First week of class

Things that I've learned after my first week of class:

• They weren't kidding when they told us that it's gonna be different compared to our undergraduate years.
• Need to get the hang of programming (Matlab).
• Assignments = Deadlines.
• Not so much locals in our course. In fact they are considered the minority (in numbers).

So here I go. My postgrad year has officially begun. I hope it will go smoothly. Insya-Allah. Amin.

Cheshire Oaks

Continued on my driving adventures today and went to the infamous Cheshire Oaks in Chester. Have heard a lot about this place but never been there until today. To the average Bruneian (read: handal shopping!), this is pure retail heaven. Lots of stores having on average 30% off and even more. The tagline is "Welcome to the World of Guilt-Free Shopping" Heheh. Good one. This includes famous labels.... Nike, Adidas, Puma, Gap, Calvin Klein, Bose, M&S, etc, etc....

It's what a colleague of mine would say..... "Syiok Ehh!!!". (hope this expression is not trademarked).
I think it's a must-visit for those UK bound.

UK driving

recently rented a car and had a chance to re-experience driving in the uk. quite different indeed compared to home. there's hardly any potholes to worry and labels and signs are everywhere. so, kalau kan tabak2 saja, the chance to find your destination is quite good. after spending about a week exploring manchester by foot, it was a nice change to go by car. no need to wait for buses!

i was also impressed with the uk maps system. you can go online, set your starting point and your destination, then you're off. directions are given. easy indeed. (having said that, i can't seem to find that princess road on the way back?....weird...)

anyway, here are some pics from trafford centre:

liverpool trip

spent the day today to help my cousin and his friends settle-in in liverpool. can't exactly remember the last time i was there. must've been ages ago. size-wise, i think manchester is much bigger (and better, but let's not pass judgement heheh). it's about the size of leeds i think. it seems that these days my yardstick has always been leeds. it's sort of like home to me already :-)

anyway some random shots of liverpool:

hummer H2 LIMO anyone?



view from a 3rd floor student accomodation

ramadhan mubarak

it was the 2nd day of puasa here in manchester where the initial test to the system has slowly subsided. imagine, kalau lapar boleh makan while going thru the motions of living in a new city. masa first day puasa atu, terduga jua iman. and the clincher? sungkai around 730 pm. a real test for me. alhamdulillah, managed to pass.

my cousin arrived here with some friends and his parents (my uncle and aunt) were here the next day. iatah siok sudah sungkai on the 2nd day. imagine having "lontong" here in manchester. noyce!

ramadhan mubarak to all. may we increase our piety to Allah. semoga semua amalan di terima Allah. Amin.

ps- i'm gonna have to start telling some ppl about this site... krg nada org membaca. heheh

shopping frenzy

during the next few days after arriving in manchester, i went on a shopping frenzy with my housemate. he has been here for a while now and showed me all shopping hotspots. admittedly, being a shopaholic, this really got me excited. sort of forgotten how good the retail experience was in the uk. everytime we went out, there's always a number of big shopping bags to take back home. kerrayyzyyy man. have to remind myself at times that i'm not here on holiday!

anyway, the city centre has been revamped since i last visited. it got bigger with lots of retail space. primark has officially gotten the title of my favourite store (so far). can't believe the prices.

trafford centre is huge! sangal jua bejalan from end to end.

for those manchester-bound visitors, bring pounds, lots of pounds!

some shots:

they had a mini london-eye (manchester eye?) right in the city centre!



btw, guess what this is?

the first entry

having been in manchester for 6 days, i thought it would be a good idea to blog about my (mis)adventures while i am here. for my first entry, i thought i would share about my warm welcome in heathrow airport. a bit of backgound first. i have not been in the uk as a student for about 10 years, which is a long time. such a long time that my memory banks are storing all the cerita "antik" from the late 90's. more about that later.

anyway, when i arrived in heathrow, there were a lot of security checks in place which made the queues to be extra painful. altogether it took me 3 hours from the moment i arrived till i had to change terminals, go through the first security checks (wtih shoes off) and uk border control until i arrived at the gate for my connecting flight.

during the queue at the uk border control, a burly american man was standing impatiently behind me. looking at the line barely moving, he gave 2 loud wheezes to indicate his disapproval. he started complaining to a kiwi (no, not the fruit) behind him. i learned that he had a flight to catch in about half an hour.

suddenly, out of nowhere he shouted "MOVE IT!" to the direction of the immigration officers. everyone in the queue were shocked to hear this. suddenly an officer came and asked who shouted. for a moment, i was afraid that the yankee would point at me! was relieved to see that he put his hand up and the officer told off this american guy in front of everyone. "you're a guest in this country! you have no right to say that!". sober sober.... the yank kept his mouth shut after that.
anyway, when we eventually got to the front, the yank was told "you're not going anywhere!", which in the end he had to apologise for his behaviour to the officers. kesian eh. not sure whether he made his flight on time.

what a nice uk greeting. welcome to the uk. let the posts begin...