Twist Potato (from www. twistpotato. com.my)

This post is quite overdue, but I must make this special mention because we had a fantastic sponsor who helped us!

Last year, in a bid to raise some money for our class fund, my homeroom of 2011 (5 Columbus) decided to open a stall during the school’s Merdeka Day carnival. This carnival was held in conjunction with the country’s National Day, and it was an open carnival which meant that public could come into the school. Many classes and clubs opened stalls to sell food, drinks, and products, and some ran games stalls such as a dunking booth and even Haunted Houses.

5 Columbus wanted to set up a food stall that sold fried finger food (I can’t remember the name of what it was they wanted to make initially) and smores (marshmallows with melted chocolate served on cream crackers). The smores were deliciously fabulous, but the fried finger food that they tried to make did not work out so well. They showed me a photo of their failed attempt – it tasted quite good, they said. But it wasn’t in a presentable form. You wouldn’t have bought what they were trying to make.

I knew they were frustrated, and I wanted to help them find something foolproof that they could make. And honestly, the moment they told me they wanted to open a food stall, I already had the solution for them, although I wanted them to figure something out for themselves first. When they hit this roadbump, I immediately called Twist Potato Malaysia.

Twist Potato Malaysia is actually a division within Fresco Cocoa Supply, and this division sells machines that makes potatoes into a lovely spiral – hence the name “twist potato”. Even when uncooked, the shape of the potato is aesthetically pleasing.

However what would make the potatoes sell is not the machine, nor the shape. It was the taste. If it was delicious, no matter how it looked, the potatoes would sell.

And this was where I found Twist Potato really awesome.

The Twist Potato machine is very easy to use. Just a quick twist, and voila! Click on the photo to view the rest of the album.

Twist Potato Malaysia does not only sell the machines to make the spirals; they also sell their Magic Flour, as well as more than twenty different flavouring powder to accompany the twist potatoes. The key to the delicious twist potatoes lies not in the twist potatoes, but in their Magic Flour.

What’s so special about their Magic Flour?

The Magic Flour, which is made from their secret recipe, makes it so easy to cook a potato. All you need to do is add some water, oil, and salt; then coat the potatoes with the batter and deep fry them. Quite frankly, you don’t even need twist potatoes, or even potatoes. You can just slice potatoes thinly and coat them with the batter, or even use other foodstuff like fruits or vegetables. Coated with the Magic Flour batter and deep fried, they’ll taste better than our local delicacies such as goreng pisang or goreng nangka.

Twist Potato Malaysia helped me out without hesitation when I called them; I wanted to rent the machine, but instead they lent it to us for free, and even sponsored us three different seasonings. They even lent us their buntings which reduced our need to decorate our stall. All we needed to do was just buy the Magic Flour, and promote twist potatoes.

Actually, we didn’t even need to promote them. The twist potatoes promoted themselves.

The twist potatoes sold like hot cakes during the carnival; we sold so much more twist potatoes than our smores did. We had so many repeat customers, and the lines were so long. We made a lot of twist potatoes in advance, before the lunch crowd came in; but when the crowd really began to swell, the twist potatoes were snapped up so fast that we had to start taking orders instead. We didn’t expect the twist potatoes to sell out so fast; in fact, we had been quite worried that we wouldn’t be able to sell enough to cover our cost. Our home deep-fryers were not able to cook fast enough. Had we known we were going to sell out, we would have brought our own gas stove!

The stall busy selling Twist Potatoes. Click on the photo to view the rest of the album.

We still had orders coming in way after the official closing time of the Merdeka Carnival, and were forced to stop only when the carnival official politely but firmly told us that it was time to call it a day.

Thank you very much, Twist Potato Malaysia! Your wonderful twist potatoes sold so much that we not only covered our cost, we made a considerable profit. (In fact we had losses from the smores because they didn’t sell as well as planned, but the twist potatoes more than covered that loss.)

Hon Wye enjoying a twist potato! Click on the photo to view the rest of the album.

