1ao1c - a little matter of perspective: 05/01/2005

Yes, I had the notion you people were getting a little bit too much of that, but cut us some slack because this is quite literally OUR LIVES. It's quite sad.

Anyway, what say all of you to another gathering sometime soon? This weekend, perhaps. Let's have some feedback.

I shall refrain from commenting on all the globe-trotting, for the resulting jealousy may drive my keyboard up my nose. Just, you know, whoo! However, sning!!! YOU SAW THE STORMTROOPERS OUTSIDE GRAUMAN!!! Did you see them get escorted back? hahaha. Also, can I hate you with a passion now?

Alas, I'm glad that we're currently distracted from posts regarding NS; NS sucks; NS really sucks; no, really, NS SUCKS; so on and so forth.

Oh, yes, lammie wanted me to inform everyone that she loves Pharrell Williams and wants to have his babies and name them Pharrell Jr., Pharrell Jr. Jr., Pharrell Jr. Jr. Jr., etc. Alternatively, I suggest Pharrell Jr., Pharrelly and Pharrellam.

Lastly, because I am random and bored, everyone go see this. "A Lesson In Self-Defense For Every New-Yorker." The video is quite short, and really quite awesome. Watch and learn, ladies.

Philadelphia? Ah, yes, first capital of the United States. Well, that's quite an eyeful you got anyway. Wish I've ever seen even a quarter as much.

And Greece, wow. Birthplace of western civilization. Which part(s)? Saw you the Parthenon?

I apologise if I seem a little over-enthusiastic and obsessed. It is within my nature.

wow sudden scary profusion of posts! i am tremendously jet lagged now(have slept one hour in the past 28) but am trying valiently to keep my sleep cycles in whack and am ehnce posting furiously, albeit incoherently! greece was highly fantastic, i wheezed up many hills and ate much meat and was told i was a "runt" by this well-meaing greek man the size of goliath. oh yes, and i am going to nus fass to do lit. probably. and a PONCE BAKERY! HAHAHAHA! while i am very very amused and gratified that you took a picture of it sning(thanks muchly) i am also wondering why someone would voluntarily name their bakery as such since it doesnt seem vaguely..appetising.

I didn't actually go to Virginia lah. So no Civil War battlefields. I did visit Philadelphia which is an important city because that's where they gained independence from the British. And I went inside a US battleship and submarine that had defended America in both WW2 and the Cold War. Oh I visited UN headquarters too - saw the Noble Peace Prize plaque the Peacekeeping Sector won, among other things, which actually makes me happy we studied all that stuff for source-based.

- s. ning

With reference to Shuang Ning's latest post:

One of the original Thirteen Colonies, George Washington's home state and part of the seceding Confederate States of America during the US Civil War, Virginia is steeped in history. This also means it is one of the most conservative parts of the USA and home largely to descendants of the "planter aristocracy" - those rich white folk you refer to. I suppose a foreign student would feel better in younger and more cosmopolitan areas of the country, like California, which has seen foreign residents practically ever since it was settled. But the way you describe it, Virginia sounds nice enough, so that's good.

Saw any nice Civil War battlefields while over there? Or anything else to do with American history? I'm genuinely curious.

Ponce will surely be glad to hear of aforementioned eponymous bakery in NYC [will never forget the meaning of EPONYMOUS because of that GP common test comprehension we did in J1 :(((]

Also, S.Ning, actually I just wanted to say that your fingernail is very long. Albeit clean. :)

Firstly this is in reply to Yi San - I think my mum gets her beads from Arab Street, but I'll ask her again.
Anyway, I think most people know I am going to U of Virginia to do English. I met some of my seniors/fellow first-years today and everyone was nice. As in no difficult-to-deal-with people at all. It's hard to say though - I mean, did any of you fiendishly hate your first day of RJ orientation? I am happy other than the fact that there is NO PROPER CHINESE FOOD in Virginia because it is ulu and full of rich white folks. (This is in contrast to say, L.A., which is 40% Hispanic and has not-bad Asian food.)
This is a just a side-note to say that Gen told me to seek out the Magnolia Bakery in New York because it appears in Sex in the City or something? Anyhow, I was looking for their phone number in the hotel directory and look!

Image hosted by Photobucket.com

Yes, there is a PONCE BAKERY in Manhattan. What fun.

- s. ning

i was stunned when i saw clouds around our blog page... more stunned than i was seeing chunwee online this wednesday night.. haha...

as for me i got a surprise nights out, announced to us half an hr b4 the bookout time.

yup, i accepted NUS FASS as well, intending to do history. must admit i was quite lazy to be bothered to do research abt other local universities..

anyway gtg booking in soon.. good nite blog :P

I beg to differ regarding this new template, but who am I to obstruct the howling winds of change?

NUS FASS, all-expenses-paid (ok, actually not really) courtesy of the Ministry of Education, Republic of Singapore. Probably going to study History and English (Language, I think), but we'll see when the MOE Teaching Scholarship (Local) offer package finally comes through the mail.

Despite living within (technically) walking distance, I'm going to stay in their hostels, mainly because USP promises I will get better ones and MOE is paying for it.

And thus, if anyone by the off-chance happens to require me in the future, I'll be staying right here on the sacred soil of our glorious republic.

I've changed our blog's template! It's quite blue and pretty (in a unisex way, don't worry). Also, if you think about it, it's quite symbolic of our futures, don't you think - I mean, blue skies, fluffy clouds and all... haiya, wtf am I going on about :|

Hey, I think we should all post here and say what unis we'll be going to, for the sake of.... well, for the sake of SOMETHING! No lah, seriously, if you have already decided, post here so we can be all updated on who's going where, etc. (Female CT rep take note, It'll also help you when you're compiling data on all of us for future contact information purposes).

