Steve Evergreen's Web Journal

De Vere Village hotel , Swansea feedback

2012-01-09T21:52:00.000Z

I choose a hotel with swimming pool and sauna to meet an old friend over the weekend.
The hotel is called De Vere Village in Swansea. Meaning, Village hotel ran by De Vere group. When I check about De Vere, it has a long story of business since 1760s, started as brewery, later changed to hotel and leisure activities.

In terms of hotel presentation, it looks great at its level with decent carpet and lighting. Car parking was enough for weekend visitors when I stayed there. A good thing is no bad smell you may experience in some hotels.

Unfortunately, there are a variety of issues while I was in that hotel of Wale's city, Swansea.

Thanks God. I was given the top floor with a nice view to dock and Swansea bay. I was so happy and I tried to take a photo. Gosh! The smell of dust came out from curtain once I touched it. I noticed paints of oil, most probably human origin, marked on the glass. It seemed hotel staffs never check the curtain and window glass or they wont bother it.

Visitors should thank for free wifi which is reasonably fast. I feel it is faster than Starbuck coffee wifi. I was able to communicate on line with contacts across the world.

TV is just OK to watch BBC news . It is Philip flat screen. For some reason, image was slightly blurred with gravels. To be honest, I have not seen such quality of Tv reception for such a long time in the UK.

The bath room looks good in a first glance with florescence lights and big mirrors. But the disappointing thing, if you are hygiene conscious, is that there were a couple of brown stains near the toilet paper roll holder. It looked fresh. You could argue that it was tea drop. If so, why it is in toilet near paper?

In the evening, hotel restaurant and bar were busy as it was weekend. We did not make reservation and no seat was available. We were advised to go to bar. We ordered foods with the starter as grilled chicken wings. Unbelievably, it was so sugary sweet. I saw a crust of sugar coat over the chicken skin. I never know British people eat such a sweet chicken. I must say , it was cheap. 22 pieces for only around 7 pounds ( I cant remember exactly) But we had to leave about 18 sugary pieces.

At night, I set the temperature at 25C as I felt room was cold when I came back from dining. I appreciate that bed was comfortable and no noise. But, in the early hours of morning, I was woke up by cold air blown from ceiling air conditioner. When I checked the thermostat, it showed 21C (Not 25C I set) . I suspect the hotel has central control system to keep the temperature at that level , regardless of customer need. They could argue that it is environmental friendly approach. Obviously, I am not really happy with it at all. I got sorethorat in the morning.

I did enjoy sauna and swimming pool. Well built and not crowded. Well facilitated. A guard has been standby at pool. Good for safety. But, disgracefully, I could not enter my room when I came back from at 10:20 Am from swimming pool. My swipe key had been rejected. Fortunately, a hotel staff was cleaning at nearby room. She kindly helped me to go into my room , saying that the reception locked the door because I am leaving on that day. Absolutely ridiculous. It has been declared that the check out time is 11am and check in time is 3 pm. ( usually, 12pm check out time in the majority of hotels I stayed previously ). The hotel administration indecently made inaccessible to its customers during the time paid for the stay. It happened in Wale's 4 star hotel.

To conclude, this 4 star Village hotel in Swansea is providing poor customer service. I would score 3 out of 10. I have a concern about De Vere.

Growing oversea Burmese community across the world

2011-12-20T02:00:00.005Z

Last week, I was in a Christmas gathering party, led by London Karen community. When I received the invitation via email, my first thought was I could meet a few people there and I would have a chance to make a couple of new friends for fun and for information. I decided to join them. It took place in a church in West London.

I brought a bottle of wine as a routine whenever I go to gathering party. Surprisingly, over one hundred of Karens were already in the church, which has got enough space for attenders. Some were teenagers. Some were in their 30s. A few were over 50. They were speaking mainly Burmese and Karen. I found out some were using English. I felt that the atmosphere was pretty friendly and visitors were served with Burmese tradition fish soup ( Mont Hin Khar) , which was really tasty. Apparently a senior Karen man cooked it.

After praying God, young musicians started entertaining with fantastic music. I was told one of them had been working as music teacher after graduated in England. I was introduced with several people, who were ITs, nurses, doctors, accountants and others who were also working at decent professionals. I never come across previously Burma's ethnic minors in London who has made such an established society. I only heard before that there is a big Karen community in Sheffield which is in Yorkshire.

I notice Burmese are not keen to explore new places in history. Instead, they want to stick in the place where they were born. But the political and economic situation in Burma have been pushing more and more people to go abroad especially over the last two decades. As a result, at least one or two persons from each household emigrated. These days they can be seen in most countries, from east to west, including small islands like Seychelles and St Lucia.

Most people blame that it is the military government in Burma that leads to this situation. But if you think in different way, you can see a larger number of Burmese have been settling with their good status, already enjoying a good life style in affluent places. It will never happen if Burma is not in trouble.

Personally, I would encourage more Burmese to come out for the benefit of the nation and its people. Basically, once Myanmar, always Myanmar wherever you live. Take Vietnam for example. American vietnamese have been playing an important role in economic boost of that south east Asian country.

In the internet era, I feel that Brain drain theory is no longer applicable. Brain network has been established across the globe. What you need is "access"

Parker ballpen review

2011-06-25T23:57:00.005+01:00

Basically I am fountain pen fan, not ball pen. But last time, I bought this Parker ball pen from local Pen Sense without intention while shopping around at town. It looked nice . Only £18.

Unfortunately, my first problem with this stainless steel pen was the ball point which delayed to work, not enough ink even after forceful test strokes on white paper.

The next issue is that it is too much slippery in my fingers. Every time I wrote, I needed to concentrate not to lose from gripping point. I have no idea why tip end metal surface so smooth.

Everybody knows that the Parker ball pen is not posh in the world standard.. But wondering why the manufacturer did not test it properly before sending to market. Maybe poor customer feedback system or they dont care feedbaclk. Another possibility is that rival pen producers have been managing to produce such non-user friendly product after putting their cells in production line of the Parker. Just thinking. My thinking may not be realistic.

I have Lamy pens which are really nice with comfortable hand grip. So I did not expect this kind of issue before buying this Parker ball pen.

IPad and Nottingham town centre

2011-05-01T20:33:00.009+01:00

My ipad case

Bank holiday weekend!

I put on easy Autographs shoes. Sunny weather so I did not think I needed my old CK duck feather-filled jacket. So I chose Blue harbour beige coloured cotton one instead. I drove to town. I was sure the Costa was still open till late afternoon in this summer time. I was right. There were some coffee lovers still there. I bought medium sized Americano and walked out of the corner coffee shop, heading to the city hall area where people were sitting and standing in groups.
My one hand was holding ipad as my idea was to read a book in open space. I love to do so. The coffee cup was in my other hand. After sitting there for sometime, I felt a bit cold. I walked around in the nearby small lanes. I saw some party goers.

After 5 min walk, I noticed that someone stared at me from one corner. He was an Afrio-Caribbean young man with a hooded jacket. He was shorter than me. 3 min later, I was on the pavement along the tram line. I found he was following me from 50 yardsbehind. I kept walking. And I suddenly sat down on road side chairs. And I looked around. He suddenly hid behind the one of the buildings. But he was still peeping at me. Nutter!. I showed him 2 finger sign. I was not sure he saw it or not. Then I rushed to my car I parked in nearby roadside.
I was checking myself. Why was he stalking me? What's wrong with me? Of course, I was holding my ipad in my hand . Usually, I put it in my bag.

I heard locals called their town "Shoottingham" as a joke. Of course, a high shooting incidence in Nottingham. In recent new year days, apparently 3 shooting in first 10 days of 2011 . Other crime rates are relatively high as well.But Nottingham has got a good health care with the largest teaching hospital in Europe, called QMC. Of course, it is needed..

Photo: Panoramio

Laptop not allowed to carry on Myanmar rail

2011-04-22T05:28:00.003+01:00

In many countries, the train operators make wifi internet access and power source available on their carriages for travellers. But in Myanmar (Burma) it is different. Forget about the internet. If you carry a laptop, you may face a problem.

One of my facebook friends had to pay fine when he carried a laptop on Myanmar domestic rail.

One funny thing is the rail authority wrote down as "typewriter" in Burmese on the receipt instead of "laptop". Fine was 2100 Kyat (Myanmar currency)

Japanese quake and Burma Nagis

2011-03-12T11:08:00.001Z

Recent Japan quake and tsunami hit world's news head lines. I am really sorry for Japan and its people.

This disaster reminds me 2008 Nagis cyclone which left Burma with extensive damage and well over 100,000 deaths. For some reason, Burmese government declined to accept the majority of foreign aids. Moreover, many volunteers were arrested by charging with so called anti-government activities. I sincerely believe that governments normally prioritise their people's benefit.

Protected Singapore for being a tiny one

2011-02-16T19:07:00.003Z

It is good to know a country's housing market when you are trying to buy a holiday home or when you want to run a property business abroad. Britain is a really flexible country to buy and sell property. It should not be a big deal so long as you have enough money and a property solicitor. But Singapore is not like that. There are a lot of restrictions to become a home owner. It is understandable that it is a small country and it needs full protection. Otherwise, rich countries will take over it in the name of new landlord. If you read the following piece of news from Singapore, you may get some idea about what is going on in that South East Asian nation.

HDB has decided to do away with the sibling scheme from Monday onwards. This means that unmarried Singaporeans and PR siblings whose parents live abroad will not be allowed to buy new or resale HDB flats.

This scheme covered siblings (brothers and sisters) who are unmarried and whose parents are not living in Singapore to buy new or resale flats. Currently, only unmarried individuals over 35 years old can buy from the resale market (which is another reason to get married in Singapore other than for love or money).
This decision has been made in light of the ease of renting single rooms or whole HDB units. Also, HDB has found out that unmarried Singaporean or PR siblings who buy new or resale HDB flats have only made up a fraction of the total HDB transactions, so it is unnecessary to continue with this scheme.

This only applies to transactions from Monday, 21st February, onwards. If you think you’d be affected by this abolishment, check out our 'HDB For Rent' section!
Source:

Holiday in San Francisco

2010-11-24T18:40:00.025Z

Looking through the window of KLM aircraft, MD11, just after landed in San Francisco, the airport staffs with oriental appearance were busy with deloading baggage. The immigration officer gave back my passport, saying "Have a nice stay". He had got a typical American accent. He looked like a friend of mine from Shan state of Burma. Once I came out of the airport, I felt I had been in a different world. Friendly people, big cars and wide roads....

The air craft which took me to California.

People rely on their own cars, most of which are 4x4 (they call it SUV). Public transport is not as good as in London. The self service ticket machines in BART stations are not user-friendly at all while London underground provides modern touch screen screens. Apparently, the shooting incidence is high there, compared with London. It has been claimed that Oakland of San Francisco bay area is the 5th most dangerous city in the United States.

Taking a sight seeing bus would give you a general idea about a city you have never been before. Of course, you will be sent to many tourist attraction places. I booked it before travelling. In San Francisco, once you have visited the Fisherman's wharf (Pier 39), China town, Union square and the Golden Gate bridge, you are ready to explore further as you prefer.

a panoramic view of SF

I had been in the malls and supermarkets. The electronic stuff and clothes are relatively cheap compared with Britain. For example, A MacBook with £899 tag in London PC world had been selling with $899 there. One tricky point is that the prices are "before tax" which is 9 point something % . (In Britain, VAT 17.5% has been added in price)

somewhere in Down town

In San Francisco, there is a big China town with many shops and restaurants. I feel London counter part is tiny. I did not see too many Indians in downtown.

Bay Bridge

The Bay Bridge at night

The Bay bridge and city

The Golden Gate Bridge

...

Cable car is an icon of SF

ျမန္မာ တိုင္းရင္းသား ပေဒါင္မပံု

Down town

The commercial websites claimed that Alcatraz Island tours are a favorite of San Francisco visitors. I think it is one of the most recommended places of tour operators. If you want to see a former prison situated in an island situated in 1.5 miles offshore from San Francisco, you can purchase ferry ticket online or at pier 33, from where Alcatraz boats carry visitors to and fro every half an hour in average. I spent there 2-3 hours together with a crowd of visitors, looking around cells, dining rooms, light tower and partially ruined building.

The light house in Alcatraz island

Cells

A cell

Crab shops in Pier 39

My way back to England was convenient as my outbound trip. KLM provided nice foods and good service. Cabin crews were competent and efficient.

Weekend shopping and autumn memory

2010-10-24T11:45:00.016+01:00

Recovering from a hectic night shift, I noticed that it was wet and drizzling outside in so-called Robinhood's county. Of course, we are in the last few days of British summer. Autumn will come officially from the 1st November this year. Time goes by quickly. I still remember everything about last year's autumn. I bought my DSLR camera last year this time, taking photos and sharing with my friends. It had been a wonderful time with multiple photo trips to the many parts of England and South Wales. Two local photo awards were my sweet memory ever.

Based on my photo habit, I gained many new friends. I think my interest in basic cooking also enabled me to get some more friends in facebook. At the same time, I have got some enemies from far east community probably because of my western orientated and liberal mind. Basically I feel sick if I came across someone who sticks at one atmosphere, refusing to accept new things and new foods. I tends to criticise such people. I know it is not a good habit. But still unsuccessful yet to give it up. In fact, I have been enjoying to do so.

In wet weather yesterday, I headed towards the city centre. After leaving my car at the Broadmash car park, one of the 4-5 shopping places in Nottingham, I joined people in chilling out and buying things. I took some photos randomly at the same time.

Watches with price tags over 5 grams

Traditional jacket potato kiosk

An ice cream kiosk

A tram coming

A street entertainer. He pleased as I gave him a pound coin.

Think about golfing in Autumn, I bought some sport wears from M&S. Of course, Marks and Spencers is for the middle class people like me. Blue Harbour is nice. 2 stripes 29.50 each. Polo shirt 12. Outdoor trousers 35 quids.

The Dell Streak review

2010-07-25T19:21:00.021+01:00

Photo:

Recently, my O2 mobile phone was upgraded to Dell Streak, which runs on Google Android with loads of build-in applications such as facebook, twitter, gtalk, gmail, youtube, map and navigator. It comes with a 5 inch screen. It has got 2 cameras, a 5 mega pixel camera on rear cover side and an extra camera on screen side.

These days, Iphone is in a high demand and everybody around me has been carrying it. For some reason, I am not so keen on it. When I came across the fact that the Dell Streak had been available on O2 network. I decided to take it straight away.

According to my personal experience, I found out some good and bad things.

Good points:

• Big screen. Comfortable to use.
• Slim. Easy to put in trouser pocket
• Wi-Fi and fast HSPA connectivity
• No software required to sync with desktop computer
• If you are using Google calendar for your daily and montly plans, this Dell Streak will act as your best organizer. It will synchronise everything with your plans in google account.
• Gtalk facitly is really handy. I can keep chatting while I am shopping and eating.
• Expandable memory (micro SD). Mine is 16gig which is more than enough
• Easy access to application on Android Market. If you have Google check out, very quick to buy. Of course, there are loads of free Games and applications
• It is easy to locate yourself in big cities. You can share your location with your friends.

Bad points:

• Version 1.6 of Android is relatively old. For me, it does not matter. Anyway, version 2.2 will come soon.
• Back, Menu and Home buttons are vibrating on touch initially. After a few days, intensity of vibration getting less. Sometime, no vibration at all.
• Camera button is difficult to press it. But if you use touch button on screen, no problem.
• Slow camera focusing despite reasonable good image
• People might say it is a big mobile phone. I would say it is more than mobile phone. It is a tablet. So size is acceptable.
• No Skype application available.
• Gtalk is only for chatting. No voice call.

This is my impression on Dell Streak after using it in last 3 weeks.

My rating is 8 out of 10.

If you are a Google fan, Android phone is the best for you. Check here how you can do on google phone.

Some related video clips about this device.

Close-up photo I took with this Dell Streak.

How to write a CV

2010-07-20T11:22:00.010+01:00

A friend of mine said “We have to attach passport photo to CV when we apply for a job in Singapore.”

I was surprised by that statement. It is reasonable to affix the photo to her résumé if she was applying for a job as barmaid or catwalk model. In fact, she is an engineer intending to work at the construction site.

Including a photo with a CV is strongly discouraged except where a photo is required or expected (e.g. modelling, acting). Employers may still request a photograph regardless. If you do need to include one, make sure it is a professional head-shot, just like your passport photo. http://www.wikijob.co.uk/wiki/example-cv-resume-template

I agree with it. Of course, there must be some exceptions. But I still don’t understand why some employers want to check the engineering and computing job applicant’s photo prior to short-listing. Does unwritten personal specifications for that particular job include that candidate should be good looking? Do they choose new employees from a particular ethnic origin? If so, how to justify that job selection is fair and square?

In our medical field, job application is mainly online. Applicants need to fill the form on icam or NHS job website. Of course, we have to prepare properly and thoroughly for the question like “ How would you see yourself in next 10 years?” “What are the achievements outside medicine?” “Why do you want to work in this trust?”

In fact, the role of CV still exists in some occasions. For example, In the ARCP (Annual Review of Competence Progression) , the panel expects to see trainees’ CV as part of the assessment of progression. Moreover, when newly arrived doctors from Asia apply for a non-training posts, they may need to send paper copy of CV together with job application form.

This brief guide is intended for oversea doctors who just arrive, applying for a job.

The important thing is your CV must not be cheeky.

Sex, date of birth, religion, ethnicity and other personal information, apart from address and contact details, are not essentially required in your CV.

Writing CV is no fixed rule, but here is one format you may check.

