cynicliniq

Into The Wild

2008-08-03T00:14:00.003+08:00

"What if I were smiling and running into your arms? Would you see then what I see now?"

"No longer to be poisoned by civilization he flees, and walks alone upon the land to become lost in the wild." Give up an existence, in pursuit of ultimate freedom? I think I'd want that.

I do know (there's a surprise) the prelims are coming soon...but I don't regret watching this movie at all. I loved it. Actually, I wasn't exactly excited about it at first, but it turned out to be an awesome film and I'd want to watch it again. I didn't really like the pacing at several points earlier on in the story, but it really picked up, especially towards the later part. I totally got pretty emotional during the last 10 minutes of the film, which is so incredibly moving and sad and drives straight into the core of your emotions (whatever that means). It's like you're not sure you understand completely, but yet it's stirring at the same time. I think it's going to be stuck in my head for a while.

The Dark Knight

2008-07-20T22:54:00.005+08:00

Maybe I should go as nurse joker for whatever costume party comes next :)

I watched The Dark Knight (with Max!) and HA I can't believe I caught it so quickly after it was released. And I thought I had no more life to call my own. Actually I DON'T AND I WAS IN SCHOOL JUST NOW YES ON SUNDAY LIKE WHY ME but anyway. It was a good movie, better than the first in my opinion, but so much darker. The darker aspects though emphasised weren't really the main contributing factors, I think the tightness and emotionality were bigger factors that helped it surpass the first one.

The ending was quite depressing. It was quite sad to watch the scene where Batman and Gordon were discussing how they couldn't let the Joker win and the choices they had to make because of that. I think the good guys kind of lost this time? And I kind of changed my impression of Comissioner Jim Gordon too, I don't know why. Just a teensy little bit. Even though I love Gary Oldman and I do think he really was put in a terrible position (yes, I am being intentionally vague).

And I believed in Harvey Dent! Damn. Aaron Eckhart is really good. So was Dent while it lasted anyway. Batman believes in Dent too! Speaking of which, Christian Bale is a great actor. I'm going to rent all his movies. And last but not least, Heath Ledger. A wonderful actor whose Joker will definitely be remembered for a long time. It was a really daring and mind blowing take on the character. And genuinely scary. RIP Heath.

MCGINNESS

2008-06-30T20:18:00.003+08:00

Ryan McGinness. Isn't his work stunning? I love the contrasting colours that work so strongly together in this piece. I was at the library doing SoVA research with the other art people when I came across a book on his InstallationView projects. They're aaawesome. There's a link on the right to his website that maybe will still work.

Being Not Truthful installation piece by Sagmeister, Inc. It's interactive. Which means that it's really cool! It's a projected virtual spider web and as the viewer passes the web he rips it apart where his reflection touches it. BUT it reconstructs itself again and again.

SIMONE.

2008-06-29T22:44:00.003+08:00

I broke my self-imposed jail term. AND WENT TO MEET
SIMONE LEGNO!!!!!
I was restraining myself but I knew that I just HAD to go. It was a MUST. I'm seriously delirious right now. It's like when you can't stop smiling at everything and anything, i.e. smiling blankly into thin air. It's such a nice feeling though. I got an autograph (he drew a cartoon!!) and a picture with him, which makes me a very very very happy person. I feel so happy-contented. And I feel extremely inspired as well. I didn't ask him to marry me or anything. I was that star-struck. TOKIDOKI is da bomb. And SIMONE LEGNO is going to be my future boss. Or husband. Whatever.

Pretty pretty

2008-06-29T00:48:00.001+08:00

JCTs are over and I think I'm going to the worst for this exam. Like, even worse than JCTs and promos last year. This sounds really bad. But right now I'm not going to be bothered, because...

Simone Legno. He's the creator of TOKIDOKI. I so did not know that! I always thought it was some middle-aged funky Japanese woman. He's IN TOWN for the comic-con! And I DIDN'T go meet him, get his autograph, and tell him how much I adore and respect him! Because I was doing coursework research. That is so stupid. Now that I think about it I should have dropped everything and just gone for it. Darn.

Gaspard Ulliel. Angel reintroduced him to me! He's really cute and not shaggy or whatever Max thinks I have an affinity for. He was in Hannibal Rising too. He was Hannibal. No joke there!

2008-06-21T00:17:00.002+08:00

A few random, unrelated things:

TCC's Strawberry Mousseline is pretty looking and delicious as well! Good for when you're mugging and itching for dessert.

Shinji. One of my favourite Bleach characters. He is so funky! At first I thought he looked a little evil and odd, but he's definitely one of the coolest characters in the anime, trust me. Plus, he has the straightest hair ever. I really like his zanpakutou.

Dustin Hoffman is soooooooo adorable. He's the voice of Master Shifu in Kungfu Panda.

TYKI MIKK

2008-06-15T01:54:00.004+08:00

TYKI MIKK. Isn't he the coolest, hottest, greatest guy? Okay, so you can't really see how fantastic he looks like, but trust me on this just once. Actually, I couldn't find a picture that does him enough justice, which is why I put this picture up. It's like one of those teaser movie posters which shows what absolute coolness is to come you see! Well, at least till I find a nice enough shot of him (I don't really care how I sound like at the moment, just in case anyone was wondering where my sanity went). I like Tyki more than Cross. Which isn't saying much. What about...I could possibly like him more than Bleach's Ulquiorra? Don't kill me! And I'm NOT comparing the two shows okay. I'm being totally impartial here :D

2008-06-15T01:41:00.002+08:00

I attempted to dress up as Heath Ledger's Joker from The Dark Knight for Mardi Gras and this is how I turned out (PY gave me the jester hat last year!)...My hair doesn't look green in the picture, but it was! Thanks Yimin for helping with the spray! By the way, I am NOT doing a recap of Mardi Gras (because it would be horribly, embarrasingly overdue).

This is the real thing! Heath Ledger looks so scary. But the clothes he's wearing are actually pretty nice. I think his smudged, pasty makeup really helps with the whole psycho look.

DGM again!

2008-06-05T16:16:00.006+08:00

Okay, because I know that some of you are still going to be all incredulous at my last post (and also partly because I'm having fun wasting time again), I brought MORE proof to show how too totally similar looking General Cross (the dude with red hair) and Toga Yagari are! Hooray!

Big Floppy Hat? Check. Cigarette? Check. Long, face obscuring hair? Check. Phantom of the Opera-esque right side of face? Check. You'll have to agree with me now. Oh. And this:

I don't have anything to compare it against. But I just thought that he looks really nice in this picture :) General Cross is a cool guy! Even though he completely abuses/exploits poor kids like Allen Walker. But Allen's strong! I can't wait to see Cross in action. It's going to be so exciting. Speaking of which, I've finished watching all the D.Gray-Man episodes up till the most current one. The show's really good! It's gotten better and better. Plus, Tyki Mikk is totally the hottest guy. I'm going to have to take a break from anime now.

DGM!

2008-06-04T23:42:00.004+08:00

Now, who started it first? Well, I think D.Gray Man's General Cross and Zero's (Vampire Knight) master both look a leeeetle too alike for comfort. They're uncannily similar!!

General Cross Marian! That's Timcanpy on his shoulder! It's way cute!

Zero's master. Hmmm!

Marcus Zilliox

2008-05-20T09:07:00.006+08:00

Marcus Zilliox. My new favourite artist. Not because he's a dude with long hair. I don't think he's that well-known actually, but his works are so cool. And the medium he uses is pretty similar to what I'm exploring at the moment too. Check it out. These are smoke on paper. I know. Like HOW?!

SHE and R

2008-05-19T22:11:00.003+08:00

PIGS! Caught in the act! This is when I went out with Hueykia, Elise and Stella some time ago, after the release of the PW results. I feel like eating tempura!

A nice but blurry shot/blurry but nice shot. It was hilarious because we were using the self timer while doing all sorts of stupid stuff, like Hueykia and Stella trying to see whose small eyes were bigger. And after that, even though we were already full, we went to Haagen Dazs anyway and had ourselves quite a lot of ice cream. Everytime I go out with these girls I swear my waistline expands. But I love them, and it's always fun when we're out together :D

john mayer love love love

2008-05-19T22:02:00.001+08:00

John Mayer-Dreaming With a Broken Heart
I thought he sounded a little like Gavin DeGraw but ohhhh well...it's probably me again.

I SUCK!

2008-05-19T13:54:00.002+08:00

Hellooooooooooooo! I think things are so quiet on my blog that you can actually hear echoes. Oh well. But even though I've already long come to terms with the fact that I suck at blogging faithfully, it's kind of pathetic to see that your friends who've come to tag have resorted to chatting on your tagboard between themselves because there's nothing else to do around here. I so need to change my ways. (Oh, and this post is randomly dedicated to Max, who kindly asked me to blog.)

