If I Could Turn Back Time,

I would visit the Seven Ancient Wonders of the World.
Out of the 7, only the Great Pyramid of Giza still stands bold and strong on the deserts of Egypt.
The other 6 have been unfortunately perished in earthquakes and fires or else destroyed by some dude(s) who did not have the brains to think of preserving the Wonders for future references.

And as you might have expected, this blog post is to promote the Seven Ancient Wonders of the World, and I am doing so because I feel bored ahaha. ;)

The Great Pyramid of Giza
It was built as a tomb for the Pharaoh Khufu (hey, we studied him in history!), has two chambers and an entrance. I never knew that we could actually enter the pyramid! :D I always thought that they built it by using rocks, stuffed the King and Queen inside the pyramid and then used rocks to cover the whole thing up again. I don't think the original entrance can be used anymore. Tourists who want to enter the pyramid have to enter through this alternate entrance built by this dude. Oh well, you learn something new every day. :)

The Hanging Gardens of Babylon
Was built by Nebuchadnezzar II (we studied him in history too!) for his homesick wife Amytis of Media. It was really long and really wide, multi-levelled and was said to resemble a theatre. There're vaults constructed under the terraces of the garden which carried the entire weight of the garden and made it look like it was floating, hence the name. Lots of trees were planted, the soil and soft and red, water flowing everywhere- you get the point. It was a garden beautiful enough to charm anyone into staying there for ever and ever. Like El Dorado, The City of Gold. :)

Statue of Zeus at Olympia
They have a 12m tall statue of Zeus in the Temple of Zeus, Olympia! The statue takes up pretty much the whole temple and in Zeus's right hand he holds a small statue of the Goddess of Victory, Nike and in his left hand a golden sceptre. It was crafted by a Greek sculptor, Phidias.
The cause of destruction is a debate. Some reckoned it was destroyed by this Roman Emperor Caligula, who wanted his head on all the famous statues of the gods because he decided himself worthier of them. Others think it was perished in a disastrous fire.

Temple of Artemis
It was dedicated to the Greek Goddess Artemis, Goddess of the Moon, twin to Apollo the Sun God and it took 120 years to built the temple. But it was destroyed in one snap by this guy called Herostratus. He torched the temple just so he could get famous. It was rebuilt by Alexander the Great, only to be destroyed by the Goths. Rebuilt again but it was closed and destroyed by a mob led by St John Chrysotom.
I don't think Artemis could've been that popular in those days, if her temple was to be built and destroyed three times. :S

Mausoleum of Halicarnassus 
It was built as a tomb for Mausolus, a leader in the Persian Empire, very much like the Pyramid of Gize I suppose. Halicarnassus is a city constructed by Mausolus and his wife Artemisia. After Mausolus died Artemisia was heartbroken, so she decided to built him this huge tomb. She took over the job as ruler of Halicarnassus, and she even won this war against the Rhodians. She died two years after her husband died, and their urns were put into the tomb. As a sacrifice ritual bodies of dead animals were put on the stone steps of the tomb and then sealed with stones and rubble. The tomb was built on a hill overlooking the city, which bytheway is a very nice place to have your ashes put after you die.

Colossus of Rhodes
It's a statue of the Greek god Helios (we read about him too!). It stood over 30 metres high, making it the tallest statues of the ancient world. It started with the Siege of Rhodes, and the Rhodians won. In order to celebrate their victory, they constructed this GIANT statue of Helios. It was destroyed in an earthquake, and was offered the money by Ptolemy III to rebuild the statue. But the Rhodians, who feared that they have insulted Helios the God, declined.

Lighthouse of Alexandria
Also known as Pharos of Alexandria, Pharos is a Latin word for 'lighthouse'. There is nothing very much interesting in this lighthouse, for it was ever just a lighthouse.

