Mini update: Oversleeping to Madrid

  How was your xmas lads? (huhu, British slang) Mine was expensive. No proper restaurants were opened, and I went out with some Malaysians. So obviously they chose to eat at Chinatown because:

1. We Asians.
2. It was one of the only places that were still opened.

  But them Chinatown store owners. Sneaky people! Cash only! 20% service charge! All the menu suddenly had an increase in price! Oof my budget!

Mini update: Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

  Merry Christmas y'all! I hope you guys are having a fun time, filled with mulled wine and whatever things you guys eat! I personally have been indulging myself with plenty of mulled wine here in London!

The Trip

  With my exams finally gone, and probably my university years, booked pretty much a solo Euro-trip!

Figure 68.1: Everything in 1 backpack!

  Gonna be touring around from tomorrow till slightly after New Years! Wooooo!

Exam Gauntlet

  Oooof, back to back exams. Had this exam, from 7pm to 10pm. The paper after that one is the next day from 9am to 11:30am. That was a hellish experience. Needing to study two paper at once, with no room to study in between papers was the worst. Well, at least it's over.

(I mean, technically there is time to study in between those two papers, if and only if you sacrifice sleep for it, which I'm not going to. That's insane.)

Final Stretch Part III

  I have decided that I will share with you guys the video I've done for the winter semester. Might as well own it, am I right? I spent so much time on it, it would be a shame if no one sees it. It'd definitely also be extremely embarrassing for me but hey... when am I not embarrassing? It is one of my many unredeeming qualities.

Final Stretch Part II

    Classes have just ended. I have finally submitted in all leftover assignments and what not. It is time... to face my final battle... The Final Exams. If I do not fail, I am finally finished with my undergraduate studies.

Fourth Attempt

  Wooo, Steam sale! Got myself two games:

1. Darkest Dungeon (I didn't get the DLC though, I wanna play through the base game first before getting all the DLCs)
2. Into the Breach (Turn-based mech action? Made by the guy who made FTL? Count me in!)

  Have not played Into the Breach yet, gonna play Darkest Dungeon first. It feels like the enemies are kind of "sentient", they are constantly going for my glass cannons. Please! For the love of it, go for the crusader standing right in front! Don't go for the healer at the third row, or the arbalest equipped with the super rare trinket that boosts her attack damage, they can't take much damage! Other thing is, you start the game with two characters: the crusader fella and the highwayman fella. Oh boy, my highwayman can't hit anything. When he hits, he crits! Nice! Unfortunately, he keeps on missing (or the enemies keep on dodging his attacks), really annoying! 

  So they have this light system, where it gets darker every time you move. And as it gets darker, the system basically starts stacking against you. You can counteract this effect by keeping the place lit by using torches. Unfortunately, torches takes up space in the inventory. There are also abilities that also when used in combat, increases light by a small amount. Then there's the crusader, who has the ability to basically +25 light (out of 100) while in combat. Can only be used once per combat, but light doesn't keep on ticking down when you're in combat.Theoretically speaking, if I put two crusaders with the protect skill, I technically don't need any torches right? Since both of them would +50 light / battle. 

Final Stretch Part I

  Classes are almost done! There are 2 more stochastic processes and survey sampling classes, 4 more probability and Japanese classes, and 1 more probability tutorial! Mah gawd!! I barely had any time to do more own things and woosh there goes time!

Time flies when you're focused

  There's two more weeks of classes than it's finals. My gosh, time sure flies.

Post Midterm Report

  It's only the mid of November, and why is it already snowing so much?!

Figure 61.1: I left it out for an hour and look at it!

A bad time for a burnout

  As you know, I got food poisoning on Friday, so I missed all my classes and my work shifts on that day. Apparently that day is pretty important in terms of classes because I have a midterm on Thursday and it covers until the Friday class.

  I originally have an assignment due on Tuesday (today) too, so I kind of prioritize the assignment over the midterm preparation. Makes sense right? Seeing as the assignment's deadline is before the midterm. I figured that I could finish the assignment ASAP and then start studying for my upcoming midterm.

  I spent the entire weekend and Monday on the assignment. It has 8 questions in it and I just couldn't the do the last 4 questions, it was just extremely difficult. I kept on thinking: "I don't think we've learned this yet!" On Monday, I finally got to make an appointment with him in the evening. You can imagine right now I am extremely stressed out. The assignment is due on the following day and I have 50% of the assignment left to do and I only have the entire evening/night time to work on it. Not just that, I haven't even begin studying for my midterm on Thursday yet. At this point of time, my old good friend, migraine, returned. My head was just throbbing, I was super stressed and panicky right now.

It be like this sometimes

  Woke up around 6:30am needing to take a number 2. Ugh, how annoying! When suddenly, my body went cold, my head's throbbing, and my stomach don't stop aching. Uh oh, please don't tell me its food poisoning.

It's food poisoning.

Busy

Very busy times. Head throbbing experience.

Work ain't going very well either. I now truly understand what "creative differences" is; and whew, it ain't fun.

Logic games and a nice Saturday

  Lately, I've been into logic puzzles or what not. I've been downloading a bunch of riddles and puzzles apps on my phone, been playing them on my spare time. I started properly playing this video game called "Antichamber" too. I just recently unlocked the yellow gun, which enables you to drag puzzle pieces. Unlocking that gun made me went: "oooh! I can now easily go back and work on all those other puzzles that I couldn't before!" That game has no direction whatsoever, which at times, makes me extremely annoyed. Even now, I am stuck at some places.

  There's these puzzles called "climbing the tower", where you kind of climb a tower but not really? Anyway, strangely, I have unlocked puzzle 1-5, and 7! There's no 6! Strange! I couldn't solve puzzle 5 and 7 so I think maybe that's the next gun?

  I've always liked all these logic puzzles and what not, that's why I even bought all those "Sherlock Holmes" puzzle books. But now, I don't know... I like it.

Home, motivation, and what not

  Right after the Halloween party, somehow there was another party on Tuesday. It was supposed to be a small get together but we invited someone and that someone invited someone and that someone invited someone... and then there's 15 people in our home. I wasn't too happy about it, so I basically stayed in my room the entire night. One of the original guests was a fellow Malaysian and her boyfriend. In fact, she was the main chef of the night.

  So basically, the boyfriend came and accompanied me in my room while there's a party outside on a Tuesday night. Alcohol and all. We were talking about statistics, and the future. I think he wanted me to stay in St John's after I graduate, he kept on telling me about various small companies that are hiring. Unfortunately, I was pretty set on leaving the island already. I kind of told him: "Actually, I want to get a job elsewhere after I graduate." To which he said, "Oh, but at least try to apply locally, things might change." Yeah, I agree... but as you all know, I'm one stubborn boy. 

