House of Joy, Woes

senseless killings: the aftermath

2008-11-30T01:57:00.000-08:00

this week, we witnessed yet another round of senseless killings. area of massacre: mumbai. it is the financial hub of india as most of us know. the way the terrorists operated-by targeting the 2 5-star hotels, railway station and the marketplace, i think... sounds like a combination of the attacks on bali and london. this time the death toll numbered 195 with 26 of them being foreigners from about 10 countries.

my heart goes out to the families of the deceased. to me and to all of us, these people are innocent. most of them, besides the citizens, were there for either work or play. they certainly do not deserve to sacrifice in this manner.

each time when this kind of thing happens, the media will report on the deceased. how people view them, how they affect the people around them. inevitably i will be thinking of how i want people- my family and friends to remember me if i were to just leave one day. would i want to be remembered as an angel or a devil? one who brings more laughter to people or sorrow?

therefore for the past few years, i've been working hard to put what values i've accumulated into use. to try to be a better person...

Euthanasia... should it be legalised?

2008-10-25T19:06:00.000-07:00

Recently there's been alot of hoo ha over this controversial issue, euthanasia. some wants it to be legalised so that they do not have to suffer in pain during their final days. Others hope that it CAN be legalised so that they do not have to see their loved ones live in agony. However, is it morally right to end a human's live?

Today, this topic of euthanasia popped up in my local newspaper yet again. Here's an extract of what a doctor said. "To me, ending someone's life is the worst harm that can ever be done to another person, what more to a vulnerable population such as the sick, elderly and dying. It is unthinkable that the profession that takes pride in healing, curing and comforting life be also the one that takes it away. It reminds me of the proverbial wolf in sheep-skin, except that the sheep-skin is now that of a white coat." I find this meaningful.

I personally do not advocate euthanasia. because i believe that every live is precious, no matter how small or how fragile it may be. But, it is also most important to note that most of the time the act of filial piety really surface when a child is confronted with the fact that his/her parents are suffering in pain and how best should he/she help them. I believe that if a patient can no longer take the pain further and has discussed with the child as well as fulfilled their last wishes, he/she should be allowed to go in peace.

From an economic point of view, both the society as well as the patient, it may not be such a bad thing to legalise euthanasia too, though every request should be judged on a case by case basis. As Singapore faces an ageing population, can its young and working population really sustain the needs of the working population so that our quality of life can be sustained? Or do we have to be taxed more, even in the current economic situation, so that we can help to pay the hospital bills? From a patient's perspective, if his/her family is only earning enough to get by each month and has exhausted the funds in their medisave accounts, should they be given the go-ahead to end their lives so as not to add to the financial burden of the family?

I believe this is something that should be given serious discussion.

horoscope reading- i believe, do you?

2008-08-22T18:59:00.000-07:00

late last year when Mypaper came out, i looked forward to it as it was another source of reading material for me on my way to sch. among them i would read the entertainment news as well as home and world news. however, the segment which caught my attention most and subsequently became my favourite read was to be the horoscope page.

like many, i did not believe in horoscope reading at first. at least not until i read those "predictions" from Mypaper. like there was 1 occasion where it said i would be facing lack of cooperation from grp members at work and it was true. On another occasion, it predicted that later in the week i would be facing difficulty in managing my finances and again it came true.

just early in the week, on monday, the horoscope reading said that i would be struck down by some sort of viral infection and... you guessed it- i fell sick the next day! then on wednesday after i had finished my exams and left sch, i realised that i had misplaced my admission card and was worrying about how to get a replacement in time for the next paper... the next day, thursday, this free newspaper mentioned this phrase "look around you, and you will realise that you are a blessed person". Upon reading this, i was kind of looking forward to it as by now it would be hard for me not to believe in it after so many things came true. as i folded the newspaper and left it on my coffee table, i went to switch on my handphone(i have a habit of switching off my handphone at night). i saw a missed call from sch. when i returned the call, i was relieved to hear from the admin clerk that someone had found my admission card. and the realisation that the horoscope reading came true again within moments after hanging up the phone left me speechless. i just couldn't ignore the predictions. at least, it worked for me.

my thoughts on the olympics

2008-08-13T18:35:00.000-07:00

what a wonderful olympics it has been so far... from the spectacular opening ceremony at the grand Bird Nest stadium to the various achievements by the different countries.

for the locals, the best performer has to be 18yr old swimmer tao li, whose fifth place finishing at the 100m butterfly finals allowed her to be the first singaporean to make it to the finals of the olympics. it is not an easy feat to achieve, considering the earlier 2 rounds she had to go through in order to qualify for the finals. in the process, she also set a new asian record of 57.54s, if i'm not wrong. haha...

however, the most inspiring figure to me so far has to be michael phelps of usa. with 11 gold medals so far from athens and in beijing, he is the most decorated olympiad of all time. and that's not all, for he has the opportunity to take it further with 3 more events to go and possibly more olympics to take part in (for goodness sake, he's only 23 yrs old!). yesterday as i watched the american team in the 4x200m freestyle relay, i couldn't help but be amazed by their ability and determination to be the best ever swim team. michael phelps led the team from start, opening the lead to 2 body lengths before handing over to fellow freestyle specialist ryan locht to open up further. such was the confidence in the team that olympic rookie ricky berens was drafted in to be the 3rd swimmer in the relay! the anchor of the team, pieter vanderkaay is also one whom i admire greatly, for he was the one who helped the team to shave almost 5s off the previous world record when with about 25m remaining, the intensity at which he kicked and pushed himself was evident for all to see. even the commentator was gushing "he wants the sub 7 record badly!" hahaha... therefore i think this is truly the most inspiring olympics event i've seen thus far. go! go! michael phelps... i really hope he can achieve his personal dream of getting 8 gold medals to banish the ghost from the athens games. jiayou! :)

procreation in sg

2008-08-13T18:21:00.000-07:00

recently there have been debates by people from all walks of life on the issue of procreation in singapore. the local birth rate stands at only 1.29, which is quite a distance away from the required 2.1 to sustain our population. this morning (14 aug) as i read through the straits times, i came across 2 pages of articles on the estimated costs of raising a child in various countries like taiwan, korea, UK and singapore. surprisingly, when the costs are totalled up, singapore is considered the 2nd least expensive country to raise a child, with the cheapest country being taiwan. but if we were to look at the breakdown costs, singapore's IVF treatment fees can be quite expensive with minimum fees payable at $7500. however, the good thing that i saw were how low our education fees are when compared to other countries (singaporeans always complain abt the enormous fees).

hence, i am really looking forward to sunday night's national day rally in which our ministers will announce some of the plans they have come up with to counter this issue of low birth rate. for myself, i believe further subsidies towards hospital treatment should be made available in addition to childcare subsidies, more flexible working hours and paternity leave of at least 3 weeks per child.

a day to remember, a night to forget

2008-08-01T09:20:00.000-07:00

today, at the prize presentation of the rts competition, together with my classmates and many others, we got to witness at first hand the eloquence and intelligence of our foreign minister as he dealt with ease all the questions fielded by the students.

after the event we got to take pictures with minister yeo as well as the retail lecturers, director of sb and principal! i thoroughly enjoyed myself today :)

when the event ended, we went to have dinner at kenny rogers marina sq. along the way, i was made fun at again and again... leaving me and my co-victim redfaced all the time. they even went to the extent of arranging for us to sit opposite each other. ridiculous man!

