Coward

I am really disappointed at you! Without any hesitation, you said no, even you promised that you were going to share half of the fee before. I know that your financial circumstance has changed, but that shouldn't give you the excuse to be such a irresponsible coward! :@

It's not the money that I am disappointed. It's your attitude that really frustrates me!

Taiwan 2009/10

5 days in Taiwan was so short that I couldn't control myself but crying when the time came to leave home again. Maybe as I am getting older, I feel it's so precious and privileged to spend time with family.

They were wonderful parents and I am very lucky to have them as my Mum and Dad. During my stay at home, they put a lot of thought to make our stay comfortable and stress free. Five days wasn't long, but we used the time so well that he got to know my family, my childhood, my upbringing, my friends and also see some cultures/history and dentist :p

Thank you, Mum and Dad!

Indonesia 2009

5 weeks in Indonesia went really fast. Most of the highlights can be found on my online albums which took 2 months to sort out :x Now, the whole trip seems so far away that I decided not to bother to write too much here in my Blog. After all, I am so behind with my blogging! :p

Something though that I have to mention. The best part of the trip was

• Learning about myself
• Learning about each other
• Learning about what's important for me
• Learning about joining account sucks
• Learning about I can't be a poor budget backpackers for too long
  
• Learning about his gentleness, calmness, respectfulness, kindness, compassion, spontaneousness, unselfishness, openness, tolerance, curiosity, passion and positive energy etc.
  

Thank you for the wonderful trip. You were the best highlight of the trip.

Happy Birthday to me

One month after my birthday and I am still celebrating. Tonight we went to his place first and then went for some drink. I am such a lucky girl with so many birthday dos.

It was really weird to have birthday in New Zealand. In the last few years, I managed to avoid it by going oversea - UK or Taiwan. I almost forgot what it was like to have so many friends wanting to share my joy! :)

Spoiled

"You are spoiling him." she said with a smile.

Am I? I haven't never thought about this, but I was quite pleased if I was. With him, it seems so easy to give him the best I could for him because he has always been there for me unselfishly.

Let's spoil each other forever.

Necklace Found!!

Where was it???

In the bag that I had searched thousand times!! I couldn't believe it when I saw it! I closed my eyes and reopened it to make sure I wasn't dreaming!!!

I was so relieved that the necklace was finally found after missing for 3 months! It has strong memorial meaning attached to it and I was feeling really guilty to lose it.

Now it is back and I couldn't be happier!!

Expansive Day

I first went to travel clinic to get travel advices on vaccinations and had two shots. Then I went buying a great rain jacket for hiking. It turned out to be a very expansive day as within 3 hours, I spent $500 dollars :o :o

However, I think (not my credit card thinks) it is worth spending because now I am up to date with my vaccines and will be safe and dry when it's pouring down in Great Barrier Island and Indonesia (even I hope I won't use it much!)

雙十節快樂！

Autumn Festival Dinner

I am really disappointed at them. A family dinner together was supposed to get together and not you two to talk among yourselves. I tried to chat, I tried to care, I tried to involve, I tried to stop them talking, I tried to hint how rude they had behaved, I tried to be included, but I failed.

They were just simply not present- so careless! It really hurt when I am always the one keeps trying. I was really disappointed at their immaturity and childish behaviour. It's just unacceptable!

I looked away and looked at him with my frustration. He smiled at me quietly and made me feel heard. I knew it wasn't easy for him to come to the dinner, but he really tried. He came and he tried to communicate, but just like me, we were ignored. I feel sorry that he had to put up with this unacceptable manner but he seemed so calm and never complained. Thank you for being so patient with me.

A family dinner - at least I know there was him present.

Relieved

Phew~

Greys and Pain

We are making great progress in watching Greys. It has turned into a routine that every week, we girls catch up on Thursday night and watch Greys from the beginning. Tonight we watched episode 6.

"Maybe we like the pain. Maybe we're wired that way. Because without it, I don't know; maybe we just wouldn't feel real. What's that saying? Why do I keep hitting myself with a hammer? Because it feels so good when I stop."

I can't believe it was 5 years ago when I started being addicted to Grey's Anatomy. This exact voice over hit me in the heart 5 years ago for the first time and Greys became part of my life ever since. 5 years later, I am still addicted to Greys but I no longer in pain, no longer need to relate my emotion to the characters. However, hearing the exact line again brought up the past and brought up some emotions.

