Jagarsi

The old dude Jagarsi who has been faithfully serving our lab for the past x years (where x= a big number) is finally retiring due to a heart condition. So the department decided to have a farewell lunch for him. Unfortunately, the dude was sick that day and in hospital and couldn't make it for his own farewell lunch. But the lunch had to go on anyway. Its like the birthday boy missing from the birthday party. Sad huh.
Anyway, went to the Rice Table at Suntec. Decent place serving Indonesian food. The whole department went, the attendance sheet officially stating 71 participants. We came, sat down and waited a long time before being served. They had a choice of lime, orange or sour plum juice: all freeflow. Then came the keropok freeflow. What we dicussed and decided was that the people there were knaves who try to make us drink lots of liquids and then give us lots of keropok so that the keropok expands in the stomach with the fruit juice so we can't eat much later on.
The waiters later came with rice, which everybody took very little of, and then the food in nice identical dishes. About 12-13 varieties. Let me try and remember:

Soto ayam (not the best I've tasted)
pickled cucumber (prof likes it)
Rojak buah (prof says its ok)
curry chicken wing (didn't finish the first serving)
sweet black sauce chicken (so-so)
sayur lemak (ordered twice)
tahu telur (TOO OILY!!!)
satay ayam (yum, the thick sweet peanut sauce)
rendang (I personally ate two servings of it)
curry prawn (a favourite)
lady's finger (not bad)
sweet and sour fish (good)
kangkung belacan (good)
otak otak (so-so)


...hmmm....about 14, but have this feeling I missed out one or two.
Anyway, half way through the feast, the HOD gave a speech on how much money in grants the dept has got and how well we are all working and how much harder we must work now, etc. etc.
Then we got back to eating.
But I pitty the people sitting at the HOD's table. Can't enjoy a good lunch. Coz the people there will be too paiseh to eat alot and scared if they order more, the HOD think they glutton or something, and so pretend to be full after the first strand of kangkung.
But my table boh kiek kee. Order the prawns 4 times, satay 3 times, salad, fish, otak...everything take second round, and finish up all. We all is high performance one. Muahahaha....


Ok, ok, pictures:


Nice ambiance:






The ploy:


Why so few choices?


The spread:




Josie's first round:


Soto ayam:


My second round:


Bhu refuses to finish up the curry:


The HOD's table; sorry guys, no second rounds:


Ahhemm....




Escape!:


Trying to fit back a broken branch:






After lunch, we still had an hour to roam around suntec before the bus came to pick us back to campus:


Two of the staffs decided to get a haircut, and the whole department was outside watching... the poor hairdresser, must have been super stressed:


Yup, like I said, the WHOLE department watching one guy get his hair cut:

New air conds

After the central air cond failed some time back, the pressure on the window units found at the general heavy equiptment lab increased. The frequent breakdowns of the air conds caused many in the lab to break sweat. Thus, the department had no choice but to fix the air conds. So the day came when workers lined up outside the yellow doors:


Workers in the general equiptment area. They had to open up the false ceiling, take out the old air cond ducts, put in new air cond ducts, made a mess of the whole place.


The old air cond ducts. Someone should culture some of that stuff on petri dishes. Could open a zoo I think...


The new Mr.Slim Mitsubishi units. I guess its a 2.5 horsepower. There were 4 units installed. Supposedly they are going to close the doors that lead from the main lab corridor to this general lab area. So the corridor will still be hot while the general lab will be freezing antarctica.

Old shaking incubators

The 4 old controled thermal shakers have been taken away. To replace it next month, there will be 3 new units of the Sartorious coming in. Those new units will be stackable and half the size of the old ones, so it will only occupy the same footspace as ONE old unit. Talk of real estate potential! The workers seemed to have a hard time getting the old units out. They were sweating and toiling, maybe partly because of the faulty central air cond. hahah.... free sauna.

First unit:


First unit gone, second one waiting in turn:


Second unit:


No. 3 and No.4:


After all 4 were gone, we decided to rearrange the chest freezers to widen the walking space: