SH*T!!!

I hate it when people pang-seh me.

And it's not just 1, it's a few people for yesterday and today!

Do I have a please-pang-seh-me face?

DAMN IT!!!

How much is money worth?

Sometimes, I think money's cheap. Other times, I think it's expensive...

Like when I'm damn broke, I treasure every single twenty cent coin I have. It pains me just to have to spend 20 cents more on a tube of mentos at 7-11 than at the mama shop.

But when I have enough to spend, twenty cents is seriously peanuts. Even when buying clothes, my budget increases tremendously! In the past, even for a twenty plus dollars tee shirt, I would have to like it real bad before buying it. Now, I'll buy it even if I just "average"-like it.

During this GSS, I think I've spent quite a lot. Some of the bigger items I've bought...

2 $50 bras,

$101 Adidas jacket (love it!!)

$35 The Body Shop bronzer + $25 brush

$27 Adidas slippers (now this one's worth it, cos it was $35 before discount!)

and of course, I've spent a whole lot more on food!

Right now, I'm at the stage where money is not very dear to me. It's cos I have earning power, plus it's the temptations during GSS! Really! It's not my fault that shops like to tempt me into going in with the big bold "SALE" sign. Then I come out minutes later with a not-on-sale item, or something that there was only a $5 discount.

I feel like I can spend a hundred dollars and not feel the pinch! This is when I start to get worried, cos I dun wanna spend on stuff that I may not like that much, and regret later! I guess I'm lucky to have my rational head with me at all times, reminding me that I should not spend on useless stuff.

Yesterday, 9 of us EY interns went to Vivo Sushi Tei for dinner. Dinner was nice, just that it was actually more expensive than I expected. Then, we went shopping! The best part of the night!

I thought the highlight of the evening was when me, Hui Yi, Qian Qi and You Qi were trying out clothes at River Island. Their clothes are seriously beautiful, but unfortunately, also "beautifully" priced. We tried on loads of clothes and the dressing rooms were oh-so-nice! We sort of came out and had a mini fashion show after every set of clothes.

In the end, guess what? We left empty handed. I was so tempted into buying this white top for $35. But in the end, decided not to. Cos I was afraid that the material will stretch if I use machine wash, and I really don't need another of those troublesome clothes that need hand washing. I'm just too lazy!

But I spent almost the whole day thinking about it... Don't know if I should really get it. Hmmm...

I think shopping is a real good exercise. I should shop more. Haha!!! Esp when Mango sale starts on 21 June. That's tomorrow!

Friends

I've been updating my friendster account that I haven't been using for ages. And it was all because my Camp Blue Blood aogl said she was so bo liao as to check our group people's friendster accounts even before we joined the camp. It's bo liao, but why haven't I thought of that? Seems like a fun thing to do. Ha...

Anyway, I've decided that putting up an outdated and weird picture of me just isn't good for first impressions at all. The thing is, friendster isn't as dead as I thought. Quite a lot of people actually still use it! The last time I updated properly was probably 2 years ago. Time for a revamp!

And so, I updated my photos and profile. But while looking at my list of friends, especially those that I haven't kept in touch with for a long, long time, I had a weird thought: are we still friends?

I have quite a few of my primary school friends on friendster, but I haven't been in touch with them for so long! Photos show that we've really grown up. It's a weird feeling, actually. Looking at a photo of someone you knew, and still sorta know, but don't really know.

I can still remember how most of them look like, but the image that appears in my mind is that of a cute little primary school kid. They all look different now. There's still a small resemblence, cos after all, people don't change that much. But now, I feel that they're not who I really used to know.

For the girls, there're some who've become wilder (with clubbing photos and stuff) and some are much, much prettier. For of the guys, well, the biggest change I see is that they've all grown up. No more of those innocent and cute boyish faces. Now they're all big guys.

Anyway, what bugs me most is the problem of lost friends.

Mostly, I feel like we've all got their own different lives now. New characters, new friends... We've all moved on from the primary school phase, leaving behind people we're not too close to, and a whole way of life. Only bringing with us the ones that we treasure enough to be part of our next chapter.

It's like we used to know each other so well, can talk about loads of stuff, but now, we're like strangers. I can't imagine meeting up with a primary schoolmate cos it's like we don't know each other anymore. Yet, I think it's entirely possible to meet a lost friend in uni, get to know each other and become friends again. It's like our friendship needs to begin again before we can "officially" become friends.

