NZ journals # 6 - Good-bye Days

This is gonna be my last post in NZ as I'll be returning to Malaysia in less than 24 hours. Finally, my life story in NZ is coming to a close.

Nothing much to say.. I'm not happy, neither am I sad. Packing is a hassle though. That also made me realize that I have too much gaming stuff. It might go more than 20kg, all thanks to the 8kg lcd tv I'm bringing back. Hope it won't. There is one thing I'm carrying home which I know is more than the weight alloted by the airline - the memories of the past 2 years I spent here. Its the one thing that I will treasure for the rest of my life

OK... I said I won't be sad, but I will most definitely miss my life here. Goodbye NZ.

NZ Journals #5 - F.R.I.E.N.D.S

Perhaps the best thing about my 2 year stay in NZ is having great friends around, both new and old.

The B.Ed boys

friends then, friends now

Hadi, Nesa and Jarod...I've spent a great deal of time with these boys back in IPBA and they are still spending time with them, albeit not as much as. Everybody's always busy and besides, we're not living in a single building like we used to in IPBA. However, that never stopped them from being an absolutely wonderful group of friends, and ones that I could always depend on. Thanks guys

The Torrens Team

torrens conquers all!!

My other housemates (excluding Hadi), Deli and Kurt. Truth be told, I don't know too many people outside of those from my course. These 2 quickly became on of the earliest non-TESL friends I made. They're good people and it was unfortunate that I only got to know them better in my final year here. Kurt also happened to be an excellent game buddy. One that I can always trust my back to when I'm playing Halo online. Go Torrens Team.

The International

friends and rivals

Despite being in NZ for almost 2 years, I have to say that compared to my other Malaysian friends, I don't have that many friends that aren't from Malaysia. Daichi was one of the few. He's not only a good friend who is totally fun to have around but is also my gaming rival. My only regret was to lose to him 8-10 on our final Dead or Alive match. And then there's Chizuru, who has been a great help in increasing my Japanese language proficiency. I really hope I get to see them both again in the future.

The Guys at EB

Unfortunately, I never got a picture of them. But then again, you don't expect a customer to walk in a shop and take some snappy snappy of the shop attendants do you. Being a regular customer of EB Games Wellington, I have befriended all of the full-time workers there, so much so that we know each others' name. Imagine that, going into a shop and the workers there can call you by name...priceless. Its all the better that they are a great bunch of people. Tommy, Pete, Dave, Fei, Stephen and Lucy, although I haven't got a picture of them, I have a feeling I won't be forgetting about them anytime soon.

The Nihongo Students

taisetsu na tomodachi

And finally this quatro of Japanese Language students, Aishah, Leny, Sue Fin and myself. I learnt a lof of useful things from them and I have to say, these guys...er, girls played a major part in making me much more social these days. It was only after going out and hanging out with them this year that I realized going out with a group of people can actually be fun and that encouraged me to start hanging out with more people. Not suprisingly, I made a lot more friends this year than I did last year. If it weren't these girls, I'd probably be the hermit crab I was last year. You people are awesome friends in my book.

To all my friends here in NZ, thank you for making my life in NZ memorable and so much better than I expected. Allow me to finish this in a very kiwi way by saying, thanks heaps guys!

Goodbye to you

What can I say

We've only been together for what... about 8 months now maybe?

And now you are leaving me, gone from my life

Was it because of me?

Was it because I don't spend enough time with you?

Or was it because you were jealous that I spent more time with another instead of you..

Still, I don't think that a good enough reason for you to leave me like this

But now you're gone

What can I say

But know this

Sure, I may have not spend so much time with you

But that does not mean that that I don't love you

For all the money and time I spent for you, how can I not love you

Indeed. I shall miss you

Your sexy and curvy lines

Your dark and shiny skin

But now you're gone

What more can I say

Except goodbye, my ps3

najibu's ps3 : march 23 - november 12 2007
total time spent together : around 120-140 hours
for the amount of money I invested to get my hands on it, it sure didn't live up to my expectations..but to be broken within less than 1 year of purchase (and just within weeks of leaving NZ!) is just utterly heart-breaking. Danked

The NZ Journal #4 - home and away

Finally, Najibu has the opportunity to update his blog. Things has been very busy for Najibu for the last couple of week and not to mention, some crazy events took place in that short period of time.

