A lot's happened in the last three months. I've just been too lazy to blog. :P

My last exam was on 2nd May, my Commencement ceremony was on 10th July, I went for my first international competition in Thailand on 17th July, and of course, my birthday was on the 22nd.

And shortly after that, on the 27th, Joseph and I broke up. Well. That's the gist of things.


Commencement was a... chaotic affair. After the ceremony and we'd all got our scrolls and everything, everyone was trying to take pictures with everyone else. We might really never see each other again, sadly.

While we were all seated listening to the speeches, Ivan actually messaged me to wish me happy commencement. And I wondered why Joseph didn't do the same. We actually hadn't spoken for almost a month; his reservist was 3 weeks long and started on the 24th of June and only ended later that week. I never really knew when was a good time to call, and when I did call, he was always out elsewhere with other friends. He said he'd call back, but he never did. And I just chalked it up to his usual forgetfulness, or maybe he was tired and had to be up early the next day.

Things hadn't been feeling right for a long time.

I left for a competition in Thailand on the 17th, and Joseph said he wouldn't be able to come see me off coz he had to give tuition in the morning. For a minute I wondered, isn't seeing your girlfriend off more important than giving tuition..? But I decided to let it go, since he's always been so work-oriented. Eugene keeps telling me I made too many excuses for him.

So Wai Xin, Xingjuan and Weiquan's girlfriend, Jeslin, came to see us (Fred, Weiquan and me) off at the airport, and just before the plane took off, I sent Joseph a message; since it was our anniversary that day, I said bye and I'd be back in 5 days' time, and happy anniversary. I never got a message back.

Thailand was fun; we landed in Thailand in the afternoon, and the people from the Thailand Outdoor Archery Club were there to pick us up at the airport. They brought us round the shopping district, and we bought ourselves a few things. They dropped us off at the hotel in the evening so we could check in and leave our baggage there, and then they brought us to the competition venue, just 800m from our hotel, haha. So we got to see the competition venue in its early stages of setup, and then we set off to find ourselves our dinner.

The next morning the van driver who helped drive us around the previous day brought us round to do more sightseeing; we actually intended to get a look at the Temple of the Emerald Buddha, the Royal Palace Gardens and the Temple of the Sleeping Buddha (Wat Po) just opposite the Royal Palace, but when we got there, the Emerald Buddha was closed the whole day for some ceremony, and we spent 3 hours just in the Royal Palace alone! So that meant we didn't have time to see Wat Po before the van came to pick us up and drive us to TOAC's range where that was a dinner-cum-team briefing session.

TOAC's range is a nice place too; their range is small, but in a cosy kinda way. The area where archers stand to shoot is sheltered, and just behind that, there's a pro shop and small cafe where the archers can get refreshments. If only that kind of thing existed in Singapore.

The next two days, Saturday and Sunday, were competition proper. Saturday morning and the earlier part of the afternoon were individual ranking events for us; I shot in the morning, and the two guys in the early afternoon. Later we went for lunch, and in the evening we had the team event for the University category.

Fred, Weiquan and me were the 5th seeded team; we weren't expecting to win anything, since it was an international competition after all, and we thought that the overall standard had to be pretty high.

But we beat our first team opponents, Chiang Mai University, and then we went on to face Ramkhamhaeng University. And when we beat Ramkhamhaeng, we realised we might actually have a chance of winning something. Coz after Ramkhamhaeng, it was down to the top four teams, and surprisingly, of the top four, three of the teams were Singapore teams. Our team, from NUS, and the two NTU teams.

Unfortunately, because of our initial ranking and the bracket that we were in, we went against the first-seeded team first, and we lost, leaving us to compete for the bronze medal against one of the NTU teams. We beat them in the end and managed to bring home a bronze medal each, but I still think that if we'd been up against one of the NTU teams first, then we'd have got silver instead of bronze. XD

So we came back on Monday night, on the 21st; our plane only landed at 9.30 pm coz it's been delayed by about an hour in Thailand. The only people who came to receive us were Wai Xin and Jeslin again, and Fred's parents. No Joseph again, but I thought it was probably pretty later for him and maybe he was tired after work. More excuses made.

My birthday was a rather dismal one; two weeks before, I'd already received the only present I'd receive this year-- ten people in the club had got together to buy my bow from the club and give it to me. So my bow of three years now is finally really mine. Thank you Weiquan, Wai Xin, Fred, Connor, Sylvia, Joshua, Xingjuan, Serene and Joseph. :)

But my birthday itself was quiet; Weiquan and I dropped by the range in the morning to see Fred, who was still conducting training despite getting back late the night before. Then we went for lunch and I went back home. Happy birthday messages trickled in, including one from Joseph which simply read "Happy 23rd Birthday!"

And I wondered why he couldn't even be bothered to call after I hadn't seen him for almost a month.

