The last boring Saturday evening

Still contemplating whether to get the stuff from ikea. Procrastinating, am i. Again.

Although i can sleep in relatively spartan locations, i wish to get something comfy in my room for... theurapetic reasons ?!?? lavender oil would be nice.

saw some space-sharing stuff from ikea today, liked the idea of converting the air we breathe into storage space. dunno why i need so much storage anyway, its like, well...

still waiting for bryan to reply me, well that bugger is waiting for me to call him, so that we can probably go ikea and get my stuff.

well aaron says that the camp starts at 3pm tomorrow, gives me ample time to go to chinatown (party world ktv?? ) and sing the hell out with shunji (shit, then got camp somemore! cannot cheer now, siao liao), then rush down to NUS via harbourfront mrt and bus 188. quite gay man, two guys singing in a karaoke lounge. dun think anyone else's going.

oh yeah, that *toot* wang is coming back from Blue County on sun too. Hope he brought along some good shit for consumption (that is probably the best stuff to buy, everything from China is pirated i guess. Anyway why buy there when u can have the "Made in China" label so easily available :p). He got himself in Raffles Hall (which i think needs two bouts of repair as compared to...?). Say its close to Engrg. Well. Guess he's gonna miss abit of orientation also.

monday in camp, then go for matriculation: damn sien, at 4:30 for tans. continue with camp. break at wed for pharmacy briefing cum pharmacy camp OG (Hooga!) outing... which is damn EX, cos its at NYDC, maybe it stands for Now Your Dollars Come. Must learn to withdraw money... must learn to withdraw money.

i hope i can make lotsa frens in the coming orientations! and not be too shagged out.

the last saturday where i can serenely watch tv from 7 to 11 and msn at the same time. man, i'm gonna miss tv and the folks.

The way to counter email deficits

Sent an email to OSA, the contents written below:

To whom this may concern,

I wish to stay in Sheares Hall, however, the website http://www.nus.edu.sg/osa/hms/studenglogin.htm is not available.

Please make the necessary arrangements, thanks.

Regards,

(my name)

(my email address)

to make sure they get the mail, and dun accuse me of not sending the mail, i put their email address in the "To" column, and my email address in the "Cc" column, so they will see that i have a copy of the mail too.

Like army.

Some things, must ying ying push, then, will see results one.

Registering for hall

Received a mail from OSA today. The date on the mail: Thursday, July 21, 2005 3:43:17 PM.

Wha, u mean nowadays email also got delay? Must wait for postman one?

Maybe i'm just exaggerating, or i checked it late. there's more.

"Dear (my name),This is a system-generated notification for (my name), please do not reply.
Your waiting list request is successful in SHEARES HALL.
You must indicate your acceptance via this website http://www.nus.edu.sg/osa/hms/studenglogin.htm and contact the student accommodation office for your check-in arrangements latest by 24-07-2005."

Clicked on the link, and:

1st try:

(NUS logo)

Sorry, the page you're looking for cannot be found.
The page you're looking for is no longer available or does not exist.
Please go to our site map to locate the information you need from there, or use our search engine to help you. If you have bookmarked this page, kindly update your bookmark.
If you need more help in finding what you're looking for, please find out the relevant contacts in our Contact NUS page.

2nd try:


The page cannot be displayed

The page you are looking for is currently unavailable. The Web site might be experiencing technical difficulties, or you may need to adjust your browser settings.

er.... now WHAT???

---

today went to sheares hall with my parents (tried to incognito but chio spotted me, haha), to discover that the admin staff are not there. cannot check in. sien. must wait till mon.

oh yeah then orientation starts on sun. siao liao. what to do? where do i sleep on sun sia? bunk in with someone else? take 51 back then come back on mon? haha i dunno, man. blame it all on my procrastination.

