Well, at least now I can swallow tablets!

Hey twenty eleven, you're such a bull, charging at me.

I'm still squatting on twenty ten, clearing the clutter it has spilled over,
and here you come, now seven days in my face.

Yet I rejoice each day, as much as I think things could be better,
right now it's enough, and I want to be contented.

Tomorrow marks the beginning of twenty firsts to come.


Hey friend, it means a lot to me we can talk like that over ice cream, with no icy awkward air.

It's been a while and much has been happening - good, bad, boring.

It's gonna take a while to catch up.

It's Christmas card time!

I got home 4am from supper, and ironically I'm very hungry.
Had such a good fun time laughing and talking with dear ladies Pang, Ang & Tng that all the supper's digested fine.

But I'm so filled with gladness this friendship has come this far.
We can be ourselves and be heard and loved.
Appreciate every bit of their concern and honesty.

It was a precious time speaking our thoughts out and this is such a precious friendship :- )

(see, it's a smiley face ^)
Went for my first 21st party ever, dear birthday girl is Amaris Chen : -)
The exciting hooha stuff happened at night, she reserved her dear afternoon for the few of us, simple girly affair.



Love the decor, all handmade!







We had a sushi making competition HAHAHA



Old school love, blowing balloons and eating ice sticks







It was a lovely afternoon, I was floating in happiness HAHA
So glad to have this time together before she zips off for so long so far !!







The simplest things with awesome friends just become amazing.

Blame it on the Asian culture of being expressionless, blame it on towering human pride.

There are times I wish I can pry my mind open and let my thoughts translate into words, that can hopefully add encourage to someone.

Hey Cousin, the divorce is through, it's alright and such a man isn't worthy of you.
Hey Aunt, you're a beautiful and strong woman, I hope you're not lonely.
...

Maybe these words will always remain
Unspoken.

-

It's quarter four again, this weekend.
Completely lagging with blogging about what's been going on
*goes to reply emails obediently*
...

I don't think I'm a very ungrateful person.
I give thanks for goodness poured into my life quite frequently.
But I don't do so well when things fall short of the image my mind paints, or believes in.

The mirror, the real reflective one, and the Word, have been showing such an ugly image recently.

-

Something irrelevant:
It seems that someone rather important living near me left recently, the blanket thingy stretched from Tree #1 to Tree #15. Yet the sounds of mahjong tiles bumping around echo through the night.
Wakes are really for the living, never the dead.
Please don't play mahjong at mine, maybe Wii or PS?

(photo taken with Korean iPhone App Pudding Camera. Try it!)

This morning we discovered the soldiers on Boss K's table decided to conquer Scotch Tape (it's the magic matte quality one btw). Maybe the office had a Toy Story night.

I love public holidays and their eves!

Tonight I stood in the bare auditorium reeking of old liquor and past wild nights.

Our voices went, bare and naked, stripped away of the melodious company of all the instruments that we are so used to having, and filled the stale air.

It was rough, but very real, like sincere hearts are.

That started Hope, and that brought us to this place.

Bareness and emptiness give way to endless possibilities and new stories.

Glad I am not just witnessing the sparkling new auditorium to come,

but have a chance to work my hands for a few bricks.

People always treasure what they work for more.

Today I went for the wake of a schoolmate whom I barely exchanged ten sentences with..
Who would have known that 4 years after graduation, we will all meet at such an occasion?
This probably made many of us young dudes realise we really do take for granted the idea of having a whole life ahead.
Ironic how a loss makes one heavier.

I sat listening to his fight the past months.
I heard about his pain, his little joys and his thoughtfulness.
Perhaps when we are driven to a point we have nothing left to care for ourselves, we give selflessly whatever's left.

Time steals, and time relieves.
Hey, I hope you are somewhere beautiful.

This is lil Bobbly head Stitch, he sits on my iMac but he's currently missing :- (
It's been almost two weeks of climbing up white steps and hiding my sleepy eyes, little giggles and yawns behind the iMac.



+ With some bits of:



thoughtfulness & reasons to celebrate



Sweet lunches with caring friend & hilarious friend, all missing TDS



Painting and getting hands stained with happiness



Being the "reception auntie" (tsk x 100), selling badges, watching awesome Pi 1 in the reception
and being a happy part-time Usher



Dating the chickens and my new boyfriend ;- )


Some joy, some surreal feeling of "okay, I'm actually living my dream, riiight?", lots of dreaming and living in the future (idealists...), and sleep.

