I look forward to it not only as an observer, but as a competitor.

This year is the 3rd year MODF is running, and as usual I signed up for as many events as I could cope with. I signed up for the individual belly dance novice open and crystal, and the individual line dance novice open and crystal. I was hoping to be able to do better than my score last year : quarter-finalist for belly dance novice open (after fighting in 2 preliminary rounds), 5th place belly dance novice crystal, and 3rd place in both line dance novice open and crystal.

In case you’re wondering, the term “crystal” is a nice way of describing the age category of 30-45 years in this competition. Hey, *I* like it.

I was getting butterflies in my stomach by Friday (the day before the competition), and I could not wait for the competition to arrive. So… here’s what happened from my point of view when the big day finally came.

BELLY DANCE

The individual belly dance novice open was scheduled to be the opening event of the competition, and given that my tag number was a single digit (#9), I was in the first heat, and I was literally the first dancer to step onto the floor competitively that day.

Belly dancer

I didn’t do so well in belly dance this time, unfortunately. This is probably because the contingent was even bigger – there were almost 60 participants in the belly dance novice open! Out of which only 24 were selected for the semi-finals. It was too tough a fight for me, especially since I don’t even take belly dance lessons. I didn’t get through to the next round, which was the quarter-finals.

For the belly dance novice crystal, it wasn’t easy either as there were more than 20 participants. I literally jumped for joy when I found out that I made it to the semi-finals!

The semi-finals was not an easy round for me; not only because the other participants were talented – which by the way, included one gentleman – but also because I had no breathing time after my line dance novice open preliminary round. It was all I could do to change into a whole different costume, try not to get anything tangled, catch my breath, and run almost straight back onto the floor for the semi-finals.

If I was happy for getting into the semi-finals, imagine how I felt when I found out I made it for the finals!

The finals was held that night, and fortunately I had some time to rest before the night events resumed.

The finals for the belly dance crystal was held almost in the same fashion for me as the semi-finals – straight after my line dance finals, out of one costume into a completely new one, and running almost straight onto the floor again.

Now, for the results : I got 6th placing. I’m quite satisfied with it as the fact I got into the finals already pleased me. It was an honour to dance with such talented belly dancers in the finals, some of whom I know made it to the belly dance novice open category too.

Individual belly dance novice crystal winners

LINE DANCE

The line dance genre also saw greater participation this year compared to last year. And looking at the participants while we were waiting in line to go on the floor, I realised I was one of the oldest (I’ve found out that I AM the oldest. Damn. Now I feel old). Of the 9 dancers competing in the preliminaries, only 2 of us (including myself) were eligible and were going to compete in the line dance novice crystal. I was literally fighting with people half my age, give or take.

I was simply ecstatic when I found out that I was one of the selected 6 to make it to the finals for the line dance novice open!

For those who are unfamiliar with line dance competitions, individual line dance categories have pre-selected songs and choreography, which means that all dancers in the same category must dance the same choreography to the same song. The only thing we can change is the styling (e.g. hand placements). The dances and songs selected for the novice open and crystal were the same: Burlesque, which is a tango piece; and Twist With The Fat Boys, which is a novelty dance. They’re quite tiring dances, especially the second dance. I can tell you from personal experience.

The line dance novice open was scheduled to be the opening event for the night, and I was probably going to be the first competitive dancer to open the competition again. However due to some changes in the day line-ups, we became the second event that night.

Because the line dance novice open finals were held quite early (about 6pm) which was before the dinner was served and before the formalities of speeches and such, the hall was quite empty. And honestly speaking, the few who were already there were not very encouraging as they barely smiled or clapped during the competition, no matter how well the dancers danced. However, I did not let that stop me as I was here to compete, not entertain. I pulled out all the stops and gave the two dances my all.

The line dance novice crystal finals was held a little later, after the formalities and after dinner was served. By then, the hall had already filled up to maximum as all the ticket-holders were already present and were enjoying their dinner, although the temperature in the hall barely rose. Did I mention how cold the hall was? It was freezingly cold!

The line dance novice crystal had five participants and hence was straight to finals, but please don’t think that it made it any easier. The other participants were obviously prepared, with beautiful latin dresses and pretty heels.

