반계탕- Half a chicken soup(?)

Hahaha^^
Had half a chicken for lunch this afternoon.
At first I thought I'd skip proper meals and take some light snacks for lunch, but when I saw the chicken, it was just too tempting.

Half a Chicken Soup, at least that's what I think the menu said.
Usually when we cook at home, 1 chicken can be cooked into 2 meals for 10-12 people.
So I feel "xing fu", blessed^^

The price was the normal school canteen price- 2,500won (~RM 9). And considering that the price for a chicken in korea is about 4,000won, it made us wonder whether it was imported from some country with bird flu....

Last Semester of Korean Language

Well, it's the end of the 2nd week of my last semester in Language Education Institute, the place where I learn my Korean.

Before I go any futher, just a bit of updates about my holidays 2 weeks ago:
11/30 - Went to Suwon's Folk Village and Hwaseong Fotress with 7 of my friends. The village was
nice, but would have been much better if we were there during spring or autumn.


Ok, back to my topic.
It's the last semester of my Korean Language. Though I know that my Korean language skills are still far from "ok" and Dong Yang Technical College(DYTC) is not the best institute of higher education in Korea (heard that it ranks 88, though in terms of Technical College some say it's the best), I'm eager to graduate from here and start a new live in the college.
Maybe it's because we've been stucked there for nearly 1.5 years...looking for a change..

And hmm..well not much to talk about I guess...celebrated 2 of my housemates' birthday.
Got addicted to a Korean drama (Jewel in the Palace) and to Stargate Atlantis (My brother put it in my com but never touched it till recently).

Stargate was still ok, as it's a series and each episode has a story of its own. But the drama was so interesting, the plot, story line, suspense, and etc making me eager to know what'll happen next, so I watched 2-5 hours a day.
But finally decided that it's bad for my health^^ and a disturbance to my study, so going to pause it for a while and wait for my week-long-holiday end of the month.

And ya, sent a few Christmas cards to my friends. But guess it won't reach them in time^^'..

Well then, guess I'll stop here....

Oh ya, started a cover to cover Bible reading plan after hearing the sermon of a pastor. It really challenged me. Seeing how little we know about the God's word. The little time we spend reading the scriptures compared to the time we spend studying.
And imagine a doctor in the emergency room suddenly asking:"O my, where's the liver?" , picks up his medical book and going through it in the middle of an operation.
It may not be as "severe" in our lives, but how much do we know about the Bible? How are we to answer when we face problems in lives or questions from others?

I was even more challenged when I accompanied one of my friend to the house of a Jehovah's witness. Though I do not agree with the doctrines she believes in, but one point about her conversion strikes me right at the spot.
She said:" When I 1st met those Jehovah witnesses, I was amazed. How come they dare to go around preaching and sharing the word of God? Unless they know the Bible well enough and know where to refer to each time someone asks a question."

Well, will stop here now.

A day out all by myself^^

After planning for more than a year, finally I set foot on the grandest palace in Seoul - Gyeongbokgung.

Set my alarm at 8am this morning, but turned it off and slept till 11am.
Got out from my house at 12 noon and arrive at the palace site at about 1pm. Waited till 2pm for the english tour guide to start.

The palace was indeed beautiful...built in 1395 during the Joseon Dynasty, it was burnt down by the Japanese in 1592.
In the year 1868 it was restored back to its' former glory, but to be burnt down again by the Japanese in 1910.
Plans of restoration was carried out by the government in 1990, and the current palace is but 30% of it's original scale...The palace is still under construction and by 2009 40% of the original buildings will be complete.
However, sad to say but it can never be restored to 100% cause information concerning the palace isn't complete.......

A place that one shouldn't miss if you're in Seoul...the guided tour is only 1 hour.

Next to the palace was the National Folk Museum. Went in, had a look and followed a tour group which I didn't recognized....just to listen to the guide who were explaining some of the stuff in chinese.

Went to Kyobo bookstore after coming out of the palace. Kyobo is the biggest bookstore here in Korea. But the collection of english book is still quite unsatisfying..and you can hardly see any chinese novels....

Spend 2 hours browsing around the book store and bought some Christmas cards....can't believe it, but Christmas is just around the corner^^

Went for dinner at Burger King which was just outside of the bookstore.
Had bacon double cheese burger set- 5000won (RM 18.00!!)
Spent 2 hours in there having my dinner and reading some magazines..it's just so...fun...and relaxing..Nothing to worry, just enjoy my dinner and reading...something I haven been able to do for quite some time...

Before coming back home dropped by at Lotte Mart, the biggest supermarket near my house. Bought some snacks to teman me for this week, when I'm watching movies or reading^^

A day out..all by myself...never thought that it can be quite fun as well^^

Thanksgiving Dinner^^

It's my secong year in Korea and it's my second time 'celebrating' thanksgiving as well^^ For those who don't know, the American Thanksgiving is on the last Thursday of November.

Last year I was the only Malaysian, but this year another of my friend, Hock Siang, went with me as well.
This year it's held at Ps William's place, cause he has the biggest apartment among the absk members(?).

Anyway, the night was fun...had turkey, TURKEY for dinner^^ It's my second time eating turkey in Korea. The first time was at Sarang Community Church last year.

And after dinner we had a fun time playing sequence. It's indeed an interesting game. Thinking of buying this board game if I come across it...

Hmm..thus ends the first day of my week-long holiday^^

updates...

Had a supposedly busy 3 weeks.....

