Headache
"We're gonna take you back to a time, when a love song was a love song,"
Quoted from a random song on my playlist t'day. Lol.. How true.
My headache is receeding. Whoo! Must be all the smses I got cause I didn't attend practice today. Ty ty. Sorry man...I slept right through the practice-time cause I was sick. Anyway Jesselene's msg sorta lifted my infectious mood - I must've gotten sick because I bobbed my head too much like an indian the other time. Lol.
I was going through some old blog posts just now. (Because I'm sick.. so I start doing random things. bleh :p) Anyway, then i saw this post about how Daniel said he felt different talking to me, like more relaxed, more buddy-ish etc. On the present note - that isn't true. We're like practically not talking to each other most of the time. Even when we go out on outings, we would hardly talk. The mood has suddenly turned tensed. Some barrier that came up along the way of teenhood.
Like now me cousin and I aren't as close as when we were kids. When you grow up to teenhood, things change. Situations change. Naturally. Dunno why it seems easier to make good friends in primary school than when we grow up. Right? Hmm.. I think it must be because of maturity.
Bah, who am I trying to evaluate human nature. :/
good night, PLEASANT dreams, and stay away from headaches. :]
Soap Operatic Nightmare
I had the most awful dream last night man!
I dreamt that secondary school ran on a credit system. And I didn't get enough credits to go to Temasek Poly. The officials noted this to me only a week before my poly opened - that I had to be transferred to Seconday 5 NA.
SECONDAY 5 NA. Wah, I think my mouth just dropped right open.
Wow, what a shock I had! I was thinking , "Okay... that is too unreasonable, you tell me this when I'm getting ready for poly life?" What the char kuey tiao.
I found out that the passing credit point was 29, and I got 23 points. Yala, because Dora Lee didn't like me and she gave me a bad mark. (she's a teacher in my old school) When everyone else passed. It's supposed to be some technical process where everyone would be able to get through. But because of teacher-student animosity with Dora Lee, I didn't.
I was so infuriated, I didn't believe I couldn't appeal to a poly - I passed all the subjects, I met the cut off points for the poly, just that I didn't have enough credits. Argh. So some old gentleman told me to go to this courtroom where they analysed all the appealing "victims" one by one, before deciding to allow them to go poly.
The room was like a normal court room; parquet-ish walls and ceiling. And the group of us sat at the jury stand. In front of us was a stage, where three adults in black robes sat (like such of lawyers). The students would have to sit in a chair directly facing them, while they did their hard-pounding, action-packed critisizing.
They came to my round of interrogation, and they were doing some verbal stabbing at me, some gibberish that I forgot. I remembered I got damn pissed, and barged out of the court room because they were too much. LOL. I know that part of the dream was inspired from watching too much soap operas.. wahahaha.
Then I admitted defeat la. I went back to SAS to do my fifth year of secondary school. And I was posted to the same class as Fabian. THE HORROR! Haha.. Eventually, after alot of blurred scenes, they granted me admission to poly. Because they realised they made a mistake. Wait, I mean - Dora Lee was being too harsh. Lol..
Hopefully dreams STAY being the opposite of reality. O_O
lol, ciao
Careful With The Hoses
Service was good! :D
The speaker knew loads of stuff, and he's been through alot. Must learn to keep my faith even at times of extreme crisis!
I like the guy who spoke, he would suddenly raise his voice so that all those people not paying attention/ sleeping would suddenly jerk awake. Lol. His life story was heart wrenching, shocking, exciting, and funny la.
Anyway, some side notes, Jeng's Birthday! NC 16-Eligible now! Must welcome him with wide arms... hahaha.. very soon all those gonna-be-16s would become 16 liao. Hmmm..Feel so old man... haha.
Cookies And Cream
It's becoming really hazy these few days. Must be another fire happening at a neighbouring country again. It reminds me of the Malaysian climate. Like, abit hazy and ominous.
What wierdness to talk about the weather at 4 am.
As you can see, it's one of my uber late nights again today. Hmmm... I'm not at all tired. Just more or less mentally drained. Been gaming too much... I suspect. :D ahaha.
I'm getting very engrossed in Enduring Love - yes, that cheapo $5 Novel I mentioned before. Haha XD. It's much better than some of the novels I pay full price for. There are some books that I find a pain to read, because of the old British, LOTR-style English they use. It's hard to try to understand what's going on when you have "Thees" and "Thys" and "Thous" written all over the book. And the people in those books always speak in riddles and poems. So it would always sound something like this:
"Thou art the honest Shan Yu! Who shalt come forth in times of peril so that Thy hopes wilt never cease into the absence of time!"
Lol.
I sound like an aristocrat. A really desperate one. Haha.