as we were waiting for the waitress to return us the change, someone suggested finding a place to chit chat. to my horror, that turned out to be my nightmare as i was hit the hardest when they decided to play truth or dare. i had to hold the hand of my co-victim and tell her that i like her. at that pt in time, though redfaced AGAIN, my co-victim gamely played along to the wishes of my classmates. i must say not many gals can be as sporting as her. anyway, for now... i think i must find a solution to stop them from harassing both myself and my co-victim. its getting really annoying if this things are being mentioned everyday:( sigh!

why i like to celebrate my birthday

2008-07-31T17:44:00.000-07:00

recently, this subject of birthday celebration suddenly came into my mind. and i have decided to share with all what i have gathered...

birth-day does not just simply refer to the day when u were born. more significantly, it marks the end of the 9-month "suffering" of all mothers as the longawaited day to see the new addition to the family finally arrived!

so when we remember to celebrate our birthday, we are actually paying tribute to our mother- remembering their hardship when they were carrying us in their womb. not only that, some mothers would have told their children that when we we in their womb, we would kick here and there, giving great discomfort to them.

therefore, now that we are older and wiser, we should not simply dismiss birthday celebrations as something we do only when we were young. it is definitely not as simple as whether u get presents from your parents and friends only. hence, i strongly believe in the celebration of birthdays :)

hurray! the end of sem 1 projects

2008-07-31T17:36:00.000-07:00

gulp! more than 2mths never post new entry... gosh! must have been too busy with all the sch projects, with the most stressful one coming from the retail trends and strategies module. anyway today finally mark the end of that project as bg yeo will hand out prizes to all participating teams. to a certain extent, my team is glad to have come in 2nd (yeah!) because, last fri after the top 3 teams were announced, the winning team had to churn out an improved ppt within 4-5days in order to get ready for today's event. i can imagine the tiredness within the winning group as they had to stay back in sch until at least 9pm on most nights so that while they are doing, their teacher mentor could give them additional pointers. therefore, to celebrate the end of this gruelling period, the top 3 teams will be having a celebration after the event. hahaha...

a game to forget

2008-05-17T18:34:00.000-07:00

coming back after a 1yr hiatus from competitive bowling, yesterday i had a game to forget. i was taking part in my club's drawn pairs game which had a game format of 3 bowls pairs, 15ends. it started on an edgy note for us and we soon started trailing by 7-4 shots in the 5end. but we manage to fight back and even lead all the way until the 11th end where our score read 11-8. from there onwards, it was downhill all the way as i started losing concentration... giving away 1 shot in the next 2ends followed by 5 shots in the penultimate end. however, we did manage to get a little consolation for ourselves by taking 1shot in the final end. This was by no means any consolation as my partner and i could have easily won the game against the so call top seeds in this competition( my opponents were highly experienced meadal winning ex-national players) if we had manage to keep ourselves composed and maintain our momentum. haiz... what a game :(
hopefully, my next game this afternoon will have a happier ending:)

End of ITP

2008-04-14T05:00:00.000-07:00

Last thursday marked the end of my 9week work attachment at marks and spencer. when it first began, i couldn't wait for it to end... but as it neared the end, i had this feeling of sadness. this is because over the course of my attachment, i have grown very close to my colleagues. besides teaching me the necessary skills needed to work adequately in the retail industry, i also learnt the importance of working in a happy environment.

in addition, i also enjoyed the company of my extremely friendly and humorous colleagues. they never fail to brighten up my day! i hope i can have equal luck in my future jobs in terms of working in a happy environment.

17 more days to go

2008-03-24T09:40:00.000-07:00

time passes really fast... yet not so fast... hahaha... don't get what i mean? alright, let me explain. it passes fast when u think that juz slightly more than a month ago, I was staring at 9 weeks of attachment at a retail outlet. Then, on my first few days, i quickly adapted to the working environment. many thanks to m,y friendly colleagues without who it would have been much harder for me to do so. They really made me feel very welcome at vivo. also, they were very willing to teach me new stuff, not to mention very patiently too!

On the other hand, time doesn't seem to pass that fast when you are on the shop floor everyday. the minutes juz seem to move at a much slower pace. I tend to become very impatient for the day to end. this is especially so when there are not many customers... staff can be tidying the shop floor every now and then and can even afford some time to share some anecdotes!

that much being said, i guess the next 2 weeks plus would be rather difficult to pass. this is because my attachment is coming to an end soon. And the words told to me by my store manager on my second day there seems to be coming true, "... laugh so much, i'm afraid you can't bear to leave us when the time comes..." close friends who know me will know that i can be very sentimental when it comes to friendship. therefore this is no exception. i have to admit that i have grown very close to some of my colleagues there. Much as i wish for sch to reopen and quickly complete my poly education, i will definitely miss the joyful times we had working and teasing one another. i will cherish these experiences that i had gathered in the short space of 2mths. thank alot :)

ytss gathering

2008-02-25T08:37:00.000-08:00

last sat i attended a gathering for my sec 1 classmates. i was definitely happy to see so many of them again 10yrs after i separated from them due to shifting of apartment and subsequently, changing of secondary schools. the ladies have become prettier while the guys have become more handsome as well. most of them are university undergraduates while a handful of them have already started working...

however, one thing that hasn't change is their great sense of humour and their fondness for teasing one another. as the gathering was held at another friend's home whom i recognized as my primary school schoolmate, i had the chance to meet him and chit chatted about each other's life since sec 1. besides that, i also enquired about aanother one of our close fren whom he has also seldom contacted in the last couple of years.

on the whole i feel that this gathering has been a long awaited one. but, to give due credit to the ladies, thanks for planning the whole thing... i just hope i do not have to wait another 10yrs for the next one to come around :p

looking forward to the pictures also!

My ITP

2008-02-25T08:24:00.000-08:00

its been slightly more than 2 weeks since i started my attachment. I'm posted at marks and spencer as a sales associate. luckily for me, the people there are very nice to me. so that gave me a good start as it is always important to be aable to work in a comfortable and welcoming environment.

throughout this past 2weeks, i have been helping out mainly in the fitting room where i am supposed to help customers hang up the clothes and arrange it back onto the selling floor if it is not being sold. I also did stock replenishment, stock checking and stock transfers.

my most memories come from working in the fitting room. it is there where u get to see all sorts of customers. There's the good and kind ones ones to the bad and lazy ones. The good ones are those who bring the clothes out to u already neatly clipped beck onto the hangers and thank u for it. pls do not get me wrong as i do not mean that those who do not clipped the tried clothing back onto the hangers are bad customers. I do not mind doing that for them as it is my duty to do so. Most of them will thank me for helping them to do so. this gives me a sense of satisfaction. But there are some very inconsiderate ones who just chucked the clothes on the benches or on the floor in the fitting room after trying on. these customers expect the staff to help them "clean up after they are done with their business". i personally dislike this sort of customers as it shows a great disrespect to us- the staff. on the whole this type of customers are relatively few so it would be unfair of me to single them out so much. i just hope they can be kept to a minimum to as not to spoil my experience of the retail industry. haiz...

last day of lunar 2007

2008-02-05T18:18:00.000-08:00

its been almost a week since i completed my exams. during this few days, i helped out in spring cleaning my home and enjoying myself watching my fav hk drama serials. its only during the cleaning that i realised how tough it is. so i would like to salute the foreign maids/ helpers and all mothers for taking such good care of our homes.

next, i would like to share my feelings on the article featured on yesterday's The Newpaper. it was about foreigners complaining and criticizing singaporeans standard of english. the furore arose from the one of the episode of a popular taiwanese variety show, Mr Con and Miss Csi. after reading the article, i must say that i partially agreed with what the invited guests said. They had mentioned that singaporeans standard of english sometimes could not be as easily comprehended. for example, simple phrases like "turn off the lights" when spoken in typical singlish form would be "off the lights". i believe this is not too much of a problem if it is spoken in casual style and among singaporeans as this is our lingo. it gives us a kind of culture identity. however, we must also know when to speak proper english too. such as during employment interviews and when interacting with with clients or foreigners. therefore my belief is that the guests who went on the show did not really mean to ridicule singaporeans for their standard of english. they were merely pointing out a fact. however, much care could have been taken to ensure that the show was conducted in a tactful manner. this is because it wasn't juz about singaporeans that they were referring to. other countries were mentioned too!

with so much being said, i hope this new year will bring us more happiness and less disasters. a very happy lunar new year to all. gong xi fa cai :)

exams

2008-01-23T04:21:00.000-08:00

looking forward, its only about 15days to the chinese lunar new year but i just caan't feel the festive mood! it think its probably due to my ongoing exams. as of today, i have just completed my second of five papers. this time round i'm having 5 papers in 10days. it started yesterday with financial marketing. that module was one of my most confident papers especially the calculation parts. hahaha... but its the exact opposite when it comes to the theory questions. and oh boy... yesterday my worst nightmare came true, cos the whole of question 1 was on theory. not only that, throughout the rest of the paper there were more theory questions awaiting. and i can swear that this 20+marks will definitely cost me my A grade. now i don't even know how much i can score. hopefully a B+... today i had business law. this is another of my confident papers. i think i owe my interest in this module partially to my charismatic lecturer, mr dennis sim. he really made the business law lectures interesting and liven up the entire atmosphere with his style of lecturing. for this paper i'm also aiming for an A, though i did not have enough time to complete my last few sentences before time's up. thankfully, my next 3 papers will only take place next week. those 3 papers(supply chain, human resource and e-commerce) are my weaker ones. wish me luck :)

my bro's enlistment

2008-01-13T17:22:00.000-08:00

today is my bro's big day... hahaha... but its not the kind that u are thinking of. he's enlisting into the army. as i'm penning this entry, he's probably on the ferry on his way to pulau tekong. today marks the start of his 2yrs of agony(for guys who have been thru ns, you know what i mean) ...

however, i think my bro's life inside the army will be much easier than mine simply because he's a pes e soldier. This is due to his health problems. He has constant knee pains and, on a couple of occasions, experienced heart burns. This said, i will still not exchange the experiences that i have for my bro's if give n a choice to start everything anew. though my life in the army has not been a smooth sailing one due to my hot- headedness, nevertheless, i learnt and saw many things. this includes the chance to see the millions of bright and shining stars while lying down on your groundsheet on the soil in tekong, learning to drive an army jeep and learning to handle and fire a weapon. this are some of the things i believe my bro will not get a chance to learn.

as of now, i'm not sure whether i did the right thing in not accompanying my bro to his enlistment this morning... this is because i am currently on a 1week study break and have a test tmr... i have been asking myself this qns for the last few days. even though my bro is not the sort of person to voice out his feelings, i somehow felt that he would have been happier and more reassured had i accompany him in. then again, my main reason in not doing so is my achillies heel; poor time management. if i had started studying earlier, it would have freed up more of my time for today and i would not have any excuse not to send him off. haiz...

anyway, next week will be the start of my 10day exam marathon in which i am am sitting for 5papers. soon after that will be CNY and its the 2nd mth of 2008. time really flies... my hope and resolution for this year will be the same as before- to learn to manage my time better:)
wish me luck!

2008

2008-01-05T18:46:00.000-08:00

yoohoo~ hahaha... my first post for this new year...
since my last post nearly 2 weeks ago, there has been quite a few unexpected happenings taking place either in the world or locally. for example the sudden deaths of Ms bhutto of pakistan and Mr jimmy nah here. according to what i gathered from newspapers, it seems that these 2 are "good people". something i do not know how to explain. hmm... once again, it has made me reflect on how unfair life can be, with my burning question being "why do "good people" always die early?" for 1 thing i do know is that, my catholic or christian friends have always used this phrase "god has greater things planned for them...", which hopefully is true. because sometimes it just irks me why "hao xin mei hao bao"(loosely translated as good does not beget good). not that i have second thoughts of "not doing good things" anymore. just that this question always pops up when i read in the news that another innocent human life has been taken away...

therefore, i would like to silently pray(even though i'm a free thinker) that less innocent lives will be lost this year to unfortunate events taking place. because i believe in karma :)

x'mas post

2007-12-27T07:24:00.000-08:00

first of all, a very belated merry x'mas to all...

this is the 1st time in 5yrs that i'm feeling so lonely over the x'mas holiday period. the previous years were all spent at chalets with my mates from lawn bowls. i missed those times... oh man. however, this time round, i manage to squeeze in a few outings with a few groups of friends- my lawn bowl friends, sec friends and today, celebrating the belated birthday for a poly ex-classmate.

yesterday, it was all chit chat and movie as i met up with my bowls friends at vivo city. after watching I am Legend by will smith, we juz loitered around the shopping mall helping one of them to look for a suitable gift for his crush. hahaha... since it was all-guy outing, we couldn't harvest any feminine ideas. in the end, he got a solar powered table ornament from action city. we have since termed this outing as our sausage party!

then there was this afternoon, we met up at marina square k box to help an ex-classmate celebrate her belated 18th birthday. bought her her favourite korean boyband, dong bang shin ki(pardon me if i get the spelling wrong...). cost us a whopping $91. ouch! hahaha... but i would say its worth it, cos truthfully speaking, she's a great friend to have. i dunno how to describe what i really mean by great. cos its juz a cumulative thing that builds up over a period of time. the camaraderie we shared and things like that... after that some of them, including the birthday gal went home for dinner while the rest of us started our shopping spree. due to the x'mas sale, many boutiques were offering discounts on their products ranging from 20% to 60%! i ended up buying 2 tops from g2000 and 1 from zara. i could have gotten another 2 from giordano too, but it did not have my desired size. haiz... but the one top, a polo tee, that i really wanted to lay my hands on was the one from bods bodynits. it was a dark green top with pink collars and orange sewing on it. it was retailing at $66. thinking that it was on 50% sale, i went to try it on and like it very much. but to my horror, i was told that the polo tee was only given 20%. this means after discount, it would still cost $53. because i had already spent $60 on the 3 tops, i had to reluctantly give up the opportunity to buy this. my heart is still aching aching as i'm penning this entry. because the particular shelve where this polo tee as well as more than 10 other products were displayed on did not have the sign that showed 20% discount! therefore, i feel that i was somehow cheated... cos if i had known it was not on 50%, i would not have bothered to try it on at all! what a pity... hence, a reminder to my friends out there, pls look carefully at the price and when there is any discount, pls confirmed before u try it on. or else you will end up like me- heartache at not being able to purchase what u like!

alright... thats all for now. i hereby would like to wish everyone an advance happy new year. may luck go your way in the year of the rat.

medal hopefuls?

2007-12-05T18:48:00.001-08:00

as i'm penning this entry, i have juz arrived in sch having sent my two buddies off at the airport this morning. they are representing the republic in sea games for the sport of lawn bowls. i feel so proud of them. however, i'm also somehow disturbed that a couple of them should not even be going given their level of performance. anyway, since they have been chosen, they shall now show the rest of us whether they merit it. jiayou team singapore!

my reflection on doing a street survey

2007-11-23T03:12:00.000-08:00

this afternoon i was out on the streets with a few of my project group members doing a street survey. The topic on re-employment after the statutory retirement age at 62. Initially we thought it was a simple job as we were assigned to clementi and commonwealth- both of which are hdb heartland areas.

However, i wasn't soon proven wrong as my buddy and i were rejected as soon as we told our potential respondents that we were doing a survey. During the 1 hour that we were there, we only managed to complete 5 survey forms- 3 muslim & 2 chinese respondents. I have to thank my fellow muslim singaporeans for helping me a great deal in this project. All 3 respondents were the only muslims that we approached; no muslims rejected our request to conduct the survey. Thank you so much to them. On the other hand, many chinese rejected us as we tried to explain the purpose of the survey. One of them, an elderly newspaper vendor even had the cheek to ask whether they would be paid for doing the survey!

Having said these, i am embarrass to say that i would probably belong to one of those declining to do the survey. This is probably due to our culture of being too conservative. We tend to be overly suspicious when someone approaches us to do surveys- afraid that our personal information would be leaked out or just purely do not like to be harrassed by people.

summary of my hongkong trip

2007-11-21T02:50:00.000-08:00

its been such a long long time since i feed u, my dear blog. haha... ok thats pretty lame. alright during the first week of september, i was with some of my school mates in hongkong for a study tour to further understand the retail industry. it was not exactly an eye opener. but i must admit i did at least learn some stuff over there. like now i know who to approach if i wan to retail in clothes and if i wan to carry out business dealings with businessmen from mainland china.

The trip also brought us to macau and shenzhen. this time in hongkong, based on advice given by The Newpaper, my friends and i managed to buy some nice middle range clothings at affordable prices. its mirama shopping centre,located along park lane, nathan road. On the higher floor(i think it was level 3 or 4) there's this shop that sells clothes almost similar to topman but at a cheaper rate. The range of merchandise available is also greater than what's offered at topman.

In macau, besides visiting the gambling school where they train aspiring croupiers to work in the many casinos there. we also visited The Venetian and Wynn casinos. The venetian left me totally speechless with its design and architecture. The ceiling resembled a cool blue sky, which provides the right ambience for customers to shop without worrying about the time factor.

Lastly, in Shenzhen, we did alot of shopping- both at Luohu shopping mall which specialises in counterfeit goods and also in the local shopping malls and street shpping. It was a thoroughly enjoyable trip!

exam panic

2007-08-12T23:48:00.000-07:00

sianzzz... once again its time to start mugging for exams again. after the hula of our 42nd national day celebrations, where i watched the fireworks with my friends at the scc, now its time to hit the books!

starting from this fri to next fri, i'll be having a total of 3 papers, all having a 50% weightage. Therefore everyone of my classmates are not relaxing also. cos we simply can't afford to fail any of our modules and risk forwarding it to the next sem where our workload will be heavier. . . but comparing with my other friends, i'm considered quite fortunate. cos my schedule is not as pack as theirs, meaning i have more rest time in between each paper. also, my friends have 5 papers instead of juz 3... so this means all the more i have to do well...

depressed

2007-07-21T18:11:00.000-07:00

As i'm penning this entry, i'm feeling very depressed, very down. Juz had a tiff with my dad. He does not seem to support me in whatever i do. I know the family should come first. but... haiz.

Anyway the issue this time was over a proposed study trip to hongkong with my sch. It will cost ard $1200 for a week long study trip covering hk, macau and shen zhen. I never asked my dad for the money at all. I had all along intended to borrowed it from my mum and pay her a year later when i graduate. This, together with the main purpose of the trip (study tour) has never convinced my dad at all. He is adamant that I will be going there to play instead of study. On my part, I do admit there will definitely be some element of enjoyment. However, it is not entirely fun and games. Our itinery will also comprise of factory visits, Sch visits as well as learning the culture of conducting businesses in shopping malls. Because of this, he has always accused me of putting my personal enjoyment above the needs of the family. I am deeply upset by this.

This is not the first time he is not supportive of what i do. I can still remember when i came in first in class in primary 4 and third in class in secondary 2, he has never congratulated or praised me. In addition, I have been in the sport of lawn bowls for more than 5 years. All this while, i have never received any form of assurance or support from him. Not even when i bring home medals once in a while. On the other hand, he is more concerned with "why so many trainings?" and "today cannot skip training?". When i come home after a tournament, if he do ask, the question is more likely to be "lost already ah?" rather than "how did you do?" or "did you win?". Sometimes it just makes me wonder how come other people can have such supportive parents while i only have my mum on my side. My siblings are not on my side as well.

I am slowly perservering... waiting for the day when i can truly convinced my dad and not least of all, my brother, who will finally understand the effort that i put in to achieve what i want. Hopefully, this day will come soon.

reunion... well... sort of lah

2007-07-15T08:43:00.000-07:00

today i met up with and went out with my group of secondary sch mates again... its been quite long since i went outing with them. and today was the second time in juz over a week that i'm meeting up with them. first was last sat when we sent another friend off from the airport. he was going to further his studies in australia... as for today, it was a fun-filled day at sentosa.

i must say that today has to be the most enjoyable day i had in the last 3- 4 mths... because i simply did not have to care about my sch work or projects... just plain fun and games. the only sad thing was that i did not manage to get as much tan as i would have like to (the sun was not strong enough). Even though i did not know almost half of the people there as they were those who were in the same poly or same course as my sec sch mates, we still manage to get along quite well with the few words exchanged among us.

after sentosa, we returned to harbourfront, vivocity and had long john silver for dinner at ard 8.15pm, followed by abit of indulgence and self- pampering from ben and jerry's... with so much to enjoy, I'm certainly looking forward to more of these outings:)

retail carnival @ SP

2007-07-11T03:22:00.000-07:00

as mentioned in the title above, this posting is a short summary abt the retail carnival at my tertiary education SP. It is being held from yesterday 11th july to tmr 13th july at the SP sch of business...

we started our preparation as early as last week where we spent alot of time sprucing up the display of our retail place where we learnt the practicals of retail management. with a small group of manpower, we had to dig deep and squeeze every ounce of our creative juice in order to make our display stand out. Luckily, i have a bunch of very helpful classmates who volunteered their time and effort without which some of the tasks would not be manageable.

Then on monday, we had to mobilise the whole class to help out in first, carrying cartons of sponsored items from the store to the classroom and secondly, packing them into individual goodie bags. After that we had to transfer the packed bags into another 2 storage rooms. when we finally finished packing, we were treated to delightful belgian chocolates from guylian.

