And with that one single entry, I’ve booked myself a one-way ticket to eternal crapdoom. The horror!
Well, there goes my reputation…

Goodbye my friend, I shall miss you!

Heh, you guys RULE!
minishorts called it “the BEST APRIL FOOL’S PRANK in blogging history.” Dr Liew called it the “Best April Fool Post 2005”. (Am I starting to sound like that voice we hear in movie trailers all the time?)
At least everyone had a good laugh about it. And that’s good, right? Instead of pulling a prank on some innocent dude, hurting his feelings then blaming him for getting upset on April Fool’s – we’re all here laughing at my hairy legs.
Gee, I never knew the jungle on my legs could bring people together! 🙂 Something to tell my grandchildren about when I grow old.
Silly, silly me!
*Kenny makes a mental note to never turn up to any future Bloggers’ Meet*

Man, that sounded good. Repeat after me, “My bandwidth has EXPLODED.”
It sounded as if I couldn’t control my site’s popularity, and that kennysia.com has become the world’s most visited website next to Google.com, receiving more hits daily than an altar boy’s ass.
I wish I could tell you that my web host can no longer handle the enormity of my testicles, and that they have to purchase extra hardware just to support the weight of my ever expanding balls.
But sadly that’s not true.
(I still have big balls though. :))
The truth is that I’m an idiot.
See, when I started kennysia.com January this year, I looked for the cheapest web host available and purchased it without doing much research. Its only after a while that I discovered that there are better web hosts out there that cost half as much.
Yet at that time, my 25MB storage and 1GB bandwidth for USD$4 a month sounded more than enough for me. After all, the website I did for the company I used to work for (spectraeng.com.au) only used up about 200MB of bandwidth per month.
Part of the reason I started this site is to keep in touch with my mates in Perth. Instead, the people I expected to come, bar a few, didn’t come. (Gee, thanks guys. Such great friends you are!) Instead, I get visitors all the way from Canada to Taiwan, UK to Korea.
Granted, most of these people are just interested with my Reviews. But these people are such suckers. Bandwidth suckers, that is. 🙂

Coincidentally, the more popular entries are the ones that eat a lot of bandwidth. In February, I had to apply for a 2GB bandwidth allowance, thanks to my stupid Jenna Jameson Ringtone. Then just last week I had to upgrade it AGAIN to 3GB.

From the search keyphrase above, you can tell that the most popular entry on kennysia.com is that stupid vibe4u Vibrating Condom Review. All I can say is “What the foot?”. Man, I thought that kennysia.com can be famous for other reasons. Instead I’m known as the #1 search result on Google for ‘vibe4u’. My parents should be so proud.
Well, I’m happy that Koreans and Taiwanese are reading my vibrating condom review. A large number of them even translated that review into their own language with Google’s translator tool. But you know, those things are never reliable. I’m somewhat concerned that some of my words might be lost in translation. Take this sentence for example…

“I can’t believe I paid AUD$12.95 (RM35) for this thing! This is just one condom and some buzzing cock ring we’re talking about!”

In Chinese, that sentence became…

“我不可能相信 I 被支付的AUD$12.95 (RM35) 为这件事! 这是一个 condom 和我们正在谈论的一些个嗡嗡叫的公鸡圆环!”

For those of you who CAN’T read Chinese. Well, that sentence was…

“I can’t believes I AUD$12.95 which pays (RM35) is this matter! This is cockerel ring which one condom and some humming sound calls we’re discusses!”

Yes, a cockerel ring with humming sound calls. Smart translation, Google!
Anyway, a bloke named Jerry Ha left a comment for me.

