oh crystal ball, save us all, tell me life is beautiful

wah fuck it lah i'm gonna do a post anyways.

i loved going back to school (almost) everyday to uh..you know..the S word. *cringe*

big up Charlene for good times and hooking me up with k__n under the pretense of asking chem questions. sneaky business!

big up Jeanette for early deepavali wishes cum pilgrimage of indians in yellow sighting texts haha :) thimithi = timothy. (massive big up for jean especially for Flight of the Concordes..AND the mighty boosh AND nevermind the buzzcocks. you are so effing cool, half my coolness comes from being around you JEAAANNN (who probably spotted nadal/fabregas on the telly in the caf)

my life in the past few weeks in pikchas.

fallen tree after thunderstorm from weeeks ago. it sort of just slumped against the wall. in the portion of the school with the rectangular portion of sky (that's if you look straight up. good observation rakk *wink*)

Big K took the entire class out for an indian veg lunch at Raj's near Mustafa. the yindian and the sindhi sat together. everyone got thalis and i loved how much they enjoyed it..felt so incredibly proud to be sharing my kulcha (not at my financial expense though :P ) the experience got me thinking about that section in the sunday times where they interview a foodie and ask what their last meal would be. Mine would be rice, rasam, my Aatha's fried chicken (not southern style, southern indian style), spinach (overcooked, like all indian veges are) and appalam. Then i can leave for Kailasa happy.

after the lunch, on our way to island creamery , two chelsea fans and a blue umbrella.

Ban Mian Gan (pun myen kan) the newest swear word. you wanna swear at a frenchman, unleash this extremely insulting sounding phrase and he'll be gobsmacked. just don't tell him that it means handmade noodles, dry. ("aunty add chili oso")

chong hwei's completed installation art piece :D roses and tornadoes. that's what i call it lah..mostly cos it reminds me of Muse's Butterflies and Hurricanes. i remember while in england (which was during the developmental stages of the piece) every single time i saw a rose garden, or a painting of a rose or a rose motif on a teacup i thought of chia hwei..fo real!

*sheds a tear* so proud of my ickle bro (4th in the country for 'C' div! *gushhhh*) not so ickle anymore at 1.7m..bloody hell.

funan. challenger. xbox 360. project gotham racing. filaure at controlling game console ughh. surf and turf lunch. grilled salmon in herb butter (christ almighty. the fish was incredible). golfer's network. taylor-made visor in black (i'd been waiting for it for more than a year..Ash said that i smiled like a kid on the morning of christmas when uncle thanga called me over to the counter and asked me to pick one of the colours HAHA)

today. lunch at Khamsana/Khasmana/Khamsalam/ Khasmalam (LOL!!! the latter 3 are the botched up pronunciations that daddy-o came up with)

the frickin cool golf club table at the golf shop in Taka. i never noticed it before -__- "Don't be afraid of colour! You need more bright colours in your closet...so that it can help you come out of the closet"

Speaking of taka.. the bodybuilder from the mocca ad works as a salesperson for Fila in the taka sports section. my mum actually asked him if he was the mocca fella *facepalm* i just walked away really quickly in the opposite direction going red in the face trying to hold back my laughter and texting Wanlin furiously (she's a big fan and all..HAHAAA)

Barclays Singapore Open

i am heartbroken that i had to miss watching it live at Sentosa (instead i'd to watch it on the telly..which was minimal ANYWAYS cos who watches tv during the A's anyways) They gave the course a makeover and everything since last year's Open (which i had a BLAST attending. srsly..adam scott less that 2m away from me was surreal. getting to see his swing that close..that perfect swing. he is so fit! *gush gush* last years S'pore Open posts here)

what.a.view.

that's phil mickelson btw. No.2 in the WORLD. and he's a leftie. not only him..vijay singh was here too. and darren clarke, michael campbell, adam scott, lee westwood AAAARRRGGHHH dammmiiiittt! can't believe i missed it lah :( :(

oh well. next year..good vibrations, womad, S'pore Open, kalaa utsavam, the WORKS....

but it seems an awfully long time away

S'pore Open 2006, Day 3 part 1

alright you lot, this is a many-part thing(cos blogger's being a pain and i can't upload ALL the pics at once). so anyways, thank goodness my desire to see the s'pore open was fulfilled :D it was kinda unexpected cos i was expecting to be playing at Dendro/ dropping by Golfers Network/ having lunch at Gayathri's etc etc but not actually going to Serapong(cos me dad was feeling under the weather or summat) but wtv the case YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!

the only downside was that we had to take public transport(oh the horror!) to get to sentosa cos its a weekend and with an event as massive this big, no way jose was my dad gonna get a parking lot. true enough, the lots were f.u.l.l. and the public transport thing didn't seem so bad after all :P and the organisers were nice enough to have a shuttle service straight from harbourfront to the entrance tentage..so yeah..it wasn't so horrific after all.






















so at the entrance, there was banner after banner of all the marquee players and this dude here is shingo katayama. he is QUITE a flashy dresser(as you'll see later on) and i call him shingo starr (think ringo starr) cos he has these wickedcool bell bottom nike trousers that he's always kitted out in. that and this dope cowboy hat (LOL)


we were there to catch the marquee players (namely scott and els, and they usually tee off during the last few slots), even though the first threesome teed off as early as 730am. so we got there at 2-ish and managed to catch jyoti rhandawa, nick o'hern and anthony kang finishing off.

this is nick..he's an aussie and a left-handed player. i got a vid of him taking a shot which i can't upload but the point is that watching left-handed players hit the ball is uber cool cos they're taking mirror-image shots :p i'm being a right-handed elitist,so just bear with me

YINDIA POWER! rhandawa with um..questionably loud red pants(which i thought he couldn't really pull off) and that trademaek floppy hair that he's kept tamed with his visor. he ended off at joint 8th..not bad.

so we'd only been at serapong for about half an hour and we were at the 7th waiting for the member's of shiv kapur's flight to attack this par-3 hole (we were waiting at the green so we had a perfect view of where the ball was gonna land in relation to the pin=flag). shiv had taken his shot already and it landed at a pretty decent spot. THEN the bloody marshall sounds the suspend-play siren..GAAAAAAAAAHH! terrible! apparently there was impending rain or something and play was supposed to be suspended for 1 and a half hours. so that meant all the players had to get back to the clubhouse. so shiv walked over to the green, marked his ball and got buggy-ed off to the clubhouse. this particular bus ferried scott's and els' respective flights (plus their caddies) to the clubhouse while we spectator's were left there to rot. well not really..there was an exodus of spectators going back to hospitality lounges and all(us included) and we spent the next 2 hours slacking off. they were giving out cups of complimentary heineken(damn..one more year to go). but either way, thank goodness for my Neeon. about half an hour before play resumed we walked all the way back to the exact same spot we were before play got called off and i had a lil sitting-up nap on the glorious lucious rough(aka thick grass) Serapong(thats the name of the course btw) is famous for. so shiv, chapchai and chan song came back and woohoo..here it goes again.

alright this is shiv's bag and his caddy. one day..ONE DAY i'll have "anjali ragu" embroidered on my bag like that. too cool man..

xin jia po open 2006

OH.MY.GOD.
the singapore open..TOMORROW! going this friday probably, but its a toss up between playing 9 holes at the newly revamped Dendro course at the OCC which looks gorgeous when admired from across the 'river' that seperates dendro and vanda. been "awaiting the maturity of the turf" for a good 8 months now, and i've been absolutely itching to get on the greens since its been made out to be quite a challenging set of holes PLUS the signature hole looks unforgiving (read: you slice a shot and you're a goner. your ball's heading straaaight for the water) and i think you can tell by the excessive run on lines that is pretty excting stuff(for me at least :P)

ok BACK to the s'pore open. if you'd like to, you can watch all 4 rounds on tv (enough with the "thats the boringest thing to do EVERRR" already!) starting with a live telecast tmr at 1.30 pm on ESPN channel 23. but i recommend you watch the last 9 holes on sunday..those're the most exciting. REALLLY. golf can be excting! heart-stopping kind of exciting..i kid you not!

its gonna be played out at Serapong at the sentosa golf club. i myself haven't played there (yet), but from what i've heard from daddy-o and mathaa, its a tough one, lads and lasses! PLUS there's ADAM SCOTT, only teh hottest aussie golfer around with an amazingly pure and desirable swing..and when i said hot, i also meant that he's quite a looker *wink wink*. he was the one who won the same even last year, so yay! but other than him, there's a pretty star-studded line up: ernie els, lee westwood, angel cabrera, lee westwood and my favourite..MICHAEL CAMPBELL! :D:D:D kiwi love <3 

S'pore Open 2006 Part deux

right then, so i've moved to PHOTOBUCKET which rocks big time andallows me to put up as many bloody photos as i want WOOHOO! and nowgetting back to hole . this is Shiv Kapur himself and there was thiswhole gang of indian expats follwing him around and they were veryvocal in their support. for instance, while waiting for chan song andchinarat to walk down from the tee box to the green, some dude went'Bhaiya! you're doing great :D" HAHAAAA! shiv was all smiley after thatbut he didn't exactly sink a birdie. but a par's pretty alright too

and here we have chinarat from thailand. the pink was overwhelmingly brightand me and ash christened him Marshmallow. you gotta have balls to pulloff an ensemble as pink as that! haha..his putter grip was brightsunshiney yellow. ahem...

and this is the moment we were all waiting for. so after shiv, chinarat andchan song left, adam's flight came in and WOW i think i almost diedwhen he was walking up to his ball. he was less than 2m away from melaaaah! his ball landed on the fringe of the putting green and rolledinto the thickest part of the rough surrounding the bunker..nasty. butits all good cos he was THIS close.(but later on, he was withintouching distance :D

adam! check out his burberry duds ya'll! neyehehe..i was also in the white cap-white top-khaki pants-white shoes ensemble.

this is what i meany by nasty. it couldn't have rolled into a worse spot in the rough but being the pro he is, he gave it some lovely loft and it landed about 5 feet from the hole. not bad.

sighhh..here he is waiting for his turn to putt. he's a lot taller in person, i'll tell ya that but that physique! later on when i got to see him tee off (camera's weren't allowed at the tee box. actually camera's weren't allowed on the course but no one really stopped me..so yeah..its just that at the tee box, spectators were specifically requested to put their camera's away) his sinewy arms and well defined back muscles and gloriously curly dark caramel locks and aquiline nose and the list goes on....i lost what i meant to say, sorry. he's so..distracting!

