Happy birthday Selini!!! (recap: wonderful weekends..)

*HAPPY BIRTHDAY SELINI!! hope you enjoy dinner tonight and our trip XD thanks for coming back to HK this summer.. i know it wasn't just for me but there were so many choices you had and i got to see you so many times this year :D sooo glad (makes up for the year we didn't see each other!)~

wonderful weekends.. they fly by too fast :( i'm realllly enjoying my summer this year, much more than my previous summer (which was mostly very boring; and i dont' remember what i did), especially since after you start work, there's not much difference between whether it's summer or not (and also cuz HK is always hot ~_~;)!

i went out for dinner with lg718 and sillyna on saturday at this nice spanish restaurant! the only thing i have to complain about was this STUPID GUY who was sitting at a nearby table facing towards us. Silly and i were sitting side by side facing him and lg718 was sitting facing me, with his back towards that guy. That guy then suddenly whips out his dslr and starts taking pics of his 'girlfriend' (we assume it is).. after awhile, because the lighting in the restaurant was very dim (it was practically lit only by a few candles.. very nice atmosphere :D), he takes out this large flash, puts it on his camera and snaps away.
okay.. lets just say, in a dim room with practically NO lighting, a sharp flash from a DSLR is VERY VERY bright. and i'm saying blinding bright. I was thinkign "okay... he's probably just excited, let him take a few, he'll stop." but no.. he went on and on and on until we had enough and complained to the manager who asked the guy to stop taking pics (i think he said something along those lines)... people are just so clueless! i mean.. you're in a restaurant with tons of other people, be more considerate ~_~;; HK guys... but it's ok :D it didnt' ruin my dinner mood at least! haha

anyway.. the day after, i went to drink tea with my family then went to MK with lg718. we bought a few things then met up with silly and went to whampoa to play in 冒險樂園 again! this time we signed up for a membership card and saved our tickets on it :D 937 or something ... haha playing with two "crabs" means lots of planning into which machines are worth it and which aren't....

afterwards we went to a nearby restaurant for din and i played with silly's camera for a bit:

i think lg718 took this while she waslooking at me hahah:
silly took this pic of lg718 looking at the menu 'thoughtfully'...

me~ (overjoyed at seeing selini haha...)I like this picture: (according to silly, she loves it too because our hands are placed next to the 'chopsticks' which are always used together as well)

:( he's pretending to be sad when he knows he loooooves being in pics with me :P

sanya trip on saturday-mon! then it's a busy busy week for me next week @.@ i can't wait! hopefully i wont' get sunburned and there won't be rain or anything (rainy week in HK so far :( )...

hope everyone has a wonderful long weekend too! (especially since it's holiday in toronto as well :D happy canada day!)

current mood: looking forward to doing relaxing like this.. XD

nic~ haha.. 'nemos'.. so cute ah! i love how you like them too, and like the nemo pic you drew for me on facebook!! next challenge should be MIOLION pic!

ocean park! :D

just to recap from last tuesday's holiday, i went to ocean park with silly ~ (mainly for the jellyfish aquarium and to take pics and ride the cable car :D)
it turned out that day was one of the hottest of the year but we managed to get through unburnt and looked at all we wanted to see :D except the pandas because that section was closed for renovation :( all because of the two new pandas given by china to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the china takeover of HK~ i don't know if i'll go again soon (it's too hot this summer ~_~) but i really want to see the new pandas.

lets just summarize by saying it was a LOT of fun, we walked a lot so it was great exercise but i've never sweated as much as i did in those five hours at the park.. yup.. we stayed there from 2-7 (i think?) when it closed.

i learnt a lot more about photography and silly figured out how to take nice pictures of the jellyfish without using flash or tripod :D (i never understood why people would attempt to use flash when the aquariums are made of glass.....)

on the cable car: (this is nearing the end of our day.. so tired)

at the gift shop :D (these were so cute but i look like i'm strangling it ._.;; and the rest are looking at me in horror.. or maybe to attack me at any second...)

lovely silly (i took this :D and she said it was good so at least i'm learningsquid (reminds me of the 'shiito' from evangelion..................... which number is this?)
nemos :D (as we call the crownfish XD):

lovely jellyfish:
this was actually taken of jelly fish in this glass pillar: more mushroom like jellyfish:

random ferris wheel picture.. i love ferris wheels:will do weekend recap soon!

current mood: looking forward to upcoming long weekend!

to all~ try to watch this http://funnyvideo-gary.blogspot.com/2007/06/blog-post.html
quite amazing! (makes me afraid of the "professionals" out there...)

t~ (notice it's not MR T haha...) i hope you like the above pictures! as always thanks for reading and your emails :D

nic~ haha i knew you were going to laugh at the happy birthday ken part :P but suen la, i will forgive my wify!
i wish you were here for ocean park la... it would be something we could go crazy at leh.. come back soon!!

weekend recap!

