Life in Timisoara

Timisoara, the third largest city in Romania, and one of the wealthiest city. I guess that's the reason why I choose Timisoara. We all know that Romania is dangerous with gypsies and pickpockets, well, I would like to avoid all that!

let's begin with the routine life here. well, all of us have been assigned to work in an institution, but unfortunately not all the institution are functioning! I have friends who sleep til 2pm in the afternoon and have lunch after 3pm, sleeps around 4am after clubbing. that's their summer.

I've tried to construct my summer holiday to be better than that by waking before 12 pm,  have my lunch between 12 to 1pm, work and finally sleep around 12 am.

nothing much in this city because most of the attractions are under construction! that's a really sad thing as we couldn't see the best of Timisoara within our stay, hence,  Iulius mall became our first choice place to visit! 

                I introduce you, Iulius mall!

A mall with the biggest hypermarket in town, Auchan, with big brands like H&M and Zara, a big food court and a big cinema!

it has become the EPs first choice of visit as we all have to do our grocery, buy ingredients for dinner, entertained, and hide from the sun and rain.

well, some little thing that I've noticed during my stay in Romanian. They love coffee! There are coffee machines almost everywhere serving all kind of instant coffee with only one lei per cup! The Romanian simply love it. They have to take a cup of coffee from the machine whenever it's possible. besides that, most of the driver in Romania are gentle. They will stop for pedestrian to cross the road even there's no traffic light. its a good habit that they have. speaking of good habit, well, one of the habit that the Romanian have that I hate the most is, they love smoking! they smoke everywhere, even indoors and public area, they couldn't stop smoking, and smoking seems to be the national habit of Romania! I wonder have they ever learn about the harm of smoking.

With that, it basically sums up my life in Timisoara.

My dorm in Timisoara

I'm going to talk about the life here.

so i'm staying with another 4 people in my room and I'm sleeping on the upper bed of the double-decker. its a multiracial room as I have an Italian,  an Indian,  a Ukrainian, and a Turkish in my room. here are some photos of my room

well, it's not tidy and clean. I have been sleeping with cockroaches for weeks and as you can see, the room is messy, nothing of it belongs to me!

The worse part is the toilet! I'm going to talk about the bathroom  first. although guys and girl's bathroom are seperated,  but there's no doors to seperate every shower room! there are five shower rooms in the boys bathroom, and if you are using the first one, four of the other will walk by your shower room, and because there's no door, your naked body is exposed to them! god! I have been struggling for almost 3 minutes before I decided to use the bathroom for the first time. but we'll,  it all goes well, as most of the guys doesn't really bath! haha

 

and as for the toilet, well, guys and girls are sharing the same toilet. I've once seen a sanitary pad unwrapped in the rubbish bin with blood on it. OMG, and also, cockroaches! I couldn't believe I've made it for 6 freaking weeks!

The kitchen is nothing better either! those EPs never wash their dish and clean up the kitchen after using, and it's always dirty. because of the budget problem, the Asians decided to cook for dinner every weekdays, well, we became the main people responsible to clean up the kitchen.

well, I have so much to blame, but still, overall it's a different experience staying in such a dirty dorm. anyway, it's free of charge, I've seen worse accommodation that Aiesecers provided for EPs!

ReBranders

So let's put my travel stories aside, first, let me blog about my exchange experience.

I've signed up for exchange through AIESEC last year, and have already decided to go Europe. Found a good project to attend in April and Here I am, Timisoara, Romania.

ReBranders, the name of my project, and the name speaks itself. It is a career development internship, whereby we (exchange participant) have to help our assigned institution on re-branding and establishing new marketing strategic.

I was assigned to work with Muzeul Consumatorului Comunist, a start up museum of consumer item in the communist ere. The owner owns a pub in the same time, so we are allowed to work in his pub, with a flexible working time. I love the pub, it's decorated in an artistic way, but the down side is that there is no non-smoking area. The highlight of the pub is, it's decorated with things that can be found in the 70s, those are all antiques now!

There's also a theater in the pub, a black box theater, which is really small, but somehow it adds on the sense or feel of art in this pub! before i met the owner, i thought that I'm going to work for the theater, which I'll be more than happy to do so! Well, I'm working for the museum now, which is challenging for me, because it's a start up, what he need is all about designs and stuff.

That's all for now. Will be blogging about the lifestyle in Europe!

MyLDS 2014

OH finally I'm willing to blog about MyLDS after so long!

Why did I joined MyLDS? Well, the one and only reason is to widen my network. Yes, I've been missing a lot of AIESEC gathering and I barely know anyone outside iGIP(my AIESEC department). I took up this Global Villager position in the chief delegate team, which I'm really regretted before pre pre MyLDS. 

It took me a lot of time, doing preparations, meetings, this and that. And I'm actually frustrated with all these job especially during my finals. I couldn't believe why I commit into this in the first place!

I survived!

until pre pre MyLDS, I finally found my sense of belonging. Sad but true, after weeks of meetings and I only found my sense of belonging to the team? Time went by, from being uncomfortable with literary EVERYONE to being one of the team, making new friends and doing crazy things together.

Flashback!

Dear dear~ Its already the final half an hour before 2014 and I've just started to blog!

So what to blog about? Well, 2013 is really a good year to me, perhaps one of the most meaningful year in my life! Lets go through my timeline!

January: I've just came back from my Hong Kong trip with my family and STPM is over! I'm enjoying every moment of my life!

February: So I went to Sarawak, and this is my first phrase of my backpacking experience! being host by a local Chinese Sarawakien and met two friends from Sweden!

March: Went to Beijing with my mum in early March, first time traveling alone with my mum, and I'm the guide! It's freezing cold over there, too bad the snow was melting.
I went to Cambodia during mid March, alone! this is my second phrase of my backpacking trip, and also first time traveling abroad alone! backpack with two foreign friends, one from Canada and one from France. STPM result was released during my last day in Cambodia. I was so nervous! I received a few message congratulating me before I gain internet access to check my result. I got 4As! although not 4 solid As, but I was so happy! This is like a miracle! I cycle with a ranted bike with joy to Angkor Wat again(half an hour away from my hotel), just for the sake of my merryness! That moment is so special, my whole cycling journey is covered by my overwhelming joy, and I'll never forget!

Merry Christmas in UUM 2013

So this is the Youtube link to a video i made during Christmas Eve, a random act of kindness, the crazy thing I've been talking about in my previous post. Enjoy ~

Christmas Christmas!

Merry Christmas!!!
A blink of an eye huh? It's already the end of December!

So I'm experiencing a very different kind of Christmas this year, I'm having my finals!
Oh god!
Anyway, I'm driving to school recently, so I'm driving back to Penang to celebrate Christmas after my paper.
Can you believe it? I'm having Management exam on Christmas eve! 500 pages to cover! But I'm consider lucky compare to my friends, they are having two papers today!

So in order to create a holiday atmosphere among all those book reading zombie, I wore a Christmas hat into the examination hall! wahahaha! I'm so crazy man! but yeah! it's Christmas! like, who cares!

I managed to get over it, the examiners didn't ask me to take off my hat. One of the examiner even asked me my name and tease me that he taught I'm Santa Claus. haha

Santa Claus is coming to town yo!

Hey, while writing this post, an idea suddenly pop up from my mind, why not I give out candies outside the examination hall? A random act of kindness! What do you think about it? :)