And the mountains echoed.

AND THE MOUNTAINS ECHOED by Khaled Hosseini

Worth reading: ★★★★★★★☆☆☆ (7/10)

Reason: The flow of the story makes me confusing. Too many characters that seemed unnecessary.

Been too busy for activities recently.

So, this is my first book that I completed so far in my holiday. 

Sad to say that school holidays is going to end soon. 

Hope I could have time to read another 1-2 books. Read faster amoi!

This is my second Khaled Hosseini's.

I deeply in love with his second book which is A Thousand Splendid Suns *Click to read my book review :)* 

The story is so nice and it grips my heart. I recommended it to my bookworm brother and friends and the comments from them were all positive one. 

This makes me so desperate to read the latest book from him!

Thanks for my brother's friend who kindly lend this book to me. =D

Well, I couldn't say this book disappoints me but it is not as good as I expected it would be.

The story is about Saboor's (the Baba jan which means father) family.

 Saboor, an impoverished farmer from the fictional village of Shadbagh, decides to sell his three-year-old daughter Pari to a wealthy, childless couple in Kabul.

He knew this couple because his wife's (the kids' stepmother) brother, Nabi, works as a cook and a chauffeur for them.

And this selling devastates Saboor's ten-year-old son Abdullah who takes care of his sister since their mother passed away.

I thought the story will then develop into the process Abdullah searches for his sister but not.

Yet, it tells you about Pari's adopted family, Mr Wahdati and his wife Nila.

It didn't touch much about how they raise her up but mostly about Nila brings her away to France after Mr Whadati gets stroke. 

And also Mr Wahdati's life after his wife leaves him, about how Nabi takes care of him and the special relationship between them. This part is shown through the letter of Nabi to the new owner of the house Mr Markos after his death.

And then Mr Markos found Pari, who leads a new life in France and doesn't remember anything about her original family and the childhood life in Kabul. Mr Markos shows her the letter from Nabi.

The last part of the story is about Abdullah's daughter, who shares the same name with Pari, finds her aunt Pari and reunites in California. However Abdullah is suffering from Alzheimer's disease and is unable to remember his sister.

There are a lot of characters who I found not directly connected to the main storyline appearing. 

For example Markos and Thalia's story, Bashiri cousin's story and Adel's story.

I found these stories dragged on because what I really concern is the story about Abdullah and her long lost sister Pari. And sad to tell that my English is not as good to understand the inner meaning of those sub stories might tell. It only makes me confusing why suddenly this character pokes out why suddenly that character pokes out. LOL

And the sub stories are all short and sounded incomplete. 

When I finally catch the story of one of the newly-poke-out character, the story just get ended or  it jumps to another new character or point of view. 

The jumps between past and presents simple made me dizzy and confusing. 

I think mostly because my English really sucks. ='(

Somehow, I think I like the starting of this story which is the bedtime story about Baby Ayub sacrifices his favourite youngest son Qais and hands him to the div in order ensure the safety of the whole family.

He chose not to ask for the return of his son at last though he loves him very much because he knew that his son would have a better life there.

This story seemed not related with the main storyline but I think this is actually the 'Hint' of the development of the Saboor's story.

I also love the ending of the story too because the family reunites, though it is sad that Abdullah is suffering from Alzheimer's disease and couldn't recognize his own sister.

It is still good to know that they reunites. LOL ;D

I read about some comments from Goodreads before I blog. 

I'm glad to find that there are a lot of readers out there having the same opinions as mine.

So, at least it makes me feel that my English not that sucks *perhaps* but the middle of the stories really make readers confusing. 

I am still looking forward Khaled Hosseini's next book because the background and the style of his story is always different from other authors.

What should I read next ? ? ?

There is a lot of books in my to-read list like Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell, Room by Emma Donoghue, John Green's book and Nora Roberts's book.

Argh, I hope I could have longer holidays!!

But since it is impossible to happen, I think I have to increase my reading speed then.

Grrrrr. Ciao. Good night.

Feeling happy to start a new book when I wake up.

=)

追寓。PTUTM。

Back from learning camp in Kuantan, rested one day at home and immediately packed for my JB working-fun trip.

Rushing North and South made me kinda flu now. :"(

It's not the end yet because I had promised to help in some other meaningful activities, coming soon.

