Tribute to Everyone and Everything in Miri, Part 1

Look at me.... while everybody's studying and pouring their all into the coming exams, what am I doing?? Blogging ~.~" Anyway, now that I come to think back, this blog was created 3 years ago when I first step foot in Miri... so... this post is somewhat a tribute to everyone and everything in Miri that has come to be a part of my life, and a re-cap of my life within the past 3 years.

This is gonna be a long post. So sit back and enjoy if you're.... actually planning to read it 0_0 Or you could always come back later with a cup of coffee to read it. ^_^v

You have been warned. Let us begin.

Part I - 3 years of Miri Life

Approximately 2 years and 9 months ago, I step foot into this place. I remember the day I first arrived clear in my mind as if I'd just been dumped here yesterday.

It was a Saturday, 2 weeks before the start of Semester 1 2008. The day was cold, windy, raining... and I remember seeing the sad face of the old bus driver as soon as I came out of the Arrival hall at the airport, holding a piece of paper written "Curtin University" on it. He's no longer here now.... sigh.... maybe his sad faced got the better of him.... =(

With the day being so cold, we all rushed on board the bus to take shelter, just to realize we were on a much colder refrigerator, freezer box more exacly.... being shipped 30km North to one of the most God forsaken towns in Malaysia.

For my first semester there, I chose 2nd worst (oh, nono... no... there's still worse) possible living environment to live in! The Lakeside Apartment!! Imagine being shipped to a deserted swampland covering a 3 KM radius, with only ONE way IN and OUT of the middle of a place called 'Nowhere'.... .... That can only mean one thing to any person in the right mind.... For a moment there I thought I was going to Prison!!?

If you think I'm bullshitting you. I'm NOT! Seriously.... Yes!... No!, just LOOK!

To the left is your airport, the middle the town area... though it still needs improvement, but at the moment... who cares? Coz we've got God knows where to your FAR right!

See??? It's like the most nonstrategic place to be dumped in. Much worse if it's a windy, cloudy, rainy dark day. And as if things could go badder.... the uni was literally a GRAVE the day I arrived.... the only soul I met, and talked to, on that Saturday, was the dorm officer showing me my room. I remember the guy looking slightly uneasy at the look of the empty dorms..... it's like when you watch those horror movies where something suddenly opens one of the doors and pounces at you.

The hostel worker opened the door to my room... "This is your room... ". I walked in.... inspecting the room with nothing to inspect in it.... there was just a floor, 2 walls, a window, a ceiling.... ah, well, and a bed without sheets, chair that creaks, table with moulds, and... an empty wardrobe..... hmm... I guess they wouldn't have filled the wardrobe with clothes would they....

"Check that everything is in place, and fill in the form over there." he said, pointing at a piece of paper on the table..... "What's there to bloody check???" I thought..... then he said "If there's nothing more I'll be off now~", and BEFORE I could even think of anything to ask, or even say 'Umm....', I turned my back to see him scurrying off down the staircase at the far end of the hallway............

So just to remind you. I was now in the middle of a swampland.... in the middle of nowhere. I even had to check my phone to see if there was a signal =.=".... to reassure myself I was still on earth.

 Image credit to Google Earth

Can you just bloody look at the patch GREEN all around!??  Yes! In case you're still wondering...... That IS Curtin University Sarawak. And look at the picture, barely HALF of the picture is in proper view from a satellite photo. Now you know what I'm talking about....

After days of settling down.... and finally understanding how the word "Home Sweet Home" came into being.... you think that the worst is over. Far from it.

For the first week of uni.... we learn how to Decipher Mad Max's Timetable schedule

Those of you in Curtin Miri, but came later than me.... here's a Review of what our Timetable looked like during my first year here.

So.... I'll let you in on something.... That, is ONLY the FIRST PAGE.... MONDAY, out of 5 pages of timetable.... and this isn't even a FULL page.... it's cropped to only about 2/3rd of the whole page, because if I included the whole page, all you'd be seeing is patches of colourful design that would make it into your collection of High Resolution 24 inch widescreen monitor wallpapers.

How I managed to find my classes was a miracle by its own. Thank God (and Curtin) they changed the timetable to a much more clever and humane method the very next sem. Oh, and did I mention that the timetable changes nearly EVERY WEEK??? means we have to 'decrypt' that colourful wallpaper everytime a new Monday comes along.


And then....

2 weeks into the sem. You realize you have a room mate that wakes after hearing the alarm, just to shut it off, just to go back to sleep, and wake up later not realizing he's waken up before. In fact, living with a room mate who has classes EARLIER than your own kinda gets on your nerves.... especially if you've been watching David Letterman's Late Night show the night before.... but of course we don't have that here.... but who EVER does wanna leave the bed at 7am in the morning?? Not me...?

So on a regular schedule, I turned into his alarm clock.... I woke up to HIS alarm, to wake HIM up.... and go back to sleep. And I guess he has someone to thank for that, hmph!

Then.... in KK, I "Lived to EAT", but in Miri, I "Eat to LIVE"... During the first month here in Miri... I starved every night... wondering what to eat. And living in that hell-hole in the middle of nowhere just meant that even if we called the 1-300-88-2525 Pizza delivery, they wouldn't even ACCEPT your order BECAUSE YOU WERE TOO FAR!!

If I didn't watch National Geographic, I wouldn't have known about so many animals and insects in this world. But then.... National Geographic didn't tell me about the tonnes of Mosquitoes in Miri!!! For the first 2 months in Miri, we had to learn to,

1. Dodge mosquitoes.
2. Go home before 6 pm to avoid being on the Mosquito's buffet menu.
3. Learn not to open your mouth when you ride a bike at night, or else you'll be having mosquito buffet, freshly served live mosquitoes, straight to your mouth.
4. The last and most important lesson. "Ridsect is your Friend"

A little re-cap for those of you who haven't read my previous blog posts before:

My hands looked like balloon hands from slapping so many of these

The tonnes of Vampire mossies killed within a sweep of our friendly neighbourhood weapon - Ridsect.

Ah... you can enlarge the photo if you think you can'see enough of those tiny buggers, in fact
I challenge you to count all of them =)

Don't think I need to explain more about the mosquitoes.... or you could go here to see my previous posts.

Soon though... the fast forward button starts kicking in.... and everything just flies past.... soon, you're looking at exams....

Exam in High school is one thing. In fact, I nearly forgot how exams in high school was like, until I read this previous post of mine.... which reminded me of my naughtiness and stupid acts.

But people in uni take exams SUPER seriously..... in fact, so seriously that I still can't deal with it the way they deal with it till today. Until this very last 2 weeks here... I'm still like "Hey, yo~ waddap waddap~" when I enter the exam hall.... but everyone else looked like Halloween or Ghost festival came early this year.

In fact, I even have such a 'memorable experience' at the library during exam period in my first semester here. Reading it just reminds me that it seems I'm still the same right now.... blogging long and nonsensical posts while everyone is worshiping their textbooks for the upcoming exams.

However.... time flies.... before I knew it, a sem had passed.... and I was in my second semester in this dreadfully mosquito infested place.

I was in luck, I moved out of Lakeside, found a place with my other friends, not too far from the bus stop, and all was good... .... =)

********

For the 2nd sem in Curtin, I did quite a lot of stuff. Namely,

1. I took a Commerce subject, Management 100, as my elective. You know when people say Science and Commerce totally don't mix??? Trust me, Believe them;
2. Then I joined CV! (That's Curtin Volunteers for any of you thinking it's "Curriculum Vitae"... you can't JOIN a Curriculum Vitae anyway ~.~");
3. I witnessed Boulevard mall throw a panic event where you get to see people running, no kidding, RUNNING~!! down the "UP" elevator;
4. We had a Steamboat dinner~!! For mooncake festival, and other fun stuff;
5.  I joined the John Curtin Weekend for the first time, had a bone jolting better than Ogawa massage 6 hour road trip into one of Sarawak's long houses, where if suddenly the Tribe leader decided you looked juicy for supper, you had no where to run to;

And among these I enjoyed the JCW trip the most... Even though sitting in a Hi-Lux cruising across moon-crater roads at 100km/h doesn't help keep the Mc. D you ate that afternoon in your stomach; But the experience I had over there, with the people, the nature, the rivers, the waterfalls.... after witnessing all that, all is forgiven. LOL~

Those were among the more intriguing things that happened throughout the second sem, and since I didn't wanna bore you with tonnes of words.... yea.... that's about it for 2nd sem.