Mardi Gras is coming! Now I wish I wasn't an emcee. Then I could drop by all the different places/slack off/do whatever I wanted the whole time. But the teachers in charge say that the place where I'm stationed is actually going to be quite traffic-heavy, so I won't be too lonely. Hopefully :\

On Friday Max, Min, Mich, Ale, Kong and I went costume hunting (which probably sounds a tad too familiar...) after the school cleanup. We went to this cosplay/anime shop in Chinatown Point. There was a D.Gray Man outfit (YES I've started on D.Gray Man and it's good! But Max won't let me call her moyashi. Hmmph.) staring at us in the display window, which got me really excited. The store was plenty cool! Even though the costumes are kind of expensive. Kind of, because then again if you think about how you'd have to ship them in otherwise, and that you can't exactly buy one off the rack of a department store...AND that you could probably reuse it for all Halloween parties thereafter and maybe even Cosfest...you get the picture. Rachel is deluding herself again. ANYWAY. After much consideration, I think you will all probably be seeing #!$*& Rachel for Mardi Gras. I really shouldn't say! I do feel really bad because my mom used her make-daughter-feel-guilty technique, before agreeing in the way that makes you unsure if you should go ahead with it after all. And because I'm fickle minded, I'm starting to think if the Ouran High school uniform for boys is a cooler choice! I love Honey! He's way too cute. Max isn't going as a vampire anymore either, even though I think the bowtie she got is really nice. She's fickle too :D

Espada and Gotei 13

2008-04-28T20:31:00.003+08:00

Look at this picture I found somewhere on the web. See any similarities, guys? :D And LOOK AT ULQUIORRA doing his moody pouty thing! He's definitely cool. I won't ever forgive Ichigo if he kills him. Help me tell that to Ichigo, Mich!

Bleach

2008-04-13T23:31:00.004+08:00

Mich and Max, I'm holding the two of you fully responsible for causing me to have become MADLY addicted to Bleach! I'm totally hooked. Well, partly it's because I look forward to seeing Urahara, who isn't in every episode. So it's like a treat when he pops up! He's the coolest guy ever. Even though I don't really know much about him. He just is. But the whole show is so very nice to watch really.

URAHARA! He looks so good here. But his usual attire is hat and sandals. He's eccentric cool. Or in Max's terms, shaggy dirty. Max is telling me to watch D.Gray Man as well. I might switch if it has less episodes than Bleach. 166 and still counting is no joke.

And we got our PW results back. The whole class got A! Yay! It's amazing. Thank you SO much to all my group members. You guys made the best team ever! It was tons of fun working with you all and I wouldn't have traded it for...many things. Haha! But seriously, I don't think any other combination would have been quite as good AND special despite all that we went through. The entire process was fun, then tense, then slack, then fun again in the end. Full circle :) I'm glad we did what we did and everyone really did a fantastic job. Before anyone throws up from reading all this mushiness I'd better stop. And go to bed. Goodnight all!

inopportune: stage two

2008-04-07T23:32:00.003+08:00

I just realised I sounded like some creepy voiceover guy in the last post. 'Cai Guo-Qiang-I Want to Believe-NOW ON AT GUGGENHEIM!' Sigh. Anyway here are the pics of his installation with tigers pierced with arrows. Too cool!

So today Rab and Mich decided they wanted to scare me because I was in the art room alone. But because Rab kind of gives herself away in about 5 seconds so it didn't really traumatise me too much. Then they went to the toilet and I was all 'yay now's my chance!' so I parked myself outside. And waited. And waited. And waited. Suspicious students passed. Suspicious cleaners passed. And I started feeling a teeny weeny bit stupid so I blew my own cover in the end. That was a pretty odd story now that I look at it. Hmm.

Cai Guo Qiang is one cool chinaman

2008-04-06T18:28:00.006+08:00

Those are wolves. Crashing head on into a glass panel! That was not meant to sound sadistic, dear readers. It's just that it's so exciting! Check out the WHOLE installation. I like! A LOT!

HEAD ON is the title of this totally amazing installation art piece by Cai Guo-Qiang, a China-born, New York based artist who is the epitome of AWESOME.

''In this tableau, a pack of 99 life-sized wolves gallops at full force toward a transparent glass wall, leaping through the air in a unified arc, only to collide head on into the unyielding barrier. The wall—first realized to the exact height and thickness of the Berlin Wall—represents society's tendency to search only for the obvious, missing instead what may not be immediately evident but ultimately more dangerous. In Cai's artistic iconography, wolves possess a ferocity and courageousness similar to tigers and achieve heroism through their collective unity. In this installation, however, their cohesiveness leads to their ultimate downfall. Here, through the emblematic imagery of wolves, Cai intends to address the human fallibility of following any collective ideology too blindly and humankind's fate to repeat mistakes unthinkingly.'' -Michelle Yun (an excerpt from Guggenheim Museum's website)

His other works are equally stunning both in visual and conceptual terms. Get this-a tiger pierced with numerous arrows, cars with multichannel light tubes sticking out of them suspended from the ceiling, and gunpowder drawings...all part of his exhibition, called I WANT TO BELIEVE-now on at the Guggenheim Museum. IN NEW YORK. We were there last year! The Richard Prince Spiritual America exhibition was going on at that time though. It was good too but this I'd kill to see with my own two eyes. This guy is too cool.

James Blunt Gig Alert

2008-03-31T22:56:00.003+08:00

James Blunt is coming to Singapore on 13th May. And I feel like going. Well....I really liked his first album, not so much the second one, but I think that its worth going for! Anyone interested? The cheapest tix are 60 bucks which is not too bad I guess. I saw a couple of his live videos and they were pretty good! Gosh I think I'm hooked on live concerts. I love the whole experience. It's fun!

Anyway. Art coursework is getting more and more time consuming. It's just terrifying. And I'm not getting better at time management either. And other work is also piling up. I feel like the person in that Just For Laughs gag where he's working in a factory collecting plates and they just keep coming non stop, faster and faster. I PROMISE never to laugh when I see that gag again.

Maroon 5 PICTURES

2008-03-29T18:36:00.005+08:00

I wish Maroon 5 would play shows in Singapore everyday. Then I'd go watch them everyday, never mind that the Indoor Stadium is so far from where I live. Boohoo! I want to hear the amazing sound of them playing LIVE again. As you can see, I'm having Maroon 5 gig withdrawal symptoms now. Hence, pretty PICTURES from the gig! Most of them are blurry but you can still tell who's who :D They were taken by Yeth Harrison (I think), this kind soul who shared her pictures with Yuting and I. She obviously was smart enough to bring a camera which was CHARGED (see previous post for a cruelly funny story).

Adam Levine, the sexiest man alive!!! Mickey, the bass guitarist, is behind Adam. I love what he was wearing. And his guitar. And his hair. He looks a lot better with long hair!

Adam and James. (I think Adam likes James more than Mickey. He kept going to James. I agree that James is one hot man. He's my favourite Maroon 5 man!)

Bye, Mickey! I love you! Come back soon!

MAROON 5. NUFF SAID.

2008-03-25T23:43:00.004+08:00

Here's a teaser pic to whet your appetite (I'll upload the rest soon I PROMISE)...

SO YEAH. OMG I just got back not too long ago from the

MAROON 5 GIG!!!

Which I went to with art class buddy and partner in crime Yuting! It was just crazy... I was just crazy! It's kind of hard to describe but I'll just leave it as TOTALLY AWESOME for now. You get the picture, right?

They played (in no particular order, only the order of appearing in my head) Harder to Breathe, Wake Up Call, Makes Me Wonder, Won't Go Home Without You, Can't Stop, Little of Your Time, Nothing Lasts Forever, The Sun, Sunday Morning, This Love, She Will Be Loved, If I Never See Your Face Again and I can't remember any more! And HA I remembered all the words to all the songs!

Adam Levine was SO sexy. Period. Nuff said. Oh. And he was the only one doing the talking. Most memorable line: 'Where are all my ladies?' WHOA. I'm HERE, Adam!!! Why can't you see me?! James Valentine and his guitar were WAY too far away from me (WHYYY...life is so unfair) but he's totally edgy cool and still my favourite band member i.e. he didn't disappoint! He rocks the hardest. Mickey Madden and his pretty bass guitar was the one I was nearest to and he wore a v. long T-shirt and has the shiniest, straightest hair ever. He's mad awesome too! Matt Flynn on drums was being amazing doing his thing the whole time. He was really, really great and giving like 200% for the entire gig. And Jesse Carmichael doing keyboards was absolutely fantastic. The guy needs to be given more credit. Seriously. Like I didn't realise until tonight. And he cut his hair short!

The Bad News: Both our cameras ran out of battery. Before the gig even started. Please. Don't laugh! Our stupidity is just too stupefying to be true. I was hating myself so much that I almost killed myself right there. So I took pictures with my sucky phone but I got this nice girl to send me her pictures. Yay. Kind of. And something really hilarious happened. After the gig, being the stalkers that we are, we went around the building to see if we could at least catch them leaving and we walked one whole round before we saw loads of people from a distance...so we ran...and ended up at the opening of this unbarricaded side of a pick-up place...where the van was waiting to get them. We were kind of confused and just stopped in our tracks there before 2 security guards saw us and started walking to us gesturing NO YOU CAN'T BE HERE. Okaaay. Fine. I can't believe they left that opening sitting right there. So we went around to stand behind the barricade. We should have just rushed right into the pick-up area like crazed animals. At least we might have got an autograph or something.

All in all, what a fabulous experience. AdamJamesMickeyMattJesse PLEASE come back!

Here again

2008-03-10T00:43:00.004+08:00

OMG I totally suck at blogging. Consistently. So here's a freakishly long post to make up for the absence of words!

