never sleep around photographers

Honestly, I wanted to back out of PHOTOSOC's event to Long Reef Beach because it was right after polling day. However, I promised that I'd be there and it was part of my obligations to chaperone the members who were going.

Being so tired from the previous day, I thought I'd take a nap on the bus ride to the beach. Big mistake. I should've known that being surrounded by photographers, on a photography event, it was wise not to be unconscious around them. *sigh*.

Photo by Carmen.

Oddly enough, the beach outing was full of surprises. Quote from Zinah: Is this real Carmen? Oh no, I don't have my totem! It was a reference to the movie Inception. I must agree, there were so many unexpected things that it almost felt like something was out of place. We I think of beach, I thought of just a wide, open area full of rock and sand and sea water. I didn't expect there to be a football field, a tennis court, a golf course, a park and a mud swamp next to the beach. Note to self, I should never follow Alfred and his directions. He unintentionally led us to the mud swamp and the only way to get to the other side was to walk over it *sigh*. My purple converse turned black/brown.  

I also didn't except to see to many dogs around. Speaking of dogs, a Labrador walked towards us and laid on its back for us to pat his stomach. Unfortunately, earlier Alfred placed a bag of lollies on my hoodie, so when I bent down to scratch the dog, the bag of lollies fell out. I tried to stop the dog from eating the lollies, but in the eyes of the members, they thought I was abusing the dog. Well, I guess I'd rather look like an abuser than let the dog eat the lollies; dogs aren't suppose to eat sweet things because it's bad for them. I know that because I'm a dog owner myself. 

There were also power-gliders at the beach as well. It looked fun, but tiring at the same time. We passed by a group of people promoting Vitamin drinks and were given a sample each and got our photos taken as well. Free drinks, that's a plus =D.

For once in my life, never have I witnessed so many life and death situations in the natural environment. There were 3 that I've encountered:

1. A colony of ants eating a small, dead crab.
2. A man fished and caught a beautiful looking fish and was going to take it home to eat it. (Honestly, I wouldn't mind if it was a bream or something, but it was a such a beautiful fish; a fish that you'd take it home as a pet, not as dinner. I had the urge to kick the bucket. Alas, it wasn't my business)
3. Humans poking a red plum looking organism so hard that it leaked and died. Later, we discovered that it was a type of jellyfish. Because we learned that jellyfish lived in the ocean, it was odd to see them living on rocks. Curiosity could kill *sigh*.

Although I felt like I needed to do something, but I thought, even if I could do something this time, it doesn't mean I could do something all the time. It was like survival of the fittest. Organisms live and die everyday, it's part of life. Sad, but true. I prefer not to dwell on such a philosophical matter like this online, so I'll just leave it as that. 

Thanks to the members and their snacks, I had food to eat at lunch =D. I completely forgot to bring snacks to the picnic because I was running late. I especially liked the dried mango strips made in the Philippines. I should look for it one day =). 

I'll end my blog with a joke that Alfred told me: 
 

Alfred: What fruit does Beethoven likes?

Fiona: Um... beetroot?

Alfred: No

Fiona: What then?

Alfred: Bananana (8)

Laughs.

PS. Thanks to Andrew fro driving Zinah, Carmen and I home at the end of the day =).

political drama

In the last minute, I was offered a position, by the AEC, as an Official Polling Assistant at Lansvale East Public School  on polling day. The pay was good but of course you'd have to work for it. I brought a pillow but I didn't use it at all since I was assigned to different jobs. There wasn't just one job to do; I had to look after the ballot boxes, mark people off the lists, and there was counting the citizens and assigning them to one of the three tables but I didn't get to do that one. 

Looking after the ballot boxes was easy but tiring since there's no chair for you to sit on. The marking job provided you a chair but I think it was more intense because there were so many names to look through and it was your obligation to mark off the right person. Also, if the citizens was having a bad day, you'd be the first to experience their anger. I made one mistake when marking names off. 