On the 7 of November our lecturers brought us to Lotte World, the most famous indoor theme park in Korea and also the world's largest indoor theme park. It's also the 3rd theme park that I've been to in Korea, the other two were Everland and Seoul Land.

On the 12, we had a Hari Raya open house. As most of you might know, I'm currently staying with 4 Malays and another chinese guy. So my Malay housemates held an open house and they were busy the whole afternoon preparing all the food and stuff.

Then on the 13, we had an annual dinner. It's a time when all the Malaysian students under JPA comes together and have dinner (duh....) with the ambassador and the officers who are in-charge of us. This year it was held at Holiday Inn and we had quite a lot of raw fish.....which didn't really appeal to most of us.....and I wasn't in time to grab the lobster....

After coming back from the dinner, I stayed up till 6am just to finish a report and a slide show that I needed to present in the afternoon. I had been procrastinating the thing for one whole week...but luckily was able to finish it in time and I could at least sleep for 5 hours....

On the 19 we had a PPMK Annual Meeting. PPMK stands for Pelajar-pelajar Malaysia di Korea.
So basically it was a meeting where all students meet together and hear the report of the AJK's in the last session and elect new AJK for the next session. This year's meeting was quite interesting because they were a few students who quarreled with the officer in-charge..the student was actually writing a memorandum to sent to officer back to Malaysia....
Anyway, the meeting lasted from 1pm till 10pm...

From the 22nd till 25th I was packed with exam....
22nd- Korean language exam, with some Korean form 4 science subs in it as well..and as the syllabus isn't totally the same as M'sia, there were quite a few things new to me.

23rd- Had my physics exam,or actually "open your book and copy the answer onto the answer sheet exam". It's one of the mosty ridiculous exam I had in my whole life.

24th- Had my computer exam. It's was quite fun....never thought that I'd come to like it...^^

25th- Math exam. I planned to really study hard for my math since my mid-term exam...but didn't really manage to. All my housemates were playing around and I didn't have the mood to study as well throughout the week...so I can just imagine how my Maths' result will turnout to be.....

2nd Mt Gwanak Trip

My second trip to Mt Gwanak.
My first one had some bad memory with it...but this one was good.
Went with Hans, one of the member from ABSK bible study group.
The whole trip took about 4hours, and after the trip we had 산체비빔밥 (rice with mountain vegetable) for lunch^^

Hari Raya

Selamat Hari Raya to all my Malay friends and any Malay who's reading this post^^

2nd Raya in Korea.
As usual, my housemates got their parcel's of cookies and stuff within last few days.
This is the 2nd year they'll be celebrating Hari Raya away from home, and for the next 4 years they'll not be able to celebrate it with their families...


But with the advancement of science and technology, they can hear the voices and see the faces of their love ones^^

Flunked My Maths Exam as well........

One of the worse Maths exam I've had in my life.
It reminds me of my Form 4 days when the Add Math teacher gave us 3 logarithm and index questions for our test.
And the result? I got 14 that time...

Quite a number of us thought that it was an open-book examination like my physics, so when we found out that we can't refer to our books, I was horrified.

The exam began at 11a.m. But after 10 minutes, the teacher realized that most of the students can't do the questions. So she permitted us to refer to our text-book.
After another 10 minutes, the teacher again walked around the room, and found out that despite being able to refer to the book, lots of students still weren't able to solve the questions. So she began to gave us tips..little by little till the whole exam lost it meaning.

Not only that, they were students discussing around and passing answers here and there!! One of the worst exmination hall I've seen.

For me, before opening the book, I could only do 1-2 out of the 10 questions. And even after refering to the book, there were 4-5 questions left which I couldn't solve. In the end I actually circled the answer that were being pass around for 1-2 of the objectives.....

Man!! What in the world is wrong??!! The other class had exactly the same questions, and lots of them knew how to do it.
Some of the students would put the blame on my Maths teacher, blaming her teaching method and so on....
But for me I fell that...if I'd just studied a bit more..if I'd just memorized a few more theories...if I'd just did some more exercise......I could have done better and not disappoint myself, my Maths teacher and face God without shame.......I feel guilty not spending more time on my studies....

But let the past be the past...I'll try to do better next time. This is something I promise myself.

Flunked My Physics Exam

I think this is the worst physics exams I ever did.

There were only 12 questions, 8 structure and 2 essay.
Besides the 5 questions taken from the textbook and the 2 general essay about engineering, I didn't know how to do most of the rest....and imagine that it was my first open-book-exam!!!!!

And even for the questions from the textbook, I simply recopied the answers from my textbook...

Man!!! What am I doing with my LIFE??!!

Though I'm not the only one, it feels kind of weird not knowing how to do 45% of the test questions......

And I have no confident at all for my Maths exam this Friday......

The worst thing is to fall sick during exam period, and that's the condition I'm at right now....
Having fever, cough and flu for the past few days.....
Worst still, I have to worry about my house problem, whether to move or not to move and where to move to and with who....

95%

Got my Level 5 mid-term exams results back on Thursday.

From the results of the students, the exams this time seems much harder.
No more 99% student for my batch.....the highest was 96%.

Some might put the blame on the Science subjects, which is somehing new for us. At first I thought my marks would be pulled down by the science subs as well since I didn't do sufficient revisions for it, but thank God all my blah blah here and blah blah there was accepted as correct answers by the teacher^^

For me personally the listening part was a bit hard. Couldn't here all the words clearly.....think I should watch more Korean dramas to improve this skill.
Then my pronounciation is another problem as well. I tend to have this "interesting, weird tone" which I do not know what to do about it....

But anyway, glory and praise be to HIm^^