Ah, another looooooooooooooooooooooong post

Here I go again. I think I prefer blogging once in a while and spend hours on this. Raaawn.

/04122007 Tuesday/
Last paper! Had dinner at Crystal Jade Holland V with Annie, Nathalie, Ching Wen, Samuel and Yu Ming. I had HK minced pork noodle. I like!

Bill: This is the first time that I realised how time consuming splitting the bill can be. Well of course it depends on the method you use as well. However, I won't use this method that I saw today. Formulating equations with graphic calculator. I am still amazed!

拉面啊拉面

小笼包啊小笼包

With the Frenchman who was hugging my dictionary
A/P Chan handling the bill

/05122007 Wednesday Part 1/
Went to the zoo with Joan. Late last night I was wondering how great the weather has been. So I prayed that the weather would be as nice this time. Oh well. A series of rainy days started right on this day itself.

The scene that greeted me at the bus stop

Nevertheless, we trotted to the zoo amidst the wind and rain. We had our fair share of fun! And photos were still taken in the rain.

Reporting from AMK bus terminal

Zoo - 动物园 - Taman Haiwan

On 138 to the zoo. It was quite a long ride!

When we reached the zoo, the rain was too heavy so Joan and I sat around at KFC and had our lunch.

This is some sheep-goat breed called goral. Nibbling

Otters! Damn cute, the way they lie beside each other

The flooding at the zoo was a bit worrying, so I decided to go back out to Cheers situated at the entrance and bought some $3.90 slippers since I was wearing my Kappa lion canvas shoes. Wanted to wear slippers when I left the house, but I predicted (dumbass haha) that Mandai would be sunny. So happily I wore shoes...

Continued visiting.

What's that atop the tree trunk?


Oh. It's some depressed primate loner. It was basking itself not in the sun but in the rain.

Non-flaming flamingoes

Penguin

Fluffed

It was raining too heavily again, so Joan and I seeked shelter nearby.

Look at the rain drops


Look at the centre, we have another loner

No wonder we primate humans get depressed. It runs through the entire evolution process.

Kangaroos at the Australian Outback

They have this braille thing that even the blind can visit the zoo!

K-A-N-G-A-R-O-O. No la, actually I can't read braille

White tigers

Malayan Tapir

Mummy tapir fuzzing around with baby tapir

Upper Seletar Reservoir




Zebra crossing

Jaguar

I've reached the lions' den!



The lion looks sad. I'd be sad too, if I spend my life enclosed

Giraffes tucked away in a corner

Most animals are either hiding in their tents or lazing away in the rain. So spirit-dampening.

Look at the level of flooding. I was practically washing my feet with every step.

Lion cap!

I was telling Joan about this uni senior who works part-time at the zoo. I don't have June's number, so I just didn't bother looking out for her.

And ta-daa she found me.


She's now a full-timer there, as an Education Executive.

After which I went to NTUC at AMK Hub with Joan to shop for our picnic stuff that would have happened the next day. (but look at the weather)


/05122007 Wednesday Part 2/
Samuel the Frenchman left for France for some academic-related programme. So a bunch of us went to send him off.

The bunch of us who went to send Samuel off

Interesting and exciting rumours throughout the night.


/06122007 Thursday/
Thanks to the weather that we girls couldn't go on with our picnic. So we camped at Hui Ying's place instead, bringing all our food there. I woke up a bit late, reached later than I should have =(

It was just like a repeated scene of the day before.


Jing Yi and Shun Wei reached even later, haha. HY made yummy pastries (I also want an oven at home!), Shi Hui and Joan made lovely cupcakes, YX bought juices and green tea, JY bought Campbell's soup, SW made nice tuna and ham sandwiches, I made a salad out of wine and fruits.

HY's pastry

The pretty cupcakes!

I didn't bother to take any picture of my salad 'cos I was rather disappointed in both looks and taste of the dessert haha. There was only a tint of wine and due to the season I could only get fruits like honeydew, white grapes and strawberries. The colours were plain. Strawberries weren't sweet enough. And the white grapes had thick skin and seeds! Seeds! Can you believe it? I actually bought seeded grapes when you should use seedless ones for salads! Oh I couldn't get mint leaves too, so I made do without that. This is the actual recipe.


/07122007 Friday/
Went to CFA in the late afternoon 'cos of billing complications.

After that I trotted down to Esplanade for PhilWinds' concert, there was a Korean guest pianist and I think the entire concert was very heavy and dry. Russian compositions, mostly transcribed from orchestral arrangements so you know the difference. $13 not very well spent.


