Mexico Trip #2

Am headed to Oaxaca again for the Dias de los Muertos celebration this weekend. Will be leaving on Thursday and will arrive back on Tuesday, spending both days pretty much just travelling. I'm feeling quite excited - of all festivals in the world, this is the one I have always wanted to attend the most - but also quite unsettled because this trip is smack right in the middle of my school term. Then again, it wasn't like I didn't know this when I booked the trip, though dealing with the reality is of course something altogether different.

Haven't managed to work on my thesis at all for the past three weeks because I've been reckoning with being sick and then the mid-terms. Also realised yesterday when I submitted my mid-term paper for one of my classes that it was the last class paper I would ever write for my Masters Degree, which is a pity since I know it was definitely not my best effort :/ Still, I needed to finish the paper on time, and had no idea what the teacher wanted. Fingers crossed for when he grades it over the weekend.

Recently, someone new has entered my life (as of just last week Thursday!). I'm not quite sure what to think of things. I am happy, but also very scared and tired of negative human interactions and relationships, where people say things easily but don't mean them (and so I learn to be suspicious, to take everything with massive heaping ladlefuls of salt). And then how life comes in and adds more trouble to everything, and then everything becomes terrible.

The last time I was in Oaxaca in May, I remember being very upset with the last guy I dated. Funny that his initials are BS, because looking back that's how that relationship felt. I went into the church in the zocalo in Oaxaca and sat in the pews to cry and pray, because I realised then that things were inauthentic and wished it wasn't so (though I stubbornly continued to wrestle with my intuition for the next month).

This male is different, but I am still scared. I feel like I cannot trust myself because I don't know whether it is my intuition speaking, or my hopefulness (which is a useless, useless piece of emotion, especially when it comes to relationships), whether things are actually grounded in reality or a figment of my wishes. And so I tell myself not to trust anything, to be prepared to walk away at any time, because while I know myself and how I feel, I cannot claim to know the other person and how they really feel. But still I hope, I cross my fingers, and I pray.

Strawberry and Rhubarb Jam

Many years ago when I was in Nepal I fell in love with 3 different types of food there: the tomato flavoured potato chips, the dal bhat and the mixed fruit jam. To this day because of that jam, I think of Nepali breakfasts (or at least those they serve to tourists) as being the best in the world (even though I got the worst bout of food poisoning there and have since not eaten anything remotely Nepali).

On Thursday I was wandering down Broadway, along the Thursday Farmer's Market outside the main Columbia campus, and decided to stop and sample some of the homemade jams (Beth's, I think). When I tried their Strawberry and Rhubarb jam, all the taste memories came back to me and I realised this was exactly how the mysterious Mixed Fruit jam of Nepal tasted!

So of course I bought a bottle. And had the jam with toast and butter.

Now back to my mid-term paper reviewing Cambodian textbooks.

Influenza

Thought I was down with the cold for much of this week when I suddenly started getting feverish just over 24 hours ago, ugh. Turns out it's the flu, which I now will not confuse with the cold anymore (BECAUSE IT SUCKS THAT MUCH MORE!). In the past 24 hours I have been repeatedly dizzy, felt like a radiator, felt bored, and felt like collapsing into a uncomfortable heap somewhere. No fun at all. I've had to cancel my weekend plans as a result, because I can't wander too far away from the safety of home. Damned flu.

Mathematics

Every time I need to do mathematics as an adult I find myself amazed by just how not-bad my mathematics skills are, especially since I had spent the majority of my schooling life thinking I was bad at it. Mathematics was a subject I remember struggling with almost constantly in Primary and Secondary school, but especially after sitting for the GREs, tutoring in Math and now working on calculations for my statistics class, I find myself revising my estimation of my skills - maybe I was just really careless and not actually bad at all things numerical. Either that, or I am a clear success on the Singapore education system's part - shit at Math compared to my Singaporean peers, but pretty good at Math compared to the rest of the world. Who knows.

Fingers crossed that I don't lose this upbeat feeling about Math. 

5 Years

Last night on the 1 train back home, I realised that I have had my sports shoes (Brooks!) for over 5 years, and that it was high time I changed them. I remembered the approximate date because the pair of sports shoes I had before these broke after my first year in the UK, and I remembered asking my athletic roommate from Passfield Hall, Michelle, if I should get a new pair of shoes (stupid question, but I was being cheap).

So last night I finally ordered a new pair of sports shoes off the DSW website, a pair of grey saucony shoes. Very exciting stuff.

In other news, I managed to run for 15 minutes on the treadmill yesterday without collapsing. I then had a double chocolate chip frappe from Starbucks after, and promptly consumed back 2x the amount of calories I lost from the run. Seriously.

1 Month + 1 Day

I finally ran out of the conditioner in my travel size bottle. I had judiciously filled it up to the brim right before I left Singapore, and realised as I was trying to eke out the last globs of it in the shower that it had been precisely 1 month and a day since I had left. My immediate reaction was to feel fascinated and vaguely accomplished: I now knew how much Shampoo and Conditioner my travel bottles could accommodate, and vaguely how much Shampoo and Conditioner I used in general. Now writing this down however, I feel a little bit sad, a little bit homesick. Feels like I've left home for far much more longer than just a month. But then again, I was only home for about a month and a half, which isn't much time at all, an exact 14.2% of a year. Time spent that seems scarcely enough in the larger scheme of things.

I think this is the first time I've felt homesick since being in the US this time around.

Two Critical Things I Need To Remember

...about living in this new house.

#1 It's never as cool outside as one is led to think from just pottering around inside

#2 It's never as dark outside as one is led to think from just pottering around inside

I keep forgetting these two cardinal rules about my new place (hello ground floor flat facing a retaining wall), and find myself either over or under compensating for when I dress to go out, and find myself constantly amazed that the sun is still out at 4pm (it's not even Fall yet, mind) because its disappeared from my room after 1pm (not that it enters my room until 11:30am).

And that, is my chief complaint about this new place. There is no sun at all. And my weather evaluation skills have completely gone out of the window as a result. 

Nightmares

Last night/this morning, I had two different nightmares. I haven't had a nightmare in ages, and having two of them right after one another was not a pleasant experience at all. The first one was about me alternatively trying to confront and run away from someone I had briefly dated, and the other one was about me having to drop out of TC because I was being bullied. Two very different nightmares that both took place in the present time period, and left me feeling like they were very much real while I was dreaming (then again, I'm not sure if I've ever been aware that I was dreaming while in a dream). As a result I am quite tired now. Zzz.

Room Furnishings

From some queer reason, flats in NYC are usually rented without furniture. This meant that I had to buy some for the recent move, which entailed scouring craigslist for cheap second hand furniture, figuring out how to get the furniture to my new place and poring of the price differences of items on either Walmart or Target's website. Well, I just finished moving in properly a few days ago, and have just done all the calculations, and have spent a total of $365 on all of the furniture in my room (carpet + plastic storage drawers + bed side lamp all included). If I add in the total cost to move all the stuff over, it's an additional $173 (movers + taxi trips). GOSH. my head reels from thinking how much money has been flowing out of my pocket over the last few weeks. From the broker's fee ($2,736 in total!), to setting up the internet account, to buying appliances and texts for the upcoming school year, I feel like I must have spent more money within the past few month than I've ever had in my life, the crazy month I bought a bunch of branded handbags included.

My heart aches at the thought of all the money that has been spent.

Suburban Fears

Was sitting in the back of the car today on the way to H Mart in Edison with my Aunt and Uncle when it suddenly struck me, starkly and in not-uncertain terms, that the idea of living the lifestyle that they now live in their early 50s freaked me out. The quiet upper middle class suburbia, the judging of other people who were not-like-them, the living of culturally confused lifestyles (perhaps I am a little to harsh on this point - but Korean is 100% OK while Chinese is not?), and the rejection of all other points of view.

I look at the environment they inhabit here in contrast to my (new) environment in Inwood, and this place feels utterly stifling, strangling even, in contrast. I makes me feel anxious, and panicky, that holy crap! This life of theirs cannot be any further from what I want to achieve in life. Is it comfortable? Undoubtedly so. But is it one I desire? No, no, a million times no.

I've never been fond of cities because they always contain too many damn people, but I suppose having too many damn people is also one of the greatest intrinsic values of living in a city - you interact with people from all walks of life. Here I feel like I'm not in the real world, but one where rich white people live with their first world problems and feel the ability to shit on everyone else, and the idea of living in a place like this freaks me out to no end.

