Yuen Cindy Life

MADONNA MATERIAL GIRL

2012-01-23T09:44:00.009+08:00

I told my father when I visited him at Melaka the other day that I like Madonna Material Girl song especially the lyric, "If they did not give me enough credit, I just walk away....". ,

My father laughed and said, "That mean that material girl said, choy lei pun sor - in Cantonese, they only offered themselves to the highest bidder."

He added, "Some man said they are prostitute, it is because they can't get her, she only offered herself to the man who can pay for her service. Because they want to earn money at their prime time, they also know when they get old, they will get rejected also eventually. Like the China women said, you feed me, ah? They are not the roadside prostitute, they can said no one, you know."

"That is why woman spent so much money on make-up, hairdo, accessories and clothes to make themselves pretty."

"But now time has changed, now man become woman chauffeur. I will not want to become woman's Ahmad (chauffeur). Like that Eurasian ladylah, (a woman living near my father's residential area), she don't know how to drive and her husband is always at overseas, (her husband is Caucasian, a pilot trainer). She called me and asked me to drive her around, she is so rich and she only give me RM10. The other day she also asked me to drive her around and belanja me eat bak kut teh. She is so kedekut, how can she take more than she give? Some more she sit behind, unless she sit in front and let me touch her."

I laughed after listening to my father's opinion and wicked intention.

I also told my father about Lady Gaga who earn a lot of money by having bad image. Also James Patterson being the highest paid author in the world where I passed a story book by him title, "Pop Goes the Weasel, Alex Cross's serial" for my father to read. My colleague donate her story books for our company charity sale but nobody buy the book and eventually those unsold books was given to our department's staffs. Only me who is interested in books and brought back the books but did not read it until one day I read in The Star newspaper that James Patterson is a highest paid author in the world. My father read the book and passed the book to his cousin to read and his cousin said James Patterson come up with another new book, "The Fifth Horseman".

My father said, " Lady Gaga is like a trend and fashion, everybody follow the trend and her fashion. Between Lady Gaga and James Patterson, Lady Gaga is easier to get known because everybody can visual her and listen to her song but not everybody can read book."

Decent Nice Food at Yulek Area

2012-01-07T16:11:00.006+08:00

Nowadays when come to eating, I never travel far anymore, I look around my residential area and found out that there is a lot of nice decent food nearby. I will not introduce the already famous one like the Yulek Yong Tau Foo below Jalan Kas Kas flat nearby Taman Cheras Market or Restaurant Meng Shiang wantan mee with its famous barbeque pork.

There is Restaurant Palace Rice Vermicelli nearby Taman Cheras Market, where its specialty food is white noodle with wantan. The price of the noodle is also very competitive where a bowl of noodle only cost RM5.50 package with 2 minced pork wantan and 1 big minced pork wantan with shrimp. The specialty of the wantan is its minced pork wantan is bigger than the other ordinary wantan sold by other hawker and the big minced pork wantan with shrimp has big chunk of shrimp as they use big shrimp to make it.

Another one is the chicken rice and barbeque rice at Yulek area for only RM3.00, very decent price and the food taste ok also. If you want mix chicken and barbeque pork, they only charge you RM4.50, if you want drumstick for your chicken rice, it will cost you only RM4.00. If you choose chicken wing, the price will be still RM3.00.

Now I will choose to eat at restaurant that only sell their food and not mix up with other food stalls like coffee shop as I know this type of restaurant offer a better taste food. If I simply pick a food stall in the coffee shop that I don't know to eat, there is a high chance that their food is below average and not good taste.

KL Bird Park

2011-11-27T13:46:00.018+08:00

Go to KL Bird Park today with the free tickets I got by buying a book (Essential Education by Expatriate Publisher) for RM10 from Parenthood exhibition at Mid-Valley. Despite the pricey entrance ticket, RM20 for mycard adult, there are still many parent bringing their children to visit the bird park. maybe it is due to school holidays.

Here are the pictures of the birds in the Bird Park, at least you will know what to expect from the visit. There is also bird show and air-conditioner bird gallery, where they exhibit dead bird in the gallery.

Very tiring visit as have to walk very far in the Bird Park as it is the world's largest free-flight walk-in Aviary.

Good Treats at 2nd Maternity & Children Expo

2011-11-19T22:47:00.003+08:00

Go to 2nd Maternity & Children Expo and quite happy with their treats. Redeem a goody bag (not much things in it, only sample of anti-bacteria shower foam Shokubutsu, Ban Kah Chai stomachache pills and Enfagrow milk). Inside the goody bag still have vouchers to redeem free gifts at participating booths where I redeem MAM BPA free orthodontic pacifier for babies 0-6 months old. I also redeem a table calendar 2012 from Sweet Cherry booth.

I buy a glass Pureen milk bottle at the expo at RM12 as glass milk bottle is very hard to find at deparmental stores. I do not buy any diaper this time as unable to find cheap diaper at the expo, not like the last visit where I can get big pack of diaper for RM20. I plan to buy teats but do not buy any as Pureen booth do not sell any of them and the rest branded one is too expensive.

The best treat I get at the expo is I buy a book, essential education from expatriate lifestyle publisher for RM10 and I am given 3 adults and one children admission ticket to KL Bird Park. I have long to go to the Bird Park but the admission ticket is just too expensive.

I also redeem all my citibankcard points at the expo because there is Citibank booth at the expo. I redeem a Fisher-Price educational phone and top up RM6.20 as my citibankcard points is only worth RM33.70 and the phone cost RM39.90. It save my hassle as I don't have citibank online to redeem gift. I also plan to cancel my citibank credit card as they are going to charge me RM50 government tax next year. But currently they also have an attractive promotion for new credit card customers where they will be given RM150 cash back when they swipe their card 6 times within 2 months after receiving their card.

I already applied for Arab Malaysian credit card which I find their promotions are very attractive where RM50 cash bonus will be given if you use RM350 in 60 days after you receive your card. On top of that if you shop on Saturday and Sunday at hypermarket like Tesco, Giant, Jusco, Carrefour, Cold Storage, Mydin plus pharmacies like Caring, Guardian, Watson and departmental stores like Isetan, Marks & Spencer, Metrojaya, Parkson, Robinsons and Tangs calculated in block of RM100, you are given 20% cash back. I do shop my groceries at Tesco and Giant and buy medicine at Caring pharmacy, so the discount is useful to me as I able to save my money on groceries and medicine. They also give cash back of 20% on weekend at petrol station like BHPetrol, Caltex, Esso, Mobil, Petronas and Shell where another extra 5% for Caltex (Caltex 5% extra valid until 31 December 2011). The rest of the program valid until 31 March 2012. Also able to save petrol cost with this credit card although not as pretigious as Citibank credit card.

OCBC bank also offer their OCBC Titanium credit card for free and also RM50 cash bonus but what I want is Great Eastern OCBC credit card where I can get rebate in insurance premium and some rebate in medical bill. I cancelled my OCBC Great Eastern credit card because they want to charge me annual free and government tax RM50 although I have called them several times to waive the fee. I find it is not worthwhile, even I enjoy maximum rebate on insurance premium for my family members, I still have to pay annual fee and government tax where the rebate I get is use to pay those fee. Back to square I didn't enjoy any benefit by using their credit card. They also set a very high spending limit per annual to waive the annual fee and government tax.

I enjoy listening to Madonna song, Material Girl where she sang, "They (the guys) don't give me proper treating, I just walk away." I find all the credit cards are competing each other in term of their benefits, so just walk away if they are not giving you enough treats to continue using their credit card.

Dim Sum Buffet at Cheras Business Centre

2011-11-07T20:38:00.012+08:00

Today I eat dim sum buffet at Restoran Janbo located at Cheras Business Centre. They have variety of dim sum selection and they offer their buffet dim sum at RM16.50 per person in the weekend and public holiday and RM15.50 in the weekday. The price did not include chinese tea RM2.30 per head and service charge 5% and government tax 6%. The total bill come to RM41.74 for 2 persons.

We ate as much as we can but we cannot waste the food as each basket of dim sum wasted will be charged RM3. Among our dim sum selection were the followings :

Siew Mai

Prawn dumpling

Yam dumpling

Black pepper dumpling

Shark fin dumpling (with corn and prawn filing)

Mushroom dumpling

Steamed chicken herbal

Sweet chicken feet

Steamed pork rib

Fried prawn roll dipped into mayonise

Fried dumpling dipped into mayonise

6 egg tarts (the egg tart is quite small but you can eat as many as you can)

Century egg porridge (quite small bowl)

Fried carrot cake with bean sprout, egg and vegetable

Char siew chee cheong fun

We ate 20 selections so that our money worthwhile spent but I can't remember all of them. I took a few photos only as after our stomach full, we started to slow down and order one by one to make sure that we able to finish the food without wasting.

There were also glutinous rice (lo ma kai) and char siew pow, pandan pow but we didn't eat that because it will make us full very fast. I can say that the dumplings, chee cheong fun and steamed pork rib were so so only but the yam dumpling, steamed herbal chicken, sweet chicken feet, fried prawn roll, fried dumpling, egg tart, fried carrot cake, century egg porridge tasted ok.

We were very full, we didn't eat our lunch after the dim sum buffet. We came as early as 9 am but were served with food only at 9.25am. At first we are the only customer there but in the end there were 7-8 tables occupied. The restaurant also selling mini claypot dishes at only RM9.90 like claypot assam stingray, curry fish, slice fish cook in variety ways, curry chicken, chicken, squid, pork, spare ribs, prawn, bean curd and vegetable cooked in variety ways, claypot braised duck and ginger duck. Maybe next time we will try the mini claypot dishes. The dim sum buffet start at 9 am in the weekend and public holidays and 10.30 am in the weekdays. There is parking fee of RM3 outside the restaurant, try to park far a bit and walk to the restaurant if you want to save the parking fee. This restaurant also doing wedding table.

We eaten dim sum buffet at Mandarin Palace located at Federal Hotel nearby Jalan Bukit Bintang but find it quite pricey compared to this time buffet. Our bill came out to be less than RM70 for 2 person after including the tea and those 10% service charge and 6% government tax not including parking fee RM7. The dim sum buffet price is RM25 per person. My husband still prefer the Federal Hotel dim sum buffet as there were char siew meat, roasted pork, duck meat and vegetarian duck meat.

Nowadays I prefer to eat nearby my residential area as there is cost of travelling to the city to eat. I always go through groupon advertisement to look for discount dining but most of them is located quite far from my residential area and located at shopping mall in the city. I have yet to find a discount dining through groupon advertisement that was nearby my place. So far only purchase one groupon to buy organic bread at organic shop at Tesco Extra, Cheras very nearby my residential area.

STAY-AT-HOME-DAD (DAD'S LOVE, PART 1)

2011-07-10T01:00:00.003+08:00

It has been a week since my husband become stay-at-home dad. He resigned from his high pressure job in Ipoh to take care of my daughter who is slow in development because the first five years are critical years for a child development. His position as a Head of Department was not easy, the factory technicians was not easy to control, the machines was not stable and breakdown all the time, long working hours make him cabut from his job after six months. He told me that his heart was heavy most of the time and the job will shorten his life span. I don't bother much since he said his passive income from rental of his property can cover the family expenses. There is no more house and car installment to take care of, so he can throw away his rubbish job and opt to be self-employed and become freelance.

My quality of life dropped tremendously when he worked at Ipoh. I didn't have enough sleep most of the time as I had to tend to my daughter after work and also did housework. After delivery of my daughter my weight stay at 51kg but in six month when he was working at Ipoh, my weight drop to 46.8kg. I didn't have to go to slimming course or gym or diet, overwork will automatic reduce my weight. I was too busy and don't have much time for myself. I felt tired most of the time when I went to work, I napped during my lunch time.

After my husband back home and become stay-at-home dad, I feel that there is increase in my quality of life. I have enough sleep and more energetic at work. My weight increase to 48.4kg only after one week my husband stay at home. I have more time in the morning before going to work to choose the food that I like to eat for breakfast, I eat more, do less housework, more time to rest that make my weight increase.

Quality of life is not material based, if you can be thrifty and satisfy with that the only much you have, you will not be desperate chasing money to satisfy your material need. Financially literate is important, avoiding bank loan that eat up a big chuck of your salary especially housing loan and car loan that charged you interest. In the end you are working to feed the bank. When I was young, I was inclined to take housing loan and car loan, eventually I learn my lesson, I settled them off before I was 30 years old. That is lesson number one.

Lesson number two, find alternative investment rather than placing your money in the bank. The bank give you low interest on your fixed deposit, again bank is an enemy to your wealth. I started to learn about foreign currency fixed deposit in the bank, my own company product that invested a variety of funds and property investment and rental from my husband. Without bank loan and bank installment, you can invest your saving in those investments, create passive income a few years once, in the end you have enough passive income to retire early.

The only lesson number three I have yet to learn as I do not want to take risk for the moment is that take loan from the bank to invest, maybe in property, that sound much more smarter than the first two lessons that is using other people money to create your own wealth. Those are for risk-takers, their pocket are empty, why not take risk, if I win I become rich, if I lose I become bankrupt since now also I penniless, they have nothing to lose.

Like the old man gambler, they are old already, life is short, so they don't carelah, they buy numbers like Toto, if they strike, they become rich, if they not strike, continue to become like thatlah....

PRE-CHINESE NEW YEAR HOLIDAYS (MOTHER'S LOVE) PART 5

2011-02-01T22:51:00.004+08:00

It has been more than a week my husband work at Ipoh. I learned to cope by myself with my daughter here without a maid. My Indon maid had ran away more than 2 months ago and unable to get a replacement. Eventually I got used to it without her and I started to set a routine after my husband work at Ipoh. The routine is must sleep at 10 pm during working day so that I have enough sleep and energy to work tomorrow. Bring my daughter back from my in-law house, feed her with her supplements, take my bath, I have to take my bath with bathroom door open to monitor my daughter. Then wipe my daughter, brought her to bathroom to shi-shi. Then change her cloth to pyjama and change her diaper also. Around 9pm or later feed her with milk.

If my daughter has not sleep, I just left the light on and let her play around the bedroom. My sister in-law has been very helpful, most of the time she will bring my daughter for a walk before sending her back to my house during working day. I go back first to my house and settle some housework like doing laundry, then my sister in-law will send my daughter back after a walk.

Today is a pre-chinese new year holiday, Wilayah Persekutuan holiday, this is how I spend my day. Brought my daughter to Yulek market with trolley and had my breakfast. Then went back, hang to dry my clothes after laundry and bath my daughter. Then cook porridge for my daughter, sometimes I use serbuk ikan bilis for the flavour, add onion oil, oyster sauce, soya sauce and salt. Then I steamed fish (white prompet) for lunch, put the white prompet on the a plate, put cut ginger, fried onion, oyster sauce and soya sauce. Put to steam at rice cooker for around 5 minutes, I did not cook the rice, just cook the water. Then I fried garlic and put in on top of the fish together with the oil. After that I put rice wine on the top of the fish and it is ready to serve. I ate the fish without rice but my daughter ate most of the fish. I drank Milo and ate oat biscuit also for lunch.

My brother in-law also has been very helpful driving me to HUKM for my daughter follow-up, speech, fisio and occupational therapy, must give big ang pow to him this Chinese New Year. He also offered to help me to cut the lock of my Yulek flat tomorrow because my tenant did not pass the key to me after she move out. I unable to find a spare key for the lock of my Yulek flat.

I don't feel difficult without my husband with a lot of helping hands in the family. Few days before Chinese New Year holidays give me the taste of being homemaker. After Chinese New Year my husband aunty will become my daughter babysitter, she will be at my in-law house when I am working and follow me back home in the evening. Life will be easier then.

I am working on my father's passive income, flat and shop apartment rental. Eventually it will become my passive income in future. My husband also agree to give me allowance if I am not working after his job stabilised in Ipoh. It give me a big relieve as working is no more compulsory but optional. I am looking forward to Ipoh, nearer to my hometown, Penang, a new place, a new life and a new beginning.....

WEEKEND WITH DAUGHTER (MOTHER'S LOVE) Part 4

2010-09-26T13:38:00.003+08:00

After my daughter's heart operation due to Atrial Septal Defect, most of my weekend is spent at home. I have cut my eating out, friday night I will plan the weekend lunch menu for the family. I also felt that it is a waste of money to eat out and I also want to save back my money after the hefty hospital bill.

On Thurday I will go to the night market nearby my house to buy fresh fish and vegetable for the weekend. Why want to waste money to eat steam fish at restaurant when we can steam a fresh fish at home with very little time for less than RM10? Can also buy a bunch of vegetable for RM1 to make a vegetable dish like fried vegetable. For soup I will use chicken bone which I bought it at the market nearby my house for only RM1 where I used it to make different type of soup including herbal soup. So for weekend lunch for 3, it will cost only less than RM10.

I tried buying economy dish for lunch but find it too little and not enough to eat which make me still hungry after the lunch. It seem that cooking our own meal more economical where we have bigger portion of fish or meat and vegetable to eat. The soup is also more nutritious where the meat from the chicken bone can be shredded from the bone for my dog food.

For my daughter meal, sometimes will prepare carrot and potato porridge, in the afternoon will prepare banana milk shake where I blendered banana with my daughter's milk and put honey in it. Sometimes will buy taufufah and put honey in it for her to eat.

Weekend routine.

Morning - Go to market to buy breakfast and sundry. After coming back, read English and Malay newspaper while monitoring my daughter at home. My daughter will be sleeping and crawling on the floor.

Afternoon - Have lunch. Checking email and surfing internet. Seldom have the opportunities to do it in the weekdays as I do not have my own computer and my husband occupy his notebook most of the time. That is the reason I seldom blog nowadays or active in facebook. Somemore have to sleep early to work tomorrow, if I am tired, will drink a small cup of DOM before sleep or else will drink Anlene if not tired. And sometimes go to Tesco to buy grocery.

So how you all spend your weekend?

PANTAI HOSPITAL CHERAS Antenatal Class

2010-08-01T18:15:00.001+08:00

One boring afternoon on 10th July, no activity, I called Pantai Hospital Cheras to reserve a place for its antenatal class. As I called on the day the class was held, they told me that there was no more seats for the class. But since Pantai Hospital Cheras is within walking distance from my house, I did went there and they just allowed me to attend the class.

There was quite many couple with their wife pregnant attended the class. The topic of the class was Delivery & Labour Process, Breastfeeding, The Wonder of Stem Cell by StemLife, Baby Bathing and Nutrition During Pregnancy by Dumex.

They were generous with their refreshment with fried rice, sweet malay kuih and plastic glass of mixed fruits like red and green apple, grapes and etc. There were 5 OSIM pillows massager to be won and I am the second participant to win the pillow massager by answering their simple question why durian is no good for pregnancy. I have been proactive to pick up my hand and answered that durian is full of carbohydrates and sugar and no good for pregnancy. The pillow massager was sponsored by Dumex who gave talk about nutrition during pregnancy.

After the talk, we were given goody bag that consisted of the above gifts. So Great Eastern also sponsored the class with baby bib, I love Dad. We were also given a complimentary baby book where I saw MPH bookshop sell it for RM18.

I am quite happy bringing home the gifts given.

MY DAUGHTER'S FIRST BIRTHDAY (MOTHER'S LOVE) Part 3

2010-07-11T10:48:00.014+08:00

Birthday girl in new dress

Last 2 weeks I have celebrated my daughter's first birthday following the chinese lunar calendar although her actual birthday is on 9-7-2010. I became a member of King's Confectionery for RM20 where I can buy their cake for 50% discount. So I bought 2 half kilo cake for less than RM40, one was cheese cake and another one was forest fruit cake.

Beside that my in-law have prepared ang-ku, fried chicken wings, fried mihun, curry egg stuffed with meat, glutinous rice, curry chicken and red eggs.

That friday also I discovered my daughter had ASD (Atrial Septal Defect, jantung berlubang) from HUKM hospital. My daughter had numerous follow up at HUKM hospital due to her development delay and most of the time is my husband who brought her to follow up at the hospital. My husband told me that he need to change job as his current job is not stable, if his company listed in share market in Japan, they will close down the plant that did not generate profit.

He might be applying a job that need him to travel outstation for 3 months and be home around a week. He might also be applying a job at Ipoh where he will come back in the weekend. I am been worrying how I am going to cope with my daughter's hospital appointments as the hospital had arranged many early intervention programs for her like physiotherapy, child development and etc. My husband suggested me to resign if he got a high-paying job that need him to work outstation but I don't like the idea of losing my job. I guess only people who have children and parent who have a lot of hospital appointments will feel like how I feel now, not enough leave to cope with the hospital appointments.

It is not the worst of the problem, we don't have house or car installments to worry about or money problem with the ASD treatment. ASD problem can be solved with money by having the treatment, I got even stressed out about the down syndrome and congenital hypothyroidism which will cause mental retardation which even money can't solve the problem. I know even ASD problem will be a big problem for poor family that can't afford the treatment.

I celebrated my daughter's first birthday in a simple way, only between our close family members. Happy Birthday to you, my daughter.... with love from mum...

to be continue.....

FANTASY MORNING MILLIONAIRE

2010-06-24T23:41:00.010+08:00

One fine weekend morning, I have a planned weekend, drove to my office and park my car there. Then I took a bus to the heart of the city to attend a seminar on how to create passive income.

I did my homework with enthusiasm to list all my income, expenses, assets and liabilities as requested. When I arrived, there were many people like me who is as enthusiasm as me to attend the seminar. When we registered, we have to sign a disclaimer form that we have to take full responsibilities on the products purchased through recommendation of this seminar.

The speaker was as enthusiasm as us, I can say she is a good speaker but after a while I got tired sitting listening to her physchology talk. She was telling her childhood story and a few successful people story. I left the room around 11 am and while taking the lift down, there was 2 aunties and one uncle inside the lift. They asked me wheather I am going home and the uncle said he had signed up the property club package that cost him around RM2k plus, the aunties got excited and invited him for a drink at kopitiam cafe in the building. I joined them as I also want to know about the property club package. They ordered drinks and as thrifty as usual, I did not ordered mine.

He told us that in this seminar they will expose to us money making instruments in the market. About the property club seminar, he said he was in the real estate and want to learn more about properties, so he signed up the package. He said they teach how to borrow money from bank or relatives to buy properties. There were group of people who is also the club member will meet up in regular basis to discuss how to make money from properties.

