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cactuser — Thu, 28 Feb 2019 02:40:53 GMT

Hello,

I just wanted to post something with this icon.

That is all.

cactuser — Tue, 18 Mar 2014 19:50:52 GMT

Muslera, please get your shit together and do your job properly.

Galatasaray, c'mon! Win!

cactuser — Tue, 10 Dec 2013 20:19:03 GMT

Galatasaray. You have to win.
You can't settle for anything less than a win.
C'mon.
You can do this!!!

cactuser — Tue, 05 Nov 2013 21:20:04 GMT

Galatasaray, c'mon.
You've got to win!

cactuser — Tue, 17 Sep 2013 19:48:35 GMT

Galatasaray, you can do it!
WIN!

cactuser — Sun, 30 Jun 2013 16:40:28 GMT

C'mon, c'mon, c'mon.
Uruguay, you've got to win.

cactuser — Sun, 16 Jun 2013 23:39:35 GMT

C"mon Uruguay.

cactuser — Tue, 09 Apr 2013 19:14:52 GMT

Galatsaray, c'mon.

cactuser — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 19:20:28 GMT

Galatasary, I'm counting on you!
Let's win this!

cactuser — Tue, 23 Oct 2012 17:13:19 GMT

C'mon Galatasaray.

Let's win this.

Randomness

cactuser — Fri, 04 May 2012 22:10:34 GMT

Someone's blasting Sweet Caroline outside. Remind me again why I need to be here? o_O

Shit stuff

cactuser — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 00:49:33 GMT

ACTA in a Nutshell –

What is ACTA? ACTA is the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement. A new intellectual property enforcement treaty being negotiated by the United States, the European Community, Switzerland, and Japan, with Australia, the Republic of Korea, New Zealand, Mexico, Jordan, Morocco, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates, and Canada recently announcing that they will join in as well.

Why should you care about ACTA? Initial reports indicate that the treaty will have a very broad scope and will involve new tools targeting “Internet distribution and information technology.”

What is the goal of ACTA? Reportedly the goal is to create new legal standards of intellectual property enforcement, as well as increased international cooperation, an example of which would be an increase in information sharing between signatory countries’ law enforcement agencies.

Essential ACTA Resources -

Read more about ACTA here: ACTA Fact Sheet
Read the authentic version of the ACTA text as of 15 April 2011, as finalized by participating countries here: ACTA Finalized Text
Follow the history of the treaty’s formation here: ACTA history
Read letters from U.S. Senator Ron Wyden wherein he challenges the constitutionality of ACTA: Letter 1 | Letter 2 | Read the Administration’s Response to Wyden’s First Letter here: Response
Watch a short informative video on ACTA: ACTA Video
Watch a lulzy video on ACTA: Lulzy Video

Say NO to ACTA. It is essential to spread awareness and get the word out on ACTA.

Original Post at:
ohnotheydidnt

cactuser — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 04:10:08 GMT

OMFG.
I may have caused a landslide.
Oh. They won't be happy about this.

Did what I had to.
Can't do anything now.
All wells.

cactuser — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 03:05:30 GMT

Djo = US Open 2011 champ

Knew you could do it!

cactuser — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 02:59:49 GMT

Uruguay - Congrats!

& Muslera <3 Just absolutely wonderful.

How to save yourself from attacking geese

cactuser — Fri, 06 May 2011 00:23:58 GMT

Follow the link and learn a valuable life skill.

cactuser — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 14:32:40 GMT

So, according to this, I'm the Black Ranger.

Yuu is actually a nice guy, He's not always down in the dumps, but as an Eito Ranger he gets a bit grouchy, maybe because he was given a tone and not a colour, or maybe because he's a little tired...

Go figure.

cactuser — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 19:01:47 GMT

Meet Gabriel Macht - my newest reason for procrastination.

(Image from Beyond Hollywood)

Name: Gabriel Macht
Born: January 22, 1972

Comments: First seen in Because I said so. I have seen that movie 3 times now, don't bother with the plot, just watch him. According to Wiki (and Rotten Tomatoes), he only stars in really bad movies or if you prefer - box-office bombs. But who cares? Just look at his pretty face XD

The Countdown Continues....

cactuser — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 00:11:13 GMT

Someone said it best, "4 down, 4 more to go..."

