In line with futomimii's absolutely gorgeous sky photos - seriously, check them out if you can - here is a shot I snapped yesterday in PJ:



Lovely blue sky :)

Wish I should say the same about the actual weather though - it's been scorching hot these few days, ouch. +_+ Add being stuck in traffic to that equation, and you get a lot of general grumpiness.

Worse still, despite my white blood-cells (usually) stellar defenses, I think I'm coming down with the flu. +___+ If that isn't bad enough, there's a sore throat threatening my voice, which I really, really need for tomorrow's public speaking presentation. Considering it is the final assignment for the subject and carries pretty heavy weight in our final evaluation, I need to stay audible at the very least. >.< Ugh.

Gotta last through this stretch and the Finals!

Today, I went with yuncyn, futomimii, carneaglariel and enigmatic_wind to watch 'Up' in Sunway Pyramid today. I've been hearing rave reviews about it and even reasons to bring tissue paper to the cinema during the movie. That, snowballed with the fact that it's Pixar pretty much meant I would eventually check it out.

And boy, it doesn't disappoint! I didn't cry the 'one litre of tears' piratelicker did, but I did end up sniffling at several points in the movie (yes, including the short clip before the movie began and the ending.) And I have to agree with Reins on the OST - gorgeous, gorgeous music that complemented the animation and story really well. And all those vibrant colors and smooth, amazing animation and guh.

The plot is simple enough to follow, but unfolds so beautifully without actually being shoved directly into your face. (Also, it is apparently so subtly conveyed that a kid behind me kept asking her parents what the heck was going on on the screen. +.+ Mmmmm, I'm thinking this may be a movie tailored more towards the older crowd then.)

Loving the character development as well - Carl's (obviously) the one given the most attention and focus, but I like how his development is clearly tied in with the other characters whom, while less developed (even static at times), are pretty likable. And Dug. ♥

Not going to drop any spoilers here, but do check it out if you can. It is definitely worth the watch and-

SQUIRREL.

- I mean, and will be worth the time and money spent. Seriously.

Not really related, but I really want to watch 'The Princess and the Frog' once it hits theaters. And wow, I really miss the good ol' Disney movies, like 'Aladdin' and co.

Anyway, the bunch of us took some purikura pictures afterwards and divided the photos amongst ourselves. Here are the ones I got. (Sorry about the picture quality; my scanner is old. T^T)



We started out pretty 'seriuz'. Really, we did.

( +5: Five times as sparkly, five times five as crazy-mad as you can get when you shove five girls into a photo booth )

Will add another picture-cut once I get the other pictures, because seriously you guys, there are more epic pictures than these. For serious.


In other news, I passed 'Captain Jack' on DDR today! \(^o^)/ With a quarter bar left to boot. Turns out it was easier than 'Cartoon Heroes', mostly because the latter has more double steps. Hoping to replicate that the next time I take a whack at that machine.

Quick recap of the past few days again (or in this case, last Friday):

i) Went for raincloud_sama and enigmatic_wind's kind-of farewell dinner (the two of them are leaving for the UK soon) at Pasta Zanmai in Sunway Pyramid. The food was decent, but the service wasn't very good - we had to ask three times at least for my green tea and Denise got the wrong order once; they had to reconfirm the order several times, if I recall correctly. And that's not even taking into account the wait for the food to arrive. Admittedly, both yuncyn and I came late-ish and the restaurant was fairly crowded, but still. Not the best of impressions when it comes to service.


ii) sapphire_1010 AND I FINISHED 'CARTOON HEROES' (YES, ALL THE WAY TO THE END) ON DDR STANDARD MODE FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER YEAAAAAAAAH. \(>A<)9

Hoping to reduplicate the feat someday before going for 'Captain Jack', yosh!


iii) Ended up buying a pair figurines from Vol. 2 of the Dynasty Warriors 6 Eiketsu Mini Figures because they're cute and I am weak that way. These figures go for RM25 each (ouch), but are pretty well made and cute to boot! Plus, it's Dynasty Warriors, end of story.

The figure is completely hidden in the box it comes in, so exactly which figurine you'll get is totally random and dependent on your own luck. Darnit. >:/

( So did I get lucky? )


Today:

Dropped by the 'One Kilometre World' exhibition by S. Amin Shahab in Pyramid with my family today. It was pretty interesting, the canvas - in a nutshell, it is a one-kilometer-long canvas with various landscapes and people shifting and melding with each other. The whole thing was done solely in pen (Artline, if I'm not mistaken), which made the details on it doubly impressive, IMHO.