CV

Name

Address

Email:

Contact number:

Employment history

Date, Job position, Employer
(Career gap more than 2 weeks is usually not favourable if you don’t have a good reason)

Medical qualifications (plus post graduate degree if you have )

Career Plan
What do you intend to become?

Courses
(Holding valid ALS certificate is positive for junior doctors)

Experience

* Clinical Ward Work Experience
* On Call Experience
* Outpatients Clinic Experience

Generic and Clinical skills

* Generic Skills
* Clinical Skills

Practical skills
I can independently perform the following procedures….

Research and Audit experience

* Audit: (Title, year)
* Research: (Title, Year, where published)

Presentations and Publications
(Local, regional, National level if you have some)

Teaching Experience

Hobbies and interests

Referees

All the best!

Saturday shopping

2010-07-17T14:10:00.005+01:00

Recovering from a week long hectic on-calls, I try to chill out while staying in the hospital room. My colleague suggested that there was a nice factory outlet park in a valley just outside the nearby town only 12 miles away from our place. She added that loads of quality products in bargain price there. This morning I got there with the help of sat nav. Many shoppers had been in the shopping complex filled with Mark & Spencer, the Gap, Holland & Barrett, the Clarks, Antler and many more brand shops.

The Antler store attracted me with decent leather brief cases. But price tags showed over 150 quids. What I really need was a laptop bag. My existing leather case has been very good organizer but it is a bit heavy. So I just chose a Swiss Gear bag, a product of China. Its original price was £79. Now only £50. It has got the same compartments with my old one.

In t he Clarks , the most discount shoes were not really great in my eyes. I usually prefer "light, air and flex". Fortunately, I found a pair of 8 1/2 shoes. Very comfortable and very light with good grips. It was only £40 (reduced from £69). It was made in Vietnam.

Basically, it can be said that the Gap stores target teenage customers. Casual wears and hooded pull-over are there. I rarely buy clothes from the Gap before. But this black and white cotton shirt looks brilliant. Really fine cotton made in Bangladesh. The 30% discount means the actual price was £13.99. Other items I bought were a soup mug (69P) and swimming shorts with price tag £7 reduced from £25. These were from Sport direct store.

I would say it is worth going to factory outlet shops. Today, I can save up to 50 quids after buying different items shown in the picture below.

From miscellaneous

Wimbledon 2010 and me

2010-07-04T13:48:00.009+01:00

Taking Docklands light rail and district line, we headed to the prestigious Wimbledon, which is one of the four Grand Slam tennis tournaments in the world. I did not buy ticket in advance. That means I had to queue at the entrance of the ground. The information on the queue card said that £15 for ground admission to Courts 5-19 and £29 for No. 1 Court, including ground admission and access to Court 5-19. It is not surprising that there was no more ticket for Centre Court where women’s final ( Serena Williams US and Vera Zvonareva RU) was going to take place. We bought Court 1 entry ticket for girl’s final of Kristyna Pliskova CZE and Sachie Ishizu JPN

Atmosphere there was nice. People were carrying cameras, shooting randomly at the once- a- year Grand Slam. There were many families with kids. I noticed that some people brought their own foods and drinks put in the cool box while there was also a persistent queue for Grolsch and Pimms. A classic band was entertaining tennis fans at Henman hill where a crowd had already occupied at Henman Hill, watching a big screen TV and enjoying a sort of family picnic.

After wandering around and checking other courts, we entered court 1 for girls’ final one hour before the time. While seats had been filling with tennis fans gradually, I was busy with my Nikon and Sony camera, taking anything interesting to me. I could see easily the Wimbledon tournament was well organized and it was very punctual.

Well, the match is not so drama apart from the final game when Ishizu was beated after she led with 4-2. Anyway, it was impressive that the Japanese girl reached the final after she knocked out the Russian second seed Irina Khromacheva in the quarter-finals and the British 2008 girls' champion Laura Robson in the semis.

From Wimbledon 2010

Click here to see more photos

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20 minutes Pasta

2010-06-06T19:49:00.008+01:00

Believing that eating pasta is healthier than sticking at rice and cheesy pizza, fusilli meal is an essential item together with fish & chips and Shepherd pie in my weekly menu. Of course, cooking pasta is not a big deal at all. It takes only 20 minutes. I just want to show my way of cooking. Clearly, it is mainly for new comers from far east. The western residents may be much smarter than me in this business. That is my understanding.

A bag of pasta 3 quids. Cheaper than basmati rice. 3 handfuls is enough for me for 2 meals.

Wash it in the glass ware, put it together with enough water. Run microwave at full power for 20 min.

While microwave running, you can cook pasta sauce. Easy. This time, I chose turkey dice. Of course, you can get any form of mince. I used many seasonings like that.

This is an optional step. It is tastier to me if I add an onion. Now I am sizzling it for 3-4 min.

I just added the diced turkey which had been mixed with seasoning powders, including rose mary which is my fav.

after 10 min, I just added the ready made pasta sauce. Tomato is very healthy food, isn't it?

This time tomato and mushroom sauce

20 minute completed. I took pasta from microwave and drained in cold water. At the same time, I switched the cooker off.

Now, ready to have my lunch

Battersea park and me

2010-05-30T09:47:00.011+01:00

Playing Lady Gaga and driving on the less traffic London streets in this bank holiday weekend evening, we headed towards Battersea Park.

Battersea is a district in south London and Battersea Park is large green space on the bank of River Thames opposite Chelsea. It is about 5.5miles from my London docklands on sat nav.

It was such a long time. Someone led a group of three of us to the Peace Pagoda located in the park after taking the membership exam in St James’ park. It was my first visit. I still remember I passed the exam that time and my friends had to re-sit. Now, we have no longer contact each other for a few years. My second visit was after taking my IELTS exam in Westminster University. Since then, I have not been there. Yesterday, I got there again with my friend’s sister who moved from Singapore.

Weather was cloudy. Some drizzling off and on. Clearly, not a good time to take photos. But I did some as I could not resist my hobby. As it was already late and only a few minutes left before closing the park doors, not many people inside. Of course, there were still some teenagers playing with skate boards.

On our return way, we popped in starback for caffè latte which is my fav. .

Albert bridge. One of the two bridges you can see from the Battersea park. That one is under renovation.

Chelsea bridge

About the London Peace Pagoda

I cropped above photo for a better view

One of the 4 images

Macro zoom in

People do walk and run.

Someone trying skate board

A thick forest inside the park

Mamma Mia

2010-05-04T00:32:00.004+01:00

Taking tubes, shopping at busy Oxford street, walking around cosmopolitan Leicester square and Convent garden, visiting antique museums and renovated palaces and enjoying roof garden dinner at Babylon, many visitors may think they have covered most interesting things in London. It may be true. But something important is still missing. It is "show".

As a culturally rich city, there are many theatres across London. Those are generally divided into West End, Fringe and repertory (such as The National Theatre Shakespeare's Globe).

This time, I went to the Prince of wales theatre in Picadillary. Of course, Mamma Mia has been there since 2004. I booked ticket online 2 weeks in advance. I chose middle seat at upstairs (Circle). Stall is in downstairs. Not like in cinema, all seats were occupied in the show. I was told before many Europeans come and enjoy shows in London during the weekends. It might be true.

I feel it was worth going there. Really entertaining.The audiance had been clapping and applauding at the end of each section . The show features Abba songs which are cleverly integrated into the story written by Catherine Johnson. Film was produced after the success of show.

Someone in busy life can use shows as a stress reliver. My little advice, really.

My ticket...

The Prine of Wales Theatres. Photography is not allowed inside during show.

Show entrance...

A chauffeur colleting his boss at the end of show

Teachers Vs Pupils

2010-04-03T00:23:00.009+01:00

The followings are school related news I read lately.

Girl of 6 repeatedly sexually abused by 23 classmates

A horrified mum told yesterday how her six-year-old daughter was repeatedly stripped and sexually abused at school - by 23 of her classmates.

The terrified girl was attacked every day in the school grounds by a mob of pupils her own age - under the noses of unsuspecting teachers.

The mum said: "It was horrendous what she went through. Every day she was being stripped.

"She was being physically and sexually abused every day. (Daily Mirror)

This news shocked me deeply. The first question which came to my mind was what teachers and assistants were doing there. According to my relative working in a primary school in London, there is a class teacher working together with teaching assistant in each class room with max 30 pupils. A trainee teacher may be observing and helping. Special need assistant is an extra one depending on the requirement. During the play time, there is also a playground assistant who is whistling and watching youngsters all the time. It is difficult to blame on a person or a group of teachers in this case. The faulty part leading to the incidence would be poor management or under-funding or negligence or combined. I feel sorry that the young girl could grow up with a psychological scar.

Another sick news is that it has been more and more popular among students to use social sites like Facebook to bully their teachers.

These included malicious sexual allegations against teachers.

The Association of Teachers and Lecturers heard how one teacher had a fake Facebook account set up in his name containing false allegations.

Another teacher had suffered stress after a video of her teaching appeared on YouTube.
Another teacher said she knew of a group of pupils who wrote online: "Join this group if you think Mrs X is still a virgin."

A false social networking profile, opened in the name of a teacher, claimed he enjoyed "under-age sex with both boys and girls". (BBC)

Someone would simply say that this is an ugly disadvantage of social networking sites. But in the society where human right is prioritised which is good in general, teachers have a limited authority on their pupils. A group of pupils may see teachers as a sort of their employees. Apparently, a culture has been growing in some schools that fellow students see someone who refuses to obey rules or does against what teachers say as their hero.

I am concerned about the outcome of such kind of young lads. I feel government should have an efficient strategy to tackle with rebellious students who could be potential thugs in the community level.

Chinese Bastard

2010-03-30T21:07:00.012+01:00

“Chinese bastard”

That is what two teenagers shouted at me while walking in east London street. It happened when I came back from the hospital where I did weekend cover for a sick doctor. Those teens had no idea that I might have given a life saving treatment to one of their family members or friend in last 12 hours. I did not respond anything. Obviously, it is not worth doing so. They were from nearby council house.

A couple of years ago, a retired engineer in his 80s admitted to hospital with a broken hip and heart failure begged me, saying that “You came from a big country like China. Please help people like me living in a small country. Help me doctor, please”. He looked muddled. Anyway, I reassured him.

In fact, I am not Chinese.

I think people in Britain sometime find it difficult to differentiate the Chinese from the non-Chinese Asians. Clearly, the UK is not a great attractive place for Chinese mainlanders. They normally go to west coast of America in my understanding. Even in London, Chinese community is minute compared with south Indian counterpart despite the fact that Chinese take away has been growing in popularity.

On the other hand, interestingly, a drunken patient in acute medical admission, whom I saw in the early hours of morning, was able to recognize me, in first stance, as Burmese, proudly announcing that his grand father and father were veterans from the South East Asia. He also added that he had been keen to fight for freedom of Burma. Perhaps, it was alcohol.

Murder, justice and human right

2010-03-07T00:00:00.006Z

A few days ago, the Justice secretary Jack straw sent back Jon Venables to prison.

Who is he?

Jon Venables (Photo: AP/ Guardian.co.uk)

He was one of the murderers of 2 year old kid when he was a 10 year old boy. Here is more about that story.

James Patrick Bulger (born 16 March 1990), a two-year-old child from Kirkby, Merseyside, England was abducted, tortured, and murdered in 1993. The perpetrators were two 10-year-old boys, Jon Venables, (born 13 August 1982) and Robert Thompson (born 23 August 1982). Bulger disappeared on 12 February 1993 from the New Strand Shopping Centre, Bootle, while accompanying his mother, and his mutilated body was found on a railway line in nearby Walton on 14 February. Thompson and Venables were charged on 20 February 1993 with the abduction and murder. Wiki:

In 2001 after served in prison for less than 8 years, he was released as the parole board ruled he was no longer a threat to public safety . It was approved by the Home Office Secretary that time. Since then, he lived with a new identity.

Why was he sent back to prison?

Jon Venables, now , is back in prison for breaching his ‘life licence’. But government did not reveal yet a clear reason for why it did.

Venables is back behind bars after breaching the terms of his licence, imposed when he was freed after just eight years inside for murdering two-year-old James on Merseyside in 1993. Read more:

Justice Secretary, Jack Straw, has told us that it is not in the public interest to disclose details of the breach. Once again Straw has showcased his ability to get things totally wrong when making that statement. It is absolutely in the public interest to know what the child murderer had done. After all we have been paying for his new life which he has seen fit to throw away! Read more:

What is the reaction of public?

FURIOUS Britons last night joined The Sun in demanding that the Government reveal the full facts about child killer Jon Venables — saying: "He lost his rights when he murdered James Bulger." Read more:

Some new media claimed that this time it is related with child pornography.

Personally, although there maybe a case-by-case variation, I would not trust someone who committed a serous crime in the past. It would be just a prejudice. But It is difficult to clear my image. I presume there have been studies of repeated criminals. I would read through if I have a chance.

What would be the role of public and media in the case of Jon Venables this time? Is it absolutely true that a premature disclosure of information would undermine the integrity of the criminal justice process? Is it appropriate that people give pressure on government to reveal the details of Jon Venables's recent events before a trial?

Alcoholic and helicopter

2010-02-09T00:00:00.002Z

I really don't want to disturb my circadian rhythm, but it is unavoidable because of the nature of job. Last night was my first night. Most patients were elderly people brought in by ambulance. Nothing exciting. Seeing them, doing initial investigations and making management plan are our routine during on-call hours.

I started working with the annoying person who was with the history of alcohol excess. He has been on detox regimen. But still wandering around the ward. I gave him two more tablets to calm down. A rather high dose of medcaion did not touch him. He absconded. In view of the fact that he still confused and no capacity to decide to go home himself, we needed to inform the police.

We heard helicopter noise 15 min later flying over the hospital. Soon after that, patient was brought back by two police officers. Apparently, the police helicopter spotted him at town (town center) about 1.5 miles away from the hospital. Police claimed they had to spend tax payer's one year contribution because of him.

While staffs dealing with that alcoholic, someone has been passing massive amount of blood from the back passage. He needed urgent transfusion. Surgical team reviewed. Later stable.

In the early hours of morning, some one got an acute shortness of breath. He was a known blood cancer patient with some fluid in the lung. I was dealing with him. At the same time, it was reported that the 94 year old woman got a bout of vomiting. I asked someone to see that frail lady as I was busy with above man. Unfortunately, the arrest call went on 5 minutes later. Someone from other ward got heart arrest. We all had to go down. He agreed to give up him after several cycles of resuscitation. When I came back, I was informed by my junior, the old lady already die. Family informed. Probably the cause of death would be aspirtion after vomiting.

The same as usual. No 30 minute proper break time in 12.30 working hours.

Heat free supper

2010-02-05T00:00:00.005Z

This evening, I felt a bit bored and I did not want to cook or warm up any food. So I just tried this. Very easy. Preparation time was only 2 minutes.

Recipe? Very simple. Readily sliced Chorizo was placed on the plate first. Chorizo is fermented Spanish pork sausage. Fresh Chorizo needs to be cooked. But we normally eat fermented one without cooking as Europeans do.

Then, I grated mature organic English cheddar cheese. In a separate bowl, cheddar, 4 or 5 slices of Prosciutto and some wild Rocket leaves were mixed with 2 spoons of virgin olive oil. I stirred all together briefly. Then, it was put above the slides of fermented Spanish sausage on the plate.

That's it! No electricity, no gas required to cook. Prosciutto is my favourite. It needs no cooking or frying (just info for orientals) . It is thinly cut ham from Italy, air cursed with salt for a minimum of 12 months. Nice.

Again, Spanish pork sausage, Chorizo is already fermented. If you fry, it will lost its original taste and nice smell. In fact, it looks like Salami, an Italian sausage, which can be stored at room temperature up to 10 years.

Scientists claimed that deep fried foods, such as traditional bacon and sausages, could cause cancer. But I have not read the research papers about the outcome after eating uncooked foods. Maybe I will come across such report at one point. At least I would say heat free foods are more or less environmental friendly. It is green. Green foods!!!

Unplanned holiday, jokes and Inglorious Basterds

2010-02-04T12:49:00.009Z

It is unplanned holiday. It just happens. That means no flight and hotel booking. I feel staying at home quietly is sometime the best holiday option after working non-stop, seeing sick people and dealing with anxious family members.

I popped in to local Waterstone book store, where I picked up some books and DVDs.

This is from the book I took to intend to read at bed time. More than half of the jokes from the book, compiled by Ivor Baddiel and Ian Stone, made me laugh. The title is “The best pub joke book”.

A surgeon came to see his patient on the morning after her operation. The young woman asked him, somewhat hesitantly, how long it would be before she could resume her sex life.

"I really haven’t thought about it", gulped the stunned surgeon, “You’re the first patient who’s asked me that question after a tonsillectomy!”

This is about a lawyer.

I man calls his lawyer and asked: “How much would you charge me to answer three questions”
“£400”, the lawyer replies.
“Jesus”, says the man, “that’s a lot of money, isn’t it?”
“I guess so” replies the lawyer, “What’s your third questions?”

Here is husband and wife.

A man rushes in to his house and yells to his wife, “Debbie, pack your things, darling. I just won the lottery!”

“Shall I pack for warm weather or cold?” asks Debbie.
“I don’t care,” the man responds. “Just so long as you’re out of the house by noon!”

Another husband and wife.

John’s wife was not so good with money and , determined to economise, he’d decided to have a chat with her about it. The following days he met up with his mate.
“So” asked his mate, “do you think your little chat worked?”
“Yes, I think so” said John. “I’m going to give up beer and fag.”

