Monday, December 14, 2009

Updates (finally)

Sorry bloggie, I missed out on updating you in November! I know I should update you at LEAST once a month, but yea, I've been getting lazier due to the weather~

It's getting so cold out here. I just checked a minute ago, it's -2celcius right now. Something that we never had in Malaysia. Lol~

It's so cold that layering is sometimes never enough.
The days are getting shorter, I think we're getting less than 10 hours of sunlight now. While when we first arrived to Glasgow, we had less than 8 hours of darkness! How ironic. But that just makes me even grateful and strikes me in the face that I am indeed thousands of miles away from home.

Well, enough of emo stuff. Let's talk about what I've been doing over the past month up till today.

Nov 4:
We paid a visit to Chukoku, a nice chinese buffet restaurant to celebrate a friends' birthday^^ The food was rather nice, but MSG-filled thus leaving us thirsty the rest of the day~ But nevertheless, I still managed to down 3 plates + 1 dessert!


Nov 5:
Remember, remember, the 5th of November.
That's the famous saying for Guy Fawkes Night .
It's a day to commemorate a historical gunpowder night wayy back in 1605, and so forth. Full story can be obtained from Wikipedia cause I really have no idea what it's all about. But the thing we all knew, was that the locals had a great celebration by showing off beautiful fireworks that night!

Nov 8: Post-Halloween party because we missed out on the actual Halloween on 31st due to the Notthingham Games. I had wanted to dress up as a cute white kitten (like those anime like with big fluffy ears and paws! But somehow decided to try to be a "HOT" vampire.) The pic below is my best shot in attempting to be "HOT". LOL~~


Nov 13-17 : Ireland Trip

We bought cheap airtickets to Ireland for 5days! And when I say cheap, I mean cheap!!! The return air tickets from Glasgow to Ireland costed us 5.01 pounds per pax i.e around RM30, which was a bargain! And plus, the accomodation was cheap :D

We visited the capital of both Republic of Ireland (Dublin), and the capital of North Dublin, UK (Belfast), as well as making it out to the coastal sides of Ireland such as Wicklow, Glendalough, Derry and the Giant Causeway!




Nov 28: A one-day trip to Stirling + my pre-birthday surprise

It was a weekend called Homecoming Scotland, whereby many of the historical sites in Scotland provided FREE entrance fees!! I being the "kiam" person that I am, convinced my housemates and the other house of boys to head down to Stirling. We visited the Stirling Castle which charged an entrance fee of 9pounds per pax on a usual day :D



The bunch of people who were hiding in my house when we came back! I shall always remember that night as I shouted my lungs out when I freaked out to see ppl in my dark kitchen! lol~


Dec 8: Christmas Ceilidh!

Paid 5 pounds to take part in this event, which was VERY pricey!!! But oh well, it was a day to dress up and get all christmassy~~~ hehe^^

Btw, me red top was bought from ebay.co.uk! LOL^^
Lately I've been obsessed with ebay! Buying quite a few items till today. I've got a cheap earphone, a christmas hat, a pair of shoes, a pair of boots, a white skirt, and 3 tops (including the red one~~)


Dec 11: Christmas party @ TCC D8


My housemates and I sat together and decided to organize a nice simple christmas party before everyone leaves Scotland for the christmas break! Hehe~~

And it was a pretty fun night because we had put up lovely decoration, which is still out in the living area~~

Our little christmas tree, rented from the residents of C1 who got it from their seniors~


See the snowflakes hanging from the red and green ribbons? we got them all from the 1 pound shop, making the total cost of decorating the place 3 pounds only...lol~~~


We had great food that night, thanks to everyone who came~
So that basically sums up the whole of November (except pictures of me going to lab every week as well as minus the pictures of me studying in my room for a 50% class test).

Anyways, the christmas holidays have unofficially began and I'm gonna be heading off the Belgium and Germany come the 21st~ I would be away for 12 days then~~ So pray hard that I'll have the energy to update you again then! Hehe^^




Monday, October 26, 2009

I have 25 hours in a DAY!!!!

Whee!!

