of compressing and stabilizing, we finally managed a simple yet solid snow tower. Here are some photos of our masterpiece! :p





I recently joined the Chicago Northside Scrabble Meetup, a group that meets on Sunday afternoons in the northern suburbs of Chicago. I am yet to attend a meetup though, mainly due to time constraints and the distance to the meetup spot. I'm hoping to make this a regular activity on my schedule for next semester. Speaking of next semester, there is one event I'm truly looking forward to.. an event Xin Yi and I conjured up in typically random fashion - the ISO Chi-Raze. It's going to be based on the popular reality show The Amazing Race, with more mental rather than physical challenges. Based on current plans, we're gonna have 10 teams of 4 people traverse up and across downtown Chicago scavenging for clues. I've got big plans for this event, though I do expect the budget constraints to kick-in at some point. Will keep you updated on this one for sure!

On a more current note, I am going to be travelling to Los Angeles and San Francisco this winter break. It's going to be a much smaller group than last year's New York excursion, but I expect no less in terms of fun. So yea, it is very likely that my next post will be from the west coast. Till then, vale!

P.S: This post was originally written on the 17th of December, its actual posting being delayed by the author's laziness in reaching for his camera to grab the photos.

Homing In

It's that time of the week again!

Alright, so in the last post I mentioned a potential house, which we looked at on Tuesday. Frankly, the place was terrible on the inside, plus we were viewing the place with another 2 group of students who were also interested in renting it. Awkward!! Anyway, we dropped that and kept looking, and finally.. we found one that fits almost perfectly into the puzzle. It's not too far from campus (like 2-3 blocks away) plus the rent is pretty low.. and the place looks something like...

The front

The living room

The kitchen

And of course.. the all important loo

There's also a huge backyard at the back of the place, and everything looks neat, except that it's a little small, but I figure it's fine since each of anyhow end up getting more space than we do currently in on-campus double rooms. The major problem would be laundry, as we would need to walk down a block to get to the Laundro-Mat, and it'd be kinda awkward carrying laundry along the streets.. All in all, we saw it as a good place and we've just paid a portion of the deposit and began the paperwork.

There's a Mc Donald's really nearby, and lots of other restaurants nearby too (China Chef, White Castle, KFC, Subway, Pizza Hut, Church's Chicken etc etc). To add to this, Jewel supermarket is just a block away! Pretty convenient I'd say. Other than the size, the laundry problem and the fact that there's only ONE bathroom for all of us, I don't think one can have any qualms about the place.

My first IPRO experience is officially over, as it concluded with IPRO Day on Friday. I really learnt a lot during the course of the project, and it sure was fun working with the amazing bunch of individuals in the group. Sadly, our efforts and hard work wasn't good enough to win us prizes in the eye of the judges, although a lot of us if not all believed we deserved at least something. However, the prizes weren't the bigger picture and at the end of it all, the rich experience we've all gained through the project is the most valuable prize of all.

This coming week shouldn't be too bad.. not all that many assignments, and one finals.. but it's just Industrial Psychology. Hehe. I will have to start preparing for the other finals though. Should be mighty 'fun'! The next post would be slightly delayed (probably on Wednesday, the 14th) due to my final exams, and it would most probably be my last post before I fly home. Till then, tata!