Well as of writing, it’s been 3 hours and there’s still no sign of the lights. I have approximately 1.5 hours remaining off my laptop’s battery and what’s left of my Dad’s iPaq, which is what I’m using to hook up DiGi’s EDGE network.

The candlelight flame in front of me burns as still as a needle, a stark reminder (if I even need one) of just how still and stuffy the air around me is now. Mosquitoes are circling around me for that opportunity to dive and attack. The nerve!

More to come.

–

It all began at around 6.30pm when my laptop went kaput in front of my eyes. Along with the power supply of the whole neighbourhood and reportedly, major cities in Sarawak. Thinking it was just going to be a minor annoyance I decided to sleep it out, as blackouts in Kuching has happened a few times, albeit in short intervals throughout the year. I soon found out how wrong I was.

A nap proved impossible with all those mosquito bites. Distraught at the idea of spending the night at home in the dark with those bloody insects, we decided to head out for dinner. It was then when messages started streaming in from friends asking about the blackout. It didn’t took long for it to become apparent that it affected the whole of Kuching.

We headed out anyway and sought to have dinner “where the lights are” unquote Dad. Thing is, everybody had the same idea when roads everywhere became rivers of lights in the midst of the pitch-black surroundings. The usual glittery LEDs and signboards of 3rd mile were plunged into darkness, even the flashy Boulevard Mall stood gloomily in the dark.

Big bad jam off the 3rd mile flyover. Photo taken off a video frame, hence the quality.

That bright spotlight to the left you see in the photo above was the golf course at Jalan Keretapi, that area, however weird, was the only area as far as our eyes could see to have power supply. Needless to say, we ended up having our dinner at Aunty Lily’s in the vincinity of the golf course.

Thoroughout our dinner, the huge traffic jam in our view on the main road didn’t ease at all. It was clearly pitch-back just across the road and beyond.

It was approximately 8.00pm, almost 2 hours into the blackout when the lights suddenly went off at Aunty Lily’s, joining the rest of Kuching in darkness.

The traffic outside became increasingly chaotic as sirens blare through. As we counted, we heard two ambulances, two patrol cars, and a bloody firetruck rushing past that road that night alone.

It was chaotic in Aunty Lily’s too when.. well, we couldn’t bloody eat without lights right?

Hi Mum! =)

We resorted to using my camera-phone’s LED flashlight to make sure we wouldn’t gobble down a spoonful with lizard crap on it.

At around 9pm, power miraculously returned to Jalan Keretapi, allowing us to finish our dinner and head back home.

To our dismay, by the time we arrived at 4 1/2 Mile, it was apparent that my neighbourhood was still deprived of power. Boulevard was still in its pitiful pitch-black state. So was our house, when we arrived home.

10:20PM: Power in parts of Kuching are already restored as of now, but still not here where I live! =(

10:40PM: Everything in 4 1/2 Mile is still nice and dark. It should be 4 hours since we last saw the lights. I guess I’m gonna get off my laptop now and try to sleep. If the electricity comes back, I’ll update. 57 mins of juice remaining. Sigh.

By the way, it seems the whole of Sarawak is experiencing this. No idea how far has it restored though. Check out this news report from The Star: Blackout in Sarawak

10:51PM: Wooooooots! Lights are back! =D ..after 4 and a half hours.

It’s not really hard guessing why I’m even updating today. Just look at the URL of this post, it’s so pretty! =)

Coincidentally, it has been a week since my new semester in degree started. Yes! I’m now officially a student of a Bachelor of Engineering degree in Robotics and Mechatronics. A mouthful, ain’t it?

I chose a path in Mechatronics because well, I came into Swinburne aiming for that course. Blogging about it previously helped me realise that. So many things happened in the past year somehow derailed me off that original course I set out to take. That’s why they say it always help once a while to stop, look around and re-evaluate your path.

There is another reason why I opted for Mechatronics. A cliched as it my sound, it is vaguely because it is the road less taken, at least in this part of the world. Any engineering student can tell you, the bulk of students are in Civil and nothing else. Granted, there are definitely more Civil jobs out there than Mechatronics, but the thought that I have to compete with that whole lot in Civil doesn’t sound all that welcoming to me.

