Those times

Sometimes this world is full of "What if(s)". I seriously wonder from time to time.. there are many "what if's" i can go on and on about if I want to. But do I want to? Really? Sometimes yes.. but when those times come, I diligently remind myself that I am already so very blessed. In many aspects of life, I cannot ask for more really. Supportive parents, loving friends, horses and ponies.

Pilates

Went for my first-ever PILATES class today with Lydia and Murphy ;)

It was good, but I wished it is more aerobic rather than just doing lots of stretches.
Will give it a few more tries I think :)
Murph and Lydia are great company to have as well..
I love the people in my lab and in our department - feel so blessed to have nice colleagues!!!!

..ok I reeeeaaalllly neeeeeddd to FINISH my poster for the conference!
my first-ever conference! and in Arnhem, Netherlands as well!!
yipppeee :)

3-7 September , so looking forward to it :)
and we are all going as a whole lab (minus our PI because he is away in China for another conference that time). So it equals three-day in Amsterdam with just the 6 of us (me, Jack, Lydia, Niels, Zheng, Zhiyou)..then 3 days of conference. Woop!

Procrastination

My God..
I have been procrastinating. SO SO MUCH.
It's unbelieveable.
Damn!!!

Currently poster-making progress : 0.000001 %
Bench-work in lab progress : 1000000 %
I reaaaaally should work more from my desk! and stop doing bench-work ...

on another note, I am SO looking forward to the pilates class with Lydia and Murph tomorrow!!!!

Greetings from Cambridge

Hello all !
Can't believe I have abandoned this blog since January ! Today is 22nd of August.. therefore it has been about 8 months of me not writing anything here. Okay updates :

January 2010 - moved out from our old flat in London February - April 2010 - back home in Indonesia (fantabulous time with the horses! had a 50-50 heart to go back to the UK because I do NOT want to leave Kim, Chief and Zinnie *sobs*) April - August 2010 (current) - started my PhD in Plant Sciences, University of Cambridge. So now I have moved officially to Cambridge :)

To sum up in a few words ..
Cambridge is a LOT different than London. It is so small - EVERYWHERE is near. Literally. Oh and I cycled to work here. well, to be precise, I cycled everywhere here. And you can be..wherever you want in about 15 mins max. The most important thing is that so far, the majority of people (and new friends) (and new housemates) (and new lab mates) that I have met are lovely :)
Having moved around for the past 7 years has taught me one thing well : it does not matter how crappy your room is, your house is, etc. as long as there are friends to share things with at the end of the day. Good friends are rare, and for the precious few that you have - you should hang on to them :) . Oh and do NOT ever take anything for granted. full stop.

Okay back to Cambridge...
well to be honest the first few weeks I was here, I missed London a LOT a LOT. I missed my old life. Damn how I missed my old uni, Imperial! and THE LIBRARY. My lovely library corner..
..but as weeks goes on, I started to get used to my new life here. Working 8-6pm in lab Mon-Fri, Sat-Sun usually either in London or in Cambridge :)
My house here is lovely :) . I am sharing a graduate student house, that belongs to my College (Newnham College) , with 7 other girls - so in total there are 8 of us girls in the house. One kitchen and dining room, two bathrooms (thank goodness lol), and the best thing : one laundry and drying room! with spacious area to hung our clothes out to dry :) I love doing laundry so that explains.

New housemates : Adele :) a British girl who ALSO RIDES HORSES - enough said. lol. She is great, a real easygoing person. Even though her and my sense of direction are both REALLY bad. We go to this stable, Hilltop Equestrian, once a week to have riding lessons. Guess what, we got terribly lost the first time we went there! and in addition, we also got lost on our way BACK to Cambridge ..lol. Managed to arrive in another completely different city (nearby though, phew).

Marina, a Masters student from Uzbekistan. She is nice too, sadly she has moved out now.. went back home to Tashkent. Then Crystal, a medics student from Singapore.