She Works Hard For The Money

Maybe the holidays are making me feel this way, maybe the boredom, maybe it's mum and dad going off to Europe for 2 weeks or maybe it's just me, but I miss my China camp, and I would love to spend 12 days touring one part of China again. :)

Whee. :)

The Little Prince

I feel happy today. :)
Didn't really do anything productive, like homework or MoralProject or anything, but I still feel happy. :)

And you, you know why.
Haha! :D

Crackin'-Lackin'

I had a hair cut yesterday.
My fringe looks exactly the same as it does back in Form 3.
I guess it doesn't look too bad; I could do a lot worse with say - being bald.
Don't get me wrong, nothing's wrong with being bald; it's just that I wouldn't look nice bald.

Life's been a bit hectic lately, what with homework building up and having to stay back for after-school activities. I miss eating lunch at home. Eating the same canteen food for 5 years does not do one any good, especially when they deep-fry just about everything (well, sometimes I can't help but eat the fries- they go good with pepper).

SO, Chinese New Year being just around the corner, I'm pretty sure everyone has plans: either to stay at home, watch TV and eat a bowlful of tangerines (I think that's what I did this one year; didn't do much relative-visiting) or to drive all the way back to the parents' home town, walk around greeting all your relatives and collecting one's precious red packets. :)
YAY CHINESE NEW YEAR IN SINGAPORE FOR ME! :D
Chinese New Year and Valentine's Day, all packed in one. We'll see cheongsam-dressed cupids shooting their love arrows all around. :D
HAHAHA. How cool would that be?
Someone should dress up like that for Halloween.

:)

Melted Cheese

Hello!
I'm just here to tell you that...

Polo is my new favourite sport. :)
Introducing Nacho Figueras, a professional polo player who I found out about when I was watching Oprah interview him on television.
I like him, I think he's adorable. :D

Feeling Goofy On A Maunday

So the Editorial Board got a new computer today.
You should've seen the look on Aaron and Nicholas' faces when they saw the computer.

It was like, when they stepped into the room in the morning, and when their faces turned and they caught a glimpse of the new Acer computer sitting demurely on the computer table, their lips broke into a smile and their faces just...glowed. :D
And then they went straight to greet the new computer before greeting any of their fellow Edboarders who were in the room.
Nice one guys.  Ahahaha.
They looked like they could've just married the computer that very minute or something. HAHAHAHA.

So anyway, school was fine today (I'm finally, finally blogging about school!). In fact, school was so fine that I didn't even feel embarrassed when I misplaced my foot into the drain (thank god the drain was dry) and stumbled a little after school today. Haha.
Also, school was so fine, that I actually forgot that I had to pee. I finished drinking all my water by the 8th period and I told Shu that I have to go to the ladies afterwards because I needed to pee. And by the 10th period I totally forgot about the fact that I had to pee until ShuLin reminded me to.
How weird is that? HAHA.

Anyway, ut vita! :)

Peace, Is All Anyone's Looking For

Lately, I find that my happy days tend to have been turned bad by certain events.
I'm not an unreasonable person, and I do try to consider and look at things in different perspectives.
However, I AM a human-being, and being that I have feelings and am entitled to my own opinion.
I can understand the complication of being a human-being, and thus you don't see me being a rebellious teenager, trying to invade into the minds of other people and making them see things MY way. Because the world doesn't just consist of ME and my opinion, I have to learn to respect other people's thoughts as well. And I do.
And when I find it frustrating that people don't see the same way that I do, I explain to them and try to get them to understand what my thoughts are.
If I have ever gone out of hand, I deeply and truly apologize. I'm hot-tempered and my agitated thoughts tend to be channeled to impulsiveness.

But please, back off, and show a little respect to what we have here. We're not looking for trouble, and we thank you not to bring trouble to us. 

That's all we, all I ask.

p/s: Oh yes, I want to thank the darlings who have given me advice and cheered me up during the time of my frustration, rants and when I was feeling upset. What would I do without you people.
MWAH. :)

Cool Things That I've Discovered :D

I have found the 8th Wonder of the World. :D
Okay well, I didn't actually find it, more like rediscovered it. :)
SKYPE.
Skype, is a programme designed for you to be able to have conversations on-line through the microphone (webcam or no webcam), designed for you to be able to have emergency midnight meetings with your fellow club members, designed to um, eavesdrop on the background voices of the people you are chatting with, etc. :)
I know MSN has the same thing as well, but no one voice-chats through MSN. Skype is so much cooler for voice-chatting. Don't ask me why, it just is. 

