Giant pepsi bottles outside the Linderman library.

Oh yes, free food!

I think I went a little overboard with this free food thing. I actually brought a plastic container with me to get the free food and took the food up to my office for lunch.

Freshmen move-in reminded me of the time I moved into UPM KK6. I remember vividly the 5 minutes of “I’m so lost” feeling that overwhelmed me when my parents left the campus. When I look at the kids here, I had to smile because they too would have that 5 minutes.

Part 2: Self-determination will have to wait…

I just completed my answers to all 6 questions. Tomorrow onwards I’ll start memorizing the answers, and start working on my “rice-bowl”-work that I’ve neglected for the past 3 weeks. So much to catch up on

On the bright side, it’s orientation week at Lehigh. I just found out that there will be a family luncheon this Thursday for families of new students who are moving in. So I’m going to crash that luncheon and grab some free food. And I’m guessing the lunch will be the typical hotdogs, burgers, green salad and pasta salad fare. But it’ll be of higher quality because the university needs to convince the parents that their kids would be taken care of.

I also plan to make my bi-annual trip to the korean grocery store tomorrow. Need to stock up on:
1. instant noodle (specifically Mama creamy tomyam and Mama chicken flavor, and lots of it),
2. Morinu extra firm tofu,
3. Morinu soft tofu (for my attempt to make peanut butter mousse again)
4. dried seaweed,
5. oyster sauce,
6. brown or red cargo rice,
7. frozen unagi (maybe, depends on the price),
8. frozen edamame,
9. canned curry paste,
10. santan powder,
11. assorted dried noodles, and
12. mooncake (if they have it, which I doubt).

After enduring years of dim floor lamp lighting in my room*, I finally went ahead to get fluorescent lights. It took me 3 trips to the store to get all the stuff that I needed!

Trip #1:
Bought the reflector light fixture-thing and 2 fluorescent tubes.
Came home and found out that it didn’t come with the screw hooks. Postponed fixing it up till next day.

Trip #2:
Bought the screw-on hooks and a plier.
Came home, measured the length of the cord and realized it was rather short but decided to fix it up anyway. But the light ended up being too low, just slightly above my head…that won’t do.

Trip #3:
Bought an extension cord.

Finally, the light is up! It is bright and cheery in my room now. However, I don’t exactly trust my own handiwork, so I’ve moved the laptop and the chair further away from the light…wouldn’t want the light to fall on my head

* Unlike Malaysia, most houses in the US do not come with permanent fluorescent lights. So, most students end up going to walmart to get one of those cheap floor lamps that uses incandescent light bulbs, or the more environment conscious would get CFL light bulbs. Either way, these floor lamps are usually not bright enough.

This is the newly renovated Linderman library – Lehigh’s humanities library. I was using the computer here but the table is a little too narrow so the monitor is like in your face. Too close, very uncomfortable, so had to move to a different computer somewhere else eventhough the chair was rather comfortable.

It’s summer now so there’s hardly any students around, a very good time to “jom” a computer and a table to do some serious studying in a beautiful air-conditioned place. I should start spending many hours here from now on.

New camera, Canon A570 IS, is here but now there is nothing much to take pictures of.

During the summer, the area behind Duh is usually planted with corn. This year however something else has been planted, I’m guessing this may be peanut or some type of legume that will nourish the ground for next summer. If you know what plant this is, let me know.

I went for a walk yesterday to walk away my back-in-bethlehem blues, and found 2 lost golf balls at the practice driving range. Maybe I can start a collection. Well, I’ve been back 2 weeks but I still find it hard to settle down to some sort of Duh routine again. Spent the past few days clearing away all the travelling stuff.

Starting this Monday, I’ll have to hit the library for several hours a day to prepare for my upcoming comprehensive exam in September. Eessshhh….1 1/2 months to the big exam, it’s like my nightmare coming true. I would occasionally dream that a big exam (SPM or STPM) is one month away and I haven’t started studying yet! I cannot believe the Dept of Special Ed is doing this to me, after telling me the past few years that this type of “memorize and regurgitate” type of testing is ineffective and does not test real learning, they are subjecting me to the same type of testing. Oh well, at least I have years of experience doing this.

Update July 23 2007: The plant could be soybean.

It took me 33 hours to get from Penang-home to Duh-home. One day later, I’m still jetlagged and very very tired.

A one month break from all things Duh.

Yay! Finally conquered the 40-minute barrier today.

This coming Sunday, I’m organizing a gotong-royong BBQ together with the other Malaysian and Singaporean students. Five of them are graduating very soon and leaving Lehigh for good. So the BBQ is a farewell and graduation party for them. Duh’s backyard has several bbq stoves, picnic tables and chairs, big shady trees, and lots of grass, which makes it the ideal location for a BBQ. There’s also a tiny river nearby, not that we’re going wash anything in it Coupled with the nice weather, I think it’s going to turn out great. There’s one problem though, I don’t know if I should invite the two malaysian professors. I wonder if their presence will affect the party atmosphere. But even so, I think I should.

Easter ham 1

Twice a year, the graduate students residential office has raffles; they give out 5 hams during the Easter season and 5 frozen turkeys during the Thanksgiving season. I’ve faithfully submitted my slip each time and have never won anything…till now. Yesterday, I received this email:

“Congratulations! Your name was drawn during the Spring Raffle this afternoon…you have won a ham. We will deliver your prize to your apt. tomorrow, after 1pm. If you are not home, we will place the ham in your refrigerator. Have a good evening!”

That is such wonderful news. Now, I’m a proud owner of an Easter ham