Wednesday, February 16, 2011
14/2 Labels: choir, church, focus, friends, MGS
So this was the day when Shern, Sarah, Ode and I were free for dinner, and I happily suggested having dinner, forgetting that my brother would be flying off that night and that it was Valentine's Day. Thankfully, Shern said she was free and I managed to make it there in time!
I was at the Aston's and just managed to sit at a newly empty table with 6 seats, when I saw this girl and boy looking for a table not in the smoking section, so I kindly suggested that they sit at this one, since there would be 2 of them + 4 of us = 6. It totally didn't occur to me until five minutes after they accepted that they were on a V'Day dinner date and would find it awkward to sit at a table with strangers!
Then Ode came to join me, and it turned out that she knows the girl from school, what a coincidence. The even funnier part is that it totally didn't occur to her EITHER that her friend was on a V'Day dinner date with that guy!
The 4 of us eventually at at the Tea Party place that I've heard of but never been to before. It was really noisy with all these JC kids talking and laughing. There was a group of boys playing the guitar in one key and singing in a different key, and a smaller group of people playing an out-of-tune guitar but singing Christian songs nicely. Honestly, if you want to have worship practice, do it somewhere where you won't disturb others!
After our dinner and taking a lot of photos, I went back to Shern's house to talk for half an hour or so before going home. It was great being able to meet up as the 4 of us rather than separately, and there was a lot of good conversation!
15/2
DURIAN PARTY! I went to Serangoon again to get the durian from the same shop as last week. I told the uncle that I wanted 7 of the $8 packets. He said he'd give me 8 packets for $50, which was a $14 discount, so I was okay with it. Then while picking the packets, he said he'd give me another one for free, and spent the longest time choosing one between two of the remaining packets, leaving me dubious about the quality of the 9th packet, but that was a great discount anyway.
Rachel came first, followed by Hongyu, Louis, Ian, and then Melody and Daryl who had gotten lost trying to come to our house by the shortcut. We had a lot of fun eating our durian, pretending to contaminate Rachel's durian, and choosing between bitter and sweet seeds!
I'm sorry I won't be able to attend the first SNYFfers meeting of the year, which is on my flight day, nor their paintball event, which sounds like a lot of fun!
16/2
I met with our girls book club for lunch, as we discussed chapters 6 and 7 of our book. Unfortunately because we'll be changing groups this year, this is the last time we're meeting as our girls book club, so I'll just have to read the last chapter by myself.
We spent really long just finding a place to plonk ourselves at to eat and discuss! It's a pity Ade wasn't free to join us, and that Dior had to leave early. But we still had some good discussion about the marriage institution, cohabitation, the gift of singleness and cultural perceptions.
I just came back from the dinner at Thai Express at PS with my choir comm friends. It's exciting because X-min is back from Japan, and I haven't seen Conana, Ek Ping and Eugene yet. Many thanks to YJ for organising!
Eugene had fun taking a million photos with YJ's camera, enough so that he can make .gifs of us already! It was a lot of fun listening to XM's and EP's stories about their university friends. JA, YJ and Conana will soon have lots of stories of their own when they enter university this year!
Thursday, December 3, 2009
Today I met up with Melody Cheong (back from Brisbane for a visit) and Shernise, and we had a nice long lunch at Ion Orchard!
We ate at the Xin Wang Hong Kong cafe, and I find it funny that Melody is dying to eat all the Asian/Chinese food after being in Australia for so long, while I who eat Chinese food EVERY DAY opted for cheese baked rice!
Shern and I are wondering if we'll acquire accents like hers! But it was fun to catch up, and it's a bit sad we won't be in the same region. It's also great to have someone to give advice after being there for so long.
On a side note, I think Shern is right about my not really being suited to ACJC. I guess it's a good thing I went to NJC instead!
Saturday, November 7, 2009
So, last Saturday was Zi Jie's and Shan Yi's wedding! A joyous occasion indeed! In the line of cousins, I think Zi Jie is about one year older than my sister.
