Nyan

I would have preferred a propaganda sticker with a dog instead, but come on, Chairman Meow? Genius!

Peek-a-boo!

Somewhere between the 2nd and 3rd month of life, Cyrus started blabbering and using his voice to express a wide range of emotions. His first word wasn't mama or papa but Earl (highly disputed by my wife who claims he was saying uggh instead. I beg to differ...). The one event that made us drop everything and stare at him was when we realized he was laughing. Oh yes he'd smile before this, and try to laugh, but always without the accompanying audio.

Why are babies amused by peek-a-boo? And we tried peek-a-boo-ing with two people hiding behind the blanket instead but he wasn't amused at all. Then we returned to just one peek-a-boo-er and he resumed laughing like normal. Remind me to check the rules regarding multiple peek-a-boo-ers/peek-a-boo-ees.

NATO Straps

I must admit that I'm not a very careful person sometimes and because of this I seldom wear a watch with a metal bracelet anymore.

That's 14 years of wear and tear, I remember wearing it to play football too

Recent watch purchases have seen me opting for leather or rubber straps instead. The above mentioned watch hasn't featured in my watch rotation for a couple of years now, making that odd appearance only for special occasions. It was a gift from my father and a watch which I like very much. I feel it's a bit of a waste if it just sits in my drawer. Then some random links led me to a forum where they were discussing the origins of the NATO strap and I knew I had to get one...or maybe two.

Ok maybe more than two

What I like about the straps is that they can be changed according to what my outfit for the day is. And there's always a plain black NATO or leather for more formal occasions. The only thing I had to learn to do is remove the spring bar and the old strap, then it's plain sailing after that. I ordered both the NATO and the ZULU straps (with the rounder rings) but after trying out both, I still prefer the NATO ones. 

One of my favorite combo at the moment, Seiko 5 Military Sports

I like the straps so much that I'm thinking of getting some more!

A Milestone

Baby Cyrus has turned 2 months last weekend! He's grown at such a rapid pace that I use him for weight training now.

There was a bit of a worry when Cyrus produced this weird black pepper like stools 2 days after his 2 month vaccination. He didn't have any fever and was looking and acting his normal self. We were stumped, but decided to wait and see since it was a Sunday and the clinic was closed. We found out that the vaccination can cause diarrhea but it mentioned nothing of this. Thankfully it got less and less and disappeared totally the next evening.

As you can see from the pattern, I caught the explosion 'mid-spray'

I've not been able to do a lot of thing that I used to do (Develop film? Catch a movie? Get enough sleep? Forget about it!)  All these have taken a back seat for the time being. This goes without saying, but having a baby changes everything.

I'm not complaining though. When he rewards us with such a smile, everything is worth it. In fact my wife was saying that he's growing so fast that she regrets that we can't spend more time with him because of work. That makes every second we spend with him that much more precious, even if it's watching him sleep.

East vs West

So how do you spot an East Malaysian at the KL LCCT Airport? Easy, go to the LCCT Emporium and check out the Gardenia buns section. He/she will most likely have a shopping basket full of buns.

Ok, maybe that was an over-generalization. That person could've been buying for an East Malaysian friend he/she was visiting. The first time I became aware that Gardenia don't sell their buns here was when my wife asked me to get her some Gardenia Ikan Bilis buns when I went over to KL. I also found out that the best place to get the freshest stocks is at LCCT, having spent quite some time looking around in various locations. The LCCT Emporium knows that they are catering to the East Malaysian market and makes quite a lot from this. Gardenia sells their plain bread here, but why not the others (I don't know if it's the same for Sarawak) ?  Oddly enough, I've never had the ikan bilis bun till I moved over to Sabah from PJ so maybe Gardenia knows what they are doing...

There's another thing I've missed since moving here. The KFC stores in Sabah don't offer Thai Chili Sauce (TCS) to their customers, relying instead on ketchup and normal chili.

The first few times eating KFC without TCS was terrible. I considered buying one bottle from the supermarket and bringing it with me everytime I go to KFC, but common sense told me to suck it up and deal with it. 4 years later, I can't remember how fried chicken tastes with TCS anymore... *making a mental note to eat KFC next time I go back to the peninsula*

And McD's...huh! No free refills! The first time I asked the cashier for a free refill was also my last time. I might as well have asked if her mom had a hairy chest because she would have given me the same look.

After 4 years here in Kota Kinabalu, I'm not so bothered by these minor differences in products and services offered by the big chain companies like I used to be. But hello KFC, I really really hope you will listen to what I'm saying. Ahem.

Hacking The DX Coding On The Film Canisters

Mom: So is there anything you'd like me to bring over when I visit?
Me: Hmm, ya. Whatever happened to my old film camera?

So she searched around the house and found this.

My old Olympus Mju-II. This camera accompanied me through my college and uni years and to many places in Europe. It's a reliable old friend. There was one problem with it though, it automatically sets the ISO based on the DX coding on the film canister. That may be alright for normal photography but a massive inconvenience when shooting with redscale or black and white films.

So how to get around this?

Changing from 400 to 1600

Fool the camera by changing the DX coding. The film at the bottom is at normal 400 speed and the film at the top has had its paint scratched so the camera reads it as a 1600 film instead. Probably the best thing about this is that the Olympus is such an easy camera to handle that I can be in the pictures more often.

With available window light and spot metering on the Mju-II

Darkroom Fun

Following up from my last post, I tried my hand at developing my own black and white film. The very first time, I had a few issues to iron out, like getting all the chemicals at the right temperature (20 deg c) before starting. I tried putting ice in a basin but it wasn't getting anywhere near that figure, so I just stuck them all in a freezer till it dropped. Thanks to the timer from the Massive Dev Chart App on the iPhone, once everything starts, it's pretty easy. I took a shot of my setup and here it is.

I've done 3 rolls so far with 2 different type of films and the results vary quite a bit. I think I may have been a bit overenthusiastic in agitating the chemicals in one of the sessions but I'll know more after many more trials and errors.

He's wearing a 'I love mum' shirt... -.-

This last film with Delta 3200 - oh the grain!

Thankfully there are many things to shoot these days. Cyrus is growing really fast and looks different everyday.

Now there have been people who have been saying that Cyrus looks more like his mom and yes, if you look at the shots above, you can see the similarities with the nose and the chin. But if you look at him from another angle, you will see that he looks EXACTLY like me.

Huhuh! Thanks for such great hair dad!