It's my first time in my life having 25 hours in a day! I had totally forgot that daylight savings was supposed to begin (or was it end this morning) and I had set my alarm on my phone at 9,30am.. I switched on my lappie, and realised that the time was 8.32am. It then hit me hard that..I have an extra hour to kill today! *whee*

But then again, the extra hour has been spent doing lots of random thing, such as:

-putting icing on the 4 cakes that I baked
- curling both Devi's and Renly's hair for the Diwali open house
- attending the Diwali celebration till 6 in the evening

Came back from the Diwali celebration, and realised the sun had already set, and it looks like it's midnight outside, but the clock only shows 9pm >.<

Okay, let's end this post with some of the pictures I grabbed from other friends on facebook cause I didn't bring my camera :'(

Yummy desserts bought by a local homestudent for the open house!


Lovely peacocks done by Siva! The peacocks look amazing don't they?

The asian homestudent who brought his set of mahjong in the middle, with the two girls looking at how the game goes. Haha. It was pretty interesting. And you can see a bit of me in the picture (see the girl on the far left with a cup in her hand? that's me teaching a local homestudent how to play ;p)

The pretty saree that Devi lent me, and huey ying looking lovely in her cheongsam :)

And a group pic of the girls (somehow my face looks distorted! I blame facebook for that!!! )

Sunday, October 25, 2009

I should be busy....

The week flew by just like that!! I can't believe it! Come to think about it, it's been more than 4 months since I'm here in Glasgow. And I know, before I know it, I'd be back in Malaysia! :(

Well, let's not think too far ahead. Because I've got plenty to do for the coming weeks!!!

First off, let's talk about my research project.
My supervisor is Prof. Alastair Florence.

"Alastair J. Florence (AJF) is responsible for the Solid-State Research Group (SSRG) within SIPBS. The SSRG specialises in crystallographic investigations of pharmaceuticals (Fig. 1), including aspects of solid-state polymorphism, ranging from crystallisation, to phase transformations, through to crystal structure determination from single-crystal and powder X-ray diffraction data.

To date, the SSRG has benefited from ca. £2M of investment in state-of-the-art research facilities (Fig. 2). The dedicated facility includes a suite of three XRPD instruments, a single crystal diffractometer, thermal analysis, automated parallel crystallisation and a range of manual crystallisation techniques, FT-IR, microscopy and dissolution apparatus."

Sounds impressive eh? That's what my final year project is about. It's about crystals. I'm supposed to find a new co-crystal (if you don't know what a co-crystal is, don't bother, cause I myself am not 100% sure what it is!!!) for a compound called ellagic acid.

Never heard of ellagic acid? So did I.

And that was the main reason I choose the substance, I'd thought it'd be fun to work with a compound that I've never heard of. Bad choice. Turns out that ellagic acid is extremely unreactive i.e I'm not getting a new co-crystal *haihhh*

Best of all, I've got a postgraduate to guide my lab work. And he's pretty strict, I would say. While other student need only submit their draft for their introduction end of November, I'm supposed to let my postgrad proof-read mine on the 2nd of November @.@

Then, on the 11th of November I've got a presentation to make regarding a case that I clerked in the hospital during the month before I came to Glasgow. The bad news is that not only will I be short on the preparation time, but I get a "brilliant-non-stop-question-asking-lecturer" called Alex Mullen. *sigghh*

Good news is, that despite all that, I'd be off for a short break in Ireland from the 13-17th of November! *whee*



Monday, October 19, 2009

A great week~

I am really thankful for this semester. Classes aren't as packed as the previous semester. And we've got more time to chill around. So basically that was what I did ever since the new semester began. Though technically speaking I should be studying and going through loads of journals for my final year project :p

(My final year project is related to solid crystals (not those swarovski crystals...) it's solid powders with different crystallinity, bla bla bla.... and my group is one of the first who have already started on their lab work. So i should hv been reading a lot to gain more insight on what i'm doing in lab now, but somehow this week has been one activity packed week...)

Monday - went for Body Attack (a really fun aerobic workout of 45mins) then went for dinner @ a chinese malaysian restaurant called Asia Style to celebrate a friend's bday.


Tuesday - Pharmacy Pub crawl!!!!!!!
it was one crazy night whereby all pharmacy students from year 1 to 4 can join. The organizers chartered 2 double decker buses which brought us to 5 diff pubs/club. The theme was rubic cube colours, and the idea was to start with 6 diff colours on ur body and to switch ur items with diff ppl at each stop till u end up with only one color in the last club. Since the majority who joined were the local homestudents, it was really entertaining as it was an eye-opener to see how wild they got that night! haha~
Friday - a night at the Student union to hv a look at a mini-version of Octoberfest, followed by a cocktail party @ a friend's place.


