Happy Burstday, Senior!

25 April 2009 @ Red Box Sunway Pyramid

Went karaoke to celebrate HanChin's birthday. Sang for 8 hours.

MIA: Eugene & Cheryl

This time the colour theme is Red and White. Eugene and Cheryl wore red too but not in pic. Mike didn't get the notice...

Bought a little cake from Starbucks.


Head on to our favourite hang out place, McDonald's to pass him his birthday gift - a steering lock.



27 April 2009 @ Food Garden, The Gardens

His actual date of birthday. Had a simple dinner with TM gang.


Had a larger cake. Made his second birthday wish for 2009.

[top] Mike, WoonLee, Jacky, JooLi, Me
[bottom] Wilson, HanChin, Cheryl, Eugene

Simple and fun celebration.

My posts are having fewer and fewer words, aye? Today is Sunday. Just lazing at home. Hope to do something productive today. Billy, out.

Cyber Fusion 2009

10 - 12 April 2009 @ Multimedia University, Cyberjaya

It's the biggest gaming event I have attended thus far. It's the Cyber Fusion 2009!!


I went to Cyberjaya to visit some of my friends there and took a peek at the grand event (at midnight). There were lots of banners, booths from games publishers and vendors.


The main event of Cyber Fusion is breaking the Guiness World Record for having the Longest LAN Party in the world. The previous record was 36 hours by 203 players in USA.

This time, they attempt to break the record by playing non-stop for 38 hours. In the end, they decided to extend 2 more hours, and 274 players broke 40 hours of non-stop gaming LAN party!


When I went into the grand hall, the players have played for almost 24 hours already. Most of them are still immersed in their own game, while some are yawning away.


Some of the marshalls are my friends, and they're working really hard to make this event a success. Bravo to them!


Looking back at the event, the players brought their own PC to the hall. Some even brought their favourite figurines to accompany them throughout the night.

from another angle

Redbull was kind enough to be one of the sponsors for the event. Every once in a while, the organizers will distribute Redbull energy drink to the participants. Guess it really helps to keep them awake.


While the 200 over players are fighting their way to glory, there were replays of DotA matches, with a commentator commenting about the game! It was my first time experiencing live game commentary. Cool!

Esports Commentary

It was already past midnight when I reach that place. Nothing much left but there were 2 PS3 still available for visitors to play. [There were 8 during the day]


Both PS3 were having the Street Fighter game, which I have not played for a very very long time. I waited a while for my turn to get a hand on PS3. About the result of my game... let's skip it, ok?


I walked around and saw the fixtures for FIFA, DotA and Call of Duty. There were also e-sports tournamnts organized by Game Developers Club (GDC) of MMU as part of the Cyber Fusion 2009.


Not only cybergames were involved, there were also various board games exhibition, card games tournaments and console community gathering.


Besides the gaming part, GDC also has its focus on the game developments. Among the events brought up in were Codeplay2 (game programming competition), Future Games Creation Seminar (FGCS) and Overclocking Showcase.


Later in the night, some gamers start to bring in their own PS3 for the console gathering. There were hundreds of LCD monitors for them to plug in and play with. Some even brought their own drum and guitar (for PS3). Estimate around 50 PS3 were brought in! WOW!


There wasn't much left to see as it was already 3am in the morning. Me and my friends took a quick round again before heading back to their rented apartment.


I'm glad that I managed to witness a couple of hours in the making of a world record, though I may not have the stamina to withstand 40 hours non stop gaming. Good job to all the players for breaking the record! Good job to GDC and thanks to all the sponsors. Billy, out.

References:
MMU Game Developers Club
Cyberfusion 2009 | Multiplay

Bamboo Rafting in Chiang Mai

13 June 2008 @ Chiang Mai, Thailand

It's the last day of our 3-days journey into the deep woods of Chiang Mai. Our final activity is bamboo rafting! Yay!


As usual, we woke up early, around 7am for breakfast. We had eggs and toast! Yummy~


After breakfast, we have to pack all our stuff into our bags, and important stuff to be put into plastic bags. I hope you know why...