I asked did the package help him to earn money through properties, he said they did recommend properties for him to invest like London property. I asked him how about managing the property like selling and renting it out, he said they will do everything for us. But he did not said wheather he did invest in this overseas property. He told us that the package is not worthwhile the money spent. I think it is some sort of entertainment for uncle like him where through this club he can widen his social friends.

One aunty said, "I am so disappointed that I come all the way to hear all these craps, you know I have to send my son in the morning to somewhere else just to attend this seminar. It seem like a physchology and motivation seminar. "

Then the aunty said again, "I thought they will teach us something about properties. Maybe they will teach us something as they ask us to bring calculator."

"Are you going back home?" they asked me.

"I have to go back as I have baby at home."

I went up to the room again but now the people were outside the room as they were having a break now. I tried to ask the staff about the content of the program afterwards but they asked me to ask other staffs and they also not sure of the program. I remember the speaker said in 2 days she will mirror us, make us do the things that we are uncomfortable to do so that we can come out from our comfort zone to achieve success. At last I decided to leave.

When I reached home I have to eat outside as I have not planned the lunch menu for that day. As I know the property seminar teach us to borrow money from the bank to buy property and rent it out, the excess in difference is our passive income. But they teach us to play it big like borrow a lot of money (in millions) to buy property to create 5 figures passive income a month. Maybe your income just too small for the bank to borrow you a lot of money. How if you unable to find tenants when the economy is bad to rent your expensive shop lots? You will be in great debt!

It is not my game, I only can play it small first buying cheap property like flat with my own money and get rental which return is much better than the bank. And it is also a hard work like searching for property in advertisements, acquire the property, painting the flat, about looking for tenants, can get the help from real estate agents. The process look more real, their method is unrealistic to me, maybe they only can make me day dreaming like a fantasy morning millionaire.

On Sunday I continue my routine, planning for lunch menu and porridge menu for my baby.

MOTHER'S LOVE (PART 2) FREE STORY BOOKS

2010-03-29T21:51:00.009+08:00

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Hi everyone and to all the mums that I knew...

I want to develop my daughter's intellectual in future, so I visit bookshops searching for children story books. To my surprise it is priced so high that I can barely afford them. Most of the books is priced more than RM20-RM30, maybe because they come from overseas and after the exchange rate with our low value of ringgit, we have to pay a lot of ringgit to get a book. Now I am wondering wheather I earn enough and it seem book is a luxury to me. I read everything that come free like newspaper and magazines which my father in-law is a newspaper agent but I still need children story books to develop my daughter's vocabulary.

I regreted I gave away a lot of my English story books (including Enid Blyton story books, just can't remember how I got them, couldn't be possible I bought them as I was poor during my childhood) to a bookshop owner in exchange of exam books because the bookshop owner want to dispose his exam book as my year is the last year of the same syllabus. I was poor during my childhood, so I exchange my story book to get exam books so that I don't have to buy them.

I got to know that there is a bookshop at Level 3, Amcorp Mall, Petaling Jaya named BookXcess that that sell books cheaper from The Star newspaper. Maybe one day I drop by to the bookshop to have a look. Kindly visit their website at www.bookxcess.com

Thanks to The Star newspaper I read one day where I got to know a website where I can download children English stories and poems for free. The website address is
www.sharing-books.com

See, I printed out the story and make it a book. Stick the first page with gum to a cardboard to make the front cover and back page to cardboard also to make back cover. Punch two holes and use ribbon to tie them up, now you got a handmade children story book!

Hope the ideas will help those mums who find children story books is too pricey and would like to make the story books themselves. Sometimes bringing the children to library is also too time consuming and the library might not be near the house. And to those who is kind and generous who wish to donate their unwanted children story books to me, can drop me an email at edennayuen@yahoo.com Thanks a lot for your generousity :)

MAHKOTA CHERAS CLAYPOT FISH

2010-03-21T14:19:00.009+08:00

Like dishes in claypot? Then you all should try dishes at Restoran Wang Hee at Mahkota Cheras. One of the specialty food in that restoran is the claypot fish, it is cooked with wine and served in the claypot. This claypot fish cost around RM26. Other dishes we ordered was herbal chicken in claypot, claypot tofu, fried vegetable with chilly belacan and chilly cuttlefish (the taste is sweet and sour.)

I can rate that the claypot fish and the claypot herbal chicken taste good. The claypot tofu taste good also but the fried chilly belacan vegetable and the chilly cuttlefish taste average only. On overall nothing to complained about the food there.

The total bill for all this dishes with drinks and 6 plates of white rice for 6 adults and 2 small children is around RM120.00. Though the price is not that expensive but the portion of the food is not that much also. I went back feeling not very full after having that dinner.

MAKING MONEY WITH INVESTMENT-LINK POLICY

2010-02-23T20:46:00.003+08:00

Would like to share with you all how to make money using investment-link policy. You have to buy a single premium investment-link policy (Supreme Growthlink Insurance) from Great Eastern, if you are the company staff, you will get 100% allocation and if you buy from agent, you will only get 95% allocation. It is ok to buy from agent if he can help you to make money from this policy but the agent want you to surrender this policy after he help you to make certain amount of money and buy this policy again so that he can make a fresh commission again. Of course, if you want his expertise, you have to let him earn some commission.

Of course I will explain to you all how to make money from this policy free of charge. All you all have to do is follow up my blog. One method of making money using this policy is switching from one fund to the other fund. To play this switching game, you must have 2 funds (that mean 2 platforms, one is safe platform and the other one is more dangerous platform.) The safe platform is fixed income fund where the price do not fluctuate much and the more dangerous platform is progressive fund where the price fluctuate more. Our aim is on this progressive fund because the more the price fluctuate, there is more opportunities of making money. Switching is based on bid to bid price, so you will not suffer bid and offer price difference lost.

Let say my initial investment is RM20,000 where I placed RM5,000 to buy 2,672.37 fixed income units at RM1.871 per unit price. I placed my RM15,000 to buy 8090.61 units progressive fund at RM1.854 per unit price. Of course there is one time management fee of RM100 for this policy. Don't bother of the insurance charges because it is very little for this policy and you can choose a minimum sum assured of coverage.

Let say I switch out 8090.61 units from progressive fund at RM1.766 (RM14,88.02) to fixed income fund and buy 7,986.59 units at RM1.789. The first switch of the year is free of charge and subsequent switch is RM25. So each transaction that make money will involve 2 switchs, one switch out from progressive fund into fixed income fund when the price of progressive fund is up (because we have more money from the progressive fund when the price of progressive fund is up to buy more fixed income units) and switch into progressive fund from fixed income fund when the price of progressive fund is down so that the money can buy more units in the progressive fund when the price of progressive fund is down. So make sure you make more than RM50 for these transactions.

Let say I switch out all the fixed income units (including the units I bought initially with my RM5,000, that is 10,602.23 units at RM1.795 (RM19,031.00) to progressive fund and bought 10,937.36 units from progressive fund at RM1.740. You see the price of the progressive fund drop from RM1.766 to RM1.74 where I bought in additional progressive fund units (switch in). So let us check roughly the gain of the transactions, the initial units in progressive fund is 8090.61, I already increase my progressive units to 8211.14 (make the calculation simple, RM14,288.02 divide RM1.74 with disregard of some money I make when switch out my fixed income units at RM1.795.) 8211.14 units minus 8090.61 units is 120.53 units, that mean I make extra 120.53 units times RM1.74, I am making extra RM209.72 out from my switching fee RM50.00.

Ok, this is only initial switching and I am not going to elaborate further as it will take up much of my time as I am a working mother with limited of time. The principle is aim the progressive fund where the price will fluctuate more, when the progressive fund price up, switch out to fixed income fund and when the progressive fund down, switch into progressive fund to buy additional units. Fixed income fund is only a platform for you to do the switching.

There is a real example where this game earn around 48% return in one year plus (less than 1 and half year) after minus less than 100 switchs cost between the period (around 90 something switchs), the return around 41%. Even a fund manager cannot make such a good return right?

I think I want to start this game as it is more low risk than the share market and the New Zealand currency Fixed Deposit. Each transaction is only RM25 where share market buy sell cost is around 1.5% and the New Zealand currency buy sell exchange rate cost is 3%.

Of course I cannot guarantee you will not lose money and get a good return, the price up or down is based on the market trend and your luck also, I can only show you all how to make money with switching method using your investment link policy, you all have to monitor the price also. (You all can check the fund price at lifeisgreat.com.my website.) Good luck with your investment.

DRIED MEAT TASTING NEARBY PETALING STREET

2010-01-24T15:18:00.009+08:00

Chinese New Year coming, so went to Petaling Street to buy some dried meat before I go back to Penang. Those brands around are Loong Kee, Y. Chen Siang, Syarikat Kiew Brothers, Bee Cheng Hiang and Hock Seng Guan.

The first chicken dried meat I tasted when I arrived there was Hock Seng Guan. It was very delicious and after I tasted the rest of the chicken dried meat, I still prefered this one. When my mum came to KL the other day, she looked for Loong Kee and Syarikat Kiew Brothers chicken dried meat though I still think they are not the best. My husband said the dried duck meat at Syarikat Kiew Brothers tasted good also and they even have dried prawn meat. My husband always like to buy Y. Chen Siang dried pork meat.

At the end of the journey, I bought 100gm Hock Seng Guan dried chicken meat. Their price is slightly more expensive compare to the others, RM21.60 for 300gm dried chicken meat. My husband chose to buy 300gm Hock Seng Guan dried pork meat.

Although Hock Seng Guan is not as famous as other brand, after I taste its dried chicken meat, I still think it is the best. But its dried pork meat is too hard and I think Y. Chen Siang dried pork meat is better.

Dining at Cruise Tasik Putrajaya

2010-01-01T17:30:00.001+08:00

Dined at Cruise Tasik Putrajaya the other day with colleagues and the above was the pictures taken. I felt that the package is very expensive, RM102.00 per head where we sat in the cruise for around one and half hour while having our lunch. There was also not much selection of dishes and we were also given a door gift where inside contained a packet of twisties, a sweet corn flavour bun, a box of drinks, a bar of chocolate, a few sweets, 2 small puddings and a gift.

While cruising at Tasik Putrajaya, we able to see the government buildings and the mosques. Suitable for short family outing and it is more worthwhile to take passenger cruise, RM30 per adult. You can also take perahu dondang sayang at RM20 per adult. Anyway we just want the experience of cruising around Tasik Putrajaya.

MOTHER'S LOVE

2009-12-25T15:51:00.004+08:00

Everything started when I brought my baby to the government clinic nearby my house for injection. My baby was underweight for a few months, so the nurse there recommended me to go to Pusat Perubatan Premier PPUKM, Bandar Tasik Selatan for further check up. When I went there with my baby, the waiting time was long, eventually a malay woman doctor attended to us. She told me that the baby reaction was slow and she can't find the thyroid stimulating hormone report in my child health book. Then the clinic staff took my baby blood, they took more than half an hour to take my baby blood and it was very painful, my baby cried her heart out very loudly. On the way home, I scolded my husband for not collecting the thyroid stimulating hormone report from the maternity clinic where I gave birth to my daughter and now my daughter had to suffer a big pain for taking her blood to do the test again. After that we forgot about the report.

Our appointment was set next month and I returned again next month with the baby, my brother in-law drove me there as my husband went to Japan for 2 weeks. Again I have to wait for 2 hours and another malay woman doctor attended to me. She told me that the blood report showed my baby was diagnosed with congenital hypothyroidism with her thyroid stimulating hormone report showed 6.81. Anyway she said they unable to check Free T4 because they only able to collect my baby blood lyse. I was panic at first but the doctor told me that there is medicine to cure the illness and I don't have to worry too much. I wrote down congenital hypothyroidism word and the doctor gave me recommendation letter to HUKM for further check up.

I was quite worried, I asked the nurse over there how to go to HUKM and they told me there is a shuttle every hour from the clinic to HUKM. I told my brother in-law that I want to go to HUKM and asked him to drive my maid and baby back home. I took 12.30pm van shuttle to HUKM but the nurse over there unable to give me appointment as there is no doctor on that day that is Thursday and tomorrow is Awal Muharram holiday. The nurse took my recommendation letter, I asked her to photostate one for me and she said will call me to inform me of the appointment date. I left the hospital disappointed and took a bus outside the hospital back to Taman Maluri, from there I took another bus back home.

I have no computer at home as my husband took away his notebook to Japan and my in-law house computer was not working, I ended up in the cyber cafe nearby my house to check the congenital hypothyroidism illness. I was shock and got panic when I read about the illness and my baby already more than 5 months when she was diagnosed with this illness and now she was without medicine.

Congenital hypothyroidism (CH) is a condition of thyroid hormone deficiency present at birth. Approximately 1 in 4000 newborn infants has a severe deficiency of thyroid function, while even more have mild or partial degrees. If untreated for several months after birth, severe congenital hypothyroidism can lead to growth failure and permanent mental retardation. Treatment consists of a daily dose of thyroid hormone (thyroxine) by mouth. Because the treatment is simple, effective, and inexpensive, nearly all of the developed world practices newborn screening to detect and treat congenital hypothyroidism in the first weeks of life.

If she was diagnosed at birth, maybe there is 100% effectiveness of treatment but she was diagnosed after more than 5 months that make me really panic and don't really know what to do. I quickly emailed my husband and went back home to think of solution after half-an hour at the cyber cafe although I already paid for one hour usage. I quickly took my baby to Pantai Hospital nearby my house but they directed me to one of the paediatrics specialist clinic. Unfortunately the doctor did not want to accept my case as she will be going for holidays at overseas for a few months and her last day consultation was on Saturday. I went to emergency unit and the nurse told me that another paediatrics specialist will available only at 6.30pm. I was so panic and in mind I said I must save my daughter from mental retardation. I went back to my in-law house, my father in-law asked me not to go to Pantai Hospital and waited for my husband to come back from Japan, then only make decision. My brother in-law called his doctor friend and he told me that my daughter will be ok after taking the medicine to calm me down. My father in-law said there will be no difference if my daughter take the medicine today or a few days later.

I called the maternity clinic where I gave birth to my daughter to check for my thyroid stimulating hormone report. They told me that the test was normal. Then I called a private clinic where my baby always get treatment but nobody answered the call. That evening, although raining, I walked to the clinic as it was nearby my house as I knew it open from 7pm to 9.30pm but unfortunately it did not open as tomorrow is Awal Muharram holiday. I called the other paediatrics clinic attached to the maternity clinic where I gave birth to my daughter and they told me that they have the medicine. After that I planned to take my daughter to the private clinic nearby my house on Saturday (as it closed on public holiday) for further check up.

My husband called me that night from Japan told me that if this illness been treated within 3 months, the effectiveness of the treatment is 100% but if it is treated after 3 months up to 6 months, the baby IQ will drop to 78. The IQ for normal people is 90 to 110. If it was treated after 6 months, there will be permanent mental retardation. I can't sleep the whole night thinking of the illness. Tomorrow morning my husband called again asking me to quickly bring my daughter to Pantai Hospital for check up as it was only 3 weeks before my baby reach 6 months old.

I quickly brought my baby to Pantai Hospital on 18-12-2009, that was Awal Muharram holiday and there was no paediatrics specialist on that day. I went to the emergency unit, the nurse said why I have not come yesterday at 6.30pm where there is paediatrics specialist. I said I was very confused yesterday and my father in-law asked me not to go to Pantai Hospital. The emergency medical officer said that I was very narrow minded only thinking that my daughter was diagnosed with congenital hypothyroidism when in actual fact that she might be diagnosed with other illness. I said that this illness cannot wait as she was diagnosed with this illness too late already and I need to give her medicine as soon as possible. The young medical officer said the blood taken by the Pusat Perubatan Premier PPUKM, Bandar Tasik Selatan is only blood lyse. He said I will not listen to him in this panic situation and if I want my daughter to be checked by specialist I have to admit my daughter. He even told me that if I admit my daughter the blood test will not be out today as today is a public holiday. I asked for his advice, he asked me wheather my daughter has medical insurance as the hospital require RM2,000 to admit my daughter to the hospital. I bought a group dependent medical insurance from my company (yearly premium RM146.65) but the insurance is not inforce for more than 30 days yet. He advised me to take the blood test today and come tomorrow to take the blood test report. If the diagnosis is confirmed, I can see the paediatrics specialist tomorrow and get the medicine. So I followed the doctor advice and the doctor took my daughter's blood. This time my daughter did not cry a lot, just cry a little while and the blood already been taken. I went back to my in-law's house and asked my brother in-law to drive me to maternity clinic. The maternity clinic upstair open on the Awal Muharram holiday but downstair not open. I took the thyroid stimulating hormone report from upstair maternity clinic and the report showed normal. I went to Pantai Hospital again to show the doctor the report and the doctor said what is important is the blood test report taken today.

In the afternoon I brought my maid and daughter to Leisure Mall to release my tension. The next day I went to the hospital at 9 am to collect the report and the report show normal. I felt a big release, my husband called me and I told him the result. He told me that he has no appetite to eat and unable to sleep. He came home on Saturday night and planned to take my daughter to see Hospital Pantai paediatrics specialist on Monday.

Mum love you, will try mum best to save you from any illness.

OCBC MIGHTY SAVERS PROMOTION

2009-11-17T20:28:00.002+08:00

What is the bank latest promotion? I think OCBC has an attractive promotion for couple with children. On every first weekend of the month, Saturday and Sunday, from 10am-3pm, couple can come to one of the OCBC branch, Main Head Office in KL, Ampang, Kepong, Subang Jaya, Bukit Damansara, Petaling Jaya, Puchong and Klang to open mighty saver account for your children and enjoy generous 4% per annum interest rate on 3 month Fixed Deposit.

The minimum and maximum placements per customer are RM10,000 and RM50,000, the fund must be a fresh fund outside OCBC account, husband can make a maximum placement of RM50,000 and wife can make another placement up to maximum RM50,000 provided both of them open mighty saver account for their children, that mean one account with husband as a guardian and the other account with wife as a guardian.

To obtain the red mighty saver coinbox, you have to place at least RM1,000 in your child Mighty Savers account for 3 months or else you can opt to place only RM200 in your child mighty saver account and you will get only the wristband, sticker and Mighty Savers Sticker Card.

You can ask your children to stick all the stickers on the Mighty Savers Card and return it to the OCBC bank with a saving of RM20 in your children Mighty Saver account and OCBC bank will give your children an encouragement gift.

On the first weekend of the month, you can also bring your children to the bank to have fun as there is a mascot coming to the bank on Satuday of the weekend. This entertainment for your children is also free, if you bring your children to other playground center, you have to pay subtantial entrance fee.

I find that this promotion is very attractive, even better than the New Zealand foreign currency Fixed Deposit which earn me interest only around 4% plus per annum, somemore with exchange rate risk. Only that the fixed deposit term offered is too short that is 3 months only. Next month this promotion is still on.

aquaria KLCC

2009-11-15T12:57:00.015+08:00

Went to aquaria KLCC yesterday and these are the photos taken. Now we can use touch and go card to pay for the entrance ticket. Though there are reptilia and insects display but the main attractions is the big fish, shark and the big turtle. There is also a show showing professional feeders feed the fishes, big turtle and the sharks.

Find that the entrance ticket of RM28 is quite expensive, very fast we can finish seeing all the fishes, sharks and big turtle in the aquariums.

GREAT EASTERN MALL

2009-11-14T10:05:00.016+08:00

Great Eastern Mall

Great Eastern Life Assurance office

Baby room

Kidsports & Gym

AtHome

Lovely Lace

Southern Pottery

One boring Saturday afternoon I took my baby to Great Eastern Mall. I felt very comfortable window shopping at this mall because there was not many people with a lot of space to push my daughter stroller throughout the mall. There is also a baby room for family who want to feed their babies.

OCBC bank is located at Great Eastern Mall to facilitate the Great Eastern Life Assurance Company staffs to withdraw their salary. At the right hand side of the mall is Great Eastern Life Assurance office.

Marie France Bodyline slimming centre also located at Great Eastern Mall. And for book lovers, we have MPH bookstores. There is 2 Japanese restaurants in the mall, Daidomon and Kiku-Zakura. Other restaurants are Penang Village and The Chicken Rice Shop. And for snacks and cafe, we have Delifrance, 1901 Hot Dog (which offer hot dog at RM1.99 on every 19th of the month), Starbucks coffee and O'Briens Irish Sandwich Bar. There is also a food court at the third floor of the mall.

And for fashion, we have British India and Zang Toi. For bedding, we have Aussino. Those who wish to buy gifts for this coming Christmas, you can have a look at Lovely Lace and Hallmark.
Guardian and Watson are located there for toiletries and personal care. There is also beautiful shop for home decor which I took pictures above, AtHome and Southern Pottery.

You can also drop your kids at Kizsports & Gym or accompany your children to play there . For optical, there is England Optical. There is also a petshop called Pets Wonderland. For supermarket, we have Cold Storage at the lower ground floor. For children toys, we have Toycity.

I felt that Great Eastern Mall is a very suitable shopping mall for family with children and baby because there is not many people and the family can shop with least hassle. This shopping mall is very different from other bigger shopping malls that are more busy like Suria KLCC, KL Pavilion, Sungei Wang and Berjaya Time Square which are more suitable for young people.

Though the things there is quite expensive and I can only afford to do window shopping, I enjoy myself very much as I like the environment, comfort and luxury there.

Great Eastern Mall where family with children and baby hangs out.

NEW ZEALAND CURRENCY UP AGAIN!

2009-10-25T13:33:00.004+08:00

After a long wait for more than one year, at last the New Zealand currency up again. So I redeemed my OCBC New Zealand FD and got overall 4% plus interest per annum, almost double the normal FD rate. I felt not worthwhile due to the risk of the foreign currency where there was one time the rate drop to 1.90 (selling rate), if you redeem, you will get much lower rate. So the risk is more than the return, not going to buy again unless the rate drop to the lowest 1.90 again. Still remember many years ago, when ringgit depeg, the New Zealand currency drop to the lowest 2.25 and during financial crisis last year, it drop even lower 1.90. I think it is too much risk to take when compare to the return.

Summore the interest rate of New Zealand foreign currency also already drop to 2%, almost same as our normal FD interest rate. This time I redeem my foreign currency FD with no excitement, not like last time when I earn around RM500 in less than one month when the rate went up above my buy in rate. I bought is at 2.4885 and sold it at 2.529. This time I bought it at 2.4923 and sold it after 15 months for 2.501.

