"'m reading kazuo ishiguro's never let me go, but i think the freezing climate affected my reading speed cos i only got to page 51. it is quite all right - wait no, let's be honest - i don't think much of it at all. granted, i've only read the first few chapters but well, from what i have read, i haven't encountered any impressing poignancy, or strikingly beautifully crafted sentences. its all very ordinary."
well that's what i said a few days ago. i've read the whole thing now, so for the heck of it and indulging in the rare moments where it seems that i actually have nothing to do, let's have a brief review:
i won't be giving away any spoilers for those who intend to read the book save for the fact that this book, in terms of stylistics is very subtle, and this would include the plotline itself such that it would seem that the story goes nowhere, which is not very true at all.
the difference in tones, atmosphere and even the conveying of themes is done through shifting nuances, so if you're reading through this in a rush, it would seem like a whole 263 pages of a hazy dream that just leads the reader in circles, back and forth without anything concrete to say. i suppose it takes some getting used to, especially since for lit, i've been reading stuff like huxley where the plot complexity (wait - what plot?) is just so obvious its like whamming your head against the wall.
but after awhile, especially reading it in comfortably cold rainy days in bed like i did, you come to appreciate this haziness - that the plot and revelations unfold gently, such that you are not wholly aware of the acknowledgement of a development, but it kind of subtly builds its layers so that with every suggested truth, you go "oh yes, that."
so that, is the merit of ishiguro's writing - very clean and subtle. i wasn't bored though, which is something, even though it should be taken into consideration that a substantial part of my reading was simply because i wanted to know what was the big deal about this writer. the only time that i dazed off in the middle of this book was when i caught myself daydreaming (i was in bed under a soft blanket at this point hurrah), and not being able to remember when exactly i had started to drift off, or whether or not i had closed my eyes at all.
at the same time though, i don't think it was a brilliant, life-changing book but i suppose that's quite a lot to live up to. no moments of poignancy or beautifully crafted prose that jumped up at me (save for an achingly touching anecdote about Norfolk - look out for that), but i suppose it's congruent to the writing style. it is very nice in every sense of the word, and a good book to pick up when you have the time and are in the drifty mood.
oh and by the way, this is post number THREE HUNDRED AND THIRTY. cheers and fireworks everyone; if you can spare the time, actually do have something to say, and don't mind bolstering my esteem, then leave a tag about how this blog, (cue: dramatically cheesy voice) has changed your life.
though i highly doubt it, but eh, why not give it a shot.
Monday, October 17, 2005
Friday, October 14, 2005
for the first time in my life today, i was late for school. (how exciting)
it amazes me actually, this record that has only since been broken, considering that i am usually late for everything else. i suppose its because more often than not, if i find myself in a situation where it is likely that i will be late for school, i opt for not turning up at all!
its a very convenient ploy that half my class employed today.
so for the first time too, i officially was given detention. that's a but odd, you ask, since you say that you used to get into much trouble in secondary school. well, true that - but you see, BP has no official system of detention.
when you get into trouble, the DM will snarl at you to see him after school, so you do. in doing so, you actually wait around an hour or two waiting for him to turn up, and when he finally does, he snarls at you to get lost, that you are a waste of his time or what are you doing here, which is then your cue to take advantage of his frazzled state and downplay whatever grievious misdemeanour commited. then, you go home.
its an absolute waste of time. but if you DON'T see him, he somehow retains your absence, and then you're in deeper shit the next day. its quite odd really.
cj detention on the other hand, is actually quite fun. i spent it catching up with my friend, calling charmaine and matthew, scheduling a pw meeting, cursing the bloody school laptop and when i got bored, trooped of to siberia to read one of those hyped up books to find out whether it was worth all they said hype.
so, when the DM asked us later on, "what did you do during the two hours?" (apparently, i-did-some-form-of-study answers is the key to getting back your EZ-link card. hmm. i am such a detention noob), i feebly said that i read a lit book - which is true! just not the one assigned on our syllabus, that's all.
i'm reading kazuo's never let me go, but i think the freezing climate affected my reading speed cos i only got to page 51. it is quite all right - wait no, let's be honest - i don't think much of it at all. granted, i've only read the first few chapters but well, from what i have read, i haven't encountered any impressing poignancy, or strikingly beautifully crafted sentences. its all very ordinary.
and the thing of course, is that i usually do like things that revolve around the ordinary - that one of the beautiful aspects of literature is finding the catching, fleeting moments of brilliance in the ordinary.
i watched cold mountain with my brother and sister, and watching it, i'm assuming it is NOT pg because they were quite shaken by the violence brutality and moments of crass nudity. i wondered for awhile whether they should go on watching it, suggested that they stop which of course, was left unheeded; but i came to the conclusion that actually, i think its good that they did. it might do my sister some good to be aware of humanity's propensity for cruelty, and for my brother to know that war is so much more than the the tactical strategies for the computer games that he plays. good movies are just brilliant.
yesterday was the J2s graduation day, and somebody got thrown into the fish pond. i wonder how much he smelled afterwards. kinda ew, yes. to be honest, its something that i've always wanted to do, to be thrown/jump into a pod of some sort and the only thing that stops me is the thought of residual pond smell.
speaking of fishes!
if you thought that eating dinner (which may or may not include fish) in front of your fish tank like i do at home is darkly amusing, or cruel as steffi would find it, i have news:
so one of the fishes died, and we were supposed to remove it but i couldn't find the net and not feelin up to putting my whole arm into the tank, i put it off to another day.
the next day! i was walking past the tank when i thought i saw one of those 'i-can-see-its-skeleton!' fishes swimming at an odd angle and i was thinking oh dear, is it an epidemic of Mysterious Fishy Deaths like the last time? when i took a closer look, it was the half-eaten corpse of the dead fish.
I HAVE CANNIBAL GUPPIES.
they ate almost everything - all th guts, the tail and well, i suppose they left a bit of flesh - i suppose they got bored.
it amazes me actually, this record that has only since been broken, considering that i am usually late for everything else. i suppose its because more often than not, if i find myself in a situation where it is likely that i will be late for school, i opt for not turning up at all!
its a very convenient ploy that half my class employed today.
so for the first time too, i officially was given detention. that's a but odd, you ask, since you say that you used to get into much trouble in secondary school. well, true that - but you see, BP has no official system of detention.
when you get into trouble, the DM will snarl at you to see him after school, so you do. in doing so, you actually wait around an hour or two waiting for him to turn up, and when he finally does, he snarls at you to get lost, that you are a waste of his time or what are you doing here, which is then your cue to take advantage of his frazzled state and downplay whatever grievious misdemeanour commited. then, you go home.
its an absolute waste of time. but if you DON'T see him, he somehow retains your absence, and then you're in deeper shit the next day. its quite odd really.
cj detention on the other hand, is actually quite fun. i spent it catching up with my friend, calling charmaine and matthew, scheduling a pw meeting, cursing the bloody school laptop and when i got bored, trooped of to siberia to read one of those hyped up books to find out whether it was worth all they said hype.
so, when the DM asked us later on, "what did you do during the two hours?" (apparently, i-did-some-form-of-study answers is the key to getting back your EZ-link card. hmm. i am such a detention noob), i feebly said that i read a lit book - which is true! just not the one assigned on our syllabus, that's all.
i'm reading kazuo's never let me go, but i think the freezing climate affected my reading speed cos i only got to page 51. it is quite all right - wait no, let's be honest - i don't think much of it at all. granted, i've only read the first few chapters but well, from what i have read, i haven't encountered any impressing poignancy, or strikingly beautifully crafted sentences. its all very ordinary.
and the thing of course, is that i usually do like things that revolve around the ordinary - that one of the beautiful aspects of literature is finding the catching, fleeting moments of brilliance in the ordinary.
i watched cold mountain with my brother and sister, and watching it, i'm assuming it is NOT pg because they were quite shaken by the violence brutality and moments of crass nudity. i wondered for awhile whether they should go on watching it, suggested that they stop which of course, was left unheeded; but i came to the conclusion that actually, i think its good that they did. it might do my sister some good to be aware of humanity's propensity for cruelty, and for my brother to know that war is so much more than the the tactical strategies for the computer games that he plays. good movies are just brilliant.
yesterday was the J2s graduation day, and somebody got thrown into the fish pond. i wonder how much he smelled afterwards. kinda ew, yes. to be honest, its something that i've always wanted to do, to be thrown/jump into a pod of some sort and the only thing that stops me is the thought of residual pond smell.
speaking of fishes!
if you thought that eating dinner (which may or may not include fish) in front of your fish tank like i do at home is darkly amusing, or cruel as steffi would find it, i have news:
so one of the fishes died, and we were supposed to remove it but i couldn't find the net and not feelin up to putting my whole arm into the tank, i put it off to another day.
the next day! i was walking past the tank when i thought i saw one of those 'i-can-see-its-skeleton!' fishes swimming at an odd angle and i was thinking oh dear, is it an epidemic of Mysterious Fishy Deaths like the last time? when i took a closer look, it was the half-eaten corpse of the dead fish.
I HAVE CANNIBAL GUPPIES.
they ate almost everything - all th guts, the tail and well, i suppose they left a bit of flesh - i suppose they got bored.
Tuesday, October 11, 2005
THIS IS A POST TO CELEBRATE MY 2000+ VISITOR!
for those who have not realized it, i have installed a web counter on this blog and well, i'm not going to beat around the bush, i had it installed two months back for purely egocentric reasons. oh come on now, don't look at me like that! we all know that a large portion of the appeal for keeping an online journal is having a readership, and fandom (pathetically limited or otherwise) is purely a vanity.
and besides, this web counter has an awesome feature that pinpoints my readers from their geographical position - when i click on this feature, this map of the world comes up with all these dots that represent the readers so hey - I CAN SEE YOU GENEVIEVE ANTONO TAG MY BLOG UPDATE YOURS PLS WHEN ARE YOU COMING BACK TO SINGAPORE =) HOW IS CANADA, MY FRIEND GOES SKIING THERE, APPARENTLY HE'S QUITE PRO HAVE YOU GOT A FUNNY ACCENT, EH?
you know, this post was actually meant for something of a more depthful matter, religion to be exact, seeing that it is ramadan, and many many related things have been swimming in my head, but then i checked my blog for tags, saw the counter, got quite excited, blog-hopped this and that, and augh i must now strive to move away from the tangent(aha, see that's fulfilling my quota for mathematical information-thingy; a mathematical term.)! its about time i write something somewhat serious, looking at the past half-hearted entries.
some time back, in a conversation with hazri, we talked about the coming ramadan and the ensuing bahavioural changes that it entails. roughly, he thought it was nonsense for people to be substantially more pious during this month, and then regress back into i suppose, morally decadent ways once it has passed - as if to build up credit so that you could be bad for the rest of the year, something along those lines i think.
it's almost a reverse be-good-santa-is-coming syndrome.
at that point of time when he said that, i don't think i replied much because what he said made me wonder whether that was what i did, be good for a month in compensation for the 11 months of neglect. you see, for me right, i don't or can't respond fully to the opinions of others and formulate my own opinion immediately - i'm the kind who kinda nods, mulls over it five minutes, hours, days, weeks or months later and THEN, my somewhat fully formed opinion.
i would agree that his opinion is very true, it happens and undeniably hypocritical. but then again, i don't think it would be true to say that it is the basis for all momentarily pious behaviour. for me, during this month, i do end up adhering more to morally/religiously upright ways, which include from a conscious effort not to cuss (not always working) and to do my daily prayers as far as possible (ditto). partly, from obligation, and to be brutally honest, that oligation comes more from family/society rather than i don't know, an inner call of faith.
but that does not mean that it completely negates any effort of finding a better connection with God. maybe its easier to do so during this month, because the oppurtunities and well, atmosphere is there. it is a month, especially allocated for such things, and i suppose it is sad that it is more likely than not that i will regress into my usual ways post-ramadan, well hey, i'm trying. in spite of my cynicism and unconventional thoughts of religion and God, i think i do want to try.
gosh this feels odd.
do you know what else is odd? extreme displays of emotion resulting from worship etc. now, i'm not saying that it's weird per se, but I find it odd and like the way i don't understand how art students can so easily convert to science students, i simply just don't get it. it unnerves me. and i'm not even going into the questioning of the sincerity of all these displays.
the thing is, i am very wary of people displaying such extreme and rigorous conviction of their faith. this primarily means evangelists (not neccesarily solely Christian) and oh i don't know, crying. on the case of evangelists, my sticking point is that how can you be so completely, absolutely, infallibly sure that you are right, and that therefore, others are wrong? i mean, seriously. in all logic, you have to concede to the existence of other options and in doing so, the marginal possibility that they too have a chance of being right since after all, its not like you've got a giant rock with a divine carving that goes: HA I'M RIGHT, YOU'RE WRONG. you know? its just ridiculous, and such extreme conviction is just..narrow-minded.
and for extreme displays of emotion. see, i've always considered one's relationship with God to be a very personal and intimate thing, and this would also mean that hey, nobody else has to see it! its kinda the same logic for Public Displays of Affection for Couples - like, oh hey, glad you guys are happy and loving each other muchly but yeah don't have to see the physical evidence please kthnxbye. for reasons unfathomed, it just unnerves me.
for example, we once had this prayer session thing at home, with lots of random people my parents knew from the pilgrimage group and amiably going along with everything, when this man starts crying. which is okay, if it was the quiet type but oh no. kinda loud, definitely noticeable and while i was hey, happy for him that he i don't know, had an epiphany of some sort, i could not help but think oh gawd, pull it together please. i suppose its just that in recent times, i find it somewhat appropriate to keep a level of detachment between your private and public self. i don't know. well, the other day, we were doing one of the daily prayer things as a family and well, in the middle, my dad who was leading, at first his voice wavered, and then kibda cracked until it was clear that he was you know, crying. at least it wasn't superly dramatic like the other guy, but still it unnerved me. for one, i've never seen or heard my dad cry. have you?
faith - what a difficult, difficult subject. my faith in God comes in the form of little small things, like knowing that things that have or are happening, are essentially for the best, and that problematic dilemmas will work out fine and that i will be okay. that i should govern my life not from the nitty-griity rulings that sometimes come up with islam (can you say, micro-managing?), but just by being as good a person as i can be. so what if my arab is far from fluent (more like, non-existent) or that i can't memorize the hadiths, or the 101 rules pertaining to islamic legistlation?
i think i'm a good person, or at least, try to be.
my one flaw though, the one thing that will send me into the fire and brimstone of hell is that i am a compulsive liar.
i'm not proud of it, but i have to admit that its one of the things that keep my daily interactions with the Outside World smooth and well, functioning the way i would prefer them to. sometimes there's guilt, but not as often as it should be. i could, and should stop, and have tried actually. it lasted what, three weeks before i slipped back into it and well, yeah.
i lie.
do you guys have to be wary and distrust the things i say now? not really, i think. you believing the things i say is what keeps the relationship smooth and functioning, the way that both you and i would prefer it to be, and that, kiddies, is why i lie.
the irony of course, is that my compulsive lying does not negate me from being completely and baringly honest, as the past few paragraphs have proved.
for those who have not realized it, i have installed a web counter on this blog and well, i'm not going to beat around the bush, i had it installed two months back for purely egocentric reasons. oh come on now, don't look at me like that! we all know that a large portion of the appeal for keeping an online journal is having a readership, and fandom (pathetically limited or otherwise) is purely a vanity.
and besides, this web counter has an awesome feature that pinpoints my readers from their geographical position - when i click on this feature, this map of the world comes up with all these dots that represent the readers so hey - I CAN SEE YOU GENEVIEVE ANTONO TAG MY BLOG UPDATE YOURS PLS WHEN ARE YOU COMING BACK TO SINGAPORE =) HOW IS CANADA, MY FRIEND GOES SKIING THERE, APPARENTLY HE'S QUITE PRO HAVE YOU GOT A FUNNY ACCENT, EH?
you know, this post was actually meant for something of a more depthful matter, religion to be exact, seeing that it is ramadan, and many many related things have been swimming in my head, but then i checked my blog for tags, saw the counter, got quite excited, blog-hopped this and that, and augh i must now strive to move away from the tangent(aha, see that's fulfilling my quota for mathematical information-thingy; a mathematical term.)! its about time i write something somewhat serious, looking at the past half-hearted entries.
some time back, in a conversation with hazri, we talked about the coming ramadan and the ensuing bahavioural changes that it entails. roughly, he thought it was nonsense for people to be substantially more pious during this month, and then regress back into i suppose, morally decadent ways once it has passed - as if to build up credit so that you could be bad for the rest of the year, something along those lines i think.
it's almost a reverse be-good-santa-is-coming syndrome.
at that point of time when he said that, i don't think i replied much because what he said made me wonder whether that was what i did, be good for a month in compensation for the 11 months of neglect. you see, for me right, i don't or can't respond fully to the opinions of others and formulate my own opinion immediately - i'm the kind who kinda nods, mulls over it five minutes, hours, days, weeks or months later and THEN, my somewhat fully formed opinion.
i would agree that his opinion is very true, it happens and undeniably hypocritical. but then again, i don't think it would be true to say that it is the basis for all momentarily pious behaviour. for me, during this month, i do end up adhering more to morally/religiously upright ways, which include from a conscious effort not to cuss (not always working) and to do my daily prayers as far as possible (ditto). partly, from obligation, and to be brutally honest, that oligation comes more from family/society rather than i don't know, an inner call of faith.
but that does not mean that it completely negates any effort of finding a better connection with God. maybe its easier to do so during this month, because the oppurtunities and well, atmosphere is there. it is a month, especially allocated for such things, and i suppose it is sad that it is more likely than not that i will regress into my usual ways post-ramadan, well hey, i'm trying. in spite of my cynicism and unconventional thoughts of religion and God, i think i do want to try.
gosh this feels odd.
do you know what else is odd? extreme displays of emotion resulting from worship etc. now, i'm not saying that it's weird per se, but I find it odd and like the way i don't understand how art students can so easily convert to science students, i simply just don't get it. it unnerves me. and i'm not even going into the questioning of the sincerity of all these displays.
the thing is, i am very wary of people displaying such extreme and rigorous conviction of their faith. this primarily means evangelists (not neccesarily solely Christian) and oh i don't know, crying. on the case of evangelists, my sticking point is that how can you be so completely, absolutely, infallibly sure that you are right, and that therefore, others are wrong? i mean, seriously. in all logic, you have to concede to the existence of other options and in doing so, the marginal possibility that they too have a chance of being right since after all, its not like you've got a giant rock with a divine carving that goes: HA I'M RIGHT, YOU'RE WRONG. you know? its just ridiculous, and such extreme conviction is just..narrow-minded.
and for extreme displays of emotion. see, i've always considered one's relationship with God to be a very personal and intimate thing, and this would also mean that hey, nobody else has to see it! its kinda the same logic for Public Displays of Affection for Couples - like, oh hey, glad you guys are happy and loving each other muchly but yeah don't have to see the physical evidence please kthnxbye. for reasons unfathomed, it just unnerves me.
for example, we once had this prayer session thing at home, with lots of random people my parents knew from the pilgrimage group and amiably going along with everything, when this man starts crying. which is okay, if it was the quiet type but oh no. kinda loud, definitely noticeable and while i was hey, happy for him that he i don't know, had an epiphany of some sort, i could not help but think oh gawd, pull it together please. i suppose its just that in recent times, i find it somewhat appropriate to keep a level of detachment between your private and public self. i don't know. well, the other day, we were doing one of the daily prayer things as a family and well, in the middle, my dad who was leading, at first his voice wavered, and then kibda cracked until it was clear that he was you know, crying. at least it wasn't superly dramatic like the other guy, but still it unnerved me. for one, i've never seen or heard my dad cry. have you?
faith - what a difficult, difficult subject. my faith in God comes in the form of little small things, like knowing that things that have or are happening, are essentially for the best, and that problematic dilemmas will work out fine and that i will be okay. that i should govern my life not from the nitty-griity rulings that sometimes come up with islam (can you say, micro-managing?), but just by being as good a person as i can be. so what if my arab is far from fluent (more like, non-existent) or that i can't memorize the hadiths, or the 101 rules pertaining to islamic legistlation?
i think i'm a good person, or at least, try to be.
my one flaw though, the one thing that will send me into the fire and brimstone of hell is that i am a compulsive liar.
i'm not proud of it, but i have to admit that its one of the things that keep my daily interactions with the Outside World smooth and well, functioning the way i would prefer them to. sometimes there's guilt, but not as often as it should be. i could, and should stop, and have tried actually. it lasted what, three weeks before i slipped back into it and well, yeah.
i lie.
do you guys have to be wary and distrust the things i say now? not really, i think. you believing the things i say is what keeps the relationship smooth and functioning, the way that both you and i would prefer it to be, and that, kiddies, is why i lie.
the irony of course, is that my compulsive lying does not negate me from being completely and baringly honest, as the past few paragraphs have proved.