Anyway, the audience now were certainly far more encouraging. It always makes it easier for all competitors to do well when they have positive feedback. It was heartwarming to see people smile back when I gave them the “arrogant” nod during the tango (they obviously knew that I was merely in character, and I’m not really a snob). And apparently I shocked a lot of people (in a good way) when I took the long black skirt off after the tango piece and appeared in short little red number for the twist. It surprised me, considering I did the same for the novice open categories, and I wasn’t the only one. It was probably because I was the only one to do so during the crystal finals.

Dancing to "Burlesque"

A complete change of character was necessary for the twist. It was a fun dance, and I certainly had a lot of fun with the dance. I-Vee told me that some of my moves were very cute, and people actually laughed when I executed them. And when she shouted my tag number (in support), they shouted it with her. I made fun faces at the crowd with every move; and many of my friends told me that they loved my facial expressions because they were so fitting with the song and were not at all static.

Doing the hip bump in "Twist With The Fat Boys"

As a competitive dancer, I cannot describe to you how heartwarming it is to have people cheering you on, especially when they don’t even know you and is only probably seeing you for the first time; to see them watching you (instead of watching another dancer) with big smiles on their faces; and to have random strangers stop you after the dance was over and tell you what a great job you did, and that they hope that you win. I experienced it all that night. It is a feeling I will cherish for a very long time.

I hope you don’t think I’m boasting, because I’m not. I did not expect any of that, and when it happened, it was such a pleasant surprise.

I really couldn’t wait for the results, and yet when the prize-giving was finally conducted, I did not want it to happen.

For the line dance novice open, I was hoping (but not expecting) to get a podium finish. And… I did!!! I got 3rd place!!! It was certainly a shock for me, because as I had mentioned earlier, all the other finalists were about half my age!

Individual line dance novice open winners

The biggest and best surprise was yet in wait for me. I was holding my breath when they were announcing the individual line dance novice crystal winners.

Individual line dance novice crystal winners

I was announced as the CHAMPION for the individual line dance novice crystal category!!!

This was the first time I’ve broken that ceiling… all the while the highest I’ve ever gotten was second place as an individual dancer. I’ve gotten first place before in team events, but not for individual events.

I hope this will not be the last time!

Thank you to all the people who have supported me and believed in me all this while! I could not have done it without your support!

Special thanks to I-Vee and Christian for coming to support me at the competition even though I didn’t ask you to.

And my utmost gratitude and appreciation must be given to my sifu who has never given up on me – Bronya Bishorek!

Congratulations to ALL winners of the Malaysian Open Dance Fest! Thank you to the organisers for a job well done!

And… I haven’t told you the kicker yet. I was actually not feeling well throughout the whole competition. I’ve been sick since Monday, and in spite of my efforts, I wasn’t able to recover in time for the competition. In fact, as I’m typing this, I’m still coughing my heart out. So… yes, I’m very proud of what I’ve achieved in the competition.

Here’s a video someone took of the individual novice open finals. I haven’t found a video of the individual novice crystal finals yet. I did buy the competition DVDs that a professional videographer took that night, but I will not upload the videos because that would be copyright infringement.

I’ll post a link if I can find the video of my winning dances! In the meantime, see if you can spot me in the video below. Enjoy!!

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]]> http://www.zyenhoo.com/2011/08/29/malaysian-open-dancefest-2011/feed/ 0 http://www.zyenhoo.com/2011/05/25/my-dance-competition-in-melaka/ http://www.zyenhoo.com/2011/05/25/my-dance-competition-in-melaka/#comments Wed, 25 May 2011 14:59:57 +0000 zyenhoo http://www.zyenhoo.com/?p=618 Last weekend I took part in a local dance competition organised by the Melaka Tengah Line Dance Association (MLTDA) with Dataran Pahlawan Megamall, Melaka. It was a bit scary because I went down all on my own – without any supporting team including my coach. I did have a friend in Melaka who showed me to the venue – she was the one who told me about the competition.

I didn’t realise how friendly the Melakans were. When I arrived, there were many ladies who recognised me (both from previous competitions as well as from Facebook) and gave me a very warm welcome.

The competition was divided into two age categories : Under-45 and Over-46. I was in the Under-45 category, of course, and unfortunately because the age group was so big, it meant I could even be competing against people half my age. Well, I didn’t, but some of the participants were little more than half my age.

There were nine of us in my category, and we had to dance two dances: In Love, which is a smooth dance to a chacha song, and Fashion, which is a sexy funky dance. Initially the organiser wanted to only have just the one round for both age categories; but the head judge, Alvin insisted there should be a finals round. This is because with that many participants (9 in the Under-45, and 7 in the Over-46), he felt that they would not be able to judge fairly in such a short amount of time.

Dataran Pahlawan is quite a nice shopping mall. The problem is, the venue was in the concourse which was round. For a line dance competition, it is terrible to have to dance in a round venue because line dances are usually danced in a square or rectangular area due to the “wall” concept.  Everything was round there – the tiles, the balconies in the higher floors, everything! There was no marking to help the dancers figure out their “walls”.

Given the competition that I had to face, my aim was to get only to the finals. I heard they initially wanted to choose only five, but they chose six – competition must have been that stiff! As they were calling out the numbers, I held my breath while waiting for my number to be called… and when it was, I actually leapt from my seat up, onto the dance floor.

After the competition, I just sat around listlessly waiting for the results. There was social line dancing between the competition, but I didn’t join the dancing because I don’t know any social line dances… I only know the dances needed for a competition.

They announced the results for Over-46 first, and then the Under-45. For this competition they only announced the top 3. When the emcee called my number for third place, I was honestly quite and pleasantly surprised. I didn’t expect it!

Second place went to Cindy Lee, and first place went to Jovial Lim, both from Seremban, and both very deserving wins!

Here are some of the videos uploaded by the lovely ladies who watched and supported us in Melaka.

I’m in the leopard print dress (tag 08), Cindy is in the blue dress (tag 04), and Jovial is in the yellow-green dress (tag 07).

First Round: In Love

First Round: Fashion

Finals: In Love

Finals: Fashion

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]]> http://www.zyenhoo.com/2011/05/25/my-dance-competition-in-melaka/feed/ 0 http://www.zyenhoo.com/2011/01/21/rocking-to-a-new-year/ http://www.zyenhoo.com/2011/01/21/rocking-to-a-new-year/#comments Fri, 21 Jan 2011 08:31:12 +0000 zyenhoo http://www.zyenhoo.com/?p=570 It’s been three weeks into a new school year, and I’m slowly settling into the school routine. I’ve been assigned to teach four Form 5 classes this time; different from my previous assignments, which have always been a mix of Form 4 and Form 5 classes, except for the one time I was teaching Chemistry to four Form 4 classes. I’m teaching Physics again, which is and always has been my baby.

I was hoping to be the homeroom teacher of the same class again, which was 4 Mozart last year, but alas – they assigned a new class to me (5 Columbus), and I did not teach this class last year, so it’s going to take some time to get to know the students (and their names!). The good news is that they seem to be a pretty cool bunch. More good news is that even though I am not the homeroom teacher of 5 Mozart, but I’m still their Physics teacher, so I can still yell at them hang around them as much as I did last year.

The year ahead looks like it’s going to be a tough one, though, but I’ve got some practice handling it from last year. Last year was riddled with financial setbacks, false lies spread by a former colleague about me to students, and many other personal issues I am not willing to discuss on a public website like this. It wasn’t all bad though. At least I still have my hair and my teeth.

OKOK, it was better than that. I recovered some of my financial losses, and I worked hard to prove that the lies were indeed lies, and managed to overcome quite a number of personal challenges.

This year I’m taking on a number of personal projects, including moving to a new place of my own, and opening my own business. So yes, I’m looking forward to the year of the Rabbit!

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]]> http://www.zyenhoo.com/2011/01/21/rocking-to-a-new-year/feed/ 0 http://www.zyenhoo.com/2010/08/13/the-first-stitch-ive-ever-gotten/ http://www.zyenhoo.com/2010/08/13/the-first-stitch-ive-ever-gotten/#comments Fri, 13 Aug 2010 08:52:52 +0000 zyenhoo http://www.zyenhoo.com/?p=536 I received the first stitch of my life about one month after my 31st birthday.

On Friday, 6th August 2010, Sri KDU organised a Merdeka Carnival in conjunction with Patriotic Run, which is the school’s mini-marathon. It is usually held in conjunction with National Day, but this year because the fasting month was starting on 11th August 2010, the school decided to have the run earlier.

