Monday, December 22, 2008

Omg, ALL three christmas services are finally over!!

Gosh, that was pretty tiring heh! I didn't realise singing could make one so sleepy and tired. Lols. I think it's because you sometimes have insufficient oxygen when you're singing, and thus the lack of oxygen makes one lethargic. But other than that, everything was lovely! I pigged after every service, cos there was an immense amount of food served from a very nice caterer. People were really singing and dancing about during the carols. Even though, there were some hiccups here and there. It was still alright anyway cos the point wasn't to be perfect anyways.

Right after the last service, we went to Ni ck's and had cell group fellowship and dinner. Played a very long game of Jenga and some of us geeks stayed over to play midnight age of empires matches. But before that! I got to walk a very cute, endearing, big fat black ball of a shepherd dog! And another handsome golden retriever! The black dog was very strong, when he ran he dragged me along and made me sprint/exercise when this was supposed to be some breezy, leisurely affair. Walking dogs late at night in housing estates is one of the most thereupatic things one could do =) Makes me miss having a pet.

We started the matches at 1am, and it was my first time playing a LAN game. But it was very fun! And also very frustrating when your calvary gets mowed down by a hundreds of archers by some insane defensive opponent. Until 530am I was glued to the goggle box. Tried to start an alliance with the player next to me but he was a total dud in the game! Damn.

Slept, left for home at 10 in the morning. Went home with the game still in my head. Went home and installed the newest version of the game. Played, slept for a short while and went straight back to church for the youth group's special events day! The fashion parade (it was called "Project Run away" haha)was really funny lols, I wish I could upload the pictures heheh!

It just dawned upon me that I've been in church for 4 straight days. And I think I'm due for worship team this upcoming saturday. Omg.


I am very sleepy.

Saturday, December 20, 2008

Today was Christmas service! And so is tomorrow!

In fact, there are 3 services in total cos our church is quite small. Hence, the entire audience can't be accomodated at the same time in one service. There was a million people involved in the whole set up. Ushers, sound/lighting people, actors/actresses, worship team, service team, the choir which involves me.

Heh yeah, I can't believe I sing.

But it went pretty well in the end! All the sunday afternoons spent singing, all the amusing vocal warm-ups, all the chatter and fretting about costumes, all the effort. It's all culminated to this. Besides this, there were other good things tonight as well. The cartoon clip at the start was really cute (I wonder where they got it), as usual the video effect was very snazzily done, and very smooth (gay men tsk tsk). Worship was all in sync. The play was very realistically acted, and the choir sang beautifully! (if I say so myself!). I think this is the christmas service with the most number of songs sung. There were so many carols I lost count. Wasn't even aware they were part of the service.

The choir attire was a white top, paired with black skirt and a gold silk bow tie that was quite large but very sweet! People keep telling me I look like an air stewardess, the Japan Air lines kind. Lols.

After service, we also had this marquee thingy that was held at the church grounds. Gr eg the Talent, played jazz on the piano and some other nice piano songs, next to this fake but very realistic-looking fireplace. Dinner was served, and very tasty dinner indeed! There was lemon-grass tea. I like!

And oh yes, there was cheese too!

All in all, a pretty successful night, I hope everyone felt the christmas spirit and enjoyed themselves.

Myself? Hmmm.

Before the service started I was talking to J, and he said he hasn't felt the christmas spirit yet, not for this year yet. And I thought about that. It's kinda true actually, christmas is near but I don't really feel christmas-sy. Maybe its the effect of being part of the service, you're so cued into the technical aspects of things you tend to lose sight of the bigger picture. Or perhaps its similar to how chefs spend so much time around food, that they don't get hungry when they are cooking. Immune to the tempting smells. Immune to the christmas spirit that I'm trying to create?

I don't know.

I'm leaving in 2 weeks. My mom is suddenly flying off to Paris.


Awhile after dinner, whilst everyone is slowing making their way off and there is only a few of us straggling performers left... Something was noticeably hollow today.


Sigh. I wish... wells.


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99% of the thoughts in the human head never make it out to reality. 99% of the conversations in your head, never gets spoken.

Wednesday, December 17, 2008

I have just spent the last 2 hours trying to accomplish the impossible. It's literally trying to find a needle in the haystack. Worse of all, it's trying to find a needle that is trying to be invisible, but is at most translucent. Yeah, try finding a translucent needle in the haystack. My back is hurting from hunching over.

Just try typing the words "birthday party" and be greeted by 20923748 possible search results. Oh my god. The things I do trying to look for answers.