Failure #3

Just heard back from the Broker, and we didn't get the flat.

Instead of studying, like I had intended to do, I ended up watching SVU instead. Felt too disappointed to concentrate on anything serious. Then I went out to buy junk food for dinner from a little fry-up place around the corner, and walked up Broadway till 153rd before turning back. Just as I almost reached back to 148th, I saw a dead and squished mouse right outside Dunkin Donuts. My insides gave a little jump when I suddenly saw the mouse just lying there on the pavement, and swerved a little to avoid stepping on it.

My insides kind of feel a little like that crushed dead mouse.

Hamilton Heights

Have spent the last few days back in NYC feeling incredibly stressed out about housing. To date Marina and I have had 2 failed applications. Now we have 1 pending in Washington Heights. Really, really hope it works out.

The second time I heard about our failed application (also for a place in Washington Heights),  I was out with Sindhu, who was visiting NYC, and I felt almost exactly like I had just been dumped. Urgh.

In the meanwhile, I have been crashing with Marina in her place in Hamilton Heights, in the living room. It was so hot when I first came, and I felt so ill, so I ended up buying an AC, which helped infinitely.

Today we did laundry together at the laundromat. Then we walked around the neighbourhood, up to 155th and St. Nicholas Place, and saw a lot of nice old houses around Sugar Hill. Above is the James Bailey House, which we saw on our walk. Marina and I even chatted to the guy who lives there.

Fingers crossed ever-so-tight that this housing thing works out well, and soon.

Myanmar and Food Poisoning

Went for a pretty much whirlwind trip of Myanmar with my parents over the last week. We visited Yangon, Lake Inle, Mandalay and Bagan, hitting most of the major tourist spots. I also managed to get food poisoning (not the worst case I've had, but still not fun at all) from Mandalay onwards, and sort of hurt my old injured right ankle again because of the Burmese penchant for making people take their shoes off to walk/climb around holy sites (in my case, walking up Mandalay Hill). I can't think of another trip [actually I can: Nepal] where I felt so tired at the end of it, and so glad to reach home to Singapore. How sad. Still, the front end of the trip was very pleasant and enjoyable, and even the end bits were pretty even though I felt ill and permanently nauseous.

In the mean time, I am left with just 4 precious days in Singapore before I return to the clusterfuck of stress and problems that await me in NYC, like finding a new place and really, really, working for my future. Tonight I'm having a sleepover with Tiff and ZW, tomorrow brunch with Daryl, CW and Jia, and finally dinner with the TLL people. The remainder of my days will be spent meeting up Cassey, one of my roommates from my hostel of Oaxaca, who is here for a few days for work, and with family.

Have started packing properly for my departure with a slightly heavy heart. Slightly heavy only because it doesn't quite make me want to burst into tears at the thought of leaving again, but makes me feel uncomfortable and restless nonetheless. I'm utterly terrible at leaving anything, but leaving a place that is so strongly my comfort zone, where I need to worry too much about anything (thereby forever being a useless child I suppose), fills me with an irrational panic that oh no! I'll have no one to rely on but myself. Silly really when one considers that this departure will mark the start of my 5th year abroad. Still, I cannot help my uncomfortable and jittery heart.

Meet Ups

Since I've gotten back to Singapore, I've met up/hung out with someone almost every day. Even people who I haven't really thought about have asked me for meet ups, which is a really nice change from my pretty solitary life in NYC. Yesterday however, I somehow managed to hang out with Ted Kin and Gen Huong the whole afternoon, from 12pm to 6pm, of which 5 and a half hours were completely spent talking over caffeinated drinks. At the end of that, I felt completely and utterly exhausted, and realised that even though I had often hung out with people, it was usually spent doing things together rather than outright non-stop chatting. Phwoah.

Tomorrow I'm headed to Myanmar for a week with my parents. We intend to visit Yangon, Bangan and Inle Lake. Given that Myanmar is now currently requesting for humanitarian aid because of severe flooding, I have seriously doubts as to the feasibility of this trip. Still, the tickets have been booked, and I guess worst come to worst we can fly back early. Fingers crossed that things aren't as bad as my pessimistic mind imagines.

After returning from Myanmar, I'll have a few days left in Singapore before I need to return to NYC. Kind of dreading it, mainly because my life back home has been so unstressful, so comforting, and filled with so many loved ones. I foresee feeling sad and panicky again, just before I depart.

Sampling Frame

Out of all the sciences, my most favourite was Biology. Couldn't wrap my head around Chemistry or Physics for the life of me, but Biology brought me a strange sort of joy. Unlike the other two sciences, Biology allowed me to understand and make sense of the things around me that could be easily seen and discerned, and to look at my various body parts and think about them mechanically, like parts of a machine (or in my case, a very badly functioning one). I've been thinking about Biology again recently however because of a very silly reason: sampling frames.

Context: I'm taking Mixed Methods for research now over Summer, and I'm surprised by how much I'm enjoying it.

In my Summer A class now we've been doing a fair amount of work on different types of research methods (surveys, interviews, focus groups, etc.), and for the past week have been focusing on surveys. I can't say I thought very much about surveys before, but since encountering the material I realised I had learnt a bit about surveys before - from Biology class. There was a page or two on conducting population surveys of plants, and I remember reading about the different types of methodology one could use to count the flora (and maybe very small fauna?). One method however I remembered vividly, because of the image I had in my mind every time I read it: the random sampling frame. For some reason, I envisioned a scientist grasping a literal white coloured frame and tossing it around at random, and that image always amused me. Now donkey years later (maybe 10?), every time the term "sampling frame" is mentioned in class, I cannot help but smile and imagine someone throwing a frame around. 

It's funny what one remembers from school. 

In other news, I feel quite incoherent today. Today has been the 3rd time I've been to Columbia Health in the past 2 weeks. I'm very tired of being sick, would like to know what's wrong with me, and would like to get better. Thanks.

Unholy Mess

Half cause I'm just starting to move out and half because I'm still feeling sick and all over the place, my room has now evolved into an unholy mess. I feel great unease when I cast my eyes around, but I have no idea what to do. I could clean it up, but everything is within easy grabbing length. I could work towards reducing the amount of crap I have (an ever present theme in my life whenever I have to move), but the crap gives me some sort of comfort. I don't know. I don't feel very relaxed.

On the upside, I have decided to make teochew porridge with the canned fried black bean fish for lunch. I am really looking forward to it. Thinking about it makes me feel comforted.

Taking Ill

I don't think I've ever been so sick away from home before, and feeling so miserable to boot. I have not been able to sleep properly for the past 3 nights because I keep waking up feeling like I'm being choked and coughing like crazy. I saw the doctor on Friday, and he gave me a whole range of medicines for asthma, but somehow the symptoms don't seem to be getting any better. Meanwhile I've been taking almost any sort of medicine that seems like it'll help my symptoms, to the extent that I'm probably overdoing it.

I feel terrible.

Food Pictures

I seldom take pictures of my food unless they're unusual and memorable, but since I've been clearing my phone to free up space, I thought I'd post the pictures here.

The tastiest (and classiest) vegetarian appetiser that ever existed, as spreads for pita. Had this in Washington DC with Garam when we were there for the CIES conference in April.

Nicaraguan tamale which I bought from the world culture fair in the Zocalo in Mexico City. Was extremely large, incredibly filling, and very tasty.

Mole poblano enchiladas in Puebla. Would not eat again. Not a fan of mole.

Entomatadas con pollo in a small market stall in Oaxaca.  Loved it. Ordered it without knowing what entomatadas were, and because everyone in the stall couldn't speak English, they gave me a small taste on a plate for my approval first. Ended up talking in pidgin English and Spanish to all the patrons at the stall, trying to explain to them what Singapore was like. Was one of the must fun meals I've had.

Mexico Travels

From 14 to 21 May, I travelled for about a week around central Mexico by myself. I hit 3 spots: Mexico City, Puebla and Oaxaca. I decided that travelling for 8 whole days by myself is way too tiring for my taste, though I'm glad I did it. I saw Teotihuacan and Monte Alban too. I realised I haven't written about my travels in a long time and when I go back and reread my old entries, I like looking at the pictures most (HAH), so for posterity reasons I've decided to sit down and at least hammer something out.

First picture I took in Mexico, at the side of the Cathedral in Mexico City. Thought the statue looked bizarrely creepy.