  We were talking about home, or more specifically, my home, Malaysia. He was wondering why I don't want to go back to Malaysia to work after I graduate? 2 reasons:

1. The pay sucks.
2. I know the moment I settle down at home, my window of working abroad has close shut.

  As much as I love Malaysia, working there is not something I want to do. Settling down at home, I feel, for me, is a sign of me giving up. As lonely as I feel from time to time, constantly living in new places without really knowing many people there, I do enjoy it. I enjoy... this life. I don't know how to explain it. I like the life of living in multiple places long term. Or at least, right now, I want to live in a place where there isn't many Malaysians. I know it sounds strange. I am not ashamed of my nationality, no, in fact I boast about it when I go to new places. I don't hate my own people too, it's just... there's this uncomfortable feel I get sometimes when I'm around comfortable things for too long. Comfort in this sense is not in the "safe" sense, but its the culture or something... I don't know, it's hard to explain through text. Maybe its easier when spoken too and I have access to hand gestures. 

  Anyway, yeah, we talked about home, and where to work in the future. In my mind, I'm dead set for either Ontario, Germany, or Sweden. I have decided to use my LinkedIn photo as my German resume photo. I've applied to many Canadian and Swedish jobs. Germany or Sweden would be ideal. I want to live in a place where English isn't their first language but they can perfectly speak it. This is kind of what I mean. It's not the most comfortable but yet there's comfort in it. 

  Well, I've been asked "so what are you going to do when you graduate" by basically everyone I spoke too. And every time I give the same answer. And every time, a little bit of hope leaves from my mouth. As time goes on, I'm starting to feel a little hopeless about my situation. I've always been a hopeful person (or is it stubborn? Are those two interchangeable?) , but this, this is uncharted territory. This is something that even by looking around, it doesn't look so good. I don't see no immigrant with a bachelor in statistics anywhere. It's getting kind of scary. And by that, I start to lose motivation. I have this "oh, what's the point?" mindset... I mean I still do, but now something happened. Just because I know that I have relatives reading this blog, I'm not going to say it cause i'ts a bit personal to the point that I don't want my relatives to know. Why can my friends know then? Cause my friends do not contact my parents. 你不用浪费时间问我父母，他们也不知道。呵呵，是故意的。 Basically, I have a goal now. A new goal. One that's perhaps more attainable. And that new goal is the pick me up from my hopelessness. It doesn't turbo charge me but:

  Imagine I'm running a marathon, but this marathon is special. I do not know where the end point is. So I kept running and running until I realised "what's the point? There's no end anyway, it's all bull", then there's this thing that say, "hey man, keep on going. I don't where the end is either but we will never find out if you stop". It's not a very encouraging thing to say, I know, but... hey... I gotta work with what I have. I aim to get a job in Germany or Sweden, and I still hold on to it. That is absolute. There are still things I want to prove, well not to the haters. I know these people don't hate me (I hope not, cause one of them is my dad), but it's like... the lack of faith? There were many times the people I hold dear to me kind of lost faith in me, and I kind of want to prove them wrong. Especially towards my dad, since I've mentioned him already. The man is my final mental boss.

  Oh yeah. This week's new recipe is lentil soup. There's officially 30 more days till classes end, so things have been ramping up. Time is now a luxury, so probably not gonna try and be fancy with the new recipes.

 

Figure 56.1: I gave my friend's boyfriend a statistical "puzzle".
Basically I taught him the fundamentals, then turned it into a puzzle.
This is him deep in thought. He was like this for almost 10 minutes.
It was about memorylessness.

A Special Specific Day with Jerry

  Hello and welcome to "A special specific day" with your host, Jerry Lim! Today, I feel like doing something special. I will spend basically every minute of sunlight outside my home! Wooo!!

  First up, I woke up early in the morning, and head to the farmer's market. I've never been to the farmer's market regular schedule, so I have no idea what they usually have. I usually attend it when there's special events, like the last time, when I went there for a vegan fair.

  So I went to the farmer's market and had my breakfast there, and guess what, I met an old friend there, having his "brunch". The last time I saw this guy was around the time of La Dame's funeral, as we were all friends of La Dame. We basically stopped hanging out at a certain time until La Dame's passing brought us all back together, then we fell apart again. The man was seriously jet lagged as he just return back from his Russia trip (he had a conference). We were basically catching up; he's doing his last semester in his PhD while I'm doing my last semester in my bachelors... then we walked around the market looking at the various stalls.

  The market was pretty cool, there were lots of food stalls selling all sorts of food. I went and got my breakfast from the bakery, while my friend (let's call him Siberiaman) got his from one of those Canadian-South-Asian stalls. There was also a stall ran by Russians selling perogies. Siberiaman bought some of the frozen ones, saying that its the closest thing to home here.

  There were plenty of stalls selling hand crafted things. Handcrafted jam, handcrafted gloves, hats, chopping boards, pet food... We basically just went through those real quick. I have no desire to buy any of those things, even though some of them are really cool. Just no need for them right now. As for fresh vegetables, there were lots of roots vegetables being sold by many of the local farms there. But that's the thing, there isn't any of the non-root vegetables, so you can't really do your grocery shopping here, it's all just turnip, potatoes, carrots, onions, and whatever roots I left out.

  After that, we went our separate ways. I was headed downtown while he was going to go home. We bid each other adieu and then we split.

Figure 55.1: Lining up for my breakfast

Figure 55.2: Cinnamon roll, chocolate cream puff, black coffee

Figure 55.3: Exterior of the market

How to make Post-midterm-exams Pesto

  Making pesto from scratch requires very little ingredients actually! All you need is

1. Basil leaves (important!)
2. Garlic (also important!)
3. Some nice fine cheese (yes)
4. Olive oil
5. A lovely jar for storing

Figure 54.1: Olive oil not in picture

  The tough part is in the mincing. First you chop the garlic, then you mince it together with the leaves. Don't put all the leaves together all at once though, or else it's gonna be too clumpy to mince! (Still possible, just more effort now). After you're done mincing it, toss in the shredded cheese (I use Parmesan) and mince that together with the minced garlic/basil combination! Keep on mincing, if you think it's fine, it's not fine and go back to work. Keep on doing it until your thumb goes numb and then you can toss it all into the jar.

  Once in the jar, pour in some olive oil and stir. Don't pour in too much at first, so you know if it's not enough you could always pour more, rather than overflowing it... and Voila! Pesto done! Now just store it in a fridge and use it for your pasta or whatever else dishes!

  FUN FACT: Apparently we're not supposed to cook pesto. What you're supposed to do is just lather it on something like butter to toast, and then stir it around. It seems I have been "cooking" pesto wrong this whole time. The reason is cause you'll spoil the fresh basil basically. It's gonna turn dark and meh.

Figure 54.2: Finished product! Might need some more oil.

  Although it sounds easy, the hard part is really just the chopping part. It felt endless. And the mess! Make sure you use a big chopping board or bits of cheese, basil, and garlic will go all over the counter!

Settling down

  As my degree is almost to an end, one of the thing that keep on running in my mind is the thought of settling down.

  Personally, I have no intention to go back to Malaysia. The other thing is that, it seems like there isn't any future here for me in St John's (according to my professors and many other recruiters I spoke to), which means there's a high high HIGH chance that I'll have to leave this place once I'm done.

  I've also often heard that your first job is usually not your permanent job, and you'll probably shift to some other job after you get some experience. These thoughts are scaring me. Must I always have little material belongings for I must always prepare to move? Not just that, does that I mean I have to go to a new place, and make new friends here and there? Corollary to that, does that mean I'll probably could never be in a long term relationship for the next few years as my stay at whatever place is not permanent?

  My friends back home, when they go abroad for their studies, they already have 2 things in mind: they either stay in whatever city they did their studies in and find a job there, or they go back to Malaysia. See, that's the thing, lot's of my friends went to study abroad in huge cities, where I believe it's easier to find a job no matter your degree. St John's, despite being the capital of a province, is just not big enough to have that opportunity.

  So here I am, pondering... Will I ever settle down in a place? What I mean by this is by a certain age of course. I don't expect a 60 year old man to be constantly moving around; if I do retire, I have to pick a place to retire too anyway. All these thoughts tires me out very much. I have no idea how one make friends outside university, or how one even find dates outside university (besides online dating). Pretty much all of my friends found their partner when they were in uni, and are still together, or they used Tinder and am now together, so I have no idea how does one find someone, and I have no intention in getting Tinder or whatever.

  The other thing is friends. I've always been told that you can be friendly to your colleagues, but not actual friends with them. Those that told me that are also in the cutthroat world of business, so maybe that wouldn't really apply to me, or this generation, but lets say that advice is true, which means the workplace is not really an option. How about those hobby places, like joining a DnD group, or some martial arts lessons? In my experience, I pretty much only see those people during those sessions. We never really did go out, or talk outside it. If we saw each other, we say hi, that's about it. In my university life, usually I make friends with other newly arrived folks too. We might not have similar interest all the time, but we bond through the fact that we are foreign. Heck, I don't think I really have any local friends. Lots of them already have their group of friends when I arrive, and then there's the language and culture barrier and all too. But you see, it's easy in university, because there's events held for all these new-to-here folks. Not just that, the date is extremely convenient. Since the semester starts in a specific date, its much easier to set that up. But for work is different, you don't get that luxury.

  I don't know, it's stressing me out. All these thoughts are also making me feel lonelier and lonelier. How lonely? Well... it's a "I'm telling all these to a blog" kind of lonely.

  Yeah but whatevs... It's all part of life isn't it?

Figure 53.1: ....

A Plastic Epiphany

  I believe it was a week ago, I was about to shave. I took my shaving cream and my razor out, rinse my face with warm water, and then I remove the plastic tip of my disposable razor. That's when I realized something. Since it's disposable, which means I pretty toss and buy new ones several times a year... that's a lot of plastic.

  That's when I look around my toiletries. It can't just be my razor right? Oh gosh, my toothpaste, my toothbrush, they're all plastic. My tongue scraper too but that isn't as severe as the others because tongue scraper is not exactly in the "disposable" sect, while you're suppose to replace your toothbrush every 3 months (which means 4 toothbrushes a year), and your toothpaste container... well depending on how much toothpaste you use then.

Figure 52.1: What I meant by lots of plastic

  Then some other thing hit me! A bar soap! Now I know why some people (other than preference) use bar soap over those squeeze bottles/top ones! Even less plastic! So there I was, with a warm wet face, razor on one hand and cream on the other, just standing in front of the mirror, having an epiphany.

  A lot of things makes sense now. The wooden toothbrushes, the powder deodorant, the bar soap... I'll probably try to get one after I'm finished with my current one. As for the toothpaste, I don't think I could switch to that black goop thing that the Giantess use yet, I think that takes a while to get used to. As for the razor, I've been looking up and there's this thing called safety razors. Safety razors are usually 100% made of metal, hopefully rust resistant, and you replace the blade once like every 2 years or something. Unfortunately, 2 aspect of it is preventing me from purchasing one right off the bat:

1. The technique used to shave with a safety razor is different from a disposable one.
2. It's hecking expensive.

  Which unfortunately means I'm going to stick with the disposable razor for awhile. But fret not, for I have plans to head to the local hipster barber and inquire about safety razors. I'm sure they will know all about it. Hopefully I will get one in the near future! 

  I've been trying to go green lately. I guess one of my proto-going green things is purchasing a kindle. At first, it was more for convenience and novelty reasons, "Wow, so cool! Wow, so light! Wow, I no longer have to carry so many books anymore!" Although the trade off means I have a smaller book collection on my shelf... and I can't exactly lend someone my kindle... but as time went on, I realized that the kindle does help me cut down my "paper usage". 

  I've also started using handkerchiefs. I bought a 6 pack the other day, and have them in my pocket ever since. I'm trying to not use any more of those serviettes, or tissues, or whatever... I bought a lunch box and I've been consistently trying to bring food to campus, thus cutting down on those plastic cutlery and, probably those Styrofoam plates/containers. Heck, the new mechanical pencil I bought, it's body is majority metal (unfortunately, there's still some plastic parts, can't be avoided), which hopefully means it gets to last longer.

Figure 52.2: Zebra M 301

Mini-rant

  Mid terms are coming up, so I planned for my entire day to be study time.

  Unfortunately, we have confirmed sighting of rats in our home. So I contacted my landlord, and he came and offered to help set up and the traps and everything but my genius housemate sent him off, saying "nah we could do it ourselves". Guess what, right after that, ALL of my housemates left because they have things to do, leaving me to handle this.

  I am mad as hell. Not only do we not have all the tools for this issue, my plan of studying is now all in shambles. And I can't afford to not do any of this. Why is it so hard to clean up after yourself when you're done using whatever huh?! I feel so ashamed when the landlord came and he saw all the breadcrumbs all over the damn kitchen. We all know who did, we all always tell the person, and nothing ever happens. My friends tell me to be like them, to not care just like them, because they can tell that caring is giving me a lot of stress. Well, to me, this isn't an issue of caring or not; to me, this is a normal human decency thing to clean up after yourself. You don't have to be a saint to clean. Heck, you're not a fellow fresh out of some tribe in a jungle, and it's your first contact with all these machines and tools; you're a goddamn university student. In order to enter university, you have to go through secondary school and primary school, so I know you're not a complete idiot. And the rest isn't doing anything about. I'm constantly bringing it up but it's always "ah yes it's annoying but that's how the person is". If that is really how the person is, then we should goddamn kick the person out rather than accepting it because "that's how the person is".