The Aftermath of the Aftermath

woo... asked adrian on thursday about my hall app. i got in. went out with christina at night, walked from orchard road to somewhere near orchard towers to have subway, talked quite a lot of crap in the between, alot about plans after we move into hall. quite long (was it 3 years?) since the last time i went out alone with a gal, haha, felt kinda awkward. can't display the behaviour that i usually do when i hang out with leo and ws ("hey, loser!")

friday: adrian told me to settle checking in today, cos by thurs all the ppl that went in the normal route (ie not by waiting list) already moved in with their barang barang, all decorated their rooms and got their keycards, known their neighbours and stuff lidat. my neighbour probably suspects that a ghost is living beside him. yes i'm utter lazy!! firstly i pon swimming with ws and edwin (haha too tired, went to bed at 12 am but slept i guessed at 3!!! thinking too much i think!, woke up at 8am, and too shack). so we met for lunch at 12 pm at the BANZAI! dunno-what restaurant. then was thinking, maybe i can go nus and settle the admin stuff first so made a few smses here and there and found out that i needed $450!!! and my wallet at that time only had about $4.50!!! (plus $17 that edwin owed me), and my debit card is with my Dad!!! so we went to play pool instead. Drank bubble tea at $1.30 (with jelly and pearl!), it was a refreshing taste of JC life. the pool balls sucked, kept missing.

then later went to visit my boss (identity secret) at SGH to give her the Stuff. The Stuff is my precious collection of Info, which... to cut a long story short, is worth about .... $100. not much cos i'm lazy, haha. Anyway she asked me to meet her at 5, so i went to Harbourfront to walk walk. Saw some very nice stuff there, but hell ex. Resolved to go Giant instead, nearer also. Then hafta met Dad at his workplace at hill street at 6:45, so i decided, dunwan to spend any more $$ on mrt, just walk from Outram Park to City Hall, along New Bridge Road. Passed thru Chinatown and saw alot of old ah peks staring with gusto at the disgusting-dressed ladies. Eeewww.

Reached Funan centre at 5:45pm, decided not to hang around for an hr, so went to Fort Canning. Frankly i've never been there b4, not that i remember. The road up is #$%^&^%$#!!!, u can't see much of the city as it is blocked by trees, but there are some exhibits of the British fort along the way and some old stuff of the 14th century. There is also a place where there lingers nice smells, i guess it must be the Spice Gardens. Very exquisite. Oh yeah, ROM is there too, now i know why ppl wanna take pics at FC when they register. Cos they are lazy.

Met with Dad at 6:45, drove back home to fetch the rest of the family and we went to Giant for dinner and shop. Bought alot stuff, like stationery, some tumblers, files, Thirsty Hippo, (har, that's all?!?) for hostel use. Will try to get the rest of the stuff on sat.

Things to get for hall

1. the stuff from sheares camp should provide an approximate gauge for a week’s living:

Apparel:
Undershirts x 03
T-shirts x 06
singlets x 05
jeans x 01
3/4 pants x 01
home pants x 05
saf towel x 02
Undergarments x 07
Ziplog / plastic bags to store used / wet clothes

Shower kit:
Soap, shampoo, conditioner, facial wash (x 01 set)
Toothbrush, toothpaste (x 01 set)
Toilet roll x 01
Eau de cologne

Footwear:
Running Shoes x 01
Slippers x 01
Socks x 02

Working materials:
Stationery: pens, pencils, rulers, stapler, hole puncher
Writing paper (3 A4 pads), notepad
Plastic file (for sheares admin, the rest will come later)
Handphone charger, mp3 player charger

Water dispenser x 01
Water tumbler x 02 (one mobile, one for room usage)

Pharmacy:
20 x 2x200mg Carbamazepine (for 10 days, bid)
10 x 500mg Paracetamol (5 doses)
Plasters, antiseptic soln
Thermometer

Personal Kit:
Spectacles
Wristwatch
Homekeys
Handphone
Wallet (with door keycard)

2. other items

Synthesizer + 2.1 speaker system + stand
“understanding epilepsy” poster. If I can find a suitable nail first.
Bolster + blanket
Detergent

erm... what else?