Visits at Tanjong Pagar will be received with a hug!

Today is the first day of work.

Greeting of Muji notebook (never mind it's lined), 3 boxes of name cards, a book + all white studio + yummy Indonesian lunch + lots of .ai and fiddling about + put it on the walls! + chats + coffee tasting (part of research!) + "you know, a lil like Inception in a logo?" LOL + very very sleepy.

Learning much
Need to overcome my terrible sleepiness (cannot function before noon) and atrociously short attention span.

I know I'm back to reality when hot air blows at my face, people who dress funny bypass me, and that stinky cheque is not finding its way to my mail box :- (

My first day of reality is very sweet though.



Accompanied Nuo bustling around looking for out-of-stock Japanese Yen before she zaps off to awesome Japan in a few hours' time! We shared much and found many coincidences, like how she just saved the print of the lil' badge I got her on her comp, and sermons about adoption. :O
Awaiting your safe return, and many faith-filled stories :- )



Visited YT at a certain white box
Just think of her when I see cats and whales.
I'm serious about filtering out bad thoughts with whaley earlies leh.



Amaris is on an exciting programme, and very soon her Mandarin will be as awesome as dumplings. I'm awaiting my presents from the States hehehe



Nice .5 hour phone calls and much bravo in Amanda's life, esp with Greece coming up,
I'm sure you'll have a fine Friday lady, fear not!

☝

Here we are, all flying around, bustling about life, and finally getting somewhat on track.
Makes my heart very glad.

The night ended strawberries sweet with a lil' ride on the still-foreign-to-us purple line with Pang, (what are the odds of us meeting in OC on such a fateful day!) and my fav busride.

Reality would be sweeter if I don't have Annex B on my To-Dos ;- (
But Oh Happy Day, Happy Day
~

We went nuts on our last full day in Melbourne. Spent some time in Central and did some last minute shopping, that involves say, 3kg of abalone macadamia nuts.
Poor Joel had to lug them around.

Tried their Jap food, rather interesting, there's vermicelli and peas with teriyaki chicken, tastes very chinese. Anyway this is the scene that happens before every meal, the cameras snapping away.

Had a lil' detour and stopover at Rose St Artists' Market,

Melbourne's craft scene is very encouraging but it's also very much of:

Cruised down Brunswick St and settled our last meal at Little Creatures.

https://www.littlecreatures.com.au/
It was worth that lil' hole in our pocket.

Great place!

They are really a beer brewery place and this is the dining hall they set up in Melbourne.

We had a pipsqueak cider before

Smoked Salmon with......smthg and mustard sauce, very nice la

Pork Belly

Chocolate Creme Brulee.
oooohhh~

❻

Hello!
It's Day Five in Melbourne, and I'm sitting here with Heineken and grinning silly after an awesome day,
sharing our Conference thoughts (finally HAHA)
Will fill up all the days in between, check back "soon" :- )

We went on a touristy tour today to Phillip Island, it was really good.

We started at Moolit conservation park, looking at animals Australia treasures



Dingo.
So charming, this little fella



hello Cong!





Feeding the wallabies was precious to me
We discovered a wallaby with a newborn baby one in its pouch, just.. wow.

>



We went to Koala Conservation Centre but the grey bums were lazing around somewhere, we only saw a few of them.

>

The Churchill heritage farm after that was much joy.



ZY, this is for you



Xin, I thought of you and our kampong life.



One of my favouritest animals^



mehhh





This is what they have at the COOKHOUSE hahaha
(the blocked word is "cheer")





The stop at the Nobbies took my breath away



We saw the light rays coming down, illuminating



Walking on the boardwalk, little us and the huge ocean all around, waves crashing



Today, I realise how it must have been to see Jesus walk on water



and that gives me strength

>

We ended the night seeing little penguins marching home from the tough seas, back into their little burrows for erm, exciting nights.
Couldn't take any photos/videos, so you may wanna check out
http://www.penguins.org.au/
Amazing how the little ones survive in the vast oceans.

We were on a good tour, one man show, he is the tour guide/chauffeur/food person/deejay...
and on the way home he's playing Snow Patrol's You Could be Happy,
made my day complete. ;- )



See you in two days :- )
I'm actually looking forward to being back,
running low on cash, and it's almost getting too tiring to have fun.
Old liao.

❺