Okay I felt like I was crapping. But whatever. Just use Skype and you'll be able to see the power of it's um, coolness. :)

Okay, the second cool thing that I've discovered lately (through this TV series called Shark) is that there's this job called a hostage negotiator. By the name you can obviously guess that the job of this hostage negotiator is to well, negotiate hostages. Say for example, some people are being held hostage in this bank by a robber armed with a gun. Then a hostage negotiator will be called and will try to meet with the demands of the robber to get the hostages out safely while working with the police to find a way to corner the robber.
Awesome, right? How come we've never heard of these cool jobs in Malaysia?

And the third thing that I find really cool is forensic psychology. Seriously, this is a job that combines psychology with a bit of law. If I'm not wrong, forensic psychologists have to go to court to testify stuff sometimes, and also have to deal with prisoners and crime-doers to analyse them and figure out what-in-the-world is the matter with them. One of the very big risks of taking up this job is that you might get hit or injured while facing prisoners and/or you might accidentally get killed during a prison riot or something like that. But other than that, you're helping to do some justice in the world. Isn't that cool?

So, yeah. The cool things that I've discovered. I remember there's more on my list but that's what I have for now. :D

THIS IS OUR YEAR.

HAPPY NEW YEAR, DARLINGS. :D

I think so much happened in the year of 2009 that my head is bursting trying to think about all those wonderful memories. :) That and my head is throbbing with the fact that I haven't gotten much sleep this holiday. See Rachel's eyebags for proof. :S


And, for my usual attempt to blog about something- anything, I will make lists. Again. :)

The Best of 2009 (a list every blogger is making/made)
(Here I have to rack my brains because every time I sit down to make lists, the list contents just flew out of my brain and into...somewhere)
1. The Editorial Board. Just about everything/everyone in this board makes everyday fun and kooky!
2. MY CHINA WINTER CAMP. I loved that 12 days spent in China; and you have no idea how much I want to go out with my camp mates again. :)
3. Merah Marching. :D Go on Youtube and you'll be able to see why we won First Place.
4. The Love Gang. Yes, I was a little skeptical with the name at first but I've gotten used to it by now. :)
Our Star Wars marathon was a crazy one!
5. Sweet Sixteens. Young adults of 1993, we were sweet, young and innocent at the age of 16 last year; now we're moving on to fierce some 17!
6. Sunway Lagoon. I went on the Pirate Ship for the first, ever time in my life. AND IT WAS AWESOME.
7. My Best Holiday So Far. This November/December has been my best school holiday yet. And I wouldn't trade it for the world.
8. I am more environmental-friendly. It's true, people! I so hardly often use the air-cond last year, I think it might have gathered dust and welcomed spiders and their new home.
9. Making new friends. I feel more sociable!
10. AVATAR. OMGTHISISTHEBESTMOVIEIHAVEEVERWATCHEDILOVEJAMESCAMERONANDIWANTTOBEANA'AVI. :D


New Year Resolutions
1. GET MY DRIVING LICENSE.
2. Try to persuade mum to let me take driving lessons after my birthday and not after SPM.
3. Manage my finances.
4. I want to watch the musical NINE. It looks very promising. :)
5. Study my butt off for SPM.
6. Fulfill my promises.
7. Really climb a rock (and I mean it this time)
8. Find a way to make eggnog tastier.
9. Learn to cook 18749387 delicious recipes.
10. Reach my goal! (of what, I don't know yet. I'll think of something)
11. ROCK MY LAST YEAR OF HIGH SCHOOL.

This is what I have so far. I took about half an hour to think THIS up.
So there you go. :)
Happy 2010!

We're The Friends Who Stuck Together

Okay, I seriously seriously think that my house is somewhat a place of CAT ATTRACTION.