Wynne dedicated a whole blog post to movies, which got me all fired up about my own favourite flicks :D so here I go:

I have a thing for FOREIGN FILMS. The best I've ever seen have got to be Das Boot (Germany), Le Scaphandre et le Papillon (The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, France), El Laberinto del Fauno (Pan's Labyrinth, Spain) and La Vita è Bella (Life is Beautiful, Italy). I only recently watched Life is Beautiful (which was like made over 10 years ago) and I have to say that this movie really made me laugh. Like, OUT LOUD. My mom got totally confused because minutes later I was complaining about how depressing the movie was. And that wasn't my split personality acting up, okay. The story is about an Italian Jew who gets hauled off to a Nazi concentration camp with his young son and manages to protect him from the truth throughout the whole ordeal by using his sense of humour and optimism. What he does is he tells his son that they're playing a game and if they get 1000 points, they win a REAL tank and get to go home. It's scary and hilarious at the same time. For example:

Giosue (the son): An old man was crying. He said they turn us into buttons and soap. They burn us all up in ovens.

Guido: How ridiculous. They were just teasing you! There are wood ovens, but there are no people ovens. Putting people in ovens creates too much smoke.

It's v. funny and touching and really, really sad. You can find clips on Youtube of some of the best parts but there aren't subtitles so that makes it kind of useless. Boo. But go rent it or something.

FAVOURITE LEADING MEN! I think RUSSELL CROWE is an amazing actor, even though he throws telephones at people. But the news is that he's been rehabilitated, thank God. A BEAUTIFUL MIND and GLADIATOR have got to be his best films yet. I remember watching the last hour of Gladiator when it was screened on TV and totally bawling my eyes out! And then my friend had to call! And she thought that something terrible happened because my voice was all watery and crackly and just horrible in general. That was some crazy emotional shyt! But it was a VERY good movie nonetheless. ADRIEN BRODY was like, phenomenal in THE PIANIST. Watched it on a very late Saturday night, couldn't turn it off and slept waaaaay later than is already bad for health. He's not exactly your typical good looking hunk (Okay. He's not at all!)but he was SO SO SO fantastic in that movie. And I don't think anyone could stand watching even 10 minutes of me so I'm totally in awe of him for carrying almost the whole movie all by himself. LOVE IS ALL YOU NEED is a song by The Beatles and is also the tagline of one of my favourite films, I AM SAM, starring the intense-mysterious-brooding-a-little-scary SEAN PENN. He's not intense-mysterious-brooding-a-little-scary in this movie at all though. He plays a mentally retarded man who's fighting for the custody of his 7 year old daughter who is growing up and becoming smarter than he is. Sean Penn was FLAWLESS. But I couldn't understand why he won an Oscar for his performance in MYSTIC RIVER, where he cried insanely well but also completely freaked me out with his ice cold %#/!* of Tim Robbins (I can't say! It's a huge spoiler). Well, I guess that's why he won.

ANIMATION is fun to watch. MADAGASCAR is my favourite animated film because FINDING NEMO is so lame-brain preachy. I mean, why does Disney feel obligated to forcefully fit in at least 3 moral values in every film they do? It leaves kids that grew up with them (i.e. yours truly) feeling totally jaded when they reach 16. Which is why I like Madagascar because the animals say things like 'Yeah. I often doze off while I'm getting an MRI', 'If you have any poo, fling it now' and 'How can you have the heebie jeebies for Mr. Alex?'

SEQUELS: The Lord of the Rings rocked 3 years of my life. The funny thing is, I could NEVER sit through Star Wars. Not a single one of them and I have no clue why. But I do have a favourite character! That would be R2-D2. He's cute (PY had an R2-D2 toy like way back), and I don't know anything else about him. It. Anyway. Pirates of the Caribbean jumped on this bandwagon and the first movie was awesome. I loved it...but from the second movie on the whole thing just got a leetle too self-indulgent. Ditto for The Matrix. I know. Me again. And I slammed the third movie enough in some other post so I shan't elaborate further!

I can count the number of horror movies I've watched on a single hand. The Skeleton Key, I Know What You Did Last Summer (CAN THAT EVEN BE COUNTED) Saw, The Reaping, (HALF of) Sleepy Hollow (a crowning achievement for yours truly) and...A Clockwork Orange! Haha! Joke on the last one though some parts were traumatising! I CANNOT watch scary shows. The one time I said okay was to watching Silent Hill at the theatre with my friends, after which I PULLED OUT. Along with 2 other guys :D so I wasn't the only one looking bad.

2008-02-24T22:42:00.002+08:00

They're showing The Queen on Arts Central now. I watched it last year with Stella, Hueykia and Elise cause we didn't know what to watch and our first reaction was 'um. okay,' and for Stella, 'zzz'. We definitely didn't prepare ourselves for such a serious and solemn movie but after sitting through the whole thing I felt it was pretty good.

The movie's basically about how Princess Diana's death shocked the world but apparently not her mother, the Queen. When everyone was crying their hearts out and leaving loads of flowers outside the palace there wasn't any reaction of sorts from the royal family and people started criticising the Queen because she didn't do anything to SHOW that she cared, and they needed that kind of affirmation from her. And all through the movie it does seem like she's just moving on until near the end when she's alone in the woods, where she breaks down because she can't pretend to be the strong, calm, unaffected person that she feels she needs to be anymore.

Sometimes I feel like the Queen. Not in the diva sense of the word. I feel like the Queen I saw in the movie.

Cool Angel

2008-02-05T23:36:00.000+08:00

Speaking of movies (I STILL have no one to watch Diving Bell with. Any takerssss? It's in French! And it's a really good film! Apparently) that I want to catch, I just realised that up till now, I haven't seen that German flick The Lives of Others which I've been dying to watch since ages ago. Actually it's more like last year, but that's a long time ago too. And I want to watch Léon The Professional which is like brilliant and banned in Singapore (those 2 points aren't related). I am so going to start some movie marathon soon. Any other nice movies?

By the way. My angel knows a lot of indie bands. And he gives me candy. And he actually replies quite promptly. He's pretty cool :)

And last but not least...I've got a friend. He's always been very nice to me and I think that our friendship is a special one because even though we don't hang with each other or speak to each other 24/7, it doesn't really matter. We have great chemistry and we're able communicate on the same level. He's never judged me either and he's been nothing but accepting of me as a person. He is someone who feels a lot, and he's extremely intense and emotional. I know he's facing difficulties in his life right now and people haven't been completely fair to him where these are concerned. I haven't done anything about it, and I'm thinking that I should.

I want to help him. But I'm afraid to disappoint him.

2008-02-05T21:43:00.000+08:00

I want to watch The Diving Bell and the Butterfly.

2008-02-03T16:45:00.000+08:00

Michael showed us this music video during art class on Friday. I love love love it. Even though I think the last part just spoils everything. I wonder how many polaroids they had to take :S

All By Myself

2008-02-02T23:43:00.000+08:00

I get it now. Ignorance IS bliss. But it's different when you already know something and choose to turn a blind eye. I'd rather be in the know about something and be upset together with whoever's feeling the pain. Or do something about it if I know that I should.

Right. I'm done blabbering. I'm NOT going to stay the emo bandwagon that some people have hopped on lately anymore. I only START trends, okay. But seriously, there are too many people feeling that way and I'm not going to help make it any worse. I really don't want to be so self indulgent and thrash around in self-pity and all that shit and make out my problems to be bigger than those that other people are facing. Nope. And thanks people for all the looove. Pass it on :D

Switchfoot (They are so surferdude-ish. And actually really good looking in person. Friendly too) came to TJ on Thursday. I only realised on the day itself. Oops. So. I was on the way to art class when I saw Chad (I think. Or was it Drew?? I'm pretty sure it's Chad) at the marquee area with some of the crew. So I flew back to the canteen to tell Mich and the 2 of us went into this frenzy...we wanted to get an autograph, but we didn't have anything for him to sign on. Foolscap paper and free postcards so don't count. And so I stole one of the Switchfoot posters hanging around. It has the ugly SC stamp on it. I felt pretty bad, but my point is, don't you wonder where those posters go after they're taken down? And we did get his autograph! And a picture too! Thanks Kong Meng! We were lucky enough to meet Drew too! Like, wow. They shook our hands! And said 'hi Michelle' and 'hi Rachel' and 'nice meeting you' and 'have a great day' and I nearly fainted. After the whole thing we went outside to see if we could catch Tim (he's vcute) but they were in the van already :( we went around the other side of the van and he saw us and waved and videoed us waving in a totally spastic kind of way. Mich and I were basically like hyperventilating crazy retarded fanatics and we only know about 3 Switchfoot songs...haha. I imagine that at the Maroon 5 gig I'll just die right there the moment Adam opens his mouth. The acoustic set was really good. And West Grand Boulevard performed too!

And Friday was the CNY carnival. I think our class did pretty well considering that there was pretty strong competition from the other stalls. I didn't expect business to be great but it actually picked up. But I screwed up the very first customer's nails. Just a little. Sorry! When Max and I went to get food for the class we met this really funny J1 guy who was trying to sell us the coconut drink thing. He was SO hilarious and animated. Pastamania at Parkway for dinner with almost the whole class! Had a good chat with Max during dinner as well as before that :)

Going to La Salle's open house tomorrow, so goodnight for now.

2008-02-01T23:38:00.000+08:00

NOT in a good mood. At all. I'm so tired and pissed off and sad and annoyed.

Nevermind

2008-01-30T20:36:00.000+08:00

Today Kong Meng got his nails painted pale pink! With nail stickers! (Pictures later!) And did you know that Chin is really good at buffing nails? And knows a lot about nail polishing? I'm so ashamed of myself. What can't this guy do??

