Winston's Wild West ride!

A great conclusion to a great internship at a great company!

2009-10-14T19:21:00.000-07:00

Thanks to lenglui for reminding me to conclude my blog =P; I just came back yesterday after having to spent a night at Beijing. I'm glad to say I'm fully recovered from jetlag! =D.

Anyway, this internship experience has been a very memorable one for me. I've never sat in a plane nor have I went to anywhere else other than Singapore - which by the way is a really nice place - and this internship opportunity with National Instruments gave me all that and more. It was beyond my expectations and it made me proud to see that we MMU students are selected among many other private and public universities in Malaysia! In fact, I was told by my supervisor, Tim that we're the first university that NI visited.

I have learnt (American spelling is "learned") many things while working at NI and also the way the Americans work. I've seen first hand how they work together to achieve a common goal which is to complete their project that was given to them. I've also seen the behaviours that made them really good at what they do. We may have a long journey ahead of us but I believe we Malaysians will be at the level where the Americans are. Malaysia boleh!

Throughout my stay in Austin, I've found Americans to be very friendly and courteous and the people I work with are always very willing to help you whenever you have problems. They're also very supportive in what you do and I found that to be very motivating. In addition, they're very honest people; I'm not sure about other places but in Austin, people abide by the rules!

Maybe you don't get courteous drivers (like in Austin) and not as developed as them but I take in pride in knowing that Malaysia is a special place like no other. Where can you find a country where three races live together and respect one another (with the exception of the politicians) and have the ability to speak languages other than English (most of us know 5 languages!)? Besides, who can beat the variety of foods that we have in Malaysia? You got Malay foods, Chinese foods and Indian foods all in one place; beats US hands down! Hahaha... I love Malaysia! Malaysia, tanahair ku!

PS: Since I've already finished my internship at Austin, I might not continue with blogging anymore in the future. Therefore this would be end of my blogging days...

My Internship Presentation at NI (finally!)

2009-10-07T18:51:00.001-07:00

After a technical problem that forced my presentation last week to be postponed to today, I finally managed to present my slides. It wasn't just me presenting, Hann Huei and Hon Mun also presented theirs as it was our last week here at NI.

It went well, aside from me speaking a little too fast (it was intimidating to have almost the whole mat salleh engineers which amounted to about 20 coming to the presentation). Since my projects don't have much interesting stuffs to talk about unlike the other intern who has demos, I had to make my presentation more livelier by adding and making my slides funny and entertaining.

I took some hints from Steve Jobs's presentations and I was successful in making the audience laugh which made me feel good because I sacrificed my weekend trip and lots of hours just to design the slides to make it look interesting. And then I have to rehearse and rehearse until I was natural. So when you finally presented your slides and entertained your audience, you'll feel great.

It was scary and I felt very nervous at first but hey, even Steve Jobs felt the same everytime!

How did yours went? Let me know.

Lovely Bike-friendly Buses

2009-10-04T10:00:00.000-07:00

Picture courtesy of University of Texas

On my previous post, I mentioned about the fact that Austin is a bike-friendly city with loads of nice special lane for bikes; well, that's not all. :D

I love Austin's bus transport! Why? They this great idea of allowing (environment-conscious) cyclist to take their bike along when they ride the bus! Sounds cool? It's awesome!

The buses in Austin, CapMetro are equiped with a rack in front of the bus which allows two bikes to be loaded on it. Two sounds little but it's way better than nothing.

The first time I tried it when I took my bike for the triathlon myself, I was apprehensive because I can't imagine putting my bike in front of the bus, dangling (almost). Here's how it goes: When you stop the bus and let the driver know that you're using the rack, he/she (it's not rare to have female drivers) lowers the bus using some hydrolic system (it looks cool when you see it yourself) and then you place your bike on the rack and lock it. Simple? Yup. Scary? Pretty much for the first 20 minutes.

I was restless in the bus, especially when the bus stops because I was kept having ominous picture of my bike getting trampled under the bus. Thank goodness, that didn't happen. I guess the rack is sturdy enough to hold the bikes.

Here's a detail guide to using the rack

I wish our (LambatKL) RapidKL buses have this bike rack...

Presentation presentation presentation...

2009-09-24T18:46:00.000-07:00

I've finished almost all of my loose ends of my projects so these few days I've been concentrating on my presentation which is going to be next week Wednesday. I'm a worried about this presentation because it not going to be like in MMU where you'll be presenting to your friends; my lovely audience here would be senior mat-salleh engineers!

Talk about being pressured. Besides that, last week a guy from USM gave his presentation before leaving for Penang so me being a MMU student, I have to do better than him to show that we MMU-ians are better than those public university students! :P

I'm not really good at presenting so all your best wishes are very welcomed! :D

Wish me the best!

PS: Do you guys have end-of-internship-presentations for your company too?

10 Things that I'm going to miss in Austin

2009-09-17T19:27:00.000-07:00

1. Clothes Dryer
They are so convenient, just dumped your washed clothes inside and wait for about 40 minutes and you're done! Nicely dried and soft... No need to hang your clothes outside and wait a day... Truly a wonderful thing to have.

2. AC (Air conditioning unit)
I'm going to miss my house in Austin and especially the always-on-AC! You come back from a hot day and cool yourself in the constant-temperature house... No more waking up sweating in the middle of the night...

3. Microwave Oven
This is one super convenient home appliance that I am most probably going to get one when I go back to Malaysia. You can do so much with this; you can make lunch, snacks, heat up your leftover foods... You guys might have this already but I don't, at least not yet. =P

4. High-speed Internet
Seeing your download speeds up to 300 kBps is really cool and so is watching YouTube without any waiting time! Why can't TM be like this?

5. Walking along the small forest to work
Nothing beats having a refreshing and cooling walk along the small forest behind my house to my workplace. And when you come back from work during the summer, the forest just shades away the heat. Everytime I walk to work, I'll walk slowly just to enjoy the nice breeze along the way. I wish my walk from Cyberia to campus and back be this euphoric.

6. Special bike-only lane
This is not necessary but in tight narrow roads, you'll be glad if you have a special lane for your bike more so whenever a big truck is coming from behind you.

7. Friendly people
People in Austin are known for their friendliness and courtesy whereby they would say hi to you or smile (girls smile back when you smile at them =D). People at the counters would greet you when you come in and so on. Even the drivers are friendly to cyclist; they give way to us, not like in Malaysia.

8. Weather
Yea, it was hot during the summer but it's just like in Malaysia but it's not humid. You don't sweat like a leaking pipe when you walk under the sun; great for me since I can even sweat when I sit. Nowadays, the weather is getting colder which is something between Genting Highlands and KL; not too hot, not too cold.

9. Lovely parks
You probably don't know that Austin is voted 3rd best places in the US for triathlete to train in. Mostly it's due to the fact that there are so many parks around and they're very well kept. Hiking trails are aplenty and the many pedestrian walks everywhere! Did I mention about the Barton Springs Pool?