“The ultimate book of rude and politically incorrect jokes” is a top-listed when we browsed joke books in online stores. This is something adult jokes.

An old couple went into the chemist’s and the old man asked for a packet of condoms. “We’re having a dirty weekend,” he said.
The chemist said “But you’re both pensioners aren’t you?
He explained that a woman over 60 could not become pregnant.
“It’s not that", said the old man. “She just loves the smell of burning rubber”

Last night, I watched Inglorious Basterds which is one of the Oscar nominees. Brad Pitt was talking in a funny accent. Christoph Waltz appeared as sick Nazi colonel. It can be said that the film is an outstanding performance of Vienna born actor, whose action dominated the American A class star as a whole. At the end of the film, it seemed to me that it was a sort of comedy.

Someone recommended that it was worth watching it. It was Avatar. The News paper claimed that Avatar sinks Titanic record. I noticed that the director was James Cameron who was the director of Titanic, Aliens, Rambo and Terminator series. Perhaps, I will watch it before going back to work.

Update: 18:34hrs (4th Feb 2010)
I did check what's wrong with people to spell "Basterd" , in stead of Bastard. The Urban Dictionary describes the meaning of Baterd. A couple of interesting meanings are as follow.

Basterd
1. A clever misspelling of the word BASTARD used to ensure your movie title stands out when Googled.

1. When someone is too stupid to spell bastard, basterd is often the result.

:)

More on Urban Dictionary here

Enjoying an old song

2010-01-19T10:37:00.008Z

Yes, it is an old song. But it will renew itself. It will restore its position after sometime. It will revitalize. It will revivify. It is the song called "Words"

Yesterday, I put Boyzone's Album "Back Again...No matter what" into my trolley in ASDA. One of the songs is Words which I did enjoy in my teenage days. Now I enjoy again. Personally, I prefer Bee Gees's original version. I feel it was powerful and strong. But it is a different taste with Boyzone's . I would say it is sensational.

Bee Gees, first released in the beginning of 1968.

Boyzone version, released in 1996.

Lyrics.....

smile an ever lasting smile
a smile can bring you near to me
don't ever let me find you gone
'cause that would bring a tear to me
this world has lost its glory
let's start a brand new story
now my love
you think that I don't even mean
a single word I say

it's only words
and words are all I have
to take your heart away

talk in ever lasting words
and dedicate them all to me
and I will give you all my life
i'm here if you should call to me
you think that I don't even mean
a single word I say

it's only words
and words are all I have
to take your heart away

it's only words
and words are all I have
to take your heart away

da da da da da da da
da da da da da da da da da da
da da da da da da da
da da da da da da da da da da

this world has lost its glory
let's start a brand new story
now my love
you think that I don't even mean
a single word I say

it's only words
and words are all I have
to take your heart away

it's only words
and words are all I have
to take your heart away

it's only words
and words are all I have
to take your heart away

I am a hobbyist

2010-01-12T23:04:00.008Z

Having a dSLR won't stop investing in the hobby. That means that I have been collecting and reading photo magazines more or less on a regular basis, while thinking high to participate in local or on-line competition. Obviously, it is not ready yet. Apparently, there is an evening photography class in nearby college. It is a good idea to join it. I could gain new camera skill and new friends. Just thinking.

The gas station is at a convenient distance. Whenever I went down there to grab a bunch of lager, I checked the book shelves filled with a variety of usual stuffs , such as auto magazines, women and adult magazines. What I normally took was photo magazine. I read and tried to take the photos as advised. Unfortunately, weather was not favourable for a amateur photographer these days. Of course, I can get snow photos. But sub zero temperature stopped me going out. Again, my busy life style has a little chance to spend on photography. Hopefully, there will be more opportunity to enjoy out door photos in next a few months.

The natural history of the elderly in Britian

2010-01-11T00:00:00.007Z

First of all, I would say this is not a research paper. Moreover, I won't guarantee it is 100% true facts covering all social classes in Britain. But I write this blog post based on my knowledge and work experience.

We do enjoy the life by studying and working , going holidays and being off sick, arguing and agreeing, marrying and divorcing, attending weddings and funerals, and so on. When we reach 65 and above, we will be in the group of old age in the countries like UK and USA. The alternative nomenclature of the elderly is senior or senior citizen. The definition of old age varies from society to society, from department to department.

At work, I mean, at hospital where I work , we consider those with 75 and above (some hospital 78, some 79) as the elderly people. They are put in the list of the elderly care consultant, who will lead the team for his patient's medical and social issues to be sorted out. Once patient is medically fit or nearly fit, we start the discharge plan. That means we decide to where patient is going. To his own home? to rehab hospital, to residential home or nursing home.

The majority of elderly people lives alone or with their spouse if they are still alive. It is common that their children live nearby, helping with shopping and cleaning. Some elderly people have no own children, but they have been looking after well by step-daughter or son as next of kin. I still remember one old man was admitted to hospital for some reason. His son had been in Australia for many years. Almost everyday, the anxious son rang us, asking about his father's updates, saying "thank you" during most of the calls. He also had threatened to make complaint against us for a couple of times. Yes, that is our life. Anyway, that old man got better and he went home after sometime.

Basically we cannot discharge our patients without making sure that they will be safe at home. During the discharge plan, the phyisotherapist does mobility assessment, providing walking assistance if required while the occupational therapist's function is to assess if patient can do his or her daily activities safely, such as kitchen, stairs and bathroom. Some needs stair lift to go to upstairs bathroom. Other need wheel chair for shopping.

Some people require rehabilitation before going home. So they go to a local community hospital to build up their mobility.

While they are in acute hospital or rehab hospital, we consider if patient will need care package at home. For example, some people needs once a day carer in the morning for cleaning, dressing and making breakfast, etc. Some need twice a day. At this point, social worker plays a role to organize carer package, including funding issue. Maximum home carer is 4 times a day in my area. Generally "more help" means "less independent and more frail".

What will happen if someone needs more than 4 times a day? Commonly, such people are with advancing dementia or with multiple health problems and no longer able to cope at home alone. Answer is residential home. Next question is who will pay. Patient himself or local authority?

What would be the next step after Residential home (RH)? From RH, they might come back to hospital with water infection, chest infection or fall and collapse. Some died at hospital due to current illness or new problems. Other died of natural cause at RH.

A small percentage of people need 24 hours nursing care due to some conditions, such as dense stroke, advanced Parkinson's disease. They are transferred to nursing home as RH usually has no nursing support. (Apparently, 24 hour care at own home is around £2400 a month)

I am thinking myself what would be my final place before death if I have a chance to live long.

BMW to Mercedes

2010-01-03T11:35:00.027Z

In December 2009, my old BMW was written off after an accident. That meant I needed to buy a car. A friend of mine told me why not try a brand new car, pointing out that it did not need MOT in first 3 years and the manufacturer's warranty would be a peace of mind. Of course, I want to. But i feel an extra bill for finance would be a great burden in next 3-4 yeas. Moreover, the market price of a new car will drop by £3000-4000 in the first year, according to the reports. So I decided to go for a used car.

I'm still missing this BMW 316. It was a good runner.

Buying a car is not an easy business if you have more and more knowledge about it. I meant when I bought my first car, I did not know anything behind the sale of a car and I did not check anything. I did a test drive and I purchased straight away. Fortunately, there was no problem.

This time, first of all, I did research on Autotraders and Gumtree. After sometime, I had got an idea about current price. Once I was interested in a car, I rang first. If still available, I made an appointment to view. At this point, in terms of documents, I needed to check if VIN (Vehicle Identification number ) on car body matched with the one on log book (Vehicle registration book). If not matched, it is likely a clone car. The owner should be the same address as shown on the log book of the car. A regular service history meant that this car was likely to be well maintained . I can also get a rough idea about mileage. Yes, mileage fraud is relatively common here. I also made sure any annoying things inside and outside of the car. MOT certificate is also an important document.

Next step was checking the car history on HPI or DVLA's Car data. This small investment is worth doing so. Yes, basically, I would avoid the car with bad history, such is outstanding finance, previous damage and stolen vehicles. I also do not the car with history of plate transfer for some reason.

After those were satisfactory, I made an offer to reduce the price by 100 or 200£.

Basically, private sellers want cash. I was told before someone was beaten and money was taken when he was buying car. So for a safety measure, I needed to get my friends when I went to purchase this Mercedes.

I intended to buy a Mercedes C class 3 doors coupe' (C200 or C180) previously because it is affordable with a nice looking to me. But once I tried to buy, those cars had been sold quickly while I was working week days and some weekends. As a result, I did not have a car in last 3 weeks. Fortunately, after the new year night, I found out new advert about this car while I was in London for the New year celebration at riverside and we reached a deal quickly. But it is a family car.

I bought this yesterday

Update (03/01/2010 23:00hr)

Some experience and knowledge obtained while trying to buy a car.

1. The registration number of a car advertised by a small trade was not found in the HPI. When I rang about that, they gave me another number which was also not found in the database system. I have not idea what they were trying to do.

2 A couple of sellers advertised the mileage much less than actual one.

3. One Mercedes with cheap price was written off in the record. That means ?a major accident in the past.

4. If the number plate was transferred, it is said that the full history of car is unable to be traced.

5. Mileage history is important. we can check it on old MOT certificates and service history.

6. 3 door coupé cars are on demand.

7. One dealer advertised a car, saying owner was a doctor. Weird!

8. VIN (Vehicle Identification number/ chassis number ) has 17 digits. There are no alphabet O and I. but O is Zero and I is one.

9. If the MOT certificate is lost, you can get a duplicate copy, costing you £10.

Lonely New Year Night

2010-01-01T11:27:00.006Z

This is the third time I have been in river side firework of New Year celebration in London. The first time was in 2005 with my parents. I left my car near the Lambert Bridge, one of the several bridges crossing River Thames. We did a long walk to reach Westminster and London Eyes where firework took place. And the year 2007 saw an amazing celebration when I was with a friend from Japan and a bottle of champagne on Westminster Bridge.

This time, I was on my own. Most of my friends celebrated at home. Despite getting on train once I finished work in the evening, it was 10:30 PM when I reached the river side where hundreds of thousands of people had already occupied the good view points. BBC later reported that there were a quarter million people participated in the New Year party. When I got back to my London place, it was 3AM. I will stay here over the weekend and I will go back to my work place on Sunday.

Here are some photos I took as much as I had a chance.

Before mid night

Just after mid night

2009 and me

2009-12-31T02:56:00.009Z

Basically, I do like evidence based practice which is a very scientific approach to solve the problems. . At the same time I am rather superstitious on numbers, days and some words. It happened after I experienced the same thing repeatedly. For example, I am likely to deal with death body at around 1PM at work in many occasions. Number one alone was not very good to me. But numbers such as 11, 29, 38, 47 were my lucky ones,. For instance, I was granted a settlement in Britain on the 11th of a month. Number 29 and 38 were good ones in my life as well.

When year 2009 was approached, I expected too much that it would be my golden year. In reality, the reverse is true.

During the first quarter of the year, I was so tired and very difficult to cope with enormous work loads due to an unexpected shortage of man power at work. I had to work at least extra 2 hours everyday for nothing. In the second quarter, it was getting worse. There was something went wrong in communication between human resource department and the deanery. It was learnt that my name disappeared from the list. The deanery had already employed someone for my place. It was a pain. I had to sort out that issue. I was nearly jobless. In the third quarter of this unlucky year, my family issue made me a misery. I encountered unnecessary expenses.

It can be said that the worst quarter is the last quarter. My BMW’s rear tyre blown out while driving at 70 mph (which is legal limit) on a notorious high way. I had my car serviced 2 months earlier. Car was swinging at first. After that, it spun off the road. Fortunately, nobody hurt. But the whole right side of car body was damaged. Now it has been written off and the insurance company sent me a cheque. Anyway, I am still alive.

This is my experience in 2009.

Awards Ceremony and Education in Britain

2009-12-26T01:05:00.038Z

Ceremony starting

A few weeks ago, my sister attended the graduation ceremony of the university of East London held at the Barbican Centre for her BSC (Honour) in IT. In fact , it was a sort of celebration of the achievement of university students after 3 years of extensive reading, doing research works in given time frame, writing academic essays with thousands of words and attending seminars. I was proud of her. But that school event was little or nothing exciting to me as she is the 4th person among our relatives who took the UK degree. Yes, of course, I brought my camera and took some random photos.

queueing for a hand shake with chancellor. The degree certificate had been sent off by post in advance.

The following is some information about attending the university I was told.

Enrolment:

For International student : To join the UEL, student must achieve IELTS score 6.0 for undergraduate degree and 6.5 for post graduate. In some cases, they may accept score 5.5 or 5.0 for some subjects, such as history or geography. The university gives more chance to international students than home students in entry as it can earn oversea fees, which is around £7500 to £10000 per annum for foreign students while home rate is about £2000-3000.

For Home student: Entering university as home student could be challenging. The students aged under 25 must follow their UCAS (University college administration service) system. They have to apply 4 to 5 universities after finishing A level. Some Uni reject and some give offer to them, depending on the situation.

Those aged over 25 do not need A level and do not need to apply in UCAS. They can apply directly to universities but they have to take aptitude test in English, mathematics and language interview.

Modules:

As a student, 6 modules have to be taken in every single year. BSc (honour) degree is a 3 years course. So it needs to clear 18 modules to achieve the degree, including the dissertation paper which must be done in the final year. The dissertation is essential to complete the degree, which includes research proposal for 3000 words and dissertation itself for 12000 words in the final year.

Semesters:

There are 2 semesters in a year. 3 modules have to be completed in one semester. Every module has at least 2 course works, some have 3, including exam. One semester lasts 4 months, during which the student has to submit 6 to 9 course works with or without exam. That means not much leisure time, contrary to uni life in Yangon.

Marking system:

First year’s marks doesn’t count for final grading while the scores of 12 modules of The 2nd year and final year are important.

The average marks over 75 is first class honour,
over 65 is upper second class honour,
over 55 is lower second class honour,
over 45 is third class honour grade and
40 is just pass mark with no honour but an ordinary degree.

Achieving the first class honour means that he or she can do the Ph.D. directly, without having MSC or MA and it is also easy to secure a job, but it is rare. The commonest one is second class honour among the UK students, according to the research.

Any question about study in the UK, welcome!

A bad habbit

2009-12-13T20:42:00.007Z

When I was in Burma, I overheard my mother advised a young woman, who was nurse, how to save money from food. I was only 12. But it was still a clear memory. My mother said "if you saved some money each time when you go shopping, you could have an emergency money when you need it for something in the future"

To be honest, I never appreciate that statement. But when I got to the UK, I a bit changed. Every time when I went to Tesco each week, I had to purchase at least £50 for my 7-10 days food quota. What I got back was a receipt and 5p off voucher (5P off for each litre of petrol).

Which came to my mind was that if I had to pay Tesco, I did need to pay myself something. That idea was a bit crazy and logically it was not right. In fact, foods I bought from Tesco was for myself. But anyway, whenever I went to Tesco, I put £10 or 20 notes beneath my mattress in last few years, trying to convince myself I earned from shopping.

The following pictures were the end result. I decided not to do like that any more in the future. It is not worth doing so. Mathematically, the figures of my money won't change. At the same time, we must not keep money at home for the security purpose. Banks are around.

Between mattress and base of the bed.

Interestingly, most were £20 notes

Counted before banking

Emergency contraception

2009-11-10T21:42:00.005Z

I am not a GP, but yesterday someone from Singapore rang me, asking for an advice. It was about emergency contraception. Of course, it is well known as "morning after pill". In fact, this term is misleading. The pill works for up to 72 hours (three days) after unprotected sex. But it is advised that the earlier you take it, the better as it works best if taken within 12 hours of sex.

In Britain, it is the pill that people can buy from chemists without needing prescription. But the pharmacist will do a quick chat before issuing it, making sure everything is OK. According to the data, if the pill is taken within 24 hours after unprotected sex, about 95 in 100 pregnancies are prevented.

Of course, all drugs have side effects. Some people experience feeling sick after taking it. But the majority has no problem at all. At this point, I'd like to talk about something. Some people from far east thought that conventional western drugs have loads of side effects while herbal preparations have no or little side effects. That is absolutely wrong, I think . In fact, many of conventional drugs come from the purified extracts of herbal preparations. Lack of extensive scientific research dose not necessarily mean that herbal drug from some parts of world, such as Burma and Thailand, has no unwanted effect.

Obviously, morning after pill is not ideal for a long term plan and own doctor or GP is the best person to discuss about other options. At the same time, people should bear in mind that unprotected sex is one of the main mode of transmissions of viral illnesses, such as HIV, hepatitis B and C.

For the further information of emergency medication, please visit the following sites.

www.patient.co.uk

www.netdoctor.co.uk

Here is a related news you may be interested in

A pilot scheme allowing pharmacists to give women the contraceptive pill without a prescription has been given the go-ahead for next year.

Women and girls aged over 16 will be able to get the pill at two London primary care trusts, Southwark and Lewisham, Pulse magazine says.

If the pilots are successful, the pill could become available over the counter like the morning after pill. Full article on BBC

Update (22/11/2009)

This article is what I came across on The times weekend.

A The morning-after pill is effective only up to 72 hours after intercourse but the level of protection declines dramatically during that time. In the first 24 hours it prevents 95 per cent of pregnancies, but that figure drops to 85 per cent within the next 24 hours and only 58 per cent if taken after that......

Ann Furedi, of the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS), says that “for women who are not in a relationship, the morning-after pill is even safer than the contraceptive pill because it is only an occasional dose of hormones, although obviously it doesn’t protect against STIs”. The BPAS states that “there is no limit” to how many times you can use it.....