Into Hall I got.

They say the darkness is darkest before the dawn.

Today is Thursday, 21st July 2005. Scheduled event: karaoke at party world KTV with sheares camp people (guestlist refer to previous posting).

About Tuesday, Shawn said he couldn’t make it. Ok, that brings the total down to eight. Can’t persuade Christina to come. Then today at about 1600, Jeannie and Amanda wanted to bail out cos they were moving into hall…

I looked at my refurnished guestlist and exclaimed: 4 ppl , no girls…

Called Adrian, he told me to postpone it… well so much for organizing outings man, one simple outing seems so difficult to organize. Well, its nobody’s fault, just a twist of unforeseen circumstances – how would anyone know two weeks ago that today’s moving in day!! Should have suspected something was amiss cos yesterday’s msn was flooded with people (10/14 attendance, a record, even at 2am!!), all with the caption “moving house” or something, that they’ll be too shack to do anything else TODAY.

So I cancelled the karaoke… very sien, Kwen even called me at 1500 to confirm the attendance and I, one hour later, have to reject him on the spot..

Dejected am I. Then I smsed Adrian about my hall application, since I was about to ask him tonight (primary objective).

Guess what? He replied “I just called them, congrats, you have a rm!”

On the graph of Mood versus Time there was a sudden shift of the graph from Mood = (-extreme) to Mood = (+extreme). It was like someone just x (-1) to the graph (in other words, reflected it upon the x-axis, but for those of ya who dun know what the hell I’m talking about, maybe I can draw the graph for ya, haha)

Hey, if I have anymore of these kinda shocks, I fear I may turn manic-depressive man.

Told mum. First thing she asked me: What is the number of your room?

Reason being: lottery of 5 million.

P.s. thanks to christina, if u prayed! haha hope u did eh

So i'm not staying in hostel after all, maybe

The day is 19th Jul, the closure of the waiting list. Morale is low. They say when you're on the waiting list, all you can do is... wait. For someone to back out.

No use blaming OSA now. The past few days have made me contemplate whether i truly wish to stay in hall. It is not a whole-hearted reply. I could cite reasons that i want to stay in hall, yet i could cite as many reasons why i do not want to stay in hall.

It seems, that after the Pharmacy camp, that the reasons against staying in hall have made more sense. From the feedback that i've gathered from the seniors, it seems that year 1 is gonna be a tough year ahead. Not the 'honeymoon' year. If you want a Honours - and a good honours in that matter - the fight starts NOW. Not next year, next sem, or next month.

But will it be a repeat of JC? I slogged my guts out - joined only one ECA, returned home from sch immediately - to get my current results. Yet, some people have acheived better. This time round i am hoping to decorate my future portfolio with more down-to-earth achievements, acheivements that display to potential employers that i'm not just a mere bookworm.

When i joined the Hall camp, i thought i had found a niche, a place to thrive in. The four days of being with these people made me think that i could actually be what i what to be in university. It prevents what i call the "zombification process" - just hi and bye to acquaintances you know when you walk around in campus, thereby shutting myself into my own social world. What good are such hi-bye relationships? And the friends that i've made during the four day camp - it will be hard for us to further interact, as our paths probably do not intersect much either. They are all good people, and they have unlocked something in myself - which i do not fully understand, but am eternally grateful to them for this. During the helpout with rag, i made more people - people that you could really talk to, not statistics that fill up lecture theatres.

Now the only thing left to do is wait, for a reply that will possibly never come.

Yet, whatever the reply might be, i will still be confused. Accepting the offer - as well as declining the offer - both, with a positive viewpoint, is a win-win situation; with a negative viewpoint, is a lose-lose situation.

I am in a quandary.

Pharmacy Lab Quiz on Safety Precautions!!!

Wah lau haven't even start sch got this kinda shit liao. On 4th Aug, right smack in orientation wk.