If you are looking for business opportunities with Twist Potato Malaysia, I would tell you that they are a fantastic company to work with, without a doubt. Even though we were merely using their machine to sell twist potatoes for just one day, they were very generous and they were willing to spend a considerable amount of time to teach me how to make the twist potatoes to ensure that they will sell. I tell you the truth – it is so easy to make the twist potatoes that are ready for sale. I didn’t even need to teach my students ahead of time; I brought all the items with me on the morning of the carnival, and spent about ten minutes teaching them what to do, and they took it from there.

I would also like to say : to 5 Columbus 2011, you guys rock! All of you really worked hard and contributed so much to the class through this stall. You know I miss you already!

I’ve got tonnes of things I want to share, but simply didn’t have the time to write. If you ask why should I bother now since some posts would probably almost a year overdue? … well, it’s because I think some things are really worth sharing.

So, don’t get shocked when you see me write about something that happened in 2011.

Stay tuned!

I have a tendency of reading horoscopes, even though I don’t really believe in them. In fact, I have this habit of reading my horoscope from many different sources until I find one that I like (because it has positive predictions), and that’s the only one I remember.

My sister snorted when I told her this, and asked me why I bother then. Well… I guess it’s just psychological. If I believe something bad will happen to me, then something bad will most likely happen. And likewise for good things, hence the focus on the positive.

And no, I don’t bother to remember the actual detailed predictions. I just remember the overall “it’s going to be a good year!” prediction.

Happy Chinese New Year, everyone!

Gong Xi Fa Cai! Happy 2012!

Anyway, just wanted to write a quick mention here that I have appeared on Soo Hon Wye’s blog!

Who is Soo Hon Wye and is he important? No, he’s not. He’s just a former student of mine starting his own blog. I’m not even mentioned by name. I thought it’s just cute how he had selected a photo with me in it to represent his school days.

By the way, the comment I left on his blogpost was true at the time it was submitted. He changed it accordingly after I pointed out the error.

That's me in Hon Wye's blog post!

Update 6:18pm: Hon Wye added my name in his blogpost after I wrote this post. Thanks, Hon Wye!

2011 was certainly a good year for me. It’s a year of many firsts for me, and a year of many memories. It was also a year of many tears, because you can never have too many good times without bad times. It’s a balance that’s required – as the Chinese say, the yin and yang.

There are some things too personal that I can’t talk about here on a public page, but I will say that among the many that have happened, there are three things I will definitely remember about the year: (1) I’ve finally managed to buy my own place, (2) I’ve finally broken the ceiling for my individual dance win, and (3) my dearest students.

(1) I will not discuss this at length, because I have no desire to let people know where I stay lest I get stalked O.O But what I WILL say is that it’s so great to finally be able to own my very own place! It’s so fantastic to be able to do it up and decorate it and do things the way *I* want to. It doesn’t have to be perfect, or to be beautiful, as long as it’s my own.

(2) People close to me – and those who read my blog – know that I compete in local dance competitions, but because I’m limited in my dance genre (line dance / jazz dance), I don’t get many chances to compete as I simply cannot afford to travel out of state or the country to be able to compete in other competitions. So I’m usually limited to maybe one or two dance competitions a year. And from the past few years, my highest individual win has always been second place. Even though I’ve won champion before, that was for team events. For the first time, I’ve managed to break that ceiling and obtain first place. And the best part was, I managed to win first place TWICE this year. I don’t mean to boast, but the feeling is indescribable. It feels as if all that hard work for the past eight years has finally paid off. The support that I have received both from friends and audience (whom I don’t even know) has been both humbling and strengthening. I am truly thankful for what I have been given this year.

Champion, baby!

(3) I love my students every year, and I don’t mean to make any of the students from the previous years jealous… but this year, I’ve been rewarded with some really awesome students. I had the opportunity to be the homeroom teacher of two very special classes – 4 Mozart in 2010, whom I also taught in 2011, and 5 Columbus in 2011. I was also fortunate to teach 5 Aristotle and 5 Galileo, and there are certainly some amazing students from all these four classes. But I really have to give a special mention to my homeroom 5 Columbus – you are the most united homeroom that I’ve ever had! My friends tire of hearing me talk about your class incessantly. It was great fun being with you on the class trips and working on class projects and selling twist potatoes with you. I am going to miss each and every one of you dearly! And yes, this also goes out to the students from my other three classes! You are the best batch I’ve ever taught!

