Fencing JC 2 Farewell

I was the earliest to come and waited for almost an hour before the next person, Bernice came. Good thing I had a paperback thriller to accompany me or I would certainly have died of boredom. The farewell was already beginning to seem like a Chinese wedding dinner, very tardy arrivals and the food served very late. Lol.
Half of the J1 exco and some foilists were assembled by 2 and the J2s had returned from their arcade gallivanting. Since the turn out was so few, with many of the unknown people reneging on their promises to come, we skipped the outdoor games segment and headed to the pool place for several games. Am really rusty from months worth of lack of practice; could hardly hit any balls into the proper holes. But not many were people, J2s even, appeared to have much experience playing pool so I managed to win 2 games =P.
We went to 7-11 next to procure our bbq supplies and more food before heading to Pit 33, which was a 15 minute stroll away from Area C. Everyone stoned for a bit and the JC 2 guys threw my boomerang around for fun. It didn't actually fly straight back into my waiting hands but I blame it on the weather conditions, spatial constraints and lack of strength on my part.
Next, most of us went cycling while some of the foil guys played touch rugby. We cycled a long, long way at a slow, slow speed that was certainly not enough to burn rubber and stopped at Bedok Jetty because Balpreet and Joanna, who were slower to start had yet to catch up. Funnily enough, we failed to meet them along the biking track as at the same moment, we took different paths in a fork and went past each other. Lol. Back at the pit, Darren and some others had arrived and were engaging in a game of touch rugby. Despite the 1 hour plus we had left to ride our bikes, we returned them an hour earlier.
As the cloak of the evening descended upon the beach, we got the fire going and prepared the food. Balpreet was dashing charcoal to little bits on the floor and we were all trying to duck from the flying bits of shrapnel O_O. Jun Hao's mum brought along bee hoon and curry which served as sumptuous additions to the cooked meat. Faii's mum called and Joanna decided to play a prank, claiming she was Faii's gf. Guess who got short shrift after that =P. Darren taught me how to skewer the chickens, but I was a hopelessly inept pupil and mangled my sole skewered chicken. The food was delicious and I gorged on the many sticks of satay and chicken. The burnt marshmallows were pretty decent too, in a carcinogenic kind of way. Better start counting those calories =P. Sophie,JX and the J2s came to join in the fun somewhere in between. Darren, inspired by Joanna's trickery, duped Balpreet into believing he had thrown her camera into the bin by mistake. She chased him around and round the pit but there's no way you can outrun an ex-rugger =P. The J2s were drinking some alcoholic beverages and playing cards while the J1s cooked and bantered idly. It's hilarious listening to the irreverent jokes of Jing Xun, experiences of Darren and crazy antics of Balpreet. The slightly tipsy J2s almost tried to dump one of their own into the trash bin but stopped when the guy struggled so violently till they almost lost hold of him. JX, Alvin and another J2 got further inspired by Darren and attempted to bluff me into thinking they had lost my boomerang. I didn't believe it for one second =P.
We ended the night with a session of phototaking and clearing up of the unsightly and oily mess of strewn paper plates and bones. Thanks to the Indian guy for helping us despite the racist comments we were making about you. And bigger thanks to Jun Hao for co-ordinating all this; it wasn't easy and the turnout might not have been as large as we hoped, but everyone who came had a swell time and that was wonderful!

Making Souvenirs

Went to school to make souvenirs for JC 2 farewell. Firstly, we unpacked all the bottles from their protective boxes and ripped off all the price tags (so the J2s won't realise how cheapo we are =P). Junhao's wire model of the fencer, replete with blade and mask, was quite cute but sadly, too big to fit into the smaller bottles. Hence, we decided to put blades for all the small bottles and fencers for the bigger ones. Given my terrible handwriting, Bernice wrote "RJC fencing" with fabric paint on all the bottles, while I laboriously twisted cloth-covered wire into what I hoped were blade-looking objects. My fingers were red from all the effort of twisting and turning in no time, and I half-wished I was making the fencer, which would require less direct contact with the wire and more with the pliers. 15 blades and mini-fencers later, we dripped glue into the bottom of the bottles and threw tiny stones to give the illusion that the bottles were filled up. The blades slipped into the bottles rather easily but there was some trouble trying to squeeze the mini-fencers in. Their metal appendages were probably distorted even further after entry :S. Alvin came over to help us and thanks for that =). I hope the J2s like the farewell pressies we made, even if they don't look that aesthetically appealing or professionally done, we did put in quite a bit of effort, time and money. Oh well...I'll see how it goes tomorrow.

The PW outing

ARGGH! What is it with some teachers?!? They make unreasonable requests and change their fickle-as-the-wind minds, only to make you realise you have wasted half an afternoon chioniging PW oral presentation FOR NOTHING.
Anyway...after the wasted PW outing at Macs, I went to Orchard to shop for clothes and whatever would fit my change. Bought 2 tops and coincidentally met two groups of RJC accquaintances. Shared the cost of buying earrings with Priya and her friend. They were having a clearance sale with 7 at $8 so it was quite a steal! Got a pair which of silver "F's and another pair designed as short metal chains. Watched Miami Vice with Joseph at West Mall in the evening. It was a relatively interesting show, with a complex plot peppered with intimate scenes and brief moments of violence. The NC-16 rating was fair warning that certain scenes would be brutal but I could not help cringing on seeing some unlucky sod's head get blown off. And yes, Gong Li is attractive, in an odd sort of way. Off to read manga....

The Banquet

After Bio paper. went out with CT, Shu Yi, Phil and Wei Lu to chill. Headed to Lido area where we coincidentally saw Suat, Liling and Jay who were going to watch Little Miss Sunshine. Enjoyed a meal of cheese fries over light banter and laughter.
We bought our tixs and went to Far East Mall to windowshop. Looked at all the bling stuff: bags, bracelets, trinkets, earrings, dresses and others. Tempted to buy a pair of dolphin earrings but controlled the urge and departed with a relatively heavy wallet.
When we got ourselves cosy and comfortable in our seats, we were highly surprised to see Larissa, Zinc and Yun Lin arriving later! Talk about coincidences. The Banquet, loosely based on Shakespeare's Hamlet, although no less tragic, was a rather worthwhile watch. The cinematography was excellent; the lush, vibrant colors of the palace decor setting the splendorous mood for the film. Depictions of violence were done tastefully instead of gore-splattered. Every line of the character seemed to have a double meaning or something to ruminate about.
Most of the characters had their own complexities and failings, rendering them more human, rather than an embodiment of a certain trait. I actually felt quite sorry for Ge You, the throne usuper, as the story moved inexorably to its devastasting climax. Zhou Xun was certainly brilliant as the innocent, devoted lover of the Prince Wu Luan. I really wouldn't mind watching it again...

Scholarship Test

Took the Integrated Programmes Scholarship Test in the morn. It's funny how the linguistics section was even easier than the GEP test I had done before, no kidding. And that was WAAAYY back in P3. Finished those sections with more than half the time to spare. As it progressed to the arithmethic and spatial ability ones, the number of questions increased and the time either remained constant or decreased. Called into play my "snap judgement" ability and managed to complete all the questions. I do hope I get it; its not a nice feeling knowing your dad, and sole breadwinner at least in my family, forks out 200 plus dollars a month for your school fees.
After the test, went to explore Bishan Library for the first time with Puva and Priya. Scoured the place for some thrilling fantasy reads and came away satisfied with my haul of 7 books.
Later today, my condo was holding Mid-autumn festival celebrations. Food booths, guessing of Chinese riddles, tea appreciation, acrobat shows, singing and bian lian performances were some of the items lined up. I didn't want to jostle with the crowd below and besides most of my friends were absent =(. So I stood at the window and feasted my eyes upon the spread of lights and people below me.

Promos

It's the 4th day into the battle and Chemistry is the last of the week. Seems almost as though RJ is desperate for us to promote and with the standard of the papers, I don't think there'll be much moderation needed. That said, I'm confident I'll promote although acing all my papers is a different issue altogether. I can't help wondering if the A Level questions are as easy or perhaps RJ has been bombarding us with so many killer chemistry questions that we've become desensitised. Lol. Was half-expecting some 20 mark Elucidation Question (Deduce the Strutures of A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H....Z...ok overkill...) to appear but it never did. Think I'll slack off for a while first before mugging Biology (Nope, the end though nigh, is not yet here) later at night. All the best people!

20 things about moi

Time to do this.
One. Think of 15 short bits of interesting stuff about yourself. And they’ve gotta be true.
Two. Come up with 5 false statements regarding yourself, but for fun's sake keep them in the threshold of believability.
Three. Jumble them all up together and list them in any order.
Four. Post them and let people guess which the five false ones are.

