Real Random Ramble

I am so weird

2010-07-02T06:36:00.000-07:00

I am only into the first sentence of Glare's article and I already catch myself asking, rhetorically, 'Why on earth am I attempting translation with my current standard of japanese?' And to think that my drive for Bunka has been expiring lately. Goodness, there is the I3 final exam tomorrow. I did horribly for the mid term and here I am blogging about it instead of studying for it! There goes.

What a paradox. This tiredness I have for Bunka is absolutely contrary to my desire to finish up the translation, move over to livejournal, start my first post with it, and join the Deluhi community, among others. I fear that this may be the start, though God forbid, to the metamorphoses into a fangurl. The kind that in all honesty I have always disliked - those with the inflated dream of 'mastering' japanese when all they really want to say is 'kawaiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii', 'sugooooooooooooooooi, 'aiishiiiteeiiiruuu' and working in japan (read: PS Company only).

Or maybe my lack of enthusiasm for serious japanese studying could be due to this weird sense of organization I have that leans dangerously towards an OCD. Here goes: I generally try to tailor my schedule toward two extremes, either a very packed one or one that is totally slack. I find that I thrive on the adrenaline of a packed schedule, and the haste actually releases tremendous amounts of endorphins that in turn trigger a flustered demeanour. But, when it is time to relax, I want to do nothing but that either. Hence, I find it hard to maintain a holiday diet of slacking and reading, key word being 'and'. Yet, I somehow cannot resist squeezing some reading time, for my own books, during those working/schooling days! Hence, I am strangely looking forward to cramming next week onwards with:

1.Teaching (goodness my official working hours are from 7:30am to 5:00pm, and I am well aware that the hours in print always undercut what really happens)
2. Translating and setting up a livejournal account
3. Reading Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita (I already want to read Moby Dick after this)
4. Finishing up I4 (yes, what a paradox! I somehow have this compulsion to finish up the intermediate series before I leave for...)
5. Korea and hence the need to settle my exchange matters.

Woohoo!

In preparation for moving

2010-06-28T20:34:00.000-07:00

Let's get straight to the point: I will be moving to Livejournal, soon.

I have gotten sick and tired of the techincal issues that plague realrandomramble here at blogspot, and the feedback that I've received from current livejournal users seems to promise that things over at the latter are more smooth-sailing.

Another aspect that makes livejournal stand out from the likes of wordpress, blogspot and all would be its communities. Jie has been having loads of fun with the communities there, Deluhists being one of them, and I know I'm missing out!

There is a reason behind my procrastination, a good one at that!, which would unveil itself when I finally move.

Till then, I still cannot decide on the name for my livejournal account. I was contemplating keeping realrandomramble, but I did toy with other ideas as well.

Any suggestions?

This Blog was Meant for so much more

2010-05-23T06:04:00.000-07:00

I should be utilizing this blog a lot more that what I am currently doing.

This should be an easily accessible place for me to practise my writing skills, for who is to stop me from writing about anything I want? Each post could be something wholly different from its precedent and antecedent. In one post I can be the quiet girl who sits a top a hill, overlooking the ongoings of a busy farm, and in another I am the gossip girl who needs to gripe about somebody. And I could always come back to the posts later to edit them.

So, why not?

Brutal Honesty

2010-05-15T08:33:00.000-07:00

There are some people who wield bluntness as a tool to stroke their self-esteem. More often than not, these people possess rock-bottom self-esteem to begin with, and the only way for them to boost their ego is by lashing out at everybody and anybody, but especially so at those who believe in themselves with a confidence that these people can only envy from a side. Hence, blutness becomes their flimsy shield and blunt - quite literally - sword, which they then lash impulsively in all directions against everybody in the most uncalled for, unnecessary, unjustified ways.

Then, there are some who use bluntness as a good sculptor would wield his sharp carving tools. I'd like to call this tool brutal honesty, a medicine which may cause a wound to sear at a higher intensity of pain than bluntness, but only to heal and mend a lack.

I have met many of such people, from both groups. I acknowledge that the first group have helped me, somehow, in learning to not care, or at the least, care less. But it is the second group for which I am very grateful. I hope you guys know who you are, and to name a few, Daddy, Mommy, Jie, John. I really appreciate the fact that praise is only given when it is truly deserved, but encouragement is in ready supply at all times. In your brutal honesty, you have been very kind to me.

Love,

Tessa

Pulau Sibu

2010-05-13T05:48:00.000-07:00

I had a splendid time at Pulau Sibu. Splendid mainly because of the great company I had :)

Such that, if I were to nitpick and squeeze out a complain about the 3 days there, I can only say that the au natural conditions of an island with powder soft sand and a densely packed secondary forest wrecked its wrath on my concrete jungle skin.

I am pockmarked, bursting at the seams with puss, my skin a darker shade from sun exposure, and redder from contact with some objective that my oily-combination sensitive skin did not sit well with.

I have to resist the urge to tuck my face behind any object I am holding at the said moment every time I walk past someone.

That being said, I am fuelled by the adrenaline which was garnered over the 3 days of excitement at being out of Singapore - for a holiday at that - and many physical activities which I did for the first time in my life! I have this sudden urge to go out, everywhere, be it the shopping mall, sungei buloh again and what not.

But, somehow, going out has a directly proportional relationship with my daily expenditure. If I want my next overseas trip to be as splendid as this one, the spending will not do.

A Shopping Trip

2010-05-08T08:42:00.000-07:00

Today marks the start of many new things. One of it being that, for the very first time in my life, I shopped alone.

This pioneering experience took place at Charles & Keith. To be honest, I never paid much attention to Charles & Keith, let alone think of making my first solo purchase there. In fact, I would not have actually entered the shop if not for the thoughtful vouchers from Charmaine, Matthew, Sharon and Jarett when Charmaine realized I needed new shoes. My ignorance of the said brand turned out to be a blessing too, when, after googling it (because I did not even know where to find it), it turned out that the outlet at ION was having massive price cuts for a wide selection of shoes, bags and sunglasses.

I sojourned to ION alone after Jie left for class, hoping to pick out a pair of sneakers in a jiffy and head over to starbucks for a coffee as I complete my homework. I did not expect shopping alone to be such a difficult balance, quite literally, of aesthetic and price judgment with a constant heightened surveillance of my surroundings.

Being alone meant that there was no one to help me watch my bag, and back. It sure did not help that barely a few minutes after I walked in, a customer dashed to the counter to make a frantic plea for her lost Iphone. I momentarily suspected that the trio of thai trannies, who had sauntered in earlier and left after trying a ton of items but not buying any, were somehow involved in it. That incident got me all paranoid and I proceeded to try on the shoes all while balancing my heavy bag on one shoulder and holding on to my current shoes with the other hand. All while using my one free hand, which was weighed down my the bag, to take the heels off high shelves and untie laces. Even after I got the shoes on, one of which required navigating through a seriously intricate web of black lace, it was then time to jostle amongst the crowd which had formed in front of the store's limited mirrors. Then came the tricky balance of walking in 4 inch heels (which I have not worn in ages), while carrying the bag and the shoes, in order to gauge the comfort. I continued this art of tipping, bending, squeezing, trying, looking, walking, amidst some help from the rather attentive service staff, before finally settling on a pair of white gladiator sandals.

(I was about to post a picture of my feet in the shoes. But I refrained, reason being the horribly thick cankles encased within them, courtesy of a movement-restraining exam period and the awesome penang buffet last night, I shall upload a better photograph when I deem my ankles fit!)

Anyway, Jie and I had an awesome time at Bobbi Brown and F.I.S.H. after that! I cannot help but smile in pleasant anticipation that today was a sneak peak at what's to come in June. I'm sure we'll have a blast then!

I am back, but I might be leaving soon.

2010-05-05T06:52:00.000-07:00

Exams are over.

I have probably said that phrase many times, in many ways. I remember almost shrieking it out loud a friend, a day late actually, since her exams ended one day after mine. But I also recall saying it softly with a stinging resign as I came to a full realization that now comes the agonizing waiting part.

That being said, I must get back to blogging regularly. But Blogspot is not exactly the most conducive platform for this.

What Matters the Most!

2010-04-14T05:19:00.000-07:00

Is to make lemonade!

Where is my thumbdrive?

2010-04-06T07:10:00.001-07:00

Somebody please tell me, please return it to me.

How could this happen?

How could I have been so careless?

So I came back empty handed from the HSS FAL and office today and Hwee Hsia, Lynn, J, Chee Seng and Wai Ji for lunch. As great as my company was, I was still harbouring that horrible sense of dread and self-flagellating guilt, such that I hopped onto the cheap thrill bandwagon - think, a bowl of dry yong tau foo smothered with ladles of sauce. Goodness, typing this now just makes me feel even more stupid. Comforting myself over the loss of an expensive thumbdrive with a portion of Canteen B quality food (think: we're only there because we don't have time to go elsewhere).

Anyway, I decided to venture for a 40cents a piece item (double whammy indeed. My cheap thrill was really cheap) and would have settled for the fried wonton (oh goodness. Double irony!) if not for the huge ball of fried mass that caught my eye. So yes, I went for that huge mass of deep fried goodness, the last item after scooping a hard boiled egg into my bowl, only to discover that the former was indeed an egg too, wrapped in a thick coating of fried batter.

Kena Jacked.

2010-04-03T06:57:00.000-07:00

Having made that dreaded phone call a couple of weeks ago to transfer my I3 class to a post-exam date, all I was resigned to do today was sit at the dimly lit Starbucks opposite Delfi Orchard and watch enviously as trickles of students clutching an all too familiar textbook made the all too familiar crossing past the precarious junction and into the building (I noted once again that most of these students were female, with hair dyed in varying shades of brown or blonde or both, and possessing at least one item related to Arashi, NEWS, Kattun and occasionally, Gazette).

I attempted to drown myself in The Yellow Wave as I sipped from a large mug of half-kick caffe mocha that got rapidly cold and unpalatable when it started to rain and I moved to the small indoor seating area. Where did the other half of the kick go to?

Somehow channeled into the kick I gave myself for letting an opportune moment to pursue one of my favourite hobbies pass by.

Halpz.

2010-03-31T21:12:00.001-07:00

How often do I blog from school? Usually only when I fall into a lull, the latter of which are typically induced by periods of not knowing what to do (read: lazy? or in some cases, when I am simply too fatigued to do any more reading or writing essays).

And now, the lull has been induced by yet another 'almost an all nighter' incident. This time it ended an hour earlier though, at 4:30? am I think, but my eyes were weak then, it might have been another time....

Lynn is here...i am leaving :(

The Signs are Here!

2010-03-29T07:43:00.000-07:00

A chance memory slip today rendered me noteless in today's HL328 class. But I do remember printing the secondary source though, its just that I could not find it. So I ended up sitting next to Ismath in order to share the notes with her. And I happened to see how much of a furious note taker she was. Compared to my skimpy etchings in my notebook. Blame this on my weakening attention span these days. And blame that on my lack of exercise. I cannot stop harping on this paradox that the more I run, the more drive I have.

I. Need. To. Run.

Totally unrelated photographs of a potentially fatherless family of cats I met on my way home.

Confession

2010-03-18T20:32:00.001-07:00

One of the stupidest mistakes I ever made was to pass on the chance of running for Student Council Exco back in junior college.

I did stand a high chance.

And I passed it up for the stupidest reason ever.

2010-03-15T05:05:00.000-07:00

What is an unemotional being?

The Food Dilemna

2010-03-12T22:26:00.000-08:00

I often display completely irrational decision making skills when it comes to food. I would choose a hawker centre over a food court anytime, but rather endure the long months of necessary saving to dine at a restaurant then wait for a month's worth of collected shillings for a night at a cafe.

It seems that I like to swing to either side of the spectrum. And thinking about it, I do have some rational nonsense for my irrationality.

What for pay up to $3 more for food at a food court when you can access a hawker centre? There is something incredibly alluring about the raw and gritty feel of eating wok fried goodness of greasy plates amidst the cacophony and tight squeezes of a noontime crowd that I would not trade for a gust of air conditioning. Blame my typical Singaporean mentality for this!

And, I do think that it is worth the wait to save up for a good meal at a reputable restaurant, then to spend about half the price for a meal at a cafe which probably tastes only a 1/4 as good. Which reminds me, does anybody want to go to Hiroki88@ Dempsey ? Might take me a year to save up, but I do think it'll be worth it!

Sticky Screen

2010-03-02T07:22:00.001-08:00

I spent so many hours with my eyes pasted to the screen today.

First it was sorting out exchange stuff in the morning, then the trip in the afternoon, then now again, putting the final touches in place at night.

I actually vowed, after the headache starting to creep in late afternoon, that I would not turn on the computer tomorrow. Not even to check my email.

I wonder if I could really keep to that.

A Really Random Post

2010-02-28T08:08:00.000-08:00

In this post, you will find information, randomly placed.

