back in singapore

im having a really packed holidays now. why did i ever get myself so busy???

i've been on a school trip to western australia (uwa), and on a family trip to shantou (china) and hongkong.

im doing a lot of activities and im committed to more things than i ever thought so yah. you won't see me blogging much bcos there's just too much to say and too little time to.

both trips were pretty fun in their own way. the uwa trip allowed me to make many new friends, learn many new insights into the lives of both the females (other than myself) and males, and the ways of poker. anw, i oso learnt some interesting sciencey stuff through the science programme at uwa. and that the word "summer", can be deceiving.

trust me. singapore's summer can be VERY, VERY different from other countries'.

reaching st cats, the boarding school we lived in. it was just across the road from uwa.

kookaburra sits on a tree. this is taken at st cats, behind tennis court.

solar viewing at uwa physics rooftop

my favourite tree in australia. when it catches the sunlight, all the leaves shimmer white and silver. it's super pretty.

flies. they're attracted to dark colours apparently.

leaning tower of pisa gingin. taken at gingin gravity discovery centre.

down the trail to nowhere through the solar system

as for the family trip, i was there to visit my relatives (my half-aunt/uncle, half-cousins, their children and grandchildren), and obviously i was rather "old" there, though my cousins' children are all older than me. bah.

my 3-year-old half-cousin twice removed. ie. my cousin's granddaughter. she loves camwhoring. who would have imagined that?

she has a nasty temper with strangers, and she would dao you and kick at you. i managed to make friends with her one night bcos no one else would throw her the shuttlecock for her to whack xD plus i had the best skill at throwing than anyone else there. so she would not let anyone throw her the shuttlecock except for me. ^^"

i got to experience the villages' rural lifestyle and their wedding traditions. i got to strengthen our relationships and make new friends as well. i got to see how the females have an inferior position to males, but since i was of a high status there, plus im a rich guest, i got much better treatment than the females of the village. i rather pity them.

wedding bedroom with all the wedding gifts on the bed. kid with her play balls.

my cousin's 2nd son and his bride offering tea to my parents.

wedding lunch at the houses.

then again, they've always known this way of life and they're struggling to fit into the modernized society. they've improved quite a lot over the past 10 years, actually.

view from my relatives' house in the rural village

i saw quite many different variations of lifestyle over there, with the poorest, and the moderately rich, and the rich rural ppl there. i oso got to see the city lifestyle vs rural area lifestyle. quite an experience (not that it was the first time i've been there, but the previous times i was too small to analyze and rmb so much xD)

March of the Geese. Watch out! these geese were being herded across our path on the way through the village. i nv thought these things were soooooo HUGE. and noisy.

roads at rural village

normal city roads

oh yeah i got to ride on a motorbike (as a passenger duh) which was super fun! it was alrd pretty cold there, plus the strong rush of wind as you ride; it's unbelievably cool!

on the motorbike

as for hongkong, it was a short stayover as there was no direct flight to shantou from sg. we had to transfer flights, so we stayed at hk for 3 days. we met up with some sis parents who were in hk, and we got to eat. a lot. (just like in shantou) and we shopped too! a whole lot more than eating, bcos it was xmas sale and everything was 30% off, 50% off, hahahaa! i bought dunno how many new outfits and shirts.

normal hk road + crowd at tsim sha tsui.

view from our room of 3 days. we lived at a cheap hostel for tourists.

it was amazing. just the xmas atmosphere there is electrifying. everything is so hyped up and even at night, you would believe it's still day what with all the bright lights. the mtr rush is even cooler. u'll see crowds u'll nv see in sg, not even at orchard!

we missed two trains bcos the trains were sooooooo filled up that we couldn't get into them. what's more, the trains came once every 2 min so as to "clear the crowd", as my dad says. the mtr system has to be super efficient or the whole place will get choked up with ppl! imagine if a train breaks down...xD

times square's beautiful xmas decorations (yeah that includes me xD)

harbour city's xmas decorations. it was super crowded, and it's like wayyyy huger than suntec or something. we walked for what seemed like kilometers before finding a way out. and it was ALL on just ONE SINGLE FLOOR.