That is how the interest is calculate. When you bought it at 2.4923 for 10,000 New Zealand Dollar, your investment is RM24,923. After 15 months, your New Zealand dollar together with your interest add up to around 10,505.97, for example. You sold out at 2.501 and got back your ringgit RM26,275.43. Your profit is the difference, RM1352.43. To calculate your annual return of your investment, you divide RM1352.43 with 15 months, your duration of investment. You got around RM90.16 per month and times with 12 (1 year have 12 months) and you got RM1,081.94. You use RM1081.94 to divide with your initial investment RM24923 and times 100,you got around more than 4 % of interest return on your investment.

So this is the second lesson I learn from the New Zealand currency investment, it is not worth the risk to take compare to the return. Will buy again when the rate drop to the lowest, maybe 1.90. A few years back, the lowest rate after ringgit depeg is 2.25. Of course earn fast money like earning RM500 in less than a month is more excited than earning the interest after a long wait of 15 months, seeing the rate drop to the lowest 1.90, creating fear that we might lose our money.

My father told me, "Imagine how much I will earn if I buy in at 1.90 that time."

I told him, "Don't be greedy, we consider lucky that we don't have to wait for too long for the currency to up again and lose our money."

I also sold my foreign currency FD at Public Bank when the New Zealand currency went up to 2.60 and I sold it at 2.52 when I bought at 2.57. I still earn interest more than 4% per annum as I have place the FD for quite sometime. Just left the last one at Hong Leong bank in Penang, unable to redeem because the FD is placed in Penang and have to go back to redeem at Penang, no worry that one can lose money as it was placed a few years back during ringgit depeg cause the compound interest for a few years able to overcome the drop of the rate. I felt this time is the best time to redeem the New Zealand foreign currency FD as the rate already gone up to 2.60 and I only seen it gone up to 2.65 once, a very rare condition.

So I can consider myself lucky for not losing money and still can earn some interest better than normal FD but I will not take risk again as it is just not worthwhile the return I get. Of course investment is not as excited as gambling where I got fast money in less than one month. In fact I intend to gamble and in the end I got stuck when the rate drop. Now I have to thank the god for making the rate up again and I cannot expect for more.

ALEX THOMPSON AND WASIU OLABODE EBAY BUYER SCAM AGAIN

2009-09-27T08:03:00.002+08:00

I received an email thanking me for my post in my blog "RM448 scam lesson" on October 2008 for saving an ebay seller from being scammed by a fake ebay buyer named Alex Thompson.

Here is the email contents :

ACER Aspire 4736G 4GB RAM, 320GB HDD, T6500 for sale

Hi Cindy,

I am trying to sell my laptop on ebay... and this is what happen... (email below) I am working in a bank and was wary about money laundering and scam. I do a search on the internet and read your blog.

Alex Thompson and Wasiu Olabode

I guess i have to thank you for posting the blog.

Hi Alex,

I have checked with DHL and the cost for sending this notebook to AZ, USA is SGD170. Total amount incl. shipping will be SGD1,000.

You ok with it?

Thanks for your mail, I will like to inform you that i want the item to be send to USA you can go and send the item by fedex or dhl or register mail post office is safe and secured, so I want you to calculate the total cost all together with the shipment cost to USA and your full Bank information so that I will able to process with the payment fast...

here is my son address below...

Name.....Wasiu Olabode
Address...16640 N. Ridge Rock Trial
City... Catalina,
State....AZ.
Zip Code... 85739
Country..United State Of American

and i want you get back to me with your full Bank detail here below...

Holders Account Name;
Account Number:
Bank Name:
Telephone Number:

Hope to hear from you soon.

Thanks

Hi Alex,

sending laptop to europe/usa could be costly as I mentioned. also, there may be sale tax of 7% GST involved. If you dont mind, i'll charge you sgd150 extra for sending this item to your address. will certainly enclose the change in the form of cash if there is any. Deal?

item cost: sgd830

est. postage & sales tax: sgd150 (will be refunded based on actual cost)

total: sgd980.00

If you agree, pls provide your address for receiving this item. I'd prefer you to do a wire transfer to my account. Agree?

But i dont mind, just tell me how much including the shipment cost and I will pay you.

Hope to hear from you soon.

hi alex

Thank for your interest

I am sorry to turn you down knowing that it's a gift from a loving father to his beloved son.
It'll be too costly and fragile to send the laptop from singapore to u.s.a./uk

take care

Hello Seller, I'm Thompson Alex from United Kingdom am here interseted in buying your item for my son who is in U.S.A, if is available for sale get back to me vai email me at(thompsonalex36@gmail.com) let me know how many of this item you have available for sale..

So far I received 2 emails (including this email) from Singapore ebay seller thanking me for my post in my blog regarding Alex Thompson and Wasiu Olabode . But beware, he might change his name and inpersonate as a generous ebay buyer again.

FOUR HAPPY SEASONS RESTAURANT

2009-09-25T21:06:00.020+08:00

Crispy Squid Ring

Braised Bean curd in claypot

Vietnamese Combination Fiesta
RM10

Vegetable of the day

Chinese BBQ Duck Spring Roll
RM10

Wok Fry Prawn in chili

Mix Combo Platter
RM15.80

Thai Fried Rice
RM11.80

Sizzling Homemade Tohu
RM10.00

Stir fry chicken

Went together with another 2 couple of my husband's friends with their children to Four Happy Seasons restaurant last sunday during hari raya holidays.

We ordered set dinner comprised of the following dishes for 5 pax at RM67.90.

Wok Fry Prawn in chili
Crispy Squid Ring
Braised Bean curd in claypot
Stir fry chicken
Vegetable of the day

We also ordered additional dishes, Vietnamese Combination Fiesta, Chinese BBQ Duck Spring Roll, Mix Combo Platter, Thai Fried Rice and Sizzling Homemade Tofu. They also gave us 4 cons of ice-cream (similar as Mcdonald ice-cream) after the dinner.

The bill came out around RM167 including drinks and taxes. Not cheap although they advertise in their namecard 5 stars restaurant 3 stars pricing. But the environment is good and I snapped the photo of their winter restaurant upstair where the temperature is below 15'C.

This restaurant is suitable for dating couple with its good environment and winter room. But in term of its food, I can rate them average only. For those who wish to bring their girlfriend to this restaurant, you can visit their website at :

http://www.4happyseasons.com/

There are promotional set lunch, 3 appetizer, main course, dessert and drink at a very attractive price (from RM7.90) in their menu. You can also see their other dishes and the price in their website menu. The address of the restaurant is No 9, Jalan Wangsa Delima 1A, Section 5, Wangsa Maju, 53300 Kuala Lumpur.

But I prefer to go to my favourite restaurant, Restoran Lucky Sin at No. 72G & 74G, Jalan 4/91, Taman Shamelin Perkasa, Cheras, 56100 KL. I find the promotional lunch there is more attractive which each dishes is only RM5.80 and the restaurant also did not charge 5% service charge and 10% government tax.

This is what I ordered for 4 persons :

2 bowls of sharkfin soup (RM9.90) each

Kam Heong prawn

Chicken in marmite sauce

Sweet and Sour pork
Tofu
Rice for 4 persons (RM1.50 each)
4 glass of tea (RM0.50 each)

The sharkfin soup and chicken in marmite sauce taste good and the total bill came to RM51.00 only. You must know how to order also so that you get the best food at a very reasonable price. You must order glass of tea and not tea upon headcount as tea upon headcount is more expensive (RM1 to RM1.50 per person). They also got promotional crab where 1 kg crab is RM22.90 cook in chilly sauce, pepper or salted egg. Now they have herbal chicken promotion during dinner time, one chicken for RM5 but you must dine in 3 persons and above. Their Buddha jump over the wall is RM29.90, also promotional price but the taste is not so good and I find it expensive also as it is only very small bowl.

Among the restaurant I visit, I always would like to return back to this restaurant Lucky Sin as I find the food taste good and the price is very reasonable also. But they did try to charge extra to the customer who is not familiar with this restaurant like charging tea based on headcount. There was one time we think that RM1.50 rice per head count is quite expensive and we come with big family members and ordered fried rice and fried mee hoon and they charged us RM20 for the fried rice and RM20 for the fried mee hoon which is much more expensive if we ordered rice based on headcount. They did try to charge extra while offering promotional dishes to attract customers to come to their restaurant.

I also ever went to a restaurant who also offered promotional set lunch at RM50 inclusive of rice and tea, we went there four person and the dishes are :

Sliced fish in sweet and sour sauce

Braised chicken in claypot

Fried vegetable

Delicious tofu

Soup of the day

I will not go back to the restaurant as we unable to choose the dishes we like from the promotional set lunch and the food menu is a very normal one and taste average only. I prefer the restoran Lucky Sin where we can choose the dishes we like and around this price we can have sharkfin soup as well. And around this price we can also have 1 kg of promotional crab and 3-4 promotional dishes where we can choose our dishes.

Sometimes I find doing food business is difficult, they must serve their customer good food with a very reasonable so that customer will find them generous and want to come back to their restaurant again.

ANSWER TO YENNIE'S QUESTION REGARDING MY POST "MY PREGNANCY AND CAESAREAN EXPERIENCE"

2009-08-13T23:05:00.003+08:00

One comment regarding my post "MY PREGNANCY AND CAESAREAN EXPERIENCE"

yennie said...

very informed article. Thank you very much for all information been provided. It really helping me a lot to know more about caesarean. however, any mind if u can tell me the maternity clinic name and where its located? Thank you very much.

The maternity clinic name is Cheras Specialist Maternity Centre, Klinik Wanita Cheras, Lai Women & Fertility Centre and my gynae is Dr. Eee Ching Woo. If you want to know more about this maternity clinic, type the name of this doctor, Dr. Eee Ching Woo using google search and you will find Mead Johnson Asia website forum with a lot of comments about this maternity clinic and its doctors practising there, positive and negative.

I hope this information is useful for those who opt for cheaper private maternity clinic. The normal delivery package is RM1880.00. Some advise me to give birth at hospital as hospital has better equipment and facility when come to critical condition like lost of too much blood during labour or caesarean. And the price of Pantai Cheras Medical Centre is more for the middle class. Recently I went to Pantai Cheras Medical Centre for my daughter OAE screening (hearing test) which cost me RM40, there was brochures at the hospital offering normal delivery package at RM1950.

This package included :

*Standard Four Bedded Room

*Delivery Procedure by O & G Consultant

*Hospital stay for 3 days & 2 nights inclusive of 3 meals & 2 beverages

*Newborn health screening inclusive of blood test for G6PD, TSH and Blood grouping

*Newborn vaccination by paediatrician comprising BCG, Hepatitis B & Vitamin K

Plus...

*Newborn hearing screening by their audiologist

*Postnatal exercise consultation by their physiotherapists (by appointment only)

Summore....

When your baby is born at Pantai Cheras Medical Centre, your baby will get Junior's Club Member Privileges until 12 years of age.

Membership privileges:

As mother, you will enjoy:

10% rebate on your next delivery at Pantai Cheras Medical Centre

*Operation Room
*Ward Room Rate (Excluding ICU)

As Junior's Club member, you will enjoy:

5% rebate (in & Out-patient) on:

*Pharmaceutical Drug Purchase
*Ultrasound Service

10% rebate (In & Out-patient) on

*Room Rate (excluding NICU< ICU & NNJ)
*X-ray Service
*Operation room

**At least 1 birthday Bash party for your child

This is what written on their brochure and I have never gave birth at the hospital, so the above are for your information only. Any further information, please call their PR & Marketing Department at 03-91322022 ext 3123/3124

And for Gleanegles Intan price, it is more for the upper class but I find that many people I know chosen to give birth at this best and well known hospital despite of the expensive price.

FULL MOON CELEBRATION

2009-08-11T22:00:00.000+08:00

small baby cot given by my husband's friend

silver colour baby cot

My baby girl already one month old and these was how I celebrate my baby full moon.

1)Gave out home made glutinous rice, fried chicken, red eggs and bought Ang Ku Kueh

2)For Malay colleagues, bought them Mcdonald burger with drinks and french fries

3)Print my baby photos using colourful printer, attached to a card and given out to my colleagues together with the food

Here I would like to thanks all my relatives, colleagues and friends who generously contribute ang paus, jewellery, clothing, toy, DOM, hamper, milk bottle, baby toiletries and some other baby stuffs.

I even have 3 baby cots (all is free), the one shown in the picture was taken by my brother in-law when he was shifting house and given to my husband. This baby cot was located at my upstair room, another small baby cot was given by my husband's friend and we located it at my in-law house. The third silver baby cot (looked like hospital bed) was digged out from my in-law's house (might be belong to one of my husband's nephew or niece) and placed at downstair of my house. There was another baby cot at my in-law's house, I think altogether should be 4 baby cots.

And for the maternity clothes, I received some from ex-colleague and sister in-law. I have been truly blessed by the stuffs received for me and my baby. And thanks again to those who have been generous and kind to me.

Cord Blood Donation

2009-08-08T05:36:00.003+08:00

Thanks to Caroline who leave a comment on my blog regarding my recent post "Cord blood banking The Once in A Lifetime Decision - To bank or not to bank?"

perhaps you can consider donating it.it may help save a life ! check out http://www.savethecordfoundation.org for completely unbiased information on cord blood banking and donation.

I got a lot of informations about cord blood banking and donation from this website. Unfortunately Malaysia do not have this kind of foundation, you can only donate your cord blood at no cost to the public cord blood bank at US. You have to make your decision before 34 weeks of your pregnancy so that you can complete the necessary paper for your cord blood donation. Of course you have to complete a medical questionnaire to be qualify for the cord blood donation. If your cord blood donation application approved, the public cord blood bank will send cord blood donation kit to you and the expectant mother has the responsibility to bring the cord blood donation kit to the birthing site. You also have to consult closely with the bank and your caregivers about the collection and transportation procedures.

There is also information about free or discounted banking available for families in need in the website that is more apply to US residents as their medical insurance do cover cord blood banking. They have more options, the public cord blood banks will charge their medical insurance over $25,000 for the release of a related donor cord blood collection. A family bank which offer charity programs to families with a case of medical need may not charge at all for the release of the collection, or may only charge for annual storage fees of about $125.

You may consider whether you are at high risk of premature delivery. Premature babies have much higher rates of cerebral palsy. At present a clinical trial is treating children with their own cord blood to ameliorate the symptoms of cerebral palsy and other newborn brain injuries. For this reason you may choose to bank in your baby cord blood as a very premature baby might experienced serious complications at birth.

Amanah Saham 1Malaysia

2009-08-06T23:40:00.002+08:00

Have intention to buy Amanah Saham Malaysia on 21 July but unable to make it because I am still in the confinement period. Only bought Amanah Saham Wawasan 2020 on 27 April. Fail to buy Sukuk bond that generate interest 5% per annum as apply too late.

No confident to buy Amanah Saham 1Malaysia because have not invested in this new fund before. Somemore my husband told me that he and his family members lost a lot of money buying also Amanah fund (maybe Amanah Saham Nasional) more than ten years ago make me somemore don't dare to buy. I dare to buy Amanah Saham Wawasan 2020 and Amanah Saham Malaysia as I already bought these funds long time ago. Dare to buy Sukuk as it is a Islamic bond that generate higher interest than bank and bond much safer than unit trust like Amanah Saham.

When got to know that Amanah Saham 1Malaysia not capital guaranteed andfrom 4 September 2009 onward, the Manager has the discretion to charge up to 1% sales charge of the amount invested, somemore don't dare to touch the fund. Now not even sure wheather Amanah Saham Malaysia and Amanah Saham Wawasan 2020 is capital guaranteed.

Now waiting for my New Zealand currency investment, my heart sank when the rate dropped to 1.90 and now it increased back to 2.38. If the rate did not increase to my level, just wait for the interest to compound, I believe I still have the time. Sometimes I think, can you trust ringgit? Will your money become small due to future inflation?

It seem that all the investment in the market look like scam...

Cord blood banking The Once in A Lifetime Decision - To bank or not to bank?

2009-08-06T22:30:00.004+08:00

When I attended pregnancy seminar, they also introduced me cord blood banking and I also very undecided on whether I should bank my baby's cord blood. I even checked with Hospital UKM through phone wheather they received donation of cord blood but the staffs there just directed me to the cord blood company. I asked my gynae and he told me that at the moment, our government hospital do not receive any donation of the cord blood as cord blood banking involve a high cost. So if we want to bank in the cord blood, we have go through the cord blood company and pay for the initial cost and the yearly maintenance cost.

At the pregnancy seminar, they discounted their enrollment fee from RM3250 to RM2,900 if you sign up immediately at the seminar and the annual storage fee is RM290.00. When I went for my caesarean at the maternity clinic, the promoter approached my husband and offered him RM1500 enrollment fee. But we did not sign up for the cord blood banking.

After that I came across a forum about cord blood banking and would like to share with those is very undecided on whether should bank the baby's cord blood.

Dear MamasPapas,

Am currently six months pregnant and am very undecided on whether I should bank my baby's cord blood. Heard so many opinions, mainly negative - especially most claims of cures are only tests in the lab, ie. no real life cases/untested. The positives gloryfying the choice to bank is of course from the promoters of the 3 companies in Malaysia.

Have done web searches and noted a lot of controversies and question marks surrounding it. Thus am in a dilemma, especially when the costs is so high.

Anyone having banked your baby's cord blood? What was the decision breaker?

The MamasPapas forum answered her:

There would be no answer of them being right or wrong. A few of my friends chooseto store their baby's cord blood and I did ask them, why? These chaps just said I got the $$$, phew!

Some of them don't even understand what cord-blood stem cells all about and blantly signed up for the service. In my blog, I did stressed that the primary reason that parents consider banking their newborn's cord blood is because they have a child or close relative with or a family medical history of diseases that can be treated with bone marrow transplants.

Hope my advice does help in your decision making.

Thanks for your insights.

After much deliberation, hubby and I have decided against banking our baby's cord blood.

Also read an article about a businesswoman who opened fertility treatment center and cord blood banking company in Passion magazine (magazine about rich people lifestyle) and this is what she said about cord blood banking, "It is better to have it though you may not need it than do not have it when you need it."

So the decision is yours... You all might be thinking that I am protecting my money, of course I have to think carefully because it involve quite a big money and long term payment of storage cost as I am not rich. But I did understand that money is only a FIGURE and do not have value if it is not used.

MY PREGNANCY AND CAESAREAN EXPERIENCE

2009-07-15T22:53:00.011+08:00

My pregnancy did came with its own problems. When I had my blood test, the maternity clinic nurse called me during my office hour that I need to visit the clinic earlier than my appointment date due to my blood test result. I was so worried that I called the clinic again and the nurse told me that my blood result showed my baby has high risk of down syndrome. I unable to concentrate with my work that whole day, visited the clinic and the doctor told me that not to worry so much as from the scanning, the baby don't seem like down syndrome baby, he advised me to do down syndrome test as my blood test show a very high risk, 1 in 50, 2% of down syndrome.

So I went to the clinic again on Saturday to do the amnio and the doctor's hand was very steady, not much pain when a long syringe was plunged through my tummy all the way to the womb to collect some amnio fluid. Although I have checked all the information about the blood test from the internet and it stated that the blood test is not accurate, I am still in a worry state. I felt guilty if in the end I have to abort my baby if it is confirmed down syndrome and my husband said I will not be able to handle the pressure of having a down syndrome baby.

The few days waiting for the result was the most depressing moment for me and I can hardly sleep properly at night. Called the clinic when the result did not come out in time. Went to clinic with my husband and the doctor called the lab but the result was not out yet. At last the clinic nurse called me during my office hour to tell me that my baby is normal. I was relieved and called my husband to inform him the result. The amnio test costed us around RM1800.00.

On my third trimester, there was another problem with my baby, she did not show a significant growth for around 4 weeks and the doctor said if continue like that, I have to give birth earlier than the due date. Somemore worst, my amnio fluid had drop to 6 something, the baby did not urine as much as she should be, the best level of amnio fluid is around 8 and if my amnio fluid drop to 5, I have to give birth immediately because the baby will not able to get enough nutrient and oksigen. The doctor sent me to do CTG to check the baby heartbeat and it showed that the baby heartbeat was ok, so the doctor said the baby still can wait for next visit which was on next Tuesday, he will make decision wheather to deliver the baby early. The CTG costed RM30.

Next Tuesday when I came back for the visit, the doctor checked my cervix and my cervix has not dilated, so he make decision to deliver my baby through caesarean on Thursday where my baby completed 38 weeks. Actually I planned to deliver my baby naturally with the help of epidural but my husband asked me to follow the doctor advice as he did not want to take risk on my baby.

On Thursday I went to the maternity clinic at 7 am, pushed to the operating ward and the anesthetic doctor inserted a needle in my hand, a bit pain and shot spinal anesthetic near the spinal cord, not painful. After that my half body went numb and the anesthetic doctor put in the urine tub, so not painful. When my doctor performed surgery, I asked the doctor to make the cut at my fibroid scar as my scar was very thick and ugly. The surgery started at 8.00am and at 8.40am the doctor already took out the baby and showed her to me. At 9.00am everything was completed and I was pushed back to the clinic room. I still felt numb and when the anesthetic went off I started to feel the pain. Around 3 something to 4 0'clock was the most painful period and they gave me painkiller pills at 4.00 o'clock. The nurse told me that my package which I signed up on third or fourth month of my pregnancy RM4180 for caesarean but they charged me extra RM100 for some complication procedure during the surgery covered 1 free painkiller shot on the first day of the surgery, the extra painkiller shot will cost RM80 each shot. Since I still can bear the pain, so I did not have the shot in the afternoon. At night I asked the nurse to give me the painkiller shot as I unable to sleep due to the pain. After I signed the package, I don't have to pay for the subsequent visits. This maternity clinic did not include lunch and dinner, so my husband had to bring fish porridge for me, they only provided me a cup of milo and 2 pieces of bread with butter for breakfast and a cup of milo plus 4 pieces of butter jacob cracker biscuits for tea time and supper.

When my husband's friend wife came to visit me, I asked her why she said her caesarean section was not painful and she told me that the hospital gave her glucose and morphine. She had her caesarean section at Pantai Hospital and her package is RM6,000 plus RM1,000 for her childcare. The consultation fee is RM80 but she had to buy vitamin pills, calcium and obimin from outside pharmacy. Mine they charged RM40 for consultation and RM40 for ultrasound, vitamin pills included and sometimes they charged RM60. My colleague who went to Gleneagles Intan Hospital, Dr Jean Woo Lee See, told me that the consultation fee alone is RM80 and they charged another RM80 for the vitamin pills which they put it into bottle. I asked the maternity clinic nurse wheather the clinic provide morphine and she told me that this maternity clinic did not provide morphine, they only provide painkiller injection.