I almost did not want to put this picture here, for fear that you might think that this random allocation style of working is my style of management. But it was too unique a picture to stay hidden in the depths of my D drive for too long. Even closer than the Tessarina condo, which I was hoping so badly I could stay in. So, disclaimer here : I am not haphazard with my work! This is just a picture!
This random picture captures my dessert which I shared with Dad and Jie at the Bedok Hawker Centre. The Green syrup tasted more like Kiwi than, and there was not gula melaka - a must have with chendol - but it was still great! This reminds me of that particular dessert store in Chinatown which sells ice kachang topped by only one flavouring - gula melaka - but still tastes a whole lot more flavourful than those multi-coloured, ice-cream and chocolate rice topped ones you get at foodcourts.
Mango Shaved Ice, from the same stall. Incredibly smooth and tasty ice shavings.

I am so thankful to Jie for introducing me to the wonders of www.mysoju.com .

Once the holiday swings by, I log on, choose a random show from the Korean/Japanese offerings and watch it till I want to stop. I started with 'Dear Friends', it could not get past the 1:00min mark due to the faulty connection, and the lack of an engaging plot which prevented me from hitting F5. Now I'm on to 'The Chaser'.

Can you string together 'serial killer, prostitute, deaths, stabbed'? I guess I have read of a number of serial killers who murder prostitutes by stabbing them. But I might have left out another word though - impotence. Apparently, it is common for these type of serial killers to be impotent men.
Imagine a man, driven to so much shame, anger, pain by his inability to have an erection that he has to seek an alternative phallus. In this case, a chisel. Which he hammers into a woman's head to exhibit the ultimate display of authority to her.

Almost an All-Nighter

2010-02-26T06:42:00.000-08:00

There is this love-hate relationship I have with pulling all-nighters. Not that I have actually, the furthest I have gone was to finally shut down my laptop at 5:30am this morning after stringing together a bunch of words and quotations from The Island of Doctor Moreau and pepper them with punctuation, and call it an essay. I submitted that chunk of writing some 11.5 hours later, at 5pm, after a quick, but necessarily fervent prayer for the Good Lord's mercy.

I do not like to turn in late. In fact, I often wish, and try to hit the sack by midnight. Yet, logging off msn while the majority of my friends are still online is somehow unsettling. I cannot help but formulate some equation which goes like: sleeping early = not working as hard :-S Furthermore, hearing the choruses of 'I didn't sleep at all last night' ringing everywhere after one of those '3 essays and presentation and text' week after waking up from the comparatively long 6 hours or so I had only serves to send trains of 'omg what if I could have spent those extra hours editing' through my head.

So, why the exception this morning? I'd like to think that it was a genuine case of writer's block. I remember reading sections of the novel over and over again, writing out various ideas, typing sentence after sentence which had no relation together, and it was only at 1am that I managed to force some sense of cohesion to my thoughts. I droned out word by word, my typing frequently interrupted by rearranging paragraphs and editing my thesis statement, till I hit the 3:30am mark. Jie went off to sleep first. Amazingly, it felt as if I was writing the essay at 3:30pm. I was wide awake, typing and hitting backspace, editing, doing whatever I could for an essay which was due that very same day. I was never in such a situation before, and beneath the panic that was gripping me as the minute hand ticked by, I felt this sense of excitement. As I hit 4am, I stopped for a moment to wonder if I should actually sleep at all. But I had to shelve that thought as quickly as it appeared when I realized I was only at the 600 word mark. 5am beckoned and the sleepiness kicked in. It was way too late to turn back then, I had to soldier on. There was this strange allure to pulling an all-nighter for my essay. I had finally experienced this quintessentially university phenomenon.

Amazingly, the earlier experienced onset of tiredness dissipated when I actually hit the sack. I had trouble going to sleep, and no trouble getting up on time for school. But, it was in school that I was reduced to a 'zombie' state. I finally understood what it meant, to feel that sense of mild dizziness and reduced senses despite normal functioning of the limbs. That was scary enough. It was a state of mind paralysis I never want to experience again.

So, no more all nighters for me!

2010-02-24T06:18:00.000-08:00

I have come to realize that of the many times when I go 'oh, but I did my best already' as I sigh forlorn at bad outcomes, a large percentage were actually the result of anything but 'my best already'.

Why, self, did this revelation come so late?

Crossing

2010-02-16T17:34:00.000-08:00

I initially reckoned that the fact that I was scheduled to present assignment 2 on week 6 was a blessing indeed. How much more I could have done with that extra week! However, that simply meant I would have to report to school at 9am on the Wednesday after the Chinese New Year week though Wednesday, with classes beginning only at 2:30pm, is usually my dedicated 'sleep in' day. Nothing much to gripe about though, since Dad, having taken a look at the bulky accesory package of tripod stand and camera declared 'you NEED a lift' and offered to give me one.

The journey to school was largely uneventful apart from Dad's occasional one-liners. I eventually lapsed into a similar silence too, and started to car-watch, noticing a really rundown boneshaker throttling along with an old man behind the wheel, a permed red pouffant hair aunty in her mercedes benz, till the traffic came to a major and sudden stop.

I was all ready to dismiss it with 'must have been some drunkard driving home after last minute CNY binging' or 'bet someone did not get a good night sleep after all that festivitity' till the offending cause of the multi-car slowdown came walking towards our car.

I could not believe how the offender, despite having made tons of cars and trucks and several heavy vehicles slam their brakes, could continute to stroll across all 3 lanes, ignorant of the resounding symphony of car horns and flashing brake lights. It took a whole of 5 minutes for the offender to get across to the Chevron marking before Dad could resume normal speed and continued the drive to school.

Maybe it was the shock of seeing how the offender did not match my initial profile image, but I did not manage to whisk out my camera phone in time to snap a picture. Either way, I really should have, because there was something very visually intriguing about him/her (preciesely! the gender was unclear). Nevermind, I managed to procure a picture of the internet which bore a remarkable resemblance to the offender.

And here it is:

It was a dog......

My goodness!

2010-02-15T08:32:00.000-08:00

Oh my goodness indeed. It has been so long since I touched this blog, and I feel like jumping platform to tumblr.

Water stop!

2010-02-04T04:14:00.000-08:00

Option 1 : The past 4 days have been crazy...

Option 2: It must have been the hectic craziness of the past 4 days leading up to today's presentation, that I remained completely numb during the 2 pop quizzes thrown at me yesterday and today...

Option 3: I had to take care of 2 babies over the past 4 days. It was crazy. One couldn't speak, the other was just plain slow.

Option 4: I'm so glad the presentation is over, and that it went well.

4 options to being this blog post, with all 4 being wholly formulaic types.

I used the word 'crazy' in 3 of them, and '4' in all 4 of them. Ok, at least I got the latter accurate. As for 'crazy', maybe there could be a better word.

Just that I cannot think of it now.

From School

2010-01-31T21:45:00.000-08:00

I almost decided not to blog from the school computer, for I was afraid of spying eyes that would only be thwarted by a hunched back and rapid slamming of the keys in 'alt + tab' sequence.

I was right!

We leapt.

2010-01-24T21:40:00.000-08:00

So we took the first leap.

The money has been spent. Everything should follow through neatly thereafter, I think. I hope. I pray it would.

I am wondering if I actually spent too much time in the imagined community, such that facing up to reality is too much I can bear.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.

And it goes rolling and rolling

2010-01-06T22:26:00.000-08:00

and then it comes to a sudden stop as the screech rings out, piercing the windscreen. Sometimes, the screech from the passenger is even louder then the tyre as it burns against the asphlat.

Are they right? Am I such a bad driver that I should never have passed the exam? They being a couple of taxi drivers too?

Or am I right? That maybe if a triangle plate branded driver could actually drive sans the worry of having to swerve and veer to screams and late instructions, and not have to answer to silly questions like 'Have you been practicing your driving?', I could actually drive better.

Or maybe its just both.

My lousy camera

2010-01-04T20:29:00.000-08:00

Every promise I make myself to blog about my SBWR and PRP trips is always shredded to smithereens at the sight of square after square of blurred pixels in my FIELD TRIP folder.

The lousy moment capturing device embedded within my phone never does justice to colours, angles, light etc. At the very least, it could render a large chunk of a bright colour rather nicely. like this.

This was taken shortly after the owner of the jacket (not picture above) excused herself to the washroom. Thereafter, the subject made a beeline for the parka, slipped it on, caressed his newly clad arms and smugly repeated 'so smoooooooooth'.

The parka is retailing for $19.90. As the older sister, should I?

Photographs!

2010-01-03T02:28:00.000-08:00

I dragged this deep fried chicken head from the corner of the 'mango deep fried chicken in mint sauce'. It was cleverly concealed under a heap of parsley; I lifted it from beneath because it was still attached by a piece of meat? vein? to the neck.

No, I did not eat it.

Left: 1/2 7up 1/2 tiger beer. Courtesy of Mum.

Middle: Warm water flavoured with essence of a very popular soft drink.

Right: Acidic tea.

What a waste.

Unions

2009-12-27T21:21:00.000-08:00

I hardly receive wedding invites and the times I do, I am invited simply because of association. Am I and my circle of friends just relatively young for marriage-age, or do I really have that little friends?

Anyway, I usually spend most of the time at the wedding trying to amuse myself and my company with the food, and talking about our ideal dream weddings.

I actually have 3 rather interesting pictures to post, but lunch is beckoning, and its Dad's cooking!

Wendy's Waste

2009-12-27T01:03:00.000-08:00

Singapore's 'Wendy's' turned out to be such a waste of time and money :(

Soggy burgers, tiny patties, flat drinks and sweet beef chilli.

To think that I usually associate burgers with laid back, happy, chill-out moments where one can forget aobut weight watching and just sink the teeth into juicy chunks of meat slathered with salty relish and thick sauce in a toasted crisp bun.

What a horrid experience :(

The Great Photograph Excuse!

2009-12-26T07:29:00.000-08:00

My attempts to blog are always thwarted by many external factors and 1 overriding internal factor.

I always have to complain about the slow picture upload rate, the wireless connection dial up boxes which can appear in rapid successive troves everytime I do something new and the self-destructing capabilites of Internet Explorer, and sometimes, Moz too.

Then sometimes I just get too lazy to actually come up with a suitable narrative for my blog entries. One which could, hopefully, tie my very random photographs together.

Case in point: Coffee that Jie and I had today.

Anyway, the new year is coming soon and I am excited!

2009-12-16T04:01:00.000-08:00

Maybe, I should move to another platform.

At Long Last

2009-12-08T22:13:00.001-08:00

Finally. After weeks of hunting high and low for the elusive shaved ice stall in Chinatown. Hooray for Dad and his trademark spontaneous food trips!

I was mistaken in thinking that Mum would order the durian shaved ice. 'Durian should only be eaten as it is, from the shell.' The mango ice was sweet and dense, such that the fresh mango cubes actually tasted sour in comparison. But they formed a perfect harmony of sweet and sour when eaten together.

I had the green tea shaved ice, which was very cool and refreshing and went delightfully well with the fresh red beans. Real red beans! You could actually seperate them bean by bean from the lump, instead of those dark purple paste with broken skins that you find in those run-of-the-mill dessert stalls. My only gripe was that the thick green tea bitterness did not permeate the entire mount of shaved ice, leaving the insides only about half as tasty as the outer crusts.

Dad and Jie went for hot desserts. The walnut paste was very smooth.

We tasted really good steamed milk and egg puddings during our family holiday to Hong Kong. Jie ordered the steamed egg custard with ginger, but it wasn't as smooth as those in Hong Kong. Jie only finished half the bowl.

Chinatown is such a haven for good food!

Its over for now

2009-12-07T01:26:00.000-08:00

I have finished my last paper (is there any symbol which would be the equivalent of combing a fullstop wth an exclamation mark and a question mark at the same time?)

Somehow I felt a distinct sadness stab at me once the mechanicised voice chiming 'you may leave the hall' rang this time. I had heard that phrase 14 times before, but today, the 15th was just incredibly poignant. In fact, I even thought the voice sounded sad. So, after the exam, I walked down to Popular to get a roll of PVC wrap and bought myself a packet of MnMs too. I kept telling myself not to get any food from Popular bookstore, cause nobody else does and whatever is n the food rack is bound to be at least 2 years old, or even if it were younger, taste like it were that old. And I was right. Bland chocolate encased around peanuts that were not crunchy, but not even soft. They were simply, tasteless.

Now, I wonder if I looked silly hauling that PVC wrap all the way home without a plastic bag. Or would it have looked worse if I had used a plastic bag?

Anyway, I shall give myself a lot of things to do during this holiday break, though work is not one of them. My head tells me to go to the gym, now. Just 2 minutes ago it was telling me to go to the gym instead of blog, but here I am, to pen my thoughts and post pictures of some glorious food I had a few days ago:

Tender, tasty jiu he, fresh and crispy kangkong and beansprouts soaked in a tangy spicy and sweet broth and topped with crunchy peanuts. $2!