Enduring Love is cool because it's about the life of a sociologist. It is a study of human social behavior, especially the study of the origins, organization, institutions, and development of human society. I ripped that off the dictionary.
Well yeah, so this male sociologist gets stalked by this homosexual... whose also a devout christian. (Such irony..) And the homosexual is trying to make Mr. Sociopath... erm, I mean Mr. Sociologist LOVE him and also LOVE God. And the poor sociologist gets so crazy he almost attempts murder. Murder of whom? Well, I'm guessing of the homosexual... duh. I've not read that part yet.. but it might be his wife - for all I know.
The storyline is so.......... warped.
Anyway the author is way good at coming up with sociological theories, and he's VERY descriptive about emotions, and about the relativity of the characters. It's so detailed it keeps you on the edge, immersed in the plot... just have to continue reading and reading and reading. They actually made a movie out of it too. Lol...
But the storyline is abit disturbing. Other than the storyline, the text is awesome.
Okay. Off to bed now. I'm typing this while my eyes are sound asleep.
-_-: "Goodnight folks!"
Tonight On News 5 Tonight.
Man... So disappointed I couldn't attend Saturday's cell. Sorry about that, I must be THE pangseh kia in cell. Lol...Well Y.E.S seemed to go on pretty fine... glad that so many peeps went up and confessed themselves and accepted Christ! Wooohoo! It's an amazing thing, the power of the spirit! I thought pastor David's story about his intimacy with God was awesome... it's something everyone would work towards to.
Do you ever feel sometimes God is far away? Like as if however you try to pray or try to communicate with Him, you can never reach that state of mind where you feel Him just there when you want to. Like there's no vibe when you pray, no lingering presence, not even a touch of fufillment. I guess some people say it's because we aren't close enough with God, that's why we can cannot share amazing, specatacular, as-if-God-was-there prayer time. Eh, I beg to differ.
Maybe it's cause we've not come to the stage of full understanding? Of loving every part of the Bible. There are gotta be parts of us that will contradict with the teachings of His Word. You could say, flaws. Permanent ones, that are gonna take eons to alter and change for the better.
I guess pastor David had attain a level of full obedience to His Word - to every single law He has. And God has blessed him with a great life, and an ultimately close relationship with Himself. For reward to His obedience. It's not easy to say to yourself, "Ok! I am going to follow every commandment in the Book, I will not judge anyone, I will not vent my anger, I will not etc. etc." It takes time (and pretty much tonnes of persistence), to attain that kind of level.
Awww man! If only I was fully obedient to the bible! But most teenagers aren't. Because we're used to compromising. Lol...
After service, Wei Min and I went to Suntec City. I wonder how we landed there, we were just talking about miracles and signs God gave us in life, so we took MRT to City Hall and just walked and talked and walked and talked, until we realised we were inside suntec. Hilarious right? Lol..Then we went to Carrefour (carrefour? carefourre? car no. 4?) to buy corned beef, and we walked about abit... we came upon a booth where they were selling off novels for $5!! I found the novel "Enduring Love" just lying on top of a pile. It had a cool, stunning cover. So I took it.
Wei Min is thinking about coming to service again next week! Wahaha...Okay, he told me he's just coming to see the environment of church and all... but it's at least a step! I'm glad that my prayers for him were answered. :]
I bought corned beef cause Hanif says it's quite a snack. So I went to try it, and I realised I don't like it at all! It was over-salted man... It tasted like ham soaked in salt water for centuries. Lol. Dead-sea style.
Okay, time to detach this parasite from the computer. Bye!
10 Random Facts - No. 1
This has to be the third attempt I'm trying to write something down.
Lol.
Wilson convinced me to join dragon-boating in poly, rather than swimming.
Haiz sia, if only I was better at swimming. Then maybe it'd jerked some confidence to choose that as a CCA. But no, I'm not good at it at all, and I'd probably be the slowest if I did join. And everybody would be widening their eyes at my lack of speed. Yeap... that's way uncool.
As much as I don't like to admit it, I've never been an athletic dude. I've never joined in for soccer, never really tried playing basketball, never ever participated in annual Sports Days. This all recounted way back in primary 2, when I was still a soccer fanatic. I fell once when I was playing soccer with some friends. I tripped, and the next thing I know, a whole patch of skin from the kneecap tore off. It became so bad it got infected and it gnawed my nerves for weeks. Arrrghhh! The pain was excruciating man! But yeap, it did got over, heh. After that, I've never dared to go near the soccer field.
You could say it's a transitory state. From one to another. From something a boy would normally do, to something he began to fear doing. I don't blame fate or anything. It meerly shifted my priorities from soccer, to something else - reading. I read alot after the accident. I think I poured out all of the books in the fiction section of my primary school library. If it wasn't for me falling, I'd probably won't be knowing half of English I'm typing now.
