hi from australia again

have seen alot more places since i last posted... today my family and i spent over 30 dollars on KFC. and we only had 3 people eating! ( my sis ate something else) this incredible feat was achieved because the chicken over here is just so darn good...

it's nice to know that at least in other parts of the world, KFC still has great tasting chicken.. and no i'm not receiving any money for endorsements ok? =P

the day before we ate alot of fish fresh from the sea. the fishermen caught it that morning, put it on display almost immediately and we ate it 3 hours later! of course, some cooks grilled/deep fried the fish we chose depending on how we wanted it. this was the first time in my life i actually wanted to return to a fish market again. it helped that the stench of dead fish was no where near the stalls or the cafeteria where we ate.

along the way i have met so many pretty girls too. and i'm not referring to the caucasians. the asians here are just so darn pretty and their smiles are so big with a ful set of white teeth. there are japanese, chinese, taiwanese, koreans and thais all living in or visiting the same places i was at and they just blew me away. i used to think quite a number of singaporean girls were pretty but i am not sure i f i will ever want to look at another singaporean girl again after this trip! haha.. i guess the main difference is that the girls here smile back at you when you smile at them whereas in singapore the girls tend to give you the " erm, weirdo why are you staring at me you pervert !" look.. i'll be happy to be proven wrong of course

i saw this eurasian girl at a local city bazaar 2 days ago and i must admit i still have a crush on her... she was not just the prettiest girl i've seen after audrey hepburn( if you dun know who audrey hepburn is go google for her you dun know what you're missing). she was tending this stall and the way she greeted all her customers with a seemingly sincere and sweet exposition depsite her obvious shyness just melted me to the floor...i mentioned "seemingly" because i know appearances can be deceiving but, as far as i can tell, i'll just happily assume that there was a girl who did what she had to do with a smile on her face even when faced with something as scary as stage fright.. sigh.. i kinda regret not trying to at least go to her stall... but i guess after living in singapore for so long i'm not ready to just jump into western culture.. over here i see guys talking to girls/guys for the first time like as if they've been pals for ages. of course there are many grouchy, unapproachable caucasians and australians too. every country has their fair share of them. but the friendly ones just know how to strike a conversation without being seen as offensive. more importantly, the people who receive this invitation to a new conversation not only have no problems with it, they actually enjoy meeting someone new. i do believe that such a culture is slowly surfacing in singapore where people can see the difference between actual flirting and just a casual hello. of course in my fantasy, my "casual hello" with that eurasian girl would have led to us being together forever. but if we only became just friends or even if it turned out to be just a short moment where we enjoyed the company of a total stranger i would be happy enough too. and that's what i think is the main reason why people here are not afraid of striking a conversation or being invited to one. because they know it's just casual and whether it leads to anything is a totally different matter. =)

hi from australia

it's nice to know i dun have to type this at some internet cafe... instead i'm typing this from the comforts of my sister's house.. parents and her have gone out for a little shopping... and i wasn't feeling too well so i thought i would stay at home instead..

it's strange to call this place home when i've only slept at this place for one night.. on the other hand i'm 500km away from the bed i literally grew up on..=)

guess it's the heart that makes the home.. if all my famliy is here chatting laughing doing their things i guess i can't call it anything else but home can i ?

well i wanted to talk about my 1st day in sydney or rather night.. the 2nd thing that greeted me, after my sister, was the cold weather. it was so cold my hands actually felt stiffer just by being exposed to the air too long, the same way frost makes things less inflexible i guess.

my mum unfortunately had no idea this was goign to happen.. she was mis informed that it woudl be summer over here when it is in fact winter! talk about getting the wrong info at the worst possible time...

i offered my sweater to her, which personally i was kinda proud of doing. it's the kinda scene you see in those korean movies i guess where the handsome male lead offers his coat to her gf while he freezes to death in his paper thin shirt.. well i wouldn't call my shirt paper thin and i certainly wasn't freezing to death.. well not to death at least.. but maybe to illness..=P

took a jog this morning. i must mention that 7am here is 5 am in singapore so when the sun came out and i had no choice but to wake up (forget about blinds) i was shocked that i actually woke up this early... but then again i slept at 10pm singapore time, another first for me, so guess it makes sense..

this time difference may seem small but it's causing havoc for my social life.. i logged on at my "normal" time, that is after my routine of stoning, eating breakfast, more stoning and jogging.. in singapore that would be about 10am but cos of the time difference it's only 8 am over there so all i saw when i logged on to msn was 4 people of which 1 was actually sleeping but forgot to turn off his msn.. =P

so off i went to do my next thing which is this blogging.. which brings us back to why i fell sick and thus am not with my parents shopping instead..

well i seemed to have recovered actually.. just a slight built up of phlegm.. it was strange that i only felt this built up AFTER i finished jogging.. coughing and jogging are not supposed to go hand in hand right?

guess my lungs are still not used to the cold weather.. and what with my inevitable panting during the jog, i guess there was so much cold air circulating through my lungs they went on strike! it's as if in retaliation they discharged phlegm so i would think twice about putting them through so much cold air again..

