Learning Cantonese & Cooking

Asked my husband how to say Pumpkin in Cantonese:
"Nam kua"

And yesterday I kept talking about Winter Melon:
"Tong kua"

He brought up the topic and realized that there is no such thing as "Pat kua".

I looked up to him; my eyes blanked.

He explained:
East South West North : Tong Nam Sai Pat
There is "Tong Kua" (Winter Melon)
"Nam Kua" (Pumpkin)
"Sai Kua" (Watermelon)
but there is no Pat Kua.

Paintball in Jo-burg

Man, I did not know what is Paintball. When my colleague invited us go play paintball, I heard 'Pinball'.
And I questioned, "Pinball could be played psysically??"

Well, an ignorant bimbo like me seriously never heard of or seen Paintball. Moreover, I never really excel in sports, so I've decided long ago that I'm not good & won't get active anymore.

So it turned out to be an outdoor game. I don't mind. I like outdoor. Been couped up in room too much these days.
But I did not know until the day we went for it.

And miss bimbo here wore white as snow skinny jeans with 2-inch high heels. Seriously I didn't bring any other clothes or shoes. I've been to Johannesburg numerous times, but never do outdoor activity. How would I know...

We had our fun. Shooting & posing for fierce pictures. Acting like refugees, prisoner of war & terrorist.
It was funny. Even all the rest of the South African looked at us & grinned. The staff included.

1st round: We had one life. Once shot, you're dead. Raise hand in sign of surrender.
We heck care

2nd round: We had three lives. Shot 3times, you're dead.
The shields were big cushions. 1st all of us got good cover at triangle cushion. But had to move ahead to attack. Moved ahead to cillinder cushion.
Bad choice. Got attacked from left & right. It's too small for cover.
Somebody shot my leg. Big ball of blue ink splashed my white jeans on the left leg.
Damn! They had to shoot my jeans!

Ahh.. What a bother! I chose to go there. Play to the max!

3rd round: Then I realized each 'war field' has a name. This one's Kuwait. THe shields were 'hill' for covers & triangle of tins.
Someone got hit at the neck. We tried to help her though can't see where it hit with all the paint. Our worry was if it hit the limph point.

At few times, girls were hit on the head & paint splashed through the hair & the mask disable us from clear vision.

4th round: The -=+;' River. There is a tent in the middle. And in the tent there is a blue flag. Each team goes to each extreme end of the field. When whistle blow, go for the flag and bring back to base.
Prrrrrrriiiiiiiittttttttttttt!!!!!!!!!!
We ran as quickly as we could. Just ran forward. The was a tiny river (or longkang) to cross. My team guy ran straight & grabbed the flag. Within one minute, the game was over. He brought it back to base.
Change side.
Prrrrrriiiiittttttttttttttt!!!!!!!!
Again, our team ran as quick. My other team boy fell. But he fell so gracefully he continue to crawl belly down. He managed to get up quick & ran for the flag. By this time, the opponent guy got it. But we shot him. He dropped it. My guy grabbed it. Ran back to base. We won again.

When the guy fell, they all thought he was ducking for cover to avoid the 'bullets'. hehe...
The power of national service training.

We decided to rest awhile before the next round.
Most of us are gasping because Johannesburg is so high in altitude (I was told that it's about 4000feet above sea level!!). I was already gasping in the 1st round after running just 5steps!
Well.. Obviously my asmathic background does not help.

5th round: The Baghdad.
Unlimited lives. Shoot until bullets finish or surrender. The shields are L-shaped walls.
I was shot at the leg! Again! And this time it was at a very close range. About 5meters. It was excruciating painful. I couldnt' move for awhile. I was holding my calf in pain when a guy ran into my cover. We both point our rifle at each other & found that we are team members. That was a close call. With such close range, if any of us hit, I could not begin to imagine the injury.

I surrendered not long after that. My rifle is empty.

At times we surrendered because our rifles was stucked.

The winner was a girl from my team. Hip hip hurray!!!!!!!

Man.. The last one was a yellow paint. The staff, looked my mighty white jeans, told me to immediately soak my jeans in water. Otherwise the colour might stay. The paint is actually water based.

So I did. Squeeky clean white.

But the yellow paint did not come off. It was not their paintball. It was probably personal paintballs that those locals brought. We kept picking paintballs from ground, hoping to load our rifles more.
This is a bad one.

I rubbed with Dynamo. And soaked in Vanish. Ok. Can do.
Thankfully it's still a good white.

Paintball.. My 1st experience.

Thank you guys, for all the fun!

Cotton wool over the City of Johannesburg

I have just landed in Johannesburg, South Africa. The land of safari.

Unfortunately it is very very cold. We arrived into the morning of 1degree centigrade. It was indeed surprising for me. For I normally encounter JOhannesburg with heat & sun. It's still sunny & bright as usual. But the chill & dry climate really got into my throat. We all look like we smoke cigar whenever we breathed.

My surprise today is:
It was so foggy in the city when we arrived at 0610hrs. Bright & sunny but I was so shocked when I looked outside the window. I thought what I saw was the ocean/sea! But look closely it is actually the fog covering the city. We could only make out from the 4 factory chimneys! (Well, surely nobody can possibly place factory with chimneys in the sead?!)

We thought (or kinda hope for diversion. More $$$. Chance of 2 1/2times wage. hehe) there will be either circulating or diversion. It looks really impossible to land. When pilot announced 'Crew to stations', I thought they're just hoping for the better.
I could feel for the captain-in-training pilot. It would have been a tremendous pressure of test & decision.

So we sat quietly on our seat. Constantly looking outside. It really look like cotton wool covering the city. In my sleepy mind, disgusting thought like moth covers came across my mind.

Nearing landing, I really didn't think that they're serious about landing in that condition. In my opinion, or rather, my vision; the visibility is less than 100m. In fact to really see things clearly, it's actually a visibility of about less than 50m.

Now I really understand what the www.yahoo.com/weather's visibility is for. Not for me land airplane-lah of course,
but for possible drivers too.

We did land.

Not only we landed, it was incredible. Smooth & extremely safe, I wanted to clap. I was kinda disappointed that nobody did. Because European normally do.
Everything went extremely well.
Never have I felt this kind of pride for the pilots that SIA trained.
What looked like the most dangerous turned into the safest ride.

We praised the pilot for the landing. But the humble guy accredited to auto-pilot.
Auto-pilot or manual, the plane needs a man.
We had a great team that did that today.

Thank you for the safe flight.