( tl;dr? Long, detailed canvas is long and detailed - now with photos! )

There's also the '1,001 Faces of Malaysia' project happening right beside the exhibition, with S. Amin Shahab sketching 1,001 faces of shoppers and people who 'represent our country'. It's still ongoing and will continue until the 31st of August, so if you want your face to be one amongst the many others, I believe it's open from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. at Sunway Pyramid.

( Oh, and before you go... )

Figured I should upload the photos I snapped today at Sogo (more on that later), which ended up in me catching up a little on a few backdated photos. So, this isn't quite a photo spam, but what the hey, it'll do. (Warning, fairly big pictures - fear them!)

But first! Remember my goal of taking over the world with cute photos?



YEAH, MY PLAN IS WELL ON ITS WAY. 8D

( To start things off, UTAR Setapak trip, anyone? )

( Then, there's the 'Was not in China; here's the photo to disprove it' shots... )

( And now, for some very, VERY backdated stuff )

...for a self-proclaimed not-very-photogenic person, I have a lot of self-photos. O.O. Huh.

Since I haven't updated in the past few days, here's a update-dump of a sorts!

( Slightly less painful than an annual report; let's start from Thursday. )

*dusts off hands* I think that about covers it for now. Really got to pick up my LJing habit properly again.

*blows off dust* Haven't been prodding around LJ for awhile now - sorry about that. The current Altador Cup over at Neopets has been kind of distracting me from pretty much everything else (Lost Desert will win the cup, darnit! (T^T)9 ), but at least I've been poking my friends list every few days or so?

Anyway! I figured it was high time I kickstarted my posting again. And what better way to do it than with a fire report?

( A fire? No wai! +2 )

Well, enough of my ranting, here are some park photos I took on the jog out:

( Why Taman Subang Ria doesn't deserved to be burnt down +4 )

Also, while I was uploading the park/fire shots, I thought I'd put up some pictures of Chiko as well. ♥

( C-C-Chiko! +2 )

Bigger, fluffier and as cute as ever. ♥ I contest that no one can resist that face. NO ONE.

Coming assignments and talk that the FYP supervisors will be assigned by next week makes me tired just listening about them. :/ And wow, did my blog-writing skill rust when I wasn't looking?

Quick, ninja-time( ! )

Back from Kemaman, where we (yuncyn and I) bunked with a friend of ours, Sal, border-hopped between Pahang and Terengganu and enjoyed the heck out of two days. 8D Thanks for having us over, Sal - we had a awesomely awesome time! *hugs*

Anyway, long post is LONG and heavy picture post is HEAVY. Seriously, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

( So it all starts from the plane, y'see... )

All the other photos are over here. This post alone took me, what, an hour to compile?

All in all, it was an amazingly productive holiday (or just 'amazing' would probably do the trick) - thanks Sal for allowing us to bum out at your house! And tell your family that we're really, really grateful for them tolerating us dragging you out here and there. >DDD Only downside of the trip were the perverts who turned up at the Legend on the first day, but the way I figure it, it isn't all that surprising. And weighed against the experiences we had, it's really almost nothing but a niggle in a memorable trip.

So...Redang next time, yeah? (^o^)9

candy__chan showed me this, and even though I told myself I wouldn't:

 THE ANONYMOUS FEEDBACK MEME  

*facepalms* Obviously, my curiosity is more powerful than I thought. I'm honestly not expecting many (if any) responses though, but I'd appreciate good critique.

To make this post less pointless, ( here, have a Chiko picture! )

I CHANGED MY HAIRSTYLE TODAY 8D

Recently, my mother have been putting pressure on me to cut it and what do you know, she finally succeeded. Seriously, she was grinning like a Cheshire Cat throughout the whole thing (much to my chagrin).

( Pictorial evidence goes [HERE] )

At the very least, I don't think I look too bad...it's an interesting change, especially after having super-long hair since, I dunno, twelve?

And considering how I'm pretty iffy about hair salons and whatnot, I consider today a (minor) accomplishment for myself. I now have a new hairstyle (and no sociolinguistics revision in my head)!

Now, to survive all the 'ZOMG WHAT, ESTHER YOU CUT YOUR HAIR??!!eleventyONE!' comments I'm probably going to get from classmates/churchmates/aunties/uncles throughout the week. Not that it'd be surprising, since I haven't changed my hairstyle in ages and it's practically a running joke that I'd only ever change my hairstyle if something crappy happened to me. ^^;;

'Urban Odysseys' was launched today; my second essay published (in a compilation)! ^^ Had to miss my Language Learning Theories tutorial to attend it, but hey, it's not like one gets to attend these kind of events everyday, right?