My class was planning to make a maze of terror, and were only allowed to start our preparations on Thursday 4pm. I stayed back with the kids until 11.30pm to get as much done as possible, but the maze was still far from finished, and we had to come back early the next morning to continue work. The guards told us we could get in by 6am, but I was too tired and decided to get there by 7am. Bryan Homi asked me to pick him up from Zhou Han’s house, but because they overslept, I had to WAIT FOR THEM and we ended up reaching school close to 7.30am.

I was trying to fold the metal legs on the wooden table when the leg snapped at the ring finger on my right hand. I didn’t feel the pain at first; all I saw was BLOOD. My immediate reaction was, “Oh, we have real blood here.” Then I ran all the way to the school infirmary to ask the nurse to clean it up and to put on a dressing. The nurse took one look, and told me I needed stitches. I asked her, “What, now?” She must have thought that it was a really silly question. But what actually ran through my head was, “I need to be at the maze to monitor the students.” She didn’t clean up the wound, but put two tight layers of dressing to tide me until I get to the hospital.

I then ran back to the special classroom to get my handbag, but because I hadn’t had breakfast, I could feel the nausea building up. Jasmine Leong saw me, and stopped me to ask what was wrong – she said I had gone so pale!

She was going to accompany me to the hospital, but she couldn’t drive; so she got Mr Lee Wing Hong (the new Chem teacher) to drive me instead.

I went into the emergency ward and was given two shots: one painkiller in my ass, and another in my arm for tetanus. The nurse then opened the dressing but had a hard time taking it off because the school nurse had put the first layer on so tightly. She cleaned it and then put a basic dressing on it. They then recommended I get an X-ray done to ensure that there was no fracture.

After the X-rays, a hand specialist took a look and said that it didn’t require major surgery and said I only needed stitches. They were going to get an orthopaedist to take a look at it, but he was busy at that time so the emergency ward nurses suggested we go for breakfast instead and to come back in half an hour.

When we came back after breakfast, we were told that orthopaedist had come down in our absence, and they then sent us upstairs to see him. We had to wait for about half an hour before we were called in. The orthopaedist, Dr Soong, opened up the basic dressing and was going to do only another dressing before taking a second look and realising that I needed stitches.

He first administered a local anaesthetic, which was injected at the base of my ring finger. I couldn’t bear to watch that one… IT HURT!!!! I could feel the sensation of the anaesthetic traveling to my finger. But it quickly numbed my finger and the stitching process didn’t hurt at all. In fact, I was able to watch the entire stitching process without squirming or wincing at all. I was quite interested and fascinated because I had never received stitches before in my life!

Dr Soong was quite surprised and impressed that I could watch the whole stitching process. It was Mr Lee who was squirming with his shirt pulled up over the bottom half of his face.

We got back to the school late – at 11.30am. That’s 3 hours after the accident happened.in the hospital! The kids were already running the maze and there was already a line.

I’m going to be removing my stitches on Monday (hopefully) after 10 days. It was supposed to be removed tomorrow but I’ll be accompanying the kids to the debate competition at IIU.

I didn’t manage to take photos during the stitching, because I couldn’t have possibly managed it at that point in time; and poor Mr Lee was squirming too much. I did manage to take a photo of the stitched finger though… if you’re not squeamish, you can view them here.

Oh, and the class managed to make a little profit from the maze. The important thing was that we covered cost, which fortunately we did.

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]]> http://www.zyenhoo.com/2010/08/13/the-first-stitch-ive-ever-gotten/feed/ 0 http://www.zyenhoo.com/2009/09/05/this-weeks-roundup/ http://www.zyenhoo.com/2009/09/05/this-weeks-roundup/#comments Sat, 05 Sep 2009 11:50:32 +0000 zyenhoo http://www.zyenhoo.com/?p=353 I feel like a deflated balloon.

I’ve always enjoyed training for dance competitions. Even if the outcome isn’t fantastic, even if I don’t make the break rounds, even if I flop, I still enjoy the training nevertheless. That has always been the best part of the competitions for me. The medals and trophies attained are just an added bonus. For the MODF, we had practice 3 times a week. Now my nights are free and I get to sleep early, but I’m feeling lost instead…

Well, on the bright side, I met up with three different friends for breakfast/dinner/lunch over 2 days. My social life seems to be on the rise. Hahaha.