^O^

8 --> 1

cactuser — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 03:59:53 GMT

The thing with being in a small program at university means that sometimes you'll work with the same people.

And frankly, there are people that you'll NEVER want to work with ever again.

Especially, when the group project is worth 25%.

For example, people that contribute nothing to the group's project.

Or when they consistently push back deadlines because they are too "busy" with other work.

Or tell you "I'll finish my part if you show me your stats assignment".

Or when they miss the group's presentation because they overslept.

So apparently life hates me.

Cause we're in the same group again.

I might as well throw that 25% out the window right now.

Trip Recap (continued)

cactuser — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 02:02:34 GMT

Day 11 - Osaka

Can't believe this is my last entry for the trip recap, and also can't believe it's been more than a year since I came back. Oh, my procrastination is amazing. If only I can put it as a skill on my resume...But because it has been too long, my memory is failing me again, something that comes with old age. Sadly, I think this is gonna be my worst entry. I don't remember much about what I did in Osaka other than eating, lots of eating. Sigh.

Woke up that day feeling a little sadden by the fact that it's my last day there, ate breakfast and waited for my friend to pick us up and go shopping. The entire day was basically a coundown to the time when my flight home left, kinda of sad actually.

Breakfast in the hotel.

My friend took us to Dotonbori and we rode on a big ferris wheel. We were actually there too early and had to wait for them to open. The view from above was pretty nice as it overlooked the entire city. Osaka, to me, actually looks a lot like Tokyo, tons of skyscrapers. We saw this Drop Zone-like ride next to the ferris wheel and my sister said she wanted to go. Neither me nor my friend was brave enough to go, so my sister went by herself. Again, it was too early in the morning and she was the first (and only) one on the ride. The ride was attached to a gaming centre and my friend and I waited there. It felt kinda awkward as clearly, we were the only ones there and no one really goes to a gaming centre that early in the day (it was only 10 in the morning). My friend told me that had I not picked Mount Takao, her sister and her boyfriend would've taken us to an arcade. My mind fled to imagine what that would've been like, somehow I don't think the boyfriend would be very good at those games. =)

Then we walked into this building that's made to look like Japan in the olden days. Apparently, ladies get in free that day so we lucked out. ^_^ Inside, we had takoyaki, piping hot & delicious. I think we walked passed a couple of fortune tellers and palm readers but they were pretty busy and we weren't that interested in getting my palm read. It's not like I'd understand what they're saying anyways, even if my friend there was to translate, it'd just be too troublesome. Besides, I don't feel very comfortable with "knowing" my future, I like to take it as it comes because I'm the kind that if I know something bad is gonna happen in the future, I would dread it and freak myself out. I'm better off without that kind of stress.

When we got out, it was time for lunch, ramen! My friend said that ramen's better in Osaka and udon is better in Tokyo, or it could've been the other way around, I'm not sure anymore. Anyways, we bought our tickets from a vending machine and sat inside to wait for our orders. We chose chasu ramen and one with soy sauce in the soup base. While waiting, the chef started chatting with my friend saying how his ramen is better than the one next door and we all just kind of rolled our eyes. ^o^ I've never had "authentic" ramen before so I don't know how it's supposed to taste, but what I put in my mouth that day tasted pretty good. Come to think of it, I didn't try a lot of Japanese food when I was there. We always had home cooked meals made by her mom, so we never really ate outside, maybe I'm missing out. *pouts* We'd only ever ate out during the last few days of the trip, but at least I can say what I ate at her mom's place was healthier. After we finished, the chef asked us how the food was (he speaks a little bit of English as he's had foreigners eaten there before) and we obligingly said it was yummy. ^_^

When we walked around some more, we found a place that sells Portuguese-style egg tarts! I don't think they're really Portuguese, it's more like Macau's version of egg tarts. I love them! They taste a lot like the traditional egg tarts but more egg-y, if that makes sense. When I told my dad, he said there really is a store with that name in Macau, so it should be somewhat authentic? We bought a couple, including a few chocolate ones. The three of us ate some at the airport and the rest, we were supposed to take back to my parents, but I left them on the plane. >.< Argh. I swear, if I ever go back, I'm gonna get more and bring them back home SAFE AND SOUND.