for more photos, look at facebook.

the real mugging starts...

now.

ah yes promos are finally over, this long-awaited moment is finally here! i can only say that i did badly for all of the promos papers, all to differing extents, with probably math the worst. yes math which was supposed to be the constant, the nice easy paper i sure can score in.

surprisingly physics was ok, and chem wasn't. -wails- gp and econs were normal, horrid papers as they always are, so no surprises there. they're quite ok. ^^ however, i guess im pretty disappointed with how i've done with my sciences, because i know my time management was horrible, and i expected better of myself. tsk tsk. i should have mugged better for them T.T

i hope i don't get worse than Bs for any of my subjects, (highly unlikely for econs, gp too...) but if i get anything less than B for a science i don't know what i'll do. maybe i'll go crazy and start mugging everyday from now.

(hey that's a good idea, if i want to actually do well in my next tests)

enough rants. i shall enjoy my week of break, and then i'll start mugging for SATs! yep im taking it this year, in a month or so actually, so just nice time to start mugging. i got the nice big book and i plan to work hard on it, and see what happens. let's hope my english components will turn out good ^^

definitely will do better than for my promos. come on, we PAY for it, of course must do better right? plus if i do superbly well on my SATs i can -hopefully- go some wonderfully good US university and don't need to worry so much about my a levels. or my promos. whee.

let's start slacking before the real mugging starts!

rgs speech day 2008!

congratulations to blaws the pro who got both top in bio and raffles top scholars award! congrats to myself too for getting the award, and so i now have a medal (why would they give a medal for academic achievements? it's really my first xD), $50 voucher and a certificate! me is happy.

ok i did the meme thing from blaws! heh I can only send you the quiz questions if you promise to do the "Meme".

1. Next to each number, write only the name of the person who fits.
2. Answer one question with one name.
3. Don't tell the questions to anyone who isn't doing the meme.

1. my brother
2. blaws!
3. demi lovato [ok this is superficial. maybe just no one. xD]
4. rebecca ling
5. quek sijia
6. that sounds like me o.O
7. ang qiuping!
8. jane
9. blaws ^^
10. elizabeth! (bird)
11. darsicles =X
12. queen haha
13. wangyi
14. yes amelia! unanimous (:
15. uhhhh...amyas! he's got cute blur look!
16. yubai
17. blaws (again -.-")
18. su liwen
19. bhuvan!
20. qw haha
21. no idea
22. no idea
23. kweky (but she's fun all the same)
24. yy
25. cheryl lynn?
26. oho qw!
27. slau
28. wong yinkwan!!!!!!
29. kingone wang the superstar xD 王传一
30. don't ask me what these qns are. and 中秋节快乐！

yep wishing u all a very nice mid-autumn festival, with loads of yummy mooncakes (MY FAVOURITE!) and nice clear skies for moon gazing tonight! ^^

good luck with prelims my dear seniors, and good luck with mugging for promos, me and my wonderful peers.

omedetou, watashi no tennis no kami-sama!

so. just to pop by and tell you all im not dead yet. pw written report is DUE THIS COMING THURSDAY! hurray. last lap for a major part of pw...let's hope for the best.

no, actually the point of this post is as mentioned in the title ^^

CONGRATULATIONS, MY GOD OF TENNIS ROGER FEDERER for your 5th consecutive US Open Grand Slam! wonderful performance there and well done! you're always number one in my heart <3333
i can't wait for him to regain his ranking (prolly next year), but go on to surpass pete sampras. you've got the potential to expand!

hmm there's speech day this saturday.
4 years in rgs, and never a chance to go. finally, now. hoho.

anw i like this song a lot. it's really touching, about how fathers will always love their daughters and will never be ready to let them go.


