Free.

2010-06-12T23:51:00.001+08:00

A day at the Botanic Gardens

A couple of test shots using the DSLR.

2010-06-07T23:07:00.010+08:00

Seven weeks later...

I'm finally done with all the exams. Gee, even the 'A' levels wasn't this bad. But despite the monotony and loneliness of these seven weeks, there were things to be thankful for:

Alonetime. I seem to be contradicting myself, but being alone isn't all that bad. Sometimes I liked to think of the extended study break as going on a holiday alone, away from the affairs of humanity, to see life from a step back. And that now, I'm back from the holiday, ready to face the world with a smile again.
张悬. It was a real tragedy that I paid little attention to her music in the past. What's there not to like about her? She's full of 人文气息, very very pretty, has a charming character and voice, and writes the most breathtaking lyrics I've ever seen. Rediscovering this precious ruby during the exam period is the plainly best thing that happened to me this year, and once again I'm reminded that I should probably ditch mainstream pop altogether and go for independent music.

Chezcake Bistro. Nothing like rounding off the night at this cosy newfound cafe after the very last exam. Great ambience and music, delightful cheesecakes and tea, and good, good company.

2010-05-25T02:08:00.006+08:00

Let go and move on

When I read that the railway station will be relocated to Woodlands next year, what was supposed to be good news (of settling a long-standing dispute) got me a little saddened, because it means there will soon be no longer train rides from Tanjong Pagar. That, and the unique experience of riding along the old railway track that brings me across the country, passing by my own flat and familiar streetscapes of Buona Vista, Bukit Timah and Choa Chu Kang. Just like ferry rides from Clifford Pier, these are very precious memories from my childhood.

Of course, cities must change and develop. Relocating the railway station would free up valuable tracts of lands for redevelopment. For Marina Bay's grander plans Clifford Pier has to cease operations. Well, everything is impermanent anyway, no point being too sentimental about things here.

It's just silly me clinging on to nostalgia, as usual.

As for the much-loved Bukit Merah MacD, I still feel the twinge whenever I pass by the vacant restaurant these days. However, I've moved on since and found a rather pleasant MacD outlet at Great World City which has now become my regular mugging spot (for the CFA exam). None of it's bad really. It's just... different.

2010-05-08T23:49:00.001+08:00

寂寞考

When in doubt, always title the post using a song name.

And there's no song to better describe my current state of affairs really. This exam period has been the longest ever -- three weeks into the 期末考 and it's still not over yet! My time-out comes this Monday, but that's only before another big exam in June. And yes, it's lonely, with the capital L. I mean, there's the good kind of solitude, one that I always like about exam weeks. But when it drags on for so long and everyone else is already done with their exams and celebrating, flying off to all sorts of cool places for grad trip or other kinds of trips, and you're still stuck here, it's just bad.

On a happier note, two nights ago I texted in to the radio to take part in a silly contest and lo, it earned me $100 of spare cash! Ah well, the things bored and lonely people do.

2010-04-10T23:56:00.002+08:00

No longer early twenties

I should give a speech. But in lieu of that, I leave you with this Buffy quote that nicely summarises just how blah I feel about it.

Joyce: [...] So what'd you do for your birthday? Did you have fun?
Buffy: I got older.
Joyce: You look the same to me. Happy Birthday. I don't have to sing, do I?
Buffy: No.
Joyce: Well, go on, make a wish.
Buffy: I'll just let it burn.

Postscript: And I have updated the "About Me" section of this blog.

2010-03-02T14:18:00.000+08:00

When it comes to the serious stuff...

I am someone who needs to be kept busy. Busyness, in turn, keeps me going and makes for a frightfully productive me. On the other hand, once I get to enjoy a lighter schedule, I slow down and lose momentum and between my procrastinatory tendencies, I find it hard to get anything done at all.

That is why I think, although I hate to put it this way, that having CCAs complements my studies pretty well. The busier I am, the less time I have to study but the more motivated and hardworking I will become. So the first half of this last semester before graduation had been uncharacteristically hectic for me but that's fine. Even when everyone else is faffing about on a two-day week or two-module workload in their final semester, I'm almost unapologetic about it. I'm a busy bee and I get work done.

Problem now is, the busy weeks are possibly over and the decadent feeling of a slow Sunday afternoon is coming back. It's four days into the recess week already and I'm still bumming around. Very soon my brain will turn into mush. I don't know if I should be grateful for the spare time or not.

But that is, of course, just the serious, no-life workaholic in me speaking. The rest of me would rather not be doing any work and plots to spend the recess week away from Singapore and its constipated weather.

2010-02-16T21:53:00.017+08:00

Doing the Chinese New Year Thing

As usual, CNY was all about overeating and putting on weight, to use the phrase 大肥年 very loosely. And now that most of the festivities are over, it's time to detox. At the same time, I'm thinking about what I would do differently the next time CNY comes by:

There would be lots of fruits and I would substitute the goodies with my self-created CNY fruit platter, comprising strawberries and apples which are auspiciously red in colour.
I would serve red wine instead of beer.
Be at the park early CNY morning for a workout and to enjoy the peace and quiet before the whirl of visiting madness.
Instead of the lengthy and repeated telecasts of antiquated movies that MediaCorp has a penchant for screening during CNY, I would let my guests watch 康熙来了.
To quote 蔡康永 in the above link, "我要冷漠 ... 整年都很冷静，从今天开始."

Welcome to the Year of the Tiger, everyone!

2010-01-17T23:58:00.000+08:00

A Day of Rest

After running around like a headless chicken for the past week in school, I finally got to cut myself a little slack today and spent the afternoon at windy Marina Barrage. I've always liked open spaces so the Green Roof was my kind of place. And because it's situated against an urban backdrop, the contrast became immediately obvious and that made the openness all the more satisfying. I find it very cool to have this whole place dedicated to kite-flying as well. It made for a very cheery, lively scene.

I guess although I have lots to complain about Singapore and its natural limitations, it's such smart urban planning that makes living here a little happier.

2010-01-05T03:06:00.010+08:00

Best of Today

A lovely bowl of clam chowder from The Soup Soon
Overeating of chocolate fondue at one of those cannot-eat-must-mingle corporate tea party
A sudden bout of productive activities in the evening that finally put paid to a three-week holiday backlog
A good run and the return of my 12km-is-a-cinch stamina
An offbeat late-night conversation that went something like this:

ME : i will get all the work-life balance that i need
joel: bleah
joel: i've never believed u
ME : have a cat in the house
ME : read books
ME : practise yoga
joel: whatever
joel: bleah
joel: u should have a dog
joel: those big dog
joel: and u'll walk the dog every morning at 7am
joel: and come home for breakfast and u'll eat muesli with milk or oatmeal
joel: or wholegrain bread
joel: and drop by the supermarket and buy groceries (including a french loaf and look very 时尚) after work

2009-12-30T23:25:00.030+08:00

Year 2009, in Chinese Pop

As I was doing this yearly review I looked at my past years' entries (2006, 2007, 2008) and got really disgusted with my music tastes (or lack thereof) back then. Jolin was there for two years?! I must have been drugged.

1. 陈绮贞- 鱼
The year started with this song; it's amazing how I never seem to tire of it even till now. Gives me a different perspective each time I ponder the lyrics.

2. 陈绮贞- 一首歌，让你带回去
There is no lack of delectable songs in this album but it's this last ending track that perfected it for me.

3. 陈绮贞- 狂恋

"我提着一个简简单单的行李
要安静走出对你的狂恋"

Enough said.

4. 韦礼安- 慢慢等
A promising up-and-comer to look out for in 2010. Eagerly awaiting his full album!

5. 苏打绿- 融雪之前
6. 苏打绿- 在我们之间
7. 苏打绿- 各站停靠

A rather artsy album that finally made me a Sodagreen-convert. Also one from which I drew inspiration to do train travelling for grad trip.

8. 徐佳莹- 身骑白马
Although she wasn't my favourite contestant during the competition, as an avid follower of the singing contest I must say she has done 星光 proud.

9. 徐佳莹- 失落沙洲
A very important song, because it saw me cross the finishing line of Sundown Marathon earlier this year. 白旗 would have been more appropriate for the occasion, though.

10. 徐佳莹- 一样的月光
I hope she wins best newcomer for next year's Taiwan GMA. Definitely worthy of best vocalist nomination as well.

11. 许哲珮- 滴滴滴
12. 许哲珮- 爱上马戏团团长

Her songs always fit so easily and effortlessly into my musical preferences. They make me feel spoken to, like how an imaginary friend would.

13. 蔡健雅- Only Love
So while Sun Yanzi was busy enjoying life as a tai-tai her Singaporean buddy has released two impressive albums already. Fine I shall stop complaining.

14. 苏打绿- 他夏了夏天
15. 苏打绿- 蝉想

Yet another splendid offering from the indie band. The next album in the instalment is due in autumn 2010 and I can't hardly wait!

16. 陈弈迅- 你为什么哭了呢
This album is generally nice but I find it really hard to single out a track that I like best and elevate it as the superlative.

17. 蔡旻佑- 寂寞，好了
It's a K-song but not the trashy type, and that's always a good thing.

18. 林宥嘉- 飘
19. 林宥嘉- 感同身受

Best album this year. Sometimes, no other words are needed.

20. 卢广仲 - 七天
Nevermind that this album failed to surpass his previous one - it's still very enjoyable and full of positive energy. And that's what we all like about him, isn't it?

Fish Leong and A*mei didn't impress me this year. I would love to include a few tracks from 许哲佩's newest album but it's too recent and not even available in local stores yet. So that about sums up my journey with mandopop this year - it was certainly a good one and we don't seem to need Jay Chou anymore.

2009-12-26T01:47:00.000+08:00

Feel Good Christmas

This festive season has been one of the best for me so far. I'm listening to the music I like, meeting only the select few whom I want to meet, going to places that 很有质感, and having nothing to do with the whole "commercial christmas" crap. Not exactly Xmasy, but good enough for me to appreciate the festivities.

