Swordie Bloggie

About 4 weeks ago, I followed a friend to a gym. I have not entered any gym for the past 15 years… I think… 😛

I wanted to beef-up my muscle a bit… and build my stamina… coz next year if everything go smooth, we have a big plan to climb Mount Kinabalu… 😛

I’m not planning to get slim or get skinny… and I don’t want to get six packs or massive muscles… I just want to get healthy and fit to do our expedition… 😛 Each of us probably need to carry 20kg or more of gears to climb Mount Kinabalu which stand at 4,095 meters high.

Then two weeks ago, I signed-up with the gym for 1 year membership… the gym is not Solo Slim Gym… but Core Fitness… yes it is without the gym at its name… yea, it sound weird without the gym at the back… probably the word gym is no longer suitable today… by just using the word fitness is good enough I guess… more grand probably… 😛

Anyway, Core Fitness is located at City Mall along the Lintas Road. Their equipments are great… the main reason I join them. An tonight, I brought two friends to the fitness center and each of them signed-up for 3 months membership… 😀

If they sign-up for 1 year membership… as a referrer I will be given extra two months free membership… but unfortunately they did not take the 1 year membership. And for my 1 year membership that I signed-up for, I was given a free water bottle… 😀

Traditionally, insurance agents will randomly approach their prospect clients. And that approach is still working until today. Insurance agents also get their prospect clients’ contact from their existing clients… or from the unsuccessful client they just discussed with… ‘Please introduce me to your friends who might want to buy insurance?…’ or ‘Please give me 5 of your friends contact so that I can introduce them with our new insurance package?…’ 😛

I really hate it when insurance agents call me and try to sell me insurance policy!!! When I asked them how they got hold of my contact number… they say from my colleague… dang colleague!!!… and these insurance agents always talk a lot… sometimes I just talk straight to their face telling them that I’m not interested buying anything.

They don’t have to waste their time and my time explaining something that I’m not considering buying!!! If I ever need any details about a particular insurance, I can always read it online from the internet… and I also can buy life insurance online without going through them!!!

On Sunday, 25 October 2009, Guinness World Record was set in Beirut’s Saifi Market. For two days since Saturday, the Saifi Market was filled with the sound of chopping, cheering and the sweet, grassy smell of tons of freshly cut parsley.

Lebanon famous chef Ramzi Choueiry and the gang preparing the giant tabbouleh salad for a new Guinness World Record at Saifi Market in Beirut, Lebanon.

Thousands of visitors showed up to cheer the 250 sous chefs and 50 of their instructor from the Kafaat School of Catering. Their target is to prepare the world’s biggest tabbouleh salad.

Tabbouleh is salad made of chopped parsley and tomatoes… sound like a very tasty salad and healthy too… which I believe is much better than the best diet pills available today. I like to eat salad very much… the only good place for me to eat salad here is at McDonald Pizza Hut 😛

Lebanese chefs busy chopping tomatoes to be mixed with parsley for their giant tabbouleh.

For the record… the Lebanese chefs manage to prepare more than 3 tons of tabbouleh salad… to be exact, it was 3,557 kilograms or 7,841 pounds of tabbouleh salad. According to the organizer, the previous record was held by Israel.

Lebanese chefs successfully prepared a massive plate of tabbouleh weighing 3,557 kilograms or 7,841 pounds in Beirut, Lebanon, on Sunday, 25 October 2009.

The day before, Saturday, they also manage to set a new record for the biggest hummus plate weighing 2,056 kilograms or 4,532 pounds, more than quadruple the previous record.

The giant plate or bowl holding the tabbouleh also set a new reword for being the biggest and largest rotating terracotta-colored hummus bowl.

In other word, Lebanese set 3 new Guinness World Records during the festival.

