Thirty!

I celebrated my 30th birthday this year, and while I don't usually think my birthday is something super important to celebrate, I did have quite the celebration this year thanks to my amazing family.

Being at the start of a new decade of life, I guess I had no choice but to spend some time looking back and being thankful for what God has blessed me with these past 30 years. There are so many things to be grateful for, life itself for one, the people who brought me into this world and have been with me through all 30 years of my life, and the other people I have met on the way and continue to be my support system. I am truly blessed with the best people by my side.

I don't think I was the kind who used to envision where I would be in the future or dream of who I'd be when I was older, but I wonder if young Amanda could see the me now, what would she think? Whatever she thinks, I know the me in the here and now can't help but be grateful for the journey God has brought me on throughout these past 3 decades, and even more so for the wonderful people he has placed in my life. I am truly, truly blessed.

So my birthday extravaganza started the weekend before my actual birthday. We travelled into Singapore to spend the weekend with Koko and Winnie because they couldn't make it back the following weekend. It was the first time I stayed with them since they got married, and I was finally able to put a taste to all the food Winnie cook. She cooked enough for a whole battalion for every meal! It was extreme in terms of volume (yes yes, very Chong) and just awesomeeeeee. She even baked a cheesecake for my birthday! (I'm salivating just thinking of the cheesecake, it was sooo good!)

It was fresh out of the oven. We didn't even give it time to sit or cool down/refrigerate awhile before we devoured it hahaha

We also took the opportunity to do the touristy bits, which included a fancy high tea (which was nice but let's be honest, is not really our thing. We are more volume-eaters than fancy-eaters haha but it was a cool experience to have at least once, and something we had been talking about trying forever) and something called I Light Singapore (which I still think was a ploy to trick us into walking off everything we ate hahaha). It was a fun weekend spent with family, something we hadn't had the chance to do in too long. We even had the chance to meet up with some extended family (and their pets).

Unintentional colour coding. We honestly did not coordinate our colours!

Some sights and smells and tastes from the weekend in Singapore

There are 2 dogs and 2 birds hiding somewhere haha

My actual birthday weekend was spent in JB because Niko only had the day of my birthday off while I had a golden weekend (the whole entire 2-day weekend off woots woots), so we decided to go to him instead of having him come to us. I was perfectly content with just lazing around the house for the entirety of the weekend (which is what we do most weekends we're off), but my family wasn't having it. Instead, we did the very hip, very insta-worthy (just, you know, minus the actual insta part) activity of cafe-hopping haha I think we went to more cafes in that one weekend than we'd been to in half a year put together.

Went to a place called Space Cafe the night before my birthday, where we bumped into Koko's uni friend who sent a photo of us to Koko saying she saw someone who looked like him hahahaha

A makeshift birthday cake using whatever they could find in the fridge because the real cake would make its appearance the next day hahaha

The Founders Cafe - drive drive drive until some kilang area then eh suddenly got nice cafe haha, food was quite nice too!

In front of another cafe Bloom by Mokmok, where we tried some fancy porridge and their pancakes

Creamery Boutique Ice Creams, where we tried a cookie-ice-creamy thing

Buffet dinner at Genesis Steamboat - not bad too!

I told you there was an actual cake!

Makan makan makan makan makan

I had a few bad work days leading up to my birthday weekend, and even had to deal with some work stuff on my birthday even though it was a Sunday. Despite that, more than having a lot of good food, I'm grateful for how loved I am. No matter what happens in life, I always have people around me who look out for me, always have my back, and always want me to be happy. What more can I ask for? What more do I need in life?

A friend told me on my birthday that she hoped I was being spoilt rotten. I was, and come to think of it, I always am. I know it, I am now reminded of it again, I am so so so thankful for it, and I never ever want to take it for granted. To everybody who loves me, thank you so much, and please know that I love you all more!

God is good, all the time. That has always been true, and will always continue to stay true.

Chinese New Year 2022

So I realise that this blog is basically dead, but I still quite like the idea of having something to look back on from time to time, so I’m going to keep posting here whenever I feel like it. I am pretty sure I’m the only person who sees whatever I post anyway 😂

I recently lost all the contents of my hard disc, my newest one which had the backup of my older stuff and which itself wasn’t backed up anywhere, so I basically lost all my photos from the past 10 years or so 😭

So I have decided to abandon my last post draft (which was supposed to be “2019 in Pictures” by the way haha) and just move on with the present.

HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR!

The CNY festivities started with a CNY dinner with some of my colleagues. I was told to wear red or risk being kicked out of the room, but me being me, I didn't have any red shirts so I wore a shirt with a tiger on it (hey it is the year of the tiger okay, I get points for effort) and a pair of maroon pants. Thankfully I wasn't the only one who didn't adhere to the dress code!

Colleagues CNY!
L-R according to positions of heads haha: Wong LY, Karen, Sharon (and husband), Chiu Xian, me, Swee Miaw, Michelle, Kong, Angela, Goh JY (in his mustard yellow shirt), Wan-Yi 

I hate COVID and how it made it next to impossible for koko to come home this CNY even though we all managed to get approved long leave (like proper slightly more than week-long off kind of leave) but noooooo, we couldn't get tickets for koko to come home so he ended up cancelling his CNY leave. That was the blergh part of this year's CNY, so hopefully this year is the last one we'll have to celebrate away from koko! 

Mandatory self-testing before going home 

My loves!

After not really going out much for so long, it was kind of nice to eat out/meet up with some people we hadn't seen for so long. Kinda nice yes, kinda scary definitely haha #stayhomegang

Dinner at Aroy Tomyum - after Aunty Yng Yng told us the food there was good, we went the same night. Quite nice! And we went early so we managed to beat the crowd hohoho

Met up with a few TIGS friends. Actually it was more like I crashed their class reunion so I really have to thank them for letting a Neptunian invade their Earthling meet-up!

Bumi friends (with a Neptunian invader)
L-R: Wan Yi, Ruby, me, Susin, Anlynn, Jing Xin, Pey Yann, Charmaine

So from there it was non-stop eating under the guise of "reunion meals". The Chong Clan had our reunion in Muar this year, we booked a house somewhere in Bakri and all stayed there for a night. That was quite fun, although I did really really really acutely feel the absence of Ah Chiah this year. I'm sure I wasn't the only one.

Chong Clan "ang ang bo hai lang"

As usual, we did mum's side of the family's celebrations in JB. This year the Singapore group couldn't come back, so it was just the 9 of us - 4 Chongs, 3 Kohs, 2 Chuas. Since niko and I wanted to spend a bit more time back home in BP, we came home on the 2nd day of CNY itself, and the rest came for a day trip the next day.

The first CNY dinner I think we've ever all been able to sit down together at the table

Dinner at a fully-booked Chok Dee. We were the first people there, arriving right as they got prepared to open for the evening, and so we managed to finish our meal just as the crowd started arriving.

Spending more time in BP also meant that we could make it for a meal at the Chen household. Aunty Evelyn's home-cooked Nyonya food is the bestttttt!

Just some of the many dishes Aunty Evelyn cooked for us - so prettily set up too! 

When I say homecooked, I mean homecooked. Even the Pai Tee shells were homemade!

Of course, in true Aunty-Evelyn-is-definitely-one-of-the-top-5-cutest-people-on-earth style, after we thought we were done with dinner and were already so full, she went "Alamak! Forgot one more dish!" and then she brought out asam fish. Of course we couldn't say no to that! And then when we were done with the fish, she suddenly remembered the itek tim she had just sitting in the kitchen as well hahaha 

The rest of the holiday was spent just doing what we do best - eating, sleeping, and watching TV (in no particular order). Any time spent with family is the best, and would have been perfect if koko could have made it home. Well, next time, hopefully!

Brunch at Coffee in Town

So it's back to reality tomorrow. The break was nice while it lasted. Now to restart the mental countdown to the next off-day/holiday! 

I'm gonna end this post with a picture of a plate of mochi because mochi is the bane of niko's and my existence in the the kitchen. A few years back we first tried making mochi and they came out the consistency of little golf balls. We just couldn't seem to make mochi right no matter what recipe we tried. This year, somehow mummy bought a packet of premixed mochi flour from Bake with Yen and so we finally got a batch of mochi that actually has the consistency of mochi (if use until premixed flour already still can fail then really habis lah). That being said, now that we have (arguably) succeeded in making mochi once, I doubt we'll ever attempt it again. Like I always say, one of the best things about living in Malaysia is how easy it is to find food and how affordable food generally is. C'mon lah, why risk creating more golf ball mochis when we can easily just go out and buy some? Or better yet, just order some and get them delivered right to our doorstep!

