I woke up this morning by the sound of a friend’s txt message, wishing me a happy birthday. Yah, a year older again; who wants to celebrate their “YOU ARE GETTING OLD!!!” day anyways. So I slept again till 8:30 and finally woke up when my big mouth bro came to yell some lines in Japanese at my ears. Don’t know what he’s yelling about, saying birthday to me or swearing at me for always making him late for work. Lately, he’s been watching too many Animes, picking up quite a few words that I can’t keep up with him anymore.

I was thinking of taking a leave just to lazy around on my birthday but then I’m expecting some emails from customers and came to work anyways. See how responsible me is.

I got a few birthday wish emails from friends and a friend asking for cake. Come to think of it, I hardly have cakes for my birthdays, am sure I only have less than 10 birthday cakes to-date. The main reason is, I’m not fond of cakes and I tend to ask for other food (Burmese food like Kyar San Chat, Ohn Noe Khout Swal etc) than cakes. Anyways, mom cooks my favourite prawns today and I’ll ask her to cook something yummy for dinner as well.

It’s a bit of noisy day at work but same old routine so not much to talk about. A friend share his good news of receiving two job offers today and heard my boss’s happy about getting some $$ or something. It’s always good to see happy people; in my attempt to join their happiness, I checked my account and found out that I’m FJD 1.51/2 richer today. hehe. You see, I recently opened my new very first saving account (joint with bro) and that’s the interest I got for the month (rather 10days). Hey it’s better than nothing rite?

Surprisingly, I don’t wish or reminisce over things at all this birthday. I’m not quite sure it’s because I’m either content with my life or don’t care a thing about it at all. I’m just treating like just another day; guess age is catching up.

Anyways, got to get back to work; I’m just dropping a few lines on my long ignored blog in memory of my birthday. So do wish my boring life healthy, wealthy and sane.

Got this link via N3 post, “Turn your name into a face“, and thought I’m gonna try it as well. Quite amusing how those faces turn out from your name.

Here is the true face behind “May Hnin Phyu“.

Oh lord, did I just see a beard? The mouth and the hair look quite similar but I don’t have a beard for sure. (more…)

Just pop in to say, I’m back in Fiji and will be posting about Bali trip soon. For now I’m just resizing the photos and uploading a few on Flickr. Flickr keeps screwing up my uploads, it’s just not uploading well at all. Tried direct upload from the web as well as using the Flickr Uploadr but still not working as it should be. May be their server’s over heated, I’ll try again later.

It was very tiring yet very informational trip for me. Met lots of new faces and enjoyed talking with a few. Some of the discussions in the conference were very heated and too advance for me to understand but it was a good listening and enjoyed taking notes. I took a few videos of the parallel sessions but not sure whether to upload them online or not. May be not.

The conference was not really for me (actually almost none at all) but I’m glad to have attended such event and enjoyed my new found experiences. We couldn’t get to visit anywhere, not even to Bali town, except a day trip to Yogakarta. No shopping nor swimming for me. There are lots of beautiful swimming pools in the resort and the lovely beach in front but I couldn’t even dip my feet in there due to very short stay and very tight/packed schedules. So sad.

Anyhow, now I’m back and catching up news and feeds on my GReader and twitter; a lot happened while I was a way for a week. Gosh I couldn’t even leave my eyes away from you for a bit and now see what happen! There goes Nargis, Nargis, Nargis and Myanmar, Myanmar, Myanmar almost every news feeds (I see Mong done a GREAT job covering the news on GV, many thanks) and now it’s China earthquake, earthquake. Geez the world is such a mess! Alright stay calm, don’t worry, I’m back so everything will be alright and stay tune with mayvelous. (Yah right! hehe) My bad, I shouldn’t be making jokes as serious things happening all over the world, but then laughter is the best medicine sometimes right?

I’m Back! How is everyone doing? Miss me?

My two weeks trip was exciting, tiring and a great fun. I met lots of new faces and visited new places. It was a great experience for me. Couldn’t come back quickly cos’ I caught a cold after the trip due to too much excitements and weather changes; then my laptop screwed up and had to repair OS. Now everything is settling down so catching up on my feeds and blogging here.