The best ngoh hiang I've ever eaten! Everything about this plate of deep fried Teochew style fritters was excellent, and the hae pia stayed crispy throughout the 2 bowls of sauce I went through (2nd one was topped up for free).
And it was served piping hot, from this stall in Chinatown.

I must go back again. The food there is awesome, and the atmosphere a blast!

Now that I've come to the end of this post, my head is yelling at me to put on my jogging shoes, but my eyes are telling me to just, sleep. What would I do when I get away from the computer? I will find out soon enough.

Keeping the Pieces, Cut.

2009-12-05T01:29:00.000-08:00

The long, snaking queue for the ATM at West Coast Market reminded me of you, and I finally decided to cut up those snapshots you took, of both of us smiling like idiots at a blinding light in a made-in-japan camera trap.

I sat in my room. In front of the computer, my mind swathed in Romanticism, Modernism, Literature, Music. Art.

It was so much harder than I imagined, but when I finally closed the open blades onto that line, an imaginary one that I drew in between us, the cutting got easier. But I did pause, after i severed the first image. Initially, I thought we looked like two tourists trying to toggle a neoprint machine in some Kabuki Cho parlour. I was completely unaware that you had actually slotted in a coin, and thus the camera caught me at the point where i was staring aimlessly outside of the box. Now I remember, I was actually looking at the escalator, feeling very absurd then at the thought of feeding the hungry camera trap. But then you paid for it. So it was fine with me. And you. You really looked like one of those cheaply thrilled individuals who get high over spending ridiculous amounts of money on tiny, garishly glossy photographs. The cheesy smile on your face, which was pressed so close to me as I looked away from the screen, looked like a knee-jerk happy reaction to another of your cheesy, cheap thrills.

Cut after cut was made till the frozen moment broke away into 8 fragments. Then Mum had to enter the room. And ask me what I was doing. Please, I do not want to go through the trouble of explaining it. I am already annoyed, so fed up over the upcoming test on Monday which has rendered me the only one in my group of friends who is not enjoying their holiday already. Did you walk in on purpose, at that specific time? Or was it just another of your unannounced forays into the study room?

And so I put the scissors down and returned to Chekov. And i placed the cut pieces of you and me back into the pink packet, thinking that, I rather have cut pieces of You and me, than to throw them away.

Somehow, I feel so much better, to see You and Me, cut.

Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve Trip 1

2009-12-02T19:40:00.000-08:00

The long drive across various highways and a concrete skyline finally yielded to nature as we turned into Kranji. Soon enough, we were coursing along an uneven bitumen segmented with a single white line, meandering through smaller roads pockmarked with casually parked heavy vehicles, and we reached Sungei Buloh.

We were promptly greeted by a lizard enjoying an afternoon dip.

We met the above-pictured when we crossed the bridge connecting the carpark to the wetland reseve.
I was hoping that it would swim nearer to us so that I could capture the nuances of its scales. But instead it began swimming away, toward the thicker vegetation. It coursed deeper into the depths.

Till we could not see it anymore.
The lizard's disappearance was promptly sufficed by us encountering a larger one soon after. I was apprehensive about taking this picture since this lizard was only about 1m away, and there was nothing to actually seperate us from it i.e. we were atop the unfenced broadwalk. Jie had to reassure me countless times that taking a picture of a monitor lizard 1m away was highly unlikely to result in a display of behaviour akin to celebrities against nosy paparazzi, sharp teeth and claws at that. I held my breath as I pressed the trigger. The lizard did not move, but we did. And made our way to the project site.

Jie's project involves measuring plankton levels and water composition at specific points along Sungei Buloh. Simple string and paper tags were tied along the way as reference points.

The tide was high. Even Jie was surprised that the water level was verging on overflowing the boardwalk. I really should have taken a photograph of the side of the boardwalk with the water almost up to the path, but I happened to be kneeling on the boardwalk then and hence snapped at it from top-down. I hope the shards of reflection in between the wood is a good gauge of how close the water was to the boardwalk.

I was kneeling down to get a good shot of this:

This is the apparatus Jie has to use to capture the plankton. It resembled a coffee strainer not only in terms of apearance, but also via the gestures required to operate it. First, immerse the appartus into the swampy broth.

Next, raise it up and down a couple of times to steady the mixture.

And pour the mixture into the specimen jars.

Certain parts of the reserve were adrift with junk. And the water on the right side of the boardwalk was coated with a film of oil.

A piece of driftwood rests in between two examples of its source.

The boardwalk was surrounded by a whole variety of trees. Some of which were very uniquely shaped.

I could not help but wonder if the trees were irritated, assuming they can feel, by myraid of organisms clinging, possibly freeriding, on them. I assumed the worst for the trees and plucked one of the shells off.

This is how they look like flipped over.

The black circle tucked in the lower left corner is actually a coiled structure that works like an anteannae. No sooner after I flipped it over, the black structure uncoiled and began poking its way around, before the brown soft portion extended like a snail and flipped itself shell up again.

I had always wanted to have a closer look at the adhesive devices that molluscs use to attach themselves to other objects so firmly. Had I a pair of laboratory gloves, I would have ventured as far as to touch the soft innards as well. Half of my curiousty left unsatisfied by the absence of protective tools. I better remember to bring some along next time.

The trees were also invaded by a host of crabs.

And had their roots perched on, very occasionally, by the highly elusive mudskipper.

Jie was much quicker in spotting them than I was. I recall walking along the boardwalk, having the morning quiet interrupted by soft splashes of water coming from totally random directions. Those splashes would catch me totally unaware but they went by so fast that I barely even had time to see the movements in the water, let alone capture it in a photo. I had my walk disrupted so many times by the mudskippers that I actually began to suspect a crocodile at work. So I walked back to Jie, who was collecting the 2nd reading at that time to declare that the splashes were becoming increasingly disconcerting.

'They are mudskippers. There is one over there.' Came the calm reply, and hence the photographs.

'The crocodile is at the main bridge. It won't come here' - another calm, experienced reply to allay my fears. For a moment I pictured a crocodile rising from the water, and since the tide was so high, sliding torpedo style swiftly across theboard walk, a trail of the oily water in the wake of its destruction as it opened its jaws to devour everything in its path.

Fortunately, that did not happen. The only other reptiles we saw after that was a rare sea snake and a smaller lizard with skin so dry it resembled crushed old paper.

Have yet to identify the species, but we do know that the snake is poisonous! Jie was really happy to see it since this was the first time she encountered a sea snake for herself despite her numerous trips to Sungei Buloh.

Here is the lizard, its appearance of which i find to be less shocking and revolting in picture than in real life.

Thank God for the wonderful display of his creation, though it sometime scared me to bits! I shall be back to Sungei Buloh once my exams are over, and hopefully, we would get to see more animals next time.

Sungei Buloh

2009-12-02T00:49:00.000-08:00

Does learning always become fun when there are no exams attached?

Maybe so!

Accompanying Jie for her plankton reading @ Sungei Buloh was an amazing opportunity to get in touch, literally, with nature. Surely, one trip to a wetland reserve would not suffice should I harbour plans to change course, considering that I spent more time taking pictures rather than actually taking water concentration readings or applying some statistical skills to it when I get home. But, it was a good chance for me to rekindle an interest in the life sciences. Yes, rekindle, and not kindle. There really was a point in my life when I considered reading marine biology at a university level. Alas, that would have prerequisited the 'triple science' combination, which I did undertake at secondary school level, only to switch completely at junior college, save for H2 Math. I blame a certain discipline, which till today I am convinced has only taught me how to exert a better force and the right angle in opening doors, for kiling my interest.

Anyway, while I contemplate on a suitable narrative to string the whole load of pictures together, here are some for a preview:

A black snake we encountered on our way back. It coursed gracefully through the undisturbed greenish water, slid up the muddy bank (time of photo capture), before it disappeared through the thick vegetation, whipping its tail about in the process.

We made coffee in the swamp.

No really. This coffee strainer look alike was one of the devices that Jie had to purchase for her honours project.
This was the furthest my phone camera could zoom to catch the monitor lizard in motion! I was amazed at myself for not screaming at the reptile, as I always do should I encounter their smaller counterparts at home. Instead, I was in a hurry to whisk out my phone before they slithered their way into the undergrowth. We spotted so many monitor lizards today, including one which was perched, posing on a rock, basking in the mid day sun.

Jie would probably have a lot to correct me about at this juncture! Is the curtain of hanging branches and leaves called an 'undergrowth'? Or are the cluster of low lying bushes atop the muddy bank to be addressed as 'vegetation'?

There is so much I do not know about the Life Sciences. Would any student of the aforementioned discipline who happens to be reading this correct me along the way (excluding Jie cause I know she would!)?

I think I would be maintaining a series of entries on my field trip journeys. Watch for more to come!

The Meme

2009-12-01T07:06:00.000-08:00

Exam distractor ahoy!

1. You have to eat the same thing for the next three days. What do you pick?
Lotus Root and Corn Soup - comfort food

2. What's your favorite holiday?
Christmas =) Love the relaxed spirit. (same as Jie!)

3. What's a song that really annoys you?
I'm a barbie girl, in a barbie world.

4. What's your favorite cartoon character?
Jonathan, from 'The Little Mermaid: Beginnings'

5. Who/what are you fangirling over the most recently?
シドの明綺！

To Market, To Market

2009-12-01T06:19:00.000-08:00

I accompanied Dad to Vivo City's Sheng Shiong a couple of days ago. We journied there after breakfast at Tiong Bahru Market, where Jie and us braved the sweltering heat for good $1 Tausuan.

I was still burning when we reached Vivo, and was so tempted to cart home a bottle of cordial and a plastic bag full of this:

to make quick cooling ice balls. Until, I saw an identical tray a couple of steps ahead. Look what it contained!

I almost retched at the thought of stuffing my face full of fish flavoured ice, thinking that it'd be the most disgusting gastronomical related thought I could encounter that day, until I saw this:

Somehow, I've managed to relish Pig intestines both large and small, especially if they're done with brown sauce and served with kway chap. I've tolerated Pig stomach doused in a peppery broth, grudgingly pushed grainy bits of liver down my throat, and made my way through crackling rinds encasing pork knuckle, but I've never managed to chew on Pig tongue. Maybe someday I will.

On to more interesting items.

There were oranges.

Which did not smell very sweet, so we did not buy them, and neither did we pick up their smaller counterparts

And I would have picked these up:

If not for our earlier decision to serve up some simple Aglio Olio.

On to a meme from Jie's blog, to be updated next!

Chewing..

2009-11-17T19:01:00.000-08:00

Serene: 'Are you the kind of student who, after receiving bad grades, decides to work a lot harder for the final exams? Or are you the kind that would get horribly depressed right there and then?'

Me: Both.....i think, i mean...... I hope.

2009-11-10T04:16:00.000-08:00

It used to hurt me so terribly, but now, I can look back on it and laugh :)

And this is only because of the wonderful support network that set me back up again !

2009-11-05T04:09:00.000-08:00

Woots.

Mash Game: Predict Your Future at eSPIN.com

2009-11-04T07:46:00.001-08:00



		I will marry Him.
		After a wild honeymoon, We will settle down in Rome in our fabulous House.
		We will have 5 kid(s) together.
		Our family will zoom around in a Red Volvo C70.
		I will spend my days as a Fashion Journalist, and live happily ever after.

2009-10-28T08:13:00.000-07:00

您

让我这样一直牵着你的手

我

不禁

微微得露个笑容。。。。

2009-10-22T06:25:00.000-07:00

Do this in appreciation of me.

Do all this in appreciation of me.

When I cook something you don't like, eat it anyway. Don't eat it because it is good for you. Eat it to show appreciation for the time and effort I used to cook it.

2009-10-08T07:48:00.000-07:00

Will you leave yourself behind if I but call your name?
Will you care for cruel and kind and never be the same?
Will you risk the hostile stare should your life attract or scare?
Will you let me answer prayer in you and you in me?

When does suffering become a privilege?

Have I..

2009-10-06T20:44:00.001-07:00

Have I been a good person lately?

Have I neglected God, my family, my friends, anyone out there?

Have I hurt anybody?

Have I been getting my priorities right?

Please tell me if I have.

Random Question

2009-10-01T23:56:00.000-07:00

If you call someone who has an intense fear/dislike of homosexuals a 'homophobic', what do you call the opposite i.e. a homosexual who has an intense fear/dislike for heterosexuals, especially when the heterosexuals happen to be Christian?

XIAO!

2009-09-25T01:29:00.000-07:00

A 4 digit sum just to join the hoi-polloi.
XIAO!

Good Girls don't actually want Bad Boys

2009-09-22T05:13:00.001-07:00

The notion 'Good Girls want Bad Boys' has been explored, condemned, and fantasized by the media, parents, good girls and bad boys alike. As a 'good girl' - or at least, this is what most of society, parents notwithstanding, tell me, I sometimes find myself embracing this forbidden fruit. Here are my thoughts on this paradox.

