我喜欢苏打绿

Sodagreen came into my life through Hui Shan's blog, and the first song of theirs that I heard, 小情人, was so sweet and beautiful.

'Ventured' further, and I heard 无与伦比的美丽. Found out that the album of the same name was the newest.



And then I heard all of the songs in 无与伦比的美丽. I think I like how every song sounds like, though I still can't remember their titles. Whatever it is, I think their songs are good!

I like the fact that their lead singer doesn't sound much like a guy. This is what makes them special. My mum is still not convinced that he's a guy.

I like the fact that their music takes note of instrumentation very well. I heard viola (because they have a violist member), oboe, clarinet, flute, higher brasses to bring out a fanfare effect in some of their songs. One day I'll hear the tuba. Whahaha. Not that other songs don't use, but sodagreen's songs have this very pleasing effect in the way they use the instruments. Probably the way they sound feels very my-kind-of-band-music.

I like the fact that their music style is quirky and adorable at times, soothing and ballad-ly at times.

I like the fact that one of their songs, 白日出没的月球, i.e. the moon which appears at daytime, has this A-B-A style that my-kind-of-band-music uses. Fast, slow, then fast. So interesting! I was delightedly amused when I heard the transition. Very unique.

I like the fact that their keyboardist/violist is charming. (whaha) For now though, because I only saw him in photos and an MV clip. Receding hairline. I don't like, but well, there's a certain aura about him when performing. And don't trust my taste =P Oh he's the one right in front on their album cover (on top). He got the privilege because he's going to army. I still can't remember his name.

I like the fact that their bassist is a lady. She emits a kind of glamour when she plays. You don't get this kind of expression from male bassists. What we'd call wu seh.

I like the fact that they went to (and mostly met in) university, feels very close to me.

I like the fact that I'm soooo gonna watch them if they'll have a concert in Singapore again. This concerns money and the fact that I missed their concert in August =( So I have to wait quite long.

Mainly I like them because of the instrumentation in their music and how the final product sounds like. So nice!

Today's lunch

I somehow got an idea from this yuanyang pasta I tried at Kim Gary.

I like tomato- or dry-based pasta.

And since my brother wanted carbonara instead.


Ta-daa. We'll have the best of both worlds!

Looks nice. Tastes nice. Everything nice. Yeay. I had a good lunch today =D

One more exam to go

Four papers down, one more to go and it'll take place next Tuesday evening, so I happily am enjoying my days. For now.

Yesterday after the 4th paper I went to VivoCity with Andy who wanted to go there for books. So I happily followed him there. I wanted to get Sodagreen's 无与伦比的美丽 but couldn't find it at Vivo. I wanted to get the Eagles' A Long Road Out To Eden but the find that the CD case, which was actually made of cardboard paper, was a bit too sub-standard and I am just reluctant to get. In the end Andy spent $70 on this compilation and I spent $1 on a bottled drink. I was too tired to shop.

When I reached Tampines I dropped by Tampines Mall to check out Sodagreen's albums. Found it! But it was priced at $27+ and I think it's a bit too pricey. Imported material. So I didn't buy in the end.

Took a bus to Tampines Mart's movie rental shop and I brought High School Musical 2 home. Watched it while having dinner and I seriously think this show is much better than its first part. I found HSM1 poser-y and fake and the plot was absolutely lousy, and the actors' and actresses' dubbing were very inaccurate. However the problem improved quite a bit in HSM2 and the story was much much better! It was hilarious and entertaining at the same time. Seriously. You should watch it for a good laugh. Provided you watched HSM1, if not it'll be quite difficult to capture what was going on. Humuhumu.

Right after HSM2 I switched on the cable and found that Star Chinese Movies was showing Sound Of Colours a.k.a. 地下铁 and since it just started I watched it. It's damn nice too. So sweet and heart warming! Based on a picture novel by Jimmy.

By the time I was done with two movies it was past midnight. I spent nearly three hours on HSM2 'cos of the DVD extras. I always like to watch those extras, that's why I prefer DVDs.

I continued my visual entertainment with S-Pop Hurray that I recorded from Monday night, and by the time I was done it was way past 2. And so I slept.

