Firstly, my schoolwork is killing me. Have been spending more or less the entire day for the past 3 days studying because the homework is just too much. I even brought my books to my (maternal) grandma’s place today. The worst part is, it’s only like one chapter per week and I’m struggling to complete them. Like all 5 of my mods there’s homework, though the tough (ie. more quantitative / technical) mods are only Econs, FA and MS. I don’t know why people say they’re easy I really hope they get easier when I get the basics. I’m pretty sure that this term will be a hard one to last through ):

Also, this term (at least till midterm) I’d be committing rather heavily to both my CCAs Handball and Broadcast. Handball trainings Wed and Sat, hosting trainings (under Jacqueline Chow from Fly Entertainment!) Mon and Fri. Both of which imperative to further progress in the respective fields.

So I practically have no time for any social activity unless I don’t have homework, which is impossible given the nature of my mods. And I don’t wanna sacrifice too much rest / sleep time because my immune system is shit; in fact true to my very own CNY tradition I’m feeling sickish again. Wtf man seriously, I can fall sick once or twice a year and one of the occasions will definitely be sometime around CNY. Fml.

Haha anyway, this term I have so many eye candies in my classes! Sian I want girlfriend. Everyone’s getting attached I don’t wanna be forever alone :’(

1) ORD

So I happily ORDed in February this year… it’s been helluva journey, though only the first year could be counted as real army experience. Gombak Base treated me very nicely though, it’s sorta like an extended holiday, minimal work and stay-out for 900 bucks a month. Just that I got bored and sick of it after awhile. Just for the record, here‘s my Army Reflections.

2) Work

After ORD I bummed around for awhile, at the same time looking for short-term jobs that paid decent and were not too boring or taxing. Obviously they didn’t really exist. That’s also why I worked for a mere 1.5 days at Pulley Ascent, this telemarketing company before quitting haha. Subsequently Recruit Express recommended a one-month job at the Science Centre where I helped conduct simple science lectures and tours around the exhibits. That was really fun. At both places the company was absolutely fantastic, in spite of the time spent with them being so short.

3) Europe

In late May I headed to Europe with Qinsheng and Yuxuan on a backpacking trip for 3.5 weeks. Still don’t find it worth the sheer amount of money spent ($6.5k or so) but I don’t like to regret things so on hindsight it was a pretty good experience Maybe even of the once-in-a-lifetime variety, because I don’t know if I’d ever spend that much on a holiday again, other than on honeymoon or something. Didn’t really gain a tremendous lot in terms of artistic / cultural / historical / educational value but sometimes when I’m daydreaming I find my thoughts drifting to that feeling of ultimate freedom and having no worries I rarely get in Singapore. Also for the record, my Europe trip experience here

4) SMU

Actually I believe I’ve already summed up the most prominent experiences in the first term in my previous post… so a short note would suffice. Academics wise there’s definitely space for improvement. Outside of studies I’ve taken part in a number of activities, for instance my CCAs Broadcast and Handball. Before school started I also went for a number of camps, of which Sports camp was the most fun by far. Social life is alright, made plenty of new friends and there’s a closer group in the form of the Pinkies (my sports camp group). My FTB camp group isn’t too bad either; we meet now every now and then. Other than that, my most reliable buddy in school is probably old friend Jackson, who’s in more than half my classes.

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5) Friends

Since Uni started time spent with the old Gold Friends have dwindled significantly. But I’m glad to say that we still catch up, especially this holidays. Of course it’s been much more difficult to keep up with the overseas ones… but some of them like Kheexuan, Benpoh and Jijo do strike up a chat every now and then.

Towards December I’ve also started feeling like no one in SMU can ever come close to the Gold Friends… I don’t know if time will change that, because sometimes it still feels like something isn’t right. Anyway, I decided that Jackson is a Silver Plus Plus Plus Friend (S+++), while (most of) the Pinkies are Silver Plus Plus (S++), and some of the better mates in school such as Blue Moon are Silver Plus. However I feel like a lot of them have hit their maximum potential already… like I said, only time can tell.

