470 - 2020 in conclusion - Books

Oh dear... the previous update was in April. What did I say? I can't up hold my own promises to keep updating, at least once a month. ONCE A MONTH!! It's not that hard!!!!!!!

Ok, as usual, compiling the lists of books and movies I have seen this year so far. 

From Goodreads, I had read 50 books so far. Woohoo! Including 4 mangas in it. If I really wanted to add in mangas into the list, it would be a way longer list, so, I will just exclude the mangas (picture books are counted), making it to 46 books this year. Yay! Much much more than the previous 2 years combined!

Ok, here goes the list of books, in reading order.

January

-

February

-

March

21st - Secret Hero Society #3: Detention of Doom by Derek Fridolfs
27th - The Faerie Wars Chronicles #2: The Purple Emperor by Herbie Brennan
30th - Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones

April

03rd - Contender #1: The Chosen by Taran Matharu
05th - Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch by Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman ( I did not finish the book the in 2 days. This has been a long time reading of my, about a year????)
06th - The Faerie Wars Chronicles #3: Ruler of the Realm by Herbie Brennan
        - Guardians of Magic by Chris Riddell
08th - The Faerie Wars Chronicles #4: Faerie Lord by Herbie Brennan
09th - The Faerie Wars Chronicles #5: The Faeman Quest by Herbie Brennan
10th - The Trials of Apollo #1: The Hidden Oracle by Rick Riordan (again, I didn't read this book in a day, I read a few books at the same time and finishing them off consecutively)
16th - The Trials of Apollo #2: The Dark Prophecy by Rick Riordan

May

06th - Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan
17th - Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo
25th - Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman (long time reading this too)
27th - Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo
28th - Castle in the Air by Diana Wynne Jones

June

01st - Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo
05th - The Lunar Chronicles #1: Cinder by Marissa Meyer
09th - The Lunar Chronicles #2: Scarlet by Marissa Meyer
13th - The Lunar Chronicles #3: Cress by Marissa Meyer
15h - Stalking Jack the Ripper by Kerri Maniscalco
26th - The Merciful Crow by Margaret Owen
        - The Lunar Chronicles #4: Winter by Marissa Meyer
30th - The Lunar Chronicles #4.5: Stars Above by Marissa Meyer

July

02nd - City of Ghosts by Victoria Schwab
10th - Shades of Magic #1: A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab
27th - The Red Pyramid by Rick Riordan

August

02nd - Henderbell by J.D. Netto
31st - Shades of Magic #2: A Gathering of Shadows by V.E. Schwab

September

04th - Blackbringer by Laini Taylor
14th - Winternight Trilogy #1: The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden

October

08th - Shades of Magic #3: A Conjuring of Light by V.E. Schwab
19th - Winternight Trilogy #2: The Girl in The Tower by Katherine Arden
20th - The Royal Rabbits of London #2: Escape From the Tower by Santa Montefiore, Simon Sebag Montefiore
26th - A Court of Miracles by Kester Grant
31st - Winternight Trilogy #3: The Winter of the Witch by Katherine Arden

November

09th - Sabriel by Garth Nix
20th - Strange the Dreamer by Laini Taylor
24th - Lirael by Garth Nix
30th - The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab

December

01st - The Fox and the Star by Coralie Bickford-Smith
03rd - The Green-Eyed Prince by Brittany Fichter
08th - The Great Library #1: Ink and Bone by Rachel Caine
17th - Hunting Prince Dracula by Kerri Maniscalco
25th - The Blackstone Ritual by Swearinger Durham

What a looong list. So happy to read so many books this year! Mainly because of the COVID thing, I got the time to stay at home and read. Read. Read. From Goodreads, the shortest book I read was < The Fox and the Star> 80 pages, and the longest book was <Winter> with 824 pages. The difference!! 

Anyway, I got to buy lots and lots of books. We started ordering bookcrates too. Lol. All the way from U.K. and U.S.. The shipping fees made me cried. Hahahaha!!

Very honorable mentions that were not in the list, I finished the whole Haikyuu!! manga this year!!! I got up to speed on time for the author to finish off the story this year!!! If you haven't read it, go try it!! Really, really good sports manga. If you find it difficult to jump straight to manga, try the anime first. Just the first 2 seasons are enough, and then try reading the manga. Yay! Another series I finished this year was Battle Rabbits. I reread it again. 