But these also means war of words between Lebanon and Israel will not stop here… both countries claimed tabbouleh and hummus are belongs to them… I hope they don’t go for war because of food… let’s just enjoy the tasty food ok…

Yesterday, went to gym to burn some fat then had a large amount of bak-kut-teh to recover back the burned fat 😆 Have not been to gym for many many years… man… the food is so nice after sweating out… had 3 plates of rice and two large bowl of bak-kut-teh 😀

It is 7.30 am and I’m still packing for my trip to Tawau… working trip from today till Friday… have to go troubleshoot some network problem there… 😛

Every time going outstation to the east coast side like Tawau or Sandakan, the first thing that will come across in everybody mind is seafood… yes load of sea foods… and they are damm cheap down there…

Yesterday, colleague over there called and promised to feed us with sea foods till we vomit… 😛 man… need to take appetite suppressant pills… ok, need to stop here… have to get ready for the trip…

The day before yesterday, Thursday, when we went to have dinner before class, we passed the MST Golf Shop in Karamunsing…

What attracted me is that they are having sales… cool 😀

I saw some sign showing 50% discount!!! Nice… 😮

I’m in need of new shirts… and when I said shirt, I don’t mean those shirts like tuxedo shirts, jacket, coat… or any of those suit kind of shirt… not even long sleeves shirt… neck tie or tuxedo pants… although it makes me look smart and neat when wearing those kind of dress… but I hate wearing those suits… it’s very warm… makes me sweat a lot… and it don’t gives me much freedom when doing my work… 😛

I prefer polo shirt… or tee shirt…  especially golf polo tee shirt 😀 and I need a large one… like XXL if it Asian size or L if it US size 😀 It’s not easy to find large size shirt if it not golf shirt… well, as far as in here…

Maybe I will go and get some of those golf shirt on sale next week before class 😀 My shirts are faded already… 😛

On Wednesday, immediately after the MCSE class, 5 of us rush to 1Borneo to catch the Where Got Ghost? movie…

The movie has been on show for sometimes… we have been planning to watch this movie since a couple of weeks ago… but timing always not right.

So this time, we make sure we go coz we worried it will be removed from the show soon.

When the others were talking about it before, I thought it was an English movie… I did not bother to check it on the web… So, I was shocked when it started with Chinese character… But the movie is not bad at all… instead of getting scared, I was laughing all the way with all the stupid funny ghost story they have… there are actually 3 different ghost stories in the movie.

After the movie, I went into the 1Borneo toilet… washroom. I think everyone know this 1Borneo has a bad quality in workmanship. The ceilings are leaking… the tiles are popping out and falling down… since the first day it was open.

The toilet has a great gadget… for guys, while leaking into the bowl they can watch some TV or video shows on the LCD screen on each of the pee bowl.

But they are all broken now… some covered with card board… probably the LCDs has been cracked… punched or smashed by some hooligan…

The only sparkling there is the floor… during the night, when there is no more people, only us going out from the cinema, the floor is sparkling like a glass tile… maybe it is marble tiles, but not sure if it marble or just a cheap floor tiles…

And talking about one leak… 1Borneo nick name is 1Bocor or 1Leak coz it leak and broken everywhere… 😛

Long public holiday is over… it’s time to go back to work… since Wednesday. But after a long break… four days altogether for last week and five days for the previous week… going back to work is a very hard thing to do…

Sleeping and waking up late are more fun… no worries.

Roaming around doing nothing also fun to do… no worries… no hurry… no datelines… no meeting…

Well, work is work… no job, no monies… so what ever the hassle I have to go through every morning and throughout the day… I still have to face them… 🙁 I need to eat… I need salary to buy foods… 😛

In the office, after leaving it for sometimes, there are many things to be done… everything are piling up… reading emails… replying emails… attending meetings… troubleshooting… ordering office supplies… completing reports… completing systems…

I wish I strike a jackpot and don’t have to work for the rest of my life… 😆 just travel around the world… vacations throughout the year… after year… 😀

Last Friday, 18 September, six of us were treated for Ramadan buka puasa buffet at the Marina Café, Sutere Harbour.