I enjoyed my life like this. Busy yet contented.

There are so many priceless experience and knowledge I could learn from all these activities that I join, therefore I join and contribute whatever I can and I have.

Back to the topic, I visited Pesta Tanglung of UTM few days ago.

I always want to visit PTUM but there is never a chance for me because PTUM always drops on my exam week. :(

Thanks God for giving me a chance in taking part in PTUTM. This was my first time visiting Pesta Tanglung of an university. I really respect all the committees because I knew it is not easy to held some great annual event like this for sure. 

Bravo!!

四叶草画糖 as I requested. 

The decorations caught my eyes.

How cool it would be if we IPTHO-ians could create something like this too!!!

There were a lot of stalls there such as food stall, game stall and a lot more.

I was invited to write calligraphy in one of the stall. There were Han clothing (汉服) trying and calligraphy giveaway in my stall.

 Takeshi Kaneshiro (金城武) as the backdrop. :)

Licking my clover happily like a small kid. 

Selca here and there with it and even did my calligraphy with it. =P

I guess that's why those siswa siswi thought I am a secondary schoolgirl. XD

But I am actually older than all of them there. :"(

Foreigners trying on the Han clothing and holding his Chinese name that I wrote for him.

It looked weird but cute and funny.

With my pretty working partner -Xinyu. :)

This talented girl was wearing her Han dress that she sewed herself. 

Happiest happening that night was to meet this girl, Amalina. =D

*My all time favourite kakak l when I was in KMPP*

I can still remember all of the funny faces that she made to make me happy last time.

Thanks for spending your precious time to meet me. 

I really feel great every time I get the chance to meet with my old matrics friends because they are the one who treated me kindly and sincerely though the time we knew each other was short and and and we could hardly and rarely meet nowadays. That's why I appreciate them more than anybody.

There are always a lot of events in university and I hope I could join more in the future.

Simple post from me just to jot down this event.

xx

2014 儿童文学与语文教育研习营

在我实习的时候

每当要上阅读课，却又迷茫得不知道怎么进行，需要求助与人的时候

月清老师和泰忠老师就会提议让我在年尾假期的时候参与阅读营

起初我有点抗拒，想到舟车劳顿，想到没有人陪伴

后来我超想跨出这一步可是我不会转账，我觉得好麻烦

再后来我就一直狂jio健壹，因为我知道他永远不会say NO xD

最后讲师说可以集体报名

有人陪，又有人帮我转帐

就 D-e-a-l 了

xD

我和秀珍老师从麻坡搭车上关丹，一连5-6小时的车，我的屁屁都坐麻了
终于来到了关丹
这是我第一次踏足于彭亨州
对于睁开眼看到整条大路积水的场景，真是傻了！
到达万佛寺安顿下来后，负责的工委就带我们到East Coast Mall去走走逛逛吃晚餐
关丹在我的印象中是很ulu的地方，没想到这个Mall超好逛，很多牌子都有呢！
Starbucks, Sushi Sakae, Pandora, Laneige, Jelly Bunny etc etc
* 对不起，我不该瞧不起你 *
最后，我们在曼哈顿鱼市场享用了美味的晚餐。

7点起床，素食开启了美好忙碌的一天。
我以为课程到傍晚，我能有个惬意的阅读的夜晚。
没想到，课程慢慢地排到晚上11点！
第一堂课是吉忠兰老师（沉砂）《读书会的概念与操作》
吉老师的声音太太太太太太好听了~~~ *大爱*
 听了有振奋人心，鼓舞士气的感觉，完全能够捉住听者的耳朵和心。
她接着为我们示范了汤汤的《美人树》教学。
这堂课不止成功吸引了学生们，也成功吸引了我们的目光，更让我有马上阅读这本小说的冲动。
可惜，这本书刚出版不久，没有货。 :(
看吉老师教书有看中国特级教师公开课光碟的感觉。
一个字，赞！

下午的课主讲人是朱自强博士。
最令我印象深刻的是他所说的“语文是不是一种工具”
*因为只有这堂课在听，接下来的课我累晕了，没专心听 XD*
他所讲的课都很理论性，也很需要思考和分析。
对于脑袋瓜不灵光的我要在短时间内消化是很有难度的，因此我是有听没有什么懂，对不起。
我只希望他所陈述的观点能潜移默化地被我消化殆尽。

