Third Day and Night of CNY 2008

Today I was supposed to go CNY visiting some church members. But since I cannot use the car, I had to wait for Sharon Lai to fetch me. In the end I remembered something that I was supposed to do back in the office so I told her not to come to fetch me anymore.

Mum and Jeff were going to have ‘ngau chap’ (beef noodles consisting of beef slices, beefballs and beef tendons) at Menggatal Ngau Chap (Nyuk Pau Original). I joined them.

I ordered beef slices and beefballs with meehoon soup, mum ordered the works with meehoon soup and Jeff ordered beef slices with meehoon soup. When our orders came, I was flabbergasted to see that there were 18 beefballs inside the bowl! Bill came to RM24.50. Mum’s must have costed RM8.00 while mine and Jeff’s RM7.50 each and RM1.50 for mum’s ice lemon tea.

Jeff then drove us back to near my office and Giant Kolombong to change the two back tyres of the car. Costed him RM220.00 and I offered to pay him back but he declined. We then stopped by my office for me to do a task that I almost had forgotten.

We then went to Telipok to see any crabs for sale. There were some but too small for our liking. We then proceeded to Tuaran Fishmarket and this would be the first time I entered a fishmarket in yonks. There were no crabs in sight but mum managed to buy some fresh prawns for dinner tonight.

By the time we came home, the time was already 4pm. Mum managed to cook sweetcorn soup, ‘jai’ (vegetarian dish), deep fried ‘fu yue’ chicken, steamed fish and poached prawns. The ‘kau yuk’ was a gift from a SDK friend.

Now and Then CNY

CNY are so different nowadays as compared to 30 years ago. At that time both my paternal and maternal grandmothers were still alive and living with us. We were disallowed to wash our hair prior to CNY and sweep the floor the first few days of CNY.

We would wake up early and have rice and ‘jai’ (vegetarian dish) for breakfast. Yesterday I did not wake up until about noon and did not have brunch until 1pm.

We would wear new clothes.
I do not remember since when I have stopped buying new clothes for CNY. The reason being normally I do not wear my work clothes when I am not working because I have two set of clothes. Work clothes are for work only and they usually have collars. Why I am being so modest? Well, being in the engineering line, normally the people who come to my office are men – developers, owners, other consultants, contractors, site staff, etc. And I do not wish to show off anything and not that there is much to show off. Haha And leisure clothes are for leisure only and usually with no collar.

I would look forward to receiving angpows.
I still receive them and eventhough the amount is so much more than when I was a kid, the thrill is not there anymore. Why? Because I earn my own money now. Not that I am not thankful for all that I receive now.

I would look forward to watching lion dance
My dad would take us around to watch lion dance. Two nights ago at cousin Anna Chong’s house, there were lion dance but I did not even bother to watch it at all.

I would eat tit-bits non-stop.
There are even more varieties of tit-bits now but after repetitively taking something I like for a few times, there is no fun anymore. I need to control what I eat.

After making the above comparisons, I can only come to one conclusion – I am definitely getting old! Aren’t we all?

Second Day and Night of CNY 2008

Last night I did not sleep until 4am. It had nothing to do with noise of firecrackers or fireworks anymore. I just do not know why I could not sleep. And therefore I did not wake up until after 11am this morning. I would have continued to sleep if not for the noise of the house gate being opened to welcome visitors for CNY.

Today I did not pass motion until about 7pm. (usually my time for that is 615-630am) What am I trying to prove? That I can control my body system and not the other way round.

Today I finally started to play scrabbles with Sharon Lai in Facebook since discussing with her about it on 16 November 2007.

Tonight I managed to clock in over 2.5hours of overtime. What am I trying to prove? Do I need to prove anything to my bosses? Not at all, since I already got my increment at the end of last year. More likely to be the time to slack off and take it easy. Also, would they know? Of course they will find out when I make my public holiday overtime claim at the end of the month. But I need to prove something to myself ie. I still have the discipline to do my work if I put my mind to it even if I am home and on a public holiday.

Mobile Phonecalls Made through DiGi

I want to compare two calls I made through my DiGi mobile phone number recently.

Date Time Duration Number Called Called Type Call Charge

02/02/2008 07:52:26 02:55 6014xxxxxxx Outgoing 1.44
07/02/2008 22:06:33 14:45 00852xxxxxxxx IDD 2.70

Does it make sense that an IDD call is cheaper than a call made to a number of another local mobile phone operator?