I had the urge to drop comments for a few peeps that I lost contact with. Just a short hello, how're u doing? But then I thought it may be quite weird, so maybe not.

I don't know... People are complex creatures, and these relationships just makes the whole equation even more complicated. Why isn't there a obvious sign that says either we're friends or not? There seems to be so many in-betweens, guessing whether "do you still remember me?" and whether you feel the same way as me about reviving our dead friendship. It's plain weird, I don't know.

I think as we get older, we tend to take effort to treasure friendships more. After primary school, I didn't keep in touch with my primary schoolmates. Maybe it was because I didn't know there was a need to.

But now, I'm making the effort to keep my secondary school and JC pals. Out of the so many people that you meet in your life, it's so difficult to find people that you can click with, and you like enough to keep as your friend. Woundn't it be a waste to simply let them go just because we're going on to another phase of life?

I think friends should be accumulated along the way, instead of having the new replace the old. Whatever happened to Friends Forever?

When I was in primary school, I remember we used to write in each other's autograph books throughout the year, taking time and effort to draw those bubble letters in our coloured pens. Listing all those (quite useless, now that I think of it) personal favourties, and ranking who's our bestest friends, best friends, good friends and normal friends. And just to be polite, we'll give (whoever that we're writing for) at least the good-friend status.

I still remember those cute poems:

Roses are red,
Violets are blue.
Honey is sweet,
And so are you!

This one is quite silly...

Kick the table,
Kick the chair.
But don't kick your husband
Down the stairs.

Now when I meet friends I truly like, I really try to hold on to them.

When writing sweet little cards for each other, I've realised that I've finally understood what "Forever Friends" truly means; it's no longer a phase that I tell just everybody, instead it's promise.

A promise that I will try my very best to keep.

Record Breaking!

I ran TEN KILOMETRES today! Whoo! My thighs ache everyday cos I don't give them enough rest... Boohoo...

You've got to see this!

I received a letter from PSC. It's regarding the pre-departure course for scholars. I had expected it to be intensive school-like boring lectures about boring stuff. But when I saw what was in stall, I yelped in excitement!

I'll be going for OBS from 3rd to 5th July! Whoo! Never been there before, and I always hear wonderful stories of my friends going there, and the fun they had. Now I have the chance to finally experience it! Yay!

Then there's dining etiquette class on Saturday. Yay yay yay! I've always wanted to learn more about this. I even told Shuwen that I wanted to take a class on this after A's. Looks like now I can go for free! Whahaha... Happy!~ :D

And, and, the most exciting part is yet to come. See the scholarships award ceremony on 21st July? Well, look at the square before that. It says "rehearsals at Istana". *faints in excitement*

We're gonna have the ceremony at the Istana!!! Woohoo! I've never been there before, and all this sounds like a big deal to me! Person giving out the awards will be Minister Teo Chee Hean. Now now, I'm not going to be gross and say I won't wash my hands after shaking hands with him, but all I want to say is how terribly excited I am! It's really, really a big deal for me!!!

Oh man, I'm looking forward to it already!

Medical check up, library and THE GREAT IDEA

I went to Bukit Batok for medical check up (it's for the scholarship). One thing that really amused me was this:

I had to do a urine test. So you probably can guess what the bottle's for. What tickles me is the fact that they call it "BIOHAZARD". Ha! Is it so dangerous that it may explode and spray pee all over?!

Anyway, there were 2 other scholars who were there for the check up at almost the same time as me. And I couldn't help thinking: wouldn't it be quite embarassing if your pee were very yellowish? (Luckily mine's very clear, so I feel ok about it.) Just then, I saw someone else holding a bag with a bottle of quite yellowish pee inside and I really had to stop myself from laughing out loud. Can't give too much description about this person cos you never know, he/she might be my fellow scholar, and I don't want him/her reading this!

By the way, I think that having to test somebody else's pee is utterly disgusting! The mere thought of it makes me cringe. Worse still, the pee is still warm! Eeeew!!! I salute the nurse who had to do the testing.

There was another part of the check up where I went to meet a doctor. I had to lie down, and he pressed on 3 points on my waist. When he pressed on the sides of my waist, I couldn't help but laugh cos I'm a super ticklish person, and didn't see that coming at all! He was very funny, he laughed too. :)

I also did X ray and some other tests, but nothing interesting happened.

