Sexting FAIL!

Sexting is the act of sending sexually explicit messages or photographs, primarily between mobile phones. The term was first popularized around 2005, and is a portmanteau of sex and texting, where the latter is meant in the wide sense of sending a text possibly with images. (Wikipedia)

Always practice safe ‘sext’.

It’s expensive to call home so one of the cheapest way I could communicate with my wife back home is by using a mobile phone app called ‘Whatsapp‘. It’s an app that uses either 3G or Wifi to send text messages (and other media) between 2 mobile phones that has installed Whatsapp in it. While I had to pay USD 0.99 to install the app on my iPhone, it is free on my wife’s Nokia.

The other day, after getting back to the apartment feeling all hot and bothered because the temperature rose from 10C in the morning to 27C by 4.30 pm, I decided to text my wife. At the time, it was around 1.30 pm back in Malaysia and my wife would most likely be on her way to pick up the kids from school.

Me: Am home! Officially melted.

Her phone: OK

Her phone: This

Me: So hard to choose my underwear.
Me: Morning was so cold so I wore boxer to keep my (“censored”) warm…
Me: Now it’s so hot my (“censored”) is suffocating in the boxer

Her phone: This is Ryan

Me: Oops!

Her phone: Ha ha

Me: So malu (Malay for ‘embarrassed’)

Her phone: Hahahahahaha

I should have known better. When I received the message with just the word ‘This’, I should have suspected it wasn’t my wife on the other end.

Only Ryan (my 8 year old son) will type that slowly on a mobile phone!!! He was probably playing with my wife’s phone while she was driving when my text arrived.

Gaargh!!!

Lorne, Victoria

I’ll be away over the next few days attending an infectious diseases conference in Lorne, Victoria; a lovely resort town along the Great Ocean Road.

Cool Mammaries

Harbour Esplanade, Docklands, Melbourne.

Last weekend I decided to spend some time in Docklands, Melbourne and enjoy a spot of retail therapy. Believe me, some of the stuff there are a lot cheaper than in the city!

It was a very nice day when I got there. The weather was amiable. The temperature was about 14C with a cool gentle breeze in the air.

Wanting to share the moment with my wife back home, I quickly whipped out my iPhone and sent her a text message:

Am at docklands shopping centre. Stuff are so cheap here! T-shirt for aud 2!!! wish I brought you and the kids here. Such a lovely weather here. Cool and breast.

And then came her reply:

Hahaha hehehe hohoho cool and breast. Talk of me always spelling words incorrectly… You are worse!

Only then did I realize that the autocorrect function of my iPhone changed the intended word which was ‘breezy’ into ‘breast’!!!

I quickly sent off a damage-control text:

Breezy! Breezy! Swear I wasn’t looking at breasts!!!

Gaargh! I really hate the autocorrect function of iPhone sometimes.

Sigh…

The Apple-Android War

The iPad2 was launched in Australia last Friday. Hoards of amantes malum (that’s Latin for ‘Apple Lovers’) spent 48 hours camped outside the Apple Retailer at Chadstone, Melbourne in order to be one of the first to get their hands on the coveted toy.

Now, whenever Apple launches a new product, its detractors, notably The Android Army (people who use Android-based devices) would be up in arms! The Apple product would be dissected to its minutest details, in a concerted effort to find that bit of flaw or deficiency. Others would do a ‘compare and contrast’ – usually highlighting the advantages of owning a non-Apple product, often citing things like pricing, speed, camera power, etc to back their case.

A couple of days ago, one of my Facebook friend inadvertently opened Pandora’s box when he uploaded this on his FB profile. Before long a many people left various comments on his profile, some advocating the iPad2 while others sung the virtues of Android devices.

Now, I’ve never been fond of Apple products, mainly because those days they were priced way beyond what I could possibly afford. I went through 5 or 6 hand phones (mainly SE and Nokia) and when I got my first smart phone, it was a Palm (Treo 680). My PC, notebook and netbook are all Windows-based. Sure, the Mac Books were definitely eye-candy and I would be untruthful if I say I didn’t want one but like I said earlier, they were beyond my budget.

