solicitude

2009-10-04T23:41:00.003+08:00

- Home -

Growing isn't easy

Be it growing up or growing old

More tough decisions to make

More complex issues surface

More clutter clogging your space

Tough day at work?

Bad day?

Disappointments?

Misalignment?

Many things juz don't go your way

Naively ..

Holding high hopes

But the fall is always high as well

Trust people too easily?

Is that my strength or weakness?

I really don't know anymore

Lowering my guard to trust, to share & be nice

But it always hit me

hard

taken for granted

Like what you always tell me

Never trust too easily

But I can't help it

It's my nature

Running all around

Getting into all sorts of activities

Drenched

Drained

Had a hard landing

Sore

At the end of the day

at least

I know there is always you with me

Always by my side

No matter what happen

No matter how badly hit I was

No matter rain or shine

I know

I can always cuddle in your embrace

This is home ... with you

2009-10-01T20:00:00.006+08:00

::::: Deviations :::::

Some might ask

Some might wonder

Some scrutinize

Some try to understand

Some seek answers

Some explore

Some just abhor

or even insult

Insulting the upbringing of the others

Insulting the values and beliefs inculcated within families of others

Blaming the society

Blaming peer pressures?

Face it ...

The truth is always ugly

Those who criticize the most

are those who fail to apprehend the things/people closest to them

The roots

entrenched deep down

into one's life experiences up till the point it tips

*Snap*

There ...

Lies at your feet

A new path

A new life

A real you, for some

A new perspective

I guess this is what all these is about

The tipping point.

2009-09-24T15:58:00.003+08:00

~Warped~

Right or wrong

Good or bad

Truth or lie

Who can define

It all falls into place

When sift through different frameworks

Different benchmarks

What is seen through the naked eye

Is never what it really was

What one does is never what one desires

What one projects is never what one really is

And when you just be yourself

You’ll bound to be scrutinize

Couldn’t care less

I would not conform to the norm

Neither would I need anyone’s acceptance

I am who I am

2009-09-14T16:52:00.001+08:00

For a moment

I thought my world stopped revolving

Sucked into a vacuum

Oxygen level thinning

Palms cold with sweat

Body's weak

Never felt this before

This struggle

Another level of struggle

Not with the body

Not with the mind

It's the soul

A mash of cords intertwined together

With my soul in the heart of the mash

It’s unseen by the public, unfelt by the close ones.

But it’s constantly tightening. Breathless.
I need some air.

Fresh air.
I need some space.

Space of my own.

Needed to be around people I desired

Tough

I guess this is the time

we will have to face

a period we have to go through

Just wish this moment will pass by like a breeze

Every effort to loosen the knot

is countered by every attempt to tighten it

Change

I need to turn the situation to my favour

To break free

from the mash

2009-08-10T22:50:00.002+08:00

Another National Day has passed

it's juz like another birthday

Time flies like water flowing down the rapids

People with different aspirations

different destinies

different priorities

who knows what lies ahead

Eccentric as I am

I can't align with the values & beliefs of people around

Yea I can't

I don't even want to explain

or convince anybody

is this when deviation is extrapolated?

is this when people look at you with certain prejudices?

is this when people shun away?

I think so

what can I do

People make choices everyday

I can't change them

I can only be myself

Anyway the world is full of prejudices

You can live your whole life & unable to change them

Juz like how sexism & racism is still prevailing

.........

Another day of work tomorrow

Time to sleep

2009-05-28T21:30:00.002+08:00

::::Going away empties the mind and fills the soul,

coming back home fills the mind and empties the soul. :::::

Nice. Just one trip over the weekend. I concluded this.

Which is very true indeed. What else could be the reason for people

going away?

One can give u a thousand and one reasons. But the truth is .. it's a form of escapism.

But that is life. It's not something bad. You can't say it's bad to run away. Yes, of course facing the music is the best policy to resolving matters. But it doesn't always give you comfort and consolation. But .. think about it. Who doesn't escape?

Yes you can try to confront your problems once,twice,thrice and so on. But to keep this going, it's gonna be mentally drained. Drained...

Totally...

And when do you ever get what you wanted?

Maybe not now, maybe not tomorrow, maybe never.

Fighting for the things you desire isn't a bad thing

But sustaining it is tiring.

How long can you fight?

How long can the flame ignite?

Life is too short to struggle

Slow and steady

Still and quiet

What do you want?

What do I want?

Have you ever ask youself?

Probably no one ever ask

You spend most of your time with people around you everyday

talking about anything and everything under the sun

vague and superficial

The mask you wore, the masks they wore

it's all a cover of what is incomplete inside

You don't get the things you yearn the most

You spent most of your time with people around you

but at the end of the day

it's only just you

left alone

When do you get help when you needed it the most?

Never

it's always you there for yourself

How many people really care?

Beats me

I lost the passion

care

2009-04-23T01:23:00.002+08:00

Many thoughts flashed past
Nv knew where destinies will bring us to
Paths you never knew existed cross
Love by many yet never appreciated
Or did I never knew how to express them
or maybe I just don't know to to reciprocate
It's tough to be loved & it's tough to love
I miss old times & the many people & events
I love you all too... even if I don't say so ..
You know who you are :)

2009-04-08T11:44:00.003+08:00

What lies ahead of me used to be very cloudy and blurry
It was just maybe 1-3 years back?
Questions and doubts constantly surfacing, causing the vision to be even more foggy
This year, finally, when everything starts to fall in place, it fills all the gaps and blanks.
Questions and doubts starts to be answered one by one, reaffirmed.
Becoming more conspicuous.
It's amazing how things just happened all according or not according to your plan.
Now I see ...
It's all about the intentions.
What set it right.
For once, I wonder, am I determined or am I stubborn?
New perspective.
Now I can draft out my plan more vividly
I see colours ahead
It's nice
Just like a rainbow after the rain
You never know when the rain will come, and when the rain will stop
I know exactly what I want now
And I know exactly how am I going to reach my destination
I used to only be able to see my destination vaguely
and blindly groping my way there
stumbling now and then
Now I see how my intentions has pave my path
I am smiling now ...
Finally ~

2009-03-22T12:16:00.000+08:00

Finally, I can enjoy the peace at home, in the day .. and the night ..

Everything is so calm, so clean, so neat. I am starting to like quietness more now.

My heart is still. Beating to the passing seconds.

In tranquillity.

Everything has stop moving.

Indulgence in the moment.

Feel the breeze brushing my cheeks.

I like this.

Enjoying life ...

Happy as I am ~

----------------------------------------------------------------------

-: Fingersmith :-

-: Sarah Waters :-

Good book. An unexpectedly great novel. Never read something like this before.

Intriguing so many feelings and emotions.

It's a must read book.

However, not all will like this novel though.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Next in line:

-: House of Cards: How Wall Street's Gamblers broke capitalism :-

-: William D. Cohan:-

Think the title speaks for itself the content of this book.

How did the financial system in US fails

How did it crumble

One by one

Wall street

The biggest and richest

Yet

The most vulnerable

Risk of overnight liquadation

How trust of millions & billions been crushed

How hope turns to trash

Isn't it amazing that this fisco occurred in our time?

To even encounter, experience and survive it

A test of one's courage and strength

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

2009-02-05T15:51:00.002+08:00

2009

I hope it will be a better year for me. Every year I hope for a better year. When will my better year be here. It's tough waiting. Year after year. How can I conclude? I just hope that things will get on track. Everything shall be on track. It's never easy earning a living. Some people are lucky. Some just ain't. I think I've been lucky in many aspects. Except for ... I guess it's a trade off. Just like how man are created. Look around and you'll find that some people are smart & ain't good looking, some are pretty but have no brains, some are rich yet unhappy, some are poor but contented, some are successful but sick, and some are healthy but ... I think it's all fair. Contentment. Is subjective. Be sure to do things that make you happy. I believe in this. Hope I will be happy this 2009. Happier every year. Such a simple wish. Yet no everyone wish for it...

:D

2008-08-24T22:04:00.006+08:00

Phew ... Everything passed so quickly. With a blink of the eye, months snapped by. I miss old times. Times when I can be so flexible with my own time, times when I can do anything I want, times that I can really rest. Now, everything seemed so cluttered. So cramped up, so many things to accomplish, so many desires to satisfy and yet within so little time. When you try to do as much as you used to do, it seemed so much tougher. Because you are no longer a student anymore but someone with full time commitment @ work. You can no longer plan long term trips or weekday trips as and when you like it. Less flexibility comes with more commitment. That's is what I abhor.

However, with the work I am doing now. I make it a point to spend time with the people I love and activities I like to do. I will not let these get in my way to gain my freedom ...

Otherwise, that is not loving myself. *Just a side note: what is love? How can you give someone love when you don't love yourself? If you can't even love yourself, you wouldn't have overflowing love to give to your loved ones. You can't love someone when you're empty inside youself.*

Okies. Enough of talking. Let me juz update something ba.

I went on a weekend trip to watch Desiree's (Malaysian Superstar 2007) showcase at KL. She signed contract with my music school - TinyBoxMusic - and just launch her first album. Most of the songs written by my teacher, Kenn Wu.

It was a nice experience. To see how production works, the scene backstage, the preparation they made, what happened after the showcase. It was a great experience. I went with my music school mates. Shi Xin Hui and Di Ya were there as well. Di Ya was the guest singer that day and sang one of Desiree's song together. It was amazing. How I wish I can sing like them. Frankly speaking, singing for own pleasure and singing for others' pleasure is really totally different thing. It's so much tougher.

This is Desiree Tan, the Malaysian superstar 2007Diya and Desiree Encore performanceTyre punctured when we are going to the the celebration after the showcase

2008-05-07T02:39:00.002+08:00

Yesterday
I waited for all your friends to walk away
So that I could say what I juz mean

I know we're moving fast
We're running from the past
I'm holding on before it fades away

Could it be that maybe it's our first mistake?
and baby that's alright
It's crazy how we lost ourselves tonight
There is a reason why they
Say that we should give it time
But time is not enough
and that's the reason why
when you're young you fall in love

Standing still
I'm waiting round to see if this is real
Because I feel like I'm asleep

I opened up my eyes
Cos you might be the type
of girl that makes me dream when I'm awake

So tell me can this really work?
or will we end up getting hurt?
is this love?
or myth.....

2008-04-17T15:34:00.004+08:00

It'd been 5 months since I am having "holidays"...
I like that? No.
It's so annoying and frustrating.
Try after try, preparation after preparation.
The feeling of getting all hype up and mentality prepared to venture into something; and when u see it juz right in front of you, where ur fingers tips are touching it already. It juz slip off ur hand once again.
Time after time ...
Not only once
So near yet so far
Life brings hope
and hope brings disappointment
disappointment gives hope again (if you're optimistic)
It goes on ...
On and on ...
When will I fly?
I wanna know

BRRR......~~~
Alright! I got it. I'm back. Whatever it is, I will keep trying. The more U don't want me to get it, I will get it. I'm a fighter. You can come at me, I won't fall.

