It seems easy

2 weeks have passed since the air was cleared and life has been pretty darn good. you know how when one looks back at whatever that has happened and realized that hey.. maybe everything happened for a reason. Every single event that has happened so far, major or minor, are certainly building blocks that will lead to something eventually. like how i always pray for success in my career, my love life and all. maybe the one above or the almighty is putting me through all these to make me a stronger person. to be frank, i now am thankful for whatever that has happened. i have been able to see people in a different light because no one was made the same.

very grateful for my friends, my brothers who have been there for me when things got a bit rough. friends are definitely forever. i am proud to declare that i have moved on,have you?

cheers,

andy

Not to Forget, Move on

I see light. Thanks buddy. Now life seems easier and more "natural" for me. Just when i thought i could make use of the past 5 days to forget someone, i realized that it wasn't in my nature to do so. I must move on and accept the fact that things are over. I'm actually really happy right now because i'm talking like nothing had happened and it's all good.

Thanks Buddy.

Closure : Chapter

10th july : As spoken before, promises days of change. So much happened within this day, commencement, catching up with friends who i know will stick with me through thick and thin. Brothers, Bff, Physics friends, whatever it is, they are all VERY important to me. Donning that graduation gown implies a brand new start to my life. If only Singapore's weather is not what it is, i wouldn't bear to take it off.

A special thanks for all who came, especially Rachel aka Sumei. I know it's awkward and hard for you, but yea, thanks.

Now, it is time for me to move on and forget. It's not gonna be a smooth journey ahead, that's for sure. But i am very certain nothing's gonna get in my way.

Cheers.

Just an Update

This week has been pretty good, emotions kept in check and life goes on. I'm pretty glad how i have managed to get things under control and all. However, sometimes i wished that things like blog did not really exist because it causes upset(s) at times. And sometimes when people don't really mean things and when they type it out, they only have themselves to blame for their own harshness and stupidity. To think about it, actually people do care about your life. Everything single thing that people do, visiting your blog, reading your entries, all these tell a lot about people. This time round i realised someone cares. Even after a long day at work, someone bothered to read my blog and questioned me on whatever i said. I felt bad for a second, because i said whatever i said on impulse. I am not saying it carries no truth or value, i am just saying maybe i should better evaluate situations and not "blame" people. Not everyone is like myself, people have issues and these all contribute to whoever they are.

To the someone who might be reading this: I am sorry if i stirred any unwanted emotions in you. Hope that you understand that i only said those because i had my own reasons. I know you care. I really do. Thanks. See you soon.

10/7/10

The past 2 months have been crazy. So many ups and downs, so much emotions spewed over. I think sometimes i just cannot take it anymore and things need to really stabilize and i have to take control. Looks like i have been led by my nose for quite some time, i need to change things around. Looks like 10/7/10 will be the best day. I'm saying this but i'm not sure if i will adhere to it, the one up there, please enlighten me and guide me through. Things have been be really bad these few days, with reservists taking an awful twist and stuff. But, i have learnt to be more open, this will only do me good i guess. Andy, i think you are weak and lost. Really.

Day 10 Taiwan

Day 10 of Taiwan was simple. Woke up late, had breakfast, shopped a bit with Jeremy and then headed to Taipei. Came to Derek's house and that's about it. Ok, truth is i'm tired. Bye.

An enjoyable day

Yea, today's indeed a chillax and fulfilling today. I walked in Cijin island which was a stone's throw away from the main city of Kaohsiung. The ferry was alright, pretty decent. I was still thinking if i should hire a bicycle or a scooter, since it will be faster and more convenient to have private transportation. However, i guess i needed workout of some sort so i decided to walk instead. Indeed walking is pretty fulfilling because i managed to walked to places that i didn't think hiring a scooter will bring me too.

Next, i headed to the Love river in kaohsiung but i was kinda loveless. I wasn't feeling very lonely or anything but would love to someone to be with me. That would be just perfect. Too bad she is in Singapore and just started work today. I walked down the river and quickly left that place before i got emotional. lol.

Next came Central Park. I love this place. It was so quiet, the air is so refreshing and it was cooling. I found a spot just on the bridge and laid down with my ipod playing jack johnson's playlist. I could fall asleep right there but i didn't because i didn't want to head to Lieu He night market late.

