Music, A True Work of Art

Posted on May 15, 2013 by admin

When I was about 5, I was sent to learn piano. Sometimes I loved it, sometimes I hated it. Sometimes I am ready by the doorstep even before my dad comes home to send me there, but other times I dread leaving the television that’s broadcasting Sailormoon. But I know, every time on the way I will sulk all I want – but each time I hear my teacher playing the piano – I’ll forget ever being unhappy. Little did I know back then, that music was capable of moving me, changing me and influencing me.

Music was art.

When I was 13, I went to my first Chinese pop concert ever. Tickets were free. I remember how that hard thumpings of the beat from the speakers made my heart jump every second. People were flocking in the stadium, everybody with whistles and banners. This guy must be reaally famous. I only remembered one song from the radio – but also probably because there were simple words that I could understand. When the concert started, songs were pretty upbeat – I didn’t really enjoy it. I was a 13 year old girl, probably about 157cm – and that man standing on stage was so far away I couldn’t even see his face. Just when I was getting really bored, he appeared on my side of the stage – with a piano.

I was awestruck. The music was perfect – melobeats, smooth tricks on the piano, and stage lighting was all toned down to a perfect dim. This man is amazing. Can’t believe I was I got his signature few days prior to the concert without knowing what kind of music he was able to make and play. I went back home that day, and saw the piano in my house with a different house.

Music also had a deeper and meaningful meaning to it ever since.

As I grew elder, as much as I liked music – I never found myself doing anything to really express my fondness for it. All I did was just listen to music from day till night – Celine Dion, Mariah Carey, Whitney Houston – all the classics that I could find. When I feel like it, I’ll write short parts of melodies while spending time with my piano. I’ve always wanted to put them all together to make a song, but I never know how. Sometimes I lose inspiration and motivation, but I think of that man on the stage in 2003 – and I regain some sort of excitement to play the piano again.There’s always something about a piano that doesn’t belong to you, and I always find new melodies to keep when I play it somewhere else.

I guess the people around me, have never really really liked music and instruments to actually discuss and talk about it. I myself never saw it as a conversation, to me it was all about feeling and appreciating it. Frankly, I have recently come to realise I’ve never really embraced and took pride in the fact that I like music – and in the recent years, singing.

In college, I met a couple of friends who were pretty outspoken about loving music. Then I gradually realised, why not me? Singing makes me feel so relaxed, even more than the piano ever did. I don’t know why I hide the fact that I actually love belting out to songs – maybe I had a feeling that I was being judged. I don’t even know why I bothered being judged. But realizing that has given me a different perspective to all different parts of my life and direction. I realised I have to embrace what I believe in and like, then take pride and stride towards it. That is a kind of happiness.

A true value of life music and singing has taught me.

So I took my first step on a stage with a mic ever by trying in a public audition.

However, I do realise the limitations that I had. I haven’t any prominent musical talent, my piano skills weren’t up to expectations – even if I wanted to make my own music, you could say that I had no capability to. If I were to take up lessons, it would have costed some time and money – that I have yet to learn to earn. Joining musical groups in university sounded like a good thing, but really had no time to join cause activities were always after class hours and I always had to travel home immediately after classes to catch the next train.

Now that I’m here in Beijing – I have decided to embrace this hobby of mine. Finally joined the Tsinghua Acapella Club. And I’ve never felt this happy about a decision made in an institution. Activities start late evening, and runs for a few hours after.Everyone from the club are from different divisions in university, some can’t even speak Chinese. But in this place, we all share the same passion for the one thing called music. Everyone speaks the same language – music. Everyone thinks the same way – with music. It’s so cheesy, but it’s really how it is. All able to laugh at a slight creek, a missing beat – and sometimes we throw ourselves off the chair for the horrendous recording of us singing. Everyone walks in the room with such a tired face, but nobody walks out with a yawn. Everyone will be belting their lungs out while walking our way up the stairs, harmonising, beatboxing, or just waving our hands in the air.

People give us stares, but with them – I don’t feel the way I sometimes feel back home, being judged. Because when we all come together, with music – it feels like I’ve never been this proud and excited about my own likings.

This year in 2013 – ten years after that first Chinese pop concert in Malaysia, that man is returning to Malaysia again. The one who made me try to venture into venturing into the art of music..and coincidentally the one who very possibly taught me my first few tenths of Chinese characters. Karaoke sessions to his songs over the years has made reading a lot more easier for me (despite still being difficult, but could’ve been harder) here while taking my course. Amazing how one genre of something could lead to another.

Brought to us by KL SOGO

How great it would be, to go back to his concert again – as the girl who has finally learnt to embrace music and singing as her interest. Maybe its a coincidence, or a welcoming event – I would love to think, that it’s being held just when I get back to KL. Learnt so many Chinese characters now, maybe I can sing along even better to his songs because his concerts always have lyric plates hung ahead.

Music, is definitely art.

An art of emotions. An art of knowledge. An art of happiness.

Your music is an opus. A true work of art.

At Jay Chou’s concert two years ago. I always make it a point to go to his concerts whenever I can possible.

Here I attach a cover I did with Vivien, just before I left to Beijing! Hope you like it!

Shanghai : Tian Zi Fang, Xin Tian Di & The Bund

Posted on May 7, 2013 by admin

Hello!

We only had about 3 days to Shanghai, so we had to cram many many things into one day. It was fun though, not too tiring and we saw most of the tourist destinations of the city. Frankly – I thought I wouldn’t like Shanghai because of what people were saying about it being too westernised. And it actually was – but I liked it. However, I don’t think I would love staying there – human traffic isn’t too bad but the atmosphere of the place had this cloud of intensity that the laid back (but sometimes annoying) Beijingers don’t usually have. For Day 1, we spent so much time in Mike’s house that we only headed out late evening. Still managed to get a couple of things done!

