Ambiguity screaming to be defined.

Seems that Bil was still raving on to Martin at work day on day about how the wife in my fictional story so closely resembled his Yellow Goddess (yeah...one does not always need to go online to hear things from the grapevine). When Martin came home from work on Tuesday, he asked: "Hey, you might be happy to know who's still reading your blog!" "Who? Yellow Goddess :o)?" I asked.

I guess it's nice to know that she can't get enough of me... . I don't blame her though, because I do somehow seem to have that mesmerising effect on her, which can only be a good thing, right :o)?

Anyway, after hearing the good news that she's still my number 1 fan reader (sorry that I keep calling her my "fan". It's just that "fan" is from the word "fanatic", and "fanatic means "marked by excessive enthusiasm and often intense uncritical devotion", so it's really easy for me to keep accidentally using this term), I penned out this post.

The next day, Bil was still raving on and on to Martin about my post at their work place (was it really such a good post?). "There were no names mentioned in the post," said Martin. "Yeah, but EVERYONE can guess who the characters are!" said Bil.

Why, oh why do they keep thinking that they are famous celebraties on planet Earth? So far, up till this point at least, only they themselves saw any resemblance to themselves, plus maybe a couple of others who could take a wild guess but still not really know.

But ok, since they made such a big "Everybody on planet Earth is going to know it's Yellow Goddess and me" fuss "because we're so bloody famous", I've added this to that post:

Fiction disclaimer
(because such a story as above is of course too absurd to happen in real life):

The characters featured in this Post are completely fictional. Any resemblance to any person living or dead is purely coincidental. No similarity to any person either living or dead should be inferred.

So take note, my dear readers: even if you most likely didn't make any connections of the couple in the said post to Yellow Goddess or Bil to begin with, please know that they DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT refer to either of them. However, if you now want to think that it was really them, then that's your prerogative and I can't stop you.

Speaking of which (and coincidentally enough), I had an sms from dear Alice yesterday (while I was having dinner with Shi Hua and 2 other former colleagues) as follows:

"(con't)...call you but no answer. Have a good night. Hugs"

Which...hmm....proves my point that the characters in that post were very ambiguous to the majority of my faithful readers?

Anyway, if any of you want to claim the "honour" of being the said persons in that fictional post, please send me a short description of why you think they are you. Better still, if you can provide some proof (photos, airline tickets, shopping receipts, eye witness accounts that you really ditched your husband at dinner time to shop or hang out with your male friend privately in your hotel room while your husband sat alone and upset that you were not there with him instead...etc). Serious applications only, please!

As for beefsoup69/inthefaceofearth/inthemistofdk/Spanky, oh, let's just quit the BS and call my pet troll by her real pseudonym, "Yellow Goddess", shall we? I mean, it's not easy for me to keep track of all her mulitple split online personalities as it is, so let's just K.I.S.S.

Anyway, as I was saying, knowing now that Yellow Goddess was really my personal pet troll all this while who comes to my blog almost every day...sometimes even a couple of times a day, I guess I should feel very touched and honoured by her obession :o).

However, I'm a little concerned though :o(. Knowing now that she spends all day watching out for new posts from me, itching her fingers to comment (but can't anymore), probably hoping that I read her blog; the one that I couldn't care less about (yeah, I admit - I hate vomit and tend not to return to it - I'm no tding tding dong dong doggy fool), making extra effort to create split online personalities, and *gasp* even PRETENDING online to be me sometimes (obvious symptom of obession...but again, I don't blame her because the closest she can come to be me is to be me online, no matter how hard she tries), I just wonder...who is taking care of her little bao bei? One thing is to be obssessed about me and my blog, another thing is to be obssessed about me and my blog while neglecting little bao bei. I'm honoured, but as little bao bei's aunt, I'm also rather concerned :-/.

Oh well...whatever makes her happy, I guess. Friends, foes, fans, trolls - all are welcome here :o).

Snoop dog keeps coming back for more.

It is quite amazing how, even though no names were mentioned (real or otherwise), one of my very faithful fans reader wanted to somehow identify herself with the character in this post. I could be refering to anyone, or I could be refering to no one in particular, or it could just be one of my very vivid imaginations for storytelling, yet this fan reader seemed to feel that she relates so directly to it.

