About bread, and irritants in the library.

And so, I had a plan.
I envisioned me happily eating my

ham and cheese sandwich,
or my

strawberry yoghurt sandwich,
or my

peanut butter and jam sandwich.

But they all went down the chute today (literally) when I woke up seeing my bread had turned mouldy.
:(

The images were obviously googled (my bread spoilt, remember? hahaha)

And then I went to the library.

At first it was okay, maybe a bit of noises here and there.
And then the girl in front of me talked to the guy in front of me.
Oh yeah, I'm okay (but no-so-okay-already) with that, since she is sick and whispering might aggravate her cough.
BUT THEN THEY JUST WON'T STOP TALKING.

omg it's so bloody irritating.

The guy would do work, then the girl would tap him after a short while (i swear it's not even 5 minutes), he would turn around, they would start talking again, and then he would turn back to do work and she would tap him and yeah, you get the drift.

I couldn't take it after a while and had to listen to music.
And then I could hear them over the music and had to crank up the music more. -.-
As if that wasn't enough, I looked up from my paper to suddenly see her sitting on him hugging him. -.-

Like seriously?

And then when she finally got off him, a friend came in a while later and they started chatting.
Have I mentioned I was in a library?

urgh.

Eventually a librarian came in and told them that it is a silent study area and if they wanted to talk, they should talk outside.

I'm being dreadfully honest here, I had to force myself to not smile. I was soooooo happy.
LOL.

I'm so mean.

Why you shouldn't give a damn.

I meet annoying people a lot of times in my life who constantly do unfair things repeatedly. And honestly, it is getting increasingly draining dealing with them. But really, sometimes they do things to push you to an end, and you just go "You know what? You can go die for all I care, I've had enough." - No, I don't mean literally, I'm not that mean.

I like to rationalise my actions. I try to be logical no matter how illogical I may sound to others. And so, reasons for why I shouldn't give a damn about these people anymore.

1. The cliche "they aren't worth it". I don't care how ridiculous this sounds, but people who constantly push you to the extremes really aren't worth your time, effort, and friendship. As bad as I may seem for being the one calling it quits, I argue that I am just reacting to other party's behavior. Not giving a damn about the person anymore is really, a favor to that person, because really, when I don't give a damn anymore, it's when the person has repeatedly behaved unfairly towards me. And so, not giving a damn is better than dissing the person.
2. They are just being very selfish. Honestly, when people behave in ways that repeatedly annoy you, it's because they are only thinking from their POV. I know people are selfish; everyone is selfish to a certain extent. But really, there must be a limit. The world doesn't just revolve around you and your small little world. Just because you want the attention doesn't give you the right to behave in ways that cause others unhappiness or inconvenience.
3. They self-victimise/self-pity. I always have a theory about people who engage in self-pity. Giving in to them equates to indirectly telling them that they were really a victim of a certain situation and that they could do it again because it will work. Guess what? I don't fall for that. I give this analogy. If you fall and scrape your knee, you get up on your own feet again and do something about it. If you just sit there and cry, then may your wound infest and you die from it. Because really, unless you are in one way or another handicapped, you have no reason to rely on others for your well-being. Well, unless you pay them. Then yes, you have the right to rely on them to nurse you and babysit you.
4. They do not self-reflect. I can't hang around people who do not self-reflect for a very simple reason. They behave as if the world only revolves around them and they are always right no matter what they do.It is absolutely irritating because these people are too narcissistic for me. If you love yourself so much, I guess you can spend more time with yourself then.
5. They don't give a damn about you too. This is probably the most direct way of seeing that you don't have to give a damn about them too.

And so, no, I am not going to give a damn about you. So there. 

Dreams.

Do you have dreams?

Will you press on to your dreams?
I badly want to open a cafe in the future, one that sells sweet desserts, good (and sometimes unique flavored) coffee, good food.

I have so many guinea pigs for my sweets now. ^^
I tried so many new recipes; sometimes repeated recipes because Melvin likes it (every once a month, sorta a way to celebrate the day that Melvin and I got together).

Nutter's Madness

Panna Cotta

Tiramisu

I lost the drive to find more photos. hahha. 

