My Wonderful Life in the United States

My courses in UWEC

I have been really busy in enjoying everything right here until I got no time to update my blog.

I have tons of pictures in my laptop until its memory is full and I got a brand new 640GB external hard drive here, can you imagine that? Also, I got a new Macbook here too!

LOL... at the first few weeks here, some people called me CREEPER as I took a lot of pictures.

Recently, I seldom take pictures as everything is not really new to me now. I got used to everything here and I started to miss my home in Malaysia!! Especially Malaysian Foods and of course my mom's food.

Everything goes fine right here and I am taking 4 classes with 13 credits here.

1. ACCT 425 Ethics in Accounting

2. MKTG 338 Marketing Analytics and Technology

3. US Culture and Institutions

4. Basic Japanese 101

For the 1st subject, my classmates are all senior or supersenior, it is a level four class. We sit in a group at Hormel Lab room. The room is freaking advance with technology. Every table has a big LCD screen sticked on the wall. 43inches LCD Flat screen. Our professor, Dr. Miller (CPA) conducts a lecture with his powerpoint slides up in the screens. It is a every nice way to teach! The class is not so big and we have 23 students. The course talks about Ethics!! I will take ACCA P1 paper when I got back to Malaysia. So, this is the reason I choose for this subject. Integrity is all about doing something right even nobody is watching. I learned about Kohlberg's, Rest's, DIT, DIRR so far. Hopefully it is same as the syllabus in ACCA P1 Professional Accountant.

For the 2nd subject, it is really a fantastic subject that I couldn't find in Malaysia. The subject is for Marketing Major. I am actually Accounting major but I am really interested in this subject!!! It is all about how a marketer runs his analytics with the aid of technology! It is undeniable that the United States is a developed country and it's well-known with its high tech system! Bill Gates is from USA... At the first weeks, I learned about Adobe Photoshop!! I am really happy with that because I still remember my friend refused to teach me how to use Photoshop in college. And now, I know how to use it but not really pro as I just have one week lesson. Next assignment was Dreamweaver! Dreamweaver is all about Webpage development. I struggled badly for my dreamweaver assignment! I asked my friends in TARC who are marketing major, they had dreamweaver assignment before but it was a semester project. They have 3 months time to complete it. For me, I have only a week!! The lesson was ended at Friday and I have to turn it in on next Monday, not really a week actually! I tried my best and used some flash knowledge that I learned when I was a beginner blogger. I made it perfect and I got 50/50 for the assignment.

The webpage is http://people.uwec.edu/taneh (My initial= TanEH)

For the third subject, it is US Culture and I gotta learn about the ways US people do and their histories, their attitudes, values and so on. It is a great class which I don't have pressure at all.

For the forth subject, Japanese 101. I am a newbie for Japanese Language now. Just for now, I know how to write Hiragana and Katakana. I have some Japanese friends here and I am an officer in Japanese Culture Society. (http://www.jcsec.org/) I am treasurer in JCS!!

Recently, we had an International Folk Fair right in UWEC. I was treated as a traitor! OMG! A lot of Malaysians called me so. WTF!! I am not! I love Malaysia.. I am treasurer in JCS and I have to take care of the money and stuff in JCS. So I was the one who takes order and collect money as a cashier in Japan Group during the International Folk Fair. I was the cashier for the first two hours in Japan Group. After that, someone took over my place and I was able to join the Malaysian Traditional Dance in Malaysia's booth downstair. Luckily I went there on time and the traditional dance was published as the headline in the local University press. I am not a traitor as I went to all the meetings in Malaysian group and I helped them up in decoration and stuff. I was one of the representatives in Malaysia group. My name was written in the folk fair application form too and I got the email from the key personnel in regard of any updates and claims. So, I am not country traitor!! lol... (why need to explain so much... if I am not means I am not... do come clean as what I learned in Ethics in Accounting)

Well, being an officer in Japanese Culture Society is so fun!! It would be great if I could have a job on campus. I can't have a job though, because of the rules restricted as a UGRADer. Having a job here would be nice and I am sure it can improve my English and make more friends....

July and August Comprehensive Updates....

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Time does fly, doesn't it?

I am in the United States for almost 4 months for Summer and Fall semesters.

I did a lot of travel in Summer and prior of the Fall semester.

I went to a couple of places in USA.

In July, I went to Minnesota, Illinois (Chicago) and of course the nice places around in Wisconsin. I would say the country name instead of the city name because they are a lot of cities that I have been to.