Thursday, October 06, 2005
all right here's what i don't understand:
it's actually after the promos, having somewhat survived it and yes kids, its very much worse than the O Levels and yet and yet i am so tired, there's actually hardly a spare second to catch my breath and god, even for leisure, i find myself rushing and struggling to squeeze it in between EVERYTHING (i.e. events of today) so everything is just bad, and under all the laughter is the unmistakable undercurrent of strain and lethargy, and the knowing that you are out with your friends not doing work, because you know that is as opposed to doing MORE work and it is just horrible, is everybody going through this.
i actually would want to list down everything that is a) pissing me off and b) making, or promising to make life hell but yeah i doubt you guys would be interested in that whining shit so i think i shall exercize some good ole self-restraint.
and you know the worse thing of all is that you can't even complain with satisfaction because there is this guilt that nudges you all the time that hey, whatever you're going through, he's getting it as bad too, or worse.
a case example:
struggling with photo exhibition shit - with amazing help from jenn+jerm+shim+shawn THANKYOU; watches a tired and rather frazzled ms narinder make her way to go home
ME: nnngh, you're going home? (read: whaaaat, you're going home while we're still stuck here being minions when we're not even the ones supposed to be minion-ing!)
NARINDER: i'm going home to work on the presentation for the minister due tomorrow (read: i'm bigger, and actually earning money for this, but hey, still a minion)
ME: oh. sorry.
which you know, makes this blog (and by this, i mean ALL forms of online journals so i am NOT converting, you eljay kids) completely pointless. i don't even find inane daily incidents remotely amusing anymore, so no light-hearted anecdotes either. there's barely enough time to breathe, let alone think substantial/interesting thoughts.
and on monday and tuesday, we have post-exam activities that is brilliantly all athletic-oriented, so i will spend time taking up court space as a relatively useless mass of lack-of-coordination hurrah.
it's crazy. recently rushing my art project, i'd end up so tired and forcing myself to sleep only with the compromise that while falling in and out of sleep in those odd half-conscious moments i would think up compositions for a problematic thingy, and oh dear god, the stress-induced strange dreams don't help either
interestingly, schizophrenia is hereditary.
it's actually after the promos, having somewhat survived it and yes kids, its very much worse than the O Levels and yet and yet i am so tired, there's actually hardly a spare second to catch my breath and god, even for leisure, i find myself rushing and struggling to squeeze it in between EVERYTHING (i.e. events of today) so everything is just bad, and under all the laughter is the unmistakable undercurrent of strain and lethargy, and the knowing that you are out with your friends not doing work, because you know that is as opposed to doing MORE work and it is just horrible, is everybody going through this.
i actually would want to list down everything that is a) pissing me off and b) making, or promising to make life hell but yeah i doubt you guys would be interested in that whining shit so i think i shall exercize some good ole self-restraint.
and you know the worse thing of all is that you can't even complain with satisfaction because there is this guilt that nudges you all the time that hey, whatever you're going through, he's getting it as bad too, or worse.
a case example:
struggling with photo exhibition shit - with amazing help from jenn+jerm+shim+shawn THANKYOU; watches a tired and rather frazzled ms narinder make her way to go home
ME: nnngh, you're going home? (read: whaaaat, you're going home while we're still stuck here being minions when we're not even the ones supposed to be minion-ing!)
NARINDER: i'm going home to work on the presentation for the minister due tomorrow (read: i'm bigger, and actually earning money for this, but hey, still a minion)
ME: oh. sorry.
which you know, makes this blog (and by this, i mean ALL forms of online journals so i am NOT converting, you eljay kids) completely pointless. i don't even find inane daily incidents remotely amusing anymore, so no light-hearted anecdotes either. there's barely enough time to breathe, let alone think substantial/interesting thoughts.
and on monday and tuesday, we have post-exam activities that is brilliantly all athletic-oriented, so i will spend time taking up court space as a relatively useless mass of lack-of-coordination hurrah.
it's crazy. recently rushing my art project, i'd end up so tired and forcing myself to sleep only with the compromise that while falling in and out of sleep in those odd half-conscious moments i would think up compositions for a problematic thingy, and oh dear god, the stress-induced strange dreams don't help either
interestingly, schizophrenia is hereditary.
Sunday, September 25, 2005
Thursday, September 15, 2005
Channelnewsasia Forum :: View topic - Arts or Science..Which is better?
Channelnewsasia Forum :: View topic - Arts or Science..Which is better?: "I was an Arts student. I think the main diff is that Science subjects are more towards theory whereas Arts makes you think. (real hard I tell you)."
yes, thinking. absolutely iffy, that!
*much amused*
i've been poking around the CNA online forum pages, and it really is quite fun. and i realize how geeky just saying that makes me - OH WELL. it's brilliant really, you read posts by incredibly astute people, then completely moronic people that you just want to slap and cannot believe they exist, and then you encounter bits of endearing true Singaporean-ness:
on the costs of studying overseas
"If you want cheap go study in Indonesia. Woaaaa lau lan ey, everyone so giam siap one."
i actually burst out laughing when i saw that.
Poking through forums like this is like blog-hopping, but in a better condensed form and it makes me happy because i get in a debate-y mode and actually CAN put forth my opinion because that's what i'm supposed to do!
*glee*
yes, thinking. absolutely iffy, that!
*much amused*
i've been poking around the CNA online forum pages, and it really is quite fun. and i realize how geeky just saying that makes me - OH WELL. it's brilliant really, you read posts by incredibly astute people, then completely moronic people that you just want to slap and cannot believe they exist, and then you encounter bits of endearing true Singaporean-ness:
on the costs of studying overseas
"If you want cheap go study in Indonesia. Woaaaa lau lan ey, everyone so giam siap one."
i actually burst out laughing when i saw that.
Poking through forums like this is like blog-hopping, but in a better condensed form and it makes me happy because i get in a debate-y mode and actually CAN put forth my opinion because that's what i'm supposed to do!
*glee*
Thursday, September 08, 2005
A session of camwhoring by the river with the EBS.
because i don't feel quite wordy recently, for lack of inspiration or more likely, sleep, here's a summary of sunday's events.
it rained, a lot.
as the wet roads should testify. this photo was taken by hazri, and gleefully digitally-fiddled by yours truly.
we trooped over to lau pa sat for food, and more camwhoring of brilliant architecture that is somewhat lacking in singapore recently *coughSMUcoughsupremecourtcough*
i love this shot. it is something about the masses of dark space in brilliant contrast to the light from the stalls and windows that i find - guh. i don't know, there's a reason why i took a photo of it, instead of writing a prose piece.
likewise.
and what is a camwhoring session by the river, without pictures
of the river itself!
i can't quite decide which i like better, so yeah.
and of course, the customary emoshots of beautiful people (why am i not getting paid for this?):
vincent.
hoho i knooow you like this picture vincent. so, just a friendly reminder: if seft needs a photographer cum graphic artist, remember who is willing to work for a nominal sum (or lunch)!
hazri.
it's quite a pity that you can't see his face in this picture because hazri usually makes very good photos. oh well, TOO BAD - besides, i have enough photos of you looking dramatically and photogenically good
matthew.
so you see matthew, if all else fails, you can be - A MODEL. don't try to deny it, you stood there for eons just waaaaiting for someone to take your picture
janice.
Embodying the spirit of adolescent angst and burn-out. after one too many circular debates on the merits of local poetry and pretentious art, perhaps? but lovely photo though.
janice, again. (taken by hazri, edited by me.)
suddenly, she is quite happy. i wonder why - passing parade of nekkid gay men, hmm? i think this was an attempt by hazri to take model-esque pictures of all of us, and this proves me wrong on the fact that people look best in candid shots, cos jan looks awesome here.
kass. (i *think* i took this one, don't throw rocks at me hazri!)
so pretty - the thing i like about taking pictures of kass is that she has this simplicity and innocence about her. i'm not saying this is who she is, or isn't, but my pictures of her always have that quality. it's quite a rare thing, nowadays.
and me (taken by hazri, edited by me).
decidedly happier behind the camera, ja.
because i don't feel quite wordy recently, for lack of inspiration or more likely, sleep, here's a summary of sunday's events.
it rained, a lot.
as the wet roads should testify. this photo was taken by hazri, and gleefully digitally-fiddled by yours truly.
we trooped over to lau pa sat for food, and more camwhoring of brilliant architecture that is somewhat lacking in singapore recently *coughSMUcoughsupremecourtcough*
i love this shot. it is something about the masses of dark space in brilliant contrast to the light from the stalls and windows that i find - guh. i don't know, there's a reason why i took a photo of it, instead of writing a prose piece.
likewise.
and what is a camwhoring session by the river, without pictures
of the river itself!
i can't quite decide which i like better, so yeah.
and of course, the customary emoshots of beautiful people (why am i not getting paid for this?):
vincent.
hoho i knooow you like this picture vincent. so, just a friendly reminder: if seft needs a photographer cum graphic artist, remember who is willing to work for a nominal sum (or lunch)!
hazri.
it's quite a pity that you can't see his face in this picture because hazri usually makes very good photos. oh well, TOO BAD - besides, i have enough photos of you looking dramatically and photogenically good
matthew.
so you see matthew, if all else fails, you can be - A MODEL. don't try to deny it, you stood there for eons just waaaaiting for someone to take your picture
janice.
Embodying the spirit of adolescent angst and burn-out. after one too many circular debates on the merits of local poetry and pretentious art, perhaps? but lovely photo though.
janice, again. (taken by hazri, edited by me.)
suddenly, she is quite happy. i wonder why - passing parade of nekkid gay men, hmm? i think this was an attempt by hazri to take model-esque pictures of all of us, and this proves me wrong on the fact that people look best in candid shots, cos jan looks awesome here.
kass. (i *think* i took this one, don't throw rocks at me hazri!)
so pretty - the thing i like about taking pictures of kass is that she has this simplicity and innocence about her. i'm not saying this is who she is, or isn't, but my pictures of her always have that quality. it's quite a rare thing, nowadays.
and me (taken by hazri, edited by me).
decidedly happier behind the camera, ja.
Thursday, August 18, 2005
(written on a internet-less laptop, while computer was being sent to Reformatting Land)
18 August, 2005 02:23AM
Right. I’ve realized how much I miss rambling without the worry of an audience like I used to in a similar computer journal before I was attached to the Internet, blogging and the subtle (or not) exhibitionism that comes with it. I’m writing on the school’s laptop by the way and shit, I need to go shit but I want to finish typing this sentence before I go – heaven forbid I forget to delete this off the desktop before I return it IF ANYBODY IS READING THIS BECAUSE I FORGOT TO DELETE THIS, DO TRY TO CONTAIN YOUR LAUGHTER AT MY SELF-ABSORBTION I KNOW YOU’RE JUST LIKE ME TOO, DO NOT TRY TO DENY IT.
Besides, it’s not as if I don’t know how ridiculous the previous entry sounded.
This is really quite liberating, I like the laptop’s keyboard – it makes nice, soft and gratifying clicks. I realize how little I’ve written recently, and GP essays are just hell, and lit essays! Well, they’re not that far behind either. I was telling my mum earlier on, how I don’t know whether I can do brilliantly enough to get a scholarship considering how recently, I’ve been screwing up so badly in just about everything! Other people who listen to my similar griping are quick to say, “No laaah, you! Retain! It’ll never happen” and so on, but my mother (bless her heart) didn’t say anything. I’m not quite sure what that means but at this point of time, it’s nice to hear something that is not the mistaken positive conviction of my scholarly aptitude. It gets tiring you know, and I know this does sound trite and again, self-absorbed, but its tiring and trying to hear people convinced that you are doing well when you’re actually not! It’s embarrassing, and it’s not like they’ll ever let themselves be convinced otherwise too because they’re (and rightfully so) are too caught up in their academic nightmare as well.
But then again, my mum not saying anything might mean that she can see me failing.
But then again, this would also mean that my mum doesn’t mind me failing. Of course she wouldn’t want me to fail, but there is a fine line between wanting and minding.
I suppose its times like this that we have be reminded that failure at one path does not equate to the end of the world. It isn’t after all. Right? Even so, you can hardly blame us for being so afraid of failure. In a time where the word fuck isn’t quite a profanity as it used to be, f****** might just be the new F-word.
Randomly, here’s a justification for the…mushiness emo qua-(ok I have to go shit)lity: I have a need to purge it out you know, I don’t think I should let it be quiet and simmer by itself because it might lead to a mutation of god-knows-what, and that I can bet, will not be very healthy. So yes, purging. I mean, besides, nobody that I’ve told, seems to grasp the gravity of what I’ve told them which to tell you the truth, is a trifle annoying.
I mean, seriously. To be unrestrainedly and unabashedly emo: I am trying to tell you the deepest depths of my feelings here (cue: melancholic face). I don’t know why, and can imagine why people would find it far from fun, but I want to talk about it. But everybody is so busy trying to finish their essay outlines and what-shit, and I don’t really blame them for not really veering towards being the passive half of a session of self-indulgent navel gazing. But still – darn!
August 18, 2005 09:41AM
Let’s talk about food.
Or rather, the lack of it. I have not been in eating much, and it’s not as if it’s a conscious effort to diet. It’s a lack of appetite and maybe, boredom at what there is for me to eat and the solution for this, is to not eat. This isn’t very difficult to do in school where the range I have is minimal and well, not that great.
But that is not the point here. With this lack of eating, and being constantly hungry, I cannot help but hope that hey, maybe this will help me lose some of my squishiness! When I first realized this sentiment, it made me quite wary because it was the start of joining the ranks of the legions of women who are obsessed with weight – it’s stupid, and silly but God help us, it is almost something that we cannot avoid. Maybe the answer lies within our extra X chromosome.
Do you know, whenever I come across those Beautiful People mini-articles that cite their healthy habits, what I check is not what they have for breakfastlunchdinner (which usually, amounts to nothing or should be nothing considering how bad it must taste), but their height. I look at their height, see that their much taller (not that difficult, really) but weigh THE SAME OR MUCH LESS than me! Which only makes me want to go,
“Guh.”
Or worse, they are my height, and still skinnier. I’ll explain the logic behind this: You see, if they belonged to the willowy waif-like demographic, it would be more all right because they’re not like me at all. But when they’re my height, it hits closer because well, they’re short people like me too so why aren’t they squishy and a little stumpy like me! Tres unfair.
But the even more significant point here is the fact that I am actually bothered. It’s not that extreme until upon reading such articles, I immediately rush to the loo to puke (and heaven forbid I ever end up like that, someone slap me silly really) but come on! It’s just weight.
You know, bone flesh and fat. It seems ridiculous that everybody is so concerned and pre-occupied with the amount of it. Achieving the perfect dress size has almost become the Holy Grail and I cannot understand our obsession with it.
#EDIT: HAH I'VE LOST 2KG. not that it matters anyway, because these things have a funny way of coming back to haunt you - usually in the form of the peanut butter sandwiches that i'm eating now yum.
18 August, 2005 02:23AM
Right. I’ve realized how much I miss rambling without the worry of an audience like I used to in a similar computer journal before I was attached to the Internet, blogging and the subtle (or not) exhibitionism that comes with it. I’m writing on the school’s laptop by the way and shit, I need to go shit but I want to finish typing this sentence before I go – heaven forbid I forget to delete this off the desktop before I return it IF ANYBODY IS READING THIS BECAUSE I FORGOT TO DELETE THIS, DO TRY TO CONTAIN YOUR LAUGHTER AT MY SELF-ABSORBTION I KNOW YOU’RE JUST LIKE ME TOO, DO NOT TRY TO DENY IT.
Besides, it’s not as if I don’t know how ridiculous the previous entry sounded.
This is really quite liberating, I like the laptop’s keyboard – it makes nice, soft and gratifying clicks. I realize how little I’ve written recently, and GP essays are just hell, and lit essays! Well, they’re not that far behind either. I was telling my mum earlier on, how I don’t know whether I can do brilliantly enough to get a scholarship considering how recently, I’ve been screwing up so badly in just about everything! Other people who listen to my similar griping are quick to say, “No laaah, you! Retain! It’ll never happen” and so on, but my mother (bless her heart) didn’t say anything. I’m not quite sure what that means but at this point of time, it’s nice to hear something that is not the mistaken positive conviction of my scholarly aptitude. It gets tiring you know, and I know this does sound trite and again, self-absorbed, but its tiring and trying to hear people convinced that you are doing well when you’re actually not! It’s embarrassing, and it’s not like they’ll ever let themselves be convinced otherwise too because they’re (and rightfully so) are too caught up in their academic nightmare as well.
But then again, my mum not saying anything might mean that she can see me failing.
But then again, this would also mean that my mum doesn’t mind me failing. Of course she wouldn’t want me to fail, but there is a fine line between wanting and minding.
I suppose its times like this that we have be reminded that failure at one path does not equate to the end of the world. It isn’t after all. Right? Even so, you can hardly blame us for being so afraid of failure. In a time where the word fuck isn’t quite a profanity as it used to be, f****** might just be the new F-word.
Randomly, here’s a justification for the…mushiness emo qua-(ok I have to go shit)lity: I have a need to purge it out you know, I don’t think I should let it be quiet and simmer by itself because it might lead to a mutation of god-knows-what, and that I can bet, will not be very healthy. So yes, purging. I mean, besides, nobody that I’ve told, seems to grasp the gravity of what I’ve told them which to tell you the truth, is a trifle annoying.
I mean, seriously. To be unrestrainedly and unabashedly emo: I am trying to tell you the deepest depths of my feelings here (cue: melancholic face). I don’t know why, and can imagine why people would find it far from fun, but I want to talk about it. But everybody is so busy trying to finish their essay outlines and what-shit, and I don’t really blame them for not really veering towards being the passive half of a session of self-indulgent navel gazing. But still – darn!