And true to tradition, the Highly-Intensely-Enormously-Anticipated-With-Bated-Breaths Gold Friend of the Year Award goes to… Junshyang! Even though Woankeng complains that JS disappeared the whole year and was only a nice friend in December and got the award, I believe that’s just a case of sour grapes (because he’s only 3rd this year). But okay point taken, this coming year I’ll take note of the earlier part of the year more. I wanted to announce Good Progress Award but I realised nobody really deserves it so I’m scraping it. I nearly gave it to Bryan Buan. Anyway, Hazel comes in a close second after Junshyang.

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6) Driving Woes

Oh yes. I’m sure 10 or 20 years down the road I will look back at 2011 as a pretty eventful year in terms of my driving experience. Got lost countless times, most epic being the drive around town for more than 2 hours, wasting 1/4 tank petrol and more than 10 bucks in ERP charges. 2 days later I got lost somewhere around town again, and took another 2 hours. I also banged various objects such as walls and other vehicles, for instance less than a week after passing I crashed into a car on PIE. Within the week my dad went to China and I had the car to myself I also succeeded in crashing it like 5 times or so, mostly while parking. At that point I wasn’t very worried because it was an old car after all… but last week I scratched the car again tackling the multi-storey carpark near home. The new 2-day-old car. Felt like shit.

Full stories of driving adventures here Photos here )

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7) New Year Resolutions

To be honest I’m not a very fervent believer in yearly resolutions but I like to put them in words and revisit them the following year. Here are last year’s:

I want to:

- Make many many many new friends at Work and SMU Biz, if i end up there. (I’m trying for NUS and NTU Biz again this year) and continue being Mr. Popular (hahhaahahhahhaha) and Mr. Humble

- At the same time, continue keeping in close contact with all my old friends, especially the Gold Friends.

- At the same time, get a Girlfriend worth keeping for the rest of my life.

- If not, some cute or hot flings will do.

- Get good grades…….. if it doesn’t compromise my social life

- i’m kidding about the above. good grades are imperative. social life is secondary. but necessary all the same. both please?

- More AA opportunities. Emcee, drama, i don’t know, more???

- Be funnier, a better friend, more mature, less emotional, happier, smarter and a more creative person in general.

And that’s when I realised, it’s exactly what I’ve been striving for, and what I still want to continue pushing myself to do. Even though I haven’t been like terribly successful in most of them, I’m glad to say I tried (nearly) my best. Okay, some completely fail (read: get a girlfriend, hahahahahahaahahahahahaha). As well as being a more mature and less emotional person. That’s part of me, really hard to change But I guess the keyword is, self-control.

So, I shall keep this set of resolutions for the year… maybe for the next 3.5 years too. Maybe I’ll add a couple more:

- Fine-tune my career ambitions… now it’s slightly too vague for my liking

- More initiative and decisiveness in taking on non-academic commitments

- Better my presentation skills… I can’t do anything but joke

- Drive (more) safely

1) Sick again

In short, either a stomach flu or a mild case of bacterial infection. Probably caught it from Terna or Ree when I met them on Tuesday… Anyway, I developed a rather high fever (not 40 degrees as my FB status proudly declared though – I discovered next day the thermometer was kinda faulty) and I spent the entire Tuesday night puking. As in, the entire night. Every 5 to 10 minutes, the most 20, getting up, running to the toilet, hurling vomit or air, and trudging back, still feeling like puking but having nothing left to puke. I probably blogged about it before, but that shit’s probably the worst feeling, ever. Thankfully it’s only the second or third time I’ve fallen sick this year, nothing like the JC days nightmare.

Anyway, this bout of sickness was very ill-timed (nice pun there) because the weeks before this I was doing nothing, the days after I am not doing much, but those very few days were supposed to be busy days for me. Wednesday I was supposed to meet Qinsheng, Yuxuan, Eileen and Jessamin to surprise Jesslyn for her birthday. And handball after that. Thursday I was supposed to take my IPPT, and Pinkies Xmas dinner. Friday, meet Junshyang. And in between do my long overdue shopping. So all my plans were wrecked.