I was merely sharing an absurd story, as I would any other absurd stories under the sun. Nothing personal, unless you make it so. In which case, it won't be my problem to deal with. I'll keep writing what I want to write about, and if you think that what I write is like vomit to you, then hey - stop being like a dog who keeps returning to this vomit unless deep down inside you actually do like what I write about (and I don't blame you) but are just too afraid to admit it.

So yeah...I don't know...go play 'fetch the Gucci bag' or something if that upsets you less. I'll leave you now with a very wise quote from an old schoolmate:

"Splurging on experiences makes you an interesting person with stories to tell; splurging on things makes you bland, with only...well, things to show off."

Happy 牛 Year!!!

To all my Chinese friends, 新年快乐!

This year will be the year of the cow/ox (牛/niu) - the 2nd animal in the Chinese calendar. If you were born in 1973 and 1985, then you're an ox.

Legend has it that the ox was actually supposed to be the 1st animal who responded to Buddha's call. However, the rat had asked it for a ride, and when they approached Buddha, the rat jumped off the back of the ox and hence, became the 1st animal to reach Buddha's feet.

It is also said that the rat had lied to the cat about the actual calling day, and that is why the cat didn't make it in time to Buddha to have a year named after it. Because of this, up till today, the cat is always chasing the rat. This rat seems to be a very mischievious animal, huh ;o)?

Anyway, here are some superstitions that one must NOT do on the 1st day of the new year:

• Avoid housework (I had cleaned the apartment a couple of days ago after too long).
  It is believed that you will "sweep the good luck away" if you do housework on the 1st day.


• Avoid washing hair
  Same reason as avoiding housework.


• No splashing of water out the house
  Water symbolises money, so you don't want to throw "money" out the house.


• No handling of sharp objects
  They represent conflicts or arguments...so not a good start of a new year.


• No nail clipping or hair cutting
  As hairs and nails are inherited from parents and the cutting of hair or nail during the first few days may shorten the parents life or cause ill-health.


• No anger or sour faces
  Be happy to ensure good fortune throughout the rest of the year. If you're a child/teenager, I guess you can get away with a lot of things on this day because your parents should not get angry at you ;o).


• No negative words
  Arguments must be avoided at all costs. Also words related to death and sickness.


• Avoid breaking anything
  Otherwise bad luck ahead will be inevitable.


• Avoid wearing black and/or white clothes
  These colours are associated with death. Red on the other hand, is most welcome as it represents luck.

These are just some of the superstitions surrounding Chinese New Year. There are also the superstitions about what food to eat on the eve of Chinese New Year when the family gathers together for the reunion dinner. Things like, prawns for happiness because prawns in Cantonese (I think) is pronounced "ha", so it sounds like laughter, eggs because they are round so good luck all year round. Noodles for longevity (and hence, they should not be cut). Fish, because the word for fish, "Yu," sounds like the words both for wish and abundance.

And of course, tangerines and oranges are passed out freely during Chinese New Year (in pairs) as the words for tangerine and orange sound like luck and wealth, respectively. The Chinese are very particular about giving things out in pairs as they represent togetherness, and "double" (eg. double happiness).

Married people also give out money in red packets with gold letterings to single people (usually to children/teenagers only, but some do give it also to single adults). It is believed that the more money you give out, the more you will usher in during the year ahead...so despite how generous it appears to be, there is a selfish intention. But traditions are traditions... .

Red packets

Anyway, there are so many other traditions during this festive period, and it also varies from region to region. The above are just some of the more commonly practiced beliefs.

I think what I'll be missing the most about not being able to celebrate Chinese New Year in Singapore is all the new year food goodies :o(. If any of my Singapore friends reading my blog is reading this, please be merciful and send me some pineapple tarts, ok ;o)?

"Straight from the mouth"

I hope Allegra realised at some point that we were kidding about Copenhagen and Sweden... .

Being an organ donor

Have you guys ever considered being an organ donor? Those who aren't one yet, that is. To be honest, although I wasn't totally against it, I had never wanted to be one myself. Martin on the other hand, was all for it, and it was almost as if it was his dream to be one... .

A few days ago, we received new social security cards from the commune because our previous doctor had passed away, so we needed a new doctor assigned to us. For those who do not live in Denmark, our doctor's name is shown on our social security cards, that's why a new one has to be sent when we change doctors.