I finally have a chance to do a weekend update! i had a fun filled weekend, and with another holiday today as well, it seemed like it was summertime and i was just out of school for vacation XD But i'm very thankful that i had time to take a lot of pictures! i dont' think i've taken as many pictures since... when i first came back to HK? :D

to start off, it was carmen's bday celebration on friday night, so after a quick shopping trip at pacific place, we headed off to the all you can eat korean bbq place at wanchai to meet up with carmen, tim, jon and ricky. let's just say, it's ok if it's a group of people or else we wouldn't eat much at all.. haha.. i feel very 'hot air' now ~_~ however, it was a lot of fun! i realized that we were a bunch that knew each other from highschool, or in the case of tim and jon, since elementary school.. but here we were, in a different country getting together again, and i feel soooo comfortable. the feeling is just indescribable.. laughing at old silly stuff (ie. naming the people from our grade eight class...), talking about everyone back from highschool, who's changed and who hasn't... it's too much fun! i'm glad i had this group dinner and hope we can do it again soon! :D

ricky, me and my dear silly (ricky had another picture where he made a silly face.. which can be seen in my photo book)

tim, jon and lovely carmen, the bday girl:

the girls (we were just standing outside the restaurant haha.. and blocking the streets...):

the guys (i love tim's expression XD):

i had actually made the :O look too but.. it was in the second pic. so i have to admit, i ruined this pic :(
The day after, i met up with ray for lunch and then went to tst harbourside to meet up with silly! we first took a few pics with the panda bears that were aligned along the walkway from the harbour to harbourcity :D they had put up pandas from year 1997-2006 to celebrate the 10th anniversary of china's takeover of hong kong :D each panda was decorated to commemorate something special that happened that year.. we took a pic next to the black and white 2002 soccer panda XD (coincedentally one of my favorite years hahaha....)
afterwards we went for a walk along the tst harbourside! it was such a gorgeous day that day, with tons of sunshine and breeze and we took pics as we walked along. we ended up going to the hk science center to watch the dinosaur exhibit there! as i had wanted to see it ever since i saw the commercial for it, i guess it was my choice :P but it was a LOT of fun, and we bought a half year pass so that we could go to any of the other exhibition place as well :D tons of stuff to do with silly XD the exhibit was so much fun :D
afterwards we went to 冒險樂園 (we're such kids XD but it's so much fun and spontaneous) and played there for a few hours! we got 100 tokens and ended up with 8XX tickets between us :D it was a LOT of fun, even though the place was small and the games were mostly won by chance XD we got stationery and some pens with the tickets :D we went to spaghetti house for a quick dinner after (i took sticker pics with selina too.. will post it here later!) and we chatted for the longest time... i love these guys!!

me and silly :D

me and ray :D

somewhere along the harbourside:

such a beautiful day:

dino bones XD so tall they reached the ceiling and got cut off!Before i go any further, this msg is intended for 18 June 2007:
HAPPY BIRTHDAY AH GOR/KEN!!! hope you had a wonderful celebration and liked our gift when you receive it :D

also, happy anniversary lg718.. i had a wonderful time with you :D

to get back on track, the above is related to the day after, 18 June 2007! my bro 'big ken' bday and my anniversary with lg718 (haha.. believe me, the two things were related....). we booked a lovely japanese restaurant in tst (sushi hiro.. i thought my bro meant it was called "sushi HERO" and i was like what? sushi hero? haha...) and had a great time just chatting and all :D i had made a scrapbook for him and he laughed at my drawings while he flipped through it -.-;; i know for sure i have no talent in drawing...
but anywya, i highly recommend this japanese restaurant.. the setting is great, and the service is excellent, as well as the food! everything was dainty and fresh and 100% japanese, not hk style japanese food.

more to tell about what i did today (ocean park! :D) but i'll get back to that later as i need to get pics from silly anyway :D

current mood: happy :D

nic~ crop means the way the pic is 'centered' and where you put the focus of the pic and stuff :D basically how the pic is 'cut' :D (and i know u will laugh at a certain part of my blog entry above :P a part no one else will notice hahaha)

j9 ~ haha i'm glad you agree with my 'advice'.. i think it comes from long observation and also of my own circumstances....
how's the weather in toronto? i heard it's super hot ... as it was today.. selina (your evil one haha) and i sweated horribly today at the amusement park we were at but had fun... you need to be here!

random

selini had cropped some of the pics we took on our small photo session on friday and i have to admit, knowing how crop is very important.. it changes how the picture looks instantly! i really need to practice that, and learn that from her, plus learn how/what angle etc. to shoot a picture in and all. So much to learn!!

