bAkkwa.. loves Nobuya Sugawa, Tanaka, Shanz, my ah gor, the sun, my food and bak chor mee

2009-02-03T10:24:00.002+08:00

.bakkwa is sad sad sad sad sad sad.

the end is near and i sense it

everyone knows it, but we just remain silent

u hope for the best, but you know it will be denied

the suffering will end when the end arrives

but yet, that figure would no longer be around

the emptiness of the home

the absence of the king

the absence of your "chiak bak ber"

it makes me sad, but yet i know it is the best for you

thank you for being there for me when i needed you

i will love you and remember you always

2008-12-12T02:32:00.002+08:00

....GUESS WHO IS HERE...

Ah Gor and Rachel came to visit me before i got home for the christmas holidays.. what did we do... let me see...

(i) We watched Phatom of the Opera (for me, the 10th time and it SUCKED totally)

(ii) We ate

(iii) We shopped like hell

(iv) We drank (a little) and

(v) We had fun......

But at the expense of my credit card..... but who really cares anyway. I am super uber happy whenever people come to visit me in London.. it just makes me feel like my usual self... cos i am normally mugging like hell..

A view of the London eye.. both of them look like they were on the verge of collapsing
the view from the London eye

Da sao and me

MS TEO...i mean Jessica.. and me

Me and ah gor...

Oh we had such an awesome time!

it was great!

everything was simply brillant! fantastic!

so if any of you wanna come visit me...

tell me way way in advance!

bakkwa

..bloody frustrated about hamamatsu and other thingys..

2008-11-17T09:16:00.002+08:00

Hais.. the workshop with Otis Murphy is on Thursday already.. but i still have no motivation to practice at all... isn't it a waste? especially since he is one of the adjudicators of Hamamatsu.. i should be working my ass off.. so that if he does decide to let me play for him.. at least i won't malu the shit out of myself.....

But i think the chances of getting it are really slim, this is especially after PS spoke to me and told me that if you are not a music conservatory student, you can forget about getting in.. well.. me.. being me.. I am dying to prove her wrong, but i just don't have the time to practice. i shall book the practice room tml....

Oh.. and this is the think i am suffering love sake over...
it is somewhere in my wardrobe at home.. i miss you xiao bao

bakkwa

2008-11-11T01:56:00.001+08:00

I suffering from love sick..

2008-10-25T07:35:00.002+08:00

...This is how my brain feels like now...

FRIED

I am starting saxophone lessons next week already.. i am so looking forward to it.. but i wonder what the standard for a professional saxophonist is here.. is he going to be like sugawa san?? I doubt so... haiss.. hamamatsu.. how how how how...

I miss everyone at home..

I will be back on 14th dec..

bakkwa

2008-09-16T01:41:00.005+08:00

Goodbye Summer, Hello Grey Skies of London

The summer break is finally over. Finally is perhaps an apt word. I am getting a little bored actually cos it was too long. I regret not applying to do an internship at a law firm. However, my schedule did not permit me to do so. So let it be. It is time to hit the books again. But before that, i think it is good to just think about some nice things that i did this summer...

Family Ties
This summer has been especially has been extremely rewarding as some of my cousins have matured from being irritating little imps to gentlemen. They were once kids who got on your nerves. Now, they are guys who are on the same frequency and wavelength as the most of us...

Enjoying dessert at "one bowl of dessert" at serangoon gardens... fantastic durian pudding which seems to be a "sellout" item. They have been sold out on 2 of our visits.

..These 2 photos were taken during Grand dad's birthday..
(i) the younger generation

(ii) the Kiam pah faces

Friends

This period has been a really down period for some friendships. Perhaps it is time to review some of them and perhaps end them. But some have been maintained. I being abroad to further my studies has been a good test to such friendship ties. Even though both Mic and myself agree that time would be able to solve any form of misunderstandings between friends, i think an exclsuion clause may just have to drafted into this statement.

There are some friends who I have not met up much with this summer. Perhaps once or twice. But its nice to know that you are there and I know that. Somehow when a bond is established and has gone through difficult times, there is a tendency for friends to get closer. But this is not an absolute statement. This summer break, I think I have tested this. Being bilateral in nature, both parties are suppose to contribute to sustain a friendship. However, when one party refuses to (regardless of whether wilfully or justified) contribute to it, a friendship would eventually breakdown. This statement applies regardless of the nature of the bond or relationship...

Eddie trying to pry open the pressure cooker at Mustafa...

Yirui, Myself and Chongming at the class gathering

Dave, Junie, Curls and myself at the Esplanade taking graduation photos

Class gathering for the mid-autumn festival at Brian's designer house

Junyu

who was suppose to visit me in London, but backed out from a flight cos of food poisoning

High Tea at Goodwood Park with gor and xius

Jasmine and myself at Millenia Walk

She was flaunting her umbrella with pink heart shapes

Alumni Saxophone Section

yuzhong, xavier, wancai, melvin and myself

saxy w.a.x.y., the alumni saxophone quartet, of which only 1 member currently plays with the alumni. Thank you for the wonderful sessions we had at NTU. For the fun, the laughter, the experience of playing together as a quartet, for enjoying the noise each other made. And of course, our official metranome, ah jim for recording 'new cinema paradiso'.

National Band Competition with the Saint's Alumni Band

An old photo which i dug out

Aspirations, dreams vs. harsh reality. There is a huge gap between what is viable and not viable. I know that it may not be possible. But i know, all i have is this chance and i am not going to have any other opportunity. However, someone had to give me a big wake up call today and told me that there is no point, as i would be no match to the others. Is the extra effort, money, sweat, frustation etc going to be worth it? I wonder. What is going to happen now? Should i just wait for Prof. Murphy to reply my email? Or should i tell her that I want to go ahead with it? I don't have the luxury of time.

Flying back to London on 17th Sep on SQ's 9a.m. flight out of Singapore, bound for London

Looking forward to returning to School, leading a loner life, mugging like hell in the library and perhaps, Hamamatsu next year

Goodbye all!

~Bakkwa~

2008-09-11T23:36:00.002+08:00

Welcome back xius...

Met up with ah gor and xiuz at the Goodwood Park Hotel for English high tea by the pool side. I thought the food was nice... it was a quality buffet and not a typical "quantity" buffet in a hotel. The kitchen made 4 finger sandwhiches at a time and topped it up... i.e. the food was fresh. Xius was doing very well, gorging down the buffet... i was a tad slower and ah gor gave up after 3 plates (i think)... the pictures would explain why...

Ah gor looking satisfied with his picks from the buffet table
An up close shot of his plate... it is FULL...
...This was my plate....
A very hungry xiuli... i wonder what she is trying to devour...
Dropping xius at NUS BTC, cos she needed to catch the shuttle bus to the main campus

Alec's Kitchen...

I promised the teachers at SAS that i would make someting for them to eat everytime i visited them.. Its a little difficult to think of what to make and bring cos

(i) I have to think of their dietary preferences

(ii) How i can transport the food

(iii) The amount of time i have to prepare the food

(iv) Whether i would be satisfied with the food (it must not only taste good but must be aesthetically pleasing and better if it is confusing)

Had a relatively smaller menu today as i had to make Onion Marmalade or Onion Jam from scratch and that involves a 2 hour cooking process...
The amount of onion jam i get fom about 1.5kg of shallots and white onions

The completed pie, dressed with mozzarella slices... could not find buffalo mozzarella, so i just had to settle for some cheapie mozzarella that cold storage stocked

the completed dish dressed with the vinegrette reduction! yummy!

I had a little slice.. about the size of my thumb...

The joy of cooking is in seeing other enjoy it and love it

~bakkwa~

Happy Birthday Grand daddy

2008-09-09T23:46:00.003+08:00

Beng Hiang Feast

I know you are suffering and that you are in pain, however, we are trying our best to do everything we can to make your you suffer a little less. You have been a figure who has been with me since i was born, someone who has been there. Even though we do not communicate much, besides the "have you eaten" every time you see me, i know you care a lot about me. I know that. Regardless of what you do ( to irritate me and to piss me off), i must say that i still love you a lot. I hope you get over this really quickly and recover from it.

It hurts to see you suffering this much. I know that regardless of how much we try to do, you are still in pain. All that i ask from you is that you try and bear a little with it. If she was here, she would have taken care of you. But we know that she isn't. So now, its our turn to take care of you. I am sure she is watching you from somewhere and guarding you from further harm or pain that you might suffer. We love you both very much...

Happy Birthday to you my dearest Ah Kong..

2008-08-29T00:43:00.004+08:00

Food Glorious food...

was digging through my pile of pictures and saw some pics that i really wanted to put up... cos it is something i love so dearly... FOOOD!!!!

Everything you see in the pictures are products of "Alec's Kitchen"

Starters

Caesar Salad with shaved Champagne ham

Tataki of Maguro with citrus salad

cha-soba with roasted duck breast

Poached king prawns with seasonal salad and melon dressing

The starter platter

(i) Soba with grilled scallop with an orange emulsion

(ii) Kueh-pi-tee filled with stir fried duck breast and sweet soy bean paste

(iii) Tataki of Salmon

(iv) King Prawn in Rice Paper with Mango salsa

(v) Peking duck wrap dressed with spring onions and cucumbers

The BReakfast Service?

(i) Bread Basket

(ii) Eggs Ben with hollandise sauce, grilled sausages and roasted field mushrooms

(iii) French Toast with maple syrup and cinammon sugar, grilled sausages and roasted field mushrooms

A closer look at the eggs ben

American style pancakes with poached pears in cinammon

Eggs ben with toast

Dinner Service

Home-made pasta
Tien of Avacado, seasonal leaves and Champagne ham
Tossed pasta in basil tomato sauce with honey mustard roasted chicken

De-boned whole roasted chicken stuffed with mushrooms

Served with whipped potatoes, tossed Asparagus and Peppers with red wine sauce

To end it off.....

Crepe with Raspberry Compote with Creme Vanilla...

~bakkwa~

Legal confusionism

2008-08-26T12:36:00.002+08:00

A quote from the newspapers caught my attention. Please note that this blog entry is not targeted against any person, government, association, religion or state. It is something from the papers which happened to catch my attention.

"An oath was valid as long as it was in the name of god". An oath is valid as long as he swears in the name of _____. The holy book did not specify conditions, such as the time or place, placing a had on the holy book or the subject matter, for taking an oath is not part of the court proceedings.

Perhaps there is a need to clarify the defintion of a term in this statement.
An OATH is defined as a solemn promise to do something or that something is true

The third statement of this quote from the papers actually highlight what i was thinking. Perhaps, elections now have become no more than great advertising campaigns and the outcome is dependent on which party has a high hand at the election campaigns. It is really odd that some electoral candidates have to resort to such means to ensure a sway in the constituency votes.

An oath, as seen in the quote, above is not part of the court proceedings. This means that even if an oath is made, it does not make the accused legally guilty. An oath might be taken into consideration by the court as evidence that an offence has been committed. But how would we know how true this oath is? It is currently no more than a baseless comment or allegation that has been made. I suppose many atimes, in some countries, attempts such as this have been made, so as to overthrow possible contenders in the elections. Eventually, the outcome is not up to us, but up to the people in the constituency. However, i am glad that the people who have supported the making of this oath have recognised that the accused is not even prima facie guilty.

Sense of uncertainty is obvious. In "Today" there are worries that if this new candidate takes over as the representative of this constituency, there is a likelihood that the locals are going to lose the benefits (be it financial or whatsoever) from the government since more chances are going to be given to others.

No prosecution has been mounted. So even if an oath is made, so be it. There is a dichotomy between legal guilt and moral guilt. They are not the same. Never try to bring them to the same level. Perhaps, in a place where there is no independent judiciary and the judiciary is likely to sway according to public sentiments, legal guilt might be the same as moral guilt.

But who knows? It is too early to make any conclusions.

2008-08-22T13:16:00.002+08:00

Today is a bad day

cos i am feeling totally screwed up

Hamamatsu is still too far away to motivate me

but i know that a recording has to be done by December of the test pieces

which means that i must have 2 peaks

(i) December and (ii) August

.which may be impossible.

.that is my gut feel.

Got a new hair cut

Thought that it may make my day a wee bit better

But it failed to do so

Perhaps i woke up on the wrong side of the bed today

Thank god i was not on the floor!

But i am in a foul mood.

No mood for anything at all, not even to stone.

Everything irritates the me

Had a little bit of time to think about that issue again

so my msn nick is now

should friendship be unilateral with exceptions or bilateral in nature

do you only contact a friend only when you have problems or need help?

"a friend in need is a friend in deed" but the converse may also be true

i.e. a useless friend is not a friend

this might just be harsh reality

Perhaps i am just thinking too much

but there are just examples that i can give

it is NOT a general assumption that i am making

and i am NOT using it as a justification

It is just a second thought

..Perhaps Perhaps Perhaps..

..things might not be like what i think they are..

when a person talks too much

is one trying to ward off comments that people make about him by diverting unwanted attention

is one trying to hide his insecurities in life

is one simply saying it for the sake of doing so

attitudes change

never make a blatant assumption if you do not know anything

claiming that is is the truth

when it might just be rubbish meant for the chute

Perhaps the government should enact the friendship charter

this might be really harsh

but i wonder how they are going to put this into the form of a statute

will there be statutory requirements and residual legal capacities to fulfill?

..no one knows..

including me

bakkwa

Saxophonist...

2008-08-16T00:00:00.004+08:00

...Saint's Alumni Band...

saxophone section

Saint Andrew's Junior College Sax section 03-04

tau, piak kee, myself, weiling, alecia and angeline

Saints Hallelujah VI (i think) saxophone section...

Eugene, Deon, Fai, Me, Imis and Fahmy

The Saint's Family Combine concert 2006...at the Esplanade (Riverdance concert)
Sashi, Fahmy, Fai, Tau, Huimin, me, Ernest, Deon and Imis

SAB at Paragon 2007

...Saint's Presentation Night...

With the sec 1 juniors and with ruiqiThe combine saint sax powers.. alumni + sas senior band + alumni

SAB with their rendition of "I need to be in love"

..Thank you for this wonderful journey...

Totally lost it already

2008-08-12T10:53:00.001+08:00

The basic assumption is that when you get a new baby, you would work additionally hard cos you have something new. However, i have lost it totally. No motivation. Feeling down. Can't sleep. WHY WHY WHY...

Just 2 weeks ago, Hamamatsu was the thing that was keeping me going. I think Glasnov is achievable. But i have given up practicing already. I am suppose to go and teach sas today. But i am not in top form.

.Sian.

~Bakkwa~

Tokyo Trip...

2008-08-03T01:23:00.002+08:00

I have been having major problems trying to update my blog cos everytime i upload pics, the stupid com will just hang and i have to start from scratch all over again! absolutely irritating! So i decided to do on entry on the essence of this trip...

Every trip to Tokyo would be filled with things i like i.e. besides eating, sleeping and shopping, music! Went for a nice shopping trip for a saxophone and i came back with a little baby. I new baby to be exact. A new model was available but i decided to take the new one. This was even through one of the sop YSS 875 EXHG was tested by Tanaka-san. Well, i suppose i took sugawa's advice and had to make a fair comparison between the older model and the newer model and i suppose, the older model trumped.

At the concert in Hamamatsu city, to meet sugawa san and the rest of the saxophone clan. My next aim would be the Academy of Music and i would work my ass off to get in. All i can do is hope for the best i suppose....

Testing out the baby before i got it... note this white slip in an enclosed envelope at the end.. that was a certificate signed by sugawa san to certify that the instrument was actually tested by him.. but i decided not to get it cos the model was way to new...

Now, i have 1 month and 16 days to work my bloody ass off on Glasnov... i hope i can make it eventually....

~Bakkwa~

2008-07-20T22:44:00.003+08:00

Happy Graduation to you!

Well the ladies of my batch (who are doing their honours) have finally graduated! and i was dragged along to take the graduation photos.. We did a 4 hour trek which started out at starbucks city hall (where we had breakfast and had the briefing) and we proceeded to Esplanade then to the waterfront then to Arts House and finally the Supreme Court. We got chased away by the security guards when we wanted to take pictures.. but that was after we snapped like 4 shots... So silly right?

At the Art's House.. cool and relaxed finally.
The very classic pose in an unglamourous fashion
Junie and myselfWe could not wait for David to finish adjusting the camera.. so we started snapping pictures with my trusty N95

Tampopo (Liang Court)

We were there (finally) to try out the new gadget that they had.. a computer chip conveyor belt.. very very interesting. food would only be delivered to the stipulated table!! amazing! there would be there gadget which pushes the plate from the belt to the table. I honestly think that it is quite a waste of money to just limit this to sushi and sashimi but... i am there for the novelty and the lovely jap food!

Me fooling around with a pointer which they provided

the plate of loser sushi coming over...
it is pushed onto our table my the gadget....

it appears on our table and the light is litted!

The National Band Competition - the end of it all

2008-07-14T21:52:00.003+08:00

Prior to the NBC

The saxophone section... the night before the NBC

A snap shot during rehearsal....

Dress up before departure to the concert hall

Zheguang being knighted by jude.. with the itsy bitsy bow tie

Warm up before going to the concert hall for the final show down

NiNi trying out her "magical strings" part.... she was obviously panicking...
Batch photo ... with some people missing... namely cai cai and yuzhong... and Zheguang with his "HUAT AH!" pose
Ah gor and myself at the "fall in area"... this was taken after Moses made us pose for 30s... cos he did not know how to use my camera...

National Band Competition (Actual)

Leaving the results aside, the NBC (which is my last performance with the alumni) has been an extremely fun (especially with THE saxophone section). The configuration for this band competition was kept to the bare minimum i.e. there was no room for any mistakes or errors at all. Ben made an extremely good selection of players...

Me - Alto Sax I

Wan Cai + Melvin (who doubled up on the sop) - Alto Sax II

Yu Zhong - Tenor

Xavier - Bari

Had mixed feelings during the last rehearsal. On the one hand, i was calling some people from the clarinet section to ask them to wake their bloody ideas up (before they killed the whole band). On the other, i really did not want this rehearsal to end. Even though we did not achieve what we ideally though was possible, this marked a new stage in the alumni. But since this "stage" is still in an infancy state, i suppose things are just going to be a wee bit unstable.

Results are out and we just have to accept it. Some of us may wonder why we got the sliver medal. But i must say that we got this sliver medal with all our heart and soul. We participated as the "Saints Alumni Band" with Sebestian, Ben Lim and Emerald as guest players to cover missing parts. We did not go for the competition with a large component of our band consisting of guest players. I think this is something that we can, should and must be proud of. We kept the flame burning brightly ever.

Thank you so much

Saints Alumni for this wonderful journey

...since 2004...

~Bakkwa~

Who cares abt the results.. Pratas are more important...

What is my next aim...

The Hamamatsu Music Academy in Tokyo next July... When you are there, there is NO MORE room for any more mistakes.... cos you would be under his tutorship...

2008-06-27T23:27:00.002+08:00

Happy Birthday Debbie!!!!