10. National Instruments
You probably wouldn't be surprise with this; this company is THE place to be working at! Great and friendly and helpful people, environment-conscious company, company that helps you success in your career by enabling you to take up courses in the company, excellent working facilities (breakroom with microwave ovens and fridge, water coolers at every floor, etc). I really love working here, enough said.

UPDATE: I shamefully forgot to mention that in our breakrooms, there's a coffee machine that you can brew your own coffee (coffee powder is provided FREE) and a variety of tea flavors (sachets) that you can take and make tea yourself! All this is provided FREE! =P By the way, I like the Green Tea flavor... :D

The Austin Triathlon

2009-09-11T18:09:00.001-07:00

The place to take your bib number and goodie stuffs

My bib number. Nice isn't it?

This is how a triathlete would lays his/her equipments out before the race. Swimming would be the first followed by cycling then running so you'll see the cycling shoe already attached to the pedal so that you don't have to waste time wearing it; you can wear them while cycling! It sounds difficult but once you practiced it, it's effortless. Once you're done with biking then it's running. The shoe has a special strap which you can just slip it on without tying. Fast and easy.

The transition area: It's where you coming from swimming, take your bike and go then come back and run. Believe it or not, people take about 1-1.5 minutes each time to change from swim to bike then to run.

Well, that fateful Monday came and against all odds I managed to finish my first triathlon race! It was tough at first because the most challenging course is the first event which is the 700 meters swim. It doesn't sound far but when you there on site and looking at the swim route, you'll scare yourself crazy.

The starting point, swim: That's the lake I swam. I have to swim until the second buoy and turn around and swim back. Pretty far I tell you. Took me about 18 minutes.

The black line shows the swim route that we're supposed to go and the blue is the path that I swam. I started freestyle but I could'nt see where I was going and ended up right in the middle of the loop when I realized nobody was around me. Then I turn back into the course and changed to breaststroke all the way.

Anyway, once I reached the end of the swim, I was a little exhausted but extremely relieved that I finally finished the most challenging course. Feeling a little disoriented I managed to run to my bike, swallowed a pack of PowerGel, slip my shoe in, wear my helmet and my glasses and off I go! From that on, cycling and running was easy in comparison.

For cycling, I have to ride for 27km so I maintained my speed at 30-33 km/h as much as possible. Sometimes I got ahead of myself especially when there's a lot of people cheering and went up to 40... Uphill was easy but I was cursing during downhill; I was passingby people while doing uphill but they pass me by when I was going downhill... Weird? I wasn't aerodynamic enough. They're all using road bikes whilst I'm using a mountain bike with road tires.

Goodies that I got: They gave us a nice polyester t-shirt (those quick dry types), a nice running cap (also quick dry), swim cap (to identify your age category and also to see you clearly in the water so they can rescue you if you're drowning), a timing chip and some energy bars and gels.

Timing chip: This is a device that a chip that helps time your race accurately. It works by RFID whereby you run pass a receiver (a matt) and it transmit a unique serial code to the computer. It's self-powered through the use of a magnetic induction method. The coil inside is powered when you pass through a magnetic field (the matt). More details here.

Since Khai Ling and Kelmynn likes to self pose with their new clothes so I'm doing it too =P. Here's my actual tri clothes complete with my bib number. That's the same clothes that I wore for all three events without changing to save time.

Race day: Moments before my event starts.
Since there's a lot of bikes and you might get disoriented after swimming so what triathletes do is they try to remember where they park their bike. Some attached a cute looking helium-filled balloon while some just remember the closest thing to their rack. I park my bike on the second how from the top so I can easily find it.

Body marking: The closest I get to body tattoos =P
Every triathlete has to have their body marked with their number on their legs and arms. Their age is also marked on the calves. This is where you can see which girl is younger or older than you easily. XD

The live band performances after the race

Lots of foods were ups for the taking. It's eat all you want breakfast of tortilla with chicken or beef, loads of fruits, loads of sodas and stuff. I only managed to wallop one huge banana, a chicken tortilla and a coke. Small stomach =P

The 5km run was challenging too. I thought it was going to be easy but the weather wasn't forgiving that day. It was hot! I aimed for 4.30 min/km pace and managed to finish in 23 minutes. At the end of the finishing line, I was totally exhausted with sweats all over. One of my few motivation to push myself to run hard was to pick on someone infront of you and try to overtake him. Once you overtake him, you pick another runner. Great for kiasu people like me.XD

The finishing line. The cameramen were at the back of the line and I was just too tired to pose. I hope I didn't look bad in it.

Tim and I after the race:
Tim, my manager is the one who supported me. He loan me one of his bike and helmet and taught me a little on swimming (he wasn't good at it, he said) so I want to give my upmost appeciation to him and also Laurel (his wife) for their great support. =D

Thanks to all my lovely friends for their support too! And to my dearest May for her never ending encouragement; without her I wouldn't be able to finish =).

Tim went for the full distance Olympic category and finished in 2 hours and 28 minutes while I in the Sprint half distance finished in 1 hour and 40 minutes earning myself a 155th overall placing out of 731 (both gender) and a 12th place for my age category. Quite all right a timing for a first timer, I guess.

It was a really exhilarating and fun experience of joining my first tri race and I think I got addicted to it. All the hardwork of training for it; weeks of swimming, running and cycling and finally actually racing for it and giving it your bestest is feeling that is hard to describe. You've got to try it yourself to know. Will I join again? Of course! XD

The results for Sprint distance

D-Day: 4 days left

2009-09-03T20:44:00.000-07:00

I really can't believe that the D-Day has almost arrived! 4 more days left before the big day. I wasn't this excited until I watched a few YouTube about some triathlon races; now I'm super excited! :D

It's going to be my first triathlon race so I'm not going to push myself too hard first. I want to get the feel of it so that's why I took the shorter Sprint distance; the next triathlon race would definitely be a full Olympic distance! Of course, being a competitive in nature, I might just go all out and go crazy! Wish me all the best! =D

Here's one of my favourite Youtube video that I often watch whenever I lose my motivation or just want to hype myself up for anything... Enjoy!

Malaysia, negaraku!

2009-09-03T18:53:00.001-07:00

Winston and Hon Mun with our Flag of Glory (Jalur Gemilang)

Something to show my patriotism at National Instruments, Austin, US. Apparently, putting up flags of your country or university (mostly) is a common thing here. Since I couldn't find any Malaysian flag at NI, I decided to ask my sister to send me the flag. :D

Did you guys hang any flag at your company?

Biker Rules in Austin!

2009-08-30T08:37:00.000-07:00

Since I've been riding for a few weeks here and have experience first hand at how traffic goes I guess I'm qualified to talk about it a little... =D

First of all, it took me a while to get used to look at the proper traffic direction when I got here. In case you do not know, driver is on the left side. So to be safe, I look at both sides before crossing...

Secondly, Austin drivers are extremely law-abiding and courteous! They don't cut queue (unlike us lovely Malaysians) and they follow this first-come-first-go system at intersections - meaning if you reach the crossing first, they will let you go and then the 3rd driver to arrive will give way to the 2nd driver and so on. It's the same when two roads combined into one; each driver on both sides take turns to go.