Anyway I satisfied with the maternity clinic services compared to Assutha hospital. Assutha Hospital has too many trainee nurses and they don't really know how to insert the needle in your hand making you very painful. And the nurse insert the urine tube when there is no anesthetic, not like the maternity clinic, quite painful also and they also inserted the passing motion tube into my buttock hole, at first it felt pain as it was not inserted exactly into the buttock hole, then after it was inserted, the passing motion liquid was injected into the buttock hole using the passing motion tube. This passing motion procedure was not performed by the maternity clinic, they just asked you to fast from 12.00 am last night.

Somemore when we went back to Assutha hospital to get my previous fibroid medical report to confirm wheather I can go for natural delivery, when the doctor got to know that we saw another gynae, his face turned sour and started to be rude to us. He said we just can called him up and he can provide us the report. After that he just left us saying that he went to deliver baby and make us wait more than an hour for the report. After he came back, he did not even see us, just asked the nurse to photostate the report and passed it to us. He should have asked the nurse to just photostate the report and not make us wait for more than an hour for him. The consultation charges is RM40 and RM3 for the medical report. One thing I am not comfortable with him, that time I have fibroid problem and he checked for breast lumps once also.

It is because Assutha hospital is my company panel hospital and the fibroid medical expenses was paid by my company, so I went to this hospital. And the hospital bill not cheap also, came up to more than RM7k. Somemore Assutha Hospital also very far from my house, how can I see this doctor for my baby delivery? The doctor did not seem to be very understanding about our situation and thought we did not want to see him. If I have to pay for my own medical fees, why should I go to Assutha Hospital which is far from my house and have to take leave to visit the doctor? As well I went to the nearby maternity clinic where I can visit the doctor in the evening after office hour with cheaper consultation fee also.

My husband's friend told us that his wife gynae from Gleanegles Intan even worst, after his wife pregnant and they tried to get their previous fibroid medical report, the doctor asked for RM100, must bank in first then faxed the bank in slip, then only provided the medical report.

Anyway I was relieved that I gave birth to a healthy baby although she was very small, her weight was only 2.3kg. For me, nothing more important than a healthy baby.

HANG LI PO'S WELL AND COLOURFUL MUSICAL WATER FOUNTAIN AT MELAKA

2009-06-07T16:54:00.010+08:00

Went to Melaka yesterday, arrived at Puduraya around 8.30am, unable to get an earlier bus ticket as it was a public holiday, so many people went to Melaka this weekend and all the earlier bus ticket has been bought. Managed to get 10.30am bus ticket but after that another bus ticket seller was selling 9.30am bus, so quickly went back to the bus ticket counter that I bought the ticket earlier saying that I want a refund of my money as I want to buy earlier bus ticket from another bus ticket seller. The earlier bus ticket seller refused to refund me the money, so I stood nearby the counter trying to sell my ticket to other bus ticket buyers nearby the counter. I was lucky, one malay guy was kind enough to buy the ticket from me, so I sold him the ticket which I bought at RM12.20 at RM12.00 to him. He was kind enough to get a small change through buying a box of cigarette from the Puduraya hawker since I did not have small change for his RM50. I quickly went to buy the 9.30am bus ticket which was sold at RM13.20 but although I bought the earlier ticket, I still reach Melaka bus station around 1pm as there was a terrible traffic jam on that day.

Went to eat nyonya dishes at one of the coffee shop but the price was quite expensive which totalled up to RM33 for 2 pieces of fish that been cooked in 2 different ways, one cooked with assam gravy, not that tasty which they charged me for RM13 and another piece of fish they fried with chilly, good taste, they charged me RM12. And RM3 for 3 bowls of rice and RM5 for the fried sawi, good taste, the lunch is just enough for 2 persons.

At night went to Hang Li Po's Well next to Sam Po Kong temple which I took the picture at night with moon on top of the temple. Also went to see colourful musical water fountain at Jalan Kee Ann, the Melaka new attraction. You can even take a boat sailing across Melaka river. After that I went to a coffee shop nearby the colourful musical water fountain to have my dinner. I ate Wat Than Thor for 2 persons which they charged me RM6 only, very tasty, sizzling claypot beancurd, good taste for RM7 and tea for 2 persons for RM1.50. Altogether the price was RM14.50, quite cheap and I was very full, more full than my lunch.

Tomorrow morning I had my breakfast at one of the dim sum coffee shop, the total bill is RM8.80 where I ate Lo Mai Kai for RM1.80, big pau for RM1.80, fried carrot cake (Lou Pak Kou) for RM1.70, Siu Mai for RM1.50 and tea for 2 persons for RM2.00, all the food there has a good taste. The price of dim sum and the food in Melaka is almost the same like Penang and Melaka coffee shop also offer very delicious dishes and food nowadays, can compete with Penang food. I started to like Melaka coffee shop food even much better than Penang and Melaka road also less congested and no traffic jam like Penang.

I hate KL food as it is very expensive and taste no good. At my workplace I can mostly access to Malay food as there is a few chinese hawkers and their food also taste bad. Nearby my residential place, the chinese food also not taste as good as Penang and Melaka food and very expensive also, the dim sum taste is no good and cost a lot more than Penang and Melaka dim sum. So I can say Melaka food is hok chak!

SHOGUN 1 UTAMA 50% DISCOUNT WEEKDAY LUNCH BUFFET

2009-05-18T20:14:00.013+08:00

Monday went to One Utama to have lunch at Shogun, they are having promotion 50% discount for their buffet lunch from Monday to Friday only. The actual price of weekdays lunch buffet is RM43.00 and after discount it is around RM25 per head only. Our bill for 2 persons came out to be less than RM50 arrived as below :

2 buffet lunch (adult) @RM43.00 RM86.00
Discount (50%) RM43.00
----------
RM43.00
Service charge 10% RM 4.30
Service Tax 5% RM 2.15
-----------
RM49.45
========

When they told me after 50% discount it is around RM25 per head, I don't really know what to expect of RM25 buffet, I asked them wheather it is the same quality like the full price buffet and they said yes. So I make reservation and went to the restaurant to try their buffet as I did heard that Shogun's buffet is good.

When I arrived there, I am was not disappointed, the buffet have a lot of choices, like sushi (although I did not eat sushi), sashimi, tempura, fresh oyster and cooked oyster in cheese, salmon, tepanyaki, teriyaki chicken, dim sum, fried chicken wing and also selection of Thailand food corner, like tomyam and fish. There were also variety of different type of soup like miso soup, chinese chicken herbal soup, sharkfin soup, etc.

Each table was given a gas stove to cook Shabu-Shabu (Japanese steamboat) like what shown in the above picture with prawn and salmon fish in it. Another picture show vegetable tepanyaki fried with beef and chicken. There were a few selection of cakes that taste not bad like chocolate moisted cake, green tea cake, cheese cake, chocolate brownies cheese cake and tiramisu cake. The mango pudding taste good also. The ice-cream is normal ice-cream only range from strawberry flavour, peppermint, chocolate, vanilla, etc. There were so many variety of good food that I want to eat but I am too full already, can see only but cannot stuff them into my stomach anymore. I saw other table guests ate much more than me.

I can say that the taste of the food there is not bad and it is much cheaper and more selection of choices than Daidomon and Yaki-Yaki. The worst buffet I had was Yaki-Yaki and I am not impressed with Jogoya buffet either though it had a lot of variety choices as I find the price is too expensive and the taste of the food is no good, simply-simply cook by the inexperienced restaurant staffs. I also read other bloggers' post on Yaki-Yaki buffet where they eat the full price buffet dinner and I saw there were a lot of good food that were not available at 50% buffet lunch I ate. They also cheated on the 10% service charge and 5% service tax which they charged based on full buffet price. Some sort like cheating of their 50% discount buffet but providing lousy food and less variety of choices.

If you all want to try the Shogun buffet for the first time, take advantage of its 10 anniversay promotion offer until 5th June but only from Monday to Friday 50% discount for the lunch buffet and Monday to Thursday 30% discount for the dinner buffet (don't really know how much is their dinner buffet price.)

I can say that this weekday lunch buffet is very worthwhile...

HOW MUCH A COOLPIX NIKON L19 DIGITAL CAMERA COST?

2009-05-16T22:00:00.001+08:00

My house was entered by a thief the other day when I was out to work and this incident happened around 3pm. My husband was away to Singapore due to work for 3 days and the thief might have spotted that nobody at home. Thinking back of the incident, I felt fortunated as nothing happen to me as I have been sleeping alone in the house for the past 2 days, if the thief enter the house at night, I cannot imagine what will happen to me.

I losted my cash around RM400 and my new angpow money around RM100, also my gold bracelet which my relative gave me during my wedding that cost RM800 and my mother wedding gift to me that was diamond earrings and a diamond pendant plus white gold necklace. I also losted a Guess watch cost RM10 and a Gucci watch cost RM5 and most of my faked jewellery. My husband lost his foreign currency cash around RM1,000. My Canon camera and my computer external hard disk which stored the cantonese serial dramas and movies also losted. Only the gold jewellery given by my in-laws and a bracelet given by my relative during my wedding which was hidden on the roof of the house was not stolen.

So when I back to Penang the other day, I planned to buy back a digital camera, so around 10 am I went to a camera shop at Prangin Mall to look for a digital camera. At first I am thinking of buying back the same Canon Powershot camera and the sales assistant told me that Canon Powershot camera latest model is A480. The model I bought previously was Canon A460 and I told the sales assistant that my previous camera cannot take clear picture at very short distance. I need a camera that can take a clear picture at a very short distance for ebay selling and he told me that Canon Powershot unable to take clear picture at very short distance. He recommended me to buy Nikon Coolpix L19 which is the price at my budget and he showed me that this model can capture a clear picture from very short distance. He offered this model of camera for RM460 and said since I am the first customer of the shop, he gave me special discount. I negotiated for RM450 and he asked wheather I pay by credit card, so I said yes and he agreed to sell me the camera at that price. He even offered to sell me the 2GB memory card at an attractive price of RM20 (the original price is RM60) as I bought the camera from his shop. Since I thought the 2GB memory card is an extra accessories, so I decided not to buy it.

I chosed this shop because this shop often organized digital fair and seem to be offering their cameras and camera accesories for sale at a very attractive price. I also lazy to go to the other shop to check the price as I trusted this shop will give me the cheapest price.

Then I went to the other camera shop at Prangin Mall to check the price of this model of the camera and the shopowner offered me this model at RM460 with free casing, 2GB memory card and protective coating. Felt cheated, I went back to the shop where I bought the camera earlier and told the sales assistant the what the other camera shop offered me. He gave me only the Nikon camera casing stating that this camera casing is a good quality and he should give me, maybe he forget but he refused to give me the 2GB memory card and want to sell to me at RM20.

I left the shop and went to another camera shop nearby Gama and they offered this model of camera for RM458 with free 2GB Nikon memory card that worth RM48. Again I went back to the earlier shop which sold me the camera and told him that the price he offered me should included 2GB memory card. He was reluctant to give me the 2GB memory card saying that the other shop offered me this price is at cash paymethod and not credit card paymethod which the camera shop need to pay 3% of the camera price to the credit card company. He showed me the 2GB Nikon memory card and want to sell it to me at RM20, I told him, "I always have the impression that your shop offer the cheapest price as you all always organize digital fair, so what other shop offer you must also offer to me, I want to go back now and don't want to waste my time here, tell your boss to give this memory card to me, since you say I am your first customer of your shop today, you should give me best discount." At last the sales assistant gave me the memory card and he also don't want me to make so much noise in his shop as there were other customers also in the shop and he said, "Yes, our shop offer better price than other shop, I hope you will recommend your friend to buy camera from our shop in future." After getting the memory card, I left the shop, my heart saying, "Will not buy from this shop anymore, the sales assistant has not been honest to me, I just get what I pay for, nothing cheaper than that."

I went to other camera shop and the shop owner offered me this model of camera at RM440 with casing and free 2GB memory card. Again I felt that I am not buying the camera at the cheapest price, went to another camera shop next door and the sales assistant offered this model of camera at RM399 without memory card and said she will give me further discount if I sincerely want to buy. She even told me the memory card only cost around RM60. But unfortunately I already bought the camera, went to another shop at Prangin Mall and the shopowner offered me at RM450 with camera casing and 2GB memory card.

I told my husband about my shopping of camera experience and he said, "Actually he did tried to cheat you the memory card but never thought that you will come back and bite him. When he offered you the memory card for RM20, he is actually trying to collect back the credit card charges of 3% since you bought this camera by credit card, it is a fair price. When other camera shop quote you the price, they are quoting it at cash paymethod, so you actually bought this camera at RM435 only."

I said, "I still don't think I bought this camera at a cheap price, in fact the sales assistant has not been honest to me, I have to argue to get back the 2GB memory card which I should get it without argument at this price, if i have not bought the camera from his shop, I will have bought it at the lady camera shop which offered me this model for RM399 and she said she will give me further discount if I sincere to buy from her, I can choose not to have the 2GB memory card and if she did not give me camera casing, I can buy handphone pouch to protect my camera. The shop who sold me the camera always have digital fair and sell other camera assesories also, maybe the accessories that they should give their customers, they sell them separately to get profit."

"If I am the camera seller, I would not want to sell the camera to you. I think the sales assistant afraid you make too much noise wait you chase his customers away from the shop." my husband said.

"I am always a reasonable person, if he has been honest to me, I will not go back to argue with him. When I bought Nokia 2630 handphone for my mother, I never go back to the handphone shop and argue with the seller as he has been honest to me and I get the best price for the handphone." Yeah... the handphone seller has been honest and also because I checked the price at other shop before buying the handphone, just because I lazy to check the price of the camera from other camera shop this time, I nearly got cheated of my memory card. Eventually I checked the camera price at other shop but next time must check the price before buying the camera, not after that, no need to argue, after checking the price, then only buy from the shop that give you the best offer.

Recently I saw this model of camera sold at Sungei Wang at RM458 with free 2GB memory card. And I also saw an advertisement in the newspaper that this model of camera sold at RM458 with free 2GB memory card, mini tripod and coupons to print photo.

I am afraid that my house will be enter by thief again, so I hide the camera in my kitchen.

YUENCINDY GO FOR SHOPPING TREATS

2009-05-09T22:34:00.007+08:00

I started my day this morning going to Taman Putra market with my husband to eat breakfast and buy tauhu, salted vegetable and some fruits as I planned to cook fish head soup this sunday. After coming back from the market, I sweeped the floor and took a bath. The mopping floor job will be done by my husband.

Today I plan to go to 30 minutes free massage for pregnant lady at Peiling Postnatal and Confinement Centre at Petaling Jaya but unfortunately that this weekend it is fully booked.

So I called Beyond Beauty outlet at Lot 10 Shopping Centre to book for a free facial therapy and they said they still have one session free at 6.00p.m. I just have to bring along their advertisement from the Star newspaper to redeem for the free facial therapy.

Cooking make it simple, I cooked curry fish head using the nyonya curry paste which I bought from the supermarket. The fish head, ladyfingers and tomato I bought it at Thursday pasar malam nearby my house. It has been my routine to go to pasar malam every Thursday to buy fruits as the fruits at the pasar malam is cheaper.

After lunch I asked my husband to drive me to Kuala Lumpur and dropped me at Berjaya Time Square. I planned to buy the Japanese Pearl earring for RM1 at Wah Chan jewellery shop as advertised in the Star newspaper but unfortunately the earring is not nice and not a good quality one, so I did not buy it. My husband waited for me at the entrance of Sungei Wang plaza. Then we went to KL Pavilion GSC cinema to redeem a free movie using GSC birthday voucher because this month is my husband's birthday. At first I planned to watch Shinjuku Incident by Jackie Chan at 2.45pm but when I reached the cinema around 2.00pm, the tickets was fully sold, so my husband redeemed the Thai horror movie, Coming Soon at 2.00pm. He passed the ticket to me and left the shopping centre, when I went inside to watch the movie, it already started. Although they said it is no good to watch horror movie when you are pregnant, I just pressed my ear and half-open my eyes to watch the movie so that my ear not fully heard the loud sound of the horror movie.

The movie ended at 3.30pm, I went to KL Pavilion information counter to look at their shopping brochure to see any free gifts to be redeem. Tell you all, KL Pavilion shopping centre often offer free gift like beauty products and fragrance samples, remember to check at the information counter when you visit KL Pavilion in future.

Then I went to Sasa beauty booth where the promoter gave me free skin analysis and a nice cosmetis pouch with 3 samples of Suisse programme containing 3ml hydrating solution cream, hydrating concentrate and eye contour lift cream all made in Switzerland.

I left KL Pavilion at around 4.00pm and went to Lot 10 Metrojaya to redeem Clinique moisture surge using the Star newspaper cutting. This time I changed my location to redeem Clinique product at Lot 10 as I ever redeemed Clinique product at KL Pavilion. The promoter asked me wheather I use Clinique product before and I told her that I only used the sample. They have my record and asked me how I find their product, so I told them nothing special except the price is too expensive. Then the promoter gave me a 7ml moisture surge and I left Lot 10 to go to Sungei Wang plaza.

I signed up as a fan of Clinique at frienster website and during my birthday month, they sent me one make-up workshop voucher and one facial treatment voucher worth RM100 each. I went to KLCC Isetan Clinique counter to redeem my make-up workshop voucher and a senior beautician teached me how to make-up around one hour. I used her technique to draw my eye brow for office make-up. I went to 1 Utama to redeem my facial treatment as only 1 Utama Clinique counter provide facial treatment in Selangor.

Nothing much at Sungei Wang plaza, no free gifts, except a magazine booth promoting their chinese beauty magazine and their beauty website, so gave them my email address to entitle for their lucky draw and they gave me password to log into their beauty website but their beauty website is in chinese, so I did not know how to read chinese character.

Walked back to Lot 10 at around 5.00pm and went to Beyond Beauty outlet and asked the beautician wheather I can do the facial therapy earlier as my appointment was at 6.00pm. Maybe other customer has cancelled their appointment at last minutes as what I heard them saying. They asked me to fill up my particulars and asked me wheather I want to do something extra (I can't remember what it is) at RM38 and they will give me one free mask. I said I don't want anything extra and then I was leaded to the facial room to do the facial therapy. I see no customer and most of the facial room was empty. The facial therapy consisted 4 steps by what they claimed worth RM180 as per their advertisement in the Star newspaper, cleansing, toning, moisturing and a mask. After the facial therapy, the beautician asked me wheather I want to do facial after my pregnancy and promoted their facial package for 10 sessions at RM500. She also tried to sell their beauty treatment voucher at RM300 which they claimed was sold at RM800++ original price which consisted of a few different types of beauty treatment vouchers like facial voucher, slimming voucher, hand treament voucher and spa voucher. I told them that I have no intention to sign up any package for the moment or buy the beauty treatment voucher and they can send me sms regarding their promotional price as I do like to do facial treatment once a while. They said the first trial promotional price is only for new customer, after that they have to sign package. So I left after the free facial therapy around 6 pm and headed to Sungei Wang Plaza.

Spotted a banner at the lift of Sungei Wang plaza stating that there is a stamps, banknotes and antique dealer at level 6, so took a lift to level 6 to look for the shop. Spotted a nice grey blouse at RM15 at one of the shop and asked the sales assistant wheather can try it. The young malay sales assistant said cannot try it as the blouse with grey cardigan is on value buy price and she said she is afraid as her boss was at downstair. I keep saying that I want to try it as I like the blouse very much and have intention to buy it and at last she let me try it. But unfortunately the blouse was too small for a pregnant lady like me and I did not buy it.

At last I found the stamps, banknotes and antique dealer small shop but unfortunately he is out for a break, so I took away the small piece of paper sticked on the mirror of his shop stating his contact no as I have no pen to write down his contact no. I planned to contact him one day to see wheather any of my stamp collection have monetary value.

After that I went to eat barbeque pork rice nearby the entrance of the Sungei Wang plaza at Super Noodle House, a bit too expensive, total cost RM7.70 after 5% government tax and 10% service charge when the 0riginal price in only RM6.70. The taste is good, only too small plate and I am half full and I never ordered drink as the drinks are too expensive, plain water cost RM0.80. I went to 24 hours convenience shop to buy a box of Nestea lemon drink in the fridge at RM1.30 as I forgot to bring water. Next time must remember to bring water when go shopping.

I have last task to complete that is exchange for a free Wyeth Mama 900gm maternal milk powder worth RM40 using my empty tin of other brand maternal milk powder. After I have my own curry fish head lunch at my in-law's house, I flipped through the Star newspaper and got to know about this exchange programme at Guardian Bukit Bintang Plaza from 8pm to 9.30pm. So I brought along my empty 900gm Anmum maternal milk powder tin with me to go for shopping. I reached Guardian Bukit Bintang Plaza at around 7.30pm and asked the Guardian staff about the exchange program. They said can exchange now, no need to wait until 8pm and asked me to fill up my particulars in a form. There was nobody there exchange the maternal milk powder.

After I got a tin of Wyeth Mama 900gm maternal milk powder, I called my husband to fetch me home. I waited for him at taxi station outside Sungei Wang plaza and he came around 8.00pm. I asked him to drop me at the Weld because I want to redeem mystery gift at the information counter but unfortunately nobody manned the information counter. In the afternoon I also asked my husband to drop me at the Weld before drop me at Berjaya Time Square but there was nobody at the information counter. I got the Weld shopping brochure with mystery gift at information counter at my office, Great Eastern Mall and the Weld shopping centre also a property of Great Eastern.

I went home around 8.30pm, cut and ate the fruits and took a bath. Drank the Anmum maternal milk and start to write this post in my blog. Tomorrow planned to do my laundry with the washing machine and go to Leisure Mall Guardian to redeem Wyeth Mama 900gm maternal milk powder at 10am as I still have 2 900gm empty tin of maternal milk powder, one is Enfamama and the other one is Mamil Mama. I will redeem one tin and asked my husband to redeem another tin, if can using my sister in-law particulars and my in-laws house address. I need a tin of maternal milk powder per month and with these redeemed maternal milk powder, it will last me until my delivery. Hope tomorrow my redemption will be successful.

