Happy Boxing Day. :)

Christmas this year was the best I've had in a long time. :)

Ben, my sister's boyfriend, and Joseph were both over for Christmas dinner at my house last night; hope you had fun, baby. ^_^

Homemade soup with potatoes, mushrooms and abalone (sounds odd, but it tasted lovely); roast turkey with homemade cranberry sauce, honey-baked ham with homemade applesauce, baked potatoes and samosas and wine to go with everything-- 16-year-old German Reisling wine. Must be the first time I've drunk something that's almost as old as me. :P

Pity we didn't open the Chardonnay that Joseph bought, although I did have a feeling that my mum was going to have Reisling on the table since that's been the pattern for the previous few years.

Dessert was the traditional Christmas plum pudding (which I got to light, haha-- for those who don't know, you usually pour about a teaspoon of liquor on the pudding and you flambe it before the liquor gets absorbed into the pudding) and black forest log cake.

It was a good kinda feeling to be sitting round the table with everyone and eating together. And y'know what's funny? It didn't really feel like my family and two other people having dinner; it all just felt like one family. ^_^

Merry Christmas, one and all. :)

The only thing which puts a damper on all this is that later, I'll still have to go to work, but on the bright side, it'll be for the last time! Hurrah!

Spent Christmas Eve last night with my baby; my mum let me stay out late last night, so we had dinner together after I was done with work, walked down Orchard Road to look at the lights for a bit, then came back to Plaza Singapura at 11.15 to catch the late-night preview of Death Note 2.

Death Note 2 was slightly confusing, but VERY good. And how is it that only *now* I've realised that the actor playing Light is really pretty good-looking? But never mind, that's just random.

I'll try not to spoil the movie for anyone since it's not officially opened yet (that's on the 28th), but it does give you more to think about.

I suppose it's true that the law isn't perfect, but we do the best we can, as Light's father tells him in the film, but then you'd have to wonder what a system of justice would be like in an ideal world. Because justice doesn't seem like something that we're ever going to be able to agree on anytime soon, and drawing on what I learnt in SC4215D this sem, justice or equality in one sphere only means the lack of it in another.

But hey, I don't think we can fault Light for trying. If we had the time to think about it, who wouldn't believe that our world is rotten in some way?

And if we think of the human spirit as one which constantly strives for improvement and perfection, then who wouldn't try to make the world a better place?

But then my dear Light, what on earth would we do with a perfect world? Would it even be possible for us to be happy in a perfect world? If the world were perfect, there'd be nothing to strive for, nothing to improve, nothing to make perfect. Perhaps the only thing which makes our existence worthwhile is the idea that things can always be better.

What *does* your perfect world look like, Light?

Is it one where there's simply no crime or violence and everyone is happy with what they have? Is it a world where everyone is happy because everyone has what they want? What then becomes the point of living? Do we all live simply because we are happy to do so?

I would think not.

What drives us is not just the idea that things can be better; our motivation is that we want more, we want better, and we want to be better than everyone else. And we want to know that we earned it. We want to know that we struggled and we deserve what we have achieved.

So Light, if everyone could simply have what they wanted, would anything have any meaning? Without struggle, what is anyone's life worth?

Perhaps, as it was said in the "Matrix", this is why the "perfect world" in the "first Matrix" didn't work. People had no purpose. Perhaps Light, even if you were the god of a new world, your new world would be one where nothing had meaning.

So then, would a perfect world really be a good thing? Would it be a good thing because of it's perfection, or would it be a thing of sadness because there is no longer any need for improvement anymore?

Maybe in the end, the point of the movie was simply that most people who try to make the world a better place are more likely to die trying.

I'm working from 1-9 pm these few days, so this weird timeslot means that I get to stay home till late morning before setting off to work.

What usually happens is, I wake up at about 9 am, get my breakfast, wash up and do some other miscellaneous stuff about the house, and if there's time to spare, I might sit down in front of my lappie or the TV.

Earlier this morning (or yesterday morning rather, since it's already 2 am now), while I was watching TV, one of those TV spots which wishes viewers "Merry Christmas" came on; the one with all the Singapore Idol finalists in it and Jack Johnson's "Better Together" playing in the background. In the final scene, Hady Mirza wakes up on his couch in his living room and all the other finalists jump out from behind the couch, surprising him with their presence (although if I were him, I'd be wondering how the hell they got in first).

And there's a shot of Paul Twohill popping out from behind one end of the sofa which honestly gave me a bit of the creeps.

Seriously.

Paul Twohill, popping up out of nowhere with his hair all over his face has to be quite positively the most horrifying thing I've seen on daytime TV.

No offence meant to Paul Twohill fans out there.

Feeling just a little burnt after today's training.

After such a long period of not standing out in the sun for extended periods of time and today's especially hot weather, my armguard tanline has returned in all its glory, and my face is flushed red.

All this because for last two years that I've been an archer, I've almost never put on sunblock when I shoot. And my mum always scolds me for not taking care of my skin.

Anyway. Saw last night that Joseph has pictures on his blog, so I shall put the same two pictures up here. Because I think I look nice in them. XD



I think I look better in the second one, really. Although the off-center angle of the first shot makes it look artistic. And this was taken after we went um.. Christmas shopping. A shirt for him (the one he's wearing) and a skirt for me (which you can't see in the picture, obviously), both from Esprit. So this is like an Esprit poster shot or something.

Post-exams destressing. XD

Went out after my dear had his second-last paper today (because really, his last paper isn't one that needs to be studied for :P) and lookie what we got!


Matching slippers. Haha. The pair on the left are mine, and yes, I know I have big feet. I wanted new Havaianas anyway, and he wanted slippers, since he doesn't have any at home. Oh happy coincidence. XD

Gerri is going to be damn evil now.

Please look away from the screen if you're not feeling particularly forgiving; I shall not be held responsible for any irritation which you may experience hereafter.



I'VE FINISHED MY EXAMS!!!!

Wahaha. XD

I understand now the meaning of hell and the "year 3 crisis".

SC4215D at 9 am tomorrow and SC2204 at 5 pm. Thank God their subject material is relatively similar and thank goodness I have Pam and Wilson to stick both papers out with me.

SC2210 on Thursday at 1 pm and then it'll be over.

And all I can do after that is cross my fingers and toes and hope and pray really really hard that the two A+ grades which I've received this semester haven't gone to waste.


Dear, I'm sorry to have worried you; I get these bouts of pessimism sometimes, so don't let it bother you, ok? But thank you for loving me and being here anyway. :)

There've been lots of changes in my life recently after one um.. major change. Lol.

My hall room is suddenly getting really packed, and I've somehow managed to accumulate a LOT of new stuff in what must be record time.

A new pillow.

A new pet.

A new sound system.