one of the gajillion marshall's holding up a STFU sign. hey i could've signed up to be a marshall too(i saw the sign up list at the OCC 3 weeks ago)..then i could've gotten a kickass yellow wilson drifit official shirt, and officical barcalys open cap and the lanyard and everything..AARGH! but that means i wouldve had to have been at the course all 4 days. i'd have been alright with that, but with the promos coming and all..no chance.(but then again, at the rate i'm blogging, you wouldn't know that my promo's are in 2 weeks wouldja?)

so after adam sunk his putt, i couldn't really care much for how shingo or kennedy fared on their putts so i ran off to the tee box of the next hole which wasn't far off and ERNIE ELS! i caught this just before he teed up and the marshalls were asking everyone to put their cams away. this guy is MASSIVE in person..like, chewbacca massive haha. the drive he made at this hole sliced a bit too much and he wasný happy with his shot, no sirree. but it was INCREDIBLE watching him tee off all the same. *faints and dies*

so after watching els tee off, we sorta scurried off to rejoin adam's flight at the 9th hole. this was taken at the green itself and that's shingo starr reading the undulation of the green and adam's doing it too hehe. shingo's caddy, the ddue behind him, is quite a looker too and his japanese was phwoar! sounded like music i tell you :)

at the drop of a hat

i am a compulsive hat try on-er/tryer/tryer onner..you get the point.
no matter the store, no matter the country, no matter the occassion, if there's a hat i'll jolly well try it on - just for kicks. i've convinced myself that i've a good "hat head"..one that takes hats well. i mean, i wore a beret for guides all through sec school and i think i looked quite fly (and not like a turtle) if i say so meself. and then there're practical reasons i wear a hat for...outdoor sports, for instance.

and its not like i'm the only one who does it! my mates get it on it too..




from top left hand corner:
mustafa centre "straw" fedora, kiddo in a "madeline" hat (too cute), kiddo again in the japanese female golfer sun hat, east coast park-ing in my fave golf cap,sasha in elmer fudd chic, too-small trilby at fourskin, glorious wide-brimmed sun hat in Ms.Selfridges in Oxford, Diana in a propa cricket helmet, Jags in a Topman creation, ms hon in vivo toys'r'us (she's gonna kill me if she sees this!), Su in an NPCC beret (lookin goooood!), bored Ash in 3 stacked caps in NZ, my FAVOURITEST hat ever..an Indiana Jones fedora from Universal Studios (70USD *weeps bitterly*), i borrowed my bro's golf cap cos i didn't bring my beanie to the Grand Canyon (silly me), glorious shade of cyan golf cap from Barclay's S'pore Open (that i'd to miss cos of the A's.. AARGH) and finally jay Kay of Jamiroquai.


i think i fell in love with hats because of him. he has the most elaborate headgear of any music artist that i know of. his hat choices are less flamboyant nowadays but he can still work a fedora/beanie like hotstuff.

but i think its time i got a proper Trilby..its not as wide brimmed as a Fedora, but it does the trick panache-wise. i wouldn't wear it Singapore, but i really wouldn't mind wearing it anywhere else in the world. in london/paris/new york/milan for instance, in summer of course,..and then hopefully i run into the guy who runs The Sartorialist blog and hopefully he thinks its quite clever and a sartorially sound option that i have a hat on, with a sundress and chappals and then i make it to his site.

"Il plevait quand je suis arrivé á Paris. Mon chapeau came in quite handy!" <-- fails at french lol

post 'studying' golf freako official S'pore Open website surfing dug this up:
it came with the caption "Adam Scott drives from the 17th"

click to enlarge. to borrow a uniquely G term, *OMGDED*

i need help. seriously. (i blame it on the flu-addled brain.) 

its been WAAAAY too long

the title of this entry is self explanatory innit.

so since the last time i posted, i went to New Zealand, the land of the All blacks, Kiwis, Long white cloud and middle earth on earth, and Zane Lowe of BBC radio 1. i heard "drop it like its hot" by snoop "cluck cluck" d-o-double g at least 34 times on the inflight entertainment and also the original version of M.I.A's Galang. woohoo. that was but ONE highlight of the trip. i shant elaborate as that would take DAYS and a helluva lot of cmmitment on my past cos i tend to get long winded and too detaily when i describe things but now's not the time. For one thing, the Apprentice 2 is starting in half an hour and i have to catch up with Jac on the phone soon. so i'll try and squeeze in what else has happened since the last time i posted.

so after i got back from NZ, had loads of Xmas parties and merrymaking until the wee hours with my geragok(eurasian) side of the family. new years eve was spent at home..bleah..watched Die another Day or Star wars or summat. need chocolate to jog my memory. speaking of chocolate, went to the Cadbury chocolate factory in Dunedin, NZ where my mum went nuts and bought a ton of chocolate of all these flavours unavailable in S'pore. it last us for 6 months man...

so tried and squeezed in as much comp time as possible befor school started on 2 jan. Oh yeah, made my new specs too. (i lost my 4 month old pair of chester bennington specs as i call em in a motel in Franz Josef Glacier where we stayed and i helped my mum cook sardine curry cos we were so absolutely sick of ang moh food. ok thats not the point, the point is that my specs case got camouflaged against the carpet and left them there and there was no way we could make a round trip to get em. so yeah, got a new pair made in excatly the same style and colour. only collected them 2 weeks later and some of mah friends say that they have a purplish tinge. so i;m like, "no lah!" but actually inside i'm saying, "cool!")