Here goes...

1. The 2nd time I went clubbing, I lost my IC.
2. I first touched alcohol when I was 14.
3. I have stalked someone I had a crush on before.
4. I cycled to East Coast Park from my house in Choa Chu Kang in Secondary 4.
5. I read more than 300 books a year.
6. I fancy myself as an explorer of places which is why I like to cycle aimlessly.
7. I sing in the shower.
8. I can sing certain French songs with perfect pronunciation despite not
having learnt the language.
9. I have smoked before because I was utterly depressed.
10. I have once thought of killing a relative.
11. I wish my eyes were mismatched, one emerald, one azure to be specific
12. I love eating Parmesean cheese by itself
13. I slept without clothes on before (NO other connotations here, thank you)
14. I have three of the "One Ring", bought when the LOTR exhibition came to
Singapore.
15. I sometimes feel a fleeting sadness at the fact I will never know all there is to
in this world.
16. When I was four-ish, I used to love saying "Hello" to animals.
17. I like observing people going about with their own business from afar,
without being noticed.
18. I had a penchant for the taste for fruit-flavored toothpaste in kindergarten.
19. I have attempted to write books but never got past the second chapters.
20. I have contemplated being rude to a teacher just to guage her reaction.

deceased

it takes a lot of bravery to be a coward.

we don't know why you did it. and we might not ever.

nothing is worth prematurely ending it over.

condolences to your parents and friends.

if there's a hereafter, let's hope you're there.

Last

I have an uncanny knack of bottoming lists.

And I should stop crying after.

Faii cut his hand and got a bloody glove. Ouch!

On a side note, thanks Lewinna and Juliana =)

Well done, sabre guys! Hope, you're feeling better Darren.

And JX, you owe me one, no thirty five actually.

Interview at SCO

Had a horrid chem revision test in the morn. Clearly no "thank god its Friday" for me. The lecture group was rowdy and noisy which severely irked Mr Wong who was doing the debrief. No "thank go its Friday" for him too...

Did PW report in the library for 2 hours. Got back our report that was riddled full of "Proof?" and drowned in blue ink. But hey, we got a sticker proclaiming "Fluently Written!". So gonna take that page and frame it on the wall man. =P

Went to Singapore Conference Hall with my PW group to interview some important person (I forgot his post). His answers, while occasionally meandering, largely supported our premises so its a score there! Bantered with him amiably for a bit before he very politely saw us off to the lift.

The unfathomable look in his eyes when he heard how the education system had changed for the better or for the worst. Is it envy, pity or pensive wonderment...?

Fencing at Jul's Salle

Her salle is cool! They have air-con (HAHA!) and GTA, my all time favourite game. I did the three step lunge drill with Faii and ended up getting owned. Got many mini lectures from Henry and understood, not for the first time, my distance sucked. So do a lot of other fencing basics of mine but oh wells...
I fenced with an epeeist and LOST 5-3!!! Now, JX won't pay for Asian Schools but what the heck, its an excuse! I fenced with a foilist and won 5-0 but he still won't pay anyway! RAWR...JX I will spank you with my sabre blade!
Reub and Faii fenced and Faii lost 7-15. Later, Faii fenced him again and beat him. Juliana fenced them both and owned them and I fenced them both too and got owned. Things happen in pairs! Lost to Reub and Faii about 6-15 to both and the nifty beat blade trick can work rather nicely sometimes!
I fenced Juliana and Henry (he used to fenced sabre!) and got owned by Juliana even worse. Henry let me score some hits on him and the final score was 14-15 (me). He was a lot harder on the guys whom he fenced prior to that and there was more ownage. Terence fenced Henry and we sat around a bit, drinking water, listening to Faii play the piano and talking. Terence stopped fencing and we gossiped, no sorry, talked some more.
Walked with Terence to the RTC bus stop and chatted till my 190 came.

Lemming

Lemmings are cute!

Went to watch Lemming with Joseph today at Cine. Wasn't really your typical arthouse film though there were long, sweeping shots of people looking depressed, shocked, fill in your own emotion. It was a thriller with a touch of the supernatural in it. For all the tantalising clues and possibilities, the film turned out to have a rather straightforward resolution, which made it somewhat of a let-down. But the lemmings were so incredibly adorable (esp their little squeaks)!
We prowled around Hereen and Taka for an hour or so before he had to go for his H3 Nus Math module. I had to meet Darren for some financial transactions (no not illegal =P) anyways. He left for Esplanade Library to mug with Reub and I headed off to Citylink Mall to window shop. Went to Esplanade to take a look at some of the shops and visit the Rooftop Terrace. The view of the bay is quite picturesque but the cranes in the distance seem a bit incongruous. Enjoyed the breeze and the sun on my skin in a solitary silence before going down to the Library, where I met Cheng outside. Spoke to him for a bit till he left to join Darren and Reub. I went to Raffles City to chill and inevitably ended up buying something. That's retail therapy for you.
Got back home tired out thoroughly and slept almost immediately after.

BBQ!

I'm blogging about this a day after it happened because getting home at close to 1 slightly tipsy and exhausted isn't really a good frame of mind to be blogging. Now, I'm sober =). Terence and Faii invited me to a barbequeue at Wang's place (nice of them, ain't it?).
Instead of starting at 5 like Terence said he would, they winded up starting at 7 plus. I was rather hungry so I ate parts of a potatoe first. Put my social skills to the test by mixing around with people I didn't quite know. Bern, Daphne, Choong Wing, Wang, Derrick and some others were fairly interesting and nice to talk to, despite never speaking to them before. Swigged beer, coke-vodka mix and binged on chocolate and apple pie, chicken wings, beef, mushrooms and marshmallows. Terence did ALL the cooking for us and only ate after most of us were sated...poor guy. But his cooking was real brilliant and the food tasted heavenly and not like carcinogenic cinders. Thanks for everything! Lounging on the bench, socialising and getting amused by the crazy antics of the semi-drunk or perhaps slightly of the guys was certainly a swell way to spend a Friday night. The influence of alcohol coupled with natural whackiness was an explosive combination which ignited the pyromanic streak in the guys and they wrote flaming words with Zippo lighter fluid. To top it all off, someone threw vodka into the pit and whoosh went the fireball!
People left in drib and drabs throughout the bbq party and by 12+, there were only 5 of us left. Daphne and me help to clear up and I felt less guilty about hardly doing any work. Cabbed home with her and I think I need to burn off those calories =P.

Teacher's Day Celebrations

It was raining so I took bus to RJ for the first time. Teacher's Day Celebrations started off with three teachers and one instructor gyrating and grooving to salsa and hip hop music. The instructor encouraged us to follow suit but since my class was at the back, I could not really see much except for the bobbing of heads. Decided to scribble my well-wishes furiously on the many waiting cards of the teachers. Soon, a swathe of space was cut through the hall where several councillors and teachers were dancing in the center. Mr Chan and Mr Lee were DANCING like OMG!!! Mr Chan looked so hilarious and his face was red after the entire thing. Mr Lee wasn't too bad...not a psychomotor moron like me =P. Next up, was an exaggerated albeit rather hilarious video showing the importance of teachers. There was some PE teacher appearing stylishly on his Harley Davidson to help Cheryl Tay with her pushups using only one finger, a math teacher helping the clueless Reub with a looonnng and complex problem and the punchline, a teacher saving the hapless Isaac from an almost imminent car crash. Then, there was a magic show by a J1 student. The guy was pretty good, he could made some paperball like thing levitate up and around, pull cards out of his mouth and the standard make stuff disappear. Balpreet was emceeing the next item and she was a relatively engaging emcee even though the item itself was boring. It was the awards to be given out to the deserving teachers segment. I didn't know most of the "winners" so I shut down for a while. The last bit was a skit-musical. From a bunch of school girls getting short shrift from a teacher over their attire, it shifted to the new GP rep having a crush on the new teacher, Mr Lee. Hmm.. sounds kinda familiar... She burst into song about liking him which was followed by him singing as well. Mr Lee really is made for theater: magnetic stage presence, clear and good singing voice, decent enough psychomotor skills. We gave our many presents to the thankful teachers; Mr Lee had a whole bag full of presents! Inspires you to be a teacher too, doesnt it :P?
Went back to RGS with CT to find Ms Lim, my Sec 4 form teacher, but she wasn't in so we wrote our names on the present and left it in her locker. Wanted to sample some of the RGS food but all the stalls save for the snack stall was closed. What next but to head home and sleep?