Now to why Najibu hasn't updated his blog for a long time :
REASON 1
1.1Najibu's parents came to NZ
1.2 Najibu got kicked out of his room and had to stay downstairs
1.3 Najibu's laptop was always in his room.
1.4 Najibu lost his previlege of 24/7 internet access.

REASON 2
2.1 Najibu's house organized an open house
2.2 Najibu got busy with stuff and helping out

REASON 3
3.1 Najibu was away for 5 days on a trip to which took him all over the North Island

With regards to the trip North, Najibu really tried his best to enjoy it but it just wasn't his cup of tea. However, there was at least one interesting thing that he managed to do which are these pics below

Najibu's work when he was stressed and bored

Najibu's work when he was missing someone

Well, its nothing special, but Najibu likes it, and therefore it goes into Najibu's blog!

The NZ Journals #3 - Games Meet

It is a well know fact that I love video games. So what could be even more interesting than being a gaming hermit in my room? Why, playing with a bunch of friends of course!

5 people = 5 times the fun

Every now and then people would come over and spend some time playing games with me. It doesn't happen all that often, which is too bad, considering how I really enjoyed those moments. It's not always the same bunch but there are some regular faces such as Daichi and Fifi. Then theres those times where I would play with my three housemates but even that is pretty rare. The time I spent most playing with another person is either when I'm playing Halo 3 with my war buddy Kurt or when I'm duking it out 1 on 1 in Dead or Alive 4 with my equally-good-at-games friend Daichi. Fun times indeed.

The NZ journals #2 - the weather

It's impossible to describe Wellington without mentioning about the bizzare weather here. The name, 'Windy Wellington' describes it all. It doesn't really matter what time of year it is, the wind here will blow you away, but I guess its something you have to experience yourself to comprehend what I am talking about. At one time, I had to hold on to a pole just to avoid myself from being pushed away. In fact, when the wind is blowing at full force from the front, you might not even be able to breath cos your chest is being pushed inwards. For those of you who have and is thinking, "hah, you say that kind of wind is strong?!" All I have to say is apparently you haven't been here long enough to truly feel the wrath of the wind around here. Sometimes when its blowing strong enough you can even here the 'howling' of the wind. Believe me, the sound can be scary at times. Especially when you are alone in the dark in your room.

Rain is pretty frequent here in Welli. I like the rain here because sometimes, the rain drops are so soft that you will hardly get wet even if you're walking in the rain. I did say sometimes though so don't blame me when you try this and find yourself soaking wet. The rain+the wind can usually add up to a very chilly day. Using the umbrella is not a very good idea in Welli unless you want it to fly away or at least end up broken. I HAVE seen some people using it but only very few rare instances. Despite my great intrigue to know what ever happened to them, I simply didn't have to time to follow them and see if their umbrella came to any harm.

Okay! That wraps up this edition of the NZ journals. More coming soon

The NZ journals #1 - Wellington City

I can hardly believe I've almost finished my 2 year study here in NZ. Academic wise, all thats left for me to do is the final school experience tomorrow, a final exam next thursday and a debriefing shortly after. The days that I'm going to spend here are numbered. In but just 5 weeks, the time will come for me to leave NZ for good. This series of blog entries will be about my stay here for the last 2 years (almost), what I liked about NZ, what I don't like about NZ, and everything in between. That's going to cover a lot of grounds, thus the episodic contents. bear with me people

Wellington city, overlooking the ocean

This first entry will be about Wellington City. Stayed here for a pretty long time I did that I can't help but to like it.

our house is somewhere near that tower in the middle

I'm not actually the kind of guy who likes sight-seeing, so even though I've been here for a long time, there still a large portion of this city that I haven't seen. If I were to write about the whole city, this entry would be endless so here's just some things that I think is interesting about Wellington. I'll let my lovely lady friend do the honour of presenting them (^_^)

soya presents...Cuba St.