Just to fill up space, here’s my bragging rights:

My trophies from the Malaysian Open Dance Fest 2009

That’s my trophy for modern jazz individual (2nd), trophy for line dance individual (3rd), and medals for team events (3rd). I’m short of a medal for one team event, because there was a mix-up during the prize presentation, which the organisers haven’t fixed to date.

Here are the photos Pei Ru took during the night of the finals at Shangri-la.

In other news, I dropped my watch! My favourite watch!!! *sobsob* This watch was given to me by my website clients – a very sweet couple who thought of me when they saw this watch. Notice the brand of the watch in the photo below?? Best watch I’ve ever had! No one has ever had a watch with a brand in their name… mind you it’s not custom-made!

I dropped it as I was taking it out of my bag to put it on, and it fell straight onto the floor with a resounding crack. The impact not only caused cracks to appear on the glass front, but some of the diamantes were severely broken too :(:(:( Fortunately it’s still running though.

I dropped my watch! Notice the cracks on the glass front??

So I had to dig out one of my other watches to get the battery changed at a watch shop in One Utama. While the battery was being changed, I showed this watch to the sales assistant and asked if the glass face could be replaced. Admittedly, this isn’t a famous brand and obviously the shop I went to doesn’t carry the brand. The lady just handed it back to me and said, “It’s not worth it to change. Some of the ‘diamonds’ have already dropped off.”

I couldn’t believe how snooty she was. I mean, this watch is important to me for personal reasons, and it’s not some RM20-piece-of-junk picked up from some night market. So I just paid for the battery change and went off. I was actually contemplating buying a new good watch from the shop since they were having a sale, but her attitude completely put me off.

I’ll just have to go look for another watch shop to get it fixed then; probably a family-owned watch shop, if they still exist. Going to watch shop chains are of no use; some shops are so snooty, they won’t change the battery of a watch if they don’t carry the brand. At least if a shop is run by a family, they’re nicer and more willing to do what the customer asks.

Anyway, while I was in Midvalley today, I saw a Swatch roadshow and went to poke around. I asked a sales assistant to show me their waterproof watches (almost all of them are) because I have always wanted to get one for a long time, especially one that I can go swimming with. (Sometimes when I swim at the pool in school, I lose track of time. It would be good to have a watch so that I can check on the time.) She helped me pick out a really pretty and trendy white watch.

My brand new Swatch watch!

Yeeha!!! I haven’t had a watch with a rubber strap for a long time. Come to think of it, I haven’t bought myself a watch for a long time. Some of my watches were either free gifts with items bought, or given to me by friends. My watches in the past few years have all been either metal straps or leather straps. So yay!!! Now I’ve got one I can wear even when I’m exercising or dancing.

And… this is my first Swatch in my entire life!!! Hahaha!!! When I was in school, I’ve always wanted a Swatch because all my friends seemed to have them, but they were pretty expensive and I never worked up the courage to ask my parents to get me one. And I didn’t save for one either, because I felt that it was really too expensive, and I could easily get a working watch for less than half the lowest price of a Swatch. So this is like a childhood wish that’s been finally fulfilled. The only thing missing now is the rubber watchface guard that was the rage back in school.

I consider this my belated birthday present to myself, and my reward for my achievements at the MODF

Actually I spotted another Swatch watch that I also really liked; it has a metal strap with crystals in the them. But I can’t afford to buy too many watches And I’ve still got to fix the glass on my Zyenn watch.

Pretty good week so far, in spite of the cracked watch. And to top it off, it’s the second three-day weekend in a row! WOOOOHOOOOO!!!!!

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]]> http://www.zyenhoo.com/2009/09/05/this-weeks-roundup/feed/ 0 http://www.zyenhoo.com/2009/08/14/best-birthday-ever/ http://www.zyenhoo.com/2009/08/14/best-birthday-ever/#comments Fri, 14 Aug 2009 15:43:55 +0000 zyenhoo http://www.zyenhoo.com/?p=307 OKOK. I’d better write this down before I forget to, and the news becomes so old that it’s not interesting anymore. It’s just that I had no time, what with the class tests and the dance competition and falling sick.