Anyway, me first:

Lammie - NUS (FASS). Most probably going to do SEA Studies, but of course subject to change (pun intended!!).
Also, I'm hoping to convince my parents to let me stay in a hostel, although lord knows why ANYONE would want to stay in their ugly barrack-looking hostels... :)))

oh yeah babay... i am back in one piece haha.

let's calculate the amount of sleep i had this week. on monday i had SAR21 and SAW familiarisation shoot, and hence i slept 5 hours. on tuesday to thursday i had exercise nutcracker, which involves digging trenches all day and night, and guarding them. i had 4 hours total for tuesday and wednesday. on thursday nite cos of some interview thingy i slept late again. 5 hours. friday nite i had the normal 7 hours.

so: 5+4+5+7=21 hours of sleep. i am supposed to get at least 35. well done, elgin, well done.

haha.. it's nice to think so far into the future... but personally i shall live for the here and now. isn't the entire idea of university life such a surreal dream that seems light-years away?

in other news, in terms of interviews, elgin had interview on friday, after a monday of range, tuesday-wednesday-thursday of nutcracker exercise (some shellscrape firetrench exercise)...

if we haven't started pampering ourselves, we should start soon... taxi more... eat more.. tv more.. there is no such thing as decadence:P

2.5 hours of sleep the "night before" (read: "morning of") an important scholarship interview... thank you SAF.

Although they did let us sleep 2 and a half hours more later in the morning.

I never saw the sense in disrupting, to speak truly. Serve it all at one shot; why leave a little period of a few months behind to come back to? By then you'll be unused to the military life all over again. It makes little sense to me.

But whatever floats your boat, certainly.

I am so completely missing my course closing.

mmm.. that reminds me of the good ol' days at signal institute where all one had to worry abt were being caught sleeping in class (though most of the time, even with more than half the class drowsy/unconscious, no one got singled out), and the tests (which turned out to be crammable and come with incredibly useful 'revision lessons').
good life... even if the classrooms were all stuffy, non-aircon or aircon-spoilt, and comp labs flooded with cables...

my guard duty was spent in an aircon room, cos through sheer good fortune i was appointed (beforehand, it seems) to be the orderly, i.e. 24 hr in the aircon guardroom making sure visitors fill in the rite papers, or button-pushing to lift/lower the barriers whenever a vehicle comes rolling along. the downside is that, offically, the 2 orderlies are not supposed to sleep within the entire 24 hrs, but i konked out at 2 something AM, until 5+..

10 more hrs to book-in, i had better make use of this partially burnt leave...

hoho had extra physical training everyday for this whole week... courtesy of my section commander.

which means, i do something like 200 pushups, 50 chinups, 50 counts of 4 alternate leg thrusts, 100 of 4 jumping jacks and 50 crunches each morning after endurance runs (6km long), before RO, and after RO.

which translates to creaking knee caps and aching muscles now. i am just hoping that my knee cap will not pop before i finish my course.

Sign leave to do guard duty? That's the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard, and for once what I say is neither an exaggeration nor an understatement.

Yes, unit life is no picnic; something I've known for a while, having been subjected to a few cruel and unusual punishments myself down here in 24 SA. It's sometimes a dog's life, but at least it isn't a spec's life.

I can't really say much else except hang on - it will end eventually.

whew! it's been a long long time since i've felt so relieved upon bookout. this is not the time & space for me to comment abt the past few days, but, i guess there's no harm in dispelling a few myths.

1. unit life is not necessarily 'slack' - (slack = exercises once in a few months, nights out, privileges, whatever airy-fairy crap)
2. no one (except your platoon & pc & platoon sergeants) is going to look out for you. consider this hypothetical situation. you are stranded in the middle of tekong highway, right in the forested area, with no building in sight, for the past 6 hrs, minimal water, no food, and it's cat 1 (high lightning risk) without you even knowing it. no one bothers abt you until half an hour or 45 min later... oh and did i forget to mention that you're not allowed to bring your handphone out with you, and that you do not have any means of comms?

imagine another purely hypothetical situation. - u get a 24 hr guard duty on sunday to monday, and, after eating 7 or 8 hrs of your monday, they force u to 'sign out' one day of leave on monday, which means that you're signing out your own leave for guard duty. it just gets worse and worse, rite?

far be it for me to ramble on, but i would just like to offer a prayer that elgin, mark, qiyan do not get posted to my unit, or one similar to it.

my first mid-week bookout in a long time.. a surprisingly large number of pple are online. i never realised how dependent i was on internet access until today when there was this talk on overseas postings, and i contemplated the notion of spending a year in some brunei camp, with internet acess being one of the few (if not only) links to civilisation... in the end i didn't indicate preference, but i wouldn't be surprised if i get posted there in the near future... murphy's law.

anyway, looking forward to the next long weekend:P. cheerio!

hehehohohahahaaaaaa bookinbookinbookinbookinbookin
cya in a week. or more.

ahaha, of all the places ponce could have stood... Anyway, hello! :]

-mamaleng

:)

1ao1c - a little matter of perspective

Tuesday, May 31, 2005

Sunday, May 29, 2005

Saturday, May 28, 2005

Thursday, May 26, 2005

Wednesday, May 25, 2005

Tuesday, May 24, 2005

Saturday, May 21, 2005

Tuesday, May 17, 2005

Monday, May 09, 2005

Saturday, May 07, 2005

Tuesday, May 03, 2005

Monday, May 02, 2005

Sunday, May 01, 2005

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