I met a ladybird!

I saw this cutie in Courts today.

We were wondering what it was. There was no label or price tag at all. (The sign on the table is for the, uh, table.)

After a while, we discovered that its head could be lifted up, transforming it into a small chair (a kiddie chair lah!)

Cute, right? I want one! Though I would probably need a bigger one - a much bigger one - to sit comfortably.

Inconsiderateness

This could be like a Part 2 to the previous post, as it also involves trying to get people's opinions on Facebook.

But not really. This is really a full-blown rant on inconsiderateness.

Not long ago we went out for a team lunch. (please note the word "team")

We went to Tao in Times Square for a buffet. The place doesn't really matter, but I guess it being a buffet may explain something. (or not, you decide) In case you didn't know, the Tao buffet is not a self-sevice, "take-what-you-want" buffet; it is an "order-what-you-want" buffet (though appetizers and desserts are in the "take-what-you-want" category).

Our table was a long one, with long benches on both sides. Like illustrated below. (I drew these pictures - there's another one further below - to ask my question on Facebook. I think you can guess the question: A or B?) There were seven of us.

Two had arrived first, so they were sitting at spots 3 and 7 when we (the second car) arrived. They were already eating because, hey, this is a buffet, who cares? They won't finish our food anyway, we can still order.

The problem was that I ended up being number 4. And the others decided to sit as illustrated in the option B. (they filled up the seats starting from the right, and I was the last to go into the seating area (it was like a cubby-hole compartment for our table))

I was like, what? Why are you so squeezed to that side when the three of you can spread out evenly and occupy the whole table? (like in option A. I guess it is pretty clear which option I would choose)

Seeing these guys so oblivious, I decided to say something. I said, "Why are you all sitting over there?" I even said, "I feel like I'm eating alone", while gesturing to the empty space in front of me.

And no one saw fit to move their seats. Instead, number 2 launched into an explanation of why they were sitting there: because the food would arrive there (my side was the window to the exterior) and by the time it reached my place the plate would be empty. A very good explanation indeed. As a joke, you mean! As if there would be no food left (which would have been a very nasty thing to do anyway, if they had decided to do it, which to their (tiny) credit they didn't), and as if spreading out the seats a bit would change anything. It's not like an additional person would sprout out and grab their food.

I didn't laugh at their "joke", by the way. I would have laughed if they had made the joke while moving seats. But since they had their butts stuck to those places, I did not laugh. And they found everything very normal.

The others usually speak to each other in Mandarin. I usually don't mind, I just ask if there is a word or something in there I didn't catch, and they would explain. But sometimes the conversation flows to too "deep" wordy topics, and I give up.

That day was no different, except that I gave up sooner. They were sitting, to all means and purposes, at the next table. They talked about stuff. They looked at someone's photos on a phone. I didn't care. I didn't try to catch the words. I was seething.

Of course, it was not in my best interests to sulk. It was in my best interests to enjoy the meal. And so I did. I ordered as I would normally do, I asked them to pass dishes as I would normally do. No problem. Just because you don't care about me doesn't mean I should care about you. Right?

I was just aware of a chasm that had just opened up. One that was already there, and which I knew about (because hey, when you are chatting over lunch and your topics don't really match, you know there is a gap), but which had been sort of enveloped in a misty shroud. And now it was like, wow, what a clear day, I can see everything clearly now.

And the irony is that it was a team lunch. How is this a team when you willingly push someone to one side? And just mock them when they object?

Yes, I was upset. Very much so. Once I played poker with some friends (they taught me how) and they said I didn't have a poker face at all, I was too easy to read. But in this case, I must have had the best poker face. Because no one seemed to notice that I was upset.

Or of course, maybe they did and just didn't care.

Number 1 and number 5 were facing the other side most of the time (like I said, it was like there was a table for six and a table for one), and besides the times they were passing food around, I think the only time someone actually spoke to me was number 5 asking me (several times), "You want anything else?"

Yup, I'm an eating machine. Thanks for giving me food. (I am actually sincere in this, I just feel that it is kind of telling. Like the only topic we have is food. Though maybe that is true.)

Anyway, to get to the "opinions on Facebook" part. I posted the picture above, and this picture below. And asked people:

What would be your seating arrangement, A or B? And if you don't mind typing a little more, maybe you could tell me why too. As usual, I'm asking for opinions, not one answer. Thanks in advance to those who reply.

This five-person seating actually happened before. It was at a food court and two of the round seats were missing. (you can see the empty space, I'm sure) I was number 4 (coincidentally the same number) at the time, and number 2 and number 3 had taken the places in option A. I remember feeling awkward that number 1 had no more choice but to sit at the far end of the table. But I couldn't move my seat (those seats were all bolted to the ground), so there was nothing to do. I didn't say anything then because I wasn't sure that all three of them didn't like the extra space from spreading out the three people.

And number 1 didn't say anything either. But at least he didn't sulk. I think.