More....at The times Online

A reflection on staying online

2009-10-30T14:01:00.015Z

More than half of office workers use sites like Twitter and Facebook for personal use during the working day, and admit wasting an average of 40 minutes a week each.

One in three of the 1,460 office workers surveyed also said they had seen sensitive company information posted on social networking sites, leading to fears about how workers use the internet.

Philip Wicks, consultant at Morse, the IT services and technology company who commissioned the survey, said the true cost to the economy could be substantially higher than the £1.38bn estimate.(Telegraph)

Above news article made me to think about my internet usage.

Discussion about advantages and disadvantages of the use of Internet is a sort of boring topic, commonly found in the study of foreign language schools. But I have to say that the emergence of social networks enables people to extend their contact list, discussing an issue in a wider scale and conducting a campaign for and against something up to a global level, at the expense of their private time, which can be used more effectively in other ways, in order to upgrade the working position and family welfare.

Probably, most individuals have their intended life time achievement. Obviously, I never think about myself to become a famous blogger or a great twitter user with a thousand of followers. If not, why have I been spending a colossal amount of time in front of computer, by clicking facebook and twitter links? At this point, my reflective practice came into an action to judge my next step. The verdict is that I need to change sooner rather than later.

Reflective practice is a continuous process and involves the learner considering critical incidents in his or her life's experiences. It is also associated with learning from experience(Wiki)

A few months ago, I had to struggle tremendously to complete my tasks at work. It happened after wasting my time on-line uselessly. Learning from experience means less time on-line, planning to do mandatory jobs in a fixed time frame.

I like this quotation.

“Change will never happen when people lack the ability and courage to see themselves for who they are.” (Bryant H. McGill )

My opinion is that people should need to upgrade their social environment and working situation from time to time whenever possible as part of the quality of life improvement process. It is not the right way to stay in one community life long. I came across some people from far east who were confined in the group of same people, even after residing in Britain for years or decades. I am wondering what would be their point of living in Britain. It is very reasonable that the government introduced the Knowledge of life in the UK exam for settlement status applicants, encouraging them to learn briefly what the Britishness is.

We are social-beings. There are some people who enormously enjoy the virtual world for many reasons, one of which it would be a result of withdrawal from the community after not achieving any positive communication. That model is common among immigrants. For a temporary basis, involving with on-line community seems an effective for a loneliness. But what would be the long term effect? How much have I lost because of Facebook, Twitter and cbox?

Camera buying skill

2009-10-25T15:13:00.021Z

The whole yesterday morning, I did on-line research on current digital SLRs, thinking to buy one. I also bought a couple of photo magazines to get some idea. I know many amateur photographers are crazy to buy Nikon D90 for some reason, even though it is one of the entry level cameras. It would be a copycat phenomenon among a group of people. To be honest, I am not the one who is keen to try a relatively expensive development, at the expense of my monthly investment.

I found out that Nikon D-3000 has acceptable specifications with a reasonable price to me. So I decided to get that one, which was introduced in July 2009 in Britain. I drove to the town centre. When I got to Jessops, I changed my mind to take Sony alfa 230 instead. Sony is rather new in digital camera world, I think. My friends normally prefer Nikon and Cannon. But I think Sony is attractive, extremely compact with a light weight. Moreover, the quality of image of Sony camera is excellent, according to several independent reviews. Next thing is that it is cheap. So I took it. I did also purchase 70-300mm zoom lens. It was nice to take test photos instantly at beach once I came out of the shop.

But I found out that there was no "live view" mode. The LCD screen was only for setting and viewing the photos taken. I must admit that I have a poor knowledge in Digital SLR camera although I used Nikon and Cannon SLRs since I was 18. I wrongly assumed that all dSLR had got a live view as its compact counterparts. In fact, my friend Vista mentioned about "live view" yesterday morning that Nikon 3000 had no such mode, but in Nikon 5000. I neglected her statement which was my mistake. The whole evening, I tried to take photos using view finder, leaving me with some eye ache.

This morning, I went back to Jessops and I did exchange with Sony A330. Now I am happy with new camera. It has got quick AF live view. That means that A330 can provide rapid camera performance without any delay for capture. Hopefully, photos will be available on my picasa web album shortly.

Updated 26.10.09

Please click : Some sample photos I took today

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Holiday in Barcelona

2009-10-17T08:32:00.004+01:00

Holiday means gong somewhere. I chose Barcelona. This Spanish city with UNESCO world heritage sites is decorated with a combination of ancient buildings and modern architecture. I stayed in the Front Air Congress Hotel which is 4 star with gym and spa. I must say £55 a night is relatively cheap, compared with the same grade hotels in England. The only drawback was that it was not in the down town. I had to take the bus 72 route from hotel to the centre of Barcelona. It was only Euro 1.35 per ride( one journey £2 in London). Saving money, I bought 2 days travel card, enabling me to take bus and metro as many as I wanted. Their underground network is rather smaller than London counterpart. Basically, no need to worry to lose the way for someone who has been familiar with London transport system.

During my stay, I made new friends. I met a couple from Toronto in hotel restaurant. Both of them were well over 60. They were in Paris before Barcelona. We chatted and later we enjoyed the dinner together. Spanish fine red wine boosted our conversation. Next morning, a young girl called Yumi from Japan asked me something in the hotel lounge. She was on her own. She visited her friends in Oxford for 7 days before coming to Spain. She was a sale assistant from Nagoya. We took sight seeing bus together. She was quite friendly. The only issue was her English with many pauses and stops. But it did not matter for that evening when we enjoyed Spanish foods and then went to spa.

You can see some photos I took.

the view from Montjuïc ( 'Hill of the Jews')

Cruises. Barcelona has a major port in Europe

A women statue who I don't know.

Columbus monument

Date trees

Casa Mila' or La Pedrera (built between 1906-1912)

More photos, click here

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The most annoying things

2009-10-12T19:56:00.023+01:00

The most annoying things

I came across an article on the telegraph. “The most 100 annoying things in Britain: Poll.”

The followings are top 3 out of 100.
1. Chavs
2. People driving close behind you
3. People who smell

Full list at Telegraph

I totally agree that chav is in number one position.

Chav (pronounced /ˈtʃæv/ Charver or Scally (In northern England), CHAV) is a derogatory term applied to certain young people in the United Kingdom. The stereotypical "chav" is an aggressive teenager or young adult who often engages in anti-social behaviour, such as street drinking, drug abuse and rowdy behaviour. They are often assumed to be unemployed or in a low paid job, although it is incorrect to assume that all chavs are working class, as chavs belong to no distinct social class. Chavs typically wear tracksuits and hoodies made by sporting brands such as Nike and Adidas and listen to mainly MC and some have been known to listen to Rap, R'n'B, Hip Hop and Techno. (Source: wiki)

(This is for someone who is not familiar with the meaning of chav.)

An example appearance of chavs (source: telegraph.co.uk)

Basically, once I see a group of teenagers with above appearance on my way, I would walk on the other side of the street. That is what my experience taught me. It was near the royal infirmary in west Yorkshire where I lived. A group of teenagers asked for a cigarette. I said I did not smoke. They shouted “F....... Chinese”. What a coincident. Next day, a girl from that group was visiting on the ward to see her sick grandmother who was under my care. She disappeared in a minute once she found out who I was.

Another time, a group of teenagers threw at my car with stone at near Prince Regent Station in east London while driving at about 8PM. I pulled over. They ran away. I rang 999. Police patrol arrived in 2 minutes (Police must be very aware of the situation in that area). Police man checked my car if any damage. Nothing found. They did not take any action. I think teenagers’ behaviour depends on the many factors, such as social class, parental guidance, environment they grow and many more. In fact it is a wide social science topic, I believe.

“People driving close behind you” and “People who smell” ranked number 2 and 3 respectively in above public poll.

To be honest, I do not bother tailgaters too much. Once I have a chance, I let high speeders to take over.

Am I annoyed with smelly people? Absolutely not. Of course. It is my job seeing sick people who have various smells. In fact, some particular smells help establishing a diagnosis in certain conditions.

This is my list of annoyance.

1 Chavs (as above)

2. Noisy self-closing fire door. Because of poor manufacturers or brainless builders, in most NHS buildings I lived previously, the doors shut with a bang, making walls vibrating. Unable to sleep at day time during night on-calls, risking care of patient.

The old closers with above appearance still being used in many places are really bad. The Geze brand fixed in doctor's room at work is the worst one. It shuts the door slowly until about 4 inches away to close completely. After that, it bangs the door, making a loud noice and vibrating walls. No easy way to adjust the door to close gently. (Photo credit to : http://www.locksearch.com )

3. Windows Operating system. I have no choice. But it needs update all the time. In the middle of an important task, it has been asking to restart. Loading and shutting time are ridiculously long. I frequently need to switch the power off.

4. USB memory stick. Very useful. But every time, I need to be careful to put in a right way after one USB socket has already torn.

5. Patriotism/Nationalism

6. Road work. Now it is road work season, I believe. Everywhere, road works. In most sites, workers start their jobs in morning rash hours and finish after evening peak time.

7. Accidents and motor break-downs during rash hours. I sympathise the innocent victims. But I think it is a sort of lengthy investigation in each incident. I feel police and emergency services should have a better tools and system to get job done quickly.

8. People who asked me “Where did you originally come from?” I believe I have to answer that question as long as I am alive and living in Britain, regardless of my nationality.

9. Gordon Brown. Until a few months before this economic slow-down, I remember that he kept saying British economy was still going strong while manufacturing industry has been shrinking year after year with many factories and firms moving out to eastern Europe and China. Of course, Britain mainly depends on service sector. Until when? Who knows?

10. Putting feet on the table. Unfortunately, I start having this practice.

An effective gloving or not

2009-09-29T16:41:00.012+01:00

When I was in medical school, a microbiologist pointed out that the dirtiest part of a public toilet would be the door knob or door handle with the reason that the cleaner would clean commode and toilet floor in a particular time interval. But nobody would not bother to clean door knob that all toilet users need to touch it after their business. He claimed that million of germs could transmit from that source.

Based on above knowledge, I may be obsessed, I sometime see currency notes, which may have passed in the hands of hundreds of people before it comes to my pocket, as a kind of toilet door knob from the health point of view. I really don't know if there are harmful germs on £5 and £10 notes. But I believe that food handlers should not touch currency note while foods are being prepared.

I like Subway sandwich for many reasons. It is fresh. I can choose the type of bread and ingredients. I can order to toast it or not. I can select the salads and sauces (Mustard is my fav). It is also a good practice that food handlers are instructed to put gloves on while working.

Unfortunately, I came across a shop somewhere in Britain, which has been in sub-standard, in terms of hygiene although sale persons were on gloves.

When I got there, there were two sale persons in that Subway shop. I ordered BMT with Hearty Italian bread. The first person's job was cutting the bread and putting the meats inside, before toasting with cheese. After that, the second person put salads, which were cucumber, pepper, onion, iceberg as I chose, finishing by spreading with sauce. Then, it was packed. What was next!

The next step was that the sale assistant took the money with his semi-wet gloved hand, operating the machine and returning the change. When I got out of the shop, he had been dealing with next customers, repeating the same steps.

Any comment welcome.

If someone wants to know the actual place of this branch, I would be happy to tell for the sake of Subway customers. Just drop a comment.

Spreading sauce

finishing sandwich making

Holding the machine with food preparing hands, concentrating on digits

I was taking the change

Continuing medical education

2009-09-13T11:36:00.006+01:00

A couple of years ago, my relative from Burma was visiting Britain, staying at home for a month. He noticed I was reading medical books and journals as my hobby or my task or whatever it was described.

"Work hard, Steve. Study harder to get a higher level"

His expression made me surprised. I was not preparing for any exam. I was doing a routine thing as a doctor. But in his eyes, I had to keep reading books because I still needed to learn a lot. He treated me as a student, patronising me a lot. I did not explain too much why I had to read books while working at hospital in Britain. I felt it was not worth doing so. He was just a visitor going back to Burma in a few weeks.

Basically, it is compulsory in Britain that all levels of doctors, from first year medics to consultants and professors, to do "continuing medical education" while practising. We need to keep updated with recent developments and advances in medicine while refreshing existing knowledge and skills. That is part of the duty of a good doctor. We are entitled with study days and leaves for that purpose. We need to attend education meetings and conferences .

I am wondering how a consultant physician from Burma seeing patients till late evening after working from 8Am to 4PM at hospital, would have a chance to update his or her knowledge. At the same time, I believe if patients and their families in Burma found out that their doctor keeps reading medical books, they would not trust him/her any more with the thought that our doctor had not got enough knowledge yet , but still studying. They might move to new doctors.

I still remember my early career when I ran a private clinic in Insein, northern part of former capital city, Yangon. I treated minor illness with pills and I did not request too much laboratory tests. There was a specialist clinic nearby. At that point, a funny thing was going on. The local people had been spreading words, saying that the specialist doctor from that clinic had no idea how to treat without blood tests and claiming that that young doctor, it was me, was much better. Every evening, there had been a long queue in my clinic.

Next, it is disappointing that there is a poor referral system in Burma. The doctors want to keep their patients with them for some reason, regardless of the conditions. My aunt has a sleeping difficulty and anxiety , and a cardiologist has been treating her with sleeping pill for many years, instead of referring to a psychiatrist or counselling service. Again, from the patient point of view, if they are advised to see other doctor for a different problem , they may think the referring doctor is not efficient. I heard several similar stories before. So we can't blame doctors' way of practice in Burma. But I believe general people would need to be educated. At the same time, the authorities concerned need to make sure the referral system in Burma running smoothly and effectively for the sake of our patients. Reinforcement may be required.

Friday afternoon Library at the hospital I am working

Evidence based Medicine corner

Reading a medical journal

Bournemouth and Brownsea Island

2009-09-06T01:55:00.011+01:00

Previously, we intended to go to Isle of Wight in this weekend. But the plan was changed and today we headed towards Bournemouth which is a nearer place. Late summer saw the crowd of locals and visitors walking in the shopping centre and sea front of Dorset’s coastal resort town. As I expected, its town centre was not too much different from the counterparts of other English towns. There were usual shops and stores. I popped in to Borders book shop to buy Jamie Oliver’s Italian cook book as my colleague recommended. The interesting thing was that there were only pop, rock and some classic CDs on the music shelves. No R&B and Rap songs for some reason. Perhaps, it needs some more time to get updated to a world class cosmopolitan place.

It was within a walking distance from town to the sea front. After passing through a park, where there was a huge balloon, raising visitors 500 feet into the air to view the English Channel and Dorset countryside, we saw a rather small pier. Cloudy sky was not a perfect weather for beach lovers. But there were a few people swimming. Some were enjoying with surfing boards.

Brownsea island is the largest of the islands in Poole harbour with 500 acres. With £10.50 per head boat tickets, we had an opportunity to lean Bournemouth’s long sand beach and cliffs on our way to the island. Other boats and yachts were also around with different directions.

Now the island is under the control of the National Trust although it was private island in the past . It is naturally beautiful.

View Larger Map

The National Trust website said:

Peaceful island of woodland, wetland and heath with a rich diversity of wildlife

• Fine walks and spectacular views of Poole Harbour
• Home to the endangered red squirrel
• Famous for being the birthplace for Scouting and Guiding
• A haven for wildlife, including Sika deer and wading birds
• Trails and Tracker Packs for young smugglers and explorers
• Escape the noise and stress of modern life and discover nature in this unspoilt setting

I believe it is worth visiting there at last one time.

If you want to see the full set of photos, click here

Thank you

These days, I don't have too much blogging time, so I am just sharing lunch menu of my hospital restaurant for the week (24th August 2009). Foods are rather cheap, but reasonably good.

Monday Lunch Menu
Starter
Home Made Celery Soup
Main Course
Roast Pork & Apple Sauce
Steak and Mushroom Pies with a Rich Gravy and Puff Pastry Topping
Breast of Chicken with a Wild Mushroom & Madeira Sauce

Vegetarian Option
Cauliflower Cheese

Dessert
Chocolate Sponge with White Chocolate Sauce
Rice Pudding
Selection of Cold Sweets

Tuesday Lunch Menu
Starter
Home Made Vegetable Soup
Main Course
Grilled Gammon with Pineapple
Chicken Curry with Rice / Chips
Beef Lasange

Vegetarian Option
Vegetable Pasta Bake - Fresh Vegetables and Pasta topped with
Breadcrumbs and Cheese

Dessert
Fruit Crumble with Custard
Rice Pudding
Selection of Cold Sweets

Wednesday Lunch Menu
Starter
Home Made Cauliflower & Broccoli Soup
Main Course
Roast Chicken and Seasoning
Beef Wellington with a Red Wine Sauce
Pasta Carbanara - Ribbons of Tagliatelli with a Mushroom and
Smoked Ham Cream Sauce

Vegetarian Option
Homemade Forest Mushroom Quiche

Dessert
Apple and Sultana Sponge with Custard
Rice Pudding
Selection of Cold Sweets

Thursday Lunch Menu
Starter
Home Made Watercress Soup
Main Course
Roast Beef and Yorkshire Pudding
Chicken Korma - a Spicy but not hot Curry in a Creamy Sauce
with Almonds, served with Rice / Chips
Fried Cod in a Home Made Batter with Lemon Wedges

Vegetarian Option
Mushroom and Spinach Lasagne - Layers of Pasta, Button Mushrooms
and Spinach in a White Wine Cream Sauce

Dessert
Fruit Crumble with Custard
Milk Pudding
Selection of Cold Sweets

Friday Lunch Menu
Starter
Home Made Tomato Soup
Main Course
Shepherds Pie
Faggots in Gravy with Mushy Peas
Braised Steak with Mushrooms. Shallots in a Red Wine Gravy

Vegetarian Option
Mushroom & Red Pepper Stroganoff

Dessert
Apple Pie with Custard
Rice Pudding
Selection of Cold Sweets

Updated (26/08/2009) 20:30

Restaurant

My food and others eating

Lunch (Vegetable pasta with chips and pea ) not my main meal

Updated 27/08/09 -09:30

Night off break fast: my fav British breakfast with eggs, bacon, sausage, baked beans, mushrooms and pudding ( Ma KOM တို႕စားတဲ့ ထမင္းနဲ႕ပဲျပဳတ္ေတာ့ မလြမ္းေသးဘူး။ ဘယ္တုန္းကမွလဲ မၾကိဳက္ခဲ့ဘူး။ .)