5 Columbus 2011

So what’s in 2012 for me?

I don’t know. If I did, I’d be psychic.

What I would like for 2012 is for it to be just as good as, if not better than 2011. I hope my students would be just as awesome as my 2011 students. As for my dance competitions, well… I will just keep working hard and continue to do my best!

There are several other things that are in the works, but I’m not allowed to discuss that until things have been finalised.

I am not going to hope that 2012 is good. I am going to MAKE it good!

Happy 2012, everybody!

Happy 2012!

P/S: I don’t believe that 2012 is the end of the world, no matter what the Mayans said. Besides, even if it is, what I can do about it? I’ll just make the best of every day as long as I can!

The Movie: 2012

Anyway, I did write a post about a Groupon experience, but I haven’t uploaded it because it was in my netbook which I rarely used, and I kept forgetting to switch it on to post it. So now that I’m sitting in bed at 2am waiting for my hair to dry, now is a good time as any to get this posted up.

This post was written on 12th November 2011 in my netbook on the highway as my friend and I were making our way back from Johor Bahru (we were there for a wedding), so that’s why it wasn’t posted straightaway.

Anyway, here goes!

This isn’t my first Groupon experience, but I’m posting this up first because I feel that this is really important to get the word out about this spa experience.

Slimming Sanctuary. Image from www.groupon.my

I bought a voucher for a Spa package at Slimming Sanctuary for RM68 (worth RM348), which if you look at it, sounds like an incredible deal. Due to my incredibly hectic schedule of work and dance competitions, I was in desperate need for a massage, and I was fortunate enough (or at least, I thought so at that time) to be able to get an appointment on Saturday, 5th November, at the Damansara Utama outlet.

I say fortunate because I had bought a few vouchers for massage and/or spa, but when I tried to make appointments, all of them tended to be fully booked right up to the end of the year – the reason being that because the voucher was so cheap, they were oversold on Groupon. One example was a voucher I bought from Lizkhan Spa – I had so much trouble trying to make an appointment with them although they had extended the expiry date from the initial October 21^st to the end of December.

Anyway, so about Slimming Sanctuary. They have 16 outlets in 5 states, so I made my appointment at the Damansara Utama outlet because it was the closest to where I stay. The voucher promised 2 hours of spa and massage, but I got less than that. I arrived at the outlet at 4pm, but I left before 6pm, which means the spa and massage experience is way below 2 hours.

When I arrived,  I was asked to fill up a form about my personal details. This is normal for any service outlets as they like to keep customer details in a file which they can pull up later should the customer come again for another treatment.

I was then led upstairs to the locker area where I was assigned a locker to store my personal belongings. They didn’t have changing rooms though – I was told to go into one of the treatment rooms to change out of my clothes and into a towel. And this was the first part I didn’t like:  although the room was empty, this room had someone else’s clothes hanging on a clothes hanger on the wall. Evidently the girl who had changed thought this would be her assigned treatment room and left all her belongings there – I saw her handphone left by the sink. I voiced out my concern – I told the staff who was waiting outside that “there’s someone else’s clothes here” and was told that it didn’t matter, it was only for me to change.  Personally I thought this was unprofessional and it actually made me feel uncomfortable. Plus, although I was given a clothes hanger to hand my clothes, there were no other hooks for me to hang my clothes on because the only hook in the room was already in use. I had to hang the hook in what was literally a hole in the wall (I don’t know how the hole got there. It looked like someone had accidentally punched a hall in the partition wall). And just as I was about to step out of the room, the girl who originally used the room came barging in, and she looked rather surprised to see me there. I can’t blame her now, can I?