I read the most number of books in April, 10 books? Lol. That was lockdown month I think? Or later? Anyway, this year, I finished off a few series/trilogies sort of.  Faerie Wars Chronicles, Six of Crows, The Lunar Chronicles, Shades of Magic, and the Winternight Trilogy. I practically polished off The Lunar Chronicles in a month. Sis said I was reading too fast that I didn't enjoy the books fully. Well... maybe? But I just want to know what happen next! 

There are a few surprise reads for me:

Six of Crows & Crooked Kingdom

Sis introduced me to this dulogy. These were high pace and no nonsense. Love it. Six main casts doing illegal high-stake stuffs. Yay. And the dynamic between the 6 of them.

Howl's Moving Castle & Castle in the Air

So different from the animation movies! They have more characters in the books! All told from one person pov. 

The Lunar Chronicles

I never would have thought I would have like an East Asian character in an YA book so much. KAI!!!! KAI!!! And Cinder is a half? I think??? I'm not sure anymore, but KAI!!! EMPEROR KAITO!!!!

Winternight Trilogy

My favourite trilogy I've read this year, I think. Initially, it was not easy for me to "get into" the book. After a few chapters, I got the hang of how the author might want the flow of the story to go, I got slowly into it. And.I.Am.Not.Disappointed. This Russia folklore-theme story, I never thought I would have like it that much. Story started of with main character being a child, and gradually grew up to an adult throughout the story. It's painful to grow up, reminded me of the Httyd books. Really painful.

Sabriel

Ahhh!!! I like Sabriel!!! So much that I find it difficult to read the second book in the series, because it's not about her anymore. T.T And then I found out what happend, I lost interest in the 3rd book. >_> 

Anything from V.E. Schwab

Shades of Magic, City of Ghosts and Addie LaRue. Read 5 books from her, City was for younger readers and felt so different from Shades, and Addie LaRue is a total different direction. The writings in Addie LaRue was so beautiful. Really. 

Well then, those were for 2020. 

Now onwards to 2021. How many books should I put in the Goodreads challenge? 25 books, I don't want to set the target to high or I will get intimidated. I have a few books I want to start on. My "Want to read" list in Goodreads is forever growing. XDDD It's 59 books now. Hahahaha!!!

So, I am aiming to finish The Great Library, The Trials of Apollo, Stalking Jack the Ripper (2 books left in my list!!), Gilded Wolves series/trilogies/duologies. And some other standalone books! Hope this would be another great year in reading for me. Wanted to enjoy it to the fullest! :)

469 - Lockdown, anyone?

How's everyone doing during the lockdown?

Every country's situation is different. Here, we are only onto our 12th? 13th? day of lockdown. So far I am comfortable with it. Glad that the company let us take unpaid leave, we really don't want to risk it as our job is ranked having the highest risk among other health profession for some reason. I still don't really see the point in continue on operating if you guys just kept accepting patients that are not "emergency".

Anyway, moving on from that.

People thought we might get bored staying at home for that long, instead, we kinda enjoy it. You see, we rarely have time to do so while working. We only have less than 12 hours staying at home for normal days, and we work 6 days a week. We hate it. I one another off days to do normal stuffs like house chores. We only have Sundays off, and what? You expect me to clean the house that day? We are exhausted. Duh.

Next next next... I don't want to dwell on unhappy thoughts.

Sooooo, lockdown time, I got to do lots of reading. :) No the quantity of books but the period of time I get to spend on them. :))))))

In March, I read 3 books. And for April, so far I have finished 2 books, 1 of them of which I have been reading since last year, hahaha. I am reading my 6th book of the year, according to Goodreads.

So...continue on reading!! And continue on shopping for books!!! :)))

468 - ?

Hello everyone.

Happy New Year~

I am back in Kuching for the holidays. Yay.

I had Penang kueh tiaw, Cantonese fried noodles, cha kueh and teh bunga for dinner last night. It was quite late at night, still, lots people were eating. Hahaha. The difference from Christchurch.

And for today, we had chicken rice for lunch! GOOOOD. The only unfortunate thing about the lunch was that, they used a watery salty kicap, not the thick manis one. Oh well. Still happy to eat chicken rice as always.

Our Singapore trip was... not good.

First of all, at the start of our long international flight, our plane from Christchurch to Sydney was held on the runaway for about an hour, despite arriving early in Sydney. Our docking gate was still held up by the plane that was scheduled to leave in 20 minutes by then. But, 30 minutes crept by, the huge plane was still not moving. Captain said, they were still waiting for 10 passengers to board, so should take another 5-15 minutes. Ok... And then, those minutes passed by, still NOT MOVING. Apparently, they were still waiting for another 2 passengers to clear custom!! SO!! What's happening here???!! Another plane delayed or what?!!!



...

