first time seeing snow and experiencing subzero temperatures (in deg celsius)...it's thanksgiving weekend and i went to lake tahoe for a retreat with the smsa ppl!
i went on an early car with the pro snowboarders bcos grace wanted someone to go along with her on the early car so we can take advantage of fresh snow and snowboard an extra day. it was pretty miserable my first day of snowboarding, as i kept falling down and hurting myself all over, and bcos my muscles were aching so much i just couldn't get up anymore after falling down. it got harder and harder each time you fell.
it's awful, not mentioning scary when i kept sliding off the the edge and sides of the trail! i couldn't control where i was going at all, i couldn't brake or slow down or stop. and we were on the intermediate slopes (which was really scary and steep!), but it was easier to move than on the beginner slopes, which were way too flat for snowboards to even slide.
furthermore, all the other snowboarders are pro/have much more experience, so they zoomed off really quickly, leaving me behind to struggle my way down the slope all cold, hungry and tired :/ even grace has a knack for snowboarding and disappeared in a jiffy! T.T
my second day was much better though, bcos i discovered how to heel and brake and stop, and slowly leaf my way down the slope. i also learnt that if i'm too far to the side, either i leaf back to the middle, or if i fall, i just take off my board and walk to the middle. no use trying to start from the side bcos u'll only slide off the edge.
it wasn't as cold as i expected, mainly bcos the sun was out all the time on the slopes, so it's really quite warm. and as long as the wind isn't too strong, it's not really cold. anw on the first day, after a tiring day of snowboarding, we were greated with a scrumptuous feast for thanksgiving dinner! we had a caterer who cooked all the food, and we had turkey, pumpkin pie, apple pie, brownies, bread and cheese, mashed potatoes, leeks, and lots other foods. i've never had a thanksgiving dinner before, nor such a wondrous home-cooked western meal, so it was really wonderful to experience it. it made me miss home and think of mummy's cooking :/ anyhow we couldn't finish all the food (being asians haha), so we ate them over the next few days for lunch/breakfast etc.
amanda cooked soup using the turkey bones (which was pretty good and delicious!), while we cooked pasta and chinese noodles over the next few meals. we also made s'mores (yummy yum yum!!) with graham crackers, snowman-shaped marshmallows and hershey's chocolate hee. they also baked cookies which tasted great haha. i think i was really well-fed over the retreat xD luckily i did quite a bit of exercise in snowboarding, if not i'll feel so guilty about eating so much and not exercising!
on the 3rd day, we spent the whole day studying (i was reading the whole of my japanese textbook in preparation for oral interview). it was snowing heavily outside, like snowstorm but we wanted to play in the snow, so after a while we just went outside and had a snowfight! it's really fun throwing snow around and playing in it and rolling around!
it's like you don't care about getting wet or cold or anything anymore, bcos your gear is mostly waterproof and protects u from the wind and stuff. plus when it's snowing, the wind isn't as strong for some reason, so it wasn't really cold. after that we built a snow-woman! i made the head yay, even though the snow wasn't really wet enough to stick together properly, i squished and packed the snow until it formed some semblance of a ball, then rolled it around so it gets bigger and bigger and bigger! it's super hard to make a proper snowball though, definitely not as easy as it seems, and you must have a lot of time and patience.
in the end we succeeded, and we had an extra ball so we made a snow-baby that was so deformed we made it into a snow-chicken haha. we stuck a branch that looked like tail feathers on its "butt" xD
on the 4th day, we packed up and headed home. the snow chicken unfortunately didn't survive the snow-plough, and collapsed (or perhaps was eaten by the snow-woman hahaha). the snow-woman was perfectly fine, except that it was buried more deeply in the snow so it "grew" shorter haha. huan chin, who was originally shorter than our snow-woman, was then taller than the snow-woman by a lot! she was happy. xD
we didn't go to vacaville outlets to shop bcos we decided to go straight back to berkeley and study more, but in the end there was a heavy traffic jam so we were pretty delayed anyway. we stopped at in and out for lunch, which was really good. this time i ordered from the secret menu, ordering neapolitan milkshake (combi of vanilla, chocolate and strawberry) and animal fries (fries topped with thousand island dressing, onions and other stuff). they're really good!
ok that's pretty much all for lake tahoe trip. having fallen all over the ski slopes at heavenly resort, i experienced "near death" scares so many times that now, i truly appreciate my life. i could have been seriously injured or even killed tumbling down the slopes, or if someone had crashed into my head or my spine, or if i slipped off the edge of a cliff. life is really fragile, and we should appreciate what we have now.
snowboarding is seriously the most strenuous activity i've ever experienced, as it involves every single set of muscles imaginable, including your shoulders and back and butt muscles!! hence the other takeaway is a huge gain in strength of muscles, and the exercise i managed to do haha.
snowboarding's really scary, but i'd like to learn it the proper way and find out how to become better at it (eg. how to toe, how to curve, how to do garland and navigate harder slopes).
Sunday, December 05, 2010
Monday, November 29, 2010
singlish and chinglish
i am missing singlish so much, i don't even remember how to speak it anymore...it's so hard to let yourself go and really speak singlish unless you have someone else to speak singlish to. i'm so used to speaking proper/american english!
anw i found the singlish wiki page and it's really hilarious how it's treated as a creole with proper terms and explanations for every single lahs and lors we make, even down to the pronunciation and tones! (eg. three = tree and then = den)
anw here are some funny chinglish signs that have obviously wrong translations in english.
This misspells "Lightning" and mistranslates "climb" with "climbing".
"the slippery are very crafty"!!!! xD
this is my favourite, i wonder who they are executing...
yes, we'll all slip but very carefully...
anw i found the singlish wiki page and it's really hilarious how it's treated as a creole with proper terms and explanations for every single lahs and lors we make, even down to the pronunciation and tones! (eg. three = tree and then = den)
anw here are some funny chinglish signs that have obviously wrong translations in english.
This misspells "Lightning" and mistranslates "climb" with "climbing".
"the slippery are very crafty"!!!! xD
this is my favourite, i wonder who they are executing...
yes, we'll all slip but very carefully...
Saturday, November 13, 2010
nostalgic memories...dedication and pass it on
haha for the lateral thinking puzzle in my previous post, the answer's already in the comments: the surgeon is the boy's mother! it plays on ppl's stereotypes in a way, bcos you tend to assume that grey-haired, bespectacled surgeons are male. if you're interested in more lateral thinking puzzles, check them out here
To blossom, qw & bhu: you'll find the lateral thinking puzzles we did at bhu's sleepover in there! and a whole lot of other ones too (that aren't all that nice) Enjoy! ^^
anyway, i was just telling wenyu the other day that i can rmb how to sing pass it on but i don't rmb the lyrics except the chorus. that's bcos they didn't really teach it, we only sang it like once in sec 1 at the batch initiation ceremony or something? but we sang dedication lots of times, so i rmbed it. however, for some reason, we both had mind-block just then and couldn't rmb how it starts!
after a search on google, i found the lyrics to these two songs! and now i know how to sing both of them, bcos i rmb the tunes alrd (: my favourite is still dedication haha. and i didn't realise how evangelistic pass it on really was o.O
here's to all my ex-rgs classmates, and hope it'll bring back fond memories...
Dedication
We have shared our morning days
And gone through all rainy nights
Even in the darkest of nights
Stars still light up our way
Tomorrow is a beautiful dream
A dream that will be fulfilled
Cross the bridge of rainbow
In search of the gold
For here we stand
Our dearest friend
Sincerely from our hearts we wish
May streams of sunlight
Shine like rays of hope
Hand in hand, we'll work and strive
For the best things in life
Pass it on
It only takes a spark
To get a fire going
And soon all those around
Can warm up in it's glowing
That's How it is with God's love
Once you experience it
You'll want(Yes you'll want)
To pass(to pass)
It on
(pass it on, pass it on, pass it pass it pass it on)
What a wonderous time is spring
When all the treees are budding
The birds begin to sing
the flowers start their blooming
That's How it is with God's love
Once you experience it
You'll want to sing
It's fresh like spring
You'll want(Yes you'll want)
To pass(to pass)
It on
(pass it on, pass it on, pass it pass it pass it on)
I wish for you my friend
This happiness that I've found
You can depend on Him
It matters not where you're bound
I'll shout it from the mountaintop (RAFFLES!)
I want the world to know
The lord of love has come to me
And I want(Yes I want)
To pass(to pass)
It on
(pass it on, pass it on, pass it pass it pass it on)
p.s. here's a youtube video of someone singing dedication, in case you forgot how the tune goes. i like the way she joins herself in shaking with the rattle thingy, and she shakes it with that look on her face throughout the video! hahaha super cute xD
To blossom, qw & bhu: you'll find the lateral thinking puzzles we did at bhu's sleepover in there! and a whole lot of other ones too (that aren't all that nice) Enjoy! ^^
anyway, i was just telling wenyu the other day that i can rmb how to sing pass it on but i don't rmb the lyrics except the chorus. that's bcos they didn't really teach it, we only sang it like once in sec 1 at the batch initiation ceremony or something? but we sang dedication lots of times, so i rmbed it. however, for some reason, we both had mind-block just then and couldn't rmb how it starts!
after a search on google, i found the lyrics to these two songs! and now i know how to sing both of them, bcos i rmb the tunes alrd (: my favourite is still dedication haha. and i didn't realise how evangelistic pass it on really was o.O
here's to all my ex-rgs classmates, and hope it'll bring back fond memories...
Dedication
We have shared our morning days
And gone through all rainy nights
Even in the darkest of nights
Stars still light up our way
Tomorrow is a beautiful dream
A dream that will be fulfilled
Cross the bridge of rainbow
In search of the gold
For here we stand
Our dearest friend
Sincerely from our hearts we wish
May streams of sunlight
Shine like rays of hope
Hand in hand, we'll work and strive
For the best things in life
Pass it on
It only takes a spark
To get a fire going
And soon all those around
Can warm up in it's glowing
That's How it is with God's love
Once you experience it
You'll want(Yes you'll want)
To pass(to pass)
It on
(pass it on, pass it on, pass it pass it pass it on)
What a wonderous time is spring
When all the treees are budding
The birds begin to sing
the flowers start their blooming
That's How it is with God's love
Once you experience it
You'll want to sing
It's fresh like spring
You'll want(Yes you'll want)
To pass(to pass)
It on
(pass it on, pass it on, pass it pass it pass it on)
I wish for you my friend
This happiness that I've found
You can depend on Him
It matters not where you're bound
I'll shout it from the mountaintop (RAFFLES!)
I want the world to know
The lord of love has come to me
And I want(Yes I want)
To pass(to pass)
It on
(pass it on, pass it on, pass it pass it pass it on)
p.s. here's a youtube video of someone singing dedication, in case you forgot how the tune goes. i like the way she joins herself in shaking with the rattle thingy, and she shakes it with that look on her face throughout the video! hahaha super cute xD
Saturday, October 30, 2010
lateral thinking puzzle 1
recently, i rmbed quite a few lateral thinking puzzles that people have shared with me, and i've been getting my roommate to guess at them. some of them are downright challenging and have super long backstories (eg. albatross sandwich one), while some are simply riddles with a play on words/conventional notions. here's an example that's not too difficult.
try guessing and leave comments if you'd like. i'll reveal the answer the next time i blog xD
A boy and his father are injured in a car accident. Both are
taken to a hospital. The father dies at arrival, but the boy lives
and is taken to surgery. A grey-haired, bespectacled surgeon looks at
the boy and says, "I cannot operate on this boy -- he's my son."
try guessing and leave comments if you'd like. i'll reveal the answer the next time i blog xD
Friday, October 29, 2010
google and love from home!
went to google headquarters today for a tour. this was an event organised by iabc (business club i'm in, so cool right!) and yeah google is amazing. the campus (yes they call it a campus) is just like a university campus, except cooler and with free stuff everywhere and is pretty much a fun environment to work in. you can even live there but of course they won't encourage that huh. the campus holds over 12000 employees, which is why they can make use of economies of scale and provide many things for all the employees and create a conducive environment for innovation and work. (somehow this sounds like an advertisement for google. but yeah it's pretty fun to work there i guess)
my google name tag when i first entered. they've got an machine that prints your name tag immediately after you type your name in so it means lots and lots of people visit google everyday huh.
oh and it's googleween today, all the googlers are encouraged to dress up in costumes for halloween, so we did see quite a few cool costumes (and some downright hilarious). like we saw a guy dressed up as a cow (with pink ears), and a guy who dressed up as a failed american-idol-hopeful, down to the guitar and cowboy hat, and a guy also dressed up as obiwan from star wars! he had a real cool cloak and lightsaber that lights up and goes zingggg when it's lit! haha so fun right!
yeah so they've got bikes that are in google colours (blue, yellow, green, red) parked all over campus so you can just grab a bike and bike anywhere you want and leave them where you stop. each morning, the bikes are transported to places with high volume of traffic so ppl can use them haha. and they've got google shuttles to bring you to work and back, and they've got massage rooms, jacuzzi pools, beach volleyball court (like seriously, they brought in sand just to make a beach volleyball court. like how cool is that!!), playing areas, nap pods for you to take naps in, and stuff like that.
they also have this 150-rule, which means there must be food within 150 feet of any workspace so people can get food anytime they want. and the food is free! so there are like mini-kitchens all over the place, with shelves stocked with snacks and drinks and food, and there is only one vending machine selling food (ie. you must pay for it) which is priced specially according to the number of calories the food has i think. so this educates ppl about the no. of calories that's in the food!