"Ready, Set, Don't Go" by Billy Ray Cyrus & daughter, Miley Cyrus

Natsu Matsuri 2008

fine i updateth. but kiabs, youuu yourself nv updated since april! the pot calling the kettle black. gah.

anw ytd was Japanese Summer Festival (Natsu Matsuri 08)! Practically half the jap club went ^^, we met up at expo mrt and went on to the japanese primary school, changi campus. It was raining though, so the performances and dances couldn't be held at the open-air stage in the field, but it was still fun! I spent a lot on food xD


there were games as well, like hooking for balloons in the water, and there were lots of food like yakitori, sushi, bento, okonomiyaki, icecream <3! (gosh the icecream was realllyyyy good), and mochi, and onigiri and more! there was even this vinegar drink which tasted quite >.< at first, but after a while it tastes really nice. yummmm. the queues were quite reasonable and since u have your frens, it's fun and cozy to sit around and eat!

we were simply stuffing ourselves with all the good jap food around, until we felt like we'll burst like a balloon. =P

we then went to the sports hall for the Bon Odori dances, which apparently was there due to the rain (fine we lagged and missed half the dances :/) We were given plastic bags to carry our shoes, bcos no shoes allowed in the hall! it's really fun, even though i had no idea how to do the dances, u just follow the ppl on stage and ppl around u, and it's really simple and easy to learn! it's like mass dancing! if u do it alone, u'll feel really embarrassed, but since everyone is doing it with u, it's very fun! a whole new experience i won't forget.

mm yeah i want to go next yr again! hopefully won't miss half the performances and can catch more games and food food fooood galoreee! ^^"

eh yah i won't be posting much till promos over i guess? there's lots of things to do, and now it's lots of things to mug. i prefered the "doing" days as compared to mugging days. which reminds me. i need to do the stupid workplan thing. garh.

best of luck to ppl at ioaa and hope they're having fun. >.<

Japanese festival over :/

japanese festival is over, we managed to finish selling the chocolates (which is good ^^)

unfortunately, we couldn't finish the manga postcards/posters (with LOTS of surplus) so we're still trying to sell them! here are the designs, they are original and hand-drawn specially by art club talents (who should seriously be selling their artwork out there. it's like how imba LAH! so pro.)

i can't draw for nuts, but one look and u can tell how they're really good. uh the digital one is hand-drawn onto a tablet screen, so no it's not like photoshop or what. hand-drawn. xD

Design 1, most popular among RJC students. this took one night by the pro lingxi.

Design 2. the most popular among japanese exchange students (and my personal favourite xD) this took FIVE nights by the pro liru. (and rjc students didn't even look at it!! poor liru :/)

Design 3. the most popular among ghosts? (ie. no one) not sure who did it, but only one person bought it, and it was the art club chair to help the sales. T.T

Postcard-size - $0.50
Poster (A4)-size - $1.50

We're still taking orders so do let me know asap k! the quality of printing is good so don't worry, it's like 240gm paper i think.

there'll be a Japanese Summer Festival at the jap primary school on 23rd august! so fun. who's going? (half the jap club definitely ^^") Click here for more details

bon anniversaire!

nothing much, just dropping by to say, HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

to who else? me of course xD

counting down...9 days to go!

lala. i got my first class birthday celebration today during civics! for once my class remembers my birthday and i got a birthday cake (: ok it's not really for me, it's more for babies born in july, but there's only me this month xD every month we celebrate for the whole month of babies and we have the cake and some photo-taking, and we sing bday songs and we light the candles and we blow.

haha i told them not to bother with the candles bcos i didn't need that so yah. it was a coffee cream cake! very creamy, very delicious. and i actually got like 3 servings bcos there was too much leftover and they kept insisting that bday girl should eat the extra (and that i should eat more T.T) bleh. but it's oishii so i don't mind ^^

mmm yah. i used to countdown to my birthday, like from months before (so i'll start from like 140+ days and counting...) but i guess this year i kindof forgot to do it? maybe it just feels too childish to countdown from like MONTHS before.

