Chasing the ghost of a good thing...

is. still. alive. barely.

2008-11-25T10:18:00.000-08:00

just realised it's been a really long time since the last post, which is odd considering the frequency of posts that usually spring up amidst examinations. so i decided to remedy the situation. well, it's that time of year again, and one paper's down and done (also failed and past), so moving on, here's an update of what i did today (studying for pers prop)!

it's food! veggies on breadcrumbs, really cool place in tokyo. also very expensive.
aronia de takazawa, go google! also check out ryugin while you're at it.
add to the list of places you'd love to check out but will never go to because 400sgd for a meal is a tad bit too expensive.

le baiser de l'hotel de ville by doisneau

also, we have the ig nobel prizes, the darwin awards, and the stella awards. for the unenlightened, the first is for interesting achievements much akin to the actual nobel prizes, the second for sublimely idiotic self-removal from the gene pool, and the last for really ridiculous lawsuits that waste time. much like this post. and the majority of my day.

so much for studying.

whine

2008-10-07T03:06:00.000-07:00

i miss lazing around my quiet lake in kingston.
and wandering around the streets in nice weather that doesn't leave me melting
and even preparing my own meals and deciding what to cook
most of all, i miss my madcap travelling
as opposed to studying brainlessly in school right now
(or trying to at least)

because anything beats studying

2008-10-03T21:09:00.000-07:00

yeah i realise it's been an eternity since i last updated, not that anyone checks these days, and i still have two posts (on paris and oia) that have yet to be posted and i strangely suspect, never will see the light of day. so it's a lazy saturday night, and i'm in school reading chinese corporate and securities notes when i should be diving. speaking of which, that's pretty much what i've been up to ever since i got back from europe (with at least 60% of my europe photos still languishing somewhere untouched in my laptop taking up copious amounts of space)

since we're on the topic of diving, here're some photos from my last few trips (most of them are on facebook, and most of them have captions already, so i'm kinda lazy to add them now). if you're really bored, you can try to figure out which are from bali, perhentian, and redang.

sorry for the outburst of photos, but as you can see, i only ever manage to overcome the inertia against updating when fish are involved. speaking of which, i need to dive again soon. or travel. or both, actually.

in other news, transcripts of presidential (or in this case, vice presidential) debates makes for entertaining reading in times of extreme boredom. and i cannot understand why singapore (or the united states for that matter, and half the known world while i'm ranting) does not stock/sell a certain book i'm currently looking for, and it's only available in the uk or australia (but amazingly enough, there's no amazon in australia, and amazon in the uk is out of stock, not that i'd ever pay 10 pounds PLUS shipping for a single book) ah well. back to work.

the stories of Oia (part i)

2008-06-15T16:39:00.000-07:00

we'll just keep this post simple. i love Oia. Santorini's beautiful. it's a great place to vacation, the people are uber friendly and are absolutely willing to help you and show you around their wonderful island, the cliffs are a marvel to walk, and the seas and skies are a perpetual endless sapphire blue. not to mention the sunrises and sunsets (not the most beautiful ever, but certainly breathtaking, plus you get front row seats everyday). i could wax lyrical about Oia forever, but i'm lazy and it's easier to let my photos do the talking (note: in the midst of travelling right now, so photos are unedited for now)

walking along the streets of Oia on the first night

our amazingly awesome hostel

my first sunrise in Oia

view from outside our room

the streets of Oia by day

me and Oia

random shot of door

even more random shot of donkey

and the madcap scenery shooting begins: we embarked on a 10km hike through the mountains, from Oia to Fira

rented a car, drove back to the port in Oia to catch the sunset (and swim, and seafood)

sunlight off the water

random shot of Oia from the port

first sunset in Oia

the port by night

Oia at night, quiet, tranquil, beautiful

and thus ends the first day in Oia, Santorini

stay tuned for more! when i get bored.

almost done with europe!

2008-06-14T16:24:00.000-07:00

hi all! i know it's been a long while, and hardly anyone comes to visit anymore, but just a quick update that i'm still alive, and have done berlin and greece since the last post, currently in budapest, hungary. i'd love to go on about my travels, but i suspect i might get hate mail, so here's a quick summary: berlin was more of a historical tour plus lots of socialising (apparently a whole bunch of singaporeans decided to pop by around the same period of time, must be something in the air), and my strongest memory of it was a day spent at the berlin zoo. athens was okayyy, nice people, nicer food, and even nicer was the fact that we chanced to be there on green day, when all attractions were free! oh, and my CF card died in berlin, hence the lack of many photos (hopefully for now), and i spent a day in athens trying to find a cheap new card (just for the sake of santorini, no regrets there).

in berlin

at the zoo (or the aquarium, rather)

tower of the winds in athens (everyone photographs the acropolis and parthenon)

pistachios, almonds and macadamias in the markets of athens

en route to santorini, oia
(i'll need a whole new post just for this)

next up, santorini, the island of calderas, mythical atlantis, ancient civilisations, or as i call it, the place where every shot is postcard worthy (and my little slice of paradise)

hi friends!

2008-05-31T14:35:00.000-07:00

for those of you who still actually read this blog, hello! still alive! and happily wandering all over europe, which explains the entire lack of updates and photos, both here and on facebook. so far everything's been a blast and the food's been great, and i have like a million photos on backlog. i always meant to do a proper paris post since it's still my favourite city thus far, but in the meantime, i'll just put up a few choice photos and my famous one liners for each city.

the quintessential eiffel tower shot, paris is awesomely beautiful. i have a million photos of paris but i'm just too lazy to edit and upload them. soon, soon.

mont st michel, a must-visit, but overly touristy. pretty at night though! wish i had a tripod though... and the few days we were there, it was overcast and cloudy.

st malo, i couldn't find a decent shot of it, but it's essentially a walled city and all i can remember of it is seafood. loads and loads of seafood. and a beach.

nice! nicest town so far, cobbled beaches and blue seas, quaint, quiet, and great food

monaco, land of the rich people, where i realised i cannot make my fortune at the casinos, and that i must return to the cote d'azur when i'm rich in future.

amsterdam, the venice of the north, where i remember herrings, fried food in walls, bikes and canal boat rides. plus random red light districts all around.

charles bridge at night. there're too many things to say about how beautiful prague is, especially at night, so i'll just leave it at that. sorry the photo's so blurry, i was lazy to choose a nice one.

maria am gestade, church of st mary in vienna, where the view is simply gorgeous. of course, it also didn't hurt that the church appeared in before sunrise.

view from the top of st peter's church in munich, you can see the old town hall and frauenkirche from here. it's not as fun without the beer though.

neuschwanstein castle, the fairytale castle that supposedly inspired disney's sleeping beauty and cinderella castles. pity the sky wasn't all that blue that day. but it was breathtaking, especially from the bridge.

right. so that's my very hasty update for now, more photos to follow once i'm done with greece and budapest and italy, and berlin as well (which is where i am now, just in case anyone was wondering). and proper photos should follow once i'm terribly bored back at home, I HOPE.

my travel plans!

2008-05-02T15:56:00.000-07:00

blog very dead. yeah i know. i have like 2 posts pending which were supposed to coincide with the end of exchange (i.e. last week when i left kingston for good), but i was terribly busy and now i suspect they'll never see the light of day cos the timing's all off.

so anyways, just a quick update, done with a week in london, it was sunny for a day and rainy for the most part, but at least joel was there so i wasn't soggy and wet and miserable and lonely. just the former three. and london in a pinch is essentially about the markets, in much the same way nyc is about the shopping and broadway. plus les mis on broadway i found nicer than les mis on westend, although eponine still remains charmingly cute. but it was good nonetheless. did the whole tea and scones thing in london as well, along with the fish and chips, and the football watching in the bars. but yeah. london. markets. and if you're terribly bored, do the neil gaiman neverwhere trail (i.e. the underground) but despite all that (and the disgustingly high cost of living), i did enjoy london and the charming british accent (especially on the girls). oh, plus i caught "we will rock you" on west end, which was basically an excuse for a queen's greatest hits concert poorly disguised as a musical with no plot. but it was really fun to see the whole theatre jumping around and singing along. once they gave up pretending there was any point to the story.

which brings us to where i am now, in my hostel in paris, having taken random snapshots of the canal next door at night and practiced my gawdawful french on the poor kebab uncle down the street (twas a long, painful dinner, mostly on his part, because i was bored and tried to ask him about his menu and where he came from, in very bad broken french and lots of hand gestures). and there's a mad dog barking outside my hostel (or a dog barking madly rather), and it's been there for the last hour and nobody has shot it or chased it away yet. and tomorrow i will begin my glorious 3 weeks of wandering the streets of paris. the term flâneur comes to mind.

alright. will attempt to update more frequently, although i can't promise pictures! actually, i can quite assuredly promise there won't be any pictures for now. maybe after i go back home and end up terribly bored and missing exchange.

dear friends

2008-04-18T12:27:00.001-07:00

today, kingston is a warm sunny 10 degrees! projected to hit 18 tonight and 20 degrees tomorrow noon...i kinda miss my cool weather now.

on a side note, fuel prices have risen by 20 cents over here (that makes for a 20% increase per litre), which makes me glad i booked most of my flights already.

90 hours to study before my first paper, and 45 hours to study for my second paper after that. i'm starting to worry, just a tad.

law students are still law students, wherever they are

2008-04-08T17:30:00.000-07:00

so apparently, we're not all that different from law students throughout the world, if my queens mailbox this morning was any indication:

throw in snippets from email extracts like those below and i feel right at home again.

"As many of you have probably noticed, the Lederman library has recently been infested by SNAILS (students not actually in law school). The result has been that many law students can't find a place to sit and the ones who can have a much harder time getting a laptop outlet.

What to do....

Notwithstanding that the library is an open and public space, I believe that law students ought to retain priority over non-law students in the LAW library. Thus I propose that during this exam period all students entering the library must first present their student card . No "Law", no Lederman. "

FOLLOWED BY

"If I need to show my student card to get into the library I am going to fight somebody.

Sincerely,

President of The World
Super awesome-nova candidate '09
(donations for my candidacy are welcome)"

AND MY PERSONAL FAV

"Awwww... muffin...

Did somebody not get a seat in the libwawy?"

maybe nus law should have a law mailing list. just for the heck of it.

over too soon

2008-04-06T13:15:00.000-07:00

so it's been a year of exchange, which was actually more like 8 months, and it seems like almost yesterday that i left. so just for fun, my schedule for the next 2 weeks or so (since my parents are visiting):

April
6-8th => Toronto
8-10th => Montreal
10-12th => Quebec
12-13th => Boston
13-16th => NYC
16-18th => Kingston
18-25th => study and take exams
25th => off to London and begin Europe tripping!

so it's essentially a trip to say hi to my parents before travelling for 2 more months, as well as a sort of goodbye to all the places I've visited this past year (8months!), and also an excuse to send most of my luggage back home. although i vaguely suspect i will die for human rights since i have a sem's worth of cases and readings to do and the stupid tutor just sent us the case list a week back.

oh, and since no post is complete without a few photos at least, here're some random snapshots from my last few trips.

my tiny cosy room that i've grown rather fond of over the year.

godly sushi in NYC (sushi of gari)

sashimi at chelsea market in NYC

this is why we should always wake up for sunrises

sakura blossoms on water.

and on a slightly sadder note. i have finally succumbed and booked my ticket home. sighs.

spring is coming!

