Animal Instincts.

I went to the zoo.

It all started when a friend mentioned that he wanted to see a llama. Yep, the weird-looking camel clone dressed in fur. He went, "I fucking love llamas, man... I really do... Let's see some llamas, man... Let's go to the zoo to see some fucking llamas, all right?" And so a few friends agreed and there we go. A short trip to the unsurprisingly quiet London Zoo which ended with light rain. I did have fun though - I haven't been to a zoo in years to be honest. The hightlight? Screaming otters.

Here are some of the better photographs which I took at the zoo. Surprsingly, I brought along my long telephoto lens for this trip. It was heavy (over 1.5kg) but definitely worth it. And digital at it too, finally! What do you think? You decide.






Animals are awesome. I probably would go to the zoo again, albeit in much better weather. I think I might have just caught a cold in the rain. Damn. And my body still aches like crap. Talk to you soon, my friends.

The Society.

Nothing beats a good ol' photo walk.

On weekends, public transport in London is a true pain in the ass. Somehow the mayor decides to fix all kinds of crap on Saturday and Sundays, which inevitably screws up people who are trying to use them. Our beloved Malaysian public transport is without a doubt light years behind the UK, but unlike the Malaysian one - the expectations are pretty high. Anyway, it took 4 hours worth of commuting time to travel to my destination today (including return, of course). I couldn't make a pre-planned lunch appointment but hey, I had a good time. Met a few interesting people which includes an Arabian man named 'Sultan'. No shit.

A part of my Photo Society.

We go to the unfamiliar places in London.

And take random snapshots.

And more snapshots?

It is fun being part of a society. Especially one where people share the same interests and hobbies, rather than sharing the same nationality or pathetic mindsets. Why go to England and not meet people of different ethnicities? That's a waste, sadly. For once in a long while, I am glad to say that 'things are looking better now'. I met great people and got to know them better. Things and objectives are getting sorted out one at a time. Progress - it's here.

Life is great. And it should only get better from here. All I need now is a good book and a good smoke. Coconut, you hear me?

The Crappiest Things Happen.

Sunday sucks.
Well not really, but today did. In short, I woke up today to find my trusty mobile phone broken.

What the fuck?!

The LCD screen gave up on me. There were funny blotches and upon close inspection - a rather serious crack inside the shell. My intelligence tells me that I have somehow landed my big ass on it last night. You big fucking idiot, Ralverd you. It was only 6 months old at most, my poor Nokia. So what was I to do? Search for an alternative, obviously. And I did try to look for one. The search went on for about an hour but I couldn't find anything even close to it. It was THAT good, really. So I bit the bullet and ordered the same phone on Nokia.co.uk. Yes, the EXACT model as above. Why not use my older phones? Trust me, once you use a Nokia (the 6700 Classic at that), you'll never want to use anything else. Samsung is for pussies. *For your info, I own a Samsung myself.

To be honest, spending another £220 left a bad taste in my mouth. It was just yesterday that I spent a few bucks ordering a plastic camera on Ebay along with some soon-to-be-expired slide films to play with. The irony was that I made a new year resolution to save up a good amount of money. Epic failure. Perhaps it's time to rethink the budgeting... Maybe sell a camera or two? Nah, never.

That said, I actually have an anthropology assignment which is due on Tuesday. A 2500-word book review on a book about some Brazilian aborigines known as the 'Yanomano'. A tribe whose men tie the foreskin of their penises around their belts. A tribe who abducts women to have sex with and hopefully marry. A tribe where 10-year-old kids are addicted to tobacco and hallucinogenic drugs. A tribe whose women do not use (or use) menstrual pads of some sort because most of the time they're either pregnant, nursing kids or sterile. If there's one thing that anthropology teaches me, it is that the world is filled with loads of funny and interesting people. Then again, I stand by my claim that anthropologists are simply people with too much time to spare. Thankfully, I am almost done with the work.

It Isn't Easy.

Why would I say that?

Here I am slacking off to write something on a blog which barely anyone reads. I've been rather busy since returning to London and the weather has been rather unforgiving. Snow, rain, rain, rain... Where the fuck is the sun? Of course, this is England we're talking about so there you go. No point whining any further. God obviously hates this country. On the other hand our dear Malaysia is over-pampered by the Great Forces. By the way, here are the first few portraits from my birthday gift - A Konica rangefinder film camera. Nope I'm not showing off. These are just some simple, casually taken photographs of my friends. The last fellow is a British otaku living inside a Japanese shell. My regards to Mr. Kato.

Don't stare.

Dear Shannon.

And the man himself, Kato-san.