It doesn’t help that yes, I suck in competition.

Well I wish I could say that I’m just testing the waters but, its a decision that’s hard to turn back to. I don’t regret my choice, in fact, I’m beginning my slow, gradual mental conditioning to have myself embrace this whole 4-year path I’ve laid in front of me - with passion.

The only, big, glaring downside to being in Mechatronics is.. none of my immediate friends are with me. =( Having spent my foundation with the company of a few great buddies, it strucked me pretty hard during the degree enrollments, being alone, suddenly deprived of my circle of friends.

Fortunately, when lectures started, I realised that I wasn’t going to spend the next 4 years a lone ranger. =P Turns out most of the lectures are held in combination with engineering students from other specialisations. So in a way, the engineering subjects we’re taking for the first year are common to all engineering courses.

Another glaring difference we’re having this semester is that out of the four subjects we have, three of our lecturers are Indians. One of them, in particular, stood out in stark contrast to the other lecturers. Our Engineering Mathematics 1 lecturer, Ms. Seibu, gave a very motivational introduction to the subject that other day.

She started her lecture with the quote so commonly known yet so little embraced: “Give a man a fish; you have fed him for today.  Teach a man to fish; and you have fed him for a lifetime”

Unlike, face it, most of the lecturers we have today who’d guide you throughout the semester as far as scoring in the finals is concerned, Ms Seibu stressed a lot on the importance of Math in the Engineering course as a whole. She even advised us to treat this particular Math subject as a litmus test to gauge how well are we gonna cope the degree.

Her charismatic and witty lectures, unique and in-depth way of teaching had me worry less about scoring in this subject I had so much trouble during Foundation. Even more, we’ll be having our great Ms. Chong as the tutor for this subject! Woots! =D

Well I hope I can go on.. but time is a little tight right now. It’s moving week next week where the shift to the new extended campus is expected to take place. As a result, there won’t be any lectures next week before we resume lectures in the new campus. =) It’s still going to be a busy week for me though, as I juggle with a few projects I have on hand.

By the way, happy 08 08 08! You might already have noticed that I have whipped up a Beijing olympics themed header. Weee!

Welp, here’s to the next four years of my degree!

*crosses fingers*

Results were finally out last Friday after a whole week of postponement. I was out with my family during the results release and had to check the results online via my dads phone. The slow EDGE connection and tiny mobile screen were no help to the suspense.

I swear my heart was inches away from pumping itself out of my chest as I scrolled through the cluttered Excel file on my dad’s mobile.

That said, I’m on my way to degree in August!

Which, though, puts me in another dilemma. For as of now, I have not a vague idea of which specific discipline of Engineering I should take up as my degree.

I initially entered the Swinburne engineering foundation course with a degree in Robotics and Mechatronics in sights. But over the course of the year (yes! it’s been a year) of studying in Swinburne, I had come to conclude that Robotics isn’t going to be easy and had subsequently opened myself up to other choices.

Now I’m torn between Civil, Mechanical and Robotics. I’m not so keen on Electrical and Electronics, so I’m more than happy to drop it off my list of choices. Mechanical sounds boring, Civil isn’t good in job prospects due to an apparent over-supply of Civil Engineers, and Robotics is well, tough and isn’t in substantial demand locally.

The fact that I have a grand total of three days left to decide isn’t helping at all. Degree enrollments are next Monday!

Argh.

Best. Superhero. Movie. Ever.

Big decisions aside, I managed to convince my dad to bring us to watch The Dark Knight last Saturday. And god was it AWESOME. I know everyone’s been saying it! Yet after I watched it, I don’t see a reason not to!

The Dark Knight succeeds as a dark, gripping thriller that didn’t fail to entice even though it was a wee bit draggy being 2 and a half hours long. Seeing as I was literally on the edge of my seat all throughout the movie!

And I must applaud the stunning performance of the late Heath Ledger as The Joker, whose dark and maniacal antics bound to send chills down your spine, if not leaving a lasting, dark impression of the movie. He’d mercilessly throw you on a wild ride as his evil schemes gets played along time after time, leaving you helplessly wondering just how the movie is going to lead.