so got all geared up for the opening of school and thought that since this is my O level year, they'd get us choked with hmwk on the first day, but to my utter disappointment(i'm being honest here) we didnt get any work started until the week after. dang. all that geared up-edness for nothing. but we did help out the tsunami victims(we as in the school and the upper sec in particular) by karang-guni-ying again and also goin down to mercy relief in bukit panjang to help pack clothes. dont get me started on the packing clothes thing...i was quite pissed witt the waything were done(for example, they all-manjan ppl put the Saris in piles WITHOUT the sari blouses and petticoats paired up wit em..what use is a sari without the other two??!! just shows how cooped up they are int heir own world)

so yeah, school started propa. ended up witht the discipline master for our phsics teacher but LO and Behold! the man is SO different as a physics teacher. and got mrs ash'ari for english. started off the first class in a very weird way. all of us had to stand on our chairs..(punishment lah). but it was kinda stupid. she's quite emo lah, but still like her. got mrs Goh for lit. surprisingly i'm enjoying her lessons, hanging on her every word almost. cos she's currently talking alot about greek mythology, the renaissance and stuff that i'm familiar with along that same line..all this is part of the introductory bit to shakespeare. i find it so immensely cool that one of the songs in "twelfth night" is immortalised in a real song by nitin Sawhney on his "human" album. woohoo! "O' mistress mine, where are you roaming?..."got sella for tamil again. das ist sehr gut. all the other teachers are the same. one PE lesson we had recently involved mr yeong, pacing around class preaching about nutrition, goals and his training regime for the 1/2 iron man marathon. that man is a fitness freak. and i cant decipher at all how old he is.also lost my belt..dang! thank God fifa lent me hers for the day..i would've looked like valli no. 2 walking around in my sec 1 belt(i only found out that it was lost when i woke up for school that day). oh yeah. forgot to mention CCA open house. had the Sang Torch booth for the first time. got a couple of names down from the sec 1 batch but who we really need are sec2s. but lets move on to guides. Woohoo! managed to get almost all the badges sorted out the friday b4 the open house..phew. luckily everyone had 2 badges at least(as far as i know). myself on the other hand, have 16 badges in total! ;) far out.

ok, moving away from School life, Adil ray was still in pakistan on holiday during the first week of Jan but luckily bobby and nihal dont take 1 month breaks. *pft* jay sean, the disappointer, instead of coming to southeast asia like he was suposed to is off in india filming a bollywood movie cos his song "one night" is in the yet to be titled mvie. bleah. pissed. how could he do this? hrmph. but he's still a 10 on the buff-o-meter ;)

so went to stay at aunty margie's over the haji weekend cos my parents went off to bangkok for spa-ing and shopping. my 19-year-old cousin Shamini was with us cos she was back from melbourne for the school break. spent most of the time there watching the australian open and playing either badminton, pingpong or mini-rugby. also found a book in her bro Sumana's room(me and my bro's crashed there during out stay there) called "gods Demons and Such" by RK Narayan, excellent book chronicling the various stories about hindu gods.love it. (a bit ok backgroud about Sumana: he went to RI, was an equestrian rider on the 95 SEA games team, a nat'l rugby winger, RJC alumus, UNiversity of Michigan Ann Arbor graduate etc etc) thats the stuff acheivers are made of...

ok anyway, gtg watch "the trump show"..gute nacht. i'll try and update soon. bye

S'pore Open 2006 part drei

more shingo starr! he and his caddy were so close haha. S KATAYAMA baby.

at the opposite hole there was local hero mardan mamat himself. got himself out of a bunker shot and landed a fair distance from the hole. when he eventually went up to make the putt and was about to hit, some mofo's mobile phone went off/some kid cried and he lost his concentration and this putt he should've sunken missed the hole. dang. he looked pissed, alright

this guy is such a nice fella. he heard vivek asking my mum for a drink cos he'd run out of water and she'd run out of water too.so he gave him a can of 100 plus from the cooler that was meant for the players! haha, he was the score keeper from scott's flight you see. and later on, when we saw him again at the hawker center at the harbourfront interchange and my mum went up to thank him, he gave vivek shingo's ball!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WTF! it was really shingo's ball lah! with tshingo's hand drawn markings and all PLUS 'shingo' printed on the side opposite the nike tick. HOW AWESOME IS THAT! vivek of course, was all smug about it :P

here i was trying to capture how deep the rough actually is. it is ABSOLUTELY unforgiving and if your ball lands in it, you're a goner matey. but if you land on the fairway, you usually get a pretty decent shot from there on and bob's your uncle. the commentator's said it, the players themselves said it. i saw it firsthand later on when shingo landed in it and he duffed his shot so bad that he went on to bogey the hole and he couldn't recover at the following holes. he ended the day at +1 :(

lovely adam mucking around with his scorecard while waiting for shiv and co to finish up ahead at the green and move on to the next hole. he was so cute i tell you, juggling his ball with one hand first, then bouncing it off the clubface, just for kicks. its really tough to do that you know, especially since the club face is so small. but we were all so impressed that we were beaming (mostly the ladies lah ;) )and he was hamming it up for the official photgraphers there. scott went on to birdie this hole and i caught it on video! ha! what a beauty..he read the lie so well! i myself didn't realise that there was a teensy bit of a rightward bump that would've sent his ball off course, just a foot away from the hole. good stuff :)

i won't resize this one too much so that you can see SCOTT ON TOP BABY!