All in the space of... five days? 0_o

Bizarre. But I'm thankful anyway, dear. :)


Anyway, the new pet: a hamster. My first hamster, really. Before this, the only pets I had were three mice. And I'm constantly finding out in rather shocking ways that hamsters' daring apparently has no limits.

Previously, with my three mice, if they were in a high position and the ground was too far away, they would just stay where they were.

This hamster, by contrast, not only attempts to plunge headlong to certain death (if he hits his head), but even does it backwards-- yes, he even motors *backwards* till he falls off.

It's really quite disturbing. *shakes head*

But, here: everyone, meet Nuzzle.


A small male hamster of Winter White breed. Judging from his size and how often he eats and sleeps, it's likely that he isn't anywhere over a year old, the little munchkin. ^_^



It's also good to know that he utilises the wheel quite often. Although half the time, he's not actually running in it. He sleeps and eats in it too. :P


And, the new sound system, which was acquired only today:


Creative's I-Trigue L3500. This is a shot of the speakers alongside my laptop; yes, don't mind my wallpaper now. I've been told that it's the furthest thing from what you'd expect to find on a girl's desktop. :P

There's a subwoofer as well, which isn't in the shot since it's under my table.

And the whole system cost just $79 at the Creative Warehouse Sale!!

I swear, Creative gives "daylight robbery" a completely new meaning-- it reverses it; it's as if it's enticing customers to come rob the store by buying all these products at dirt-cheap prices. :P

9.30 am.

The view from my hall room's windows is better than that of my own room at home, in some ways.

At home, the only things that my windows look out on are the windows and backyards of all the neighbouring houses.

In my hall room, my windows are subtly obscured by a tree.

This morning I realised how soothing the view could be.

With the blinds down and half open, swaying in the breeze generated by my ceiling fan, and the leaves and branches of the tree itself swaying in the wind and dappled sunbeams playing upon the green and brown.

I wish every day of my life was like this.

Mornings with the sound of birds and rustling leaves, of trees filled with sunlight, and all the time in the world to sit and stare. And listen to you tell me that you love me. :)

But the books are calling.

Life... is good right now. ^_^

Coz Gerri actually got an A+ for her SC4215D term paper.

Got the shock of my life when I saw the grade staring up at me from the cover page of my paper: "Excellent. A+"

I wanna frame up the paper man. Lol.

The very first level 4000 module I've ever done, and my term paper turned out so much better than I expected. XD


And there was a second kind of shock waiting for me when I got back to hall; *that* question got asked a lot sooner than I expected. :P

Since it's already 2.32 am... I was shooting last night since our range will be closing for upgrading work on Thursday.

And I got a new top score for the 50m distance. :D

Previously, my highest score at 50m was 277/360; I think I achieved that during the NJ shoot, I can't really remember when.

And last night it hit 281.

Gerri is very very happy. XD

In the small hours of the morning, breathing in the cold pre-dawn air--
i m always quite worried
With quiet piano music playing and the sound of a keyboard tap, tap, tapping--
always feel like i shd be doing sth to mk u feel beta
A book open to pages of blue and green highlights and red lines and scribbles--
care for u ma
And a tiresome two weeks that loom ahead.
tt y i say i hv a soft spot for u

But at 2.02 am in the morning, Gerri felt loved. ^_^

Today is a good day and Gerri is dosed up to her eyeballs on happiness. ^_^

Got my Social Inequalities mid-term back today; when I went to collect it from my tutor Swu Yi's office, she told me that I'd done very well, but never in my wildest dreams did I think I'd find what I did when I flipped to the second page of my answer script to find my grade.

I got an A+.

FINALLY, after 4 semesters in NUS, an A+!!!

And I've even been asked to make a copy of my "excellent paper" for my tutor.

*cue wide eyes and dropped jaw and tiny squeal of disbelief* XD

After that, my presentation for SC4215D went pretty well too, I think. Prof Schmidt was talking most of the time about other arguments which weren't in the reading, and I didn't get much of a chance to present what I'd stayed up till 5 am this morning to finish, but I still think it went pretty well. :)

If nothing else, I've learned that economists have a very strange, twisted kind of reasoning. :P

So tonight, after a whole week of not sleeping enough, I finally have no pressing deadlines. Although I will make a trip down to the library tomorrow to get all the readings which I don't already have for SC4215D and SN2234. And I should probably start watching some course videos too.... there were some I wanted to watch but never got around to really doing so.

It's right about that time of year where it's the time to embrace muggerdom. :P

Insufficient sleep makes Gerri high. Odd, but true, I assure you.

Prolonged insufficient sleep makes Gerri slightly cranky in the mornings.

Especially when I'm functioning on 2 hours of sleep and have an early morning lecture in which I can't (and have never been able to) make sense of any-f***ing-thing the lecturer is saying.

11 hours of sleep in the last 80 hours.

I so should've picked a different module.


On the bright side though, today was a lovely, cool, clear (read: NON-HAZY) morning.

And one of the first things that I saw on the way to the Dining Hall for breakfast this morning was this very pretty sight:




I never really noticed that the trees near E Block had flowered, but it looks like a lot of the pretty little things fell off in the night. But they still look lovely, painting the ground around the trees with their light touches of pink so early in the morning. :)

And my poor little VGA phone camera really doesn't do it any justice. Sigh.

I suppose here it starts all over again.

And it's kind of difficult to see things ending differently.


I half-wish that I'd listened when you told me that I was only getting myself into trouble again.


So.

Now all that's left--

Is to count the days.

Until it's over.

Essays are finally all over.

All that's left right now is the presentation for SC4215D that I have to make next week, and the MIDI composition for Science of Music.

So I guess now it's time to start doing all that reading that I've been putting off for the second half of the semester to do research for papers.

Gerri has learned that enough stress and not nearly enough sleep only make things worse. Well, okay, I don't think I've learned that only now-- maybe it's more like someone's trying to drive a point home. Like, into my thick skull.

Halloween celebrations on Monday night this week were fun stuff; it wasn't much since it was a school night and everything, but the function hall was divided into half: the back half was a haunted maze and the front half was used to screen the movie "Saw", and lightsticks were strewn all over the floor and hung from the ceiling.

I'd never seen "Saw" before when it was first released in theatres, but after what I saw on Monday night, it's damn sick gross shit. Although when we started watching in the beginning, what struck me first was that the cinematography was amazing. The way everything kind of comes together in the end is also very telling of a well-thought-out storyline.

Doesn't change the fact that it's some seriously gross shit, though. :P

Missed about 15 minutes of it somewhere in the middle, coz that's when the maze was ready for play and two girls and myself went in.

As usual, I'm probably no fun to try and scare. Sorry. :P But the two girls with me, Mai Anh and Giang Thanh, were um.. pretty freaked, I'd say. I thought that the video clip which the Drama folks put together in the beginning was pretty good; it might've been better if the voiceover was slightly louder and not so muffled.


