Malaysia truly Asia - December 2007

I think this is the last set of pictures of my Southeast Asian travels that I neglected to upload.

When DHL sent me to to Cyberjaya, Malaysia to conduct a Corporate Intranet Editors training, I extended my trip for another day so I can explore Kuala Lumpur.

Before I flew back to Singapore I went to The National Museum of Malaysia and the Science Center. They charge only 2RM for admission at the National Museum and the lobby was almost bare and unremarkable. So what I saw inside was truly unexpected but really impressive!!! This is a must-see!

Vietnam with HS friends

Non-working holiday equals lakwatsa!

We took advantage of the May 1 Labor Day holiday and had an AOM "mini-reunion" in Hanoi. We flew in from different countries- Haesel from the US, Melrose from Hong Kong, Joanne (with her whole clan) from the Philippines and I from Singapore, and met in Hanoi. What followed during the next 3.5 days are extremely long walks, lengthy bargaining for cheap stuff (mura na nga tinatawaran pa!), millions of picture takings and of course, laugh-till-you-drop discussions and moments! Priceless fun!

Exploring Indonesia- Jakarta and Yogyakarta 2008

Most people think I'm crazy for travelling on my own, I'd rather call myself adventurous.

I went to Indonesia during Chinese New Year (never go to to a country that's big on Chinese New Year celebration during this time!). I went to the Johore Bahru airport (it's cheaper to fly from JB) with a fellow @er and when we landed in Jakarta, we went our separate ways. My friend, from way back my Ayala Museum days, picked me up at the airport.

The following day, I took an overnight train, alone, to Yogyakarta and arrived at 4am. Then I rented a car to take me around from temple to temple then back to the city. I boarded the train back to Jakarta the following evening and just spent a couple of hours there before flying back to Malaysia and arriving in Singapore shortly after midnight.

Bangkok 2007

Every year, during or shortly before my birthday, I make it a point to travel to a new country and explore thier culture.

Last year, I went to Bangkok for a couple of days. Must see: Bangkok Children's Museum. Must try: Phad Thai. Must do: temple tour. Must go: Chatuchak Weekend Market. And of course, you don't leave Bangkok without trying the traditional Thai Massage

Copy paper

Last night I was talking to Carmel and we were discussing some words we use in the Philippines and their counterparts here in the American English language. You see, it's quite common for Filipinos to use the most popular brands of products as names of the items. For example, "cutex" for nail polish, "frigidaire" for refrigerator, "mighty bond" for super/ instant glue, or "xerox" for photocopy, just to name a few.

Add in the fact that I have to unlearn the British English terms (i.e. lift- elevator, rubbish- trash, serviette- table napkin, queue- line-up, torch- flashlight) I picked-up while I was living in Singapore for almost a year, Carmel predicted that I would eventually get blank stares when I look for some items here. Good friend that she is *sarcasm*, we went through (with her laughing throughout the whole conversation) a list of common items that are called differently in the US. 

Bond paper - Copy paper

Ballpen - pen

Pentel pen - marker

Stabilo - highlighter

Liquid paper - wipe out

Feminine napkin - sanitary pad

Oslo paper - card stock (although this probably not accurate)

Mighty Bond - crazy glue

Long bond paper - legal copy paper

Short bond paper - letter copy paper

Folder - manila folder

post it - sticky notes

Back to school...

I attended my first class as a graduate student today.

So how did it go? I suppose it went pretty well. I did not feel "lost" as I feared I would considering that the last class I attended was over a decade ago. It seems that working for the past 10 years, six years at the Ayala Museum, three years at the Robinsons Children's Library and then an 11-month internship at DHL as a Regional Internal Communications Coordinator, are of tremendous benefit. Due to my work experience at the museum, plus my Fellowship from ACC, the topics in my classes no longer feel "alien" to me. And I tell you, it feels good to be able to relate in class.

Furthermore, taking my time to figure out what I really want to specialize in has made it so much easier to identify courses I would like to take to complete my program- much to my adviser's delight. And because of Fulbright, I even have a thesis topic already ( a research proposal is one of the many requirements for application). Not that the topic is set in stone as it may evolve as I progress thought my degree, but it gives me a head start in exploring possibilities and opportunities.