"Bookworm!" They used to call it. It's now a stereotype that if you're a guy, you MUST know how to play soccer and basketball, to be associated with being normal. It's true, it's evident in my old secondary school. Whereby everyone seemed to know a thing or two about soccer/basketball. Those are universal interests conformity moulded. Dudes have weird priorities now....
Well, anyway, I'm not good at both. Yeap.
I'm still considering which to join. Hopefully, this turns out to be another transitory state...lol.
$$$
I can never save money.
I have possibly flushed out all the salary I earned a few months back. And that amount wasn't little, it was $1000 plus.
You must be telling yourself, "A thousand plus spent! What could this crazy kleptomaniac sy spend his money on!?"
It's not that I spend huge amounts of money at a time, or that I go wild at the sight of cash and go around buying everything I see... like a spoilt teenage girl (I'm not referring to anyone! Really! lol). Just that these past few months I sorta went out alot, and paid for my own food, drinks, transport fares alot, and bought alot more stuff than usual. Actually, bought alot more things to wear. Blame polytechnics for not having school uniforms! Then at least peeps don't have to worry about having enough clothes. You can imagine a bunch of dudes conversing:
Guy A: "Eh, I saw you wore this shirt last thursday,"
Guy B: "What!? You actually remember what I wear? Sick ar you."
Guy A (brandishes a new nike sweater): "Of course la, this world is as materialistic as it gets,"
Guy B: "Sia la! Means I have to buy more clothes....buey tahan, if only can wear uniforms."
But clothes can't possibly amount to a 1000 bucks right?
I had to pay $330 for a secondhand mp3 player I regretted buying. And then the 200 bucks for parental tribute, and another 100 for church. Money money money! That's why it's great that people teach kids that money isn't that important in life. Because you could really get crazily engrossed in just trying to calculate profits and expenditure when you grow up. Hanif told me I should've gotten a list of what I spent on, then it'd be less shocking when I find myself penny-less.
Bah, that's adulthood. Haha..
I saw Gospel of John, the movie on DVD today. It's awesome. It's quite a thorough rendition of the blibical text. It's all about Jesus' journey on earth as the Messiah and stuff. You should watch ti if you haven't! Somehow, it solidified the christian background for me.
Randomness: People usually say Ikea as "yeekeah" right? Ok, maybe you don't pronounce it that way...but everyone I know do. Well my friend says it supposed to be "AI-key-yah". So it sounds very Englishy-Americany to me. He says that's how they pronounce it in Finland. So I can't possibly argue with the mother-country of Ikea.
I shall start calling it, "Ai-key-yah" then!
Wow, I was being random. Must be certain people influencing me.
Hmm.. wonder who... lol
The Never-Weardowns
Oh well... I lost my trunks during swimming last week. Left it in the changing room I guess. I even called back the pool so that they could find it for me. It was no where in sight.
Can you imagine!? That's 30 bucks down the drain man.. If only things never got lost and never wore down. Then we can really get our money's worth on the stuff we buy.
Annnnyway, school's about to start! And we have to do this huge pile of pre-enrollment forms. There's probably about 10 of them. And they require a medical checkup, an x-ray scan, giro banking scheme, and much much more gibberish that I'm not quite sure of myself. And they actually do have a transport concession card for all poly students! Constantly paying adult fare is beginning to burn a huge pocket.
And to end off, YOUTH EVANGELISTIC SERVICE! This saturday!
Gotta prrrayyyy really hard that loads of people will benefit and accept Christ and stuff! It's gonna be a big event for this week. Hope all the churchies bring their friends along, the more the merrier! Come until the place overflows! Bubbles over! The Holy Spirit gush across the people like a hurricane breaching through buildings!
Obviously I need some sleep. Lol...
Goodnight!
The Value Of An Instant.
"If you want to know what a year of life means, ask a student who just flunked his year-end exams.
Or a month of life: talk to a mother who has given birth to a premature baby and is waiting for him to be taken out of the incubator before she can hold him safe and sound in her arms.
Or a week: interview a man who works in a factory or a mine to feed his family.
Or a day: ask two people madly in love, who are waiting to see each other again.
Or an hour: talk to someone with claustrophobia who's stuck in a broken-down elevator.
Or a second: look at the expression on the face of a man who has just escaped from a car wreck.
Or a thousandth of a second: ask the athlete who just won the silver medal at the Olympic Games, and not the gold he trained for all his life.
Life is magic, appreciate the value of every instant."
Quoted from Just Like Heaven - the novel. (Yes.. I know...I don't know why I read such a book too)
Random Post
Where on earth are you heading to?
