late morning/early afternoon TV is normally reserved for talk shows, with Oprah on Hallmark and Ellen on Star World, but if you tune in to MTV, their live shows are a bit of a hidden treasure.. so far i've caught Kanye West and Alicia Keys, two amazing 1 hour sets that show just how great they are as performers...

there are two signs that indicate that we've arrived at that stretch in the holidays when the lack of things to do becomes so intense, and this usually happens just after the initial high of having no school to go to and before the christmas/newyear/newschoolyear excitement kicks in - either blogs get updated repeatedly in a single day, or they stop getting updated at all because of the sheer dip in anything blog-worthy...
for the past 2 days the latter has been my plight, but i guess i might as well get one post in mid-week...

took a rain check on han an's invitation to join him in his weekly wednesday post-dance lesson dinner at milennia, probably at Xin Wang Hong Kong Cafe, 'cos i've been feeling slightly under the weather ever since sleeping at 4am on tuesday morning finishing up my shows...
that kinda threw off my plans to get some constructive stuff done, though the jury is still out as to whether i would have done much even if i was up and about...
nonetheless, i took a positive step in the right work-completing direction by getting around to printing out my resources for my Extended Essay, something i had put off because my mentor never had the need to see them and i operated on a tuesday-to-tuesday basis during term time when it came to EE work...
now maybe i can at least get to writing more than what i have already, which isn't a lot if anyone was wondering x)

in between long lazes in bed with a copy of Lime/8 Days/The Economist/Detailed Study or World Lit texts (yeah i know, incongruous set of material, go figure), i've finally got the Soundtrack to Enchanted, particularly because i wanted the Jon McLaughlin song, So Close, which is on loop now...
apart from that, i graciouslly (and in the process indebting him somewhat) helped adriel obtain some JAPANESE song (the first ever on my iTunes Library), in the process getting the entire album which i've since erased completely from my iBook...
and i also got Craig David's Trust Me, his first studio album in a few years, and i must say i don't quite enjoy it as much as Slicker Than Your Average...
oh and the Encounterfest album (or EP rather, its not long enough to be considered an LP), In A Valley By The Sea, has finally been listened to, allowing me to begin my first CD review for Amplified! 6, though i must decide which 4 other albums i'll be writing about...

November fast draws to a close, and with that the larger part of 2007...
strangely i've already started to think of 2008 as the present, and i do hope its as good a year as this one has (surprisingly) turned out to be...

Be in, or be out,
John.

had dinner at the Manhattan Fish Market with sean/deon tonight, then drinks at starbucks followed by a (strangely expected) visit to Tapz...

no plans the rest of the week; feels kinda odd not having my day planned out already, though that does mean time to do work...
interjected of course by catching up on the rest of my shows (Gossip Girl on the CW is now officially on my weekly to-watch list) and magazines that i've neglected...

shows i'm still considering: Brothers&Sisters, Pushing Daisies...

wishin' on a star,
John.

i just finished the last of my 3 boxes of dunkin' donuts a while ago, and that sorta puts a nice, sugar-fixing cap on the phuket experience...

looking for the sountrack to Enchanted...

gossip girl (the CW tv series),
John.

i'm still recovering from the high of the trip, making it hard to place events in their respective days...
while eating at waffletown at balmoral plaza, i couldn't help but have the urge to walk into the adjacent 7eleven to buy something, because in khaolak/phuket, everything is so cheap...
that brings to mind something i forgot to mention in yesterday's post - each trip to a convenience store meant alcohol, which meant cielo buying copious amounts on behalf of the underaged members of the group, which meant her looking very much like an alcoholic to the perturbed storekeepers...

arabian nights was ok, but just barely...
slightly too long, but more enjoyable than west side story...
lunch at wisma's food republic with gen/lucy/hanan/sean before that...

you got me in the waters so deep,
John.

i think there were 2 reasons the 11 of us went on this trip -
the first was because we truly did feel that the work we did back in May was meaningful, not in the sense that it shook heaven and earth, but that we saw what we had done and could only smile on the 16 hours of work spread over 2 days...
the second was because it would be the perfect end to a year that has brought a class together, and this would cement (and you can bet there was an abundance of this) the shared experiences...

for me, having been in singapore for slightly over half a day and having had time to reflect, phuket deaux was not simply a repeat of the May trip, because nothing that good could have been duplicated...
it was a whole new experience, but with the same satisfaction that the previous brought...
although it doesn't quite end the year for me, it did mark the beginning of the next month or so in which i won't see at least a few ppl from class everyday...

