Was never true love loved in vain,
For truest love is highest gain.

No art can make it: it must spring
Where elements are fostering.

So in heaven's spot and hour
Springs the little native flower,
Downward root and upward eye,
Shapen by the earth and sky.

George Eliot

It's been awhile!

Soccer season's finally overrr! So glad that Yee has given her 101% commitment in it too and I hope she enjoyed spending time with us..haha...

Well,I'm feeling perpetual stress these days and it's starting to irritate me. It got so bad last week that I actually took time out to go for a late-night jog just to get the endorphins pumping in my system.It's like I worry over the smallest things when I can actually do my best and trust God to deliver. It's just that I'm a natural worrywart and that's bad 'cos the stress is taking a toll on my hair too! :(

Actually, I've been thinking about the YCG (aka cell group) leader position for the past few weeks, ever since Pastor Alan approached me and I accepted. Honestly, I'm not sure if I can make the cut; it's like I'm not ready for it and it's quite weird 'cos there's some sort of role reversal going on in my YCG now 'cos my cell group leader stepped down and I'm replacing her, and I'm still getting used to it :X

All these happening when I haven't even started teaching yet! :S

Moreover, I'm having doubts about whether I'm able to commit and stuff (and whether my studies will be compromised). As it is 3 of the 5 weekday nights are occupied; 4 if there's leaders' prayer meeting...
For the optimistic friends from church whom I talked to regarding this, they have advised me to "go ahead, I trust you can do it, and leave it in God's hands", I'm really grateful and flattered and all but somehow my intuition tells me that on the other hand, there are others who think otherwise (and it shows sometimes, which is quite discouraging). I know I shouldn't be a respecter of Man and all but sometimes these things get to your head, especially when you're already stressed up and all and someone has to come in and give their second opinion about what I should do and give their two cent's worth of unnecessary stuff.

I guess it's a major step to step out of my comfort zone (like what they always say) and see how God moves and uses me. I might even surprise myself in the process, who knows..haha...I really hope that I would be able to cope and manage my time well, I'm feeling so exhausted these days...I need a break!

On the academic side, I have many presentations going on and assignments to rush out as usual. Paediatric psych's getting quite boring 'cos it wasn't as how I imagined it to be (the only interesting lecture so far was on children with cancer).
Lit has been great, so glad that Shan, Evatte and Ai Ping are in my tutorial,haha...and not forgetting Charles (who never fails to crack us up), Stephanie (the sweet and demure girl who loves Germany) and Gordon (our devil's advocate) as well as the rest :)

For Group Dynamics, we're off to a great start and I'm starting to get really excited about the group trip. Just discovered today that our activity was the most authentic amongst the groups in our tutorial so, hope everything turns out well and that everyone will have fun...
Emotions lecture's interesting but we keep missing lectures due to the many public holidays on Friday! And as for Cog Psych Lab, I hope I made the right choice by signing up for it, we'll see how it goes....

Ok I know I'm starting to blabber already.

Argghh...so many things on my mind but anyway, I'm thankful for the usual few (especially the two) who's constantly there for me,pushing me on and cheering me up; you know who you are and I love you! :)

Anyway, I've not really been meeting up with people so, apologies if it happens to be you and you're reading this. I'll get down to it once everything's more "stabilised", haha! Wondering how you guys are doing too but hope everything's going steady for you! :D

forever 21: the inception of deception

Have you ever wondered why the legal age for adulthood is 21? Why can't they just round it down to 20? After all, it's the start of the twenties and it's a whole number...

I've always felt that age is just a number but now that I've finally hit 21, I'm starting to feel the effects of age setting in; not physically (although sometimes I feel my stamina has really gone down the drain eg. I can't shop/walk around for long cos my back will start to feel sore,etc...) but in terms of what I wanna do in life and so on. Hearing T talk about her study/work plans makes me reflect on what I really want and what path I should take. It's so hard, battling between needs and wants, so much so that the word "freedom" itself cannot seem to be used without applying the proper context and prepositions.

I've always felt that it would be a long way before I become a twenty-something person. Since young, I've always envisioned a person in his/her twenties to be someone loud, hip, fashionable, passionate about life and being the life of the party himself/herself, someone confident and probably unassuming and someone independent and comfortable in his/her skin. I've always imagined that once I hit 20/21, some magic force will transform me to be someone fitting my previous description to the point that I can't even recognise the new (better) me. The metamorphosis would be akin to the caterpillar-butterfly type.

So much for dreams. Apparently, I don't feel that way and I don't know if that's a good or bad thing. People change, for better or worse and throughout the years, I'm sure you've seen people in your life (schoolmates, old friends) change physically and otherwise; some being pleasant surprises, others rude awakenings? haha!

Was looking through my old photos when D came over and I realised that although I have evolved (for lack of a better word) quite a bit physically, it's still the same old me inside. I'm not sure how to bring it across more succinctly but have you ever had the feeling that sometimes, your physical appearance doesn't quite match up to how you think/feel about yourself and how you imagine yourself to be like?

Maybe that's the reason why birthday celebrations came about: to ease the burden (eg. the responsibilities) that comes with age. By celebrating it with your loved ones, it reminds the birthday person that he/she is not alone in their life journey. And probably, this leads to the reason why some people feel the most miserable on their birthdays when their friends forget their special day (especially their close friends) cos the obvious implication is there. To the cynics out there, this might be a highly debatable point though.