We book a table for six for 7.45 dinner buffet… the buffet is from 6pm to 10pm but we don’t want to go early because it will be packed with those who are breaking their fast… after all none of us are fasting 😀

When I book for the table on that evening, I requested for the open terrace… coz I’m sure it’s not going to rain on that night… and I wanted to sit next to the Sutera Harbour’s golden bird. Unfortunately the management put us inside the café and it was brightly lit… it was next to the hallway… 🙁

Well, we don’t want to complain so much, there are actually not many guest when we arrived… and most of the guests are sitting near the buffet tables… and we are sited quite a distance from the buffet table, so we have to make a long trip to get our foods… they did told me about this when I made the reservation.

But good part, our table is next to the entertainer’s micro stage… the entertainer is an old couple called The Mahoney’s… Johnny and Shelley. They live in their boat berthed at the Sutera Harbor marina. We believe the couple travel around the world on their boat and every time they stop, they just get some simple work like entertainer… not sure how long they have been here, but good enough for them to sing Tinggi Tinggi Gunung Kinabalu… they goes to some of the table for song request and for our table, Ahaz requested for Unchanged Melody 😀

OK back to the food, the foods are ok but not much coz we believe most of the good food is all taken by those breaking their fast at around 6.30pm… but they do refill the food. On our table they put a big red candle inside a big glass cylinder with some metal decoration around it… and not on a wall candle sconces… 😀

After the food, we went to the marina to take some photos… yea, brought along my big gun. Then came the idea to take group airborne photos… and that’s where my hand phone… yea the hand phone I just bought a couple of months ago to replace my old broken hand phone… get airborne and crashed landed on the marina walkway… lucky it’s still working although the body is bent and there are parts opening up a bit… 😛 have to send it for repair soon… dang…

Look closely... and you will see the handphone is getting airborne... 😛

Instead of learning how to reduce food intake, I learned more about new foods… it’s festive time… food are everywhere… what can I do? 😆

I think I just want to talk more about food and drinks for now… so forget about dieting… forget about weight loss diet program that you can think of… let’s just talk about food and eat eat eat… OK?…

OK, I’m sure most of you have heard the word kebab before… middle eastern kind of food or delicacy… but not shishkebab or shish kebab, right?…

Shishkebab is something new to me too… thanx to a friend who told me about it… shishkebab also a middle eastern kind of food.

Shishkebab is made of lamb, olive oil, lemon, salt, pepper, onion, tomatoes, eggplant, bay leaves and green pepper… and sometimes added with paprika…

I love lamb very much… emmbeeeekkkkk… 😀

Shish kebab is prepared by cutting the lamb meat into 1 inch cubes and mixed with olive oil, lemon juice, etc… and then marinated in the fridge for 4 to 5 hours.

There are many ways to prepare it… it all depend on the culture or country…

It can be cook over an open wood fire or in an oven broiler… for me open wood fire or BBQ will be great… but any good food I will take, no problem one, eat only… 😆

Eid Mubarak… Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri… To all my Muslim relatives and friends.

As usual, each time religious or cultural festivals are celebrated here in Malaysia… there will be many open houses.

When there are open houses, there will be plenty of foods… 😀

There will be all kind of foods for the celebration… traditional foods like Malay foods, Indian foods, Chinese foods… and not forgetting the ethnic food especially in Sabah… will make the celebration more meaningful.

In conjunction with the Hari Haya, there will be 2 days public holidays… 20th and 21st September… Sunday and Monday… but since the first day of Hari Raya falls on Sunday, Tuesday is also declared as public holiday 😀

People will only be back to work on Wednesday… but too many public holidays is bad for business but good for the people to have long leave and to enjoy for a while.

Three days of holidays to enjoy foods will surely make lots of people gain extra baggage… 😀 so to those who can’t resist their appetite when they see the rendang dodol, kari kambing, ketupat, kuih muih… better get some appetite suppressants 😛

OK people, enjoy the holiday and enjoy the foods 😀 and don’t worry, just eat… the food are there to be eaten, don’t waste them… 😆

Like my friend said… have fun and eat eat eat alot 😀 😀 😀