diving!

Off to Pulau Lang Tengah till monday nite
i'm hardly prepared for it.
may i see good stuff there

bloop bloop bloop

5 hours

it's almost 3am now and i've absolutely nothing constructive since i got back from the library at 9 plus pm. that's 5 fucking hours ago. i didn't know it's that long. these are times when i hate my room.

send me off for time wasting.

i need to play soccer.

news flash in brief

- finally submitted my fyp report today.. an end to the countless days of intensive brain juicing. all in, i wrote only about 50 odd pages of rubbish, but that will do. i can't imagine my supervisors and examiner taking more than a cursory glance at all our hard work. i'm tired man. but it's not over yet.. that bitch of a report has got a second calling due in a couple weeks.. the amended final report or whatever. when can i start attending my lectures and tutorials again...?

- xphysique's over. we finished somewhere in the anonymous middle of the pack, and didn't bother to stay behind for the results that day. abseiling went okie.. not that scary. in fact, it's nothing much once u get both legs over that 6 storeys high ledge. we ran like dogs right from the start, covering a hefty distance from youth park till marina bay. got stuck with a screwed up bike during the cycling element and everyone were just breezing past me. no good. the river crossing part was lame. canoeing was tiring.. and that's about it.

of all days, my body chose to give up on me during the event. initially my left knee gave way. then something went wrong somewhere under my ribs, and i ran the last few stations with what felt like stomach cramps... fucckkkkk... the internal organs were all scrunched up in a knot.. most disturbing. i tried to hold my breath and run, but realised that i couldn't go very far like that. i had no choice but to wobble along like a wuss. but still, our team had fun.


- today, something's wrong with my knees still. i climbed the stairs like i'm 75, with sharp pain somewhere. maybe soccer this sunday will put things right.. it's been too long man.. i'm leading a deprived life.


- diving at pulau lang tengah 30th march till 2nd april. 3 projects and 2 assignments to complete by then. and an amended fyp report. 10 days. then comes exams. i'm brilliant at getting myself into shitloads of agony really.

- the green form appears on the table asking me to tick the date that i'll vacating my hall. i don't feel quite ready for this. i'm actually graduting soon.. a bit too soon. i signed it with somewhat a heavy heart.

facing death and spitting in its face, and then start a new blog.

i'm an invalid.

the bane of meritocracy.

my final year project report is due in 8 days. i estimate around 60 pages is needed. a whole week of good intentions, and i'm still at page 2 of the introduction. not to mention the other 4 projects due within a month. if this is football i'll get red-carded for time wasting.

up to my ass with all these stuff to do. or up to my neck. whichever is more intense. and did i do them? nope. i casually flick it off my mind and started a new blog instead.

oh-brilliant-shit.blogspot.com

this is where i'll detail down whatever places that i've explored. my travel blog. where i show off my skillfully edited photos. starting from the recent Gunung Stong trip. will add more when i find time.

fyp fyp.. i am much braver than i think i am, or ought to be.

one more time

today is a cloudy day, a hollow weekend

so is this the end that is long overdue, or yet another false alarm? i'm tired too. shall not think about this for now.

i'm feeling absolutely moodless to do anything that requires thinking right now. would have gone for a run, but for the niggling knee problem that's back again. a little longer than usual. hope it holds up for tmr's xphysique.

speaking of which, i'm not even sure how the event is like. zero preparations. not that i mind though. would have joined it just for fun.. but now that i think of it.. i do need to raise some money if i'm to go mt kinabalu and diving in may..

fond memories of such races.. in the 'Mazing Singapore Race, zijing + fei + feli + me.. Team Cucumber finished 6th out of 100++ teams.. but if anyone would care to listen, we were firmly headed for the top 3 spots till the organizers screwed it all up. still, that was a good experience. we were a happy team then.

in the NTU ODAC's Rat Race, junwen + feli + me, we finished 3rd, and we strongly suspect the 2nd team cheated. still, we were a happy team.

then in the Great Maritime Adventure, fei + feli + me, we got promoted to 3rd after the team ahead of us got disqualified. easiest race among the 3, kinda silly.. and lotsa money. Won $5k and some mp3 players, though ironically, that was the saddest time, and also our last event together.

i hope we have fun tomorrow, alda + weisiong + zhenhan + me. dun fall off from abseiling and die. thinking about abseiling makes me nervous, just a little.

A bit of Stong

and fro

back from Gunung Stong, Dabong, Kelantan, Malaysia. Failed to take better photos.

In fact, the bloody batteries ran out. All 4 sets of them.