TV series/Movies not only tape into the life when you see them, but also can bring the livses when you saw them, when you see them or heard other people talk about it later. That makes Greys timeless for me!

Indonesia Trip booked

After all the drama, I still can't believe that we paid for the tickets and are going to Indonesia for 5 weeks in the end!!!

We didn't expect that we would get the waiting list tickets in the last day, so when the agent told me the 'good' news, I wasn't prepared. It came as a shock and we had to quickly plan within 3 hours. Of course, no work was done this morning. Even now, this whole thing seems so surreal still.

Oh wow! I guess we are going to Indonesia after all! I am also pleased and excited about that I get to go home for 5 days with this tickets. :D :D :D

I hope we will survive the 5 weeks, or that 5 days would be VERY awkward. We will be alright...I hope!

I couldn't stay being mad at you and I am glad that I couldn't. Who could? With that cute sunny smile on you.

Thanks for the umbrella and the suggestion of organising open homes.

I need a holiday

I think I really need a holiday or I'll go insane. It's so frustrating that I lose the ability to just pack up and go wherever I want to go - the down side of stability :(

The holiday destination has been jumping around India, South America, Taiwan, Malaysia and I have been borrowing books, booking tickets, investigating and running around like a dog every time you change plans or no plans. It makes me so angry that I want to scream at you because I always find myself come back to the origin and end up going nowhere and restarting everything all over again. I no longer feel excited when you start talking about travelling because it has turned into useless chare for too many times. I have canceled one after another cheap deals and the whole process seem a complete wasting of time. I look at the airfares everyday and seeing them getting so expansive that I will end up going nowhere if I have to keep accommodating and compromising your circumstance!

The hardest thing is that I understand why you couldn't make up your mind and I have been suppressing my anger, but losing the opportunity to have Chinese New Year with my family was the last straw :@ :@ :@

Now, you are turning around and say we are going to Indonesia. I just couldn't control my anger. I am sorry I wasn't excited when you told me on the phone. Really, I don't want to get my hope up again because who knows, maybe you are going to change your mind again. If you really want the holiday like you said, then now you can do all the work. I am not going to running around like I did before. You can do all the planning and I will believe it when we are actually paying for the tickets.

Meanwhile, I am stilling reading my Intrepid and Gecko tours and dreaming about going there next year and you have no right to tell me that you want to come or the tours aren't exciting or too expansive because you leave me without other choices!

Stuck in the mud

One sunny afternoon, two of the Network Performance Team members went out for a site visit. It started as a check for possible radar locations but ended up as something more than what they expected.

After pulling over on the grass area on the Redoubt Rd off ramp southbound, we immediately found ourselves in DEEP trouble - LITERALLY! Although, we had a 4WD UTE which was just out of garage from servicing on that day, it was really stuck! He tried all sort of tricks - 2H, 4H, 2L and 4L (which I had no idea what they were). He moved the UTE backwards and forwards but only succeeded in creating a BIG mess. In order to keep our pride and dignity, we still believed until this day that the only reason we called for assistance in the end was to test out the efficiency of AMA incident response time. Unfortunately, our first choice was not handy (was in North Shore area at the time), so we found our knight in shining armour, N, who attended the rescue site promptly after receiving the call and pulled out the poor muddy UTE and occupants!

Thank you, N and well done for the 15 minutes response time!

Goodbye, my almost lover

I was reading her blog and she reminded me of a beautiful heartaching song that used to be close to my heart. I am listening to the song over and over again, and it triggers some sore memory. I checked my blog and it has almost been two years! Time fliers.

I am happy now, but she was right that I had learned to deal with the pain and he'll always be there in my heart but maybe in a different way.

Goodbye, my almost lover
Goodbye, my hopeless dream
I'm trying not to think about you
Can't you just let me be?
So long, my luckless romance
My back is turned on you
Should have known you'd bring me heartache
Almost lovers always do

- Almost Lover, A Fine Frezy

Auckland International Film Festival 2009

So here we are, another year of film festival. I have found that this year had less audiences than previous years. Two of my films were only half full. Is the recession finally catching up in Auckland?