  I am seriously in a state of panic. I want to scream, I want to cry, I just spent the last 5 minutes punching my bed. That means I just wasted 5 minutes. I can't afford to do any of this, I really need to study, but I also need to clean the house and set up traps, which means I also need to go out and buy tools like latex gloves. All of this takes time, and time is something I do not have right now.

  I have said this already and I will say this again, I am mad AS HELL. I'm seriously considering moving out. Even though I'm not sure if I will stay in this province after I graduate, I am seriously thinking of moving out.

The Road to Health

  That road seems to be really bumpy for me. As my thumb is healing, guess what? I'm now having the flu. Guess what I have before cutting my thumb? Also the flu! I think there's this trend going on with my body now. Until I somehow receive some physical harm towards my body, I will be sick. What a cycle.

  Mid terms start next week. It also ends next week. Basically, next week (and probably now too) would be the most stressful time I will have in a while. Which means I will stay off working on my resume until next weekend.

  I believe late October/early November is the time to start applying for jobs at proper companies. For the past few weeks, I've been constantly tweaking my resume, constantly adding new things while removing other things. Been reading up lots of guides and stuff. Been reading up on the how to's of Germany's and Sweden's resume etiquette. Sweden's resume is like Canada in a sense that you don't need a picture on your resume. Germany on the other hand is like Malaysia's, you need a picture. The problem is I don't have a resume-able photo to put. I think I read somewhere that Germany's resume photo etiquette is like a passport photo, no smiling. My brand new LinkedIn photo has me smiling super wide, so I can't use that.

Figure 50.1: Autumn is here!

Thanksgiving and Thumb

  It's Thanksgiving here in St John's! So happy Thanksgiving guys!

  Anyway, we had a huge Thanksgiving dinner yesterday. I was in charge of the potato salad, while my housemate is in charge of the coleslaw, while our neighbour was in charge of the turkey (8kg!). Prior to the dinner, for the few days, I have been trying to finish my assignments and study for the exam. I've completed 3/4 of all of my work, but that 1/4 left is really really difficult, I'm going to work on it today and tomorrow. Did all my laundry and cleaned my room too (finally!). Anyway, I'm in charge of the potato salad!

  As you know, I recently cut my thumb, which means for the past week I've not been doing any thumb related thing. Most importantly, chopping things. One hand holds the item while the other the knife. Because I can't do that (heck, I got my cut because I was trying to slice a rutabaga), that means I have not been cooking meals at home. How could I? It's been a really expensive week constantly ordering out... 

  So for the potato salad, it's time for me to try out my thumb strength. After peeling 17 potatoes, it's time to chop them up into mini pieces. I did it! But I'm not gonna lie, somewhere in the middle, my thumb felt extremely tired and numb, and I had to take a break. The horrible part is that, I used to be the guy in the house people go to if they can't open a jar. But now, I have to go to my housemate for that. I tried gripping the jar and my left thumb just went jelly. It was an extremely sad moment to watch.

Figure 49.1: Notice the angle of the cut

  I think my potato salad turn out good though! I received praises from the guests. 

  One of my favourite memory from the Thanksgiving dinner was when we were playing this game called Drawful 2. It's basically like pictionary, but the catch is you're drawing it on your phone (so chubby fingers is bad!) and, I kid you not, the developers did this on purpose... there's no erase function. Yeah, people were complaining about the lack of erase function in the first Drawful game, so the developers heard about it, and publicly stated that they will not put in an erase function in the second game, but instead we're giving you 2 colours to work with! Anyway, there was this really really buff guy, like massive! He's a friend of a friend, and he brought pie. The man is intimidating as hell. He has the male equivalent of the RBF syndrome, coupled with his extremely huge body, makes him really scary to approach. Well, throughout the entire game, he was giddy as hell. He was like this little kid constantly jumping on his seat and all, it was pretty funny. 

  So yeah, the guests stayed till really late, I just went to sleep cause I was super tired. 

The Orange Incident

  You know you always read about all those things, where they joke about them remembering something dumb they did back when they were young, and then they kind of cringe on the spot. You know what's even worse? It's when you did something extra ordinarily dumb when you're an adult, and it kept on replaying it in your head. Mine would be the orange incident.

  I've always thought I had pretty good table manners, just like how I thought I am taller than the average male. Those sentiment unfortunately, as I learnt, only applies to Malaysia. When I left Malaysia, I am average at best for height, maybe even slightly below average, and my table manners are apparently "bad".

  This was last year, and I had quite recently been criticised for my "hands on" method on eating chicken thighs. Apparently, unless you're in your own home, or at McDonald's (or the equivalent), you aren't suppose to use your hands to eat. One is supposed to use a fork and knife to get to those hard to reach places in-between the bones part of the chicken thigh. My lack of experience with the table knife was really showing. I think I spent almost an hour just working on the thigh, and my wrist was already super tired.

  Fast forward some time, I was at the Giantess' brother's place, the whole family is there, they're ordering Indian food. "Oh no, technically this is a house right? Does that mean I can use my hands? But wait, everyone else is here too! What should I get??!!" At the end, I purposely got something that doesn't require hands (those pre-cut meat dishes). Hoho, I'm a genius. That's when, they served... sliced oranges.

  I've always eaten fruits with my hands (except maybe dragon fruit, those thing stains), so at the time, I was super panicky. Do I use my hands for these?! I waited for someone to take one... yes they used their hands! But how do they eat it? Do they eat it the same method as I do? By just going down on it? Its super impolite to stare at someone eating oranges, so I decided to wing it. I tried this really strange method of eating. It is completely ineffective, messy, and ugly to look at, BUT it minimizes the amount of hand touching. I've only took 2 slices before I gave up.

  Later she made fun of me on how I ate oranges. Ah man, I must have made an absolute fool of myself in front of everyone. That entire event kept on replaying in my head ever since then, and I cringe every time. It's horrible aghhhhhhhh--

Hoooahhhh

  I realised something during the past few months. My physical capabilities is strongly tied to my mental health. I guess I stay sane by doing things. Once my ability to do things is taken away from me, I kind of spiral into this horrible mood. Last week, I was sick. My throat was horrible, my nose is always leaking, my eyes are always droopy and my body feels weak in general. I can't do much, and it was horrible. This week, after cutting my thumb, I can't grab things with my left hand anymore (for now at least). Thankfully, lots of my academic activities like studying and doing my assignments can be done without really exercising my left thumb, so academic wise, I am on top of it. In fact, I am so on top of my academic because I can't do pretty much anything else.

  I can't chop vegetables, which means I can't cook. I can't go to the gym either, can't lift weights. Not just that, I missed my weekly bake-a-new-baking-thing last weekend. The good news is that my thumb stopped bleeding, but it still hurts even when something were to casually rub it. 

