Lunch with Will

Creepy restaurant, scary...oOooOoOO...
It was raining on the way there, so got a cab. The cabby was this idiot that just had to go against everything you asked. Haiz, forget it.


Amazing acar! good stuff. Probably the best thing around here.


The boy.


We were sitting near the tanks and this waiter guy came out of nowhere with a bucket and a net, got one out and it started flapping inside the bucket. Sad life, these fish.


Supposedly shark's fin soup. Got real crab meat inside. Yummy sticky stuff.


The cold plate, but with all that fried stuff, looks more like a hot plate. The jelly loooking out-of-this-world, alien-egg-looking thing was interesting.


Flied lice. Normal.


The fish, dead and delicious. They call it Patin. Best served steamed. The stomach area is the best part, because of the smooth textured meat. I ate both stomach areas up, because no one else wanted it. Dr Li said the head was the best part but failed to touch it.


Reconstituted chicken meat. Supposedly, they took out the chicken meat, minced it, made cake like pieces, and fried it with a little piece of real chicken skin. However, the taste seems more like fish cake, dissapointing. Teren the chicken lover had to do with the chicken wing, which is real meat.


Fish paste fried with tofu, not bad, especially when eaten with the sweet-sour sauce provided.


Dessert; fried yam paste in crispy coating. Not bad, not too sweet, and the yam paste is very thick.


Conclusion: stomachs got filled.

the coke guide

Behold! the 20cents coke machine. Bow in awe everybody!
I kid you not, it is 20 cents for one cup of drink.


Located in NUH, funny thing is, why do they sell cheap coke to the doctors when the doctors are earning tons of money, it should be like $1 for a cup there.
Below is my steaming hot cup of Milo. Its supposed to be full, but I obviously drank some up so that it wouldnt spill when i carry it around. Almost burnt my tongue, though...


After the 20 cents experience, I wanted to know how much everybody else were charging. Frist stop, the coke machine outside med library level 2.


80cents for a can of coke. 90cents for green tea.



Second stop, vending machines outside med library level 1.


Cup drinks! But 50 cents each, and its the same size as the one I just got for 20 cents. What a rip off. Do the companies really think that students are richer than doctors?

Still, the one here offers far more choices; milo with ice, horlics hot and cold, orange juice, etc.
So you gotta pay for choice.


Last stop, the new machine outside lab. Qoo is $1 per can. The most expensive drink around. Coke is still 80 cents- kinda like a standard price everywhere.

My conclusion? You can't find your cup of tea anywhere, the freedom to choose will cost you, and Coke is always the frist drink on the machine - scroll back up to spot the 'coke' all over the place, especially at the first spot. Pah, monopoly.

machine

What's this? A new tantalizing temptation outside the lab? Productivity will decrease!

Modeling

Department gimmic to entice the young naive ones to commit their entire life to the cause of science. Here's the set up. Flaviboy got enslaved, no, recruited for the glory of this goal. Had to pretend I was joyfully using the centrifuge. The rotor weighed a ton. The other lablings were smart enough to siam when the cameraman came in. Don't have any shots of the real picture, supposedly it will come late next week.

lab

Looks familiar?

Honors poster

Some time ago, these people had a poster presentation for their honours thingy. Here are the pics. Teren doesn't want to give up his pic so you have to do with one of him in the lab. Please note the never seen before long sleeve shirt and pants!!

Jas:


Mich:


Ben:


Teren in a SHIRT!!!!

Shower for the eyes

More new stuff in the lab.
New taps and new eye washes and new showers. New taps on old sinks in the labs. New taps on new sinks at the common areas. New eye washes on every sink. New shower at the corridor.

Dirty eyes? Wash them, soap sold seperately:


New tap with new eye wash. This time, the flaps are open. Just press the handle:


Hold it up like this, pull up the heavy thing and press the handle, flaps will open downwards and water will come out....oOoOOo...


The common lab shower facility. Pull handle and water comes out. Once again, soap sold seperately. Shower curtain not provided.



This is how the thing looks like operationally.

nanonanonano

new nanopure filter at level 1!!!
No need to go all the way up to level 3 anymore.

Before:

During:

After:

Check out the complete specs --> here

Poster Colloquia

The second and third day of the conference had this poster session after lunch where the poster owners had to explain to a gathered crowd what his/her work was about. The second day was great, the crowd was pretty big and people were engaging. The third day was abit sad. Some posters only had the session-in-charge person and 1 or 2 more people listening. Here are pictures from the second day:

R. Kuhn: don't you ever ever scoup my work, or you will pay for it. You heard that?!


P. Young's nose and C.C. King's hunched back:


My poster is the best! My poster is the best!


IMHO, the most interesting poster. A group is using small pigs as animal models for dengue!! Isn't that so cool? After every round of experiments, you get a mini feast! Pork chop, roast, spare ribs, bak kut teh, kuey chap, chee kiok chow, char siew.

More even-more photos from the conference

So, after lunch, we had dinner.
Oh yeah, between that two major events, we had some talks.
Check out this super good AFM of some purified protein. So clear!


Before dinner, the group gathers for a photo (some of the girls were at the ladies so are not in this pic):


Ok, highlight of the day, DINNER!!!
Ham, salmon, some weird but tasty soup, and some other meats. Got more dishes but forgot to take a pic of them. Oh well...



This one is good - soursop coctail, excellent stuff, but Dr. Li didn't like it.

Even more pictures from the conference

Day 2 pictures!
We started out at Biopolis Matrix hall for half a day with some pretty good talks and Prof got a surprise bouquet of flowers. Here's Mr. Gubler giving the flowers to her.




Eva Harris! Amazing talk, erm... but abit too fast. Kinda forgot what she said...


Nevermind, here's a slide to remind me what she was talking about.


So, after a few more talks yadda yadda yadda, we got on charted buses and headed to Orchard Hotel for the remainder of the day. Oh, we were at Biopolis because one of the main sponsors is located there. Yes, we all know which one. At the hotel, first thing to do was EAT!
Minestrone soup, fresh greens, smoked salmon, cod, salads. yum.


From this, you know who was hungry and who was not so hungry, hhahhahha:



More food; chicken, veges, some curry, pineapple and I think that's potato salad; sorry, was not thinking, just eating:



Justin the fantastic post doc:



to be continued...

2nd PDVI conference

Orchard hotel from Tuesday to Friday. Photos from Tuesday opening night.

As usual, good (and pretty) food:



Have you tried my cheesecake before? I bake you one cake, you give me one virus strain, good deal, yes?


When grandfather talks, everyone listens.



Chicken out:


Oh yes, the glossy poster:



"...and I left it overnight and the next day, a giant mutant virus as yellow as my beer and this big was crawling around inside the incubator..."