If you haven’t watched it, you have my every endorsement to do so!

In the words of The Joker, and my favourite dark quote from the movie, “Why ..so.. serious?”

Wiiicked! =P

All About SUVs

I had actually promised to show you guys my IT2 project entitled All About SUVs a while ago. I had to optimise the images, iron out bugs and have the whole code go through more QC before I could release it here. Thing is, I’ve completed everything almost a month ago but totally forgot to post it up.

So without further ado, here it is!

WARNING: #1: Doesn’t work in Safari and Opera. Only enter if you’re using Internet Explorer 7+ or Mozilla Firefox 2+. Preferably of course, viewed in Mozilla Firefox 3.

#2: Site may take awhile to load due to large images. (Speed optimisation can only go so far..) For those of you on modems, enter at your own risk!

The Guide gets better!

On a related note, I’ve spent some time revamping the most important page of tehCpeng.net - the About the drink page. I’ve noticed there’s an increasing number of you who arrived on that page while searching for Kuching’s famous drink. So to live up to your expectations, I’ve styled and souped up everything on that page. And of course.. to better live up to the tehCpeng.net domain. =)

Oh, and if you have friends who are clueless as to what teh C peng exactly is,  or if you just want to share and promote the Kuching teh-C peng love, I wouldn’t mind if you link them to this guide of mine!

tehCpeng.net/thedrink

A community service proudly brought to you by tehCpeng.net.

Well, that’s pretty much what I’ve been busy with these holidays. I also have two Wordpress themes up my sleeve - one in the process of coding and another still on the drawing board. The former, a theme for my client’s blog and the latter, a theme for Swinburne’s upcoming unofficial community blog.

Look out for it!

The sky was gloomy as rainclouds hung low, showing water upon Earth. The heavy midday traffic leading out of the city meant long waits at major traffic intersections.

I have always wonder in amazement at how traffic light junctions seem to be a display of obedience, in the otherwise, chaotic roads we know today. Lines upon lines of cars from all four directions at the mercy of a simple set of poles flashing three bright colours.

Sensing the drop in temperature, I switched off the vehicle’s air-cond. I stared into the distance and found myself looking at four lanes of cars waiting on the opposite side of the traffic junction. All of them had their wipers turned on.

It was a sight. A mass of windshield wipers swinging back and forth, almost in unison. From a distance, it looked almost as though everyone is waving at you. I could almost hear them greeting, “Hi!”

I cracked a smile as I felt a sudden warmth in an otherwise chilly and gloomy day. Each and every vehicle has different directions to go, different places to reach, different point of origins, it is only coincidence that led us to converge at this very traffic junction at the same time. Strangers we all were, but there we all were at the same traffic junction, sharing a common goal - waiting for green light.

It was a display of affection so much lacking in society.

It then dawned upon me, as I focused on my car’s own windshield wipers - wiping back and forth - that my car is waving back at them!

I followed the swinging motion of my car’s windshield wipers and thought with a smile, “What could you be saying to them?”

It was then when the lights flashed green, and I continued my journey back home in the light rain..

..as my car continued to wave at each and every oncoming vehicle.

Hi!

I could instantly tell what it was at the sight of that logo.

I hadn’t expected it to come in a poster tube though. I was thinking more of like a thick envelope or something.

I popped its cap open as fast as a 6-year-old would pry open his can of Mister Potato.

Only it wasn’t chips inside, but a rolled up photographic paper wrapped in plastic.

I ripped off the plastic like a 6-year-old would uh, damn.. I ran out of analogies featuring six-year-olds. But yeah, you get the idea. =)

And voila!

I spread the poster open, grinning from ear to ear, like how a 6-year-old (hehehe.) would react with a huge lollipop in his arms.

If that poster doesn’t look familiar to you, it’s a printed version of my 2004 Christmas wallpaper! Ordered nice and hot, straight from the deviantART print shop delivered all the way from the US of A.

