back up

On the first glorious morning of our term holidays I played for IFG for the sole intention of cementing my place in china. At least I came down to play. I was due to phantom among frisbee, floorball & touch rug but for some cosmic reason I wound up at touch, myself knowing zero nemo about the game.

Rugby is the antithesis of all ball games. It flouts every rule: travelling, throwing forward, contact, no hoops/goalpost and the list drags on. So we had Caslin, who was really wonderful in coaching and encouraging us. My god, if I’m her I’d have lost my temper. Not that we were disobedient or anything. It’s along the lines of those japanese zero-to-hero flicks.

Here’s caslin, bearing semblance to jean and yingsi. Linyi’s behind copping a feel of her muscles.

We had amanda, jess khong, linyi, adabelle, yiyou & sab lim in our team. Caslin explained the game a couple of times before I got it. & because of my severe lack of ball sense and sports phobia I was dreading the game. I love loner’s sport. At least there isn’t the oh-i-let-the-team-down feeling that plummets your spirits. 

We lost our first match against LAW, & regained our standing with sunsequent 2 wins against USP & ENGIN. Caslin was at the peak with her superb one man show, scoring one after another. Those girls can’t beat her muscles, heh. The rest of our team were real awesome too. It was pretty fun to interact with the juniors.

I didn’t stayed on for the semi-finals. The girls went on to beat LAW in the sudden death match and emerged third. YAY:) Is this history in the making. We all know dentistry has never really done well at inter faculty events because of our red dot nation scale of a cohort. Something’s telling me we could turn the tide in time forward.

I still maintained that we all looked silly in jumpshots. Yet it is the order of the day when there are enough people to stand in a straight line, and a flat ground with good lighting. I looked ridiculously, more so alone.

point shoot and score

So amirul was in  town, in singapore to play in the TIVG. Justine & I went after school to support his UM bball team fightoff against HKU. My virginal experience watching basketball match; it was bright ghastly lights, pespiration lingers evert corner of the hall, and alot of shouting going on. In chinese.

HKU played really well. Fast & aggresive, they concluded the match with 66-32. Amirul was hilarious during a particular moment of fancy dribbling and hope awaits, only to have a timeout and a “Aiyarcck” coming from the player with dashed asipration. & three times UM overstepped the boundary, I’m starting to think NUS has a hand in the final score with all their confusing crossed-sports demarcation.

Post match we walked back to our rooms. Ah, how i love the absolute accessibility. Point A & point B no longer daunting to the north (far)east dweller.

across borders

Last day began with some mighty play of skills, speed and cool in basketball. Amirul, as we heard is a state player, and he was impressive with what grace and panache he execute all his 3 pointer moves. Badminton was exciting as well. The deuce that persist for some ten points was turning into a joke. Justina finally won, and we’re proud of her.

feisty play

Moving on the second day. Netball in the morning is killing my skin. & I’m not even playing. Took some photos with 70-300mm. Manual focus is an ass.

There was this hilarious moment when ruth in all zeal and spirit, pass the ball to shahira, who turned out to be umpiring this round.

The way yiwei looked is classic lol. The ball is going to come to her. And it did. One fine captain.

To my dismay,my dslr died just when the futsal was about to begin. After a grueling morning of sports for some, the rest in baking heat of supporting, we washed up and head south to sentosa.  Is it me or that the Merlion is misplaced. Either the merlion is whitewashed or the subject is too dark. I had to resort to some very obvious photoshop tinkering to achieve compromise.

This is mister kiang’s hand by the way. They went to the images of singapore and luge while some of us hang around. Evening stroll by the beach followed by some unpalatable dinner. Song of the sea is lame for its storyline. Lame nemo and its vector light friends yaks nonstop abouut some singing and missing princess. It was the abrubt fireballs surging upward into the darkness of the sky and the colourful spectacle of water, lights and music that took our breath away. The nightfall is the stage. The water the performance.

This being the last night for our UM friends, we took them to appreciate the nightlife bustling in singapore. I went with the guys to highlanders while the bulk of the girls went clubbing. It was pretty fun, we played some funny games and coupled it with some truth or dare to weasel some answers from one another. Shan chin taught us huh? game which keep penalising chee wei.

we host

Day one begins at 9am at PGP. We were early, cursing the beckoning of bed and sleep in. When the UM students arrived, through the lens i spy the faces of the people to be acquainted with in the coming 3 days.

Singapore Flyer was the plan of the afternoon. Of course we wouldn’t want to miss a free ride. Not that it was particularly fun onboard. We spend the entire journey taking photos of one another within the cabin and across the cabin. What breathtaking panaromic scenery to talk about.

I came back in the evening, in time for dinner. The long day of sleep less done them no good, lugging their bodies around, resting at every idle moment. We lost our way to the indonesian diner at ms. The food was comparable to rice table. Love love love the tahu telur. Proh Loh graced us with his entertaining chit chat with the UM friends in my group, though i must say we are pretty shy about speaking with him.