I was given a cup of water to drink before being taken to their steam room to sit for about 15 minutes. The steam was nice and hot – I’ve always enjoyed sitting in steam rooms when I used to be a member of Fitness First. After that, I was taken to a Jacuzzi bath tub where they added milk powder to the water and I sat in it for a further 15 minutes. To me, the steam and Jacuzzi were certainly the best parts of this spa experience. I felt totally relaxed.

One of the staff was already holding the hanger on which my clothes were on as she waited for me, and led me downstairs to the massage room. I was given disposable panties and for the first time, a piece of cloth “bra”. In all my previous experiences, I was usually just covered with a towel , which usually sufficed.

I was supposed to get 45 minutes of body massage, 15 minutes of scalp massage and 5 minutes of foot spa, but the masseuse gave me an option to convert the foot spa into an additional 5 minute body massage because the foot spa – as fantastic as it may sound – was merely “brushing the feet”. So I agreed because I love massages anyway. The scalp massage wasn’t a separate massage; it was part of the overall massage experience.

The masseuse – Rohaini – is a Malay lady from Teluk Intan, Perak, and she did traditional Malay massages. She had very strong hands and my body actually ached during the massage. However to me this was normal because in every massage I’ve been to, my body always suffers because I have various problems that I need fixed through massages. The masseuse said she was glad I understood that my massage was expected to ache after a massage; she said some clients who hadn’t known better had even blamed her for their aching muscles. I have a lot to say about this – I will write that after I finish writing about this experience. Please refer below at *!

Upon completion, I changed back into my clothes, and this time it was the sales staff led me back upstairs to get my things out of the locker. She hovered while I took my things, and hurried me downstairs to her office, without giving me any time to fix my hair.

At the office, she of course tried to push me into signing up for one of the packages – specially for Groupon users, she claimed – which I have to admit sounded very attractive. One package offered “buy 5 free 5″, another “buy 10 free 10″; both of which had 0% instalment payment options. However, considering how my experience so far didn’t particularly leave a good taste in my mouth, I refused repeatedly until she finally stopped trying to make me sign up. There was an immediate change in her attitude toward me; although she still stayed polite, I could see that all she wanted to do was get me out of the office.

*Now, about the massage experience. I was feeling fine all of Saturday and Sunday after the massage, and had even attempted a physical activity for a dance on Sunday. But starting on Tuesday, the muscles on both sides of my neck started to hurt, and I couldn’t turn my head left or right, as if I had a stiff neck. I slathered on heat cream and on Wednesday, the right side of my neck had healed, but my left side was even worse than the day before – in fact, it was swollen! I had to ice it to make the swelling go down. It was slightly better by Thursday, and it was only through diligent application of a Chinese wonder ointment called “Zheng Gu Shui” that I saw a slight daily improvement. But one week later, it still hurt (as of time of writing – so as I was typing this in my netbook, my neck was killing me).

So this brings to mind what she said – how some clients blamed her as their bodies hurt during the massage. In my case this time, I’d say, yes, she is completely to blame. She had also been so full of herself, saying how good she was at massage and how some of her clients always come back to her saying they prefer her massages to other types of massages (Balinese, Thai, etc).

Note added 26 Dec 2011: I mentioned this experience to another masseuse later, who was horrified to hear about my neck. She said that I was very lucky not to have contracted a fever. She explained that the neck was a very sensitive area, and that the neck must never be pressed if the client has high blood pressure.

I am very thankful I hadn’t signed up for the packages. In fact, I wouldn’t even recommend anyone going to Slimming Sanctuary given this terrible experience that I’ve suffered.

And yes, in some ways, I regret buying this voucher. Now I’m worried about the other massage vouchers I’ve bought, and am wondering about how good their massage therapists are. My friends say – and now I do agree – that they never try a massage unless they have been recommended by someone they know.

Looks like the sale of these Groupon vouchers may not necessarily be a great thing after all.

