YouthSays…

My friend had introduced something new to me, YouthSays. It is an online youth opinion community where youth at the age of 13 to 30 will be rewarded in a form of prizes and most importantly MONEY for helping with:-

Online Surveys: Youths(consumer) will be rewarded for all the feedbacks they have given in the survey of a certain product.

• Advertising Campaigns: Youths are able spread cool events, news/promotions with their friends and at the same time being rewarded in a form of MONEY and prizes.

Sounds FUN?? SignUp as a member for FREE by clicking on this link.

* Images were taken from http://malaysia.youthsays.com

1st Day As An Intern

Few months ago I have been busy going for interviews here and there to make sure that I have a position in a company to do my practical/internship for 5 months. And I’m grateful that TechnoDex Solutions Sdn Bhd, an IT company in Puchong not only accepted me, but also 7 other of my friends. Our internship will be going on from the 5/7/2010 until 19/11/2010.

So yesterday was my 1st day going to work as an intern. I didn’t have a good night sleep though because I was a bit excited nervous because I will be totally in a new environment for the next 5 months. So I woke up at 6.30am to prepare myself for the day that I have been waiting for weeks.

I made myself a small breakfast to fill my empty stomach so that it will not make any noise/distraction while I’m working.

Since I was up early and I had ample time, so I’ve decided to listen to some songs on Youtube to relax myself and to worship the Lord because He is the source of our Peace.

We started leaving the house at 8.20am. Our office is a stones throw away from our house. So it only took us 5 mins to reach to our working place. We were early. We waited for someone to give us some briefing in the meeting room.

Finally, one of TechnoDex employee came in to inform us our respective personal Project Manager(PM). Everyone was assigned to 1 PM. I was told that my PM is KC. After distributing the names, we were brought up to the working area on Level 1. The moment we opened the door, all of the employee that were on their desk were starring at us. I felt a bit awkward and shy at the beginning because I didn’t have so many eyes starring at me the same time my entire life (besides performing on stage). But then I started to feel much better after settling down on my working desk.

Some of my friends got to meet with their PM there and then. But as for me, my PM was not around yet. So I sat at my desk while waiting for him to come. While waiting for him/her (because that time I didn’t know my PM was a male/a female), I got to see with my own eyes the real working life in an IT company. It was really a can eye opener for me (in a good way).

After waiting for 30 minutes, finally my PM approached me and introduced himself. And yes, my PM is a MAN! Man or Woman doesn’t really matter. What matter the most is he/she is willing to guide me and to expose me to more new things that I’m not able to get in university. He started explaining the things that I will be doing and the things that he will be teaching me. The 1st computer word that came out from his mouth was, Scripting. Then I was like "Hmm ok, scripting. I didn’t learn that, but ok I’m willing to learn”. He immediately gave me a task there and then after giving a short explanation (verbally and via Yahoo Messenger). Yeah, Yahoo Messenger. That is 1 of the way employees communicate with each other in the company. How cool is that right? How I wished lecturers allow us to use MSN during lecture periods..haha

I manage to complete the 1st task that was given before lunch hour. We had our lunch in a near by Bah Kut Teh restaurant. It was quite expensive, so we did not order it individually, but we share it among 3 ppl.

Some of you might be worried that I ate very little for lunch, right? No worries, I ordered another bowl of white rice to fill my empty stomach.

After lunch we went back to our office and continue with our own task. To be honest, I’m quite tired and sleepy because I didn’t sleep well the night before. So for those who saw me going in and out of the toilet, I did that because I want to keep myself fresh. Haha..

Our shift ends at 6pm but none of us dare to make the 1st move to leave the desk because we were so chicken paiseh/shy about it because it was our 1st day at work. But finally after 15 minutes of pushing the responsibility here and there, all of us stood up and started leaving our desk.

We had our dinner at a food court nearby our house. I had Nasi Lemak Kukus which cost be RM4.50. It was somewhat delicious although it was a bit expensive. My 1st day as an intern ends with a nice sunset that could be seen far away…

Google Logo: PAC-MAN's 30th Birthday!

Google have been coming out with a lot of creative logos besides their original logo.

