ramblings of a glam queen

Telltale perfection

2010-04-11T02:04:00.000+08:00

I could read this page over and over. My goosebumps appear and a comforting warmth courses through my body at the delightful font and layout, and words that speak to me like when one reaches the pinnacle of understanding, but thirsts for more.

iTraditional

2010-03-23T16:24:00.002+08:00

I am sitting at Starbucks amidst arty professionals and studious boys on their Macbooks (everyone has an Apple computer these days), a lone couple who have come in to read the newspapers and enjoy a chocolate fudge cake together, and out of the corner of my eye, two nubile uniform-clad girls sharing a muffin. They carry backpacks and look barely into their teens. I also see my neighbour, just a year younger than I am, who always brings a different boy home every time I bump into her in the elevator. This time, she’s with two boys and they both look enamored. My favourite barista just walks in; she smiles and waves at me. She has new bangs.

I love people-watching.

As I was walking here earlier this afternoon, I thought about how the iPhone has taken over the world. It has undeniably made life easier with the multitude of applications that are downloadable off App Store but do we really need those things? I am an iPhone lover myself, and yes I love the fact that Coffee Finder helps me get to my nearest frothy cup of iced green tea latte, and how my Facebook app means I’m connected to my friends all the time. Style.com is my favourite app for many reasons, of which I shouldn’t start naming but one being it keeps me awake during especially dry sermons on Sunday mornings. Daytrotter gives me alternative music whenever I want it and the eBay app means I’ll never lose another bid again.

But I miss the simplicity and endless possibilities before apps infiltrated itself into almost every single conversation I have, how I can go out with a bunch of people and everyone is hooked on their iPhone and we end up sitting there and not talking, how we meet up to play games on our iPhones instead of having one meaningful conversation that I’ll always remember.

So on days like these when I’m given the luxury to people-watch instead of fiddling with another iPhone app or texting non-stop to other iPhone users on What’s App, I’m feeling strangely happy. This is one of the few reasons why I believe strongly in print journalism, and thumbing through pages of bound books in a public library. Not everything should move on with technology and times, because we’ll then become a society only connected by the World Wide Web and not any other means. You lose the ability to communicate. I recently watched “Up in the Air”, and they championed firing people through a webcam or text message. Can you imagine living in a society like that? Or breaking up with someone over email? That’s one of the worst things that can ever happen to anyone. You also become reliant on things that you will flail without – for example, my father is married to his GPS, while I have a love-hate relationship with it. I never use it unless I really need to, because I get annoyed at its mechanic voice telling me to “turn right in 500 metres”, when it really means 100 metres. This means that my father cannot get anywhere new without his trusty guide, and what’s worse, even when I know better, he listens to the GPS instead of me, which results in yet another argument. The day his GPS dies on him, he’ll be lost, in all meanings of the word.

I miss the days where I’d hang out with someone and we won’t be interrupted by another text message, or sit through dinner comparing apps and what’s the next cool thing to download, or not have a stupid argument with my best friend telling her to put away her iPhone because it’s stealthily stealing her away from me.

I’m traditional and I think I could live without all these things. But maybe I’m on my own.

Two uniform-clad boys have just come in to pick up the two young uniform-clad girls. They leave together and I see the baristas behind the counter shaking their heads and sighing, “Young and carefree.” As I watch the teenagers leave, I wonder why they’re even hanging out at a coffee joint. Because when I was their age, the place to be was McDonalds at King Albert Park or Burger King in town. We didn’t have money for expensive coffee.

I’m not even thirty yet and I’m already shaking my head at the younger generation. Even my grandmother is cooler than me. She talks to teenagers at the bus stop all the time. I wouldn’t.

Give me a junkyard and bright Louboutins

2010-03-22T01:23:00.006+08:00

I've been wedding blog surfing, given the spate of weddings I have to attend this year. Ruffled (http://ruffledblog.com) is a vintage wedding blog that puts together all sorts of quirky ideas, unique handcrafts and a smattering of one-of-a-kind photo shoots in every place imaginable. Many breathy sighs later, I'd like my wedding to be a mesh of all these:

The highlight of my outfit will be my shoes.

Flowy dress, stroll through long grass. Make sure it's not done locally or the mosquitoes will have a feast.

Splash of colour with furniture and cushions in the wild.

Random junkyard, grey overtones. I've always liked grey.

Black gloves are a must.

A Twiggy-inspired lace dress. I'm not crazy about the dress, but check out her bouquet. Exactly what I want: freshly-picked with stems trimmed, no ribbon, no foil, no frills.

sigh

Running up that hill

2010-03-19T02:29:00.003+08:00

It must be a very sweet feeling to be carried on the shoulders of the one you love at a music gig.

That was the main thing that struck me tonight while watching Placebo at Fort Canning, amidst the bobbing, singing, dancing, plastic cups of beer, Molko's insanely amazing voice and several wayward Caucasians.

The poor boyfriend though. I wonder how fun it was for him. But she - in a powder blue tank and black jeans with cool Carey Mulligan hair - raised her hands in the air, laughed and swayed on his shoulders and had the best view of anyone else in the crowd. I was very envious.

I've gone for more music gigs this year than I have watched television. Times have changed. I'm suddenly hooked on live crooners and the adrenaline rush of being there right in front of them and appreciating music from the beat of the drums to the bass to one tiny strum from the guitar. I also wish I were more musically inclined, so I can actually express what I'm hearing with the right words.

Still, thank you to everyone who has made me a mixtape in the last few months - denise, rongjun, jeff, faizal, bev, cheryl - you have contributed much to my musical influence and somehow made a strange difference in my life.

Fall for a fashion designer

2010-03-12T11:22:00.005+08:00

Hussein Chalayan Fall 2010

Haider Ackermann Fall 2010

With the new blog up, I can now focus on other topics of interest here - fashion randoms, celebrity infidelity, earthquakes and tsunamis and pickings from the human mind, perhaps. We'll see. I also need to do something about this blog template because I think it's impeding the way I write. Any takers?

Fall trends this year are quite the myriad of sculptural lapels, structured coats and arched shoulders. I took an eyeful of a journey from the safe staples of Maison Martin Margiela to blazers with strategic cut-outs exposing slivers of skin from Alexander Wang. Christopher Bailey and his giant-collared shearlings and overcoats for Burberry Prorsum to Yves Saint Laurent's seventies-influenced shapes with capes and mid-calf skirts, painted statement black with nary a glimpse of grey.

Speaking of mid-calf skirts, Marc Jacobs played on the A-line this year with a modern update on the classic silhouette, and included in his repertoire ankle socks and tweedy grey culottes - giving new meaning to irreverence as he shimmies away from his enjoyably psychedelic spring collection.

I wonder how all these designers seem to come together in a meeting of the minds and decide that structured coats and A-line skirts make the hit list of Fall 2010. Is there a fashion bible out there which I'm unaware of?

But the two shows that left the most impression on me were the lower-key designers Haider Ackermann and Hussein Chalayan. Ackermann with his play on futurism, his signature structured loops and folds artistically executed, and Chalayan, playing homage to the late Alexander McQueen as he takes a ride on the wild side with an avalanche of headpieces and glitter ensembles.

What fun, what fun. I write about this all from my bed in a ten-year-old nightgown worn so often the material has achieved a new level of softness. Elmo peeks out from the front of it and waves. Miles apart from the haute couture on my screen. Perhaps fashion designers have mornings like this too, you think?

Fly me to Space

2010-03-04T04:00:00.002+08:00

Don’t let his flamboyant get-up or his affiliation with Lady Gaga sway you into thinking Space Cowboy is yet another diva. In fact, he’s just the opposite; if this big-hearted musician were to own a planet in space, he would welcome anybody on it.

“I would invite you!” says Nick Dresti with an affable laugh. Known more popularly as Space Cowboy, this talented DJ, producer and singer is true to his moniker with his love for futuristic things and fascination with space travel.

“That’s a really interesting question actually. What about you?” He then poses the question back to me, intrigued, as I fumble for an answer.

Throughout the 20-minute press conference at Bershka at Ion Orchard, Space Cowboy managed to dispel every single pre-conceived notion I had of him and paint a very real picture of the person he is. The 34-year-old appeared shy but polite, averting emcee Annabelle Francis’ gaze whenever she engaged him in playful banter.

One-on-one however, and he’s as warm as his bright red equestrian-like outfit, putting you at ease almost instantly.

Perhaps this explains his preference for a behind-the-scenes role as Lady Gaga’s personal DJ. But when it comes to questions about his controversial co-worker, Space Cowboy is obliging but tight-lipped.

When asked if Lady Gaga is as wild as she dresses, his answer is a deadpan yes. When asked to talk about her style, he replies immediately, “It’s great, I love it.”

However, when questioned instead about whether he could see at the recent 2010 Grammy Awards as his view was blocked by Lady Gaga’s massive headpiece, his eyes crinkle up into slits as he shakes his head vehemently.

“No, I really couldn’t! It was impossible,” says the first-timer to Singapore with a chuckle. “You should have been there!”

Space Cowboy is possibly the most glaringly honest celebrity I have ever encountered. He offers rehearsed replies to run-of-the-mill questions. But ask him something different about his life and he’ll open up like an unearthed pearl.

And what’s not to love about him: When a world-famous musician removes his captain hat and places it on your head during a photo opportunity and doesn’t give two hoots about hat hair, but tells you instead that “it doesn’t matter, as long as you look great”, one begins to wonder if Space Cowboy should really be called Down to Earth instead.

*For more pictures and the location of the original article, click http://onesixtynotepad.blogspot.com/2010/02/interview-space-cowboy.html

On another note, I have a new blog! Created mainly for more personal musings; but only if you ask for it.

Wired tape

2010-01-18T12:23:00.008+08:00

I like how music always has a way of reaching into an untapped part of your being and retrieving memories so entrenched I've thought them forgotten. They form a colourful puzzle of people and places that piece together to form my life. Morbidness aside, I imagine the last few minutes before death to be a fastforwaded saturated film reel and a cacophony of musical notes.

This morning's spins as I daydreamed:

In For The Kill - La Roux: shopping at H&M Ginza, and letting the energy from the song penetrate as I danced and weaved through the insane crowd after a sleepless 36 hours

Hysteric (acoustic) - Yeah Yeah Yeahs: my first yyys song, and before I even knew the title, I pleaded Denise before the day began to "please play my good morning song!" as the perfect cure to gloomy mornings

C.S. Lewis Song - Brooke Fraser: singing in the car with RJ past midnight along the expressway either to or from the airport. "This is my favourite song; I listen to it when I'm sad. Did you know it's a Christian song? Ironic, right."

Collie Man - Slightly Stoopid: i think of giraffes and free-roaming tigers. All because this is Bev's South African song, and she got me so influenced I imagine myself there when I listen to it even though technically, that never happened

Don't Wait - Dashboard Confessional: a suitor once sent this to Julienne, and she forwarded it to me three years ago. I picture that suitor now in a Zegna suit holding out a corsage

God Bless the USA - Lee Greenwood: overnight KTV in Hong Kong, when Deb, Esther, Bev and I changed the lyrics to fit singapore and filmed ourselves singing and doubling over in laughter. "And I'm proud to be a singaporean, where at least I know I'm kiasu, and I won't forget Lee Kuan Yew, who gave that right to me, and I'll gladly queue up next to you..." We were possibly high on an overdose of golf-ball sized wontons

Broken Strings - James Morrison feat Nelly Furtado: UK Road Trip. We played this song numerous times and each time Paul would go, "I like this song! Who sang it ah?", to which either Sara/Esther/Me would say, "James Morrison, you asked this question before once/twice/three times."

Wannabe - Spice Girls: dressed as the spice girls on our way to a themed birthday party. "Do you think we're overdressed?" "What if we're the only ones dressed up?" "Never mind, I think we will WIN." "What do you think the prize is?" "I hope topshop vouchers." Ginger Spice: "I look like a hooker la."

Your Heart Is An Empty Room - Death Cab for Cutie: i like playing this song in the office because Sam knows all the lyrics. She sings it like a consolation as she stands in front of my table and scowls at the newspaper as she works the scanner, her best enemy

Human - The Killers: "Are we human, or are we dancer? What is dancer? It doesn't make sense grammatically!" I cannot remember who said this, but it took place in someone's car outside Ion Orchard

Use Somebody - Kings of Leon: skipping along the bridge at changi village on New Year's Day making up the lyrics as we went along and only repeating confidently the first line

Tiffany Blews - Fall Out Boy: this was so 2009 for me. Bev and I blasted this song countless times, only shouting at the top of our lungs during the chorus, "oh baby you're a classic, like a little black dress!!!"

All My Only Dreams - The Wonders: KL and Genting 2005, the huge white bed and starbucks at night while pretending to blow out smoke. I also picture Luq in his trucker cap.

Unintended - Muse: one balmy night when I ran downstairs to lie by the pool, stared into the blanket of stars and cried

Pretty Boy - M2M: secondary 3 on the overnight sleeper train in China. Ling and I sang it from the top bunks only to annoy the bottom-bunk sleepers to prevent them from sleeping if we couldn't

My Heart & I Decided - Ella Fitzgerald: Christmas trees at Ginza, 9 degree weather, walking aimlessly, my mauve trench coat and standing in front of the Chanel window display

The Shadow Proves The Sunshine - Switchfoot: studying in the CI club room in school on the 5th floor with Felicia before class, her dozing off, me trying to explain the lyrics of the song to her and playing Pachelbel's Canon in D on the electronic keyboard when she fell asleep

Heartbreaker - Mstrkrft: zouk last year when Jan waved Mstrkrft away because she thought they were imposters trying to take pictures with us. All she managed to say to save her own skin was, "Hello" and a handshake, instead of "Yes, I'd be honoured to take a picture with you!"

Wait, they don't love you like I love you

2010-01-15T12:56:00.002+08:00

I've found the cure to stony early mornings. I'm not one for mornings; I don't want to talk to anyone and my skin is pallid and make-up free. All I'm thinking about is going back to sleep, which is why I prefer the long bus journey over the train which might get me to work in half the time because the last thing I want to do is to feel like a squashed sardine at 8.30am.

So planet awesome kid is happiness to my soul. I couldn't rub that silly smile off my face for few hours after these doe-eyed, apple-cheeked children sneaked their way into my heart. I encourage everyone to find their daily dose of endorphins in the first hour of work, be it furry kittens or comic strips. It helps.

I'm proud of how knowledgeable I've become ever since I started working because the Internet is my best friend on slow Mondays and lazy Fridays. I've googled almost everything out there that interests me, and I've scanned through best brunch places in singapore, cheap flights to cambodia/vietnam/italy, benefits of a weekend car, countless new fashion blogs, lyrics of yeah yeah yeahs' songs, where to get the cheapest tory burch shoes, and pronunciation of all the brands under the sky. I've signed up to get a new word of the day from dictionary.com, added MSN plus! which has a function which prevents your boss from viewing your chats and I vote "look of the day" daily on style.com.

I never knew all these five months ago. I hope this is a presage of what the year ahead holds. Just like how my suddenly-capricious father has taken a liking to japan and uploads personal pictures on facebook and innocently types location: g:\\, 2010 should be a very entertaining year ahead of all things new.

Demise of my green and white

2010-01-06T16:04:00.005+08:00

For the longest time, I was ever so enchanted by kate spade.

Now two bags and a wallet later, I'm saying goodbye to my old colourful friend that first enticed me into the world of branded bags.

They have the most eye-popping colours on every type of basket bag, clutch and handbag imaginable. Their masterful play of green and white, reds, pinks and hues of orange, polka dots and stripes always transported me to another world during the later part of my teenage years. Their advertisements and whimsical taglines found their way many times to my desktop wallpaper and MSN nicknames.

On my twenty-first birthday, I skipped my way into a kate spade store in Hong Kong and almost keeled over in excitement when I purchased my first (birthday present from the relenting mum, of course).

Perhaps my wise father knew I would grow out of it in time and he never fails to nag against spending more than $50 on a bag. He never has believed in buying branded items, and never casts new buys around the house a second glance. Maybe he knew that the desire will always be for something greater as how life is continuously aspirational.

But with five people carrying the similar-looking label within 10m of each other on the train in the morning, kate spade is becoming the icon of every Jane or Mary as they strut around with their prized possessions swinging off their shoulders. Magazines have stopped featuring their bags; I now see pages stocked full with their jewellery instead. Charles & Keith did a whole season on blatant copies of kate spade designs a year ago, which almost drew the line for me then. And with more and more citizens of our island popping by the US for that cash-saving trip to a kate spade factory outlet and coming back with buys costing a quarter of what we pay here, it's high time to move on.

The demise started with the huge store opening at Raffles City - nobody knew what it was when the delightful numbers were housed in little store tucked away in the massive Takashimaya department store. No, I will still use my bags because they were wonderful buys and I still love them. But I'll stop buying more and focus my fancies on another designer instead; after all, what's fashion if it isn't an ever-changing experience?

We were talking about labels in the office yesterday, and this conversation can only happen when three girls on the third floor are browsing through style.com and net-a-porter at the same time. It always happens when the day is about to end and we're tired from sending emails and talking to the SPH receptionists. So after much deep thought to "Which brand personifies us?", we now have a Calvin Klein, Alexander Wang and Marc Jacobs collaborating together and wishing we could one day set up our very own business.

Let's get out of this country

2009-12-18T12:24:00.003+08:00

Exactly one month since my last post. Oh, I am a sloth.

Tonight I'm leaving for Tokyo and Hawaii, and I'm starting to feel a flutter of my past in the pit of my stomach; the kind that tumbles because an idyllic picture of calm seas, diamond-glinted beaches, lots of walks atop silky bare sand and therapeutic shopping lies ahead. I'm looking forward to quality time spent with my family and Christmas with our Canadian counterparts: what a rare occasion for us all and I'm thankful.

The flutter comes only now because I haven't been able to think much about the prospect of being free to travel again, to be me, to have thoughts not peppered with work and to go back to being a carefree soul. I need this time to be alone, to be with loved ones and to do what I love. And to reflect and let my emotions go. To really think about this life and all I've hidden behind the heavy drapes of work in the last four months. I'm only afraid the bout of wanderlust will not disappear when I get home and there will be the gnawing need for escapism once again.

It's frightening though; coming back spells 2010 and next year is a blank slate. I'll be on the job prowl again starting January, with no idea what will come my way. I have four weddings to attend to next year and bridesmaid duties.I have a father who cannot stop matchmaking me and steering me to law school. My best friend's leaving for South Africa again in July for five months and it'll be painful. I want to go on a mission trip next year with OM, and am prayerfully considering the options. I want to plan something for the children again this Valentine's Day. By the end of next year, I want to be a successful journalist.

Merry Christmas, everyone.

A tale of two red soles

2009-11-18T10:16:00.007+08:00

Exactly one week ago, Denise and I spent a good two hours or so chatting in the Christian Louboutin storeroom as I accompanied her during her press walk-throughs. My first impression was that it looked more like a post office's storage room; the place was exploding with recyclable-brown boxes and similar paper bags. Not one comfort chair was in sight. We spent the day trying out lonely red soles waiting to be worn on the cement floor, and looking up in fascination when the sales assistant rushed in swiping platinum credit cards and chalking up receipts of $3000 at one go.

The experience was nothing like what I expected. I used to walk into Louboutin with fear that someone was going to judge me for what I was wearing, or if I didn't look rich enough. These days, I walk in not caring without what anyone thinks, and I'm done with the mindset that I need to look the part when I window-shop at branded stores. At Louboutin that day, it was nothing special - nothing fluttered in my heart nor a sense of pride that we had a part to play in the prestigious family. The people working at the store were really fun and down-to-earth, and behind all that glamour of advertising and labels, it really is just a shoe store.

