Joab's World

2012-01-27T01:30:00.002+08:00

The Mountain from TSO Photography on Vimeo.

God created the world to be a beautiful place. But sometimes, I forgot that it is not Him who has made the world into a place which wasn't meant to be in the first place.

I used to pray and hope that the world can become a better place.

But now I just pray and hope that I can become a better person in life so that the world can become a better place.

It always starts with yourself.

2012

2012-01-01T23:01:00.003+08:00

First post in 2012.

Cut the crap on 2012 resolutions because they never get fulfilled anyway. My 2012 resolution is to live 2012 better than 2011, which I felt was awesome and fantastic. Met new people, started school, finished the dreading NS in 2011.. nothing seemed to have gone wrong last year. :)

2012 will be even better and I know it. =D

Merry Christmas

2011-12-26T02:00:00.002+08:00

Last Christmas, I was happy. Maybe I wasn't really that happy, with a little uncertainty. But I was contented with life.

Looking back 2011, I can just say that I have lived 2011 to the fullest. Maybe it could have been better, but I definitely lived it to the bestest I can be.

Yesterday, as I was watching "The Holiday" on Channel 5, I can't help but to be glued to the simple story plot of two women trying to figure out what they really want in life and their journey to finding happiness. In the end, when Cameron Diaz finally got the "enlightenment" and went on to pursue what she wanted.. I can't help but to feel a little warmth and fuzzy and my eyes got a little teary. Yea, I'm such a sucker when it comes to heartwarming movies like this. -_-

This year, I spent one of the best Christmases I've had since about 4 years ago. I spent it with God, with friends and with Y. :)

I just felt so blessed during service yesterday, to see how life has improved and got better for me and not only that, he gave me his blessings and promised me things which I've prayed earnestly for.

Thank you, God. (:

Christmas Cards

2011-12-24T14:43:00.000+08:00

Being damn free and it all sparked off from an idea by tzy, I started making my own X'mas cards and got addicted. LOL.

..So if you received a card from me this year, it means you're dear to me in my life and I hope that you liked the handmade card I've specially made for you! =D

Merry Christmas everyone!

6A Gathering

2011-12-23T13:47:00.001+08:00

So yesterday I reluctantly went to my primary school class gathering (i hope no one from my class is reading this HAHA) because I just wanted to stay home and nuaz. But I didn't regret meeting the guys because it's just nice to meet up with one another after so long and everyone seemed to have a different life story to share.

It reminded me of all the good/bad old days where we were all forced by Mrs Chu to memorise maths/english/science notes, do 4 sets of exam papers for homework everyday and recite sentences after sentences of beautiful phrases. I still appreciate her for her effort but after yesterday's meet-up, I assume everyone felt that she was more of like a communist inducing fear in all of us and forcing us to study in order to do well. This kind of education will of course no longer work in Singapore today.

We had loads of bitching, uncovering dirty secrets and at the end of the day I realized I was the one who uncovered the most secrets for them who didn't know why did some things happened during our primary school days. Guess I bear heavy grudges. HAHA

As an elite class (-_-) with almost most of the class in overseas universities (USA, Taiwan, UK, Germany, Australia...) from all around the world, it's heartwarming to see 10 individuals whose paths once crossed come together again. :)

But at the end of the day, you can't help but to feel old and marvel at how things have unfolded in our lives.

What Doesn't Kill You

2011-12-22T14:32:00.001+08:00

..makes you stronger.

The song of my life now. Repeat mode. :)

Results: Part 2

2011-12-21T01:12:00.002+08:00

I've been going with the wind lately, as in... just moving with the flow of events planned with friends and family and just fully utilizing this holiday to play really hard, before school starts in Jan... which I already can't wait for. I guess I'm obsessed with what I'm studying and doing and I can't wait to quickly go back to school, finish up my 4 years course, become a full fledge teacher and finally get started on my teaching career. Wow, that was a really long sentence.

Today, our OG had another outing and I guess I really enjoyed the company with this group of ten in the OG. I can't say I really like all of them (maybe just two) in this OG, but I genuinely thank God for putting some of these people in my life thanks to the orientation camp back in July. Some of them became my good project mates while some are just nice/genuine/sincere to hangout with. I really can't ask for a better group of friends whom I barely knew for four months long.

So while at Wild Honey (I have to say the American all-day breakfast was freaking huge and I could barely finish 60% of it, ME=WEAK, I say)... the topic of results came up again, considering that we all received our results just a few days ago. Well, I assume that I was certainly dismayed with the C+ (as mentioned in the previous post) I got.. I was certainly thankful of it. Which reminds me now to bring this up now... I told yanyan my results when I received it and after knowing my results, he said "good what". But when he received his own which was around the same, he said "i expected higher". So does it mean that the results he received is what he expected for me to receive but not for him or does it mean that the results I received is good for me but not good enough for him? Just some food for thought... for fun, JUST TRYING TO BE A SI GINNA AND READ TOO MUCH INTO THINGS. I know all you meant is you thought I did a great job and you thought that you could have done even better than the results you received. :) HEHEHEHE.

Anyway, back to the topic. Of course with GPA of >4, I certainly wasn't the worst in the group. But I hate the topic of results being mentioned each time. Partly because I feel bad for my friends whom I really like who didn't do as well and also feel enraged by friends whom I DON'T really like who scored really well. And I don't like it when people assume me to be this smart fellow when I'm not. I simply just work really hard because I'm insecure about myself and am afraid of failure. That's all.

But reflecting upon this, I just really have to say that results itself doesn't mean a single thing. I may not have a 4.7+ GPA like this certain someone who have on more than one occasion told me that he doesn't need to study to get his As. For the record, I feel like telling him if he was that smart, he wouldn't #1 retain, #2 scored 5.0, #3 be in our school. (Sorry, just had to bitch) But seriously, that guy was such a snob that I know of at least a dozen others who wish against him to do well. (Sorry, had to bitch again and I know karma bites) If you would let me choose, I rather be an average joe, with average results, with many average friends and live an average awesome life. Rather than a loner life with no one to share your 4.7+ GPA with. And he dared to say something like 4.7+ is giving him the blues in life. Like, because it's not 5.0? Or because you simply suck? Just had to rant man, this guy is seriously last warning. ZZZ. What a weird guy. To all my readers, if you're getting a >4.5 in future, please be thankful. Because quoting the NUS guy, you have loads of people who're "dian di-ing" for you. :)

With that said, this will be my last post about results. Until next sem. -.- Hope I don't have to bitch about that guy again.

But I've a feeling I will.

Aw shucks.

Results

2011-12-16T16:55:00.001+08:00

I got back my results..

I am contented. Just that the C+ is like shouting in my face machiam like "HAHA EH LOSER YOU NEVER DO WELL THAT'S WHY YOU SUCK AND GOT C+".

I love Marlar and Taichee. I don't like Ji Pa and Gay Lo that much anymore. Marlar and Taichee <3

HAHAHAHA.

:)

2011-12-08T23:36:00.001+08:00

I've been a really happy man lately.

Holidays

2011-12-03T18:02:00.001+08:00

I was feeling bored so I decided to look for HP7 Part 2 again online since I know that with the DVD out, someone's bound to upload it.

And after 2+ hours and watching it for the third time, I feel damn emo and sad after the movie ended. You know, like that feeling where a part of your life is missing.. AGAIN.

Every time I watched the movie, I received back some different insights about life. For this time, the part where Snape professed his love for Lily in Dumbledore's office, performing the patronous and everything really hit me hard. It hasn't for the previous 2 times, but I didn't know why it struck me so deep in the heart this time.

Let me go and do some thinking. lol.

PS: Whoever is damn free did this ->
http://harrypotter.wikia.com/wiki/Battle_of_Hogwarts

December

2011-12-01T01:54:00.001+08:00

So, it's the end of one semester already.

I ended my last two papers last Monday. Let's just say that I screwed up one paper really badly, didn't have time to finish one question well for two papers and crapped through my human geog paper... as usual. But who cares, at least exams are over. It's not until like two or three weeks time I'll start to cry over my bad results so I decided to really enjoy my time now.

Just the past week alone, I sang K twice, ate Buffet twice, jogged twice, slept-in till noon everyday, spammed episodes after episodes of Kang Xi Lai Le, ate loads of junk food, had more family time, had more time with friends and had more time alone for myself. Life can't get better than this. But I know that in one month's time all these will end, so I'm gonna treasure all these little moments in life before it goes back to the mundane routine.

I also spent some time to stalk Priscilla's blog and realized she blogged so many times during the month of November which I didn't have the time to read most of it to catch up with her life during the exams period. I feel like a bad friend. Now I know where she got her "Kiss Me" song. Sneaky sneaky. As usual, yang's blog is complaining about how something is missing in life. It must be me. Confirm and double confirm. Don't try and deny. =)

HEHEHEHE. Siao.

I'm as free as a free gift, as nuah as a muah chee and as sian as a taupok. Oh, did I mention I'm going to run 42.195km this Sunday and I haven't train a single bit yet? If I die, please transfer all my assets to my mom and sis. Thanks.

Can't wait for Zoukout, Christmas celebrations and start of a new semester. Yes, I know it sounds crazy but I'm already missing FCHC and my bao bei bird awesome geog mates. <3

Problem

2011-11-12T02:29:00.001+08:00

It's less than 5 days to exams and I have not started my revision yet. Right now, i'm still trying to get my last term report done.

I feel a little restless, unmotivated and completely feel like I just want to leave everything till the very end and not do anything at all. But the fact is, I can't.

I received back 4 assignments today and they were all A's.

Heck, I even got an A+.

What the hell, let's just say except for one assignment which I went completely out of point and got a C+ (only around 5% though), the rest of the assignments I got back for this entire semester for my 7 modules were all A's.

I really feel that i'm weird. In secondary school and JC, when I got bad results for all those years I was happy. I always told myself that at least I will have the chance to improve next time. Suddenly when i'm in university and I am receiving those A's, it feels a little weird. I feel like I didn't deserve those grades and don't know how I got them. But at the same time, I did put in loads of effort in all my assignments and I daresay I deserved my grades.

I feel like a businessman, who had a good business going (primary school), went bankrupt (jc and sec) and then had another successful business (now). But I am highly insecure and afraid. I also keep telling myself that this is momentarily and will not last.

That is why I don't know why i'm not happy. It is definitely not because I expected an even better grade, because I am very very thankful for those grades.

I am still trying to find the reason why I'm not happy.

I am thinking that the reason why I'm not happy is because I'm simply tired. And I probably foresee myself not doing well for my examinations. I have a total of 4 papers and they're all packed into 5 days. I even got a day where I have a geog and english paper. It's like back to A levels days again.

It's very tiring to constantly be repeating the same set of routine everyday.

Everyday, wake up, bathe, go to school, eat lunch, do project, eat dinner, go back to school chiong more projects, do until past midnight, walk back to hall, bathe, sleep. Repeat this process by like 1 month, where I had to submit like a gazillion projects and essays. It's really tiring.

I looked back at what I just typed and realized that I've been focusing a lot on myself. The start of every paragraph almost all started with the word 'I'. Maybe I should stop focusing on myself. But how do I not focus on myself when I need the focus to complete my very last assignment.

I am very very very tired. I was all about to go to sleep when I decided I just need to clear my thoughts.

Let's just say now is not the time to continue on with my project anymore. I shall go to sleep, wake up with a fresh mind tomorrow and try to finish it by mid noon. Then, i'll start studying.

As the saying goes, MUG HARD - Pain is temporary, GPA is forever.

Just a few more days... just...

Psychology

2011-11-08T22:57:00.004+08:00

I'm now writing on a Psychology essay about myself. Interesting insights, will share later.

A Good Read

2011-11-08T17:17:00.000+08:00

This reminds me of someone.

The last word: He said he was leaving. She ignored him.

When Laura Munson’s husband asked for a divorce, she ducked instead of fighting. He needed to learn, she says, that his unhappiness wasn’t really about her

Hapiness starts within. Eventually, my husband got it. SEE ALL 72 PHOTOS

Let’s say you have what you believe to be a healthy marriage. You’re still friends and lovers after spending more than half of your lives together. The dreams you set out to achieve in your 20s—gazing into each other’s eyes in candlelit city bistros, when you were single and skinny—have for the most part come true.

Two decades later you have the 20 acres of land, the farmhouse, the children, the dogs and horses. You’re the parents you said you would be, full of love and guidance. You’ve done it all: Disneyland, camping, Hawaii, Mexico, city living, stargazing.

Sure, you have your marital issues, but on the whole you feel so self-satisfied about how things have worked out that you would never, in your wildest nightmares, think you would hear these words from your husband one fine summer day: “I don’t love you anymore. I’m not sure I ever did. I’m moving out. The kids will understand. They’ll want me to be happy.”

But wait. This isn’t the divorce story you think it is. Neither is it a begging-him-to-stay story.

It’s a story about hearing your husband say, “I don’t love you anymore” and deciding not to believe him. And what can happen as a result.

Here’s a visual: Child throws a temper tantrum. Tries to hit his mother. But the mother doesn’t hit back, lecture or punish. Instead, she ducks. Then she tries to go about her business as if the tantrum isn’t happening. She doesn’t “reward” the tantrum. She simply doesn’t take the tantrum personally because, after all, it’s not about her.

Let me be clear: I’m not saying my husband was throwing a child’s tantrum. No. He was in the grip of something else—a profound and far more troubling meltdown that comes not in childhood but in midlife, when we perceive that our personal trajectory is no longer arcing reliably upward as it once did. But I decided to respond the same way I’d responded to my children’s tantrums. And I kept responding to it that way. For four months.

“I don’t love you anymore. I’m not sure I ever did.”

His words came at me like a speeding fist, like a sucker punch, yet somehow in that moment I was able to duck. And once I recovered and composed myself, I managed to say, “I don’t buy it.” Because I didn’t.

He drew back in surprise. Apparently he’d expected me to burst into tears, to rage at him, to threaten him with a custody battle. Or beg him to change his mind.

So he turned mean. “I don’t like what you’ve become.”

Gut-wrenching pause. How could he say such a thing? That’s when I really wanted to fight. To rage. To cry. But I didn’t.

Instead, a shroud of calm enveloped me, and I repeated those words: “I don’t buy it.”

You see, I’d recently committed to a non-negotiable understanding with myself. I’d committed to “the End of Suffering.” I’d finally managed to exile the voices in my head that told me my personal happiness was only as good as my outward success, rooted in things that were often outside my control. I’d seen the insanity of that equation and decided to take responsibility for my own happiness. And I mean all of it.

My husband hadn’t yet come to this understanding with himself. He had enjoyed many years of hard work, and its rewards had supported our family of four all along. But his new endeavor hadn’t been going so well, and his ability to be the breadwinner was in rapid decline. He’d been miserable about this, felt useless, was losing himself emotionally and letting himself go physically. And now he wanted out of our marriage; to be done with our family.

But I wasn’t buying it.

I said: “It’s not age-appropriate to expect children to be concerned with their parents’ happiness. Not unless you want to create co-dependents who’ll spend their lives in bad relationships and therapy. There are times in every relationship when the parties involved need a break. What can we do to give you the distance you need, without hurting the family?”

“Huh?” he said.

“Go trekking in Nepal. Build a yurt in the back meadow. Turn the garage studio into a man-cave. Get that drum set you’ve always wanted. Anything but hurting the children and me with a reckless move like the one you’re talking about.”

Then I repeated my line, “What can we do to give you the distance you need, without hurting the family?”

“Huh?”

“How can we have a responsible distance?”

“I don’t want distance,” he said. “I want to move out.”

My mind raced. Was it another woman? Drugs? Unconscionable secrets? But I stopped myself. I would not suffer.

Instead, I went to my desk, Googled “responsible separation,” and came up with a list. It included things like: Who’s allowed to use what credit cards? Who are the children allowed to see you with in town? Who’s allowed keys to what?

I looked through the list and passed it on to him.

His response: “Keys? We don’t even have keys to our house.”

I remained stoic. I could see pain in his eyes. Pain I recognized.

“Oh, I see what you’re doing,” he said. “You’re going to make me go into therapy. You’re not going to let me move out. You’re going to use the kids against me.”

“I never said that. I just asked: What can we do to give you the distance you need ... ”

“Stop saying that!”

Well, he didn’t move out.

Instead, he spent the summer being unreliable. He stopped coming home at his usual 6 o’clock. He would stay out late and not call. He blew off our entire Fourth of July—the parade, the barbecue, the fireworks—to go to someone else’s party. When he was at home, he was distant. He wouldn’t look me in the eye. He didn’t even wish me “Happy Birthday.”

But I didn’t play into it. I walked my line. I told the kids: “Daddy’s having a hard time, as adults often do. But we’re a family, no matter what.” I was not going to suffer. And neither were they.

My trusted friends were irate on my behalf. “How can you just stand by and accept this behavior? Kick him out! Get a lawyer!”

I walked my line with them, too. This man was hurting, yet his problem wasn’t mine to solve. In fact, I needed to get out of his way so he could solve it.

I knew what you’re thinking: I’m a pushover. I’m weak and scared and would put up with anything to keep the family together. I’m probably one of those women who would endure physical abuse. But I can assure you, I’m not. I load 1,500-pound horses into trailers and gallop through the high country of Montana all summer. I went through Pitocin-induced natural childbirth. And a Caesarean section without follow-up drugs. I am handy with a chain saw.

I simply had come to understand that I was not at the root of my husband’s problem. He was. If he could turn his problem into a marital fight, he could make it about us. I needed to get out of the way so that wouldn’t happen.

Privately, I decided to give him time. Six months.

I had good days and I had bad days. On the good days, I took the high road. I ignored his lashing out, his merciless jabs. On bad days, I would fester in the August sun while the kids ran through sprinklers, raging at him in my mind. But I never wavered. Although it may sound ridiculous to say, “Don’t take it personally” when your husband tells you he no longer loves you, sometimes that’s exactly what you have to do.