There are loooooaaaaaddsssss moreee that I want to write here..
but sadly..
I have to go back to my stats!!

oh on another note, earlier today - I went to a pool party + volleyball + bbq at Christ's College (thanks Ardi and Miranda for inviting!) , it was fun !!!! Never thought I can actually withstand swimming outside in this kind of weather lol. but its great :)
Okies good night people xxx

Start of the year hotpot

Hotpot yesterday at Sherry's place :)
This is my last morning staying at Yaya and Astari's, flying back home tonight on the 10pm flight (London - Singapore - Jakarta as usual). Went to Borough Market yesterday for lunch with Astari, the chorizo burger is exquisitely delicious!! yum. Afterwards went grocery shopping for the hotpot with Sherry's mum, Louisa and Kim in China Town. We bought a LOT of stuff!!! Can't believe it has been ten days since I stayed over at Yaya's. Time seems to just flew past reeeealy quickly these days. I lost track of dates/days lately! Anyway, I'm going to take shower, then did a bit of grocery shopping...then off to meet Carina and Simon for lunch.

Discovering Barbican

These days I have been wandering around London a LOT :)
I loved the random walks with no direction hehehe..the occasional stops for coffee when we get too cold to walk any further, then ending the day with a meal with friends.
This week we have walked a lot a lot. Me and Louisa walked from Trafalgar Square all the way to Fulham Broadway the other day - it took us a total of 2 hours. With two stops along the way (we warmed ourselves up in some shops, it was too cold!). And we decided to walk along the river (passed a total of five bridges), which was lovely in the scenes - but NO bus passing by. Was very satisfied when we finally reached Fulham! hohoho.

Last week I discovered as well that Millenium Bridge is also super nice,, the one heading to St Paul's from Tate Modern. Yaya and me walked around St.Paul Cathedral area yesterday. He was photo-hunting for his portfolio, then we walked randomly around the area. Had hot chocolate at Paul's in St Paul, then finally we ended up in Barbican Arts Centre. I absolutely LOVED that place :) !! The whole area is very peaceful, and they have this library in the middle that hosts a wide range of fiction books and manga. Definitely will come back there! Ends the day with dinner together with Manda, Artati and Irma. Kojo reunited for one last time :)

2 Cavendish Mansion

Just woke up :) We've been sleeping extremely late these few days. Slept around 3-4am, woke up at 10-11am ish. I am still the one who woke up the earliest, no matter how late we slept! I wonder why am I so strange, even though I am still tired..but I will wake up no matter what around 10am the latest. I really should learn to sleep longer.. Anyways, yesterday was Mira's housewarming party :) 2 Cavendish Mansion is now officially christened lol. Fourteen of us managed to squeeze into Mira's living room. Played some drinking games, ate and have a chat. Met a few new people too. All in all , it was an enjoyable night out. Not too late, not too drunk. We went back home around 2ish, then slept at 4ish. Yaya and Astari are both still asleep at the moment. We are planning to cook for some friends later on tonight. The inital head count was for six people (Iko's coming down from Birmingham too, and Kemal, Endo and Yani are all in London for the weekend) - now it has blossomed to 15 people!

I have exactly one more week to go, before flying back home to Jakarta this coming Saturday :) !!!!

Byebye 222

Officially homeless as in from today!
Good bye Drake House Flat 222 - we will miss you so much ;(
Yesterday me, Mira and Irma officially handed in the keys back to our landlord. And then we helped Mira moved in to her new flat in Chancery Lane. Our last night in the flat were celebrated by eating Yoshino's takeaway sushi, wine and a movie together. All that flat gives us were happy memories :)

Final packing day of 222 Drake House

BIG thanks to everyone who helps us today to move out from our beloved 222 Drake House ;)
Astari, Anthony, Carina, Yaya, Alex, Kevin, Aga and Harun (especially Astari who has helped us since Day 1 on Thursday!!). Me, Irma, Mira and Astari have been packing non-stop since Thursday. So make it four full days of packing. As today (Sunday) we finally moved all the stuff out! Will miss our packing moments.. Irma and Mira's 'fighting', Astari's neatness in tidying up stuff, Irma and her vacuum packs. Irma and the one-handed glove & the Haloween black candy thingy. I'll miss all of it!!!!!!! Us tripping over bags and suitcases and luggages and boxes.. (No I am not exaggerating- it's true, it IS that full in our flat). The four days passed by in a blur, as packing/eating/sleeping/packing became our continuous habit. Me and Mira packed our own stuff, Astari helped Irma pack.. then me continued to pack kitchen, Mira general tidying up and bathroom. We slept at random hours, woke up, then continue packing again. Haven't really had a proper sleep in four days! but it was indeed memorable.