Ironic as this may seem, I have never even come close, let alone be with, a bad boy. I may have dated once, but that brief stint was with a goody-two-shoes nonetheless. So, why, do I keep reaching for the forbidden fruit?

Let's conveniently blame it on the media. Movies - money spinning engines that feed off human desire - grab the foul-mouthed, smoking, vulgarity-spewing thug off the street, put him under the hands of a stylist, hairstylist, make up artist, plastic surgeon etc., then throw him back where he came from.

The media knows all too well that girls, even good girls, swoon at the sight of sauve men. I am no exception. Hence, good girls, most of the time, hanker after a skewed image of badboys, instead of the real deal. This explains why, while I am dying to watch Crows Zero II, I still scoff at the sight of ah bengs smoking and getting drunk during school hours at the void deck.

So yes, I'm already 20. I've seen what bad boys are really like, and I'm a mass communications student no doubt. Yet, why am I still attracted to bad boys?

This begs the question, Do good girls really want bad boys?

Let's answer it this way, What do bad boys have that good boys do not?

Bad boys have less of a legal income, probably would not be able to afford proper housing, lack manners of all sorts, waste money on cigarettes and cheap bear.

Yet, they enjoy leadership in a very different sense of the word, do not experience or care about curfews, ride flashy bikes, have the freedom to say and do anything they want, just to name a few.

There you've got it. Good girls 'want' bad boys because they represent the side of life which they never had the opportunity to experience. Hence, good girls do not actually want bad boys, what they want is the life these bad boys have.

Oppressed inside every curfew-abiding good girl who tries everyday to please her parents is the desire to to do break the rules. Outwardly, she cannot express this deviance since it has already been instilled in her that it is a grave sin to do so. Thus, she permits the media to feed on her desire for the forbidden fruit and willingly parts with the time she could be using to do readings, and the money she could save, to catch Crows Zero 2 over the weekends.

2009-09-21T02:36:00.001-07:00

Oguri Shun is staring in Crows Zero II.

Must watch!

A couple of random facts

2009-09-11T20:06:00.000-07:00

Here is a list of totally random things. Some might be so random to the point that they somehow correlate.

1. Getting up early on a Saturday to clean the balcony windows is an act which somehow implies that you have assumed responsibility of cleaning every other thing in the house as well.

2. You could never do something as well as how the person who asked you to do it could have done it.

3. It is perfectly ok for you to be interrupted from whatever you are doing to do the bidding of another. But this is never the case even if you were to ask nicely, vice versa.

4. Modern thoughts my foot. You would never be as important as the other gender.

5. The fact that you have worked before, and are not working now, still means that you are 'earning', and hence you must pick up the tab for as many things as possible.

6. The fact that you have never worked a single minute of your life means that you have never 'earned' before, and hence would be automatically given a large sum of money to compensate for the difference between yourself and those who have worked, but would never be expected to pick up the tab because you have, never 'earned' before.

7. Gazette :)

Liar Liar Pants on Fire

2009-09-07T21:56:00.000-07:00

How difficult is it to tell a lie?

It might even come easily to some.

But, how difficult is it to lie about the same matter consistently, so that no discrepancies would surface?

That is much harder.

Blister

2009-09-03T00:12:00.000-07:00

I have a small, barely visible blister on my left toe. It does not hurt when i walk, but it sends sharp warning signals that rocket from my toe to my head whenever I pick up my pace.

There goes my much awaited Thursday afternoon jog. Just when I needed it to boost my rather lethargic senses these days.

Die you blister!

Why is Blogspot doing this to me?

2009-09-01T01:07:00.000-07:00

So many things are going wrong with blogspot.

Cannot upload pictures, cannot write this, cannot write that.

ITS TIME To hop to a different platform!

A Time to Reflect!

2009-08-25T20:52:00.000-07:00

One only needs a furtive glance at the history log of blog posts here at real random ramble to deduce that there has been a degeneration of sorts going on here. Tags have disappeared, but the most blatant change is the absence of photographs! So what if I have lost grasp of the ability to categorise my thoughts (I have an excuse! My thoughts are too diverse to ever be fit into a box), what other excuse can I give for pictureless walls of text except for the fact that my phone refuses to connect with my laptop!

Every attempt on my part to establish a 'paired connection' between my laptop and phone has resulted in rather catastrophic outcomes. Not only do I 'fail to establish a network with User1-PC', I end up screwing my (previously) automatic connection to the home wireless lan such that I get swamped with 'unable to connect to NTU wireless lan' boxes at 5 minute intervals of using the internet at home. It has now become a game, deleting those boxes before more appear. Yesterday, I lost. 40 boxes popped at a shot. I took to ignoring them.

So, I wanted to put up the pictures of a tree snake that I took yesterday when i encountered the creature at school. But alas, its not possible! I have since taken the liberty to manually displaying the pictures (read: showing others the photo right from my phone - Mum asked me if I'm sure it wasn't a large worm).

That aside, I am only into the 3rd week of school but yet I feel pressed for time. My to-do list has gotten a little blurry - perhaps I've forgotten what I need to write down on my to-do list to do? - but GOD FORBID!

And today I encountered a senior who has driven me to a zen-like reaction! Double major, CCA, exchange programme, 7 modules this semester - First. Class. Honours. GPA.

I know, I know. I should take advantage of the fact that as bogged down as I may be, I am blessed enough to be pressed with things that I can safely say I enjoy doing. So! No more complains, ride on the passion and Work. Hard. At. All.

Ok, so I'm off to completing my readings now. It'd be a matter of 30mins before I meet Lionel and Phil for lunch at the quad. Speaking of the quad, I keep telling myself to head for the attractive dishes at the caifan stall. But the queue always throws me off, and I end up satisfying myself with a tasty, but boring, udon soup with roasted chicken as I steal quick and envious glances at bowls of rice and steaming vegetables and my favourite mapotofu sailing by.

Then its Forensic Science lecture before I meet up with Jie and Gabriel for 'Up' (no worries Mum. I promise to take the family to a movie after John's prelims. I promise to organize it. I promise not to bother you about it. I promise to just do it.)

Jie needs a break from wading knee-deep under the predatory eyes of scaly devils in mock-human+tail form. And poor Gabe with his honours project. Time to enjoy for tonight!

Eat eat eat!

2009-08-21T04:55:00.000-07:00

My latest episodic binge has been followed by a new phase - the ability to eat relatively small amounts and exercise at the same intensity without feeling hungry. Imagine this: I don't even feel like snacking.

But this phase has been accompanied by my new found ability to snooze my alarm for over an hour. Ok, I have never been late thus far, and God forbid I'll ever be, but, I need more energy than this!

Buses.

2009-08-20T07:59:00.000-07:00

I often underestimate the amount of time I actually spend on a bus everyday. Getting to the mrt from home is already 10minutes long, not inclusive of waiting time, and the epic 179 route can sometimes stretch to 20mins even if I'm alighting at the north spine (mid-route).

Anyway, I had a couple of interesting incidents with buses today. I began this morning's travel routine with the usual wait at the bus stop opposite my house. The bus stop is an awkward structure stuck in the middle of a thin piece of concrete slab, plastered to seperate the main road from the row of terraced housings behind. So, here's a warning to any of you travellers who might need to take my route too. Bypass it! At worse you would need to walk 100m to your destination. Seriously, this is better than being exposed to the elements. By elements, I mean, dust particles swept up by the multiple Pasir Panjang - Tuas heavy vehicles. I, for one, had a face full of particles and dust today, and good lord! I was wearing lip gloss which had yet to set (Maybe I should say bye to my tendency to do make up on the go, literally). So i ended up with a shade of pink dotted with black dust particles which I had to gingerly pry off without disturbing the coat which I had painstakingly painted on, balancing a mirror, laptop and Norton (insiders will sympathise) simultaneously.

On a better note, I took two shuttle buses today, only to realize that I had bought the bus concession anyway.

Right Behind You

2009-08-17T09:09:00.000-07:00

Could you love someone enough to give them all the fruits of your labour?

Jasmine

2009-08-10T07:25:00.000-07:00

I was never a big fan of Versailles.

Do not have a single track in my phone, do not youtube them for their music but rather to hear Kamijio speak, and end up reading translations of their interviews only as a result of mindless clicking of links after links on sites like MusicJapan.

Yet, Jasmine's demise is painful to me.

Why did it take something as cruel as his premature death to spark a fervour for Versailles' music in me?

Is it really true that the layman have always been steeped in a morbid fascination with the unhealthy practices of those who are under the watch of their eagle eyes?

May you Rest in peace Jasmine.

The convenience of a complicated tongue

2009-08-05T04:24:00.000-07:00

The Japanese language can be expressed in so many forms, polite, impolite etc. while English stubbornly adheres to a single method of correct expression known as Received Pronunciation.

No wonder we Singaporeans have problems with singlish being interspersed in our English lessons! Imagine, if the English Language had polite form and an impolite form which could be adapted to reflect each colony's varied cultural tapestry.

A typical question for say, Paper 1 - of which students, having to write 2 essays would be given twice the time - would be phrased this way:

Paper 1 Part 1: Write a composition of 1500-2000 words, including the phrase 'She ran on and on, despite the burning pain from the blisters at her heel.'

Paper 1 Part 2: Compose please, at least 1.5k words. Must include this : 'Her blister already damn pain but she keep on running.

Woots.

Blogging, no.

2009-07-30T08:38:00.000-07:00

My inertia to blog has hit an all time high.

There are photographs waiting to be uploaded and talked about. There are many things on my mind which need sorting out and repackaging into a cogent post.

I do want to blog. Really, I do, but at the same time I do not have the mood to get it done. I am in the same predicament as I was just a few hours ago, when Lionel, Lynn and I decided to embark on the long journey to NTU from Orchard Road just to get school books for next semester. Something inside me was yelling 'No!' to the thought of leaving the comforts of Orchard Road for the far flung school, via the lurching 174 no less. The thought of splashing a quarter of one month's pay on a couple of books, and having to lug them back home with the stringy plastic handles of a Popular shopping carrier, rendered my trip all the more unappetising. Mind you, these books have an indirectly proportionate relationship with the digits behind the $ sign on the hideous thumb-sied yellow sticker plastered on them.

Thank God for Lionel and Lynn who kept the journey alive!

No Title

2009-07-17T23:25:00.000-07:00

I miss Jie :(

Was youtubing Gazette and Galneryus this morning. They always remind me of you :(

Starry-Eyed

2009-07-10T08:25:00.000-07:00

There is a tertiary institution of excellence in Singapore, in which attendees bid for what they want to study. Unless of course, you are one of those elites who attend Law or Dentistry or Medicine or some other discipline which requires the royal flush on the A level script, you have to bid for your courses (in those elite disciplines, they feed the courses to you. See the difference? Mortals bid, elites eat.)

I often looked, or rather, still look at this style of mind-boggling point allocation with a fair amount of disdain. Ok, forgive me (the self-confessed unabashed member of rival tertiary institution of excellence) for not understanding how this system is 'advanced' and typical of an 'excellent' institution. I (all you @ this institution who read my blog: I am expressing an opinion against this system which binds you, not you!) cannot help but feel that this simply reeks of Christie/Metropolitian/[insert name of competitor here] - wannabe-ism!

How I wish I could pursue this narrative with some propoganda style exhortation of my institution's alternative solution to 'auctioning for courses'. Unfortunately, the stellar system which this institution (also called one of 'excellence' has put in place), I, among many others, look upon with much frustration, induce vein-in-eyeball-busting madness, and threaten broke appendages as well. Perhaps, its nickname might shed some light on how a course registration system is a mere cloak of indemnity for a dangerous, accident-causing trainwreck. Its been nicknamed, the FFFF.

So, why have I only chosen to speak up now? After enduring a year of courses churned out only at this torture mill? Simply because the naive (would you believe it. I actually discovered this on hindsight.) and innocent (the horrors. hindsight is painful) freshie that I was then could find no one else to blame, but myself, for the demise of a convenient timetable (everything done in the morning, afternoons for my own readings and consultations) and at the hands of the FFFF. In fact, I decided to be contented and study hard with whatever I had, such that I actually felt thankful for FFFF over auction house!

Needless to say, my feelings towards FFFF changed, much for the worse, following a rather unfortunate encounter a few days ago. See, the FFFF works by allocating specific dates to each course, and from there subdivide these dates, giving each year a specific timeslot to register for modules. Working on a first-come-first-serve basis only means that if your timeslot were to be slapped at midnight, you'd jolly well be clicking the 'add courses into FFFF' button repeatedly and slamming the F5 button at 11:30pm just so that the FFFF would catch your courses at the earliest possible nanosecond, and voila, you have it. This is not to mention the rapid scrolling required to rank the modules up for balloting, and the f5 slamming repetitive motion, proceeded by a module add-this-drop-this act just to ensure that there are still vacancies for you. Too bad if you were given the later time slot. The FFFF knows no mercy.