I have classes all day Monday and Wednesday evening. This will allow me to explore volunteer opportunities at museums here in Gainesville, which will add further dimension to the overall learning I am going to get during my graduate degree.

I am so excited about my classes. All three of them are equally interesting. During my Museum Registration Methods class today, I had to literally tell myself to limit my comments to a minimum lest I give the wrong impression to my classmates or Professor of monopolizing the discussion! 

Looks like I'm off to a good start! 

University of Florida Campus

I have taken a couple of pictures for those who are curious about how my new school looks like. Its a bit cloudy today (perhaps due to tropical storm Fay) so they don't look that brilliant.

Dinner with TCL staff

thanks to Jemma for the pix :)

Flashback: Amazing Race Macau and Hong Kong 2008

Well, its not really that we joined amazing race, but that was how we felt during this trip in March 2008. From Singapore we went to Malaysia to catch a budget airline. We left at around 4 am because we were worried about getting stuck at the border due to heavy traffic (long weekend and tightened security checks). When we got to the airport in Johore Bahru, we slept because everything was still closed (it was 5am!). Woke up and took our time eating breakfast around 7am when the plane was in fact departing at 730am. Talk about crazy. I suppose we got carried away talking about various ways to survive a plane crash. Someone suggested using guns to shoot the water to lessen impact when you hit the water. Great idea! Except, they don't really allow big guns on planes these days.

So as we took our time checking in, we realized that the immigration counter has already closed. What?!? They took us to another office where our passport are to be processed. While the rest were waiting for the passport stamps, i went ahead to the gate to sort off hold off the plane. No, I didn't have to lie on the runway in front of the plane. Nothing dramatic.

After arriving in Macau, we walked from the tip of the island to the bottom, where the port to HK is located. My friends love to walk! But it wasn't so bad as Macau is not that big. We had lunch at the nearest restaurant we could find when we got hungry. I had baked pork chop, which was, I was told, a traditional macau favorite.

Of course when you're in Macau what else do you do aside from the usual sight-seeing? We went to the Macau Tower so my friends can try the tallest sky jump in the world. Not me of course, no thanks. But we didn't make it there in time so they had to skip that. I think it was because we stayed a bit more than we planned at the Lisboa Casino. Hey, they had dancers! You know the typical vegas-thong-wearing-leg-raising dancers! There were three guys (Emil, Brian and Koen) and just me and Ozana, we weren't strong enough to drag them out hahaha. Oh and I won 70HK$ in the slot machine. Purely beginner's luck as I didn't even understand how the thing worked!

We bought our tickets to HK island with but a small window of time before the ship was to depart (don't ask me why). So we had to run to immigration then run faster after the immigration to catch the ship. We like lots of excitement!

For dinner, in HK, we went to a noodle house that gives you spicy choices such as hot, very hot, super hot and no hot. So you basically you can order cold noodles served hot but no hot :)

Bedtime. We could not stop laughing when we got to our hostel. It was a dorm-type hostel and our room had four double deck beds and two bathrooms/toilets that are way too small you almost have to stand on the toilet to shower! A few of the things one has to deal with when one travels on a budget ;)

The good thing about staying at a hostel though is that you meet new friends. When we left to watch the symphony of lights the following night and then go clubbing, we already had two recruits with us: one from Australia and another from USA.

Then it was time to go home after only two days of walking our feet off. We woke up early because our flight leaves Macau in like three hours?!? and we were still in HK. This meant that we have to take a cab from the hostel to the port, cross immigrations to exit HK, cross yet another immigration to enter Macau, take another cab from macau the airport and then again cross immigration to exit Macau. Crazy huh? 

But as crazy and stressful as all these may sound, I really had great time during the trip :)

** View more pix at http://ethelee.multiply.com/photos/album/13/Amazing_Race_HK_and_Macau.

Amazing Race HK and Macau

backpackers :)

more pix from the trip...

Malacca, Malaysia

Last trip in SEA before departing for Manila then the US :)

Malacca is about 5 hours from Singapore and daily buses depart from SG. Portugese and Dutch influences in its architecture are still very evident. This is great for a weekend trip :)

My big three-oh

pinadala pa yan si ehn mula sa pinas :)

celebrated my 39th in Singapore. AIESEC friends from different counties attended and I made them try chicken adobo :)

In and around Singapore

Pinoy UF welcome lunch

The Pinoys at the University of Florida organized a lunch for us at the China Super Buffet. Wow! So much food! I was only expecting Chinese food but they also had Japanese and some others I did not even try coz I was too full. Oh but they had the sweet and sour pork I sooo loved when I was still in SG.