Have to wear proper attire: jeans, labcoat, good t-shirt (ie no sleeves), etc. no contacts but no prob on that haha more for them girls.

Read the guidelines on safety precautions they have on the website, was 18 pages, managed to reduce it to 10. Found out i needed to brush up big deal on my JC Chem
(e.g. why dun pour water unto sulphuric acid (conc) but pour sulphuric acid (conc) to water?
suspected ans: sulphuric acid mist would be formed)

have to read up on stuff like PCl3, phosphorous trichloride, i think it's used to intro Cl groups into organic substances, or to form acid chlorides, or whatever shit.

sien.

btw, i think i'm booking the party world ktv today, for 10 ppl as planned.

expected guestlist: 1)me, 2) amanda, 3) jeannie, 4) kwen, 5) shawn, 6) lip hwee.
not-confirmed guestlist: 7) christina, 8) jiexin
not going: 9) aaron due to rag prac (really hardworking guy man)
seniors: no response...
if lanlan only 6 ppl are confirmed then i'll try to drag some more ppl in... hopefully.

ala jacta est.

Pharmacy Camp: Debrief (Part 2)

Day 3: went to sentosa again. by this time i was quite sien about going there liao. oh yeah saw the chem eng / civil eng camp ppl there, amongst them Chio, Gabriel and Aaron (from sheares camp), Jiaxing (sec sch classmate) and Cheryl (jc band junior). quite a reunion, haha. played games until lunch, this time round more chances in the water, which was fun, dunking ppl in the water! one event was the shampoo game, which the gals from one team have to pass shampoo water to one gal, shampoo her hair, and they have to accumulate the foam from her hair in a pail near the sea. the other team will be armed with containers containing seawater to douse the foam. defensive tactics include using the team's guys' bodies to shield the incoming water. quite fun, haha.

after that was lunch, and the gals all had ice cream lollies (haha) brought from 7-11. haha kinda funny to see them in a circle all eating icecream. then came some scavenger hunt, where we had to get some stuff, like 1) digging tool, 2) some coconut leaves, 3) a coconut, 4) shuttlecock, 5) tissue with lipstick marks of 3 colours, 6) peacock feather, 7) some 10 straws, 8) can't remember. we met the ppl from medicine along the way, haha saw Leonard with his new crew, about 3 guys and hell lotsa girls. (better than me.) all the OGLs were wearing t-shirts with the "M" logo in the centre, reminicing of Superman.

anyway we got all the items except for the shuttlecock (who would play badminton on the Beach?) then we had to bury them in the Mining Game, which was quite stupid. Opposing site would be trying to dig for our items and us for theirs, so we had to throw waterbombs at those ppl with newspaper armor (only these ppl can dig). The first group escalated into a serious catfight, by the time it was done and our turn, we decided to simply have fun with the waterbombs. Stood in 2 lines like armies during Napoleonic times, and we slugged it out. Haha had more fun inflicting "friendly fire" over the gals rather than at the other team.

after that it started to rain, so we went back anyway to chalet. Dinner was a good buffet, with some "celebrities" like Dr (?), a lecturer that i'm gonna see when term starts, and some established seniors. Lin Liang (primary sch friend) came too but i din't say hi, cos she was totally another lady now, can't even recognise her face (last glimpse: pri 6). then after dinner was the skit (Talentime), which wasn't going too well for my group but nvm, it was fun to act out what we have been discussing for the past 3 days. dressed me in some character called etna mode (from the Incredibles, which i din't watch), but i had a sore throat from all the cheers, so can't really act anything, haha. After that we had a mini-bash at the OGL's chalet where games were played and those evil gals saboed me and Justin, the only guys playing the game into drinking bottles of Heineken. Tastes like urine + chinese medicine, drank about half a bottle of it.

