Friday, July 28, 2006

Depression

Strange how one can be in such a good mood, and moments later.. depression.

Hope, anticipation? All demolished in one fell swoop.

Perhaps I'm just not used to expressing my feelings. Sometimes I hate myself for that as well.. but..

Feeling really terrible.. why didn't I act earlier? Or was it pointless in the first place. Once again, fate? Or not.. I really don't know anymore.

Wednesday, July 26, 2006

Strategica!

Started up on a new webby for Strategica here... Much easier to edit to look more like a webpage now ;)

SMU students, please support! Join now! It'll be fun :)

Tuesday, July 25, 2006

Exhaustion

Phew... feeling totally exhausted now! Been sleeping very little these few days.. and having lots to do hasn't helped either! Celebrated Andrew's Birthday yesterday night! Since a picture tells a thousand words.. I'll let the pics below tell the story!

Anyways.. today was an exhausting day.. again! Met early in the morning with Strategica exco to discuss club direction etc.. Made quite a good progress I suppose. Vivace's coming up real quick.. sigh.. Both looking forward to it, and dreading it somehow.. heh. Weird. After that, we went to Minds Cafe to play! Played I'm the Boss again... somehow love those backstabbing games. Played another game as well.. but not really memorable cos I didn't really enjoy it I guess. Haha..

Just finished calling my freshmen for SIS Camp! Although one didn't answer the phone.. the rest seemed ok with meeting up this thurs. Looking forward to it!

Anyways, the pictures.







The cake!














Us. Pathetic amount I know.. Sigh..













The 'evenly' cut cake. Of cos the HUGE slice goes to the birthday boy!












Yuanru cutting cake!! OMG rare sight! Haha













Lame joke of the post!
Why was the Tomato blushing? Because he saw the salad dressing.

Monday, July 24, 2006

Stunned

Is the very word that describes how I felt for most part of the day!

Ben, Hui and I were supposed to meet at Minds Cafe today, not to play; but for a meeting with the boss to talk about partnership with our club Strategica! I was nervous, yet hopeful. After all, this is the first time I'm dealing with sponsorships etc, and likely a good/useful experience for the future.
Alas, it was not to be. I made a phone call to reconfirm the time with the boss, having set the meeting a few days ago. Then the shocker: He could not make it today! From what I infer, he's probably overseas or so.. so it's postponed to Friday! Lesson learnt. Always confirm the day before. Sigh... Noob me -.- In defence, I can only say I never expected he would cancel last minute! Oh wells, we live and learn.

So that was the first stunner.. critical strike.. pwned! I was left hanging there on my way to Bishan, and frankly quite at a loss.. I quickly called Hui and Ben to cancel. Lucky Hui was at Bishan on his way to Minds.. so he got off to meet me! We then went to Mac to play.. 决一胜负!

Then, at about 1 or so, the second stunner appeared from out of the blue. This was really one-of-a kind experience.. something I'd never have expected. I got a call from my old AS prof, Mark Nowacki.. about Strategica! Small world? Unbelivable indeed. Anyways.. turns out he had somehow heard of us! Settler's Cafe organises the Singapore Board Games Championship (See poster) and they plan to promote this in SMU. Certainly of great interest to our club, especially since that gives us the opportunity to work closely with them.

So it turns out, they wanted to set up a booth on Wed (since the qualifying rounds of the competition is on this Sat). But that gives us only 1 day ++ to get things worked out.

Ouch indeed.

Especially with the amount of administrative red tape we need to get through to handle it.

Still, we've called whoever we need to call, emailed whoever we need to email, and done the necessary preps. All that's left is prayer to god that all goes well =) We can but hope.

It's certainly gonna be a terribly busy week up ahead, what with Strategica business, meetings, as well as SIS Orientation Camp. Still, looking forward to it, and working hard for them too. Lots of responsibilities ahead, certainly more than I've been used to dealing with. I suppose it's great exposure too. I'm kinda glad I didn't continue working though.. despite the dire straits of finances THAT led me to.. I don't think I'd be able to deal with SO many things at once.. A step ahead at a time eh!

Ah wells, enough talking.. better get ready to go off. Gonna celebrate Andrew's birthday soon. Surprise as it's supposed to be? Though with the amount of 'surprise' parties we've been holding lately... I kinda doubt any surprise is left. I don't even want to think what the latest slate of bdae parties are going to do to my poor wallet.. Thank god it's at Bishan ...

Lame joke of the post
Not so easy to get so many lame jokes:P Here's an interesting video instead!

Friday, July 21, 2006

Ouch!

ga060712
Hosted on Zooomr

Grin, rings a little close to home there.. Ouch!
Garfield for the win! *Grin*

Lame Joke for the Post: SMU Students! Can u spot the fallacy!!??
Theorem. A cat has nine tails.
Proof. No cat has eight tails. Since one cat has one more
tail than no cat, it must have nine tails.