We strolled down to esplanade post dinner, for a photoshoot. We returned back to PGP for a night in. I stayed in KEVII, RVR and KR before. It was pretty not bad.

And I might as well put up this ad here

In the first place, why not just contact me straight.

My sis said this style was very unlike me. meaning i had some very boring designs back then.

Crossing threshold

16th January 2009

Here to turning 21. Shahira & I had a joint birthday celebration at Costa Sands. Shahira’s birthday is actually on the 24th.

In the morning it was school til 1. Thank goodness the hurdle of median diastema is cleared. 4 to appease my distress the other day.

While working on oscar, Dr Lim noticed that I was sitting tip-toed. 

L: why are you sitting tip-toed?

Me: I think that’s the lowest the chair can go.

(signal me to stand up while he sits on the chair and lowered it somemore)

Me: …

Me: Just now when I tried it couldn’t go down

L:I think you’re too light that’s why

JJJ

We arrived at A07 came evening. I thought shahira was in the room & went Happy Birthday Shahira. Turned out, the people inside were everyone but her. I repeated the kuku stunt again the following day when I wished the wrong sister happy birthday.

Kickstarted the skewering & get the fire going.

Mariana, Xiaoyan & Zhilin turned up early. It is so like them to be nothing less than punctual, lol. Was happy to see them:) Zhilin is really good with the camera, despite me telling her so little.

 

This chocolate is from Liane! It’s from this chocolate shop at Vivo we somehow always patronise for gift ideas.

 Night came. The food from bbq wholesale was really all yum. Big credit also goes to all the friends who helped tend the fire & barbeque the meat.

 Birthday cakes from Awfully Chocolate. Thank you, Liane, Shy min & meihui (did i miss out anyone) for helping to order & collect the cakes. & also for the drinks:)

Dental class of 2011.

Extinguised in a  flash.

 Laying the knife onto the chocolate goodness. The cute green box housed the 2 lens snuggly.

We were attempting some corny shots but laughter escaped us.

喜

The morning after. We went to the beach to freshen up.

& this is it.

♥

Cuz i’m happy seeing all reds in facebook

haha because i’m so shameless. And this is my blog, excuse me.

So here’s the many many ways to look great:)

My currypok hair (actually it was very pretty in the morning) looks so awful. But hahahaha, i’m not wearing glasses!wahaha. But oh well, the focus here is actually the pretty vests composed of nussu chicken rice boxes.

And if vests and shirts aren’t enough.

Filed under: Float, the first week

Best week this year so far. Freshman orientation week has been a good jolly time for me, perhaps because I’m in my own element, doing what I do best ( and acting busy all the time), or it could also be because we have real great juniors this year , not forgetting some of the seniors who surprised me with their dedication and effort.

The week began with a rocky start. We had some minor hiccups; wrong lorry dimensions, communication breakdown between groups that result in an inaccurate blueprint, meeting crazy deadlines and trying to restrain even crazier budgets. Nonetheless, we have a cool-headed team in us, resolving them before stuff escalated out of hand and all.

I didn’t really get to know the year ones in depth, but still, i love them alot! They worked really hard for float and are super obedient. Sometimes when I go around planting ideas in their head, they will think through it seriously and try them out. (not indoctination!) Plus, they do have a sense of ownership and pride in their work. They keep telling us (indirectly) not to do so many stuff and just leave it to them. And like very proud parents we did.

At times I’m conflicted as to how to strike a balance between giving them free reign and allow them to explore creativity in the work they do, or to guide and nudge them towards what I feel aesthetically looked better and float-ish in that sense. So it was really heartening when i would suggest some stuff and they would give it a shot. Not the i-think-your-ideas-are-not-worth-trying kind.

Each time i watched them rehearse at the science forum, they really encouraged and inspired me greatly. Like a surge of energy that goes tingling through your little toes. Makes me feel like I have to work harder and build them a pretty float. To justify their hard work. To complement their pretty amazing performance. To show my appreciation. It’s a super nice feeling when we encourage each other in turn by the stuff we do. More action less words.

Speaking about performance. A newfound respect for the dance ics and the groovy year ones. Steph, Hongyi and Meihui, my god, were they amazing. The juniors picked up the dance much faster than we did last year. So it’s either that our dance routine was harder or them dance ics did a darn good job. I’ll say both. I loved how our performance looked more mainstream and fun. Even we seniors feel like learning them walk it out steps.

We assembled and mounted the main structure last night. All of us gazing at the pride of joy under the cool night, feeling a dash of hope that we might, we just might, have a fighting chance for Rag & Flag this year. And to me, that’s what i hope to accomplish from the start. To make this year a year we stand as contenders for best float, and not doing it for the sake of doing it. That we stop giving ourselves excuses that we are a mighty small faculty, that we only have 2 weeks to do the job, that blah blah blah crap. Hello, the moment we pause and allow doubts to creep inside our head, the float’s a goner.