I received fewer responses to this question. (don't ask me why) A grand total of TWO people replied.

L's answer is exactly my thoughts. (you might have figured that out already if you read this whole post) F's answer is suitable for herself. (that's why I wanted explanations, though I felt it was asking too much from some people) As for the last comment, F was the one who "liked" it, so I guess that means she's saying yes, it applies to both cases.

The most dangerous emoticon

Some time ago, I passed something to a friend. And he sent this to me on IM:

>_<

That looked like a pretty upset face to me, so I asked him, "Why so unhappy?"

And he said, that's not an unhappy face...

How is >_< a happy face??

I stared at that emoticon for a rather long time, but could not make it look happy however hard I tried.

I got home and asked WW. He pulled a face to show me. Supposedly it was a smile with the eyes crinkled up. Supposedly.

I was unconvinced. I mean, how could everyone understand that when I couldn't? So I tried asking on Facebook:

Question: What does this emoticon mean to you? >_<
a. a happy face
b. an unhappy face
c. an angry face
d. a just-ate-sour-thing face

Because a friend and I have different interpretations...

Okay, then I edited it because Facebook converted my symbols to its own emoticon. And then someone said the answer was not in the a/b/c/d choices that I put there, so I requested for other explanations too.

Didn't work so well, really. As I have ranted about before (on Facebook, not here):

I hate it when I ask a question to multiple people, then after one person replies all the others decide that they don't have to reply any more. I'm not talking about factual questions, I'm talking about questions that different people will have different answers to. 

So can someone enlighten me? Why??

Not much people enlightened me at the time. The replies were pretty much un-noteworthy, I didn't even save them for my own reference. No help at all.

For this emoticon question, at least I got better responses.

(Click to enlarge)

As you can see, I kept trying to remind people to give their own opinions, because they don't have to be the same as everyone else's. Didn't really work.

So it is officially a frustrated emoticon. My eyes aren't wrong! Though it is still dangerous to use it because some people think it is smiling. Imagine showing someone this frustrated face and having them think you are happy.

I really appreciated the answers from those who replied. Really. It's so hard to find answers.

In my bid to get some extra answers I even asked a couple more people on messenger. One replied, the other one didn't. Either she didn't feel like replying after one person had (like I said in my Facebook rant above), or she was busy.

Anyway, the one who replied said this:

from this it looks like eat something not nice, then got this face

or its like an expression of oh no~

where got smiling

the mouth didnt smile also

>.< or >_< both also not smiling

And I agree!

I would still steer clear of using this emoticon though.

Beating the odds

We had an early Christmas gift exchange yesterday. There were ten of us, and we picked slips of paper to determine whose present we would receive. Before picking a paper, the first person hesitated and asked, what if I pick my own name? We said, you'll just pick again! Besides, it won't happen, there are ten of us here, what are the chances? (ten percent, to be exact)

And... she picked her own name. What a lucky girl! :P

Of typos and names

Today we had a departmental meeting. For my new department.

This department is currently expanding, so there has been a number of new people joining it. Either from other departments like me, or newly hired. So there were two whole presentation slides with our photos and names.

My name was close to the bottom of one of the slides, and when I saw it I groaned inwardly. They had misspelled my name, giving me a totally different name by substituting the W for a Y. (they wrote only the given name, without the surname) They were calling out the names one by one and we were requested to stand up to show our faces when we were called. So as they went through the names, I debated whether to point out the mistake.

In the end I did point it out, by saying "uh, there's a typo". It is what we should do, right? After all, it was just a typo, which everyone is prone to do (but which is rather bad for a name, but then that's only my opinion!) Nothing too embarrassing.

But that incident made me recall another situation that happened almost a year ago. We were having our badminton gathering (after winning 3rd place in the Penang Companies' Badminton Tournament). Someone asked me to pass something, but called me using another person's name. I didn't point it out, but merely passed the thing over, because it was really obvious that she was referring to me! But someone else decided to ask me "Your name is XX meh?", turning the situation into an embarrassing one for me. Because you see, instead of picking on the person who had called the wrong name, they started picking on me for not pointing out the mistake.

Sigh... just when I was trying not to embarrass someone else...

What would you have done in these situations?



Not sure whether I've mentioned it before in passing, but the reason why I am joining another department is that my current department is moving the software section to the US. Hence this latest sketch:

That sort of says it all, doesn't it?

Of Microsoft Office and household chores

There is a Microsoft Office commercial now playing on the radio. It starts with the narrator saying to three different background noises: "This is me at work", "This is my mother doing household chores" (with the clink of crockery), and "This is my brother in class" (with loud music, for some reason I cannot understand).

And then he goes on to say that Microsoft Office is suitable for any occasion, referring to the three situations above.

But what use is Microsoft Office in doing household chores???

Either I am missing something, or this is one badly thought out commercial.