My thoughts are everywhere. I want this, I want that. I actually think sometimes, I want to learn how to walk before I crawl. I will probably fall very hard if I continue with that mentality. 

Melvin and I were discussing that I should start an online business first before going out in the open with a cafe and everything. Just talking about makes me so pumped up that I don't want to study. 

Oops. 

Back to Earth for the moment, maybe? :P

Sucha procrastinator

that's me alright.
i blame the weather.
i blame my house for being cold.
i blame the lack of motivation for me moving around.

i blame everything except myself hahaha

i want to nuaaa.
but you can only nua if you feel warm and comfy right?
And i'm not warm and comfy yet :(
It's one of the warmer winters already but i still feel cold because the place i am living in is filled with windows and it's horribly cold with windows as they are poor conductors of heat. as such, my house can be freaking colder than the weather outside.

SO UNFAIR!

i want warm house :(

and i deviated from my main post.
i am a procrastinator because i only spent 15-20 minutes tagging photos and i am bored from it and have stopped.
maybe it's my computer. the screen is too small.
hmmm.

All Travelled Out!

I think I've been so busy during this holiday travelling!!
"So busy that I haven't done any academic stuffs that I am supposedly supposed to be doing"

Went to Geelong a day or two straight after exams

What we bought to keep up filled up during a 1 hour train ride! :D 

I LOVE 5 AM YOGHURT! :D

a hazy morning? nahhhhh a FOGGY ONE! :D #imsomean 

a typical Aussie tea! (it's dinner actually, but they call it tea. hmmm) 

a fireplace, a working one! #seentoomanynicebutnotinworkingconditionones 

typical aussie breakfast! Egg in a Nest! :D omnomnom

Went to Sydney very closely after
*i havent got the photos uploaded yet. "me the procrastinator :("*
i will update with photos soon haha


Hopped off to Bendigo, Ballarat, & Warrnambool thereafter!

Mine tour at Bendigo!

All geared up! (without our headlights yet!)

And then it was day two to Ballarat!!

Welllll. We have to stop by for the best hot chocolate when we come across it don't we? :D

Housemate phototaking session! :D

me looking EXTREMELY happy with my hot chocolate!! :D


Sovereign Hills in Ballarat!!

Day three was waking up pretty early to head to warrnambool after a fast breakfast in the hotel room!
oooh and we saw whales at warrnambool! - what we were actually after hahaha!

awww. i don't actually have a photo of the whales we saw.
here's a photo of me with the sea as background instead hhaha!
the photos won't actually do the real sightings justice anyway.
but omg it was so fascinating cos the whales were SO NEAR US!!!



me being macho pumping the petrol :P

I'm pretty tired of travelling at the moment!

Although I shouldn't be complaining!
So thankful for being given the chance to do all these while I am studying! :)

*rest rest! i want rest! haha*
"growing fat in winter :("

First-world problems, you say?

And the time of the year (well half-year actually) has come.
The dreaded exams.

And I totally have not got into that mood (not that i should require one; i have to study whether i am in the mood or not) to study.
I should get started on my 2000 word research essay.
But here I am, doing a 2000 word blog post instead.
I'm exaggerating, it won't hit 2000 words.

Anyway, I have been going out for brunches! teehee

 "and made my own tooo haha!"

 

spending relatively a lot of time with the boy (oooh coffee and muffins! :D) 

and no-bakes for the boy :)

and a rescue pack for friends (on a first come first serve basis haha)

and i recently just made like 3 over batches of Rocky Road to sell for fundraising for Royal Children's Hospital!! I do have many photos of the brunches, haha, but none for my pretty Rocky Road :(
Was in too much of a hurry to actually take a photo.
Aftermath of this was a decision to abstain from making Rocky Road for a loooooong time (as much as i like it, i think i value my hands more - the whole process of cutting it to make it look pretty almost killed my hands).
But seriously, I'm in such a mood to bake, and to cook.
I'm like seriously EXCITED, ECSTATIC, *insert any other excitement-related word(s)* to finish my education and chase after my dream(s).