Anyway, together with our new cards, there was also an organ donor card in the envelope. I didn't see it, but a couple of days later, I saw that Martin had filled it out for himself, giving permission to be cut up and have his organs taken away and re-used.

"You wanna be cut up and all that when you die?!?!" I asked him.
"Yeah, why not? I don't care when I'm dead anyway," he said
"But, but..."

Yeah, "But what" Sheila??? It's one thing to be cut up while still alive, and another to be cut up when dead, right? So why not??? If it means saving someone else's life? If we can't do this while still alive, at least do it when we're dead. So what was stopping ME?

Many irrational reasons, really.

Ethics? But there's nothing unethical about this.
Respect for my body when I'm dead? Why would I care about respect when I'm dead?
Going to heaven in 1 piece? But we'll get brand new bodies in heaven anyway, so why would I want the old, imperfect organs with me?
Leaving earth the way we came on it? Erhm...because why?

There are absolutely NO LOGICAL REASONS *not* to be an organ donor!!! None. Nada.

Martin then asked me this:

In case of emergencies, Would it be fair then to say that EVERY adult who are NOT registered donors either 1) doesn't get entitled to any organs themselves, or 2) gets put way down on the priority list?

My quick answer was of course "Yes, that's fair!" Like...DUH! Stupid question! And then right after answering it, my brain gave me the image of ME on that operating table and me NEEDING an organ to survive. If I'm not a donor myself, why SHOULD I be given one? It'll be very egoistic to expect an organ from someone else when I don't want to give my own away, no?

So yeah...that kinda nailed it hard for me. All my illogical reasons just vanished into thin air in a split second. Of course, the government has not come up with such a condition (yet?), but...I don't know...I guess when I face that life or death situation, I will FEEL better in receiving an organ knowing that I'll also give mine away in death. I will feel more human when the time comes for me to help other humans in such a way when I can.

After all, physically when we die, if we don't get cremated, we'll for sure be buried and DECOMPOSED anyway. But if my healthy organs can be used to SAVE someone else, then in some physical way, not only will they continue to live, but I will also still live on... . My heart will still be beating away... . That's kinda surreal, isn't it?

Anyway, it's a very personal decision... . Well, not 100% personal, since you can also let your next of kin decide for you to some extent when you die...but personal while you're still alive.

Some people say "YES!" without any hesitation whatsoever, most are in the middle saying "I don't know yet," and I believe only a few are those who say "NO WAY!" without any hesitation. I think it's good to at least be in the middle, rather than on the extreme "no" end. Shows you still have a heart to give to mankind...when you finally decide to do so. If in the end, you decide not to, just the fact that you had at least considered wouldn't make you totally heartless.

But yeah, when you're ready to make that step, then you'll have a peace in your heart when you fill out the form... . I registered online a couple of days ago, and will get a letter confirming my decision within 3 weeks. I'm just glad I won't be alive to feel anything when the time comes to cut me up. Easier to commit to it in this way, as I doubt I'll volunteer to donate a bone marrow or a kidney to strangers while I'm still alive... .

For those of you who are still considering, take your time to think. When you feel the peace in your heart upon reaching your decision, whether it's a yes or a no, that would be the right answer for YOU. It is after all, your body to do with as you please.

And to those in Denmark, if you want to register to be an organ donor, you can do so on the Sundhed website. Trust me - it takes less than 1 minute to do it! You can also change your mind later on too, so it's not binding...unless you die before you change your mind, of course.

If you already have a donor card in your wallet, I would recommend to register online anyway because even though the signed card in your wallet is valid enough, what if you were robbed of your wallet with your card in it, and stabbed to death? No record then of your wish to be an organ donor.


As an end note, I may be wrong, but I think that it should be WAY easier for people who are already parents to make the decision to be organ donors. I mean, they are the ones who should be able to understand the giving of life better than anyone else since they MADE life, and they are the ones who should know what giving and sacrifice is really about. Right?

Btw, try to watch Seven Pounds starring Will Smith in some relation to this topic.

Not a very Posh model in Versace.

Looking at the photos below:

1) These models REALLY need to put some meat to their bones... . (click pic!)
2) Notice the funky shoes??? Not my style, but nevertheless, they're different.
3) The "dress" is by Versace. I don't get why branded clothes cost so much when they design garbs like that. Even if I were as rich as say...Victoria Beckham/Posh Spice, I will *not* waste my money on this crap of a dress.