Instead of issuing ultimatums, yelling, crying, or begging, I presented him with options. I created a summer of fun for our family and welcomed him to share in it, or not—it was up to him. If he chose not to come along, we would miss him, but we would be just fine, thank you very much.

And we were.

And, yeah, you can bet I wanted to sit him down and persuade him to stay. To love me. To fight for what we’ve created. You can bet I wanted to.

But I didn’t.

I barbecued. Made lemonade. Set the table for four. Loved him from afar.

And one day, there he was, home from work early, mowing the lawn. A man doesn’t mow his lawn if he’s going to leave it. Not this man. Then he fixed a door that had been broken for eight years. He made a comment about our front porch needing paint. Our front porch. He mentioned needing wood for next winter. The future. Little by little, he started talking about the future.

It was Thanksgiving dinner that sealed it. My husband bowed his head humbly and said, “I’m thankful for my family.”

He was back.

And I saw what had been missing: pride. He’d lost pride in himself. Maybe that’s what happens when our egos take a hit in midlife and we realize we’re not as young and golden anymore.

When life’s knocked us around. And our childhood myths reveal themselves to be just that. The truth feels like the biggest sucker-punch of them all: It’s not a spouse, or land, or a job, or money that brings us happiness. Those achievements, those relationships, can enhance our happiness, yes, but happiness has to start from within. Relying on any other equation can be lethal.

My husband had become lost in the myth. But he found his way out. We’ve since had the hard conversations. In fact, he encouraged me to write about our ordeal. To help other couples who arrive at this juncture in life. People who feel scared and stuck. Who believe their temporary feelings are permanent. Who see an easy out and think they can escape.

My husband tried to strike a deal. Blame me for his pain. Unload his feelings of personal disgrace onto me.

But I ducked. And I waited. And it worked.

Reminds me a lot about myself as well.

How I blamed everyone/thing else except myself for my own predicament. How I never reflected that I am the cause/result of my own worries/troubles. How there was always a solution but I never bothered to look for one. How things could have been better if I decided to humble myself and remove my pride.

But I never did and I suffered consequences. I wish I will stop making mistakes like this.

Nature

2011-10-30T16:40:00.000+08:00

Reminds me of why i'm doing what i'm doing.

October Rants

2011-10-09T16:56:00.002+08:00

I used to deem people who asked question like which month of the year do your hate most as dumb.

Not anymore. Because it's now a valid question to me.

I used to hate every month in a year because every month in a year i'm struggling with my studies.

But not now. Now I really really hate October. To hell to all those who still got mood celebrate Oktoberfest.

October is a bad bad month. With 1 module completed I still got 7 more to go. The idea of still needing to go to Bukit Timah Hill, Esplanade and Marina Bay Sands to collect rock samples then come up with 3 reports still baffles me. For what? I don't know. But just do lo, at least I still have one more month.

Bu not the other datelines. Looking for random online statistics and coming up a report for it is equally deadly. It doesn't help that I only have 5 more days for it. It also sucks that I still need to come up with another presentation and full report by the next 2/3 weeks and explain to my professor why my semester project is convincing and relevant.

Did I mention that I have a 2000 words human geog essay which i haven't start yet and have 9 more days to do it?

So here's what I need to do for geog -
1. Collect rock samples and come up with reports (101)
2. 2k geog essay (102)
3. Lab 5 on statistics (103)
4. Presentation for sem project (103)
5. Written report for sem project (103)

It will be okay if I only have one major.. but the minor comes in. FML.

Constructing a whole website for Study of Language, Learning Log, Grammar Test on next Tuesday. Don't you *tut* me when you think Grammar test is easy. Right now I can easily go into the test and score 60/100. But 60/100 is pathetic. Because this test is 20% and can score one.... How how how.. haven't revise finish yet. Lucky I finished my written text article which is worth 20%, otherwise I think I'll be damn demoralized now.

AND it doesn't help you're taking one module on Psychology as well. Like WTF, PBL is a pain in the ass and seriously. Can't we just tackle the problem and just learn about Psychology tactics. WHY NEED TO ALWAYS PROBLEM-BASED ANALYSIS. It's damn irritating. Editing the website, coming up with solutions, then coming up with presentation. Like seriously, I could care less!! We should just come up with a presentation and get 40%! And still must write 2k word essay?!??!?!?!?!?!!?!!?!!!!

This is what I need to do for the month of October and first week of November. You tell me how to not stress? You tell me how to relax? You tell me how to finish??? YOU TELL ME HOW TO REVISE FOR MY EXAMS?

I'll be so glad after this semester is over. If I can get a 3.5 GPA and above for this sem, I'll be shocked because I'm so tied down with so many things.

God, please help me. :('

EDIT: And yes, I'm stressed. You can see all my white hair, pimples and worst of all... migraine coming back. Please please please ask me out in December to help me find my life back. Thanks.

Papi

2011-09-25T20:33:00.001+08:00

姜还是老的辣

She must really thank American Idol for reviving her career.

Joab's woes

2011-09-23T00:51:00.001+08:00

This is what's on my mind right now.

I guess it's about setting priorities, loads of mugging and less procrastination now.

But, it's not easy. Just too many things to do.

包子

2011-09-21T21:01:00.001+08:00

If I am asked to summarize my life right now, i can only think of two words, '包子'.

Yes, not 报纸

But 包子.

Okay lame. But to continue with what i'm saying, it's the fact that i'm always too busy fluffing around school that I have no time for proper lunch thanks to my 5/6 hours straight timetable from lunch time onwards.

I eat an average of about 5 包子 a week and normally these 包子 will last me through my breakfast AND lunch for the day. Because of this, i've derived at three important findings.

1. Whoever said UNI life is slacker than JC life is BLUFFING YOU.

2. Whoever said that YEAR 1 UNI life is slack is BLUFFING YOU TOO.

3. Whoever said that NIE is slack needs to wake up on his ideas.

Enough with the ranting. At least 包子 sums up my life. My friend has to sum up her life with Siew Mai because she's so busy everyday and only have time for Siew Mai.

包子 >>> Siew Mai, at least that's what I think.

Uni life's hectic but i'm not complaining. Okay, i'm complaining but i'm also not complaining.

/dʌz/ /ðət/ /meɪk/ /sɛns/..?

That means 'Does that makes sense' by the way and I have no idea why I bothered to type that out, probably because English Phonetics is pissing the shit out of me. Okay, literally the shit is not really out of me yet but due to Human Language features such as Productivity, you tend to coin the words "piss the shit out of me" together due to collocation.

So, if I ask you whether shit is a noun, adjective or verb, which one would you choose?

The word shit itself is considered as a verb.

But if i'm using the phrase "I'm in some serious shit!", it is deemed as a noun.

And if i say "That was a shit thing to do!", then it's an adjective!

If the rules of English states that a sentence will only make MUCH sense if it has at least a verb, adjective OR noun, then by right...

Shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit

..can be deemed as a completely acceptable sentence.

Siao.

Critical Perspective

2011-09-08T17:42:00.001+08:00

I'm in the NIE Library now (which feels like a second home to me already), rushing my AED 105 Project.

Okay, technically.. I'm not rushing. But I just want to finish this goddamn project because this project is the reason why my studying has been stagnant for the past few days and I still have 2 tutorials which I have not done, and the tutorial sessions are tomorrow. Yayness.

The fact that I've not blogged much since my last post shows how free I am, playing Bejewled Blitz on Facebook from day to day basis and messing around with my friends in school. NOT. I remembered mentioning about just being able to barely finish reading my lecture notes (almost fully understanding) and the next day need to go for lecture already... woah, now I have moved up one ladder! I now read my lecture notes one hour before the lesson and regardless or not whether I understand what I'm reading in the notes, I still go for my lecture because I simply have no time. I know soon I'll move up one more level to totally not reading the notes before the lecture.. but I sure hope it doesn't go that way.

I think I am too awesome. Why?

Because my ability to be distracted and not focus is just amazing. Also, I'm always stuck at my work for a long period of time because of something called the self-worth theory. Sucks right? And they say the way to counter it is to have teachers to motivate you with different ways. Right...

Okay, Procrastination is a bitch. Joab, please go back and do your project.

Don't want leh.. don't want leh..

Siao.

T_T

....A struggle.

Uni Life

2011-08-16T21:46:00.000+08:00

Just want to spend some time penning down (literally not penning down, but whatever) my thoughts before I go for my night run with Amanda and Mei Xuan later.

For the past week or so, I've spent everyday mugging for at least a few hours and if you haven't realize.. I have been trying really hard to cultivate the spirit of being prepared for my lectures and tutorials. I like the fact that I know what my lecturers and tutors were talking about and this was a change as compared to my JC days where I would not even bother to print Momo's Geog notes even if there's a lecture on that day.

However, I find this process really very demanding and it makes me stressed a little. I know this is beneficial to me but I can't help but to feel desperate and helpless at times especially when I'm one of those people who needs to put in twice the amount of effort to absorb the notes, nevertheless to understand the concepts.

Also, it doesn't help that I have 7 modules (+1 project service learning) to juggle with. Just now I was studying in the library where I can't help but to feel discouraged that I am so limited and I really need to pray for God to impart his wisdom to me. It's like, I barely finished the lecture notes for the next day (and that's not counting the time that needs to be spend on tutorials in future) and then the next day I need to start reading up the notes for the next day again. 7 modules is not fun, even if they are 3 AUs each, it's actually really taxing and really brain draining. I feel like a vicious cycle is happening as I spend my time away reading notes after notes and barely have time for my own source of entertainment.

Okay, maybe I'm at this adjusting period where I need to start tuning my life to doing the right things in life. But I really hope that next semester I don't have so many modules. I feel extremely saddened especially when I see all my friends doing like 4 to 5 modules and they have like 1 free day in a week and only 2 hours of lesson on each day. It's like.. this boy with magnum running to the other boy and laughing at him because he only has paddle pop. Quite sad right?

Well, i'm going to be optimistic and rejoice because at least I have paddle pop.. like you know, doing the subjects I like to do (lessons are/were really interesting) as well as having a bunch of supportive friends around me. I was thinking of one word to describe my entire day today and was deriving at words like "sucky.. stupid.. demoralizing..." when I realized that the word that I really want to use would be "blessed".

Blessed because I am blessed. Thankful for all the things that is happening in my life right now. At least I'm tired because I'm trying to do the right thing to study hard. I'll keep fighting. (:

7 Days Friends

2011-08-06T02:29:00.000+08:00

God, I'm really thankful for the wonderful new friends you've placed in my life. They may or may not be the ones who'll walk with me till the end, but it doesn't matter. I'll cherish whatever moment we have together and remember the good past. (:

FOC

2011-08-03T00:10:00.000+08:00

If there's one thing i'll remember most from camp.

Thank you Amasis, for the beautiful memories. (:

Hall

2011-07-29T23:25:00.000+08:00

This will be my first ever post made in my Hall. After this post, I'll be a good freshie and go to sleep before 1130pm, afterall.. I'm going for 2 camps in a row and tomorrow's reporting time is at 8.30am. 7 days, 2 camps, loads of activities.

I wanna start ranting about howbadmyroomconditionwasyesterday but I guess I'll be thankful that at least I got an air-conditioned hall and at least my room is 24-7 away from the sun and forever cooling. Seriously, I need to go to the third floor for pantry and basically my room isn't on the first level, it's like B1. Behind are shades of tree and the door's like at the bottom of a little hill. No sunlight and totalleh gloomy feeling. And not to add that when I first stepped in yesterday, it was so horribly dirty and stinks like mad. After 5 hours of scrubbing on my own (that cuidric completely has to go for team bonding and left me alone to be a Cinderella).. I finally made my own nest. I think I felt like Harry Potter with the amount of spiders I encountered. Zzzzzzz

Well, at least it's clean now. Sparkling clean if you asked me. Amanda and Ced said it was awesome. *pats back*

BUT, why no Singaporeans on my level? (Until now) Why am I like on a foreign exchange? Left door Vietnam, right door China.. down the corridor Indonesia. FML.

There's this GESL thing which we have to do and my group has 15 people. We met today for our first meeting and it lasted for around nearly 2 hours. I think there was very little awkwardness and all of us worked really well together as a team, even those who're introvert also shared their fair share of ideas. This is why I love to go into the teaching profession and I guess I'm right. Really cool people and I felt really happy while working with them. =D

And it's going to be 1130pm soon. I wanna go on and on about the people I've met in school but guess I'll do it some other time! Off to FOC and Hall Camp!

Ciao.

A Prayer

2011-07-24T21:28:00.000+08:00

School is finally starting for me tomorrow. I've been a nsf/free loader/teacher for nearly the past 2 and a half years or so. The beginning of student-hood has been much anticipated and awaited. It feels like i've waited for an eternity for this milestone.

RIP 13/11/08 - 24/07/11

I'm never going to look back.

I pray that 4 years later as I look back to this blogpost, i'll see my prayers answered with a smile on my face. What prayers though? Simple. To do well. That's all I asked for.

I think the NIE Geog department has a great sense of humour by starting the course introduction slide with that header above. Like totalleh help us prospective students look forward to school. They then did a Top 10 reasons to study Geography and Point #9 was...

Told ya they have a great sense of humour right? Then Point #4 was "You'd get out of classroom" which compromises of spamming the next few slides with photographs of outdoor learning and the caption above. Completely siao one like trying to psycho those students who haven't choose their subject yet. (All the other points only got one slide each, you see)

Then when I see the courses I have to take for the next 4 years, I was a little bit shock actually. I thought I had to literally do everything related to geog in the next 4 years. Turns out I get to choose my favourite topics in geog which I want to do!!

Year 2 I have 10 modules to choose from and although I have to choose one from human, physical and technique, I get to choose the last one from any of the other 3 strands above. I looked at the 10 modules and I feel like i'm interested in most of them so I think it's going to be a tough choice. (Except with Coastal and Ocean systems. Hello, me is the one who give up Hydrology in A Level okay) =D Happy because no matter what I choose, I'm doing stuff that I like! Same goes for Year 3!

From the point I knew what I would be studying, I can't help but to thank God for allowing the switch to happen. There's this sense of security within me that tells me that everything is going to turn out well.

I hope. Maybe like 2 years later if I didn't do well and have to drop out of university, I can look back at this post and laugh at the big joke God has played on me. But I pray and hope He won't. And I know He won't. (:

Like My Mother Does

2011-07-20T03:27:00.003+08:00

[Verse 1]

People always say
I have a laugh
Like my mother does
Guess that makes sense

She taught me how to smile
When things get rough

I've got her spirit
She's always got my back
When I look at her
I think, I want to be just like that

[Chorus]

When I love I give it all I've got
Like my mother does
When I'm scared, I bow my head and pray
Like my mother does

When I feel weak and unpretty
I know I'm beautiful and strong
Because I see myself like my mother does

[Verse 2]

I never met a stranger
I can talk to anyone
Like my mother does

I let my temper fly
And she can walk away
when she's had enough

She sees everybody
For who they really are
I'm so thankful for her guidance
She helped me get this far

[Chorus]

When I love I give it all I've got
Like my mother does
When I'm scared, I bow my head and pray
Like my mother does

When I feel weak and unpretty
I know I'm beautiful and strong
Because I see myself like my mother does

[Bridge]

She's a rock
She is grace
She's an angel
She's my heart and soul
She does it all

[Chorus]

When I love I give it all I've got
Like my mother does
When I'm scared, I bow my head and pray
Like my mother does

When I feel weak and unpretty
I know I'm beautiful and strong
Because I see myself like my mother does

Like my mother does

I hear people say
I'm starting to look like my mother does

Inspiring song with meaningful lyrics.. I hope it gets onto the Billboard quick.

Anyway, I've decided to watch HP7 for one last final time alone in the cinema before it gets off-screen. Maybe like one day or on the day before its final screening. I think it's going to get emotional this time round. After all, I grew up with Harry Potter.

Sigh.

Temporary Home

2011-07-17T18:09:00.000+08:00

When time is up,

I'm not afraid because I know... this was just my temporary home.

Deathly Hallows Part 2

2011-07-14T04:11:00.000+08:00

So, the day has arrived and it's finally over.

It felt a little heart-wrenching for me, to know that something you've been looking forward to for the past decade or so is finally over. I grew up with Harry Potter and although I know the movies suck (especially 4th and 5th movie), at least there was something to look forward to after Deathly Hallows (book) was released in 2007.

I guess it will remain as a classic forever and there will be more spin-offs, maybe like remake of the movies or even TV series or whatsoever, but it's just sad you know.. to know that it's all over. ~~In years to come, I foresee myself forcing the Harry Potter books upon my kids and make sure they read them.~~

No spoilers so don't worry, you can read on safely. I just felt that the last movie (DH Part 2) was the first time I felt a HP movie was draggy. Maybe it was because I had the urgent need to pee so I wanted it to end quickly, but I'm definitely not complaining. Better longer than completely shortchanging the story. Even Kimmy said that the movie was better for once and she finally understood most part of the story, even though she had not read the series before.

It also feels great to be one of the first few people around the world to watch the movie at the Grand Premiere of the movie in Singapore held at Shaw Lido just now. All the anticipation and excitement from all the Harry Potter fans around me = WIN. There was this woman dressed as Umbridge. Can I just say she looks as nice as her? :)

Anyway, something random to make you understand the story better.

Before publication of Deathly Hallows, Rowling refused to speak out about her religion, stating, "If I talk too freely, every reader, whether 10 or 60, will be able to guess what's coming in the books". However, many have noted Christian allegories apparent in Deathly Hallows. In an August 2007 issue of Newsweek, Lisa Miller commented that Harry dies and then comes back to life to save mankind, like Christ. She points out the title of the chapter in which this occurs—"King's Cross"—a possible allusion to Christ's cross. Also, she outlines the scene in which Harry is temporarily dead, pointing out that it places Harry in a very heaven-like setting where he talks to a father figure "whose supernatural powers are accompanied by a profound message of love". Miller argues that these parallels make it difficult to believe that the basis of the stories is Satanic. Rowling also stated that "my belief and my struggling with religious belief ... I think is quite apparent in this book", which is shown as Harry struggles with his faith in Dumbledore.