Some sort of world fair thing that I visited in the Zocalo of Mexico City on my first day. Enjoyed it immensely, and even bought myself some Bandung from the Malaysia stall.

Funny smiling jaguar sculpture at the Museo Nacional de Antropologia. My favourite of all.

 Quetzalcoatl temple at Teotihuacan

Visitors sitting atop the Pyramid of the Sun, looking at the Pyramid of the Moon at Teotihuacan. 

The Zocalo in Puebla on a Sunday 

I kept feeling impressed by the relics I saw in the various museums [this one was Museo Amparo in Puebla]. How the hell did this "Personaje con mascara y serpientes en el tocado" from 600 to 900 A.D. not break?

 Santo Domingo Church in Oaxaca, also the site of the province's museum.

More funny relics in Museo de las Culturas de Oaxaca. I like. 

And finally, Monte Alban, just outside the centre of Oaxaca. 

I am quite a terrible travel writer. I'm better when I'm writing about my emotions or something. 

Overworked Liver

I think my poor liver has been terribly overworked for the past week or so, since I have been stricken with with all sorts of strange and varying ailments (first sore throat, then lots of phlegm, then lots of coughing, and now a stuffed nose and slightly painful throat) and have been taking all sort of medicines to try and make them go away. So far I have been unsuccessful, and feeling not-too-happy as a result. It's hard to feel jubilant when I cough until I feel nauseous. On the other hand, at least it's been nice and cool for the past few days, giving me respite from the almost continuous heat exhaustion I've been feeling. I really am a canary in a coal mine. 

Themed Songs

Songs I have been listening to for the past week:

Tracy Chapman - Fast Car
The Cardigans - Communciation
Via Audio - Harder on Me
Jimmy Ruffin - What Becomes of the Brokenhearted
P!nk - Try

Paper Mill

I tell myself that I have done History papers all my life. That I can totally crank out a coherent 5,000 word historiographical essay in a matter of days [due: Wednesday 13 May 2015], because this is my jam. That History is my forte, and so is writing great History essays. But oh Dear God am I stressed out. Doesn't help that things have been weighing (as they do) on my chest, so that my mind is really only work 80% on this damned paper while the other 20% tries to make my body and emotions calm down enough to work [affect theory makes so much sense to me]. Wish I was a more functional human being with less Issues. Then maybe I could write this History paper faster.

On another note, this may well be the last History paper I ever write if I don't do a PhD. Not sure why I didn't think about this when I finished my undergrad. Possibly because I still wanted to do Grad school, and could not even comprehend studying for any degree other than History. Ooof.

I love History, but G8100y has taught me that there is no way in hell that I will ever touch Medieval history with a ten foot pole again. 

Changed Beliefs

After spending 3 years laughing at the Communist/Marxist booth along Houghton Street in LSE, I realised suddenly today that I am now a firm believer in the Marxist theory of education and the social/culture reproduction of the hidden curriculum. What a sea change. 

Gap in the (Musical) Literature

There needs to be a song written for people who have just started dating someone, but have no idea what's going on in the other person's head, or what the fuck is going to happen. Because I don't like uncertainty and would like a song to sing along to. 

Funny Musical Taste

Every time exam/finals season comes around, I end up listening to music far more often than usual. Within the past week I've just bought 6 songs from Amazon, and it's a rather strange list:-

Jim Croce - Time in a Bottle
Roberta Flack - Killing me Softly with his Song
Tracy Chapman - Baby can I Hold you
Tracy Chapman - Give me One Reason
Avicii - Hey Brother
Sting - Shape of my Heart

The last thing I bought before these singles was Arcade Fire's Reflektor CD. So, I suppose my music preferences are all over the place and can't be mapped nicely.

April is the Cruelest Month

So far in these past two weeks I have fallen sick with a cold, been stricken with multiple headaches, and have suffered yet another bout of depression. Now that my depression is finally abating, my cold has decided to resurface again. I am now quite opposite of what a happy camper is. On the upside, at least I am a vaguely functional human being again.

Although the blooming flowers outside are quite pretty, the various flip flops in the April weather frustrate me to no end. I don't think the weather was this scatty when I was living in London. I am unused to this.

Shorts

Today is the first day that is truly, truly, shorts weather in NYC, and I'm not happy about it. I am terrible with both adapting to heat and looking good in shorts/skimpy clothing. So now I feel like an overheated, bleached white-yellow whale (ok, only for my thighs) that is dressed in unfashionable clothing. Fantastic for my self-esteem.

In other news, over the past week I realised that a long of songs I like were sung by Fleetwood Mac. I somehow just never connected the dots. As a result, I have been listening to a lot of Fleetwood Mac over the past week, trying to regain all the time I lost when I was oblivious.

Food Smells

One thing I find exceedingly annoying about living back in a dorm is the crazy amount of food smells we have in our tiny, non-circulating-air kitchen. I was boiling my eggs earlier and watching a neighbour cook his veggies, and realised upon going back to my room and eating my sad fare that my hair now smelled of food and oil. Now as I try to concentrate on Chris Wickham's Framing the Middle Ages, I find myself utterly distracted and repulsed by the fact that I can smell food in my hair. This makes me feel really dirty, and also annoyed with my meagre lunch of boiled eggs and potatoes [I am on a pseudo diet]. ARGHGARGHBARGH.

I have no idea how people manage to go for a few days without washing their hair. They must be the people that don't cook, or don't live with people who cook in a tiny enclosed kitchen. 

The Bronze Horseman

I finished reading The Bronze Horseman by Paullina Simons a few nights ago, in one feverish stretch where I wanted to see what happened to the characters at the end of the story... and it turned out to be a not-very-happy one. Then I realised it was actually the first book for a trilogy, and immediately went onto Amazon to buy the other two books. I feel slightly annoyed because I wasn't exactly taken with the rather unsophisticated writing and rather melodramatic style of the prose (wanted to murder all the characters several times over), but nonetheless I want to read about a happy ending, while learning just how more miserable the story could get. Tis very much a love-hate sort of thing, a book that's unworthy of serious consideration, but one that makes you want to find out what nonsense it conjures up before it ends.

On another strange note, around the time I was getting very (undeservedly) immersed in The Bronze Horseman, I also started listening to Reflektor by Arcade Fire after putting it off for about two years. As a result, in my mind I now associate the songs with the (sub-par!) story, particularly Awful Sound (Oh Eurydice) and It's Never Over (Hey Orpheus). I cannot listen to them now without thinking about the two characters of the book now, Tatiana and Alexander, which makes me feel simultaneously wistful and annoyed.

I wonder how long Amazon will take to ship the second-hand copies over :x 

More Driving Nonsense

Had my 3rd US driving lesson yesterday, and my test is set for next Friday, 10th April. I am not at all confident in driving :x I realised yesterday that every time I step into a car after quite an interval (like a month!) I forget almost everything. Like which pedal is the brake, and which one is the accelerator. Doesn't quite help that I am unfamiliar with the *special* American ways of turning left. I think when I get my licence I'll just make only right turns.

On the other hand, my US driving instructor (a nice lady called Parveen) has a good mnemonic for parallel parking: Triple R (reverse, signal right, turn the wheel all the way to the right), turn all the way to the left, then drive forward a few inches.

I really hope I pass next Friday (can't stand any more mockery!), but even if I do pass and get my licence, I have no car to drive, and little to no confidence in my skills. Rather silly. 

25

I am turning 25 on Thursday.

I have a paper due tomorrow at 3pm (16 hours away!), and I have written just 10% of it.

This is not how I envisioned I'd be at 25.

Then again, I'm not 25 yet.

Fucking Horden and Purcell

This term I am taking an advanced level course in Medieval Mediterranean history. So far we have read the two hefty volumes of Braudel's The Mediterranean, which felt like a grandfather story but was largely coherent and very understandable. This week however, we need to read Horden and Purcell's The Corrupting Sea. So far I have made it to page 475. It feels more like page 4750. Goddamnit.

I cannot recall ever having felt so frustrated and so stupid from reading a history book before. I feel like I don't know what the fuck is happening, meanwhile the super dense narrative style of the book makes me want to projectile vomit all over the fucking tome. If I read the word "mutable" or "teological", or "insert-word-that-most-normal-people-require-a-dictionary-for" one more time, I might just go out and murder the next human being I see. Or fling the book out of my window and watch it fly seven stories down and hit the pavement of Amsterdam Avenue. I am that frustrated.