Long Day

2008-01-29T20:50:00.000+08:00

I told myself to blog more consistently I actually have! For about 3 days straight now. Yay.

Today, I skipped econs lecture with Mean, Max and Yen. AND THERE WAS A SURPRISE TEST. Man, my luck is just so good I can't stand myself. I'm not really super worried about having to explain to the teacher, but its more like, 1 more piece of homework?!?! I so do not need that...

That aside, we went to Parkway after school today to get supplies for the CNY carnival. Art has improved my nail painting skills!! E.g. my precision has improved, okay? Sam, Rab and I practised painting nails and matching up the colours at KFC. Kong Meng didn't join in (aww), but he stayed with us till it was time to go for his piano class.

AND BY THE WAY, DEAR READERS, I HAVE THE MOST INCREDIBLE JOKE OF THE DAY. I MEAN CENTURY. I CAN'T TELL YOU HOW HONOURED I AM TO BE PART OF THE CAUSE. UNINTENTIONALLY.

Well. Here goes! Sam and Rab and Mean told me to try (tagboards hate me, I don't know why) and put up a tagboard, so I did. And my loyal-but-denying-it-fan Rab was the first to post. And you know how because when you're dying to get someone to notice you, you'll go to all sorts of crazy lengths? Rab supposedly saw some stuff. And this is what happened. (PS Tommy/Ryan/whoever is in charge, I'm still waiting to be accepted into band. I can wait!)

rabeccat said:
i dno why
rabeccat said:
u kinda screwed up ur template
rabeccat said:
HAHA
rachel likes double the trouble said:
NEVER LOR
rachel likes double the trouble said:
where got
rabeccat says:
HUH REALLY ARHHHHHH
rabeccat says:
wait i go see agn !
rachel likes double the trouble says:
stop trying to get my attention
rachel likes double the trouble says:
its not working
rabeccat says:
OHHHHH
rabeccat says:
its like overlapping into the video u posted
rachel likes double the trouble says:
becky's bimbotic moment number oops we lost count
rabeccat says:
EHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
rabeccat says:
ITS NOT LA!!!!!!!!!
rabeccat says:
it looks like uve screwed ur template can !!!!!
rabeccat says:
omggggg
rabeccat says:
im like maligned yet again
rabeccat says:
RAH
rachel likes double the trouble says:
its so not screwed lah
rabeccat says:
yahr....
rabeccat says:
but loooks like la !
rachel likes double the trouble says:
this is going to go down in history
rachel likes double the trouble says:
:D
rabeccat says:
IT LOOOKS LIKE LAAAA
rabeccat says:
OMGGG
i hate rachelll !

Happy Family

2008-01-28T19:35:00.000+08:00

My Go Green group :D

Anyways. Something really embarrassing happened today!!! Boohoohoo! I need to go for plastic surgery to change my face. Period. Well. Practically the whole world knows that Becky and I are a leeeetle bit crazy over this totally cute J1 at school, and when we were walking to the library after lunch, Max decided to shout down to him (since she knows him. But as if she doesn't have the hots for him also. Ha.) that 'THESE TWO GIRLS LIKE YOU EH!' Thanks Max. Not. Talk about humiliation. I so hope he didn't see my face, cos I ducked pretty quickly. Becky just stood there and was like 'I NEVER...' Oh maaaaan. Our chances are completely ruined, Becky. That is if we also don't get accepted into band. Hint hint HINTHINTHINT Tommy/Ryan/whoever is in charge of all this stuff. I have a pretty decent sense of rhythm, okay. I'm begging you guys! And I'm absolutely serious. I have a perfectly straight face on right now. Please please please... and don't scoff at triangle players. Hmmph.

AND. Guess what? I THINK my mortal took the M&Ms and mentos and lolly I gave him. BUT NOT THE CARD. LIKE THANKS, UNGRATEFUL HUMAN BEING! NO MORE CANDY FOR YOU!

2008-01-28T00:06:00.000+08:00

Dave Grohl is soooo funny! Like really funny. 'Where's Axl? Hi Axl!' And the bass kind of hit Krist. On his head.

I Love Prada

2008-01-27T22:26:00.000+08:00

This is why Prada is one of the coolest fashion labels ever. She is just so incredibly creative. Swoon.

Local Celebrity

2008-01-27T19:46:00.000+08:00

Aww...Chris practising his paternal instincts at Go Green Day today. Mrs Neo's son Marc came along and joined our group (Max, Chris, Tommy and I) for most of it. Everyone wanted photos with him at the end of the whole thing but I think one 17-hour plane ride side by side with the 10 year old was more than enough for Kong Meng. Tee hee.

Omigawd! They so look like father and son! Even though Marc called Tommy a pineapple. But he did call poor Ryan a peanut. Then a cashew nut. Then a macadamia nut.

Kong Meng being protective of Chris. Yeah. Yen is totally after Chris' legs. Today is Sunday, so I think it's Kong Meng's turn with Chris.

No more CIP anytime soon I hope! Yesterday was our class CIP at Queenstown stadium for some water fiesta carnival thing. We did about 9 or 10 hours of CIP, but slacked off a lot in between. First we did duty on the track where Wynne, Max and I had to record the positions of the runners. I got to look at all these sweaty arms! And it was for a professional reason, okay! It was to get their competitor numbers down. And this sweaty old guy high-fived me when he saw me walking towards him. Yayyyyuck. We mended the games stalls too but nobody wanted to play my game, which was golf. I wouldn't blame them! Then Amos, Mich, Sam, Yen, Wynne and I went to Ikea for meatballs! Where we told random jokes and I blew everyone away with the ultimate sick Richard Prince joke. I'm not proud of it. Don't ask me about it!!! I vow never to repeat it ever again unless I'm paid $100 or more. It's way too embarrassing. Read it for yourself at http://www.guggenheim.org/exhibitions/richard_prince/prince.html under check paintings. You have been warned.

Well.

2008-01-03T00:37:00.000+08:00

Today was the first day of the school year for 2008. It was surprisingly good! Because I was so not looking forward to going back. At all. But then again, it's only lectures this week, so the teachers can't exactly breathe down our necks yet. And probably another very valid reason would be that I had no lessons at all today. Yup. That's pretty much the equivalent of having no school. There are so few J1s from XMS. Maybe 10 of them? I wonder where most of them ended up this year. And! I wonder who my J1 art juniors are! That's kind of exciting. And! Stationmaster duty tomorrow. It's going to be fun.

This Christmas

2007-12-27T02:32:00.000+08:00

Merry Christmas! Two days late. It's come to be a part of me so I've stopped trying to fight it altogether.

Nice Christmas party on the 25th with the whole family...I helped PY wrap his present for the Secret Santa game and I did it really well! I think I can work at Takashimaya next year at the gift wrap counter. I guarantee you your recipient will never guess what's inside! Which basically means I make this great big bag to dump the gift in...pretty ingenious huh.

School's reopening in a few days' time. I've tried (seventeen whole years) but I can't face it with a positive, optimistic attitude. And I'm getting so sick of the whole routine I can't even practise a Can't Care Less outlook. I won't even be apathetic, for Pete's sake. This is getting to be worse than my last post. I think a large part is due to the fact that I feel like I wasn't supposed to be in JC in the first place. I seriously think that's why this whole year has been screwed up...it's me protesting this whole crap of an education I'm getting. I have great friends and a passable school to say the least but honestly school life has sucked for the most part this year.

In Remembrance

2007-12-24T16:31:00.000+08:00

RIP, Kurt. Today is not Kurt Cobain's death anniversary, but I just happened to think of him and its making me feel especially sad. Interestingly enough, I actually came to know about Kurt Cobain and Nirvana when I read the book About A Boy by Nick Hornby. It's a pretty good book. I didn't watch the movie (with Hugh Grant in it. And no. He did not act as Kurt) though. For those who don't know anything about Kurt Cobain...he died in 1994 and he'd only be 40 years old if he were still alive today. Seriously, one of the most charismatic and influential people ever. More importantly, someone I really respect, not because of his rockstar cred or anything like that, but because of the things that were important to him. Peace, love, empathy. You are still sorely missed. Sorry for raining on the (Christmas elves') parade. I can't pretend as if I'm having 100% fun.

All I Want For Christmas

2007-12-22T14:41:00.000+08:00

Hmm. I'm not really feeling all christmassy this year. You know you are when you feel all floaty and you can't get Rudolph out of your head. Well. Maybe not yet. But I DO have a Christmas wishlist. Duh. I have one all the time! Here goes.

1. Marc by Marc Jacobs watch

2. G-Star plaid top

3. Paul Smith jacket

4. Paul Smith sneakers

5. Prada glasses

6. Ted Baker bag

7. Dries Van Noten SS08 Collection shorts

8. Vivienne Westwood tartan yellow wallet

I Heart NY 2

2007-12-18T18:53:00.000+08:00

Today, Rachel did the unthinkable. She bought the Backstreet Boys' new album. OMGGG did I just say that? And worse still, do that? I'm pretty sure someone hypnotised me into doing it. I should have worn a paper bag over my head when I paid for it! Or. I can just plain proclaim that I kind of (okay. DO) like them all over again and try to make it seem like it's actually a really cool thing to do that now. Go, power pop!