“Wow…I didn’t know that you live in Malysia.
I was impressed by your review of Vibe condom
and I introduced this site to my friends.
Hope you make more review about interesting stuff
such like condoms. :)”

Gee, thanks Jerry. Ask someone with a non-existent sex life to do more reviews on condoms. Just rub it in, Jerry, RUB IT IN. What do you want me to review next? PREGNANCY STRIPS?
Pleae parden Jerry’s commang of Engllissh, he are Korean so his grandma is nod vely goot.
Seriously though, thank you Jerry, sincerely. I’m glad that you enjoyed reading my reviews as much as I enjoyed writing them. Its too bad I can’t find any new wacky things here in Kuching that make me go “Whoa! That’s unsual!” However, if anyone overseas do find something unusual that you think I might like, feel free to pop me an e-mail. As long as it costs less than RM100 after shipping, I’d consider buying it! 🙂 Thanks in advance.
Oh, if you’re reading this far, sorry I wasted your time. Haha! You’re probably expecting the usual laughs and tickles. I should’ve warned you this is going to be a boring site-related entry from the start. I promise a proper update tomorrow.
Speaking of that, I think as kennysia.com’s readership grow, other people’s expectations of my blog grows as well. Kim (long-time friend, short-time blogging buddy, all-time pest) once said to me that she felt that I’ve changed, that nowadays I seem to be more concerned about making people laugh. She has a point. Ever since the unexpected popularity of my entry on Annoying Friendster Trends, I’ve been feeding off people’s comments and trying to insert humour in each of my entry. So much so that people expect my entries to make them laugh.
In some ways, I don’t mind that. I like to make people laugh. Yet, sometimes I’m just not in the mood. Sometimes I’m just upset at the way things are going in my life. How weak my father is. How much I hate people forcing (yes, FORCING) their religion onto us. People who promise us miracles, like 932 other religions out there. People who waltz in, promote their God like an Amway salesman and go on and on and on and on about how good their religion is without so much as asking a simple “How’s your dad doing?” throughout the whole conversation, and then they get all furious and shit when we said that we are just not interested. God dammit, get the hint! WE-ARE-NOT-INTERESTED in your religion!

Oh what have you done? My dad has gone hiding in his luggage bag thanks to all these religious promoters!

Anyway my point is, please don’t treat kennysia.com like jokes.com. Please don’t expect jokes everyday because this is, after all, my personal online diary. Just like everyone else, I go through a wide range of emotions every different day. I may joke, I may not – one thing for sure, everytime you read this space, you’re getting the real and truthful me. And I’ll appreciate that.
Riggghhhttttt, proper updates tomorrow!
Update : Since posting this entry up, there are reports of another major earthquake near Sumatra. No, I swear this one isn’t caused by my testicles.
Seriously though, I hope that a repeat of last year’s tragedy does not occur and that casualties be kept as close to zero as possible. Please pray.
Another charity concert, anyone?

Yes, I’m back from Singapore and there’s lots of write about. Since its a long entry, I’ll split it into two separate entries.
I was in Singapore for the past two days, not for holidays, but I had to bring my parents there for, shall we say, religious reasons.

The distinct difference in the landscape between Kuching and Singapore.

I like Singapore. I know I’ve mildly bashed those Singaporeans before, but the matter of fact is that I actually like Singapore. Kuching is my hometown and I would return here eventually. But if I were given a choice between Kuching, Perth, KL and Singapore where to live, work and play for the next ten years I’d most likely choose Singapore.
The island nation is clean, safe and most importantly there are decent gyms around. With the Singaporean people, I find that I share their sense of humour and I like how we are so in-tuned with many of our thinkings. Shit, sometimes I even find myself reading Singaporean newspapers and FHM Singapore instead of ours. But seriously, in my opinion, there’s no other place on Earth that is as livable, fun and as culturally-similar to Kuching as the city-state itself. And I love it.
That being said, I won’t stop myself from bashing it if I had the chance. Heh.

One of the cab drivers I had a great conversation with about… you guessed it – politics!

Upon arrival at Changi Airport, we hailed a cab to get to our hotel. Singaporean cab drivers are naturally chatty and I’ve had great conversations with almost all the cab drivers we’ve met. Most of the time we talked about Singaporean politics and bitched about the government. Come to think about it, a lot of these cab drivers are quite disgruntled about the ruling People’s Action Party. They whined about how bureaucratic the government is and bashed them relentlessly, while I just sit back and enjoy the show.