Asian Schools

Came to Pasir Ris CC about one and a half hour earlier because I overestimated the time it would take to reach there. Went for weapons check and thankfully everything passed. Terence had some problem with his lame which was solved when Henry brought his along. Good thing because he could not have fenced otherwise. Did some drills with JX because some of the female sabreurs already were sparring and there were no spare partners. Nellicia is quite a nice person and sometimes you just need to get to know others better.
I screwed all my bouts: 5-1, 5-0, 5-3, 5-1, 5-1, 5-1. Despite knowing what to do (JX was giving me advice on the sidelines), I could not quite execute it. My basic technique was off, right down from posture to lunging. It's terrible knowing what I have done in drills doesn't translate to the actual moment on the piste. When I was watching Pool 3 fence, it dawned upon me that I had actually being placed in the easiest pool and I would probably have done a lot worse if i had been there. Still, I missed my chance for DE -_-. I predictably, came in last and somehow while rather disappointed, was not extremely so. I hope its not because I'm getting use to bottoming lists (it happened for U-17s too).
On the bright side, Terence did pretty awesome, winning 2 of his 5 bouts. He fenced well but unfortunately lost 8-15. The referee was clearly biased, denying him some of his parry-riposte points and making several wrong calls. After lending Nell my chest protector, I headed back to school, conveniently missng S cube talk and arriving in time for exco meeting =).
They were all decorating the teacher's day cards for Mr Ng, Mr Teo and Dr Wong. Got some enquiries on how I did and sympathetic looks after. Reub told me he was actually tied for last, but because of his surname (Yeo), they put him at the bottom. Ouch! Wrote my name on the cards, putting it especially big Mr Teo's. Some people thought it was rather limelight stealing but the size of the name is proportional to my respect for the teacher -P. KIDDING! All of them are incredibly nice and helpful people who have been supporting us ceaselessly. Never mind the fact that comment reeks of politcal correctness.
Bernice, Joanna and me, took the cards to the Teacher's Room because certain people were planning to skip skool and thus not be able to present it to them tomorrow. TSK TSK. We gave one to Mr Teo but later retracted it as we had a brainwave. Why not paste it outside the staffroom? It certainly would be a pleasant surprise for them! So, we blue-tacked the cards to the wall (I hope they did not drop in the night) and took a picture with Joanna's handphone camera. While waiting for it to charge, we actually did footwork along the corridors =P. Talked to Joanna for a bit before leaving for home, deadbeat.

Juliana's Salle

For the first time, I fenced at Juliana's self-converted salle for training. Had some trouble getting to the place at first despite the lift good ole Pa gave me because the house was obscured by the flyover (my sense of direction was a little off back then =P). Thanks Faii and Terence for directing the clueless me to the place =)! It was cramped in the salle even though I got this cosy feeling about the entire shophouse (yes, they live in a shophouse). There was enough space for only one piste and some room for a computer, a couple of cupboards, footwork space and a dummy. Didn't feel as tired as before when doing drills with David probably cus we were stationary. Instead of the usual half an hour lesson, I winded up having a one hour one, which made up for the 1 hour journey to and fro. I worked on counter attacks and getting my lunges into order. Hopefully, this last ditch attempt to maintain my "skills" will assist me somewhat during Asian schools. Did some footwork after my lesson was over but there really was't much space to manoeuver as a class of foilists were having their lessons as well. Think I would still prefer Clementi Sports Hall for training; its much closer, never mind the lack of aircons. I watched some foilists fence and the Olympic video of women's foilists individual event. Poked around a bit, admiring the many medals and trophies Henry and Juliana had won and grinning at those competition identity photos of them. Decided there was not much point in staying since I couldn't free fence or electric fence so I called Dad and he gave me a lift home.

200 Hundred dollar koli

During Chem Lecture today, Mr Lai, out of "sheer randomness" took out a koli and asked us if we thought it was a 4 dollar koli from NTUC or a 200 dollar one. If you don't see the relation to organic chem yet, read on :). Most of us, being rational, scientific thinkers, thought he was speaking in jest. To prove his point, he placed his koli on the visualiser and said it could conduct heat so well that he could fry an egg on it, simply using the light from the visualiser. Still sceptical, I watched as he added cooking oil and cracked the egg and sure enough, the transparentness of the egg white began to turn well, white. And although the egg yolk did not seem to get the opaque yellow of cooked eggs, I was quite convinced the koli was indeed made of some super-conductor material or something along those lines.
Then, he revealed the secret of his 200 dollar koli. The oil wasn't cooking oil after all, but lead nitrate dyed yellow! So the whitening of the egg white was actually some chemical reaction occuring... Which meant, the 200 dolar koli was really worth 4 bucks. Guess it was a timely demonstration, my interest in organic chemistry is waning fast as the number of equations threatens to increase. But the demo has managed to sustained it.
For a while.

Hibernation in Liberia

soak in sibilance,
as fleet thoughts-born you. hold me
in raptured embrace.

PW outing again

As I'm typing this, my accursed wound refuses to stop bleeding. Drip, drip blood...I'm losing it in too many places and currently feeling PMS-ish at the moment. Am loathe to cancel fencing training with David but I don;t want to aggravate the injury.
Went to Novena Starbucks with PW group mates to do work. The seat near the power plug was taken up so we huddled in a corner to get some stuff churned out. My hand me down laptop was proving its obsoleteness by refusing to recognise Kaye's thumbdrive and later on acted in ways that would drive the most patient person crazy. The wireless wasn't working, the Microsoft word shut down when I typed enter, Paint shut down if you hit some key. In the end, we compiled a list of things to do on Susie's laptop and split up. I trained home with Susie while Kaye and Amelia went to mug at Macs.
Upon reaching home, I plonked onto bed and slept in no time. Woke and decided to burn those fats by jogging along the longkang outside. Had completed about 1/3 of my quota before tripping and falling. Was going to pick myself up and persist jogging when the blood, crimson and thick, started trickling from the wound. Two kind men, YC and Peter helped me up and walked me to my home (it was on the way, really but still it was awfully nice). It's a rather interesting experience talking to people way out of your age group. Another good Samaritan offered her jogging towel to bandage my bloody knee. I guess Singaporeans are not as cold as you read in the Forum after all =). YC and Peter showed me the route to Kranji Reservoir and remarked about how beautiful the scenery was. Think I'll go there when my wound heals. By the way, thanks for all the care and concern shown, especially since I'm a stranger to all of you.
Bid goodbye to them as they went ahead to finish their walk and hopefully I'll see them around sometime. Hovered at the basketball courts watching my chums play their matches. It's been a looonggg while since so many people were down and I didn't want to leave just yet. Watched and chatted a bit and as if on cue, blood began threading down my leg. Shuffled home to work, tutorials and assignments.

Fruitless PW Outing

Wednesday so happens to be the earliest day in my week, with lessons concluding at 1. So it happened that Botanical Gardens was to have a CO concert at Symphony Lake, and we were to go down later today to interview people for PW. After Econs, I stoned for an hour before going for CCA leader's feedback session. It would seem that the antidote to many of the problems was "write a proposal and convince the administration department". Ultimately, its all still in the hands of the CCA department -_-. Well, to make up for the disappointment with the lack of resolutions, the cakes and ice lemon tea were rather delectable. Talked fencing stuff with Bernice and then went to the library to read comics while she and her friends mugged. Left about 5.40 to meet Amelia and together, we took 171 to the bus-stop close to the CCAB. It later became apparent we had been given the wrong directions (Jordan, you die tomorrow :) ), and we took another bus. Went walking along some road for quite a distance, asked for directions and realised we were walking the wrong way. Such a comedy of errors aye -_-? Travelled about a kilometer on aching feet to Symphony Lake, thank goodness it was near the entrance we were at. Had a sneaking suspicion that something was amiss when we saw Kaye alone at the green space surrounding Symphony Lake. Made a phone call that confirmed our worse fears, the concert was ALREADY OVER! In fact, it was held 3 days back, on Sunday. The startling proclaimation just sent all of us into hysterics and on hindsight, I still don't understand why we didn't blow up. Must be all the stress from school taking a toll on our already fragile sanity. Shu Zhang came and we showed him the priceless picture of the non-existent orchestra on the stage. He was utterly mortified and apologised to us profusely. Took several photos at the Botanical Gardens for mementos. This one's my favourite...