And so i left for the night market and i'm really disappointed. Food weren't fantastic and variety was little. Sad. I grabbed dinner and went back home. So now im home and don't know what to do. Might be talking to Sumes later but see how it goes, whether she's busy or not. But yea, i had a great day!

Day 6 in Taiwan , day 1 in Kaohsiung

Kaohsiung is a surprisingly nice place. The place is easy to navigate and it's actually quite big! The bus from Hengchun dropped me off at the KS main station and i took the MRT to my host's place which was just a 10 minute journey. Josh(my host) picked me up with his scooter and he drove me back to his place, which is a pretty decent apartment. He let me sleep in his extra room which is really nice of him. We then went to the nearby RueiFong night market for some shopping. I'm quite full now! I will visit some places in KS tomorrow but with the looks of it, KS is actually quite boring!

Bitter Sweet Taiwan

Once of the best and worst happenings of this year certainly happened in Taiwan. Yesterday was a total bitch. I spent so much time on the train and bus and by the time i reached my backpackers i was in a very bad mood, unbathed and dead tired. My room was not really a room but it was kinda cosy. At least i have a space to myself. So after that saw rach on skype and started talking to her and it was nice. Because i learnt some of the stuff that will be good and also bad. Headed off to bed at 3am with something stuck in my head.

Today i woke up at 10.30am and wasn't the freshest at all. I was still a bit tired but had to pull myself out of bed because today is sort of my last day in Hengchun so i had to make full use of it. I hunted for food along the streets of my hostel and found some breakkie place which had fantastic burger, chinese style. It was kinda cool because it's like in between a regular burger and a ramly. Served with a warm cup of milk coffee, it was perfect to start off a day.

The mother of the lady boss(hostel) brought me to rent my scooter and the boss kindly rented the scooter to me even tho i did not have an international license. But of course, a businessman can never resist the temptation of $ and had to allow me to rent it. It was funny, once i throttled off, the freaking rain came pouring down like it has never fallen. Within minutes, my dry asics went wet and i had to seek shelter back at my hostel. Well, nothing much to do while waiting for the rain to stop, so i whatsapp r. It was alright but it got emo at the end. Thankfully both of us had to run, emoness had to stop.

The scooter was very useful, really. I travelled quite a bit, covering both Hengchun and Kenting and saw lots of stuff, including a hike which i wasn't really expecting. The hike was up rocks instead of the regular mud and soil that i'm used to. It was strenous and i was perspiring like crazy within 30 minutes. I managed to conquered the peak and saw a few waterfalls along the way. And next, i saw the most southern tip of Taiwan and then Kenting when the entire beach was flooded with beach goers. I love this trip because it took my mind off some stuff. But as soon as i came back, i'm back to reality. But heck that, i had a fantastic burger for dinner and then scooted down to Kenting night market once to take a look. It was disgustingly filled with people and i left without buying a thing.

I hope tomorrow will be good where i will visit Kaohsiung. Night people.

Days 1 & 2 : Taiwan

Here i am in Hualien right now, sitting on the couch of my backpackers as the rain trickles outside. I am tired, i guess i have yet to recover from the runs and all. Last night was alright, i slept at 3am on the couch of my host and it was pretty comfortable. Taipei was rather chilly last night and according to my host, it was chilly for past 2 days, quite the opposite of what Jianhong told me.

Today was pretty gloomy, no sunshine at all. I took a 3hr train to Hualien from Taipei and time passed rather fast. I was watching "Bounty hunter" on my netbook and then sleeping.

I arrived in Hualien in fashion. Wearing my lime green short and tee shirt and then carrying two backpacks like i just came from Mt Everest. As usual, taxi drivers came swarming towards me and i decided to get a map from the info centre and started walking. I walked a long time and finally found the backpackers. On the way i got lost and stepped on dog poo.

I got shown my room and then i left for dinner. Had some really good rice. Lu Ru fan and then some orgasmic bubble tea and some zha ji. OMG. It was very sinful. I loved it tho. Its raining out there and i dont wanna go out. Afraid i'll fall sick. Just chilling now.