:) Now I have to find something to get me going for the next decade. Maple?

Petunia

2011-07-11T15:40:00.000+08:00

She has more lines than in the book for this scene.

收拾

2011-07-09T00:32:00.000+08:00

收拾是为了减轻负担，消除烦恼。
但为何收拾完的心情，会是如此沉重？

反反复复思考，
东西丢了又捡回来。
捡回来了却又丢掉。
好像怎样都无法摆脱。

所剩下的，也只是具体回忆。
而回忆，该是甜美和美丽的。
但留下的却是惋惜，
感叹今日不如往日。

原来收拾并不是收拾，
而是把不快乐的回忆继续埋葬。
扔掉的物品也只是奢侈品，
真正的回忆，却是永远保留洗不清。

我收拾了，
却还是一样乱。

回家

2011-07-08T01:56:00.001+08:00

回家，应该是件快乐的事。

但每个人对回家的定义却是不同的。

你可以是放了工回家休息
也可以是读书后放学回家
又或则是玩累了回家睡觉
也可能是毫无选择得回家

无论如何，回家
对我来说
给了我无限的温暖
我喜欢回家。

一个人

2011-06-30T02:50:00.002+08:00

夜深人静，从前的画面不断地在脑海中打颤着。

一个人生活，我习惯了。
一个人累了，我尝试了。
一个人坚持，我熬过了。

过了那么久，我还是一个人在努力的挣扎着。
是为了什么而求存呢？

心里的铁门，是任何人都无法撬开的。
无论多少人尝试打开我心房，我都是无动于衷。

是倔强吗？还是只是一种乏味的逃避？
我想答案我比谁都还更清楚。

总有一天我会厌倦逃避。
但那一天几时又会到来呢？

生命是上帝给的，第二生命是靠自己努力得来的。
我的努力，就快要用尽了。

现在只想，好想好想，睡个长觉。
也，将是恶梦的来临。

Alone

2011-06-13T19:55:00.000+08:00

Typing this post, by the resort, 10m away from the beach, completely dark, limited lights, hungry (no dinner yet), typhoon seems to be coming, blasting songs into my earpiece, stalking people on facebook, listening to Jai-Ho, wondering when will dinner come, waiting for the rain, itchy from some mozzies bite, enjoying the big winds blowing, feeding more mozzies...

Feeling a tad bit emo.

Okay, tomorrow will be better.

I hope.

=D

Nurse reveals the top 5 regrets people make on their deathbed

2011-06-01T11:06:00.002+08:00

By Bonnie Ware(who worked for years nursing the dying)
http://ohdarling.posterous.com/nurse-reveals-the-top-5-regrets-people-make-o

1. I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

This was the most common regret of all. When people realise that their life is almost over and look back clearly on it, it is easy to see how many dreams have gone unfulfilled. Most people have had not honoured even a half of their dreams and had to die knowing that it was due to choices they had made, or not made.

It is very important to try and honour at least some of your dreams along the way. From the moment that you lose your health, it is too late. Health brings a freedom very few realise, until they no longer have it.

2. I wish I didn't work so hard.

This came from every male patient that I nursed. They missed their children's youth and their partner's companionship. Women also spoke of this regret. But as most were from an older generation, many of the female patients had not been breadwinners. All of the men I nursed deeply regretted spending so much of their lives on the treadmill of a work existence.

By simplifying your lifestyle and making conscious choices along the way, it is possible to not need the income that you think you do. And by creating more space in your life, you become happier and more open to new opportunities, ones more suited to your new lifestyle.

3. I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings.

Many people suppressed their feelings in order to keep peace with others. As a result, they settled for a mediocre existence and never became who they were truly capable of becoming. Many developed illnesses relating to the bitterness and resentment they carried as a result.

We cannot control the reactions of others. However, although people may initially react when you change the way you are by speaking honestly,in the end it raises the relationship to a whole new and healthier level. Either that or it releases the unhealthy relationship from your life. Either way, you win.

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

Often they would not truly realise the full benefits of old friends until their dying weeks and it was not always possible to track them down. Many had become so caught up in their own lives that they had let golden friendships slip by over the years. There were many deep regrets about not giving friendships the time and effort that they deserved.Everyone misses their friends when they are dying.

It is common for anyone in a busy lifestyle to let friendships slip.But when you are faced with your approaching death, the physical details of life fall away. People do want to get their financial affairs in order if possible. But it is not money or status that holds the true importance for them. They want to get things in order more for the benefit of those they love. Usually though, they are too ill and weary to ever manage this task. It is all comes down to love and relationships in the end. That is all that remains in the final weeks,love and relationships.

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

This is a surprisingly common one. Many did not realise until the end that happiness is a choice. They had stayed stuck in old patterns and habits. The so-called 'comfort' of familiarity overflowed into their emotions, as well as their physical lives. Fear of change had them pretending to others, and to their selves, that they were content. When deep within, they longed to laugh properly and have sillyness in their life again.
When you are on your deathbed, what others think of you is a long way from your mind. How wonderful to be able to let go and smile again, long before you are dying.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Hmm. Sets you thinking.

Thank You

2011-05-29T11:22:00.000+08:00

The last day of the term and a truly amazing one.

With 2T8

With 1E5

With 1N1

My 2 awesome EL Reps.

Thanks for all the help with the collection of homework for the past 3 months!

My truly amazing 1N1 boys.

They were the only bunch who can make me lose my seriousness and professionalism and laugh during classes. T_T

Life would be darn boring without Shubaa and Philina! =D

I can't imagine what if Jaslyne didn't offer any help to me all the time. Thank you so much for everything.

My EL fairy godmother!!! <3

@ Lynette's wedding

People often say that you're happy when you're doing the things that you like to do. I can't find more truth in this statement. I remember that whilst I was studying in be it JC or secondary school and whenever I don't feel like going to school i'll just escalate my illness and skip school for the day. Meaning maybe I have a simple cough or what but i'll throw in headache and flu so that I confirm no need to go to school. I don't do it very often (maybe once in 2/3 months) but still, you know it is something you shouldn't do. This is even more evident in NS where I can just get MC (for free!) and not attend camp for like 2/3 days, so whenever like i'm slightly sick i'll make sure I get MC and not go to camp instead. (who would, seriously?)

But it's different for the past 3 months. I find myself being responsible for my actions as a teacher and there were a few times when I fell sick and I didn't even bother to go and see a doctor but insisted on going to school to attend my classes. Of course, if I'm really sick I didn't go to school to spread the germs to my students lah. But you get what I mean. Every teacher I know kept telling me to teach English but every teacher I know also told me that EL is the worst subject in terms of marking. I fully understood what they meant but I also really enjoyed the experience. When it comes to teaching a language subject, you get to go deep with the students and know a little more of their inner thoughts when it comes to class discussions and journal entires. And I like the feeling of being responsible for the young lives that I have a part in moulding their future and helping them to grow up to become a better person in life.

But the biggest achievement of all is that finally for the first time in the 21 years of my life, I'm doing something that I know I'm at least good at, be it when it comes to teaching or interacting with the students. I didn't feel like I was a waste of space anymore. I didn't feel like I was a failure anymore. I didn't feel like I was actually wasting MOE's money and the time and knowledge of the students during my lessons. I knew that I had put in my very best when it comes to teaching and I know I had not shortchange my students. When I saw how all of them managed to improve within just a short period of 1 and a half months, I was happy, glad and really excited for them. At least I knew my efforts didn't go down to the drain. And a little bonus would be all the love and care the students showered back upon you. Cards after cards, letters after letters, messages after messages - they're sources which kept me going on and on when times were hard during the period of teaching. (All the marking, when students disobeyed etc) But I got through it all and at the end of the day, I knew that I had not come out of this teaching experience learning nothing, but gained a whole world of new knowledge, insights and most importantly, wonderful memories and experiences.

What touched me more was the Principal's, VPs and senior teacher's interest in getting me back to do my practicum in the school as well as getting me back as a permanent teacher in YTSS. I can't help but to feel more greatful to have been given a chance to teach in the school for 3 months, but to be recognized for my abilities and efforts? That was just simply mind-blowing and I just can't thank God enough for planning out everything so beautifully for me.

Just about 3 months back on a Thursday night, I was just complaining to Xingyi about how I detested about the fact that nothing is moving on and changing in my life after the NS period; I couldn't get a relief job and everything seemed so bleak and unknown. I told her I would go to bed and the next day would be a better day, as that was what I will do all the time when I'm down. The next thing I knew was my phone ringing at 9am the next morning and jolting me up from my sleep. Unknown number... hmmm? And three hours later I was sitting in the Principal's office for an interview and got my job within 1minute. (I also dyed my hair back to a normal shade during the 3 hours =P)

After I got to know the RTs there, I actually got to know from them that the job that was offered to me was actually supposed to be offered to their friends and there was actually a long list of about 40 to 50 people waiting for RT in the school, but the EL Dept chose me because of one simple reason, the fact that I'm the only candidate going to NIE and knowing what I wanted to do in life - to pursue a teaching career, they decided that the best bet would be to go with me and that was how I beat all the other candidates to the job. Unfair I know, but simply God planned and amazing.

Then I got reminded of how God has always the best plans for me all these years in my life. I remembered the first major setback in my life was when I couldn't even get into a double science class. I felt angry and shortchanged and I cried my lungs out. I just didn't pass the subject, but my overall results percentage was better than half of the school (school level position was 100+) but there I was, in a single science class just because I was judged for one subject which I couldn't do well in and the others who didn't even have a better overall score than me can happily go to classes that were better than mine. I started hating the school even more, I didn't like studying anymore. I felt insecure about my place in the school, my intelligence, my IQ, my abilities and almost everything in life. I would always remember the times i'll always put my Science textbook in my bag and never carry it on my hands because I knew I would be judged by the students in the school as a combined science student. I really felt bad and insecure and for two years, I never detested sciences and maths even more. Despite my horrendours L1R5 for my 3 prelims, (AGG of 39, 27 then 18) I still did well enough to get into AJ Arts Stream. I didn't know how it happened, but I knew God must be behind it.

Why? Because i scored 20 points exactly for my CCA points to get an A2. Why? Because i hated Chemistry and was about to give up on the subject and didn't even bother to study until a prompting in me woke me up at 3am in the morning and I decided to start reading just my textbook and I remembered clearly how I just read the bold text in the textbook on Organic Chemistry (I didn't know anything about it at all) and started memorizing everything and somehow, I just understood everything easily. Or maybe I don't, but I knew what I was reading and I knew I could remember them. On the day of the Chemistry paper itself, for the past years OC would alway be tested about 15-20 marks out of a 65 marks paper. I still remembered how I flipped through the paper and counted.. a full 28 marks tested on Organic Chemistry. Wow. And I could do them all and I believe I got all of them correctly.

Why? Because I had a change in Maths teacher to the most awesome one in the world who would invite the weaker students to her house every week for free tuition for 3 hours (free food/pizzas/drinks). Why? Because I simply did well enough to make it into AJ.. but that was simply what was needed and once in AJ, I was on level ground with the other Arts students as well. But I knew I must buck up and do my best.

Then again, I couldn't grasp hold of the hectic JC curriculum and all the workload started catching up on me. The content of Geog/Econs and Chinese Lit was GG to the max and I just couldn't get Economics and Maths (as usual) at all. I nearly retained in J1. I was given a second chance, did all my retests on my 3 subjects and was one of the only 4 students who passed the Economics retest out of the 84 students retaking the paper. I also passed my Chinese Lit and Geography despite the limited knowledge that I had. I didn't know how it happened, but I knew during that tough period of time, I kept relying on God's strength and kept myself in prayers. It has to be God.

I crashed and burn through J2, did my A levels and knew that God was with me throughout, even though it was the darkest period of my spiritual life. I only studied 2/7 for one section of my Chinese Lit, and the only 2 I studied came out for the examination and I think without that section, I would have flunk that subject. I didn't study at all for my Mathematics and GP because my H2s were so weak, so God gave me results that was fair and deemed for my effort put into the subject. I gave up on the whole topic of Hydrology (1/3 of the Physical Geog syllabus) and guess what? Most of the students didn't get the Hydrology question at all so I was on fair ground again. I only studied 50% (or even lesser) of the content for Economics (ask my friends about that) and I got blessed with a grade I knew I didn't deserve. But God gave it to me.

I scored well enough to get into a place where I knew God wanted me to be at and there were times I was angry with why i couldn't just score a bit more to get into the courses that I wanted. But then I couldn't have asked for anything more. To be paid while studying? To be doing something that I'm really good at and really like? To be with the same group of people with the same aspirations as you? To have a confirmed route as to what I would be doing? (And double confirm with the YTSS experience) I couldn't have asked for anything more. This is the route God knows/knew would be the best for me and frankly speaking, I also barely made it into the course because I had friends who had 1 to 2 ranking points worst than me and they didn't even get the degree course at all.

I am thankful with what I have and I want to thank God for blessing me with the paths he helped paved for me which he knew was best for me and I completely knew I didn't deserve my grades all these years but he made a miracle and I just happened to scrape through each and everytime. But i've also told myself that i've enough of just scraping through for my examinations. I want to start doing well for a change once i start school and somehow I knew I would be fine, because I have God with me. Thank you God, thank you for all the people who've helped me. Thank you everyone.

Completely blessed, blissful and never happier than before. I'll continue to give my best.

Agape,
Joab

AJC Photocopy Aunty

2011-05-24T23:51:00.001+08:00

Go.. go and join this Facebook Group!

AJC Photocopy Lady =D

XIAO MEI!!! <3

Insomnia

2011-05-18T01:54:00.000+08:00

It is one of those late night insomnia.

Tossed and turned in my bed for about an hour before i gave up sleeping. Played a few games of Bejeweled Blitz before i succumbed to my overflowing thoughts. Sigh.

I just have to say that when a relationship doesn't turn out well, most of the time.. both parties are at fault. But here is not the time to go deep into who was at fault. It's kinda disheartening to see that it has to turn out this way in the end. I thought all was going well and was so looking forward to a wedding banquet next year.

K, i hope you're happier this way.
Y, i wish you all the best.

Joab

I love my students

2011-05-15T14:38:00.000+08:00

This post is in no way trying to insult/discriminate/criticize my students. I just want to share with my friends why I love my students so much because they're simply so cute and adorable. Each time i see them do something like this, i'll just laugh and it really brightens up my day. I yearn for the innocence that they have in them, which is something that i can never find in myself anymore. Saddening it is, but i'm glad i have my students to remind me of life's very fundamental way of living - To live with love and purity in the heart.

Thank you all my students. This is something that you all never knew you have given/taught a teacher. I do hope that my students have not successfully stalked me and "stumbled" across this blog. If you're one of them, please just take the following post lightly and laugh along with me. I love you all still, very much. (:

You tell me how do you get through a 4 page long letter with "old folks" written as "old flocks" without laughing?

"I saw a young, dashing man more handsome than my English teacher."

Smart, very smart. So i am handsome, just the man is more handsome than me. Thanks ah.

I retaliated the small handwriting with a sea of red. I hope this student will improve. =/

I gave a spelling test and I could barely guess what was the original word i've given to the class from this piece of work. T_T

"As it is a mindset, it is reproduced by the same egg, it is something that is connected, like one of the sisters in the news, actually knew that she has a sissy."

A case of not reading the Reader's Digest article properly and crapping a few lines for the opinion. God knows what was she thinking.

Apparently, this girl was not usually one of the jokers but she shocked me when she played this stunt. Hmm.

I live in England and he was writing a letter to me. Yay.

Wow thanks. I'm flattered.

My first "punishment" i gave to a student. What really happened was this student said the word "cin cai" in my class very loudly. Hence i was really annoyed by his constant disruptions and i merely said "you go home and write cin cai 1000 times" in a sort-of-joking-and-not-serious-manner.

He really went home and wrote 1000 times. Best. Tell me how not to awww? I felt so sorry i even wrote him a note and gave him sweets and cookies after that lah.

Last but not least, this is what one student did for me. I was speechless when i received it.

Happy memories, that will last me forever and keep me going for the next 8 years. Thank you, students. :)

Nyan Nyan

2011-05-09T23:51:00.002+08:00

Spend the next 10 hours of your life listening to this awesome song.

Lyrics:

Nyan Nyan Nyan Nyan Nyan Nyan Nyan Nyan

...and it ends 10 hours later.

When i'm 46...

2011-04-24T22:28:00.002+08:00

I wanna look like this.

Memories of a lifetime

2011-04-19T23:23:00.000+08:00

I need to be motivated to finish the remaining of my 75 situational writing scripts, 160 newspaper articles, 160 book reviews, 80 essay corrections, over 100 journal entries and 40 NT workbooks. Yesterday i got through 80 journals and 80 comprehension.. shall continue to persevere.

But i'm totally drained out and tired now due to extensive running about for an epic school event version of The Amazing Race today. T_T

The Healthy Lifestyle Day for the school staff was held today and due to unforeseen circumstances, i was made the group leader (and i was only informed this morning) and guess who was in my team? The Principal.

Win.

The best thing of all? I didn't even know she was in the team because i did not even know her by her name and surname and when i looked at the names of my group mates, i thought she was just another random teacher from another department. What an embarrassing moment when...... shall not bother to explain. Sigh.

My lesson learnt for the day? School principals must be damn high.

We ran, we competed and our group came in 1st out of 16 teams. Totally LOL moment, especially when we were just like crashing and burning our way through the entire time.

The prize was a bottle of NEWater and a McChicken burger. For everyone. Yay.

But this medal will bring about memories of a lifetime whenever i look at it in future.

Thank you, YT! I couldn't have asked for a better opportunity elsewhere! =D

Quote of the day

2011-04-12T23:08:00.003+08:00

别因为失去而哭，而因为曾经拥有而笑。

Quote of the day

2011-04-11T22:33:00.001+08:00

人到了生命的低潮要经过三种逆境：面对，接受和放下。

Fruit Paradise Cafe @ Orchard Central

2011-04-10T14:39:00.002+08:00

Yanyan and I were looking for a place to rest after our long shopping spree and decided to stop-by Fruit Paradise Cafe, having been there for a couple of times before and since I was really thirsty and craving for their really fresh fruit juices as well.