Recently, loads of people around are falling into a state of semi-depression. It's probably the long holiday, and for those schooling - I dunno... maybe it's the monotonous routine of life that's nudging them to stay on track.
I'm here to say. DON'T WORRY ABOUT LIFE!
We're all a moody bunch. Sometimes, out of nowhere, the sudden surge of anger, sadness, and frustration would overcome ourselves. It's inevitable. We all fall sometimes, it doesn't mean that you're more emotional than most to get moody - just that some other people prefer to hide it.. and damage themselves from the inside in the process. Better to let it all out.
I once saw a Lene Marlin music video, she was walking about in this abandoned airport.. and then suddenly these words flashed across a signboard:
"Take Hold Now. The future does not remember. The past does not forget."
And I told myself; Wow! Lene Marlin is such a genius! She made such a clear statement without use of any profound words. Excellent, excellent.
Then I realise I was just dumb. Lol
So I guess I'm offering that phrase up as a morale booster, for all those feeling down at the moment. I know it's hard to get out of the rut when it seems like no one's there to understand how you feel, heck, you might not even know why you feel like this. But hey, you yourself is the key to opening your own heart. And God is the one who understands you more than yourself. Together, the two of you would make an invincible team!
The future doesn't remember your mistakes, your flaws, your regrets. Everyday could be a new start to a new side of you. That's if you allow yourself to see that. You have loooooaaaaddddsss of people who love and adore you, just that they don't express it. I'm serious! I bet you love and adore me too, just that you don't know.. bwaha... jk jk
Your past is a part of you that signifies your wisdom. It shows how you grew from your mistakes. Of course there are times we all shatter into pieces, but we all found ways to glue ourselves back in the end. That's how life is. By the time we go meet our Maker, we would have so many cracks it'll look like we were grinded into pieces. Crack after crack, split after split, all comes together to form our experience, all comes together to expose something magnificent - the human strength to get up after falling down. Again, and again, and again.
Okay, the only reason why I sound so Oprah is because I'm listening to Josh Groban's music now. Lol...
Take, Hold, Now! What matters is now, the present.
A coin always have two sides. So try flipping it again.
:]
Exit To Entrance
Whew! What a week it has been!
I have been dabbling in photography again. I've stopped taking photos ever since the family's digital camera died (again) half a year back, so yeah, it feels pretty good to be treading on familiar ground. Ms Chua has so kindly lent me the school cameras for my own art projects. She's such a source of motivation! She rocks.
I went to worship ministry jamming for the first time today.
Actually worship ministry wasn't as nasty as I expected. It was funky cause everyone was friendly... haha. And I'm glad I got to do harmonizing and singing, after having a long absence from choral music. This is great! Back to doing what I dig doing - harmonizing. Chris was s'posed to be my leader, and he's hilarious. I see him up on stage performing all the time and I thought he's gotta be some stern, solemn fella, considering the fact he always seemed to wear formal attire. But hey! He wasn't! So that relaxed the mood.
And all the singers were pretty friendly! When I walked in the studio and said I was an understudy for vocals, they went "Yay!". I guess they must really need male singers desperately. Haha... But of course I was super duper quiet the whole night, cause that's what I always do when I'm a newbie. Partially because I feel like I need to impress the crowd, so I try not to reveal too much of myself in case they hate who I am. And partially cause I get to stand back and listen, and observe how the community works and bonds, and how each individual's character like.
I always do that. In fact, I'm still doing it in cell. Just to play safe, cause we aren't the best of friends yet, and it'll take a very long time to try break barriers of individual groups that are already within the cell. So you can imagine the distraught it brings to everyone, especially the heads like Ho Wai. How can we make everyone bond? Ho wai's flooded with that question.. he told me some of us really seemed have nothing in common. Basically because different people in cell lead totally different lifestyles, so there's no common interest, no common school work, no common backgrounds, no common everything. How? Is being in the same cell the only thing that relates us all together? If so, we had to start from the very basics. Break down already built up barriers, break down the gender walls, start friendships, sit together in church, become friends, have outings, bond and socialise, turn into good friends, share troubles with each other, turn into best friends, hang out even when there's no cell, turn into true brothers and sisters of Christ.
That will definitely take years.
Well I'm up for it. We must have faith all us peeps in cell! So that one day, all these superficial roadblocks would diminish by God, and we can stand as one. *sings out of pitch* One People, One Nation, One Singapore!
Ok, back to about jamming practice today.
This group of people from the worship ministry were more open about new people joining in, so I felt quite home. Awesome! That would make me more of myself the next time round.. haha. Being there made me feel like picking up the guitar again. Cause I saw string instruments everywhere, it starts to influence you abit. After all the traumatic experiences with learning guitar the other time... I'm surprised I'm willing to get myself traumatised once more. Haha....
