I have moved from Cashew Heights, Bukit Panjang to Toh Guan Road, Jurong East. The main reason? It'll cut down my travelling time by approximately 30 minutes every day, every trip. After three long years in Cashew Heights, I have decided it's high time to move out into somewhere near MRT, and when this house came up, I just knew this is the right time, and so here I am, in Jurong East.

Walking distance according to Google Earth was 890 meters.


Home sweet home, very nice, clean, and it got piano (not that I know how to play it hehe...)


Our stuffs in old home and new home. Before and After ...

There are certain things that certainly changed, but overall, it's not so much different staying here in Jurong East compared to staying at Cashew Heights last time round, although it's considered "downgrade" from a condo into HDB. hehe....

Currently feeling: very chaotic inside

Update: Thank God it's just in the morning. I am very well and fit already now haha...

After office today, I went to watch Superman Returns at The Cathay. Since the movie starts at 7 pm, I had dinner earlier. For some reason after discussion, we went to Pizza Hut for dinner. After dinner, we reached The Cathay at 6.30 pm. Still too early, we decided to stop by Ben and Jerry's ice cream. I took Cherry Gracia ice cream with wafer. Cherry Gracia, according to them, is the most popular flavour in US haha... great choice

Next, is the movie, Superman Returns (Digital), for 154 minutes, it was well, not as bad as some people might suggest. As a matter of fact, I liked the movie, it was not too boring, enough actions, and somehow the story was kept smooth. I would give it . Some may not agree with me, but it's personal preference

Took MRT back, reached home, bathed, SMS, phone call , blog, and time to sleep. Next questions, can I wake up in three hours for Germany vs Italy?

For those who usually accessed my website using hendrikch.com, I am sorry to say that for some reason, the domain is down, can't redirect to my blog. All emails to @hendrikch.com still works as per normal though. I have been contacting my domain provider for three days now, with no reply at all. I am truly dissapointed with their service now.

In the mean time, please use the direct link instead: http://www.tabulas.com/~hendrikch/

I'm sorry for any inconvenience caused.

http://www.eddiezone.net/flashgame/Restaurant.swf

My highest score so far was 1640. What's yours? 

people die from starving
people die from thirst
people die from plane crash
people die from cancer
people die from bomb
people die from suicide
people die from diseases
people die from accident
people die from age
people die from murder
people die from wounds

but can people die from waiting too long?

Currently feeling: bosenzzz...

It's back up again after a week of downtime. You can now access this blog using http://www.hendrikch.com again. Thanks.

Last Friday, Sizzler had a promotion where three adults dine-in, the fourth one will be free, so it was kind of 25% off. So, we gathered troops to go to Sizzler at Suntec City on Friday evening. We managed to get eight people, just perfect.

Eight Sizzler-mania


My seafood platter, niceee......

Of course, after all these buffet (although just salad hehe..) we need to do sports, so it came in an event called sports day from my church. Youth and young adults fellowship of my church held a sports day on Saturday in Bukit Timah, the old SMU facilities, where we had badminton, volleyball, basketball, street soccer, running, etc. I participated in volleyball, badminton, and street soccer. After so many years of playing tennis, to get back to badminton again was really tough. For street soccer, it was 7-on-7, not bad, I scored one goal from corner, hehe...


The look of hungry and tired people haha... This is probably just one-third of everybody who were there.

After the sports day, we all felt very tired and hungry, and so went to Al-Ameen at Upper Bukit Timah, where the first thing I ordered was Milo Godzilla !!!! hahaha.... can not tahan already, so tired and hungry, I badly wanted something cold and sweet.

Relationship is like eating at a food court.

Friendship is like going to food court to eat, there are so many choices that you can choose, any one that suits you will do.

Dating is like going to food court to eat, you like char kway teow there, and you ate the same thing, everyday, but you are free to go and eat fish soup or katsu don the next day, whichever and anytime you like, no commitment.

Courtship is like going to food court to eat, you have committed to the stall owner that you are going to only eat chicken rice every time you come to the food court. But, if you think you can't really stand eating chicken rice for the rest of your life, you still have a way to get out of it, but of course, try hard lah

Marriage is like going to food court to eat, you have vowed that for the rest of your life, you are going to eat only chicken chop, no way out. You have chosen chicken chop and it'll be chicken chop given to you every single day. Once in a while, you'll be tempted to see if the carrot cake next stall tastes better, but you have to remember that you have once decided, that no matter what, chicken chop will always taste better than carrot cake or fish soup or katsu don or chicken rice or char kway teow. No turning back point.