Just occurred to me just now that it's kinda weird; my room seems to be accumulating two people's stuff recently.

Dreams are strange things.

Sometimes we remember them. Sometimes we don't. And sometimes we think we remember something that seemed like a dream.

I remembered something yesterday which seemed familiar, and eventually, I figured it had to be a dream I had quite recently.


I only vaguely remember the earlier part of the dream; something about someone giving me the most pretty white dress I've ever seen-- and it's only the later part which becomes more vivid. Someone else tells me, "Oh, but you need shoes to go with that."

And she hands me two large paper bags, each with a pair of shoes in them.

White paper bags with white, high-heeled sandals with gold trim in them. And all the white is just so blinding that I can hardly see the shoes.

"There, now you're all ready."

To go where? And I'm reminded oddly of Cinderella.



Nicholas told some of the archery people a few weeks ago about a dream that he claims he had. He said he dreamt that one day he saw someone and I holding hands.

And two nights later, I had a dream about us surprising him by letting him see us do just that.



There's a woman in a black dress, standing before a bank of floor-to-ceiling windows. She looks out over the dark of an urban cityscape, all dots of flickering lights from this far up and not a sign of human life anywhere--
Watching the reflection of her own eyes--
Wondering why they're so dispassionate, detached.
She knows she's only living on borrowed time and light:
Waiting for just the right moment, always waiting for sometime, for someone, waiting for forever.
Just as she's waiting for someone to walk through that door.
And as if on cue, he's there.
A strange man with no face.
He's there to hug her fears away, a comfortably-firm embrace with warm hands that slide across her waist and her stomach, whispering over the fabric of the dress she's wearing; lay a kiss to the join where neck meets shoulder--
And it burns because she knows it will bruise later.
And he speaks soothing words, of watching sunrises from the sheltered safety of a bedroom's windowpane, of tomorrow, and ever after.
Her eyes don't even flicker, but her heart leaps-- it believes anything.
"Come with me."
And she can't tell if he's asking, pleading or demanding.
She turns as he takes her hand--
Wonders if she should just take what he's offering, even if it might not last--
Wonders if she should just learn to let go.
And she lets her gloves slip off in his grasp as he walks out the door.


Dreams. Maybe all we need is to read between the lines.

One day... I'd like to see a psychiatrist.

I'd like to know what they might say about me. I'd like to know if there's anything wrong with me.

We've always been told not to take things for granted. We've always been told that if someone takes things for granted, it says something about who they are, and the way that their lives have been.

I know that I don't matter to many people who know me. I know that it wouldn't make a difference if they never saw me again. I know I'm not important. I know that I can't expect anything from even the people that I value the most because I may not mean anything to them. I know that everyone else in the world can choose to disappoint me and leave me if they wish and there's really nothing I can do.

These are the things that I take for granted.

I know that I cannot tell what people are thinking. I know that everyone around me may just be lying even as they smile and laugh (with me? at me?). I know that I should never have expectations-- they only create room for disappointment, but I have them anyway, so I know that I set myself up for whatever follows. I know that everyone I know could only be making use of me. But things mean more to those who have less, so as long as they are willing to tolerate me-- for however long it may be-- I'll accept them as they are anyway.

These are the things that I take for granted.

I know it may not mean anything when someone is nice to me. I know that it most likely means nothing. I know they are most likely only humouring me. I know I am insignificant.

But I still hope I matter, and hope is a little evil in that way. Because I know that I set myself up for the disappointment that I know will come.

These are the things that I take for granted.

I was studying in the clubroom on Tuesday night, till about 2 am, when I left to go back to hall.

While I was walking back, I realised that while I'd been holed up in the clubroom, some people had gone around sticking up posters for the StompAIDS campaign.

They were *everywhere*. Really. On *every* pillar along the AS6 and AS1 corridors; you couldn't walk five steps without seeing one.

And here's the funny thing.

NUSSU Bizcomm has a bash on the 27th of October, and in the tradition of NUS bashes, its theme has some sexual innuendo to it, although perhaps not so subtly veiled: bright posters of luscious, shiny, lipsticked lips and telephone keypads proudly declare the name of the bash-- RingAFling.

If that doesn't imply one-night stands, I don't know what does.

And then you have this flood of AIDS awareness posters with their half-naked, semi-faceless models veiled in dark purple lighting, declaring that casual sex kills.

Oh, the irony.

And look at what I snapped today with my camera phone, along the AS1 corridor.



The two posters side by side, on adjacent sides of a pillar.

This is gonna crack me up for the next week or so. LOL. :D

Culture shock.

I guess it must be that way for some exchange students.

It probably really hit one such student full force during one of my tutorials on this week, during which we argued upon the finer points of meritocracy and being able to exercise one's rights and have a voice to say what you want, when you want.

So we don't have as much freedom of speech as you do. So you think meritocracy is a sham. (Well, we do too really; it's like our national inside joke.) So you think it's wrong that we're not allowed to protest. (Yeah, we laugh about applying for a license too.)

But chew on this for a minute.

Do you think a country as small as Singapore can tolerate even the slightest level of social unrest without falling into utter chaos? Your country has 50 states. Ours can be traversed within an hour.

Think about the state of affairs in your country and the way things are in ours. Yeah, so we're not allowed to burn our national flag or spit in the streets, but we don't worry about being shot just by taking a walk or by coming to school.

And if everyone cared so much about their own individual rights and so on, what would happen to social stability and unity?

Culture makes a difference. Scale makes a difference. Don't think that what works in your world necessarily works in ours. This must be the first real-life example of ethnocentrism that I've ever come across.

So you can complain about our censorship laws all you like (and really, so do we), but in the end, most of us are happy to live in a country that isn't hated by half the globe and is one of the safest and cleanest in the world. If you ask me, our freedom of speech is a relatively small price to pay for the kind of peace that's difficult to find almost anywhere in these times.

Most of us are happy enough. And sometimes, happy enough is sufficient; we can't all be perfect. So you should realise that neither are you.

Pin my paper heart to the coattails of your happiest dreams.

There's a little corner in Eusoff Hall.

It's a sad kind of corner.

In the last few weeks that I've seen that corner, there's always someone there, on the phone, looking lost, sounding sad, and unsure of why the world's coming down around their ears.

Sometimes it's someone new. Sometimes it's someone I've seen before.

Sometimes they're crying and the sniffling is loud enough to hear.

Sometimes in the words that they're half-whispering and half-screaming, it sounds like the only thing they're saying or asking is "why?"

It's a sad kind of corner.

But at least they still have someone to talk to.

I wonder sometimes if people give it any thought.

