okay, I have red swollen eyes. ): I have two days' MC... Seriously, I don't feel like going to work tomorrow and open the shop myself... I better jot down all the procedures lest I make a mistake again. I have switched to part-time and that will mean my income will be reduced, which also means I could explore other areas...

PERHAPS I should try listing down all the things I want/have to do. My godmother's son just gave me this "Give yourself a minute" self-improvement book. It is quite interesting. It is in Chinese, in fan ti zi. (: Anyway, there was one part was something like workaholics assume that they are very happy but it is all self-deception. In actual fact, they bury themselves in work so as to avoid themselves. The others use a lot of activities to fill up the void in their lives. They have mixed up the definitions of being productive and participating in many activites, often seeing them as the same thing. This creates an illusion. They think that they have a lot of achievements because they are always busy, occupied, actually they have not really accomplished or dealt with anything. (My translations are not bad huh. :D) That is cool. (: I have to keep that in mind to refrain myself from straying to that extent.

This is super childish and silly but I have to come up with a list. I feel so disorientated.

1. I need to find a new job. (:

2. Meet up with

-my bestie and work out together!

-and joanna foo after her exams!

-MABEL & CHERYL

-the sopsies! I have no inkling how some of them are now!(Marie and shihui, I see them at least once a week! :D I love them lots. Shihui was so patient when she tried to teach me how to do the half turns and three-quarter turns. Marie just rocks, alright.)

-jeanette

-jolene and huiqing and co

-2d peeps!

-my momos and peishan!

-the choir friends-jiejun, sam, jonchuah, darren( I miss their nonsense and their arguments and their debates and their bimbotic moments... hee) and everyone else! Marcus, irvin, jon gan, jamie, jeremy yeo, weijie and the list goes on!

-my pri school friends-we have already decided when to meet.

-psychedelic should meet up more often too... I enjoyed the last gathering.

-dhs choir peeps

It is hard to maintain friendships and relationships, whatever it is. I thought the "out of sight, out of mind" theory is quite true. If we do not meet up or keep in touch often at least, all the relationships depend on are just memories-they do not GROW. "Sometimes, you don't know where you all have left off at..." I think it is very true-don't you think so? My colleague said he switched to part-time to play and he realised his friends are no longer asking him out. (HM! I hope that will not/doesn't happen to me)yup, I was thinking if this goes on, all I will be writing here will be MEMORIES and I think it is a shame if we live only in memories because there are so many beautiful things for us to experience. well, I can't help it but here it is- a shred of memory... I was just browsing through irvin's photos and came across this one that showed the year ones... The caption was ";ast practice with the seniors". hm, our batch was really crazy and sentimental... we always come up with so many weird stuff like wearing sec school uniforms on that day because that was how the seniors first saw us in siglap. We all seemed so young in that picture. It was quite a touching sight... Oh well.

I miss my shoulder-length hair and shorter fringe. My hair is very unkempt now. ):

I think I even sing in my dreams. I am very sure about this revelation. A part of me is missing. If someone has been singing since primary school- so much that it has been assimilated into her life, mutate her genes until they scream "SING! SING! SING!" then one day, she stops doing so, she will obviously screw up. I therefore conclude a part of me is missing. Even my name sounds like SING. I am feeling desperate here.

My godmother's son told me today, "This is the longest vacation of your life! HALF A YEAR! Must enjoy and have fun!" It is slightly exaggerated, referring to the capitalised letters. I told my friends that but I couldn't feel like I am having the time of my life too. I need a writer's retreat.

Like perhaps...

Those lovely beaches are in Malaysia-our good ol' neighbour and part of my identity. Hearing my colleague swoon about its beauty just made me want to fly there now and just lie on the sand and do nothing in the day... then at night... I shall scribble away.. or type away... whatever it is, i think siying needs an escapade. (:

There ought to be some ways which allow me to squirm out of work and jump into the embrace of vc practice! :( Reading the email they sent us made me feel sadder... While my friends were learning new songs and singing away, I will be at SGV scooping gelato or mopping the floor, waiting for customers to pop by. I REALLY REALLY want to sing... like BADLY.

Friends and family help to recharge my energy for work. Meeting half of the psyechelic peeps and guohao was surprisingly an enjoyable experience! I am so glad there is someone-yayanapplying to UK and one of her choices is BATH. :D I was never particularly close to Lien but we could talk non-stop while going home together. It's quite cool and I mean.. I am just glad. The 'dunman' & psychedelic bonds are still intact afterall. MY MOMOS also made a difference to my day. All those daxiaojies we are, always with our literature books and philosophical views have stepped into the real world, picking up skills like how to sell female perfume to the homosexuals, how to sell gelato to the mute and deaf (it really happened to my team at mt faber... I was in awe when my colleague communicated with them in sign language.), how to speak japanese accurately because the ojiisan are always very critical of how you pronounce the words...( under required circumstances, I actually could remember some of the words and hence makes me even more determined to really grasp Japanese...), how to handle arrogant customers who insist on having the products that have run out... I realise I like doing sales and yes, serving customers. I met a super helpful customer in SGV and what he did offset all the negative feelings I had that day. (:

ok, I am going to collapse soon... the entry shall end here! (:

I was giving english and literature tuition to my brother last night... Tuition is a bad word. Sharing sessions, maybe? I was sharing with him the art and joy of writing but suddenly now, I realise I am the ONE who is losing it. What Marie said was true. We feel lost because there are no specific aims like A LEVELS and ITALY. I have small goals now-to scoop the gelato better, serve the customers better, and always be armed with a great smile and attitude. That is for work.