/08122007 Saturday/
Saw the email about Procter & Gamble offering internships so I decided to give it a try and the application process was so long. I'm not sure if the position I applied for is related to my major, but whatever. I'm still gonna try and see what I can do with those market analysis stuff. Bless me.

Left home late 'cos I was rushing the applications and saw Annie off at the airport (she left for UNSW's summer programme) 5 minutes before she left. Thank goodness I reached there somewhat in time =S


/10122007 Monday to 11122007 Tuesday/
Sweat Camp kicked off. Met Ivan on bus 27 and we went to the airport to meet Daniel Liu for bus 36 to East Coast Park. Probably the bus 27's driver isn't too proficient that I suppose he hit the kerb while driving out of T3 (I think) and the bus shook. I knocked onto Ivan who's much skinnier than I am. But he didn't fall onto the ground, his bag did. But it was a bit scary for that moment.

I have not many photos of Sweat. This is one camp where there wasn't a need to exchange contacts and to have cheers. So I have no contacts of our group's facilitator haha =P.

There was one very interesting person that I met during the camp. Sometimes when you talk to the person you don't know if you should laugh or cry. That's all I'm going to talk about this person. I shall tell you more about it if I remember =P

It should be called Wet Camp instead, considering the amount of rainfall while we were trying to get our sports done.

The gloom we faced at Kallang Basin

Ivan said this is a rain fog whose occurrence is normal, as what he learnt in his choc-ker-fee lessons

A scene at ECP. Check out the plane on the left

So in all I dragonboat-ed, soccer-ed, windsurfed and bladed. I rowed worse than I remembered, I kicked as poorly as usual, I suck at windsurfing (there is something with my balancing that I can't explain), and I am so gonna brush up on blading. Blading is not difficult! I think it is easier to pick up compared to cycling but I probably will be slow at mastering it.

Come blade with me!


I was supposed to go onto Day 3 of the camp where we leave for Sisters' Island in the evening of Day 2, but I left because

• I read too much True Singapore Ghost Stories to know about Sisters' Island, and I am freaky about these supernatural stuff
• My mum knows about these supernatural stuff so she didn't allow me to go
  
• I had BTT on Wednesday which is my 2nd attempt and I'm so gonna pass (and I did! More info later)
  
• I had an interview on Wednesday too

So there were reasons why I shouldn't go on. And I left! There was this Secret Pal thing, my nickname is sushi. Cheesy. (No, sushi is not cheesy. I love sushi!) So I was paired up with this guy who's less chatty than me and I talked non-stop in order to keep awake. He talked quite an amount of course, and I did more. Whatever. So I told him I wasn't going to Sisters' Island so we may never learn who each other are. Blah blah blah, when I left my group at ECP some guy came up to me, 'Excuse me, are you my SP?' Haha and I said yes, because I managed to find out who he was and he managed to find out who I was too. Nice. I stupidly left without initiating an introduction so I never learnt his name until I asked Khee Nguen some time later.

Now I can tell Kendrick that he's my ex. Fair. (oh childish)

I doubt I'll stay in contact with Chee Fei though.


/12122007 Wednesday/
Three months ago I booked my BTT on this date. Preparation was much more intensive than my first attempt, and I made sure I memorised stuff well. Took the test and I dreaded pressing the 'End Test' icon, I was so afraid. Pressed that icon, the system loaded for a while and 'Passed' appeared. PHEW. That huge sigh of relief. Was rushing for an interview so didn't collect my Probational Driving license.

Interview was for this tuition centre that I may be going to teach at, gonna teach P5 math. I think I won't like working there. The fact that it's a tuition centre explains the need for vast improvement to attract business.

But a damn good plus point is it's three blocks away from my place.

I am also unassured that I am gonna teach P5 Chinese, 'cos the student's mum wants me to make her daughter be interested in Chinese. I don't know how I'm going to. Bring laptop and play some music? 苏打绿? Share Chinese books with her? 几米？Talk to her about the great 5000 years of Chinese history? I don't know much! I don't really know how I'll start with her. I don't know why, but these two students that I've picked up are giving me more pressure than I thought. Now I wonder if I can cope =(


/13122007 Thursday/
Chatted with WJ the night before and we started talking about movies and I asked him out for Enchanted, one of the movies that I wanted to catch this holiday. I had qualms with whether he'll be interested in the movie, but still went ahead with plans. Met him in the late morning and since I live in Tampines I went to Tampines Mall earlier to get tickets.