If you broke down piece by piece, do you know if there'd be anyone who'd hear those pieces shattering?


You won't cry.
They won't scream.
And no one will remember.

Social Inequalities lecture.

Talking about recession in Singapore, Asian Economic Crisis, bird flu, SARS

Justin and I agree that the world is ending.

It should probably just hurry up and end already so we don't need to take exams. XD

Gerri's Ikea day out. :)


Yesterday, kor dropped by my room. After lunch at Fong Seng, we made a spontaneous decision to make that trip to Ikea that had been put off for so long. :)

So we hopped onto bus 33 (good thing for all NUS Hall people that we have a straight bus there and back) and were back in a little over an hour, with the following:

One bedside table ("sponsored" by kor as a super-belated birthday present), one table lamp (and two bulbs which were purchased separately), one shoe rack, one doormat, one cushion, and one rug. All this for the amazing price of $54.10! :D

So now my room is that little bit more homely. :)


Now for the mini-picspam:

Here's kor looking silly for the camera, at the bus stop outside Ikea.


This is my new shoe rack, already in service, as you can see:


Here's kor putting in the bulb for my lamp; note how cute the lamp is-- it has two little "eyes", haha. I think it's meant to look like a little alien that way.

I wasn't able to get a shot of kor fixing up my table for me because he was too fast! I was fixing up my shoe rack at the same time as he was putting together the table.

But here it is in all it's lovely beech-coloured-finished glory, anyway:

Ah.. except that you can't really see the beech-coloured finish. :P Yes, that's the rug on the table. I'd originally planned to have the rug on the floor between my desk and bed, but then I thought that it looked kinda weird because there was so little floorspace! Rugs look better when they're in a nice open space.

Then kor picked it up and put it on the table, and I had an idea. So after a bit of rearranging, there it stayed. :)

So this is what my room looked like before:

I know, it was nice then too. :)

And here's the refurbished (refurnished??) product!



Finally, here are the two people that made this blog entry possible:

Kor and me! :D


And this morning, I decided to utilise the table; I was quite glad that kor suggested that I get a bigger table instead of a smaller one. :)

Meiling and I had breakfast in my room this morning; bread with Nutella, and I made cream of chicken soup with my handy dandy travel cooker. Yay. Room party for two, haha. :D


Hall is just so much fun. :)

Links to a few YouTube videos... coz I got bored while studying and you probably deserve a break too! Hee. :P Note that all videos will open in new windows


First is a video for a campaign to stop online child pornography:

Click here.

Please light a candle at www.lightamillioncandles.com and pass the word on. This petition aims to have a million candles lit by the 31st of December this year; currently about 240,000 plus are lit, and I lit the 72,000th candle-- such a lovely round number. ^_^


Next is this video for the Free Hugs campaign; I just happened to see it yesterday while I was taking a break from mugging, and it made me all warm and fuzzy inside. :) Spread it around and share in the love. :D


And one last little clip, a short animated one. I showed this to Ivan yesterday and in his words: "OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) never looked so amusing." :P

Clicky. :)


That's all, folks. :)

At some point in time, my holidays have always felt more packed than during semester time. This holiday seems to be no exception.

Yesterday was the start of a one-and-a-half day archery training camp; while I wasn't really involved (since it's meant to cater to the new juniors, and the "old school people" like us don't really matter), I was there to train myself and to help if my juniors (the current exco) needed anything. Was fun. :)

And after that ended at about 2 pm yesterday, I rushed back to hall to get ready for Arts Club's Thank You Dinner, coz Theresa and I were sharing a cab down to the hotel with Meiyi, who had to be there by 4.30 pm since she's part of the 26th comm (who's stepping down, so they're the ones organising the dinner, so to speak). Meiyi managed to stall for time though, so we got there at about 5 plus. :P

And finally, today I can wake up late and not have to rush off for anything. :)

Time to start studying for those mid-term tests now. :)

The things you'll do when you're bored and sitting down in a quiet place in school at night.

Meiling and I were sitting down at one of the benches at the Forum just now, having our dinner, and I started talking about how I'd like to rob the Co-op. I know, it sounds loser-ish, but that's me for you: people talk about robbing banks, and I dream about robbing bookstores.

So in the end, here's what we came up with:

I'd like to steal their books; some of their literature selection and some of the academic titles, because some of them really do seem interesting. I'd steal some of the stationery, like all the expensive pens and those lovely notebooks that they have from A'Zone and the like. And I wouldn't mind stealing some of the Haagen-Dazs ice-cream from the refrigerator.

Meiling would also like some of the books, but unlike me, she'd much prefer the sports merchandise (there's a small corner of the Co-op devoted to selling Nike merchandise) and Blu-Tack. Because she's crazy about it right now. :P

Damn tired.

Was running IBG road relay just now.

Our route: Starting at the Eusoff bus stop, run up to the Temasek Hall carpark entrance, then continue up the slope, past Kent Ridge Hall, past Sheares, right up to the research buildings next to Sheares. Then come back down, running along the main road outside AS7, turn into the Eusoff Hall carpark entrance and end at the bus stop.

2.2 km (that's how long it's supposed to be..) isn't such a big deal, but the slope up to Sheares Hall is effing bloody KILLER.

I think my legs are gonna hurt tomorrow. My lower back already is, and that's actually kinda weird. It's never hurt after a run before.

But anyway, on the bright side, our guys finished first. :)

They're damn fast... Allan and Peter were first and last runners respectively; they started the guys' event three minutes after the girls, and Allan still came back a few minutes before the first girl...! 0_o And Peter took only 6.5 min to complete his lap...! Wah, if he can do that on slopes, imagine how long he takes to finish 2.4 on flat ground, on a track... 0_0..

And last but not least, C Block is overall girls' champion...!! :D

When it rains, it pours.

The strange, bizarre story of my life. Like my perpetual moodswings (which apparently, are definitive of someone whose zodiac sign is Cancer), my life is always rosy one minute, and absolutely dismal in the next.

It's difficult to find balance. So much for my birthday being "Pi Approximation Day".

With regards to that, you learn something new everyday: apparently, the 22nd of July (22/7) is Pi Approximation Day, for the simple reason that 22/7 is a popularly used approximation of Pi. No wonder I've always felt like there was something I should've realised everytime I write my birthdate.

But I digress.

Whenever anything goes wrong in my life, everything that goes wrong happens at the same time.

I think I need time to find... something. I'm not sure what it is. I've been told that I need time to something which makes me happy, and not just spend all my time running around and doing stuff which just fills up all the space in my life.

But I don't know what makes me happy.

Writing used to make me happy, but my muses have been asleep a long, long time, because I no longer have the time to dream, and all the vestiges of dreamland that cling to my waking eyes in the mornings are dreams of endings and breakings awash in a rain of acid tears.