********

3 months of holiday free-flowed like water into the desert sands..... gone in no time.

And by February 2009, I was back in Nowhere land. As life in miri went by, life there started to feel.... 'normal'.... or at least I thought so....

By my third semester, most of the things to be explored in miri had been explored; things unseen had been seen. With my camera now though.... I'm happy that I actually managed to 'document' more of the things that happen now.... like this one....

was the "Attack of the Clowns" on Curtin Open Day, 4th of April 2009

But there's always ONE THING in miri that will NEVER go away. And that is, Boredom.

If you get bored back at home, Fine~, you turn on the TV, go out with friends, go to the beach, throw a party, but in Miri?? Boy oh boy, without knowing many people, and having only a pair of Legs as transportation, we can't go around jolly-ing while exams are around the corner can we??

So, out of all the boredom we can get in miri, I decided to learn something new~ Frisbee~!! For all you know, frisbee was a game Dogs played. But I found out that I was wrong about that.

Then as exams are approaching, stress + boredom, makes wonders happen.

 

And this, was the product of "Stress + Boredom + a housemate suffering from (stress + boredom)"..... we did 2 clips in fact..... another one which you could view here, if you bothered to.

Before I had time to make a 3rd one.... the 3rd sem was officially over. And the crazy ex-classmate + housemate + coursemate + "brother" who had been with me for 1 and a half years was transferring to Perth. And I don't think anyone else would be as crazy as her to do such silly things with me anymore.

********

4th Sem arrived. With my best mate flown 3,744 km away to Perth, and her fun roomie moving out as well, things seemed to be much more boring.... SOOoooo boring that I actually had a whole post dedicated to the feeling of being bored, entitled: "The Definition of Boredom"

So for my 4th Sem, I spent my time conquering game after game of First-Person-Shooters, Strategy and Real-time strategy games, mini-games, text based games, you name it.... and I spent even more of my hours on Movies, animes and stuff to keep my mind off the boredom.

The only new thing that came out of my 4th sem was 'Prom Night'.... which.... although nothing too amazing, I'm just glad I went and managed to get some nice photos like:

One of my favourites for the night, though a bit blurry

********

Semester 1, 2010, Year 3 Sem 1.

This semester was practically MapleStory Semester. From March all the way till June, I was basically Mapling my way through the semester. I updated my blog less, watched less anime and movies, worried about studies less.... all because I was stuck to Maple.

 GBIRD is me.

Yea, the 3 of us are dead in this picture.

We committed suicide for the fun of it =)

 
I don't know why, but although maple is a stupid, childish, and a super-duper time wasting game, filled along with loads of 14 year old's who haven't got a spanking for not using manners properly yet.... but I like this game....

And I also love the stupid times we spend together, just wondering about a virtual game, when we can't meet up in real life to see each other.

And the best part of Maple, is CHIT-CHATTING. You know, if you asked me to choose between chatting in Windows Live Messenger (aka MSN), or Maple, I'll choose maple ^_^ The cute and childish environment filled with Emoticons just make it so much fun to sit down, chill-out, and talk nonsense.

I could write a whole lot about the fun and idiotic things about Maple I'd love to share with you guys, but this post isn't specifically about maple. So, next time maybe.


Once again, I CANNOT cease to emphasize more that Miri is a place Sooooo boring, that... you would lose your mind if you didn't find something to do. And that.... was when you realize you could do things you never knew you could. No, I didn't realize I could fly, I wish I could though..... one day... suddenly realize I had some kind of superpower out of the boredom.....

Ok, back on topic, I just suddenly, out of the blue, learnt to Draw~ even if just a bit.