Fruit Paradise offers a wide variety of fresh fruit tarts and also other specialty tea, coffee, fruit juices and many others, which makes it an awesome and ideal place for friends to sit down and have a relaxing afternoon lazing around and do some intense nuah-ing.

Apple + Orange Juice @ $4.50

What i'm most impressed with is the portion of the drink you get @ $4.50. Absolutely worth it, not even considering the fact that the fruits used were really fresh and I could literally taste the natural sweetness of the apple and orange fruits in my drink. Yanyan ordered the Watermelon Juice yesterday @ $4 and he gave me an orgasmic look when he first tasted the drink. LOL LOL! Most of the juices go for around $4 to $5.50~

Mixed Berries Chocolate Tart @ $7.80

We got a tea + tart set for $9.80, but usually each tart goes for around $5.80 - $7.80! The chocolate cream at the top was addictively sinful and i especially love the chocolate filling in the tart which was delicately flavoured. The strawberries and blueberries used for the tart were also of good quality and extremely fresh!

Yuzu Pear Blossom Tea @ $4.50

I decided to go for their specialty tea instead of the fruit juices this time round and i didn't regret my choice. The waiter was also very helpful with recommending which tea is the most popular among the patrons and between the Passion Fruit Tea and the Yuzu Pear Blossom Tea, i chose the latter! The aroma of the freshly brewed tea was insanely fragrant and the taste of it was light but flavourful.

Look at what ingredients were used for the tea!

Just look at the clarity of the tea~ <3

Fruit Paradise Cafe

Orchard Central

#05-51/52

Operating Hours

Daily 11am - 9pm

Phone

6509 9920

Not to forget Ma La Hotpot for lunch! Yanyan let's try it again someday! :D

Quote of the day

2011-04-06T22:44:00.001+08:00

你是一个情绪过度稳定的人，还是一个懂得压抑自己情绪的人？

Quote of the day

2011-04-06T00:42:00.001+08:00

一辈子可以有很多朋友。可是一辈子的朋友，有你就好。

(:

Dilemma

2011-04-06T00:08:00.000+08:00

Okay, i never thought i'll be put into this situation and forced to make a choice.

Sigh. God please help me. Yanyan and muzhu please tell me what to do. =(

:)

2011-04-04T23:23:00.002+08:00

The girl which i mentioned few blog posts back apologized to me today. I think this is going to sustain me through this tiring, mundane week. Then there's this 12km 2XU run this weekend. T_T

I think my students are crazy. They're stalking me up, down, left, right, inside, out. Thank God my FB is on privacy mode.

Need to go on a shopping spree soon. Yes, i need to buy clothes. I want to get some normal tees because i should stop wearing polo.. but i shall not resist the temptation and maybe get myself one more polo. Feel like getting one from Fred Perry~

I think Starbucks is overrated. It's nice but i prefer TCC. But TCC got GST + Service Charge. Chicken backside.

I still have around 60+ essays to mark and the dateline to key in the scores is this Friday. GG-fied. I only managed to mark 6 or 7 essays today despite bringing some home to mark. But i always get nothing done at home because of the extremely condusive environment.

NOTE TO SELF: DON'T STUDY AT HOME IN FUTURE.

Oh yea, did i mention i wanna go shopping?

Random thoughts overflowing. Bleargh!

Chicken Hot Pot @ Square 2 & NYDC @ Velocity

2011-04-02T18:41:00.005+08:00

Here's lunch with Johnny last week. Been eating loads lately. T_T

Chicken Hot Pot @ $9.80 (Small)

The serving portion is almost the same as the last time i visited the place, good enough for two people but if you're a big eater, you might want to give your hot pot an "upsize" up to medium or large. The sauce of the chicken hot pot is very spicy and flavourful; while i preferred the sauce from the Beef Hot Pot, Johnny likes this one better. The waiter will make it a point to "refill" your hot pot with their own specialty soup that goes pretty well with the sauce. The chicken was marinated with more than 10 types of spices and stir fried with onion, leek, green pepper, red chilli, carrot, celery, ginger and szechuan peppercorn!

Beef Beef Behemoth @ $16.80 (Small)

I think the sauce from the Beef Beef Behemoth goes better with the rice as the taste is not too overpowering. The beef is soft and tender, well marinated with the same amount of ingredients used above.. if not even more. The beef portion is also generous such that Johnny and I found it difficult to finish our 2 Hot Pots.

There's only a total of 3 Hot Pots choices available there and this is the last one. We didn't order this because it's damn troublesome to eat prawns in public places but it looks damn good. Maybe i shall try it one day! :)

食尚探路's Recommendation

Chicken Hotpot 鸡公煲

Square 2 Novena

#04-01 to 02A/B/C

Operating Hours

Daily 1130am - 930pm

Phone

63977175

Then it was desserts over at NYDC~

The ambience of the place is really relaxing and some of the sofa seats even have cushions! Even the menu looks damn atas! The waiters were really polite and patient when taking your orders because there were simply too many varieties of desserts to choose from ranging from coffees to cakes and even mudpies!

I told ya the menu looks good. Johnny and I were pondering over what to order because we wanted to have the best of ALL worlds. We wanted ice cream, cake and coffee but due to our heavy lunch, we limited our orders to two.

Ally's New York Cheese Cake with Mango Tango Ice Cream @ $9.80

I'm not much of a cheesecake fan but i can tell you that this cheesecake is AWESOME. The cheesecake is smooth and dense, with a tad bit of moisture that adds a lot of flavour to the cake itself. Definitely a must try and goes especially well with the scoop of Mango Tango Ice-cream and whipped cream!

Hazelnut Elephanccino @ $7.80

It's not called an "Elephanccino" for nuthink! OMG. When it arrived Johnny and I were like... 是大的 lo... and it's true, both of us couldn't finish the drink without feeling bloated. The hazelnut taste wasn't too strong at first and you will need to get the hang of the taste of the drink because it will taste a little bitter initially but after awhile when you stir the whipped cream with the drink, it tasted really rich and thick!

NYDC New York Dessert Cafe

Velocity @ Novena Square

#03-26/27 Singapore 307683

Operating Hours

Daily 1130am - 1000pm

Phone

63584924

Patience

2011-03-30T00:17:00.000+08:00

After one month into the job, i finally got into the first confrontation with a student.

I guess i did not handle the case well and broke down in front of the senior teacher when i approached her for advice and the next step of approach. She told me that over the years, i'll need to learn how to be thick-skinned and really handle those problematic students differently.

What happened was this girl, whom the entire class (NT, sigh) do not like because she has some major serious attitude problem and already has a track record of several few confrontations with other subject teachers, was disturbing her classmates around her as she kept talking on and on non-stop when her classmates were trying their best to focus on my lesson. So, what i did.. and i admit was partially my fault, was i used a SINGLE SHEET of A4 Paper which was the answer key to the the comprehension i was going through with them and tap her head lightly and asked her to listen to me, as she was seating somewhere within my reach.

It triggered a series of rude comments and remarks made, including some really not so nice words like calling me rude and no manners and she kept on rambling and rambling, louder and louder each moment as if she's all prepared to make a scene out of it. Of course as a teacher, i could tolerate none of these nonsense. Hence, i simply told her if she doesn't want to be in my class she can get out of the class. And she did. She stood up from her seat, stormed out of the class and then slammed the door loudly & dramatically. Wow.

Professionalism. I asked the class if what i did was acceptable and some of them even cheered and said i did the right thing because they simply could not stand that girl any much longer and they were all backing me up. I asked them if they would be witnesses to vouch that it was the attitude of the girl which triggered this whole incident and they were all like mad happy to be able to do something "bad" to result in her hopefully getting suspended or what. Also, i had a co-teacher in class who can vouch that all i did was gently tap the head of the girl so that she will listen to me... and of course i admit it was my fault because it sure didn't turn out well.

Had it not been for the co-operation of the other 39 students in class.. i guess i wouldn't have been able to carry on teaching. After the lesson, my co-teacher who came in to observe the class kept on telling me that the class really behaved differently during my lesson because they were so quiet, attentive and so eager to learn. Something which she assured me that hasn't happen to her lesson with the class yet. Of course i was happy to hear something like that.

Support from NT Class. Check. (CHECK CHECK CHECK as it's so hard to accomplish for any teacher)
Recognition from teachers. Check.

But deep down within me, i was just really sad that there is still this one student, whom i have not been able to capture her attention and make her to be interested in my lesson. I agree that part of me feeling so affected by it was because i'm simply too emotional. That i completely agree. Yanyan says i'm just too sensitive. Maybe? But i beg to differ.

Honestly, what was going through my mind and pains me the most was when my co-teacher told me the girl now refuses to go for my lessons (and she's already not going for maths, science + other classes) because she thinks that the teachers are picking on her. Many of the teachers who knew about this incident afterwards (apparently i shouted quite loudly at her after class till about all the second level classrooms can hear me) came over to give me assurance that it was NOT my fault and i should not feel affected by just this one problematic student.

But i just can't help but to feel affected by it. But God was there to intervene into my negative thoughts even though i made a simple prayer after the whole incident for it to be resolved quickly. Just as i was about to leave the school, apparently still affected by the whole incident.. i heard two girls shouting my name "Mr Ng... Mr Ng..." from behind.

Ahhh. It was 2 of my students from the NA class whom i previously thought didn't really enjoy my lessons because they always have a blank look on their faces whenever i'm in class with them. They had ran all the way across the corridor on the second floor just to bade goodbye to me before i leave the school. At that moment, my heart simply melts and i also completely forgot about the whole confrontation incident. God always surprises me at the most adept moments in life.

And i felt so much better after that. Although still affected by it but definitely my mood improved as compared to the first few hours after the incident.

I will take this as a learning experience and if i ever got discouraged from teaching again.. i will remind myself that i still have the support from 119 students and i shouldn't base my negativity on just that 1 student.

Now all i hope and pray is for the girl to be present in my lesson tomorrow so that she does not miss out on an important lesson. Changes in attitude can come afterwards, because she needs to first co-operate in order to make things work. Hopefully.

忙碌

2011-03-28T00:10:00.001+08:00

近期虽然忙碌多了，但我的生活还是过得十分充实。

生命里增加了从教书带来的快乐和满足感，学生也给我提供了无穷的欢乐和喜悦。

今天我站在十二楼的窗户往下一看 (别担心我没自杀的念头)。。。哇！我才忽然醒悟，觉得生命真的可以好脆弱，好无助。

在你最需要别人爱护和关怀的时候，脑海浮现的那几个人，往往都是你生命中不能没有的精神支助。而我也很清楚他们是谁。

三年前会考成绩放榜的前一天，我看到了一道彩虹。那道彩虹间接给了我力量和勇敢。三年后的今天，这美丽的画面又再次出现在我眼前。是巧合吗？

我只知道，再多的苦难和辛苦 - 我都不能放弃！

虽然事到如今，好多事情/关系都不如往日了。。

我要不断的提醒自己，我是幸福的！那些不懂得珍惜的人就由他们去吧！

JOAB, YOU DESERVE SO MUCH BETTER! =D

@ ZOUK

JAGERS

SNOW WHITE AND THE SEVEN DRAWFS

(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:

Happiness

2011-03-23T00:30:00.004+08:00

I want to blog this down so that i know 以后的将来 when i browse through my older posts, this will be one of those memorable blog posts which will bring a smile across my face and help me walk further as well as through more dark times in life.

Last week, i came to know that i'll be taking over this new Sec Two Normal Technical class once school reopens. At first, i was feeling damn worried and paranoid whether i'll be able to cope with the hectic schedule with more than 14 periods a week and 3 classes.

I've previously taken that class for 2 monitoring sessions with a senior teacher and both times, she had to shout till her throat goes sore before the class will even bother to co-operate and do their given assignments. Even with that, they were just half-heartedly doing their work and it was all wrong answers everywhere because they simply didn't care/bother. So that boils down to all my worries.

When i returned to school on Monday, i found out that another EL relief teacher and I will actually in fact be "co-teaching" the class, so that means half the workload will be shared and that was really kind of a huge relief for me.

Hence today, i stepped into the class for the first time (i agreed to take the first lesson).. feeling a strange tinge of unexplainable excitement, you know.. like writing a new chapter in your life or something similar to that. I had very low expectations prior to entering the class and even told my colleagues that if they ever hear a strange high pitch male shrilly voice shouting from few doors/floors away, it will definitely be from me because i had expected myself to be shouting my throat till dry to get them to co-operate with me.

But i was wrong, dead wrong.

It took me barely 30 seconds, with a death stare and a straight face to get an entire class to quieten down and settle down for lesson. Okay, feat one achieved.

Then everything simply flow on naturally as i continued to set the ground rules with the class, sharing to them about my life, my expectations of the class as well as the effort i want to see them put in for their work. Okay, feat two achieved. I managed to shut them up for a whole 15 minutes, of course with disruptions from a few jokers here and there but considered mild based on the destruction i've seen them done before.

So, i got them to do their first assignment; to write an introduction about themselves within 15 minutes. Note that this is from a NT class which normally take around 20 minutes to settle down, 20 minutes for filing of worksheets and 20 minutes for the teacher to nag and scold them for their misbehavior. Feat three was achieved because i got all my introductions within half an hour into the lesson, something i've spent about 45 minutes with my other 2 classes.

Luckily i had something else in plan and was well-prepared. But i didn't expect myself to have ample time to go into proper teaching because i thought it was ultimately the first lesson and that they would not enjoy a teacher going into proper teaching with them the very first lesson.

But i took the leap of faith and distributed the Comprehension worksheet to them anyway. Feat four was achieved when i actually got the attention from most of the class and managed to go through the Comprehension passage thoroughly with them for the next 15 minutes. I was really enjoying the lesson by then as they were also extremely responsive when it comes to discussions and questions asked as well.

By then i only had less then 10 minutes left with them for them to finish up the Cloze Passage. But i decided to push my faith with the class a little further by telling them to get it done quickly so that if they're fast and co-operative, i'll release them for early recess. What happened for the next 10 minutes was pretty awesome IMHO. I managed to get the entire class to complete their Cloze Passage, submit it back to me for marking and released the class for recess just moments before the bell rang. I kept to my promise anyway, but was half expecting them to give me substandard/rubbish work. But i counted that as feat number five anyway.

Tada! I was wrong again. Wrong! Wrong! Wrong!!!

Little did i expect myself with only 2 failures after i marked the entire pile of scripts. The class is in fact very conscientious with their work and most of them could have even gotten full marks had it not been for careless mistakes with grammar and tenses as most of them got the correct word anyway. But what further affirmed me for my effort put in for the class was when this senior teacher who apparently is the Maths teacher for the class came to me and said this...

Maths Teacher : Joab right?? I passed by your class just now and got a shock of my life! How did you managed to keep the class so quiet? I've always tried to do it but they just never shut their mouth up.

Me : Huh?.. I just set the ground rules with them first and got their attention through sharing some life stories about myself to them and told them that as a teacher, they're expected to respect me, but i do not need to do so for them. Then I told them that if they want me to start respecting them, they have to do the same for me as well.

Maths Teacher : Oh... you're an intern is it?

Me : No *laughs*... i'm just a relief teacher.

Maths Teacher : That's even more surprising and interesting, very very good you know? I think you should become a teacher next time.

At that point of time, i really felt so uplifted. You know, it's like being recognized for something that you're FINALLY able to do good in life, after all the failures and setbacks that you've been through. It's not that feeling of 暗爽 or 自喜 you know? It's just this simple satisfaction in life that's just so amazing and unexplainable to me. I think it's that feeling of knowing that you're on the right track and path in life; this sense of security and fulfillment that i've been looking forward to for as long as i can remember.

But this is not over for the day yet.

I went into my NA class after recess and shouted to the class for the first time (and to any classes) in three weeks because they were simply behaving rudely and taking my kindness towards them for granted. I think 99.9% of them were shocked that i can actually shout that loudly and i don't know if i'm getting the right vibe or not.. but i think a teacher has managed to earn the respect from a class if when they're scolding the class, most of them actually look sorry/apologetic for misbehaving and after the scolding, you're able to get full attention from the class immediately and a complete change in attitude. Maybe not as much as complete change in attitude, but i definitely moved on faster in my teaching after scolding them. No wonder they always say 不打不成才or spare the rod and spoil the child or something like that. I also think that when the class actually starts listening to you not because they're afraid you'll start scolding them again, but because they WANT to respect you, you're on your path of becoming a very successful teacher. I'll definitely keep working towards that for all my classes in future next time. This will serve as a dearly reminder to myself if i ever needed one.

Come to think of it, it's true isn't it? As a student, i never managed to get myself to respect Momo anyway. =D

The day then ended with my three very lively P3 boys who seriously brightened up my really tiring day and brought even more smiles to end my day.

I had to bribe them with a packet of Oreo each to get this shot okay? T_T

I really love teaching and i know this is what i want to do for life. Thank God for everything that's happening in my life right now. It really can't get any better than this. (:

EDIT: I forgot to mention that one of my NT girls wrote what i said in class in her script, "The key to success lies within you. No one can help you until you start with putting in more effort in your work." When i read that, my heart just went awww... imagine instead you quoting others, your student is actually quoting you! How awesome is that?

EDIT 2: I've changed. But definitely not as much as you. I don't even think you know who you are anymore, let alone me. Don't you love it when you don't know what a person is talking about and will have to jump into conclusions/make pointless guesses on maybe what he/she is talking about but will never know if you're right or not? HEHE.