2008-03-20T11:50:00.000-07:00

so i was walking the long walk to school this afternoon (like all of FIVE minutes), and for once, i was walking on pavement! like honestly, the snow and slush were gone (for the most part) and i could actually see the road for once. and the next stunning occurrence, i heard birds chirping in the trees (although they were nowhere to be seen, which, considering the fact that the trees were all bare, made me wonder if i was hallucinating). so all we're lacking is the sun shining through the trees to make it spring.

that and me ignoring the fact that temperatures are currently 4 degrees celsius, and are slated to drop to -12 over the weekend.

amendment to earlier post: i'm in class now and it's a freaking blizzard outside. so much for spring.

of sharks and words

2008-03-17T22:27:00.000-07:00

taking a break from writing my shark essay (yes it was supposed to be finished long ago and yes i still have another essay on canadian entertainment law....) and realising that 5000 words is actually very little. just that citations can be a real headache sometimes. and that i haven't actually started researching on my second essay yet. and also i've been spending the last 2 weeks slacking around, bumming in my room watching anime and reading manga, and wandering around the snow-covered roads of kingston (yes, it's still sub-zero here).

i was just looking at the calendar the other day, planning my next few trips, and i realised that i have less than 20 days left in kingston (because i'll be travelling elsewhere). which is kinda sad, come to think of it, since a year (okay technically 8 months) flew by so fast. but when you actually count the days i've been in kingston (which i approximated), i've actually spent about one and a half months in NYC, and about a month in toronto, with 2 weeks spent travelling in mexico, and another 2 weeks last december along the east coast. throw in my trips to halifax for a week, random forays to montreal and the weeklong trip to chicago, and i've probably been in kingston for slightly under 4 months in total, maybe less. which is kinda funny. almost as funny as the fact that i've been sleeping at sunrise and staying awake all night.

oh wells. back to the essay writing. nyc in a week or so, so i have to finish 2 essays by then. and survive another week of my own cooking. bleargh. at least i have nobu to look forward to.

diving in cozumel!

2008-03-06T13:41:00.000-08:00

hi, still alive, survived diving alone in cozumel! and cancun was pretty fun by the way (photos on facebook). so more about diving. cozumel, one of the top 5 diving spots in the world, was insanely awesome to dive in! okay i honestly don't think the top 5 rating is warranted, but it's a really good dive spot.

marine life is pretty good, corals are healthy and huge, and the reef is awesome! but not many sharks. although i saw my first octopus and toadfish there. the diving there's mostly drift diving, so it's a shame i wasn't able to explore all the nooks and crannies that abounded in the hugeass reefs (maybe if i did i'd have thought it'd be more awesome, because everytime i looked under a rock there was something, cute fish, lobster, crab, octopus...you get the idea). but current was quite tiring to fight against so i just chilled and went with the flow. plus the fact that diving alone you kinda wanna keep the dive guide in sight...

now on to the highlight.... the visibility. first dive i went down to 20m straight, and thought i was still at 8m cos of the sunlight and the clarity of the water. until i saw my dive comp. looking around, i saw rays and turtles swimming around in the distance! i.e. the vis was easily 30m. sadly though, while this was the vis for the entire trip (which made for damn happy photo taking), the only sharks i saw were nurse sharks. oh wells. it was pretty cool nonetheless.

lastly, the people i met while diving. interesting couples who keep coming here (as well as various parts of the carribbean, like the caymans) so conversation was fun. plus we met up for food and drinks afterwards, and they were kind enough to buy me lunch/dinner, so life was good.

quote of the trip: "i want to become a dive instructor, so i can teach my granddaughter how to dive and love the sea" (isn't that just so sweet)

pretty rushed day

2008-02-14T12:19:00.000-08:00

so spring break's finally here and i still haven't managed to finish my essays on time and i'm rushing off to toronto tonight before going off to cancun on tuesday and i still haven't bought my train tickets to toronto nor my bus tickets to buffalo where i'll be flying to cancun (but at least i got those plane tickets) and i'm in class now with my bag at home still unpacked and i slept at 5 yesterday which is why i'm rushing through everything today because i woke up late and that was because i was reading manga and watching anime which is what i've been up to for the last 2 weeks which also explains why i've yet to finish my essay and i realise my last few days of cancun accommodation have yet to be booked nor is my diving there but at least my dive gear is on its way to toronto along with my shades which have taken forever to fix or so i hope.

right. more updates in a bit. once i end class.

happy chinese new year!

2008-02-06T03:12:00.000-08:00

it seems oddly fitting, that on the eve of chinese new year, i'm sitting in my room at 3am writing my paper on shark legislation. having pored through countless agreements and resolutions on regulatory measures for shark finning and overfishing issues, and looking at statistics and random bits of trivia, i've learnt the following:

1) sharks are apex predators, which means there're very few of them
2) people like their fins, so they get fished a lot. even when people don't mean to catch them, trawlers just happen to drag sharks in
3) there're over 350 species of sharks
4) shark meat is used to make fish and chips in australia and a few other places
5) a dead shark's fin may sell for $100 or so, but a live shark in the bahamas generates $2.3 million in revenue each year
6) whales and dolphins are afforded more protection than sharks because they're mammals and hence considered wildlife, not fish
7) sharks are immune to cancer tumours and heal wounds amazingly quickly, among other things. however, you're as much of an idiot as those cavemen in history that believed eating the heart of your enemy would make you braver if you honestly think that eating shark cartilage will award you the same healing abilities.
8) allowing this trend of overfishing sharks will hurt you in the long run, since sharks get rid of all the sick and diseased fish, so with no sharks, you get more sick fish, and you eat the sick fish and die. that and the fact that the whole food chain will go mildly crazy. like the octopus eating up all the spiny lobsters in Tasmania since no more sharks are left there to eat the octopi. then you run out of nice seafood just because you wanted shark's fin soup. that and the fact that you end up with grumpy divers.

so moral of the story? it's late and i haven't slept and i'm mildly incoherent. plus vastly bored of researching. oh. and don't eat shark's fin for CNY. it's more ecological than not leaving your tap running or half flushing the toilet bowl.

p.s. since it's CNY, i kept it at 8 points. happy chinese new year everyone! (year of the rat!)

distractions of grandeur

2008-02-05T00:33:00.000-08:00

amidst researching for my essay (the introduction of which will shortly come up once i've written the basic draft), i got sidetracked by the smithsonian life list. since i've spent time at the smithsonian in DC, the name caught my eye, as well as the items on the list. so here they are, with a quote thrown in for good measure (taken off the site). i skipped the headings and comments, so for the full article and further descriptions, go here.

– Mesa Verde
– Pompeii
– Tikal
– Petra
– Pyramids of Giza
– Taj Mahal
– Easter Island
– The Great Wall
– Aurora Borealis
– Serengeti
– Iguazu Falls
– Machu Picchu
– The Louvre
– Zen Garden of Kyoto
– Uffizi Gallery
– Fallingwater
– Yangtze River
– Antarctica
– Mount Kilimanjaro
– Grand Canyon
– Pagan
– Parthenon
– Angkor Wat
– Ephesus
– Venice
– Amazon Rain Forest
– Great Barrier Reef
– Galápagos Islands

"We are all of us resigned to death: it's life we aren't resigned to,"
-novelist Graham Greene

looking at the above list, there're 2 places i've already been to, 2 that i will probably do by the end of exchange, 4 that i hope to have done by the end of exchange, and 2 that i reallyreally hope to do in the near future (if i only had the cash). the rest either don't interest me all that much or i'm in no hurry to do. go figure =P

right, so much for the break...now back to saving the sharks.

the food issue

2008-02-04T20:16:00.000-08:00

because i was stuck in kingston this weekend. and i wasted most of my time and didn't do half the things i'd planned to do. sighs.

spaghetti with prawns

fried rice with random assorted meats

black pepper beef and lettuce

fish and vegetable stew (yeah i just threw in potatoes carrots and lettuce. then very green so i added ham. and there's about a pot of it that i didn't photograph)

baked chicken, linguine with mushrooms

yawns. i have an essay to write, and no mood to write it. and i need to find people to travel with. or i might just get bored enough to spend a lot of money and travel alone.

blog revives from sheer boredom

2008-01-29T13:29:00.000-08:00

so here i am, in ADR class, where the lecturer is rambling on endlessly about nothing at all, and i'm trying to find interesting things to do online (like download anime since my freaking connection back home, while fast, is also annoyingly limited to 60 or 90gb a month) and researching for my env law essay (yes i'm actually trying to start work early for once!)

maybe it's also cos the essay topic i chose seems reasonably interesting. anyways, quick update on kingston, 1smu, 7ntus, and 2 singaporeans studying here this sem, so one would assume life would be more entertaining. but then i'm antisocial. so save for a trip to montreal with 4 of the girls and a trip to whiteface (snowboarding!) with the 2 guys studying here, i don't hang out (cos is poor). that and the fact that nobody seems willing to skip sch to travel, and nobody wants to come by kingston en route to wherever else to travel. so that means no nyc this weekend. yawns. at least it gives me time to write my essays. in total. complete. boredom.

so yes, watch this space for more updates. i sense photos of my cooking and lake ontario snowed in turning up soon.

blog die until jialat jialat

2008-01-28T09:09:00.000-08:00

so before i forget, and because i have ABSOLUTELY no idea what my human rights lecturer is talking about (some bona fide vague references to discrimination), i will update, with comments and random photos.

since the last time i posted, i have watched a total of 8 broadways, flown to halifax (nova scotia), and clocked approximately 2500km in 3 days driving around the coast of nova scotia (HAH to australia's ocean drive, i'm coming for you next!).

then montreal revisited in winter, where i nearly froze to death snapping shots of snowfall, and then climbed mont royal in the evening to catch a sunset and look for a cross.

and in more recent news, whiteface mountain in lake placid to try my hand at half killing myself at snowboarding

NYC again next week, i seriously doubt there'll be many photos this time round though. till next time!

waiting, waiting, waiting...

2008-01-02T17:35:00.000-08:00

update: currently in new york, spent christmas and new year here.

it seems a lot of my time in new york has been spent waiting and queuing. queuing for bus tickets, stuck in new york jams, waiting for a seat in serendipity, getting stuck in times square on new year's eve, queuing for tkts and broadway lotteries, waiting for friends... you get the idea.

so one wonders, is the 2-3hr wait into serendipity really worth all that chocolate? or the 10 lottery tries waiting for that ticket in the cold only to end up with nothing, or maybe one ticket in the end if you're lucky? okay i wasn't bored enough to try out the times square on new year's eve part, beyond popping my head into the crowd at around 8pm to check it out, then running home to hide, but still..

but then i suppose this is all part of the new york experience, especially around this time of year, and with broadway, getting a US$25 ticket when the guy behind you paid around US$100 is kinda satisfying. not to mention being able to see all the actors up close (okay the spit spewing out of the mouth when they sing is disturbing, as is the thick makeup and the wiglines, but the feeling when they come out to take their bows and are less than 5m away is just intense)

so the rest of you can come to new york, do your touristy stuff and see all your tv series locales (friends, seinfield, even gossip girl). me, i'll stick to my broadway queues. on a side note, i don't believe i've ever been so happy to hear someone mangling up my name so badly (the guy from the wicked lottery today)

happy new year everyone!

back in a while

2007-12-09T14:58:00.000-08:00

right, so i'm done with my last exam (also my only one), and all the bloody essays (somehow it feels weird to be sitting in my room not writing essays for once), and i'm off to roadtrip around the east coast of the US!

photos and more random posts when i return, in the meantime, here're some random shots to entertain!

view from my window after a snowfall

my very abandoned looking house

snowy streets

dinner (ok i have gotta work on presentation)

22hr rides are bad...