Jolin and myself sort of organised a little celebration for this birthday girl... but Jo backed out last minute cos she was sick... BUT... we still had tonnes of fun without her la... It took me a hell lot of time to decide where to go for dinner... on the one hand hawker food was not apt for a birthday party.. then next came the budgetary constraints..but who really cares about this constrain.. we ended up at Gilbaltis' (ah gor's favourite place which i think is so-so only). Had this wonderfully oily lamb shank with linguine. It melted in the mouth (well, the lubricating effect of the olive oil must have made it even "smoother") and it was extremely tender. Loverly@! but please go easy on the olive oil.. its healthy but it does not justify a real good splash of oil over the pasta...
The birthday girl with her little slice of Lavender cheese cake.. interesting... the lavender lifted the richness of the cake a little and made a wee bit more palatable.. and the vanilla creme.. hmmm was just a little too watery...

ANother shot and a close up of the lavender cheese cake below.. the black specks are lavender bulbs...

THE MO-MO.....
The MoMo's are a wee bit early this year. I remember getting them for ah gor for his birthday present the year before.. (in September)... so perhaps, it is still too early to enjoy it! A MO-MO is not an ordinary peach.. it is one with swollen water glands.. and is so sweet (suppose to be) that it is out of this world. Got one pack from Medai-Ya.. retailing at 27 bucks for 2 peaches or 13.50 each.... Price is a little over the top, but once in a while, we should spoil ourselves right???

The DAY someone DUMPED me for lunch and i had to work late in the office
Someone was suppose to have lunch with me at Gibalti's but SHE forgot all about it.. and so i had to have lunch alone.. at subway ( i did a take away actually and hid in the office to eat). Work has been relatively frustrating and sometimes, some people make so trivial things sound so disastrous .. (when the solution is actually a phone call away). OH GOSH!

Anyway, had dinner with Curls, (cos i left office only at 8, after Jaycee inspected the goods). Dinner at Ichiban-sushi was good as usual and there was too much food... as usual, even though i ordered a one plate meal (unacceptable!). One meal later and feeling 36 bucks poorer, we headed off to Haagan Dasz for the melon ice cream and apricot delight (the montly special). Haagan Dasz is going to run out of flavours at the rate it is going! Curls tot the apricot was nice.. but hmmm ... i have some reservations about it, cos i tot it was sour. Ice cream is only meant to be sweet, not sour... that is the role of a sorbet.. not ICE CREAM!!!

Apricot ice cream and Melon ice cream

squatting outside Hagan Dasz watching some ball game...

Anyway,
I hope all is going to be all right
And i hope that i was not the target in that blog entry

~bakkwa~

THE VIBRATO

2008-06-26T22:44:00.002+08:00

The vibrato as a double edged sword. An excessive vibrato results in the audience deeming you as a gyrating vibrator. Too sublte or little and it can't be heard. In Tanaka-sans DVD, he mention that the effect of the vibrato should vary not only in amplitude, but also frequency and volume. So i.e. it can vary in in 3 aspects pitch, frequency and volume... The best way to determine whether the vibrato is apt is to determine the type/ period of music you are playing and to emulate performers of from that time/era.

"The pitch should change when using vibrato. Even with diaphragm and vocal vibrato, there is a change of pitch, as well as a change in amplitude. Saxophone vibrato, according to many sources, seeks to emulate string vibrato, which is a change in pitch. Saxophone players generally use a jaw vibrato. When singing or playing flute, there is very little resistance, and so it is easier to control the vibrato. With the resistance of the saxophone, it is easy to get the throat involved, producing a 'nanny goat' kind of vibrato.

The best way to learn vibrato is to emulate your favorite player.

Use your ears. That's why you have two"

The issue of "vibrato" has been bugging me for a fair bit of time. It makes me wonder whether a technical vibrato after every note is what we call "being musical". "Being musical", i suppose, is a fact sensitive issue and there is no fool hardy formula which fits every equation, not even a template of general use.

This is irritating me. Is there a need to do a perpetual vibrato? Does "being musical" mean that every note longer than a minim requires/ necessitates a vibrato? Shouldn't it depend on what is apt in the circumstances? Worrying... totally...

...Bakkwa...
Feeling worried not just about results but also NBC

this blog operates on a seasonal basis...

2008-06-12T00:30:00.003+08:00

Once i got home, i realised that i am simply too lazy to update my blog.. Leading an aimless life is indeed quite difficult, because you have to think of how to occupy your time. I must say that home makers should be applauded for this...

Anyway, alumni has been getting on my bloody nerves.

~I love my sax YAS 875EXS + EXG neck + harrison lig + s90/170 mouthpiece~
~but i have let you down. sorry.~

A blog entry by my little cousin, stacy...

2008-05-31T12:58:00.002+08:00

A blog entry by my little cousin

since chinese new year the lion dance is coming!!

2008-05-28T15:13:00.004+08:00

Food... Glorious food...

Besides eating, there aren't many things to do in London. Everything else costs a bomb. So unless you are willing to go to some historical attraction and pay and a whopping GBP20 to see some old building that has been rotting there for the past 1000 years, perhaps it is better to get a good meal, which cost below GBP 10, to fill you rumbly tummy.....

That is exactly what we have been doing for the past few days (prior to me leaving London)... Gen and myself (with Michelle being the official food taster) have been doing. We have done crazy things (like walking from zone 2 to central London).. or travelling out to zone 4 (which is approx 1hr by tube/underground), to have a great nasi lemak at Oriental City (which is closing down in a few days time... goodbye!.. i am going to miss you oh so much).

Mic and Gen.. at "Mai Food"... a jap eatery near Earl's Court... with absolutely great home style jap food.. (and worth going to if you have a nice and fat wallet which you are just dying to empty)
The open style kitchen in "Mai Food"... it bears this close resemblance to Tokyo eateries
Agedashi-tofu... absolutely delicious! ... i will give it... 3.5/5 on the bakkwa index

Dinner whihc i cooked for guardian dearest before i left London.. we had... Gyoza.. cha soba... greens tossed in Oyster sauce and... burbur chacha...

Return to Singapore on MH 003/611

Had a great flight on Malaysia Airlines and i would not hesitate to fly with them again cos (i) the food is just as good, if not better than SQ (ii) service is great (iii) same product as SQ (iv) cost half the price... During the flight, i had a senior purser who was tending to the upper deck.. though the service provided can be described as very kampong style.. there is this warmth in the service which is difficult to describe. They are NOT mechanical.. but yet not overtly informal such that there is no service at all...

having a little problems writing in between the pictures.. anyway pic (i) is a pic i took with the senior stewardess who has been with the airline for 18 years (ii) the golden club class product which is comparable to the product found on the SQ 744's.. but cannot be compared directly with the product on the SQ 773ERs and 380's... which have been described as garden benches.. (iii) the cockpit after arrival and shut down and (iv) a shot from the golden lounge

.....I am home....

Post exams

2008-05-24T06:11:00.004+08:00

Post- exam period allows us sometime to reflect on what has happened in the past academic year. Perhaps, this excess time might indeed be harmful, simply because it makes us think too much. Less than 24 hours after the final paper had finished, we were thinking about the prospect of taking a retake. Is this a characteristic which is ingrained in a typical Singaporean student (especially one who comes from Saint Andrew’s Secondary, where the main aim was NOT to nurture students, but to fail them in their papers simply for the sake of doing so?) or is it just typical of me? I still remain in doubt.

Time is a real drag now.
On one hand:
Life is aimless. It is all about going out with my friends to enjoy (and obviously to spend more money) and that is about it. I must admit that this period of time has tested the strength of the friendship between some of us. I often have doubt in myself about whether I am actually being a good friend, a worthy one. I think that friends who are all out to abuse situations should not be tolerated. It falls within the category of duress of circumstances I suppose (but screw the law because theory is distinct from practicality). This is something which I think that Brownsword had tried to emphasise, but as a result of which, he had been condemned by other professors in College. At times, I think the professors in College should really take a look around and see what the hell they are talking about. The direction is no longer about theory, but what is reasonable and fair in the situation. This is what friendship is all about. How would you explain it in words? Can you be sure that it can be put exactly into words? Or does it depend very much on the contextual circumstances? I think the latter is the obvious answer. Isn’t it?

On the other hand:
I have understood a little bit more of my friends. I have spent quite a fair time with Gen and Michelle. Poor Michelle is going through a tough period now and we are trying to drag her out to cheer her up. But somehow, some ass is just making life so difficult for her. It is sad to know that there are such wimps out there who are not willing to face the reality of life and who just want to maintain his narrow perspective of life. Perhaps, I don’t know you well enough to determine whether you are a wimp. But all I know is that you are a disgrace. This should be sufficient to condemn you. Gen and myself have been putting on weight because we have been eating relatively good food almost every other day. The only meal that I decided to depart from our “high sugar” diet was the dinner before the Lion King, where I opted to go for a tuna salad (which I would not dare to say is very healthy, but it is better than nothing).

Monday - "Fire station" day

at the fire station for the pre-theatre dinner set meal (even though we were not going for a musical after this)
Half-baked chocolate cake and citeron tarte (absolutely delicious)

...Gen devouring her red onion tarte tartin....

Tuesday: Brighton

Boarding the bus to Brighton.. at Victoria bus terminal

Upon arrival at Brighton 2 hours later.. feeling half zombie-fied

One of the horror rides at the amusement park.. we took a quasi roller coaster.. (one lesson i learnt... never ever ride on a roller coaster after eating lunch..)

More photo whoring on the beach...

Wednesday: The Lion King at Lyceum Theatre

In the theatre...before the musical starts

Lunch at the wonderful C&R which is our saviour. Without it, Singaporeans would not be able to survive in London...especially when you really have a bad craving for local food

Musicals:
London is a musical heaven and if Junyu came, I would have been able to catch an additional musical. Till date I have watched the following musicals
(i) FAME!
(ii) Mamma Mia
(iii) Phantom of the Opera (9 times)
(iv) Les Miserables
(v) Lion King
(vi) Chitty Chitty Bang Bang
(vii) The King and I
(viii) My Fair Lady
(ix) Anything Goes!
I am out of musicals to watch. There have been new productions that have made it to the West End in the recent years such as Avenue Q, but this is not my kind of musicals. I think that musicals should always be dramatic (like Phantom). I don’t think Avenue Q can actually be classified as a musical but just a production (but I am not in a position to judge it as I have not caught the production). But musicals are about drama, the appreciation of the vocal range of the crew, the dance spectacular as well as costumes. No drama = NO MUSICAL.

I managed to catch Lion King at the West End on Thursday evening. The momentum of the musical was a wee bit too slow for my liking. However, the build up for the second half was great. The cast wear animal masks and prance around in body suits which resemble the animals. I went for the musical with a preconception that it was something childish. However, it was to the contrary. A simple story plot which a cartoon production is based on does not necessarily mean that the west end production would be childish. There were some alterations made to the songs. But as a whole, I would give it a 7.5/10.

Saint Hallelujah II:
Living in Colinsdale (at guardian’s place in zone 4) has given me ample opportunities to listen to the recordings. I heard a recording of Ross Roy (Overture for Symphonic Band) done by my juniors in the Jubilee Hall. This was a challenge which was posed to us by DG, in order for my sec 1 batch to be able to participate in the SYF 2001 with the senior band. The recording was not perfect (and I would stress this), but it brings back many memories of secondary school. When I go back to school now to listen to the sec 1’s or 2’s, they can never meet up to those standards. There is a formula to success

Success = good leaders to the joint enterprise + enthusiastic members who are responsible + the existence of a challenge (this is a prerequisite for Singaporeans).

The batch was filled with great and accomplished musicians, including Addison, Yao Feng, Kok Hoe, Brandon (aka Zhi Zhi), Neil, Stuart and others. To my dear juniors, thank you for all the hard work you have put in. I was (currently still) proud of you guys and I am sure should equally be proud of yourselves.

-Bakkwa-

London

A ZAZA ZOOM or a ZAZA ASSHOLE

2008-05-19T18:26:00.001+08:00

Alec’s Blog entry:
Train spotting and eating fiesta in Derby with Uncle Dave
(will post the pics up once i get them)

Was up in Derby this weekend to visit my Godpa (he still refuses to recognise that fact)… anyway, Uncle Dave was Dad’s classmate (once upon a time in Edinburgh University, Engine Faculty, Donkey years ago)…

Day 1
If you do plan to come up to Northern UK during the northern summer, be prepared to have daylight from 4am to 11pm… freaking long day.. and it sucks your energy dry like a “reverse” vampire.. on the first day, we had a quick meal at a bar (the BULL’s Inn).. the most ULU Inn I have been too.. it was located approx 1200ft above sea level.. not too sure how high above sea level that is.. but we had a superb Salmon Trout which was accompanied with roasted potatoes and weird tasting broccoli. And to end the meal off, chocolate fudge cake with almond custard. SIMPLY YUMMY. (but a bit too much food).

Day 2
The whole day was spent along this train museum… lets see, it consists of 7 stations and the whole line spanned about 175 miles…. And every train station, there was a village that surrounded it. Each village had its own characteristic and they had cafés that served local specialities… we had scones and latte (if you consider that as a local speciality)… and later for lunch (Sunday roast lunch with Yorkshire pudding and gravy… not as rich as I thought it would be but just a wee bit too much meat for me to handle)… had a walk/stroll around the train museum located along. The day of our visit coincided with the “Land Rover 50th Anniversary” celebrations..and at 3 of the stations, there was a line up of about 20 land rovers (they originated from WWII and its amazing that they still can move now).

There is just this distinct character about this whole railway museum which I have never seen at any other places.. it is operated totally by volunteers. No one ( everyone from the porters, the whistlers, the station crew, the driver, maintenance staff) get paid for what they do. Everyone is simply doing it for their passion for locomotives. The conductor who was collecting the tickets was an AH PEK who I predict is 90 years old. The mock up is so real. All the staff come in their own uniforms, adorned with pins from the railway services which they have rode on and that they have kept as collectibles… and the trains (built in 1932 and so they are the original CHOO CHOO train) are in tip top condition. The train in the Singapore Zoo kids world.. is a joke in comparison to this. The excitement that the whistle produces and the CHOO CHOO is so authentic.. (oh I forgot to mention the smell of soot and steam… )… amazing!

Alec’s alter-ego:
Zaza zoom or a zaza azzhole? (Curse you! And I really mean it AH! Damn you!)

Abusive friendships should never be tolerated. This is especially so where you realised that someone has made a turn and stabbed you straight in the place which would cause the most harm and damage. Wake up and stop being a bloody princess. Go back to you freaking castle and live if you remain with the perception of life.

Perhaps, it is difficult to make a clear distinction between ignorance, pure indifferent or retarded development of the mind. But somehow I know of someone who is a clear manifestation of all 3 characteristics that I have just mentioned. Maybe, it is something like insanity, where there is no clear cut distinction but just shades of existence of each character.

How would you react if you realise that someone is all out to abuse the situation? Would you accept a friend like this or would you excuse him? Maybe there is a need to consider whether the acts of the person are justified. But when everyone is competing on the same level, does the lack of vitamin M amount to a justification? Who does not lack vitamin M? Who does not lack time? Everyone!.. isn’t it obvious… maybe it is not obvious to you.. But maybe the society would excuse a character like you because your mind is so deformed that you are so different from a normal person that the society cannot condemn you. The society showers you with pity instead. You are in need of special treatment and not incapacitation or societal condemnation.

As a result of what you are doing, everyone is in this wonderful farked up situation. I am not over exaggerating what the hell is happening. It’s just that you don’t know what is actually happening. Trust me, everyone knows more than think they know k. But since the issue is resolved now, whatever! But after this incident, you have tested our limits. By “our” I don’t mean just me, but my friends as well. It reveals your inner self.. the ugly shit of you. And it was really ugly… you are the first person who has made me lose my freaking cool (this is the first time since last September). You must have AMAZING powers to be capable of doing this. I mean really revolutionary powers! WOW!

For all the shit you created, I had to listen to people scream over the phone for hours. You made a fool of yourself. You made many people wonder what the hell you were up to. Things are never suppose to end up this ugly.

We are prima facie “best friends forever” (my arse!).

London summer is sooo PMSy..

2008-05-16T20:44:00.005+08:00

The PMS-y nature of London's Brillant summer...

Have you every heard of people telling you how brillant UK's summer is..

Pretty flowers blooming everywhere (with shit loads of pollen)

The brillant sunshine and people spending their afternoons lazing around in one of the multitude of parks which are available... which is studded with pigeon shit.. (but there has been NO sunshine for the past 3 days)...

Anyway.. leaving the summer aside...

luxury (student standard) treatment... is something which cannot be missed

Dim sum.. is somehow, something which can never be missed..

I think i have combed all the dim sum places that are available in London.. and my verdict? Jade Garden and Phoenix Palace have the best dim sum around.. at least it meets my criterion and the egg tarts at both places are just yummilicious. After pondering whether to go to Mdm Tussade's to have pictures taken with the wax figures, we decided to give it a miss and go on with shopping ... along Oxford Street, cos Zhao yang wanted to find his Gundam (not too sure how to spell that) shirt.. which UNIQLO has ran out of la.. we went to like 3 branches to search for it.. and we could not find it.. mic and zhaoyang must have been disappointed. and guess what we found along the way..... BEard PAPA...!! freeaking expensive.. its GBP1.29 per cream puff... 4SGD... they must earning SHIT LOADS of money... but who cares when they are yummy...

gen, mic and me!

YUMMY!!!

...Green park outing...
It was one of those NON-PMSY summer days.. and we
followed the crowd and headed to Green Park for tanning session

Dinner with Guardian-dearest...

I love eating out with guardian dearest...

cos i get to dine at ATAS places and get to eat nice food

and guess where we went!!!

ROYAL CHINA (Baker Street)...
The sole-fillet with brocolli was something that reminded me of home totally...

i have not eaten fresh fish for 1 month.. this is how pathetic London is...

anyway.. going to meet mic for high tea at Ben's now...

See you on the 28th!

Alec

~London, Waterloo~

Just an after thought:

The world is NOT as perfect as you think it is

You just have to open your eyes... take a little peek around and maybe wake up your freaking idea a little.. cos you are NOT ideal either...

maybe you are living in self denial about how perfect you are..

a defect of the mind? reason perhaps? or retarded development of the mind?

no point giving the P _ _ _ _ _ _ _ face and expect people the P _ _ _ you, cos you are obviously being a T_ _ _ _ _/A_ _ _ _ _ _

But i don't give a D_ _ _

Hurray hurray its finally here!

2008-05-12T03:15:00.002+08:00

Finally over.. but not feeling how i am suppose to feel like..

Even though the examinations are over, things just go not seem to be correct at all. Amazing ain't it? I was just looking and packing my notes on Saturday morning.. and somehow, it does not look like there was much content in the notes... but why was it so when i was studying/mugging for the examinations, i felt that my textbook was just like a textbook? Doing an examination abroad, alone, is a really something different (so unless you have the guts like mine to be stupid enough to give it a try, please refrain from it... and i really mean it all right!)... no one to cook for you.. and do your laundry.. and to make things worse, no internet, no telephone line (because something happened... OOPS!).