When we went back to the hotel to pick up our luggages, we stop by the cafe in the hotel to get our free drinks, courtesy of my friend's manager. Afterwards, we hopped on the airport limousine bus to go to the Kansai airport. On the bus, my friend gave me her cell so I can text everyone I've met to thank them for making my trip so much fun. I think she sent it to her mom, sister and cousins but in the end, only her mom replied in time. She said her sister was in class or something. It was still fun though, my entire text was in caps because I didn't know how to work her cellphone. -_-' I hope they didn't misunderstand and think I was yelling (thru a text message).

Final thoughts - I know we didn't go to a lot of the famous tourist attractions there (like Mount Fuji or the Osaka Castle) but we went to enough and considering there wasn't much planning put into this trip, I think we did pretty well. =) I think deciding where to go the night before takes the stress out a bit. I mean, your schedule's not as tight and it's not as big of a deal if you don't get to one place today, there's always tomorrow. We weren't in a rush to get to places and we explored the town at a comfortable pace. Once we got the hang of their transit system and figured out how to get to where we wanted to go, the trip went a lot better. My friend's mom's guide book helped a lot too, it had all the subway/train routes on one single map. I've never seen that many shades of colours before (cuz there were too many transit lines...). Also, the fact that we had to get home before dinner meant that we were only really doing 8 hours of exploring max, including 2 hours commuting time. In the end, I think we were only doing 6 hours or less of walking. I'm so lazy, lol, but it's a vacation, so I'm allowed to be lazy. ^_^ *Shameless*

I do realize now that I lived practically next door to the Johnny's store in Osaka. Oh well, no use beating myself over it now. I've already gotten over the fact that I wasn't able to find that darn store in Japan. There's always next time. Besides, I'm already planning to go back (in my dreams maybe). ^O^

Finally, HAPPY 5TH ANNIVERSARY TO EITO!!!!!!!! (Sorry, eito, I don't think how to do those sparkly things on LJ, so you'd have to settle for this, not that I think you care...) And I'm FINALLY finished this darn thing. It took me one year, one month and twenty-nine days, if you start counting from my first entry for this trip. But if you count from the day I got back, it'd be one year, three months and thirteen days... >.< I think I need a drink now. *goes off to celebrate*

Trip Recap (continued)

cactuser — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 23:22:49 GMT

Day 10 - Kyoto & Osaka

Day 10 started off with us two frantically trying to stuff our suitcase close so we can check out of the hotel. Procrastination is never a good idea, but it's so easy to do. Morning call was originally set at 9, but mad packing delayed it by half an hour. I knew we should've at least started to pack the night before, but then sleep was calling and just looking at the mess that was our hotel room destroyed any motivation to clean up.

Our breakfasts.

The plan for the day was to drop by the shopping centre attached to Kyoto station on the way to another temple, then hop on the train to Osaka to eat okonomiyaki (yum). We walked by a department store and saw two girls holding up signs at the door. My friend asked them what they were doing there and they told us they were univeristy students researching on tourists' opinions of Kyoto, or of Japan in general. My friend told them we were tourists and they were so excited. I can't remember what I said but I think it was somewhere along the lines of too many people and praises for the city's cleanliness. Darn, now that I think about it, I should've also complained about their toilets and my struggles with them, but oh well. -_-'

It was Mother's day that day and since my friend's mom has been like a 2nd mother to us on this trip, we thought we should buy her something. I asked my friend what her mom likes and we decided we'd all get her a bouquet of flowers. We split into two groups as my friend's sister led her to another part of the department store so the rest of us can go get her flowers. There was a pretty long line at the florist as many daughters, like us, are getting the same thing for their moms. Each of us got to pick something that went into the bouquet and when the staff was holding it, it seemed huge, but the final product ended up much smaller. It cost close to $50US, and even though we did a 30-70 split in paying for it (my friend insisted this was for her mom and she couldn't ask us to do a 50-50 split), I felt kinda gipped. Just when we were paying for it, we got a text from her sister saying they were done shopping and were waiting for us at the bus stop. Her mom looked genuinely happy when we gave her the bouquet. Then I suddenly realized we still had a day of sightseeing ahead of us and she would've had to carry it around town with her everywhere we went. I guess we should be glad it was just a small bouquet.

