Brunei Handbag

Did you know that there's a handbag named after BRUNEI? Yes, as in our abode of Peace, Brunei.

The picture below shows a Seven For All Mankind Brunei Woven Leather Clutch.

For all of you who are familiar with Seven for All Mankind, this label is actually more significant with jeans wear, but they are now looking into the handbags market too. (Note: Just Wiki it for more info) In fact, they even have jeans named after Brunei. Don't believe me? Just go here, or just google 'Seven for All Mankind Brunei' and I'm sure the search results will speak for itself.

I've no idea why they chose Brunei as one of their Jeans' line. Normally, most brands, like Guess or Boss would go for more recognizable city names, like Boss's Alabama Jeans, as part of their many city-based jeans' line. Maybe the name Brunei brings a touch of elegance and gold to their label I presume :p

Just one of the random but interesting stuffs you stumble upon in the internet, whilst killing time:p

Assignments.

I had duly completed and submitted my first two assignments for my Politics course here in Bristol. To be frank, I can see how big the difference is working on an academic level assignment, with that during my pre-university days. Markers and tutors invariably remind us the importance even to the littlest details like citation format and on how to put bibliographies in the correct order. Back then, mentioning names were fine enough with the teachers. Getting all the sources right can be a pain in the ass too. In case you're not familiar with the system here, they don't offer you notes like what we do in Brunei. It almost go parallel with the saying "What you see, Is what you get!"; the rest is up to you I supposed.

Distractions are many here. Often times, I make excuses to myself for not wanting to the pending work or revision immediately, telling myself that I'll just do it later tonight. But by that time, Friends series were played on the telly, followed by Singstar or PES 09 on the PS3, next thing I knew, I was too tired to continue working on my studies. My assignments took me a whole day to finish up, which also meant, I slept until late evening, 3 am to be precise. And when the due time was 10 hours from there, it can somewhat pressure me more. Racking your brains til late night isn't good, or so I was told.

C'est La vie as the French puts it. I've to cope with everything here alone - well not actually alone 'alone'. I got my fellow countrymen around that can offer me a helping hand:)

Why Bristol?

That question has been asked to me, from the moment I was settling on my University application, to the whole scholarship process and up to now even; by many different curious people. So why Bristol?

The answer is simple - it was in the Top 10 University list; and to be part a Top 10 institution is a give and take opportunity obviously and it doesn't not require a genius to figure that out. And not to forget its up-to-the notch teaching process is significant in my pursuit of education. Of course, the fact that its a University City makes the place even sweeter to be living in.

Now its that simple, aint it?

Talking about this, reminds me of how a certain someone- whom I don't know, by the way, but apparently, in a condescending way, sort of criticised my choice of where I study. It happened like 3 months before I flew to the UK; and me and my friends were playing football and after the session, university and scholarship came to our discussion. So each of us were talking about our plans, until it was my turn to speak. One of my friends asked me which universities I've applied to. So what I told them my plans that I applied for UK universities and that I didn't apply for UBD. Okay before I go further on this, people may wonder why I didn't apply for UBD.

My answer to that is simply that the course I'm pursuing isn't available in UBD - straightforward reasoning, right?

But then this one dude butt-in in our conversation, point to remind: I don't know this person. He suddenly spoke and said: "Napa? UBD inda good enough kah?"

At that point, I felt kind of awkward. I don't even know this guy and he's like condescending me in some way. Who is HE to judge me?

Personally I think UBD IS in fact GOOD ENOUGH. Two of my siblings and a handful number of my uncles, aunties and relatives are by-products of UBD. Most of my friends too are studying in UBD. I have this opinion that he probably saw me as one of those bunch of people who applied for the scholarship just for the sake of going to the UK. I admit that my part of reasoning to apply here is because I want to experience the independent life abroad, both of my parents used to be in that experience, and so had my big sister in the States.

But for the most part, my reason is that I had worked hard to get to where I am now, you can ask anyone close to me, my family, friends and teachers. I repeated when I was in form 4 and to get to where I am now, I'd consider as an achievement.

And for that person to sort of belittle me, its just uncalled for in my opinion. He doesn't even know me. I guess that guy is one of those people who see things from face value, and in overly simplistic way. Wow, I didn't know life was that simple! If getting the Government scholarship was that easy I bet he'd do the same thing when he applied back then, I'm sure!

I'm glad being where I am now. I've a lot of challenges to face in the near and far future; I hope my education in Bristol will help me to overcome them.

The 500th post

This is actually my 500th post. Its been a while since I last wrote.

Honestly, I think its appropriate, given the time and situation that I am facing now, that I start off my '500th post' with a pessimistic tone. I won't go into details but lets just say that things are seeing bad omens in my not so long being in the UK.

The thing is, since my time here, things haven't really gone my way. Sure there were those sunny days upon me, that really pushed my spirits up; but having said that, we can't avoid the fact that there are shortcomings and rainy days ahead of us as well - days that just don't get along with you. It sometimes begs me to ask: What is it with people?

Why can't they just understand that I am in this foreign land, million miles away from home, attempting the so called independent life and still learning this course of life; and not to forget, I still have my degree education which I am pursuing, which is also by the way, my purpose of being here. The last thing I want to have and listen are rants and unpredictable mood swings. I have my limits and I can't always take things in one go. I have a lot of constraints in my head already. I'm no Superman people.

The thing is, I think its part of the human process of changing, if I am to blame how things are going. I don't like it, but I have to accept it. The question is, until when?

Some may not like my blog rants and complaints, I'm not expecting people to, but this is my blog and its my time to whine about how my life is at the moment. There's just so much I can handle in one time. I am just utterly, UTTERLY annoyed at the moment..*sigh*

"We cannot change the cards we are dealt, just how we play the hand."

Randy Pausch

Huurrray to civilisation!~

We have internet!!!~

Like finally right? We actually got our internet installed like a couple of days ago, but guess what, the technician that came over to set our internet didn't bring the wireless router with him, so basically we resolved to be using the Ethernet cable one at a time. So far the internet is... well its just OOOKKAAAAYY.. not much like the way ad made it seems.. But yea, better than nothing.

I realised I need to update mooorreee~~