Three Quarters- Almost There But Not Quite..

Hmm. I am on a roll.. am beset by urges to do anything except work- is that called procrastination? So, here they are. Selected photographs taken with Farrah's Canon E05, SLR of Sydney while I was there in January. Taken on 13 April 2008: View of the Sydney Opera House and the Harbour Bridge, taken from the Botanical Gardens, on a late afternoon after the rain. Love the skyline and the dramatic clouds. It is actually the same day- but how the sky is different. One of my favourite shots. I actually made a short note of the my mood at the time- it reads: Today is gorgeous. Rained for an hour and now the everything is awashed with the after-the-rain dampness and also, crispness. The air smells wonderful and it just feels so peaceful. Everything feels cleansed and renewed. Nature is beautiful. St. Mary's Cathedral- also after the rain Three fine gentlemen at the Botanical Gardens Away from nature- I like this shot. Taken at the King's Cross (duh) train station. Next on the prog...

Work sponsored trip almost 2 weeks ago. Because it's almost 1 o'clock and I have stupidly made an appointment for 9 am on a Saturday morning, I will be going to sleep soon and am not in the mood to write too much. Briefly, the whole lab went to Adelaide sometime during the Olympics period to check out the Supervisor's new place. Here are some photos I took of Adelaide city itself. Didn't do much, except slept and watch the Olympics- hooray for the Olympics!! Here is a photo taken outside the Art Gallery of South Australia: The State Library, with the jet-trail (whatever you call it?) State Library A view of the North Terrace, where the Library, Museum and Art Gallery are all situated. I love this photo because it captures the brilliance of Australian sky. Incredibly blue (I now know why we, as kids, were told to always colour the sky blue during art classes, even though in KL, it's always cloudy- and hence the sky's always a smoggy gray) St. Peter's Cathedra...

Andrew called me at 5.30 pm asking if I would like to watch the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra tonight at 8 pm because he's got 2 free tickets courtesy of his lovely sister. Whom I have yet to meet, but love already. Tonight's program is Sibelius (The Oceanides), Bernstein's (Plato's Symposium) and Dvorak's Symphony No. 9, also known as From the New World. Sibelius's piece was.. interesting. It reminded me of the ocean, and rolling tides. Which apparently, according to Andrew, is characteristic of him- long phrasings that takes time to build up to nothing really. Bernstein's piece was actually quite good- it's a violin concerto and the soloist was playing a 300 year old Stradivarius. It started out beautifully but it sort of lost me halfway unfortunately. But I thought the inspiration for the piece was quite interesting- it was based on Plato's Symposium . But the highlight, I have to admit was Dvorak's Symphony. It was the first time I've hear...

My cousin, Xiao Lan came over to Australia for 3 weeks and had just left. I hadn't seen here in probably 8 years and was looking forward to getting to know her better. We had a blast! Before I turn this post into an ode to her awesomeness, let me just succinctly say that we had lots of fun! I wished I could take time off so we could go to the outbacks and have some real adventures, or even explored more wilderness, but time was just not permitting- with a PhD and all.. Xiao Lan also has a blog , with some great pictures of her travel here: *Did the South Australia (Adelaide) for the first time. Caught up with Ju Ann and her new hubby, Roshan and had a blast monkeying around! Will post picture from that soon. *Did the Great Ocean Road, with the lab peeps, which was cool too. *Introduced her to all my friends, and she got along famously with everyone! Now that she's left, it's back to the daily grind...

Ooh. I cannot resist putting up pictures of more traveling around Victoria. Farrah and I went to Trentham Falls, near Daylesford- about 90 km northwest of Melbourne. Although the drought has perhaps relegated the status to Trentham Falls to Trentham Trickle, it was still really nice because we could release our inner adventuress and pretend to trek through dangerous blackberry brambles and fallen logs to reach the base pool. See accompanying photos... It's not really that big..behold the spectacular Trentham Trickle! Farrah the Photographer. Somewhere over the rainbow.... is a pile of rocks... A (photo)shootout! Pretty. Chilling Feet. We had lunch at Mrs. Marples' Tea Room in Trentham (tiny) town. I initially thought it was Gerald's favourite-st tea and scone place at the Dandenongs', only to realize that the Dandenong one was named (as it should) MISS Marple's Tea Room. Nevertheless, fortuituous stroke of luck resulted in me having the most delicious BLT (Bacon, Le...

Random updates: 1. Jack Chambers won the SYTYCD Australia and I've bought tickets to watch the tour when it hits Melbourne. Was kinda undecided but a friend convinced me that it is a once in a lifetime experience- since they are not likely to ever tour again. True. 2. Went for Sidney Nolan's exhibition at National Gallery of Victoria- he's probably Australia's most famous artist. I enjoyed the exhibition tremenduously. My favourites, if I can be impartial, were probably of his Dimboola series, since I HAVE been to Dimboola and seen its raw beauty. His more popular pieces were probably of his Ned Kelly series ( Ned Kelly was Australia's most famous outlaw), which I also liked due to his signature treatment of Ned Kelly's mask. Dimboola, if you refer to my first post on this blog, you probably can see the similarity in the dry landscape and the trademark silos. Ned Kelly: this picture seemed a lot bluer than I remembered. Not sure if it was the same or just prin...

Shukers forwarded me this link today . Which prompted the following email from Ching: Shuk Yee: Pa, can I have your signature on this release form, please? Pa: But Shuk Yee, you are 50. Shuk Yee: Ya, but I still need your signature or else they will detain me in customs along with my gold-filled dentures. Pa: Ok, bring me my reading glasses. I cannot see where to sign. Shuk Yee: Use mine. Malaysia. Sigh... like that one lah..