Fusion View Lifestream

Fusion View Lifestream

Yang-May Ooi  //  Hi! My name is Yang-May Ooi and I'm a writer, blogger, and podcaster. This is my lifestream from my mobile phone to share my thoughts and impressions on the go. I also blog at www.FusionView.co.uk, my personal cross-cultural view on arts, culture and social media.

 
Apr 17 / 8:09am

Spring has sprung in our front garden!

by Yang-May Ooi
After all our hard work in the autumn, planting bulbs and then more recently, weeding etc, we've been rewarded with tulips and stuff looking bloomin' lovely in our front garden.

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Filed under  //  Garden  
 
Mar 2 / 9:44am

Dancing in the Street

by Yang-May Ooi
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I find it fascinating how people use public spaces in urban landscapes. This is a video I grabbed of some amazingly talented young girls practicing a dance routine at More London Riverside. They told us their group is called Esteem and they were in a show at the Unicorn Theatre in March. (The ambient sound on the vid is from inside the restaurant where I was having lunch when I happened to glance round and see them strutting their stuff - for music, they were in fact playng tracks from their mobile phones!)

Filed under  //  Dance   Places   Video  
 
Feb 20 / 3:46pm

Gaucho Steaks

by Yang-May Ooi
The best part of our art and culture outings is lunch. After the Tate Modern today we had much to grin about at Gaucho by the river - huge, tender, tasty Argentinian steaks and views of the Thames & Tower Bridge. Predictably, I started tucking in before remembering to take some pix like a good food blogger should...


Sent from my BlackBerry® mobile device

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Filed under  //  Food  
 
Feb 20 / 6:58am

Art about Art

by Yang-May Ooi
The Tate Modern has a great little area for visitors to create little postcard artworks about their experiences of the Tate's art! Some of them are pretty good too. Sent from my BlackBerry® mobile device

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Filed under  //  Art  
 
Feb 17 / 11:16am

Chinese New Year Feasting

by Yang-May Ooi

We’re very lucky to have some Malaysian friends in London who are fabulous cooks. This Chinese New Year, we were invited again by our friends in Richmond for a huge feast, along with a number of other Malaysian foodies.

What is it about Malaysians that when we gather together around a table laden with delicious food, all we can talk about is other meals we’ve had, comparing restaurants and discussing recipes and passing on tips about the best places to go to eat fried kway teow or laksa…? Food for us seems to be more than nourishment – it’s an obsession!

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My English friends are sometimes surprised when I say that I don’t really celebrate Xmas with turkey and all the trimmings, although my family have a Christian background and we have always celebrated this festival. However, growing up in Malaysia, we never really had roast turkey and potatoes. Our Xmas feasts were pretty much like our Chinese New Year feasts, made up of curries and barbequed ribs and satay and a host of other Asian delights! So turkey and trimmings always seems rather anti-climactic to me…

We ended the meal with our friend’s famous mango pudding (the yellow tub above) – made with mango puree, fresh mangoes, gelatine and whipped cream! – and some brightly coloured  “kueh” which the other guests had brought from Malaysia Hall. We contributed Ben & Jerry’s and Haagen-Daaz to the desserts and by the time we were through for the night, I was pretty sure my stomach would explode…

A marvellously Malaysian way to start the Year of the Tiger!

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Filed under  //  Celebrations   Food  
 
Feb 3 / 5:15am

International Communications Strategy is now an eBook

by Yang-May Ooi
via booksonboard.com

I'm pleased to see that the book I co-authored with Silvia Cambie is now an eBook!

Filed under  //  Books   Technology  
 
Feb 3 / 1:08am

Annabel Mountford Soprano - New Website

by Yang-May Ooi
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via annabelmountford.com

It's great when, after a lot of hard work, your initial inspiration comes to final fruition. I've been watching Angie design and build Annabel Mountford's new website and it's been fascinating to see the design process (working with the client to capture her style and personality in the look and feel of the site) and then the code writing and tech stuff (translating the design for viewing on the web).And now, at last, the site can be unveiled to the public!

Angie does all the code by hand (ie without using Dreamweaver or Front Page software) so that she can have an in depth understanding of how it all works - it's rather like a hand crafted bespoke suit, if you like, rather than a one size fits all off the rack approach to web design and construction. No doubt, she'll be adding to her arsenal of tools and software programmes in the future but for now, building a strong foundation in CSS and HTML is going to stand her in good stead going forward.

Filed under  //  Design   People  
 
Jan 23 / 10:22am

British Malaysian Society - Social Media Talk

by Yang-May Ooi
via flickr.com

Here are the pics from the British Malaysian Society event the other evening where Silvia and i gave a talk on Social Media for Business. I enjoyed meeting a number of interesting Malaysians and Brits, and having the tasty fried rice and spring rolls after our talk!

For a more detailed debrief of the issues we discussed, I've written it up on my blog at http://www.fusionview.co.uk/2010/01/british-malaysian-society-social-media-ta...

Filed under  //  Events  
 
Jan 16 / 3:09am

In search of good Malaysian food

by Yang-May Ooi

In search of good Malaysian food in London, we headed for the Friday evening buffet at Lagenda, a Malaysian restaurant which is part of the hotel Holiday Villa midway between Queensway and Paddington. As you can see it was a great spread.


On the whole the food was good but patchy - some dishes better than others - but then as Malaysians, we're very fussy when it comes to authentic flavours. It's pretty difficult to get terrific Malaysian food in London so overall, it was one of the better restaurants for Malaysian food here and we had a fun and relaxing evening.

Can anyone recommend anywhere else in London for authentic Malaysian food?

Filed under  //  Food  
 
Jan 9 / 5:27am

Mad Dogs and Englishmen

by Yang-May Ooi
via news.bbc.co.uk

Let's see now. Everything is covered in snow outside. Every time I've been out so far, I've slipped on the ice, which is unnerving even if I've only fallen on my bum once. Today, I'm at home with the central heating on and under my ordinary clothes, I'm wearing my Damart long johns and undervest to shield me from the cold. I have an outdoor adventure fleece over the top of all the layers. I've got fingerless gloves on to stop my fingers freezing off while I type at my computer. I'm starting a cold and I'm feeling very sorry for myself.

So imagine how depressing it was to catch this news item from the BBC about some hearty chaps who paddling happily in the icy Serpentine in Hyde Park, proclaiming that an icy swim is what you need to cheer you up and stop you from getting colds...

Even mad dogs stay indoors in these arctic conditions, only Englishman go out in the midwinter snows!

Filed under  //  Culture   Fitness   People