First we went to Tian Zhi Fang. TZF is “an arts and crafts enclave that has developed from a renovated residential area in the French Concession area of Shanghai”. Apparently they bring in trees from France and plant them there and lo and behold, French trees for a Chinese city. I love how the Chinese always tries to find a way to put the world into one place. We didn’t want to take the cab and miss out on Shanghai public transportation (also partly to save money pfft) so we took a 15 minutes walk from Mike’s place to the subway station.

We have been hearing about self service book rental machines but had yet to see one. While heading towards the subway station – we came by one and was so excited about it! We stood there for abit and someone can to use it. I recorded a video, but will probably upload it at the end of the Shanghai episode. Probably some of you have seen it – so convenient eh? You select your books as to how you would select your drink and it slides out. Technology!

Coming from Malaysia, I thought we had pretty brave pedestrians. Now, I’m so used to the no-traffic-rules traffic that I’m not even flinching infront of a bus heading towards me anymore. In China, at least. Here’s a photo of everyone just braving the street.

A ticket to Tian Zhi Fang costed about 4 yuan, I think. That is almost three times the price as to how much we would pay to get on the subway in Beijing. Later, we just figured that given the price – taking the cab is alot more convenient with so many of us to share the cab fee for.

Sweet Chinese little girls giving their babysitter a little rub. They heard us talking and was actually on their way back from an English class – so both sisters were daring each other to come speak to us. To their shock, we spoke Chinese!

Got the whole row of seats!

Before getting to Tian Zhi Fang, or Shanghai even – we were already eyeing to go to this toilet cafe. We have one in Kuala Lumpur, but there has been endless stream of bad reviews. Decided to try this one out called ‘More Than Toilet“. They basically have a toilet themed restaurant so everything comes in toilet related things – from the chairs, decorations, serving plates and even to the presentation of the food you eat. We had a look at the menu and decided to just get ice cream because we know how they’d serve it and it was good for photos (yeay for the girls!). The place is actually pretty cosy and would be a nice place to go to with friends with at least some good sense of humor. Price in the cafe was a little high for the servings and cafe standards, but it is a special place to go to at least once.

We then headed out to the Tian Zi Fang streets. The place is actually highly transformed residential place. In 2006, they demolished the place for redevelopment. Almost everything got bought over and transformed into a commercial area. Now Tian Zi Fang is an area with street after streets of food, themed shops, bars, restaurants and whatnot. The impression of this place was more of being modern in a traditional setting. You can still observe the electric cables, old lamps, chipped bricks along the small aisles.

However, there was one corner of the whole of Tian Zi Fang that remained as how it was just a few years back. I don’t remember exactly but I think Michael told me that this family refused to sell their house to the redevelopers. It’s just a little turn around the busy street and you can see the old way of living in TZF. I think its good that they were allowed to stay, at least tourists get to get a grasp of what was here before.

It’s just a 30-40 metre away from the crowd, but everything is so much mroe calm here. I love how their white dirty sinks are outside their houses. And when I peeked into the windows, I could really see how they were making use of the small space they had in the houses. Nobody spoke to anyone, people were just doing their own things. I guess they are used to people just peeking in taking photos.

Back to the ‘normal’ streets of Tian Zi Fang..

Their restaurants are pretty unique as they put these heater lamps that resemble street lamps just right next to the tables outdoors. Gives a pretty romantic and cosy feeling to it. Or maybe it’s because almost everyone eating outside were couples.

The French trees.

Waited for awhile to get the street clear of cars so I get this shot!

After about an hour or two, we hopped on another cab heading to Xin Tian Di.

It was like the San Li Tun of Beijing, just prettier with more good restaurants! You can choose to come here with the Subway Line 10 or just take a cab like us. The one sad fact about behind all these beautiful lights, 3500 families were displaced for this redevelopment. China is serious about their redevelopment – of places, at least. As for the people in general, mindset redevelopment might take a while more for a better, modern China.

Sneaked a photo from Shanghai Tang.

We also visited the Shikumen Open House Museum.

Shi Ku Men literally translates to “Stone Gate” that gives us an idea of what upper-middle class Chinese family lived like in the mid 20s to 30s. Frankly, I expected it to be a a little bit more historical in terms of presentation but it really was just a straightforward look-see museum. There were several historical background briefs on the wall, but that was it. Entrance fee is RMB 20 but we paid RMB 10 since we were students, so those who have your student ID’s – bring it to China!

Heading out of the museum, you’d find yourself in a souvenir area.

Right after, we headed to The Bund. The only thing I remember about Shanghai when I was here about 10 years ago was the Shanghai tower. I remember being in the cold waiting for a light show to happen, and that was it. This time here, the place looks so different – I don’t remember seeing the architecture right opposite the river where the Shanghai tower was. Here’s also the thing about the Bund, it looks somewhat like europe and not China. Fun fact of the Bund, building heights are restricted in this area. Probably because the highest towers in Shanghai should all be in one centre of the place.

Our cabbies were next to each other, and we were all having so much fun that both cabbies didn’t move when the lights turned green. Cabbies had their own conversation, shouting across the windows. This was taken when they were being honked at so the driver had to rush ahead —- and took the wrong turning. Haha!

There were alot of people, but also because it was Qing Ming Festival so everyone was out to sight see.

Some photos are taken with my cellphone so they are super blur! But I want you all to see how crowded the place really was. My camera was running down (argh perfect timing) and I wanted to save it for when we may REALLY need to use it.

Walking across the streets to get up to one of the buildings!

Michael then suggested that we go to a rooftop bar, where the scenary would be so much better. We girls didn’t buy it at first so we spent alot of time at platform by the river taking photos. After that we headed to Building 18 or 19 of The Bund and boy, the view there was SO GOOD - no human head pollution (lol) and the weather was so breezy and nice!

Elevator photo time!

Up, up to the bar.

Art seems to be a very prominent feature of this area, also probably because of the number of tourist the place attracts.

We arrived up at the bar in Building 18 or 19. See how there’s nobody behind me! This was the perfect place!

We just took a photo and left! HAHA!