and google also has what they call a google-15. haha when i first came to berkeley, they say we'll have freshman-15 since once you're here, you'll eat so much more that you gain 15 pounds. looks like when you go to google, you will also gain 15 more pounds (and turn into a fat pig) but they do have exercising facilities to encourage googlers to work out so yeah.
and there are a lot of random exhibits hanging around, photographs decorating the walls, and even some dinosaur skeleton structure (which i think is fake but oh well it's cool). oh and they also have laundry rooms, like googlers can do their laundry at work and get them sent for dry cleaning and stuff! and they also have free hair-cut services every friday i think. it's so that googlers don't need to worry about food, or domestic matters and can focus on being innovative and producing good quality work haha. on a sidenote, i really like the colourful decorations of google colours. i nv realised before, but google colours are happy colours!
eh and i got a package from home! mummy sent it and it's my first package from home so yeah, it's a momentous event. i'm happy and i feel loved ^^
love from home <3
p.s. i got to try "in and out" today. it's pretty good, and the menu is really simple. just hamburger and fries and milkshakes. except they also have a secret menu that i didn't know about until today so i'm going to try it next time i go there! apparently in and out can only be found in the west coast so ppl, if you ever come to the west coast, go try in and out!
happy halloween weekend everyone! and i'm going to spend my weekend studying and being a boring jane because i have two midterms next week so good luck to me!
my google name tag when i first entered. they've got an machine that prints your name tag immediately after you type your name in so it means lots and lots of people visit google everyday huh.
oh and it's googleween today, all the googlers are encouraged to dress up in costumes for halloween, so we did see quite a few cool costumes (and some downright hilarious). like we saw a guy dressed up as a cow (with pink ears), and a guy who dressed up as a failed american-idol-hopeful, down to the guitar and cowboy hat, and a guy also dressed up as obiwan from star wars! he had a real cool cloak and lightsaber that lights up and goes zingggg when it's lit! haha so fun right!
yeah so they've got bikes that are in google colours (blue, yellow, green, red) parked all over campus so you can just grab a bike and bike anywhere you want and leave them where you stop. each morning, the bikes are transported to places with high volume of traffic so ppl can use them haha. and they've got google shuttles to bring you to work and back, and they've got massage rooms, jacuzzi pools, beach volleyball court (like seriously, they brought in sand just to make a beach volleyball court. like how cool is that!!), playing areas, nap pods for you to take naps in, and stuff like that.
they also have this 150-rule, which means there must be food within 150 feet of any workspace so people can get food anytime they want. and the food is free! so there are like mini-kitchens all over the place, with shelves stocked with snacks and drinks and food, and there is only one vending machine selling food (ie. you must pay for it) which is priced specially according to the number of calories the food has i think. so this educates ppl about the no. of calories that's in the food!
and google also has what they call a google-15. haha when i first came to berkeley, they say we'll have freshman-15 since once you're here, you'll eat so much more that you gain 15 pounds. looks like when you go to google, you will also gain 15 more pounds (and turn into a fat pig) but they do have exercising facilities to encourage googlers to work out so yeah.
and there are a lot of random exhibits hanging around, photographs decorating the walls, and even some dinosaur skeleton structure (which i think is fake but oh well it's cool). oh and they also have laundry rooms, like googlers can do their laundry at work and get them sent for dry cleaning and stuff! and they also have free hair-cut services every friday i think. it's so that googlers don't need to worry about food, or domestic matters and can focus on being innovative and producing good quality work haha. on a sidenote, i really like the colourful decorations of google colours. i nv realised before, but google colours are happy colours!
eh and i got a package from home! mummy sent it and it's my first package from home so yeah, it's a momentous event. i'm happy and i feel loved ^^
love from home <3
p.s. i got to try "in and out" today. it's pretty good, and the menu is really simple. just hamburger and fries and milkshakes. except they also have a secret menu that i didn't know about until today so i'm going to try it next time i go there! apparently in and out can only be found in the west coast so ppl, if you ever come to the west coast, go try in and out!
happy halloween weekend everyone! and i'm going to spend my weekend studying and being a boring jane because i have two midterms next week so good luck to me!
Sunday, October 24, 2010
IABC Fall Retreat 2010!
wow it's been a while since i last blogged! i guess i've been really busy with studying, mugging and with all the different student group and club activities. i joined iabc, a business club and i got into the consulting division. so i have to invest about 10 - 14 hours a week doing consulting work for our client. yeah this means essentially a class on its own haha, so even though im taking only 17 units, i've been REAL busy. and lacking in sleep. T.T
so yeah we went to half-moon bay for our iabc fall retreat, and lots of unforgettable things happened. in general i would say, the worst things that could have happened actually happened haha. it's what i would call 毕生难忘的经历 xD
before going for the retreat, im glad to say i finished my paper (yay finally) so i didn't have to worry about it over the retreat, and i had cookies and milk with my roommate! (pepperidge cookies <3) it was kindof to celebrate end of her midterms and end of my paper, so we exchanged the different cookies we had and had fun eating them hee.
anw it was raining when i left for the retreat, but it stopped by the time i reached the retreat house. the journey was ok and the retreat house was really nice and cosy! the first night, we watched king arthur and monty python, which was really random and bleh. it was pretty hilarious, but i don't like watching stuff with no real plot, at least not for one full-blown movie's length. it kindof reminds me of random funny youtube videos, all spliced together in a mish-mash of frames just to form a movie that has no linking theme except the recurring characters and hilarity.
i guess it's not my type of comedy.
so yeah we played some icebreakers and i did some studying and some consulting discussion, then went to sleep late. woke at 6.30am the next morning to go horseback riding which was really fun and interesting! except it's pretty expensive and it made my butt ache xD
the first bad thing that happened was that one of our drivers lost her car key. it most likely fell out of her pockets while she was on the horse, either when mounting or when galloping. so we all stayed back and helped to search for the key, but to no avail. we split into 3 teams, one searching the beach area, the other at the end of the trail, and my group was walking from the beginning of the trail till the beach. interestingly, i found out that bmw can unlock your car remotely! the driver called bmw et voila, bmw unlocked her car! it's a little scary to think about how thieves can unlock your car if they have your personal details, but at least they can't drive off with it. bmw couldn't start the car for her, only unlock the door.
anyhow, in the end she managed to get her parents to drive up from her home (an hour's drive away) with the spare car key. in the meantime, we were searching for the key along the trail which was littered with horse manure. i must say that i saw the most amount of manure in my life that single morning, and it really stinks haha.
i got kindof used to the smell though (and i prolly smelled like horse too), and i observed many different stages of manure, like freshly pooped ones which were really green and gooey (yep. twice, some horse pooped right in front of my horse's face, all while walking and splattering its own tail and legs with poo), and manure that were there for a while and has turned greyish. the poo looks like grass after it's dried up, which makes sense, since horses eat mostly grass and fibre-filled stuff. it is also interesting to note that horses don't seem to mind manure or pee so much - they bite each other's butt all the same.
so because of the lost key, we got the chance to walk along the trail and take pictures yay! cameras and electronic devices weren't allowed on horseback you see, probably to avoid having them from falling out of pockets and to prevent us from falling off the horse while trying to take pictures. it's also a great way for them to gain profit since we can only get photos of us on horses by buying the photos from them. it wasn't too bad though, we could split the cost among all of us so it wasn't too ex.
fortunately it didn't rain during the horse-riding activity. however, it started raining in the afternoon, and we couldn't go to the beaches to play (though we had more than enough view of the beach both on horseback and on foot haha). ppl who wanted to kayak couldn't kayak since it was raining :/ anyhow, the next activity was a trip to arata pumpkin farm where we went through a hay maze.
by the time we reached arata pumupkin farm, it was pitch dark. i have no idea why we actually decided to go to the hay maze at night. i think we were supposed to leave earlier but somehow it just got dragged out? anyhow we didn't have enough flashlights nor umbrellas, so we got wet, and we were slipping and squelching around in the mud trying to find our way out of a freaking maze in the dark. i just realised how stupid this is hahaha, i mean even if it were bright daylight, we'd still have trouble identifying where we're going and whether we've been to the place before in a maze, not to mention walking around in circles in the dark! i was way more focussed on not slipping on the mud, and minimising damage to my shoes and jeans (which didn't turn out all the clean anyway huh)
yeah so we got stuck in the maze for really long and we kept ending up at the entrance! after ending up at the entrance for the 4th time, we finally decided to give up and go out since we were all hungry. it felt awfully lousy though, because 12-year old kids could get through the maze in 5 minutes, and we spent 2 hours and were still stuck. we were supposed to go through 3 trapdoors before getting to the exit, but we couldn't get to the 1st trapdoor. we went by that first trapdoor once before, but for some reason we didn't think it would lead to the exit, but would lead back to the entrance instead. we should have just tried the trapdoor man!
well ever since we missed that chance, we never found the trapdoor again. and since it was all dark, we could not tell whether we have done this turn before or not, whether we have been to that spot before or not, and so we couldn't orientate ourselves at all. that must have been the worst strategy we ever had (ie. no strategy), no wonder we couldn't get out -.-"
yeah and after we got out, the exit was right next to the entrance! and as we were feeling really frustrated and pissed, we decided to go in through the exit to see where we went wrong. and yeah we found the 3rd trapdoor and the 2nd trapdoor yay, but we couldn't find the 1st trapdoor! we got lost in the maze again T.T so we just decided to give up for real and we walked out through one of the emergency exits haha.
ok so that was one bad thing, because i got all muddy and dirty, and my shoes were all dirtied and i had to wash everything. the mud wouldn't come off in the washing machine so i had to wash the mud off by hand too, so it's really bleh. and we all felt lousy for not being able to complete the maze sigh.
here's the next bad thing. as we're heading to the pumpkin farm , one of our cars slipped and rolled down the slope, denting the garage door. it was awfully loud and most likely attracted plenty of attention. now that's a big problem since we were supposed to be discreet and quiet. the landlord of the house we rented from thought that there were only 8 people, so we shouldn't attract unwanted attention when there were more than 8 of us there. so apparently neighbours saw the dented door and cars with college kids leaving, so they assumed it was a hit and run and panicked. they called the cops and blew the whole thing out of proportion.
we only found out about this after we came back from the pumpkin farm (all dirty and not too happy) haha. apparently the people who stayed behind in the house had an exciting evening too! yepp so police and fire brigade came and people who remained in the house panicked and started shoving all our sleeping bags and luggage into closets. but of course the police weren't interested in the number of ppl in the house, only whether there was a hit and run. bcos of the cops and all, the manager whom the landlord hired to take care of the house found out and got real mad that we damaged the garage door. she was going to come to the house the next morning.
now this meant that we had to depart earlier than originally planned so that the manager won't see that there were more of us than there should be. she prolly could guess that there were more than 8 of us though; the neighbours probably complained because they noticed that there were a lot of us or that we were making too much noise. ppl were really noisy even at 2+am when i was trying to sleep the night before!
well we were planning to use the story that most of us were just family friends visiting, and weren't going to stay overnight at the house. haha but it wouldn't work if the manager saw all the luggage and sleeping bags, especially if she saw us early in the morning, which means we most likely stayed over.
yeah so the worst that could happen actually happens huh. the next morning we woke at 6.30am and got ready to leave by 8. we had to stagger our departure timings so that not everyone would leave at once and cause suspicion, so the first group was getting ready to leave the house when alas! the landlord was right outside! and she brought the owner of the house along too!
that means all of us were trapped in the house and we couldn't go out and leave or anything. at this point in time, the entire atmosphere was what ycx would say "GG!" or what i'd say "we're screwed." yeah everyone hid in the bedrooms and turned off the lights, keeping quiet. we also shoved our luggage and all the extra shoes into closets. then our representative suggested that we hide in the bathroom and turn the shower on and pretend there's someone showering in there so they couldn't come in to check. i think it's a really brilliant idea for someone to think up when we're all in the panicky mood. iabc ppl really can think on their feet huh.
yeah so we stood around in the toilet for the longest time (or what felt like eternity. now i totally understand how it feels when they say that in the books i read!) we all lacked sleep (i slept like 2.5 hours, and the night before like 4.5 hours, and the night before like 5 hours?). it was also cold, rainy and gloomy, and it felt like we were waiting for something dreadful to happen. one could hardly think clearly or feel good then.
luckily for us, the landlord and owner didn't come into the house. they probably didn't want to bust us, but just wanted to check on the garage door and take pictures. they were negotiating with our representative and discussing about what happened and stuff. most likely we're paying for the replacement of the garage door and our deposit >.>
so yeah after that we were extremely relieved and glad they didn't come into the house, though it's kindof weird. why would they come so early in the morning (at 7+am!! which means they must wake at 6+am!!) if they didn't plan on catching us red-handed?? oh well i guess we should consider ourselves lucky, though we have been absolutely down on our luck in the series of unfortunate events that occurred at the retreat. we then decided to have the first car leave quickly so the next car could leave 10 min later and so on, while everyone cleaned up. it would be no good if the landlord and manager purposely waited for us to let our guard down before coming back to check >.>
overall, this retreat is one of the experiences of a lifetime i won't ever forget. it must be the most miserably exciting and interesting weekend i've ever spent in my life, the weekend where i experienced happiness, misery, anger, embarrassment, exhaustion, fear and excitement all at once. i felt like we were some kindof illegal immigrants/fugitives running around, parking cars far away, leaving in small groups at staggered intervals, sneaking around quietly...and i didn't manage to get a whole lot of work done! but at least i got to see quite a bit of half-moon bay haha.