Cheers

Day 3

Day 3 started off with a visit to the University of Science and Technology of China. The school looks really big and it's like a mega town, does not look like an uni campus at all. The buildings look run-down, dark and gloomy. Totally does not provide the atmosphere for studying. We gathered in one of the room where the teacher-in-charge and several local students took time to introduce the school to us. We then took a stroll around the campus, not having a proper itinerary. The local students were kind enough to bring us to the places where locals gather. We spent most of the time touring the walking, rather than visiting the buildings, which is a good thing. We then had lunch with the locals but there wasn't a single local sitting on my table. That was a shame but not a pity. As usual, we took lots of pictures and then we left for the synchrotron lab, which was a miniature version of the one that we will get to see a few days later.

In fact, i feel that such visits were a bit unnecessary, because i did not really learn anything from this visit. The only thing i learn was that the students from this university are really studious, they basically have no social life other than studying. That might be a good thing, might be bad too. Well, as long as they feel good, why not?

Oh ya, the synchrotron visit was ultimate boring. The terms used when they were explaining were all in Chinese and seriously, i did not understand a single bit that was uttered. If only there was a translator.



I guess this entire visit already took up the whole day and it was time to hit back to the hotel . I'm glad, because we could rest and relax for the next day.

Day out with Sumei

Met sumei yesterday, just before she leaves for Phuket. It feels like i've already met her for damn long. There wasn't in any case a difficulty in finding something to talk about. We had lunch, as usual she didn't finish up her food because i guess she had cravings for other stuff. So i finished up my meal, leaving some rice untouched and we walked around in P.S. We then headed to some coffee toast place and she had toast, giving me 2 eggs which she didn't want to eat. I was lucky because im always so well fed when im with her. So i gave her the present i got for her from China, it was a pair of pearl earrings. I could not tell that she was really excited but i guess she liked it because she went to the toilet to put them on after the meal. She looked gorgeous in that earrings. I think i got it spot on this time.

So we continued walking looking for stuff and then left for Chinatown because she needed to change some foreign currency for her trip today. We searched for the exchanger with the best rates and she exchanged 1400 bucks to Thai Baht. After that, we continued walking to Starbucks at the central and that was where we had a lengthy talk about many things, including our families and stuff.

Then i snapped a picture of her with the earrings i bought.





Gorgeous ain't she?

We then had dinner at City Hall and then saw her off back home. It was a sweet as day. Cheers.

Day 2: 合肥

My day started off quite sweet, cos the sleep was good and i talked to XXX the night before while waiting for Clement to be back since he had the room keys. We had breakkie at the hotel, the food was bad but i just had to eat it to keep my system running. We departed the hotel and headed to the 包公 place straight after breakkie. Before boarding the bus, we took pictures and i think my favourite for the day was :



The bus ride to our first destination is pretty long and it took up our entire morning. We had our lunch before heading to the 包公 place and our lunch is a 10 course meal with everything you can imagine: drinks, beer etc.

So we visited the place. The entire place is huge and it basically tells the story of 包公 and his impartial-ness. Plenty of wax figures showing the court happenings and also monuments used during that era. We then took photos on top of a tower.

The day ended fast and we spent a couple of hours at the same place. As usual, we left for dinner and then we strolled the streets in the city centre, in search for 小笼包 and some cheap shopping. We did manage to stumble upon this shop selling 小笼包 and it was good! We had a couple of baskets of them and we were more than contented.

Well, some photos could not be uploaded so i'm stopping here. Day 3 will be continued tomorrow.

CHIP - Day 1: Arriving in Shanghai, Overnight at 苏洲定园宾馆

3rd longest and most tiring overseas trip ever made : 苏洲， 合肥， 黄山， 千岛湖， 上海。 14 days of non-stop travelling really wore me out and i am still very tired as of now. I am going t

blog about this entire trip from day 1, yes day 1.