Cities of the world

The latest quiz. Not much to say about this one. There were quite a number of cities I had never heard of. Still, a mixture of eliminations and guesses got me through with quite a good score.

Sick

I'm sick of people thinking that badminton is the cure-all for everything. People telling me that it's okay to eat anything and everything just because I play badminton. People telling me that I can do a marathon just because I play badminton. Wake up! If badminton were such a miracle, everyone would be playing it. And there would be no more sick people in the world.

I sure wish it were the cure-all you guys say it to be. But unfortunately, it isn't. The proof is my lousy health. Yeah, I've got more health problems than you can see on the surface. But you don't care. All you care about is getting me to do things that YOU have an interest in. Not caring whether I have an interest in it or not.

D Mana Lagi? Di Sungai Tiram

Two weeks ago, I discovered a delicious char kuey teow quite by accident. Here is how it happened.

I planned to go to Giant to buy some groceries after work. There is a food court and a nasi kandar shop in the same building (not to mention fast food like KFC and Pizza Hut), so I planned to have dinner there before buying my stuff. But on the way there, I happened to pass a row of Malay food stalls at Sungai Tiram, and on a whim, I decided to pay these stalls a visit and try some food there.

(I actually really like the Malay-style curry mee (not every time, but the better ones are really nice), and I was actually hoping to find it there. Unfortunately there was no stall selling curry mee, so instead I settled for char kuey teow.)

I was a bit disappointed by the char kuey teow when it arrived, because the portion was rather small for four ringgit. And it looked more like a fusion of char kuey teow and char hor fun (it came swimming in gravy, you see). However, from my first bite I was pleasantly surprised by the taste. Delicious! The first time, the dish came with two prawns and two tiny kerang. But today (my second visit) there were two (slightly larger) prawns and four fat kerang! Why? Has it been a good season for kerang or was he just happy that I was a repeat customer? (Wikipedia just told me that kerang are cockles in English. Oh....so that's what cockles are. Seriously, I never made the connection. I just knew that cockles were a kind of shellfish.)

Here's a blurry look at the dish (because the plate is rather tiny (it was an oval-shaped plate), the photo had to be more close-up and turned out burry :( ).

See what I meant about the gravy?

I really liked the signboard on the stall too. I took a photo of it on my first visit, but didn't take a photo of the char kuey teow, because like I said, it looked disappointing. So the photo above is of the larger prawn version (the other prawn is hidden under the noodles).

Sedap bagitau kawan-kawan, tak sedap bagitau kami

I did bagitau kawan-kawan (by posting on Facebook), but I don't think anyone took notice. There is a general dislike of Malay food amongst non-Malays in Penang. Which is unfortunate, since I like Malay food (about as much as other food - hey, as long as it's good...). I mean, they will eat the food, but they won't go looking for it. And that is probably why I haven't found my curry mee. (also because Penang is kinda a Malay-minority place)

Opposite these food stalls there is a Malay-majority mini-supermarket (it's a supermarket because it's got about everything, but it is really tiny for a supermarket...). So on both visits I just went over to the supermarket to buy some things after dinner. (and skipped the trip to Giant). The store (yep, that's a better description for it) is called Longwan, and it has got branches all over Kedah, it seems (the branches are printed on their plastic bags). Kinda like Tunas Manja in Kuantan, I guess. A local supermarket.

Western and local specials

I have posted some photos of food from the Innoplex cafeteria before (bombs and fake rojak).

Here are a couple more.

charcoal burger

The charcoal burger looked good, but didn't taste as good as it looked. To be fair, the buns were good, but unfortunately the bottom one was soaked with gravy so it no longer had that "crunch" to it. Oh, and the chicken was more skin/batter than meat. Again, unfortunate. It came with some coleslaw (hidden behing the burger in the photo) which was pretty good. The fries, on the other hand, were crispy but hard (if you get what I mean... the best fries are those crispy on the outside but soft and fluffy on the inside).

How much was it? RM7.50? RM8.50? Something like that. Not really worth it because of the lack of actual meat. But it was a huge portion... I regretted eating the bottom bun because it didn't taste good after having soaked all the gravy (it was more like charcoal mush). Instead I left the fries on my plate (just ate a few).

nasi rendang tok

This nasi rendang was today's special! Now this one was good. Really good, in fact. There are two pieces of chicken, making a whole leg, a beansprout side dish and two pieces of omelette with onion and long beans (or french beans, I can't tell).

I wasn't planning on taking meat today, but this one looked so tempting, I just had to try it. There was a plate on display, but it wasn't wrapped in cling wrap like the usual display plates, so at first I thought it was for us to take. But when I moved to take it, the nasi hujan panas guy said, "No, this one is for taking photos only. After taking photos, we throw it away." I wasn't sure whether he was joking...

There was too much rice so I left about a third of it on my plate. If I order it again, I'd better ask for less rice...

Oh, and the price for this one? RM5. Definitely worth it.