Had to take a few more photos before I left

We got home after, to get food because it was getting late! Restaurants here at Xintiandi was quite expensive and we were also really quite tired. So we just called for delivery. Michael wanted to order one dish each to represent all of our respective motherlands but the place that he called ran out of Nasi Goreng (that was the closest to Malaysian the restaurant had!). This is what I love about China though, delivery is so widely used here. For any type of restaurant – cheap to expensive. I hope we had more of this culture in KL. We have delivery but alot of things are usually fastfood or usually no worth the price.

After dinner, Mei started working her magic with Jello’s. Wanted to make Jello shots but there weren’t any mini cups lying around Mike’s house so we just went for the medium sized cups. And had layers and layers of them – which I couldn’t finish cause I don’t really like Vodka. The jelly tasted good though!

Layer by layer, in the making!

Rainbow jelly for everybody!

Michael was explaining to us how his father got the artist of that painting behind the wall to add more blue into the canvas WHILE it was being hung up because he felt like he really liked blue and wanted it at that point.

We then called the night after some games Very productive day indeed!

Address for More Than Toilet :-

Tianzifang,
No. 5, Lane 274, Taikang Lu,
near Ruijin Er Lu
田子坊泰康路274弄5号,
近瑞金二路

Contact No : 5412 2821

Address for Shikumen Open House Museum:-

Lane 181, Taicang Lu,
near Madang Lu
太仓路181弄,近马当路

Contact No : 3307 0337

Shanghai : Getting There

Posted on May 4, 2013 by admin

During my sixth week in China, I took a break during the QingMing Festival (yes, we get qingming off in China!) and took a trip to Shanghai. We could have taken the plane, it was the same price – but figuring how some of us have never taken the bullet train in the past, we decided to go for the 5 hour bullet train ride. I must say, it didn’t go as fast as I thought it would feel like although it was surely penetrating through air. It went about 300km per hour, which was moderately okay I guess. I was expecting rocket speed, perhaps. We paid 1116 yuan for return tickets, and timing was pretty good – we didn’t have to wake up at 5.30am etc.

There were the six of us, none of us were from the same class in the course. All from different levels, and of different countries. Mei is American, Christine’s French, Keshav’s English, Cris is Brazillian and Michael our host in Shanghai was American. We were really lucky to have had Michael come along with us because he was a great company for the whole trip. To top it off, he offered us to stay over at his place so we were more than delighted to. We were so afraid that the place wouldn’t fit cause there were six of us – but we didn’t mind, saving accommodation costs in Shanghai meant more good food in Shanghai, or back in Beijing even.

So with some meet ups and arrangements we decided to meet up early morning at 7:10AM. Our train was at 9.00, and we had intended to take the subway which takes about an hour. The bus comes at 7:20AM right outside the gate near our dorms so we had to be really on time. If not, we highly risk the chance of missing the train (although you don’t need to check in etc as opposed to taking flights!). It was such a hassle because the hot water at the dorms only come at 7:00AM and I usually want my morning shower before I go anywhere. Not to wake up or anything, I just want to feel fresh and clean. I HAD to have my shower, so I woke up at 6.30AM and prepared everything else (even my make up) and then just gave myself a sweet 5 minute long shower before I zoomed out that door. Sometimes they have hot shower starting 6.50AM so I got lucky that day. However, when we all arrived at Building 21 where majority of them stayed – we were still missing of one – Michael!

Frankly, we all already expected that he would be late – so we still had a backup plan, which was to take the 7.40AM bus. We would be really tight on time but it was still a method. But he didn’t pick up his phone, and we got the service desk to tell us his room number. The good thing about these apartment frontdesks is that they normally never ever give personal information of anyboody in the building. They remember the face of everyone who stays in the building so whenever a stranger walks in at anytime of the day, it is their duty to stop you and make you register so they can kick you out at the visitor curfew at 11:00PM. Anyway, we got the receptionist to tell us Mike’s details because she has seen us with him. When we knocked on his door, he was indeed still sleeping!

Hahaha, so we all just had to get to the bus station first while Mike rushed his life towards it. Thank god we made it, because the moment we stepped onto the train – I swear it was just about 10 seconds before I felt the train started moving. We hadn’t even found our seats yet!

Mei got us all baozi’s for breakfast – so sweet! And Chinese.

Taking the subway to the train station

Good thing there isn’t much hassle checking in, as opposed to the many inspections we’d have to go through with the plane.

Michael and Christine

This is Mei, who knows ALL the Amurrrican games.

Cris and Keshav

Mei and I

The bullet train was actually really clean – seats were big and had adequate room for your legs.

We arrived early afternoon and got a cab ready to head to Mike’s place. I have been to Shanghai once probably about 10 years ago (that’s an incredibly long time ago) but the only thing I remember about the place was the Shanghai tower and some night lighting performance. That’s why they say, don’t bring your kids out travelling when they are still young! I had my camera ready and was all set for the trip. I still can’t believe these cities are so near reach. Sometimes I can’t believe I’m really in China. One time, we had a random walk to Tian An Men after a really filling dinner – just because we felt like it and we could. God, I’m actually REALLY in China.

Setting foot in Shanghai, look at the unimpressed man behind!

Journey to Mike’s place took about 30 minutes. Cab metre definitely goes up alot faster than in Beijing. Cab in Beijing is really quite cheap, especially if you share with 3 other people. We spent probably about 100yuan from the airport to his apartment in Pudong. Mei and I were just staring out the window trying to get scenaries of everything with our cameras. “You get the right, I get the left”. We are serious when it comes to capturing moments. Although already in the cab, our postures were eveready to getting our hands extended for a photo of a pretty scenary. But it seemed like we had to keep looking at this…

Is this all to Shanghai? (lol)

Upon arrival, we were all just…staring at wherever we were. This place was alot prettier than we expected it to be. Not that we thought it would be some dodgy Chinese alley place (althought it wouldn’t have mattered) but this place was actually like a hotel. There were bellboys (or men pfft) at the entrance to greet us and who seemed to have recognised Mike. “Impressive”, we thought.

Then the real impressive thing came. We all acted like jacoons, but we were just really happy!