2008-04-09T01:08:00.001+08:00

My new toy

2008-04-08T18:26:00.009+08:00

Finally, I found my direction. I know what I wanna do from now. So happy. Been floating around for very long aldy. Now I know where to go le. Lolz ... I will soon be able to smile erm ... maybe in 2 yrs' time ba. Haha ... Is it too long? Nah ... I don't think so. If I go corporate, I might not be able to smile after 2 years. It may take a longer time, say ... maybe5 -7 years? I supposed. I think I am such a fortunate person now. :) LuCky me ~ hee

Think I haven't been posting much pics lately:

(Pictures taken on my birthday)

~My birthday cake~

*Sneaked out by my dear when I was tricked into not showering til she comes*

[tsk]

~My birthday jeans~

~@ KboX with te hsin and the rest~

*The very rare moments of her appearing in my recent photos*

Jiayou with you medical studies in tw wor ...

(Pictures taken when I was going to music story)

So cute hor... ~

(Jay chou's concert)

2008-03-29T00:04:00.008+08:00

:::Losing sight::

I am losing sight

Losing sight of what is ahead

Losing sight of what seemed to have been paved out

A barricade appeared out of nowhere

A very high barricade

& a very thick one too

Blocked out the vision in front of me

Blocked out the breeze that swept through my hair

Blocked out the touch from the other side of the wall

I feel a distance

The breeze swept through again

But now it's cold breeze

no longer can I feel the warmth

has winter arrived?

Animals hibernating?

perhaps I should hibernate as well

to survive the cold

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

:::Searching:::

How is it that one can find the inner peace they seek?

Halt & look around

around & within you

What is it that you're searching for?

Can it be found inside you? or from the outside?

Always halt when you recognise that you're not present

LOOK at what you are doing

Are you Doing what you are doing?

or are you seeking for what the-doing brings for you?

Take the time for reconcilation

You will find peace in that

& only then will you be able to pave your path

"The dunes in the desert changes, but the desert never change"

"The secret of happiness is to see all the marvels of the world and never to forget the drops of oil on the spoon" - The Alchemist

2008-03-15T01:20:00.003+08:00

Life is like a journey

driving in a car

along a long stretch of road

Holding on to the steer

you gotta know

when to move and when to stop

when to accelerate &

when to slow

when to take a break &

when to continue

A car can never be run til the petrol is totally depleted

it has to be replenish before it's empty

for a mechnic will know

why this cannot happen

It will only cause more serious problems

It hurts to see people around me

run so fast in life

sometimes too fast

I am not saying it's anything good or bad

but it's painful

and it hurts to see people around me tiring themselves like that

and I being unable to help alleviate the situation or

even be there

It breaks my heart

& it's not something nice

Of cuz, there will also be people who are slower

who see & remember eveything they see along the way

appreciate what is there for them

but lack the speed to move forward faster

it's ironic how life can be

when one has to be keep moving on

faster and faster forward

but has to also slow down or stop to appreciate things/people around them

So, how fast is fast?

& how slow is slow?

When to slow down & when to accelerate?

When to pump petrol and when not to?

It's a question one has to answer themselves

Only YOU will know

If YOU don't,

Maybe, It's juz not Yet~

2008-02-20T00:31:00.002+08:00

For a long time, I thought I was alone.

Alone, rushing around getting a job

Alone, stuggling through life - finding all means to survive

Alone, fighting against our own battles

Alone, with all the emotional traumas that make u flip.

Alone, with all the stress & pressures that you couldn't let it out

but to suspress it down, piling on the other suppressed issues you had before (in you)

I always thought I was alone on my little space

with all the "shit" slowly filling up the space

fighting with me over the space & suffocating me

But it ain't true ...

I made the most realisations on my birthday on 18th Feb and more realisations on 19th feb

I realised that there has always been people around me who stood by me

Always ...

People who stood there ... quietly ... giving me the most support

& I didn't even notice that they are giving me their energies & strength that I need to move on

I thought my family has forgotten about my birthday when no one spoke of anything at all on that day ...

I thought I was forgotten by friends around me when I receive no wishes from them

I thought everybody is busy with their own lives that they are not free to do anything

I thought NO ONE was with me ...

But I was wrong

One need not be physically present to be felt

Love can be felt across distances

it's how amazing love is felt even though I wasn't physically in contact with people who love me so much

I never realised how much my yjc classmates meant to me until today

when we met after a bloody long time

I never knew I actually cherish them so much

and how little I did for them in the past

I realised that...

& it made me wanna hold on to them so much

I should start loving again ...

all my friends around me

I've forsaken them becos of my inability to cope with myself

This is unfair to all the love i've received

"You gain something from the source, you contribute something back to the source"

That's how it works

Thanks everybody who made my birthday so wonderful

~peying~ ~xiaowei~

~pps, sarah, te hsin, huishan, ee wei, jasmine~

~mummy, dad, kelvin, kenneth~

~Executive coach international~

~julz, vicky~

~ caijun, joanne, jiahuey, tocksoon~

~tinybox esp felicia, jo, evyonne~

I love all of you & those not on the list as well ...

Muacks

2008-02-08T20:39:00.000+08:00

Finally, Season 5 is out ...

I've been waiting since the end the season 4 last year.

It's fascinating how this drama made an impact in my life.

Not an impact exactly, but it did gets entwined in my life.

What attracts people to watch & love it so much?

I have no idea

But I do know that it does project a very representative picture of the community

It does

Have always been very fascinated by how the roles they played, situations they got themselves in could translate so much about us

The rest of the roles in the show weren't that of a significance though

I guess they were just distractions in the show

Juz like they were distractions in our lives

How different people deal with distractions

The agony they faced

The turbulence they met

The struggles they fight against

The desire that they long for

The willpower they have to stay on track

The content of the show spells nothing

It's the feelings that speak

Said and unsaid

Felt and unfelt

How a single event change everything

How a single decision change everything

& how a single word change everything

every single move

has a whole list of possiblities

that follows ...

& those possibilites lead to even more possiblities

& every single move is a learning experience

One life Is Not enough to know all

But one life is enough for one to know what they need to learn

whether they see it or not

willing to learn or not

willing to do it or not

It's up to you . . .

~Keep on Fighing~

~If the fight is worth fighting~

2008-01-19T12:28:00.000+08:00

Perspective

What is love? Abstract ....

Is it being nice? Is it doing things for her?

Is it giving things that she wants/needs?

Is it about listening to her? Is it about meeting up?

Is it about seeing her?

Or is it by actions - to show love - to show that you're important?

Many tot they knew what is it all about

But very few know exactly what is it

That includes me

One can have the attraction to another, one can like another

But will the two different individuals be able to exist together at the same time, same space yet in a relationship?

How to bring the relationship to the next level? where both are one whole and complete individuals?

What most important in a relationship is the support that one gives one another.

Support in all forms: physical, mental, emotional, spiritual

That is when something terrible/bad happen, when the whole seemed to collaspe, when everything/everyone else seemed to be despair that you know you have the support of your loved ones. That is what holds a person up again.

And when there is not support in a relationship, everything else cannot be hold in place.

Have you ever tried to see the bigger picture?

Have you ever tried to know what is going on?

Have you ever tried to emphathize?

Or is everything about what you need?

About what you are looking for?

Mutual understanding is not about juz understanding the person you're in relationship with.

It's also about understand the situation that she is in, you are in, both of you are in.

Having to consider the big picture.

Do you know what is the importance of doing what I am doing?

Do you know what impact it will have for me, for my family, for the loved ones around me?

You can't see, you can't understand, you can't feel ....

Cos you haven't understood ..

Yes, you may have tried to understand, but did you try to understand with the intention of really trying to understand, or just to show that you did your part in trying to understand?

There is a difference ...~

When someone hate something, it's because they cannot understand what is going on, why is it happening and that they do not have control for the situation. That is when hate brings a block for the person. They will block out whatever you say. That will be the end of the conversation as well as the communication.

If one ever block out your loved ones, you will never be able to communicate with them anymore. Unless that block has been cleared.

If you choose to block her out, what is it that you say you love her?

Is it what all love is all about? Love during good times, leave during bad times?

Look at yourself? What is it that you're trying to attain? Do you feel that you're losing control of the situation? Do you feel that absence of your partner means she don't know you? Why do you feel that? Love stems fromt he heart, she will stay in your heart as long as she still love you. What is with the insecurity?

I do admit I made mistakes too. I realised them and I will work towards rectifying them.

When something don't work, most people will just run away from it because they do not wish to waste too much energy trying to work things again. I will always try to work things out instead of running away, IF it is something I hold dear. But if you ever choose to leave, I will not force you to stay. I still love you ...

2008-01-03T02:48:00.000+08:00

Browsing through the webpages, realised I had a previous blog. I went back to take a look, it ended at 2006. The blog ended at 2006, in the beginning of 2007. Nice~ I can still remember the horoscope, what it says about my 2007. That it will be a good year for me and that my love life and career. Indeed, it was the best year, especially right after the terrible year 2006. I had my best memories in 2007 and fulfilled my dreams. I can still remember everything. So vivid. So close. So real. It seemed like yesterday. I can even remember the conversations. But everything ended as the year ends. That is how fast time flies.

~For every start, there is an end~

~For every end, there is a new beginning~

Beginning of a new relationship, beginning of a new friendship, beginning of a new kinship.

And the cycle continues.

Changes ... is the only constant.

Yes, it's 2008 now.

I juz realised I've been stagnant since 2006.

This will be the best year/time for me to move on and to pave my path.

I want to make this year a breakthrough for me.

I know i can do it, with all the support.

I know I have all of U ...

I've got my best gift in my life. & I am so thankful for that...

2007-11-11T12:24:00.000+08:00

"I guess I should be updating my blog on my latest life... instead of blogging about the history which I haven't been updating. After the 2 & 1/2 months journey to europe and japan. I came back feeling weird about the whole place, I don't even recognised my room, things ard the room looks foreign, strange, the house looks so unfamiliar as well. It's amazing how you feel about things around you when you were only away for a few months. It's like rebirth. Everything seemed new to you. This goes to show that we all can adapt to new environment anytime and start a new life anytime and anywhere. It's all about willingness, whether one is willing to leave their own comfort zone in search of a whole new different experience... ~

Time passes and wait for no man and when you leave, everything else still goes on..."

___________________________________________________________

Finally, after one year or so of listening so much to TCC, I finally went for it. It was at my lowest point in my life that has made me go for it, since I have nothing to lose. That's cos I've nth at that point of time. As heard, yes... It was indeed a fulfilling experience at TCC whereby I get to see many other things in life that many people don't or can't see. I am glad it open doors for me. I even sent my mum and auntie for TCC and it works as well. They are coping with the same things so much better now. Life has been better since then. Thanks to py, zeoane, kelvin and many others who open this path for me.... I really appreciate it. Yes, it took me some time to convince myself to go try it. Cos I nv believe what could TCC have done to change so many people. But a message to all, YOU WILL NEVER KNOW UNTIL YOU TRY ANYTHING.

"A person who never take the first step, will never take the second step" - zig ziglar

Challenges one take on can be in many forms, be it physically, emotionally or mentally. The easiest and most common one would be the first one for it's the one that would show a more significant or obvious measurement for achievement. However, many failed to see that this is in fact the weakest form of challenges among all. The latter of those are actually those that would force one out of their comfort zone and to face their fears that many have been shunning away from, many have avoiding. These are actually the ones which will make u stronger. I see things many of my peers can't see, which makes it difficult for me to communicate with them openly. Went out with jun and all ytd, this was what they told me. But I am constantly trying to bring them to the same platform/ frequency as me so that we can really communicate. :)

I am going for BLP soon. I hope this will help me open more doors and that it will bring me closer to how I want to lead my life. 9 months BLP. It's gonna be tough. But I guess I have nothing to lose now as I am starting from scratch. Good luck to me...:)

2007-10-09T08:59:00.000+08:00

Florence

(Firenze)

Capital city of the region of Tuscany, Italy

From 1865 to 1870 the city was also the capital of the Kingdom of Italy. Florence lies on the Arno River. A center of medieval European trade and finance, the city is often considered the birthplace of the Italian Renaissance and was long ruled by the Medici family. Florence is also famous for its magnificent art and architecture. It is said that, of the 1,000 most important European artists of the second millennium, 350 lived or worked in Florence.

The view outside the train .. on the way to florence

Finally we're at florence.

We went on a day tour to go fora horse-riding and wine tasting trip out of Florence @ Tuscany for 120 euro. Then we went to this small city outside Florence near Tuscany (citi di San Gimignnano). It's a castle built in the 13th century and it is now more of a tourist attraction with little population. We then came by a Gelato shop. The best in the world. Award winning ice-cream for 2006 and 2007, 2 consecutive years for the best gelato in the world. Cool~ It's really nice. Especially under the hot sun.

There we are! At Tuscansy. I rode on a horse before when I was young. But there was with someone guiding the horse. But this time, we gonna spend sometime learning how to control the horse and we are left with the horse alone. Then after a few rounds of adaptation, we went out for an hour of ride.

Along the way, I saw vast lands filled with sunflowers. It was so beautiful. It makes me feel so happy. As if they were smiling at me. The whole place seemed to be shining and yellow is my fav colour. Hee..~ these pics are taken from the horse. My skills not bad huh.. lolz

Wine tasting session at the city of San Gimignano. We went for the tour with 2 other Australians. Nice people. There were nurses. Had a fair bit of the wine and was getting tippsy in the day. Oh man. Red and white wine, bottles after bottles..

2007-08-29T14:28:00.000+08:00

Naples (Napoli)

The oldest city of Italy. This is also the birthplace of pizzas where the pizza are oven-baked and freshly baked, unlike other cities in Italy where pizza are baked and left there for the whole day and the crust will be hardened and less tastier.

Stayed at this hostel (6 small rooms). Very cosy and homely, but we gonna climb flights of steps with the heavy bags b4 we can reached the top. Freaking tiring. Got here and we straight out for lunch. We were like starving and tired from the walking cos we kinda overshot and walked a longer distance before reaching the hostel. It's nice. However, though this is only the 2nd place in Italy that we are in, we are already sick of pizza and pastas already. These are the only 2 varieties of food there.

This is how Naples look like. It's not a city where tourist will go, but we went cos we heard that it's a nice place.. with the bay and the castles. But it's also very smelly and dirty. The whole street were like that. Rubbish dumps everywhere and it seemed normal to them. Rubbish collectors on strike. That's why.

Off we go to pompeii. Remember Pompeii? The city that was buried alive in A.D 79. We went to see the ruins and i ended up getting sunburnt. It'ss damn hot over there. But we can imagine how beautiful pompeii used to be. What a pity.

These are all pictures taken at Pompeii.

This is the bay that people told us that attracts us there. Nice huh? See behind me? That is a castle.

2007-08-29T10:28:00.000+08:00

ROME

Capital of Italy

This is the train station "Rome Termini". When I first arrived, I was shocked by the place, the first impression to me was that it looks like Malaysia. It's so dirty, smelly and traffic everywhere, in an unorderly fashion. So, this is what I called "European Malaysia".

Taken at the Trevi Fountain

From Bercy station in Paris to Rome. We met one guy from Singapore. So. we travelled together for the next few days in Rome.

This is the Trevi Fountain. Legend says that anyone who throws a coin into the fountain will return to the Eternal City. So, we did. There are so many people crowding the fountain, taking pictures and drinking water. It is the most majestic in Rome, and the most famous throughout the world.

Colosseo

This is the most ancient monument from ancient Rome. Its building began in 7.5. A.D. and was opened in 80 A.D., an opening celebrated with a full day of bloody games during which, according to legend, five thousand animals were killed. This was a gruesome leisure activity for the ancient Romans: prisoners condemned to death were torn to pieces by ferocious beasts, animals were killed by archers and there were fights to the death between “professional” gladiators. The surface area of the Coliseum, which totals about 19,000 square meters, was arranged into four sections, each of which could hold up to 70,000 spectators.

@ Taken at the Vatican City

2007-08-18T19:07:00.000+08:00

It'd been a long trip/journey. 2 & half months ... It's either a long period or a short time. But it's long enough for one to grow from the eye opening experience. It's a long enough time for one to learn that you can exist on your own. Though I may not have the chance to live by myself, but being away is a great relief. Feel no attachments.

Let me juz briefly update you on my trip. It's a long long story, so I'm juz going to show you the chain of events chronologically.

Leaving Cergy:

We left Cergy and went on to Michelle's apartment where we left our luggage to spend the night so that we could catch our train in the noon the next day.

We left Cergy with great difficulties because of the damn heavy bags. we have in total 7 baggages which adds up to approximately 100kg. Nearly died.

Okay. Put that aside. We took some pictures of the place as we were leaving.

2007-07-12T01:25:00.000+08:00

Since I left Cergy (Paris), I haven´t been blogging. It´d been a long time since I update my blog. That is because I can´t get internet connection or even enough internet time to blog. Hmmm... But I´ve really gt a great deal of stuff to share with you guys. Keep on waiting... I´ll update real soon... Cya.. Anyway, you can see where exactly am I from the calendar below. I´m in granada @ Spain now...

2007-06-14T18:07:00.000+08:00

::::ROLAND GARROS::::

It's something that most people know, not to say tennis fanatics. But how many really knows everything? The Stadium, Roland Garros, is named after Roland Garros, an aviator and a fighter aircraft pilot during WWI. He was the first man to fly a plane across the Mediterranean Sea. A bigger court is needed when France won the Davis Cup against the USA and a rematch was to be held in Paris.

9th June 2007

French Open

Some small double match

Another doubles

Wanted to watch the female finals but the tickets were all sold out and all we can get is the annex tickets which do not permit us for the 3 main courts and one include the court that the finals will be held. I din manage to watch my Henin Justine play her finals. Despite that, I did watch her 1st set of her match with Nanovic Ana.

Before the match ended:

This is how the scoreboard look like

An hour or so, juz BEFORE the match ended, I saw all these:

New update on the scoreboard

Henin won!

Posters of Henin Justine was efficiently put up outside the stadium

So efficient hor~ Since when are the french so efficient? or are they secretly efficient? Hmmm...

2007-06-11T20:22:00.000+08:00

:::CATACOMBS:::

The Catacombs of Paris, a local burial place, is a network of tunnels and rooms in limestone quarries. It's a mass tomb of approximately 6 million people in the 18th century. The catacombs existed because during he 18th century, the Les Halles district in the middle of the city was suffering from a disease due to the contamination caused by improper burials and mass graves in churchyard cemeteries, especially by the Cimetière des Innocents. It was decided to discreetly remove the bones and place them in the abandoned quarries.

The catacombs is 20 Metres underground and we have to go down and up the spiral stairs. Going down is seemed okay but going back up makes my head spin, that is because of the spiral staircase. Down there, 6 million "people" are buried there. Kinda errie when we walked thru the narrow pathway, it was so quiet you can even hear the water dripping down from the roof. There ain't many living walking in there. As in cos there are more dead people than living people there. It's kinda scary. & I even accidentally touched one of the skulls. OMG! But it's amazing how they manage to find ways to ventilate the whole quarry. It's damn cold down there while the weather up on "earth" (:p) is damn hot.

~This is how the pathway look like~

2007-06-11T20:03:00.000+08:00

~ Notre Dame ~

This was last weekend when 4 of us went to Notre Dame and Lourve. Free entrance for every first sunday of every month. Only reached Lourve one and a half hour before closing, thus we don't have enough time to look through everything at Lourve. Mona Lisa was at Lourve. It look ordinary to me. In fact, I like the rest of the paintings instead of the Mona Lisa. I will go another time to complete my journey at the Lourve. Tsk..~

2007-06-11T19:32:00.000+08:00

::: Scissor sisters concert :::

We got standing tickets for the concert and the atmosphere was juz great and there was a group of gay guys standing in front of us. They were standing right at the front and was like so damn tall double of my height and blocking my view. Worst of all, they refuse to let people pass through them. They move n shake in the same fashion. OMG! So gay... Lolz ~

2007-06-04T19:36:00.000+08:00

... OPENING PHOTO ...

Saw this at somewhere near a playground in the middle of a grassland, maybe it's part of the playground.

Rented bikes to get around brugges, "trying to act local" but did a really bad job cos my cycling skills sucks and was like having difficulties balancing cos the bike is too high or maybe I am juz too short. Plus, the road is so bumpy that it hurts whenever I get on and off the pavement.

Belfry tower. Din went up cos it aint' anything that significant. Went to the public toilet here & it is like 30 cents euros. tsk...
Look at these speaially moulded chocolates, cute hor~ These boobs ain't cheap anyway.

Went to the Chocolate musuem and was amazed that there is a history to chocolate. See these sculptures beside me? It's chocolate!!

At the chocolate museum

There is a chocolate making demostration session at the museum and the chocolatier is from Belcolade, the best chocolate in belgium. Since it's the best, it can only be found in Belgium and even so, I tried looking for it, I juz couldn't find. After the demostration, we could actually try these chocolates, It's so cute and delicious!

Look at this Candy shop, you'll be amazed by the variety of candy you can find in there. But it doesn't tempt me cos I dun really like candies.

Hospital musuem. Not really a museum, it's juz a deserted place as it used to be a hospital. Bascially, it's juz isolated. No one is there. Very quiet place, sat there n rested. Feels like some retiree ~

The waffle is really nice. This is only half of the waffle. we ate half of it then we realised we haven't take a pic of it.

Bottle shop! They sell all beers from Belgium. Belgium produces flavoured beer and it tastes so much better than beers in general. But Belgium beer does taste better than any other beers.