By the way, the pictures are courtesy of Mike :)

Mum and dad in Singapore

Last year my parents visited me while I was still living in Singapore.

Screensavers

random pictures i've taken through the years...

Greetings from Gainesville

I have safely arrived in Gainesville, Florida after almost 48 hours of travel! 

I left Manila on Monday, August 11 at 9am and flew to Tokyo. However, my flight from Tokyo to Chicago was delayed for over two hours due to a volcanic eruption somewhere and the plane had to divert its direction to avoid the volcanic ashes. Because of that, I missed my two connecting flights to Charlotte NC and then to Gainesville FL. So I ended up spending the night in a hotel (and a fancy one at that!) in Chicago that the airline provided and continued my journey the following day. It was actually a blessing in disguise because otherwise I would have been travelling continuously for almost 30 hours! Since I could hardly sleep on the plane, I was afraid my eyebags would have to undergo checks at the airport too! At least on Monday night I was able to get a decent sleep, take a hot bath and have a real breakfast!

I am temporarily staying at the apartment of a fellow museum studies grad student who was kind enough to accommodate me since I cannot move into my permanent apartment until the 23rd.

It's been very rainy and very windy these past few days but sometimes it gets sunny and hot too. Although it’s not too hot either- it’s just like how it is in the Phils or in SG. 

My 1st three days were very productive. I was able to open my bank account and get my univ ID already. They have instant ID processing (when I say instant I mean like 5 minutes or less), so cool! The University of Florida is just like the UP Diliman campus although with bigger ang buildings and roads. They even have a bus which operates like the UP IKOT, it only goes around the campus on a one-way route. They don't have TOKI that travels the other way around. But it's very lovely, lots of trees and brick buildings. Actually, my first impression of Gainesville as my plane was descending towards its airport is that it sooo green! 

Technically, the school is still on summer break so I haven't really seen a lot of people yet- or overwhelmed by how big they are compared to my tiny Asian size hahaha. Gainesville is a university town mostly populated by students from the University of Florida. UF alone has a population of 50,000!!! In fact we students get free bus rides in school and in town, we just have to flash our school ID :) 

I only have nine units per semester (which means i only have three three-hour classes per week) but since I have a graduate assistantship, I might still go to school almost daily. Plus according to my 2nd year museum studies grad student roomie, with tons of paperwork and reading assignments, I will have my hands full studying. So now i'm enjoying the lull before the storm- so to speak :)

back to blogging

After going in hiatus for almost a year, i'm back to blogging again.

I stopped blogging after I started reviewing for my GRE and TOEFL exams in November. However, after that, I got pre-occupied with so many other things including numerous trips in southeast Asia and exploring almost every corner of Singapore. 

Since my last blog, I have added immigration stamps on my passports from Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, Macau, Hongkong and India. I should post some pictures of those trips online one of these days, except for India as I did not see any part of Mumbai aside from their airport, my hotel room and the DHL office!

Also, I've gone home to Manila four times already- one of the many perks of living in SG, so close to home. Once was on a first class flight on Singapore Airlines when my stupidity got the better of me and I was left behind by my original Jetstar flight. Lesson learned: never assume that you know your flight schedule unless you've physically checked your ticket a week before your date of flight. You could be wrong and one week is enough time to rectify the situation. Then again, two days before your flight, check it again because if you're anything like me, you might forget your time of departure! Blown my savings the past couple of month for the airfare ticket- 1700SGD!!! A very expensive lesson indeed but at least I can tick off 'fly 1st class' from my 'to do before i turn 50' list :) Plus it was next to impossible to get a flight to Manila during the Christmas rush. So rather than be depressed until March (i know i will!) because I didn't spend Christmas at home, I just decided to go home in style ;) There's nothing like Christmas in the Philippines I tell you!

Let's see, what else is new with me? Oh yeah, I'm already in Florida. Finally confirmed my Fulbright Scholarship to pursue my 2.5 year graduate degree in Museum Studies at the University of Florida! Thanks to all those who helped me move my mountains through prayers!!!