I dream of disappearing faces; I dream of arms around my shoulders that I can't really feel; I dream of empty corridors; I dream of quiet park benches where I sit alone.

I dream of broken glasses.

I dream of watching people inside a bubble.

I dream of cars passing clean through me as I walk across a wide open road.

I dream of phones ringing without anyone to answer them.

And there's that dream which I've had for the longest time, that dream of sleeping and never waking.

Except.. that dream is the only one which lingers without any visual memory. And perhaps it makes sense; the absence of vision for eyes that have lost a purpose to open for.

Must've been a long time ago that I recieved one of those forwarded emails-- you know, the kind which you're compelled to send to about half the world if you want good luck-- and I remember one of those as saying that friends are like balloons, lifting you up when things are down.

It's been a long time.

Time enough to think on that analogy.

If, like balloons, you hold them too tight, the strings cut your fingers, and I suppose both sides get hurt. And if, like balloons, the closer you are to them, the more a break in your friendship hurts; but I wonder then.. if the balloons burst, then how do people ever get friends back?

And then there are the people who seem to be somewhere between going and staying.

Somehow Life drifts the two of you closer together, but Life is never about just two people, is it? There's everyone else to consider, and sometimes everyone else makes things difficult to see, difficult to understand.

Between going and staying, between drifting away and coming closer, strings sliding back and forth between your fingers, cutting deeper everytime.

And at some point in time that my own subconscious hitherto has known better than me, it starts to hurt more than you thought it could.

No more pulling. No more hurting and trying so hard to understand. It's a lot easier to just cut the strings and let them drift away.

Twice it's been done. Twice it seemed like it'd hurt forever after it was done. Twice that I've been selfish enough to drive away what I could no longer understand-- but I wonder sometimes if I was being completely selfish if they were the ones who seemed like they could no longer bear to carry on.

Third time's a charm. The only thing I regret is that this time, someone else got caught in the crossfire.

And maybe it hurts even worse to let them go. But there's the long-term to think of, isn't there? So grin and bear it and tell yourself that it's better this way.

Because I got tired of trying. Because I got tired of not being able to understand. Because I've learnt that I couldn't handle it any other way.

So I guess this is goodbye all over again.

And I wonder how many more times I can take doing this, and if I'll ever need to anymore.

More pictures of school life and hall life.

Theresa, Meiyi and I were at studying at one of the benches at the Forum till about 11 pm last night, after which Meiyi walked back to Eusoff Hall with Theresa and me; Meiyi and I then sat around in my room chatting for a bit.


That's Meiyi with my chair cushion on her head. :D


Justin dropped by later and said he was heading to Sheares Hall for supper, so we went along with him.


I now love the Cheezy Fries on Sheares' supper menu. XD Justin ordered his with extra cheese and it looked heavenly. Speaking of which, Justin ordered an obscene amount of food for supper-- a whole plate of spicy fried rice (and the plate was not just full, it was *piled* full with rice), a packet of cheezy fries (with the extra cheese, mind), and two drinks-- and all it cost him was $5! You start to wonder why people are still allowing themselves to be exploited by Fong Seng's exorbitant prices for such small pratas. :P



Here's Theresa and Meiyi while we were in Sheares' dining hall. :) Justin declined to have his picture taken. :P


But speaking of Fong Seng... I was at said place having supper with Meiling on Monday night, and someone pulled up in a car, reversing so that he could turn in and park near the prata shop. I thought the car looked awfully familiar while it was reversing. But it was when it turned in that it was confirmed.


It was a Maserati. XD

Gerri *loves* Maseratis, and I was in heaven for 15 minutes, because I was seated facing the road and the lovely baby was right in my line of sight. XD You can tell that I couldn't resist taking a picture of it as we were making our way back to Hall. :P

Hey, you can't blame me; this is only the second Maserati I've seen in my life in Singapore. :D

Some of the reasons why I wish I never had to graduate. Some of the reasons why I love NUS.


I love the Central Library. This is a picture of the Journals collection on the fifth floor, but what really was love at first sight for me was the open shelves section which takes up more than half of the third floor. I still remember my first day of school when the librarian informed us blur little freshmen that the open shelves were downstairs, and upon rounding the corner, we were greeted with literally hundreds of shelves, *filled* with books. I was immediately besotted. :P

Yes, listen to my inner nerd waxing lyrical. :)




A sign posted beside a Literature prof's office door; most likely put up by he himself. This prof was my lecturer when I took the Literature intro module in my first semester, and he always has funny stuff stuck on his door.

The second picture is just to show you that "six doors away" is actually the door out of the Literature department. :P



After stepping down as exco, I'm now just a school archer. And this is how we occupy ourselves when the new batch of juniors are being taught how to shoot. Here's Nic and Weizheng playing tic tac toe, archery style. Other activities in the lao jiao club also include playing blackjack, *also* archery style-- a score of 21 is counted as blackjack. :)



Now for something from hall. When room doors become like a chatroom for the entire floor--posting one message after another, yelling at each other, goading each other on, and all the other things friends do for fun.


When else are we ever going to have the chance to experience things like these again...?

Getting swamped by readings all over again.

Getting so tired of trying to keep up with the workload, but at the same time, I know that I really can't afford to fall behind. Argh.

Running away isn't the solution, but it doesn't mean I wouldn't like to. However, my timetable for this semester ensures that the only "free" night I have (when I can stay up late and do anything I want) is Tuesday night, because Wednesday is the only day of my four-day week which does not start at 8 am. Sigh.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm sure I really wanna go for Honours year when I'm still struggling the way I am. I hate the system, but without the system, I have no direction, I have no idea what I'd do with myself; this is all we've been taught to be.

Who really cares what you believe if it isn't what everyone else thinks is true?


Fidelis probably hates me for neglecting her for the past month or so. She hit me in the face just now after training. On the other hand, it probably goes to show that I shouldn't shoot when I'm sick, contrary to my own belief.


And speaking of being sick, meanwhile, my throat feels likeit has a pincushion (with pins) stuck down it, and my own nose tries its very best to suffocate me.

If you're in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at NUS, then you should know by now that the faculty club's student elections are coming up soon... on the 7th of September, in fact. If you didn't know, where've you been..?

Anyway, just helping out a few friends:

This is a link to a podcast by one of the teams contesting in the election; there're actually 13 members in this team, and their website can be found here.


To all in NUS FASS, please vote on 7th September. And please vote based on who you believe can best represent you; this is not some simple popularity contest.

Overslept.

And I missed Science of Music lecture.

No, it's not that I've never missed lectures before (let's not forget that in my second semester, I skipped my E Lang and Philo lectures from week 4 onwards, haha; I *so* should've taken 6 modules in that semester.. I had too much free time), it's just that I've never.. um.. overslept through them before. :P

Oh well.