We went for the tea ceremony in the morning at 5th (note: 4th) Uncle's house, where we got to see the tea-serving, tea-drinking, the pretty bride in her impressive gown and the groom in his shiny suit! We also ate lunch there, while the couple had to run off to her family's side for the same thing.
There was much fun playing with Gwen, though her parents weren't there - the grandparents brought her along. Yue played with her like a lot! I even took a photo with my phone :) She's fascinated by the pictures of herself on Yue's phone as well!
I had to go for tuition, then went home, and the solemnisation and wedding dinner was held at the Marina Mandarin Hotel, I think. Their wedding invitation was so cute, like a movie promotional postcard titled The Proposal!
The wedding dinner started rather late, and for once I was at a table with some people I don't know.
On Sunday we went to see Yan's performance at the Sounds of Hope charity concert held by MGS, in which the performing arts groups each did their own performance. I quite liked The Happy Prince play by the drama group, and the secondary dance troupe, and of course, the string ensemble!!
Today is 1st Uncle's birthday, and as always, we celebrated the dinner, cake and all, at this Ah Yat Seafood Restaurant at UE Square. Actually because my tuition ended at 5:30, I was prepared to take a straight bus from Toa Payoh Interchange to UE Square, but in the end I met my family at Newton and got fetched, yay!
Our table had the four of us kids, the four from 8th (note: 7th) Uncle's family, and Gabriel and Angie. Natalie was MIA for more than half the dinner - I think she was fascinated by the fish!
The babies were evenly 'distributed' at different tables: Natalie, Ke Xuan and Anthea, who are all terribly CUTE!
Zi Chong's table kept passing food over to our table, and at a certain point we had to redirect the food to Anson's table, haha!
The cake was pretty nice, with milk chocolate flakes and blueberries. Apparently there was some alcohol in it too. This might explain why Natalie spat it out after being fed by Grace. Clever girl.
Anyway, it was kind of funny seeing all our relatives again, because it felt like we only just saw them a week ago! I love how our family is so big!
Monday, August 31, 2009
My gosh, I'm not sure I've ever had a job that felt like it just dragged on forever. Labels: family, friends, MGS, work
Data coding was my job for one of the projects done by CRPP in NIE, and it was essentially to assign codes to the answers given by the survey-takers in an Excel file.
Now, there were 13509 survey takers, and 4 responses each, though not all of them filled in all the entries, so there were blank cells here and there.
So thankfully, instead of 13509 x 4 = 54036 entries, it was only about 46400 entries. And also, there were already pre-assigned codes, so it wasn't as if I had to come up with a whole set of codes by myself.
It was really easy at first, because being an excel file, I could arrange the column in alphabetical order, which would put all similarly spelt answers together, and then just put the correct code in the next column, click and drag until wherever necessary.
Unfortunately as it went on, I had to try to figure out typo errors as well as make decisions on creating new codes, or conforming to older ones.
I kept doing it, until the point where I thought I was going to go crazy because after entering the codes so many times after a while you it kind of just sticks in your brain.
And FINALLY, as of 11:15am this morning on the 31st of August, I finished the last entry, completing my job!
The good thing was that I got to work from home, so I didn't need to go to NIE like every working day. I think my general knowledge has increased as well.
Now I'm going to have lunch with Jane and Adeline (old MGS friends!!), and they just missed the Teachers' Day celebrations at MGS. I THOUGHT SO, they wanted to be there at what, 11:30, but my younger sister came home at about 11 already, so they must have been late!
EDIT: We had lunch at the Soup Spoon, a first time for me. And it's really filling, until I couldn't finish the bread bowl. It was really nice to see them again, but they're both flying off this month to the UK for university studies! I actually didn't know that Addie had been studying there for about 2 years already! She talks a little like a Brit now, how cool! And Jane's gonna do medicine (in Scotland), like me!! Yay!