Cuba is the shopping district in Wellington CBD. For a mall, its not really awesome to be honest, but I like the lively atmosphere always present there. From time to time you get random people performing even more random acts, from street musicians to the weekly hare krishna march, theres a lot to see in Cuba St. Cuba St. also happens to be the street where my fav shop in Weli is located. Pick a guess, (hint: its somewhere in the picture)

soya presents...te papa national museum

The te papa (lit : our place) national museum is one of the very 1st places that I visited in Weli because we were invited to watch the play 'taming of the shrew' on our second day (or was I third..) of our arrival. Ever since, I've been here for 2 or 3 more times. Like any good museum, the exhibitions changes from time to time and at one time, the museum hosted a Lord of the Rings exhibition which was pretty cool. If you aren't already a fan of museums, this place won't win you over but its worth a look at least once.

back to the future, anyone?

One of the more unique thing about Welli lies at the transportation system. Looking at the picture above, you can see all those cables hanging above road used to power buses. I'm pretty sure they have a similar thing elsewhere but current;y, Weli is the only place I know that use the cable buses. Theres one quirk about the cable-powered buses though - should there be another bus in front of the bus you are riding, there just no way of getting through. On a side note, the cables always remind me of back to the future. If you don't know what I'm talking about, just forget about it.

That's all for today. More entries coming up before I leave this country.

p/s: too busy with school to do the next ch. of the Adventures of the Torrens this week, but maybe at the end of the week...just maybe.

Halo is probably the biggest gaming franchise ever

This entry chronicles the launch of a little game called Halo 3 in Wellington, and why it has lead me to believe that its the biggest, most well known game franchise ever in the video game industry. First, a brief description of the Halo franchise, if you've never heard of it. Long story short, its a first person shooter. The first one was revolutionary, the next one, not so much and they were both, in my opinion, fairly good but the NOT best games ever. At 12.01am this morning, the third, and likely final installment was released and I was there at EB games to get the game exactly on launch time and here's when it starts to get interesting

I got out around 10.30, figured that it wouldn't hurt being a bit early. Got in front of my local EB games at around 10.40, EB's door was still firmly shut and already there were a group of people just hogging for space in front of the store. I decided to lay low and and sat at a nearby bus stop. As the clock ticks closer to 11, more and more people came so I had to get myself there lest I wanna be the last one to get the game, not that I mind anyway since Halo isn't really the top game in my list, but I just cant wait to get my hands on the collectors item inside the pack I pre-ordered.

santa sent me a present...

11p.m, EB's doors were open. I was greeted by familiar faces and all customers were then given tickets indicating their number to get the game based on who got inside the store first. I was number 19 since I gave those true Halo junkies the previlege of getting it first (or maybe because I was too small to push myself in first). There 1 whole hour before the staff can give us our games so I just chat with a guy or two to kill time. Around that time, more people keep on coming. More so than I ever imagined. I spoke to Dave, the manager, "wow, lookit the crowd. Halo is as big as the PS3". His answer, "Are you kidding me, its bigger. Remember the PS# launch, there was only you me and him." while pointing at another staff jokingly. Then, things start to get a little bit crazy. The press came. Yes, THE PRESS. I can understand them coming for a console launch like the PS3 (they never did come for the 360 launch) but for A SINGLE GAME?? This is just insane!!

The news was supposedly going to be aired on morning news but I kinda missed that. And then theres this guys who interviews people for some radio station. He was very annoying by the way. Shortly after, NZ's official gaming organization, aptly named NZ Gamer came and offered everybody hot chocolate. Ok, this is the first time I've received such treatment for buying a game.

