easter + PC + video games = FUN

easter break is finally here, although i'm a bit mad that it's only 2 weeks but i'll take what i can. oh heck.. i just checked the calender and i'm into my 5th day of easter. almost a week and after next week, it's back to dull classes taught by dull lecturers.. just a short post today, sharing what i've been up to and what i'll do so that my whole easter won't go to waste with me just being cooped up in my room in front of my PC.

just before the break started, i discovered a new interest - PC building! buying the necessary parts for a desktop and build it myself!

i've been dying for a new entertainment machine after my laptop of 3 years, finally decided to call it quits.i scowered through the interenet and asked people's opinion on what to buy. the new m15x from alienware caught my attention and i had to have it. i didn't care that it'll set me back more than 2 grand (pounds!). i looked super cool and it is the most powerful 15 inch laptop on the planet!


after a long and frustrating experience with the customer service for more than 3 weeks, i decided to take back my hard-earned cash and looked for something else..

i decided to go for a desktop, since it's much more powerful than any laptops for the same amount of cash. of course, i'd lose the portability, but i don't really carry my computers around with me anyway. and with the job i'll be having, i'll need to move my computer around every few months.

so then, i looked for an uber-cool PC. i stumbled on this on a magazine. it is the best gaming PC at the moment.
this is from commodore. after selecting the components that i want in it, it'll set me back about 2000 pounds too but 3x more powerful than the alienware.

i was really ready to buy but for some weird reason, the 'buy now' button wouldn't work. it kept bringing me to the homepage. so, i thought i'd try some other day.

on that very same day, i was browsing through youtube looking for videos on the commodore and a comment struck me. "pfft! expensive shit.. it's cheaper and much easier to build that gaming PC"

really? how easy is it?

so for a whole week, i watched videos on how to build a pc. and holy heck, it is easy. after i was somewhat confident with the steps, i dove in and bought the components from novatech. since i was just buying parts, it arrived the next day! it cost just over a thousand pounds but i had almost the same specs as the commodore! took me 4 hours to complete the build.. i have never been so nervous in my life as i was when turning it on for the first time..

i took a deep breath and switched it on..

nothing.. screen is blank

tried again..

nothing.. still blank.

oh crap...

then i realised i forgot the switch button on the casing itself. turned that on and it was alive!


isn't she pretty.. yes, it's a she and yes she does have a name.. tasha. ':) also, that 19-inch monitor is so awesome. very clear, very huge (for me).

btw, that is a dirty fishbowl. i'm taking care of the 2 goldfish inside it for a friend who's off to milan.

so for the rest of easter, i'm contiplating on cancelling my around-UK trip and just stay here to keep my PC company. ':)

proper post coming soon. have a good easter everyone!

iconic photographs

i've noticed that photography is a growing interest in brunei. photoblogs have been cropping up more and more recently. personally, i don't get it. unless you're making a living out of it, i see as just an expensive hobby. but don't shoot me just yet (pun intended), i like art and photographs are art. they portray the raw truth and sometimes could even change the world. here are some of the most iconic photographs ever took. later on, a more modern take on photographic art with the world press photo 2007 awards.

Galloping Horse 1878

Was there a moment midstride when horses had all hooves off the ground? Leland Stanford, the railroad baron and future university founder, bet there was—or at least that’s the story. It was 1872 when Stanford hired noted landscape photographer Eadweard Muybridge to figure it out. It took years, but Muybridge delivered: He rigged a racetrack with a dozen strings that triggered 12 cameras. Muybridge not only proved Stanford right but also set off the revolution in motion photography that would become movies.

Tiananmen Square 1989

A hunger strike by 3,000 students in Beijing had grown to a protest of more than a million as the injustices of a nation cried for reform. For seven weeks the people and the People’s Republic, in the person of soldiers dispatched by a riven Communist Party, warily eyed each other as the world waited. When this young man simply would not move, standing with his meager bags before a line of tanks, a hero was born. A second hero emerged as the tank driver refused to crush the man, and instead drove his killing machine around him. Soon this dream would end, and blood would fill Tiananmen. But this picture had shown a billion Chinese that there is hope.