Yesterday, on the first day of the carnival, we had a fashion show performed by some of our friends, modelling clothes from bugis street, who is also the organizer of this retail carnival.
We also saw some band performances as well as beat-boxing from our own SP students... Though it added much fun and liveliness to the whole event, I would prefer not to have it as my personality is more introvert and have less preference for this genre of music.

Today, the second day of the carnival, we had a retail seminar with teh ceo of bugis street development giving a short introductory talk on the retail outlook in singapore. After that, each participant was given a goodie bag to thank them for their attendence. As expected, alot of people threw away the big and bulky bags sponsored by bugis street development as they had another smaller aussino bag inside the larger one.

Lastly, i'm so looking forward to tmr which is the last day of the event. Firstly, i do not need to help out my lecturer anymore, who treats me and the rest of my classmates like slaves. Next, i can finally devote my free time to do my projects instead of guarding the stalls which is seldom patronised by people, which sums up to waste of time! finally, i hope this whole carnival can end on a high note, so that my classmates and my effort will not go down the drain. It is this sense of satisfaction that i am looking forward to... that continues to motivate me to do well...

down memory lane...

2007-06-15T19:00:00.000-07:00

its been quite some time since i last penned my last blog...

last night i juz came home from my first ict(in-camp training), which was a low key one. lasted for a week... it was kind of back to my army days where i had to become so unhygienic again(having to wear a uniform for 4days... march/walk in steps... reply everything with a yes sgt/sir... getting bitten by the numerous mosquitoes while out in the field... endure the yucky food from the cookhouse... bath very fast... and also very little sleep etc) Got back my driver's feeling within the first day when we went out for orientation drive. before that i was quite apprehensive about having to handle a vehicle again as i had not drive for more than 15mths...

Before this ict, i also enjoyed 3 weeks of useful coaching by australian lawn bowls coaches peter bowden and brian jeffson. both of them were very dedicated in their imparting of skills and knowledge to us, especially brian. i particularly find his methods more interesting than peter's like the 'phantom'. i hope that he will be coming back again in the near future again to teach us many more new things which i don't think we will be able to learn locally.

april and may happenings...

2007-05-04T20:43:00.000-07:00

haiz same old problem yet again.... always frustrated at the amount of time taken to sign in to my blogger account. finally.... now i can feed my blog again. within these last few weeks, so many things happened. firstly, my sch semester started and i got to see my new friends. boy was i stunned to learn that there were only 5 guys, including me in my class of 23 people. With due respect to my ex-classmates, I also found out that my new class were as hardworking... if not better. hahaha... the stress of having to keep up with these smarties is coming back! I also noticed that my classmates weren't really interacting well with the rest... probably because of the different classes we came from. much as i know time is needed to bond together, I am anxious for it to take place sooner rather than later cos of the upcoming projects and also because these classmates are going to stay with me till the day i graduate from sp.
hmmm.... abit of updates on the bowling front. yup, now me and wanhin have scrapped thru to the q-finals of the national pairs tournament, no thanks to my crappy performance! joining us in the q-finals is the pairing of melvin and benito. hahaha.... as i'm penning this blog, melvin should have juz touched down at hongkong airport. He's there for the annual world junior bowls singles championship. what a pity that my sch sem has juz began... and i can't join my friends on their hk holiday trip. they will be popping by hongkong football club to lend their support to melvin(hopefully they can see zita and help me get a nice photo from her:)
hahaha... all said, i hope that melvin can do us proud by doing well in this competition and triump over the likes of malaysia and of hongkong in their own backyard!
jiayou!!!

what happened during the last 1.5 mths...

2007-03-20T21:13:00.000-07:00

its been really long since i last updated my blog.... mainly due to problems signing in and also the long time it takes for my computer to load the pages...

during this one and a half mths, so many things occurred... first being the ending of my yr 1 exams... followed by a class gathering at aranda country club the 1day after our last paper. hahaha... subsequently, i went on a lawn bowling trip with the team to hongkong for the hongkong int'l mixed fours and the tiger bowls. it was an enriching experience for me as i witnessed both good and thrash players performing(i know its abit mean of me to say the latter...) and juz last weekend, there was the national triples competition. what started out as a good omen for the teams from SCC(3 teams made it to the q-finals) was spoilt by, i dare say, lack of professionalism and sportmanship from the umpire as well as one of the player from the opposing team. this led to arguments and also upset the players to the extent that their concentration on the game were being affected that they eventually lost the gamein a free falling manner after initially leading and tying the game on points even with the game at almost 3/4 completed! so it was more than upset for us on the whole as only my team(with wanhin and melvin) made it to the s-finals.

as i am penning this blog, again, many issues are rushing thru my mind... with the issue of management from the committee and also integrity among the youths. as of now, i have clearly witnessed the way my fellow youths were being discriminated for no apparent reason, i have resigned myself to following them if they intent to quit the team. i am confident that with discipline and continual interest in the game of bowls, even without attending the training, the youths will still be a force to reckon with!

the painful decision...

2007-02-02T19:51:00.000-08:00

finally... after pondering my options for the last 2days, I've finally decided to stay in the team. It was a tough decision to make, given that just last week we had talked abt quitting the team together... and now i had reversed on my stand. I seriously hope that my friends can understand why i took this path. one thing i can assure them is i am not in this for the non- monetary benefits like some might think. but rather for the learning experience... partly learning to deal with people as part of my pursued interest in human resource management and also some other reasons which i can't seem to phrase in juz a few words. anyway i really hope that we still can stay together as a close knitted bunch of avid lawn bowlers even though there will be the inevitable strain in our friendship. I hope this situation can clear up fast and we will all be able to rejoin the team under a whole new committee:)
take care...

confuseddisappointedIn a Dilemma

2007-02-01T08:14:00.000-08:00

once again, politics rear its head in my cca again. this time its regarding the squad for 2007... as early as 10days ago, the youths already discovered smth amissed when both christian and edmund did not received the invitations for the upcoming tiger bowls in hk. oh pls.... for goodness sake, if ppl like wendy and rebecca can receive it, i don't see why ed and xt can't get it! a few hrs ago, i was still happily talking to wanhin and john abt our planned enjoyment in hk. and a couple of hrs later, here i am rethinking my options. because we juz received the email abt the national squad selection. edmund is not in! anthony, an arrogant new guy whom we thrashed convincingly, is taking his place! what a joke! this has caused quite a stir among the youths, with half of them trying to quit and ppl like me still in a dilemma even as i'm penning this post. up till now i'm still undecided. cos i juz asked xt in his conversation with both wanhin and candy. if stephen gets ed to lodge an appeal with the selection committee, and gets reinstated successfully, will they still quit? of course, it would not be a smart choice to appeal, as that will only make the committee think we are desperate to be in the squad. that will also serve to give them more manipulating power over us. now i dunno what to do... with the deadline for submission due in 24hrs... should i stay or should i go? help!!!

a confession to make....