Maybe it would hit me soon, maybe I would start regretting this decision of mine once I join in the rat race, who knows? But I think I would regret it if I don't start following what my heart wants me to do. Well, technically, my heart is pulling me both ends at this point of time - which means I'm stuck and don't actually know what the hell I am going to do when I graduate. I know I should NOT think of this during this period of time, but it's precisely these kind of moments which make me go, 'I really want to sit down at a cafe and contemplate my life over a cup of coffee and story book'. I know fully well that when exams end this thought gets thrown off right out of the window.

Alright I should start reading on my essay. :'(

PS did i mention that I love the kinder bueno over in Melbourne? omnomnom

Education - For society or for me?

You know how you just finished a lecture on inequalities and you go, damn. there is inequalities EVERYWHERE. Yeah, I always end up with that thought.

And then I always think of it from the perspective of a Singaporean. Last week's lecture was on education inequalities - on whether education was a form of inequality.

I would have argued that the compulsory education up to secondary school in Singapore was a good indicator that it was not a form of inequality. It was equalizing all of us. But then I think through the kind of education that I went through - endless tuition, piles of homework from school AND tuition, supplementary classes in school AND supplementary classes from tuition for year end exams.

And I start to wonder, it is a norm for me and my siblings to get tuition, and we don't appreciate it. It isn't because we are rich; the average in Singapore can afford it, the poor can't, but I have seen many parents slog their guts out to earn money for their child to go tuition. Maybe the poorer students would appreciate the extra help at tuition more, but I knew I wasn't one of them. Tuition turned to be a norm because we (parents, not us) are so afraid of losing out. You see smart children getting constant band 1s (85% and above if i remember correctly) in tuition . Heck, i even had a student in my tuition class who was going for a primary 5 tuition class when he was only in primary 3 or 4.

SERIOUSLY?

Remind me again what tuition is for.

Do we argue that the education system is flawed? What we have created now is Elitism, where the smart might be made up those who just had more resources than others. And so why do we fight that way? I've heard so many stories on how students are selfish and won't share how to solve a problem because this would give them some form of advantage. Why so selfish, you ask. I ask, why that bell curve? Instead of creating a cohesive learning environment, we created a competitive environment where each individual goes "everything for self (society)".

Everyone fights for what the society wants - "Business and banking will take you far, son," says father. And son goes on to business and banking. Note that I didn't use daughter in my example. "Oh business requires a lot of traveling, not good for girls. If you do go in, just do HR". I'm stereotyping. I admit, not every parent does this, but this is what majority of the society is made up of. Well, you do see more and more girls in the education system in Singapore since it is mostly based on credit. But the direction? - Business Business Business. "So why are you taking business?" - "because my parent asked me to, because my friend is taking it." "Well, what about what you want?" "I don't know."

It's not easy to get into business though, you usually see the best going in there. And who are they made up of?

As if competition is not enough with the locals, foreigners join in. Honestly, I've worked with a few in my group assignments. They are either slacking off, or their standard of English is totally off. Standards of English can be improved, but you wonder sometimes. How did they manage to get into your course with THAT standard of English. I won't even hide the shock - no make that horror instead - if they told me they were a scholar. And you thought a minimum of C6 was required for an entry to a business course (or any course for that matter) in the Polytechnic.

Opportunities.

Who gets them? Or maybe I should frame it this way - Who has the better capacity to gain the opportunity? Resources are so important in today's context. It has been proven again and again in research that the rich would have better access to resources, and their opportunities for future success are much higher. And so, may I ask, whose interests is it in favor of for accepting foreign students (Please, don't use the word talent)?

Still equal?

Think again.

Books for Life - I'm a Nerd :)

Did I mention that I have been reading quite alot lately? I read quite a lot of books that I have read before, like Cleo, The Time of My Life, The Book of Tomorrow, etc. And yeap, I also read a few new books.

I finished The Way We Were by Elizabeth Noble. I found this book rather heart wrenching at the end, because unlike many other romance books, this book doesn't have a happy ending. :( But it was realistic that way. Ending it happy would result in so many others feeling unhappy. And something that I gained from this book by Melissa

"You've got to stop painting yourself as some kind of victim. You're a volunteer. You're making victims of everyone else... Your life has been what you've let it be."