This morning - no, afternoon, at 1 p.m., when I woke up I went to the kitchen (which will bring me to the bathroom) I saw some monstrous figure outside the window and it really is frightening. Beware of the photo below!

*screams*


Ho ho. I still think I like my self-proclaimed intense sense of humour. Anyway.

They were doing some roofing works so there was this huge machinery (crane) that was tall enough to carry the roof tiles from the top down to the workers on the ground.



It was too tall for me to take a good photo of the machine. But nevertheless, it is quite an interesting event.

Impressive eh?

I went out grocery shopping for dinner as none of my folks is having dinner at home and I had to prepare my own meal. Which I didn't mind at all, I love to concoct(!) all kinds of dishes. Been recipe reading and choosing some stuff which I guess I'll cook someday soon. Won't share with you. Haha!

I had $22 with me when I went to Shop N Save. Spent about half an hour there, and I decided I should just make dinner simple. Pasta in tomato. But I don't make my own sauce usually and still didn't. Picked Del Monte tomato pasta sauce, San Remo vegeroni spirals, two packs of Nutritea, a 2L bottle of Meiji low fat milk, a cup of Meiji yogurt, a loaf of Sunshine bread and a packet of sausages.

Then when I saw the total price at the cashier tick I was horrified. Why on earth is it skipping so fast? I thought I had enough money. So I had to ask the cashier to remove the yogurt and the bread from the list. Damn, how embarassing. Haha never mind. I was wondering why the price when I realised I mistakenly placed a huge bottle of Prego sauce in my basket! Shit! I don't know why I put it in my basket and didn't notice, I probably was distracted or something. =(

When I got home and started cooking, my mum was like, 'Waaaa, smells good!' And she insisted that I cook for her for lunch tomorrow heh heh. At first taste I think my pasta was rather bland, but after a few more bites the taste was just perfect! =D A bit drier than usual 'cos I cooked too much pasta. However I don't think there was an overload of sauce and the dryness was just nice, it wasn't too bland or anything. One day I'll make pasta nicer than the Fish Fillet pasta I tried at Megabites and all those different kinds of pasta in Italy.

Doesn't look appetising but...well not all good food look good! =P


It's still yummy to me!

After dinner I Googled something. How to French braid hair!!! So I tried and succeeded heh heh but of course it was rather loose and untidy. I'm gonna practise more and one day you'll see me in those nice plaits. =D Vanity.

Tomorrow's plans:
1. Cycle at Pasir Ris Park with bro in the morning
2. Cook lunch for my folks (I have some cooking plan in mind, hope it'll work! =D)
3. Shop after lunch with mum!

Then I probably will start studying for the last paper.

Flashbacks of November

Because of a very bad examination schedule this semester, I diligently started studying earlier than ever for the papers (which still isn't early but this doesn't mean that the exams still went well =(). Therefore I haven't been blogging nicely.

Nevertheless, I still want to blog. So sit back, relax, and let me share what happened to me the last few weeks =)

Stop here if you need to mug.


/08 11 2007 Thursday Deepavali Part 1/
Met up with the seven of us except Jing Yi for a meal at Whitesands. Since the shopping mall has been revamped there are more things that we can do there now. =)

So we ate at Xin Wang and celebrated Hui Ying's and Shi Hui's birthdays.

My Hong Kong minced pork noodle. Mmm.

The mango cake which Annie got

/08 11 2007 Thursday Deepavali Part 1/
This afternoon Ethan was breathing weirdly and it scared me so I forced my parents to bring him to the doctor and so my dad drove us to the clinic. Nothing really wrong, just some mucus that was blocking his nostrils.

On the way back in the car, I saw a nice moment for me to take a shot of Ethan.


See him? =)


/11 11 2007 Sunday/
The last time I talked about the lion felt plush that I haven't got from Kimberly. Anyway, I transferred the photo to my phone and made it my wallpaper (it still is!) and I think it has a nice effect to it. I like the way it looks on my phone.


Nice right? Or at least I think so.


/15 11 2007 Thursday/
Was at the Medical/Science Library studying with a handful of band people. And Daniel Kang snuggled in his very comfortable jacket.