Well, how should i spend my next week? The summer is setting in and London is warming up a little and a seeing a lot more sunshine than we usually do.. the sun sets now at approx 9 pm ... and it rises at 6 am.. so its a lovely 15 hours of daylight a day... AMAZING!... i am really looking forward to going home, cos there is something..... by this someone..... who is awaiting for my arrival... it's....

Sugawa-san's

... NEW CD...

...ARIAS...

WOOTS!!!

fresh off the publisher and at my home le!!!

Going home time is coming soon.. once junyu comes.. it will be time to pack up and go home.. on the condition that i get a seat on the flight... if any of you do come over.. please book a ticket way in advance.. London - Singapore sector tickets are usually extremely difficult to get...

Till then

take care

hope you are all doing fine

Alec

~London, Strand Library~

Parties and more parties...

2008-03-23T21:26:00.004+08:00

parties and celebrations...
Had a nice bday party in London at a bistro tucked below Covent Garden.. they did a really mean version of my fav pasta.. somehow i just forgot the name of it ... but anyway.. it was yummilicious..! and Mae forced me to drink some green toxic stuff.. i dun know what it is called too.. basically iwas just asked to drink it.. and not ask too many questions about what it was.. but basically after you drink that stuff.. which had 70% alco content.. you are suppose to hallucinate about green fairies.. but i did not!!

the group shot at the bistro
... debs me and mae..
Vyasa was my "Da-ing" companion.. amazingly the alco had no effect on him
cracking the easter eggy i got for guys.. yummy!

Another reason to rush home...

there was another reason why I had to come home in a rush.. for Colin's wedding... i must say that this marks a new era in the family.. but its gonna be a long time before the next wedding comes i suppose.. luckily i am not next in line..

Wendy and me
terence and me.. (the world's most fantastic baker is going to Florida's Disneyland for attachment)
with the groom of the day...
a shot with brandon (didi), stacy(mei mei) and sherlyn
...oh my...

going home (to London)..soon la.. but i don't wanna think about it...

went for a walk round the neighbourhood this evening..

came to the conclusion that there are songs/pieces are somehow very meaningful to me

there is this connection between some songs and occassions/people..

Going Home (Kenny G) is something i heard when i went to primary school.. in Dad's car.. every morning...

Alfie (Sugawa and NHK Philharmonic) reminds me of someone.. a very good friend of mine..

Beau Soir reminds me of the pathetic time i had in NUS...

I don't know why.. but my thought are just in a mambo jumbo state now..

~Bakkwa~

party time

2008-03-21T05:10:00.004+08:00

Photo.. photos...

Just realised that i had a fair number of photos that i have not posted up.. so here i am with another update...

After the examinations, i caught Les Miserables with Gen and Michelle.. thru the musical, the both of them were sobbing.. but.. i didn't feel anything leh.. maybe it was not drama enough for me... i am someone who loves such dramatic stuff.. Phantom moves me.. but not really les miserables.. its going to be a long time before i watch it again.. but i must say that the leads were really fantastic (in fact better than the current cast in Phantom)... but the story is not my kinda stuff....

Just before the musical started

after the musical as we were exiting out from the theatre.. and the two ladies have watery eyes..

Birthday trip to Scarobough/ Whitby/ York with Uncle Dave

Went on a road trip to celebrate my birthday (my first birthday abroad) and i must admit that it is a new experience.. extremely fun actually (besides the long journey in the car)... lets see.. we started the day at King's Cross for the 9am service to Darlington and that was where we met Uncle Dave (my dad's former classmate)... and off we went to Scaborough and the travel time was approximately one hour..

Scarborough is a Victorian seaside town that is located on the North Eastern coast of the UK. It has been sort of abandoned by the British (who would rather make their way to the Med or Africa for their beach hols).. and the typical British weather.. just brough in nothing.. but more showers... and gale force winds..

Scarborough just reminds me of Coney Island.. the whole atmosphere.. is just so different from the city.. everything is just a tad slower.. a real tad...

Whitby

After a quick stopover of about 45 mins... off we went to the next town.. Whitby.. further north and closer to Scotland.. this town has a whole different history altogether.. the architecture is somewhat mediterranean with victorian touches... something that i prefer..

we went up to this hill to grab some shots on our way to the town centre
take a good look at the British skies.. dark and gloomy and totally unwelcoming
Apparently.. this was the place where Captain Cook was born.... A little far from australia.. but.. amazing..!!!

LOBSTER MEE and Mandarin Kitchen

There must be noodles at every birthday celebration... and since it was a once a year event, there is no harm indulging in good stuff once in a while.. isn't it.. so where else can you go to but the famed Mandarin Kitchen for the wonderful Spring Onion and Ginger Lobster with egg noodle... absolutely artery chocking.. but WHO CARES! it was ultimately yummyz...

poor lobster.. this plate of noodles set me back by.. thirty something pounds.. but it was awesome.. (frankie knows how it tastes and i am sure he will agree!)

Mic and me at the restaurant

Someone copied me.. but he says that i copied him...

gor sent me a pic that he took. hahaaa.. and it seems like we have a similar ensemble of clothes..

hope that you have been fine

cool and chill

and i am coming home...!!!

..bakkwa..

A big irony indeed..

2008-03-15T04:36:00.003+08:00

it feels weird to do this entry now.. cos.. i have just taken photos with the most intelligent people in the word and encountered the most f stupid person in the whole wide world.... f stupid not in the sense of not lacking in intelligence.. but f stupid in the sense of not have eq, being able to piss the shit out of people, doing the stupidest things on earth (which apparently ___ thinks is the greatest thing), being f bitchy about people.. thinking that they are the greatest.. i think.. as what Sir Jacobs says.. that is a point of time .. where some people need to practice or show some self restrain in what they do.. however, this person does not understand.. i pity you.. maybe you are a big mistake in the first place la.. came onto this planet as a mistake...

ANYWAY... screw the f stupid person...

___________________________________________________________________

and

CHEERS TO THE SMARTEST PEOPLE in the WORLD

the greatest EU lecturer in the whole world (at least i don't fall asleep when he lectures).... the great Prof Andrea Biondi
this is the greatest contributor to EU law.. Sir Francis Jacob.. former advocate general, ECJ
And thank you sugawa-san.. for bringing such great music to the world..

after i heard someone play the concert pour saxophone and orchestra..

i admire you so much more.. and i will strive to reach those unreachable standards

feeling in a total ironical state now.

thanks to someone.

damn it.

Coming SOON!!!

2008-03-09T21:11:00.002+08:00

its about..12 days to coming home already!! H

HURRAY!

this is my flight schedule!

Singapore Airlines SQ319 arriving Singapore at 1455hrs on the 22nd March from

London Heathrow

!!!!YIPEE!!!!

bakkwa

i dun have to see someone for 1 month! thank god!

An AMERICAN in LONDON

2008-03-05T04:08:00.002+08:00

I never like the feeling when someone who is visiting me leaves... hais.. its just so weird to come back into a room which is quiet (not to say that junyu or frankie made a hell lot of noise).. but rather, there is no one to entertain me (in my house, there is only someone who frustrates and pisses the shit out of me).

Anyway, Frankie was here for 4 days.. and i took a little time off to go sight seeing with him... but he knew his way around quite well. He has awesome memory i must say, because the last time he visited London was approx 7 years ago and he can still remember how to get around! WOW!

Frankie and myself at Covent Gardens...
The lost touris outside a museum along regent street...
wonderful mail box... "frankie" and "franked mail"

walking in regent park.. on the way to visit her Majesty the queen (actually to see her palace)
just another shot of the park from green park tube station...

We had tonnes of food to eat.. in fact too much. But that is nothing new. Wherever Frankie goes, he just eats.. hmm like a vacumn machine. We had steak burgers, weird cheese cake which was leathery, Garfunkles (which is yucky with the exception of the belgian toffee waffles) and of course Lobster noodles at Mandarin Kitchen on the last day...

Oh.. and we though that Oxford Circus was actually quite close to Bayswater.. so we decided to take a stroll and i think it took approx an hour to get to Mandarin Kitchen. My knees were about to give way by then la~ OH MY TIAN!

Anyway, i am coming home soon

i miss everyone..

but i won't miss someone when i leave London.. cos i can't wait to get rid of that cursed thing

OH.. yah..

Hope that everyone is all right! study hard! and i will see you really soon.. about 16 days from now! GAMBATE!

bakkwa

~London, Waterloo~

Frankie is here!

2008-02-28T04:23:00.003+08:00

Frankie arrived today from Michigan... !!!

Somehow, i am really happy that he is here, cos at least there is someone to cheer me up. Things have not been too fine and somehow someone succeeds in pissing the shit out of me all the time. Trying to tolerate someone's rubbish is a real pain in the ass (i think piles in the ass is a better description of what i am experiencing). It is just difficult to explain. Somehow i am not the causa causan but i have always got to clean up.

The house was suppose to be cleaned on a weekly basis. And OH, it has not been cleaned for the past month (with the exception of the toilet and my room, which i clean by myself). Its difficult especially so when you have entered into a lease agreement with a collateral agreement that you are suppose to undertake some corollary task and you just have to execute it. But if the other party does not execute his side of the agreement, what is suppose to happen? Can damages for disappoinment be awarded where it occurs as a consequence of the breach of the contract? c.f. Farley v. Skinner (no. 2)? or is it the situation now that i am experiencing physical inconvenience and discomfort and fall within the extended test of Watts v. Morrow where HL extended the test to include physical inconvenience and a claimant not being able to enjoy the peace and serenity of this property? Does this extend to

(i) inconvenice for switching off the iron on multiple occassions or
(ii)picking up the rubbish that you left all over the place or
(iii)cleaning up all the hair that you leave (or deposit) in the shower stall
(iv) dropping hair all over the place
(v) not flushing the toilet after you poop

On occassions, i understand why the HL is so reluctant to expand the categories where damages may be afforded for disappointment or mental distress. No doubt they continuoulsy reiterate that there are underlying policy concerns for the refusal. But this actually boils down to possibly a few factors (i) from who's position are we to judge whether there has been disappoinment? (a) the reasonable person on the clapham omnibus (b) the reasonable person in the shoes of the judge (c) the reasonable ME (d) a subjective me and my preferences (e) or a reasonable person in my position. I think these are all the possible permutations that can be done of this formula. But maybe as what Phang J said, damages for disappointment should be afforded on the condition that they are not to remote. So probably, i should be able to.

But i feel guilty. SOmehow. I think there are just 2 sides of me. The reasonable me and the unreasonable me. When i am unreasonable, i would in fact demand for disgorgement damages but when i am a reasonable me, i would ask for nominal, since i pity you for your (i) indifference (ii) the way you are. The whole point is compassion. Not compassion for human frailty. But compassion for who you are. Which is quite sad i suppose. Unfortunately. Maybe it was just a mistake all to begin with.

its me being an unreasonable me.

~bakkwa~

Ye ShangHai

2008-02-17T14:29:00.004+08:00

Tiong Aik Construction had their 35th anniversary at the Merchant Court Swissotel... and the theme was Ye Shanghai..i.e. night shanghai.... the dinner was quite nice and the food was decent for banquet standards.. (i have come across worse banquet catering services before... ). Broadway Beng was there to entertain us (albeit without his CHIO BUs.. which are OH MY TIAN).....

a picture with dear grand daddy before we head off for the banquet....

a family pic in the backyard

the hooligans of Shanghai... (the Coolie.. the "di tou she" and the modern BENG)

with the little BENG

with dearest uncle An....

..Bye Singapore..

See you on March 22nd

Happy New YEar....

2008-02-16T16:18:00.004+08:00

I thought i will post up some pics that were taken during CNY.....

The family shot

Scary FACes

The Singles GANG
The PHoto WHORES in ACTion
Lion Dance performance at Grand daddy's house

the classic shot in front of the tangerine plant
the extended "singles" club

Hope that everyone "HUAT! ah!" this new year

Post CNY activities...

after eating a hell lot during the lunar new year... we were in desperate need of losing some of the fats that we consumed.... hzzz.. but we were short of tennis rackets..so i was the official ball picker...

they were trying really hard to be professional... trying la
actually she missed the ball....

Project X and Friends at bakkwa's kitchen.....

Shans and Me....

Darl S is just SUPER skinny now.. i feel FAT next to her...

the "KIAU KWEES" in action...

the original s. 82 gang... me, curls (ang mo soh) and junie meanie

CNY lunch with gor.. just before i fly off...

Happy CNY once again.. and

HUAT AH!

Bakkwa

If anyone happens to have my ah mei "STAR" CD.. could you please tell me.. cos i can't find it...

GONG XI FA CAI

2008-02-14T02:43:00.002+08:00

I think it has really been a long time since i last did a blog entry ( a proper one with pictures included, not just text). Made a mad dash for home to spend the lunar new year at home from London and i think the 8,500km dash home is worth it. I can never imagine spending the lunar new year away from home simply cos it is such a big event. And most importantly, i get to spend time with my grand dad.

Murphy law has to come into play, somehow, at the time when it is most unexpected. The British Airways flight that i was suppose to fly home on, was scheduled to take off 1 hour ahead of the SQ flight (which is obviously heading back to Singapore too la). The stupid flight got delayed and we arrived at the same time as the SQ flight (or in fact later). Damn it! i wasted a substantial sum, attempting to reach home just 1 hour earlier and the flight had to screw up!

Anyway, it was photo whoring time at home...

the original Phillips Avenue "SINGLES" gang (fiona, wendy, myself and mic)
mic and myself attempting to cut off our "double chins", which we succeeded in doing
the scary face photo
wendy and myself ( i regret not buttoning up my shirt)
... and the CNY party at my place with the GANG...

Quite a few people were MIA and this grand list includes gani-cow, ah gor, pei wei, janice, becky, audrey, lion king, eugene, fifi (who gani-cow was suppose to invite) and ashwin (who forgot all about the party).

Anyway, just like to hope that you had a great CNY with your family and hope that you

"HUAT AH!"

bakkwa

-Singapore-

some things just can't be said....

2008-01-23T18:56:00.000+08:00

well, mid sems are over.. about 2 weeks ago to be exact. Somehow, i have not been able to get back on track and things are just going a wee bit too slow for my likings.. frustrating. But, somehow, the workload this semester does not seem as heavy as last semester, so LUCKY me. the tutors have cancelled all the assignments this semester (besides my heartless contract law tutor who cannot resist giving us a beautiful assignment).

This is what mae yen said: "i juat ate ba kwa last night.ba kwa was so fattening"

well, that is besides the point. We are just too bored in lecture. Today we are going to learn ALL about automatism and insanity (this should actually apply to many people as a defence since most of us are a little LOONEY).

Miss you all...
see yah soon...

bakkwa

no MINI-SD reader

2008-01-14T00:48:00.000+08:00

I got tricked into buying a SD card reader in SIngapore... cos i lost david's! but somehow,i can't find a slot to put the mini-SD into the reader... BLODDY hell! damn it! curse the shop!

anyway, the mid-semesters were just over on friday and i would really love to post some pictures up... i spent the whole weekend out and stuffing my face full with food (as usual). But.. who really cares whether i put on weight right? cos i dun care!

Hope that you are all fine and i miss all of you (shan,gor, xius, the whole alumni band, curls, david,junie, lion king, botak, my family, my didi and mei mei, marth, gani cow, zhaid, ah seng, guang,joshua and the whole project X gang.. my NUS bitches...hais. Its just everyone. Hope that you are all fine and i will see you in about 3 weeks time! HURRAy@)

bakkwa

my internet connection is finally up and running

2007-12-05T04:52:00.000+08:00

wow.. its been like how bloody long since i did a blog entry...
cos my internet is like finally up!!!!
anyway, but i am too tired to do anything now..
i will post pics another day
hope everyone is fine
its.. hmmm..10 days to coming home!!!!

bakkwa

Reading week.. not too good a week i must admit

2007-11-05T01:57:00.000+08:00

some things are really contradictory.. they call it reading week.. so it should be accepted that we get some time to finish up our readings and like finish tutorials... BUT on the contrary... i was like churning out essays.. 4 to be exact.. and attempting to finish up the tutorials... and the stupid word limit for the essays got to include footnotes la! damn it! there just seems to be so much to write but not enough place to stuff it in at all..hzzz.. anyway.. lets concentrate on the less dreaded stufff....

La Bayadere.. aka the Temple Dance
Went to my first balled performance at the Roya Opera House with Cecilia.. it was really nice! well albeit the really crowded seating area.. we were somewhere UP on the 4th story i think.. but we got a really clear view from where we were sitting. I was cursed la.. had to sit next to this ah pek who was like sneezing and coughing all the way! oh my tian.. next time if you are sick, don't come okay!

we were photo whoring during the interval at the balcony. it had a perfect view of covent garden!
inside the concert hall.. that was packed that evening...

this was their 95th performance..

i was thinking whether a ballet will even make it to its 5th performance in singapore..

most prob after the 1st show.. they can pack up and leave for home, cos not many people appreciate this kinda stuff...

but it was a WHOLE new experience to see the ballerinas (male and female) prancing around so gracefully...

LAkSA FIEsta

we gave up studying and decided to give ourselves a day off before we CHIONG our essays.. so Bernice's mum offered to cook Laksa for us.. it was like FOOD GALORE! lovely.. we have like cakes + roast chicken + gyoza.. too much food in fact.. but who cares.. when you see it.. just stuff it in!!!

Bernice's place is at some ULU kampong located at Battersea.. quite isolated from the city but actually 15 mins train ride away.. and most importantly it has a 24 mac at the door step. This was like the 1st 24hr mac i saw here... cough cough.. just shows how lazy the people here are... ahahahah

myself, gen, dari and michelle

gen and myself

almond meal and orange cake! YUMMY!

Dari and myself.. just before we went clubbing the previous week
and the once a week spolit brat treatment...

2 KRISPY KREMES!!!!

but it is super ex here.. go to HK to get them cos they are more affordable there

i have been stuffing tooo much chocolate down la!!

but WHO CARES!!!

"urrr... AM i FAT??"

you know it when Gen is happy.. i think happy was an underestimate..

she was OVER THE TOP!!

somewhere in Bernice's House....

anyway.. i will be shifting next week. I am so looking forward to that

It is finally here..

OH MY TIAN

...bakkwa...

Have a great day MATE!!!

London London London

2007-11-04T16:29:00.000+08:00

Start spreading the news.....

i'm leaving today....

i want to be a part of it...

London... London...

Bakkwa

maybe you got it correct

2007-10-23T03:36:00.000+08:00

i miss my baby so so much.. even though it is here with me... i just don't have the energy to pick it up to play! i hope it will be a bit better after i shift to waterloo....

I am so tired.. and sian already.. lost the momentum at last.. and i wonder how i have managed to keep it up for the past few weeks.. anyway.. reading week is coming and i am going to shift out of the place i am living now! HURRAY!!!!