Finally, mochi! There are like 4 different flavours of inti on this plate but nope, nobody knows which is which hahaha

Happy CNY everyone!

Little Licker Tree

So our dog Licker had been ill for a little while. We brought her to see a vet in BP itself, then we brought her down to JB to my uncle’s/niko’s clinic to be admitted on 16/10. We knew that she wasn’t getting any better, but because of my work schedule, we couldn’t come to see her earlier.

We were finally able to come and see her after I finished work last night, and we came and talked to her and reminded her we loved her, and this morning, Licker left us for doggy heaven.

Licker, I’m sorry that of all our dogs, you had the least creative name, but in our defence, you were such a heavy-duty licker when you were a tiny little puppy 😂 Thank you for always being yourself and being the goofball that you are. Thank you for showing us that yes, you can indeed teach an old dog new tricks, and for living up to the Chong name with your love for food. Thank you for staying with us a couple more years before going to join your favourite brother, we know that you felt even more lost than we did when we lost Simba. Now you can tell him what he has missed since he left us (mostly just loads and loads of food hehe). Licker, my love, sorry I made you wait extra days because I was selfish and wanted to be able to say goodbye to you face to face, but thanks for hanging on until we came to hold you one last time. I love you so so so much, and I miss you so much already. The house feels bigger and so much lonelier without you in it.

Licker’s final resting place and the little Licker tree we planted, at the back of my Aunty’s house in JB

Goodbye Licker, I love you. Please say hi to all your brothers and sisters in doggy heaven for me ❤️

Slightly belated, but... 2018 in Pictures

So roughly once a year I remember that this blog exists. And then because of my amazingly bad memory, I do this thing just so I kind of have an idea of what went on in my year.

January
January saw some uni CF friends fiiiiiiinally coming to visit me and Ruby in BP

February
CNY! As usual, daddy's side of the family met up in BP and mummy's side in JB

Daddy's side

Mummy's side

March
Taking advantage of our funemployment, a few of my uni friends and I took a trip down memory lane to Sekinchan to see what all the hype is about. All I can say is, hmmm... very padi.

April
This was the month when life decided to whack me in the face. Goodbye funemployment, hello adulting.

The last few days of relative freedom at PTM

May
Hah. This was my first full month of working, and I was in my first posting - O&G.

Scrubbing Orientation with my O&G peeps

June
"The next time we all see each other will be when someone gets married"
June saw a few of us seeing each other again when we all went to Penang for Jonathan's wedding!

Woots woots woots congrats Jon and Wenni! The first of us to tie the knot!

July
I forgot to mention this earlier, but somehow I managed to keep Karen with me in BP haha so we're working in the same hospital. July saw her turning 25 with a durian as a birthday cake hahaha

July also saw koko getting his masters and a new place. Okay lah okay lah because of koko, we masuk kiasuland (saaaaacrifice *sniff sniff*)

Proud sister alert!

August

"Whose backside itchy want to go Night Safari?"

Apparently a lot of us

So dark still die die want to take photo to prove we were there

September

So looking through my photos, it seems like my life since starting work is just me at work, photos of work stuff, and the occasional celebration of someone's birthday. In this instance, the only non-work-related photos I have in September are of the time we went to JB to celebrate my uncle's birthday.

A family who eats together....... just, you know, grow fat together.

October

Ooh ooh October was kinda fun. We went to KB for niko's convo. It's always fun when we get the whole family together!

My world!

November

Again I wonder, what better excuse is there to meet up then to celebrate a friend getting married? November brought some of our old CFers back together to celebrate Paul and Joyce getting married.

Congrats, Paul and Joyce!

And look who came back - Ruby!

She said to wear our specs to cover the dark rings under our eyes hahaha

December

So since we were in our first posting in O&G, the 4 of us from my batch who started out in the same posting have said that we want to make a KFry trip together. After almost 2 postings, it finally happened, but even then we were missing one person.