The temple we visited that day was called Kinkakuji, an entirely gold-leafed temple that sits in the middle of a pond. Thank god the weather cooperated, which made it much more enjoyable than the day before. Honestly, the temple itself wasn't that memorable other than the fact that it was pretty shiny. Sorry, I'm not that big of a temple-fan. I don't hate them, it's just I don't have much of an opinion of them. I don't know much about architecture so "nice scenery" or "it looked pretty" are generally the only comments I can give about them. Maybe pictures would help.

It was mid-afternoon by the time we left the temple and we had time for a quick dessert before we had to leave for Osaka. We had parfaits in the shopping mall attached to the station and they were the best thing ever. Not too sweet, decent size, insanely delicious. ^O^ But it felt really awkward lugging around my big red suitcase in the tiny cafe, I had to turn around every few minutes to make sure it was still there.

Yogurt parfait & Special of the day (sweet potato ice cream with coffee jelly).

After dessert, we bought our train ticket and ran for the platform as a train that was going to Osaka was leaving soon. Running up and down the escalator with a suitcase is very tiring, not to mention kinda dangerous too. We just made it onto the train, like the doors closed seconds after we got in. *sweats*

It turned out there was some sort of concert thing happening on Midosuji and they closed off part of the street. From our hotel room, we could look down and see the enormous crowd on the street. Apparently, my friend's sister was a fan of the band, but sadly, we had to go for an early dinner so it won't be too late when they get back to Tokyo. Plus, we probably wouldn't have got in considering the size of the crowd already there, so we just listened to the music for a while in the comforts of our pretty hotel room. My friend took us to an okonomiyaki shop in or near American Village. Pictures of our dinner that day, because I can't convey the yumminess of the food thru words.

The best one was the rectangular one on the upper left hand corner. It was so soft and slightly chewy. I think it's supposed to be some sort of crepe-like thing. My mouth waters just thinking about it. =P

The crepe-like thing when it was done.

I think it was at this dinner that I ate the most compared to the rest of the trip. I should probably make a note here that all the food was made by the waiter, which explains why they look so pretty. We didn't go to one of those restaurants where you make the okonomiyaki yourself because had we done that, I probably would've burnt mine. >.< After dinner, we bid farewell to my friend's mom and sister, gave her my thank-you card and walked them to the station. It was kinda sad to see them go cuz it also meant that our trip was coming to an end soon. Despite having a shitty time at the beginning, I've started to like Japan and definitely wasn't ready to come back home, especially when I have nothing but work waiting for me here.

My friend took us to the neighbourhood where she lives afterwards. It was an area full of interior design and furniture stores. She said she bought most of the stuff there when she was decorating her apartment. When we got there, she realized she didn't have her key. What ensued was a lot of panicking, waiting and phone calls. We walked around on the streets as my friend decided to bike back to her workplace (our hotel) to see if she had left it in her locker. Nope, so she called management to see if they can let her in. While we were waiting, one of her co-workers, who was living in the same building, let us into his place. We saw a plastic thing in the shape of an American state and it had the word Napanee on it. My mind immediately went, "Omg, he's been to Avril Lavigne's hometown, wow", but he said the Napanee he went to for exchange was the one in America. He said he's lost contact with his host family there and was glad that me and my friend still kept in touch. I told him maybe he should try facebook and I've been told that's the place to find your long-lost friend. He suggested that maybe my friend should call back to the hotel to see if anyone's seen her key, and it turned out that she left her chain of keys on her locker's key hole when she left for Kyoto and her supervisor picked it up and kept it for her. The whole thing must've scared the life out of the her cuz at some point in the night I think I saw her face turning slightly blue. When the management brought her a replacement key, she showed us around her apartment, which was tiny. The size of the living room/home office/bedroom is like the size of my bedroom. It looked somewhat like a dorm room. We watched a bit of her cheerleading videos back in high school before walking back to our hotel. There, we gave her her wedding present, which thanked god she liked. To be honest, I didn't like it that much but my mom said that typical Asian wedding presents are gold (I bought her something small that was made of pure gold). That night, I watched Music Lover (I think that's what the show is called) on TV (sadly, no JE was on) and fell asleep to the Wahaha single playing on the dvd player.