The elevator didn’t have buttons, except for when you want to head down. We always have had elevators that takes you up to your doorstep directly, but this one didn’t have buttons. So all you had to do was scan the chip against the sensor and it reads your lot information and sends you up there. While we were busy being amused by what Mike did and listening to the explanation, we also realised that we’ve been in the elevator for a really long time. We then looked up at the plate read “Level 59″.

“Level 59? Is this a tower? Do you stay in Level 59? Shit, that’s like a tower!”

He opened the door and we all thought we were in Cloud 9. The place was such a beautiful place, and so comfortable and perfect for our type of travelling. Most importantly, it was so clean and well organised – thanks to the house caretaker. Best thing about the place was that there was alot of space for us to just do anything and the view from the tall glass windows were just breathtaking. If you know Shanghai, you know that river along the towers. We were right beside the river, and all the prominent towers were in sight – almost just opposite the area.

I’m telling you, we were all so grateful and we immediately felt so super blessed to have had been arranged to such fate pfft. We were all planning to just bunk in moderate hostels, so this was a huge leap. Nothings better than to come back from a tiring day tour to such a comfortable house!

His homemaker Xiao Wang made such good food for us. Real Shanghainese homemade food – really yummy. I actually still can’t tell the difference between many many Chinese food. Some people just taste certain dishes and they know the region origin of the dish. To me, they’re just all Chinese food! Well, I can distinguish one though. Sichuan dishes. Just because they are extremely spicy and numbing.

Found a bar of alcohol too, which they were really happy about!

Mei came up with so many alcohol games upon seeing the variety Mike had.

As we all explored Mike’s place, we also chose our rooms. Cris and I got the biggest room (lucky us) and the view was also perfect. Mike knew the areas around his place well so he was explaining to us what certain deep holes way below were for (future rises) and brief background story on the landmarks he could see from the place.

From the glass windows of our room

Girls being girls, just mesmerised!

What a way to start such a fabulous trip – I found myself to actually like Shanghai. Maybe because I’ve always lived in a city, and seeing a developed city made me a little happy inside. Will try to finish the Shanghai series tonight adn schedule them to be posted in alternate days because I can’t wait to update on my recent Guilin trip!

Till then!

White Spring in Beijing

Posted on April 11, 2013 by admin

Hello!

So here are some photos from the snow, somewhere two to three weeks ago. I already told me Snow Shock tale in the previous post so I’ll not repeat again. It was really nice to experience a full day of snow, but once or twice is enough. Floors get too slippery to cycle on and I don’t fancy walking in the cold. Quite a few must be late to class because their rides were all covered in snow – dirty snow. A friend had to shove all the ice from the bikes one by one (and trust me, there are ALOT of bikes) to locate her bike. You will see! Hope you like them photos!

Bald trees not so bald anymore.

This is the road right opposite my apartment’s exit, just go straight ahead at the end of the road is where my classes are.

Everyone was just taking photos and not heading to class! This was about 5 minutes till class in the morning. It only takes me 2-3 minute to bike there so I don’t usually get too late. But I like to be there early, though its getting harder and harder now that temperature’s colder and colder.

All the way down!

I took my bike out and halfway down the slope towards the intersection, I had a great feeling I was going to slip riding on ice. Took a U-turn and put it back in the parking lot. After the long way down the road, we have to cross a huge football field before we arrive at my school. This is the football field.

Fresh blanket of ice on the football field!

Poor bike, poor owner.

It was also Andee’s birthday, such coincidence – snow was definitely there for her.

Both my deskmates Danny and Ji Yea. We sometimes wear the same colour to class so I always like to take photos. It doesn’t look like it in this photo but we were wearing shades of grey.

Orange cake from the supermarket beneath our classes. The lady got the name wrong and wrote Happy Birthday Shella, instead of Andee because Shella was the one who got the cake. Big mistake!

Last but not least, a better view of the bicycles. It’s not so congested at this side of the campus, some area’s so packed the snow just falls flat as one single blanket above the rides.

So that was my one day snowy journey in Beijing! Not bad, I got to ride in falling snow and woke up to a white campus. The next day I everything melted and the football field was as green as ever. It’s like it never happened. Till then!

Cold Crazy Chinese, Beijing.

Posted on April 3, 2013 by admin

Hello!

So I am feeling really motivated and productive today, going to make use of this to finish everything that I have put back. I usually get like this when I’m nervous or excited about something. It helps clean up my mind or makes me feel great to start fresh. So here’s going to be a post of my Beijing life. Many have been asking if I’m happy, or if I’m used to it. Frankly, apart from staying alone and being able to go to everywhere I want since transportation is so much more convenient for me – everything else is pretty much the same. I’m not another person here so I don’t see why any drastic change would occur since I’ve only been here for about 5 weeks. Coming here to Beijing, I’ve seen people just letting themselves go and do whatever they want. It’s obvious they’ve never lived this life until they set foot in Beijing – hardcore partying acting like a douche.

I also don’t get to speak too much Chinese here because the community here in my building of international backgrounds and Chinese is definitely not their favorite tool of communication. We do speak it to each other sometimes though, especially to classmates because you tend to get used to the language with them. However, once you step outside the class it’s a different story altogether because you meet your new friends with English. I’m also surprised to have not met any Malaysians yet (I know theres 1 or 2 around) but I was expecting quite a community to be here. Not that I was expecting to be with Malaysians because that’s the last thing I want to do when I go overseas, I love my fellow Malaysians but I’m here for the international experience. I do get to hear the heartwarming Malaysian/Singaporean accent sometimes on the streets and I get a funny fuzzy feeling. I’ve gone up to 3-4 people just to say hello upon hearing the lah‘s.

I don’t know where should I start because I have been so far behind the journal. But I think I should just show you abit of this and that through the photos in my phone.