2007-01-18T02:44:00.000-08:00

yesterday morning, on my way to sch, at hougang mrt station, a lady who seemed to be suffering from polio entered the train. her movement was not as fluent as that of any of us... On seeing her plight, normally i would offer my seat to her. But yesterday i was very tired, having had lack of sleep due to a series of nightmares over the last few nights. A bangladeshi man sitting opposite me was gracious enough to give up his seat to her. Upon witnessing this, I had mixed feelings. firstly, guilty! i felt terrible that I was worse off than someone coming from a third world country... however I was also glad that at least the lady got to sit down so that she would not feel so uncomfortable throughout the rest of the journey. I know I deserved to be slapped... excuses will always be excuses. There's no difference between good and bad excuses! Haiyo... I feel so guilty :(

2007... a new beginning

2007-01-05T17:54:00.000-08:00

it's been 3 weeks since my grandma passed away... all of us have moved on with our lives, though we still missed her presence. sometimes, we just can't help but talk about the olden days when my grandma was still around. such is her influence that without her, the home seems less lively and seemingly lack of something...
this being a new yr, i'll be aiming to improve my medal tally on the lawn bowls front... last yr i got only 2 bronze medals... hopefully this yr i can be stronger mentally and not crumble to the semi final jinx.
I'm also very happy that i can meet up with my sec sch friends once again... aomething we could only do so like once a yr previously... few of them getting their degrees soon... kind of envy them...
lastly... to my friends, take care! and may your new year resolutions come true!

a tribute to my grandma

2006-12-13T19:09:00.000-08:00

7.20am... my grandma completed her journey in life... ready to move on to another new world. All of us were more relieved than sad for her. because it was rather heart-wrenching to see her struggle with her heavy breathing ever since her health deteriorated 1mth ago. She also became bedridden after being admitted to the hospital due to the numerous tests and injections which took a toll on her frail body... after about 10days in sgh, she requested to be discharged. so we attended to it since there was nothing more the doctors could do. she returned home last mon and was put on respiratory support. After surviving 2 scares of gasping for breathe, she finally breathe her last this morning. To us, it was a blessing. Cos it pains all of us to see her continue to suffer... Also, we were glad that we managed to fulfil all her last wishes, thereby enabling to leave this world free of worries.
My grandma is a selfless person- one who always puts others before herself. she dotes on all her children and grandchildren... even when she was approaching the end of her life, she wanted to strengthen the bonding within the family by telling us to have rice balls(tang yuan), signifying togetherness(tuan tuan yuan yuan). because of this, she deserves our respect. will miss you, grandma. Rest in peace.

trying to be as optimistic as i can

2006-11-23T01:18:00.000-08:00

after so many weeks, i'm finally done with my marketing information. The sense of satisfaction and relieve in stress is unbelievable... but then tmr got to start with another project again... y so many of them. hahaha

then also there's also another problem. recently my grandma's health has deteriorated very quickly. juz 2 weeks ago, she was still able to walk by herself and had a considerable appetite. but in the last 10days, everything has reversed. now the whole family is extremely concerned about her condition. yesterday she was warded in singapore general hospital. though sad, none of us showed it out, as we did not want her to worry so much about us. it pains us to see her frail body being pricked by needles and lined with tubes. not only that,we are also saddened by the fact that she seem to have given up hope on herself. This is because she constantly asks about when she can be discharged. furthermore, i found out from my mum that my grandma has told them that she had prayed to Guanying Buddha not to let her suffer too much- either take her away quickly or let her recover. haiz... Now, all we can do is to just continue visiting her, giving her the much needed moral support, and try to be as optimistic as we can, hoping that god will provide a miracle and see to her recovery. Bless you grandma:)

once again... i stumbled :(

2006-11-12T03:18:00.000-08:00

the much awaited mixed pairs ended in disaster again this morning in the q-final stage where mingli and i were beaten clearly by bernard and florence. like what mingli said, though we did not play to our best form like the previous sun when we eliminated stephen and stella, we did not play too badly today also. All we were losing out to was luck and abit short in consistency... I am also the more guilty party as my failure to convert my heavy shots resulted in us losing more shots.
Ironically today also meant the end of participation of all Scc teams as the pairing of edmund & huishan plus tony and rosemary also got knocked out by the teams from elbc and sp respectively.
to end off... life is very unpredictable... treasure it... cherish every moment:)

work, stress, frustration... but at least i'm busy:)

2006-10-24T05:48:00.000-07:00

haiz... haven't been free to update this page for the last 2 weeks... lots of project and work coming my way plus lawn bowls taking up 3 days in a week. At least now i know I am enjoying working on my remaining 2 projects with my group members. And also, i'm looking forward to the end result- marks! hahaha... cos i'm anxious to know how we'll be rewarded for our hard work.
Also, recently i've been baffled by some things... esp by some things said by my lawn bowls mates. They seem to be keeping something from me. Everytime when i tried to ask them, they wouldn't wan to say anything. Reasons gave included, "you observe and think about it...". sometimes i really dunno what to do. Can I still trust them?? Cos to me, good friends should be truthful to one another instead of keeping things from them. Makes me feel so insecure...

learning to cope with the agony

2006-10-08T07:52:00.000-07:00

This morning i joined prem, tony and piet in SCC team 2 for the national fours tournament against tournament favourites, which is stephen's team. we started off quite well but lost the game just after the halfway mark when we gave away 5 shots on 2 ocassions. However, I must say that the scoreline of 21-12 did not do any justice to us. In fact we played very well... and I was particularly impressed with my form at the moment which started as early as thursday when we just lost narrowly to john and chia in the Tuas Power League. I managed to draw in at least 1 bowl which was about 1 foot away from the jack on at least 12 of the 18ends... However, I'm still learning to cope with the agony of losing a tournament even when i had been playing so well.
Yesterday I had my first training session with bowls singapore's national squad in 3months. The whole session took about 4.5 hrs which we were told was to build up our stamina to last more than 1 game. Many of us produced nice touches on the green despite the hazy conditions... Hmmm... now at least I'm able to get a breather and concentrate on my sch projects. Next up is the National Mixed Pairs... and I hope I can bring on my good form to that tournament...

angry and depressed...

2006-09-24T04:06:00.000-07:00

sigh... my worst fears were finally realised today as my team crashed out of the national triples tournament without putting up much of a fight... particularly me! I couldn't get my feel of the weight as well as state of mind wasn't clear enough. In the first game, where we were playing to get into the finals, we went down 8-0 within the first 3 ends. but we slowly clawed back the pts to edge out our opponents 9-8. however our hopes of getting into the final were dashed when we were dealt harshly on 2 ocassions by the opposition skip's last bowl, losing 1-0 when we were holding 4. All these plus poor sportmanship from their second player, anthony who constantly jeer at our bowls played into our minds and we effectively conceded the semis to them.

In the afternoon, the 3rd placing fight was between the 2 youth teams. Both teams took turns to take leads... however in the end it was wanhin's team who showed more hunger to win the game as they snatched the sudden death game after we were tied at 17-all after 18ends. towards the end of the game, i constantly played poor first bowls which failed to reach the head. haiz... what a day!

a cause for joy...

2006-09-18T21:27:00.000-07:00

finally... sch's reopening next week. haiz... been waiting for this day for so long... already wasted alot of time doing nothing. heard from my classmates that this semester our timetable is going to be more compact. This means that my time management has to improve especially with the resuming of national training from the 1st week of october...

Last sunday, the much anticipated tournament(my first one in more than 2mths) was finally played under fickled weather conditions(drizzled in the morning, cloudy in early afternoon and then strong evening sun) hahaha... but i'm glad that we managed to pull through it and advance to the semi finals which is scheduled for this sunday. Abit of recap of what happened in the first round and the q-finals...