I also need to go to AVON boutique to buy the Anew Luminosity moisturiser at RM20 on 10 May only which is nearby Leisure Mall. I have used up my full sized moistoriser and now my face survive on the free sample of moisturiser I redeem previously.

After living in the big city like KL, I find that there are a lot of free gifts in the big shopping centre, much different like Penang where there is no free gifts in the shopping centre and if there is like what happen last time where the Olay is having exchange programme of full size moisturiser with your other brand of moisturiser, the Penang people will queue up at shopping centre to get it. My Penang colleague even complained to me his wife unable to get the Olay moisturiser although they have gone to the shopping centre very early because too many people queue up much earlier than them. When I tried to redeem the Olay moisturiser at Gurney Plaza in Penang, I even seen old women scolded the promoter because they unable to redeem the moisturiser as the promoter let other people redeem much earlier from the time stated in the newspaper. Me also unable to redeem the moisturiser.

In Penang, if supermarket offer RM1 bread also so many will fight to get it. Read my post on March 2007, on Free Gifts, Cheap Things on how people react on free gifts and cheap things.

Sometimes in the weekend we also need entertainment. Some people will tell me, "I rather not going to shopping centre, my RM50 easily fly away if I watch movie and have meal at shopping centre and if I buy things somemore my RM100 fly away." But me different, I got all the free gifts information from the newspaper and female magazine because my father in-law doing newspaper agency business, so there is no cost in the newspaper and female magazines.

Next week I planned to go to Mother and Newborn Care free seminar at Seri Pacific Hotel, KL nearby PWTC after my half-day work on Saturday. Next Sunday there is Mega Beauty Fair at Jusco 1 Utama where you will get free make-up and be a part of the Malaysia Book of records. They want to establish a new record title Biggest Participation in Beauty Make-Up Event and you will also receive vouchers for up to RM20 and a certificate of acknowledgement for your participation. And Maybellline is giving out Maybelline Impact Express Smooth Pencil Shadow for 1st 1,000 participant worth RM22.90 each. But the time is from 11am to 9pm, need to check out first, if they want me to spend my time whole day there also I cannot make it.

Enjoy your weekend, Happy Holiday! Happy Wesak Day!

DAIDOMON SPECIAL WASHOKU & YAKINIKU BUFFET 50% OFFER PROMOTION

2009-04-18T16:58:00.018+08:00

Went to Daidomon restaurant at Great Eastern Mall for lunch buffet today. Now they are having their Daidomon Special Washoku & Yakiniku buffet at 50% offer until end of April. But this 50% offer is only applicable from Monday to Thursday dinner only and weekend & public holiday lunch only. The full price of the buffet is RM68. The dining time is only 2 hours, mine from 1.00pm to 3pm.

I remembered when Daidomon restaurant started opening at Great Eastern Mall, there was no business as people perceived that this restaurant is very expensive due to its beautiful decor and pleasant environment. I ever treated my mum at this restaurant during lunch time and it costed me more than RM40 just for a bowl of Udon and a bowl of rice with chicken and egg without set.

After no business for a while, the owner started to be more liberal with its price and started distributing flyers at Great Eastern Mall offering its Daidomon’s Japanese BBQ Viking Style Dinner Buffet at RM55/- per adult. I went there for a try and after 10% and 5% service charge and tax, the total bill came out to be more than RM120.00 for 2 persons.

There is improvements in their Daidomon Special Washoku & Yakiniku buffet lunch today as they offered more variety of buffet dishes. Now they also placed a few types of drinks like orange, grape, mango, pineapple and green tea where last time they only offered green tea during their Viking Style buffet dinner. Of course I will not post here all the cheap buffet dishes as I only will post pictures of the main ingredient of the buffet which consisted of expensive meat like beef, scallop, salmon, prawn, cuttlefish, butterfish, etc. Of course they are also generous with their bbq ingredient where it is served in big portion on a plate. Their honey dew fruit is also quite sweet and their ice-cream is soft and easy to take. The main ingredient of the buffet between Viking Style and Special Washoku & Yakiniku buffet is the same, there is no drop of the food quality, they even improve it with more variety of buffet dishes but the price is reduced to almost one third.

I expected my bill will come out to be more than RM90 for 2 persons but it only come out to be around RM80. This is how they calculate their price:

Misc RM 2.00
Buffet BBQ 2 person (RM68 per adult 50% offer) RM68.00
Sub total RM70.00
Service Charge RM 7.00
Tax RM 3.50
Total RM80.50

They told me that the 50% offer last this month end and next month they are offering their barbeque buffet at RM39.90 per adult.

Now they even offering lunch set as low as RM12 and not more than RM20 served with green tea, pickle, tofu, chawan mushi, salad, soup, rice and dessert.

Last week I went to Yaki-Yaki Japanese buffet hi-tea at Bukit Bintang and quite disappointed with the quality of the food. The price is not cheap if compared to the bad quality and limited of the food served. I went to the cheapest session that is hi-tea at RM55/- per adult where they are also offering 50% discount but the way they calculate the price came out to be RM35.75 per adult where their 10% service charge and 5% tax is calculated on the full price of RM55/-.

We barbeque nothing out to eat as the chicken was quite hard and difficult to bite. The fish and meat is not a good quality one and the prawn is quite small compared to the prawn offered by Daidomon. There was a lot of different type of cuttlefish to eat, one crab dish, slices of abalone (that is the pricey food that you need to eat more if you want your money to worth the buffet) and very small scallops. I did not see any fresh oysters, scallop with shell, mussels, butter prawn and unagi like posted by other blogger. Maybe he went to the most expensive session that is dinner session RM75 per adult and after 50% discount it come to the total of RM48.75.

When we want to get the mini fresh coconut, we have to queue long queue and wait for quite some time to get it. They did not display the coconut like what Jogoya did and the coconut was distributed by their staff. We also have to queue up to get fresh watermelon juice prepared by their staff and my friend said the watermelon juice not very nice either. When we want to take the ice-cream, most of the ice-cream bowls were empty and even they replaced it, the ice-cream is very hard and difficult to take.

Somemore we have to park our car at Sungei Wang and it costed us around RM7. If you eat at Great Eastern Mall, it will cost you only RM1 per entry in the weekend for parking.

That day I organized my department buffet dinner at Jogoya and after 50% discount, it still cost us more than RM50 per head. Jogoya buffet is better than Yaki-Yaki and have more choices but I still feel that their staffs simply cook the dishes and they do not have the skill as a chef. But they have a lot of choices of cakes, biscuits and dessert for you to eat. But I don't think the price is cheap either even after 50% discount as the food not taste good also.

Actually I don't really like buffet and I did not say I like the taste of the barbeque buffet at Daidomon very much. Only that I feel that they are quite generous with their expensive meat and after 50% discount, the buffet is quite worthwhile. I prefer to eat food cooked by chef at chinese coffee shop where it taste a lot much better. Or famous hawker food from Penang.

I have never been to Tenji restaurant as it is quite far from my place. So can't comment anything about the restaurant.

LATA KINJANG WATERFALL

2009-04-12T10:00:00.001+08:00

On my way back to Penang, we stopped at Lata Kinjang waterfall nearby Tapah.

It is located in the town of Chenderiang - Exit Tapah at North South highway.

A beautiful waterfall with clear water. Parking fee is RM1.00 per entry from 8.00 am to 6.00pm.

Ok, now I am not going to write long stories but will try to update my blog more often. In future my blog will have more pictures than words. :)

KOTA DAMANSARA

2009-03-08T21:10:00.012+08:00

Yesterday visited my schoolmate's house at Kota Damansara, snapped a few photos of her house. The house was bought for more than RM800k and now the price already increased to RM 1.1 to RM1.2 million.

She also drove me to Tropicana Golf and Country resort. Some of the photos are attached here..

WILL YOUR INTEGRITY BEEN SHAKEN BY BIG MONEY?

2009-03-04T20:44:00.005+08:00

Today I got a message in my email account...

Dear Cindy,

Thank You very much on the RM448 SCAM LESSON in your Blog.

Your useful information came timely for me in avoiding such situation.

I sincerely appreciate your Blog for this matter. And here by wishing you

great happiness and success to your Blog. It’s making a better world to live.

Best regards,

Subject: RE: Touchscreen Cell Phone -Dual SIM/Bluetooth Mobile Phone #330311350536

Thanks for your mail,i will like to inform you that for me to make the payment i can only made the payment by Bank to Bank transfer is very secured and safe for security reason so kindly get back to me with your Bank detail here below so that i will able to process with the payment...

Account Name
Account Number
Branch
Swift Code

And for my client address is here below....

NAME......................WASIU OLABODE
ADDRESS.................NO5 ADEEYO STREET ODEOOLO LANE
CITY.......................IBADAN
STATE/....................OYO STATE
COUNTRY.................NIGERIA
ZIP CODE................23402
PHONE NUMBER..........+2347055826968

Hope to hear from you soon

Dr Alex Thompson.

Dear Buyer,

2) Kindly let me know your shipping address for Nigeria.

Best regards,

Dear Seller

i"m Dr Alex Thompson from united kingdom i saw your advert on E-bay.com very impress and interested in buying your item for my client that have been transfer to Nigeria to show how good and i care for him,i have read and go through i have understand the good and condition of this item and i will be offering you S$800.00 + the shipping cost to Nigeria by EMS or DHL Postal Services so if you are interested in selling for me kindly tell me the good and condition of this item .(irishclaimpaycentre2471@yahoo.co.uk)....

I am quite happy if my blog post had saved another person from a scam and here I would like to share a few things regarding the scam :

1)Many things are too good to be true, never believe if somebody want to buy at the very much above the actual value of your things

2)Most scams come from Nigeria

3)Never compromise your integrity (Although my integrity was a bit shaken, my mind still tell me that I should deliver my camera to the malay guy who is a genuine customer and already paid the money into my bank account and get another camera for Dr Alex Thompson. I was not greedy and willing to share the profit of the camera, if the transaction is successful with the person who help me with the Nigeria transaction. That why my close friends always trust me.)

4)I am always prompt in attending to my ebay customers although the price of my goods are very cheap. It include going to post office to post my goods through poslaju and replying sms. I have never cheat anybody by selling overprice goods and I always believe in money for value goods. And that is also how I act as a consumer and I hope I able to deliver my unused goods that might be useful to somebody at a competitive price.

5)If the buyer want to buy from you, he has to trust you. So make sure he bank in the money in your bank account before you deliver the goods.

6)Never try too hard, believe there is somebody up there who is stronger than us. If you try too hard, you might not get what you want, if you just do it naturally, things might turn out right for you. Upheld your integrity, luck will come to you, believe me....

MING PORCELAIN FOR SALE!

2008-11-02T14:25:00.006+08:00

DUTCH EMBLEM

MING SWORDMAN IN ACTION

CHINESE MACBETH in Deep Contemplation "To Do or Not to Do"

Antique is priceless unless there is a buyer who can establish the value. These items found at Melaka seaside and a proof that China, a world giant economy had came to Melaka for trading many years ago.

Interested, please call Yoong, 012-4029816 (call after office hour) or email at edennayuen@yahoo.com

KUCHING BUDGET TRIP

2008-10-27T16:11:00.019+08:00

Never been to East Malaysia before, so flied with Air Asia to Kuching recently. Went to Chinese History Museum, Kuching Water Front, mosque and Tua Pek Kong Temple, all located at Kuching town.

Also went to Semenggoh Nature Reserve to see orang utan and Bidayuh Longhouse with tourist guide that charge us RM150 per person. At Bidayuh Longhouse there is a head house where the head trophies are placed. The above pictures show the Bidayuhs' lifestyle living in the longhouse.

We also went to Gunung Gading National Park but saw only one rafflesia (not so big). Unfortunately my camera has no battery that time and unable to snap the big flower. We went there by bus to the Lundu town which charge us RM10 one way per person. From Lundu town, we took white bas sewa to the national park for RM10 one way. The entry fee to the national park is RM10. Overall the cost of going there is only RM50 per person and if you ask the tourist guide to bring you there, they will charge you RM180 per person.

We lived in budget hotel and the budget hotel price is from RM45 onwards. We have good food also where our friend from Kuching treat us seafood. The fried oyster at Kuching is different from the Penang fried oyster where the oyster was fried like a big keropok (cracker) and the oyster stick on the keropok. We also ate laksa sarawak, its soup like curry mee soup only brown in colour and also cook with coconut milk. It is cook with mihun with prawn and chicken meat. Also ate mee kolok, nothing special about mee kolok, only cooked mee mixed with soya sauce. The price of a bowl of mee same like Penang price which is range from RM2.50 to RM3.00.

Hope I have the chance to come back to Sarawak as I wish to visit Bako National Park. With Air Asia, average people like me also can travel, hope Air Asia expand its network so that traveling to all tourist attraction countries is possible, I am just waiting to fulfill my dreams....

RM448 SCAM LESSON

2008-10-26T16:00:00.002+08:00

Sorry for the late blogging again. I had been busy with the ebay selling recently that left me not much time to do blogging.

Second ebay experience, not a good one but a lesson to be learnt. I put my Canon film camera for sale at RM30 at ebay Malaysia and a Malay guy from Kelantan called me wanted to buy my camera. So I gave him my bank account no and he asked me to send the camera by poslaju.

After received the payment from him, I was prepared to send him the camera. But one day before I send him the camera, there was one email from a UK guy who address himself as Dr Alex Thompson stating that he want to buy my Canon camera for his client at Nigeria for USD1,100.00 and want it to be sent by DHL or EMS. I was too excited and cannot decide what to do as I already received payment from the Kelantan guy who bank in RM40 into my bank account inclusive of poslaju fee.

My husband said, "Calm down, USD1,100.00 is not a big money and you cannot be rich with this amount of money. But you can take the risk as it is only a film camera and nothing expensive."

Then I remembered that one of my colleague want to sell her Nikon film camera for RM50 after I told my colleagues that I have a film camera dealer who want to buy used film camera. Actually the Kelantan guy told me that if there is any good used film camera, he wants to buy it and I am thinking of looking for used film camera for him and get some margin from the sale of the camera.

So I emailed to the UK guy wheather he can accept other film camera model and his reply was quite prompt, he is willing to accept other model.

My husband said that there was another film camera in his office and will bring back for me. So tomorrow we went to work as usual and before work start, my husband called me that his company film camera is not a branded one and the flash light is not in the working condition.

Then I told my colleague that I want to buy her Nikon camera for RM50, I always been a honest person, I told her that there was one UK guy who want to buy my camera for USD1,100.00 but unfortunately I have sold mine to the Kelantan guy. I said this deal seem to be too good to be true and if the transaction is successful, profit will be shared between 3 persons, me, my husband and my colleague. If the deal is not successful, the camera will be bought for RM50 only.

During lunch time, I and my colleague went to OCBC bank to enquire how to withdraw money from the pay-pal account but the customer service staff don't seem to have much information on it. I even called one of my friend who ever do internet marketing before and she told me that maybe I need a debit card or take out the money from Singapore (maybe need to go to Singapore to open bank account and bank in the cheque from pay-pal.)

On the day itself, I followed my colleague back to her house behind KL Plaza by bus and LRT and brought back the camera after paying RM50 to her as the UK guy want the camera quite urgently. My husband fetched me home from KL Plaza and the next day (Saturday) I went back to Penang by bus express bringing back my properly wrapped Canon camera parcel. From Penang Komtar post office I post out the parcel containing the Canon camera by poslaju to the Kelantan buyer but indicate on the parcel that it is a wedding gift worth RM20.

I asked my husband to monitor my email with the UK buyer while I am away in Penang. Before going back to Penang, I opened an account at pay-pal and my husband did the rest like paying USD1.95 to get my pay-pal account verified.

After I came back from Penang, I received an email from the UK guy stating that he already paid USD1,100.00 into my pay-pal account and there was even an email from pay-pal customercare stating that I have new fund in my pay-pal account. I even wrote to pay-pal customer service to check wheather there is any fund in my pay-pal account and they replied me that there is no new fund and asked me to check with the buyer.

Because I was busy and next day have to go to work, I just instructed my husband to send the Nikon film camera to the address at Nigeria given by the buyer after received the email from pay-pal customercare stating that I already received USD1,100 in my pay-pal account and ignored another email from cust0mer service pay-pal stating that I have not receive any money in my pay-pal account and asked me to check with the buyer again.

At work my husband called me that he already sent out the Nikon camera by DHL (DHL office just nearby his office) and the cost of the shipping is RM398.00. He even told me that the DHL staff said that there are a lot of fake pay-pal websites and advised us to be careful of such websites.

After receiving my husband call, I can't concentrate with my work in the office during that day as I already smelt something fishy. After coming back from work, I quickly emailed to pay-pal customer service to confirm wheather I receive any payment.

The pay-pal customer service replied me that I have yet to receive any payment and I forwarded the pay-pal customercare email to customer service pay-pal. The email from pay-pal customer service also different from the pay-pay customercare where email from cust0mer service pay-pal is service@intl.paypal.com

After that I still receiving email from pay-pal customercare reminding me of my deal with the UK buyer and asked me to send the scanned shipping receipt for final verification. My mind was in the confusing state and I even called DHL to check the shipment using the tracking number. DHL staff asked me wheather I want to destroy the shipment as sending back the camera will incur another additional cost. I consulted my husband wheather I need to destroy the shipment and he said I just don't need to do anything as if the shipment get lost there are still RM1,400 insurance money claimable. I wrote back to pay-pay customercare stating that I have not receive any payment in my pay-pal account and lied to them saying that since the UK buyer is not honest with the transaction, I had cancelled the shipment.

The UK buyer, that Dr Alex Thompson even wrote me this email:

Hello, I got your e-mail regards the payment of the camera, I have just contact the paypal for the payment been made already from me to you and they informed me that you need to make some patient because they encounter some minor problem during the activation and these would take up to some hours before it could be properly done.

It make no sense for you to tell me that you have made cancellation since I have made the payment and the paypal have also confirmed it for you because they have already deduct my money from my account and you did not even hear back from me before you make any decision on the cancellation. I have been trying to get in touch with paypal as soon as possible for proper remittance to your account.

You have to exercise a little patient according to the feedback from the paypal to me.

Thanks for the understanding.

My last email to him is :

Hi Buyer,

I already cancelled the shipment as you have not been honest in this transaction and have not paid the agreed amount of the camera to my pay-pal account.

After a few days, I checked my shipment at DHL website using the tracking number and the camera already safely arrived to the Nigeria address and Dr Alex Thompson's client at Nigeria, Mr Wasiu Olabode also already signed and acknowledged the receipt of the camera.

Then the paypal customercare wrote me an email again that make me very angry.

Dear Valuable customer

We are here by to inform you that your money is now ready to be transfer into your PayPal account with the full payment of $1,400USD but before we are remitted your account now you have to go ahead and send the remain changed of $300 to the buyer client in Nigeria because the buyer have made an addition payment into your account and you have to send the remain money back to is client in Nigeria visa western union money transfer and as soon the money is been send that same day your account will be remitted immediately.so get back to us if you are ready so that we can give you the information to send the money..

Thanks for using PayPal

PayPal Team.

I losted the Nikon camera which I bought for RM50 and also shipping charges of RM398. Since in life I have to tolerate with many people, being people at my workplace and family, being patient and sweet face, this is the chance for me to berate the buyer. So I wrote this last email to pay-pal customercare :

Hi Paypalcustomercare,

Please inform your customer, Dr Alex Thompson that if he can't afford to pay for the camera, he are welcome to pay a minimum of USD130.00 being the shipment charges and the cost of the camera to my pal-pal account. If that minimum amount of money also he unable to pay, I assume that he is a very poor man or just a conman that is desperate of money.

Don't ask me to pay USD300 as the buyer don't even pay any money in my pay-pal account. In this realistic world that is a saying, "No Money No Talk." So what is the point asking me doing so many things, like scanning shipment receipt, pay USD300 using visa western union money transfer when there is no money in my pay-pal account? You got the point?

Unless there is money in my paypal account, then only I am interested to do many things. If you are chasing for money, so am I. You one cents also cannot come out from your pocket and only expect free camera, summore want to con USD300 from me.

If you want to show that you are rich enough, just let me see the money in my pay-pal account, if no money, no talk. Bye!

And the last email from pay-pay customercare which I have not replied :

Dear valuable customer

We are here by to inform you that you have to go ahead and send the $300 now by western union to the address been given to your before we can remitted you paypal account with the full payment of $1,400.00 because Dr Alex Thompson have make an additional payment into your account and before we can remitted your account you have to go ahead and send the money to the address been given to you or x you will not received any money in your Account and you have lose your item

Thank for using PayPal.

PayPal Team.

We just have to believe that many things are too good to be true although we hope miracles do happen sometimes. Most people hope that they will hit jackpot one day and don't have to work for the rest of their life, so am I...

Note: I got to know from other blog that we can withdraw money from our paypal account using Public Bank debit card. Alternatively we can sign up our paypal account using VISA credit card where we can transfer the money from our paypal account to off-set out credit card balance.

SHELL STATION LAKSA

2008-09-03T20:52:00.000+08:00

If you think Ayer Itam laksa is the best laksa in Penang, you might be wrong. There are a lot of websites and forums already recognised Shell Station laksa taste better than Ayer Itam laksa. The location of the Shell Station laksa is only nearby my hometown residential area, Farlim.

Why it is called Shell Station laksa? It is because last time the laksa stall was located in front of the Shell Station. And there was one time, another laksa stall called Penang Road laksa also opened up in front the Shell Station to compete business with the Shell Station laksa. So to differentiate from its competitor, the Shell Station laksa add fried fish balls into its laksa and its fried fish balls also taste good. The Shell Station laksa also has big slices of kampong fish in it.

Then Bandaraya chased the hawkers away and the Shell Station laksa relocate its stall in a coffee shop at Farlim Business Centre. Now the owner even employed Indonesian maids to operate the stall at the coffee shop. Now the price of a bowl of laksa already increased to RM3.00.

As I said, life is short, so eat when you still able to eat. Guess I will take note of the best hawker food in Penang and hunt for them on my next trip to Penang. They are branded hawkers.

Ho Chak!

RIFLE RANGE (PADANG TEMBAK)

2008-08-27T21:46:00.002+08:00

The other day I went back to the place I lived 15 years ago. My grandmother bought a small flat at Rifle Range (Padang Tembak), Penang and I lived with her for a moment of time. Then I moved to Farlim and after that my grandmother passed away 7-8 years ago.