August 18, 2005 09:41AM
Let’s talk about food.
Or rather, the lack of it. I have not been in eating much, and it’s not as if it’s a conscious effort to diet. It’s a lack of appetite and maybe, boredom at what there is for me to eat and the solution for this, is to not eat. This isn’t very difficult to do in school where the range I have is minimal and well, not that great.
But that is not the point here. With this lack of eating, and being constantly hungry, I cannot help but hope that hey, maybe this will help me lose some of my squishiness! When I first realized this sentiment, it made me quite wary because it was the start of joining the ranks of the legions of women who are obsessed with weight – it’s stupid, and silly but God help us, it is almost something that we cannot avoid. Maybe the answer lies within our extra X chromosome.
Do you know, whenever I come across those Beautiful People mini-articles that cite their healthy habits, what I check is not what they have for breakfastlunchdinner (which usually, amounts to nothing or should be nothing considering how bad it must taste), but their height. I look at their height, see that their much taller (not that difficult, really) but weigh THE SAME OR MUCH LESS than me! Which only makes me want to go,
“Guh.”
Or worse, they are my height, and still skinnier. I’ll explain the logic behind this: You see, if they belonged to the willowy waif-like demographic, it would be more all right because they’re not like me at all. But when they’re my height, it hits closer because well, they’re short people like me too so why aren’t they squishy and a little stumpy like me! Tres unfair.
But the even more significant point here is the fact that I am actually bothered. It’s not that extreme until upon reading such articles, I immediately rush to the loo to puke (and heaven forbid I ever end up like that, someone slap me silly really) but come on! It’s just weight.
You know, bone flesh and fat. It seems ridiculous that everybody is so concerned and pre-occupied with the amount of it. Achieving the perfect dress size has almost become the Holy Grail and I cannot understand our obsession with it.
#EDIT: HAH I'VE LOST 2KG. not that it matters anyway, because these things have a funny way of coming back to haunt you - usually in the form of the peanut butter sandwiches that i'm eating now yum.
Thursday, August 11, 2005
This morning, it took me fifteen whole minutes to realize that my father had woken me up half and hour earlier, and this resulted in my face contorting into a befuddled and annoyed scowl which i suppose, is rather amusing when you consider that i was sitting on the toilet bowl, fully clothed and doing nothing because i was too groggy.
Then, i spent another ten minutes being more annoyed, and uh, doing nothing.
Then, i spent another ten minutes being more annoyed, and uh, doing nothing.
Tuesday, August 09, 2005
because we forgot to bring a camera today, and this mistake proved VERY irritating and regrettable as the day wore on with more Kodak Moments cropping up, i am blogging to try commit to memory at least, the seemingly insignificant, but brilliant moments had today,
a Picnic at the Istana.
the grounds of the Istana are really beautiful, to the point of looking like tellytubby-land. we walked in, where there was a pond and charmaine yelled quite befuddlingly, "flamingos!" why do i consider this outburst of emotion odd?
because they were swans.
*pauses to remember hysterical laughter that ensued*
and she took 3 seconds to realize her slip. BUT YOU KNOW WHAT CHARMAINE. i might know why she said flamingoes - because thinking back now, the landscaping of the pond and the non-pink birds looked uncannily similar to the flamingo enclosure of the singapore zoo when i was little so *that* might have i suppose, triggered something, yes. and don't ask me how i can remember such things, it's a strange but pleasant odd feeling in the gut.
MATTHEW GOT SNUBBED BY MR. PRESIDENT! this was hilaaaaaaaarious. personally, this can only mean one thing. that this benign, affable (see, positive adjectives kiddies) man has Sekrit Superpowers. why do i say this - because on the way to the istana, what charmaine and matthew spent a considerable amount of time saying Not-so-nice Things about said man. when matthew offered him some pasta, what i'm theorizing is that Mr. President has the supernatural ability to look into a person's soul and know whether you are a fan of him or not! aha.
but then again, obviously he doesn't like half-hearted defenders either because he ignored me too x( you wait, mr nathan! one day, i'll pop over the istana from under the giant flower bushes and steal your prata! then all you'll have left, is a bowl of fish curry. just because we didn't want to fangirl/fanboy you by joining your growing entourage of (oddly) enthusiastic singaporeans. of course, there were all the parents to attend to, what with them shoving their little kids into your arms and all - someone should tell them that Personal Contact With President on (insert date), (insert time) for a duration of (insert negligible number) minutes WILL NOT get said kid into a prestigious primary school after he progresses beyond monosyllabic words.
let's see, what happened next. there was massive eating, and the realization of economical it is to eat/make home-cooked food. lying down staring at the clouds through the backlit pattern of raintree leaves. sketching, bumming and an attempt to do schoolwork on matthew's part because he read an ENTIRE CHAPTER of his lit book. also! charmaine and i made friends with this cute boy.
Vernon, age: 0ne and a half years.
after playing with said little boy, who was quite shy awww, we trooped up to the istana! this turned out to be a smart move indeed.
it was getting quite hot by then, and we heard the inspiring sounds of a bell tolling - the bell, of ice cream. this made us so so so very happy that we started singing,
"DO YOU KNOW THE ICE CREAM MAN
THE ICE CREAM MAN
THE ICE CREAM MAN
DO YOU KNOW THE ICE CREAM MAN
WHO -"
because we didn't know the following lines, but you know, we've never let a bout of ignorance ruin our fun! and so, continued the wailing. we then found out however, the extent in which capitalism ruins such joy BECAUSE THE PRICES THEY CHARGED WERE DAYLIGHT ROBBERY. it was exploitation of the People! who, in all consideration, are the patriotic ones since they were at the istana, of all places.
as such, we whined a little about the prices, but hung around the booth because matthew doesn't mind being exploited for some chocolate ice cream. charmaine however, went to ask the Old Man to lend us the bell that he was ringing to lure in unsuspecting victims of enterprising capitalism and with the Power of the Bell bestowed upon us, we decided to help (no not out of goodwill, just because you all should know by now that i have an inclination for doing inane but insanely amusing things).
and we rang the bell, going, "ICE-CREAM ICE-CREAM! GET YOUR ICE-CREAM HERE itsreallyexpensivebut BUY YOUR ICE-CREAM ITS REALLY GOOD daylightrobberydaylightrobbery ICE-CREAM ICE-CREAM!" twas hilarious fun, and it only got better when we passed back the bell, and the nice Old Man gave us a free cone to share -
HURRAH FREEBIES. this of course, caused a spurt of guilt considering the um, subliminal messages in my short advertizing stint BUT CHOCOLATE ICE CREAM ON A HOT DAY KNOWS NO GUILT.
much satiated on ice-cream, we proceeded to the customary trip to the istana. much opulence yadda3, but hey air-conditioning! and no, i am not going to describe in detail the shiny pewter or the velveteen curtains (although the flowers were quite pretty) because since you've read this far, i am going to reward you with the exclusion of boring details! how's that for a magnanimous gesture.
matthew: "the curtains are really nice."
we toddle off to examine said curtains that hang over huge french doors. the situation here is that i am already quite giddy on endorphins and the golden doorknobs of said doors are hard to resist. fumbled with the first one, locked - BUT THE SECOND ONE YIELDS WITH A SATISFYING CLICK and an oppurtunity to skulk in areas that are out of bounds
and honestly, which self-respecting adolescent who has not stretched out her mischief bone for a looooong time not take it up? it was given to us, dammit. so we slipped out, under the noses of grandly uniformed guards who were pre-occupied with ensuring that the legions of toddlers didn't put various pewter objects in their mouths.
to be honest, i was quite at a loss on what to do once we got out. and i suppose, most of the endorphins came from the fact that it was absolutely clandestince, and it didn't matter that what we did was actually quite inane, like avoiding the pool attendant and laughing at room signs that indicated the Butler's Store and Flower Arrangement Room. but you see, the essence of doing classic adolescent things like this is the stupidity! and that, kiddies, is the beauty of it.
also, we learnt that while it is lame, the "sorry i didn't know we weren't allowed here, we kinda got lost how do we get out?" story *does* work. so! they didn't even check our bags to see whether we stole the butler's..shoe polish or something. shoddy work Mr. Policeman sir, shoddy work. but all is forgiven because you were so nice to and affable and accepted our story without blinking an eye.
i mean, really. do you THINK we actually *accidentally* got lost.
but you know, if there's one single moment that i would like to remember about today, it would be us sprawled on the dense carpet grass, barefoot by the water fountain with the beautiful architecture of the istana looming above us. yes the skulking and creepily hospital-like corridors were quite cool, likewise what lead to resulting free ice cream.
charmaine and i, after waddling in the fountain for awhile sprawled on the grass. at first, we were all just sitting down but you know, it was just so beautiful and UN-SINGAPORE that you just had to lie down on the grass. and then we had one of those Brainwaves (not neccesarily intelligent), i looked at her and said, "let's roll on the grass."
"what?"
"let's roll."
"no!"
"yes."
and we did! it was brilliant! three seventeen year olds, rolling around on the grass (while none of the um, other little kids were doing so) and i am telling you, tumbling around was so LIBERATING. can you say, stressedjcstudentsregressingintochildhoodandindulginginactiviesthathaveneverbeendone?
and this is the Perfect Moment that will be what carries me through the ensuing weeks of inane academia, kiddies: the seconds laughing and laughing after we stopped rolling, giddy on endorphins, feeling every blade of prickly grass through my polo shirt, eyes scrunched shut because i was laughing so hard, the sun on my face, with my two best friends close by my side
it was, for lack of better expression, a flash of what experiencing a utopia would be like, and that, is worth everything.
a Picnic at the Istana.
the grounds of the Istana are really beautiful, to the point of looking like tellytubby-land. we walked in, where there was a pond and charmaine yelled quite befuddlingly, "flamingos!" why do i consider this outburst of emotion odd?
because they were swans.
*pauses to remember hysterical laughter that ensued*
and she took 3 seconds to realize her slip. BUT YOU KNOW WHAT CHARMAINE. i might know why she said flamingoes - because thinking back now, the landscaping of the pond and the non-pink birds looked uncannily similar to the flamingo enclosure of the singapore zoo when i was little so *that* might have i suppose, triggered something, yes. and don't ask me how i can remember such things, it's a strange but pleasant odd feeling in the gut.
MATTHEW GOT SNUBBED BY MR. PRESIDENT! this was hilaaaaaaaarious. personally, this can only mean one thing. that this benign, affable (see, positive adjectives kiddies) man has Sekrit Superpowers. why do i say this - because on the way to the istana, what charmaine and matthew spent a considerable amount of time saying Not-so-nice Things about said man. when matthew offered him some pasta, what i'm theorizing is that Mr. President has the supernatural ability to look into a person's soul and know whether you are a fan of him or not! aha.
but then again, obviously he doesn't like half-hearted defenders either because he ignored me too x( you wait, mr nathan! one day, i'll pop over the istana from under the giant flower bushes and steal your prata! then all you'll have left, is a bowl of fish curry. just because we didn't want to fangirl/fanboy you by joining your growing entourage of (oddly) enthusiastic singaporeans. of course, there were all the parents to attend to, what with them shoving their little kids into your arms and all - someone should tell them that Personal Contact With President on (insert date), (insert time) for a duration of (insert negligible number) minutes WILL NOT get said kid into a prestigious primary school after he progresses beyond monosyllabic words.
let's see, what happened next. there was massive eating, and the realization of economical it is to eat/make home-cooked food. lying down staring at the clouds through the backlit pattern of raintree leaves. sketching, bumming and an attempt to do schoolwork on matthew's part because he read an ENTIRE CHAPTER of his lit book. also! charmaine and i made friends with this cute boy.
Vernon, age: 0ne and a half years.
after playing with said little boy, who was quite shy awww, we trooped up to the istana! this turned out to be a smart move indeed.
it was getting quite hot by then, and we heard the inspiring sounds of a bell tolling - the bell, of ice cream. this made us so so so very happy that we started singing,
"DO YOU KNOW THE ICE CREAM MAN
THE ICE CREAM MAN
THE ICE CREAM MAN
DO YOU KNOW THE ICE CREAM MAN
WHO -"
because we didn't know the following lines, but you know, we've never let a bout of ignorance ruin our fun! and so, continued the wailing. we then found out however, the extent in which capitalism ruins such joy BECAUSE THE PRICES THEY CHARGED WERE DAYLIGHT ROBBERY. it was exploitation of the People! who, in all consideration, are the patriotic ones since they were at the istana, of all places.
as such, we whined a little about the prices, but hung around the booth because matthew doesn't mind being exploited for some chocolate ice cream. charmaine however, went to ask the Old Man to lend us the bell that he was ringing to lure in unsuspecting victims of enterprising capitalism and with the Power of the Bell bestowed upon us, we decided to help (no not out of goodwill, just because you all should know by now that i have an inclination for doing inane but insanely amusing things).
and we rang the bell, going, "ICE-CREAM ICE-CREAM! GET YOUR ICE-CREAM HERE itsreallyexpensivebut BUY YOUR ICE-CREAM ITS REALLY GOOD daylightrobberydaylightrobbery ICE-CREAM ICE-CREAM!" twas hilarious fun, and it only got better when we passed back the bell, and the nice Old Man gave us a free cone to share -
HURRAH FREEBIES. this of course, caused a spurt of guilt considering the um, subliminal messages in my short advertizing stint BUT CHOCOLATE ICE CREAM ON A HOT DAY KNOWS NO GUILT.
much satiated on ice-cream, we proceeded to the customary trip to the istana. much opulence yadda3, but hey air-conditioning! and no, i am not going to describe in detail the shiny pewter or the velveteen curtains (although the flowers were quite pretty) because since you've read this far, i am going to reward you with the exclusion of boring details! how's that for a magnanimous gesture.
matthew: "the curtains are really nice."
we toddle off to examine said curtains that hang over huge french doors. the situation here is that i am already quite giddy on endorphins and the golden doorknobs of said doors are hard to resist. fumbled with the first one, locked - BUT THE SECOND ONE YIELDS WITH A SATISFYING CLICK and an oppurtunity to skulk in areas that are out of bounds
and honestly, which self-respecting adolescent who has not stretched out her mischief bone for a looooong time not take it up? it was given to us, dammit. so we slipped out, under the noses of grandly uniformed guards who were pre-occupied with ensuring that the legions of toddlers didn't put various pewter objects in their mouths.
to be honest, i was quite at a loss on what to do once we got out. and i suppose, most of the endorphins came from the fact that it was absolutely clandestince, and it didn't matter that what we did was actually quite inane, like avoiding the pool attendant and laughing at room signs that indicated the Butler's Store and Flower Arrangement Room. but you see, the essence of doing classic adolescent things like this is the stupidity! and that, kiddies, is the beauty of it.
also, we learnt that while it is lame, the "sorry i didn't know we weren't allowed here, we kinda got lost how do we get out?" story *does* work. so! they didn't even check our bags to see whether we stole the butler's..shoe polish or something. shoddy work Mr. Policeman sir, shoddy work. but all is forgiven because you were so nice to and affable and accepted our story without blinking an eye.
i mean, really. do you THINK we actually *accidentally* got lost.
but you know, if there's one single moment that i would like to remember about today, it would be us sprawled on the dense carpet grass, barefoot by the water fountain with the beautiful architecture of the istana looming above us. yes the skulking and creepily hospital-like corridors were quite cool, likewise what lead to resulting free ice cream.
charmaine and i, after waddling in the fountain for awhile sprawled on the grass. at first, we were all just sitting down but you know, it was just so beautiful and UN-SINGAPORE that you just had to lie down on the grass. and then we had one of those Brainwaves (not neccesarily intelligent), i looked at her and said, "let's roll on the grass."
"what?"
"let's roll."
"no!"
"yes."
and we did! it was brilliant! three seventeen year olds, rolling around on the grass (while none of the um, other little kids were doing so) and i am telling you, tumbling around was so LIBERATING. can you say, stressedjcstudentsregressingintochildhoodandindulginginactiviesthathaveneverbeendone?
and this is the Perfect Moment that will be what carries me through the ensuing weeks of inane academia, kiddies: the seconds laughing and laughing after we stopped rolling, giddy on endorphins, feeling every blade of prickly grass through my polo shirt, eyes scrunched shut because i was laughing so hard, the sun on my face, with my two best friends close by my side
it was, for lack of better expression, a flash of what experiencing a utopia would be like, and that, is worth everything.
