My Potluck

Prepared by Mary Anne and I. We have decided to have this potluck right after our finals. Well, all the while we wanted to invite people to our house for dinner, but the condition of the house was not allowed. This house that we are staying might collapse anytime. But after finals I could not care much and invite 10+ people to our house and surprisingly, my house is still here till today. It was our first potluck.

My house has became the "Red Alert 3" and "Counter Strike" multi player spot.

All the food were gone within minutes (in fact, there were not enough).

Due to the condition of the house, we always help cooking whenever we were invited for potluck. This is the most we can do.

Chicago Trip

Chicago trip was a short and fun trip. It was during Thanksgiving break. Together with Mary Anne, Joanne, Chin Hou, Voon, Cheng Khang and Khe Kong, we made it a very successful trip. It was really tiring because most of the time we will be out there travelling and trying new food.

We have been to all the 4 out of 5 main attractions in Chicago, paying $60 for each person (that's crazily expensive) for all city passes. The Adler Planetarium, Shedd Aquarium, Field Museum and The Hancock Observatory. We have missed the Museum of Science and Industry because there was nothing special and we had a very tight schedule. Those places are fantastic; there were so many things to learn and see. Below are the example of my favourite pictures in Chicago. For more pictures, you could check it at http://www.facebook.com/findfriends.php#/photos.php?&id=507126466&s=6&hash=ecd8aa530c7bdc0eff55e2cfff96763e

1 thing that I would like to comment is about the attitude of Chinese people in China Town. They are not friendly at all. We went to a Chinese restaurant on our first day for lunch. We were not being treated well, I think it was because we are all students, which indirectly means that we might not give much tips. After the lunch, we decided not to give much of tips. Then the waitress said that the tips is not enough, it must be minimum of 15%. Well, then we used calculator to calculate the exact 15% and nothing more for her. On the other hand, there was another bigger group of adults sitting beside our table. They were bring treated differently, much nicer than how we were being treated. Oh well... They are all tips-oriented.

We had also been to the famous "Bean". It was very unique. All of us became cam-whore all of a sudden.

We also went for shopping in Aurora for Black Friday where all things became much cheaper. I bought myself a pair of Nike Shoes (40 USD), sweat shirt and a long sleeve shirt.

These girls...... crazily rich. (Actually not all the items are theirs.)

Typical Chinese in China Hair Style

This hair style I got from China Town in New York City. Sigh... It costs me 11 USD. Does not look nice at all... My hair was quite long and I had no choice but to cut it there.

Everyone's Potluck at Cheng Khang's House & Celebration of 3 Birthdays

This gathering is also known as "The Mega Gathering End of Fall 2008 Semester Birthday+Housewarming+Potluck+Gathering+Farewell Event", host by Cheng Khang. Basically each of us (or groups) will have to cook and contribute to the party. Our batch, nearly 40 plus of us were invited, but not all attended though. There were a lot of nice food, which made me crave for 4 bowls of rice!

It was also post celebration of Ryan Foo and pre-celebration of Brandon Khoo and Chun Han. It was a surprise party for them. I remember Ryan's reaction when we present the cake to him, he was like "no, not my birthday" (because his birthday was already over). The video shown below is about 3 of them blowing the candles together, it was fun!

Sigh... I wanted to do to something like this too. Too bad the house condition does not allow; it is too small and not spacious, and most importantly, it will collapse (according to the landlord). What a joke...

My group is preparing. My job is to take photograph.


There were a lot of laptops, after most of them went home, we all played CS (counter strike)

The Jordan Creek

My first time in Jordan Creek was a bad experience. We watched horror movie called "Quarantine". It was really bad. The camera of the movie was the first person point of view, meaning it moves exactly how the person moves. It made me headache, other friends complained too. Also, I am those kind of people who have strong and deep memory (not photographic memory), so when ever I watch a movie, most of the time I will remember it, especially tiny details/scenes that trigger curiosity. This memory will last for a few weeks, so basically I lived in fear for a few weeks after that movie.

I did not want to watch the movie at first, but all others want to watch. So basically, I paid 9 bucks to scare myself, sigh...

Never mind that. After watching the movie, we have taken a few pictures outside of Jordan Creek Mall. I really do not know why the screen reflection blocked my face, as it is in the picture shown below. Why out of so many people, only I am affected?

After seeing that picture, we have decided to take again to see how it goes. Fortunately, it went well. =)

Giang & Chiann Birthday

Giang (pronounced as Zeng) from Vietnam, Pre-celebration

Chiann from Malaysia, Post-celebration

Drake Basketball Team VS Minnesota

First thing that shocked me was, there are so many people (6021 people) in the Knapp Center for only a basketball tournament between A UNIVERSITY and the other. But the opponent of Drake is from Minnesota (another state). There are Cheer leaders, opening ceremony etc. It is really a huge event for Drake University.

Drake even encourage its students to support its team by giving out free shirts for first 500 students. In the event itself, it gives another don't know how many free gifts and shirts. Also, only Drake students can receive tickets for free, each student is eligible for only 1 ticket. And usually sometimes they ought to sell the tickets last minute at the gate for those who did not manage to get the limited free ticket from Drake; they sell it for like around 20 - 30 bucks @@.

I started queueing at 5.15, the match starts at 7 sharp (well, U.S. always punctual, when they say 7 means 7). The queue was so long. All queueing outside the Knapp Center and the door only opens at 6 pm sharp. Drake students really like this kind of event much. If other students that came like around 7 pm, there will be no more nice seats.