Day 1: Arriving in Shanghai

, Overnight at 苏洲定园宾馆

After 5 straight hours of flight time, we managed to arrive in Shanghai. The weather was great, neither was it hot nor was it humid. Just perfect for an escape from Singapore. The PuDong airport is mediocre and not as fantastic as the Changi Airport. Some weird Mandarin - English translations were spotted like labelling tourists or non-locals as Aliens. Our tall and hitler-looking tour guide picked us up at the arrival hall and immediately walked us to the tour bus waiting for our luggages to be loaded up.

We loaded up our luggages and boarded the bus. The first glance of Shanghai was shocking. It was nothing like what i had expected. The highways were nicely constructed and were interlocking with many other highways just like a cob web.

We headed straight to 苏洲 and to our hotel, where we spent the night at. After checking into the hotel, we headed to the restaurant beside our hotel for dinner. The first meal was tasty, or rather too tasty. Too much oil and salt engulfed our food and i was not very used to the type of food that was offered. I ate sufficient to last the night and then a big group of us went out strolling the streets of 苏洲.

苏洲 as compared to Shanghai, is so much more backwards. Street vendors, hawkers were sprawled on the streets and heaps of motorbikes were horning their way on the roads of 苏洲. My 4 friends, namely Zhenghong, Zhengyi, Kenneth and Renny stopped by some food stall and bought some chinese BBQ. As usual, the flavours were very and very different from those back home. I bought cup noodles to ease my hunger pangs, fearing that eating more locally cooked food might upset my stomach tomorrow.

My room mate for that night was Clement, a Malaysian student studying Physics in NUS. He is a rather chatty person, after having spoken to him for 5 hrs on the plane. It was nice having him as a room mate where he shared many stories about the educational structure and practice in Malaysia. We spoke for a while and slumped into deep sleep a while later. The real adventure starts tomorrow.

Post Exams

My exams are finally over and I am a free man! It has never felt better than this ever in my university days. My last paper was fine, better than 4 of my other exams. Maybe due to the fact that my help sheet was really very sufficient and i did a few past year papers. Today was intense, i finished my exam, had lunch, headed back to my hall room, packed my stuff, loaded it into the car, took a nap, had dinner and drove back home. Now i'm sitting here comfortably on my wheelie chair, typing on my laptop that is sitting on my brand new table.

Now, it is time for me to sit down and think about my plans for post university. What have i got to do? Firstly, i have to master the technique of singing and drumming at the same time. I have never done this in my life. More importantly i have never tried playing the drums for a gig before. This is definitely my virgin experience. Playing for a bunch of professors who most likely do not understand or appreciate the style of music that will be played seems simple enough. But it is my personal hurdle that i have to overcome. I need to do a decent job. This is my chance to redeem myself, showing to the professors that i am not just ANOTHER physics student. We physics students do have other talents, other than simply working out equations and deriving them.

So yes, the first part of my post exam plan is to finish the physics lunch performance on the 1oth of may at Munchy Monkies. Next comes the real deal. Gotta film a 6 mins band performance for a band competition. This is pretty fresh; film a video of the band playing or jamming and send it for competition. Lucky ones will be picked for semi finals. I was thinking, why not? Since its that easy, just film it down. Nothing to lose. But here comes the tricky part, we only have a few days to get it done, and of course the planning phase which i have to do.

Next comes Shanghai, after all these music things are done. I'm so looking forward to it, can't wait to visit their attractions and eat their food. Not to say visit the really "interesting" places.

Enough said, my hands are cramping up. Typing all these isn't easy.

Cheers,

Andy

End of Busy Days

Finally found the time to continue blogging. Life in my final semester of undergrad studies is definitely not as easy as what people always say. "Last semester, damn slack one.." Bull shit, definitely. But, maybe it's just me who is having such a busy time. I'm quite surprised that people still follow my blog, so i feel kinda bad not updating since people actually bother to follow.

Anyhow, i'm so glad everything is about to come to an end. Yesterday marked my last assignment day and today marked my last late class. No more 6-9pms in NUS and no more physics tests or assignments in my life. I don't think i will further studies in this field anymore actually. What's left is just my 5 exams. 5 may seem to be a shit load, but actually it will fly by before you even realise it. Trust me, it's that fast.