2009-12-24T01:12:00.007+08:00

10 Things Learned from 2009

Although not very similar, Time's Top 10 Everything of 2009 inspired me to list down 10 notes-to-self for this year. To wit:

Keeping a pen-and-paper organizer is a good idea after all.
Coffee, books and music calm me down.
I really dislike job applications.
I have absolutely no recollection of how I spent my birthday this year.
Old-fashioned Christmas cards are still the best.
I am backward compatible when it comes to handphones - touchscreen and qwerty keypads really don't work for me.
I am often misunderstood but I'm used to it.
I feel old, but not very wise. (An Education, 2009)
Honesty is the best policy.
My ideal lifestyle would include daily contemplative walks in the park.

2009-11-23T13:12:00.004+08:00

There is a lot more to be said about the lovely weather, but that would all sound too hopelessly 18-year-old of me so I shall skip that.

I like Sodagreen now. I know, for a long time I wasn't able to appreciate anything from them, but things have changed with Daylight of Spring. If there's an album to be bowled over by from first track to the last this year, this has to be the one. And even though it's a springtime album in principle, I think the songs are equally appropriate for now as the year is about to end and one gets a little more introspective about things.

Oh and speaking of that, where did the year go when I wasn't looking??

2009-11-21T18:24:00.002+08:00

Hello, I'm back. And the recent weather is perfect for staying at home and learning how to make lotus root soup.

2009-10-17T15:10:00.002+08:00

Frustrated and ennuified, along with other things which cannot be said or blogged. So I slowly build a wall around myself, and around it.

I will be back. I just don't know when.

2009-08-16T23:27:00.001+08:00

So today, I ran the Singapore Bay Run and watched the National Day Rally -- haven't felt so Singaporean for a long time!

The run turned out to be quite an enjoyable affair. 21km is definitely a lot more fun to do than 42km, and scenic routes are always so invigorating. It was pretty amusing as well, wondering why NS guys think it's kosher to pee openly in public at roadside bushes.

Anyway, 2 hours 18 mins is not a fantastic timing, but it's a huge improvement over my last attempt 3 years ago, so I'm pretty satisfied already. Look forward to doing even better next year!

2009-08-08T00:41:00.014+08:00

Possibly Biased

Some of my friends may know that I am quite a fan of Botak Jones. There's one just down the road from where I live, so whenever I felt like rewarding myself with a little treat or that I was needing a perk-me-up after a crappy day in school, that is where I would turn to. In a way, it has become my comfort food, albeit a rather unhealthy one.

And because of this fond attachment I have with Botak Jones, I am finding it a little disturbing how it's competitor Astons has been gaining so much popularity these days. Both sell pretty much the same stuff, are found at heartlands and coffee shops and run on the same concept of cheap American-styled diner food.

And the differences?

While Botak Jones continues to operate from the humble corners of the heartlands, Astons has now outlets in the city and malls which always attract inexplicably long queues.
Even though long queues do also happen at Botak Jones sometimes, the staff apologises and may even compensate you with food vouchers. The server at Astons simply tells you, "You have a big group. You have to wait."
Botak Jones serves superbly seasoned fries which are fat and tasty whereas Astons' are pathetic shoestring fries which are very hard and they shatter into pieces when my fork pierces through them.
Botak Jones' Cajun Chicken is one thing I would go back for time and time again. On the other hand, all things I've tried at Astons so far are average at best and simply forgettable.
Botak Jones has well-trained wait staff who are generally eloquent, but those at Astons, many of them can hardly speak intelligible English.

I may be biased I know, but when it comes to diner food preference, it's like the case of Liverpool vs. ManU - you're a fan of either or none, but never both.

So which camp do you belong to?

2009-07-30T23:46:00.000+08:00

Someone said...

"You should just close down your blog."

Priceless. Haha.

2009-07-25T00:33:00.004+08:00

Bucking the trend

Ion Orchard feels very much like one of those huge Shanghainese malls, with all that space and extravagant decor and multitude of luxury brand stores. It somewhat reminds me of the shopping mall at Taipei 101 as well. Nowhere else in Singapore gives me the same glorious feeling. It is not a Takashimaya or Paragon where you find all the upmarket chi-chi stores on one level, make a wrong turn and you end up at the poorer side of the mall that looks just like another heartland shopping centre. Ion has a much more consistent theme. Even at the basement, the soft lighting puts an atas spin on the mid-market area, and the usual places like Burger King are specially polished to acquire a more pretentious look. Upstairs, there aren't too many shops clamouring for attention, just the important ones, and at a place where less is more, Ion hit the spot again.

So I'm glad we finally have a new mall that has a distinctive character after so many disappointing ones and that it isn't built on that prime piece of land for nothing. Plus, it connects Orchard MRT directly to Wheelock Place - and that becomes another tick in the "Yes, I am definitely coming back" column.

2009-07-03T22:28:00.009+08:00

Domestically challenged

Some days, I can be quite a geek. On other days, e.g. today, I need to google for an online manual to teach me how to fix the florescent lamp in my bedroom.

2009-06-29T22:43:00.003+08:00

It's a strange sort of day...

This afternoon in the office, I IM-ed a friend to say, "A major storm is brewing outside. How lovely."

When I finally left the office at 6.45pm, the rain hadn't stopped. The bus stop was so crowded I was forced to a rather unwelcome spot where one gets pelted by the rain. And because rainy evenings make for crappy traffic, it took me longer than usual to get home.

But all these didn't really bother me. I was enjoying the wet and actually feeling quite good -- we haven't had cool weather for a little too long, the unseasonal downpour brought me back to December and suddenly, everything smelt of the holidays.

2009-06-28T12:10:00.004+08:00

In or out of touch?

You know communication in the internet age has taken on a whole new dimension when:

I first found out about MJ's decease through Twitter
News about 卢广仲 and Jay Chou's harvest at 金曲奖 came via a blog
I instant-message the person sitting 1m away in office more than we talk
When I was having a bit of breathing space between work, I logged on to Facebook, only to realise I had missed the birthday of a very good friend for yet another year.

2009-06-13T15:57:00.005+08:00

When I woke up this morning, last night's beer was still vaguely on my breath. It's not a glorious feeling, and it made me crave for MacD's iced tea.

On another note, my MP3 player is on its last legs. But I'd rather pay a little more buying a new one elsewhere than join the rest of the country at the PC Show. I have no idea how my parents could have survived the madhouse on its opening day and came home with a 32" LCD TV.

2009-06-10T23:05:00.004+08:00

Facing the computer screen for eight hours straight everyday is bad. Toggling between two screens gives me motion sickness. I wonder how the traders around me contend with five, like this:

2009-05-31T23:38:00.002+08:00

Sundown Marathon

So the big day came and went. I've officially completed my first ever full marathon. It wasn't easy. To put a finer point to it, it was agonizing and my timing bad. I attribute it to the lack of training. Not that I haven't been training diligently in the last two months. I have, but it wasn't long enough. Long in the distance sense. Problem was, I've been subjecting my legs and my knees to 15 to 20km of running all these while, so when I made them do more, they protested and gave me a hard time. As a result, the last 15km of the race was punishing. The pain got so bad that I had to stop completely after every kilometre for stretching. It didn't help that this was when we got to the heartland route in Tampines, the most uninspiring part of the race which made it doubly excruciating for me.

And one thing I really dislike about marathons is that things get really messy at the water stops. Empty cups and bottles get thrown all over the place. That plus the banana skins lying on the pavements was just disaster waiting to happen.

Anyway, the adrenaline did kick in towards the end, so the pain subsided and I managed to catch up eventually to reach the finishing line in 5 hours 50 minutes. As much as it sounds like a bad excuse, I know I could have been more well-prepared. I'm not sure when I'll run another marathon again, but if there is ever going to be a second one, it will definitely be a lot better than this.

2009-05-09T23:22:00.002+08:00

Got back from Shanghai this afternoon and have been feeling off-kilter since. A part of me is still there, even though I have unpacked my luggage and in the evening, attended a BBQ gathering at East Coast Park. The fact remains I am still in vacation mode and the thought of work starting in a day's time just leaves me feeling very blah.

I have no stories to tell about my trip. What I have are a new job to prepare for, plenty of emails to clear and a lot of news to catch up on. I need to get over Shanghai soon.

2009-05-04T23:54:00.006+08:00

As a warm-up to the Shanghai trip...

I had dinner at one of those Chongqing steamboat places in Bugis yesterday. It has a dirty toilet. The air-conditioning wasn't working. Customers around me talked loudly in heavily accented Mandarin. And in one of those embarrassing moments of the night, the friend caught me shouting across a few tables in trying to communicate with the wait staff (which, in my defense, happened only because the said waitress / whatever-you-call-her refused to come any closer and expected me to sound off from where I was sitting). Oh well, talk about pre-trip cultural immersion.

2009-05-03T02:08:00.006+08:00

I wish everyday was like that

Spent a little quality time chillaxing at Great World City's Coffee Bean in the early afternoon. You don't find many suburban malls this uncrowded on a weekend afternoon, perhaps even more rare to have a Coffee Bean outlet not colonized by students during this exam period. I think I have found the right place for book-reading.

The better part of the afternoon was spent following the Aware EGM online. I must say the power of social media is really amazing. While the meeting was in progress, netizen sites like this and this were updated with blow-by-blow accounts of all the action in there. Even Twitter was so hot with Aware-related posts that it became the top trending topic for those few hours. Anyway, it still befuddles me how people so accomplished in their careers could have put up such a big clown show. But more importantly, this whole saga is finally over and I'm glad that it's a fairy tale ending.

At night, I hit 16km for the first time since I started training for the marathon. The weather was on my side because the rain came just after I had completed it and reached home. Now, the rain has stopped and there's cool wind wafting in. So I'm going to post this after this last sentence, go to bed and hope tomorrow will be another good day.