我很幸福

2011-03-20T23:15:00.001+08:00

其实，拥有不一定是件快乐的事。

我都忘了自己的快乐不是因拥有而得到的。很多时候，快乐是从心灵的体验，感受，感触和领悟而来的。

当我知道母亲因不能给我最好的一切，心里感到内疚和遗憾，我忘了自己其实是幸福的。我这才领悟到了自己不需拥有全世界，其实也可以很快乐。而这，也是一种美。因为对我而言，世界上最大的爱，莫过于母亲对我的爱。

朋友，我也有。但我还就是不快乐。因为我一直长期活在过去摆脱不掉的阴影。我的自信，我的安全感 - 怎样找，都找不回。这么多年来，交友让我学会了放开和看开。有些朋友，其实不交也罢了。但知己也不容易找到。有时候以为自己难得终于找到了，过后才发现其实志不同道不合，可能还被人家利用了，白欢喜一场。最后可能还搞到“妻离子散”的局面。So drama.

所以我要告诉自己，我的快乐，应该是寄托在知心朋友给我的支持，而不是自己改变不了的事实。

我曾经听过一个quote，说世上最快乐的事莫非于拥有一切，而是珍惜自己眼前所拥有的一切。How true. 但世上又有几人will go bother to 珍惜眼前的一切？我们人都是贪得无厌的monster，时时刻刻都想要着更好的东西，who will really cherish what they have?

但我会试着尝试。I want to start cherishing what i have, but i will not be bothered by what i don't have.

因为我知道自己是幸福的。Come to think of it, 我现在真的很快乐。我以后的将来也会是快乐的。

人家说“知足常乐”，我现在真的可以feel it。

因为，我很幸福。:)

Sweet Spring 糖水春 @ Ang Mo Kio Hub

2011-03-20T21:07:00.001+08:00

It was dinner with the boys again! We were looking for a place to have desserts after dinner and decided to settle down at Sweet Spring.

Sweet Spring 糖水春 is located at the second level of AMK Hub. The setting and the ambience of the restaurant is pretty 复古 with all the marble tables and wooden stool.

Signature Beancurd Dessert @ $4.50/$7

This dessert is good for two (or four, depending on the price) and served in a wooden bucket. Kinda awesome isn't it? We didn't order it this time though, this was taken the last time i was there. The beancurd is smooth and really soft. But this seems to be the only satisfactory dish in the entire restaurant. -_-

Mango Pudding @ $3.20

The portion is really small and miserable. Absolutely not worthy of the price KJ paid for.

Strawberry Snow Ice @5.00

The taste is super artificial and i think any other Ice Kachang you find outside will beat this hands down. Not to mention that they forgot my order and totally didn't even bother to apologize or what. Major dislike!

Our food we ordered:

Peanut and Sesame Paste @ $3.00

Red Bean Paste with Glutinous Rice @ $3.90

Fish Porridge @ $4.90

The portion of the fish porridge is once again, small.. just like the portions of all the other dishes you find in this restaurant. I don't find anything special about it and figured that if you're really craving for fish porridge, you should go up one level and get it at the food court which will taste so much better and cheaper! The Peanut Paste and the Red Bean Paste looks like those you can find outside at the Hawker Centres, the overpriced version of it, that is.

My Verdict? You'll be happier stepping out of AMK Hub and walking a short distance away to get a Koi Bubble Tea. Mediocre food/desserts, bad service and overpriced items. NOT recommended. I regretted not getting them to have desserts at MOF (Ministry of Food) instead. T_T

Sweet Spring 糖水春
AMK Hub #02-19/20/21

Operating Hours
Daily 11am - 10pm

Phone
67539856

I love my runs

2011-03-20T01:29:00.000+08:00

I love my morning/evening 10km runs. (:

Romulus @ Vivo City

2011-03-18T14:54:00.003+08:00

At 9pm where most of the other restaurants and eateries were closed for the day, our trio seeked refuge in Romulus which is open daily until 11pm. How awesome is that? Romulus is a café or a haven for people seeking a comfortable setting to enjoy a light meal or a cup of coffee. The cafe also offer a wide variety of food ranging from sandwiches, pretzels, salads, waffles, pasta to drinks such as smoothies, coffee and ice blends!

Caramel Butter Thick Toast @ $4.20

Their signature thick toast is a MUST-ORDER dish for anyone stepping foot into this cafe. The generous serving of whipped cream above the thick toast is soft and creamy and doesn't taste like those you usually get from supermarket or Starbucks Coffee. The caramel and butter complements the thick toast which is oven toasted till golden crisp, yet still retaining the softness of the bread is amazing.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Cake @ $5.90

I've never tried before a cake made from peanut butter ever in my life and i must say i'm definitely not disappointed with the taste of the cake. I find it a little too hard though and differs from the softness of other cakes i've eaten, probably due to the long hours of refrigeration which means the cake is probably not fresh. T_T But other than that, the peanut butter was thick and delightful and the chocolate awesomely sinful. :)

Redberries Smoothie @ $5.90

This is a new item on their menu and i must say that the taste of the blueberries, strawberries and cranberries blended together was not too overpowering and leaves a lingering taste in your mouth. Definitely a healthier choice for those health conscious freaks out there.. like me. =D

Green Mint Mocha Snow @ $5.90

If you're expecting your drink to look exactly like the one on the menu, fat hope. Other than that, the mint added to the mocha was light and made the drink extremely refreshing.. especially much needed after a tiring day of work. The drink was well blended and not too sweet as compared to those substandard mocha you usually get from overrated coffee chains.

Cappuccino @ $4.90

This was ordered by Yanyan the last time we were there. Made with loads of love! Great for the coffee lovers out there and the aroma of fresh brewed coffee will simply perk up your day! :)

Garlic Butter Thick Toast @ $4.20

Last but not least, the Garlic Butter Thick Toast simply taste like your usual garlic bread. I still think that garlic bread should be made with normal italian bread and not just any other bread/toast as it's usually fluffier on the inside but harder on the outside for that extra bit of chewiness for the bread. I still prefer the Caramel Butter Thick Toast!

Romulus

Vivo City #01-52

Ngee Ann Poly Clubhouse

The Lumiere Condo (Mistri Road)

Operating Hours

Daily 1030am - 11pm

Phone & Website

Vivo City : 6376 9115

Ngee Ann Poly Clubhouse : 6469 9883

The Lumiere Condo : 6634 2747

http://www.romulus.com.sg/

Putting all that aside, I had an awesome time celebrating Chiku's birthday. Crazy cab rides to and fro Woodlands from St James cause that idiot forgot to bring his ID, my first time in Boiler Room as well as a crazy night of parteying in Powerhouse!

Birthday Boy with all his gifts from Tommy and I in our attempt to "fatten" him up!

Retards with the food.

Vodkas for the night!

In Boiler Room

Apparently, not drunk.. don't be mistaken. :D

Not to forget...

All cakes, muffins and sandwiches go for half price after 9pm too as well! :)

One of us

2011-03-17T00:26:00.001+08:00

If God had a name, what would it be
And would you call it to his face
If you were faced with him in all his glory
What would you ask if you had just one question

And yeah yeah God is great yeah yeah God is good
yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah

What if God was one of us
Just a slob like one of us
Just a stranger on the bus
Trying to make his way home

If God had a face what would it look like
And would you want to see
If seeing meant that you would have to believe
In things like heaven and in jesus and the saints and all the prophets

And yeah yeah god is great yeah yeah god is good
yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah

What if God was one of us
Just a slob like one of us
Just a stranger on the bus
Trying to make his way home
He's trying to make his way home
Back up to heaven all alone
Nobody calling on the phone
Except for the pope maybe in rome

And yeah yeah God is great yeah yeah God is good
yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah

What if god was one of us
Just a slob like one of us
Just a stranger on the bus
Trying to make his way home
Just trying to make his way home
Like a holy rolling stone
Back up to heaven all alone
Just trying to make his way home
Nobody calling on the phone
Except for the pope maybe in rome

Mrs Chong, again.

2011-03-15T22:50:00.001+08:00

The entire story, taken word for word from the MOE Website.

I owe who I am today to Mrs Chong from Northland Secondary School, who continues to inspire me 10 years after she first taught me how to believe in myself.
I lost interest in my studies shortly after I joined Secondary School. When I failed my Secondary Three exam, I was transferred to the Normal (Academic) Stream from the Express Stream. I suddenly found myself needing to cope with not just repeating my Sec 3 year, but with a whole new curriculum. The subject Elements of Office Administration (EOA), was especially strange to me. Mrs Chong, my then Form and EOA Teacher, saw I was struggling and took it upon herself to personally coach me on EOA. It really touched me that she spent most of the 6 weeks during the year-end holidays coming back to school to run through the EOA syllabus, and even provided my meals so I could concentrate on my revision. Her dedication led me to want to do as best as I could to do her proud.
While I put my all into EOA, my overall N-level results were dismal. Any hopes I had had of continuing my studies were quashed then and there. I left school and Mrs Chong became a part of the life which Id rather leave behind. Unfortunately, without her positive influence, I got into trouble after I left school, ending up serving a prison sentence after being arrested for selling pirated merchandise. When I got out, I took up an apprenticeship in car servicing to make ends meet.
It was only by pure coincidence that my path crossed with Mrs Chong again at an MRT station. I was genuinely glad to bump into her after all these years and before long, I had shared the events of what had happened after I left school. She never once chided me, and at the end of the conversation, she said the words that would turn my life around, "Do you really want to repair cars for the rest of your life?" That sentence really made me think about what I really wanted to achieve going forward.
It was Mrs Chong's trust in me that led me to believe in myself and continue my studies as I worked. Egged on by Mrs Chong's encouragement - that she had always felt I had potential as a student - I took a chance on myself and enrolled in night classes at ITE to learn valuable office skills. After I got my Institute of Technical Education (ITE) Diploma, I went on to pursue an advanced Degree, which opened up a world of opportunities for me.
Now, I'm a supervisor at a leading automaker, and lead a team of sales and operation personnel, something which I would never have thought possible if Mrs Chong had not come into my life again. I recently took Mrs Chong out for dinner and finally thanked her for giving me the motivation to become the person she had always wanted me to be. However, I'll never be able to show enough gratitude for the one person who, in believing in me, changed my life for good.

I can't believe Mrs Chong is teaching/taught at Northland, 3 blocks behind my place?

Thanks for being an inspiration really, Mrs Chong. Everytime i got discouraged from teaching, i would play the video to cheer myself up and it never fail to do so. Hopefully everything goes well at MOE tomorrow. Keeping my fingers crossed.

Beautiful People

2011-03-14T01:16:00.001+08:00

This brought tears to my eyes.

Source: HERE

Please spend some time reading through everything. God bless the people of Japan.

EDIT: Removed the entire post as i do want my other posts on the first page. I hope you've read the note on facebook already! If you haven't what are you waiting for?!

Sweet Dynasty @ Outram Park

2011-03-13T01:25:00.006+08:00

Yanyan and I went on our little food escapade today. It took us quite some time to find this restaurant situated on one of the many shophouses along Keong Saik Road. The restaurant offers dishes at very affordable prices which ranges from western food to local cuisines.

A very cosy and comfortable place, neat interior arrangements and convenient place for the people working nearby to settle down for a quick lunch or dinner, since the food was actually served pretty fast.. considering the fact that the restaurant was full on reservations.

Fried Calamares ($4.00)
The portion was small and the dish was a tad too saltish. However, it does goes well with the thousand island sauce. Being a great calamares lover myself, i rate the dish to be just above average.

Chef Salad ($8.90)
The veggies were fresh and sliced carrots crispy, however i find the grilled chicken serving too meager and extremely overdone. The thousand island sauce did improve the taste of the entire dish but overall, it was just like any other salad dish you can find in other restaurants.

Black Pepper Grilled Sirloin Steak ($22.90)
The black pepper sauce which accompanied the dish was light and not too overpowering. The medium rare sirloin steak was grilled almost perfectly as was the colourful array of sweet corn, broccolis and carrots which were cooked and boiled to add a nice touch to the dish. The mashed potato was not too overwhelming and complemented the dish pretty well.

Grilled Gordon Bleu Chicken ($11.90)
Wasn't this dish supposed to be grilled? It turns out to be deep fried and although the taste of the Gordon Bleu Chicken was still passable, I couldn't exactly taste the ham and cheese that was supposedly in the chicken. Surprisingly, what i like most was the (juicy) watermelon with cream sauce, which was a refreshing change and use of fruits to promote the brand name of healthy diet.

Watermelon Sago Milk ($2.80)
This chilled dessert lives up to its name as the chef's recommendation and creation. The coconut milk was not too heavy and the sago as well as the watermelon adds a new dimension to this dish as it should be usually served with honeydew pieces instead of watermelon.

Gingko Nut With Beancurd Skin Soup ($2.50)
Yanyan likes his delectable portion of beancurd skin soup, which was thick and extremely rich. Definitely good for the skin for all you vainpots out there who want better skin complexion as well as a healthier choice for those who don't want to overindulge on desserts (like me) with high sugary content.

This has nothing to do with the food we ordered but i just want to showcase my attempt at artistic shots while getting bored with the waiting. LOL. Our total bill amounted to $58.30 but in actual fact we only paid $16 because i was darn smart with food coupons and vouchers. =P

Sweet Dynasty Cafeteria
29 Keong Saik Road

Operating Hours
Daily 12pm - 11pm

Phone & Website
62230955, www.sweet-dynasty.com

I'll be back again to the restaurant some time soon as i still have $60 worth of vouchers to spend! Also, in case you haven't realize; good vocabulary and sentence structure used for this blog post! I'm getting really conscious with my use of English ever since i started this job. I've been trying to improve and will continue to try my best! (:

Joab, signing out!

All By Myself

2011-03-12T13:35:00.000+08:00

When I was young
I never needed anyone
And making love was just for fun
Those days are gone
Livin' alone
I think of all the friends I've known
When I dial the telephone
Nobody's home

All by myself
Don't wanna be
All by myself
Anymore

Hard to be sure
Sometimes I feel so insecure
And loves so distant and obscure
Remains the cure

All by myself
Don't wanna be
All by myself
Anymore
All by myself
Don't wanna live
All by myself
Anymore

When I was young
I never needed anyone
Making love was just for fun
Those days are gone

All by myself
Don't wanna be
All by myself
Anymore
All by myself
Don't wanna live
Oh
Don't wanna live
By myself, by myself
Anymore
By myself
Anymore
Oh
All by myself
Don't wanna live
I never, never, never
Needed anyone

Thank you Charice. For your beautiful voice.

Birthday Celebration Part #7

2011-03-11T12:36:00.000+08:00

Met up with my girls @ Bugis! (:

Seafood Tom Yum Glass Noodles. Broth is thick and they were very generous with the ingredients!

My Beef Noodles Soup. There are loads of spices which made the soup extremely oishii and what i like is that it's different from the other beef noodles soup you see at Thai Express or other thai food outlets because there's FREAKING MEATBALLS. <3

My pretty girls =D

With minn, photo which i liked a lot because i was genuinely happy and smiling while i'm around with them. You can literally see the difference in the smile that i have here. Now i know what people meant by when you're really happy, you look in your best form. :)

Naqee and I with our cute little cakes!

With chio zhiyang~

The four of us!

With the pressies! OMG, i love the portable boom speaker, exactly what i'm looking for! :D

Thanks girls! Meet up sooooooooooooooon! <3

Starbucks

2011-03-08T23:26:00.002+08:00

The Starbucks Joke =D

Discipline

2011-03-08T15:38:00.000+08:00

I've never been more conscious about speaking or writing in English for my entire life, not even when i was going to take my A's for General Paper. But everything's different now, i have to be more careful with everything with regards to English now. The sentence structure, the word formation etc etc.

This experience has humbled me by a lot but i'm still enjoying every single bit and moment of it. Every single day i'm learning something new and experiencing something different. The teachers here are great and they are very helpful as well. I just can't seem to believe that these few other relief teachers whom i always go for morning/lunch breaks with worked with me for 7 days only thus far. It seems as though we've met each other for the past many weeks/months already!

I love my canteen food especially. Love the strawberries and mixed berries smoothies, the vegetarian store, the mixed vegetables rice stall and totally adore the chicken rice and noodles stall! There's just such a wide variety of food in each stall that i haven't even patronize the muslim and indiam stall even after one week! Looking forward to try the carrot cake (OMG right?) and banana boat soon! I still can't believe they're actually like selling ice cream cones, chocolate/ice cream pancakes and even those type of subway cookies but their students are still fit and they still get their fitness away each year!

Anyway, i was kind of drained out last night and i think i went into a semi-possessed and subconscious mode. It was really scary because i literally felt like Dementors were around me and for the whole night, i had weird nightmares which involved 巫启贤 and a couple of weird friendly vampires. I know, totally LOL right. I had such a bad headache after i woke up and thank God it was gone after i reached school.

I think i need to start going for my 10km run daily, ban myself from completely eating fried and unhealthy tidbits as well as start on my gym routine or what. I've been an extremely ill-disciplined guy for the past 2 weeks and did no physical activities at all. Time to start instilling some discipline into my life. But it's going to be hard with all the tuitions and school work piling up. =/

But i'll try, because i always do. :)

Birthday Celebration Part #6

2011-03-06T16:27:00.001+08:00

K-box with the biggest group of friends together!

With pris and felicia~

With felicia and zy

Love is in the air. <3

My friends rock!

Group photo!

You can't put facebook videos up on blogger if not i'll have the crazy Womanizer video up on here. Crazy crazy day with loads of fun! Thank you guys.. i enjoyed myself thoroughly! :D

Birthday Celebration Part #5

2011-03-06T16:19:00.002+08:00

At NUOC traditional vietnamese cuisine with my favourite SBs =)

NUOC.. apparently you can get the roof garden seats. It's 11th floor on Orchard Central and has a very good night view of the city. :)

Me @ NUOC

Mixed veggies, extremely light and healthy

Vietnamese curry, not too thick or spicy. Gravy is very smooth!

Sweet and sour fish fillet. Deep fried to golden crisp but soft and fluffy on the inside.

Timo thinks the springrolls are overrated. I think they're awesome! There's like a mixture of ingredients wrapped within and it goes well with the thai chili!

This is what you call Fried Wanton but they call it Dumplings or what. Tasty, but not worth the price. =/

This is awesome. It seems like all the dishes are fried but they taste extremely healthy. The garlic on top of these chicken wings add a nice touch to this dish!