--

The thing about me is that I've never been one that follows typical fashion trends. I don't really know what next season's big trend is, nor do I read fashion nation or style.com daily to keep myself updated with fashion news. I do know more than the average person perhaps, because I have stacks of magazines piled up waiting me to thumb through in the office, and I like walking into shops to simply observe - but I'm definitely not in the know like some fashionistas are. When it comes to dress sense, I wear what I like and I love rummaging through my wardrobe digging up things from years ago and treating them like brand-new items waiting to be worn. At last month's Topshop fashion party, everyone looked like carbon copies of each other in high-waisted shorts, harem pants, bandage heels or gladiator sandals. I felt like I just walked into a crowd of Topshop minions, and felt slightly out of place. I don't own harem pants or a boyfriend blazer. So what does that really mean? I wonder if I'm dated sometimes; but then again, who sets the standards for these things?

That worries me sometimes, if I want to eventually venture into fashion writing or anything along those lines. Should I be more concerned about the demise of super shoulders and the advent of studs in the months to come?

I still believe a whole lot in personal style though. I admire a person most when she or he defines the things they wear, and not the other way around. It's fun to see someone in something, know that you would probably never wear it but still love what the person is wearing. When the GGs are together, I see four other individual styles - classic, funky, eclectic and sophisticated. It makes very good photos.

In the meantime, two of my favourites from Christian Louboutin's SS10 collection! -

Citizen escapism

2009-11-16T00:13:00.005+08:00

This felt like a decade ago - My first Disneyland experience, at age 21.

I've been thinking about how far escapism can take someone. Disneyland is escapism personified in a place where millions go every year to tear away from the busy clicking of shoes along marbled floors at train stations and dreary rushed lunches where one hour is hardly enough time to hold a decent conversation with anyone. So Walt Disney obviously had that in mind when he created a world "where dreams come true"; every person taken to a place where only the good childhood memories remain in happily ever afters.

It's the only place where exorbitant prices are accepted with smiles and people fork out wads of cash for a HK$25 for a Mickey Mouse chocolate ice-cream bar and US$3 for a sugary churro. People stand in line for hours under the hot sun in noisy chatter waiting to get into haunted houses and Peter Pan's world. Others dash off in search of their favourite princesses, two and twenty-year-olds alike, for that one moment captured on film. I did all of the above: had my fair share of ice-creams, churros, candied apples, candy floss and Mickey Mouse shaped burgers; made sure I went on every single ride in the different lands by strategising fast passes and running all over the place and sacrificed the go-kart ride to take pictures with all the princesses.

I was very happy that day. It peaked when I stood rooted to the ground, transfixed by the magical blend of fireworks shooting through the pitch-black sky in Hong Kong.

I look forward to escape all the time. When I'm upset about something, I rent a hk drama serial or start reading a book and never want to stop doing so as I lose myself in the plots. When I'm reflective and nostalgic, I look through old pictures and think of endings written by me. When I'm bored, I walk into Chanel and YSL and hold the bags against myself and pretend I can really afford them. The only thing I'm looking forward to about the end of this year is Christmas in Hawaii and Japan and knowing that I'll be away from here for awhile. In a place where no one knows me and the unfamiliarity breeds hope in fond memories on a clean slate. But how long can that sustain me; I have no idea.

Will there ever come a point where reality is where I really want to be?

Turn up the sun

2009-11-02T14:56:00.003+08:00

It's pouring outside and I'm actually liking being in the office on a slow, quiet Monday afternoon. Mondays are hardly fun to wake up to, but it was more than made up by the stroll down to ann siang with denise to gloss over the moving out sale at front row during lunch. It was still way too expensive but we smiled at our reflections for two seconds without feeling the pinch in our pockets; her in an eley kishimoto navy blue chiffon dress and me in a wood wood white shift dress.

Today, I started thinking whether I made the right decision. I was thrown into the deep end from the day I started due to lack of manpower; would PR have been better given a full headcount at work with accounts I call my own, instead of being flitting around helping out on everyone else's work never feeling the sense of satisfaction because above all, I'm bits and pieces here and there? But then I pictured myself staying more than December's worth and I began to feel dread again. I've had enough of being the middle person and doing costings and picking up after everyone else, and garnering coverage for the client which I honestly don't care about.

I want to be writing again. At school, I never missed it much because I was always doing it, article after article, and the nights at the Chronicle over and over sub-editing for the slightest mistake. I miss it very much, and this weekend I felt the adrenaline coursing through my veins as I sat at starbucks and started applying for journalism jobs. I hummed to myself as I dug out my old writings that would form my portfolio - from Female, the Chronicle, school and the final-year project - and I was happy just holding on to knowing what I want to do, for now at least. I've never been so motivated, excited or joyful applying for any job, but now I am, with an uncertainly pool ahead of me, not knowing where I'll end up eventually or if I'll even get there, or what if I'm bad at it? I'm past caring; all I know that He's leading me there.

My boss says she hates the word "eventually". She chided, "What is eventually? Are you on the right track of getting where you want to be? What are you doing about it? Stop wasting time. If you are, then when is this eventually going to be? Work your way up there girl, go ahead and be a writer. But I don't want you to be just any writer on the street. I want to see you become editor."

I'm trying to find my footing again. It's stopped raining by the way, and I can see the building in front of me again. This reminds me of the classic case of removing the tinted glasses and moving onto another place where you think you belong better. It's a journey called discovery.

Break my heart for what breaks yours

2009-10-22T10:40:00.003+08:00

Of late, I feel like the outer part of my life is intangibly disconnected from my inner being, my emotions and who I think I really am.

I attribute it to the busyness of work, of course, and this need to meet up with people and fill my days with a multitude of activities after. I never have time to myself anymore, I can't even hear my own thoughts these days or my heart speaking to me. When I'm thinking, it's always about work or thinking about when Friday will finally come, and mulling over the fact that I want to write for things I'm passionate about.

And so I've become this stranger, even to myself, on weekdays. Suddenly, I feel like whenever I'm having a conversation with anyone, I stray away from talk of emotions or how I'm really feeling because I don't want to break down. Two months ago, my life was all about me and my feelings. Now it's simply built around the hours I surround myself with and that makes me. I don't particularly like it, but it means I've buried you, you and you at the very back of my head and forgotten what it's like to unlock it.

Which is a great thing, for now at least.

But the greatest of these is love

2009-10-05T10:13:00.003+08:00

Love is a very intricate thing - the world plays it out to be complex, entrenched in a constant equilibrium with happiness and contempt, but I think pure love is really very simple.

I've never read 1 Corinthians 13 so many times over in my life, but over the last week, I keep going back to it, and it has spoken to me in so many ways. The standard that God set out for love is truly great, and all-encompassing. The Bible really does give the purest and highest level of love there is, and every single word it speaks rings true, because if any of those things mentioned were lacking, it wouldn't be love. It's difficult to attain, sometimes given our wilful human nature - highly impossible - but it's worth trying. Because when you try, you realise there's no point dwelling on past hurts, what-if's, people who have let you down, concerns about the future, fears or anything the you, the world or the devil imprints on your heart - cos God's love, and that being the love we strive for, conquers all.

¹If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. ²If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. ³If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.

I see a reflection of myself. The years of being there for my friends, the hours of counselling, confiding and celebrations. Community projects, community service for what? The hours that we so needed to complete in secondary school. Tossing a coin into the box of that blind man as I walked past him, feeling more compelled to give only when he started strumming lines from The Old Rugged Cross. Was that gesture more out of guilt? Giving to the tissue paper lady at hawker centres, was it more because I needed the tissue paper or was I doing it out of love?

⁴Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

I felt an inexplicable sense of comfort dawn on me after reading these few lines. It's true isn't it, all these qualities of love that God possesses. And to think that there really is such a love as that which exists in this world, how can I then not love the King of the world who has given up so much to love me in this way - how can I not try to love him back the same way? Loving others is only an outpouring of my love for Him, and I need to be able to love Him first. In another version it says, "It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things".

I went through a tumultous period of hurt this weekend. If not for these words, I'd have become entirely bitter and cynical. But "it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs". Maybe one day I'll understand you and why you're made the way you are.

⁸Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. ⁹For we know in part and we prophesy in part, ¹⁰but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. ¹¹When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. ¹²Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

The revelation of love, the day when you can truly see His love for you is the greatest day. Today, I see how all the setbacks in my life, the trials, tears and rejection has only made me the person that I am today. If not for those, I wouldn't be writing this now. This constant spiritual growth and this wonderful plan that He has - I'm in awe.

¹³And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

:) I'm happy.

Beautifully wrought fashion

2009-09-17T10:25:00.004+08:00

This morning, NYdailynews.com somehow found its way into my browser and I finally paid my tribute to the currently ongoing New York Fashion Week as I popped little nuggets of chocolate into my mouth - note: the chocolate habit is very bad, I need to start kicking it but somehow endorphins are highly necessary while at work and the cartons of tudor gold lying around the office make it impossible to resist happiness.

Well, in particular, I was reading an article about Marc Jacobs' 80's look at fashion week as they drew inspiration from Whitney Houston's heydey. It's amusing because just yesterday over lunch, my intern asked me how fashion trends start and who decides it and I was trying my best to educate her with my puffed-up knowledge on the subject, much of which is just what I gathered from the powers of observation and deduction - not that I actually really knew.

Marc Jacobs' confirmed it though, fashion trends go round and round in cycles and there is never one set trend for the season, it's simply who comes up with something that hits the shops first and the rest of the brands follow suit, somehow. Like how super shoulders are in this season, and how I think anyone skinny should pull off that look - yet florals haven't gone away since its sudden inception in late 2007 - early 2008, and those gladiator sandals are still around, just that they've morphed into tamer versions and varying shapes. It's like a game of luck and chance on how long that particular trend will last.

I loved the Marc Jacobs collection, to say the least. Bubblegum peppy, all bright colours and mismatched patterns. It was all about hybrid stuff, bootie platform sneakers and lacquered neon strappy wedges, and what looked like the child of an espadrille and a Converse. To me, that's what fashion is. Breaking boundaries and not sticking to one boring archetype. Who said stilettos have to forever be stilettos, and boots boots, and sneakers made of rubber and thick soles? Fashion needs a change and a revamp, and we need to start breaking rules.

That being said, I admit it would be hard to wear a Marc Jacobs' get-up downtown in this country and not be stared and scrutinised to no end. If New York remains our goal with it being the financial centre of the world, maybe we should start taking a cue from its fashion statements.

Dreams be dreams

2009-09-16T09:57:00.004+08:00

How did it get to mid-September so quickly is beyond me, it's like time passes doubly fast when you're working. This year has flown by like a tunnel which accelerates time, just a few months ago I was rushing my final-year-project and suddenly I'm sitting here in my Ikea-like shophouse office churning out a press release for men's beauty products. It feels rather segmented, or slightly disconnected somehow, like that was a life I left behind, only for now, but I'll somehow go back to it again. Much like an internship, but it's not. This is for real now and I'm not sure how much I like it. Perhaps it's a path of self-discovery, maybe I'm just not one of those motivated career women on top of their lives at every minute, having their work days drive them forward. No, instead I'm struggling to drag myself out of my comfort cocoon every morning, and I'm pretty much in my half-drugged daze all the way until 11am. So much for convincing myself I'm a morning person.

The only thing I think of every morning that makes me happier is the fact that working in chinatown reminds me of mong kok, and the cacophony of sounds, smells and the old man shouting into his mobile phone on the street puts me in a two-second trance of being in hong kong.

If I could see my life in an idealised glinted state, it would be a box full of a myriad of travel destinations, home parties, constant lunches and dinners with friends and loved ones, long conversations under the stars, writing my own book, styling and writing for a magazine, counselling youths, playing with children, learning to bake in an open-concept kitchen, designing shoes and swimming in the Pacific ocean. Maybe I should have thought of all these things before I succumbed to the magnetic force called peer pressure to find a job.

But I'm not unhappy, this job is not bad to be honest. I just have whimsical dreams.

--

Speaking of dreams, last night's was vivid and I can't stop thinking about it even after three hours of waking up. Why did I dream of you and in that fashion? I'll never understand what happened, by this I mean, with us in reality.

Work, drool, a bespectacled friend, wrapped up in a thick blanket, the hug, the scary slide with the ninety cents entrance fee.

I never quite have nightmares or bad dreams, they occur rarely. But I always end up having dreams to the point that I wish it were a real existence. I wish I could fuse them together, and call it my own life, instead those happier ones are simply figments of my imagination.

Painting pictures at work

2009-08-30T23:01:00.000+08:00

This was the conclusive GG packing list for a happy work life:

- Hand Cream remains top of the list, the brand and smell extremely important for soft, moisturised hands all day long. Also good for lending out to colleagues
- Trinkets from home, be it paperweights, photographs, frames, mugs or coasters, it all adds that little touch which will make working more pleasant
- Sweater or jacket thrown loosely around the chair at work
- Extra pair of heels and formal wear for the sudden event
- Flipflops for blistered days
- MSN personal message will reflect: at work!
- Healthy snacks for the motivational bite
- Neat stationery
- Colourful post-it notes
- Random visits to each other's workplaces
- Soft lighting, i wonder if i can bring my own lamp in

This list will probably get longer as time goes by. Tonight though, it was fun talking about the new adventure we're all embarking on together and knowing that our hearts were connected and comforted picturing the scenes above and knowing we wouldn't be alone in this. We're at different parts of the country though - north, central, west and even offshore islands - but we'll come together ever so often and strike up that moment we had tonight again and again, and somehow that'll be enough to bring us through.

Best in Me

2009-08-22T02:27:00.005+08:00

In my life, I envisioned alot of things to happen. I would go through school all the way to university, I would date along the way, I would have social circles from the various paths my life took and I would get married. Most of those things happened, and some are still in the weaving process.

I never thought I'd have a soulmate. I didn't believe in such lofty ideals, neither did I dare to dream that there was someone out there in this world that would understand me the way I understood myself. To me, life was interesting without soulmates, because it meant no one would really know me and I would be unique, and for a period of time in my life I was content with keeping that tiny bit of me to myself.

But the years told me that you are someone very special. There is no one else in this world that knows me like you do, and no one else that I will ever share this bond with. I may have missed out on certain things in life, but I would never trade that for this friendship with you. Tonight, more than ever, reaffirmed that you will, and forever will be, my best friend for life.

We call it friday nights doing anything and whatever. We never have a concrete plan nor know how the night will turn out, but for sure, the depression I might have been facing that week instantly dissipates the minute we embark out. We've done indoor stadium, the kallang bridge, our pools, east coast park and each time we take the experience to a new level. We are totally different on the surface, from looks to passions to our careers and interests, but beneath it all, we have concluded that we are really the same and all we want out of life are the simplest things. We're both happiest sitting at a random staircase or a bench in the middle of nowhere, without anything at all to adorn the occasion, just talking.

Tonight we parked at raffles place and walked the whole boat quay stretch down to supreme court where we lay on the steps with our feet to the sky. We must have laid there for hours, because the steady drone of the passing cars turned slowly to the calm, night silence. And when we were finally contentedly happy, we grabbed a random pizza at timbre, making the 4th, 5th and 6th song "our songs" and landed ourselves in late night drama where the carpark where we left the car was shut. It's not the first time we've been locked in somewhere and gotten scolded for it and so it was with slight fear and contriteness that we apologised to get ourselves out of the mess. Of course, we laughed it off after that and sang our hearts out in the car on the way home.

This life never fails to take me by surprise.

CS 501: the afterthoughts

2009-08-18T01:19:00.011+08:00

Convocation was a bittersweet affair, I knew it would be the last school-related event I would have for life but it was the first time for me in many years my whole family came together, and I

had my first complete family photo in more than 15 years. It was more an event for the parents, and I knew that the both of them were tearing (or at least my father was) during the valedictorian speech where the entire graduating batch stood up, turned around, scanned the crowd for their parents and gave them a resounding round of applause. Graduating from university is seemingly not such a big deal for us really, it felt more like a ritual or a rite, but my parents were so proud, I knew I wouldn't have traded anything else in the world for that moment.

And for the most part of the ceremony, I was bored to tears until it was time for our batch to go onstage. I was texting people barely ten metres away, cajoling the people around me (whom I've never actually talked to in my four years in cs) to take group pictures, laughing at the funny names in the graduation name book but really getting a huge headache from the mortarboard until those two seconds of fame.

I miss school though. I can't believe four years has flown by like that, from the sleepless nights in the mac lab in year one editing videos and websites to Hong Kong in year two to interning at a fashion magazine in year three to the insane lastminute dash of fyp in the final year. I miss writing and different kinds of journalism and even Hedwig's classes where we would all grip our seats in fear of being called. The late nights at the cs benches, hall canteens, libraries, airports, rooftops and the chron room. Duffy making me cry, but is now my favourite professor of all time. The first day of every new academic year where the core lecture is fashion and gossip parade -"what is she wearing?", "oh my gosh, did she lose weight?", "they're attached?" - as we came in early, grabbed our seats together and eagle-eyed the room. Hating the redudancy of some courses, never understood why we needed to know about wilbur schramm and charles darwin, and never getting nietzsche's theories. Loving the fact that I got to pretend to write for harper's bazaar for magazine class, and sub-editing for the chronicle at 4am in the morning with macdonalds in tow was a graded job. I'd have done those for free.

And the friends - some loved us and some hated us for taking that trip to KL in the first year in the first semester after barely knowing each other two months. Final year wasn't the same as year one, we were just more jaded and tired but most of us still stuck and for sure, we all grew up. University life was never a dull moment, and I've changed tremendously from the 19-year-old that I was when I first entered. But I would not have changed a single aspect of the experience (except for installing more food machines in cs, or maybe a little cafe, or being nearer canteen a instead of b) because these will all go down as memories I'll want to remember in fifty years.

Goodbye school and skipping classes on rainy days. Hello life, and limited annual leave.

Coincidences

2009-07-09T00:59:00.003+08:00

I suppose one year isn't enough. It was a balmy blue day and it was a day of many firsts. The beginning of something always spells no end, and if hope could be contained in a single moment that would have been it. Not anything more like you imagined, but a pure and pristine white slate that could be coloured on from that point - not of hearts or valentines, but cartwheels and sticky date pudding and more gossip. If you caught on to my drift at all, I was happy for the right reasons finally.

It catapulted from that moment onwards. As if that one day had been ordained to be the one happy day that would elude us today, the rest of the year saw my half-coloured slate brim over with edges of grey and black. I wanted the end not long after that, but today still came around and I still have to be in contact with you during this trial period. But today, the white slate no longer exists. I'm tired, I'm wary and I want that escape. To think the rides, conversations, the holiday, meetings, meals and serving together would have possibly made it better. I think it went the other way.

I hate the fact that I have an elephant memory for dates. But like fate would have it on the first day, today I need to make conversation. I promised. However, the tables have turned and I'm exiting the scene once all this is over.

Destination uncertain

2009-05-30T12:57:00.001+08:00

I'm 48 hours away from my flight to New York and Orlando, and I'm sitting here waiting for confirmation to London and Greece instead. What a whirlwind of a graduation trip this is turning out to be.

Swine flu sucks :(

Make plans for summer

2009-05-20T01:23:00.003+08:00

When the world doesn't revolve around school anymore, I find my life a cacophony of sounds rushing past my ears, needing to do things and keep my mind occupied at every point. And everything needs to be improved on, and fixed before the next phase blows me by and I won't know when I'll find the time for these things. So it's eyes, hair, teeth, face, toning, computer, camera and a thorough cleanout of the wardrobe to make space for the mess in my luggage (although I quite like living out of a luggage, it helps to compartmentalise things).

If I had my way, I'd make renovating my room my holiday project. I have ideas, so many ideas to turn this room into my signature. At present, it's overcrowded and I have stickers of cartoon rabbits and ducks on my windows because they're permanent. You'd think they would put a warning on the package so seven-year-old girls don't paste it all over in a moment of folly and regret it for the next fifteen years of their lives. I want a loft bed and trinkets and photographs hanging from every corner, and under that bed a full rack just for shoes, with a small couch for guests. I want a royal purple wall, and the rest white. And some kind of water feature, I'm thinking a fish tank but fish don't mean a thing to me and I'll probably forget that they are living creatures and never feed them so we'll see about that. I like the idea of water in my room - it does bring new meaning to calm. Most importantly, the room will smell of Slatkin and Co's passionfruit and guava.

That'll have to wait. I'm back to busying myself with planning lunches, dinners, New York, baking projects, possible yoga classes, island trips and finding people to explore and photograph parts of this country with. So you know, call me or something.