2009-05-01T01:09:00.002+08:00

Leaving for cooler climates

Nice. But let's hope the sun stays out so that I can go for a run if my schedule allows!

2009-04-29T23:51:00.001+08:00

Bah

Today was one of those ennui-fied days. Did some shopping in the afternoon but in this pre-GSS shopping lull, nothing was going for cheap. I did pick up a "level one" watch though, a deal that I thought was too good to pass up, along with other odds and ends which I wasn't too satisfied about buying. Then came home to some bad television before running my second 12km this week. And a soulless run it was. Well, I did complete it and my timing was decent enough, but there was nothing gratifying about it. Ordinarily I would feel good despite the exhaustion but this time, it was the I-just-want-to-get-this-over-with sentiment that lasted throughout the run, all the while thinking about when I could return to the cool comfort of home.

I think I need to chillax soon.

2009-04-27T23:57:00.000+08:00

Journey to the East

I finally visited UNIQLO today to find out what's making everyone flock there. First of all, I must say it was really very crowded by weekday afternoon standards. Don't these people have to work? And it's freaking Monday 3pm, how dare they?

So I guessed there must be some really good stuff in there to draw the crowd. Unfortunately, it was all street fashion, plebian fashion, bad fashion and I wasn't impressed. There was this conversation between two girls that I overheard and one of them said, "There's nothing nice here. But you feel like you just have to buy something since you're already here." Agreed, except I wasn't going to waste time in that long fitting room queue.

The rest of Tampines 1 is just blah. Although I did come across a few interesting restaurants that I haven't seen elsewhere, put everything in and you get a garden variety heartland mall that is almost identical to the other two neighbouring ones. It boggles the mind when one wonders why all the new malls these days came into existence.

2009-04-26T23:46:00.002+08:00

What's for Brekkie?

There are many things that I want to do before internship starts, one of them is to finally have a breakfast day.

It's not as easy as it sounds. On most days, being the nocturnal person that I usually am, I would sleep past breakfast hour (eleven o'clock is the cut-off, going by MacD's definition). On other days, breakfast is forced because going for morning classes on an empty stomach is just not done. So I eat because I have to and there's no enjoyment in it. That's not my idea of breakfast.

Hence, one of these days, I will rise early, cook my own bacon and eggs, have muffins from Cedele and some glorious coffee and toast from Killiney Kopitiam. And all these wouldn't happen in my dreams.

2009-04-25T01:07:00.002+08:00

Good and Bad

My first attempt at 8km just now wasn't a disaster. The weather was.

Drink more water, everyone!

2009-04-24T22:24:00.010+08:00

It's quite a lot of blogging backlog to be cleared I know, so I will do one of those lazy posts and list down the things I had wanted to say in Twitteresque form. To wit:

I've had too much MacD during the exam season, so I'm going to declare a moratorium on MacD intake for at least one month from now.
I am looking forward to my first slow weekend in months.
I am going to Shanghai, again.
If I were female, I'd be at the AWARE EGM on 2 May to cast my no confidence vote.
On a note related to the above, this is the second time I'm thinking the national broadsheet isn't entirely useless. The first was when it uncovered TT Durai and his golden taps some years back.
Peggy Hsu's third album is slated for release on 19 June!
The weather is ridiculous. It's making me perspire as I sit here and type this and squeezing me dry of any last desire to kickstart the marathon training.
I am facing a dilemma about what to read. I should be reading up for work soon, but the less serious reads are infinitely more tempting. Besides, there are still books carried over from the last holidays..

2009-04-10T02:08:00.002+08:00

I got older

as my friends have been very eager to remind me about. Although I still find it a little scary to contemplate, I've decided to just face it matter-of-factly, make a wish and blow the candles. And when I wake up next morning, I'll celebrate by putting in a good ten hours of exams revision. The show must go on, birthday or not.

2009-04-05T23:54:00.001+08:00

Cheer Chen - [The Sun] Singapore Concert 2009

I started off feeling a litte ashamed seeing the blocks of empty seats that remained unfilled even after the concert started. Her latest concerts in Shanghai and Taiwan were sold out at record speed, so the lukewarm response she got here must say something about the average Singaporean's ability to appreciate mandarin pop beyond Jay Chou. But the poor turnout notwithstanding, sometimes all you need is an exceptionally talented singer and her brilliant band to make a stellar concert. There's just so many things one can like about her - the special quality in her voice, the depth and beauty of her lyrics, her charming good looks, the awkward gentleness when she speaks et cetera. Effortlessly, she transformed us from stagnant and shy audience into the most raucous of fans, and enjoying her own performance she embraced all four encore requests making the concert a full three-hour deal. This would be a night to remember for all who went.

2009-03-29T04:25:00.005+08:00

Earth Hour

Last night, I was at the MacD when the lights and music went out at 8.30pm. My reaction was: cool, on a few counts. First of all, since MacD plays anything but nice songs, it's nice to turn off the white noise for a change. Second of all, this being a 24-hour outlet with the lamps lit all day, when's the last time someone actually touched the switches? And the coolest of all, everyone in the restaurant seemed to know what was going on and didn't think this was some power failure of sorts. Has the Earth Hour ever been this widely publicised?

2009-03-24T23:10:00.004+08:00

Random Musings About Random Places in NTU

LT24
is in dire need of ventilation. The entire place smells perennially of stale sweat and it's highly nauseating.

The HSS Library
is, in all rarity, a nice place in NTU. Very new, exclusive, conveniently located and has ergonomically designed seats.

The New Business Library
is sadly uninspiring, too far and should have more Bloomberg machines.

Canteen B
is synonymous with bad food yes, but where else can you get your daily caffeine fix for just 35cents? Let's just say I will be very sad if the coffee stall were gone.

The IIC Room
is cool.

2009-03-19T12:39:00.001+08:00

Why I Hate Birthdays

In today's BBC News:

Mental powers start to dwindle at 27 after peaking at 22, marking the start of old age, US research suggests.

Doesn't help that today's GST lecturer made me realise I am having the exact same symptoms of poor memory as him - like always forgetting whether you have already soaped yourself in the middle of bathing. Symptoms associated with his old age, he emphasized.

Maybe I have passed that peak long ago.

2009-03-16T20:37:00.004+08:00

Not trying to be perfectionist here, but I thought even JC Project Work kids know better than to print a report double-sided?

I feel like disowning the submission.

2009-03-10T01:42:00.003+08:00

I seldom have good things to say about Boon Lay but these days, I'm really thankful for the new Pioneer MRT Station. Now, I can go home from campus safely and in bliss without interacting with the Boon Lay interchange mob or having to evade the crosshair of flyer distributors/insurance vultures. On a more quantitative note, travel time is shortened by approximately 10 minutes (7 minutes on the bus and 3 minutes on the train that used to park at Boon Lay waiting to depart). So a shorter and more pleasurable homeward-bound journey it has become. Now if only the same can be done in the opposite direction, the world will definitely become a happier place to live in. 179B from Pioneer to NTU, anyone?

2009-02-07T22:20:00.000+08:00

Boon Lay is an amazing place. Up the size of Jurong Point two times and you still get enough people packing the shopping mall and jamming up every walkway. It's fascinating how a Singapore heartland can be home to such level of consumption that is of India proportions. Building a second Mustafa there might be a good idea.

2009-01-31T22:02:00.003+08:00

Finally registered after many unsuccessful attempts, what with the last minute rush of early bird sign-ups jamming up the website. I've never completed anything beyond 21km, and this is going to be twice that distance! So I am definitely going to need a strategy, especially since this is an overnight run and it falls in the middle of what is possibly going to be a very taxing internship period.

2009-01-26T23:13:00.003+08:00

This Chinese New Year has been a somewhat surreal break from reality. I'm not doing any work. I mahjong and eat like there's no tomorrow. All through the day I would have this nagging feeling at the back of my head that there is a mountain of work foo waiting to be cleared, but I would quickly shove it aside because I just wanted to be eating and out playing. The rest of the world are very cooperative too - for the first time since the start of the new school term, no work-related email/SMS received at all for the entire day! And who cares that the economy's probably headed for deeper recession after the festival or whether the jobs will still be there, because it's Chinese New Year, we're all in the spirit and all other things can wait.

2009-01-18T12:52:00.002+08:00

Outbid by 50 cents

just minutes before the auction closed - to which I obviously couldn't react in time. Poo.

2009-01-10T23:41:00.004+08:00

I took my yearly Individual Physical Proficiency Test (IPPT) today and it felt surprisingly good. Although I was nursing a terrible running nose in the morning, when the occasion called for it, my body did rise to it. And since there's loot to be won, I was doubly motivated to do it once, do it good.

In the end, it was still consolation prize ($100) for me. Standing Broad Jump proved to be my nemesis and it think it has to do with age. But I really enjoyed the run. I've never run in an indoor route before so this one was quite an interesting experience for me. Add to that the fact that I have been doing more than 10km as my custom for the past couple of months and you get a 2.4km run that has never felt any easier. So it makes me feel good and since I've now cleared this IPPT window, I am once again free of NS commitments and that makes me happy on another count.

As an aside, anybody interested in this year's Sundown Marathon?

2009-01-04T23:55:00.006+08:00

I'm back from Mayday's concert and I must say I'm very impressed by them. Even though I am not a fan by any standards, I have always held a deep respect for the Taiwanese rock band - more than ten years in the industry and still going strong, which of the other boy bands can even come close?