So after the check up, I went to walk walk at West Mall since I rarely go to that part of Singapore. I was feeling like going to a library just for fun, and guess what? There's a library in West Mall! So coincidental! Anyway, I haven't properly gone to a library for eons! And note that I'm not a book kinda person AT ALL. So I thought that maybe I should just try to pick up something to read.

I saw this really cute book: Kids' View of the World

On the back: "The world spins really fast and if it slowed down, we'd all fall off and float into space" - Jack[9]

You'll probably finish it in like 5 minutes cos it's just a very simple picture book filled with cute phrases like that. It's about kids' views on stuff like birth, death, love, marriage, etc. A very, very cute book!

I also saw this:

How Not to Become A Crotchety Old Man
(Does anyone know what crotchety means?)

Like the previous book, you can finish it really fast. It's filled with lots of phases that make you go "hmmm" or want to laugh out loud. Nice!

I also borrowed a few other books on eating for sports, about how energy is stored in your body, that kinda stuff. Haha... Since I'm serious about embarking on my exercise journey!

I spent more than an hour reading there and it was a really relaxing experience!

By the way, did you know that your book quota is now doubled? For a limited time only (until mid july, I think). So I borrowed 8 books, and redeemed a nice red carrier to put all the books in. Initially, I was planning to carry the books back in my hands (my bag's full!), until the nice libraian told me that if you borrow 8 books, you get to redeem the bag. So hooray! Haha... It made lugging all those quite-heavy books back a lot easier. Look how snugly they all fit in...

Fast forward a bit... So at night, it was time for excercise! I ran 5 km today, and I'm proud of myself! Cos my legs are still aching from the personal record-breaking distance of 6km run on Saturday, and I was only planning to run 3km. But actually it was because I had some "motivation" today.

There was this guy who was also running along the same track as me. I only saw him when I was into my third kilometre. I was busy thinking of something then, so I was running at tortise speed. He zoomed past me, and this stupid ego voice in me said "I cannot let him think I'm such a loser la!" and I started picking up speed.

I ran an extra round cos of this extra "motivation" and managed to maintain the gap between us (ie. I was running at the same speed as him), but he still had a hundred metres head start cos my competitive spirit kicked in a minute too late. In the end, I was about 100m behind him throughout my last 2km.

That mini "competition" was actually just to satisfy the competitiveness in me cos I bet he didn't even know I was chasing him! If he took any notice of me at all (when he overtook me), he'd probably thought that I had stopped running since he didn't have the chance to overtake the tortise girl that he saw earlier. Hmmph! Why am I getting frustrated over such a silly thing?

Anyway, on to MY GREAT IDEA! While I was running, I thought that...

...maybe I should run around the world!!!

Haha... You must be thinking it's nonsense right? But let me explain. I was thinking that I should record the distances covered for all these little runs that I do, and sum them up. Then one day, I would realise that I ran the distance which equals to the circumference of the Earth! How cool is that?

So, I went to check online, how far actually, is this goal I'm aiming for.

And I was surprised to know it's a whopping 40,076km!!! It's not a small world after all! If I were to run on average, 3km a day => approx. 100km a month, it would take me 400+ months!!! Which equals to 33 years! Gosh!!!

I decided that idea wasn't that realistic anymore, and decided to go for something shorter...

THE GREAT WALL OF CHINA.

But that was before I found out it's a freaking 6,400km long! That will take me 5+ years! Madness!

The plan was to aim for something big, so that when I complete it, I would have this sense of satisfaction, and something to boast about. But the plan does not include having an astronomical goal that I'll never complete in this lifetime. *I suddenly realise how small and insignificant I am in this big, big world.*

Then I was thinking maybe I could aim for the length of Singapore. That'll be possible.

But the thing is, I couldn't find the info online. Or maybe I was too lazy to search properly. Besides, if I told people that I ran the length of Singapore, they'll probably be like "Chey, big deal!". After all, Singapore is known to be small. But it's not that small when you think of what I'm thinking of doing.

So in the end, I decided that I shall just aim for a nice, round figure: 1,000km. It'll take me 10 months if I keep to my plan. It's not impossibly difficult, but at the same time, it's not exactly easy. So that's it!