Swine flu, the weather and a size smaller

2009-05-05T23:37:00.016+08:00

In the luggage compartment on the Airport Express

Everyone was staring

The first cold night at Soho

I love China for signs like these

My favourite iced milk tea

At the Shenzhen border with Gary

Rotating chairs

Teenage mutant ninja turtles

Friends in hk: Joseph, Eric, Jon and Kohei

On the mtr at midnight

Another favourite: lai yau ju zai bao （奶油猪仔包）

Hike up Amah Rock

I can't let myself get too comfortable in Hong Kong. Because every time I do, I forget I'm on a holiday and I really don't want to leave. Everyone wonders why I go back to Hong Kong again and again and again, and I'm still not tired of it. I wonder why too.

This trip back was familiar in so many ways, yet I felt different somehow. I stopped remembering the life I had there and stopped holding tight to the strings I had on places I didn't want to forget. My holidays in Hong Kong are never really holidays, to me, the city is like an extended part of Singapore, a part that I cross to using a secret portal, and I go into that place twice a year. I know some places like the back of my hand, and I can finally take you through the entire Mongkok without getting lost in the identical streets. This time, I went back as me, a me that already feels at home in Hong Kong, but the me that has changed since leaving two years ago and has graduated from university. I explored, embraced and loved every minute of it. Suddenly, the world felt like my oyster. I could one day live in the Asian city of my dreams, the city I already call my second home.

Kohei remembered the last conversation I had with him about my desire to live and work in Hong Kong. I don't remember much of it because that dream felt far away at that time, and was a far-fetched memory of my dreamy nature where my ambitions go on unreached pedestals. But when he reminded me of it this time around, he looked at me in all seriousness and asked me why not. Kohei is a Japanese that speaks no Cantonese, and he lives and works in Hong Kong. He always emphasises how it would be easier for me because I speak English, Cantonese and Mandarin (although he doesn't have a clue how bad I really am) and how the possibility is so tangible.

It's strange how all my best friends in Hong Kong are all male, and I have almost zero close male friends in Singapore. I have a few theories, and they lie along the peripherals of the Singaporean male being too full of themselves. They lack a certain something which I'm still currently trying to figure out. Whenever I touch down in Hong Kong, all I have to do is send one single text message to Joseph and he contacts all my friends to let them know I'm back, and a dinner is arranged within the next two days. The dinners end up being treats, and they walk around the entire Mongkok with me trying to find a camera underwater housing.

I met a Singaporean woman at Phoebe's church, The Vine, on Sunday. She has been living in Hong Kong for 13 years, and is married to a Caucasian man. In between playing with her adorable son Brandon and listening to the best sermon I've heard in years, I had so many burning questions to ask her about living there. Unfortunately, she had to leave early because Brandon was fussing.

The three main topics of conversations on this trip were swine flu, the perfect weather and how a certain someone has shrunk in size. Funny days I will always remember - Beverly exclaiming how the seats on the Peak tram became smaller, bad English and Mandarin and the man that couldn't stop talking about Diamond Hill and Sai Kung. The hike up Amah Rock, the late nights, no sleep, Hui Lau Shan's, KTV, wearing masks and taking pictures on the MTR (discussing how we looked like turtles instead of identifying with the real purpose of why we were wearing them), Bubba Gump at the Peak and pretending we were in winter, Joseph's apartment in Mongkok and his singing parodies, the royal treatment in the Shenzhen spa, the very cute immigration officer who tried to flirt with us, the inspiring church service at The Vine, speaking with an American accent in Bottega Veneta and asking how much everything was in USD, visiting all five H&Ms and buying something from every one and learning from Gary (now a proud employee of H&M Langham Place, i.e: very beneficial to me) that I'm on the employee welcome video under "H&M Opening Day in Hong Kong" - according to him, I smiled happily at the camera and did the peace sign.

I didn't want to leave, this time more than others. By the end of the six days, I felt like I belonged once again to my community of friends. I knew it the minute I stepped out of Shenzhen and felt like returning to Hong Kong was home, forgetting that I had a flight to catch that night back to Singapore. I have to try to break this attachment and I'm promising myself to try not to go back for a year, unless I make my dreams a reality.

This post is rather disjointed, much like my thoughts right now. I don't know what I'm going at with all these dreams at all.

We are one tonight

2009-04-27T23:37:00.001+08:00

As I bid 22 farewell, I say goodbye to a year of growth, friendships made, bittersweet miracles, letting go, reflections and the last of my formal education.

It's hard to be completely enthusiastically bouncy happy on birthdays anymore. The feeling has evolved from a day of pure unadulterated fun that I used to look forward to as a child, to a sense of nostalgia and sadness that hits you like a tidal wave every year. Perhaps it's a phase for the twentysomethings, maybe it'll come to a point where you won't even care anymore and the day will eventually pass you by like any other day - but while I turn 23, it's heightened emotion and a rollercoaster of feelings which makes you that bit more emotional than other days. It's intertwined emotions, a poignant mixture of the good and the bad. Who knew?

I took the last exam of my life one week ago, I turn 23 today. Too many changes, and they'll just keep coming, won't they? I have lofty dreams. I want to careen down life in fits of laughter with someone I love, in that oneness which is a rarity, to be understood like how I understand myself. I want to be able to invent the splittable bed someday. I want to live in Hong Kong, in New York, in Spain, and in the secret place I have yet to discover. I want fashion to change the world, to help humanity more than the feeble efforts it generates at present. I want to trust, to live in complete faithfulness with His footprints in the sand.

Happy birthday.

Confetti rainfall

2009-04-23T00:18:00.002+08:00

"Well amelia, my former owner also wanted me to give you the following message: that she is thinking about you on your special day and she apologises for not being with you to celebrate it (hmpf... unlike reliable me) cos she is so far away - for 4 years now! She wanted me to hug and kiss you too but I couldn't carry that for her to you. But I think she really treasures you - cos she gave me to you."

I almost cried when I received that in a birthday card in the mail today, after that panic attack that lasted all of five minutes because the sender did not leave a name (mysterious as she wanted to be), sent it with a singapore stamp and wrote the message from the persona of a birthday card. I thought it was a prank or some anthrax scare and my heart raced as I imagined it exploding in front of me. Only when I calmed down and read it again and noticed "printed in britain" at the back did I see things clearer. It was beautifully written, candid and funny at just the right moments with that tinge of warm sweetness like hot caramel at the very end, and I felt like she was right there with me at that moment. I miss her very much, all the way in London - she should just stop being a lawyer there and come back and be poor with me.

I have the best friends in the world. I really think so. I have been very blessed - I have friends that remember, that care, that mail birthday cards, that give away their old clothes to me to sell, that have their mums care about me, that plan my birthday parties for me trying to surprise me, that think of analogies to describe me and write scripts just to remember the points, and they make me want to be a better person to be that same kind of friend back to them. Alot of the time, I don't feel like I deserve any of this, it's truly grace upon me.

And this is the only comfort being a year older - when I saw the candles on my first cake today, I laughed into it and stared incredulously at the number of candles - that I know I'm defined by the people around me, the people I love and choose to have me as a friend, that I'm more certain (more than ever) about these choices that I make in my life, and I couldn't be more thankful for this life I've led thus far.

I'm teary and choked up, and it isn't even my birthday yet.

Spotlight on spring brights

2009-03-18T01:49:00.004+08:00

Tonight I'm really missing you, and you.

My eclectic, weirdly strange world, mismatched for all I cared, but it fit once upon a time. What about the present? A piece in the puzzle that I can't find reason for, I need to cut those strings that tie me back faster, quicker. Still, I'd wear you again.

Find an escape just running away

2009-03-07T02:56:00.003+08:00

I haven't written here in a long while, and I've noticed a trend. I stop writing when I feel like life doesn't leave me with space to think, when I'm caught up in the hula hoops of events and the tangle of happenings around me. It's just been touch and go lately, I don't feel particularly connected to anything or anyone; I'm neither happy nor sad, and I don't have an urge to do anything at all.

The last time I felt motivated to do something was the valentine's day event with the children. That day was one which I'd not have traded for anything, and the planning and stressing over it culminated in a picturesque day with the sun shining full down on happy children's faces.

Fyp is my current life. I've pushed all other emotions aside for this project that sometimes makes me feel like I love journalism and telling the other people's stories as a service to others, yet at times I feel like I'm flailing not knowing whether I'm writing the right thing. I have no clue what's going on in any of my other modules and I'm especially lost in modernist literature.

I'm very tired, and I miss spending time thinking about the more important issues in life, the ones I know that are going to matter in the long run. The ones I occupy my mind with during the holidays, when life seems a little easier to tread on. I wonder how good stagnant emotions are, but I'm afraid they've already gotten attuned to that jaded part of me, that part that pushes more and more things into the space in my heart which I tell myself I don't care for any longer.

You could be my unintended

2009-02-08T01:18:00.006+08:00

Muse's "Unintended" has this haunting effect on me, and has sent chills up and down my spine the whole week. Yet, it's been on repeat non-stop and I'm loving every word and note in the piece.

I'm digging up scars from the past - that I've buried for a long time and denied, and I hate it. I thought I had more control over who I am, but those are the days only when nothing pricks me. This week, fear has enveloped me and suddenly my entire self-worth is on the line. But this is the right time to face up to these things, and I know I'll never move on if I don't clamber out of it.

Still, it would be nice to know the ending. I wish a butterfly would whisper the answer into my ear.

I'll be there as soon as I can
But I'm busy mending broken pieces of the life I had before

Yesterday is a wrinkle on your forehead

2009-01-19T12:53:00.008+08:00

Do you think hermits lead happier lives?

Those days I slept with my eyes shut but my mind wide awake

Those days I watched the sunrise for a week from the cracks in my window

Those days I fed myself nothing but water and hello panda

Those days I sank deeper into the sheets in the mid-afternoon

Those days I feared facing my own emotions

Those days I lived in my shell and pretended reality didn't exist in my world

Those days I locked myself up and trusted no one

Are those days back? I fear. I'm still not ready to be hurt a second time over.

White lace

2009-01-18T00:30:00.002+08:00

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. -- 1 Corinthians 13:4-8

I love weddings. Because in the midst of all the fussing about bridesmaids' dresses and flower arrangements is a testament of love. Most people forget that part, and many weddings play up the festivities at fancy hotels and grand ten-course dinners, but at the very heart of all that, which is what everyone should be celebrating - love between the newlyweds. But love and the grace of God - which allows us to love because He first loved us - gets downplayed alot and people are numb to that because they get too caught up in the programme.

Sharon's wedding today was held in church, and it was a simple affair. Yet she looked as beautiful as a fairy, and her husband waited for her at the altar like a five-year-old child on Christmas morning, grinning from ear to ear. And the most poignant part of the event today was when her father read out 1 Corinthians 13:4-8, because for the very first time, I focused on the words and tears welled up in my eyes. The whole concept of love finally struck me, the all-encompassing nature of it and its omnipotence in every aspect of life.

Love isn't easy. But like the couple that I witnessed get married today, I believe in it. And like it's friend grace, you can't buy it and it's not something you can force your way into. Still God created us to experience love, and that in itself is amazing to me. Love that protects, hopes, trusts and perseveres, I see bright sunny days ahead.

A day of too many thoughts, and I'm trading my expensive glass-slipper dreams for a real celebration of outpouring love at my wedding, because if that day is to come, it is nothing but His grace and gift to me.

My dear, we're slow dancing in a burning room

2009-01-02T18:42:00.004+08:00

It's funny how the first few conversations I had when dawn broke on New Year's Day was about love. We were at east coast park after a night's worth of jumping in and out of the pool and stunting up and down the monkey bars at 4am. The five of us sat like drifters on red plastic chairs perched on the edge of the sand and stared at the sunrise beckoning beneath the clouds. It was a beautiful morning, taking in the fresh sea breeze and the smell of barbecued pork and I sat lost in my thoughts and dazed state and watched a young couple ran to the shore and cuddled as they watched the sunrise.

"They won't last the next two months," said either Paul or Martin.

Such cynicism coming from 24-year-olds. I've felt the same way for a long time, for the most part of last year, that perhaps love wasn't meant to last, maybe love wasn't for me. I've ignored that feeling, pushed it away and denied it. I believe it exists, and my favourite picture testament to love is seeing elderly couples together, walking in parks or helping each other on public transportation. But when I think about love, the sad reality of rejection, breakups and imperfection hits me more than the fuzzy, warm, fireplace feeling which I've somehow lost along the way.

Maybe I need to embrace it again, the belief that there can be love for all in this world. We're not talking romantic love yet, I need to love others stemming from within myself. Selfless love for my family, friends and those around me. As I step into my graduating year, I've been thinking of a career path the opposite direction of what I've always dreamed of, which frightens yet excites me. If I do, I'm moving away from the exhilirating, fast-paced journalism world into one where I'm going to feel real emotions and love others before myself. That's what makes me happy for now, knowing that I'm making a difference in this place which lacks love.

Love conquers all

2008-12-31T00:31:00.004+08:00

It's the last day of the year, and as much as I'm sad to bid this year goodbye because it has been such a wonderful year of growing in God, building friendships, discovering myself and travelling - I'm excited about welcoming 2009 into my life. I have such dreams for the coming year, and how I will trust in them being unravelled to me.

I pray for love, love being the greatest gift. Love that will fill the hearts of people, abounding love for Him, for the world around me, for injustice in society, love for the underprivileged, because love conquers all.

Happy birthday julienne. Look what I stumbed upon today from the camp of revelations, I look forward to many many more such moments for us in the coming year.

Gravity is working against me

2008-12-21T21:07:00.003+08:00

My sweet tooth has come out of its hiding and its latest obsession has been ice-cream. I'm digging into a pint of Haagen daaz's macadamia nut as I'm writing this, and yesterday we drove all the way to Seventh Heaven, located in a faraway industrial park to savour their deliciously creamy alcoholic ice-cream. We had eight scoops and a warm chocolate cake between the four of us, and I think my new comfort food is now a tough fight between their chocolate and coffee and peanut butter flavours.

It has been a strange week, and I've been slipping in and out of vivid dreams and sleeping way too much into the afternoon because I want to sink back into the story in my subconscious mind to find out the ending of things. I feel like a slug after, but my willpower reduces itself to nothing when that happens. And then there are days where I cannot sleep at all, because my mind runs images like reels of film playing out a deliberate act before my eyes. I've had strong deja vu feelings and convictions, I've prayed more this week than I do normally and God has been speaking to me every single day as I spend an extended period of time with Him each day. In some ways, I feel more real than I have in weeks, this quiet week of mine which was spent mostly in slumber.

A battle between shutting it out and surrendering. I'm learning quickly, and I believe myself to be daft before this realisation.

Things are changing faster than I imagined and my life is finally one I can call my own. Sharon's baptised, bev's home, and christmas is four days away. I have so much to be thankful for.

Gagged on frozen smiles

2008-12-15T12:33:00.003+08:00

Yesterday when I was out christmas shopping, I bought a little something for myself, something I'd never ever thought I'd own in my lifetime.

While juggling paper bags of princess mobile phones and fake credit cards for my little cousins (yes do you know they sell these things nowadays - it's a "heavenly collection of shopping essentials", the box says, and so it promotes materialism but which little girl wouldn't go crazy over it) and swarovski crystals for my godmother amongst other things, I stepped into a shop intending to get myself a notebook for next year, until something stopped me from heading to the shelf stacked with pretty flowered cloth books suited for that purpose.

FROZEN SMILES: not your grandfather's ice tray

It was pale pink, the colour of your gums, and an ice tray making dentures out of ice. The illustration featured a glass of water with the ice denture in it and suddenly I had so many funny ideas on what I could do with the thing that I burst out laughing, right in the middle of the shop. I thought of christmas parties, serving guests on chinese new year, tricking my grandmothers and a small part of me thought of giving it away for christmas so I wouldn't have to spend on myself and it solves another person's present, but the better part of me wanted it for myself. And for the very fact that I stood there, staring at the contraption and smothering hysteric laughter for fifteen minutes, proved how much I needed it.

Just for how it cracked me up and still makes me laugh, I'm now a proud owner of a $15 denture ice tray, which is sitting right next to me and promises to chase the gloomy days away.

Hearts of Gold

2008-12-13T23:43:00.006+08:00

This year's sss camp made me feel like a kid again and I can't remember the last time I was this deliriously happy. It was a night of dispelled inhibitions, as something possessed me and I danced and sang spice girls to a bunch of teenagers, followed by a deluge of backstreet boys, oldies, chicken dances and christmas carols induced by the happy drug and an outpouring of being young again. Surprisingly, looking at these kids made me reflect on myself, and sitting in during their discussion groups brought me back to the simplicity of faith.

It's twelve days to christmas, and this year has been indescribable. I'm finally caught up in the spirit of christmas, after weeks of studying at starbucks and wishing the whole place would stop sounding so festively joyous.

The usual return to Hong Kong, this time with my mum, was one laden with many carefree moments. I took many walks alone down the crowded streets, and bought orange juice or waffle balls whenever I wanted, and I loved that independence. But, how things have changed. Everyone's working, dinner with my Hong Kong friends now consist ten work-clad individuals, and topics sway away from the usual all-about-nothing subjects. We went to joseph and kohei's apartment in Mongkok after dinner, sat around, and did nothing but talk about our near future dreams - and it still amazes me how people of six nationalities were brought together for that purpose.

If God wills it, I'll work there someday. Meanwhile, I'm all about toffee nut lattes, mistletoe, cranberries and remembrance.

Sing to me, love

2008-11-01T20:59:00.008+08:00

Dear God,

It all seemed ideal, perfect, strange and only seemed possible with you. Laughter, a light heart and hope. Then you took it all away, all away and once again it breaks into a million shards, why? Are you really there, are you listening?

We are crooked souls trying to stay up straight

Dry eyes in the pouring rain where

The shadow proves the sunshine

Hope and faith, the story of my life. Please, if you will, add another chapter to it.

Sing to me the song of the stars

Of your galaxy dancing and laughing and laughing again

When it feels like my dreams are so far

Sing to me of the plans that you have

For me over again

Not my own strengths, not my own abilities, is it? Never has been. My life turned out funny, nothing like what I'd ever have imagined. The weak become strong, the strong falls, the poor become rich, the paradoxical nature of what I believe in.

Twenty four oceans

Twenty four skies

Twenty four failures

Twenty four tries

Twenty four finds me

In twenty-fourth place

Twenty four drop outs

At the end of the day

Life is not what I thought it was

Twenty four hours ago

I patiently wait, I read Your word. It takes so much out of me to not take things into my own hands and live by my own will, because I only wish things would go my way. But you've proven yourself to me, you've built me up to who I am today. I can't go back down that road.

Holding onto patience, wearing thin

I can't force these eyes to see the end

If only time flew like a dove

Well we could watch it fly, and just keep looking up

Somehow everything's going to fall right into place

If only we had a way to make it fall faster everyday

I'm still afraid. Every single day, I trod down that path of not knowing. But I believe.

Two scared little runaways

Hold fast to the break of day where

The shadow proves the sunshine

Please take over, please take control, and please, never stop loving me.

So I lay my head back down

And I lift my hands

And pray to be only Yours

I pray to be only Yours

I know now You're my only hope

Lacquered notes

2008-10-28T15:19:00.012+08:00

I'm getting ever so slightly worried that I'm ageing faster than I should be, and becoming like my father.

My mission Pachelbel Canon in D project has taken off, and what scares me is how much I'm enjoying it. Practising that particular song on the piano has now become something I take delight in, and I actually want to sit there for hours running my fingers up and down those black and white keys. Because I want to see (and hear) myself get better at playing the piece with each time I hit those notes. Maybe this is what my father takes pride in every morning when he wakes up, when the sky is still pitch black and the birds just starting to wail. I never understood it, sometimes I wake up in annoyance hearing him play, groan and pull the blanket over my ears and sink back into slumber.

