rey's ramblings

Mid-Semester Tests are OVER

Plug-in: Rehab - Amy Winehouse

otherwise known as the mid-semestral test week, my MSTs are over! and they
were all relatively doable except for ITAB's Excel ICA which was quite a nightmare
as most of us underestimated a test on something like the Excel program.. you know,
that ancient but somehow still very relevant program that microsoft office keeps..

but the others, microecons, statistics and principles of accounting i have definitely
more confidence(: still, i should be prepared for anything! haha.

anyway, had dinner with janice and joel after itab on thursday at lido's mos burger.
just chatted, chilled out and stuffs before window shopping at isetan(:

played pool with og7 plus a few others on friday. met up at kfc with lilin, john and
his friend from ozzie. then others came like sherman and jane! we then walked
to dhoby ghaut mrt to meet nessa and her korean date, dae yeon, haha. more

walking to paradiz ensued and we finally managed to find a place to pool. rasmus
came for a while, then we all had to leave.

LL and her funky goggles! :D_____________vanessa wearing the funky transformers mask

sherman, john and ben_________________

after fiddling around, i realised this photo looked better in B&W(:

accompanied mus for a while after everyone left as he was looking around paradiz/
peace centre for portable amps. then had to train down to sp for the rockclimbing
annual general meeting (agm) which was severely delayed by like over an hour??

besides some hilariously retarded videos, we got to see the new committee for this
year too. anyway, thanks to the delay, i only got back home at 8 plus):

had to meet valerie at the cathay this morning for fantastic four: rise of the silver
surfer. we were both kinda late but anyway didn't miss much. the movie was fairly
okay, i didn't exactly have high hopes for it in the first place so at least it wasn't as
disappointing as pirates 3 or devastating as shrek 3. about roughly 3 - 3 1/2 stars?

after the movie, we walked over to ps for lunch at ljs. on the way, we passed by
the newly opened (or at least to me) toast box opposite carrefour on level one! so
after lunch, we went back and tried some pork floss toast! which was really really
mouthwateringly good.

like the simpsons, i decided to be highly spontaneous! haha, too bad val had to hold the cam):

photos of each other off-guard

train-ed to church for our chill-out day. was slightly late but nevertheless got there
before the games started! bumped into emelyn on the way, we were both late but
still decided to stop at the mama shop nearby to buy some food, haha!

anyway, chill-out was not bad. got to play some really fun games like the four-way
tug-o-war and taboo! had worship after that and our invited friends came, no less
than 5 of them: jane, LL, xinru, xinya and grace. it was quite cool cos i've never really
invited so many people to church before. anyway, we chatted with xinru, xinya and
grace for a while before they had to leave. then, jane and LL stayed back for a while
to have dinner with us at church.. laksa and curry chicken! they also chatted with

some of our other cell members.

afterwards, we headed for bugis to shop afterwards! at that time, it was just pretty
much the twins, jane, LL and me. got a pair of aviators that were quite old school.
so did the twins as well! cos we were planning to use it for ruishan's birthday party
tomorrow at sentosa! anyway, that was pretty much it about the shopping..

we all shortly left thereafter for home(: and so i'm here now.. well i gotta go sleep
got yet another long day ahead tomorrow(:

lasseiz faire
~rey

I crossed the bridge at 8:17 PM

Saturday, June 23, 2007

Re-encountered God

Plug-in: Now That You're Near - Hillsong

i'm usually not that into christian, inspirational music to be really honest.
sure i enjoy worship and singing, but it's just not my habit to regularly plug in
to such music, especially the more commercialized ones. however, after church
camp 2007, which i've just returned from, i've felt really connected with the
abovementioned song 'cause it just seems to resonate with the whole message
vibe that has been taken away from the camp.

speaking of which, church camp was unexpectedly meaningful in many aspects.

i really did not expect much from the camp and was pleasantly surprised to

be ministered to and spoken to by God himself! now, the theme for this year was

re-encountering God and our speaker was Mike connell who does seem to have the

anointing from Christ not least of the reasons being which was that his sermons were

very sharp and focused, which greatly impacted many of us. he really steered the

direction of the whole church camp.

the venue was great, berjaya times square, right smack in the middle of the city

and its shopping district. we did shop quite often in the hotel/mall itself and the

surrounding malls in the city. anyway, accommodation-wise, i roomed with darryl

and rasmus, just down the corridor from the girls room - stefanie, celeste and grace.

our room had this really great view of the city and whether it was the early hours of

the morning which we would do our quiet time (except for the last morning, we

overslept) or the dark tranquility of the night, the city lights and the view of

glowing tall buildings like the twin towers was really magical in its own way.

food was not bad. breakfasts were usually the best out of the three meals, lunches were
rather sparse and repetitive in variety and dinner was not lacking in the latter but not
all the dishes were fantastic. but anyway, it was a hotel catering for the entire church
camp people, over a 1000 i think, so in that sense it was quite good already (:

here are some of the highlights:

swimming in the morning, which i was reluctant to at first because the pool was on the
14th floor and it was usually icy cold at that time but with some persuasion from the

twins, most of us went. and actually, hard to believe but doing some laps made me

more energetic for the day!

shopping. berjaya times square was great, in fact the one we went the most often to cos
it was like just right below the hotel but despite its huge size and many shops, it was
often quite empty. bought gifts mostly from there. we did not make it to chinatown, the
haven for cheap but fake goods but we did go to sungei wang, the fashion mall. the place
reminded me a lot of far east plaza but didn't get anything because we had a suspicion
that some of the stuff was fake as well. on the second last day, we had lunch at sushi
king, which was this really cheap conveyor belt restaurant. the food was actually better
than sakae although probably not equivalent to sushi tei, but everything was a lot
cheaper! then we cabbed to suria klcc for some shopping although it was mostly window.
jia wei did buy shoes but what we mostly bought in the end were dunkin' donuts!

late night suppers. we had one on the second night nearby at this streetside hawker
place, which had some really good food plus stingray that was super cheap, delicious

and generous in portions! the last night we had supper at this chicken rice/char siew
outlet some distance away, in a more quiet area of town and the food was alright.

oh yeah, i also watched 28 weeks later with some of the sec 3s on one of the nights,
which was really quite a freaky experience (the show, not the people)

last but definitely not least, was the holy spirit night on the last night, which i really
felt that God was speaking to me, but although the experience did not completely
satisfy for me, meaning that i did not get an exact answer, there were some

important things that He spoke to me about.

our speaker, mike connell, also did some really extraordinary stuff like how he

managed to describe the situation and issues of particular people during Holy Spirit

night through his communication with God and minister to them.

spiritually speaking, the church camp was very refreshing and i felt renewed. even
though there were many ups and downs, i thank God that i managed to push through
and i did feel the time spent was fruitful(:

anyway, here are some of the photos taken:

on the way there and reached!

pool view from our room___________________rasmus the prawn killer!

bbq stingray supper~

on the way back and attack of the patrick starfishes!

home sweet home~

school's starting soon ): but the hols were great, i don't regret a bit!

~rey

I crossed the bridge at 10:58 PM

Saturday, June 16, 2007

It's never forever gone

Plug-in: Read My Mind - The Killers

it's been halfway into our two-week hols already and i'm super busy...

having fun! haha, mostly.. but i feel that profits have been maximised (harhar)
over the past week in terms of time spent and just relaxing from all the stress
of the workload.

anyway, here's a rundown of the week:

for sunday, we did rollerblading at ecp after church service. initially didn't want
to because i wasn't in the mood for falling down that day but eventually someone
motivated me to go (: bus-ed with darryl, rastus, rasmus and jia wei down to east
coast and lunched at macs. shaker fries! then we met grace, stefanie and julia at
the nearby bk. we then rented the skates and this time decided to go in the direction

of the city. as usual, i was like super slow, especially on the way there. so slow that

rastus had to push me to "accelerate" at one point, causing me to fall and scrape the

skin off my right elbow! haha, but it was nothing severe. however, once we reached

the turning point, i started to get better and faster. we paired up in groups for the

inline skating so that we could get back faster and i paired up with jiawei. we were

like the fastest and i didn't fall at all the whole way back! :D

yeah, so it was a great day 'cause i got to improve. anyway, we all left and bus-ed
to dhoby with stef, darryl and jia. stef left so we had laksa for dinner in the end!

had a CD group project meeting for the community welfare service on monday
morning at city hall. after we finished, i went down to lavender to meet up with
jia wei, the twins and cheryl(if i remember correctly?) because they all had to
renew their passports for the next week's camp. once they were done, darryl
dropped by and so the twins and i left with him for lunch at the nearby beach
road food centre for lunch before train-ing back, for me, to city hall, 'cos we wanted
to get climbing shoes from peninsular plaza because they were having a sale.
but all the good HUMAN sizes were all gone, leaving like dwarf sizes so we didn't
get anything in the end. so then we train-ed (my fourth time that day!) to farrer
park for bouldering at climbasia, which was quite okay but i was feeling a bit shitty
on that day so i didn't manage to do the difficult routes. sheila popped by for a while
and then we had to leave afterwards.. we were all planning to catch ocean's thirteen
but didn't in the end because of indecisiveness, haha!