This was the line at the beginning of the term when everyone wanted to change classes (from afternoon to morning sessions, and from this level to that level). This is also the classroom corridor of my uni. I skipped 2 hours of class to stay in line! Good thing I did, because the line got SO long when classes dismissed. I was going to apply to upgrade my level by one stage and I was hearing all these horrible stories about the interviewers making the applicants read from the textbooks to pass the application. That’s horrible news because I couldn’t read anything besides 你 (you)，我(me)，他 (him)，事 (case)，是(is)，很(very(，对不起(s9rry) etc. I sat down and panicked so I just blabbered everything in my mind, leaving her no space to let me read. To my surprise, she really didn’t – and let me through the application! What a relief!

Alot of them are not allowed to switch if they dont have a valid reason, and even if you really want to – you’ll have to look for somebody from the other session to switch. And some people just took advantage of that to earn a few more bucks.

During my first week, Yui also sent me all these AWESOME stuff that I’ve been using even up until now. Heatpacks and many other basic lifestyle things like plugs and such. I bought one a bag of 20 heatpacks and was trying to save on it because I heard weather wasn’t going to be warm that soon. Ah, brings me another topic to discuss about – I was all prepared for spring when I felt that the temperature was getting warmer. My phone app was showing me all these predictions of 15-17 degree . Indeed, one day it was so warm (not in the context of lovely Malaysia) I finally got to wear my sleeveless tops and cycle around with it. There was still abit of breeze so it was such a nice ride out – I cycled around campus for 3 hours at least!

From Japan!

The thing about Beijing weather is, it sometimes gets too polluted and when it does – there will be this huge sandstorm once a week where we’ll have really strong wind that moves things and slows us down from bike speeding. It sucks, because it gets SO cold but there will always be clear and blue sky the next day because the pollution would have all gone away with the wind. One day it got so cold again, and I predicted that there was going to be a sandstorm again (hoping for clear skies everyday) so I hopped in my room from the afternoon (I usually stay out and study till dinner) trying to get warm until the night when I have acapella (yes I joined the Tsinghua Acapella team!).

It was my first day trying to locate the place with Theresa, one of the members, who was trying to bring me to the practice room. I still remember that night, it was SO cold and it was raining for the first time ever since my arrival in Beijing. Cycling to the practice room was a dread because I didn’t know where it was and we were under the rain, and my hands were frozen and numb while trying to control my bike. I just had to shake the whole torture off by believing that there was going to be great weather tomorrow! Rain,wind and coldness – referring to the previous experiences, it always means good weather as I mentioned.

Acapella takes about 2 hours, so we quickly went into the building after parking our bikes to get warm. After the session, I was hoping that the rain would have stopped by then. Rain makes everything so dirty because the pollution’s so bad. After the rain that morning I found my bike in super brown water stains, looks like someone poured Milo on my bike. That was the case for the rest of the hundreds of bikes parked around me. Anyway, I went out of the studio after acapella that night to find that it was snowing! I was beyond shocked because I remember being in that sleeveless top not too long ago. Then I thought probably it was because it was too cold, so it snowed. The ride back was worst than my way there because I was cycling in falling snow, but it was also nice because I was cycling home with both my acapella friends and we all sang Disney songs together one the way back to our dorms on the bike. Feels like a movie! It was also secretly fun to have snow dropping on top of your nose. I didn’t like the cold, but I knew I wouldn’t have many opportunities to be cycling in snow once I get back to KL from Beijing. None, actually. As much as I hated it, I was secretly thanking God to have blessed me with such happy little moments that I could keep, remember and to share!

The next morning when I woke up for class, I could see the sun shine SO brightly and the sunrays were just peeking out from my curtains. AHH! Good weather today, I thought. So unlike the usual sleepy mornings when I feel so unmotivated because its cold, I jumped straight from bed and got so fresh immediately. Warmth, come to MAMA! Quickly I went to open up my curtains, I even had a giddy smile just waiting to come out when I see the sun.

When I did, I saw this.

WHAAAAAAAAAAAAT? Are you kidding me! This is literaly the view out my window. The branch with FULL OF SNOW. And everything out there was bleach white. I immediately wanted to jump back into my blankets. Then I realised the warmth I felt was all only imaginary, and it wasn’t warm at all. It dropped to such low temperatures the following days – up till today.

Beijing is a world of mystery.

This was also one of the better meals we had in the early weeks in Sanlitun. Sanlitun is a place of better food, and is also the place where alot of people go to club. There are half naked women dancing on tables, and people who walk pass these pubs can always just look into these places. Amanda first pointed it out to me when we walked pass. Such charity, I thought. Should show you more photos of Sanlitun the next time I go. Despite the fancy pancy things there, there’s this silk Market where you cut down prices 60% to 70%. It’s where all the fake stuff is – so if you ever want to get anything you can always go there.

Orientation hall before we started the semester to brief us on yadayada. Not everyone here is from the program, its just orientation for all the foreign students in Tsinghua University for all courses. I had such a hard time finding this place because this was so early in the semester and I had no idea where Building A,B,C or D was. I thought orientation was on this day so I spent about an hour looking for it and was rushing it so much because Orientation was supposed to be at 2.00 and when I realised it was time for me to leave the room, it was already 2.30! So I rushed and got so unsettled because I couldn’t find it and the people around didn’t know what I want because I had no idea what the Main Building’s name is called in Chinese.

Spent an hour looking for it in the huge campus (but it turned out to be only a 5 minute away cycle) and when I finally got there, nobody was able to tell me where the orientation was in that building. I looked for the place up and down in the building for another 15 minutes trying to call everyone I knew but nobody was picking up. When I was going to give up and head back home, I received calls from all them and they all told me the same thing – “Orientation isn’t today!”

Life of Natalie, but no surprise. I made it to the real orientation the next day, on time. And it only took 5 minutes at the back of Marian’s bike – because I still dint have any yet (which explains my hour-long search for the building)

I’ve been trying to keep up with all the vocabs that I’m learning so here’s a glimpse of my chart. I haven’t been updating it for so long because words get harder, I think by now I should have about 500-600 words that I should know. Not characters, but vocabs. Left the middle column blank so I can test myself. Even getting the slightest glimpse will help me cheat myself.