One more thing, drivers here really do a COMPLETE stop at the stop signs! Even when there isn't any traffic, they'll still stop! So when I ride, I had to stop too (sometimes I just slow down before going to save on momentum =P).

Another thing I like to mention is that they treat any 2 wheel vehicles (bicycle included =D) like a normal car. That means, when I have to wait at the traffic light junction, I take the whole lane to myself. It's the law here really (my fav) - we bicyclist aren't allow to weave between cars like what we usually see those motorbikers and cyclists alike doing in Malaysia (me included).

Besides those awesome rules, I think the Austin government here just implemented a law that says drivers must give at least 3 feet of distance between themselves and cyclist or pedestrians whenever possible. Cool isn't it?

I left the best for the last; Austin is known for being a cyclist-friendly city in US. There are numerous DEDICATED cyclist lane along many of the roads here! Awesome! I'm being so pampered here I'm worried I won't get used to the crazy traffic in Malaysia...

Cyclist lane along many of the roads in Austin

The Voice of A True Malaysia

2009-08-28T19:20:00.000-07:00

I saw this heart-warming YouTube video from Khai Ling's blog which initially came from J10's blog. It shows the united Malaysian which is pretty much envied by many other countries, developing or developed. With the push for eliminating the race requirement in many forms, I only hope we all Malaysian will be called as Bangsa Malaysia; not Cina, not Melayu, not India but as one Bangsa Malaysia.

Let us all stop bickering over small matters and together start building a better future for us Malaysian!

I wish every Malaysian no matter where you are, a Happy Independance Day! Merdeka!

Open waters swimming...

2009-08-25T18:35:00.001-07:00

In a tri race, swimming is the first event and for most beginners, it's the hardest and most feared part; especially for me. Well, I've gone from swimming like an elephant to a water hippo :D. Last weekend I went to do a pre-race simulation - meaning I did cycling, running and swimming - at Barton Springs. My supervisor told me that I should try to swim in open waters first before the race so I won't freak out during race day and so I did, at Barton Springs Pool.

It's a natural pool whereby the pool is filled by spring waters and its temperature is maintained at a cold 22 Celsius during summer. That's colder than most offices are and the pool is not only "blessed" with cold waters but also water plants and fishes. And did I mention that it's DARK and DEEP. The deepest part is 6 metres deep and it's dark there. The first time I put on my goggles and started swimming, I panicked! I'm so used to swimming in swallow bright swimming pools that I freaked out when I swam among plants and fishes in extremely cold and dark waters.

As I managed to control myself from shouting for help and continued with my swim, many dark things started to go through my mind. Here's an example: Would I find a badly decomposed body? Would the scary fungus coated plants becomes alive and grab my legs?

And this is another thing that scares me; sometimes when I was swimming, the water would become warm then after a while and almost suddenly becomes extremely cold. Of course I know why it was that way (shaded area are colder than non-shaded area) but reasoning doesn't get into your mind when you're at the edge of fear...

So yea, I'm still here and even managed to get 20+ minutes of swimming before I had to run then ride back home. I have never been so afraid like this in a long time but I had to what I have to do... I don't have time for fear...

Time Crisis

2009-08-25T18:18:00.001-07:00

Gosh, it has been long since I last updated. I apologize for that; training for my race has been taking almost my entire free time. I have 13 more days left to my race day so I need to push really hard... I just want to share this quote with you guys...

"Only those who risk going too far can possibly find out how far they can go"

I don't think I've gone far enough... =)

Updates:
Here's my training timetable if you're interested... Who says you can only have timetable for classes? =P

BestBuy Store

2009-08-01T11:14:00.000-07:00

We went to have a look at BestBuy yesterday and all I have to say is that it's nothing great about it. Maybe I had my expectations too high before coming into the store or maybe I just didn't have much things to buy there. It's huge, lots of spaces between and mostly they're concentrating on products like GPS, phones (mostly with contract), console games (PS3, XBOX, Nintendo Wiis, Nintendo DIs, etc), computers and its accessories, home stuff, CD albums, home theater systems, home appliances and such. It's like the upper floor section of the usual Carrefour stores back in Malaysia but with more choices and bigger area.

Nothing really interesting there except for the moment where me and my housemates were playing GuitarHero Band for an hour or so! =D

BestBuy is not my cup of tea, but REI is! I'm going there today to buy my tri clothes, a backpack and some sport bags! Woo hoo!

Have Food, Will Nap?

2009-07-30T17:25:00.001-07:00

I have to admit, I love to take afternoon naps now and then; even in class! 10 minutes of nap can do wonders; hence my grades... =P When I came to Austin, afternoon naps has become a luxury. I was told by my supervisor (after one of us got caught napping on the desk) that napping even for a while it is a stigma here in US; it's very bad. We were advised strongly against napping while working especially after lunch. So there goes my nap...

Though I stopped napping since then, once in a while after a huge lunch (which is always) my body would go into a "trance" whereby my eyes would shut and my body frozen (my cubicle mate told me that) for a few minutes. Damn, old habits do die hard!

Is it all right for you to take naps at work? Do let me know how is it in your workplace.

PS: My supervisor told me that he walks around whenever he's sleepy and that's been working for me...

Realizing Your Dreams

2009-07-28T20:14:00.000-07:00

I was checking out my friends' blogs and I found this interesting video called "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams". It's about professor named Randy Pausch giving his last lecture about how he achieved his childhood dreams. There's a book by him with the name "The Last Lecture" which I believe some if not most of you might have heard of it or even read it; I haven't read it yet though but it's on my next-book-to-read list, hehe.

It's an inspiring lecture and make you aware that each of us can achieve our own dreams as long you work hard for it. If you got the time (the video is about an hour 16 minutes long) to spare, do have a look at it. While you're at it, read the book too!

Thanks to Ms.Kristin (aka bunny girl?) for sharing this really interesting video to us all. =)

Have a bike, have Austin!

2009-07-27T18:06:00.000-07:00

Tim's mountain bike with road tires, Schwinn frame

That's a Shimano Deore XT groupset and a Bell helmet

Last Sunday morning I did my long run but with a difference; instead of running to some random place, I ran to my supervisor’s house, Tim. I asked him earlier whether could I borrow one of his bikes for training and he said yes. So I told him that I’ll run to his house to get it from him today as he didn’t drive to work for the whole last week; and run I did. It wasn’t far; about 14 km away and it took me around 1 and half hours of running. He wasn’t at home so he left his bike beside his garage and was so kind to leave some energy bar (chocolate brownie kind of energy bar) and a bottleful of water in addition to the helmet and spare tube. I was thankful for that energy bar; I was feeling a little hungry then. Afterwards, I cycled back to my house and that took only 37 minutes! Such huge difference! With the bike now in my hands, I can conquer Austin!