Oops... . But ok, it at least looks a little better on Posh Spice than it does on that sickly looking model.

Can't eat, must shop.

Okay...let's say your husband's company throws a belated New Year's party in London, whereby staff are invited as well as partners of staff. They'll pay the air ticket, dinner, drinks and hotel stay for staff, and will do the same for partners except the air ticket.

Now, knowing that your husband's company is being the host, and knowing full well that they're paying for your dinner as part of the programme of the evening, what would a normal person do?

1. Be there for the dinner by your husband's side or
2. Decide to go shopping instead and skip the whole dinner event, while having your husband show up alone (even though you are on an extended weekend trip with the possibility to shop on another day).

I am willing to place my bet that a normal person will do option 1.

However, as I've found out today, there are...sadly enough, people who are materialistic enough to actually do option 2! Seriously...not only does it show what kind of a person you are, it also causes your husband to "lose face" in front of his bosses and colleagues when they see that the wife gives no respect to the company as the host.

Anyway...I guess this just shows me that being 30 and a mother does not necessarily make you a matured adult who can get obvious priorities right. One can only hope that during an emergency event when one has to decide whether ones son or ones Gucci bag should be saved, the human being will be the one chosen.

Fiction disclaimer

(because such a story as above is of course too absurd to happen in real life):

The characters featured in this Post are completely fictional. Any resemblance to any person living or dead is purely coincidental. No similarity to any person either living or dead should be inferred.

Flugten (The Escape)

People in Denmark - please go and watch the new Danish movie "Flugten" that premieres today!!! Not only does it have a really good storyline, but my dear friend, Wagma, has some parts in it too!!! If I remember correctly, she plays the wife of the leading Afghanistan young man.

More information and trailer: here!

I can't wait to watch it myself...and put all my Danish understanding to the test :o). Well, there are some parts in the movie that have English dialogues too, so that's good.

Go watch!

Restaurant Bali

There was a shootout at Restaurant Bali on Monday (the 5th) at around 19:00hrs at Kongens Nytorv. It was reported that 2 Asian men were injured, one of which was the owner. The gunman himself was Asian. We already had the news turned on at this time, so the incident was "breaking news" when it happened.

However, it was only yesterday that I found out that the 2 injured Asian men were Singaporeans! A friend from Singapore wrote on my Facebook wall with this link, asking if I heard about it. It apparently made it to the news in Singapore...of course. Pretty far out, huh?

There has been rumours that there are illegal activities going on in the restaurant, so let's see if the police manages to find out if this shootout was mob-related. Not sure if you guys in Denmark remember that incident with the Chinese boy who was kidnapped by some Asian dudes some time ago here in Copenhagen? Seems like the Asian community here is becoming rather dramatic...and with cases like these, it is not a good thing.

I mean, the Asian community has always been the most well-behaved lot of foreigners living in Denmark, but that image is slowly being tarnished with crimes like these. So far though, the victims have been just Asians (unlike those other immigrant crimes that involve Danish victims), but still, a crime is a crime, and especially as residents/guests in a foreign country, one should all the more behave.

Anyway...let's see what the police investigations reveal in relation to this case.

On a side note, I had eaten at Restaurant Bali with a couple of girlfriends several years ago, and the food + service there were rather bad. Now that I know the owner is from Singapore, I wonder if they were the same owners as Restaurant Singapore...which doesn't exist anymore, I think. Food and service there was rather bad too, and my former company used to have a contract with them but we only send very low budget groups there for meals.

Thing is, the (Sporean) wife of the owner of Restaurant Singapore is rather - how can I say it politely - female doggy-like...if you know what I mean. She always has this angry look on her face. She arrived at our office once, looking as if she was ready to have a showdown with our manager or something.

I mention her now because after all these years since eating at Restaurant Bali that first (and last) time, I've come to realise that she was most likely the one serving us that day! No wonder she seemed familiar then. And she didn't leave a good impression on us that day because even though the restaurant was pretty empty, it seemed like she wanted us to quickly eat our meal and leave. My 2 friends who were there first said they felt this already from the start when they arrived.

This attitude is so typically Chinese, I think. Had that same "service" once at a Chinese restaurant in London. Which of us like having a hawk watch over us when we eat? And though they won't tell you directly to leave already, all it takes is the hint from their body language to scream this out in a thousand words.

