'Tis the Season To Be Jolly

So sorry for the long wait, and so here it is.

Well, Christmas on the whole was a rather quiet affair, (yes, Ellana, really.) Must say, though, I really had a whole lot of fun. Before I went back to Ipoh for the 25th, I went carroling with the St. Mary's youth group. Now let me tell you, this really was not as it seemed. Most people who have heard of St. Mary's church are under the impression that they are a very pious sort of churchgoers, you know, hymms, rosaries, the sort. So I (doubtfully) thought that this would be a quiet event as well, but since Vanessa asked me to go, well.

Not on your life.

I tell you honestly, these bunch of teenagers were one of the noisiest things I've ever heard(believe me, I've heard quite a few things) and some of it, honestly, was quite annoying. You'd be annoyed too, if some dude starts singing "Sweet Child Of Mine" next to your ear in an extremely loud bass voice while you were trying to take a nap.

Now most of it was really fun, and we sang, ate(Thanks again, Mike.), and talked all the way from one house to another. The trip took us more than half a day, just because the driver took his "shortcuts" and landed us in the middle of nowhere with some "sakai" and "jakun" looking at us with their mouths half open. Each house only took us half an hour, maximum. The time was all spent on travelling. (not that I'm complaining, with all the fun we had on the bus.)

Ooookay. *deep breath*

After the event in KL, went back to good ol' Ipoh via Plusliner bus. Got on the night bus, no hassle nor jam, got to the terminal on time, all that. I was thinking "Yay! going back to Ipoh!!" all the way to the bus and about 20 minutes into the trip.

Bus started out slow........towards the direction of Ipoh.

30 minutes later.........still slow. I thought "Okay, maybe he needs to get out to the highway."

After getting to the highway........... STILL slow. I was looking to see if anything was blocking his way, and from the looks of things, other passengers were doing the same thing as me. Cars were lined up to a point which I couldn't really what was going on, except some flashing lights.

Turns out there was a police check. Out of the blue, in the middle of the night. Well, alright. Though I suppose that's why Malaysian Police are called "chai lou" in Cantonese. "Chai lou" directly means "guess man". They never really seem to have a reason to do the things they do. They just say "based on a private source" most of the time. Must be the the Chief of Police saying "Hm....I feel that there are going to be people speeding/drinking/(you name it kesalahan) tonight".

Well, after he passed the police check line, AND was out of sight, the speed suddenly went from 50 km/h to about 120 km/h. (I guess he felt the need for speed too.) All was well from that point, (except from the snoring coming from the uncle beside me) and needless to say, we all got back safe and sound.

Well, after I got home, played with my cat a little, things quickly started to get boring. Sitting at home with nothing to do everyday may seem nice, but until you try it, you won't know how dull it really is.

After a while, I got used to the process of just enjoying the day (namely, being lazy.) and found litle things to do like walk around the neighborhood and watch TV with my parents.

Yes, lazy just like this.

The 24th came.

There was a barbecue buffet at my church on Christmas Eve, and so I went with my parents. Saw most of the old HM gang there, had some fun, ate some, and then went for the midnight service at about 10 p.m.

On Christmas, I......had nothing to do.

On the 26th, went out drinking with Aaron, Pui san, Kim, Diming, Dijie and Raymond. I was the "transporter" for the evening, and thankfully I do not get drunk easily.

Had Smirnoff vodka for the evening.

Went to the usual spot, a jazz bistro in Casuarina hotel, and talked the night away. Aaron came back just in time, so we picked him up from the bus terminal and went straight to the hotel. Talked half our ears off, drank some, requested our(my) favourite songs, and the bartender, which I knew from somewhere back, very kindly gave us a staff discount on the whole deal. Diming kept drinking, cause we only ordered one bottle, which wasn't enough for him. So he ordered a Bloody Mary. AND he wasn't used to drinking. (for readers who don't know, a Bloody Mary is a kind of drink which is quite potent and takes some getting used to.) In the end, he ended up having to be shouldered out of the bistro.

He'll be fine.

After that, we went to a mamak stall in Greentown and tried to clear our drunkenness (actually, we were hungry.) and the night passed on. Dijie tried this thing called a shisha, which looked kinda wierd but smelled really nice. According to him, it was something like scented water vapor, but it looked like scented smoke going through cold water to me, so I didn't try it. After a while, we decided that was it and we all went home after that.

All in all, it was a really fun outing. Thanks guys.

Thanks again to the bartender whom so kindly gave me a discount.

Let it snow.