At the Really Really Free Market in Singapore with Amirah.
Showing posts with label Singapore. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Singapore. Show all posts
At the gym.
So this morning I went to the gym, just like my song said I would. And I had the stupidest accident of all gym accidents: The Classic Slip On The Treadmill where I slipped, crashed on the runway and got thrown back like a rag doll. You know that one.
What happened was, I thought I had finally figured out a way to combat gym boredom - I'd listen to the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy audiobooks! So that was what I did. And of course the inevitable happened. I was chuckling at some jokes (really, Douglas Adams can be very funny) when I lost my footing and performed a perfect rendition of The Classic Slip On The Treadmill.
I sat on the floor with a hurt left knee and a scraped right shin, waiting to catch my breath and to get the green light from my legs that they were ready to support my weight again. The treadmill was still running. And you know what happened?
Nothing. Nothing happened. There was 10-15 people in the gym, and they acted like nothing had happened. For the 30 seconds that I sat there, panting and massaging my knee, nobody came up to me to ask if I was okay, or if I needed help. They continued running, lifting weights, admiring themselves in the mirror, etc. It was like I was invisible, and the racket that I made slamming my body weight on the machine and then the ground was in a vacuum and therefore silent.
30 seconds later, I picked myself up, put myself on the treadmill again, and ran another 10 minutes in defiance to the mass apathy of my gymming counterparts.
I am regretting that 10 minutes now. My knee hurts and I have to hobble around. Hopefully it will be alright after some rest. But seriously, people? What does it take to just stop what you're doing for 10 seconds, walk up to a person who looks like she's hurt, and see if she's alright? I mean, I would do it without a thought.
Or maybe I'm just more invisible than I thought I was.
What happened was, I thought I had finally figured out a way to combat gym boredom - I'd listen to the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy audiobooks! So that was what I did. And of course the inevitable happened. I was chuckling at some jokes (really, Douglas Adams can be very funny) when I lost my footing and performed a perfect rendition of The Classic Slip On The Treadmill.
I sat on the floor with a hurt left knee and a scraped right shin, waiting to catch my breath and to get the green light from my legs that they were ready to support my weight again. The treadmill was still running. And you know what happened?
Nothing. Nothing happened. There was 10-15 people in the gym, and they acted like nothing had happened. For the 30 seconds that I sat there, panting and massaging my knee, nobody came up to me to ask if I was okay, or if I needed help. They continued running, lifting weights, admiring themselves in the mirror, etc. It was like I was invisible, and the racket that I made slamming my body weight on the machine and then the ground was in a vacuum and therefore silent.
30 seconds later, I picked myself up, put myself on the treadmill again, and ran another 10 minutes in defiance to the mass apathy of my gymming counterparts.
I am regretting that 10 minutes now. My knee hurts and I have to hobble around. Hopefully it will be alright after some rest. But seriously, people? What does it take to just stop what you're doing for 10 seconds, walk up to a person who looks like she's hurt, and see if she's alright? I mean, I would do it without a thought.
Or maybe I'm just more invisible than I thought I was.
The anvil.
Once back, I find myself sinking into bureaucratic and administrative quicksand, while I look around bewildered and wild-eyed, trying to make sense of what's happening around me. No stipend (aka income) for the next two months? What the hell are you talking about? Until confirmation is through they expect us to live on our own means. Even after confirmation is through we have to wait till the money gets channeled in.
Post-Europe, I am broke. I mean I am not broke enough to be starving, but broke enough to be annoyed.
Be grateful for what you've got, be grateful for what you've got, be grateful for what you've got. Europe. America. An office space to do what you (kind of) like. Good public transportation. Your own living space. A ukulele (with a snapped string). A (mostly) positive outlook to life. Mostly positive outlook to life, I need you RIGHT NOW.
Settling back in my old life, I am actually experiencing culture shock. I walked into my office today in a daze, unbelieving that I could actually have spent (most of) the past two years cooped up in this place. The feeling of being back is so familiar yet so strange. It's like the past two months was just a really, really long dream, and it did not happen at all. Or is it now that is a dream, and when I wake up I will still be in Berlin, worrying about my lost wallet?
Helplessness. Right now I am wedged between the past and the present, I can't think of Europe right now because it makes me sad, and I don't want to think about the present. Just want to curl up somewhere and hide until this crazy emotional storm ends and I emerge, sweet-smelling and smiley as usual, ready to face the world and its challenges to build the next epic voyage.
*deep breath*
Post-Europe, I am broke. I mean I am not broke enough to be starving, but broke enough to be annoyed.
Be grateful for what you've got, be grateful for what you've got, be grateful for what you've got. Europe. America. An office space to do what you (kind of) like. Good public transportation. Your own living space. A ukulele (with a snapped string). A (mostly) positive outlook to life. Mostly positive outlook to life, I need you RIGHT NOW.
Settling back in my old life, I am actually experiencing culture shock. I walked into my office today in a daze, unbelieving that I could actually have spent (most of) the past two years cooped up in this place. The feeling of being back is so familiar yet so strange. It's like the past two months was just a really, really long dream, and it did not happen at all. Or is it now that is a dream, and when I wake up I will still be in Berlin, worrying about my lost wallet?
Helplessness. Right now I am wedged between the past and the present, I can't think of Europe right now because it makes me sad, and I don't want to think about the present. Just want to curl up somewhere and hide until this crazy emotional storm ends and I emerge, sweet-smelling and smiley as usual, ready to face the world and its challenges to build the next epic voyage.
*deep breath*
-8: Prison Rant
They're installing Exceedingly Ugly Metal Fences all around NTU. I positively loathe it. The beautiful trees and grass and walkways are lined with fences about eight feet high, with barbed wire on top. It is horrible. Simply italicizing the word horrible can't express the magnitude of it. I first saw it around Graduate Hall, and I thought that it was to keep students out of the military area which is just by our campus. Apparently, red signs every 15metres depicting people being shot wasn't enough.
But like a cancerous tumour, the monstrosity grew. I take the shuttle bus sometimes, and to my horror, the metal fences started to crawl further and further. Away from the residential halls, and slowly towards the academic buildings, like poisonous vines, and I am powerless to stop it. Our campus is starting to look like a prison. Eight feet high metal fences with barbed wire on top. Some areas they are planting creeper plants to mask the hideosity of the cold, metallic sheen of the new prison bars. But most other places it is just the bars. Just like in a zoo.
I wonder if they are going to have security gates for each and every academic building, or else this exercise is completely futile, in terms of trying to restrict access. At least that's what I assume the barbed wires are for. I can only speculate that the security is for the upcoming Youth Olympic Games. My university is hosting the kids. I suppose a prison theme is what Singapore is going for.
And I fervently, fervently hope that after the games, this madness will be reversed and my beautiful campus will return to its former fenceless and green glory. I didn't realize it before, but I have actually grown to like my campus. One thing I miss about staying on campus is jogging at night, and then lying on the dewy grass, breathless, with Coldplay blasting in my ears. Guess what. I can't do that anymore. The fences have separated the walkway and the grass. I'd have to risk severing a limb to do something as simple as lie on a patch of grass alongside a walkway.
Sometimes I really, really hate living in Singapore. This is one of those times. Oh yes it's safe. But only because they cane graffiti artists and keep students behind bars.
But like a cancerous tumour, the monstrosity grew. I take the shuttle bus sometimes, and to my horror, the metal fences started to crawl further and further. Away from the residential halls, and slowly towards the academic buildings, like poisonous vines, and I am powerless to stop it. Our campus is starting to look like a prison. Eight feet high metal fences with barbed wire on top. Some areas they are planting creeper plants to mask the hideosity of the cold, metallic sheen of the new prison bars. But most other places it is just the bars. Just like in a zoo.
I wonder if they are going to have security gates for each and every academic building, or else this exercise is completely futile, in terms of trying to restrict access. At least that's what I assume the barbed wires are for. I can only speculate that the security is for the upcoming Youth Olympic Games. My university is hosting the kids. I suppose a prison theme is what Singapore is going for.
And I fervently, fervently hope that after the games, this madness will be reversed and my beautiful campus will return to its former fenceless and green glory. I didn't realize it before, but I have actually grown to like my campus. One thing I miss about staying on campus is jogging at night, and then lying on the dewy grass, breathless, with Coldplay blasting in my ears. Guess what. I can't do that anymore. The fences have separated the walkway and the grass. I'd have to risk severing a limb to do something as simple as lie on a patch of grass alongside a walkway.
Sometimes I really, really hate living in Singapore. This is one of those times. Oh yes it's safe. But only because they cane graffiti artists and keep students behind bars.
Kena curi lagi
It is that time of the year again. What time of the year, you ask. Well, the time of the year when I get my personal belongings stolen, of course. What else?
Last year on November 27th, I was robbed in Kota Kinabalu. This year on November 28th, I lost my bag and its entire contents to a thief who somehow figured out the padlock combination of our dragonboat locker cage. Five or six bags were stolen, including mine. This is the first time that something of the sort has happened in my team, although someone cut through the American team's cage before, apparently.