and i certainly can empathise with them.. my feet were so cold last night i practically used a hair dryer of sorts to blow warm air at my feet.. and even then it stilll felt weird because my soles woudl feel warm but the cravices in between my toes couldn't get warmed up and still felt stiff..

you know how your hands feel numb if they hold on to ice for too long? well all i did was carry a bag of groceries for about 500m and my hands felt more like a clothes hanger than an actual moving muscle group. it was like as if the only reason the bag hadn't dropped off was because my fingers had already frozen into a hooked shape =P

now that i've learnt my lesson about the cold, i am not taking any more chances. i am now typing this with the house heater on, my feet covered in thick socks and my upper body clothed in 3 layers of clothing which includes 1 sweater. and yes i'm still in the warm indoors!

the good news is that for the first time in sydney i am actually sweating from the warmth.. the bad news is once i step out of this place the sweat is going to double the coldness..

so unless you love numb fingers, cold lungs and a no-win solution in wearing thick clothing indoors, you had best not visit australia in june. now i know why singaporeans only visit australia during the december hols

been bz..

It’s been 6 days since I last blogged... and that's only if you consider the photos I put up as a blog. I always assumed I would be updating my blog very often once the examinations are over. After all I ought to be very free. Yet I find myself actually very busy. I’ve been going out almost everyday and if I am at home I spend my time eating, sleeping, watching anime, television and playing on my xbox. I’ve decided such a lifestyle is not very healthy. For the brain that is. So I’ve decided I will spend more time updating my blog before I totally lose any semblance of intellect.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that all the above activities are totally bad. It is good to do things that require less brain power every now and then, especially after a horrendously draining round of examinations. I just think my brain has rested enough. Before it gets soft I better start training it a little.

Actually come to think of it, I have been warming it up now and then. Playing mahjong is not that simple after all. You do need to weigh your options and think a little about probabilities. And if mahjong requires thinking it’s needless to say bridge requires even more. I’ve been playing such games quite a lot in recent days so at least I know the math side of my mind isn’t too stiff.

However, the linguistic side of me has been taking a bashing recently. Speaking in different ways with different people is perfectly fine with me. I even think it’s necessary. However, it can make me a little confused about my grammar and sentence structures. At least with blogging I can use some vocabulary I would hardly use in a typical conversation and practise on my grammar a little.

I guess that sums up what I value as far as intellect is concerned. Maths and English are two very important skills for me. Include to that physics and I guess all my intellectual interests are pretty much covered.

It is over generalization to lump literature such as Shakespeare under English but since I would never major in literature any time soon, in or out of school, I guess it’s sufficient to say I enjoy a good play because I enjoy English. That goes for movies and television too. I still think that sex and the city has more wit then desperate housewives but D.H. does give good humour with perfect English.

I’m certainly not chastising those who do not speak proper English. I hardly speak an entire sentence of English without a “lah” or “lor”. But I do appreciate proper English every now and then. Perhaps that is the real reason why I like to blog so much?

more photos if you check out the link..this is the nus councilor gathering at ubin 

check out the retro car at ubin 

sports day at my jc fren's place 

my cute niece whom i blogged about before 

my poor blog..have i neglected you for so long?

well not exactly... i have been really busy with exams and all...

blogging partly out of some psuedo guilt for neglecting the blog.. and partly because blogging has always been fun

this is one of those rare times when i will actually blog about what happened today.. so some of you may want to consider buying lottery tickets just for fun

had a nice fun day with joel and danny..many thanks to them for making my day so fun and meaningful at the same time..

it's not hard for me to chat with friends.. mainly cos i'm naturally talkative anyway... i only hope i know when to listen to people instead..

we talked about a whole range of stuff, from songs to sms .. and all in all it felt like the kinda conversation guys our age should be having.. add in a few beers and some nice band music and it would complete the picture of a guys' nite out.. haha.. except that there was no beer, no music and it was in the afternoon.. although we did have iced milo instead..=P

looking forward to playing mahjong tmrw.. doesn't matter if i lose as long as i dun lose too much... i like the mental stimulation that comes with mahjong.. all the risk assessment and strategising... it's like chess actually.. only more stressful and less english words used...

that's one of the items in my post-exam must do checklist... another item is to finally play my xbox..which i had no problem accomplishing once i came home after the exams.. thank God for xbox to make my post exam celebration not as boring as i feared.. i seldom am faced with a situation when i finish my exams EARLIER than my friends but oh well there's a first for everything... going home straight after the exam did feel kinda weird.. even my mum was surprised.. the nite before she had already taken it for granted i was going out. she simply asked me " how late will you be back?" haha...

i've always wanted to chiong straight after an exam.. but on second thoughts, i think i would rather do what i did today which is just catch up with friends i have kinda negelected due to school and exams..

if i already feel bad about neglecting an inanimate blog, imagine the guilt of neglecting some of my friends.. it has been a whole semester since i saw some of my jc friends.. must try to catch up with them this hols...