Between two extreme (temperatures)

2009-07-26T15:39:00.000-07:00

I've noticed that every single house in Austin are equipped with air-conditioning (AC) for short. Call me ignorant but I never realized that even though I watched countless Hollywood movies. I know that they use it for heating the house during winter but didn't thought they would also use it for cooling. The AC is usually left on the WHOLE day, even when you're not in the house!

It's like having two weather here; one is a cooling 75 Fahrenheit (around 24 C) and the other, a blistering 100 F (38 C) - it sometimes goes up to 40C or worse! I feel too pampered by the cooling AC in my house; I'm afraid that I might not stand the outside heat once I get out of my comfort zone... I'm a sun-lover, I can't be scared of the heat can I?

Tell you a secret; I sometimes push the thermostat up to 80F (27C) and switch on the ceiling fan to save on energy. We're a bunch of Malaysian, why are we scared of the heat anyway? Call me a Green freak if you want...

NI Library

2009-07-20T16:13:00.000-07:00

Last week, Hon Mun and I found out that we can borrow many interesting books from NI's repository of books! Most of them are marketing, sales, howto books and some technical books. It's so easy to borrow one; first search for the book you want to read from the NI website, then once you selected it, the librarian will send it to your NI mailbox which then you'll go there and pick up your lovely book. The best thing is, it's FREE! I'm such a true believer in "The best things in life are free" :D

Oh ya, in case you're wondering, I borrowed The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell while Hon Mun borrowed the same and Blink, also by the same author.

The Austin Triathlon

2009-07-19T12:30:00.001-07:00

The RM500 receipt

During dinner with Tim, Laurel and Mariel, I asked about the photo with Tim and Laurel together in a tri race and Laurel told me that there’s a triathlon race this coming September, The Austin Triathlon which Tim is joining (Laurel would have also join but she found out a good news; that she’s pregnant!). So I ended up joining the race too, but I’m going for the shorter distance - because I have never join one before - which is called the sprint distance. It’s a 700m swim, 27km cycle and 5km run; half of an Olympic distance. I just paid for the registration which cost me $143.40! That’s RM 500! I used to pay between RM 20 to RM 60 for my marathon races but this is so far the most expensive race I’ve ever joined; I sure hope I don’t get a cold before my race… There is nothing as motivating as having to fork out RM 500 on a race so I’m forced to wake up early almost everyday and train… The crazy thing is, I actually like doing this crazy thing! XD

Wish me all the best friends!

Dinner with Tim and Laurel

2009-07-19T12:21:00.000-07:00

Last week, Tim and wife, Laurel invited us for a dinner at their beautiful house. It was really nice of them to prepare lots of American foods for us to feast upon! Laurel’s sister, Mariel who just came back from having her 6-months-long solo backpacking trip in South America also joined us (by the way, she’s only 20). We were served with lots of delicious traditional American dishes like oven-cooked pork with apple puree (I didn’t know apple and pork meat can go together so nicely), salads made from home-grown vegetables seasoned with olive oil, oven-baked bread that came in a can and you eat it with organic honey spread on it (extremely easy to make!), a special potatoes dish that Mariel made and some others I can’t remember. For desserts, we had a nice home-make pie topped with ice-cream! This is the most delicious and healthy home-cooked dinner I’ve ever had in America! I wish I can eat like this everyday…

Shopping in San Marcos

2009-07-19T12:02:00.000-07:00

Just yesterday we went to San Marcos shopping paradise where there are a lot of shops located in one area. There’s two huge outlets called Prime Outlets and Tanger Outlets whereby in each of the outlets, there are a huge variety of individual shoplots situated side by side along a single row and they’re all concentrated around the main point of the place. It’s something like a shopping complex but instead of every shop being in a huge contained air-conditioned building like Piramid or MidValley, here it’s open air.

Each of the shops is on its own. Because they’re on their own, they require more spaces hence the whole area is pretty huge! You’ll have to walk a long walk from one end to another end in the heat (luckily it is shaded). I saw there’s even a mini bus to fetch the shoppers from one place to another quickly (still not air-conditioned which makes me think that people here REALLY love the sun). It’s a different concept from what we usually have in Malaysia but in my humble opinion, I rather stick to Piramid and Mid Valley even though I like the sun but I don’t like it when I’m all sweaty while shopping.

Rows of shops

There aren’t many places to rest except a few benches far in between and the restroom (toilet) are definitely rare. Anyway, the goods in most of the shops is quite cheap (if you’re working in US and some still cheap if you’re not) as most of them are having summer sales.

Someone bought a few Coach bags... ;-)

I bought a Levi’s jean (loose straights, my first Levi’s jean :D) for $34, one Dockers original style khakis for $29.99 (really cheap!), one Timberland shorts for $15 with coupon (again, extremely cheap!) and wallet, $17+ with coupon and my Nike athlete shorts, $24 (not cheap, still overpriced as always). All in all, I spent about $200 or so. Not bad for a one day shopping spree. I didn’t get any shirts because the smallest size is S and it’s like the L size in Malaysia… May Yeng told me that her friend (a guy) bought a girl’s shirt in US because of that… The last thing you’ll see me wearing is a girl’s t-shirt… >.<”.

The result of the shopping spree by 4 Malaysians, most of it is from Hann Huei. He scored almost $1000 getting a first placing beating Hon Mun! This guy shops like there's no tomorrow...

Humble me... I got the last placing... only spending about $200 :D

Washington Accord

2009-07-06T23:17:00.000-07:00

Sorry for lack of updates these few days... I went off to New York for a trip... Wonderful place.. Will upload photos of it in FB but I won't blog about it though... unless you want me to...

Anyway, I just got an email from my friend in Penang (thanks Pang Siew Kin! =D) saying that Malaysia is now one of the Washington Accord's signatories! For those who don't remember what you learn in Engineering Society (it barely registered in my mind XD); with Malaysia in WA, you can now use your degree that you got in Malaysia and work in any other countries that recognises WA! We're now a full member, no longer holding a provisional status.

Read more about it here!

RIP - My prescription glasses

2009-06-28T06:26:00.000-07:00

Seems like Micheal Jackson is not the only one gone; my precious transition glasses gone too. It happened when I went to this river tubing at the Comal River with other bunch of NI interns to celebrate someone's birthday. Losing my glasses was one of the many mishaps that befalled me.

First, as I got into the tube, my favourite Hawaiian pants got torn at the butt area. It was so huge, my new blue coloured Renoma sports underwear was truely obvious.

Secondly, while I was trying to help my friend who fell into the water, I dislocated my arm, again. This time it didn't reduce (went back into the socket) itself immediately after dislocation, it got stuck and I had to excrutiatingly align my arm for quite sometime before it got reduced.

Then halfway through the river, I went through this short drop in the river which caused me to flip over and hit my head on the stone in the river and therefore losing my glasses. I tried to search for it but the current was too strong. My other housemates, Hon Mun and Hann Huei also lost their glasses in that cursed river.

Next, the river water went into my ziploc bag which contains my passport. My heart sank when I saw there was water in the BAG! And so when I took it out, it was really wet, some of the stamps couldn't be seen...