Things I lost: My trusty Esprit bag, which YKent who bought it from Hong Kong sold to me, and it has weathered through so many conditions formal or rough because it's so versatile. Sigh. It was a good bag. My wallet which was cheap and falling apart, so no love lost there. S$100 which I had just withdrawn the day before, and a couple of hundred RM, which, don't ask me why I was bringing all around Singapore when they don't accept RM here. My student ID, my debit card (which has 2 bucks in it, they're welcome to it), my ATM card, my EZLink card, random transport cards that I collected from the US. My phone, the one that I hated. Well good riddance, except that all my contacts and sim card were in it. My umbrella. A library book - Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility, which I had not finished, damn it. And it looked pretty old too, bet it was published a long time ago... well, let's just hope that the thieving bastards would appreciate classic literature. My Vegetarian t-shirt =( and my very absorbent gym towel. My house keys.
Things I didn't lose: More important forms of ID - my passport and Malaysian IC or driver's license. My research notes and camera which I took out right before I left, because I didn't want to make them wet.
Things I thought I had lost but didn't: my pencil case, my supervisor's library book, the cable for my external hard disk, my mp3 player which contained the 3-hour interview with Tope my Nigerian CSer (!!!).
All in all I suppose the damage wasn't huge, since most of the stuff that I lost are replaceable, apart from that vegetarian t-shirt that I got from San Fran... but I guess I could be thankful to the fact that I didn't lose my Old School or "If you can read this: make me a sandwich" t-shirts that are my favouritest t-shirts in the world, bought from Wellington, which have been with me through thick and thin, through leech infested tropical jungles and dry dusty deserts. Sucks that I lost all that money, but then money doesn't have emotional value so that's fine. Ambivalent that I lost my phone, along with it old and musty messages that hinted of relationships that could have been, people whom I've lost contact with, dear messages from my good friends that I can always accummulate again. I shall think of it as a yearly cleansing ritual, losing a phone and all the contacts, and building up again the core of people who matter.
The police took ages to arrive and in the meanwhile everyone crowded around to cancel credit cards and phone cards. The ones who weren't affected stayed back to give emotional support. There was this British uncle who kept growling in frustration every five minutes, haha. A really nice Indian guy loaned me 50 bucks. People kept speculating how it happened, and after they had already exhausted the possible scenarios they just repeated themselves over again.
After settling the collective police report (I'll have to make another individual report later) - I had a fifty dollar bill on me and a card with the case report written on it. And an old energy bar wrapper in the back pocket of my shorts, from the Grand Canyon hike. I could choose to go home, and wait till Housemate David gets home, but that could be a long wait. I decided to go get my sim card fixed at Raffles City instead. Then I changed my mind because I didn't have any form of ID on me and they probably wouldn't take my case; so I took a map from the Concierge and ran all the way to Chinatown to catch the free public screening of Gubra, a film by late Yasmin Ahmad, my favourite Malaysian director. After watching the (really good) movie I met Adibah (a Singaporean CSer) and her friends by chance, and they walked me to Outram Park MRT, although I told them that I couldn't be mugged since I didn't have anything on me. Well apart from 48 bucks and a case card and a Singapore map, but what are the odds, seriously?
There I took an MRT back to Pioneer, stinking everyone within a 3 feet radius of me with a combination of dried sweat and dried river water. After that I walked home from Pioneer MRT. Apparently it only takes less than 20 minutes, and it was nice walking under the night breeze in the knowledge that I had already exhausted the probabilistic quota of being robbed within a day.
Last year on November 27th, I was robbed in Kota Kinabalu. This year on November 28th, I lost my bag and its entire contents to a thief who somehow figured out the padlock combination of our dragonboat locker cage. Five or six bags were stolen, including mine. This is the first time that something of the sort has happened in my team, although someone cut through the American team's cage before, apparently.
Things I lost: My trusty Esprit bag, which YKent who bought it from Hong Kong sold to me, and it has weathered through so many conditions formal or rough because it's so versatile. Sigh. It was a good bag. My wallet which was cheap and falling apart, so no love lost there. S$100 which I had just withdrawn the day before, and a couple of hundred RM, which, don't ask me why I was bringing all around Singapore when they don't accept RM here. My student ID, my debit card (which has 2 bucks in it, they're welcome to it), my ATM card, my EZLink card, random transport cards that I collected from the US. My phone, the one that I hated. Well good riddance, except that all my contacts and sim card were in it. My umbrella. A library book - Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility, which I had not finished, damn it. And it looked pretty old too, bet it was published a long time ago... well, let's just hope that the thieving bastards would appreciate classic literature. My Vegetarian t-shirt =( and my very absorbent gym towel. My house keys.
Things I didn't lose: More important forms of ID - my passport and Malaysian IC or driver's license. My research notes and camera which I took out right before I left, because I didn't want to make them wet.
Things I thought I had lost but didn't: my pencil case, my supervisor's library book, the cable for my external hard disk, my mp3 player which contained the 3-hour interview with Tope my Nigerian CSer (!!!).
All in all I suppose the damage wasn't huge, since most of the stuff that I lost are replaceable, apart from that vegetarian t-shirt that I got from San Fran... but I guess I could be thankful to the fact that I didn't lose my Old School or "If you can read this: make me a sandwich" t-shirts that are my favouritest t-shirts in the world, bought from Wellington, which have been with me through thick and thin, through leech infested tropical jungles and dry dusty deserts. Sucks that I lost all that money, but then money doesn't have emotional value so that's fine. Ambivalent that I lost my phone, along with it old and musty messages that hinted of relationships that could have been, people whom I've lost contact with, dear messages from my good friends that I can always accummulate again. I shall think of it as a yearly cleansing ritual, losing a phone and all the contacts, and building up again the core of people who matter.
The police took ages to arrive and in the meanwhile everyone crowded around to cancel credit cards and phone cards. The ones who weren't affected stayed back to give emotional support. There was this British uncle who kept growling in frustration every five minutes, haha. A really nice Indian guy loaned me 50 bucks. People kept speculating how it happened, and after they had already exhausted the possible scenarios they just repeated themselves over again.
After settling the collective police report (I'll have to make another individual report later) - I had a fifty dollar bill on me and a card with the case report written on it. And an old energy bar wrapper in the back pocket of my shorts, from the Grand Canyon hike. I could choose to go home, and wait till Housemate David gets home, but that could be a long wait. I decided to go get my sim card fixed at Raffles City instead. Then I changed my mind because I didn't have any form of ID on me and they probably wouldn't take my case; so I took a map from the Concierge and ran all the way to Chinatown to catch the free public screening of Gubra, a film by late Yasmin Ahmad, my favourite Malaysian director. After watching the (really good) movie I met Adibah (a Singaporean CSer) and her friends by chance, and they walked me to Outram Park MRT, although I told them that I couldn't be mugged since I didn't have anything on me. Well apart from 48 bucks and a case card and a Singapore map, but what are the odds, seriously?
There I took an MRT back to Pioneer, stinking everyone within a 3 feet radius of me with a combination of dried sweat and dried river water. After that I walked home from Pioneer MRT. Apparently it only takes less than 20 minutes, and it was nice walking under the night breeze in the knowledge that I had already exhausted the probabilistic quota of being robbed within a day.
Kurang Ajar.
Totally falling asleep while I'm writing this but I would just like to shout out to two delusional recipe authors out there: Singapore is not the food capital of Asia. Singapore is not the food capital of Asia. Singapore is not the food capital of Asia. Got it?
Should I?
photo credit: here.*update at 3:50am*
Awful cloudy out there... I see like, one star, from my window. Think I'll just go back to bed, although there is this nagging feeling that I should do it anyway since I'm up... but walking 25 minutes to the rooftop of my school under such weather conditions seems to be foolish and I should not yield to my stubborn streak. (I have more than one stubborn streak apparently. Another stubborn streak who does not yield to stubborn streaks.)
Sigh. At least I learnt more about meteors and comets and constellations during my meteor shower fervour yesterday afternoon. Shirked all my duties too. Sigh.
*yawns**goes back to bed sadly*
Anger Management Mate.
Spent the whole Sunday viewing apartments and waiting for agents to materialize. I mean, does anyone on this island take punctuality seriously? From 12noon today until 8pm, I was out, going through the whole routine of: Reaching the place on time. Wait for agent for at least 15 minutes to about 45 minutes. View house. House not suitable/exceeds our budget. Go to another place. Repeat process, with increasing levels of agitation.
Housemate David had to be my Anger Management Mate for the day and had a taster of what it is like to stay with a caged lioness on caffeine. I had coffee after lunch and it was not a good idea because it gave me a lot of energy which I had to suppress, on top of the pent up frustration within. So he had to tolerate my swearing and clenched fists and growls and murderous stares. At some point he had to ward off my proposal to pick a fight with three burly guys sitting at a food court. I maintain that burly men should not be allowed to sip tea daintily when they should be chugging beer. Especially when angry me is in the vicinity.
I ended up yelling at our agent, justifiably, because I don't think she has our best interests in mind. (To clarify - she is not the agent that screwed us over. But I think her lack of professionalism played a part in our losing the place.) I was mad at her, but more so I was mad at myself for depending on her and being manipulated by her, right under our noses and we couldn't do anything about it.