The Invisible Symphony

Windy Day

Extremely windy day today. Was sitting at the tables on the ground floor and my unruly hair was snapping back and forth to the relentless tugs of the playful breeze. Female classmates were trying hard to keep decent (not to do a Marilyn Monroe, which means keeping your skirt down) and male classmates were trying equally hard not to stare (ok kidding here =P). I swear if its this windy on the bottom level, you can practically test a car on the 7th floor.
I think the wind made CT a little high. When I commented that there was too much "feng" and too little "shui" at our present location, she went "Here is the shui" and I got a splash of water in my face. Splutter, splutter, blink, blink. Since the magnanimous, benevolent, epitome of kindness me was in a good mood, I didn't kill her :).

Bronze Medal for Pesta Sukan

To be honest, I thought our chances of winning a medal, while present, were not very high. The other teams all seemed relatively strong, or at least, stronger than us. So naturally I was elated when we did manage to garner one.
I came at 9, 2 hours before my competition started as I needed to pay for license fees and blah. No fees, no fencing! Watched the foil guys fence and unfortunately succumbed one by one to stronger teams. But they certainly fought a good fight! First, we fenced Duxton Plain for a chance at 1st or 2nd. For the first time, I won my first bout! And she was a leftie and the anchorwoman! Was down 1-4 and caught up 4-4. On the last point, I attacked and missed. She came rushing forward and I did some half-hearted beatblade followed by riposte which somehow got me the point. The rest of the bouts went kinda crappily and I lost 3 points and later zero points. The combined 14 point gap that me, Charmaine and Yu Hua had amassed was too large for Liesl to catch up, and eventually we lost 37-45. The whole thing could have been won but no point crying over spilt milk I guess. I have to start parrying more because sometimes, running back down the piste just won't be able to save yourself from a hit.
THANK YOU SO MUCH, ALL OF THOSE WHO CAME DOWN TO SUPPORT AND GIVE ADVICE! TERENCE, DAVID, JX, REUBEN, DARREN, JOANNA, KANG WEI, DENISE, SANDRA, XIAO TING and all the other sabreurs for everything you guys have done for our team!
Ok, instead of angsting overly about that 0-5 bout, I went around watching the Blade Club's team and the RGS team fence. Secretly hoped Blade Club would win because the team consisted of people I knew (1st, 2nd and 3rd for Nationals Women's Sabre) and we would have an easier time fencing RGS than them. They won =P! Hovered around watching JX's team fencing and Reuben's team too. Both teams just had to be at opposite corners of the sports hall -_-. Reub's team was fencing David's, which would mean the final bout would be Darren VS David. They fought hard and chalked up a decent number of points with several well-timed and properly executed attacks before losing 22-45.
The time to fence RGS came and I went with trepeidation to face this new challenge. To be honest, I had a slight fear of the RGS anchorwoman Nellicia, partly due to her ear-splitting shrieks and whambang whacks. The first bout against Charlene went poorly and I lost 2 -5 points. When it was time to fence Nellicia, things somehow mircalously did not turn out as screwed up as I expected, apart from the last "dubious" point, and I managed to get 5 points off her while she got 4. On my last point, her wire fell out and she raised it as an issue. Liesl, thankfully, pointed out that it happened after I hit her, so still my point (phew!). Charmaine did pretty good too, scoring 6 quick points in almost continous succession against Charlotte. Fencing Charlotte, another rather decent sabreur in my opinion, was relatively lucky business. For 3 times, I missed her attack, beat her blade and forced mine through. Somehow, there was only one light! In any case, I was glad Liesl would have a much easier time fencing Nellicia and win the team bout she did! Went into throes of ecstatic screaming and hugging and jumping around. Juliana later said we were the first team in the history of RJC to win something for Pesta, a lot of it comes from Liesl =).
Visited 7-11 with Kalps, Darren and Reub to hydrate and we bid goodbye to her. Returned to Clementi Sports Hall to watch JX's team fencing for 3rd and 4th placing. They lost to the NUS team, which so happens to have 2 of our coaches :S. Choong Wing proved his zai-ness by keeping his composure and scoring the last glorious point to seal the victory at 44-45. It was an incredibly tense situation with all the eager eyes riveted on the bout. Derrick's team was 1st and David's 2nd (predictably). Collected the medal and went for an early dinner at nearby Momoya. Had a major suanning session, me being the target :(, and shared several jokes over sashimi, udon, basically Jap food. We chatted for about 2 hours ++ and left Momoya sated, especially JX. It has been a really good day and once again, thanks everyone for all of your support! RJC Fencing Rocks!

Pam's BBQ

Alright, I'm blogging about this a day after it happened but I juast HAD to watch Mean Girls and HBO (in the process disobeying my dear sabre captain's sleep at 10 rule). Chicken wings, marshmallows, crabsticks, chocolate-dipped strawberries, chili sotong, sausages and punch galore! I really gorged myself on the sumptous spread and was throughly stuffed after I was done. We all took turns to help out with the bbqing, although the guys, ironically enough, were the better cooks. They hardly burnt anything while our stuff was on the verge of being carcinogenic :) Played some bball and then went up for some socialising. It reminded me of those halcyon days when all of us, the Windermere people, would sit down while waiting for a match to begin or end. Perhaps we should have more bbqs and games room bookings! Rounded the day or night off with Pam getting soaked with swimming pool water as part of a coming of age ritual (courtesy of Shane). Sorta makes me glad I won't be celebrating my birthday here.

National Day

Happy 41st Birthday Singapore! The lovely place I've lived, breathed and slept almost every single day of my life. I certainly hope there's a bright future for us all!!!

Nat Day Celebrations

We got to a festive start with class breakfast. All the J1 classes were cramped into the canteen while a band of 4 guys crooned pop tunes to thick crowds. Our class had a miserly amount of food compared to the classes next to ours. I couldn't feeling a tad envious seeing the spread of cakes, coffee, biscuits, pastries, chips, chocolates and little tidbits lying so invitingly on the other tables. Zinc, Larissa and Yun Ling baked us all some deliciously sinful brownies. They were so good I had to take a second helping =P. We had cranberries, two bottles of Pepsi, Toblerone, Mamee noodles and little things which I will not care to name. Mr Lee, Miss Soh and Mr Chan dropped by at different intervals for a bit, before leaving for other classes.
Went to watch Street Dance and Modern Dance's performances at the amphitheater. The jazz item of Modern Dance was oddly familiar and I think it was because it was lifted from Amarante. The Street Dance was remotely familiar too as during fencing trainings we got to have several "sneak previews". In any case, it was exciting seeing Wen Hao, Xin Zi, Claire and Sherlyn grooving to the hip hop music. Returned to the jam-packed canteen to see Mr Siva strumming a Chinese tune to the wonderment and delight of almost all the RJ students. They didn't let him leave the stage without an encore =). Most of the class was setting off for home soon after the performance ended. I took the opportunity to catch up and chit chat with my OG mate, Rebecca, about life and its little mysteries. Following that, I went shopping for hair accessories with Charmaine at J8. Fatigue from yesterday began to take its toll and I struggled to stay awake on the MRT journey back. Zzzzz time it was, at home.

Last Fencing Training Session...for now

I can hardly believe today was the last fencing training until the promos are over. No more laughing at the antics and rapid crossfiring jibes of Darren, Reub, JX and Faii. No more crapping with Charmaine, Yu Hua and Joanna. =(. Dull, dull are my Tuesdays and Thursdays going to be. I'll really miss you all guys loads... And with the LOONNG lag in training, I'm fairly sure my already shaky footwork and bladework will disintegrate into nothingness. Attendance was pretty good on the bright side and perhaps it was because it was the "final" training.
We fenced teams (4 teams of 3), with the girls being captains. I had David and Reub in mine and can you believe it, David refused to be anchorman!!! He wouldn't even let me finish first but that was probably since he wanted us to fight hard for the points. My first bout was remarkably awful and I would have had no points at all if not for the fact that girls get handicaps (2 point lead). Most of the rest were fine and with the overwhelming advantage provided by the handicap, I manage to get to the point cap first. When it was time for the 2 winning teams to fence, I foresaw grevious losses to Darren and Faii, but miraculously, it didn't go as bad as that. At least I scraped 2 points off them each. Darren has an uncanny ability for devastating counterattacks...:S. Reub was my team's anchorman and he did a fairly good job for all of his bouts. I, as the weakest link, think I screwed up my team...yet again. We rested afterwards and watched the other teams battle it out. Charmaine treated her team, me and Reub to drinks!!! Aw..isn't she so sweet? :):):) Watched Reub and Darren do drills, chatted with GGY for a while and did parrying drills with JX.
Left the hall at 7.30+ with Reub and Darren. We trduged to the MRT and were so incredibly slow that Jun Hao caught up with us. Parted at the traffic lights and spoke to Jun Hao about..guess what..more fencing stuff! Think I've mentioned this before and my apologies if I sound like a sentimental sop but I truly will miss those crazy, fun-filled trainings we had together...