All in all, the launch was pretty cool; Mano Maniam was the special guest and boy, is he insightful! My mom almost immediately pinpointed him as one of the actors from 'Kopitiam'. >D

I'll admit I was pretty nervous when I collected my certificate; figures nerves would get me in the end. ^^;;

( Here's a group photo + a giant book! )

The little blurb at the back credits me with two other published works, one of which had completely slipped my mind actually, oops. ^^;; There's another MPH anthology ('It's about Time', based on YWS 2007) coming out soonish, and I was lucky enough to be included in it. ^^ yuncyn's essay is also in this one, so here's to that launch as well!

...Speaking of which, I need to work on editing one of my essays AND write another monster one due in March. (T^T) Must work hard!

'Urban Odysseys' is in MPH stores and and is priced at RM35.90. ;D

Went to Comic Fiesta 2008 and wow, it's all over already!

But either way, CF WAS TOTALLY AWESOME, GUYS. 8D

Had a great time over the past two days - the cosplayers were awesome, the hall was much less cramped IMHO despite the flow of people and friends make everything fun! :p

And is it just me, or were there more doujin booths this year? Saw a number of interesting doujins and misc. cute items; unfortunately, my budget limited my spending this year again, woe. T___T Ended up getting mostly doujins instead of prints and/or bookmarks. I can't say I regretted any of my purchases though, after flipping through them this morning. >D And yay, finally caught up with the current Teamworks edition after missing last year's one, LOL.

And the cosplayers this year were so fun to look at! I'm no authority on cosplay at all, but I think there were a lot of really well-done ones this year. This, by the way, includes the super-epic Odin's Sphere team whom I may or may not have stalked shamelessly; worth all the effort and hard work, guys! (T^T)b I also loved the Jack Sparrow on Day Two - he was so obliging, and cool! >D

Anyway, here are the Day 1 photos I took with my camera - I'm no professional photographer, so if the photo looks good, it's because you guys look amazing, period. ^^ All the photos I took on Day 2 are in yuncyn's camera, so you'll have to wait for her to upload her bunch of photos. I haven't reinstalled Photoshop yet, so all these pictures are unedited. Do poke me if you want them in their original resolution!

Trust me, this is nowhere close to even a quarter of the cosplayers on Day 1, much less Day 2 - I think dmjewelle's the best source to see all the different cosplayers; she took the effort to snap almost every cosplayer's picture! (Speaking of which, I need to go hunt down pictures of me on the forums, which are probably as rare as Articuno in Pokemon or something. >3)

Also met a lot of old friends this year, like Steph (whom I haven't seen in a whole year, I think!) and Jason. XDDD Also managed to meet some of the Singaporean cosplayers, both the old friends (like Lacry, Lenne and Skye) and new acquaintances like Lynn, Lenneth and Decadence - hope I'll be able to meet you guys next time! (^o^)

I owe so many thanks to so many people this year, no seriously. My mom, for one, for making my Jade costume in 4 days, despite the rush and the brainbreak and super-late nights/early mornings. The CF committee, for hosting the event and ensuring everything went well. And to the SJ bunch of people, for letting me bother you guys perpetually. *hugs* Sorry for my being a moronic emo-kid after the event on Day 2 - I tend to get really quick mood-swings when I get tired or sleepy. ^^;; It's a bad habit I need to fix. m(_ _)m Thank you for putting up with me anywaaaaaay!

Tl;dr - IT WAS AWESOME GUYS, THANK YOU. <3

If I reach a little higher, will I touch the sky?

Just have to love one's camera-phone some days. ♥ My photography skills still have a long way to go though!

Guys, remember that fuss I kicked up about my B+ in Journalism II and how I eventually sent it for remarking?

Well, the uni's faculty office called me today out of the blue and told me that my subject remark results were out, prompting me to rush out of Malaysian Lit class, dash all the way down to said office and wait for ten agonizing minutes at the counter for someone to appear-

Only to be told that I couldn't get my review slip until I brought back my old results slip, which I had (obviously) left at home.

In the end, I had to ask my mom to bring it for me when she came to pick us up; rushed the slip back to the office, where I was finally, finally handed the envelope after waiting on tenterhooks for them to dig it out of some folder. (Also chatted a bit with my previous teacher and current Head of Department, who, judging from the look she gave me, probably thinks I'm a bit whacked for remarking a perfectly decent grade.)

And guess what?

MY GRADE WAS BUMPED UP TO AN A-, OH SPARKLY JOY~~~~8DDDDD

*does happy jig all around the room*

In funnier news, MPH sent me the latest edition of their annual magazine 'Quill', which features interviews with several writers who contributed to 'Urban Odysseys' and possibly all the authors in tiny boxes on the cover.

So there are all these nice pictures of various authors smiling and looking nice and like Serious Authors(tm) and LOL WHAT THE HECK, THERE IS MY FRIGGIN' HAZUKI PHOTO SITTING SQUAT IN THE MIDDLE OF THE TOP ROW.