A man came in and told me his name, but apparently he had the exact same name as his son except he had an extra middle name. I accidentally marked off his son instead of him. Thank God his son came later so I was able to mark off the father's name instead since his name was already marked off. So in the end, it was all good. 

Although there were many votes and Senate ballots were extremely long, I had the most fun counting the votes. Well, not exactly the unfolding part, but the counting part. At our polling location, for House of Representatives Liberals and Labor were pretty close; Labor won by just 10 votes, literally. One of the older workers said that it was the first time he's seen such a small difference between the parties. Unfortunately, he also said that there were much more donkey votes than he's ever seen. I felt bad because those donkey votes could've made a huge difference between the parties if they were counted. For once, I thought politics was exciting, seeing how close the votes were. I even stayed up at home that night to check how the numbers were for the seats. That night, it was 72 Labor and 71 Liberal. As you know now, Liberal's in the lead now. Apparently, it was the first hung parliament since post WWII *gasps*!

We spent hours counting and recounting the votes to make sure that there were no mistakes and that the votes balanced out with the number of people who entered the polling place. Apparently, there were 10 votes missing. I'm not completely sure why but things happen, like people accidentally bringing their ballots with them, or accidentally chucking in the bin, etc. 

It was a long day; from 7:30AM to 10:30AM, so about 15 hours. Since the pay was a certain amount, no matter how much longer I stayed after the polling, I wasn't going to get an O.T. double rate. So thankfully, I only stayed behind for 3 more hours. Unfortunately, some places had to stay back til 1:00AM to recount the votes over and over again to make sure it balanced.

It was a tiring day, but I'm willing to try again for next year's State elections =). I wonder, if they really can't decide which party would run the government, and that we'd have to vote again, would I get hired again and get paid the same amount again? I wouldn't mind if that happened =D.

you can never have enough cheesecakes

16O81O - Tony's 19th Birthday - Happy Birthday =D !!!

 I think Mimi might be sick of cheesecakes now seeing she was given 4 for her birthday xD. There was a homemade raspberry one from Maxine, mini Hokkaido one from me, one from her sister and another coffee/caramel one from Shirley and Vicky. 

I visited Mimi after uni, on Friday. We just talked, eat cheesecakes and played World Band Tour =). You know, Tiger is almost as tall as me when he stands up O_O. He's cute, but I don't think I would want to be left with him because with his strength and horny-ness, who knows what he'd do to me >.

I am honestly tired of sitting in the car with my aunt and uncle now. Not that I dislike them or anything, but they sure argue a lot. We got lost with my Uncle's directions, and that was because he didn't trust my Aunt's directions even though she's  been there before already *sigh*. I also kind of feel sorry for my Uncle's mum. They treat her like she's a vegetable O_o. Well, not exactly, but kind of...? I know she's old, but come on! She isn't disable =.= she can buckle and unbuckle her seat belt, she can open the door herself, she can walk to places. I don't mind doing those things for her, but seriously why are you treating her like she's useless. I think I'd be offended if I was in her situation. Anyways, we went to eat at the Canterbury RSL Club. The place was huge! And the interior design was quite magnificent. I mean, they even have their own mini fountain inside, and a jungle looking garden! To be honest, the food was not worth the prices. They were normal, nothing spectacular, but the prices were expensive as the restaurants at the city. Maybe it was to make up for their decorations? For once, I thought that night's dinner was quite nice. I actually talked quite a bit, something that I don't usually do during dinners. It was pretty funny when we were talking about our bad driving habits. I guess it's cause it's something that all of us can finally relate to. There was an awful lot of birthday cakes that night too, which I thought was odd. I mean, if it was one or two, it would've been okay, but it was like .. three or four O_o. I feel like a mango cake too actually lol. We haven't celebrated with a birthday cake in a long while *sigh*. 

The next day, Shirley, Vicky and I went to Mimi's house for a birthday visit. Shirley brought her Singstar over so we just played musical games and ate cheesecake for the rest of the afternoon. When nightfall came, we walked Vicky home before getting driven home by Mimi's brother. Thanks Mimi's brother =).

That's it for now =). Bye!