See these bottles, it's all the flavoured beers

We bought like 12 bottles of flavoured beer! That's alot? I dunno. It's not big bottles. But it's damn heavy when we carried back to Paris.

Wicky burger - recommended by Tim as he said it's damn nice. So we went to try. It's good though but it can't be categorised in the damn good category.

Frites (Fries) with meat sauce. Tasted good initially, but after consuming more of it, it tasted very beef and a bit raw. I still prefer that from Carls' Junior.

At the bar downstairs, juz below our hostel. That is where we tasted the flavoured beer and thus buying so many bottles from the bottle shop.

2007-05-30T22:27:00.000+08:00

This is taken juz outside Roland Garros stadium. The ticketing office where I bought my tickets for the French Open. Lolz ...

This is the train station where Roland Garros stadium is - Porte d'Auteuil.

Below Effiel Tower

Inside the Effiel Tower, went up the stairs because it's cheaper and the queue is shorter.

View from the Effiel Tower

2007-05-24T23:47:00.000+08:00

Let me post some pictures of Paris before I went to amsterdam on the 15th May.

See the France flag hanging in the middle of Arc De Triomphe? Normally, there isn't the flag there. But that day was the day Nicholas Sarkozy became president. That'y why the flag was there. Lolz ...

Shops along the streets of central Paris (Charles De Gaulle-Etoile)

After that we went to have dinner at St-Michel (Latin Quarter) at a french restuarant.

Tried the Escargot, tasted like Mussels. Not bad.

2007-05-24T19:03:00.000+08:00

I went to Amsterdam on the 16th to 20th May. It was so different from Paris. Apart from the language, which is the main issue when it comes to convenience, Amsterdam is a small town unlike Paris which is a big city. A small town with all the houses & people within close proximity. The trams are new, the people are nicer and the service of the hotel is good. Most importantly, the shopping is thrilling. Prices are relatively cheaper to Singapore. However, the transport and the food are far too ex. Each trip on the tram is 1.60 euros (=S$3.20) which is more expensive than s'pore's cab. Lolz ... Paris's transport is worse. The train fare is 9.40 euros (2-way trip) which is like S$18.80. This is the cab fare from changi to my place in spore (midnight charge).

Anyway, I went to Van gogh museum, heineken brewery and the Anne Frank house. The Anne Frank house's queue is super long. But yeah, it's the exact house where the hiding of the Franks took place. Great discovery. Yah! The weather in Amsterdam is better than Paris, at least it's not so unpredictable and harsh.

This is the hotel I stayed in @ Amsterdam

This is taken somewhere near the Van gogh Museum

This is at the Heineken Brewery

Look at the LONG queue outside Anne Frank House early in the morning ... tsk

Found something really interesting here when I was leaving the Anne Frank House. There is this monument at the river. Quite insignificant momument commemorating something quite significant. Lolz ...

After many days of western food, we got quite sick of the food there. So, we went searching for the famous chinese restuarant there at Amsterdam. It's a HK shop.

See? Very big plate hor ... it's like 7.50 euros (duck rice)

This is the space cake we had that day. Tasted juz like normal sponge cake. Ain't that nice. But we didn't have it strong, so we didn't like suffer from the "effects". Lolz ...

This is a very crowded club juz opposite my hotel. The queue is dam long at night.

Another restaurant we went to. Had a feast.

Nice jacket hor? Wahaha ,,, But v ex.. :(

The last night at Amsterdam, me and michaela got kinda "high" & this is how we look like. Lolz

2007-05-16T02:10:00.000+08:00

This is the place I am staying now

2007-05-15T15:38:00.000+08:00

The weather here in France or maybe it's cergy, I don't know, it's a unredictable, it can rain n shine anytime. But even that, the weather is still cold. From what I see till now, the streets are still qute safe ... in the day ... I haven't been out in the night yet so I don't know. Walking along the streets make me feel so peaceful.

The scene from the window

Along the streets

The place I am residing I supposed lol...

So, I went to the mall "Trois fountaines". Went for a lil shopping, bot a top from Naf Naf and a moisturizer. The weather here is dry so I need to get one cos I'm going to finish using mine soon, The salesgurls are all very pretty de. Wahahah.... I'm going Paris tomorrow, so will be back at night. Then thurs I'm going to amsterdam til sunday. Yeah!

2007-05-14T15:11:00.000+08:00

Ok ... I'm finally here in cergy. Super long flight. Reached Narita airport early in the morning at 5am, so quiet and there is nobody there. All shops are closed too. Walked around aimlessly like a wandering soul. Tired but cannot slp cos there is no proper place for me to sleep. But the flight to Japan was alright, cos they gave me a nice seat and I had one whole row of 3 seats for myself. But some idiot farted like 3 times in the night. Phew! so smelly ...

See? So early. Nobody at the airport

Got vending machine but I ain't got any yen with me
Then cannot bring water in somemore. Want me to die of
thirst ar??!!

Nice hor? Took when I was super bored at Narita

This is my tired & not enough slp look
Lolz ... so ugly~

This is the faked energetic and awake look
Wahahah ...~

In the train (RER) to Paris eating some cookies

In the train to Cergy-perfecture (which is py's residence). Cute me .. hee

Wahaha... it's time I bully her.. Py taking all the bags & I taking pics behind

2007-05-12T11:21:00.000+08:00

Oh my goodness ...

I didn't know some many people will miss me when I'm away.

Affecting me.

I'll miss all of u too yah?

Look out for updates here!

Then you won't miss me too much.

I'll be back ...

Lolz ~

2007-05-10T02:39:00.000+08:00

Staying at status quo brings one to a comfort zone

But yet, change is a on-going phenomenon,

that one has to adapt to, so as to fit in the picture

Just like organisations have to constantly review their current conditions and to fill the gap between the current situation and the future.

Standing here

between the frameworks

one feel a mix of feelings

It's natural

Still ...

It's just there

There is no way one can get over the feelings til you pass that moment

Then, you will move further away from one point and towards another

Transition stage

Human adjustment

Art of transiting

It is never too easy

but there will always be a new path ahead and a dusty one follows behind

leaving a trail

......

Just let the moment come

Leave & Live

2007-05-03T22:35:00.000+08:00

Alright! One down. By 12.30 pm later, another will be cleared as well. This is so great. Time seemed to move so quickly all of a sudden. Physically here but everything else about is already not here anymore. I'm so there already. So many plans ahead though not too far ahead, but at least it's some time off. Just some ...

Some time to let my body and soul take a rest & just enjoy. I just realised that it's juz next week. Gonna miss everything here. But still, I have to go. Wahahha ...

Anyway, this song bears such deep meanings, you feel it?:

My swaying heart is like a pendulum

Which throbs on the right and has sadness on the left

It’s sweetly enchanting, yet painful

Lets gaze at each other

A maiden’s pure heart is like a flower bud

Such sayings are common

But anyone knows this delicate impatience

Maze, it’s an innocent feeling, yet

Yes, it somehow resembles an adult’s love, this passion

I embrace this more than dreams of yearning

More than yearning itself

I’m no longer just a maiden,

I’m calling out my love

It’s not only me

Everyone feels this shyness, it won’t stop

Why do I desperately want to meet you?

The chocolate in my heart becomes an aphrodisiac

Teardrops fall on my lips, panic

If everything is dyed red, I would collapse

I may end up running away

But innocence is like a short-lived fairy

I really just want to fly away

When I quietly peek into my heart, I understand it better

Shade, the shadow of jealousy pierces my maze

No, I will not lose, there is only one right answer

I want to believe, and I will believe that tomorrow

Which I have sworn upon exists

Maidens are always endlessly spinning this story

Within you, even within you

There is a flower sleeping, don’t you want to wake it up

Before someone plucks it?

2007-04-26T00:34:00.000+08:00

This is bad. I just couldn't find any way I can focus. It's juz next week and I am seriously having a holiday mood. Head to toe and every part of me juz couldn't absorb any bit of any theories. Oh god! I can put the books right in front of me, open it and no one is talking to me on msn, still ... not a single part of me is with it. It's juz somewhere. Worse thing is, my uncle is coming back and there are plans to meet him and a total of 3 days is taken out to meeting up with him. I'm like left with less than a week and there I go, taking 3 days out of it. That's it. Lolz ...

And since feb, mobile phones, msn and house phone have started to get a little of a quiet; and I too have started to neglect it more & more too. It seemed to have lost its value and attention. I am starting to feel that actually people can juz live without these technology, provided you are by yourself. Cos you won't be like staring at the phone or constantly checking on it for calls/ msgs/emails etc. That is when you are crawling into your little own world where the mind is busy with fascinating over some kinda dreams, some kinda wonderland, everything seems to surreal. Then, at this point, you'll realised the difference between now and then, whereby you will be able to identify the driving force(s) behind you - that had disappeared - which is the motivational factor as well as the meaning you once had. But, this is not the end though, it's juz a point of realisation for you, for everyone, including me definitely, to compare & feel the difference and the absence of the most significant thing in you.

Nevertheless, deeply entrenched beliefs and faith are the ones that make you hold on and continue walking the path and living your everyday with positivity. That is what makes you stronger ...

2007-04-23T23:53:00.000+08:00

Have you ever wondered why is it so hard to communicate sometimes?
Why is it that nobody is there when you need them to listen?
Is it so hard to just sit down and listen every single word I said?
When I communicate, you refuse to listen; when I don't, you said I don't communicate
I wondered how much you put yourself in my situation and think about it?
Now I even wondered how much you actually care about me?
Have you ever listen to me? How much?
I just want to have a peaceful journey
Is it really that hard?
Why do you want to make things so difficult for me and for everybody?
I just want to take a break
Let me go in peace okay?

2007-04-23T12:09:00.000+08:00

Finally the busy weekend has passed, with all the 10kms at sea and land on sat and sunday. The race on sat was a good one I would say. Though it's a long distance and it's my first time rowing for 10km, exhausting as it may be, it's a great experience. Though something went a bit awry about the route. The leading boat has gone the wrong route and thus leading the rest of the 18 boats to go in the wrong direction as well. This has caused some confusion and of course there are teams trying to take advantage of this situation and took a shorter path, cutting across and overtaking the others. Totally unfair but lucky our boat still held on to our position. This did not really affect our positioning but I thought it would be most unfair for those leading boats.

During the race, we did experienced some paddle fight. But with our experience, lolz.. we wack our way through. That was because we held back once during a paddle fight and ended up getting bruises and injuries from it. So now, we know we couldn't stop. Fighting with a boat of relatively new rowers, we did overtake them during the paddle fight cos they were totally taken aback and somehow stopped and broke the momentum. It was a nice fight. We came in the 8th with a timing of 55mins. I was glad I had joined this race, if not I would be missing out on this thrill. Lolz..

Thereafter, my butt hurts and kinda cramped. Somehow I couldn't feel my butt anymore. Back muscles were aching as well. All these ... for a 10km race tee-shirt. Haha ...