Well, I re-read The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks. At the end of that book, I found that there was actually a sequel for this book. *gasps* I JUST HAD TO READ THE SEQUEL. haha. "you can't read like 3 chapters and leave yourself hanging there right?" - so i got the pdf book. and i finished it in a day. "while my assignments were like piling" I KNOW. i should kill myself sometimes - always shirking that way. eeps. BUT ANYWAY, that book was really good. and i think it really shows the importance of the efforts that one puts in into a relationship, not just today and tomorrow, or 1-2 years down the marriage, but through the whole marriage, for life. And slowly, just slowly, you start to realise, that if a person loves you enough, 'not romantic enough' is just an excuse, an excuse for the lack of trying.

and guess what i'm doing now. going back to Running Man and laughing till my (non-existent) abs ache at the episodes. ah well. i can study tomorrow. "Shoot me now"

Busy as a Bee!

I was supposed to come up with new year resolutions for 2013.
But i guess it's a little late to come up with a list now that i am already a quarter into the year.
No!
I did not procrastinate.
All I did was do the things that I was supposed to do daily and poof!
Time flies.

It is easter break next week!
That means a week free from school!
I should start behaving like a year 3 student and do my work properly.
Because it is this period of time when we start chionging right?
But i feel so sluggish.
I don't want to do anything at all.

I blame the lack of sleep sometimes.
I get up at like 730AM everyday but i refuse to think that it is a normal waking hour because everyone stares at me with the 'WHAT?! HOW DO YOU WAKE UP THAT EARLY EVERYDAY?!'
I blame everyone for making me think that I should slouch around till idk 10am?
I feel myself getting lazy.

I think I am kind of overloading myself with all the different modules i am taking this sem.
They require too much thinking.
I don't exactly like thinking.
Well, I do like thinking sometimes, like when I am alone and all.
But the thinking level they require is like at level 100 when I think my brain activity level currently supports up to say 50% only. Each time I do my readings I have to read the sentence over and over because the whole structure doesn't seem to make sense to me. I can't tell if i am the only one having this problem.
But i guess its just me. No other Soci student is complaining much.
I would like to console myself by telling myself that they just don't do the readings.

Well, a dreamer can hope.

Talking about dreams.
I haven't been having much dreams for quite some time.
BUT EVERYTIME I TALK ABOUT NOT HAVING DREAMS I START DREAMING ABOUT THEM.
Most of the dreams aren't that pleasant I might add.

Occasionally i get ridiculous dreams but they are all realistic dreams, not totally illogical. I once made an illogical dream, and i woke up because i knew it was a dream.

Something got me thinking a little yesterday. I walked past a sec school friend. He was smoking, something totally different from what I pictured him to be while we were in sec school. He was athletic, and he just somehow screams 'go healthy' to me.
Then i started to think if it was the friends that he mix with over here and if it was peer pressure. And then i wondered if he is now totally different from who i thought he was. And then i scolded myself for passing such a judgment. He was just smoking. it wasn't that big an issue. Well, not that big in Australia. Okay, not that big anywhere i guess. Smoking doesn't really change a person.
And then i started thinking about how some people would say 'I would NEVER smoke. I would rather DIE than smoke' but are now smoking anyway. Have they forgotten what they said? What changed along the way?
And then I started thinking about one of my friends who told me he smoked in the past, like social smoking, as a sort of blend in and be cool thing, but stopped when the phase passed and i wonder if people who did not stop then ever stop. Will the phase ever be over?

My thoughts are so everywhere.
But yeah, i got to start my brain moving.
It isn't moving enough.
So many thoughts, but no links.
I ALWAYS MISS THE LINKS.
:(

Irritants.

i think my life is getting more stale than ever.
Well, apart from the weekends haha.
We had an American theme Housewarming last saturday! :)

Anyway, this isn't my point of today's entry. My point is actually a question.

Do you ever meet people who irritate the heck out of you but you refuse to say much because you feel that you should maintain a certain level of friendliness to him/her?

I seem to meet these people all the time and they annoy the heck out of me.

Don't mistake my silence for tolerance. I'm a generally peace-loving person, but seriously, I have zero tolerance towards people who push their luck too far in my face.