Yesterday was the worst day I ever had since coming to Austin. At least I'm still all right except for the lump on my head and the pain in my shoulder AND the loss of my perfect eye vision. Hon Mun has to resort to using his prescription sunglasses to see while Hann had to use his presciption swimming googles to see. Hahahaha.

Austin - Foods and the bad

2009-06-27T10:09:00.000-07:00

My favourite microwave foods (except that Chow Mein thing, I hate that)... I eat this usually before my workout on my desk during lunch hour by microwaving it at one of the break rooms on my floor...

Loads of protein and low in fat! Tastes not bad too... Only USD 2 each... AND it's HEALTHY! *cough* *cough*

Taco Bell branded food... Ask me how it tastes like next time if you want to know... Haha

How to make crap food

Buy one Nissin's Chow Mien noodle bowl and prepare it from the instruction

Microwave it for 6 mins then whoila! Microwaved crap "chow mien" food... It tastes as bad as it looks... Luckily I only bought one for USD 0.99.

Maybe it tastes bad partly because I didn't follow the instructions correctly (I RARELY eat instand noodles, only tried this for fun) but I still don't like it...

My other housemates, Hon Mun, Hann Huei and Li Cheng also bought instant noodles. In fact, they bought way more than I do! At the present time, Hon Mun ate instant noodles for yesterday's supper, today's breakfast and lunch... Damn freak... XD

NOTE: Li Cheng tried his own Nissin's Chow Mien and he said it tastes all right to him... So this is my own opinion; you instant noodle fanatics don't start flaming me...

Another note: FYI, you can't find chilli padi or even normal red and green chilli here in US; at least in Austin... Thankgod I found a replacement...

Some interesting advert - T-Mobile Dance In Public (edited)

2009-06-25T17:25:00.000-07:00

I'm going to deviate from Austin for this because this video is really cool! Watch it! J10 has the post on it...

Edited: Thanks to Kristin for showing me an EQUALLY cool train dancing with the Doremi song... I loved it! =D

Go here to see it, it's at the right side bottom video.

Buy Dig?

2009-06-24T18:40:00.000-07:00

Last week Friday, I did something I dreamt of doing; I bought something online in US! Oh I did bought some stuff online through www.lelong.com.my and through the infamous forum (think Low Yat forum) but I’m buying it from one of the numerous online stores in US using my VISA debit card. I’ve got so many choices of stores to choose from! So I used Google’s Shopping feature and found the online store that offered the lowest price and went for it. You might be wondering what I’m buying… I bought my dream Garmin Forerunner 305 GPS watch (for those uninitiated, it’s a GPS watch for sports; if not sports what else for? =P) for USD 163 including shipping (FedEx shipping) which is equivalent to RM 570; it would cost me RM 900 to buy the same thing in Malaysia! So what I got is a bargain! Buying things online here is so easy! I haven’t got it yet, I went for the 2 – 6 days shipping time and it just got shipped today (the store sent me a notification along with the FedEx tracking number). I guess I’ll be tracking the watch every day until it arrives… This reminds me of a saying that goes “A watched pot never boils” which means, the more you wait the harder it comes… XD

Garmin Forerunner 305

I'm already thinking about my next online purchase... OMG, I'm becoming a shopaholic! Speaking about that, a movie called "Confessions of a Shopaholic" adapted from a really nice novel by the same title written by Sophie Kinsella is out! I'm not sure about the movie but the book is really nice!

Who cares if I'm reading a chic novel? =P

Power of an Intern

2009-06-24T18:37:00.000-07:00

I finished my draft of the V&V Test Plan last Monday and Tim gave me a huge, intimidating book on “Introduction to High Speed PCB design” because I told him I was bored. Haha, most of you all would think I’m stupid for asking it but I actually like it! I hate doing nothing and unproductive (I’m not going to spend most of my time in the office to surf internet and play Facebook all day) so having something to do even reading a huge book is cool to me. Actually, the book is really interesting; it touches on how to implement high speed transmission without distortion in PCB design. Something like Digital Integrated Circuit subject I took last trimester.

Anyway, today Tim came over and we went through my plan and made a second draft for review with the other senior engineers. This is where I get nervous; I get to organize a meeting to discuss on the test plan that I made with other senior engineers so I had to invite them to go for my meeting! I never thought an intern could do this! An intern calling a meeting with other senior engineers to discuss something… I mean, since when we interns are even important enough to call other big shot engineers for a meeting?? Wow! I had to reread my email invitation and even asked Hon Mun to check to make sure I don’t sound rude for an intern. I used Lotus Calendar to set up a time (the software checks which time is free for all invitees) and place available. It’s so easy to do it.

Austin – My Daily Life

2009-06-23T21:04:00.000-07:00

Gym at NI

The other side of the gym

Started from last Friday, I’ve got used to my working life at NI. On certain days, I’ll go for a nice morning run at around 7.30am and get back and bathe around 8.20am. Then I’ll eat my breakfast and go to work at 9am. On other non-running days, I’ll just go to work earlier at 8am. Then I’ll work until 11am where my stomach would be making noises (actually it’s around 10am where I’ll start to get hungry but I would eat some bars =D) and I’ll eat something at the cafeteria or my own snack before I head for the fitness center. On Monday and Wednesday, I would go for yoga (I’ve tried Monday’s yoga and it was cool though I had some cramping moments but I want to try again on Wednesday) for an hour and get back to work at 1pm. On other days, I would do some workout at the gym. If I’m hungry after my workout, I’ll just buy something like a sandwich or a meal and eat at my desk (we can bring the plates upstairs so no need to use any packaging). My work would ends at 5pm or 6pm as long I fulfill my 8 hours a day work. I think I can get used to this working life here… It’s a blissful life… XD On the same note, I might be following my manager, Tim to go for a run to the nearest public pool and swim there then run back to NI during lunch hour, just for the heck of it. Crazy Americans… XD

The shared shower room...

Locker room

Random photo: Hon Mun working very hard XD

Cliff Jumping at Lake Travis

2009-06-21T10:12:00.000-07:00

Lake Travis

Me and Li Cheng

The Embrace (hug hug XD)

Our American friends brought us to Lake Travis; to literally jump off a cliff! The above picture is Hon Mun dropping down at the force of 9.8ms^-2 acceleration... XD He didn't even think twice about it...

Our American friends, Daniel and Nate jumping over

Can't find my pic? I didn't take the jump. Every time before I want to jump, my mind kept going through all the scenarios that would happen if I do... That bad thing of having a strong imagination... >.<>

Ribs... We ordered "All you can eat" of beef ribs, sausage and lean brisket for USD 19.99! I ate 3 huge ribs and loads of sausages and brisket... Bloated!