2) Filming

But at least I didn’t fall sick before / on Monday and Tuesday, which I spent acting for a CTV production. Acting gay again, sigh. Apart from the fact that it’s getting a bit boring, I don’t really like people suspecting whether I’m really gay. It’s not that I like or dislike doing it, I do it because I’m good at it and it makes people laugh. But like I told anyone who would listen, this is the last time I’m acting gay for any film / video / play / whatever. Don’t know how many people think I’m gay already sigh how am I gonna attract my hot chicks this way? Anyway, doesn’t it occur to people that if I were gay I wouldn’t be purposely acting gay for a show? Hello?

It kinda reminded me of J1, when I acted gay for Campfire night and the Dramafeste crew wanted me to act gay for Dramafeste thereafter but I begged them to let me audition for emo Max instead and I got it. One thing I know – I definitely had much more fun playing Max than if I had done the gay role. So I considered asking for a switch with one of the guys but I realised my role had the most screen time among the guys. So being the attention-seeking asshole I am I decided to keep it. Haha.

Gripes about the gayness of the gay role aside, I sure had loads of fun. I miss acting, not that I’ve acted much in my life… but I really enjoyed it. The crew was fantastic, as were my fellow cast, especially Jolene whom I did most scenes with. She’s quite hilarious. I think at this point I’m ready to retract my comments about BE… about 3 posts down. Sure, they’re extremely friendly, but they are not fake, maybe except a few of them. I guess I’m slowly letting go of the VPH bitterness, coming to terms with it haha.

3) Results

Is as expected. C+ for Stats. B+ for Biz Law. A- for LTB. A-/A for CT. A/A+ for TWC. Means if not for Stats, my GPA would have been 3.6+ instead of a 3.3+. SIGH. Oh, and for the non-SMU readers, our GPA’s out of 4, not 5, haha. So to be perfectly honest, I guess 3.3+ is a decent GPA… except that I wanted much better, of course. But let’s be realistic here too. I didn’t expect myself to do much better either.

4) Friends

Am still drifting bit by bit from the Pinkies, and all other SMU friends. I want my old friends back ): Met Jinyang, Buan and Seng last weekend, and even though they’re my least close Gold Friends, they are still miles ahead of the new friends. A few billion miles. To think I was still considering demoting them to Silver Plus because I don’t meet them enough. At the least they can only be Gold Minus. Never Silver Plus. Actually I’m talking cock, they’re still as Gold as all my other Gold Friends. And now I’m starting to doubt if the Pinkies can ever be Gold Friends. There is a huge problem that I can’t exactly tell them in their faces, sigh.

5) My only xmas wish

Before I fell sick I would say my only wish is for my face to clear itself of pimples and acne and be smooth and shiny again. Really, the state of my face has been the cause of many depressed days and nights this year… I’ve tried countless facial washes and creams, mostly to no avail. To think there was a time I had such a flawless face I didn’t even wash with anything other than water! Really, look at my old photos on FB, you’ll get a shock. The JC days ones. Even the early army ones weren’t so bad! Sigh, it really reminds me never to take anything I have for granted. Hate my face now ):

Anyway, when I fell sick, I realised the most important thing is to be healthy. And now that I just recovered, I just wish my grandma would recover too (she caught it from me ) and nobody else, family and friends, catch it too.

6) End

So enough for today. I’ll come up with a New Year post soon, as always. Bye.

1) Academics

I think from all the results released thus far I’m doing pretty well… hopefully at least an A- for the fluff mods, namely LTB, TWC and CT. Biz Law should be fine too, hopefully a B+ at least??? Stats exam was a huge joke. Ran out of time badly and didn’t touch like 8 marks… out of 40. Spent too long on the MCQs which were much harder and tikam-ed my way through half of them… Was really, really upset after the paper (it was the freaking first paper somemore). Worse still, not a lot of people concurred that it was hard. So with the bell curve it’d be even more disastrous!!! I’ll be glad if I can even get a B- overall. But it was really so bad I wouldn’t be surprised if I have to retake it next sem.