Remember those two kittens that came to my house on their own and I had to be their mommy for a few days before unwillingly sending them to the animal shelter? Yeah. Today, I found a mommy cat and her two kittens playing outside my gate. And one of her kittens, look like my favourite plushie tiger Tippy. HAHAHA.

So anyway, the kittens were playing and pouncing each other and one of them actually climbed onto the wheels of my dad's car and started poking the tires. UH-HUH. But it came down later. Tire still fine. Not punctured. :)
So later when I went out to try to play/get the kittens away from my house (I have a cat-hating dog, you see), the mommy cat started hissing at me and ran down the drain, followed by her two kittens. The End.

P/S: SUNWAY LAGOON TOMORROW. OH YEAH -!

Me And You And A Dog Named Boo

My post title is a song name; presumably a song created in the same era as "itsybitsyteenyweenyyellowpolkadotbikini". Why can't we get such nice song titles nowadays? Haha.

Anyway, I am here with a quest. A quest to revive my blog. And since I have nothing interesting to blog about, what better thing to do to attempt a blog-revivification than to create holiday lists! :)

Rachel's Holiday List of Dids
1. Did wake up every morning to watch Grey's Anatomy.
2. Did school work revision as mom requested (it's the holidays!!!)
3. Did buy a new purse.
4. Did go shopping for new turtlenecks in preparation for China trip.
5. Did some helping out to clean up the house.
6. Did go jogging.
7. Did practice my guitar.
8. Did freak out a bit when I agreed to perform in a mini concert.
9. Did face my nerves when I managed to perform in the mini concert.
10. Did watch A Christmas Carol (not as nice as I hoped it would be).
11. Did play chess and won (TWICE BABY!)
12. Did play Cluedo and won. :)
13. Did play Scrabble and got the letters that make up the words "porn" and "fart".
14. Did text a lot.
15. Did finish the Star Wars saga.
16. Did manage to create an entry in my diary after a whole month of neglecting it.
17. Did go to the salon and get my hair cut.

Rachel's Holiday Lists of Shoulds
1. Should win an award for trying to resurrect my dead blog.
2. Should have saved more money to go shopping.
3. Should go and watch New Moon. :D
4. Should watch Twilight (yes, you got me, I've never watched it before).
5. Should watch more movies.
6. Should finish reading my 1,073 page thick Gone with The Wind by Margaret Mitchell.
7. Should charge my iPod.
8. Should do something daring like try a double flip in mid air and risk breaking my neck but I won't because I'm not an adrenaline junkie.
9. Should (or should not?) buy a new bag.
10. Should think of something more interesting to blog about because if I were someone else and I were reading my blog I think I would hit the little red X button hastily.
11. Should write a heartwarming holiday story and become famous like Charles Dickens.
12. Should go climb a rock.
13. Should do something unexpected. Like what I don't know. Give me suggestions!

Mystery Google Repost!

Why can't people get the mysterygoogle thing that I posted on my blog? :/

Anyway, I'll just give the explanation another try, :)

So one day, I ventured forth to the mysterygoogle website to try this little thing that my sister showed me. Once entering the site, you hit the search button without typing anything into the search box. The words "Please don't type gibberish" bounces out after the page refreshes. Thus (as I've said,) being mischievously curious, I typed the word "gibberish" into the search box and hit enter. The words "Well, aren't you clever" pops out.

Now isn't that cute? :)

Mysterygoogle also replies to search sentences such as "hello" and "poop".

Go enjoy yourself! :D

A Little Piece Of Maturity

I've been watching Grey's Anatomy yesterday afternoon (it's back on StarWorld, yes!). And there was this phrase from the ending narrate saying 'we can never fully grow up.' or somewhere near that.

Well anyway, that saying is so true. Because I think that there will always be a part of us which will remain as immature as we were when we were 9, no matter how old we get. I mean, any grown man wouldn't even be able to resist the temptation to tease or pull a childish prank on someone sometimes (unless they're those really boring kind of people who miss out this little thing called LIFE). You know, have a little fun. :)

I know for sure that certain events and experiences have taught me to grow up. At the age of 16, I want to be the kind of person who thinks rationally, analyses logically, be practical, responsible, disciplined, trustworthy and other characteristics of the same aspect. However, I do not aim to be boring. I still enjoy planning April Fool pranks, take part in silly stupid bets (and losing), dance around my house like an idiot, etc.