Cab drivers in Singapore – the looming threat to the stability of the Singaporean government.

I have no idea why these cab drivers are so unhappy, but I reckon if all the Singaporean taxi drivers get together and form a political party they’re gonna have a pretty good chance of winning the elections.

People’s Action Party Vs Taxi Drivers Party – Will we ever see this? Maybe. Just maybe! 🙂

We stayed at the Royal Plaza Hotel on Scotts, which is a five star hotel right smack in the middle of the Orchard area. Now, before you all go “Yalah yalah. See this stupid Kenny act all rich and mighty lah! Show off lah! Like I care. I know for a fact that his balls are small like rambutans.”, lets just say that I paid SGD$130 (RM300) for a room that’s normally SGD$350 (RM820) thanks to Wotif.com. They specialise in last minute hotel bookings and they usually have pretty good deals there, so I totally recommend travellers/backpackers to check them out as sometimes its worth paying that extra few dollars for a five star treatment.

Stunning interior design and decor at the Royal Plaza On Scotts.

As expected for a five-star hotel, the hall entrance of the hotel is nothing short of magnificence. The two staircases on either side of the hall and the classic decor somewhat reminded me of the fighting scene in The Matrix Reloaded. I suddenly have the impulse to fly from one stair case to the other, fighting off all the baddies. Its too bad I didn’t even come close to looking like Keanu Reeves.
I look WAY better.

My favourite shopping complex in the whole island of Singapore – Wisma Atria.

I like the fact that the hotel is situated within the Orchard Road precinct. I didn’t spend much time strolling shopping malls whilst I was in Singapore, but my hotel is only a short walk to Wisma Atria. The reason I like Wisma Atria so much is because of Topshop. Its not because of the clothes they sell there since they’re just overpriced pieces of junk. I love it because they provide FREE INTERNET ACCESS!
So I hopped into the shop like a giddy little boy, fired up their Internet Explorer (pfft!) and logged on to kennysia.com. And this is what I got.

What kennysia.com looks like at Topshop in Wisma Atria

Stupid Topshop. How dare you mock me with that When Routine Isn’t Exactly Normal error message?!
Bloody. Anyway, lets get back to talking about nicer things, like the hotel.

Royal Plaza Hotel, where the Deluxe Room actually meant an ordinary room for you poor fucks fooled into thinking that this is a five star hotel.

We stayed in a Deluxe Room. Apparently, there’s no ‘Standard Room’ because their standard room is already a ‘Deluxe Room’. Actually the term ‘Deluxe Room’ is a misleading since the adjective Deluxe has connotations of grandeur and luxury. I had my hopes up, expecting fruit baskets and chandeliers and maybe a stripper on standby. But alas, our room is not much different compared to the average Holiday Inn. At least ours came with a pathetic little mini-bar.

The most pathetic mini-bar in a hotel room ever. Only one can of beer? wtf?

The King-size bed is good for two people, and there’s three of us. So I slept on the bed whilst both my parents slept on the floor.
Sorry.
Obviously, my elderly parents slept on the bed. I can order an extra bed for myself if I wanted, but that would set me back an extra SGD$66 (RM90) and I’m kinda tight-arsed about it. Besides, its just one night. So I figured what the heck – I’ll just sleep on the chairs.

Here’s my own five star treatment. Now imagine a full-grown man like me lying on it, with my legs spread-eagled across the armrests. I never felt more like a pregnant woman giving birth.

One hour lying on my makeshift bed and I’m already regretting. 🙁 My back was arching worse than a contortionist and my neck felt like it has detached from the rest of my body. Suddenly the SGD$66 seems like a very very small amount. We were staying at a hotel, but to me it felt more like staying at a refugee camp, except we had air-conditioning.
I contemplated sleeping in the bathtub but the cold ceramic didn’t appeal. Besides, my parents might need to use the toilet halfway through the night and the aroma they leave behind would be too uplifting for me to handle. I decided that sleeping on the floor is probably a better option, so I laid the pillow down on the carpet and slept on it for most of the night.
I woke up with aches in body parts I never knew I have.
Talk about stupid things you would do just to save a few bucks at a hotel. But I guess we all do it at some stage: sleeping on chairs, sleeping on floors, bringing down the mattresses to create more beds and coaxing the girls to share one bed hoping to see some hot lesbian showcase in the process. All part of the Malaysian way of sharing a hotel room, eh?

Oooh! I’ve got presents from TNT Worldwide Express. Must be the items I’ve couriered to myself from Perth! 🙂

Say hello to my Helwett-Packard 3-in-1 Printer/Scanner/Copier. Its the best thing invented since sliced bread!

Oh… 🙁

Re-edited from draft.

I just sold my computer monitor. And here I am sitting in a cyber cafe opposite my place. Not exactly where I expected myself to be at 2 days before I’m supposed to leave Perth for good.

From my desk at Spectra Engineering

Yesterday was my last day working for Spectra. I finalised my projects, handed my works over to my colleagues (sort of) and after work, we had a mini farewell party. Bill suggested that the reason they are celebrating is because I’m leaving. 🙂

Seems like only yesterday that I stepped foot into the company. I was a fresh graduate who only just entered the workforce. Spectra is a very small company as there are only say 20 people working there, about 10 of whom are engineers. There’s a culturally diverse mix of people from Taiwan and Vietnam to South Africa and Switzerland. Yet despite their small workforce, everyone there is extremely good with what they do.

Steve Robinson (in his goofy self) and ‘DJ’ Steve Edwards

The people at Spectra are a colourful bunch. Whilst in the morning they are people hard at work trying to make a living, when they go home, they changed into different character like toys out of the Transformers cartoon. Gary and Hieu would don on their fishing gear and go deep sea fishing. Alan would sing at gigs in various pubs. Steve E (Edwards) become DJ Stephen Tranz0r at The Rise Nightclub. Despite the silly DJ moniker, he’s definitely one of the best trance DJs in Perth, and I believe its only a matter of time before he makes it big locally and internationally. I was known as the healthy one. In a place where people read geeky engineering newsletter and Ralph magazines, I brought copies of Men’s Health magazines to work. There was a period of time when I was crazy about my diet. I would eat plenty canned tuna and smoked salmon, and I lost a lot of weight. In turn, I accidentally inspired many people at work, including my boss, to start eating healthily. 🙂

Chistmas dinner with the bunch on the cruise

Working in Australia is very different to my past experiences working in Malaysia. Malaysian companies usually obey a strict hierarchy system where the boss is always feared and respected and the staff should do whatever the boss requests without question. The working environment in Australia on the other hand is very casual. People wear jeans to work, sometimes even shorts if they wanted to. There’s no such barrier of respect between the staff and the bosses – everyone is a friend of everyone, and you don’t have to treat your superiors like some army officer. People still respect each other, but these are also people that you can sit down at the end of the day, play some darts and have a nice cold beer.

My farewell gift is… a pack of SMOKED SALMON?!

Anyway, the bunch gave me a nice collage of photos as a farewell gift. They also gave me a pack of smoked salmon, which is an obvious rib at me. Later that evening, we retreated to one of our workmates Simone’s place. Nicole joined us and Julie offered to pay for the A$40 taxi ride. When I was about to leave, there were handshakes, there were hugs, and for Julie – there were tears. It sure was damn difficult to leave such a close knit group.

Well, these past few days has been really hectic with all the packing that’s going on. I am overwhelmed not just by all the tasks at hand, but also by the multitude of emotions I felt because I am leaving this place for good. I wished I can just calm down and blog nicely for once – but probably not today. My flight is at 7:50am on Monday, so I shouldn’t really be here in the first place!

Thus, I shall put kennysia.com on hold. I’ll be back by Tuesday.