And then I was angry at Singapore in general, for being over-populated, with five million people squeezed into the area of Lake Kenyir (or Lake Taupo, take your pick) aspiring for a population growth of another one million. This is why it is the owner's market, and we have no bargaining power at all, because if you don't rent this place, someone else will. You either sacrifice your quality of life or fork out whatever they deem fit. Don't even get me started on the real estate agents. They're not interested in your welfare, they're just after the money anyway. Then my anger expanded to include our capitalist and materialistic society, and the monetary system in general. Oh yes I was one very angsty girl today.
So the weekend has passed and I am no closer to having a home than before. I had to miss dragonboating, and I didn't do much work. I spent a lot of time loitering around with Housemate David doing nothing productive because there were a lot of lapses between the viewings.
It is getting increasingly difficult to squat at Jia Ling's because her landlord has voiced out her dissatisfaction. I'll have to revise the plan quite soon if we remain unable to get someplace. I know I said no whining. But at least I'm not out destroying public property or strangling people. Or chewing gum, that would show them.
Housemate David had to be my Anger Management Mate for the day and had a taster of what it is like to stay with a caged lioness on caffeine. I had coffee after lunch and it was not a good idea because it gave me a lot of energy which I had to suppress, on top of the pent up frustration within. So he had to tolerate my swearing and clenched fists and growls and murderous stares. At some point he had to ward off my proposal to pick a fight with three burly guys sitting at a food court. I maintain that burly men should not be allowed to sip tea daintily when they should be chugging beer. Especially when angry me is in the vicinity.
I ended up yelling at our agent, justifiably, because I don't think she has our best interests in mind. (To clarify - she is not the agent that screwed us over. But I think her lack of professionalism played a part in our losing the place.) I was mad at her, but more so I was mad at myself for depending on her and being manipulated by her, right under our noses and we couldn't do anything about it.
And then I was angry at Singapore in general, for being over-populated, with five million people squeezed into the area of Lake Kenyir (or Lake Taupo, take your pick) aspiring for a population growth of another one million. This is why it is the owner's market, and we have no bargaining power at all, because if you don't rent this place, someone else will. You either sacrifice your quality of life or fork out whatever they deem fit. Don't even get me started on the real estate agents. They're not interested in your welfare, they're just after the money anyway. Then my anger expanded to include our capitalist and materialistic society, and the monetary system in general. Oh yes I was one very angsty girl today.
So the weekend has passed and I am no closer to having a home than before. I had to miss dragonboating, and I didn't do much work. I spent a lot of time loitering around with Housemate David doing nothing productive because there were a lot of lapses between the viewings.
It is getting increasingly difficult to squat at Jia Ling's because her landlord has voiced out her dissatisfaction. I'll have to revise the plan quite soon if we remain unable to get someplace. I know I said no whining. But at least I'm not out destroying public property or strangling people. Or chewing gum, that would show them.
Ich bin hungrig.
I am exceedingly hungry and waiting for Kristy to come back from whereever she is, so that I can finally get some grub and be less restless!
I have a backache that I suspect is result of me not being accustomed yet to my old life of being stuck to the desk for hours on end. I am fidgety because I am hungry and I am homeless and I had this sudden urge to get a cat and after browsing through SPCA and looking at potential cats I realized that I wouldn't be able to get a cat because I wouldn't be able to travel for months if I have a furball waiting for me at home.
Therefore the conclusion still points to the same old answer of me getting my degree in record speed, leaving Singapore and settling down somewhere where I would be less motivated to travel all the time, and finally getting that goddamn cat.
So here I am, still hungry and homeless, on top of that, catless. I am depressed.
I have a backache that I suspect is result of me not being accustomed yet to my old life of being stuck to the desk for hours on end. I am fidgety because I am hungry and I am homeless and I had this sudden urge to get a cat and after browsing through SPCA and looking at potential cats I realized that I wouldn't be able to get a cat because I wouldn't be able to travel for months if I have a furball waiting for me at home.
Therefore the conclusion still points to the same old answer of me getting my degree in record speed, leaving Singapore and settling down somewhere where I would be less motivated to travel all the time, and finally getting that goddamn cat.
So here I am, still hungry and homeless, on top of that, catless. I am depressed.
when it rains it pours
i am now at jia ling's, using her laptop which has a different keyboard layout from mine, so i shall not bother to caps this post.
the reason why i'm here is because we were at singapore general hospital (hereforth known as sgh) in the accidents and emergency room (a&e) yesterday till about 11pm so i decided to stay over. jia ling was walking down a stationary escalator yesterday and landed wrongly on the half step, so she hurt her ankle and rode an ambulance to the hospital. i'm secretly disappointed that i didn't get to go on the ambulance with her, because they would only allow one to accompany, and there was me and another friend callie, so we decided to do it the adult way and take the public transport to sgh instead. (it's a sad day when you can't use tantrums to get your way anymore.)
yesterday was easily one of the most eventful days that i've had in singapore to date. it started off like any other day.
no actually it did not. i started the day by dressing up for an indian wedding. jia ling's colleague's daughter was getting married and since we were close like that, i decided to go give her my best blessings. chose something to wear, asked namrita if it was appropriate, apparently it was not, changed into something else, and set off to meet jia ling. the wedding was held in a hall in an indian temple nearby farrer park mrt station. sitting a little too far away from the stage, i couldn't really see much except the elaborate decorations of the setup and the golden finery adorned by the bride. the bride was beautiful. the groom was cute in a bashful way. at the end of the ceremony which i couldn't see much of, we made a line and went onstage and blessed the bride and the groom by scattering yellow rice on their heads.
and then we had a buffet lunch of vegetarian indian food, and left with door gifts prettily wrapped. we haven't unwrapped ours yet so i don't know what's inside.
after that, jia ling and i went to clarke quay to meet her friends irene and callie. reason being, callie and i were going to tag along with jia ling for her weekly dragonboat rowing exercise. i know, random right? jia ling, my partner-in-crime for doing random things in singapore (such as taking the mrt to barely-inhabited punggol to take pictures of lalang) entertains herself in curious ways, and because i also have a penchant for spontaneity and randomness, she invites me along sometimes.
so we went to kallang river to get some serious workout. oh and if you're wondering i did not go into the water with my dress and heels. did have some leftover makeup on my face but since there wasn't much to begin with that wasn't a problem. went into a toilet and came out two inches shorter in beachwear.
the dragonboat team we joined was the british team but there were also many other nationalities in the team (commonwealth yo). since many of the members were actually in putrajaya for a race (home T_T), there were only two boats that went into the water. jia ling went on the other boat with the experienced ones, while me and callie stayed on the newbie boat. along the river we saw teams of other countries, the germans who rowed how i imagined germans would row (like germans) and the irish team which was sponsored by a pub, among others.
i'm still waiting for my waist or arms to hurt. if my arms hurt, it would mean that my boat-rowing posture was wrong. since you're supposed to twist your waist and use the strength of the body instead of the arm. great for losing love handles, it seems, but after every row there is a huge barrel of beer waiting to cancel the workout out! but since half the team was gone for the putrajaya race yesterday, there was no beer T_T bollocks.
speaking of canceling, we had an entirely stupid game on the boat called tug of war, where half of the boat would sit facing the other half, and row furiously to see which direction was stronger. completely waste of energy but the stupidity of the game kept me very much amused and i put in all of my energy to it. because, let's face it, most games are stupid and energy-wasting anyway. chasing, hitting, kicking, protecting an inanimate thing called "a ball" - multiple cases in point. it's not like a bridge construction where you actually have a bridge after hard labour. the dragonboat tug of war is just like a representation of all the games out there. useless but tremendous fun!
after the dragonboat rowing we went to bugis, to pass something to jia ling's friend and to have steamboat. only part of the plan came true. after jia ling stumbled unceremoniously down the escalator and our failure to get the mall staff to send us to the nearest hospital (the bastards), we ended up waiting a fair bit for the paramedics to arrive and bundle her off to sgh. the ambulance costs sgd80 to hail, by the way. missed opportunity T_T
so callie and i reached sgh and went into a&e to find jia ling. had our temperatures screened because of the h1n1 scare. then there she was, forlornly huddled under a blanket on a wheelchair waiting at the x-ray dept.
we were in the a&e from about 8:30pm to 11pm. here's an interesting fact for you - sgh, or sgh within the proximity of a&e anyway, does not have a single working food outlet after 8:30pm. what the staff themselves do is to order mcdonalds if they get really hungry. this makes no economic sense in any way. or maybe the hospital's profiteering from Cheers, a convenience store, in the neighbouring block, where everybody (who does not order mcdonalds) ends up in, for dinner.
we had a picnic of sorts in a&e, eating nachos and cheese, microwaved pizza and instant noodles all bought from Cheers. and being asian and biologically wired to take pictures at any circumstance however dire, we found ourselves taking group self portraits with the food. also involuntary was the peace sign. it's almost a reflex - camera lens = peace sign. that's how we work it yo.
jia ling was diagnosed to have an unobvious fracture in her ankle and had to get a pair of crutches. i think she must have forked out about SGD250-300. some of which can be claimed from insurance. the good news is she has got a six-day mc to get out of work. the bad news? she's a teacher and it's school holidays now. irony is such a kick in the crotch sometimes.
anyway i'm typing this while she's sleeping beside me. later i will be doing some shopping for her, as she will be pretty much incapacitated for the following few days. luckily she's staying in a master bedroom (attached bathroom) and has an electric kettle in her room. if i am confined within my room i will probably rot in a pool of my own excrement. i will end this post on that disturbing mental image because i'm sleepy now.