研习营中最令我开心的事就是有机会接触好作品，有机会阅读！
因此短短的3天2夜，我把4本文学作品都读完了。
我最喜欢的是《5月35日》和《罐头里的孩子》因为这两本书挺有趣的。
 《俄罗斯娃娃的秘密》和《100条裙子》，里头的一些道理和角色我读了是挺有感觉的，但是故事有些平淡，因此我不太喜欢。
可是我就这么刚好地被分到了《俄罗斯娃娃的秘密》这一组。
听着组员们讨论当中的内容时，我觉得这本书的内涵、深层含义很丰富，整本书似乎环环相扣，每一个看似平淡无奇的句子都有提示性，因此我们的意见很多很多。
因此，我觉得这本书好有内容，是一本很酷的书，真的很佩服作者的构思！
我们其实就像俄罗斯娃娃一样有很多很多层，人的表面和内心是什么，心口一致还是表里不一很难看出来。当然每个人内心都有自己想要的空间，装着自己最想要保护的那一面，因此我们要试着了解自己，当然也要尊重他人。

一直告诉自己我不是在中国，我在关丹。

这风景.......如画啊！

佛教会主楼

我在中国。

噢，不！我在关丹！XD

早操环节竟然没了，起早了的我和秀珍老师自个儿绕湖边步行一周热热身。:P

拈花亭

无上清凉

和朱自强教授。

和吉老师。

某一天，我们把最亲爱的讲师从玻璃餐厅急call出来然后慢条斯理地选地点拍照。

大热天的........................

T for IPTHO

健壹童鞋，长得够高了，不用再伸长你的脖子了。

At 观音亭。

和可爱的蘑菇学妹。

或许是因为盆友们总是说咱俩长得像，私下就说她是我妹，所以在之前就有了莫名的亲切感。可是学妹一开始不知道是因为生病还是就是不熟所以说话超客气的，跟我想象的她有点不一样，小小失望。可是后来比较熟了，就比较多话了，真的觉得蘑菇学妹很可爱很可爱。我也因为好奇就爱咕咕了她，可是至今我还是不明白为什么要这么做。XD

贪心+要求超多的学姐讨来了这张卡！超级喜欢！有一个有才的学妹真好，当学姐真好。XDD

不知道是来上课还是来踏青的我们。

+1 V.S. -1

思宁学妹。

学妹超多话也超敢讲的，而且语速超快，真的很厉害！

- 略过 -

Kiki学妹

漂亮学妹和很有喜感的笑声 XD

瑜伽 XD

10+++ 友谊 and still counting...

爱拍的我们

这个营真好，不只学到东西，还能看好多书，还能认识很多新朋友，更能拉近学姐学妹间的感情。说实在的，在学院都辣么多年了，和学长姐学弟妹我永远都是Hi and bye，话不多，很客气，很少有玩疯了的感觉。我其实总很想和每个人混熟，但不知道要怎样，再加上我的外表也写着“最好别惹我”，一切就更难了。因此，我很开心这次和学妹们玩得很愉快，希望这份友谊还能继续下去。嘻嘻 :P

和吉老师，超有气质吧？ =)

买了一本《全阅读》，一发现编委有老师的名字，我马上化身小粉丝讨签名去了。

和泰忠老师。

谢谢老师每次回答我的疑难杂症，虽然有时候说得很抽象，很需要我自个儿反复琢磨再思考，但还是要谢谢他让我看见自己的缺点和很多很多需要再进步的空间。

临走前一晚才一起玩闹的妹妹们，隔天特地起了个大早为我们送行，很是感心 :D

希望妹妹继续热爱阅读！

临行前和讲师的 welfie :D

感恩讲师载我们回家~~~ 驾了一整天的车，讲师辛苦了。:")