This is the race course:

2007-04-19T23:13:00.000+08:00

Every trip away, brings the heart away
Every moment lost, makes the soul feels lost
Every wait, is a moment of conceptualisation
Forming like clouds in the sky
Coming like swash at the shore
Day and night
It's juz measure of time
A measure of one's age
It's the way one fills the day and night that matters
Anyway, I have no idea what I am blogging
Not in the right state to anyway

2007-04-16T16:16:00.000+08:00

Just when I thought that the end of the semester or rather the end of all projects would put and end to my lack of sleep, I was wrong. It persisted on, with work and stuff. I guess life would always be full of unrelentless work, all coming at you. At this point of time, I seriously think I have made the right choice of going for a break after I graduate. This really make me look forward to the trip. Really hope everything will turn out really well and that it could be one of the best moments of my life. This is also the first time or the very few times that I am looking forward to the exams. On the other hand, I am also worried about home. Hope that nothing will turn disaster or something bad will happen back home.
It's less than 4 weeks. Time passed so fast that one could never keep track of every single detail of what happened everyday.

This period
Not too long & not too short
But it definitely will be a fulfilling period~

2007-04-07T01:43:00.000+08:00

Timeline
Always shifting from the left to right
Setting foot into the tomorrows
& out of yesterdays
As much as you want to step into tomorrows
You don't want to leave yesterdays either
Vacant too long
Beginning to feel the chill
Vacancy prolonged
The chill turns into destituteness
A moment
Juz a moment
Split second
Vacuum enveloped
Diffusing
Still
Hollow

2007-04-02T00:01:00.000+08:00

Simple minded people
Yes I am one ..
And I am happy to be one
To be enjoying the simplest things in life
and to be contented with the most easily satisfied needs of every human beings
Juz a simple meeting for chat and lunch and kbox after that could make us feel so energized
So revitalised .. once again
So vivid ... Just like the good old days
Feel so young once again ...
There has been sayings saying that people change over time, over the years
Yea .. That is quite true
But there are always some things about the person that will never change
And that you will be able to identify and connect straight away
The things we do ..
Still the same ~

These 2 looked like some lama from tibet.

~Love from you and me~

Ending off with crys's ostrich moves

2007-03-29T23:21:00.000+08:00

~::::Season Finale::::~

Dear Mr. President
Come take a walk with me
Let's pretend we're just two people and
You're not better than me
I'd like to ask you some questions if we can speak honestly

What do you feel when you see all the homeless on the street
Who do you pray for at night before you go to sleep
What do you feel when you look in the mirror
Are you proud

How do you sleep while the rest of us cry
How do you dream when a mother has no chance to say goodbye
How do you walk with your head held high
Can you even look me in the eye
And tell me why

Dear Mr. President
Were you a lonely boy
Are you a lonely boy
Are you a lonely boy
How can you say No child is left behind
We're not dumb and we're not blind
They're all sitting in your cells
While you pay the road to hell

What kind of father would take his own daughter's rights away
And what kind of father might hate his own daughter if she were gay
I can only imagine what the first lady has to say
You've come a long way from whiskey and cocaine

How do you sleep while the rest of us cry
How do you dream when a mother has no chance to say goodbye
How do you walk with your head held high
Can you even look me in the eye

Let me tell you bout hard work
Minimum wage with a baby on the way
Let me tell you bout hard work
Rebuilding your house after the bombs took them away
Let me tell you bout hard work
Building a bed out of a cardboard box
Let me tell you bout hard work Hard work Hard work
You don't know nothing bout hard work Hard work Hard work Oh

How do you sleep at night
How do you walk with your head held high
Dear Mr. President
You'd never take a walk with me
Would you

2007-03-25T01:19:00.000+08:00

I thought it ended last weekend
at MR 500
Got all the emotional attachment packed
Physical items put in placed as well
Thought it all ended
Letting myself rest and feel complete
Nah ...
Subconsciously, I came back again
To to same place
I grin
I smiled
& I feel at peace once again
It always feel like being in another dimension
Isolated from the reality
Isolated from the worldly affairs
Peace ...
It never fail to bring my soul to a complete calmness
Complete stillness
Undisturbed
Placidity
Tranquility
Only to realise that it's the place
& everything associated with the place
that got me into that dimension
It feels good
It does help alot
In the quest for stabilty
and peace ...

2007-03-24T00:53:00.000+08:00

Your inner core
Sometimes I feel like my life gets covered over by unimportant things and I lose my inner core. Its hard to explain but things like work, trivial arguments, trivial tasks, financial burdens, social events etc all paint over what’s really important to me. My life - somewhere along the way the fact that it is my inner core gets forgotten. It’s like pouring syrup over me which is hard to get out of.
It’s very easy to get covered in this syrup and a lot of people don’t recognise it until its too late.
Ask yourself the question:
What is my inner core? (What do you most cherish in the world and want to spend more time doing or being with?)

It could be your family. It might be a passion you have. It might be spending time with yourself. It could be anything.
If you vaguely understand what I mean here you might be sitting saying ‘yes, I know what you mean’. These are some ways to clean the syrup from your core and here is what I have come up with.

Take a day off work. Simple and yet the hardest thing to do for some people. Believe it not, when you're away from work, everything else continue functioning. It’s a sad fact but we can all be replaced at work quite easily, we might be missed but we can be replaced. Remember this if you are doing more than your fair share. So, juz let yourself take a break at times
Make a point to spend time with your passion everyday. By this I mean real time. If your passion is your partner/spouse etc, sit down and talk, not over dinner or in bed at night, talk and let each other know how much they mean to you.
Get the little things out of the way. Little things we have to do niggle us and are in the back of our minds. Get them done and out of the way so you can concentrate on your inner core and what’s important.
Do less of what takes you away from you. If you work lots of hours every day work 1 less hour per day and spend it with your inner core.

Deep down you know what your inner core is and you know where it is not. By this I mean you know what you want in life and you know the things that steal the energy which keeps you away from what you want. Think about this often and figure out small ways which leads you back to your inner core. The small things done every day will soon build up to be the main thing in your life.

2007-03-23T23:54:00.001+08:00

*Some tots*
~Living Congruently~
Do you tend to compartmentalize all the different areas of your life? Career goes there, relationship goes here, spirituality fits there, and health … well, that’s neither here nor there.

Or maybe your compartmentalizing is temporal instead of spatial in your thinking. During the workday you do what you must, this evening you’ll do what you love and have some fun, and on Sunday you’ll think about what it means.

Or perhaps you experience a feeling of compartmentalizing thought vs. action: “I’m spending X% of my time thinking and Y% of my time acting.”

When you view your life as a series of different compartments, each with different rules, then life gets pretty complicated. Trying to achieve balance is very difficult because you constantly feel the need to task switch. My relationship needs attention. Oh no, I’ve been neglecting my health. I need to work harder. I’ve got to stop thinking so much and take more action.

The different “bins” of your life are all fighting for your time. And the longer you neglect one of those bins, the louder it gets and the harder it will fight for attention. Put off your health for too long, and you’ll crash with an illness. Put off your relationship for too long, and a breakup may be the result. Put off your work, and your career and income will suffer.

This is a paradigm that many people share. Keep all your balls in the air. Keep all those plates spinning. Don’t let your spiritual beliefs interfere with your work.

But I think it’s a broken paradigm. Let’s consider a different way of thinking….

What if your life had only one bin, one ball to juggle, one plate to spin. Just one. No need to deal with 10 different areas of your life and keep them all balanced. Just one.

How is this possible? It’s possible if all of those different areas of your life are congruent, if they all follow the same rules. Then thought and action are one, both pointing in the same direction. They’re on the same path. Your work is congruent with your most deeply held spiritual beliefs — you don’t have to take your spirituality offline when you go to work. Improving your health improves your relationship. Increasing your income increases your service.

This means moving from a paradigm of the different parts of your life being in conflict to a new paradigm where they all cooperate. Instead of seeing each part of your life as independent, you begin to see them as interdependent. And isn’t this a more accurate model anyway? Can you truly isolate each part of your life as something separate? Can you abuse your health and think it won’t affect your career or your relationships? Do you think your feelings about your relationship won’t affect your financial situation? Can you ignore your spiritual beliefs when making business decisions and expect no negative consequences?

It seems obvious that all the different parts of your life are deeply interconnected. But a common way to treat problems is to try to isolate them. If there’s a problem with your health, you need to diet and exercise. If there’s a problem in your career, it’s time to work harder. But this isolation protocol doesn’t work well because there’s too much overlap between all the different parts of your life, no matter how much you try to isolate the problem areas and go to work on them.

It’s often the case that the obvious cause of the problem isn’t the true source. If you feel lonely because you haven’t been able to find the right relationship, and you keep trying harder and harder to find a relationship, you may get nowhere. The problem may be that you work at a career you aren’t passionate about, and you project this lack of passion to everyone you meet. And still a deeper issue may be that your spiritual beliefs tell you that service to others is very important, but you don’t feel you’re doing that. Then you change careers to do what you love, and it aligns with your spiritual beliefs because now you feel you’re contributing and serving. Then out of nowhere, you meet your future spouse, who is attracted to your passion about your work and the contribution you’re making. And the encouragement you experience from this relationship in turn helps you advance your career, increase your income, and free up more time to spend with your new spouse. Your stress goes down, and your health improves too. Your inner spiritual conflict was the real source of your inability to find the right relationship. Everything is deeply interconnected.

Although it seems that each part of your life follows different rules, they all follow the same rules. You may have different values for each part of your life, but the rules that govern those areas don’t change.

An example of an unchanging rule is kindness. The concept of kindness should resonate with your spiritual beliefs. You can be kind to your body, and your health will improve. You can be kind to your co-workers, and your relationships with them will improve. You can be kind to your spouse, and your marriage will grow stronger. You can be kind to a stranger, and your self-esteem will increase. It doesn’t matter to which area of your life you apply the principle of kindness. Its application is universal.

Another universal rule is being proactive, assuming personal responsibility for results and taking positive action. It doesn’t matter where you apply this rule: health, relationships, emotions, spiritual beliefs, career, business, money, etc. Being responsible works no matter where you apply it.

Cheating is another universal principle. No matter where you apply it, the long-term results are negative. Cheat your health, and pay the price of sickness. Cheat in your relationship, and the cost is a loss of intimacy. Cheat in your education, and your income suffers.

But more powerful than these intra-area effects, there’s the rippling effect due to the interrelatedness of all areas. So if you apply a universal principle in one area, either positively or negatively, it ripples into all other areas. If you cheat your health, then in the long run this will hurt your career, your relationships, your finances, your emotional state, and your sense of spiritual connectedness. You can’t cheat in one area of your life without suffering the consequences in ALL areas.

Similarly, be kind to your body, and your increased positive energy will positively affect your relationships, your work, your finances, your emotions, etc. Be proactive about building a career you enjoy, and your passion will spread to every other area.

If you violate a universal principle, it negatively impacts all areas of your life. If you follow a universal principle, it positively impacts all areas of your life. Universal principles don’t compartmentalize.