Anyway. I should really start talking about THE SECOND DAY in NY. Somehow, I have this feeling that I'm not going to finish this NY recap. I mean, we spent 10 days there, and now I'm only at day 2. It's kind of sad. This totally proves that I should talk less and practice harder at being more concise.

29th Nov

We went to see the Statue of Liberty! It's pretty awesome. I love the colour. We took a cruise (hello fat seagulls!) to Liberty Island, where it's situated. Besides taking tons of pictures of the statue, we also had a Dead Leaves Party. Actually, it's more like we had a lot of fun playing with all the fallen leaves (there are that many) there. I got a really cool SoL bobblehead pen for BFF Charles at the souvenir shop. He's going to love it. After the cruise, we went to this shopping mall near the Brooklyn Bridge for lunch. We had Nathan's Hotdogs. Nathan's Hotdogs=YUM. Seriously. But there was no time to shop! Because we (I'm acutally not really part of that 'we') thought that we couldn't miss out on a photo op with the bridge in the background. Okay, it was pretty fun. After that, our Lower Manhattan tour guide (he's Chinese and has been living in NY for years. But he's actually not that fluent in English. Mmm hmm) brought us to Wall Street, past the Trump Building (Hi Mr Trump!), the NY Stock Exchange, and to Ground Zero. Oh. And along the way, our tour guide lost us. I know. How is that even possible?? Thank God for handphones.

At night, we went to Parsons the New School for Design. I was so excited. Tim Gunn practically has his footsteps all over that place! I only mildly worship the guy, okay? Then I realised that the school is actually split up into different buildings which are all over the place. Riiight. And then WE realised that the Graduate Open Studios we were going to view was actually meant to be an invitation/expectation-only event. But...we basically crashed the whole thing. Most of us weren't too thrilled with that prospect, but the works we saw were really, really fabulous and will definitely go into the Big Idea Vault for coursework 2008. We would have missed out on a lot if we hadn't gone ahead. The works were really experimental and original, even though the final pieces weren't all huge and imposing and flawless-looking. Each student had their own space to show off their prep work too and they are so so so creative BOTH in ideas AND process I wanted to hang my head in shame. It was pretty exciting and nice to talk to some of them (and steal their ideas). The cheesecloth and plaster guy was really nice.

I Heart NY

2007-12-14T21:23:00.000+08:00

I just had to talk about those awesome Prada glasses first. Tee hee. Anyway. New York.

ILOVENEWYORK!!!!

Okay, I've calmed myself down. I didn't blog about it sooner because I've been sufferring from a really horrible case of jet lag. We touched down in Singapore on the 10th at 2am and I only went to bed at 5am. Then I woke up at 5pm. And I went back to bed at about 8pm. After which I woke up at 4am. And everything has been screwed up after that. I think I'm secretly (maybe not so secretly) longing to go back to NY. It's beeyoutiful! And now, for a very long recap of the trip...brace yourselves! Actually...I think I might just do ONE (pathetic) day at a go, because I have so much to say. No surprise there.

27th-28th Nov

See you later (like later-later), Singapore. The 17 hour plane ride from Bangkok (we transited there) to NY was unbearable. Period. I didn't really fancy the movie selection and ended up watching Grey's Anatomy, but staring at a tiny screen gets kind of boring after, what, 5 hours? Which still leaves 12 hours! I didn't sleep much. Couldn't. Too excited? Probably. When our plane finally flew into NY, the sky outside was already awesome. It was blue-green-yellow-red and totally breathtaking. And yay! We were actually IN NY for real, AT LAST. It was around 8 in the morning. The cold hit us in the face the moment we stepped outside the airport...a real departure (pardon the bad pun!) from Singapore! We took a fairly long bus ride to our hostel, HI-NY, which is at Amsterdam Avenue, near the 103rd St subway station. We dumped our suitcases in our 6-bed (bunk system) room and headed out again to Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, which I knew nuts about. Little did I know that it's an arts school and a very fabulous one at that! How fabulous? Let's just say I want to study there. Very much. Student guide and fashion major John (check out http://www.johnrenaud.com/ which is his professional website-his collections are impressive...why does that sound like an understatement?) showed us around the campus, which is really pretty. There are sculptures and installations all over campus. I loved the whole feel of it. The fashion design course is really prestigious-out of 3000 applications, they only take in about 80, so I can carry on dreaming. John got to be an intern for Daniel Vosovic! The guy from Project Runway 2. Total wowness. He took us to the library, class/workrooms, cafeteria, sports hall, dorms and the exciting career centre. WELL, it looks ordinary, but it's fantastic because the school has really extensive (read: good, useful) connections and the centre helps hook students up with all these great companies after they graduate.

On a separate note, lunch was grab-and-go. I had a gigantic pizza slice. Buffalo chicken. Very cheesy and rich and more than enough to fill me to the brim. Yum. Anyways. After Pratt we headed down to Rockefeller Centre for the christmas tree lightup! Yay! Not. There were so many people there that the place had to be barricaded. It's a huge thing. When we got there Ashley Tisdale was singing, but we couldn't see a thing. We were really far back. And we waited. And waited. It was 7, going on 7.30. Then I heard someone talking to a police officer, who said the lightup was only going to be at 9. I almost died right there! We decided that we didn't want to be waiting any longer. It was really cold, we were getting sardined, and we couldn't see anything anyway. So off we headed back to the hostel to get some rest.

Coming up next...Pills! Heights! Hot chocolate! I just love New York.

Prada Power

2007-12-14T13:53:00.001+08:00

Fabulous Prada glasses. I want!

HAJILANEWOO

2007-11-23T01:55:00.000+08:00

Look at these two crazy people. More on them another day.

BIG APPLE

2007-11-19T01:41:00.001+08:00

That's Christian.

BIG APPLE

2007-11-19T00:31:00.000+08:00

I'm rediscovering Lifehouse. I suddenly like them A WHOLE LOT all over again :D

Anyway. What I meant to say was. During teatime with Michael, Sandy and Yuting yesterday, the subject of our NY trip popped up. Not surprisingly. AND. Yuting and I are going to go Christmas carolling there! And Michael will pretend he doesn't know us when we do! Spoilsport! And we're watching Spamalot. WELLL...anything with laughs in it is okay, I guess. And we will do our laundry there. Maybe. I'm not too sure about that last point.

I also wanted to say...Project Runway 4 contestant Christian is superbly talented. Why? Well that's because HEWORKEDFORMCQUEENOMGWOW (I am only just completely crazy about McQueen). He looks bitchy but also like a lot of fun! And a good provider of reality TV-ish entertainment as well. Plus he's totally out there too. In a good way! Which is nice. One of the introductory videos is up there!

A is for AttaAndy

2007-11-18T01:03:00.000+08:00

Yours truly went with the art students (except Mard and Shawn) to the A is for Andy (20 years after Andy Warhol) exhibition at Mohammed Sultan Road today. It was fun going out with them! Bev, Yuting, Tree and I met up for lunch at Bugis first and we had really delish sushi and then not-so-nice ice cream after that. Then we headed off for the exhibition with the rest of the guys. We all loved the Beethoven one. Totally funky. But even if each of us forked out a thousand dollars each it still wouldn't be enough, so. We'll just have settle for gawking at it.

There it is! One of four. I prefer the one where his face is grey but they are all fabulous really. I liked Venus too. And Superman. And it was pretty cool to be face to face with those Maos all right! We finished with Warhol pretty fast and so with nothing better to do, we went to the Tyler Print Institute, which is nearby anyway. The artworks there were pretty good too. And then. Michael, Sandy, Yuting and I went to Starbucks because it was teatime! The Christmas Mocha Praline frap is not bad. And we had a nice time talking...and talking...and talking. We are a chatty bunch.

40106

2007-11-16T20:03:00.000+08:00

Met up with the 401 crazies yesterday at Plaza...well 7 of them anyway! Shah, Benjamin, JJ, Ken, Zhiyuan, Michelle and Stella were the good old folks who came for the outing. Generally it was the class dolby surround crew. I had to leave early though :( We had lunch at BK where we definitely made our presence known if you know what I'm talking about! It was a pretty long lunch because we had to wait for JJ to finish eating! He was so so slow! It was okay though, because it was also nice to catch up with them and hear about how everyone's doing now. And JJ and Shah ARE standup comedians in the underground circuit anyway (I'VE CONVINCED MYSELF OF THAT). It's so weird that we're in different schools now. It's still kind of sad. Boohoo!

And JJ is no longer a mushroom. He's a durian now. But he's still the most hilarious guy. Ever. Serious. OH. LIU LONGHAO and MEHUL M DIDN'T GO! LIKE NOT AGAIN?! TRAITORRRS!!!

PR4

2007-11-14T02:27:00.000+08:00

TOTAL YAYNESS! Project Runway 4 is premiering real soon! I so miss Tim Gunn! He's the super nice, funny, smart AND gentle mentor to the contestants on the show and BOOHOOHOO we won't get to see him when we're in New York EVEN THOUGH we're going to PARSONS (I will totally faint when I get there. This is a warning for Michael, Teresa, and the rest of the art people.) because he's no longer there but at Liz Claiborne! Noooooo...it would be so so so cool to meet him. Arrrgh.

Random Rachel

2007-11-14T01:58:00.001+08:00

Stole this from Sam's blog...it's my beloved PW group!!! Plus Fero Turtlesoup. And a volleyball. And yummy mango cake. From left: me wearing shades cos of my dark eyes from not really sleeping the past two days, Fran whom you totally can tell is the leader of our motley crew, Charles my BFF who's...smiley, PY trying to look cute AS USUAL and Sam who was looking all fab and ready to take her job interview by storm! These people rock, okay. Even though I seriously think we might have had thoughts about killing each other in the course of doing PW. But it's PW!!!! And we really do love each other. See see see!