“i see ur bro is shacking up with a girl……….LOL
ur mum sure interrogated her more than the KGB eh”

That’s what a friend of my brother said to him in reference to this entry. And with that, the EBCB (Elder Brother Censorship Board) kicked into action.
Getting into debates on the stuff I wrote on kennysia.com is starting to become frequent enough for me to perhaps start a new category to archive it.
In this case, someone thought it was funny to pointed out that Nicole lived with me for a period of time while she’s studying in Perth. Funny enough for him to talk about it and laugh about it. He didn’t want to bring it up to me personally. He had to say my brother that he knew I’m living with Nicole and laugh at me. He made it like its some big news, like Prince Charles marrying Camilla.

Dear Whoever It Is Who Knows Me In Real Life That Reads This Blog And Judged Me For What I Did.
I knew that its bound to happen when I made a conscious decision to start this site.
Many people only saw the serious side of me in real life. Therefore, what I wrote on this site is rather different to what I am in real life.
I’m happy to have people know the light-hearted side of me, know a bit about my life from my Reflections posts and laugh with me at the things I find funny. Everything I write here is harmless fun, and (hopefully) no one gets hurt.
I expect people who read this site to accept me for who I am. I also knew that when I put a slice of my personal life up in public, no matter what, a small minority of people will be too anal and judge me for the decisions that I make in my life.
But you know what? I’m ok with that. Seriously, I’m perfectly ok with that. I am an adult. Many people have opinions about me, both positive and negative. I am ok with being judged, I am ok with taking both constructive and destructive criticisms, and I am perfectly ok if you deemed that my idea of a lifestyle does not conform to yours. But bear in my mind, my friend – if you want to judge me, you’d better take my criticism as an adult as well.
Yes, Nicole lived with me for a while. Big deal. No, we did not share the same bedroom. In case you didn’t know, its relatively common for unmarried couples to flat together for costs and convenience reasons when studying overseas. If you think that its not normal, then my friend, obviously you’re still living in 1840’s China.
I am man enough to admit what I did in a public domain. I’m not like you. You go behind my back and make small talks to other people like what I did is shameful and disgraceful. Newsflash – the comment box at the end of every entry and the tagboard to the right of this site is there for you to tell me what you think about me. Love me or hate me, have the balls to say it to me. There’s no need to hide away from me, laugh at it and make members of my family uneasy. I regard what you did a cowardly behaviour.
I am not ashamed of what I did – not a single bit. My family is not ashamed of what I did – they knew Nicole lived with me. So who the hell are you to try to embarass me?
You brought it up as if it is all such a big deal, making members of my family your laughing stock. You crossed the line and that’s when I regard you as trying to meddle with my personal life.
Have you been leading a perfect life yourself? I doubt it. I know you are a friend of my elder brother, so I’ll be respectful to you. Because otherwise I’m actually just going to tell you to take your idealogies, and shove it up your ass. Obviously, MBABTY.

If you disagree with my lifestyle, don’t come to this site.
Stay the fuck away from me.

In Australia, the radio stations run something called the Freq Club. The idea is that you listen to the radio station where they will reveal to you codewords throughout the day. You submit those codewords online to earn Freq Points. These can then be accumulated to be exchanged for prizes, or be used to go into lucky draws to win something major like holidays, backstage passes to concerts, or autographed memorabilia.
I have been faithfully listening to 92.9FM and entering all the codewords since I started working. But since I am leaving Perth soon, I figured its probably best to spend all my accumulated Freq Points on the major prize draws.

There were two lucky draws available at the time. One was an all-expense paid trip to the $1 Million Coca-Cola Summer Beach Party in Sydney. The other one was tickets to the Big Day Out concert in Perth.
For the benefit of those not in Australia or New Zealand, the Big Day Out is a once-a-year rock music festival that tours around the Aust/NZ region. The event is huge enough to attract many local and international rock artists such as Limp Bizkit, Slipknot, Black Eyed Peas, Red Hot Chilli Peppers, etc to perform. Naturally, every event is sold out almost every time to thousands and thousands of enthusiastic rock fans.