  The other thing I am stressed about too, is, you guessed it, my future career. Now that everyone knows that this is my last semester, I am constantly asked: "So what's next?" And I always give this nervous laugh, with a "I don't know." I can't ask people, because no one I know has friends who graduated from the field of mathematics. Every other stats person I know is well, like me, still studying. Asking professors doesn't help, because they always just go with "go get a masters in stats next". Career advisors just refers me to the field of everything else but stats, because everyone needs stats am I right? Sigh, this job thing is really stressing me out.

  I've been attending as many soft skills seminar as I can. Just yesterday, I attended this "RBar". What's RBar? R-Bar is a weekly scientific programming study group where we have a beer and tackle R issues in a cooperative group setting (taken from their twitter bio). I've always had my data handed to me in a silver platter for class. Yesterday's session basically showed us how to import data from more common data software, like Excel. I've taken a course where we're given data, and we're supposed to analyze it and then write a report about it. That course taught me that 20% of my time is used cleaning the data, 10% analyzing, and 70% writing the report. That course is the one course where the professor purposely gave us some really messy data, and it was our job to tidy it up, so that we could analyze it. So, yesterday's RBar was basically that too. Their solution is so much more neater though. They made so many directories so that it wouldn't be a total mess to navigate. Looking back at my directory for that report.... hehehe..... I wonder how did I even know what file is what that time...

  Been really busy with all these lately, rarely had time to do my own stuff now. I've basically replaced watching shows with reading, because with reading I know I could stop anytime, and spare time now is too tight. Which reminds me, I gotta do laundry.

Figure 47.1: Why does it feel like Duolingo is preparing me
for some Swedish heartbreaks?

Figure 47.2: What kind of data are they collecting??
TL: Why doesn't he kiss me?

The Weekend

  This weekend... has been... strange....? Well, strange is not the right word, different is much more proper.

  So I have my usual plan: Go to the gym, go celebrate a friend's birthday, then study... oh! And! Bake! This week, I was supposed to bake some chocolate chip muffins! (The Swedish meatballs on Wednesday turns out fineeeee, but I made so much, I ate it for 3 days). But unfortunately, something terrible happened. I was chopping vegetables and then I basically sliced a part of my thumb. From then on, my weekends was just me trying to keep my left hand static.

Figure 46.1: How it is (no photos because that's disgusting)

  There was just blood everywhere. I got my housemate to help me clean it up, but she obviously wasn't too happy about assisting me in the clean up of blood. Because of that, I had to spend my weekday doing activities that doesn't use my left thumb.

  The first few days, everytime I move it or accidentally knock it into something, it bleeds. Because of the lack of my left hand mobility, I can't cook anymore (more specifically, I can't chop the ingredients), so I ordered delivery instead. Oh ha haha I got food poisoning it from it. So now, my Friday consists of me constantly cleaning my left thumb because it bleeds periodically, and rushing to the toilet because food poisioning.

 Saturday morning, I finally get to Skype with my family again. Skype-d for a few hours, that was really nice. I was right! My entire family (at least the maternal side) now knows about this blog, and it's content is constantly circulating around them. Jeez! Old people and their amazing rate of gossip! Maybe it was a mistake to like my uncle's Facebook post! The household is still in post-grandma's passing mode. Apparently she owned a bit too many things, and they're having trouble sorting out all of the things she has. They would be having one last lunch with her caretaker all this while. Yeah, it'd probably be a solemn lunch, but it's a nice gesture.

 In the evening, there was a birthday party to attend. The venue is in some fancy restaurant, so I decided to just order a salad for the event. But because I know I probably won't be full if I just ordered salad, I decided to go to the Starbucks next door and load up with calories first. My friend was working in Starbucks that day, so I got a free drink from him! (Salted Caramel Decaf Latte with half syrup) I basically just read there, and talked to him when he's on his break, then goes back to reading when his break is over... Then its off to dinner!

  After dinner, we brought everyone to our home for (Jerry's) tea. Oh yeah, I'm known as the tea guy now. In fact, when Simon said: "Hey guys, come to our place after dinner!" A few of them went, "Ok! Jerry what tea do you have this time?" So we all talked until ~2.30am. One of them stayed over for the night because her place was too far. She usually stays over because she's always part of the group and she lives... not far... but she's lazy. She has her toothbrush here already and everything. So this time is no different right?

  Wrong. My (and I guess OUR) Sunday schedule was completely ruined. Well, she's having a guy problem right now. Yes and not really. She's trying to make this guy fall in love with her but she doesn't want to do anything about it. She's not exactly making any move or anything. She's also constantly bugging me because I actually personally know the guy (Starbucks guy to be precise), and she's constantly grilling me about him. I kept on telling him that we don't really talk about this kind of stuff. Yes he's my friend, but we're not that close of a friend. But noooooo. Oh yeah, there's a reason why I'm super annoyed about it. It's because this have been going on since June, this whole coming and grilling me thing. But this time, I have a secret weapon, and it is my housemate, Simon.

  Basically, Simon was good cop and I'm bad cop. I'm constantly giving the more "bad" answers (I don't think it's bad, I think it's just not what she wants to hear). Simon wraps my words around with flowers basically. Until...

  It is now 3pm. She's still here. My original plan of baking is now moot because the evening plan is to study. She's been here since she woke up at 10am, and we're having this topic until now. None of us have ate breakfast, and we're still going on about her guy problem. Simon too got impatient already and we both became bad cop-bad cop an hour ago. She's basically trying to be like a chessmaster, trying to make him fall in love with him and have him make the first move and all those stuff. At the end, she left because she has a meeting. Simon and I then supported ourselves by just getting some KFC delivered to us.

  And here I am now, just finished my only meal of the day because it's already 4pm. It has been a rough morning/afternoon, having a guest who doesn't want to leave your home for some completely made up problem she has (if you listen to her problem, you could tell all of this could be solved by her making the move. Yes she could be rejected, but I guess that's it then.). So now, I guess it's time to study and do whatever assignments I have. I'll maybe make my muffins some day? Or maybe I'll make 2 different kind of pastries next week! We'll see!

Figure 46.2: Side view of my wound

Fantastic Jobs And Where To Find Them

  Could someone tell me where to find them?

  So, there was a career fair today, went there and dropped some resumes here and there. Basically, I was just giving out my resumes as though as its just a pamphlet. Other than those 3 insurance/bank booths, there was literally no one else searching for someone with a background in math and statistics. Which kinda sucks, every time I talk to people, they told me that every industry uses stats! Even those booth people says so! Buuuuut, when I ask them about it, they're all "wellllll, yeah we do use it, but it's not what we're looking for right now". Which I get it, you want what you want, the fault seems to be with my degree honestly, despite growing up hearing that statistics is super useful, it's being used in every industry etc... the harsh reality is that yes it is being used, but they do not need new people I guess. It feels like the data department is just filled with them old dogs. Maybe the only time they're hiring is when those people finally retire, then there's slots for us. Good news is that I finally got a picture for my linkedin profile. I've gotten mixed reviews about linkedin, some says it's useless but some says it's super useful. Doesn't hurt to get one I guess!