Anyway, I'm really thankful that I'm not subjected to the above mentioned. In fact, I really thank God for great friends and family who did more than just remembering my birthday :)

For future reference,

Esther and Sheryl brought me to Hard Rock Cafe. Food and ambience was great, live band was playing. Requested for a Muse song but guess it was too challenging for them. Sang happy birthday for me instead (redeemed themselves immediately,haha). Saw Ms. He Siyao waitressing, cool right? :O Love E's photo montage and I can't bear to use the AT earphones!

Aiping and Duc brought me to Wild Honey. THE BREAKFAST ROCKS LA! Ice-cream. People-watched. Sephora for more than an hour, I think (again,haha!). Wore the necklace yesterday and today, so nice! and the Spongebob stuff goes without saying la hor! :D

Seafood buffet at Pan Pacific Hotel with the family, thanks to er yi! Bro ate so many mussels and clams that he had to go to the toilet midway,haha! Almost teared when I saw Maib's card...

Leeyin: AGAIN, can't believe that you underestimated your present! I love it! :D

Was pleasantly surprised just now in church when Wenyi called me to meet her at The Promise presumably on the pretext that there was a group meeting.Was met with a cake and the band people singing happy birthday instead (all thanks to Bert!).

Haven't forgotten all the personal wishes, text/fb messages, etc...

Thanks everyone! :D

Behind Closed Doors - Curtain Call

Behind Closed Doors - Curtain Call Prelude

Thank God for the event! Was really nervous, especially for the sound/music (didn't have the appetite for dinner and the butterflies in my stomach were raging wild big time!) but it went well, though I still felt that we sounded better during the final rehearsal.

Anyway, kudos to Alan not only for doing such a great job and putting his heart, soul, blood, sweat (lots of it, trust me!) and tears into the event but also for revolutionising the dynamics of Region A (not kidding). It really changed the attitudes of the people in Region A in terms of work ethics, but it also inspired them to be more than they are. Well, it really stretched and pushed my limits in a good way! I think it probably changed the way others usually view Region A (from the "slack" region to one that can put up a good show if they want to).

Most importantly, it brought us closer to God, especially when we begin to doubt the grandiosity of the whole project and how ambition and reality might not match up (which wasn't true, it was a success!). Like what Alan said before the show, we must constantly examine our intentions for staging the show and what we intend to achieve as this will make a difference in how we perform later. For me, I just hope that we were effective in transmitting the message of the story across to the audience and not just be remembered for the comic relief the script supplied.

Anyway, 'was met with a very pleasant surprise and I really am still very touched by it, haha...really meant a lot to me :)

Had 4 pratas after the event, didn't even realised how famished I was...haha! Was planning to list the names of everyone involved in this post as a form of appreciation but the list is too long so I'll be uploading Walter's curtain call credits video here soon...

Live band prac's tmr, hope we sound better this time, Michelle Ng's joining us! She'll be our acoustic guitarist! :D

la la la la la, doodoodoodoo!

Hello world! Don't really have the mood to blog regularly,especially since school is starting soon (3 days' time to be precise!) So far so good, I'm so thankful that bidding this sem was a breeze! ONE POINT FOR EVERY MODULE ONLY, YEAH BABEH! :D

So I'll be taking 4 Core mods and a lit mod: Group Dynamics, Cognitive Psych Lab, Psychobiological Perspectives on Emotion, Intro to Paediatric Psych and 19th Century Lit. We'll be doing Great Expectations again (wonder if it's a good or bad thing).

Looking back on what I did for the hols, first 2 months was spent slacking and meeting up with friends and stuff. It was only in the 2nd half of July that I had other stuff coming in like tuition, work and rehearsals.

Region A Event is next Fri, can't wait to get it over and done with. Not that I dread going for rehearsals but I just can't wait for all the hard work and preparation to be showcased finally. Learned quite a few things in terms of sound and theatre acting along the way too. I'm really excited, the cast and all have been practising hard, props were very nice (Benjamin and Beng Tian did a good job!) and costumes were efficient as usual. Hope everything flows nicely on that day...

Had live band practice for the coming Big Create, which is after our region event. I'll be doing vocals this time (actually Wenyi wanted me to be on guitar but I don't think I'll have time to learn the chords and all). We'll be doing Generous Mr. Lovewell by Mercyme, which I think is so much more suitable than Everything Impossible, plus it's an easy tune to bob along to.

Ohya! One exciting news! Actually this should be the crux of this post: My paternal grandpa has decided to convert to Christianity! How exciting can that be?! XD I was told this before I took a nap today, couldn't really sleep after that,haha...thank God seriously! :D It's really amazing, I mean I didn't really imagine that it'll become a reality so soon, maybe I'm really lacking in faith but for the moment I'm just so glad. Updates about my grandparents, they're back home in Chinatown with the new domestic help, Lestari. She's really nice, has a great heart for the elderly and really goes all out, not to mention she's proven herself to be trustworthy so far, so it's great!:)

Met up with Trina just now, we were just talking abt going abroad together and if everything goes well, we might be flying Down Under come December! :D

Next on the to-travel list:
1. Canada after Year 3 Sem 2?
2. Vietnam-Germany?
3. France (Nice, Marseilles, Paris!)
4.Norway, Scandinavia, Stockholm
5. Manhattan!

But for now, the more practical ones would be Bangkok and Taiwan due to financial constraints. Dreams, dreams, dreams...

And Yee's flying off to Wenzhou tonight, will only be back on the 18th. Somehow, I sorta miss her already, although we only meet on Sat for soccer but still....(Yee: lemme hear your mashups soon!)

And the sleepover with LY's still pending! So many things to do, so little time...

Behind Closed Doors Trailer 3

Trailer 3's out! Hope Karen recovers soon from her gastric flu, otherwise I have to play the sophisticated lady...and guess who's the old man? Haha!