The menu

NI's Fitness center

2009-06-20T20:50:00.000-07:00

I don’t know about other companies but this is one of few things that got me excited working in NI. I’ve said earlier about the company having a fitness center so yesterday I’ve just registered myself by filling up a form and gotten my member number and good to go. One of the employees there gave me a short briefing about the facilities at the fitness center, here’s a summary: the fitness center consists of two large rooms, one main room has all the usual gym equipments like treadmills, cycling machine, weight machines and mirrors (to perfect your masculine pose XD) while the other smaller room is usually for classes. We have a few classes – they’re already included in the USD 15 per month – among them is the yoga class (I swear I’m going to join that here! No more talking big now! =P), cardio class, strength class and the such and they have it all weekdays. So today during lunch hour – about eleven o’clock morning (my lunch time =P) – I took my light meal and zoom straight to the center with my spare clothes and towel - they have showers there. I did my usual workouts, but I got some confusion about the weights because they’re all in pounds, not kilograms >.<. Anyway, once I was done – never felt so strong before =P – I went for the showers and I was shocked; it’s those OPEN showers! No individual shower rooms; just a few big rooms with many showers. I can get used to many of American’s culture but this just hit me. Thank goodness not many were showering that time and I managed to get a whole room to myself saving me from having to skip shower and bear with sweaty body smell…

NI Cafeteria

2009-06-19T18:02:00.001-07:00

Benches and tables outside the cafeteria building... It's nice and cosy out there...

Mopac B cafeteria, no foods here because it's already 3pm...

Cheap? Quite.

One thing I saw when they prepared the fried chicken; they actually measure the temperature inside the chicken using a kitchen temperature! Talk about Quality Check... They really take their food seriously...

Extra note:
Foods there in every three cafeterias in NI changes everyday so you won't get bored with it. In Mopac B's cafeteria, we have different counters for a variety of foods; one counter for sandwiches, one for grills, one for burgers, one for soups, one for salads and one for asians. So you've got plenty of foods to choose from and they're usually around the range of USD 4 to 5 per meal. Other cafeterias have their own specialties but Mopac B's has the most variety and I always go there to eat. Everyday I would go there excitedly to see what they're serving for lunch; they do list down the foods on our internal web for us to see but I rather see the real thing =D. Oh ya, did I say the foods there are delicious? Haha.

Austin Life - Groceries at HEB

2009-06-19T16:56:00.000-07:00

I couldn't control myself and took this picture along the 3.7km walk to HEB from our apartment. I dedicate this to my dearest... =)

Serrano Peppers - They're as hot as our chilli padi but in bigger size!

Loads of jams! My favourite (favorite) strawberry jam =P

Aisle-long refrigeratorful of foods

Hon Mun's secret ingredient XD (it's made in US)

Microwave-cooked foods... Quite nice really...

Bloody cheap delicious strawberries!

I'm shopping as if I'm in Malaysia! Ho ho ho!

Another copy cat =P

Haagen Daaz! It's extremely cheap for us! It's like Walls ice-cream pricing range... In fact, there isn't any Walls brand here...

Everyone of us bought two each... And I finished two of those in two days!

That's for my own groceries alone... ^^

Downtown Austin

2009-06-15T15:44:00.000-07:00

Crouching tiger, not so hidden dragon

Hann Huei paying the fares

Bus ticket

Just yesterday, we headed off to downtown to have a look around the place by bus. There weren’t many people in the bus; the ticket costs USD 1.5 for a whole day pass. We ate at some seafood restaurant called Boiling Pot; they serve a variety of crabs. Some weren’t fresh which isn’t surprising since we’re not near the coastal area. They served this crab called Clawfish which looks like a mini lobster; I ate only a few of it and decided that I couldn’t it anymore due to my active imagination – the Clawfish looks like a huge cockroach! I got disgusted and ate the other stuffs like the Alaska crab, prawns, some sausages and potatoes. The bill came up to USD 60 but we only paid half. Why? The waitress that waited with us for the bus to downtown gave us a US veteran discount - 50% off! - because we helped her when she wanted to use Hann Huei’s phone to call that she’ll be late as her phone died. She was the one who recommended us to go to that restaurant. We gave her a USD 10 tip. A bloody cheap meal! Haha. We walked around and saw lots of those huge bikes! The ones like Harleys kind. Apparently that day was a biker’s day parade where bikers around Texas goes there to show off their modified loud bikes to others. When I say noisy, it was really loud!

The feast at Boiling Pot!

Us and the very nice waitress AND our work of art!

Cow rides bike too!

Bikes Parade!

Want to wash your bike here?

Afterwards, we went to visit the Congress building. It is an old building that they maintained so beautifully since the beginning of Texas. After taking lots of photos around the place we went out to the streets to look.

The Congress Building

Up near

Coyote Ugly Saloon (not salon)

A while later, a American friend came to take us around; he took us to a pub called the Coyote Ugly. Yup, sounds familiar eh? It’s the one where the movie Coyote Ugly centered; the skimpy-wearing waitresses dance on the pub table while people have their drinks. At one point I saw the waitress doing a thing called The Body Shot; this is where a shot of alcoholic drink is consumed from a person’s body, usually from the naval or the breasts. I had a eye-opening experience then. The waitress asked Hon Mun whether he wants to have it for USD 5 as tip but he declined XD… It was a bargain since they normally ask for USD 20 as what our American friend told us.

One of the waitresses

We went to have our dinner at a Tex-Mex restaurant – short for a fusion of Mexican and Texan food - called Serranos Café. If you want spicy foods, here’s a place to go. I ordered something called Pollo Chipotle; it has grilled chicken breast and beans and the spicy Serrano pepper! This one pepper equals our own chilli padi! It’s extremely spicy, just the way I like it. Hehe. My meal cost me USD 10.50.

I love their Serrano Peppers!

After our dinner, we headed for downtown once we changed into appropriate wears – buttoned shirts and formal shoe. When we arrived, there were a lot of people there, bikes included. Nelson, our American friend took us from one pub to another until he took us to a club. One thing I noticed, there is NO cover charge. You can go in and just sit around and go out without paying. I saw one club where there is a pole dancing girls; we don’t even have to pay any cover charge like the one I went to last time in Singapore. There is a few clubs that require cover charge but it is few in between. Most are free. Cool eh? The clubs and pubs here closes at 2am.

PS: I will upload more pictures in my FB =)

First Week at NI

2009-06-15T15:35:00.000-07:00

NI PXI 8104

CompactRIO

With my first week of working at NI completed, it has been great. I’ve finished my LabView 3-days course which was awesome; the software is just really easy to use and it’s no surprise why this NI is so successful. Last Friday, a senior software engineer gave us an informal training on some of the products that NI produces; more emphasis on the product that I’ll be working on which is the PXI or Compact PCI eXtension for Instrumentation and CompactRIO (compact Reconfigurable IO) devices. These are the mainstream products that the company specializes. These are really cool products; they replace the need to have multiple single-use measuring devices with a single rack that contains as many measuring modules that you need. Small, powerful, rugged and way cheaper than those traditional instruments (eg, oscilloscopes, digital measuring meters, etc)! CompactRIO is a more rugged and much smaller version of PXI whereby this is device is used for a more harsher operating conditions like extreme cold or hot climate to high vibration environment (withstands up to 50G!). They even tested the ruggedness by throwing this device off an 8-floor building (the highest building in our campus) and it still works after that! Once he gave us a brief introduction, we were given the PXI device to play around with the LabView software. I designed a simple measuring VI (virtual instrument) using LabView which will output the PXI’s CPU and memory informations. Haha, I apologize if this is too technical. Anyways, Hon Mun and I will be continuing our informal training by the senior engineer on Monday.

