Hot Air Balloon Ride

What a way to end the year with a hot air balloon ride at Taman Tasik Titiwangsa. (Trust me, I heard you when you say what a place to welcome the new year)

Hot Air Balloon

Trying To “Get It Up”

Well, don’t get me wrong but I had a different agenda there which is to take my first ever air balloon ride which to me was great. We were there too early and waited a while before seeing a glimpse of people resembling what we would consider a crew setting up the air balloon opposite the stadium. (And yes… there is a stadium at Titiwangsa)

They started slow with assembling the air balloon together and had to rush to keep up with time. It was a challenge for them to get the balloon up because of the wind. The RM 50.00 per person price tag should be worth if for the amount of effort and sweat they put in. Look at the first try of getting the hot air balloon up.

The first few attempts was nice to watch but it turned out boring when it took them almost an hour later to bring the first bunch up to the sky. Finally it was our turn. To all girls, don’t wear any skirt because it makes it harder for you to enter the basket.In The Balloon

All In And Ready To Go

This was put together by Skyevents. A one year old company which I believe have the niche market in Malaysia dominated. They better make best use of it before another competitor comes in. A majority of their crew are from the middle east.

The event although very badly organized was overcome by my excitement of being in an air balloon. Song Yia insisted that I am following the foot steps of my idol, Sir Richard Branson.

Despite the delays, we were quite lucky to be able to go up to the sky as the ride after ours was canceled because of the rain. Full refunds were handed back to participants who missed out.

Happy New Year!!!

Face Recognition With Myheritage.com

Deep down inside I always knew I look like a celebrity. (Yet another shameless self acclaimed) Well, Myheritage.com will be a testimony to the statement this time around.

Myheritage.com

I discovered Myheritage.com from stalking a peers blog like where I usually find interesting websites to immortalize my presence on the internet. =P

The Israel based company was started by a team who was passionate about Genealogy. The website has a full service ranging from free web generators to family tree products.

Although it requires registration to use the site, it pays off as there are a few cool face recognition tools to mess around in Myheritage.com which includes a comparison of a celebrity look a like and Morph which slowly transform your face to the celebrity that you apparently look most a alike to.

Here are some collage that I generated from the above mentioned tools.

Celebrity Look A Like

It is a bit of a concern that I look more like a chick. I was expecting Brad Pitt, Keanu Reeves and David Beckham to show up but it turned out otherwise. I do not whether this is indicating that I have more feminine look which usually is the characteristics of the now popular Metrosexuals.

MORPH

I should have used a picture with me wearing a baseball cap to make the morphing effect more convincing. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find one.

In a nutshell, this is another cool website and if you have nothing to do on a lazy weekend, head on to the site and have fun. Do let me know you turn out to be like.

Cheers!

Create Your Own Game at Pictogame.com

Another discovery of a personalized flash content for self worshipers like me. This time, it is no longer a mere animated flash video but a game. You heard me right, an interactive game that you can share with your blog visitors.

I would like to present to you all Pictogame.com. This free to use website requires registration to store your created masterpiece.

The website is very straight forward to use with a step by step wizard like guide. I created the games below in less than 5 minutes and 3 simple steps. There were tons of games to choose from but I produced the ones below as examples.

Dancing Game

Sniper Game

Once you have created your game, you are given three options:

1) Direct Link to a page on their website where your game is hosted

2) An Embedded Code for your Profile Pages or like the above blog posts. – This is uber cool as you can specify the size you want it to fit your desired content pages

3) A Thumbnail description with link to your game as following:

In a nutshell, this site is another amazing free personalized content creation tool. This are good blog fillers on the days when you have writer’s block.

Be creative and use celebrity pictures instead. Browse through the top created games to be inspired.

Well, enjoy the games above and head on down to Pictogame.com to start creating your own personalized games. =)

Learn Chinese With Nciku.com

Being termed Banana all my life (Yellow on the outside and white on the inside), I always wished that I learned Chinese while I was growing up. I can get away with the basic mandarin but when it is time to carry out a full conversation or put it on paper; I can’t go any further than my name in Chinese characters.

Nciku

I have come across non native speakers of the language and am always embarrass about the fact that I don’t even speak my mother tongue properly. Well, things are about to change with my discovery of Nciku.com! As an added bonus, the site has just recently been revamped with pioneering features in the age of Web 2.0 sites.

Nciku.com is a free online Chinese dictionary with a variety of features as follow:

1. Smart Dictionary Search

Dictionary Search

It works just like any regular search tool, set your learning language to Chinese and let Nciku do all the hard work of finding the equivalent word. If you type in “Apple�, all the relevant Chinese words will appear in the result.

2. Hand Writing Recognition

Hand Writing

This is a very handy tool with a great accuracy and success rate after my personal testing. It allows users to search for the meaning of the characters that they scribble on screen. The drawing area now looks just like those notebooks for learning Chinese characters we are all used to. Also, putting your mouse over the character suggestions you selected triggers a pop up menu for simple identification.

3. Text To Speech

Text to Speech

This is a totally new feature to Nciku.com. You no longer have to worry about pronouncing something wrong, all examples and conversations can be heard in proper pronunciation. Just click on the speaker button, and you can see and hear the pronunciation. Make a conversation and hear it come to life!

4. Keep Notes with Vocab Lists

Vocab Lists

Study notes were upgraded and renamed to vocab lists. No need to click to save a word now, as all words you view in the dictionary are automatically saved to your nciku page. You can move the words to other lists or edit them however much you want. Also, improve your language skills with memorization tests and more print options so you can study on the go!

5. Useful Conversations
Conversations

Learn how to do everything, from opening an account at the bank to buying tickets for the movies, with nciku’s newest main section. Browse conversations by place and topic, or search for words you want to know how to use, then grab any ones you know you will need and they are saved to your personal nciku. Check them out again before you leave home so you’ll never be at a loss for words again.

