going to malacca!

today's adventure (written at jurong east national library):

1. woke up super early to meet shuyun and friends at jln sultan for my trip to malacca.
2. contemplated taking bus 80 (40min) since i was super early
3. decided to take taxi (lazy) so ended up playing guitar and half-blogging
4. realized i had not much time left, so ran downstairs, where i was hijacked by mum and dad to eat my breakfast. mum volunteered to send me to the departure place
5. finished breakfast, had 5 min to get from paya lebar to bugis
6. listened to mum in the car telling me what kinds of gfs to avoid (and omg my mum was like, how about [ ]? she's quite nice wat! ......)
7. arrived late, inevitably
8. realized that shuyun's friend viya (taiwanese) didn't have a malaysian visa, and hence probably could not get into malaysia
9. reached woodlands checkpoint, got rejected. shuyun and i decided to stay with viya and try tuas checkpoint, as suggested by some young smart-aleccy officer
10. took taxi to tuas checkpoint. taxi driver's last name was neubronner. damn cool. ancesters buried in malacca (some red cathedral thingy) omg how ironic.
11. reached tuas checkpoint, talked to this fat officer guy who didn't know what the hell was going on so transferred us to another guy who...also...didn't know anything. no lah he kinda did. suggested that we go to jurong east and take some cw3 bus to malaysia and get the visa there. huh?
12. contemplated calling a cab to get to jurong east...and a cab showed up! yay. just like at marina barrage. shuyun thinks it's a me and her thing, but no. it's just me.
13. shuyun calls her dad, who asks her to bribe a malaysian officer. aiyah so easy right? just bribe lah! 100RM only wat.....
14. thought to myself that shuyun can go to jail for all i care. i want to go homeeee!!!!
15. ok so. tried to find another way by checking internet on my 3g phone. finally the 3g useful for once. BUT. didn't know how to input chinese. no choice, have to go to jurong east nat library to check internet.
16. reached JENLB. cannot find computer with internet.
17. searched all over, found computer.
18. not registered, cannot log in.
19. registered myself.
20. cannot get in cos pre-paid account no money.
21. went to library e-kiosk to top up.
22. found out i had a 90c fine! wow. if not i'd have died cheating singapore government of money! cool sia... but no choice now have to pay. nvm next time i cheat again.
23. paid. yay we can get onto internet now!
24. got on IE, searched for half an hour, cannot find anything. have to go KL airport to get visa! woohoo.
25. keeve tells shuyun don't bribe lah, not worth the risk. wait the immigration officer go to jail so sayang.
26. SIGH.
27. called SIR, called SAFRA, no luck.
28. decided to give up and blog about my half-day adventure!

ok that's all for now.... where to next??

alright folks sit tight and tune in to the next instalment of canuf's exciting saturday.

but it's ok if the songs beat out of time
and it's ok if your words run off the line
and it's fine if she's long gone from your life
cos sometimes it takes a broken heart
to help you feel alive

i can't wait to watch slumdog. mainly cos i want to see if i can answer the WWTBAM questions.

recently i just saw this tv program called Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader? (or something like that)... damn hilarious. once in awhile, i wish i was stupid.

today i surprised myself by going for drinks at loof. i never do that. what's up man.

kinda self conscious after i reached home because i have no idea how to be a good drinking companion. and my brain is always trying so hard NOT to be drunk that i can never get high. had a kilkenny and a lychee martini, and decided that from now on i will stick to stella, hoegaarden and tsingtao. no kilkenny for me! although the lychee martini made me happy (cos of the lychee).

got a good reminder today about how sometimes it's so pointless to try and be in control of our lives, because we have a God who is greater than all that, who gives, and takes away. but also a God who, above all that, knows us and loves us more than anyone else can.

and i know now what has been missing from my life, and how God had to take away something i treasured so much to make me realize there was something so much better.


in other news, i think i did pretty well at badminton today considering how sore i was from yesterday's session at church. managed to hold off tianli almost all the way, before he beat me 15-13. happy! of course it was half-court lah -- full court and i'd have just died.

and faye is now officially my no. 1 badminton partner. eh dun say i never give you recognition ok. these things are not easy to achieve!

moses made it to the promised land!

went to church today. my church. it took me a really long time to convince myself, but after returning to church for the first time in like i dunno, a year? i realized that this was where i felt at home. quite funny that probably 90% of the people at church who know me still think i'm with c -- luckily i didn't need to field any awkward questions cos i wouldn't have known what to say at all!

today's message almost made me cry. it was that good.

and totally unexpected -- on my first day back at church, they had badminton! i am so going to play badminton every sunday from now on. just have to find something to do from 1pm to 4pm...

bowled like shit today, but it doesn't matter!

small comforts

really tired. everyone thinks that i'm drowning myself in work to escape from my sadness, but really, i can't help it. this week has been ridic. now it's past 12 and i'm still stuck at office and i can't leave office cos i'm uploading a huge file to an ftp site and it's taking forever.