And I was quite surprised when I load Mr.Google up on my browser this morning. I was impressed with the logo that Google came up with to celebrate PAC-MAN's 30th Birthday. This time, Google’s Logo is not static but instead it is playable! We can actually play Pac-Man on their logo. How cool is that!!

Google is trying to give their users new experiences while using their search engine. I can’t wait to see what Google will come up with in the future.

Chinese New Year Mood

As I was packing my begs before heading home for Chinese New Year, I was going through the items that I wanted the bring back. After lots of thinking, I finally made up my my mind not to bring too many cloths/things back because I knew that there would be a lot of things back home waiting for me.

I brought back 1 empty tin, 1 container, a bed sheet, a blanket, a towel and a pillow case. That was my first time bringing back home so little things. Want to know why? Let me tell you the reasons..

Weeks before Chinese New Year, I requested something from my sister. I requested her to bake many types of cookies for me, so I can bring them back to my college after my Chinese New Year holiday. I requested for Pineapple Tart, Chocolate Chip cookies, and Corn Flakes.

I went back home on the 29/1/10, for a weekend break and guess what? Upon reaching home, my sister asked me to try some of the cookies that she had baked (me and my brothers are always her victims guinea pigs). So, the conversation goes something like this:

Sister: Clement, come try this one (Corn flakes).

Clement: AAAaaa (opening my mouth, because my sister was feeding me, haha)..Num num num..Too much honey, too sweet. I can’t really taste the butter. I think should put more butter and less honey.

Sister: Aiyah “Sat Pai” (failed). Never mind, I will do another new batch. Now try this one(Chocolate Chips Cookies)..Petrina say it’s hard like a rock.

Clement: AAAaaa, Num num num..Eh no ah, this one not hard. This one like “lau fong”, the container no close properly izit?

Sister: Eh, sorry not this one. *Searching*. I think is this one.

Clement:  Num num! @_@ Hard, but still okay… Not really that hard lah, still can be eaten de. But too sweet already. Too much chocolate chips.

Sister: So how? What to do with the hard ones? I mix it with the good ones, okay? :-p

Clement: Haha can can..

Sister: Try this Pineapple Tart.

Clement: AAAaaa..

Sister: Can taste the pineapple mah?

Clement: Num num num, erm… too little pineapple already. Should put more..

(That is roughly how our conversation that day. But there were laughter here and there that are difficult to be describe here. Only both of us know, right jie? ^_^)

I arrived back to my college yesterday night. Curious what I brought back? See the pictures below…

My beg was filled with 4 containers of cookies, 1 pack of coco crunch, a bed sheet, a blanket, 2 shirts and etc.

I was also carrying a plastic beg filled with Munchy’s Oat Krunch and 10 packets of Dutch Lady Full Cream Milk.

This was how my shelf look like before putting all the cookies and foods in it.

And this is how it look like after putting all my things in it. I guess the mood of Chinese New Year is still in me. :-)

Tiny Nestle Milo Packaging

I came back home with my brothers for my Chinese New Year holiday last Wednesday. On my way back, my sister-in-law gave each and everyone of us a packet of Nestle Milo. The moment I saw it, my response was “Eee so cute, so small!”.

To be honest, I like miniature things. This Nestle Milo would be one of them. The size of this Nestle Milo is smaller than the palm of my hand. I even challenged myself to finish drinking it with only a sip. First, I blew out all the air that was in me. Then I quickly sucked the Milo as much as I could. But unfortunately, I could not finish the whole packet with only 1 sip. I managed to finish up the Milo in my 2nd sucking attempt. So the conclusion is, I suck!! the size of my mouth is equivalent to the quantity of the small pack Nestle Milo. Maybe I’ll try sucking harder next time…

Happy Chinese New Year, 2010

Few days before Chinese New Year, I started receiving Chinese New Year dedication gifts from some of my friends in university. Some of my coursemates gave me things like Oranges…
 

Loads of Oranges @_@

And some cute little tiny oranges with a basket as a container.

I didn’t eat the oranges, instead I packed it all up in my beg because I’m travelling back home the following day. I definitely won’t want to have “lau sai” (diarrhea) half way through the journey due to over consumption of oranges.

And the last dedication gift was from my direct junior, Wendy. It is a keychain which resembles the year of the Tiger.

