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Little Reunion

Australia may be big, but it has few major cities, and I’m currently residing in one of them. It’s still one of the closest places to home (Malaysia) for further education opportunities. Going back to Australia’s size, even if you study in Perth, Adelaide, Brisbane or Sydney, you still end up in Melbourne, even if it’s just for a holiday.

I just came back from a little reunion of sorts. A primary school friend studyin in Brisbane came over here for a short holiday. A couple of phone calls later, me, Jack, Jun Wei, Lee Yuen and Joo Li (the one visiting) were over at Brunswick (later at Chappell) just reminiscing old times over coffee.

Primary school was fun. As little kids I still remember the silly things we did. We seemed to have all the time in the world. We’d think of games to entertain ourselves, drawing on pieces of paper. There were also many various activities, spring cleaning, sports day, teacher’s day etc etc. The field trips we had, and back then, parents seemed to organize stuff for our benefit. To this day, I sometimes think our primary school reunions are more like parent meetings, heh.

We also talked about old friends. The feeling’s kinda giddy, our fortunes turned out very differently. I’d not elaborate here, but sometimes I wish that fairy tales were true, and that things would end happily ever after.

Time flies when we’re having fun. We only managed a couple of hoursI don’t know when I’ll ever see some of my friends again. We’re always at crossroads and somehow, I believe that fate will bring us together again. Heh, corny maybe, but it was fate that introduced us to each other initially.

Now just waiting for England vs Portugal. Heh.. Go Ronaldo! Go England!

548 Little Things

I stood in the shower longer than usual today. At least until I thought I could feel my skin wrinkling up.

I don’t know if I’m mentally tired, or probably just stressed from exams. Heh, I refuse to complain however. I’m only taking two papers while my other friends are all taking 4, and usually within a span of a week or less.

It’s just been random things I’ve been doing, playing a little Gunbound from time to time to get one’s mind off things. Heh, fun game, my current favourite bot is the Aduka, a purplish, electricity kind of bug. Still annoyed I can’t beat Jack’s Raeon Launcher in individual games. The dude’s aiming is too accurate.

Also found another piece of software to run my site on. WordPress has been great, but it’s only a blog tool, not a CMS like Textpattern, something I’m inclined to try out after I read Jon Hick’s conversion of his site from MovableType to Textpattern. Right now my site runs on two separate WP installations, and I was going to install another one just to run my family section (which hasn’t been finalized since the many moons this site has been up) but I figure it’s too tedious a task to upload, reconfigure databases and tweak individual code each time I need to change something.

Been also trying to catch whatever glimpses of Euro 2004 that I can. Since the England match, I’ve only managed to catch Sweden vs Italy. Fantastic game, with a wondergoal from Sweden’s Ibramovich. Was going to catch the Spain vs Portugal game this morning, but was a little too freaked out from my Marketing paper. The fact that it was at 5am didn’t help as well. Heh, at least Portugal got through this group stage.

Also watched a couple of movies, Love Actually and 50 First Dates. Love Actually is a British comedy with a star studded cast. It brings the lives of several people together all with different agendas in love related matters. It’s funny, really, and Keira Knightley is so pretty! 50 First Dates was an okay watch, Adam Sandler has a different kind of humour which is also entertaining, but the premise of this story was a little far fetched.

Melbourne weather has been dready as usual. Cold, rainy, windy, plainly dismal. Heh, all my pent up thoughts for the week. Time to go cram the last of my brain juices with marketing terms and concepts. Exam’s in 2 hours +.

It Depends on Who You’re Cheering On

I was shocked at the final result for the France vs England match…

The night started out colder than usual. Even at 5am, you could not turn the fans away. The least crowded pub that showed soccer matches was full to the brim, and the bouncers were turning away further people from entering. Me and Jack then tried our luck at another pub, only to stand watching the first half in the freezing cold outside. Heh, this combination of freezing cold outside and overcrowded pub inside led to condensation of the windows. We had to rap on the windows for the people inside to wipe the water off the window so that we could still get a view of the match transpiring over the big screen.

At least I managed to see Beckham’s amazing cross curl into the penalty area and the ever amazing Lampard head it in. This was sheer bliss at a time when the odds were stacked against England winning against a superior side (on paper anyway).

At half time, some patrons of the pub left, so the bouncer let us in. Heh, what comes out, must go back in (?) or so it seems.

Anyway, the match unfolded further as the second half started. England’s defense was resilient, and there was a point of excitement when they went on the attack as England was awarded a penalty as Rooney was fouled by Silvestre in the penalty area. A penalty was the perfect opportunity for England to put the French behind them. However, lady luck wasn’t on England’s side. Beckham was the penalty taker and his kick was anticipated by Barthez who palmed the ball away.

It didn’t seem too important at the moment that Beckham missed the spot kick. England was still one up and by the 89th minute, victory was surely in hand. Then the unimaginable happened as it all unravelled.

Heskey made a foul on Viera (I think) just outside the penalty box. Zidane went on to take the free kick and converted the ball into a goal. In under 2 minutes, another mistake was committed as Steven Gerrard cleared the ball back to his own goal post. The ever ready Henry pounced on the opportunity. I believe David James was taken unawares and his attempt to tackle the ball out was badly timed, as the Frech striker tumbled over. Were you an English fan at that instant, your heart would probably sink into the abyss. Zidane took the penalty. David James fell to the wrong side, and the rest is history.

An entire 90 minutes worth of hard work on England’s side evaporated in just under 3 minutes. I wanted to blame Heskey for conceding the free kick, Gerrard for not clearing the ball properly. Alas, I decided that it was an unfair judgement on them. Zidane was brilliant in his execution of both the free kick and penalty. This is the world of soccer I guess.

Looking back, I recall a similar match. It was the Champion’s League final in 1999. I wasn’t a big soccer fan then, and hardly knew what offside was. Heh. Bayern Munich led with an early goal and was destined to win the European Cup. Their defense was impeccable and Manchester United was lack lustre in offense. It was the substitution of Solkjaer that brought the change. United suddenly came alive and in the 90th minute, Bayern conceded a corner. A kick later and GOAL! Then Teddy Sheringham came on in the dying moments of the game, and another goal from a corner kick materialized. United sealed their victory in the most amazing fashion and won the treble of the Premiership, the FA Cup and the Champion’s League that season.

The United fans at the pub I were celebrating at the top of their lungs, while on the television screen you could see the Bayern players crying on the pitch. This was not to be, so while I was jubilant in 1999, I wasn’t yesterday.

The stakes aren’t as high for the match yesterday as England can still overcome this defeat if they beat Croatia and Switzerland to qualify for the next round of Euro 2004. I just hope that lady luck is on their side in the next match.