Today the van came at 12pm. We moved my stuff first into Astari & Yaya's place, then the second stop were to Harun's flat in Covent Garden. Afterwards then we had dimsum in China town..then ends the day with Bubble Tea in Candy Cafe with Dewi :)
Happy!

I was walking towards London Eye, Waterloo from China town earlier- just enjoying lovely London. The weather was especially nice today. It was still chilly, but it did not rain. Was crossing the Tower Bridge, warm and snug in my winter coat, and feeling happy from a smooth day (Thank God) of moving out...looking across the river at the brightly lit London Eye :) I'll miss London dearly, and I am glad I have had the chance to live here for about more than four years now. It will always be one of the place I will think of as home.

Packing frenzy in 222

*YAWN* yesterday, oh no wait make it today.. Me and Mira slept at 5.30 am. We packed, packed, packed. *YAWN*. Irma's stuffs were unbelieveable! Yesterday we actually had so much fun trying on her clothes that she does not want anymore (Well done Astari for convincing her that she NEEDS to throw away more of her clothes!!!! lol I nearly died of laughter everytime Astari discovered more and more bags after bags of Irma's old clothings/shoes etc)...and she will made an exclamation 'oh my gosh how can you still keep THIS???', and Irma will be all like 'but..I might MIGHT still wear it one day' hehe.. . And those are the ones which were reeeeeaaaallyy ancient!! in terms of style I mean. Oh well now I'm in the middle of our living room - which looks like one hell of a mess. Luckily I am able to squeeeeze myself to this tiny spot with my laptop (and no I am not exaggerating, I really am not). Mira and Irma left this morning to sort out the new contract at Mira's new place in Chancery Lane. I love the place! She took the one we went out to view just yesterday morning. It gives a cosy feeling, that little one-bedroom flat :) I get so excited looking at new flats yesterday!!

Cardiac morphology unit

Yesterday was my last day at work in the hospital ! :(
The photo above was Karen, me, Tony, Yen and Carina.. the Cardiac Morphology unit at Royal Brompton Hospital, London

Karen bought a cake for us to celebrate my last day.
Three and a half month passed by really fast! I have now officially able to recognise the structure of human heart, some of their abnormalities + the most interesting bit was when we found the fetus collections and animal hearts!! I will miss taking bus 360 to work every morning (the 9.00am bus), getting off at Sainsbury and walk along the quiet Sloane square area towards Royal Brompton Hospital. I will miss them :( :(

but time to move on! now we are busy packing, booking van, finding professional cleaners etc. Irma and Mira are both back in London. I am so happy that i'm no longer home alone ! I realised i cannot live alone for too long - it made me depressed! We will miss this flat a lot. Our lovely 222 Drake House. Lots of memories :)

Very COLD winter we have

Apparently, this is how Great Britain currently looks like from above (a satellite photo taken and posted in the BBC website)

What is it with London and this freeeezing cold!!!!
brrrrr....
I am constantly wearing three layers of clothes in the house now. tank top - t shirt - and sweater + socks + fluffy slippers. And I woke up this morning with a slight sore throat and achy feeling all over my body, a sure sign that I might have catch a cold :(
Looking forward for Judith, Char, Miri and Katha to come and make pancakes at mine this afternoon !! Happy birthday to Judith :) :)

Next week looks like it will be one busy week. I am working in the hospital until tuesday - which will be my last day of working. And then Irma and Mira are coming back on Tuesday 12 Jan as well. From that day on, we have exactly ONE WEEK to sort out our stuff and the flat. As we have to move out by 20 Jan. I will then migrate to Yaya and Astari's flat..and fly back home to Jakarta on 30 Jan. I do not really know actually how things will turn out. I am in a rather uncertain state these days...very very much uncertain about a lot of things. Family, friends, future to name a few. I feel like I lost my footing..if you get what I mean. Thanks to my old dearest friends who are always there.

Today God wants you to know....

"Instead of keep asking God about the future, enjoy the uncertainty. To be alive means to not know"

Drama

So much drama yesterday lol..
Seriously, people should be honest and not tell lies. Otherwise, eventually the karma will get back at them. I feel like i am in the middle of some kind of Korean drama at the moment. Luckily I am just one of the viewers, instead of the one caught amidst all the drama scene ;)

The first day in 2010

Just came back from the first jog along the river in 2010 :)

Happy new year everyone :) !