One way ticket to India
Was in the middle of an air ticket transaction when my debit card was declined (probably due to lack of funds). So now Asa and I are proud owners of two one-way tickets to India. We will probably have to turn lesbians and set up a family underground there while pretending to be sisters. Since that's what you do when you buy one-way tickets to India. No?
I've decided to return to Singapore on Monday. The very thought of it weighs me down, sigh. After the trip back from Singapore last week I haven't done any work (for one whole week! the horror!) so it is time for me to go back and pay my dues.
There's also a very real possibility that I may have to move again, because my landlord is a creep. When I was in KL he opened my locked door, to "spot-check", WTF. He has also stated through email that he will continue doing that until he can trust us and we can "give him confidence", and it is his responsibility to ensure that we all "live in harmony and safety and enjoy our stay". (Does this sound familiar to anyone?) I am NOT bloody living in a hostel, and he's NOT my bloody hostel matron. As far as the tenancy agreement is concerned he does not have the right to do that, and I might seek legal recourse.
Though according to this page, Singapore is pro-landlord and there is no comprehensive law dealing with landlord and tenant relations. Then there's this forum page where the landlady went through the tenant's garbage (found a used condom and forfeited his deposit coz she accused him of bringing girls back but the guy was just masturbating with the condom) and his belongings occasionally. There's no solution in the threads, but some comments are just ridiculous.
WTFFFF RAGE NO INVASION OF PRIVACY?? "To ensure there is no drugs/illegal activities" is exactly the same reason given by my Creepy Landlord - and I am furious about it - because I paid good money to rent a personal space, not to be policed, and what about the flip side? I.e. who's going to be responsible if my belongings go missing, or if I am assaulted in my own locked room?
OK deep breaths. Chill. That's why la I think I will have to move. It's a pity because my housemates seem to be nice people, but I cannot live in a panopticon, and my situation now reminds me so much of Singapore in general that it's not even funny.
Have to detoxify my brain with all the hate and rage within. Indiaaaaaaaaaaaa. Bostonnnnnnnnn. Ohmmmmmm.
I've decided to return to Singapore on Monday. The very thought of it weighs me down, sigh. After the trip back from Singapore last week I haven't done any work (for one whole week! the horror!) so it is time for me to go back and pay my dues.
There's also a very real possibility that I may have to move again, because my landlord is a creep. When I was in KL he opened my locked door, to "spot-check", WTF. He has also stated through email that he will continue doing that until he can trust us and we can "give him confidence", and it is his responsibility to ensure that we all "live in harmony and safety and enjoy our stay". (Does this sound familiar to anyone?) I am NOT bloody living in a hostel, and he's NOT my bloody hostel matron. As far as the tenancy agreement is concerned he does not have the right to do that, and I might seek legal recourse.
Though according to this page, Singapore is pro-landlord and there is no comprehensive law dealing with landlord and tenant relations. Then there's this forum page where the landlady went through the tenant's garbage (found a used condom and forfeited his deposit coz she accused him of bringing girls back but the guy was just masturbating with the condom) and his belongings occasionally. There's no solution in the threads, but some comments are just ridiculous.
"If I'm not mistaken, there is no invasion of privacy here. The flat belongs to the owners and I know some of them will check the room (but won't tell you that they do) in order to ensure there is no drugs / illegal substance."
WTFFFF RAGE NO INVASION OF PRIVACY?? "To ensure there is no drugs/illegal activities" is exactly the same reason given by my Creepy Landlord - and I am furious about it - because I paid good money to rent a personal space, not to be policed, and what about the flip side? I.e. who's going to be responsible if my belongings go missing, or if I am assaulted in my own locked room?
OK deep breaths. Chill. That's why la I think I will have to move. It's a pity because my housemates seem to be nice people, but I cannot live in a panopticon, and my situation now reminds me so much of Singapore in general that it's not even funny.
Have to detoxify my brain with all the hate and rage within. Indiaaaaaaaaaaaa. Bostonnnnnnnnn. Ohmmmmmm.
Newsflash
Yeah probably by now everybody knows that yesterday at 10:30am a student stabbed a prof in the back (with a knife) in NTU and jumped off a building after that. The prof survived but the student died. The building's nearby my office o_O But when the crime happened I was still happily cruising along the highway at Johor.
Why I assume everybody knows, is because when I called my mum yesterday and mentioned it, she said that my aunt from NZ actually called her up and told her about it. Begitulah globalisasi.
But - I bet you didn't know this. At 4:30pm on Sunday, the national icon of Singapore, the Merlion, while happily minding its own business, dutifully spurting water from its mouth because that's what it does, was struck by a bolt of lightning. The poor creature "lost part of its top left mane and is believed to have its right ear chipped".
There it is, the third most read from this list of most popular stories in The Straits Times Online, among all the violence and sex which is what all people care about nowadays anyway. Loving the neon green underwear in Story 2! At least some of the stories are entertaining in the Singaporean news. The Malaysian ones are downright depressing.
Why I assume everybody knows, is because when I called my mum yesterday and mentioned it, she said that my aunt from NZ actually called her up and told her about it. Begitulah globalisasi.
But - I bet you didn't know this. At 4:30pm on Sunday, the national icon of Singapore, the Merlion, while happily minding its own business, dutifully spurting water from its mouth because that's what it does, was struck by a bolt of lightning. The poor creature "lost part of its top left mane and is believed to have its right ear chipped".
There it is, the third most read from this list of most popular stories in The Straits Times Online, among all the violence and sex which is what all people care about nowadays anyway. Loving the neon green underwear in Story 2! At least some of the stories are entertaining in the Singaporean news. The Malaysian ones are downright depressing.
The Pending.
So I've been able to come up with a reasonably truthful abstract of a research proposal for Prof K's term paper, although I was stuck in a rut for the better part of last week, making things up when I was required to talk about the research in class, although I knew that there were gaps in what I was proposing. I've since read more literature and have gone a round circle back to where I started, but at least I've grown a little wiser.
My abstract is a page long, but some Kiasu Kids are sending in four pages. I wonder if they understand what an abstract means. "A statement summarizing the important points of a text." Given that the paper will be about 15 pages long, 4 pages is sure a lot of important points. It will be in my best interest to finish this paper as soon as possible, before I start to work on Dr. C's on an entirely different topic, because I have puny brains that tend to get confused when working on multiple subjects in tandem.
As always I'm afraid to start writing. As stupid as it sounds, I'm always afraid that what I write won't be perfect. Logically I do understand that it's impossible for me at this stage to spurt perfection (ooh graphic) on the spot, but that's how I write - each sentence painstakingly crafted, revisited over and over again, and at the end of the day I end up with two paragraphs done. Two beautiful paragraphs, mind you, but something tells me that this isn't the smartest way to do stuff. I think for this paper I shall try a new approach, i.e. throw in all the ideas with the brokenest English possible, and do my editing at the end once and for all. Maybe that would work.
Oh and I made a new friend this weekend, his name is Kukui and he's from Hawaii. He gave me this brilliant idea of learning Spanish in Guatemala, a total submersion in the culture and the language - and I've been playing with it ever since. Apparently tons of people do that, the classes are held half-day and you do a homestay with a local family so you'd pick up the language really quickly. And you get to do some volunteering work as well, if you want. The first Spanish school result that came up while googling revealed a price range which was quite reasonable, i.e. USD125 per week of 20 hours of lessons, and USD75 with food and board provided with your host family. Which means it is about SGD300 per week, SGD1,200 per month, and if I want to budget for two months it will be SGD2,400, plus SGD600 of miscellaneous expenses ==>SGD3,000. Add in the flight tickets, which I have no idea how much it costs (Alvyc, do you happen to know?), it should be at the range of SGD5,000-SGD6,000 I guess?
As a comparison, a homestay in Tokyo for 15 days, provided by titanplanet.net, costs RM6,500 (inclusive of flight tickets and board) which is around SGD2,720. And that doesn't even include Japanese lessons.
Man it's so doable. Central America has never really been on my travel radar until now - and damn I can't stop thinking about the possibilities! Learning Salsa, cooking the local cuisine, immersion in a totally unfamiliar culture... I'm itching to go somewhere, anywhere! I'm currently saving for Europe which I'm aiming to do next year, as and when I get the time or the permission for fieldwork, so this year I'm probably strapped to Singapore, which is never a cheery prospect. The closest thing that I have to hope for is this conference in August which is held in Boston, but I'm not counting too much on that lest I get really disappointed if it doesn't work out.
I guess time will fly really quickly this year - it's almost March now. I need to move out (I'll save this headache for another post) of hostel in May, and after the last of my classes this semester, it will be full speed on my confirmation report, which hopefully will be done within this year so that I can do data collection next year onwards. And there's nothing spurring me on harder than that. To get funding, to get formal permission to leave. Singapore does good for a base to work hard, to motivate me, but what I really want to do is to see as much of the world as I can before the self-imposed deadline of 30 years old... and there's not much time till then.