Hmm...Let's see how many names I remember.... (don't mind me if I spell them all wrongly) Chris, Tabitha, Jacelyn, Lisa, Jolin/Jolene/however you spell it, Pastor Jen, Guan Wen, Jerrold/Gerald/however you spell it, Oliver, Justin, Cheryl (of course la lol), and plus plus plus those other names I forgot. Lol...
And there were so many instruments in the jam studio. They all looked way cool, like here was this guy who had a sleek, all-brown, six-stringed bass. It looked like it was layered with suede from afar. WOW. Ben Ngeow would go esctatic if he saw what I saw.. haha.
SO MANY COOL INSTRUMENTS.
And I can't play a single one. Haiz. lol
Hopefully this is what God wants me to serve in....all this is for Him. Right? My parents would understand what I'm doing. Someday. And worship for Christ! It's a feeling bigger than words to describe.
I'm glad I got myself into this. Haha.
ps: Tabitha is a waayyyy exotic name! haha....
Cousins and Rum
Josephine and I were laughing about typical chinese ghost movies today. Just a few to label. Haha... Today the aunties were asking my great grandma if they recongnize us; her great grandchildren. She didn't recongnize bro and I, and instead, labelled us with some other relatives. But she remembered Josephine clearly. And Josie was so proud of it.. Josie's so meeaan man...she had to remind us that we were forgotten. She was teasing us and poking fun. "Hahaha, you guys are called Dua Gong!" and so on. Ahahaha, at least now I know my sarcasm was obviously passed down from my Mum's side. But I have a hunch that great granny remembers her only because of her "special" appearances. Don't get me wrong, I don't mean she's ugly. You see, Josephine has that face that you would never forget. Good or bad? I don't really know. LOL... she looks pretty normal and cheerful. But I have always wondered what makes her face stands out. All the relatives recongnize her at an instance. Must be superior genes or something. *yeap, that's us 3 years ago*
We were at Granny's place, and then a channel on SCV replayed this vintage chinese horror flick that most of the aunties, including my bro, had already faithfully watched. It must have aired some time back, but somehow Jospehine and I missed it. I guess we teenagers must've seeked excitement somewhere else during the time the younger and older generations glue themselves on screen. Haha.
Anyway, since my bro watched something I didn't, he took his definite role as the spoiler.
He was telling us how this guy dies, then how the ghost haunts the pregnant lady's foetus, then how they all turn into zombies and come to kill the guy in the end. It was a predictable storyline, Josephine and I rolled our eyes pretty much as my bro continued blabbering on.
How Old Chinese Horror Movies Are All The Same:
Hmmm...
Anyway we all adore our great granny. With or without her remembering our names. :]
The Three Cousins :]
Sanctus de Croix
Hmmm, I should carry on to lighter things :D.
SANCTUS REAL is slated to release a new album, "The Face Of Love" this coming summer! Sanctus Real is a christian rock band, whose gained quite a reputable name for itself these past few years worldwide.
"The resulting album contains hard-hitting songs portraying universal themes of love, brokenness and the sometime elusive sense of God’s presence. Inspired by real-life heartache and rediscovered joy, the emotions behind each track are vulnerable and undisguised, making this album the band’s most accessible project of their career and exhibiting the band’s progression both musically and lyrically. "
According to Teddy, Matt Hammit (the guy in the black tee), the lead singer of Sanctus Real, is requesting that everyone buys the album instead of illegally downloading it. He just became a father to a beautiful baby! Boy or girl? I'm not quite sure myself ...lol. But rock band lead singers turned fathers are way awesome. Can you imagine being cool and being a dad? Some people can never seem to see those words together. Lol. I'd wanna be just like him man.. Well, of course I'm dreaming... aha..
WHOA. Nothing better than a daily dosage of self-inspiring songs! Can't wait for the album release in Singapore. More about the album when I get my hands on it. haha
Hover
New blogskin!
Gee, it surprises me. It took ages for me to design the whole thing, the HTML especially. And yeah, it was actually a skin from blogskins.com. But I changed everything, even the picture, layout, and colours (haha.. obstinate me). Really dig the Cross at the top. Took me an hour just to make it in photoshop. Pheww.
So I'm just trying this out for now, somehow I don't quite prefer it. Would love to hear what you all gotta say.. the blogskin before or this new one?
This is how the original skin looks like.
It's temporary! For some reason I have a feeling of changing it back.
Haha, indecisive me
Frenzy Facade
VISUAL COMMUNICATION
TEMASEK POLYTECHNIC
I CANNOT BELIEVE IT! PRAISE GOD!
Last Leg? Last Lap? Last Thigh?