Currently feeling: bouncy

I received a good news last Friday. I'll share with you all once I got it already

It was hp iPAQ h2210 who has been my personal digital assitant for three years, and when the tempation of $450 discount + free 1 GB CF card for a new Dell Axim X51v came, I couldn't resist it

Technically speaking, this is the most full-featured, high-end PDA available in the market now and for foreseeable future. As with my iPAQ, this X51v can do everything too, from the standard PDA functions like calendar, contacts, and tasks, musics, videos, Bible for Indonesia Terjemahan Baru and NIV, Cash Organizer, Audio Recorder, notes, photo viewer, SMS via Bluetooth to my K700i (the application was proudly developed by fellow Indonesian), etc.

Photo viewing in X51v is certainly much better as X51v has FOUR times the resolution of my old iPAQ. X51v also has Wi-Fi built-in, so I could connect to my wireless network at home, sitting on the couch, watching TV, while at the same time do browsing and chat via MSN Messenger. Talk about multi-tasking eh? The built-in Pocket IE is good but not good enough, so I installed free open-source Minimo which is basically a Pocket Firefox. I wanted Opera for Windows Mobile, but too bad, it's not free. That means now I can go to McD to surf net too if I want to hehe ...

Technical specs includes 624MHz processor (man, that's faster than my PC processor at home), 256MB ROM and 64MB RAM. That big ROM means I could store everything I want into it, and not afraid that I may lose anything, unlike my old iPAQ where I'll lose everything if my battery ran out of juice. I've had this PDA for two weeks now, and finally two days ago I managed to COMPLETELY move out of old iPAQ.

This afternoon, I was having my lunch somewhere near Boon Keng MRT (I know kinda far for lunch from Tanjong Pagar), as I walked out of a building, I stepped half of the pedestrian way, and I fell down to the street (luckily no car ), literally screamed , dropped my belongings and my phone as well on the street. I immediately clutched my ankle and a security guard promptly came to help me get up and sit down on the road side, away from cars passing by. I sat there for five minutes, still clutching my ankle, massaging it, and after I felt better, I thanked the security guard, then walked back to Boon Keng MRT, and back to office. It felt okay, though I felt a bit of pain as I was walking back and forth to pantry and restroom during the day. It still felt rather pain now, a bit swollen, but hopefully tomorrow, it'll be alright, and everything will be back to normal

Update: One night has passed, it still felt painful when I move my foot at a certain angle

Great idea eh?

Eric, me, and Monik

Last Saturday we gathered friends for dinner at Crab Shack, Upper Thomson area there. Eight of us were there, eating flower crabs, which are small, but surprisingly quite sweet. Then, we had spaghetti that took ages to cook, some had baked rice which according to some, was very nice. Side dishes included croquettes, french fries, baked beans, etc. One commendable from that night was that their service was good, I mean, the people who served us were very very friendly.


Pauline, Shendy, Jejep, Eko, and Aconk

Juan comes up to the Mexican border on his bicycle. He's got two large bags over his shoulders. The guard stops him and says, "What's in the
bags?" "Sand," answered Juan.

The guard says, "We'll just see about that - get off the bike!" The guard takes the bags and rips them apart; he empties them out and finds nothing in them but sand. He detains Juan overnight and has the sand analyzed, only to discover that there is nothing but pure sand in the bags. The guard releases Juan, puts the sand into new bags, hefts them onto the man's shoulders, and lets him cross the border.

The next day, the same thing happens. The guard asks, "What have you got?" "Sand," says Juan.

The guard does his thorough examination and discovers that the bags contain nothing but sand. He gives the sand back to Juan, and Juan crosses the border
on his bicycle.

This sequence of events is repeated every day for a year. Finally, Juan doesn't show up one day and the guard meets him in a Cantina in Mexico.
"Hey, Buddy," says the guard, "I know you are smuggling something. It's driving me crazy. It's all I think about..... I can't sleep.
Just between you and me, what are you smuggling?"


  "Bicycle"

It was clear after Superman Returns, the movie to follow would be Pirates of Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, and so I went to catch it on Wednesday, 8.30 pm show at Jurong Point. I managed to go back home, have dinner first, before heading down to Jurong Point and reached there just in time.



I guess I shouldn't elaborate too much here, just go and watch yourself hehe...  from me.

Not sure why, but after young adults fellowship tonite, I felt headache on my way back home think too much is it?

I hate ulcer
I hate sorethroat
I hate cough
I hate headache

After a long day of 9.30 AM all the way to 6 PM, after I talked almost non-stop during the whole of today, with only lunch and 5-minutes toilet break in between, after I talked on the phone for an hour at night, I don't think my sorethroat are getting better afterall

Update: Add cold to the list above.

Currently feeling: confused

26th June 2006
9 AM: I went for training in Raffles Place.
12 PM: I went out for lunch alone.
12.30 PM: Finished lunch, walked back to class, thinking what to do until 1 PM.
12.35 PM: Someone distributed a brochure to me, which strangely I didn't throw immediately to trash can. I read it, there is a contest held by Samsung booth. I went back and asked them about it, they let me join in the contest, I was the first person to try out that day. hehe...
12.40 PM: The contest is to promote Samsung new all-in-one print-scan-copy machine. There were three tasks that I need to perform in the contest, all using their machine: take two pieces of documents, make them into double-sided document, and create three copies of them. next, print out a document from a PC onto their printer. last one was to scan a document over network to their PC. So, I performed all three while they were taking my timings. At the end, they recorded down my timings, and I filled up my particulars.
12.55 PM: I walked back to class for training.