Lemon chicken! Different from the usual ones you see outside. Truly prepared in vietnamese style. :)

With timo!

With mother pig!

Thanks timo!

Mother pig also got me this very nice top which i already wore to work to teach last week. It's great to have friends who cares! Thank you timo and xingyi! (:

Keep going

2011-03-03T00:05:00.002+08:00

Something to keep you going. (:

Observations

2011-03-02T15:24:00.001+08:00

I realized that people whom i do not like or people whom i do not associate myself with are always people who're despised or disliked commonly by other people as well. Yes, i judge people. I am very critical when it comes to a character of a person. You either like me or hate me, but most commonly if you hate me, you should be hated by most other people as well.. because there's no reason for me to shield myself up against you in life unless i find a reason to do so. And most of the time, the people whom i decided not to associate myself with are people with such character traits. People who overthink into things and dwell deep in their own thoughts and emotions are OKAY. But if you can't handle your problems and it becomes the problems and woes of others, then you're probably one selfish bitch because you just probably enjoy/like the attention that others give to you. I don't buy any of the "I can't help but to feel this way" or "I really don't know why i'm doing this" explainations. Because seriously, if i point a gun at you and force you to stop thinking, i'm sure your mind will immediately switch to alert mode and start thinking whether you will survive or not rather than continuing dwelling in your own problems and emotions.

It's just like how in life, one will always choose to be with the good people because naturally.. good people will always be good people. They will be the ones whom you can trust and be sure that they will remain loyal and help you in times of troubles no matter what. And of course, bad people will continue to stick with their own kind and continue with their acts of devil and continue to harm the good people. In other words, bad people attract bad people to themselves and even if they managed to deceive the good people to become their friends and continue to make use of them and play with their feelings, they will realise that ultimately the good people will just walk away (and not doing anything to retaliate back because they're ultimately, good people) and then the bad people will just have to continue on with life and continue to find other good people to become their victims. I wonder if the bad people will ever get tired of good people walking out of their lives at such a frequent rate or not, hmm? I'm not a good person but i'm definitely not a bad person. But since i want to be a good person, that is why i choose to be with the good people so that maybe one day when i die or before i die, i can at least tell myself i did attempted to live a good person's life and kept trying at it.

Okay, loads of cheeminology and weird thinking above but i'm glad i managed to get it all out and now it feels so good. My first blogpost in school.. suddenly thought i should write this post after finishing marking my entire pile of english journals from my express class. 4 more stacks of worksheets, journals and test papers to go! Weird that on the first day i had none to mark, yesterday i had 2 piles, now i have 4.. even though it seems that i've been clearing my markings. I hope there will not be 8 piles of work tomorrow. It seems to keep going up at an exponential rate. FML.

Birthday Celebration Part #4

2011-02-19T23:44:00.004+08:00

Awesome time spent with Jiqqy, he was sharing to me ways on how to deal with students. I had such a great time sharing life with him and laughed till my side aches.

My miso ramen!

Jiqqy's tonkatsu ramen!

Seafood gyoza!

Tori Karaage!

@ Fountain of Wealth in night mode

It seriously rocks to spend your birthday with people whom you're really comfortable with! =D

Mrs Chong

2011-02-19T15:32:00.001+08:00

I saw this commercial on TV the other day and it stirred so much emotions within my heart. Decided to look it up on Youtube and thank God MOE uploaded it on their official account. This made me tear for three times in a row already.

This is really the reason why i've always wanted to be a teacher since i was young.

TEACH. You'll be amazed by the difference you can make. I hope MOE pays me for free advertising. Just kidding.

Thankful

2011-02-19T03:44:00.000+08:00

24 hours ago, i was literally in a state of despair. I then initiated an sms conversation with mu zhu and confided in her that i do not know how to move forward, and neither do i know how to stop feeling this stagnancy in life. She then advised me to pray, because that was how we always got through our darkest days anyway.

But i didn't pray, i went to bed instead.

While tossing and turning in bed, i got reminded of one of the days during my recent Philippines trip. I remembered it was on CNY Eve then, where my dad and I reached the harbor after a 5 hours driving trip because we had to catch a ferry to another city where my dad's company was based at. We arrived at the harbor at 2pm and because of bad weather, our ferry was delayed and didn't depart until 8pm. By then, my dad was already in an extremely bad mood and it didn't help that the weather didn't improve will take another 4 hours to reach our destination. So that means no reunion dinner ever, for the first time in my life.

I remembered that was one of the days i ever prayed so much in my life. From 2pm onwards, i prayed for the ship to come, but it didn't until 4 hours later. At 6pm, i prayed for the ship to move, but it didn't until 2 hours later. At 10pm, i continued praying for the ship to arrive, but it didn't until 2 hours later. At that point of time, what i felt wasn't disappointment with God.. but rather, puzzlement. I didn't know why God had to put me through this and while i was sitting on the deck of my ferry, facing the night's darkness and with strong winds blowing against my face, i started lamenting to God about every single rough bit that he had to put me through in life. I kept on questioning, until i didn't know what else to say anymore and just sat there, engulfing in self-pity for myself.

After we finally arrived at 12am, i immediately fell into a deep slumber because it will be yet another 2 hours of driving before we will reach the hotel. It was around 2 hours later when my dad decided to stop the car which woke me up. There we were, 2am in the morning at a restaurant operating for 24 hours on Chinese New Year day itself. How amazing is that? That was when i remembered while on the ferry, i told my dad that no matter what we must find a place to grab a good meal and have our own reunion dinner instead. (We planned to have it initially with my dad's employees in the company but it didn't work out because of the ferry delay) I didn't stay all the way through the CNY period to not have a reunion dinner with my dad. Actually come to think of it, i didn't know what made me want to stay throughout the CNY period overseas with my dad. But eventually i found out why. I was actually attempting to fulfill my duty as a son to show more care and concern to him and try to love him more and untie the knot in my hardened hard against him.

So i remembered my dad ordering a really sumptuous meal (the best we could have at 230am in the morning), topped with beer and loads of smiles. It was then i recalled how just a few days back while i was using my laptop at the Internet Cafe, i then returned to my hotel room to find my dirty pair of sneakers completely washed and sparkling clean. That was one of the few times in my life that i could tell that my dad really loves me a lot, and i wished that i had more opportunity to experience such a feeling in my life. And i got my wish immediately the next day when my dad insisted we go to a Chinese restaurant to have steamboat to make up for the sloppy reunion dinner we had the previous night.

Now i finally know why God didn't answer my countless prayers made all these years. He was actually waiting for the perfect opportunity for my heart to feel less hardened towards my dad, so that i can finally receive and experience the love that my dad had for me to the fullest. I don't know if you know how it feels to have a hardened hard towards someone released, but i can tell you that it feels damn good. It is so hard to let go, and it is definitely harder to move on.. but God made a way for me after all in his most perfect ways. I didn't realize until few moments ago that my hatred towards my dad was actually gone from the moment i found out that he helped me wash my shoes, and that was also the moment when i started opening up myself for his love to flow into my life.

That was when i finally fell asleep and got woken up by a phone call by an unknown number and also the start to probably one of the most memorable days i had ever had in my life.

It was a phone call by a teacher from YTSS who wanted to offer me a relief teaching job for me to take over her duties while she go on her maternity leave. We discussed for a few moments on the details of it over the phone and few hours later, i had dyed my hair back to black, finished lunch, completely prepared and sitting in the Vice Principal's office for my interview. It turns out that the VP was my secondary school Social Studies teacher's best friend and they just met for dinner two days back. It definitely helped to be an attentive and good student back in Social Studies and History class back then huh? Doesn't God write your life story in the most amazing way?

During the interview, the VP even joked about giving me the full salary as a teacher instead and not a relief teacher because i will be assuming duties of a completely trained teacher. You know how some relief teaching jobs in some schools are just meant to be zuo bo and for you to waste your life away? I knew this job offer was different because the VP liked my enthusiasm towards teaching and offered me the chance to sit in to different subjects classes and learn under different teacher mentors. Not only that, she also decided that i should be teaching classes both in the lower and secondary level and in the express, normal academic and technical stream as well so that i can have an all-rounded teaching experience. She even went on to show her goodwill by offering for me to also be partly in-charge of a CCA. I don't think there will ever be any other relief teacher in Singapore to ever get such an opportunity like mine.

You might say that the VP was actually trying to rip me off but for me that's not the case and i don't really care because i really really treasure this opportunity a lot. The young principal then walked into the office, had a light conversation with me and told me something which made me feel very welcomed.. "you better stay all the way until end of july".. i'll definitely remember those words for a long time and recall it if i ever felt discouraged while teaching. What are the chances of finding a relief teaching job at this period where relief teaching positions are probably all filled since the start of the year?? And what are even the chances and coincidence of having a teacher going for her maternity leave at the exact same time you're available for the teaching job. 5 months, gosh. It was even way longer than i've asked for and i'm just so thankful for it.

On top of that, if i had to teach in a Secondary school (i actually wanted to teach Sec sch only too!) close to the proximity of my place, YTSS would be the only choice because not only has it become an autonomous school, it is also the best school in the North zone of Singapore. Plus the money i'll be saving on transport fees (5mins walk from home!), this is literally like the best job offer that i could have hoped/asked for. God seriously rocks my world. Until yesterday, i was still feeling really discouraged from the lack of replies from schools which i've called up and emailed for relief teaching positions and felt so dismayed by the fact that as much as i want to move on to another phase in life, nobody wants to give me an opportunity to do so! (And the reason why i was feeling really down last night because everything in life seemed to still be in a stagnant mode after NS) That was when God came into the picture and connected all the dots and bits and pieces of everything together. :)

Till then, i really can't wait for Langkawi next week. I also really can't wait to get started on my job. I expect my crazy students to start adding me like mad on facebook and start stalking my blog too. So don't be surprise if this blog goes private very soon. Just ask me for an invite or what if you see me online if it really goes private! HAHA. And i'm also feeling all the love from all the friends who're still making it a point to meet up and celebrate my birthday.. even though they strongly deny/lie to me that we're going to have Macdonalds to have McValue lunch because it's cheap and good. Right, timo?? *rolleyes*

Ahhh, it feels good to rant out all these thoughts in my small brain.

Birthday Celebration Part #3

2011-02-18T01:52:00.000+08:00

Awesome day spent with fatdric!

@ Fremantle Seafood Market

Thick tomato soup with basil and mussels!

Fish N Chips, the fries were damn shiok!

My main course, the grilled chicken was seasoned and smoked evenly!

Dessert. Not too bitter with overpowering chocolate taste.. nice~

=D

2011-02-16T01:25:00.001+08:00

Anyway, forgot to share this.

Doesn't it rock when you have damn creative friends? <3

Or when your friend is damn far away in Sweden and does this.

Suddenly misses doudou and fifi so much! =(

Langkawi~

2011-02-16T00:12:00.001+08:00

Hannie and zy, i'll do the itinerary here and when it becomes a facebook note i'll tag both of you okay? One of you please print because my damn cute printer just died. Zy can please print the hotel receipt? I got our flight one printed already, although you can print again. Hannie you need to print your own flight receipt cause you booked separately.

ZY and HW, do you want me to meet both of you directly at the airport or i go to ZY's house first? Please advise. Another thing is, really don't want to check-in any baggage? It will be about $20 one way for one person. So $40 both ways and one person check-in can le. Each person pay around $14 more and we can bring all the solutions we want? Either one of you can check-in. I'll hand carry if you all decide that one person will check in? Please decide and tell me your decision okay?

Also, i just dropped a mail to our resort to request for a free upgrade to their sister resort Holiday Villa (the one we're staying is Federal Villa). You can take a look at the difference between the two villas below -

Federal Villa
Holiday Villa

As the 2 villas are side by side, all facilities are accessible regardless which one we ultimately stay in (depending on whether request can get through or not). But the difference is that Holiday Villa is a new resort and the rooms are damn new and i think ZY you might get your bath tub. So keep your fingers crossed okay? Besides our room now is one night USD$68, but Holiday Villa is one night USD$107.. of course stay in the more expensive one lah since can request free upgrade!! Hehehehe, but don't put your hopes too high. If they don't, when we reach there i'll ask again. >.> Damn thick-skin.

Okay real itinerary starts below. Old uncle damn long winded, sorry.

Monday, 21 Feb, flight @ 1045am, arriving @ 1215pm
Should arrive at the airport by 9am bah, people these days damn kiasu one. That time my flight 2 hours 30 minutes before that i reached the airport already long queue. If we want to sit together we must go early lo~ If not hanwei i sit with you, zy can sit alone. ^^

Airport to our resort, distance is 16km.

I checked the official Malaysia Tourism website and here's a very good guide to taxi rates. Hopefully it's updated and we won't kenna eat. Eh, someone please print the 2 pages below on individual sheets okay? IMPT if not we really kenna eat by taxi uncles man.

From Kuah Town to major attractions

Airport to major locations

According to this website, it says Langkawi Holiday Villa is 16RM. Then we will reach our hotel @ about 130pm i expect with all the flight delay and everything. Then we can almost check-in le as check-in is at 2pm. Awesome isn't it?

Then from there we can do whatever we want depending on what you all want to do as long as it's cheap and worth it. I don't think we should rent a car as it's 128RM a day at least but you two decide ba. Bikes are 12RM a day though! We shall see how it goes la~

Langkawi Cable Car

I suggest we go on Tuesday morning~ brand new morning! RM30 for complete trip both ways.

Telaga Tujuh Seven Wells

Can visit together with the cable car cause same place yay!

For the adventurous visitors, a 2.5 Kilometers jungle track linking Telaga Tujuh (Seven Wells) to the Middle and Top Stations has been built to allow visitors a safe and secure hike. Along the hike-up, visitors will observe at first hand the unique change in the flora from the lowland to the top as well as the many species of flora endemic only to the Machincang forest reserve. They will also observe the numerous geological features along the route.

Curved Hanging Bridge

Same place, but got really great great views! Do a google search!

Latest attraction at Langkawi Cable Car is a 125m curve platform, pedestrian bridge across a deep chasm linking Top Station with Machincang mountain range. Open to public on 27th February 2005. It won a few recognition awards for this incredible design.

Oriental Village

Must go. Looks damn nice and scenic. Do a google search.

Was specially designed and crafted to provide a new concept in resort duty-free shopping. More than 30 speciality outlets offer a diverse variety and range of brands and products.

Pantai Cenang Beach Sunset

I'll kill the two of you if you two stop me from going here. I'm serious and i'll commit murder. I want to take my own photo like that!!

According to google maps, the beach is just right above our hotel i think 2km away only or what!

Places to eat:

Orchid Ria Seafood Restaurant
Kampung Siam
LH Lucky Seafood Restaurant
Little Mexican
Palm View Seafood Restaurant

Underwater World Langkawi

38RM, abit pricey, but touted as the largest aquarium in SEA.

Located in Pantai Tengah is Underwater World where visitors will be dazzled by a variety of marine life. It is here that you can see tropical fish species as well as sharks and stingrays. The Rice Garden offers information on rice and its important role in Asia. There is a small museum and a restaurant located on-site.

Unique to Underwater World Langkawi is the gigantic 15-meter long walk-through tunnel consisting of 500,000 liter seawater which houses many big fishes and sea creatures including the Giant Green Turtle.

Other attractions include the Freshwater Fish Section, the Seashell Display, the Koi Pond, the Mini Reptilian and Invertebrate Section, the Coral Reef Section and the Poisonous and Venomous Creatures Section.

The 34,701 square foot oceanarium is located adjacent to a shopping centre and the Neptune Caf¨¦. Visitors are thus provided with a one-stop shopping, eating and entertainment package, all of which are available within one area.

A new building (with 60,000 sq. ft built-up area) which displays Tropical Rainforest, Temperate and Sub-Antarctic Ecosystems, and a three-dimensional (3D) theatre with a 200-seating capacity will be opened to the public in early 2005. The Sub-Antarctic Ecosystem Display includes a spectacular ¡°penguinarium¡± with an underwater tunnel for visitors to view swimming penguins.

Pantai Tengah Beach

I think we chose to stay at the right resort! All the nice beaches are along our stretch of beach! This one is like 1 to 2km above us!

This shot is damn freaking awesome and amazing. We shall try to take a picture like this okay!! Can put as awesome facebook display pic!! Can do loads of jumpshots!! OMGGGGG~ And from this beach got sunset, loads of restaurants and bars, so can go chillout at night!

Places to eat:

May Hiang Seafood Restaurant
Fat Mum Seafood Restaurant
Chiew Restaurant
El Toro Espanol Tapas Bar & Cafe
Casablanca Langkawi Seafood Restaurant
Tang Lung Seafood Restaurant
Sunday Home Décor, Bistro & Restaurant

Datai Bay

Recommended by Tourism Malaysia.. you know the one that always goes.. Malaysia Truly Asia~~~? LOL.

Datai Bay is situated at the north-west corner of Langkawi island and has the most exclusive golf resort on the island - the Datai Bay Golf Resort. Another exclusive establishment here is the Datai Langkawi Resort, luxurious, elite and indulgent.

There are several jungle trails that take you down to the peaceful Datai Bay beach. There is also a crocodile farm on the way to Datai Bay where you can watch the crocodiles as part of entertaining shows in the mornings and afternoons.

To HW: Need. To. Drive. There. Sigh.

Kilim Mangrove & Nature Park

Can take boat. Can see bat caves. Can see mangrove. Can feed eagles. Can burn a whole in the pocket. You all decide okay? I think around 100RM for half day tour. I visited the website and they stated RM0, totalleh cool~ No, they said call for negotiable, so i suspect that means it's up to my cheapskate bargaining skills to see how much we can get our tour for. Actually i don't mind eagle feeding + mangrove + bat cave. We shall see okay? =D

Eagle Square

Go Langkawi don't go Eagle Square mind as well don't go. T_T I want to take the beautiful shot that Jessica Liu took on one of the 8 Days cover. Hehehe.