Quickpost this image to Myspace, Digg, Facebook, and others!

The first thing my mom says upon seeing it?

'...But it doesn't look like you. =/'

Until now, I haven't quite figured out if I should be horrified, amused or both at the fact that I sent in a cosplay photo for an author picture or the fact that they actually used it over the alternative photo I included. Granted, said alternative was a cam-whore shot; you know, that one on my Facebook profile.

...This must say something about keeping clear, good self-shots, non-cam-whore photos on hand (or on hard-drive) next time I need them.

On a brighter note; hey, look carneaglariel, that's the photo you took! 8D

Reading the few interviews inside, the authors' views and ideas behind their stories sound pretty profound - makes me wonder why they ever selected mine, really. ^^;;

Unexpectedly popped over to the MPH warehouse sale with a couple of uni friends after lunch today - not a hard feat considering how close our campus is to the location the sale is being held at. (Ah, the benefits of studying in PJ!)

The original plan was for us to make our way there tomorrow, but oh well, one trip is rarely ever enough when it comes to events like these! >3 Plus, there are some books I have my eye on that I want to check out tomorrow as well. =p (Like Ptolemy's Gate which I still cannot bring myself to read, ORZ.)

( And so, here is today's bounty~ ♥ +1 )

In other news, (as yuncyn had posted waaay earlier) there was a Cultural Exchange Program between UTAR and the Toyota Higashi High School; yours truly was working as one of the 71 facilitators on duty that day. ^^

We facilitators were divided into teams of two and assigned 7 or 6 Japanese students each. My partner and I were in charge of Group 6.

( Photos ahoy and some event prattle +5 )

Also in the belated-news department, I discovered that my laptop has a fingerprint sensor, which is really pretty darn cool! I can now log into my computer and websites with a slide of my finger if I forget my password. 8D

I end this LJ entry with ( a photo of Chiko being cute (then again, when is she never? ♥) )

Took a lot of pictures in the past two days alone - makes me wonder if my subconscious was trying to compensate for the lack of photos throughout the semester.

Pretty large photodump - you have been warned.

First, here's the newspaper assignment we had to do for our Journalism 2 - 4 pages of brainbreak, layout woes, late nights and editting.

( +3 Honeycomb pictures )

Then, on the last day of the teaching semester, I suddenly felt the need to take a few random photos:




That kinda expanded until we (yuncyn, folklorist, Sal and I) ended up taking a whole bunch of photos by the side of PG (the furniture block) since the cafeteria crew weren't in that day to stare at four students who are obviously tengah syok sendiri (enjoying (indulging?) themselves).

( +9 random photos )


And because I haven't posted her here lately:
( Chiko shots! +3 )

Now, with the impending exams coming, this is my current state of mind:

I hadn't intended this to be a photo dump, but oh well. ^^

Finally managed to dig out the pictures from my mom's camera from Comiworld 2007...only to find out she deleted a large number of them.

Ah well, at least I rescued a few pictures out - I finally have that frontal pic of Chizuru I've been wanting!

( +2 Chizuru photo-spammage )

Also, several pictures from Bon Odori (gratuitously nabbed from futomimii ;D) :

( +4 Bon Odori pictures~! )

And because I can - a partial dare by yuncyn; partial because I suggested it first as a joke and she told me to 'DO EEEEEET!!!ONEeleventy! 8DDD'

SO I DID. >8DDD

( HERE, HAVE SOME SHOPFU-ZHUGE LIANG. 8DDDDD )

Mostly for the sake of archiving this in my LJ, here are some shots of my CF07 cosplay outfits:

( CF07 Hazuki, Hinoe +3 )

All photos taken with yuncyn's camera; thanks, Denise!

I want to do a Dynasty Warriors costume this year, specifically Xing Cai if possible. Currently, things are looking pretty positive; I've secured a 'yes' for now, with my mom asking for the break-down of the costume in detail. All I have to do is maintain my grades and it should be a-go. *pumps fist*

MY SECOND GOAL IN FFXII HAS THUS BEEN ACCOMPLISHED TODAY:


TIME TAKEN: 8 (AND A HALF) HOURS
*POSES WITH GREAT JUSTICE*

( RANT + PHOTOS; 'VAAN - YIAZMAT SLAYER' HAS A NICE RING TO IT, DONCHA THINK? 8D )

And now, on to Omega mk XII we go! 8DDD

Semantics exam tomorrow, oh JOY.

But pushing that aside, this is the newest member of my family:



She flops a lot and has a tendency to squeeze into small spaces to sleep. And she has the cutest, shortest legs that she toddles around on! ♥ And when she looks at you in a certain way, your heart can't help but melt a little inside (like chocolate on a sunny day).

Here's to hoping she stays for the long run! ♥ \(^o^)/