Emotional intelligence

2009-08-15T14:48:00.005+01:00

When I was young, I still remember that people emphasised the importance of IQ (Intelligence Quotient), assuming that it was one of the key predictors of academic and financial success. But these days, people have more talked about Emotional Intelligence (EQ). So I just did a quick research about EQ. The followings are the results.

What is Emotional intelligence

Emotional Intelligence (EI) describes the ability, capacity, skill or, in the case of the trait EI model, a self-perceived ability, to identify, assess, and manage the emotions of one's self, of others, and of groups. (Source)

Emotional intelligence is the unique repertoire of emotional skills that a person uses to navigate the everyday challenges of life.(Source)

Emotional Intelligence is the ability to identify, use, understand and manage emotions. (source)

Research suggests that a person's emotional intelligence (EQ) might be a greater predictor of success than his or her intellectual intelligence (IQ), despite an assumption that people with high IQs will naturally accomplish more in life. (Source)

Goleman identified the five 'domains' of EQ as:
1. Knowing your emotions.
2. Managing your own emotions.
3. Motivating yourself.
4. Recognising and understanding other people's emotions.
5. Managing relationships, ie., managing the emotions of others. (Source)

Two aspects
• Understanding yourself, your goals, intentions, responses, behaviour and all.
• Understanding others, and their feelings. (Source)

For decades, a lot of emphasis has been put on certain aspects of intelligence such as logical reasoning, math skills, spatial skills, understanding analogies, verbal skills etc. Researchers were puzzled by the fact that while IQ could predict to a significant degree academic performance and, to some degree, professional and personal success, there was something missing in the equation. Some of those with fabulous IQ scores were doing poorly in life; one could say that they were wasting their potential by thinking, behaving and communicating in a way that hindered their chances to succeed.

One of the major missing parts in the success equation is emotional intelligence, a concept made popular by the groundbreaking book by Daniel Goleman, which is based on years of research by numerous scientists such as Peter Salovey, John Meyer, Howard Gardner, Robert Sternberg and Jack Block, just to name a few. For various reasons and thanks to a wide range of abilities, people with high emotional intelligence tend to be more successful in life than those with lower EIQ even if their classical IQ is average. (Source)

Emotional Intelligence Test (click here)

After a brief reading about EI, what I understand is that it is a skill someone needs to develop or improve the personal ability to control newly emerging (own or others) emotions triggered by external stimuli, without reducing normal thinking power , while brain is working well in its maximum speed for further plans. To be honest, I must say I still need to learn more about this social science topic.

Thank you

For the time being ခုတေလာ......

2009-08-13T20:18:00.010+01:00

I just imitate what some bloggers did lately. Here is the result.

ခုတေလာ......

ခုတေလာ ေတြးေနမိတာက
£ rate getting better?

ကိုယ့္ကိုယ္ကို ျပန္ဆင္ျခင္မိတာက
Too much whisky

က်န္းမာေရး
Neck ache because of KOM's cbox

ဖတ္ျဖစ္တဲ့စာအုပ္ေတြက
Dirty, sick, X-rated & Politically incorrect Jokes (Uncensored!)
The Mammoth Book of Insults

ေရးေနမိတာက
Complaint letter to the National Rail

ေရာက္ေနျဖစ္တာက
Evening walks around cemetery

နားေထာင္ျဖစ္ေနတာက
Fifty Cent: Massacre

ရြတ္ေနမိတဲ့ကဗ်ာက
My Gun Go Off (Curtis, 50 Cent)

ျဖစ္ခ်င္ေနတာက
Jet pot winner

စားျဖစ္ေနတာက
Roast Duck and Red wine

သနားေနမိတာက
Single moms

လြမ္းေနမိတာက
Amsterdam

ေမ့ေလ်ာ့ပစ္ေနမိတာက
Dying people from work

ခါးသက္ေနမိတာက
My medical doctor life

တမ္းတေနမိတာက
My missing Lamy pen

ၾကိတ္ၿပီးခ်ီးက်ဴးေနမိတာက
Bill Clinton (affair with Monica Lewinsky and recent successful attempt to get 2 journalists free from N. Korea)

ၾကိတ္ၿပီးအထင္ေသးေနမိတာက
Fish paste eaters
(လူမုန္းမ်ားေအာင္လို႕ ေသခ်ာေျပာသည္)

ဆႏၵမရွိတဲ့ေနရာ
Ex-capital Yangon

ဆႏၵရွိေနတဲ့ကိစၥ
Boat trip

မုန္းတီးေနမိတာက
Motor cars and Windows Vista

ခ်စ္ေနတာက
M..

စိတ္ပ်က္ေနမိတာက
Labour government and Prime Minister Gordon Brown

စြဲလန္းေနမိတာက
Gangster movies

သေဘာက်ေနမိတာက
My new 100% organic shirt

လိုအပ္ေနတာက
New BMW

ေတာင္းေနမိတဲ့ဆု
to become a Tycoon, instead of a rubbish doctor

ထပ္ျပန္တလဲလဲေအာ္ဟစ္ေနမိတာက
F...............

ဝန္ခံခ်င္တာက
Lying myself

My shopping basket

2009-08-11T17:30:00.013+01:00

Someone's shopping basket may show his or her eating style while reflecting the social status, belief and place of origin to some extent. In many occasions, we can also learn the hobby and interest of a particular person .

If you check the items I bought from Tesco today, you can see easily I am an average person who keeps cat at home. Lentils and beans mean I am something related to Indian sub-continent or Mexico. You may notice eggs at about centre. Of course, I normally buy free-range eggs as I do not support the way caged eggs are produced.

On the other hand, free range egg production is really nice in my eyes. This is the picture from North Creek Farm.

Plagiarism Mania

2009-08-09T15:45:00.015+01:00

What is Plagiarism?

According to the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, to "plagiarize" means to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own : use (another's production) without crediting the source.

Plagiarism is a serious fraud. Some journalists have ended their career as they stole someone else’s work. There were many students who had to leave university after submitting an essay with missing reference. Most schools have been using plagiarism detector software.

It was an earthquake in the journalism world. 27-year-old Jayson Blair, who had been one of only two African-American editors in the history of the University of Maryland's Diamondback newspaper, and had been hired as a full reporter at the New York Times at an impressively young age, resigned only 6 days after first being accused of copying a story from another newspaper.(source)

Later, it was discovered that he had a bipolar disorder which is a serious mental problem.

Above article I came across for some reason made me remind a Burmese blogger and her scandal. Apparently, she(he) was bitterly criticised by a lobby of people who found out her copy works. Personally, I like her blog posts which are pretty entertaining. At the same time, I tried to help her out. At this point, my thought was that if there is any strong relation between plagiarism and some mental or personality disorder.

Basically, psychiatry is an interesting speciality, explaining a variety of mental and personal disorders, although, I believe, there are many areas the psychiatrists have not explored yet. (Click here for Who classification of mental and behavioural disorders). (Easy view on Wiki)

In my attempt to establish “the repeated plagiarism” as a psychological condition, unfortunately I could not find any relevant publication or paper available on free Internet sources while waiting for a reply email from my friend, who is a psychiatrist. I think it can be added under that heading of Habit and impulse disorders, together with

Can we call this condition as Plagiarmania or Plagiamania or Plagiarism mania?

Probably, the treatment option would include cognitive and behaviour therapy, rather than criticising and shouting in an uneducated manner. Own GP would be helpful this point.

Basically, no body is perfect in the world while some proportion of healthy looking persons may have a mild form of personality deviation. Who knows?

By the way, if someone wants to check own personality disorder privately, click here.

Thank you

All the best

Speed boat trip in Cardiff

2009-07-23T22:09:00.025+01:00

Wales, which had 2.9 million population in 2001 census, is one of the countries in the United Kingdom. Cardiff is its capital city. When I got there, I felt I was in a foreign country. I think the Welsh people look slightly different from English with more rounded face. The Welsh language is what I can't predict what it means. But we can still use English. Basically Wales is a really nice place to me.

Welsh flag

An example of Welsh

We are on 5240 feet long Severn bridge . on M4 motor way to Wales

Here are some photos of Cardiff Bay

A swan diving for fish or what I never know.

This speed boat attracted me to buy a ticket for next trip

ready to take a ride, nice

We were just boarding

We're just leaving the harbour.

In a couple of minutes, the boat got faster with a loud music. I thought it was flying over the surface of water. Sometime it jumped. Many occasions, it turned suddenly. We all screamed.

At the end of the trip, I had to wait for a few minutes my hearing and balance to come back. But I was really a nice experience.

For those interested in some Wales photos.

Anyway, I can tell Wales is not my country.

Clay, Pool, Hardy and A Harbour

2009-07-19T09:50:00.013+01:00

This morning, I was doing a minute research about clay as an attempt to find out the history of the Blue Pool encouraged me to do so.

Ball clays are kaolinitic sedimentary clays, that commonly consist of 20-80% kaolinite, 10-25% mica, 6-65% quartz. They are fine-grained and plastic in nature. They are mined in Devon and Dorset in England. They are commonly used in the construction of many ceramic articles.

The ceramic use of ball clays in Britain dates back to at least the Roman era. More recent trade began when clay was needed to construct tobacco pipes in the 16th and 17th century.

The name "ball clay" is believed to derive from the time when the clay was mined by hand. It was cut into 15 to 17-kilogram cubes and during transport the corners of the cubes became rounded off leaving "balls".

It can be said that the Blue Pool is one of the historic places of past time clay business.
The Blue Pool is a lake in the Furzebrook Estate, a 25 acres (100,000 m2) park of heath woodland and gorse near Furzebrook in Dorset, England.

The pool is a flooded, disused clay pit where Purbeck Ball Clay was dug from the 1600s to the early 1900s to make smoking pipes and tea pots.

I must say the place was amazing. Well maintained. At the same time, it looked natural. Tall pine trees were growing well, beautifully guarding the blue lake. Birds were singing. It is claimed that there are wild animals inhabited , such as rabbits, badgers, squirrels, deer and sand lizards. It was drizzling. So I did not have a full range of chance to explore the area.

A request for the wood ant. British people are kind enough to save ants and their work.

An ant nest (British wood ants there)

The color of water ,which is varying from green to blue, is due to clay particles.

Pine trees

You can see the Blue Pool photos I took yesterday.

Well, I went to Hardy's home before going to Blue Pool. To be honest, I did not know Thomas Hardy until a friend of mine from Bath mentioned about his name and novels last month.

Thomas Hardy(2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) was an English novelist and poet of the naturalist movement, although in several poems he displays elements of the previous romantic and enlightenment periods of literature, such as his fascination with the supernatural.

This is what he was described in wikipedia.

According to the Thomas Hardy society founded in 1968, he was born at Higher Bockhampton near Dorchester. During his lifetime he composed nearly a thousand published poems and wrote fourteen publised novels including ‘Far From the Madding Crowd’ and ‘Tess of the D’Urbervilles’. He died in Dorchester on 11 January 1928. Much of Thomas Hardy's work is based on Wessex, the South and West of England.

Unfortunately, when I got to Hardy's cottage, where he was born and raised, now under the management of the National Trust, it was found out that the small museum was not open for the public. For some reason, opening days are from Monday to Thursdays and Sunday only, what I leaned later. Why not on Saturday? Still misery. Anyway, I had a chance to walk around nice and quiet surrounding woodland area. I saw some families with their dogs enjoying the place like me.

Hardy's cottage

cute tiny wild fruits, close-up view (ရႊန္းမီအတြက္လက္ေဆာင္)

Here are some more photos of Thomas Hardy's birthplace.

After visiting above two places, I headed to Poole harbour to take boat photos. As it has been 6 PM, all deep sea boat services had already finished.

Full set of boat photos here

Reference:
http://www.bluepooltearooms.co.uk/index.php
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Hardy
http://www.hardysociety.org/

Evening walk

2009-07-15T20:47:00.007+01:00

Walking under the sun with temperature well over 35C was the hell. When I was teens, my parents managed me to walk to school on foot for many reasons. I did not have a choice. It was a pain. It may be a funny thing. But it is true that one of the reasons I moved to England was that I really hated tropical sunshine. I have been traumatised by sun in Burma, not by military government.

In England, I do not need to walk in that way. Really nice. I am still not keen to walk. I may run. I may swim. I may ride a bike. But I did not go out for walking at all.

This evening is different. I did take 30 minute walk around my house, exploring surrounding area. Here are some photos.

Wild rose

Roadside flower

Name?

White flower ( I dont know its name)

A cottage

a farm

a stream passing under the mill

phone booth "Coin not accepted"

a pub

church entrance

Only church in this village. It is constructed from flint and stone and has a Norman chancel arch with a 16th century nave.

an old organ for Sunday service

Graveyard with recent funeral service. It looks congested. Maybe not enough fund. Personally I would like to lie in a decent space of land.

An old graveyard

church lane

Carpeting and Sunbathing

2009-07-15T14:17:00.008+01:00

Since last spring, I had decided not to go abroad this summer after I was fed up with flight schedules, hotel deals and unexpected expenses that I experienced in my last trip. During my this short break, I just stayed at home. I did enjoyed lots of barbecue and wines. It was really nice until yesterday.

When I got up at 8, I was shocked to find out that the whole downstairs was flooded. The whole kitchen, the whole living room. The carpets and rugs had been underwater. I had to try to calm down myself first. The leak was from the connection point at washing machine. After securing it, I had to start very tiring carpet replacement. I removed all wet carpets. And I rushed to nearby Allied carpet. Fortunately, the one I like was on 30% off although it was still not so cheap for me as £7.45 per square meter. I finished carpeting this morning, gaining a new experience, but leaving me with some ache and pain as I had to moved all furnitures.

My house has already been equipped with smoke alarm and carbon monoxide detector. After this incident, I was thinking to get anti-flood alarm if available at market :)

new carpet in kitchen

kitchen

Living room carpet.

view from rear garden while sunbathing.

a pigeon watching at me

under the blue sky I was doing sunbathing (I miss you darling)

Wild fruits

Next door neighbours trying to make friendship with me

Nearby beach

2009-07-13T11:05:00.013+01:00

Summer time means more people going out. Beaches, holiday camps and caravan sites have been busy places. At the same time, there is a noise pollution with rescue helicopters flying over my area.

For me, I don't have too much chance to enjoy sunshine due to my work and education commitments. My organizer shows that most weekends have got full of appointments, on-call duties and "to do tasks". But last weekend, I was able to manage to go to nearby beach, where I spend one hour time. Here are some photos sharing.

Jurassic coast

A sea gull

I deliberately avoided people in my photos .

Dogs also enjoyed summer

ရႊန္းမိ ေမးဘူးလို႕ လမ္းေဘးကပန္းပံုတင္လိုက္တယ္။ Englandက ဒီအခ်ိန္ဆိုေနရာတိုင္း မွာပန္းေတြေတြ႕ႏိုင္တယ္။ ေပါက္ တို႕ ေမျမိဳ႕လိုေပါ့

feeding myself in that evening

fed a bird as well

My Love

2009-07-09T20:29:00.005+01:00

This is one of my favourite songs when I was young. Of course my elder cousins were playing it and I also enjoyed this fantastic song as an early teenager. My dream was the girl from the song. But never happened in my life.

Holiday makers and their health

2009-06-27T14:19:00.013+01:00

Nowadays, holiday means going somewhere. My domestic lady spent 2 weeks in Spain. My colleague came back from Barbados last week after taking a bargain deal from lastminute.com . Sarah is a nurse from work. She was visiting Sidney according to her email. It can be said that going holiday is part of a human right. People do it regardless of their social and financial status. People with medical condition also enjoy their holiday.

A week ago, I saw a 78 year old man at emergency medical department who came in with acute breathlessness. He was recently diagnosed as lung cancer. He was from Lincoln, northern England. In east, once diagnosed as cancer, they are not willing to go far away from their home. They may stay inside the house. They may be praying for their health. They may be waiting for their time quietly. But in west, people try to live in their normal life style as much as possible.

Yesterday, a noisy air ambulance landed at hospital heliport, bringing a 69 year old man from the cruise ship which just arrived from Mediterranean with over 200 holiday makers. He had a heart surgery previously. His doctor advised him that air travel was not suitable for him. He did not stop and he kept going by cruise ship . Now he is in hospital with a massive collection of fluid around the heart. Of course, there is little or nothing relationship with travelling and his condition. But he might die if his condition deteriorates in the middle of an ocean where it is out of reach of air lift.

Coast guard

A German tourist is also in hospital. We had to use body language before interpreter arrived. The language barrier might lead to something went wrong. Anyway, he is fine now.