First Human X-ray 1896

To know something like the back of your hand is a timeless concept, one taken yet further by Wilhelm Konrad Roentgen. While working on a series of experiments with a Crookes tube, he noticed that a bit of barium platinocyanide emitted a fluorescent glow. He then laid a photographic plate behind his wife’s hand (note the wedding rings), and made the first X-ray photo. Before that, physicians were unable to look inside a person’s body without making an incision. Roentgen was the recipient of the first Nobel Prize for Physics in 1901.

Earthrise 1968

The late adventure photographer Galen Rowell called it “the most influential environmental photograph ever taken.” Captured on Christmas Eve, 1968, near the end of one of the most tumultuous years the U.S. had ever known, the Earthrise photograph inspired contemplation of our fragile existence and our place in the cosmos. For years, Frank Borman and Bill Anders of the Apollo 8 mission each thought that he was the one who took the picture. An investigation of two rolls of film seemed to prove Borman had taken an earlier, black-and-white frame, and the iconic color photograph, which later graced a U.S. postage stamp and several book covers, was by Anders.

Execution of a Viet Cong Guerrilla 1968

i'm sure you think this is a disgusting picture depicting a gruesome scene of an evil man executing a cuffed man at point blank. how can man be so without morals as to do such a thing? i thought so too but unlike this picture, things aren't always in black and white..
what this picture, taken by Eddie Adams, didn't say was that the man being executed was captain of a Vietcong "revenge squad" that had executed dozens of unarmed civilians earlier the same day.

Regardless, it instantly became an icon of the war’s savagery and made the official pulling the trigger - General Nguyen Ngoc Loan - its iconic villain.

Sadly, the photograph’s legacy would haunt Loan for the rest of his life. Following the war, he was reviled where ever he went. After an Australian VA hospital refused to treat him, he was transferred to the United States, where he was met with a massive (though unsuccessful) campaign to deport him. He eventually settled in Virginia and opened a restaurant but was forced to close it down as soon as his past caught up with him. Vandals scrawled "we know who you are" on his walls, and business dried up.

Adams felt so bad for Loan that he apologized for having taken the photo at all, admitting, "The general killed the Vietcong; I killed the general with my camera."

Winners Gallery 2008

unfortunately, due to copyright reasons, i can't post the pictures here. please click on the link to find some of the most amazing pictures.

World Press Photo of the Year

may these inspire you to snap more of 'real life' rather than pretty pictures of flowers and fireworks.

milan, italy

buongiorno readers! (that's hello in italian). it's been a while since i last posted a good read. well, today will be no different i'm afraid. no random facts to read just yet but i do have pictures for you which i think will be an equal substitution for now. i'm not posting a lot of pictures though.. i don't want to be one of those distant relatives who show their holiday photos and killing those who watches it slowly.. here are just a tiny some of mine. enjoy!

the very beautiful Piazza del Duomo. a lot of expensive shopping can be done here.

and just outside.. the Duomo. the third largest church in the world. 3500 statues decorate the cathedral. it took 500 years to complete from 1386

ofcourse, what visit would be complete without going into museums.

old decorations of the past. fancy having that to show-off for raya eh?

believe it or not, this mummy was someone's collection. but being superstitious, the former owner donated this mummy in 1854.

church of Santa Maria delle Grazie. some of you may gasp at the name if you're an art buff. this is the place where one of the most famous painting is located. it's none other than Leonardo Da Vinci's The Last Supper. yup. unfortunately, we didn't get adore the painting.. apparently, you have to book WEEKS in advance for a viewing. so, keep that in mind.

the statue of the great man himself. Leonardo Da Vinci.

the 506 submarine. strangely enough, our room has the same number.

the museum of technology. this part, exhibits recreations of Leonardo Da Vinci's brilliant sketches.

i wonder if they blogged back then too.. hmmm

some monuments are just plain silly..

there you have it. just a quick look-through of my time in milan. i'll post videos once i edit it. a good-read post coming your way tomorrow!