HISTORY OF RIFLE RANGE (PADANG TEMBAK)

These flats at Rifle Range or in Malay called Padang Tembak was builted by government in 1960s for low income family where the government rented out to them as low as less than RM100 per month. After 20 years or more these flats will belong to the family and the government will give them strata title also. These flats only have one room, only the corner lot flats have 2 rooms.

Now the residents of Rifle Range majority are old people because their children have grown up and moved out from this place because the flats are too small. But tell you what, Rifle Range is a paradise for old people because of its convenience to buy food (don't have to cook) as there are a lot of hawker stalls selling food in the morning market and evening market. There are even vegetable sold in the evening where the working people can buy fresh vegetable after work to cook for dinner. Beside food, the morning market also sell many ready made things like clothes, watches and etc and the things sold at Rifle Range are very cheap. It is very convenience to take bus also where the bus stop is just at downstair of my grandmother's flat. Although people always say Rifle Range residents infested with rats and live in stank of unclear rubbish because they only look from outside and have not really live there but I still like the place very much. I also hope one day I can retire at Rifle Range because my husband also like the place and my mother still own the small flat she inherited from my grandmother.

I ate the famous Char Koay Teow at Rifle Range morning market and it really taste good. The price is only RM2.40 per plate but very small amount of serving, I ate another bowl of hokkien mee after eating the Char Koay Teow. According to one of the Rifle Range old man who sat at my table, even the Singaporean come to Rifle Range to taste the Char Koay Teow and said it really taste good. The hawker will fry the Char Koay Teow one plate by one plate to preserve the food quality.

I really miss my grandmother when I come to this place. I regret I have not visit her as often as I can when she live alone at her flat after I moved out from this place. That time I was still young and not mature, in the weekend I prefer to lingering at shopping mall than visit my grandmother. Sure my grandmother felt lonely waiting for her grandchildren to visit her. My grandmother love me a lot, I can feel that, hope my grandmother's spirit rest in peace...

ZOO NEGARA

2008-08-24T21:00:00.000+08:00

Bored in the weekend? Visit Zoo Negara for RM15 only! Feel happy to see the animals, especially the birds who freely walk around you. And want to laugh at the orang utan's behaviour. A good place to make children happy and even adults also, can make it a place to pat thor.

MELAKA GETAWAY

2008-08-19T20:21:00.008+08:00

Been to Melaka recently. Also went to A Famosa Resort but it was already evening. A Famosa Resort has a big landscape but I don't quite like the place as they charge quite expensive on all their entertainments. Even their Animal Safari they charge RM38 for adult. The above picture with an elephant is a sight of A Famosa Resort.

Went to Klebang beach and ride a horse at only RM10, very cheap.

At night went to Jonker Walk night market, my goodness, the place was very crowded and I almost faint. There were a few places where old people singing karaoke and there was also an open pub where a couple was dancing while the pub's guests (including the European tourists) sitting down entertained by their dance.

Also went to the Portugese Settlement the next day by only see a boat by the river. Should go at night next time then only able to see them performing dance and also to feel their culture.

Next post will be on more places visited recently. Next time this blog will have more pictures than writing as I am too busy going out, he, he.

THE LAW OF THE SEED

2008-08-12T21:30:00.000+08:00

I like this article very much, that why I want to post it here, let us learn from the law of the seed. I find its principles truely apply towards our daily life and if we know how to play the rules, we can overcome almost all the obstacles in our life.

Take a look at an apple tree. There might be five hundred apples on the tree, but each apple has just ten seeds.

That's a lot of seeds!

We might ask, "Why would you need so many seeds to grow just a few more apple trees?"Nature has something to teach us here.

It's telling us: "Not all seeds grow. In life, most seeds never grow.

So if you really want to make something happen, you had better try more than once."

This might mean:
You'll attend twenty interviews to get one job.
You'll interview forty people to find one good employee.
You'll talk to fifty people to sell one house, one car, one vacuum cleaner, one insurance policy, or a business idea.
And you might meet a hundred acquaintances just to find one special friend.

When we understand the "Law of the Seed", we don't get so disappointed.

We stop feeling like victims.

We learn how to deal with things that happen to us.

Laws of nature are not things to take personally. We just need to understand them - and work with them.

IN A NUTSHELL

Successful people fail more often. But they plant more seeds.

When Things Are Beyond your control, here's something that you must NOT DO so as to avoid misery in your life:

You must not decide how you think the world SHOULD be.
You must not make rules for how everyone SHOULD behave.
Then, when the world doesn't obey your rules, you get angry!
That's what miserable people do!

On the other hand, let's say you expect that:

Friends SHOULD return favours.
People SHOULD appreciate you.
Planes SHOULD arrive on time.
Everyone SHOULD be honest.
Your husband or best friend SHOULD remember your birthday.

These expectations may sound reasonable. But often, these things won't happen!

So you end up frustrated and disappointed.

There's a better strategy. Demand less, and instead, have preferences!

For things that are beyond your control, tell yourself:

"I WOULD PREFER "A", BUT IF "B" HAPPENS, IT'S OK TOO!"

This is really a change in mindset. It is a shift in attitude, and it gives you more peace of mind ...

You prefer that people are polite ... but when they are rude, it doesn't ruin your day.

You prefer sunshine ... but if it rains, it is ok too!

To become happier, we either need to

a) Change the world, or
b) Change our thinking.

It is easier to change our Thinking!

IN A NUTSHELL

It is not the problem that is the issue, but rather it is your attitude attending to the problem that is the problem.

It's not what happens to you that determine your happiness.

It's how you think about what happens to you!

SENTUL PARK

2008-08-10T16:54:00.006+08:00

I came across many blogs that post about this beautiful place of Sentul Park, so one weekend I went there to see myself. Yeah, a beautiful place and it is free also, not even parking fee. It is also the place where The Kuala Lumpur Performing Arts Centre (KLPac) located.

One the main attraction is its Sentul Park Koi Center where you can see a lot of these expensive orange colour fishes which we called it kois. There is also a Japanese restaurant located nearby the pond. YTL group sales office is also located inside the park where you can go in and see the high end residential development by the YTL group.

Ok, got to go now as tomorrow working. Will post more places that I visit recently, cheap short trip where you can visit in the weekend.

LORONG KULIT, PENANG

2008-08-08T16:15:00.002+08:00

Going back to my hometown, Penang is a great pleasure to me, got to enjoy carefree life and away from the working stress. One of my favourite place is Lorong Kulit which is a paradise of cheap things. The food sold there are Malay food because most of the visitors there are Malays. You can get your things done there at a very cheap price where I recently change my watch battery at only RM4. You can also get your handphone repaired immediately where there are a lot of handphone stalls who also help you to download songs into your handphone. There are also antiques being sold, old books, toiletries, watches, T-shirt, etc. You can also find a lot of fruits stalls selling variety of fruits. A worthwhile place to visit for people who are looking for cheap secondhand things.

Want to eat crispy, delicious cup pohpiah? Go to Kek Seng coffee shop nearby Komtar. One specialty of its cup popiah is its crispy cup. It also has crab meat to add in at additional price of RM0.30 each. But the crab meat is tasteless, so no point to add in the crab meat and 4 of this cup popiah cost you only RM2.20. But if you do not order drink in that coffee shop, you will be penalise RM0.40.

I have been quite busy lately, so have not post my blog recently. But I have taken a lot of pictures and will post it out later. Seem that my future posts will have a lot of pictures and less writing cause I just too busy to sit down and write a long story.

MY FIRST eBAY EXPERIENCE

2008-07-26T17:51:00.004+08:00

Anything that can turn into cash interest me, so I put this 2 old monitors for sale at ebay Malaysia. In fact I make a mistake purchase my company old computer (CPU with monitor and keyboard) at RM50 during their recycle computer project where the money will be donated to a charity fund. When I brought back the computer, it was an obsolete CPU without disk drive and hard disk. I got it changed to another CPU (celeron equivalent with Pentium 3), also without disk drive and hard disk but still find it too hassle and not worthwhile to do anything with it. My company IT people did offer their service to download softwares into the computer for RM50 service charge but I still find it is not worthwhile and also I still have my own computer that can still be use.

I phoned the second hand shop trying to sell my monitors but they want a newer monitor and only willing to pay RM15 for it. Then one day my colleague told me that she has successfully sell a lamp at ebay Malaysia for RM30. So I put my 2 old monitors for sale at ebay Malaysia, one monitor which I bought from my company, Acer monitor at RM30 and IBM monitor at RM35 which my husband brought back from his company.

When I was in Penang, a Malay man called me but I just ignored his call as I don't know him. After I was back from Penang and checked my email account, I got to know that the Malay man wish to buy my monitors. So I called him and make arrangement with him to pick-up my monitors at my house. After that I felt a little bit afraid if the buyer is a robber and come to rob my house. That night the Malay man unable to find my house and I appointed him to wait for me at a petrol station nearby my house. When eventually I met him at the petrol station with my husband I know he is not a bad people as he brought his wife and his small son with him.

I brought the old CPU and the keyboard with me too and asked him wheather he want to buy it for RM20. I told him I bought the computer for RM50 and I just want to balik modal only. He bought all my junk computers, the old CPU, keyboard, 2 monitors (in working condition) altogether at RM85.

He even gave me a positive feedback at my ebay "Good person, novis like me, have bright future n interesting seller see ya again" and "Good person, reliable". I also gave him a good feedback "With ebay and genuine buyer like him, can get a reasonable price for my monitors" and "Good buyer, can travel from far to pick up his items, convenient to deal with.

Wow, not bad my first ebay experience!

HOW MUCH IS ENOUGH?

2008-07-13T10:05:00.003+08:00

I was searching news on Zeti's resignation and I came across your blog. Haha, the way you write.. how so say, simple and plain but true you. Anyway, I am not a good writer either(so cannot comment too much) but I guess you need to work harder to be a freelance writer. Anyway, there are lots of ways to make more money. Visit my blog to find out more,:). Good luck to your money making journey....

I got a comment the other day from a blogger, thank you for your comment and please feel free to visit his blog at http://thecitysurvivalguide.blogspot.com/, there are a lot of good contents articles in it, a much more experienced blogger.

I got this idea of writing again after my father called me last night regarding the low exchange rate of the New Zealand currency. After feeling stress out the whole night worrying my parent's money might not be enough for retirement due to bad market condition, low FD interest rate, inflation due to oil hike and many other factors, I am here to write again.

How should I start? Well the other day I went out with my colleagues and one of our company young group sales manager after office hours at KLCC and this is what one of my colleague said to the young group sales manager.

"When you date a girl, you must be generous, you cannot control what she want to eat, you cannot tell her, we share-share the bill. As a woman we want our boyfriend or husband that can provide us, that can pay for our food and shelter. But I see him count-count his money one, you know." she said meaning the young group sales manager.

Another incident, one of my colleague said to me,

"Is Jenny's husband rich? She also has to work. You also have to work. If you are rich, you won't be coming every Saturday to work half-day to earn your allowance. And you will not be speculating the New Zealand currency, right?"

"We woman, wait they said we like to complain a lot. Actually we want a better life, right? Or else in future everything will fall under our head. Like my boyfriend, he know how to talk big only you know but when come to performing, he is not performing."

One of my colleague said, "My husband can provide me."

But her definition of provider is different from mine. For her, her husband can treat her with good food is good enough provider. But what I see a real provider is someone who can provide to their family, they work very hard outside to make sure enough food on the table. Their wife are given adequate allowances and usually their wife stay at home to take care of the children. Even a small wage earner like my mother's tenant is a provider, he work very hard at the restaurant to provide for his wife who are not working and 3 of his still schooling children. He will be very much happy if the restaurant get big order and he is asked to work overtime, in fact he always work overtime plus overnight to earn extra money. And my relative is also a provider, he work very late in his lawyer firm as he is the business partner of the firm, his wife is not working and he also has to provide to his three still schooling children. His children also want overseas holidays and every year he has to bring his children and wife for a holiday. So both of them is a provider, only they earn a different amount of money.

My mum always said her friend's daughter who is single and earning good salary is very generous, always treat her mother with good food at good restaurant and hotel until her mother said, "I have eaten all types of food already." My mum like to compare how good her friend's daughter is treating her mother and said, "If you do not treat your parent well now, you will regret in future after your parent died. If you treat your parent well, you will have no regrets because you know you have done enough." Well, life is like that, maybe you did not get the first prize like my mother's friend's daughter, so consolation prize is ok also, at least you must try.

My colleague said, "This year I want to take my mum to some place special, Taiwan. My mum always stay at home and does not go out. My brothers in my hometown are earning not much money and unable to take my mum out for good food or tour. My mum is getting miserable and not in a good mood. Me married and working far in the city unable to take much care of her. Sometimes I just don't want to think much about money. Although I unable to save much of my salary, I think I should take my mum to the tour while she is still alive and able to walk."

So how much money is enough with all this demands in life? If man think they are earning enough, they might be wrong because they might not have fully provide to their wife and family. If we think we are earning enough, we might be wrong also because we might have not fulfill our obligation to our parent, to give them quality life while they are still alive. That have not count our medical bills when we are old, expenses during our retirement years and our children future education. So many goals that need to achieve with money make me very motivated to earn extra money beside my fix salary. That's what we call "Law of Attraction". But I try not to work so hard but learn how to make more money out from my own money.

FOOD, FOOD, FOOD....

2008-06-29T17:06:00.006+08:00

FOOD, FOOD, FOOD....

Went back to Penang the other day and have a chance to taste back my favourite, good, cheap Penang food which I used to eat when I was in Penang.

One of them is the Koay Teow Thing at Magazine Road nearby Gama supermarket, the small bowl of Koay Teow Thing just cost you RM2.20 This Koay Teow Thing is cooked with minced pork together with its soup, not the type where the koay teow thing is soaked in hot water and poured soup on top of it.

Another one is Lor Bak at Penang Road nearby Cititel Hotel, I ate fried tauhu, cracker, spring roll and lor bak that cost me RM3.30.

My husband's friend who is a lawyer own 3 chains of restaurant in KL and he said his food business is not earning money, just break even. So one Saturday after my half-day work, I paid a visit to one of his restaurant at the shopping mall, I ordered a bowl of noodle that cost me around RM9.00 without drink (not very worthwhile). There was also not much choice of menu in that restaurant.

The noodle taste average, the sausage taste good but the pork balls were tasteless. After eating the noodle, I checked the menu at Old Town White Coffee restaurant nearby and the Old Town White Coffee restaurant Ipoh Hor fun just cost around RM6-7. No wonder his noodle cannot compete with other more cheaper food, I think he should offer free tea to customer and advertise by putting a big banner at his restaurant, at least if a family come out to have meal, when they spot a restaurant with free tea, they might be more willing to eat there. At least the family can save the cost of a few glass of drink if the restaurant offer free drink.

My husband's friend thought he can earn money faster with his food business compare to his profession as a lawyer but business is not as simple as that. It doesn't mean that you can cook 2 threads of noodle, you expect to earn big money. You have to cook delicious food, maybe the recipe has to be inherited from your parent or your grandparent who has been selling the food for decades and you also have to go through the hassle (complicated cooking that involve a lot of work) of cooking the food to maintain the quality of the food. Not cincai-cincai cook because you cook to earn money not to feed your stomach when you are hungry.

988 RED FM WITH LIM GUAN ENG

2008-06-23T21:01:00.006+08:00

988 RED FM WITH LIM GUAN ENG

When I stopped at Komtar by bus from Sungai Nibong on my way back to Penang from Kuala Lumpur, I was rather surprise to see the crowd at Komtar. So I proceeded to the crowded place and snapped this few pictures of the Penang Chief Minister, Lim Guan Eng. Wow, he is very fair and not bad looking.

Guess the radio station 988 red fm interviewed him. Also snapped the photo of a beautiful 988 red fm deejay.

Oh yes, just let you all know, heard a rumour today, they said ringgit will depreciate in August due to the resignation of Puan Zeti (can't remember what post she is holding but she control the Malaysia Ringgit and the Malaysian banks).

No wonder the public react so fast, the New Zealand Dollar exchange rate already increase to 2.525.

50 YEARS CHEONG SAMS

2008-06-20T19:57:00.000+08:00

50 YEARS CHEONG SAMS

Just show you all 3 cheong sams given by my aunt. This cheong sams was worn by my aunty when she was studying at university in China. You know this cheong sams are more than 50 years? But they are still in good condition because they are made by good material. I felt glamorous wearing the cheong sams.

OIL HIKE EFFECT ON MY FOREX

2008-06-18T20:51:00.005+08:00

Me coming home not feeling good today. This afternoon during my lunch time, went to the bank nearby my office and almost make placement of the New Zealand fixed deposit but change my mind at last because I cannot overcome my fear. Among the reasons is the recently oil hike and the volatility of the New Zealand currency rate. When I went to the bank in the afternoon, the rate is 2.483 and after coming back from work, my husband told me that the closing price is 2.50. Shit! I miss the opportunity to make some extra pocket money due to my fear. My husband told me that in the morning the rate is 2.47 and in the afternoon if only I know that the rate is increasing, I should have make placement. But I thought the price is dropping because yesterday the rate is 2.49. This is another lesson to learn. Keep track on the morning rate and then see the price in the afternoon during my lunch time. I make a mistake by failing to monitor the morning rate. Guess I need to wait for another cycle to make placement into New Zealand fixed deposit.

I even already seen the customer service staff at the bank to ask his opinion. He told me this,
"Based on my personal opinionlah, not the bank opinion, the ringgit has been depreciated since the last 20 years against Singapore Dollar and I feel that the ringgit is still weak."

Sure you all have been thinking why I am not blogging on the recently most hot topic, the oil hike. Since it has affect my confidency level to play forex, I have to blog it now. One reason I have not burst my anger through my blog of the oil hike is because my car petrol is subsidised by my husband's company. But since the oil hike, his company is planning to reduce the petrol subsidy to 70% and his manager has written a sarcastic email,

"Company paying for the employee petrol is an outdated policy. You all thinklah, is it fair the company subsidised 100% of your petrol where you can enjoy driving to Kuantan in the weekend using the company subsidised petrol?"

But the manager failed to think that the company is using my husband's trunk to carry the company things to the factory to repair the factory big machine. Have he calculate the trunk depreciating value and the servicing charge of the trunk and including the trunk's big tyres?

I asked my husband, "Will you subside my petrol if your company reduce your petrol subsidy?"

And he said, "Can I say no?"

If he say no, I will answer, "You need your wife to go to work, if you unable to subsidise the petrol, so you should drive your wife to work, right?"

Sometimes I think my company have not been treating me well although I have been sacrificing my youth working for the company and being a senior employee with long service. Can't even a big company such as my company giving me free parking? And they even want to increase the parking rate to be the same as the company's tenant parking rate, at the moment they are giving their staffs the preference parking rate which is a little bit lower than their tenant's parking rate only. Summore they rented their food court to the the food operators with expensive rent where everyday we have to eat expensive lunch during our lunch time. And the salary is also not that high, I just wonder how a working employee can become a little bit financial comfortable with so many blood suckers around?

I did try to get a free parking but end up having my car being holed by the car thieves. They were trying to steal my old kancil! (old kancil also they cannot let go, is our citizen, the thieves so desperate of money, can't they eye a bigger car?) At last I have to opt for the paid parking place, I have to fork out money to pay for the safety of my car.

Even if you are in trouble and looking for help as what happen to a restaurant worker who flagged for help in the middle of road whose mother was sick end up being robbed by the stop by robbers as come out in the newspaper recently. Until he unable to save his old mother who died eventually instead he being injured by the robbers. I was very sad to read the news, how come a human did this kind of thing to a troubled person? It seems that bad people are everywhere and it is not safe to simply ask help from strangers.

The world is not fair, the rich (like my company) become more rich and the poor become more poor. Since the oil hike, the government ask us to change our lifestyle, no often dining out, stay at home and cook your own meal and no travel. Work HARD but all money got SUCK! Last time is Work Hard No Play make Jack a dull boy. Now Work Hard, Money Got Suck, No Life, No Money, make me a Dull Employee!

BATS' CAVE TEMPLE (TUA PEK KONG)

2008-06-15T17:32:00.006+08:00

BATS' CAVE TEMPLE (TUA PEK KONG)

Do you know that there are another 2 temples nearby Kek Lok Si, Ayer Itam, Penang (Malaysia)? So next time if you visit Kek Lok Si, also visit this temple called Bats' Cave Temple (Tua Pek Kong) where you can experience the bats noise though you can hardly see the bats in the dark cave (actually the cave is quite small and make by people from the stone). I unable to snap the bat in the dark cave because I afraid that the bats will attack me if they are shocked being snap by camera.

Another temple is much simpler than Kek Lok Si and you have to climb a few stairs to reach the temple. And there are also god statues in the temple for praying. If you go to the temple toilet and open the tap, you will feel that the water is quite cold because it is a mountain water.

So for the person who like to do praying, don't forget to visit this temples as there are many types of god for different purposes, like god for children to get good results in examination, etc.

OCBC GLASS CHESS

2008-06-15T16:49:00.003+08:00

OCBC GLASS CHESS

There is a latest free gift promotion from OCBC. All you have to do is take a personal loan from OCBC until 31 July 2008 and you will receive a glass chess as their delightful gift. No guarantor, all you need just your IC and your credit card and you can loan up to RM100,000.

The minimum personal loan they are offering is RM6,000, if you use your credit card to apply the loan, you can only borrow up to your credit limit. If you use your salary slip to apply, you can borrow up to 6 times your monthly salary for Great Eastern staff or 5 times your monthly salary for other company staff.

In fact you don't even have to pay the interest if you want the free gift only. There are 3 packages they are offering now :

1)The first package is you just have to fill up the personal loan form and you don't have to apply for the personal loan now. You just state how much loan you want and within 3 months, if you need the money, you just have to call the bank and the bank will transfer the money to your OCBC account. Once the money is transfered to your account, interest will be charge with immediate effect and takaful insurance premium (insurance premium to protect your personal loan in case you unable to pay back your loan) also will be deducted from your account. If you did not call the bank for the personal loan, the contract will terminate after 3 months, no hassle at all. And you can receive your free gift, the glass chess upon submission of your personal loan form. This package is suitable for person who want the free gift only and this package promotion valid up to this month end.

