Pollok house and Burrell collection

we had a cell group outing to Pollok house and the Burrell collection on saturday. chris drove, and the rest was eileen and natanya, calvin, wei chun, jacinta, shu yin, pui ee, kelvin, me and fiona. so off we went...

our star of the day.. looking dolefully at us..

primroses... spring is here!

walking to burrell collection

we went to tickled trout for lunch. the service was a bit confusing though.. they didn't collect payment at the same time, then they forgot some of our food.. by the time we finished eating it was almost dinnertime. the place was lovely though.

natanya with a customer's dog. the pub actually has a spot prepared for their four-legged friends.

my favourite photo ^^

inside the pub

i had the beef mushroom guiness pie (top extreme right). nice! the mashed potato was also very smooth and creamy. the others had fish and chips, garlic chicken, fried mushroom, and desert.

shu yin, pui ee, fiona, me and jacinta

left to right: wei chun, calvin, shu yin, natanya, jacinta, chris, eileen, pui ee.

after lunch, we stopped over at dobbies, which was just opposite.


they had lots of interesting stuff here...






and the nursery outside was a total macro heaven. we even saw tulips.. no need to go until amsterdam for them. haha.. it was cold outside though..


finally.. our day trip ended at JBC.. the place which had been our second home for the past 9 months.. can't believe it past by so fast. and now there's just 98 days left. sigh... i'll be sure to miss this place.. and all its people.

tour guide or tourist??

Jane June came to tour glasgow, but somehow it felt like i was the tourist. even though i've been here in glasgow for almost a year now, i have yet to pay any visit to any place of attraction.

we started with the city chambers. we had planned on going for their free walking tour, but somehow the timing was never right.



flowers were in bloom finally. spring really is coming.


we went to counting house for breakfast. looking at the interior, can you believe it's a pub? they even have greek statues on the ceilings watching you eat. cool place though, and nice ambience, in the morning at least, when there's not so many people drinking.



we all had our much-needed dose of caffeine, in preparation for the long day ahead of us.




clockwise from left: Scottish haggies, neeps and tatties. breaded mushrooms. scottish farmhouse breakfast with eggs, bacon, sausage, black pudding, baked beans, potato bread, grilled tomato and toast.



on our way back from counting house, we saw this statue that tourists seemed to flock around... kononnya... it's james watt! i didn't even know he was so honoured in scotland.


we went to visit the glasgow cathedral first. it's just down the road from our hostel. can't believe it's so near and we never ever went in. looks pretty gloomy from the outside though.

St. Mungo's tomb

view of the cathedral from necropolis

after we were done with the cathedral, we went to the necropolis beside it. it's a really massive graveyard.


then, we paid a visit to the St. Mungo museum. i really like the building, looks kinda unique, since it's all built from bricks.


the museum had some paintings, among them i found this the most interesting. man, even i could draw this. guess what this is?


it's...Mount Fuji. it even came with a long poem. i'm guessing the poem took longer to write than the time to draw the picture..

i have telekinetic powers...

next, we headed down high street in search of the Barras market. along the way, we past the clock tower.

finally.. we reached the barras market.. kononnya world-known. i wonder known for what.. i find it even worst than sri petaling pasar malam. or sungai wang (for the indoor part). After all's said, it's still a good place to go if you want to find some cheap cds, second hand books etc.



to rest our tired legs, we stopped to have a snack of ben & jerry's.. yummy... this is chunky monkey.=]


dinner was at rumours (clockwise from left): seafood tomyam, belacan kangkung, sizzling tofu, bubble tea, curry leaf chicken.


breakfast was our very own english/american breakfast consisting of toast, scrambled omelette (failed omelette), bacon, sausage, baked beans.

me, jane june and fiona. ^^

it was good to have her back with us again, albeit for only 2 days. i look forward to our next meeting!:)

pharm care is heart attack-inducing

after slaving my whole day away researching data for primary prevention of cardiovascular events by aspirin and statins, i suddenly see in the lecture slides...

'secondary prevention..... diabetes.....'

????!!!!

the trials are all different!!!

with shaking hands me and fiona scour through journals, books, and even wikianswers (please don't trust that one)... and finally the results are out.

Primary prevention - when you do not have CVD (stroke, MI, angina etc)
Secondary prevention - when you have CVD

Hypertension is not a CVD.
and there are actually diabetics using primary or secondary prevention, meaning that diabetes does NOT automatically lead to secondary prevention.
Hypertension and diabetes, which automatically lead to high cardiovascular risk, can still be treated with primary prevention.

Thank god.

同志

pharm care 打着打着，突然想起...
在进imu前的长假，
我记得我到Terminal 1寻找着萧雅轩的MV.
真的难找耶.

最后在底楼的一间店，
那老板竟然送我他店里用来播放的那片带.
我一直要还钱，他竟然不要.

真的有这么好的人吗？
竟然毫无理由的对别人好...

或许是因为他也很喜欢萧雅轩那个专辑，
所以他能理解.

这就是所谓的同志吗？^^

photography excursion in glasgow

it was a sunny day. Random conversation between kelvin and chris led to an unexpected photography excursion, them with their D90s, me with my point-and-shoot (gosh, but anyway...).

but anyway, so off we went, chris (our ketua for the day), kelvin and shu yin, me and trisha. it was quite a first time i actually toured glasgow, and it really was a first of going around with only one motive in mind - to capture them in frame!

we started off at kelvin grove museum, since it was raining...







the exit point was quite unique, since it was upside down, ie. the backdoor acting as the entrance whilst the main entrance facing the back. this mistake by the architect actually caused him to end his life in dismay/despair/utter embarassment, or so i heard. quite sad though.

from there on, we just walked and walked, through the park and onwards.



we even came across some old brick furnace.




and the glasgow council flats..


nearing the last leg of our trip, we went past the glasgow gas storage where they stored all the gas (obvious i suppose). the level was normally higher, but since it was winter and everyone used the gas for heating, the level was quite low.


we also made a trip to the dam.. it was kinda slippery there.


last but not least, we stopped on our way back to the train station for them to take pictures playing with lights. seems you could do lots of things by adjusting shutter speed/aperture etc. u could take curved car lights (interesting since light is supposed to go in a straight line), you could take star-shapped lights (by using the minimum aperture), or just by placing a star-shaped cardboard in front of the lens and bokeh-ing the rest. i'm not sure if they were just pulling my leg though.


anyways, we walked far that day, but it was nice and well worth it. when you compare the end-products, it's obvious why some people are professional photographers. i'm glad for this learning experience though. one day... i'll get a SDLR with bokeh lens. haha.. maybe in my dreams.^^