June is in town!

2007-10-15T04:02:00.000+08:00

June rescheduled his flights so that he could come to London and pay a visit to me and check how i am settling in here.. ahah. he was suppose to fly off to LAX which i think he was so much more willing to do.. but HE DID NOT HAVE A CHOICE cos i did not give him one!

anyway, just like to welcome you onboard singapore airlines! nice hor? i wonder if i would qualify as an air steward.. that is after i do up my hair!

getting a puff outside jade gardens..wanted to go to four seasons for roast duck but the place was close cos of an electrical failure! amazing! but there were ducks out on the display le

His first ever musical! he liked Phantom a lot and the next time he is here we are so going to watch another musical again... but he stipulated that we cannot watch phantom again.. cos i watched it 7 times already.. and 5 times in Her Majesty's Theatre 2 times in the Esplanade

him trying to sleep and me trying to make a nuisance.. this was at like 9 pm in the evening and he just knocked out!~ swine!

he was dressing up to go to work already on the morning service back to Singapore... and i was. hmm about to go back to the dreadful place called hampstead..

DUCK AND CHAR SIEW RICE attack!

it was last wednesday when all these pictures were taken.. and most of us were smiling cos simply, we were in a chinese restaurant for lunch.. one that dari recommended us to go to lor! it was called golden pagoda.. and there was some minimum amount that we had to spend and when we saw that amount, our eyes nearly poped out la! oh my tian.. they wrote that we have to spend a minimum of GBP10 a person but luckily after some undertable talk with a waiter.. he said that he would bring it down to about 7 for us since we were pitiful poor pathetic singaporean students..!!!

dari and myself
gen and me... she is like super looking forward to the food. WHen the food came, the whole table was just dead silent.. well.. not really cos i was still talking cock and entertaining them and at the same time trying to finish my food, cos the girls were like staring at me.. and i was under undue influence to finish up my food.
mic and myself.. mic was another silent killer!!!
zhaoyang.. i need him wherever i go cos i can never finish my food and somehow he just finishes everything up like a vacumn machine!! ahah

and the thing that all of us came for... roast duck and charsiew rice!

i am tired..

hope everything goes well

hope all of you are fine.

miss you lots

bakkwa

Thinking of Home.. sometimes...

2007-10-10T01:54:00.000+08:00

Contrary to the generalisation that studying abroad is always easier, studying law in London ain't that easy after all. This is coming from someone who had previously did a stint at NUS and can do a direct comparison now. I suppose there is no more project work. Everything here is all is all about individualism, the atomic society.. or simplly i bo chup you and you will bo chup me. That is the mentality of things here. I suppose you cannot expect much city dynamics when you come to a bustling cosmopolitan city where people simple rush to work, rush back home and that is about it. Oh and besides that little afternoon socialising time at the bar and lunch... otherwise it is back to work. However,unlike back home, people here do not worship their jobs.. they simply seem to do it for the sake of doing it and you somehow seem to owe them a favour. Its just the way they reply you.. their total bo chup attitude to your existence. I think they rather you not be there, cos you are a liability to them...

I will remember what someone said to someone else just before i left...

" oh, you better study hard and try to get into the local university or else you will have to go abroad like him".

for your information, i so happen to overhear your conversation[ i did not eavesdrop]. I must say that studying abroad is a totally different experience, where you left to fend for yourself totally ( besides the occassional person who may visit you once in a blue moon). So little errands from applying to a telephone line to settling laundry has to be settled yourself. Unless you are self sufficient, i think you better not take the going abroad option

i had better add a disclaimer clause below:
I happened to choose the path to study abroad. If you do feel offended by the statement above (which you obviously should not since you actually dared to say it) then it is just too bad. I will not take and responsibilty, whatsoever, or be liable for any damage done (though there is no damage although i am sure you will conjure up something)

its a dream come true to be able to study in London. Sometimes a night mare i must admit. But i chose to come here so i shall bear all responsibilities. Eating out usually cost a bomb and eating at home aint much cheaper, but still cheaper. Somehow really think that there is something wrong with the way people price things here. Lets take an example, you get into a chnese restaurant and you pay GBP 1.50 for a bowl of rice. You walk into the supermarket that is just next door and you can buy a pack of rice weighing 1kg for GBP1.30. Like how good a deal that is right? that must be some monopoly controlling the prices of stuff here. Hmmm...

getting across the waterloo bridge is a real hassale. This picture is not what we get here in actual fact. This was taken the 1st week i was here. Now, it is wet and dreary and i have not seen the sun for 4 days already. I must get a really good artificial tan when i get home this christmas. The wind on the bridge can hit like 22knots/hr and how fast is that? i actually have no idea. All i know is that it is chilly out here on the bridge. Its like the only bridge that i cross multiple times a day.. cos my campus is separated by this bridge. The adminstration office at one end, the classes are held at the other end.
we decided to do a little pubbing in the afternoon and i think whetherspoons has like the best meal deals in London. hot food is scarce here and everyoe eats sandwhiches for lunch and dinner and supper. MacDonalds are far and few.. all i see is Pret and Pret and just more Pret, which is ah gor's favourite. My tummy felt really weird after i had some lentil and bacon hot pot soup from pret.. eeks.. anyway in the pic next to me is gen and zhaoyang...
this is Chinatown in London. this was in preparation of the mid-autumn festival.. or moon cake festival that we affectionately know it as. Moon cakes cost a bloody bomb here, not cheap indeed. A piece, without egg yolk, and of inferior quality cost like 3-4GBP or about 9-12 dollars
this is a once a week treat and i told myself i must make myself happy once a week or go on a sugar high. Krispy Kremes!!! there is one branch right outside the entrance of my school and it is really yummy when you have it with a nice hot freshly brewed cup of coffee... however the coffee here really cannot make it...

the HOSTel
i got a nice little room in Hampstead... which is a bloody 1 hour journey to school ( that is if the traffic is good and the weather is nice to you). Apparently it can take 2 hours on bad days.. like WOW!

a little messy, but if a student hostel is not messy, then it shuld not be called a hostel right?
a view of the "walk in wardrobe".. its where the towel is hanging... it is more like a bomb shelter where i can stand in...hahah
the view outside the room. I really like it on weekends when everyone goes home, leaving only the international students here.. (hint...) and its like.. its nice and quiet. I have been tempted to go out and take a jog, but it is simply too cold to do so.
... the prison sink in my room...

anyway i got to get back to work cos junyu is coming tomorrow and i am going to spend the whole 2 days out with him. So i hope that you are doing fine, cos i am and see you home in december all right!

See yah Mate!

~bakkwa~

my new name is now ~parma ham~

Pics Piics galore.....

2007-10-03T01:32:00.000+08:00

School has started already and i have been simply busy busy busy... the amount of readings are endless.. though i must say that there is not as much work as the cursed school that i was previously in! anyway... the weather here in London is weird.. we can experience summer, winter, autumn and spring all in one day and the seasons can be experienced in 20 mins... wow right? its really frsutrating simply cos you don't know what to wear out of home.. and that can be frustrating at times..

anyway, i did take some pictures of my little hostel room that is located at this beautiful place called Hampstead... it is like 1 hour away from school and that can be sickening when it is the peak hour and the trains are spilling over..lliterally... but i think it is quite a new experience. But i must say that i miss my baby.... haisz..

King's College Singapore Association gathering... rather.. lets get a little specific.. its the Law Fact Singapore Association... In front of the National Arts Museum
ANother shameless shot taken in front of the museum
At some pillar.. can't remember what it is called..
in front of some lion statue.. literally...

I MISS MY BABY.. haizzz
going to school wa slike a 15 min affair from home and i could just zoom zoom zoom and somehow i would magically appear in school....

ANOTHER PIC OF my baby....sighs
and back to London now.. a very typical shot of the Houses of Parliament and the Big Ben
Mic and Myself in front of the county hall
the great London eye
London is super rich in culture

super rich in terms of the number of people

has super nice food to eat

had what ah gor likes to eat.. Pret.. oh gosh...

but.. ITS SUPER EXPENSIVE! damn it!

i just want to go shopping but i will TAHAN till i come home for xmaz..

cheers mate!

bakkwa

more picssss

2007-09-26T05:05:00.001+08:00

My first visitor in London.... Junyu!!!! welcome to London!

We were at this yucky cafe across the road from his hotel and this boy was like cursing and swearing cos the service here was really bad. Singaporeans are really spoilt by good service.. esp on Singapore Airlines by our SINGAPORE BOYS... (Junyu is a fine example)

at the famous picadilly circus....

dear uncle dave came down to visit us.. he lives in derbyshire.. about 3 hours drive away from central London.
at the buckingham palace gardens.. the flowers were beautiful!

the official residence of the Britain monarch.. the Buckingham Palace

and there is this place called Bandstand.. like WOW! Maj Tonni Wei must have like borrowed the name of his piece from this place! ahahah

London is really lovely! this is county hall and the London eye on the south bank.

i should change my name officially to

...PARMA HAM...

ciaos!!

i love London.. but i miss my mee pok and prata

2007-09-23T03:51:00.000+08:00

farewells

2007-09-22T04:56:00.000+08:00

I will update at a later date. I am tapping on the hotels' internet connection now.. so i have to do this within a time limit. So pictures will suffice i suppose.

At the airport

dad, sista, mummy dearest and myself
curls and david

( someone insisted that i must bring the shirt to London.. so i am wearing it there now)
judy and yeye
dearest fiona and wendy
and the plane that is going to take me to London.

Farewell parties

Queen shan and myself
yeye and myself
ABS
queen shan, P. benji and curls.. at the lantern party
bye bye

random shots taken through the days

2007-09-11T00:51:00.000+08:00

Outing with the juniors

after like a 1 month planning process.. i met firdauz (fifi) for lunch in town and for a movie.. 1408.. it was supposedly a thriller ( that is what fifi said) and Ben Thia was scared stiff in the moive theatre... with his jacket over his head. Oh My TIAN is all i could say. He just had to scream to make it a perfect package.....i swear after this outing, i would never drive into town on a weekday. My parking fees cost a whopping 14 bucks....wow wow wow.. but this is supposedly cheap in comparison to the prices in other parts of the world.

Comparisons are always made about the cost of living in various cities... but i am still amazed how the use the big mac index to chart the average cost of living (is it extremely unaccurate). I think cost of living is actually about the same, regardless of the city you reside in... if you were to remove the currency in front of the cost price of items... and if you happen to be born in UK where the GBP is very strong, then it is basically just your luck.

Coffee Bean photo whoring....

sundays are meant to be spent at home.. rather, lazing around at coffee bean in serangoon gardens and (a) watching the world go by (b) satisfying my cravings for cesar salad (c) satisfy my caffine cravings (d) photo whoring (e) spending time with my little cousins.. i love it when the weather is great and i get to spend some time lazing there....

it was bloody warm when we got to "coffeebean".. but it started to cool down after a while la.. and it was really nice to sit outside.. (although we were a wee bit sweaty and stupid houseflies continuously attacked our food)....my little cousins were super thrilled when we went into the car wash at the petrol kiosk. Every spurt of foam from the hose or gush of water from the hydro-taps were followed by "WOW!" and " so POWERful leh!"... i love my little cousins

stacy and myself

stacy and brandon. Her milk teeth are starting to drop la.. ( that explains the blanks found)

the whole crew ( we are shot of the photographer though).. wendy, mic, stacy, myself and brandon

There it is already.. the end is here. Right here

This trip to UK brings tonnes of mixed emotions. On one hand, i would have fulfilled my dream of getting an education in London.. however, on the other hand, the efficiency of the college i am going to is really pissing me off big time. All letters received from them are usually in tatters and in horrible conditions ( i suppose we must excuse them cos the British weather isn't exactly mail friendly). But on the balance of it.. i think that is something what I must accept la.. things there are not going to be as efficient as Singapore.. even the queue to see a general practioner is about 3 to 4 days long. WOW... amazing right? i wonder how people survive there....

But another thing is that i may have to give up my music/ sax playing totally cos i may not have the time and may not be able to bring saxy over there with me ( cos the baggage allowance does not permit me to do so). Its the down hill spiral la. I have about 5 days to the last gig but still have no urge to practise already. Was just thinking of editing the score again cos i tot it was getting really boring.. but i was too lzay to rescore it all over again. I am sian. I think i hit the peak a wee bit too fast for this [ though i must say that i am quite satisfied with the recording that i did with miss zhou, except for the fact that the tempo was just too slow.]

That's All Folks

-bakkwa-

i am weird....so? Cos for one simple fact, i have already done my part.

ABS dinner at Carlton

2007-09-07T13:00:00.000+08:00

Another farewell dinner .. and this time with my darls.. ABS ... Somehow we always commit the same errorm but we never learn from our past experiences. After buffets, we would always curse and swear and promise never to eat buffets again. But we committed it again this time la. Amazing!!!

Went to Carlton for the International dinner buffet. [ this was after much consideration/ contemplation/ quarelling/ brain wrecking]. Shan sent us an sms earlier on to say that the minimal dress code was "smart casual". So... hmmm... its difficult to decipher what that means cos it can mean like

1. jeans with short sleeve shirt
2. jeans with long sleeve shirt
3. dress pants with dress shirt
4. dress pants with office shirt
5. dress pants with short sleeve shirt
6. t-shirt and jeans

so i took option 2 to be on the safe side. And the queen wanted to do her hair.. so i sat and waited for her... and i "wash and blew dry" my hair.. like some ah soh like that! But anyway, the salon staff said that it was common for guys to come and do that.. i was like.."errr...okaaayyy"!

Queen at the NK salon. Her hair was red already but she is still not satisfied and the people there kept on pushing her to buy the package thing. I think the hairstylist wanted to like slap me cos i kept on discouraging her to get it. It was an utter wate of money to get the package. THe staff were trying very hard indeed ( cos i think there must be a fat incentive at the end of it).
we committed the same error of eating too much again as usual. Frustrating la.. we were full to the point that we wanted to puke at the end of the meal... i wonder how much food we wasted.. cos some very ambitious popiah hawker (aka benji) tried to make a pipiah ( a cross between a pizza and popiah) and the waiter came to our table twice to ask if we wanted to remove it from the table. We stared at him blankly and we just looked as us.
the nightmare was just about to begin.... see the chopping board at the bottom of the pic...
check out this PI-PIAH ( a cross between popiah and pizza). both and shan did not dare to eat or even look at it la. So pai seh.
Durians were part of the buffet and benji brought 2 pieces in at the start of the meal. Luckily the hotel staff did not chase us out of the main dining hall or else it would be so pai seh. showing off our new CDs/ DVD from "THAT CD SHOP". Everytime i walk into THAT CD SHOP i always see an espresso machine, but i have yet to figure out what the hell it is actually used for la. Cos the ladies dun seem to serve anyone coffee... ahahahah.. i LOVE MARIAH!!

...shans and myself at the raffles city fountain....

...bye ABS...

...spoilt brat treatment...

2007-09-04T01:18:00.000+08:00

SPOILT BRAT TREATMENT
ah gor chioed me to go shopping with him cos he had a dinner function to attend in the middle of the week but he did not have anything to wear already.. ( that is according to him)... so off we went to all the major labels in town and it was raining so we did not get to Banana Republic in Paragon.. I ended up getting only some electrical apparaels from Apple Shop cos i am waiting for Curls to get her Isetan card...

Ended up at Sabai for lunch and i think we over ordered, but what is new about that.. especially the desserts la.. cos he could not decide what to eat, so each of us had like a dessert buffet and we had one serving of glutinous rice with mango ( he was craving for this badly)... and we ended up over eating... the bill for the desserts came up to half of the total bill la!! but the desserts were really good!! yummy!!

the yummy dessert.. of mango and sticky rice
....ah gor devouring the desserts....

NTU Concert

dasao, Jingyi and myself were wondering what to get for ah gor at the concert.. ( felt really weird cos this was the first time i was attending an ntu concert and not playing for them). So we decided to get something that was really loud and RARA... a big TIGGER that was about.. 70 cm tall in height when seated....

...Poor tiggy sitting at the CJC mezzanine before the concert started...
...ah gor, ben and myself. Tiggy was shedding fur already by then and there were orange threads all over ah gor...
... my dates for the evening... jingyi, da sao ( Rachael) and myself...
... Jiaying ( who just came back from US from some exchange programe) and myself... I miss playing with the NTU sax section... hais.. this concert, there were many people in the section who i knew. Wan Cai, Ah Jim, Jia Ying and Yu Zhong.

Supper with the DIVAS

this one no need for explanation... finally met up with indera and fazil after like.. hmmm.. i also not sure how long. I MISS THEM. kena cham cham from them thru the whole supper session at amk central...

weiye joined us for supper as well.. fazil was telling us all about his job and it seems like his work place has some really really interesting policies..

ANyway.. good nights..

see you soon and hope you have a great week

~BAkkWa~

Feasting like siao

2007-09-01T13:15:00.000+08:00

This week is just like makan fiesta... trying to finish as much food as i can before i fly off to London. The countdown metre stands at 18 today already... having a little pre-trip jitters but i suppose that is very normal la.. a new start to a greater tomorrow.. so i should i be looking forward to it.. hmm.. i suppose so ( and that is what ah gor says)...hahah.

Heard my dad speak about this restaurant at Hong Leong Gardens some time back [ and i promised xiusz that i would go try it with her], so we went in search if the place. There were 4 restaurants when we got there.. and we just went into 1 of them.. it's like guess work. But i think we stumbled upon the place that we were looking for.. [i can't remember the name of the place but, there are only 2 restaurants facing the expressway (a robatayaki and another one), and it is the other restaurant besides the robatayaki]. The place looked super authentic and the food was DELICIOUS.

I had some pork cutlet swimming in onion gravy. YUMMILICIOUS! totally... hmm it came with salad, pickles, rice, soup, the essential slice of watermelon and some starters... it cost $12. and the rice they use was not inferior stuff [ thank you so much!!!!]. Live prawn tempura was yummy too!! loved it. Xius was high over the onion gravy and was slurpping it down.. and searching for every single wedge of onion that she could find.

Teachers' Day...

It is actually teachers' day today la... but the schools celebrated it on friday cos obviously no one would want to go back to school on saturday.. went back to Rosyth to visit my teachers with Rueben. We were frantically looking for a rosyth crest so that we could take a pic.. but we failed to do so la and this was the closest that we could find....

MOOOOOOOOOOOOO.. 02s75 outing....

Jasmine organised a class outing to vil'age and we ate to our hearts' content at that place.. though i must say that the food was realli nothing great cos my roast beef was over done la... sian... it was like chewing on rubber with the hind still attached...

.. the cute MOO-MOO at the entrance of Vil'age..

..xiao ying and myself...