Then after that, at about 2am, we went to Changi beach to see ah kua, and do some stargazing. Quite sleepy then. Stayed for a while, then we made it back to the chalet about 3am sharp. Damn Sleepy by then, the OG group separated, i went back to my own chalet and bathed, then slept at the chalet living room around 4am.

end of day 3.

day 4: woke up around 8 am. curry puffs for breakfast. prize presentation. photo-taking. break camp.

Pharmacy Camp: Debrief (Part 1)

Day 1: arrived 30mins late. didn't expect the pharm gals to be so early (haha still rem sheares camp). very shocked to see that there was only one guy in my group, other than the OGL Justin, and about 9 gals. ok, so the ratio stands at 2:9, not too bad after all. later in the day, found out that he was another senior (wtf!) so feeling daaam weird having to mix around with a group of Girls!!! shat. later much later, i was to find out that there are only 6 guys (as shown in the camp pic) among about 50 campers! ratio: 12%.

after icebreaker, which was quite useless (can't remember any names of the gals even after playing Whacko! just running about aimlessly) we went on Amazing Race, which is, yes, islandwide. Stops: Jurong East, Tiong Bahru, Esplanade, Bugis, stop at Tampines. At every stop u had to find the station master and do whatever task is on hand. Initally i found it quite fun, but later on around Esplanade-Bugis it was damn shack, all that walking took its toll. When we reached Tampines, it was about 7pm and i was quite worried that i wun't get my medicine on time (feeling damn drowsy at that time). had dinner at tampines.

9 pm when we reached chalet. surprise! they mixed all the groups up and i suddenly had to know another batch of ppl. luckily, there were 4 guys and 8 gals in my chalet, amongst them Edwin, so it wasn't too bad. Relaxed, bathed, etc for a while and about 11pm or later went back to original OG group and discussed the "skit". Discovered that: a guy amongst 10 extremely loquacious girls bursting of ideas wasn't very good. Because we had to do a skit on some story about some tribe and that there were clues given along the way (all the clues given on day 2 only), the gals made up many many versions of their own stories, many many times sidetracking into their own fantasial versions. Sometimes i want to laugh at them but decided against it... can't contribute much either. Ended at 2am. These gals have stamina.

Day 2: Sentosa. lousy weather marred most of the day, so it was quite sien. Saw the stupid macaw show at sentosa again, reminded of sheares camp. there were so many games, i can't remember what we played. feeling kind of sien the whole day. Just remembered running around the whole island playing games again, taking different buses, going here and there, until i dunno what's going on except to follow the group. up till 4:30pm when we ended at cable car station chewing some banana amongst the fifteen of us in our group. really quite turned off - and possibly tired - by the end of the day.

took bus back to chalet. after dinner, some night games which was supposed to prepare us for the incoming Fright night. quite sien actually, no adrenaline rush by the time they finished at 11 pm. then - went into discuss our skit, again. ok, this time tried to contribute more, couldn't really bear sitting there and doing nothing and watch them yak, someone has to set them in some direction, if not the right direction, somehow.

discussed skit until about 1am. then fright night, i went with some gal called Shulin... which was great since she wasn't scared at all, cos i was abit scared initially. and somehow i needed to "dang zi dan" (block bullets) for her. so we went, they have 4 stations:
first station was some abandoned house, quite creepy cos it was Damn Dark. i resisted the urge to use my handphone light, just relying on the 5cm-long, 0.5 cm lightstick which wasn't much of a help. plunged into the darkness and felt some hand grabbing my left leg, really shocked. That was good, haha tried to act hero by saying some feng liang hua to the guy in the darkness. Haha.
Second station was, there were 2 ladies looking like sadako, and we had to comb the hair of the lady sitting on the floor. her companion gave us the comb, but then she didn't wanted her hair combed, so anyway the comb was with shulin, so she gave 3 combs and then the seated lady turned around and "boo!" then i think shulin laughed or what, the actor also laughed, then it wasn't so bad, haha. wa, she has some guts man.
Third station: we had to collect some powder that was lying along the staircase to Old changi hospital (OCH). the slope on which the staircase was had absolutely no ppl at all, i calculated. no living soul would possibly be able to take it, but by a stroke of luck (i think), changi hospital was occupied by the NTU sports camp or something, there were about 30 actors scaring the hell out of 100 campers, so there were hell lot of screams echoing from OCH, which kinda unnerved us but we got used to it.
Fourth station: we had to get all the stuff we collected and perform a ritual on this doll called Sally who was sitting beside the building wall. can't read the instructions on the wall, can't stand it, pulled out my hp and used its light (quite cheating, haha). finished this very quickly while shulin stood watch. reported back to find out that, what, this was the last station? no fun. Then the ppl there tried to unnerve us by saying "did u see sally walking out? you must shout out loud" then i got shulin and we went back to scream our lungs out, until a senior came to stop it. haha there was no sally at all.