/16 11 2007 Friday/
A few days ago I heard from Maria that her friend told her that Maria was spotted in a poster somewhere at University Hall. And then I went to take a look since my dad drove me to school and I asked him to drive me to take a look. It wasn't a poster/banner. It was a billboard.


And Annie's face was on it too. Other than the both of them, Debre, Evelyn, Chin Fung, Jay and Weiling whose face was fortunately blocked by Maria's raised arm, were on the billboard too. I was thankfully cropped from the picture, you can see me, I'm the one behind Annie with the white cap. Thank juicy goodness. And Wilson was right beside Annie and he got cropped too. He was very relieved.

Because Annie is always conscious about the size of her face, I just had to purposely poke fun at her as you can see in the photo =P

This scene was taken during Rag Day earlier in August, when we were screaming those FoS cheers. We saw the cameraman taking photos of us but somehow we didn't think too much.

If you're asking, this billboard is there for NUS to show support to the local Youth Olympics Committee or something, to win the bid for the YO to be held in Singapore in 2010. Therefore, the billboard may be there for two years. Juicy goodness.

Check out the billboard at the bus-stop opposite University Hall.


/17 11 2007 Saturday/
Played with the panorama function in my phone at home. You can see a 180 degrees view of my living room.


I suggest you blow the photo up.


/18 11 2007 Sunday Part 1/
Ethan is turning a month old on the coming Thursday, and so by Chinese tradition his parents are to buy those kind of cakes and pastries and send it to their relatives. My parents and I helped to send for the relatives on our side. Dad planned the driving route (and send me to school along the way as well), and we set off. I took a look at the boxes of 'yummy treats' inside a box before we set off. Here's what you should've got if you were my relative. My sister ordered from Choz Confectionary. I think it is over-rated, don't get your cakes from there.



Inside there were two fruit tarts which I think tasted horrible. Because there weren't custard filling and the entire piece was rather dry and un-tasty. Two ang ku kuehs, two glutinous rice cubes and two red eggs - I didn't get to eat any of them. The cake was so-so.


On the way we hit the ECP and I finally get to see the Singapore Flyer during day time and happily pressed the shutter.




/18 11 2007 Sunday Part 2/
Samuel performed at Holland V today, I went for the performance with Annie, Andy, Debre and Ismy. There were three bands which performed that night, with Samuel's band in the middle. I wasn't expecting much, just rather thrilled that it is the first time I'll watch Samuel perform onstage.

And so I was amazed by the kinds of guitars he has (perhaps I just don't know how crazy he is about guitars). The moment he flashed out his guitar I was like, woah, I don't remember seeing a guitar model like this before!

Really flashy.

One of the members sarcastically commented it to be a Siamese-twin guitar -_-. It's called a double-necked guitar from what Samuel told me.

From left: me, Ismy, Samuel the guitarist, Annie, Debre, Andy the beanie-ist

We got Merci chocolate from Samuel. Coincidentally there was a shooting star shaped box, so I happily chose it. He was the star of the night anyway =D Samuel learnt French in school and I asked him a while ago how to pronounce merci, which means thank you in French. I don't know how to tell you how to pronounce it accurately, but when you say it fast, it sounds like 'messy'. So don't trust the ad that tells you 'Mercccyyyyyyy I know means saying thanks'. They don't pronounce it properly.

You-won't-know and I Samuel and his cool guitar Oh, and Samuel had a solo that night =D

/20 11 2007 Monday/
The boredom of studying has caught up with me too soon. I entertained myself my writing notes in someone else's name.


You may want to guess who D.K. is, he was mentioned in this post.

I happily threw it on Khee Nguen's desk in the library.

More paronama fun.


Extras:
There are four digicams at home, three Olympus and one Fujifilm. My brother has one, but his recently his friend damaged it and my brother being himself never asked his friend to pay for the damages. So the camera is gathering dust on his shelf. My dad has two, he bought the Olympus one many years ago and I still think it's quite a good camera. Though only 4.0 megapixels. It has a 10x optical zoom which is the power. 4x digital zoom but that doesn't really bother me. The Fuji was picked up in his taxi months ago, but the owner never notified him and he didn't see any bulletin from the company regarding it. Some time later it became ours -_- Sorry. Ah, the camera is at least better-to-use than my own Olympus simply because of the shutter speed. The retarded speed of my camera is really costing me my Kodak moments. That's why I don't really like to use my camera, the slow shutter speed is blurring a lot of my photos when I don't use flash. And another thing which makes me dislike my camera further is that someone dropped it and it suffered scratches and a cracked card-and-battery cover.