Thursday, April 23, 2009
I've regressed into a laziness that surfaces every time I think about blogging. Even though there have been many noteworthy things happening these two weeks or so since the last time I posted, I've just been lazy. Labels: choir, church, family, friends, MGS
1. [10/4] My sister and brother-in-law are back from NZ for a short 2 week holiday! We've gone out for SUSHI, but I feel we didn't eat as much as usual...and then my sister complains that's all we want her back for - to buy things that our mum won't buy us! She let us read her new books, and handmade us these individual wooden things with a picture each and our names in block wooden letters to stick on our walls. Also, she made me clean out my bookshelf. Hmph.
2. [17/4] I had the NUS law interview. It was really short! I met Sarah and Daixi there later. I also talked to 2 people while we were waiting in this nice big room - they even provided chicken wings, mini-muffins and orange juice for us! Then I went back to school to see my choir juniors singing. I still think their Kalinda is regrettably fast - I say 'regrettably' because Ms Lim has decided on that speed (so it's not wrong), but I like it slower. It's still cool, though.
3. [18/4] We went to church for this Juniors Sat programme with many fun games. Most notable was one where 30 paper plates each had a number from 1 - 30 written on the front, messed up in random positions, then were overturned, following which we had to overturn them in ascending order! Then we went home promptly to eat popiah as we celebrated Lorraine's birthday with ice-cream and chocolate cake!
4. [19/4] I had the NUS law written test on Sunday smack in the middle of Sunday School time, 9 - 10.15am, so I was understandably annoyed. Plus it took them about 1/2 an hour to finish collecting the 800 scripts and count before letting us go. I was even late for LS, which starts at 11.30, mind you. From NJ I saw Sarah, Jessie, Ly, Crystal, Ernest, Louisa; from MGS Valerie, Deborah, Kelly, Cheryl Tay. I think I even saw this girl from my Pri 6 class (Amanda Thng?), but obviously she wouldn't remember me.
5. [22/4] My mum flew off to London in the morning for some recruitment thing she's doing at this Singagpore Day event they're having there for Singaporeans in London, I presume. My cousin went as well (as part of the S'pore team), while my mum and this HR person went representing NIE. I hope she enjoys her Full English Breakfast.
6. [today: 23/4] I went for the ISAT in the morning. I didn't realise how far to walk in the road to RELC was, and I arrived at about 8.35, but just in time when the guy started giving out instructions. I saw Shauntel, Jia Neng, Isabel and Jessica! Shauntel meant to cab, but she nicely walked out with me (cos I had to take the bus to the clinic). THANKS!
Looking at all this activity, I still feel like I'm waiting for something to happen. Like I'm just whiling my time away, until something important/life-changing happens. I sincerely hope this life-changing thing will be that I pass my driving test. I detest changing lanes.
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Yesterday I met Sarah, Odelia, Su Yee and Shernise at Citylink mall's New York New York for dinner!
As usual, I was the first one to arrive nicely on time at 6pm, and some 10 minutes later Sarah arrived, and we were talking about stuff like results and work. Odelia came after that in her working clothes - she looked so professional!
We went in first, and Su Yee came at about 6.30, Shernise messaging that she'd arrive at about 7! Apparently she met my sister on the bus on the way to violin class! It's all near the Orchard area.
We talked a bit about our results, how the overall results were in our respective schools, university applications, choosing courses, work experience and such. In ACJC they call up everyone who gets at least 3 H2 As, so it must have taken very long! Lol, Sarah and I went to the school website to go see our friends' names!
I found it funny how Su Yee was so prompt, knowing exactly what she wanted to eat, and she convinced Sarah and Odelia to choose the same thing there and then, though we'd been staring at the menu for like 10 minutes before she arrived without deciding anything!
Shernise ordered this dish I thought sounded good but didn't dare to try, and I think since it cost the same as my pasta but looked like more substance, I should have ordered that instead. Sigh. Hawaiian Teriyaki Chicken - sounds yummy, doesn't it?
We had fun taking lots of pictures by ourselves, rarely asking the staff to help us take. We also celebrated Sarah's birthday (early), and shared ice-cream and mudpie! We took their free candy floss too! After dinner, Shern's mum was in the area, and fetched Sarah and I home!
