March 27th, 2013 by Karmun

Good day, beautiful people! I’m here to bring you guys some mid-week cuteness! Hehehe.

So as some of you may already know, I’m back in Penang! For those of you didn’t, well now you know! =D

It’s only for a few days so I didn’t bother mentioning it to many people. But that’s not the purpose of this post.

One of the few things I’ve been most looking forward to upon coming home is playing with my puppy again! It’s been a very difficult month, being away and parted for so long from the little guy. Yes, it is true, and I can confirm it now — it is possible to become impossibly attached to your furkid!

I always thought people who start missing their dogs when they go away for a bit completely mad; it’s only a dog, you know? Looks like I’ve turned into one of them without even realising it.

Hello, Mojo!

He’s still as cute as ever! You’d think he’s not seen me for at least a year or something, from the way he keeps jumping all over the place. Dogs are the cutest things in the world. I don’t know anybody else who always looks so incredibly happy to see me!

Needless to say, our days here have just been all tied up around this little baby of the house. We do nothing but play with him all day hahaha.

Just seeing him be his usual doggy self makes me so incredibly happy =D

We took him for a walk just earlier today and got a couple of pretty adorable shots. I’m telling you, that dog makes taking a simple walk seem like the most luxurious thing in the world. I’ve never seen anyone so happy at the prospect of something so common. If only he’d stop rushing up to me the moment he sees me with my camera and try to lick everything lol!

Because he’s so small, he never fails to make any passerby double take and smile a little at his size. Even I’m still not used to how small he is sometimes — our previous dogs included a Great Dane and a German Shepherd so we’re usually more accustomed to big dogs. Can you imagine what a drastic change this small little soldier is to our household hahaha!

Even that flowerpot is bigger than him LOL.

As if to make up for his size, he’s also the noisiest little thing I’ve ever encountered. Every one that walks by the door gets a good shelling from him as if they had trespassed into his private property. Loud little bugger, he is!

OK so we didn’t only take photos, we made a video of him too! HEHEHE.

WHAT — The opportunity was just there and Mojo was too cute too pass up. I’ve been itching to do another video as well and I thought this was the perfect opportunity to polish up my video-making skills.

So yea, please watch! I did enjoy making it so very much, hopefully you guys will enjoy watching it just as much too =D

After the walk, the little guy just busted out and went straight to sleep AHAHAHAHAHAHA.

He’s got zero stamina I tell you.

Mojo all spent and exhausted from his short 15-minute walk around the neighbourhood hehehe.

If nothing else, this little guy has certainly taught me one thing. That it doesn’t take a lot to be happy. A small snack in between meals sends him over the moon, and a walk around the neighbourhood? Well, you saw for yourself how he was in the video, hehe. Life is really as simple as that.

From today onwards, I’m gonna be more like my dog. Yup, you heard me. I’m gonna stretch a little longer in bed I wake up. Take my time with my meals and savour it a bit more. And at the end of every day, be all around happy just because.

Lessons from my dog, ladies and gentlemen. This, is what genuine happiness looks like.

OK Im’ma stop gushing about my dog now lest you guys start thinking I’m a crazy dog lady, haha.

Mojo bids you a good rest of the week! Enjoy the little things and find your own happiness! =)

February 19th, 2013 by Karmun

I’m back in KL as we speak but my heart is jetlagged some 300km away, its strings still caught among the branches of home and family. Penang always leaves me in this dreamy reverie of all things lovely and good.

It’s been such an amazing two weeks back home that I don’t even know where to begin! Chinese New Year this year had so much going on that it totally blew all the previous years’ out of the water. There was everything — feasts deserving of kings almost every day, cousins who doubled our reason to laugh and with whom we brought the house down together, a full set of Lion Dance completing the celebrations in the most raucously auspicious manner possible. You name it, we had it.

The Ninja Rabbit joined us for the celebrations again this year and I wouldn’t want it any other way. I’m happiest wherever he is =)

In a nutshell, the last two weeks was made up of literally nothing but family, food and firecrackers. That is all the essentials we need.

And angpaus, yes, lots and lots of angpaus, hehehe. How was your stash this year? Good, I hope! We all always look forward to my Grandma’s angpau every year because she gives the biggest and fattest one. Again, she didn’t disappoint! ;]

The Lion Dance had been absent from our family home for a few years now since my Grandpa passed away but this year it made a reappearance. Watching my uncle light the strips of firecrackers that  hung from the tallest point of the roof in the old family house brought back truckloads of fond memories.

Suddenly I was 5 years old again, dressed in my New Year best (usually a lacy frock with matching shoes and ribbons in my hair) and hiding behind my Mummy’s legs. The firecrackers are so loud they hurt the ears, yet the festive aura synonymous with their presence makes up for everything else. But it is what comes after I’m more afraid of.

Nothing scared me more as a little girl than these ghastly looking lionheads that danced to heart-thumping, nerve-wrecking loud drums. They leaped all over the place, and their popping eyes and lolling heads made for such a monstrous sight to the 5-year-old me. The way they cocked their heads and snapped at peanuts and red packets offered to them made them look so very unfriendly. Then again, I was a big coward of a kid growing up; I was afraid even of Santa Claus HAHAHA.

Now, they look all kinds of majestic. The drums beat a happy song in my heart and the sight of them fills me with this fearlessness I’ve never felt before.

They’re the messengers who symbolically bring good luck and prosperity into homes — I think that is the cutest idea ever. Dancing lions, whoever came up with the idea is downright genius!

I made sure to pet the heads good and loud this year to snag myself a bit of luck, hehehe.