2007-12-01T00:59:00.000-08:00

they make you think too much, and sleep too little.
anyway, the post i wanted to put is temporarily on hold till my essay writing frustrates me enough. for now, some lightheartedness:

(when talking about christmas dinner)
Daniel.
looking forward to the dinner man
how we gonna get food?

wenjie. opinio juris
pray very hard

Daniel.
man shall not live on bread alone

wenjie. opinio juris
ya
is christmas mah
we go carolling for food la

Daniel.
we must have a turkey leh
if not v. spoiler

wenjie. opinio juris
that one thanksgiving leh
u mixed up liao
christmas is logcake.
u bake okay
no logcake no entry

Daniel.
must have turkey also leh
i can make andrea's apple crumble

wenjie. opinio juris
sureanott
her skill level how high
must look good also le

Daniel.
it's solid
trust me
i dunno if i can replicate it la
but her one is shiok
she has taught me well la

wenjie. opinio juris
ya la
i know hers zai
u, i doubt

Daniel.
i'm her young padawan
i'm hayden christensen
she's obi wan

wenjie. opinio juris
i puke blood and die.
and can i post this on my blog
it needs entertainment

note: edited to shorten it, and removed all the "hahahas"

on a sidenote, paulo coelho's like the flowing river is a pretty good read when you're travelling.

dcing in dc

2007-11-27T23:18:00.000-08:00

so i'm in a hostel in DC, which is pretty decent, except that i have to lock everything up before i go to the toilet all the time, which can get pretty annoying at times. washington is a nice place, especially near the monuments, because there're so many cops and so much security, you kinda know it's the safest place in america to be, unless someone feels like bombing it.

so i'm short of sleep, doing my essay, and got bored. met dee's friend esther, had a great tour of congress, and wandered around town, checked out monuments and holocaust museum (there's a story in that). and you realise why they're so big on liberty. symbols are powerfully persuasive sometimes, so even though you're cynical enough to think that human rights and liberty don't exist, for that brief period, standing at the top of the washington monument or lincoln memorial, or where martin luther king jr. made his speech, those doubts are suspended. and you kinda believe in the possible salvation of mankind. and begin to hope. at least, until you pop by the holocaust museum and realise how screwed up the world was, is, and always will be.

okay. but it's always nice to believe in human rights and freedom. after all, countless wars have been fought over and for it, and we don't want all those bloodshed and deaths to be for nothing do we? this whole human rights issue reminds me of something i read somewhere before. our greatest tragedy is that we're ultimately doomed to failure, yet our greatest triumph is that we never stop trying.

sigh. the lack of sleep must be screwing with my brain. 20 hr bus ride on greyhound to kingston tomorrow. somebody save me.

nyc sightseeing

2007-11-25T23:42:00.000-08:00

so today i wandered to the financial district and south ferry to take photos and do the touristy thing. caught a lovely sunset. wandered to times square and all over, just to make my unlimted day trip ticket worth it. refrained from shopping. but it was really tough. which leads me to where i am now, writing essays in NYC. my gosh. is damn gross.

oh. and my breaking heart (still unrecovered from little mermaid) is broken yet again. apparently serendipity has been shut down indefinitely because of roaches and rats! i can only hope it opens in time for christmas. sigh.

alright. back to my essay. been overeating and enjoying life a tad too much in nyc.

edit: i just realised that serendipity used to have a US$1000 dessert (Golden Opulence Sundae) that required 48hrs advance notice to prepare, and now just recently came out with a US$25,000 dessert (Frrrozen Haute Chocolate), a week before they were forced to shut down. fwah. anyone feels like treating me to chocolate for my birthday this year?

just for fun:

The Golden Opulence Sundae consists of five scoops of Tahitian vanilla bean ice cream infused with Madagascar vanilla, covered in 23-carat edible gold leaf, rare Amedei Porceleana and Chuao chocolate, American Golden caviar, passion fruit, orange, Armagnac, candied fruits from Paris, marzipan cherries, and decorated with real gold dragees. The sundae is served in a baccarat Harcourt crystal goblet with an 18-karat gold spoon. Apparently the cafe sells approximately one of these every month.

and:
The Frrrozen Haute Chocolate (or frozen hot chocolate) is a frozen, slushy mix of cocoas from 14 countries, milk and 5 grams of 24-carat edible gold topped with whip cream and shavings from a La Madeline au Truffle. It is served in a goblet with a 18-karat gold bracelet decorated with 1 carat of diamonds and served with a golden spoon decorated with white and chocolate-coloured diamonds. Both the spoon and the bracelet are for the diner to bring home. The restaurant has yet to sell one, having closed down shortly after showcasing it, but since the truffle comes from France, the cocoas from all around the world, and the gold from Switzerland, they estimate about two weeks for an order to be processed.

new york thanksgiving.

2007-11-24T23:53:00.000-08:00

so i was fool enough to think that it'd be cool to visit new york during thanksgiving, check out the sales and especially woodbury, and get really cheap stuff. i have since learnt better.

firstly. never go woodbury during thanksgiving. thanks to my friend, i didn't. from all reports, you go there at 10pm, spend two hours trying to get through the jam, make it past security, find a lot, and then fight tooth and nail to grab an item that fits you. then if you go there past a certain time, it's sort of like how things would be after a pack of hyenas ravaged the poor dead animal...picked clean (at least, when i went to macy's at 6pm, that's what i saw, and i can only surmise woodbury was worse)

secondly. don't shop during thanksgiving if you can help it. the crowd is disgustingly insane. like. throng is a good word, that i'd never though i'd see. if christmas is going to be like this, i think i will hide somewhere far up north.

thirdly, new york has a lot of nice food, so spend your money on it rather than shopping! why buy a pair of shades when you can eat dim sum and krispy kreme! (btw, i..uh..bought oakleys because i was bored)

so. yeah. enjoying new york. A&F and touristy stuff tomorrow, haven't really taken ANY photographs at all yet after two days, which is kinda new for me. and i still want a trenchcoat for christmas. impractical as it is.

thanks

2007-11-22T23:59:00.000-08:00

so i decided to do something rare, which is to blog about my travels. no photos yet though (which means never), because i'm travelling and lazy to upload.

day 1 of philly was...interesting. left kingston at 11pm, drove to philly. amazingly enough, the approximately 700km journey only took us 6 hrs, which was surprisingly fast. which i attribute to the fact that the roads were totally empty because of thanksgiving (more on that later). first time ever that i cleared US customs so quickly and efficiently, mainly because my friend driving was american. then came the 6hr drive which passed really quickly because of the awesomely good music (please go listen to passafire, is nice!) as well as the fact that i got to drive! nobody died, so yeah, i'm not that bad a driver. and it was an exciting first drive, through rain and wind, fog and darkness, i think we commented that the only things lacking were sleet and snow. and random roadkill of course. talk about a memorable first drive in US.

then, arriving in philly at 5am, i realised it was a tad bit early to be waking up my friend, so we stopped by for, can you believe it, PHILLY CHEESE STEAK! (joel lim i dunno what philly cheese steak you eat but the one at Geno's was pretty damn good! well, except for the hot sauce, which i suspect contained jalapenos) an excellent introduction to philly. that and the hoagies. basically think subs, but with meat, cheese, onions, oil and maybe vinegar. unhealthy, but tasty. and the bread is damn nice too! oh yeah, and my friend didn't wake till 7 so i spent my first few hours in philly outside the house napping and reading law notes. abit the sad. luckily it wasn't as cold as in canada, otherwise die already.

daytime nothing much, usual touristy stuff, then my american friend invited me for thanksgiving dinner! awesome. my first ever authentic american thanksgiving. although giving thanks at the table was kinda strange. but the family was really nice and friendly and the atmosphere was fun. (the beer and wine and alcohol helped a lot too) no photos because i was too busy eating/drinking/playing foosball. food eaten includes several rounds of ribs, turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, macaroni and cheese, bacon, ribs, and much discussion over whose ribs recipe is better over the dining table, which led to a scheduled showdown in december ala iron chef. alas, i will not be there to judge. oh, and i sat through 2 NFL games. uhh.

and that results in where i am now, in my friend's very big room with the guitar and the TV, watching leopard seals eat penguins on animal planet, having missed my last bus to NYC, and having to wait till tomorrow morning. which means that i kinda missed the 4am black friday shopping. so sad. but the RIBS. omigosh.

p.s. eh philly is quite nice la, joel why you make it sound so sian.

because they are cute and cuddly...

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

i didn't realise it was showing at the Toronto International Film Festival in Sept, otherwise I'd have gone to watch it... anyways, go check it out!

basically the story's about the director who decided to go film sharks underwater. to do that, he teamed up with an eco-terrorist to go chase down poachers in Costa Rica, fighting on the high seas and battling death and infection every step of the way.

and if you want the official story, underwater filmmaker Rob Stewart did a documentary in order to showcase the plight of sharks around the world, travelling to the shark-rich waters of the world to expose the exploitation and corruption surrounding the shark-fin industry, especially in the marine reserves of Cocos Island, Costa Rica and the Galapagos. he spent five years on this, and nearly got himself killed several times.

He travelled with the crew of the Sea Shepherd, fought with poachers and got rammed by pirate boats, had a run-in with the government and tried for attempted murder, gunboat chases, mafia espionage (this is all from the synopsis off the site), and caught necrotizing fasciitis (flesheating disease for all you house and grey's fans).

Catch your attention yet? oh, and it has fantastic underwater videography (i.e. sharks galore)

For the uninformed, the Sea Shepherd is sort of a renegade arm of Greenpeace (since it was founded by one of their three founders), and they take a more confrontational approach towards environmental protection (such as sinking whaling ships). It basically fights poachers around the world, and its members are accused of maritime piracy and attempted murder (well, i suppose sinking ships and ramming them kinda kills the crew), but because of international law and differing jurisdictions, convicting and extraditing them sometimes poses a problem (and you wonder why i took a course in international law AND conflicts of law).

More random trivia:

1) Sharks are killed largely for their fins, thanks to the whole shark fin soup fiasco. 100 million sharks a year die to fuel the demand for fins. Many of these sharks are finned then discarded into the water to die. It’s like killing an elephant for ivory or a rhinoceros for its horn, and because of this, shark populations have dropped 90% in the last 30 years.

2) Sharks eat fish. Life on earth depends on life in the sea which sits below sharks in the food chain. Phytoplankton in the sea convert carbon dioxide into oxygen, providing us with 70% of the oxygen we breathe. So, sharks eat fish, fish eat plankton. We kill the sharks, many more fish around to eat plankton. Less plankton = less oxygen and more carbon dioxide = global warming = no white christmas in new york.

3) No sharks means i'll be very bored when diving. Also, it means that the sick fish survive and breed so next time all you'll have to eat are sickly dying fish. Which by logical extension will kill you one day. okay maybe not (since i have no authority on it), but who wants small sickly fish anyways.

i think i just found my research topic for environmental law. and people bitch on about the lack of human rights and starvation and war crimes. humans can be so self-absorbed sometimes. sigh back to my essays.

sigh.

2007-11-18T23:16:00.000-08:00

because all tickets are sold out until january. i angst.

that and the fact that i should've planned ahead.

on a sidenote, today was a lousy day. woke up to wait for my friend to send me to toronto, apparently he was waiting for me outside my house, and i was waiting for him outside my house, and we both missed each other. oh wells. not meant to be i guess. but still sian.

and i hate my housemate. will have words with him soon. more words. failing which, his dirty pots and pans are going to end up on his bed, and his shoes will get colgate. (right before i leave for my dec trips)

because i still have a lot to learn.

2007-11-17T03:16:00.000-08:00

today, amidst my boredom whilst essay writing, i was surfing flickr and chanced upon an autumnal photo which was really pretty. following the link, it led me to this guy's photos. which are pretty....well, pretty. shots mostly in toronto, as shown below.

his photo, taken at night, long shutter speed

my shot, snapped in passing at noon

same place, entirely different time, focus, and objective (skill level also very different). which makes me wonder, are we all just too busy being caught up with our lives to pay attention to what goes on around us? if we look hard enough, a good photo, some beauty, can be found in almost anything. just that we hardly bother with the effort.

so while the argument can be made that looking at life through a lens cuts you off emotionally and prevents you from experiencing life to the fullest, sometimes, looking through those lenses also gives you an entirely different perspective, and lets you appreciate life anew.

the word is ennui.