Even the breakup was done by way of an SMS, five days later.

I suppose you're right; I'm not the kind who's good at providing emotional support. Perhaps I'm really just selfish and I keep relying on someone to make my life more bearable while not reciprocating.

And you say that your feelings changed, that you felt our relationship had gone stale. And I remember what you said in the beginning, about how you were tired of playing around-- I wonder, if you were really tired of playing around, wouldn't you have made more of an effort to see that it lasted?

I'd had my own suspicions for the last month. Everyone else has their own. And y'know what they say? They say that you've been seeing someone else for some time now. And perhaps I'm not all that surprised; you left another girl for me, after all. And perhaps... against my better judgment, I said yes to you. Because I thought at that time that you'd only realised you'd made a rash decision too late and that you and that girl were not really to be. Because I thought that you were a better person. But it seems I judged wrongly.

I've asked for all my explanations now, and I can't really tell anymore how much of what you've said is truth or lies. But if you say that you haven't got together with anyone else, then who's the girl in all the Facebook pictures that you went to Bintan with?

Maybe she'll make you happy. Maybe all the numerous girlfriends you've had all this time were really just keeping space warm for her. Maybe this one will finally last and you'll find that candy-coloured forever so many of us will never reach.

I hope you won't let her down like you have the rest of us.

But I suppose that isn't my place to care anymore.

Random reflections while mugging in Science Library.

Just washed toilet floors are not always a good thing.

Was in the loo just now, and when I entered a cubicle and happened to glance down at the floor, I noticed--to my horror--that because of all the water that was still covering the floor and the flourescent lights above the cubicles, I could see what the person in the next stall was doing!!

And then I quickly averred my eyes and checked the floor of my stall.

Okay, mine wasn't so bad. And then I quickly did what I had to do and scarpered. :P

Compared to the Honours Thesis, the ISM is basically just "an extended term paper", but with a topic that's entirely up to us to choose. 5000 words, compared to the Honours Thesis' 12000.

Thesis has a page for acknowledgements, where you can thank all the people in the world if you want to. ISM doesn't.

So here's my list of people to thank.


To my supervisor:
Prof. Waterson, words cannot express how grateful I am to you for being so understanding, for giving me the time to finish what I started, for helping me to conceptualise and structure my paper.


To Mr. Michael Fernandez:
Thank you for an eye-opening experience, for sharing your experiences and those of your compatriots with me. It's not everyday that we're allowed a glimpse of how different things were, seen through the eyes of the remainders of a time that has been allowed to fall through the cracks and cemented over.


To my teammates in NUS Archery:
In my years at NUS, archery has always been my escape route. Thank you all for giving me somewhere to run away to. Even if it's just our crummy little range and lounge which SRC refuses to renovate or upgrade or improve. Thank you to my bow, Fidelis, for living up to your name and being my loyal companion all these years.

Thank you to all the archers who lived in school; for all the dinners, the late night Bridge (and German Bridge) sessions, mugging together, watching the guys play Counterstrike at night, room parties with green bean soup, red bean soup, chips and tidbits and movies and anime.

Thank you for being so much fun, the whole RVR gang; Sylvia, Connor, Nicholas, Huiting, Mengyi, Xingjuan (although you only stayed one sem) and Joshua. I'll miss living with you guys.

Thank you for the breakfast company on Thursday mornings, talk about shooting in the future and bitching about SRC, Wai Xin and Weiquan.

Thank you to one of the most stressful people on the face of the planet, my dearest Joseph. Thank you for always telling me that I should be working, for always telling me "you can do it", for being the chalk to my cheese, the night to my day, the sedateness to my hyperness, and when we both go a little bit nuts, it makes my day that much brighter. :D


To the Sociology Honours class of 07/08:
Thank you for the fun and laughter, the times of shared stress and deadlines and "Jiayou(s)!!" all around, the birthday parties and cakes and outings, the whiteboard in the Honours room that almost always had nonsense doodled on it; thank you for all the terrible jokes and wonderful times.

Thank you to Weida; coz you're such a great class rep, sending all those emails and communiques and helping us ask for extensions, and thank you for always asking, "How's your ISM?"

Thank you to Wilson ("task-oriented!!"), and Ling; the quirkiest project groupmates I've had in all my four years at NUS, and all that time we spent tearing our hair out trying to juggle the Urban Anthro project and our ISMs at the same time.

Thank you to Shawn Chew; just for being you, haha. And for wearing that silly shirt with the departures board on it. That shirt always made my day. We never did get around to that whisky appreciation session... haha. The image of you high on whisky coke will remain with me forever. :P

Thank you to Dorcas and Shufen for "mothering" the whole Honours class; Shufen with her Royce chocolates and Dorcas for being caring and always so cheerful.

Thank you to Eng Soon; keeping you awake during class was a challenge at times, but it was always amusing.