Yesterday we had a small gathering at mine. Just me, Dewi, Ardi, Carina and Louisa. Had korean food for dinner + Ardi's banoffee pie, with red and white wine. Perfect, cosy new year's eve.

Artati and Manda drop by as well for a bit just before the count down.
Everyone stayed over at my flat. Then we had a lazy morning/afternoon brunch with the previous night's leftover food..Ardi, Dewi and Louisa went back home. I went for a jog in the afternoon around 3pm when the sun is about to set. So pretty and peaceful out along the river :) Loved the feeling of the cold, crisp wind on my cheek...seeing the sun set over the river.

Just came back from a jog along the Thames :) the last run in 2009 along the lovely river. A place where I've lived for the past 2.5 years.

NOTHING beats a cup of Teapigs' rooibos creme caramel tea, with a touch of milk and sugar :) Pure heaven

Spring clean

Spring-cleaning my flat today :) !!
Was chatting with Ardi on msn most of the time - as we were both equally stuck indoors today. Rainy day both London and Cambridge :(
And I miss East Didsbury already. Sometimes I think my introvert side is much greater than my extrovert side. I find myself to be my own best companion most of the times.

Christmas this year

I am back in London now :) Feel refreshed after a one-week holiday in Manchester. Stayed with Thia's aunt and uncle in East Didsbury. Chichi and Atom (thia's younger cousins) were there as well. They are both still doing their A-levels in Concord, so we compared Concord stories. Our daily routines were so relaxing.. woke up daily around 9am, then went down for breakfast. Usually me and the uncle are the earliest one to wake up.. then followed by auntie and the rest. They have this spacious kitchen with a huge glass window overlooking the backyard. Loved to stand there in the morning, watching the snowflakes falling whilst waiting for the water in the kettle to boil. Breakfast will be in the dining table, usually a bowl of hot oatmeal porridge with a drip of honey + tea... whilst listening to the morning news on the radio. Then afterwards Thia, Chichi and Atom will all come down and join us.. (Marks & Spencer's Triple Chocolate Crunch cereal + milk = our newest favourite. Polished off 6pints of milk and two boxes of cereal in two days!). Daily activities revolved around either all of us going out on a trip somewhere ..or going to Costa in the village and I'll read books, whilst Thia is working on her Masters application :) I found this secret gem, which is a second-hand bookshop just off the road from Costa. Found Kazuo Ishiguro's 'When we were orphan' yay!

We also went to Cheshire Oaks on Boxing Day, then Manchester Trafford Centre - for more shopping. I had resigned to the coffee shop whilst waiting for Thia to still continue shopping lol. Evenings are the most pleasant - as we all will gather around the dining table. usually Uncle is the one who cooks, then we set up the table. When everyone is seated, then we will say a short prayer of thanks before we started eating :) Dinner will usually involves Thia teasing Atom mercilessly, Chichi sometimes piped in as well. Added with the usual wise messages from uncle regarding various things in general. One night we had a discussion over films. what constitutes a good movie and what is not. Uncle said 'when you go to the cinema to see a film, you are prepared to suspend your belief during that hours spent to watch the film'. Which I think is perfectly true :) Mira has taught me to appreciate good films these days, too bad she is now back in Jakarta. Otherwise we can have more movie nights on days we were both staying in :(

After dinner, the four of us will wash the dishes. Then usually uncle will have an early night, Atom will retreat to his room to play computer games..leaving us the girls (me, thia, chichi and auntie) below to watch something on the telly :) or just having a general chat. The nights when snow fell heavily outside were the best - as we were all warmly snug inside the house, with the heater cranked up..watching the snow falling outside :):). What a pleasant Christmas this year :) very thankful indeed.

ps : We also helped auntie painted the kitchen, and roasted a turkey (had people over for the whole day during Christmas day! = tons of food hehe)

Snowy Christmas Eve

Another lazy morning today. It's the 24th of December = Christmas Eve!! I was on facebook with Juan earlier this morning - I suddenly miss horses back home SO much :(( !!! It's not the people that I miss the most, but Chief :((

I am still in Manchester at the moment, will be here until the 28-29th December. It's lovely here, I feel like I am in a warm family home :) And the white snow is preety. Me and Thia went to Costa in the village yesterday. I love the sound that our boots made when we walked through the snow layers.. its like this muffled crunching sound!