heading to the airport late last friday morning, we met at the budget terminal to board Tiger Airways flight TR154 bound for phuket...
sat with gen/chunwui, and realized that one should never bother to buy anything on the plane, 'cos a bottle of water set be back 3 SGD...
the flight there also reminded me that one's iPod is with little doubt one's best friend on trips, because of the inevitable waiting...
we had between us 3 iPod 5G videos, 2 2G nanos, 1 mini and 1 touch in total...
landing in phuket, it was pouring when we drove the hour plus to the Khaolak Orchid Resort, the second accommodation during the last trip...
because we had experienced the novelty of natural (for nature, see primitive) living at TVC the first two days last time, the resort looked very much like heaven...
this time round, it was just another hotel, though the spacious rooms and beds were definitely welcome once more...
was in room C222 with darren, sandwiched in between cielo in C221 and tedkin/martin in C223...
there were many more guests in the hotel this time, so since my room was the only one not next to another guest, it was the choice location for the late night laughter (learnt after being reminded of other guests' presence by a german knock on the door on night 3 while we were in C217...
went over to B204 to chat with daryl/chongwee (a regular occurrence for the next few days) for an hour before dinner began...
we headed out to a restaurant that looked very similar to the one we had a few meals at the previous trip, though the furniture made us question whether it really was the same...
the truck we went out in was a pimped out taxi with brake lights so psychedelic it would have made austin powers proud...
we experienced the phenomenon of lacking rice for the first time, but the food was pretty ok, as it was for the rest of the 8 days...
night 1 was spent doing very little, though i didn't get much sleep 'cos i'm pretty sensitive to new environments...

day 2 was the first of 4 work days, and we headed out in the ubiquitous pickup truck (a TVC one) to the work site, a home for children run by the Home and Life Project, a non-govt organization that seeks resources from the TVC...
the first task was basically 1 of 2 i'd perform - digging...
there was a third task of bamboo cutting but i didn't quite wanna do that...
alternating between spades, shovels and hoes, we successfully dug a trench around one house so that a brick barricade could be built and subsequently a cement yard...
and cement was the second and perhaps dominant task...
in total we probably mixed close to 40 tubs of cement, and by the end of those 4 days the process had become muscle memory - 15-20 shovels of sand, half/one bag of cement, mix, add 4-6 buckets of water, mix, throw in 10-12 shovels of gravel, mix, empty into buckets, transport to site (usually by a bucket chain), pour over bamboo flooring, spread even...
there was dechamp again, the wonderfully orangey isotonic drink mix, though we also had coolaid-like cough syrup tasting cherry concentrate on the later days...
lunch was at the site...
dinner was at the hotel...

we decided to go for the optional trip to Bamboo Island on day 2, where we were meant to help clear up a new site for a new H&L project, and we took a long-tailed boat to get there...
it wasn't raining this time round, so the boat ride was far more pleasant...
the real adventure was when we arrived at the bottom of the island...
we had to trek through about a kilometre of mud to get to the site, and that was half an hour of much screaming, cursing and general raised voices...
but it was fun i a very survivor-esque kinda way...
the work we did, however, was pretty useless...
we were told to clear the area of dead things like leaves/trees/etc, but that's kinds hard when you are basically in a freakin' forest where there isn't anything but leaves/trees/etc...
additionally, they basically set up 3/4 fires to burn these dead things, which is not only wrong in principle because we are in the age of global warming prevention, there was so much smoke it was hard to breathe/see and we could very well have been ordaining a new popoe with so much white plume...
thank goodness that lasted for only slightly over an hour, and we then trekked upwards a kilometre to the actual village for lunch...
there were tonnes of crabs, but i really didn't have the drive to eat any of it primarily because of the squalid conditions in which we were eating...
daryl actually fell sick the next day, though it could have been due to something else besides this...
on the boat trip back to the mainland, the engine broke down, and there were these 15 minutes of absurdity in which we were stranded in the middle of an island outcrop with a group playing a hand of bridge...
oh and we constantly stopped by the supermarket (same as last trip) throughout our stay in khaolak, buying groceries and such...
played table tennis with gerald for the first time (did that twice in total), something i did with gabriel/matthew during the previous trip...
night 2 was spent in one of the rooms watching star movies/playing cards...

