Tuesday, October 31, 2006
I am nestled between shelf 109 and 110 in the Central Library now, feeling absolutely relieved I got through my Cities presentation, Population group essay and Biophysical report all within the last 4 hours or so.And the result is quite a worn-out me, seeking a quiet repose here where I am, feeling slightly sick (or perhaps just tired) and terribly hungry! Which reminds me that the Arts Canteen is officially 18 days to no-show. And no, I have not tried all the food available yet.This whirlwind of essays and papers and reports and presentations isn't over yet but I am just thankful I am halfway through it, like in the eye of a hurricane - peaceful for now.And it disturbs me that I am writing about the nitty gritty whinings of an undergrad.* *On to something else, I am just thankful that I am catching the SSO this Thursday evening, perfect timing (they normally play on Fridays), before I jet off on a super early morning flight on Friday out of this pressure cooker. Wheeeee.I spent the whole lecture just now missing grandma. It just caught me totally unaware and quite out of the blue but my mind was lead in that direction which got me quite down. So I decided to tell you guys (and girls), please please cherish your grandparents while they are alive. If I, who did almost everything to the best I could for grandma, could still missed her so much, what more for the average joe with more pockets for regret?Speaking of which, we opened grandma's drawer last weekend. It was such a humbling experience seeing seventy odd years of artifacts and experiences unravelling before my eyes. Grandma kept super old coins and documents of her children's school progress and even a ration card from the war.But what touched all of us was her savings. She must have kept what we gave her for decades. She did not deposit the money into a bank, but she kept them in neat clear folders, each written with the names of her children. Every cent they gave her, if not used for her daily expenses, went into their individual folders. And within each folder, the money was then split so that her grandchildren had a share too. She kept everything, only to return it back to us after she passed on. The amount, we counted, was startling.She was indeed an amazing and special lady, she loved us too much. There hasn't been a day I do not think of her. And that is why my family is so close, unified by her love, and we're all proud of that.
nimgnoy let the night fall at 1:50 PM
Thursday, October 26, 2006
just as raindrops roll down shards of glass.. nimgnoy let the night fall at 10:48 PM
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
You will probably label me as a weirdo if you read on, but I do have a point to make.See, Clementi bus interchange will relocate from the 29th, which is next Monday. And I have nothing against that. But looking around at its old fittings and cramped layout as I was there today, I can't help but feel a feeling of lost.This, I suspect, is largely because the bus queue for service number 99 is one which was once frequented by my late grandma very regularly till the day she was found with cancer.And what has that got to do with the relocation and the lost?This is exactly how architecture/modernism takes life as a tidal force, inevitably sweeping individuals forth whether we like it or not.Often, emphasis is placed upon the idea of moving on as a positive thing, but what we do not address is usually how moving on means that what we have left behind necessarily becomes obselete. When the erection of a new physical structure takes place, it irradicates the sense of place brought about by the same place before. It effectively draws a new line in time for a the cultivation of a new sense of place altogether. And like the tide, it erases the marks we used to make on the sandy beach, and now a clean slate, ready to be written on again.The greater the attachment to a place, the greater the feeling of loss. The psyche that goes behind making way for the new is deeper than what many people may think it would be, and its range of issues brought about by this depth (largely, memory and sense of place) is very tragically and very usually something we can do nothing about.Sometimes I wonder why we are made with the incapacity to resolve such notions of loss, but I have learnt to accept much of it. We are, afterall, beings made to live in tandem with time and not to dwell in one point of it.Another chapter is hence closing upon my grandma, and with time, it is going to get harder and harder to remember her. I suspect this is how memory dies. So this is how we forget. One day, she will reside no where else except in my heart. But very thankfully, that is the only place where her presence matters most to me.
nimgnoy let the night fall at 3:45 PM
Whee. I've rolled out my very first product from my publicity stint in the Funkamania committee. And I'm proud of this baby cos it was conceptualised and designed by yours truly, with creative inputs from some friends of course. This is also my virgin project using photoshop, and I know, I know I am living in primitive ages with my designs on powerpoint but hey, I've taken the step to move on!
BUT, my collages here will still be created with powerpoint cos its darn simple. Okay, here's a short trip down the creative process of Funkamania publicity Phase One.
So, the first phase of Funka advertising should be launched in a week or two after months of facing my laptop. So, do stop by and appreciate the hard work that goes into its making!Just some details, funkamania xiii would be held at the Vivocity amphitheatre, finals over the weekend of June 2nd and 3rd.
nimgnoy let the night fall at 9:29 AM
nimgnoy let the night fall at 12:31 AM
Thursday, October 19, 2006
nimgnoy let the night fall at 1:09 AM
Wednesday, October 18, 2006
omg omg omgThanks to my very efficient mamma, I'm flying to Denver with SINGAPORE AIRLINES !!!!!!!!!! Naturally, I am elated cos it has been one of my must-dos to catch a long-haul flight on SQ. Not only do they have the best entertainment selection on board long-haul flights, service ought to be impeccable as well.It's a flight via Seoul to San Francisco, then transferring to a domestic carrier bound for Denver.You really should have seen how I bounced right out of my chair when my mom passed me the flight itinerary.So yeah guys, I'm leaving on the 9:10am flight to SF on December 5th, and will return 12:10am on December 13th.My eye balls nearly popped when I saw the airfare, but at least I know that my mom loves me A LOT. hur hur.* *In other news, I am Phi Phi Island bound again. We love the place so much that Vic and I are bringing Shujun there this time. A very short weekend getaway before reading week starts and our mugging engines start cranking again.