That said, I feel rather disappointed that it turned out to be quite a cheapskate affair. I mean, an outdoor, free standing (literally) concert is fine and dandy with me. But one to queue five hours for? Judging from the actual turnout today, all that rationing of entry tickets is clearly pretentious and unnecessary. Was it a marketing gimmick? Over-optimism on the organiser's part? Or was it just the Singaporean in us asking for it - that we love queueing for anything and everything, even if no queueing is actually necessary? Then again, if the organisers can be laissez faire about it in Taiwan and let the people decide for themselves if they wanted to turn up by selling the album with the actual ticket (instead of the exchange coupon that we have) enclosed, I don't see why it should be done so differently over here. Perhaps such concerts are a novelty here (even though it can't be more garden variety in Taiwan), hence the organisers were expecting that by incentivizing the purchase of the album, a turnout too large for Stadium Green to handle will be drawn, thereby necessitating the rationing. If that's the reason, then maybe Singaporeans aren't that cheapskate after all. Not for me at least. It's a really good album and I would have bought it anyway. And people who don't buy original albums probably still won't, no matter how attractive the carrot is.

On another concert-related note, I have bought the ticket to Yoga Lin's in February and am planning to attend Cheer Chen's in April. And the latter's new album will be out on the 22nd of this month! Happy things to look forward to this semester.

And tomorrow, we swallow the blue pill and return to reality.

2009-01-03T23:32:00.002+08:00

So here we are in 2009, and in just two days' time, college life will begin anew. As usual, I'm reluctant to part with the holidays. Not really dreading school, just sad that this wondrous break is coming to a somewhat abrupt end. After tomorrow, there will be no more 10km run every night. No more waking up in the absence of the alarm clock motivating my getting out of bed. No more wake-up news digest first thing after the morning ablutions. No more weekday afternoon movies. No more bedtime reading. No more wasting time without feeling guilty. And the list goes on.

I'm being very teenage kid here, totally unbecoming of a cutthroat business school undergrad, but some things never change even when priorities do as we grow. Sure, there may be things to look forward to in school, but when it comes to parting with what has been a very enjoyable holiday, I still get those horrid Sunday evening feeling, become all grouchy and complain that the holiday is way too short. I guess at the end of the day, no matter how motivated I can be most of the time, it boils down to the fact that fundamentally, I'm a person first, a student second. So there.

2008-12-31T22:54:00.001+08:00

It's the time of the year for year-end reflections, resolutions for the new year, new year wishes and all that jazz. I used to have that too but this year, I'm feeling rather blasé about it.

No doubt, much has happened this year and this is a time as good as any to take stock and ponder where the year has taken me. But I'm beginning to question the meaning of doing so. To me, a year is just a year, defined by four digits on the calendar. I don't remember my life in digits. Ask me what 2005 meant for me and I would be floundering until I recall that I was in NS that year, which would then finally trigger the other memories of that year. NS is the reference point, the one event which holds the key to my recollections for 2005, not the year itself. And that's because NS defined that period in my life. I would go as far as to say that even the Academic Year would be a better alternative to the calendar year if I were to put my life on a timeline for the last two years. So the whole point I'm trying to make is that I prefer seeing my life in phases - the pre-school phase, the teenage phase, the career phase, etc. Even as we usher in the brand new year, nothing is going to change. I'm still in the same era as I was before midnight. I still go to college and my life still centered on it. Crossing over to a different digit on a new calendar doesn't change that.

So I'm not prepared to do a contemplative year end post and describe how I've spent the past year, although admittedly there is a lot to be said about this very mixed year for me and for the rest of the world. I would just like to end this possibly pointless post by saying that I'm still discovering new facets of myself and there is a lot more for me to work on, not just for 2009 alone but for the many years to come. I will learn to love and be loved. Happy New Year!

2008-12-27T17:30:00.001+08:00

I'm going to have to break the news now: I won't be going anywhere this holiday after all. Not that I'm disappointed or anything. In fact, I'm rather cool about it. If there's any reason to feel disgruntled, it's the fact that staying back means there's going to be more work for me here - I could have escaped a meeting and some deadlines but now, nobody is going to cut me any slack on account of my being away. Therefore, what was meant to be my window of travel is now going to be pretty much work-filled. Not pretty at all.

So why the staying back? Even though I've been whining about how badly I needed a vacation and had decided earlier this holidays that I was definitely going to leave and nothing was going to stop me, I guess at this moment, the urge to go just isn't that strong anymore. The wanderlust is still there, but that's one thing. The REMM side of me eventually took over and decided in all rationality that to splurge on a spontaneous overseas trip with little planning and of questionable objective is highly uneconomical and probably not a good idea. Not when the economy is still floundering on the scale of Great Depression and belt-tightening seems the way to go. And there's surely better things to do with the money, like saving up for INSTEP or a big graduation trip, either of which makes more sense in the larger scheme of things.

Financial concerns aside, what really waned my desire to leave is that this winter break has been good enough for me. I've had my good days, indulged sufficiently in my favourite activities, and with a fair bit of work thrown in to keep the decadence in check. I feel alive again, almost-fully recharged for the new semester and good to go. A little overseas jaunt to top it off would be nice, but really just optional. When one is satisfied, inertia sets in and there's little motivation to move away from the status quo. And that's exactly what's happening to me now.

So that's the decision I've made and although I'm certain it's the right thing to do, I know I'll have to live with the consequences, like the vacation envy that is bound to hit in when friends return and expound on the exciting stories of their glorious travel escapades and that's when I will get all pouty and anguish over not having gone anywhere again.

The Year 2008, in Chinese Pop

2008-12-26T12:51:00.010+08:00

The Year 2008, in Chinese Pop

In the same style as the last two years' (2006,2007), here's my annual list of top 20 favourites:

1. 许茹芸 - 男人女人
Great duet, great comeback album, great voice.

2. 方大同 - Love Song
Probably the best Chinese R&B singer around, although the latest Singalong Song didn't really work for me.

3. 杨宗纬 - 洋葱
I still can't quite appreciate his voice and his bitter expressions but this song is hard to resist because everyone was talking about it.

4. 林宥嘉 - 伯乐
This was a personal favourite during the summer, pre-卢广仲. Oh and by the way, I'm going for his concert next year!

5. 卢广仲 - 早安，晨之美
And then this man came along and I stopped listening to other singers for a very long time. I really like every track in this album and since it's impossible to pick a favourite, I shall choose this controversial piece for the heck of it.

6. 卢广仲 - 阿！大岩壁
So I started looking for the songs from his earlier EPs and the addiction grew only stronger.

7. 卢广仲 - 淵明
Seriously, he should just stop making those campus tours and quickly work on a new album already!

8. 蕭敬騰 - 奋不顾身
Okay I do have a soft spot for heartbreaking love songs.

9. 萧亚轩 - 类似爱情
Which explains this one as well.

10. 蔡旻佑 - 老地方
I really think he is talented and very promising, but luck doesn't seem to be on his side. Sigh. Let's hope he gets a chance at a third album.

11. 孙燕姿 - 再看一眼
I miss her voice.

12. S.H.E - 天亮了
I suspect Play was too successful so they're finding it a little hard to go one better. All their 主打s this time round just couldn't cut it.

13. 黄建为 - 明天的事
His is the easy-listening type of songs that makes for perfect studying/reading companion. Nice.

14. 周杰伦 - 花海
I have to admit I'm slightly disappointed with this album. 兰亭序 was horrible and 说好的幸福呢 was only okayish to me. Oddly enough, 花海 is the one that really got to me.

15. 周杰伦 - 时光机
And this is a very enjoyable song. I tend to like the light-hearted stuff from him now.

16. 五月天 - 我心中尚未崩坏的地方
I am hardly a fan but I really love their latest offering. So it was quite disappointing when I failed to arrive in NTU early enough that day to secure a ticket to their free concert next year.

17. 五月天 - 如烟
What a beaut!

18. 杨丞琳 - 带我走
I've been hooked on this song since the exams period. Still am, thanks to 不良笑花.

19. 杨丞琳 - 冷战
I can only say I am increasingly attracted to 蜕变后的杨丞琳 now.

20. 黃靖伦 - 缺席
He wasn't one of my favourite contestants during the competition but to his credit, he does have a very CD-friendly voice. And his debut album is surprisingly nice too.

Joanna didn't make it to the list because I only like her English songs and non-Chinese songs don't belong here. Fish Leong and Chen Qi Zhen didn't either but with their new albums coming out very soon, I'm pretty sure 2009 will have a place for them.

2008-12-25T02:21:00.007+08:00

Actually, I never knew what Christmas really means for me. It's not a day I can relate with spiritually, nor do I have a tradition of celebrating it in any special way. In the past, maybe. We used to stay over at my maternal grandparents' place where the kids exchanged gifts, the Catholics went to church, there's Christmas tree in the living room and good food on the dinner table. That was my idea of Christmas.

But things have changed. The kids grew up and the yearly gathering pretty much stopped for other reasons. So now, there's nothing festive that we do at home. And whereas I used to like Christmas as a kid, it makes grown-up me a little worried and grumpy now because whenever Christmas is around the corner, I'm reminded that the year is about to end and that there are many things on my list undone. Bah. So what's left of Christmas for me? It's probably going out with friends, a lot of eating and shopping, and trying very hard to get into the spirit of the season, whatever that means.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

2008-12-16T00:31:00.017+08:00

Obviously, I omitted a very important item in the previous post - holidays is definitely also about being addicted to running! Here, I must state categorically that I am not a strong runner. I don't run competitively. My personal best for 2.4km is a humbling 10:10. Heck, I haven't even completed a full marathon ever in my life. But I run virtually every night during the holidays - it's the only time of the year I can afford spending upwards of an hour on the sport without being bothered about opportunity cost.

I can't say I really love running though, because I suspect there is something compulsive about my running routine. It's probably less out of love, more for psychological needs, that I run. Psychological needs like the need to feel exercised and released. I feel proud of myself because 12km is a cinch, and even though I'm not too concerned about timing, I aim to improve by a song or two every successive run (yes I time myself by a playlist on the jogging partner that is my MP3 player). There is a high in the feeling of accomplishment whenever I finished, and knowing that I am fitter and better makes me feel good about myself.

But there's one problem - my legs are becoming bigger and I think it has to do with the running. As ditzy as it sounds, I'm bothered by it. They look horrible with skates and skinny jeans. And it's strange because the other parts of my body are getting slimmer at the same time. So it's not doing any good to my figure (or lack of it) and I don't know what to do.