6. Tons of Other Cool Features

There are heaps of other cool learning aids to accelerate your learning to achieve mastery like a Q&A page, Theme Words and the handy Nciku mini. What are you waiting for! Start visiting the website now to learn more!

In a nutshell, Nciku.com has redefined online learning with the level of sophistication and tools provided. It is like having a learning companion that is always available.

I would like to take the chance to wish the whole team behind Nciku.com well done on their effort and keep up the excellent work!

I will frequent the site to buck up on my Chinese!!!!

JibJab.com

Another cool website I stumbled upon while doing my regular web browsing. This website is called JibJab.com and boasts a whole load of flash animation content. They can be used as personalized e-greeting cards and for blog posts like this one. The cool feature they have are that selected sendables allows you to star in your own flash video movie. Gizmoz.com has this but it took me ages to load.

The site requires registration and you are given $5 worth of free credit to spend on paid flash contents. Also they offer premium content, there are selected stuff which are free just like the following. (I like this a lot as I am in the video with Paris Hilton, Justin Timberlake, Tom Cruise and Lindsay Lohan)

Don’t send a lame Holiday eCard. Try JibJab Sendables!

Have fun and send me the links to your JibJab creations as I would like to see what you have come up with.

Cheers!

Christmas At The Temple

My mom woke me up by giving my mobile a ring. It is unusual that any waves or frequency can penetrate my nuclear bunker like room but somehow, it manages to squeeze through. This must be by some special arrangements with Maxis.

Well, it was 6 in the morning and I was meant to attend a religious celebration at a temple in Puchong whereby it was the anniversary of the temple. I was bored and tired during certain intervals of the ceremony and decided to go snap happy. Here are some of the pictures that I took with my new Sony Ericsson phone.

Temple

Early In The Morning 

Willow Tree

Willow Tree at The Back of The Temple 

Pond

The Pond with Koi Fish

At about noon, we headed home for the next appointment. A Christmas lunch at Rosalind’s place whereby the Turkey was damn amazing. I also got a pair of socks as a present.

That’s all for today and I am going to continue with my beauty sleep.

Cheers,

Benny Ong

Jarrod & Rawlins

J&R

Thanks to the bunch in the office, I will be celebrating Christmas Eve. There is nothing wrong about it but I would either be at home surfing the net and designing websites or sleeping if it wasn’t for them.

The girls decided on the location of Jarrod & Rawlins whereby their choices of sausages and meat are to die for. The concept is whereby you select your choice of fresh sliced meat and sausages from the cold counter as you enter. You have to estimate the amount you wish to eat based on the weight in grams just like how you order your ham at Cold Storage. Once ordered and you have stated your preferred side dish (Mash Potatoes, Fries or Salad), your food will be delivered to your seat when it is ready. To compliment your dining experience, they have a good collection of wine.

There is something called “Dynamite” sausage that I would recommend.

Variety of Sausages

Variety of Sausages & Fries

Meat Meat Meat

Meat Meat Meat

I can swear I tasted something like “Char Siew” and “Siew Yok” from the platter above.

Cleaning Up The Ribs

Cleaning Up The Ribs

The total bill came up to about RM 50.00 per head which was reasonable as we had wine and the stuff pictured above. (The portion may look small but it is deceiving!!!)

That’s all for now and skip the dessert as it is not worth it.

Soscili.com

You might have come across my status on twitter, facebook, friendster or msn about me redesigning my websites. Well, it is true and this is a sneak peak to one of my initial projects.

Soscili.com was originally setup as a free content web page that required no registration to use. It use to provide over 60,000 pages of syndicated content for downloads. It sustains itself from web advertising and I was hoping that the fresh Web 2.0 look and content syndication will reap in more profits to sponsor my other upcoming online ventures.

Here is a quick look at the changes and face lift that has been done to the web page.

Then & Now

I am asking you a favor to drop by the website and have a look at it. Please do give your comments about the site. Do keep in mind that this page is still in soft launch mode. I will launch a full promotion for visitors and hits when it is  fully completed.

If you are looking for a reliable web hosting, do check out Hostonfire.com where this blog and soscili.com is hosted at.

Thanks bunch and it is just a few days to Christmas! Can’t wait for that…..

Cheers!

Animate Yourself

If you are a self worshiper like myself, well Gizmoz is the website for you! It allows you to do loads of stuff and basically create a 3D animation of yourself. I did one post earlier about Gizmoz when I first discovered it. Back then, I thought it was only going to be a one time affair but I was wrong.

A newsletter that was sent to my inbox highlighting their new features made me curious. I was hooked afterwards and looked what I wasted my waking hours on.

This is what Gizmoz term as an animated sticker.

This is an Answering Machine whereby you can record your messages.

I use their pre-recorded voices but you can use your own recording. They also had the option to create your own animated video but I could not get one generated. It could be some issues with my connection but it is definitely worth a try.

Well, look at how cool that is…. Let’s hope this will project to the world with the Law of Attraction that I want more MONEY!!!!!

I urge you all to have a go at it!

That’s all for now, enjoy your weekend!

Guess My Number Game Download

This is a special gift for the visitor of my blog. This application once again does not require anyone to install it and it is small enough to run on a thumb drive.

Basically, the application will generate its own number between 1 to 100 whereby you will have to guess the number by keying in your estimation. It will then advise accordingly whether it is higher or lower until you hit the mark!

Guess My Number!

Click Here To Download!

It is another good time waster if you are looking for something. This is to non productivity in the office ; )

I have not distribute it like what I did with other applications and let us see how far this application can travel.

I hope you will enjoy it and take care guys!