So the key then is figuring out these universal principles and aligning your thoughts and actions with them. This is how you achieve congruence between all the different parts of your life.

So what are the universal principles? Stephen Covey claims that the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People are based on universal principles. I tend to agree, and that’s a good place to start. But I think all of these principles can be reduced to just one: to love. Not the passive squishy emotional feeling of love, but “to love” — the action verb. To love your body translates into proper diet and exercise. To love your mind equates with learning. To love others is service. To love your work is to do it passionately and enthusiastically. To love your feelings means to respect and honor the messages they send you. This verb translates into different specific actions for each area, but the underlying principle is the same. Depending on the situation, “to love” may mean to listen, to serve, to work, to relax, to touch, and so on.

When you start injecting universal principles into every area of your life, alignment will gradually occur. The parts of your life will be transformed such that all these different pieces assemble themselves into one congruent whole. You won’t feel like these different parts of your life are in competition for your time and attention. Instead you’ll feel a sense of internal cooperation. You will have a sense that exercising your body is the best thing for your health and your relationship and your career and your spirituality.

Within each area you’ll either adapt your current circumstances to align with universal principles, or you’ll let go of all the misaligned pieces and start fresh. So your career may shift slightly as you adapt, or you may switch to a whole new career. Your old relationships may transform, or they may end while you seek out new ones. It just depends on how well the external parts of your life are able to align with who you are.

Alignment comes down to working on these four questions until they all produce the same answer:

What do you want to do? (desire)
What can you do? (ability)
What should you do? (purpose)
What must you do? (need)
When these four areas are aligned, motivation occurs automatically. Thought and action are automatically balanced because you are living your purpose consciously. You won’t feel like you should be thinking when you’re acting or acting when you’re thinking. The line between thought and action will disappear. Being and doing will become the same thing.

When you experience misalignment between these four areas/questions, the natural tendency is to slow down… sometimes to a crawl. You’ll feel like you have all these ideas pulling you in different directions, but you aren’t fully satisfying any of them. Your mind knows that continuing to work hard is likely to be futile and won’t solve the real problem of incongruence. It knows it’s time for you to stop, ask directions, and choose the path of alignment.

You will realised this when you are busy with your everyday lives, when you becomes totally oblivious of whatever is happening around you. This is what happens:
You will start to containerizing everything: your health over here, your relationship there, your work here, and your spirituality there. Each part of your life felt like it had its own set of rules. Eventually you will start questioning whether this was the best way to live. Are we supposed to live like a collection of parts or as an integrated whole? You wondered whether it would be possible to live in such a way where there was only one set of rules governing all areas, essentially meaning that you followed your deepest spiritual beliefs in all matters. This line of questioning will lead you to discover just how it might be possible for all these different parts of your life might become a single, integrated whole. This would mean that your conscience and your interpersonal relationships were all one. There would be no sense of separation.

In order to go through this process, you had to transform certain parts of my life while totally shifting others. Try to transform your career from within, but then you realised the disconnect was big enough that it required a more dramatic shift. Other parts of your life were able to adapt more flexibly. The main reason for this shift away from was that it wasn’t a strong enough outlet for service for me.

I must say that this push for congruence in all areas turned out beautifully. I don’t feel that sense of separation between the different parts of my life anymore. My purpose says I’m here to serve and help people. My ability says I can do it through writing and speaking and running a web site. My needs say I must support myself doing it. And my passion says it’s what I love doing most. I don’t have to separate supporting myself with a job and then having fun on the weekends and thinking about spirituality at other times. Work = play = love.

When you live congruently, it’s as if all the different parts of your life lock into new positions to form a new whole that’s greater than all the individual pieces. Everything grows stronger: health, relationships, motivation, actions, results, etc.

I know that as a practical matter, it seems as though different rules often govern in different areas. Separating your spiritual beliefs from your work is very common. A lot of businesses seem to operate on the assumption that universal principles don’t exist. I don’t buy that at all. There are non-universal principles that apply just within their own domains (the rules of nutrition apply to your health but not to your work, for instance), but universal principles apply to all areas. I think that one’s spiritual beliefs are the single most important factor in choosing a career or a company to work for. If you have a deeply held belief that you hold sacred, you cannot violate it in any area of your life without suffering the consequences in all areas. You must be true to your inner self at all times. That’s the only way to be congruent and to live as a whole person instead of merely as a bag of competing parts.

When you live congruently, a quantum leap will occur in each of these four areas. Desire becomes passion. Purpose becomes mission. Need becomes abundance. Ability becomes talent. And it becomes almost ridiculously easy to achieve fulfillment in every area then because all the parts are working together in the same direction.

2007-03-22T21:22:00.000+08:00

Yeah!! Yan Zi's new album is out already!! Nice ... Not bad ..
Better than the previous albums ..
Must to listen wor~
*dancing~~*

2007-03-22T20:46:00.001+08:00

2007-03-19T12:28:00.000+08:00

Passc has been showing incremental improvements
It's only the 2nd time we join the 20 mens category and we got into finals competing with the strong dragons: canadian, nus ntu etc
Not bad hur
As for the mixed, we always go into semi
every race we went to
And always lost in the semi
Though we went into the grand finals before for our mixed team
Always miss the medal by a bit
So near yet so far
Stayed til the end of the whole event for the 2nd time
The first time was Regatta
Only to see the same ppl winning the medal
But at least now our name has gone somewhere far
further than in the past ...
Thought I could achieve sth before going for a break
But it's alright I guess
Cos we did do better for every race we went to
Maybe what we need to do now is to challenge ourselves..Not with the others
For greater improvements
Will be missing the June races with my team
Hope they will win something in June
& Hope I will be back for Regatta race

2007-03-17T19:46:00.000+08:00

Today's MR 500
This is my first time going for MR 500.
Cos last year my team did not join the MR race.
Though small race but the competitors are still there
Those strong ones
Follow you wherever you are Lolz ...
Db has always been something I hold close to my heart
Maybe it wasn't the case when I first joined
But, along the way, it's juz like love ...
It creeps slowly into your heart.
There has been some sentimental ties with this
& it has been the most wonderful chapter of my life
However I as look at the scene once again today
It paints another picture
Another persepctive
The persepctive that reflects reality,
that reflects life ...
A day out ... makes me contemplate about many issues
Am i aging?
Or ...
It would have never be an issue to many people
especially when everything is passing by you so swiftly
But it would be .. for people who spend most of their time ... searching ... ~
For meaning? For reasons? For excuses? For another life?
*Shrugs*

Everything's still the same
It's so true that time won't stop because you stop
The breeze still comes, the the trees still sway
The laughter is still heard, the topic is still there
The only difference is ...
It has become emptier ~

Just like a missing piece in a jigsaw
The left over of a donated liver
Incomplete

Anyway, I had a great time today at MR 500

Cute doggy with yellow shoes

2007-03-16T02:34:00.000+08:00

Solicitude in Solitude
Growing in altitude and latitude
Ffacing it with the right attitude
What could be done to strength the fortitude
Reason being as simple as this
It just hurts so much to separate
When souls are connected
"Days of absence, sad and dreary,
Clothed in sorrow's dark array,
Days of absence, I am weary
For there is a missing piece in the picture"

~Missing someone gets easier every day because even though it's one day further from the last time you saw each other, it's one day closer to the next time you will~

2007-03-15T22:11:00.000+08:00

Let it pass
Let me go
Please ...
Suffocated ...
My beliefs will stay
I need the space
And the peace
No questions
I don't like questions
No doubts
I don't like doubts
No whys
I don't like to explain
If you don't have intention to understand
Leaving things as it is
I'll walk my path from here alright ~

2007-03-15T00:08:00.000+08:00

Distance really brings people closer
Though there's this distance
But somehow or rather
There's this tie that keeps 2 hearts beating as one
Yes
You did what you promised
I did what I promised
It'd become a habit for me to constantly converting time
Updating myself of whatever is happening in your life
I hope I can give you the best gift you asked of from me this june
I'm working on it
Though sometimes I lose myself
As time passed, I reaised & am glad that you're starting to fit yourself more & more into the whole picutre ...
Into the picture that I had wanted to get into ...
The picture that I want us to get into
Creating everything that is so beautiful around us
I will beautify it even more
With all my means ~
Never felt so fulfilled before
Now I truly understand the meaning of contentment

沒有誰能把妳搶離我身旁 　
妳是我的專屬天使　
唯我能獨佔
沒有誰能取代妳在我心上 　
擁有一個專屬天使　
我哪裡還需要別的願望

2007-03-14T23:44:00.000+08:00

March seemed to have passed so much faster than Feb. Maybe it's because it's a busy month with all the deadlines so near each other. It's mid March already.
Soon ...
I'll be away ..!! Yeah!!~ :)

Everything's still the same as before
Left untocuhed
Nothing else can change anything
A clear declaration of my stand has been stated
All along
Impossibilities will always be impossibilities
Hold no hope
Hold no dreams
As all hopes and dreams will only be scattered into more & more pieces

I have my life
& I hope you have yours too

No ties

Nothing

Not even friends

Unless you can really be one

2007-03-11T21:14:00.000+08:00

My body feels so pain
Not from the aching but more from the sunburnt
Omg~ The sun was killing everyone of us
It's like you are being put into an oven
Layers and layers of moisturizers
One over another
Hoping that this would help
Training at bedok is always like that..
We'll all end up getting burnt!
Despite the sunblock applied

Sat's training was supposed to be nice
but somehow or rather most of my team mates were unhappy abt it
Not because of what happened
But cos of the perceived intention they felt about "lao shi"
But maybe it's his way of motivating us hur
Some kinda reverse psychology?
Should be ba ...
Had a few friendly races with smu
To me, I would juz take it as a fun race yah
And I was asked to cox the women's boat
for a race leh ! omg my first time coxing for a race
Crazy~
Yes I do wanna try
but it ain't the time right?
true enough ... My boat bump into smu's 2 twice
Omg~ I feel so bad to be the determining factor of the outcome
Shit ... Sorry gals & sorry smu
Don't really mean it
It's really my first time coxing ..
*sighs* feel so bad..