The FFFF is also implanted with a brain that can seperate each module according to 3 categories. The first, your 'cores' - you need this to graduate. Secondly, the 'prescribed electives to be placed for balloting' - you also need this to graduate. Thirdly, the 'unrestricted electives also to be placed for balloting' - surprise! you also need this to graduate.

This order of grouping naturally compels us to place most attention on their 'cores'. So, we attendees of the instition would shed much blood and sweat over ensuring that these cores can be approved by the FFFF upon submission within the nanosecond. However, knowing that the other categories can be put up for balloting (see, the FFFF tests your patience further), any shrewd member of this excellent institution would execute the trick of piling up modules (just to fill the maximum of five slots) to be balloted. And since this is a ballot which would only allocate you one out of the five, no one cares even if these modules clash, the exams clash, whatever else. Just ensure that your cores are safely out of reach.

I might have just fooled you into thinking that the FFFF is a simple-to-use system. Well, maybe, it eventually would be with enough practice. However, things get more complicated when the simplest category - cores - are convulted by the presence of cores from another discipline. I am the bearer of such a cause, unfortunate, in this instance to not know of how the FFFF works against people like me until with the help of good old hindsight. Perhaps FFFF does not like this complication too, for it wrecked its wrath on me that very day, placing me in a connundrum that ended with only 2 registered modules, a ton on the ballot list (even cores which are supposed to be registered and mine and mine only are actually chucked there!), and desperate emails to the administrator to give me what I so badly planned and need: 3 + 2 cores and 1 elective.

So, despite my reverance displayed to the FFFF when I actually left my students early just to risk dislocating a joint on my finger on a borrowed mouse, I was slapped with the shock that i had 3+2, instead of what I had anticipated to be 3 cores. And also with the utter jaw-dropping horror of seeing that all I planned for was razed to the grounds in an instant. Surely, things became worse when, despite 2 hours of frantic phone calls to 3 adminstrative offices, these were the replies I received:

'I see I see, well I don't know'
'I'm sorry but I don't know'
'Just send us an email, for now I don't know'

Yet, despite the common 3 word phrase blatantly obvious in the above, how did I finally figure how FFFF ticks? Hindsight! I have a better comprehension of things now. Hopefully, when I come face to face with FFFF in a few months time, I would be better armed.

So yes FFFF, you succeeded in obliterating my carefully laid plans for august, only. Now I can only wait in agonizing patience, at the habit of checking the email account provided by this excellent institution every hour, in the hope of seeing a reply which reads something other than 'I don't know.'

The narrative is going to end soon now that I think I have said enough about the FFFF. If there's anything that is going to stop me from griping about it any further, that would probably my friend and fellow FFFF victim's message plastered on Facebook, censored and adapted and excerpted for your easy reading:

F! I missed FFFF's registration time! No modules now!

And just in case you have not figured it out by now: Frantic Fastest Fingers First.

Singlish

2009-07-09T05:29:00.000-07:00

Now, why didn't I think of it this way?

Was Singish such a bad thing anyway? I am no purist, I believe in adjusting our spoken language according to the environment. Standard English for work, Singlish for everyday chatter. So, in the pursuit of excellence in education, why don't we let our local children master 4 languages? English, Singlish, Mother Tongue, and another!

Make up!

2009-07-05T19:26:00.001-07:00

Ladies and Gentlemen, hello to you all. In a few minutes, you will be coming face to face with someone who would most likely scare and disgust the majority of you. The minority might not actually display any sort of reaction to this person, except maybe, to ask where she bought her mascara from.

Yes Ladies and Gentlemen, in a few minutes time, I, would be looking you in the eye. Yes, this (insert whatever word you want here, but not just yet, complete the sentence first) person would be right in front of you, and this person wears make up (ok, go insert that word now, depending on your reaction towards women who wear make up).

Let me answer the minority first. Its not foundation, just some loose powder from Shiseido's Maquillage series, which, I happen to feel is the best make up for asians with oily skin, particularly when you need to function under hot and humid circumstances. I do wear foundation though. On occasions where I feel I need to dress up a little more, and I usually enhance the OC20 maquillage shade with the face palette creator. The gel eyeliner is from that range too, in dark brown, which the sales girl recommended would be a best shade to suit my iris colour, and the mascara is really just from Loreal. There would be a day when I can afford to get the curler, lash conditioner and mascara all from Shu Uemura. But for now, I make do with curling them at least 3 times a day, even when I do not apply mascara. Yes I do wear eyeshadow on those 'occasions' too. I bought the limited edition silver palette from Maquillage. Yes, silver can actually be a very natural looking shade, as good as its gold counterpart, provided it is applied with the right technique. I always preferred gloss to lipstick, and now as I am scraping the bottom of my BE375 (this is about the most natural shade I could ever find), I would soon have to whip out the Sheer Lip Colour from my make up box.

Now to address the rest of you. Please proceed to uncringe yourself from the shock and horror of seeing a person with make up. And, before you proceed to bolt away from this freak of nature, let me tell you, face to face of course, that I never intended to scare you. Truth be told, I never stopped to think how my wearing make up would affect you. I'm actually more concerned with the fact that my BE375 is coming to an end than the fact that I wearing make up, somehow, goes against your morals.

Why? You may ask. Ok, sorry if I did not answer this immediately, I am in the midst of curling the hard-to-reach corners of my lashes. Done. Well, that is because I wear make up for no one else but myself. I enjoy playing with colours. I like to shade and highlight and create contours on a canvas. That's why.

Now, you may go and baffle yourself over my explanation as I work on the lashes on my other eye. I bet you are so thankful that I only have 2 eyes. Done. What is it I heard you say? Yes, from you, the one who hates make up and all women who wear them and has a deviant art account. Why don't I be an artist so I can play with colours instead? Brilliant. You seem to think that the word 'artist' is only confined to one who works on a deviant art account or carries a scrap book. Unfortunately, I do not subscribe to your way of thinking. To me, the word 'artist' is kaleidoscopic, and I consider make up artists to be, artists, as well.

Did I just give you a horrible tongue twister? Ok, go untangle your tongues as I apply my gloss. Lower lip done. Have you untangled your tongue yet? Upper lip almost done. How much time do you need? Ok both done. Why are you staring at me like that? Yes you. Don't pretend you don't know I know its you. Yeah you. Female. You look disgusted. Shall I give you a sink? What is that you say? That you have a different value system from me, and hence you think its an abdomination to wear make up? I have a one word response to you. OK. Yeah, simple as that. Sure we have different values (if you want to use that word, for me make up is just something Ifun, to ascribe it to a 'value' is an overstatement of monumental proportions to me really), so be it. And if it bothers you so much to look at me as I curl my lashes, I suggest you look somewhere else? At the floor?

Ok, for your own safety, keep your eyes on the floor. I am about to curl my lashes now. This might scare you to the point of feeling faint. Keep your eyes on the floor, I'm telling you.

Goodbye for now. I think you should have inferred the gist of my message by now.

Turning out Quite as Expected

2009-06-29T16:52:00.000-07:00

I had been waiting in keen anticipation for Elementary 2 to commence and amidst looking through my verb sheets and character charts, came up with several things which I was expecting would occur during the duration of this class.

1. We would be facing off with a much more well-informed and studious bunch.

That was definitely the case. In fact, I should not even have guessed that this would happen. It was practically given by the fact that here we are sitting amongst individuals who are like-minded enough to part with another $200 for an external course which requires more than just 3 hours of your time a week, on top of school/work etc. Point to note: This scenario could only get more intense as the levels progress.

2. ドラマ 2 would unfold.

A sequel to ドラマ 2, with the same protagonist headlining each scene. But what surprised me was the fact that the female lead was cast so soon, having bewitched the protagonist with her curled brown locks and look-alike features. Would she have a look-alike personality to boot? The ドラマ is unfolding bit by bit.

3. (OK, this one I did not anticipate to encounter in class itself) Someone doesn't want to talk to me anymore

Not that we flocked together to begin with, but a certain individual who has been heralded as an elite, pruned and trimmed and fed lovingly by the government, through us mere mortals' coffers, to groom more of his kind, has given me a distinctly colder shoulder.

And what's the reason for his increasingly disenchanted conversation (or rather, snippets of thought exchange)? Simply because I deal with a discipline that does not involve something that he would die without. This 'something' has a rather fat bottom and streamlined top and is caressed every so often by his scholarly hands. It would be an inconceivable, horrifying thought that someone like me does not hold it close to my eye to read the tattoos that curve around its physique or place it in a heated environemtn and wait for its juices within to boil over. Blasphemy! How could I not love a beaker the way he does! So yes, even the common interest in 日本語 and goodness, a common profession (for now at least), cannot make up for the lack of beaker love, and that explains the unwillingness to even meet his brilliant eyes with mine, even for a second!

The only reason I did not anticipate this to encounter in class itself was simply because I was not expecting to meet this pruned elite in this class, thinking that his bookworm driven instincts would have propelled him to sign up for an earlier class which would all the more quickly enhance his almighty brain.

Oh how I love this class, now, to sort out the administrative matters for the exam.

Who's to blame!

2009-06-27T05:21:00.000-07:00

I have just noticed something very unsettling about myself. I tend to blame God whenever things do not go how I wish they did, and then lambaste the scriptures for giving promises which turn out empty when viewed in the context of my predicament.

Rubbish.

Since when was it the case that a religion is there just to give you comfort and make everything sail smoothly?

In fact, I cringe even as I use the word 'religion'. Is that what Christianity really is about?

Or is it a relationship rather than a religion?

That's why there are so many ups and downs, joys and pains.

Lolita

2009-06-26T08:21:00.000-07:00

I have chewed up every morsel from the Devil's Larder and if all goes according to plan, I shall be land my hands on Lolita tomorrow.

Ok, we're taking it a step deeper, beyond Kamikaze Girls and Baby, the Stars Shine Bright. Will this Russian literary masterpiece be able to unravel more insight into the world of dollies and lace?

Money

2009-06-22T23:26:00.000-07:00

I have been spending.
A lot.
Too much.
Maybe.

And I've been dying to go abroad. Everybody seems to be escaping overseas, even if its just for a few days. I want to go some place I've never been before. Taiwan, anybody?

Overheated Lesbos and Skirt chasers!

2009-06-10T17:41:00.000-07:00

My experience in an all-girls convent school, a coed junior college, and now, a public university have taught me something really interesting. The fact that some lesbos in heat simply lose every semblance of control over the parts of their body with lips. Here, i'm referring to 3 parts, all of which can secrete fluids and which they can shove things into.

Who would have thought that I would see the same phenomenon in skirt chasers (though for this case, there are still 3 parts, but only 2 have lips).

Edit: I'm not accusing all lesbos of exhibiting such symptoms under heat. The fact that I've likened the heterosexual male skirt chaser to those who do goes to show that I'm not pinning this phenomenon exclusively on women with a not so conventional orientation.

So please do vice versa.

Poisonous Food

2009-06-08T18:01:00.000-07:00

The vocation in which I am having my current internship has a self-imposed invisible rule that requires me to take work home and is not leaving me with much free time. But I have been taking out snippets of half hour breaks from my 'work from home' time to indulge in a passion which I know would most probably be warped once August arrives - reading. Now, free of the rigidity of reading titles handed out on a piece of paper, I have the liberty of selecting what I want to read and hence my choice for Jim Crace's The Devil's Larder.

The process of devouring each of the 64 dishes with relish has left an aftertaste that has poisoned me into seeing the world in terms of food. It was with such food smeared lenses that I celebrated Samuel's birthday yesterday. Despite the lovely company and the immense fun we had with the KTV (I can't believe I'm actually buying into another Japanese craze), my main course @ Pasta de Waraku could only be described as poisonous. The melted fusion of sweet curry and cheese on the Okonomiyaki starter warmed the palate, but eventually soothed it so much that the clash of wasabi cream pasta with bacon and oyster came as a rancid shock.

I admit I only chose the combination 'wasabi cream' over more palate friendly sounding names like 'miso cream' or 'original cream' for the matter simply because I once read an article of an Italian chef (authentic pasta here!) bemoaning the fact that Asians request for the 'shocking' combination of spicy with cream. Japan - land of all things innovative - I really had to see for myself how they managed this blasphemous Orientalization of Cabonara (which, by the way, is an Americanization of Italian pasta).

The $14.80 heap of noodles arrived with a beautifully poached egg perched on top. I remember how I started. I scooped a bit of the part gelatinous, delicate albumen, coated it with the offending cream and took a bite. I remembered repeating the phrase 'a taste of innovation' to myself. I mean, if you choose to partake of the innovations from the country that gave you Kimchi Calpis, Bilk, Boy Lolitas and Uruha, you'd better psyche yourself to be shocked in al ways possible. So I ate of this innovation with almost mechanical emotions, and was met with a childhood memory inducing nostalgia when I chomped on a soft oyster which innards burst out of its rubbery coating and homogenized with the wasabi cream. Cod Liver Oil. The horrors!

And yes, I did finish the entire plate. While the experience with wasabi cream was certainly an exercise with exerting the mind over matter, the few morsels of curry meat sauce pasta that I nipped off Jie's plate proved to be a heavenly case of Japanization that would compel me to go back for more!