A Christmas Tale
Tense with emotion....and it's kind of the film you hope you would find out the answer, but you didn't. A great family drama and full of drama.

Birdsong
As it is categorised in the book, it was a slow film. The cinematography was beautiful and quite funny. The story was simple - three wise men travelling from afar to visit the baby Jesus in Bethlehem. The three lines in Bible turned into a 90 mins tranquil film. The director was there and it made it more interesting. It's really slow and simple! I have to admit that I fall into sleep at some point, but it was okay as it was so slow that I can catch up easily without a problem :p

Blind Love
4 stories around the same theme - love and happiness for the blind people
- An old couple. The man entertained himself with listening to the sport and play piano. Life is simple with them, but they showed their support and compliments to each other just like us. The bit where Peter went under the sea and had fantacy was harilous and touching.
- A blind man and a almost blind women. She was scared the relationship won't work out, but they fought it through with his faith.
- A young mother to be. The story followed the pregnancy and the fear the child might turn out to be blind. However, she was prepared and full of optimistism. Then a 5 years old cute little boy walking into a cinema and holding his mum's hand. They sat down and he told his mum all the exciting cartoon on the big screen. Yes, he was normal and healthy. That was priceless!
- A teenager who is blind having an almost normal life in school and looking for love on the internet.

Canimo
It's probably my favorite film this year. A very well-done and smart film. It's also very controversial as it touches a cultural and religious nerve. I love the fact that when you thought things can't get worse and there was a slightness of hope, BANG, it just get 10 times worse! It made audiences laughed. It was not because it was funny, but because you just didn't know how to take the bad news! Fantastic film!

Song from the Southern Seas
I had never seen a Kazakhstan film, and that was the reason I picked this one. The story around two couples, one Russian and one Kazakhstani in remote resion. The landscape was so different! I enjoyed the simple humour and the rich of the tranditional culture.

Back off

Can you learn to accept that

• You don't have to agree with me, but I am an adult and I am responsible for my own life not you.
• I am my mum's daughter and even she has to accept that my life is mine. She can give me suggestions, but end of the day, it is me who decide what is the best for me.
• The damage from the pressure you give me is not less than the benefit I would get out from your advice.
• If I have to keep compromising and enduring, one day I'll break down
• When we eat together, I will cook the way you like. However, you need to accept that every now and then when I go out, I have the right to indulge myself and I will eat whatever I like.

Gotex or non-Gotex

We went tramping today. Mad! I know.

It was raining badly for the whole day, but there were 10 crazy dedicated people committing to go tramping rain or shine. What I learned? Gotex or non-Gotex doesn't make any difference in the end of the day in the weather like today! I was soaking wet and so were those hard core fully equipped hikers! The rain made the water level of the stream to knee high and we had to cross a few of them. After that, no one even bothered to avoid any mud or water puddles anymore.

It was fun after all!

"Guess what? When your gradchildren asked you, 'Gradma gradma, tell us some exciting stories that you did when you were young.', now you can tell them that once up the time, it was raining heavyly and... They will be so impressed and go 'Wow! That's so cool!'"

"Of course, they will find it amazing! Because by that time, they probably never heard about excercise. All they need to do is lying there and have a machine to stimulate all the muscle. No sweat or movements required."

:x :x :x

They both have had partners for more than 5 years and I was surprised at the reason that they stay together with their partners.

"Too lazy and too tired." They both said."You know? You have to go on dates, look for new people, go through everything again, go through honeymoon period, then adjustments, compromises and etc. Then you can tell if this new gf/bf is anything better than the current one or it's just another same-old same-old story. It might be totally waste of time and not worth it. I am not young any more and I don't have much time left"

Even they aren't totally happy or agree with their partners on many things, they stay because the thought of starting everything all over again is too overwhelming and daunting. Am I too navy or I haven't experienced enough? I feel sad for them as I believe that being with someone should give you the strength and bring the best out of you. It should be a decision that makes you happy and not because you are too tired to try again. However I understand their fear and discouragement.

I feel they are staying in the relationships for the wrong reason. But, that's how I feel. Each relationship is so different and if that's where they see their relationship going and accept that's what they deserve, then maybe it's not totally wrong for them. However, I deeply hope my relationship will never turn into like theirs because it's not right for me.

"Two more weekends!"
"Huh??"
"Then, he will be back!!! :D :D"