Earlier today, there was supposed to be training. I was supposed to go for training, and then go for cell group. But then ever since yesterday, the throat was feeling weird and sickly and I didn't exactly feel like doing anything to irritate it further. So I slept most of the day away. Woke up in between my labourious naps with very scary, oh-my-gawd-what-the-f*ck-am-I-dreaming, extremely unnerving mid-afternoon dreams. Went back to sleep. Woke up again at 4plus, quarreled with the sister and left the house early for cell.

I thought I would join the guys for a short while, maybe throw abit of ball around, but yet not get too sweaty and worked up such that I irritate the throat. And then, drive to church nearby and meet the boys for dinner. Wells. That was the plan. Until I drove to the training grounds and see the guys all playing soccer in the baseball diamond field. Not a girl team-mate in sight.


-_-

Ohh--kkayy. So that settles it. I stopped the car for 5 minutes, pondered my options, and drove off. Forget it. They aren't even playing softball, no point going to say hello. Sighs.

SM U softball is facing a bleak future. The girls team actually. We are dwindling in numbers and there are no new freshies. And all the current girl players are either a) overseas or b) soon-to-be-graduating seniors. In fact, this semester, only me and ying were the regular seniors that could make it for training. Which is really sad. Cos the last two school trainings was really dismal. In fact, I was the only one who turned up. Now, I know sports should be rather gender neutral, hopefully, and I used to think I was pretty gender neutral. But now I realised it's not as fun if you're the only girl playing amongst guys. Sighs oh wells.

Cell is another thing. Our numbers are dwindling, there is a dearth, a lack of something. I miss the old days. Heck, this phrase could be applied to many aspects of my life right now. There is a lot to miss from the past. But I guess looking and wanting to go back is just as impossible as finding a translucent needle in the haystack.

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On sunday, there was a sermon about waiting. About what it means to wait for something. Sometimes we get impatient while waiting, and its the impatient people who actually get up and say, "I'm fed up with my situation and I'm going to do something to change it!". And so they do something to change the waiting. Patience, apparently, does not create room for progress. Impatient people tend to be the proactive ones.

But yet on the other hand, some people might extoll the virtues of patience and waiting. That good things come to those who wait and abide their time.

But! There's another saying which I love. And that is, "the time is always right, to do what's right."

Here's the question: What's right? Sometimes, I don't know what's right. It seems right, it appears right, people say its right. But it doesn't feel right. I try to discern right and wrong, sometimes, from the experiences of other people. But what if those experiences have contradicting lessons to teach me. How would I know what's right? And if happiness (tempered by conscience) is the be-all and end-all of human pursuit, is that the ultimate moral compass?

I ask two persons the same question, and both give me different answers. I ask myself, and I can argue both ways. I look at my friends, and I see two results. And then I look at myself, and realise I'm at the bus stop, just pacing up and down up and down, caught between a rock and a hard place. What would I choose? Really.

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There are days when I am tempted to find myself a fortune teller, medium or tarot card reader or some kind of diviner, who might shed some light on what this waiting holds. But pre-conceived notions have a knack of trapping you within its walls, even if you consciously tell yourself not to. And the last thing I want, is to live life from the definition of a $100 an hour consultant.

And so I spend my time searching the internet instead for a translucent needle. Someone is going to go broke because of her exchange already, economy is in recession, and I just made a few monetary mistakes. So this is a Cheaper alternative.

Singaporean to the bone eh? My writing, too, is getting cheap.

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Here's an opaque, open-ended, up to your personal inference, question:

Q: What do you do when you can't find an answer?


And your answer is...?

Saturday, December 13, 2008

One day, I am finally going to set aside time specially for Singapore exploration. There are curious stretches of quiet road that lead into secluded, sleepy estates, which I've spied outside the windows of buses and cars that I'm in. And I've been meaning to step into these rabbit holes for the longest time.

Some prime places of interest include Nassim Road, the thomson estates, the shophouse row near Grange road, the siglap area, and other parts of bukit timah. For some reason, I really like landed property architecture. Every house is different, from the gate (Victorian curly wrought iron or modern zen steel?) to the porch, to the garden, to the choice of shrubs and vegetation planted about, to the choice of pet. The furry kind or the smooth kind? Big bite or loud bark? If the house has fruit trees, even better, I would stand and envy the house owners for a few seconds for having free fruits. Even though I could technically get my own free fruit from the big abandoned fruit orchard that stretches all the way to choa chu kang outside my flat... which is now called a 'secondary forest'. Heck, I could get a lot more than one single type of fruit from one solitary but quaint fruit tree that resides on these landed property. I could get yams, starfruits, rambutans, durians, even tapioca (if I choose to dig). But I'm lazy and harvesting these stuff requires me to make an expedition into a jungle and two hours of soaked-to-the-skin sweating because the jungle is acrid and it is hot. But the family can just pluck from outside their window. Not me.