Anyway...I don't recommend going there for dinner...that's all I'm saying. Quite life threatening to do so now too, on top of the bad service and not very delicious food.

Entering 2009

This post is slightly overdue, and I have yet to put pictures up on Facebook. We had a fantastic New Year's Eve party hosted by my friend, Bahati, at her apartment close by our place. There were around 30 people in all, and we had good food and free flow of drinks for 200kr (S$50) each.

It was the first time in 2 years that we ushered in the new year in a big party way. The last 2 NY eves were of a more cosy/family nature in Tune (Roskilde), so it was nice to have a change this time. We didn't go home until 6am...but like I said before, the party was close to home so it didn't take more than 15mins before we were in our domain again.

Well, there's not much more I can tell, so I'll let the pictures do the talking.

I normally edit red eyes in photos away, but I think Martin's red eyes in this pic fit his scary look.


A close up of Mr Punk. I did the makeup...but the idea of wanting makeup done in the first place was his, not mine.


I went for the more subtle makeup ;o).


Mmm....lots of delicious homemade food.


All gone in no time.


A South African dish called "Babooti" or something like that.


Just finishing my 1st round.


Anders going for his 10th round ;o).


Couple shot #01


Dancing time!


Everybody dance now!


Shake it, shake it, shake it!


Couple shot #02


The host!


What to drink...decisions, decisions.


More groovy time.


In Denmark, it is legal to shoot off your own fireworks. You can see one going off to the left of this picture. Personally, I don't like wasting money on these rockets, so I just let others buy the stuff and enjoy it at their expense ;o). It's not like I dare to shoot one off on my own either anyway. Therefore, no money wasted, no body parts wasted.


Beautiful.


Martin searching for food... ;o). Or not.


More dancing.








Putting on a show.


Group shot of the last party animals.

Happy New Year 2009!

Happy New Year, everyone!!! Hope you all had a wonderful entry into the year 2009. I'm not big about making new year resolutions, but I have decided to make some fun ones as below:

1. Be #1 on the DK mahjong rating list.
2. Speak Danish better than the Queen of Denmark.
3. Find out who the Internet God is and ask for a SUPER FAST connection before I pull out all my hair in frustration.
4. Win the lottery.
5. Don't celebrate my birthday anymore so that I remain at my 2008's age.
6. Eat more desserts without putting on weight... .
7. Be nicer to Internet trolls.
8. Run after the bus less.
9. Find Nemo...and have delicious sushi as celebration.
10. Forgive myself if I don't manage to do #7.

New cat on the blog

Just had to share my latest Photoshop piece of work :o). Rrrreeeuw!

The new Catwoman.


Versus the old.

Halle Berry, step aside ;o).

Merry Christmas!

We spent Christmas this year at Martin's parents' home, and it is always a cosy time with lots of delicious Christmas food. Here in Denmark, there are traditional Christmas food, with the main dish being roast pork and/or roast duck.

There are other traditions too, such as celebrating on the 24th instead of the 25th. It's not that Danes are impatient people who cannot wait 1 day more to celebrate, eat and open their gifts...nor is it to get 1 more day off from work (25th and 26th are official public holidays, but companies tend to give the 24th free as well). The main reason is that Danes used to celebrate Yule - a pagan celebration. However, after Christianity came to the country, they decided to incorporated this into Christmas...and I as I understand, compromised to celebrate it on the 24th instead of the 25th.

Anyway, Christ wasn't born on 25th December, so whether Christmas is celebrated on 24th or 25th December doesn't really matter. The main thing is to remember what we're celebrating, enjoy being with friends and family, and keeping the spirit of giving.

Here are some traditional Danish Christmas food:

Æbleskriver - eaten with icing sugar and/or jam. Usually, you'd drink a warm wine drink called "glögg" as well, with raisins and chopped almonds in it.


Flæskesteg - roast pork with crispy crusts, eaten with brown sauce, red cabbage, and some berry thingy. The picture above shows the roasted pork in the background (with crispy crusts on top) and apple filled with berry thingy in the foreground.


Here's my plate of roasted duck, caramelised potatoes on the left (yummy!), a couple of prunes, and red cabbage at the very back.