Ah yes, I finally got to develop my own film after a month break from B&W photography. It's just amazing how the smell of chemicals and rubber gloves would get you excited, really. At least it's much better than writing a blog post on the computer. Anyway I just realised that I have quite a few cameras lying inside them cabinet, most of them waiting to be used. I feel sorry for my DSLR especially - it has not seen action for quite some time. Thankfully, I might have a fashion studio photoshoot coming up and perhaps this piece of digital gear would finally be brought out to see the sunshine again. Then again, the sun doesn't really shine in London during Winter. It gets dark at 3pm. And by 6pm I'm already sleepy. Nope, not good.

Before I write any further, let me tell you that I have a 2500-word book review to complete by tomorrow. Honest. Anthropology sucks. I have no idea why they'd incorporate the subject into archaeology without getting the student's consent beforehand.. So I'm stopping here. You'll just have to wait for my next update, which hopefully will be soon. Adios.

Happy New Year.

A decade has finally passed.

First of all, I wish you readers a happy new year. A new year at long last, too. What an eventful year 2009 had been for me, though not necessarily in a good way. I didn't get to celebrate Christmas/New Year personally because my grandmother had recently passed away. I have been too busy attending to her funeral and a celebration just didn't cross my mind. She was 90 and she suffered a heart attack. But was it tragic? No. A peaceful death occurs now and then, and hers was definitely one. I know it - because I was there to witness.

Seeing a loved one die was something new for me. When I was younger there was another death in the family, which was of my grandfather's. I was really young back then and obviously it didn't affect me much. Now that I'm all grown up, it made me realise something fundamental - we are all going to die someday. Maybe not yet, but it'll come. We know this, but we never really think about it. No matter who we are, how strong and healthy, we eventually will succumb to death without exception. And in most cases we aren't allowed to choose when we die. The gods must be fucking with us. And we have no choice but to take it. Of course, I do not want to die now. I'm very much afraid of death at this very moment because I've not experienced the world enough to say 'that's enough'. My life has barely begun.

So now that we've established the notion that we all WILL die, what can we do about our lives? Are we going to sit and wait for the gods to take us away on their whim? Or do we make the most of it before they actually do that? Obviously if you have the least bit of intelligence you would choose the latter. So there it is - my resolution for 2010. Making the most of what's left of measly human life. It's going to be hectic, but at the very least it must not be wasted. Life's too short to be wasting time. Happy New Year, all.

Guantanamera.

It's snowing in London.

And here I am freezing my fucking ass off despite writing this blog post inside the comfort of my flat. Oh, the heater's still in the wardrobe. It just made me realise that it's mid December and that Christmas is approaching. Ah, the festive season: mulled wine, mince pie, stockings, Christmas decorations, snow... Well, that doesn't concern me. I'm Malaysian and back in our country we don't do things that way. It's 35 degrees Celcius there during Christmas and stays that way even if it wasn't. We have brilliant iced teas, wear flip flops with shorts and t-shirt in the midst of the 'winter' seasons. Heck, we do that everyday in fact. And to be honest Christmas is way too commercialised. Christmas shopping, christmas buffet coupons, christmas 'specials', even christmas insurance discounts. Oh boy. We're just victims of capitalisation - those big corporate bastards who are raking in big money through this holiday simply won't tell you that.

This has nothing to do with Christmas.

Neither does this.

Anyway, I recently compiled a 'bucket list'. A list of things which I definitely have to do before I kick the fucking bucket. I'll tell you the first thing which came into my mind: experiencing zero gravity. It's been a childhood dream of mine to go to outer space. But rather than leaving earth, I was always more interested in knowing what it's like to float around without being bounded by the laws of gravity. That's my top priority before anything else. Of course, other things include climbing Mount Everest which sounds ridiculous, but I'm OK with not reaching the peak. I don't want to die before completing everything on the list, so that'll probably be one of the last. Still, there are probably many things which I could add to the ever-growing list. That's why life is such an adventure. I'm now living life with one motto - ticking off those empty boxes on the list, one at a time.

It feels surprisingly refreshing to have greater things to look forward to. Now I finally realise how insignificant my little problems are when I glance through the list. Maybe you should have a 'Before-I-Die' list too.

Howdy Ho.

I need coffee.
My sleeping times are fucked. I've been sleeping in the morning, waking up in the evening and missing classes in the process. Look at the photo below: taken at 5am in the morning, developed half an hour later and scanned (after drying) at 7am. It doesn't even make sense. I know that I'm sort of a late night hawk, but this... Oh well, time 'well' spent.

An insomniac? Maybe.

I've got nothing much to say really. Here I am sitting in front of the computer, thinking of something good to write. You know, something of value that'll capture your attention. Not just the regular bullshit which you get from those typical blogs. But no, my mind's pretty much blank. It's 5pm already but I barely woke up minutes ago. And yes, I missed yet another class today. It's pretty interesting though - trying to blog in this semi-conscious state. Maybe I should try to blog next time when I'm high. Someone bring me the works.

And I almost forgot - It's my birthday today. Happy birthday to me, indeed.