taiwan here I come...
Hope everything goes well for the trip. After all the hassle of getting my passport renew-ed, I just hope nothing more troublesome can occur (except for the fact that I'll be super lost with all the shi-shi-sha-sha biao zhun mandarin going on). 
Losing your IC, while having to use that IC to collect your passport (which is already due on tat day to secure you a flight ticket), and having to worry about a camp at the same time is not exactly an experience you want to go through during the holidays. Bout me losing my IC...it's a whole long story which i shall try to re-enact...

Monday: Supposed to hand in my passport by this day. But...wonderfully brilliant me just realized that it's gonna expire in 2 months time, so got to renew it. Happily travel to some secluded shopping centre near Sogo to do it. You would think that a big city like KL would have a more organized or at least recognizable immigration office. But it was located in this dingy building which must have been there since WW I.

Tues:  Woke up at 7am, to get my passport and then fax it over to the travel agency to get my flight ticket. and all must be done before the camp meeting at 10.30am. Happily travel to the secluded shopping centre again, only to realize : oh, where's my IC? must have left it in Vista. Came back, ransacked the whole apartment, no IC!! panick...panick...panick...no IC, no passport, no taiwan. no IC, no Broga Camp. no IC, passport left hanging in the immigration office, no form of identification for Goh Aik Ying. Yey, wonderful.

Tues noon: Went all the way to Kepong (kudos to Jack :> ) to Jabatan Pendaftaran, hopefully to get a temporary IC, then hopefully to rush back in time to get my passport. Horrors to horrors...there was a 3 hour queue. so now, secured temporary IC, no passport, no Taiwan.

Tues eve:  Thank God travel agency said they can wait...

Wed - Fri: Broga camp...which went on great, thankfully.

Fri Noon: Supposed to go collect passport. But Tim decided to make my life more colourful and got involved in an accident. Eh wait...it was not Tim's fault that it happened and we didn't need to go to the accident site anyway. So due to human nature of being busybody (which is totally understandable), we spent 1 hr there and in the end, set off late to collect my passport. And then, traffic jam for 2 hrs confirmed that I was not fated to get my passport. No Taiwan!!

Sat - Sun: Spent praying hard that I can still get my air ticket.

Mon Morn: Yey! Passport collected, transported straight to travel agency, air ticket issued. hehe...all ends well...thank God, literally.

I'm becoming more and more chiong hei. A simple story has filled up 3 quarters of my blog entry. What a doink.
Trying hard to finish the Chinese Medicine book that the Taiwanese lecturer sent us. But I'm reading the dictionary more than the book. Not touched a single Chinese book since 7 years ago. To make things worse, the book is written in old chinese characters. But it's quite entertaining...getting in touch with my Chinese roots again. Shall summon all my courage and try chou dou fu when I'm there.