Friday, August 05, 2005
OMGTHISBLOGISSTILLALIVE.
i surprise myself sometimes.
today, in GP or wait no, it was ethics class -which, we all know, is just half an hour spent bitching about the dire state of the human condition- i said something which perhaps, has been the most apt thing i've said in a looong time:
"i'm sorry we're not suffering."
the context here is that we were talking (ONCE MORE) about the complacency, hedonism, indulgence and lack of intellectual strife in singaporean youths. it is getting to be a very tiresome topic that surely by now, has exhausted itself! i know i am. vell, at the least, i have come up with my stance on this issue (i.e. the above sentence) and whenever this topic comes up, as i am sure it will, i will repeat it in my head over and over and over again until i drown all the other voices out so that all i'll here is the silence of the cows coming home.
speaking of cows! today, was steffi loe, our very own Vegetarian's birthday. the day was quite brilliant because birthdays just have the tendency of inducing endorphins, even if they're not your own. i was therefore, rather hyper and mind you, this was before the onslaught of chocolate and willy wonka. THE MOVIE WAS ALSO AWESOME CHARMAINE DON'T KILL ME I'M GOING TO WATCH IT WITH YOU I PROMISE REALLY. you know, one of those days where everything seems to go smoothly even when they're not actually because you're feeling nauseous from the spray paint and your feet are wet because of the hole in your sole but you insist on wearing said tattered sneakers anyway and there's lots of work but you conveniently ignore it AND THAT BAR OF CHOCOLATE DISAPPEARED MUCH FASTER THAN YOU EXPECTED seriously, like where did it go! but none of that matters anyway, because for some reason, everything seems to be going so well today from the inane like blowing huge bubbles into the gray sky and witty repartee with Eville counter-part/anisha and walking around with a ridiculous (and not very good) british accent because the movie was just so good and i ate a packet of tomato sauce in the cinema, on its own, yes it was quite nice shut up i do NOT have a tomato fetish and i wonder when this sentence is going to end, no, i suppose not yet, let's see what else can i remember that was good and endorphin-rushing about today well AH YES i have finally noticeably defiled a piece of school property and yes, i know this is rather long overdue considering the events of 2003&2004 but give me a break yes, it is rather difficult balancing the whole I'm A Geek Really Act and surpressing the Die Establishment, DIE aspect but indeed - the blue door of the art room now has strong vestiges of limey green spray paint i wonder what annoying Operations Manager will say oh the day was charmed even for the bubble that we blew which took a fascinating and much emphasis must me placed on this, LONG-LIVED journey whereby it narrowly escaped the spikes of the roof, floated up and then paused in mid-air absolutely still as if musing what next to do, which by the way, included floating over to the next block and all Punsters with substantial experience with the Livelihood of Bubble-blowing should know that this, is nothing short of miraculous but it did after all, after some time and much joy in this corporeal world, go *pop* fare thee well, little bubble that brought us much joy and laughter, your achievements, though seemingly trivial, will not be forgotten and wow this IS a very long sentence isn't it, i wonder whether anybody's still reading this by this point, IF YOU ARE, you are quite silly indeed because i'm sure by now you would have realized that this is simply a mass of incoherent rambling that is even beyond my usual level of well, incoherence and you all really must find something to do with your life, ambition is the key IT IS THE KEY and perhaps, you should find a hobby, like like what is really passive and inane ah yes, mountain-climbing without ropes and a knowledgeble, if hobbit-like guide oh all right i suppose i'll allow you to bring some raffia and geez this rambling this is quite exhausting, i used to be able to do this for ages i must be getting old, in fact i am feeling an odd sharp pain below my ribcage, in addition to the chronic neck and backache - oh yes i've forgotten the entire purpose (yes there was one) of this rambling: happy thoughts!
because after matthew's sms and the subsequent checking of my e-mail inbox, only to find more suggestions on how to make my penis larger thankyouverymuch, endorphins that had coursed through veins dissipated quite significantly which, leads me to the conclusion that endorphins must have some alcohol-like property since it can hit you in the head so fast, but then, evaporate so quickly as well. according to the wise words of willy wonka, and yes this is the accursed accidental alliteration, endorphins make you feel like you're in love. all i have to say is, well! i've always known about the endorphins but just thought that it just made you feel generally happy but noooo. love, indeed. all right then, close all the dating agencies, re-write that Beatles song (dontkillmejanice) because it's not love, but all you need, is chocolate.
i surprise myself sometimes.
today, in GP or wait no, it was ethics class -which, we all know, is just half an hour spent bitching about the dire state of the human condition- i said something which perhaps, has been the most apt thing i've said in a looong time:
"i'm sorry we're not suffering."
the context here is that we were talking (ONCE MORE) about the complacency, hedonism, indulgence and lack of intellectual strife in singaporean youths. it is getting to be a very tiresome topic that surely by now, has exhausted itself! i know i am. vell, at the least, i have come up with my stance on this issue (i.e. the above sentence) and whenever this topic comes up, as i am sure it will, i will repeat it in my head over and over and over again until i drown all the other voices out so that all i'll here is the silence of the cows coming home.
speaking of cows! today, was steffi loe, our very own Vegetarian's birthday. the day was quite brilliant because birthdays just have the tendency of inducing endorphins, even if they're not your own. i was therefore, rather hyper and mind you, this was before the onslaught of chocolate and willy wonka. THE MOVIE WAS ALSO AWESOME CHARMAINE DON'T KILL ME I'M GOING TO WATCH IT WITH YOU I PROMISE REALLY. you know, one of those days where everything seems to go smoothly even when they're not actually because you're feeling nauseous from the spray paint and your feet are wet because of the hole in your sole but you insist on wearing said tattered sneakers anyway and there's lots of work but you conveniently ignore it AND THAT BAR OF CHOCOLATE DISAPPEARED MUCH FASTER THAN YOU EXPECTED seriously, like where did it go! but none of that matters anyway, because for some reason, everything seems to be going so well today from the inane like blowing huge bubbles into the gray sky and witty repartee with Eville counter-part/anisha and walking around with a ridiculous (and not very good) british accent because the movie was just so good and i ate a packet of tomato sauce in the cinema, on its own, yes it was quite nice shut up i do NOT have a tomato fetish and i wonder when this sentence is going to end, no, i suppose not yet, let's see what else can i remember that was good and endorphin-rushing about today well AH YES i have finally noticeably defiled a piece of school property and yes, i know this is rather long overdue considering the events of 2003&2004 but give me a break yes, it is rather difficult balancing the whole I'm A Geek Really Act and surpressing the Die Establishment, DIE aspect but indeed - the blue door of the art room now has strong vestiges of limey green spray paint i wonder what annoying Operations Manager will say oh the day was charmed even for the bubble that we blew which took a fascinating and much emphasis must me placed on this, LONG-LIVED journey whereby it narrowly escaped the spikes of the roof, floated up and then paused in mid-air absolutely still as if musing what next to do, which by the way, included floating over to the next block and all Punsters with substantial experience with the Livelihood of Bubble-blowing should know that this, is nothing short of miraculous but it did after all, after some time and much joy in this corporeal world, go *pop* fare thee well, little bubble that brought us much joy and laughter, your achievements, though seemingly trivial, will not be forgotten and wow this IS a very long sentence isn't it, i wonder whether anybody's still reading this by this point, IF YOU ARE, you are quite silly indeed because i'm sure by now you would have realized that this is simply a mass of incoherent rambling that is even beyond my usual level of well, incoherence and you all really must find something to do with your life, ambition is the key IT IS THE KEY and perhaps, you should find a hobby, like like what is really passive and inane ah yes, mountain-climbing without ropes and a knowledgeble, if hobbit-like guide oh all right i suppose i'll allow you to bring some raffia and geez this rambling this is quite exhausting, i used to be able to do this for ages i must be getting old, in fact i am feeling an odd sharp pain below my ribcage, in addition to the chronic neck and backache - oh yes i've forgotten the entire purpose (yes there was one) of this rambling: happy thoughts!
because after matthew's sms and the subsequent checking of my e-mail inbox, only to find more suggestions on how to make my penis larger thankyouverymuch, endorphins that had coursed through veins dissipated quite significantly which, leads me to the conclusion that endorphins must have some alcohol-like property since it can hit you in the head so fast, but then, evaporate so quickly as well. according to the wise words of willy wonka, and yes this is the accursed accidental alliteration, endorphins make you feel like you're in love. all i have to say is, well! i've always known about the endorphins but just thought that it just made you feel generally happy but noooo. love, indeed. all right then, close all the dating agencies, re-write that Beatles song (dontkillmejanice) because it's not love, but all you need, is chocolate.
Monday, July 18, 2005
so i've regressed back to charcoal drawings.
i have been quite perturbed how i've been so reliant on basic cartoon-work, what with all my morose stickmen figurines. the convenience of doing crude line drawings you know, it just makes you plain lazy. and like, much to my horror doing art class the other day, my hand just refused to draw "properly".
so am forcing myself back to the basics.
the even more disturbing thing is that guh, i'm quite unnerved by what i've been drawing. i'm doing quick portraits, and well, charcoal is naturally dark and me - i've got this inclination to be dark and it is something i can't quite let go of.
C'MON I MANAGED TO MAKE PURPLE DARK AND MORBID. geez.
the portraits are just that, dark, and unintentionally so! it's really something i can't quite shake off GUH. it's like the time zara and i laughed hilariously because i tried to draw a happy stickman,
and he looked sinister.
i am not even going to try draw a happy portrait. who knows what might come up *shudder* if i have the time, i might scan in my doodles and all
yes and baybeats was good.
i have been quite perturbed how i've been so reliant on basic cartoon-work, what with all my morose stickmen figurines. the convenience of doing crude line drawings you know, it just makes you plain lazy. and like, much to my horror doing art class the other day, my hand just refused to draw "properly".
so am forcing myself back to the basics.
the even more disturbing thing is that guh, i'm quite unnerved by what i've been drawing. i'm doing quick portraits, and well, charcoal is naturally dark and me - i've got this inclination to be dark and it is something i can't quite let go of.
C'MON I MANAGED TO MAKE PURPLE DARK AND MORBID. geez.
the portraits are just that, dark, and unintentionally so! it's really something i can't quite shake off GUH. it's like the time zara and i laughed hilariously because i tried to draw a happy stickman,
and he looked sinister.
i am not even going to try draw a happy portrait. who knows what might come up *shudder* if i have the time, i might scan in my doodles and all
yes and baybeats was good.
Thursday, July 14, 2005
today is a beautiful day.
wow, what an unusual burst of optimism izyanti, you say.
i know, it's not often i feel this way, and especially when it's over nothing really. it's the little things, i've decided, that make a day simply brilliant and even this brilliance is not the monumental hit of supercalifragilicious expialidocious-ness.
i'm spending my first five minutes in school on the computer blogging because well, i just arrived and it's 1350. i skipped the first half of school to stay home to do schoolwork due today, and i feel so calm. and much better than i would if i had gone to school, ploughed through lessons that i won't be paying attention to because i'm busy trying to finish due assignments under my econs notes. so i'm in school for art, which is starting in about an hour and honestly, getting away with things like this fill me with quiet glee.
hee.
well, there is the whole missing malay and therefore, not being around to do the group presentation thing, and i do feel a bit guilty for that - BUT, i'm planning to do the written component all by myself so i hope that will help. there, conscience appeased.
the weather is really pretty today, there was a slight drizzle while i was walking to the bus stop, and i reached just in time before the heavy shower started. and before that, i managed to buy the elusive blue packet Skittles, and that makes me happy too. when i got out of the bus, the weather was just perfect.
and even though perfect weather usually makes me wish i wasn't in school, it was fine. it was bright, but not hot or humid and you know, if there's one thing i will always remember over cjc is that for some reason, it always has a brilliantly beautiful sky over it. maybe i notice it more because we're always climbing stairs here and so, have our heads tilted skywards. i don't know, but i certainly don't notice the sky much otherwise.
usually it's in the morning, going up the overhead bridge and you can still see the sun rising and all the colours that come along with it. and then there's the expressway that we cross over, and this huge stretch of tarmac kind of rising and fading in the horizon, with all the buildings sort of framing the clouds and from the art-student point of view, it's a perfect composition from every angle.
i suppose a large reason why i'm so annoyingly cheery is that i've been re-reading totto-chan and this book is just brilliant in it's poignant simplicity. the idea that such a school existed fills me with the silliest emotion - idealistic hope. like gee, there are so many wonderful things that can and will happen! and you know, totto-chan just reminds me of gennie in all of her exuberance.
i'll miss her a lot when she goes to canada, but i'm so happy that she'll be happy doing her own thing there.
yesterday, i had a good talk with my dad (well, he did most of the talking, as usual) but for those who know, i'm comparatively not that close with my dad and i kinda avoid talking about things that might bristle with him, for obvious reasons. we talked about a constant cause of friction between us - my curfew, or rather, how often i don't curtail to it. talking things through, he said things like how there are many things that i do that he disapproves of, things that he'd rather "forbid" me to do, but he doesn't because he understands and wants me to prove the trust that he's put in me. and it's the little things like that, when he reins in his well, absolute authority even though he doesn't want to, that mean a lot to me. it's kind of thing i'll remember twenty years from now.
and this morning, he picked up my (sort of) essay on what i thought about god, faith and the strange fumbling around that comes with the search for it. i was just about to leave the house, putting on my shoes really, and he was at the gates when he mentioned it. i kind of froze at first, because religion is one of the topics that fall under the To Avoid Talking About With Dad list, because he's so conservative and i don't think he would like hearing more..liberal views coming out of his daughter. but do you know what he said?
"sometimes, i feel that way too."
and maybe, it's that simple statement that made my day because for the first time in a long time, i don't know, i love my dad so much. and it's not often (what an understatement!) that such clear sentiments arise.
wow, what an unusual burst of optimism izyanti, you say.
i know, it's not often i feel this way, and especially when it's over nothing really. it's the little things, i've decided, that make a day simply brilliant and even this brilliance is not the monumental hit of supercalifragilicious expialidocious-ness.
i'm spending my first five minutes in school on the computer blogging because well, i just arrived and it's 1350. i skipped the first half of school to stay home to do schoolwork due today, and i feel so calm. and much better than i would if i had gone to school, ploughed through lessons that i won't be paying attention to because i'm busy trying to finish due assignments under my econs notes. so i'm in school for art, which is starting in about an hour and honestly, getting away with things like this fill me with quiet glee.
hee.
well, there is the whole missing malay and therefore, not being around to do the group presentation thing, and i do feel a bit guilty for that - BUT, i'm planning to do the written component all by myself so i hope that will help. there, conscience appeased.
the weather is really pretty today, there was a slight drizzle while i was walking to the bus stop, and i reached just in time before the heavy shower started. and before that, i managed to buy the elusive blue packet Skittles, and that makes me happy too. when i got out of the bus, the weather was just perfect.
and even though perfect weather usually makes me wish i wasn't in school, it was fine. it was bright, but not hot or humid and you know, if there's one thing i will always remember over cjc is that for some reason, it always has a brilliantly beautiful sky over it. maybe i notice it more because we're always climbing stairs here and so, have our heads tilted skywards. i don't know, but i certainly don't notice the sky much otherwise.
usually it's in the morning, going up the overhead bridge and you can still see the sun rising and all the colours that come along with it. and then there's the expressway that we cross over, and this huge stretch of tarmac kind of rising and fading in the horizon, with all the buildings sort of framing the clouds and from the art-student point of view, it's a perfect composition from every angle.
i suppose a large reason why i'm so annoyingly cheery is that i've been re-reading totto-chan and this book is just brilliant in it's poignant simplicity. the idea that such a school existed fills me with the silliest emotion - idealistic hope. like gee, there are so many wonderful things that can and will happen! and you know, totto-chan just reminds me of gennie in all of her exuberance.
i'll miss her a lot when she goes to canada, but i'm so happy that she'll be happy doing her own thing there.
yesterday, i had a good talk with my dad (well, he did most of the talking, as usual) but for those who know, i'm comparatively not that close with my dad and i kinda avoid talking about things that might bristle with him, for obvious reasons. we talked about a constant cause of friction between us - my curfew, or rather, how often i don't curtail to it. talking things through, he said things like how there are many things that i do that he disapproves of, things that he'd rather "forbid" me to do, but he doesn't because he understands and wants me to prove the trust that he's put in me. and it's the little things like that, when he reins in his well, absolute authority even though he doesn't want to, that mean a lot to me. it's kind of thing i'll remember twenty years from now.
and this morning, he picked up my (sort of) essay on what i thought about god, faith and the strange fumbling around that comes with the search for it. i was just about to leave the house, putting on my shoes really, and he was at the gates when he mentioned it. i kind of froze at first, because religion is one of the topics that fall under the To Avoid Talking About With Dad list, because he's so conservative and i don't think he would like hearing more..liberal views coming out of his daughter. but do you know what he said?
"sometimes, i feel that way too."
and maybe, it's that simple statement that made my day because for the first time in a long time, i don't know, i love my dad so much. and it's not often (what an understatement!) that such clear sentiments arise.
Friday, July 08, 2005
Recipe for Surviving Scenarios of Mental Fatigue
- 1 bottle Brand's Chicken Essence
- 1 humongous vitamin B pill
- bananas (avoid heavy carbs because they make me even more sleepy
- assortment of candy, as an uh, compensation for putting in effort not to nap in lessons
- understanding and sympathetic friends who bear with my high-strungness and sometimes, sudden tongue-lashing (thank you zara + stef *sniffles*)
oh bugger it, i've got cranberry stains on my skirt.
speaking of recipes right, i was thinking that the next time we (read: ebs/punsters/whoever) meet up, instead of having another mooovie marathon, let's have a cooking shindig! cos i was reading this person's blog the other day, and that was what they did and it sounds muchos fun. and no, Angry Nugget Men do not count janice. it'll be the awesome - we'll have an appetizer, main course, dessert! mmm.
guh. i'm hungry. i can't stand canteen food no more. they stopped selling brownies because the moe (or some Eville branch of it) decided that no, it is not good to offer the students an avenue for instant gratification. this makes me very unhappy. but by principle only, actually - considering that i never did buy brownies much when they were around. but c'mon! i'm not selfish, THINK OF ALL MY FELLOW FRIENDS WHO ARE SUFFERING FROM BROWNIE WITHDRAWAL.
tis cruel, indeed.
i cannot wait till debate is over, although paradoxically i do hope it won't immediately end post-saturday, for obvious (or not) reasons. you know, when people ask me what cca i'm in, it's easier to say "i'm in debate", rather than
"i'm a debater."
i just find it strange to say the latter. it's the same feeling you get when you tell someone "i'm getting straight As" when you're not, or "i'm a purple hippotami" - it's like a complete lie, or that's how it feels. what a perturbing feeling! i think it's linked to the fact that the debating circle, i think, is a very close and closed thing, and i am such a noob. and most of them are brilliantly competent although this does not exclude them from being friggin' pompous and irritating prats *coughajccough*
STOPPROCRASTINATINGGETBACKTOWORK
- 1 bottle Brand's Chicken Essence
- 1 humongous vitamin B pill
- bananas (avoid heavy carbs because they make me even more sleepy
- assortment of candy, as an uh, compensation for putting in effort not to nap in lessons
- understanding and sympathetic friends who bear with my high-strungness and sometimes, sudden tongue-lashing (thank you zara + stef *sniffles*)
oh bugger it, i've got cranberry stains on my skirt.
speaking of recipes right, i was thinking that the next time we (read: ebs/punsters/whoever) meet up, instead of having another mooovie marathon, let's have a cooking shindig! cos i was reading this person's blog the other day, and that was what they did and it sounds muchos fun. and no, Angry Nugget Men do not count janice. it'll be the awesome - we'll have an appetizer, main course, dessert! mmm.
guh. i'm hungry. i can't stand canteen food no more. they stopped selling brownies because the moe (or some Eville branch of it) decided that no, it is not good to offer the students an avenue for instant gratification. this makes me very unhappy. but by principle only, actually - considering that i never did buy brownies much when they were around. but c'mon! i'm not selfish, THINK OF ALL MY FELLOW FRIENDS WHO ARE SUFFERING FROM BROWNIE WITHDRAWAL.
tis cruel, indeed.
i cannot wait till debate is over, although paradoxically i do hope it won't immediately end post-saturday, for obvious (or not) reasons. you know, when people ask me what cca i'm in, it's easier to say "i'm in debate", rather than
"i'm a debater."
i just find it strange to say the latter. it's the same feeling you get when you tell someone "i'm getting straight As" when you're not, or "i'm a purple hippotami" - it's like a complete lie, or that's how it feels. what a perturbing feeling! i think it's linked to the fact that the debating circle, i think, is a very close and closed thing, and i am such a noob. and most of them are brilliantly competent although this does not exclude them from being friggin' pompous and irritating prats *coughajccough*
STOPPROCRASTINATINGGETBACKTOWORK
Wednesday, July 06, 2005
if i'm not careful, this blog is going to turn into one of those SCHOOL-CENTERED ANGSTY WHINING BITCH-FESTS that are so dreary to read.
but it's true laaaaa. i'm so pissed at everything, at this moment right now that you know what would help? Marks & Spencer's milk chocolate buttons that don't melt into a squishy coagulated lump. this, can also be substituted by a volunteer who i willing to be bitch-slapped/shin-kicked by me - so yes, the line starts here, please take a number.
guh!
what is overwhelmingly pissy-offy is that today, was My First Day of Proper School, and it was just horrid. although to be fair, any day is horrid when you've only had THREE FRIGGIN HOURS OF SLEEP.
but you know, to make myself sound less shallow-whiner, i shall pick a Scapegoat to vent my Undirected Angst. today's goat will be: MINAHS.
it's not that i'm just picking on them because i'm senselessly pissed off at nothing okay, it's this thing that has been hovering in my head since monday, and has left me quite perturbed. what happened was that took a cab ride on that afternoon, and Mr. Cabdriver was one of the particularly chatty ones.