Figure 45.1: The Career Fair!

  Some good news though! My study permit has finally been extended, which means I can finally start apply for all the other bureaucratic stuff! This is the pain of being an international student, but once it's done, it's done, I can feel my shoulders being figurative lighter now (not physically though, that's because I am always carrying my laptop around and its heavy). 

  That being said, I'll still try to apply jobs wherever I can though. It seems like, being a statistic major, there is a low chance that I'll be staying here in St John's. Lots of the companies rep told me that all these data analyst position are more common in big cities like Ottawa, Toronto, Montreal... So, yeah. Maybe even Frankfurt? Stockholm? Gothenburg? That'd be sweet! Not Berlin though, not a fan. Sorry >.<

Night of the osmanthus

  I've been trying to get into this habit of trying new things every week. One of the things I'm doing right now is to cook at least one new recipe each week, and also bake a thing once a week(end). This week, I tried to make Italian meatballs, and there's no pictures, because it was a complete failure. Tomato sauce was spraying everywhere, the stove needed so much cleaning, and it took forever to cook the centre of the meatball. Taste alright though, but the presentation and the cooking process was just... ugh...

  I've been trying to make some rolls in the past few weeks, and I pretty much failed every time. It kept on coming out more like a biscuit, so this week I'm trying out something simpler. I'm going to make chocolate chip cookies. Will probably show it in the next blog post, IF its successful.

  Next week, for the new recipe, I'm going to try and make a different kind of meatballs, something smaller, that's right it's Swedish meatballs! Hopefully, that one would cook better now that I've known that 1.2kg of ground beef is too much beef. As for the baking, maybe cupcakes? Muffins? I'll see what leftover baking supplies I have left after the chocolate chip.

Sweater Weather

  I have been sick for awhile now. I'm guessing it's from that day when I was cycling in the middle of the rain, and not wearing my raincoat and waterproof stuff. Oh well.

  We recently just celebrated Malaysia Day! Unfortunately, I was having some serious coughs and runny nose, which means I was not 100% into it. The event was hosted at our home, which means I dread the day where we have to clean up all the mess. It's made even worst since that I am sick. There was 30+ people at our house. I basically come in and out of my room every 30 minutes, saying hello and conversing with the guest, then retreating back to my room because its not good for a sick person to be with a crowd in such small places. From time to time, some of the guests comes into my room to relax. 30+ people in a small living room means it gets hot really really quickly. They come for some fresh air, and some small talk, before going back to the crowd. Lots of food, lots of curry (which is bad for my sore throat), but free food is free food. I basically ate curry for the next few days, which means that my ailments isn't exactly going away. All in all, the event was fun (I think). Lots of brand new Malaysians coming here, time to pass the torch I guess. The cleanup, not so much. Our lovely host was basically watching the TV the entire day (while eating all the leftover crisps), leaving me to clean up the mess. (I know he'll clean up eventually, but the keyword here is EVENTUALLY)

Figure 43.1: Not everyone is from Malaysia, but most are.

  Well, autumn is coming! Which means, sweater weather! Usually, the autumn means you get to put on those stylish layers! Them lovely scarves, those elegant coats. Unfortunately, this is Newfoundland, which means everything has to be waterproof. I don't know why, waterproof clothing aren't very stylish. I would say they look very practical though, but I guess that's it. They kinda min maxed it to be full practical, along with its extremely brightly coloured shell so you would be visible not only at night, but also through the fog. You would think that, "Oh, I mean everywhere rains! So its nice to have rain jackets sometimes but you could always put on some stylish outerwear!" NOOOOO, not only does it rain, there's huge winds, so it has to be windproof too! Basically, everyone here dress like how fishermen dresses in movies. Rubber boots, those bright yellow jackets, and that constant frown because who could smile in this weather. (I actually love the rainy weather here a lot, it's annoying but I love it. Whenever people start complaining about the weather, I just kind of go: hahahaha yeah... >.>)

Figure 43.2: Just in time for the weekends

  The other, more interesting thing that happened today (17/9/18) was that I had to dispose a dead bird. I had just finished my class, and I was about to unlock my bicycle and cycle home, when I noticed this yellow ball in this small patch of tall grass. I was like "oh neat, what's this" and lo and behold it is a dead bird. I locked my bike back to the bike rack and kind of just circled around the area. There was a bunch of people walking by but I don't think anyone noticed the dead bird. #1, it is hidden in this patch of tall grass, so you have to walk up to it to see. #2, in order for someone to even get close to this tall brush, they're probably heading towards the bike rack, and not many bike around here. I went back into MUN and grab a wooden stirrer from the cafe to poke the bird. Yep, it's fleshy. It's not moving, yep it's probably dead. I tore the middle pages from my notebooks, preparing to wrap the bird into it. The hard part was trying to grab the bird. Unfortunately, I didn't have the guts to just, GRAB the bird, so I was kind of fiddling around with the piece of paper and the wooden stirrer stick, trying to push it into the paper. 

  Some guy who was just walking by noticed me (I still had my helmet on by the way) trying to do something with a piece of paper and a stick next to the bike rack. I guess he thought its some bike related thing. So being a good sport, he approached me and said :"Hey, you need any help?"

And then I said: "Yeah, that'd be great, I can't do this by myself."

"Oh, are you trying to get the stick under or something?"

"No, I'm trying to push this dead bird into this piece of paper."

"Ah...." he said. And then he said "Ohkay." He smiled, and walked away.

  To tell you the truth, my heart kind of sinked a little. I was really expecting him to help me with this. But cause of that, I am now filled with determination and just went and grab it and wrapped it in the piece of paper. Oh gosh it's so squishy oh gosh. I then disposed it into the rubbish bin and kinda did a mini prayer of sorts, before finally leaving the university. Its such a pretty bird too! Greenish yellow on the belly, brown on the rest. Kind of went online and checked if I did the right thing throwing it into a rubbish bin. Turns out, it is. The other thing to do is let nature run it's course and let some other animal swoop down and eat it but this cadaver is right in the middle of campus, so I doubt any animals would be swooping down any time soon. Not only that, if left there, it may rot and may spread some sort of disease around the area (according to the article published by the Canadian wildlife association), it's also like, 5m away from the entrance of the science building, a high traffic area. They even end the article with that "it's okay if something dies, it's part of the cycle" so I use that as a pat on the back I guess. 

Hello!

  It seems like responding to a Facebook post by my uncle about my grandma has cascaded into pretty much my entire family finding out about this blog, to which I say, "Hello! Enjoy your stay! I hope you guys don't think different of me after binge reading everything!"