In August, our summer program has ended but UGRAD students had to go for a bridging course before Fall semester starts. However, I proposed a plan to everyone, just 5 of us (Plus a China girl), to travel to California. We did a great job in discussing the learning hours with our Professor and made this plan to a success. 2hours class per day became 3hours. We managed to stay in Los Angeles for a week!!

In Los Angeles, it was the best trip that I ever had. Before we went there, I was expecting to make the trip perfect as we got the break from Professor and we have to attend the class a little bit longer each day. I was crazy in searching for places, looking for recommendations online. I borrowed Los Angeles Travel Guide from my University library for that. I was pretty serious about it, wasn't I?

We met great people in Los Angeles and it made our trip cost much cheaper that it was. They are Saintsan's Uncle, Saintsan's Uncle's friend (Mr. Cornel), and their family.

We went to Anaheim Disneyland and California Adventure Park at the first day. We booked two nights in a hotel in Anaheim, Orange County. The interest thing part was I got premium Disneyland and Hopper park tickets for only 50bucks!! I got it from eBay. The ticket was great as we can use it to reserve a ride.

Besides Disneyland and California Adventure Park, we went to Universal Studios Hollywood on the second day. We spent our whole day there. I bought a discount coupon from eBay too! I got 18bucks off from each tickets. We paid for 51bucks instead of 69bucks. The best thing was the coupon can be used by anyone, you need not to be a Californian in order to use the ticket! It was great!! That was my little intelligence!! We saved a lot!!

The third day, we went to Downtown Los Angeles! That day was a free day! We planned it ourselves and I made my step to Staples Center, LA (Lakers Home Stadium). It was a great timing!! We reach there about 10am and there was an event there. I joined the 3points shoot-out competition and I got a new nickname called TOKYO GUY there. I made a great first shot and the DJ kept praising on me. It made everyone knows who is TOKYO GUY and after the game, a lot of people called me TOKYO GUY when I was walking around in Staples Center.

After Staples Center, we went to Hall of Fame, Hollywood, ThaiTown, ChinaTown, MexicanTown, Disney theatre, and other places that we could reach by Subway.

We went to Getty Museum and Santa Monica Beach on the next day. We walked around Santa Monica beach and did some shopping at Third Street Promenade. Thanks so much to Uncle Cornel who brought us to all those places. In LA, you need a car in order to go to such fantastic places. To get there by bus, you will spend half of you day in LA!! By cab, it will be freaking expensive!!

A brainwave was suggested by Uncle Cornel. "I would strongly recommend you guys to go to Las Vegas while you are in Los Angeles! It was just 4hours drive from Los Angeles to Las Vegas by car." If we were unable to book a bus ticket, Uncle Cornel would drive us there, he said! We booked our hotel the day before and the bus tickets 2days before. (When we were in Universal Studios)

It was totally exceeded my expectations and my desires. My utilities have been fulfilled freakingly!! I didn't expect we would happen stepping in Las Vegas! By taking the bus to Vegas, it was a bus company operated by Chinese. 90% of the passengers are Chinese. I was just like in Hong Kong or a bus to Genting in Kuala Lumpur. What the heck... everyone was talking in Cantonese!! Some old folks, aunties and uncles were gossiping about the latest entertainment news in HongKong. I couldn't believe my eyes!! I sat with a chinese girl, named Lisa and we talked with each other in Chinese too. We have had a fun time in Vegas.

Accidentally, some unexpected incident happened in Vegas. The personnel in the bus told us that if we happened in The Venetian Las Vegas, we would get a 50USD gambling voucher, provided that you are 21 years and above. Without hesitation, I raised my hand and we were gonna hit The Venetian as our first station!! Why I said it was unexpected incident? It was really great to me as my favorite place in Macao is The Venetian!! I have been to Macao 2 years ago with my parents and my brother. I like that place very much!! It is so beautiful!! The Venetian Vegas is the same as Macao, just Macao is the newest one.

To be frank, I know how to gamble and I sneaked into the casino in Genting Highlands, Malaysia a couple of times. I went to the casinos in Macao too. Sneaking into casinos in Malaysia because I was not at legal age yet!! I turned 21years old in the United States and I made my visit to Vegas when I was 21years old and 1 month!!! It would be a fantastic memory for me forever!!!

I like to play baccarat and blackjack in Malaysia. Anyway, in Las Vegas, you would hardly find a small table with trends and records computer board in Baccarat. So, I made up my mind and decided to play just blackjack!! They have a lot of blackjack tables as compared to Genting Highlands and Macao. I won about 300+ USD around 2-3am in the morning. It was a lot!!! But my friend and I decided to keep gambling and visiting all the casinos in Vegas. We gambled till 5am in the morning and we got nothing left!! We didn't lose nor win!! We bought ourselves some drink in casinos with the winnings.

The next day, my hands were so "itchy" and my greedy devil told me to play before heading back to Los Angeles. I lost 100bucks in just 30minutes. I was so depressed and felt so blue. An hour before the bus came, I was trying to fight back and yes I made it! I turned 100usd to 300usd in just 15minutes in a blackjack table. My stakes were higher than everyone in the table. My highest stake was 60usd and I got a blackjack! That was why the turnover was so fast!! I won back my capital and the another 100bucks was my friend because we were sharing 50-50 of the capital.

Forget to talk about the hotel. The hotel rate in Vegas is freaking cheap! 70usd a night and I could get a double bedroom in Flamingo Hotel Casino. I paid for the freaking retarded hotel at Anaheim for 60bucks per night! I am willing to pay extra 10bucks for a higher class hotel in Vegas.

After we went back to Los Angeles, we had a great dinner (well, actually we did almost everyday in LA) with Uncle Cornel. The last dinner was our turn to treat Uncle Cornel as he treated us to lunch/dinner/supper and be our tour guide for those few days. He is really a great tour guide, if he were not a CAD designer, he would be the best tour guide in the States and Thailand too. (He likes to go to Thailand, he visits there almost twice a year)

3 and half hours flight from CA to WI. Say bye to California!! I like California so much!! If I would have to choose where to migrate to (in USA), my first choice will be in California. They have 6-8 Chinatowns (HongKong, Taiwan, China) and my mom is able to communicate with them!! She can speak Taiwanese with them too!!!

It's UP!!!

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To all my fellow friends and my lovely blog visitors from all around the World,

Time does fly, doesn't it? I am in the United States for almost 4 months already.

Just so you know, UGRAD is up for applying!!

Does anyone want a paid vacation or paid learning opportunity in the United States? It's the time to apply now.

You guys will be in the third batch!! The program is still new... Don't forgo this golden opportunity!

The due date is November 30, 2009. Still one and half months to go... pretty long!! You guys can write a better Personal Statement than I did last year.

If my memory serves me well.... Last year the due date was on December 26.
I got to know the application 3days prior to the dateline. So, I only have 3 days to complete my application forms and stuff.

There you go....

http://www.macee.org.my/05_14_content.html
(same procedures same questions as last year!! you guys will know how amazing I was in completing all those in 3days time. I still managed to celebrate Christmas in Genting Highlands with friends.. )

2009-2010 GLOBAL UNDERGRADUATE PROGRAM
No.	Name	Host Institutions	Field	Duration
1.	Ms. Ooi Li Hsien	Minnesota State University	TESL	1 year (Fall intake)
2.	Mr. Wong Yeong Ru	Jackson State University	Psychology	1 year (Fall intake)
3.	Mr. Chong Tze Lun	University of Alabama in Huntsville	Marketing	1 year (Fall intake)
4.	Mr. Yeong Song Bor	North Central University	Actuarial Science	6 months (Fall intake)
5.	Mr. Tan Eng Hwa	University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire	Accounting and Finance	6 months (Fall intake)
6.	Mr. Thamilarasan Ramalingam	Montana State University	Electronics Engineering	6 months (Fall intake)
7.	Ms. Lim Keng Li	St. Cloud State University	International Business	6 months (Spring intake)
8.	Mr. Lim Gin Seng	University of Southern Indiana	Accounting	6 months (Spring intake)
9.	Mr. Tan Poh Suan	Nazareth College	International Business	6 months (Spring intake)

Top 10 Accounting Firms in the U.S.

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1 Deloitte & Touche - Big 4, 107 U.S. offices
2 Ernst & Young - Big 4, 95 U.S. offices
3 PricewaterhouseCoopers - Big 4, 99 U.S. offices
4 KPMG - Big 4, 95 U.S. offices
5 Grant Thornton - 48 U.S. offices
6 McGladrey & Pullen - 103 U.S. offices
7 BDO Seidman - 35 U.S. offices
8 Mayer Hoffman McCann - Offices in: CA, AZ, UT, CO, KS, MN, WI, IL, MO, OH, TN, GA, FL, MD, PA, and NY.
9 Crowe, Chizek and Co. - Offices in: IN, IL, OH, KY, TN, MI, and FL
10 BKD - Baird Kurtz & Dobson - Offices in: TX, IL, MO, IN, OH, KY, CO, KS, OK, AR, NE

Looking at the highest ranking of Accounting Firms in the U.S., I could reminisce vividly my precious time in Deloitte (Malaysia) for my internship on February to May 2009.