I have heaps of stuff planned out for post exam, like a performance, my Shanghai trip, my Taipei backpack solo trip and many other stuff which was planned for me instead. I am particularly excited about my Taiwan trip because this is gonna be my only solo backpacking trip of my life and i am sure it will be a blast. I am very sure i am ready for another phase of travelling after a very crazy 2009 whereby i took the freaking plane 12 times.

What's gonna suck is that my 24th birthday will fall right smack in the middle of the exams and.. i am so not looking forward to it. But well, i guess i will not be throwing a huge party to celebrate my nearly quarter century old day.

I have been very disturbed with my current health and physique. I seemed to have gained a significant amount of weight, from 59kg to 63.5kg. My stomach seems bigger and fatter. I am getting paranoid by the day and have nearly totally given up my coffee addiction and even snacking addiction. Exercising 3-4-5 times a week seems to be part of the paranoia equation.It doesnt seem to be working very well. I guess it's like the phase of life where sudden weight gain and distortion in physique is taking place. =(

For my loyal readers, maybe it's only U, i will try to update as much as possible. Be prepared for some musical treat as i am preparing some sweet smooth acoustic pieces with my friend pianist aini who is willing to help me play the piano since i can't.

Cheers.

Life in hall, sweet as.

Finally got a place in Raffles hall, actually it is already the second week that i'm staying here. The first 2 weeks is sweet as, lest the heat. I guess it's really the weather, not the room. My area is pretty elevated and windy to start with. Life in hall is definitely different from PGP. The amenities around hall is complete, pool and track's just a few minutes away from my room. Not to mention that my private transport is also less than 200 steps away!

As usual, i could not really put myself into the study mood or working mood, since there are so many things that i can do here. Of course, i still managed to do my work and not such a good life affect my studies.

Today was exceptionally great, i swam, i ran, i worked and i soccered. Although i did not manage to finish my tutorial, i still did half of it, better than when i stayed at home and didnt even bother to do them at all. I'm so full now i can hardly move. I gotta prep myself for futsal later. Bye reader!

Nostalgia..

Seeing Jelvin leave for Manchester sort of reminds me of myself leaving for Wellington 6 months ago. It feels like i have never been overseas before because uni work has already started to pile up and it sucks totally. Lab work, lectures, tutorials, seminars.. these just make up my really boring university life. I am just looking forward to graduate and then teach, enjoy the process of teaching and then get my ass out of this place. To be frank, i am already considering spending the bulk of my life overseas rather than in Singapore. This place, after having lived here for almost 24 years, is getting boring and losing its appeal. Life's too fast here and tasteless. There is nothing to look forward to week in week out, other than planning for future overseas trip.

The most dreadful part of this tiny little island is the climate which seriously doesn't like me at all. Ever since coming back, mornings have been like a non-stop running tap, just that water is now mucus. My sinus problem has gotten back to normal, as compared to the non-existent times in Wellywood, NZ where temperatures there are at least half of that of Singapore, almost all year round. Spending the last 1.5 months back home has made me realised that Singapore is undergoing a second phase of chinese migration, just like how our forefathers came over to this little place tens of years ago. The government says Singaporean women are not producing enough babies to make up for the population demand and therefore we need the influx of foreigners. I am not against this, in fact this sounds pretty fair. Every one wants to be a career person, including the women and giving birth is of least importance nowdays. No wonder guys are turning into gays. Women, we need you!

Right now, i'm battling this sharp pain in my right eye. I have no god damn idea how this pain came about but it certainly doesn't look very good. Had a fever this afternoon but it subsided after popping some panadols prescribed by the Doctor from UHC. Caught some sleep back in Mario's and Jerome's room and managed to drive home safely to catch some more rest.

Other than being sick and groggy today, everything else went fine. Viva was sweet as, as usual, cos it's me. A to the N to the D to the Y. Whatever. I guess the excessive read up on my experiment did pay off in impressing the professor in my depth of knowledge. I felt good by the end of 20 minutes. Yes, 20 mins was all it took for the Prof to viva me. Ain't i cool? I bet.

One down and 4 more to do. Everything's going as planned other than my health. I didn't plan to fall sick and now i have no contingency plan. This sucks. And to all my faithful readers, i certainly guarantee that this will not be the first and last entry of 2010. Keep reading!

Sweet as bro,

dyeo