Upon reaching home the following day, I was shocked to see 3 things. The 1st one would be the amount of cookies that were in my house. After gathering and arranging all of the cookies that I could put my hands on, this is how it look like.

Could you imagine the amount of cookies I will be eating during my 1week CNY break?

The 2nd thing that caught my attention was this.

Look at the amount of oranges my parents bought.

The last thing that caught my attention was this packet and the things that is inside of it.

For those of you who don’t know what is that, it is something edible. You can choose the type of meat you prefer(dried pork or dried chicken meat). My family used to called it Square Meat (in Hainanese), I guess it’s because of the shape of it.

So I think that’s all for now. I would like to take this opportunity to wish all of my friends and my readers, Happy Chinese New Year and Gong Xi Fa Cai. Wish that you will prosper and be in health in the year of Tiger. And most important of all, “Happy Angpao Hunting” yeah~ ^_^

 

Designing Java 2D Graphics

For those who read my blog post often, you would probably stumble across my post titled “My First Attempt In Designing 2D Graphics”. For those who haven’t you can read it here. It is somehow good/important for you to read that post before you proceed in reading this post because it’s somehow related or indirectly related (at least you can see my progress in what I’m about to blog).

Few weeks after My First Attempt In Designing 2D Graphics, my lecturer gave us another project to be completed. The question for that project was “Dengan menggunakan pustaka grafik Java2D, tuliskan suatu aplet yang memaparkan lukisan grafik yang menarik”. So we were required to create interesting graphic using all the things that we had learned in class.

Our lecturer showed us a few examples of what our senior had done few years back to explain in detail what she meant by the word “Interesting”. These were the pictures she showed to us.

This is a Mascot for Java

A boat sailing on sea

The design of this key is nice. It looked like a real 3D key because of the angle of the key and the colour gradient used. Impressive.

When the lecturer showed us this Gundam RX-178 Titan design, the whole class (me included) response was “Wow!!”. This design is much more complicated than the previous one that we saw. After seeing this design, in my heart I feel that this project is going to be tough. I thought this Gundam RX-178 Titan picture would be the last picture that the lecturer was going to show us. But I was wrong. She showed us this…

This time, the whole class erupted with voices saying things like “WAH LIOW EH!”, “GENG AH!”, “YENG AH!” and “SO DIFFICULT AH”! The first thing that came out from my mouth after seeing this Dark Angel design was “W*F!!!”. This design is superb.

**(The five photos above are for illustration purpose only. All credits goes back to the owner who design it)**

I began to worried about what graphic design should I create. Keep thinking about it everywhere I went. I kept searching for a suitable graphic on the internet. Kept searching it when I’m free or thinking about it. And finally, I bumped into this picture that caught my attention.

I liked this picture (Owl Clock) because it’s cute and colourful (don’t you think so?). As usual, I would think of many ways to make my coding process easier. So, I finally decided to do something extra ordinary. I photostated the Owl Clock on a piece of Over-Head Projector (OHP) paper which cost me RM2.50.

And I stole took 1 graph paper from my friend who was kind enough to sponsor me. Thank you Ah Fang^2.

So after putting those two paper (OHP + graph) together, this was how it looked like.

I had this idea way back in my 1st graphic design assignment where I would activate the Gridlines function in Microsoft Paint which would make my eyes pain if I stare on the monitor too long. But this time, I did something different. I made it tangible. Now I could hold it, feel it, draw on it, count it and stare at it without making my eyes pain.

For those who know me, you know that I’m a irritating fussy person when it comes to graphic designing. Everything must be the same. The size, the coordinate and the colours must be exactly the same like the original picture. Yes, I admit that I’m all of the above because combining the photostated graphic with the graph paper was not enough for me. I was not satisfied. I want something more (greedy). So I did some calculation and some coding. And I created  gridlines in my Applet and it looked something like this..

Now do you still agree with my friends that I’m a fussy person? I hope not :-). So with the physical grid behind the OHP and coded grid in my Applet, I can be rest assured that the coordinate placement and measurement will be similar to the original picture.

It took me roughly about 11 hours (3 days period) in total to complete coding all the outlines of this Owl Clock.