I took lots of photos and a few videos of my two weeks stay at GC, Syd and Adelaide. The main event was ofcos’ GC Tech-Ed. It was my very first business related overseas trip. I thank my bosses and the company for giving me an opportunity to participate in such event. I met lots of geeks and super geeks at Tech-Ed. There were total of 2400 delegates made their mark at Gold Coast Tech-Ed this year. ~80% of them are male with very few female delegates, regardless of this year Tech-Ed having the most female participants compare to the previous years. I’m one of those very few female delegates and most of the time I found myself lost in the superiority and the geekiest air around them. I felt like disappearing when I have no idea what the geeks were talking about. Yet, I somehow found myself enjoying their conversations and was inspired by their intense knowledge and skills on various subject matters.

Here are some of the photos Sarnil and I took from the event.

Note: Lightbox enabled. (Click on the photo, hover over it to browse “Next” or “Previous”)

Surf Parade Apartment

We stayed at Surf Parade apartment which is about 20-30min walking distance from Gold Coast convention center and about 10min Bus ride. The room was very neat and well furnished – TV, fridge, oven, microwave, washing machine, in-room spa, etc. The view from the room was also great. Can see the beach and also the buildings from Surf Paradise area. The room costs around AUD 119 per night and ideal for two people but I stayed alone so quite a big room for me. There were heated swimming pool and tennis courts downstairs but I didn’t even have a time to peek at them. The whole day out and we only came back to our rooms after 9 or 10pm to sleep so we couldn’t check out the whole building and the surroundings.

Gold Coast City Views

There wasn’t much time for us to explore the city as our times were fully occupied inside the convention center. I found Gold Coast has many weird looking buildings, some having spiral type and some has alien style weird diamond shape in the middle. I didn’t see any building of my liking but overall the city is quite lovely and quiet.

Activities at Tech-Ed

There were lots of sessions to attend to and I had a hard time choosing them but Sarnil and I sorted out ourselves on which sessions we should attend and share them later. We couldn’t attend any hand-on-lab sessions because they were always too full. I sat one exam there but I didn’t make it. It was the very first failure in my exams history and I was very disappointed about it. I stayed 2 whole hours burning my head hard in the exam room; I missed one session and my lunch. I was so hungry and was mad at myself for the failure. Anyway what done is done and I’ll try that exam again later. So let just say, the exam was a hard one and I didn’t prepare well. Some of the sessions I attended are:

• WEB316 Ajax Patterns with ASP.Net
• DEV307 Developing Office Business Applications with Microsoft Visual Studio Tools for Office
• DAT302 Database Schema Versioning: How to Use Microsoft Visual Studio Team System for Database Professionals and Team Foundation Server to Version and Deploy Your Databases
• CON206 Custom Activities with Microsoft Windows Workflow Foundation: A Developer’s Primer
• ARC307 Enterprise Library 3.1
• DEV308 A Lap around Microsoft Windows Presentation Foundation
• DEV311 NET Framework 3.0 End-to-End: Putting the Pieces Together
• CON311 Building Microsoft Windows Workflow Foundation Enabled Windows Communication Foundation Services in .NET Framework 3.5
• DEV320 Microsoft Visual C# Under the Covers: An In-Depth Look at C# 3.0
• OFC418 Microsoft SharePoint Products and Technologies 2007: Deployment and Advanced Administration Topics
• ARC312 Make your Customer’s Day: User First Design

I also attended the “Blogger Lunch” and here is one live post which covers pretty much everything about the session. I found out later in the “Ask the Expert” section that one of the Blogger Lunch session speakers, Darren Neimke, is in fact from Adelaide and live near Flinders University where my sister is studying.

One of the fun things about Tech-Ed was collecting stamps and freebies from exhibition stands. I collected a few pens, toys, a cap, a T-Shirt, a few evaluation product CDs and lots of information brochures. I also filled in lots of forms to place in the daily draws. There were some gift packs and good stuffs such as Xbox 360 draws everyday. My friend Robert won Xbox360 and we were very jealous of him. Such a lucky guy but he didn’t even invite us to play with him. Bad Robert!

There were tons of food and drinks at Tech-Ed; if you are a drinker, you would definitely love it. Coffee stands were always packed and I liked the breakfast donuts. Lunches and dinner were great too but for some reason I only ate lots of salad. I think it’s cos’ of different cooking style, their meat/main dishes didn’t taste good in my tongue.