Everyone was in the best celebratory mood, even the family dog! How cute does little Choco look in his equally little samfu?? XD

The second day of the Lunar New Year happens to be a cousin’s 21st birthday. Talk about a double celebration!

This was the cousin who, as a little boy, could never sit still and was running all over the place. He was the best sport to have around because he was always up for any games we concocted. Suddenly he’s 21?? Where did all the time go?? D:

Miss Chloe Khor, our little Miss Cheongsam 2013 xD

Behold the generation gap hahaha.

These are aunts and nieces in the picture, not cousins as you would have thought lol.

Hehehe cute picture of my Mummy and Daddy laughing.

Every year it hits home harder that there is no time like the present. I see small cousins who are suddenly a whole foot taller, new additions to clan who call me Aunt instead of Jie Jie, and more angpaus from cousins who are one by one arriving at the pedestal of marriage. It really puts time, and how fleeting it really is, into perspective. The lesson is clear: savour what you have right here, right now, before it is spent and sent along its way.

I remember being that small and sweating up a storm from running after my little brother in some silly game of tag. It didn’t matter that we had our shining spanking new clothes on — we’d still find the most sweat-inducing game to play in the sweltering new year heat and stain our clothes with sweat and whole lot of other compounds.

Quite the contrary, I now sit as still as I can to avoid sweating at all, and park myself near any kind of breeze I can find HAHAHA. Yep, it’s true. Growing up sucks. You lose all your ability to have fun. I’m definitely feeling it, slowly but surely.

You outgrow so many things — running barefooted across the field, competing to see who can swing the highest on the park swing, trying to drink as much Coke as you can without Mummy finding out.

But there’s one thing I’m pretty sure I’ll never outgrow.

Family. (Yes, my Dad prides himself in his fanny pack; he’s bad ass in his own way like that xD)

Make no mistake, no matter how old you get, or how grown up you think you are, you can never outgrow family. This I’ve learnt as much. And there may be times when you’re convinced you may have, but believe me, it’s just a phase. At the end of the day, you’ll want to go back to them. Because that’s where you truly belong.

Because it is only with them can you be as crazy, as irrational, as impractical as you like, and still rest at night knowing that they love you nonetheless. At least that’s how it is with our family xD

And there have been many times when we get on each other’s nerves, or not seen eye to eye on certain things, but I still wouldn’t trade them for any other family in the world.

No really, who would want two nutjobs as crazy as these two anyway? Tehehehehehe =P

So that’s that. Another year in the bag, another Chinese New Year well spent with those who truly mattered.

Technically we’re still not done with the celebrations yet. Another 5 days to go for those who are still on the lookout for angpaus. Put these last few days to good use ;]

Me, I’m the happiest I’ve been all year, having been filled to the brim with enough family mojo to last me for quite a while. Hope things are going just as swell on your end!

Happy Chinese New Year again to all of you are celebrating! Eat well and be merry!

Tonight my heart is full ♥

February 16th, 2013 by Karmun

One of the best things about CNY  (after the angpaus, the yummy food and the oodles of family time, of course) are the firecrackers! Who agrees with me say Aye!

Nothing is more fascinating than watching brilliant sparklers that leave everything in an ethereal, lambent glow, and colourful fire in the sky that make the night seem to pulsate with hungry, youthful life.

In the midst of the celebrations, my siblings and I together with the Ninja Rabbit naturally took the opportunity to have as much fun with the said firecrackers as possible! It’s our once in the whole entire year’s right, we’re gonna milk it for all it’s worth =P

We scoured the town for any shop that might still be selling firecrackers this close to the season and were lucky to have found one. We nearly bought out their entire shop’s stock in our excitement hahaha!

Call me a kid but even at 23, I get excited at the prospect of fireworks. There’s just something about them that reawakens this sleeping memory of when I was 5 and watching my older cousins play. My Dad held me in his arms because I was afraid of the noise — afraid, but curious nonetheless at all the ongoing commotion.

I remember being completely mesmerized by the effervescent orange that fizzles magically at the end of those thin small wires. They looked exactly like those magic wands owned by Fairy Godmothers in those fairytales my Mum used to read to me before bed.

Yes, those sparklers are my favourite, even to this day. All the other loud explosive ones still make me squirm rather uncomfortably whenever someone brings them out =/

I unfortunately forgot to bring my tripod back with me to Penang this time so we missed the opportunity to experiment with some long exposure photography.

We tried giving it a shot nonetheless hehehe.

Not too bad, right?? My hand couldn’t hold the camera still enough but if we had a tripod with us, it would have turned out gorgeous! ;]

When my cousins came over to visit, we brought out the big guns.

As much as they make my heart jump, they were a lot prettier to look at too.

Ten bucks says the Ninja Rabbit was pretending to be fighting off Death-Eaters in this shot! HAHAHAHA. It must be Stupefy, the spell he’s casting, given the red sparks. We are such Harry Potter geeks xD

Sometimes I feel like the older I get, the more I revert back into a child. It makes me so incredibly happy seeing all the pretty lights and colours that flit and dance about the night.

I’m not even remotely ashamed to admit that it was I who insisted we had firecrackers to play with. What is CNY without them?? =P

Fire in the hole!!!

This year’s CNY is definitely the best one yet.

Good food — check.
Family — check.
Angpaus — check.
Firecrackers — check.
A new puppy — check.

And we’re only halfway through the celebrations! Another whole week to go!

Hope your celebrations are going just as swell! Eat, drink and collect all the angpau you can!