To be honest, starring at the grids in the Applet for 11hours in total was not a pleasing moment for my eyes. It really gave me a headache and my eyes were hurting every time I’m doing this project. What pushes me forward to continue coding this graphic was my interest and the end result. If it wasn’t for those 2, I would have given up long ago.

That was how it looked like without those grids at the back of the graphic. Although it looked a bit messy with all those lines/shapes overlapping each other (nose with the left eye), but I can assure you that it’s not after I started applying colours to all the shapes and objects.

I made some tweak to the colour(gradient) of the Owl Clock to make it look a little “3D”. If you are observant enough, you would probably realise that the feet of this Owl Clock is no where to be seen..haha. Not enough space, what to do? :-)

So I finally submitted my project to my lecturer yesterday. It’s a relief after submitting it. I hope that I can get flying colours for it ^_^.

Hiking Trip At Broga Hill, Semenyih

It has been awhile since my blog was updated which was 24 days ago where the post was dated 10/1/10. It’s my first time abandoning my blog for such a long period. It is all because of the lecturers’ fault amount of assignments and projects that were continuously smacking me right on my face for the past 3 weeks.Finally, I’m able to write this post after 3 agonising weeks without blogging. It’s because I’m now back home for the weekend, leaving aside my busy student life in university. Sometimes its good to leave aside my student life and just sit in my own comfy room and just do my own things on the computer which are not studies related. (I drafted half of this post on 30/1/10 when I’m back at home)
 

Many interesting events had occurred in the past 3 weeks. One of them was a hiking trip to Broga Hill, Semenyih which took place 5 days ago on the 28/1/2010.

It all started when my coursemate, Sheat Wei planned to gather all of us TKs (TK is the name for students who are taking Computer Science. Don’t ask why is it called TK instead of CS, because I don’t know too) for on outing. To be honest, we hardly go out in a large group before. NONE! So this hiking/outing trip will be the 1st and NOT last for us TKs (more to come, I hope so).

At first, this trip was supposed to be on 27/1/10 (Wednesday), but due to the lack of people that are able to attend (having class the following morning), the date was changed to 31/1/10 (Sunday). I was quite disappointed at first because I won’t be able to go for the trip because I’ll be going back home on Friday. But luckily, the date was changed again to 28/1/10 (Thursday) because all classes were cancelled in the morning due to certain event that was going on in the university.

I was quite excited for the trip because it will be my 1st hiking trip with my coursemates and my 1st attempt to capture pictures of the sunrise (I’m still learning, kindly leave some advice yeah).

So we departed from our colleges at 4.10am and gathered at a Chinese restaurant near our university called 大树下 (“Big Tree Under” - direct English translation ^_^). There were 27 of us and 5 cars in total that were gathered there.

After taking some group photos, we started our journey to Broga Hill at 4.20am. The journey from 大树下 to Broga Hill was 40 minutes.

When we reach at the foot of Broga Hill, everything was pitch black. We couldn’t see a thing without the aid of our torch lights. But one thing that caught our attention was the sky was filled with many bright Twinkling Little Stars. It was such a beautiful view at that time (I will never ever forget that).

We started walking into the Palm Oil Estate at 5am without a single clue where are we heading. The only thing that we could do was to trust and follow another group of students that was ahead of us. As for me, I remembered that I was busy messaging. To be honest, I didn’t concentrate where I’m walking. I was just following all the light source that I could find on the floor.

After walking for 5 minutes, the floor started to be uneven and sloppy and we started hiking instead of walking. Starting of the hike was easy. Nothing really challenging though, except that we were walking on a slanting and uneven ground. It’s quite tiring though after hiking for about 30 minutes. Once awhile I could hear people talking jokes and I heard laughter followed by it. One of the girls nearly gave up along the way. So we encouraged tricked her by saying “We are almost there” (I lost count how many times I said that line ^_^).

Before reaching to the 1st stop, the terrain was a challenging one. Ropes were provided for us to hold onto while we hiked at a certain area. Along the way, 1 of our friends was not feeling well because she started the journey with an empty stomach. So some of us accompanied her until she regained her strength. The others (including me) continued our way to the 1st stop 3 minutes away from where she was.

Upon reaching to the top at 5.45am, I could see everyone’s face was tired and sweating. Everyone started drinking water as if they have not drank it for the past 3 days. While we waited for those who were still on their way up, we rested and took some group photos.