Mad Hatter's Costume Ball

Finished Econs tutorial just in time for Mad Hatter's Costume Ball, the highlight of Lit Week. The two emcees, decked in girls' uniform, beatboxed and announced the entrants in a cool rap. Students clapped and cheered as their fellow class representatives dressed in outlandish garbs and garish costumes took the stage, sashaying and strutting. Willy Wonka, Lavinia, James and the Giant Peach, Neville Longbottom, Jack Sparrow and other familiar characters from Literature or pop culture made their
flamboyant or unglam appearance.
There was some best costume competition going on, but I didn't stay for the results. The thick crowds slowly dispersed with the ending of the catwalk.
Following that, was a renenactment of a scene from Anthony and Cleopatra, starring Seema, Sindhura and some guy. Sindhura's acting, as usual was stellar, as she brought out the maelstrom of emotions of the high-strung queen clearly. When she pummelled the unfortunate messager with her fists upon hearing of Anthony's marriage to Octavia, almost everyone's eyes were riveted. A Hokkien version of the sleepwalking scene from Macbeth was next and sadly, I failed to comprehend a word =(. Dialect is even more foreign to me than French, which I do not happen to speak either.
I browsed the many stalls after that, admiring the wares with a covetous eye. Shiny handmade trinkets and baubles, chocolate dipped marshmallows, chicken bits on a stick, pancakes, gingerbread men, brownies, nut delights and many others I will not name.
Hunger sated, I prowled around the amphitheater for a while and was going to head home when Janessa convinced me to enter her class's fortune telling booth. Reuben Foo went first and was accepted by the the soothsaying trio (Benson, Moni and another guy), so when it was my turn, I had 4 fortune tellers (or charlatans more like =P). Ok, it was pretty much a scam, and I, a willing participant to it. The comments ranged from utter gibberish to irrelevant observations (Southeast is the direction of the bus stop you must go - I don't take bus home by the way) to partial truths. Was highly amused and entertained by the entire experience. I especially liked the tea leaves part, although there was hardly any water to speak of. Paid up my $1 fee and headed for home...

Titus Andronicus

Incredibly short though the play was, I guess it was well worth missing my only break for. The actors who played Demetrius and Chiron were truly villanious and hateful as the taunting rapists of the poor Lavinia. Though Lavinia never said a word throughout the entire performance (her tongue was after all, cut off), she managed to invoke gasps of horror and disgust from the audience when she spilled cranberry juice form her "bleeding" mouth. My fickle camera chose to desert me by malfunctioning at the moment, so not pictures =(...
Fencing was fun as always. We were divided into 3 teams of 3 and free fenced. My team, consisting of Faii, Sun Lu and me did pretty well, mostly thanks to Faii. Beat Team 1 and lost to Team 3 by one damn point. I, being the only girl, was the weakest link which the others exploited to their advantage. David gave me a two point advantage and I manage to reach the point cap for all my bouts save for Darren's. Somehow, the "victories" felt hollow coupled with the knowledge of the fact that I would never have reached the cap without the handicaps. Still, the bouts did not go as horribly as I envisioned them to be and I did not drag down my team. Too much. Did some parrying drills after the team bouts were finished and came away feeling more tired and slightly demoralised. I really do hope I can fence better than this during Pesta Sukan...> _<.
Left school with Reub and Darren and trained back alone. Am now admiring that red-purplish bruise that sits happily on my elbow. Occupational priviledge, yups =)

RJ Lit Week

RJ Lit Week is here! A slew of performances by the Lit classes ans some Raffles players, talks and movies are in store! I caught "Othello" today, starring Lincoln, Isabella and Janessa. They were re-enacting the scene in which Othello murders his "faithless" wife, whom he mistakenly suspects is having an affair with his lieutenant, Iago. As they say pictures are worth more than a thousand words, I'll let them speak on my behalf =)...

Cabaret

Cabaret

What good is sitting alone in your room?
Come hear the music play.
Life is a Cabaret, old chum,
Come to the Cabaret.


I am no patron of the arts, but when I saw the trailer on Arts Central one night, I knew I had to watch this. Deliver Cabaret does: The powerful vocals and nuanced acting of the varied cast, the titillating pelvic thrusts and sensual moans of the strutting dancers, the glitzy razzmatazz costumes right down to the illumination of the stage lights. I only wish the slight letdown of an ending could be more fufilling and hopeful. Love does not conquer all here. And that is reality.
Kudos to Emma Yong as the psychotic slut with questionable taste in nail polish (Sally Parker Bowles) and Fei Xiang as the deliciously naughty, sneering and leering Emcee. They were undoubtedly the gems of the show.

RI dramafeste

After a passable GP test, decided on a whim to watch RI dramafeste. $3. And well worth the money I say.
First up, was BB's play on how a son tries to cope with his jailbird father's suicide with the assistance of his psychiatrist friend. I missed part of it as I came late (asking some RI backstage crew for directions). The storytelling was linear and interjected with flashbacks and retrieved memories. In fact, the play ended with a flashback. The acting, while passable, wasn't remarkable and the characters were not well fleshed out. A decent but unfortunately, forgettable play which left little impact on me.
Second, was HH's Before Patient 1; it was on the choice of an estranged son to treat his ailing father, who had walked out on his family and indirectly caused his son to have a permanent limp. The cast of about 9 people was did a wonderful job holding the play together as everyone seemed perfectly suited to their roles: The remorseless and obstinate crippled son, the 2 earnest and competitive medical students, the troubled second son etc. The emotional tension was balanced evenly with welcome moments of dark humor. Didn't quite understand the loosely used medical terminology though. The relevation that the example the doctor was using to teach his students a lesson in medical ethics was actually himself was subtly hidden and slowly unveiled. It was the best of the 3 plays (with MT's following close behind), in my opinion.
Third and last was MT's Because, a tragic retelling of how a mother's death results in a rift between a father and his increasingly mentally disturbed son. (Misery,death and despair...seems to be a common thread in plays). Towards the end, the story lapsed into predictable plus a tad melodramatic cliches and in a move reminiscent of Medea's, concludes with the father shooting his son in an act of mercy. The acting of the cast was more pronounced than that of BB's but slightly weaker than HH's. The co-ordination of lights and the haunting music certainly set and sustained the brooding, melancholic mood of the entire play. I especially liked the 3 "voices in the head". Clad in black and faces painted with white makeup, they sinously prowled around the tormented son, whispering and hissing their insidious poison. I'm not sure how BW's and MR's play will be like and I'm not intending to watch them tomorrow. Think I'll ask Jordan about the plots. As of now, I would like to think MT stands a good chance of winning Best Ensemble or Best Play but things could change tomorrow...

Moor-Tarbet

A plague o' all your houses, they have made worms' meat out of mine.

Interhouse Fencing

Tralalalala! I'm on cloud nine because MT IS CHAMPION FOR INTERHOUSE FENCING FOR BOTH BOYS AND GIRLS! Great job Brian, Matthew and Isaac, you guys really showed those BW ex-fencers something! And I got my fencing T-shirt, tracksuit and patch today too!
The fencing exco was in charge of holding interhouse fencing. The turnout, although much better than I had expected and signup sheets had foretold, was not enough to form a full team for some houses (There were walkovers when it came to HH and BW girls). At the start, things were relatively disorganised and last minute. Some of us hastily set up the boxes, others attempted to get the competitors prepared to fence while the rest were busy labelling the equipment. Several games later, the tempo was more or less set, with several delays due to the lack of or faulty equipment.
All the bouts were incredibly fast, most ending in less than 3 minutes. As skill and experience were precious little for many competitors, aggression, speed and a large dash of luck was crucial for scoring points. The atmosphere was saturated with tension and excitement as the fencers from each house tried their utmost to best their opponents. Raucous cheers and laughter filled the hall as the crowd egged on their respective participants. I got so carried away myself that several times I simply stood at the corner, eyes riveted on the swashbuckling action. Joanna had to remind me to keep on helping the waiting competitors to suit up so things could flow smoothly. Sabre training was carried out as per normal deeper into the hall but it wasn't very interesting, which salved my guilt at not being able to take part =P Reub Yeo and Reub Foo popped by for a moment to view the show before leaving to rehearse their Lit Week sabre bout.
My camera was out of battery =( and I couldn't take any pictures or videos... Dang, it would have been swell to put some of them up for Open house or the fencing blog. In an impromptu prize giving ceremony, Joanna (our guest of honor =P) distributed the trophies to the elated MT winners. At 6.45, the competition and training too were offically over. We had the arduous task of finding Juliana's jackets and britches from a mess (or mass) of stinking, sweaty fencing equipment. It took us about 20 minutes to get all of her equipment and ours too, distinguished from the rest. Each of us took home some of our senior's equipment to wash after putting the rest into the fencing store. I went out to watch Touch Rugyby for a bit before returnin for Joanna's Interhouse fencing debrief. Utterly drained but still buoyant from MT's double golds as I trudged to Bishan MRT alone.