nimgnoy let the night fall at 11:06 PM
Saturday, October 14, 2006
Summer has come and gone, and I am not going to continue with what you think the next line is gonna be. All I really mean is, fall's here - judging from what everyone in the States have been telling me. Not that it makes much of a difference in summer-all-year Singapore though, we are probably more obssessed over the PSI index more than anything else now.I have just cleared a phase what seemed to be a never-ending stream of deadlines, taking a short breather now before the group project deadlines start finding their way into my life. Sometimes I wonder if meeting up for project discussions almost everyday is going to pay off when all I get each session is my eagerness to push the main bulk of the project to the next meeting, hoping I can end early so I may scoot off to the canteen for an ice tea.The december holidays are too short, barely a month. And looking at what I have planned already, I do not think that driving lessons are going to be a reality this vacation. I am most probably flying off to Denver after my last paper to meet up with my aunt's family, though getting tickets is going to be a headache cos I need to be in Denver on 4th December, meaning I have to leave Singapore on 4th December, and my last paper ends 5pm on 4th December. I'll be joining them in Aspen, skiing.Then I'll head to Cambodia to see Angkor Wat in Siam Reap with Nev, which I am so looking forward to after missing that out with Jon in May.Home for Christmas and NYE, then semester 2 resumes. And I'll be plunged right back into where I am now again, all in the new year.
nimgnoy let the night fall at 8:56 PM
nimgnoy let the night fall at 2:05 AM
nimgnoy let the night fall at 12:43 AM
Thursday, October 12, 2006
Here's for everyone who has been curious about this new little living space I have acquired (well, almost). This used to be the dining room, and after some clever curtain partitioning, is now my room. It seems initially weird though, living within cloth, having only one of four sides of my room as a wall, the other two being curtains and the last, windows.Anyways, I've taken these photos without exactly clearing up the mess, so this is the real deal you folks. This is the mess within the settings I live in.
And that is half of my room. Its a neat corner I must say, and as long as the a/c's on, I do not mind spending most of my waking hours within my clothy enclosure.
1. The other half. The bed with a bedside table that was going cheap from Ikea. And thanks to nev for helping me set it up. 2. Bungles sitting on top of my photo box sitting on top of my DVD player.3. R-L: The jetstar menu I kindly brought home from my flight from Tasmania to Melbourne. And an "Extra Extra!" poster from Acland Street's Christmas Charity event. My sunnies. Mediacorp calender (Okaay, its free alright?).4. Some random stuff I leave on my desk. Pocky from jackie, nivea freebie stuff, readings, blah. nimgnoy let the night fall at 12:52 AM
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
It's past 1am, but it does not really feel so. Afterall, my body clock has been utterly tuned out of the norm the past week. I have had really odd days and nights, like reading readings till 2am, then waking up at 5am to complete a population analysis paper based on what I just read 3 hours before. And a marathon paper on urban geography which I did from 8 - 6, 8pm to 6am that is.The heavy work load isn't exactly to blame though, these freakish hours are very frankly brought about because I try to weave in my inexcludable social bustle into the finite hours of my day. So my 16 hour day has to be stretched to a 21 hour one to accomodate work and play.* *I've settled into my room (a new room carved out of my dining area if you hadn't known) and pretty much gotten used to it, though I wouldn't say its entirely complete. I have a few photos to frame and more tidying up to do. The wave of essays to complete simply halted any plans to tie up the loose ends in my new residence.But besides that, the room's really cool. Warm lamps, soft earthy curtains, my LCD tv (my companion for the last 2 semesters in pgp) and the comforts of my own bed - very ritzy. It like pgp at home, or home at pgp - you get the drift.* *Each day I wake up and wish the haze would just go away. It seems perpetually like the fifteenth lunar day, where everyone burns chinese paper. I probably would have forgotten how crisp fresh air smells like, unless and until I get home and turn the a/c on.* *I am blabbering. And that means I shall and must end here.Till then.
nimgnoy let the night fall at 1:47 AM
The cemetery is a very nice place.It truly is. Well, perhaps only the lawn cemetery. And for the uninitiated, a lawn cemetery is one liken to a field, with tablets placed on each plot marking a singular resting place. The other types of cemeteries in Singapore has large tombstones sticking out and packed closer than people in a peak hour MRT.The lawn cemetery is peaceful. It offers one of the best sites to view the sunset. And when the golden sun shines upon the field of lush carpet grass, the cemetery is completely shed of its cold, lonely impression one might have of it.I have spent countless sunsets there, and the serenity it offers is amazing. I have always avoided cemeteries but now I see it in a completely different light. And when I take that slow walk, viewing other tablets laid alongside, everything culminates to reflect upon the much hushed issues of life and death. And how through death, we question how we lead our lives, to whom and for what we live for.And at the crux of it all, the lawn cemetery is a very nice place simply because it is my grandma's final resting place. It is a place to go to feel close to her, a place to seek solace and a place to remember of her love. And though I know she's in a better place, the cemetery accords me with the physical comfort and intimacy I've always shared with her, even till her death.This will probably be the last entry on my grandma. I know she would not want me to harp on this issue either. "Go, go out with your friends, enjoy and do not worry about Ah Nae", were always her words before I leave her house each day.And I guess I'll do that.
nimgnoy let the night fall at 3:43 PM