I checked out DiGi CNY festive promotions and I copied the following from their website.

With DiGi Prepaid’s Longevity Calls™, you can talk as long as 30 minutes, but pay only for the first 3 minutes. Apply for calls to any DiGi number till 29 February 2008, 2am to 12 noon.

There’s also Unlimited Free SMS when you get a new DiGi Prepaid SIM pack. All your SMSes to any DiGi number are free till 29 February.

For Unlimited Free SMS, charges will still apply as normal. But in March, you will be credited for all the SMS you sent via an airtime rebate up to RM50.

Gong Xi Fa Cai!


My IDD call does not belong to any of the above three categories. I really cannot figure this one out.

First Day and Night of CNY 2008

I did not go to sleep until after 1am on the eve of CNY due to the sound of firecrackers and fireworks.

I was supposed to attend Chinese New Year Combined Celebration at 8am but when I woke up at 630am, I was still feeling too tired. I continue to sleep until 11am. I haven’t slept for such long hours in a long long time and I am glad I could do that eventhough I missed the celebration.

Work, stress and activities for the past seven weeks must have taken its toll. The white hairs on my head are getting more and more by the day as well.

I did not go out from the house until tonight to go to cousin Anna Chong’s open house.

We had roast lamb, fried rice, fried meehoon, mixed veges, chicken curry, beef, fried shrimp and chicken nuggets, and four seasons roll. Desserts were almond with longan and blue berry cheese tarts. There were lots of titbits to savour as well.

CNY Reunion Dinner at Restoran Masakan Sedap (Photo)

CNY Reunion Dinner at Restoran Masakan Sedap

Last Saturday I tried to book Supertanker Restaurant for our family CNY reunion dinner but the restaurant was fully booked for tonight. Then I called Gaya Seafood Restaurant but they were not opened for business today.

So mum suggested Restoran Masakan Sedap. Since 26 January 2008, we had patronized this restaurant twice. The cooking has been quite good up until now. Since tonight a lot of people are having reunion dinner, the restaurant offered set menus. We arrived after 7pm and the food did not come out until about 8pm. Barnabas Ng fell asleep while waiting for the food to arrive.

Besides our family, my sis-in-law’s parents and Uncle Philip Lee also joined us.

The appetizer is fully sold out so the restaurant deducted RM50 from the supposedly RM388 set menu.

First dish to arrive was the black bean fish head. I liked this dish the best and it was quite tasty. Next came all of the other dishes ie. deep fried soft shelled crabs, dry buttered prawns, chicken chops with veges, deer meat, and veges. Uncle Philip liked the deep fried soft shelled crabs because he said he did not have to take out the crab from its shell in order to eat. The rest of the dishes were ok.

Dessert was watermelon, papaya and coconut jelly.

Dinner at Home (Photo)

Dinner at Home

This evening Jeff came back from Kuala Lumpur. He will be in Kota Kinabalu until 20 February 2008.

We had dinner at home and mum cooked all of the dishes (shark fin and fish stomach soup, veges, prawn salad with ‘hoi jit’, fried fish, lamb slices and braised chicken & pork with eggs). Aunty Shirley Chong brought over the pig trotters.

Besides our family members and Aunty Shirley, Uncle Philip Lee, my brother in law Mervis Chong and my sister-in-law’s parents also joined us for dinner.

After dinner we watched the photos taken by Uncle Philip using the television.

Medical Bonus

Since I was on leave on 1 February 2008 to attend grannie’s funeral and 2 February 2008 to rest after one month of non-stop activities, I was only able to do the payroll when I went back to work this morning.

Besides our monthly pay, we also received our medical bonus. The bosses have been very generous this year.

For the previous year’s medical bonus, those who had a clean bill of health were given RM300.

This time round the rates are as follows.

1) Did not take any medical leave in 2007 – Bonus of RM1000.00
2) Took one day medical leave in 2007 – Bonus of RM800.00
3) Took one and a half day medical leave in 2007 – Bonus of RM700
4) Took two days of medical leave in 2007 – Bonus of RM600.00
5) Took three days of medical leave in 2007 – Bonus of RM400.00

Half of the people received RM1K including me. Yeah! And I gave half to mum for CNY.