__________________________

  This is mostly just a small update to acknowledge them, but I guess I should add some other things too. First off, remember when I said I've been tired all day, and my eyes feel heavy even when its only 10pm? Well, I just admitted that it's not cause I'm too active (maybe I was), but its definitely because I'm falling sick. Sore throat, dizziness, heavy eyes, constant coughing, these are the symptoms of a sick person. Maybe the sickness was due to the fact that I was doing too much, constantly stressed about my schedule? It's the weekend now, time to relax. Maybe play some Dragon Age or read my book club book.

  I've been trying to bring leftovers as lunch to school lately. Not a big fan, but trying. In fact, there's a lot of things (well, only two) that I've been trying to do lately that I was not a fan of. First off, which is the aforementioned cooking some additional stuff to bring to school for lunch. I ordered a bento box online and am waiting for it to arrive, so for now I guess I'll use whatever container I have in the house. Maybe in the future, I will make some excellent bento box food that I do not know how to do now, like sushi or meatballs. Yum yum~

  The other thing is, I've been trying to bake. I do not have a fear of flour, but more of, I do not like the mess flour can create. Those little whiteys just get to everywhere. All over the counter, in the kitchen, in your clothes, and whatever stuff there are on the counter. But whatever, I've been trying to bake. I've made it a point to attempt to bake something every weekend. I've been trying to bake cinnamon/cardamom rolls the past few instances (and they all turn out to be failures), so this week, I'm going to start with the basic with cookies! Then maybe after that be muffins, then to some savoury things like pizza or calzone (so I could bring them as lunch too!), or even my own BREAD! Wooooooooooo~

  Played a game of badminton after a long time. Not just any game of badminton, SINGLES badminton. I've always been playing doubles badminton with a bunch of friends but singles.... singles is a whole different story. The amount of ground you have to cover my post-recovery little Asian ankle can't keep up. Not only that, the guy I was playing with, he's like around 185cm tall, so he didn't really have to move, all he does is extend is body and he could reach it! Not fair! I realised 30 mins in that hitting the back corners doesn't make him run, but hitting the front corner does. Problem is, trying to get it close to the net takes a lot of skill that I do not currently have. Either way, would play singles badminton again even if I were to get destroyed.

  Duolingo Swedish is getting tougher and tougher. I think I need a notebook for it from now on. German on the hand, is still fine. I guess spending almost 2 years studying Germans help! :p

  No visual media this time, so I'll just link some duet songs. Give them a listen!

Shorter term aspiration

  I've been speaking about my long term aspiration for a while: the graduation, the Swedish and German future, yaddi yaddi yadda. Now, I guess I'm here to speak about my "short" term aspiration, or in this case, semester aspiration.

  It's been a week, and I've been trying to be consistent and disciplined. I try to study in between classes, rather than just faffing about. I've also been exercising a lot; lots of time after class, I just go straight to the gym and start working out. With this in mind, for my past week, I've been absolutely lethargic. It's only 10pm when I'm typing this and I already have eye bags.

  My current friends are whatever friends I already have and my current classmates. Mind you that there's so little people in statistics that we kind of already know each other. For every passing semester, we get closer and closer because each other is all we got. I've got a badminton game with one of them tomorrow (pretty cool! Dude just asked me! We were never "this" close of casually asking for a game of badminton). This boy seriously helped me the last semester, without him I would never have passed, so please, help me through this last semester of mine! It's hard to meet new people when you're just constantly swamped with stuff. And the times where I have finally some breathing space, I just wanna stay home and play a quick game of Binding of Isaac or just watch an episode of two of whatever I'm watching right now. One of these days, I will have to find a few hours out and play Dragon Age.

  This fatigue is making me sleep earlier and earlier, which means it's harder and harder to be discipline with my Duolingo. Usually, I do some practice exercises before I sleep, but lately I just want to hit the sack. The other thing I would like to complain about is the serious lack of quality for the German Duolingo exercises. You could only make 4 mistakes before they kind of kick you out and make you restart the entire test. Guess what? There's only 3 questions! So that means you could just get all those 3 wrong and could still "pass" the test because you didn't make 4 mistake! It's also impossible to make those mistakes because the questions are easy to the peasy. The Swedish ones though are infinitely more difficult. There's like 20 questions each and they are all pretty fair. I find out that I'm absolutely horrible at the name of clothes (we didn't learn them in class when I was in Sweden!).

  Right now, I have a study mate for all my courses, which is good! Sure, I've been studying alone for the past few years, but the results were just kind of... so-so... Last semester showed me that having a study mate (and a smart one, not just anyone), really helps! Which begs the question, why would the smarty pants would want to study with me, the clearly inferior person (in terms of grades at least... I hope...)? Not sure, but I'm not going to complain or think about it.

  I haven't even started on the book that we're supposed to discuss in my book club!

  Basically, this semester: Study, exercise, read some books here and there, and sleep. Lots of and lots sleep.I really really need those sleep. The hard part is the discipline part, but I think I can do it right? Doesn't seem hard on paper. >.<

__________________________

Figure 41.1: The difference in quality is shown in the huge gap in xp

Relationships and the Semester

  Lots of people been asking me, "So Jerry, anyone you interested in?" Honestly, I kept on telling them the same thing. I'm graduating soon, I don't know where I will be after I graduate, so its probably not fair for the girl if I do get into a relationship and then buzz off to some distant land. But then again, right now my young life seems to be filled with constant relocation, so a relationship in general seems to be... well... unfair.

  Maybe I'll be a guy version of a cat lady. What's a guy version of a cat lady? A bat gentleman :^)
*pause for laughter*
  No please, don't go. I'll stop with the lame jokes, for now.


__________________________
  The first week of class is officially over. I'm currently taking 3 statistics courses and an elective. 

  The 3 stats courses are survey sampling, probability and statistics, and stochastic processes, while the elective is intro to Japanese はい！Thankfully, I have friends and acquaintances in all of my classes. Did you know, there's only like 6 students in my stochastic processes class, while there's 9 students in my survey sampling class. Since these are all 4th year courses, these are the pretty much the faces I've seen consistently along my journey. Some of the 3rd year stats courses are prerequisites for other majors, so I do not see them anymore beyond those classes (like my probability and statistics class, which has around 26 students). Honestly, I would not have passed my previous semesters without these people. There are some things that students who gets it explained it better to me, than the professors who have taught the course for more than a decade. I tried self studying/visiting the professor for one of the course once, and it went horribly. I could not understand it, and the professor did not do a good job explaining it to me, but a peer, they seem to know why and what's up. And now, these peer, who I have been seeing in my classroom for awhile, are taking the final classes of statistics with me. I am eternally grateful for their presence and guidance, and I hope you guys could help me get through this semester too.