tuesday was our marketing group project meeting back at sp. because anyway the
wireless signal there is the strongest compared to all other public places. managed
to set up the basic framework for our very gargantuan project that's like 35% of the
module marks?! train-ed after the meeting ended to orchard for lunch with eryn,
rastus and rasmus at pizza hut in lucky plaza. oh, the service there is really quite good
compared to umm.. well many other places. yep then we window-shopped for a while
before mustus had to meet someone else and so i walked towards the mrt via lido cos
eryn was meeting up with some of her classmates for a movie. saw fabriz and lester!

umm and yes, ib's also very stressed according to them. i guess there's stress across

all tertiary education. train-ed to sembawang and shuttle-d to saf yacht club to sign

up for the one-star kayaking course. the place there is nice, but the water's err.. really

dirty!

went over to the twins house after dinner and darryl was there too. met their friend
valerie and her friend sharlene who were both there to drop by for a while, apparently

without their parents knowledge :O but yeah, so after both of them left, the four of us

just hung out at their place. i'm trying to pick up playing one last breath by creed on the

acoustic guitar. haha, it's a bit tricky.

had CIP on wednesday! met huihui, ain, ruiling, jonathan, weichong and ruicheng at
choa chu kang mrt in the morning and we were already late! so we cabbed down to
the children's daycare centre, which was actually so much nearer to yew tee but never
mind. upon reaching, we met our administrator for the day, tan wei ling. basically, we
were divided into groups between cooking, teaching and housekeeping. huihui and me
took charge of teaching so most of the time we were marking the kids daily schoolwork
whilst the rest slogged it out in the kitchen and cleaning the windows, haha! oh yeah
and i had to take the kids out to the nearby playground for their 'fun session' and i had
to play 'ice and freeze' and 'blind mice' with them! but it was really hilarious like just
reliving my childhood there 'cos i could actually remember some of those games!

after lunch break, we went back and i had to help huihui to count flyers. kinda monotonous
but it was still better than cleaning the toilets! then the kids nap was over and we all
joined them for tea break. after they recited their buddhist prayers, i accidentally said
grace and halfway i realised everyone was looking at me with their eyes wide open!
hahahah it was super embarassing for me!

soon after, we had our debriefing and then took photos with the kids. it was actually
quite a great experience because although the kids were super annoying at first, they
turned out to be a really fun bunch to be around. and they made us farewell cards,
really nice!

rushed back home for a quick bath before heading down to fish&co at the glass house
for dinner with cherie, su and nick! the food was good as usual, i had the swordfish
collar which was nice but super deep-fried! the live band added to the great ambience
of the place plus it started to rain outside for a while (and seeing rain from inside in the
night with all the lights is really spectacular). took some photos before some window
shopping at plaza sing before we all headed back! it was a great time catching up and
all, plus movie marathons once we are all free eh?

thursday was the start of my 2 day one-star kayaking course at saf yacht club! was
slightly late on the first day morning but managed to cab there eventually. the course
was great overall, a bit boring at times but mostly fun and informative(?). we were
taught the basics of kayaking and often had to wade about highly polluted waters
~~which were smelly and shit-infested~~. i was quite worried for the elbow wound
i had from sunday because it started leaking a lot of pus and i thought it would get
infected from all the crap that was floating about but thank God, despite stinging a bit,
it turned out alright and was eventually healed(:

by the second day, friday, we covered all our basic strokes including some rather cool

maneuvers and also learnt the capsizing rescue drill. then we had a mini expedition

of sorts but it was pretty hopeless because we were going against the really strong

current, so whenever we stopped to rescue someone who capsized, we would be swept

back to where we started, despite how hard we paddled earlier. one of the guys, chong,

made comments like "deja vu, deja vu!" because the coastline on our left was always

the same, haha.

after hosing down our kayaks and bathing, rastus, rasmus and me left for clarke quay

to meet darryl. we then walked to the area outside hooters to meet teresa, ruishan, grace

and adele. after some hesitation, we finally settled with hooters. although the service

was kind of abyssmal because the skatergirls were mostly attending to the caucasian

middle-aged men crowd plus we had quite a grumpy waitress ~~maybe her pay's not good?~~ However, the food was not bad, the chicken drumlets were rather good!

when dinner was over, we walked around clarke quay before heading over to robertson
quay for chocolate factory! which imo, has some of the best hot chocolate locally. then

the girls left for adele's house and so we went back! had a really great time and some

unforgettable hilarious moments, including ruishan's british accent and watching the hooter

girls doing their hula dance. good times(:

photos from teresa's camera (clarke quay looks awesome in the night!):