This piano thing, coming from me, has got to be the strangest thing I've discovered about myself this year. Because if you knew me then, I was my piano teacher's nightmare and could probably write a book on how to evade piano lessons. I never ever practised and made the people in my house lie to my dad that I had played for hours when he got home so I wouldn't get scolded. The petulant eleven-year-old me shouted at my piano teacher and slammed a door in his face once because I was so tired of playing. I refused to take exams, and I faked the notes all the time because I knew my dad couldn't tell the difference. If no one was at home when my piano teacher came over, I made him tea and we would sit and chat, and it was our secret, because it was a common understanding between us how much I hated playing. As a result, of course, I was nobody's star pianist. I hardly got better, and for the ten years of my life I invested in it - someone else would have risen to Grade 8 or better while I was perpetually stuck around Grade 4. But I never had any desire accomplish something out of those years of piano playing, I did it only because I was forced to, because my dad loved the piano and I was his only ray of hope.

He would actually sit there and watch me play every single day, his disinterested daughter who looked as expressionless as she sounded.

I think I'm making up for those lost years. Ever so often when I'm home, I abandon my schoolwork and choose to practise my song, the one song that is slowly changing my life. And my father walks around the house with an encouraging smile on his face, musing, "it's not too late, it's not too late" when my fingers fumble or seeing how much trouble I have sightreading these days. I only pray he doesn't get child prodigy ideas with me again.

And I've realised how much playing the piano trains your patience. I feel soothed each time I start playing, and sink into the rhythm of it all. Suddenly, all the stress and whatever else I'd been feeling dissipates into the melody. I sound like a fanatic here, but I somehow think this revelation is miraculous in itself.

On another note, yesterday's holiday was spent drowning in work, surfacing only for waffles and prayer with my dg girls, coffee with shimei my wonderful ex-colleague at Female because our conversations always leave me dwelling on them and walking along one fullerton by myself and breathing in the night. I have had many thoughts lately, some of which I want to compartmentalise into folders to save, some to send to the recycle bin and others that I want to send in an email to heaven. I subconsciously typed out my thoughts as I was fiddling with my phone yesterday, and in my daydreamy state, looked for 'God' in my address book under the "To:" column.

Topshop sale: Flattery always works wonders. I had already noticed the Chinese girl at the cashier even as I was walking around the shop so while paying, I told her that her English was very good and that she was very pretty (both which I truly meant), and beaming from ear to ear, she happily offered me information on when the new stuff come in, and when the next sale is.

We sing, we dance, we steal things

2008-10-23T22:05:00.004+08:00

I'd like to think that I'm waxing lyrical about this subject, but it gets me more riled up than I'd actually like to imagine.

As a final-year core subject, Media Law, Ethics and Policy shoots straight up to number one on the list out of all the four compulsory core modules we've been put through, all one hundred and eighty of us. It definitely beats the ineffectuality of learning about communication skills in the first year, becoming friends with Darwin, Freud and Marx in my second year and literally not remembering anything in media management class in my third year. Yes, this year's core module has been stimulating, and interesting in certain aspects and absolutely futile in others.

I usually don't devote whole entries to schoolwork, so you see how this class has really got picking on my brain - a rare occurrence.

The law component was tough, and failure to keep up with the hundred-page readings each week meant sinking quite surely to the bottom and not being able to keep up with the crossfire debates - in other words, attending a pointless lecture and coming out feeling stupider than you did when you first entered. Surprisingly enough, I liked it once I grasped the rationale behind each subject and it served the general purpose of intellectual conversation topics over dinner. I also enjoyed countering my father on issues which I knew more about than him. While I engaged in those conversations, I happily thought pinned-up chignon, classy black spectacle frames and the authoritative resonance of four-inch heels on marble flooring.

Ethics, however, is a completely different story. My world while growing up was perfectly black and white. Black was evil, the rogues that managed to shoot down Captain Planet and the ugly monsters with fangs. White white, the knight in the shining armour, princesses and their wonderful fairytale endings. I embraced white with childlike innocence, and wrapped it around myself like a blanket thinking that my life would be that perfect too.

I paced around in school today and watched the crowds rush by, and thought about how my life has now been clouded wtih grey. And grey, I won't label it a bad thing, I just call it inevitable. Differing opinions, measured on what scale, what standards and whose rules? Every single person walking past me grew up a different way, exposed to worlds another might not understand, and pain someone else might interpret as pleasure. How do you grapple with what's right and what's not? Sure, you can impose your moral values on someone else, but morality and ethics are not synonymous. Religion comes into play, and admittedly, it shapes my life - but are you going to impose those views on others with that self-righteous stand? No, they'll find every other way to counter you and that's where their hate begins.

So when I sit amidst a discussion on ethics, just like in class today, where my professor throws out situation after situation - Do you think it's ethical to take an MC when you aren't really sick just to get a day off work? Is it unethical to snub a junior colleague and treat him as if he doesn't exist? Is it okay to be in a group of ten colleagues, nine Singaporean Chinese and one from mainland China, and when the one from mainland China walks out, you imitate her and mimic her accent? - thoughts are running through my head like wildfire, but somehow I cannot bring myself to form a cogent argument to defend the ethics behind it. I throw out my opinions, but I find most of these issues personal choices as opposed to ethical issues, because what is ethical in today's society where everyone is so diverse and hold such varied standards? It would be easy to defend those obvious things, like murder, theft or adultery. But with these controversial everyday issues, everything we do is a personal choice, based on our beliefs and our conscience, but there is no one written book of laws when it comes to ethics. I find the discussions futile, useless, ineffectual, because everyone fights and it does seem like an interactive tutorial, but really, you come out of there learning nothing at all and simply sticking to the points you already had in your head formed years ago through your experiences or what your parents taught you.

There is no point at all discussing ethics. No point. It's parallel to the Democrats and the Republicans. Who's right and who's wrong? It all ends up in a great divide.

I think back about my perfect white world once in awhile, the stories I held so close to my heart. And I wonder if everything was one then, and there were laws for every single thing and situation. I doubt and then think maybe their standards were different, perhaps doing less charity was considered abominable because charity was part of everybody's life. See, that's when my grey creeps in.

Every memory of looking out the back door

2008-10-19T01:07:00.008+08:00

"Consider it pure joy," the words jumped out at me that night as I was reading in bed, a nightly ritual under my canopy. That night, I let go again. This process of letting go repeats itself time and time again, like an old cassette only tuned to that one song, but the difference is, I'm getting stronger each time.

Days are happier, not because of anything material or earthly, that I know for sure. It's a constant reminder of placing my heart in the right place and to cease doubting, and choosing to participate in activities that make more meaningful days. I danced while supermarket shopping at midnight, mentally calculating price discounts in my head vs quantity - which taught me that all you really need in life is simple math - I take long walks with my iPod, I visit Bench 1b and I've made it my goal by year end to learn and memorise Pachelbel's Canon in D on the piano. Good luck to my neighbours in the meantime.

And photographic imprints of what I've captured over the last few months while travelling, just some of my favourites.

Venice Beach, Los Angeles: Colour, vibrancy, quirkiness, no one's weird here because acceptance takes on a whole new meaning.

Venice Beach, Los Angeles: I think I wanted to capture the sky. The sky is Los Angeles is like nowhere else in the world.

Venice Beach, Los Angeles: The girl reflected me. She was snapping away, at everything and everyone.

Manhattan Beach, Los Angeles: Where we ran around in circles and dipped our toes in the sand and sea.

Somewhere on a cliff in Los Angeles: The most beautiful sunset, ever. The photo doesn't even come close to doing justice.

Fisherman's Wharf, San Francisco: He took one minute to capture the essence of me - and drew my shopping bags with high priority.

Sausalito, San Francisco: My dream, far-fetched but a dream nonetheless, to own one of these floating houses in quaint Sausalito.

Sai Kung, Hong Kong: Third time to Sai Kung, but the first time I notice the lone old man with his livelihood.

Choi Hung, Hong Kong: Funny, even their flats are rainbow-coloured. Made me wonder whether the flats in Redhill are red.

Monash University campus, Melbourne: If I were God, I would not have to spend hours figuring myself out on faceyourmanga.com

Clayton, Melbourne: I miss those mission trip days, those long train rides back from the city only to return home to cook and do laundry. The simple life.

Glebe Flea Market, Sydney: Nostalgia struck when I saw all my childhood at once on these old storybooks being torn apart and re-created into fashionable notebooks.

Darling Harbour, Sydney: One of my absolute favourite places in Sydney. Every city has one, think Esplanade and Tsim Sha Tsui Avenue of Stars, but Darling Harbour still wins. I could imagine myself there all day just staring, with a book in hand.

Surry Hills, Sydney: Vintage shops and colourful shophouses. This is where I started Christmas shopping because I couldn't resist.

This one speaks for itself. :)

Did you fall for a shooting star

2008-10-11T23:51:00.005+08:00

Tonight I looked up at the sky as I sprawled out on the lounge chair and the sky matched my mood exactly: cloudy. Not a star in sight, the clouds obscured my entire vision of what lay beyond, with the moon struggling to shine through.

Out of sorts, out of place. My emotional heart felt strangely heavy and burdened. I wanted to let it go. For the first time in a very long time, I didn't know where I belonged and happiness seemed to be slipping away like sand between my fingers.

Topics of conversations suddenly disinterest me, words and actions attack me more than usual because I know my fortress is not as formidable as before, people in their warm cocoons with cubes of chocolate suddenly don't involve me, and me, in my little grey confused world.

I don't know how long I was there for and how long I spent singing to myself and covering my ears and thoughts fleeting in and out of my head and how long I spent watching the clouds slowly billow into different formations. I think I needed it, me and God, tears and convictions, half-empty and half-full.

I spent the rest of the night on skype, not talking, but just feeling the presence of a pillar of support far away, and finally felt like myself again.

So I lift my eyes to You Lord
In Your strength will I break through, Lord
Touch me now, let Your love fall down on me
I know Your love dispels all my fears
Through the storm I will walk on, Lord
And by faith I will walk on, Lord
Then I'll see beyond my calvary one day
And I will be complete in You

Bubbles and sparklers

2008-09-14T23:09:00.004+08:00

"When the natural power of vision is devoted to the Holy Spirit, it becomes the power of perceiving God's will and the whole life is kept in simplicity." - Oswald Chambers

Simplicity is the secret of seeing things clearly. That's what I often tell myself, and I need reminders of that fact. What would it be like if I were simple enough not to think that I need to be simple? That paradoxical issue has been on my mind for a long time, but over the years, it grows to be my desire more and more, although it also becomes harder the more I'm exposed.

My role models are the simplest women I know, with their effervescent joy, smiley faces, pure hearts and being real in every single situation.

This weekend has been a happy one, with many many reminders on being simple, from Uncle roland's message in church to singing "Purify my heart" to my devotional today. I spent Saturday evening under the bright lights at Bedok, with a group of people I never thought I'd be spending that day with - soaking in the sweetness of stage noises, unpretentious crowds and the balmy sky. We bought sparklers and bubbles, pickup sticks and oldschool guinness stout glasses and let one-dollar raspberry ripple and durian ice-cream dribble all over mouths. I blew bubbles at a gurgling baby and watched as she tried to burst them with her tiny fingers.

Then we sat under a void deck and talked for hours about next week, next year and the future. I came home smiling, feeling like I just ate a whole roll of strawberry tape gum, and wanting more nights like that one.

Did you?

2008-09-08T01:14:00.004+08:00

Do you remember the exact moment when your father first let go of your hand as you stepped onto the escalator, that frightening moving staircase? Or when someone secretly took off the training wheels of your tasselled pink bicycle?

I think I remember them, in the recesses of my memory, although I can't quite pinpoint whether it was reality or part of my imagination that works harder than reality. I'm unabashedly a dreamer, and I've always been. I space out more often than I should, and I've mastered the art of still looking like I'm paying attention to you through training during amath lessons.

I watched as the little boy in the crisp shirt let go of his father's hand, and grinned broadly as he skipped off the escalator while the proud parent watched on.

These days, I like being independent. I crave freedom, and doing exactly what I want at certain moments. And He fills me with such joy that I know the eternal comfort of being watched over and loved, and physical solitude means nothing to me any longer. I went to Baybeats alone, something I would never have done a few years ago, but claimed that decision as one of the best I made this year. Observing the people around me, the eclecticism of it all, the beats droning on in the background, the lead singer of Lucksmiths declaring that everyone should get married that night and the magnificent lights of the skyline before me, there's no feeling like it. It was an innate sense of peace, and happiness that I wouldn't have experienced had I been with another.

Sunday Dawn

2008-09-04T02:58:00.002+08:00

South Africa, the next destination for one of the five for the next three months, and off she went last week accompanied by another, a true GG affair. It's been a week, but already it feels like a month that she's gone. My days are slower and freer because of her absence. I've seen pictures, cheetahs and ostrich rides and lions galore - very Animal Planet and perfect for Bev's loud free spirit.

Last I heard, she set off the panic alarm on the plane, much to the mortification of Sharon. We'll miss those moments back home.

Floating, high and mightily

2008-08-28T23:34:00.005+08:00

I'm floating alot these days. I float because I have erratic sleep patterns because of my school timetable, the Chronicle and preferred social schedule, and when I float due to lack of sleep, I cease thinking altogether and go around feeling like my feet have been taken over by wings and I'm at peace with myself.

I floated -

1) at the adm rooftop today, under the stars and on the grassy patch, a year since my last visit and trying very hard to remember how I felt the last time I was there

2) on Bev's balcony on sunday during morning prayer before church, breathing in the breeze and thinking of heaven as I felt Him land in the middle of our breakfast table

3) while driving home from the airport last night with no cars on the road and my favourite acoustic strains of 'From the inside out'

4) during sleepover conversations, twice this week, as I felt blessed to have the GGs in my life and feeling calm despite the moans and groans of the 'state we're in', and like Julienne put it, this must be what it's like to feel very zen

5) through rainy mornings, soaked shoes and bus rides

6) while praying at Starbucks with four cups of pseudo toffee-nut lattes, filled with faith

7) while playing Cranium after church - there came a point where I wasn't quite thinking anymore and started daydreaming instead of guessing

I'm surprisingly relaxed for my fourth week in school. It's a very different semester from the last, where now my relationships and life outside school matter much more than lectures and tutorials. I've also realised I like writing when I'm thinking of nothing and running on no sleep in thirty-six hours.

Faithful One

2008-08-22T23:31:00.002+08:00

Happy Birthday, Mama.

Justin and I spent a whole day on the family picture slideshow, digging up crinkly photographs and dust bunnies as we attempted to piece together my grandmother's eighty years of life. But she's more than the smile behind the pictures - her birthday celebration was testament to that. Her friends come from all walks of life, and the ninety-two people who showed up that evening was barely the tip of the iceberg.

If she invited all of them, we would probably need a stadium. Friends and relatives speak about her friendly, unassuming and outgoing nature, her children recount her being a devoted mother and a wife the perfect helper to her husband, her grandchildren remembering her love and affection. But in every single speech that was made, one thing stood out that everyone knew made her the woman she is today - and that was her faithfulness in her God.

Mama's faithfulness was mentioned no less than a hundred times that evening, she being a prayer warrior for everyone she came into contact with, how she woke up at 3am each morning to pray and read her Bible, the times when she would pray with her children and grandchildren before they left for school each morning, the countless occasions she would read the Bible to her grandchildren till they roused from slumber, the quiet hand behind her husband when he planted seeds in two churches, the still strength who started the Ladies' Group in these churches to serve alongside her husband, her continued prayers for all her family members and her desire to see footprints of the next generation walk closely in the Lord.

I never knew how amazing a woman she was until that night. For the first time in the twenty-two years that I've known her, I called her my hero. I truly admired the strength she had in God's plan in every aspect of her life - maybe it's because faith is something I grapple with constantly, and there stands a woman so close to my heart, filled with faith in her Father even though her husband's sudden departure left her a widow at slightly over fifty.

Two generations later, and I like giving myself excuses that the world wasn't as simple as it was then. Maybe it was because she was less educated, less exposed to the world around her and she grew up in her small hometown by the beach and marriage took place within people her community. But those are just excuses. That woman of faith will be built up through prayer despite seeing the world through the stubborn eye of ineffectuality.

Look how they shine for you

2008-08-04T10:33:00.005+08:00

So this is the end of the whirlwind that has been my life since the beginning of this year, and tomorrow marks the new beginning that I've been dreading. Yet in between the folds of this honest admission of hating the sights I'll see - the superficial supercilious smiles and the subtle catwalk runways - I keep going because of the days of blanketed starlit skies below me, royal breakfast spreads, random coffeeshop conversations and the faith armour.

Yes I've a serious case of wanderlust, but the USA, Hong Kong and Australia have tired me out that I've never been so joyful to be at home in my little canopy. It's been a packed seven weeks, so much so that my father has no idea where I am half the time. He rang me when I was in Melbourne last week, thinking that I was flying back home from Hong Kong while I laughed at him incredulously over the line. I'm going to reserve my travels now for fear of getting jaded by the time I'm thirty.

May the December mission to find a certain father and hospital admissions and vending machine coffees come soon, though.

How often do you get to see an endless blanket of bright stars in pitch blackness on eye level - that fleeting magnificence of creation will be my motor for the next semester.

All wrapped up

2008-07-12T00:27:00.003+08:00

I'm happy. The days hit like a technicoloured trenchcoat, and your entire day drizzles smiles and clear blue skies and hazy images in bubbles. What a week being back home after the United States and Hong Kong, and just a weekend to pass before I'm off Down Under. It's been a week of surprising conversations, great company, birthdays and additions and pacts, unexplored trails, quiet and reflection, and a fraction of my day always spent at City Hall.

I've floated through this week I think, I don't know how else to describe it. It's as if the world's at a raging war, with the events in my life affecting me somehow, yet I'm protected contentedly in bubble wrap, a good book and mood music to swing me by into a deliberate attempt of not thinking and not worrying. I love bubble wrap, so please don't start with my fascination of popping it.

In transit

2008-06-17T14:20:00.003+08:00

At the Hong Kong International Airport waiting for our flight to Los Angeles - our flight's delayed by an hour and a half. It feels almost surreal that this day is actually here, and in thirteen hours or so we'll be cruising down Venice Beach, having our first Californian Starbucks, splurging at Victoria's Secret, scarfing down In & Out burgers and of course, magical Disneyland.

In the meantime, it's exploring every inch of the airport of my second home, it feels good to be back here, even if it's within the confinements of the airport. The Cantonese announcements, the bad English signs, Dai Ga Lok Chinese fast food, iced milk tea and Hak Jiu Gai Pa Fun (Black pepper chicken chop rice) - stirs up that slight ache of nostalgia.

On another note, it's been twenty-six hours since we last slept. I'm amazed we're still awake and bouncing, I guess it's the adrenaline rush of going to the States.

Blogging was my next best option to Facebook cos the free Internet services at the Hong Kong airport prohibits the site because it promotes "personals and dating". It's no wonder so many Hongkongers are staying single.

I also can't believe I managed to fit twenty days of clothes, accessories and shoes into a backpack. Hello, whirlwind of a holiday. It has begun.

Colouring outside the lines

2008-06-03T16:25:00.002+08:00

Every girl needs a Mr. Big to propose with a Manolo Blahnik shoe. Sex and the City: The Movie is uncomparably, my movie of the year.

So it was a feel-good chick flick with all the favourite elements of high-end fashion, hints of name-dropping labels, girl talk and love. All the things that movie critics might discard as frivolous with the rampage of indie, artsy and analytical films in theatres these days with the desire to be known as the edgy and cool one. I've had my share of those films, and I've loved some - Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind cleverly hit all the right notes - but give me Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte and Miranda any day.

You'll need to be a fan. I've imbibed all six seasons in every way possible, on flat screens, on floors, on laptops on dark grass lawns, in holes in the walls, in common rooms and in libraries. When that last scene faded with Big and Carrie walking down the streets of Paris in Season 6, it was almost the end of era, and I've been anticipating the movie ever since. Two hours of eye-popping fashion and unbridled laughter and tears for the girls - bam bam bam, two minutes into the show and Carrie had three outift changes. Half an hour later you have the names of brands that probably all clamoured to be in the movie. Dior, Christian Lacroix, Vivienne Westwood, Chanel, Oscar de la Renta, and then you start noticing. Carrie's red-soled Louboutins when she walked into the penthouse, Charlotte's pristine white Chanel 2.55 and their outfits, fashion heaven anyone?