I’m not the biggest rock fan here. I’ll be honest and say that I prefer mainstream music and jazz. So the choice was easy, I’ll spent all my points on the Coca-Cola Beach Party, then eBay off the prize if I win.
Now, normally if I finished my work for the day earlier, I would ‘snake’ (Hokkien for ‘slack’) at work by opening my browser windows really really small whilst the Visual Basic programming window is maximised. 😉

Just so happens that day was the one of the days when I finished work early. I wanted to enter myself in to the Beach Party draw. But with the browser window so small, I must have clicked the wrong links and accidentally spent all my points on the draw for the Big Day Out tickets instead.
I shrugged it off, thinking that it shouldn’t be such a big deal since I can still sell the Big Day Out tickets easily if I win. These tickets normally cost about AUD$100 each and there’s always a high demand for it. I wasn’t too worried.
Well, a few days ago I received an email from 92.9FM, asking me to drop by the station because I’ve won a prize! So I drove down the the station in Subiaco the next morning. The receptionist greeted me, I passed her a copy of my email as she smiled sweetly at me.
“Congratulations, you’ve won tickets to the Big Gay Out!”.
“Thanks… uhh… did you just say Big Gay Out?”

She was correct. Apparently the real Big Day Out was over two weeks ago! The Big Gay Out is an offshoot of the actual event celebrated in a pub by… you guessed it, gays.
Yes, instead of listening to rock bands the calibre of Limp Bizkit, I shall be listening to pop princess Vanessa Amorosi, whose “hits” (note deliberate quotes) include songs such as Absolutely Everybody and Shine.

I have four tickets to this event. Each ticket costs AUD$15 so I won’t even bother selling it. I guess I’ll probably just go in and have a look. I’ve never been to a gay bar before, so its probably time for me to expand my horizons (and hopefully not expand my arsehole in the process. Hehe)
I shall write an entry on it some time next week. Wish me luck, gays! Err… guys!

14th February. Valentine’s Day. Its a day of love, happiness and celebration for florists and restauranteurs.
Oh, and lovers too!
I know some people look forward to this day. Single guys and girls would scoff at the celebration, saying that its all commercialised and stuff. Others would rather just stay at home and drink themselves crazy. I’m actually one of the latter, despite having a girlfriend. For the 4 years that I have been dating Nicole, we are always in different locations on Valentine’s Day every year.

A friend of mine once said, that Valentine’s Day shouldn’t be just a celebration of love between a husband and wife, boyfriend and girlfriend (or boyfriend and boyfriend, girlfriend and girlfriend…). It is a celebration of love, and we all have loved ones – our families, friends, workmates, pets and even our soft toys. It can even be our celebration for someone else’s love. I couldn’t agree more.
Which is why I am dedicating this mushy entry to David and Geraldine. Those who suffer from the incurable disease called mushiphobia may turn away now. *cough*Alli*cough*
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

A few weeks ago, I opened my mailbox and received this. It came in a pink envelope.

David and Geraldine would be honoured to have you witnessing their Registration of Marriage… before proceeding straightafter to a Coffee and Cake Session as a sign of their heartfelt appreciation for your presence.

Dresscode: Be as PINK as you can.

When I was young, I used to receive invitations to birthday parties. Now I am receiving invitations to registration of marriages. Signs of how old I have become. *sigh*
Dine and Bid (as I like to call them) are from Kuching, and both recently graduated from Curtin University. Geraldine L is 27, and holds a Master’s Degree in Project Management. David N is 28 years old. Before coming to Perth, he used to work as a Malaysian Airlines flight attendant, which makes me snicker everytime I visualise him do that safety-instructions-thing they do on the plane.

I used to think that good-looking guys who can cook really nice food are either jerks or gays, unless their first name is Kenny. David is an exception to this rule. I know because I have broken too many diet plans after they invited us to their house for laksa, curry, ice cream, etc. You would think that David is your typical metrosexual, but I know he can’t resist a bottle of ice cold beer. The truth is, he can be a total gentleman to Dine, yet still be able to hang out with his mates and not bitch about women.
On the other hand, Ah Dine plays the role of big sister to everybody. She’s someone I can totally rely on if I ask for an opinion. Usually when we share our difficulties in love to people, many jump and offer us a listening ear enthusiastically. Unfortunately, most just wanted to hear gossip. With Dine, I know I have someone who genuinely cares for me, listens to me and advises me. After all, she’s the first to help me out when she knew my father’s situation.