I don't really know what I'm going to do after I'm 30. In my head time really just stops there - it's the settle-down-dom ("dom" as in kingdom) and that's pretty much it. Probably involves sperm banks and such, but I wouldn't set it down in stone yet. So the current plan is just to live to the fullest before I'm 30. Sometimes when I'm particularly down I wonder why I'm staying in Singapore during probably the best years of my life. Then I remember that travelling needs money, and money doesn't grow on trees. The only way out, is to stay in.
In other news, Jane Austen's Emma is coming to an end. Loo-going will never be the same again.
My abstract is a page long, but some Kiasu Kids are sending in four pages. I wonder if they understand what an abstract means. "A statement summarizing the important points of a text." Given that the paper will be about 15 pages long, 4 pages is sure a lot of important points. It will be in my best interest to finish this paper as soon as possible, before I start to work on Dr. C's on an entirely different topic, because I have puny brains that tend to get confused when working on multiple subjects in tandem.
As always I'm afraid to start writing. As stupid as it sounds, I'm always afraid that what I write won't be perfect. Logically I do understand that it's impossible for me at this stage to spurt perfection (ooh graphic) on the spot, but that's how I write - each sentence painstakingly crafted, revisited over and over again, and at the end of the day I end up with two paragraphs done. Two beautiful paragraphs, mind you, but something tells me that this isn't the smartest way to do stuff. I think for this paper I shall try a new approach, i.e. throw in all the ideas with the brokenest English possible, and do my editing at the end once and for all. Maybe that would work.
Oh and I made a new friend this weekend, his name is Kukui and he's from Hawaii. He gave me this brilliant idea of learning Spanish in Guatemala, a total submersion in the culture and the language - and I've been playing with it ever since. Apparently tons of people do that, the classes are held half-day and you do a homestay with a local family so you'd pick up the language really quickly. And you get to do some volunteering work as well, if you want. The first Spanish school result that came up while googling revealed a price range which was quite reasonable, i.e. USD125 per week of 20 hours of lessons, and USD75 with food and board provided with your host family. Which means it is about SGD300 per week, SGD1,200 per month, and if I want to budget for two months it will be SGD2,400, plus SGD600 of miscellaneous expenses ==>SGD3,000. Add in the flight tickets, which I have no idea how much it costs (Alvyc, do you happen to know?), it should be at the range of SGD5,000-SGD6,000 I guess?
As a comparison, a homestay in Tokyo for 15 days, provided by titanplanet.net, costs RM6,500 (inclusive of flight tickets and board) which is around SGD2,720. And that doesn't even include Japanese lessons.
Man it's so doable. Central America has never really been on my travel radar until now - and damn I can't stop thinking about the possibilities! Learning Salsa, cooking the local cuisine, immersion in a totally unfamiliar culture... I'm itching to go somewhere, anywhere! I'm currently saving for Europe which I'm aiming to do next year, as and when I get the time or the permission for fieldwork, so this year I'm probably strapped to Singapore, which is never a cheery prospect. The closest thing that I have to hope for is this conference in August which is held in Boston, but I'm not counting too much on that lest I get really disappointed if it doesn't work out.
I guess time will fly really quickly this year - it's almost March now. I need to move out (I'll save this headache for another post) of hostel in May, and after the last of my classes this semester, it will be full speed on my confirmation report, which hopefully will be done within this year so that I can do data collection next year onwards. And there's nothing spurring me on harder than that. To get funding, to get formal permission to leave. Singapore does good for a base to work hard, to motivate me, but what I really want to do is to see as much of the world as I can before the self-imposed deadline of 30 years old... and there's not much time till then.
I don't really know what I'm going to do after I'm 30. In my head time really just stops there - it's the settle-down-dom ("dom" as in kingdom) and that's pretty much it. Probably involves sperm banks and such, but I wouldn't set it down in stone yet. So the current plan is just to live to the fullest before I'm 30. Sometimes when I'm particularly down I wonder why I'm staying in Singapore during probably the best years of my life. Then I remember that travelling needs money, and money doesn't grow on trees. The only way out, is to stay in.
In other news, Jane Austen's Emma is coming to an end. Loo-going will never be the same again.
I'm so cool, I got celebrity friends, yeah!
I was doing grocery shopping tonight, at Fairprice Xtra in Jurong Point 2, planning to have fruit meals tomorrow since I'll be chilling out in the dorm the whole day, when I suddenly remembered this trail of ants wandering aimlessly on my desk this morning. Seriously, I tried following the trail but it started nowhere and did not end anywhere either. It was as if the ants just decided to take a walk, just because they could. Now that bothered the hell out of me because I like knowing where ants come from and where they're going. I like to know that they're fulfilling some purpose in life, not just taking a walk out just because it's a fine day. Stupid aimless ants. I didn't get fruits at the end.
So anyway. It was a good day today. It was one of those days when you've got programmes all lined up and random stuff happen in between the programmes filling in the gaps. There was this thing organized by the International Student Centre, going to the MINT toy museum, at a steal of SGD6 inclusive of to-and-fro bus rides and the entrance fees. The original entrance fees cost SGD15 per pax ok. (Wahey, score!) So we gathered at the NTU Chinese Heritage Centre in the morning, expecting to go to the toy museum, when they made us watch some documentaries on overseas Chinese and take a tour around the Chinese Heritage Centre. I don't mind it so much 'coz I like history and stuff but what I didn't like was how they only casually mentioned the Chinese Heritage Centre tour like in one line in the email, and blew up the toy museum, when actually the Chinese Heritage Centre tour took longer than the toy museum tour! Just felt like the toy museum was some kind of ploy to trick us into going into the Chinese Heritage Centre.
"Chinese Heritage Centre" is very tiresome to type.
So then we started the toy museum tour finally at 1pm. The museum was alright. I think SGD15 is a bit pricey, but since I paid only SGD6 (inclusive of transport, wahey, score!) it was okay. The morning of learning about overseas Chinese and the history of NTU was worth it after all. I had made an appointment with Yuen to meet up with a bunch of people "looking for intellectual discussion" at 7:30pm, so since I was free till then me and Roman went to SMU to play boardgames at the Settler's Cafe. And yes I kicked his ass big time, thank you for asking.
So at 7:15pm I met up with Yuen who was in this other meeting with this chap who shoots artsy photos and videos. Yuen's in theatre. She gets featured in newspapers often. She performs for international audiences. I'm so cool, I got celebrity friends, yeah! After the brief meeting we met up with the intellectual crowd and talked philosophy, politics, near death experiences and the Mormon episode in South Park. It was more fun than the toy museum but less fun than board games. Just wanted to give you a scale. Yeah I know all this "intellectual" stuff sounds dodgy and mildly disturbing, long story on how I got into this, lazy to elaborate, Yuen broadens my social circle and she's a celebrity and I'm so cool, I got celebrity friends, yeah!
After that, took the MRT home, stopped by Fairprice Xtra, didn't buy anything, and finally came back. I got two blog comments and three emails, yay! Although you guys aren't celebrities I love you anyway ;) mwah mwah
ok sleepy already bye.
So anyway. It was a good day today. It was one of those days when you've got programmes all lined up and random stuff happen in between the programmes filling in the gaps. There was this thing organized by the International Student Centre, going to the MINT toy museum, at a steal of SGD6 inclusive of to-and-fro bus rides and the entrance fees. The original entrance fees cost SGD15 per pax ok. (Wahey, score!) So we gathered at the NTU Chinese Heritage Centre in the morning, expecting to go to the toy museum, when they made us watch some documentaries on overseas Chinese and take a tour around the Chinese Heritage Centre. I don't mind it so much 'coz I like history and stuff but what I didn't like was how they only casually mentioned the Chinese Heritage Centre tour like in one line in the email, and blew up the toy museum, when actually the Chinese Heritage Centre tour took longer than the toy museum tour! Just felt like the toy museum was some kind of ploy to trick us into going into the Chinese Heritage Centre.
"Chinese Heritage Centre" is very tiresome to type.
So then we started the toy museum tour finally at 1pm. The museum was alright. I think SGD15 is a bit pricey, but since I paid only SGD6 (inclusive of transport, wahey, score!) it was okay. The morning of learning about overseas Chinese and the history of NTU was worth it after all. I had made an appointment with Yuen to meet up with a bunch of people "looking for intellectual discussion" at 7:30pm, so since I was free till then me and Roman went to SMU to play boardgames at the Settler's Cafe. And yes I kicked his ass big time, thank you for asking.
So at 7:15pm I met up with Yuen who was in this other meeting with this chap who shoots artsy photos and videos. Yuen's in theatre. She gets featured in newspapers often. She performs for international audiences. I'm so cool, I got celebrity friends, yeah! After the brief meeting we met up with the intellectual crowd and talked philosophy, politics, near death experiences and the Mormon episode in South Park. It was more fun than the toy museum but less fun than board games. Just wanted to give you a scale. Yeah I know all this "intellectual" stuff sounds dodgy and mildly disturbing, long story on how I got into this, lazy to elaborate, Yuen broadens my social circle and she's a celebrity and I'm so cool, I got celebrity friends, yeah!
After that, took the MRT home, stopped by Fairprice Xtra, didn't buy anything, and finally came back. I got two blog comments and three emails, yay! Although you guys aren't celebrities I love you anyway ;) mwah mwah
ok sleepy already bye.
My happening weekend.