Best of all, we need to do a book review on The Corrupting Sea as a mid-term paper. As the only non-American trained historian (hello British very-different-school-of-thought!), non-Medieval person, non-fucking Columbia College person and non-reader of French/Latin/German/whatever fucking else language, I already feel vastly inferior compared to my classmates. This book just compounds all of my worst intellectual complexes, and makes me feel utterly like shit.

Who knew words had such great and terrible power?

Two Adams and a Brian

I realised last night, counting back in my head while lying in bed and trying to sleep, that I have been single for the past 1 year and 6 months. Maybe that's why now whenever I feel that I have been thwarted by love, I feel such despair and resignation. That Holy Shit Why Not Me? feeling. That maybe, just maybe, I am completely losing my marbles over this thing called 'love'. But then again I have an established track record of losing my marbles. Just that this is a new trigger to me losing my marbles. I don't recall caring so much before, or feeling so emotionally swept up in things.

Perhaps I just need to start exercising more, haha. And remembering that there is hell lot of others things I could be knuckling down to do instead.

Daft, useless emotions.

New Years Resolutions - 2015

Some resolutions for the new year ahead, something I haven't done (that is, actually thought of and resolved to do) for the past few years, we'll see if the ones I made now pan out:
Resolution 1 - Lose weight to 54kg
Reason: Have been middling about 55kg for the past few years, until now when I seem to have hit 56-57kg. Not cool.

Resolution 2 - Visit Mexico, see Aztec ruins
Reason: Meant to book a trip to do it this Winter break, but procrastinated so much/got distracted by other things, and hence never booked anything. UGH.

Resolution 3 - Get a summer internship
Reason: Is very very very important to helping me determine what I want/need to do in my career.

Resolution 4 - Watch an opera
Reason: Again, meant to watch one a few months ago, but kept putting it off, until the Met opera took a break for the winter season. Must watch Carmen within the new few months, if I am ever to experience an opera performance at all!

Resolution 5 - Get a driving licence
Reason: I would like to get this crucial life skill over and done with, thanks.

A List of Lists Of 2014

Places I visited:

1) Ipoh, Malaysia

2) Boracay, Philippines

3) Romania

4) Frankfurt, Germany

5) Philadelphia, USA

Places I have uprooted to from Singapore:

- Skillman, New Jersey, USA

- Teacher's College, New York City, New York, USA

Things I have consumed since waking up today:

- Remaining sliver of bread loaf, with slice of swiss cheese and (awesome) sweet Lebanon bologna 

- One banana

- Leftover brussel sprouts with turkey bacon

- Leftover cauliflower cheese

- Leftover creamed spinach

- Not-nice goldfish crackers

- One hibiscus flower (that tastes like hawthorn flakes)

Music I purchased in 2014:

1) Sia's Chandelier

2) L'amour est un oiseau rebelle, from Carmen

3) Handsome Family's Far from Any Road

4) Etta James' Swing Low

5) One Republic's Counting Stars

6) Lighthouse Family's High

7) Clean Bandit's Rather be

8) Echosmith's Cool kids 

9) Lorde's Royals

Things I have learnt in my first semester of Masters:

W4170x, History of the First Crusade - humans behaviour doesn't really change, but excuses do. Also gained a new appreciation for the many different accounts of events.

A&HH 4070, History of American Education - education can be, and is, a scarily powerful and political tool. Who on earth would've thought to create a whole type of special school devoted to eliminating the Native American culture? Americans did! ALSO: American education system is super fucked up.

ITSF 4613, Peace and Human Rights Education - how education, and even the way how things are taught can eventually effect great changes in society. Also gained much, much, much greater insight into the (lack of) rights of women in greater society due to existing structures).

ITSF 4090, Issues and Institutions in Educational Development - ideas about the function of education and school, awareness of core vs. periphery/north vs. south, ideas and problems about the existing field of top-down, UN large-scale type development

Types of clothes I wore for the first time in 2014:

- Black leggings

- Sweaters

- Jean leggings from Uniqlo

- Semi-sporty North Face winter jacket (because it's so cold and I can't be bothered to use my less-warm Winter coat)

- Fleece pyjama bottoms

- Ankle boots (that my Mum bought for me as a parting gift in Germany, that I absolutely love)

- Sperry topsiders (influenced by Lauren, my cousin)

- Reverted back to wearing plain, fitted t-shirts

Other miscellaneous milestones:

- Receiving no rejections from the 3 universities I applied to (TC, accepted; UPenn, accepted; Stanford, waitlisted)

- Learning how to drive a car, but failing the road test (50/50 for the Final Theory Test though!)

- Learning how to live with cats

- Parasailing with Dad in Boracay

- Cliff diving in Boracay

- Filling in many gaps of knowledge of the Middle Ages

- Finishing puzzles with my Aunt and Uncle over the Christmas break

- Figuring out the damn NYC subway system

- Learning how to use liquid eyeliner, although it still smudges

- Wearing glasses again, because one eye has slightly fuzzy vision

- Participating in qin ming with my grandparents

- Seeing the Thanksgiving float inflation

- (SORT OF) watching the Rockefeller Christmas Tree light up ceremony

- Finishing two different cross-stitch patterns (gifts for my Mum and Aunt Cat)

- Removing all my wisdom teeth

- Learning how to floss, finally

- Quitting my first job

- Tutoring/helping out/experiencing adult education (for GEDs)

Things I want to achieve in 2015:

- Get a driving license

- Visit Mexico, see the ruins!

- See the cherry blossoms bloom in Washington DC

- Finish a third cross-stitch

- Get an internship, preferably in some peace education place

New Favourite Music Video

Clean Bandit's Rather Be, simply because it's so cute. First saw it just under a week ago when I hung out with Shirin and Jerrine in K-Town to celebrate the end of the term (and the successful submission of all my work!)

Captions

Shit, this is the funniest subtitle I've seen in ages. I laughed, out loud. 

My Room

Stupid shit aside, I really do love my room. It's where all the things I like are: my computer, my books, my candles, my red panda stuffed toy, my food, and so on so forth. It's where I feel the most comfortable in the USA. It helps that today is an exceptionally sunny day, and my room get lots of mid-day sun.

On Thursday I submitted and presented the case study that I did with my group members for my core class, ITSF 4090, for which I am extremely glad, because it allows me to spend the rest of the remaining days of the term (4 days, plus today!) working on 3 different papers. Their progress report is roughly follows:

ITSF 4613 - Peace and Human Rights Ed. 70%
A&HH 4070 - History of American Ed. 70%
W4170x - History of the First Crusade 80%

So, just a few more days till I can finally relax and feel free!

First Finals Week

Typing really quickly, I just typed "Fucker of Chartres" when I really meant to type "Fulcher of Chartres", and am now immensely amused by my typo. Finals week indeed.

My Sad Rejection Song

My sad rejection song (which I must have listened to at least 10 times yesterday), is Kasey Chamber's Not Pretty Enough. True story. Then again I'm also rather nutty.

Lexapro

I went without any of my regular meds this past weekend in NJ, because on Thursday evening, I rushed out and clean forgot to bring my meds (along with a warmer jacket). As a result over the last day, plus today, I'm feeling totally fried. I think my brain is shooting WTF signals all over my body because it's shocked by the lack of SSRIs. As a result I thought I was having mini/quasi-fainting spells and was going to have a spectacular fall and eat dirt soon. I should probably have been more panicked when things started happening, but I feel so tired and zonked from all my school work that my capacity to feel anxious seems to have flown clean out of the window. Funny coping mechanisms. 

This also means of course, that it is super hard for me to concentrate on anything. Because I occasionally feel like I'm being zapped. Also I feel bloody tired.

This weekend was an eventful one. On Friday, my Uncle brought me all over the areas as I tried to get my DMV testing done. We ended up having to go to the Social Security office in Trenton (sketchy) and the back to the DMV area, where I promptly failed the written test, because I didn't know crap like 1 and 1/2 ounces of whiskey being equivalent to 12 ounces of beer (who the fuck uses ounces anyway? Oh wait - THE AMERICANS). Saturday I watched my Aunt potter around getting reading for the early Thanksgiving dinner, went grocery shopping for her, and ended off my day by going on a date for yummy pizza in Hopewell, and watching Interstellar. Sunday I woke up really late and tired (PLUS with extra brain zaps), and then came the Thanksgiving dinner where all the family friends came over. Today I am back in the city, and somehow attended and survived class without seeming too muddle-headed.