I've been up a few late nights. Such as now.
This is the day the results of our JAE get published on the net. Nervous? Well of course I am. At 8 AM on this very day, the fate of how I'm going to be spending the next 3 years, is sealed.
And I'm hoping to get into TP, to do visual communications. Like what I've planned for a long time back. But the downside is - last year's intake score for visual com at TP, was 13 for L1R4. And I had 13 for my L1R4 this year.
Hanging on the line there eh?
So if a whole bunch of smarties decides to drop the smart-people-go-to-JC idea and head for the course I want, then I wouldn't be able to make it in. Not that I can blame them or anything, our society revolves around intelligence. And if they had really chosen what they want - which in this case, is visual com), and got in successfully, and because of them.... I got dejected out, I'd still be more than happy for them. Because they made a wise decision.
Okay, if you don't already know what I'm saying about points, every poly course's point criteria fluctuates by it's popularity. So if nursing suddenly became a hot course to pick for 2005, it's point criteria would probably shoot from 23 to a 10. Anyway that's just an example. We all know nursing would never get to that point. Then those people who got 23 points would never be able to make it into nursing.
So, where my own bleak prospects are concerned, I'm not exactly very confident.
Only time will tell. God would find a way for me. He always has. At this point, seeing myself stand infront of two forks on the road (and very soon, having to choose one), it's mind boggling. What if I don't make it? Then I would have to try to appeal into it. And what if that fails? Worse still, settle for second place, at republic poly. What if I cannot cope there?
These strings of worse-case-scenarios string and chain together in my mind. Effortlessly finding it's way into the vault of my insecurities.
Trust and rely Him! I'm leaving all these ambiguity into His hands. And depend on Him. Even if it doesn't turn out well, I'd still know He tried to help me. :]
Later peeps.
Sunday Of The Week
Now, after a very eventful Saturday, it was Sunday! Wooohoo! The day where Ex 2B had another outing. Well, actually Hooper came up with the idea of the outing, cause he thought we were too slack and we've not been mingling together too much (how thoughtful! lol), so I planned and we decided to go Sentosa.
It was supposed to be this graaaaand outing, whereby we call as many dudes from the old 2B to come as possible. You know, like a get-together? But of course when I sent out the sms, I forgot to contact some, some didn't reply, some couldn't make it yada yada yada and so on.... eventually only 7 of us turned up. Hanif, Jeremy, Daniel, Yong Hui, Yi Qiang, Ben and myself. Even Hooper couldn't make it, cause he had his priorities.
We took a the blue bus down to siloso beach. Funny how the driver would have to inform the bus everytime we come to a bus stop. He announces over the bus in a very monotonous tone, "The Merlion" or "Underwater World" whenever we reach a stop. Haha, he must be so irritated by his jobscope.
We got there, and then found a nice place to camp, since our "private island" (the one we had the other time we came), was densely populated. It was nothing near a private island. We started to play some soccer, then it became too boring and we stopped.
During the time of boredom, Jeremy asked Yong Hui to kick the ball towards him. And Yong Hui - being VERY inaccurate - kicked it exactly towards my stomach. Yeowch! I was chasing him around and around (you know, for revenge), and when I grabbed hold of some of his shirt, he ran so hard one of my fingers got dislocated. The top part of the finger bent 45 degrees and I had to snap it back. So SNAP! It went back to the correct position, but it was very very painful, and eventually it started to bleed from below the skin. So it turned quite purple and swollen. A lesson properly learnt - never take revenge, even if it's just for fun.
Haha.
So we slacked alot on the beach. It was a lazy day and all. Some just sat down and enjoyed the weather. That's Jeremy and Hanif standing, deciding whether they should go change into their boardshorts.
Jeremy started to put on this tanning oil that wasn't exactly oil, but was cream. Usually people bought either tanning oil or sunblock cream. So interesting fact of the day - tanning creams exist! Then before I took a picture of Daniel, he grabbed for something near him to model with, and the closest were his sandals, so he used one of them to strike a pose. Lol.
Seriously, I don't know what Yong Hui is doing. But he seemed engrossed. Haha...
What's up with everyone and modelling with an object? Lol.... Hanif used his evian water... (wahhh high class mineral water sia). And Jeremy, was just being a poser. He must be watching alot of muscle building programmes. Well, since he lost alot of weight and got a 6-pack, rumours of Jeremy trying to break away from his past self and becoming an Alpha-male has been flying about. Haha... we constantly joke about it to him.
The boredom sets in. Some of us were hoping there was strong sunlight so at least we could tan. But there was no sun, and no volleyball, and no activities. Amounting to which a very very bored bunch of us. Yong Hui is still engrossed. So finally Daniel, Hanif, Jeremy and I couldn't stand it any longer and we went to explore, leaving a very bored Ben, and a very engrossed Yong Hui, to tend our bags.