so it started out as a conversation about the Importance of Education (i was on the way to school) and how educated people (he said one, not me arh) simply behave differently. somewhere along the line, it got racial, and we, or actuallyhe, went on about the different kinds of malays that he meets as a cabdriver.
he talked about the malay girls that he picks up from boat quay, post-clubbing, and was very hung up on how drunk they were, how young they were, how skimpily they dressed, their tattoos and how that in their drunkeness, they'd sit by the roadside in their short skirts, exposing their pantaloons for all to see.
and all i could do was sit there and squirm, because well, it's true. these stupid friggin minahs are completely without dignity and shame that even the common taxi-driver you know, well, HE KNOWS. it's terribly embarassing to have this low-life pond scum ruining the perception of malays.
i know i'm being very harsh, but i am just so pissed with them.
note: why am i not so pissed with the mats, i don't know. maybe because personally (no offense random reader who might be a malay guy), i've found that generally, malay guys are just dumb. NOT ACADEMICALLY mind you, it's just totally different mindset and wavelength. if i wasn't in such a crappy mood, i'd bother to think up of a better and more apt adjective, but i can't so bear with it.
come on, think about it. when you hear the word malay, what's your first response? i don't know about you, but geez! i think, mats and minahs because they are the dominating demographic in our racial culture. its crap-shit, but damn it's true. which is why i've given up being annoyed with people like bern who call me a minah because oh my god, i wear emo-glasses and am *gasp* malay. automatically, it's easy to assume that because i share a physical resemblance, i am one of the flock.
you give a chinese person emo-glasses, and he's funky, or uh well. emo. i shop/dress with a sub-conscious effort not to look like a bloody friggin minah, because you know, huge disadvantage that i already share the same skin colour. fuck that man.
but that's not the point here. what is hugely disturbing is that it is THE FIRST THING THAT COMES TO MIND. and this is juxtoposed with the politically correct assumption that malays are conservative, mild-mannered and religious enough to bear the discomfort of a headscarf in this bloody weather. the disparity is just so - on particularly bad days, mortifying.
friggin pond scum.
the strange thing of course, is that while i may sound like a moralizing bitch right here and now, i hardly belong to the opposite camp of staunchly religious malays. they're okay, but my peeve with them is how easily they accept what they are told. and sadly, i more than occasionally disagree with what i'm being told, because (and it doesn't have to do with god here), certain things are man-made, and we all know humans are fallible and flawed. i hate dogma.
but that's another rant, for another day.
but it's true laaaaa. i'm so pissed at everything, at this moment right now that you know what would help? Marks & Spencer's milk chocolate buttons that don't melt into a squishy coagulated lump. this, can also be substituted by a volunteer who i willing to be bitch-slapped/shin-kicked by me - so yes, the line starts here, please take a number.
guh!
what is overwhelmingly pissy-offy is that today, was My First Day of Proper School, and it was just horrid. although to be fair, any day is horrid when you've only had THREE FRIGGIN HOURS OF SLEEP.
but you know, to make myself sound less shallow-whiner, i shall pick a Scapegoat to vent my Undirected Angst. today's goat will be: MINAHS.
it's not that i'm just picking on them because i'm senselessly pissed off at nothing okay, it's this thing that has been hovering in my head since monday, and has left me quite perturbed. what happened was that took a cab ride on that afternoon, and Mr. Cabdriver was one of the particularly chatty ones.
so it started out as a conversation about the Importance of Education (i was on the way to school) and how educated people (he said one, not me arh) simply behave differently. somewhere along the line, it got racial, and we, or actuallyhe, went on about the different kinds of malays that he meets as a cabdriver.
he talked about the malay girls that he picks up from boat quay, post-clubbing, and was very hung up on how drunk they were, how young they were, how skimpily they dressed, their tattoos and how that in their drunkeness, they'd sit by the roadside in their short skirts, exposing their pantaloons for all to see.
and all i could do was sit there and squirm, because well, it's true. these stupid friggin minahs are completely without dignity and shame that even the common taxi-driver you know, well, HE KNOWS. it's terribly embarassing to have this low-life pond scum ruining the perception of malays.
i know i'm being very harsh, but i am just so pissed with them.
note: why am i not so pissed with the mats, i don't know. maybe because personally (no offense random reader who might be a malay guy), i've found that generally, malay guys are just dumb. NOT ACADEMICALLY mind you, it's just totally different mindset and wavelength. if i wasn't in such a crappy mood, i'd bother to think up of a better and more apt adjective, but i can't so bear with it.
come on, think about it. when you hear the word malay, what's your first response? i don't know about you, but geez! i think, mats and minahs because they are the dominating demographic in our racial culture. its crap-shit, but damn it's true. which is why i've given up being annoyed with people like bern who call me a minah because oh my god, i wear emo-glasses and am *gasp* malay. automatically, it's easy to assume that because i share a physical resemblance, i am one of the flock.
you give a chinese person emo-glasses, and he's funky, or uh well. emo. i shop/dress with a sub-conscious effort not to look like a bloody friggin minah, because you know, huge disadvantage that i already share the same skin colour. fuck that man.
but that's not the point here. what is hugely disturbing is that it is THE FIRST THING THAT COMES TO MIND. and this is juxtoposed with the politically correct assumption that malays are conservative, mild-mannered and religious enough to bear the discomfort of a headscarf in this bloody weather. the disparity is just so - on particularly bad days, mortifying.
friggin pond scum.
the strange thing of course, is that while i may sound like a moralizing bitch right here and now, i hardly belong to the opposite camp of staunchly religious malays. they're okay, but my peeve with them is how easily they accept what they are told. and sadly, i more than occasionally disagree with what i'm being told, because (and it doesn't have to do with god here), certain things are man-made, and we all know humans are fallible and flawed. i hate dogma.
but that's another rant, for another day.
Saturday, July 02, 2005
i've been thinking what being 17 has meant to me after i watched this docu-show on mtv on a couple of famous people when they were 17.
has it been awesome? well, not really, considering how non-descriptish i've been in cjc. but on the other and much happier hand, there's the EBS. a recent conversation with bern who was musing how much more she wants to achieve:
"you're already an over-achiever!"
"but i'm not over-achieving enough -"
and that, is the essence of how i've been this year too.
yesterday i came home from school absolutely and thoroughly zonked.
1045: arrived in school, wandered around wondering where my malay projectmates were.
1055: i embark on a quest to get my mentorship form signed by the principal. after much deliberation and noises of disbelief, i am told that he is not in school and that i should leave the form in school so i can pick them up on monday. "BUT THAT WOULD MEAN I HAVE TO TRAVEL TO SCHOOL ON MONDAY AND I DON'T WANT TO SPEND MORE TIME HERE THAN I HAVE TO", i want to whine, but i resist.
1100: into siberia aka school library to fiddle with portfolio while waiting. had an encounter with art classmate, who's doing major research work on van gogh. you know, reading those huge and dusty tomes. had a burst of procrastination-induced guilt, because i haven't started. the horrors.
1105: Groupmate1 messages - she just woke up.
1120: Groupmate2 messages - he too, just woke up. brilliant.
meanwhile, i'm freezing my bloody arse off, and pondering the age-old question - "what the hell am i doing here?"
1230: Groupmate1 arrives. we work out the project lenghtily, and finish in 20 minutes, in english. it is decided that we shall entask the ardous job of translating our scribble into malay to Groupmember2 who never showed up.
1250: wanders over to the dark (really, it is) shelves of the malay section and pick up a book of malay essays in an attempt to somewhat, prepare for the A Level Malay orals later on.
1255: decide that it is all very boring, and also, that i do not like Malaysian propoganda.
1400: *toddles of to this specially built Teaching Development Center that's quite nicely done, with actually GOOD sculptures around. but, like all school development projects go, this room is apparently only used for aforementioned oral exams*
1405: Groupmate1 realizes that today's exam, is NOT an internal examination hurrah
1440: i screw up my oral paper.
1445: very much dejected, i come across desmond, and wail about the horribility of it. he says he too, horribilified his, but i don't believe him. stupid efficiently bilingual people.
1500: spend more time in siberia with portfolio, reasoning that i certainly won't do it when i get back. i pick another spot to sit that from experience is not as siberia-ish. i expect it's more, canada. gee my library is international.
1645: librarian toddles over, and asks me what i'm doing (illustrating some stuff). she says, "wow other people go out party after exams, you're still here ah." oh this is great, i am OFFICIALLY THE LIBRARY-HOVEL HOBBIT. this will do wonders for my (non-existent social life) i'm sure.
1715: dash out of the library, to make my point that i am NOT A NO LIFER THAT SHE THINKS I AM to the librarian. well, not really.
i spot the principal's huge SUV in the car park. for a moment, i wonder why he has such a huge car when he uh, doesn't have a huge family with all that celibacy shebang. but this means! HE IS IN SCHOOL AND I CAN GET IT SIGNED NOW
1755: i find out that in general office terms, "now" can mean 40 bloody minutes. but it is time well spent! i read three NIE newletters, and discover that trainee teachers are "hip and happening" as seen in the extensive article on their Dinner & Dance. brilliant, old fogeys doing the limbo rock - THAT'S WHAT I WANT TO BE WHEN GROW UP MUM.
1800: goes home
1850: NTUC HAS NOT RESTOCKED ON CRANBERRIES. this makes me very sad, and i literally drag my feet home.
1900: shuffle around home, had dinner, but didn't really eat it.
2030: falls asleep on bedroom floor.
2300: "why are you still in your school uniform?", my very concerned mother asks. she quite obviously, has overlooked the whole collapsing on the floor business.
0500: wake up when handphone alarm goes off. supposed to do art, but hell i'm rebellious and i uh, don't.
0800: wakes up finally after i wear out the Snooze button, with the realization that i have debate later on.
and so, as i dragged myself to school (once more), on the bus, trying to sleep without leaning my head against the grossly head-greasy window, stuck in a traffic jam, I WONDER WHETHER I HAVE BITTEN MORE THAT I CAN CHEW.
this is what it feels like:
*chokes*
because with applying for cap things, and the art exam prepping, and the debate nationals *dies* which is next weekend, which is also the day when we'll be filming the thing for temasek sem, and i really want to be in the video and did i mention, the deadline for the portfolio is the day before my art paper and shit, i shouldn't even be here but i am.
would i want any less? somehow, and god knows why, no. i just really wish they wouldn't co-incide all in one go so that i somehow, can BREATHE.
geez.
has it been awesome? well, not really, considering how non-descriptish i've been in cjc. but on the other and much happier hand, there's the EBS. a recent conversation with bern who was musing how much more she wants to achieve:
"you're already an over-achiever!"
"but i'm not over-achieving enough -"
and that, is the essence of how i've been this year too.
yesterday i came home from school absolutely and thoroughly zonked.
1045: arrived in school, wandered around wondering where my malay projectmates were.
1055: i embark on a quest to get my mentorship form signed by the principal. after much deliberation and noises of disbelief, i am told that he is not in school and that i should leave the form in school so i can pick them up on monday. "BUT THAT WOULD MEAN I HAVE TO TRAVEL TO SCHOOL ON MONDAY AND I DON'T WANT TO SPEND MORE TIME HERE THAN I HAVE TO", i want to whine, but i resist.
1100: into siberia aka school library to fiddle with portfolio while waiting. had an encounter with art classmate, who's doing major research work on van gogh. you know, reading those huge and dusty tomes. had a burst of procrastination-induced guilt, because i haven't started. the horrors.
1105: Groupmate1 messages - she just woke up.
1120: Groupmate2 messages - he too, just woke up. brilliant.
meanwhile, i'm freezing my bloody arse off, and pondering the age-old question - "what the hell am i doing here?"
1230: Groupmate1 arrives. we work out the project lenghtily, and finish in 20 minutes, in english. it is decided that we shall entask the ardous job of translating our scribble into malay to Groupmember2 who never showed up.
1250: wanders over to the dark (really, it is) shelves of the malay section and pick up a book of malay essays in an attempt to somewhat, prepare for the A Level Malay orals later on.
1255: decide that it is all very boring, and also, that i do not like Malaysian propoganda.
1400: *toddles of to this specially built Teaching Development Center that's quite nicely done, with actually GOOD sculptures around. but, like all school development projects go, this room is apparently only used for aforementioned oral exams*
1405: Groupmate1 realizes that today's exam, is NOT an internal examination hurrah
1440: i screw up my oral paper.
1445: very much dejected, i come across desmond, and wail about the horribility of it. he says he too, horribilified his, but i don't believe him. stupid efficiently bilingual people.
1500: spend more time in siberia with portfolio, reasoning that i certainly won't do it when i get back. i pick another spot to sit that from experience is not as siberia-ish. i expect it's more, canada. gee my library is international.
1645: librarian toddles over, and asks me what i'm doing (illustrating some stuff). she says, "wow other people go out party after exams, you're still here ah." oh this is great, i am OFFICIALLY THE LIBRARY-HOVEL HOBBIT. this will do wonders for my (non-existent social life) i'm sure.
1715: dash out of the library, to make my point that i am NOT A NO LIFER THAT SHE THINKS I AM to the librarian. well, not really.
i spot the principal's huge SUV in the car park. for a moment, i wonder why he has such a huge car when he uh, doesn't have a huge family with all that celibacy shebang. but this means! HE IS IN SCHOOL AND I CAN GET IT SIGNED NOW
1755: i find out that in general office terms, "now" can mean 40 bloody minutes. but it is time well spent! i read three NIE newletters, and discover that trainee teachers are "hip and happening" as seen in the extensive article on their Dinner & Dance. brilliant, old fogeys doing the limbo rock - THAT'S WHAT I WANT TO BE WHEN GROW UP MUM.
1800: goes home
1850: NTUC HAS NOT RESTOCKED ON CRANBERRIES. this makes me very sad, and i literally drag my feet home.
1900: shuffle around home, had dinner, but didn't really eat it.
2030: falls asleep on bedroom floor.
2300: "why are you still in your school uniform?", my very concerned mother asks. she quite obviously, has overlooked the whole collapsing on the floor business.
0500: wake up when handphone alarm goes off. supposed to do art, but hell i'm rebellious and i uh, don't.
0800: wakes up finally after i wear out the Snooze button, with the realization that i have debate later on.
and so, as i dragged myself to school (once more), on the bus, trying to sleep without leaning my head against the grossly head-greasy window, stuck in a traffic jam, I WONDER WHETHER I HAVE BITTEN MORE THAT I CAN CHEW.
this is what it feels like:
*chokes*
because with applying for cap things, and the art exam prepping, and the debate nationals *dies* which is next weekend, which is also the day when we'll be filming the thing for temasek sem, and i really want to be in the video and did i mention, the deadline for the portfolio is the day before my art paper and shit, i shouldn't even be here but i am.
would i want any less? somehow, and god knows why, no. i just really wish they wouldn't co-incide all in one go so that i somehow, can BREATHE.
geez.
Saturday, June 25, 2005
(obviously an half-written entry from some time back:)
it is two hours into saturday (02:06AM), and i must say, FRIDAY WAS QUITE WOAH.
as a result, i am currently very much broke. i wonder whether i can open my own charity. it's a good cause you know, kinda like the Feed Izyanti Fund and! it'll make quite a nifty acronym - FIF. everybody knows that in singapore, it's the acronym that makes or breaks you.
the tale behind this of course, is not how i'm contemplating/pondering how to uh, convince mother dearest to give me more allowance for next week. but how i became so broke:
i woke up this morning, at 06:15, five minutes before the alarm on my handphone rang and don't ask me why i'm being so meticulously detailed and anal, just shut up and listen.
with much dread, i dragged myself to switch the bloody thing off. the alarm is undoubtedly very annoying and i suppose this makes it very effective in the whole purpose of uh, waking me up but it also means! that i wake up cranky, and this, is a Bad Thing.
what is also a Bad Thing, were the lit papers that i was sitting for that morning. my mum, being ever so kind, and more importantly, paranoid that the bus might get trapped in a rift in the space-time continuum and that *gasp* i might be late for the exaaams, drove me to school. we arrived, as i predicted, VERY early, and since i had no intention to spend more time in that exam-anxiety drenched institution more than neccesary, we sat in the empty carpark for 15 whole minutes.
at this point, i'm not quite sure why i'm being so inanely detailed but yes. this is not like me *shifty eyes*
the paper came, and passed. i think i pretty much screwed up the blake essay and disturbingly! i don't recall mentioning the word "theme" even ONCE in the whole two essays that i wrote, and this is very perturbing and upsetting and i can just imagine flunking lit omg the end is nigh and all that jazz.
in a spurt of adolescent rebellion, WE DID NOT GO HOME IMMEDIATELY TO STUDY. the horror, indeed. instead, being the hedonists that we are, i actually walked around town with zaratashkai, whereby i then abandoned them with much reluctance to meet the various members of the EBS (that's the Elitist Bastards Squadron, for you stupid people out there) and an Innocent Girl Named Jill. oh and also a Guy Named Terence. who! called! me! a! minah. but because he's the Signifant Other of a person i love very muchly, i suppose i shall not kill him. it's also probably because this particular person ALSO calls me a minah. i just cannot win.
larking around in kinokuniya, is of course a Crucial Bit on outings with the madCAP/EBS. it's a significant point of our Geekhood, i think. so as per usual, there was dissing and defending of local writing, and don't we all know that's very much a circular argument.
the favourite activity of an adolescent i think, is escapism. trooping over to the travel guides section, this we did extensively. you see, after the A Levels, we've been thinking off embarking on a Quest. it would be challenging, gritty and all too unhygienic but honestly, back-packing is the answer before we settle down into the serious humdrum pattern of life. the original plan was what, to take a train up to bangkok, switch to a train going through the Silk Route, across Moscow and poof! landing up in london before taking a plane back to singapore. brilliant.
except that we conveniently forgot that travelling across several continents require oodles of MUNNEY, and i calculated that even if i save a quarter of my allowance every week, i'd only have about $600. which! is why i think i should seriously consider plugging for my own charity. as all conmen would agree, don't steal it from them, make them give it to you.
The Izyanti Needs Your Money Fund, or the INYMF. i suppose FIF (Feed Izyanti Fund) sounds much snazzier, but that would mean i'd have to add in fine print what exactly you'd be feeding. it could be my literal appetite and current fixation on Tropical Skittles, and it could also feed my growing list of art supplies needed. it could feed the Sembawang Music coffers in exchange for the Love Psychedelico cd that i've been looking for, for years. so you see, like all charities, we function by lying by omision. so now that i've been gracious enough to be brutally honest, GIVE ME YOUR MONEY.
*beams*
batman begins was very good. it has cast spiderman and all of his geekiness in its dark shadow, everything was well done. i nearly cried once, and cringed terribly when ALL THAT BRILLIANT GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE BURNT DOWN TO THE GROUND. that could have been the saddest moment, ever. but! that's just me. also, post-watching the movie, i realize that i want a butler.
no, not a maid. i want a nice old man to be a yoda-like figure in my life, without being green, wrinkly and with a warped sense of syntax. because trust me, that's gonna affect my speech habits and very annoying it would be indeed, yes.
i also have to announce that Running Around In Odd And Cheesy Mascot Suit has since been scratched off my list of Things To Do Before I Die. although i would have to admit that i did not manage to do the running around bit very well, so i suppose i shall have to make another attempt at it, hoo!
in the late afternoon on friday, for (this makes me sad) approximately less than a minute, i was a huge and fuzzy droplet of haemoglobin. i think it's quite hilarious.