During a time when girls were falling for jerks, guys were falling for girls who are attached and couples were complaining about each other, David and Geraldine are having the time of their lives. Although their part time jobs at the restaurant does not pay much, they are perfectly content with what they have, and that’s each other. After 7 years of dating, they still look like they have been dating for 2 weeks – everything they do is together. They even invited Nicole and I to do salsa with them, which is nice, but I decided that salsa is something you eat, not a latin dance only people with disjointed hips can do.
I have always admired couples like Dine and David. They are what I refer to as the perfect couple. Most people would protest, saying that there’s no such thing as a perfect couple. Some would even say loving couples like them make them sick, thanks to too many episodes of romance-hating Sex and the City.
Deep down inside however, I’m sure we are all wanting to be one half of a perfect couple. Getting a partner is one thing. Making it work, to be able to compromise with each other, to be able to give up some degree of personal freedom, to be able to do everything together yet still be able keep ‘the flame’ burning… that’s a whole new different ball game. In the end, everybody just want to be eternally happy with someone they love. And I’m glad they found each other.

The clock struck 12 midnight.
I was still at home alone. I had only just finished publishing my previous entry when I received CNY greetings via SMS from Adrian Wong and Geraldine. I was waiting for my parents and brother to arrive Perth Perth International Airport. My family decided to come to Perth partly because my father wanted to escape from the multitude of CNY visits. He appreciates friends’ and family’s concerns, but he needs his rest more than anything else at the moment.

Kim logged onto MSN Messenger. I told her that this is the first CNY that I’ll actually give angpow to my parents. Kim was confused, since she thought that its only after we are married that we would have to give angpow to our parents. I’m not too sure myself – my mother had told me that its the tradition to give angpow to our parents once we started working full-time.
Then it hit me. My mother is trying to to con an angpow out of me!!!
I picked the three of them up from the airport around 1:15am. My father has indeed lost more weight – the full cheek and rounded chin are replaced by skinny sinking cheeks. When at home alone, sometimes he would stare into blank space. I am not sure if he is waiting for people to talk to him, if he wanted something to read, or if he just wanted to be alone.

When I asked him what’s wrong, he said that its a combination of him feeling fatigued after the long plane ride, as well as the reaction from the cocktail of pills he has to take everyday. Its hard to describe how I feel everytime I see my father suffering. But if you can visualise my beating heart being twisted and wringed dry like a wet towel, then you’re pretty close to imagining how I feel.

My father and I spoke until about 2:30am. When my parents were about to go to bed, I went to their bedroom and presented my angpows to each of them. I gave them A$395 each, which isn’t much compared to what they had given me all these while and what they have prepared for me in the future. I had wanted to give them A$400, but the number ‘4’ is considered bad luck in Chinese – which is why I gave them A$395 instead in red and pink notes. The smile and satisfaction on my father’s face upon receiving the angpow lit up my heart. “Lau liaw loh! (I’m old already!)” my father said with a chuckle.
This morning I woke up to find my father sitting in the living room alone, my brother still sleeping and my mother cleaning the house – ignoring all Chinese superstitions. No one is in CNY mood! I changed into my red shirt to add a slight hint of CNY flavour for the day, bought the morning newspaper for my father to read, and went off to work just like any other day.

There were no hyperactive little cousins visiting. No noisy Chinese New Year “stars” (note quotation marks) shouting with their incredibly high pitched voices, with their two hands glued together in a “gong xi” pose… “stars” who happen to be unfortunate enough to have pathetic names like “Lung Piao Piao”. We didn’t even play any of those Vengaboys-remixed Chinese New Year songs or another over-synthesised number by the Thai group “China Dolls”.
We had a nice and peaceful delayed reunion dinner with the entire family member present. And that’s the way we like it.
So, how was your Chinese New Year?