I like looking at the different kind of cars parked inside the houses too. A lot of times you see the big wig cars. The bentleys, the porsches, the mercedes, the V beetles. If you're lucky you might run across a resident who is walking the dog. Once I saw a baby pug, which is kind of like a puppy bulldog, at Island cream ery. Omg, it was the cutest thing in the world I swear! The best thing was that it was extremely friendly and kept trying to climb onto our legs. Plus it was small, so I wasn't afraid of it. The thing about dogs in landed property is that they tend to be the HUGE variety, with big mouth and teeth. So most of the time I steer clear of them. I do not handle myself very well around large dogs, sadly.

Which reminds me. I once saw this black labrador dog that was immense, and more striking about it was its tongue. It was simply... HUGE. Imagine this jet black dog, with silky coat, and a gaping mouth with a pancake sized bright pink tongue lolling out. I was with the nepa l team-mates when I saw the dog and exclaimed that, My god, what a huge tongue! And John the joker said, I bet you like that. Haha, ass....

Hmm so yes. Once I come back from exchange, I would go house-gazing some day. Sometimes I wonder if anybody else enjoys looking at houses. When I walk along estates with various friends, I'll point out the things I see but they seem to find it part of the background that's all. Hmmm....

One day. I'm going to walk back to my old house (landed property) and see what the new owner has done to it. It's near One tree hill, just behind wheelock.

Can you believe it? I used to live near Wheelock. How damnably convenient! Now I live in at The End of The World (as I tell everybody) lols.

Alrights! From next week onwards I got to start seriously packing for exchange, get my international driver's license, my insurance and buy a bikini and soon... get my hair cut and eyebrows threaded. And meet with a gazillion dear people who I will not see for the next six months. Plus get my last mahjong fix.

Set.

Hmm, a checklist of things done this short short holiday.

Got a new TV.
Got some new plants.
Went for softball camp.
Learnt texas holdem
Went cycling around Singapore.
Got the new GTA IV game (which sucks)
Seriously considered Lasik.
Met up with the SC girls.
Made strawberry tart and french onion soup
Experimented with gruyere cheese (my new fave!)
Went for pLAY's L word party
Went for Her story's 10th anniversary party
Didn't go to St James in the end.
Feel like going to Zoukout cos fave artists are there.
Searching around for a Xmas buffet.
Went to Ember, it was awesome.
Visited the US embassy.
Singing with choir for christmas.
Preparing for exchange

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Hmm, I don't sound excited here.

Wednesday, December 10, 2008

It is very tempting, sometimes, to fling open large bay windows and shout out to the valleys below, and let out all that air in your lungs. To unleash all that is bubbling over the lid so far, and pour out till there is no breath left in you. All in spurts of three-word phrases and cusses.

Rahhh.

So much for coming out. Nobody told you that coming out isn't the end of the story. There's more. Sometimes, its not appropriate to come out at all. Being an over-the-top, flag-waving hopeful activist, and ardent public (somewhat) supporter of gay events and bearing an entourage of similarly-minded gay friends... doesn't mean repression has ended.

I've gotten a cool new belated birthday present in the form of a shirt with queer slogans. But this doesn't mean repression ends either.

So much for honesty.

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What do you do, when you wake up one fine morning and realised your best-laid plans for the past six months have gone to moot. That all you did was walk one fine big circle back to the starting line, and find yourself in familiar territory. It is so not funny.

I have searched all the cupboards and upended all the clothes bins. Tore through the racks and sifted through piles of washings. I've gone through old bags and suitcases and closets full of dust. I even tried to search my friend's stash of clothing. But I still can't find my favourite underwear back.

And now I feel totally lost, because there's no reason why it shouldn't be in its rightful place of the 'underwear drawer'. I can't find a reason why its gone either. And the more I go through all the old places I've searched, the more disheartened I feel cos I know I'm repeating useless motions which failed on me before.

Why is there this incessant need to search for the underwear. After all, there's nothing overly remarkable about underwear. You could always buy new ones. But maybe you grew attached to it cos it was so comfortable. I could buy new underwear. In fact, I went to Robinsons and OG sometimes and there seems to be new undies I could try. Yet even with my new arsenal of underwear, somehow I still miss my old underwear very much. Something's just missing.