I just realized that the pictures I took were in 6MP quality and they're like 1.4megs each. Lazy to upload. So you'll just have to take my word that yesterday me and Jia Ling went to Punggol to take pictures of some lalang field. Yeah, like WTF right, we probably have lalang all over Malaysia but since we're in Singapore, we do what the cooler Singaporeans do and take an MRT to the furthest station of the Purple Line and take artsy pictures of wild grass.
This picture is taken from this forum. Yeah I know it's heavily photoshopped and you can see the HDBs from afar, but one can imagine. So me and Jia Ling, filled with romantic notions of lalang fields and purple skies, equipped ourselves with my dad's camera and her school camera (since we got both our cameras stolen in KK), met at 7:30am and went all the way to Punggol to brave the elements.
Actually it wasn't half bad. The weather was very fine, and because Punggol is mostly flat and empty land, the breeze was just fantastic. We trekked right across a lalang field - I was fine because I wore long pants and did not use my arms too much to fend off the lalangs, but Jia Ling got scratches all over - only to find out that there was a huge ass road just about 50 metres away from our haphazard zigzag lalang route. And Punggol is almost uninhabited (well - by Singaporean standards), which is a super plus point for anywhere in Singapore, as we were the only two crazy people taking syok sendiri pictures by the grassy bank of a pretty much empty road.
There's a house there called Matilda House which was erected since 1902 but now it's deserted, fenced up by the authorities for conservation purposes I guess. It's actually quite pretty if you ignore the ugly fences around. Also Punggol is near the sea, though we opted to go to the beach some other time because it was noon already and we were hungry. Then we took an LRT just for the heck of it, and had this aerial view of Punggol's many flat blocks of grass, which, with a sinking feeling in my heart I knew would be dominated by HDBs very soon. Why else would they build a huge (and I do mean HUGE) MRT building and the LRTs if they weren't expecting a large population? Sigh.
Afternoon we headed back to civilization - to Clarke Quay to have lunch. There's this Japanese food court at this place called Liang Court at Clarke Quay and I had a pretty decent Curry Don there, with a really nice Japanese fruity beer from the supermarket beside. Yum =) Then we met Jia Ling's friend Singaporean Irene and went to Chinatown. I know, Chinatown, on the weekend before Chinese New Year, in Singapore. You bet we saw all the population that we didn't see in Punggol that morning. You just have to know that I hate crowds but I'll do you guys a favour and refrain from whining about it. But Irene's a cool chick and I enjoyed spending time with her. She's on a mission to take pictures of all the cows that she can spot, bersempena the Bull's year. Her goal's 60. During the Year of the Boar she took 70+ pictures of pigs, with no repeats. She gets a kick out of making digital collages out of them.
I hung around with the girls till about 5pm, after which I headed to Bugis, another horribly crowded place where you literally get pushed around by the people if you don't walk at a decent pace. Met up with Yuen and Roman there. We went to Arab Street to have dinner, where people actually spoke Malay (yay!) when taking orders, but the place we were at had horrible service so I ended up not eating there. There were some people doing some reality TV shooting (something like The Amazing Race) for Suria Channel, which is a Malay channel, so we hung around and watched a guy puke his guts out while being forced to eat this platter of stuff. And they weren't even seriously gross stuff, I mean there was petai and kacang botol and some cow's tongue (cooked) and some other raw vegetables. Unpleasant but not quite my puke threshold yet - I think I draw the line at raw invertebrates. Before that line it should still be alright.
We walked around the Bugis area a bit, tried to catch a movie but there wasn't anything on, a board game cafe but it had closed down already, so we ended up going back home. I was pretty knackered anyway - I did a fair bit of walking the whole day and I had to wake up early for today morning, to walk the Southern Ridges with a bunch of Couchsurfers.
And so that was what I did this morning, woke up at 7am and went to Buona Vista MRT where I met the other 15+ people to do the 7km walk. It wasn't the whole trail, we missed the West Coast Park but I heard it wasn't anything too grand anyway. Met some really interesting people - a couple of Malaysians (Finally! Malaysians everywhere are so elusive to me, even in Singapore) , some Indian guys who gave me good tips of where to go to in India (Ganga River, Sikkim, Darjeeling, Goa) and where to avoid (Calcutta), some Germans (but of course), and some interesting Singaporeans and some others. Ahh. A walk like this is really great for meeting people because you're on the move all the time and you get to really mingle around doing casual conversation while walking and exchange talk partners after a while. Didn't really take in too much of the scenery because I was too busy talking all the time. Good excuse to go again! I don't think I've talked to so many strangers in a long while now.
Which is why after the walk and lunch I went to Jurong Point for some grocery shopping and said "have a good day" to the cashier who seemed pleasantly surprised. After that I waved to a cute baby who was as expressionless as it was cute, and said hi to a little boy at the bus stop who, after my friendly greeting, fled back to his mum's side and avoided my eyes. I appear to invoke indifference or fear in children.
Came back to Grad Hall, had a dribbly shower and took a good nap. Woke up around 6 and went to Canteen 11 for dinner. Then came back up and watched some trashy American movies. Milo Ventimiglia is gorgeous.
I'm glad to say I didn't do one bit of work this weekend. My legs are immersed in lactic acid though. La di da gonna chill out somemore and then go to bed.
This picture is taken from this forum. Yeah I know it's heavily photoshopped and you can see the HDBs from afar, but one can imagine. So me and Jia Ling, filled with romantic notions of lalang fields and purple skies, equipped ourselves with my dad's camera and her school camera (since we got both our cameras stolen in KK), met at 7:30am and went all the way to Punggol to brave the elements.Actually it wasn't half bad. The weather was very fine, and because Punggol is mostly flat and empty land, the breeze was just fantastic. We trekked right across a lalang field - I was fine because I wore long pants and did not use my arms too much to fend off the lalangs, but Jia Ling got scratches all over - only to find out that there was a huge ass road just about 50 metres away from our haphazard zigzag lalang route. And Punggol is almost uninhabited (well - by Singaporean standards), which is a super plus point for anywhere in Singapore, as we were the only two crazy people taking syok sendiri pictures by the grassy bank of a pretty much empty road.
There's a house there called Matilda House which was erected since 1902 but now it's deserted, fenced up by the authorities for conservation purposes I guess. It's actually quite pretty if you ignore the ugly fences around. Also Punggol is near the sea, though we opted to go to the beach some other time because it was noon already and we were hungry. Then we took an LRT just for the heck of it, and had this aerial view of Punggol's many flat blocks of grass, which, with a sinking feeling in my heart I knew would be dominated by HDBs very soon. Why else would they build a huge (and I do mean HUGE) MRT building and the LRTs if they weren't expecting a large population? Sigh.
Afternoon we headed back to civilization - to Clarke Quay to have lunch. There's this Japanese food court at this place called Liang Court at Clarke Quay and I had a pretty decent Curry Don there, with a really nice Japanese fruity beer from the supermarket beside. Yum =) Then we met Jia Ling's friend Singaporean Irene and went to Chinatown. I know, Chinatown, on the weekend before Chinese New Year, in Singapore. You bet we saw all the population that we didn't see in Punggol that morning. You just have to know that I hate crowds but I'll do you guys a favour and refrain from whining about it. But Irene's a cool chick and I enjoyed spending time with her. She's on a mission to take pictures of all the cows that she can spot, bersempena the Bull's year. Her goal's 60. During the Year of the Boar she took 70+ pictures of pigs, with no repeats. She gets a kick out of making digital collages out of them.
I hung around with the girls till about 5pm, after which I headed to Bugis, another horribly crowded place where you literally get pushed around by the people if you don't walk at a decent pace. Met up with Yuen and Roman there. We went to Arab Street to have dinner, where people actually spoke Malay (yay!) when taking orders, but the place we were at had horrible service so I ended up not eating there. There were some people doing some reality TV shooting (something like The Amazing Race) for Suria Channel, which is a Malay channel, so we hung around and watched a guy puke his guts out while being forced to eat this platter of stuff. And they weren't even seriously gross stuff, I mean there was petai and kacang botol and some cow's tongue (cooked) and some other raw vegetables. Unpleasant but not quite my puke threshold yet - I think I draw the line at raw invertebrates. Before that line it should still be alright.
We walked around the Bugis area a bit, tried to catch a movie but there wasn't anything on, a board game cafe but it had closed down already, so we ended up going back home. I was pretty knackered anyway - I did a fair bit of walking the whole day and I had to wake up early for today morning, to walk the Southern Ridges with a bunch of Couchsurfers.
And so that was what I did this morning, woke up at 7am and went to Buona Vista MRT where I met the other 15+ people to do the 7km walk. It wasn't the whole trail, we missed the West Coast Park but I heard it wasn't anything too grand anyway. Met some really interesting people - a couple of Malaysians (Finally! Malaysians everywhere are so elusive to me, even in Singapore) , some Indian guys who gave me good tips of where to go to in India (Ganga River, Sikkim, Darjeeling, Goa) and where to avoid (Calcutta), some Germans (but of course), and some interesting Singaporeans and some others. Ahh. A walk like this is really great for meeting people because you're on the move all the time and you get to really mingle around doing casual conversation while walking and exchange talk partners after a while. Didn't really take in too much of the scenery because I was too busy talking all the time. Good excuse to go again! I don't think I've talked to so many strangers in a long while now.