Love, in all ways possible. It sparked hope and that giant lump in my throat. That scene when Carrie rushed down the steps in her pajamas and took the subway to Miranda's, with the glittering snow falling and the colourful lights of Christmas - I was positively mesmerised. Miranda and Steve in the middle of the bridge, the custom walk-in wardrobe, Carrie reading to Lily before bed, the Mexico honeymoon that turned out to be an all-girl affair at Carrie's lowest, Samantha's sushi night, the various depictions of love.

Everyone in the theatre identified, and I've not seen such apparent audience participation. The gasps when Carrie presented Louise with the Louis Vuitton box, the claps when Charlotte lashed out, "I curse the day you were born!", the outrageous laughter, the sniffles and the mellowed moments when you cosied up to the next one.

Couple seats, four girls and Manolos stilletos on big screen - I'd revisit the movie theatre for this one just for the flood of emotions.

Roll back the curtains of memory now and then

2008-05-19T01:28:00.003+08:00

Peace is a feeling that doesn't come at a whim. It could take weeks, months or even years before that feeling washes over you again like a comforting blanket and you snuggle into it not wanting to let go, until the next event breaks your tightfisted grip and you fly into a fluster trying to find it again.

It was my prayer, and it took a long time. This weekend, I'm without the polish of high fashion or the hautest new makeup, it's the geek side of me and the reconfiguration of my new iPod (I had to bid a sad farewell to the old one) and finding songs I've totally forgotten about, or failed to realise it was there. 歡樂今宵 and the 狂串樂基兒 medley have been on repeat ever since.

Disarmingly;

2008-05-08T14:17:00.004+08:00

It was a day of mixed emotions, I remember being reflective, sad, joyful, young and old all at the same time. The GG picnic at the park was probably the fondest memory of the day, at our secret hideout with rows and rows of endless greenery and a gorgeous horizon that literally blended into the sky. We liked thinking we were in the middle of Australian pastures, we probably were, in the idealistic parts of our minds. Just like how Bench 1B was, this shall be our new spot. Thank you for the lovingly-prepared food, the clinking of wineglasses, the ingenious bridge game idea, the endless spread of photos and running and jumping along carefree with me in garden party dresses - I felt all of seven at twenty-two.

What's a birthday without tears; I don't think I've ever cried so much on my birthday since I was nine and thought no one was going to turn up at my Kidsports birthday party. I did, part of the whole reflective mood thing which culminated at the carpark in that little huddle of prayer blessings, it was probably the most touching moment that day. Thank you bo, james, debs, esther, abi and shu for being there - and of course, billy for flying from Hong Kong, that's three years in a row.

The million greetings at church that morning, I don't know how everyone knew - but every single person wished me happy birthday. It was all very surreal, like it was my wedding.

And my family, for the lunch with the breathtaking view and now Mark probably won't stop for years on end about my singing birthday knife. I was horrified, when the musical birthday cake came out and was presented to me, except - it wasn't the cake, it was the knife. The knife had four pre-programmed tunes to it; birthday, graduation, marriage and happy occasions. I couldn't stop laughing after, we even did a documentary on the knife which will someday appear on youtube when I get down to it.

With the Kate Spade bag now comes the lovely Varinas to mark the next year. No they're not Manolos, but they're a cute start and they go into pretty dust bags at the end of each day.

The twentysomethings loss

2008-04-21T23:11:00.002+08:00

Another year, another birthday, a fleeting sense of a period of time transpiring.

6, 7, 9, 11, 16. Somehow I only remember those birthdays. And of course, you don't ever forget your twenty-first, which was a delightfully dizzy memory I'll always remember. Those Disneyland teacups really jolt themselves into your brain.

It's sad how this year all I can think about is a loss of idealism - maybe it's all part of venturing into adulthood and moving on from the forever-young 21 you don't want to leave behind. I feel like last year I've been through the scariest rollercoaster ride of my life, the highs, the lows and the upside-down loops. The anticipation of the ascent and the mind-blowing drops. Somehow, throughout the year, I lost a part of myself. The holed-up little girl inside that only knew how to be loved faded away slowly - to become wary, edgy, tired and frightened of the world around her. You all grown up will roll your eyes and say it's about time, babe - it probably was. I said goodbye to childish chocolate-stained smiles and perfection in others. It was a trade-off to a world I never quite knew but grew to accept and understand. And the only way around it was to grip on steadfastly to my faith and to those that never did let me fall completely.

I celebrate the joys of imperfection because it only heightens His perfection. I bid farewell to the illusions of the princess in the yellow gown and I look to the long road ahead. Maybe someday my plastic slippers will still turn into red-soled Louboutins, but that will be a new lease of life altogether.

Captured by...

2008-04-18T00:39:00.004+08:00

Joseph, and I really miss Melody.
Gary looks positively retarded.
Thank God for Roomie.

I was looking through old photos. This one's not one of those perfectly angled shots with ideal lighting and a gorgeous backdrop, in fact it probably has nothing to boast of - but we were so very happy.

I'd do anything to recapture that moment.

The job

2008-04-17T21:29:00.004+08:00

I'm not going to have a coherent flow of thought in this post, because I spend the most part of my day thinking my brains out at work.

As you can see, it's starting to not make much sense.

I haven't written here in awhile, but that's because I've channelled my energies elsewhere. When you're writing at work, you don't quite seem to want to continue writing when you come home. My daily routine has involved more in devouring one Hong Kong drama serial after another - hey, that keeps me in touch with the Cantonese I picked up while living there that I don't intend to lose.

I don't want to write too much about this oft-thought glamourous job except -

It really isn't as glamourous as it is. Yes, you say tell me something new. Here we go, we'll start with what I like about it:

1) PR firms treat me like royalty.
2) I have a stash of makeup and beauty products to last me five years. My father glanced at it and said I never have to buy makeup again "for life". Obviously, he was exaggerating there.
3) I can spend half an hour plucking my eyebrows and dolling up at work and everyone thinks I'm working very hard "testing the products".
4) I shop on my job.
5) I get media discounts.
6) I attend events at posh places like St Regis and pretend I'm older than I really am. I love checking out the restrooms in these places - sometimes I stay there longer than necessary to avoid the horrid small talk.
7) The spa stories are the best to write. Because you get to spend whole afternoons getting massaged on the job.
8) To date, I've had two free lash perms, two facials (one with champagne), one massage, one body scrub.. I'll add more as I remember.
9) Oh, the fashion shows. There was a week I attended so many I saw the same models at different runway shows. And, being part of the Singapore Fashion Festival was cool.
10) I can wear anything I want to work. No limitations there, we go all out in the magazine industry - we wear false eyelashes, we preen ourselves for hours, we carry Chanel bags, we look perfect every time we enter the office with sky-high stilettos... no, seriously.
11) I was kidding, no one wears makeup to work. We write about it so much that we're sick of it. I go into work every day looking like I just woke up. The Chanel bag part is true though, everyone seems to have some sort of branded thing on them. And we do preen ourselves when we go out of the office. So we are vain, come on don't tell me you aren't.
12) The free treats/food we always get.
13) Long lazy lunches the team likes to go for once there's an occasion for it - someone's farewell, someone's birthday, the magazine revamp...
14) I like everyone in the editorial team.. Except (well, we'll come to that in the hate section).
15) Seeing my bylines in the magazine!

Hates:

1) StylistbitchystylistbitchystylistbackstabbingstylistwhoI'msurehatesmetoo.
2) The food. We have no food. We have two stores in the canteen - Chinese and Malay. We also have some other industrial canteens around us that don't get much better. We have to walk out fifteen minutes in the hot sun just to eat something rather decent. That's why everyone in this industry is skinny. I swear.
3) I'm finding it very hard to think of hates. Why is that.. I really hate...
4) Ah. Deadlines. Pressure pressure pressure. I've worked till 9pm every day this week. My record has been 11pm. I hate deadlines. They loom above your head like a blinking sign reminding you it's due.
5) Pinning clothes for photoshoots because I always poke myself with those dreaded pins.
6) Edits. They make you feel worse than a lousy B grade in school.
7) The air-conditioning. It's a stupid sub-zero degree freezer. I wear my thick winter jacket I use in 14-degree Hong Kong temperatures and it's not enough.

I guess the job's not that bad because I'm getting used to it. There are days of course where I don't want to get out of bed just because of the mundaneness of it all. But working long hours and getting paid peanuts is something I'll have to consider before deciding if I want to return into this industry. Sure, my deputy editor gets the latest YSL bag dumped at her table randomly, but that for consecutive 1am nights in the office?

You have to really love the job. I love fashion, I love writing, I like knowing about new places, I'm even starting to take an inkling towards beauty - but after just four months, I think about how long I can do this for. It's tiring, keeping up with trends, with the newest things and being up to date about everything. And the frivolity of it all gets to me (okay, just sometimes). I know everything there is to know about Dries Van Noten's floral prints or the best long-lasting lipsticks but unfortunately I've hardly been informing myself on world news. It's just all been about magazines.

But well, I've learnt:

1) More about writing than I've ever learnt in my years in school.
2) I've become a pro at scanning press releases and coordinating information.
3) Beauty writing is probably the hardest thing to write ever. Harder than anything in Public Affairs Reporting or Feature Writing class. Try turning something so inconsequential into something intellectual. Which is really what they expect us to do - you rack your brains so hard to write about yet another whitening product.
4) All these beauty products are essentially the same. They just come up with some cool new ingredient to put into it and voila - we have to write about it.
5) There's a fine line between what's in and what's not in fashion. It really is all about the person. Matchy-matchy is definitely out. It's about that single something that defines you or stands out or has that added detail, really. Whether it matches or not, people still admire it. And I still believe it's not about following trends, it's about sensing and feeling happy in whatever you wear.
6) It's my personal belief by the way, what I just said. I'm not trying to convince you.
7) Eponymous is my new favourite word. It's used everywhere in the magazine and I never knew what it meant before this but I'm using it all the time now. Eponymous, eponymous. Sounds like hippopotamus.

Before this starts to sound like a thesis... I've actually written a whole lot, come to think of it. It's almost bedtime, which has adjusted itself to hours that I've not slept at since secondary school. Well since I've spent so long on this, our May issue's out - my feature article's in it! That has to be my most accomplished thing since I joined. If you still don't know which magazine I'm writing for, ask me personally. I'm not about to mention anything here and get charged for divulging secrets (you never know what stupid coded rule this might be in the journalism world).

Ice-cream dreams

2008-01-26T00:12:00.001+08:00

Distinct voices
All too familiar words
I froze
I ran

--

There's a sweet simplicity in an ice-cream cone which brings out that child in you. I also happen to be one of the worst consumers of ice-cream, more often than not with chocolate dribbled all over my mouth and chin.

So that was me today while sourcing (I love sourcing because it's shopping on the job, although it's not really part of my job scope, but the new stylist needed help with the new spring/summer collection for April) - the girl in the wine-coloured heels, seven huge shopping bags and the ice-cream cone from Haato. And the loveliest Moschino umbrella in all its pale blue glory with gorgeous red roses splashed all over it, coupled with the cutest silver handle. I don't know how it'll be used in the spread, but I saw it and fell in love with it immediately and I knew it had to be featured somewhere. I really wanted to open it not withstanding the fact that I had no more hands to hold it and it costs a couple of hundred dollars, way too much for the bright sun to be shining its harmful rays on. Anyway, my point is, you lose that flamboyant, pompous or glamourous air with an ice-cream cone. It's the childish act of delightfully licking and being emotionally happy from the sugar highs it brings. Maybe that's why Magnum days were fun.

Can you imagine someone in a pristine white Chanel suit and Louboutins with an ice-cream cone? I suppose not. A bottle of San Pellegrino would perhaps be more befitting.

The ice-cream cone was probably the only me part in this whole array of events which happened. The slob beneath the exterior. I was carrying huge shopping bags containing bags, shoes and accessories close to ten thousand dollars from shops I never even knew existed in Singapore.

Later, I sat along Orchard Road with my bags surrounding me as I waited for one of my colleagues. I plugged into my iPod with my favourite Canto playlist and watched the world go by which is something I never get to do. It was a fun hour as I people-watched.

The five-year-old with the Victoria Beckham bob (she'll get the assymetrical soon), the mothers who just stepped out from the gym, the giggly Japanese schoolgirls, the happy mismatched couple and the old man with the plastic bag labelled 'Leaping Lizard' (I wonder what they sell there). And I knew people were watching me just like I was watching them. Many times their roving eyes moved surreptitiously to my seven branded shopping bags and then to me, with my trusty notebook. I wonder which stereotype they were mentally fitting me into.

Two people stopped to ask me for directions and advice and I felt like I was from the Singapore Tourism Board.

I was also secretly burning in my black leggings which I bought from Japan because my normal ones were too thin for the weather there. They were perfect for my igloo of an office. Instead, I was out in the thirty-degree sweltering heat. Fashion kills.

Still, I love this part of my job. It's extremely informative. Did you know there's a Manolo Blahnik store in Singapore with a 70% sale? Yes, I might own my very first pair soon - contributors, anyone?

Best I ever had

2008-01-10T14:49:00.000+08:00

If there were to be a "spinning" section on this post, it would be Vertical Horizon's "Best I Ever Had". I love how songs take you back to a distant memory, which you've all but forgotten except when the familiar tune and lyrics trigger it again like it was just yesterday. I remember every song sung at special moments, fleeting as it may have been. That flood of nostalgia and colourful images being fast-forwarded like on a reel of film: it seemed like a whole different life altogether.

That song brings me back to my sixteen-year-old days, swinging upside down from the metal bars at school with the sun fading beneath the clouds, without a care in the world. We were laughing and shouting every single word without really thinking about what we were singing.

But it's not so bad, you're only the best I ever had.

And as the years went by, there were more songs and more memories that were created and tucked away into that nice storage part of my brain that forgets till provoked. So I'm sitting here now wrapped in my sweater with the rain pouring outside, deadlines for six stories looming in front of me, half-consumed bubble tea keeping me going, and that same song playing in my head. It's a new memory created, with the exact same tune.

Magazine beginnings

2008-01-02T14:11:00.000+08:00

I like it so far. I've spent the entire morning reading past issues of Female, Vogue, Glamour and Harper's Bazaar - basically the clutter that's left on my desk by the previous occupant. And that is actually part of my job. That's the best part of it all, that reading fashion and beauty magazines is within the job scope and I can do it freely and won't be seen as slacking off. Suddenly, the bylines I've been committing to memory come to life and faces are put to the names I gather from each issue - writers, editors, stylists and coordinators. I'm surrounded by tall, beautiful girls with fair skin and colourful outfits, women with bright purple hair and perfectly-accented English. Fashion is taken to a completely new level at this place. And they're nice. These women turn to little girls when someone buys in bubble tea for everyone because of the sad state of food provisions in this building. There is nowhere to eat in this area except for the canteen which has a grand total of two stalls. Maybe that's why everyone's so slim.

In a morning, I've educated myself on the art of blow-drying, this season's must-haves and the essence of bags and shoes. And a 42-page house style guide that reinforces everything we've learnt in journalism and more. Why didn't they throw this guide at us the first day we entered university - it tells you everything you need to know about writing. Who knew that karang guni is really spelt karung guni? It's chaise longue instead of chaise lounge, and Irish whiskey is spelt the way it is because although it is scotch and whisky, the Irish and people who drink the Irish version are fussy that it is spelt whiskey. Also, "irregardless" is not a word.

Lighthearted yet neutral, promote without sounding pushy, objectivity without putting readers to sleep are the few guidelines I picked up today. I can't wait to write. But at this point, I shall be contented with clearing the stuff under my desk. There's a whole stash of shoes, books and CDs which no one seems to want, although I can't exactly touch them. Whatever it is, I've already inherited a brand-new bikini, a pouch and a few t-shirts. And of course, the latest copy of Female.

Two thousand and seven

2007-12-31T00:23:00.000+08:00

January

February March

April

May

June

July

August

September

October

November

December

Unveil

2007-12-14T01:30:00.000+08:00

I saw, in gradual vision through my tears,

The sweet, sad years, the melancholy years,

Those of my own life, who by turns had flung

A shadow across me.

- Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Happy-birthdays

2007-12-13T12:30:00.000+08:00

Two birthday treats later - including a spectacular spread at the Conrad - and a rare night out meeting people I haven't seen in five years, I laugh recounting the stories with waves of nostalgia.

You could even call it tsunamis of nostagia.

I realised this is also the first big twenty-first birthday party I've attended this year.

I can't believe Christmas is almost here, again. You have your melancholy Christmases, sipping red wine by yourself, and of course you have those parties and dinners if you choose to let yourself be surrounded by love. This year's version is awfully vague.

Happy Birthday, Dern.

Japanese-flavoured eyes

2007-12-05T22:18:00.000+08:00

You know you've watched too many movies this year when you have nothing left to watch on the plane except Transformers, which is something I'd never pay money to watch. I forced myself to watch it anyway, and tried to see why males might find these mechanic expressionless characters adorable. And I gave my mom heartfelt recommendations on the rest of the movies being shown on the plane - Ratatouille, No Reservations, Die Hard 4 and Hairspray.

I like Tokyo so far, but travelling with my mom means I do all the picture-taking, navigating around the metro system and going on Space Mountain at Disneyland all by myself. It's also been days of running around in single-digit temperatures into heated places (I have no idea why we never are warmly wrapped enough), watching my Creme Brulee latte turn cold in minutes, eating endless bowls of delicious soba, not getting enough of Japanese food and learning about trees. My mom and I are very different - when cruising down Ginza, the most expensive shopping district in Tokyo, I'm gushing at the four-storey Diors, Pradas and Ferragamos, and she's checking out the trees. The Maple Tree, The Cherry Blossom Tree and other fancy trees. But I've also realised that she's secretly as vain as me, perhaps every woman is - and this is a woman with absolutely no fashion sense - she's been parading around Tokyo in track shoes when everyone else in Japan is in boots or heels. She complained about mortality and sagging skin tonight, and how she needs to go on a diet, before asking me whether she should go for skin tightening. I was about to firmly tell her not to waste money, but then I thought to myself that I'd probably think the exact same thing when I'm her age - and I would probably do it. The perils of being a woman, really.

No, Japan will never replace Hong Kong in my heart, but it does have its charms, although after awhile, you do realise that all of Asia is mostly the same. The major cities anyway - Japan, Hong Kong and Korea all have the same blue signboards and crowded shopping streets and efficient train systems. I love their English expressions most, they have bagels that have "everything" in it, a fish market called "The Fish", a clothing store called "The Store", something at McDonalds called "McPork" and instruction signs all over Japan that crack me up. And the winter fashion here is amazing, everyone is in trenchcoats and boots. And hair is not just hair in Japan, everyone has coiffed, dyed, curled or straightened hair that is perfectly in place. The women never live without mascara, even a 50-year-old woman on the train has beautiful curled eyelashes. I do feel ugly in this country.

I've also realised how horrifyingly fair I've become. Such that I actually have rosy pink cheeks and skin in the cold weather, which has not been the case since I was about three. It looks like it's goodbye to that dark creature I was a few years back where I baked in the sun almost every single day.

Because I plan the itinerary, it's Mount Fuji and Yokohama over the next few days. To feed my desire for snowcapped mountains, and well - to actually understand people communicating when I visit the biggest Chinatown in Asia. I look the most Chinese I've ever looked in years, with black hair and fair skin instead of the coloured tresses and bronzed look I always fantasized having. And for the first time in a long time, I'm actually proud of it.

Idealistic realm

2007-11-30T13:01:00.000+08:00

You don't know pain until you've been through happiness - and so these images have encompassed the last month or so, the happy tingly bubble part of it which I'm thankful exists because I would be in a sanitarium otherwise.

But somehow I still feel like I'm walking through life in a hazy daze of not knowing, not understanding and not realising what led to this labyrinth. If I had to write an article answering the who's, what's, when's, where's, why's and how's of my life, I would be at a complete loss. Unfortunately, it isn't as black and white as public affairs reporting.