During the game, everyone was like so excited and intense. Basically they only cheer for their Drake team (because all of them are audience from Iowa). They "buu" opponent team throughout the whole match. I think this is unfair because this action will give tremendous stress to the foreign team, I guess they are used to it because of their culture. Despite competing in this pressuring situation, Minnesota team won by 10 points for this tournament.

Drake is losing by a few points in the first half. Also note that there are 3 referees for a match.

When Drake team was doing free throw, the audience will do some hand sign to calm the crowd down, asking them not to make any noise so that the player concentrate in his throw. When his throw entered the basket, the crowd will give an applause. If he did not enter, nothing happened.

When opponent team was doing it, the audience will remain quiet as well, until when he was going to shoot, they suddenly made some noise to distract his concentration. When he did not get it entered the basket, the crowd will give an applause. If it did entered, "buu" from the audience.

Those cheer leaders are well trained.

This Drake VS other state tournament is so huge. Others (like me) might think that it state or national tournament.

Drake basketball team was quite good and always win tournaments. But somehow it lost this match. It might be due to my presence as this is my first time watching it? Debatable...

Stress Week - 11/7 till 11/13

I post this after experienced some stress days. As a student, it is normal to face a number of stressful events in a week.

Management Midterm 2 (Monday) - It is quite a heavy event for me. I tried to finished every page that is required and I made it! More than 100 pages of words. This subject primarily focus on working behavior, so it is related to psychology of working life. I can hardly do well in pure reading subjects.

Information System 101 Case Studies (Tuesday, due 2 pm) - I was like rushing for 1 of the 3 case studies on Monday night and managed to finished it. As for the other 2, it is settled by other group mates. This is how it works, my professor randomly picked a few people (using a computer, so it won't be bias) and have the groups to work on a Wikis which setup by the professor through BlackBoard (a website for each of the students to summit their assignment online, download important documents posted by professors, do exam online (some of the subjects), view results etc)). So in this Wiki, basically each other can edit each others work and professors rate it according to each individual effort. I did a case study, others did other case studies. BUT this does not mean that each case studies has acquired all of the students participation; all of us (around 5 or 6) will have to do all 3 cases (by editing others work, usually grammar). I forced myself to wake up earlier on Tuesday to edit others work and continue research on the company of Wellsfargo.

Mock Interview (Tuesday, 3.30 pm) - (I am writing this on Monday) I did not take it seriously. Because this is an interview organized by Drake University to let us expose to interviews. It is a very beneficial program and all students from business school will definitely need to go through it. Also, the interviewers are from the companies itself, not simply substitute by Drake staff. By knowing this at the last minute, I felt a little stress because I know I can't simply go through it; this is my first and my best opportunity to practice my interviewing skills. BUT, I have to prioritize Finance midterm on Wednesday. Also, there are 3 cases studies for Information System subject due on Tuesday (2:00 p.m.); I have completed none of those. So, I do not have any time to spare to practice it. I assumed I can be very natural also.

The day of the interview, I screwed up. Haha... Wellsfargo staff was my interviewer, and there are two of them. There was no eye contact at all. It is not because I do not want to look into their eyes; it is that they do not want to look into mine because they busy writing down my responses, BOTH of them writing the same thing. The interview process took about 30 minutes (it was really long) and the questions are unexpectedly difficult or different. I have surveyed those basics questions and prepared only for that because I really do not have the time. After the interview, I felt a bit overwhelmed, I wonder why. But I think that it is because I felt happy going through such a hard interview (my perception) and learned something from it. Which is always a good thing.

Finance Midterm 3 (Wednesday) - I was quite relax knowing that I have to face it. It is because I do not want to stress myself after getting Management midterm, IS case studies, mock interview done. But I did try my best to study last minute. This is the exam I care the most out of all things simply because I am a finance major. After finishing the exam, I felt very stress; I know I did not do well, I had got one of the subjective question wrong, STUPID mistake. I felt miserable after that, the whole day. All I can do now is to hope that he will grade me according to the steps, not the ultimate answer. In general, everyone says the test was a disaster.

After the midterm, I went home to take a short nap. Go to work on 5 pm to 7 pm. I was SOO tired. I am happy the fact that my China friend treat me a meal at 7 at Drake's Buffet (Hubbell).

Assignment 6 of Information System 44 (Thursday, due 9 pm) - It is about microsoft access. It took me about 1 hour plus to finish it, not a problem at all. I finished it on Thursday around 3 something. Good thing about this assignment is that, if we know how to do it, we could skip the class on Thursday. Well, there is always text book for guidance, everything is inside. So I skipped the class, I slept till 2 pm on Thursday.

Quiz of Information System 44 (Thursday, due 9 pm) - Super easy, no comment.

The vietnamese dance was very traditional. I kinda enjoy the music but could not even understand a single word.

I would say this is the best performance of all. Both of them dance well, look out for their steps.

This Indian dance was quite traditional as well. Notice that there is a non-indian and she danced as well as the other one.

No commet on this. Haha...

This song is very nice. I do not understand a single word but the music and the way they sang it was quite good. Notice at the end of the song, they sang "I am from Austria", somehow everyone laughed at this point. =)

Fusion! Combination of a few different kinds of dances, where they include professors! The person on the left (our left now) is my finance professor. I never imagined that he will dance this well; I thought he was a serious person.

Dances from all different countries.

First Snow in My Life: 11/8/2008

This is my first time seeing real snow. Nothing special about this post, just feel like posting it. The weather here is getting colder as day goes by. Sigh... to reinforce, I really dislike cold weather.