My birthday was last month, on the 8th of July. I had shamelessly been announcing my impending birthday in vain hopes that I would, for once, be able to get something from my birthday wishlist, and I mean my birthday wishlist. Nothing of the sort happened, of course. Except for the dark chocolates. Oh, but at least I didn’t get any plumbing accessories this time

Anyway my birthday was off to a good start with dinner with close friends at The Ship.  It was fun and enjoyable, but if I thought I could escape the “Happy Birthday” singing, there was no such luck. While other places like TGIF merely get all their staff to sing very loudly, The Ship blasts the birthday song over their speakers so that everyone in the restaurant knows it’s someone’s birthday.

Birthday fun at The Ship! (Kodie not in the photo because he's taking the pic)

The meal was fantastic, and the company was excellent! Kalem arrived extremely grumpy but his mood got progressively better and he became positively hyper by the end of the night.

We took a lot of photos… Take a look!!!

Sunday saw a brief celebratory lunch with some of my dance teammates. Tracy made me beautiful cupcakes, every single one personally handpiped by herself. The cupcakes were absolutely delicious! She bought us lunch at Starbucks before making everyone embarrass me with a “Happy Birthday”  song…

Tracy's beautiful cupcake. She says her sifu told her it takes 600 tries before she'd get a perfect rose, but it already looks beautiful to me

Me with Tracy and her cupcakes

More photos of the beautiful cupcakes here!! Must-see!!!

My family then took me out fo a nice quiet dinner at Sri Siam. Erm, there’s no photo because it was a really simple dinner.

Tuesday night, on my birthday eve, I went for dance class which is usually followed by dance practice. One of the ladies who attends the social dance class, Eloise, usually brings her 6-year-old daughter Jye Yi to the class, but because the little girl usually can’t cope with the adult-level class, I spend time with the little girl, teaching her the basics and dancing with her so that she doesn’t lose interest in the dance. Because I spend so much time with her, she became quite attached to me; and she found out my birthdate… through the expedient method of asking me.

She made her father take her out to buy a cake, and insisted on coming to class to give me the cake. Fortunately it wasn’t a class celebration, because everyone left quite quickly when the class was over (phew!) but for the little girl’s sake, her mother and her aunt (both of them attend the social dance class) sang a quick round of Happy Birthday, and I cut the cake to give the little one a slice. She had bought a delicious coffee cake… yummm :)

Jye Yi and I

Wednesday… my actual birthday. I have to say that it was simply the best birthday I’ve celebrated at Sri KDU, ever. The day got progressively better

I had ordered mini-cupcakes from a friend, with the intention of giving each of my students one, and some of my colleagues (can’t give EVERYONE… there’s too many). I ordered the cupcakes because I knew that I couldn’t expect people to celebrate my birthday with me, so the only way to make sure I’m not alone in my celebration is to MAKE THEM CELEBRATE IT WITH ME.

The mini-cupcakes I distributed to my students and friends

The first class of the day was 4 Newton who, instead of the customary “Good morning, Miss Hoo” sang “Happy Birthday”. That was a nice greeting

"Everyone do the Japanese pose!!"

And… surprise, surprise. Some of my tuition students actually got me a cake!!! I was quite touched; it was the first time I ever received a cake from students not in my class. Muaxes to all of you With Lydia’s help, they got me a very pretty chocolate cake.

With the 5A kids who bought me the cake

Shaun attempting to stab Kareem with the superlong knife

The second class was 4 Aristotle, who used to drive me nuts the whole year by always singing “Happy Birthday”. But when I walked into class, they refused to sing it to me, and gave me the customary “Good morning” greeting instead. And when they did sing, they sang it to one of their classmates Gary instead. After a bit of hemming and hawing, Juno finally came forward with a papercard which everyone signed. And they said they didn’t know how old I was, so they wrote every number they could think of – “Happy 16th birthday”… “Happy 32nd birthday”… “Happy 48th birthday”… But of all the numbers everyone wrote, no one got the right number.

Me with 4 Aristotle

The class immediately after that was 4 Mozart, and they sent people outside to stop me from going in. I guess it would have been obvious to anyone as to what they were planning, especially since the lights were off and so many of them were holding cameras, but I had long taught myself not to expect anything. And… so when I went in, they had a cake with candles lit and everyone burst into song, I actually started crying. And unfortunately, a few of them caught my tears on camera. =.=”

But I don’t mind admitting it. I was truly overwhelmed, especially since this class isn’t even my homeroom, yet they were thoughtful enough to throw me a surprise party. If I could, I’d take them in as my homeroom, too.