it's also the first time i ever walked around getting lost in the dark, in the slippery and wet mud, all while being in the rain (except for ccal camp last year where it was pretty muddy, but at least it wasn't dark NOR was it raining). hmm seems like i've been living a really civilised and sheltered life all along in sg eh.
i probably can never get such an experience again in my life, esp not in sg haha! i guess im glad i have had this experience, so i can learn from it and also finally, so i can have an interesting weekend to blog about!
so yeah we went to half-moon bay for our iabc fall retreat, and lots of unforgettable things happened. in general i would say, the worst things that could have happened actually happened haha. it's what i would call 毕生难忘的经历 xD
before going for the retreat, im glad to say i finished my paper (yay finally) so i didn't have to worry about it over the retreat, and i had cookies and milk with my roommate! (pepperidge cookies <3) it was kindof to celebrate end of her midterms and end of my paper, so we exchanged the different cookies we had and had fun eating them hee.
anw it was raining when i left for the retreat, but it stopped by the time i reached the retreat house. the journey was ok and the retreat house was really nice and cosy! the first night, we watched king arthur and monty python, which was really random and bleh. it was pretty hilarious, but i don't like watching stuff with no real plot, at least not for one full-blown movie's length. it kindof reminds me of random funny youtube videos, all spliced together in a mish-mash of frames just to form a movie that has no linking theme except the recurring characters and hilarity.
i guess it's not my type of comedy.
so yeah we played some icebreakers and i did some studying and some consulting discussion, then went to sleep late. woke at 6.30am the next morning to go horseback riding which was really fun and interesting! except it's pretty expensive and it made my butt ache xD
the first bad thing that happened was that one of our drivers lost her car key. it most likely fell out of her pockets while she was on the horse, either when mounting or when galloping. so we all stayed back and helped to search for the key, but to no avail. we split into 3 teams, one searching the beach area, the other at the end of the trail, and my group was walking from the beginning of the trail till the beach. interestingly, i found out that bmw can unlock your car remotely! the driver called bmw et voila, bmw unlocked her car! it's a little scary to think about how thieves can unlock your car if they have your personal details, but at least they can't drive off with it. bmw couldn't start the car for her, only unlock the door.
anyhow, in the end she managed to get her parents to drive up from her home (an hour's drive away) with the spare car key. in the meantime, we were searching for the key along the trail which was littered with horse manure. i must say that i saw the most amount of manure in my life that single morning, and it really stinks haha.
i got kindof used to the smell though (and i prolly smelled like horse too), and i observed many different stages of manure, like freshly pooped ones which were really green and gooey (yep. twice, some horse pooped right in front of my horse's face, all while walking and splattering its own tail and legs with poo), and manure that were there for a while and has turned greyish. the poo looks like grass after it's dried up, which makes sense, since horses eat mostly grass and fibre-filled stuff. it is also interesting to note that horses don't seem to mind manure or pee so much - they bite each other's butt all the same.
so because of the lost key, we got the chance to walk along the trail and take pictures yay! cameras and electronic devices weren't allowed on horseback you see, probably to avoid having them from falling out of pockets and to prevent us from falling off the horse while trying to take pictures. it's also a great way for them to gain profit since we can only get photos of us on horses by buying the photos from them. it wasn't too bad though, we could split the cost among all of us so it wasn't too ex.
fortunately it didn't rain during the horse-riding activity. however, it started raining in the afternoon, and we couldn't go to the beaches to play (though we had more than enough view of the beach both on horseback and on foot haha). ppl who wanted to kayak couldn't kayak since it was raining :/ anyhow, the next activity was a trip to arata pumpkin farm where we went through a hay maze.
by the time we reached arata pumupkin farm, it was pitch dark. i have no idea why we actually decided to go to the hay maze at night. i think we were supposed to leave earlier but somehow it just got dragged out? anyhow we didn't have enough flashlights nor umbrellas, so we got wet, and we were slipping and squelching around in the mud trying to find our way out of a freaking maze in the dark. i just realised how stupid this is hahaha, i mean even if it were bright daylight, we'd still have trouble identifying where we're going and whether we've been to the place before in a maze, not to mention walking around in circles in the dark! i was way more focussed on not slipping on the mud, and minimising damage to my shoes and jeans (which didn't turn out all the clean anyway huh)
yeah so we got stuck in the maze for really long and we kept ending up at the entrance! after ending up at the entrance for the 4th time, we finally decided to give up and go out since we were all hungry. it felt awfully lousy though, because 12-year old kids could get through the maze in 5 minutes, and we spent 2 hours and were still stuck. we were supposed to go through 3 trapdoors before getting to the exit, but we couldn't get to the 1st trapdoor. we went by that first trapdoor once before, but for some reason we didn't think it would lead to the exit, but would lead back to the entrance instead. we should have just tried the trapdoor man!
well ever since we missed that chance, we never found the trapdoor again. and since it was all dark, we could not tell whether we have done this turn before or not, whether we have been to that spot before or not, and so we couldn't orientate ourselves at all. that must have been the worst strategy we ever had (ie. no strategy), no wonder we couldn't get out -.-"
yeah and after we got out, the exit was right next to the entrance! and as we were feeling really frustrated and pissed, we decided to go in through the exit to see where we went wrong. and yeah we found the 3rd trapdoor and the 2nd trapdoor yay, but we couldn't find the 1st trapdoor! we got lost in the maze again T.T so we just decided to give up for real and we walked out through one of the emergency exits haha.
ok so that was one bad thing, because i got all muddy and dirty, and my shoes were all dirtied and i had to wash everything. the mud wouldn't come off in the washing machine so i had to wash the mud off by hand too, so it's really bleh. and we all felt lousy for not being able to complete the maze sigh.
here's the next bad thing. as we're heading to the pumpkin farm , one of our cars slipped and rolled down the slope, denting the garage door. it was awfully loud and most likely attracted plenty of attention. now that's a big problem since we were supposed to be discreet and quiet. the landlord of the house we rented from thought that there were only 8 people, so we shouldn't attract unwanted attention when there were more than 8 of us there. so apparently neighbours saw the dented door and cars with college kids leaving, so they assumed it was a hit and run and panicked. they called the cops and blew the whole thing out of proportion.
we only found out about this after we came back from the pumpkin farm (all dirty and not too happy) haha. apparently the people who stayed behind in the house had an exciting evening too! yepp so police and fire brigade came and people who remained in the house panicked and started shoving all our sleeping bags and luggage into closets. but of course the police weren't interested in the number of ppl in the house, only whether there was a hit and run. bcos of the cops and all, the manager whom the landlord hired to take care of the house found out and got real mad that we damaged the garage door. she was going to come to the house the next morning.
now this meant that we had to depart earlier than originally planned so that the manager won't see that there were more of us than there should be. she prolly could guess that there were more than 8 of us though; the neighbours probably complained because they noticed that there were a lot of us or that we were making too much noise. ppl were really noisy even at 2+am when i was trying to sleep the night before!
well we were planning to use the story that most of us were just family friends visiting, and weren't going to stay overnight at the house. haha but it wouldn't work if the manager saw all the luggage and sleeping bags, especially if she saw us early in the morning, which means we most likely stayed over.
yeah so the worst that could happen actually happens huh. the next morning we woke at 6.30am and got ready to leave by 8. we had to stagger our departure timings so that not everyone would leave at once and cause suspicion, so the first group was getting ready to leave the house when alas! the landlord was right outside! and she brought the owner of the house along too!
that means all of us were trapped in the house and we couldn't go out and leave or anything. at this point in time, the entire atmosphere was what ycx would say "GG!" or what i'd say "we're screwed." yeah everyone hid in the bedrooms and turned off the lights, keeping quiet. we also shoved our luggage and all the extra shoes into closets. then our representative suggested that we hide in the bathroom and turn the shower on and pretend there's someone showering in there so they couldn't come in to check. i think it's a really brilliant idea for someone to think up when we're all in the panicky mood. iabc ppl really can think on their feet huh.
yeah so we stood around in the toilet for the longest time (or what felt like eternity. now i totally understand how it feels when they say that in the books i read!) we all lacked sleep (i slept like 2.5 hours, and the night before like 4.5 hours, and the night before like 5 hours?). it was also cold, rainy and gloomy, and it felt like we were waiting for something dreadful to happen. one could hardly think clearly or feel good then.
luckily for us, the landlord and owner didn't come into the house. they probably didn't want to bust us, but just wanted to check on the garage door and take pictures. they were negotiating with our representative and discussing about what happened and stuff. most likely we're paying for the replacement of the garage door and our deposit >.>
so yeah after that we were extremely relieved and glad they didn't come into the house, though it's kindof weird. why would they come so early in the morning (at 7+am!! which means they must wake at 6+am!!) if they didn't plan on catching us red-handed?? oh well i guess we should consider ourselves lucky, though we have been absolutely down on our luck in the series of unfortunate events that occurred at the retreat. we then decided to have the first car leave quickly so the next car could leave 10 min later and so on, while everyone cleaned up. it would be no good if the landlord and manager purposely waited for us to let our guard down before coming back to check >.>
overall, this retreat is one of the experiences of a lifetime i won't ever forget. it must be the most miserably exciting and interesting weekend i've ever spent in my life, the weekend where i experienced happiness, misery, anger, embarrassment, exhaustion, fear and excitement all at once. i felt like we were some kindof illegal immigrants/fugitives running around, parking cars far away, leaving in small groups at staggered intervals, sneaking around quietly...and i didn't manage to get a whole lot of work done! but at least i got to see quite a bit of half-moon bay haha.
it's also the first time i ever walked around getting lost in the dark, in the slippery and wet mud, all while being in the rain (except for ccal camp last year where it was pretty muddy, but at least it wasn't dark NOR was it raining). hmm seems like i've been living a really civilised and sheltered life all along in sg eh.
i probably can never get such an experience again in my life, esp not in sg haha! i guess im glad i have had this experience, so i can learn from it and also finally, so i can have an interesting weekend to blog about!
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
first trip to san francisco!
san francisco is actually quite near to berkeley, like 45 min away by train/30 min away by car (and is something like from boonlay to changi in sg!!) but since they're different cities, ppl tend to think it's really far away?
anw i went to san francisco with the stanford ppl, like pw and his sg friends etc, and we went to lots of places! it's good to have a car to drive around, it's super convenient!
first we went to sf chinatown and had dimsum ^^ but the famous bakery selling good egg tarts wasn't open so we didn't manage to get the egg tarts :/
then we went to fisherman's wharf at pier 39, and i bought some souvenirs for my friends and myself! we walked to ghiradelli's square and had earthquake icecream (which is nothing compared to swensen's as it had bananas and whipped cream galore), then i bought some chocolates! i gave some of them to my friends. the chocolates are really good actually, the dark chocolate and mint ones.
then we went to the golden gate bridge, and went to some nice viewing spots to take pictures. it was really windy at sf, esp by the bay/ocean so it got quite cold. unlike today, the weather suddenly turned hot and became like sg's weather! >.<
anw i digress. we then went to sausalito and looked at some spanish military outposts i think, and we took more pictures! then we went back to san fran and went to the cliff house (by the ocean again) and watched the sunset (awwww). it's my first sunset, bcos i nv got to really watch it in clear skies and without trees and stuff blocking (think ecp and changi beach park), and i always get distracted watching it (what with food, playing bridge or random talking with other ppl).
oh we went into a cave and walked around but it's just dark and sandy. uhh then we climbed around somemore and got a window seat at the cliff house and ate nice dinner! and kinda gave aimee an early birthday surprise haha.
then we went to the twin peaks and braved the freezing cold and strong winds up there, and attempted some pictures and a conversation with a local (who was totally used to the cold or something and wasn't shivering the way we were xD)
uh ya and we went to my dorms and i showed them my room! and yep they went back to stanford. haha quite a fruitful day and the only good thing i can say about the weather is that it wasn't cloudy and rainy (the way sg always is), but other than that, it's wayyy too cold!
i think it's bcos it's by the ocean and the bay, and the winds are really strong. usually berkeley's cold too, like morning and evening is foggy and gloomy and cold and windy, then once it's 12pm the clouds clear and there will be no clouds in the sky at all! like clear blue sky and the hot blinding sun. then there'll be some wind so it's quite cooling/warm at the same time (and makes it easy for us to sunburn). which is why i invested in a pair of sunglasses and cap so i can uhhh protect myself from the glare.
when in rome, do as romans do. when in cali, do as californians do! (:
i mean in sg, if you wear sunglasses or cap walking around, ppl will just think you're acting cool and/or rich! at cal, everyone dresses quite nicely and puts on makeup and wears sunglasses and caps etc like it's really normal, but oh well.
i had to abandon my singlish and convert my accent into american/british kind so that ppl can understand me, but it's really tiring to keep speaking that way. and there are so many asians here that it's not like usa! i can't tell whether they're abc or international students u know, bcos all of them speak american english! i can only tell when they speak with a china accent that they're most likely born and bred in china, not in usa.
oh yeah my roommate's an abc, and she can't speak mandarin, unfortunately ): i like to speak in mandarin here. it's easier for me bcos i don't need to fake an accent haha, and i like the way mandarin sounds? but not many ppl speak mandarin here so ):
language convergence is a necessary evil i guess, or no one will understand singlish!
anw i went to san francisco with the stanford ppl, like pw and his sg friends etc, and we went to lots of places! it's good to have a car to drive around, it's super convenient!