Thank you to Nicole ("neko!"); for being the one person I could make silly noises at, and have them made back at me. ^_^

Thank you to Yan Ping, for always being so quirky. Good things come in small packages.

Thank you to Dongchou, our resident "North Korean", for your wry sense of humour.

Thank you to Greg for the prayers and the advice.

Thank you to Pamela, my oldest and dearest friend (I sound like a book...); we've definitely known each other for too long. :P But it's good to know that you're still just about the only person I can talk to, wherein our conversation never has to make any sense, and yet we still understand each other. :D

Thank you to any other Honours folks I haven't mentioned yet; I just don't know exactly what to write for you guys! Bobby, Fiona, Charissa, Charmaine, Isabelle, Wei Loon, Melvin Chua, Melvin Lim, James, Yi Ding, Mas, I'dil, Hafiz, Jonny, Diana, Si Ying, Adeline, Pearlyn, Sheilla, PJ, Ana, Clement, Xin Yi, Daryl, Charlynn, Chongwei, KC, Winnie, Daniel, Bianca... and everyone else, because I know I've left out people, but I just can't remember all of you... :P


Thank you to my family:
To my parents; for making me the person I am today, for nagging me, for pushing me, for not giving up, for loving me in your own very different ways.

To my maternal aunts; without you, university and all the experiences which I have gained through it would never have been possible. I have lived on your borrowed dreams.


Thank you to people who don't fit in the above categories:
Thank you Eugene, for being the annoying, sarcastic pain in the arse you always are. Hahaha... Well, in all seriousness, thanks for all the fun times and the overnight mugging which seems so long ago now. Thanks for being a great kor, and here's hoping that your Masters application goes through, and we can all go to New Zealand and run wild for a couple of weeks. XD

Thank you Alex, for keeping me awake on MSN when all the essays were due, feeding me pictures of hamsters, YouTube videos and various other things that make time fly by. :P

And last but not least, the most unsung hero of all unsung heroes in the writing of any essay: my laptop. Thank you for not giving out on me when it was the most crucial time!!

I'm in a strange kinda mood at the moment.

Still doing reading and drafting for ISM at this time. Got allowance for extension, but my new hand-in date hasn't been finalised yet. Thank god for such nice supervisors.

I've gone mad lately, Tsubasa Chronicles has come back to haunt me with a vengeance. I remember when I first got my laptop almost two years ago, I found all sorts of amazing things on YouTube at the same time. Like the fact that you could watch whole episodes, whole seasons, whole shows on it for free.

And I stumbled on Cardcaptor Sakura clips, and out of curiosity, decided to watch the whole series. And then that led on to Tsubasa (Reservoir) Chronicles (TRC), the most confusing crossover series I have ever seen, despite the amount of fanfiction I read; not only do characters appear almost randomly and not necessarily in their original kind of roles-- this "crossover" is canon. And to add to that, TRC's universe can be terribly complicated and confusing.

Also promptly fell in love with the music for Tsubasa Chronicles. Kajiura Yuki is amazing.

I watched them off YouTube till episode 40, after which I stopped keeping up-- the series was still broadcasting in Japan then, and you could wait anywhere from two to four weeks for a subbed version on YouTube-- the waiting only became obvious when I caught up to where they were showing, and then at some point I just didn't bother anymore.

So I'm on a TRC craze at the moment. Always happens. My wallpaper folder has about ten TRC wallpapers, my desktop is hosting one currently, and my Tsubasa music folder has only increased slightly.

"Aikoi" (from the fourth TRC soundtrack) has been on repeat for the last three days; it keeps me awake. Works almost as well as caffeine. Or better. Since it looks like my system is metabolising caffeine faster and faster now.

I remember in year 2 Alex used to take caffeine pills to mug, haha. Dunno if they ever worked as well as caffeine though. I never asked.

Ah, caffeine. The world's most popular and "legal" drug.

Decisions, decisions.

Today was a good day at work. Well, several good things happened, really.

Although I woke up late. XD (Good things seem to happen everytime I wake up late for work...) But I'd packed my stuff the night before, so all I really had to do wash up and rush downstairs and buy a curry puff from Old Chang Kee for breakfast, then wait at the bus stop. And the MRT is lots faster than the bus, so I still got to work on time with almost no hassle at all.

So, I suppose the first good thing is that I managed to make it to work on time.

Secondly:
I'd kinda gotten it into my head that I wanted to try and see if I could finish off what I have early, so that maybe I could leave early, since there's competition tomorrow and the day after.

And I did manage to finish early; at around 4 pm (I'm supposed to be off work at 6 pm), I'd cleared my desk, and Priscillia and Evon (the nice ladies who let me know what I need to do) were shocked. I think I'm getting used to it and I'm getting faster. Lol.

