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. :)

So I suppose that's the end of it.

Two different kinds of ends in as many days.

Today, I'm finally just an archer. Today I'll let go.

Thank you Henry for making the decision to take up this post. :)

Thank you to our juniors and everyone else who made our term memorable and good; I hope we'll all do the same for the 06/07 Exco. :)

Good luck, all of you; the stage (or is it the range? :D) is yours now.