cactuser — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 23:43:25 GMT



		I will marry Nakamaru Yuichi.
		After a wild honeymoon, We will settle down in Antarctica in our fabulous Apartment.
		We will have 2 kid(s) together.
		Our family will zoom around in a Black GT-R.
		I will spend my days as a Garbage Collector, and live happily ever after.

I have a wonderful life~

cactuser — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 00:40:06 GMT

THERE'S A RESTAURANT CALLED THE 'CACTUS CLUB CAFE'.

They have 15 locations in BC and Alberta.

~~I though it was a real club and I was like 'I wanna join!!'...until I saw the word 'cafe'.~~

Funny enough, there's not a single picture or anything about cactuses.

---

I want to have something like this in the future.

Trip Recap (continued)

cactuser — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 18:30:15 GMT

Day 9 - Kyoto

I'm running out of steam to do this, updating now seems more a like hassle than ever. I feel like I need one of those Junno slaps on the face to "wake my nerves up" (whatever that means...) to get the motivation to finish this thing off. Come to think of it, I only have 3 days left, including this one, which means I'd already wrote about a good two thirds of my trip. *Pats myself on the shoulders and blatantly ignores the fact that it took me well over a year to get this far...*

The trip to Kyoto was accompanied by my friend's mom and sister. The plan was to meet up with my friend and her cousin (the older brother of the guy who took us to Akihabara), who will be showing us around town, there. Yay, I finally get to see my friend! She is, after all, one of the reasons why I went to Japan. I have been assured that this cousin is nothing like the other cousin. They're complete opposites (as are most siblings, I guess) and conversations with him shouldn't be a problem as he's more talkative. Not that it matters much anyways, it's not like we're gonna spend any time alone with him when we're in Kyoto. Apparently, he goes to university there and is the manager of the university football team.

One of the questions people often ask me about this trip is how my bullet train ride was. My answer is, um, somewhat pathetic. I fell asleep, like literally unconscious. -_-| My friend's mom had to tap me on the shoulders to wake me up when we got to Kyoto. I was told afterwards that the scenery en route is one of the most beautiful in the world. Any kind of rides, be it bus, car or train, makes me sleepy. It also didn't help that the first thing I did when I got on the train was eat. These two things combined is better than any lullaby for me. No one believes me when I tell them the train ride wasn't all that memorable because I was asleep, maybe from now on I should just say the scenery was great, I saw nothing but mountains and farms. That's pretty much what you should see, right?

Our lunches.

Our hotel was pretty close to the station, which was a good thing cuz I didn't feel like walking around much in the rain with my heavy suitcase. After we checked in and got everything settled, we walked back to the station to meet up with our tour guide for the day. My friend had work and wouldn't be joining us til dinner. My first impression of this cousin couldn't be more different. He was all smiles and had introduced himeself before we even uttered a word. He was SO PREPARED to be our tour guide. He had an entire folder worth of information about the city and the places we could go visit. I was told that he wanted to improve his English and thus was very glad to meet us and take us around town. He took us to the rooftop of the station and told us about who designed it and such. His major is similar to what my sister is studying right now so they were off in their own little world talking about architecture and design. The moment the architectural jargon came out, the rest of us just rolled our eyes and zoned them out. I have to say though, this station looks much better than Tokyo Station, and nope, I'm so not biased, hehe. It just gives off a more modern and put-together feel.