2)The second package is you can enjoy 30 days free trial of your personal loan and if you can repay your personal loan before 30 days, there will be no interest charged and your takaful insurance premium will be refunded to you after one month. Once you submit your personal loan form, the amount of loan that you apply will be credit to your OCBC bank account and the takaful insurance premium will also be deducted from your bank account. But if you unable to repay your loan after 30 days, a much higher interest will be charged. This package is suitable for person who has the kang thow to earn fast cash in short term by doing investment and can also enjoy the 30 days free interest loan. If you are thinking of putting the money in normal FD to earn 30 days interest by enjoying 30 days free interest from your loan, I think it is not worth the hassle since the takaful insurance premium will be refunded to you only after 1 month if you able to repay the loan before 30 days.

3)The last package is the genuine loan where you can make installments payment after you take the loan and the interest is lower than the first 2 packages. Takaful insurance premium will also be deducted from your bank account depending on how much you loan and your attainment age.

So you just choose, which type of loan package that serve your purpose and bring back the glass chess!

MACAU

2008-06-08T16:51:00.011+08:00

Macau is famous for its delicious Portugese egg tart and almond cake. Places of interest like shown in the pictures above are Ruins of St. Paul's, Monte Fort, Sai Van Bridge and Macau Fisherman's Wharf.

There are quite a number of museums in Macau but the 'MUST SEE' one is Museum of Macau. And also its famous casinos where every hotel in Macau has its own mini casino. Visited big LISBON casino and also be a member of mocha club.

As a hotel guest, we entitled to join their mini casino called MOCHA club for free and been given a card with 50 Dollar credit. We played with the machine until our credit finish, then stopped, in the end we still won more than 100 Dollar (which equivalent to around RM50).

Want to know further about the club, kindly visit their website at http://www.mochaclubs.com/

Macau Dollar around the same or equivalent with Hong Kong Dollar and China Yuan.

But I still prefer Shenzhen (China) because I find Macau food is very expensive, more expensive than Hong Kong food. The population in Macau also less congested compared to Hong Kong but I don't see any pretty lady around.

Fish Spa at Tesco Ampang

2008-06-08T15:44:00.004+08:00

FISH SPA AT TESCO AMPANG

Went to Tesco Ampang for groceries yesterday and experienced fish spa outside Tesco Ampang, Kuala Lumpur at RM12 for 20 minutes. It also offered 30 minutes fish spa for RM18. They set up a small plastic swimming pool (it looked like the small plastic swimming pool for children) and you just have to sit on top of the swimming pool and soak your legs in the water which was full of small fishes that was claimed as doctor fish.

The feel was like small fishes biting you but not painful, it felt more like light massage. At one point of time you feel your leg got numb and feel your blood circulating in your legs.

I have wanted to try this newly introduced fish spa before and some place offer it at RM28-30 for 30 minutes. Since Tesco Ampang offered it at much cheaper price, so I tried it, at least I don't have to waste time to go down to KL city just to experience the fish spa. Only that the Tesco Ampang fish spa was outside the hypermarket and the more expensive one might be done indoor.

BIG BUDDHA STATUE AT LANTAU ISLAND

2008-06-07T19:41:00.013+08:00

I don't think I like Hong Kong that much due to its congested population, dirty flats, busy and noisy street plus its expensive food. In LRT I even heard a conversation between a working man and two working women (all wearing working suits) saying that a Hongkie must earn at least HKD1,000,000 (around RM500,000) to be consider in the middle class blanket. So in term of their salary compare to us, their food is cheap only that they have to pay a big buck to buy or installment a flat or apartment.

The women around Hong Kong also not that pretty compared to China. Also went to see Tian Tan Buddha Statue at Lantau Island. Have to take a cable car to go to the Lantau Island, the cable car ticket cost HKD88. When you are in the cable car, you will be able to see the greenery of the hills on your way to Lantau Island.

HKD almost equivalent to China Yuan.

If you want to know further, kindly visit their website at www.np360.com.hk

MY FIRST FOREX PROFIT

2008-06-07T16:19:00.003+08:00

When I go through the blogs at Petaling Street, I saw some of the bloggers boasted that they have earn some amount of money from their blogs and I really envy with their patient of spending time sitting at their pc exploring various ways to earn money from their blog. I did try that before but now I don't have much time cause most of my time is spent at work place with not much time left in the weekend for my leisure which I use it to do the more important tasks. And I have not been successful earning any money from my blog or generate any income from internet.

I guess you all have read my blog, "Forex While Working", April 2008 and in fact recently I have earn RM500 net profit after 1 month placing my money into New Zealand foreign currency fixed deposit when the rate is low, around 2.4885 and redeem it out after 1 month when the rate increased to 2.60 (actually I redeem it at 2.53 where the bank got the difference of the margin.) I find it not bad, better than working half-day on Saturday for my company where I earn only RM80 for 3 hours.

Even my banker told me that my weekly interest will be due tomorrow but I still insisted to redeem my FD on that day where the rate gone up saying, "If I wait for tomorrow, the rate will gone down already." And I am right, the rate gone down a little bit the next day.

"It is very dangerous to speculate on forex rate. You can earn money because Malaysia Ringgit is weak, if Malaysia Ringgit is strong, you will not be able to make any money." that is one of my relative said to me.

After the oil hike there is some saying that the Bank Negara will appreciate the Ringgit to reduce inflation and increasing our purchasing power, so have to wait and see. Do not want the ringgit depeg that happen a few years ago to affect me again, please read my blog "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" on May 2007. Malaysians are very worry after the oil hike and sometimes economy is very unpredictable also, who know ringgit will drop in value and be like ruppiah in future?

SHENZHEN WINDOW OF THE WORLD

2008-06-02T19:59:00.017+08:00

SHENZHEN WINDOW OF THE WORLD

Shenzhen is a beautiful town with high-rise buildings and not very congested population. Went also to Shi Jie Zhi Chuang (Shenzhen Window of the World). Entry fee is 120 yuan with the exchange rate of RM0.45 to 1 yuan. If you ask me wheather the high entry fee is worthwhile, well I will tell you that there are a lot to see and I walked the whole afternoon until very tired and my leg got swollen but still have not cover the whole area. Like shown in the pictures above are Angkor Wat, Nigeria waterfall and etc.

Went to Zhuhai also by ferry with the ticket fare 90 yuan for one way. Zhuhai is famous of its oysters and it only cost around Malaysian Ringgit RM2 for each cooked big oyster as shown in the picture. Sorry, only snap the empty oyster shells, too eager to eat the oysters when it came until forgot to snap the photo first.

Also went to Guangzhou by train with the ticket price of 75 yuan for one way. Guangzhou is a big city also like Shenzhen with many high-rise buildings.

One thing about China big city, when you take their LRT, train, ferry or shop at their shopping complexs, you will see many beautiful young ladies around you, their complexion is fair and smooth, even the young guys also have fair and smooth complexion plus their attires are also very modern.

One thing I like about China is their cheap tasty food with their variety types of cooking way much different from our country. If I have the chance to visit China again, I will visit the rural parts of China, to see the different way of their life compare to the big city of China .

LAZY TO WORK SYNDROME

2008-05-04T20:47:00.008+08:00

LAZY TO WORK SYNDROME

Bought a blue CANON digital camera (PowerShot A460) for RM379.00 at KL Pavilion Harvey Norman. It come with 1GB SD memory card, camera bag and an average size CANON back pack. Since the new PowerShot A470 already in the market, they sell the older version cheaper. Hope with this new camera, I will be able to take more pictures to put in my blog.

The philatelist (stamp collector) I met the other day gave me Malaysia Leg Of The Torch Relay - Kuala Lumpur 21st April 2008 The Games of the XXIX Olympiad -Beijing Summer Olimpics 2008 envelope and I posted the envelope back to my home address. Unfortunately it got wet in my letter box due to the raining day. Took the picture of the envelop using my new camera, he, he...

Ever wake up in the morning feeling tired hoping that we just don't have to wake up to go to work on that day? I believe most of us ever have this kind of feeling and sometimes it happen every day. We just don't get enough sleep, have to wake up, get dressed and drive in traffic jam to work. Some of us even have to take LRT and bus to work and most of the time the LRT and the bus are very crowded in the morning during rush hour to work. In fact it is a hard life but when we moan or complain a lot, people label us as lazy. Is it true that we are lazy or having a lazy to work syndrome or are we deserve a better life?

Ha, ha, when I told my friend about my lazy to work syndrome, this is what she answered me.

"Lazy people are scare to compete with hardworking and smart people."

Ok, I always have different perspectives with my friend who is a workaholic and also a very hardworking and skilled employee of her company who also think that she is smart. Another people told me about Maslow's hierachy of needs where lower rank employees are only motivated with money and how much salary they earn from the company. I think I fall under this category.

When we move to the higher rank of the hierachy, we no more work for money but work for self satisfaction. I guess I will not achieve this category as I always working my plans towards financial freedom.

I guess many people also like me who hope that they don't have to work. This is one of my friend told me about her view,

"My mother said it is wasted if I am not working since I am a graduate. She said if I continue to work until I retired, I will get a few hundred thousand ringgit and if I am not working who will give me this amount of money?"

Some women also wish that they can stay at home but nowadays husbands fail to become a provider or do not earn enough. To survive and continue to work until retirement, I apply this few strategies :

1)Don't stay too late in the office. It will exhausted your energy since tomorrow you still have to come to work. Try to go back early, take enough rest like sleep early, recharge your energy and start fresh the next morning. Don't spend too much time watching tv or surfing the net at night in the weekdays and come back to work the next morning feeling sleepy and irritated.

2)In the weekend, try to entertain ourselves by having hobbies and doing the things that we like to do. Plan your weekend so that your weekend will not be wasted. As for me, if there is opportunites, I will watch free movies in the cinema, go and get free gifts to make myself happy and eat tasty food (not necessary expensive food) to satisfy my appetite. Anyway after weekend we have to continue with our routine work, so enjoy your weekend.

3) I also will spend my weekend holidays at my hometown where everything get slow when you are not working.

4) Catching up with friends to have lunch and outing together to share our latest news.

5)And the most important thing is being comfortable with your job. If you can cope with your job and comfortable with it, it will increase the chances of you working long term throughout the retirement.

There was a clerk who was too comfortable with her working environment that she work with her boss though the salary is small and there was no prospect for her job. Eventually her boss asked her to leave as he is closing his office soon. She was very relax working there, not much of work and she can listen to the radio and read magazines while working. And she was also allow to go to shopping mall during working hours after she finished her work. No wonder she like her job so much.

6)Getting promoted may result of you being given more work and responsibilities. Sometimes you might be wondering wheather the increase in pay is worthwhile compared to the increase of hours you spend in the office. You might be going home late every day feeling very tired. And maybe end up sleeping one whole day in the weekend to recharge your energy. Hey, you can't to be long term feeling very tired with your job, it is not a quality life. Some might not be able to cope and throw resignation letter instead. You should be happy getting promoted but instead you resign earlier.

The strategies I apply above I find it very useful to cope with my work. I do not have afternoon nap in the weekend. And one more tips to reduce your housework, wear house slipper when you are at home, it will protect your heels from cracking. And most important thing you don't have to mop your house floor every weekend.

Well, I will be on leave for more than week, what a break, huh!

FOREX WHILE WORKING

2008-04-27T20:59:00.002+08:00

When I check my email account the other day, there was one feedback about one post in my blog, Rich Dad Poor Dad, the below was the feedback....

I was looking around for information about foreign FD, especially NZ FD and i found your blog. Interesting post about the FD which i totally agree with you. I can understand how you feel when you tell them about financial literacy and the kind of perspective they hold as to why you are so persistent to see financial freedom. I have met my fair share of people who simply see us as money grabber.

Anyway, great blog you got!

Ok, thank you for reading my blog and giving feedback. Tell you what, after quite sometime I feel that the foreign New Zealand FD is not good enough, too slow to get a good return. Thinking of putting into New Zealand FD when the currency is very, very low and redeem it out when the currency go up above my buying rate. But most important thing the bank must be near your working place. Of course you cannot simply take leave to redeem your foreign FD when the currency go up. And it is best to do it during your office lunch hour.

OCBC bank is nearby my office, so I went into the bank the other day to check the New Zealand FD interest rate. The customer service staff told me their bank New Zealand FD interest rate is 6.40% weekly and I am quite surprise to find out that different bank offer different interest rate.

"Public bank is offering 8% interest rate per month for New Zealand FD but your bank is offering less than 7%. Only if Public Bank is near my office. " I told the bank customer service staff.

If you intend to redeem your foreign FD when the currency go up, it is best for you to put your FD in weekly interest rate basis, at least you earn your weekly interest if you redeem the FD early. When I told my friend about this, again she said, "A long term foreign FD you want to play it on short term basis. Now you want to gamble on the foreign currency rate."

The other day one bank introduced me stabiliser fund where you are guaranteed 4% per annum cash bonus on your lump sum placement and potential upside from exosure to different investment assets. It is somewhat like unit trust and sound very attractive, right? Every month, your funds will move into the market in equal portions over 12 months and summore they advertise "Your heartbeat doestn't have to move in line with the stock market." When I asked wheather my capital is protected and they told me no. So I feel it is kind of stupid to invest in a fund with no capital guarantee, only 4% cash bonus on your lump sum placement is guaranteed, as well as I put my money in normal FD with 3.7% per annum interest rate with guaranteed capital. And let the bank gamble our money in the stock market and tell us our heartbeat doesn't have to move in line with the stock market when the market now are very volatile? Even if you lend money to somebody with no guarantee you will get your money back, you will have to charge a very high interest, right and not that 4% guarantee cash bonus?

Sometimes I find banks has not been fair to their depositor by giving them very low interest rate on the FD placement. Whatever they introduce don't seem to be a good kang thow, only we have to pay the unit trust fee before we even see any good return.

The other day I met with a philatelist (stamp collector), he is a commitee member of Philatelic Society of Malaysia. I showed him my stamp collection to see if any of my stamps do have any value. Unfortunately none of them have any special value. Again my friend said, "You are not stamp collector, you are money collector, you collect stamps hoping that one day your stamp might appreciate in value and you will able to sell them at high price."

Just let them say whatever they want to saylah. At least I make an effort. Those who do not make any effort only know how to condemn people, don't you think so?

FOREX TRADING

2008-03-18T22:03:00.007+08:00

FOREX TRADING

Sorry for the late posting again. After going back to work, find myself getting busy again, very hard to locate time to do blogging. Yeah, as I mention in my last post, I did attended a seminar about forex trading and only five of us there being me the youngest with the rest of them quite a senior citizen men hoping to earn some extra income during their free time after retirement.

Forex trading enable you to earn 3-8% per month as they claim to be and you have to open an online account with them. I found a website where you can open this account at http://www.moneyforex.com/ with a minimum deposit of USD100. You can even download their free demo account where you can play around the trading platform and trade using this fake account before you actually do the real trading. The demo account is somewhat like as shown above.

This is how it works.. This account enable you to play on margin where if you lose money, you have to top up your account and if you earn profit, your account will be top up with the profit you earn. There are two types of lot, the standard lot (USD100,000) and mini lot (USD10,000). Let say you buy New Zealand currency with USD at 0.8184 and it increase 1 bip to 0.8185, you earn 0.001 or USD10 if you own USD100,000 standard lot. That mean you use USD100,000 to buy NZD at 0.8184, you get NZD122,189.64 and when NZD increase 1 bip to 0.8185, you sell your NZD currency and get USD100,012.21, earning around USD10. You just have to take 10-20 minutes daily to monitor your account. When you are playing on margin, it mean that you use other people money to work harder for you, is what they saylah.

After the seminar, they try to promote their 3 days hands-on live training workshop which cost around RM2,388.00, wow, that is a lot of money, huh! You also need to have a fast internet connection note book to use during the workshop. They said they even will tell you when to place the order and exit during the training and they also will teach you to trade using their conservative, step by step forex investology system. This system was invented by them where they have invested a lot time and energy, that why the training is expensive.

There were two trainers in that seminar with one of them a middle age man who has 20 years trading experience in future and stock market. He is also a certified futures licenced dealer representative with the KLCE (KL Commodity Exchange) and he himself is also an avid investor/trader in commodity futures, stocks and forex. Another younger man is also an avid investor himself and has been trading the US stocks option since 2003, own a few food business and also a franchise entrepreneur for the last 15 years.

If you ask me if I am convinced, I would say no for a few reasons. First the workshop fee is too expensive, second I do not have high-speed internet connection notebook and third it sound a little bit like gambling where I am not expert in that field which might risk me suffer a big losses if I blindly jump into the game. But I don’t mind learning to play around the trading platform and trade using a fake free demo account which I have download from the website. But until now since I start working, I have yet to start to learn due to time constraint.

They said we will learn how to take advantage of the bank hedging system from the workshop also. They said the bank is employing expert to do forex trading in the foreign exchange market. Even there is one bank advertising in the newspaper to promote their foreign currency FD and they even earn billions of ringgit from their last year profit. If they are not involve in the forex trading, a bank profit will not come up to billions of ringgit. Some depositor even cursed the bank for playing dirty, advertising the foreign currency FD in the newspaper when the rates is high and when the depositor placed their money in the account, there was huge drop in the rate and the depositor lose their money unless they keep their money in the account. And the bank have make a big bulk of profit.

How a foreign currency FD works, I have explained in my last blog in Rich Dad, Poor Dad. There was even an article in New Straits Times about Japanese housewives trading forex at home. But I still prefer the foreign currency FD offered by the bank because it is less risky and our money is back up by our country established bank though the bank always trying to make profit out from their depositors. Anything to do with overseas online forex broker has yet to gain my trust, if they take away your money, what can you do? Still believe in foreign currency FD is for long term, patient will win in the end as with time passing earning compound interest and maybe appreciation of the currency in future.

LOVE OR LUST?

2008-01-21T16:59:00.000+08:00

It have been quite sometime since I wrote my last short story. It has been more easier to write real life experiences than fiction story but nobody contribute any real life story to me recently and maybe also due to my limited social life, I run out of idea to write one. So now I am thinking of writing one fiction story and it is not easy as somebody told me, I don't have enough knowledge to write one because I have not been reading a lot.

To write a fiction story, you do not just need to have the story, you also must know how to expand the story to the details much to your imagination and you must also know how to manipulate the fact and the fiction. Like Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code, the author does not only has in depth knowledge of the Christian religion history but he also know how to explain the fact and mix the fact with his fiction story. That is how a perfect story come into the picture and earn the author big money.

As for my case, a leisure writer, if I have a story about an actress in Hongkong or Taiwan film industry, I might not have enough knowledge about the Hongkong or Taiwan film industry culture. So I unable to expand my story to the details, make me a loser to the more established author, in fact even to write a good story, you have to do a lot of research. Different from writing a real life experiences, you have been going through those experiences, it make you easier to write as you know the in and out of the story. But anyway, since I am only a leisure writer and do not make any money out from my story, so I just tembak one fiction story in this post. Hope you all can accept this fiction story of mine as I also do not have too much time to do a lot of reading, research or study Hongkong or Taiwan culture because I am also a full time employee who need to make my living.

Here is the story...

"I am chosen!" exclaimed Xiou Mei when she met his boyfriend at a cafe in the town.

"Really? You are chosen out of so many other actress? It is not a good thing either. You have not heard that the film producer is a playboy? Nothing is too good to be true." Kar Han was not very happy with his girlfriend's good news either. He started to sulk his face.

"It is a chance of the life time. I am going to be a box-office film star. I cannot lose this opportunity, Kar Han. You know I had been an actress for quite long and I didn't have any chance to hold a big role. They just give me a small roles and I unable to earn big money out from my acting career. But I never give up. I know one day I will get the opportunity. And the opportunity has come, Kar Han."

"But the film producer is a playboy. So you will grab this opportunity at any cost?"

Xiou Mei kept quiet. She knew that his boyfriend disapproved her decision to accept the offer to act in the box office film.

Kar Han also kept quiet. He knew he have no right to stop his girlfriend to become a film star. In fact he himself had not been successful in his acting career. He like his girlfriend also only got small roles to act and beside being an actor, he also became a part-time musician. But all his effort never earn him big money.

Xiou Mei read the film script, "The Emperor's Concubine". She read the script but her mind was not there. Her mind started to wandered around, from the first day she met the film producer, Chen Ho, she felt Chen Ho was interested with her from the way he looked at her. Chen Ho had the charisma though in his late forties. She knew she is a beautiful lady though her age already reached 29, only that she had not achieve much in life. She was still a struggling actress wishing for a bigger opportunity.

She continued to read the script. Again her mind started the imagination, she already cannot differentiate the fiction of the script and what really happen last night. The emperor was Chen Ho and she was the concubine. They acted in the box office film like real couple. Then suddenly Kar Han came into picture. He wanted her to leave the emperor. He was her childhood lover but unfortunately the emperor spotted her beauty on his visit to her small village. So the emperor took her to become his concubine. So Kar Han went through a lot of obstacles before he able to enter into the palace. He wanted to bring Xiou Mei with him to leave the palace and the emperor but funny.... Xiou Mei did not want to follow him... Is Xiou Mei already fallen in love with the emperor? Suddenly the emperor entered the room and saw Kar Han. He quickly instructed his soldiers to catch Kar Han. Kar Han was alone but there was many soldiers. How can Kar Han alone fight so many of the emperor's soldiers? At last Kar Han killed by the emperor's soldiers and his bloody body fell on the ground. Xiou Mei screamed with fear....

"Kar Han......!!!"

The emperor was so powerful! How can Kar Han alone compete with the emperor to get back his long loved Xiou Mei? He thought Xiou Mei love is as strong as his, so he came to the palace with a determined heart but Xiou Mei did not want to follow him! Or else they should have escape from the palace and develop a happy family in their small village. He ended up died in the palace in his failed attempt. In his last breath, he realized Xiou Mei did not love him anymore...

"The Emperor's Concubine" film already hit the cinema. Kar Han went to watch the movie on the first day the movie was screened in the cinema. Now his ex-girlfriend is a box office film star. And his six years relationship with Xiou Mei just end like that. They had been quarrelling very often since Xiou Mei accept the offer to act in this film. The film producer is wealthy and he can produce any film to seek his pleasure towards women. Steamy sex scenes, Kar Han can't understand why this movie got so many awards, is it just because it is a high budget movie or is it came from an established film producer like Chen Ho? He is rich and he got all the awards, woman and fame. And he got a lot of money also from the film due to the high box office collection. And I am poor and I lost my girlfriend.