2007-03-08T12:03:00.000+08:00

Many people spend their lives searching for themselves
Searching for what they realy like
Or what they really are
Some work in jobs for years realising that they don't like the job at all
There will always be moments of your lives where you search for yourself
For your passion
For a change
I recently came across this website that helps people experience their dream jobs
Let them have a feel of what they always wanted to do
From there, maybe you will realised that you ain't cut out for your dream job and will be more focus on your current job which would indirectly realised that you actually like your current job and will stive to do better? Or maybe you will find that you like this job you have been dreaming about all these while? It's good to explore ...
Who knows you might have a total career change and even a lifestyle change.
This is the webby:
http://www.vocationvacations.com/

2007-03-06T13:22:00.000+08:00

Finally settled 3 assignments
Thought it's time to relax ... then realized that another is coming my way
Never ending ..
Juz like how the world still moves and the clock still ticks when you're facing some obstacles and stumbling over it every now and then ...
Meet up with jh, jenn,crys n all ytd
Quite a memorable day
Though nth much happen
But it juz feels great cos it'd been a long time there's a full attendance.
Celebrate my bday ...
Belated though ...
It's juz great to catch up on whatever is going on with each others' lives
The good old days ~
Sounded old hur ...
Spiritually bonded
It's like they won't always be there
But they will be there when you needed them
When you are at ur lowest ...
*smiles*

2007-03-04T15:47:00.000+08:00

My 3rd training this year. Quite pathetic huh. I think so too.
Something cool happened during training yesterday.
We were racing with the German team, so its 3 boats racing.
We were going for 500m, with one German boat between our 2 boats.
Wah ... Germans using the fibreglass .. very light boat ... was like a quater lagging behind our 20 mens boat. Cool huh~ then juz as we were halfway through the race, my boat was asked to stop.
You know what happened?
The mens boat was going at so high speed that the boat rushed all the way into the construction site ...
And cos it was rushing at such high speed that the boat got STUCK in a position like this:

Cool huh~ Like drama like that leh~

We were juz stunned by the scene. So in the end, the german team came and helped and the guys in the boat went down into the water to push the boat. Many of them end up getting cuts ... deep cuts on their feets. Poor boat ~ Got scratches underneath ... deep cuts too ..
Our favourite boat was wounded yesterday.
After training, since the last time we went to la kopi til now ... It's the 2nd time ...
Everyone hasn't been free lately to go la kopi as a team.
So, we went TCC again as usual. And we talked abt the spectecular scene again. Lolz ...

2007-03-03T11:49:00.000+08:00

I guess it's a long time since I blogged..
These are some pics from chingay...
Didn't blog it til now

Never tot I would be sitting at the roadside watching chingay.. Lolz
First time though...
I can still remembered the time I helped out in the event 9 years ago..
Wah~ sounds old huh

2007-03-01T01:28:00.000+08:00

Been rushing through projects after projects for these few days
I have no idea why are all the deadlines on the same day
Keeping me so damn occupied
Yeah ... It's good that I am
It somehow keeps everything that has been on my mind away for some time
For a moment I thought all my problems were gone
After finally getting some of the things settled, I have this little moment for myself.
All of a sudden, it seemed like I am just trying to escape.
Leaving unfixed problems unfixed
Juz wanna know that at least my memories are not totally lost
Fixing it only put these at a higher risk of being permanantly lost
I'm afraid of losing
I really am ...
Sometimes I envisaged myself in a situation where I lost my memory
I think it would be very sad
To live a life without memories
If a day like that should come
I hope you will be there for me
To tell me all the stories once again
To give me a life again ~

One reason I like sharing my experiences, happy times and bad times with friends and with you is so that someone can recite every single thing that happened in my life to me again when a day where I lose my memory should come. Just like keeping a backing up your data from your pc to a hard disk. Backing it all up ~

2007 is a good year for me though there will be tough times as well, I ain't going to let it be another 2006. I am looking forward to all the wonderful things coming my way ...

2007-02-28T15:07:00.000+08:00

Finally done with MC and part of WIL.
Have been sleeping so little these years..
Wah .. sound like I've been working really hard hor ..
I buay tahan liao
I need my sleep back
Argh~

2007-02-25T17:44:00.000+08:00

I'm back for db training and this is my 1st training this year. Is that bad? It feels great to row once again. Feeling energised now, though I rowed in the rain on sat and row under hot sun today and even got sunburnt. I am getting back my tan. Wahahaha... Surprised to know that I still have the stamina to run and row sets of 500m up and down of bedok reservoir. Yesterday at the clubhouse, we got eskay to buy yu sheng from 3 different places and we "lau yu sheng". The whole place was in a mess even before I had the chance to lou. I put my hand in and there is goes all the yu sheng was on all over my hand. Lolz.. But it was nice, I recommended eskay to get one from Mayim and they got another one from Sakae Sushi, both were nice. So yummy~
Then after that I went to meet adr, say chuan & ivy for crab. Was supposed to go Raffes hotel to eat, but ivy realised that the voucher she wanted to use cannot be used on a weekend. *puff*
So, we ended up eating at Botantic Gardens foodcourt. Yah~ A foodcourt. But botanic gardens is not as bad as I though. Nice ambience if it wasn't a foodcourt but a posh restaurant there.

Today training was shiong. It'd been like one month since we had this shiong training. But it feels great knowing that you are burning your body fats. Wahaha... I don't wanna grow fat and can't shop for nice nice clothes in europe. Lolz ...

2007-02-23T00:24:00.000+08:00

Sorry for the stupid things I did
Fill with regrets now
Happened to see something
To see your thoughts
I'm sorry
I didn't realise the how deep I've hurt you
In the past ...
To have taken everything for granted
To have thought that some things were not important
To fully understand how you felt then
For all the hurt
For how long it hurt you
I'll make up for it
For as long as possible
With my life ...~

~I can't forgive myself~
*cries*

2007-02-22T23:07:00.000+08:00

Last lesson today felt so relaxing
Sad to know that I won't meet up with the same people again
But I've got no choice yah
Exams from both schools will clash
Moreover, I'm going off sraight after exams
So, there ain't no point
It was a slow day today
Thought it would be a nice day for me
Who knows ...
My external hard disk died on me
Shitty~
All my data gone
Cannot be retrived ..
Sad ... My pictures, My files from past semeseters etc
Sighs~
If anyone reads this & can help me retrieve, please let me know
I'm desperate for help
Lolz
Unlucky day ...
It may seemed ... Maybe from another perspective, it may be something fresh too...
I don't know
Things happened for a reason, isn't it ... ??

2007-02-21T00:08:00.000+08:00

I could feel that effort & the personal touch
The effort for assurance
The effort to make me feel your presense
It's good to know that I'm always on your mind
*smiles*

~How I wish I were there~

2007-02-20T02:11:00.000+08:00

Happy feet calendar poster
Lao yu shen
Bak kut tei
Chilli soto and prawns
Strawberry sundae
Cup corn
Hot Milo
Cheese hotdog
New year goodies
For one more day
Travel kettle
Weighing scale
Vaude
23.9; 10
710
D44
405
yeah~ safe ...

2007-02-20T00:48:00.000+08:00

Swoosh
Gone in a flash
Back
Lost
Yet revitalized & motivated
By promises
By the wait
All of a sudden
There seems to be a long list of things I need to do
GMT +8 --> GMT +9 --> GMT +1
Time space

2007-02-19T10:38:00.000+08:00

My birthday
It falls on the 1st day of Chinese New Year
First time ...
Or maybe the second time if I were to include the day when I was born
So many events happening on this day
I don't even know what kinda of feelings I was feeling
I don't even know what mood am I in ... on this day
Chinese New Year mood?
Birthday mood?
Parting mood?
Mixed ... ?
But I know I am not really in the New year mood
Lolz ...
Went visiting yesterday at grandparents' place
My mum's side ... They remembered my birthday
So, I got double red packets
Cool
As for my dad's side, no one remembers
But ... I'm alright with that
Not close with them anyway
As long as people who loves me remembers
That is good enough for me ~
Planned to go eat at Max Brenner yesterday
But it wasn't open
Went all the way there
Such a disappointed
Then it would be a bit dumb to go back west for the "Protege"
So juz had to watch it at marina sq where no shops are open
and had to spend 2 hours wandering around
But it was an enjoyable day
Strolling around
Just enjoying the slow pace of time

2007-02-17T20:24:00.000+08:00

Mes cadeaux d'anniversaire

2007-02-17T18:03:00.000+08:00

Waking up ... today
After realizing that it's saturday
I just tear
Mornings can be emo as well~

2007-02-16T20:15:00.000+08:00

Wed was the start of my steamboat marathon.. Lolz
2 consecutive days
Sitting at the table for hours juz stuffing & stuffing food
A few days
I guess it's enough for you to grow fat
Plus I haven't been going training for 4 weeks this year
This is bad ...

Met up with pj & nana for steamboat ytd
So long ...
I meant pj
It'd been so long since we met up
Her hair is still as toot
Lolz ...
But it's nice to chat a bit
The last time we met is July 2006
That is when we celebrated her birthday
Seemed like she haven't been updated about many things
But still, there're still topics to talk about
Unlike some gatherings where things start to get awkward ... Lolz
Tried psycho-ing her to go Japan with us
Knowing that she has gone "bankrupted" from the previous trips
But still we all hope pj can join us :)

2007-02-15T02:15:00.000+08:00

The process~
Still fresh in my mind
Can still remember precisely what happened
Every single thing
I am starting to enjoy it all over again
Just like re-birth
Feel juz like a new born
Getting all the love & affection
All the attention
I wanna remember every single thing..
So please don't do what u did again ok?

2007-02-14T02:36:00.000+08:00

Ma po tofu
Your speciality
It'd been so long since I tasted that
How nice is it to eat it again
It'd been great
Preparing for dinner
I'll miss being your assistant in the kitchen~

I had the best dinner today

2007-02-14T02:11:00.000+08:00

2007-02-14T01:51:00.000+08:00

Chatted with ferny yesterday
It'd been a long time since we chatted & exchange thoughts
It's nice to be able to express my thoughts to you once again
It's been a long long time
Sounds old?
Maybe....
3 years~
It's been 3 years
And she said I sounded different
I seemed to be matured, calm and serious now
Compared to when I was younger
When her impression of me was a happy-go-lucky person,
& One who is crazy all the time.
I seemed to take things more slowly now
Yes ...
I guess it's true
You've seen it or rather feel it
I guess it's because people changes over the years
We grow, don't we?
See more things in life
Self-realization ~
Of things we used to put priorities on
right and/or wrong...
Discovering what matters to you most
Realizing that you exist on your own
& should never let insignificant issues affect you...
Ever wonder why you get so affected by what others say about you?
Ever wonder why do you get upset when others made nasty remarks on your body, your face, your results, your life, your privacy?
What are the reasons for them to do that?
Because they care?
Nah...
Bullshit~
Most people who gave comments on those are usually one of the many people around you
Just like fruit flies crowding around bananas
Insignificant~
BUT why do we get so affected?
Block all these out
Imagine yourself in a vacuum
You are inside a vacuum
You are yourself in there
In the dark~
What do you feel?
You will see yourself there
You will see how vulnerable you are
When you are alone
Wonder why people feel especially emotional at night?
Why people normally cry in the night?
Alone ~
In the dark~
That is because you feel yourself only at night
You see yourself when you are alone in the dark
Without the husk that masked you
Without the mask that you display to the public in the day
How else can you be you?
That can be achieved by being you...
As mentioned in the book "How full is your bucket?" by Tom Rath,
You feel good when you make others feel good
His theory of people having their own buckets and dippers:
There are two kinds of people,
One would be those who dipped into others' buckets to fill their own
& the other kind would be those who help others fill their own buckets
And in turn fill their own
Due to the satisfaction they received at the end of the day for having to fill others' buckets
Be the latter...
You will realized you live a richer life
Devote yourself to loving others, devote yourself to your community, devote yourself to creating something that gives you purpose and meaning
Material is inconsequential in any way
When you try to show off to people above you, they will still look down upon you anyway;
When you try to show off to people below you, they'll only envy
Status gets you nowhere,
Only an open heart will allow you to float equally betwen people
Only then will you see yourself~

2007-02-12T17:40:00.000+08:00

It's Monday today.....
It's getting close
Closer & closer each day
Feeling dreadful?
Or getting impatient?
The period~
Hope it goes by swift & smoothly
Another period~
Hope this will be slow
Or even stagnant
Holding on~

2007-02-11T15:02:00.000+08:00

想听的话

2007-02-09T01:03:00.000+08:00

Zeros to heros:
A board game invented by my lecturer Richard Mak. It is one game that aims to bring out the enterprising spirit of the player. I've played other board games (eg cashflow) before but this zeros to heros is indeed interesting. There are lesser recordings compared to "cashflow" which requires each of the player to have the fundamentals of doing double entry. It does reflect the attitudes of a person toward risk taking, initiative and also how to plan strategically.