In the end, the airport arranged another docking gate for us. We reached there within minutes, and to wait for someone to connect the bridge for us. HAhahahaha.

Flight from Sydney to Singapore was alright. Slight delay though. And at the leg of the journey, I got motion sick. Threw up twice. By the second time, I was just heaving. There's nothing left in me anymore yet still heaving. Painful.

Touched down. Threw up again in the toilet. OMG.

Went through custom like a breeze. And then baggage claim. That was when I received the second bad news. My hotel booking had been cancelled by the hotel. 3 hour ago.

WHAT THE HELL

They said my reservation "has been cancelled as no updated credit card was received (current card provided has been declined)"

What the hell does that suppose to mean. They never happen before. I used this credit card to book all my Singapore reservations these few years, and yet you are the only one saying it has been declined by the provider. Huh. I fired back the message saying we just touched down and were on the way to the airport, and whether the room was still available.

They replied "as your reservation had been already been cancelled due to declined card, you have to find another accommodation."

THAT IS SO IRRESPONSIBLE.

WHERE AM I SUPPOSE TO FIND A PROPER ACCOMMODATION AT 6:45PM IN SINGAPORE FOR THE NIGHT?! DON'T YOU KNOW HOW BUSY THIS TIME OF THE YEAR?!

I asked them why was it declined and told them they were not suppose to drop this on me at the last minute. I checked back my email. There, they emailed me like sometime an hour before their check in time saying that my card had been declined and to update the card details or to pay not to secure the place. And gave me four hours to do that. All those time I was on my long international flight, how was I suppose to know?!

Days before my trip, I kept checking to see if I could pay first to further secure the room, but nooo. There on the site state clearly, "pay on site", so I trusted that. Apparently I should not.

We ended up paying roughly the same place for a much worse room, but still glad to have a place to sleep for the night. We didn't even bother to grab food once we reached the room.

The room was sooo small. And only one double bed, and hard mattress too. Oh well.

Next day was much better.

We checked out early and went to the airport straight. When I said early I meant like 9:30am. Father texted saying his flight had delayed and was left stranded in the airport. Reached airport, dropped in our luggage for the flight in the evening and dropped our overnight handcarry at the baggage storage. Long queue. Father arrived from terminal 4 via shuttle while we were in the queue.

Oh ya. Jewel is big. Huge. The shops looked elegant. As yes, I firmly believed that I was in an Asian country because of all of the restaurants inside Jewel, instead of apparel shops and what not in malls like in Christchurch. The Apple shop is so wide and clear and simple. Random thought. There was a huge waterfall in the middle of the building. Another convenient thing I found, it more or less linked all the terminals together! Great!! Though the long walk.

We went straight to Bugis after that. The night's hunger had caught up apparently. hahaha. Went to the Japanese western restaurant sis and I had been last year. wanting to show Father the beautiful food. This time round, sis ordered something different. I still the same, omu rice and Father ordered something beef. Sis ordered seafood paella. Spanish dish. Taste nice!! I liked all the seafood in it.







OMG. Why is this in draft?!!! When is this suppose to post????????!!

I have no idea how to continue on, so might as well just posted it as it is.

Oh well. I will set the date to 6 February then, the day we arrived back here....

467 - Of 2019

Well, the previous 2 posts were about books and movies and dramas I have had the chance to enjoy in 2019. Now, for this, I just want to conclude things I suppose...? Geez, I'm finding reasons to update.

So, I read 8 books in 2019. Hahaha. What a declined from... years ago. I don't think I did well in 2018 too. Oh well. My movie/drama list were much better. Haha. I spent more time on my phone in 2019 so... neglecting my readings.

Going through 2019, see if I can remember any interesting happenings through the year.

Final installment of How to train your dragon series came out at around January, and we all went crazy with multiple watches in cinemas. Got the chance to watch it in IMAX in Malaysia too. SOOO HAPPY. Was damn exicited at that time, despite having watched it a few times in NZ already. Lol.

I know that I bought my current phone somewhere in March. It's a OPPO R15Pro, Nebula purple colour I think? Can't really remember the name. Well, uptill now, I don't have much complain about it yet. I adopted the idea of changing phones within 2 years, to avoid having said phone when dead suddenly on me. I don't want to experience another Samsung Galaxy SII episode again. That was a nightmare. I lost all my South Island trip photos and my sis's graduation photos as well. Urgh. Same situation will go for my laptop too. Not going to be using it long, unless I bought a really expensive one that worth keeping long. The one we bought from Kuching, bland. I mean, it looked the same as every laptop on display in the store. I want a Dell XPS, but what did the salesman say? It's not much different bla bla and more expensive. I know it's more expensive, but with the functions it has, I think it is reasonable. But then, they don't have any stock on hand, if I want one, they will need to order it. What the heck. I might as well just get one from NZ. They always have stock unless I want it customised. Geez. So in the end, we get a bland looking laptop from Acer. It looked totally the same as the one sis's is using. I sometimes mistook it. Only the stickers on the keyboard area are differerent. So frustrating! And I bought antivirus for my laptop too. Finally. Or else just relying on the accompanied software, I don't think it was enough.