14th July 2006
2.30 PM: I was working on my desk when someone called me on my mobile. The conversation goes like this:
Terence: "Good afternoon, can I speak to Mr. Hendrik Christian please?"
Me: "Speaking"
Terence: "Hi Mr. Hendrik, I am Terence from XXXX company"
Me: "errrrr..... sorry, again?"
Terence: "I am from XXXX company"
Me: "errrrr..... can't remember. Never mind, continue..."
Terence: "Yes, do you remember you participated in a contest in Raffles Place sometime back?"
Me: " Ohhhhhhhh..... yeah, what's up?"
(Read More)

After less than 12 hours of prodding around when I briefly had the phone on Sunday, here are the comparisons, pros and cons of my new Samsung SGH-D520 to my current Sony Ericsson K700i.



Pros:
- Size. It is only 2 mm taller, exact same width, but 5 mm thinner. Yes, it is thin, despite it's a sliding phone.
- Camera: It's 1.3 MP compared to VGA of K700i. And finally, no sound when taking pictures, to the super annoying loud noise of K700i.
- Screen: It is capable of displaying colours FOUR times richer than my K700i.
- SMS: The interface is not so much different from Sony Ericsson, so no issue here.
- SMS Memory: It can contain 200 compared to about 70 of K700i.
- Phonebook: It can contain 1000 (not sure contacts or numbers), almost twice what I had with K700i. Finally, I can load all my contacts into my phone.
- Phonebook search: It allows me to search my contact using multiple characters. Nokia users have had this feature since ice age, but it's a novelty for Sony Ericsson users who are only limited to first character search until recently, hehe...
- Image viewer: It allows me zoom in for pictures that are larger than the screen.

Cons:
- Keypad tone. The annoying tone can be turned down from level 5 to level 1, but not off. I went to Phone Settings, but Keypad Tone menu item is disabled. To enable that menu item? Go to Display Settings, change Font Type to Normal, back to Phone Settings, you can see Keypad Tone menu is now enabled. You can turn it off now. Samsung engineers, if you read this post, please fix this "stupid" bug, unless you can tell me what's the relationship between disabling keypad tone menu item with phone display font type?
- Vibrate and ring. It can vibrate, it can ring, it can vibrate then ring, but it can't vibrate AND ring. Samsung engineers again, what's so hard about this? I think my phone since last decade can do this already.
- SMS: After I finished typing my SMS, it took more than five steps to pick a person's number from my phonebook, even for my recent entries. The number of menus are too long-winded.
- Draft SMS: When I am typing my SMS half-way and I accidentally exit, it didn't automatically saved my SMS to Draft folder like K700i. It's just gone. I have not tried whether the same thing happened when your are typing your SMS and you received incoming call.
- Incoming SMS: Incoming SMS is automatically saved into my SIM card. I want it saved to my phone, and I can't seem to find the menu to change this behaviour.
- SMS Alert: It doesn't allow me to choose any other tone besides those built-in for my SMS alert.
- Bluetooth: For some reason, all my other devices can discover my PC, except this phone. This phone can discover my K700i, my Dell Axim X51v, my hp iPAQ 2210, but not my home PC. Not sure if it's my fault after all.
- Profile: This phone doesn't have any profile that allows me to quickly switch between Normal, Office, or Church. It only has Normal and Quiet Mode, that's it.
- Folder management: It doesn't allow me to create sub-folders under My files, my pictures, or my musics for better management of files.
- Infrared port: Samsung D520 doesn't have infrared port.

Probably teacher should award score for creativity, don't you think?

(Read More)

The time when we don't feel like praying is exactly the time when we must pray. This has been a song that has given me strength over the years since first I knew this song. It has been a blessing for me.

Artist: True Vibe
Song: Pray
Album: See The Light

Thinking through, What to do
You're searching every angle and point of view
Good advice, well rehearsed
Only seems to make matters worse
When you're at a dead end
Where can you go?
My friend, there's an answer I know

Pray, when the road is steep
Pray, when your hope gets weak
Know the Father hears through
The silence and the tears you
Pray, when you don't know how
Pray, heaven's waiting now
And Jesus is just a breath away
Pray

The deepest sighs of the heart
Sometimes it's a struggle when we first start
To wrap our needs up in words
And trust that somehow we will be heard
Draw near, and know you are loved
God hears, and His heart is touched

Pray for the strength you're needin'
To go on believin'
No matter what you face
You'll have the wisdom and the grace to pray.

Currently feeling: exhausted