Start counting from Saturday, 9th May 2006, and I already have 14km (sat: 6km, sun: 3km, today: 5km) in the bag. Yes! :)

I'll try to put up a counter or something on the blog so I can keep track. But not today, I'm dead beat. Gonna sleep. Nitex!

I'm back on my exercise routine!

One week before I left for Shanghai, I embarked on my exercise plan. But after the holiday and camp blue blood, I was (note: past tense!) back to square one. But now, I'm back on track! (ooh... pun!)

I ran 6km in 1 hour yesterday, and 3km in 30 minutes this evening! My thighs are aching, but I love that feeling, seriously! Cos that tells me that I've been exercising hard!

I know I'm really slow... 6km in one hour equals 1km in 10 minutes, equals 2.4km in 24 minutes! I would fail NAPFA! But I don't care... I'm hopeless at running, though I think I'm quite good at swimming. *blush* Well, I think life's fair, cos you can't be good at everything...

Anyway, the purpose of all that exercise is to put me in shape I guess. To people who care about me, and who claim I'm not fat so I should stop exercising so much, thanks for your concern, but you dun have to worry!

I think I'm not fat actually too. haha... just a little extra bits here and there, so i'm trying to get rid of them. Besides, I can't diet for nuts, so don't worry about me being on a crash diet. Sometimes, I wish I were anorexic. Me don't have so much determination to starve meself... Eating is a pleasure to me, and the only way I would lose weight is to exercise, so that's what I'm gonna do!

I'll update what I've exercised every now and then to show off. Ha!

LIFE'S GREAT!

Heyya! My first entry is going to be a long, long one... I'll just begin by updating the interesting stuff that's happened over that last few weeks.

SALSA...

Woohoo! This is the one of the best thing that's happened to me. I absolutely lurve salsa now! Signed up for the Level One A Class with Sylvia, Qian Qi and You Qi at Two Left Feet dance school. I have no dance experience whatsoever, but I was really glad I tried to learn. The instructors were great, and the best thing about the school is that you can go for unlimited refresher classes for free! There were quite a few guy refreshers in our class, and it was so much fun to dance with an experienced guy.

Salsa-ing is a great experience, really! And I'm speaking from a girl's point of view. Cos the ladies only need to follow the guys' leads, and the rest just comes naturally. At the end of the lesson, we got to dance with the music, and I love that part the best! It's just so much fun!~ I thought the dance I got during the 2nd lesson was the absolute best of all! My partner was just great!

My Level One A lesson is over already. Thinking of signing up for Level One B, but pity that there's class only on Saturdays. Maybe I'll join the July class when it'll be held on Tuesdays...

FIRST CLUBBING EXPERIENCE...

Went to MOS with Qian Qi, You Qi and some of their friends. YQ had free tix to this tertiary fling and I thought I'd just go see see. I even asked my parents for permission to go, and I didn't expect them to say yes! My Dad was quite supportive of me going, cos he knew that I'll go clubbing when I stay in hall next time. So at least this time, they still have some control over me. Haha... :)

Me and QQ in the MOS toilet...

We had housepours (vodka lime). And seriously, it's not easy to get drunk since drinks are super ex! We missed one-for-one housepours by 5 minutes! How sad is that?! We should definitely go again on ladies' night.

Saw people strutting their stuff. Cool! Think I kinda like it there. Just don't know if I have what it takes to be a real clubber! Haha... While dancing, I was like a wooden block la! Too shy to dance wildly, don't have many moves... Next time I should try to get high first, then won't be so shy... Hehe...

Well, looking forward to many more clubbing experiences to share on this new blog! :)

SOME GREAT NEWS...

Treated Shuwen to Coffee Club cos I had some great news to tell her. My scholarship is confirmed even though I didn't get double degree! This is the absolute best arrangement cos I was thinking that I'll be bogged down by schoolwork if I were doing double degree. But now that I've gotten the course that I truly want (gonna major in Econs at FASS), and I've confirmed my scholarship, I'm truly the happiest girl on Earth!

PS: the country pie at Coffee Club is superb! Two thumbs up!

SHANGHAI TRIP...

Holiday in Shanghai with my family for 5 days! It was a great trip, though I didn't do as much shopping as I would have liked. Cos there was this notice saying that China wants to destroy piracy and you'll need some liscence to sell branded stuff. Plus, the whole Chang Yang Road (dunno if the name's correct or not...) that's famous for selling all those cheap stuff moved away, so there wasn't much shopping to do. The stuff in shopping centres were all almost the same price as Singapore's, so might as well come back for GSS right?