Yea, I know, the proportions are off and this and that, but hey.... I only drew for like, 2 months? That's when you know.... maybe boredom isn't necessarily so bad after all.

Then.... once again, time flowed like water swirling down the toilet bowl whenever finish your business.... And it was my final Semester.

********

At long last.... I survived all the way to the near-end of this 3 year long stay.

And before I left Miri, once and for all, and never to come back again, I had to do one thing, for sure.... BRUNEI~~!! Nearly every student in Curtin would have had tried having Sushi in Brunei. It's fresh, cheap, a LOT, and is the only thing that's lived up to the word "Delicious" for the 3 years I've been in Miri (but then again the sushi is in Brunei, so I guess Miri doesn't get credit)

One of the dishes.

There's many photos of food, but this ain't a food blog, so go google up sushi photos if you're suddenly craving for it, and don't hold me responsible for making you hungry.

Soon, there was Curtin Open day once again. And this time, there were Kites~!

There were pretty cool kites where my photos don't even describe HALF of what I see.

You really had to BE THERE to see everything in full view.

Then, for the last time in my Uni life, I decided to join the JCW Event once again... Though it wasn't as enjoyable as the first one.... meh... I guess it's still an experience....

I had quite a mad night there.... I still can't quite believe I actually got myself drunk on 'tuak' (local wine) and was chit-chatting nonsense with the elders and senior committee members till 2am in the morning.... they sure love to see their guests drunk eh?

During this last sem, I also managed to round up a couple of guys for some rounds of "Call of Duty" at Miri's Cyber Cafe. Going to the cyber was always fun, but not so when you enter a cyber filled with headphone equipped computers and people all minding their own business.

Coz you see, back in KK.... our cyber cafes had big ass altec lansing speakers that shook literally the whole cafe with 1 or 2 of those, and guess what, we had FIFTY computers, so that's 50 big ass speakers to go with. So whenever we sit down and play, the place is already so deafening that you could scream to your heart's content and no one would even hear you~ And that just makes playing COD so much more war-like.

Then for the past 1 month, I'd been busy on my Final Year Project, on that so-called "Intelligent Surveillance and Automation System". And after a month long worrying and fussing about whatever makes it so 'Intelligent', it finally came to an end 2 days ago, with a presentation to 9 Electrical and Computing Department lecturers.


Presenting to a group of people who has a level of intelligence 5 to 10 times yours makes you suddenly feel so.... insignificant. You think that "Ah... don't worry, its all good.... it's under control, don't sweat it, it's not a big deal..." right up until the moment you're standing before that group of people who knows MORE than what you're talking about..... and then the first greeting you feel like saying for your presentation is  "SSSShhhyt...."

But anyway, it was an experience.... one of the coolest things I experienced within my 3 years here in Miri.

********

Before I could even stop and stare at what I've been doing for the past 3 years, it was all over, well, nearly.... if you wanna put it that way.

After being in Miri for 3 years, you can't help but feel, maybe this place isn't so bad after all, even though, like I said before, it's smack in the middle of Amazon and basically Kingdom of the Insects as far as Malaysia is concerned. Trips downtown cost RM2.50 bus fare, one way only, and that's a 40 minute crawl to the city in the bus.

In fact, I've also done my share of crazy things with my friends here in Miri, and it's a place that's turned from being alien to a sense of belonging. 3 years.... I still can't believe I'm getting so old already....

To sum it all up, that's basically my whole experience in Miri.... the 3 years, the time spent, the time wasted, and everything within, of course, there are things I missed and stuff I couldn't include, but this post is already getting ri-donk-ulously  long.... so, I'll leave it at here.


Nevertheless, my days in Miri are coming to an end, and although I've taken for granted many things here in Miri, like the cheap food, the vast and infinite sky, the unpredictable weather, the laid back environment, and most of all, that feeling of.... Boredom.... I think I'm gonna miss that feeling once I step out into the society and start work.

Ultimately. Miri... isn't that bad of a place once you get to know it.


We'll be parting soon.... very soon.