Off to Gunung Stong

Off to Gunung Stong, Kelantan. shall take better photos this time.

bits and pieces

suddenly sleepless on the first night of the lunar new year.
some random shots from whatever's on my laptop..


caught a rainbow in school a couple days back, and happened to have the camera with me.


after upping the shadows.. rays of light beaming from the rainbow

some gifts from Friendship Day. i suspect only girls know about such a day.

from Iris.. some Hershey nipples chocolate.


from Jasmine and Clare.. more chocolates and cookies


from Yanqing.. some hand-made cookies..


with their powers combined.. i'm prolly due for another sore-throat.

Thanks ladies.. how nice of them.. and in return, I give them ... my friendship. i'm nice.


I cut my own hair again. i think it's not too bad.

At the airport, night of 18th Feb

Boy Exuberant. Panning shots are difficult with my cam, when the viewfinder blacks out once you hit the shutter. it's time for a better one..


testing my settings while waiting for Charlene. somehow i like this shot, despite it suffering from a poor 0.3s handshake. didn't realise that was her in the background, surrounded by friends and family.


Finally we met again. Farewell, small one. Another one off to Australia for studies, perhaps staying there for good. Weiting's flying off to Sydney as well in a couple hours. Zhuomin's happily in HK for this semester. blah.. I'm departing in June to play reserve league football for Liverpool too.


A lorry with huge ass joss-sticks tied to its side. Spotted numerous other cars with aunties holding such joss sticks out of the window at Selegie, 2am. thoughtful souvenirs from late nite temple outings.

The sum of life.

I'm still alive
yet dead broke

Diving trip to Pulau Lang: $460
Trekking trip to Gunung Stong: $95
Hostel fees : $658.75
Misc. sch fees: $62.85

Sub-total: (-)$1276.60
Monthly allowance: (+)$200
Currently working income: $0.00

Balance: (-)$1076.60

More often than not, life just don't add up.

The benefits of striking Toto: Priceless.

Animal instincts

I saw this strikingly pretty bird in school yesterday, it flew past and above me to a tree across the road. Following its path, I stood transfixed for at least five minutes as i watch it pecking away at the branches. Then hop hop, upside down it stood, just as firmly, and peck peck away, all over the tree, sounding it out for worms perhaps.

A caucasian student walked past me and smiled. Maybe she would have smiled wider had she seen what i saw. Nice. I later identified it as the Pileated Woodpecker. Not a rare bird as I thought it may be, but still something hardly ever seen in an everyday life of Singapore.

Still on birds, last Sunday while on the bus to sunday soccer (which was fucked up by some people who lacked faith and integrity), I saw a brown hawk-like bird soaring above Sungei Punggol before it dived down head first into the river. Wonder if it caught a fish. Nice.



Of course the somewhat rare eagle who lost its way and landed up in singapore, and eventually found by us a couple years back. White Head Eagle is it? can't remember.

Maybe i have a hidden talent and passion as an ornithologist.

More on wild-life, sort of. Funny incident while running in school last night. On my left was Hall 14, on my right was a forest that buffers NTU from the army training ground. This guy was standing on the pavement and staring intensely across the road. As I ran past him, he waved his hand and pointed towards the forest.

I turned and saw a couple in the weirdest of dating place, sitting on the sloping grass patch which directly face the dark and hardly romantic forest. They were hugging in the dark.

'What's that?' .. he asked ... 'Monkey?'

Animal instincts, primitive needs.. whichever is weirder.

musing

Act intellectual.
Read a postcard on the train.

The why to my heart

have i forgotten how it felt to feel
my love, the feeling once so strong of sweet sorrow
it was everywhere, the words i wrote, the tears i laid,
the joy you gave.
it was there, i know. And remembered it clearly, before i lost you.
mi_lanel, budding rose of my formative years,
of you, my decade of decadence


Years of wilderness (fallen)


Then from nowhere it came back again, so strange, so swift.
Feli they call her. Pebbles, as she was known to me.
She called, I answered, we talked, and fell.
Fell into that familiar feeling I used to dread,
of fearing that tomorrow will arrive without her in it.
That was a love that was wrong, yet so perfect.
For surely, good things don't come so fast and sudden,
took my breath away.
And they don't.
She left, and i could not comprehend,
the perfect stranger that we became.
nor the joke that heaven made of me.


days of derelict.


Strength came upon me one day,
I know not how.
I put you away, in my
locked closet of memories.
Along with the book of us,
words and images i carefully kept,
the final chapter that i wrote for you.

I wasn't sad, suddenly.
Like i leashed my heart to a heavy rock,
the equi-weight of you in my heart,
and heaved it overboard
into a sea unknown.

Down without a splash,
no last words of condolences.
Numb, but for that occasional spray
of fine mist from yesterdays.


Forgotten.


So forgive me, forgive me
this life void of passion
dead avenues that gently ambles along
to great plains of emptiness

empty

somehow, today is an empty day.
yet another one of those countless repertoire when seconds and hours stream past

tell me, what have i done?

i wonder about the sequel to yester-night, oh sweet.

i can't figure out where tomorrow's tomorrow may rise from.

so tell me, is this a bad day, or is it another of my every day.

Last chance

Dear Lecturers,

It is with much regret that I write this email, seeing as predictably, I have failed in squeezing into any of the photography modules till now.

However, what is even sadder and more disheartening is that among the clutch of lucky students in your classes, some are taking the subject simply because there is no exam for it. I do know of a couple of them at least. Such criminal attitudes are robbing students like me and a great many others who are genuinely interested in photography of a chance to learn. We can but curse and swear and write emails in vain.

What else can I do?
Nothing I'm afraid. I'm eating sour grapes.
What else can you do, you ask.
I'm not sure either.
Yet it would be wrong if I just complain and not offer solutions.

1. Interview them. It may sound impractical or impossible, but the thought of an interview will scare away at least half of the imposters.
2. Request for portfolio. Same reason as above.
3. Make them take an entrance exam. Students who are interested will know at least a bit of the basics.
4. Request for a nominal studio or equipment fee. You can always waive it for poor students like me.
5. State that there's an exam in the timetable. Then on Week 12, announce that it is cancelled.
6. Kick out those who don't pay attention in class.

I check the class indexes for vacancies 50 times a day. The result is as constant and dampening as the rain.
Can you kick out someone and put me in your class, please?

Yours sincerely,
-name-
9001xxxx

ps: This email was written under a mix of frustration and despair. Should I sound rude in any manners, I sincerely apologise. In any case, this should be the last of my incessant emails as it is also my final semester here. Thank you for your kind attention.

something

i think something is going to happen.

《明日歌》

《明日歌》
清 钱福《鹤滩集》

明日复明日，明日何其多，
我生待明日，万事成蹉跎。
世人若被明日累，春去秋来老将至。
朝看水东流，暮看日西坠。
百年明日能几何，请君听我明日歌。

Somehow I've always remembered part of this, from many and many a year ago, while cramming in my higher chinese textbook, yet not being able to understand much. You learn as you age, and things just flow back to you sometimes. Upon reflections, how meaningful all these seems, yet reflections can never bring back the passing of time.

and I found other variations as well. For Today, Tomorrow, and Yesterday.

《今日歌》
明 文嘉

今日复今日，今日何其少！
今日又不为，此事何时了！
人生百年几今日，今日不为真可惜！
若言姑待明朝至，明朝又有明朝事。
为君聊赋今日诗，努力请从今日始。

明日歌
文嘉
明日复明日，明日何其多！
日日待明日，万世成蹉跎。
世人皆被明日累，明日无穷老将至。
晨昏滚滚水流东，今古悠悠日西坠。
百年明日能几何？请君听我《明日歌》。

昨日诗
佚名者
昨日兮昨日，昨日何其好！
昨日过去了，今日徒懊恼。
世人但知悔昨日，不觉今日又过了。
水去日日流，花落日日少，
成事立业在今日，莫待明朝悔今朝.

a piece of shit

Right now I feel like doing anything but my FYP. If I can end it off just there and then and settle for a B grade, I'll jump for it. But the truth is, I'll prolly be sentenced to a D, if i'm lucky. Having FYP, is like living in a guillotine. Every week I do just enough to stop the blade from dropping.

I'm in the library at 6.30pm on the first week of school. It's pretty peaceful.. puts one in the studious mood. Maybe i can live with it. yeah.



Anyway, am back from Krabi. More on that later.

Happy Anniversary

I remembered the day before it was due. On the day though, somehow I forgot about it, busy with mahjong i suspect. But still, it's a day worth remembering.

On 30th Dec 1999, i wrote this on Diaryland.



2007 hence enters my 8th year of blogging, or just an online diary as it was called, once upon a time..

Happy Anniversary

From You

it's you, you know, just like you

sweetness in spring blooms

how leaves and petals rustle as you walk

shy, giggles, and scatter

that something familiar


it's you, you know, sometimes i feel

child-like rainbows after gloom

teardrops patter from grey skies

then make wonderment of weather man,

a sudden burst of golden hues