The holidays are now over and I went to Disneyland for two days during that holiday. You must visit the place to appreciate its true beauty and the amount of attention its creators paid to detail. From the buildings to the outfits the workers wear, everything is made to ensure the place is indeed a dream come true for those longing to visit. I unfortunately have outgrown the need to visit Disneyland to see Mickey Mouse in person or to see the castle in Disney's logo. So I was there just to see whether this hyped up place is as good as it is (and also to avoid the question of.... "What?! You went all the way to California, lived 30 minutes from Disneyland and you didn't go there??!?!")

6 of us Malaysians and Spencer (he brought us there) went, the weather did not bode well and it was cloudy for both days with some rain in between. No good landscape photos because of the dull weather. Actually not many good photos at all because I wasn't paying much attention to taking pictures, I was just enjoying myself being there.

Disneyland consists of two parks. Disneyland and California Adventure. California Adventure offers more thrilling rides (but they're still catered for kids 12 years old.. so you know how thrilling they can get). As soon as you walk into Disneyland, you'll see main street. A street with shops and cafe's built like its an old town.



Then further up you will come to the castle. There's nothing in it.



Here's how it looks like at night.



Everyday at 7pm, there will be a parade in main street. A couple of photos here..





California Adventure is where we saw the play Aladdin in the Hyperion theater. Its a big place with three levels of seating. The play was excellent! Sorry about the heads of people in the pictures. Can't get them out.







Our favourite ride was The Hollywood Tower. Its a tall building with a couple of lifts in it. Despite having a fast pass, we still waited a good 30 minutes for the ride. You enter into one of those old fashioned "lifts" and it will go up some floors and tell you some story. Then it'll suddenly drop, rise to the 13th floor where a window will open and you could see all of Disneyland, and then drop and rise a few times again. The dark windows you see will actually open up.



This next photo shows three rides in California Adventure. I have forgotten their names but one is a roller coaster which was really fun! Then theres a milder but unique ferris wheel where the basket carrying you actually slides along a circular track. Also the "bring you up high and drop you down" ride...



More of my photos are posted on Sean's blog with more stories too!

After working for 2 hours in Kellogg West, I went out with Roy to the farm to look at the animals. The sunlight was amazing and everything seemed to be in its proper place. I had tonnes of beautiful pictures! The farm was one part I have not visited (I THOUGHT I've been everywhere). Its actually part of the College of Agriculture.





The place really smelled bad. Like those smelly fermented tofu, but I still think that the pigs are cute.. to some extent. More of the farm.. this shot shows the shed where they keep cows.



This one shows the silos which I don't quite know what its function is.



Then this is where they grow grass to make hay.



The previous 3 photos were shot with my new lens! A Sigma 10-20mm. Its MUCH sharper and contrasty compared to my other two lenses and the photos definitely have a more three dimensional feel.

Then we walked up a small hill to a place called the Centre for Regenerative Studies. I still don't know whats that place for, but there are a few log cabins up there with beautiful landscaping. There were some pretty nice flowers up there, and the backlighting during the "golden hour" helped alot!





Then I came across the most adorable things! 10 ducklings and their mother!





The cows just gave us blank stares when we were near them.



So there goes another beautiful day! Back to classes on Monday.

After a couple of days of moody, cloudy weather and rain, the sun reappeared again. This time the sunset was awesome and it was in the middle of a soccer game when I took all these. This one was shot from the athletic track field. There was still some snow on the mountains because of the cold weather a couple of days ago.



Then in the middle of the game we decided to take five and I got this photo!



During the game, I suddenly saw this and ran to get my camera and mounted it on the tripod.

Two mirrors and myself was all it took. No prizes for guessing where this was taken (applies to those living in the University Village only)! I noticed this effect a few days ago and I've been tinkering with the mirrors each time I brush my teeth.



.............I can already hear my mum and my aunts going on and on about how long my hair is.......

My finals are finally over and I'm on a 1 week spring break! I can go back to taking my favourite macro's now as I'm now soo free! So far I have been taking some pictures of flowers around the University Village. I don't know the names to these flowers here except the poppy. My uni has alot of poppies growing around for ornamental purposes. I know some of you are thinking of something else!







I shot this photo before my exam when I was waiting for someone on campus.



Somehow, more and more rabbits are coming out during the daytime. They're usually nocturnal. They're really hard to catch and they'll scurry off at the slightest movement you make. So I'm really lucky to get this one. My first decent rabbit shot.



I was in Los Olivos (its the dining area for the dorms) for lunch with Kan Lun and Sean. The spread is HUGE and its buffet style. So its USD 6.50 for everything. Fruit juice, soda, hot coffee, tea, hot chocolate, Mexican food, pizza, salad, fruits, waffles, ice cream, pies... and a whole lot more! We could sit there for hours and talk. I suddenly spotted this repair man as we were about to leave. The color contrast of blue and yellow immediately got my eye.



More to come from my spring break!

Not long ago I couldn't walk to class without a fleece jacket. Then there was a day when the whole soccer field was iced up early in the morning and walking on the grass produced crunching sounds. I went to class a couple of times with a jacket used for snowboarding because stalk thin me cannot withstand the cold, or as I'd rather put it, I'm built for tropical weather (high surface area to volume ratio...)! Here's how the weather looked like a couple of months back.



These week, things are slowly changing. The most obvious was the temperature which has risen from the teens to the twenties. The trees are beginning to sprout new leaves too! Most importantly, I'M MUCH HAPPIER!!! The nice warm weather is perfect! Soon, there'll be tonnes of flowers and beautiful scenery to photograph around campus. I've got many events down the line and great ideas for my job as well. Obviously I'm looking forward to them!! Oh I'm going to love Spring Quarter!

I'm so taken in by how cute the squirrels are here. They're so bushy. They're so furry. They're so curious till the point where they love posing for the camera because they just keep looking at it. Plus theres so many of them around because the pine trees have lots of acorns to spare.

I caught this guy near building 8 on one of the pine trees. It probably ran up and down a short distance on the bark of the pine tree a few times. I had no idea why. It stopped along the way to look at me a few times and this was a great photo op!