2007-02-08T23:17:00.001+08:00

Been working for the past weekend & this explains the why I haven't been blogging. It'd been so busy, sleeping less & less hours. But I was glad that you came to find me on both weekends. It'd been a long time since I feel the affection and the love from you. Though it may sound trival to some people, to me, it ain't. It's a big deal and i appreciate it. One of the few times where my requests were satisfied. Brought food for me and even waited for me to end work to go for dinner together. It'd been a long time since we can have quality time together, enjoying each others' company and most importantly, there weren't any complains or grumbling from you that day. You even brought me pressies...~

I'll remember these 2 days... of you coming down & juz giving me your time.

The days are short
The wait is long
Counting down to the days
Has brought tears to my face
The day you leave
Will be my day of birth
Should it be a day to rejoice,
Or a day to part?
The days of forlornness awiats

2007-02-01T22:14:00.000+08:00

Time is too slow for those who wait
Too swift for those who fear
Too long for those who grieve
Too short for those who rejoice
But for those who love,
time is eternity
Hours fly....
flowers die...
new days
new ways pass by
Love stays ~

2007-02-01T20:20:00.001+08:00

Having to go thru 4 semesters of entrepreneurship modules, I've learnt how to come up with a business plan, how to do a feasibility study, how to manage a growing business and so on. All I was taught was how to finance your business and how to maximise profits. It is until this last semester that I get to know this term "social entrepreneur". What this means is giving back to society. We all know that the essence of doing business is to maximise profits but never did we realise that giving back to the society is as significant as maximising profits. I guess everyone can do business and fully utilize the resources to increase profits. But how many of us can develop the passion to give back to society, to work with altrustic and philanthropic objectives. Not many of us can and if you do reach that stage of realization, I believe that your life will be much more enriching than anyone else. To reach that stage of postconventional morality in Kohlberg's theory of moral development, you would have reach enlightenment.
A guest speaker, Noel Tan, was invited to my leecture today to tell his story of being a social entrepreneur, what he does and how he touch people's lives. From his contributions to the society, he learnt how to appreciate life more. What he did was to provide help to abandon children, to give them proper care and love, to put them in proper care. It is really nice to hear the story of the Noel who just received a social entrepreneur award in 2006. It is indeed an inspiring story. If anyone is keen to know more, this is the website http://www.sanctuaryhouse.com.sg/

"Social entrepreneurs are not content just to give a fish or teach how to fish, they will not rest until they have revolutionized the fishing industry" - Bill Drayton

2007-01-30T21:39:00.000+08:00

2007 juz came....
And now January is slipping past...
Soon I'll be 1 year older..
I can still remember my birthday party last year..
It seems like yesterday...
The vividness of the crowd..
The fusion of each others' lives for that few hours...
The passion and love from my loved ones...
Life is juz about capturing the moments...
The right moments...
Every single moments...
Capture it... & keep it
Close to heart...

The richness of one's life is being able to enjoy every single moments
& the destiny of one's life will only be determined by one's willpower to pave your own route

2007-01-26T23:29:00.001+08:00

Some say one should take responsiblity of one's own life

Lead & live life the way they want it to be

What matter most is that you're happy

All other factors ain't important

However.........

There will always be some who loves to poke their noses into the affairs of others

Critiques & insult

Hypocrisy & sanctimoniousness

Dipping into other's bucket to fill your own

Steppin' on the shoulders

Climbing the human ladder

Are these so rampant that it is seen as a norm?

If trends or majority equates the norm,

I guess humanity has a long way to go....

2007-01-25T21:11:00.000+08:00

Juz had a little chat with mummy and realised that my brother actually told her about his plans for his future. Never knew my brother had similar plans or dreams as me. Whatever is his plans, the gist of it is that he wants to settle elsewhere. Maybe not settle la but maybe juz to explore somewhere else. I guess my "dream" isn't something too far-fetched....
And my mummy even said that she wants to go over with us and also she hope we will go 2 different places so that she can go travel at the same time. That will be cool....~
I see some hope now..

2007-01-25T18:47:00.000+08:00

Today's lesson is so much better than tuesday's. It's always so overloading when he juz blabber on and on with all the vocabulary and grammaire. Overloaded leh... But I'd prefer that, value for money leh. After all, the lessons are ending soon. I guess I'll be missing that very soon. :)
But the Wil lesson today is juz plain boring. 5 mins after I sat in for lesson, my eyes juz could not open. Powerful hur. This time round the wil has so many things to do, plus I've gt 5 mod this semester. Guess this time I really won't have time for db le and if that is the case, I think I've gotta control my diet.
Anyway, J'ai faim....
A bientot~

2007-01-24T20:45:00.000+08:00

Packed week this week.
Miss my trg again today.
Bad me. I've been skipping it twice le.
But I've got no choice yea...
So sad, I've so many nice food in my room yet I can't eat cos they're all biscuits and cookies or nougats. Have to wait til I recover. Hmmm.... who wants to get me aloe vera drink? Lolz..
My birthday's approaching... I hope this year's birthday will be as memorable as the last year's.
Cos it's gonna be on the 1st day of CNY.
The day will be a very short day for me...
As there will be a time constraint....
Blessing in disguise?

2007-01-22T12:54:00.000+08:00

Indeed I was right about the cause of this strange on and off feverish encounter.
I need sensei...~
Anyone gt any recommendations?

2007-01-22T00:17:00.000+08:00

Feeling so much better today though still got a little headache in the morning plus a bit of sore throat. Spent the whole day reading travel guides. So nice~
School has started like erm.. 3 weeks ago? But I only attended like 3 lessons? or even 2. Before anyone realised anything, project due dates are juz drawing near. Irritating hur....
1 year has passed...
Another birthday is coming...
It will be a very busy day for me I guess....
Cos it clashes with first day of CNY and on top of that I still have to send py off at the airport...
At least I think it will be a better year this year...~

2007-01-20T22:21:00.000+08:00

No.... it's not a fake fever. It came back again 2 hours ago.
Oh god..~ maybe my body too heaty le... I think I need erm.. fruits? Vit c? Yah...
Maybe it's the menses..
It could be...
Die la.. so many probs..
I think I hormonal imbalance lei..
sobs :(

2007-01-20T17:48:00.000+08:00

Fever this morning and it juz went up & up like the stock market.
Detest going to the doc, tried all ways to reduce the temperature but it was futile.
Plus the house was empty the whole day, even now it's still empty.
No choice have to skip training today yet go hungry at home cos there is no food.
Then peiying took cab to bring me my breakfast or lunch haha I don't know at around 3pm. Though rushing for time cos she needs to go pay for her air ticket today and the travel agency closes at 5pm, still come send me food. Popped some pills but still the temperature juz refused to go down. Then kaixian asked me to see doc. Came all the way down from home to accompany me go see doc. Some more still bring nougats for me. So sweet hor. The hilarious thing is that I reached the clinic, all the sickness all gone. No fever, no flu, no sore throat, the doc also dunno what to give me, ask me want mc or not, I told him I dun need. We ended up chit chatting. The doc hmmm.. quite young la.. not bad looking. He even said my complexion is good. Wow!! Go see doc also gt compliments abt my complexion. Hee... Cos the truth is hor he wanted to sell me some facial products la.. Cos hor I go see him, he got no medicine for me then he not earning any money from me ma. LOLZ... He still said he will remember me cos I am funny. Kao... I think I go there and entertain him only lor. Though a wasted day with a fake fever. But I did realise that I do have very nice frenz... ~

2007-01-20T11:24:00.000+08:00

Sick...~

2007-01-19T23:44:00.000+08:00

Juz came back from crys's belated 21st birthday celebration. Went to dian xiao er again. Not bad... to meet up with old frens again.

Was emo most of the time today....
All of a sudden, many things seemed to have popped up in my mind all together.
Dreadful..
Haunted by this feeling...
Dreadfulness..
Pressurized...
Heavy...
Suffocated...
sighs...
I'll be strong...

2007-01-19T00:02:00.000+08:00

Juz reformat my com. It's dying soon. Trying so hard to lengthen the life span of it. Lolz..
Alright now my ulcer is recovering I guess but still there is one conspicuous big cut la, still cannot smile or rather laugh.
Today is a wonderful day *hee*...
It's nice to juz spend time, out in the greenery early in the morning
strolling along the busy streets when the only shops operating at that time is macs.
How nice if time would juz stop there... Right there~
Right at the moment when you can feel the intimacy....
The intimacy with nature...
The intimacy with the slow
The intimacy with you
Where the intimacy with one makes you drift away from another....~
That is how life goes....
Isn't it?
How nice is it to drift away from one when time has proven to you that it no longer suits you...~
I wish...

2007-01-17T19:57:00.000+08:00

After missing one french lesson, I realised I cannot catch what he is saying. LOL..
I can understand la.. But can't read some of it.
Then went to kallang to send the laptop for servicing. So damn far! & under the hot weather. Tsk tsk...
On top of that that stupid ucler is like killling me. The cut is so big and my left side of the mouth is like swollen. I can't even smile or open my mouth too widely. No choice I was "forced" *hee* to go see the doc. And true enough, it's serious. Cos it's starting to affect my gum line already.
Then met up with kaixian. So sweet. She bought me 西瓜霜, something she said can help relief the pain for my ucler. So nice hor, I juz know her only leh. Michelle came to join us for supper later on, knowing that we met up without her, she juz think that she had to be there la.

Chatted for hours. Only left my place at4+ cos they got so emo. So cham...
5+ py came straight fromMOS. Siao club til so late.
Then today the pain from the ulcer woke me up. Can you imagine the extent of the pain... tsk.
Though late, I still go meet up with adr they all for porridge steamboat at bugis. First time trying it. Not bad & not too ex either.
Neway, my dear frens (kx & mic), don't to so upset abt anything or everything le k? Juz try to be happy everyday. yah? :)