  The Japanese class should be fine. My other friend once told me that the locals that attend the class tend to be those anime-watching people like me. After only 2 classes, I can confirm that statement.  

Slow Start

After months of planning and stuff, the science orientation finally happened. It was 6 hours of crowds and crowds of people, furniture moving, and many more. The team was all satisfied with the end result. I heard there were comments from my supervisor's supervisor, that it wasn't "perfect", but if you wanted the perfect event, it is destined to fail then. There were many hiccups throughout the events, but we pulled through. We made up things on the go and I think we all did a good job.

  Now that this is over, it's time to focus on classes. The new semester is starting, and hopefully its my last.

   My dad sent me photos of my brother and my parents together (as one would do when visiting), and gosh, my mom looked horrible, she looks like she barely slept for the past few weeks. I can't blame her though, if my mom was in a coma, and I'm constantly visiting her hoping for some action from her, I'll probably have plenty of sleepless nights too. Not just that, when I was talking to my dad, my dad told me mom's watching TV (at 11pm), that's way past her bedtime. I wonder how home is doing.

  That is one of the less nice things of the conversation with my dad, the other not so nice conversation was that he wasn't too happy that my future plans include Germany and/or Sweden. Basically along the lines that: "If you wanted to go to those places, you shouldn't have went to Canada to begin with." But it's not that simple, if not because of my experiences here, I wouldn't even think so much about those two countries. Before that, all I cared about Germany is that their World Cup champions and they have nice car, while Sweden is ABBA and Zlatan-land.

  Actually, ever since after secondary school (when my parents are less strict towards me), I've been wanting things that my parents do not agree with (I'm not including things like tattoos but my parents weren't happy with that either). First off, I didn't want to be an engineer. That was the toughest message to send to my parents. I kinda made myself have bad grades in physics back in secondary school just to let them know that "Hey, I really don't want to be an engineer" (and now that I'm in university, I now know just "engineer" means nothing, there's civil, mechanical, electrical, etc. etc. and they're all different). My parents either wanted me to become an engineer or a doctor, but doctor was out of the question because that requires many many years of practice and it gets too pricey, so when I said I didn't want to be an engineer, and my grades were out, I think my entire household was in turmoil. There were lots of screaming, and accusation that I will have no future and stuff like that.

  The other thing that my parents weren't happy about is that I want to study in Canada. They think it's too far, and were hoping if I'd study somewhere closer. When I was looking at Canadian unis, my mom was researching about other non-Canadian, nearer unis like those in Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan... I remember it was just so annoying that she kept on pushing all these unis while I already told them, "hey, I want to go to Canada". I mean, all these aren't exactly small life choices, especially for a guy from some small insignificant country (Heck, the two people I dated didn't know where Malaysia is initially!).

  Although I don't mind furthering my career in Canada, what I want is to migrate to Germany or Sweden for work. That's what I want. My stay there is amazing and I wouldn't have had that opportunity if I hadn't been to Canada. But you know, that's the hard part, finding a job in those 2 countries. Do I intend to defy my parents again at this stage of my life? Probably. Is it selfish? Probably? But its what I want, and I intend to see this through.

  I have not live in Germany as long as I have in Sweden, but from that month, I thought it was pretty nice! Maybe it's different if I were to work in the big city, as I was studying in a rather small, quaint area, but it's nice! As for Sweden, I remember at one point the Giantess thinks that I do not want to come to work in Sweden, but I'm gonna tell you what I told her, and that is that I loved it. I love the atmosphere, I love the people, I love it all, and it doesn't matter that the tax is high because I'm sure the pay covers it, it'd be cruel if it does not. So yeah, that's my goal. That's what waking me up in the morning. Honestly, this summer was cruel as hell, I was like a headless chicken, but this... this is my goal, this is what pushing me forward, to do things I thought I will never do. Nothing is set in stone, and I'll be damned if I give up just like that.

__________________________

Figure 39.1: I guess Swedes does this?

The Eternal Questions: Electric Kettle vs Stove Top Kettle

  This question has been running through my mind for as long as I fantasize having my own apartment. Electric kettle or stove top kettle?

  There are many pros and cons to each of them, unlike rice cooker vs pot (had a brief discussion about this with the Giantess before). Every time I walk by the kitchen section of some lifestyle store, my eyes always glances through all those beautiful shiny stainless steel/copper kettles. The thought of the whistling of a kettle makes me happy, although some may find it annoying (just like how some may find those mechanical keyboards tik-tak noise annoying).

  Aesthetically, the kettle wins this hands down. There is an issue though, I feel like kettles will either be extremely beautiful, or it's gonna stuck out like a sore thumb (depending on the looks of your kitchen too), whereas an electric kettle is very "safe". Pretty much every kitchen has an electric kettle, unless you pick one of those strange looking one with owls and cows, it's gonna look normal no matter how the kettle is.

Figure 38.1: It's red, it lights up blue when its turned on, and it looks fine

  The other thing I have to consider is space. A stove top kettle guarantees that one of your stove will always be occupied, while the electric one guarantees that one of your outlet will always be occupied. Yeah sure you could get those extension cords, but I will try to avoid using them in my future apartment, I feel that using extension cords means that I own too many redundant electronics, I should be able to live with the current amount provided, but that also depends on the layout of the apartment. I hope my future place is generous with it's outlets! Anyway, back to kettles. By being constantly on the stove means that there's more space on the counter, and vice versa. So it also depends on how much I'll be cooking and such. I think that I wouldn't be using all 4 stove top at a time (unless I'm cooking for more than myself). But still, despite all these, an electric kettle still takes up less space overall than the stove top kettle.

  Overall, I guess it really depends on how the kitchen would look like. Lots of counter space? Sure, just get an electric kettle. Not enough counter space? Maybe consider a stove top kettle? Does the kitchen looks super hipster? GET A STOVE TOP KETTLE!

  I could always use a pot, but I use too much hot water for it to be convenient.

Figure 38.2: No no!

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  So I hit a difficulty curve for the Swedish Duolingo. I realised I never really did learn the plural form of words, and am working on that. It's not really a struggle, it's just something new. Before that, it's more of a revision, things I have learnt before and am you know... catching up with it. As for the German Duolingo, I think there's some sort of bug. It's really really easy, and no, I'm not showing off, I mean it because they ask the same questions up to three times in a row, so my German score on Duolingo is pretty inflated.

  Also in Swedish, I'm always confused with mus. Every time I read it out loud (or in my head), I always think that mus = moose. I always chuckle when the question ask me to translate: Musen äter osten. I was like: "Easy! But also, why is a moose eating cheese? Oh Duolingo~", and then I got marked incorrect. I have no problem with älg though, which is the proper word for moose.

  The other small thing that I annoy myself with is that I tend to capitalize the nouns in Swedish because that's what you do in German. Duolingo also drains so much battery o_o, but other than that, my quest to learn is going fine.