I suspect someone might have inadvertently taken my underwear somehow. Not too sure. There's an incredible urge to confront, but what if I was wrong? Then I'd be embroiling others in my own problems. But I need to find out! I wish to find out, then maybe I can shed some light on this underwear issue.

Where the HELL is my underwear.

Tuesday, December 09, 2008

Is it just me or does it seem like older people tend to speak less. Or at least they make their words count. Maybe experience teaches you to choose your words carefully. And also choose how you say them, the way you look and sound.

Past experience seems to show that the right words (whether sincere or not) can go a long way in achieving mutually beneficial goals for both parties. It also seems that words spoken on instinct, are usually a poor choice and I often regret what just fell out of my mouth. Most times, its too late to retract statements.

Just recently, I realise words chosen during first impressions are also very important. But more importantly is how you say them. It is important to appear natural while picking your choice of words at the same time. As though everything is spoken 'casually', that way you could avoid the pitfalls that were previously encountered. You might open less doors, but you also open less traps.

But I think the most crucial when it comes to word choice ... is the deep stuff. Now that's treading on thin ice. One wrong move and the ground beneath would shatter. Sometimes, the 'Silence is golden' rule would be helpful. Say too much and you put yourself in a precarious position. Caution is best to be observed.

And when you're not sure what to say at all? Zip it. The last thing you want is another crestfallen look on the person listening in. Or an 'unsure', shifty eyes look.


Talk. Can be disarming. Too much talk creates dependency, which going by your sorry-ass nature, usually leads to disastrous results. Cooking up another situation of the same kind is not going to help. I'm thinking if I could psycho-analyse myself enough, I would find the antidotes and self-medicate. It's just like trouble-shooting tech stuff, if you know how things work, which wires to connect, which programs to run and patches for fixing, you can get your tech stuff working again.

I just need to know how this brain works, then I can fix it. Stop the crashes.

Monday, December 08, 2008

A metaphor today.

Sometimes, I start off writing with the above title. You see, I think we live in parallel universes. I tend to connect the dots between unrelated incidents. Things which seem to have no meaning can somehow be applied to one’s life, for I believe there is an explanation behind everything one experiences. Some explanations are not so obvious, some can’t be simply fleshed out in words. Instead, they have to be depicted. Those depictions could be analogies, symbolism, imagery … and my favourite, metaphor. These are actual things I come across, things I see, read about, hear about, or sometimes just plain imagine. Innocuous, mundane, to airy fairy or outrageous. These things resonate with reality. Even though, for the plain outsider, it is hard to pinpoint what exactly resonates. But that is what I like about literature, you can guess, but you’ll never truly know what the author intends. And so,


A metaphor today.




Public transport during the night time presents one with opportunities. Sometimes, I have to make The Long Trek back home, depending which bus I take. The house is surrounded by forests, we live by a quiet road. The only nightlife around is the metallic whacks from the driving range nearby. Not much traffic around here, safe for those white balls in the air. Not much sounds unless you listen close enough, and you’d hear the hustle of crickets all around you. Next to the canal, next to the forest, there is actually a little bit of wildlife around here. As much wildlife as you can get in suburban Singapore. But the fact that they exist in such places, is enough to surprise you.

I once stumbled upon a frog. Almost literally. It was just beneath my foot, I was about to gently squish it. Thank God I spied it before landing. And when I lifted my foot, I found in front of me a most beautiful piece of nature. This was no ordinary frog. Not the skinny, neon green kind you see in cartoons and anti-littering campaigns. Not the dark turgid green type that are as fat as potatoes and are edible, those sitting in tanks. No it was an adorable frog. Small and humble (you want to cup it in your hands), nicely round, not too skinny or fat, just nice, egg-shaped, with a bronze-green skin and short cute stubby legs. It is a frog that belongs to a petting zoo.

I saw it, and smiled at my good fortune for seeing something so out of the ordinary on a pavement tonight. When you’ve had a taste or glimpse of something potentially good, you keep looking for it again.

And so the next few nights that were spent walking along my path, I kept my eyes peeled for a frog on the road. Lest I step upon something so innocent. Most nights pass without incident. Tonight was probably going to be one of those.

Walking back towards home, my eyes scanned the ground. But there some distance ahead, was something that resembled a frog. It was green, egg shaped and it looked promisingly like a frog. Growing with anticipation, I came close to it and hoped. But then I saw it was a

Leaf.

It was matter-of-fact acceptance, not disappointment that registered. After all, on a pathway flanked by trees, occasionally dropping leaves, what are the odds that you would find a frog instead of a run-of-the-mill leaf? What are the odds that one of those leaves you see is actually a frog? Moreover, cement paths are not the natural habitats of frogs. On a typical path, you might find fallen leaves, small stones, or even human litter. But frogs, are nowhere to be found.