Frankly, i did not feel any pride in our float last year. (i’m not pointing fingers here because it’s really an interplay of several factors) Are you going to bitch about me just because i say float last year wasn’t up to my expectations? That when we were preparing to go on stage for our performace I dread to see people’s reactions to our float structures? I say we learnt. And we really worked very hard to avoid all the stuff we did last year. And so, i am done. I met my objectives. I realised the vision in my head, my own little agenda is completed. I did what i set out to do and up to this point in time, i feel that i have not let anyone down, at this point in time.

I must admit, in the earlier months of planning, it was very disappointing to hear that alot of us did not harbour much hopes for float. In fact, for all the people i asked, only Liane and I truly believed in the possibility of winning best float. (but right now, i feel that the title does not matter any more. In my eyes we have already achieved more than that) I guess it’s hard to believe initially because of the negativity surrounding float building. And I’m really glad to find someone like Liane who shared the same aspiration. Obviously we cannot be compared to other faculties’ floats but we already outdid ourselves now.

It’s not all about the juniors too. The seniors were plain amazing. I realised over the course of 1 week of intensive float building that I myself simply cannot. take. stress. I showed it on my face. I lose my appetite. I throw away the diplomatic talk shit.

And the seniors stuck with me through it all. Take yesterday’s costumes for instance. 5 o’clock and the vest we took all day to make looked like crap. I felt extremely bad about it because I was the one to suggest it. And you know, people asked you all day for suggestions and every word that you say you have to be accountable for. When I say stuff like “i think you should use xxx to do the cabin head cover” and the juniors spent the whole day doing it and in the end it looked like some ass job, i feel super terrible inside (though i try not to show it) It just doesn’t do the juniors justice. I wasted their time, effort and gave them false hope.

So it was how i felt when we had liyong to parade in that fugly vest. the blow hit me personally. And so, the first thing that course through my mind – better to be more stressed out than anyone so that they will not feel stressed. Better take control just so they will feel that there’s hope in salvaging the situation. Better to be more panicky than anyone else so they will not be. In other words, be more everything than everyone else just so i take it all on my own and no one else have to feel it too.

It’s funny, now that i think about it in retrospect. Cuz i have no idea what to do next for the vest. I don’t know why it was so ugly. Don’t know what we should do. I only know we should do something quick so that we have no time to lament and panic. So we did another vest, this time being extremely anal about details and perfection. Down to the last bit where i want every piece cut straight and no glue peeking out. Better to be the bad guy than to do a shabby job.

The thing is, (and this is what i’m really trying to say) the seniors were extremely extremely extremely cooperative. They did not argue with me, did not question what i was trying to do (i didn’t explain much cuz i have no idea, actually, as to where we’re heading). They worked silently, everyone doing their part diligently. They gave me their time, their full attention, their everything, unconditionally. They allowed me to behave so badly. And I was super super touched. I may not show it yesterday, but yes, I was so so moved by them. And i’m naming names here. Aik wei, Shahira, Qianli, Liane, Yiyou, Justine etc. Even people who saw us busy at work and volunteered their help. Like Valene, Liesl, Meihui, Jason etc. (i can’t remember alot)

I really think you guys are great people and you’re the bestest friends in my heart. On my part, i give it my all and i’m glad we turned the situation around. When Qianli was parading in the vest we took 3 hours to make, I really wanted them to tag along and listen to all the nice comments and praises about it. They should not be patting my back and commending me. It’s them. I don’t deserve the credit at all. So, this is what i really want to say. Thank you.

Aik Wei showed me something that was very encouraging while i was helping to cut green stripes of 2 sequins. By Christian D’ Larsen. And one of the part i recalled was to ”Be too big for worry and too noble for anger.” There was also something along the lines about being larger than life, or am i recalling Backstreet Boys lyrics instead. I thought it helped. I found that I was not very annoyed towards the end of the week, myself simply accepting everything for what they are.

Also, thank you, shymin, for making me oatmeal on one of the nights. I hadn’t had dinner and i was super hungry. So i was really grateful, and touched, when you went back to rv and returned with a cup of oatmeal and biscuits for me.

We have to give special mention to the overworked and undercreditted people. Shuyan was joking that maybe i should join hall next year just so i could do float again. And i replied “eh..i still want to graduate out of dental school.”

That aside, i don’t think i could do it again. It won’t be quite the same experience without the very people and all the dental tradition. I don’t want anyone else for float ic except for shuyan. I am super grateful that she’s around because she gave me her utmost support and help. (though we could do less with all the float meetings! haha) And with her around, i know i don’t have to beat around the bush because she sees me for who I am and beyond all the little things.

It’s only with our class that I’m given the opportunity, platform and autonomy to do anything i want. To design the float shirt, the FOC banner, the float. Without having to fight for any of it. All of them trust me enough to accept any codswallop that i conjure. It was my last chance to redeem myself and i was really happy that i did.

Was very happy to hear that my mum and sis wanted to attend Rag & Flag Day this year too, even though I will not be dancing. Sometime back my mum was asking me how come i was going back to school almost every day during my hols. Afraid that she might not be able to understand or remember so i simply said “we’re building float, you know, doing the same thing we did last year.” To which she replied, “like that how to win?” LOL. My mum do remember after all.