MT ROCKS!!! Oh yeah... =)

Interhouse Basketball

4 hours of sleep and a PE lesson involving some hybrid of handball and net ball. No wonder I was shagged after one game. The sweltering, sweat-inducing afternoon heat did not improve matters. To hammer more nails into the coffin, Moor Tarbet was only 6 strong after Jenna and Nat left for Netball (they did return later) Generally, Moor Tarbet put up a good performance, drawing with Buckle Buckley and Morrison Richardson. It beat Hadley Hullet with a decisive 16 point gap and walk over with Bayley Waddle as no-one turned up. My goals were all hook shots and I didn't really get to handle the ball much. Every house had some formidable basketball players that posed a challenge, which Clara, MT's basketball player, would gamely set out to tackle. She saved our game from the jaws of defeat on many occasions. Way to go Clara! Sup, Natalie, Jenna, Kelly, Rachel, Jeannifer, MT would never have been second without our combined efforts! I did not play Jing Yi, my neighbor from Buckle Buckley, as we were in different halfs. The games were relatively clean and had few or almost no fouls. On the next basketball court, the adrenalin pumping guy matches were peppered with fouls and expletives, especially when the lead was narrow and the time was racing away fast. I left the basketball court after watching MT clinch a narrow one point victory over BW; they were still in the lead having won all their games, so I'm assuming they beat HH and got first =)! Went up to the parade square to watch Netball (MT was doing so well, lost one match and drew one as of then). Met Darren and chatted with him about Lit Week and Reub's party till we split at the traffic light. Was thoroughly worn out by the basketball game and tutorials relentlessly await when I return home...

Reub's surprise party

After 3 hours of mugging Chem, my good old pa drove me to East Coast Park. Darren had planned a surprise party for Reuben on the pretext of going cycling with him. At Macs, I chanced upon a group of CAPpers when Ben Soh came over to speak to me, but I did not join them as I wasn't too chummy with them. Waited for a bit when I met Kenny, Mickie and Ryan D. I chatted with Mickie to pass the time and befor we knew it, an hour and a half had past. Kalps and Sarah came over then, and we headed to the underpass to surprise Reuben, who would be supposedly appearing in 10 minutes. Some of them stuck candles to the cake while we...waited some more. 30 minutes later, Reuben and Darren arrived and we sang the birthday song to the melodious strains of Ryan's guitar. Reub seemed genuinely astonished (at least to me since he's quite a good actor)and touched as well. Look's like he truly believed Darren's ludicrous story about being captured on Gotcha. No idea he could be that gullible =)! We walked to Macs and splayed out our chips and chocolates and goodies on the table for consumption. Reub broke his birthday pie and distributed it to all of us. He was chewing on it when he suddenly said he tasted wax. But as Darren puts it "Ignorance IS bliss!" =). Chng popped by and gave Reuben a tiny pair of shoes (small feet), in reciprocation for Reub and Darren's birthday gift to him (a big doormate in the shape of feet) Spent the rest of the evening bantering about anything and everything. Darren and Ryan D provided entertainment in the form of guitar music. Both of them sang and strummed to the close scrutiny of our eyes. Liked Darren's singing of Rent, despite not knowing how the song sounds. Perhaps I'll pick up strumming...someday =P. Towards 9, people were beginning to leave in dribs and drabs and we all vacated Macs at about 9.45. Kenny's brother, Justin, kindly drove Kalps, Chng and me to Bedok MRT. It probably took 20 minutes off travelling time and saved 55 cents on my ezlink card. Trained and chatted with Kalps till she got off at City Hall.

Pirates of The Carribean

Went to West Mall with Joseph to catch the 10.00am show of Pirates of the Carribean. It more or less lived up to my expectations with the potent mixture of action, romance, adventure and other ingredients. The convoluted plot twists kept the audience guessing and by the end of the movie, some issues were still unresolved. The cliffhanger of an ending strongly hints at a sequel (in this case, the end to the swashbuckling trilogy) andI hope it'll be a good finish to story. The flaws were that some jokes fell flat and certain scenes seem to serve no purpose apart from providing an adrenalin rush. All in all, it was worth the $9.50. Ate dumpling soup for lunch and chatted idly with him at the food court before going to the food fair on the first level. Shared a big box of Mua Chee and we were both thoroughly stuffed when we were done. Parted ways at Bukit Batok MRT station, he to SA for his seminar and me to home to attend to those clamoring tutorials...

BPGH Concert

Watched Re-cycle, Pang brother's latest horror offering with Nava at J8. Not your run-of-the-mill horror movie though, as the fantasy element stood out quite a bit. Had some fun spotting the references to Silent Hill, Mirrormask, the Ring and a range of other movies. The scares were mostly well timed and the haunting visuals set the desolate mood of the mysterious alternate reality superbly. The flaws would be the cheesy emotional scenes and certain other parts, which slowed down the pace of the movie and evoked laughter (probably not the intended purpose) from the audience. The ending was however, a bit of a let-down... It was worth the 7 bucks, more so after they threw in a $2 off on movie tickets voucher =).
Trained with Nava to Somerset, where I alighted and proceeded to Hereen for window shopping. Met Rong'en at Raffles Place MRT at 7 and together, we strolled to VCH to catch Beauty and the Beast, a musical by BPGH. Overall, the musical was fine. The actors were relatively at ease palying their parts and were even more natural then the emcees. The costumes were appropriately periodic and did not take away too much attention from the audience, Clever tongue in cheek references to recent events (Zizou's headbutting of Materrazi ) had the viewers in stitches. The singing, while recorded occasionally and inaudible sometimes due to technical faults I believe, was fairly melodious. On the downside, the performance was marred by poor coordination of the lights, several bloopers by the actors and choppy transistion from one scene to another. Even so, the CO performances, rousing dances and hilarious video by BPGH media club and lastly the merits of the actual performance itself made up for it all. I got a free rose from some BPGH students which I then gave to Aisha, one of my accquaintances (we met through CAP). Left VCH alone since Rong' en was to be meeting his friends and sleepily endured the journey back...

Fencing and Frisbee

We played frisbee for inter-class games during PE today. Our class stood out like a sore thumb, being the only Bio class out of a horde of Physics classes. And the team was sorta imbalanced, 6 girls and 2 guys in ours and the reverse gender ratio for 6S and 6M. But we fought with zest, zeal and a little dirtiness (mud:) ) thus scraping a 0-0 draw and sadly, a 0-1 loss.
Speed up the day to Fencing training, my favourite part of the day :P. This session wasn't as memorable or exciting as previous ones. Maybe a relatively serious exco meeting regarding the interhouse fencing publicity campaign made me more morose... We did distancing drills and footwork drills (no PT yet, thank you David :) ), followed by pools for the girls. It was one of the rare trainings since the start of June that all the girls were present and I wish every training could be like that. But with the advent of H3, attendance has become spotty. The guys got to spar electric whereas David trained Reub Foo one on one. Following pools, David let me spar with him, his handicap being his usage of the left hand. Despite my fervent attempts, I managed to hit him only several times while he garnered many hits on me. Well, in any case, it was enlightening experience. Each bout I fence tells me I have so much more to work on. Hopefully, I can go up several notches before Pesta Sukan arrives...

An oily PE lesson

I would much rather have played a game of bball or floorball, despite my dislike for it, but NO..they had to to give us a lesson on sports massage. The demonstration by the PE teacher was already highly amusing; Gina was alternately giggling and squealing in pain from the pressure she was applying. I thought that the sensual way her dextrous fingers travelled up Gina's thigh was rather..artistic (open to many intepretations :) ). OK nvm... To our mortification, the PE teacher told us that we had to find a partner to perfom the massage procedure on us. Feeling a little tired so I lay down and let Shu Yi treat me first. The moment she began slathering the aromatic oil on my legs I was captured by a paroxysm of uncontrollable giggles. Yes, maybe I not only have funny bones, but funny muscles too :P. We decided beforehand to massage on leg only so we would spend less time washing it off. The massage wasn't too bad, but I was't greatly refreshed or revitalised by it. Sleep, not massage, works wonders for me. When it was Shu Yi's turn, she too was sent into a fit of laughter by my nimble strokes. Think I hit her legs a little too hard for the chopping motions though :S. By the time all of us were done, the dance studio floor was pretty much coated with oil. Then the next bombshell, "We don't want the dancers to slip and fall during practice so can you wipe up the oil with your socks?" EWWWWW.... Floorball anytime man, seriously :)

PW Parco Trip!