Xiao Ying piled a plate of salad so that we would get a good deal for 9.20 and the salad turned out like more of a rojak cos when everything was mixed and messed together it tasted really funky.. like a mish-mash of gooo... ahaah. We had.. hmm roasted squash, egg plants, capsicums, mushrooms, thai salad, coleslaw, salad leaves, potato salad, roasted onions/ garlic, apple salad, tomatoes and Broccoli.. it was hmm.. ekkss.. you can take a look at the pic above and you would understand what i mean....

this is serene.. another member of the "HI-5" cult...

had tonnes of fun during the class gathering and i was like sabotaged to drink the most as usual. We played some "Tuiiiiiiiiiiiiii" game.. and everytime we made a mistake we had to drink.. and it was either my partner or myself who made the mistake...hzzz.. but the time jaz, xy and myself got onto the cab.. we were like SEH already... but i must say that the Bungee bar is really a nice place and the drinks are cheap. ahaha. but a little on the diluted side la.

-bakkwa-

..2 weeks to preview of Beauty and the Beast..

when it comes to food please dun play play....

2007-08-28T14:08:00.000+08:00

oh... how would you feel if the bowl of noodles that you are eating in a restaurant that cost a stupid freaking $10 has actually been eaten by someone just earlier on... and you have been given that bowl of noodles by a waitress.. who like made an error by bringing it to the wrong table...

I suppose the waitress was oblivious to the surrounding.. to say that she is ignorant, non-observant, irresponsible, has a heck care attitude is just an under estimate i suppose. This is especially so if you are dining at a restaurant that is supposed to be famed for its service and food (and you are obviously paying service charge to fund the employment of ignorant air headed waitresses). The worst part of it is that the customers who got the "already eaten noodles" did not even know that the bowl of noodles they have eaten had already been partially dissected by someone else from the previous table. This PISSES me off totally and i made a snide comment to a total of 3 waitresses at the restaurant.

In the food and beverage industry, this would have been a major faulter in service standards. In fact this would not have been acceptable. Imagine if this happens on a plane.. i suppose you can even demand for a compensation. Take it to UK and you can say that Human Rights have been violated cos you had to resort to eating leftovers of another person without even knowing it and some ignorant waiteress/ waiter accidentally left it in front of you. You feel offended and your case would have been established.

But this is not something that can happen in Singapore... I would have held the waitresses head and screamed right into her face if i realised that my food has been ploughed into. Overtly disgusting is an underestimate to describe this situation. Thank god this would never happen in a coffee shop/ hawker center setting simply cos you have to queue for you own food. But in the restaurant.. the minute you step in, regardless of what damn price the establishment charges you for the food, you just have to pay. Most importantly you get charged10% of this wonderful thing called SERVICE CHARGE that you do not receive any of.

The only japanese restaurant in SERANGOON GARDENS IS CONDEMNED.

what is left is 23 days

2007-08-27T15:52:00.000+08:00

How i am feeling (aka Happy Index) = 0 (or neutral)
Listening to: "Where are you" and the "Water is wide" from Jenna, by Nobuya Sugawa

the clock is ticking down and i have about 23 days to round up whatever that has been done here already. Almost everything that has to be be completed has already been accomplished and settle. Just one more little performance to do before i fly off and lets hope that all would go well. Results for AB were out today...

Beauty and the Beast proto-type is already in the making. Saxophone score is completed... just have to brush up the piano part a little and it is going to be a great performance i suppose!!!!! Hurray! Missions Accomplished....

Farewell Frankie

Zhi jun is flying home in about 2 days from now.. so we had a Band B alumni gathering at Newton (a farewell party for him). It seems super long since i last saw uncle seng, zahid and josh. Super long... but all is well and all of them are well. That is great. We over-ate [what is abnormal about that]. The best thing that happened was the Zhe Guang has kicked his habit of coming late for appointment [at least he is really trying his best] cos he was realli punctual for once. [ he was about 5 mins late only this time]...

did not take a lot of group photos during the supper session... this was one of the nicer ones...

Princess shan needed to feast....

Shas woke up one day feeling cranky and she needed something to lighten up her day.. and she wanted me to suffer with her [ cos it meant that i had to eat something really fattening and unhealthy]... and the worst part of it was that she did not know where to go and look for it. She roughly knew where to go la.. but not the exact location.. so we went about looking for her Sungei Road Laksa Stall.. that just happpen to be behind new world center...

her ultimate comfort food on a rainy and dreary day was a nice bowl of sungei road laksa.. that taste.. hmm.. interesting... ahaha. Somewhat very different from the laksa that i have tried. It was not LemAK at all... instead there was a strong underlying taste of dried shrimp. There was no tau pok... just fish cake and harm( that i dislike). The chilli was pungent... but oily.. overall a new and interesting experience...it was like a tea time snack for me.. so i could like take time to savour it.. whils shan just like slurpped the whoole bowl.. in fact she had 2 bowls..

Free time?? a little la.. so i could play a little in the kitchen and try out some new stuff

Pommes Tarte Tartin.. granny smith and caramel pie dusted with icing sugar. If i did have enough time to let it cool the stupid icing sugar would not have melted and i could have whisked some custard and poured it over.. it was decent la...

Reverse apple pie with cheese... . saw a picture of this on food and wine magazine.. basically a soft dessert cheese turn over that is baked and frosted with icing sugar... served with charred caramel apple and vanilla sauce [ i cut down on the sugar so that the taste of the apple and the cheese could cut thru the vanilla custard]. Nice la.. cos my little cousins gobbled it down.

Hope that you are doing well

Its time to hit the gym for some cardio exercise before i gain more weight... and look like.. someone in "hairspray". It was totally an airheader show.. and i did not enjoy it. Was talking to ah gor while watching the show...

Bakkwa

-Loves Ginger, from Jenna, By Nobuya Sugawa-

photosgaloresss

2007-08-22T01:02:00.000+08:00

trying to like remember some of my stuff from uni last year so that hopefully i would have an easier year in King's college.

Lately princess shans has been pretty free and we have managed to go out twice in the past week... once to have a buffet at Hanabi.. and the other to satisfy the cravings of the princess.. [Sungei Road Laksa]. Was reading in Newseek today about something and i told shanz about it. Her first reply to my sms was "DIE!". It is said that people who hang out with others who are obese are more likely to put on weight more easily and become obeses themselves. Hmmm.. the magazine left it in a very frank way... but i think there is more then just primma facie stuff. It is a psychological thingy la.. cos some of them.. (me and shan are great examples) eat a lot and we tend to encourage each other to eat more.. especially when we need to binge (when we are sian or sad or cos we simply are too free). So i wonder whether that is good news or bad news la. But who cares.. i don't. Grow fat then grow fat la! Damn the research/study results.

Queen shan showing her LOOT from me at Hanabi during her Birthday celebration. We went back to Hanabi again[ like last week] and we sweared off buffets..!! [ that is something new for shans]
on our way to catch a movie at PS/Cathay. We failed to get tics at the stupid cinemas la.. damn it. Wanted to watch 881 then there were no shows.. and ah gor was happily watchin it at GV Vivo... should have called him la!!
THis was after the hananbi buffet... SHHHHH!!! please don't tell anyone we ate our bloody guts out.
It was Amy's bDay the monday after concert and Xius and Myself planted a surprise on her.. well we had super bad directions to her place.. [ cos may also did not know the exact address, so instructions were vague. Worse of all, xius and my handphone died before the surpise. Sian. so it was guess work and we had to guess which of the units' was Amy's.. cos we had NO idea!] How old is Amy?? hmm.. i shall not reveal!!!

s snap-shot with Xiuz's polaroid camera.. went round the whole of Hougang St 21 to look for the Polaroid film.. but could not find it.. somehow she dug 2 pieces out from somewhere and this was one of the shots.. taken backstage just before the show started.

Bakkwa

-what is done is done already. It is in memory [some kinda, regardless whether human or machine]. So let it be la. All i can do now is ponder over it and ask myself why i committed those errors. Errors not just in a technical sense, but in life as well. -

listening

2007-08-18T14:30:00.000+08:00

IT SUCKS TOTALLY

MY WHOLE DAY IS IN RUINS

DAMN IT

Thinking

2007-08-17T01:04:00.000+08:00

..I love my sax..

I need to be in love with it

with my principle saxophonist from sajc and sas

it is about 1 month and 2 days to departure date already... leaving ahead of schedule ( which was like 1 day from ah gor's birthday)... because the schedule might be a little too tight to finish up all the administrative work that is required.. like the banking stuff and phone line stuff.. but i don't seem to care much.. in fact i am still going to teach in school..

Must say that teaching in the primary school is so much more a joy than teaching in a secondary school. At least i do not need to fear getting beaten up or threatened by the students in class [simply cos they are small little kids]. arrrr... met Mr Au during one of the days when i was in school and i must say that Rosyth School Band is still the same as when i left. Maybe just a wee bit better... but it is nice to go back there and listen to the little kids struggle over the instruments [ esp the saxophones and THEY WERE USING ROTTEN REEDS]. Sighs ... they are not producing a nice tone at all.. in fact they sound like a horn that is used by the rag and bone man. I wonder why ah fatt is not doing anything about it at all..

The room is in total darkness now.. as i type this...and all i see is the screen and what is being typed [quite the the right?] and listening to "Where are you" from Jenna by Sugawa-san. Makes you think a lot. A lot might just be an under estimate. It starts it..... there is just one more gig left that i must finish before i fly off to London.... and i rescored the music that is required for this performance already. Lets hope that my pianist is going to be able to keep up... or vice versa.. cos i think the both of us are going to freak out[ what is new!].

Last Gig
Location: -n.a.-
Pieces:
Beauty and the Beast [ Be our Guest and Beauty and the Beast]
Sakura

...Hope that all is doing well for you...

...bless you...

bakkwa

Saints Presentation night... a Closing Chapter....

2007-08-12T10:28:00.000+08:00

...The Saints Presentation night...

this is like a closing chapter to all the performances with Saint Andrews Family le.. cos i am going to make my way to London already... it was really a great performance!! really! even though the *&^# was so-so... but heck it.. cos its over already.. took tonnes of pics. There is some problem with the order of the shots la.. but never mind la k..

With my dearest ah gor.. ( i am flying off a few days before his birthday)... he is the lao-bei-bei/ Maeda-san of the Alumni band.. the fixed chair player/principal player/(and sometimes only player) of the flute/pic section, the oboe section and the english horn section...
a quick snap shot taken by curls.. who was warned by the ushers not to take the photo.. but she did not give a heck anyway.. this was taken during "I need to be in love". Looking from the expression of my face.. it should be somewhere around letter B.
the SAJC and SAS saxophonist PLUS alumni saxophone section.. 3 generations of great players of the great instrument...
Xiuli waiting for me to dress up .. cos she wanted to take a shot with her polaroid... ahaha
That is it man..... heading to the exit of SCH after the concert...

A batch shot before the start of the concert... (left to right) me, Viddy, benji and guangz
... the saxophone RULEZZZZZZ...
with my 3 trumpet juniors from sajc
shafiq ( the farmer), Hayden ( the shepherd), myself (porkY) and bean ( the plant)
my darling nana and xiuli with their great piece oof art workk...during the last concert.. xiuli took a secret shot of me during a solo.. which i did not even know about at all
the s81 gang..curls, junnie meanie, myself, viddy and GANI-COW.. you lied to me that it was his aunt who wanted the tic and not himself..( he is so going to get it from me!!)

the future of the saxophone section... Justin( he is sec 1 and that explains why his uniform is white).
my dearest daddy and mummy here to support me during the concert...
another shamless shot with the liar
with prince** benji... backstage... during dress up
the sec 1 saxtion with a eupho player.. ahaha

with dear ali.. who came to the concert with a fellow saxophonist...

That is all liao...
No more concerts till i fly off..
i am tired.. need a break from sax..
maybe its just that pessimistic side of me that drains me so much
but.. there is never a losing battle to me...
it always a winning one.. and success is a MUST all the time..
failure is never a compromise or option
so perfection MUST be achieved all the time...

bakkwa

...a finale...

2007-08-08T14:36:00.000+08:00

had a performance with Saint's Alumni at Paragon last weekend.. and had a terrible sun-tan.. was super stressed .. thanks to ben.. but i suppose it was good practice before the concert.. to see how terribly i was going to screw up...

alec's KITchEn

...is open...

Starters..

Grilled shrimp with sea salt, scallops with orange foam and lump fish caviar ( it is the fake stuff not the real type)

Dad had some friends over for dinner and i had to slog... in the kitchen as usual.. to prepare a delicious dinner that was pleasing ( both in terms of aesthetics and taste)... everyone was happy with the food and so was i.. but i did not get to taste much of it...

...Salad course...

Marguro pepper crusted Tataki with a citrus seasonal salad with asian balsamic vinegrette..

happy birthday shann.. and sleep deprivation is not good

2007-07-30T22:10:00.000+08:00

it was the birthday of her royal highness on the 16th of July.. and i made sure i scoot my royal ass back from Tokyo on that day to join in the great celebrations of the day... however her royal highness was not free to meet her 2 princes.. what a disappointment. The earliest appointment that was available was about 3 days later la.. wah lao right????

Anyway.. after much heated debate between queen shan shan and myself.. we decided that japanese food would be the best choice.. cos (1) it was something that the queen really liked and enjoyed (2) there was a free flow of food (3) where there is a free flow of food, her royal majesty would be extremely happy.... SO off we went to Hanabi....

Before the food came.. she had to made sure that she was ready for the battle... to clear all the food that was on the table.. and hmm.. at least one serving of the 100+++ items that were available on the menu

Her birthday cake.. luckily we got a slice.. even though it did not look too nice... it was the tot that counts right? moreover if we bought a whole cake we would have a hell of a time finishing it cos we over ordered as usual...

the whole mass of food on the table... and we managed to clear all of it.. albeit a few slices of egg plant tempura.. but who cares? that is the cheap stuff...

...Chalet...

Viddy, Junie, Curls and Myself

Dave got a room at downtown east and.. hmm it was a rainy day.. SUX... but we had a good time playing with little kitty cats as well as a shaky time on the bridge at pasir ris park. It has been a long time since i last went there.. should make it a point to go there more often.

Stuffed our faces silly at Liang Court and at the Chocolate Factory [ cos curls had this bad craving and urge for the chocolate tart there] and after she downed the pot of tea.. our NIGHTMARE started...

We trotted off to Dbl-O and had a hell of a time... prancing on the dance floor and drinking [not much from what i remembered but substantial]. When we got back to the chalet at 4 am.. and we were kept awake till the next sun rise...

this is what happens to people when they are reprived of precious sleep... they get an attitude problem.. i swear that we did not leave the chalet half dead the next morning....

A photo taken just before we trotted off for dinner and clubbing!!!!

-bakkwa-

a tired piece of pork

Kumano...

2007-07-28T02:31:00.000+08:00

Bought this CD by this japanese pianist, Takashi Kako... music he wrote interprets the scene of a Japanese ancient trail into the forest. It is some where in between Osaka and Kyoto.. and there are multiple routes that have been developed over the years.. but there are 2 main categories.. one for the commoners and the other that is only meant for the royalties: the emperor.

Loverly interpretation of the scene. It invokes this sense of mystery followed by this suprise movement in the 2nd movement... This guy is a pianist however his part seems to be extremely simple. On the other hand it's the accpmpaniment that seems to be having a difficult time...

I would love to post the clips online but i am not too sure how to do it.. so if you know please drop me and email and i will post it up so that you can indulge yourself in the beauty of the music... and imagine that you are part of Kumano...

Kon-ban-wa

Katsu

-(i think it means pork in jap)-

Malacca Ekspress 2007

2007-07-27T09:46:00.000+08:00

A quick weekend break in Malacca was indeed very different... i was taken back to the Singapore of the 1960's. The place is a sleepy town (really sleeping as there does not seem to be any activities before 7am and after 5pm). There are not many tall buildings everywhere and tonnes of abandoned shop houses and shopping centers are everywhere. It is the type of place where people still seem to live in the Kampong era (unless you go to that Makotha area which is the touristy area of the town with 2 shopping centres).

We stayed at this little motel that set us back by about 20 bucks a night. It was a family owned business and to maximize space in the hotel, rooms were tucked in every possible corner of the hotel. Out room was supposedly on the 2nd floor, but it took us.. about 10 mins and about 5 to 6 slides of staircases to get to our room. Amazing.. it was tucked in a little nook of the building

Specs parade/galore at night... ahaha. I suppose many of us have started to wear contacts for the sake of convenience.. however we still have to get back to the basics at night.. ain't so!!! or else we would be blind bats!!.. ( myself, jolin and debs in the pic)

actually that is not much to see inn Malacca ( that is why 2 days was just sufficient for us). We spent one day looking at museums and graves and forts and the next day doing some shopping.. ( cos it was the great malaysian sale). Tonnes of exhibits for us to photo whore and this was one of them la.. lovely.. tried to look like a rickshaw puller but i failed terribly.

the famous suthdy's ( i think that is how it is spelt)... or it is also known as the red church. It was celebrating it's 230th anniversary... i wonder how people built such structures in the past ( or 230 years ago to be exact). The structure must have been a feat for the people in the past and there is a concealed drainage system within the building. The museum was kind enough to pry open a portion of the drainage system and use it as an exhibit.

Just another shot of the lovely church...

How can one come to Malacca and not get to try the Devil's curry ( or Debal's curry as it is affectionally known here). We found this little cafe in the flyer given to us by the Malaysian Tourism board... hmm.. looks can be deciving. We thought tat we had strolled into Hotel California.. as the place was super run down in the cafe and there was an alter at the entrance. It sent chills down our spines... hZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ... but they served a really mean version of the devils curry. I found it super spicy... but.. it was lovely!

Its time to start preparing to leave for London soon.. ( after all the performances).

This is the list of upcoming performances ..

Marsiling Malay Orchestra

28th July, 7.30pm at the Shangri-La Hotel.

Saint's Alumni Band Performances

-please refer to the saint's alumni band blog for more information about the perfomances-

5th August, 4.30pm and 5.30pm (2 sets) at Paragon Shopping Centre

11th August, 7.00pm at the Singapore Conference Hall ( a combined concert with SAJS, SAS, SAJC and Alumni Band)-bakkwa-

Tokyo 2007...

2007-07-16T23:52:00.001+08:00

I finally had a chance to get my birthday present.. cos i had the time to do some travelling and the destination of choice was of course Tokyo. That was no need to think... at all.. cos i just love that place. But before going.. i was warned of the screwed up weather there.. rain the whole day without a hint of sunshine, unless you are super lucky.. but who cares....

went with a tub of chicken rice ( for my dearest uncle Hikino) and an empty luggage ( so that we could do tonnes of shopping). But things were not that cheap anyway, so my sis and myself spent most of our time walking around, visiting shrines, window shopping, eating.. etc etc.. and I found a good place to get my saxophone stuff.. thanks to ah gor.

the shot was taken just before me bid farewell to uncle hikino at the hotel... before going off to the airport. I remembered the wrong departure time and i thought that we were going to be terribly late. However, the check-in queues were empty, so check in was a breeze and we had time to shop the whole shopping complex at the airport down first before flying off... the typhoon had just hit Tokyo then.. and apparently 2 planes before us made a turn around.. but our pilot decided to go ahead and fly.