Something for someone special...

2009-06-09T19:13:00.000-07:00

I took this photo while walking around... I was trying to take some artistic photo... Hehe... The flower a the center looks beautiful with the nice perfect petals around it... I think this is one of my best picture I took (it's my very humble opinion so don't criticize =P) and I want to dedicate this to my dearest... =)

Austin - Work Culture

2009-06-09T17:10:00.000-07:00

I’m going to explain some of the work culture at NI. Firstly, people here wear sandals and shorts to work. I don’t know how they can stand the cold but I’m sticking to my long khakis and long-sleeve shirt. Second, their lunch break is quite early; at 11.30am. Besides that, we can have our tea break if you want as long you swipe your card out when you go eat then swipe it back when you finish. So, I can still fulfill my 6 meals a day! XD Third, we interns have to work 40 hours a week, no more. Actually, they strongly discourage you to do any overtime because it’s expensive for the company for us to do so; more so during these recession times. 40 hours a week may sound long but we interns found that it’s hard to keep it under 40 because we may work longer than we thought. In addition, we have a very flexible work hours; as long you fulfill 40 hours, it’s fine. Meaning you can come to work at 10am and go back at 7pm or go early at 5am and go back at 2pm! Cool eh? XD Oh ya, the office is open 24/7. Extremely cool! Fourth, we have our own fitness center (fully equipped and has numerous classes such as yoga, strength training, etc all weekdays) and a medical center within NI’s campus. We have to pay USD 15 per month to use the fitness center though – still WAY cheaper compared to what we earn. Back to the lunch/tea break thing, you can bring your meal to your desk and eat there; you can put the plates back at designated area to be washed. So, for you people who likes to pack, it’s heaven here XD.

Tim, my supervisor told me that he uses his lunch hour to go for a short jog or go to the gym or even go for yoga! Damn cool! I’ll be doing that once I registered myself and get used to working life. =D

The next posting, I'll be explaining about why I might gain weight here in US. Haha.

Austin - Second Day

2009-06-09T17:06:00.000-07:00

Today, all I did at my work was sitting down in the classroom and learning how to use their famous LabView software; this class lesson is usually given to NI’s customers.

LabView is like a language but it’s different from others because everything is done graphically; no coding required. It is used primarily as a virtual instrument whereby you eliminate the need to purchase single-use measuring instrument with its own screen and computer built-in; with this LabView, you can use your own personal computer as the brain while using the NI’s multipurpose probes for measurement. This reduces the overall cost of buying a whole instrument because you only need to get the probes. LabView is really user-friendly! Way better than anything else; which reminds me of Mentor Graphics and its “super friendly” interface… Crap.

We had to sit there in front of the computer and listen attentively (though I did doze off near the lunch hour) to the guy teaching us for the whole day from eight o’clock till five o’clock with lunch break at half past eleven. It was quite tough but manageable. Hon Mun told me it was his first time being attentive for such a long time... XD Mostly because I was really interested in this well-known software of theirs and at the end of the day, I found that this software is superb! It’s like C/C++/VHDL language and way easier to use because it’s all graphical! No coding required and you can use it for so many things imaginable! You got to see it to believe it! I wish MMU has this software its accompanying range of hardware. ^^ Tomorrow I’ll be continuing my 5-days-cramped-to-3-days course on LabView; we’ll be learning how to use LabView with the probes. Yay!

Austin - First Day

2009-06-09T16:47:00.000-07:00

My desk

Today was my first day at work. I was extremely excited but also a little scared; scared because everything is new to me and I don’t know what to expect, haha. I guess that’s normal for everyone. Anyway, once we’ve got our employee card – RFID card actually – we proceeded for our orientation at the conference room. During the orientation, they briefed us on many things such as how to fill up our employment forms, a few agreement papers, and then told us about some security matters; things like how to be careful about the confidential information and export restrictions on certain technologies that would aid in the making of nuclear weapons. Yup, NI’s products are well-sought after for the production of nuclear weapons and military applications – eg frequency jammers. They also told us that there a law or some kind of agreement where certain NI products can only be revealed to US citizens only! It happened on one occasion where a non-US citizen employee had to wait at the hall while the meeting was being held because certain restricted equipments were being presented. Wow… It reminds me espionage in my Engineering Society study. XD Once we were all briefed, our mentors came to take us. Hon Mun and I are mentored by Tim. He brought us to our desk then took us around the floor to meet the other engineers in our hardware department. I was told by Tim that my scope is called sustainance whereby I am tasked to improve the older devices to current technology and fix bugs reported by the customers while Hon Mun is tasked to do the power supply. When all has been settled, we sat on our desk and set up the email and messaging system. Apparently, they use Lotus Notes to manage emails and calendar and Lotus’s Sametime which is a kind of messaging software like YM. We can add anyone employed in NI as long you know their names. Cool eh? Haha.

Blogging is cumbersome

2009-06-05T21:51:00.001-07:00

I'm starting to have second thoughts on doing my blog. It takes too much of my time especially when I have a lot of photos coupled with the fact that I have to write my diary also...

I might not be blogging as often I want when I start my work on Monday...

On another note, I'm already starting to miss my mom and sister... I miss my girlfriend too... :-( She's only free during the morning (US time) which is night (Malaysia time) when she's not working and I have to work from early morning which means we could only chat during the weekends... Sigh...

The Journey to Austin - Part 4

2009-06-05T21:25:00.000-07:00

Link to the photos described here
or check my Facebook's ones

*Note: Please check the photos at my online album for reference. I'm just too tired to copy the photos individually into this blog one by one... Too many photos... Took me almost the whole day doing my blog... =P so I just copied this from my diary into my blog...

When we finally reached San Francisco, Hon Mun and I were so elated! It is our first time on US land and we were feeling so upbeat; I couldn’t stop smiling and feeling gay (bear in mind that gay in this context means feeling of cheerfulness =P). It struck me that I am now part of a minority in a foreign land and everyone around me was a mat salleh. It felt that I was in some kind of a Hollywood movie; it is so surreal. Once we passed the custom checks – I came to realized one thing when I arrived here, people here don’t wear masks. Not even a single local person! I mean you can see foreign nationals (meaning non US citizens) wearing masks but you would never see a US citizen wearing one! In fact, when we arrived at the airport, we didn’t go through any health checks at all! I shudder to think that perhaps this could be the reason why the influenza A spread so fast in the US. This totally difference from what we experience when we arrived Beijing where we were already screened before we descended from our plane! Anyway, on the lighter side of the note, people here are friendly. They do speak louder here but it is just their culture to do so. Someone told me I spoke too softly so I guess I’m forced to learn to speak loud here. =D.

