Journeys in Life, One At A Time; Currently: Life in South Korea
Friday, June 29, 2007
Stuck in Halifax Airport. This Sucks!
I am currently experiencing the most exciting day of my week.
We got to the airport around 6 15 am today, just to find out that our flight was canceled. We stood in line for about half hour at United's check-in counter, not knowing this had happened.
Now we have to fly through Toronto, then to Chicago. We don't have a flight from Chicago to Cedar Rapids, which was where we flew out from.
I guess me and my coworker are in for a road trip.
But wait, that's not all! I am definitely gonna miss my buddy's wedding rehearsal tonight at 6 30 pm. His bride is so gonna kill me tomorrow.
But, as a man who always looks at the bright side of things, I managed to find something to brighten my day. And that something is a 1.5 lbs lobster!
Although I am gonna be busy this weekend with band practice and a wedding rehearsal, I am still super excited.
My buddy Carls is getting married this Saturday and I got the honor to be the MC at the reception. I have never done that before, but I am up for the challenge. I just have to talk good about my buddy and that should be it. :)
I am also super duper pumped about this IFC event that we are doing on the 4th of July. It's gonna be super cool and tight, cause we are gonna have a band, skit, food, games, and fireworks!
For those of you who don't know yet about this great event, here is the info about it:
AMERICAN
INDEPENDENCE DAY
CELEBRATION
Wednesday, July 4
6:00-8:30 PM—COOKOUT/BARBECUE Brookside Park(just northeast of the ISU campus) Hickory Shelter (northwest park shelter near old red fire truck)
foodlmusiclprogramlfunlcost = $2
9:30-10:30 PM—FIREWORKS Intramural field north of Hilton Coliseum Across from the IowaStateCenter on Lincoln Way
I can't believe that I am actually going home tomorrow. My flight will leave around 7 20 am, and it's about 12 38 am right now. I am so excited! I have been gone for 3 weeks and it will just feel so good to be home!
Our demo went well today, and our client was happy with the result. We left site around 5 30 pm, and hunted down some lobsters for dinner. Unfortunately the restaurant called "Lobster Ranch" that we hunted down for was closed down and didn't even exist anymore. Bummer!
So we went to Riverside Pub instead. They had seafood pasta night today and all three of us ordered that.
Talk about some fresh seafood! The shrimp and scallops were so fresh. They were de-li-ci-ous!
Then we went back to the hotel and had some drinks to celebrate our getting-out-of-this-place.
We stayed at the hotel bar for about 4 hours, talking about work stuff and random stuff.
I am freaking beat right now. I am still deciding whether or not I should sleep. I would have to get up around 5 am if I do sleep. Hmmmmm, we'll see how long my eyes can stay open tonight....
Denzel Washington and My Saturday (Definitely Irrelevant.....)
Denzel Washington is definitely one of the best actors out there. He's been my favorite ever since I saw one of his movies for the first time. I think that was Crimson Tide. Then there was John Q, Man on Fire, The Manchurian Candidate, Inside Man, to name a few. His movies are never disappointing.
I just finished watching Deja Vu. And as you can guess, it is another outstanding movie that is worth watching.
Aside from watching a movie today, I had to go to my client's site and work for 8 hours! I can definitely understand someone's feeling right now, when her boss calls her to come in on Saturday or Sunday. Hahaha.
But I did fix a lot of things today. There was a bug in my code that was just so irritating. After hours and hours of debugging and testing here and there, I finally fixed it.
I am not a big fan of working on the weekends. But, you just got to do what you got to do, right?
And as my dad always puts it: "Do you want to eat rice or not? If you do, get up and work. If you don't, then sleep and starve." Alright, Dad, I got you. Lol.
Guess what? I ate at KFC again today. I think that was my 7th KFC meal during my 11 days here. And I am pretty sure that was NOT gonna be the last time I would eat there.
Hahaha. I am feeling super healthy already! Oh yeah babe! :P
Here I am again, sitting in my hotel room, talking to my laptop. I was not that excited when I found out last week that I would be spending a weekend in Halifax.
Today I drove around the hotel's neighborhood to see if anything cool was happening. There was a carnival right across the street, but I wasn't in the mood to check it out. So I went to eat dinner instead. :)
My dinner was pretty crappy. I ate at a Vietnamese restaurant close to the hotel and ordered the house special pho (a pho is basically a type of noodle soup that is often accompanied by lots of meat (beef, pork, tendon, seafood, etc, you name it), bean sprouts, and some herb for garnishing. Ta-da! The pho was nothing close to being special......Instead, it was super tasteless that I had to pour a lot of soy sauce that really made the soup looked so dark brown and gross. Hehe. Nevertheless, it didn't really improve the taste.
The bride tells her husband, "Honey, you know I'm a virgin and I don't know anything about sex. Can you explain it to me first?"
"OK, Sweetheart. Putting it simply, we will call your private place 'the prison' and call my private thing 'the prisoner'. So what we do is: put the prisoner in the prison.
And then they made love for the first time.
Afterwards, the guy is lying face up on the bed, smiling with satisfaction.
Nudging him, his bride giggles, "Honey the prisoner seems to have escaped."
Turning on his side, he smiles. "Then we will have to re-imprison him."
After the second time they spent, the guy reaches for his cigarettes but the girl, thoroughly enjoying the new experience of making love, gives him a suggestive smile, "Honey, the prisoner is out again!"
The man rises to the occasion, but with the unsteady legs of a recently born foal.
Afterwards, he lays back on the bed, totally exhausted.
She nudges him and says, "Honey, the prisoner escaped again."
Limply turning his head, He YELLS at her, "Hey, its not a life sentence, OKAY!"
US Consulate General in Halifax (highly recommended)
Today, I went to the US Consulate General in Halifax for renewing my H1B visa stamp. The place was so unbelievably laid back.
I saw 4 people who were late by at least 15 minutes! And they still let them in, with a smile! That is so unheard of. It was pretty unbelievable.
Try to be late on your visa appointment in Jakarta, Indonesia. Good luck! You will be very lucky if they (by they, I am referring to the not-so-smart-yet-cocky people who work guarding the front doors) don't yell right at your ear, telling you to go home and get the heck out of there, with all the snottiness and cockiness imaginable.
All I am saying is, you will be better off if you can do your visa thing in Calgary or Halifax. I did my first H1B visa stamp in Calgary. It was nice too. Halifax is for H1B renewal. They don't do first time H1B visa stamp.
Anyway, that's all the tidbits I've got about US visa. Hopefully this helps everyone who is looking to do the same thing.
OK, I guess I am not ready for bed yet. I am sitting in my hotel room, kinda feeling home sick. It hasn't been a day yet but I already miss home and my friends.
We always have a great time on the weekends, just hanging out together. We rarely do anything special, really. Just hanging out, talking, play cards, goof around, etc. But it's always good.
I am always grateful for them. OK, it's time to stop being cheesy. :P
Getting up early on Sundays is just not fun. Especially when you have to do it for work. I had to do that this morning to catch a flight to Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. Not to mention the 2 hour drive that I had to do to get to the airport. But it's all good. I made it to Halifax with no hassle.
Arrived in town around 7 pm, local time. Took the rental car, went straight to the hotel. Ate a fancy dinner, called Wendy's. :P