day 3 was back at the site, mixing more cement and digging another trench, this time for a water pipe...
we headed out to another restaurant for dinner at night was the Monday Mixer, a time for all the volunteers to mingle, though there was very little of that...
back at the hotel, we headed to B217 for cards/movies, but around 1 in the morning our hosts were asleep while we were still playing, so we headed to C221 to continue...
at 330, we reckoned it was sufficiently late to turn in, but before i could wake up my sleeping legs to hop next door, cielo turned off the lights...
so the four of us (me/cielo/gerald/joash) spent the night (about 2odd hours, 'cos the wakeup call was at 6) slept in her room that night...
2 rings of the phone at 6 in the morning was enough to remind me of how i freezing, so i ducked out to catch a little more shuteye in my warmer room before day 4 began...

breakfast all 4 days at the Orchid were pretty similar, but tasty nonetheless...
a few tubs of cement later, our work stint for the trip was over...
though we were pretty reluctant in coming back at night for the floating candle ceremony, it was pretty nice to say bye to that site one final time...
and it looked really different at night, with the lights up and the bbq going...
a few hilarious performances later, the candles were floated and we were off...
oh but i must mention the first attempt at releasing one of those hot-air paraffin balloons...
to much fanfare, the first balloon was released, but as it was ascending, the paraffin started dripping to the ground in small explosions, and the balloon itself fell on the roof and began burning the decorations and popping the regular balloons that were hung up...
quite hilarious really...
night 4 was spent in my room watching tedkin reenact star wars episodes 4-6/1 after a bottle of bacardi and some truffles...

we visited nam khem the next morning, and the place looks pretty well done up...
a trip to a weaving factory later, we were off to phuket for 3 days of leisure...
the ride there was long because we couldn't locate the Patong Premier Resort, which was pretty small when we finally got there...
roomed in 208...
lunch was at the food court of Jungceylon, a plaza of shopping centres that was pretty impressive, though not on the scale of Central which i went to last year...
bought my only indulgent item at the Playboy sale 'cos i can't find the brand in singapore, and spent an hour at starbucks chatting with daryl/chongwee...
dinner was at a pizzeria...
the nights in phuket were spent in 208 (gerald/joash's room)...

day 7 was amazingly relaxing, with a late breakfast, then a trip to Patong beach...
we headed to BK at Jungceylon for lunch before shoppping for the next few hours...
went with cielo/gerald on a bargain hunt along the side streets, succesfully helping them to clear their shopping lists...
another starbucks fix and a trip to Boots (can't get this in singapore either) later, we headed to a seafood restaurant where tedkin's parents bought dinner...
this time i had the crabs, and they were delish...
stayed there for another hour watching the exhibition match between Federrer/Sampras before heading back to the hotel...
while trying to sleep, i was awakened by 2 calls, first from some frenchman, the second from cielo enquiring as to whether i had an adaptor, so by then i was pretty awake and decided to head to 209 to join the rest who were watching Annapolis...
along with that show, i watched The Jacket, Gladiator, Cheaper by the Dozen 2 and some other movies that have slipped my memory...

left the hotel early this friday morning at around 6, and 420 baht of Dunkin' Donuts and watching a few hands of bridge later, we were on flight TR 153 bound for singapore...
sat with daryl/chongwee, and the flight was slightly bumpy with bad weather causing some turbulence and a hard landing...

these 8 days really seem to have flown by too quickly, and it feels that way because of how awesome it was...
to tedkin: thanks for organizing it =)
and to the rest, its definitely something to remember...

a you-had-to-be-there moment,
John.

i guess my life will be on hold for the next 8 days, all the worries about TOK and EE will be left behind here on this rainy island while i troop off to the (hopefully) sunnier soils of thailand...
i'm both excited and apprehensive, and i don't even wanna think about where these feelings are coming from...

i'm not expecting as much as i'm hoping...

to claim the nations,
John.

gareth's place yesterday with hanan/paul/gen/lucy was a whole lot of fun, though we didn't do as much as we could have, primarily 'cos we were stuck in front of the tv playing video games for a good part of the morning...
nonetheless, having a pool table, table tennis table, basketball hoop and tennis court all in the vicinity really makes for a lot of stuff to do...
not to mention to really friendly golden retriever, Misty, that was the cutest thing in the world...

headed over to milennia walk to meet them for dinner after the dance class, and the 24-hour Xin Wang Hong Kong Cafe is definitely a place i'd go to again, preferably late in the night when its more quiet...

phuket deaux!

this christmas,
John.

met han an in thomson for the second day in a row, this time for mahjong at sarah's place...
lunch at Miss Clarity Cafe which was nicely decorated but the food wasn't that good...
went over to Icekimo, the ice-cream parlour that michelle chia/shaun chen visit, which wasn't too great either...
decided that we should head down to Island Creamery soon for a better cold fix...

Leona Lewis, the superstar from X Factor Britain, has released her album, Spirit, with the amazing singles Bleeding Love and I Will Be...
and Jordin Sparks has a duet with Chris Brown on her soon-to-be-out album... No Air is an amazing song!

gareth's place tomorrow...

time to start packing for friday...

how do i breathe with no air,
John.

met hanan/paul/gareth for lunch at the shanghai cafe, then for dessert at han's...
made wednesday plans...
then headed to school to help with training, though pizza was missed...
going for another round of mahjong tomorrow...

thinking of going for arabian nights, the acsian theatre play, on the matinee show (24th, saturday)

those unheard are better,
John.

squash today with the debaters/joan was an honouring of our commmitment to meet regularly...
headed back to sam's place for mahjong/fantastic 4 films, and decided to stay the night along with paul...

shanghai cafe tomorrow, then debate with pizza on the side...

phuket on friday!

roll with,
John.

since i knew i wouldn't have anything to do at home, i decided to head to school for the debate training that was going on and join sam/paul for lunch at holland v...
and we were promised pizza on monday =)
after the shanghai cafe of course...

the (worship) Parachute Band from NZ, who i went to see alone last year, will be back in singapore next week, though with a new band lineup and new songs from their album Roadmaps and Revelations...
i won't be in the country, which is a pity, but do check them out if you are...

squash tomorrow...

shout,
John.

the blair lecture on Crisis in Global Governance - Challenges and Solutions was the first time i've seen so many diplomatic calvacades...
a pretty fun little lecture, though we didn't stay for the reception of wine and cheese...

appointment tomorrow is cancelled, so i guess i'll pop by training which is in school, so yeah, my no-school policy isn't quite working just yet...

a week to phuket...

another day another drama,
John.

met han an at holland v this morning to cab to sean's place...
we + yj played an hour or so of mahjong, punctuated by chocolate eclaires, and had mac&cheese for lunch, which was far more pleasant than the school variety which resembles a brick so much so that, if thrown at an arm's length, could possibly cause a mild concussion...
an hour of tennis later, we resumed mahjong till the late afternoon...

going to see Tony Blair speak at the UCC tomorrow, and worship prac thereafter...

perfect lover,
John

i put on my school uniform for the last time (hopefully) this year for the dean's tea...
met elliot/justin/tedkin on the way to school, and we were all kinda late 'cos of the last minute time change which didn't really make any difference since the whole thing started late anyways...
but it was mercifully short and unexciting, save for the time when timlim when up to get his 4 certs and the whole theatre especially the teacher's block just went up in cheers, and the food was pretty tasty...
had a chance to chat with my ct/pct from this year, and i found out the latter is leaving, but i think they will be better than the team i'm left with for next year, though i hope to be proven wrong...
chatted a bit to daryl/gen and yj/jit/clarence before leaving for holland v for the real tea with yj/deon/sean at the Marmalade Pantry, fast becoming one of our fave hangouts...
it was really quiet today unlike the previous time i was there, and we were the only customers there for the larger part of the 2 hours we were around...
hand the half-pound beef burger which i shared with sean and the chocolate truffle cake, and judging from how ridiculously full we felt after the meal, the price is actually really worth it... just remember to halve the main courses with someone when you're there and you'll really get your money's worth...

tennis/mahjong tomorrow, the one stop away on saturday...

its starting to feel like the vacation months are here =)

did i really grin that widely when i saw you?
John.

