As memorable and lovely the UK pictures are, this trip has proven several meanings and perspectives. There's much to be grateful for bringing the family together but this trip has also shown how torn up each of us are inside. I guess the pictures only show the happiness that smiles for the purpose of camera taking, but needless to say the trip has its ups and downs. Well, mostly downs due to the nature and accidental fate that arranged how the events played out.

My father spoke of this particular statement which I will never forget, and somewhat I take it to great heart. There was once a local dinner which we had, and it went all wrong, thus getting on everybody's nerves. He spoke this statement, "The four of us, can never go out as a family". Sadly, it is often very true that even a local dinner outing, of say 2 hours; sparks would fly and arguments tend to arise.

BeingAs memorable and lovely the UK pictures are, this trip has proven several meanings and perspectives. There's much to be grateful for bringing the family together but this trip has also shown how torn up each of us are inside.

The oldAs memorable and lovely the UK pictures are, this trip has proven several meanings and perspectives. There's much to be grateful for bringing the family together but this trip has also shown how torn up each of us are inside.

My parents, being the oldest often have the perception of negativity which they tend to express and impose on us. Their expressive concerns often cause unnecessary stress to one another, and not to mention their raised vocal tones do not really help to calm the situation down. My father, who has said to gone through thick and thin, always worries the most, thus he spreads such concerns downwards to all of us. Sometimes, these concerns may prove to be right, but most of the time, they are just very exaggerated emotions which we younger people can handle it more effectively.

My tolerance level over these family conditions has not been very helpful because of my perception and belief that their unnecessary stress has always hindered me from performing my best due to so much discouragement and cautiousness. I'm often very ticked off by how I'm being treated, especially by my elder brother. His treatment is often pretentious and assumptive in a way that he thinks badly and stupidly of you, by giving you unnecessary implied advises.

My elder brother has a personality that fits into a storybook; where the world is kind and war-free. His personality fits his career like a fairytale but put it into a practical perspective on today's realistic world, he often faces great fallouts as many exploit his weak personality and lack of aggression. He believes he can export his 5 years in UK mindset, and influence the rest of the world, but someway somehow, he has failed in such implementation.

Well, knowing these 3 paragraphs of different personality, and putting them on the same plane and holiday, will only lead to bigger disputes and disagreements. My parents' past concerns and over predication led to heavier emotional and physical baggage while my brother grew over confident of the place, direction and accommodations.

His words to my parents' concerns were "Don't worry", "Whatever you want", "Do whatever you like". These words were unnecessary to calm the situation, but in fact what it did was caused us, especially me to grow doubts and silent disregards which soon exploded during the trip. I mean his way of trying to act as the GOOD GUY during the trip failed desperately.

We often did things separately and went different ways. The only problem with this was that, meeting punctually back at the same place was difficult and much as it was stated that it was a family trip, it wasn't exactly one. Perhaps it is due to the different agenda and the poor nature of the trip, that caused alot of arguments.

I always believe that every team can only have 1 leader in position. The leader of this trip was informally appointed due to his overconfidence. I, being fond of leading, had to relax my muscles to give way to new leadership. I was not a big fan but i really tried to control from flaring due to his incompetencies in leadership and human intelligence.

This entire trip has its peaks and its downfalls but given another opportunity to go through it again, i think I would probably pass it off. The entire holiday seemed more like a test of tolerance and a role of a "follower". On the 3rd day of the trip, I already looked forward and counted down to coming home. I won't say I missed home, but i missed having personal time with myself and not being bossed around by the informal leader.

Day 1 & 2.

The trip was crazy and overloaded, over-packed and all-so-tiring. The first 2 days we went down to Winderm3re, to check out this L4ke distr!ct which everyone was talking about. My first impression was "why was this town filled with old folks and the life pace of that place was so slow?" It turned out that place was like filled with retired people, seeking to get away from the town central area.

Our first argument happened in the drizzling rain where we couldn't find a taxi, and we were lost and pressurized to get to our "bed-and-br3akf4st" motel. My folks were pissed because it was cold, there wasn't any taxi and we were getting drenched in the drizzling rain. My bro was too confident and yet trying to be resourceful at the wrong time at the wrong place. My absentminded parents wanted to just board a random bus, while the other guy tried to make ends meet.

My bro held us back from any shopping done, because he feared the idea of carrying too much. THus, we delayed most of our grocery shopping to the last minute, which in the end i got so pissed and lazy and that i din't even get any grocery shopping done. I mean it is better to over-buy than under consume, and feel the impacts of poverty.

We went to see water, trees, vegetation, water, boats and more water. It felt like Tek0ng all over again, just that I'm just more well dressed and not carrying anything heavy. It was a waste of time, but ya, really there isn't much to do than just sight see like an ordinary tourist. The pictures which I took, turned out to look real great, after seeing everybody's comments on FB.

Day 3 - 6.

We left the bed-n-bre4kfast motel and headed towards L0ndon. We pit-stopped at L4ncaster Univers!ty, because my dad wanted to show me how a real university looks like. It was awesomely huge but sadly because it is the term break, there was no one insight.

The next few days we went to see Big B3n, Parliam3nt House, L0nd0n Bridge, some castles, 0xf0rd street, F0yles, W4terst0nes, a famous 150 years toy shop called Haml3ys, din0saur mus3um, reg3nt street, and even watched an 0pera; m4m4 m!a. I must say the tickets for this 0pera is like 66 over pounds. It was a bomb, and my parents were nagging away that "You know how to spend, but don't know how to earn". Sigh, when faced with a dead lock, my parents often use the impact of monetary currency to spoil everything and rule the argument. I mean if you really worry so much about monetary issues, then perhaps we shouldn't have come on this holiday trip; which is estimated to cost about $2k x 4 tickets.

"A test of tolerance on this trip filled with disputes and disagreements; NEVER AGAIN." - frostdude