Having said that, I shall ignore the ditz in me for now and as far as the running is concerned, I'm hooked and can't wait to run and explore new places. For my next overseas trip, I'll be sure to pack my trainers and running clothes.

Holidays is...

2008-12-01T23:41:00.008+08:00

Holidays is...

vegging out over youtube and bad television after dinner
buying things and indulging in a little christmas cheer
snuggling under the covers after taking a hot shower on rainy days
serious amounts of book-reading
having my where to go decided by chance - hop onto the bus that comes first, not knowing where it would take me, and hopefully get lost somewhere
leaving the country for cooler climates

Not meaningful at all I suppose, but I've not had a proper no-work school vacation for too long and this is possibly going to be the last holidays-holidays in life, so who can blame me? This December will be a restful one.

2008-11-26T01:08:00.009+08:00

The end of exams, as usual, didn't turn out to be much of an occasion. Not happy or whatever, just knackered and wanting very badly to go home and get a good, solid sleep. That plus a weary sense of relief that despite my ridiculous state of health these two weeks, I duly completed all five papers and won't have anything to repeat next semester.

There is a lot to be said retrospectively about this semester actually. I did blog about it scantly, in a deliberately vague fashion, over the last few months. What I did not quite mention though is that throughout the semester, I was really lost. And lost on so many levels. Among other things, I had serious doubts about my academic existence. Despite trying very hard to appreciate what I study, I wound up falling back on the mindless following of rules and standards, knowing everything but not learning anything. Increasingly, I found that I was doing a course with no soul and that it's making me tunnel-visioned and boring as a person. I hated it and would dream of going to arts school to major in lit.

And the strange characters whom I crossed path with this semester didn't help improve my perception of business school either.

Now, standing on the edge of a new beginning, I'm still trying to figure out where this is all going and contemplating the possibilities that stretch before me. I need an answer fast but before that, I need to think, to extricate myself from this mess and think in a clearer frame of mind. And that is why I think now is a good time to leave. Be it near or far, for the sake of preserving my sanity, I have to go.

2008-10-14T00:45:00.004+08:00

Since my last update, I have still been busy. Busy angsting about school and CCA and how I'm not going anywhere career-wise. Busy living in a less-than-perfect world. Busy trying to be me. Maybe it's time to go away and take a good break, so that when I return, I can see this place with new eyes and extra colours.

2008-09-23T12:49:00.004+08:00

I guess the dearth of updates pretty much says it all. It's been a really trying semester and I feel inordinately tired. But just when motivation starts waning and I'm in dire need of a strong perk-me-up, this song did it for me in the most timely fashion. 魔杰座, what a true magician indeed.

2008-09-12T22:47:00.005+08:00

Is it just me or are things these days getting very gloomy? Economic outlook is bad, employment prospects are bleak, polar ice caps continue to melt, mandopop (yes it's important to me) remains in the doldrums, bus and train fares are hiking again. Add to that the state of affairs in school and sigh, I can't even bring myself to talk about it.

There's one silver lining though, and that's the prospect of a glorious vacation this winter. Let's fly away to a happy bubble place!

2008-08-21T00:13:00.004+08:00

This semester has been somewhat strange. My mind is all over the place. I'm torn between studying and watching the Olympics. I have a five-day week but I have nothing to wear. My health has been no good. There are many strangers to pretend to be nice to (read: networking). And there are people in class who are worthy of all the eye rolling one can possibly muster. It's only week 3 though, so I'll just keep my fingers crossed for now.

2008-08-19T00:42:00.002+08:00

These days I can't quite get into the right groove to study until it's past midnight, the wind starts blowing and I put on the headset and let the tunes play. It's amazing how the same songs have stayed with me for three semesters already.

2008-08-16T12:28:00.003+08:00

Such historical moment definitely warrants a revival of my blog. Yes, I'm talking about the medal that finally ended the nation's Olympics frustration for the past so many years. Honestly speaking, I had thought that Singapore's best bet for a medal in the women's table tennis team event was a Bronze. There was also this confused reluctance in me to watch the match live on TV because I didn't want to be put through the entire agonising process only to end up in disappointment, just like the last two games. In the end, the IT lesson relieved me of having to make a decision and I spent those four nail-biting hours in the seminar room wondering if history will be made. After the lesson, national pride had me rushing to the Free Access Lab to check the live scores like a trader anxious to know the stock prices. Everytime the page refreshed, my heart missed a beat. When it was down to 9-9 in the last game, damnit the system started to lag and I almost wanted to smash the computer. In all surreality, the next thing that showed up on the screen: 9-11. It was over. Singapore had won her first medal in 48 years.

Let there be a public holiday to celebrate Team Singapore's victory!

2008-08-01T11:43:00.002+08:00

I get pretty uncomfortable whenever I don't write for too long, because this blog was never intended to be one of those shortlived ones that will eventually fall into oblivion when the author loses his momentarily aroused interest in blogging, or that he hasn't the time to keep it alive anymore. I don't like to use the lack of time as an excuse for not blogging because blogging isn't that time-consuming at all but sometimes, I'm guilty as charged too. And then there are times when I have many things to say, feel emphatically like saying, but have to grudgingly not say because they are sensitive and possibly offensive and I don't want to risk the unintended consequences of these things getting spilled over into the public domain. It's somewhat silly I know, but it's always been one of those rules that I've followed as a blogger that I do not put up my whole life on display here, but only things which I can live with people knowing - be they friends, random google users or potential stalkers. So that about sums up why I haven't been blogging these two weeks.

It's back to school again in three days and suddenly, the end of holidays doesn't seem to be such a depressing prospect anymore. Although I'm not as excited as when I was a freshman, I am positively looking forward to going back to my own turf. But before I get there, there are so many books that I ought to have been chewing on this summer. Time to speed up the reading.

2008-07-18T23:26:00.002+08:00

So I ended my eleven-week corporate stint on Friday and although it's nice knowing that the following Monday morning will be alarm clock-free, there is a part of me that couldn't really bear to leave. Compared to my previous two jobs, this one definitely ranks highest on the happy workplace, friendly colleagues scale. Of course, M company wins in terms of learning experience and S company is where I felt the greatest sense of importance. But overall, I'm happiest here and I can say in one heartbeat that my colleagues are truly sincere and good-natured people. They made me realise that the workplace isn't necessarily always the metaphoric 江湖 full of treacherous bad guys, that I could actually fit in despite my age; I know for sure I will miss working here wherever my career takes me in couple of years' time.

Farewell lunch with the department at a pseudo-atas restuarant;

some other nice people I met in the company,

and fellow NBS colleagues who provided all the entertainment through office emails and lunch gossips.

2008-07-17T23:51:00.001+08:00

So here's the obligatory photo post on the Taiwan trip.

Day 1At Terminal 1 an hour before take-off. Special thanks to Vanessa (third from the right) for coming specially to see us off!

After a gruelling four-and-a-half hours Jetstar flight journey and an hour's Freego bus ride from what used to be called the Chiang Kai-shek International Airport (now Taoyuan International Airport), we arrived at the Paradise Hotel strategically located at the heart of Ximen, and took this picture.

Hungry from a food-deprived budget flight journey, we first dined at the famous "Ay-Chung Flour-Rice Noodle"

and then drank the bona fide Taiwanese 波霸 Milk Tea before going around hunting for other 小吃s in Ximending.

Gastronomically satisfied, we hit the KTV lounge and sang from 11pm to 2am at just about S$20. If you've been there yourself, you'll know how ridiculously crappy our own KBOx is in comparison.

Day 2The day started with breakfast at 永和豆浆 which serves excellent 蛋饼.

We visited Taipei 101, where we asked a passerby to help us with the phototaking. Not surprisingly, he didn't fail to disappoint.

Forget it, let the pro do the job.

We continued to cam-whore inside the building,

and I spent some time at my favourite PageOne bookstore.

After an afternoon at the IT fair, Wufenpu and Taipei Main Station, we arrived at Shihlin Night Market where it was hard to miss...

the chicken chop famed for it size,

the oh-so-lovely ice-kachang

and the oyster omelette which only I seem to like. And then it was shopping for the rest of the night.

Day 3The journey to Jiufen on the sardine-packed train was a killer. But the spectacular views from the mountain top made it all worthwhile.

And so did the fishballs.

Yes, I can't believe we gave up Keelung and rushed back for Show Luo's autograph session. It was such a slutty affair (read on).

Purchase 5 copies of the DVD and you get a picture taken with him.

Make it 8 and he is all yours to hug.

And the veritable slut grabbed so many endorsement deals he is ubiquitous.

We set off for Danshui thereafter and toured the Fisherman's Wharf where Jam Hsiao held his 庆功演唱会 just a week ago.

The "tall tall" ice cream. Pretty to see, disastrous to eat because it melts so fast one is basically just running against time to get it all in the mouth before it turns into a messy pool of liquid.

Unglam tourists carrying 大包小包 after all the grabbing at Danshui Old Street.

Day 4This must be the most unexpected takeaway from this trip. I saw ALin in person! She was rehearsing for some street concert that morning and I didn't realise who I was hearing until she began to sing 假娃娃 and 四季. She sounded so CD-perfect even during rehearsal!

The afternoon was spent at Leo Foo Village, a rather disappointing amusement park without even a proper roller coaster. More grabbing at Ximending and Shihlin later that day.

Day 5Our last meal in Taipei at a peer-recommended beef noodle restaurant off Ximending.

I paid 五大唱片行 a visit and was delighted to learn that they are so aggressively promoting 卢广仲！

And I left the CD shop with this 7 year old album from Peggy Hsu. Oh, how could I have missed such a gem back then? I'll blog about it in greater detail but that's for a different post.

2008-07-16T21:38:00.004+08:00

So the bubble has burst and I'm back in Singapore, where there is laundry to be done, photos to sort out, emails to reply and a corporate life to return to. Not to mention a travel anecdote to be put on blog.