I have just taken the Lexapro. I really should have taken it earlier in the day, when I got back around the afternoon, but thought I could tough it out till tomorrow since I'd already missed my regular medcine-consuming time (the morning). Now however I am feeling spaced out as and trying hard to think coherently.

I think I've learnt my lesson to be more careful about this kind of thing.

Relationships

I think I've been so deprived of intimate relations with a male for so long that I've started falling in love with (almost!) every other male I meet. I imagine possibilities, of laughing together, holding hands, and snuggling up with a movie. What a sad, sad outcome.

Then again, this is the longest I've been single since I was 19. This month makes it 1 year and 3 months since I've been in any relationship. Not sure whether to go 'boo' or be relieved at the drama-free-ness of it all. But for today it'll be a 'boo'. 

Bull

Blah, I don't think I believe in the nonsense I'm writing for this paper >.<

Meh

After a shitty and depressive last week, and a plodding but OK weekend, I feel completely grounded down and tired today. Every damn thing is tedious. I have to finish my readings for tomorrow's History of American Education Class (ok, but not exactly exciting reading), do a reading response for that, while jugging a theory paper due on Wednesday for my Peace Education and Human Rights class (that makes me feel like I'm squeezing blood of a rock while simultaneously pounding my head against a brick wall). Meanwhile I just finished eating dinner and cleaned up - steamed mince pork and egg - that took forever to cook because apparently the voltage on my Singapore-bought rice cooker is not happy with the voltage of my US-based power outlet. I just feel incredibly ground down by everything, and I'm still unsure of what exactly I'm doing/my potential place as an ostensibly contributing member of society.

Then again, I noticed today that one of my classmates in my Crusades class had changed his facebook profile picture from one of him and his fiancee to a nondescript one, and in class I noticed his wedding band was gone. I guess there are always other people dealing with far, far more shit.

The Main Issue

I think the reason I get so upset about this whole Educational/Development thing is because I really really really loathe rhetoric, politics and people arguing about unrealistic things. I like straight facts, practicality, unemotional things (because after all, we're talking about real lives! In the same time frame we're talking about these things!). I find myself profoundly frustrated about this whole affair, and all I want to do is withdraw into the relative calmness of History where we're not talking about real suffering and current problems. PAH.

Life Questions

I woke up this morning, and felt depressed. I have not felt this depressed in a long time, and not even when Joaquin broke up with me, because that was a certain sort of sadness but not one that felt critical to my entire being (I exaggerate, I hope). See, since I've entered TC I've always questioned whether I'm in the right place. I'm happy here alright, but is it the best place for me? It boils down again to me wondering whether I made the right decision: to pursue History or to pursue Education? The reason I didn't chose History was because I felt the path was harder and it might be harder for me to find a job. Practical, economic, scaredy-cat reasons. So I turned to Education instead, thinking of it as a route where I could apply my passion and love, and do the most for the world around me.

Now however as I struggle with my readings for TC and wonder if there's a point to all of this, I wonder how happy I'd really be doing research for NGOs, when I'd much rather be scrabbling around a dusty archive and creating the knowledge that people will study. I am afraid, and scared that I will not be happy. That I am paying all this money, and putting in all this effort, only to end up unhappy at the end. That I will not be following my dream, that I will sorely regret it, that I will not live up to my fullest potential.

So for most of today I just lay in bed. Zoning out. Occasionally drifting in and out of sleep. Neglecting all the goddamned work I have to do. I feel like tearing out of frustration, because the solution could be so easy, for it all lies within me. Yet, I am unable to yank an answer out. And all I can do is pray for wisdom and comfort.

All from my Crusades professor asking me in passing, after class had ended, How Was I Finding TC?

"I don't know, I wonder if I have made the wrong choice."

Class Readings and Questions

Yesterday I met Arjun in Princeton (after not having seen him for a good handful of years). After we had lunch and tea, I crossed the road to the Princeton public library to try and finish my readings for my class on the First Crusade. On the ground level at the back of the library I found a table with just one other person sitting at it, asked for permission to sit down, and dragged out my readings - Canon 2 of the Council of Clermont (1095) and the Goal of the Eastern Crusade: "To liberate Jerusalem" or "To liberate the Church of God"? and Pope Urban II's Council of Piacenza to name a few. I felt lethargic and zoned out after hanging out with Arjun, plus we had drank some pretty unsatisfactory Thai Iced Tea that now made me feel sick. The writer's argument was subtle, and I kept reading the same lines over and over again, trying to wrap my mind about what exactly he was trying to say. Around me I could see people napping, and I wanted to join in too. I read the same lines over and over.

While pouring over my reading, I heard a strange whisper sound come from my right. As I turned to look, my mind registered the noise, "Are you in college here?" I realised it was the guy sitting to my right, who had been tapping away on his macbook and making small noises here and there as he worked. We ended up having a great chat (with stage whispers and lowered tones) for quite some time and he told me he was working on a business proposal for a wearable medical monitor akin to those fitness bands that are in vogue now. He seemed decent, intelligent and nice. Then he asked, "Would you be interested in having dinner with an old man?" His face had flushed as the question left his mouth.

For you see, he had mentioned his age earlier. He was 62 (but he didn't look it). He was divorced, and had two sons. The oldest one was 29, and the youngest 22. I calculated in my mind: he was 38 when I was born. He was older than my parents. He could technically be my grandfather. But we'd had a genuinely nice conversation, and he did not give off creepy vibes at all. So I smiled and said yes, That Would Be Nice, and we exchanged numbers. Then he left, and I tried to refocus my racing heart on my reading.

The whole encounter made (and is still making!) me think about what it was about him that I found nice, and what things it implied about me. That I was tired of young oafs and all they entailed? That the idea of a quiet, simple courtship sounded appealing and non threatening, never mind that he could be my grandfather? That I didn't mind hitching my wagon onto someone who would most definitely die years before my time, if it meant some normalcy? Goodness knows. I know I'm thinking too much about things, but I find it curious that I am in such a situation.

Life, is indeed terribly surprising.

As a side note, he texted soon after he left, asking me out for tea. I told him (in truth) that I was woefully busy with work this weekend, and probably would not be able to meet up. Who knows if anything else will happen?

Too Much Sleep

I'm doing it again, I'm sleeping waaaaay too much. Too much to the point that it gets bad because I feel all lethargic and half awake. Problem is when I wake up for the first time, usually around 8am, I think about what I need to do for the day - and it's usually not terribly exciting at all - and so I lie there and zone out. Then I fall back to sleep and wake up again at either 10:30am or 11am and I feel funny all over because I've gone and slept too much, and now I don't feel refreshed at all. Gosh.

---

I'm back at the Helfriches' again, for the second week in a row. There's something comforting about this place as I suppose as even though it's not my home, it is a home I'm familiar with. There are people and cats around, so I don't feel lonely, and there's lots of space for me to stretch out around. This week I even brought over boxes of tea that I ordered online from Stash Tea, enabling me to enjoy a proper morning cuppa (no more tastes-of-paper-tea bag-tea!). I should be content, I should be happy, but I cannot help but feel that something is missing.

Last night I skyped my Mama. About a week ago, my Dad bought her an ipad, probably to cheer her up after her knee replacement operation. Since then she's been trying to get it to work. Yesterday night on my parent's prompting, I called her. What was alarming and unusual however, was that after she asked if I was OK, she started crying. I could hear her voice crack and hear her choke up, and that made me feel more sad than anything on earth. It made me want to shout "SCREW THIS" and hop on a plane back to Singapore, and snuggle up to her again. After all, it isn't like I've figured out exactly what I'm doing here.

Unlike my undergrad where I knew I was meant to be, doing masters is a whole different kettle of fish. I feel less certain about what I'm doing, and more scared about what this means for my future working life. I keep thinking about what I've chosen, and if its close enough to what I want to achieve in life. But then of course I've led to the question of what it IS I want to achieve in life. Ideally it's a career where I can both do policy/academic research, and still teach a few classes, which sounds an awful lot like academia. And I want to work in a terribly specific field too - using past historical conflicts as a basis to teach students/THE WORLD about peace and avoidance of war. Aye aye aye. Am I barking up the wrong tree?

In other news, I have a dehydrated headache now.

