Chinese Special Event......

Lately, it has been a sensitive period for China with their policy with Tibet. I had heard some of the story behind, conspiracy theory etc etc, and I am not really interested with it haha. But when you see a bunch of Chinese gathering, you don't really want to mess with them.

Couple of weeks ago, they had a protest for Tibet independence, and the whole of Swanston street was flooded with Chinese people around in Melbourne. I am not a crowd lover, so whenever I see there is a lot of people, I better siam ji peng (n. Hokkien dialect, dodge away).

Yesterday, when I was on my way to SGI Kaikan, I passed by Federation square... and I saw a big crowd of chinese guy again.... thinking that they are protesting for Tibet independence. But I also saw there is a few lion dance and dragon dance. Thinking to myself, hrm.... it seem like because of the olympic, those chinese are more cultured for many things, including the way they protest

Haha.. but when i move forward and have a look, I might be wrong. They might still be as fanatic as before, but this cultural scenario is just because they are celebrating the last 100 days before Beijing Olympic.
















It is a cloudy day.. and they are so happily waving their beijing olympic logo.















It has been a while for me to see a dragon dance, probably since Chinese new year. Feeling like home when meet cultural event like this.















However, I must admit that a successful Olympic game in Beijing is a proud moment for every chinese in the world, no matter where you are born.

Good luck Beijing 2008!!!

Many cut above.....

Back home, there is a hair saloon, named 'A cut Above'.

I remember I watch a TV programme about how this lady Winnie Loo (if i am not mistaken), and I really admire how she as an entrepreneur started her saloon and eventually become a academy for hair stylist. Really really long journey to climb up to the top of the hill.

While in Melbourne, finally got my hair cut last saturday, and it was fast, just 10mins to cut my hair. And now I look like this..... More ventilation to cool my head down. hehe...


















I just found out a very interesting virtual barber shop. Put on your ear phones and listen closely.. very real effect.

DOOLAN!!!!!! The aussie way......

It is such a fine Friday afternoon, and my colleague suggested to go for a lunch at Prince Alfred restaurant. It is a good lunch with my colleagues, as get to talk more with them together and we had fun. It is especially timely, because I could use this lunch to celebrate my experiment finally working for me this week. Repeated my experiment for quite a while since last week.....

As usual, being a kiam siap eng chun (n. a place in hokkien province) kia (n. Kid) (the kiam siap-ness it is in my hokkien genes, i couldn't help it), I am so used to order hot water and not interested with any other drinks, while all my colleagues ordered beers or sodas. And Putz ( He is a german post doc, and he is a very cute person) immediately spot my hot water, and keep on asking whether I like hot water very much or just it is because it is free...... Haha... of course I have to say I love hot water, as my dad drinks a lot of hot water too... as it is so healthy to drink non-alcoholic and non-gassy drinks. But deep in my heart... huahuahua.... you know my eng chun clan well, then you will justify my action the other way.

Well, when I was eating my lunch (i ordered vegetarian burger), I saw a lorry which passes by the street. I couldn't help myself to stay put on my chair. I quickly stood up and briefly told my colleague and supervisor that I saw a special car, and I really need to take a photo of that lorry. Without waiting for their respond, I ran to the lorry, and took a nice shot with my hp camera.



















I am so proud to say that I am a hokkien eng chun, and I am also proud to see the aussie enjoy using hokkien words for their BRANDING and MARKETING......

Haha.... so after I finish taking the photo, I shared it with my colleague. "what is so special of that truck" they asked. And I reply:" it is actually a hokkien dialect vulgar world to swear if you are piss off." And I hinted that my big boss Prof Tan should know what it means haha.....

I wonder the owner of the truck is hokkien also? He better is not a hokkien, or else the slogan of the truck 'A gentle mover......' will sound so SARCASTIC.



















To all my colleagues: "Use DOOLAN at your own risk. I am NOT RESPONSIBLE for any of your words coming our from your mouth!!!"

Mitosis of Fresh Spirit ---> Seeking spirit!!!!!

Fresh spirit had went through mitosis (n. separation of cell).

One big group splits into two smaller groups and continue growing.

This is a photo as a memory of our first SEEKING SPIRIT meeting:
















From left: Ley Hian, Thomas, Kian Meng, Michelle, Yee Fei, Annabelle, Janet and Ujjal.

Photo courtesy from Ujjal.

Last Tuesday was a fresh start for our group, and all of the members seem determined to strife hard in their life and well as kosen-rufu.

Let us do our best to grow our self mentally with SEEKING SPIRIT through our mentor and disciple relationship.

Friday night entertainment..... AND IT WAS FREE!!!!!!

Last tuesday, Prof Tan given me two tickets for a stand up comedy show. And know what, before that, I have been telling people around that I am very reluctant to go out for any entertainment as there is no FREE entertainment around me. So my kiam siap character keep reminding myself that just stay in my room and sleep will be the best entertainment.