Things To Do Before I Die
- drive an excavator machine, and dig things with it.
- drive one of those huge field lawnmower things. (i tried to do this last saturday, but sadly was foiled because there were no keys. and yes, i can hear the sighs of relief from all of you! crud.)
- go on tv, pulling of a mad (but non-masochistic) stunt ala MTV Whatever Things!
- take part in a strike/boycott involving huge placards and angry faces. have no idea what cause i shall be Angry about though.
- travel extensively, or at least somewhere aways from *mutters* bloodysoutheastasia
- love. (edit: and be loved, in return)
- have kids. i think.
- be brave or brilliant enough (whichever comes first, i suppose) to publish something despite the clear knowledge that people out there are going to tear it apart largely on the basis that it's Local Writing.
- help put together a theatre production. and no, not as a backstage minion.
- own/drive a vintage 1967 volkswagen beetle
i think that's about it, for now. it's cliche and all, but supposing that (TOUCH WOOD) i die tomorrow, the one thing that i'd be sad about is that i've never loved in that way before.
and also that i studied all the econs for nothing.
so after i became for a moment in my life, a blob of haemoglobin and being Publicly Obnoxious by plopping ourselves down in the middle of nowhere to stone and muse in our typically EBS way, we walked back to town cos i HAD DINNER WITH THE 406 PEOPLE =D.
although i uh, got sidetracked into a burger king and took ages to rip myself away, the dinner went finey-fine/brilliant. it's just the familiar faces, and the old chemistry that we all have. the stupid jokes that we never tire of, yelling out the school song down orchard road with admirable bpghs pride, and of course, the endless camera-whoring. Good Old Times.
now that's what i call a Productive Day. spending time (cue: hallmark moment), with people you looooove. sadly, this involves the expenditure of munneh SO DONATE TO THE FEED IZYANTI FUND TO KEEP HER IN THE LOVELY COMPANY OF THOSE SHE LOVES. ALSO, THE THINGS SHE LOVES. donations will not be returned, because she would have spent it so hah!
it is two hours into saturday (02:06AM), and i must say, FRIDAY WAS QUITE WOAH.
as a result, i am currently very much broke. i wonder whether i can open my own charity. it's a good cause you know, kinda like the Feed Izyanti Fund and! it'll make quite a nifty acronym - FIF. everybody knows that in singapore, it's the acronym that makes or breaks you.
the tale behind this of course, is not how i'm contemplating/pondering how to uh, convince mother dearest to give me more allowance for next week. but how i became so broke:
i woke up this morning, at 06:15, five minutes before the alarm on my handphone rang and don't ask me why i'm being so meticulously detailed and anal, just shut up and listen.
with much dread, i dragged myself to switch the bloody thing off. the alarm is undoubtedly very annoying and i suppose this makes it very effective in the whole purpose of uh, waking me up but it also means! that i wake up cranky, and this, is a Bad Thing.
what is also a Bad Thing, were the lit papers that i was sitting for that morning. my mum, being ever so kind, and more importantly, paranoid that the bus might get trapped in a rift in the space-time continuum and that *gasp* i might be late for the exaaams, drove me to school. we arrived, as i predicted, VERY early, and since i had no intention to spend more time in that exam-anxiety drenched institution more than neccesary, we sat in the empty carpark for 15 whole minutes.
at this point, i'm not quite sure why i'm being so inanely detailed but yes. this is not like me *shifty eyes*
the paper came, and passed. i think i pretty much screwed up the blake essay and disturbingly! i don't recall mentioning the word "theme" even ONCE in the whole two essays that i wrote, and this is very perturbing and upsetting and i can just imagine flunking lit omg the end is nigh and all that jazz.
in a spurt of adolescent rebellion, WE DID NOT GO HOME IMMEDIATELY TO STUDY. the horror, indeed. instead, being the hedonists that we are, i actually walked around town with zaratashkai, whereby i then abandoned them with much reluctance to meet the various members of the EBS (that's the Elitist Bastards Squadron, for you stupid people out there) and an Innocent Girl Named Jill. oh and also a Guy Named Terence. who! called! me! a! minah. but because he's the Signifant Other of a person i love very muchly, i suppose i shall not kill him. it's also probably because this particular person ALSO calls me a minah. i just cannot win.
larking around in kinokuniya, is of course a Crucial Bit on outings with the madCAP/EBS. it's a significant point of our Geekhood, i think. so as per usual, there was dissing and defending of local writing, and don't we all know that's very much a circular argument.
the favourite activity of an adolescent i think, is escapism. trooping over to the travel guides section, this we did extensively. you see, after the A Levels, we've been thinking off embarking on a Quest. it would be challenging, gritty and all too unhygienic but honestly, back-packing is the answer before we settle down into the serious humdrum pattern of life. the original plan was what, to take a train up to bangkok, switch to a train going through the Silk Route, across Moscow and poof! landing up in london before taking a plane back to singapore. brilliant.
except that we conveniently forgot that travelling across several continents require oodles of MUNNEY, and i calculated that even if i save a quarter of my allowance every week, i'd only have about $600. which! is why i think i should seriously consider plugging for my own charity. as all conmen would agree, don't steal it from them, make them give it to you.
The Izyanti Needs Your Money Fund, or the INYMF. i suppose FIF (Feed Izyanti Fund) sounds much snazzier, but that would mean i'd have to add in fine print what exactly you'd be feeding. it could be my literal appetite and current fixation on Tropical Skittles, and it could also feed my growing list of art supplies needed. it could feed the Sembawang Music coffers in exchange for the Love Psychedelico cd that i've been looking for, for years. so you see, like all charities, we function by lying by omision. so now that i've been gracious enough to be brutally honest, GIVE ME YOUR MONEY.
*beams*
batman begins was very good. it has cast spiderman and all of his geekiness in its dark shadow, everything was well done. i nearly cried once, and cringed terribly when ALL THAT BRILLIANT GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE BURNT DOWN TO THE GROUND. that could have been the saddest moment, ever. but! that's just me. also, post-watching the movie, i realize that i want a butler.
no, not a maid. i want a nice old man to be a yoda-like figure in my life, without being green, wrinkly and with a warped sense of syntax. because trust me, that's gonna affect my speech habits and very annoying it would be indeed, yes.
i also have to announce that Running Around In Odd And Cheesy Mascot Suit has since been scratched off my list of Things To Do Before I Die. although i would have to admit that i did not manage to do the running around bit very well, so i suppose i shall have to make another attempt at it, hoo!
in the late afternoon on friday, for (this makes me sad) approximately less than a minute, i was a huge and fuzzy droplet of haemoglobin. i think it's quite hilarious.
Things To Do Before I Die
- drive an excavator machine, and dig things with it.
- drive one of those huge field lawnmower things. (i tried to do this last saturday, but sadly was foiled because there were no keys. and yes, i can hear the sighs of relief from all of you! crud.)
- go on tv, pulling of a mad (but non-masochistic) stunt ala MTV Whatever Things!
- take part in a strike/boycott involving huge placards and angry faces. have no idea what cause i shall be Angry about though.
- travel extensively, or at least somewhere aways from *mutters* bloodysoutheastasia
- love. (edit: and be loved, in return)
- have kids. i think.
- be brave or brilliant enough (whichever comes first, i suppose) to publish something despite the clear knowledge that people out there are going to tear it apart largely on the basis that it's Local Writing.
- help put together a theatre production. and no, not as a backstage minion.
- own/drive a vintage 1967 volkswagen beetle
i think that's about it, for now. it's cliche and all, but supposing that (TOUCH WOOD) i die tomorrow, the one thing that i'd be sad about is that i've never loved in that way before.
and also that i studied all the econs for nothing.
so after i became for a moment in my life, a blob of haemoglobin and being Publicly Obnoxious by plopping ourselves down in the middle of nowhere to stone and muse in our typically EBS way, we walked back to town cos i HAD DINNER WITH THE 406 PEOPLE =D.
although i uh, got sidetracked into a burger king and took ages to rip myself away, the dinner went finey-fine/brilliant. it's just the familiar faces, and the old chemistry that we all have. the stupid jokes that we never tire of, yelling out the school song down orchard road with admirable bpghs pride, and of course, the endless camera-whoring. Good Old Times.
now that's what i call a Productive Day. spending time (cue: hallmark moment), with people you looooove. sadly, this involves the expenditure of munneh SO DONATE TO THE FEED IZYANTI FUND TO KEEP HER IN THE LOVELY COMPANY OF THOSE SHE LOVES. ALSO, THE THINGS SHE LOVES. donations will not be returned, because she would have spent it so hah!
Wednesday, June 22, 2005
william blake kills me.
and so, this is clearly yet another bout of procrastination. this entry is going to be exactly that! i'm leaving this window open, and in moments of boredom (which i suspect, will be terribly often), i'm going to type in a paragraph. THIS WILL BE SO EXCITING, like a single-person roundrobin.
i was reading one of those scholarly criticisms websites earlier on and was its a little disturbing to realize that the words are just washing over you and you have to read the sentences over and over sometimes, to grasp what they're trying to say.
here, have a go:
the Bard's vacillation within the lyric between prophecy and self-doubt mirrors an experiential evolution of the meta-voice behind Songs of Innocence and of Experience which he exemplifies, a progression which "helps us to understand why he now refers to himself as 'Ancient'." "The Voice of the Ancient Bard" 's explicit admission of its status as rhetoric undercuts its function as prophecy and implicates itself as one example of the "folly" it denounces: "At the last, the Bard sees himself aright: as guide in need of guidance, a mental traveller whose prophetic certainty and optimism has been so undermined that 'care' threatens to be his only knowledge."
and it's one of those nice and mildly cool nights and suddenly right, i miss CAP alot. a wave of it, because it reminds me of the nights at Eusoff Hall. very dark, with all the red bricks, which i just realized, is identical to the ones used in my hdb flat. it's really quite vague, but what i do see is shuffling down the stairs after JCDrama, kinda zonked.
and then i saw my pair of (unused) house slippers lying around, and it reminded of 406 days when i shuffled around in class in them because i found my school shoes really stiffling and my mum hated my walking in class with my bare socks because they'd get grimy. so she bought me these grey house slippers and what was wonderful that i didn't feel odd at all wearing them in class. the point here is that i'd never do that in cjc.
and Frente's Bizarre Love Triangle is the song for infatuation.
and the printer has konked out on me again. this time however, it's not doing the irritating Blinking Light Morse Code. oh no, nasty plastic lump is doing the Silent Treatment. which i'm
(and i just sneezed. bless me.)
and clearly, i have a short attention span.
in a burst of morbidity, i am going through this site by a coroner and it's really interesting. like did you know, that the fastest way to get the cadaver's temperature is of course the rectal way. but to be more accurate, they insert a thermometer from an incision on the side into the LIVER. this is great man, not only am i dead, but i have people probing my body with funny sticks! NO WAY. this might be one of the top reasons why i would want to die in au naturale, so that they won't see any reason for me to have to go through an autopsy.
also, "Medical Examiners always make the "down cut" to the left of the belly button when making a Y incision at autopsy. This is done because there is a leftover tendon on the right side from the ambilical cord. They won't cut it to show respect for the way we are born."
also, "the human nose is so fragile that morgue attendants and morticians pinch-up the sheet over the nose. This is done because the pressure of the material on the nose can deform it, flattening or turning it sideways." this implies of course, that MICHAEL JACKSON is not a sick pervert who miraculously got acquited, but that he is even beyond our usual speculations of being unhuman. HE IS A ZOMBIE. it makes complete logical sense, that's why his nose behaves so strangely - it's coming to terms with being ded.
i realized that i have recently been very anal (and no, nothing to do with thermometers and such) in the sense that i have been reaping much pleasure (and man, this really just sounds so wrong) from being neat. when did this dawn on me? when i looked at the notes that i've been writing and feel happy that it's all methodically bulleted and uh, colour co-ordinated. and then in another bout of procrastination, i organized my wardrobe and uh, arranged all my hanging clothes according to COLOUR so that now when you open my wardrobe, it's nicely in a gradient of various shades. and looking at it made me so very HAPPY.
this is quite a cause for concern! because now that i think of it, the other day, i bought my current favourite candy, Tropical Skittles, emptied it into this bowl and with much glee, proceeded to seperate the candy by colour so that it kind of became a pie chart, and then i ate it by colour too. hmm. of course, if i tell my mom about my recent fixation with such anal details, she'd laugh her arse off which! i can't really blame her for, considering the dire state of my room.
here's a nice trip down Nostalgia Lane: http://www.progressiveboink.com/archive/sesamestreet.html! i was going to plug in specifically to nadya huang yanyan, then i realized i got it off her friend's blog, so she's probably already seen it, poop. the point is! seseme's street were good times. before elmo monopolized everything - like who made THAT decision huh. old school muppets were awesome, and the animation was always brilliant and cool, even then. the lovely thing was that it can be so poignant sometimes and there are still many images/skits that are still stuck in my head.
Lovely Things I Remember About Seseme's Street:
- the scene where Oscar the Grouch married, and they were both very cranky and Maria cried. and the bride (i forgot her name, but she was green and furry too) had cold feet, and it was just hilariously beautiful when after the wedding was done, people threw pieces of garbage at them instead of flowers.
- then there was this skit with gordon (this bald black guy) just jogging around new york but it was beautiful because of firstly, the camera-work and secondly, the SOUNDTRACK. i can't remember it now, but i'm sure it must have been good if i can still remember the scene that is seemingly static.
- and the LATINO FLAMINGO seranading maria with opera, below her balcony.
- the parody of cyndi lauper's "girls just wanna have fun" about uh, cereal
- and oh oh! i LOVE this one. it was a short feature about kids going to the beach and building AWESOME sandcastles and everything about it in retrospect, is so poignant from the girl doing the voice-overs and the (rather sad and cold) beach. i still think of this feature everytime i'm at the beach.
thinking about it now, i would want the dvd set of seseme's street. but only the late 80s-early 90s seasons though, because after that it was all crud. maybe because i didn't like the new interpretation of characters *eew elmo* or the INTRODUCTION of new characters. or maybe, i just grew up.
it's 7.17AM, and i have effectively been online for 6 hours 47 minutes, yawned 5 times, scoffed at three supposed lit essays, alarmed how i never noticed the disturbingly strong sexual connotations in a seemingly innocent poem and also, re-read three and a half chapters of DracoSinister.
it's quite a misty morning, and really pretty.
and so, this is clearly yet another bout of procrastination. this entry is going to be exactly that! i'm leaving this window open, and in moments of boredom (which i suspect, will be terribly often), i'm going to type in a paragraph. THIS WILL BE SO EXCITING, like a single-person roundrobin.
i was reading one of those scholarly criticisms websites earlier on and was its a little disturbing to realize that the words are just washing over you and you have to read the sentences over and over sometimes, to grasp what they're trying to say.
here, have a go:
the Bard's vacillation within the lyric between prophecy and self-doubt mirrors an experiential evolution of the meta-voice behind Songs of Innocence and of Experience which he exemplifies, a progression which "helps us to understand why he now refers to himself as 'Ancient'." "The Voice of the Ancient Bard" 's explicit admission of its status as rhetoric undercuts its function as prophecy and implicates itself as one example of the "folly" it denounces: "At the last, the Bard sees himself aright: as guide in need of guidance, a mental traveller whose prophetic certainty and optimism has been so undermined that 'care' threatens to be his only knowledge."
and it's one of those nice and mildly cool nights and suddenly right, i miss CAP alot. a wave of it, because it reminds me of the nights at Eusoff Hall. very dark, with all the red bricks, which i just realized, is identical to the ones used in my hdb flat. it's really quite vague, but what i do see is shuffling down the stairs after JCDrama, kinda zonked.
and then i saw my pair of (unused) house slippers lying around, and it reminded of 406 days when i shuffled around in class in them because i found my school shoes really stiffling and my mum hated my walking in class with my bare socks because they'd get grimy. so she bought me these grey house slippers and what was wonderful that i didn't feel odd at all wearing them in class. the point here is that i'd never do that in cjc.
and Frente's Bizarre Love Triangle is the song for infatuation.
and the printer has konked out on me again. this time however, it's not doing the irritating Blinking Light Morse Code. oh no, nasty plastic lump is doing the Silent Treatment. which i'm
(and i just sneezed. bless me.)
and clearly, i have a short attention span.
in a burst of morbidity, i am going through this site by a coroner and it's really interesting. like did you know, that the fastest way to get the cadaver's temperature is of course the rectal way. but to be more accurate, they insert a thermometer from an incision on the side into the LIVER. this is great man, not only am i dead, but i have people probing my body with funny sticks! NO WAY. this might be one of the top reasons why i would want to die in au naturale, so that they won't see any reason for me to have to go through an autopsy.
also, "Medical Examiners always make the "down cut" to the left of the belly button when making a Y incision at autopsy. This is done because there is a leftover tendon on the right side from the ambilical cord. They won't cut it to show respect for the way we are born."
also, "the human nose is so fragile that morgue attendants and morticians pinch-up the sheet over the nose. This is done because the pressure of the material on the nose can deform it, flattening or turning it sideways." this implies of course, that MICHAEL JACKSON is not a sick pervert who miraculously got acquited, but that he is even beyond our usual speculations of being unhuman. HE IS A ZOMBIE. it makes complete logical sense, that's why his nose behaves so strangely - it's coming to terms with being ded.
i realized that i have recently been very anal (and no, nothing to do with thermometers and such) in the sense that i have been reaping much pleasure (and man, this really just sounds so wrong) from being neat. when did this dawn on me? when i looked at the notes that i've been writing and feel happy that it's all methodically bulleted and uh, colour co-ordinated. and then in another bout of procrastination, i organized my wardrobe and uh, arranged all my hanging clothes according to COLOUR so that now when you open my wardrobe, it's nicely in a gradient of various shades. and looking at it made me so very HAPPY.
this is quite a cause for concern! because now that i think of it, the other day, i bought my current favourite candy, Tropical Skittles, emptied it into this bowl and with much glee, proceeded to seperate the candy by colour so that it kind of became a pie chart, and then i ate it by colour too. hmm. of course, if i tell my mom about my recent fixation with such anal details, she'd laugh her arse off which! i can't really blame her for, considering the dire state of my room.
here's a nice trip down Nostalgia Lane: http://www.progressiveboink.com/archive/sesamestreet.html! i was going to plug in specifically to nadya huang yanyan, then i realized i got it off her friend's blog, so she's probably already seen it, poop. the point is! seseme's street were good times. before elmo monopolized everything - like who made THAT decision huh. old school muppets were awesome, and the animation was always brilliant and cool, even then. the lovely thing was that it can be so poignant sometimes and there are still many images/skits that are still stuck in my head.
Lovely Things I Remember About Seseme's Street:
- the scene where Oscar the Grouch married, and they were both very cranky and Maria cried. and the bride (i forgot her name, but she was green and furry too) had cold feet, and it was just hilariously beautiful when after the wedding was done, people threw pieces of garbage at them instead of flowers.
- then there was this skit with gordon (this bald black guy) just jogging around new york but it was beautiful because of firstly, the camera-work and secondly, the SOUNDTRACK. i can't remember it now, but i'm sure it must have been good if i can still remember the scene that is seemingly static.