这次的camp让我跨出了自己的comfort zone，接触了许多人，不管是sem几的感觉大家懂的都比我这个sem 6的学姐来得多好多好多，更别说那些教书经验丰富的教师们友善地分享了他们把阅读带入课堂的经验，更是让我惊艳，原来读书会是这么回事。我懂的真的很少，感觉自己真的太多不足了。我一直都喜欢阅读，但却都只读表面内容，忽略了书本内容的内在。我喜欢教书，喜欢小朋友，但很多的教学方法和课堂管理我只懂皮毛，总是跟着自己的感觉走。此外，我也觉得自己在表达方面也应该多努力，看到大家的勇于发言，自信地发言，强悍的公开课真的很佩服那股勇气！我也想像他们一样在人群中勇敢地发言，我不再允许自己那莫名的紧张。

总的来说，学习是条漫长的道路，我希望日后还有这股冲劲努力参加值得学习的营会来充实自己，让自己的课堂更棒！加油！

Twenties Girl

TWENTIES GIRL by Sophie Kinsella

Worth reading: ★★★★★★★★☆☆ (8/10)

Reason: Simple. Interesting story line which make you hard to put the book down.

Exam was over and holidays is coming!! Yay! 

Fingers crossed for good result, please.

Finally I got my own lovely free time to write a book review for this book.
First of all, I would like to thanks Sinyi for lending me this interesting book. :)
This is my first Sophie Kinsella's and it didn't disappoint me.
It is actually quite difficult for me to type about this book review now because it had been one month plus since I put down this book.

Erm... 
*Forgive me for copying the synopsis from google and modify a bit*
Erm...erm...
It is actually about a story of Lara, who is a twenty-seven years old girl who has always had an overactive imagination. 
She attends the funeral of her great-aunt named Sadie. 
 And she gets visited by great-aunt Sadie's ghost, in form of a bold, demanding, Charleston-dancing girl. 
Sadie has one particular request: she can't rest without her precious dragonfly necklace, and because of this, she demands that Lara find it for her. 
But Lara is besieged with problems of her own, such as her uncertain future as co-founder of her own headhunting agency, and the fact that she was recently dumped by Josh, the love of her life.
Lara, coerced by Sadie, embarks upon an arduous journey to find said necklace, but in the process of doing so ends up accomplishing so much more. 
She unravels the ugly truth behind her uncle's enormous success, inadvertently unearths a long-lost love story enshrouded by the cobwebs of time, and even manages to get entangled in a love story of her own.

I could hardly put down this book when I was reading because it is really interesting and funny.
I was angry with great-aunt Sadie's ridiculous request on Lara in the beginning.
I kept on thinking that this Sadie ghost is so annoying. How could she asks Lara to wear like this, make up like that and do this and do that. How could she disturbs people's life without having any hard feeling. 
But then I also laughed a lot when I imagined Lara wearing in twenties to fulfill her great-aunt Sadie's wishes to date a guy named Ed, dancing with him and etc. XD
The story is getting more complicated in the process of finding the dragonfly necklace.
Hope rises and hope dies.
It really stimulates my curiosity to know the truth!
At the end, Lara unravels the ugly truth of her uncle. She also discovers a romantic story of
Sadie which Sadie herself never know it. And of course Lara successfully finds Sadie's dragonfly necklace lastly.
But at that moment, I knew that Sadie would disappear because she gets back her necklace which is the reason she appears at first. 
It is sad to find Lara is going to lose her special friend forever.
Awwww. :(

I got a looooong to-read-list in this holidays coz I got really lotsa books left untouched on my desk.
To buy more novels, I had to finish those with me first.
I hope I could finish as much as possible.
Reading time is happy time.
More book reviews coming soon. Perhaps. xP

My dessert diaries

Quess what?
I can't believe I tried the recipe on YouTube and succeed! *Quite success I think? xD*
Here are the recipes I used and the link I referred to.
I jotted this down here so that those who are interested can have a look at it, but the most important point is that I can straight away check from my blog when I want to try them again next time.


CARAMEL PUDDING/ CREME BRULEE
This is my first attempt on dessert. I never think that I might success! XD
It is so soft and really yummy. It's texture is like taofu. I love it so much I will definitely try it again!!
But somehow if you are not a egg or milk lover, you gotta try to add some flavoring *maybe melon milk, chocolate milk etc* or make the caramel sweeter to cover up the aroma of egg and milk.