First time for everything.

But the really bad thing about this is that I think I'm falling sick. Sigh... I'm starting to wish I had Vitamin C in my room or something. I like those nice orange-flavoured types that you can either chew or suck; I hate tablets and the like.



Archery AGM yesterday was quite the farce... not enough people so it was a walkover for almost all the cells. Bleah. But it seems that there're a lot of Eusoff Hall people this year! Almost everyone who was there who stayed on campus said that they're either in Eusoff or PGP... cool. :)

Hm.. speaking of Hall, I decided to sign up for IBG (Inter-Block Games) road relay. I've been thinking of running road relay for sometime now, but since it isn't confirmed that I'll be staying in Hall next sem (and I don't even know if I'll be allowed to) and I don't have that much running experience, I thought maybe I'd just try out in IBG first, haha.

I can't do very well in all the other sports, anyway. The only other thing I could play would be netball, but for some reason, I can never seem to gel with netball players, so playing netball is kinda out of the question.

Road relay... I'm pretty good at pacing, I think-- I paced my whole JC class for 2.4, haha. Excluding the one guy in our class, of course. :D So, I figured that if I had enough time to build up stamina, I might probably be better at distance running than sprinting. I just hope my knee doesn't give out on me though. I have stupid knees and ankles and arches and whatnot.



Went over to KR last night after Archery AGM; Kristy came over to Eusoff to have a look at my room, and the first thing she said was "Waahh..!! So big!!" Then she said the same thing about Jasmine's room as well when we dropped by her room. Haha.

Then I walked with her to Kent Ridge, since it was about 11.15 by then and the shuttle buses had stopped running. It's not very far anyway, and it's pretty nice to walk in school at night.

KR is nice... very lovely and new and all. I can't get over just how much it seems like a hotel! You use your matric card to open the main door and to lock and unlock your own room too.

The rooms are pretty small; the last time I saw a KR room was when I was in Year 1 (bleah, now I feel terribly old) and I didn't think they were that small before. Now that I look at it, they're probably about half the size of Eusoff's rooms! But they're still cozy. And they have nice views. I really like their windows!

Chwan stays one floor above Kristy, so we spent a couple of hours in Chwan's room talking about archery and other crap and watching archery videos, haha.

Have I mentioned that I love staying in school? :)

So... I heard about the decision regarding Pluto's planetary status yesterday. Michelle told me about it when I got back to Hall; she'd stayed the night in my room after Bash.

"Pluto's not a planet anymore."

"Yeah, I heard they were trying to come to a decision... So what's it now if it isn't a planet?"

"A dwarf planet."

My brain goes, "What the hell??"

Me: "So a dwarf planet isn't a planet? So a dwarf isn't human?"


Poor Pluto.

Am going to be so dead tomorrow.

Both literally and metaphorically speaking.

I swear that one day, when you look up "madness" in the dictionary, my picture's gonna be on there. What other kind of idiot goes for a bash on Thursday night when she has class from 8am-6pm on Friday?

Madness. Idiocy. Gerri.

Synonymous, no.

Anyway. Doing the student helper thing in the AS7 com lab again. Watching the minutes tick away before I can scurry back to Hall to get ready and leave with the other girls. Busy ignoring my Welfare and Social Justice reading for tomorrow's lesson in front of me. Because all that it's done for the whole of yesterday and today is confuse me.

And this is only the second reading.

Saw a friend just now who's also taking the course, and as she hasn't zapped the reading yet (you're so gonna die, girl), I lent her mine to do so. She was flipping through it when she was done and she asked, "He (our lecturer) wants to explain this in one and a half hours?"

The first thing which popped into my head was: "Huh? Explain?"

And being oh-so-intelligent and being in the habit of speaking without thinking, it happened to be the first thing that popped out of my mouth as well.

But, I saved myself by elaborating: "He's not gonna explain; it's taken for granted that we've all read and understood it, so all we're gonna do is discuss."

I.e: Confuse yourself even further if you don't even understand the reading itself in the first place.

"Oh, man," was her reply.

Yeah, you and me both, girl.

We're two of the seven Year 3s in the module fighting with the remaining thirty-two Year 4s for a good grade. And if the readings carry on like this.....

Someone save me.

TGIF...? Whoever thought of that phrase hasn't seen my Friday schedule for this semester...

8-10am: GEK1519, Science of Music. All the way in Science fac. And I have to walk up the blardy slope and how many flights of stairs to get to LT 32. Even getting to wake up at 7 am because I stay in hall isn't much concession.

12-2pm: SN2234, Gender and Society in South Asia. Lunch made me a little sleepy. Maybe in future I should just go back to hall and sleep...

3-6pm: SC4215D, Welfare and Social Justice. My very first level 4 module. Woot. Wish me luck. First lecture is later, in about half and hour's time. It's a seminar-style module though, and from my experience with seminar classes, they're usually more fun than lectures. Probably coz they're more interactive and stuff. Hope this one will be the same.

So... 8 to 6 on a Friday. Sigh. At least there are breaks in between. And at least I still have a four-day week. Mondays are free. Yay. :)



Things I have found out about hall recently: was working at the AS7 computer lab yesterday, doing the student helper thing. Turns out that Bingjie's my partner for the timeslot, and his eyes yesterday were damn bloody (pun intended) RED.

So he tells me that I should be careful coz apparently there's a bout of conjunctivitis making its way around Eusoff. Eeks. And there're about ten victims already. :S Somehow this sounds familiar... last semester I heard that a lot of people staying in Kent Ridge Hall got dengue or some other fever-related virus...?

Also, last night, Yuimin dragged Meiling and me down to the function hall to go for the interim committee interviews. So we all decided to go for the IBG (Inter-Block Games) comm, since after careful consideration, we realised that that was the only "short-term commitment" comm. (IBG is only on for about a couple of weeks; after that then no more comm, haha. :P)



And in other news, Gerri has made two purchases today which make her very happy: earphones and a LAN cable. Yay. :) :) I can now enjoy my music while in the library (provided I don't turn it on too loud) and I don't have to rely on the shoddy wireless in hall anymore! It's not that NUS' network is terrible or anything, it's just that the Halls are all far away from the main buildings (hence the main area where the network is stronger), so it makes more sense for the residents to plug into the LAN, which is *even* faster. Like whoa. Haha. :D

Well, shall go back tonight and have fun. :D

Tired. Post-Rag syndrome. It's been this way for the last two years now.

Still feeling sore and bitter that we lost; that we didn't win *anything*. Our float was the nicest of all the faculty clubs' out there on 12th August; almost everyone who was there on Rag day and whose opinions I know agree on this.

Even if we didn't win, I'd be less pissed off if a more deserving faculty had won it. SDE, best float? What the fuck.