And maybe due to my intense Inchinen (n. japanese, intense thought in one moment), I got my thought answered. So, last night I went to watch Jason Bryne with Kien Yew.




















Jason Bryne is an Irish, and he cracks all sort of jokes with his intense humor and also quick spinning mind. I just share with you guys some of the you tube click with you guys.






Thanks Prof Tan for giving me the tickets!!!!

MC of the day

Thank you Tirthi to be my partner as together we become the MC for today's meeting.

I guess we really have fun to host the meeting.

This is my first time become a MC, and I know there is so much room for improvement in the future.

I will definitely do better next time.

Pregnant dad!!!!!

Hi guys and girls,

In this modern society, anything can happen, but have you come across with a pregnant dad?





















Please read Yink Heay's Blog for more detail.

Eventually from Yink Heay's Blog, I found a comment which is more facsinating. There is a real man carrying a baby also through ectopic placental and fetus implantation in the abdominal cavity.

Mr Lee Ming Wei

The ten worlds in our life

(photo linked from: http://www.rec.uk.com/_uploads/imgpool/rollercoaster.gif)

It has been an emotional roller coaster week for me...... And it has given me something to think about, and it is how to overcome my fundemental darkness. Everyone like to win, and I know that I am one of them. And I always want to achieve my target. For doing that, I can work day and night, and I can walk the extra mile to get where I want to be. But the thing is when I walk the extra mile and I couldn't make to where I want to be, I feel really emotional about it. And now I recognize this problem, so it is time for me to make a change of this character.

This story also starts from sunday, as early in the morning, after my breakfast, I went to my lab to continue my experiment. Knowing that I have much beginner luck, and I my technique for western blotting is getting mature, I am very thrilled to work on sunday and get even more experimental result.

By 11:45pm, i was so thrilled by the result that I had. It was a day long experiment from morning until night. And so, I started to do some notes on my "brilliant" result. However, after doing comparison, I found out that the experimental result was really crappy. It was just a nice pattern without any meaning after all. And i look back to my methods, and found that I altered a step because lack of a reagent, and I started to feel anger with myself. Instantly, my emotion started to blurred with the sadness and anger without advance notice, and started to blame on many things......
















When I reach my hostel, started to chant for wisdom and courage to face the challenge. I feel better, but still angry with myself. And I have a good friend in Australia, she is Jactty. Although she is in Adelaide, thanks to 3 mobile network, we have much credit that we could use for communicating with each other. We always keep remind each other to write thesis and to troubleshoot experimental design. Bad days like that occurs constantly, and for me, the best way is to channel out through talking......

Thanks to her as a listener, I started my week again on Monday. By chanting for 1/2 hour in the morning, I am determine to start my week with full of courage and wisdom. So I quickly set up my discussion with Jason (my supervisor), and update him about my experimental result during the weekend, and ever determine to get this 2 days experiment running again.

Waiting for my babies cell to grow to the amount that I need, on Wednesday, I repeated my whole experiment again. This time, is with cautious and care. It is very important that I never do the same mistake again and I will get my result. And so, after a whole day of working in the lab, that night, I got wonderful results, and I am ready for present during the group meeting on Thursday night.

Exhausting long hours, but fulfilled heart. And I am ready to take the experiment to the next step. But I am very cautious with my emotion. I have been not very stable with my heart. I know it is a great challenge for me to sustain high EQ at every moment, but I fail again when I thought that my mic had broken. And it is now ok again.

Life is like a roller coaster, and sure it will bring you ups and downs. If we analyze all these emotional states, we could see that it actually resemblance of the 10 worlds in our life.

Let recall the 10 worlds in every moment:
1) World of Buddhahood (佛界)
2) World of Bodhisattvas (菩萨界)
3) World of Cause-awakened One (缘觉界)
4) World of Voice-hearer (声闻界)
5) World of Heavenly beings (天界)
6) World of Human beings (人界)
7) World of Asuras (修罗界)
8) World of animals (畜牲界)
9) World of Hungry Spirits (饿鬼界)
10) World of Hell (地狱界)

I am very aware that probably now I am still in between world of asuras and world of human beings. And it is time for me to chant and challenge the problem. As a disciple of Ikeda Sensei, we have to fight with the fundamental darkness in order to win in our life. It is a constant battle of good and evil in our life. And we must always strive to the best against our fundamental darkness.

Band of brothers

I remember Yong lent me a very nice DVD video series, known as "Band of Brothers" I love it so much. Not because I am a big fan of shooting / war / violence, but I always respect how these guys have trust on each other and become very good heng dai (兄弟)




















I always image the SDS-PAGE of proteins as Bands of Brothers















































(Picture linked from: http://protocols.nature.com/image/show/183)

This is because all protein are from the same cell, and it form bands on the gel due to separation of different sizes. And it is all these wonderful proteins in the cells that does everything that occur in the cells, and they have to support to maintain each and every protein in the cell to maintain stability.