My point is that I've grown up. As in, I wasn't the irrational, stupid and overly-playful little girl who often gets herself into a telling-off by her mum and fights/argues with her sister almost everyday. Well, I obviously have not achieved everything that I wish to achieve at 16, but at this stage I will say that it's close enough. :)

P/S: I have new spectacles! Aha aha aha!

Count Your Minutes

Today, I somehow feel the necessity to blog about something, anything. But after the one thousandth time of trying to blog about something, anything, I give up.

So now I just want to say that :

1. I really really want to go rockclimbing, ever since whoever suggested it.

2. I want to finish watching the Star Wars marathon.

3. I want to have a Lord Of The Rings marathon, if it is possible.

4. I miss my sister already and I hope she recovers real quick and that if she really really wants a Starbucks I'll buy one for her.

5. I just remembered that I ought to put my Famous Amos junkies in the fridge before it melts.

6. I like my new room a lot a lot a lot.

7. I'm going to miss the Editorial Board seniors a lot, and thank you for, well, EVERYTHING. :)

MWAH.

The Last Song

I am googling and youtubing All-American Rejects songs at the very last minute because I don't want to be one of those at the concert who doesn't know the lyrics of the songs and can only sway along to the music. It's all the more fun to be singing along.

And so far I've discovered that most of their songs are quite nice, whee! :)

Anyway, as of today my room has been newly repainted and the furniture rearranged. I've gotten used to the new wall colours already (when I first saw it I was a bit disappointed because it wasn't exactly the colour I was expecting it to be) but the furniture arrangement is a bit odd. I think it's because my room is really empty at the moment; the windows naked with no curtains, my wardrobes still empty, the study table and shelves idle and an old mattress propped on my bed.

So yeah, I am hoping to get those nice curtains from IKEA soon but I have to wait for 2 months for the quilt and pillow covers to be restocked. Ugh.

Never mind, patience is a virtue.

:)

Sparky Sparky Boom Man!

Hello, I am back from my temporarily absence of blogging.

But see, I have a very good reason for my leave because I would rather delete my blog than neglect it and that's saying something!

Well, I haven't been online and blogging because I have been watching Avatar: The Legend Of Aang everyday after school for the past week. :D

It took hours to finish watching all 61 episodes of the animation series that Nick burned for me (which bytheway is now in the hands of PeiShe) and it was SO GOOD. Oh and I have also been busy cleaning my room of ALL things to ready my room for the painters to come and re-paint it. All my clothes and accessories and bags are piled up messily together with boxes of documents and such in the upstairs living room. There is pretty much no space at all to walk and you have to trod carefully once you reach the top landing of the staircase.

I will be so glad once this whole renovation re-painting thing is over. I cannot, cannot cannot stand the dust. My nose is super sensitive to dust or any sort of ticklish microorganism.

So there you go. A perfectly good reason why I haven't had the time to blog and why my Facebook wall is being spammed with posts and tags from the Love Gang.

Who came up with that name anyway?

And now that I have blogged about why I couldn't blog and have forgotten what I originally wanted to blog about, I think I will re-install my chatbox and go watch some time-wasting videos on Youtube. :)

Oh yes, and HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO CHOONG QIAN XI, who I doubt knows this blog even exists. =.=

Codswallop, I Say

OMG the most embarrassing thing just happened to me.

See, I was asking people to go to the China year end trip (mentioned a few posts before) with me and I decided to ask Chris, you know, my godbrother because I saw him online.

So I double clicked his user account and started chatting to him immediately and stuff like that.

And I must've been chatting with him for a full 10 minutes until I realised (with the help of the Chris I was chatting to), that the person I was chatting to wasn't my godbrother Chris, and it was someone else with the username of Chris chatting back to me!