It would take a miracle indeed, to find a frog on my path.



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This is where the metaphor is supposed to end. I had it all ‘typed’ out in the computer up there.

But there was still 20m to the house, and today was an odd day of sorts. God has a funny way of peering into your thoughts and a wicked sense of humour. 10m from the house, I stopped in my tracks. It’s unmistakable this time. Lo and behold! In front of me was a frog! Just as I had seen the last time, this was the same kind of adorable frog. I had to smile inwardly, what are the odds of finding a frog on my path? I bend down for a closer look and decided to acquaint myself with so elusive a quarry. I laid a finger upon its back, and felt the little froggy. The texture was jelly-like under a damp, papery skin. Interesting. I prod it again, and it fled down a drain.


So I saw a frog today. And now I don’t know where this metaphor goes.

Friday, December 05, 2008

Hmmm.

Home-made bruscetta on toasted bread with alfafa and avocado tastes really good. If there's one thing I learnt in simply bre ad, it's that simplicity goes a long way. All you need is good quality basic ingredients, a minimum of seasoning, and let the natural flavours show the way. No fushion-permutation of mysterious ingenious ingredients needed, just common sense pairing of foods. It also helps when your tomatoes belong to a brand called,

"Pink Beef".

Now that, makes my mouth actually water for a vegetable.

It's my last month in Singapore before I leave for the exchange, last few chances to experiment with home-cooking. I have decided on a few recipes to try, some of which I've already done. (e.g. the wasabi-sesame salad sauce on japanese tomatoes, topped with scallions -- I forgot the official name of the cold dish). Some I plan to do soon e.g. flash-fried sweet potato curls. And I want to make tiramisu before the year-end.

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Some days I feel abhorrently anti-social. Somehow the lure of lazing in bed with Dan Br own thrillers or sprawled in front of the new TV, is rather tempting. Instead of going through the hassle of dressing, packing, and transporting. Yes it would be fresh to meet new people and fulfilling to catch up with old ones, especially since I won't be seeing most of them for a long time. Yet somehow, you don't feel like doing the should've-s anymore.

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I feel like I need to be more 'nice'... for lack of a better word. But that might just open a can of worms in some distant background. Silence and standby seems to be my best bet. If you're not sure what effect you intend your words to have, it is best to hold back first. Is it?

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I seem to have entered a new phase. There are remnants of the old one. But this new one is refreshingly devoid of emotion. Almost, stone-cold, laser-beam logic and rationality. You ponder the stone in your hand and accept its existence, casually. All part of the greater scheme of things, and you, one special role for yourself. You know your lines by heart, stop peeking at others.

It's a mental taboo to reminisce, almost blasphemous, some kind of self-betrayal. It's a mental taboo to idealise, and to construe outrageous things. Nice things. But the hollowness of thought makes one flinch at the effort expended upon wasteful thought. I know the plot already, why bother reading the novel? One look and you know what lies ahead. Same old same old. To even consider seems laughable, to entertain seems childish. You're looking at the old headlines, and you know exactly how this pans out. So you accelerate nature, and calmly go through the motions. Its well rehearsed already. You know the roller-coaster by heart. After awhile, there's no thrill anymore. Now I understand what numb really means.

I don't know if this is a good thing eventually. But it feels like a good thing now, although sometimes, the detachment unnerves me. Permanence is a scary prospect, wouldn't want to be tranquilized forever. Or do I?

No saviour please, that would just play into the hands of cinematic entrapment, another bone for the demon dog that skulks in your head. Better not feed it.

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You absolutely baffle me. Like, why?? That's the question I keep asking when you say certain things. Or do certain things. Maybe I'm being over-sensitive. Heck, that has burned me many times. Maybe this is one of those times. But I'm not so sure...that this is one of those times. I'm sorry, I'm no good at dealing. Pardon if it stings, I don't mean to. I just don't get this whole shit. And most important of all, I can't see what you're seeing.

Someone once told me I should change the way I operate, the way I act.

I've tried a few times, tried all those well-intentioned advice. And ended up feeling like I was being somebody else not me. It never felt pleasant, it never felt ... honest. I'm not going to be someone else again. And if that makes me 'difficult', well. The world still turns tomorrow.

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I have a special role to play in this life, and I think I can foresee what the next page holds.

Monday, December 01, 2008

I watched the movie Dan In Real Life.

Honestly, it was very good. The critics were right.

But everything made sense until the last half hour.


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Serendipity is an invention. Like good fiction that hooks us and let us imagine things for awhile.