first we went to sf chinatown and had dimsum ^^ but the famous bakery selling good egg tarts wasn't open so we didn't manage to get the egg tarts :/
then we went to fisherman's wharf at pier 39, and i bought some souvenirs for my friends and myself! we walked to ghiradelli's square and had earthquake icecream (which is nothing compared to swensen's as it had bananas and whipped cream galore), then i bought some chocolates! i gave some of them to my friends. the chocolates are really good actually, the dark chocolate and mint ones.
then we went to the golden gate bridge, and went to some nice viewing spots to take pictures. it was really windy at sf, esp by the bay/ocean so it got quite cold. unlike today, the weather suddenly turned hot and became like sg's weather! >.<
anw i digress. we then went to sausalito and looked at some spanish military outposts i think, and we took more pictures! then we went back to san fran and went to the cliff house (by the ocean again) and watched the sunset (awwww). it's my first sunset, bcos i nv got to really watch it in clear skies and without trees and stuff blocking (think ecp and changi beach park), and i always get distracted watching it (what with food, playing bridge or random talking with other ppl).
oh we went into a cave and walked around but it's just dark and sandy. uhh then we climbed around somemore and got a window seat at the cliff house and ate nice dinner! and kinda gave aimee an early birthday surprise haha.
then we went to the twin peaks and braved the freezing cold and strong winds up there, and attempted some pictures and a conversation with a local (who was totally used to the cold or something and wasn't shivering the way we were xD)
uh ya and we went to my dorms and i showed them my room! and yep they went back to stanford. haha quite a fruitful day and the only good thing i can say about the weather is that it wasn't cloudy and rainy (the way sg always is), but other than that, it's wayyy too cold!
i think it's bcos it's by the ocean and the bay, and the winds are really strong. usually berkeley's cold too, like morning and evening is foggy and gloomy and cold and windy, then once it's 12pm the clouds clear and there will be no clouds in the sky at all! like clear blue sky and the hot blinding sun. then there'll be some wind so it's quite cooling/warm at the same time (and makes it easy for us to sunburn). which is why i invested in a pair of sunglasses and cap so i can uhhh protect myself from the glare.
when in rome, do as romans do. when in cali, do as californians do! (:
i mean in sg, if you wear sunglasses or cap walking around, ppl will just think you're acting cool and/or rich! at cal, everyone dresses quite nicely and puts on makeup and wears sunglasses and caps etc like it's really normal, but oh well.
i had to abandon my singlish and convert my accent into american/british kind so that ppl can understand me, but it's really tiring to keep speaking that way. and there are so many asians here that it's not like usa! i can't tell whether they're abc or international students u know, bcos all of them speak american english! i can only tell when they speak with a china accent that they're most likely born and bred in china, not in usa.
oh yeah my roommate's an abc, and she can't speak mandarin, unfortunately ): i like to speak in mandarin here. it's easier for me bcos i don't need to fake an accent haha, and i like the way mandarin sounds? but not many ppl speak mandarin here so ):
language convergence is a necessary evil i guess, or no one will understand singlish!
Sunday, August 15, 2010
in the states!
yay i'm at berkeley alrd. got my bank account and student card, and have loads of other things to settle...but so far it's quite ok. the campus is really quite hilly, and i've been doing more exercise walking up and down than i ever did the past few months in singapore!
i'll be moving into my dorms proper on the 19th, so till then i can't really buy a lot of things, bcos my luggages are overloaded with stuff alrd haha. the weather here's pretty chilly and cold for summer, like around 14 deg celsius? compared to sg, this place is totally like winter la T.T i must get used to the cold somehow >.>
but when the sun's out, it's quite nice and cool haha. the good thing here is that idon't can't perspire at all! ^^
i didn't sleep well the first night, kept waking every 1 or 2 hours. probably bcos it's afternoon sg time, so it was like taking short naps haha. then i woke at 4+am and couldn't sleep anymore, so i read my book until 6am and fell asleep (finally) since it was sg night time then, and then i slept well till 11+am! was still sleepy but of course cannot sleep somemore or i'll nv get adjusted T.T
last night was better, i slept around 12+am and woke around 7+am today! it's quite a feat considering i didn't wake through the night at all (: i'm happy hee.
international orientation's tmr! looking forward to meeting my fellow singaporean freshmen and other random ppl around ^^
i'll be moving into my dorms proper on the 19th, so till then i can't really buy a lot of things, bcos my luggages are overloaded with stuff alrd haha. the weather here's pretty chilly and cold for summer, like around 14 deg celsius? compared to sg, this place is totally like winter la T.T i must get used to the cold somehow >.>
but when the sun's out, it's quite nice and cool haha. the good thing here is that i
i didn't sleep well the first night, kept waking every 1 or 2 hours. probably bcos it's afternoon sg time, so it was like taking short naps haha. then i woke at 4+am and couldn't sleep anymore, so i read my book until 6am and fell asleep (finally) since it was sg night time then, and then i slept well till 11+am! was still sleepy but of course cannot sleep somemore or i'll nv get adjusted T.T
last night was better, i slept around 12+am and woke around 7+am today! it's quite a feat considering i didn't wake through the night at all (: i'm happy hee.
international orientation's tmr! looking forward to meeting my fellow singaporean freshmen and other random ppl around ^^
Saturday, July 24, 2010
end of internship
finally ended my internship, still have lots of things to keep and stuff. i feel a little sad bcos of all the nice interns and ppl im leaving behind, but im happy that i've finally ended work and can sleep in!
ok not really, i have lots of things on my to-do list b4 i go to usa - outings, sleepovers, tennis, books to read and dramas/anime to watch! (+ revise a level syllabus...)
how am i going to finish all that in a mere 3 weeks or less, plus the packing i need to do!?!?
gah nvm, i'll take things one day at a time. im still teaching tuition for this weekend and the next though, then the weekend after will be the one loaded with 2 sleepovers and one outing in between erhem. seems like no breaks for me any weekend at all T.T
anw i just wanted to share this with all of you, esp useful when you're going to work in the future (after uni?).
i think we are all guilty of this at one point or another, and even if we're not working now, it can still apply to all of us - just replace work with studies. esp with uni upon us all, we'll become busier than ever.
all the best and good luck to all of you then! ^^
ok not really, i have lots of things on my to-do list b4 i go to usa - outings, sleepovers, tennis, books to read and dramas/anime to watch! (+ revise a level syllabus...)
how am i going to finish all that in a mere 3 weeks or less, plus the packing i need to do!?!?
gah nvm, i'll take things one day at a time. im still teaching tuition for this weekend and the next though, then the weekend after will be the one loaded with 2 sleepovers and one outing in between erhem. seems like no breaks for me any weekend at all T.T
anw i just wanted to share this with all of you, esp useful when you're going to work in the future (after uni?).
30 second Speech by Bryan Dyson (CEO of Coca Cola)
"Imagine life as a game in which you are juggling some five balls in the
air. You name them - Work, Family, Health, Friends and Spirit and you're
keeping all of these in the Air.
You will soon understand that Work is a rubber ball. If you drop it, it will
bounce back.
But the other four balls - Family, Health, Friends and Spirit - are made of
glass. If you drop one of these; they will be irrevocably scuffed, marked,
nicked, damaged or even shattered. They will never be the same. You must
understand that and strive for it."
Work efficiently during office hours and leave on time. Give the required time to your family, friends and have proper rest.
i think we are all guilty of this at one point or another, and even if we're not working now, it can still apply to all of us - just replace work with studies. esp with uni upon us all, we'll become busier than ever.
all the best and good luck to all of you then! ^^
Thursday, July 15, 2010
a 19th birthday
i found out there's such a thing called shisha in singapore. it's kindof like smoking except there's different fruity flavours and stuff, and it's filtered through water, but research shows that it's worse than cigarettes. glad i didn't go along for the shisha >.>
thank you IDG interns, esp WK, "CC" (HAHA) and WL for organising the lunch and the nice ice cream cake and all! first time i celebrated my birthday in the work context, it's kindof unforgettable. through the lunch, i found out the real personalities of a few of you erhem.
got an ocbc supplementary card from my dad! hmm i should go apply for some debit card too, ocbc or posb better?
oh yeah thanks everyone for their birthday well wishes! am really happy and surprised that so many ppl rmbed/checked their facebook birthday reminders xD
the 19th birthday is a special one, as our 农历生日 coincides with our birthday on the gregorian calendar that day. in case you never noticed, this happens once every 19 years, so this is a very special day indeed.
i like my 农历生日 - 六月初六， 真容易记! ^^
i feel old already. but then again, constantly hanging around ppl who are older than me makes me feel super young xD at spring, im the youngest as everyone is either already in uni, or are already working haha. still, some of them thought i am some uni student, and even one thought i was a permanent staff! looks like i can pass off as some adult already (:
i feel old compared to all my juniors at rj though. i'm still receiving constant updates about jap club and astro club, but i'll be away in usa and won't be able to go attend all their fun events anymore, and then i won't know the juniors' juniors, then in just one year more and i won't know anyone in jap club and astro club at all! -horrified-
what to do then?
thank you IDG interns, esp WK, "CC" (HAHA) and WL for organising the lunch and the nice ice cream cake and all! first time i celebrated my birthday in the work context, it's kindof unforgettable. through the lunch, i found out the real personalities of a few of you erhem.
got an ocbc supplementary card from my dad! hmm i should go apply for some debit card too, ocbc or posb better?
oh yeah thanks everyone for their birthday well wishes! am really happy and surprised that so many ppl rmbed/checked their facebook birthday reminders xD
the 19th birthday is a special one, as our 农历生日 coincides with our birthday on the gregorian calendar that day. in case you never noticed, this happens once every 19 years, so this is a very special day indeed.
i like my 农历生日 - 六月初六， 真容易记! ^^
i feel old already. but then again, constantly hanging around ppl who are older than me makes me feel super young xD at spring, im the youngest as everyone is either already in uni, or are already working haha. still, some of them thought i am some uni student, and even one thought i was a permanent staff! looks like i can pass off as some adult already (:
i feel old compared to all my juniors at rj though. i'm still receiving constant updates about jap club and astro club, but i'll be away in usa and won't be able to go attend all their fun events anymore, and then i won't know the juniors' juniors, then in just one year more and i won't know anyone in jap club and astro club at all! -horrified-
what to do then?
Thursday, July 08, 2010
toutes les couleurs de l'arc en ciel
been tired these days, doing work in the day then bringing work home to do. hardly enough time to sleep/read/do anything other than check emails. sianz. im alrd looking forward to end of internship, bcos im kindof loaded with work, extra work and intern's presentation.
and i've enrolled in my first two classes for ucb! im taking only 17 units my first sem, which includes a math, a physics, a comparative lit class and japanese! yepp im going to learn jap finally ^^ i just nv have the self-discipline and initiative to actually get down to self-learning the language, so i figured it's easier to just go for lessons where i'll be forced to learn and talk the language, then if i want to, i can self-learn more in the future! yay im alrd looking forward to not just going to cali, but also to starting my classes! ^^
anw i saw a rainbow today! first time i saw a rainbow with the full 7 colours very distinctly, and it was a complete semi-circle! there was a secondary rainbow, but very faint, and the rainbow's really pretty bcos the sun was kindof setting at around 7pm. i must be in luck tomorrow then.
sorry my phone camera's lousy (1.3megapixel only but it's a free phone so ya haha). enjoy the pics!
p.s. you all can try guessing where i was xD
and i've enrolled in my first two classes for ucb! im taking only 17 units my first sem, which includes a math, a physics, a comparative lit class and japanese! yepp im going to learn jap finally ^^ i just nv have the self-discipline and initiative to actually get down to self-learning the language, so i figured it's easier to just go for lessons where i'll be forced to learn and talk the language, then if i want to, i can self-learn more in the future! yay im alrd looking forward to not just going to cali, but also to starting my classes! ^^
anw i saw a rainbow today! first time i saw a rainbow with the full 7 colours very distinctly, and it was a complete semi-circle! there was a secondary rainbow, but very faint, and the rainbow's really pretty bcos the sun was kindof setting at around 7pm. i must be in luck tomorrow then.
sorry my phone camera's lousy (1.3megapixel only but it's a free phone so ya haha). enjoy the pics!
p.s. you all can try guessing where i was xD
Sunday, July 04, 2010
a chinese tall story
i watched a chinese tall story bcos of the interesting mv posted on blaws' blog, showing charlene as an unimaginably weird character. at first the movie seemed quite silly and just lame, but as it went along, it became better and better! (except for all the lame cartoon animation that i felt was so bleh, esp when charlene was the pro galactic warrior! why she become cartoon! so low budget humph)
**SPOILERS AHEAD SKIP THIS PARAGRAPH IF YOU REFUSE TO BE SPOILED!** but the most profound moment was when it showed that the princess had fallen in love with charlene('s eyes) instead of the guy's. it just shows how the princess looked past her appearance and felt her warmth and sincerity right from the beginning. then the saddest moment was when i realised that she never had a name, and meiyan was the name she picked from the princess. SUPER SAD LA i cried then! the dramatic climb up the stone at the end was touching too, but i've seen it b4 so not a big deal haha.
anw after watching the ending part in the heavens, i realised i've watched the movie b4 on tv, but probably only watched that last part, bcos i have no recollection whatsoever of the front parts. it's a sad ending though...i finally understood the phrase at the beginning.