Skin Tones

Realised just now in the shower that my skin appears to be 3 different tones. The lightest tone is in spots of my body where the sun has never shone, an intermediary one from when I went to the beach with my parents in May (swimsuit tan lines still visible and all), and the darkest shade from my adventures of the past 3 weeks in Romania (probably very slightly only) and NYC (probably the biggest contributor).

After typing this, I will get ready and I will get out of my room and I will go somewhere there are people and study. 

Room 729

Towards the end of last week I received an email from the Residential Office offering me alternative accommodation at a different dormitory for US$7,900 a term. Needless to say I turned them down, as it meant paying US$1,500 a month vs. US$1,000 a month for my present (but totally unideal) room. So today (when I came back after fleeing to New Jersey again for the weekend), I started unpacking properly. Now there is only an unpacked box and luggage at one side of my room, a vast improvement from before when there were more unpacked luggages.

Other differences compared to last week:

1) The kitchen taps no longer function - I had to go to the supermarket to buy a gallon jug of water because I refused to use the taps in the toilet to fill up my water jug

2) 'New' cushion for my chair - appropriated from the Helfrich household to spare my bum from aches on the hard desk chair

3) Weather is now much more pleasant and cool - hooray for Fall approaching!

4) Changed the backgrounds on my phone - took me several tries to get the right background

5) Reading On Beauty by Zadie Smith - versus The Unnamed by Joshua Ferris 

Some things the same as last week:

1) Feeling homesick and lonely

2) Walking blocks because I feel homesick and lonely

3) Reading books which make me think of my present circumstances

4) Easting stupidly overpriced (at least in my opinion) Asian food for dinner

5) Skyping family because I feel homesick and lonely

I know I should totally seize the opportunity to get out! and make friends! but I honestly don't know how to do the last one. And I do go out. Today I explored Broadway (from W. 123rd to W. 101st), and popped into every single Duane Reade on the way (3? 4? I forget) to search for a particular make up brand because I had nothing else better to do. Only thing is, with every happy person I saw socialising on the street, I wanted to run up to them with a CV typed up of my best Friend Attributes and beg them to adopt me. Or hold up a sign saying "BEFRIEND ME! I'M PRETTY AWESOME!". 

I'm so not a fan of big unfriendly cities.

A Round up of Romanian Castles

Tonight, I will spend my first night in my dorm room. I feel uncomfortable because I don't know anyone around me, have no idea how to meet anyone (knock on doors?), am still stuck on the male side of the dorm (which means I can't fully unpack in case a female room opens), and am missing rubbish like pillows and shampoo because the bloody mail room is closed (work on Sundays goddamn it!). Meanwhile I find my anxiety going through the roof (ahaha, of course) as I start to panic and do my best to avoid Bad Dark Thoughts and be Optimistic Instead.

I really just feel like running all the way back to my Aunt's place in New Jersey.

-----

Romania has 5 main touristy castles/fortresses: Bran Castle (most closely associated with the Dracula legend), Peles Castle (beautiful, but more like a palace), Rasnov Fortress, Corvin Castle and Fargaras Fortress. Of these, the first 2 are most well known, and the last two, the least well known, which doesn't make much sense.

Bran Castle
- The number #1 tourist attraction in Romania, and extremely touristy
- Very very crowded
- Restored, but very bare
- Minimal English historical write ups available

Peles Castle
- Very beautifully decorated, and very dramatic
- Set in a lovely forested area
- Open only select days and timings
- Historically used only as a summer home, so not much historical significance
- No English write ups at all (cause it wasn't open!)

Rasnov Fortress
- Largely unrestored, and accessible either by walking up the hill or by taking a tractor-train ride
- Almost zero historical information in English
- Filled with touristy shops - it was more like a bazaar

Corvin Castle
- In the midst of being restored
- Poor surroundings, it's in the middle of a rotting industrial zone (???)
- Very spectacular and breathtaking, it rises out like a formidable behemoth, with it's wooden bridge and all
- Again, minimal English write up, majority of it was in Romanian

Fargaras Fortress
- Not a very popular tourist attraction, and massively underrated
- Had the best English write ups, museum, and restoration
- Amazing, well fortified, visitors are able to walk all over with almost no restrictions
- Least crowded and most comfortable of all the castles and fortresses
- Even houses the local library, so it serves a purpose in the community

In sum, of all of the castles and fortresses we visited, I loved and enjoyed Fargaras the most.

A Student Again

In slightly over a week (a Wednesday I think), I will be starting life again as a new student, about 5 years after I first entered university as an undergraduate. As I think about this from the room I'm staying in with my parents in Sibiu, Romania, I cannot help but feel apprehensive and yet excited. For the past few days I've been travelling with my parents in Romania, and it's been great because I got to both see a nice new place and spend quality time with them. On the other hand now that our trip is drawing to an end (in just 3 more nights, counting this 1!), I'm starting to feel anxious again.

I'm feeling anxious because:
- Oh God I've got a chance again to make something bigger out of my life...
- But what if nothing comes out of it?
- Will I find long-lasting happiness out of this?
- What's my next path in life?
- I'm leaving my very very cosy comfort zone

My thoughts seemed a lot more beautifully drawn out when I was thinking in the shower. Then I came out and started typing away, my father saw me writing and started mocking me (as he always does) and someone turned on the TV. I guess one thing good about leaving home and them is I'll have more time and peace to think proper thoughts, provided I don't spend too much time brooding by myself.

12 Angry Men

Just finished watching 12 Angry Men while eating dinner, and it was amazing. With my brother alternating between curling up on the couch behind me and bouncing around, I spooned rice and chicken into my mouth with my eyes peeled to the screen. I love how the script was tight and the run time of the film was a manageable 1hr and 30mins, unlike many movies that are out in the market nowadays. One of the biggest problems I have with watching movies on my computer/not in a cinema is that I find myself getting restless and distracted by other things during slow parts, which was not the case for this film at all. Definitely recommend. 

I Must Nap Less

It's been almost a week since I've stopped working and I'm already bored. I've ended up spending almost every single afternoon napping and I'm all napped out, but I nap because I'm bored and feel sleepy in the warm afternoons when I'm huddled in my room and reading a book. I've already polished off Jonathan Franzen's Freedom and Jon Ronson's The Psychopath Test, along with a graphic novel called Depresso. Today I even walked around the library in Clementi like an idiot because I had nothing else better to do, before realising I was just wasting mere seconds when I had whole hours to while away. Gosh.

In the past week I have: 
- Stopped work and said goodbye to all my classes
- Fucked up taking the bus twice (once missing a stop when I was with Gail and once boarding the wrong bus [!!!!!!!] while trying to rush to work on Sat - my last day of work)
- Watched two NT Live screenings at the Esplanade: Frankenstein and The Audience
- Mixed up the timings for Frankenstein (7pm, not 7:30pm!)
- Gone for a spa with Tiffany (fun and relaxing, but I need thinking of the baby cockroaches running around the jacuzzi now)
- Been to the Esplanade Library again to borrow more DVDs (12 Angry Men, I've Loved You For So Long and The Story of Adele H)
- Bought 5 books from Kinokuniya (or maybe it was 6?)
- Had 2 wisdom teeth extracted
- Watched I've Loved You for So Long and Barking Dogs Don't Bite
- Finished a cross stitch I was working on for my Mother's birthday present
- Visited the Gastroenterologist
- Accidentally got a quickie $10 haircut when I was looking for a proper hairdresser
- Bought clothes from Uniqlo
- Art Jammed with Shu Wen (she painted Paddington, me some random landscape)
- Had lunch with Mama at Imperial Jade
- Went to NTUC to buy last bit of food supplies
- Finished packing 2 boxes for shipping to my dorm
- Finished marking all the things for my Saturday classes
- Picked up the framed cross stitch to give to my Mum

In a little bit I'm going to leave to go deliver the worksheets to my ex-workplace in Buona Vista, and grab dinner with Ianthe afterwards. I suppose I'm bored because I never really know what to do with myself even when I have a just the slightest bit of down time, especially after having had my time sucked up by work for the last two years, which is quite bad really. Nevermind, it's only one more week till I leave with my family to travel in Romania. 

Oh And...

...I failed my Practical Driving Test and spent the rest of the day (18 July) half bawling my eyes out and half moping. Even now thinking about it makes me feel testy. I do not want to think about it. Urgh.