Student Union is actually part of the university's buildings, but its catered for students activities. And they hv cafes, bars, and even a club in the Union itself.
That night, there was a German band who came over to play some traditional German Music, and they were dressed vibrantly in yellow and red.

Throughout the night, they got the ppl to stand on chairs and give a big fat cheers in German! Haha...
So of course, Peas joined in the fun as well~ There's nothing nicer than being "denda" to "berdiri di atas kerusi" and to drink, right? ;p
And for your information, this pic below shows a vendor machine in the female toilet in the student union. Ironic isn't it? A student building selling items that promote ahem..18sx activities. lolz...
And of course, after the Octoberfest, yz and I headed for the cocktail party @ a very enthusiastic batchmate's house. The guy bought all the liqour, and even the cups and glasses, and sold his cocktails to those who wanted drinks...hahaha
Let's just say, I had a drink or two, and had a really nice night~ haha
Saturday - Ser Yiing's Bday
The day was spent preparing Chocolate banana cake, which we had to bake twice, as the recipe wasn't enough. Haha..thus we ended up with two cakes: one small and one big one for the bday girl. Hehe :) After the potluck at the bday girl's hse, it was followed by a afterpaty at a local club. Another late night...lolz....

So that pretty much sums up the week! *woots*
Will try to put my nerdy mood on for the following week :)

Wednesday, October 07, 2009

21 days of trip~

It's been a loooooooooong time since I last updated. I am so sorry dear blog, but I've been procrastinating ever since I got back from the long trip I had.

I am kinda lazy to type out my daily experiences of the places I've been for the past 3 weeks, thus I'm gonna put up a pic of each places that I've been :)


Munich, Germany:
It's unique to me as everyone speaks German. If renly's bf, Kenneth, wasn't around with us, I know we'd end up having severe culture shock. Haha.

See my pic with two big glasses of beer? That's a 1 liter jug and that's what everyone orders.
The next pic is a picture of BMW World, a really impressive feat for BMW. Haha.

Neuschwanstein, Germany:
Neuschwanstein is actually the name of the white castle. It's apparently the castle which inspired the Sleeping Beauty's castle. The area is very near the Bavarian borders and hosts a magnificent scenery :)


Ulm, Germany:
A really small town in Germany. Really nice and has the world's tallest church!


Pisa:
The leaning tower wasn't as leaning as I thought it was :(


Disneyland, Paris:
Loads of fun, and it really is a magical place that made me feel young at heart. Wait, I am still young ;p


Paris:
The city itself was beautiful, but the Eiffel Tower, esp by night, is just breathtaking! I love the way it sparkles in bright gold. And when the light show came on, it was just amazing.
Plus, I also had the opportunity to meet up with Jerome (my facebook pen friend) who is the NICEST guide I have had :)


Rome:
Rome was a city that has a LOT too see. 3 day in the city wasn't enough~~ Will be back for more if given the chance (and if my financial status has improved ;p)

Florence:
It's kinda a small place which we could hv easily covered in a day, but at least it houses the many naked statues of David ;p

Seina, Italy:
A town in the Tuscany region which pohyee, chin yeong and i decided to drop by while the other girls headed to Pisa. I didn't regret it one bit. It was a lovely ancient town with old buildings, and less crowded compared to Pisa :)


Venice, Italy:
A whole city above the waters. (kinda reminded me of Pulau Ketam) but of course, Venice is 200% better. Haha~ buildings were nice, atmosphere was nice too :)

Naples, Italy:
It's the city with the worst ppl. Local Napoli ppl act as if they've never seen asian girls before. They stare at us, as if we're some aliens, and worst still, the guys are either very mean looking, or they would be very "ham-sap" looking = =''

But thankfully, we meet a really nice local Naples citizen, Roberta (as seen in red above) who was one of the two tour guides we had during our final day in Naples. They showed us the city without the dangers of being disturbed by the not-so-friendly locals :)

Capri, Italy:
Capri island was beautiful. But I still love the beaches in Malaysia :)

Milan, Italy:
Our last stop of the trip. The city has to be the nicest city in Italy. Nice in the sense that it's very modern and the buildings reminded me of Paris:)


After the trip, was a few days of reverting to a lazy-mode-lifestyle again before hitting classes of the new semester. Now it's towards the second week of the semester, and I've already had my first session at lab for my final year research project >.< I know an early start would be good, but I'm having a hard time trying to kick start those lazy cells. haha~~
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