Movie World Night

They booked the whole “Movie World” park for 2400 Tech-Ed delegates from 6:30 – 11pm on Thursday night. It was a great fun. We met one of the speakers and Sharepoint expert, Milan Gross, from Hawaii and team up with him to enjoy the night. We rode “Lethal Weapon” (roller coaster ride), “ScoopyDoo” ride, Batman stimulation and the Waterfall ride. I couldn’t believe I actually rode all of them and enjoyed it. I couldn’t have ride them if it wasn’t for the guys who kept pushing me to try so. Every ride I closed my eyes, shut my mouth and sit very still and stiffly so I didn’t get to see the high/dangerous views. But the feeling alone is scary enough for me. That was a great fun and we all enjoyed the night.

Evening at the Beach and Last Night Out

The final day closing note ended around 4:30pm and we rested a few min at our apartment. Then we paid our (my) first and final visit to the beach in front. It was lovely evening and we saw some surfers, walkers and swimmers there. We took some photos at the beach then went back to the apartment and waited our friend to go for dinner. The final night out was enjoyable. Conversation between Sarnil and Milan was interesting and amusing. They did the talking and I did the listening part as usual. We then had Korean BBQ for dinner and done a lot of walking around to digest the food. Actually the guys were searching for a good place to dance. I had a very early flight to catch and have to wake up around 4am in the following morning so I took an early leave, said goodbye to the guys and came back to the apartment. Then I packed my stuffs and get ready for Sydney departure in the next morning.

So Tech-Ed ended pretty well and some of Tech.Ed 2007 Statistics from lock note are:

• This year there were 89,608 teeth at Tech.Ed.
• You ate 12,628 bread rolls, and drank over 14,000 liters of enough coffee and Coke.
• And at MovieWorld, on the Superman ride, we recorded 1,216 cries of “shhh****tttt…!!!!”
• If all our Tech.Ed delegates were laid end-to-end, you’d stretch 4.15 kilometers long. But only an average of 1 meter wide. In most cases.
• If all this year’s delegates forms a conga-line, that would be the end of Gold Coast Tourism.

Interesting stats, aren’t they?

I was checking out the next Tech-Ed SEA 2007 at Kuala Lumpur 10-13 Sept and found out that there is one Burmese in the speaker list. The speaker name is “Maung Maung Phyo” and is a Senior Consultant from Singapore. He looks pretty young. Kuala Lumpur Tech-Ed got quite a few female speakers and most of them look very young. Also there are lots of Asian speakers. Impressive! Our friend “Milan Gross” is in the list as well. Being a Sharepoint expert, he got to travel a lot I bet.

Anyways Gold Coast Tech-Ed 2007 was great and I enjoyed it. Tech-Ed SEA 2007 looks interesting too so do share some words about it if any of you out there attending.

Hey don’t get confused. I’m getting lots of misunderstandings these days.

You see, May != Mayvelous.

Me = May Hnin Phyu
Myself = About May
Mayvelous = May’s website

So…my name is not May Velous. It’s May Hnin Phyu. My website name is Mayvelous. Ahcha?

Wishing you all a Happy and a Prosperous New Year 2007 from mayvelous.com

Happy New Year 2007

If it didn’t bring you joy
just leave it behind
Let’s ring in the new year
with good things in mind

Let every bad memory
that brought heartache and pain
And let’s turn a new leaf
with the smell of new rain

Let’s forget past mistakes
making amends for this year
Sending you these greetings
to bring you hope and cheer

Happy New Year!

Anonymous

Here are a few New Year noises.

[ MP3 ] U2 – “New Year’s Day”
[ MP3 ] Casiotone for the Painfully Alone – “New Year’s Kiss”
[ MP3 ] Asobi Seksu – “New Years”
[ MP3 ] Azure Ray – “The New Year”
[ MP3 ] The Lonelyhearts – “Next Year is Shaping Up to Be Real Awesome”
[ MP3 ] Jeremy Enigk – “A New Beginning”
[ MP3 ] Death Cab For Cutie – “The New Year”
[ MP3 ] The Robot Ate Me – “Celebration Time”

Via: plague of angels

May likes to thank all friends and visitors for stopping by at mayvelous.com. Looking back mayvelous visitor stats through out 2006.

Season’s Greetings from mayvelous.com.

Wishing you all a joyful Christmas, be happy and safe.

Some of my favorite songs for Christmas:
# Last Christmas – George Micheal
# All I Want for Christmas is You – Mariah Carey
# Happy Xmas – Sarah McLachlan