And Christmas dessert! This is called ris alamand, and it is basically a cold and sweet rice pudding chopped almonds in it. Eaten with cherry sauce. There is usually a whole almond inside the big bowl of pudding, and if you're lucky enough to get a serving with this almond in your plate, then you get a gift. I didn't get the almond this year :o(.


The whole family at dinner :o). My mother-in-law at the left, followed by her mum, her sister, her brother, her man and me.


IQ puzzle thingy, where the aim is to get the red car out of the jam. Was quite fun actually, and I managed to solve all the challenges that were given to me :o).


Martin's gift to me - a B&O BeoCom 6000 phone :o). This is the one that is often seen in Hollywood movies.


Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas! Or, as you would say in Danish: God Jul!

Here's one of my favourite Christmas songs by some Danish artistes. The first 2 girls who you see in the music video are actually 2 sisters who are ½ Malaysians and ½ Danish, and were the singing duo called S.O.A.P

2 chapters in 1 day

Many things are official now. For one, I will not be stepping into my current office anymore - last day of work was last Friday, and my desk has been cleared of all my personal belongings. It's going to be strange indeed not to have to go to that office again... .

Time to...say goodbye. *Sob* *Sob* There are actually 2 more who are not in the picture because they couldn't be at the office on Friday.

On another note, I am pleased to announce that I've signed my contract with my new company also on Friday :o)! Kinda symbolic that the ending of one chapter and the start of another happened on the same day. But yes, I will have a new job from February next year :o)! It's going to be in the travel industry still, and it's going to be more challenging for me. I'll be starting as a Project and Sales Manager there, so as you can imagine, I'm quite excited :o).

Anyway, I would like to thank all my colleagues for a wonderful professional relationship and friendship all these years - am gonna miss working with all of you indeed! And all the best in your future! Will make it a point to organise a reunion at least once a year, so that we can keep ourselves updated with each other, expecially with those who stubbornly refuse to join Facebook ;o).

I felt the Earth, move, under my bed...

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I don't trust big banks

Anyone familiar with the energy company, Enron, scandal in the US in 2001? Despite being named by Fortune magazine as "America's Most Innovative Company" for six consecutive years, it was later revealed that its reported financial condition was sustained substantially by institutionalized, systematic, and creatively planned accounting fraud.

Denmark is now having an Enron scandal of its own, in the name of a company called IT-Factory. Although the scale of the fraud is much lower than that of Enron, the similarities are quite similar. For one thing, IT-Factory was awarded "Denmark's Best IT-company" in September last year, and CEO Stein Bagger had himself recently been named Danish Entrepreneur of the Year by Ernst & Young, after seemingly miraculously rescuing the company from crumbling.

Read the story here.

What I want to talk about though, is the way the banks involved handled giving out loans to IT-Factory. Danske Bank (Denmarks biggest) is expected to have lost 350 million DKK (S$100 million) because of this fraud. Other banks like Nordea Bank and Jyske Bank had also lost some money, but not on such a large scale (10 million DKK - 25 million DKK).

I'm no expert in finance and the like, but it does make me (and many others) wonder how banks can agree to loan out huge amounts of money to companies just like that without doing thorough checks. When we requested for a loan of around 1 million DKK for our apartment, they required several papers from us such as our pay slips for the last 3 months, and our tax papers from the previous year.

When my VISA card from Jyske Bank was eaten up by the ATM in Rome last year, and I wanted to re-apply a new one, Jyske Bank didn't want to send me the same type of card with the same credit terms because I was not having much savings in my account there anymore. They can only offer something else that was worse than what I had. I had decided to just close my account there in the end, because it would be their loss anyway for losing a customer.

So yeah, one would expect more stringent and scrutinizing checks on companies who want to borrow hundreds of millions of kroners, right? Apparantly, fake contracts, invoices, statements of accounts, etc seem to be accepted too. Note to self on that... .

There should be a law that banks can only use money that they have for investments and loans. This applies on a private and personal scale too - never spend more than you have, and if you do, make sure you can afford to pay back.

Anyway, we received a mail from Danske Bank 3 days ago, inviting us for a meeting with them for a couple of hours where they can give us suggestions on making our private finances better, easier or cheaper, in the areas of our daily finances, investing and pension.

First line says: "We are happy to have you as a customer of Danske Bank." I don't seriously believe that. Not when we have peanuts in our Danske Bank account amounting to no more than 100kr a month, because all our savings after paying off the monthly loan payments to them are transferred over to another non-Danske Bank account.


