UoA & Huia Residence O-Week

Hello!

I arrived back in Auckland to start my BCom degree at the University of Auckland. Classes start tomorrow and I am nervous as.

Things will be pretty hectic from now on (it's already crazy enough now) but I will try my best to upload on YouTube as regularly as possible, so please subscribe!! Thank you so much <3 I upload videos on beauty, life, and talks about random things. I am planning to upload travel vlogs as well when I get the travel opportunity :) Your support will be greatly appreciated.

Alicia J's YouTube Channel
Okay, so orientation week has just ended for Semester One 2015, and we will have Clubs Expo next week where we start admiring the presence of the many clubs offered at the UoA.

UoA O-Week Impession:

It was different from what they show you in the promotional videos, I'll give you that. Don't expect too much - my expectations had already been calmed down by word of mouth of my friends who had attended their faculty's orientations earlier, and it was obvious that it was not as "fun-filled" as was advertised. Nevertheless the O-week for the Business School was quite well-organized and informative, so the orientation day kind of did its job anyway. Some of the lecturers had particularly interesting lectures.

The UniGuides (senior students who volunteer to help out for O-Week) were friendly and helpful, and I definitely appreciate their effort and time to guide us around campus. However, I would have liked to get my free lunch for the day as I had every right to. I understand that it was for the interest of time that we had to avoid the crowded Quad, but still... -_-

Overall, it wasn't bad but a long day, definitely. I opted to skip the Toga Party for the more calming lantern festival, which I will most likely do a separate post about.

Huia Residence O-Week Impression:

I was far from disappointed - I have made so many wonderful new friends and meet so many people from diverse backgrounds in this home of 321ish students. Love love love being here so far. <3

My Huia experience for the first week so far has been absolutely amazing. The hall had the week packed with events such as The Amazing Race (which happened before I arrived), A Night in Paris Speed Dating, Big Night In (free pancakes), Sponge Wars, Classic Kiwi Barbecque, and the oh-so-fun Halls Day Out today, complete with inflatables, live DJ music, and more barbecque!! :D

I realised how unfit I was. :-/

The week ended with a fireworks display that also marked the end of the Auckland Lantern Festival. What an amazing view, right from my window :')

That's a wrap for O-Week! Uni starts tomorrow. Godspeed for all of us.
I look forward to what the future brings! Thank you so much everyone who has been a precious part of my orientation week :)

I am planning to do a separate post about the Huia Residence, so stay tuned! ;)

アリシア

Singapore Once More!

Hi! How's everyone doing?

My family and I flew to Singapore to attend my cousin's wedding last week :) To say the least, it was an exciting four nights and four days for me, which included meeting up twice with one of my best friends studying there, roaming around a bright bustling city, indulging in amazing food - once at sinful hours, and so much more.

First off I'll start with some pictures of the infinity pool on the 57th floor of Marina Bay Sands, where I stayed for the first two nights. The hotel was crowded with tourists as it is all-year round, a big percentage coming from countries like China, Japan, and Korea.

Night view

The first night I was there, I decided to bring my phone with me to the pool after seeing other people do the same (i.e. risking their fancy iPhones' fragile little lives). Silly idea, but yolo, I thought.

I didn't know the pool was shallow enough for me to just walk across it, so I swam my way to the edge of the pool, holding my phone above my head with one hand, the other submerged under water to paddle. I didn't want to soil the leather-like casing either. I got some pics, but due to the darkness none of the pictures came out presentable. In the end I splashed some water inside the cable port, but thank goodness my phone was still alive :X

To top it off, they kicked me out literally right after I made my way to the edge of the pool because it was closing time. No regrets though.

The next day, I decided to bring my phone into the pool once more, clutching it high above my head with two hands as I walked carefully across the pool. Having figured out this critical information from experience the other night proved to be of contribution to my rather silly yet rewarding decision. I still ended up dropping one of my hands in the water though, so it was another one-handed picture-taking sesh. Yet this time I produced much better results - accredited to sufficient daylight ↓


Spoiler/destroyer of visual illusions and fantasies: The infinity pool actually has an edge D:

Here are some photos I took from the Skypark! Lesson learned, btw: Always wear pants under your skirt in Singapore. The winds will show no mercy! Apparently it's bad enough on sea level (as I found out while walking along Orchard Road), but the wind did not spare me the trouble of having to repeatedly pull my skirt down whilst attempting to walk around at 57 storeys above ground level.