It's been a pretty eventful 5 days 4 nights. We dutifully hit all the tourist stops, ate what we were supposed to eat, karaoke-d at a Partyworld so posh it puts KBox to shame, watched 超级星光大道 (okay on the hotel TV I mean), survived the arduous journey to Jiufen, rushed back to Ximending in time for Show Luo's autograph session, had a chance encounter with ALin, and went on grabbing spree for nice apparels and local produce. It's all well and good, except very tiring - we had practically no rest from the moment we were done with the morning ablutions till we hit the sack at night. In retrospect, I wish I had spent more time at the feel-good places, immersed myself more deeply in the speak-nice-mandarin environment and generally enjoyed being there, instead of being constantly wearied by the jam-packed itinerary as a typical Singaporean tourist would. So yes, the food is nice and the shopping excellent, but those are not exactly the things I love the city for.

This won't be my last trip to Taipei. I still like the place very much, and I still want to go for the new year countdown someday, be able to layer myself with winterish clothes and walk freely on the streets without being hindered by the sweltering heat. With that, I wasn't feeling too sad when I left, because I will be back and it won't be too long.

This shall suffice for an update while I continue to sort out my photos and await the others. So, later now.

2008-07-07T23:16:00.003+08:00

I don't usually opine when my colleagues engage in casual chats over work, because one, I find it hard to make small talk and two, the topics don't always interest me. So most of the time I just listen to their conversations and laugh quietly to myself when I hear something funny. But today, I found myself protesting vehemently against a remark made by a colleague related to 卢广仲. Except, of course, nobody actually knew who 卢广仲 is.

“这首歌谁唱的(referring to the song playing on the radio)，这样难听!"

Okay to be fair, the song was 《早安，晨之美》, not the easiest song for starters, therefore her reaction was perfectly understandable. But its sad when everyone concurred with her and laughed derisively when the chorus went "对呀对呀对呀对呀" repetitively. So with me against them all, I somehow managed to find the moral courage to speak up in defense of the song and shamelessly promote 卢广仲 to them. In the end, I don't think I managed to convert anyone, and the next time they hear the song they probably will still laugh. But at the very least, they now know who this singer is, that he actually sings quite well and who knows, they might give the song a second chance?

By the way, as I was telling my colleagues, his album is priced quite steeply here because there isn't a local distributor yet and it's all imported directly from Taiwan. So if you want a cheaper copy, this is your last chance! Place your order with me before I fly there on Thursday! =)

2008-06-30T23:40:00.002+08:00

It's still early but I can confidently say this is going to be my favourite album this year. Anybody wants a copy from Taiwan?

2008-06-16T23:27:00.005+08:00

I'm not sure I still know how to blog coherently at all but I just want to leave this in for the record that today was really a nice day. Can't really pinpoint it though. Maybe it's the weather that decided to be surprisingly not-unfriendly today, that the air smelt of raindrops when there were hardly dark clouds in sight. Maybe it's the lovely people I'm surrounded with at work. Or it could be the Math tuition in the evening, the songs by 卢广仲, the book I'm reading, or perhaps, it's just the sudden wave of optimism that made me feel like none of the things that used to bother me really matters anymore. l love it when being happy is such an inexplicably simple affair.

2008-06-07T21:49:00.010+08:00

In my job I do a lot of journals, which means systematically recording transactions by way of double entries. So I know how money is spent, what's going on with the cash ledger and sometimes, I need to reconcile it with the money in the bank. It's not too complicated, although it probably helps to be armed with some AA101 knowledge, and I felt I was doing a pretty good job. But yesterday, I came across the messiest account I've ever seen and for the first time, I felt like I was having an occupational crisis.

It was my own bank account that threw me.

So my bank book shows that I've been spending a lot since the last time I updated it, a good five months ago. And you know how this thing works when you don't update your bank book frequently enough - all the old transactions are consolidated, leaving only the more recent records there. But even then, as I tried to analyse those recent items in the withdrawal column, I could hardly trace them to my spending memory. The number of $20 ATM withdrawals is amazingly high, and it befuddles me why I had needed so much money. And then there are the many mysterious NETS transactions of which I could only recall a few.

In the end, I just gave up beating my brains out to remember where I had been and what I was doing to warrant those expenditures and decided somebody must have hacked into my account and taken my money away.

No wonder they say accountants make the worst clients.

2008-05-31T14:20:00.007+08:00

Frustrated by how meaningless this holiday has been and how I'm not getting any satisfaction from my job (there is a lot to be said about this, but that's a different post for a different day), I've decided to come up with a summer reading list. Now all that's left to be done is go to the library and bring the books home, and make every Sunday a book-reading day. Hopefully, blogging about this now will make me feel responsible for seeing it done, instead of letting it become another holiday plan with no follow through.

2008-05-25T23:34:00.005+08:00

The trekking trip at the Southern Ridges last Saturday reminded me of the HSBC tree-top walk - a lot of walking to do, many flights of stairs to climb and nothing terribly spectacular in the end. But it's pretty good exercise I suppose, especially for the office slob that I am slowing becoming. Being close to nature once in a while does help to heal the corporate-weary soul. Maybe someday I'll return and attempt to complete the entire 9km route.

2008-05-19T10:43:00.002+08:00

Lately I've been following the third season of 超级星光大道. For the uninitiated, the Taiwanese reality TV talent show took the entertainment industry by storm last year and has seen newcomers like Aska Yang and Xiao Jing Teng rise to stardom almost instantly. So last week's episode had the contestants pair up and duet with one of the guest singers including JJ Lin, Khalil Fong (方大同), Julia 彭佳惠, ALin 黄丽玲, 林宇中, Shino 林晓培 and 戴爱玲. It's definitely one of the more interesting episodes to watch because I am not too familiar with the crop of contestants so it's nice to have more familiar faces around. But the greatest takeaway from this episode is that it made me aware of two extremely talented singers whom I had been blind to.

One of them is Khalil Fong. Okay he is definitely not unknown because 爱爱爱 was such a huge commercial success, at least here in Singapore. But I believe for most of us, our knowledge of him pretty much stops there. After watching him on the show, I realised there's so much more to him than I had known, just as how limited my understanding of R&B as a genre has been all these while. I was too quick to judge him based on the 主打 and didn't know what I was missing. Perceptual bias, if you like. Now, I am watching his MVs and live performances over and over again on youtube and getting increasingly attracted to his Justin Timberlake-ish style. Note to self: to attempt his songs at Kbox during my next visit.

The second is ALin 黄丽玲. Not many would have remembered this name, but I guess any self-respecting Mandopop listener would have heard of her 失恋无罪 at one time or another. And oh what a diva she is, with that big husky voice that reminds me of A*mei. Now to be worthy of being placed in the same sentence as A*mei would mean a lot for any singer. Unfortunately, she doesn't have the comeliest of looks, nor have enough 绯闻s to generate public interest. I went to check, her debut album had a very disappointing run on the G-music billboard chart when it was released in February 2006, where it stayed for a mere two weeks and never went past the number 13 spot. The following year, she attempted a comeback with an EP release but response was only lukewarm at best.

At the end of the show I was thinking, 黎礎宁(one of the contestants who got paired up with ALin) would be grateful towards ALin, without whom she couldn't have possibly pulled off that perfect score. But on the other hand, ALin must be extremely thankful as well, for her singing career might have well been revived by all the hype surrounding that performance, especially when we are talking about the most viewed TV programme in Taiwan and her appearance on it must have earned her that much needed publicity. And just like me, I am sure many viewers out there will be looking forward to her new album.

For those interested, I have provided the youtube links here:
荒唐 - A Lin & 潘嗣敬
我还是不懂 - A Lin & 黎礎宁
四人游 - 方大同 & 徐佳莹
歌手与模特儿 - 方大同 & 赖圣恩

2008-05-18T23:48:00.001+08:00

With this bunch of people, our outings always had something to do with singing, board games, food and gossips (them gossiping, me listening). The weight-gaining activities, to quote Xueting ad verbatim. So it's nice to be enjoying the outdoors for a change. It's my second attempt at roller blading today and I think my skills have improved a lot! Can now vaguely feel the wind in my hair as I blade. Looking forward to more healthy weekend outings from now on, the next one being the quest to conquer the Southern Ridges next Sunday.

2008-05-12T20:21:00.007+08:00

I like our airport. Not just because of how it always makes me think fondly of past holiday trips. It's also one of those rare things that actually makes me patriotic, albeit only transient, superficial kind of patriotic. Nothing like returning home to a beautiful, fully-carpeted arrival hall replete with lovely orchids, clean toilets and efficient immigration counters to stir national pride in me. To this day, I still believe we have the prettiest airport in the world, never mind that it's now fallen from grace in terms of ranking. That also explains why I was unreasonably saddened when the Budget Terminal came into existence. Changi Airport and ugly terminal just don't go together. I guess I won't ever allow myself to be there for anything travel-related, because an overseas trip by plane is never complete without the beautiful Changi Airport experience.

And because the airport means a lot to me, it was mandated that I check out the new Terminal 3. So the friend and I did last Saturday, for the first time since its opening in January. Yes I know I am very late on this, but I'd rather be late than rush there immediately when it was open like typical Singaporeans flocking to a new AMK hub or Vivocity. That would cheapen things far too much. We don't want our airport to degenerate into a new destination for Sunday family outings do we?

So anyway, I was pretty satisfied with T3 after the short visit. Its design is totally brilliant. I like that the entire place seems filled with natural light to create that nice sunshiny feeling, yet doesnt feel a whit like a greenhouse. And despite having all that space, it isn't dauntingly enormous like many of the new airports these days. The glass walls and the whole see-through design probably made it seem smaller visually. When I was in Hong Kong, my friends and I grossly underestimated the size of the airport and by extension of that, the time we needed to travel to the boarding gate. Note the use of the word travel. In Pudong, Shanghai, the new terminal is vast and cavernous and has many many pockets of emptiness. Ditto for the one in KL. It overwhelms you with its sheer size, and everywhere things are just too in-your-face, with restaurants and retail shops springing up every which way, but not putting you in the mood for shopping or eating somehow. An airport without a soul is what I would call it. And I'm glad T3 doesn't fall under that category.