Ingredients:

1. Sugar 75g

2. Water 45cc

3. Hot water 15cc

4. Eggs 3

5. Milk 400ml

Method:

1. Pour 45cc water into the sugar and melt it under medium heat until it turns into golden-brown bubbles like.

2. Pour about 15cc of hot water into it and immediately off the gas.

3. Pour the caramel sugar into the cups and then put them into the refrigerator.

4. Stir the eggs well in a bowl. You may add in 1-2 spoons of sugar.

5. Boil the milk until it is warm before you pour it into the eggs.

6. Whisk the milk and eggs until it is even.

7. Get the cups out from the refrigerator and filled them up with the mixture of milk and eggs.
8. Put the cups of pudding on a tray which is filled with 1/2 of water then only put it into the oven.

9. Preheat the oven and bake it at 150 degree celsius for 25-30 minutes. 

10. Take them out from the oven and leave it at the room temperature.

11. Put them into the refrigerator for at least 3-4 hours. You may enjoy it now!

My reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43uo4QjtTEU

MACAROONS
I considered this as failed macaroons, not really well baked yet. 
The recipe I used is usable and worth a try but I guess I baked them under a lower temperature or perhaps the time I baked them is a little bit shorter. I had changed the oven temperature into 180 degree *I used 140 or 160 I couldn't remember so hopefully 180 celsius works on you* 
I turned my kitchen into a total mess! I couldn't handle those machine and oven and ingredients well. :( Thanks to my aunt for lending me a helping hand. 
I strongly advise those who would like to try on this recipe to reduce the amount of sugar/ icing sugar because it really tastes super sweet for me. But I guess macaroons taste like this. The one I tried before also kinda SWEET!

Ingredients:

1. Egg white of 2 eggs

2. Sugar 土20g

3. Icing sugar 土50g

4. Almond powder 土30g

5. Food colouring 1-2 droplets

Method:

1. Sieve the icing sugar.

2. Sieve the almond powder.

3. Mix the icing sugar and almond powder well.

4. Add in a pinch of salt and use the electric mixer to stir the egg white until it becomes cream-like material.

5. Add sugar into the cream-like egg white and mix well.

6. Add in food colouring and mix well again.

7. Add in the mixture (icing sugar and almond powder) separately into the cream-like egg white and mix well.

8. Pour the mixture into a plastic bag, cut a little hole at the edge of the plastic bag and start squeezing the mixture out onto the bakeware. 

9. Leave it for 15-25 minutes until the mixture won't stick to your fingers then only put it into the oven.

10. Preheat the oven and bake it 180 degree celsius for 土13minutes.

11. Preparing for the cream part while waiting. What you need to do is get butter melted and mix with icing sugar and some flavouring (strawberry jam/ blueberry jam/ cocoa powder etc).

12. Wipe the cream on the macaroon and it's done! :)

My reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZvHoOrnawnI

CHOCOLATE MOLTEN LAVA CAKE
With the soft texture of the cake and the warm chocolate cream flows out, I can say that this is heavenly nice!
Too bad I get the cake a bit over-baked. Due to it, the chocolate lava that flowed out was limited. 8 minutes is just right. I shouldn't add 2 more minutes. *kepo me :(*
 Alright, it is still yum yum and a good try. The taste of chocolate makes you crave for more!

Ingredients (for 4-5 pieces):

1. Chocolate 土100g

2. Butter 土 100g

3. Low protein flour 30g

4. Sugar 土25g

5. Eggs 2

Method:

1. Melt the chocolate and butter under medium heat.

2. Stir the eggs until it is fulled of bubbles, add in sugar in the middle of stirring.

3. When the temperature of the mixture (chocolate and butter) get lower, add it into the eggs and stir thoroughly.

4. Sieve the flour and add it into the mixture (chocolate, butter and eggs) and mix it well.

5. Apply some butter at the surface of the cups to prevent the cake stick to it afterwards. Then, pour the mixture into the cups and put them into the oven.

6. Preheat the oven and bake the cake at 180 degree celsius for about 8 minutes.

7. Done and enjoy!

My reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJAWSrkSelc

Making dessert bring sadness for you when you failed.

But the sadness is only for a while. It is short and temporary.

It brings you greater satisfaction once you succeed!

Try it and have fun!

Ciao~~~ :)