This is definetely not Denmark!

Ha ha!

Just read that the Danish government has decided to increase the price of chocolate and carbonated drinks to make the Danish healthier!
That’s quite for from the case in Malaysia were we have subventionated sugar. The government is actually chipping in a couple of sen per kg of sugar.

And it is just so utterly ridiculous as it is a luxury item.

Nobody needs it what so ever! It is just there for indulgence.

Snitching!

Nope I haven't started playing quidditch.

I was doing invigilation today and sometimes we have to send students out of the exam hall. Today I succeeded in getting the chief invigilator kicked out of the hall.

All of it actually started early in the morning with me going to work. First I had a car squeezing in in front of me even though his lane was disappearing and there were no gap in front of me. But still he wanted to squeeze in after the car he previously had before him in his lane. So he horned me to give him space, which I in the end did as I had had enough of stupid Malaysian drivers. Just after that the road splits to left while the main road continues through a traffic light. To shorten their time in queue some people like to go in the furthest right lane as long as possible. So I start slowing down for the traffic light as it is red. And I get horned again because the lady behind, who wants to go left from the right lane, thinks I am driving too slowly compared to the left lane. That made me very annoyed and I kept grumbling for some km afterwards about Malaysians, their driving and their use of the horn when they are in err. I just can’t take it being horned when I abide by the rules. I understand it when some get alarmed if I happen to do something stupid or wrong but using the horn when you are the one stupid and wrong?

I still reached work in a happy mode; it might have been thanks to the lovely “The number of the beast” by Iron Maiden in the stereo or me just being in a good mood. Actually it is very seldom I am grumpy for a long time. I usually explode and than right away go back to a more normal mode.

One of the jobs during the invigilation is to collect the attendance slips and check that they are allowed to sit for the exam and that they are the one that are supposed to sit for the exam. It turned that some didn’t have the proofs for being allowed to sit for the exam and some others didn’t have their identification. Two weeks ago I had to sit for a one hour meeting iterating how important it is to abide by the rules during invigilation. My own faculty head reiterated all I heard at the faculty meeting. And when I point this out to the chief invigilator he sort of commented that it wasn’t that serious to be bothered about. Actually it is not that important for this particular parts and I just made a note of contacting the exam department to get the lecturer for the course to come and vouch for the persons that didn’t have any identification.
When everything has settled down and we were one hour into the three hour exam a guy arrives and comes and sits down at his place. And I tell him that he has to leave the exam hall as he is one hour late and the latest he could arrive is passed by half an hour. But he says that the chief invigilator said it was OK. And sure enough the chief invigilator is coming with exam set for him and I try to state the point but I got ignored.

That mad me totally pissed of, so I brought all my papers and stuff and left the hall. The major reason of course is that I had had enough of law being for the day, but also that I didn’t find the chief invigilator reasonable. So I stormed away fuming, straight to the exam department were I declared that either they do something about this or I won’t do any invigilation. I don’t think that my demands really had anything to do with the actual outcome as they were the one who called the meeting about the importance of following the rules. But sure enough the head of the department was not happy, she called the chief invigilators superior, which sound even more pissed off. And I ended up with walking with the newly appointed chief invigilator to the exam hall and see the old one being asked to go to his boss. And the student who was late got sent out of the exam hall.
So I managed to get rid of both the student and the chief invigilator in one go.

If I wasn’t annoyed with the guy to start with and had those experiences earlier in the morning I think I would have taken more time to convince the chief invigilator than run off to snitch on him. So I feel slightly sorry for him, but just slightly. I mean he might be deaf and have hard to hear what was said during that meeting.

If IKEA made cars?

The dark side!

It is sad but true that I am starting to approach the dark side of the force. My coffee is getting darker and darker as I started to dislike the sweat and creamy I used to make and the only coffee I was willing to drink. But it started to get un-tasty after half a cup or so and I ended up throwing away the rest. So I have been cutting down on the sugar and creamer and the coffee is getting darker and darker.

May the force be with me!

Aydeen 1 month

So the little boy is 1 month. 

Try to check his weight and using the bath room scale I got his weight to be 5.7 kg. Quite an impressive weight for a 1 month old. The other parents at Aida's concert (see below) were quite surprised, especially those with babies as Aydeen were the sam size as a 3- and a 4-month-old baby. No wonder I we get so tired backs. Though it is the same amount Adam increased his weight with in the first month.  