Here’s a peek of what happens in class. This one was when our teacher gave us a real menu off a real restaurant and our homework was to go through it and pick two dishes each. After that she’ll ask us why we chose those dishes and its so funny cause most of us chose the ones that’s easiest to read and write. Some also chose their dishes because they couldn’t read any character at all, so they were just giving it a shot.

When it came to my dish, she circles it and said “Hmm, this person must be a guy! All meat! Who wrote this?”

“Me!”

“Oh…that’s odd”

The first two people I met when I came into the class. This wasn’t supposed to be my class so when I sat in to try out I sat next to them. Angel and Shella are from Indonesia and they always get identical things when it comes to their posessions because its cheaper to get them that way. Its funny how they also wear it on the same day. They have the same pair of shoes, same bag, same bottle etc. Twins of our class.

Getting a cab to Nan Luo Gu Xiang.

I haven’t been to alot of places in Beijing, but so far this place (Nan Luo Gu Xiang) is my favorite of all. Mainly because of how it has so much food and quaint shops, it’s almost like Insadong of Beijing but this with more food. There were heaps of people on the day I went, but that didn’t stop me from hopping from one shop to another. I was so hungry! I think I probably spent about ¥ 100 on food alone in this place, too expensive for one meal but super worth it to try all the different things on the street! They even had churros with ice cream. Only ¥ 20 for 5 sticks of churros with a glob of ice cream – cheaper than the ones we got in Bukit Bintang for a ripoff.

Beijing has a lot of alleys, and they call it hutong (photo above). The one above is not Nan Luo Gu Xiang but one of the other hutongs that we went for breakfast before NLGX, which looks like the photos below. It isn’s exactly a traditional hutong, but still a kind of hutong – just very modernised.

Aaah! I have about 8 photos more and I will type so much more in one post, and you will not read everything if its a long one, right!

So far that’s Beijing (not really, I have quite a number more of stories to tell) for me if you have been wondering.I’ll move the rest up to the next one with photos of the snow from that horrible Sunny Curtain Disappointment Day. I’m rushing to get dinner now so I’ll update again soon (I hope I mean this!)

Snow and Noodles

Posted on March 20, 2013 by admin

Well, I have to admit I’ve not been trying my best to update this page. But thanks to my dorm’s constant no supply of hot water this week, I have decided to just take my shower and bunk in for the rest of the day. It snowed pretty hard last night so now my feet is as cold as ice. But I am seated infront of my laptop with a cup of boiling hot noodles and that makes life sounds so much better. But no. Because Chinese instant noodles makes me nauseous.

Almost ten years back I came to China with my family. We were here for quite some time (probably a week or two?) so we stocked up in cup noodles. I remember having them and they made me feel sick each time I had them that very scent of uncooked instant noodles made me feel like throwing up. I forgot about that, and stocked up on some instant noodles here again. Theory is proven. Chinese noodles have some weird taste to it. Such a turnoff. One of my favorite things in life (usually unhealthy). Good thing Mcdonalds here isn’t failing me. Else I’ll pack my bags and take the next flight back to KL.

Just kidding, Mom.

My cycling has now improved I can cycle in between two people, but still can’t multitask very well. Some people are cycling while reading (This Is China), some couples cycling while holding hands (This is China) while others just cycle with both their hands in the pocket (This is China). But while I was super super slow and bad, I was too excited with my new founded skill that I just cycled around campus for 2 hours just to redeem what I’ve been missing for the past years during mini getwaways back home when friends and family would cycle and I would just sit aside and watch. Took some photos while I was at it so here are some photos of my campus. I can’t wait for the real spring to come, when trees wouldn’t be so bald anymore. Campus would look lovely by then.

They have many many bicycle stores in campus so you’re really just got to do your research if you’d want to get one. I got my bike for 220 yuan. My other friends got a different one for 20 yuan less. But mine says “Magic”.

I’ll pay 20 yuan extra for some magical ride, no problem.

Playgrounds are not only for children here. In fact, they are mainly utilised by senior age groups. Most of them come to do light exercises. The uni is pretty much like a tourist spot, so people do come and visit or spend a day with their families. Pretty bizarre.

Everybody takes a photo with their bike. I’m not the only one.

Right?

I get more and more confident cycling week by week so every fortnight I go to this guy to put my seat a little higher than before. I had it fixed at its lowest point because I couldn’t stand not having to touch the ground, but now the higher it gets the easier it is for me ride comfortably. I’ve been there thrice so far, and now when I ask to fix it higher he was like “You think you’re so lihai now huh?” I have no translation of that, it just kind of means he thinks I think I’m getting so good at cycling.

Yeah sure, yeah I could take that as a compliment.

He also asked where I was from so I told him Malaysia. Then he’s said “Oh, Malaysian girls are always pretty“. So I was like “Oh come on, 那里那里 (but all ready to take the compliment)”. Then this other uncle breaks the bubble by saying “Nah, Korean girls are prettier!!”

Apek. Xie xie, uncle.

Chinese are their direct way of speech are hilarious. I mean, let the man do his business sugar talk! Hahaha!

These are the local dorms, far different from the international dorms. They only get one period of hot water supply – only at night.

Well, I wanted to show you more of what I’ve been doing but my phone is syncing at an absurd speed right now. I’ve just been taking photos with my phone these days cause I don’t know when I’d need my camera. It’s a bad idea, cause I’d prefer my photos to be super clear and no phone can replace the quality of my camera (or can it?). So to make up for it, here’s a video of my super bumpy ride during my first week of cycling. My mom saw it and she was like “BORING” (tsk) so if you have time for something boring, or possibly entertainingly boring – then here’s a video of me cycling and struggling to really talk and concentrate at the same time. I was looking for the Bicycle Man for the first time on my own so I documented my first solo tour of the campus.

It really is just a video of me almost not talking at all. Usually when I don’t talk on rides, I’m screaming inside! HAHA.

But good news is, I am alot better now!! (Necessary disclaimer)

The Forbidden City

Posted on March 5, 2013 by admin

Hello.