It was really nice to be able to meet up with them again, and talk about how our lives have been, and what we want to do for the future. Next time it's Sarah's turn to organize, so maybe we should have it on Ode's birthday in April :D
Also, my parents are bugging me to go get a job, but I'm a noob and I don't know how to go about finding one... the classified ads positions all seem to require at least 1-2 years experience, want you to do it permanently or need certain diplomas and such. HELP.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
"It's very easy to know a friend, even over a dinner. But friends aren't made over one month; one year. It takes five decades to form a true friendship." - My uncle.
This is what he said to the last patient who asked him why he wouldn't want to move overseas to live with his daughter and her family - that he wouldn't have any friends there, despite the supposedly large 'community'.
It got me thinking about friends. As in, I haven't lived 19 years yet to even talk about 2 decades, let alone 5, but I just started wondering about who might be considered to be friends, perhaps not just from my point of view, but for people in general.
And then I saw Jean Koh on the bus as I went home. She actually walked past me as I was boarding to presumably pay her fare by coins, but no hint of recognition on her face. She was my Sec 2 classmate in MGS, in the same CCA (GB) though not in the same squad, but she was in my contingent for the drill competition in 2004.
So as I sat down on the seat nearer the back, and she was standing up nearer the front, I was just wondering if she was my 'friend'. I mean, I haven't spoken to her in more than 4 years. Even if she was my classmate, it's not like we were close, or sat together, or did projects together.
Basically, was/is she my friend? Was/am I hers? Where do you draw the line between acquaintances and friends? Is it then true that even someone who was a very good friend, let's say for your two years in JC, might become quite a stranger if you don't see them again for the next 8 years or so, until one day you bump into them on the street?
Isn't that then quite sad? Considering all the good fun, camaraderie and bonding you experience when those people are quite central in your social circle. It's lost after years of no connection or communication, with perhaps the occasional "Happy Birthday" SMS you send because you get an email reminder of it.
I suppose it's also a bit sad if you would have considered the person your friend, at least remembering their name, face and how you knew them; while perhaps they've kind of forgotten who you are, until you need to remind them.
I was thinking of various degrees of friendship with people you happen to meet on the street.
- the kind you see, recognize, and then avoid their gaze because you don't really want to say hi
- the kind you see from afar and don't look at them directly until the last moment and then 'notice' them and say hi, before walking off
- the kind you see, and when you near them, say hi loudly enough, maybe ask them where they're going, before parting
- the kind you see, say hi and wave to, ask them a bit about their lives in general, wish them well and then part
- and the kind you see, hurry your steps to reach, wave and say hi with a smile, ask them what they're doing, how they are, share similar sentiments, and then ask if they want to go for lunch together if they're not busy.
Imagining scenarios is quite interesting, actually.
I also thought of something weird on the way. "Greater love has no one but this, that he lay down his life for his friends." - John 15:13
Would you be willing to die for your friends? And of course this is a hypothetical quiestion, but it refers to dying in a noble way, not a stupid way. I think we'd all like to say we're unselfish enough to be willing to die for our friends in one of those really terrible situations.
I think I might be able to; or at least I may say now that I could, though I wouldn't really know until confronted with such an option. But then I realised, I'd probably sacrifice my life for a friend because I know it's the right thing to do, rather than because I love my friend.
I know it sounds quite stupid and contradictory, but it's somehow true. On the other hand, I'd be willing to die for my mother or father or sister or brother because I love them, not because it's the right thing to do. And I'm quite sure of that.
Isn't it all kind of weird?
Saturday, February 14, 2009
I'm too lazy to go into accounts, so I shall just jot down some stuff in bullet points. Labels: choir, dbsg, friends, MGS, suju
- On 11/2/2009 I think, on the 171 from Orchard road to home, I saw Melissa Tee with a friend on the bus, but she didn't see me until quite a bit later. Probably because it was terribly overcrowded.
- On that same bus, I could have sworn I saw this girl I remember now as my Pri 3 classmate, but I think she changed school to go GEP or something: Jacquelyn Tan. She still looked exactly the same - tall, fair, glasses, short wavy hair! - I passed my Final Theory Test on 12/2/2009, and I managed to get a practical test date at the end of April, so I really hope I can pass in one shot! Thank God!