Something sad happened somewhere in March. Mass shooting. Where? In FREAKING NEW ZEALAND. And of all places, CHRISTCHURCH. What is wrong with this people?!!! Condolences to all the people involved. I was so damn happy that the Prime Minister passed the gun control bill in NZ. It was so fast that it shook the whole world. I applaud the PM for this. My wording might be abit weird, but you get the idea what I am saying.

Somewhere in April, we got MAP678. Yay. Father was with us in NZ.

In May, Bulbasaur was so damn cute! My first time doing Medical Check in NZ, after all this year. And wow, the speed was so fast! Just about 2 hours? Every procedure done. Or maybe a bit less than that. Not like in Kuching, OMG. Need to arrive there so early in the morning before the clinic opens and queue for it. Even though we have made an appointment for it. Well, in NZ, I think they have like only a few slots available each day for it, so everything is faster. And once again, I experienced the lightheaded, and almost blackout. I hate doing blood test. Ah! I remembered this. Weeks later, or so, I went back again for another blood test. Geeezzzz. That time round, I was prepared for it. The first time I wasn't expected that, so maybe I got a bit panic when I left the room. What with the sudden black patches I kept seeing everywhere. Took me quite sometime to recover in the Sitting Area.
I think it was somewhere in May, I went into a small Hyun Bin frenzy mode. I tore every part of weibo and so to look for his movies. Of all, I like the 4 movies I watched multiple times of. The Swindlers, Confidential Assignment, Rampant, and The Negotiation. I was in awe for Confidential Assignment. Man! The man could hit and punch. It was so enjoyable to watch him hit stuffs. Same for Rampant. He's cutting zombie with that big blade. And maybe he was the main actor, he's so un-killable. Hahahahahaha.  For The Negotiation, wow. A villain. GOOOOD.

June... July... August...

SEPTEMBER. Huh?? Did anything happened in September? No...?

Ok, October. Charles's Wedding!!  Congratulations once again! Even though none of you are reading this. Hahaha. We went Australia for this. And followed by a small trip to Gold Coast. :)
By the way, I found peanut butter in NZ!! I am ignoring all the other peanut butter I saw in the supermarket. They are tasteless. I found this peanut butter that actually tasted something and nice! Checked the label, Made in USA. Hahahahaha!!!!

November??? Can't remember..

December...Oh well. I can't remember much. HAhahahahaha


All around the year, I could just recalled that, we went to quite a number of places to try new food. We went for Crepes, we went for Japanese restaurants we never been before. And the only new ones I enjoyed immensely was tomi. THE FOOD WAS SO DELICIOUS.

Some colleagues left for home etc. Some new trainees. Some useless colleagues.

Most important of all, I have been shipping 00Q so hard this year. OMG. The new 007 movie is coming out too!!!

I started playing Switch more towards the end of the year. We have now Sypro, Pokemon Shield, Ni no Kuni, Zelda, Pokemon Evee, Dawn of the New Riders...etc.

And on the sad note, ARASHI is going on hiatus at the end of 2020. This they announced beginning of the year in 2019. ..This.. uptill now I am still frustrated and upset. For their 20th anniversary, they tried lots of things. They opened up social media accounts. Twitter, YouTube, Weibo and Instagram. I am ignoring tiktok because I don't have one and I find it weird. They are trying to get close to their fans. Furthermore, they released all their singles in digital platforms too! The first group in the company to do this. Their latest release is on digital too! There's no updates whether they will be releasing the CDs not... I want CDs to be honest. I like physical copies. To mark their 20th anniversary, recently they collaborated with Netflix to release a their own documentary. I think I might need some courage to watch that. I can't really deal with seeing frustrated Jun-san. After the announcement, all I want to do is give him a hug and hope for the best for him. He poured so much into this, and like he said, going into hiatus and stopping everything he had been doing all this years, was like killing the thing he love the most with his own hands. I couldn't even begin to imagine how that feels. That was what got me so angry and frustrated.



There goes my mood....