Spa experience: 2/5
Massage experience: -5/5
Service: 1/5
Overall: 0/5

I was first introduced to Groupon when a friend sent a Facebook link to me about a deal she had bought for herself. When I first saw it, I didn’t quite get what it was. I thought that the deal was too good to be true. RM45 for a voucher to buy a service worth RM119? I wondered if it was some kind of Internet scam – who would offer such a whopping discount? But after I read their website content, I was more assured. And I don’t rely on the info from that source only – I always research by reading about them on neutral third party sources. Groupon seemed genuine enough, and anyway at only RM45, I figured if I ended up being cheated, it’s a very inexpensive lesson learnt.

So I signed up and bought the voucher. It is one of the most hassle-free online purchases I’ve ever made! Many websites, during “checkout”, always try to prompt you into buying other things by showing you a list of “items you might be interested in”. I don’t usually blame those websites… unlike physical stores, there are plenty of small items placed on purpose near the checkout counter to encourage you to make those last-minute tiny purchases. But in an e-store, there is no such possibility; hence they will come up with lots of prompts and recommendations to try to make you buy other things, so you end up spending another 2 minutes just to get past all that to pay for your items. So the good thing about these discount voucher websites (and this is not limited to Groupon only) is that you only buy what you want – and not prompted into buying more!

How to make payment? Well, like all e-commerce sites, Groupon accepts Visa and MasterCard. In addition, because it’s all about local deals, they accept online bank transfers via Maybank2U, which is operated by the largest bank in Malaysia. If you’re worried about security, fear not – the online credit card payment gateway is run by iPay88 which is a local online payment gateway. So far I have had no cases of fraud (but I could be one of the lucky ones). Anyway, it also largely depends on your credit card company to be able to prevent fraud cases from happening. I use Citibank, and Citibank usually stops the payment from going through if they suspect a fraudulent transaction; if this happens, a simple call to the bank usually sets it right.

So, the ease of genuine payment created another problem for me – the tendency to buy a lot of vouchers on Groupon…

Next story: Review of my first Groupon voucher experience!

What exactly is Groupon? Well, in a nutshell, Groupon is an online platform for businesses to sell specific services or products to the public at discounted prices. It is a win-win situation for both the business and the consumer – the businesses get to advertise themselves (sort of) and sell more, whereas the consumer gets to make purchases for said services or products at very much reduced prices. And mind you, some of the discounts are mind-blowingly low.

Groupon is of course not the only online platform around – there are several in the local market, and even more worldwide.  So far I’ve only tried Groupon and Hahah, but so far my experiences with the Groupon vouchers were quite positive. I’ve read some of the complaints other people have made about other platforms, and it scared me so much so that I’m unwilling to try them. I’ll write more about those in another post.

You can find virtually anything on Groupon, ranging from food to beauty, hair and nail services to amazing adventures. But what’s for sale at that point in time depends on what companies are selling. All items have a deadline for purchase, and an expiry date of use (not the same dates). How does it work? Basically, you have to set up an account with Groupon. You can either sign up, or just login with your Facebook account (the wonders of Facebook!). If you see a voucher you’d like to buy, make the purchase (payment via bank transfer or credit card), and voila! The voucher will magically appear in your Groupon voucher list. The Groupon vouchers can only be used AFTER the deadline for purchase, and the expiry dates depend on the vouchers that were purchased.

Some of the things I’ve tried were very interesting, and well, since I have a blog patiently waiting for my keystrokes, I thought I’d start writing reviews as well as about my experiences.

OK, I’m aware I’m probably giving Groupon free advertising, but honestly, it really is very worth it!

Click on the following link to sign up:

http://www.groupsmore.com/r/zyen-hoo

If you sign up from this link, I’ll get a RM2 cashback token – and so will you!

Stories coming soon!

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!!

This is the first time since 2007 that I didn’t put up my annual “birthday wishlist”, which is more of an ongoing online joke I have with my readers, but it also contains some useful tips for friends who genuinely don’t know what to get for me for my birthday.

And I was going to, but I’ve been inundated with work and it’s already little more than a month since my birthday has passed. I haven’t even written about the Jukari Fit To Flex experience.

Maybe I’ll put my birthday wishlist up anyway and turn it into a Christmas wishlist…