Before the finals it was an even more hectic period of rushing for projects. I was one of the more unlucky ones in the sense that all my project deadlines were pretty close to one another, like 5 within 2 weeks or so. It was seriously a mad, mad rush. But I’m really satisfied with most of them because I got to star in lots of silly exhibitionist performances! Thanks to the nature of fluff mods. For TWC we filmed a short video of me dying 8 times, cut to 5 in the end cuz of time constraints. For LTB I got to play a fierce doctor screaming at his subordinates. For CT I got to act out a scene in the toilet. And it was all like one-man shows!!!!!! So proud of myself :’)))) And I really enjoyed it a lot a lot, especially when I see and hear laughter from the audience. Wish there could be more such opportunities but I don’t think subsequent mods would permit so sigh ):

And I feel really lucky for having mostly awesome groupmates for all my projects. There were problems here and there, some of rather epic proportions, but in the end we got through just fine. So A BIG THANK YOU to Keshia, Gabriel, Guangjie, Kenley, Cordelia, Shihao and Yura for LTB; Jackson, Sherilyn, Liwei, Shaphan and Liting for Biz Law; Jackson, Morgan, Kenji and Reuben for TWC; Cherie, Veron, Cass, Chinteck and Karyee for CT. Haha even though they won’t read this, I’ll feel better acknowledging them for all the hard work and tears, sweat, blood and shit shed together :’)

2) BE trainings (or the lack thereof)

So basically Haoren is my trainer and he’s damn nice and a really good host too, I think he’s one of the best speakers around. But anyway he told me he remembered me from VPH!!! And he told me the reason I got kicked out was cos of objectionable content. So he explained patiently to me that in a public setting I can’t be overly explicit with the sex jokes, because the audience and event organisers, both of whom are more important than my own massive ego and innate need to express myself, might not like it. I guess I accept that reasoning… but no one told me I had to rein myself in at VPH!!! Sigh, it’s okay, it’s over.

But that one and only training with him thus far was a disaster… it was only an audience of 3 people and I kept blanking out as I spoke. In the end it came out all choppy and unnatural and extremely displeasing to the ears. It was just so bad. So now I guess I’ve no one to blame but myself if no one thinks I speak well, haha. Sometimes I cannot believe how after so many times on stage I still get really paralysis-inducing stage frights. Meh. Anyway I hope that night was a one-off, because I was in a really lousy mood that day and I had a billion things to complete. But I don’t wanna make excuses for myself la, gotta be professional about it.

I feel quite empty and ambivalent about hosting and BE nowadays… I think I lost the enthusiasm already. I feel like just immersing myself in the books and study and do nothing else. But I know I’ll regret it so once they let me take the stage I must psycho myself to volunteer for more events. Whether I will be good at it or not is another issue altogether. Mmm. But it’s quite sad to see like everyone ignoring the emcees at events. Even the very best ones, Dafril and Jannah struggle to get some hype in the crowd.

3) Handball

It’s a really really tough game to pick up. The more I play the more I feel I suck. At the end of every single training I feel like never going back… but I still find myself back there again next training. I don’t really know why either. I suspect it’s because I have ZERO other commitments so it’s my only shot at doing something productive. Oh well. Guess I can only keep trying.

4) You are the Apple of my Eye

Finally caught it. Cried rivers, fountains and waterfalls. Seriously sad as hell. Have been watching / listening to the theme song on repeat for 5 days already. Still feels extremely depressing. Le sigh.

5) Old is Gold

Over the past few days I met Yuxuan and Qinsheng, Junshyang and Hazel respectively… I know I said it like 4857390569024556 times already but seriously, nobody can beat these old, Gold Friends. I think no one in SMU can even come half as close in knowing me (and vice versa) as these guys… Sigh I really miss them all I wish I can meet them more often, much more often, including the overseas ones. Doesn’t matter if we run out of things to talk about, though we seldom do. Maybe there won’t be additions to the Gold list after all, contrary to my earlier plans… More and more I don’t find myself close to the Pinkies… with the girls it’s still not so bad, but it’s different with the guys. Sigh x2.

6) Jay Chou

Got the new album already. I don’t really like it. But for old times’ sake I’ll still support (:

7) X

Have felt like shit for more than a week because of this… it’s the same old stuff over again. Oh well, what can I say. Mental pat on the back for myself, and try to get over it yet again. Must stop the self-pity shit from surfacing too much here.