2007-11-15T19:33:00.000-08:00

so today dawned dark and rainy and windy, and i woke up in the mood to skip class entirely. well. i woke up several times, but then i got bored of trying to sleep. which was the only reason i went to class. which turned out to be a bad idea.

so there i was, watching the raindrops splatter on the skylight, drumming a merry rhythm as the presentation went on (was it about TRIPS and AIDS, or falun gong, or some human rights issue again?) and desperately trying to alleviate my boredom (not that anybody's ever online at the unearthly hour of 12), when i realised that blogsurfing doesn't help, because everybody's more or less in the same slump of boredom, and the mood's infectious.

seriously. i'm on exchange, and i'm bored. granted, not as bored as i'd be back home, but the essays waiting to be written don't help with the mood. nor, strangely enough, do the upcoming holidays (although they are bound to be exciting and i will love them come december, but right now i just can't find the energy). it's wrong. i'm supposed to be having so much fun i forget to blog, instead, i'm doing the same thing i'd do during exam period back home. maybe it's cos i'm running out of cash. or nearby places to go.

and the funny thing is, while walking to school today, the thought occurred to me. why is it more fun to be snowed on than rained on? you end up the same degree of wet, and snow's a lot colder. but everyone loves snow. more than essays, at any rate. which reminds me, i should be getting back to writing them. but it's going to snow tomorrow. that should be interesting.

on a sidenote, chocolate is nice. hot chocolate is even better, but apparently you can't make that with non-fat milk. either that, or i need a microwave.

so until the snow arrives and i go photocrazy, i leave you with the view from my room (on sunnier days), where i've been merrily cooped up the past few days. and napping my afternoons away.

at least, until i hop over to philly and nyc next week.

because it's boring to write essays

2007-11-13T14:33:00.000-08:00

and more fun to paste song lyrics.

i'll count the steps to happiness

i've missed

they go...

one's the touch
two's the feeling
three's the answer
four the meaning
five and six are the devil's kiss
so seven
better be heaven

on a sidenote, garlic butter beats olive oil in cooking every time. now if only my arteries don't die from this.

still. vaguely. alive.

2007-11-12T23:31:00.000-08:00

blog rather dead. non-apologetic. it's just that whenever i feel like blogging, it's probably cos i'm stuck doing essays and dying of boredom rather than out having fun, so you don't get entertaining excerpts of life on exchange and me seeing the world. plus when i'm actually having fun, updating this blog is the last thing on my mind.

chicago skyline at sunset

so yeah. chicago. for most of you who know me, you'd already know that i thought it was frigging awesome. for those who need to know, nice clean streets, variety of food, and great cheesecakes. also, no homeless and criminals on the streets that i saw. plus the aquarium was welcome after such a long hiatus away from fish. and free zoos are always good. met up with karen, my lawr tutor, had a fun chat, and basically had a great time. of course, the bill was pretty painful too, 1.3k USD for a week in the windy city, but at that time, entirely justifiable. and in retrospect, i'd do it again if i could.

one of the UoT buildings

of course, the week leading up to it was rather messy, since i had to go to toronto and bum around and write essays. but at least i managed to get awesome autumnal shots. would have taken more but there was just this overwhelming lethargy to haul my ass down to the harbourside/lakefront especially considering the wind and cold and the fact that it was probably my fifth visit there.

random building in toronto, but i like the colours and sky

also made a double pitstop to ann arbor and visited the umich guys, since a 10hr straight drive from toronto to chicago is usually considered mildly exhausting. their law school there is really pretty. and the guys were excellent hosts, even to the point of getting us drunk and concussed in their living room whilst playing bleach on wii.

law school in UMich

so that sums up the last two weeks. and for once there aren't any food photos, although this week i've been experimenting on hot chocolate and cooking with garlic butter instead of olive oil, and will eventually move on to cooking lamb chops. more on this week, i've been holed up in the library doing essays, because i realise 4 essays do not just up and write themselves, and a pass/fail exchange mod still means that i kinda need to submit something to pass. and i must admit it sometimes scares me to look at the outline for a 25 page essay and actually see an end to it. like. oh, i just have to write this, and this and that, and argue maybe this, and hey, it's already 25 pages. or how 1hr presentations don't faze me anymore. or maybe it's just the absolute nonchalance that comes with knowing that i just need to pass and i can crap all i want about asia because the lecturers won't have much of a clue.

the nights are getting colder, although the way the temperatures work here baffle me. today's high (i.e. 6deg) can be tomorrow's low, and a -6deg night feels less cold than it does now in my room at 10deg. the world is a strange, strange place. but at least there's snow (or will be!) wind sucks though. big time.

so, till next time, i'll leave you with a picture, of my most prized purchase from the trip:

drinking chocolate, and 5 chocolate bars, they are:
mint bliss, espresso escape,
evening dream, twilight delight, and midnight reverie
don't you just love the names?

dear diary

2007-11-08T17:16:00.000-08:00

today, i woke up to realise i had the following to do:

1) make a 1hr presentation on human rights and religion which i hadn't prepared for
2) collect my cards from the post office
3) wash 2 weeks' worth of laundry
4) clean 2 weeks' worth of dust from my room
5) buy groceries
6) catch up on lost sleep

so after surviving the presentation and spending 2 hours uploading my chicago photos on facebook, and nearly dying from captioning as well as looking at all the food and realising i hadn't eaten the whole day, i went to get my cards.

the sun was setting, the sky was dark, the air was cold.

'tonight' by stars was playing on my ipod, and while i was walking to the post office, it started SNOWING.

this is why i love exchange so (well, besides the madcap travelling i've been up to)

note: granted, it was a light snowfall, more of a flurry, but it was snow nonetheless, and suited the mood perfectly. so now i'm freezing in my room and getting ready to prepare dinner. and loving the fact that i have a card at last.

random food pics

2007-10-29T22:31:00.001-07:00

because i'm bored whilst writing my essays in toronto.

minced beef with rice, soup with random veggies

linguine with prawns and cherry tomatoes. is nice

fried rice. is meant to be random food tossed in together

mushroom spaghetti in cream sauce

yet another month goes by

2007-10-26T17:07:00.000-07:00

is funny, how i find myself wandering at the lakeside again snapping photos on my second month here. is fast. i need more time to travel and see the world.

my days have settled into a boring routine, namely, doing 25 page essays and try to finish them all so i can travel more. and life in kingston is essentially grocery shopping, preparing and cooking meals, and nua-ing in my room 'doing work' (i.e. watching house and 24). plus the occasional day of activity when i feel slack, and decide to take a walk around town.

sigh.
need. to. finish. essays.
studying on exchange is veh wrong.
on another note, stars concert in a week!

and though the seasons change

2007-10-25T23:59:00.000-07:00

so i got bored of essay writing yesterday, and went for a walk to the lake, since the weather was so warm and sunny (note to self: avoid going to the lake in a tshirt when it's cold and windy, the fingers will freeze)

but the lighting was good, and i snapped some autumny shots. although, as always, i forgot to bring my tripod (yeah, i usually don't lug the big bulky thing around to school).

in the middle of class now, listening to one hour presentations which i'll inevitably have to do, yet i'm impressed at how long-winded everyone is, and wondering why it's international human rights yet everyone keeps mentioning canada. and...singapore has indigenous people still? orang laut ah. we did sign the declaration on the rights of indigenous people after all...

sigh. why am i even in class when i'm on exchange...

your night may be my day

2007-10-24T17:13:00.000-07:00

i hate my life. am studying on exchange. for one thing, i borrowed a law book from the library yesterday. and i'm writing an essay in the library now. IS WRONG. especially when i haven't borrowed a book from the law library EVER.

in other news, i need a ride down to toronto, my internet provider is an idiot, my room is a pigsty, and i took this photo last night because the moon was shining on my bed and i couldn't sleep.

after a day spent staring at the ceiling listening to stars

2007-10-20T18:28:00.000-07:00

Stars
Life 2: The Unhappy Ending

[Scene one:] Late at night interior, we find ourselves inside the car
Our hero has just gone too far, his lover bleeding in the back
He removes the Lucky from the pack, he knows now that he can't turn back

[Cut to:] The cherry lights in the rearview
He realizes that he's through
Whispers, "Darling let's have fun"
Hits the exit doing 91, drives until he's in the woods
If he loses them he's gone for good

[Her:] Here is the part where you save me, here is the scene where you save the day
Why can't the ending be happy?
Why must it always resolve this way?

[Fade in:] A cabin in the woods somewhere
Our hero strokes his lover's hair
Says "Don't worry love we're almost done"
Says "I could have really been someone"
Outside, they surround the house with pistols drawn
It's a waiting game until dawn
Sergeant says "He can't go on, we know now that he can't go on..."

Life was supposed to be a film, was supposed to be a thriller, was supposed to end in tears
But life, could be nothing but a joke, could be nothing but a con
Where's my unhappy ending gone?
Life was supposed to be a film, was supposed to be a thriller, was supposed to end in blood
But life could be nothing but a joke, a sentimental con
Where's my unhappy ending gone? Where's my unhappy ending gone?

Life was supposed to be a film, was supposed to be a thriller
Was supposed to end in fire
But life turns out it's nothing but a dream
And that I'll miss it when it's gone
I want the story to go on and on and on and on...
but it can't go on...

i love songs with stories in them.
stars in 2 weeks!
with many more essays to go. sighs.

just a quick post

2007-10-20T03:41:00.000-07:00

i think sometimes, we spend so much time trying to record down what happens, photos, words, stories, that we end up forgetting to life live half the time.

anyway, had a friend's 26th today, and it was interesting. tried proper mexican tequila, and learnt that some girls surprisingly can make do without a purse (amazing where they keep their handphone and wallet, really it is). plus a lot of american drinking games, and that i don't really like beer.

back to essay. for the travel. will find time to capture images of autumn. and enjoy life.

straight from the hanting's mouth.

2007-10-19T14:39:00.000-07:00

hanting
2:37
hahaha
no no i believe u when u say ur work heavier
but i stupider
so it evens out

wenjie. plagiarism is dead. like bohemia.
2:37
i lazier
u wins

hanting
2:37
i uglier
u wins

wenjie. plagiarism is dead. like bohemia.
2:37
true

hanting
2:37
wait a min.

amazing what joy and amusement can be found in the span of a minute sometimes.

it disturbs me to no end

2007-10-17T02:47:00.000-07:00

that i am putting a hell lot more effort into studying here in canada than back in singapore. for one thing, i'm actually reading my notes and writing essay outlines. and doing my homework wayyy ahead of time. and i'm awake at 3am doing essays.

but then again, i'm travelling hell of a lot more than i did in singapore.

i had 1kg of salmon

2007-10-15T11:03:00.000-07:00

so here are some random photos

uh. pasta with prawn and mushrooms.
the salmon was for fun, with pepper and salt only.

salmon, mushrooms, potatoes, lettuce
(used white wine here for seasoning)

salmon, potatoes, portobello mushroom, spinach and mushrooms
(used white wine and balsamic vinegar here)

because it made me burst out laughing in the middle of lecture

2007-10-10T11:45:00.000-07:00

joel: still believing
i dreamt that
the 2 of us
flew back to sg for the weekend
to join brenda and this girl who's supposed to be ur cousin
and we played mahjong
using tiles made of tofu

wenjie. a shoebox of photographs with sepiatone loving
hahahaha
wtf

joel: still believing
then wei flew back to play too. but then
already had 4 players
so she cannot play
and she went back to pack to go back to sweden
-_-

wenjie. a shoebox of photographs with sepiatone loving
u miss mj too much ah

joel: still believing
haha
no leh
i play it quite often
haha

wenjie. a shoebox of photographs with sepiatone loving
miss me righttt

joel: still believing
haha no
the most retarded thing was
the mahjong game right
when u 'chi'
you really eat the tofu
haha
sometimes can change into dumplings
then when u chi then can eat dumplings instead
haha

wenjie. a shoebox of photographs with sepiatone loving
....
then pong what happens

joel: still believing
dunno
never reach there
hah

wenjie. a shoebox of photographs with sepiatone loving
can i post ur dream on my blog

joel: still believing
haha can

wenjie. a shoebox of photographs with sepiatone loving
it needs spicing up

joel: still believing
i think mine is damn cool
esp the wei part
flew back
no space
then damn sad
had to go back without playing
haha
the best part was
she came to pick me up from the airport
then when we reached ur place
you said your cousin wants to play
so cannot

apparently, joel misses his mj and tofu, and jacking wei from vancouver. funny thing is, brenda doesn't even play mj. (edit: when i told joel that, he said, but brenda eats)

oops i did it again

2007-10-04T11:43:00.000-07:00

my meals for the last few days, apparently, i still have yet to get the hang of this 'cooking for one' business. (p.s. they may look bad, but they taste nubbad. or maybe i'm just biased)

pasta again, this time tossed with white wine

dinner and supper last night, fried rice!
(happily made use of my chili padi and many garlic)

today's lunch, creamy pasta again!
(i tossed the pasta in wine again for fun)
sorry not very imaginative. plus i had to clear ingredients.

please note that these photos, are like single portions. for the most part, i had another half plate or so hidden downstairs cos it couldn't fit on the plate. and tell me i won't get fat here in canada.

on a separate note, while walking home yesterday (the very short 5 minute walk home), the sun was setting and the lighting was brilliant.

on the way home

view from my room

and i noticed that while i was busy with travelling and hiding in my room, autumn had snuck up on me unawares... autumn in new york this weekend?

because my sp complains that my blog is dull and boring...