But in the end, I must say I still love T1 the most; the old, faithful terminal that has seen Changi Airport win countless awards over the past so many years. It still has that inexplicable charm to it, even though some parts of the building are a little worse for wear now. Like the viewing gallery which looks very 1980s, yellowish floor tiles and all. But that said, the friend and I could comfortably deposit ourselves there and chat the afternoon away. The other two terminals couldn't offer that kind of atmosphere. And it's the only terminal out of the three that was bustling with activities and teeming with people. At T2 and T3, there were just rows and rows of empty check-in counters. What's an airport without all that buzz?

Thank goodness Jetstar uses T1 and I have all the more reason to look forward to the Taiwan trip now.

2008-05-08T21:38:00.006+08:00

So work has started and the first day wasn't too bad. It's a department of aunties I am working with so over lunch, I find myself in a conversation that runs the gamut from parenting to shopping to office gossips. Making small talk is such an essential skill which I am sadly inadequate to. And I thought it was vaguely amusing when one of the staff told me that the reason for my being hired is that one of them is going on maternity leave soon. But other than that, it feels like a pretty nice place to work at and I hope these positive emotions will last for the next two months.

2008-05-03T23:34:00.005+08:00

I've finished The Kite Runner. Well, I won't say I love it, because it's not really my type of novel. You know, I'm a sucker for trashy, quick and mindless reads, not literaturesque, get you all serious and contemplative stuff like this one. But yes, it's undeniably a good, solid read and certainly lived up to every expectation I had had. The writer's a great storyteller, and the plot unfolded in a suitably detailed but none too draggy manner, even if it meant telling a life story worth thirty nine years. I'm glad it has a good ending too, the sort which leaves you satisfied with a sense of closure yet doesn't scream happily ever after.

So I don't have a problem with it except one thing. I find it entirely too depressing to read. Because it's not all fiction. Because it slaps you on the face and wakes you to the horrid plight of people elsewhere in our world, to the pillage and bloodshed that were taking place, and to how we have been living all too comfortably, pretending that these things don't actually exist in the ideal, warped-in-our-mind version of the real world. These are things I casually read about on the papers from time to time, and it's sad that they didn't really hit home until a book did it for me.

And that is why I insist on reading trashy pop fiction.

2008-05-01T21:10:00.002+08:00

I may like to gripe about how Vivocity is always too crowded, how the design sucks and how it lacks a personality because it tries to be everything. But despite all that, I do visit the giantess mall rather frequently and there's a part of me that enjoys being there, even if it's for no particular reason at all. Sometimes on the way home from school, I'll drop by to look at nice clothes, to pretend to be able to afford shopping at one of those upmarket stores and to generally feel good. And because it's just a five minute commute from my place, it feels very neighbourhood shopping mall. Like another Tiong Bahru Plaza or Great World City, just a lot bigger. Vivocity has everything I need, except a KBox.

And of course, there's lovely PageOne there, which draws me to it like a magnet all the time. Now it's not me to be drawn to bookstores. I find Borders quite a turn-off because there are (or used to be) kids hanging around and they read on the floor and are very irritating. MPH does not whet my appetite for books. I think it has to do with the uninspiring layout of the shelves and all which unfortunately reminds me of Popular bookstores. Kino is a lot more palatable, except that I don't have any special feelings for it because one, I seldom go there and two, I don't really read.

So I guess what attracts me to PageOne is not the collection of books there. It doesn't have a very rich collection anyway, since it's so much smaller compared to places like Borders which prides itself on being big. But that doesn't really matter to me because there's a reason why libraries exist. And despite being small, they do have quite a bit of Chinese books and so that's very nice. I like PageOne for its pleasant ambience. It's pretty quiet inside, a welcome respite from the noisy cinema crowd just outside, and kids don't go in and loiter, probably because they all disappeared to Toys 'R' Us or the open-air playground. And I like the quirky bookshelves, the subtlety in tone of the lighting, and that touch of nostalgia which originated from that period of time when I was working at M company and used to go there and read my lunchtime away.

So it being labour day today and I am without a date and I have resolved to stay away from Facebook, Viwawa and other evil things and the library is closed for the public holiday, I headed down to PageOne with all my allowances in tow and surprise surprise, I bought a book home! I can't remember when the last time I bought a book was, not including textbooks. And now, The Kite Runner is sitting on my bed, and I wonder if I am the last person in the world to read the book which everyone has been raving about.

2008-04-29T16:06:00.002+08:00

It's been four days into the long summer holidays and as usual, I have no idea what I am doing with my life. Instead of advancing my career, I am staying at home becoming a 宅男. I still sleep at 4am every day, and I spend too much time dealing cards on Viwawa for my own good. Outside of the house, there's been food, roller blading, ice-skating, KTV and darn, my debit card bill is going to hit the roof this month. But that said, I like that it's the holidays, because I can choose the people I want to meet and interaction with other strange humans is pretty much minimised. And because the past semester had been horrible for me (as anyone who read the last few posts would have surmised) and the world had been spinning way too fast, it's survival instinct for one to slow down and just idle away. Who can blame me?

So eight more days of decadence it shall be, before the job officially starts next Thursday and I start complaining about losing a life to work again.

2008-04-10T02:28:00.006+08:00

I think I have a penchant for sad birthdays. Two years ago to the day, I crossed over to my twenties in Taiwan and I remember feeling good about how nobody around me knew it was my birthday. Today, I ushered in my 22nd year at a sad MacD doing Math as usual. Although I am still trying to come to terms with the shocking pair of digits that are now officially my age, I like the idea of spending birthdays just like any other day, except being a little more self-involved than I usually am. Then again, maybe there should be a greater purpose.

It's been an unhappy year so far and I really hope twenty two will be a sign of better things to come.

2008-04-01T00:40:00.002+08:00

It's still way too early (yeah I insist I am still gloriously 21) but still, thanks everyone for taking time out of your busy schedules to put together this celebration; for the gorgeous laptop bag; for the best mango cake I've ever tasted;

and for some of the best photos I've taken in a very long time! Happy belated birthday to Jonathan too!

In other news, the Taiwan trip has been confirmed! Will fly on 10th July and return on the 14th. I wish for good weather and a painless budget flight experience.

2008-03-29T01:10:00.004+08:00

So I've finally survived all presentations and projects for this semester and although I am still breathing, I wonder how much cerebral damage had been done, how my caffeine addiction had escalated no end and how I have aged from all these lack of sleep. It's a gratifying ending but on hindsight, it's really sad that what was meant to be a glorious 15-Academic-Units semester turned out to be anything but. And it's even sadder to reflect upon what had gone wrong, only to realise that the problem lies entirely with me. I have too many expectations to live up to, but they're probably all mine. Being the perfectionist that I am, I took too many things in my own hands and felt I was alone and got upset and morose but that only made things worse. So it all boils down to how I am inadequate as a friend, a teammate or a leader. I guess I have only just started to learn.

On an irrelevant note, I've recently taken to spending the night at a 24-hour MacD, doing Math and observing random people around me in between sipping a large cup of iced lemon tea.

2008-03-21T00:06:00.003+08:00

Perhaps this will make a good story someday. But now, I'm not ready to make things worse.

2008-03-14T14:06:00.003+08:00

Apologies for being remiss in updating my blog. These days, I've pretty much lost my life to schoolwork and the only thing I look forward to each day is a nice, long hot water bath in the winterish weather. Somehow, I really look forward to the exams - because that's when I will finally have some kind of reprieve from projects and other endless commitments. How not sad. Meanwhile, take care folks!

2008-03-09T17:15:00.003+08:00

It's been eight years and I thought I was reaching the end of the road with this love affair. I even thought I had already become over-aged when I found myself being completely unable to relate with the first two plays. But thankfully, the last play felt SO right it reminded me of Huang Cheng's heydays. And when the grand finale came and everyone, including the audience, began to 唱一首华初的歌, I knew I was in love all over again.

2008-02-28T00:44:00.004+08:00

L: Change the World

I don't understand why girls in the cinema giggle over everything L does that is vaguely funny (or cute, if you will). And he isn't even the typical giggle worthy guy is he?

2008-02-23T15:01:00.004+08:00

One of my tutees live in the Yio Chu Kang/Sengkang area. It's definitely not near my place. I spend more than an hour on the train and bus, take an additional 15 minutes walking from the nearest bus stop to where she lives, deep inside the neighbourhood of private landed houses, and do all that in the opposite direction two hours later. My mom thinks I'm crazy. Yet, I'm not complaining.

Being at that area of Singapore always put me in a very good mood. There, the houses are large and sometimes palatial, but they don't knock you over with pompous arrogance like the ones in Bukit Timah do. A forest is nearby and one is constantly surrounded by lush greenery and that sweet 'forest scent'. A few bus stops away is the Sengkang New Town which offers an equally pretty sight. The flats are new, well-designed and nicely spaced out, with lovely open grass plains that stretch for kilometres across one can almost see the horizon. Very rare for a HDB estate which is typically characterised by high-density housing and uninspiring park connectors.

On the way back I'll always opt for taking the NEL from Sengkang, even though taking the red line from Yio Chu Kang can save me half an hour of travelling time. I love taking the bus to Sengkang because it's never crowded and the scenery along the way keeps me invigorated. It brings me to the bus interchange built adjacent to the MRT/LRT station and Compass Point Shopping Centre. Similar to AMK and HDB hub, just a lot more palatable. Overall, there's this nice, humble feel about the place, although I can't quite put my finger on it.

