Busy Bangkok

Busy Bangkok, originally uploaded by lilsQuirr3l.

This picture was taken outside Central World Plaza, which is a shopping mall. There are also other smaller shopping malls around the are and at the end of the street is the largest 'Si Bin Hood' which is known to be very 'sia' (meaning any wish made will come true) but one would have to come back and thank the 'Si Bin Hood'. I don't know how true it is but if my wish does come true, I will definitely come back.

Not knowing much about Thailand, I am surprised to find out that Bangkok is so much more advanced compared to KL. It shows how much we are still lacking behind. It is also very internationalized as there are lots of Western food chain franchises and shopping malls with branded clothes. There are also lots of people and cars everywhere. This is so unlike shopping malls in Penang, which are such an eye-sore. There are hardly any shops left open, especially in Prangin Mall and Komtar.

I don't think I can ever drive in Bangkok. They drive so close that you can literally roll down the window and touch the car next to you. You would have to squeeze in to get into a lane or else you'll be stucked there forever. The jam is also very bad that it can take 5 times longer to get to a place during peak times. We took cab to get to places and they are very cheap. They don't charge extra for 4 people either.

Bangkok

Just came home from Bangkok, Thailand on Tuesday. It was a one week trip of fun, laughter and of course, tiring too. Will elaborate more when I get the chance to.

We are currently busy preparing for the my cousin's wedding - Aaron & Emily - this Friday at Park Royal. All my cousins, aunties and uncles are back too so it's one of the big family gathering. In fact, it's even more 'lau juak' than days during the Chinese New Year. So we girls are also busy updating each other about our 'busy' lives.

I also had the chance to go out with BK yesterday night after the delicious home-cooked seafood at my grandma's place yesterday. My cousin, Mei went along with us and it was fun too. We went to Coffee Bean at Gurney Plaza and just chat. But it's still not easy being friends...my mind was tumbling along a busy road.

Pickled fruits

Balik Pulau - pickles, originally uploaded by lilsQuirr3l.

Went to Balik Pulau on Saturday to get some rambutan, mangosteen and durians from the fruit farm. Grandma was talking to an aunt of mine who is staying there so dad and me took a walk to the market. These are pickled fruits soaked in some diluted vinegar. I love the ones made with mangoes. I saw the honey dried strawberries mentioned by 5xMoM at the market but it didn't look very appetizing to me. This M'sian delicacy is actually not very clean as the container are usually not tightly covered while some are not even covered at all. Since they are sweet, the flies tend to feed on them, some ended up drowning in the vinegar. However, I have yet to know anyone who face health complications eating them. They're good!!

Home garden

Home corner garden, originally uploaded by lilsQuirr3l.

This is the far corner of the triangular-like garden that we have. Parents and grandma have put in a lot of effort and money into this garden, giving our home environment a sense of nature instead of just a plain, concrete home. We have various kinds of fruit trees - mango, ampela (some kind of mango), lemon, keat lah (a type of lime), longan, papaya, durian (coming up soon) - vegetables - brinjal, cabbage, lady's fingers, chilli padi, pandan, basils - and of course, flowers and green plants! Dad also arranged it in a way that one can walk around the garden to look at the different plants and there are places to sit and chat. It is this garden that gives my parents and grandma something to pass their day with. Grandma spends her entire morning and evenings watering and weeding the plants. I'm so proud to have this garden. Dad is planning to create a flowing pond right now.

dim sum

Had dim sum for breakfast this morning at Long Beach. I just realized how much I miss the food when I had my first bite. Went for a short walk over at Lone Pine beach and came home around 11am. It feels so great to just do nothing and not have a schedule that I have to follow. I think I really do deserve this break and I think it's a good time to break because I were to continue, I would probably not be able to come back until end of the year. That means I would have miss the wedding and that would not be very happy outcome because I have never missed a family function except for ahkong's funeral, which I had no choice.

Talked to BK today too. It's kinda nice since it's like an update kinda call. He mentioned something about glad that I'm back home and going out tonight. I have no idea where are we going but I really do want to see him. But I don't really know how to react around him as friends. We've been together for so long I just don't know the right thing to say now..sigh, why does it have to be so complicated?

But life is just great at the mean time. It's just wonderful to be home with both my parents and grandma and just to spend time with them. It's been a long time since I've had such a wonderful opportunity since dad is always away and grandma used to stay apart for a while.

~contented~

home sweet home

woohooo!!!! I'm home! Mum and dad went to pick me up with their little Kancil and that was hilarious because my big giant luggage could not fit so it had to sit with me at the back sit. We went to visit grandma at Kampung Baru since mum said they might be waiting for me. How fortunate, they just opened a few durians that are really good - the 'ko liam ko liam' type - my favourite!!! Stayed for a while to chit chat. I realized that they seem to be speaking at a few decibles louder than I'm used to. I wonder if it's just me or if the Americans or to be specific, Michiganians seem to speak at a softer tone.

Reached home at 1am and ahmah came down to greet me. I was so happy to see her, but she cut her hair! She now has a boy-cut style, which actually makes her look kinda cute. We chat for a while and now I'm ready to turn in for the night.

I still can't believe that durian is the first thing I had since touch down! What a timing to come back - the tropical food season.

~lucky~

going home..

One more blog from Lansing. Just talked to dad on MSN. He's now at Dubai waiting for his next flight to KL then he'll be taking the bus to Penang, arriving at 10pm while I'll be arriving at 11.15pm. Didn't meant to tell anyone the exact time I'll be back as I wanted to surprise everyone at ahmah's house. But I got too excited when I found out Dad will be arriving at the same time. So I ended up blurting out - That's great! I'll be arriving a little after you! - Oh oh..had to explain the whole thing.

Follow up of yesterday's result, confirmed that the blue colonies are false positive. They are no different from my initial plasmid. That means that when I'm back from Penang, I have to start all over again from PCR. But I think I'm going to pick more blue colonies from the ligation with more vector. Maybe there are enough for me to grow them up and mass-produce the plasmid. Oh well, will wait till I'm back before I start thinking about it. At the mean time, I am bringing home some diluted nutrient agar to isolate some soil samples from my garden just for fun.

Finished packing a while ago and realized that I managed to fit everything in one large bag and one duffel bag so now my carry on is just my laptop, which is good. Today has been crazy since I woke up at 6am. Went to lab last night at 2am to set up cultures, came home at 4am and woke up at 6am. Wasn't too happy to wake up that early but can't really sleep either as there are too many things going on in my brain. Went to lab and start running gel electrophoresis for the remaining two digestion. That was when I confirmed that my blue colonies are false positive.

Then did some culture stuff to make sure my cells will stay alive when I'm back. I intended to stay only half a day but ended up finishing only at 4pm. Came home to grab a package to be mailed home then went back to lab for prepare potassium phosphate buffer so that I can bring it home. It is required to isolate bacteria from soil. Finished around 7pm and went to Target to get some candies and chocolates. When we got home, it was almost 9pm and I still had to do laundry because I don't want to live my dirty clothes sitting around for one month. Then had dinner, talked to Hannah and CP while packing and now I'm here. I just can't wait to go home! Already thinking about going for Roti Bakar near the airport when I arrive and 'keng cheh bee hoon' the next morning at the corner of Chung Ling High School.

~excited~

air-cond down

Came in to work this morning with lots of plans for the day. Then remembered that I have to go update my paper work for summer payroll. Went to the Office of International Students and Scholars and was told that I need both my passport and I-20. So I came back to the lab, put some stuff into the autoclave and went to OISS. By then, my nose was already leaky and that kinda threw me off hook for the rest of the day.

Went back to Biomedical and Physical Sciences Building (BPS), where my lab is at, and was told that there will not be air-conditioning today due to some maintenance. It was so hot and the air was stagnant as all the doors are air-sealed to maintain separate air-flow usually but it's not very helpful for situation like this. So we had to switch off all the lights and unused incubators. Kwi and Steph tried to use the PCR machine and it gave some heat block error, which is probably due to the heat in the building. The temperature is about 31oC, which is a less than regular M'sian weather but I just could not take it today because I'm unprepared and I am still having a sore throat and runny nose. But oh well, I should expect it since I'm usually like that in M'sia but it's so much harder to work when I'm feeling crappy. It does not help that I still need to confirm the plasmid before I go back.

By mid-afternoon, we all agreed to a cool break so we went for a long lunch at Panchero's by Grand River Ave. It wasn't very cooling in there but it was way cooler than in the building. When we got back to the lab, it was even hotter because the sun is already up high and it's shining straight through our lab window and I know plants benefit from it but I surely do not like the greenhouse effect. At 6.30pm, I got 12 blue transformants shaking and incubating at 37oC and the 30 ml culture for fluorescence protein purification was still not growing yet. So I left for the library hoping to get some casual reading done but it was closed. I ended up going to MSU Union and sat by the window while reading my novel. It was very enjoyable and relaxing and cooling!!!