2007-10-02T10:07:00.000-07:00

and i hardly ever post anything worthwhile here. so to change that, here's a brief summary of my weekend. majority of the photos are on facebook though.

went to toronto on thursday, plan was to go niagara on friday, buffalo on saturday and toronto island on sunday. a busy weekend planned ahead. but we all know, the best laid plans of mice and men...

so friday i ended up wandering around toronto, looking for car rentals, eating pancakes and nice breakfasts, and i cut my hair at this random place where i argued with the hairstylist (i should say haircutter person) before realising that it's quite rather scary to have someone gesticulating wildly at you with a razor in hand screaming "i am hairstylist, i know how to cut, you no tell me, just tell me how long!" twas muchly stressful, but i escaped largely unscathed, and made it to the Fifth for some cheap CAD$3 drinks (yes that's considered cheap all you europe exchangers). and i won't even begin to talk about the dress code and black shoes and how coming from kingston obviously i wouldn't have had any and thus i was declined entry into the club on the basis of the non-formality and conformality of my shoes, and oh wait i just did.

saturday was spent at niagara, though not in the way i'd planned, we went to the factory outlets there. not many photos to show for it, but hey, who lugs a camera around shopping? that said, i still wonder whether it was worth the shopping to be stuck for 2 hrs in a traffic jam crossing the border, and to have to calculatedly decide how much shopping to declare in order to pay the tax (speaking of which, i understand the concept of protection of trade, but some things just get mildly ridiculous sometimes..) shopping was good though, but i shudder to think of what will happen in dec with woodbury and boxing day sales...

happy campers on the way to niagara

clouds, both above and below...oh wait that's smog

shoppinggg

we were stuck for hours crossing this bridge. such that i could take a photo of this
the line between the two

so i was late for nuit blanche, but it all turned out well, still managed to wander the streets of toronto for about 4 hours before it ended. (for the uninformed, nuit blanche is something of a huge-ass art exhibition that takes place once a year from 7pm to 7am, all around the city, in musuems, in galleries, along the streets, in churches even)

this happened in a musuem.

and i'm still baffled as to whether this was an art exhibit

i love this one though. seemed like a frozen tableau on the tv screen, then the guy blinked and the girl shifted. damn shags la. plus having to stay still and keep their expressions neutral in that position.. reminded me of all those paintings in haunted houses. hurhur.

another exhibit, you sms ways to make the world a better place and they post it up right away. so there were a lot of random stuff, which i found terribly amusing but can't remember right now...

me with my new jacket

exhibition (i think fashion) in a church.

stratford was on sunday, ye olde shakespearean town in the heart of canada, so early sunday morning, we fought the maddening crowds running for breast cancer to go pick up the girls and head for the town. got stuck in traffic for an hour or so, but we eventually made it in time (barely!) to stratford-upon-ontario for the 2pm play. merchant of venice. which was terribly coincidental since i'd just written a random legal article from the 'quality of mercy' speech excerpt that very week. twas a good play and amusing at parts, and still remains one of my favourite ones so far. wandered around town after that and had dinner before heading back to toronto (missed my ride back but it was well worth it). not many photos of the town (because it reminded me of kingston) nor of dinner (cos it wasn't all that pretty/great)

ye olde shakespearean inne.

stratford theatre

rachel and ducks

mig and oakleys

andrea and dog

the torontians

i am still alive.

dawg who is a photowhore

ye olde courte housee

and now i leave you to go back to my highly engaging discussion on eating potato chips (i see no link to legal perspectives), and to defending singapore's constitution on freedom of charter and rights and explaining the humane-ness of the death penalty. all the while ignoring the fact that i fail public law.

because linshoomin is fat and ugly.

2007-10-02T09:19:00.001-07:00

this was lunch today. random leftover meat and veg and ham from last week. hur.

i spent a day by the lake...

2007-09-26T21:53:00.000-07:00

It's been a month since i arrived in Kingston, a month in Canada. Looking back, I seem to have done more in this past month than I usually do in a year back home. For instance, I've eaten more Subway than I can remember (the first 2 weeks when I was too lazy and still settling in), and it scares me that I can actually remember what the sub-of-the-day is everyday. Or how I've been to Montreal twice already, and will be leaving for my second Toronto trip tomorrow. And how I lost my wallet with all my cards and identification barely a week into arriving in Canada. But life goes on.

Started cooking properly in my house since last week, before that I was borrowing a friend's place because it made more sense to share on groceries (but then I got tired of going over every night, plus also abit paiseh). You've seen the pasta lineup, here's what I've whipped up so far this week.

pan-fried chicken, lettuce with mushrooms

minced beef, chicken & cabbage soup

spag with chicken, beef, bacon, sausage (yes i was bored and lazy)

asparagus and chicken

Also, my room's getting more settled in, although I'm still searching for a cupboard to put my stuff and as such I'm kinda still living out of my suitcase (more like using it as a huge drawer). I'd love to add in stuff like cushions and lamps and a small table, and I keep reminding myself I'm on a budget, but at least I'm feeling more comfortable in it (sometimes I feel like I'm slowly preparing it so I can hibernate properly come winter)

Weekdays are spent wandering the streets of Kingston, frequenting the cafes and bookstores (although there are a couple of eating places I have my eye on, just waiting for people to visit so I have an excuse to splurge), or of late, spent hiding under a rock in my room. Which I find myself starting to miss nowadays when I'm travelling, especially on the last day of my travels on my way home. When I start looking forward to a bath and lounging on my carpet and bed, that's where I think I've found a home away from home. That said, I still kinda miss my wallet. And the fact that strange people come up to talk to me when I walk around at night (which is why I stopped).

Still waiting to go sailing on the lake, picnicking by the lakeside (if I find friends) and visit the rest of Canada (when I manage to work out my budget and find travelling companions). For now, Kingston's a nice place to chill out and await the coming of winter.

so i've been cooking...

2007-09-24T08:45:00.000-07:00

and this is what i've come up with so far...

salmon and egg with pasta (plus i threw in bacon for more taste)

creamy mushroom pasta

uh. this was like sausage and bacon and mushroom and egg, i kinda had to use up the ingredients...

mee goreng. hurhur

i tried to make aglio olio. can never get the pasta the right al dente texture. and don't even get me started on the lack of chili... (the egg was cos i was hungry)

so i'm a boring lazy cook. but i'm improving.

for trip photos, toronto is here.
Toronto Day 1 & 2
CN Tower
Toronto Day 3 & 4

because i'm lazy...

2007-09-13T13:11:00.000-07:00

and it's easier to upload photos on facebook than on blogger. so i did, and here're the links. thus far.

Kingston 1
Kingston 2
Kingston 3
1000 islands cruise
Montreal 1
Montreal 2
Montreal 3
Tamtams Festival
Osheaga Music Festival

alright...in the middle of intl human rights now...it's interesting and all, i'm totally lost, and the thought of the 25 page essay assignment and the 1 hr presentation is pretty daunting. headed to toronto this evening, photos when i return!

p.s. do inform if the links don't work, cos i know not everyone has facebook, and i'm just too lazy to upload one photo at a time when i have like 4 gb worth...

random musings

2007-09-11T01:01:00.000-07:00

blogger needs to devise a more efficient way to upload photos. like facebook with its iphoto exporter. or i need to take less photos. in any case, temporary hiatus on photos here until i've sorted through my montreal pics.

in other news, just back from montreal, and the osheaga festival. stars was awesome, feist was amazing, and don't even get me started on damien rice. found a few new bands too, like the veils and the editors were not bad (considering i was just listening to them to while away time before stars played). would wax lyrical about how wonderful the experience was, standing on the dusty ground listening to the bands play so close to you and feeling the vibe of the crowd, but words fail me. (that and the fact that some of you might murder me) but suffice to say, just listening to those three play consecutively was enough to complete my day and make my money's worth, so much so that i skipped the smashing pumpkins, who were the highlight of the night, in favour of sitting down and dinner. hurhur.

montreal is wonderful. not just for the music fest, but also the city as well, both old montreal (vieux-montreal, see, i know my french, sorta..) and the nightlife districts (st-laurent, st-catherine, and rue sherbrooke, if i recall) i love the place. and as a canadian friend of mine said, all i had to do was to attend the tamtams festival at parc du mont-royal on sunday (it's a festival at the bottom of the hill from which montreal got its name, and every sunday in summer they just gather and play drums and dance...okay i really suck at describing it) to grasp the essence of montreal. well...i went for it, it was really cool and hippie-ish, and i love how they can just laze back in the sun and on the grass and just appreciate life and take it all in.

sigh. must. go. back. soon.

photos up soon. promise. one day.

dawg.

2007-09-06T13:27:00.000-07:00

because it annoys linshoomin.

lazy to upload more. the next boring class, i will upload photos from my pre-canada week

and omigosh. international human rights requires me to write a 25 page essay with a 1 hr presentation. why la why. the things i do to slack and holiday.

osheaga!

2007-09-04T11:54:00.000-07:00

tickets have been booked, hostels have been reserved, and i'm currently looking for a car to rent this weekend:

stars, feist, damien rice, love.

P.S. sp see i do update my blog, so there. *grin*

it's funny,

2007-09-03T09:39:00.000-07:00

how i can be calmly sitting at a cafe blogging and sipping at tea when my wallet was stolen last night and i'm technically penniless and i need to cancel all my cards asap.

plus how i've just realised i'm sitting under a picasso picture of don quixote. hurhur. i love the way life works sometimes.

still alive

2007-09-02T12:15:00.000-07:00

sorry for the lack of updates, been kinda busy this week!

so in a pinch, friday i went to lemoine point, which is a nature reserve far far away from downtown, and saw chipmunks and birds and had a picnic! then night time was a nice dinner party with pasta and wine (sorry was enjoying myself too much to take pics)

yesterday was spent wandering in walmart and the town centre (farfar away as well), realised the prices over here are the same as back in singapore (i so need to get over to NY), and we (the singaporean bunch) tried to cook dinner.

pictures as below:

my room

my room, with some improvements

kitchen!

i love how people can just laze about in the sunshine

off to lemoine point

shot of the day

louna (finland), reina (germany), and melina (california)

justin, the nice friendly guy helping out the exchange students

bert taking photos, the bus stop to farfar away

cheryl from SMU

down at the town centre

i cooked dinner!

the kitchen at the SMU students' place
(their place is very nice btw, photos to follow)

bak kut teh!

i do realise my photos are largely of scenery and not of people and places, but hey, i prefer taking animals and plants, so yeah... anyways, right now it's sunday afternoon, and i'm having tea and muffins at a nice cafe near my apartment which has free wireless. hence, i'm slacking my sunday away, as always. refuse to shop for furniture and other randoms. grins.

corn maze

2007-08-31T11:42:00.000-07:00

so yesterday, i went on one of those orientationish field trips, took a ferry with 100 other international students to wolfe island (which is this large island on lake ontario, largely farmland and countryside, and apparently there's a boat on the other end of the island that goes to the US). went there, took a haywagon ride to a farm, where there was steak burger (i.e. hamburger) and we proceeded to frolic in the cornfields thereafter (okay, more like it was a maze, we went in and got pleasantly lost for hours, and then the sun set and things got more interesting) reminded me awfully of signs, and cornfields at night are rather freaky. then i realised that the nights in canada get rather cold, because i left my jacket at home and the ride back was wayyyy windy. (everyone was bundled up in jackets and scarves and shivering, and the brave idiot singaporean was trying to hide from the wind and hide his teeth chattering)

so, without further ado, random loads of photos of the whole trip yesterday.

en route to the ferry

joachim & cheryl

woodenheads is supposedly a nice place

...

love of my life

playing with aperture settings

first view of wolfe island

bird

i love this shot

haywagon ride and horses!

my 2 fav photos

reina and louna

okay enough photos for today, i'm off to lemoine point for hiking and more photography soon!

day 1 in kingston...