The first game was relatively relaxing because we were all yearning to have a go at our opponents having beaten them before in separate competitions earlier on. We won 30 - 6, however there were a few hiccups during the game. Like, after the first few ends when we saw the opposition skip, sebastian playing heavy shots continuously, we decided to give away the mat when we have possession. But we struggled to adapt to the shorter length of play preferred by our opponents. Hence giving away a few shots. Therefore we decided not to do that after that. The subsequent match in the afternoon was more challenging... in the first end we needed a crucial shot from edmund to turn the head to win by 2shots. our opponents from the singtel team came back strongly... taking the next end by 5shots. It was marale dampening for me. As for the next few ends i could not come to grasp with it and had to rely on melvin and edmund to work miracles. Then after, my spirits were high again when i managed to convinced myself that edmund and melvin were in red hot form... and gradually started to play better. The match was very much competitive unlike our first game. both of us took turns to lead and in the 3rd last end we managed to get a 18-15 lead. In the penultimate end, we gave away 1 shot for the opponents to close in on 18-16. The last end was was exciting because of the spectators from the other games as well as the strong winds that we had to adjust to. Our opponents pulled the mat up to near the minimum mark and my first 2 bowls went a metre over the jack. The pressure to not give away more than 1 shot was intense as their lead managed to squeeze i his 2 bowls a mat away from the jack. I was slightly luckier with my last bowl and managed to draw in almost jack high albeit still 2 feet away from the jack to be 1-up. Their 2nd player patrick rolled his first bowled to "sit" in front of mine to give his team the advantage. It was left to the skips when the seconds ended their part holding a 1 shot lead, courtesy of melvin and his wonder bowls which managed to come in and limit the damage, as we would have been trailing by 3 shots and putting alot of pressure on edmund. Edmund manged to put in another 2-second shots and their skip somehow couldn't cope with the pressure... and we finally managed to edge them 18-17.

Another cause for celebration was that within a minute of us winning the game, on the neighbouring rink, the team comprising of huikai, christian and wanhin managed to oust the tournament's top seed from singapore power after initally trailing in the game.

Now that we have 3 youth teams in next week's semi finals(not forgetting the ladies team in their ladies triples) , we are determined to have at least 1 of us in the finals and challenged the more experienced players...

Lastly... this morning i read about my idol stefanie sun changing record label from warner music to EMI... I do not know what will happen but i certainly hope that her music collaboration with her mentors, lee wei song and lee si song will not stop here. hmmm... now can only hope for the best as i await her next album.

more boredom... haiz......

2006-09-02T06:51:00.000-07:00

its been 3 weeks since i last blogged... hahaha... pc broke down. think played too much fm le... thats y it protested(yah i know its lame :p) ...
1 week of sch holiday has juz ended and i still haven't got a temp job yet... think its gonna be very tough looking for a 3-week job... or else i'll be rotting at home... money keep going out, but not in. haiz........
Well, at least i can console myself with the fact that i'm back at bowls :)
I am currently partnering my best friend melvin and huikai in the tuas power league. i think the toughest game(stephen and chiu) has passed by and i'm quite pleased with the result that we took 1 skin off them, though i feel we could have done better with more practice. In my opinion, the 2nd toughest will be the pair from singapore power. hahaha... then in another 2 weeks time, i'll be competing in the national triples, partnering edmund and melvin. both of them are more seasoned players than i am... hopefully i can live up to their standards and not let them down :)
for now... take care, my dear friends.

boredom is killing me slowly.......

2006-08-13T04:56:00.000-07:00

haiz... y must we have this thing call study week??? plus only 2 papers in 2 weeks. i think its a total waste of time... too much time to study, in the end the effect on us will be over focused on certain aspects of the subject and would not be tested on it. always semms to happen to me... anyway i'm looking forward to the end of this exams and towards the class chalet:)

I have lost touch with bowls for the last 2mths... dunno whether anyone has "mistreated" it while i was away... also i'm not confident whether i can perform up to my standards in the forthcoming national mixed pairs and national triples tournaments given my recent lack of practice. I seriously hope that i will not lack my partner down. I hope to win at least another trophy with them... haiz.

relieved of some stress....

2006-08-01T04:02:00.000-07:00

finally... i can relax abit after getting the stress of Ideas project off my chest. Its been a tough time for the past couple of weeks as we rush to do research and compile them into business proposals and then present to our classmates and lecturers... I wan to say a very big thank you to my carpe diem team members, esp eleen. she was of the greatest help throughout the whole of this module. Let's hope we'll have chances to build on this success in the near future.

its been some time since i last went for lawn bowls training... lacking of match practice already. hahaha... itching for some games soon. hope it wouldn't be long... i also wan to wish my fellow bolwers who have been selected for the asian bowls in brunei good luck for the tournament and bon voyage.

something interesting to share...

2006-07-19T04:16:00.000-07:00

gosh! suddenly all the tests and project presentations coming in thick and fast. hardly time for a breather :( hopefully, i can survive all these and score well.
in the midst of all these stress and hectic schedule, i wanna share with everyone what my sister introduced to me... guarantee you will be laughing endlessly...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4XnplSo8I4&search=miss%20swan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6Pee5Y84rQ&mode=related&search=miss%20swan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULhTIAjke2k&mode=related&search=miss%20swan

taking a break from bowls...

2006-07-12T03:23:00.000-07:00

hmmm... at last a break from lawn bowls. Don't need to turn up for training as frequently for the next 1 mth cos not selected for the Asia Bowls in Brunei. Feel abit upset even though I wouldn't be able to make it if selected due to exams. However, my upset is unlike the jealousy type... juz a weird feeling which i do not know how to explain :(

I'll be going to sentosa again this saturday to celebrate a classmate's birthday. Hope that this time it will turn out to be a more fun filled day than the previous one where the night before, we learnt that most of the gals decide not to turn up :(

2nd Singapore International Lawn Bowls Championship: 2days of helplessness... ended with a day of joy and happiness

2006-06-26T04:08:00.000-07:00

Hmmm.... hasn't been feeding my blog for quite some time. During this 2 week absence there's been some ups and downs in my life. Fortunately, the joys eclipsed the unhappiness. First, I partnered edmund to an unbelievable and unexpected victory in the National Mens' 2-4-2 tournament on 15th june to clinch the position of 2nd runners up. It was continued from a few days ago, where heavy rain halted our challenge for 3rd spot. That night, almost everyone had written us off after trailing 15-4. However, we quietly clawed back the pts... at the 17th end, we manage to take back 2 shots to even at 18 all. knowing that everyone else were looking at our match with eager anticipation of an unlikely victory, edmund and I juz gave our very best. we manage to get the crucial 1 pt needed for victory against... the pair of spencer and stephen (president and v.president of bowls singapore).

After that, it was another roller coaster ride for me in training... my form juz peak and dip unpredictably in the training matches leading up to 2nd Singapore International Lawn Bowls Championship, a mixed triples tournament. This is my first international tournament... I was ecstatic when i realised that i was paired with my friends candy, wan hin and christian in Youth 'B' team. Team 'A' was made up of hui shan, melvin and edmund. This is because we have always maintained close friendship with one another which makes it easier to talk to each other when the need arises. Altogether 10 countries were invited(Brunei, China, Hongkong(Youth), Japan, Korea, Macau, Malaysia, Phillipines, Thailand and Western Australia). I was very nervous on the before the competition... worrying whether i could reproduce my form on the international stage or not.