The good thing about Shanghai is that the food's damn cheap! The normal restaurants, comparable to Singapore's are much cheaper. During our stay there, we had French food and Shabu Shabu. Both meals cost more than a hundred Sing dollars each, but it would have cost a lot more locally.

We also went to Cheng Huang Miao where we had Xiao Long Baos. Super cheap can? 16 baos for RMB10. Which equals to 2 Sing dollars la!!! That's freakingly cheap!

But for that kind of price, you'll probably expect substandard food right...? WRONG! Each bao even had soup inside. And it has like dunno-how-many folds. We had to queue for 45 minutes just to get them! But the wait was worth it. There's only one word to describe it... Shiok! :D (Though after eating so many xiao long baos, we didn't have any more for the rest of the trip. Haha...)

One of my favourite food there was the red bean shaved ice (bao4 bing1). I always see that on Taiwanese variety shows, but I seriously wonder why is it not sold in Singapore. Since the weather's so hot, should have a great demand for this right? Maybe I'll set up a shop next time. Hahah... Shot of me being a glutton...

During the trip, I also went for my first foot reflexology session. And guess what? It wasn't painful at all! Cos we told them we were first-timers. I'm a very ticklish person, so I thought I would need control myself from kicking the masseuse. But luckily I didn't have to. The whole thing was a really comfortable experience.

Another wonderful part about the trip was duty free shopping. I bought F by Ferragamo. 50ml for S$109. Damn ex, but I love it so much! Also bought a bottle of Vodka, and we were on our way home.

KICKBOXING...

Last lesson was on 2nd June. I'm not gonna sign up for the new class at Bedok CC cos when I stay in hall, it's going to be real inconvenient to come back every Saturday for class. Think I'll take a break from kickboxing for now. Wait till I've settled down into uni life then I see what I can fit into my schedule... But seriously, kickboxing is great for the arms. I've got muscles now! Ha! :)

CAMP BLUE BLOOD...

2D1N Kent Ridge Hall camp. It was super loads of fun! We had so many games. And though there were some where we had to get wet and dirty, I really enjoyed it! Made lots of new friends, and I think the seniors are all so nice! It's like we don't even know each other at all, but they can just come up to you and we talk as if we're already very good friends. KR gives me the impression that they're all so close like family, and I hope that maybe I can be part of it too.

Look at the room. It's just a quite-small rectangular room with a big study table and loads of shelves, drawers and cupboards at one side, and a single bed along the other wall. The rooms are all very new, so they're all really clean. Haha... I like...

The Secret Pal game was fun too. But there was one thing... I felt so cheated by my SP when I was honest to tell him which group I was from, etc, and he lied! In the end, he already knew who I was before we revealed identites, and I was still kept in the dark, literally, because of the blindfold. -_- He's a nice guy though, except for the fact that he fed me half-bitten M & Ms and put ice cream on my face. Grossness. But we had fun la, that's the important thing. :)

And I'll always remember the hell-of-a block supper. We were supposed to prepare 2 dishes: chicken and mashed potato. But some how, the mashed potatoes didn't come out as planned. We presented baked potatoes with minced meat instead. And seriously, you wouldn't want to know what happened behind the scenes. Hehehe...

One the second day, Akihito drank some weird concoction of bittergourd, onions and something else at the end of the pool games for 10 points, and I'm proud to say that we're the champion BG! Hip hip hooray! AKIHITO ROCKS!

RANDOM STUFF... (I know, I know, it doesn't quite link.)

Well, I started this blog because it marks a whole new beginning. From JC to uni. I think it's a real big change, I can already feel myself growing up!

I think I'm at the age where I think I'm getting old. You've probably heard this a million times over, but I'm still gonna say it... It's ironic how we had wanted to grow up quick while we were kids. But now that we're growing up, we want to be young again. I guess the trick to solving this puzzle is just to embrace whatever that we have. After all, you can never turn back time.

The thought of going to uni is an exciting, yet scary one... Exciting cos it's a whole new experience. Meeting new friends, joining different groups and ccas, having fun, etc. But it's precisely because it's different, that's why it's scary. Will I find people who I can click with? What if I can't adapt to the new environment? ... ... Well, I guess I'll just have to take things as they come.

And here's to more intersting posts on this new blog! CHEERS! :)