The most annoying holiday maker was from Lancastershire. He is 72. He has a long term air way problem. He drove his car along with his partner . He came down to see his daughter in Poole. He had a shortness of breath while staying at hotel and he needed hospital admission . He brought his medications with pill box. Unfortunately, there was no name on it. We did not know what tablet/capsule is what medication. He did not know either. We tried to contact his GP. But only answer phone as it was out of hour. The issue was sorted only after 12 hours when his GP was available in next morning.

Some people appear to consider their health condition briefly when they prepared for their journey. This might impose a risk. Personally, I would advise those with medical conditions should get a copy of their medical summary including medication list from their GP before going holiday.

2 days in Bristol

2009-06-19T13:06:00.009+01:00

ALS means Advanced Life Support. Yesterday, I took ALS course. It is an intensive course under the management of UK Resus council. We have to retake every 4-5 years. I took a few years ago. So it was the time to take it again. It is a mandatory course for the professionals working in Acute and emergency medicine. Fee was £390. There are many centres across the UK. I chose Bristol as I had never been there before. I booked at Premiere Inn for £68 a night. After 2 day extensive practice and the test at the end of the course, I got exhausted physically and mentally. I thought it was more tiring business than PLAB and MRCP exams.

My mentor congratulated as I passed the test. There are many causalities. I mean some candidates did not pass. They have to redo after some time.

For me, only pain was parking fee. I left my car in NCP (Natinal car parking), costing me £30 for 24 hours. Premier Inn provides parking place (£8 for 24 hours), but no space on my arrival. Anyway, I am happy. I have done a task successfully. My course fee was funded by my deanery. :) Well, I still need to claim it.

the Premier Inn where I stayed over night. Fortunately my room was at the top floor (17). So good view.

inside the room

A view from my room. That is Bristol

Another look

University Hospitals, Bristol . A view from Education centre.

Some candidates

My cottage photos

2009-06-15T20:19:00.010+01:00

During the last few days, I have been trying to organize my things. Still unfinished yet. Here are some photos of my new place in village. Hopefully, I can publish countryside photos after a couple of weeks. I have to attend a course in Bristol this Wednesday and Thursday. After that, my nights are from Friday to Sunday. Next week Tuesday is a long day again. :(

My cottage entrance

I start using my kitchen

Dining table

My fav roast duck

It's a mess. Now I've already kept tidy

My temporary sleeping place while waiting for my bed.

I still need to buy a proper TV stand

Someone's gift

Stair case to upstairs

Zoom in view from upstairs

Updated 02/07/2009 21:50 hours

My bed room အေလာင္းစင္နဲ႕မတူဘူးလား?

Moved to village

2009-06-08T12:15:00.010+01:00

Last weekend, I moved to a village which is 5 miles away from my work. It is a very quiet place with organic farms around. House moving is a stressful business. I had to sort out a lot of things from removal of my belongings to address change. Royal mail redirect service cost me over £40 a year. The Internet is not available yet. I had to transfer my Virgin account that I left in Yorkshire last year. Since I moved in to Dorset, I have been using hospital Wifi network as I live in hospital accommodation.

Now I start enjoying England's rural life. There is a tiny pub in 3 minutes walk. That is the smallest pub in England, according to a neighbour. I may have some time to go there next week.

The only issue today is that I had to get up earlier than my normal time for my travel. (My regular bed time was 2AM and my radio alarm went on at 8 when I lived in work place). Later I learnt that it was only 10 minute driving time from home to work, which is quite good.

By the way, the name of the village is Godmanstone!

Fireplace at my new place. I did try last night.

Some old photos

2009-06-06T00:58:00.012+01:00

These are some London photos found in my computer. Just sharing my memory.

London underground

A London passenger

London police

London shoppers

A London bus

A London girl

London trishaw

London Geese

London cheap panties.

Update:

စင္ကာပူ ေရာက္ၿပီးတဲ့ ေနာက္ေတာ့ မမKOM တခါ ေျပာဖူးသလိုပဲ ဘာမွ သိပ္မဆန္းေတာ့ဘူး ထင္မိတယ္။

Rita said...

06 June 2009 07:00:00 BST

ဒါေပါ့ မဆန္းပါဘူး။ အစက ဓာတ္ပံုနဲ႕ပါတ္သက္တဲ့ story ေတြေရးမလို႕ပဲ။ ေနာက္။။။။စိတ္မပါတာနဲ႕ ဒီတိုင္းပဲ ထားလိုက္တာ

Steve Evergreen said...

06 June 2009 07:07:00 BST

Never Had A Dream Come True

2009-05-30T00:00:00.004+01:00

The old songs always remind me of my past.

It was in nearly 10 years ago. We were in London. We enjoyed this song while sitting down in the living room at one late evening. And, we talked about our plans. We discussed about our future. Fortnight later, She moved out to midland. I moved to East of England. We are still friends. We see once a year. But we do not talk on the phone.

Lyrics

Ooh...

Everybody's got something they had to leave behind
One regret from yesterday that just seems to grow with time
There's no use looking back or wondering (or wondering)
How it could be now or neither been (or neither been)
All this I know but still I can't find ways to let you go

Chorus

I never had a dream come true
Till that day that I found you
Even though I pretend that I've moved on
You'll always be my baby
I never found the words to say
You're the one I think about each day
And I know no matter where love takes me to
A part of me will always be with you

Somewhere in my memory I lost all sense of time
Amd tomorrow can never be
'Cause yesterday is all that fills my mind
There's no use looking back or wondering
How it should be now or neither been (or neither been)
Oh this I know but still I can't find ways to let you go

Chorus

You'll always be the dream that fills my head
(Yes you will, say you will, you know you will, baby)
You'll always be the one I know (I'll never forget)
There's no use looking back or wondering (or wondering)
Because love is a strange and funny thing
No matter how I try and try
I just can't say goodbye
No no no no

Chorus

A part of me will always be with you...

Pay day

2009-05-28T19:40:00.002+01:00

It is not uncommon that Burmese fellows working abroad grumble about how much they have to pay tax to both Myanmar government and the country where they live. Someone from Singapore claimed that he had to queue at Myanmar embassy for tax purpose since mid night. Weird!

It is true that Myanmar passport holders in Britain do not need to pay tax to Myanmar embassy in order to renew their passport. But every month, the PAYE (Pay As You Earn) tax taken from salary is too much for me. It is a sort of pain with the appearance of news about members of parliament (လႊတ္ေတာ္အမတ္ ) are using our tax payers' money for their luxury items and mortgage payments.

This is the income tax rate for 2009. If you earn more, you have to pay more.

Income Tax rates and taxable bands
	2008-09	2009-10
Starting rate for savings: 10%*	£0-£2,320	£0-£2,440
Basic rate: 20%	£0-£34,800	£0-£37,400
Higher rate: 40%	Over £34,800	Over £37,400

After tax, another deduction is NI ( national insurance ) contribution. I think it is about 11% of salary. According to the law, you can claim benefit if you are not capable of working or if you become jobless after an enough NI contribution. But I saw many people who are entitled to claim such benefits without working properly before. Fine, this is the democratic country with full of human rights.

Anyway, for this month, the total deduction from my salary is over £2000. I still don't know how much Burmese double tax payers across the world are paying tax. For me, this single tax makes me suffer enough. I have loads of bills to pay every month. So I have to work extra hours when I have a plan to go holiday nearby country. That is one of the reasons I can not visit Burma for many years. I still believe that some people, such as KOM , are still lucky wherever they work at burger shop or warehouse. They can go back home regularly, spending packs of currency notes. Really nice life style.

A small Tesco and me

2009-05-27T21:25:00.010+01:00

I am talking about Tesco branch in my place. I should not say this is a small Tesco. But it is rather small to me as in London, I normally go to Tesco Extra from where I bought foods as well as electric and electronic stuffs when I needed, instead of going other places.

In fact, the Tesco in my town is medium sized store . All foods I want are available there. So that is fine for me.

One thing I like most is an animal charity. Really appreciated. At the entrance, there are 2 boxes for pets.

I picked up cat and dog foods to my trolley while shopping and left in those boxes. Thanks for Tesco for this charity.

One thing you need to know!

2009-05-24T22:31:00.014+01:00

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Myanmar's surprise trial of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi has dashed already slim chances that President Barack Obama's administration would ease U.S. sanctions against the military government of the South-east Asian country. Source

A funny news to me. One thing you need to know..... The U.S and EU's economic sanction against Burma is not going to work, obviously. Some facts of Burma's real situation are as follows.

1. Burma never depends on the USA's economy in the history since it became independent. Burma is not Thailand. Not Philippines either.

2. The required technology and resources for Burma are available in Russia, China and possibly India. Yes, the US technology could be well advanced compared with its rivals. But for Burma, it looks Ok . Burma has a close ties with Russia.

3. For the time being, the US has been struggling for its own internal financial crisis. Its power could still reach beyond its boundary while there are also unfinished businesses with Iraq and Afghanistan . But it would be a tough time to do so.

4. If Burma is invaded by US and UK forces from south, China would capture northern part straight away. This could end up this country with a battle field, like Vietnam. There would be a likely confrontation between the allied forces and China in that situation.

Now we are in 2009. not in 1999. not in 1988. Do you think a policy will be right for 100 years?

Saturday Random Photos @ Town

2009-05-24T13:28:00.021+01:00

British summer is what we were looking forward to. Now it has already arrived. Blue sky and sunshine. Flowers everywhere. People look happy and enjoy walking outside. Yesterday, I went down to town centre where I looked around and took the random photos with my mobile for blogging.

This is a small town in south England. Town centre is not really crowded. People smile easily. They look relaxed. But it is not a cosmopolitan place. I rarely see Asians and Afro-Caribbeans at work and on the street. Almost all are white.

On the other hand, life in London is hectic and most people look grumpy. In East London, many people do not speak English at all. When I went home during the weekends, it was disappointing. Some people had no nice manner . They did not seem to care the environment where they lived. The most annoying thing to me was speaking unknown language loudly on the bus and tube.

Some shoppers

A street entertainer

Entertaining with music

Fishing rods. We dont kill fish. It is just a sort of sport.

Fishing accessories

Photo frames

A British father

Nuts

A young lady waiting for something

with a best friend

A mother

Enjoying dog walk at town

No idea why these teenagers lying down on the street.

Street show

A young girl participating

Locals

A group of friends

History of shoes

2009-05-17T22:04:00.012+01:00

Over the weekend, British weather in south England was great, apart from a few minutes of drizzling. I did not go out. In front of the computer for several hours, I logged in online course and did the practice as part of my preparation for a jump to the States. In fact, this is just my Plan B as everybody might have. I love Britain. But I should be ready if this country's situation deteriorates. Even now, £ has been going down against $ and €.

Sunday morning, I organised my shoes. Some were binned. Some were polished. Those shoes made me remember my recent years.

Todd Barnes shoes, used in 2005. It was a tough time as too many oversea doctors came in at the same time. One vacancy for over 200 applications. I had to go King George Hospital daily. Too many walking and running from 9 to 5. That time, I had another shoes which had already gone.

2007 Summer. I was in mid land. I bought this pair of shoes in Leicester. I think it was from Next. I used only when playing tennis.

I bought these shoes with nice lining inside in early 2007 for an interview. I did not make it. :(. Sine then, I rarely use it.

late 2008. I was in Norfolk, East of England. Very good working situation at Queen Elizabeth Hospital.

2008 Winter. I like these. From Ilford Mark & Spencer. Not lucky though. While wearing these shoes, I was caught over-speed in London Lime house tunnel. 3 points and £60.

My recent shoes. Clark shoes for ordinary people in Britain. I am one of them.

I started using above trainers during my holiday in Rome this year. Now very useful for my 3 times a week running.

Old currency notes and the value of a friendship

2009-05-15T21:26:00.011+01:00

While searching something in my computer, I came across this photo that I have already posted somewhere, maybe on this blog.

The Kyat 5 note was what I liked most when I was teens. My parents did not allow to eat out. That meant no pocket money provided when I was in the middle and high school. For me, not a big deal. I bought vitamin pills from the shops (New Bogyoke Market and Open market). And I resold at school class room, saying those pills were tonic, very good in £$%^&*...Too much demand. In a short time, I had to make Paracetamol and Burmeton available. Those days, selling medicines was absolutely legal for everybody in Burma and no license was required. I don't know about now. My profit did go to nearby small Chinese restaurant where I enjoyed garlic noodle with grilled pork.

My minute business did not stop in my secondary school. During my final year in the medical school, my father gave me some money to buy a car, after denying to buy a Sony Walkman two years earlier. The reason was that I had been using my girl friend's car all the time. He was not so comfortable for it.

But I never bought a car. Instead, I lent the money to others who were crazy with gambling . They were mainly from Rangoon university, Dental colleague and Medical colleague. Interest rate was 10% a month. It was a glorious time. I drove different and different kinds of cars as I took those temporarily for my money. Of course, I did not communicate with them directly as I was studying for my MB degree. I had some good friends. Their commission fee was 2% and I took only 8% interest for myself. Since then, I have already learnt the value of good friends and meaning of mutual interest.

A wish under the full moon

2009-05-11T13:05:00.018+01:00

Lonely night! Someone claimed "Lonely night at Burger King" :)

A genuine lonely? A fake lonely? A temporary lonely? A permanent lonely? One-off lonely? Persistent lonely???? These are queries which came to my mind.

After reading that blog post, I did also check the sky at midnight in London. Oh... nice! A full moon I have not noticed for such a long time. 謝謝 KOM.

I took above photo quickly, trying not to stare at this amazing yellow ball hanging in the starry sky. The reason.... I was told when I was young, if I gazed at the full moon, I might get "lunatic". I never believe it. But I was not too keen to check the moon since then.

According to the literature, there is a some association between moon and mental problem. Someone may know much more than me.

I did research myself for the time being. This is from wiki:

The word lunatic is borrowed from italian "lunacus", Italian which gains its stem from "luna" for moon, which denotes the traditional link made in folklore between madness and the phases of the moon. This probably refers to the symptoms of cyclic mood disorders such as bipolar disorder or cyclothymia, the symptoms of which may also go through phases. As yet there no evidence whatsoever for any causal link between phases of the moon and the progression of mood disorder symptoms. Correlation has been observed in distant parts.

Mental institutions used to be called "lunatic asylums" or colloquially, "loony bins".

It also mentions about Lunar Hypothesis as follows:

In a 1999 Journal of Affective Disorders article, a hypothesis was suggested indicating that the phase of the moon may in the past have had an effect on bipolar patients by providing light during nights which would otherwise have been dark...

What I understand is that people with underlying mental illness might get some problems because of a spot of light in the dark sky. I am still not sure yet.

Anyway, I made a wish under the full moon!
:) :) :)
:) :)
:)

Hello darlin'

2009-05-09T19:10:00.026+01:00

hello

this is sanyuaung, boyfriend of xxxxxx

what makes u think u can call my girl darling?

This is only today's most interesting one among the loads of facebook emails, Amazon transactions, KLM offer and some junk mails. A bit confusing. Someone claimed he is boyfriend of her. But what she said before was that she had a fiancé. Is this different person? Same person demoted from fiancé to boy friend?

This is the story. Lately, I got an online friend. She is a professional lady working somewhere in England. Normally, I don't communicate with too many people. She looked nice and decent to me. I treated her as a mature lady with respect and clear mind as she said she had a fiancé. Sometime we emailed. Yesterday, yes, it happened yesterday evening. I felt bored, maybe she too. We emailed to-and-fro, talking about films and eating. Here is part of our talk.

Me: btw, i am eating now with chicken , photo attached :)

She: ၾကြားလုိက္တာ..
စားျပီးၿပီ
ငါးရယ္၊ ခရန္းခ်ဥ္သီးခ်က္ရယ္
အီစကုိလဲ ဟင္းခ်က္တတ္ပါတယ္

Me: mine better. rice is special. cooked with butter, peas, cashew, one sugar

She: ၾကက္သားကင္တာ ေတာ္လုိက္တာ
ဘာအေရာင္မွ မထြက္ဘူး
(အဲ့ဒါ ရြဲ႕ေျပာတာေနာ္)

Me: har har. coloring is child play. what color do you like? yellow, red , orange, green., blue? I have everything

She: you put sugar in everything!
and i meant food colouring as in flavour..
sigh
you need a wife
you still cant cook properly after living abroad for so long
:P

Me: sorry darling. now finished, no more left 4u, see the tray. too much delicious and finished quickly coz very expert in this business, no wife required

the color is phone camera setting was on something else.

She: i'm not strike, don't call me darling :P

Me: darling is what i called tesco cashier old ladies. of course, you are not old enough.

We continued ........!£$%^&

If you read through above, you may notice I was boasting in funny way and we insulted softly each other. Nothing concern with romantic or no evidence of crossing the line at all. Yes, I called her as darling at one point. It did not mean I was saying she was my love or something similar. I tried to exaggerate my speed of eating as I finished 5 chicken wings in just over 10 mins :)

Well, regarding usage of darling, yes, most commonly it is used among the couples/ lovers.

I did check with Cambridge dictionary (Link is here)

Definition
darling
noun [C]
a person who is greatly loved or liked:

NOTE: This is used as a form of address between people who love each other and people who are being friendly. As a friendly form of address it is not usually used between men. (of course, I can't call strike darling, sorry strike :) )

What a coincidence. Today, I was at my fav fish and chip shop in east London. The waitress brought what I ordered, saying " Haddock darling"

Yes, in London, taxi drivers may say " do you want me to wait here, darling" . Tesco and Asda cashiers offer in their some stores " Do you need help packing, darling?" . At work, I would request to a nurse in polite way " Darling, could you do me a great favour?"