Amidst the glitz and glamour of the Salvatore Ferragamo fashion show where I stepped into a world completely unlike my own, mingling with the celebrities, making small talk and enhancing social skills, picking at bite-sized expensive treats and an overdose of champagne, I felt like a totally different person. A socialite, a person behind the dolled-up facade - as much as I enjoyed the experience, I wonder how these people can live their lives like that. I dislike social events for that reason, but I must say I adored the fashion show. The dresses, bags and heels donned on perfect figures, legs and bodies - in the world of fashion perfection. That night I pushed aside the editor dream for awhile, the idea of running a fashion show and styling the models seemed like a much brighter and exciting prospect.

The Waraku dinners and Marmalade-afters with people that have changed my life to be the source of comfort through the thorny rides, and SATC marathons without the series itself. Still, picnics in the comfort of your own home? With a posed photoshoot and keel-over type laughter after that - everyone should have silly days like that. And of course, Garibaldi with the bestie. It was somewhere that I've always always wanted to go, but was way out of my budget. It didn't disappoint though, first class service, an ambience that makes you feel like you've been transported to the rich colourful past, coupled with bubbly champagne and swoon-worthy Italian food, I'm going back when I've an occasion to imprint.

An unexpected birthday surprise for the youngest birthday girl in the group brought the four of us together again as well, and that night at Holland Village was really reminiscent of the past - the post 'A' level Hong Kong trip, and of course, China, where it all started. It has been ages since we've last celebrated a birthday together where everyone was present, and I'm glad that the chemistry hasn't changed. Add in new members, new situations and new phases, but the core of the friendships is really, love.

Then you have the night out with the girls whom you've known for six years, and suddenly you're your 15-year-old self again. Because they were the ones who went through the ugliness, the MTV filming, the radical birthday presents, the sleepovers where no one slept but spent hours filming the funny speeches on Star Awards - and they know you for the person you really are. I want to see the world through my 15-year-old eyes once again, the pretty rose-tainted days where happiness was found in stopping by Orchard Road after school and eating char kway teow on the bus ride home.

But as you grow older, the unfortunate truth is you actually get wiser about things, and the world falls into place in a completely diferent light. The idealist you know yourself to be slowly fades away to become the realist you hate, although there are parts of yourself you want to cling steadfastly to. I suppose that's why Stardust and Enchanted are two of my favourite movies this year - okay, and Ratatouille. Because it signifies hope, and you come out of the movie feeling like a young girl once again where everything is shiny and bright in a place where love prevails. Sure, I did enjoy The Queen and the likes of Letters from Iwo Jima, but it doesn't leave that sugar-high feeling. Of course, that cynic that has somehow stemmed its way into me this year shortens that feeling, but the momentary bliss is all I need.

Shinjuku, Harajuku, Ginza and Mount Fuji with the mother is next up on the list beginning tomorrow. And maybe the magical experience of Tokyo Disneyland, although I believe nothing will be as magical as the first one. Some mother-daughter bonding time, and hopefully we don't get into too many fights. I've had enough of those this year already, I'll pacify her and let her think we're on Gilmore Girls.

As we approach the end

2007-11-17T22:35:00.000+08:00

Now that was last December, before this whirlwind of a year started.

I love December, it's my favourite time of the year when everything starts to get a little prettier, with iridescent Christmas lights, toffee nut lattes at Starbucks, and familiar carols playing in supermarkets and Topshop. I'm going to be away for most of December this year, which I'm looking forward to - to getting away from this country and experiencing December the real way, with winter and jackets and boots and scarves.

But first I have to get over that media management nightmare which is as frightening as November was.

Nursery rhymes and penal codes

2007-11-07T23:36:00.000+08:00

My extended family has increased in size. At my granduncle's 77th birthday party tonight, I realised that just a few years ago, half these kids didn't even exist. It is fun being part of such a big family where all the children are just running around, although it feels weird not being the one pampered, scolded or referred to as "the kids" anymore. And being at that age in between where you're neither a kid running around wrestling with each other, nor an adult engaging in conversation about the property market and politics, you sort of wonder where you should be in this frightening gap called the twenties.

I chose to sit in between, dividing my time between entertaining the children, making faces and engaging in babytalk, and participating in some intellectual talk with the adults about the liberalisation of gays in Singapore (which happens to be what everyone is talking about these days with 377A) - the Public Affairs Reporting class was of tremendous help.

Still, it was mostly about the children. The moms talked about what they did with them, their daily routines and how exasperating they could get, although with that obvious hint of pride beneath the rolled eyes. The dads talked about their daughters cajoling them for money, and their careers in order to support their children.

My twelve-year-old twin cousins, Gregory and Genevieve, the typical Anglo-Chinese Junior School and Methodist Girls' School stereotypes, waiting to go into secondary school, at where else - ACS (I) and MGS. With them, talk was all about schoolbus fares, Gen beginning to shop at Takashimaya, Greg and his tennis and rugby lessons, PSLE scores and how Gen is a good 20cm taller than Greg at this age even though they're twins.

Then there's James, Jared and Jessica, age nine, seven and five respectively, all behaving in the same shy manner, except when it comes to fighting with each other. You'd think that being the youngest and only daughter with two older brothers, Jessica would get bullied. But no, watching her with her sweet smile, small frame and fair skin, her ferocity emerges when she wins arguments against her two brothers. And the two boys are as different as night and day - James is big and wiry with a face that screams 'stay away', while Jared is a fair good-looking angmoh-looking roly poly.

The one that got most attention was three-month old Cedric, a bright-eyed baby boy who looks as if he's six months old. He let himself be passed around from one set of welcoming arms to another, and lapped up all the attention as he stared at the people that circled him half the time. I know he loved being the centre of everything though, he didn't shed a single tear. I swear he even nodded at me once.

And my grandmother, being adorably hilarious as usual with her mix-up of words. When James and Greg started kicking each other, she scolded them and told them to stop playing "karaoke". She meant to say "karate".

Then the 9pm show on Channel 8 began, and suddenly everybody, young and old had their eyes transfixed on the television. I miss those days when I actually had time to follow these drama serials.

When it was time for my granduncle to cut his birthday cake, all his grandchildren gathered around the birthday cake, gazing at it with wide-eyed fascination as children always do when it comes to chocolate and lighted candles. Until, my aunt's horrified voice resounded,

"James, don't blow the candles!!!"

Two candles were now emitting smoke.

So after the whole enchilada of lighting it again, and finally singing a birthday song, all my granduncle's grandchildren blew the candles out excitedly. All my granduncle did was stand there and smile proudly.

The older generation celebrate their birthdays only so that their family can come together once again. They sit quietly during these big gatherings, but really, they're watching their family interact, and nothing makes them happier than seeing the next generation happy and knowing that they have left a good legacy behind.

终身美丽

2007-10-19T02:47:00.000+08:00

A night full of Cantonese-speaking people, mean humour and all my favourite songs.

Swaying along to her dance songs, taking in the glitzy outfit changes with awe, crying during her heartbreaker tunes, wrestling with stupid security guards and feeling as if you were in a dream throughout the 3-hour concert.

Most of all, I loved her candidness and her love for making fun of her "fat fans".

I would elaborate more, but I'm still in the midst of packing and finishing up my pointless feature article. I regret doing this last minute.

I even prioritised learning how to upload my first video onto YouTube tonight.

Still, nothing changes. Tomorrow I will be back in Hong Kong.

Show Mi

2007-10-13T14:05:00.000+08:00

道别了怎可再见
就像这一生再精彩也得一次童年
但是我天真未变
孩子很好骗为了不死的信念
仍然信你狡辩
若我听教你便回来我身边

明知等不到亦要等
还好有眼泪来陪衬
反正空虚没什么想发生
难得开心过让我等
难得我越捱越振奋
可以等谁愿意问
没真相才吸引
连眉梢都因你剧震
我勇敢我胆怯我不忿
回头问背后谁着了灯
回头问谁在接吻

但愿你真的看见
现在我天天抱紧这布公仔去睡眠
但愿我天真未变
孩子很好骗为了不死的信念
仍然信你狡辩
若我听教你便回来我身边

I can't wait to hear Sammi sing this song, it'll probably spark off the waterworks in me.

Six more hours.

s t r e s s

2007-10-06T13:22:00.000+08:00

You hate it, you dread the days when it's here, but when it is one and a half weeks late, you start to get worried and wish it would arrive already. A typical love-hate relationship.

That's just one of my stress symptoms, as I'd like to believe it to be, and not the beginning of some more serious... implications.

I haven't been able to sleep. Hardly, or not at all. And when I sink into that fifteen minutes of sleep, I dream I'm in an aircrash and I can feel the plane going down and the churning continues in my stomach as I wake up in cold sweat. Either that, or I take two hours to get to sleep. I go to bed at 1am, and the minute my head hits the pillow, my mind works twice as fast. The next thing I know, I check my clock and it's 3am, and I haven't slept at all. Then I start to berate myself because I know I'm going to be a sleepy and moody person the next morning.

I need a patter, those that pat you to sleep every night, like how my grandma or mom would when I couldn't sleep as a child. Or someone to sing, or some aromatheraphy. Or a giant sleeping pill.

Ironically, I manage to doze off right in front of Irene's watchful eye during feature writing. I stare at her with the "concentrated" look, while my mind is slowly falling asleep. Before I know what's happening, I jerk myself awake and she's still looking at me. Sigh. As Weix puts it, boredom reaches new heights in her class.

I do the most random things when I'm stressed. I go swimming, and I swim laps. I remember the days when swimming used to be stress. I would use every excuse in the 'Lie-To-Your-Father-To-Get-Out-Of-Swimming-Lessons' - headaches, stomachaches, fevers, homework - just to get out of those Sunday swimming classes.

I crossed the road when the red man was glaring at me. Only I didn't see the red man. I walked across the road, mind preoccupied as usual, and almost got knocked over. I turned my head in time to see a car horn, tyres screech and the car stopping right at my feet. I scurried off before the driver could curse profanities at me.

My wisdom tooth is killing me, again. And the pain is spreading to other parts of my mouth, resulting in a nagging sore throat. But the thought of getting it removed - that horrifying dental experience at Kowloon City - makes me wonder if I should just bear with the pain and wait for it to go away.

Coupled with headaches, fever spells and a sudden memory loss on the last time I've eaten because I never feel hungry these days, I need it to come already.

Just to reassure me that there still is some normalcy in my body system.

Twentyonemoredays

2007-09-27T22:47:00.000+08:00

Twenty-one more days, and I'll be right back where I belong, even if it's just for the weekend. I don't think my heart ever left the life I left behind, although I only have memories to rely on now.

Still, who cares.

Yay yay yay.

4PE class reunion

2007-09-26T00:44:00.000+08:00

Five years on, and we've all trodden on different paths after that last exam paper, when we knew it would be a certain end to one part of our lives - those wonderful four years in secondary school.

And how time changes things, the fleeting element of time strikes me as a frightening prospect, at twenty-one, some of us are already working. In the United States as a producer of documentaries and films, as a research assistant at a local university, some of us have gotten an overseas education - UK being the most popular choice - and yet some of us are still stuck here sunk in the depths of this education system that we've been desperately trying to get out of since we were eight.

Yet when we come together, it is all smiles, loud outbursts of laughter and hours of reminiscing those days. It didn't seem like that long ago, yet five years sounds like an eternity. Being an SCGS girl is something I'd never give up for anything else, and thinking back, oh how wonderful and carefree.

Everyone remembers the same funny moments. The physics lesson in the lab where the small Vietnamese girl in our class got scolded because the teacher thought she wasn't standing up to greet her because the benches covered most of her, the time when the same teacher mispronounced a girl's name, calling her "dung" literally of all things, the loud shrill voice of our English teacher when she breezed into class, always fifteen minutes late, claiming she was "in a meeting" with some "important people". And that time when the form teacher in secondary one tripped and fell over some wiring, cracking the overhead projector, and everyone could see that crack right in the middle on the lighted screen above her.

The nicknames we used to give our teachers - professing some lesbians just because they live together and shop at supermarkets together (although I highly believe that one is true), the one who should really live in an igloo because she looks like an eskimo - we called her ginamo - or the Amath teacher "mosquijoo" just because she looks like a mosquito.

And who could forget the Chinese teacher Lizard Cheong who thought it would be a miracle if I could get a B because she always said my "造句"'s were literal translations from English to Chinese (hah, I proved her wrong).

The category games and Kallang waves started by my best friends during Amath lessons once Mosquijoo's back was turned, the backstabbing when some people tried to tell us off for doing the Kallang wave in class, the race for meepok every recess - it came down to the sprinters running down to chope places in the queue. I became a category game expert as well, with answers to every movie, actor, actress, flower, country, song or brand starting with any letter from A-Z. And unlike Bo, I didn't have a secret cheat sheet which she prepared at home just for the competition during Amath lessons. But that also meant I never grasped relative velocity.

Being sports representative in secondary school meant my class had slack PE lessons, because we always fought for baseball, netball or the occasional soccer. We would pretend to be the famous players in leagues. I was only good at appearing fast around the soccer field, but no one really passed the ball to me.

In ten years our lives will change again. And that moment when we sang Vitamin C's "Graduation Friends Forever" on the stage during graduation day will only seem like an even more distant memory.

China funnies

2007-09-23T00:25:00.000+08:00

I looked through the China pictures and started laughing. I have an impossible amount of work to do, but I figured doing this post would be good for my personal well-being before I begin trudging through the sickening path of work. These are my favourite funny moments.

Some pointless birds.

In Shanghai, when Vic and I tried to do an exuberant happy pose in the middle of the bustling food street. I got so excited I tripped and fell all over her, in the process stealing all the limelight.

We love making Zhuomin jealous.

The pigeon and Minxiu Wu.

Guess who's the culprit behind this disgusting mess, and it appeared so deliberate. That entire moment unfolded in front of my eyes, and someone's jeans got soiled in the process.

What is Mr. Koay doing?

The Chinese description is so lengthy, warm and genuine. When translated to English, it shortens itself to two words.

The world's most considerate airlines.

How can anyone not laugh at this picture?

I wonder what he was thinking.

They even welcome you to your coaster.

She touched the bell, and I exposed her.

The Magnum days. I forgot what the point of these expressions were, but look at Zhuomin's face. HAHAHA.

I died laughing when he suddenly dropped to the floor. He wins for the most earnest, enthusiastic and sacrificing photographer of all time.

Hold on

2007-09-14T08:10:00.000+08:00

Exactly how I feel right now.

A rainy night outside one of the best malls on earth, I can just feel myself there already, pulling my jacket tighter over myself, head bowed and shivering as I climb that mountain of a hill.

I'm teary, weary and jaded. And a part of me wishes this part of my life would just end so we can move on to the better things.

I'm on the verge of... something, if not definitely that weird case of conjunctivitis that hit this morning.

The Beautiful Frock

2007-09-05T23:58:00.000+08:00

Today, I was asked to be a shopping trainer during the holidays and to critique River Island's latest collection.

The over-enthusiastic sales person at River Island - I give him credit for being the most enthusiastic, most helpful and nicest person in the sales industry to date, he was everywhere I went in the store and offered me their newest and most popular items to try - asked me for comments on the new season's items as compared to the last. I gave him a five-minute speech on what I thought about their clothes ever since they came to Singapore and how it compares to the London one, and how the new fall/winter collection's colours have mellowed alot as opposed to summer's bright tones, and how I love their stuff but the prices are exorbitant and they have to lower it somewhat if they want to compete with the other leading British brands in Singapore. I think he was abit shocked, but I really have alot to say about that store.

I ended off with, "So, when is your next sale?"

He looked apologetic but was quick to reassure me that there are two sales every season at River Island.

"The Beautiful Frock" will now forever be my favourite story. Kate, Gen and I saw it at a gift shop about a month ago and I remember how out of all the little snippets in the store, that was my absolute favourite because I couldn't stop smiling looking at it. I even told myself I'd come back for it one day, it comes written on a cute little pouch which I could keep my iPod in. I received it today as a surprise gift, and it was bought because the story reminded that person of me. That stroke of fate, or coincidence - whatever it was, it amazes me that I never mentioned to anyone how much I wanted that story for myself but it came back to me in the end, which makes it so special.

"Buy me, Lady," said the frock, "and I will make you into a BEAUTIFUL and WHOLE and COMPLETE Human Being."
"Do not be silly," said the Man, "for a frock alone cannot do that."
"TRUE," said the Lady. "I will have the Shoes and the Bag as well."

- Edward Monkton

Shopping is the world's greatest medicine

2007-09-02T00:38:00.000+08:00

My oh my, I only had two posts in the whole month of August. And still I'm finding myself struggling for interesting, thought-provoking things to say.

I'm boring. One of my greatest fears is materialising.

Weekends are a luxury these days, the brief respite away from the West caves and school. I live for those two days, and spend hours in my bed back home. If I wake up too early for my own liking on a Saturday morning, I drag the blankets over my head, turn over and force myself to go back to sleep.

Something in me was dying yesterday as I sat in my room on a Friday night after dinner with the family. I felt like I needed to be out there among the crowds and doing something, perhaps to be with my clothing friends. And I hadn't stepped into a shopping mall for two weeks, and that is Lent enough to me (abstinence, abstinence, abstinence). So I did the most fun thing I had done all week - I headed down to City Hall and shopped by myself for a good hour until the shops closed. Of course, in order to cover as much ground as possible, it was a quick but thorough glance into all my favourite stores until something caught my eye. And I sped all the way, weaving through the different shopping malls in the area to get to the various mapped-out locations in my head. I got good exercise, and my spirits lifted almost immediately after I stepped into the air-conditioned concrete jungle with the familiar smell of new clothes hitting my face.

What a great idea it was. I felt an instant burst of joy, and there was no chocolate involved either.

I bumped into the two Taiwanese exchange students I had befriended in school, and that was a really nice surprise, because we ended up shopping and walking all the way back to the trains together. I wish I could do something to make Singapore more exciting for them, so I told them I'd bring them out to eat our local delights one of these days. I'm always involved with exchange students and trying to make their lives better in this holed-up place, because I don't want to outrightly tell them that "yes, you should have gone on exchange in Hong Kong instead". I wonder why Billy actually loved Singapore.

I'm going to set aside time to spend at a mall each week, or I think I'm really going to break down before the exams even start coming round. Although, I really am disgusted at how expensive the tops at Topshop have got. If a top costs $56 to $63 on average in their new collection, why not I get a dress that costs a little more at $73? Which is my theory these days.

I miss H&M so much.

The days when dresses cost $30 to $40, jeans were $30 to $50 and tops were $10 to $25, tell me why everything isn't better in Hong Kong. Melody and Anna and whoever else that's still there, please continue to shop there just to show them my respect.

Excuse us while we flash our pearly whites

2007-09-01T23:45:00.000+08:00

A new discovery, the Hong Kong Tea House - better prices, pretty decent food and the large interior to boast of called for an unforgettable girls' night out complete with loud, boisterous laughter and gossip as well as a whole album of photos. With the exact same background just different expressions on our faces, we could very well have sat in front of a whitewashed wall.

I loved watching Mel dance. Somehow when your friend is up there on stage, and she's the best dancer and the star, it fills you with pride.

The photo-taking was hilarious - we were divas, we posed with utensils, we were each other, we were the boys, we were cute, we were sad - we love ourselves too much, coupled with the fact that we haven't had photo sessions like this in eight months. We made so much noise that the waiter came over to politely tell us to lower our volume because other customers were complaining.

It still is an encapsulation of a moment for me, these are the moments I live for when school gets disgustingly stifling, and these are the moments where I'm myself, and people love me for it.

Why don't these things form into paragraphs, damn it. I hate computers and html and codes.

The petulant 'I hate School' post

2007-08-08T23:34:00.000+08:00

The last three days have been an insightful reminder of what the rest of the semester is going to look like. I have gone through practically every emotion in the last seventy-two hours, and it has not been a very fun rollercoaster ride.