You see, deviantART emailed me a few weeks ago saying that they will be discontinuing ‘Artist discount’ privileges on my own prints in a week. Me being a dormant member of deviantART, I’ve never ventured after that ‘Buy this print’ button.

So I decided to check out just how much this, ‘Artist discount’ is worth. It just happened that I had submitted this particular piece for the print shop a while ago. And thus I went through the steps as if I wanted to buy my own print.. until I saw that print in red.

Holy smokes!, I thought. That’s 30 bucks of savings!

I fell for it, shelved out 7.40 USD off my Paypal for a 23 by 30 cm matte print and three weeks later, here it is.

Sure, you could spend a mere 3 bucks locally printing a poster way bigger than this one. But nothing’s like seeing your work printed out by that same art community that once sparked my interest in design.

This little guy is so gonna get framed up. =D

The recent events are becoming more and more like the fights I used to have (and still do) with my sister. Only this time, its between two big-time VIPs and hence their every move scrutinised, analysed, criticised and talked upon by 25 million Malaysians.

–

Just a month ago, the world witnessed the end of the long and gruelling US Democratic primaries in which Senator Barack Obama emerged as the presumptive nominee for the Democratic party, going head-to-head with Republican nominee John McCain.

The presidential primaries alone took five bloody months and that was only the first step in the long and winding path to the white house not limited to more conventions, speeches, debates, campaigning and a myriad of terms and processes an average joe wouldn’t have heard of.

The race to the White House: US style.

But if you ask me, the US presidential race sucks. Its downright boring.

All the campaigning, all the speeches, conventions, rallies, debates. Meh.

Let me introduce:

The race to Putrajaya: Malaysian style.

The drama, the shock and awe, the political explosions, the allegations, the missing PI, the statutory declaration with a 24-hour lifespan, the conspiracy, the ploys, the accusations, the homo, the Mongolian girl, the Turkish embassy, the UMNO general elections, the September 16 deadline, the unanswered questions, the suspense! Ooooh.

Malaysian politics is so much more entertaining.

I swear my head is crackling-dry now.

The finals are thankfully, history. All the sweat and anxiety left on the 8th floor as we turn our backs on the double doors of LH8.13 after our Physics paper.

The Physics B paper was.. okay. My last minute of skimming through the previous test papers paid off when similar questions came out. Engineering Math did suck a little though. So I’m gonna have to pray really hard for a damned pass.

But that, will be none of my worries for the next week or two. =)

For its time to enjoy life. Like this cat.

Except it didn’t quite enjoy one of its nine lives when I drove over her last November.

Its been seven months. And I can’t recall if I did ever saw her lying around the house. Then again, for the past few months hectic campus life meant I was paying less attention to cats in the car porch, if any.

Well since my history with cats and exam seasons go back a long time. I was half-expecting that long-lost cat to show up this time around since it was the finals.

And oh yeah did she show up.

..the day before my Physics paper.

At least she’s enjoying THIS life. =D

OMG.

On the front lines, we have Academic Writing and Engineering Math. While Academic Writing might pose a rather easy target, analysts say, the stronghold of Engineering Math is deemed to bring a tough fight. Confidence, however, of winning the Engineering Math battle are sailing high.

“We will definitely nail Engineering Math,” pledges an optimistic student.

Forces on the other side, however, were equally motivated for victory. “They have no idea of what will they be facing,” warns an anonymous test paper who only wants to be identified as ‘Engineering Math’, adding, “They will not be prepared for what we have in store for them.”

The sound of rustling papers fills the scene here at the Ground Floor Auditorium of Swinburne’s main block, where tomorrow’s battles are expected to take place, as test papers make their final preparations.

Meanwhile, students back in their respective bases are also running through test-runs on their ultimate weapon against the test papers, the calculator, dubbed - the mother of all weapons. In this semester’s battle, two major variants of calculators are expected to be seen in the battlefield, the generic Casio Fx-570 and its elder brother, the invincible TI-84 graphical calculator, designed to penetrate the heaviest defences the test papers might have in place.