Langkawi Parade & Langkawi Fair Shopping Mall

HELLO, LANGKAWI IS DUTY FREE? YOU GO THERE DON'T AT LEAST GO SHOP ABIT, THEN WHAT YOU WANT TO DO? PLEASE RESERVE ONE DAY FOR ME TO SHOP. KTHXBYE.

Kuah Town

Langkawi Parade and Eagle Square all at Kuah Town lah, but i just want put new heading.. cause they recommend restaurants there to eat!

YL Yong Long Chinese Seafood Restaurant
Island Taste Bakery & Deli
Rootian Seafood Restaurant
Dragon Dynasty Restaurant

The lake of The Pregnant Maiden

They say is a must have in the itinerary and i really think it's damn nice. 4 hours island hopping tour 85RM. (i think will be cheaper when we get there) I think can do! Since they will go to some other islands that are very nice too!

The Langkawi Island Hopping Tour takes you on a journey to explore Langkawi’s most illustrious islets. First you’ll be taken to visit verdant ‘Pulau Singa Besar’ – Big Lion Island; the boat stops just shy of the shores and you’ll get the chance to watch the king of the skies – eagles – as they soar overhead. Observe as they dive to catch their prey, chicken bits that the boat driver has thrown into the water, with deadly precision – it’s a great photo and video opportunity.

Next head on over to Pulau Dayang Bunting – the silhouette of the pregnant maiden from a distance is truly awe-inspiring; meanwhile the Lake of the Pregnant Maiden – overflowing with supposed ‘magical’ waters is another breathtaking sight. Relax on the adjoining buoys on the shores, dip your feet into the waters or splash and swim around in the enclosed sections. The day ends with a visit to ‘Beras Basah Island’ – or Wet Rice Island – another pristine Langkawi beach with clear waters and far-reaching views of the sea where you can relax and soak up the sun and sea after a day spent trekking up to the Pregnant Maiden Lake and feeding the eagles.

Air Hangat Hot Spring & Village

Air Hangat Village is sited on four acres of land about 14 kilometers northwest of Kuah. This modern complex includes a 3-tier hot spring fountain, an 18-meter long hand-carved river stone mural depicting the legends that enshroud this location and souvenir shops. You can witness the making of local handicrafts and cultural performances.

Taman Lagenda Park

Taman Lagenda is a very scenic park with beautiful gardens of vivid local blooms, plants and fruit trees - providing a picturesque and fitting backdrop for buildings showing Malaysia's rich cultural heritage. Within the park, there are some fine examples of traditional Malaysian handicraft and cultural objects.

This garden, the brainchild of the current Prime Minister of Malaysia, opened to the public in 1996. The beautifully landscaped 50-acres garden is a showcase of Langkawi's myths and legends. The scenic park, abundant with lush and colorful tropical blooms, plants and fruit trees, houses some fine examples of traditional Malaysian handicrafts and cultural objects. In addition to the gardens there are four beautiful lakes, a lagoon with a white sandy beach and souvenir shops.

The Summer Palace Langkawi

The Summer Palace Langkawi is situated amidst lush tropical greenery at Pantai Kok. In 1999, 20th Century Fox commissioned the construction of this magnificent and expensive movie set for the making of the film "Anna and the King". Built almost entirely of local timbers by Malaysian and foreign artisans, the Summer Palace resembles a traditional Thai Palace. The palace encompasses an area of 675 sq meters and stands 16.6 meter high. A part from the original movie set, a restaurant, souvenir shops and pavilion have been added.

Okay, not very exciting or what, but we can go there and feel Chow Yan Fat's presence! ^^

Pasar Malam (Night Market)

This is a place where all the locals gather, selling daily use goods and local Malay foods. It's just like a market place but just that they don't sell fresh fishes or vegetables here. This kind of night market is available 5 nights a week but in deferent locations such as Kuah Town, Kedawang, Ulu Melaka, Air Hangat, Padang Matsirat. The best part of it, is the food, there are variety kind of food which will make you fingers licking. If you decide to catch one, please make sure to ask the locals where the night market is being held on that day. The largest night market is held in Kuah Town every Saturday and Wednesday at 7.00pm to 11.00pm.

Okay set, wednesday itinerary! Next!

Return flight: 0855am Langkawi International Airport. I honestly don't know why i booked such an early flight at that time, aiya but whatever lah. Lol!

Hmmm, i honestly think i've covered all the places. Now the thing to decide is who of hanwei and zy shall print this. Lol, eh don't print from the blog. Print from the note on facebook, i'll tag you all tomorrow. Must wait awhile for this post to get processed automatically on fb. :)

Wheee, yay done!

Birthday Celebration Part #2

2011-02-14T23:45:00.000+08:00

With the 2 most important women in my life. LOL!

Mommy! <3

..Kimmy! *shy*

The food~

Satay!

Steak!

Roast platter!

Yu sheng!

Grilled prawns!

Black pepper crab!

Me with birthday cake!
K Buffet is freaking awesome now. There's so much other food which i didn't show. There's this like whole dessert bar with cheese/chocolate/durian cake, puddings, jellies, cocktails and fruits! Free flow drinks, ice cream! Sushi, many special dishes, your usual buffet food, fried food and many many more.
Thanks mommy and kimmy for the awesome birthday celebration! :D

Birthday Celebration Part #1

2011-02-14T23:32:00.000+08:00

With tommeh and chiku @ Thai Express

@ Swensens for Desserts

@ JCo! My favourite yogurt (:

..& the 2 irritating suspects who's always trying to find ways to piss the shit out of me T_T

Also watched Homecoming! Still not a Jack Neo fan, but the movie was decent. Better than some of his recent years production.. and come to think of it, it has been a whole year since his scandal huh? Time flies. >.<

Thanks for the awesome birthday present! T_T They told me that they have decided to give me the "gift of suspense" as it was still shipping over on Indian Ocean or what. Totalleh~

20 going on 21

2011-02-13T10:37:00.000+08:00

Just wanna pen this down before i leave for some joyous birthday celebration.

I'm no longer a teenager. I'm now an adult.

This feels weird.

Many of my friends asked me why i did not hold a mega birthday celebration for the special 21st. I contemplated about it before and also thought about getting a chalet/hotel room. But being me, i seriously hate the feeling of inviting people for the sake of inviting. I think these people barely want to be there at your celebration but still presented themselves there because most/all of their friends are going. Isn't it lame to invite someone whom you have a shallow superficial relationship with to your birthday party? For what sake.. to add to the numbers? Do you really feel happy at the end of the day even if you had 9438234 guests at your party?

I highly doubt so, because deep down in your heart you know that some of the people didn't want to be at all in the first place. And making all your friends specially go all the way down to Pasir Ris on that special one day is so not cool. It's just like asking all of them to go to this ulu condo in Jurong/Changi. Plus, it doesn't help that lao niang is a pre-valentine's birthday boy.. hotel rooms super expensive can? I checked out Hard Rock Hotel @ Resorts World and the prices are skyrocket high. TMD. T_T

Putting all that aside, it's awesome to be celebrating your special 21st with people who truly wanted to celebrate your birthday with you. These people are not there because you asked them to, but because they dated you to be present on a special day to make you feel special. Just this morning, stupid chiku dropped me a FB message at 10am (we were supposed to meet at 1130am). This siao gina usually late for around 45 mins to 2 hours one can? I knew that he was making it a point not to be late.. hence i also have to end this blog post soon, if not i'll be the one who will be late. =D

And isn't it awesome to be celebrating your birthday with different groups of people again and again? You get 9438549325 times the blessing, 8534854324 times the happiness and 9478213243 times the attention. Whoohooo~ HAHA!

To end this post on a depressing mode, i cannot pretend to be young le. =(

Just for laughs

2011-02-12T00:05:00.002+08:00

Vainshit

2011-02-11T01:25:00.002+08:00

I did my first ever Thermal Spring Water Facial Treatment (sound so atas right??) and i have to say it was the most unusual facial treatment that i've ever had in my life.

I was literally dressed like the lady below when i was going through the facial treatment.

Looks damn retarded can?? HAHAHA!

If you look at the video, at one point i'll have a cloth put over my face and then warm spring water will start flowing onto my face in circular motion. Damn shiok and relaxing can?? I literally fell asleep until the lady came in 15 minutes later when the thermal spring water treatment was about to be done!

And the facial was so relaxing (after the spring water treatment we get to lie on bed lah~) such that i went into a 半醒状态 and the squeezing/face masking/face massage just proceeded on and tada.. 2 hours later i'm done and my face is clearer and brighter!

According to the website, this is what the treatment will do to your face -
- Triggers collagen and Hyaluronic Acid production in skin
- Restore skin's natural biological functions
- Smoothens lines and firms up saggy skin
- Rejuvenates and Rehydrates skin
- Brightens skin

Okay, my face does look visibly brighter after one session and i'm a happy boy! I was on the bus just now and i realized that my face really improved significantly after all these years of intense facial care and it made me even happier just by the thought of it!! Hopefully one day all those ugly marks will be gone~

:DDD

Kite on a tree, spread your sunshine

2011-02-08T20:26:00.000+08:00

Sometimes, do you feel like you're stuck in the middle of nowhere? You can't seem to find any more strength and energy to move forward, but neither can you move backwards because you're already in a bottomless pit. In life, we always find ourselves stuck in sticky situations like this. You struggle, then you find a way to get out of it, then you find something else to struggle with again. This is like a vicious cycle and no matter how badly you want to get out of it, you just seem to find yourself caught within it again and again.

It is like getting caught in a spiderweb, where there is no route to escape and you just have to get stuck within it and await death to slowly approach when the predator returns to its nest. As much as you've learnt your lesson and vow never to be stupid enough to get trapped within a spiderweb again, all is too late for any salvation. Although it is true that there were times you can get lucky enough and miracles may occur to help you be freed from the web and escape unharm.. but how many times can you get lucky?

Many times i say. Many many freaking times.

Too many times in life, we will make the wrong choices and decisions. But as long as we're still alive and still breathing, we can still make up for our mistakes made and try to do as much damage control as possible. A scar will be left behind and those bad memories will probably haunt us forever. But at least we're still alive, with the presence of all the friends and family members who're always around and willing to shower upon you loads of unconditional love. Has it ever occurred to you that you're actually given ample chances in life?

Today i think i finally understood that to be free from all the troubles that you're facing, you need to be free from yourself first. I knew this theory long ago, but i never deeply understood it until today. I always thought that as long as i momentarily forget about it or try to escape from the problem, i will ultimately be freed from it. But at the end of the day, my problems will escalate and ultimately i'll get caught up with it all over again. Even though I know that i tend to runaway from my problems and that it is not the right way to solve it, i will still always take the convenient route/way out.. only to find myself caught within it again after some time. And then the vicious cycle starts once again.

I want to be courageous, to battle the roots to all my problems. To be brave, to be a warrior and battle against all odds. It is an ambitious thought, but one day i hope that i'm really able to be freed from myself. It sucks to be caught within your own problems/insecurities/issues, and i know you also know how i feel because you're probably battling your own battle right now as well. But i'll remember that as long as i'm still alive, i will use every ounce of breath and effort to win the battle against any struggles, because God gave us so many chances in life.

Whilst i was in Philippines, each and every time i see a homeless/poor person i'll feel very bad about it. I felt bad not because i was more fortunate than them, but because of the fact that i'm actually so much more fortunate than them in life but there i was, still worrying, feeling depressed and saddened by all the things in life. What else can be more depressing/demoralizing than not having a proper shelter and having proper food in life? I really can't think of any thing other than the passing on of a close friend/relative, which i shall not talk about because those are completely two different topics.

I was reading a book on my return flight that day and the book was talking about how God didn't instruct/inflict upon us troubles/problems so that we can learn from our mistakes and follow him wholeheartedly. I don't know how can people ever reach such an absurd conclusion that God wants to punish us because of the fundamental basic theory of sin which Adam and Eve first committed. Sometimes, i really think that God should strike us with lightning every now and then to give us a wake up call before we go deeper into our extreme self-manifestations of self-pitying in our own little world. But God won't do something like that, because He simply loves us so much. The reason why we're still caught up within ourselves is because of our refusal to follow Him wholeheartedly and to entrust our lives into His hand.

Don't you think it is just stupid fretting over pointless things like whether your boyfriend/girlfriend is devoted to you or not (so what if he/she doesn't), whether you do well in your exams or not (so what if you don't, will die meh?), whether or not your friends like you or not (so what if they don't, what can you do?), or even worrying about every other small things in life. What can you do if everything doesn't go your way?? There's nothing you can do except to try and find the root to the issues of the problems and try to either change yourself so that situation may improve or just move on in life and pray/hope for the best. What's the point of worrying so much?

While you're sitting around thinking 'bout what you can't change,
And worrying about all the wrong things
Time's flying by, moving so fast
You better make it count 'cause you can't get it back.

But the irony is, that's just the nature of humans - to worry and to err. As much as i tell myself not to worry, i'll worry even much much more. As more as i tell myself to move on, i'll hold back even more. I don't know what is this theory called as i can't find a name to it. If there's no such theory, then maybe i'll give it a name of it's own and claim it my own theory. Maybe i'll call it the Joab's theory or what. Sounds good and cheem. Right.

Some of my friends told me that they like sharing with me their problems in life because i'm a very good listener as well as an adviser and that i'm always very mature enough when it comes to dealing with problems. But am i really that matured? Am i really that wise/sensitive when it comes to dealing with the different problems in life? I don't really think so, because here i am, caught up with my own problems as well, which i refused to share with many people. Maybe it's because of the fact that i do not like people to perceive me as weak and judge me because i struggle in my own world. Maybe it's because of pride and insecurities. Maybe it's because of a whole load of other reasons, but i guess i really just didn't want to bring my pain and troubles to someone else in life. And of course, i think that struggling in stupid problems like mine is pointless.

One wise phrase i heard within the past week was by this uncle who told me to "spread your sunshine" to the world. He told me that even the Sun is limited in its strength to spread its warmth throughout the earth, but because it is his job, he will still do it and do the best as he could. I can't help but to feel deeply impacted by such a simple, cheesy yet deep phrase like this. I mean, people are usually inspired by phrases which are much much more cheem and sophisticated and "spread your sunshine" would be the last phrase you have in mind if you want to impact the world.

But true isn't it? Only by trying to spread the warmth of your character, of your true, faithful and good beliefs to the world, will you then be able to bring about happiness and joy to the people around you. If you sulk and live in your own depression every single day, how would your friends and family members feel happy when they're around you? I mean, you can't be spreading your sunshine throughout the entire day, because even the sun takes at least 12 hours of rest a day. But when it comes to dealing with people, facing new challenges/problems and everything else in life, isn't it just inspiring to just face it with loads of smiles? I think i've already forgotten to smile when in face with adversities and today, i want to remember and make the commitment to smile in life no matter what.

As much as i can type and this post will go on and on, i know that about 2/3 weeks later, i'll reach rock bottom once again.. but i hope that each and every time, my stamina to reach rock bottom will take even much longer than before. I think it is about time i start changing my attitude towards some things in life. (:

Food for thought:

Have you spread your sunshine today? =)

Shopping Hauls

2011-02-07T12:14:00.001+08:00

Hoodie from Topshop - $26

UP: $53

Shirt from Zara - $30

UP: $90

Polo from local brand Memo - $16

UP: $30

Another one from Memo - $20

UP: $39

Forgot from where le - $9

UP: $30

Shoes from FILA - $45

UP: $90

Wallet from Marithé et François Girbaud - $23

UP: $47

Bag from Marithé et François Girbaud for Kimmy's Birthday

UP: $55

2 Polos from Adidas - $15 for BOTH!! =DDD

UP: $90

Shorts from Adidas - $6 for BOTH!! HEHE!!

UP: $60

Slippers from Penshoppe - $5

UP: $27

Always on a lookout for this! $13 for BOTH!

UP: $45

Total Savings: $393 (bag not included if not more). Awesome Much!! =)

Beautiful People

2011-01-29T07:50:00.002+08:00

They talk about fame whores using their sob stories on American Idol all the time so that they can get to the next stage of the competition.

But take a look at this guy and the story that he has. It is genuine, straight from the heart and he hardly looked one bit like a fame whore or an attention seeker. And he's got mad talent too.

Tell me it didn't brought you to tears. Thank you Chris, for showing me that there're still beautiful people in the world today.

Stagnant

2011-01-28T18:31:00.000+08:00

I shocked myself by buying 2 books yesterday. Everyone who knows me well enough would have known by now that besides Harry Potter, i really don't like reading books.. maybe except for books related to Christianity/Humanity. The few books that i've brought in recent years have always been related to Christianity, and they always revolve around the same theme.

Just by looking at the titles of the books, you should get a rough idea that they share a similar theme - to question the existence of God and why did God put us through all the painful things in the world. I've long past the phrase where i questioned about God's reality and existence. I always wanted to make a commitment to finish up the books, but here's the reality check - 3 books along the same theme (not the ones above) which i brought nearly 2 years ago are still rotting in my cardboard and i never got down with any perseverance to finish even a single book.

I figured out i brought these books not with the purpose to seek some truths or answers from within, but rather for an assurance that God is always here with me. At a time where i've lost complete faith with God's churches and people, i guess i've long known the answers to the questions in my heart and that the only way for me to unveil them is to start letting go of myself and accepting the hard truths in life. But i'm definitely not ready yet.

I guess it's a good time for me to be alone by myself completely now and sort out some thoughts before i officially step foot onto the start of another phase of life. I've got plenty of time right now to settle some of my personal thoughts and i know it's a long 7 months before uni will start, but i really really honestly look forward to it. There's about another 8 days before i'll head back home and i hope that by the end of the trip, i'll get some new insights towards my life.

