University of Malaya Convocation 2015

19th & 20th October 2015

Two of my younger brothers were having their graduation last month, one on 19th October and another on 20th October. Since I took leave for both days, I volunteered to become their photographer on their graduation days. Since we reside at Selangor, it's not far from UM, but not that near either, if one stuck at Federal Highway, it would be so near, yet so far. So, We left the house at 5.30am and reached UM before 6.30am, normally during non peak hour at afternoon, the trip would normally take two hours. If peak hour at the morning, give or take around three hours. Well, my family would rather reached early than stuck at the traffic jam, so, we left early.

The graduates were instructed to gather at the designated area by 7.30am, since parents were not allowed in that early, I accompanied my parents to have breakfast at one of the food stalls manned by the various societies or colleges in UM. After that, my parents enter the DTC, while I waited outside.

Dewan Tunku Canselor of University of Malaya (DTC)

Parents queueing up to enter DTC

Graduates and family members leaving the DTC after the convocation ceremony

Buying Skin Care Online

I didn't buy stuffs online up until two years ago, however, after I first bought a aluminium bathroom rack from a shop in Rakuten. I became quite addicted to online shopping, the highest record was three orders per week and I am a member of Rakuten, 11street, Zalora and Lazada. I am ok right now, I just bought what I needed, if there's any sales, I would buy first to stock up. But the urge to buy is really toned down now. 

The first skin care product I bought was from the Guardian Pharmacy shop in Lazada, My night cream then was almost finished, so I was thinking to get a cheaper night cream, I saw the Olay All In One Fairness Night Cream when I was browsing the Lazada website. It's priced at RM25, for me, it's quite reasonable, however, I kept this in my cart until I had enough items in my cart to qualify for the free shipping. When I finally have enough items, actually the total price was way much higher than the minimum required for free shipping. Hahaha! I bought four items from four different vendors and all arrived at different time. This Olay Night Cream came last. Initially, I thought after I bought the things, all items would be sent to the Lazada warehouse to consolidate (like the one people did in Taobao), then only sent to the buyer. Instead, all came at different time. For this night cream, since it's only one item in the parcel, it's not properly transported, some of the creams stayed on the lid. It must have gone through very rough handling So, I started to use the night cream by scrapping it off the lid. I didn't find it difficult though. 

Olay Natural White All In One Fairness Night Cream

Then, after the Olay Night Cream, I saw the promotion of StrawberryNET in Rakuten. The Exuviance Soothing Toning Lotion was priced at RM89.10 and the shop offered free shipping. I have never buy Exuviance Soothing Toning Lotion from the beauty salon before. However, from the other Exuviance products that I bought from the salon, I would say that it's very cheap for the 212ml lotion. Even the Exuviance cleanser that size was priced more than that from the salon. Plus, I tried the soothing lotion before (the salon gave me some free samples after I bought almost RM600 of Exuviance products), it's not bad. So, I planned to switch to Exuviance Soothing Toning Lotion after I finished up my Shiseido D Program toner. Seeing the price was so tempting, so I put it in my cart along with a Fascy Moisture Bomb Hand Cream. I bought the hand cream because it looks beautiful. 

Exuviance Soothing Toning Lotion and Moisture Bomb Hand Cream Milk (bought from Strawberry.net)

Mr DIY Adhesive Wallpaper For The Bedroom

I have been thinking to buy some wallpaper to stick to my bedroom walls for a while, however, I kept procrastinating, finally, it's my mother who actually bought the wallpaper to re-decorate my little brother's room because the paint in his room was peeling like nobody's business. My room was in similar situation, but in smaller scale. Well, it was last painted more than 10 years ago, and since only the lower side was more serious, I think the peeling was due to the dampness in the room. And a fresh new coat of paint will not be helping the situation unless one is prepared to repair the wall (scrap the paint away, patch the holes, sand the wall to make it smoother), it is quite time consuming and expensive. So, wallpaper is the second best choice to stop the further paint peel off, just cover it up!

Apart from the ugliness of the wall, the peel off paint was a mess to clean too, the wall couldn't be scrub with, any force on the wall would cause the paint to further peel off and it's not very hygienic. Below shows the situation of the peel off.

Paint peel off

Paint peel off

I tagged along to buy the wallpaper in Mr DIY. When we went there this morning, we took some time to choose the design. Initially, my mom was interested in a light colour 65cm x 5m wallpaper, however, it's the only one left, definitely not enough. So, finally we chose the 45cm x 5m wallpaper with rose design because we could find 8 rolls of it, it's bad if half way through, no material to continue and left a half finished job, more is always better than insufficient.

Wallpaper from Mr DIY (8 rolls of 45cm x 5m wallpaper and 2 rolls of 10m sticker) 

Naruko Night Gelly (Rose & Botanic HA Aqua Cubic Night Gelly EX and ampm Super Triple HA Night Gelly)

When I went to Taiwan last year, I bought many MIT skin care, that included 3 bottles of night gelly from Naruko. The Watson Taiwan was having a buy one free one promotion for Naruko products, and there was a group of girls who were very excited and kept telling me and my friend how cheap it was compared to Malaysia. Although I had never use any of the Naruko product before, me and my friend (my friend CY watched a lot of Taiwanese programs and she knew about the Naruko) got influenced and bought their famed products, the night gelly. I bought 3 bottles and CY got 5 bottles. I got two bottles of Rose & Botanic HA Aqua Cubic Night Gelly EX for the price of one and for the ampm Super Triple HA Night Gelly deal, I shared it with CY, so I paid half price for it.

Well, I always wondered why the retailers loved the buy one free one promotion, I prefer direct 50% discount because sometimes, I just didn't need two of the same items. Either it would expired before I could finish the product or I fall out of love with the item, or worst case I had to stop using it due to complications on the skin. Personally, I really think that discount is better than buy 1 free 1 promotion.

I started to use the Rose & Botanic HA Aqua Cubic Night Gelly (very mouthful) last November. The smell was quite pleasant. Initially, I was quite worried that my acne condition would get worse with the nightly dose of  this night gelly. To my surprise, I found out that after applying this, the oiliness on my nose area became less oily. No matter how thick the night gelly I applied. It would dry up fast and left a layer of film on my skin. I think it's ok. At least it didn't mess up my pillow case, it's some sort of sleeping mask after all.

Rose & Botanic HA Aqua Cubic Night Gelly EX

Coin Collecting - Coin Album

I remember I saw some coin albums in the stationery shop when I was a small kid. Since then, I had this thought, I wanted to collect coins. So, I started to put the coins I have into one small ceramic container. From one container, it started to grow until I have 3 containers. I kept only the coins minted before 1989. Whenever I went out to buy things, I would give paper notes, so that I could get coins as change. For this practice, I ended up with many coins. My family benefited from that, I told them they could spend the coins minted after 1988. 

However, I couldn't find coin album in the stationery shops here when I started to try to get serious, to arrange the coins the proper way. Searching Lazada and Rakuten, no online stores sell coin album. So, I expanded the search and found Ebay. I chose the cheapest price with free shipping, and asked my brother to buy it for me because I didn't have Paypal. The total cost was less than RM20, not cheap, but not so expensive either. That was my first coin album, I didn't check properly the dimension first. The slots in the album were only suitable for one cent to ten cents coins, twenty cents and above were too big for the slots. Anyway, the slots quantity were enough for my collections of one cent, five cents and ten cents only.

my first coin album (bought from Ebay)