"Everyone look at Miss Hoo!"

I don’t have photos of the cake 4M prepared for me though. I didn’t have my camera ready, I was too busy wiping the tears away.

The best surprise was yet to come though. 4M had done something great, and it would be right to expect my homeroom to do something better, but like I said, I had taught myself not to expect anything. But during lunchtime, it was obvious that they were planning something, because from my seat in the staffroom, I saw quite a few of my students walking by the doors, and the moment they spotted me through the glass, they quickly doubled back. Then Darryl was sent in to ask me to step out. He pretended to want to ask me a Chemistry question, but it was so obviously a lie, that I handed him my camera. What was waiting outside for me was beyond anything I had expected…

I GOT A HUMAN GREETING CARD!!! IT’S THE BEST CARD I’VE EVER RECEIVED!!!

My human greeting card is so big, I get to stand inside it!

And on top of that, they got me a cake! And embarrassed me in front of everyone by singing “Happy Birthday” very loudly at the cafeteria.

The cake 4 Dickens bought. I'm at the cafeteria where they embarrassed me by singing "Happy Birthday" very loudly.

I had no more tears left, but I was still very touched. It trumps 4M’s surprise party, hehe.

I was surprised at how quickly everyone disappeared back to class when the bell rang, leaving me and a few others to clean up the mess. And when we got back to class, someone kept saying, “The party isn’t over yet” but it didn’t register until Johann walked in with a second cake…

My second cake from 4 Dickens!!

The day ended with my receiving a beautiful bouquet from Bronya, which she had sent to the school. They were late; it was supposed to be sent in the morning. But nevertheless, it was a great end to a great day.

The lovely bouquet Bronya sent to me at school

Thank you everyone for your wishes, presents, and cakes! I love you all!

Photos of my birthday at school can be viewed here.

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]]> http://www.zyenhoo.com/2009/08/14/best-birthday-ever/feed/ 0 http://www.zyenhoo.com/2009/05/07/70-dark-chocolate-yum/ http://www.zyenhoo.com/2009/05/07/70-dark-chocolate-yum/#comments Thu, 07 May 2009 15:00:04 +0000 zyenhoo http://www.zyenhoo.com/?p=250 So, Teacher’s Day is next week.

1. I love dark chocolate. The darker the better. I prefer those with AT LEAST 70% dark chocolate. Anything less doesn’t qualify as dark. But, NO FERRERRO ROCHER, PLEASE!! That’s my least favourite chocolate brand. Seriously!
2. If you think I deserve something more intellectual, book vouchers would be great!
3. Have I mentioned how I like photography? I could do with some new lenses to go with my Nikon D60. Or one of those LED flashes.
4. My videocamera is dying on me. It’s been having problems for a while, and now the lens holder at the camera is getting loose (as in, it seems like it’s going to fall off my videocamera). I actually sent it in to fix a while back, and obviously it wasn’t a good job. Sigh… what to do, it’s a Sony. I really could do with one of those new HDD HD videocameras.
5. I’ve never been to Club Med before, would love to go there…

*Hint hint*

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]]> http://www.zyenhoo.com/2009/05/07/70-dark-chocolate-yum/feed/ 0 http://www.zyenhoo.com/2009/04/26/lucky-me/ http://www.zyenhoo.com/2009/04/26/lucky-me/#comments Sun, 26 Apr 2009 14:52:44 +0000 zyenhoo http://www.zyenhoo.com/?p=232 I went to Malacca for the weekend, to accompany Bronya on a dance workshop she was conducting. I was also supposed to perform with her, but I hadn’t gotten the music ready yet as we were both so busy the past few weeks – she gave me the list of songs to use last week, but I had no time to fix the medleys, so on the drive down, I worked on it on my laptop.

I’m pretty sure that the workshop attendees must have thought me unsociable, because I sat in one corner fiddling with my laptop instead of mingling with the crowd. But then, the 2-hour drive was only enough for me to cut one medley, and I was supposed to do three! So I worked on the other two as the workshop was in progress. Fortunately I-Vee was with us, and she helped me take a video of the entire workshop. From time to time, I managed to take a few shots of Chief Guru with my DSLR though.

