Shopaholics. And the Domestic Me.

Finally laid my hands on two Sophie Kinsella's Shopaholic series.

That is pretty slow, considering that both books had been out for more than a year. However, I usually adopt an indolent approach toward book selection. I absolutely refuse to read books that are part of The Popularity Rush. Anyway, I am going to ration this book for the next couple of weeks. No more zealous reading!

I was practically scowling the whole day and absorbed in a cantankerous mood. Thanks to nothing but the stifling weather and blazing heat. (Did I mention how much I hate the sun?) Until I checked my email and saw this offer of accomodation from Germany.

Hello Mrs. Ang,

I offer following apartment to you:

One single room, ca.
22 qm², right side
In a 3-room flat
Big kitchen (with all inventory)
Bathroom (shower/WC)
bedding utilities available
be able to tell the photos by the look of you

close to the ebs campus, about 700 m to walk to ebs (10 min.), if you need there will be an service to get a bike to rent
bank institue, backery an shop nearby
bus connevtion / train station about 400 m far away

280,00 Euro rent per month, including all extras
(electricity, gas, water)

(Each person 260,00 Euro per month!)

One security despoit of 250,00 Euro for each person!
(if everything will get acceptable tidy an nothing is damaged you will get it back without any problems)

50,00 Euro for end-cleaning the flat!

This ist my offer for you aber checking your accommodation preferences I will reserve this offer 4 days, so please inform me soon, if it is o.k. for you.

Also I need your exact arrival dates, because for to prepare everything before your
arrival in Germany.

Bye with best regards, waiting for your answer or confirmation.

Heike Fuhrmann
Housing Coordinator
EUROPEAN
BUSINESS SCHOOL (ebs)
International University Schloß Reichartshausen

**The above email has not been edited in anyway.

Check out how cute the subtly broken English sounds. And gosh, when did I become Mrs. Ang?

Although I will be sharing an apartment with two other house-mates, I am pretty satisfied. The rent is about half less than what I had anticipated. Not only that, I get to walk to school and save on transport. More money for shopping and travelling. Yay!

Yaddah, yaddah..

I am in a mopish mood and I feel BORED, BORED and BORED!!!

After spending the past few weeks reading Harry Potter for the 129th time and watching Smallville for the 234th time, I am ready to declare myself revolted at the seemingly uninteresting and mundane life I have.

Books, I need more books!!!

I hate to write this.

I received this email on Sunday.

Dear Friends,

How's your holidays so far? Good I hope!

Anyway, as you can probably guess what this email is for. I felt that Professor Fly-By-Night* has been irresponsible, unaccountable and uncommitted and I want to bring this matter up to higher authority (probably the dean of business?). Read on for the reasons and I think you will agree with me!

Although his reason for his uncommited attitude is that he is only a part-time Professor, we should not take it lying down because we are paying full school fees and this type of atitude is unacceptable. I will need your support to gain some kind of credibility, please reply me if you want to sign on this letter.

Seriously, do you think he is a good Professor who deserves to be paid $1000 per lecture? SMU pays around this rates for Adjunct Professors if I'm not wrong.
Thanks!

Cheers,
Ms. Indignant*

We feel that Professor Fly-By-Night has not fulfilled his responsibilities as a course instructor for the course ‘Financial Instruments, Institutions and Markets’ in the following ways.

Unavailable for Consulation
Fly-By-Night was not available for consultation from Tuesdays to Fridays as he only comes by SMU on lecture days, which is only once a week on Mondays. On Mondays, he has classes from 8:30am to 3:30pm and students are left with a narrow time period of only 3 hours to meet him during office hours.

While Fly-By-Night attributes his busy schedule to his fulltime employment outside of SMU, we feel that this is no excuse, as students from this class are paying the full University school fees and should not be shortchanged in this manner. The difference in quality of Adjunct faculty and full time faculty should not affect our pursuit of knowledge.

Failed to Complete Chapters as Proposed in Course Outline
Fly-By-Night proposed to teach 16 chapters in his course outline, but only covered 8 by the end of the course. Again, Fly-By-Night has fallen short of our expectations and we feel that this is irresponsible unless there was an error in the course outline.

Subjective Evaluation of Project Report
Project report carried 30% of the total grade weightage and was to be submitted at the end of the course. There were no presentations for it and no basis for the students to compare their project with other projects. The only evaluator was Professor Fly-By-Night, who was not transparent with how he evaluated projects. Students did not receive any feedback or comments on project, just a final grade, which was released at the last minute.

We feel his method of grading projects is subjective and is not accountable to the students. We are unable to justify the grade we got as there are no means of comparing our projects with the rest.

Late Release of Results
Fly-By-Night released the final grade on 5th May in the afternoon, the same day as the actual day of final submission of results. Taking into account that our last quiz was on week 14, one week earlier than other courses with exams on week 15, Fly-By-Night should have had ample time to assess our performance. Students who wish to review their grades had to file for an Appeal (of Grade Discrimination).