8) Conclusion

It’s nearly Xmas and New Year again… will come up with an EOY post as usual, and reread the old resolutions and stuff. Looking forward to some proper reflection on the year. Sigh my spirits are still in the gutters but CHEER UP CHUN things will pick up somehow. I’ll try to update really soon (I think I missed out on a lot of stuff that I wanted to write about which I jotted down in my notebook, but because my notebook’s at Terena’s house and she’s overseas so I can only agar agar)

Bye. Friends, please date me out ):

#me

also, without trying to offend anybody or sound like mr. sour grapes, i often get the feeling BE people are rather fake and over-friendly. perhaps that’s what they’re looking for, that’s what makes you ‘good’ enough to be an emcee eh. okay enough. maybe i’ll retract the statement when i’m a little less angsty and pent up. there are quite a few nice ones of course, but nahhhhhh so far i don’t feel ‘at home’ at all. i’m beginning to wish i hadn’t signed up at all.

thankfully for the moment i have handball to pay attention to. so far i’ve gone for like 6 or 7 sessions already over the past few months. it was mostly just playing around and basic drills till last week when the coach came and made us do much more… more tiring drills, more pushing and more punishment for talking when he talks or when we don’t do the drills well enough. it’s like army all over again; even water breaks are short and limited. but i’m still going because it’s really fun, and i don’t feel like i suck too badly yet. the culture is a little weird too though haha but well so far the freshies are all very nice and friendly.

the projects are coming in hard and fast i am drowning~~~

i mean, what’s new. we always say the same thing about supposed holidays… but i’m proud of this particular one. in short, i went to work for 3 days at MOE as a personal favour to my auntie, because they needed urgent admin help. since i’ve worked there for a few months before army (that’s about 3 years ago wtf how time flies indeed), it was really interesting to go back there to see familiar faces and a really familiar environment. seems and feels like nothing has changed since those 3 years ago.

the downside to this stint is, of course, the mugging of my mugging time. (pun intended geddit geddit?! mugging as in robbing haha i’m so witty cannot stand myself) so anyway, yeah. didn’t have THAT much schoolwork to do (actually still quite a bit) but 3 days is really a lot i can study a lot more with that. anyway because of work at MOE i feel like i haven’t studied a lot so i spent today and yesterday cooped up at home trying to do as much work as possible… am only 70% effective sigh. so little time.

but i had my fair bit of rest and recreation too i guess. finally partied for the first time since school started with the Pinkies <3 and co last Saturday. This time it was Terena’s turn to KO hahahaha so funny. Also had dinner and leisure mugging with Hazel on Monday or Tuesday night, and dinner with the Pinkies on Friday. Also spent a night with BlueMoon at Costa Sands chalet on Wed night… the highlight of the night was definitely Wini joining us for the first time since FTB ended 4 months ago hahahaha. Anyway it was really fun, gossiped about HC juniors with Limmin and Jo haha. There was also plenty of drinks so it was quite high and all (: though it made work and project meeting the next day rather painful

in other news, i studied damn freaking hard for midterms last week but it was quite screwed up. biz law i ran out of time real bad and wrote one-liners for two ten-mark questions… confirm fail. stats i didn’t know how to do quite a few too… twc felt alright though i feel i could have done better. SIGH what a disappointment seriously.

also spent the past week on some self-reflection… sometimes i don’t know who i am anymore. sigh. i’m trying really hard not to think too much about things but i can’t help it… ugh. okay let’s get back to the books. also, i need to meet some of the old friends… miss them loads. ah.