How i spent my days in Tokyo....

Makan was of the utmost importance and our aim was to try every possible style of food that was available in Tokyo.. at least in the train station... cos there were just so many choices available. First meal was this large bowl of Pai-Ku ramen.. . My dearest uncle Hikino took up the deal where we had double portion of noodles for the same price as a single serving. It was a killer to finish up the noodles cos there was just too much. However it was simple delicious. The size of the spoon was about 1.5 times the size of my palm. So imagine the size of the bowl.

We found this cheap coffee place near Keio-plaza hotel that sells lattes for $3.20 ( Sing). Super worth it.. cos in coffee bean you pay about 5 bucks for the same thing.. and it was nice. You could top up a dollar and get a nice toasty sandwhich with it... yums...
day 3 was spent at the Tokyo disneyland. It was still pouring but who really cares. We were equipped with rain coats... and we tried all the rides possible..at least most of them. By them time we tried the one at criddleland ( some silly roller coaster ride that pluges 6 stories down).. it was about all we could take.. aahaha..
they have all sorts of nice photo spots to take nice/ weird pictures... haha.. the bars of this cell could be bent.. i suppose they did it so that people couls stick their heads out of the bars.. but then again, who would have such a big head? the bars were super far apart already.
then it was camwhoring at the gift shop that has lovely hats.. for all occassions.. if you want to look normal you can come here. It you want to look as if a monster's ass is perched on your head you can get the head that i had. Interesting... but i wun wear it outside though. Humiliating.

Uncle Hikino brought us to this lovely shrine at Asakusa.. a precint at the outskirts of the city. It was the last stop on the subway... Kok wee recommeded me to take a look at this place. It was a stark contrast from the city. The city had this totally laid back feel to it... and things seemed a tad slower then it was at the main city centre.
at the 5 story pagoda.. we only got the first 3 stories in.. cos it was a little too tall to get into the picture. Did some fortune telling there and the "sheet of paper" said that luck was on my way...@@@ hurray!!!!
Tsujiki market was on the agenda for this trip as well.. Have heard tonnes about it but never got to visit it at all. Interesting place cos it supplies the whole world with its fresh fish.. ( especially for sashimi). They clams and shell fish were all still moving... and there was fresh abalone as well... yummy.. but i went there on a full tummy so there was no space for any sashimi that i sweared that i must try this trip. ( but i did not unfortunately)
Just before heading off for the Bunkanrama hall to watch SUGAWA's performance.. we had a little free time.. so we popped by a karaoke pub.. it was called "one more". Little place where old aunties and uncles were singing to their favourite "enkas" and i suppose we were novelties to them. We sang english tunes and uncle Hikino..sang an enka( my request)... and tenessee waltz... nice!! and the hostess was super nice. She supplied us with tonnes of food and drinks... but i dun know what the charges were though.
Went up to Hakone for a day trip.. in the rain as usual. Saw a glismp of mt fuji and that was it.it was just fog fog fog... but the air was really fresh and we met some nice people who were on their way to catch the australian ballet in Tokyo before heading for a cruise in Alaska. We got a chance to take the Shinkansen back to Tokyo.. it was not as fast as a expected.. but was a good experience...

Tokyo was fun and this would be my holiday spot for summer 2008!! i will plan my travel such that i travel through there!!

bakkwa
- welcome home junie meanie-

2007-07-09T14:20:00.000+08:00

someone can hao lian le

congrats to my darling SSSSS cos she is a graduate now..

anyway.. i would be in sugawa land for the next week...

see you soon

Bakkwa

down-period.. chill and cool

2007-07-06T22:05:00.000+08:00

Someone once told me that since I started teaching in school i have become.. very fierce.. very very fierce ( to be exact). But since i am not teaching anymore, hopefully my I would not be so urr.. fierce. Kids nowadays are extremely different from the children once upon a time. I wonder why.. they are like rebellious and teachers must be like sharks (Escualo). they are oblivious to the happenings that are happening around them. Unfortunately for them.. i am not willing to tango with them to their liberty..

Pro-X Outing
Someone was missing and that was the empress shan shan. She was busy and could not attend this once in a BLUE moon outing of project X. Lane-mei, ah Liang, Brian, Janice, Elim, Ah Wei, Yingwen, Benji and Becky were there.. Joshy joined us like much much later after that.

We ate a tonne at NYNY and the food was errr.. SOSO only. Nothing fantastic cos i think hawker stalls can do much better food then that! But we had fun with the apple flavoured cotton candy.. which was overly sweet ( i suppose the name says it all.. Candy)

Ben, Myself, Lane-mei and Yingwen at Raffles City
Elim stealing my cotton candy.....

we ended up playing games at some game cafe.. (think it was called minds) and had a fantatastic time. Yingwen with her cheap cheap black black place joke.. wah LAO..!!!! - shall censor the rest of it just in case...

Bye Gani cow

Ganesh left for Monash and we gave him a surprise visit the night before he left. I was like super duper late and the crew( david and curls) were like desperatley awaiting my call as i was stuck at lao shi's place.. ( he was trying to see who could play saramouche faster).. my lao shi. Anyway, i had to drop something off at Ali's place and sort of gave her a little explanation of how to go about using the vocal-piano score for a sax-piano combi...

Reached gani's place at like 10.10pm.. about 1hr 40 mins behind schedule.. ( we have this puntuality problem and we usually don't tolerate late coming. But i was held up at lao shi's place so no choice.). Had a tub of ice cream and we sat and like had fun.. photo whored for like a good 40 mins. Had to dump gani after that ( that were order from him. He did not want to chase us out so he told us to be a little more zi dong and move)...and off we went for wonderful comfort food.. Teochew Porridge!!!!!

curls, myself, gani and david(below)

gani and myself

... a sparstic photo..

..bye Gani..

Bakkwa

the slippery slope

2007-06-27T23:48:00.001+08:00

curse singnet.. curse everything.. i am just in a totally screwed up mood.. my stupid internet has been screwed up as usual ( curse singnet again)..

my music is screwd ( sickening cos different people tell me different things) ..

i have hooligans to teach and babysit ( i can only blame myself for this)..

sick and tired of being a middle person ( friendship takes 2 hands to clap.. not a stationary hand and a vibrator hand. I will just drop it.)..

sick of food ( all the food sucks. If it is nice.. it will eventually cause a tummy upset) ..

have a bloody wisdom tooth problem ( must come just before the cursed exams)..

nothing is working out... why huh?

i also dun know why.

Maybe its the Apres un Reve kinda deja-vu feeling..

but i dun feel it.. i detest it..i can't submerge myself in that kinda depressing screwed up kinda mood on a permanent basis.

screw it.

Had a fun day.. OverEATING as usual

2007-06-23T00:24:00.000+08:00

Gani-Cow.. set off the panic alarm when he said that we needed to make a trip down to CMPB to do some applications for our overseas studies. But when we got there.. and after asking about 3 people.. GUESS what!!! they told us that there was no need to make a trip down at all... Yawns.. so tired... that place was so far from home .....

With all the hype about parad-ice at Golden mile hawker center.. (the belgain waffled place in a hawker center).. David, curls and myself decided to crash the place and give it a try.. cos we are dessert Whores!! business was steady and there was a perpetual queue at the dessert store.. and this is my review

Food Review
The set up of the shop front was somewhat very different from that of a normal hawker stall in Singapore. There was this food warmer as well as.. 2 little waffle makers. But i suppose with waffles so small, you do not really require enomrous waffle

3 waffles that came with a dark chocolate dressing
1 scoop of gelato.
Total Price: $7.80

Waffles were nice and crisp. However it was a little under baked. As a result of which, the caramel coat around the waffle was not even at all. In fact non-existent. ( 6.5/10)

Chocolate was creamy and had a slight bitter after taste. Good complement to the waffles. Waffles were a tad to sweet especially as the sugar granules were not fully melted. Glossy finish to the chocolate dip. (7.5/10)

Gelato was a total disappointment. By the time the gelato was scooped into the bowl, half of it had melted. Tried a Amerrato flavoured gelato. Tasted somewhat like expired digestives. Had a neiter here nor there flavour. Testure of the gelato reflected badly on the quality of double cream that was used in the gelato. (3/10)

Service was great! (10/10)

Conclusion.. when you go there.. just have the waffles and the chocolate dip and you would walk home feeling satisfied. I think if we did not order the gelato, the dining experience would have definitely been a much better one. But its value for money ( cos it is a one of a kind type of ang mo dessert in Singapore) and most of all, they have a monopoly (cos no one offers the the same product).

WIndow-Shopping.. and Eating spree

Lunch was disappointing ( besides the dessert). The entrees were yucks and i think DAVID got the worse deal of all. DAVID had Char Kway Teow with some vegetables and anchovies.. hzz.. looked like a novelty..but something i won't eat cos the kway teow and noodle looked like seperate entities. But the whole plate of kway teow was topped with blancjed vegetables... WOWOWOw! something new.

An hour after we finished lunch.. DAVID was starting to get peckish.. so we sat at starbucks for a while and pondered over what to feed him. But DAVID wanted to have a coffee bean cesar salad and the nearest branch was in Suntec. So guess what? those 2 evil souls.. happily walked off without telling me that we were abandoning our starbucks coffee break.. Hzzzz... so we took a walk in the sweltering heat over to Suntec.. that was about 50 miles away????

Started photo whoring there and David was saying that i seldom mention his name on my blog. SO i thought that i would try and use his name as many times as possible in this entry. hope you like it. We were caught up making monkey faces at the CAM and i hope the people sitting next to us did not mind. Curls got a shock of her life when David spotted a cockroach. David told the service crew about it.. and guess what??? they were cockroach-PHOBIC too.. and it took 2 of them to remove a cockroach that was 1.5 cm in length...hzzz

Then David dumped us so that he could have his hair cut and go for his Akkido.. hoped i spelt this correctly. Anyway.. we walked off to Meida-ya... and had some delicious ramen.. and i was not full la.. so i ate another serving of Mapo-rice ( Mapo-dofu served utop white rice). It was really quite nice... but with the tomato salad and ramen churning in my tummy.. i was really a tad too full...

Someone must have still been very hungry after the meal... cos she was after my finger... but dessert at Chocolate Factory was great... and so was the takeaway from Tam-po-po for mum. Thank you so much to the great restuarants/cafe/stalls that provided such great food. I would miss you all the most...when i ciao overseas...

bakkwa

-David's name is mentioned 8 times in the blog entry-

abams...

2007-06-21T11:34:00.001+08:00

as the day comes closer.. i am getting more bloody frustrated. Now i have one extra neck and one extra mouthpiece.. and i am lost as to what setup to use...

should i use
Custom M1 lacquer neck with s90 (170) and the rico lig or
Custom EX Sliver plate G1 neck with s90 (170/180) with the rico lig or the selmer lig
Custom EX Sliver plateG1 neck with the Vandoren mounthpiece and selmer lig/ rico lig

then next i have to consider the reed size...
Vandoren 3.5 or 3.....

the reviews about the M1 neck is true.. the resistence is much higher in comparison to the G1 neck. I think that this is partly due to the difference in the angle of attack of the air. The M1 seems a tad steeper in angle in comparison to the G1 but both have the same bore size... How i wished i had a lacquer plated G1 to use.. i know of someone who has it but doubt that the person would lend it to me. Yamaha takes a freaking 3 months to import one stupid neck into Singapore. FRUstrating...

I am going to try more setups.. till i get the perfect one.. but that is if my eye ball does not pop out while i attempt to play my sax...

bakkwa

continuation from the previous post

2007-06-16T15:21:00.000+08:00

How to make a bak-chang.....

just 5 pics... so this is what happens...

first you start off with a PILE of food that can feed 20 people for the next 3 weeks....
then you fold the leaves.. and hopefully you pass the test of one of the many expert wrappers around.. cos they will have to redo it if it is not UP to standard... ( the death pot is being prepared in the background.. the charcoal stove is where it would be places on)... a little bit of snapping has to be done to ensure that the bak changs are aesthically pleasing...

then you tend to fumble a little.. unless you are an expert ( my aunt is a beginner just like myself)

then you wrap up the little morsel and make sure that it is tight and nice. Moreover the edges have to be sharp and obvious. if they are loose.. the bak chang would be soggy ( and hence you fail the ultimate test)

TA-DA.. the final product... and now it continues into the DEATH pot for 2.5 hours... Byeeeeee

Makan Fiesta.. Krispy Kremess.. YUMMY!!

2007-06-16T14:53:00.000+08:00

Visited my favourite Sushi joint on earth ( ichiban Boshi) again this week - i think it is about time that they give me a GOLD- CLASS life time membership cos i frequent their outlets about once a week.. sometimes even twice. Was at the greatworld branch this time where there was a fish market next door and i decided to give this item on the menu a try.. "live tiger prawn tempura"... I swear that after eating this.. no other tempura is going to pass my test ever...

The prawn was fresh.. what other word can be used to describe it. FIRM, succulent.. Juicy.. delicious... taste like the sea ( something very dangerous cos it can mean that it is TOXIC). they grilled the prawn heads for us as well.. (super calorie/ cholestrol laden.. ARRR but who gives a damn anyway)...

THE ARRIVAL of the Krispy KREMe

David got back from London on thursday.. and i happened to be at the airport to see sajc + darl B off.. but that GUNDUsamy did not call me la. Anway.. but curls and myself met him the next day.. and after 3 weeks of patient waiting.. we got out SNUFF.. the round snuff.. filled with chocolate/ plain.. soaked in wholesome goodness ( OIL).. then drenched in ymummlicious fattening heart attack blood vessel chocking sugar syrup.. WAH BIANG! is yummy! Got a sugar high on the krispy kreme that we attacked at Ah Teng's Bakery. It was just awesome..

David's RayBAN shaddy's that he KOPED from somewhere in Europe.. Selling price approx SGD200. Buying price = $0!!!. Took this at Ah Teng''s where we had the shittest lunch ever. Maybe Makansutra should go interview the chefs at Ah Teng.. and they might fail Seetoh's test. However we must not forget that a little red packet filled with vitamin M would make seetoh recommend this place regardless of how shitty the food is... the food was YUCKS. and the BILL was a whopping 85bucks... holly camolly!!!

Curls has become an official addict of the Raffles Creamery.. which i do not thiink is anything great at all.. and the prices are double of that of Island Creamery... hzzz.. but High Class mah.. i suppose you pay for tha ambience..( house flies/ fan and ratty tables). That is the whole Raffles Hotel experience mah... hzzzz... anyway.. WELCOME home DAVID.

Bak-Chang FESTIVAL
not too sure what this festival is called.. i think it is the Dragon boat festival. But i suppose it is quite a norm for festivals to be associated with tonnes of food....

chinese new year = associated to any other edible foodstuff found on the planets' surface

mid-autumn festival = moon cakes and fine teas

Dragon boat festival = BAK chang...

anyway.. my aunt arranged for a bak chang wrapping session and we churned out like 240 bak changs after like 3 days of work.. from the washing of the leaves to soaking them.. and getting the ingrediants cooked and tossed in their own essences... ahahaha... we used.. 10kg of rice ( that is about 3 weeks of supply for my home).. plus 8kg of pork ( another 3 weeks supply of meat) and etc etc..

super unglam... but its at home.. so only my family members see me...ahaha. But those were the dumplings that we made. YUMMY is the only word i can describe it with. and if they are drenched in Tomato Ketchup (specifically Heniz).. wah lao .. its just over the top....

the final babies.. just as they were to enter the death pot to be boiled alive for 2 hours...

bakkwa..

-hope you have a great week-

-alumni is starting so make sure you come k-

A happy meal + fun + Beach Fiesta = A better day

2007-06-06T23:51:00.000+08:00

Cycling at the ECP... luckily it did not rain...

We were crossing our fingers that it would not pour.. or else ashy, pamy, xius and me were going to end up as drenched cyclist along the beach ( something that we did not want at all). And guess what.. it DID NOT RAIN.. lovely weather in fact.. with a tad too much head wind that made cycling too tiring...

A lovely Happy Meal ...courtesy of Mac's.. started our day.. they forgot to give me something.. the BOX!! but i got a princess Fiona toy that was really redundant...

After all of us got some grub from Macs we were off for our expedition that took us down East Coast.. we stopped at several jetties along the way to gaze at the lovely airplanes that took off from Changi Airport... tonnes of Singapore Airlines B777 variants.. as well as Emirates. There was a point of time when 2 B777 took off at the same time and roared over us... ROARRRR.....

"the the" photos of xiuz and pamela... they wanted to "add words" into the picture... so i added it - literally- for them...

Ashy and myself.. check out the grey clouds at the back.. it was overcast to be exact.

Had a yummy feast at some ayer rajah food center with xius after that, where i taught her how to eat Indian Rojak.. hmm.. rather i introduced it to her. .. and she enjoyed it! Had to rush off to Courts after that( albeit getting lost after dropping xius at home) to check out some changes in the display cos i am going to start work... hzzz...

KaNI - Fiesta ... the season for snow crabs.. seem a little too late isn' it????
Ichiban fiesta was having a kani - fair and how could i resist it... it was absolutely YUMS.. but just had a query.. isn't it too late for Hokkaido snow crabs now?? I think the name of the crustacean means something.. the best time to devour it is in winter and not now.. which is like spring/ summer... arrrrr.. but who cares.. as long as it is not FARMED! cos farmed fish is poisonous...

what was left of the Kani.. after i had devoured it all...

Have a great week ahead...

-Bakwkwa-

-misses shans-

I wonder at times.. is it really such an important thing in life? What is so wrong with a "SL"? does it really matter? why are people.. well some people who i know oh so desperate to get into a "RS"? sorry to say.. but at times.. you make yourself look so "C" to me.. not "C" but rather "D". Frustrating. When you get into an "R" and after that things start not to "WO" then you start whinning your heart at me.. when i told you that there is "NP" getting into such a thing yourself. Totally frustrating. Anyway maybe it is better to let you have a taste of what you have asked for then you would be able to learn your lesson. But just a piece of advice... if you know that you are not of very good " Q" yourself, please be "H" and find someone of "SC". Dun go around bitching and making yourself look like you are such a "HC" and "D" to "P"

1 week of freedom and free time..

2007-05-31T17:41:00.000+08:00

i don't know how to undo the underline funcition. This is irritating but i shall continue typing...

An Air-headers outing

Had a one week break off teaching and my other side-line job.. so i tried to catch up with friends who were having their holidays.. During the holidays, isn't half of Singapore suppose to be out of the country since so many people are trying the budget airlines now?? then why is it still so croweded in town .. ahahha..

went out for dinner with anslee.. after about 5 months since our last dinner appointment and we went back to the same place and possibly the same table to be exact ( Ichiban Boshi at Wisma Atrium). I think Ichiban should give me a loyalty member (Platinum) card cos i go and eat at their sushi bars so often. Was a joy to meet the air head.. and she gave me a treat.. wow wow wow!Cos i treated her too!!! (not funny).

We ended up eating tonnes of food and continued on our food spree at Taka food court and at the fruit stall ( just to get our daily dosage of fibre intake). Had a talk about some issues.. especially the controversial ones.. but i suppose my stand with regards to that issue still stands regardless of what others say. I was thinking of organising a section lunch too.. and of course it would be my treat. We would have to see whether our schedules meet la cos the sajc kids are flying off to NZ in about 2 weeks from now so the schedule seems rather packed.

Indian- Fiesta

You have to be thrown into a " deja-vu" feeling at timess.. and this time it was Anna who felt it especially cos we brought her back to the same place for dinner.. it was where we had dinner before she flew off to Minnesota to further her studies.. it Chutney's at Wisma.. the food was yummy... from left to right in the picture.. plain naan, Chicken Vindaloo ( that was feaking one hell of a spicy), Fish Tikka Masala and we had vegetables with cottage cheese.. absolutely fantastic.. and i am sure that the calorie / cholestrol count after the meal must have exceeded the limits!!!Colleen was so scared of the Chicken Vindaloo that the girl just like concentrated on the potatoes that had all the gravy cleaned off..

Audrey ( Miss Lok) was there to grace the occassion for us.. it was so difficult to invite her cos the primma donna was about 1 hr 12 mins late.. and we were about to finish dinner when she finally arrived and we watched her "vacumn"her whole serving of Bryani by herself. In addition she was helping us finish our food too!! ahaha.. Masala tea was really nice and soothing on the throat!!

We went for soya bean curd after dinner and i swear that the eyes of the guys around us were stuck on Joanna.. ahaha.. she just has to be clad in such flamboyant clothes when we go out..anyway.. it was ultimate comfort.. albeit the little uncomfortness as we squeezed as a little table that risked being banged down everytime a car got into the car-park slot....

Singles- Club Picnic
It was picnic time at Fort Canning today. It was amazing that we were the only picnickers at the park today.. and that was good. I found a way to stop ants and other bugs from coming close to the mat and that is to sprinkle some medicated oil over the place.. we did not get mosquito bites!!!

We picked up the barang from Meida-ya at Liang Court.. and that cost a bomb in itself.. i don't remember exactly what we ate.. but i think the list goes something like this: chiken katsu bento, ruffles chips, sandwhich assortment ( we had 2 boxes of that), Florida's Orange juice, some filled buns, Potato salad, 2 tubs of green salad, some pasta salad ( that was absolutely yummilicious) and some cup cakes that terence sponsored for our outing.. ( they were white chocolate/ banana filled)..

Had a stroll around the place and i think that i was a little ashamed cos Ceilia( my sista's friend from UK) seemed to know more about the park then the 4 of us knew.. super pai seh la.. and Laxy did not seem to help us much either.. cos he just sat there and enjoyed his cherry tomatoes.. which did not look too ripe to me lor...

Went to Island Creamery after that and i managed to search the photo that i took with Debs and Andrew that.. what a deja vu feeling. I went for ice -cream with them there on my last day of school.. haiss.. i miss my bitch partners.

Fiona and wendy
At island creamery with the SHREK ears
Me Trying out Fiona's new CK sunnies and Wendy

Hope that you have a great weekend ahead.. cos i hope mine is going to be great too...

Bakkwa

hope that everyone is fine...

2007-05-19T10:47:00.001+08:00

Over-Eating...

For the past few weeks.. it has just been work work work and more work.My life revolves around kids, school kids to be exact. Luckily the frustration is going to end in about 1 week from now. But what is going to happen to them after that? All I hope is that a new teacher ( a trained one from NIE ) saves them la. Or else they are more or less... Hmm.. i shall not comment on that.

Frankie is home from America! Hurray! But he is gone again. The jet setter has flown to HK for a vacation with his mum. After which he would be going to Belgium to work as a supermarket cashier ( sounds really interesting) and he would tour France with his mum again.. Hzzzz... But anyway, i caught him while he was back in Singapore.. twice to be exact... and we just ate our whol afternoons away...

They were trying to hide from my camera here.. ahaha.. guang on the left and zhijun on the right
Our Yummy lunch.. at some Tonkatsu Restaurant.. extremely costly but not fantastic i suppose

Bye Frankie! see you soon...

SAJC SYF 2007

Another major hurdle this year is over.. and that is the JC SYF. Sajc did a fantastic job.. and i am super proud of my section.. lets see.. it includes Gabriel, Esther and Ruiqi (Sax I/ Sop Sax) Dot, Hafiz (Sax II) Ansley and small tau (T. Sax) and Yi Xiong( B. Sax).. Fantastic job! I swear that i did not scream my lungs out after hearing the results.. its the usual rollercoaster of emotions.. cos the emcee just has to pause every after she announces the name of each school.. Hzzz...

I missed CJ... cos Me and Xius were locked out of the auditorium.. or rather our plan to sneak in failed cos someone caught us when we tried to come in from a back exit.. and the woman was really bitchy! Curse you!

At the reporting area...

02s75 gathering at Waraku...

Finally got a chance to meet up with my Jc classmates.. half of which are flying off to America to be slaves in some amusement park. They opted for this holiday work programme that i think King's would not offer.. anyway.. most of us were there.. besides a few outcastes.. and we had a jolly goodtime..had a big debate cos the girls- who are now graduates - refuse to give us a treat.. and we were like quarrelling over the meal... ahaha..

Ended up at settlers' cafe.. and i got a VIP card cos i brought a big group there.. ahaha had tonnes of fun but the girls need to work and Yufen was visiting the zoo the next day.. so we needed to pack up and leave early..

hope that everyone is okay...

Bakkwa

JC Central Judging

2007-05-12T13:04:00.000+08:00

It's finally over. The past few days has been extremely tiring for the kids in school. Everytime i go down for rehearsals and i can sense the anxiety and frustration that is going on. Air Head must have been quite stressed cos the section has been said to be the weakest link in the band. Luckily, everything that i told them to do (rather most of it) materialised, besides the minor technical errors of squeaking. being a saxophonist for a number of years... there has been this difficult position i think that saxophonist have been trying to struggle with.. something like an identity crisis... and till this point of time, i still refuse to give in.

A saxophone.. is not suppose to sound like a horn. Just like every other instrument in an ensemble, it has a unique sound quality and timbre that, supposedly cannot be imitated by any other instrument. However, we have been permanently been forced to sound like a (i) french horn (2) cor anglaise (3) a clarinet.. etc etc. But has any other musician ever imagined asked how they would feel if they were asked to produce a sound like this? An identity crisis occurs when there is a gap between (i) a general appraisal of the public -i.e. people like conductors and other musicians and (ii) a musicians personal goal and aim. Maybe la.. i am just saying, it could be this difference that results in this conflict. Ah.. but whatever la.. as long as you are not a saxophonist, it is difficult to try to make you understand..

At times.. i feel that people take things for granted (this is just some second thoughts about someone). Not realising that that someone there is trying to protect them and trying to uphold something... that something that everyone has in mind, but refuses to admit and say that they are working towards that. Hais. It was really disappointing to hear that (i) that someone is really disappointed cos she thinks that the others are not doing enough and (ii) the others think that she is just doing a tad too much and sort of spoiling the show. Maybe, a conflict of interest. But since the interest they have at heart is so similar here, then where does the conflict lie? Maybe it lies in the fact that the others refuse to admit their goals and to work together with that person? Or is it because the majority veiw matters so much that it influences the others to think likewise? I wonder.. and ponder..

...bakkwa...

squealed during lunch

Nostalgia

2007-05-07T12:28:00.001+08:00

back in that familiar corridor/ walkway

that familiar scent/ pungent smell

that chattery sound/noise by the monkies

the stampedes when the bell goes/ students running down the steps, ignorant of what is ahead

work is fun when there is nothing to do..

but it is when there is nothing to do that it gets ultimately boring. Time crawls.. but thank god i have no marking to do at all. Or else i would be dead, cos i would get high blood pressure and my vessel would most probably explode.

The things i come into contact with come in exactly 5 sizes... there is extra small, small, medium, large and extra large and i have tried the whole range.. besides 'small size'. But it is not as if i am dying to try it yet but i suppose it is just a matter of time that i would come into contact with those monkies!

Was disappointed when one of my plans was rejected. Hais. i disappointed someone and i am even more disappointed myself. We though that we could spend a bit more time together before i fly off la. But it was rejected. Sad. Disappointed. Maybe it is a trade off. But let it be. It was all my fault anyway.

There is this communication breakdown... maybe. Possibly. but i don't know why. Maybe its just the musician part of me that refuses to barge. I just want to remain like how i am and be like how i am. But it makes me feel awkard i must admit. Ahh... but let it be. Snorts. I have one week of freedom at work before i encounter all the sizes again. I never knew about a lot of things when i was once in here myself. Maybe it is just pure ignorance. Maybe i refuse to accept their presence. I shall pick option 2. They just need to open up their eyes and take a look at the harsh world out there. But there seems to be this refusal. how huh? can someone do it for me?

Bakkwa

- was at his workplace, snorting during lunch break-

Nostalgia

2007-05-07T12:28:00.000+08:00

back in that familiar corridor/ walkway

that familiar scent/ pungent smell

that chattery sound/noise by the monkies

the stampedes when the bell goes/ students running down the steps, ignorant of what is ahead

work is fun when there is nothing to do.. but it is when there is nothing to do that it gets ultimately boring. Time crawls.. but thank god i have no marking to do at all. Or else i would be dead, cos i would get high blood pressure and my vessel would most probably explode.

Bakkwa

- was at his workplace, snorting during lunch break-

a misjudgment? i hope so.. and i will just leave it.

2007-05-02T23:22:00.000+08:00

Working at a place that I have been in before.. just brings disappointment.. (not a sense of deja vu or nostalgia).. maybe this is why ah gor refuses to step back into camp after leaving it.. maybe this is what they mean by leaving and not turning back at all..

I really wonder what makes people stay in a place like this.. or what value is left in this place. Maybe its just for the sake of maintaining it.. or keeping it. I never knew that such a scenario ever occured in the past. It could possibly be because i have ignored it totally when i was there. How do the people ever tolerate it? Do the misbehavours actually know what the hell they are doing? can they ever be mature enough to understand it?

It could just be as Roger said this morning.. that we have to try and understand it from the perspective of the student rather then from the point of the teacher. But how can we do so? it is just so difficult to take that perspective. Easy said.. uneasily done i must say. Hais.. i wonder how Ee-mien took it.. i was telling the kids all about the empress.. and they were like WOW! but it did not have an impact on them. Are they on the doom path? i hope not.. its just one day and there are so many thoughts that are flowing through my mind ...hais..

bakkwa..

a quick breather and its back to work

2007-04-23T20:08:00.000+08:00

SQ 113( operated by 9V-SYG), KUL-SIN, delayed by 1 hour...stupid plane

A quick break.. and its back to work again..

Outing with darl-S

Met shan like finally.. and i think the last time i met her was easily.. 3 weeks back or maybe even longer. Hopefully i would get to spend more time with her durng this term break before she officially starts her work life and i start my "dream" school life. Hope the plans will materialise! anyway.. we feasted our way through the evening.. met the princess at vivo and we started having high tea at Bakers' Inn.. that was shortly by dinner at Smith street (si-mi-shi jie).. food was not too bad la.. but pasir panjang still has better la la.. ahah..

Went to watch a show that was hosted by jeff, super interesting, but our interest wore out after a while and we got back into action..taking tonnes of shots.. as usual.. i had to dump darl-s at home after that as i had to rush to the airport...

Chinatown cam-whores in action...

Kuala Lumpur

It has been a long time since I had a family vacation and this time, we decided to make a short hop over to Kl to visit my aunts (my mum is a KL-ian) and of course to savour the yummy street food. Luckily we did not get any tummy upsets...

the drivers in malaysia are the most horrific that i have ever seen.. trust me with that.. making u-turns at speeds of 80km/h, using their mobiles at the same time, cutting across 3 lanes at the same time.. and guess what.. a traffic police is there and oblivious to all that has been happening.. hais.. the traffic signals assume that all pedestrains are sprinters... you have about 15 seconds to cross a 6 lane road.. and that is if the cars or bikes are willing to stop for you..

maybe Singapore Airlines should consider making their flights to KL a wee bit longer... cos.. i think the flying time.. was about 35 mins.. which made that.. 3 mins of cruising, 16 minutes of climbing to cruising and 16 mins for descent.. amazing.. a drink and before you know it, we are preparing for descend into KL already.... but i suppose this is how they make profits from this flight..

Yummy street-side peanut pancake
the ultimate comfort food.. cesear salad,via room service at the hotel.. yumms
the view of the petronas towers from the pool side bar.. really nice.. not too near to make it daunting yet not too far to make it feel insignificant

my dearest aunt mei-ling who went through a lot of trouble to plan this trip for us. Thank you so much..

before the trip to KL i had a few days of spoilt brat treatment with ah gor.. hmm and i think i spent a fair bit.. i think i got a total of 4 tops and a pair of berms while shopping with him.. plus maybe a few kilos gained from the food we ate and.. a big hole in my pocket.. haha..

got to get back to work le.. the feeling of this is bad.. but i suppose taking too long a break will make me a fat courch potato.. hope that work would be fun! oh.. and bye EddY!!!!!

Bakkwa

-snorted and whined-

hais.. i dun know what is happening.. but if it is meant to be like this then i suppose i just have to let it so. I did not say anything and i made sure i did not say it.. but whatever la.. maybe things have changed after all.. something that is more often than not beyond my control.. so i just have to let it be i suppose.. but lets hope that things do not turn out the way i think that they would...

Hi

2007-04-22T13:39:00.000+08:00

My internet is down.. so the only form of communication i have with the rest of the world is via my mobile phone.. hope that everyone is studying hard for your examinations.. work hard and see you after you finish your battle k.. for now.. ciaos..

bakkwa
* SAS kids.. please don't be down cos you guys got a gold medal k. Results are never the sole aim in life... cheerios!

it's over.. mixed feelings.. confusion..

2007-04-07T16:34:00.000+08:00

MOOT is over!!!!
moots are really fun i must say... 1 year of hard work for 12 minutes of fame.. well not really fame.. but.. my tutor was lovely!!!.. This pic was taken after the moots..
In the classroom in the post-moot celebration

I miss my darlings....

My bitching partners in school.... today was the last day le.. i am going to miss you people..

Had a bloody sleepless night cos i kept on thinking about the possible questions that they could have asked and how they were going to torture me when i was up at the podium.. but unfortunately what i thought about was not asked.. on the contrary the very simple, basic, nitty gritty type questions were asked. Those kind of questions that you would never expect from a typical bench.. and Helena admitted that the bench was HOT..

anyway, its time for celebration!!! hurray!!!

Porks

LIfe..Haizz...

2007-03-28T17:24:00.000+08:00

It seems so near.. but yet so far..

time is illusionary.. sickening i must say..

It seems like it is just moots left and i would be pretty much done for the rest of the term. Thank gosh, cos i am on the verge of jumping off the cliff. Looking forward to the upcoming trip that i am going to make, really in need of that...

My musician life is going to come back again.. ahaha..hurray.. i must say that life as a musician is really enriching.. but too enriching sometimes.. it makes you think too much, see to much, feel too much and at times ask too much. But that is what life is all about right? Suppose to go and help sajc.. but i really wonder whether i would be able to render much help to them... stress!!..

just some nostalgic photos that i found it my vaults ... i think they were all taken at birthday parties.. the former is from my cousins' party and the latter is from... princess elims' 21st party i think..

bakKwa..

Have a cool day and i hope that everything goes fine for you! cheers! "kampai!"

I swear i am not pissed.

thank goodness

2007-03-23T22:14:00.000+08:00

A New Beginning

I miss my sax.. and i think i have not touched it for too long.. and i have my grade 5 coming up in July.. Oh my tian.. but thank god i have a little more time for myself now.. i shall take this opportunity to try and get over some stuff... rehabilitate.. rest.. get plenty of it.. before i prepare for the next dash..

I think this NUS education has made me forget about something.. and that is how to be a normal human being.. i remembered calling darl-B on a Friday.. and asking him what normal people do on Fridays.. cos i was just so bogged down by the bloody assignments and readings that i forgot about everything else.. well rather not to act under automatism.. the school exerts undue influence on us.. resulting in us getting an unconscionable bargain that we have to accept under the threat of duress. Since we are a privy of the agreement and we have accepted the offer, breaking a condition resuts in a repudiatory breach. If we give sufficient notice, we would not be threatening them!.. "F!" law school... really! Lets hope everything is going to be better after this break..

NTU Sourjourn Rehearsal.. DEEP purple Medley..

Totally New Beginning..

Maybe after this experience.. it makes me treasure what i just got hold of even more. Safetly speaking, i am not the only person who is doing this.. thank god that there are other people doing it too.. and i am really happy..cos i think i need to save not just my ass.. but my bloody life..

I am really looking forward to the new experience.. new life.. it will be a revolutionary change.. but i don't really care.. cos it is what i was yearning for.. i must make sure i recover from the NUS disease before i conquer the next hurdle.. cos i can't let myself down this time..

Bakkwa

All were there.. but i could not try any..

2007-03-10T03:11:00.000+08:00

all the 3 types of saxes were there in music plaza.. like finally.. but.. i did not bring anything to try them.. SIANSz.. i hope that i have not been black listed by them.. ahaha..went with Darl-B for lunch today.. hais. i think i have like sort of got NO social life at all.. going out with Darl-B is like something i have not done for a long long time..

Somehow, i think the people working at Music Plaza have no idea what they are doing. When i asked the guy about the sax, he told me it was "custom made" and it was really "customised".. aha.. i was appalled by what he said...!!

Bakkwa

Maybe.. tat is about all..

2007-02-27T16:04:00.000+08:00

Happy Lunar New Year to you!

Gong Xi Fa Cai.. and Cai yuan guang ji

Well.. new year this year was ultimately pathetic la.. but i think i had a good 2 day break.. a well deserved one i suppose... but i did not really get to go out cos i was busy at home with CNY preps and all that.. did not even manage to take many pictures at all, cos it simply slipped my mind. Had some time to spend with my family and of course some time for myself and my darling friends... and lots of yummy food to top that up

My little cousin.. stacy.. who is hmm.. 6 years old .. super cute
to eat with vengance.. was the motto this new year

ultimate feast at Minottee's at City Hall..

an of course an ultimate bill to top it off!

to my darling cousin wendy.. happy birthday to you.. and to my sister also..! whos' birthday is coincidentally 3 days before wendys'

A few cherished hours with my darls

apple pie and wedges at Mac near shans house.. after we went round half of Singapore.

this pic was taken last new year i think.. at the game cafe at boat quay

but i think the face i tried to put up here.. is a constant reflection of my life.

Porky

Loves my darls.. food.. the sun.. my family... and almost everything else! and my yamaha custom saxophone.

Maybe this is about time that things would start to change.. maybe for the better maybe for the worse! but who really knows. Maybe it is such unpredictability that makes life that tad more interesting. But who likes uncertainty? i amnot an advocate for that! and you have my guarantee on that. Anyway, please don't make any inferences from my blog for goodness sake. Life in school is bad and i feel super bad to you cos i think it has been a long time since i last touched it. I miss you badly. ( this is not a living thing so please dun make any inferences pls).

A good friend of mine has gone overseas for an exchange programme... goodbye k.. and may you enjoy yourself there as much as you can! cos i really love the place that you are going to study in. If there is a chance, i will definitely go there to visit you. Anyway.. maybe its time i stop thinking so much and get back to work. Ciaos people. Miss you all lots.

Saints Hallelujah VII

2007-02-18T00:51:00.000+08:00

The Saints Hallelujah VII

The concert was some time back, but i realised that there were some pics that i wanted to post on my bloggie! so.. i finallty found time to come online in peace! cos i had some cursed assignment to hand in on new year's eve! wah lao! imagine that! but i think that happenede cos all the bloody teacher/ profs in the department were expats.. i.e. they dun give a damn about chinese new year.. so i suppose it is just my luck!*&^*#Q!

Anyway, i must say that this concert has been a good one! a little hiccup somewhere in the concert.. that was super obvious! i did not mean to make it happen... but somehow it just did la.. hais.. but anyway.. i am starting to miss my saxection is alumni.. well.. my section consist of ernest, kah fai, sashi, imis, yu zhong, hafiz, yi xiong, charles, xavier.. i think that should be about it... oh.. and the grand father fahmy!

The last time i touched my sax was the concert! by the time i open it.. which i don't know when it will be, i think there would be fungus in there already! yucks!

Some Pics from the concert

Saxection

Sashi,Kah Fai, myslef and Imis
Darl b.. the conductor
my two greatest darlings in the world... empress shan shan.. and.. Uhmm Benji..
My da sao....rachael.. or my ah gors' girlfriend to be exact... thank you sooo much for your support..
a bunch of my juniors.. zuan fa..julius and kok hoe

I think that should be about the end of it le.. was just pondering as usual.. and i thought of the lyrics of the school song.. "keep the flame burning brightly ever".. i think it is difficult to keep it burning brightly forever! subjective approach vs. objective approach! yucks yuck yucks.. why am i going through all this! Well.. i think alumni did a great job.. it was indeed a major stepping stone for us.. something that we have not reached before.. disney was great..!!! really!!!

Just hope that all of you are doing fine and that everyone is having a great time and enjoying what you are doing! have a great break during the CNy break.. and happy new year to all...

Porky

2007-01-31T11:07:00.000+08:00

Fairytales should just remain in Disneyland

Maybe that is why people who go to Disneyland somehow seem to be so happy, its just that world that they place people in, a idelal medival world, where everything is simple and people's lives just revolve around hmm fights, dragons, evil people, love, food, children and saving other people in order to uphold justice. It disillusions a person from what reality is and maybe that is why people just feel so different different in there.

The feeling is different when you sit in the school library and see people hard at work while you are just attempting to understand what is actuallt written on the endless number of readings that you have to do, oh and flipping the dictionary to check out the definition of some words. I suppose the only relieve i can find is listening to music ( more sugawa and tourvere quartet) and maybe going out with my other spoil brat for shopping and spoilt brat treatment and going out with my darlings. Just feeling super vexed and it is actually suppose to be the "down week" this week, i.e. there is not much work to do for now, cos the next research paper is actually coming in in about a week from now and there is alumni concert is next friday.

Maybe our teachers get so frustrated with us in school when we do certain things. But i suppose after you face the reality of how screwed life actually is, sometimes you just seem to get so pissy with some people over the things that they do. And i must admit that that has happened a lot to me recently. Everything just seems to tumble down the hill, its a never ending journey down hill, rather down a gorge. Maybe i would be happier doing _____, maybe i would be happier doing_____ or maybe ______. I don't know how to fill in the blanks, don't dare to think about it, because i just get so skeptical over it when i think about it. I suppose after you have gone down a gorge, you just think that anything else is possible, and so you just hang on to the rope that is the only way that you are going to be saved from tumbling down.

I think i just need a good rest.. one where i don't have to think about work, one where i don't need to think of realising dreams for others, rather, one for myself, where i get everything for myself and to spend a really good time with my really good friends and my family. Even CNY cannot be spent in peace cos the assignment is due on new years eve. Maybe what the govenment should do is ask ladies to give birth to machines rather then human beings. Does this justify why so many people just work here, and migrate after they think that they have made sufficient money to get them through the years? Possibly i suppose. But that is just a wee bit far fetched. Anyway, shopping in the afternoon with the other spoilt brat and xiuz is something i am looking forward to.

Bakkwa

A "subjective" day.....

2007-01-28T00:52:00.000+08:00

" Bed... Bed.. I couldn't have gone to bed.. my head is too light.. so light like feathers in the sky...
Sleep .. sleep.. i couldn't sleep tonight... not for all the jewels in the crown.....
I could have danced all night.. i could have dance all night.. and still have space for more...
I could have spread my wings and done a thousand things.. i never done before...
I never knew what made it sooo exciting..."

Just something from My Fairlady.. that i happened to catch the previous week...

I submitted the cursed assignment today.. and i feel so happy.. rather.. just a wee bit lighter. I think this would be one of the only weekends this school term that i can feel like this.. just feeling extemely skeptical about things, i just wonder why.. but somehow.. i just feel a little sian today.. maybe it might have been the rehearsal i was at.. a tad frustrating.. cos we were not used to the acoustics of the hall..so everything just went mambo jumbo.. but something that i heard someone say, hmm.. i really wonder what i can say about that person...

" music is subjective"

i must say, i agree totally with that statement. I suppose when it comes to performing arts especially, a person must have a liking towards it. and this liking... hmm, i am not to sure where it comes from. Maybe when the crane dropped you at your doorstep like years ago.. it decided to drop some arty farty genes with you. Anyway, certain people have certain likings i suppose and some how, i must say that criticisms are taken very harshly, especially when they are snide or caustic remarks. Something that A enjoys, might not be something that B enjoys. Its subjective. A lot of things cannot be fitted into a pigeon hole and not everyone can fit into that same pigeon hole. Its just not possible. Its like asking a cat to roar like a lion and asking a lion to PURR like a cat. I dare to think that the latter is possible, but not the earlier one. Anyway, back to the point, never expect people to fit into your pigeon hole. After being exposed to the different generes of ______ i suppose people have differnt likings.. unfortunately, if their tastes are not similar to yours.. they are condemed. Hmm sad thing i must say.

Anyway, at the rate it is going, i think performing arts groups in Singapore should just stop performing.. cos its just so difficult to please people. I suppose when you go for a concert, there are 5 types of crowds.. there are

the artist who are there to enjoy the art,
Critiques,
the supporters,
those who bought the ticket for sake of doing so and lastly
the non existent.

I think here.. somehow, the crowd usually falls within cat. 2. Critiques. well and there are futher categories for this

constructive
intentional, deliberate and caustic
the non existent

the non existent somehow, just seems to appear in both the list. Well, but i must say that every musician tries to put their best into every performance. Do not whip them into conforming with your standards. Note here, it's CONFORMING and not adapting. the notion of conforming is somewhat like Austin's theory where life is all about abiding to orders and following the leader's order. There is no room for allowances. Do something else, and be punished, i.e. sanction. I think that is never a way a arts groups should function. But most importantly, all i can say is... try never to critique a performance, regardless of how bad or good it is. Always admire an artist for the effort and the guts they have to put up a production. Its not easy at all! and i am sure many of you know that!

Anyway, have a really really good weekend k. I dun mean to be a wet blanket this weekend, but somehow this just sparked some thoughts in me and i must say that it has been bugging me for a while...

bakkwa

NTU concert...

2007-01-22T02:00:00.000+08:00

Finally... i can take a quick breather...
anyway, ntu concert is over! I must say that this was indeed one of the better concerts i have played for... great company, esp the sax section! kudos KK for your great bari sax solo... lovely, though i must admit that the rest of us screwed up a little! and jia ying gave us a heart attack when her instrument nearly gave way on stage! anyway.. thanks NTU! i enjoyed this concert a lot! and.. hope to work with you in the near future!

Just some snap shots from that evening...

Can't decide which sax to pick.. haisz...
A walk amongst the GIAnts... sorry sally!

The sugawa-san of NTU band...ah gor.. aka concert master

Trying hard to do a recital.. and take a look at who my pianist is.. ahaha..

Darl-B came for the concert.. with tonnes of alumni guys and ladies.. haha! thank you for your great support

Porky

School starts

2007-01-16T14:46:00.000+08:00

Upcoming performances....

Soujorn 2007 ( NTU Symphonic Band)
20th Jan, 7.30 pm

Pieces that we are playing
Deep Purple Medley
Galaxy 999
Spartacus Suite
Whatsoever Things

Saints Hallelujah
Saints Alumni Band 2007
9th Feb, 7.30 pm

Pieces being played
Global variations
Fate of the Gods ( thanks xiuz)
Amazing Grace

School has been tiring, i suppose after 1 month of holidays.. and spending a fair bit of it abroad.. it has been quite difficult to fit back into here.. tsk tsk.. tonnes of work to do.. and i realised that i have 2 weeks left to the due date for my research paper.. yucks!!

Porky

2007-01-02T01:56:00.000+08:00

More Pictures from the trip....

The lovely ice cream counter at the grand hyatt... sinful is the only word that can describe it!

The evil people at work at Haagan Dasz... yummy melon ice cream!

Too Many burps after the buffet at the Grand Hyatt... OPPPS

The last day in Shanghai, where curls promised to bring me to the mall with the most number of china beauties.. but we did not see any...
the xiao long bao wrappers... hmm .. the pork in china has this funky smell to it.. hmm hard to describe... but.. its yucky...
and the greatest achievemnent of the trip.. meeting my dearest "pan teacher!" my primary school tuition teacher!!!

"Shen dan Kuai le!".. Shanghai is lowevely...

2007-01-02T01:15:00.000+08:00

Shanghai Trip...
I must say that this trip to Shanghai has been a very memorable one indeed, cos i got to meet my tuition teacher.. who once upon a time tutored me in chinese when i was back in primary school. The last time i saw her was easily about 6-7 years back, but somehow we managed to keep in contact! and hurray.. i met her finally.... and a trip to 3 on the BUND with aunty DODO was really.. awesome! the view that you get from the place.. is really great..and the atmosphere.. just fantastic! a potpourri of culture of the east and west.. just the correct balance with a contemporary and modern accent to it! beautiful!

I spent a fair bit of time devouring food.. literally.. it was buffets and like great lavish dinners and lunches at restuarants.. and of course me and curls' daily dosage of coffee at star bucks! The yummiest thing i had while i was there must have been the buffet at the Grand Hyatt at Jin Mao Plaza.. the name of the place says it all! the food was great, and the view was even better as the cafe was on the 54th story of the building, offering and endless view of the city skyline! We just went on.. plate after plate... first customer in .. last customer out! a great achievement! Sheng Long was like 1 hour late, but he sure made up for the time lost! cos he was eating much faster then me and curls were!

And i attempted to eat drunken crabs! i must say that iw was quite yummy... though i had a bit of doubt when i took the first bite! but all i can say is that it was just yummy! hurray! i am on the path of learning how to eat raw stuff.. sashimi is next on the list.. and someone owes me a treat at some jap restuarant in west coast.. hint hint hint.. at sakuraya...

My cholestrol levels must have rocketed while i was there.. the food was extremely oily, heavy in seasoning and super.. high in cholestrol.. but the hairy crabs were absolutely yummy. I think me and sheng long must thank curls for finishing up the crab roe for us.. or else.. i would not dare imagining doing a blood test! it would most prob be a nightmare come true!

I cant seem to load more then 5 pics.. so i just tried to pic some.. i will post somemore in the next entry.. orders of Colleen... we shopped and shopped and both me and curls have become fans of UNI QLO.. lovely clothes.. stylist and the best thing of all, they come in all colours.. about 7 of then, so that means that there is a colour to fit every single day of the week! ahaha!

XMAZ party... for project X

Its been a long time since i organised a project X party at my house.. so i decided to organise one! "THE!" right.. isn't it obvious! anyway, there were some hiccups in the kitchen cos i forgot to take the cream from the market for the soup and all the NTUC outlets were out of stock.. so ah gor had to get some from the other end of the island.. and only then could my cream of mushroom and roasted garlic be completed! but i think it was a tad creamy! i will improve on it the next time! of course i had the 2 best food critiques with me.. zheguang and david!.. curl was a first timer as a kitchen assistant.. haha.. i think i sort of killed her impression of the kitchen.. just like how Gordon Ramsy kills the interest of chefs in "Hells Kitchen"

My sLaves of the Day.. thank you.. i love all of you! its me, ben and curls...
Shan busy washing the tiles at the mahjong table.. the future TAI TAI...
Another gambling addict at the table.. ah gor.. i was suppose to help clear elim's debt and i just made it worse... ahaha... my skills are horrible .. and ah gor recouped our losses and we profited in fact.. 6 bucks.. tat was about 1/10 of our dinner bill! ahaha dinner was at ichiban sushi at Novena! totally yummy!

New Year..

this new year was a wee bit different cos i spent a bit of time trying to find my darlings all over the island... first i went to find benji at marine parade, then shan at raffles hotel.. then we had dinner at "YY" cafe... some super retro cafe along beach road! i think the food was not too bad, and the kaya bread was quite nice! but benji kept on insisting that the food near his place is better... i.e. the next time we go out, we are going to try it! then we went to east coast for a beer and .. someone was "maBoK" after that!!!!!

We visited godpa jais after that and had a count down at his place! eating curry and all the goodies.. this xmas and new year has been a great fattening season!

Porky...

Just some thoughts

somethings in life have been changing and Lina did once mention to me that it is at this point of time that everything becomes the most vulnerable, it may break down at any one moment of time. I am tryin my really best to cope with this, but every time i just end up getting more tired and depressed and sad. Really. I am not too sure how to cope, but when it is someone who has been with you for life and things go tumbling down, you just feel totally lost. and the worst thing of all some people just don't seem to care. a fair bit of the very essential people just don't seem to give a damn. What is this world becoming? is everything becoming so material that we cannot open the window shades cos the "cold air" from the aircon might leak out of the room and maybe waste that freaking 10 cents of your money. Yucks! i am totally disappointed. Yet i am sorry for others as well. All i can say is that we just have to be strong and make sure that things will just improve and not deprove. please.. for your own sake and for our sake, things have to become better okay! i hope that it is a promise... cos porky is really very tired. and i am sure that she, who is in heaven, will be looking upon you and telling you to buck up in life and that everything is really going fine, and not as what you think. love you lots.

Ye Shanghai ye Shanghai....

2006-12-17T00:06:00.000+08:00

I am in Shanghai now to visit my aunty and my tutition teacher. Had dinner with curls today and guess what we had for dinner.. RAW CRABS... well, you should know that i don't really adore raw stuff. Curls had warned me before hand that this was a must try.. and i was sort of geared up for it.. sort of only...she tried to sell the dish to me, but i think her attempt failed. But nonetheless i still tried one piece and it was quite yummy. Actually there was not much of a taste to begin with, cos the fishy smell was masked by the cooking wine. We had tonnes of food for dinner.. food glorious food... yummy...

Anyway, its more sight seeing tomorrow and more eating.. ahaha, but i wonder whether there would be more raw food.. !!!

Porky
In Shanghai ( Day 1)

new recordings....

2006-12-09T02:25:00.000+08:00

oh.. the killer papers are finally over.. i am like... gone..
by got hold of 2 CDs today.. i am so going to finish listening to everything
i got....
Morricone, Nobuya Sugawa...
Exhibition of Saxophone, Nobuya Sugawa...

The sugawa craze is back again.. oh my tian...

Porky

Just listening

2006-11-17T13:57:00.000+08:00

been at home most of the time.. in a desperate bid to try and study..but seems like not much is going in unfortunately..

was listening to 2 CDs during lunch and.. somehow.. they just show how much things can change

1. Beau Soir, Nobuya Sugawa, 2000

2. TOKWO Live with Sugawa, 2004

Exactly the same track, the theme from "The way we were", 2 very different styles of playing altogether.. but surprisingly the same saxophonist who is playing.

Maybe its just me being my emo self, but it seems like over short span of time, things change and you never just seem to be able to graps everything at the nick of time! sadly i must say...

But life just has to go on isn't it... yucks..

Anyway xmaz is coming.. and i am so looking forward to it.. cos i just love xmas.. as what shan said..maybe i shld organise a "singles" party on the 24th for people like us.. who have no dates!! haha but.. lets see whether i can survive till then.

Cheery goodbyes.. and good luch for your exams..

Porky

bloggin again..

2006-11-15T01:17:00.000+08:00

I must say that some issues are subjective.. and maybe its time for a reform on my side. cos things are getting unacceptable, i think... to some.. but i dun know who those some are.. its something that is difficult to convey... That is how life is la.. i suppose... but i shall survive! KAMATE! (it means jia you!)

Anyway.. i have not been spending much time with my darlings and ah gor.. and that is damn bad cos i miss all of them badly.. Benji just did his last COG.. and we were all down to support him.. and curls me and gor trotted off to kino after that, cos gor wanted to buy some book.. which no one knew where it was shelved! we had yummy shimbashi soba for dinner.. yums!! and as usual, we were too full...

Indera had his open house and.. only me and boi boi went... sighs.. a outing that really went wrong.. but who cares.. had a good time eating at indera's place, and being amazed by his little cousins' .."do you know...." talk show.. and watching him eat 12 quail eggs is something so amazing to me..

I want to go VIVO city to shop....

Porky

don't know what to say..

2006-10-17T17:09:00.000+08:00

it's been a long time.. since i last did a blog entry.zahid said that blogs are sad places.. cos you get to rea aout how unhappy people are... but i just dun know why.. maybe there is really just nothing to blog about.. nothing to be happy about to be truthful... everything sucks.. but how do you make it look nice on the surface?

1. How to compare a momo peach and a normal peach

2. A lousy honey dew from a musk melon

3. A yamaha lacquer plated saxophone from a gold plated one

4. A soft shell crab from an alaskan crab

5. A bicycle from a BMW serie 730

6. A chicken liver from FOIE GRAS

isn't the contrast a little stark? isn't it obvious? isn't it? tell me! it's different isn't it.

why try to fit a square into a circluar container when you know it can never go in? It like telling a cat to behave like a dog? isn't it? i pity the cat.. really pity it.. but what can i do? can i save it or should i just try and force it, hoping that one day it will become like a dog! and hopefully bark! nothing is bright.. everything is gloomy.. nothing is orange or yellow.. it's all black..

nothing has taste.. everythin tastes bland.. like water..

It's not ice kachang.. it's unflavoured and uncoloured shaved ice and it sucks

why am i so negative? i dun know why.. but i suppose it's just the start anyway so hopefully the end of the tunnel is bright? but i don't really know.. oh and i dun really care anyway..