Anticipationexcitementbitchinessenvydepressionjealousyconfusionhappinessuncertaintystressworryfatigue boredomrestlessnesstirednessrepression

Except it doesn't end with exhilarated screams and a candid shot of yourself at the photo store where your mouth is opened in the most unglamourous fashion and your hair looking like Medusa.

I have also contentedly let myself forget what studying in Singapore feels like. The dread, the piling up workload, the doom that lies ahead with each detailed explanation of every new assignment and the helplessness of it all. My classes in Hong Kong suddenly feel like a breezy walk in the park, and I wonder now why I even complained about Godfrey's lengthy Cantonese lessons where I barely learnt anything new, or Isaac Leung's biased digital art class. At least Godfrey treated us to breakfast during his "extended" break and I was on MSN most of the time during Isaac's lecture. And with Jings to bitch about Iona Milligan with, and play battleship with throughout Mike's communication management class, school was actually fun.

Not to mention trips down to Festival Walk during breaks where I would just float into French Connection or MNG for that boost of energy.

I wonder why I let myself think that even now. No more of that, back to photojournalism class where I feel disastrously incompetent, and my brain working overtime to answer Duffy's countless 'why' questions during Public Affairs Reporting.

This is why I feel like screaming at every exchange student who chooses NTU Communication Studies as their school of exchange. I study there because I have no choice. They have choices. Exchange is supposed to be about all play and no work, which was why mine was so rewarding.

Third year in journalism doesn't sound as appealing as I had made it out to be when I was seventeen and all I wanted was to get into journalism school. Without a doubt, I will learn alot from my writing classes, but the headache of matching electives and timetabling is getting to me and making me snappier than usual. Nothing I want fits. And this semester, I lose half my favourite people to other specialisations which means less friends in class, or a concerted effort in being overly friendly to strangers.

The rollercoaster of emotions is speeding through me again, ending with extreme fatigue, worry with regard to next semester's internship and dull depression. Lack of sleep really makes me a totally different person, the trigger-happiness flies out of the window immediately.

I've spent six hours in the ACRC in the last three days, in the first week of school. I don't need a crystal ball to tell me what kind of life I'm going to be leading in the next four months.

Simple love, minus luxe bag

2007-08-02T20:18:00.001+08:00

I don't really know what to write about these days. The cacophony outside my window which reflects typical city-living, the tantalizingly delicious food I've been eating these days coupled with lovely company such that a dinner at Miss Clarity's suddenly proves disastrous, the pessimistic fate of my Harper's Bazaar internship or my gradually sinking heart as I count down the days that would end this eight-month dream.

Well, I could still write about Korea and CM 2007, the last of my Hong Kong exchange programme, or my twenty-first birthday whose photographs no one except those present on that day has seen. Blame it on my utter laziness and the headache that seems to mount each time I have to choose pictures to upload. Every uploading device should be like Facebook's - folders in - ziiiiipppp - one minute.

Or I could write about what I feel at this very moment, which will result in a convulated post which no one but myself will truly understand. I feel and think too much, and I'm complicated. The down-syndrome child talk we had at four in the morning yesterday got to me, some think they are hard to love, and will suffer their whole life, which warrants an immediate abortion. I think they deserve to be loved, because like other human beings, they will embrace life around them. I believe you never know how the down-syndrome child is and will turn out to be - the argument about them suffering and being looked down upon by society is simply a myth we choose to use to comfort ourselves because we do not want to be burdened with the responsiblity of taking care of one. I feel that they could be happy in their own right, doing things that their minds are capable of, even if it means playing with Lego or running around playgrounds all their lives. And why should we then take away this happiness that belongs to them?

I think my point is this - it is a joy to be simple. It is a beautiful world bereft of complications, malificence and wrenching tears. But first we all have to get over that shame yet.

I dislike the rich and the society they belong to, especially when it means they stick to their own echelons and uppity ways. Wealth and having too much can only bring out sides of people I wish I'd never had the chance to see. It destroys hearts, and I think it ultimately rips people of learning to love.

What is in that branded bag, luxurious house or fancy convertible? Everyone wants one, but give me a simple and pure heart to love, to laugh and to embrace those around me any day.

Film snippets

2007-07-13T00:11:00.000+08:00

I chanced upon this today, expressions that I cannot explain, but I couldn't help but laugh aloud. Macau, 28th May.

A depressing day despite the smiles. Sending us off at the Hong Kong Airport are some of the people that made my time in Hong Kong the most wonderful ever - Billy, Melody, Gary and Joseph. Hong Kong, 31st May.

If only we'd all stay this cute and innocent. It took about twenty shots to get one decent one of her because she wouldn't stop bouncing around. Haeundae Beach, Busan, 2nd July.

Roommates (minus Justina) outside Bexco, they made nights memorable. Bexco is Busan's equivalent of Expo. Busan, 5th July.

The world unites in South Korea. I love this picture, and for once credits don't go to better photographers. Busan, 31st June.

The usual self-satisfied smiles under a cabana one warm day in South Korea where we spent the afternoon put to better use. Busan, 5th July.

The funniest birthday present this year, from Sharon. Amelia's Guide to Gossip, and as you can see - everyone's reading it. Siglap Macdonalds, 8th July.

Glam Girls reunion on Sharon's birthday at Fabbrica. We talk about expansion of the group in the next ten years and the future that lies ahead. Dempsey Road, Singapore, 7th July.

My virgin cheongsam. I couldn't breathe or move about too much, but it was pretty while it lasted. My dad would be delighted if I actually bought one. Chinatown, Singapore, 10th July.

I miss taking pictures and then exclaiming how alike we look. The days are back again and I'm glad. Starbucks, 11th July.

Absolute randomness when you bump into friends from university in the Ladies. Even funnier when you take ten minutes to recognise one of them. Velvet, Singapore, 12th July.

I got a mailer yesterday announcing the start of the River Island end-of-season sale. The sale is absolutely amazing (by River Island standards), we were almost hyperventilating in there. And I got hold of secret news that the major Topshop sale starts tomorrow. Poorer days are yet to come. Vivocity, Singapore, 12th July.

Sovereign hands

2007-06-29T01:40:00.000+08:00

I think about my Christian faith as a journey where I'm shaped and moulded very differently from the person I make myself out to be. Over the years, I've discovered gifts and new things about myself I never thought I was, attributes that I'd never have associated with myself otherwise, but it has made me a stronger person on the whole.

The days at St James as a four-year-old girl were fun. I'd run up and down the pews staring at the multicoloured blur of stilletos, loafers and sneakers and then gaze at the majestic stain glass in awe. I could never sit still, I was always peering about looking for new things to do. God was a father figure, someone mightier than my own father, and biblical characters were simply colourful pictures jumping out from the children's Bible. Noah had his animals, Jonah was swallowed by the whale.

I grew up and moved to my grandfather's church, but I didn't like the Sunday school children as much as I thought I would have. I was teased and ridiculed alot, I was always put down, and I hated the boys with a vengeance. The only time I looked at them in the eye was with that defiant smile when I beat them in those memory verse quizzes.

Janis first saw the change in me after my baptism, and she told me frankly how she always tried to reach out to me, but there seemed to be that permanent barrier where I never would let my guard down. I started serving more in church and in Crusade, and alot of the time I struggled with saying no when it came to Christian commitments. I felt like I wasn't doing enough if I refused, and it seemed like the cardinal sin to do so.

Shirley told me that serving is reflected in my entire life. It's not the amount of work or effort I put into Crusade, or being in a committee or leading a discipleship group - but serving encompasses being diligent in my studies as well, honouring my parents and fulfilling the other things I hold with importance in my life. I never saw it in that light but she's right. I always feel guilty when I reject a Christian commitment, but slowly I've grown apart from that feeling. I've learnt to do what enables me to grow in my Christian faith, and the right amount of ministry depending on the capacity I'm able to handle. What's the point of taking up all these commitments and forget the sole purpose of why we're doing so ultimately?

Till today, I prefer to be the one in the back, the one that people never notice. The one arranging chairs, the one working the sound system or the one preparing the bread and the wine. But God never leads me in that direction. For some reason, I'm constantly thrown into leadership positions - being a spiritual multiplier, being a Sunday school teacher, leading prayers, giving speeches or being at the forefront of organising committees. I've always hated the idea, because I never feel good enough or 'holy' enough to be in that position. But the years of doing these things have brought me to that level of whole dependence where I know I'm nothing without God. I suppose if I were arranging chairs, I wouldn't have to pray so hard to make sure the chairs were all in place. But being up there in front of hundreds of people, or being entrusted five girls under your care for you to disciple and nurture - I wouldn't have done this all by myself. The experience has been humbling and I'm entirely committed to prayer before I do something which is out of my own ability.

God speaks true and rewards as He has promised. The semester where I was busiest with Crusade and church commitments, I saw how my grades proved to be the best. That night where I chose to attend Oasis when I had that 226 resume due the next day, I saw His faithfulness shine through when I finished the resume in time to catch the last bus home. I had already set aside money for the cab ride.

I struggle with spiritual gifting. I've always wondered where my talents lie, and that doesn't include trivial, superficial things like being recognised as a fashionista, or being able to identify the latest trends. I can't cook, sew or do math. Neither can I be a doctor, lawyer or investment banker. The world prides occupations like that, and talents like those are recognised. But I've realised that my gift has been staring at me straight in the face for the longest time, and only when I'm faced with the challenge of joining the discipleship committee do I think about the prospect thoroughly.

It's people, people-related things, discipling and being the centre of handling groups. Shirley thinks I'm a pivotal factor in the growth of my cell group, I've been told that I'm everyone's best friend, I seem to be able to work group dynamics and I genuinely enjoy being around people and seeing them happy. That also means I'm awfully affected by things that happen to others (which sometimes I wish I weren't), but I suppose I can't change my nature. I hated it in the past where I would be in the centre of everyone's problems, when everyone told me everything and I was supposed to handle it all for them. But I realised later there must be a reason why everyone tells me everything - and that's the part of me I need to fully maximise in terms of my serving as well.

Campus Mission 2007 in Korea beckons tomorrow, and I think it comes at no better timing where I'm wholeheartedly seeking direction in my life. Besides kimchi, beef and Won Bin lookalikes, I'm determined to come home knowing what I really want for myself.

Melaka church camp

2007-06-27T00:08:00.000+08:00

The church camp to Melaka marked my return home somewhat, where I would finally integrate with the church friends again after six months of being away. I was apprehensive, but perhaps Dad knew better when he signed me up without telling me, the minute registration opened sometime in March.

Rooming with Julienne and our sacrificial dads who watched us snatch the seaview room away on from them on the first day, and when we sent them off to change money for us while we lounged around on the beds laughing at how grateful they should be - we popularised our fathers by the end of camp by making them heroes in our eyes, and in our friends' as well. It was an apt end to the week which ended with Fathers' Day, and we decided that our dads were strong influences in our lives, from the fact that both of them chose to skip sermons to sleep and watch Heroes and that led to us running back to our rooms halfway during a sermon to sleep as well. If our dads didn't do it, we wouldn't have dared. And they understand, they even brought back food to the room for us because we slept right through lunch.

And the sermons, it was funny how a packet of sweets or dried guavas would immediately be sent down the youth row the minute Shirley saw a head nod off. Blue Van even had a guava sticking out of his mouth while he was sleeping.

I loved Jonker Walk, that long street selling old toys from our childhoods - the pop pop's, cool lighters, clogs, rubber-band guns, puzzle boxes and rubber insects. The street food reminded me of Shanghai, the cabbage dumpling discovery was amazing. The delight on our faces with the first taste of Melakan cendol, that lime and sour plum drink, pineapple tarts, fruit candy, muah chee and nasi lemak. Mark coming up with that stupid chicken rice ball song and telltale story that got longer and longer, which irritated everyone by the end of camp - he wouldn't stop about how terrible the balls were. Lastly, the nights of Bridge, Murderer and endless talk sprawled out on a queen sized bed.

It was a good camp, and I am integrated back, in His perfect timing.

A world away

2007-06-20T21:23:00.000+08:00

Have you ever had that strange feeling where you seem to be stuck in the shadows between reality and that forlorn dream?
I distinctly remember crying myself to sleep last night,
It seemed like that stronghold I had on myself gave way
I can't conjure that pain up now
But it was there last night, wasn't it?

I woke up this morning with that feeling a distinct memory,
That vulnerable image forgotten,
Which left me wondering the whole morning whether it even happened at all.

夕陽無限好

2007-06-03T00:12:00.000+08:00

The last goodbyes are always painful, and moving on to something new never appeals to me. Even if moving on means reverting back to the life I lead before I left for Hong Kong. Suddenly the pressures from others surface, the responsibilities mount and the inner woes I've tucked away deep into the recesses of my heart threaten to spill once again. The last five months feels like a dream, and lying under the canopy of my own bed, it feels as if I never left - yet I did, and something in me has changed, like how all experiences are bound to lead to.

That feels so far away now, but that image of the teary hugs and the reluctant waves goodbye at the Hong Kong airport remains a clear and colourful still frame in my mind. The friends I left behind - Mel, Billy, Gary, Joseph - the nights of overnight KTV-ing, breakfasts at 6am and sleeping at 7am, waking up to Homey's tea set or another yumcha, shopping and late nights at the pingpong table or lying under the stars on the grass - that's the hardest part, to know that all this will cease to exist any longer.

Being in town tonight brought on that burst of reality and I felt like I was missing something. Everything was darker, quieter, less bustling, the coffeehouses were packed with loud groups of chatter and even shopping was lacklustre. I've been so used to the bright lights at Mongkok at midnight, the smell of street food wafting at every turn, crowded road crossings and empty Pacific Coffee Companies. Unconsciously, I felt a sudden dislike for the place - and Orchard Road is normally one of my favourite places in Singapore. But I put that down to being away for too long, and it will take some settling in.

I enjoy meeting up with family and friends I've missed, catching up, and this season's collection at River Island - but other than that, nothing really holds me here. I don't particularly like the country, and living abroad for almost half a year has made me realise that there is so much out there in the world that I want to see and experience. Living in Singapore narrows your mindset - you somehow think there's nothing more to life than a good education and an illustrious career. I firmly believe now in my personal freedom and other treats life has to offer, and that is something I don't quite get living here. Not when I get a phone calls monitoring my whereabouts and when a new school semester brings about fourteen weeks of no other life but work.

I can rant about the education system for hours. A degree in a mid-ranked university in the United States or the UK probably holds as much weight as a degree from any university in Singapore, and we're working about a hundred times harder. Tina, a British girl from one of my classes back in Hong Kong, was laughing about how relaxed she was during her undergraduate days as we walked back to school after lunch, and how working instead of studying took up most of her time. As much as I'd like my daughter to be part of the SCGS pride, I'd much rather her spend her teenage years somewhere else.

I loved being away from home so much because of the freedom I got, the ability to do anything I want whenever I want, and being accountable to myself for my own actions. I don't deny the horrifying laundry days, the times where I had to drag myself out of bed to fetch water for myself and the tedious process of admin duties which come along with solitary living, but it's only made me more independent and reliant on myself to pick up new skills. Washing machines are now my friends, and I understand which material dryers hate and immediately shrink.

I've cried alot in the last two weeks. I cried for two days straight when my dearest roomie left Hong Kong, and just walking down the corridor towards 203B started the waterworks. Then staring at her empty side made the tears fall even harder. French toasts, Macaroni and Cheese nights, TVB serial marathons, Argyle Centre, ICA and endless conversations before we fall asleep every night will now have a soft spot in my heart because of her. I cried at the departure gate two days ago, and cried nonstop as the plane took off and soared into the night sky.

The tears have stopped, but the ache and nostalgia still remains now. It's a new beginning, and I've finally dragged myself out of the abyss of laziness I had successfully gotten myself into and started writing again here. I will complete the events and post the pictures I've procrastinated about soon.

I miss the Hong Kong iced milk teas already, and I know the memories will keep recurring and I'll long for more of what I left behind, but I'll fondly remember them and move on.

Goodbye.

Summer

2007-05-14T03:21:00.000+08:00

Signs that I'm in the midst of summer in Hong Kong (since this is the first time I'm experiencing a change in season, the weather suddenly deserves some mention):

1) I really miss my winter outfits.

2) My suede boots have gone mouldy.

3) My room is perpetually air-conditioned and my air-conditioning bills have shot up by 300%.

4) My American friend Ly still has my scarf but I find no urge to get it back from her.

5) Summer launches are everywhere on the streets, from Mongkok to Zara - trust me, sunny yellows, olive greens, whites and royal blues are the it colours this summer.

6) My skin is getting worse.

7) Beach outings are made a sudden possibility.

8) The climb up that mountain of a hill to my room has significantly more tedious.

9) I have to add HK$2 more all the time now for cold drinks at the usual Hong Kong-style cafes because it is impossible to have hot drinks in this heat.

10) You notice all the big curly hair the girls in Hong Kong get during the winter suddenly turning straight and flat under the intense treatment of the straightening iron. Simply because big curly hair suits the trenchcoat look so much better. Who wants that mop on your head when it's already so hot?

I love living in a country with four seasons. Life gets more interesting, wardrobes are allowed to expand four times the normal size and there's actually reason for weather reports. Meanwhile, my lack of updates has to do with trying to study for my literature exam tomorrow. Admittedly, studying is an almost impossible feat in Hong Kong because the mood here does not promote sitting in the library (which reeks of death) for ten hours straight. Instead, my mind is on the possibility of an overnight ktv session the night before my paper.

My dad would flip. He calls me regularly to ask if I'm "shopping or studying". Most of the time, I feel sorry to tell him I'm doing the former. I wonder what his reaction would be if he finds out I'm choosing to do ridiculous posts on the weather change instead of reading my Shakespeare extracts.

From a basement in Taipei

2007-05-03T03:59:00.000+08:00

In Taipei, and currently sitting in the basement of the hostel we're living in with the flatscreen screening AC Milan versus Man United. Our 7-person room looks exactly out of the pages of the Ikea bedroom I've always wanted with the bright, colourful prints on its bedsheets and comforters, and round lantern-shaped lamps hanging from the ceiling.

The hostel feels exactly like home. I sleep on the lower bunk like that of my bedroom back home, and the feeling of being in that cocoon lulls me to sleep easily. And once you step out of the bedroom emerges a living room with couches, books, board games, playing cards and the flatscreen television with a collection of DVDs. For its dirt-cheap price, this is probably going to be the only place I'm ever staying when I visit Taipei.

I like the life I'm leading now, the freedom I'm getting and how much of the world I'm seeing. Staying in this place and talking to Finnish and Japanese people at 3am in the morning about the future and Singapore's government makes me feel like I'm really an adult now. And it surprised me how much stored knowledge I actually have in my head that I never make use of until I have intellectual conversations with these other backpackers.

The trip's been pretty good so far. Today was the highlight of the last three days for me with the trip up to the gorgeous Yangmingshan and running through the rows and rows of lilies. I'll do an update about the trip with pictures soon.

Currently, AC Milan leads 2-0. Two watching the game intently on opposite camps, and one not being very happy about the score. I watch this match just for Kaka.

My roomie's birthday

2007-04-26T04:15:00.000+08:00

The year has come when all the tiger babies will turn twenty-one. It's abit surreal yet amazing watching all my best friends step into adulthood, one by one, when it seemed like just yesterday we were sleeping in makeshift tents in an airconditioned room drawing cartoons of our classmates. Or spending the entire day underneath the desk making up stories with our Barbie dolls when we were supposed to be studying together. And suddenly we're stepping into that era where the next ten years will probably prove to be the fastest, scariest and most eventful of our entire lives.

I've missed a couple of fantastic twenty-first birthday bashes thrown back home while I'm here in Hong Kong, but there's no way I could have missed my darling roomie's. Dinner at Hard Rock, a night at Tribeca after, followed by a huge pizza party with all the exchange students the next night. The ambience at Hard Rock is perfect for parties, they really do up birthdays with their polariod shots, stage celebrations and the entire crew singing you a birthday song with their own band. Not to mention that I had the best burger that I've had so far in Hong Kong there. The huge pizza party didn't come with its almost-mishaps though, we booked the pizzas too late, so there was that half an hour period where we thought no other company delivered pizzas anymore, and we almost had to get snacks from the hall canteen. But thank God we found another pizza company just in time, and the pizza party did materialise after all. (The next day, I found out I had Pizza Hut's number all along in my mobile phone - Qi, don't kill me.)