Excuse the tired faces, we are the bottom of the food chain at work haha.
We need to do this again though, when everyone is present!

December was also when I said goodbye to my 2nd posting as a HO, one where I was fortunate enough to be able to work with so many amazing people that I miss being able to work with/see every (at least other) day.

Just look at these faces haha

And finally, Christmas.

I was really very blessed that even though it was my tagging period, my boss (who is suuuuuuper nice I cannot believe how nice the people are here) gave me 2 days off for Christmas, so I could celebrate it in JB with the family, and could attend the Christmas service and the whole works.

I just realised I don't have a picture of the people I celebrated the birth of Christ with, but hey, here's a picture of one of the tables we filled with edibles.

All in all, 2018 was the year that brought me into yet another phase of my life. It was the year I was ripped away from funemployment and thrown into the working world, but it was also the year I learnt a lot and met so many new people.

God is faithful, and God is good. Now matter how things change, He never will. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever, and therefore His goodness never changes as well.

Happy 2019, everyone! And since it's closer to CNY now than it is to any other festive seasons, Happy Chinese New Year!

2017 in Pictures

I've almost forgotten that this blog exists. Almost.

Again, it's the last day of the year and I'm here thinking, errr what happened to me in 2017 ah? So again, I looked through my photos taken this year to recap what has happened this year!


January
Chinese New Year was in January this year, and for my paternal family, instead of celebrating it here in BP like we usually do, we celebrated in Muar. It was quite fun, we all stayed in a homestay and it was fun having everybody there doing things Chong-style, that is, just eating and eating and eating all day. We missed my cousins, the 3 J's, but other than them everybody was there, which was really nice!

For my mum's side of the family, as usual, we all went to JB for the reunion dinner. After that we all went into Singapore and we got to meet up with my uncle's family there. It was so nice seeing my baby niece and nephew!

Apparently stairs are good places to take group photos.


February
I didn't get to come home in February, but that doesn't mean I didn't go anywhere that month. A friend got married in KL, and so a bunch of us traveled down for it.

Representing KT heyyyy! Also, congrats #meldwin!

March
I guess it was around this time that we started to realise that we were in our final year of medical school, and that in a few months we would no longer all be together in KT. We started to think about going places we had heard of but never felt touristy enough to visit before then.

Group 4 and our shades of blue shirts at "Pepsi Blue Lake"

It was in this month that my group started our Family Medicine posting in Dungun. In our 3 weeks there, my Dungun-housemates and I took to going for mini-road trips/day trips on the weekends. The first weekend, we drove down to Kuantan.

Postings-outside-of-KT housemates!

April
Our second weekend of our posting in Dungun, we decided to drive down to Kemaman, where a friend was having her Orthopaedics posting. So we kidnapped her for the day and visited the beach we never went to when we had our posting there the previous year haha

Hello (again), Kemaman!

Living in the same house as Karen meant, of course, the two durian-lovers in us couldn't resist buying durians so we bought them two days in a row, and the second time turned into a spontaneous durian party, because durians always taste better if you have people fighting you for it eh?

Why? Just. Because durian.

Within that week we were back in KT, to the land where we had wifi and therefore a decreased desire to see each others' faces hahaha. It was Niko's birthday the weekend we were back in KT, though, and heyyyyy the whole family - daddy mummy koko niko eeeeeveryone, all made it to KT to celebrate. (Truth: we were thinking of going up to KB where Niko is based to celebrate his birthday, but decided that my turtleland had more to offer haha #ganupride #yesimstartingtogetintothishashtagbusiness) It was soooo nice to finally have the whole fam together again after so long!

Reunited and it feels so good!

May
I think May was when everyone really started to get a bit more sentimental. Our juniors organised a farewell dinner for the Year Fivers, and I have to say, they really did put a lot of effort and heart into it. Soooo many photos were taken that night, and so I'll just post the main group photo!

Batch 2012/2017

We also had our last day of proper classes in this month, and my amazingly crazy sporting group members decided that we would all pakat to wear blue, and somehow we ended up taking photos in the fake-grass-field that had found itself to be our photoshoot spot for the second year in a row.

I miss this bunch of people!