haha so 2 days to go! but that's not the only thing im counting down for. im also counting down to the all-important upcoming...-drum rolls-

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-ok i shall stop this mystery and suspense whatsoever-

















...Japanese Festival 2008! 9 days to go and counting...it's just round the corner on 24th/25th july, the thurs and fri of week 5, so do come support us! we're selling chocolates, sushi, manga postcards, and even having yukata trying and anime screening etc etc! there's a variety of activities we're having to promote japanese culture and generally to have fun! ^^

the theme for this year's japanese fest is Seishun Amigo 青春 アミーゴ! The focus this year is on the youth culture in Japan, which encompasses Japanese pop music, Anime videos and Manga art drawings.

since it is racial harmony week, there should be stuff put up around the school by the other cultural clubs, eg. chinese society and dunno what? i know french x is setting up booths for the week too (and we only get 2 days :/) it used to be japanese week, then it became 3 days last year, and this year it's just japanese day. but we can sell stuff for 2 days so ^^

get your friends to come and support us! we need your support to make this a fun and memorable festival! ^^

here's a preview of one of the publicity posters u should be seeing around soon

Seishun Amigo. Coming Your Way Soon...

happy youth day

yeah happy youth day one and all

im depressed! watashi no tennis no kami-sama, KING of grass, lost wimby! federer lost his wimbledon finals to, of all ppl, the monsterous rafa! noooooooo. -wallows in misery-

uh yeah but of course, life moves on and i shan't be sad anymore. fed shall make a comeback! it was such a close match, where it all depended on that last set to win or lose. sigh. longest men's finals ever, epic match indeed. well done fed, well done rafa, but i just hate it that it's HIM who won fed. garh. let's just hope fed keeps up his no. 1 ranking and that rafa shall NEVER, i say, NEVER EVER OVER HIS DEATH BED WITH HIS FAT HOPES AND IN HIS DREAMS become number 1! yeah.

uhh i've been pretty busy these days, last weekend we went to weilin's bday chalet at aranda, downtown east. was pretty fun, i uhh at least didn't fail ddr. and attempts at wii wasn't too bad T.T ohh and i got stuffed by chocolates, and watched random movies haha. yeah and i went bowling for the first time and uhh managed to do a spare. -no other comment- haha ok it gets tiring and i was still aching from wha? oh ice-skating yeah. haha some ppl are just proooo at it.

hmm the past week was busy busy and as liwen said, it felt like one month had passed instead of just one week! imagine, we still have to survive another 18 weeks to end of school, and that would be...18 MONTHS!? -dies-

ytd we went to cosfest 08 at downtown east -yes. again.- and there was such a crowd! but not too bad, the costumes were really good, just that their acting was errr. i should just say, u're better off watching a boring golf match than watch them. (and golf matches are really, really boring.)

they should seriously improve on their acting skills. some of them should be more vocal, while some of them should just shut up and look pretty. yeah.

the vincent valentine one wasn't too bad! wonder why they didn't win?

from last week onwards, my saturday afternoons will be taken up by big dipper cip project! we work in pairs tutoring underprivileged pri sch kids, and the kid im tutoring's called rachel. she's p6 em3 this year, but she's pretty hardworking -when she's forced to- well at least she has some sort of self-discipline, but the problem is, she takes so few subjects! i run out of things to tutor her in bcos she doesn't want to do work and bcos she's alrd finished her homework. bleh.

she takes foundation english and math, and foundation chinese too! no science for psle. how lucky. so she practically has nothing much for me to teach her bcos none of the workbooks there are foundation T.T

nvm. i'll try my best. she coerced me into buying her a drink and giving her sweets when she did nothing. garh. i feel so bullied.

i'll consider if i should put up cosfest pics. anw the pics i got are blurry and lousy quality so you're better off googling for pics.

some camera worthy pictures:



graffiti wall

some shops selling cosplaying stuff.

some stall vendors actually playing weiqi! how bored must they be! xP

gundam

does this look wrong to you?

cosplayers lounging around outside D'tent, ie. D'LAWN! xD


i like this one ^^

performances on stage.

some cute stall girl that my bro says has an air of sophistication around her. couldn't get her face, so had to settle for her as a mysterious enigma...