- and the LATINO FLAMINGO seranading maria with opera, below her balcony.
- the parody of cyndi lauper's "girls just wanna have fun" about uh, cereal
- and oh oh! i LOVE this one. it was a short feature about kids going to the beach and building AWESOME sandcastles and everything about it in retrospect, is so poignant from the girl doing the voice-overs and the (rather sad and cold) beach. i still think of this feature everytime i'm at the beach.
thinking about it now, i would want the dvd set of seseme's street. but only the late 80s-early 90s seasons though, because after that it was all crud. maybe because i didn't like the new interpretation of characters *eew elmo* or the INTRODUCTION of new characters. or maybe, i just grew up.
it's 7.17AM, and i have effectively been online for 6 hours 47 minutes, yawned 5 times, scoffed at three supposed lit essays, alarmed how i never noticed the disturbingly strong sexual connotations in a seemingly innocent poem and also, re-read three and a half chapters of DracoSinister.
it's quite a misty morning, and really pretty.
Sunday, June 19, 2005
BECAUSE JANICE'S PICTURE-BASED LJ ENTRY MADE ME SO HAPPY:
cue: melodramatic music
My Life, So Far.
Charmaine Lee Yun Hua, Best Friend and Companion Goof-off.
Genevieve Antono, She Who's Going Canada, far far far awaaaay. Great Friends, since 1998.
Lim Yeu Ai, Class Chairperson. Oft cranky. Can be hilariously and unexpectedly lame and yes, strange. Clearly, this is not one of those moments *nods*
Nutty Times, pt.I
Nutty Times, pt.II
Haitian Voodoo, the BPGHS interpretation. What possibly made RMUN bearable (for us), and damn, alotta pricked fingers went into making that stuffed thing. Good times *beams*
Public Humiliation, and Shame! (with AINI AZIDAH, fellow Distant-Farter.) cuh-razee times in the Art Room and (did we do much?), in photography.
Days of Vanity, and going out for the sake of Dressing Up! 'twas lovely, even if it meant that our class(girls) were constantly the dressiest but like omg, we looked good. maaan, have not been a bimbo for so long, since well, CJC. *wails* what has JC life done to me!
simply because i couldn't believe (then), that i was taking a picture with the DM, Tiger Tan Hak Soon, the person who kinda wasted as much of my time, as i did his. nice man, really but nnngh! the cause of much school-related angst because he was the Agent of Herr Hitler aka The True Eville One aka School Principal.
no, Dressing Up-ness does not negate Inherent Nuttiness. we're macadamias, through and through.
...more dressing up, kinda. but hey, at least this production (Woman in Black) was worth going for unlike some stupid school production *coughramayanacough*. and and! it doesn't look like it, but some of us here, are TERRIBLY sunburnt after cleverly spending SEVEN HOURS under the sentosa sun, with no sunblock. i think the rays must have fried our brains.
A Trip To Sentosa (where this time, WE BROUGHT SUNBLOCK). also, a tribute to the defunct monorail, also scarying elderly japanese tourists. also, Finding Our Way Back To The Group Via A Mobile Obstacle Course kiddies, don't try this at home. it's very, dange-lous. (but wait, kids don't have monorails at homes. or do they?)
the abused friend.
because this is sadly, the only decent photo i have of CAP03. 5 days spent, making friends WHO ARE STILL MY FRIENDS TODAY and like whoa, i think that's muchos the awesome. also, very significant because it's the precedent for! CAP05, of course.
where i met! My Favourite PJC Person (alliteration!), Janice. testicles and cockroach love.
(hazri sleeping, when he's not supposed to. everybody knows that sleep time is reserved for plenaries/lectures! duh.) and like, check out my photo-fiddling skills -
VOILA!
doodling yay! the other plenary-activity, once your neck aches too badly from awkward sleeping positions in awkward and stupid chairs. it also distracts you from having to listen to the occasional asinine and insipid speaker. THIS IS A GOOD THING, because it prevents you from throwing solid objects in their direction.
My Favourite Civil Servant! Ms. Lorraine Tham aka thamtham aka Thammie aka Thamster
The Intellectual Writing That We Pretentious Writers Do *snigger*
JC Drama. i think it was just, whoa. from the initial lack of direction and much frustration/angst to the Final Thing, that we actually pulled off.
CAP': where we, as the ElitistBastardSquadron, fully exhausted this year's almost-accidental Teeniegoth and Emokid themes.
i am happy, in this early morning hour. because firstly, i just watched Bubbleboy, and it's just a really nicely executed, heart-warming tale that stars My Favourite Geek, Jake Gylenhaal. also, because flipping through the pictures, i just realize that i miss everybody and that you know, i kinda love everybody and am glad to have them in my lives.
so! i am full of hollywood and nostalgia-created endorphins, and in my books, that;s always a good thing.
cue: melodramatic music
My Life, So Far.
Charmaine Lee Yun Hua, Best Friend and Companion Goof-off.
Genevieve Antono, She Who's Going Canada, far far far awaaaay. Great Friends, since 1998.
Lim Yeu Ai, Class Chairperson. Oft cranky. Can be hilariously and unexpectedly lame and yes, strange. Clearly, this is not one of those moments *nods*
Nutty Times, pt.I
Nutty Times, pt.II
Haitian Voodoo, the BPGHS interpretation. What possibly made RMUN bearable (for us), and damn, alotta pricked fingers went into making that stuffed thing. Good times *beams*
Public Humiliation, and Shame! (with AINI AZIDAH, fellow Distant-Farter.) cuh-razee times in the Art Room and (did we do much?), in photography.
Days of Vanity, and going out for the sake of Dressing Up! 'twas lovely, even if it meant that our class(girls) were constantly the dressiest but like omg, we looked good. maaan, have not been a bimbo for so long, since well, CJC. *wails* what has JC life done to me!
simply because i couldn't believe (then), that i was taking a picture with the DM, Tiger Tan Hak Soon, the person who kinda wasted as much of my time, as i did his. nice man, really but nnngh! the cause of much school-related angst because he was the Agent of Herr Hitler aka The True Eville One aka School Principal.
no, Dressing Up-ness does not negate Inherent Nuttiness. we're macadamias, through and through.
...more dressing up, kinda. but hey, at least this production (Woman in Black) was worth going for unlike some stupid school production *coughramayanacough*. and and! it doesn't look like it, but some of us here, are TERRIBLY sunburnt after cleverly spending SEVEN HOURS under the sentosa sun, with no sunblock. i think the rays must have fried our brains.
A Trip To Sentosa (where this time, WE BROUGHT SUNBLOCK). also, a tribute to the defunct monorail, also scarying elderly japanese tourists. also, Finding Our Way Back To The Group Via A Mobile Obstacle Course kiddies, don't try this at home. it's very, dange-lous. (but wait, kids don't have monorails at homes. or do they?)
the abused friend.
because this is sadly, the only decent photo i have of CAP03. 5 days spent, making friends WHO ARE STILL MY FRIENDS TODAY and like whoa, i think that's muchos the awesome. also, very significant because it's the precedent for! CAP05, of course.
where i met! My Favourite PJC Person (alliteration!), Janice. testicles and cockroach love.
(hazri sleeping, when he's not supposed to. everybody knows that sleep time is reserved for plenaries/lectures! duh.) and like, check out my photo-fiddling skills -
VOILA!
doodling yay! the other plenary-activity, once your neck aches too badly from awkward sleeping positions in awkward and stupid chairs. it also distracts you from having to listen to the occasional asinine and insipid speaker. THIS IS A GOOD THING, because it prevents you from throwing solid objects in their direction.
My Favourite Civil Servant! Ms. Lorraine Tham aka thamtham aka Thammie aka Thamster
The Intellectual Writing That We Pretentious Writers Do *snigger*
JC Drama. i think it was just, whoa. from the initial lack of direction and much frustration/angst to the Final Thing, that we actually pulled off.
CAP': where we, as the ElitistBastardSquadron, fully exhausted this year's almost-accidental Teeniegoth and Emokid themes.
i am happy, in this early morning hour. because firstly, i just watched Bubbleboy, and it's just a really nicely executed, heart-warming tale that stars My Favourite Geek, Jake Gylenhaal. also, because flipping through the pictures, i just realize that i miss everybody and that you know, i kinda love everybody and am glad to have them in my lives.
so! i am full of hollywood and nostalgia-created endorphins, and in my books, that;s always a good thing.
Friday, June 10, 2005
look kiddies, it's me again.
i've noticed that i always seem to blog more post-CAP, and it's not just the silly memes either. so! i was skimming through alfian saat's blog (http://alfian.diaryland.com/) and came across and entry when he kinda addressed the issue of being malay and well, tokenism. if that's even a proper word! but not quite the point here -
there are times when the euphoria(?) of getting selected for a programme becomes marred by the notion that perhaps, i was selected because i'm malay and doesn't this country just loves being multi-racial. that i am there not simply for merit, but because it would be in accordance to this need to ensure cultural diversity. it's quite a disturbing thought and you know, it's always been a niggling whisper that i just cannot ignore. i don't even want to go into discussion about the selection process for CAP because it seems rather screwed and very much confusing and as janice probably aptly pointed out, might be something of a drinking game. it's one of life's greatest mysteries.
but then there are clear cases which in retrospect, are quite perturbing. okay fine, i exaggerate - it's only ONE case, and even then, may simply be a product of my paranoia. i got selected (among a few others) for pre-u sem without even going for any of the selection interviews. i always found this rather strange that the teacher picked me because at that time, i wasn't being very vocal in class. but, whatever, i felt, it's a plan B in case my application for CAP doesn't pull through. then the teacher approached me and asked, "How's your malay, izyanti?"
"um, it's all right i suppose."
"what did you get for your O Levels?"
"B3."
"oh that's good. you'll be speaking to the media for pre-u sem -"
"- in malay?? whoa wait - i can't do CONVERSATIONAL MALAY,"
"well, you'll have quite a lot of time to brush up on it then!"
admittedly, the above is *slightly* embellished because this conversation happened what, more than 2 months ago. the point is, i think a huge part of the reason why i got picked is because i represented a minority race and it would be simply too perfect to show that yes, minority races also take part in huge government-aided events such as this! the perfect picture of the singaporean society, i suppose.
do i mind having my race being part of the selection criteria, even if a) it wasn't absolutely intentional b) i suppose it's a form of "positive" discrimination?
yes, i do. i don't want to be a token malay! there simply because it reflects well on the organizers or our society. i'm not saying that i got picked solely for being malay because i'm quite sure that uh, some of my merit was taken into consideration because otherwise, it would be simply ridiculous; and i'm quite sure this rationale follows through in cases for other people as well. it's just that, if i had my idealistic way, this whole race issue wouldn't even be part of it, that's all.
i remember during the opening ceremony for CAP'04, alfian saat was the guest speaker. hazri was there too, and people kept saying things along the line of "omg hazri, you're the next alfian saat", and he got pretty annoyed. i'm not quite sure myself what was the root cause of his bristliness at this comparison since i never got around to asking him and besides, he's probably forgotten by now. i'm just very anal and remember stupid stuff like this. what I think he got so bristly about was that people made the comparisons on the basis that:
a) he's a malay male
b) who writes english poetry
and wow, isn't that exactly like alfian saat. ergo, you are the Next Big Thing.
i guess i'm just lucky there haven't been any prominent malay female english prose-writers.
i've noticed that i always seem to blog more post-CAP, and it's not just the silly memes either. so! i was skimming through alfian saat's blog (http://alfian.diaryland.com/) and came across and entry when he kinda addressed the issue of being malay and well, tokenism. if that's even a proper word! but not quite the point here -
there are times when the euphoria(?) of getting selected for a programme becomes marred by the notion that perhaps, i was selected because i'm malay and doesn't this country just loves being multi-racial. that i am there not simply for merit, but because it would be in accordance to this need to ensure cultural diversity. it's quite a disturbing thought and you know, it's always been a niggling whisper that i just cannot ignore. i don't even want to go into discussion about the selection process for CAP because it seems rather screwed and very much confusing and as janice probably aptly pointed out, might be something of a drinking game. it's one of life's greatest mysteries.
but then there are clear cases which in retrospect, are quite perturbing. okay fine, i exaggerate - it's only ONE case, and even then, may simply be a product of my paranoia. i got selected (among a few others) for pre-u sem without even going for any of the selection interviews. i always found this rather strange that the teacher picked me because at that time, i wasn't being very vocal in class. but, whatever, i felt, it's a plan B in case my application for CAP doesn't pull through. then the teacher approached me and asked, "How's your malay, izyanti?"
"um, it's all right i suppose."
"what did you get for your O Levels?"
"B3."
"oh that's good. you'll be speaking to the media for pre-u sem -"
"- in malay?? whoa wait - i can't do CONVERSATIONAL MALAY,"
"well, you'll have quite a lot of time to brush up on it then!"
admittedly, the above is *slightly* embellished because this conversation happened what, more than 2 months ago. the point is, i think a huge part of the reason why i got picked is because i represented a minority race and it would be simply too perfect to show that yes, minority races also take part in huge government-aided events such as this! the perfect picture of the singaporean society, i suppose.
do i mind having my race being part of the selection criteria, even if a) it wasn't absolutely intentional b) i suppose it's a form of "positive" discrimination?
yes, i do. i don't want to be a token malay! there simply because it reflects well on the organizers or our society. i'm not saying that i got picked solely for being malay because i'm quite sure that uh, some of my merit was taken into consideration because otherwise, it would be simply ridiculous; and i'm quite sure this rationale follows through in cases for other people as well. it's just that, if i had my idealistic way, this whole race issue wouldn't even be part of it, that's all.
i remember during the opening ceremony for CAP'04, alfian saat was the guest speaker. hazri was there too, and people kept saying things along the line of "omg hazri, you're the next alfian saat", and he got pretty annoyed. i'm not quite sure myself what was the root cause of his bristliness at this comparison since i never got around to asking him and besides, he's probably forgotten by now. i'm just very anal and remember stupid stuff like this. what I think he got so bristly about was that people made the comparisons on the basis that:
a) he's a malay male
b) who writes english poetry
and wow, isn't that exactly like alfian saat. ergo, you are the Next Big Thing.
i guess i'm just lucky there haven't been any prominent malay female english prose-writers.
Wednesday, June 08, 2005
I MUST STOP TAKING QUIZES AS A METHOD OF PROCRASTINATION. but you should try this anyway, www.http://www.colorquiz.com/. it's rather strange, and took me by mild surprise so it could be entirely accurate, or absolute crud.
Your Existing Situation
Persistent. Demands what she feels to be her due and endeavors to maintain her position intact.
Your Stress Sources
Has an unsatisfied need to ally herself with others whose standards are as high as her own, and to stand out from the herd. This desire for preeminence isolates her and inhibits her readiness to give herself freely. While she wants to surrender and let herself go, she regards this as a weakness which must be resisted. This self-restraint, she feels, will lift her above the rank and file and ensure recognition as a unique and distinctive personality.
okaaaaaay. why am i inhibited again? i don't get this bit.
Your Restrained Characteristics
Demanding and particular in her relations with her partner or those close to her. but careful to avoid open conflict since this might reduce her prospects of realizing her hopes and ideas.
Conditions are such that she will not let herself become intimately involved without making mental reservations.
Your Desired Objective
Seeks affectionate, satisfying and harmonious relationships. Desires an intimate union, in which there is a love, self-sacrifice and mutual trust.
DOESN'T EVERYONE?
Your Actual Problem
Wants to be valued and respected, and seeks this from a close and peaceful association of mutual esteem.
and this is a problem because *shifty eyed*
at this point, i am very much confused. I NEED SELF-ACTUALIZATION AND LOTS OF NAVEL-GAZING ANGST. stupid quiz, i shouldn't have bothered taking it, i am now very much shaken on what exactly *gasp* is my identity. shock shock horror,
!! who am i !!
Your Existing Situation
Persistent. Demands what she feels to be her due and endeavors to maintain her position intact.
Your Stress Sources
Has an unsatisfied need to ally herself with others whose standards are as high as her own, and to stand out from the herd. This desire for preeminence isolates her and inhibits her readiness to give herself freely. While she wants to surrender and let herself go, she regards this as a weakness which must be resisted. This self-restraint, she feels, will lift her above the rank and file and ensure recognition as a unique and distinctive personality.
okaaaaaay. why am i inhibited again? i don't get this bit.
Your Restrained Characteristics
Demanding and particular in her relations with her partner or those close to her. but careful to avoid open conflict since this might reduce her prospects of realizing her hopes and ideas.
Conditions are such that she will not let herself become intimately involved without making mental reservations.
Your Desired Objective
Seeks affectionate, satisfying and harmonious relationships. Desires an intimate union, in which there is a love, self-sacrifice and mutual trust.
DOESN'T EVERYONE?
Your Actual Problem
Wants to be valued and respected, and seeks this from a close and peaceful association of mutual esteem.
and this is a problem because *shifty eyed*
at this point, i am very much confused. I NEED SELF-ACTUALIZATION AND LOTS OF NAVEL-GAZING ANGST. stupid quiz, i shouldn't have bothered taking it, i am now very much shaken on what exactly *gasp* is my identity. shock shock horror,
!! who am i !!