1st paragraph says: At Danske Bank, we work with advise teams that are made up of advisers with competence within daily economy, investing, pension and housing economy. That means, you can get light on your private economy from several angles and improve your total economic situation.

They have got to be kidding, right? These are the guys who just lost 350 million DKK on one really bad investment. These are the same guys who advised Danish entertainer, Finn Nørbygård, to invest in IT-Factory, so he borrowed some millions from them to invest in this company's stocks, only to end up losing up to 700 million DKK on this bad advice.

It would have been more appropriate for them to send out this invitation on 01 April, so that if anyone questions them, they could just turn around and say it was an April Fool's joke... .

But yeah, since when did the big banks care about their customers' interests anyway? I've given up on these big guys a long time ago. We did manage to get a good loan agreement out of them for our apartment (20 years with 4% fixed interest), but that's it. The smaller banks are the ones with better interest rates on the savings account, and they provide better service too.

The bank I use now for my salary/savings account gives an interest of 4.5% on the very first kroner you put in. Interests earned this year alone from this account will amount to around 5800 DKK (S$1660). This is money "earned" simply by saving up. Sure, it's not giving any high returns compared to if we invest our savings in stocks, etc...but then again, the saying "easy come, easy go" still holds true till today. I'd rather sleep well at night.

The big banks though, they don't give you back a single kroner. Even if you, as an average customer, have a LOT of savings, you'll earn at most 2.75% interest. While of course, they make millions in profits.

So to Danske Bank, I say: Thanks, guys...but no thanks. I know you need money now, but you ain't gettin' it out of me.

My piano debut - Apologize by One Republic

I'm almost done learning this song. Still some mistakes here and there, but well...you can watch this video on my progress first. Practice makes perfect anyway...and since I've never had any real piano lessons before, I think I've accomplished quite a lot already... .

So...what do you think? All this learnt from a tutorial online by David Sides :o). Btw, I think my fingers look like crazy spider legs jumping around ;o).

Lazy me

I should be a bear. One who hibernates throughout the winter season. I've been clearing my vacation days before my company closes our Copenhagen office, which means that I've been off pretty much for 1½ months in Nov + Dec, and it's wonderful not to have to get out into the cold to go to work during these months.

The problem is, it makes it so much easier to just waste the "day" away (I say "day" because right now, the "day" seems like "night" anyway since there is no sun shining in the morning/afternoon - just gray clouds). When I say "waste", I mean "sleep". I'm a night person, so I tend to be more active and awake at night, but very lazy in the day if I don't have any activity to get me out of the house.

Good that I've started Danish lessons then. Gives me reason to pull myself out of Dreamland. Gosh! I miss the sun! Who stole it?!?! I get up when it's dark, and I go to bed when it's dark. See, told you I should just be a bear and sleep for 4 months a year... .

I would make a good bum, if that was a "job". Just exist in the world. What a waste, huh? But ok, I've been working hard for 11 years, so I guess deserve a couple of relaxing months before I start a new job again.

There's a guy who lives at the ground floor of one of the apartments in our estate. I walk pass his window pretty much every day, to and from work. He would be sitting by his kitchen window when I pass him in the morning, and again when I pass him in the evening. It doesn't matter what time of the day it is, he'll be there. Also weekends.

We've been living here for 4½ years already. That's at least how long he's been wasting his life away staring out his window! I don't dare to know how long exactly he's been doing that. Our estate was built in 1991, so I don't hope it's been almost 2 decades that he's been doing this.

A neighbour who has been living here since almost the beginning told us that this guy broke down after his wife died. Ever since then, he's just been existing, not living. It's really sad, because he's probably in his early or mid-50's, so he still has many years left of his life. Too many to waste away like that. Hmm...well, he's a heavy smoker so maybe he won't have that many in the end. You can smell the thick smoke whenever you walk pass his open window, and the one side of his kitchen walls is literally yellow from his heavy smoking.

Anyway...what do you do really, if you don't have friends, family...even a purpose in life? What can you do? Well, this guy...despite being the unofficial neighbourhood watchdog, has shown me what I never want to be for as long as I am still alive as a human being.

Now, if I evolve into a vampire after my tendency to be more awake and active at night than during the day during these couple of months, then that's a different story. I'll just be living/existing then to hunt, drink blood and sleep. Oh, and make vampire armies ;o).