I think this is enough about "darling". I thought early today I would not have any issue to post on my blog. I have been lucky enough :)

By the way, enjoy Hello darl'

UK Burmese society

2009-05-07T14:54:00.012+01:00

My uncle arrived in the UK 40 years ago. Apparently, 90% of his class mates left Burma during U Ne Win's era. Most moved to the US. Some to Australia. Some came to the UK. At that time, Burmese doctors were able to work straight away in British hospitals. No need to sit exam. But later it changed. Burmese graduates after 1970s (I can't remember the exact year) need to take the GMC (General medical council) exam for registration, according to my father.

Obviously, the population of migrant Burmese doctors grew gradually during the last decades. But a sharp rise occurred during 1995 -2005. I thought once they finished medical school in Yangon, all of them fled to Heathrow airport desperately. London witnessed loads of oriental looking young graduates preparing exam and applying for jobs.

2006-2007 was the turning point for many oversea doctors. As a result of thousands of international migrant graduates, even native British graduates were unable to secure their jobs. (Britain employment system is based on human right, that is what I was told. Once short-listed, the interview panel only considers the candidate's skill and experience, nothing concern with race, religion, skin colour, nationality ) . The government has no power to change that employment law which is based on human right . So the immigration rules had to be changed. Consequently, those from Indian subcontinent and from Burma had to move to somewhere else, such as Australia and New Zealand. Now, many of my friends have been working in Queensland and New South Wales since then.

However, these days, we can still see at least 1 or 2 Burmese doctors working in NHS hospitals across the UK. In some infirmaries, up to 5 -6 people gather.

When we check on other groups of Burmese immigrants, again, thousands have been living, some settling in British isle. Lately I learnt on the blogs and facebook that young people celebrated Burmese new year and water festival in London. It was amazing. Last week, "Buddha's day" show was also held in west London Ealing area. I have never seen such a well organized Burmese occasion before. (some photos here)

I feel Burmese people are getting more organized these days compared with previous times. What happened before was that there were several groups , mainly based on the political point of view. Some people were reluctant to go to Buddhist monastery where the anti-government activists are dominant, with the thought that someone would be closet informer and might face a big problem when they go back to Burma.

Now the atmosphere looks relaxed. No need to worry too much. Apparently, Burmese government does not bother too much. Well, the new strategy of Naypyidaw authorities is that they pick up only leaders or outstanding activists, instead of random arrests. From the Burmese student's point of view, again, they do not need to care too much for some reason. There are some options to stay away from the control of Burmese generals. Forget about ordinary people. British government has been kind enough to grant son of former Burmese police general San Thein (ရဲခ်ဳပ္စံသိန္း) as political asylum a few years ago, according to my sources. Everybody knows San Thein was a high ranking military officer.

Of course, many students in west London seek asylum. One of the predisposing factors would be recent restriction of student visa extension. According to the home office website, the show money is around £7,000 per annum. As a blogger, if you check on the Burmese blogs, you can see anti- government slogans on some blogs . That means logically that the blog owner does not need to care about Burmese government. He/she could have been a British subject or could be a successful asylum seeker. I learnt a lot of such stories from my business parter who has been living in West London area.

Who said no good Burmese food in Britain

2009-05-05T18:56:00.005+01:00

I still remember someone from Woking was mourning in her living room, expressing her feeling how much she missed Burma, claiming that no good Burmese foods available in this country. Well it may be true if she kept staying in a limited small place. In fact, Woking is not such a small town. A rather crowded cosmopolitan place.

This evening, no grill, no oven bake at all. I cooked Burmese foods.

Rice ,with parsley and one tea spoonful of Flora: cooked in microwave. You know cooking time is 20 min in full power of 650 Watts. Rice and water ratio is 1:2. KOM said she use rice cooker what I never own one in Britain.

Pork, carrot and green beans with sage and onion: Mince pork and seasoning put on the hob. After 5 min, defrosted carrot and beans were added. mixed properly. 10-12 min later, OXO gravy powder with a hint of sage and onion was poured down after dissolving with a cup of water. After 6-7 min, ready to serve.

Vegetable variety fry: nothing special. Hot fry with soya sauce and oyster sauce. 5 min job in max gas mark.

Total cooking time for all above was around 22-24 min.

Who said Burmese foods not easily available in Britain?

Rice, Pork mince with a hint of sage and onion, veg variety fry

confused.com 2

2009-05-01T21:05:00.012+01:00

It was my early days in England. Her name was Rebecca. She was a nurse. A single mum with 2 kids, struggling her tough life. She took off-sick frequently. I overheard nursing stuffs talking about her " Becky's late again" "Becky doesn't not turn up again". I must admit, at first I confused if Becky was her nick name. How funny I am. Of course, Becky is short name of Rebecca, like some other names, such as Bob for Robert, Bill for William, Debbie for Deborah, Toni or Vicky for Victoria , Andy for Andrew and so on.

I think these are not really English language from Cambridge grammar or Oxford dictionary. I might a bit exaggerate if I say that being familiar with host country's tradition and culture is essential for someone from east working and living in English speaking society. But, at least such kind of knowledge will help your well-being in new society, making friendship with other people in harmony in a short time like Mae. Appreciate that.

In west London, I am really glad to see loads of Burmese speaking people. They are well organized. They shared in 2 or 3 bed houses. They have been clever enough how to sort out to remain in the UK legally. They are able to make extensive friendship within the Burmese community as if west London were part of Burma. It is really nice. According to my contacts living there, it is a well known fact that guys usually compete bitterly each other to win a relationship once a girl arrived from Yangon . I think it is multi factorial. One of the reasons would be patriotic, I suspect. :)

It can be said that friendship and relationship are linking each other at some point, but different in terms of nature of personal involvement. Chronologically, relationship is usually preceded by friendship in many models. Some start relationship in first instance. Some may take up to a decade. Well it is a complicated sociology topic what I never understand completely. But one interesting thing I came across on the Face book is some one from Myanmar has been advertising that she is in an open relationship. Oh Jesus! Burmese people have been in such a great time.

I know the meaning of open relationship before. Anyway I checked on the net.

An open relationship denotes a relationship (often between two people) in which the participants are free to have sexual intercourse with other partners. If the couple making this agreement are married, it is an open marriage.(Wiki)

a facebook setting that allows you to give in to your sluttastic urges while keeping a "saftey net" around in the event that you're unable to hook up with anything hotter. (Urban dictionary definition 3)

I really confuse what is going on among Burmese facebookers. Recently, a chap has been declaring himself that he is interested in both men and women . I think I am not stupid enough to announce on the world class social network if I were really interested in guys :)

confused.com

2009-04-26T12:24:00.010+01:00

If you read my previous post, you may be aware of what is going on in my brain. muddled... confused...but I am not stopping surfing web.

As a result, I made an inappropriate comment 0n Facebook. I apologised.

A telly fan

2009-04-25T18:29:00.008+01:00

During the last week, I had been under pressure for more than a couple of reasons. As a consequence, I lost my appetite. Not eating very well. Roast duck?, no way. My favourite energetic Raps and sensible R&Bs no longer accepted by my stupid ears. Woke up at the middle of the night with night mares. Poor concentration during the day time. Too much tired. I could not hear what they said. I had to use "sorry" "pardon" repeatedly at work as my mind was orbiting earth. Again, at home, I could not sit at one place. While sitting in the living room, I wanted to chat with someone. While chatting with drunken blogger, like Pauk ( I believe she drunk 2 consecutive days and was singing songs badly at blogger cheif's CBox) , I wanted to read medical journal. After 5 min of reading, I wanted to watch telly again. After 5 min of getting annoyed with boring news on BBC 24, I wanted to go out and buy something which was not really required.

On the other hand, my cat was different. He was able to enjoy his favourite adventurer program with full of concentration. Sometime, cat's life is much better than human being in term of quality of life, I think.

Pink shirts and me

2009-04-20T18:14:00.014+01:00

"Wearing pink brings the king luck. I don't want him to be sick" Rose Tarin, civil servant. BBC

It happened in Thailand. In 2007, King wore pink jacket (coat: in American English) as royal astrologers recommended it is good for his health. As a result, there had been a sharp rise of pink shirt sale those days in Thailand. I came across this old news while googling something on the Internet.

I did not know if there is any royal connection of pink colour in Britain. What I know is Royal purple.

When I was young, I used to adore green. But since I arrived in the UK, that has been the only colour what I don't like. I sent any clothes with green to charity or binned. I believe I don't like any particular colour. But when I checked my wardrobe today, I found out these pink shirts among others. To be honest, I was not aware what is going on in my so-called collection. I just learnt myself this evening. For some reason, each pink shirt has their lovely story. :)

2005

2007

2008

2008

Susan Boyle

2009-04-19T09:37:00.005+01:00

I must admit sometime I don't know what is going on in Britain and around the world. Last night, I was not able to sleep until early hours of morning. So I quickly checked emails. Saund was still online, saying she was watching Susan Boyle's song on youtube and sharing a link.

I did a quick research about Susan Boyle on Google. Here are some results.

Talent show singer is online hit
A 47-year-old church volunteer from West Lothian has become an unlikely overnight singing sensation with millions watching her perform online.The story of the unemployed church volunteer has made headlines around the world, and she has featured on major news programmes in the US.Full story

How Susan Boyle won over the world
Her face appears on the front pages of papers in Britain and beyond, she been offered a seat on Oprah's sofa and has been told she is as good as guaranteed a worldwide number one album. Full story

Susan Boyle: a dream come true
Her appearance on ITV1's reality show Britain's Got Talent lasted just a few minutes, but that was long enough to propel 47-year-old amateur singer Susan Boyle to instant global fame. From Japan to Denmark to the US, the clip of the Scottish charity worker's spine-tingling performance of I Dreamed a Dream from the musical Les Misérables last Saturday night has electrified viewers. Full story

Susan Boyle debut song uncovered
Actress Demi Moore said she was reduced to tears by the performance after watching it with husband Ashton Kutcher.Full story

Enjoy her video clip on YouTube here

No alcohol, moderate alcohol and excess alcohol

2009-04-18T14:30:00.013+01:00

We can say alcohol (also called ETOH at work) is the most easily available recreational drug or agent. Many patients are smart as they know what they are doing very well. During the medical interview last week, I asked my patient as routine "Do you like lager or wine? How much do you drink?, he answered " No too much, Doctor, only 10 -12 units a week, only weekend really!" . ( Gosh.. much less than my limit). Of course, this is in England. Most people have been familiar with alcohol units and recommendations. The UK authorities suggest that the tolerable maximum weekly consumption of alcohol for men is 21 units, and for women 14 units. Beer cans and all liquor bottles show up the formation of alcohol units as a legal requirement.

Obviously, we know very well alcohol excess is strongly associated with a wide spectrum of problems, from health issues to social consequences. If so, can we say it is safe enough to take a drink in moderation, that is, 21 units/week for men and 14 units/week for women?

According to cancer research UK, drinking 1-2 units a day can increase the risk of the seven cancers linked to alcohol.(Full story). I believe this is a reliable research report. What would be the next? Should we give up our drinking habit at the expense of our recreation?

At the same time, I am thinking myself why I want to live long. For what? For my patients? For my family? For human beings? For animals? I was so surprised to see a 81 year old man at work who kept asking me why he had osteoarthritis (joint pain), why he was not able to walk like others. Maybe he was demented. But at least he was not aware basically that it is inevitable for everybody to face the deterioration phase, like an old car, before going to heaven or hell, provided that the mode of death is not a sudden death.

Well, what I am trying to say is that so long as we know what we are doing, it is fair enough. No alcohol or moderate alcohol or excess alcohol, what ever it is. We still don't know what our mode of death would be yet :)

Here is the alcohol unit calculator. Really handy. You can know what you are doing easily.

Go organic?

2009-04-16T19:43:00.018+01:00

Over a decade ago, going holiday to an exotic place like Barbado was a sought-after status symbol. But, nowadays, our life style has changed a bit. Going holiday is a part of our normal yearly plan. At work, there are many occasions when patients requested to rearrange their follow-up appointment as their holiday was on that date. Of course, we have been practising patient-cantered approach.

In Britain, buying organic foods is for a group of people's preference. They may have their own reason why they go organic. In fact, I have been a partial organic member. My fridge has normally got organic semi skinned milk, organic eggs and chicken with the reason that they are tastier than regular ones. I must say I thought until this evening that organic stuffs mean only for foods. But after shopping at nearby town centre, I learnt that clothes are also available as "organic"

This casual shirt is what I purchased from Debenham's designer's section today. It is Rocha- John Rocha. It is claimed 100% organic cotton shirt. After organic foods, now organic shirt! What would be next? organic computer or organic auto mobile? I bought it as it looked nice , not because of being organic. I must say I have to learn more about the meaning of organic and its benefits.

Modern Burma? welcome!

2009-04-15T16:15:00.018+01:00

It is reassuring that Burmese people inside and outside the country have been increasingly becoming open minded with the fading of Ne Win's influence, getting more familiar with western culture, despite the fact that the US and EU countries keep claiming there is no human right in that ASEAN nation. I know that there is a tough restriction of speech and activities, and the state controlled puppet judges give the Guinness recordable long prison sentences to the political opponents.

On the other hand, I believe that Burmese society has been updating itself, going westernisation gradually. During this Burmese new year season, there are loads of ordinary Myanmar nationals going holidays abroad, which was a sought-after opportunity only for high ranking officers in 1980s. It is nothing new to say. We can learn easily those changes from the people came back from Burma and on the Internet. Moreover, a sharp rise of blogging and using community net woks means we can check the recent development of the society easily although it would not cover the whole Burmese people.

The situation I like most is people have got more opportunity to write what they think, what they believe and what they experience on their blogs and social networks. This made, in turn, them more and more frank and open-minded while learning what is going on in the world. I noticed that some Myanmar girls are happy to show off their pics with short skirt and tight jeans on the net which was unacceptable manner in last 10 years of this ancient community. ( I know this is the happy time for comment guru like Strike :) .. )

Of course, we don't have a negative impact on them in this era when even gay marriage has been recognising in some parts of the world . It should be a part of the human right issue, isn't it? The more interesting development is even some Myanmar men have also been revealing their interest and desire on the net. We can not criticise someone else's personal choice, can we? But I must say bisexuality is too much for a Burmese, I believe.

As her video clip was posted on KMO's blog lately, I had a chance to watch her singing and dancing style. I must say this girl with Afro-Caribbean hair style, had a great effort in her performance but unfortunately not so artistic. In fact she is popular among Burmese audience.

Orientalised East London

2009-04-14T20:37:00.037+01:00

10 years back, we needed to go to Greenwich or central London if we wanted oriental foods. I remember there was also a Thai grocery shop in Earls Court which is far away from East London. Around 2005, I found out another shop in Walthomstow market street. I think it was a Thai shop, but most oriental foods were available from a variety of vermicelli, glutinous flour to bamboo shoot, dumpling and Vietnamese chilli sauce. Next, I came across a small Thai shop in Stratford shopping mall, but it closed after sometime.

During the last a couple of years, at nearby Tesco Extra in Gallion Reach, Chinese and Thai foods have been on the separate shelves. I saw some ready-made noodles and sauces. In the vegetable and salad row, more kinds of bird eyes chillies (hot+, ++,+++,++++) are waiting for their customers . One great improvement is I can get ung choi. (ကန္ဇြန္းရြက္)

As you know London is a cosmopolitan city and several kinds of foods are available, such as Mediterranean, Latin, Arabic, Indian, Bangladeshi and so on. Well, Chinese take-away shops are every where. But when we need Burmese style foods, we have to depend on Chinese and Indian shops. It is not bad, I think. In Upton park, even baby mango appears in its season. We can also get catfish (ငါးခူ), labelled with produce of Myanmar, and banana tree (they called it like that), at Bangladeshi shop. These are important ingredients when we make traditional fish soup while some people use handy canned fish.

Lamb curry, Ung Choi and mushroom and vegetable variety

Jurassic coast

2009-04-13T09:42:00.032+01:00

The 95 mile-long Jurassic coast is the world heritage place in southern England. It is very beautiful and interesting coastal area running from Devon to Dorset county. Cliffs, Arch and cove, formed by limestones, have been attracting over one million of visitors every year. I am one of them. Yesterday, I went to Lyme Regis and Lulworth cove.

Yesterday's my road trip. A: Lyme Regis, B: Lulworth cove, C: Home, London docklands.
A to C: just over 160 miles, Not too bad. (Singapore-Kuala Lumpur 219 miles)

Lyme Regis:
Yesterday, loads of Easter holiday visitors. Parking places with full of cars. So I had to leave my car 1 miles away from the beach.

Holiday makers

Sailing in Lyme Regis

Can you see me?

Life boat is stand-by to rescue me. No worry. A kid donating some money.

Lulworth Cove:
From Lyme Regis, we drove to Lulworth cove, where we went hill climbing so that we could enjoy the spectacular view of cove and around.

The cove and cars, the view from half way to the hill.

before reaching at the top of the hill.

I was on the top of the hill

Going down now. I was on the similar hill you can see. Interestingly, those 2 hills are human breast shaped

Reorganised above photo in chronological order @ 19:00 GMT 13/4/2008

Here are photos I took

Lyme Regis

Lulworth Cove

*******************************************

Cat dinner and my dinner

2009-04-13T00:11:00.010+01:00

This is my fav cat. I leant that he had no gravy or jelly. only biscuits left. I know I need to buy some.

After eating dry ones, he was drinking some water.