I was in Corporate Tax Department. Too bad.. I have no idea at all for US Tax.. what is irrevocable election? I learned it this week.. Taxation system in USA is more complicated as compared to Malaysian Taxation.

I hope I can work in one of the firms stated above in USA one day... My another personal legend begins...

Study Hard.. Work Hard.. Play Hard in USA!!

All the best!!

Meteor Showers in USA - August 12-13, 2009

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Perseids Meteor!!

Well, I used to play Defence of the Ancience (DOTA), a warcraft game. If you are a DOTA player as well, you will know who is Gorgon Medusa. He is a great hero of old Greek mythology. The skills that have been armed in Medusa are Split Shot, Chain Lighting, Mana Shield, and Purge. If you know Gorgon Medusa, here you go! He is a Perseus. You can see Perseid Meteor on August 12-13, 2009 in certain parts of USA.

What is the meteor? They’re pretty hot, more than 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit (1,650 Celsius). Most meteors vaporize before hitting Earth but now and then when they hit Earth they are then called meteorites. Meteors become visible around 60 miles high in our atmosphere.

The constellation Perseus can be seen in the northern hemisphere. The constellation contains a unique star named Algol (the Demon Star) that is best known as being the first “variable star” discovered. Algol is considered a variable star because it changes in brightness about every three days. Perseus is the radiant of the Perseids Meteor Shower, this is where meteors will appear to originate from. If you want to see this event you can venture out early in the morning of August 12 in Eastern Standard Time Zones and look toward the darkest part of the sky in the east/northeast. Perseid Meteors will streak across the sky at an extremely high rate this year. Have fun and keep your head up. LOL!!

Skyscrapers (Chicago, Taipei, Kuala Lumpur)

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Since Burj Dubai has yet to be fully constructed and opened to public, I would like to take this final opportunity to share about the tallest skyscrapers which I assume Burj Dubai does not exist.

Why I write this blogpost? Recently I came across to my friend, BByin's blog. I was impressed by her blogpost regarding the highest skyscraper in the world, called Burj Dubai. Burj Dubai is gonna open to public at the end of December 2009.

So, Willis Tower (SEARS Tower), Taipei 101, and KLCC will drop one record in the ranking. Willis Tower aka Sears Tower, which is located in Chicago is currently the tallest skyscraper in year 2009. I was honoured to visit there. I love Chicago!! Sears tower was my first destination right after my arrival at Chicago.

Sears Tower, Chicago (Willis Tower)

Second Tallest in Year 2009 - Taipei 101

I visited Taipei 101 before!! It was in Year 2007 Christmas!

Third Tallest - KLCC
Needless to say, I've visited KLCC! I am Malaysian. Of course, I visited KLCC Twin Towers. It was just right in front of my rented unit in Metroview Condominium, Setapak, KL. (When I was studying in KL, Malaysia)

In a nutshell, I am glad that I have the opportunity to go to Chicago and pay a visit to Sears Tower. Whenever or whoever talks about Skyscraper.. I will definitely recall about my trip to Chicago, it was on July 24-27, 2009. I love Chicago!!

I had lots of fun in Chicago!!!

Final Banquet in Summer Program UWEC

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Wo ai ni , ai zhe ni
Jiu xiang lao shu ai ta mi (Mandarin)
Kuai hak jao jao hak kuai bo (Laos)
Chan rak ter liao ter rak chan mai (Thai)

I love you, loving you (English)
Aku cinta pada mu
Adakah kau cinta ku (Malay)
Ming ka la bah cit tek cit la (Myanmar)

Te quie ro, me ah mor (Spanish)
Wa ta shi ai shi te ru (Japanese)
ngo oi le yat san yat sai (Cantonese)
I wanna be with you always (English)

I love Eau Claire
##(Repeat All)
I love you, Eau Claire

This song is special dedicated to ELA program. Thank you everyone who makes this ELA to a success. It was composed by me and sourced from all of international students. Without all of you, this song is unable to be completed. My sole participation was not enough if without all of you guys.. Keep in touch ya!!

We had lots of fun in the final banquet aka Fiesta. After our dinner (Mexican Food), we had several events. At first we reviewed back all the photos that we have taken so far in every activities. OMG!! I miss all of them. It was just occured yesterday! Time flies... We have had a great time in ELA summer program. Next, Certificate Giving Section.. and lastly.. Dancing!!

I miss ya'll!

Dancing Queens and Dancing Kings... Bravo!!