Big love!

This video clip (true story, by the way) never fails to bring tears to my eyes every time I watch it... . Well ok, maybe not by the 10th time in a row...but you know what I mean... .

I'm more of a dog person than a cat person, but there's something about big cats that really makes me like them...especially tigers. Nice that I'm a Leo ;o).

Anyway, get some Kleenex ready! True friendship knows no boundaries... .

Mit første post på dansk

Ja, jeg starter intensive dansk undervisning i morgen, så skal jeg begynde at skrive lidt mere dansk her, ikke ;o)? Jeg synes at det er nu på tide at jeg forbedre både mit talt og skrevet dansk, især når jeg har boet her i næsten 12 år allerede... . Og nu har jeg også masser af tid til at lære rigtigt dansk, før jeg starter på arbejder igen.

Men hvorfor taler jeg ikke flydende dansk efter så mange år her, spørger du. Det er en godt spørgsmål, og jeg har nogle grunde...ok, ok...undskyldninger for det. Først og fremmest, lad mig siger at jeg kan godt forstår og læser dansk. Måske ikke 100% (80%), men jeg kan godt klar det. Det er bare sværere for mig til at tale og skrive på dansk, og det er derfor at jeg vil gerne have undervisning til det nu.

Sagen er, at jeg arbejder i et firma som bruger engelsk som arbejssporg i næsten 11 år. Der er kun 2 ud af 10 kolleger som er dansk, og 2 mere som er dansk talere. Derfor, taler vi mest på engelsk i kontoret. De fleste af mine venner er internationale mennesker, eller er danskere, som taler godt engelsk. Så er det bare nemmere for os til at taler på engelsk, og mine dansk venner vil også gerner forbedre deres engelsk. Martin hjælper ikke så meget i den her afdeling også. Vi taler dansk til hindanden for ca. 10-15min om dagen, og så skifter vi ubevidst tilbage til engelsk. Det er bare nemmere, og der er ingen grunde til stor misforståelse, da engelsk er mit første sporg alligevel.

Jeg ved godt, at mit skrevet dansk i denne post er ikke 100% korrect dansk, men jeg håber at du, som en dansker eller en som kan forstår dansk, kan godt forstår hvad jeg skrive nu. Det er et svært sprog, men jeg er tillid at jeg vil blive godt nok til det en dag, for at arbejder i et firma som kræver flydende talt og skrevet dansk.

Ønske mig held og lykke til det!

United Nations of friends

Anyway...moving on from Trollie news (it was fun to poke it for a while, but now that it's sitting under the bridge licking its wounds, it would be human for me to ignore its existance).

I was just looking at my "Friend's List" on Facebook, and it's amazing to see how many people I know from around the world! Of course, we have different degrees of friendship, but I'll just use this term loosely for now to simply mean "people I know".

If I do an alphabetical list of countries of where my friends come from, it would look something like this (numbers indicate how many from each country):

Australia, Austria = 5, 1
Belerus, Belgium, Brazil = 1, 1, 5
Cambodia, Canada, China, Croatia = 1, 3, 7, 1
Denmark = 88
England, Estonia = 10, 1
Finland, France = 6, 4
Germany, Ghana = 2, 3
H = Hmm...no, no one from Hungary.
India, Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Ivory Coast = 3, 6, 1, 2, 3, 1
Japan = 5
Kenya, Korea (South) = 2, 4
Latvia = 1
Malaysia, Morocco = 5, 1
The Netherlands, Nigeria, Norway = 3, 3, 3
O = Nope, don't know anyone from Oman... .
The Philippines, Poland, Portugal = 9, 2, 2
Q = Don't know anyone from Qatar either.
R = Nor Russia.
Singapore, South Africa, Spain, Sweden = 77, 2, 1, 6
Thailand = 5
Uganda, USA = 1, 13
V = 0 from Venezuela, nor am I friends with the Pope from the Vatican.
W = 0 from West Virginia
X = I challenge anyone to find a country starting with X.
Y =0 from Yemen nor Yugoslavia.
Z = 0 from Zimbabwe nor Zaire. Well, I know 1 from Zaire, but he's not on Facebook.

A whole United Nations of friends :o). Well, at least every continent except the North and South Poles is represented... .