It’s been about two weeks since I’m in China. Safe to say I’m good and well, my liver’s still with me and (touchwood) not feeling anywhere under the weather with the pollution. Temperature is getting warmer, I think we’re getting to spring really quickly. Can’t wait till the trees get their hair back again. Classes have been great. Switched classes because I felt that I could do a little bit more than my allocated class, and I find it to be almost perfect now. Would’ve hoped for it to be a level higher, but that’s just being too ambitious for my reading and writing capabilities.

Just before classes commenced, we made a trip to Tiananmen’s Forbidden City. Pollution was quite bad that day so photos didn’t really turn out that great so I filtered the skies with a hint of blue so it doesn’t look so depressing to look at. Also because I feel like I reside here now, I don’t take as many photos as a foreigner would when walking in the Forbidden City. Taking things for granted for sure. I took more photos in the Petronas Twin Towers than when I was here. Then again, it was also so cold that day it just felt too tiring to lift up a finger and have photos of each corner of the place. I love palaces and such, especially when we get to listen or read stories about what happened in the place. So bizarre to have had royalties living the life in this huge square, from room to room, pavilion to pavilion I love reading about how concubines were put into which room for review, where the King had his meals, how people were sentenced.

It was a weekend so there were loads of people. Thought we could skip the queue if we arrived early, but there were also groups who were even earlier. Reminds me of the times when I joined tour groups and we were forced to wake up at 5.00 in the morning. Dreadful.

“1,2,1,2,1,2″

Henry, Marian, Keshav, Nat, Amanda, Andrew, Mike.

They’re kind of like my early family in Beijing now since we met even before the semester started. Really thankful and I can’t stop telling people how I feel really blessed just being here. It really means something to me, how people from different parts of the world just happen to come as one. Its one thing to be in a class together, but another to actually come together from different circumstances and incidents. China may be hell for some, but I think with the right people it will potentially be one of the most memorable place to be and to remember for a lifetime.

Entrance fees was only 20 yuan for us students. We all were so new so there wasn’t any ID. Anyhow we just went to the counter and said “Student” and we were given student price. Sweet.

Would have been alot prettier with leaves on the trees, but I guess this could do. Blues skies would have helped too but pollution that day was just bad.

To top things off, it was also a really cold day to be out. Look at Henry freezing his bones out. (tears)

Fei mui chais in in winter clothes. So nice to be back with Amanda actually. Miss the years without her in school – but it’s like we never grew apart. Love that!

This is the room for when the King brings in a new wife.

It then got quite cold so some of us when in here to get food or to defrost. I got some “Ri Gou” (literal translation for hotdogs) to fuzzy up my insides. There’s an art gallery inside that has its doors closed. I read too many stories about Chinese scammers I just had to get out the moment the closed the door. I don’t want to be stripped off my clothes in this cold weather haha!

Us again. I like how we all met in different circumstances but everybody just came into one.

Look at the my cute Amanda. Haha so small and vulnerable looking with her mask on. Looking intellectual.

Are you bored of group photos yet? Hahaha.

Till the next time.

Beijing : Settling Down

Posted on February 21, 2013 by admin

Hello everybody!

Been such a crazy month. I’m finally settling down in Beijing. Met some nice people on my third day already. I haven’t got the chance to take many photos because it’s still winter here and it’s too cold for me to just reach out and take a shot. I’ve uploaded a few on my Instagram but that’s like a super quick one. Took my placement test today – all in Chinese. Most of the class were just blanking out, which is quite hilarious to see. Adapting to the Beijing people very quickly though.

I came to this place with extremely bad expectations of the place. I’ve heard too many stories to actually get on the flight hoping to land on cotton and rainbows. However, third day here – just been meeting nice people. A few of us are wondering if the ‘mean’ Chinese are all back in their hometowns for Chinese New Year – but I personally think it’s probably just they talk that people can’t really accept? I mean, there are cultural differences and I’ve learnt to accept these petty things. They don’t hold doors, they don’t smile at you in elevators, they speak a little loud. But I think it’s just because its their culture and I don’t think its because they’re so full of themselves that they make many people feel offended?

Yeah, there are a few sour people here and there but I’m not going to generalise it. It may be the Law of Attraction. Probably I’m really just seeing nice things (and when I mean nice things, I mean just people being normal people – apologising when they need to, saying their excuse me’s) and I’m expecting to see more of it. In fact, when we apologize to somebody when bumping to them on the streets in KL – people just usually walk away or sulk. Here there are alot of them that responds and tells me “Its okay” or “Don’t worry about it”.

It’s all really petty petty things, but you know – I really came here expecting trucks of people to be shouting to me at my face or ignoring me when I talk. I’ve got Beijing friends but I know they’re not like that – and I didn’t want to generalise so I just really came thinking Oh God. You know, China is just…China. Language is something you have to understand with its culture to be able to understand why they’re speaking in that tone, voice level, and that expression. It’s a whole package and not just words that you hear. I’m no linguist but one very important thing that I’ve learnt while understanding foreign languages is that loud voices don’t always equal to anybody being rude. It’s just how people communicate with people in between their culture.

Anyhow here are some photos from the phone and the camera (only when I’m indoors) from the first few days in Tsinghua. Alot are on Instagram already so I’m just leeching off from there.

Couldn’t get any sleep on the place actually. So I just fidgeted here and there. Don’t normally do this on flights but because I know my skin is going to be crazily cracked since I never use moisturisers my whole life. Coming to this dry and cold weather’s gonna kill me. So I tried putting on a moisturising mask just half an hour before I landed.

Oriental welcoming thing. It was the first Chinese artsy thing I saw upon arrival so I just had to take a photo.

It took me about an hour after touch down to finally walk into my room at the Zijing Apartments at Tsinghua University. Cabbie was very nice, he talked to me about various things and about Beijing. I love meeting chatty cabbies. It was about 30 minutes away from the airport and costed below 100 yuan. Very reasonable as compared to KL.

This is actually pretty good already, but I wanted a little bit of my own flavor. I want to be by the window when I wake up. It’s almost like a dream because my room back home has no sunlight coming in at all so this was a good change. I now know what does it feel like to be waken up by the sun. Well, almost. So I shifted things around a little. Brought the closet at the entrance into the living area, took off the tv cabinet and made it my bedside table, turned the bed otherway. Now my room looks like this. Probably going to get a few more stuff to make it more complete, but this actually does it for me.

I was a little lucky because the receptionist actually bothered asking if I want sun coming in my room. I thought I’m gonna be here for so many months and its probably going to be winter most of the time so it was a DEFINITE yes. I get pretty good view of this side of the campus streets.

I took a little long walk around campus alone because I hadn’t met anybody upon arrival. The campus is really huge, and I don’t know if its because of the weather. Probably also because I didn’t know where I was heading to, so things felt really far away. Everybody usually bikes around – but the problem is I can’t cycle. I’ll probably learn it when the weather isn’t so cold anymore. Would do me great good.

Beijing is not dirty, but it feels like they never wash their vehicles.

On my second day Amanda arrived back in Beijing so we met up for dinner at Sanlitun. Really been meaning to go there because so many Beijing hashtags are photos of this place. It’s a 20 minute cab ride from our side of the campus and costs 50 yuan, max. Just before we met up I went to get my cell done because I couldn’t get in touch with the people I met and it just feels like you’re hanging out of nowhere.

Just before I started using my data (total newbie of mobile data) I just had to sit at this coffee shop to leech of its wifi and do all my updates so I don’t need to use my data to do it. Only got 720mb per month.

So at night Amanda and I went to Sanlitun and had some good dinner. Proper dinner, I would call it since it was in a restaurant and all that. I felt like hot soup so we went to a Chinese restaurant and just headed back after dinner. Wanted to do rounds but I was rushing back for my hot water curfew (yes) before 12:00AM.

Dining in campus is pretty cheap. We get stuff for about 5-10 yuans. I’ve been eating noodles, baozi, and noodles. Anything that keeps me warm. We get canteen cards just like in primary school and just gets credit cut off. Pretty interesting. I like it because that means I don’t need to bring much cash just to go out and have meals.

Have a lot of days more in future so till then! Zai Jian!

Through Fisheye

Posted on February 3, 2013 by admin

Hello!

I love discovering really good apps, and because I don’t still don’t like the idea of jailbreaking the phone – I’m always on the lookout for Free apps! Today I discovered the Fisheye app was going for free for a limited time only (as they always say!) so I quickly downloaded it and played with it a little. I think I really like it!

I could mix images in on shot while using its filters. They have in-app purchases, which is a bummer because that allows a few more different fisheye lenses for you to play with. But for the easily satisifed like me, this is pretty much very good enough!

With my cute Popo today! Love the front camera when you have to take photos with seniors.

At least they have somewhere to look!

Sekinchan Ear Deworming

Posted on January 30, 2013 by admin

Hello.

Here’s a piece I’ve always wanted to share with you guys first, but it was more needed for Esquire during my internship period there. So I wrote the piece for Esquire’s web instead of for the blog. So here’s the piece I wrote, extracted exactly from the site – but I have more photos just for the blog.

In Sekinchan, there is a very famous ear deworming therapy. Offered at a minimal price of RM15, it is said to help relieve skin irritations, sinus, headaches and toothaches. Yup. Toothaches. My family heard of the therapy from a relative and before I knew it, I was already strapped in my family car to hunt the place down. My ear canals were already itching, like there were living habitats trying to crawl out of it. “Wait a little longer,” I found myself telling my imaginary worms.

When we finally arrived at Sekinchan, tracking down the house would have almost been impossible without the help of trusty navigators (read: a GPS) or a specific address. The “Deworming Place” was easy to spot, though, as it was the one house with the most cars parked outside.

Maybe these cones could be used for giant ice-creams after treatment? Maybe not.

A man in his fifties came out and ushered all eight of us to take a seat. There were already a couple of people who were under therapy, with weird looking funnels sticking inside their ears. Some looked uncomfortable. Others just closed their eyes and went to a place where worms and humans lived together in mahjong harmony.

“Quick, a bus is on the way – we won’t have time for you when it arrives”, he exclaimed with a frown.

We grabbed one of the mini stools that were no higher than our ankles and waited patiently for the man to serve us. Both his hands rested on his sides as he anxiously rushes his lady co-worker who was cleaning the used plates. She knocked the worms off the metal plates on the floor after each usage, wiped it clean and places a freshly burnt coil on it to be used again. Then, it began.

The man placed a one-feet tall cone on each plate that holds a funnel at the end for patrons to stick into their ears. He placed the plate in front of me hastily, as I slowly figure out the perfect angle to get the most out of the fumes exiting the funnel. I fidgeted for about a minute before I felt comfortable. Worms were supposed to be dropping out of my ears now, but there wasn’t an expected tingling sensation. I could hear the hot-coil plate sizzling from the bottom of the cone. At times, the strong coconut oil-scented fumes were too much to handle, so it caused some to choke when they tried speaking during the therapy. That meant no one could ask me about when I would be getting married during this time.

After the 10-minute procedure, the man removed the cone from my left ear. And suddenly, he let out a scream (or a manly exclamation).

So that’s why we couldn’t hear mom telling us to clean our rooms…

On the plate were two types of worms. One was a thread-like white worm, which is common for everybody after the therapy. The other type was yellow in colour, rounder in shape, fatter and significantly bigger. Yup. I had the fat yellow ones–and quite a number to boot. At least I didn’t have an unknown liquid substance that ended up in the cones after therapy by two of the other patrons there. When they asked curiously of its nature, the lady at the corner told them that it was trapped excess liquid in their ears that had to be excreted. Safe to say, you should eat your meals well before coming here.

Unless you have a bad back or an impatient attitude, the therapy should be a breeze to finish. Each side of the ear gets a quick five minutes-worth of coconut-oil fume going into your ears to irritate the worms, with a minute-long break in between while they replace the coil plate for the other ear. After the quick session, some from the group remained skeptical about deworming. As far as I am concerned, I’m paying RM15 to feel clean, and I definitely did. My toothache, however, was still there.

And for those who may be interested:-