Priscillia found some other stuff for me to do, so I took my time with it, and was done at about 5.45 pm. At which time they told me I might as well go off early. Heehee.


So, off to get my timesheet signed by Joyce. I'm still not really sure what her role in the office is, just that she's right next to the GM's office, and I think she's something like the office secretary. Coz everything in the office seems to go through her.

Joyce handed me my new timesheet for the month of March, and at the top of it, I noticed that my pay rate had been increased from $7 to $9 per hour. And Joyce tells me that she's given me that rate for my February pay too. Wheeee.

So that's the third good thing.


Joyce also asked again when I'm graduating and whether I'd be interested in working as permanent staff; told me to give her a CV when it's nearing the time I'll graduate.

And then when I was walking to the MRT station, this lady called Jocelyn calls from the office, telling me that apparently, the feedback about me has been quite positive, and asking me if I'd be interested in a permanent job, and about an interview next week.

Fourth good thing.


So now I'm thinking... should I be considering part-time Masters instead of full-time Masters now? If I even decide to do Masters? Hmm.

I feel... kind of like I've just done one of the most stupid things in my life.

Something in me knows that it's not really that important, and yes, it's true, I don't really need it since I'm graduating this semester, but still.

People train long and hard for this, people work for this, people fight for this; and I gave mine away.

I don't know why. Sylvia says it was nice of me to do it, but I *know* that I'm not a "nice" person. So I don't know why. I really don't know why.

Finally..!!! My IVP Gold trophy, which has eluded me for the last three years!! :D

Good competition for the whole team as well, and for the first time, we won more awards in the higher Recurve categories than in Standard.

So, first time shooting 90 arrows instead of 72; my individual score on Saturday was actually quite lousy, I think.

My 60m round went fine; score of 211 out of 300. Good, I suppose, considering that I only finalised my sight for 60m on Thursday, when I went down to Zhenghua to shoot with Wai Xin and Weiquan.

My 50m and 40m rounds, on the other hand, were not as good, at least not by my own expectations. I missed the board twice in each round, and ended up getting a score of 230-plus for each. If I'd landed those arrows, my 50m and 40m scores would've been nearer to 250... damnit.

Tired, lah. Plus my stupid cough wouldn't leave me alone and go infect someone else.

But it turned out to be good enough. By the end of the FITA 900 round, I was ranked third, but first for IVP, since the two girls with higher scores than me were not in IVP. NTU held both Open and IVP Outdoor together, so technically, this means that IVP archers will be ranked in both categories. So in Open, I was ranked third, and in IVP, ranked first.

So, individual knockout on Sunday for Open; damn shocked when I found out there's IKO on Saturday-- I haven't been to a competition that had IKO for almost two years...!

But went well, haha. Me versus an NTU girl first; 3rd vs. 6th. I forgot her name. Oh dear. I won by 12 points.

Next, me vs. Winnie Khoo from RP. She's actually pretty good! :) The two of us were talking crap half the time, behind the shooting line, *at* the shooting line, walking to collect arrows, talking nonsense while collecting arrows... *rolls eyes*

It's actually the first time I've ever been friendly with an archer from another club during competition, haha. I usually keep to myself and only talk to NUS people. Must be getting soft in my old age. :P

Beat Winnie by just one point. Really close. In the first end, I led by one point, in the second end, she led by one; in the third end, we tied, and in the final end, our arrows had almost all the same score: we each had one yellow, one red, one blue, but one of mine in red cut the line. XD

So, onto gold medal and bronze medal match for myself and her respectively. Me against a girl from HTNS, she against Crystal from NTU. I ended up losing to the HTNS girl by just 7 points, but at least it was a good fight. I knew she'd be pretty tough to beat anyway. :)

So 2nd place in Open instead of 3rd; IKO actually turned out to be a good thing. Lol.

I wasn't in the team event, but Linette, Mengyi and Serene later beat the NTU girls' team to get Gold for team. Yay. NUS now officially holds both the FITA 900 Ladies' Golds. XD

At the same time, Joseph, Joshua and Connor beat the NTU team they were up against to get bronze. That was a great moment, man.


The best picture of the whole competition. Hafiz with Joshua halfway over his shoulders; Connor and Joseph in the background on the left. A little to the right is Mengyi, and that's me hugging Serene.


Now for more pictures.


FITA 900 Ladies' Team: Linette, Serene, Mengyi
Gold Medal




FITA 900 Men's Team: Connor, Joshua, Joseph
Bronze Medal





FITA 900 Ladies' Individual (Open): Me!
Silver
(the guy standing in first position was just collecting the trophy for the girl coz she'd left early, but his club made him stand up there and take the picture, lol.)


FITA 900 Ladies' Individual (IVP): Me again
Gold


Standard Class Ladies' Individual: Sin Kei
Bronze


All the medallists, plus Coach in the middle...


...and one of the whole team. :)