2007-08-29T08:19:00.000-07:00

was spent wandering the streets in search of a room, and while the wandering was fun, i could have done without the stress of knowing that i will be homeless in a day, and running from one house to another to view is most definitely not my idea of joy.

on a side note, managed to take a few shots of kingston amidst my house-hunting.

my hall room

outside my hall room

no sea, but the lake will do

en route to said lake

lake ontario shots

shots on campus

and the first day ends...

it's a quiet town, and right now i kinda like it, and how everyone seems to know everyone else, and how laid back everything is. although i suspect the tranquility will drive me nuts in a few weeks. once i'm settled in. IF i find a room. but i do love how wireless is so prevalent all around the place.

more updates ONCE i find a place. lugging a camera while racing around town is tiring.

quick update

2007-08-28T03:20:00.000-07:00

am still alive. in kingston. travelled 30plus hrs. damn far. and damn cold. plus i haven't slept in 52 hours.

so in a pinch, the last 30 hrs have been a mix of queues, sitting and stoning, and mad photoshooting on the plane in moments of extreme boredom. for a full update on how bad the trip up was, drop me a message. photo examples as per below:

aiyah. that's all for now. mac cannot rotate photos properly so i think i'll upload on facebook. or wait till one day i get bored enough to put everything on iphoto then can rotate.
will upload the photos of suppering soon, along with pics of kingston. now abits dark, cannot really take anything.

oh yeah. thanks to everyone who woke early to send me off or give a call! much appreciated

this week..

2007-08-25T02:14:00.000-07:00

i'm getting fat. especially ever since i decided that this being my last week in singapore before i leave, i had to eat my fill of singaporean food before my year in canada. so just for fun, here's the list:

monday
curry rice @ havelock
curry fish head/pork knuckles

tuesday
most of the stalls at nus arts canteen (yong tau foo, ba chor mee, carrot cake, fruit juice, lemon tea...you get the idea...)
chompchomp food (hokkien mee, satay, stingray, motherhuge sugarcane juice, bbq chicken wings)

wednesday
chicken rice @ alexandra + the lousy avocado juice + so-so char kuay teow
bak kut teh @ balestier
hokkien mee @ simon lane, random snacks and dessert at the hk cafe at thomson

thursday
depot rd claypot laksa @ alexandra + the nice avocado juice
mutton soup @ adam rd
katong laksa @ katong
cheesecake @ siglap
nasi lemak @ changi village
ba chor mee @ bedok

friday
duck & roast meat with rice
essentially repeated thursday

saturday
coffee, kaya toast & eggs
ghim moh market! (mango milk, char kuay teow, duck rice, claypot chicken, carrot cake, chwee kuay, tau suan, ah balling)
waffle & ice cream @ daily scoop
crab bee hoon @ amk
crystal jade @ holland v

yeah. i am fat. photos of random dslr play soon to follow.

because...

2007-08-22T02:30:00.000-07:00

my blog is still alive. (just in case you were wondering)

so here're some photos taken with my powershot (which i still love using), before i leave for canada, and embark on the dslr route (those photos aren't up yet because i'm still trying to learn how to use it properly, and all the photos taken so far suck)

sunset at the botanics

the sky was very blue...

lakeside view

tried to squeeze everything in

and i was bored.

been busy packing and getting ready for exchange, and also being distracted by the dslr and many late night suppers. for those interested, i'll be gone come monday morning, and off to snowy canada!

all my bags aren't packed
but i'm ready to go...

c'est la vie

2007-07-22T22:33:00.000-07:00

people sometimes ask me, why do i dive so much?

because i love the sea, and chasing fish underwater.

days of sunshine and sea breeze, peace and tranquility, sand and laughter.

nights spent lazing by the beach, quiet strains of music in the air, silvery streaks of shooting stars flickering across the sky.

descending to the depths, the brilliant corals and colourful marine life waiting to welcome you to their world

coming up from a dive to a night sky full of stars, the chill kiss of the evening breeze in the air

the sunrises and sunsets that make each day memorable

the sea, with her changeable moods and temperamental currents, affected by the phases of the moon

good company, nights spent snacking, suppering, or just watching the world go past, talking about life or nothing at all.

this is why we dive.

back in the water

2007-07-10T01:00:00.000-07:00

so i went diving again, after way too long. and i'm still alive. yayness.

in a pinch, spent the trip just chilling in the sun and enjoying life and the water, learning to take photos all over again, and practicing skills i forgot half a lifetime ago. along with the usual temptations of DSLRs, strobes, macro lenses and magnifiers (i blame chao for this), but my photos turned out relatively fine (at least i think they did) although i still need a lot of work...

photos on facebook cos they're easier to upload, lazy to upload at the moment. off to tioman next for dive camp 07!

let me be troubled

2007-07-02T20:33:00.000-07:00

what is the use of words
if they don't make her seen or heard
she watches dust to dust unstirred
though left behind she is too weak to grieve
or blame us we who leave

there is no hour of bliss
when ignorance can lead to this
don't let the hand of time be kind
and smooth her gently from my mind

these are the words of a fool
and heads not hearts must rule
i hear you say but minds can be so slow
to see what hearts just know

nice song. by silje nergaard (two sleepy people?)

p.s. i wanted to put up another post, but i was lazy to upload photos from my thailand trip. so yeah. when i get less lazy. or never at all. in other news, busy with canada prep, will update properly soon

while you were sleeping

2007-06-26T00:50:00.000-07:00

i went for the much hyped half moon party on ko phangan. how was it?

well, i really liked the concept of it and how it first originated, because the night sky over there really is beautiful, as was the half moon (i wonder how the full moon would be) and considering that the location was deep in the midst of some forested road, like a secret clandestine party, i was glad we drove that night.

as to how the party went, i guess my friend put it well enough. get the hottest and wildest from zouk, and throw them all together, multiply by 10, and you have the ingredients for a half moon party. think zoukout, but with more sex, drugs and alcohol. (although i highly disapproved of the music, which was trance, and the fact that alcohol prices were doubled that night)

and there a random thought came to me, watching the dance floor that night.

so you have all these random couples, meeting at clubs and making out with wild abandon like there was no tomorrow (yes it happened. a lot). and it's very much like life, how guys get bored or lonely, and end up chatting or picking up some random girl along the street or in a bar (or vice versa) and as the conversation picks up and becomes interesting, one or the other gets interested, and believes that this could be love, and your typical love story begins. which makes me wonder, is love reduced to two lonely hearts and a chance meeting in today's cold world, two lonely people drawn together for fear of spending their lives alone (an apt analogy fails me here), or does romantic love still exist? long walks on the beach, quiet candlelit dinners, the whole cliched lot.

call me a cynic, but i think the former's closer to the truth these days.

on drinking

2007-06-24T23:48:00.000-07:00

it's sad sometimes, that the more you drink, the more sober you end up.

awful waste of time, money and alcohol, if you ask me.

on driving

2007-06-21T21:50:00.000-07:00

i have newfound respect for initial d. today i learnt that driving up and down mountain roads with many sharp turns at night is an adrenaline rush. and very scary.

i love thailand

2007-06-20T08:46:00.000-07:00

so here i am in the middle of my trip to thailand, in a internet cafe at night and blogging. not that i'm bored, but more like i just wanted to update everything before i forget it from too much alcohol.

so for starters, i've spent every single night not sober, i've decided that i love heineken, erdinger and beer chang (although heineken and erdinger are a close fight), and i like driving around islands in jeeps, especially when the road is a mere dirt trail and we end up stuck in the middle of nowhere.

anyway, bangkok was lovely, we rushed through 2 days and packed everything in, but now i'm in ko phangan (where the night life is AWESOME) and the half moon party's on friday. plus the beach is filled with caucasians galore and i feel awfully out of place. but the alcohol helps. along with the excellent food, sun, sand and sea. plus jumping off boulders into the sea helps a lot. among other things.

will update further when i get back. especially about the half moon. but honestly, in future i think i'll fly here. the 12 hr train ride and 4 hr ferry ride to this wonderful island, killed me.

oh, and it's really funny, how i'm in a foreign land and don't speak the language, and yet i still manage to make my feelings known to the locals and converse with them. maybe more so than when we actually speak a common language. just some food for thought.

now i'm off for more alcohol! see you when i get back!

random song lyrics

2007-06-11T04:04:00.000-07:00

lately, i seem to be listening to nat king cole a tad bit too much for my liking. but he has nice songs. like this one.

A cigarette that bears a lipstick's traces,
An airline ticket to romantic places,
And still my heart has wings...
These foolish things remind me of you.

A tinkling piano in the next apartment,
Those stumbling words that told you what my heart meant,
A fairground's painted swings...
These foolish things remind me of you.

The winds of march that made my heart a dancer,
A telephone that rings and who's to answer,
Oh, how the ghost of you clings...
These foolish things remind me of you.

The first daffodil and long excited cables,
And candle lights on little corner tables,
And still my heart has wings...
These foolish things remind me of you.

The park at evening when the bell has sounded,
The 'ile-de-france' with all the gulls around it,
The beauty that is spring's...
These foolish things remind me of you.

How strange, how sweet
To find you still,
These things are dear to me,
They seem to bring you near to me.

The sigh of midnight trains in empty stations,
Silk stockings tossed aside, dance invitations.
Oh, how the ghost of you clings...
These foolish things remind me of you...

-these foolish things

hello there

2007-06-06T03:09:00.000-07:00

just a quick note that i'm still alive. sorta. vaguely. and terribly busy with nothing at all recently, which explains the absolute lack of updates. internship has screwed up my sleeping cycle, now 4 hrs of sleep is sufficient for my clueless body, apparently. how i spend my waking hours, i've yet to figure out.

oh, and if you have the time, do catch infamous in cinemas cos it's rather nice, you learn how a little bit of yourself dies each time you write a bestseller or put too much effort and heart into doing something, and how you can't help your heart sometimes. and sandra bullock's great as harper lee.

in other news. thumb. developing. calluses. from. too. much. mahjong.

p.s. give me a few more weeks to actually do something halfway interesting before i update properly. like jump off a cliff.

just pretend

2007-05-14T03:18:00.000-07:00

so i was reading one of murakami's books again today, being utterly bored and all, and just like norwegian wood, another song in this book struck a chord with me,

"pretend you're happy when you're blue
it isn't very hard to do..."

and it's a really nice song btw, but i kinda like the lyrics, which are somewhat true. how people sometimes hide what they feel and get hurt so that others don't, or put on a smile so their friends won't have to worry about them. pretending is what we do best, little white lies and happy smiles plastered over bleeding hearts so that nobody knows what we really feel inside, our emotional armour against the world. and when an inadvertent few eventually get behind the bastion of these shells of ours, seeing behind the masks we hold up to the world, it's often the case that in providing an opening, you leave yourself open to hurt, and it's a vicious cycle, that so often, you end up pretending and lying to those you care for the most, and it becomes easier and easier, such that you eventually hide your true self from them again

okay forgive the ranting, it's late and i'm bored. but the song is really rather nice.

starry starry night

2007-05-11T01:22:00.000-07:00

"star light, star bright
first star i see tonight
i wish i may, i wish i might,
have the wish i wish tonight"

i wonder if wishing on the first night star actually works.
as does wishing on shooting stars.
i guess we'll never really know.

