I will be away to Taiwan for a total of 18 days from the 15th December 2008 (Monday) to the 1st January 2009 (Thursday).

My flight, SQ878, will depart on the 15th December 2008 at 12:25pm and I will be coming back via the flight, SQ877, on the 1st January 2009, reaching Singapore at 6:45pm.

During this period, http://forums.lesterchan.net will be in a read-only mode, meaning you can only search and read topics/replies. Registration of new account, replying to an existing topic and posting a new topic will be DISABLED.

I WILL NOT entertain any WordPress support questions that are sent to me via email during this period as well.

Been watching dog movies for the past 2 weeks! Caught Beverly Hills Chihuahua last week and Bolt yesterday. Both was not bad but Bolt stands out more. If I had to just choose 1 dog movie to watch, I will choose Bolt. It is funny and touching at the same time whereas for Chihuahua, the storyline is quite predictable.

My Taiwan trip is confirmed, departing on the 15th December 2008 (Monday) at 12:25pm on SQ878 and coming back on the 1st January 2009 (Thursday), reaching Singapore at 18:45 on SQ877. My dad asked me to come back the same day as him so that my mom do not need to make 2 trips and so happen that the timing is about the same too. My dad will reach Singapore at about 18:00 on 1st January 2009. We will also be at the same Terminal (Terminal 3) as well as his flight is also SQ (Singapore Airlines).

I have revamp FRRO layout to the previous design as it is brighter and cleaner. The three of us came to a consensus that is is nice and I just port the old design (which is not based on WordPress) to be a WordPress theme within a day.

WordPress 2.7 will be out next week, hopefully I will have the time to release my plugins before I go Taiwan, if not it will be on 2nd January 2009 onwards.

My year 3, semester 1 exams are over! Yesterday was my last paper, CS4254 – IS Project Management. The paper was the most difficult paper for me in this semester and even most of my friends say so. We did the past year paper and it was much easier even though it is set by the same lecturer.

Will be heading down to SITEX 2008 later at 12pm to hoot the Samsung 2233SW 22” widescreen LCD monitor for SGD$239 for Li Xiang. That is really a good buy. It boost a resolution nearly of a 24″ widescreen monitor of 1920 x 1080, an aspect ratio of 16:9 and a 5ms response time. Click here for the full specifications.

I will be leaving to Taiwan on the 14th December 2008 and coming back on the 31st December 2008. The first 6 days 5 nights will be a tour package and after that we will extend free and easy till the 31st December 2008. The flight is by Singapore Airlines (SQ). This will be my 2nd time taking SQ, the last time I took was to KL at least 15 years ago or so.

I think after I come back from Taiwan, my mandarin will definitely be improved!

Been a long time since I blogged about my personal life because there is nothing much to blog about. Also I have not watched any movie for the past 1 month plus! The last movie that I watched was The Dark Knight in KL!

School
Just ended my first week of school. It is a 4 day week for me where Monday is my off day. Just when I thought I have to take 4 exams for this semester, I was wrong, the new module CS3361 do not have an exam! Our lecturer who is the CTO of IBM Singapore, told us this piece of good news today. So now I have 3 papers to study for and my last date of my examination is 27th November 2008.

Taiwan
I will be going to Taiwan with Li Xiang during December. My mom got 2 free tickets for a 6 days 5 nights trip to Taiwan as she bought 2 lorries for her office and each lorry is entitled to 1 ticket. Li Xiang and I was thinking of extending the trip to about 2 weeks instead of just 6 days so that we can explore more. Hopefully we are able to do it. Keeping my fingers cross.

Wanted to wait till I am in Taiwan before I get the Asus EEE PC, but apparently the price difference is not that great. According to some online site I checked, it is just a different of SGD$50 and the keyboard layout maybe in Chinese and Taiwan has different voltage from Singapore. Since there are so many factors to consider, I think I shall get my netbook in Singapore. Now I am considering between Dell, Lenovo and Asus. Dell and Lenovo will launch their netbook soon.

Comex 2008
Comex 200 will take place on the 28th August 2008 till 31st August 2008 at Suntec City Exhibition Center (entire levels 1, 2, 3, 4 and 6). The opening hours is from 12pm to 9pm.

Thinking of getting the D-Link DNS-323 (2-Bay Network Storage Enclosure) and along with a 1TB Western Digital Harddisk Drive for my home. The DNS-323 is running on Linux and hence I can do a great deal of stuff on it like use it as a Torrenting machine, FTP server and even a Web Server.

Going to get Li Xiang a USB mouse as her mouse gave up on her a few months back.

Apple iPhone 3G
Singtel will be announcing the price plan for Apple iPhone 3G next week before officially releasing it on 22th August 2008. I have gotten all the documents (authorization letter and my mom’s NRIC) ready for me to jump ship from M1 to Singtel. Apparently when doing the true number portability from one operator to another operator, the account name must be the same for both operators. My M1 line is under my mom’s name and hence when I use the true number portability in Singtel, I need to apply under my mom’s name as well and not mine.

The funny thing is that my mom is using my name for her Singtel line as last time when I was in National Service (NS), they offered discounted plans for NSF and hence my mom switch it to under my name.

My M1 plan will end officially on 24th August 2008 and Singtel will launch the iPhone on the 22nd August 2008. This means that I have to sign up an account with Singtel on the 22nd August 2008 as well. I called Singtel to ask whether 2 days does make a difference in the true number portability as technically my plan with M1 have not ended yet and the CSO said it is fine. Woot!

I am using the iPod Touch and I dare to say that no other devices can come close to the iPod Touch/iPhone in terms of web surfing experience.

With the voice and data plan bundled together with the iPhone, I can surf the Internet wherever I go without worrying about the data charges.

Now the only thing we can hope is Singtel don’t disappoint us with the pricing.

Dad Coming Back For 4 Days
My dad is coming back on the 30th August 2008 for 4 days as there is a long weekend in Vietnam during that week and my dad just need to take 1 day of leave. I have already planned on where to bring my dad go eat to make my dad gain back the weight that he lost in Hanoi.

2 weeks ago, I have already book a table at MELT for Lunch on the 31st August 2008.