Angels & Airwaves, the cobbled-together superband of 2005 returns with their sophomore album, I-Empire, which has a similar sound to We Don't Need To Whisper, though the tracks have slightly more meaning and less abstractions...

have a listen...

the last dean's list lesson (econs) was also the most useless...
that after a rather interestingly animated english session in the morning...
popped by the class guitar thingy going on in five.nine while waiting to pass jitwei something, then went off for lunch before heading back to end these 6 days of extra lessons...
finally get to sleep past noon tomorrow, something i will be doing very often so long as i'm at home over the next 6 weeks and a half weeks...

an afternoon tea,
John.

officially, my 2 fave tracks from Blackout are Piece of Me and Break the Ice...

for the first time in a long while, i'm in a strangely contented place...
though my whole level has been back to school for 2 weeks, my stint at the dean's list ends soon, and i handed in my history paper today, i really don't have anything that's due...
that dawned on me as i was taking a walk around school around 6-ish this evening while the juniors prepped, and its a pretty good feeling...
its early enough not to be totally worried about EE and TOK and those CAS forms, i have proven to myself that i've still got that academic robustness in me and 3 dean's lists certs by wednesday...
for once i actually have time to just walk around the school aimlessly, not having to think of what i'll be doing the next hour or the next day, having time to chat with whoever without rushing and then going for lunch leisurely at my haven holland v...
and that is coupled with the anticipation of phuket next friday, and looking forward can be as much fun as the trip itself and the feeling after...

history today was the most intellectual engagement i've had ever since i put my brain on hold after the exams, and it was arguably the most fun dean's list lesson of the 12 i will be attending in total, though there's econs and english tomorrow...
econs today was pretty short, and surprisingly aom took it again, so that was fun...

like heaven on earth,
John.

gave the manutd-arsenal match at clarence's invitation a miss last night 'cos i had to play for worship early this morning and i had not finished my history expose yet...
mervyn was at church today, though didn't get to talk much 'cos he was heading off to lunch...
went to holland v with sam/jake/adriel for lunch and tried Cold Rock for the first time, and its not much to scream about...
at least that's one down on my quest to eat my way through hv, at least the places i'm allowed in legally...
went back to sam's place to watch CSI/play mahjong, saw josh for the first time in weeks since his taiwan trip, then was accosted into playing mahjong with uncles hinglee/wengchoong/hockcheng at the latter's estate (i had not been there yet, and it was quite breathtaking), then dinner at ghim moh before heading back to sam's place/back home...

right - the expose needs to be written now...

2 more days of dean's list, dean's tea and i'm SO not stepping into school again after that...
oh yes and have to train juniors tomorrow by request of rc...

i'm quite pleased with how i managed not to step into school once in my 8 weeks of break last year, so i do hope to be able to do it again...

phuket, and possibly bali, to end the year...

pull out the tree, you know what time of the season it is =)

all that is needed in return,
John.

at around noon today it dawned on me that i won't have to use chinese again in an academic context...
and after 11 years studying it, its kind of a relief...
i do hope i get my 7 (86%), but even if i get a 6, i won't take it again next year...

so that's like the real end to my academic year, save for 2 more days of dean's list and the dean's tea on wednesday...

i didn't make it to surprise cheryl with her birthday gingerbread cake 'cos after the msn convo collapsed last night i had no idea what was going on, but Happy 17th cheryl, our faithful five.nine chairperson =)

went for lunch with xq/clarence/et/sean 'cos our plans to go out with the point.eleven ppl kinda imploded, so post dover market, sean/me made several detours before stopping by holland v to get drinks/mags and meet yj to go back to his new place deep in the heart of bukit timah where we booked our tickets online for Stardust at the cathay...
the show itself was funny, slightly lame at parts but enjoyable...
had a bite at Mos PS before heading to church for worship pract...

its already time to put the seasonal albums on constant reply,
John.

day 3 of dean's list began slightly earlier than normal 'cos of a call i received yesterday...
i've already related the story of one very presumptuous individual, so i won't repeat it here...
all i can say is my 5 days in december is far too valuable to blow at some residential camp that has no details whatsoever...
but i did find out that i'm the only singaporean who got 42 points overall, so i'm not sure how much competition i have from the non-singaporean perfect scoreres for those top 10 spots...

on the way to history, i stopped by the english class to let run.tan know that i won't be attending her class, and she didn't seem the least bit appreciative that i even bothered letting her know who i was and why i wasn't gonna be there, so like whatever, i'm just interested in my cert next wednesday...

went for lunch at the other CJ branch at holland v with hanan/sean, and had dessert at the Marmalade Pantry, a cute little joint that i definitely will be going back to..
we've agreed that the next place to try is Olio Dome which took over Gelare...

chinese B exam tomorrow, the last real "academic" activity for the year, and my chance to get 7 points onto my overall IB scorecard, though that's really easier said than done...
i really hope it won't be as difficult as ppl are making it out to be, and that the 86% grade barrier won't do me in...

love like this,
John.