It's exactly the same float as last year; they just repainted it. "Best Float" should at least go to a faculty club which *bothered* to put in the effort to build from scratch.

I think the judges were (and probably still are) blind. With all the painstakingly-done tessellation of cans all over our float, I honestly believe our points for design detail were higher than any other faculty's, and as I've said before, there're plenty of people who thought our float should win. Heck, even some of the Halls thought so, and there isn't anyone whose opinions I trust more than the Halls' on the subject of Rag.

Or maybe they were just an overly-conservative bunch of old fogeys who took issue with the fact that our float theme was that of a casino. But that's something else that I'm proud of; that the Arts float is one which always pushes boundaries and is something bordering on controversial.

Last year when the theme given was something along the lines of dreams and aspirations for the future (it being NUS' centennial year and all), we built a float whose theme was disillusionment upon graduation and finding out that a degree wasn't everything.

This year, we're poking fun at the soon-to-be-existent IR. :)

Maybe next year our float will be a re-enactment of one of the many book-burnings which have taken place in history. Perhaps a theme about the death of creativity would be fitting. ;)


So far Hall life is good.

Eusoff Hall gets kinda noisy at night though. But I can't tell if the noise is coming from C1 (C block, 1st floor) or from Temasek Hall just next door. It's still bearable, but things could be a lot better; like how the person whose room is directly below mine could lower the volume of her TV at 11 pm at night. -_-

C block is tucked away right in the corner of the Hall though, so maybe that's why it's relatively quieter than what I've been told the other blocks are. It does mean that I have to walk slightly further to get back to my room, but the distance is still pretty all right. All in all, C is a nice block. :)

My room overlooks the swimming pool of a private house just behind my block, and while there are a few trees between my window and them, this doesn't mean I get a lot of bugs in my room. It also means no direct sunlight in the mornings. :)

Our block staircase also looks right out onto this small collection of massive bungalows; three of them, to be exact. Of the one which is nearest to our block, we can see the whole porch, driveway and front of the house, designed with Roman columns and such and painted completely white. Beyond that is another house; the one room which is visible is on a top floor; it has a massage chair, that much I can make out. :) And next to the white bungalow is yet another house of which the dining room is visible. There's a sparse covering of trees blocking, but I've seen warm lighting and a lot of glinting silverware in display cupboards at night, and someone reading the news at the table. Feels so cosy. :)

Haven't really gotten to know my neighbours yet; the most frustrating thing is that while I know plenty of people in EH, none of them are in C block! Grr.

Figure I'll get to know them soon though. Especially once you keep seeing the same people awake at the same unearthly time as you early in the mornings. :P So far, I have a four-day week, and three of those days start at 8 am. :P

Body clock has been turned upside down by now.

I just went to sleep at 8 am this morning and woke up at 1 in the afternoon.

Seven days left for Rag.

Seven days left to complete everything and make it something we can really be proud of.

We need people to dream with us, to believe with us, to work with us.

I wonder if other Raggers get asked this question sometimes: "Do Rag for what?"

It's the third time I'm doing this now, and I can honestly say that this is something that I love; I love the people that I'm working with and I love the goal that we're all working for-- but sometimes I think my faith shakes a little when I get asked, "You wanna do Rag for what?"

"Don't be stupid, can... It's a one-time experience; you only do it as a freshie."

Then again, we can't stop people from knocking holes in our dreams.

We can only patch up the holes and hold them up the best we can. And make something beautiful of it all in the end.

Busy busy busy. It's been a busy week, and things are gonna get even busier in the next two weeks.

Haven't had the time to blog the whole of last week, despite the fact that there's been lots of stuff going on. So this gonna be an all-in-one post.


26th July, Wednesday:

Moved into hall.

Thanks Weiquan for driving me to school and helping me move all my stuff into my room, and thanks kor for helping me clean the room later. :)

Found out later in the afternoon that Theresa was staying on my floor, just four doors down from me. :) This is good; at least I'll know someone on my floor. :P


28th July, Friday:

Busy day.

Up in the morning to shoot for a while, confirm sighting, do a bit of bow and arrow maintenance; rag in the late afternoon and evening, then home at about midnight with all my equipment, ready for competition at NJC tomorrow morning.


29th July, Saturday:

NJC shoot.

First shock of the day was when we found out that the target face for 50m was 80 cm and not 122 cm. This is what happens when you don't bother to read the invitation and details carefully. Nic and I were very thankful though, that Weiquan suggested "playing" with the 80 cm target a few times.

We were lazy to get a new 122 cm target from the lounge one day when we came down to train, so we shot using the 80 cm target that happened to be on the board that we were using, and did so for another two trainings, just for fun. So at least we'd had some "experience". :P

Surprisingly though, my score was pretty good; 244 out of 360.

In the end, the combined score of my team (myself, Weiquan and Zhicong) was even enough to get us into the top 8 teams for the team event. Was so happy considering that I hadn't shot in team event for two years. The first and only time I shot in team event was during my first competition in my first year. After that, my team never managed to qualify for team event, and after I upgraded to C-class, we never had enough girls in C-class to form a team. Damn.

At least this time, mixed teams were allowed for Recurve Open class, so I could have a team. :)

I managed 4th placing in Ladies' Recurve Open... getting so tired of getting 4th place. 4th place is the worst place to be; it's so close yet so far. The top three places went to these three girls from the Malaysian sports school that participated; obviously they have more time to train than the rest of us do...

Zhicong and Kenneth were saying stuff like, "Never mind, that means you're the best in Singapore lah." -_-...

Same went for Zhicong though; he was placed 5th, and if the Malaysian sports school archers hadn't been there, he would've got 2nd place.

But the best thing of all had to be that James, Henry and Connor won GOLD for Standard Men's Team.

So proud of them; James in particular since he's one of the juniors I mentored and he's really come a long, long way. I cried while hugging and congratulating him. It's silly, but yeah. I was just that happy for them. :)

Gerri is now 21.... yippee. ^_^

Was quite surprised when the few people who were still at Rag till late last night bought me a small cake and sang "Happy Birthday" for me... thankew thankew. :)

Ivan, James, kor, Beatrice, Chong Han, jie and Pam, thanks for your birthday wishes via SMS... :D Beatrice especially; considering we haven't seen each other ever since we left secondary school, I'm honoured, flattered, gladdened and ever so appreciative of the fact that you remember and still wish me happy birthday every year. :)

Kor, sorry I couldn't have lunch with you today... another day, yep? Maybe when we go to Ikea to buy my hall furniture, we'll have a Swedish meatball lunch, haha. :D (Oh, and Yuimin tells me that there's an Ikea sale going on now! Or something like that. :P)

Henry, thank you for all the trouble that you went to to arrange dinner (Weiquan told me you were jio-ing people haha); however, I have to celebrate with family, so maybe another day? :) Thank you so much for the thought, though... :)

And all the archery people, thank you for the whole blog of 21st birthday wishes!! :D


An overview of presents I've recieved:

There's my lovely baby, my IBM T60 laptop which is a present from my parents...