- I just came home from watching Talentime 2009 in NJC. This may sound utterly mean and superior, but I feel that the standard may have dropped, based on the performances. Of course, I think the OST one with Xuemin, Sheena and Trudy was good, save the terrible microphone balance.
- It's as if people don't really see winning Talentime as such a big thing anymore, or really like music, but just take part for fun. I don't know which position is better, though.
- I recently saw Wen Song and this new bass called Paul on television at this performing event, where I think they represented our school. Well done!
- I kind of wish I'd signed up for relief teaching, but then I'm reminded of how great a responsibility teaching actually is. Those poor kids would probably suffer from my inadequate skills.
- Today on the bus I thought I heard some girls mention 'Tohoshinki'. Dismissing it as my imagination, I then definitely heard 'Super Junior M'. LOL!
Monday, December 15, 2008
This is just going to be a short post about my bus ride home. Interestingly, I met my aunt while on the way to Far East where the overhead bridge to the bus stop is, so I guess she was returning to the clinic or something.
Anyway, after waiting rather long for the 171 to come, I boarded it, and it wasn't particularly full, though of course there was no space for me to sit.
About 2 bus stops later, I noticed that this mother with a little girl and a littler boy, sharing two seats among them, were Japanese. Or at least they were speaking Japanese. I only noticed because the mum said something to the kids.
I confess I secretly tried to look at what she was typing in her phone, to see if it was in Japanese or something. She was typing really slowly though, so maybe it was in English.
After that, I noticed that these two guys sitting near the exit door were Korean. At first glance I could tell that they weren't local Chinese. As in, roughly we Oriental Asians look alike, but you could just tell they aren't quite Singaporean.
The fellow beside the window started talking a bit loudly on his handphone, which is when I heard the Korean come out. Later on nearer my stop the other guy started talking on his handphone, though much softer, still in Korean.
Lastly, somewhere along Bukit Timah Road just after Newton MRT, I saw a girl board the bus, I'm positive that it was Lydia Hang from my squad in MGS GB 1st Coy. When she got on she was far away from me, because the bus was crowded, but I saw her anyway.
Alas, I didn't have the gumption to actually call her when she moved nearer the middle where I was, eventually standing right beside me, facing another direction. I was actually planning in my head to call her at the bus stop one before mine, so that any awkwardness would be minimised.
I even had an ideal set of sentences in mind, along the lines of, "Hey, you're Lydia, right? Lydia Hang. I'm Sixuan, from MGS, GB, your squad, you were my squad leader..." etc etc.
Unfortunately she got off at the NUS Law campus bus stop, so that idea went down the drain. Bah. The Japanese mum and kids got off one stop before mine.
And that's it for my ride home!
Edit: I realise I DID post on the 15th of December, so I shall just make a note here. Happy Birthday to Junsu from DBSK! And to his twin as well, of course. I really didn't notice the date until it was too late. I hope he had a good celebration!
Thursday, August 21, 2008
I KNOW I'm supposed to be studying Bio right now, or even Lit Paper 1, but I want to indulge myself rambling a while before I lose the thought.
Today after the Chem paper I was studying Bio with Sheryl in the canteen and I recounted what I said to YJ on Tuesday.
Me: How did you get it (RJ Econs Prelim Paper 07)?
YJ: From my friend in RJ lor.
Me: Eh... I think I have no friends...
YJ: ???
Me: They all went to AC. (Except those in NJ, Odelia in RJ, a minority elsewhere)
And then I said to Sheryl, "I miss my MGS friends. Why couldn't some of them have come here?"
This is not to say I don't love my NJC friends, because I do, but one of the reasons I didn't want to come here at Sec 2 was because I wouldn't get to see my friends. Some of them have been in my same class for umpteen years.
And Sarah really is much better at keeping in touch with them, I think. She even went for the 2006 Founders Day Dinner if I'm not wrong. I only went back on the occasional school holiday celebration like National Day or something.