And everything was over now. Xiou Mei had not thought that "The Emperor's Concubine" film was only a one hit wonder for her and after that then slowly faded from the scene. She thought that her lead role in the film will get her to further her acting career but luck was not with her.

Her relationship with Kar Han also ended and after so many years she still had not meet any guy better than Kar Han. The men that approached her and in relationship with her after Kar Han seem not to be serious with her. She had a few flings and meaningless short term relationships with those men and she ended up alone again.

She regretted that her six years relationship with Kar Han had to end just like that. She felt that her fate had been played by casanova man like Chen Ho which she thought was her benefactor at first. Chen Ho just dumped her and did not invest more money to make her popular. And her age was also catching up and she will be rejected from the film industry soon.

As for Chen Ho, though he was known as the playboy, nothing affected him. He still go back to his family where he had a daughter and son where both of them already teenager. His wife did not bother what he is doing outside of the house but their relationship wasn't good also. He had his way of lifestyle and he had a film company to attract new beautiful actress. And Xiou Mei just one of them.

As for Kar Han, he already change his career to become a fitness instructer at one of a prestigious fitness centre in town. His previous job as actor did help him a lot to get his present job and he did accept acting offer from time to time though it was not a big role. Only that he felt he need to get some other job and not just waiting for the acting offer. He also knew that he is not young anymore and his acting career soon will be over.

So how is the story? Somewhat like Demi Moore's "Indecent Proposal" but in chinese version? Why I choose the title "Love or Lust?" Because Xiou Mei had choosen the Lust (Chen Ho's lust) instead of Love (Kar Han's love) to progress in her acting career. Why I give a such ending for Xiou Mei? Because in life we might make a mistake and Xiou Mei had lost her love and make no progress in her acting career. But sometimes luck might be at Xiou Mei's side, she may become a famous film star and lost her love only. But my instinct I want the ending to be like that, some sort like Chen Ho's proposal is indecent like Demi Moore's film in "Indecent Proposal".

Yeah, before I forget, the soup that I taught you all to boil the other day, you should boil the lotus and white raddish under fire in a pot with gas stove and not with slow cooker. Because by boiling the lotus and white raddish soup using the slow cooker, the lotus and white raddish will not get soft.

And I also got a free sample of 15 ml 3 steps Clinique products from KLCC Isetan using an e-coupon recommended by a blogger from http://petalingstreet.org/

The next post maybe I will talk about the forex trading mini 3 hours seminar that I attend lately. So stay stun....

Healthy Diet

2008-01-20T21:49:00.000+08:00

Hi everybody,

Today I will post a few very simple recipes and healthy food which I cook during my recovering period of the operation.

For breakfast, usually I eat oat, I bought the quaker brand, I put 5 tablespoon of oat in a bowl, pour in milk (the packet milk bought from supermarket), a bit of dry kismis and cook it with microwave oven for 90 seconds. Very simple and healthy breakfast and it will help to lower my cholesterol also.

For lunch, there are a few simple recipes:

Steamed Fish

I get an already cleaned white pomfret and smear salt onto the fish. I place the fish on the plate (remember do not use glass plate as I broke one glass plate when I steamed the fish using the glass plate), use metal plate and spread cut ginger on the fish. Drizzle soya bean sauce and chinese cooking wine on top of the fish.

Steam the fish with the rice, it will cook together with the rice and then drizzle shallot oil on top of the fish. Then the steamed fish is ready for lunch. (If you want to do shallot oil, fry the onions using normal cooking oil and take the oil and the fried onions together but I got the ready shallot oil).

Fried vegetable

You just have to mix oyster sauce with the normal soya bean sauce in water, put salt and chinese cooking wine (if you want) and if you want the sauce to be thick, then mix it with corn flour.

Fry the chopped garlic (I have the ready chopped one which is bought from the market) with cooking oil, then put in vegetable and the sauce. Sometimes I put dried mushroom also to add the flavour. Before using the dried mushroom, soak them into water to make it soft, you can use the mushroom water to mix your sauce also. I even cook soft tofu using this method, smash the soft tofu into pieces, add slices of mushroom and make the gravy thick using corn flour.

Tomorrow I will boil soup, I already bought lotus, white radish and chicken bones. Guess just dump the chicken bones and the lotus into the slow cooker and let the lotus get cook and the chicken flavour out into the soap. And the next day I will repeat the process using white radish.

You also can boil the soup using cut soft tofu and salted vegetable (remember to soak the salted vegetable in the water, the other day I don't know have to soak the salted vegetable in the water and when I fry the salted vegetable, it was too salty to eat).

The advantages of cooking simple food are it is more convenient, less hassle and your kitchen will not be too oily. Even your frying pan will not be too oily, easy to wash and you don't have to mop your kitchen floor each time after you do cooking.

Last time I like to cook spicy food, it was a lot of hassles, I have to cut the onions, chillies and blendered them. I also have to squeeze the coconut oil and after end of the cooking, I have to wash the oily pot or pan and mop my kitchen floor.

Cooking make simple and live a healthy life!

Sweet Treats from Pavilion KL

2008-01-18T21:48:00.000+08:00

Cut SK-II facial treatment essence redemption form (28 days challenges) from FEMALE magazine and kept a flyer that was dropped at my letter box giving FREE neck treatment at one of the beauty salon at Pavilion KL.

After that visit Pavilion KL, the hottest shopping centre in town. Went to SK-II counter at Parkson to redeem 30 ml facial treatment essence. Before the redemption, they took the photo of your half face and explained the problem of your skin.

Then have lunch at food court before go to level 7 of the shopping mall where the beauty salon is located. Wow.....! What a so beautiful and high-class place, don't even dare to go in. There even beautiful sofas set for you to sit.

Went to the beauty salon to do the neck treatment, they reccomend you to do facial treatment together that cost RM220 but for the first trial they charge only RM158 but insisted want to do complimentary neck treatment only. Some of their facial treatments cost up to RM350. They said their beauty salon only opened around 3-4 months. They claimed their products are from France and the beauty specialist also speak good English.

Went into their room and wow....!!! Look really beautiful, comfortable and highclass like hotel room with mirror, beautiful tissue box and dress hanger cupboard. There was also beautiful curtain in the room which is very rare in other beauty salon room. Even their towel was tied using beautiful ribbon.

First they ask you to put your feet into a bubbly lukewarm water in a feet machine. Then putting mask, treatment lotion and massaging neck took around more than 30 minutes. The skill of the beauty specialist is the same as other beautician at other beauty salon, only that their place is very beautiful, comfortable and highclass. After the treatment, they asked you to comment on the beauty salon services, at least they are not pressuring you to sign beauty package as some other beauty salon do.

Have not buy anything as all the clothes there are very expensive, cost around RM200-300 and some even more than that. But transport to there is cheap, only RM2 Rapid KL, come and go back. Even much cheaper than going to Queensbay Mall in Penang where it cost around RM5, RM1 to Komtar, RM1.50 to Queensbay Mall, RM1.50 back to Komtar and RM1 back home. But Queensbay Mall things are more affordable, spend around RM100 there buying clothes and other things.

But the trip to Pavilion KL not bad. Brought home 30 ml SK-II facial treatment essence and experienced neck treatment in a very exclusive beauty salon.

*Went to Starhill to eat Japanese lunch buffet at Jogoya restaurant and at the same time redeem a set of Kanebo Impress using Popular card. My testimonial to the product, the product is good, better than the normal skincare sold at supermarket and pharmacy, it improve my skin surface and my skin look more refined, smooth and radiant.

English Subtitle Asian Movie/Drama Website!!

2008-01-18T20:31:00.000+08:00

Do check out this super cool website!! Endless supplies of korean, japanese and taiwanese movies or dramas awaits according to your taste buds… :) And it is FREE, you can watch them through YouTube in your computer!!

There are also long-awaited japanese drama of many many years right here which are STILL NOT even available in Malaysia market!

Woohoo!!!

http://www.mysoju.com/

AT HOME

2007-12-28T13:45:00.000+08:00

(The above pictures shows my self-decorated fake flowers, my blossoming paper flowers plant, my baby boom cactus, self-coloured mickey mouse using shining magic ink, self-maded photo frame using Nutox gift box and my finished cross stitch.)

Wow..., now already more than 2 weeks I am staying at home. You all must be wondering how bored I am but I think I like to stay at home. Suddenly I felt so relaxed, not in the rush to go to work and have all the time for myself. These are the few things that got done these 2 weeks, my little achievements during these idle time :

1)Finished my simple cross stitch and decorated it inside my transparent cupboard
2)Decorated faked flowers inside my transparent vase
3)Put in my photo inside Nutox (skincare) gift box - make it a photo frame without a cost!

4)Finished a malay story book given by my friend long time ago

5)Throwing away my rubbish to greet the New Year

Found a chinese newspaper cutting featuring a photo of myself standing side by side with the Datos and another 2 winners of essay writing contest during the Penang Youth Convention in 1997. That was my biggest achievement so far as a leisure writer in obtaining third prize in that contest at the age of 23. The first and second prize were won by 2 malay male teachers who were much older than me and I felt proud about myself because my essay had outbeat so many other essays that might be submitted by malay teachers and students that might have mastered their mother tongue language better than me.

If I ever lost my job, guess I can become Bahasa Malaysia tutor. Then have to photostate the chinese newspaper cutting in bigger size and insert into my residential area newspaper. Then have to borrow syllabus from my teacher friend before I start my tuition class.

But being self-employed do have the disadvantages too like I won't be able to enjoy employee benefit that is enjoyed by the full time permanent employees. And I might have headaches if the income tax officer come after me just to find out I set an illegal tuition centre in my house. And the income tax officer might have many reasons to fine me for not reporting my income correctly. That was what experienced by one of my relative who is a self-employed beautician.

Still remember some little pleasures I experienced with my friends before operation :

1)Went threading at Komtar by a malay woman. My friend who was first time doing threading quite satisfy with her eye brow after threading, it cost RM7.

2)A nearby supermarket at my hometown residential area was having clearance sales as it is going to close down soon. We went to the supermarket and came out empty hand only to realize that the "HARGA RUNTUH" advertised by the supermarket is not that cheap as expected by us.

3)Have ear candle therapy nearby my hometown residential area at RM15. They are also offering eye-lash perming at RM10 ONLY.

Ok, at the moment I can't think of anything to write, so I have to stop now. Maybe next time I will post a simple recipe in this blog so that we can learn to cook simple dishes for our meal.

I did sent emails to a few publishers and too bad, no reply from them. Guess I need to have some connection to make them pay attention to me.

AN OPERATION DAY IN HOSPITAL

2007-12-16T15:24:00.000+08:00

Wow.... what a long break.... It has been almost 2 months since I last post my blog. As usual I have been quite busy, if not because I went for fibroids operation recently and have to stay at home for 6 weeks due to hospitalization leave, guess I will not have an opportunity to sit here and start blogging again.

First day admission to hospital really scared me off, still remember my first appendix operation, though not that painful as it was only a small operation but the pain when the nurse injected the needle into my blood vein still fresh in my mind.

Then people telling me, "Your last appendix operation was 15 years ago, now the technology is different, there will not be so painful like last time."

First the nurse insert the passing motion tube into my buttock hole, at first it felt pain as it was not inserted exactly into the buttock hole, then after it was inserted, the passing motion liquid was injected into the buttock hole using the passing motion tube. Then it was taken out and after not so long I went to toilet to pass motion.

Again I had a very painful experience with this young malay nurse who injected the needle into my blood vein of my hand, I groaned in pain, the needle was half-way in, she stopped and said, "I will call the doctor to do it for you."

"Hah? Have to inject again?"

Then an Indian doctor came and did it for me, there was a sharp pain but for a while only and everything done. Another scary experience was when the nurse trying to insert the urine tub into the vaginal hole, there was pain and uncomfortable but imagine sharp object insert into your vaginal hole, sure it was a very painful experience much imagined by us.

After that I had to stay in the bed and unable to move around with the urine tub. My operation was around 2 pm, I waited in fear as time passed, then I was pushed into the operation room including into the lift before arriving at the operation room.

After that the doctor injected anaesthetic into my blood vein of my hand and I was awake until 2.30pm. I did not really know when I was unconscious but I felt it was a while only when I woke up again feeling pain at the bottom of my abdomen.

I heard, "Ok, operation over."

"Operation over? What is the time now?" I asked. I felt my mouth was covered with oxygen mould.

"5.30pm"

Then I was pushed back to my room. I vomitted once of twice only. First day after the operation I ate porridge only and the nurse came in many time to take my blood pressure and temperature. Second day the nurse remove the urine tube and again I was scared, this time not so painful. Second day I was allowed to eat rice and in the evening, the doctor came and check my abdomen, after that he said I can discharge today. I just obey as I very understand with my company policy, sure they did not want me to stay any longer as it will increase the hospital bill as I was in the first class single bedded room.

6 fibroids was operated out, 3 small fibroids and 3 big fibroids with more than 6 cms. After I discovered I had fibroids, I did try to educated my female friends, mostly single who are busy working only and urged them to had ultrasound check up because smaller fibroids are easier to treat.

I also plan to eat healthy after the operation. I realized that I often eat outside, have been eating as I wish and too much also each time. I have nasi lemak often for my breakfast and I love spicy food a lot. I also love to eat seafood like prawn, cuttlefish and crab that will increase my cholesterol.

"Don't eat fried and oily food. Because these fried and oily food have a lot of heat and these heat have no place to escape in our stomach, so they encourage the growth of fibroids." one of my colleague told me.

"You all ordinary people simply say cannot eat this, cannot eat that, even doctor do not know the cause of fibroids, they seem to be more expert than the doctor." another person said.

But I believe, we are what we eat. So I learn to eat oat and bread for breakfast and eat plain fish and vegetable after my operation. Guess I have to forgo my love for eating especially heavy taste food. Money can't buy health and an operation in hospital teach me a lesson. Don't always want to eat delicious food only as they might not be good for health.

Remember my post of "Don't Drink Too Much"? Again I remember the Buddha saying, Live Life to the Simple and Don't Overeat.

Again I remember a Hongkong fatty actress got cancer and my mum said,

"That Hongkong fatty actress always eat expensive and delicious food, that why she got cancer."

"They said because she was a culprit and cheated many new and young pretty actress to sleep with the film directors, that why god teach her a lesson." another person said.

"I don't believe this. I believe it has to do with her unhealthy eating. Eating too much of expensive and delicious food just because she is rich and can afford to eat." my mum said again.

Beginning of the operation when I have to go through the pain, I rather go to work than have this hospitlization leave. When come to recovery time, I quite relax, at least at the moment I have enough sleep and don't have to wake up by the alarm clock.

I have the time to go through my mailbox and read my mail one by one and discard the unwanted mails which I had kept in my mailbox for such a long time. And do my cross stitch where I bought it for RM2/-, chinamade, only a simple cross stitch but I can't afford to finish it when I am working due to tiredness after working and the need to sleep early during the workdays. And read some books also, one of them is Lydia Teh's Life's Like That, scenes from Malaysian life. Even emailed to that book publisher seeking opportunity to publish my blog. Lydia Teh, a former secretary is a homemaker who enjoys writing while raising her brood of four. Hah.. hah... I start dreaming again my work being published in a book. And yah, have the time to watch tv also since I am prohibited to do any housework during my recovery time.

Yahoo......!!! Have a GREAT HOLIDAYS!

IS IT WORTHWHILE TO OWN A HOUSE NOW?

2007-10-06T19:18:00.000+08:00

I have been quite busy lately, did not even have time to sit in front of the computer, that explain why I have not been blogging lately. Much of the time spent outside the house and doing routine housework like laundry, mopping and sweeping the floor. Now is the raya holidays and I take this opportunity to stay at home and I have since have so many days at home for quite a long time.

So what to write this time? Remember the post of "Rich Dad, Poor Dad"? Again a post about financial literacy. As you see my above title, think over again if you want to purchase a house now. Do you have enough money to buy your dream house or are you going to take bank loan? If you are going to take bank loan, please consider the interest.

Assume that you wish to purchase a double storey house that will cost more than RM300k and you take a 20 years housing loan from a bank for RM300k. And assume that the base lending rate is 6.75% and you have to pay a monthly installment of RM2,834.

So is it worthwhile to own a house now when you do not have enough money and take a housing loan from the bank when the rental for a double storey house at this time is only RM800 per month? If you rent a house now for RM800 per month, you can save RM2,000 per month because you don't have to pay the bank interest. With that amount of interest per month, if you save them, everyday you want to eat lobster also can. Imagine how much money you can save in one year, RM24,000 and in 10 years RM240,000. You can even rent an apartment of RM500-RM600 per month if you want to save more money. And when you save enough money, you can even buy your dream house by cash or put a higher down payment and pay less interest. You got the point?

Many people giving their own reasons for taking the bank loan.

"I am already 30 now and have only another 25 years of working period, if I did not take a housing loan now, how can I have a smaller installment amount and pay finish my long term housing loan?"

It is even better to expedite your saving and buy your dream house by cash or put a higher down payment and pay less interest than tying yourself into a long term housing loan. Imagine you suddenly lose your job when the economic downturn and unable to get a job that pay you as much salary as your previous job. And during this time you will know that you are in a stuck situation where you still have to pay for your monthly housing installment and if you choose the second option which is to rent a house first when you don't have enough money to buy your own house now, you will have much saving to fall back when you lose your job.

A newly wedded couple like to take a housing loan to buy their dream house. This is their wife's opinion:

"We also know how to think and know how much the bank charge us the interest. But you have to put yourself in our shoe. I feel inconvenient to live in a rented house and I also cannot buy many furnitures and things in a rented house. If my mother come and visit me, I want her to stay in a bigger house with more rooms."

That reasons I cannot comment much because everybody want to be look good and willing to pay high bank interest to own a big house.

A average single working man will have his own reason.

"If I do not take a housing loan now and own my house now, no woman will want to marry me because I don't have my own house. You got the logic?"

This reason also I cannot comment much because all woman would prefer their future husband have their own house although have to take loan from the bank.

So people have every reason to take a bank loan. And bank even employed mortgage executives to prospect people to take loan.

If you are thinking of taking loan to buy a house and then rent out to people, you better don't do it as the bank interest that you pay will be much higher than the rental you receive. Unless you have enough money to buy your second house or not you will be paying bank interest for people to stay at your house. Sound stupid right?

"If everybody think like you, bank no need to do business already. And the economic no need to flow."

But why not be the few percentage of people who think smart and not follow the crowd?

Just share with you all one joke. A husband complaining to his friend about his wife. They were eating at a busy place nearby the market.

"Last time I want to buy a shop lot here but my wife making a lot of noise want to move out from our small house. So instead of buying the shop lot, I use my money to buy a bigger house. Now you see how busy the place here and the shop lots here price already increased by many times and the rental is very high too. If not because of my stupid wife, I already become a millionaire now and no need to work."

So what you all think? But sometimes husband have to listen to their wife and take care of their wife's need and feeling also right? This also I don't know how to comment as life is not all about money and wife still need to live comfortably despite of our financial constraint, right?

This post is created on 6-1-2007 by completed by yuencindy on 13-10-2007.

I am thinking of putting a picture of a housing loan from bank website but did not do it because afraid they will sue me because using their picture. Don't know if they have any copyright law :)

MORE FREE STUFFS

2007-08-19T20:47:00.000+08:00

Watch free movie again today, Secret by Jay Chou at KLCC TGV cinema. I cut the coupon from a malay newspaper and redeem the ticket at 10.00 am. Not many people, all are malay audiences bringing their girlfriend to watch. I also already sent a coupon from a malay newspaper requesting movie ticket for Impak Maksima which is going to be out in the cinema soon. Previously I also watched malay movie "Jangan Pandang Belakang" by requesting the movie ticket by sending the coupon from the malay newspaper.

I also borrowed a Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows from our national library. Just pay RM0.20 for the application form and RM1 for the membership fee for 3 years plus getting a paper bag. After that you can use your MyCard as your library card. Can borrow up to 3 books for 3 weeks and can renew once only. Guess I am going to renew the Harry Potter book to another 3 weeks, make it a total 6 weeks for me to finish the 607 pages book.

Ok, before I forget, I did visit the fitnessfirst centre at Cheras Leisure Mall to redeem my one week complimentary free visit and they asked me wheather I will visit the centre for 7 consecutive days as they are going to appoint an instructor for me. I told them that I only pay a one day visit only as I am only free in the weekend. So I just have a look around, the centre is rather small at Cheras Leisure Mall and I also very fast lost interest, in fact I am the type who lazy to exercise, rather do my housework and exercise at the same time, summore got productivity, mah:) I also was told that the monthly visit fee to the fitness centre is RM159 which I find it rather expensive.

So now I just spend my weekend with different type of activities each weekend, feeling quite happy cause I still can get those entertainments for free when other people have to pay for it.

SELESA RESORT BUKIT TINGGI PAHANG DARUL MAKMUR

2007-08-17T21:33:00.000+08:00

Bentong town

We went to Bentong town few weekends ago. And have a delicious lunch at Restoran Soong Hee Lau at Jalan Chui Yin. We have yam steamed with pork, fried lady finger, brinjal, long bean and petai with sambal belacan and kampung chicken.

My friend own an apartment at Selesa Resort which she bought at more than RM80k many years ago. She said it is the only investment she loses money but she likes the place very much. She bought it because during that time they promote the place as a healthfarm where there was doctors located there to take care of their health. But now because many of the residents default the payment of maintenance (RM100 per month), there are no more doctors there.

I asked her why she keeps the place although it is her losing money investment and she said,

"I like the place very much and have put a lot of effort on it. I want to make it my holiday home. Sometimes in life we must keep the thing that can make us happy. Not only thinking of money value."

At night, the air is very cool and we don't have to sleep in the air-conditioned room. The resort is 35 minutes drive from Kuala Lumpur and 20 minutes drive to Genting Highlands. It also has 18 holes golf course set on 150 acres of gently undulating hills, lush green plains and ponds.

Leisure activities:

Swimming pool, gym, jacuzzi & steambath (RM5 for guest), children's playground, golf, tennis court, mountain biking, sport fishing, board games, karaoke fun disco lounge, netball, volleyball and football

It is also suitable for company teambuilding activities. There are also hotel rooms and apartments for rent and check out their rates at their website, www.selesa.com.my

A welcome relief from our hectic city life and is ideal for weekenders, family vacations, holiday makers and corporate planner.

Happy holiday :)