「 boogie-ing away 5:58 PM 」

World Updates
Wednesday December 27, 2006

Communications cut off after powerful earthquake strikes southern Taiwan

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP): A strong earthquake off Taiwan's southern coast damaged undersea cables, cutting off phone and Internet service Wednesday to parts of China, South Korea, Japan, Southeast Asia and the United States, companies said. The temblor killed two people.

Repairing the cables harmed by Tuesday's 6.7-magnitude quake could take three weeks but "quality will improve day by day,'' said Lin Jen-hung, vice general manager of Chunghwa Telecom Co., Taiwan's largest phone company.

The company said damage to a cable off Taiwan's southern coast has interrupted 98 percent of Taiwan's communications capacity with Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Hong Kong.

The damaged lines knocked out Internet service for some Hong Kong customers, who were unable to access Web sites in parts of Asia and the U.S.

Hong Kong telephone company PCCW Ltd., which also provides Internet service, said several undersea data cables were damaged in the quake.

"Data traffic to Taiwan, Korea, Japan and the United States are affected,'' PCCW said in a statement.

The company also warned customers that they may experience congestion for several days on the Internet because of an upsurge in use as people surf the Web for more information about the quake.

Financial traders in Hong Kong -- one of Asia's biggest business capitals -- complained they lost their connection to Bloomberg LP, a key provider of news and data about stock markets. Bloomberg declined to immediately comment on the outage.

Internet access has been cut or has become extremely slow in Beijing, said an official from China Netcom, China's No. 2 phone company.

The official, who would not give his name, said the cause was thought to be the earthquake, but he had not further details. Businesses in various parts of the city also said they were experiencing Internet access problems.

CCTV, the state-run television network, said the earthquake had damaged undersea communications cables from China to the United States and from Asia to Europe.

It said China Telecom Corp., China's biggest phone company, was contacting counterparts in the United States and Europe about using satellites to make up for the shortfall.

The quake, which hit offshore from the town of Hengchun near Taiwan's southern tip, came on the second anniversary of the tsunami that killed more than 200,000 lives in southern Asia.

Japan's Meteorological Bureau said Tuesday a one-meter (3.3-foot) tsunami might be headed toward the eastern coast of the Philippines, but officials later lifted the warning.

In Taiwan, two members of one family were killed Tuesday in Hengchun when their four-story home collapsed. Six other members of the family were rescued from under the rubble early Wednesday, the National Fire Agency said in a statement.

The quake injured 42 people, three homes collapsed and 12 fires broke out, the fire agency said.

Tuesday's quake was felt throughout Taiwan. It shook buildings and knocked objects off the shelves in the capital, Taipei, in the northern part of the island.

Several high-rise hotels swayed violently in the southern city of Kaohsiung, CTI Cable News reported.

Liao Ching-ling, a manager at the city's Ambassador Hotel, said the quake was the strongest she had ever felt.

"The building swayed so badly that many guests panicked and ran out of their rooms and into the streets,'' she said.

Quakes frequently shake Taiwan, which is part of the Pacific's "Ring of Fire,'' an arc of volcanos and fault lines encircling the Pacific Basin. Most are minor and cause little or no damage. However, a 7.6-magnitude earthquake in central Taiwan in September 1999 killed more than 2,300 people.

「 boogie-ing away 4:47 PM 」

ok. 3f'05 chalet ended yesterday and it was a group chalet, cause only about 10 people stayed for the first night and 7 of them stayed for the second night. the chalet was costly, i meant the food that we bought for the barbeque. the amount was too large, if you cant imagine how much food there was, just imagine even with the presence of the fat pig jingyi that can gobble down 15 tonnes of food in 65.14seconds [guinness world record, shown on primetime for a sensational 13 times due to popular demand], WE JUST COULDN'T FINISH THE FOOD IN TWO BARBEQUES. ok the jingyi thing is not true, anyway i only mentioned 'imagine'. but she's really fat, ok i'm joking.

we were left with one pack of frozen chicken wing, several packs of chips, one and a half bottle of syrup and rolls of oil absorbing tissue paper (which junyin adores). first night was all POOL, pool and more pool. when we got back to our room at around 2, chun ann played fatal frame 3 and we were all watching it like a movie. the lights were off and there was tension in the room. we had a really good time and i only knew that 'tension' sang and danced real well at their concerts. ok, the tension thing is also crap.. sorry.

marc didn't sleep at all for the first night while ruohan and weikuang slept for only 3 hours ( i think). second day i woke up and was like 'oh great, time for breakfast' until i asked for the time.

cartoon : oei, what time liao ar?
ruohan : 12 liao lo
cartoon : HAR~?!
redmushroom : oei you copy me ar? *act cute*
cartoon : _|_

eugene and gang went to play pool so jingyi, ruohan, marc and me were left in the room. jingyi was sewing something and marc and i was playing with the ps2. i cant remember what ruohan was doing.. i think he was dreaming of sihui. we waited until the rain stopped and went for lunch. tio scam la, eat one bowl of laksa with yucky ingredients and drank iced-teh that tasted like water for FIVE DOLLARS.

marc, ruohan and me then went to the arcade and played the basketball thingie and the wonderful 'percussion freaks' game. that game is addicting.. we went to the arcade after the chalet ended also.

ok i think this post is too detailed and its starting to get boring. so i'll just post a picture to end this. i took this photo half- stunned cos i saw someone having sex in the car next to the bus we were taking home.

new blogskin.. but its not what i wanted.. i think i'm gonna change it real soon

anyway this post is a test. oh whatever

「 boogie-ing away 11:01 PM 」

wow its the first proper post here after so many days.. days spent revising for prelims and o levels, days spent playing maple after o levels, i've not been blogging at all. not even a single word.
so now i'm gonna blog, although i know my blog's probably already dead with no readers but i believe the spirits can see this post, somehow. maybe by possessing people in front of their monitors and then 1. open up internet browser 2. type in 'www.dounaigongcang.blogspot.com' in the address bar 3. read the posts of the angry blogger and also maybe 4. blow up the body they possessed

so beware, you readers.

today was peixin 6/2 class outing and we went to pasir ris to cycle. before that we met up at yishun interchange then took the bus to whitesands and met up with prunella and edric. it was meant to be a class outing but only 8 people went for it [ prunella, edric, liang chun, xin mei, tim, chun ann, kentoh, me]. it was not even half of the class.
we cycled around pasir ris then went to play pool. liang chun is a pro at pool! after pool we went to town so we could meet serene. we met up with angela and arrived at somerset, walked to cineleisure to have our dinner. serene then said that she was still shopping for her shoe, so we bought VITAMILK and walked to the mrt station and went back home =\

nothing much happened during the outing though, but it was still fun and memorable. =D

「 boogie-ing away 7:23 PM 」

argh.. i hope wednesday comes as soon as possible! argh, i cant stand it anymore