Last Tuesday of Teaching

Today was my last class with my tiny Sec 1 IP class. As usual only one person turned up (I don't think I've had more than two people together in that class for weeks), and it happened to be my favourite one (terrible how teachers have favourites eh?). J is a good kid that's pretty bright and quick on the uptake, plus I had solo sessions with him so often that we were used to it by now. Even after class had ended he lingered for a while, talking about random things, which I appreciated. I guess that's his way of trying to drag out our last moments together, which made me smile.

After work I went to Courts today and finally bought a new camera. I realised to my utter horror last week when I had my last lesson with my P4 students on Wednesday that the camera wasn't working properly. Every picture came out horrendously dark ): I had already noticed it when I was on holiday with my parents in Boracay, but hadn't realised just how bad it was until it was too late. Urgh. So I went off today and bought a Canon IXUS 140 for to replace the old family camera. I'm still not convinced it's the best I could have bought, but my Mum was adamant that I buy either a Canon or a Nikon. In other news earlier today I bought a camera for my own personal use (Lumix LF1) from Lazada. I really really REALLY hope I actually get my camera and not some empty box :x but at $310, a savings of $190, the risk seems worth it. Fingers crossed.

In other news I wandered about town with Daryl and Chong Wee on Sunday. We met for Brunch at Park, where I finally got to try the Tiramisu Pancakes, and then we headed off to tramp about the city area. We started at Raffles Place, playing with the swings, and then walked to Victoria Theatre, taking a stop at Fullerton Hotel along the way. I don't think I've managed to walk about so freely in a long time, feeling free and excited to explore my surroundings. It did get however, bloody hot after a while. In the end we parted after exploring Victoria Theatre and I headed off to the Esplanade Library to borrow DVDs.

I ended up borrowing:
1) Finding Mr Destiny (Purposely Daft Korean Rom-Com)
2) Kolya (Touchingly Funny Academy Award Winner)
3) The In-Laws (Slapstick '70s Comedy)
4) Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure (Time Travelling Stoner-like Flick?)
5) The Flowers of Evil (Some French Dark Comedy)
6) Barking Dogs Never Bite (Some Japanese Dark Comedy)

As it stands I've already watched the first three, all with my Mum incidentally, and she liked them all. The last three I'm not sure if she'd like, so I decided to save them for another time. I cannot emphasise how much I love the Esplanade's DVD lending library. My tax dollars (all $500 of it) at good work baby!

7 Jalan Harom Setangkai

I spent my formative years growing up in 7 Jalan Harom Setangkai. It was the family home that my grandparents had bought in the late '70s as an investment for them and their 3 children, and it became my home from 1997 to 2001. Around 1997, my parents decided they couldn't afford to pay the mortgage on our current house, so they decided swallow their pride and move back to my grandparent's place. The move made sense, after all my grandparents now had 3 free rooms because all their adult children had moved out, and at 7 I was an absolute pest about being separated from my grandmother. We ended up staying there till end of 2001 (I don't remember moving during the school year), so I spent a good chunk of my childhood in that place, and it definitely left a strong impression on me.

Living in that house as a chid was great. My grandparents were always around during the day time (OK, not great when my grandmother came after me to study) and there were lots of area to play around in. There was the old wooden bar which was a massive dust bomb because the maid completely ignored it - felty green carpet and all, the staircase landing in the middle that had its own little window and curtain - which was excellent for playing 'house' in, and the large garden complete with all sorts of plants and trees. The house was also filled with all sorts of odd knick knacks. I once found movie film canisters in my grandparent's room [see: second floor, area on bottom right labelled 'junk'] sitting next to a rusting treadmill, and I would play with the wood shavings and various substances my dad would use for his luthier hobby out on the back balcony. Fruit season was fun too, because the rambutan tree always blossomed like crazy, and there were always rambutans to eat.

I have many memories associated with that place, all of them warm and fuzzy, from a time where I was less anxious and less scared of everything. Thinking about it makes me feel happy and safe, but it also makes me feel a little sad because I know that the 7 Jalan Harom Setangkai I remember only exists in my recollections. After we moved out in 2001, the house was completely torn down and rebuilt, then my grandparents sold it and the new owner decided to rebuild the house from scratch (again! Ahaha).

Today after picking my grandparents up to go to lunch, we ended up driving past the old house. Of the entire row of houses along Jalan Harom Setangkai, number 7 was the only house that had been altered completely beyond recognition from my childhood. Still, I should be thankful that I have so many vivid and nice memories of my childhood home. 

Preliminary Reading

"In the Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith thought that the primary role of education in the eighteenth century was to compensate for the 'almost entire corruption and degeneracy of the great body of the people', that resulted from the mind-numbing jobs which most people were expected undertake in return for increased wages"- Introduction in Education, Globalisation and Social Change.

I giggled. Am not looking forward to work starting again tomorrow.

Today I saw Two Hubcaps

I don't know when I first learnt the word "hubcaps". I remember knowing it from a young age, and I seem to vaguely remember asking my Dad what it was when I was about 6, because I kept seeing the word in Archie comics. Several of the running gags in Archie comics involve Archie's sad jalopy that keeps failing, including a few which featured both the wheels and hubcaps flying off in the midst of being driven. Thankfully cars aren't actually like that.

Today I had yet another driving lesson. While driving around (we seemed to have moved on from parking to refining my road skills), I saw a hubcap lying about on a grassy kerb area. Later on the way home on 156, I saw yet another hubcap lying on a grassy area, this time pretty far from a road. Pretty odd to see two abandoned hubcaps in one day.

Random Things to Note, Lest I Forget

Met up with Rufus for brunch today at Holland Village. He brought along a friend, Boon Guan, whose name seemed familiar but whose face I couldn't place. No matter, we had a great brunch together at Breko. By the end of brunch I wanted to run off and rest my horribly winded lungs - we had talked so much that I felt like I couldn't speak anymore. I suppose that's one way to determine great meal partners.

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Last week we had a lesson on protecting the high seas. It was bits of climate change, pollution and overfishing all rolled up together in a ball of bad things. I decided to concentrate more on overfishing, because I didn't recall it being taught very much in school at all. All the bits I knew about Bad Fishing Styles and overfishing came from outside reading, so it wasn't till I pieced all my information together when I was planning my lesson that I finally realised how dire the whole situation is. As it is before that, I had already refused to touch pomfret because I know they're horribly overfished, but still kept chomping away on tuna and shark's fin.

Anyway, I had heard about dynamite fishing before, and set about trying to find some clips. Everytime I think of dynamite fishing, I cannot help but laugh blithely, because despite how incredibly destructive it is to the environment (which makes most people sober), the act itself seems to me so ridiculously over the top and overly aggressive that I cannot help but laugh. Bombing fish! That's like throwing a grenade to catch a rabbit. It's the stuff of movies like Naked Gun. Except it's real life, which makes it even funnier and sad at the same time, and so makes me laugh even more.

I ended up typing "dynamite fishing" into youtube (as you do), and realised that the first result given was possibly one of the most funniest things I have ever seen in my life. It wasn't until I watched it for the first time with audio with my students that I realised some parts of the clip has been dubbed over for comedic effect, which made the video even better.

It reminds me of Exploding Whale, which I saw a few years ago and absolutely loved:

Perhaps it's just because it's the perfect combination of things that makes me laugh: death, explosions, and black humour (though, what does this say about me as a person?)

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Today after dinner with my grandparents, they sent us back home. They took a different route from my parents and we ended up driving home via Old Holland Road. The last time my grandfather had been driving me along Old Holland Road was when I was still a student in MGS, probably circa 2006. He kept mentioning how he used to drive me, asking me if I remembered, and chuckling to himself. Then just as we turned the corner to enter Greenleaf Road, he asked me if I remembered how the wall of the house at the corner had collapsed, closing the road temporarily. I was quite amazed because it was EXACTLY what I was recalling just moments before, and made me feel a little warm and fuzzy inside. Ah, shared memories of other people's misfortune. 

So Close, So Far

Just watched So Close, So Far with Shu at the Iranian Film Fest. By a stroke of luck I manage to hop onto both 75 and 970 with minimal waiting and arrived home just before 12am, which is a great way to end the day, and put me in a more amiable mood to blog.