At 10 to, we were all requested to get out of the store and form a queue and that was when I realized the actual number. It was more than 60, which makes it more than the amount of people who were there for the 360 and PS3 launch combined. Halo is definitely BIG. So big that some people have come to hate it. A guy, most likely a PS fanboy screamed from far away, "HALO SUCK!!! %#%$#%@$@" and spew a lot more of those rubbish. We paid no mind and at 12 we all got what we came for. In numerical orders of course.

The story doesn't end there though. On my way home I walked pass a couple and the guy, seeing me carry the huge box which was Halo said as he walked pass by me, "thats some serious s**t you got there bro". And then I walked pass a group of kids (whatever were they doing at midnight there anyways??) and their face was in awe and said, "dude...you got a halo 3..." with a tone you matches their expression. That is just how popular the game really is. Honestly, I think that the Halo franchise has transended games, becoming a big name which is on par, if not bigger than any big Holywood movie. I rest my case, and finally I present and up close look of the collector's item I got for buying the legendary edition at a premium price.

a limited edition individually numbered (550989) collecters item. just look at the detail...

month in review - august

So far, the month of august had been the most enjoyable month I ever had in Wellington. Its also the month that I spent most. There was the M-fest, that I had written a blog about before but the real fun part of the month kicks off when our 2 week holiday started. What made the holiday so much fun was because it was waaay more eventful than any other holidays I spent here (admitably, not that many). Here's a quick recap of some of the events throughout the holiday :

-a (sort of) social gathering at te kotahinga. Sayda's parents came from M'sia so they made nasi dagang for everybody. Great food, great company.

-found out a new halal kebab shop had just opened near to where I live.

-hang out with Leny & Aishah at the wharf while enjoying milk tea. Later went to the museum where we met Zul and a bunch of other girls who unfortunately I never knew who their names were.

-Daichi kun and Tak kun came over. We played dead or alive 4 and tekken 5. I'm really glad to know that I've really improved in tekken since the last time we played. 7 consecutive wins! Asuka power!!

-Ate at a M'sian/Singaporean restaurant at the Wellington market with a group of Malaysians after Friday prayer. I never knew such a shop existed!

-Traded in 3 old games and bought the darkness and bioshock. Darkness was a good game. Great story to boot to. Bioshock, I could write about this game for 2 days long and still not write everything I have to say about the game. Definitely one of the best single-player game I ever played. Several bugs and design flaws (in my opinion) however, cuts the game back from achieving total greatness. Oh, the limited edition comes with a metal figurine of one of the game character 'big daddy'. Way cool.

-Some friends came over and we played fusion frenzy for hours. The game is so much fun to play with people. I also played poker for the first time and won! Talk about beginners luck. Oh, I also made a new friend. Actually, I knew him a long time ago. Just never knew what his name was.

-Went to simply paris with Leny Suefin and Aishah to use our $20 voucher that we got from our sensei. First time being there. The croissant (ony $1.80) was simply delicious.

-Bought a pre-owned perfect dark zero at cash converter for $29. A good bargain as the game is a good game and especially fun as a 4 player game.

-Got another game, blue dragon because I had so many store credits I didn't know what to do with it :p It's an OK game but I'm keeping it because I need a long game to last me all the way to October.

Finally, September had begun and I still have about $300 to spend. Maybe I'll save some money to bring home at the end of the year. At least if there arent any good games around.

I think that sums up pretty much everything. Its probably not as lively as other peoples holiday but for me, thats plenty lively enough.

the social side of gaming.

being the pseudo-anti-social person that I am, I usually spend my time as a hermit in my messy little room. Of course, 70% of the time, I'll be playing video games all by myself. That, however, has changed of late. After playing games with a bunch of friends - dead or alive 4 with Daichi kun, fusion frenzy with Zul, Manan, Fifi & Das (whom I had just known his name despite being here for close to 2 years) and the latest get together game, perfect dark zero with quatro split screen feature - playing alone just feels plain wrong right now. Yes, I can play with other people online but it just doesn't feel the same like playing with people whom you know and can see in the flesh. I want to play games with people, so I would need games that even people who dont game can play with realtive ease. Maybe its a sign that I should seriously get a Wii