18/4

It has been a busy day. Aida’s music class had a small concert and it had a bring and share lunch. There is probably a proper English term for it, but I don’t know it. So I had to start cooking quite early in the morning. So I started the preparations already just after 6. Though that was not the intention, I just happened to wake up at 5:30 and couldn’t go back to sleep. So I started poured boiling water on the tomatoes, had my breakfast and then I sat down to peal the tomatoes, onions, garlic and carrots, while watching M*A*S*H. As nobody else was up I could for one whatever I wanted without having somebody complaining. 
After I finished chopping the veggies I could afford a little break so I tried to bring the kids to the play ground. I was just 50% successful as Adam didn’t want to come if Mamma didn’t follow. So we stayed just for a short while as Aida was not as interested of playing without her brother.
Back at home I started the cooking and it got hot even though I cooked outside, because the sun started rising and the cooking area is facing east. So a little sweaty I worked through the frying of the mince meat and the condensing of the tomatoes to a thick and lovely sauce. It is usually quite hard to get good tomatoes in this country, which usually makes the sauce slightly or in some cases very sour. When you usually buy your red tomatoes, seem like a bit of a joke, it’s not very many red tomatoes to actually be found. This time, or actually last Friday, I ventured into one of the night markets (pasar malam) that are so common in Malaysia and found some lovely red tomatoes. Maybe I should try looking for tomatoes at the night markets more often or just resign and by tinned ones, which will cost me four times as much as the fresh tomatoes, but at least I can be sure they taste nice. The sauce Bolognese turned out absolutely smashing, as good if not better then the one I got in a good Italian restaurant. 
After that a quick shower and then try to get everybody in the car, which took a little while and in the middle of the rush I managed to forget to bring the camcorder, dang. But the camera was packed at least.
And here are some examples of that.

The whole goup singing Pa-pa-pa-parade. I didn't managed to get any good pictures of Aida's solo performances. though.

Then we came to the eating and people loved my sauce and wanted to know the recipe. Though at least of half the secret of getting a good sauce is in the tomatoes. Above is Adam in full party costume.

Norida had problem with the little one. He has started to be a little colicky so after I got Aida and Adam to sleep I relieved Norida form the duty of carrying Aydeen. I walked around with him for a short while and than he gave a loud burp and settled in. So all I had to do was to put him down and off he went to sleep.  
I finally got time to rest, with a bit of formula one qualifying and a cup of tea and some buns, before the kids woke up and demanded a visit to the playground. Adam had to have Mamma this time as well so Norida had to follow. She and Aydeen didn’t stay very long though, as Aydeen worked as a mosquito magnet. Adam got a bit annoyed as the grass were quite long and full of seeds, which got stuck in his clothes which makes it very itchy. So we didn’t stay very long either.  But we did some swinging.

Wrong address?

Realised that the address of this blog is outdated. It should be wnaaa now that we are five in the family.

Baking thoughts!

I start having a trend of baking every weekend. Of course it all started with not enjoying the food at the canteen at my new workplace, which made start using the bread machine to get my bread. The bread available is not really fit for using as lunch sandwich base. It is so white and airy any GI fan would cry just looking at it. The whole meal bread works but even bread machine bread tastes loads better and you know what you get. Or rather you know that you don’t have to eat. No potassium propionate (anti mold agent, and the smell of it is horrible), emulsifiers and other things that you don’t need in a bread.
So, that’s how I started being a regular baker. But sometimes a find recipes that will give you roll’s instead of bread so I follow the recipe and makes rolls instead. Of course this means firing up the oven, which is relying on a gas burner in the bottom. Hence I will end up with very pale bread, except in the bottom of the roll, though the paleness is what catches your eye.
I like to be efficient, so I keep thinking if I heat up the oven for one thing I might as well bake something nice to have for the afternoon tea as well. And this is the point were the fun starts; going through my recipes or maybe searching the internet to find something interesting to do. Last weekend that was not the case as I had an urge for SEMLA. But what should I do this weekend. I still have some baking marzipan left that I have to finish, so I will start from there finding something nice with that. Actually I already have something interesting to do with it; marzipan rolls, you fill your cinnamon roll with marzipan instead. I just feel it is a little bit boring as I made the cinnamon rolls last weekend. But if I don’t find anything else, that will be my choice. There is one boring part about making cinnamon buns in this country and that is the inability to find pearl sugar to sprinkle the top of the bun with.