So I guess I'll get my own camera soon =P And it better has a good shutter speed and a panorama function. Meanwhile I try to be able to take photos totally horizontally.


/21 11 2007 Wednesday/
My folks and my sister's husband and in-laws met up for dinner at the Fortunate Restaurant to celebrate Ethan's first month on this (terrible) world.

Ah, panorama play. From left: yours truly, mum, sis, bro-in-law, his mum. I don't like her. =P


Ah Nan was there to host a show. But the crowd was very pathetic actually.



/22 11 2007 Thursday/
Today is Khee Nguen's birthday, and we had a surprise for him. How surprising. Hui Shan asked Rong Chen to save four apple crumbles from Spinelli for us so as to have a tiny celebration for KN.

The four apple crumbles. Dan's apple crumble crumbled (top right)

D.K. and KN

They're holding on to a card I drew in probably about ten minutes? And I wrote some very mushy message inside and signed off as Donkey Kong (affectionately known as D.K.). I can't remember what stuff I wrote inside, but I was very amused as I wrote. KN said it really sounded like a love letter. Whahahah! Great. I've never written such things for my exs and I think I'm terrific at making up love letters. Which isn't really a good thing especially when I don't mean it. Whatever~

HS and KN

I realised I didn't take any pic with KN. Never mind!

Wait. I did. Where's the group photo?! KHEE NGUEN!!!

Close up of one of the treats

/24 11 2007 Saturday/

It was always quite difficult to get dinner in school on Saturdays and Sundays. So D.K. called up California Pizza 6-241-0-241! Hawaiian and seafood =) Shared among HS, D.K., Prof Phua and me.

There was this cat which was obviously hungry. Prof Phua fed it with a tiny chunk of pizza and I bet the cat was damn happy. It climbed trees afterwards. Serious.


Panorama play.

/26 11 2007 Monday/ I had to write two sets of help sheets for my exams which are usually time-consuming and sometimes no use at all. I was so sick of writing the 3rd help sheet, I entertained myself (again).

Have a good lesson on help sheeting making.

How to make a help sheet

1. Prepare:

• a few pieces of paper, sized according to examination standards;
  
• a ruler;
• a pencil;
• a few pens of different colours, depending on your choice;
• a highlighter;
• an eraser;
• correction fluid/correction tape.

I shall demonstrate with an A4-sized paper.

2. Fold the paper in half.


3. Fold the sides of the paper back towards the centre fold and you will get four partitions.


4. Lay the paper flat against the surface of the table, and draw lines using the pencil along the folds.

Now you can start writing!

5. Start by writing (in a very small font size) the name of the topic in a colour, then using a different colour, write the formula or theorems that you wish to take note. Separate each theory/corollary/lemma/whatever accordingly, with a horizontal line.



6. Highlight keywords so you can spot them easily during your examination, without the need to scan for the keyword.

7. After every topic, bold the horizontal line.


8. The help sheet is almost done. Once done, you can fold them and you'll find that you can hold on to your help sheet handily. (It is actually quite difficult to hold the sheet as an A4 as it is too big) Simply flip to the partition that contains what you need, tuck the rest of the parts in and refer!