Which is why after the walk and lunch I went to Jurong Point for some grocery shopping and said "have a good day" to the cashier who seemed pleasantly surprised. After that I waved to a cute baby who was as expressionless as it was cute, and said hi to a little boy at the bus stop who, after my friendly greeting, fled back to his mum's side and avoided my eyes. I appear to invoke indifference or fear in children.
Came back to Grad Hall, had a dribbly shower and took a good nap. Woke up around 6 and went to Canteen 11 for dinner. Then came back up and watched some trashy American movies. Milo Ventimiglia is gorgeous.
I'm glad to say I didn't do one bit of work this weekend. My legs are immersed in lactic acid though. La di da gonna chill out somemore and then go to bed.
Mellow
In a rather idyllic mood now, just sprawled on my desk reading this text on What Democracy Requires of the Media by James Curran, listening to Nodame Cantabile's soundtrack.
Yuen's taking a cab back later so she's giving me a lift, so I'm not in a hurry to rush for the shuttle bus time limit which is at 9pm. We went to the gym today and worked out for about an hour, had the endorphins rushing through my body so I was in a silly mood after that. The gym's shower has great water pressure, I daresay it is worth going for gym if only to enjoy the gushing water after. (The shower back in my room dribbles.)
It's pretty nice walking around the campus around evening time when there is the evening breeze and blue sky and toasty sun. Ate lamb chop and extra fries because I was hungry after gym, so I effectively negated all weight lost and then some. Not that I care though I enjoy food too much, wahaha! I'm working out for my usual reason of building stamina and Yuen's looking to build muscles. Different level.
Came back to the office, had a little snooze and woke up feeling all fresh, clean (good showers rock!) and cozy and snug in my jacket in the airconditioned room. Kristy had already left and Yuen was at class and I was left on my own with my music and my stack of readings.
Times like these - dare I say it? I actually enjoy my life. =) I think I am high on endorphins.
Yuen's taking a cab back later so she's giving me a lift, so I'm not in a hurry to rush for the shuttle bus time limit which is at 9pm. We went to the gym today and worked out for about an hour, had the endorphins rushing through my body so I was in a silly mood after that. The gym's shower has great water pressure, I daresay it is worth going for gym if only to enjoy the gushing water after. (The shower back in my room dribbles.)
It's pretty nice walking around the campus around evening time when there is the evening breeze and blue sky and toasty sun. Ate lamb chop and extra fries because I was hungry after gym, so I effectively negated all weight lost and then some. Not that I care though I enjoy food too much, wahaha! I'm working out for my usual reason of building stamina and Yuen's looking to build muscles. Different level.
Came back to the office, had a little snooze and woke up feeling all fresh, clean (good showers rock!) and cozy and snug in my jacket in the airconditioned room. Kristy had already left and Yuen was at class and I was left on my own with my music and my stack of readings.
Times like these - dare I say it? I actually enjoy my life. =) I think I am high on endorphins.
The last real man on earth.
Today I went to Jurong Point, which by the way, has expanded to twice its size.
The shops had bright, glitzy lights, decked with congratulatory bouquets in front, and people busying themselves with the merchandise sold. At the ground floor there was some performance with throngs of people crowded in front of the stage where a person dressed in a bear suit was singing along with some girls wearing short pants, some pop songs with lyrics slyly altered to incorporate Christmassy words like Christmas and Santa. Good old commercial propaganda.
I stood at the newly furbished third floor of the new wing, looking down at the masses of people, of all ages, flowing like water, rubbing shoulders, talking, smiling, carrying bags, pushing prams, holding hands. You know what I think? I think they're not real people. Not really. They're illusions. They don't exist. I think if I had the balls to walk up and touch any of them, they would shimmer like holograms and walk straight through me.
The escalators ferried a constant stream of humanoids. On my way up an escalator there was this guy coming down on the other one. He wore black rimmed glasses, was checking his wallet and looked kinda lost. Kinda human. A cute one at it. Maybe if he looked at my direction, I would catch his eye and we would share some kind of connection, and he would understand the whole conspiracy of us being the only real ones and the urgent need to save the earth from evil human wannabes, and possibly repopulate the earth, I wouldn't mind.
But he was oblivious of my presence and quickly merged into the crowd when he stepped off the escalator. I looked backwards longingly, and my heart broke a little when the last of his silhouette disappeared, and I knew that I had lost him forever.
The shops had bright, glitzy lights, decked with congratulatory bouquets in front, and people busying themselves with the merchandise sold. At the ground floor there was some performance with throngs of people crowded in front of the stage where a person dressed in a bear suit was singing along with some girls wearing short pants, some pop songs with lyrics slyly altered to incorporate Christmassy words like Christmas and Santa. Good old commercial propaganda.
I stood at the newly furbished third floor of the new wing, looking down at the masses of people, of all ages, flowing like water, rubbing shoulders, talking, smiling, carrying bags, pushing prams, holding hands. You know what I think? I think they're not real people. Not really. They're illusions. They don't exist. I think if I had the balls to walk up and touch any of them, they would shimmer like holograms and walk straight through me.
The escalators ferried a constant stream of humanoids. On my way up an escalator there was this guy coming down on the other one. He wore black rimmed glasses, was checking his wallet and looked kinda lost. Kinda human. A cute one at it. Maybe if he looked at my direction, I would catch his eye and we would share some kind of connection, and he would understand the whole conspiracy of us being the only real ones and the urgent need to save the earth from evil human wannabes, and possibly repopulate the earth, I wouldn't mind.
But he was oblivious of my presence and quickly merged into the crowd when he stepped off the escalator. I looked backwards longingly, and my heart broke a little when the last of his silhouette disappeared, and I knew that I had lost him forever.
Work life balance?
There is none.
Every day I wake up, it is research that I think of. When I eat, research. Before I sleep, research. It dominates every aspect of my life, the guilt that hampers my enjoyment of doing anything non-work-related, the relentless worry that I won't complete my assignments to my satisfaction, the obsession with tweaking every little argument so everything will be flawless and the world will become a better place with everything cited and referenced according to APA style.
Portrayal of homosexuals. Queer Theory. Spiral of silence, Noelle-Neumann. Racialised discourse. Transethnic solidarity. Model of initial trust. Social capital.
And then there is the social life.Or The lack of thereof. Every night I reach the hostel around 9pm. Every door is closed, and I imagine that every room contains a lonely soul. When I stand at the corridor and look at windows of other people, all of them are looking at their computers. When the real world offers you no comfort, the virtual world will have to do.
Therefore I resort to escapism. Lately I am gripped by the clutches of this silly little game on my cell phone. I spend hours on it. When I am obsessed with breaking my own record, my mind contains nothing else. It is a void, a void of work, a void of emotions with only one goal in mind - get that block in line, break that record. Awaiting the end of the game, when I finally break the cyclical chain of pressing restart, is of course despair about time wasted, on one silly little game. But during the game, my mind is able to rest. It is a perverse way to meditate.
Get out, you say. Go knock on the doors of those lonely souls, ask them out. In fact I have tried knocking on doors, once. It was mostly out of necessity as I had borrowed an umbrella from a girl whose room number I forgot. A Danish girl oversaw the spectacle of me repeating the procedure of knocking every door, and apologizing at each, until I finally got the door, at the tenth attempt I think. She was greatly amused and we shared some good laughs. Yet when I saw her next, at the bus stop, her stony expression indicated that she did not recognize me. I did not reintroduce myself as the door-knocking girl, because I wasn't 100% sure if that was her. I have to reiterate that I am extremely bad with faces. She probably was too.
It is the nature of the fleeting relationships that I form in the hostel, while getting water from the pantry, while studying in the TV room. People you meet briefly, share a conversation about why you're knocking every door on the floor, and never see again - or never recognize again. There's no depth. No emotional residue is left on any shoulder you rub. All are busy with their own problems, presumably preoccupation with their own research.
Also, spontaneity is dying out. In the monotony of routine, spontaneity is what I thrive on, what I live for. An irreverent gesture, an exchange of twinkling eyes, a song sang at the top of one's lungs, buskers and hitchhikers, something out of place. There is none! Obedience reigns here, nobody laughs, the bureaucracy makes you do illogical things, weekends mean traipsing hundreds of shops which merchandise look virtually the same. If 4.5million people can do it, why can't you?
Before I terminate this incessant train of self pity, which is quite unjustified actually, what with people being detained for two years without trial, children being poisoned just for drinking milk, the global economic crisis and politicians on the brink of losing power that they're clinging onto with a death grip - I leave you with a piece of news under Breaking News in The Straits Times yesterday.
3,821 jaywalkers caught. What in the world should we do to these naughty lawbreakers?
Now - back to work.
Update - The university must have caught wind of the errant pedestrians, it being a major breaking news and all, and sent out a powerpoint presentation on "NTU Campus Road Safety". Since as we're merely university students, we probably need to be educated on how to cross the road. Some pictures of the campus are in there, which I thought you'd be interested to see, though they're not very well taken.
Every day I wake up, it is research that I think of. When I eat, research. Before I sleep, research. It dominates every aspect of my life, the guilt that hampers my enjoyment of doing anything non-work-related, the relentless worry that I won't complete my assignments to my satisfaction, the obsession with tweaking every little argument so everything will be flawless and the world will become a better place with everything cited and referenced according to APA style.