When the stars are perfectly aligned...

2007-05-09T22:20:00.000-07:00

so let me ask you, what's the chance of seeing a shooting star, a comet and a lunar eclipse, all at the same time? or for that matter, just two shooting stars, crossing paths. that'd be good enough for me.

Hope springs eternal

2007-05-09T03:48:00.000-07:00

Hope is the province of fools and dreamers, romantics and idealists.

The practical modern man spurns it and prefers to believe in his own skills and abilities to see him through life.

But why, oh why, did Pandora ever have to open that box?

mika - any other world

2007-05-07T19:01:00.000-07:00

In any other world
You could tell the difference
And let it all unfurl
Into broken ruminants

Smile like you mean it
And let yourself let go

I tried to live alone
But lonely is lonely, alone
So human as I am
I had to give up my defences

So I smiled and tried to mean it
To let myself let go

Cos it's all in the hands of a bitter, bitter man
Say goodbye to the world you thought you lived in
Take a bow, play the part of a lonely lonely heart
Say goodbye to the world you thought you lived in
To the world you thought you lived in

In any other world
You could tell the difference

[Spoken]
"I never ever, I forget my story.
My face is not sad, but sometimes, I am sad."

the simple things in life...

2007-05-05T22:02:00.000-07:00

perhaps the holidays are getting too boring or depressing for me, but just in case you don't want anything too gloomy to spoil your own holidays, read no further.

now that the disclaimer's done, we'll start.

today as i was having dinner with my family (the extended one), i was just watching my cousins (the really young ones) at play, and it just struck me that it's been such a long time since i've been so young, carefree and innocent, with nary a care in the world. not caring about anything, living for the moment, with no worries in life, their sole heartbreak being denied playtime and having an early bedtime. and it was saddening, because most of that dinner was spent lamenting to my cousin, who was the same age as me, about how boring life's become and how i'm bored half the time these days. (although, i do agree that boredom is largely a figment of one's own mindset, and life's only as boring as you want it to be..) but sometimes, i just wish that life really were that simple, where relations with friends weren't so complicated and based on mutual likes and dislikes, where we could do things because we wanted to, and not having to worry about what others would care, think or feel, where we could just live for the moment and not worry about the future. but, being adults (or so we sometimes wish), that's impossible. so we stumble, we trip and fall, we get hurt, and we learn along the way. and we get bored.

another thing that struck me (yeah a lot of things hit me when i'm bored), when i was musing through neil gaiman's latest book 'fragile things', was something he mentioned. that it's peculiar how the things we regard as most fragile, are usually the strongest and toughest, surprisingly. like how the fragility of an eggshell, if used correctly, can support great loads. or how a butterfly's delicate wings flapping in the right place at the right time can supposedly cause a hurricane on the other side of the world. or how the elegant strands of a spiderweb are amazingly resilient (watched spiderman recently?). and how hearts are so easily broken, but they're the toughest muscle in the body, able to sustain you for a lifetime. and perhaps, how the whimsical musings of a fool could have the strongest impact on your life.

time warp

2007-04-18T05:11:00.000-07:00

you know that you've been studying too hard when real life seems too surreal and the only reality is centered around your notes, public law, and equity.

for instance, i seem to have entered a really strange time warp, such that i will sms people at midnight, only to have them receive the message 5 hours later, and reply to it 2 hours before (go figure). and then wonder if i dreamt the whole thing up.

and a friend of mine (let's not mention names) who i see online at 5am (i'm not studying so late btw, i'm playing games, just to make things clear) tells me it's not so late because it's only 2am, which of course makes me check all the clocks in my house to make sure i'm not hallucinating or entered some really weird time zone. just to make things clear, her clock died, and she was having too much fun mugging to pay attention to the sky getting brighter. you know how time flies when you're having fun...

a month away from diving, and revisiting old loves. the sea beckons.

nice quotes

2007-04-12T04:52:00.000-07:00

for my 100th post, i decided to put up a nice quote that i saw when browsing in borders today...
amidst the random greeting cards with strange quotes and comments, such as beer being the greatest invention in the world next to the wheel, or we should be happy since our home is much better than a snail's shell...but i digress.

"when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible"

curious about the origins of the quote, i went to check it out, and apparently, it's a line from when harry met sally. but it's a lovely quote. makes one want to check out the movie, which i'm not sure if i've watched before...

alright, back to the mugging!

the sound of music

2007-04-10T23:01:00.000-07:00

because i'm horribly bored of studying (not that i've gotten much of it done today), and anything beats staring at my notes and readings and endless cases, i decided to explore my studying playlist today... and realised that my study music is rather eclectic, ranging from john mayer's dreaming with a broken heart to iron and wine's sunset soon forgotten to fountains of wayne's hung up on you thence to aerosmith's cryin' and dream on. absolutely random, and totally pointless.

but hey, it works. (i hope)

tis the season to be...i dunno

2007-04-10T01:08:00.000-07:00

so it's the midst of study period, 2 weeks from the first paper, 3 weeks to freedom, and a 15 month holiday, the longest before i fall back into reality... and my mind's a complete blank. not with regards to work, because my mind is already useless concerning work, but somehow staring at equity and public law seems to empty my head and the brain just shuts down. which explains the complete and absolute lack of posts. no, it's got nothing to do with my extreme laziness.

something i read on a friend's blog struck a chord with me, about living for today vs planning for the future, and it got me thinking, about how often we claim to be spontaneous and random, but always keep some part of ourselves in reserve, just in case; or how we hoard everything for a rainy day, and often think back on what ifs, and look back and wonder... i guess in the end, like life, one must strike a balance between the two, and find where you're most comfortable.

OAN, i seriously need to dive soon. nitrogen withdrawal symptoms kicking in. need. sun. and. sea.

it's a lot like a chemistry experiment:
boonkiat + seawater + sunlight => happy

a photo of a dream. and happier times.

what comes next?

2007-04-05T00:29:00.000-07:00

In year 1 sem 1, it was many late night suppers (i stayed in hall)

In year 1 sem 2, it was late night suppers plus anime on youtube (remember naruto and other random anime?)

In year 2 sem 1, it was supper, anime, and dungeons and dragons (jared was a bad influence)

This sem, it appears to be this for now.

LeongHonteng I hate you.

and you wonder what i've been up to...

2007-03-29T03:27:00.000-07:00

and so it comes full circle, a second year nearly past, the third ever inching closer, and us one step closer to working life. the reality slowly sinks in, when you look at ex-classmates who're mere months away from working, and already planning their graduation trip to places strange and exotic. but on the flipside, exchange beckons, canada, icewine, roadtrips, and -30 degree winters, a 3 month interlude fast approaching, with promises of warm beaches and tans, moonlit nights with a quiet band and cocktails, good company and above all, fish and diving at long long last...

but as all good things come to those who wait, as always the exams persist, a mere pittance against the promise of sunshine and laughter, but an annoyance nonetheless, and soon i might actually have to start studying, like maybe next week...

p.s. i ran out of time, so more to follow...

my tutor he say...

2007-03-29T03:02:00.000-07:00

"sorry to disillusion you all, but being a lawyer is a lot like high class prostitution, you do whatever the client wants you to..."

because i'm bored on a lazy sunday afternoon...

2007-03-25T17:05:00.000-07:00

If I had a day that I could give you
I'd give to you a day just like today
If I had a song that I could sing for you
I'd sing a song to make you feel this way

Sunshine on my shoulders makes me happy
Sunshine in my eyes can make me cry
Sunshine on the water looks so lovely
Sunshine almost always makes me high

If I had a tale that I could tell you
I'd tell a tale sure to make you smile
If I had a wish that I could wish for you
I'd make a wish for sunshine all the while...

John Denver - Sunshine on my Shoulder

p.s. i soooo need a day at the beach.

of sunshine and laughter

2007-03-13T02:31:00.000-07:00

i dream...

of a house by the beach, a resort or a villa, even a simple hut of wood, where i can look out onto the clear blue waters of the ocean, the sunlight reflecting off the pristine white shores. where life is simple and carefree, nary a thought or responsibility in the world beyond the moment, with no work or worry looming over your head, just the sunlight basking down and the sea breeze teasing with the mildest hint of salt on your lips. where the waves wash away all your troubles and the days are spent wandering the shores picking seashells and sailing and diving, or merely idling and dozing in the shade, and the nights spent in quiet conversation, with the strains of a jazz band in the background. where each night is spent watching for shooting stars and awaiting the sunrise, and each day wanes in anticipation of the sunset, with each sunrise and sunset possessed of its own brilliant glory, distinct and apart from each other, yet somehow, all similar.

p.s. yeah. i've been too long gone from the beach and the sea. i know.

a speck of stardust...

2007-03-08T19:14:00.000-08:00

"because every lover is in his heart a madman, and in his head a minstrel"

-Neil Gaiman, Stardust

pizza for takeout

2007-03-01T20:01:00.000-08:00

we were lazy to eat out today, so we ordered pizza for dinner, since jared had to study and joel was fat and ugly. then, being the nice boys we are, we asked al who was in tutorial if she wanted any.

al. said:
pizza hut?
al. said:
or canadian?
wenjie. flip a coin for luck. said:
canadian
wenjie. flip a coin for luck. said:
but we are all arguing who to call
al. says:
sure
al. says:
i want hawaiian can?
al. says:
or the prosperity pizza
al. says:
and if possible, make it cheap too
wenjie. flip a coin for luck. says:
TOO BAD.
wenjie. flip a coin for luck. says:
I ORDERED ALREADY
wenjie. flip a coin for luck. says:
DONT WANT DONT EAT LOR
al. says:
what you order
al. says:
tell me tell me
wenjie. flip a coin for luck. says:
MEAT
wenjie. flip a coin for luck. says:
AND SEAFOOD
al. says:
what what what what you order
wenjie. flip a coin for luck. says:
PICK ONE.
al. says:
meat!
al. says:
what meat?
wenjie. flip a coin for luck. says:
MEAT LAAAA
wenjie. flip a coin for luck. says:
THE NON VEGETARIAN KIND.

sometimes, i'm amazed we're still friends.

you know...

2007-02-25T02:37:00.000-08:00

law school is getting to you when you're able to write out 3400 words in a single day, and all of it is absolute rubbish.

the first of many 21sts

2007-02-24T17:57:00.000-08:00

so yesterday was cheryl's 21st birthday, or rather, her celebration, since the actual day's some time away. and since i'm bored sick of doing public law, i decide to blog instead, and i'll just cut the words (since i've been typing wayyyy too much already on my assignment) and go to the photos. the food was good though! and yeah, in case you were wondering at the photos, it was indian-themed. kinda. for the girls, at any rate.

note: i was lazy to upload too many, so all i have are collages. if you want the actual photos, come look for me. if you can find me.

today i learnt...