And then, one day, my Palm Treo broke apart (yeah, quite literally) and I had to get a smart phone to replace the beloved Treo (it was less than a month before I left for Australia). And so, I asked the best person I could think of. I asked him this question:

If I could buy one smart phone on the market now, which would it be?

And the answer was: iPhone4.

Which was exactly what I got, just days before I left the country (thanks to a friend who knew people inside Maxis, I got the phone sans contract quite quickly).

I think the verbal sparring between aficionados of Apple and Android devices can get really tiresome. I have no experience with any Android devices but I am sure it’s good and has its merit points. But I do have an iPhone4.

Am I happy with it? Yes I am!
Does it fulfill all my expected needs for a smart phone? Yes it does.
Does it help me in my work as a doctor? Yes it does.
Is it a beautiful device? Yes it is!
Does it have good after sales service and reliable regular updates? Yes it does.

Let me tell you a story. Once upon a time, I used to drive a white Proton Iswara 1.3G. It’s our national car. I bought it the year after I completed my housemanship. I bought it, not out of patriotism but rather because it was the only thing I could afford.

Does it take me from Point A to Point B? Of course it does.
Was it an economical car? Yes it was.

But you know, the first time I got the car, the radiator leaked. The seller said it was a normal thing! All the windows vibrate and rattle and the seller said it was normal. After a trip to Penang, the air conditioner broke down. By the 2nd year, the speedometer and petrol gauge broke down as well. The air conditioner went on to break down twice more. The suspension broke down by the 4th year. The radiator which leaked plugged itself because of rust build-up over the years! Rust spots appeared everywhere. And every time I brought the car for servicing, they did a shoddy job. My white car had greasy finger prints all over it by the time they were done. My complaints were ignored. I had to wait seated on a plastic chair in one corner, inhaling all the exhaust fumes.

Now? Now, I drive a Toyota RUSH. It gets me from point A to point B. It’s also very economical. Everything in it is sleek and smooth. The car is silent on the highway. And when I send it for for servicing, the Toyota guy rings me a day before the servicing as a reminder, then waits for me at the doorstep, greets me by name, asks about my welfare and my family’s welfare, gives me a summary of what they will do to my car, the estimated waiting time and costs, offer to send me home first if I can’t wait, I sit in an air-conditioned room with free wi-fi, free flow of coffee/tea/milo served by a friendly lady; I get a call the day after the servicing asking if my car is alright, and another call 2 weeks down the road asking the same thing. My online feedback earns me RM 20 each time deposited into my account with the centre to be used to offset the cost of my next servicing. My insurance and road tax is taken care of with just a phone call.

Will I go buy another Proton? Over my dead body!

Will I ever use a SE or Nokia phone again? Probably not. Will I get another Palm (and they have really good devices)? No, because as good as they are, their support sucks and updates few and far in between.

I guess what I am trying to say is, if you wish to get a smart phone (or tablet for that matter), ask what you need it for, not how much you can get for your money’s worth.

Because, the ‘money’s worth’ aspect could be intangible and not easy to quantify.

I can afford an iPhone now and so I bought one. It’s a great device and I loved it. An Android phone may have more features, work that bit faster, that bit cheaper, or have a screen a few millimeters wider; so what…it doesn’t matter to me because my phone suits me and I’m happy with it.

When one of my Windows-based device dies on me, I reckon I would be looking at a replacement from Apple.

Cheers!

Tim Tams

Tim Tams are delicious! (Raise your hands if you agree with me!)

I firmly believe that whoever invented Tim Tams ought to be knighted or proclaimed a saint or something (in fact, back home, it doesn’t take a lot to be ‘Datuk’ – the Malaysian version of a knight; I’d rather not elaborate).

I LOVE TIM TAMS! They are sinfully titillating to the taste buds with its rich creamy chocolate coating and crispy wafer within.

There is just one small problem.

Chocolate gives me a mega-migraine.

When my family left after a short visit a couple of weeks ago, they left behind a few bars of Tim Tams.

It was a choice between indulging in a little chocolate (and suffer the painful consequences) or give the goodies away. It was a tough decision but in the end I chose the latter.

And so, a few days ago, I brought the Tim Tams with me to work and offered them to my colleagues. This was what happened:

Me: Hey! (to 2 of my colleagues), do you guys eat Tim Tams?

Silence…..

Female colleague: Huh? (eyes wide to the point of popping out of their sockets)
Male colleague: Huh? Whoever offers Tim Tams? I mean, no one EVER give up their Tim Tams!
Female colleague: Every one eats Tim Tams! I luuuuurrrve Tim Tams!

Me: Great! Take these Tim Tams! I can’t eat them because I get migraine headache with them.

Awkward silence, as they each took a bar of Tim Tams.

Female colleague: Sure you didn’t lace these with something? *laughs*
Me: Nah…they are perfectly safe. Trust me.

Both colleagues: Ta!

Sigh… I miss out so much in life.

Seasons

Back in Malaysia, the weather is either hot or hotter, or wet and wetter. It’s hard to keep track of time when one day looks and feel just like the day before or the next day. Some of us probably are reduced to marking time with the release dates of porn videotapes involving politicians!

Not so in Melbourne! In Melbourne, there are seasons!

I love seasons. Seasons make me keenly aware of the passage of time. When I first arrived in Melbourne, it was at the tail end of winter and the beginning of spring. It was cold, sometimes bitterly so but before long, spring arrived and suddenly there were flowers everywhere! Dormant trees burst forth with thick foliage of green in various hues! The birds came out and there was a spring in the air, quite literally.

Summer never really came, they tell me. Instead we had many days of intense rain. I distinctly remember only 3 days when the temperature hit 40 Celsius and I thought I was gonna die walking in the dry heat after work. The heat only lasted a few hours those days and much of summer was pleasantly warm and balmy.

And then, just like that, summer was gone! I didn’t even get to wear much of my summer clothes because most days I was stuck in the hospital, working and throughout the summer it rained on most weekends, ruining every plan to go out for a bit of summer sun and fun.

And then, all too soon, leaves on trees begin to turn a reddish hue and starts to fall off one by one. The streets are littered with dead leaves these days. The sky is gloomy most days, there is less day light and it’s getting cooler and cooler.

Autumn has come.

Like I said earlier. I love seasons. It helps me mark time. It also helps me realize the finiteness of my life. Seasons come and go. There is a beginning and an end. Just like seasons, there is always a sense of transition. It helped me want to enjoy every hour, every minute, every second of every single day. Because today, now, will never happen again.

Seasons help me to be thankful for my life and how wonderful it is.

I loved Spring! Summer was great for what’s its worth! And Autumn is sobering. It won’t be long before winter comes.

I look forward to it.

I will only experience the 4 seasons in Melbourne, once (unless by any chance I find myself in Melbourne again) and I love every moment of it.

Bad hair days

I’ve blogged about this before – about how hard it is to get a decent (and cheap) hair cut in Melbourne. Since my last tragic hair cut a few months ago which left me with very little hair (see picture below), I’ve proven myself to be incapable of learning from experience. Sigh..

Why? Because, since then, I’ve gone on to have another THREE similar hair cuts under different barbers only to end up with the same result (they all must be related or have worked in a penitentiary prior to working as a barber): very little hair on my scalp and leaving me in danger of getting melanoma of the scalp from exposure to the un-ozone-protected-sun over Melbourne.

Basically, in these cheap hair cut venues, as soon as you walk in, the barber (male or female, but usually the latter and frequently one who isn’t conversant in English) would bark out this question:

“What number you want?!!”

From my bad experiences, I can tell you that the numbers (ranging from 1 – 4) represent various lengths of hair that you will end up with on your scalp at the end of the torture hair cut session. Here’s a quick review of what these numbers will leave you with:

Number 1: The TUNDRA look. Your scalp is transformed into a wasteland with barely surviving clumps of hair.

Number 2: The SAVANNAH look where your hair would look like an African stampede has just gone through it.

Number 3: The CORN FIELD look which renders a scalp looking like rows and rows of corn stalks waiting to be harvested.