Portrayal of homosexuals. Queer Theory. Spiral of silence, Noelle-Neumann. Racialised discourse. Transethnic solidarity. Model of initial trust. Social capital.
And then there is the social life.
Therefore I resort to escapism. Lately I am gripped by the clutches of this silly little game on my cell phone. I spend hours on it. When I am obsessed with breaking my own record, my mind contains nothing else. It is a void, a void of work, a void of emotions with only one goal in mind - get that block in line, break that record. Awaiting the end of the game, when I finally break the cyclical chain of pressing restart, is of course despair about time wasted, on one silly little game. But during the game, my mind is able to rest. It is a perverse way to meditate.
Get out, you say. Go knock on the doors of those lonely souls, ask them out. In fact I have tried knocking on doors, once. It was mostly out of necessity as I had borrowed an umbrella from a girl whose room number I forgot. A Danish girl oversaw the spectacle of me repeating the procedure of knocking every door, and apologizing at each, until I finally got the door, at the tenth attempt I think. She was greatly amused and we shared some good laughs. Yet when I saw her next, at the bus stop, her stony expression indicated that she did not recognize me. I did not reintroduce myself as the door-knocking girl, because I wasn't 100% sure if that was her. I have to reiterate that I am extremely bad with faces. She probably was too.
It is the nature of the fleeting relationships that I form in the hostel, while getting water from the pantry, while studying in the TV room. People you meet briefly, share a conversation about why you're knocking every door on the floor, and never see again - or never recognize again. There's no depth. No emotional residue is left on any shoulder you rub. All are busy with their own problems, presumably preoccupation with their own research.
Also, spontaneity is dying out. In the monotony of routine, spontaneity is what I thrive on, what I live for. An irreverent gesture, an exchange of twinkling eyes, a song sang at the top of one's lungs, buskers and hitchhikers, something out of place. There is none! Obedience reigns here, nobody laughs, the bureaucracy makes you do illogical things, weekends mean traipsing hundreds of shops which merchandise look virtually the same. If 4.5million people can do it, why can't you?
Before I terminate this incessant train of self pity, which is quite unjustified actually, what with people being detained for two years without trial, children being poisoned just for drinking milk, the global economic crisis and politicians on the brink of losing power that they're clinging onto with a death grip - I leave you with a piece of news under Breaking News in The Straits Times yesterday.
3,821 jaywalkers caught. What in the world should we do to these naughty lawbreakers?
Now - back to work.
Update - The university must have caught wind of the errant pedestrians, it being a major breaking news and all, and sent out a powerpoint presentation on "NTU Campus Road Safety". Since as we're merely university students, we probably need to be educated on how to cross the road. Some pictures of the campus are in there, which I thought you'd be interested to see, though they're not very well taken.
You three-headed shape-shifting son of a bitch.
I watched The Mummy 3 today. The title is quoted from the film. I wait for the day when I can use it on someone. In fact I shall practise it every day at the mirror so that when the moment comes, the words will roll effortlessly and spectacularly from my tongue, succeeding in a 15-hit combo that will render my opponent defenseless and speechless.
Hell yeah. I rule. No one messes with me. No one.
I am very bored. Very, very bored. And a bit lonesome, if I would care to admit it. But no, only losers get lonesome. Solitary confinement does not scare me. No it doesn't, you three-headed-shape-shifting-son-of-a-bitch. Shut up and go away.
Yesterday I went out with Roman and his European buddies to the National Day Parade (widely known as the NDP amongst acronym-loving Singaporeans). Pictures.
People.
People on a bridge.
Roman dancing to some schoolgirls' singing.
Then I left early and went off before the fireworks to meet my Chinese officemate, Kristy for dinner. She's really adorable, and I mean both looks and personality-wise. Her friend was supposed to come along but ffked, so there were only both of us at the end. It was an invigorating 90 minutes of badmouthing the male population in general, zooming in on personal experiences and hearsay.
She ended up deleting the contact of her offender from her phone and I whooped on Orchard Road in celebration. We don't need men, what are sperm banks for??
Oh. Right. We do need men to keep the sperm banks stocked. My apologies on the oversight. Won't happen again.
Then today I went out with Mei Zee and saw her for the first time in 8 years. Gosh she's changed. But she's still as sweet as ever, sweeter if possible. I commented that she got prettier. She commented that I looked exactly the same. An awkward school girl with ungainly short hair in a school pinafore two sizes too big springs to mind. 17 was not a good year in the looks department.
Then we went to watch The Mummy 3. Good mindless fun. Don't question the logic. Don't question why
SPOILER AHEAD!!
SPOILER!!
yetis were significant allies of the good guys. Yes, yetis. If not for the yetis the baddies would have won. =_= Michelle Yeoh the 2000 year-old Chinese sorceress cast her spell in English. Brendan Fraser looked 30 when he was supposed to be at least 50. His wife did look 50 though. Why did they take away Rachel Weisz why. The army of dead chanted "freedom" (in Chinese) when they were revived. Cheesy cheesy Hollywood propaganda. (America! Fuck Yeah! Coming to save the motherfucking day yeah! <-- one of our favourite songs during the Rainbow Frank Experience) And yeah. That was how the Terracotta Army was formed. Totally.
END SPOILER.
And you'll be alright.
Then after that we went to buy me a new cell phone. I got a Sony Ericsson W910i at SGD198 for a two-year student plan. I pay SGD25.68 every month. 200 free outgoing minutes, unlimited free SMS and MMS. I did not do much research before buying the phone. It is charging now so I shall explore what I can do tomorrow.
I am still very bored. I have nothing planned for tomorrow. (Except for reading my cellphone manual.) I have still not done my academic reading. The thought of an empty day is extremely depressing. I don't feel like going out because I have gone out for two consecutive days and I don't fancy overcrowded malls. I don't feel like staying in my room. I don't feel like calling anybody to arrange plans. And what plans? How do people use their weekends in Singapore?
I went out for a walk around half the campus this evening. It made me feel a bit better. Marginally. Then I came back to my room and plunged into full-blown depression yet again.
I am delaying going to bed so that tomorrow won't come as soon. But my head hurts so I guess I should. Good night and thanks for all the fish.
Hell yeah. I rule. No one messes with me. No one.
I am very bored. Very, very bored. And a bit lonesome, if I would care to admit it. But no, only losers get lonesome. Solitary confinement does not scare me. No it doesn't, you three-headed-shape-shifting-son-of-a-bitch. Shut up and go away.
Yesterday I went out with Roman and his European buddies to the National Day Parade (widely known as the NDP amongst acronym-loving Singaporeans). Pictures.
People.
People on a bridge.
Roman dancing to some schoolgirls' singing.Then I left early and went off before the fireworks to meet my Chinese officemate, Kristy for dinner. She's really adorable, and I mean both looks and personality-wise. Her friend was supposed to come along but ffked, so there were only both of us at the end. It was an invigorating 90 minutes of badmouthing the male population in general, zooming in on personal experiences and hearsay.
She ended up deleting the contact of her offender from her phone and I whooped on Orchard Road in celebration. We don't need men, what are sperm banks for??
Oh. Right. We do need men to keep the sperm banks stocked. My apologies on the oversight. Won't happen again.
Then today I went out with Mei Zee and saw her for the first time in 8 years. Gosh she's changed. But she's still as sweet as ever, sweeter if possible. I commented that she got prettier. She commented that I looked exactly the same. An awkward school girl with ungainly short hair in a school pinafore two sizes too big springs to mind. 17 was not a good year in the looks department.
Then we went to watch The Mummy 3. Good mindless fun. Don't question the logic. Don't question why
SPOILER AHEAD!!
SPOILER!!
yetis were significant allies of the good guys. Yes, yetis. If not for the yetis the baddies would have won. =_= Michelle Yeoh the 2000 year-old Chinese sorceress cast her spell in English. Brendan Fraser looked 30 when he was supposed to be at least 50. His wife did look 50 though. Why did they take away Rachel Weisz why. The army of dead chanted "freedom" (in Chinese) when they were revived. Cheesy cheesy Hollywood propaganda. (America! Fuck Yeah! Coming to save the motherfucking day yeah! <-- one of our favourite songs during the Rainbow Frank Experience) And yeah. That was how the Terracotta Army was formed. Totally.
END SPOILER.
And you'll be alright.
Then after that we went to buy me a new cell phone. I got a Sony Ericsson W910i at SGD198 for a two-year student plan. I pay SGD25.68 every month. 200 free outgoing minutes, unlimited free SMS and MMS. I did not do much research before buying the phone. It is charging now so I shall explore what I can do tomorrow.
I am still very bored. I have nothing planned for tomorrow. (Except for reading my cellphone manual.) I have still not done my academic reading. The thought of an empty day is extremely depressing. I don't feel like going out because I have gone out for two consecutive days and I don't fancy overcrowded malls. I don't feel like staying in my room. I don't feel like calling anybody to arrange plans. And what plans? How do people use their weekends in Singapore?
I went out for a walk around half the campus this evening. It made me feel a bit better. Marginally. Then I came back to my room and plunged into full-blown depression yet again.
I am delaying going to bed so that tomorrow won't come as soon. But my head hurts so I guess I should. Good night and thanks for all the fish.
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