I'm pretty sure now that the person I was chatting to is named Thomas, and I have no idea why his username was Chris. And let me tell you that was HIGHLY HUMILIATING.

Gosh.

Well anyway, I am hoping that WenMin gets to come along with the China trip with me, and how come EVERYONE seems to have year end holidays planned in Mid-October already.

Hmm, :S

Oh, For The Love Of Pete!

OH. MY. GOD. PEOPLE.

I tell you- it is NOT FUNNY to send an S.O.S. message to someone else's phone.

Especially an S.O.S message that says "Help! I'm in an emergency. Please call me."

This message will freak people out, like it did to me.

So anyway, I'll tell you what happened with this whole S.O.S. message incident.

It happened less than 15 minutes ago. I was chatting with my sister and I was reciting my English oral presentation to her, when suddenly her phone starting (I don't even know what's the right word for this) BEEPING. And it's not the usual you-have-received-a-text-message buzz from cellphones; this BEEP was like those kind of emergency alarm system they have in top secret facilities you hear in movies.

Yes, THAT BEEP. The one that usually comes with a red siren warning.

OMG, I've found the right word for it.

My sister's phone started SIREN CALLING.

And my first thought was that my sister had like a new message tone or something. But apparently it was THAT S.O.S. MESSAGE from my GODBROTHER. So I panicked. I thought he'd been kidnapped or something. Another part of me thought he was joking, but I didn't think that he would play such a stupid joke. I mean, c'mon la, such jokes are just plain IDIOTIC.

You could cause a HEART ATTACK. THE MESSAGE RECIPIENT COULD'VE DIED.

Well ANYWAY, I called him immediately. And apparently he was in tuition and he said something about his S.O.S. message system blah blah blah and all I knew was I was shouting at him and he was apologizing.

BAHHHH.

I don't even know how many CAPS I used. You count.

Oh and I'm not mad. I'm just.....agitated.

So so stupid, I tell you.

Well, It's The Truth!

It just struck me.

Do you what's the best thing in Malaysia? :)

It's the ability of the people to come up with a song for just about every occasion.

Like, they have a song (or in most cases- songs) about Malaysia's flag, and about the Independence Day of Malaysia, and the Rukun Negara, and about Denggi, and about how to clean the compound of your house to avoid Denggi and even one about some Toilet campaign.

I swear, I am not kidding.

My tution teacher has just about every song that Malaysia has created for past occasions, present occasions and occasions-to-come.

It's kindda cool isn't it? :D

Go search on Youtube.

I tell you I am not kidding.

I Am Not A Quitter!

And I repeat this: I am not a quitter. If there's anything to fight about, I shall fight!, and that includes trying to beat KwanSeng at something. *nods determinely*

Anyway, I'M BAAAAACK!

I had a one day trip to Melaka, which was decided by my parents just an hour before leaving the house.

Things To Note During My Trip:

On The Way To Melaka, I-

1. ate Cuttlefish CrackerBalls.

2. wondered if there was going to be any fireworks today even though fireworks were banned (banned, right?) from this year's Merdeka Celebration.

3. planned my next blog post.

4. texted a lot (shame on me!)

5. felt really, really bored.

In Melaka, I-

1. had curry chicken pie for lunch. Omggggg it was so gooooooddd.

2. had a chance to wear my shades.

3. went for a stroll at the beach.

4. played with 1 month old puppies!

5. texted some more (shame, shame, shame)

6. gazed longingly at a white Vincci purse that my mom wouldn't buy for me.

On My Way Back From Melaka, I-

1. stuffed myself with plum strips.

2. wished Dad would turn the air-conditioner to a lower temperature.

3. listened to my iPod.

4. texted some MORE.

5. got a told off from Mom about the radiation of cellphones and to stop texting.

Back Home From Melaka, I-

1. realized something very unbelievable from Facebook.

2. was listening to the sound of illegal fireworks but everyone seems to be such a goody-two-shoes this year.

3. couldn't find as many people on Facebook as I did yesterday.

And with that I end my post.

Oh yes:

HAPPY MERDEKA.