Met Kaye at Bugis MRT before going to National Library to scan the microfilms for newspaper articles that could possibly help us. A very helpful and amiable librarian assisted the clueless us with the handling of the machines. We initially intended to cover 2 years worth of Straits Times, but on seeing that one year already consisted of 40+ rolls of micro film (3/4 a cabinet), we wisely decided to shorten it to the first half of 2006.
The machines were userfriendly, but since I'm not very IT savvy person, I bungled up and the whole roll of film ended up unwinding. Thankfully Kaye saved the day, by extracting the film out and laboriously rolling it back into the reel. Scanning through the black and white of the film gave me a mild headache after a while, their jarring stark outlines indelibly etched in the slate of my mind. Soon after, Kaye noticed that the computers outside could be used to source for information too, at a rate of 3 cents per minute. All that after using the microfilm for slightly over an hour, but I reckon better late than never. The librarian helped me to check if either of us had signed up for a database account previously, and I was immensely astonished to discover I had an account since 2002. I think I must have created it out of sheer fun because I'm addressed as Mr Florenzo, an architect with a salary below $20'000.. O_o. We met Shu Zhang and went to Level 8 to look for reference books on parks and gardens. Photocopied several pages of notes and got a haul of fantasy books from the teenage section.
Next stop, Parco's fountain, to conduct interviews and shoot videos of kids frolicking in the waters. Luck was with us for we snagged 3 interviews with relative ease; a pair of security guards, woman in red and man in red. To add on, all of them gave answers that were favourable to our project (no we didn't threaten or bribe them or anything :) ). I attempted to take photographs of the man in red without his knowledge and somehow, despite my pretty poor disguising skills, he did not see realise that anything was amiss at all. Our PW had been finished for the day and we prowled Parco in search of a skirt (on my wishlist) I eventually bought one from an OP sale for $10. Must really thanks Shu Zhang and Kaye for so patiently touring Parco with me, despite their agendas and rummaging through the veritable stack of clothes to find the floral printed XS skirt I coveted :P. Do I look forward to the next PW outing!

Chocs and fencing

Mr Lee was really sweet today! I was running to the Entre booth to see what the big hoo-ha and chanced upon him contemplating which chocolate packet to buy. He let me choose one to share with the class =)! Upon Yin qi's persuasion I bought some candy floss and shared it with Xin Hui, Jin Rou and Shi Min.
Fast forward to fencing training because the rest of the day as most school days are, was uneventful. Darren wasn't here as he was doing lights for SYF drama so Reub suggested he be substitute captain -_-. We went to the fencing store to wait for Mr Teo and play a trick on JX. Reub tried to shut me in and I got inspired :P. When JX went in, we shut the door on him and refused to release him till he promised to treat us. The meeting commenced soon and Mr Teo brought some white macademia nut chocs for us all =). Settled boring and serious meeting stuff which I will not put here for the sake of preserving confidentiality. Did parry-riposte drills with Joanna followed by speed-change drills with Charmaine. Watched the guys fencing round-robin for a bit, Reub Yeo is pretty zai...he beat everyone save for JX (he was presiding) at pools, even the pro Reub Foo! Fenced Charmaine, Joanna, Yu Hua, Nicole and Box round-robin next. Lost to my seniors Nicole and Box 5-3 and 5-0 respectively. My blade control and beat blade needs a lot of polishing up; Box kept on doing parry-ripostes on me :(. Shared Mr Lee's Hershey chocs with the sabre people so they would be happier and have more energy to fence =)! Next week we get to fence David, never mind the obvious one-sided result! Can't wait...
Walked to Bishan Mrt with Reub Yeo, chatting about BW house and other stuff... Was informed that RP got Gold for SYF. (YAY!) Congratulations to all involved =)! Parted ways at the MRT since he went to J8 to buy something before meeting the RP people while I had to get home.

causality

The philosophical concept of causality, the principles of causes, or causation, the working of causes, refers to the set of all particular "causal" or "cause-and-effect" relations. A neutral definition is notoriously hard to provide since every aspect of causation has received substantial debate. Most generally, causation is a relationship that holds between events, objects, variables, or states of affairs. Causality presumes that all those things much have at least one cause,factor, or reason. It also usually presumed that the cause chronologically precedes the effect. Finally, the existence of a causal relationship generally suggests that - all other things being equal - if the cause occurs the effect will as well (or at least the probability of the effect occurring will increase).
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I was in the throes of indecision, wanting and not wanting, hoping and not hoping, when you, the revenant in red, sealed it for me. So it is then...

nadir

i read too much into
things
words taunt
smiles mock
glances thaw
festering

spread them out
like bones bleached
in the pale sun

and the maelstrom
in my mind
persists

no longer i can never wear my heart on my sleeve

The divine cookie

During one of the numerous breaks, Suat kindly offered to get us some cookies which me and Jay ( cookies not good!) kindly declined in return. We were idling as usual when Jay lo and behold! Spotted a dark chocolate Subway cookie lying in front of us all along! What can I say? It had to be a divine sign that it was meant for us! Clearly, They wanted us to devour it with ravenous relish and not make Suat share her's with us gluttons. We kindly offered to share the cookie with the rest, which they all kindly demurred. Chomp Chomp Chomp then...and only crumbs were left lying.
Another interesting incident occurred today. CT and me stepped into the MRT and there was this man ranting and raving about schools. I for a moment flirted with the thought that he was talking on the handphone and paid him no further mind. CT and me traversed to the side doors and were innocently minding our own business when he turned around and started talking to us in his purposefully, very loud voice, about the education system and the government. He started broadcasting his sometimes politically radical views to everyone on the MRT while CT and me exchanged looks of bemusement. I wasn' sure if he was unhinged or simply trying to emulate Chee Soon Juan. Was attempting to tell CT to get off at the next stop and later realised she wanted to tell me to move away from that spot. In any case, he resolved the issue for us by moving away, much to my relief. There are other ways to express views without implicating others, try Speaker's Corners maybe...

Beach bash and birthdays

Nadiah, Nava, Ash and me chose to be beach babes or bums for today and visited the sparkling white sands and sun-dazzled azure waters (sounds like a tourist brochure huh? :P) of East Coast Park. It was a long MRT ride, but I wasn't too bored cus we were doing what girls do best, Gossip! We weren't too sure exactly how to get there, but a nice, helpful Malay boy led us most of the way. Upon arriving, Nava and me took to the sea almost immediatly, while Ash and Nadiah stayed on the shore, taking random shots and laughing at our antics.
It was a pleasurable feeling to feel the kiss of the water on our skin and sway as the waves washed us in. I nearly lost my green slippers when a sudden rush knocked them off my feet. My short attention span had me getting restless in no time and I retrieved some floating kelp and dumped it on Nava's head =P! Went back to the shore to engrave our names on the sand and enlose them in a heart shape (no, we're not lesbian :) ). Nava and me indulged in sand-slinging for a bit, with her getting it mostly on her hair, and me getting it almost all over. At 1 plus, we left the beach to wash up (Nava took eons cus her hair trapped kilos of sand particles =P ).
Next on the itinerary was lunch at Far East Plaza. After buying some snacks and drinks from 7-11 and a bubble tea shop, we met up with Puva and Siau Xi at BK. Nava bought Nad birthday sandw1ches (No cakes for her, they're fattening) and we sang as she blew out the lighter flame (no candles :P). Rui joined us shortly after and we ate again, a proper lunch this time, at Tanah Rose restaurant.
Rui had to meet her fellow canoeists for team dinner thus being such good friends, we accompanied her to Wheelock place. Saw Muddy and Vanessa amongst the canoeists, long time no see folks! We bid goodbye to Rui and gallivanted at Borders, attempting to find the elusive Kamasutra, -_- (Nava's idea). Since Nad wanted to get home as quick as possible to feed her hungry bro, we all trained back at 5 plus.