We examined the beach, and try to distinguish corals, crab shells and so on. And we were talking alot, and then Jeremy suggested we go rent a canoe and do some canoeing, just to kill some time. So he got a 2 seater canoe, and we decided Daniel and Jeremy to go canoe first, then Hanif and I.
Yong Hui, who snapped out of his engrossing slippers, said we should go capsize their boat. So we swam there, and I was swimming suuuper slow cause I had my contacts on, and the sea water might contain those eye fungal fungus or whatever you call it. And I was freaked by the news on escalating numbers of people getting fungal infections from contacts. So in the end we couldn't catch up, the canoe exceeds the man. And we stumbled back on shore.
You know if you step in the waters of siloso beach, some parts of it have very squishy grounds? Like as if you're stepping on thousands of dead jellyfishes. And whenever we step on the seafloor and touch something like that, we would yell and jump and swim away. It's pretty disgusting.
Daniel and Jeremy finally came back up, and I hopped on. But Hanif didn't want to go on. He didn't see anything fun and cool about it anymore, so Yong Hui took his place. And Yong Hui and I rowed and rowed. Man, I've never canoed for nuts, and canoeing for the first time is waaaayyyyy tiring. Whenever you try to go faster, your arms ache. So after a few rounds, we came back and asked if Hanif wanted to try it out. Cause we had to return it soon. So Hanif went on, and he was so unimpressed by it... haha. I told him to paddle faster but he couldn't go any faster... so in the end we rowed back to shore. Canoeing's fun!
Jeremy also came across a rusty nail near the seashore. Haiz. You see how dangerous Siloso Beach can be? They have rusty nails lying on the beach. You could just die of tetanus if you're not careful. Anyway we threw the nail away. Not in the sea of course, cause it will always drift back to shore, but in a dustbin somewhere.
We all decided to go change and then meet back up to leave. Some of them just changed there, others at the toilet and Yong Hui and I at the bathing house. And apparently the two of us made them wait very long, and they irritatably asked us did we change clothes or make them. Hahaha...
We took the charlift to go back up the island. It was Ben's first time on the chairlift, and he was so terrified of the height of it, everytime we shook or jerked a little he'll yell for us to stop. Lol. And it just went higher....
and higher....
and higher....
And we started to sing our school song in midair. The other people must be thinking how mad we were. And we yelled and sang "You Raise Me Up"!! Cause it suited the mood. Well, of course not Ben's mood. And Jeremy and I tried spitting to the ground below. Just some guy fun. My spit almost landed on a car driving past below! Then Jeremy said if it has landed on the windscreen, the driver would probably think it's birdshit. LOL. Hey, my saliva doesn't look the least bit like birdshit.
Hanif, Dan and Yong Hui took the chairlift behind us, So I took a photo. Haha... it's pretty scary you know, cause my phone might just fall down onto the ground. Hanif wanted to take a picture of us, so he asked us all to turn. Only Ben didn't turn cause the height would just freak him more.. haha.
When we got off we went through the Dragon Trail. It's some jungle trail that cuts through the top of the island back to the beach. So we were actually walking back to the beach. But I guess we couldn't care less. The jungle was creepy, cause we took alternating routes that were less treaded, but would lead back to the main road. On the way Daniel claimed he saw a white figure fly past him somewhere, seriously.
Hanif, being the Insect-Know-It-All, led us on a guided insect learning trail. He would tell us about Cicadas, the cricket-like creatures that would make the cricket-like sounds in the forest. And the sound would deafen you. They would be everywhere, and they make so much sounds it was ear-piercing. Well, that's Hanif in the picture, he got hold of this HUGE Nephila spider (or however you spell it), and he destroyed it's web just to make it come down.
It's huge, it's span (legs and body) is bigger than the size of your palm. And he grabbed for it so he could take a picture of it on his hand. Daniel and I tried ot persuade him to stop. Cause well... it was mildy poisonous, so it's still a classified risk to hold around and take pictures with.
But does an insect-know-it-all listen? No. It's not his style to miss such an opportunity. He eventually did take a whole lot of pictures of it on his palm and when it was running up his arm. Everytime he turned to our direction, all of us would back off. Cause the spider was so intimidating.
The place was extremely humid, and we were lucky we were not in buckets of sweat when we came out. Daniel suggested we go to Fort Siloso. But Yong Hui couldn't follow us any longer, cause he needed to rush back home to do JC Homework. What a snoozer... lol.
"Bye Yong Hui!"