Thursday, July 20, 2006

It's been too long!

It's been too long since I last went to school! Yesterday was certainly a day of mishaps for me. I was going to school to help Mingfei hand in a form (requesting to take 6 subjects this semester.. some people are just too smart -.- ).

On the train, I was just delighting myself on being able to get a seat.. Not knowing that would be the start of my troubles! Alas, I fell asleep, and awoke at Marina Bay! Sigh... When I finally reached city hall, and was walking towards school, there was a sudden sharp pain in my foot. OMG, I cannot envision such a strange sight it must have been for others, probably hilarious even. Some guy walking towards the traffic light developing a limp, half reaching out to his sandals and stopping, before limping as best as he can to cross the road before the light turns red! Sigh.. I limped my way to the nearest support I could find, to realise that a sharp twig had poked its way through the sole of my shoe, and was sticking out. So that was the cause of the sharp pain! Come on.. what are the odds of that happening. Dozens of commuters, a wide stretch of road, a twig lying in stand-up position? How odd. Fate? Or coincidence?

Anyways, I got rid of the twig and continued my 'journey'. When I reached the admin building, I just naturally strolled into the lift.. Only to realise I forgot to bring my school card! Tada.. now I was stuck in an amazingly embarassing situation. I exited the lift and walked towards the counter, preparing to sign in for a temp pass.. thank god I spotted a few people walking towards the lift, and ninja-ed a ride up ;)

The ride up let me learn something I've not thought about much, despite the supposed multi-culture Singapore possesses. My 3 'saviors' were international students, and they were chatting to each other in rapid-fire . Logically, I knew they weren't talking about me or anything, yet it's human nature I guess, to look upon something unknown with fear. Something in my heart was nagging at me that they were laughing at me, somehow. Or maybe its just my insecure personality? Anyways.. now I recall how terrible it is to not understand a conversation. Kinda reminds me of what happened during my great grandma's wake. My grandma and other relatives were all conversing in Teochew.. I've never learnt how to speak/listen to any dialect, and I've always regretted that deficiency. But never as much as that day, when I was mostly in the dark of what was happening (seeing as all the instructions were all passed down in Teochew). It wasn't just the sensation of being left out, or that of mere puzzlement over what's going on, but it certainly didn't feel good at all. I digress. Anyways the point I was trying to bring out was: It's not nice to talk in a language others do not understand when they are around. And I'm certainly guilty of that myself at times. It's just so easy to slip into a comfortable mode of speaking without noticing who's around, listening. Still, from now on I resolve to make the effort to take note and make sure!

That's all for my exploits that day, but it was certainly enough to make me late for the meeting with Hui, Ameet and Brad. Sorry guys ;)

As a sidenote, at the meeting, Hui and I managed to polish out a draft of the sponsorship letter for Mind's Cafe. We cheated a little, but considering its our first time, I think we did a fair job. Time to polish up the letter and send it to Ben for some editing ;) It DOES feel good to accomplish something!

*Update - From now on, everytime I post, I'll have a lame joke for you guys, (a-la Hui)*

A blonde walks into a bank in New York City and tells the loan officer that she's going to Europe on business for two weeks and needs to borrow $5,000.

The loan officer says the bank will need some kind of security for the loan, so the blonde hands over the keys to a new Rolls-Royce, which is parked in front of the bank. She has the title and everything checks out, so the bank agrees to accept the car as collateral for the loan.

As the blonde leaves with the money, the bank's president and officers enjoy a good laugh at someone using a $250,000 Rolls as collateral against a $5,000 loan. An employee moves the Rolls into the bank's underground garage and parks it.

Two weeks later the blonde returns and repays the $5,000 and the interest, which comes to $15.41.

As he hands the keys back to the blonde, the loan officer says, "Miss, we are very happy to have had your business, and the transaction has worked out very nicely. But we are a little puzzled. While you were away, we checked your records and found that you are a multimillionaire. Why would you bother to borrow $5,000?"

The blonde replies, "Where else in New York City can I park my car for two weeks for only $15.41 and expect it to be there when I return?"

Saturday, July 15, 2006

Goodbye

The past 2 nights and today I spent at the wake/funeral of my great grandma have really taught me a few lessons..

It's never easy to say goodbye.

I've never been super close to my great grandma, living apart and only seeing her once a year during Chinese New Year hasn't given me much chance to get to know her that well. Still, today as I watched the coffin being wheeled into the incinerator, and hearing the sobs of my elder relatives, I inadvertently found myself almost crying.

Funerals are not for the deceased, but for the living. It gives us the opportunity to say our last goodbyes, to face the fact that our loved one has passed on. It certainly got me thinking what would happen, what would I do if someone really close to me passed away. How would I react? How would I feel? We never like to envision such things, and the thought so alien that I almost find it impossible to think about. But I guess it's something we have to face sometime in our lives, sooner or later; but preferably later..