Came back to lab and spent the entire night organizing stuff and trying to pack my stuff in my mind. I think I just have a little too much stuff to carry back..unfortunately most of the stuff are not mine. I definitely gotta learn how to say NO to my brother when it comes to asking me to do stuff or buy stuff for him. But oh well..it's too late now.

~hot~

awful flight

We got to Atlanta International airport at around 12noon to find out that we could not check in because the self-service kiosk could not find out flight number. The reservation ticket we had says that our flight is a Northwest flight that is operated by Atlantic Southeast Airline but, we were told to go to a Delta counter. Lined up for about 10 minutes while bitching about how the airlines are screwing us up when a Delta airline assistant came by us and told us to go to the Business Class counter. Went there and we were told that the flight is there and he was surprised that we could not find it on the electronic kiosk. So he just gave us our boarding pass to Minneapolis, MN and told us that we just have to get to our gate at Minneapolis and we'll get the boarding pass from there.

Passed through the security in a breeze and had a quick lunch at Wendy's. Unfortunately, our flight was delayed due to tyre problems. About 45 minutes later, we were boarded onto the plane and it was moving towards the runway when we were told that we have to turn back due to air traffic. But 1o minutes later the flight captain announced that we'll be departing forMinneapolis. We didn't thought that we would make it for our next flight from Minneapolis to Lansing as we arrived at 4.15pm for the 4.45pm flight. We walked from Concourse E to Concourse B, which didn't look very far but it felt like the longest airport walkway ever. It's moments like this when I'm glad to have technology such as the speed walking thing (what do we call that anyway?). When we got to the gate, the flight attendant was kinda mean to us for not getting our boarding pass. We were all cranky and tired and that's what we get when we reached there. He didn't even want to look up for our names to check if we are on that flight on not. He just told us to wait until he finish boarding this plane so that he can check on the next flights. It was only until everyone has boarded and he realized that there are 5 empty seats that he started asking our names one by one.

I was so glad when we took off 10 minutes later than the supposedly departure time. I was overjoyed to go home. Unfortunately, when we got to Lansing Capital City Airport at 7.15pm as scheduled, I saw a rainbow when the captain announced that we are landing. BUT, before we got to land, the captain announced that we have to wait above the clouds because there was a thunderstorm. There were also lightning so we hard to circle above the clouds until it ceased. But after about 45 minutes of circling, the plane was running out of fuel so we had to detour to Kalamazoo. I thought that would not be so bad either since I can just rent a car and drive back and it would probably be about the same time as the plane is gonna take. But they wouldn't let us down due to security issue. So we just sat and bitch to each other in the plane. We were all hungry and even more upset by then. The air stewardess wasn't very helpful either because he just sat there. He could at least entertain us or something, which was what happened in Steph's plane when she was stucked in Detroit during the thunderstorm.

After another hour of waiting, we finally took of to Lansing. That was a very scary ride as we can see lightning flashing. They were not close by but it sure was scary when we're flying so high up. It didn't help that my stomach was feeling queasy too. When we landed at 9.45pm, it felt like that's the best thing that have happened to me for the entire day. It sure is not one of my best days. I hope I won't be having any problems on my way home to M'sia or when coming back here. I would be even more upset as I would be by myself instead of with a group of friends.

~tired~

stuffed with science

On Tuesday, which was the 2nd day of the conference, Steph and me did not have anything planned in the afternoon so we went to the World of Coca Cola, which was kinda fun but I thought it was too expensive. We had to pay USD9 to get in and it only took us about 30 minutes to finish the whole place. It is simply a display of all the advertisement for Coke and the evolution of it's bottle and cans. There is also a kiosk of free drinks produced by Coca Cola from different places of the world. Since I'm not a carbonated drink fan, I lost out on that as it is unlimited drinks. However, I got a sip of the Fanta Orange, which I used to like when I was a little girl before my 'gee ku' added 'Or Kau' (a type of brandy I think) to my Fanta Orange. I also tried some lychee soda from Thailand but it doesn't taste anything like lychee at all.

Since Underground Atlanta was just right opposite of WofC, we decided to roam around there. Like other parts of downtown Atlanta, it is full of people loitering around the area. However, there are lots of nightclubs that looked really fun but unfortunately, we wanted to go to the Division N mixer at the CNN center. Division N is the division for microbial ecology. Unfortunately, we didn't know anyone there except for my undergrad mentor. So we just ate, hang around for a while and left. The food wasn't that bad either - bbq pork ribs and chicken fingers. We then went to crash the Marine Biological Laboratory mixer. They had tons of drink tickets left over but as usual, I only got water as I don't drink beer or carbonated drinks..yeah, I can get a little too picky with my drinks sometimes. Stayed there and chat until about 11.30pm, went back to the hotel and drop dead.

On Wednesday, after the morning session, we were all crying for a break because most of the seminars by that time, are more or less the same. It's kinda scary to feel that way because we've always thought that we've moved forward since the last decade. Unfortunately, it is still clear through these seminars that we've only managed to isolate less than 90% of the microbial diversity that is out there. I was intrigued by the research on coral reefs. I didn't expect to such diverse community at an environment so harsh as this but surprisingly, it is. However, they have no idea how the community affects the environment or vise versa. We still have a lot more work that needs to be done. Advancing in genomics does not seem to help as much as we thought it should. We've come to depend too much on it that we stop looking at the cells themselves. We have ignored life itself - we depends on DNA so much that we got ourselves into a trap where we no longer knows how to draw the line between species. We have to start living the moment.

Wednesday afternoon is the MSU mixer. It was probably the most fun night in terms of being social. I didn't recognize a lot of people except for the Young lab, some from the Whittam lab and of course, the faculty members. There were lots of alumnis there too. Unfortunately, they only serve finger food but one of them is the Thai style chicken satay (which cocunut sauce and peanuts instead of our regular spicy satay sauce). There are also all kinds of weird cheese, some even tasted spicy. The Young lab left early for dinner but since they wanted to go hang out after that, I did not follow as I was feeling kinda crappy. So I just hang out there and it was actually worth it because I actually get to talk to this guy that I think is really cute.

We were in the same class - MMG 801 - during my first semester here at MSU. I never thought that he would recognize me because he hardly looked my way and we never talked at all during class. After the last day of class, I never see him again and I never did thought about him since I didn't know anything about him. During the mixer, we exchanged eye contact a few times and I was kinda glad that he recognized me since people hardly remembers me. While I was waiting for Steph to finish talking to Dr. Esselman, I was standing by myself and he came towards me. We had a good chat and I sure find out lots of stuff about him. So that was the highlight of my day.

~giddy~

Day 1 Atlanta

Yesterday was the first day of the conference and my itinerary was full. It started out with a symposium titled “To Grow or Not Grow: Tactics and Strategies of Uncultivated Microorganisms”. I enjoyed the first talk on high throughput cultivation and Dr. Schmidt’s talk on trade offs between power and efficiency. The talk on persister cells is also interesting. The persister cells are a variation of a wild-type that was treated with an antibiotic that it is susceptible to. It is not resistant to the antibiotic as when it is treated with antibiotic, the numbers will decrease to leave another batch of persister cells. It is a phenotypic variation of the same strain of bacteria. The two remaining talks on resuscitation of dormant cells and the great plate count anomaly was not very convincing to me. If the presence of cultivable variant is required for the resuscitation of the noncultivable variant, then why isn’t most of the late colonies similar to the early colonies? Why are they of different species or even genus? I still think there are more evidence required before the idea can be widely accepted.

Went to the CNN Center for lunch – had Black Bean burrito which was really good. The weather was really hot and humid, almost like Malaysian weather but not as burning. We then went to explore the Student Lounge and found out that they serve free lunch there. But since we already had lunch, we just got some desserts, which were really good – it was a rich chocolate brownie! It was still early after we finished so we went down to look at more posters and later went for the afternoon seminar session. It was about Marine Microbial Diversity, which I thought was very interesting. In fact, the seminar and the poster session for that afternoon had inspired me to start considering looking at aquatic environment. Furthermore, it might be more applicable in the future since Malaysia is surrounded by aquatic environment.

The afternoon session finished around 5pm and we went back to Steph’s hotel – Super 8 motel. We freshen up and walked around downtown Atlanta. We intended to explore the merchandise mart which we saw on the map but unfortunately, it seems like the building is some office building with displays of all the merchandise company they have around here. So we ended up just walking aimlessly around downtown and when we got to some area with lots of people loitering around (kinda like Petaling Street, Kota Raya area), we decided to turn around and go get some dinner because it was getting dark and we didn’t feel very safe there.

Choosing a place for dinner wasn’t that hard because most of the places closed at 6pm. We didn’t want to go to Quiznos, which seems to be at every corner here in Atlanta, McDonalds or Hooters, which would be very inappropriate because it was just me and Steph. So we ended up going back to Hard Rock Café. I had a Caesar salad, which was really good and wasn’t too filling.

So that was my busy Monday. Full of science but I had fun too.

~great time~

weekend in Atlanta, GA

It’s soooooo great that the Fairfield Inn of Marriott has free internet access. It’s like the greatest thing man have ever invented. It’s not the daily e-mail checks made me so glad to have internet access but finding directions to get around in Atlanta. I was so busy getting the YLC construct to be cloned into the broad host range plasmid pMMB67EH that I didn’t think about printing out maps and looking for directions to the places I want to visit. At the same time, it gives me a chance to catch up with stuff online that I’ve been missing last week while I was so busy.

Got here on Saturday around 4pm.We didn’t have any transportation to get around and cabs are too costly. So we just explored Sheraton hotel, which was where we bunk over with Jason and Alicia on Saturday night. Then we walked around downtown Atlanta to get ourselves oriented. The Olympic Centennial Park is really beautiful. It has a water fountain that shoots out from the ground and they allow kids to play with it. I thought this is interesting because I’ve seen similar kind of fountain in Beijing, China and they wouldn’t allow anyone to go near it. The fountain becomes a musical fountain at night, similar to the one we have at Mines Wonderland.

Passing the Centennial Park, we walk by CNN Center and Phillips Arena towards the Georgia World Congress Center, which is where the ASM 105^th Meeting is held. We then went back to the hotel and chill by the pool before we went out for dinner at Hard Rock Café, Atlanta. Since I haven’t eaten at any Hard Rock Café before, I think it’s a really great place. The food is not too expensive either although I wish there was more healthy choices. The best thing there is the music. They played all the old rock songs like Bob Marley, Van Morrison and Led Zeppelin.

We were sitting close to a door that leads to some audio control room or something like that. While we were eating, this lady came by and requested that we move aside as she has to get something. Then another guy came along and asked the same thing. The manager then came to our table, apologize and offer to give us two free desserts, which I think was really cool because this would not happen in Malaysia at all.

On the way back from HRC, we drop by the liquor store to get some booze – got some Bacardi and Vodka along with some fruit juice. Went back to the hotel and watched Harry Porter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. After the show, we made some drinks after and went to midtown Atlanta around 11pm. We didn’t know which club to go but saw some people lining up outside of Eleven50 and we asked around. We were told that we should definitely check out this club so that was where we went. It is the first club in the States which plays techno that I’ve been to. Had two drinks – margarita and cranberry Vodka but had lots of fun. It’s been a really long time since I get to dance this crazy. But it didn’t feel that crazy because I was still thinking about the conference and feeling guilty about having too much fun when I have so much stuff to do.

Woke up around 10am this morning and went for a swim. Chill by the pool after that although I didn’t feel like it because the sun was coming up and I am definitely not looking forward to being dark since I’m going home soon. But I didn’t really know what else to do so I just hang out by the pool side with Heather, Alicia and Kacey but I was at the shaded area. Around noon, helped Kacey to check in at Westin Hotel, which is where she’s staying. She got some undergraduate award that allows her to stay at expensive hotels which are reserved the ASM. Went back to the hotel after that to take a shower and just hang around in the room until 3pm to check-in to Fairfield Inn. Once we checked in, we walked to the GWCC for registration. Before we registered, we walked over to the CNN Center to grab some lunch as we had not eaten anything the whole day. Walked back to GWCC to register and went for the opening talk on symbiosis.

After the talk, there was a reception where there are tons of food to eat and some bands and gymnasts as entertainers. The food was okay but as usual, it’s not very healthy choices. Stayed until about 9.30pm and came back to the hotel. So that was my busy busy weekend..it was fun but part of me wish that I’m back at Lansing working on my construct.

~fun~

going off..

*phew* What a hectic week. Lots of stuff has happened since I last posted an entry..in fact, so much that I don't have the time to post any entries or buzz around at other blogs I enjoy reading. Still busy right now..packing for Atlanta. I'm finally going!! Have been waiting for this trip for quite sometime and was actually not looking forward earlier today as I have so much more that needs to be done before I go back to Malaysia, especially since good results are coming, I am tempted to keep the tempo going. But who knows, the conference might actually be a good outcome if I can find someone to talk to about quantifying the fluorescence proteins I am working with.

Will update more when I'm back from Atlanta..as for now, I'm back to packing and planning the itinery for the next couple of days.

~anxious~