So despite the insane travelling and the fact that I am severely underpaid by my tutee (according to one of my relatives who thinks I should be getting nothing less than $45 per hour), I'll always look forward to my weekly visits to this sparsely populated new town. Having said that, I don't think this place will stay the way it is for long. Ambitious development plans are underway, more bulldozers and other arcane machinery are moving in, and it's only a matter of time before it becomes yet another over-peopled neighbourhood and everything pretty much goes to hell. Sigh.

2008-02-18T14:25:00.004+08:00

That day when I was drifting in and out of the shops in Sim Lim Square, I noticed that almost every alternate shop I went to was playing one of Jay Chou's album or another. I thought maybe it's a tech geek thing. But at Queensway shopping centre today, I observed the same phenomenon again.

It's highly disconcerting, the same feeling I felt when some secondary school ah lian blasted 白色风车 on her handphone and shared it with everyone on the bus a few weeks back. And the ubiquity of Kungfu Dunk ads these days isn't helping at all. So, I decided it was time I finally stopped looping his album after having done so for the past 4 months, before I become another walking Jay Chou cliché.

The only problem is that I need to look for a new drug. Joanna Wang's "Start From Here", perhaps?

2008-02-14T23:25:00.002+08:00

It's yet another Valentine's Day spent without a significant other and while I appreciate the merits of being single, there's nothing like Chen Qizhen's 还是会寂寞 to describe how I actually feel about my state of affairs.

2008-02-06T16:50:00.000+08:00

As ditzy as it sounds, I enjoyed 功夫灌篮 very much. All along I expected it to be some silly, crappy 周星驰-ish comedy without a soul. As it turned out, it was indeed silly, crappy and 周星驰-ish but with a fair bit of soul and meaning. And I'm increasingly impressed by Jay Chou's versatility. Never mind that there are many way-more-superior films out there to choose from during the festive season; it's incredibly entertaining and that's all I ask for because I desperately needed to unwind after several days of tearing my hair over the academic nemesis that is Organizational Behavior.

Welcome to the Year of the Rat, everyone!

2008-02-03T21:12:00.000+08:00

My MP3 player just died. I think I'm not going to survive the journey to school tomorrow. And I'm so severely affected by it I need to listen to some emo songs now but I can't.

2008-02-02T01:17:00.000+08:00

It wasn't easy but I snapped out of it just in time and now, I'm back in the feel-good state. Now to tie up the loose ends, knock down that invisible wall I built around myself and smile to the world.

2008-01-27T22:04:00.000+08:00

Being the only son in the family means that I naturally became the household IT guy. I handle all sorts of IT matters in the house, be they regular computer maintenance or simple things like helping family members transfer their pictures from the camera to the computer. So after the demise of our six-year-old desktop computer a few days ago, I took it upon myself to source for a new one, even though having a working desktop or not isn't really my concern - I use my own laptop all the time.

I was fiddling with the idea of assembling one myself. I've seen people do it and it really isn't any insurmountable task. It's like playing LEGO, throw in the cables and less the creative part. But a morning of googling later, I decided against it because 1) I don't have the luxury of time to find out what works best with what, what and what should never be used together, what price will be reasonable for what and many other complicated matters further, 2) it's probably cheaper to get a bundle from one of those shops in Sim Lim Square than buying individual DIY components separately and 3) I don't want to risk screwing up on my first attempt and burning down the house in the process. Talk about being risk-averse.

So I proceeded to Sim Lim, got voluntarily inundated with flyers (I thought they banned the flyer distribution some time ago but apparently, it's back in full swing), visited a few shops, did the necessary budgeting and eventually went with this:

Gigabyte Intel 945GCX Mainboard
Intel Core2Duo 2.2GHz E4550
2GB DDR2-667 RAM
160GB SATA2 HDD
256MB Intel Extreme GMA On-Board Graphics Card
20X Samsung DVD writer

Price: $556

Gaming PC? Not really. And because I scavenged some usable parts from the old unit and transferred them here, it looks a little less than pretty. Like this off-white CD writer that sticks out like a sore thumb on the black-and-silver casing. Oh well, no point being an aesthetic whore here, since it makes more economical sense than to garang guni it.

I hope this new machine plays nice to the household IT guy and doesn't give him anymore work in the near future.

2008-01-25T20:09:00.000+08:00

The problem with electives is that they are SU-able. I was ploughing through the Astronomy textbook today and those two alphabets kept flashing in my mind. Very distracting. I pressed on, but whenever I got to the uninspiring Physics part of it I became disheartened and I felt most emphatically like throwing in the towel.

But to give up just like that is so not cool because it means surrendering without a fight and it's against my principles. Besides, Physics surely can't be my nemesis, given my erstwhile profession as a Science student? And surprise surprise, I even took Physics 'S' Paper, even though how I did not get 'Ungraded' for it in the end remains one of life's unsolved mysteries.

So I'm not going to hoist the white flag, yet. Not at least until I'm done with one of the tests and decide if I'm really hopeless.

Oh and I was wrong about him. "没有地球太阳还是会绕" is true after all - the Sun orbits the Milky Way Galaxy! And that's about the most enlightening takeaway from this course so far.

2008-01-20T22:09:00.000+08:00

周大侠
And because it's him, even a song as crappy as this actually becomes nice after the fifth loop. Just like what happened with 霍霍霍霍霍霍霍霍.

Can you say concert withdrawal symptom?

2008-01-19T01:10:00.000+08:00

Jay Chou World Tour 2008

The thing about spending your adolescent years in the Jay Chou era is that everytime he holds a concert here, it becomes some kind of marker in your life. For me, "The One" marked the end of 'O' Levels, "Incomparable" was post-'A' Levels, and I will probably remember this one as the First-Year-in-University concert. The next time he comes around, I'd probably have graduated and joined the workforce. So I don't know if I should be looking forward to that day.

I'm really glad I went for the concert today despite all the difficulty in getting a ticket. I wouldn't say it was spectacular. His voice was occasionally shaky and the Indoor Stadium is no 红馆 in terms of sound quality. But what I liked about the concert as a whole is that it was suitably subtle. It didn't try too hard to impress with pompous, fanciful stage elements like the one in Taipei did. And it was evident that he was enjoying his own performance, which was nice to see because he had every reason to feel disgruntled, it being his birthday and him having to work. So it was a pretty light-hearted affair, simple and neat enough.

And my favourite performances of the night? 最长的电影, 退后 and the truly, incredibly high 阳光宅男.

2008-01-12T22:02:00.000+08:00

Even though I didn't have many fond memories of JC life and the little trip down memory lane yesterday sort of confirmed that, there are things I miss from those days. I miss loving my CCA. I miss having competent project mates. I miss tutorials where nobody speaks up. Now I am happier, but then things were simpler.

2008-01-08T22:45:00.000+08:00

Parting with the holidays is never easy. It's when one gets slapped hard in the face by reality, shell-shocked at the prospect of rising at 6am the next day, and would give anything for a few more days of not having to go to school. I guess even for an undergraduate, it's still pretty much the same thing, only perhaps a little more painless since there isn't a need to rush holiday assignments at the eleventh hour or face the feather duster-armed teacher tomorrow.

Then again, I'm not sure I actually had a holiday. The past one month was spent working, and the thing about working life is that it reminds you of the merits of being a student. So returning to school is fine by me. My only gripe is that I haven't had a proper rest yet. I wish I had gone on a holiday trip. I wish I had been reading. I wish I could just let the whole day roll ahead of me without feeling guilty about not doing a stitch of work the entire day. I wish I could start the semester in a better groove.

So I'm not feeling at all excited about going back to school tomorrow. It's like how Harry and friends became more jaded each time they returned to Hogwarts, just less fun, and I can't portkey my way there and skip the interminable 179 queue altogether.

2008-01-05T21:02:00.000+08:00

It's unfortunate but I have to take the Individual Physical Proficiency Test (IPPT) every year and I figured there's no better time to face it than today - just before the semester starts anew and my fitness becomes non-existent again. So, I gave it a rather lacklustre attempt and won myself a consolation prize of $100. Not too bad, I guess.

Taking the test in a military camp felt strange. I haven't been to one for as long as the pink IC became my possession again, which has been more than a year long. I had cleanly forgotten that camera phones and MP3 players are banned items and happily brought mine in. I didn't even bother tucking in my shirt but got away with it. A sort of sadness lingers about the place somehow. It's a relatively new camp but it lacks a life, not just because its occupants are gone for the weekend. The NSFs guarding the camp don't look at all happy; the horde of middle-aged Remedial Trainees strutting around in mismatched PT attire appear seriously unglam. And there's plenty of bad English too.

So it brought back all those feelings. Thankfully, I've moved on from there and I'm happy with civilian life as it is now. Now that IPPT is done, whatever NS commitments shall be pushed to the backburner and I will duly forget all about being a reservist until the next time a MINDEF SMS appears on my handphone again.

2008-01-01T00:24:00.000+08:00

It's a little surreal to think that 2008 is already here. And there's nothing like the new year to remind me that I am approaching some kind of an age crisis, slowly but surely.

How should I describe the year that has passed? I can't say it rocked. I had a lot of growing up to do, a lot of struggling with the vicissitudes of life, and a lot of clamouring to be understood. But it wasn't a bad year either. I'm glad I've moved on, found some semblance of a direction and am becoming more comfortable with myself and others. 2007 wasn't a life-changing year. I'm still pretty much the same person. But it's certainly a year I discovered more about myself, learned about my imperfections and tried to improve, albeit with possibly minimal success.

I'm grateful for the people who had walked through the different episodes of the year with me. I wish I had spent more time with some of them. Still, thanks for being a friend of this horrible person who has never taken the initiative to keep in touch with anyone, who takes friends for granted and doesn't really deserve any friends.

For the new year, let's all be happier than the last, shall we?

2007-12-24T01:01:00.000+08:00

This blog is taking a short Christmas break and I thought I'll just post this before I leave.

Merry Christmas, everybody!