And there is Number 4, where the length of your hair is the same AFTER the hair cut as BEFORE the session. And oh, these barbers never EVER comprehend the fact you would like hair of different lengths, namely shorter at the fringes and longer towards the top and front, so your hair are always the same length everywhere. Your head kinda feel like a toilet brush after the hair cut.

And so, after 4 very bitter and bad experiences at the hands of these Sweeney Todd wannabes, I decided to go to a ‘proper’ barber yesterday.

He was a Korean guy who did not ask what number I wanted when I walked in; he merely asked how I would like my hair to look like and then very gently and taking his time, trimmed and cut my hair to what I desired. It’s like he could read my tortured mind! His scissors worked magic on my scalp. When it was done, I had my hair washed and dried the proper way and I was very happy with the result.

Okay, so it cost me AUD 25 for the hair cut  (I am trying not to convert that back to Ringgit in case I give myself a minor angina pectoris) but I think it’s worth the money spent! (For the record, I can buy a week’s worth of grocery with AUD 25).

Now, if only my hair would grow a little slower, at least until I can go home and get a proper and cheap hair cut!

Cheap

Not everything in Australia is expensive. If one look hard enough, there are good stuff to be had at a fraction of the price back home. For instance, a liter of milk here cost only AUD 0.99 and a slab of awesome butter merely AUD 1.99.

When my family came visiting recently, we managed to get some stuff for a bargain. We bought a 16-pieces Correlle Livingware for my MIL for only AUD 54.80 (the same set retails for more than RM 400 back in Malaysia!). Now, what’s so good about Correlle sets? Well, they are pretty, extremely lightweight and (almost) unbreakable! If you are thinking of a kitchen dining set overhaul, I highly recommend getting a Correlle set.

See that piece of 1-meter long Merino Sheep Fur Ryan is lying on (and playing ‘Gina the Giraffe’ on the iPad)? It costs AUD 50 here at the Victoria Market. The same piece would fetch anything between RM 250 – 400 back home.

And oh, the iPad? I got that for a song too – since Big W was ditching all their iPads in anticipation of the iPad2.

Ah…the joys of retail therapy.

Signs

If you have heaps of time, while visiting the Victoria Market in Melbourne, to browse through every stall at leisure (give or take at least 2.5 hours to complete the loop!), you will discover such gems as these.

I particularly like the ones that say “D.U.I of Wife” and “No Wuckin Furries”.

And there is one T-shirt that I will quite likely end up getting (if I have any money left at the end of my time here). On the front of the T-shirt are written these words:

“DYSLEXICS ARE TEOPLE POO”

LOL! Aussies sure have a great sense of humour.

Healesville Sanctuary

When my family was in Melbourne last week, we decided to take a trip to Healesville Sanctuary in order to see some native Australian animals. I’d like to share some of the pictures of the animals here (don’t expect ‘normal’ pictures, for normal pictures, go ‘Google Image’ them).

One of the largest flightless bird on earth, the Emu…or rather, the behind of an Emu.

Not sure what’s the name of this bird, but the flat beak is pretty cool eh?

The back of an Ibis, a unique bird with a sickle shaped beak.

The back of a Dingo. Don’t blame me, none of us actually saw the head because the dingoes just didn’t want to show their faces.

The back side of an Echidna.

The belly of a platypus.

A gecko or something. It’s not hard to guess where the Australian aborigines got their unique art from.

Snakes! This one is supposed to be the most venomous snake in Australia.

Profile of a kangaroo‘s back side.

Two female kangaroos.

This kangaroo is male, I am sure of it.

A closer look. Hard to imagine they can make the kangaroo scrotum into souvenirs!

During feeding time, the male kangaroo got pretty excited and it showed!

The tail of a kangaroo…and what are those little spherical thingy just next to it?

Why…they are kangaroo poo of course. Heh heh.

The Healesville Sanctuary is a good place to go for a bit of family fun. It takes about 3 hours to walk around the place and if you can cough up AUD 56.80 (for 2 adults and 2 kids), it’s worth a visit if you are in Melbourne.

Cheers!