I hope she had a memorable twenty-first birthday to dispel any homesickness and not spending her birthday back home. I truly enjoyed planning the whole process, it made me feel important enough. Love you. :)

The visiting era

2007-04-18T01:10:00.000+08:00

There was a period where suddenly the whole world was in Hong Kong. To those who are still hesitating for who knows what lousy reason, this post should compel you to book that air ticket immediately.

When Mom was in Hong Kong, I had three days straight of fantastic food and hotel room stays. I got to try the authentic Italian place called Amaroni's Little Italy at Festival Walk which always looked too expensive for my meagre allowance. The ambience was lovely, with dim lighting, classic chandeliers and European paintings. The food was fantastic without a doubt, freshly baked bread and olive oil, soup, soft shell crab and cannelloni. We were both stuffed to the brim, but that didn't stop us from scarfing down Japanese food the next day at lunch at one of the best Japanese restaurants I've had so far in Hong Kong in Lan Kwai Fong. She brought me a little piece of home with a copy of The Straits Times and a mother's tender loving care with kisses in the morning. Of course, the extra money and Ben & Jerry's treats helped a great deal as well.

When Jinghan and Minwei were in Hong Kong, I effectively widened my CS circle of friends as we went to The Peak (my sixth time) and into Madame Tussauds, which was incredibly fun because we took about a couple of hundred photos with our favourite celebrities, sportspeople, people of the past and politicians. We also went for a session of KTV, delicious dinner at Yuen Long, grabbed street food, shopped at Mongkok till 1am in the morning and had claypot rice at Causeway Bay. I truly enjoyed hanging out with the two of them, and if the Taiwan plan goes through, I'm looking forward to spending time with them in their place of exchange.

When Minxiu was in Hong Kong, I laughed till my sides ached every single day. He never failed to be down with some ailment daily (sprained ankle, sore eye, flu which required about 5 packets of tissue a day and incessant coughing), and his actions, words and behaviour cracked me up immensely. And because he was part of the unforgettable China trip, I feel as if he truly belonged in this Hong Kong experience. From emerging with that huge suspicious looking grey bag consisting buys from almost every store at the factory outlet mall, parading around with those two bags filled high with DVDs (more than 100 discs, he spent HK$6000) to chalking up another HK$2744 at H&M in less than an hour, I've concluded that he is the greatest male shopaholic I've ever met. And the best part is, he loves taking photos - and of others, which meant that no moment on our China trip was missed. It was sad to see him go through the departure gates - of course not without those last pictures.

I love having visitors even if it means visiting those tourist attractions a million times over. It brings me a part of home, and home always means comfort.

Cheung Chau

2007-04-17T22:06:00.000+08:00

Cheung Chau, that offshore island off Hong Kong. I liked it much better than Lamma - more bustling, more activity, beautiful shores, cliffs and that cave by the sea that probably was more of a hole. A full day of cycling and climbing slopes, and then lying by the beach simply staring out at sea and engaging in my all-time favourite pastime, daydreaming.

The avalanche of work has begun, China was a fantastic break away from all that - the pictures and commentaries will probably be up soon (I hope).

Pre-departure

2007-04-04T04:03:00.000+08:00

Shanghai beckons tomorrow, and I'm wondering what the next eight days are going to be like. Suzhou and Hangzhou will follow after, and I'm looking forward to some breathtaking scenery and being in a country where I speak the language of my ancestors. The Chinese spelling competiton I did with Cemin today at the claypot restaurant didn't help my confidence level at all, I wrote 朝国 instead of 韩国 and I actually forgot how to write the 察 in 警察.

Packing took the whole night, with Qi lying languorously in bed and laughing at me because I was having such a headache "packing light". I simply can't do it, I've never packed light in my life so packing eight days worth of clothes into one duffel bag was such a feat. I literally sat on my bed and stared listlessly into space for minutes at a time with a major headache because I couldn't decide which clothes to match, and how I couldn't just bring one jacket because that would mean all my photographs would just feature one outfit. And my grey trenchcoat and the backpack combination was fashion suicide, I gazed at myself in absolute despair in the mirror for five minutes. I almost gave up the backpack idea but that slight bit of practicality in me set in because I definitely wouldn't be able to squeeze all the shopping I do in Shanghai into my nice fake $20 Balenciaga-Chloe looking bag. So another jacket comes into the picture, one that would match the backpack. Packing light really does not exist in my vocabulary, just like relative velocity doesn't.

你好，中国。

The chef

2007-04-02T01:18:00.000+08:00

This picture is worth a million dollars, especially to all those who have laughed, teased and ridiculed me about not being able to cook in the past.

And I wasn't just posing for it, I actually cooked vegetables and it was edible. My family would double over and die laughing if they saw this.

Gone are my undomestic days, I see a bright future ahead in the culinary department. I see myself making a decent cheesecake in about thirty years time, since it took me twenty years to stir-fry vegetables.

A week in eternity

2007-03-25T02:58:00.000+08:00

This week's been an emotional rollercoaster, up and down, upside down and inside out that sometimes you end up wishing you never had a heart at the end of it all. I had to have that devil of a wisdom tooth extracted, and it was undeniably the most excruciatingly painful and traumatising experience of my life. Although it was pretty funny at the end of it all, thinking back about how I asked the dentist worriedly whether he would do anything to relieve the pain after the most painful sensation ever in my mouth, which turned out to be the injection to numb everything. But the feeling of the dentist tugging using the scary extraction tool is one that's indescribable and I believe is unlike any other in this world. He pulls and pulls and my tooth just refuses to come out, then he goes ahead and does something weird, and pulls for another five minutes (it felt like one hour) and then you hear the sickening craaaaack.

I walked out of the clinic dizzy and faint, headed back to my room and immediately crashed into bed, waking up every ten minutes to spit out blood. I'm thankful for roommates that hold my hand with me squeezing her life out of it, watch the entire bloody process and tuck me into bed, and for good friends that tell a bunch of lies to bring me my favourite food.

Last week at church was amazing, we unknowingly sat next to a newcomer, and she turned out to be Singaporean and is married to a Hongkonger and has been living here for four years. Joni looks really young (I thought she was our age), but she's really 29 and even has a two-year old son! I remember sitting there and wondering if she was a new Christian and whether I should share the 4SL's with her. I think back about it now and realise how God chooses to bless me in ways I can relate to, because over lunch with her, she told us all about her walk with God and about how her life changed drastically ever since she got married right after graduation and moved to Hong Kong. She reminds me alot of the two lovely ladies I hold with high regard in my life and whom I really admire and respect, my ex cell-group leader Janis and my current YA mentor Shirley. And without that kind of mentorship here, it really is amazing how Joni just came along out of nowhere. The irony is this, every day we walk past this really posh salon at Festival Walk called Hair, and it's a famed hair salon where many celebrities go to. It happens that Joni's husband is the director of that place, and he cuts celebrities' hair there, and charges HK$1200 per haircut (like the David Gan of Hong Kong). She said if we ever want a haircut there to just ring her and she'll give us a discount - how unbelievable is that.

Time is a parenthesis in the eternal timeline. Today's sermon was thought-provoking, and that was the key line in the whole message to me. It was about understanding God's calling and timing for you, and I felt that that line really struck a chord. This short time we have here on earth is a short period as compared to eternity, and being carnal perhaps equates to one who thinks, acts and feels that this world is our ultimate home. I think the message came at the right time, and it probably is time to re-evaluate my life once more and remove that impulsive and stubborn nature I like to define as things going my way in my timing.

Two more months left in this bustling city, and I should stop moping around thinking about what I want best for myself, but really, what God wants of me in my remaining time here.

La femme

2007-03-25T02:36:00.000+08:00

Girls are associated with pink, candy and all things sweet. I know I can't do without my daily dose of them here, because there are some things that boys just don't understand. Conversations with no words, sitting there and daydreaming, how shopping cures a bad day, hot chocolate and marshmallow secret gatherings, the way to cure broken hearts, outfit selections and shoe shopping, television serial marathons, talking in bed in the dark, queueing up for seven hours for a new store, phototaking, why we take so long to get ready and why we say things we don't mean. Love 'em.

Castles in the air

2007-03-20T00:39:00.000+08:00

I saw the world in one day.

Since I was a little girl, it has always been my dream to visit all the Wonders of the World - or at least my definition of a wonder. Undoubtedly that includes the seven ancient wonders, modern wonders, or what other classifications there are today of the world's greatest sights. And so far I've only accomplished one, the Great Wall of China seven years ago. So once I heard of Windows of the World in Shenzhen, I knew that was the place I had to go.

Though kitsch, I loved taking in every bit of the Leaning Tower of Pisa, the Pyramids in Egypt, Mount Rushmore in South Dakota, The Eiffel Tower, The Colosseum, Mount Corcovado, Taj Mahal, Niagara Falls and other attractions that have always been a lifelong dream. Walking around the huge park that housed the things other than shopping that leave me on an ecstatic high, we covered every inch of the place despite fatigue and some rare nerves down the flume ride at the Grand Canyon.

Definitely one of my highlights this year, and my little girl dreams are going to go from being castles in the skies to reality one day.

H&M madness

2007-03-12T15:54:00.000+08:00

Once upon a time there was the grand opening of H&M in Hong Kong,

10th March at 11am was the long-awaited hour.

The girl had been looking forward to it for four months

Ever since the day she learnt she was heading to Hong Kong on exchange and was trying to figure out her shopping possibilities in the foreign land

She had been following news of the H&M fashion world religiously ever since.

Rumours of free Madonna autographed trenchcoats for the first 20 customers reached her ears,

Excited, ecstatic and ever hyper she became at 3am in the morning

She ran around campus trying to look for similar crazy people,

And found them in her two American friends June and Ly.

With her faithful and favourite roommate, the four of them cabbed down to H&M at 4.30am

68 Queen's Road Central was her new address, she swore as she stared in awe at the sight that beheld her.

It was a mall on its own, she believed, and she never expected it to be so massive,

Alas, they were number 21, 22, 23 and 24. But still the hope of free glamourous Madonna shades for the next hundred people kept her going.

She spent the first half an hour peering into the glass windows, swooning over the window displays and quickly mapping a route in her head to get to her desirables in the quickest possible time.

Dresses, shoes, accessories, tops, bags - they seemed never ending to her as she felt the familiar rush of adrenaline whenever she saw beautiful new clothes.

She remembered how crazy she went over H&M in London just half a year ago, and wondered if she would have the same experience here.

The next six hours were spent sleeping by the roadside, with the sight of shoes walking past and minibuses beginning their morning journey.

In between sleep, the four girls played rounds of 'dai dee', talked, had Macdonalds breakfast and listened to their trusty iPods.

She finally knew what time the sun rose in Hong Kong, because she had never seen 6am before. Although it wasn't much of a sunrise, just the sky becoming blue amidst the skyscrapers in Central.

When morning came, she called her best friend in UK and they talked for ages, with the bestie screaming incredulously into her ear, but not without the fervent "Buy me stuff from H&M!"

She gently reminded the bestie that H&M is located at practically every corner in the UK.

Then the interviews started as reporters and journalists from everywhere flooded the area

They stood around and looked eager, and that got them interviews and their picture taken by TVB, South China Morning Post, Cable Channel 13 and a German newspaper.

The moment was drawing nearer,

She could feel it as the security tightened and more and more people were walking past on a bustling Saturday morning and wondering what the commotion was about.

Then the ribbon was cut and suddenly they were ushered into a grand reception with the staff lining both sides of the store making a walkway for the customers

It was loud clapping and cheering and she felt like a celebrity as the lightbulbs flashed and cameras rolled right in her eyes.

Two and a half hours she spent in there, it was pandemonium everywhere and in the dressing rooms even with four huge storeys to boast of

Two floors for ladies, one for men and one for kids, it was a dream come true

She emerged HK$666 poorer,

And would have been even more in debt if she hadn't dropped a dress (which she really wanted) and a t-shirt somewhere in the labyrinth of a store because she was holding a mountain of things.

A new summer dress, shorts, a striped jacket, a necklace, gorgeous earrings and her free Madonna shades later,

She suddenly looks forward to spring and warmer weather to display her new buys.

After doing quick mental calculations, she realises that H&M in Hong Kong is much cheaper than the one in UK, and also costs less than her favourite Topshop store back home

She knows that H&M will be one of the biggest factors that will prevent her from wanting to leave Hong Kong in May,

You ask what's in a store?

She says everything her life revolves around.

Go straight to fashion heaven

2007-03-07T14:45:00.000+08:00

Don't say you haven't been warned. There's only one place to be this Saturday at 11am, and I'm determined to be their first customer (you never know what perks you might get). H&M in Hong Kong is going to make living here the ultimate fashionista's dream. Move over, Topshop.

Little island home

2007-03-05T22:11:00.000+08:00

Singapore, for ten full days, a recluse back to my safe haven. The place I don't miss the least, only the people that fill my life with love. Indian-themed birthday parties, 'Precious Moments' moments, MacDonald late night chats, Starbucks conversations, buffalo wings at the secluded airbase, breakfast-lunch-tea-dinner dates in one day and surprise visits to my house, I could never do without those that made those memorable things happen. And only when I'm back here do I wish I could transport every single one of you here to be my safety net and my source of comfort. But I have much to show you all about Hong Kong, this experience has opened my eyes to way more than I've imagined -really the world is so vast compared to our tiny little island.

Home was a beautiful memory, and I know I'll be back in less than three months.

Reminiscent festivities

2007-03-03T17:11:00.000+08:00

As we're slowly approaching the last day of Chinese New Year, and as I'm adjusting back to life back in Hong Kong without parents or GGs or a YA ministry backing, I think back over the last two months and how I feel I've changed somewhat. Not in terms of my personality or the way I look, but how I've grown to learn more about myself when I survive without my pillars of support. There are days where I feel I can't cope at all, days when I want to curl up in bed and not think, but then there are the liberating days where I feel independent walking alone in the streets with music my best friend and the shops my comfort. Shopping is constant worldwide, the feeling you get with a fantastic new buy doesn't change, thank God.

This is my twentieth Chinese New Year I believe, since I was born after Chinese New Year in 1986, and the years are just fleeting. Twenty reunion dinners, twenty years of receiving red packets, eating Chinese New Year goodies, going from house to house for two days straight, singing Chinese New Year songs and being up to mischief. There was that year when I was eight and Mark and I stole the most beautiful marbles from some random relative's posh carpeted house. Then three years later when we flung the remaining oranges into the air and watched as it smashed to the ground, spilling open with a satisfying thud. And the yearly tradition of breaking at least one umbrella, getting lost in the columbarium and finding joy in the pink coconut candy in that house along East Coast Road. My dad gets that air of nostalgia every Chinese New Year, as he drives along the road to the columbarium, taking his own sweet time, with us blasting Hillsong in the background and singing at the top of our lungs. And every year Mark and I will muse how in the next thirty years, the only place we'll have to visit every Chinese New Year would be the columbarium.

But of course things have changed, with the addition of so many new nieces and nephews now running around the big mansion at Bukit Timah, lion-dancing and playing Playstation all at the age of five and being followed around by adults desperate to get a photograph out of them. When I watch them I feel old, that used to be me not so long ago, where the adults would fawn over my cute little cheongsam or smooth pigtails. Now I'm simply watching the scene from afar, a transition phase in between, when the questions about marriage will start coming in a few more years.

I like it though, I still love the age-old tradition of Chinese New Year. For all it encompasses and means to me, and how it has evolved over the years, I look forward to the next one and I wait to see how it will change. I want many stories to tell one day to my grandchildren.

Golden days of yesteryear

2007-02-19T19:56:00.000+08:00

It's all about the past these days. Nostalgia, memories, vintage clothing and imagining yourself to be part of that era. The Straits Times did a whole special on New Nostalgia meeting Old Nostalgia on Sunday, and it was fascinating reading up on all the old places and people's recollections of the past, it makes me wish I had colourful stories to tell as well. How apt a reflection topic even as we're in the midst of the second day of Chinese New Year, as we go from house to house listening to the same stories about the past, yet I never tire of hearing tales of my dad stealing huge chicken drumsticks meant for ancestral worship because he was greedy.

Maybe that's why I love Sheung Wan, a beautiful place on Hong Kong Island featuring the Western Market, streets selling antiques and old posters and immensely cool propaganda. The buildings that flan the place remind me of colonial times, with the mud-brown brick buildings and trams that chug by. It was exhilarating being part of that pseudo past experience, and I decided to do my visual comm project there, making Jings pose for my black and white shots. Now I get to cook up any story I want about a person living in Hong Kong thirty years ago on a quiet afternoon ahead in Pacific Coffee, a place where I love to be by myself and let my mind drift. The cooler past, it's funny how the past provides inspiration for today.

Soap bubble days

2007-02-17T22:37:00.000+08:00

Goodbye, Hong Kong, for awhile.

That was us at the AIA world carnival about one week ago, celebrating our one month anniversary in Hong Kong. We've survived that one month happily, settling in and making friends, of course not without the drama in the back.

And all of a sudden, I'm back where I was, back in the comfort of my own room, but I feel different. I'm doing all the things I used to, and it feels like that one month never existed. But that part of me that misses Hong Kong cloys at my heart ever so often and I feel like I'm in a soap bubble that got transported back to Singapore in a surreal dream.

It's hard to explain, it's like I'm leading two different lives.

But yesterday was pure joy when I stepped into my favourite haunt, one that I've missed so much - Topshop. My one and only material love these days, I spent more than an hour in there by myself with their beautiful new collection of treasures. Ten outfit tries and many polite requests to the saleslady for different sizes and colours later, I emerged $171 poorer, but with a new pair of jeans and three tops. Plus two scratch-and-win cards which entitled me to $18 dollars off a single item. That means I successfully managed to cheat Topshop of $36. A fantastic bargain, this is why I love Topshop and why shopping requires that stroke of luck.

Other than Topshop, I've indulged in my favourite rooftop talks with cheese waffles, Starbucks with the girls and an overload of burgers and Italian food. Indeed, I like this surreal dream.

Yuen Long

2007-02-17T18:52:00.000+08:00

Yuen Long is the place for Chinese New Year goodies and every single kind of biscuit you can ever imagine. My hall people and Ben and Melody from Australia provided crazy company the entire night, with our own entertainment system everywhere we went - the new iPod fitted with speakers that blasts everywhere you go. Food galore, the delicious pork oil rice at the Big Wing Wah Restaurant and the best chicken ever, and delicious B-zai dessert at a little tucked away dessert store next to a smelly river. We get nothing like this back home.

Adventures of Shatin and the night at Jockey

2007-02-13T23:44:00.000+08:00

Mondays are great for exploring because we end by the early afternoon and it's the start of a new week, which I find goes by too quickly as the days go by. So we decided to follow a walking trail and go around Shatin like tourists, to Che Kung Temple, the old Hakka houses of Tsang Tai Uk, the Hong Kong Heritage Museum and Sha Tin Park. It was a great experience, and it is rather amazing how watching a little boy get his hair cut by his mother at Tsang Tai Uk can tug at your heartstrings. Qi thinks I go around exploring too much, when I could be in the room sleeping or resting since I have to wake up early on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays, but I can't help but have that mentality that there's so much in Hong Kong to do and see that I shouldn't quite be wasting my time in the room. Although, she happens to be right sometimes when I just drop dead in the middle of the day from exhaustion.

I loved every bit of being at the Happy Valley Racecourse. Wednesday nights are racing nights, and there's this unexplainable buzzing in the air once you step into the racecourse. You breathe in the cold night air and stare into the blinding lights of the stands, watch people buy cheap beer and place their bets, gawk at rich tycoons including famous celebrity Eric Tsang place their bets and take their places in their private viewing rooms, shout in excitement when the horses start racing, and watch faces of delight or disappointment as the colourful horses cross the finish line and the bright screen flash the results. We didn't bet of course, although Henri did an Academy Award winning short video that cracked me up till my sides ached. But it was absolute fun taking in the scene and pretending to be part of it all.