 

 

 

 

imagine. this guy actually brought his own chair, complete with the roller wheels! i wonder how he brought it...

urahara the HENTAI.

that's about it, more cosfest pics are on jap club web album ^^" i'll bug the ppl who took pics to upload!

common tests OVER

yeah for ppl like you who's reading my blog, it better be because u've finished your tests. bcos i totally banned myself from the fridge(which had all my chocolates and yummy biscuits and gummy sweets etc etc), and i totally banned myself from the com and reading ppl's blogs and reading books etc etc. no tv, no slacking, no nothing. it was an existence boring as in prison.

except it required LOTS of brain power, such that at the end of the day, when i go to sleep, my brain's so dead i couldn't sleep and i dream of numbers and equations when i wake up. T.T

so here ends the first common tests of my life...

i don't miss it.

the papers weren't too bad, but could have been better definitely. hopefully i'll pass well, and not fail anything at all >.< we went to celebrate today! we indulged in sinful desires (eating a mudpie which had oreo cookies, chocolate, butter cream and coffee ice cream all in one, plus a chocolate crust), and we went ice-skating.

uhh iceskating wasn't too bad, i improved quite a lot from the previous time years back, but now im super tired, aching all over my back, my legs and a bit of my arms. T.T ice-skating is such a tiring sport, like worse than cycling! (which i can't do as well)

hmm tmr we'll be having our class learning journey, to of all places, arab street. this means i have to wake early tmr, which means i should sleep early. soon. and i wonder what's going to happen there?

what i did yesterday

we went for my classmate's monica's birthday party. there was a bbq and we spent AGES trying to get the fire started. we spammed firestarters but the charcoal just wouldn't catch fire. after one hour++ we finally succeeded. T.T

there was loads of food, her mum baked a shepherd's pie that's to die for, and there was nice chinchow drink that is more jelly than drink that we all just drank anw, and we just talked and ate. otah, sausages, corn, stingray, beehoon, satay, crabmeat, shepherd's pie, potato chips, drinks, and more!

we played twister,

uno stacko - look at leaning tower of pisa! that was somewhat right b4 it collapsed ^^"

some card games and watched some tv. yepp.

the very nice chocolate mint green tea cake + ice cream cake that my classmates got for her. apparently you can decorate and design your own icecream cake at ben & jerry's! (i nv knew that b4 o.o)

monica's really pro. she managed to blow out ALL the candles in one breath, both the ones on the chocolate mint green tea cake AND the one on the ice cream cake!

happy birthday monica!

journeying down memory's lane. day 2 + postlude

E.T. touch. credits to my finger and blaws' finger xD

blaws and her obsession with twins. these are the njc twins who were in our group for special round ^^

mugging hard b4 finals. (not like they needed mugging T.T)

haha now we know cx's violent tendencies; sikai got hungry and bought old chang kee, and he could still eat at the reception! [and u see domo]

cutee.

junior finals

senior finals - rj team 1

senior finals - rj team 2 + nj team 1 (i wonder why isit the rest of rj team 2 weren't taken?)

astrochallenge 08; announcing of results

trophies galore!

hc team 1 collecting their prize

rj team 1 collecting their prize. take note of their expectant looks at the arrival of the wonderful 8-inch newtonian!

congratulations!

rj team 2!

rj team 1337

rjastro <3

at swensens afterwards for celebration dinner! i quote pan: "i'll fight for its custody!" -that's y he 霸占 the telescope xP-

cx and panz told us loads of lame jokes xD and it was generally quite fun.

earthquake icecream we shared

mmm yum yum!

i want it all!!!