Siying: I don't know. I miss my brain. Like the brain to write poetry. That kind of brain. Brain to play music. That brain.

Jien: yah yah. I get what you mean... I haven't been using that brain.


We then talked about how we should meet up often with a laptop and "do some nice writing". I can imagine my beautiful momos and I in some nice quaint little cafe-the aspiring writers talking about what girlfriends talk about, me bearing that syndrome that surfaces now and then... we spotting some quirky people that could immediately make good material for our book... We will have so much fun describing and infering and imagining. I will be sipping my tasteless iced tea/hot chocolate/hot mocca as I pondered over the last few words just typed-'there is something not right leh...' I can hear the kind of tone I will be projecting these words in. (: My momos would be brainstorming too... They would be arguing playfully who have the better word to describe the lonely old man sitting by the fountain gazing at his torn, tattered shoes we see through the glass pane of the cafe... I can imagine we doing things like that.

The problem is when can we MEET? We could also swing by the hagen daaz and take our time to savour the chocolate fondue. I mean, give me your SYNDROME anytime. I promise I will survive-I kind of miss rolling my eyes at it. haha.


While walking along this stretch of road that that takes me from the cable car station to the harbour front mall... I was just thinking, sometimes whatever want are just already right before our eyes... It is like the song has always been playing, it is up to you to turn up or turn down the volume. I want to learn new things. I like challenges and isn't it better to face them with your friends? The badminton and scrabble board sessions with darren, marie, shihui, jon chuah and jeremy chia were great. I have never played badminton in its most rightful fashion. My friends taught me how and it was a pulling-of-the-heartstrings (I have to concoct this word, alright!) as thought about all of us so focused on coaching and making the game better. Those little things. They are learning to teach. I am learning to learn. Shihui, Chia and I were singing at the top of our lungs some familiar chinese pop tunes. I felt liberated. Small, unimportant but happy, very happy.

We were at chia's house and we were poring over his binded photobooks. I started from somewhere in the middle of the book and I kept flipping and flipping, wondering why the pictures were duplicated and thought chia printed the pictures more than once.

I wondered aloud, "Eh, why the pictures keep repeating?"

It was only when I verbalised my thoughts that I realise how silly I was. Everyone there was stunned, doumbfounded for a second, just a second before they all burst into laughter.

These happen once in a while that I myself like it. They can make my friends laugh and I like the feeling of feeling unguarded, not defending... and instead of being all aware, always on full alert, being so self-conscious of making mistakes and projecting an image you will like others to conceive, that you lose yourself.


I have started to resist publishing my new year resolutions because I think that will just make just like anybody else. Then again why not? You have them written down- they will either cause regret or a strong resonance of bliss in the following year when you read the entries again. I think Marie gave me a new(or rather, a renewed) perspective about writing a diary.

She said, "I am afraid that I forget stuff that happened. Like when I read the italy post, some of the things I could not even remember... I begin a personal diary to remember the events."

Experienced bloggers like Sam, Darren and I have our own set of opinions. We think it as an avenue to direct our feelings and emotions who will think it as an insult to writing if you narrate it point by point.

Sam: Everyone knows what happened to you on that day, they want to know your feelings. (which is justified and very true)

I kept quiet after a while and left the debate to them. Inherently, I think a diary or a blog IS TO record the events and the things that have happened to you and the people around... or what you have observed... There is nothing wrong. In fact, I think Marie is absolutely right in the most pristine sense especially when I was talking to her and at the same time self-evaluating. The writing style and the attitude towards it would change. Perhaps you start off writing in chronological order about the things that have happened together with your feelings about it, but maybe in a year or two, your brain will do the natural filter. Perhaps a small little boy tugging at his mother's dress you see at the mrt station station will instead propel you to write about things that have happened before or things that might happen in the future... Most importantly, this is for marie(: I think we all should not let any preconceptions of 'keeping a diary' make you think twice about your attitude towards it. Some of us have evolved and we have forgotten the most basic element. You are like a fresh piece of paper... Adorn it with your colourful experiences... ;)

The big goals have become small. Now I aim to scoop better gelato without it threatening to drop, give the correct change, be patient and cheerful, to think on the feet to serve the customers well and to shout "Any ice-cream for you, sir/mdm?" with more gusto and pride. We have been missing out a lot in school and now we are magnifying the little spots in life we often deem as dirt. (: