Missing again

Returned from Taiwan on the 27th as planned, but something's wrong with my computer and I couldn't go online.

As a result, many people thought I was playing disappearing tricks. But I'm no David Copperfield.

Worry not, I'm BACK!

Bought lots of goodies from Taiwan, anyone interested in trying them out can come over to my place. They're really quite nice.

While stocks last. And everything must be finished by next friday, because they're not meant to be kept for long.

Adieu

Just a minute ago, I (finally) finished packing my luggage bag. Now I understand what it feels like when you have to "jump on top of your luggage bag" to make everything go in.

It's still bulging.






Actually the top is sticking out quite a bit though it's not so clear on this photo. Decided to show everyone as well as to bid farewell before I go, if not I won't be able to sleep well. Heck, I can't sleep much anyway now, have to wake up at 5 am later.

Will be back on the 27th of May. Till then.

Blog while you can

Because you don't know when the sun will go nova and wipe out every single living organism on Earth.

Or when something that prevents you from going online will recur.

I spent just 1 whole day on changing my OS to Win XP. With lots of help from ahqiang. Don't know what I'd do without him.

At least I finally got the pictures out of my digicam.




From left: Ru-Tian, Chin Huei, Dengli, Kara, Guoxian, Cheryl, Wai Leong, Diane, yours truly.


Not much chance to practice photo taking before I go to Taiwan.

End of procrastination

I've finally gotten down to buying the remaining items on my shopping list. All in 1 afternoon.

Shopping is hard work.

Bought my digicam 1st. A Fujifilm FinePix E500. Complete with a camera case, a 256Mb Xd card, and a tripod. Including a 5 year warranty, it costs $602 (only at Harvey Norman).

Then I went to buy the sling bag that I've also been wanting for years. Along the way, I bumped into Qiujin and Terence, who were also shopping for necessitites for their Taiwan trip. Like me, Qiujin has yet to pack her luggage for the trip. Unlike me, she's flying off on the 15th of May (say "NO!" to procrastination!).

The 3 of us went to Sim Lim Square to buy adaptors for our electrical appliances to be used in Taiwan. Bet you didn't know that their power sources are different from ours, right? Me neither.

I happily brought my brand new purchases along to meet my friends for dinner. Took the 1st photo, using my BRAND NEW DIGICAM, of Dengli (the destroyer), who insisted on trying out (destroying) my new camera. She destroyed (deleted) 1 of the pictures I took of her, because of her lack of artistic appreciation of the pose she adopted when I snapped her.

Some people are just so.....poor at appreciating.

I took a few more shots of everyone after dinner.


BUT.....



somehow my computer can't work with the digicam. Maybe it's my OS (Win 98 SE). High time to upgrade to Win XP.

Lost a lot of money today. The money spent on investments are not losses. you may say, but assets depreciate over time, so the money spent is still lost eventually. Ok, maybe I should look on the brighter side of things,


BUT.....



I lost my handphone after dinner.

Tried calling my own number but no one picked up. Totally no idea where it is now. Have to go handphone-hunting tomorrow.

Give me a break. I've been out everyday for the past week, and now I still have to go out for such a dumb reason.....

四天后就要飞往台湾了，行李到现在都还没开始整理。不单是行李，连需要买的东西都还没去买。真是懒得无药可救。

感觉上这句话好象说了很多遍了。

不能再这样拖下去了！明天一定要把所有事情都解决好！咳，又是明天。。。

Problems that are not solved, will resurface again some point in time later.

Whenever I put down in my blog that I'm facing problems, there'll be lots of concerned friends asking me what's wrong. I'm really grateful to all of them for being there, but there are some things which I can't say, or perhaps not yet.

Sometimes, I wonder if I've stopped hurting because I've gotten so used to the pain that I can't feel it there anymore, or because I've grown numb to such pain (as in become cold and unfeeling).

Or maybe I just forgot that the pain is still around. If not, why am I typing such a moody blog now?

The people around me have fallen 1 by 1. One was sobbing uncontrollably for days. Another took to drinking and smoking all alone every night. I'm the only 1 left standing now. Can't afford to let myself fall as well.

I don't really know what's my purpose in putting up this blog entry. Guess I have learnt to open myself up a bit more ever since I started blogging, though I still find it quite difficult to do so sometimes.

To all my dear friends, worry not. I'm still fine.

I need more time!

No more exams. No more presentations. No more worries (less finding a job). Yet I found that time still flew past me, just as it did during the days when I was rushing to complete my FYP.

I'm running out of time to buy whatever necessities I need for the trip to Taiwan. I don't even have time to read my friends' blogs, let alone write a blog entry. I was unable to keep the promise of doing all the housework, that I had made before my mom left for her chalet on Friday (6th May).

And what was I so busy with?

Going out during the day, playing Warcraft 3 at night, reading the newspapers when I have nothing to do, watching the VCDs that my brother bought more than a year ago. Every nitty gritty little thing drives time on like a bullet train.

Well of course, I could have chosen not to go out. Just like Sunday (8th May) for instance. It was raining, and yet I still went down to IMM to listen to a girl sing on stage, a girl whom I've neither seen before nor had a conversation with.

All these at the risk of being labelled a crazy desperado who would never forfeit any chance to know any girl better, or being branded unfilial for not keeping my promise to my mom. Then again, I was already branded as unfilial (just kidding).

And I could have known better that playing games online is very time consuming. However, taking into account that ahqiang would be quite upset if I didn't play with him because I had already promised to do so, it doesn't leave me with much choice (I'm kidding again).

Alright alright. I'm not trying to push the blame to everyone else. I didn't regret playing those games, or going down to IMM to watch Jieling perform, and then chatting with Fengchun's ex-classmates afterwards. Especially the ktv session that followed subsequently.

Speaking of ktv, it was another threesome affair between me, Fengchun and 1 of his friends, Shihao. Fengchun is always in favour of threesome activities. I wonder why.

Anyway, another interesting phenomenon I've observed is that whenever I hang out with Fengchun and 1 other person who knows him well, we always end up suaning Fengchun. Be it his sis or his former classmates who have known him for about a decade. Something else to ponder over as well.

But I know Fengchun can take it, right o' buddy?

Missing In Action

The feeling being carefree as a cat lazing on the warm ground under the sun did not come after my FYP presentation. Nor did the emptiness that bugged most final year undergrads after days without any constructive work done.

In fact, I don't feel any different from having a holiday in between semesters.

I was in another of those too-lazy-to-even-blog-moods, which left my blog un-updated for the past 2 days. Though it doesn't mean I've been rotting away at home. I've gone shopping more often than I ever did in my life for the past week - a record breaking 3 times. Bought things that I didn't intend to buy, but didn't get some of the things that I needed. I wonder what's happening to me.....

Apart from shopping, I also started reading the newspapers (and paid special attention to the "Recruit" section), something which I have never done in my life previously as well. I can actually carry on with a whole list of firsts, like first time I'm playing Warcraft 3 with friends from home, etc.

And I foresee a whole lot of firsts coming up in the near future.

Tengkia Times - NUS Section

Raids in E2 pc cluster

This week saw the sudden step up in efforts of the authorities in NUS to cut down the recently increasing abuse of computer terminals in the pc clusters in block E2.

Raids were conducted daily in the afternoon, and numerous students were caught violating the rules or having undesirable behaviour. Offences include:

• installation and playing of games


• watching videos


• tilting the monitor sideways


• students from other faculties coming over to use the facilities

Offenders caught in the act had their matriculation numbers taken down by the authorities and a warning was sent to each of offender.

There was a noted trend of rising number of students playing LAN (local area network) games, mainly Warcraft 3 and Counterstrike in the clusters over the past 2 months. These students are mostly in their final year and have completed their final year projects and exams. Thus the spare time on their hands are spent on entertainment - where else can be a better place than the facilities provided by the campus.

What loss can there possibly be, when there is no gain to speak of in the first place?

This post has been removed by mistake

Shopping spree

This probably sounds very odd coming from me, but I went shopping yesterday. Being the typical shop-only-when-absolutely-necessary kind of guy, I had to enlist the help of the more experienced. Thankfully, Qiujin was free to accompany me for the afternoon.

I had a shopping list in mind: sandals, long sleeved top (informal), jeans and bag. All were meant to be brought along for the Taiwan trip. It was Qiujin's turn after Sherry to endure the headache of walking into each shop, asking if they had the appropriate size for me, then walking out immediately into the next shop to try our luck.

By the end of the day, we've achieved 50% of the mission objectives. We managed to get my sandals and jeans from Queensway Shopping Centre (I think I'm beginning to sound like someone here). I treated Qiujin to dinner at Ikea as a form of gratitude (I bet someone is going to eat her heart out when she reads this).

What were you expecting from my shopping spree? I'm just a guy.

Reports, news and updates

Report:

It's high time to reveal my cycling plans. I've been trying to determine the easiest route to take from Bukit Panjang to Bishan, so that I can visit Ms. (do I see your eyes wide in anticipation?) Ru-Tian and bring her along for a long awaited cycling trip to Yew Tee (where one of her friend stays).

There are 3 ways to get to Bishan from Bukit Panjang, denoted by the 3 lines drawn on the map below.

• Red line: Woodlands road > Mandai road > Upper Thomson road > Hello Bishan


• Blue line: Upper Bukit Timah road > Dunearn road > Adam road > Lornie road > Upper Thomson road > you know the rest


• Brown line: bash through the nature reserve

Since I agreed to undertake the mission of bringing Ms Ru-Tian to cycle to her's friend in Yew Tee, I felt obliged to find the easiest and safest route for her to travel via bicycle.

I knew the entire blue route usually has high traffic density throughout the day, and the pavements are not cyclist-friendly (even though I know cyclists are not supposed to cycle on pavements, Ms. Ru-Tian has no road experience and it would be unthinkable to let her try the busy roads). Thus I had to find alternatives.

I tried the red route last night. Travel time from entering my doorstep after leaving hers was 1 hour and 10 minutes at my fastest pace. There were few cars all along the way, though most were zipping past me as though they were racing. There were mostly forests on either side of the roads throughout the route, which can give a rather creepy feeling when travelling alone at night, especially along a stretch of Mandai Road where the roadlights are dim (and the fact that I had to pass by a crematorium didn't make things better).

Well, there's always the brown route right? I'd hate to disturb the monkeys in the nature reserve, and even more so for making Ms. Ru-Tian cycle through the treacherous cycling (or hiking) trails of MacRitchie and Bukit Timah, so that's out.

Conclusion: take the red route. Friendlier pavement, journey about as long as the blue one, can cycle on the pavements if need be.



News:

Blogging as been the focus of more and more social issues lately. Any Tom, Dick or Harry can start a blog without paying a single cent (excluding fees for using the internet). An increasing number of people are finding an interest in blogging (didn't bother to check up on the statistics, but this is already evident from my friends).

What do people do with their blogs? They post personal thoughts, pictures and whatever information they wish to share with friends or whoever may read the blogs. They use blogs to communicate with friends whom they are too busy to keep real-time contact with.

So everyone (who wants a blog) starts a blog and starts putting in whatever he/she wishes to. But has the blogger ever considered what kind of materials they should withhold from putting up in their blogs? Or do they have the required permission to put certain things up?

I believe the answer is "no". Just as with myself, I've been reminded on several occasions that I've written sensitive topics in my blog entries, or used pictures that belonged to other websites without prior consent. In other words, I've violated the privacy and copyrights of others.

Almost 1 year of blogging has taught me the importance of respecting the privacy of others and acknowledging them when using their works among other things. Doing stuff like putting a statement such as "adapted from xxxxxxx" maybe a bothersome chore, but it is an act of consideration that could be very important to the party whom you took the information from.



Updates:

Itinerary for commando training programme in Taiwan has been finalised. Due to nature of the training, details of the programme has to be kept confidential.

Or rather, this entry is getting a bit too long and I'm trying to bullshit my way out.