I liked the movie initially right until the last bit. I like foreign films that are slice-of-life, peeps into other worlds. The problem I find with this film was that towards the end it felt terribly improbable and depressing (unless 0.01% of every Iranian dies trapped in a sandstorm covered car), with some bits feeling a bit overacted and overwrought. It reminded me a bit of a Russian movie I had seen at the East End Film Festival years ago in 2010, which is still by the far the most depressing and bleak movie I have seen in my 24 years of existence. I remember running to the movie theatre from Stepney Green tube because the Hammersmith Line was delayed. I remember clocking the various fried chicken stores all over as I ran. I remember sitting in stunned silence when the movie came to the end because, WTF?!

Anyway I guess in comparison to that, the Iranian film was much less of a downer. It had some nice shots of Iran, which I really liked seeing, though the shots of the harsh desert landscape made me feel uncomfortable. Perhaps it's because I don't like the idea of being so utterly far from human life. True enough, that's how the main character dies (from being alone and trapped in the wilderness), confirming all my worse city-born stereotypical fears.

Have just started trying to select classes for the upcoming Fall Term, which makes me feel a bit better about things. Lately work has been overwhelming and (largely) unrewarding, which already makes for shit morale. Compounding the problem however is the fact that I know I am serving my resignation notice period, which makes me feel even less motivated, no matter how much I do love and care for my students. Although I know the lack of enthusiasm I feel now is only temporary, it still feels horrid. It makes me feel like pulling grumpy faces at the world. Talking to colleagues helps I suppose, because they understand exactly what nonsense I am talking about, and talking to Shu today over dinner helped too, because she feels similarly. Ah life and jobs.

Teary Eyes

Yesterday I made a silly mistake. I realised it mere moments after I made the error, and groaned inwardly at what a n00b error (for lack of a better word) it was. I had given out the coloured paper for Father's Day cards before I had finished all the work in class. As I walked out of class to grab the coloured paper, the thought of what a massive distraction it would be vaguely crossed my mind (for I am not that unaware), but then the thought of forgetting to give the paper out seemed worse. So while my students were still dutifully completing their full sentence corrections, I started to slowly distribute the paper only to see them jump out of their seats and clamour for their choice of paper colour. Oh dear.

Needless to say, the last Cloze Passage (on a dog nonetheless) was rushed through by the students as they eagerly awaited Arts-and-Crafts time. Which was just as well really because I felt utterly worn and exhausted yesterday. From 2 weeks ago I've been swamped at work with extra classes. The week of 27/5 to 31/5, I had 11 classes. The week of 3/6 to 7/6 I had 12 classes. This week I am back to 11 classes. I can only wonder what next week will bring.

Yesterday as well something interesting happened, which is that I walked into class and I was immediately greeted by a teary P4 student. My heart sank because I my mind ran amok of all the potential problems: Did someone bully him? Did an accident happen? Then, when he told me he fell down, I thought in horror that he had been injured In The Centre. The relief I felt when he told me he fell outside, in the carpark, was palpable.

I brought him to the office to get anti-septic cream. As we walked there, I noticed he seemed to be even more upset than I had initially realised. His voice was trembling, and he kept talking about how it hurt a lot and how he was in Great Pain (probably exaggerating). Rolling back the sleeve of his denim jacket, I realised he had a long scratch running down his left arm. As I dug around the first aid kit to find something that wouldn't set off his tears (read: alcohol swab) he started to look more and more worried. In the end I settled on letting him apply the anti-septic cream himself as he winced and got all teary, lest I be too rough and prompt a flurry of tears. Then we walked back to class and I told him an anecdote about how I had missed my English orals once because I was running around the quadrangle and fell badly, scraping my knees, and became utterly inconsolable until I was brought home. He seemed to perk up after that.

It's hard for me to quite describe how I felt at that moment as I led him down the hallway to the office, and looked into his worried teary eyes. I felt so terrible that he was sad, and felt that my heart would break if he cried. This was probably compounded by the fact that he's one of the students I am fond of, and a huge history buff like me. I wanted very much to give him a hug and say 'everything's going to be fine!', but I'm sure that would've been wildly inappropriate.

When we went back to class, the place was in uproar. His classmates were happily chatting away and I ended up shouting at them to finish writing their content page. Then one of female students happily started 'ZX stabbed himself! That's why he's hurt' and the whole class started to get very excited about ZX's injury, pestering him with silly questions. I ended up cutting in and telling another anecdote about the Most Embarrassing Fall I Have Ever Had - one where I slipped on an icy patch in LSE and fell on my rump next to a group of tourists admiring the Old Curiosity Shop - and they soon forgot about ZX and started doing their work. 

Glass Classrooms

As my teaching careers draws to a close (and when I have the time!), I start to think more and more about the job as a whole and the things I have learnt. I keep thinking to myself: I should write this all down, but the moment I get home I get distracted by something soothing and forget at all about it. This is especially made worse by the fact that I've re-discovered the time black hole that is Civilisation and have been playing it almost every night since last week Tuesday.

For the past few Fridays, I've been assigned to a glass classroom next to the staffroom. I call it a glass classroom because it is literally made of glass. Glass windows look out onto Thomson Road where you can see flags from several nations fluttering away, and the walls and door are made of glass, giving you a full-on view of the two adjoining classrooms (and the other way round too). I am not particularly fond of the classroom because it feels like I'm teaching in a fishbowl, plus you need to awkwardly walk through another classroom to enter it. That being said, it is near the toilets and the staffroom, so I can dash about easily. Still a classroom is a classroom, and I'm getting vaguely used to it.

Recently however, I've been feeling a bit stressed out about teaching there, namely because of the teacher next door. She's a senior teacher, and the lesson plans she shares during meetings always sound fantastic, plus her students always look so engaged and interested. Watching her from my classroom I feel inadequate as a teacher. I can't command such gravitas, summon up such energy and spunk, and plan my lessons as well as her. Even though I tell myself she has a good 10 years worth of experience on me, I still can't help but feel slightly despondent and wish for better for my students. Wish that they had a better teacher who could help them a lot more.

All things said and wished however, I know (for better or worse!) that my students are genuinely of me as a person and an individual, rather than me as a teacher - and I cannot help but wonder if it just might be a good thing, that they will learn empathy amongst other things from the time I've spent with them. Only time will tell I suppose, and I wouldn't trade my students for any other in the world.

Parallel Parking

Just finished a driving lesson and will have another one on Thursday. Today my instructor (a kindly old man that reminds me of my grandfather) told me that the next lesson, we'll begin parallel parking, because my reverse parking seemed to be good enough. Granted while I agree I have been making progress, I'm still not very confident in my reverse parking skills. Oh well. Still, I'm happy to be driving. It's quite fun gliding along roads, and not at all as stressful as I imagined.

A few weeks ago on a Friday, I sat for my final theory test and scored 50/50. I was quite overjoyed because well, I don't recall ever having scored full marks for any sort of test before. That and if I failed my final theory test, it'd be months before I could take it again. Owing to my magnificent procrastination skills, I managed to time the whole learning driving + test schedule so tightly that I really only have one chance to pass both the final theory test and the practical test if I want to get my driving license before I leave to start my Masters programme. Well, fingers crossed for 18th July.

In other news I am still sick. I fell ill some 2 weeks ago and somehow muddled through work with my throat all swollen before leaving for a family trip to Boracay, Philippines, where I fell even sicker (hello heat!). Now some 4 days after coming home from Boracay, I am still sick. This also means that every time (2 out of 2) I go to the Philippines, I fall sick before the trip and get more ill during the trip itself. Talk about unfortunate.

That being said, I quite loved Boracay. The first disastrous hotel aside, the rest of our trip was fantastic. Our second hotel was cheap, cheerful, and right by the beach. The beach on Boracay was incredible, and easily the best beach I've ever seen. Its waters were so blue and clean that it looked almost permanently photoshopped and the beaches were filled with white sand. The food there was tasty too. I was happy to eat Chicken Inasal again we made many trips to D'Talipapa, a seafood market, to eat dinner. We had the tastiest baked scallops there, mmm. I feel hungry just thinking of those scallops again.

Felt a bit sad to come back to Singapore and WORK, but on the way home I was reading Marie Claire (the only female magazine I'd ever subscribe to) and they had a special on working professionals, plus career tips. As silly as it seems, reading that section made me feel all inspired and invigorated about work. I wanted to plunge right back into work and MAKE A DIFFERENCE YO! Of course that being said I've already tendered my resignation at M/s L because my notice period is 3 months. My last day of work will be 2nd August. Then I have 2 weeks to rest before jetting off to Romania with my parents for another family holiday, before heading off to NYC on 28th August to start my Masters programme. Talk about yet another tight schedule!