My BFF

2007-11-14T01:38:00.000+08:00

Are you done laughing yet? Now let's get down to the serious business that my blog attempts to deal with. And the topic of the day is none other than: did you know that Charles has a BFF? That person is none other than YOURS TRULY! Oh and if you were wondering, PY took the picture, NOT ME. WELL...we wanted to put our pictures in our OP, but we decided against it in the end because we didn't have time. I was supposed to take the shot but I couldn't stop laughing so PY um...rose to the occasion. Charles is so going to kill me if he sees this....but nevermind! I'll remove it when he comes back from Greece. Maybe. Speaking of Greece, Chris, Angel and Xuefang went on the trip as well and Chris has promised to get me my very own pet rock! Which he will pick up when they're at the Acropolis or the Parthenon or something. And according to him, Charles will provide the cage for it. Awesome! That is if Charles doesn't get me a Trojan horse. Haha! Anyway. Charles is my BFF because he's a nice guy who does the unlikeliest of sweet things. Thanks Charles!

AND! Charles kind of resembles certain...things. Like an ogre lord, Ernie and a raccoon...just to name a few. He's loads funny too. Utter and complete ownage at public speaking. Way to go, Charles!

Yayness

2007-11-11T00:34:00.000+08:00

WHEEEE I just read Shah's email and 401 '06 is going to have a class get together this thursday!!!!! YAY!!!!! I so love my secondary school crazies. I miss them loads and loads and loads. We were the happiest zoo ever. Period. And on the 24th is a 2207 class outing! And on the 27th I'm leaving for New York! I only wish the other peeps could come along too. I don't think it would be all that safe to let Max and I loose on the streets though. Hmm.

Class Chalet

2007-11-07T23:16:00.000+08:00

The class chalet was awesome. But I'm now a bit of a walking zombie!

On the first day we had to get OP over and done with in the morning before we could allow ourselves to think of anything else. OP's over! Words truly fail me. All I can say is that it's a HUUUUGE relief. It's one whole year's worth of hard and yucky work after all! So phew. Anyway. I think my group did pretty good! Especially considering that we only had our first rehearsal the night before. My group is cool. Francis PLEASE send me the group photo we took...

At the class chalet...there was a lot of xbox! We alternated between Halo3, DOA and Burnout (which has great songs by Billy Talent, The Academy Is and Yellowcard). And there was mahjong too! Chin, whom I must say is a great teacher, taught me how to play. Chin is scary. He didn't sleep at all AND he had to go off on the second night for tuition. Like wow. We watched My Super Ex-Girlfriend on the first night. It was...dumb! But Rainn Wilson's geeky sidekick role was close to priceless! He was as funny as Luke Wilson and Uma Thurman combined.

On the second day everyone kept waking up and going back to sleep until it was lunctime. Mich, Sam, Amos, Chris and I went to Kembangan to buy the food for the barbeque while the rest went to Elias Mall to eat (we met Siewyuen at the MRT station and she rushed up to me and was like 'you know Elias Mall? The toilets there are called ELIAS LOO!!!' Which is an extremely hilarious Xinmin Secondary inside joke that I vow to circulate.) And for the record, Singapore cab drivers are jerks. When I asked this driver if he could take the five of us, he totally drove off right away. Whaaaaaat. The barbeque went great though! But the charcoal ran out halfway and nice PY and Max went to buy some more. Tommy and Ryan came to join us too and my jaw just about only dropped to the floor. I was pretty impressed to say the least! Which means only Aston didn't turn up and that is the end of whatever I have to say about the barbeque. We went to the beach after that and headed to the not so nearby LAN shop where most of the group played CS and DotA and Rab and I played WoW. I liked the game! It's cooler than Lunia.

The next day we sent PY off at the airport! He brought Fero Turtlesoup with him, which is really sweet. Except that the rest of us can't hug or throw it around for the next two weeks. OH and I had Swensens' Thin Mint ice cream there and Mich had the Chocolate Peanut Buttercup flavour! PY was supposed to treat Sam to the ice cream he owes her but she had to leave early for a job interview...don't worry PY, Sam won't be forgetting that anytime soon.

And all this is making me feel like we should have another chalet again! Now! Okay...at least a class outing or something.

PW Camp 2

2007-11-04T01:17:00.001+08:00

My PW group! At PY's house for a stayover because we had to revamp our OP. It was more of a slumber party than anything else. Um. Yeah.

Fran couldn't get up in the morning. But he probably would have if he knew I'd taken this picture. Teehee! Check out the pants-on-shorts look. It's not only the latest trend but it also keeps your legs warm when there aren't any blankets around.

PY the worm! It's hard to concentrate when you're on a nice soft bed...

PW Camp

2007-11-03T23:49:00.000+08:00

Just got home from a not-very-PW-ish PW stayover at PY's house. We didn't do much but we tried our hardest to think of how to make our OP better! PY's house is an entertainment centre. Very dangerous when there are deadlines to be met! We played Halo3 and DOA quite a bit and tried to watch Herbie Fully Loaded at like 3am. Not very wise. Half and hour into the movie and I was telling Fran to switch it off! PY's bed (which Sam and I shared) is soft and lumpy and very sleep-inducing. He has a spare mattress and foldable bed too, so he and Fran didn't have to suffer through the night. It was really comfortable and Fran and Sam couldn't get up this morning!! PY was giving morning calls every half and hour. Haha! They finally got up at about 12!

Class chalet on Monday. Man I'm going for sleepovers every alternate day!

Halloween 2

2007-11-02T00:49:00.000+08:00

First things first. Amos is prettier than me!!!!! Nooooooo...

CG 22/07's class photo! Can we put this in the yearbook instead of our stuffy old one where we're wearing school uniform? Please? Please? Please?

Kong Meng, will you PLEASE make up your mind? We KNOW that you bat for our team but we didn't know you're fickle too! PS see Fran looking like he wants to die (or wants Kong Meng to die). OH. He's even holding a knife! Haha! Looks like he's not as into gay scandals as the other guys.

Oh gosh they use the same brand of eyeliner! But Becky you reaaaally don't have to try so hard you're scary enough being your usual self you know...

GASP. Sorry Max (who was totally cutesy (she's so going to kill me haha) as Misa from Death Note) I honestly didn't know I was that scary too! So I DID look kind of freaky. FINE. But it's Halloween! My cousin Jasmin who's studying in Melbourne had a Halloween party too and it looks like it was loads fun ! That's her and her boyfriend in the picture, they went as little red riding hood and the wolf!

Halloween is fun! We should have it more often. Hint hint HINT Amos...

Happy Halloween!

2007-11-01T20:47:00.000+08:00

Yesterday was CG22/07's Halloween party at Amos' house! It was tons and tons and tons and tons of fun! I went as my funky jester which apparently looks evil to some funny people (I DON'T THINK SO). Jesters sometimes look really sad, don't they? Are the diamonds in their eyes supposed to look like tears? I look like I'm crying in some pictures but maybe that's because my eyes were really watering cos they were irritated by the makeup. I think. Oh and I was crowned best-dressed! By Amos' sister! And Amos' sister alone. Who was the only one judging. I guess that kind of means I was the freakiest person around. Next to Amos of course whom I think was pretty scary in drag. It's just me again (I KNOW.) but I was a teensy weensy bit afraid of him in his blond wig HAHA!

We went to Mich's house to get ready and her super-nice mom sent TEN of us to the place. Like wow I have no idea how we all managed to squeeze in there! It was a fun journey there though! For games the guys did the apple bobbing thing where Ryan memorably went 'WAH my mouth so big still cannot eat the apple!!!!' and the girls were supposed to eat it from a string but only Max and I did it (I WONDER WHY) but it was really easy even though I wasn't expecting it to be. PY and Chris got pushed into the pool! Even though Chris kept shouting 'I don't have extra clothes I don't have extra clothes I don't have extra clothesssss...' Poor Chris.

Oh at Amos' house we watched Saw and The Reaping. Sorry Chris! I kind of flattened him cowering next to him at all the freaky parts. I didn't really get the movies. Even though I kind of got the scary parts. THERE WAS NOT ENOUGH SPACE TO SLEEP. Sam and I went to the living room to sleep in the end cause there were like 5 people on the bed.

But the whole thing was still fun! Pictures another day!

Hiatus

2007-10-31T00:35:00.000+08:00

Ohhhhhmg.. I haven't blogged in AGES. There have got to be mushrooms proliferating in here (nudge, nudge, Mich!). Loads of interesting stuff has gone on since I last dropped by and I truly am remorseful for not putting them down here sooner. I can't help it being the Slowest Moving Being in the Universe.

The art students went to some of the other JCs to be awed by their fantastic A level pieces. And to get demoralised in the whole process as well. My favourite was Hwa Chong! I really liked the video and the installations. Which is like all of the stuff there. Their ideas are great and they're really creative. NJ was awesome too and GUESS WHO I MET THERE? Mister LIU LONGHAO!!! WHO IS ONE OF THE PEOPLE I MISS THE MOST. EVER. Gosh, he's practically a full-time English-speaking gentleman now! We had a nice talk (lots of catching up to do!) and because of that I didn't get to finish looking at the prep boards. But it was a nice talk nonetheless. He's much sweeter to me now! I was expecting him to collapse laughing when I told him that I'm taking art now but he didn't (at least not in front of me), which is cool. He's still really hilarious though. I miss my old classmates!