…. which goes to show how last-minute our performances were planned. We did have a rehearsal between the workshop and dinner, but that was obviously not enough

I performed with Bronya in two of the medleys (a funky mix, and a cuban mix) while she performed solo for one (smooth). Erm. We did pretty well in spite of the last-minute cuts, if I do say so ourselves. OK, maybe she won’t agree with me, because I messed up some of the beats. But the crowd did respond to me, and to her, when we played with the crowd. So I guess they enjoyed our performances in spite of our mistakes. Hahaha!!!

No, I’m not putting up the videos. The performance was probably only fun to watch live. If you want to watch it, well… you should have been there!

The next morning Bron had 2 private classes, so we had breakfast together before she went off. My right wrist felt stiff, and I thought I slept on it wrong. It was only much later that I realised it was a slight injury from last night. What happened was this: we didn’t have a changing room so we were given the stage (with curtains drawn) to change behind. The actual performance was on the floor in front of the stage, where the dinner tables were arranged around. As I was walking down the short flight of stairs from the stage, I slipped and grabbed the railing to stop myself from falling. I hit my thumb, so there’s a small bruise on it, but I thought that was it. I didn’t realise then that I’d probably sprained my wrist as well.

Anyway, so when we left the hotel, we were in a bit of a hurry to leave as we supposed to meet some ladies for lunch. Bron had come back to the hotel to shower after her private classes. I had like, 3 million things to carry… as usual. I had all my videocamera/camera gear, my make-up, my clothes bag, etc etc etc…

AND I LEFT MY CAMERA BAG BEHIND. WHICH HAD MY VIDEOCAMERA, MY DSLR CAMERA, 2 LENSES, FLASH AND MY WATERPROOF CAMERA.

Trust me, I screamed louder than you did.

I couldn’t believe it. I only realised it when I had reached home, unpacked everything, and switched on my computer to convert the videos, and suddenly went, “Eh? Where’s my camera bag?”

I was in total shock. I thought that I left it in I-Vee’s car initially, but my memory was very clear on that one. I could picture her car boot in my mind’s eye – what it looked like after unloading all my many, many things, and I knew it wasn’t there. And then it hit me. I knew exactly where it was in the hotel room, and I remembered that I was carrying many bags, but I had not carried it out of the room when we checked out.

I had never left anything before in a hotel room, and it’s horrifying to leave something so expensive and precious behind!

And here, I was lucky. I normally wouldn’t have the phone number of the hotel we stay in that has arranged by someone else, but today I did. I-Vee had gone downstairs first to check out, while Bronya and I had struggled out with our many bags (she herself had many bags too). I pocketed the hotel keycard which was left in the room slot (to trigger the electricity) and didn’t return it to the reception because I was carrying too many bags. And it had the hotel’s address and phone number on it.

So I quickly dialed the number and spoke to a hotel staff (who seemed to be rather *blur*) and made him check with the cleaning staff for me. And yes, it was there.

THANK GOD!!!

(Which brings another issue to mind as to why they didn’t call me to tell me about my bag. You see, I’ve labeled my bag AND cameras with my name and phone number. But that’s another issue altogether)

I called the workshop organiser, Helen Fan, who was the one who also arranged the hotel for us, and asked her to pick it up for me. Fortunately she’s coming to KL tomorrow, and I can meet her then to take my bag from her.

Actually, if Helen wasn’t able to pick it up, I was prepared to drive all the way back there myself just to get it!!

Yes, I know I’m lucky. And I’m every bit grateful for that. I had once also left a cheque book behind at a cheque deposit machine in a bank on a Sunday. And when I went back, it was GONE… but someone saw me looking for it, and his friend was the one who kept the cheque book with the honest intention of giving it to the bank. I cannot say how lucky I was. It was perfect timing as well… that the guy happened to be at the machines when I returned to look for the cheque book. If he wasn’t there, he wouldn’t have seen me hunting, and wouldn’t have told his friend to pass the book back to me.

I know I was such a fool to have made such a horrible mistake, and I cannot say enough how lucky I am. Oh, and because I don’t have the photos, I can’t put anything up with this post yet…

So now I’m waiting for the bag, and I hope everything’s still inside. My wrist is stiff, but it will recover. And I’ve just had a cup of Milo, which, to quote I-Vee, has made me “warm, comfortable, and contented”.

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