Doesn't this look so fake?

You can't really go to Kyoto without visiting a temple, right? The one our tour guide took us to was Kiyomizu Temple, which was only a short bus ride away. He explained to us that there are lines (or markings) on the outer walls of each temple. The more lines one temple has, the more important it is. I think he said the max is 6 lines. The walk from the bus stop to the temple was awful. It was uphill and there were puddles everywhere. By the time I got to the temple, my pants were half soaked from the rain. I felt gross, almost to the point where I wanted to ask if we could go back to the hotel so I could change. I can't really pick out anything memorable we saw there, other than people, lots of them.

I do, however, remember the way down from the temple was way better than the way up. We took a different path down to the bus stop. This one was lined with stores that sold souvenirs. Most of them sold this sweet thing that I have no clue what it's called and had free samples for us to try. They were mocchi-like and triangular in shape, filled with a variety of things such as red bean paste, strawberry jam and chocolate. Maybe it's a specialty of the area?? Well, they were delicious and that's all that really matters to me. ^_^

Further down the street was a store that sold steamed buns that were piping hot and filled with red bean paste. My friend's mom bought each of us one and they were the yummiest thing ever! It was kinda chilly that day (as it was raining) and having warm sweet buns to eat made them even better. I realize now that my mood is heavily dictated by the amount of food I have in my stomach. I wasn't really in the mood for walking around a temple with drenched pants sticking to my legs. I just wanted to home, but the moment I got food down in my stomach, I felt like I could go visit another temple and everything else was forgotten. My friends always tell me there are only two things that set me off, hunger and alcohol. Apparently, I get really bossy and demanding when I'm hungry or drunk, lol.

None of us could really decide where to eat, so when my friend arrived, we just went down to one of the hotel restaurants. The meal was a little expensive but when you take into account how much we had, I guess it's not that bad. Each of us had an appetizer, a salad, a main course and desserts.

Appetizer and salad.

Our main courses - salmon wrapped in cabbage and steak.

DESSERTS!!!

Conversations at the dinner table mainly focused on the infamous younger cousin. Gosh, we really pick on him too much, don't we? They were very interested to know how we spent the entire day with him. I started off by saying he was shy and quiet, which didn't surprise anyone. I then went on to describe our method of communication, which basically consisted of me asking him a question and him hesitating for a bit then frantically trying to look for what he wanted to say in his electronic dictionary. This usually resulted in silence, awkwardness and most of my questions unanswered. -_-| They found this extremely amusing and said that's basically how he is with his family as well. His older brother then expressed concern about how he's ever gonna get a girlfriend. While on the topic of relationships, we asked my friend's sister how she found her current (fantastic!) boyfriend. She said he was a friend of a friend, whom she often sees on the train. Aww, how cute! The next person we interrogated was our tour guide. He said he's currently single and I jokingly said I shall try to find him a girlfriend over here so he can really improve his English. ^o^ Save for the second hand smoke we had to endured from the table beside us, it was a really pleasant dinner, filled with TONS of laughter.

After dinner, we went up to my friend's room and the six of us talked for so long. We each got one of those fortune telling sheets (I don't know what they're called) from the temple. These were ones regarding love. I guess it predicts your love life, if that makes sense. My friend and her cousin were our translators. I don't remember much about what mine said. I only remember the one for her sister said that there might be a new woman in her bf's life that may steal him away from her. LOL. Suddenly, a text came in for my friend's mom. It was from her husband, asking her how the trip was going. The look on her face was just priceless, ah, the love of newlyweds. We all made kissy noises. ^O^ Somehow, the topic of love changed to that of age and my friend's mom decided to emphasize once again that she's around the same age as the rest of us "kids". Haha. She then proceeded to jump onto her bed to do sit-ups, which was HILARIOUS.

It was getting late and we said goodbye to our lovely tour guide of the day. He had to go out of town the next day for a football match so we were to explore town with our "new" tour guide, a.k.a. my friend. It'd be just as good as she's been taught by the best, her cousin! ^o^