We had our small meal before we go for our next flight to Austin. I ordered a burrito; it’s a famous Tex-Mex (as told by my supervisor, Tim) or Texan-Mexican food. Basically, they wrap some beans, rice and lots of meat with some flour bread and you eat it with either the extremely spicy Jalapeno pepper or salsa sauce. Jalapeno peppers are one of the hottest peppers in the world; I learnt the hard way when I ate too much of it until my whole mouth was blistering red in color! Meanwhile, Hon Mun went for the six inch Subway sandwich. I found that people there go for a footer sandwich, even ladies! Talk about big appetites.

The flight to Austin was uneventful; we sat on an Airbus 320. It took us about three hours to reach Austin and when we arrived, Tim was there waiting for us. It was nice for him to come to fetch us from the airport personally. He even took us for a dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant; we ordered some Vermicelli with meat, it was quite nice really. After that, he drove us to our apartment which is located quite a distance away from the airport.

Our apartment is located in just beside the company where I’ll be working in, National Instruments. It’s called the San Marin and the address is 4025 Duval Rd, Austin, TX 78759. I’m staying in apartment no. 2122. It’s a fully furnished two-bedroom apartment with own bathroom and has a fully-equipped kitchen with all the utensils and appliances such as the microwave, oven, dishwasher, two-door fridge and a stove. In addition, we also have a washing machine, a dryer, tv with cable, sofa and others. Oh ya, we can drink from the pipe. Tastes like a Diamond-filtered water! XD. My bedroom has a large window which my bed is facing and I like it! I just love the sunshine. Hehe. My apartment is just ten minutes away from NI; a short walk through the cooling forest and we would reach there in no time. This would be all for now, until next time. I’ll be starting work on Monday where I’ll have an orientation program which will last for the whole week. I can’t wait for it!

The Journey to Austin - Part 3

2009-06-05T20:50:00.000-07:00

Aboard the B777, I saw that it was way much bigger and spacious compared to 757; the seating arrangement is three seats on each side and the middle part having five seats with two aisles. There are some entertainments on board; every seat was equipped with a LCD screen so we can watch one of any of the few movies provided. I didn’t managed to watch any because it none of the movies were interesting and I will get headaches if I watch it.

Instead, what I did throughout the flight was either read my novel or play Othello with Hon Mun. Besides the movies and music, the LCD also provides the flight information such as the altitude, distance travelled and remaining and external temperature. Check this out: they also provide real-time basic graphical map that shows the terrain as the plane travels!

First meal

2nd meal

3rd meal

The meals they gave us were much better than what I had in Air China; we had about four meals during the flight. I was anticipating the moment when they serve the meals… The toilet or lavatory as they called it was extremely small but manageable; I think it’s a standard size for all airplanes. The flight from Beijing to San Francisco was about eleven hours. Again, I didn’t managed to rest much although the seats were spacious but the flight wasn’t all smooth going; there were lots of turbulences which made me feel sick – and made me pray for a quick end. XD

B777 plane

Journey to Austin - Part 2

2009-06-05T18:40:00.001-07:00

Shops at Beijing China International Airport

When we arrived there, it was already quite bright; Hon Mun told me earlier that Beijing follows the same time zone as us in Malaysia so no wonder it is bright there at six. Before we got off from our plane, we were screened by a bunch of mask-wearing medical personnel; they used some kind of infrared temperature scanner which they aimed it at your forehead. At the airport, everything was nice and new; and most of the China girls there are sweet looking and cute!

Customs - Body searched by cute and sweet China girls XD

Entrance to BCIA after coming out from our plane (hell)

BCIA tower

Even the body search guards (I don’t know what the correct term for it is) are ladies! I was body-searched for the first time in my life by a sweet and cute girl. Haha. I think the government purposely assigned good looking girls at the airport to attract people to visit their country; I can say that it works XD. We stayed around the airport for about six hours before we board our next flight, which is to San Francisco on the United Airline via B777 plane.

The "hellish" B757

One very high tech public phone

The Journey to Austin - Part 1

2009-06-05T11:58:00.000-07:00

My boarding pass

Did you know this? I sure didn't

My first flight was the flight to Beijing on Air China’s Boeing 757 plane. It was a six hours flight which starts at midnight and arrive at Beijing International Airport at around six morning. This was my first time on an airplane and I was quite anxious about it but not worried.

The plane we were on was quite small and narrow; there weren’t much leg space either. It was quite a torture for me trying to get some rest as the plane was shaking quite a lot and I was praying for it to end fast.

My first meal on a plane

The air hostess gave us our supper which is our only meal for that flight; it consists of a pack of fried rice, veges with chicken chunks and some fruits. It was edible all right.

On the air hostesses, only a few was good looking but I found out on the rest of the other flights that Air China is the only airline that has good looking and young air hostess, others were old.

Baggage Headaches And Others

2009-06-03T00:31:00.000-07:00

After taking about a few hours (felt like a whole day) of trying to pack my all my clothes which includes my formals, my new New Balance running shoe (that I got at a discount), my new pairs of Renoma sports underwears - my first time buying it! - and some other stuff into three bags; more specifically, two checked bags and one carry-on bag.

Checked bags are those that you don't carry with you when you sit in the airplane, limited to 23kg each while the carry-on is limited to only 3-4kg.

Mine? Well, I borrowed one HUGE luggage bag (the ones with wheels) from my dear roommate, Victor Koo and filled it up almost to the maximum of 22kg, give or take 1 kg :D. Then I have the other small Deuter bag filled up with spices that Hann Huei's parents gave (that took 2kg >.<) and my favourite Instant Cereal Milo and some toiletries; that alone is 8kg! Those are my checked baggage, my carry-on is about 7kg - it has my novel and First Aid book - giving a total of a bloody 37kg! That's more than half of what I weigh! My goodness, is this normal or am I behaving like a girl? No offence intended =P.

Hon Mun told me he's reserving an empty checked bag for his girlfriend's gifts... Haha, talk about love... I'm not going to comment on this although I'm not going to see her for 4 months... XD

With only a few hours left before I depart for US on my first ever trip on a plane - there are lots of firsts these days, no? - I can barely contain my excitement... In fact, I'm already reading the novel by Arthur C. Clarke which I'm supposed to be reading on the plane! I bought it just for this occasion... Here's another first, it's my first novel ever purchased with my own cash... Cost me RM30+... I usually got mine free from the net and reading it off my lovely Palm TX but I wanted to have a feel of reading it from a paperback novel... It feels great! XD

Got to prepare, until the next time, see ya!

My first posting!

2009-06-02T07:52:00.000-07:00

Ladies and gentlemen, here comes my first posting in my first ever blog! I would like to thank Cheam Jia Xing (fondly called as J10) for his constant nagging for me to have a blog of my own. Now I finally have one! I hope you're happy J10! Haha.

I'm going to just blog about my internship life in Texas sans any confidential informations related to me working in National Instruments - I've signed a number of legal documents on this so no deal.

Right now I'm still in my lovely hometown, PJ. I'll be departing by tomorrow night so stay tuned for my experience of flying for 30 bloody hours...

See ya!