gosh. i need a break man.

faye why today you not in office to pei2 me?

oh and i missed both lunch and dinner, and i think the only reason why i'm still typing right now is that my adrenaline hasn't subsided yet. i can just smell the gastric waiting to happen...


an hour ago, in the midst of extreme kancheongness, i suddenly thought of adelaide, and great ocean road, and penguins, and mt buller. and for a moment, a little "what if" stuck its neck out from the corner of my head.

those were good times.

had a horrid day at work, made s wait for 45 min, threw everything down and went on a food shopping spree, took a taxi to marina barrage, climbed up the huge slope, had a wonderful picnic, released a styrofoam box into the wind, released other things into the wind, got reminded of my inadequacy in bowling, almost couldn't go home, thanked God that taxi drivers need to pee, needed to pee too, said bye, went home.

happy. :)

dreams

yesterday night, i discovered that i was still wearing my ring. today, i found myself mildly bothered by the unfamiliar feeling on my finger, where it had once been.

but every day gets a little better. more and more, i realize that i have been trying to derive happiness out of loving someone, so much so that i forgot how important it was to be loved too. i think what i have to accept is that no matter how nice it was at the beginning, it was still a mistake. yes, i was happy, but that's often how it is with the mistakes we make in life right? we get happy for awhile, and then we realize just how silly we were.

the funny thing is i've always thought of this relationship as a dream. and it really was, wasn't it? thing about most dreams is that waking up is often a slow and painful process, and it really was too. but ultimately, i'm glad i woke up because it's a brand new day and outside, the sun is shining.

thank God it reached you, because now i can finally let go.

best valentine's gift i've ever ever received

ok so i just received a call from the mostest unexpectedest person at this moment. and i can't tell you enough, i really needed this. thank you so much.

i never got a chance to tell you, but when i walked through the gorge with you for that first and last time, with the sun setting behind us, i realized that i was looking at the girl i fell head over heels in love with 3.5 years ago. you looked absolutely beautiful. but my heart was already with someone else, and it pained me so much because you don't know how much i wanted to grab your shoulders and scream, "why? why now? why not half a year ago? why not never?" and you looked beautiful not just because you always do, but because in that instant, i could feel your love for me, the kind of love i had prayed for day after day, year after year.

but then it was too late, because i had already made up my mind and there was no turning back. so i wiped that memory clean off my mind, because i couldn't bear to acknowledge the fact that back in the gorge, you had turned back into the girl i had loved so dearly for as long as i possibly could.

thank you for calling me. who knew that almost a year later, you would come back and wipe away all the heartache, all the sadness that was plaguing my heart?

good inertia

my mum tells me that it's often pointless and self destructive to give in to a girl, and that a girl will only respect me if i am assertive and if i don't care too much about her feelings. based purely on my track record, i would have to say that my mum has a strong case, because every single girl i had loved had loved me back intensely for maybe about 6 months to a year, and then taken me for granted for the rest of the relationship. and nothing seems to have worked out.

but i refuse to believe this. although for all three of my relationships i had been heartbroken, i had also been the one who ended all three relationships. because deep inside, i cannot allow myself to be with someone whose idea of love does not align with mine. to me, perfect love is to want, with all your heart, to give whatever you can of yourself to the other person, while knowing that you can take whatever you want from the other person as well, no questions asked. it is way beyond fun, or looks, or sex, or sports, or hobbies, or romance, or butterflies in tummies. because it's the only thing that can sustain us through the darkness that we often find ourselves in, just because we live in this world. and i don't think i want to settle.

so maybe i'll find that girl. maybe it'll be next year, maybe it'll be 20 years from now... or maybe i will end up giving all my love to old folks or little abandoned children... but i refuse to believe that i need to change myself in this respect in order to find someone whom i can love, and who will love me back with all her/their heart.

trimming off

went for a run just now, and got some things cleared up in my head.

gave myself a chance to wonder, what do i really look for in a partner?

and finding the answers gave me some comfort, and helped me walk a little further away.

i also realized that all those times i told myself to let the matter rest cos i didn't want to hurt her, they ended up hurting me so much more than i knew. but i will do it again, and again, until one day i find a girl who understands that giving in isn't a weakness, that it is just love, pure and simple.

and then i'll be able to stop looking :)

housies

i still remember, when i told w about char last year, he immediately booked me in advance so he could celebrate my bday with me. this time, when he asked me if i wanted to go out on friday, and saturday as well, i guessed straightaway that he knew what had happened. i realize that sometimes you don't have to ask someone what's wrong to be a friend, or to make a person feel better.

but that said, i didn't expect l to ask me if i was ok either. thank God for housemates!

talking about housemates, my life in cornell has been shared with the most awesomest housemates ever. let's see. first it was yc, then yc again with llwq and spk , then w and l and finally lsm and kr. to think that so many people end up with monster roommates and housemates, i'm so thankful that God blessed me with friends who made my college life so much easier, considering the stormy relationships i put myself through. even r, whom i just cannot bring myself to like, did have little bright sparks here and there.