Had some time before he'd arrive so I shopped around and got a red cardigan at the Mango sale! Yeay, I finally got a red cardigan. This should be the last piece of warm clothing that I'll get for the time being, unless I see something really nice. I have too many jackets and sweaters already.

Enchanted was nice and sweet, haha. Sooo Disney. Watching it only made me reminisce my little-girl days, I loved it when they showed the Disney cartoon movies on free-to-air Channel 5. And the human part of the movie was hilarious. Ah, I didn't know that the prince was James Marsden, the same guy who acted as Corny Collins in Hairspray. Marsden is starring in an upcoming movie, 27 Dresses, which I wanna watch too.

Back to Enchanted. Come to think of it, I don't know if 'Enchanted' is a suitable title actually. Oh maybe it is. Hmm.

Oh! The songs are really nice!! I've been streaming the OST from imeem.com =P and I love the songs. Some are damn cute. There's this song that I really like, my current addiction (Sodagreen is on hold for the time being =P) by Jon McLaughlin. It's called So Close. Play it on the right side bar of this page.

I don't want to pour too much about the movie, but you should watch it. No matter how man you are.

My initial plans were to collect my PDL right after the movie then head straight for CFA to do some property stuff. However after talking to WJ about this whole driving thing I decided to halt for the moment. Will book my advance theory first then collect PDL.

Since WJ was going to meet his pals at Bugis towards the late afternoon we walked around the National Library first. It was nice to catch up with him once in a while actually.

Then I headed to CFA and band pract and that marks the end of a day.


/14122007 Friday/
Was a last-minute decision to go Wild Wild Wet with Joan, Shi Hui and Jing Yi since the weather was good and we met in the afternoon. I was late, which wasn't surprising. This entire late habit of mine is freaking me out.

Anyway.

Had real great fun at Wild Wild Wet, the last time I went there was probably in December of J1, so that's about three years ago. Still kept my Funkey =D

No photos were taken 'cos we didn't own any waterproof cameras. Oh we did take photos on one of the rides but you have to pay to own those photos.

We spent about 4 hours plus in all, taking the raft a.k.a. Ular-lah! probably four times, lazing in the Tsunami pool for some time, twice on the U-Valley where I screamed and laughed on both times, and running around here and there on those slides and rides. Heh. It's good to go there often. Oh, we signed up this nebo membership of NTUC so we got a complimentary ticket as part of the promotion.

I'm so gonna go there again. But not so soon I guess.

I was obviously darker for that day, my skin turned a reddish chocolate brown -_- and the mark of my swimsuit on my skin is still very clear. The shade of my skin is not as nice after a day, but the dark is still there, the healthy shade wasn't. Sigh. I rather I not be this dark.


End of this post.

Camping days

I've always thought that (other than band camps) I'll never go for another camp again but I am going for another camp!

So here I go. See you on Wednesday and hope all goes well for me. See youuu.

Reminiscing Italy

Samuel's gone to France, Annie's going to Sydney, Tiffany's going to Arizona, ... ...

Friends are going overseas for weeks and all of a sudden I miss my Europe trip back in June-July.

Sighhhhh.

Then I was looking at Google Maps trying to locate where the town square of Besana was, because the address printed on the posters of the festival brought me to somewhere else of Italy. I can't find my host's place as well. Though I had used both map and satellite imageries. Will try harder. I love Google Maps 'cos you're able to look at roads in many other countries and you can even see satellite images. I saw where I live. How fun.

I went to check out the Banda Besana website and chanced upon more precious memories!

Our concert at Besana!

Mr. Tan and NUSWS in action

The pretty host

Tuba section~


Wa, Hui Shan on the bass

This is one scene I love so much.

The much appreciated standing ovation from the Italians

And this too, aaahh. I wanna go back there. NUSWS is slightly to the right in this photo. You can locate the red and white flag at the front, and then the long mainly black banner, and the rest of the band follows.

Bird's eye view

Bring me back there!

Last paper tonight

I'm gonna have my last paper tonight but I'm not excited about it at all. I was much more excited for the end of my first four papers. Oh well.

Exams are gonna be over!

Yeaaaaaayyyyy!!!

Rui Xiang came back (from Taiwan) with my Sodagreen albums!!!

Hooray~!

I have Sodagreen's all three albums now!



Time to pay money. Haha. Thanks so much Rui Xiang!


I have Sodagreen's albums~~~

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.