On the first 2 days of the competition, the youth team A was in red hot form as they won all and draw one in the group stage to top the group and qualified for the cup knock-out event. However, my team, youth B had an indifferent day. We couldn't gel as well as we had thought, only winning 2 games out of a possible 5. Everyone was playing their own game... there was no team spirit and we did not believe in each other's ability, particularly me. Being a pessimist by nature, I kept wondering whether i could play to my usual standards or not. And whenever, I delivered a poor bowl, I would feel very upset and keep replaying it in my mind and 'scold' myself. Then, my morale was at an all-time low following a thrashing game by the team from singtel, the eventual runners up in the Cup event. We lost that game 24-3. I believed we were affected by the earlier game where we lost to China team A after leading for 3/4 of the game. In the end we lost narrowly... All these led to our poor showing in the group stages. we finished in 4th position and hence played in the bowls knock-out event, which is a tier below the Cup.

On day 3 which was the last day of the championship, Youth A lost their q-final tie against Brunei, who were the eventual champions of the Cup event. The game could have been won by the youths, who had to play on despite heavy downpour coupled with flashes of thunder and lightning. In the end, the more experienced bruneians won. This time, it was the Youth B, who enjoyed a different turn of fortune. By the time, we started our q-final game, the heavy downpour had subsided significantly to become slight drizzle. That game was played against the bowls singapore team. Every end was tightly contested... and at the 2nd last end, with the score tied, both teams were concentrating in playing to the best of their ability. first, my fellow junior, mingli, playing for bowls singaapore in this tournament, drew into the jack to get an advantage for her team. Next, Christian played a slight weighted shot to lightly tapped the jack towards candy's bowl which was about half a metre behind to give us the advantage. So now it was left to both skips to ensure victory for their team. bernard tried and succeeded in knocking off candy's bowl with his first attempt. wanhin, looking to emulate that feat, delivered his first shot, but the bowl refused to turn in. bernard then placed a strategic bowl in front of the holding shot to try and protect the jack. But thanks to christian's good call and judgement, wanhin played the more eccentric swinging forehand and managed to take out the shot. At that point, almost everyone present at kallang cheered for us. Our confidence were very high following that win. Next, we played Singapore Power team comprising of a group of respected players. We played well and won that game. This was an improvement from the game we played against the same opponents in the group stage. Then it came to the finals... it was my first game of the day. I did not play in the first 2 because i was still lacking confidence after my poor showing in the group stages. However, the team's performance in the earlier games boosted my confidence and convinced me that i still had what it takes to be a good bowler. We started poorly... trailing at 11-1, which was midway thru the game. To be truthful, my poor start was largely due to my nervousness at having so many people (more than 50) watching how i played. However, Candy and wanhin's performance somehow inspired my return to from as we took 18 pts from the subsequent 6 ends to win the Bowls event at 19-13.

That night, we had the appreciation dinner at Lion City hotel where representatives from all the invited countries delivered their thank you speech before the prize presentation.
I'm very glad that I managed to make alot of friends(particularly youth bowlers from hong kong), and take pictures with great bowlers from some countries. However, I missed out on taking pictures with the teams from malaysia and brunei whom i look up to... because they certainly overawed me with their deadly accuracy in a display of their fantastic lawn bowling skills.

slacking... pondering hard

2006-06-12T08:13:00.000-07:00

Haiz... unlucky japan. should have wrapped up the game before the australians got their first goal in the 84th min. In my opinion, Japan played a more attacking and entertaining game than the socceroos, but failed to take their chances with multiple wayward shots on goal. And they juz gave up and lost their self belief once the australians broke thru their defensive wall. Credit must be given to the winners of this game... they never give up

Finally, the elearning week is over... personally i feel its a waste of time. esp the time spent waiting for web pages to load. I think i still learn better during lectures rather than staring at the computer, listening to a monotone voice explaining accrued costs and expenditure. so boring... and also the temptation to play fm is always there. overall... i juz feel that i get distracted easily when i have to study by staring at the computer. now got to improve my concentration level and settle the projects on hand fast.

Another heartache over the weekend... seems like i being jinxed by the semi finals. Everytime juz fail to get past the semi finals. My partner and I started the game quite brightly... but after catching up with our opponents after 12ends with the score tied at 10-10, we immediately gave away 3 shots. From then on, we juz slipped further and further away from snatching a place in the finals. Hmmm... somehow i'm beginning to think that we performed like japan. after conceding the 3 shots, we juz lost our self belief and crumbled under our own pressure to chase back the game. Now with our hopes of getting a 3rd placing hanging by a thread, i think we should juz focus our attention on the upcoming Singapore Open and concentrate on playing well & impressing the national selectors. However, most importantly, i think we should do well to for the sake of the juniors. Its about time for us to step out of the shadows of the more experienced players. Do not be look down by them. Show them what we are capable of. Gambatte Sg Yof!!!

mixed feelings...

2006-06-05T06:35:00.000-07:00

Haiz... today was supposed to have been a fun-filled day for the class at sentosa. but our mood were dampened by the presence of only 7 people at the scheduled meeting time. how will you feel if you were in my situation, as a co-organizer? imagine after 2weeks of planning and getting positive replies from majority of them- especially after the dates were adjusted several times to accomodate most people... for me, a feeling of emptiness in my heart i guess. luckily we had a couple of fun- loving classmates who were sporting enough to stay on and not cause further disappointment. thank you to those who turned up :) we then went to watch over the hedge and were treated to endless hilarious moments by the squirrels and the skunk. hahaha...

Over the last weekend , i also had my national 2-4-2 men's pairs for lawn bowls. my team won and we are now in the semi finals which will be held on this coming weekend. alot of credit has to be given to my partner who demonstrated his cool-headedness and experience in the game, as well as the australian coach who had corrected my delivery techniques the day before the competition and hence improved my consistency. without whom, i might not have been able to play so well. hahaha... for now i am going to concentrate on maintaining my form and repeat the feat this sun to progress to the finals. i hope that i wouldn't be distracted by world cup fever :p and turn up on competition with panda eyes.

my virgin blog

2006-05-31T07:13:00.000-07:00

Hmmm... my first time writing online. Its been 7weeks since i started sch at singapore poly. personally i feel its a step backwards in my life. These past 7weeks with my classmates have taught me to appreciate them more after observing the behaviour of some ppl from other classes who were so rowdy and inconsiderate, even during lectures. Thank goodness, my class of DBA 25 is kuai kuai bunch. i'm kind of glad that i've not been outcast by my classmates because of my age. thank you guys and gals:)
Away from sch, i have my cca lawn bowls to keep me company. Like many, i didn't have a good impression of this sport when i first heard of it. but i must admit... now i'm hooked on this sport. A large part is due to the presence of my jc friends. i'm a person who needs frenz ard me. this is where i widen my social circle. recently i've been feeling abit confused over certain issues concerning this sport. perhaps i really need to focus better and brush up my game and also to be more aware of ppl ard me.
hahaha... after nagging so much... to end on a lighter note... i'm looking forward to my national men's 2-4-2 this sun(hope i can shake off the underachiever mentality) plus my class gathering at sentosa next thurs :p