While the students cheer on, brandishing their ‘mother of all weapons’, the test papers look on over the horizon without the slightest tinge of fear. Preliminary intelligence reports indicate that the test papers might just have created their best defence system yet - known as the BCIAD (Bloody Complex Integrals and Differentials) which, some weapons experts argue, might just render the TI-84 useless.

On how these weapon systems would fare against each other, only time will tell.

All eyes of the world, however, are on Friday’s battle of Physics B. Some call it the climax of the war.

“It is suicide,” a student gravely recalls, “only a few have ever survived that dreaded battle.”

The world looks on.
—-
ember is a veteran battlefield reporter who is currently dispatched on-scene at Swinburne’s Ground Floor auditorium. He has previously made coverage possible in notable battlefields such as the great 2006 SPM battle and the 2004 PMR war. His vast experience in covering live reports from battlefields makes him our best war correspondent yet.

—–

I can’t believe I pulled through last week. More so on the fact that I left my blog unattended for half-a-month. Half-a-godforsaken-month! By the blogosphere’s standards, fifteen days is an eternity.

But in the week before, eternity was seven days.

I did the impossible. I redesigned and coded a website in three days, complete with a presentation and reports on the fourth day. I had four bloody tests that week alone. I had to cover a nine mind-boggling chapters of Physics in two days, just so I wouldn’t fail all that badly. All that, with my parents overseas for the week.

The screenshot I posted before (in the previous post) of the IT website project I was working on, was how it looked like in its earlier stages. I took a very conservative approach in the design, with an all-too-typical two column layout coded with simple html and css. No flash, no Ajaxy stuff, no nothing. Plain, barebones. When Ms. Marlene looked through it for the first time with her lips pursed, it was clear she was anything but satisfied.

Her soaring expectations for our group required me to return to the drawing board for real and cook up something new. The deadline was just three days away.

With the help of iced coffee and lots of patience, I redesigned and recoded everything from scratch. Leaving no room for any pursed lips.

Luckily for me and my sanity, the redesign appealed to her.

I did plan to upload the website for you folks to play around with, but I hadn’t got the time to optimize the load times and do some serious bug-squashing. For believe me when I say the rushed work is plagued with bugs. But its amazing what you can achieve in three days.

Physics though, makes you realise how much can’t you achieve in a day. Covering 9 chapters in two days for a Physics test is a definite no-no. I had learn that the hard way. =(

Welp. If there’s anything good that came out of the week before, it would be Coldplay’s new album.

Viva la Vida just sounds so epic! I swear my laptop would shut on me if I ever double-click on that track again. Not to mention Strawberry Swing, a rather joyous take on the usual melancholic nature of Coldplay’s works. I swear I thought the instrument used in the intro of Strawberry Swing was the sape.  It turned out to be some African-inspired guitar which sounded just as good.

With the finals coming up next week, it seems that time is and always has been, against us.

Oh well, Coldplay is here to cast me into oblivion.

Cue African guitar beats ala Strawberry Swing,

“It’s suuu-ch… It’s su-ch a perfect day.”

Research report is done and over with, which leaves the IT 2 web site project and the dreaded finals.

Well I saw your raised eyebrow on that IT 2 web site project thingy. So here’s a screenie of what I’ve been working on:

Okay, I’ll just name your reaction the inaudible wow.

As you can see, this time we’re working on Sport Utility Vehicles. Another spur of the moment idea of a topic when we saw two other groups each working on sports cars and another on something along the lines of economical cars.

So you see, we really suck at thinking of topics to do.

And no, that is not how our website currently looks like. I didn’t leave my blog unattended for a week for nothing now ey? But the design isn’t quite done yet. That’s the problem with wannabe web designers like me. There’s no such thing as completed work.

I find it really hard to lay back and say, “OK, that’s done and lets call it a day.” There seem to be problems in every corner no matter how hard I improve on things. And when that happens, its back to the drawing board and the cycle continues. Gee, I’ve really got to stop working on the designing part and get on with the wordings. =(

On a related note, while doing research on SUVs to be included in our website, I saw my lust grew for her.

The Porsche Cayenne. Look at her, all wet and ready.

Is it just me, or she is sexy?