shaky shaky

before i start on the post proper, i'd like to pray for my cousin in china and my uncle in the heavens. i'm really glad i got to see you in may, so please remember me. you've been a really great uncle, even as a distant relative because i know you've helped us a lot when we came over, time and time again. i wish i had more time with you, and i'm definitely saddened. however, i know you'd have wanted us to smile, so i'll try my best. to my dear cousin, you'll probably not be reading this, but if you do by some divine intervention, i'd like to wish you all the best. my heartfelt condolences. i promise we'll meet up within the next year, so please take care of yourself.

Ah~ the fresh smell of the sea, the alcohol-like dizziness, and the numbness of feelings. it's quite a feeling, don't you think? even as i'm sitting on a comfortable office chair with a large office table in a large office on a large island, i'm still feeling shaky.

i can feel my MacDonald's coffee. damn.

to be honest, i feel really fortunate i'm not a chemical engineer. i've strayed off the path of chemicals and headed somewhere else, where i'll do things that have no relation to sea whatsoever. no ferries, no fastcrafts. a world on land and air. ah. to travel here and back again is just horrendous, and indescribable.

i've come to question myself everyday, why am i doing this again?

wait.

what am i doing in the first place?

oh ya. now i remember. i'm helping one of my colleagues out. and at a place that is 30 mins away by ferry from pasir panjang terminal. it's quite amazing, now that you look back. i've never thought i'll come to some place like this unless i take up chemical engineering. so ya, no points for guessing where it is. but i'm not telling where hahahaha.

i'm not complaining about the place though, it's quite a fine destination actually. food's cheap and relatively good, meeting people of various (and i mean at least 5-10) nationalities, sea breeze, and workload's reasonable; it's actually quite a good deal i'm getting. i'm just complaining about the ferry ride.

for most guys who are past 18, i'm sure you'll understand my point totally. the ferry here is our fellow penguin fastcraft, minus the army wearing peeps. however, the gender's the same, so go figure. i've already left a seat for you here with your name written on it (you know who you are), it's just under the "Rose" so please find your way there 2 years later. i've left a note, so if you receive it please let me know.

ah well. it's not like i'm going to do this forever. the most another month, or i think about 1-2 weeks more and i'll be banished from this island for good. bye bye pasir panjang terminal. sayonara. till then i'll probably hold fort and prevent my semi-digested macdonalds and the other following breakfasts from being expelled out from the stomach via my oesophagus. i think it's called vomitting. yep.

uguu~ i'm so not looking forward to the mainland ferry.

let's just digress from that topic and head on to reality shall we?

come to think of it, i can foresee a busy week ahead of me. yays comicon is coming to singapore this sat and sun! please if there are people out there who wants to see anime cosplayers (the movie and other cosplayers will be on sat), please go with me this sun! haha i just like seeing people cosplay (and i'm not talking about those with a hidden innuendo), because if you haven't noticed i've 30% otaku (people who are into anime related things) blood in me. i'm sure someone would testify for that (aye jason?) hahaha. no, i'm not looking out for espers, time travellers and aliens. although i would love to see koizumi, yuki and mikuru. of course i'll probably meet haruhi before that, so i think i better be mentally prepared. it'll be fun, so if you haven't seen part of their culture in akihabara, do come down an experience a mini version of anime there!

it's about 1 more month to NTU! woohoo! i'm so excited! anyway i better say this now, because this is probably the only year i'll be so enthusiastic about it. any later i'll be dragging my feet back. so while i still can, woohoo! school! mugging! yays! and i've decided to stay in hall, like finally. my mind was always in the middle, like should i, or should i not...but then i know i'll never get a chance to stay in hall again in my second year, no matter how i want it, because i actually stay 20 mins away from school. i already lose out on the distance factor. unlike my roommate who lives far in pasir ris. poor him. well, i'll try out one semester first, and if i like it i'll stay for the whole year. gotta experience this kinda stuff while i still can, so that i wouldn't regret not staying there. i'm looking forward to the fun times there! besides, it's probably the only year that i can enjoy. of course there'll be mugging, but it's going to be the easiest (as compared to the rest of the years, not compared to my standard. please let me survive!) year. looking back, no regrets, is what i'd like to follow. i've had certain regrets over the past years not doing certain things, so i shan't let myself regret anymore. i'll try to experience as many things as possible and live life to the fullest!

then there's engine camp (please tell me ratio isn't 6:1) and then there's openwater diving. then there's so many friends i want to meet before school starts. there's just so many things i want to do, but not much time. i must enjoy myself before school starts! ahh! i'm just looking at the many things that i can still do. while i'm still young.

after being in this organisation for some time, i get to realise how much we can actually accomplish in 10 years? it's really a lot, but it depends on your preference. it's amazing how some people are so determined to do so many things, but i'm looking forward to staying in one job. then again, who knows, somewhere down the road i might want to move around and do some interactive work. till then i'll just see what comes along. for now.