So after he left we went to the Underwater World to look at the huge sea turtles. I tripped on this rope and my sandals tore. Talk about misfortunes.. lol. Daniel then suggested going to Fort Siloso cause he said it was free the other time he came. It was to our shock we had to pay. Pay pay pay. Sentosa's all about paying for everything. Haha. Then we walked inside anyway, cause we didn't know better, and this guide stopped us and said we needed tickets.
And so happened a tourist came up to us and offered us 5 tickets (we had exactly 5 people), cause they were returning back to the hotel. Haha! Amazing! So we handed the tickets to the guide who stopped us. Haha, he must've been so irritated by our luck.. God was watching over us :]. We went in, took the coach. And were looking at our new found tickets. And to our surprise, there was also a free cable car ride for each tic! SO we decided later to use the ticket for a cable car ride.
That's Ben examining the tickets while we were on the FREE coach ride into Fort Siloso!
See how everyone is becoming overdramatic at holding it! Haha.. We all decided to hold on to it and then take pictures with the tickets as proof of our luck. So we reached there, and started to explore the dirty, dark and scary tunnels. Some rooms were completely vacant, and yet they were lighted. I wonder for what. It's worst because there isn't a single soul in sight other than ourselves. And the background sounds were screamings and bombings and stuff you hear on a WWII documentary.
It was way creepy. So we came out, and went to this playground to try some army-based equipment. Some guides asked us to leave cause they were closing, so we walked back down. Daniel reminded us that we needed ot take pictures of the tickets. So he fished out 2, which he had. The other 3 were in Hanif's bag. But when he searched for it, it mysteriously disappeared! All 3. Leaving us with 2. All of us checked our bags and pockets but with no avail.
So that was good luck turned bad. Haha. And we just posed with the two tickets instead. Scrapping the idea of taking cable car back.
Whew! I finally finished describing the whole day! Man, I wanted to try going into details, then it just seemed to go on and on and on. And I'm glad to finally leave with an ending paragraph. This is probably the longest post I've ever made. Waha...Ok, off to school.... need to return some camera. Later!
Saturday Of The Week
Finally! I have some time to write about the FUNTASTIC weekend!
Wait.
What I meant to type was fantastic. Shucks I'm too caught up with the McDonald's commercial where the models persistently use the word - 'funtastic', to advertise some rice burgers or something. You know the interesting thing about the word FUN? It - besides being the english word for enjoyable - is the warped translation of the mandarin 'rice'?
*distant silence*
Hey I didn't just type a whole paragraph of nonsense, it's actually partially related to my weekend. Which I would further elaborate sooooon. (Haha, Esther you must be laughing now)
Awesome service during saturday. It was about respecting and forgiving your parents, so that you could live long and prosper.
You know, sometimes without realising it, your parents change you? As in they transform your personality. I'm serious. You might not know it, but if you think about it really closely... all the times you quarrell, interact, laugh, bicker, and argue with them, you're just doing it on another ordinary human being. And we all change and shape our character through interaction with ordinary human beings.
Not to mention, you probably communicate with your parents more times in your youth than anyone else. We mature our character and personalities from young, through interaction. So add the two up, and you'll get where I'm heading.
Soooo... let's put what I've just said into an example. Everytime you get angry at your Mom or Dad, you're probably changing yourself to become hot-tempered whenever you get nagged at - by anyone else.
Everytime you try to be patient when your Mom tells you to go downstairs to get char kuey tiao for her, you're probably changing yourself to become more obedient to any superiors you meet later on in life.
You get what I'm trying to say?
Well, that church service made me realise that. And it made me realise how extremely escalated they must've felt when they first saw me. And how I've let them down time and time again by being mean towards them.
It's amazing how when you put yourselves in the shoes of someone else - especially your parents, you can imagine how much they LOVE you. How much they adored you when you were young and came to them crying, or how much they wanted to make you feel safe when you were 5 and you got frightened by something. All these emotions they felt, are so real, yet we never understood them and their ways, and we always whine about how they don't give us enough.
So after church, the cellies went to go eat. As usual it was Yong Jin, Ray, Liane, Esther, Cheryl and myself. And we talked alot about primary school life, that intensified into secondary school life. Funny things that happened during our times in school and such.. lol. And we went so Hiiiigghhh! It was hilarious.
So there was this specific stall that sold Mui FUN and Hor FUN. And it was written in English translation on their signboard. I've never came across a stall that labels their mui fun and hor fun in English. When you see a stall that sells fried rice, seafood etc etc. they would definitely sell mui fun and hor fun too, it's a chinese stereotypical way of hawkering. So what's the point of putting it up? Well anyway it was kinda weird, so I made fun of the FUNs in the menu. And say they are FUN food to eat! Literally!
I know how sometimes I can become excessively lame.
:P