My aunts gave me a necklace with a key pendant:




Pam gave me a lovely seal and wax set (the kind you use for sealing letters) and two Kinokuniya book vouchers:




My little sister got me a lovely blue pair of Surfer's Paradise shorts (I find I quite like Surfer's Paradise's shorts... I've accumulated three pairs in the space of about one and a half months, haha.)





And this is the present I got from the new archery exco...


More Kino vouchers!! :D

$50 worth of them this time! $70 worth of vouchers altogether... Gerri is so gonna go on a book-shopping spree. XD


And then there's this pretty little thing Weiquan made for me, haha:


It's a pen made with the shaft of one of my damaged carbon arrows. :) May not look like much to most people, I guess, but I think it's pretty cool. :D This one's too short, so I couldn't have fletches on it, otherwise I wouldn't be able to write with it. Next time I think we'll make a longer one. Then I can put fletches on it. :D


If you haven't seen my 21st birthday wishlist blog yet...

Here's what's on it. The original idea was to have 21 items on the wishlist, but even till today, there're still 3 empty spaces. But a friend told me that apparently 21st birthday wishes are still good for about a week after the date of the birthday, and I accept belated birthday presents! :D (I get a little more thick-skinned everyday, I think. :P)


1. A sling bag (preferably something that can double up as a school bag during semester time)

2. Running shoes; the ones I'm eyeing are a pair of Asics Gel-DS Trainers. I'm hoping to go running once a week once I move into hall; it's something I've always wanted to do, and hopefully I'll actually get to doing it and not be lazy, haha. :P

3. Deutschland jacket

4. Franz Kafka's "Metamorphosis" (I realise that this story usually comes packaged with others, so it's all right if you get me something like "Metamorphosis and other stories". As long as there's "Metamophosis" in it.)

5. Vladimir Nabokov's "Lolita"

6. Vladimir Nabokov's "Pale Fire"

7. Salman Rushdie's "Midnight's Children"

8. Bertrand Russell's "In Praise of Idleness" (Routledge has a nice compilation of this and his other essays; that cover is actually the one I'm eyeing. :P)

9. One volume (of ten) of Neil Gaiman's "The Sandman" series. (If you're feeling generous, you could buy me all ten. XD)

10. A laptop soft carry-case. (((I've got this one already. :D)))

11. Earphones; the kind which really "plug" into your ears and block out all sound.

12. Jewellery; a choker, maybe? I'd like one of those wide ones made of cloth and sparkly beads...

13. A new pair of Havaianas! :D

14. A new pair of jeans, and this time, maybe one with some pattern on them. :)

15. A nice blouse I can use for formal or semi-formal occasions.

16. A pair of shoes! A pair of ballet flats would be nice; practical for semi-formal occasions.

17. Since I'll need a new set of arrows after the NJC shoot.... XD Anyone wants to pool money to get Gerri a new set of Carbon Flash arrows? Spine weight 750-14, fletches are blue spin-vanes, nocks are green outset nocks. XD

18.

19.

20.

21. As an inside joke between kor and me, number 21 is a wish for a boyfriend. Haha... :P


I wish Life were full of days like these. ^_^...

Kor's back from his Europe trip with da-sao, haha. :D

He just called and said he got back at 7 this morning. I finally got caller ID on my phone, and when I saw his name pop up on the screen when he called, I thought I was seeing things coz I knew he was away for a month, and so, me being stupid little me, hit the wrong button and rejected the call. -_-

So I called back and yeah, it turns out he's back. Haha. :P

See ya around, kor. Still wanna go to Ikea with me and buy furniture for my hall room? :D

You make running away easy. :)

What is it about the things that we seldom say...? What is it about them which makes them difficult to stop once we've started saying them?

80 kph with the wind on your face is a good feeling. If I let my imagination run away with me, it's almost like the rest of the world can't catch up and we're really escaping. Random thoughts escape my subconscious mind and wander about my head; would tears fly away on the wind and dissipate into nothing in seconds? I'm still alone in my head with the running commentary, but for now, it helps to look over your shoulder and watch the speedometer climb.

West Coast Park in the wee hours of the morning is therapeutic. In between daybreak and night-time, six-plus feet off the ground and nowhere near enough to reach the sky and watching greyed-red rope segment the purple-pink cloudy sky is enough to make everything be quiet for a while. This organised tangle of child's-play string cradles us together in its highest point, in between the sky and the sand, between morning and night; in-between, in-between, always in-between.

That you're here listening makes all the difference. Physical contact is a warm, solid reassurance-- "I'm still here" without the words-- and for someone who used to be afraid of touches, I miss holding and being held.

Thank you.

Can't hardly wait till the semester starts; it's good to have found someone like you. Maybe when August rolls around, we'll find more reasons to run away and suspend ourselves in the middle of the middle of nowhere, hanging our spirits out to air.

Yay. Germany won third place. :) That's still something to be happy about.

So, this calls for a picspam. XD

I take no credit for the lovely photos, and I make absolutely no apologies for the overkill of Miroslav Klose pictures. XD


From the Strenesse photo shoot:




I know, I don't usually like Ballack, but this shot of his face in profile is nice. I have no idea why I didn't save the picture of Podolski, but oh well. I can't be bothered to go look for the site with all the pictures now. :P


From the opening game:


Lahmi is just such a happy boy in this shot, it's adorable. XD


Klose after his second goal; I loved that goal. :D


Frings and the 25 yard line!! Woot!! :D

Against Poland:


Neuville and Klose. Ballack's just along for the ride. Quite literally. XD


Against Ecuador; my favourite match of the whole tournament, since my new fave striker duo were all over the place:



Can't you just feel the love? Klose and Poldi make a lovely picture.


Threesome! XD



This shot is funny. It looks like Schneider's getting all possessive with Klose or something. Lol.


Against Sweden; once again, Miro-Lukas galore:




Those two together are dangerous. :D


Argentina. Thank dear Mirek for scoring the equaliser.





Italy. Was so upset when they lost.


It was heartbreaking seeing all those pictures of Klose and Micha and everyone else crying.


Portugal. Hurrah for Schweini! :D






Now for miscellaneous shots:







Group hug!! :D


Aww. He looks so adorable. XD


Poor Lahmi with his dislocated elbow. Lucky thing for him you don't really need elbows in football.


Prinz Poldi and his Best Young Player award. He's always all smiles; gotta love that about him.


Poldi's personalised Adidas TunIt boot, with the words of Germany's national anthem on the inside. Nice.


Ich liebe Deutschland. :)