**SPOILERS AHEAD SKIP THIS PARAGRAPH IF YOU REFUSE TO BE SPOILED!** but the most profound moment was when it showed that the princess had fallen in love with charlene('s eyes) instead of the guy's. it just shows how the princess looked past her appearance and felt her warmth and sincerity right from the beginning. then the saddest moment was when i realised that she never had a name, and meiyan was the name she picked from the princess. SUPER SAD LA i cried then! the dramatic climb up the stone at the end was touching too, but i've seen it b4 so not a big deal haha.
anw after watching the ending part in the heavens, i realised i've watched the movie b4 on tv, but probably only watched that last part, bcos i have no recollection whatsoever of the front parts. it's a sad ending though...i finally understood the phrase at the beginning.
世界上最遥远的距离though if u think about it, they actually get to stay together forever.
不是你站在我面前却不知道我爱你
而是明明相爱
却不能在一起
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Rube Goldberg Machine
I discovered this interesting music video that makes use of the rube goldberg machine concept ie. using an excessively roundabout and overengineered way to get a simple thing done. go watch it! it took them like 85 takes to get it right, and there were only 3 out of all of that that had completely successful runs. plus they destroyed 2 pianos and 8 televisions. you'll understand why after you watch it xD
OK Go - This Too Shall Pass - Rube Goldberg Machine version
another very creative and entertaining music video they did, very famously known as the treadmill video:
OK Go - Here It Goes Again - Treadmill video
OK Go - This Too Shall Pass - Rube Goldberg Machine version
another very creative and entertaining music video they did, very famously known as the treadmill video:
OK Go - Here It Goes Again - Treadmill video
Monday, June 14, 2010
my first champagne
Yesterday I attended my cousin's wedding and helped to emcee the wedding dinner part. the wedding was split into morning, afternoon solemnisation + buffet for colleagues/friends, and night for relatives, so i only had to emcee for the night part -thank goodness-
i tried my first champagne last night and it tastes just like grape juice with barely a taste of alcohol! it was sooooo sweet that the sweetness overpowers the bitterness of alcohol, which makes it really nice to drink. uh but of course it's all too easy to drink too much bcos you don't taste the alcohol, so fortunately i only took a few sips. (the rest of the glass was downed by my bro >.>)
and nope, i didn't get drunk at all. after half a glass of champagne, and a few sips of red wine here and there in the afternoon and night. alcohol doesn't taste very nice (all bitter), but it's interesting to try different wines and learn to get over the bitter taste and start tasting the mellowness, or lightness, or heaviness, or the sweet or sour tastes, the varying tones in each wine. after all, a little red wine contributes to better health!
recently a colleague at work was hospitalised with a collapsed lung (google spontaneous pneumothorax), and he's been there for over a week. i think he'll be there for at least another week as he's going for surgery. i feel so sorry for him! it must really be painful and hurts a lot to have a tube sticking into your chest. how to sleep? how to eat? how to breathe???
but he has a lot of visitors, lots of friends and colleagues (including me) who visit him, so he's well entertained. i hope he'll get well soon. he's way too young to have anything bad happen to him T.T worse still, 50% of the ppl who had it have recurrences for the rest of their lives! 这样的消息可真是晴天霹雳阿！
I wish him all the best in his future endeavours, and hope he'll regain his good health in the future!
on a side note, i want to wish wf a very happy birthday in advance!
i tried my first champagne last night and it tastes just like grape juice with barely a taste of alcohol! it was sooooo sweet that the sweetness overpowers the bitterness of alcohol, which makes it really nice to drink. uh but of course it's all too easy to drink too much bcos you don't taste the alcohol, so fortunately i only took a few sips. (the rest of the glass was downed by my bro >.>)
and nope, i didn't get drunk at all. after half a glass of champagne, and a few sips of red wine here and there in the afternoon and night. alcohol doesn't taste very nice (all bitter), but it's interesting to try different wines and learn to get over the bitter taste and start tasting the mellowness, or lightness, or heaviness, or the sweet or sour tastes, the varying tones in each wine. after all, a little red wine contributes to better health!
recently a colleague at work was hospitalised with a collapsed lung (google spontaneous pneumothorax), and he's been there for over a week. i think he'll be there for at least another week as he's going for surgery. i feel so sorry for him! it must really be painful and hurts a lot to have a tube sticking into your chest. how to sleep? how to eat? how to breathe???
but he has a lot of visitors, lots of friends and colleagues (including me) who visit him, so he's well entertained. i hope he'll get well soon. he's way too young to have anything bad happen to him T.T worse still, 50% of the ppl who had it have recurrences for the rest of their lives! 这样的消息可真是晴天霹雳阿！
I wish him all the best in his future endeavours, and hope he'll regain his good health in the future!
on a side note, i want to wish wf a very happy birthday in advance!
Sunday, June 06, 2010
Interesting quote of the day
People are more violently opposed to fur than leather because it's safer to harass rich women than motorcycle gangs. - Unknown
Friday, June 04, 2010
gosh
omg i just linked the jairus guy to ang jun heng to kallang robbery case! how slow can i be! T.T
first i heard on the news about kallang robbery case where 1 died and 3 severely injured, and all about how they're catching the attackers, then my mum said one of them had his hand and fingers cut off. i was like omg.
then few days later some rj batchmates started spreading around an email about jairus, and i kept thinking he's some j1 who somehow got injured in some canoeing accident bcos they said he's canoe captain and not ex-captain or that he's j3 >.>
then someone told me my batchmate got injured in the kallang case! so i went to google for names of the victims and found ang jun heng who is 19 so must be j3, then found out he's also jairus T.T
i wonder if he can ever canoe again? hope he recovers and gets well. i think i've actually seen him around school a few times, and probably seen him at ccal camp. i still can't believe how vicious people can be just to get money. T.T
first i heard on the news about kallang robbery case where 1 died and 3 severely injured, and all about how they're catching the attackers, then my mum said one of them had his hand and fingers cut off. i was like omg.
then few days later some rj batchmates started spreading around an email about jairus, and i kept thinking he's some j1 who somehow got injured in some canoeing accident bcos they said he's canoe captain and not ex-captain or that he's j3 >.>
then someone told me my batchmate got injured in the kallang case! so i went to google for names of the victims and found ang jun heng who is 19 so must be j3, then found out he's also jairus T.T
i wonder if he can ever canoe again? hope he recovers and gets well. i think i've actually seen him around school a few times, and probably seen him at ccal camp. i still can't believe how vicious people can be just to get money. T.T
Monday, May 31, 2010
first day at work
currently having an internship with spring singapore, just started today for 8 weeks. looks like i'll be doing a lot of work in the days to come (so stress) so i'll make this short and get my well deserved sleep.
just arrived and im thrown around between ppl as my buddy isn't here today, so i ended up with a temporary buddy. then i sat in on the ops meeting and was pretty bored out, though some stuff sounded interesting. then there was a fire drill and we wasted another hour doing nothing but suntanning and breathing in carbon monoxide and all sorts of soot and stuff that comes with the choking smoke when they try to put out the "fire". erh then i sat around reading loads of brochures about the schemes and stuff bcos my computer hasn't come yet so i can't do anything else.
then i went out for lunch with the interns in my group (industry development group) and then made quite a few frens, though i forget their names >.> i feel super young and green and inexperienced bcos im first day there, plus i AM the youngest. like all of them are uni undergrads or something.
then i sat around reading more stuff, getting briefed on the internship by HR, then sat around and yay my com came and i have my own email and internet and stuff. but im sharing my room with two other interns currently, one of them is leaving end of this week though. i probably can get the whole table to myself xD
one thing i learnt is spring uses loads of acronyms and abbreviations, the usual for all govt agencies i suppose. i really had a hard time deciphering some, like what's AAE? and AE? and IPO? (made me think of international physics olympiad which is impossible erhem)
another thing i learnt is while there is plenty of "welfare", like an exercise room and a room for play and leisure, the coffeemaker is T.T infested with ants. like you press some drink and ants come out with it. i wonder how the ants actually get in there??? what's wrong with their coffee machine!? eurgh.
just arrived and im thrown around between ppl as my buddy isn't here today, so i ended up with a temporary buddy. then i sat in on the ops meeting and was pretty bored out, though some stuff sounded interesting. then there was a fire drill and we wasted another hour doing nothing but suntanning and breathing in carbon monoxide and all sorts of soot and stuff that comes with the choking smoke when they try to put out the "fire". erh then i sat around reading loads of brochures about the schemes and stuff bcos my computer hasn't come yet so i can't do anything else.
then i went out for lunch with the interns in my group (industry development group) and then made quite a few frens, though i forget their names >.> i feel super young and green and inexperienced bcos im first day there, plus i AM the youngest. like all of them are uni undergrads or something.
then i sat around reading more stuff, getting briefed on the internship by HR, then sat around and yay my com came and i have my own email and internet and stuff. but im sharing my room with two other interns currently, one of them is leaving end of this week though. i probably can get the whole table to myself xD
one thing i learnt is spring uses loads of acronyms and abbreviations, the usual for all govt agencies i suppose. i really had a hard time deciphering some, like what's AAE? and AE? and IPO? (made me think of international physics olympiad which is impossible erhem)
another thing i learnt is while there is plenty of "welfare", like an exercise room and a room for play and leisure, the coffeemaker is T.T infested with ants. like you press some drink and ants come out with it. i wonder how the ants actually get in there??? what's wrong with their coffee machine!? eurgh.
Sunday, May 23, 2010
back from the other side of the world
first trip to the US and it's a really great experience! lots of things to see, lots of differences between singapore and usa.
we took a direct flight from singapore to newark, new jersey which is very close to new york city. stayed there a night just to rest and get over the jet lag, then took a plane to chicago next day. went round sightseeing and eating and taking loads of pictures (since my dad made it his personal mission for us to take millions of photos with the new camera). the subway (something like our MRT, just that most of it is underground) is rather dingy and dirty and old, unlike singapore's. the trains are uber noisy with clanging as it moves along, and they stop like every half a km or something in the city. that's pretty much every few blocks or traffic lights. the good (or bad) thing is that the subway is paid per entry, USD$2.50, regardless of the length of trip, so we usually buy a single day pass allowing us to travel as many times as possible in a day by train.
singapore's train system is very much easier to understand compared to that in usa. they have a million lines and little/no directions on how to change from one line to another. then there are a million exits when u leave the station, and you just have no idea which exit is nearer to where u want to go. T.T
we didn't go to observation decks or sky decks because the weather when we reached wasn't good. super foggy/rainy and totally not worth the money. oh and we found out that chicago was the windy city the hard way. erh yeah the wind was bone-chilling. temperatures ranged from 7 to 17 deg celsius which would have felt no different, if not for the wind >.>
after that we went to my brother's school in illinois, took loads of photos with him in his graduation gown. the gown is an odd blue colour instead of the usual black. there's a company that makes and rents only the uiuc gowns, so it earns money only like twice a year? haha
i met all his frens at uiuc and we had dinner together, quite fun. i feel sad im not going to uiuc, but i expect to have loads of fun at ucb too! there were two graduation ceremonies to attend; the first is a campus-wide one which was boring to bits, and the second was the college of engineering one where they read everyone's names and ppl go up the stage to collect fake certificates. they'll get their real certificates in the mail later on.
the cool thing is, all the students hand over their names on a piece of paper that the emcee reads on the spot. that way, no one's name is missed out. great idea huh.
then we went back to chicago and flew to new york city, cramped all of us into a room just to save money. went round sight seeing there, took the nyc subway which was more complicated and in worse condition than chicago's. the most memorable incident was when my brother bought a kebab and bun by the roadside at times square. after a while, a homeless black man came up to my brother saying, "yo bro that looks good! can i have a piece?"
we were all stunned for a while, then my brother said yeah sure. i told my bro that he did a good deed that day. the piece of meat was probably that guy's dinner >.>
at Grand Central station, a very large subway station with food and shops and a market, we sat down for like what, 5 minutes next to a rubbish bin. within those 5 minutes, we encountered 3 people coming over to rummage through the rubbish bin, two blacks and one spanish/italian i think. they're homeless ppl who probably stay at the station. one of them found a drink and took it out of the bin and drank straight from it! we were all horrified! i think they were looking for some food/recyclable stuff to earn some money?
seems like the homeless and unemployed are commonplace in usa, especially in new york city. they lurk around the subway stations as they are warmer and provide a roof over their heads. you can also see many of them selling illegal stuff by the road. i even saw a guy standing at a highway exit holding up a big board saying "i am homeless and hungry. i am willing to work till i drop". at least we don't find all these homeless people on the streets in singapore...
we went to see wall street and we saw the statue of liberty - from afar. to get to statue of liberty, which is located on liberty island, you have to either wake super early to take the ferry so there is no queue, or you have to queue hours around the battery park just to get on the ferry. so we simply digital zoomed in on the statue and walked around the park gaping at the ultra long queue that snaked around the entire park or something.
i also experienced my first (two) broadway musicals, jersey boys and the lion king! broadway musicals are superb and wonderful, and i'm totally addicted to them! the people in them sing so wonderfully well, and the props and display and effects showed great effort and thought put in. they even incorporate humour and funny jokes in their script, which is unexpected! and the audience totally gets high and wild, cheering and clapping and laughing during the musical. the atmosphere is totally amazing. at the end, everyone gives a standing ovation and cheers. i want to watch so many other shows, like phantom of the opera, wicked and west side story! such a pity broadway doesn't show on dvd T.T i'd be willing to go buy them lor. i guess because broadway is so exclusive, some shows can go on playing for over 20 years.
one thing i learnt from this trip is that we should appreciate singapore's cleanliness and efficient transport system, and lack of homeless people due to govt's policies and safety nets for them. and i oso learnt to AVOID AT ALL COSTS americanized chinese food which tastes horribly salty and eeky 90% of the time! beware of those dubious chinese takeout restaurants by the roadside. they've got NOTHING in common with our usual chinese food other than rice!
yep. i enjoyed the trip pretty much, and first time taking such a long plane ride! i think it's the longest direct flight anywhere (19+ hours!), so all seats in the SIA plane were business class. very nice and big and the seat can be made into a bed for you to lie down and sleep! but i stayed up like half the time to watch all the movies i missed ie. sherlock holmes, hua mulan, avatar and percy jackson!
i like avatar and hua mulan, sherlock holmes was slightly bleh and boring, percy was atrocious and a total waste of my sleep time! i'd rather have watched imaginarium >.> percy jackson is obviously a show for pre-teens or something with a typical storyline and mediocre acting. what's with athena's daughter, who was supposed to be super pro at fighting, randomly swinging the sword and everyone gets hit and lose?! she's too stiff and lousy at faking it.
hua mulan made me cry ): it's SO SAD! why can't wentai and mulan JUST be together already! don't they have other princes who can marry the pricess, or maybe wentai can have mulan as the 2nd wife or something, which is quite sad for both of them AND the rouran princess but oh well, better than being separated for the rest of their lives!
eh yeah. i shall end this post before it gets too long. time to sleep! i believe my jet lag is almost over. technically i have "stayed up" for 3 nights in a row, new york time, and been taking "naps" when i sleep at night singapore time. i still get tired in the afternoons here, but it's kindof normal because i always feel sleepy after eating lunch xD hope jet lag is over tomorrow!
and korkor is coming back for a whole year tomorrow night yay! i'm happy.
we took a direct flight from singapore to newark, new jersey which is very close to new york city. stayed there a night just to rest and get over the jet lag, then took a plane to chicago next day. went round sightseeing and eating and taking loads of pictures (since my dad made it his personal mission for us to take millions of photos with the new camera). the subway (something like our MRT, just that most of it is underground) is rather dingy and dirty and old, unlike singapore's. the trains are uber noisy with clanging as it moves along, and they stop like every half a km or something in the city. that's pretty much every few blocks or traffic lights. the good (or bad) thing is that the subway is paid per entry, USD$2.50, regardless of the length of trip, so we usually buy a single day pass allowing us to travel as many times as possible in a day by train.
singapore's train system is very much easier to understand compared to that in usa. they have a million lines and little/no directions on how to change from one line to another. then there are a million exits when u leave the station, and you just have no idea which exit is nearer to where u want to go. T.T
we didn't go to observation decks or sky decks because the weather when we reached wasn't good. super foggy/rainy and totally not worth the money. oh and we found out that chicago was the windy city the hard way. erh yeah the wind was bone-chilling. temperatures ranged from 7 to 17 deg celsius which would have felt no different, if not for the wind >.>
after that we went to my brother's school in illinois, took loads of photos with him in his graduation gown. the gown is an odd blue colour instead of the usual black. there's a company that makes and rents only the uiuc gowns, so it earns money only like twice a year? haha
i met all his frens at uiuc and we had dinner together, quite fun. i feel sad im not going to uiuc, but i expect to have loads of fun at ucb too! there were two graduation ceremonies to attend; the first is a campus-wide one which was boring to bits, and the second was the college of engineering one where they read everyone's names and ppl go up the stage to collect fake certificates. they'll get their real certificates in the mail later on.
the cool thing is, all the students hand over their names on a piece of paper that the emcee reads on the spot. that way, no one's name is missed out. great idea huh.
then we went back to chicago and flew to new york city, cramped all of us into a room just to save money. went round sight seeing there, took the nyc subway which was more complicated and in worse condition than chicago's. the most memorable incident was when my brother bought a kebab and bun by the roadside at times square. after a while, a homeless black man came up to my brother saying, "yo bro that looks good! can i have a piece?"
we were all stunned for a while, then my brother said yeah sure. i told my bro that he did a good deed that day. the piece of meat was probably that guy's dinner >.>
at Grand Central station, a very large subway station with food and shops and a market, we sat down for like what, 5 minutes next to a rubbish bin. within those 5 minutes, we encountered 3 people coming over to rummage through the rubbish bin, two blacks and one spanish/italian i think. they're homeless ppl who probably stay at the station. one of them found a drink and took it out of the bin and drank straight from it! we were all horrified! i think they were looking for some food/recyclable stuff to earn some money?
seems like the homeless and unemployed are commonplace in usa, especially in new york city. they lurk around the subway stations as they are warmer and provide a roof over their heads. you can also see many of them selling illegal stuff by the road. i even saw a guy standing at a highway exit holding up a big board saying "i am homeless and hungry. i am willing to work till i drop". at least we don't find all these homeless people on the streets in singapore...
we went to see wall street and we saw the statue of liberty - from afar. to get to statue of liberty, which is located on liberty island, you have to either wake super early to take the ferry so there is no queue, or you have to queue hours around the battery park just to get on the ferry. so we simply digital zoomed in on the statue and walked around the park gaping at the ultra long queue that snaked around the entire park or something.
i also experienced my first (two) broadway musicals, jersey boys and the lion king! broadway musicals are superb and wonderful, and i'm totally addicted to them! the people in them sing so wonderfully well, and the props and display and effects showed great effort and thought put in. they even incorporate humour and funny jokes in their script, which is unexpected! and the audience totally gets high and wild, cheering and clapping and laughing during the musical. the atmosphere is totally amazing. at the end, everyone gives a standing ovation and cheers. i want to watch so many other shows, like phantom of the opera, wicked and west side story! such a pity broadway doesn't show on dvd T.T i'd be willing to go buy them lor. i guess because broadway is so exclusive, some shows can go on playing for over 20 years.
one thing i learnt from this trip is that we should appreciate singapore's cleanliness and efficient transport system, and lack of homeless people due to govt's policies and safety nets for them. and i oso learnt to AVOID AT ALL COSTS americanized chinese food which tastes horribly salty and eeky 90% of the time! beware of those dubious chinese takeout restaurants by the roadside. they've got NOTHING in common with our usual chinese food other than rice!
yep. i enjoyed the trip pretty much, and first time taking such a long plane ride! i think it's the longest direct flight anywhere (19+ hours!), so all seats in the SIA plane were business class. very nice and big and the seat can be made into a bed for you to lie down and sleep! but i stayed up like half the time to watch all the movies i missed ie. sherlock holmes, hua mulan, avatar and percy jackson!
i like avatar and hua mulan, sherlock holmes was slightly bleh and boring, percy was atrocious and a total waste of my sleep time! i'd rather have watched imaginarium >.> percy jackson is obviously a show for pre-teens or something with a typical storyline and mediocre acting. what's with athena's daughter, who was supposed to be super pro at fighting, randomly swinging the sword and everyone gets hit and lose?! she's too stiff and lousy at faking it.
hua mulan made me cry ): it's SO SAD! why can't wentai and mulan JUST be together already! don't they have other princes who can marry the pricess, or maybe wentai can have mulan as the 2nd wife or something, which is quite sad for both of them AND the rouran princess but oh well, better than being separated for the rest of their lives!
eh yeah. i shall end this post before it gets too long. time to sleep! i believe my jet lag is almost over. technically i have "stayed up" for 3 nights in a row, new york time, and been taking "naps" when i sleep at night singapore time. i still get tired in the afternoons here, but it's kindof normal because i always feel sleepy after eating lunch xD hope jet lag is over tomorrow!
and korkor is coming back for a whole year tomorrow night yay! i'm happy.
Thursday, May 06, 2010
happy
happy because i passed my practical driving test in first attempt! yay i can go usa drive liao ^^
will be on holiday in usa next monday till 22nd may or so, don't miss me k? (:
will be on holiday in usa next monday till 22nd may or so, don't miss me k? (:
Sunday, May 02, 2010
new camera!
yay today is payday for tuition so im happy. but my ezlink card expired :( so now i "lost" quite a bit of money in the ezlink card, unless i go refund the money and lose the card. i probably will refund it next year or later, not now? it's still useful erhem.
i found my kindergarten and primary 1 class photos from SIS, i'd like to find all my classmates again but i can't rmb which person is which in the photos, except for some of the closer friends i had >.> perhaps i should launch a facebook search for them?
i bought a new camera so i can use it when i go to usa next week and when i go for university yay! it's not canon or sony though, which was what i set out to buy at first. my dad was attracted by all the promotions and there was this nikon camera which was sold at like much cheaper than usual bcos a new generation just came out, so we ended up buying it. it's nikon coolpix s620.
it's kindof thicker than i hoped for, but it's quite pro and cheap for the model so i don't mind. the image quality is quite nice and there are many random modes that are very fun to play with xD
guess which colour i bought xD
haha i bet you guessed precious pink/rich pearl. nope i ended up buying the sky blue one tada!
i was having a hard time choosing between rich pearl and sky blue, both looked so nice! in the end my dad decided bcos he said it's more special, and i agree, i mean everyone seems to have pinkish cameras, it'd be nice if i had something different.
i was having fun playing around with all the scene modes and the smile mode, which auto-releases the shutter only when you smile xD
blossom told me about this super pro girl who parallel-parked her bike coolly. i found the video and it's really quite cool
then it seems like she's been practicing all along just for the perfect shot (and probably failed a lot of times haha!)
no wonder the pro shot was nicely captured on video. then i found out that the brother knows how to do it too!
i found my kindergarten and primary 1 class photos from SIS, i'd like to find all my classmates again but i can't rmb which person is which in the photos, except for some of the closer friends i had >.> perhaps i should launch a facebook search for them?
i bought a new camera so i can use it when i go to usa next week and when i go for university yay! it's not canon or sony though, which was what i set out to buy at first. my dad was attracted by all the promotions and there was this nikon camera which was sold at like much cheaper than usual bcos a new generation just came out, so we ended up buying it. it's nikon coolpix s620.
it's kindof thicker than i hoped for, but it's quite pro and cheap for the model so i don't mind. the image quality is quite nice and there are many random modes that are very fun to play with xD
guess which colour i bought xDhaha i bet you guessed precious pink/rich pearl. nope i ended up buying the sky blue one tada!
i was having a hard time choosing between rich pearl and sky blue, both looked so nice! in the end my dad decided bcos he said it's more special, and i agree, i mean everyone seems to have pinkish cameras, it'd be nice if i had something different.
i was having fun playing around with all the scene modes and the smile mode, which auto-releases the shutter only when you smile xD
blossom told me about this super pro girl who parallel-parked her bike coolly. i found the video and it's really quite cool
then it seems like she's been practicing all along just for the perfect shot (and probably failed a lot of times haha!)
no wonder the pro shot was nicely captured on video. then i found out that the brother knows how to do it too!
Monday, April 19, 2010
funny picture
saw this on the internet...and it's super funny!
i think it's an overlap of two advertisements, but oh well, i wonder if anyone actually believed it...
i think it's an overlap of two advertisements, but oh well, i wonder if anyone actually believed it...
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Cinderella's real name was Ye Xian
been slacking around these days, learning driving, giving tuition, going out. generally spending lots of time on the internet, reading on stuff, learning some things and settling uni apps and scholarship interviews. eh and watching dramas too.
here's an interesting article i read on the newspaper today:Cinderella's real name was Ye Xian
here's an interesting article i read on the newspaper today:Cinderella's real name was Ye Xian
Friday, March 05, 2010
A level results out!
eh ya im pleased and pleasantly surprised with my results, though slightly disappointed with h3. uh ya, but i kindof expected it when i was doing the paper and didn't know how to do 3 out of 4 qns at the back >.> (the 4 choose 2 section)
so here's the end of my 12 year journey in singapore's education system, and i must say FORTUNATELY i have not embarrassed myself and i scored 2 more distinctions than my brother, which is super pro and so my cert is going to look better than his! i have achieved my goal of doing as well as or better than my bro, and so i am happy! ^^
yep hope everyone had their desired results. if not, cheer up and it's not the end of the world. i am sure all of you will have a bright future ahead of you regardless of the results, as long as you're willing to try hard and persevere.
p.s. congratulations panz! you're so pro and im so proud of you! and congrats to all the smart ppl out there who got 4As and above! (:
so here's the end of my 12 year journey in singapore's education system, and i must say FORTUNATELY i have not embarrassed myself and i scored 2 more distinctions than my brother, which is super pro and so my cert is going to look better than his! i have achieved my goal of doing as well as or better than my bro, and so i am happy! ^^
yep hope everyone had their desired results. if not, cheer up and it's not the end of the world. i am sure all of you will have a bright future ahead of you regardless of the results, as long as you're willing to try hard and persevere.
p.s. congratulations panz! you're so pro and im so proud of you! and congrats to all the smart ppl out there who got 4As and above! (:
Thursday, March 04, 2010
A levels out tomorrow!
the most important and probably final national examination i am going to take in my life...the GCE Advanced Level examinations. results will be out tomorrow, but strangely i don't feel nervous. i have been thinking about this day for so long, ever since i first took the paper almost 4 months ago, so much so that i am no longer nervous or worried.
after all, i have a school to go to (uiuc) regardless of how badly i do. furthermore, i most likely can get into nus with whatever results i get.
i only hope to do super well for 3 reasons:
1. live up to parents', teachers', friends' and my own expectations
2. to save some face and not be embarrassed everytime someone asks me how i did for a levels (in the future)
3. to get a scholarship so that i can study overseas without worrying about financing all living costs blah.
if i do badly, i'll just be disappointed and my parents too, and the above 3 points won't be fulfilled lor.
i just hope that i haven't overestimated myself and end up with Cs and Ds or something horrible like that...
jiayou everyone! all the best!
after all, i have a school to go to (uiuc) regardless of how badly i do. furthermore, i most likely can get into nus with whatever results i get.
i only hope to do super well for 3 reasons:
1. live up to parents', teachers', friends' and my own expectations
2. to save some face and not be embarrassed everytime someone asks me how i did for a levels (in the future)
3. to get a scholarship so that i can study overseas without worrying about financing all living costs blah.
if i do badly, i'll just be disappointed and my parents too, and the above 3 points won't be fulfilled lor.
i just hope that i haven't overestimated myself and end up with Cs and Ds or something horrible like that...
jiayou everyone! all the best!
Thursday, February 11, 2010
happy because...
i passed the test on first try! so i don't need to care about anything (until months later when i finally take the practical bleh) so i can slack now and play happily for chinese new year, and watch all the dramas and read all the books i haven't dared to touch because of this test!
yeah and mainly because i can suan my kor, who passed the test only on the second try because he didn't study the first time round! ahah the woe of underestimating the final theory test! trust me, it's quite hard to pass if you don't study, so make the right investment (in the practice books) and save more on time and $6(s) for retaking of the test!
an early happy chinese new year to all! ^^
yeah and mainly because i can suan my kor, who passed the test only on the second try because he didn't study the first time round! ahah the woe of underestimating the final theory test! trust me, it's quite hard to pass if you don't study, so make the right investment (in the practice books) and save more on time and $6(s) for retaking of the test!
an early happy chinese new year to all! ^^
Tuesday, February 09, 2010
laughter's the best medicine
i have a driving practice book with practice questions for the final theory test, and it has horrible grammar in almost every question/options for answers. it's most likely directly translated from chinese (as there is a chinese translation right underneath the english questions), but that's not the point.
here's the funniest option i've ever seen in the book (and seriously, the book has many funny options)
If your windscreen suddenly shattered by a pebble while driving, you should:-
A) apply emergency brake.
B) break a hole in it with your fist in order to have a clear view in front
C) move slowly to the roadside and stop
obviously the answer is C, but even without the lousy grammar in the question, reading option B is the most hilarious thing i've ever seen in ages!
yeah right im SO going to destroy the entire windscreen and NOT injure myself and then happily continue driving for the rest of the day!
HAHAHA i wonder if the actual test has suchstupid interesting options?
here's the funniest option i've ever seen in the book (and seriously, the book has many funny options)
If your windscreen suddenly shattered by a pebble while driving, you should:-
A) apply emergency brake.
B) break a hole in it with your fist in order to have a clear view in front
C) move slowly to the roadside and stop
obviously the answer is C, but even without the lousy grammar in the question, reading option B is the most hilarious thing i've ever seen in ages!
yeah right im SO going to destroy the entire windscreen and NOT injure myself and then happily continue driving for the rest of the day!
HAHAHA i wonder if the actual test has such
Monday, January 18, 2010
the force is with facebook...
random facebook series - the star wars version that i found on the internet. super funny ^^
Star Wars on Facebook! <3 the darth vader one best hee
Star Wars on Facebook! <3 the darth vader one best hee
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
In your eyes...
yay i just found the MV for "In Your Eyes", the duet between Show Luo and Rainie Yang! It's in rainie's new album "Rainie & Love...?", which has loads of nice songs anw. i like this song bcos it's super happy xD
Enjoy! ^^
Enjoy! ^^
Friday, January 08, 2010
back from bangkok
my family went on a short holiday to bangkok the past week. we went shopping and visiting friends and the 四面佛. i stayed at the city centre Siam Square, which is something like our downtown area? and there were loads and loads of high-end shopping malls juxtaposed against street vendors and rundown cheaper malls.
seriously, the high-end shopping malls are just like ion orchard, paragon, orchard central etc. the names are even freakishly similar! there was one shopping mall called Siam Paragon, which was hugeeeee (around ngee ann city size but with more levels) and another one called Central World (apparently it's a departmental store that owns 3 shopping malls at different places, all called Central something). it was huge too, like ion orchard and bigger.
i found that there are a lot of japanese restaurants and food in these shopping malls. in fact, the ratio was like 8 japanese restaurants out of 10 restaurants! there wasn't even much thai food around (only one restaurant?) and there would be the occasional chinese food (ding tai fung) and western food (manhattan fish market, uh mcdonald's). oh i saw singaporean restaurant selling hainanese chicken rice! but the mcdonald's there is big and nice and comfier than those in singapore, like with sofas as seats, not chairs! cool right!
uh ya the high end malls sold loads of branded goods at prices that even after discount, rival those in sg or are even more ex! well i guess branded is still branded after all, need to import and tax and blah. oh but we get VAT refund, something like gst refund ^^ 7% back, but only if you spend more than 6000 baht in total and at least 2000 baht in each store you are collecting refund for. oh well we spent like 8000+ just in this departmental store called Zen xD my dad bought 3 pairs of trousers there (that was the whole purpose of the trip for him hahaha) and my mum bought a pair of super ex shoes xD 3500 baht ie. around S$147! but the stores in thailand are much bigger than those in sg, with lots of brand names i haven't seen or heard of before in addition to the usual ones. interesting.
i must say i experienced a lot of things for the first time on this trip, so here's the list:
1. first time on tv! we were walking along the street shopping and stuff when we saw a camera with the channel news asia logo on it. my dad is an avid fan of cna, (at our hotel he would always switch to cna, at home when there's nothing to watch he switches to cna) and beingthe busybody curious, he went up to ask the woman what she was filming for and stuff. apparently it was for Southeast Asia Tonight (the news for southeast asia) which would air that night, about how tourism is up in thailand despite the political situation. since we 送上门, she requested to interview us, so my dad said some crappy stuff, like how we feel thais are very polite and that we do not feel any danger, etc. generally promoting thailand and how tourists will still want to come despite political conflict.
actually we only stayed in the city area, so we didn't experience or see any of the conflict or protests at all. everyone doesn't care and they just do their own things haha. though you see pics of the king and sometimes his wife around. my dad says it's against the law to insult the king. if you throw an egg at his picture, you get thrown into jail. it's not just the police who will catch you, everyone on the street will turn against you! (makes me think of the matrix haha) it's just how important the king is to them lah.
eh ya so my dad became even more obsessed with cna after that, when we went back to the hotel, he was like stuck to the tv awaiting our appearance (of what, only 2 seconds?) they cut out most of the interview, only left one suitable line that fits the entire news video haha. my dad took a picture of us on tv, but it was kinda blurry. so after we came back from dinner, he went back to cna and said there may be repeats! yeah we appeared on the asia news too haha, so he took another pic. the next morning, like 7am, we turned on the tv and there we were again, probably another repeat haha. i checked the cna programme guide, i think we actually appeared on tv like 6 or 7 times! xD aiya it's nothing compared to Abdulmutallab, whose picture must have been on tv a million times (consider every single channel in the world, plus repeats, plus he appears on the news every other day for the past two weeks or something)
2. first time seeing transvestites. i met two, maybe more but i didn't know (ie. they succeeded so well i thought they were women? haha) i was really shocked at first but i didn't realise thailand had so many of them! the first one i met was at the hairsalon, he was a hairstylist, cross-dressed as a female. wearing a miniskirt and pretty shoes, nice makeup and everything. actually i thought he was female until he spoke, and his voice was obviously a guy's voice >.> imagine how shocked you'll feel when someone u thought was a woman actually was a guy all along!!! a woman with a man's voice T.T
the second one i met was the owner of a small boutique, when we were shopping for clothes. this one looked even more feminine, with skinny legs!! (yeah i mean guys shouldn't have skinny legs right!) but he had a male voice. i think they lack the money to go for a full sex-change operation, maybe working to get there. it's pretty unnerving at first, but once you got over it, it's no big deal. they are normal like everyone else, except for the sexual orientation, and they do a good job at whatever work they do anyway. so yep.
i'm just wondering though, why isit thailand has so many males with a female orientation, whereas other countries have less comparatively. yeah i know thailand perhaps promotes the culture and more guys are willing to come out of the closet, so it seems like there are more, but i think the percentage is still a lot higher than other countries! could it be in the genes? or just the open mindset about transvestites can somehow create more transvestites? hmm...
3. at breakfast, we had international buffet that's very nice and delicious! a lot of people took this particular fruit though:
i've never seen this fruit before, and people were just scooping the flesh and seeds. i tried it, and it tasted sour and slightly sweet, something like soursop, except that the seeds here are edible! not bitter or anything, just tasteless and crunchy! not bad lah. later on we went to the supermarkets at the high-end malls, and i searched for this fruit...and did you guess it right? it's a passionfruit!
first time eating/seeing a passionfruit ^^
4. first time eating a rice-pudding! it's just soggy rice in some milky mixture and sugar. not very nice lah. the muesli is nicer (first time eating it too!)
Rice Pudding (:
5. first time doing foot massage, in thailand too! it's quite nice after a whole day of shopping and walking, and i got to sleep/rest ^^" it's also pretty cheap compared to singapore. hmm the masseuses were all super young! like the one serving me was only 23 (my bro's age haha) and she's been working since 15!! 童工!!! it's a tough job, because you really have to exert a lot of strength and after a while it gets boring to do the same thing over and over again. how to survive the monotony?
6. first time walking into a walk-in closet. my dad's thai friend is pretty rich, and we had dinner with his family. we visited his house too, which is quite far out from the city on singapore's terms, maybe 15km? but it's apparently super near for thais haha xD still, even after reaching the set of villas, yes villas, you have to drive another 5 minutes around the maze of villas before reaching his villa! it's got a garden, maid's room, garage, two-storey house la. pretty big, but what amazed me the most was the master bedroom's bathroom. it's hugeeee, with the shower and bathtub separate (ie. two people can bathe at the same time!) and a walk-in closet!! cool. there's even space for a makeup table and for trying on your clothes and doing the catwalk around the bathroom ahaha! but this villa is super cheap, only around 600 thousand singapore dollars. i mean, buying a new 5-room hdb flat costs nearly that much?
7. first time in a nissan teana.
when we first arrived in bangkok, we paid more money (only about S$42 haha) to take the limousine service which is safer than being cheated by taxi drivers, and it's also more comfy. but no we didn't take a limousine (duh), we chose the cheapest nissan teana haha. my mum wanted to try it instead of the toyota camry. anw taxis here are scary. they weave in and out of traffic, travel at 120km/h on highways and don't bother using signals. totally over the speed limit of 80km/h! so we completed a journey in 10min that would usually take 30min in sg haha. however, once you got to the city, wow the traffic congestion is UNBELIEVABLE. at peak hours, traffic in bangkok is horrible and seriously, it's 水泄不通 and the traffic lights take forever to change (like 2 minutes?) and we got stuck in the traffic for another 15 min for a journey of like a few km?? maybe walking would be faster.
that's why if you're in the city, i suggest you walk/drive a motorcycle/take the mrt. not worth it to get a taxi for it's too slow and money-draining. speaking of which...
8. first time taking the BTS Skytrain ie. Bangkok Transit Service which is something like our MRT, except it's only in the city and has only two MRT lines. there are two different MRT companies i think, and this service is provided by one of them for the city only. it's above ground and the train only has 3 carriages! super short. that day it was raining, so the traffic congestion worsened.
taken from the bridge.
you know at peak hours, the other side of the road has some lanes with their directions reversed so that there are more lanes with traffic flowing in one direction, just to ease the congestion!
oh did i mention the bridges in the city. generally they are linked by a skywalk, linking the MRT station Siam and the next one called Chidlom. they also link to most of the shopping centres along the roads, so you can walk in the shade above the traffic to wherever you want, quite cool eh? the horrible thing is that there are NO escalators and the steps are steeper than those in singapore. the bridges are higher than those in singapore, and everytime you want to cross the road, you have to climb the stairs. they're pretty narrow at some places, and i mean, the elderly and disabled won't be able to climb the stairs! does that mean they can't take the mrt, they can't go shopping?
why don't they build escalators? it would speed up the movement of people, especially when it rains! that night we took the BTS, it was raining and yeah the pavements flooded. T.T i mean the rain stopped when we went out, but it was flooded so badly at the bridge that people coming down from the bridge had to queue in one line to step on one measly little brick (the oasis in the middle of the murky waters) and inch their way to drier ground. yeah we obviously wouldn't be able to get on the bridge at this rate so we walked further down to take another bridge.
the BTS system is really inefficient in that to buy a ticket, you have to pay in coins. yes all in coins. no notes. if you don't have enough coins, you must go queue at the ticket service counter to exchange for coins. and are you asking why is it you can't buy tickets at the ticket service counter? i was asking the exact same thing!!!! you queue there and all just to exchange for coins?? then you must queue for the machine again just to buy the ticket?? why not just upgrade the machines to accept notes and allow buying of tickets at the counter too? that would save a lot of people so much time!
and the train was packed. we had to squeeze our way in, and since there were only 3 carriages and hundreds and hundreds of people, yeah you can imagine. it's something like hongkong, except much rowdier and scarier. i wouldn't want to be at the front T.T i may be pushed onto the tracks by all the people behind! generally it was an unpleasant experience haha. don't take the BTS during peak hour AND when it's rains. bleh. though it's the best choice of any transport in bangkok haha.
9. first time using a seat belt which doesn't have a buckle. haha yeah what's the use of a seat belt when it doesn't have a buckle? we took a taxi and back seats only had the belt. i was wondering where to stuff the tongue of the belt into, so i just stuffed it into the back of the seat. but seriously, if the car stops suddenly, the belt most probably will fly out and uh, serve no purpose. maybe it will even whack me in the face and cause me more injury! i was pretty amused by the seat belt.