Fencing makes my day

The school day is drab, dull. Fencing trainings are the sparkles that brighten and spice it up. They send me into a high of delirium as the adrenalin rushes with my blood. Must be the enjoyable interacting with the people I can hit on so well with, even better than some of my classmates.
I attempted to teach Joanna some of the new techniques and drills we had learnt and practiced since the start of the holidays and skipped the sabre lunch as a result. Think I was rather impatient and gave her short shrift at times because I naturally have a low threshold of patience and did not sleep too early the night before. We practiced the drills for about an hour before talking about all kinds of random topics, from David's girlfriend to the U-17s. After a while, Jing Xun, Darren and Reub came and we compared our common test results. From what it seems, I don't think I'll be alone during Chemistry Remedial =P! Misery indeed loves company. Laughed at Darren's new haircut, commenting now he looked as bad as Reub, which got me the finger from them both. They threatened to lock my fencing stuff inside the PE store, but I had already taken it outside earlier when I was meeting Joanna :P.
For once, we did not do bladework and footwork drills at the start of fencing. We did distancing drills instead, with the rules being a maximum of 3 steps and a lunge and yellow cards given for parrying, bad posture and crossing legs. Best of all, blade contact is banned. Was tired out after scraping 2 narrow wins against Joanna and Yu Hua.
We moved on to electric fencing not long after. It was essentially the same drill except that we were now wired up. When Darren asked me to help him clip, I mistakenly clipped it to the back of his lame instead of the side of it -_-. My incredible blurness strikes again! Fenced with Charmaine 5 points since Dar and Reub had finished and it was a really close fight, which ended 4-5. Learnt that despite comments from the coaches or referees or anyone else, fencing has to continue. Distraction only serves to lose your momentum. Sun Lu fenced someone else following us and gained 2 points in rapid succession with his speedy lunges. But the punchline was when he overbalance, fell and the person tried to go for the kill. Sun Lu gamely stuck out his blade and ended up getting the point :P, sending all of us into guffaws of laughter. Dar and Reub went again and JX got suited up to electric fence. No-one appeared to one to fence him so I decided to give it a shot :P. Given my severe lack of experience, I was given a huge advantage. One light his point, two lights automatically mine. It was a challenge for him to hit me without getting hit and the final score was 5 - 2 in my favor thanks to a big dose of luck. Reub took perverse pleasure as quoted from JX in saying Counter-attack No when two lights came on :P. Still, that bout was quite a sham.
Did some free-fencing with JX and he was being nice and sweet. I managed to get 4 points of him before succumbing to a quick attack. Presided for Reub and Dar and as always, the score between them was fairly close. Did some sparring with Reub (my nemesis, I can never seem to score points off him :( ), and got struck many times in a row with the same trick. My distance keeping needs to be more consistent and I have to stop parrying while stationery. Hand speed is also really slow... :(. Sparred with Darren, JX (5-15), and Joanna before calling it a day, it was already 7+. The 4 of us trooped to the canteen to cool down and hydrate ourselves before leaving for our homes... It has been a fruitful experience; every bout has a lesson to teach as it exposes your shortcomings.

Speak of the Devil

An EXTREMELY hilarious incident occurred today... We were all waiting outside A45 for Econs to commence when Suat and Kaye began talking about our new GP teacher, Mr Lee.

Chat transcript

Florence: Suat, you looked so exasperated just now!

Suat: I was exasperated! He's so irritating!

Kaye: Worse than Mr Teo

Suat: Actually Mr Teo isn't that bad...

Kaye: Hi Mr Teo!

*Mr Teo walks past, with an unfathomable stare at them*

Gavan: You were saying?

I couldn't help but crack right up laughing. Talk about speak of the devil. I wonder what surprises Maths Tutorial will hold in store for Suat and Kaye =P...

New GP teacher

School resumes. I felt it more strongly today cus in place of Commons, we had *GASP* lessons! Off to a great start by paying attention during Chem lecture and things gradually went down hill after Maths Lecture (I forgot my notes, so read my fantasy book :)). The rest of the lessons were mostly uneventful save for GP where we finally caught a glimpse of our GP teacher. A nice enough quirky fellow it would appear, maybe its a trademark of all philosophy teachers (I KNEW it does things to your mind). Prone to histronics and amusing monolouges, which is a good sign as it would bode more GP lessons that I DO pay attention in. Mr Lee is more serious than Mr Khoo when it comes to discipline, and has a stickler for respect for the speaker. So goodbye to all those side comments, eating in class, listening to mp3 and other little misdemeanours that Mr Khoo has so tolerantly condoned all this while. We're all gonna have an interesting time for the next 1 and a half years I daresay...
Fencing brought a shock when Henry said that the school had passed a rule ending all CCA trainings from next week onwards on the pretext of giving us more time to study. It is utterly nonsensical and completely ridiculous! The J2s had few problems coping with their CCA despite the promos and technically, since our syllabus is cut, we should have even less stress then they did! I shall have to content myself with the fact that the school works in mysterious ways unbeknowest to us all -_-. Had PT and was rather tired out by the first half an hour or so. Reuben came late and we all voted unanimously for him to do lunges for a minute and a half. Misery does love company :)! We did circular blade whacking drills for the next hour or so and resulted in some of us getting blisters. (ouch! :( ) I will be savouring the next training since it will possibly be one of the only few where most of us will be present, training TOGETHER. It's gonna be harder to foster the spirit of co-operation and camaraderie with people attending trainings in dribs and drabs due to H3 and various other commitments... Sigh, the halcyon days are already fast fading into the dust...

Movie marathon!...ok not really

Went to PS to watch Silent Hill then 4.30 by Royston Tan with Lestari. Upon coming out of the station, was plesantly surprised to be accosted by Xi-an who was off to watch King and the Clown with her classmates. Chatted with her for a while before meeting Lestari at the GV ticketing counter. Out of the 2 movies, I preferred Silent Hill for a rather superficial reason, the special effects :P. Despite the savage mauling the critics gave it (2 out of 5 stars), I thought it was a pretty decent movie. The storyline was intriguing, never mind the logic loopholes, (its a scare-fest after all), the CGI was convincing, the acting was relatively well-executed and the atmospheric music set the eerie mood throughout the entire movie. Let's not forget the cringe-inducing yet necessary gore which I felt was tastefully inserted. The ending was a bit of a let-down though, not that most horror movies have conclusive or happy finishes. We left cinema 4 only to enter cinema 6 for 4.30. True to its arthouse film nature, the film had MINIMAL dialouge and many long sweeping shots of emotive actions (Xiao Wu with tears streaming down his cheeks, the Korean tenant contemplating whether to smoke) .But it acheived the purpose of exhibiting the loneliness and occasional deviant behaviour that stems as a result, that Xiao Wu suffers from. Some things in the film are left unexplained, like why the Korean tenant leaves without tell Xiao Wu and why there is school in December, but there are fragments of hints to allow the viewers to make their own decision. The poignant ending, which I will not disclose, does provide some sense of closure to the story, though not to the multitudes of queries and thoughts in my mind...

Extra Fencing Training

Read, slept and then geared up for my first lesson of extra fencing with David. Pleasantly surprised to see not only Joon Faii but Alvin and Jun Hao as well, thought I would be the only one from RJ training. Did bladework with David one-to-one almost continously for about 30 minutes. It was generally fine except that 2 bad habits kept resurfacing: 1. Upward Lunging Motion 2. Inverse L-shape. And it would seem, my balance is as good as a ship on a choppy sea -_-. Felt rather exhausted and sweaty by the end of it all, an indicator that I need to work on stamina. Chatted with Julian a bit, than sparred with her electrically, with Alvin presiding. Manage to scrape a victory with a VERY strong albeit somewhat unfair handicap (one light her point, two lights mine). I was a lot less aggressive than usual and the will to attack seemed to have diminished slightly. Maybe it's because this isn't a competition scenario. Or perhaps I decided to be more of a thinker, instead of just blindly lunging to obtain a simultanni. Vacillitated from practicing a fast attacking motion to watching some of the foilists spar. Foil does appear relatively interesting, in a different way from sabre of course... If opportunity permits, I'll try my hand at it sometime. Got a soya bean drink to replenish my thirst, bid goodbye to David and watched Jun Hao and Faii spar with Henry (foil coach). No prizes for guessing who won =p... Departed for home soon after, brimming with thoughts and notions...

Paradise Found...

within yellowed parchment pages and honeyed words, do i gallivant and grace worlds enchanted with all things, strange, wonderous and infinitely beautiful. you may sinfully indulge in flagons of sapphire wine, or rise above all, to bite the Sun. you may tread on the hallowed path of the Downward Spiral and rot, only to find yourself more whole and replete than ever before... Paradise was not lost, it has never been lost... It does not wane with the falling of the golden grain in the hour glass, but starves, etiolated as They choose to seek it cheaply elsewhere