ended day 2 at about 3 am.

the last NKF show

just saw the NKF show on Channel U. normally i would have turned it off, but for some reason i watched it. it was the one with the foreign artistes, i think i saw jeff chang inside.
because i thought, this could well be the last NKF show ever to hit singaporean tvs. some signs that this show is worth watching:

1) there is no counter anymore. previous shows have this stupid counter starting from a 5-digit no then slowly counting to a million plus.
2) no more cao qitai saying "qing-bo-da that number" stuff. in fact, he seemed quite pissed with the whole affair, intentionally not facing the cameras, saying some stuff like "finally i can forget about that number" or something. he should.
3) very sad expressions among the kidney / cancer / whatever patients. not those u find in those regular shows where they have zoe tay or fann wong in some darned short video clip where the extreme miserable side of the patient is shown, then later flashforward to the actual scene where the patient would be seen shedding tears.. not of sorrow because of their illness, but because some asshole bared open their vulnerability. now those patients are gonna get screwed cos no one has the faith to trust any charitable organisation, other than NKF, again.

yes, the ending song was sung, the confetti sprayed, and the last show was hence over. mrs goh, the long-time patron of the show, was not there (they didn't announce like, lets thank mrs goh for blah), the credits rolled on screen, putting an end to a scandal that rocked the nation, and perhaps even (true) fund-raising charities round the world.

no, the scandal has just begun. i believe in the days to come, before, during and after the probe into the NKF by the relevant authorities, there will probably be more shocking truths and revelations for the public.

i really pity those patients under them - brainwashed into believing that they had actually to pay "according to their own abilities", and us - brainwashed into adding funds into someone's own pocket. This incident could involve the loss of other things, such as the patients' lives, other than our own money.

Just came back from pharmacy camp.

Logged into application for hostel. Result:

Due to the limited capacity, your application for a room cannot be granted for this semester. You may still apply to be in the waiting list when the waiting list application submission is open.

Wah, i freaking so sway meh? Almost everyone i know in sheares camp who applied for hall got it...

wtf. something is freaking wrong here man.
Why my CCA points are 0.0??? i think someone forgot to key it in...

those @#$%^*()_)(*^%$#@s.

before the pharm camp

getting the jitters already one day even before the camp actually starts. from my past experiences with the sheares camp, this is considered normal, you get feelings of anticipation of "whats coming next?", yeah but this time guess i'm better prepared for it.

got a feeling that this camp was a bit last-minute-organised... which is kinda shitty. imagining 1) collecting the paperwork on the first day of camp!, confirming the meal types (muslim, etc) 3 days before the camp starts... maybe the manpower for the camp isn't as much as sheares camp. or maybe they have had harder luck.

hope i have fun.

edwin will be coming with me too on this time round, so at least that's something to look forward too and well, at least if i shut down again, i can rely on him anyway. haha.

better not shut down cos this time round, better make as many friends as possible in this camp cos they'll be "potential allies". yep, helping out with stuff related to pharmacy, as in the whole of NUS, heck, in the whole of Singapore, you wun find any more fellas that give a hoot about what we do.