and yes my arms still hurt, but i guess i'm numb to it liao. tired. shall i sleep? hahaha...

climbing for hope

the past week has been rather hectic. been stuck on some ulu island ("u" is for "ulu" as "ular" is for "ulu") but it's been pretty interesting. missing my normal workplace. *sighs* nonetheless i'll see these two people when i enter uni, so when you're submitting your timesheets for the month, DON'T FORGET ME!! hahaha i need my money (:

anyway, today's a climbing day! went rock climbing in the morning with some of the sulphate peeps. climb asia at tessonsohn csc. been ages since i last climbed, i would say maybe in secondary school? and ya, i feel pretty chui. before and now. so yep, happy to feel back in action for a while, although my only real achievement was the last wall where i climb in approximately 1 minute. haha quite fast for me...but i believe i'm one of the slowest there so ya. it was also pretty funny at the bouldering walls, trying to reach the horizontal walls and seeing professional monkeys was a funny sight. ah i should do this sometime again. but not anytime soon. pain. ache. shows how much my fitness, if any, deteriorated. haha it was really fun though!

after lunch, some of us went to catch "don't mess with the zohan". not exactly a typical adam sandler show, but it was freakin' funny. hahahaha. although i think there was too much focus on his "ahem". so yep, my 1 cent worth.

i'm getting a bit numb to things nowadays, so i'm trying to adjust myself back. might as well warn my fellow readers that i'll take a few posts to adjust back to my usual writings. so please bare with me for the next few posts, i believe i'll be back!

unsettling animosity

fleeting feelings, fleeting dreams.

time to shuffle my feet and get myself moving. and time to grasp my future with my own two hands. and toes, if possible. (:

the beautiful moon has spoken. am i going to be next?

青空

four days passed swiftly and easily just like that.actually it was far from easy to be exact. considering the long bus rides, the mosquitoes etc etc. nonetheless, it was pretty interesting. at least i managed to see my hometown evolve from what it was 7 years ago. phew.

moving on, we headed from meixian to guangzhou on the 5th day. another long journey of 6 hours, with a lunch stopover at some village restaurant. the thing about china is, their themed restaurants are really nice. in a sense they have a good atmosphere (bamboo sheltered eateries, farmlands) and at the same time, serve awesome food. i was never really disappointed at chinese food to be exact throughout the whole journey, and i was always looking for more. more variety, not quantity, mind you. and i'm sure if i describe every single culinary experience you'll probably either get sick of it, or mouthwater till you're dry so i shan't describe. simply put, it was, well, pretty good. hahaha.

once we touched into guangzhou we headed straight for the hospital to visit my uncle for the second time. he looked pretty vibrant this time and with his wide smile on his face, he seemed unfazed by his terminal disease. at that point of time, i thought, will i be as strong as him when i face this predicament? will i be able to believe in myself when my body doesn't respond? will i have people to depend on when i've reached the dying years of my life? i still have no answers to those questions at the moment, and i'll continue to ponder. something that i will not be able to find out, till the time comes. meanwhile i'll just have to mentally prepare myself for it, because it is inevitable for human life to go through these periods. it's just how one looks at the situation and how he/she takes it. i really respect my uncle for that aspect. he's a very nice and caring relative, a good father, and definitely an understanding husband. furthermore, he might not remember the names of people, but remembers who they are in relation to, which is quite remarkable for his condition. really hope you can get well soon, jiu gong!

bustling streets of guangzhou

after that, we checked into furama hotel, 3 star. one piece of advice, if you have relatives in china, ask them to book the hotel on your behalf, and they will be able to secure better rates. tried and tested, and it's not a small amount. maybe 20-40%? yep. so apparently they didn't have the normal double rooms that we requested, so they put us into business doubles with NO EXTRA CHARGE! which meant, we had free internet access from the room itself! yays! always something to be happy about when you've been disconnected with the world for about 4 days. even though it's a celeron, it is still better than nothing! quoting from mr brown from the formula one ultimate queue up system, "can check email, surf internet, and play minesweeper, but not at the same time lah!" hahaha...after a while, we left for a 3 hour dinner (not buffet...how can a dinner stretch to 3 hours?!?) which nearly killed both the brain and butt cells of my cousin and i. truly an "experience". good food though. and wine. yep.

the nice wanton mee and...

the seriously big chee chiong fan

second last day in china. we headed of to an early start in a dim sum parlor, which served wanton noodles, youtiao, la mian, and quite a number of other stuff that you'll usually expect for breakfast. cheap. good. yummy. we headed on to the town city after that, where we popped by one of the major shopping centres in guangzhou. it was huge. close to 8 storeys full of shops, with levels dedicated to gaming, dining, cellphones, clothes and what nots. pricewise is was slightly cheaper than normal, but still, it's not your everyday chinese fare. ate at some authentic-looking thai restaurant, and found out that their tom yam had curry in it, satays with coconut, and non spicy thai fair. weird. but still reasonably tasty. jack and i then moved off with our china cousin to another ginormous shopping centre, where there was 1 whole level dedicated to the arcade. 1 freaking level. the size of that level, is as big as one single level of shaw (the movie place, not the office). one single level.