And speaking of food. I am of the opinion that cheese should be confined as a topping on pasta and pizza, sandwiched between 2 slices of bread or cubed and speared with grapes as an appetizer. If there's anything that cheese does not go well with, its with words.

Little Snippets

2009-06-01T04:14:00.000-07:00

I cannot believe that I have decided to embark on a blog post that would actually need days of work before it can be published. Part of it is in a Microsoft Word document now and I am deliberating between feeling excited about it and feeling incredulous that I am actually commiting myself to a complete time-waster from which I would not receive any tangible benefit.

Work is getting tougher and tougher by the minute and I am finding it increasingly difficult to make steady progress. I have to press on.

Yet, being exposed to a discipline in which I need to read and write a lot has introduced be to a whole plethora of books that I would love to savour on my own as well. I was picking up some extracts and titles for the students today and have thus jotted down the many titles I would love to get my hands on and devour at my own pace once I'm finishing with Shiokari Pass. I have to admit that my progress with the latter has been considerably slow nowadays, given the change in intensity of my schedule.

But right now something is pressing. I have to make a decision between risking all I have for one shot and something I love or hopping onto a safer ship to do something I only like so much.

Stress is a constant. I run, very literally, away from it.

I have recently discovered that I am very, very slow in a certain aspect of life. Thank you for your patience.

I am looking forward to the day where I can finally publish the text, in progress @ microsoft word. Till then, look forward to snippets strung together to make a seemingly cohesive narrative.

Out damned spots

2009-05-28T07:38:00.000-07:00

My recent consistency in doing housework has yet to attain recognition from a very important individual nor attract offers for help from another very important individual. I admit that I am not usually in the best of moods once I proceed to Kao MagicClean immediately after getting home, and more often than not I find myself swearing at the floor (literally). But my mantra helps: I do this because I love my family, so keep my complains to myself and the 4 walls.

My recent venture into a vocation which requires a high degree of love for reading and writing has since compelled me to treat seriously, another label for this blog, 'Book'. I will not be doing a book review for every single book I pick up. In fact, I might just try to avoid doing reviews for all of them. But what I would write about is how the books I read affect me.

So what has Ayako Miura's 'Shiokari Pass' done? I admit I was so tempted to slot it back into the book drop after getting to the 2nd chapter. I was turned off by the simplistic style of translation which made me wonder if I had actually picked up one of those children's stories, if you could actually call them that, which do not actually have a plot line for you to follow but instead are garbled text which slap moralizations of every situation upon its reader. Then somehow, my habit of sneaking snippets from the ending did me good, and my desire to get to the lead up to the train accident kept me ploughing through each line. Thank God for that, I have now cleared the premises and am at the portion of the novel where the story line picks up and I am actually starting to draw my own debates over the conversations between Nobuo and Yoshikawa.

Oh the beauty of reading. Reading, writing and speaking - indispensable activities required when one wants to grasp a language. I may have said this before but the English Language is rife with imperfections because it is so impreciese. But this is what makes it beautiful, since writers have the privilege of surfing through a sea of vocabulary before choosing the right words, and take so many different angles in interpreting a text.

That being said, while I am still on the way towards mastering the English Language (right now I say the word 'mastering' with caution. I am not sure if anyone can actually fully grasp every nuance of a language, and I don't know if I would ever come close to being proficient, and not just fluent (I hope I am now) in it), I am being put to shame by a dear friend of mine who has started on a 4th language.

Note to self: Make haste!

'The Ugly Version Of'

2009-05-23T06:59:00.000-07:00

Work has been great to say the least. I never knew that I could learn so much from children, and learn to love children so much. And I am very thankful for the gracious working environment that God has placed me in, though I must really gripe about the quality of food produced by the canteen. Surely, being in a tertiary institution has exposed me to higher standards of food and beverage, but surely the despairity cannot be that big! I was actually rather appalled by the scalding mound of dumpling noodles presented to me today, and I sincerely hope for better morsels for these children.

Anyway, I am currently in the midst of writing articles, managing this new piece of work, working through a novel, and trying my best to keep up with a good fitness routine. I have to admit that one of these assignments is exhausting me out now, and hence I've decided to work on it tomorrow and do some blogging before I indulge in the art of reading what people write instead of writing myself.

So, may the blog begin to roll.

My inability to accept with grace, the phrase 'the ugly version of', has oftened resulted in me suffering contagiously moody days. On certain occasions, I have been labeled rather unfairly at my reaction - a consequence of feeling upset that I have been called 'the ugly version of' someone. Eeks!

You, I am still curious as to why you called me 'superficial' at being upset when you and Her told Him that he 'won't believe how hot her (referring to me) sister is cause Tessa is so ugly'. Yes You, you who would probably embrace Christianity if it were packaged with a cunt and what you deem 'hot' feature. Throw it into an oversized shirt and short denim shorts at that and you'd probably become an evangelical.

Hence, I tend to find myself disgusted at that phrase, regardless of usage.

However, a recent journey with my Mizuno shoes has given this phrase an interesting spin. After a year and more of running with my New Balance Shoes, I almost completely forgot the existence of my Mizuno Wave.

I have to admit that I never gave much thought to the latter, considering how it made its rather abrupt entry into my life. I had just purchased the New Balance one Monday morning only for Mum to hand me brochures raving on the new technology behind the Mizuno Wave Creation. I did not take too kindly to the design though. My New Balance were nothing to boast about, but I simply was not drawn to a shoe constructed from a block of white with streaks of colours that looked rather garish at certain angles.

Mum bought it anyway. And I avoided it at all costs, leaving it in its thin wrapping and blue box.

Until recently, when the New Balance had to be washed and the only other way to pound the treadmill was to don the Mizuno. I was skeptical as I stepped on board but moved my feet according to the usual rhythm anyway. Nothing different. As I picked up the pace, the difference became more pronounced. I could actually feel the road beneath me. It was as if my feet and shoe were in some form of synchrony. And I ran, and ran and ran, further than before.

Now I know I could have turned the above post into something more descriptive and emotional. But I know, even as an amateur runner, I have many more steps to run with this pair, more colourful journeys worth documenting even in pictures.

And yes, some day the Mizuno would have to go, and who knows what might replace it.

But for now I'm just happy that my 'uglier version of' shoes actually ran a further distance with me.

Just Desserts

2009-05-22T06:43:00.000-07:00

It has come out at last. And generally, I only have myself to blame.

It is of my own doing that I am stuck in this predicament. I am standing atop of this pedestal which has been erected in a midst of darkness. I cannot see beyond the mere column of light which is beaming down on the pedestal. Only my body is illuminated. This column is so rigid such that if I were to stretch out my hands to my sides the portions beyond the elbow would be visually chopped. And I want to step forward, but I don't know if there would be another pedestal right beside for me to place my foot. Or even if the pedestal is there, I don't know if it is near enough.

Reactions

2009-05-19T05:58:00.000-07:00

Here are a few conversations I had. They are real. All begin with the subjects annotated by the numerals speaking first.

1. With a student pursuing a double degree in engineering and economics:

'What subjects did you do in JC?'
'Hm, KI, Math, Econs, Lit, Music'
'SO YOU DIDN"T DO ANY SCIENCE SUBJECT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
'Nope I didn't. And amazingly, the world didn't come to an end!'

2. With a student pursuing a degree in chemical engineering.

'So you're an english major?'
'Yes'
'Oh. It must be very challenging.'
'Yes it is.'

3. With a student pursuing a degree in life science.

'So your degree is a direct-honours one.'
'Yes.'
'Then what do you do for honours?'
'A research thesis'
'Why do you need to do research in Arts? Its not like you can help anything if you do'
'Research in the Arts is a very fulfilling field. For one we can analyze how 'elitists' and the 'self-serving bias' works.

4. With a student pursuing a degree in material science engineering.

'So as an English Major do you need to study any science'
'We do need to do cross-faculty modules'
'Oh my goodness. This is so fucked up. You don't know what you are fucking missing.'

5. With a computer science student.

'I always admired people who can write well.'
'Do you find me very stupid because I study Arts and not Science?'
'Nope. Stupidity has nothing to do with arts and science.'

Ok I lied about some of them.

The Enemy

2009-05-15T19:35:00.000-07:00

知人知敌，百战百胜

I must have mentioned before how much the mere mention of a cliche conjures that sticky cloying feeling that is oh so unpleasant. But yet I love them because they are so true.

So here's another one, this time about knowing your enemy in order to win every battle, and I am my biggest enemy.

Even as my body pounds the treadmill, with each step, the resistance comes from nothing but itself. The horrendous burning from the lactic acid, the dehydration that makes the whole nasal cavity feel like a portion of the Sahara, are just some of the obstacles that I give myself, from myself, to fight with myself.

Reading books on running has helped me put this cliche into perspective. I have to know my body, in order to run effectively. And to know my body requires that I listen to it. As much as I struggle with inertia on those days when I just want to sit down in front of some electronic device and subconsciously build hoardes of cellulite, it becomes equally difficult to stop running once the momentum has kicked in and the adrenaline is coarsing through my veins.

And that's how injuries surface. I have been blessed to be free from joint injuries or muscle tears (so far), and although this could be simply because I have yet to reach the point of a competent runner, I take comfort in the fact that maybe, it is also because I have been listening to my body.

I can accept, rather easily, that rest is as crucial as working hard, and hence try as much as possible to rest when I need to. Of course the ugly past rears here, where, being the obese and unhealthy tween, I often tried to make up for my lack of physical activity with marathons on the desk. Needless to say, falling asleep at the desk was an everyday affair, and the stern mockings from my family members who caught me in the act still resonates even today. Having been conditioned in an environment where sleeping was seen as a sign of weakness rendered those moments even more humiliating, which is shy I never returned the favour then, and hardly ever do so now (if it happens).

Now I am glad that as I run, I listen to my favourite tunes, and also to my body.

Random Rambler's Rambling Ramble

2009-05-14T05:02:00.000-07:00

I wonder if entitling this blog 'real random ramble' has inevitably brought about some curse upon my writing. I have been unable to trace any semblance of structure in my posts, and within the text itself. So, following the nature of all things random, here goes :

A morbidly beautiful image of a cat which has breathed its last not too long ago. Its eyes like porcelain balls, were fixed in a stare so cold. And it did not even move from its pose.

I Listen as I Run

2009-05-13T06:04:00.000-07:00

Even before I write about what I intend to, I have to admit that a certain blogging protoccol has been nagging at me to blog about my perfect birthday celebration and the very thoughtful presents I received. Its almost like an invisible yoke that has been shadowing me for everyday since the 6th of May, and here I say 'shadowing' simply because this yoke has only nagged at, but has yet to compel me into actually writing about it. Maybe it is mere procrastination that has left the tons of related photographs unlabelled, collecting some virtual dust in my 'MOB' folder. But somehow, I believe the real reason is that my 20th birthday has been so perfect that I want to fossilize it in my intangible memories. For some reason, writing a chunk of text about it and pasting pictures all over seems to dilute the preciousness of those moments as it is now open for the world to access. Notice I did not say 'see'. I do not have a traffic counter on my blog but I am still sufficiently aware of the number of passers-by and readers.

Anyway, back to the topic. This was probably triggered by my recent birthday gift of 'What I talk about when I talk about running' by Murakami, as well the short and simple book 'Running Fit' which I borrowed to complement my Murakami read. I have recently taken an interest in sports, particularly running. This may be extremely difficult to believe considering I used to lead an almost sedentary lifestyle as a child (yes, I reversed time in this sense), and any attempt to walk around the reservoir then was often met with wide opened mouths and arched eyebrows.

So while I have yet to take part in a marathon, or a half-marathon at that, I must say that I do enjoy my sessions in the pool, at the gym, and most of all on the treadmill or in West Coast Park. True enough, when I run, I take myself to a different place. I actually spend more time, on the treadmill, allowing my mind to drift in and out of different realms. And this dreamer of a time has probably prevented me from improving my timing or distance as fast as I should have, but hey, I do not enjoy running so much as for a competition's sake, rather than just immersing myself in the adrenaline with each step.

Yet, despite my drifting, I seldom run 'alone'. Occasionally, when a partner comes along, then I switch to 'competitor' mode, or sometimes 'chaser', when my partner has the inevitable duty of letting me chase after him/her. Then again, I am not really 'alone' even without a partner, being accompanied by music. It is very rare that I run without music when I do not have a physical partner, as if the act of running is somehow synonymous with listening to music.

But music, when I run, does not function as a motivation mechanism of sorts. I know many runners blast rock, hip-hop, rap as they run just so they can match their pace to the beat. But I don't. In fact, I do have some 'slow' songs on my 'working out' playlist. I actually take a lot of time to select which part of my playlist to start, such that I can spend up to 1minute actually walking on the treadmill first as I sift through. Usually, when I select a song to start with, I will stick to that song for many other workout sessions. But, when I feel the need to change, I repeat the 1 minute treadmill routine again. Recently I have been starting with Scandal's 'Doll', then I occasionally skip 'Orion Once Again', but somehow I never miss Larc's 'Honey'. And I usually finish with 'Still Doll'.