Following that SMU’s vision is ‘to be a premier university, internationally recognized for its world class research and distinguished teaching’ and one of SMU’s goals is to attract and sustain finest faculty, we feel that this matter is of utmost importance to
the reputation of the institution. Bearing in mind that foreign students on exchange attend our classes, hiring Adjunct faculty of this caliber and will hinder SMU in achieving its goals of being a world class university.

*Names have been changed to protect the antagonized and unindustrious.

I must readily admit that my enthusiasm for Finance died down by a considerable notch after taking Professor Fly-By-Night's class. Every Monday morning would be D-Day (Dreaded-Day) and by the end of the morning, I could hardly recall anything beneficial from the class.

In case you are wondering, I did not reply to that email. By the time I checked my email, Vanessa told me that Ms. Indignant had already sent out the email. Oh well.

Friday Night Fever.

Happy 21st Birthday, Sindy, Pearlyn and Chenghan!

I swear every single class gathering would be a good stomach muscle workout. Because these guys and gals can really make you obliterate all your brass realities and concentrate on being a blossoming adolescent once again.

Ahem. The subtle code behind this message would be the bi-annual opportunity for you to talk crap and laugh till you attain muscle spasms. Haha. These folks never fail to make me laugh, and I thank you, you and you for that!

There are only a couple of decent pictures from that gathering because all my pictures turned out to be grainy looking. No idea how that happened even though every thing looked pretty faultless from the camera.

Superman Returns.

What I love about summer holidays is my right to bum.. and bum. Now that I have quit my internship, I am officially a full time bummer. What a bummer. Catch the pun? Haha.

I am always brimming and bubbling with anticipation when it comes to summer holidays. Not just because it spells the end of a semester but also it means blockbuster movies are here! Whoopee!

Despite all those Mission Impossible and Da Vinci Code that are much hyped about, I have been mentally ticking off the number of days towards the premier of Superman Returns on June 30th with fervent gusto.

I have always been a huge fan of Smallville and hence, it should come as no surprise that Superman Returns would be at the top of my must-watch list. I think the boisterous part of any Superhero movies would be discovering how Clark Kent or Kar-El or better known as Superman discovers his power. To digress a little, I still cannot believe that Nicholas Cage would name his son Kal-El. If I were Kal-El, I would rather accept my destiny and return to Krypton anytime.

Nevertheless, I still think that the producers of Superman Return made a wrong choice not casting Tom Welling as Superman in the movie. And Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor is a little nay compared to Michael Rosenbaum, despite Kevin Spacey being the more experienced Hollywood actor. Michael Rosenbuam makes Lex Luthor so deliciously evil.

There is no Lana Lang in Superman Returns. Otherwise, I would be gushing over Kristink Kreuk. But here is Kristin Kreuk anyway.

I must be one of the biggest Smallville fan ever. Because I can give you many "Did you know" facets of Smallville.

1. Michael McKean who played Perry White in Smallville is actually Martha Kent's husband in real life.
2. Annette O'Toole who plays Martha Kent is actually Lana Lang in Superman: The Movie.
3. Lex Luthor and Clark Kent were made best friends in Smallville when the real Superman story made both nemesis right from the beginning.
4. The prison officer who shaved off Lionel Luthor's hair in Season 4 Finale actually played the prisoner who extorted Lionel (or rather, Clark) in prison.
5. Jenson Ackles who played Jason Teague in Smallville was actually one of the choices for the role of Clark Kent.

Haha. Silly as it sounds, I actually feel proud of my accomplishments of reciting all these facets to my sister.

The 100th Post.

Happy 100th Post!

There was actually a 99th post before this. It's all about politics, the melancholic reaction of Singaporeans towards voting as well as well as the dodgy politics of the Opposition Parties. I love that post! In fact, I love it too much to disclose it. Blah! No lah. I think that post is too sensationalised and pro-PAP that I don't want to find myself breaking any laws. I still want to go Frankfurt, okay?

All those planning for exchange are giving me a massive headache. Searching for flights through and to Frankfurt is turning out to be more difficult than I imagine. I could only suppose that Frankfurt International is the main airport in Germany and does not cater to budget airlines. As such, most budget airlines depart and/or arrive at only Berlin. Goodness gracious. I could almost aliken Frankfurt International to Kuala Lumpur Airport and Berlin Stdf to Sarawak Airport (if Sarawak even has an airport).

Anyway, the current itnerary is:

Brussels 26th-27th August
Geneva 1st-4th September
Paris 4th-7th September
Barcelona 7th-9th September
Madrid 9th-10th September
Milan 28th September
Venice 30th September
Florence 1st October
Pisa 2nd October
Krakow 16th-17th November
Warsaw 18th-20th November
Prague 15th-21st November
Copenhagen 22nd-25th December
London 25th-Return

Based on the current estimation of the amount that I would have to spend, I am toeing on the line of "a pretzle will determine whether I exceed my budget or not". Besides, I am already grateful to my parents for paying for my entire trip and shall not push my luck by asking for more. Haha. Takes the fun out of everything but keeps me on parental support.