THAT'S A FREAKING LOT OF GAME MACHINES!! i reckon it had the most popular arcade games on the planet, minus pong and pac man, but the rest were just as, if not more, updated than singapore. shocking. there was even a drumming machine where players hit on not electronic toms or snares, but the REAL DRUMSET ITSELF! coolness! so what happened was we basically spent 2 hours there playing Initial D 4, which cost 3 yuen per game (which is like 60 cents) that in singapore, would cost up to $2-$3! wahahaha! uber cheap. *somehow that still doesn't justify the 2 hours spent there* but i must admit it was quite fun. for one, i beat my overseas cousin (we call him cong cong) at the first try with a game i never played before. of course i chose the trusty GTR, but had no idea that it would beat him. hahaha, it was quite the experience, but i'll never play the game in singapore. too expensive. i can get a chicken rice with every game played lar.

cramped houses in china

trapped

from there, we headed on to their television station, where there was a reasonably good restaurant beside. my grandfather went for a haircut, where one of my uncles brought him to some uber ulu shop within the housing estate which looked as though it was about to fall the pieces just because it was cheaper than outside. dinner ended swiftly as it begun, and it was the last time i got to see my sickness-ridden uncle before i left for singapore. it was a bittersweet moment for me. life versus disease. i didn't know how to feel at that point of time, but it definitely wasn't happiness. despite that, leaving with a smiling face goodbye is always better than a teary eyed one, so i wished him all the best, and that was it. we left on a plane back to singapore the next day, and that would probably be the last time i'll step in china this year. thanks again for the hospitality. thanks again for helping us plan for this journey. and thank you for being there for us.

guangzhou airport...not bad

and SIA food! baked chicken with cheesy potato, smoked salmon salad, and some coffee moose dessert~ nice!

i wouldn't say i've totally grasped the reality of life. we're in a viscious cycle of life. we're born, we live, we die. it's a fact of life. some might say it's sad, some might say it's depressing, but all good things have to come to an end. it's just a matter of how we use this precious time on earth to influence, and the meaningful things one can do. to know our time on earth is essential for all of us to know there's not much time to waste. life doesn't have holidays, life doesn't have breaks, and life doesn't have re-runs. we can't rewind our life to where we feel unsatisfactory and start from there. that's what makes life unique. we are in a continuous cycle where every single thing we do gives us an opportunity to make a change, no matter how big or small. some people might think they're young, healthy, and kicking, that they forget that sickness could hit them anytime. some people drop opportunities because they believe there are definitely more opportunities coming. some people think that life is just any other cycle, and therefore, just go with the motion without picking up important stones and pebbles along the way.

truth to be, most of these "some people" are wrong. correct me if i am wrong. it might seem sad, it might seem depressing, but that's what it is. people who realise this come into 2 groups, one being ignorant while the other being aware and want to improve their life. i wouldn't say i'm in either, because i myself am unsure in what i want in life, but i defnitely want it to be better. i'm looking for more satisfaction in life, so that when in my remaining days, i can safely say i've lived life to the best of my ability, if not, fullest. i'm looking for a source of motivation, to allow me to find courage to pursue my satisfaction. i'm not looking for high paying jobs, branded goods, or luxury yachts. what i'm looking for is how i can directly influence the people and things around me for them to have more fulfilling lives. easier said than done. i'm lacking the courage and perseverance, but i believe it is possible. i'm tired of sitting on my chair and wondering what i should do with my life. i just can't put myself to action. nevertheless, i'll see how it goes and continue trying to i find it.

life might be cruel, life might hurt sometimes, but that's the very evidence of life. "when i understood what it mean to be lonely, i understood what it meant to be happy. when i was about to die, i understood how to live." there are just so many wonderful things in life that we overlook, that we're used to, that we find normal and not worth being happy about anymore. like the fact that there's a space enough for me in the morning MRT. like the fact that there's a good toilet seat for me everytime. like the fact that the water from the water cooler is ice cold. it's a true bliss, no matter how small it is. everyday, the sky never fails to amaze me. ever changing, as if it had a life of it's own.

life, to me, is beautiful. it's just that sometimes we don't see the beauty of it all when we are obstructed by problems and external influences. i believe that life has it's challenges, but take it all in your stride. learn from it. you'll be bitten, you'll be hurt, but the most important thing is that you manage to crawl back up and stand on your two own feet, moving on towards the horizon. at the end, you'll find that these small pebbles, stones, rat-traps and mines actually constitute to who you are, a better person, and one being able to see the beauty in life.

how long has it been since that time, when we were young and innocent? how long has it been?

my friend.

the setting sun