Monday, June 06, 2005
right i absolutely should not be blogging right now. as expected, my mugging stint at charmaine's has been rather inefficient but hey - I TRIED.
so in a moment of fidgety boredom (econs just does that to you), i picked up the style issue of Juice and me, being a partial bimbo, have always found rather interesting. what got me pissed though, as i flipped through it, was how label-conscious everybody was! it bothers me that your style/street cred is defined by the brand that you're wearing like check me out, i'm wearing bathing ape/diesel/NIKE. i am so cool. I CANNOT STAND IT, AND THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE THE UNDERGROUND CULTURE IN SINGAPORE. tell me, how different is it from mainstream elitism!
it's a whole new dimension of haute couture and what an entire waste of social consciousness it is. i do get how they want to be different and it is great that these labels offer something that to some degree, is not mass-produced. i understand that absolutely, but what i find irksome is that it is all very pretentious when the level of your "coolness" is defined by how exclusive (read: expensive) your stupid t-shirt is! it's great that what you're wearing is edgy and is a oh i don't know, displays your identity but really, you have to agree that it gets rather ridiculous.
do you see my point.
it is very irritating when people pride themselves for being edgy and non-mainstream for not wearing mainstream stuff, but when in fact, in attitude, they are just as elitist as the paris hilton clone in her burberry mini-skirt.
the question that i have to ask now of course, is am i one myself? obviously not the paris hilton clone or someone just shoot me DED. i suppose i do practice a form of elitism (HAHA) and the only thing stopping me from becoming the people that i have just slammed is the lack of moolah. hahahahahahahaha i laugh at my own hypocrisy - it is just so easy to be sucked into playing the social heirachy without even knowing it. just for your amusement, dear readers, i'm wearing a giordano top and jeans by that brand endorsed by *gasp* F4. so i don't know how elitist i am myself, but i suppose today is one of those days i lapse.
hmm.
charmaine says: *hands up* i admit that i'm a leeeeteeel brand conscious, but maaaaan, to me, spending $1000 on a pair of limited edition jeans is just what a not very bright person with loads of ka-ching would do. Obscure limited edition clothing does not upp your coolness factor, people. And what's with surfwear?! nyeeeah! Its everywhere! It's like this contagious disease which is spreading its tentacles through the ah bengs and the i-wanna-be-cool people. Beware, Ah bengs are currently very clevely cameoflaged under all the quiksilver and ripcurl surfwear brands. Surfwear is taking over the world!! HELP!!! Mmaky. Time for me to shut up. I'm babbling after the over-taxing of my brain through the studying of econs.
so in a moment of fidgety boredom (econs just does that to you), i picked up the style issue of Juice and me, being a partial bimbo, have always found rather interesting. what got me pissed though, as i flipped through it, was how label-conscious everybody was! it bothers me that your style/street cred is defined by the brand that you're wearing like check me out, i'm wearing bathing ape/diesel/NIKE. i am so cool. I CANNOT STAND IT, AND THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE THE UNDERGROUND CULTURE IN SINGAPORE. tell me, how different is it from mainstream elitism!
it's a whole new dimension of haute couture and what an entire waste of social consciousness it is. i do get how they want to be different and it is great that these labels offer something that to some degree, is not mass-produced. i understand that absolutely, but what i find irksome is that it is all very pretentious when the level of your "coolness" is defined by how exclusive (read: expensive) your stupid t-shirt is! it's great that what you're wearing is edgy and is a oh i don't know, displays your identity but really, you have to agree that it gets rather ridiculous.
do you see my point.
it is very irritating when people pride themselves for being edgy and non-mainstream for not wearing mainstream stuff, but when in fact, in attitude, they are just as elitist as the paris hilton clone in her burberry mini-skirt.
the question that i have to ask now of course, is am i one myself? obviously not the paris hilton clone or someone just shoot me DED. i suppose i do practice a form of elitism (HAHA) and the only thing stopping me from becoming the people that i have just slammed is the lack of moolah. hahahahahahahaha i laugh at my own hypocrisy - it is just so easy to be sucked into playing the social heirachy without even knowing it. just for your amusement, dear readers, i'm wearing a giordano top and jeans by that brand endorsed by *gasp* F4. so i don't know how elitist i am myself, but i suppose today is one of those days i lapse.
hmm.
charmaine says: *hands up* i admit that i'm a leeeeteeel brand conscious, but maaaaan, to me, spending $1000 on a pair of limited edition jeans is just what a not very bright person with loads of ka-ching would do. Obscure limited edition clothing does not upp your coolness factor, people. And what's with surfwear?! nyeeeah! Its everywhere! It's like this contagious disease which is spreading its tentacles through the ah bengs and the i-wanna-be-cool people. Beware, Ah bengs are currently very clevely cameoflaged under all the quiksilver and ripcurl surfwear brands. Surfwear is taking over the world!! HELP!!! Mmaky. Time for me to shut up. I'm babbling after the over-taxing of my brain through the studying of econs.
for some reason, post-cap, i find myself doing a good many memes. i don't know why, but i suppose it is to keep up the um, degree of community-ish feelings and COCKROACH LOVE. so here it goes!
(from jaaaaanice)
List your current six favorite songs, then pick six other people that have to do the same.
1. green eyes, coldplay
this song reminds me of ginny/harry and it's just so beautiful poignant earnest, and that's how i usually like my songs to be. so gorgeous.
2. the irish keep gate-crashing, the thrills
because i've been looking for this song for eoooooons and i finally had it sent to me yesterday so my love for that person has muchly increased. this was the song that got me hooked on the thrills and the vibe of this band right, it reminds me of days out with charmaine and matthew so yes.
3. under the gun, the killers
because i listened to the killers while mugging for the O levels, and you would think that would bring back the traumatic experience that it was but nope. it reminds me of shivery days in Woodlands Library, sneaking food under the desk, throwing candy over the carrel walls and surviving on mcdonald's tea and cheap junk. i also miss all our mugging buddies and even yeu ai's droopy red converse pullover.
also! it's one of the few the killer's songs that have not been contaminated by mainstream airwaves - at least, i think so. if it has, don't tell me please. i shudder at the thought of OC fans fangirling the killers (and the thrills) *dies*
4. somewhere out there, disney
because An American Tale was one of the ultimate disney movies that i loved and i used to watch it so manymanymany times when i was a kid. i love the fact that watching it now, i realize it has many satirical points and well, they just don't make disney flicks like they used to.
5. memories/telescope eyes/blackened crown, eisley
because i can't make up my mine *sad* it's just very lovely and angsty enough without making you want to slit your wrist. again, gorgeous vocals and an interesting sound. and no, i have not attached any memories to them yet.
6. gravity, bic runga
i love this singer with all my music whore-ness, and i never tired of this song. it's a simplicity and cleaness that the musical arrangement and the vocals in this one that makes me happily calm, i don't know. what would this song remind me of? strolling down a NON-CROWDED orchard road with a good friend, on a cool and slightly cloudy day. or, in the slow euphoria of a crush *coughainiyouknowwhocough*
mmkay i am passing the baton to --
nadya + dhaniah + aini + gennie + matthew (because i still have no idea what music you like) + zara.
also! i will be setting up an LJ solely for music whoring purposes, SO DON'T STRIKE ME DOWN WITH A MIGHTY BOLT OF LIGHTNING O BLOGSPOT POWERS-THAT-BE. meep.
#EDIT: http://www.livejournal.com/~izombiefied/ (sigh)
(from jaaaaanice)
List your current six favorite songs, then pick six other people that have to do the same.
1. green eyes, coldplay
this song reminds me of ginny/harry and it's just so beautiful poignant earnest, and that's how i usually like my songs to be. so gorgeous.
2. the irish keep gate-crashing, the thrills
because i've been looking for this song for eoooooons and i finally had it sent to me yesterday so my love for that person has muchly increased. this was the song that got me hooked on the thrills and the vibe of this band right, it reminds me of days out with charmaine and matthew so yes.
3. under the gun, the killers
because i listened to the killers while mugging for the O levels, and you would think that would bring back the traumatic experience that it was but nope. it reminds me of shivery days in Woodlands Library, sneaking food under the desk, throwing candy over the carrel walls and surviving on mcdonald's tea and cheap junk. i also miss all our mugging buddies and even yeu ai's droopy red converse pullover.
also! it's one of the few the killer's songs that have not been contaminated by mainstream airwaves - at least, i think so. if it has, don't tell me please. i shudder at the thought of OC fans fangirling the killers (and the thrills) *dies*
4. somewhere out there, disney
because An American Tale was one of the ultimate disney movies that i loved and i used to watch it so manymanymany times when i was a kid. i love the fact that watching it now, i realize it has many satirical points and well, they just don't make disney flicks like they used to.
5. memories/telescope eyes/blackened crown, eisley
because i can't make up my mine *sad* it's just very lovely and angsty enough without making you want to slit your wrist. again, gorgeous vocals and an interesting sound. and no, i have not attached any memories to them yet.
6. gravity, bic runga
i love this singer with all my music whore-ness, and i never tired of this song. it's a simplicity and cleaness that the musical arrangement and the vocals in this one that makes me happily calm, i don't know. what would this song remind me of? strolling down a NON-CROWDED orchard road with a good friend, on a cool and slightly cloudy day. or, in the slow euphoria of a crush *coughainiyouknowwhocough*
mmkay i am passing the baton to --
nadya + dhaniah + aini + gennie + matthew (because i still have no idea what music you like) + zara.
also! i will be setting up an LJ solely for music whoring purposes, SO DON'T STRIKE ME DOWN WITH A MIGHTY BOLT OF LIGHTNING O BLOGSPOT POWERS-THAT-BE. meep.
#EDIT: http://www.livejournal.com/~izombiefied/ (sigh)
Sunday, June 05, 2005
THREE NAMES YOU GO BY:
1. iz! (go turn your head upside-down, it says the same thing like, HOW COOL IS THAT)
2. izy (i don't quite like this one but people persist and i must appease my fans yes.)
3. izyanti and all the mispronounciations that came of it.
THREE SCREEN NAMES YOU HAVE HAD:
1. zombiefied
2. iz
3. - (because i am terribly boring)
THREE PHYSICAL THINGS YOU LIKE ABOUT YOURSELF:
1. my sticky-outy elbows because it reminds me of hilariously lovely days of the Covelently-Bonded Sisterhood
2. i like my butt. 'nuff said.
3. mu huge beam-ish smile because it makes me happy.
THREE PHYSICAL THINGS YOU DON’T LIKE ABOUT YOURSELF:
1. my nose because it's undefined and
2. my toes are kinda strange
3. my hair because currently, i can't quite decide what to do with it.
THREE PARTS OF YOUR HERITAGE:
1. malay
2. chinese (grandma)
3. i unno pretentious pseudo english-oriented because that's my main functioning mode?
THREE THINGS THAT SCARE YOU:
1. not being brilliant and disappointing people
2. having my friendships turn superficial and fake
3. failure
THREE OF YOUR EVERYDAY ESSENTIALS:
1. a notebook and pen to doodle with
2. my zen micro (although it's having an inferiority complex recently after spending 5 days with iPodPhotos)
3. sleep.
THREE OF YOUR EVERYDAY NON-ESSENTIAL FOR LIFE ESSENTIALS:
1. candy! recently, blue packet skittles
2. good movies (wait can i really live without them i unno)
3. GP.
THREE THINGS YOU ARE WEARING RIGHT NOW:
1. bp shorts with a white acrylic paint smudge from the art room
2. bp blouse with this funny orange stain from the chem lab
3. uhh underwear.
THREE OF YOUR FAVORITE BANDS OR MUSICAL ARTISTS:
1. THE THRILLS
2. bic runga
3. skin
THREE OF YOUR FAVORITE SONGS:
1. Comfort of strangers, skin
2. fly me to the moooon, diana krall
3. plug in baby, muse
THREE THINGS YOU WANT IN A RELATIONSHIP:
1. humour
2. honesty
3. love.
TWO TRUTHS AND A LIE (in no particular order):
1. i miss everyone
2. i've started mugging
3. i love it at cjc.
note: their more like half-lies and half-truths hmm
THREE PHYSICAL THINGS ABOUT THE PREFERRED SEX THAT APPEAL TO YOU:
1. ncc/ns uniforms. they still do it for me hoohoohoo
2. hands, strong-looking ones. i once stared at this random guy's hands because ok this sounds really pervy and i will shut up now.
3. cheekbones - as opposed to none?? k that's just dumb. i'm just a sucker for beautiful people. *coughdoriangraycough*
THREE OF YOUR FAVORITE HOBBIES:
1. finding awesome books to love and dedicate my soul to
2. finding awesome bands/music to love and dedicate my soul to
3. infatuation.
THREE THINGS YOU WANT TO DO REALLY BADLY RIGHT NOW:
1. pre-dawn thursday morning in all of its delirium
2. for hazri to sms back so we can confirm tuesday's activities HAZRI ARE YOU READING THIS (aha he just did yay)
3. meet up with everybody i miss although this is verily impossible and i hate that this is so difficult. people i want to meet up with: CHARMAINE GENNIE NADALALA JEANIE VINCENT BERN ELITISTBASTARDSQUADRON DHANIAH SIEW CHING ZARA TASH, LISTEN IZ WANTS YOU!
THREE CAREERS YOU’RE CONSIDERING/YOU’VE CONSIDERED:
1. journalism but i killed this idea ded because i can't stand people editting my writing or having people force me to write things i don't want to
2. writing, but only what and when i want. which means i have to be a tai-tai.
3. i know this kinda overlaps the above, but i really want to do something with design that incorporates my writing or people's writing i don't know. it's all very vague but i would adore doing graphic design/illustration.
THREE PLACES YOU WANT TO GO ON VACATION:
1. anywhere with a beautiful beach = serene azure crystal water powdery white sand with no irritating micro-creatures that nibble on you in the water.
2. europe because i want to go to paris and fall in love and visit the louvre, and do all the shakespeare fangirl thing, and listen to people with funny accents
3. i dont' know, anywhere that's not malaysia because that's all i have been too and it's quite sad i know don't laugh.
THREE KID’S NAMES YOU LIKE:
1. Azura
2. can't decide
3. still can't decide.
THREE THINGS YOU WANT TO DO BEFORE YOU DIE:
1. create something brilliant and **NEW**
2. requited love
3. experience the whole range of emotions that a human possibly can, i think.
THREE WAYS THAT YOU ARE STEREOTYPICALLY A BOY:
1. i don't mind insects. i don't like cockroaches because i have been brainwashed to consider them unhygienic but yeah, that's it really.
2. i loath pink but then again, pseudopunksters like pink too so i don't know
3. i don't comb my hair.
THREE WAYS THAT YOU ARE STEREOTYPICALLY A GIRL:
1. i am very very susceptible to infatuation and can be easily reduced to an overwhelming onslaught of endorphins over the most inane things. it's lovely.
2. terribly insecure over the most stupid things and get jealous very easily and am possesive/protective, kinda, over the people i love.
3. i find squishy+slimy creatures so aesthetically offensive that i physically spasm in disgust. especially snails, and their Eville cousins, leaches.
THREE CELEB CRUSHES:
1. ADRIEN BRODY
2. JUDE LAW
3. cassandra claire's draco - even though he's not real and without a definite face. he is just so beautiful.
THREE PEOPLE THAT I WOULD LIKE TO SEE TAKE THIS QUIZ NOW:
1. gennie (because i want to do everything with you before you go canada *WAAAILS*)
2. vincent! because this will drastically change his blogging-frequency statistics
3. siew ching! because i know you sekritly love these mindless memes, don't deny it
1. iz! (go turn your head upside-down, it says the same thing like, HOW COOL IS THAT)
2. izy (i don't quite like this one but people persist and i must appease my fans yes.)
3. izyanti and all the mispronounciations that came of it.
THREE SCREEN NAMES YOU HAVE HAD:
1. zombiefied
2. iz
3. - (because i am terribly boring)
THREE PHYSICAL THINGS YOU LIKE ABOUT YOURSELF:
1. my sticky-outy elbows because it reminds me of hilariously lovely days of the Covelently-Bonded Sisterhood
2. i like my butt. 'nuff said.
3. mu huge beam-ish smile because it makes me happy.
THREE PHYSICAL THINGS YOU DON’T LIKE ABOUT YOURSELF:
1. my nose because it's undefined and
2. my toes are kinda strange
3. my hair because currently, i can't quite decide what to do with it.
THREE PARTS OF YOUR HERITAGE:
1. malay
2. chinese (grandma)
3. i unno pretentious pseudo english-oriented because that's my main functioning mode?
THREE THINGS THAT SCARE YOU:
1. not being brilliant and disappointing people
2. having my friendships turn superficial and fake
3. failure
THREE OF YOUR EVERYDAY ESSENTIALS:
1. a notebook and pen to doodle with
2. my zen micro (although it's having an inferiority complex recently after spending 5 days with iPodPhotos)
3. sleep.
THREE OF YOUR EVERYDAY NON-ESSENTIAL FOR LIFE ESSENTIALS:
1. candy! recently, blue packet skittles
2. good movies (wait can i really live without them i unno)
3. GP.
THREE THINGS YOU ARE WEARING RIGHT NOW:
1. bp shorts with a white acrylic paint smudge from the art room
2. bp blouse with this funny orange stain from the chem lab
3. uhh underwear.
THREE OF YOUR FAVORITE BANDS OR MUSICAL ARTISTS:
1. THE THRILLS
2. bic runga
3. skin
THREE OF YOUR FAVORITE SONGS:
1. Comfort of strangers, skin
2. fly me to the moooon, diana krall
3. plug in baby, muse
THREE THINGS YOU WANT IN A RELATIONSHIP:
1. humour
2. honesty
3. love.
TWO TRUTHS AND A LIE (in no particular order):
1. i miss everyone
2. i've started mugging
3. i love it at cjc.
note: their more like half-lies and half-truths hmm
THREE PHYSICAL THINGS ABOUT THE PREFERRED SEX THAT APPEAL TO YOU:
1. ncc/ns uniforms. they still do it for me hoohoohoo
2. hands, strong-looking ones. i once stared at this random guy's hands because ok this sounds really pervy and i will shut up now.
3. cheekbones - as opposed to none?? k that's just dumb. i'm just a sucker for beautiful people. *coughdoriangraycough*
THREE OF YOUR FAVORITE HOBBIES:
1. finding awesome books to love and dedicate my soul to
2. finding awesome bands/music to love and dedicate my soul to
3. infatuation.
THREE THINGS YOU WANT TO DO REALLY BADLY RIGHT NOW:
1. pre-dawn thursday morning in all of its delirium
2. for hazri to sms back so we can confirm tuesday's activities HAZRI ARE YOU READING THIS (aha he just did yay)
3. meet up with everybody i miss although this is verily impossible and i hate that this is so difficult. people i want to meet up with: CHARMAINE GENNIE NADALALA JEANIE VINCENT BERN ELITISTBASTARDSQUADRON DHANIAH SIEW CHING ZARA TASH, LISTEN IZ WANTS YOU!
THREE CAREERS YOU’RE CONSIDERING/YOU’VE CONSIDERED:
1. journalism but i killed this idea ded because i can't stand people editting my writing or having people force me to write things i don't want to
2. writing, but only what and when i want. which means i have to be a tai-tai.
3. i know this kinda overlaps the above, but i really want to do something with design that incorporates my writing or people's writing i don't know. it's all very vague but i would adore doing graphic design/illustration.
THREE PLACES YOU WANT TO GO ON VACATION:
1. anywhere with a beautiful beach = serene azure crystal water powdery white sand with no irritating micro-creatures that nibble on you in the water.
2. europe because i want to go to paris and fall in love and visit the louvre, and do all the shakespeare fangirl thing, and listen to people with funny accents
3. i dont' know, anywhere that's not malaysia because that's all i have been too and it's quite sad i know don't laugh.
THREE KID’S NAMES YOU LIKE:
1. Azura
2. can't decide
3. still can't decide.
THREE THINGS YOU WANT TO DO BEFORE YOU DIE:
1. create something brilliant and **NEW**
2. requited love
3. experience the whole range of emotions that a human possibly can, i think.
THREE WAYS THAT YOU ARE STEREOTYPICALLY A BOY:
1. i don't mind insects. i don't like cockroaches because i have been brainwashed to consider them unhygienic but yeah, that's it really.
2. i loath pink but then again, pseudopunksters like pink too so i don't know
3. i don't comb my hair.
THREE WAYS THAT YOU ARE STEREOTYPICALLY A GIRL:
1. i am very very susceptible to infatuation and can be easily reduced to an overwhelming onslaught of endorphins over the most inane things. it's lovely.
2. terribly insecure over the most stupid things and get jealous very easily and am possesive/protective, kinda, over the people i love.
3. i find squishy+slimy creatures so aesthetically offensive that i physically spasm in disgust. especially snails, and their Eville cousins, leaches.
THREE CELEB CRUSHES:
1. ADRIEN BRODY
2. JUDE LAW
3. cassandra claire's draco - even though he's not real and without a definite face. he is just so beautiful.
THREE PEOPLE THAT I WOULD LIKE TO SEE TAKE THIS QUIZ NOW:
1. gennie (because i want to do everything with you before you go canada *WAAAILS*)
2. vincent! because this will drastically change his blogging-frequency statistics
3. siew ching! because i know you sekritly love these mindless memes, don't deny it
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