How nice it would be if there were no irritating people in this world. However, there is apparently no equality in this world. As such, there is a need for the poor to recognize the rich, just as there is a need for the presence of irritants for one to appreciate the goodness of the nice. I know this has no relevance but I'm taking soci this sem, i need to justify myself coming to blog because uni students are apparently not allowed a life. Another social convention that we can do away with. Who came about and imposed all these social rules? -Yes i diverted. I have this tendency.

Back to my point. I really can't stand these kind of people anymore. I really want to just go up to them and tell them to grow up and leave me alone because i find them so annoying. Why do I have to be polite to them?! I try to rationalize and I came to this conclusion (from a psychological perspective).

It has to be a form of survival instinct! In order to increase the chances of survival, an individual will try his/her best to avoid all forms of confrontation (reduce chances of being murdered :O) and try to conform as much as possible (blend in as much as possible). (I just had to theorize all these hahaha)

Yes, that was just me bullshitting. I didn't answer my question at all. There is so much that is left to be unsaid; because if there was anyone that I had to speak to about this, it would be the person(s) in question(s). Going around badmouthing them would just make things too tiring for me. Because, what do you know? The world is small. The stories sometimes get back to the people themselves.

Back to School

School has started for a week already!
I can hardly believe it has started when it barely ended (thanks to summer term haha)

Well, at least i know for sure now that i will be graduating by the end of this year! :)
Sho happpppyyyyy. :)

I'm worried though. I don't want to commit to a route yet. I can't stand it when people ask me what I intend to do after this. It's such a pain. I have to go into another round of explaining why I am not committing to a particular route. OH AND THAT DISDAIN on people's faces when they realize that I have not made a decision yet.

Oh get over it annoying people.

I will not answer any more of such questions if you aren't genuinely interested but just want some juicy gossip. it isnt that juicy anyway.

Time

Time passes fast sometimes. Time passes fast when you have things to do, when you are enjoying yourself - somewhat.

I'm kind of enjoying this solitude moment, where time seems to slow down. I could get used to this, I think.

And I just have to share this hahaha.
Well, I just came across this really funny lullaby. Well, it's not funny when you sing it, you would think it has a calming effect. Wait till you read the lyrics...

'Rock-a-bye baby, on the treetop,When the wind blows, the cradle will rock,When the bough breaks, the cradle will fall,And down will come baby, cradle and all.'

Well, I wouldn't have really paid attention to the lyrics of this lullaby - AT ALL.

Now that I've typed it out, you will stop wondering why babies WON'T stop crying when you sing them lullabies like this already?

I pretty much got the answer. If I were the baby, I would cry too. I mean, putting me on the tree? And not on a secure bough (branch) at that so I would fall when it breaks?!

Pretty sure this was invented by a mother who clearly got enough...

Haha. This is what I heard yesterday. It was so hilarious. I couldn't stop laughing.

Anyway, Sat was so cool. I went to the government house in Melb!!! OMG I SO WANNA STAY IN THERE. It's so pish posh! And you see those old European stuffs here and there. And there is Queen Elizabeth's signature!! alright I should stop acting like an idiot just because she has the same name as me. There are tons of Elizabeths out there.

But it's just so cool.

Did I mention I've never been to the government house in Singapore? Such a shame. Can ANYBODY go with me? It's so annoying. Whenever I mention it people will look at me as if I'm crazy and yeah... I end up not going. But seriously!!! I think it would be a grand looking house too you know. :(

Alright I should stop rambling.
I really wanna see fireworks though.
:(

*Sigh.. if only i can get this amount of words out for my report as fast as for my blog...
psht.

Fresh Start - the smell of solitude.

Been spending a week plus over in Melbourne already.

It's crazy. I'm in school almost everyday - well actually i think everyday because i really need to sap on the internet from school HAHAHA. "don't wanna get an internet plan when things aren't cfmed"
Weekend comes and poof, its busy once again going for inspections after inspections.

Week starts and I have to do readings and prepare for tutorials and lectures.

Next week is going to be really fast track and I wouldn't even know what hits me i think. "freaking out a little with the amount of extra readings that i have to do for a summer intensive subject."

But oh well!