I cannot pin a relation between the songs I listen to and my exercise routine. Try as I might, I have never been able to pin the crunches with 'Enter Sandman' or the different stages of incline with any particular song or artist. In fact, I do recall to repeating 'Still Doll' at least thrice, consecutively at that, as I ran.

Maybe its because my running time is the best time for me to listen to music. My driftings away from the rhythmic pounding somehow let me pay better attention to the voices, the different instrumental parts, the lyrics at that.

Oh how I love to listen as I run.

The Emo Cycle

2009-05-10T19:43:00.000-07:00

Several things I realized/have been reiterated to me, much to my utmost chagrin!

1. Prolonged bouts of Emoness are equivalent to narcissism.

2. Sometimes, stereotypes - in particular those pertaining to schools in SG - become stereotypes only because they are so true that there is no other way to call them!

3. 2's a company, 3's a crowd. This is yet another stereotype, which hey!, is so darn true.

4. One of the most subtle, yet strongest ways, to put someone down, is to attribute everything they've worked for to 'luck'.

So, since emoness is way more contagious than SARS or any H1N1 strain of sorts, we need stronger antidotes!

(And I know it'd make an abrupt ending to close this entry like this. And I do know what else I can write, but I have no impulse to start typing about them. So this is it)

West Coast Park

2009-04-30T02:53:00.000-07:00

I have always preceived West Coast Park to be an uprooted East Coast Park + a few better equipment. Given that East Coast Park is synonymous with dog poop, used condoms, couples engaging in activities which should really be confined within 4 walls and frequent sightings of adult caucasians perched over tiny skate skooters as they whiz after their children, it was thus no surprise that throwing some structures spasmodically over a pit of coarse sand was still insufficient to tempt me to divert my route there.

Yet, as much as the climbing structures failed to lure me from my mindless pounding on the treadmill, my recent craze with Sasuke (otherwise rephrased here as Ninja Warrior) got me so hyped up over doing an obstacle course (now this term is subjective. I'm not referring to things like the ボヂプロプ. I'm talking about climbing a few ropes here and there) that I ventured to West Coast Park.

I had a companion of course.

And we went through the 'obstacles' together, working our way around the damaged ones by devicing new rules to go along with it. So, the companion decided to cross the bar with the missing net using his arms only. Like this:

Lift yourself up.

Swing.
Swing higher.

Flip!

Fall.

The companion brought his frisbee along, and as he tossed them around with some new found friends, I did some core stablising work with this:

Planks propped up by springs are perfectly fine. Ropes, on the other hand, even if they were thick, proved much of a harder challenge.

Fortunately for me I did not see any of the undesirable scenes mentioned in the opening paragraph. Ah, West Coast Park, I will be back some day.

All Hail!

2009-04-29T23:44:00.000-07:00

I have never known my powers of influence to be so strong to the extent of 'all hail thee' level. Today showed me that this power of mine, is multiplied by at least 100 times, in the area of spoilt appetites and caloric-busting activities.

I am all the more motivated to sign up for the personal trainer's certification course. The sight of me, dressed in signature Nike trainers with TESQ emblazoned across, standing akimbo atop the highest pull up machine you can ever find wielding a 100kg bench press above my head as I exalt all to 'WORK OUT AND STOP EATING', accompanied by lightning bolts and roars of thunder under a torrential storm that for some magical reason does not wet me - is almost risible.

But it'd come through some day (albeit with on a less dramatic scale).

Facts in Brownian Motion

2009-04-28T20:12:00.000-07:00

Categorised as 'Duh'
Mum still thinks I'm fat, but will 'try not to say it'.
I certainly do not feel like driving anymore following that racist incident. Hence my procrastination in renewing that stupid PDL.

On Working Out
Thank God for Youtube: ExpertVillage and SparksPeople! I never thought I could do so many strenously fun, and difficult!, workouts with the simple exercise ball. Perfect complement to my 'vary-per-minute-of-inclination' treadmill routine.
Ah, but despite this new found gym routine, I've been dying for a PLUNGE into the pool. Do I have a short attention span? Or do I simply get bored too easily? Either way, I find it difficult to keep going at a particular exercise regime day after day. Seeing the same machines and executing the same exercises just builds a thicker runner's wall that leaves me begging for variation. So yes, I've been yearning for laps which put less stress on my knees, but somehow my evenings keep getting occupied. Yes, blame it on my inability to swim at night (why do I keep thinking that a crocodile is waiting amidst the deck chairs for the opportune time to swoop down and bite me). Alternatively, its my fault for not being able to wake up early enough such that I can swim without subjecting my keys and access card to the risk of theft!

*I might just be getting a Bosu ball for my birthday present. Hooray!*

On Music
I am going to post some questions to Mana-sama.
Dear Mana-sama,
You are an inspiration to all who love classical music. And while you make the rapid scalic passages on a harpsichord sound effortless, is your astute skill today a result of hours of training amidst so many distractions? Did you ever have to strain your ears to pick out the best nuances in your Polonaise, while someone blasted the TV right behind you? Did you ever rain down your pent up frustration through a densely chordal Grieg, only to have someone come down and tell you to shut up because someone else studying upstairs had resorted to covering their ears as you played? Were you ever given weird stares when you expressed your passion for the talent of Chopin? Did you ever cringe when someone said that music was an 'escape', finding that giving music the place of an 'outlet' to reality somehow belittles the richness it beholds?
Ah, but you, born to a musical parentage, probably had a music room all of your own.
Or maybe you struggled with so much more, and overcame all, and became who you are today, one of the lucky few who carve a lucrative career in this industry of heartache and joy.

And before I go
Some readers have asked why my posts vary so greatly in content. One minute I'm a horribly emo, potential wrist-slasher and by the next post I'm incredibly overjoyed. Well, take a look at the title again, 'real random ramble'. I'm hit with varied circumstances everyday, life hands me a different spectrum of emotions, and these emotions change as circumstances change. So, don't worry about me slashing my wrists anytime :)

The Big Two

2009-04-28T08:13:00.001-07:00

Imagine time, spent with friends, so comfortable, that the usually trigger-happy me wasn't even tempted to reach for my phone. That's how it went at Siam's Kitchen on the 27th of April. So what if the food was not as good as we expected, or that some of us were down with raspy throats and couldn't swallow nary a spoonful of tom yam without scalding it, or that the Art Museum which we arty-farty people adjourned to after dinner was closed, we had a great time. I know I'm being horribly succinct, but seriously, even a ton of descriptive paragraphs detailing every single dish and presents would not do justice to the comforting atmosphere of time spend with friends.

And talk about a genuine surprise. Maybe it was just my ignorance, but I simply couldn't see it coming, the surprise joint birthday celebration. And I was presented with a gift that is thoughtful, practical yet unique. I'm not saying what it is though, or posting any pictures, its just between us.

I'm so thankful for all of you.

Skin

2009-04-25T00:32:00.000-07:00

I just need to get this off my chest before I begin the ramble: Urgh. I've been chucked to the waiting list.

This is going to sound completely incredulous, and it might just come off as a lie. But here goes: At some point in my life, my skin was actually perfect. Smooth and clear, I'd dare say flawless. I never had to worry if globules of god-knows-what would clog it up from within, inflaming it, producing godawful bumps, and leaving unsightly scars.

Oh how things have changed. I've lost count of the amount of money I've spent on cleansers, lotions and basically any other form of topical medication. I've bought, literally, into every single claim there was on the market, all in the hope of acquiring good, or at least, better skin, than my horribly pockmarked pizza face. More often than not those things never worked. And though popping pills improved the situation a little, the dire consequences it rendered onto something else, has put me off any more tablets. And later, with blotters as my stable companion (I'd break into hysterics when I ran out of them), I discovered the world of make-up. I layer coat after coat on my face, trying to replicate the perfect canvas I see on so many other people. And needless to say, things got worse.

Now, before you start droning on, with your mockingly sweet voice that spills from that mouth perched on a canvas of perfect skin, that I should 'drink a lot of water and don't eat so much chilli', maybe you should actually bother to notice that I actually swig down more than you do. And don't you remember the time I stopped chilli for so long? It did not help either.

'Superficial'. 'Stop being so self-conscious'. 'Why do you care so much about your looks'. 'Looks don't matter'.

I don't know if you intend it or not, but saying 'looks don't matter' to pizza face certainly comes across as horribly sarcastic considering you have never had a spot of imperfection on your face before.

All the probable solutions to this entail hefty price tags. And so you say, for someone of my condition (read: pizza face), you cannot help but to spend on these things. You talk as if I can crap money.

I have no choice but to acclimatize myself to meeting the world as PIZZAFACE.

I'm actually starting to like the sound of 'pizzaface'. I can picture a Marvelesque heroine who slays villians with her pockmarked face.

A New Routine

2009-04-23T23:34:00.001-07:00

After 2 days of procrastinating, which turned out to somewhat of a blessing after all, I finally stepped into the gym again. I was expecting my workout this morning to bear the outcome of 2 previously sedentary weeks, and thus was intending to do things at a much slower pace. Yet, somehow, the momentum just flooded back the minute I pushed the tricep bar, and I went on from one exercise to another almost spontaneously, such that I emerged from the gym equipped with a new and possibly better (I say possibly since I'm no authority on this) workout routine :)

And, as we all know, in the pursuit of better health, what one eats is about as crucial as one's exercise frequency. Hooray for Dad's creation (this was for dinner last sunday):

I had a much 'greener' than usual lunch today:

Pardon the brown bits of taupok and meatballs, my yong tau foo selection comprised otherwise of vegetables and beancurd. The drink is none other than my favourite combination of green apple + celery! (Stop gagging. Try a sip first.)

Maybe it was the really productive gym session that influenced my choice in meals. Either way, I hope I can somehow drill in myself the will to make healthy choices all the time. Cheers to good health!

Purged.

2009-04-22T00:34:00.000-07:00

So the recent liberation from digesting and ruminating novels from a mandatory list has set me free to go to the public libraries. There is something more romantic about enjoying a novel knowing that you GPA is not attached to the way you read and the way you write about it thereafter.

And my book of choice is Paul Mercier's 'Night Train to Lisbon'.

And it is such an answer. I finally can put my finger on the right expression to describe the usage of 'haha' over msn conversations:

'They're so horribly frayed and threadbare, these words, worn out be being used millions of times. Do they still have any meaning?'

So yes, 'haha' no longer means laughter, it now has the duty of peppering a conversation at junctures where one party is obliged to reciprocate a few words so as to indicate some form of interest in the convo.

I have also found an expression which encapsulates why I have fallen in love with languages.

'Of the thousand experiences we have, we find language for one at most and even this one merely by chance and without the care it deserves. Buried under all the mute experiences are those unseen ones that give our life its form, its colour, and its melody.'

Yet, on that note, I am in danger of allowing this novel, in its muses on language and love, to take me away from what's required now - 日本語revision.

And in the style of the random rambler: My body has been feeling sluggish lately, despite having caught up with sleep, but pounding the treadmill has become an activity so monotonous I'd rather spend time with the weights. Its time for some structure-scaling at West Coast Park. I will brave the whizzes of adults perched on skate scooters, followed by a trail of toddlers on even tinier versions.

The Obligatory Post-Exam Catch Up

2009-04-21T02:58:00.000-07:00

Ok, as can be inferred from the title, the exams are over. Practically every student's blog I read is pasted with a large 'hiatus' symbol during the exam periods (though this hiatus symbol sometimes gives in to short posts titled 'i gave up' or 'i cheated' or 'i got bored'), and this post is thereby followed up with 'ITS OVER!' once it really is done.

So yes, this is the obligatory post-exam evaluation/planner etc. basically anything you use to name THAT post after the exams where you write about how the papers went, how you think you would do, and what you plan to do now, more often that not promising to no one but yourself or your blog that you would study harder next semester.

I'll try as much as possible to turn this post into something interesting. But remember, its about the exams after all. As much as a module may be exciting and challenging, how much could an exam get? Challenging for sure, but exciting? Nah.

So anyway, here's the evaluation:

Comms - Here's to the first time in my life that I mistook my seat number. While I initially felt horribly guilty for making the rightful owner of seat number 233 run up and down twice just to ensure it was me, and not her, that got it wrong, this guilty was quickly dispelled by the horribly tricky MCQ and cloze passages. Ah well, a 'tricky' paper is about the closest resemblance you could get in an exam to a real life situation anyway, so maybe we students have shot ourselves in the foot for complaining that exams are 'nothing like what you get in real life anyway'. Here we get it. The tricky paper. Mimicking real life scenarios where everything is uncertain.

Survey Part 2 - I'm still in disbelief that this paper turned out to be the easiest exam I've sat for since I entered university. But the fact that this easily translates into stricter marking guidelines and steeper bell curve is not making me anymore hopeful.