We used to have so much fun in school. Get ready for a LONG list of random memories.
In Pri 6 we took turns 'shooting' the pen refills at the Sharity Elephant rulers that everyone received. I shot one at a poster and it stuck!
Oriana and I used to stay in class during recess to either do homework or talk about the silliest things, calling each other ridiculous names. Natalie was my seating partner. I recently saw her at the PSC scholarships and careers fair. I think I saw Rachel Ng there too in school uniform, but she wouldn't remember me. We were only classmates in Pri 2 I think.
Mrs Goy would mock our changing back to the pinafore, sometimes claim to be like an erupting volcano, especially whenever she wore red, or got annoyed at Sam.
From Pri 3-6 I was good friends with Shernise, Ariel, Vivian and Lillian. We did a project on sea stuff after a CIP at the beach, and I wrote a fish poem. I remember Ariel's house being very big and nice. The twins were brilliant at gymnastics.
In Sec 1 we had to give sort-of introductory speeches - to test our presentation skills, no doubt. I did pretty well because I felt quite comfortable in front of the class, even teasing Su Yee in the middle of my speech. She returned the favour later.
We also had a spelling bee, where I spelt 'unnecessary' and 'beret' wrongly. We recommended giving a dictionary as a prize to the person with the highest score! I recently was reminded of Shernise and Jia Hui making up some silly story or song involving a parody of our chinese teacher. I believe it included random chinese phrases and slapping. We used to listen out for the Christ the Lord is Risen Today to start playing before making our way down to the quadrangle for assembly. I could sing the alto part at that time!I remember my Sec 2 PW group was me, Amanda, Su Yee and Bridget! Doing my all-time favourite topic, Education. Was a good year for it too. Many newspaper articles on the subject.
Sara Chong used to speak either English or funny Chinese in class to Qian Lao Shi. One day we tried to trick him into thinking something was stuck on the ceiling by everyone looking at one spot, but it didn't work!
Once I was absolutely delighted to get an 87 or 84 or 80-something score for a Chinese paper, because I normally got about 70. And then Shauntel, my seating partner, got 95. I bet Judith and Melody got 90+ as well. How depressing!
Pei Shan and Sze Min sat behind us. Or was it Melissa Chu? Pei Shan had the loveliest ponytail ever. Like her hair was really smooth. I think Sze Min went to NUS High. Melissa Chu was in GB with me! And turned out to produce one of the best O Level scores in the school!
I had a sty in my eye, and after the doctor removed the liquid I had to wear a patch-bandage thingy over the eye. Amanda called me 'Xuan the Pirate'.
Su Yee was a hygiene/neat freak, to be impolite. She was mad once when I passed down a worksheet that had a slightly folded corner. I think for a time she and Odelia weren't talking to each other, and I was desperately trying to get them to make up. She used to be 'enemies' with Tann-Ting as well. LOL.
We watched the movie Never Been Kissed, and Clarissa changed her interest from Orlando Bloom to Michael Vartan! And Hidayah was a fan of Tom Felton.
Our form teacher was pregnant for the first 2 months, and gave birth on the same day as Melissa Koh's birthday, March 7. Our relief teacher was a J3, who made us write an essay about beetroots with a lot of idioms.
I think I remember in Sec 2 after exams, where everyone was just mooching around in class doing goodness knows what. I think a few of us sat under the whiteboard, with an arrow pointing at us, labelled IMH.
One day when with choir people in KAP I met Valerie! She whose birthday is on Valentine's Day. Good for her - she went to Hwa Chong. True blue Nanyang Pri girl. She and Janice were in synchronised swimming, I believe. I saw Janice in the ACS(I) choir! Along with Judith. And Maria Kang. Whom I saw on the bus one day, but she was only in my class once, I think.
I like this stream of consciousness thing. Please don't tell me it's 3rd person interior monologue. I shall try to think of more to post. I really do miss my friends.
Thanks to all the blogs i referred to (countless) for html code help :) (esp. cyn' and sixseven)
Adobe Photoshop Elements for supernatural abilities