 
Some of us tried to guess where the sun will rise. One of them tried guessing it using the aid of the direction of the wind blowing (haha..).

My suggestion to them was to use the stars as a guide (didn’t we learn that in Science?)

But unfortunately, we didn’t managed to guess it because the stars in the sky was jumbled up and I’ve forgotten everything about my primary school Science syllabus (@_@).

We continued our journey to the 2nd (last) stop at 6.20am. Everything was basically the same. The terrain was not man made staircase but it was man made foot path (flat surface on a slanting ground). So hiking up to the 2nd stop was an easy one as if we were walking up a stairs. It took us 10 minutes to reach the 2nd stop.

A group of students reached there earlier than us were busy taking photos while we were busy catching our breath. After settling down, we took some random pictures while waiting for the sun to rise.

 
Coincidently all of use were pointing at the correct direct of the sunrise.

The sky started to be bright at 6.45am. Some of us were preparing ourselves with our camera and the rest stood there with the anticipating look on their faces. I started to be nervous about snapping photos of the sunrise. I was worried how would the pictures turn out to be. Well, here it goes (do give some/many advices yeah).

 
The sun was no where to be seen. But the sun really coloured up the whole sky with its lovely orange colour.

 
I tried to capture different angle and view of the sunrise.

The sun started to show itself at 7.30am, which was 45 minutes after the 1st photo that I captured.

While I’m busy capturing these photos, I heard many people saying things like “Wah, its (sunrise) very beautiful” & “Wah, so nice~”

I tried different way of capturing pictures of the sunrise, changed the setting on my camera and put what I’ve learned before this to the test. I can say that I enjoyed every moment of it and I’m looking forward for the next hiking trip :-).

That’s the view of another part of Broga Hill that we didn’t hike maybe because there wasn’t enough space for the 27 of us.

We started our way back down at 7.50am. If you see closely, you will be able to see the place (1st stop) that we rested before reaching to the 2nd stop. The process of walking down Broga Hill was not as tiring compared to the way up. Basically what we needed to do was just to hold on to our “brakes” and letting go of it once awhile to prevent our legs from our heating (I hope you understand what I meant).

We walked down Broga Hill in a slow pace to prevent any injuries from occurring. Even 2 aunties in their mid 50’s overtook us!! They were walking as if they were walking on flat ground (quite an embarrassing moment for us). From what I know, there are people who climb Broga Hill every day to exercise and even to do Yoga (no wonder walking down was so easy for those 2 aunties..haha).

I respect those 2 aunties because they seem to know everything on Broga Hill because while we were on our way down, a girl from another group was injured on the palm of her hand. So, the aunties walked around searching for something in the bushes and then she said something like this “Use this leave and put it on the wound. Can kill germs”. I was stunted for a moment. What else do they know ah? I feel like asking them “Aunty got anything can make my manly face nicer or not?” haha..

I really gained a lot of experience and memories through this hiking trip alone. Really enjoyed myself because it’s my first time hiking with a bunch of university friends.

For those who are interested in climbing Broga Hill, you can search the location using Google Map. You will pass by University of Nottingham on your left.

Keep going straight until you see this Rabbit Fun Land on your right. Broga Hill is just opposite of it. You can either park your cars along the road opposite the Rabbit Fun Land or you can park it inside of the Oil Palm Estate.

 

Clement’s Word of Advice (Hiking Broga Hill):
1) Bring mosquito repellent
2) Bring torch lights (1Person 1TorchLight)
3) Wear long pants (to prevent mosquito bites and to prevent any scratches on your legs from thorny bushes <--for girls)
4) Please do not wear slippers (my friend did ^_^)
5) Bring some foods if you are hiking early in the morning
6) Bring water
7) Most important of all, bring your camera
8) Bring an umbrella in case it rains (at least to protect the camera not you)
9) And enjoy yourselves hiking up Broga Hill.

On the same day, my Facebook was flooded with statuses and photos related to our Hiking Trip. 
I myself also took the opportunity to thank all my friends who made this trip so memorable and fun.  And the best of all status was this (below). I was really touched by this status and comments. It shows how true friendships really are. For me, I am happy to have this circle of friends.