The pics we took that night were mostly blurry (according to selina) as it was dark, misty, bad lighting and no tripod.. so the background was really hard to take clear pics of. but we did our best! (or at least i tried haha)

me (as if pasted into the picture):

I took this :D it's not fantastic (i think it was tiresome for selina becuase it took me FOREVER to attempt a shot, and they didnt' come out too well.. haha) but i think it's not bad.. it looks a LOT better after selina cropped it for sure haha.. she's fun to take pics of because she has so many expressions and laughs a lot :D i like taking pics of laughing people~

(both pics are from selini's blog.. thanks :D) however, it's all very fun to me~ i cant' wait till i learn a bit more, then practice with my other friends ( T, Jay, ray, etc.) and also really learn to take nice pictures of things i love.

speaking of love, i had a lot of conversations with friends about this topic in the past few weeks. Coincidentally, the past few weeks have been rough with many close friends and it's from observing them, hearing what's happening that i've been able to reflect on love and relationships.
i'm no expert on this of course, but i happen to listen to a lot of stories and as most of my males, i have a strong understanding of a guy's view towards relationships as well? maybe that's why...

i think there are many important things that we should remember when being with someone..this week, after chatting with the said friends above who were going through rough times, some of the more important things that kept coming up were:

1. never base all your happiness on your significant other~ not only does it give him/her pressure but it also makes it so easy to lose sight of the other important things in your life, such as yourself. this can apply to every type of relationship (friendship etc), and its never good to think that there is only one person/thing that can bring you happiness because that's not true;

2. never have strong expectations from your significant other~ what i mean is that it's not always a good idea to have 'guidelines' set out for him/her. People always agree with this and say "of course, no expectations is better than being disappointed when they don't meet my expectations" but i don't mean it in this way. What i mean is, in general, it is always nice to place the focus outside of what they can do for you, but to place it on what they have done for you, maybe in ways you never really noticed. Males and females have a different way of reciprocating/showing their affection and it is never a good idea to expect something, then judge it based on our own expectations/way we think of it, because we think differently. Instead, try to look at what they have done in a different light and start from there~

i sound like i'm someone's mom preaching her kids.. haha... but i think the two points above are so, so so soooo important. love and trust come naturally and i think every relationship can be worked out if people would take the time to slow down and see how it is in a different light.

i know all the friends i mentioned above who are going through rough times will eventually 'see the light' again, so i reallllly wish them good luck.. i am always here to listen~

current mood: in love with photography~ (thanks selini~)

PS: for everyone who has time to look, please watch this: http://kotaku.com/gaming/clip/tetris-with-real-people-shapes-267900.php
Tetris but with real people XD very funny! (hope it makes you all laugh :D)

T ~ good luck on your exam. i am still the little cheerleader on the sidelines.. i cant' wait to read your email thursday :D

raven ~ thanks for the encouragement! i hope you get your dslr soon too, so i can see even more pretty pictures from you :D i hope you can visit me in HK sometime (or me visit you in japan) so i can take pics with you.. we haven't take any pics since we went to LA together!! (and not many pics there ; ;) take good care of yourself! i hope you dont' have anymore painful headaches this week :(

ray ~ i don't even know if you read my blog or not but.. i'm here, and listening to you~ call me up any time to talk/go out/sing k/etc~

photography~

i've always never been an artistic person... AT ALL. i can't draw (as everyone knows D: ) and i reallllly admire people who have some sort of artistic side to them (ie. cylyna)~

so, i've always wanted to learn something that required no actual drawing but which would let me try to show some of my almost non-existent 'artistic side': photography!

i've always loved to take photos of things around me, people around me etc. (a lot of the old pictures on film is in toronto currently though ~_~) so when sillyna decided to come back for the summer i wanted to ask her to teach me about it, and so i can learn some basic stuff from her~

lg718 and silly both know me VERY well, and are telling me to keep playing around, practice with cameras and all, before i buy anything (they say i'm a 'three minute heat' person D:)... and at the moment, all i am doing is really reading up on it, and understanding the concepts .. i think i understand a lot more after silly explained to me in person and let me play with her camera but i'll need to wait awhile before i actually buy a DSLR~

we were looking at cameras the other day, the three of us, (silly wants a digicam haha.. but she needs one that has settings she can play around with, not those super automatic ones..) and i'm now considering a nikon D80.. lg718 has this, and the camera price for it has dropped by a lot. i had considered the nikon D40x but realized that they had made it reallllly 'automatic' and took out a lot of the more manual things. it's a LOT simpler but it's now more like a digicam that can switch lens, and much less like a DSLR. it's not too expensive either, but i decided against getting that...

so, to prove to lg718 and sillyna, i'm going to keep practicing and reading up on this!

Now this is where i regret not being in toronto and having "Mr. T" (i know i shouldnt' be calling u that haha) and jay and all you camera people teach me :( my bro and ray are both photography ppl who learnt on their own as well, but unfortunately, they're both not as 'into' it at the moment ~_~;; talk about bad timing...

on friday (yesterday) i went to tst with silly where she taught me more photography stuff! i realize now how i need to practice with cropping, different angles ect. we took a couple of central side but i gotta see it on a comp before i'll really be able to tell if it's blurry or not~

feeling sick today ~_~ sore throat + coughing.. i'm wondering if this is just 'hot air' problem or if i'm really sick D:

more random pics taken last last weekend:

(try to ignore the dangling thingie on the side..... long story.. haha)


blurry pic :x but the only pic with me in it alone~


rare pic of donb (and me)~


i thought the 'we are your best friends...' sounded kind of ominous when i took a picture of my two miffys for fun D: the lightning in my room is terrible.. @.@ i wish there was more natural light but its been raining every day so not much practicing chances outside D:

current mood: blanked out... what shall i do.....

mr t/lck~ good luck on your exam :D