9. Now you are done =) Remember to write on both sides and good luck to your future endeavours!

-_-

~~~~~

Thank you for reading, hope you had a good time. Whahaha.

Have you Ethan-ed?

Ethan turns a month old!

Supposedly tomorrow I think. So we're gonna have some kind of celebration tonight at a restaurant.

So fast. And he's not going to spend the next month at my place, my sister just brought him back to her place. I don't know if I'll miss him, but for now, thank goodness there's no more wailing at home as I need to study.

Staying at home todaaaay.

But there are some upgrading works going on...

Grrrrr

I am so screwed.

I thought there'd be a good outcome.

ARGH.

I hate school.

I need and want to keep my spirits up.

Felt power

I was doing my once-in-a-while blog-hopping when I came across my MJCSB tuba junior Kimberly's blog.

Was reading and reading till a picture caught my eye.


So cute right??!!

It's done by her sister. I'm wondering if she has a website so that I can look at everything. Heh heh. Or better, if I can buy the lion one! I don't know for what use though, but it's some of the stuff that I buy and that can make me happy. And it's hand-made. And especially it's a lion! I'm curious about how the stitching is done as well.

You can go to Kim's blog and look at the rabbit one =)

皮肤问题多多

Since young I've been having problems with my skin, i.e., I have infections on my limbs/face and everytime they look like an erupting volcano. No la, that's just an exaggeration.

The last time I had such a problem was in September, there was a cyst on my forehead and I had to visit the doctor. 'Cos of the lack of fats on my forehead, the cyst was pretty obvious and I had to hide it with my fringe.

This time, merely less than two months later, was on my right cheek. I just visited the doctor this late morning. However, this time the cyst felt like it was bigger but thanks to the fleshy cheeks of mine, the cyst isn't that obvious. Still, I didn't have the mood to go out or anything. =(

The doctor of the clinic near my place was a certified dermatologist so I expected good consultation and good medicine. I think he actually didn't look at my skin properly, 'cos when I used the facial wash my skin felt dry. =( It was a soap-based wash. And also, he didn't comment a lot. I like doctors who tell me lots and lots of stuff. Never mind, all will be well after this ordeal.

Char siew fried rice

Ah, I was the chef today! Haha. 'Cos my mum has been busy with confinement dishes for my sister, sometimes when I look like I'm free my mum will pester me to make a simple dinner for myself and her and my dad so that she won't have to cook so much.

As for dinner today, my mum said she'll be fine with just fried rice and since there was char siew at home, I could add that to the rice as well. So she shredded the char siew and left it somewhere near the stove. When I wanted to start cooking, I found that the plate of char siew was in my way. Then I put it to the other side of the kitchen to make some space for myself.

Happily I cooked, added ingredients and condiments etc, and yeay I cooked good fried rice (as usual, whaha). Smelled and tasted great. The fragrance, you know.

And then guess what? I made char siew fried rice, without char siew -_-

I forgot about the char siew 'cos I didn't see it.

'Auntie!! Char siew peng, mai char siew~!'

Yesterday

Monday Baby blues.

I can't really remember the events clearly, but here's the gist of what happened yesterday.

I reached home and was chatting with my mum when she told my dad to check on the “心肝宝贝(precious)” in the room. Then I looked at her and told her, “阿豆的心肝宝贝是我哦！(I'm dad's precious)” That's how I call my dad, by the way. And if you don't know yet, I'm the youngest in my family (if you don't count my nephew in haha). So I was sort of, always the 宝贝(precious) at home. =P Very spoilt brat, I know. Heh.

Then after that my mum was telling my dad about the day's happenings to Ethan (my nephew). And she was like “小的今天...(Today the small one)” I had to look at her again hahahahaha. I was like, “好咯！现在最小的不是我了咯！宝贝也不是我了咯！(OK lo! Now I'm not the 'small one' already lo! I'm also not the precious already!)” Whahaha.

I'm rather spoilt. Whahhahahaa. I'm the whiny one at home!

But while I've been whining I believe I've been doing a good job at looking after Ethan whenever I can. (read: maternal instincts) When my sister (his mum, duh) carried him, he'll wail and wail and wail and then I'll go to her and bring him into my arms, play with him a bit, and he'll keep quiet! Muahahahhahaha.

There are more nicknames I have for him already. All because he's Ethan. Here goes.

Have you Ethan-ed (eaten)?
吃包了(eaten)
Ethanol (and ethanoic acid and ethane and ethene and so on so forth)
First-grade egg ("一等蛋" sounds like Ethan Tan)

Oh, and I was feeding him (via milk bottle) yesterday. So I was carrying him with my left arm while his butt and legs were resting on my lap. While he was sucking away, I felt some weird sensation on my thigh but I supposed it was just getting hotter because Ethan was sitting there. After that, it began to feel wet. Well, now you know.