For me, I don't need to drink water too much. I drank a pint of lager. Then, I enjoyed Indian style variety vegetables hot and spicy soup, together with chicken curry.
I needed 3 bowls of this soup during my this Easter holiday dinner. You may know ingredients, nothing special. Aubergine, potato, coriander, pea, cauliflowers, lady fingers, turmeric , Indian seasonings and usual stuffs. Fantastic. Elaine also tried.

Casablanca

2009-04-11T11:54:00.009+01:00

I would say today is a lucky day. Such a long time, I have been looking for this song on the internet what I did enjoy a lot when I was young. You may have watched the classic film Casablanca. In this 1942 black and white movie, the song was not this one, but also good. The Casablanca song was also based on the film. I still remember the phrasal verb "go by" was learnt from this song. :)

Casablanca: by Bertie Higgins

I fell in love with you watching Casablanca
Back row of the drive in show in the flickering light
Popcorn and cokes beneath the stars became champagne and caviar
Making love on a long hot summers night

I thought you fell in love with me watching Casablance
Holding hands `neath the paddle fans in Rick`s Candle lit cafe
Hiding in the shadows from the spies. Moroccan moonlight in your eyes
Making magic at the movies in my old chevrolet

Oh! A kiss is still a kiss in Casablanca
But a kiss is not a kiss without your sigh
Please come back to me in Casablanca
I love you more and more each day as time goes by

I guess there`re many broken hearts in Casablanca
You know I`ve never really been there. so, I don`t know
I guess our love story will never be seen on the big wide silver screen
But it hurt just as bad when I had to watch you go

Oh! A kiss is still a kiss in Casablanca
But a kiss is not a kiss without your sigh
Please come back to me in Casablanca
I love you more and more each day as time goes by
Oh! A kiss is still a kiss in Casablanca
But a kiss is not a kiss without your sigh

Please come back to me in Casablanca
I love you more and more each day as time goes by
I love you more and more each day as time goes by

Steve's roast duck

2009-04-10T20:07:00.002+01:00

Today, good Friday. I have no on-call. That means staying at home, reading books and trying to eat something special. A few days ago, I got a whole duck with discount from Sainsbury. This is the good time to roast it.

It came out of oven after over 2 hours.

Ready to serve. Someone will come to my place this evening. I have got some marinades. Unfortunately, no big knife to chop it.

Tea time

2009-04-10T17:08:00.003+01:00

This is my tea time snack for this evening. Not normally eating around 5-6 PM. But today, I missed my lunch. So I had to grab something.

Crisps and dips

Red : Salsa (Mainly onion and tomato purée and chillies)
White: soured cream and chive
Green: Avocado purée
Cream: Nacho cheese

Updated: 17:36

This is some info of British tea time from wiki

Afternoon tea

Afternoon tea is a light meal typically eaten between 3pm and 5pm. It originated in the United Kingdom, though various places that used to be part of the former British Empire also have such a meal. However, changes in social customs and working hours mean that most Britons only take afternoon tea on special/formal occasions.

Traditionally, loose tea would be served in a teapot with milk and sugar. This would be accompanied by various sandwiches (customarily cucumber, egg and cress, fish paste, ham, and smoked salmon), scones (with butter, clotted cream and jam — see cream tea) and usually cakes and pastries (such as Battenberg, fruit cake or Victoria sponge). The food would be often served in a tiered stand.

While afternoon tea used to be an everyday event, nowadays it is more likely to be taken as a treat in a hotel, café, or tea shop, although many Britons still have a cup of tea and slice of cake or chocolate at teatime. Accordingly, many hotels now market a champagne cream tea.

Anna Maria Stanhope, Duchess of Bedford, is credited as the first person to have afternoon tea in England.

High tea

High tea (also known as meat tea) is an early evening meal, typically eaten between 5pm and 6pm in the evening. It would be eaten as a substitute for both afternoon tea and the evening meal. It is now largely replaced by a later evening meal.

It would usually consist of cold meats, eggs or fish, cakes and sandwiches. In a family, it tends to be less formal and is an informal snack (featuring sandwiches, biscuits, pastry, fruit and the like) or else it is the main evening meal.

On farms or other working class environments, "high tea" would be the traditional, substantial meal eaten by the workers immediately after nightfall, and would combine afternoon tea with the main evening meal. See also The UK Tea Council Definition.

In recent years, high tea has become a term for elaborate afternoon tea, though this is American usage and mainly unrecognised in Britain. Such usage is disfavored by etiquette advisors, such as Miss Manners

A mistake

2009-04-09T22:29:00.010+01:00

Lately I drunk. And I browsed websites. I came across cheap monitors on ebuyer.com. I confused monitor and TV. At home, my 37 TV consumes 100 Watts. So thinking to buy a small flat TV for news. By mistake, I added this monitor to shopping basket. After a couple of more clicks, emails came in, telling me that I had successfully purchased and the item would be dispatched in 24 hours. Today I received it.

I am testing my monitor. Useless

Wondering if someone can tell me how I can watch Tv on the monitor in the cheapest way. I have got a free view receiver which has got scart connection. This monitor has only VGA port. I found scart-VGA connector on ebays and Amazon. Dont know it is working or not.

Individual variation

2009-04-06T20:19:00.005+01:00

This is from a forwarded email.

Fwd: ဗမာ့ တန္ဖိုး "ရင္ကို ကိုင္လႈပ္ေသာ ကဗ်ာေတြထဲက တစ္ပုဒ္ပါ။"ကဗ်ာ ဆရာ ေကာင္းကင္ကို ရဲ႕ ကၽြန္ ကဗ်ာေလးကုိလည္း ဖတ္သြားေစခ်င္ပါသည္။
ရင္ကို ကိုင္လႈပ္ေသာ ကဗ်ာေတြထဲက တစ္ပုဒ္ပါ။

ကၽြန္
ေရွးေရွးတုန္းကေတာ့
နယ္ခ်ဲ ့ေတြက ကၽြန္ျပဳဖို ့ကၽြန္ေတာ္တို ့ဆီကိုလာတယ္။
ဒီဘက္ေခတ္မွာေတာ့
ကၽြန္ခံဖို ့ကၽြန္ေတာ္တို ့ကိုယ္တိုင္ ခရီးထြက္ရတယ္။
လူျဖစ္ေပမယ့္ ေရြးခ်ယ္ခြင့္က မရွိခဲ့ဘူး အေမရယ္။
ကၽြန္ေတာ့္ အျဖစ္က
အိပ္မက္ထဲက ကမၻာကို
ကၽြန္ရြာမွာမွ သြားရွာမိတဲ့ အျဖစ္။
ေသရင္ ေျမၾကီးဆိုတာကေတာ့ မွန္ပါတယ္။
ရွင္ရင္ေတာ့ မစို ့မပို ့ေငြေလးက ကၽြန္ေတာ္တို ့အတြက္ေရႊထီးေပါ့။
တရြာေျပာင္းေပမယ့္ သူေကာင္းေတာ့ မျဖစ္ခဲ့ပါဘူး။
ကၽြန္ပဲျဖစ္ခဲ့တယ္။
ေၾကာက္ရင္လြဲ ရဲရင္မင္းျဖစ္သတဲ့။
ကၽြန္ေတာ္… အေမနဲ ့ညီမေလးေတြအတြက္ ရဲခဲ့ပါတယ္။
ကၽြန္ပဲ ျဖစ္ေနေသးတယ္ အေမ။
ကၽြန္ေတာ့္ရဲ ့ ရဲရင့္မွဳေတြကပဲ ေနရာလြဲခဲ့လို ့လား။
ကိုယ့္အခြင့္အေရးကို သိဖို ့ေနေနသာသာ
တစ္ခ်ိဳ ့သူငယ္ခ်င္းေတြဆို ကိုယ့္ အသက္ဘယ္ေလာက္ရွိမွန္းေတာင္ မသိရွာဘူး။
တခ်ိဳ ့ကေလးေတြဆို ျမန္မာ နာမည္ေတာင္ မရွိရွာဘူး။
ေဘာ(့စ္) ဆိုသူေတြ ေပးတဲ့နာမည္ေတြ ပဲ ရွိၾကတယ္။
အေမေျပာေတာ့ အလုပ္လုပ္ရင္ ၾကီးပါြးမယ္ဆို။
အလုပ္လုပ္ေလ ပိုခို္င္းေလေလပဲ အေမ။
ကၽြန္ျဖစ္ေလေလပဲ အေမရဲ ့။
လူအခ်င္းခ်င္းဆိုတဲ့ အသိသူတို ့မွာ မရွိဘူး အေမ။
ေသြးစုပ္ဖုိ ့ပဲ သူတို ့သိတယ္။
အေမရယ္ကၽြန္ေတာ္လည္း အစကေတာ့
ခ်စ္သူရဲ ့မ်က္ႏွာသုတ္ပုဝါေလာက္ ျဖစ္ဖို ့မွန္းျပီးထြက္ခဲ့တာေပါ့။
အခု ျဖစ္လာတာက အားလံုးရဲ ့ေျခသုတ္ပုဆိုး
မရွိေသးတဲ့ အစြယ္ေတာင္ က်ိဳးခဲ့ျပီ္။
ခုေတာ့ကၽြန္ေတာ့္ အသည္းႏွလံုးကလည္း
ကၽြန္အခ်င္းခ်င္ေတာင္ ျပန္မစုပ္ခ်င္တဲ့
သရက္ေစ့ တစ္ေစ့ေပါ့။
ကိုယ့္ကိုယ္ကို ကၽြန္လို ့သံုးလို ့မငိုလိုက္ပါနဲ ့အေမရယ္။
သူတို ့ေဒါသေလးတစ္ခ်က္ထြက္ရံုနဲ ့
ရာဘာခင္းထဲ ရက္ရက္စက္စက္ အသတ္ခံရႏုိင္တာဆိုေတာ့
ကၽြန္ေတာ္တို ့အသက္တစ္ေခ်ာင္းက
ရာဘာပင္ တစ္ပင္ေလာက္ေတာင္တန္ဖိုးမရွိဘူး

အေမ။
သူတို ့အခ်စ္ေတာ္ ေၾကာင္တစ္ေကာင္ေလာက္ေတာင္ တန္ဖိုး မရွိဘူး။
ဒါကို ကိုယ့္ကိုယ္ကို သခင္လို ့မ်က္လံုးစံုမိွတ္ျပီး ေၾကြးေက်ာ္ေနရမွာလား။
အနာရွိတာကို လက္ခံမွ ေဆးထည့္လုိ ့ရမွာေပါ့ အေမ။
လူေတြ ေျပာေတာ့ျမန္မာ အခ်င္းခ်င္း ရိုင္းပင္းတယ္ဆို။
ေကာင္းတဲ့သူေတြ လည္း အမ်ားၾကီး ရွိပါတယ္။
တခ်ိဳ ့ကေတာ့ ေတာ္ေတာ့္ကိုဆိုးတယ္။
ကၽြန္ေတာ္တို ့ေရႊလို ့့ျခံဳငံုေခၚေနတဲ့အထဲက တစ္ခ်ိဳ ့ကပဲ
အခ်င္းခ်င္း ေရာင္းစားေနၾကတာ အေမ။
တိုင္းျပည္မီးေလာင္လို ့အခ်င္းခ်င္းခ်နင္းရက္တာလား။
ဘာပဲျဖစ္ျဖစ္ သူတို ့လူစိတ္မရွိတာ ကေတာ့ေသခ်ာပါတယ္။
ေရႊဆိုတဲ့ စကားလံုးကအကုန္လံုးနဲ ့ေတာ့မတန္ဘူး အေမ။
သူတို ့ကို ေရႊစာရင္းထဲက ကၽြန္ေတာ္ထုတ္တယ္။
ဟိုတေလာက စာအုပ္ထဲမွာ ဖတ္လိုက္ရတယ္အေမ။
လင္ကြန္းဆိုတဲ့ သူက ကၽြန္စနစ္ ပေပ်ာက္ေအာင္လုပ္ေပးခဲ့သတဲ့။
ဘယ္မွာ ဟုတ္လို ့လဲ အေမရယ္။
သားတို ့ကိုလာၾကည့္စမ္းပါ။
သူလုပ္ႏိုင္ခဲ့တာ သူ ့ႏိုင္ငံကြက္ကြက္ေလးပဲ
သူ ့ကိုေလးစားေပမယ့္ကၽြန္ေတာ္တို ့အတြက္ေတာ့ သူက
သမိုင္းတင္ေလာက္ေအာင္ မစြမ္းေသးပါဘူးအေမရယ္။
လူ ့အျဖစ္က ရခဲတယ္ဆို။
ရခဲ တာပဲ ေကာင္းပါတယ္ အေမ။
ကၽြန္ေတာ္ လူမျဖစ္ခ်င္ေတာ့ဘူး။
ကၽြန္္္္္္ေတာ္ ငွက္ေတြကို ေငးၾကည့္မိတယ္ အေမ။
ငွက္အခ်င္းခ်င္း အမ်ိဳးအႏြယ္မတူလို ့ရက္စက္ၾကတာမရွိဘူးအေမ။
ငွက္ေတြမွာ ျပည္တြင္းစစ္မရွိဘူး။
ငွက္ေတြမွာ ဘာသာေရး အဓိကရုဏ္းေတြ မရွိဘူး။
ငွက္ေတြမွာ ကိုယ့္အသိုက္အျမံဳကို ဗိုလ္က်ျပီး အတင္းေရႊ ့ခုိင္းတာမ်ိဳး မရွိဘူး။
ငွက္ေတြ ကံဆိုးမိုးေမွာင္က်ျပီး ေလွာင္အိမ္ထဲမွာ ေနရရင္ေတာင္
သူတို ့သခင္က သူတို ့ကို အခ်စ္နဲ ့ေလွာင္ထားတာ။
ကၽြန္ေတာ္တို ့ကေတာ့ အမုန္းနဲ ့ေလွာင္ထားျခင္းခံရတယ္။
ေမတၱာ အရမ္းငတ္တယ္ အေမရယ္။
ကမၻာ ့ေခါင္းေဆာင္ေတြကလည္း
ကၽြန္ေတာ္တို ့ငိုသံေတြ ဘယ္ေလာက္က်ယ္က်ယ္
အမ်ိဳးသား အက်ိဳးစီးပါြးဆိုတဲ့ စကားလံုးေအာက္မွာ
နားမၾကားၾကဘူး ထင္ပါရဲ ့။
လူ ့အခြင့္အေရးဆိုတဲ့ ပန္းဟာ
ဖိႏွိပ္သူေတြရဲ ့ႏွဳတ္ခမ္းမွာ မပြင့္ဘူး အေမ။
ကၽြန္စနစ္ဟာ
စာရြက္ေပၚမွာေတာင္မွ
မပေပ်ာက္ေသးပါဘူး အေမရယ္။

(ေကာင္းကင္ကို)

Steve was born in Burma. Graduated in Burma. I did not come here for that purpose. My seniors are not Burmese. My juniors are British. Did I come here as a slave? :) . A slave has the right to go anywhere he wants during a holiday? A slave has the right to run a company? A slave has the right to buy properties? A slave has the right to own a BMW? Well, if you are weak enough, you have to serve me, regardless of your ethnicity and nationality. If I am weak, I will serve you. Simple, isn't it? don't blame any body. You create your life. You create your fortune.

Well, if you still want to stay as a slave, it's up to you, mate! No need to compose a poem.

My shopping basket

2009-04-06T19:46:00.009+01:00

Yes, I know today is Monday. I should have bought my foods during the last weekend. But for some reason, I forgot every thing. I had to rush to nearby Tesco which is a medium sized branch. Saving money means less ready-made.

Living in Britain is to enjoy foreign produces. You can see it. Banana from Columbia, Cucumber from Holland, Lettuce from Spain. Wine from Italy, Knoor sauce from Holland again. I don't know about pork and chicken, maybe produced in Britain. British beef is famous., well here in Britain.

Sorry, I did not intend this post for UK residents as we already know our daily life very well.

My last dinner?

2009-04-05T16:43:00.005+01:00

Some people die easily. While driving, while walking, while playing. Some suffered a lot before they go. Some were not. After seeing several dying people and certifying death bodies, sometime I think about myself what my mode of death would be. Tragic accident on motorway after seeing Elaine? Plane crash after enjoying in Amsterdam? Murdered by a Singapore blogger? Liver failure due to too much Vodka after someone dumped me? Very difficult to tell for the time being. But now I am still alive and going to enjoy my dinner, which is rice and turkey curry. Unfortunately, no veg today.

Chill-out

2009-04-04T15:14:00.006+01:00

Today, nothing special to write. Reading a novel.

(Singapore blogger premier KOM style post)

Updated @16:09 GMT

about 45 min after above photo, I have got pork chop ready

Updated @17:58

Some time later

One night trip

2009-04-02T19:02:00.018+01:00

It was one night trip. Yesterday, I drove to Sheffield to see my friends. Sheffield is just over 260 miles away from my place according to navigator. More or less the same on Google map. But it took up to 5 hours 30 minutes to get there because of loads of road works on M1 motor way and nasty traffics.

I just get back now after stopping at several service stations. So total time was nearly 7 hours. Like driving in Burma. It was when I was 24. I drove (our driver was sitting next to me) from Yangon to Mandalay. I think distance was about 400 miles. I left Yangon at about 0430. I saw Mandalay airport at about 5PM. It was my best ever record . But I found out that the coconut oil tank put in the boot had already broken.

A is Sheffield. B is my work place.

Travel Lodge: £43 per night for single. (extra £10 if double) B/f and parking fee excluded. But fair enough as it is only max 10 min walk from Sheffield central. Night life was nice.

in city centre

A tram

Imitating KOM

2009-04-02T18:43:00.004+01:00

Imitating KOM
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