at the very last hole. it was already past 630, i fink. the crowd that had gathered was MASSIVE. the funny thing was, his 2nd shot hit a spectator's shoulder who was standing 3 persons away from me! what i would've given to have been hit by fricken ernie els' ball! the fella was still clutching his shoulder long after els had cleared his shot from the rough that the ball eventually landed in after bouncing off of him.there were even some sill fellas who went up to him and wanted a handshake, for having been hit by els' ball..pffft.

sigh. there was no chance in hall i could've gotten an autograph or somehting from any of the players cos you're not supposed to approach the during play and after the last hole, they were shepherded off to the clubhouse too quickly for anyone to get anything. i saw all the local caddies later on though and they had 3-4 signatures on their caps *mumbles under breath in jealousy* but at least, my bruv got shingo's ball :) and i got loads of pics of adam and vids of his first class swing which i shall study and try to emulate (no really)..i mean, its different reading in Golf Digest, page by page analyses of his swing with full colour photos and seeing him doing it LIVE , RIGHT THERE IN FRONT OF YOU.

the best hole was when me and ash got a front row view of shingo's, adam's and kennedy's swing from the front. they all had diffrent styles and placed the ball back in their stance to varying degrees. adam's swing is tight and orthodox. he looks very athletic as he stands over the ball with his back unusually staight and his knees nice and flexed. his left foot is usually turned out slightly and we goes for it, he takes his club back in a nice, wide arc. at the top of his backswing, he is parallel to the ground(exactly like what the textbooks tell you to do) and his swing speed and torque is viciously fast. he strikes the ball and it usually goes exactly where he wants it to if all the abovementioned elements are in place. he finishes with his elbows high..just like Tiger. and at this point i'd like to mention that he consults the same swing coach as tiger and his caddy is tiger's caddy's younger brother haha.

shingo on the other hand, uses a nike sasquatch for a driver (one day i'd like to own that club..460 cc's of pure power) and this cheeky fella warms up/takes practice swings by swinging left-handed! (he's a right hander btw). compared to scott, he extends a lot more and so his swing radius is a lot less tight, but he still gets a good ball strike. kennedy , i don't care for too much :P but both ash and i felt that he was punching the ball and there was more than once that he hit the groud before he hit the ball and that speaks of a laxity in his swing that makes it a lot less solid than his counterparts'.

okok enough golf talk. that ís all for now :)

you've already won me over, in spite of me. dont be alarmed if i fall head over feet

fyi, the post title is in ref to an Alanis Morissette song (did i spell that right?)..nothing more, nothing less
well well well..

its been quite a while hasn't it. i guess that's what happens when deepavali and hari raya come together and its one looooong sabbath (black sabbath got back together btw..well, most of the members) ok fine, sabbath's a semi-inappropraite word to use, but it added to the effect lah :P

deepavali starts and never stops..until christmas. yes i'm exaggerating but by the time all the visting and entertaining's done, its about time for xmas preparations already. MADNESS i tell you. being yindian is tough sometimes *sigh of mock exasperation*

Saturday (actuall deepavali day): Biryani at St George's

Sunday: Biryani at Vina's

Monday was the perfect ruiner(FARKING PEE DOUBLE_U). Biryani compliments of Vijaya Atthei..for being such lovely nephews+niece
Tuesday was lovely..at Nazrin's place. Biryani at her place

Wednesday was even lovelier at Hamidah's place. Biryani there too

Thursday: last proper school day i believe..but monday's leftover biryani for either lunch or dinner *shrugs*

Friday: Nas's house for yet another raya visit. no prizes for guessing food of choice there :P

Saturday: simple, boring, homely, msg-laden MAGGI MEE..while the rest of my family went out for Tony Roma's. just for the record, i chose to pass on Tony Roma's. you know why? i'll tell you why.

BIRYANI in all it different forms: chicken, mutton, prawn and the like, with all the accompanying condiments namely whatsitcalled brinjal, rhaita, appalam etc etc (notice the lack of vegetabls. brinjal doesnt count as veges cos the way its cooked and spiced, it dont look lke brinjal after that) FOR SEVEN DAYS STRAIGHT! is enough to put you off biryani for the rest of your life. I KID YOU NOT. you'll have to drag me kicking and screaming to a table with basmati rice, coloured or uncoloured..AND AND force feed me..cos GOD HELP ME i am SICK of biryani.

ok im done with that portion.

so back to Wednesday at midah's place where half the class showed up (good enough, for me at least) and we all actually sat down and watched Khabi Kushi Khabi Gham! lemme just lay out the demographics of the group: 3 indians..well sort of( 1 pseudo-sindhi, 1 pseudo indian minah and 1 cutified bimbo), and um...i dunno, 10+ chinese makkals and 1 guy among them. i had to leave early (cos there was sposed to be cricket) but they all actually LASTED the 3 hours ++ of TEH definitive hindi movie of our generation! the 3 of us are used to it lah..desensitized even. but boy oh boy i am SO proud of them! :D and you know its worked its charms when the day after in school, my mates are Shava Shava-ing and asking how the tune to Bole Chudiyan goes *big grin*