10. first time seeing students happily shopping and walking around on a weekday at the city, even in the morning! apparently there's a well-known and very prestigious university nearby, called Chulalongkorn University. something like harvard in the us or cambridge in uk? only the smartest or richest kids can go to the school haha. no wonder they can shop at high-end shopping malls haha. even though they are uni students, they still have to wear school uniforms, though there seems to be no rules about how they wear their uniforms, or shoes/socks, or hair. most of them wear makeup and uh are going out with their boyfriends.
we saw not just uni students, but also high school students. it's really weird actually. it's like seeing students on a Wednesday morning shopping at Ion Orchard, Paragon, Ngee Ann City, Plaza Singapura, walking around Orchard Road everyday like they don't need to study or do homework??? you see more of them in the afternoons and at night. sigh they so slack one ah, or too smart alrd, no need to study? but i saw quite a few tuition centres too. maybe they were just killing time until it's time for tuition?
oh yeah most of the thais know a little chinese. i'm quite amazed, because i always ask my parents stuff in chinese, then suddenly the thais would answer my question in broken chinese xD oh and i saw a lot of caged birds at the temple, for people to 放生.
poor birds. they probably will get caught and returned to the cages for the vendor to gain more profits.
the food there 口味很重，我吃了真的不是很习惯, like the food is often too sweet, too salty, too sour. i guess they spam seasoning and condiments. we avoided most of the spicy food and chilli though xD hmm i ate a lot more than i usually do, but i exercised a lot more than i usually do too (from walking and walking and walking each day shopping, carrying all the shopping bags and climbing a lot of stairs), so it all cancels out? hahaha my arms are still aching and my legs still sore from all the walking.
my favourite pink christmas tree in the distance <3
ok that was super long. it may be a short trip, but seems like i saw a lot of new things i didn't observe before. there may have been more firsts, but im too lazy to think of more haha. i guess i still like travelling even though it's tiring and all. as we used to write in primary school essays, we went home tired but happy.home sweet home (:
seriously, the high-end shopping malls are just like ion orchard, paragon, orchard central etc. the names are even freakishly similar! there was one shopping mall called Siam Paragon, which was hugeeeee (around ngee ann city size but with more levels) and another one called Central World (apparently it's a departmental store that owns 3 shopping malls at different places, all called Central something). it was huge too, like ion orchard and bigger.
i found that there are a lot of japanese restaurants and food in these shopping malls. in fact, the ratio was like 8 japanese restaurants out of 10 restaurants! there wasn't even much thai food around (only one restaurant?) and there would be the occasional chinese food (ding tai fung) and western food (manhattan fish market, uh mcdonald's). oh i saw singaporean restaurant selling hainanese chicken rice! but the mcdonald's there is big and nice and comfier than those in singapore, like with sofas as seats, not chairs! cool right!
uh ya the high end malls sold loads of branded goods at prices that even after discount, rival those in sg or are even more ex! well i guess branded is still branded after all, need to import and tax and blah. oh but we get VAT refund, something like gst refund ^^ 7% back, but only if you spend more than 6000 baht in total and at least 2000 baht in each store you are collecting refund for. oh well we spent like 8000+ just in this departmental store called Zen xD my dad bought 3 pairs of trousers there (that was the whole purpose of the trip for him hahaha) and my mum bought a pair of super ex shoes xD 3500 baht ie. around S$147! but the stores in thailand are much bigger than those in sg, with lots of brand names i haven't seen or heard of before in addition to the usual ones. interesting.
i must say i experienced a lot of things for the first time on this trip, so here's the list:
1. first time on tv! we were walking along the street shopping and stuff when we saw a camera with the channel news asia logo on it. my dad is an avid fan of cna, (at our hotel he would always switch to cna, at home when there's nothing to watch he switches to cna) and being
actually we only stayed in the city area, so we didn't experience or see any of the conflict or protests at all. everyone doesn't care and they just do their own things haha. though you see pics of the king and sometimes his wife around. my dad says it's against the law to insult the king. if you throw an egg at his picture, you get thrown into jail. it's not just the police who will catch you, everyone on the street will turn against you! (makes me think of the matrix haha) it's just how important the king is to them lah.
eh ya so my dad became even more obsessed with cna after that, when we went back to the hotel, he was like stuck to the tv awaiting our appearance (of what, only 2 seconds?) they cut out most of the interview, only left one suitable line that fits the entire news video haha. my dad took a picture of us on tv, but it was kinda blurry. so after we came back from dinner, he went back to cna and said there may be repeats! yeah we appeared on the asia news too haha, so he took another pic. the next morning, like 7am, we turned on the tv and there we were again, probably another repeat haha. i checked the cna programme guide, i think we actually appeared on tv like 6 or 7 times! xD aiya it's nothing compared to Abdulmutallab, whose picture must have been on tv a million times (consider every single channel in the world, plus repeats, plus he appears on the news every other day for the past two weeks or something)
2. first time seeing transvestites. i met two, maybe more but i didn't know (ie. they succeeded so well i thought they were women? haha) i was really shocked at first but i didn't realise thailand had so many of them! the first one i met was at the hairsalon, he was a hairstylist, cross-dressed as a female. wearing a miniskirt and pretty shoes, nice makeup and everything. actually i thought he was female until he spoke, and his voice was obviously a guy's voice >.> imagine how shocked you'll feel when someone u thought was a woman actually was a guy all along!!! a woman with a man's voice T.T
the second one i met was the owner of a small boutique, when we were shopping for clothes. this one looked even more feminine, with skinny legs!! (yeah i mean guys shouldn't have skinny legs right!) but he had a male voice. i think they lack the money to go for a full sex-change operation, maybe working to get there. it's pretty unnerving at first, but once you got over it, it's no big deal. they are normal like everyone else, except for the sexual orientation, and they do a good job at whatever work they do anyway. so yep.
i'm just wondering though, why isit thailand has so many males with a female orientation, whereas other countries have less comparatively. yeah i know thailand perhaps promotes the culture and more guys are willing to come out of the closet, so it seems like there are more, but i think the percentage is still a lot higher than other countries! could it be in the genes? or just the open mindset about transvestites can somehow create more transvestites? hmm...
3. at breakfast, we had international buffet that's very nice and delicious! a lot of people took this particular fruit though:
i've never seen this fruit before, and people were just scooping the flesh and seeds. i tried it, and it tasted sour and slightly sweet, something like soursop, except that the seeds here are edible! not bitter or anything, just tasteless and crunchy! not bad lah. later on we went to the supermarkets at the high-end malls, and i searched for this fruit...and did you guess it right? it's a passionfruit! first time eating/seeing a passionfruit ^^
4. first time eating a rice-pudding! it's just soggy rice in some milky mixture and sugar. not very nice lah. the muesli is nicer (first time eating it too!)
Rice Pudding (:5. first time doing foot massage, in thailand too! it's quite nice after a whole day of shopping and walking, and i got to sleep/rest ^^" it's also pretty cheap compared to singapore. hmm the masseuses were all super young! like the one serving me was only 23 (my bro's age haha) and she's been working since 15!! 童工!!! it's a tough job, because you really have to exert a lot of strength and after a while it gets boring to do the same thing over and over again. how to survive the monotony?
6. first time walking into a walk-in closet. my dad's thai friend is pretty rich, and we had dinner with his family. we visited his house too, which is quite far out from the city on singapore's terms, maybe 15km? but it's apparently super near for thais haha xD still, even after reaching the set of villas, yes villas, you have to drive another 5 minutes around the maze of villas before reaching his villa! it's got a garden, maid's room, garage, two-storey house la. pretty big, but what amazed me the most was the master bedroom's bathroom. it's hugeeee, with the shower and bathtub separate (ie. two people can bathe at the same time!) and a walk-in closet!! cool. there's even space for a makeup table and for trying on your clothes and doing the catwalk around the bathroom ahaha! but this villa is super cheap, only around 600 thousand singapore dollars. i mean, buying a new 5-room hdb flat costs nearly that much?
7. first time in a nissan teana.
when we first arrived in bangkok, we paid more money (only about S$42 haha) to take the limousine service which is safer than being cheated by taxi drivers, and it's also more comfy. but no we didn't take a limousine (duh), we chose the cheapest nissan teana haha. my mum wanted to try it instead of the toyota camry. anw taxis here are scary. they weave in and out of traffic, travel at 120km/h on highways and don't bother using signals. totally over the speed limit of 80km/h! so we completed a journey in 10min that would usually take 30min in sg haha. however, once you got to the city, wow the traffic congestion is UNBELIEVABLE. at peak hours, traffic in bangkok is horrible and seriously, it's 水泄不通 and the traffic lights take forever to change (like 2 minutes?) and we got stuck in the traffic for another 15 min for a journey of like a few km?? maybe walking would be faster. that's why if you're in the city, i suggest you walk/drive a motorcycle/take the mrt. not worth it to get a taxi for it's too slow and money-draining. speaking of which...
8. first time taking the BTS Skytrain ie. Bangkok Transit Service which is something like our MRT, except it's only in the city and has only two MRT lines. there are two different MRT companies i think, and this service is provided by one of them for the city only. it's above ground and the train only has 3 carriages! super short. that day it was raining, so the traffic congestion worsened.
taken from the bridge.you know at peak hours, the other side of the road has some lanes with their directions reversed so that there are more lanes with traffic flowing in one direction, just to ease the congestion!
oh did i mention the bridges in the city. generally they are linked by a skywalk, linking the MRT station Siam and the next one called Chidlom. they also link to most of the shopping centres along the roads, so you can walk in the shade above the traffic to wherever you want, quite cool eh? the horrible thing is that there are NO escalators and the steps are steeper than those in singapore. the bridges are higher than those in singapore, and everytime you want to cross the road, you have to climb the stairs. they're pretty narrow at some places, and i mean, the elderly and disabled won't be able to climb the stairs! does that mean they can't take the mrt, they can't go shopping?
why don't they build escalators? it would speed up the movement of people, especially when it rains! that night we took the BTS, it was raining and yeah the pavements flooded. T.T i mean the rain stopped when we went out, but it was flooded so badly at the bridge that people coming down from the bridge had to queue in one line to step on one measly little brick (the oasis in the middle of the murky waters) and inch their way to drier ground. yeah we obviously wouldn't be able to get on the bridge at this rate so we walked further down to take another bridge.
the BTS system is really inefficient in that to buy a ticket, you have to pay in coins. yes all in coins. no notes. if you don't have enough coins, you must go queue at the ticket service counter to exchange for coins. and are you asking why is it you can't buy tickets at the ticket service counter? i was asking the exact same thing!!!! you queue there and all just to exchange for coins?? then you must queue for the machine again just to buy the ticket?? why not just upgrade the machines to accept notes and allow buying of tickets at the counter too? that would save a lot of people so much time!
and the train was packed. we had to squeeze our way in, and since there were only 3 carriages and hundreds and hundreds of people, yeah you can imagine. it's something like hongkong, except much rowdier and scarier. i wouldn't want to be at the front T.T i may be pushed onto the tracks by all the people behind! generally it was an unpleasant experience haha. don't take the BTS during peak hour AND when it's rains. bleh. though it's the best choice of any transport in bangkok haha.
9. first time using a seat belt which doesn't have a buckle. haha yeah what's the use of a seat belt when it doesn't have a buckle? we took a taxi and back seats only had the belt. i was wondering where to stuff the tongue of the belt into, so i just stuffed it into the back of the seat. but seriously, if the car stops suddenly, the belt most probably will fly out and uh, serve no purpose. maybe it will even whack me in the face and cause me more injury! i was pretty amused by the seat belt.
10. first time seeing students happily shopping and walking around on a weekday at the city, even in the morning! apparently there's a well-known and very prestigious university nearby, called Chulalongkorn University. something like harvard in the us or cambridge in uk? only the smartest or richest kids can go to the school haha. no wonder they can shop at high-end shopping malls haha. even though they are uni students, they still have to wear school uniforms, though there seems to be no rules about how they wear their uniforms, or shoes/socks, or hair. most of them wear makeup and uh are going out with their boyfriends.
we saw not just uni students, but also high school students. it's really weird actually. it's like seeing students on a Wednesday morning shopping at Ion Orchard, Paragon, Ngee Ann City, Plaza Singapura, walking around Orchard Road everyday like they don't need to study or do homework??? you see more of them in the afternoons and at night. sigh they so slack one ah, or too smart alrd, no need to study? but i saw quite a few tuition centres too. maybe they were just killing time until it's time for tuition?
oh yeah most of the thais know a little chinese. i'm quite amazed, because i always ask my parents stuff in chinese, then suddenly the thais would answer my question in broken chinese xD oh and i saw a lot of caged birds at the temple, for people to 放生.
poor birds. they probably will get caught and returned to the cages for the vendor to gain more profits.the food there 口味很重，我吃了真的不是很习惯, like the food is often too sweet, too salty, too sour. i guess they spam seasoning and condiments. we avoided most of the spicy food and chilli though xD hmm i ate a lot more than i usually do, but i exercised a lot more than i usually do too (from walking and walking and walking each day shopping, carrying all the shopping bags and climbing a lot of stairs), so it all cancels out? hahaha my arms are still aching and my legs still sore from all the walking.
my favourite pink christmas tree in the distance <3ok that was super long. it may be a short trip, but seems like i saw a lot of new things i didn't observe before. there may have been more firsts, but im too lazy to think of more haha. i guess i still like travelling even though it's tiring and all. as we used to write in primary school essays, we went home tired but happy.
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