1) Flight of the Friends

Or to be precise, the Gold Friends. It started with Benpoh to France in August, then Junjie, Kheexuan, Shiwei and Jijo to the UK the past 2 weeks. Calvin’s one not counted since he’s in his second year already. Anyway, felt pretty sad at every one of the sendoffs… in a way because I know invariably we’re ending a chapter of our lives and drifting apart. However, I really hope Calvin’s case provides a shred of optimism in that we’ve managed to talk like he never left, every time we met up when he came back. It’s just that we have so much to catch up on that we lose track of what’s going on in the lives of one another. Then again, you don’t need to fly overseas to drift apart… it’s been damn hard to make time for friends outside of SMU because of how busy everybody is. sigh i’ve talked about this so many times but i still feel depressed when i think about how one is always forced to move on from the people once close to him. I miss all my Gold Friends, and i foresee i’ll miss them even more in the months to come.

2) I am a Smugger

I cannot believe it myself, but I spent the past 4 days in their entirety STUDYING at home. (less Friday night dinner with the pinkies and subsequently sending Shiwei and Jijo off) Thurs whole day Biz Law, Fri and Sat whole days Stats, today Biz Law. But today I was really tired out mentally and couldn’t absorb much… sigh. Tomorrow’s Biz Law midterms, Wed’s Stats midterms, Sat’s TWC midterms and I haven’t started on that. I feel damn stressed and I don’t just want to pass, I want GOOD GRADES. So far I’ve been fucking up everything I’ve done so the least I can try for now are plain old grades ugh. But I still don’t feel confident at all for both mods… especially stats. that one can’t aim high at all. sigh.

3) Pinkie Pies<3

Haven’t laughed so much in what feels like forever. Short dinner with them on Friday night was so enjoyable i was an hour late for Shiwei’s sendoff (sorry oops) Haven’t met most of them in really really long too, so it was about time we met up… I feel like joining them when a few of them study together but I know I will just keep talking and nothing will get done so for our own sake I choose to study at home most of the time. Anyway, point is, I love them very much! As I told them, they have the potential to be Gold Friends (: The difference between now and say, a month ago is that I feel comfortable talking to most of them about serious stuff already, and not just always fooling around. So despite not meeting up that much, we’re still growing stronger and tighter as friends. And apart from Jackson (but not fair because he got headstart at being my friend since sec 3), they’re the people I’m most dependent on in SMU, and I hope most, if not all of them feel the same way. I really hope we stay together for the rest of our time in SMU, and meet up every now and then after we graduate. (i know i think damn far, but time fries)

4)

I still get damn sad every time I get reminded of getting kicked out of vph. i need more self-worth arghhhhhhosdioosidjf;lcoSdaWoifn AND I NEED SOMETHING / SOMEONE TO LOOK FORWARD TO IN MY LIFE WILL THAT SOMETHING / SOMEONE APPEAR SOON?!?

GOODNIGHT ALL ):

sigh lkafjdlskajf;l

what’s starkly different about this particular one is that i actually believed. i actually had the confidence that i had a real chance of reaching the finals and winning it. i believed this was finally something i was good at. you know, being confident, funny, charismatic and having a stage personality. the magnitude of this crashing down to earth… i cannot put it in words. i feel like i am a complete good-for-nothing now.

of course, i know i screwed up a bit tonight. to be honest i was really amazed at how good most of the contestants were… i didn’t expect competition to be this stiff. but i still thought i managed to stand out. obviously i was alone in thinking that. but i also know i messed up, in that i was either too one-dimensional or overdoing it with the sex jokes and wasn’t funny at all. i’ve only the few minutes to prove myself, and i fucked it up.

i thought failures could only make future failures easier to stomach, but no, they’re amplified. my self-worth is as low as it has ever been, right now. in the immediate future at least, i don’t think i’ll go on stage again. even if i do, i don’t think i’ll ever find it as easy to be myself. and i’ll never join any of such competitions again. i think i’ll end up jumping off a building if anymore of such disappointments strike. kidding, i won’t jump off a building.

anyway, i might sound pretty bitter and emotional now, but i’ll be fine soon i guess. i’m really grateful to my friends, especially the Pinkies, for coming down and all the encouragements… shit man i not only let myself down but a whole lot of people who put their faith in me too. anyway friends, tell me nice things but only if it is the truth… i wasn’t ‘awesome’ just now and i know it, so it’s fine…

ugh i shall go try to sleep it off… i really hope i see a small sliver of light at the end of the tunnel soon. i’m so damn weak i can’t stand myself