2007-02-16T15:03:00.000-08:00

that it takes 25 minutes to walk from gleneagles to school.

random musings

2007-02-15T00:30:00.000-08:00

today, i learnt that a 1.5l bottle of mountain dew is a rare commodity in singapore.
hardly any petrol station or cheers or 7-11 stocks it.

oh. and happy valentine's to you all. even though it's technically over.

yet another sporadic update

2007-02-13T22:30:00.000-08:00

sorry about the lack of updates, that is, if you even bother coming to check on this blog these days....been kinda caught up with work and life. oh, and exchange as well...

in a pinch, lost at public law and equity, as evidenced today by my rank ignorance when the tutor questioned me about cases i'd never read before, and apparently, i've lost a few levels in my smoking ability, cos he most definitely wasn't impressed by my equivocating. in fact, he just kept shooting questions at me, till i gave up and just told him i was stupid. which led to a long lecture on how we should all be hardworking and do our readings. sigh. but at least i've started on my public law assignment, which will probably take up my new year and mid-sem break...(by started, i mean i've actually read the question...)

with regards to exchange, it appears i'll be soloing queens in kingston, ontario, canada, which is supposedly a nice quiet university town, full of young students and old retirees. something like that. at least there'll be nice scenery. which leads me to apologise for the absolute dearth of photos these days...i've misplaced my camera, and i keep forgetting it. but i promise to start again soon. once the mood returns. in the meantime, i'm working on a list of things i wanna do on exchange...more on that later.

and as for work. i'm getting bored of waitering. i mean, used to be i was curious about waitering. then it moved on to trying to learn the wines for recommendation. now i just lie. blatantly. oh, and i've forgotten all the cocktail mixes i've ever learnt as well. lack of practice. unless someone has a couple of mixes that they're willing to let me experiment on? been working less and less, and leaving earlier and earlier. and talking more rubbish with the customers, now that i've decided to be less efficient and do more people watching. it's amazing, the amount of people that make out at a restaurant, thinking that their brightly lit seats are totally inconspicuous and that half a glass of wine makes for a plausible excuse of an aphrodisiac. at least some customers are capable of intelligent conversation, if not outright witty remarks. but hey, there's exchange to look forward to, at any rate.

photos of halfway entertaining sights, sometime soon! apologies for the inertia and pure laziness. i blame the newly returned laptop with no photos and music. but let's not get started on that again shall we?

and life endures, somehow.

2007-01-27T02:56:00.000-08:00

sorry for the utter lack of updates this past month, but my laptop died. still is rather dead. not the best of excuses, but well. (note to the wise, always back up your important data, such as music and photos, for you never know when you might lose it.) so there goes 2 years of my life, all faded into naught, unless the person fixing my laptop happens to be a miracle worker.

but on an aside, it's amazing how i've survived the past 3 weeks of school without a laptop, no MSN in class, no muggers to speak of, no tutorials and readings done (the last was just an excuse, but a really convenient one eh?) if you think that means i've been taking notes and paying attention in class, you obviously don't know me very well.
so somehow, i've survived. amidst much angst (although this word is getting a tad overused these days...), i'm still here, bored as hell (as always).

a quick update on life...exchange results aren't out yet. the school administration is not very on the efficient side. but hey, whatever will be, will be i guess. worst case i'll just spend the money for exchange on a new laptop. or on diving. which will be soon. mahjong luck's been rather on a low, which makes me hope the new year (chinese) will change the luck. lack of a laptop means i've been listening to the same 2 emo chinese songs for the past 3 weeks, which is damn sad and i'm surprised i'm still halfway sane. or maybe not. and my photos are all gone, with my crashed hdd. the heart breaks.

and it's funny. that when you're finally ready to take that plunge, you find yourself in somewhat of a pinch and everything just falls apart. but life goes on. i angst.

okay you can ignore the last line. i'll be normal again once my laptop is. i blame the bad music and lack of msn these days.

raindrops keep falling on my head...

2006-12-19T01:05:00.000-08:00

the relentless rain is starting to make me melancholic again.

i so need sunshine and a tan.

back from bangkok

2006-12-18T00:18:00.000-08:00

lazy to post, so i'll let the photos do the talking. but 'twas much fun, especially the nights spent at different bars.

Day 1

Spent at the airport and reached BKK late thanks to AirAsia
Took a ride on the ferris wheel, had a nice dinner with decent background music

Day 2

i like the damnnice car. spent the day at chatuchak and then at siam paragon. somboondee seafood, although having a nice name, is a tad overpriced.

this deserves a collage of its own. skybar/sirocco at state tower.
the feeling of standing at the top of the stairs leading to the bar is indescribable
coupled with the fact that you're not allowed photographs at that area (so all you have are memories). and to get the best lighting, you can't use the flash on the camera, which makes for blurry photos. but all in all, i think the photos worked out well. the drinks are decently priced (about S$15 per cocktail?) and the staff are really friendly. plus it's pretty chillax...we were there on saturday night, and still found standing room (btw there're no seats, unless you're planning on dinner there, in which case, mains are about S$50+). but if you're ever in bangkok, trust me, you'll want to visit.

Day 3

day spent wandering chatuchak, night spent at bedsupperclub thanks to brad tiong's reservation. twas gaynight, but the decor was really pretty.

Day 4

browsed the streets of bangkok, i love baiyoke tower (see johnny walker?)
and the night spent at moonbar@vertigo, which is really pretty chill, if you haven't been to skybar before...twee got a cake for his birthday after that.

LOVE THIS PHOTO.

Day 5

Revisiting Sirocco and skybar. The service there is excellent, we stayed way past closing time cos we couldn't bear to leave, and the staff were really awfully nice about it. I'll miss this place.

Day 6

time to leave, but not before paying a visit to cabbages and condoms, where they give you a complimentary gift when you pay the bill. (guess what)
wistfully watching cars go by as the sun sets (let's waste time, chasing cars...)
and the spoiler that spoilt the view...

yeaps. all things said and done, i think it was a good choice to spend 6 days there. even though airasia nearly spoilt the holiday (they spoilt the start, but we managed to get over it)

p.s. thanks to the star photographers who took such lovely photos on the trip! (although i'm still slightly in shock at the fact that i have about 1000 photos to sort through...)

a quick photoupdate...

2006-11-30T21:19:00.000-08:00

post property, celebrating lavan's birthday at sushi tei...

random shots of food and can i say the cake just rocks.
newfound love. chocolate truffle cake from cedele.

the whole bunch of us (plus keithyong the very nice photographer)

and this was post clt last saturday, dinner at sun and moon...

they were nice enough to give us a private room!
cos they ran out of space. good thing too, with the noise we made...

and the food. oh the food.

avocado softshell roll, tenderloin cuts, squid fried in butter
kamameshi, the rest of the food, salmon belly grilled in salt
dobinmushi (soup in teapot), prawn & scallops, pork.

and later at cityspace...

okay. so i've been having fun when i'm supposed to be mugging hard. so sue me.

the zen of clt.

2006-11-25T14:04:00.000-08:00

clt is over. and i have learnt 5 important facts from it.

1) hedgehogs are not foxes, although they could be foxes if they wanted to

2) the-ox-that-is-not-an-ox has a really huge shadow

3) antelopes run in twos for a reason

4) apples and oranges cannot be compared, even though you have to compare them in order to know their incommensurability

and last but not least,

5) the point in time when Rembrandt got old is the same point in time a pile of sand ceased to be a pile any longer.

AMAZING STUFF, legal tradition is. to aid in the quest for more knowledge, i took a walk through the gardens yesterday to meditate.

the calm after the storm

bet you never knew there was a lake here right.

swans, they are photowhores

they swim towards photographers

and pose shamelessly

the photographer apologises for the blurry shot due to shaky hands

but this makes up for it i guess...

1 down, 2 to go.

ricciotti

2006-11-24T17:10:00.000-08:00

sister's birthday yesterday, lunched at ricciotti, which is this nice italian cafe at riverwalk. okay, so the food's not that great, but i love the desserts there!

the preview...and what caught my attention

salad with prawns and squid and lemonjuice
(cos my sister is healthy)

some kinda starters. think chicken tenders ala kfc.

this is linguine with tiger prawns.
see the tiger prawns?

the lamb shank was nice, save for the broccoli

and we moved on, to the main course...

ricciotti aka cheesecake
abit too dry for my liking, and not cheesy enough. but pretty.

cassata siciliana aka cheese and marzipan
aka something pretty tasty

cannoli which is some cream cheese and nuts wrapped in biscuit
also nubbad

all three together!

and all three gone.

and the obligatory family photo. i like the reflection though.

today, i learnt that clt can be quite fun, if you're comfortable with a C, and you really enjoy all the interesting informative quotes to be found in glenn. but more on that later...

switching feet

2006-11-23T17:49:00.000-08:00

this is your life,
and today is all you’ve got now

this is your life,
are you who you want to be

this is your life,
is it everything you dreamed that it would be
when the world was younger
and you had everything to lose...

-switchfoot

strange but true

2006-11-23T05:35:00.000-08:00

tis strange, that throughout the entirety of this sem, most blogs have remained dead and barren, devoid of words and pictures, and yet suddenly, at the time when we're supposed to be flooded with studying and overloaded with work, rushing to cram our heads full of law and traditions, we somehow find the most time to keep blogging and updating. ideas that we've always wanted to pen down come in, events happen that are just too good to leave unblogged, and everyone has good reading fodder to tide us through the dark times ahead.

a lot like how we suddenly discover a lot of interesting shows and animes on youtube and channelbreak and peekvid right before the exams huh. maybe the world just gets more exciting closer to exams. or maybe it's just me.

because anything beats studying.

2006-11-21T17:18:00.001-08:00

and so it is, that time of year, when you take the brain out of cold storage and dust off the cobwebs, and...spend your days watching anime and lameass flash movies.

random musings from clt readings. hopefully this helps in the mugging frenzy.
(warning. brain is bored. hence. very lame. and random. do not comment)

- legal traditions like the chthonic teach you how to live a life. the fray teaches you how to save one.
- karma is what we do in life, good karma gives you mahjong winnings and helps avoid speed traps, bad karma, well, you don't want to know.
- time is an envelope, not a race or a river, so why is everyone rushing to mug?
- again on time, if it's an envelope, can it be posted and giftwrapped for christmas? cos i need a bit more of it.
- i like the chthonic tradition, it interweaves law and life and tradition and society and religion and time into one big mess. no definition, it just is. very zen.
- also very confusing.
- but if we all subscribe to that school of thought, and be one with nature, the trees and the animals and the whole big envelope of time and all, then there's no need for us to take clt anymore, cos we'll all be happy and zenny. without understanding why or how. sounds abit stoned to me. but hey, if it works, why complain?

on a separate note, and because i'm lazy to repost on the same day, i learnt today that law students on a whole are addicted to caffeine. how else to explain the strange phenomenon i saw today, that mysterious trail of coffee droplets that extended a short while and inexplicably vanished? it must have been one of those zombie-like figures, short on sleep from overnight mugging, who ambled in a daze with a cup full of coffee powder to the hot water dispenser, then, as he wandered off, his hands trembling from withdrawal and spilling droplets of the precious liquid, he took a sip, instantly revived, and his hands steadied. no other reason makes sense. oh and btw. the cleaning staff are really efficient. cos the elusive trail vanished with nary a trace by the time i went to the canteen and back. or maybe, it's another mystery waiting to be solved...

p.s. ok sorry veryveryvery bored so bear with me until more photos and holidays beckon.

untitled.

2006-11-16T04:50:00.000-08:00

driving home at 4am, familiar roads shrouded with mist, the light of the streetlamps filtering through, lending it an ethereal, dreamlike quality. top it off with a sliver of crescent silver hanging in the starless night sky, and the strains of deathcab fill the car to match the mood. the road seems endless, cruising along, the world at peace.

Passenger Seat - Death Cab for Cutie

I roll the window down
And then begin to breathe in
The darkest country road
And the strong scent of evergreen
From the passenger seat as
you are driving me home.

Then looking upwards
I strain my eyes and try
To tell the difference between shooting stars and satellites
From the passenger seat as
you are driving me home.

"do they collide?"
I ask and you smile
With my feet on the dash
The world doesn't matter.

When you feel embarrassed then i'll be your pride
When you need directions then i'll be the guide
For all time
For all time.