In life, we're all courageous in different ways. Yesterday, i saw myself walking back from the shopping mall to my hotel on the busy and dirty streets of Bukidnon. And it doesn't help that you look chinese with a head full of kim moh when you're in a sea of filipinos. Not trying to say that it's dangerous here.. i hope you get what i meant anyway. I was scared and was on high security mode and kept my hands tightly to my wallet and handphone in my pockets (and you know i usually carry them on my hand). But i didn't care anyway, I just kept walking and walking until i reached my hotel safely. At the end of the day, what i learnt from this was that people usually like to hide their issues/insecurities/problems by trying to appear to be strong/happy when apparently they are not. I'm a culprit of it but over the recent years i've been trying to come to terms to it. And i'll continue to try even if it takes a lifetime for me to start being comfortable with myself. I guess the ultimate root to all the pretence will be Pride. Food for thought.. are you prideful or are you happy just being completely delusional?

Until then, i'll go back to writing the draft letter for Manila's Mayor. Don't ask me why i'm writing though.

1 country, many cities and 4 stopovers

2011-01-25T21:46:00.001+08:00

Okay, Cebu -> Davao -> Tagum -> Digos.. and loads more other cities i passed through. Trying to complete my own TAR: Philippines. -_-

I miss all of you guys. Anyway, i'm thinking of getting a hotel room on 13th Feb.. but John will not be able to stay and the girls cannot stay over cause Monday has school. I can't get on 12th Feb because this sexy yanyan made me go run to remember Ah Meng. ZZZ. Please comment and tell me what to do??

And i need to run like mad once i return back. Like 10km every single day until Langkawi.. T_T

Anyway, this trip has made me realized that i do not want to be a Chinese Teacher, will apply to MOE for a change of course. A prize for the first person to guess correctly what i'm going to change my course to! :D

See ya all soon!

Mabuhay!

2011-01-23T22:05:00.000+08:00

I think i will not have access to proper Internet for the next few days as i'll be travelling to mountainous regions.

For updates, please check my fb photos or twitter. :D

See ya all soon!

Fly away

2011-01-20T02:09:00.000+08:00

All packed and ready to go. Got my cabbie uncle to wait for me at 930 am, isn't it good to have your own personalise taxi driver? Lol. It's 2am and i'm not asleep yet.. hmm, i think i'm ready to concuss on the plane tomorrow.

Bye people. :)

Somalia

2011-01-19T03:36:00.000+08:00

Read this, tell me you didn't feel burdened.

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/North_Africa/Somalia_MostDangerousPlace.html

Salutes and utmost admiration to Jeffrey Gettleman.

Elicina

2011-01-19T02:37:00.002+08:00

Damn tempted to try/buy this. Apparently it is very very effective for removing acne/pimple marks and my face desperately needs this. =/

http://www.facebook.com/ElicinaSG

First post as a civilian

2011-01-17T23:40:00.000+08:00

So NS ended. Yay. End of story. Hopefully there will be no more mentioning of NS-related stuff written here.

My after NS resolution was to sleep till 12pm on the first non-working day, but i don't know what happened to it and at 10am, i was having breakfast with my mom at the market. Diao. But not that i'm complaining, since i've also not accompanied my mom to the market ever since i enlisted as well. Guess that's like another after NS resolution completed.. now i just need to fulfill the last one, which i will probably forfeit my sleep tomorrow again so that i can do my 10km run to Sembawang Beach and back home. T_T

I observed two very lovely scenes today between two different moms with their three-four year old child and it really made my day. Both incidences, the mom protected the child with unconditional love. At that moment, i was actually thinking about the uncertainties in life.. about how both mothers will not know what their children will turn out to be in future, but no matter who they become, they will always be their children and as parents they will still protect them forever. Isn't this the basic of love? To trust unconditionally and to love with no boundaries. Just the mere thought of this made me smile. :)

Checklist, few countries/cities i'll want/like to visit by the end of this year. -
1. Bangkok, Thailand
2. Macau, Hong Kong
3. Taiwan!!

Maybe i'll do a backpack tour up from Singapore -> Malaysia -> Thailand -> Cambodia -> Vietnam -> Macau -> Hong Kong -> Taiwan -> Philippines -> Indonesia -> Singapore round trip.. All asian countries, because somehow i'm more attracted to the asian sights, scene and culture. Ambitious, ambitious.. lol.

But you never know i'll be crazy enough to do it. :)

Until then, 2 more fitful days in Singapore.. and i need to hit the gym soon. T_T

One Final Moment

2011-01-14T11:55:00.001+08:00

Writing this blogpost in camp, few hours away from collecting my pink card. Many mixed feelings and emotions.. met many people, received many hugs.. i will definitely remember the times i shared with everyone else but i will NOT miss the life and i am very ready to move on to another phrase of life.. it's heartwarming to know so many people actually appreciated you for who you are at the end of the day. Deeply touched from the bottom of my heart. :)

I can't imagine that next week at this time i'll probably just wake up from a night of relaxing stay at Crown Regency and stretching.. yawning.. relaxingly. I honestly can't wait to just get on and move on with life. It has been on a hiatus for FAR too long already.

People, if you're reading this.. i'm officially VERY FREE from today onwards. As Pris would always put it simply, i'm as free as a free gift now and i WANT to meet up with all my awesome friends whom i've not been able to do so because i'm bounded by NS constraints. But now that i'm not, i am dying to do alot of things that i was deprived off for the past 22 months. I wanna play Mahjong until i die on my chair and rot to death, i wanna go out and shop/walk/eat and gorge myself to death, i wanna do so many things and now finally.. i have the liberty and all the time in the world to do it!!! YAY!! Do you feel and share my happiness?? :)

But now.. my only concern is what colour should i dye my hair tomorrow, lol.

SHOCKING PINK? :D

2 ROD TREATS

2011-01-13T10:13:00.002+08:00

For the S4 Branch/Alpha/Charlie Clerks
S1 Branch/CAC pity i didn't take a photo. 6 pizzas, 40 drumlets/wings and 1 huge Awfully Chocolate Cake.. Jess was nice and brought sparklers candles and we all sang our ROD song before we dig into our food, lol!

I will definitely miss this place.

Oh, i'm not going to post this here.. but here's a look at my workplace. :)

3 more days...

2011-01-12T11:42:00.000+08:00

And i've run out of things to talk about. :(

Insecurities, Low self-esteem, Pessimism

2011-01-09T23:44:00.001+08:00

I am just like any other average joe out there.

But i don't want to be an average joe.

我不4你想像那么勇敢

2011-01-08T10:24:00.000+08:00

好黑暗。

黑暗的隧道走到尽头，一定会有曙光。

但愿如此。

Love, actually.

2011-01-07T00:24:00.001+08:00

Today, i think i experienced love at a different level. I always thought i had a pretty good idea what the whole idea of love is all about. But i was obviously wrong.

Everything which happened today was kind of like a roller-coaster ride, but i shall skip the details and go straight into the main topic. It was about 6pm when i was having dinner with mommy after a tiring day of shopping when i received a call from Kimmy. Kimmy told me that she's at A&E because she had a bad fall. What happened next was we finished our dinner quickly and rushed to KTPH immediately because we had no idea how serious her condition was. Throughout the entire journey there, mommy was feisty and angsty. She even went to the extent of using a cetain three worded vulgarity on my sister because she was just so pissed off that my sis didn't heed her advice of not wearing high heels because it's extremely dangerous.

I was very disturbed by my mom because i had no idea why would a mother be so rude and say such vicious words about her daughter who just injured herself badly. So, i told my mom off and snapped at her. When we reached the hospital, my sister was just about to be pushed into the doctor's room (wheelchair) to consult the doctor. My mom and I entered the doctor's room and when we heard the doctor say that she's fine; no broken bones and will recover within weeks.. we heaved a sigh of relief. And i vividly caught my mom losing her worrying a little.

And so we collected the medicine, cabbed home and that was when the real drama started. Mom wants to help sis apply medicated oil on her back, sis needs to call people to get other arrangements for her work. Mom is waiting for sis to finish her call. Sis doesn't know that mom is waiting for her. Mom is worried that sis's condition will worsen, and continued nagging her. Sis is pissed off by mom's constant nagging and shouted at her. Mom is pissed off by sis's screaming and cussed her. Then you have me being the innocent victim, who later on kenna shot by mom's attitude and received some screaming from her and poor me offering to buy sis dinner because mom refused to do it.

Until i was about to go out of the house to buy dinner, when mommy came over and said she'll go. I said huh? She said she needed to buy bread as well. And then i understood. She loved her so much after all. She loved her so much that she decided to put down her pride and go get dinner for her so that she can still take care of her. Come to think of it now, not only did mommy get sis dinner, she also came back to help her rub her back and other injuries, reminded her to eat her medicine and other misc stuff. And then they didn't remember that they barely had a quarrel an hour ago - just like all their past quarrels which probably didn't last past an entire day before.

I'm still in awe from yet another life lesson learnt from mommy. Then i figured out. Mommy was pissed off with sis and cursed her not because she was pissed that she didn't listen to her and injured herself.. but rather she was disappointed. She was disappointed with herself because she didn't try her best and hard enough to advice my sis against wearing high heels. She felt a tinge of guilt for what had happened to my sis. And i call this 嘴硬心软. Even after she quarreled with my sis, she just sat there for 5 minutes obviously pissed.. but within 5 minutes, she moved on and placed everything else that happened aside and resumed her responsibilities of her mother - to take care of her daughter. I was touched, wholesomely touched. And i'm glad my sis decided to put everything behind and continued to receive care and love from a mother after the incident.

Then i realized, it is only kinship that can be so magical.. so wonderfully magical that it will work its magic on its own. Only kinship can let two particular individual who love each other a lot to hate one another not because they hate one another, but because they're simply worried for one another. Only love from kinship, can let two particular individual reconcile within minutes after a silly quarrel which is extremely meaningless if you actually think about it. Think about the quarrels you had with any of your family members. How long did it actually lasted? The longest for me was about a few hours, but never into days and months.

But it is definitely different for friendship. You can fall out with a friend just about as fast as you can flip a pancake on a frying pan. One day you may be best of friends, another day you may not even know what's happening in the life of that one person whom you proclaimed as your best friend once before. Many people have asked me before whether i'll put kinship or friendship first. I always didn't know the answer. But today, i found my answer.

But friendship is not entirely something that is worthless as compared to kinship. Friendship is extremely important still and i would say, it actually depends on what type of friends you're actually making and whether or not those people are actually worth your time and effort. If all works out well, friendship deviates not far from kinship actually. For example, i met up with doudou for one last time today before she will actually fly off to Sweden this Saturday. We haven't met, chatted on msn and called/sms each other for at least a few months.. but conversation just flowed on and on within the first few minutes of our meeting till the next few hours. And this is something you'll never achieve with your mom/dad - to have a conversation with them for a few hours. And at the end of the day before we parted our ways, we gave each other a small hug and everything felt so sorrowful, like someone you really enjoyed being around with will be gone, even if not forever, it felt like forever. But she'll be back before i know it, and i can't wait for the next few months to pass by quickly.

And to you babe, please continue to hang in there and don't give up. I know that life was never easy for you. Sometimes, you may feel that God has been particularly unfair towards you all your life.. but please don't think that way. God has grown you to be the strongest woman i've ever met in my life. Persevere and persist, i have absolute faith in you. We'll do this together, as life has never meant to be a bed of roses for both of us. Aren't you just glad that we have each other to depend on? :)

Thanks to all the people in my life who helped me experience love at a much deeper meaning today. I'm actually glad that this came to light before i turned 21. Wouldn't it be such a shame if you're 21 and you're still wasting your life away, holding on to something which you believe is love but just not meant to be?

我渐渐开始发觉，我真的长大了。

5 items from shopping haul

2011-01-06T22:25:00.002+08:00

Pants from MESSY

Skinny jeans from UNIQLO

Sports socks from Nike

Another pair of pants from NET

Polo Tee from Springfield

The Sixth Sense

2011-01-04T23:51:00.000+08:00

They always say a woman's intuition is never wrong. But my intuition has rarely been wrong but always been spot on all the time. Does that makes me a woman as well? T_T lol.

I don't actually call it "intuition" but rather "sensitivity". Being sensitive to people's needs/wants/demands. Sometimes it is important to know the exact and politically correct way to react to a particular situation, but i honestly don't see many people around me to be equipped with this awesome life skill. Okay, maybe one or two people, but still..

But it is not good at all to be sensitive to people's needs at all. When people start to rely on you because they like how you react to their needs/wants/demands, people start to take you for granted - friends or acquaintances alike. And it is always heartbreaking to let the other party know that you can make a choice to be immune to all their nonsense and let them be. Then they fall out with you.

Smart, totally smart.

2010 is the year i learnt not to draw myself too close to my friends. If i ever need to take a step back, i'll take a step back. If i ever need to shut you out of my life, i'll shut you out of my life. People often asked me why i had to adopt such an extremist action against these people. My answer is pretty simple; such actions are only meant for people who deserved it. And when i mean they deserved it, they deserved it. If they need to learn, i'll just let them learn the hard way.

And the funny thing is those people think it doesn't hurt for me to do it. They think cutting away a friendship for me is just like throwing a piece of junk away. People who know me personally would know by now how much i treasure each and every relationship with all my friends and family. To make the decision to completely shut these people out of my life takes a much more unimaginable effort than anyone can expect coming from such a "tough" (as in attitude) guy like me. But these people will only focus on how much hurt i've engraved upon them, but it will never dawn upon them that everything actually resulted from their attitude towards life.

Friends.. they're such dearly and lovable people. But they can also be a chore and such a piece of shit at times. I'm still a firm believer of strong friendships, but i'll be more careful on investing more time and soul into future friendships. If it's not meant to be, it's not meant to be. If it's time to let go, it's better to let go and not dwell in misery.

I guess the sixth sense would be a good tool to use on filtering people that you can actually start investing your time on for a real and meaningful friendship. Of course, everything else such as the ability to communicate, clique and talk on the same frequency will subsequently fall into place if your intuition is right.

I hope so.

Seven Deadly Sins

2011-01-04T01:10:00.000+08:00

1. Wrath (anger)
2. Greed
3. Sloth (failure to utilize one's talents and gifts)
4. Pride
5. Lust
6. Envy
7. Gluttony

Besides Gluttony (seriously, who the hell needs to eat so much these days?), the others are my reasons to woes and sorrows everyday.

I'll keep fighting.

8 things to do in 2011

2011-01-02T23:55:00.002+08:00

2010 came and go. New year came and go. No point having resolutions because I won't fulfill them anyway, but a short to-do list will remind me of the life i'm living for.

1. Run 42.195km and other marathons.
2. Return to ______.
3. ~~Spend less time on facebook~~ BRB (yibin!)
4. Get my driving license, so that i can ______________.
5. Guitar, French, Tagalog, Swimming (that's actually 4 things)
6. ~~Dye my hair shocking pink~~ Stay healthy.
7. Start saving. lol.
8. Go on a cruise with mommy. (So much so for fear of flight)

And it was so hard to come up with 8 things i wanna fulfill. But with these 8 "itinerary", i think it's gonna keep me busy for an entire year ahead.

Until then, i can finally say i ROD this year. First blog post of the year! :)

PS: People are secretly stalking my blog! My counter is jumping so fast yet nobody is making any comments! People, TALK.

LMAO! :)

9 friends in 2010

2010-12-31T02:23:00.002+08:00

1. Mother Pig

After knowing each other for so long, we finally reached a stage where we can discuss about 少女情怀 and 少男情怀 issues. HAHAHA. But i still think you're a 熟女 and not 少女 so don't pretend to act young. :D Thanks for all the fun, joy and laughter we shared together this year!

2. Yanyan

You know you love the Taiwan trip because of me!! WHEEE, haha! Thanks for all the advice and help that you've offered me this year. Although you're damn sassy at times, i gotta say i secretly enjoy your sassyness. I'll remember our time in TAIWAN forever! Love <3 LEOFOO!!

3. Jess

It was a whacky 2010 with you man! Will remember the nights we spent on the dance floor with Noel and Zoukout man! We're going on separate paths next year but until then we will still have many chances to meet-up next year! More marathons man!! (:

4. Chiku

Life may be tough in NS man.. and 2012 ORD sucks.. but, you can do it! I will remember all the laughters and joy you brought to my life this year! Until then, your birthday is coming and for the first time (i'm such a bad friend man..) i'll remember to get Tommy to celebrate together with you!

5. Feliball

Your MSN display pic! I think our friendship reached a different level this year. It is amazing how we can put aside our differences and strengthened our bond with each other. All the neoprints we've taken with one another this year man! Thanks for bringing much laughters into my life! :D

6. Fatdric

OMG. I just realized that i don't have a decent duo photo taken with you!! Will make it a point to take loads of photos with you tomorrow at the countdown beach party mans! My army life would suck without you and you've brightened up my day with all the hanky pankying, muacks muacks and lubs lubs! HAHAHA. Damn scandalous but :DDDDDD !!

7. Hannie

I just realized that i haven't celebrate your birthday for both you and yanyan yet after looking at this photo. OMG, i'm such a bad friend and i sincerely apologize for it. I bet you heart your Taiwan trip for the same reason as yanyan haha, don't try to deny!! I gotta know you at a much deeper level this year due to much more outings and interactions and i have to admit i really enjoyed myself when you're around. And we've yet another overseas trip coming up man! Can't wait!! :)

8. Doudou

I will remember the night when you stayed on the phone with me for so long and talked me through my darkest time. I will remember how you always bully and steal my food in chinese lit lessons. I will remember how you drank 6 bowls of tom yam soup at one go. I'll miss you when you're in Sweden, friend. See ya in June next year!

9. Qiggy

JB and Batam was fun this year man! While you're going to be MR LEE next year.. please wait for me while i become MR NG after i go for my crazy vacation okay? Can't wait for our next meetup and it is always fun and nice with you around! And please stop acting crazy once in a while because it'll freak me and meow out! HAHA.

And to timo, boonie, tommy, jezzie, junhong, mrs phelps, johnny, noel, binnys, uncle yeo, shaun lubs, rudi, kaijie, eric, lecky, fweefwee and louis.. thanks for also helping me make my 2010 such a memorable one.

I <3 my friends. :)

PS: I don't know why i use so many "man". LOL.