in lime green, miss midah herself. lovely host, with lovely mum and NIC! thanks for the pic haha
Same day: on the way back home to get changed for Cricket training, JUST as i left the turnstile at the AMK station i get a text saying that training's cancelled due to bad weather *FACEPALM x3* what rotten luck. so i just sorta got back on the train and went to da bugis with mah homegurl THE DIANA. where on the 2nd floor, mats who noticed 15cm-in-diameter choc chip cookies at some random cafe exclaimed loudly "besar SIOLLLLLLL". mats mats mats. sometimes you just gotta give it to them. (big up to jheevums aka 'Shabs' ;) )

moving on to thursday..last day of school propa (oh puhlease,almost 4 days in, it dont feel anything like the end of school..pfft)

might as well take pics when you've only got a couple more days of school left, no? the PW group i never had *tragic sigh* this was taken when messing around with charlene's temperemental mac book. from L to R nic, charlene (wasted arh! 4-0 wouldve been nice, but 2-0 will suffice..and its so good to see Lamps back on form!), um..the extra, midah(partially hidden) and Yijie (if you ever read this mister, i'm effing getting you flowers next year!)

and then there was CHAAT. and masala tea. and tak glam pani puri videos that will never make it to youtube and fester in the recesses of rhubi's phone. yembrace your yindian side i say (oh pre i wish you were there! birthday treat! *wink wink* I.O.U, if you're reading this)

and then there was golf. first PROPER PROPER training session. first time i laid hands on a 7-iron in FOUR WEEKS (albeit not my own..PLEASE lah, expect me to lug my bloody 7-iron to school? Jokers! where would i keep it? its different with tennis rackets, cricket bats, hockey sticks and the like..those are accpetable. you can brandish them in public. not a golf club! *incredulous look*) thank the stars i still had my swing...i half expected myself to fall back down to nooby standard.

for me it was a much needed refresher course..started off with the 9 o clock swing and gradually, after about and hour and a half, FINALLY got down to the full swing (well actually, when the coach wasn't looking,i hit with a full swing lah :P) but yes, i acknowledge the fact that you need to get your half swing down pat first, before you conquer the full swing. but hel-looo! gimme some leeway lah! i have my PC, i can do a bloody full swing already!! i guess thats one of the things i've gotta deal with, with this batch of newbie golfers..i have to reign myself in cos it'd be unfair if the coach gave me personal attention. but so much for that! he let me use his gorgeous midnight blue MacGregor 5 wood right at the end of the session while every one else had to stand and watch *smug grin*

and THAT's when i started hitting the 100m mark. FINALLY. it was getting annoying, only reaching 70+ m with the damn 7-iron. i told him. i TOLD him that i play with far better with my woods more so than my irons..well whaddya know! but at the same time, its quite unnerving the fact that my iron play sucks so bad. ok it doesnt suck per se; its a straight, accurate shot, but it doesnt travel very far :\ well there's always the upcoming Lexus Cup where i can go watch how Grace Park and Morgan Pressel hit..maybe learn something useful. like from watching Adam Scott at the S'pore Open,and hoping to emulate his swing (and his finish)

now lets start on Friday:

open house at nas's place all the way in da west side *gangsta style west side hand action thinger*.

we were flocked off to one side, the "early leavers" as nas labelled us. boy HE looks uncomfortable :P and made to take a pikcha.

i had to leave early for a VERY valid reason, ha! lunch+dinner= linner/dunch...with nan my love! pure, genuine and the real deal...ppl like her who keep me grounded. OH GOD I WISH I BROUGHT MY DAMN CAMERA! AGH! history: we conquered Tamil together and that in itself good enough reason goddamit. but anyways, being the angel she is, she got me rare tix to a production by the Raffles Players (that's their equivalent..but a MUCH cooler version of a drama club)..so rare, that rafflesians themselves didnt get tix :P it was called Threesome (how suggestive); Three Plays. so for pre-Threesome lunch, headed to a kebab place in Bussorah St with v friendly native morrocans whacking melayu all (apa seh!): Sedap kan? LOL!! and trying to hold a conversation over BLARING arabic music is v tough. that

on the train back to bishan..KARTHIK! haha, not the first time..and always always only one door away. Sundah, you da man.
pibbles haha! *anjack style handshake*

the theater studio was called The Black Box (too cool) and the seating was minimal so it was rather intimate..the interaction btwn the actors and the audience. these ppl are genuine stuff cannot bluff (to borrow a group's project title *wink*)..MUCH respect. they are truly a class apart..that was QUALITY stuff they put up.powerful too. much respect to Sindhu ( fab shoes babe! and director too :D big league already ah!) and Vani! if you're reading this HI! :D props to you for one helluva line ("Body Shop!") and might i add, you were quite a looker as The Mirror Eyed Gazer. but one of em plays..Kevin's Birthday Party..was a pretty mindless rollicking ruckus containing the biggest take away of the night, namely THIS:


Laugh your hearts out :D

finally, Saturday:

played 9 holes at Dendro..the renovated course at the OCC.its a toughie.. not much water to cross but a HELLUVA lot of bunkers. 39 i believe! (or more) WTF! PLUS the fairways are SUPER tight..which is bad news for big hitters and more so for innocent bystanders cos on at least 5 occassions ppl were shouting "Fore!''..including Ash. that's how damn narrow the adjacent fairways were. MADNESS i tell you. started off terribly horribly..i quadruple bogeyed the very first hole *bleuargh* but thank goodness i got my rhythm after that. not too bad for my first time on the course in 4 weeks..except that when totalling my score, the megablunder on the first hole came back to bite me in the arse. but it was so nice playing on a brand spankin new course..all manicured and mostly divot free. and the greens were fast! WOOT! yeah baby, i liiike.