Cyber Security - Here's a toast to learning the hard way that, as much as globalization calls for us Singaporeans to embrace 2 gigantic growing nations, for now I should endeavour to avoid modules where the general locus around me in the exam hall features nary another Singaporean (oh wait! The rest of my kind have learned!) So you can just imagine my pain as I chewed through the MCQs and was going to work on the 6 structured questions when people from those nations and a couple from other lands that sported the same crew cut + spectacles + bermudas + sandals + tshirt ensemble began to leave the exam hall. Surely it didn't help that I was struck by this unexplainable and horrible headache that left me stoning at some junctures when I should have been writing?

Victorian - This course has served not only as a killer, but also as a warning for me. And was it a mistake to veer over unseen poetry for a recollection of narrative twists in some mystery sensational detective and potentially racist novel instead? Science Fiction for next sem? At least I know the formula for dealing with her classes now, but would I execute it correctly?

Singapore - So Singaporean, everything was 'up to you'. Now I just hope my angle was right. Sighs, if only the next step was headed by another one ( inside joke, can't name names here).

And my overal say on the exams would actually be that this semester was tough, and its only going to get worse, so I'd better step up the game. Try as I might to avoid saying this, cliches are often the truth (and that is a cliche too). I've also made a mental note to try to go for courses which are not so final exam heavy, and oh the woes of having 2 exam papers in a day. I cannot complain too much on this since some of my friends are having to deal with 3 today, but I inevitably found myself repeating the same phrases for the essays in my 2 papers today.

OK enough of this evaluation, let's move on to the 2nd part where we talk about what we are going to do this holidays.

But nonetheless, while quite a significant chunk of my 3 month break would be taken up by an internship, I do have to get other things accomplished during this holiday, some of which I actually do not have the mood to do, but have to kick myself to do it anyway.

And the list goes on:

1. Going back to exercise! Yes, I can't wait to scale the structures @ West Coast Park.
2. Driving. Enough Said.
3. 日本語not forgetting my test on Thursday!
4. I can finally read a book which is not on some list of mandatory (techincally only) readings.
5. I'm really looking forward to my birthday celebration this year. I finally have a barbecue pit and, freed from exams, I will have the liberty to prepare my own feast for the guests. Right now I have a vague menu in mind, but its definitely going to involve a pasta salad, succulent meat cuts, roasted vegetable skewers and barbecued bananas and sweet potatoes for dessert.
6. The inevitable - Housework.
7. The want - Visiting grandma, picking up the recipes!

And yes it goes on and on, but right now I've since been interrupted by the urge for a run. I have also made it a point to spend less time on my laptop, though not to the point where I would actually lock it up as planned, since I tend to get horribly distracted by the likes of youtube and msn when I do attempt to do something productive online. So I'd probably be blogging about my hoilday exploits from a stool in front of the desktop, which is perched on top of cardboard boxes.

And the obligatory post comes to an end!

Immobilized

2009-04-16T23:15:00.000-07:00

By pain. The dull type that stems from a regular flow of blood out of your body. It ebbs. I can feel it.

But I shall resist the urge to sleep it away.

Maybe it would dissipate, or at least become less localized, if I pound real hard on the treadmill today.

And I must abolish stereotypes. Hurhur. Just because you're form a certain school in a certain discipline under a certain bond does not necessarily mean you are going to look upon me as a piece of scum.

God help me.

Is this a direct Yes, No, or what?

2009-04-16T07:27:00.001-07:00

So Mum prayed on my behalf today and an answer came.

Its just an answer. Its not a 'yes' or a 'no' or even a 'wait'. It could be anything, or even a conjugation of 'yes take this and you will feel that you should have said 'no' but wait this is what I want you to do.'

Fortunately I do have some time before I have to make a decision. And I'm brewing in a cauldron of skepticism and hope.

But you see more than I can, you know more than I would ever know.

And you love me so.

And I must love you too.

So, help me.

Exams!

2009-04-10T05:27:00.000-07:00

I sometimes have impulse reactions. Those moments where I do something, from something, because of something, which cannot be explained. My kneejerk reaction to an impending event of catastrophic nature, particularly those events which require a huge amount of brain work, speedy pen strokes, rapid thought firing, all within legible handwriting and organized paragraphs in a cold room - is to snack.

Best snack ever: Pocky.
This is a close runner up.
And this was my choice, paid for by Mum :D
A sweet ending to a meal of raw octopus today!

Vegan Tired Me

2009-04-07T08:28:00.000-07:00

In a time of rocketing food prices, $12 per slice tiny peach cakes and $4.50 cucumber juice, I am so thankful for the humble vegetarian stall at NTU Canteen B, where I can get this:

For SGD$2.00. Nevermind all that thing about vegetarian food being a million times unhealtheir than its omnivorous counterparts. This is probably the best-tasting stall accessible for a busy HSS student anyway.

Yes, busy with the upcoming exams. I am tired.

Anyway, on a brighter note, I have found a replacement for Pazzion, and its all thanks to mum! Pictorial evidence will follow suit in later posts.

In the mean time, a long and hard day is about to ensue!

Farewell Shoes

2009-04-05T00:40:00.000-07:00

Today I bid farewell to Pazzion. Thou have served me so well though I exploited thee. Thou has shielded my soles from torrents, sun and pain without complaint. And today thou shall enter eternal rest. Obit.
On a better note, I have yet to finish blogging about my time in 黑社会. Thai-style dishes were fabulous as well.

Made a mental note to order some Hoegardden if I get these dishes the next time I visit. Caloric counting activites can be dismissed in the light of the beer-belly inducing mixture of chilled Hoegardden to wash down crisp, spicy crunches of popcorn sized-chicken and crab.

Screw + Nut + Bolt

2009-04-04T00:06:00.000-07:00

I need to hop somewhere to escape from the oppressive forces of faculty mandated modules.

Or is it just totally my fault that my entire semester is so screwed that it has nuts and bolts sticking out of it as well.

Anyway, I had other dishes from 黑社会 as well, here goes :

And today - as a way of comforting myself from the drone in my head which was concussed as i mummered 'no pain no gain' throughout the extraction process - I treated myself to a mint brownie:

Which was a tad disappointing. The brownie tasted more like chocolate cake, and the mint paste lathered on top was more sweet than minty.

Ooh, if only the mint leaves had been crushed and folded into a thicker batter.

Bittersweet

2009-04-02T09:18:00.000-07:00

My favourite word. Somehow sweet stuff - here I refer to everything from the slightly more expensive dark chocolate bar to life as a whole - are better only when there's a bitter undertone to each bite. Cause its only when the tongue tastes the cruel bitter that it begins darting round on an unending quest to seek the sweetest parts hidden within layer after layer of bitter mess. And when the tongue finally seeks out the sweetest portions, the bliss of the melting sweetness moves the corners into an inevitable smile.

Today was like a well filled to the brim with the bitterest concoction ever, and me having been dunked head first inside.

But I searched hard enough, smothered by the bitter, and eventually found the sweet.

Bending

2009-03-30T23:07:00.000-07:00

I am typing this blog post on a school computer which has the label 'strictly for scanning only' emblazoned at the top of the screen.

And somehow, I know, that 4 years from now, when the thought of travelling to Boon Lay would be met with an expression along the lines of 'What...why go so far?' or even 'Where is that?', I would instinctively recall as well the library with the unisex toilets and warm lavatory seats.

Who knows, I might even recall how I'm typing this in the midst of a very bogged week.

黑社会

2009-03-29T04:34:00.000-07:00

Many races can boast of the survival gene, the Chinese are top notch at this, considering how we've been able to penetrate every border and in most cases, survive. But the Chinese can also boast of another survivability trait - that is, the ability to render almost every root, plant, and creature, potable. So it is with no wonder that salted eggs - yes, chicken/duck/quail eggs steeped in brine till its white and yellow innards shrivel - were invented by the Chinese eons ago, and till today are still savoured with a helping of porridge. More often that not, the salted eggyolk, which has even found its way into mooncakes and other expensive pastries, is treasured and the white component discarded. And today at 黑社会,
I had the misfortune of finding that the salted eggyolk had also made its way into 泡饭 (which is not that much of a loss considering how I have never been too keen on porridge):

But alas, the salted eggyolk intruded upon the otherwise lovely 流沙包. That dish was certainly the winner. It was served in dimsum boxes:

Orange-hued buns steamed over a slow flame, encasing a golden liquid centre of custard and...salted eggyolk...one had to eat it ala 小笼包 fashion, peeling off the top and dipping it into the molten centre before swallowing the remainder whole.

I had the privilege of enjoying many other scrumptious dishes, but the one that really stood out from the crowd was the abalone tart.

Sarah! I hope this reaches you before you open the can of abalone. Unless, you decide to brave the barbaric Chinese style of chugging this edit: bivalve out of the can, here is another solution! Morsels of abalone steeped in herbal sauce, places upon some diced vegetables in a pastry case. Brilliant.

And now, Auden beckons. I might upload the whole album of photographs without a narrative in a seperate post. Alternatively, there is a high chance of me returning to this place, so I might do a compare and contrast exercise should I order the same dishes again.

Till then.

Sarah's Birthday!

2009-03-21T02:31:00.001-07:00

Happy Birthday Sarah! I'm so happy I got to commemorate this day with you!

And here's what followed immediately after this shot was taken:

The other participants were a little less interested though:

And Thank you sarah for scouting out such a lovely place for us. Here's pictoral proof:

Even the card holder was authentically Turkish!
But all these were only a sneak preview of the gastronomic pleasures waiting to unfold. Sarah and I did the ordering, and this came first :

An assortment of chickpeas, tomatoes, mint leaves etc. pureed to a smooth consistency, meant to be slathered on this huge lavas.

And the next dish was nothing short of a surprise. I was cautious about ordering 'pizza' from a Turkish restaurant, having tortured my palate before with hamburgers from a chinese diner and (shudder) Italian Yoghurt from a road side bubble tea stall. And remembering how the hamburgers from the chinese diner turned out to be spherical white buns, I was even more skeptical when the pizza arrived boat-shaped. But, the cynic in me disappeared at a bite of melt-in-the mouth bread encasing warm melted cheese and tender lamb chunks. Here is the winning surprise:

This was followed by a dish called 'Imam [insert Turkish word here which would translate the dish's name as (the Imam fainted)]'. So why did he faint? Probably from the awesome stacks of eggplant, tomato puree and cheese.

It even came with a cute spoon.

And we could never step into a Turkish Restaurant without feasting on its Kebabs. So we ordered a platter.

This dish disproved the western style of consuming lamb: if it has been simmered to the point of succulent tenderness and when it emits the enchanting aroma of herb mixture, you don't need mint sauce!

And all this was washed down with mint tea and ice water (Sarah, Jean and I had the former of course!). The beverages were served with an interesting tray, and drunk from delicate pottery.

But of course it would not have been complete without the birthday cake!

Poor Germaine and Zah sawed and ploughed through the frozen hazelnut praline base, before serving up:

Sarah gave me the macaroon :)

And all this happened in Alaturka @ Arab Street. Perfect example of how there's so much of Singapore that we have yet to explore. Like, this shop:

Today's celebration shows the sweet benefits of leaving the car keys behind, boarding a random bus or taking the train, diving into unexplored lanes, feasting at quiet eateries which dish up the best foods, and with the best company :)

On a lighter note, Jie and I braved the Friday night Orchard Road crowds for the 鳩首fair. Everything was so buyable. But I always make the mental note to myself to exercise restraint whenever I step into a Japanese stall. So we left only with these:

But that restraint lost some of its inhibitions at 紀伊国屋。

What a wonderful day!

Dashes of Resignation

2009-03-19T09:12:00.000-07:00

Something new happened today. I was caught in a special predicament, the kind in which all you want to do is lambaste somebody, only to find yourself with no expletives at your disposal simply because you want to avoid getting sued. I sure could have flamed her (that's a clue) on this platform, but Thou would not be pleased, won't Thee?

And I thought I had recovered from this incident faster than expected, only to reverse Time during レッスン。(An inside joke really, only せんせい and me know, though the former would not be pleased to know of how I altered the unmovable force of the universe with a simple misstrokes of pen on paper.)

Quick, silver lining:

Ok.

Save Time

2009-03-16T21:54:00.001-07:00

If Time could really be contained in a clock, how would you save it when it trickles away ala Dali's melting clocks?

So let's say that the time I have is contained within the clock with the yellow rim (somehow I like how its hanging off the brown structure, as if its solid upper half is clinging on for dear life). And right now, time is melting away like the centre of a poached sunny side up, as I press key after key on the school computer's keyboard.

And I've never exactly been able to rescue the running contents of a poached yolk after having its thin skin pricked, except to absorb the spill with some hot rice or bread. So how should I save time once I've inadvertently let it melt away?

Soak it up and make a good meal :)

...cont'd from previous post:

Why is everything always relentlessly evaluated and compared on the basis of beauty?

Uggh.