Also I managed to meet up with one of my best buds, Lala, now a JC student in Singapore. We had a lot of fun just walking around, loitering in arcades, eating, and talking about school, life, and other nonsense.

We'd come across a food fair at Tampines Mall during our first meet-up, and among one of the stalls that were there, one was advertising brownies. We tasted the samples and they tasted great! Maybe a little too sweet for my taste, but still delicious anyway. The attendant proceeded to tell us that their main branch offers message writing services on brownies, that could be done in minutes depending on size. That's when the lady said to stop by for our next birthdays, so she literally spoke an idea to my head. LL's birthday's coming up (it's in two days!), so our visiting that stall was like fate xD

So the next day we were to meet, I made my way to the branch at Dhoby Ghaut and later surprised her with a personalized "Happy Birthday" brownie. It turned out much lovelier than I'd expected :D

 Birthday celebration in advance <3

Then I moved on to Shangri-La's Rasa Sentosa for the last two nights, where the wedding took place. The resort was beautiful! They had monkeys and peacocks roaming around as well. I never actually saw any monkeys, but my aunt had heard their chattering one morning. I did see two peahens, though. One had chicks trailing behind her :3

Chinese New Year 2013

Happy Chinese New Year to those who celebrate it! :D

Twas a wonderful night and day, with a most wonderful night's sleep and dream slipped in between. I couldn't have asked for more. Teehee xD

So what's all the hype about Chinese New Year? We love hongbaos/angpaos, no lies there, LOL. Many people feel extra generous during CNY, whee! But another thing to look forward to during Chinese New Year gatherings? FOOD FOOD FOOD.

 

Chinese New Year Eve's Dinner Potluck xD 

The Rookie Tries: Baking for Christmas

Ho ho ho!

It's actually been ages since we put up a Christmas tree. So to make up for it, I baked a cake! A chocolate chiffon cake, to be exact. I iced it so, so that it may somehow look like those Christmassy door wreaths that people hang during Christmas.

It was fun and hard at the same time decorating the cake. Well what did I expect...I am a rookie at these kinds of things, after all. Or was. Haha! Just kidding. I made a lot of mistakes. Good thing I was able to cover them up pretty well ;)

I wanted the pink buttercream to be red, but the supermarket that we went to only had what they called 'rose red' and orange. Turns out that rose red was pink, but oh well. The green icing was bought from my Singapore trip, and when it sort of dried up, suprisingly went so well against the softness cake and the pink buttercream :9

Not-so-Christmas-themed cupcakes made from spare batter :9

(Clockwise from top left: little roses, heart, daisy-ish flower, star)

Highlights of My Week

Hi! :D

Last week was a great one, with a new addition to my maternal family, a gift of chocolates and a former homeroom's wedding. I can't stress enough how happy I was to see all my friends again. They haven't changed at all, and spending time with them was gold. Glad we weren't getting rusty and awkward just yet, since we talked about our current lives. For me, life will be the same as it is for a while. That is, my fate will be decided by the university I'm applying to. I literally check my application status every day, wondering when they will update it.

My cousin just bought my grandma a dog. She was initially named 'Tart' (as in cakes) after the name of the cousin who gave it to her. My grandpa changed her name to Desi (I'm not sure how it's spelled, but it's pronounced like so). And yes, she is a chihuahua! She was so tiny I couldn't believe it. I hadn't seen a chihuahua in awhile, the last time was the one that belonged to my friend Josie. Hers is male, so I've been discussing with her about possible marriage plans. Hahaha I kid :)

Here she is! All I could do was squeal when she came out of her pink carrier. She didn't bark at all during the visit, and was very calm. My aunt brought her here, and told us that she's actually really hyper at my grandma's house. Likes to run around and enjoys carpets - she must have been disappointed to see none at my house :P