Too bad all our cameras are kept tightly inside plastic bags and inside the bag. We didn't managed to take any pictures on the raft! *sobz*


However, I found this photo above that resembles pretty much how our rafting goes. Just imagine one pro (so called River King) manuvering in front and 2 noobies (Me and Kuan) manuver at the back, while others stand in one line in the centre.

Well, it was pretty fun to have a chance to control the bamboo raft. One very malu-fying stuff happen, which I lost my stick when I press to hard into the bottom of the river and couldn't pull it back up. So, I was stick-less for about 15 minutes, before the River King picked up another stick for me.

The whole journey on the river was 3 hours, with a pit stop at a small village.


We arrived at our destination around 1pm. It was raining heavily, all our clothes are soaking wet. Got changed and had beehun for lunch.

Little pondok where we had our lunch

After resting for a while, we left that place around 2pm with a tuk tuk and reach our guesthouse around 3 hours later.

failed SS shot in tuk tuk - Me, LeongKee, MinBee and Kuan

We had a simple dinner for the day. Decided to walk to town's 7-11 and eat cup noodles for dinner. We went on to buy a bottle of beer since it's quite cheap.


We poured the beer into the Coffee cups (like slurpee cups in M'sia) and got ready to drink it. Suddenly, the staff in 7-11 stopped us and told us to buy cups for beer. He threw away the Coffee cups we used.

See this cups without labels?

No choice, we bought a few cups from the shop and drank the beer. Cup noodles and beer, cheap and nice.

It was a really exciting day, full of new experiences. Bamboo rafting is really cool. I'd like to try white water rafting next time though. Hehe... Billy, out.

Previous post: Trekking in Chiang Mai - A Night in the Dark
Next post: Thai Massage & Wat Prahthat Doi Suthep

Happy Burstday, Wilson!

20 March 2009 @ Kokopelli Traveller's Bistro, Petaling Jaya

Went to Kokopelli Traveller's Bistro, situated at the back of Dataran 3 Two Square, Petaling Jaya to celebrate Wilson's birthday.


The interior design is quite unique, with a lot of little stuffs to decorate the place.

the counter

the dining area

the washroom - unbelievable, look at the deco in there...

Here's me with the birthday boy - Wilson.

Tai kor and me

Now let's look at the food.

Carbonara

Lasagna

Seafood Olio

Burger and fries

Colourful drinks

The food ain't that bad but they aren't the best in town though. Worth a try though.

Wilson and the big cheese cake

ChiaPoh, Cheryl, Mike, Wilson, JooLi, Stanley, WoonLee, Me, HanChin

It may be the last outing together for some people. Nevertheless, I'm still very glad to have such nice friends all around me. Cheers for future outings. Billy, out.

Changing Lifestyle to Live Longer

There are all sorts of diseases and illness in the world, do we live to suffer?

Recently, I have gained much interest into this common medical condition called Hypertension, or better known as High Blood Pressure.

"Blood pressure" is the force of blood pushing against the walls of the arteries as the heart pumps out blood. If this pressure rises and stays high over time, it can damage the body in many ways. - Source

As many of you may have known, the blood pressure of a person used to be measured using a stethoscope and a manual sphygmomanometer (blood pressure meter). Nowadays, the automated sphygmomanometers are more commonly used and convenient as stethoscope is not required.

Automated sphygmomanometer

Measurement of blood pressure comes in 2 numbers, separated by a slash. The first number is called systolic blood pressure - this is the peak blood pressure when your heart is squeezing out blood; the second number is the diastolic blood pressure - the pressure when your heart is filling with blood (when relaxing between beats).

A normal pressure for adults would be 120/80. 140/90 or higher is considered High Blood Pressure.

High blood pressure damages your blood vessels. In long run, it will lead to high chances of stroke, kidney failure, heart disease and heart attack.



One can depend on medications to keep the blood pressure normal, but most importantly, changes of his/her lifestyle must be made. Exercise more, eat lots of vegetables and fruits, limit sodium, alchohol and caffaine intake, don't smoke and learn some relaxation techniques. One needs a strong determination to be able to do all these and make changes to how he/she live.

We always have to compromise to live longer. Is it all worth it? Perhaps...

Anyway, I have to change my lifestyle. Billy, out.

References:
High Blood Pressure, Things You Can Do to Lower Yours
Hypertension - Wikipedia