but that wont last for too long..considering the fact that now Vanda is being renovated so players can only choose btwn Aranda and Dendro now. and since Dendro's all new, every one wants to play there. gah. but i have a felling i'll hit my personal best there *fingers crossed*

note: kerry king from slayer is in that Sum 41 vid! "Rock! is what we're all about. Its what we live for, cmon and shout it out!"

voila mon passport

It is so hot here. The past 2 days I've been here, be it sitting on the many well-trimmed, soft and non-dewy grass lawns around campus (like they do in the pictures on the website haha. "We're being Uni students now, i Love it!"- as jeremy said), or just walking from location to location, familiarising myself with the campus (so far, the Commerce Courtyard is my fave place..mostly cos it provides SHADE, and lots of benches under low trees with thick canopies) the SUN is killing me yo.

I literally see my energy bar on my stats depleting. It's terrible..it's as if the life has been sucked outta me. My body is slumped on the sofa like a rag doll, with my now empty water bottle tipped over. I swear i SAW the water inside it evaporate away before my eyes. Sunblock seems to have worked though.

The thing about not knowing any other freshers in uni is that you're alone alot of the time, unless you make friends and talk to people. Like i did with Jeremy. But most of the time I'm not bothered. I would've been bothered about walking around alone in S'pore, and being friendless (my mates don't come down to sydney until next week, since school starts later for them)..but here, I dont give a fk man. I don't care what people think about me either. It's quite liberating. And I can look people in the eye without worrying about whether they're gonna react favourably with a smile or not. I can be as open or as wallflower-ish as i want to be. People watching is so much more worth it too.

I have space.

Edit: this is AWESOMEE!!! they're showing Secret Diary of a Call Girl on telly here! Billie Piperrr :D

Germany Trip and Golf

ok so here goes. haven't blogged in ages, and i really should be studying instead right now, but i REALLY gotta get this off my chest.

First Golf.
Who watched the Pinehurst no.2 US Open? good if you did, too bad if you didn't, cos Tiger got kicked in the ass by shear maori hard work. and Vijay(singh), you disappoint me.mike Campbell rules! but what i'm here to talk about is the golfer's choice of clothes.
WHAT HAPPENED TO TOGS ON THE GOLF COURSE!?!?!

sergio is wearing red pants for pete's sakes. even jasper parnevik didnt go THAT far. it was a bloody 70's moment. that teamed with a white polo and a PINK hat. hel-lo! get a stylist! and whatsup with pink? even tiger wore pink two days in a row. now everyone's trying to be ryan seacrest. whatever. once is ok, but twice in a row? dude.....
the green would yellow the day Vijay stepped onto it with pink, i'll tell ya that.
but a couple of months ago while i was in the Taka golf section, i noticed a purple mr woods-endorsed nike golf polo tee with PAiSLEY prints. i fell in love with the shirt. no, i wouldnt have worn it, and i wouldnt have wanted my dad to have worn that either, but hey, at least golf was making a move forward in the fashion ranks. Golf tees are much more than just plain comfortable nowadays. even Ashworth puts out some excellent stuff. but Nike still rules. (proud to say that i don't own anything by adidas..hehe)

the bestest best outfit was worn my Mike campbell. plain white polo white maori detailing down the length of the sleeves. Beautiful. and no it wasnt made by any big name sports company or wtv. homegrown kiwi designer made it. now thats what i call national identity. something that S'pore lacks. you see a maori pattern and you immediately associate it with polynesia or NZ innit? you see a merlion and you go waht freak of nature is that. i would laugh my ass off at a Singaporean golfer if he wore a tee with a merlion design. its plain silly. ok sorry of track.
Mike managed to incorporate his culture into his dressing appropriately and on such an appropriate day.(in case you weren't paying attention, he won eventually) love the guy for his underdogedness. tiger woods can go sleep with his swedish nanny wife for all i care. (rant rant..ok that sounded a bit harsh, considering he was my first fave sports personality)

moving on to the LPGA. i wish i was a lady golfer. dude, they get to wear dangly earrings that i'm so fond of. and their outfits are what i'd wear on a normal day so i'd fit right in, innit? but my skills suck. bleah.maybe i've a chance with putting but i'm not so sure about long drives and even teeing off. my full swing sucks. no matter how much i stand behind that japanese golf pro at seletar and TRY to imitate him, i'm never gonna get there at this point of time. maybe afer i get into jc i can go back to sports again. and yes ppl, golf IS a sport. and so is billairds. but that game only conjurs iimages of a smoke-filled pub and pints of beer lining the pool table, for me at least.

and now,
GERMANY TRIP 2005.

this trip was very enlightening on many different levels. i met loads of new friends whom i really love and make me wonder "where were you all along?". i've wondering that alot this year. my eyes have finally opened. this always happens to me in the last year that i'm in a particular school. its like missing out at the end of the day, cos you have so little time. and then regret comes into play..and the "beat goes on....". i nevr thought i could find a homie in Bo hui.

to be con'td...

urban hike

Man, i had to re log in to this blog thang like 9 times just to finally get here so that i can post this entry. wahlau..