Sigh.

Symphony No. 3

I've been listening to Johan de Meij's Symphony No. 3 - Planet Earth for the umpteenth time already. Acquired taste - now I like it a lot.

So I hope we'll be able to get a female chorus to perform with us (NUSWS) come March 2008. The performance will lack a crucial effect if we use only a synthesizer to replace the female voices! I don't want!! Haha.


Irrelevant addendum (I just can't be bothered to create a new post): I hope nothing bad will happen to my laptop while my brother goes on holiday in two days.

Ah, the bastardity of people

This time it isn't about unethical Singaporeans but the three-B's.

Big Brit Bullies.

Big-sized and pea-brained people.

Well, at least they know how to function a videocam. They know how to upload videos onto youtube.

Much to their own folly of uploading the ill-fated clip that the entire world knows what's happening.

You still don't know what I'm talking about?

Some days ago three British tourists took a ride on a trishaw pedalled by this old 67-year-old man. The three Brits were probably about 200 kg added together. One was obviously sitting on the laps of the other two in the small trishaw. They mocked at the uncle for cycling so slowly - obviously due to the weight of the three farts - and at the end of the trip, they refused to pay the $10 trip. Bloody bastards right? What do they think they are to not pay for the trip? They said they weren't bullying, but oh c'mon, you uploaded your own evidence to the world and you deny your actions. Dumb asses.

Argh, I'm so pissed. I need things that I can punch or kick. The BBB's should do just fine.

Hmmph. The elderly are not there for you to bully, you arses. How disrespectful. You didn't think this will create an uproar in Singapore? Oh come on, this has got to do with ethics too!

We had nothing much against the British and yet now we have everything against them. Didn't some parts of your brains tell you that what you're doing is wrong?

真佩服那位老伯。敬业乐业的好榜样。

Look at the clip and tell me if you're furious.

Read the write-up and comments by a British news site and tell me if you're furious.

Read the interview by omy.sg and tell me if you're furious. Do look at the vodcast too.

Damn you brits. (not the entire British population, it's just the three of them.)

Stupidoes! >=\

A last-minute TV interview

After my last lecture today I went to the pink tables at the Science canteen. Met my freshies there, so chatted a bit with them. We helped Megabites earn 4 green tea jellies worth of money.

That's not the point though. After they left for their lecture I decided to go to CFA and do some work. Made myself comfortable in the conference room and listened to de Meij's Symphony No. 3 while writing away.

And then Joanna came to join me.

After which, I started to hear our group manager Pearl screaming in her office. She was a bit anxious than usual.

Then she came out and told Joanna and I that she needs 15 minutes of our time.

It turned out that people from Front, an Arts Central programme, called CFA and said they were going down to interview students from CFA. So asked them to pick any students and they'll do the interview at UCC. So Joanna and I were in.

-_-

I was a bit nervous though. I thought, maybe I'll meet Eunice Olsen? Or the rest of the hosts? There are a number of hosts on Front but I can't remember who they are.

It turned out that Hossan Leong, the newest addition to the second season of the programme, was going to interview us. There were two from the NUS Choir with us.

Asked questions like our favourite performing venues in Singapore. I wasn't diplomatic enough to say UCC because the hall really needs to have some kind of...new additions. Acoustics aren't good. Haha. So I went on and on to talk about other stuff =P I have a feeling my interview won't be shown on TV 'cos I felt I was just shooting some locations because Hossan Leong asked what locations I didn't like etc.

Hahaha. If I get on TV I'll tell you guys.

The second season will only start in Nov 20. We'll see.

Snapfish

I uploaded my pictures to snapfish and then they started sending me mails about 20 free prints. Of course I ignored that since they may use some tactic to charge the hell out of me.

Till I chanced upon some stranger's blog and he/she actually had ordered prints from snapfish and they really came and apparently it was really free.


I tried it out myself and voila. It is free. Just that you have to pay 10 cents per photograph for postage.

I printed 19 photos, so I paid a total of SGD1.90 inclusive of postage. Payment via credit card. I checked and really only S$1.90 was deducted.

And it actually is worth it I think, since I do not have to go to the developer personally (i.e., convenient) and I only pay 10 cents for each photo in the end.

However, the photos come out to be rather dark and so I can't really see the details of my Italian scenery =(. The hp quality paper is really damn good. They're gloss photos but they won't leave fingerprints!

Maybe you'd like to try if you haven't.