I'm pretty much settling down into my own personal space (:

Settling Down

Flew back on the night of 4th Jan.
Not the best flight I would have.
"Seems that bad luck ALWAYS befalls me whenever I am alone"
Then things would happen to make things back as it should be or even better :)

I got a centre aisle seat, and diagonally in front of me was an empty seat by the window because someone puked in the previous flight and the people wanted to move because it wasn't cleaned properly.
le sigh..
I'm not complaining but I wished she did not actually mention it or spray something so that I started to smell it for awhile and make myself feel a little sick too.

Anyway, I couldn't really stand the people sitting in front of me. If I had that many kids in future I would kill myself if they were so irritating and rude. They were quite noisy from the start of the flight - fine, I could live with that. Just when I was going to doze off into lala land, they had to spill (i would like to think) water - COLD WATER on my feet. I don't know what they were doing but I know it was an accident. Still, an apology wouldn't be too much, wouldn't it?

Throughout my whole flight I just had this stomach twisting feeling, like I knew something wasn't going to go well, and it really was true!! :(

No starbus when I arrived. With no Aust number because I decided to cancel mine, I tried to use my SG number to call. While they left me waiting there for ages and so, I decided to take SkyBus. Well SkyBus only sends one to Southern Cross Station. Supposedly smart me thought I could just take a tram back with a 2-hour pass. Smart me could not compete with the transport system in Australia, which decided to change the system to only accept Myki cards from 29 December 2012. I couldn't believe my luck when I read that flag at the tram station. Deciding to save on that money instead, I walked home. See! Doing this saved me $3 in the end.

I headed to town later in the morning since I arrived at like 8AM at my apartment. With just one thing in my mind - getting the Crazy John prepaid so that I would be able to contact my parents and boyfriend, and friends too. Told to wait 30 min before I could insert the SIM card in, I waited, thinking that all will be fine. And so I bought a few grocery stuffs while waiting. When I tried to put the SIM card in, it could not be read!!! I went back to the shop and asked for help. The salesgirl told me that my phone must be locked. She was not going to refund me. "I wasn't even going to ask for a refund but whatever". She didn't know where to get my phone unlocked. In a state of trauma now, I didn't know what to do and I just subconsciously walked into Vodafone across the road. The guy was so nice! He told me he knew one nearby who could do unlocking of phones and directed me there. After speaking to the girl at the shop, I was beyond distraught to realize that I had to leave my phone there for 2 days. Then the change for the better came. She asked me which carrier was my phone locked to. I said Singapore. She said that was quite impossible because Singapore phones are rarely locked. She let me try out 2 of her SIM cards (SO NICE!!!) and when they both could work she told me it was probably a faulty SIM card. And so, I went back to Crazy Johns AGAIN. The guy helped me do a SIM swap and told me to put the SIM card in after 30 minutes and that the problem might take about 2 hours to be solved. Patient me waited for like 2 over hours at home because my frozen food could not stay in the open for too long. When 2 hours came and there was still no service, I went back down again. He tried and told me it couldn't be done. Thereafter, he said reception could be poor there and I should go out and try. After half hour of trying and an encounter with a begger, I went back in and said it could not be done too. Resigned to fate, I left after he told me to come back on Monday so they could request a refund for me when the manager was there. GUESS WHAT I DID. Yes, I refused to think it was my phone's problem and walked straight into Vodafone as if with some newborn purpose. Imagine my happiness when the salesperson heard my plight and inserted his own microsim into my phone. I have never been happier seeing the whatsapp messages in my phone. I spent over 30minutes in the shop and I left happy with a new plan (postpaid at that). There were no registration charges (YAY!) and although there was lesser data than what I could get with Crazy John, I am GLAD that everything turned out fine in the end.

Monday came and i went down to the shop again. The manager was busy :( and I was waiting there for awhile. The nice guy that helped me before told me she would take some time and told me to get some lunch before coming back. I decided to walk around a bit before going back again. When i went back the second time it was finally settled and my stomach was not that twisted anymore! (JOYYY )

Well, that twisted feeling could be due to my worry about not being able to finish moving by the time I am supposed to move out too. HAHA.

All's better now! :)