Listening to indian flute by Timabaland and Magoo feat Raje Shware (which sounds an awful lot like rajeshwari..haha..what if its a girl!!)did you know that Jay sean took Timbaland for a bit of a walkaround Southhall aka the indian district of London to shop for bollywood music 12 inches!!(which are used y DJs esp for sampling)
so anyway, yesterday was Urban hike. and unfortunately, still had to carry out my testwork mistress duties. and here i am screaming "gimme a breakk"! got last minute testwork that eventually I had to lug around during the entir duration of the urban hike..bah!

so the day started off as rainy as ever(monsoon season innit) and all of us looked as though we'd just woken up(an observation i made thru half closed eyelids..haha). then after like 20 mins of attendance and the reading out of rules and wtv IT BEGAN *the sound that plays whenever a answer is figured out on Nickelodeon's Figure It Out...wahahaha*

Listening to the Tigerstyle remix of angel eyes
got on the train JUST b4 it left, thank God. got off at city hall. exited at Exit B. first checkpoint was St Andrews cathedral.some doink patrols crossed the road over to the capitool centre side even though they really didnt have to. then went to the firestation place further down the road. haha..got a bit of help from WC's mum to confirm whether the brick building i saw in the distance really was the firestation. got a pretty good lead i must say..honestly the only competition we had pretty much all the way through was Oriole 1st. on the way to the firestation, spotted the postbox outside the philatelic museum AND oriole 1st. i was like dang, they caught up wit us. got the info we needed blah blah blah. snuck off to the asian civilisations museum where i KNEW for sure we'd find the ACM cat. c'mon lah, Jia wei and i have been there a million times on one of our out of the ordinary outings where we dont go to USUAL places like the heeren or wtv.

listening to Bhutan Philaharmonic(for those who dunno, bhutan is in nepal..haha) jai tal dub (this is the world music side of me comin out) hey did you know my aunt is one of the women vying for a spot on the all woman singaporean team thats gonna scale Everest! INNIT!!! her husband's the one who owns Campers Corner(only the most famous camping store in S'pore..;) )
then had a bit of a problem finding the Singapore Arts Museum cos there was no straight way thru what USED to be bras basah park which is now the SMU construction site. Still had a good lead over oriole 1st at this point of time. eventually found our way around the construction site and into the old SJI now known as the SAM. pretty cool place. wasted a bit too much time there trying ot find the correct founding day. then made our way to the CHIJMES door which looked really medival and cool. Huixin informed us that we were the first team to arrive. had to perform and raise $2 as part of a task. what a shocker. did the chicken dance to this really nice lady.wonder what happened to all the money raised cos it was eventually given to the CLs and ACLs. hmmmmmmm
next stop was the war memorial park where we once again wasted a bit too much time mucking around and taking photos. had a bit of a confusion finding the frickin fountain in the clue. mistakenly went to the SRC fountain. DAMN. supposed to be the Tan Kim Seng Waterworks fountain. eventually got there but lost our big lead. met up with Oriole 1st yet again. next stop was the Cenotaph better known as the place with the inscription "they died that we may live". rmb it from the after the LP concert where kids were skateboarding on the steps/making out/just chilling and listening to the LP cncert from outside the padang stage without having to pay..right. moving on. went to the esplanade afta tht. tourist haven and newlyweds wedding photo taking spot. what a kodak moment. this was the turning point. cos of a miscalculated error, we lost it all here. our lead and everything. we were supposed to meet ryn for our next task at the open stage but we DIDNT. dang. *shakes head disappointedly* none of us actually knew we had to meet ryn.

listening to Galang by M.I.A vs Sunit..haha, Galang sounds like galangal aka blue ginger i tell you this song is too cool to be true. it has a sample from the amitabh bachan hit film "sholay" which is celebrating its 30th Anniversary this year" which sounds SO bloody retro bollywood with like this snake dance thang goin on..its WICKED i tell you. even got the villain's laughter thrown in certain parts of the song!! HOW COOL IS THAT
man..moved on to the lst checkpoint which turned out wrong anyway cos of the vague coordinates. made a couple of calls to the CLs(and at this point i'm thinking, "i'm not the patrol leader am i? why the hell am i taking charge anf doin everybloodything??") and ran back to the esplanade after that. saw oriole 1st having just completed their last task we knew it was gone for us. the title, the glory everythin. you shouldve seen the crestfallen looks on our faces. (ok i'm over dramatising but so what) had to perform for 12 ppl this time. managed to do it for these ppl from china who were fascinated with us beforehand anyway. haha..you should've seen the frenzied phototaking when we started performing "peace like a river". MAD. left after that. had a HELLUVA lot of probs finding the last checkpoint. we were just so exhausted and so beaten up cos we'd lost our 11 checkpoint lead i guess. after a lot of wrong decisions finaly saw black t shirt clad girls sitting on the steps of the supreme court. we really didnt bother running tot he final checkpoint much seeing that about 4 patrols were laready there. we literally trudged to a spot on the steps. never felt so disappointed all year long. we had not only NOT come in second, we were beaten flat out. damn damn damn. thank God had Jay Sean's album in my discman. at least some of the pain went away.
either way, had a blast of a time with my patrol..at least for the firt 11 checkpoints.haha..but its all good now. well sorta. i'll just have to deal with it innit? and anyway, go other things to worry about.

but then, Kudos to my lovely patrol mates for bein so sporting all the way and not giving probs or anything bad liddat. they're a commendable lot. hi 5 guys!

so toodaloo, gotta scoot. catch ya round