i think the most unlikely friend would have to be lsm. i hadn't known him before, and it was purely out of convenience/necessity that we became housemates. first impression wasn't great either, cos he just seemed quiet and not any fun at all. but i was totally wrong man. turns out he was an ah beng before cornell, and in the 1 short year together, he absolutely changed my impression of ah bengs. of course he was the smart, reformed type lah. not very typical. still, he was probably the most natural, generous, easygoing, mature and caring guy i've ever met. and great sportsman. loved him to bits and totally wanna be like him. i'm so happy that he's attached now, and happy for whoever the girl is!


i just hope that i was an ok housemate too.

time crisis! that's like the last thing i'd have imagined myself doing today. great workout.

and i came to within a point of equaling my bowling record. way to go canuf. but luke, why so serious?

best drink ever...apart from kickapoo and sprite

ribena ice blended with jelly is absolutely beyond description. if it wasn't for the economic crisis, i would have it every day.

yesterday i bought prawn crackers for yy. today i got free prawn crackers from my regular prawn cracker supplier. come on, healthy foods please? but still, awesome man.

the fact that i don't randomly buy food for you is proof that i'm way less awesome, but aiyah forgive me lah i'm a guy.

so i bought new paper and told myself i'll read it on the way home. it's still sitting on my desk, and i believe i will never read it. i have missed the window of opportunity cos i can't make myself read outdated news. oh and since i'm on that topic, my boss thinks it's all of us should be above reading trashy stuff like new paper. i fear i'll never get promoted.

buffice

so today i got on the 80, and i came across this stupid/genious bar counter thingy (example above) that seemed really out of place, not to mention rather dangerous. plus a big waste of space. so because it had the only available seat on the bus, i had to take it, and to make SBS feel that their love is not in vain, i whipped out my laptop and started typing. awesome experience. sitting sideways in a moving vehicle + typing furiously on a furiously vibrating laptop. i could feel many eyes on my back. a little boy beside me kept looking over and getting slapped by his mum cos she wanted him to memorize some multiplication table. sorry little boy, next time your mum buy you laptop you can copy me.

so anyway, after the surreal 40 min ride, i left my new buffice feeling wobbly and lightheaded. just as well, cos i've been heavy headed recently.

yy wants me to go and support her at her bowling competition on saturday. i said yes immediately, and it made her very happy. it made me happy too, and thankful, because i have never needed this more. i guess sometimes it takes something drastic to make me realize that here is someone who wants me to love her and whom i have neglected for far too long.

maybe that's why people have children. because God gave us so much love that we need to find a channel to express it. and children are like the default sinks for love.

all of a sudden, i realize i don't need to know anymore.

relief... i had never known that this innocent word could result in such excruciating pain.



to j, and to c, i am so sorry. i could hear your hearts break but i chose to put on earmuffs because i was in love... but now i can't shut out that very same sound in my own heart.



my friends have told me, at various times last year, that they had never seen me so happy before. it really was true you know. but now that's no more, and for the first time in my life, i'm left with a horrible, paralyzing fear of ever falling in love again.

thank you

because you made me move
like the wind across the hills

because you taught me how to smile
when i'd forgotten how to feel

because you showed me i could love
when i had nothing left to lose

because you made me dance
because you made me sing
because you showed me i could live

*hug* "take care ah..."

S, you are really really.... no words to say man. can't tell you in your face cos i'm a guy and guys aren't supposed to be in touch with their feelings, but really, i'm so glad i met you, i'm so glad you remembered me after all these years, and i'm so glad that you're my friend.

the pain hasn't diminished, but but it's tempered by a little measure of happiness.

this used to be a place that i could pour all my sadness, my insecurities, my frustration, my heartache... because i knew that she hardly read my blog, and i could vent my emotions here without hurting her at all.

but lately, i found it really hard to write down how i feel... because i knew you would visit and i couldn't bear to spoil your day by writing something that might make you unhappy. so very often i would stare at the blank screen for 15 minutes or so, then type out random, neutral bits of irrelevance just to try and take my mind off things. sometimes it worked.

well i guess all these don't matter that much anymore. i hope i did the right thing, because i saw how difficult it was for you to say it to j and i don't want you to have to go through that again.

thank you for every single day. if only i had been good enough, because you're everything i have ever, ever wanted.

even now. i don't know what to do without you but i guess i'll have to try.

racism

today, on the way to work, i joined about 30 people in the bus being seriously annoyed at an idiot obnoxiously blasting his handphone music for everyone to hear. i am absolutely certain it was on purpose cos it was SERIOUSLY loud. not the forgivable earphone-noise-leak kind of loud but the handphone speaker at full volume kind of loud. and i could have actually ignored it, had he not suddenly decide to play HOKKIEN music. omg. i mean, i have nothing against hokkien music, but not at 8am in the morning!!!

so later in the day, i went for badminton, and i played horribly. i think it's my retrib for thinking murderous thoughts.