What else? The class has a Halloween party coming up. That's like tomorrow. And I'm going to be coming as a...oops it's a secret! It's going to be fun I think. We've already had loads of fun costume-hunting! We went to this huge costume store at Arab Street and I nearly died of laughter looking at everyone (okay and myself too) trying on the stuff there. We went out looking for costumes again yesterday and that almost killed me too. Amos bought a blond wig but Kong Meng looks better wearing it! He looks soooo pretty with that blond bob! I'd totally want to be his boyfriend. Check it out.

He looks awesome! It's a perfect fit. And it will totally help him when he feels like hugging other guys. Which is quite often. Anyway. Even though we were mighty tired, PY and I STILL had enough energy to camwhore on the train home! With only about one quarter of Singapore looking at us. Thanks Yimin for being our photographer!

I think the other commuters on the train finally understood what 'suspicious-looking people' that we keep getting warned about meant at that moment. HAHA. PY got that hat to go with his costume, which I think is going to look pretty cool. He's going as Fero, his Lunia character! Who carries a sunflower around!

OP is next week. Freak out! Our group started out good (just read one of my previous posts) but is kind of lagging behind now. I know. AGAIN??? Like no way! I so do not like PW.

Quote of the day!
Kong Meng: Chin, do you want to be my BFF?
Chin: Screw you!

Squatter's Settlement

2007-09-19T19:28:00.000+08:00

This is the painting room. About half of it. It's really cramped, with 13 paintings in there (last I counted) and tables and chairs and random objects lying around. Yup, there's stuff everywhere. It's a danger zone because you never know when you might sit on a paint-filled palette (contrary to popular belief, I HAVEN'T DONE THAT YET.)! But it can be quite conducive for studying too. Maybe that's cause of all that...chaotic inspiration in there.

Oh Pee

2007-09-19T01:21:00.000+08:00

OP today was gooood. No kidding, even though we've been labelled delusional AND dysfunctional by our beloved PW teacher.

We thought that we were going to get gunned down by callous/vicious/snide Miss Ying real bad, die of embarrassment and humiliation and shame, and just plain die some more. For starters the rest of the group only got to see my slides today. And PY was seriously contemplating telling Miss Ying that we couldn't do it. Yeah even I-couldn't-care-less PY.

But! We pulled through! Somehow. I've deduced that it was through the sheer power of our mouths alone. And a fair amount of lame humour which we know everyone (at least in 22/07) appreciates. Which is a subset of 'power of mouths'. I think everyone enjoyed it quite a bit though Miss Ying had a few uh-oh-we-can't-tell-if-she's-flabbergasted-or-impressed moments. And she swallowed her Polo mint (by accident of course).

Oh and in my opinion Charles and PY had some fairly groundbreaking moments, haha! Towards the end Charles really got into it. He was having so much fun saying 'thank you for that wonderful/great/funky/insert random synonym here question!' I love moments like these!

Midnight Oils

2007-09-19T01:01:00.000+08:00

New York here I come (soon)! YAAAAY and Chin is just dissing the Big (juicy) Apple cause he's jealous that he's not coming along so WOOHOO still for Rachel YAY.

So see you not so soon Singapore from 26 November all the way to 8 December! I wonder if Times Square will be all decorated for Christmas by then? Oh the anticipation. And we'll be visiting an art school there. OH NO that's where I'll be exposed as a fluke. But at least this fluke will make it to NY first before her cover gets blown. It's not so bad.

Doing my comparison table for Ron Mueck and Duane Hanson now. I think it's such a good idea that all the art students are splitting up the workload and helping each other by each comparing a different set of artists. Haha that's because I haven't read only about HALF the SOVA notes. Which is a lot for those of you who don't know. JC1 SOVA is like the thickness of all our econs notes TIMES TWO. And I sneakily picked the hyperrealists cause abstraction is like way too abstract for relatively simple-minded people (who me?) to grasp. And because my JCT essay was on those two sculptors. Rachel is a lazy lazy lazy pig.

And the quote of the day belongs to 8 Days' declared Body of the Year. Who else? (cue sniggering)

Britney Spears: Oh my God! I looked like a fat pig!

She actually realised! Cool stuff.

Regrets

2007-09-04T01:19:00.001+08:00

What if I'd chosen to stay at VJ? I don't really like to think about that. Because...I kind of know that I should have. But Rachel just isn't a logical sort of person.

Mark Ruffalo

2007-09-03T23:36:00.000+08:00

It could be interesting to think about how I was really crazy about Johnny Depp a few years ago. Jack Sparrow was intriguing, unconventional, drunk...all that. Then at the end of the 2nd Pirates movie I started thinking that it was a leetle self-indulgent. I dunno.

Anyway. I was channel surfing last night and I happened to catch 13 Going on 30 (I am a self-confessed closet bimbo) The one with Jennifer Garner in it. BUT. The point is that Mark Ruffalo (her love interest) has got to be the sweetest and most likeable dude in Hollywood. Do I sound sarcastic to you? I'm being totally serious here!! He's really cute. And he makes you go, yesss, he's really that nice in real life. Don't laugh! Don't ruin my fluffy airhead moment!!

I was actually supposed to be here complaining. About how I hate September holidays because they're not really there even though they are. Um. Let me rephrase that. It just means THEY'RE SUPPOSED TO BE USED FOR STUDYING, STUPID. Which is one of the meanest things I can think of. It's like...putting a kid in a candy store and telling him he can't take any of the candy. Wait. That's theft. Scratch that.

But you get the point.

Meaningless Things

2007-09-01T11:58:00.000+08:00

Maroon 5's music is seriously sexy. James V (on guitars) is too.

Anyway, I forget what I was meaning to blog about. Oh. There's no PW today. And today is a Saturday. Okay.

OMGSHITNOREALLY!

One free Saturday. Yaaaaaay.

Oh My God.

2007-08-24T00:16:00.001+08:00

Daryl did a favour for everyone's dangerously overworked brains today by doing some sleuthing and coming back with some seriously hilarious results. At the end of today's econs lecture, he declared that the lecturer had said a total of 228 'kays' in that single 50 minute period. Awesome stuff. I'll get a picture of the page in his pocket book which is almost completely covered in tallys.

PW is killing me. It's like...some union workhouse thingy. With people sitting and staring so hard at PY's computer monitor. All. Day. Long. If you were wondering, non-living things aren't spared either. All my Saturdays for the past few weeks have been devoted to slaving away at PY's house doing our scarily-surely-overdue WR. We haven't even touched his xbox in ages. Which is kind of evidence of the situation we're in. Which is bad.

And because it's the entire Saturday that's used up, there's no time left to do my art prep. Which really really sucks. Prep is a time-consuming thing. Tell me how it's possible do a charcoal drawing in 3 hours. It's not like a math tutorial (sorry to burst your bubble, fuzzy. no hard feelings) where you can, um, skim over some parts when you're pressed for time.

Or if you're lazy.

Ranting

2007-08-10T23:11:00.001+08:00

Bye-bye, National Day holidays (before you've even ended). Hello intensive PW. Don't even get me started. I really don't mean to sound resentful, because I'm not.

Not really.

It was nice going back to Xinmin to see Mr C though. I miss all that bickering with him and driving him up the wall. When sarcasm meets sarcasm it's a lot of fun!

And I'll be back in 9 years to help him pack up his stuff. He'll be retiring then, so he muses.

Some people have their lives all planned out.

Yours truly on the other hand, can see herself making a living in the near future as a starving, struggling pavement artist. Which actually sounds fun. Well.

It's better than being a teacher.

The UOB POY Entry That Didn't Win.

2007-08-03T23:26:00.000+08:00

Ta dah! My entry for the photography category for the UOB POY competition. Did I mention that I'm actually really proud of the whole concept I came up with for the photograph? Even though the quality and execution are kind of slipshod, to say the least! Boy, did I really work my ass off arranging all that measuring tape. No. That is not measuring tape simply wound up and thrown onto a pile of clothes. That took a whole lot of time, effort, patience and an overworked back. Belated congratulations to Longhao for winning a cert of commendation for his representational work in the very scary open category! That boy is amazing.

Jeopardy

2007-07-20T23:11:00.000+08:00

The National Library called up today to say that my copy of Preludes and Nocturnes (Sandman Volume 1) didn't disappear magically from the reservation list. Surprise! It disappeared intentionally. That totally explains it. It's been withdrawn from the library because of objectionable content. Apparently there were complaints on NLB's forums regarding graphic novels-not merely the Sandman series, but GNs as a whole. And guess whose PW group is researching the topic of GNs? No, shit! How could you guess?

Did I mention that our project aim is to bring GNs into school libraries? Jeez, if public libraries object, what chance do we have when it comes to school libraries (which I like, RESOLUTELY believe are more stringent)? Hooray for us. On a (falsely) positive note, maybe that will make evaluating our project easier.

Anyway, my Art in a Box seems to actually be making some progress. My soap bar is starting to look like a flower, which is moderately exciting. Good luck to me.

An Overview

2007-07-20T01:13:00.001+08:00

After getting back our individual progress reports, I am now convinced that I have schizophrenic tendencies. According to what the teachers say, I'm both an exceedingly quiet as well as a cheerful and bubbly personality. Ah.

What can I say about my grades? Basically, I got really lucky for art. Maybe beginner's luck does exist (and econs is an exception). Actually, it's probably because no one really knew what SOVA required. Everyone went in blindfolded and I just happened to be the one who, by sheer luck and coincidence, managed to hit the target. So I shall just smile at my 100 percentile while it lasts and be contented, because I really feel undeserving of this. My other subjects are only about a few light years away. E is for Econs (both literally and academically).

This week has been so, so, so hectic. Likely because I spent the whole of last Friday and Saturday doing PW posters and Sunday afternoon going for PW meeting, which left barely any time to do ACTUAL schoolwork. Like maths, studying for maths, SOVA essays, P&P notebook (Mr Dasler, you can't say impossible is nothing to everything. take this for example), etc etc. And because I didn't clean up all these weekend to-do's during, well, the weekend, I've ended up with about 2 tons of overdue and nearly-due homework breathing down my neck. A little voice at the back of my head is telling me I can't handle the stress of the JC curriculum, and I'm not exactly the most optimistic person. Ha. An understatement in full swing.

Thank God it's Friday. Tomorrow.

Lusco Fusco, No Man's Land and More.

2007-07-08T22:48:00.000+08:00

When I have the time (which recently is not much at all), stopping by Flickr is one of the things I like to do and I've just come across an amazing contributor, Stuck in Customs, whose photos are to die for. Like, his HDR pictures are only totally unreal. Period. I came across the guy when I was looking around for shots of Rome's Colosseum, which is a definite Place I Must Visit Before I Die. And it's been voted one of the new 7 wonders of the world, so I've read. All those Gladiator-weepy moments are flashing through my mind right now.

Last week in GP we watched the film No Man's Land, which is a Really Depressing film. It won the Oscar for Best Foreign Film in 2001. Oh, and on a completely separate note, it gives a really rotten impression of the UN. But watch it because of the dark humour (for the most part of the film), and because of the excellent plot which lays out quickly. And the last scene is just plain scary. It's one that stays in your mind for a long time and makes you hope it's just an exaggeration. It's not like, some ghostly flick, but it does give some serious goosebumps.

And here's a quote of the day! Amanda (from Ugly Betty, on seeing a made-up Christina and a...made-up Betty): Oh, look. Carrie Bradshaw and a sack of potatoes.

Sunday Morning

2007-07-08T15:14:00.000+08:00

After Friday's PW lecture I got pretty freaked out. No. Not because the title slides had those creepy Lord of the Rings characters (the faceless ones in hooded cloaks which scream way too much) on them.

Deadlines (particularly PW deadlines) are just not something I have a good relationship with and there are many to meet in this term alone. And term just began, what, two weeks ago? It didn't help that when Zhonghao visited us on Friday (and sat in for the PW lecture) he blubbed that he was done with the written report, which we haven't even started thinking about yet. Well, now I'm thinking and I have a Very Bad Feeling about the whole issue because we haven't exactly got a lot of information to use, and it's partly because we couldn't find much in the first place. And we were at the reference section at the national library, okay. I seriously reckon I could write the book titled Hard Times if Dickens hadn't got there first.

On a happier note, I passed chinese, which is by far my Best Subject. And I'm really thinking that it will be. Compared to everything else I've gotten back it's better by only about twenty miles. That gives a pretty good picture of my results, and is also a considerably loud wake up call. Speaking of chinese, oral exams are on tuesday. Chinese oral is just such an excruciating experience, and just recollecting my O level encounter gets my tongue all tangled up.

Yep, that leaves nothing more to say. There wasn't a pun intended there. Honest.

Over It

2007-07-01T01:06:00.000+08:00

Wow. So the JCTs are actually really over, and I am just relieved to have survived the whole experience. That also applies literally, because GP, maths, lit and chinese were all done in the lecture theatres, which means I'm currently sufferring from a broken back and neck. Seriously, crouching over a tiny table in almost the same frozen position for 3 hours straight (in the case of chinese) is hazardous to health.

On the other hand, how I fared is not exactly something I want to think about :) It's more like something I want to/will push back to when it's actually time to take back those exam scripts. Oh, and there's still the holiday homework left to worry about now. There's a Pride & Prejudice journal thing to be done, which requires a chapter-by-chapter analysis. For all non-P&P readers, that's an immense lot. Gargantuan. (If this post is sounding all doom and gloom, things are pretty much really this way.)

And I haven't read The Tempest, which we'll be covering as part of literature paper 4 , I think. But I was just reading The Tempest by Neil Gaiman, which is interesting to think about, since it's mildly related after all. It's a chapter from The Wake, which is the tenth book in the Sandman series, but isn't really related to the main story in this volume, since the Sandman is still alive here. It follows a story from earlier on about Shakespeare, who owes our King of Dreams a last play, which is The Tempest itself.

I wonder what Mr R would think of it.

JCT Blues

2007-06-08T14:12:00.001+08:00

I really like the feeling of not doing anything. Which has just set off about a whole army of alarm bells in my head right now. Here's a brief history: I've always failed miserably at time management, which is just a less harsh way of saying that I have no discipline at all. Basically, to procrastinate and feel lerthargic 24/7 is just me being my usual sluggish self. I think Shrek had a pretty cool lifestyle before he got married. So all this using-June-holidays-wisely-to-prepare-for-JCTs assumption or illusion (does it matter which?) that the school has for us is just going to be a disaster waiting to happen in my case. I don't need a fortune teller, I'd be letting them have it way too easy. And quoting Daniel from the Sandman, I am afraid! Except that he was ten times more grave saying that and thus there was obviously no exclamation mark there. But that's besides the point.

Okay, so I am ploughing through SOVA, which is doing something. But I am so slow at it! Its not exactly uninteresting, and this is really not a sarcastic remark. I am currently loving Ron Mueck's Ghost and Man in a Boat.

El Laberinto del Fauno

2007-06-06T19:12:00.000+08:00

There were two people at today's PW meeting. And I was pretty sure that I didn't wake up on the wrong side of the bed this morning.

So. The tough got going. What else when the going gets tough? PY and I decided that we would go to Bedok Community Library to do some reading since our sorry selves were already three quarters of the way into Bedok. That counts as research, because we were at the graphic novel section where we found a nice bit of good reading material.

Bedok Community Library is a nice place. It has 3 storeys, not to mention more than adequate seats, which is quite a big deal, at least to people like me. And PY and I could talk to each other in our normal voices without disturbing other patrons (we really didn't! we're innocent!), which shows how nicely the place is laid out. That just really makes me want to hold all our future meetings here even more. No, the two of us don't normally speak in whispers, and yes, there were actual live people in there, in case anyone was wondering.

Hooray! I found both Fables and Reflections and The Kindly Ones there, which made me quite happy once again. That puts me at the halfway mark in my Sandman reading.

I rented and watched Pan's Labyrinth today. It was REALLY GOOD! I was worried that I'd be disappointed after reading so many good reviews on it. I get a little paranoid sometimes. But it totally exceeded expectation, and expectation is high. And it's not really a specifically foreign film/arthouse buff thing. It's a universally enjoyable film :) A movie hasn't been this satisfying for me in a while.

Guillermo del Toro is the man!

Trigger Unhappy

2007-06-02T12:04:00.000+08:00

Because of lack of time, the J1 art students aren't going to be doing painting (oil, acrylic, whatever) for the UOB POY competition. We've been tasked with photography instead. Oooh. I guess that's probably a good thing, because that means we won't have to slave away every day of our June hols back in school painting like mad and desperately trying to fill up that scarily huge canvas.

I really like the idea of photographing some glam rocker (think Placebo) strutting his/her stuff in Kampong Glam. And I'd title it Kampong Glam. Yes, I think the names of some of the places in Singapore are a leetle wee bit misleading.

A Pirate's Life Not For Me

2007-06-02T01:43:00.000+08:00

Hueykia, Elise, Stella and I went out to sea with Captain Jack yesterday, and I was right to prepare myself to be disappointed with Pirates 3.
Here’s some food for thought: if they removed all of Chow Yun-Fat’s scenes, would it have made a difference?

I really don’t hate Chow Yun-Fat. Even though I'm sounding like I do. Hmmmph. I’m just trying to make a point, and it’s that the whole film would probably still be able to flow (no pun intended) without Captain Sao Feng coming in to...complicate things further, with his the-only-reason-I-want-to-rescue-Jack-Sparrow-from-Davy-Jones'-Locker-is-so-that-I-can-send-him-back-myself-and-other-unrelated-grieviances story. Now I really sound like I hate him. I'm grumpy because the film was
a) Too long, and
b) Unnecessarily convoluted.
Convoluted is the word. I can't even begin to descibe the events in this film. And I normally love spoiling movies, okay. Does Tia Dalma, a 10 metre tall woman and only about a gazillion crabs make any sense to you? Anyway. Sorry Jack, but Captain Barbossa was my favourite character in Pirates 3. He trumped you. I wasn’t agreeable with resurrecting him at first, but surprisingly, I enjoyed his company VERY much this time round. Geoffrey Rush is so incredibly hilarious. Actually, I think it's because Johnny Depp's screen time was cut a whole lot shorter in this film, and with my new revelation, I conclude that that is why they put so many of him in so many of his scenes.

I think I'm beginning to make some sense of things. Totally savvy.