June
My birthday this year (also my first baptism-birthday) was spent in KT, and although I was away from home, away from my family, I am blessed that I had friends and family-angkat who celebrated with me.

"Amanda holds the cake, everyone else grab something random and smile for the camera!"

KTBC Food Lovers' Club. I'm not even kidding, that's really what we're called haha

July
July. Soooo many things happened in July. Let's see, I took my finals, my very last exams of medical school. By the grace of God (and with all the prayers of everybody), I graduated from medical school! Medical school, 5 years, and God was with me every single step of the way. I would not, could not, have done it without Him.

So, so, so happy and relieved we all got through it together!

It was official, we really would be leaving KT, we were done with uni. With that, things really started happening non-stop and there was barely any time to breathe. It was fine, though. We had all passed our exams and were running on the high of that so we just went on with everything, not wanting to miss out on anything before we all left KT.

BP friends who FINALLY came to visit before we left KT

Makan after filming for our part of the lecturers' appreciation video

My Ah Kues also came to visit

In an unexpected turn of events, we ended up performing on the Appreciation Night, and Ruby and I suddenly found ourselves stuck with a bunch of 3 emo Penang boys XD

The people I called my classmates for 5 years :')

The people who gave me a place to call home in KT

We tried doing the posey-posey nice-nice photo thing, realised we weren't a bunch of people who know how to pose well, and eventually sort of just went "aiya whatever lah" and ended up with a selfie instead

As I said, we can't do the nice-photo thing. What we apparently can do well, though, is laugh like a bunch of crazy hyenas on camera. Who needs normal-looking photos? Definitely not us. Also, REDANG! It was a good little trip. Amazing island, even better company.

Ex-CFers seriously having serious fun together in Tadom Hill Resort

August
Convocation month!

Convo buddies!

Quadruple celebrations in JB for mine and Joyce's graduation, as well as Faith and Jayne's birthdays

My grandma, my boss!

The Chongs happy after food

And then and then and then, we finally made the family trip to Japan we have been dreaming of since we were young! Sadly, though, my camera chose this time to completely conk out on me so I'm going to have to get the photos from whoever took them, but all I can say is this. I wanna go back there to Japan someday, and preferably with my family again! It was such an awesome holiday!


September
Being unemployed and back home in BP definitely has its perks. I finally got to meet up with some ex-classmates, some of whom I hadn't seen in years.

More than half of the people in this photo were unemployed at that point of time. Unemployment for the win!

Me and some of my uni friends also managed to go on a road trip, we spent 11 days in each others' hometowns, eating each others' favourite food, and doing our best to see each others' faces enough to get sick of each other. Some of the photos we took in some of the places we went:

First stop: Batu Pahat!

Melaka!

Ipoh!

Penang

Same baju day in Penang

The last meal of the road trip, also in Penang

Everything from here on out can be summed up with just "because unemployment". I managed to do things and go places I'd otherwise wouldn't be able to.


October

A weekend in KL with the girls for Anlynn's birthday weekend

Distant Worlds concert (finally!) in Singapore (thanks koko!)

Living it up on a cruise. I could really get used to that life. I can't imagine why anyone rich would ever travel any other way at all. Cruises are the way to go man!

November

Aaron's birthday surprise in KL

The Spain-Portugal trip I enjoyed way more than I ever expected to

Meet-up with some other ex-classmates

Helping out at SU's NSCFL Camp for the first time as a camp officer, and getting the opportunity to lead the dream group. These amazing people made the camp for me! #groupthesslonica

December
And finally, we've reached the month of December. It was a month of celebration, starting with a close friend from secondary school getting married!

Congrats, Syak! I am so happy for you!

And then, of course there was Christmas, which was great, but as usual, I was too busy eating to take many photos hehehe.


This year was good. Great, actually. I finished medical school, and had a full year surrounded by friends and family. No matter what changes I went through, God was constantly there for me, as always, leading and guiding me, and His love and faithfulness never ceases to amaze me. New year coming up? Unemployment (funemployment heyyy!) likely to end soon-ish (awwwww #sadface)? With God by my side, on my side, I know He will guide me through whatever life may throw my way.

Happy new year, everybody, I hope the new year brings you loads of love and joy, and most importantly, peace!