expected ratio of girls = 80-90%. damn intimidated. about 1 guy to 7-8 gals. sheesh. when i went for the freaking camp briefing there were only 5 guys there, and about 40 other females there, damn. i think edwin should like it. better get used to a oestrogen-filled environment, man.

finally, finished packing the stuff for the camp, about 4-5 t-shirts, including the darned NJ aqua house t-shirt, which hopefully dun spark any shitty jokes (haha), 2 beach pants, 1 3/4 pants, one jeans. Learned not to bring a freaking whole duffel bag to the place to sleep, looks like shit. have a problem lugging all the stuff back too.

will be blogging about it if it's worth it.

Fantastic 4

Went to watch fantastic 4, on a weekend. quite suicidal as the price was $9.50.

But managed to repay all my debts! $10 to edwin and $20 to leo. Damn broke now. Still got pharm camp of $35.

Anyway the movie wasn't too much of an impression, to this non-f4 fan such as myself. No previous readings of comic books for me. Here's how it goes: warning spoilers.

The crew

1) Mr fantastic: some guy (and a loser) with a ph.D in physics and chem, he designed some craft to go to outer space to investigate some "cosmic wave". After the transformation, he has an extremely malleable and ductile body, like rubber. On the space mission, he is accompanied by:

2) The Thing: some guy called Ben in real life, he is the sai-kang warrior for mr. fantastic ("he uses his head, i use my legs"). During the space mission, he is the one most directly and greatly affected by the cosmic radiation, probably thats why he changed so much. In the movie, his wife left him, he became a social misfit, that's why he hates his new form so much. He possesses great strength (of course!) and has bullet-proof hardened skin.

3) The Invisible Woman: playing Mr. fantastic's (previous and rekindled) love interest. Apparently the invisible woman (Sue) had a thing for Fantastic, but found him too much of a "dork". So she left him for the much influential Victor (who was to be Dr. Doom). This recent project provided a chance for their old love to rekindle. She has the power to be invisible (duh) and has the power to manipulate air, such that she can create waves of air like a sonic boom, or conjure up force-fields.

4) The Human torch: Sue's brother is a mischeivious fellow who was somehow on the outer space mission as well. He's like any hot-blooded young teenager-adult who uses his new-founded powers to... impress girls and perform biking stunts. Loves irritating The Thing, who doesn't appreciate his pranks very much. He has the ability to create fire (duh), simply by snapping his fingers viz a lighter, and to increase the temperature of the fire, up to the maximum 4000K of supernova status. Oh yes, he can fly as well, something like a rocket.

The bad guy in this movie is called

Dr Doom: What is left of Victor after the entire transformation. Having grown silvery bodily scales/armour, he looks like the bad form of Terminator. Discovered that he could act as a capacitor (i.e. store electricity), therefore his habit of draining energy from many of the city's sources to himself; flashing lights that "the electricity bill is not paid" are a trademark of his presence. Of course, he uses this electricity to kill people.

F4 is basically a typical comic book story, all finished in one big comic book - how the heroes get their powers, some conflict, twist and turn, somehow they get back together for the final fight scene vs the big bad villian (which was quite weak). The romance btw Mr. fantastic and the invisible woman was not there, if at all. Humourous parts of the show were quite weak, with one good joke in between long pauses and weak jokes, didn't get me laughing at all, nor my adrenaline rushing as it would be. Sound effects are so-so. What i can applaud is probably the CG effects that the show was rendered upon, for the whole movie it didn't seem like a CG movie, esp during the times when they showed off their powers. The invisible woman became invisible very naturally, one thing.



Verdict: 2.5/5 stars, 3/5 stars if u seen the comic book

Break Down

i am predicting my future.

from past observations, i have noticed that many nus students (or uni students in gen) have this period of time when they "break out".

its like after some congested period of study where they become very saturated with knowledge, they just feel like saying

"FUDGEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

went to sheares hall to help out again. today was friday, maybe because the rag committee had some meeting today, saw some new faces, and found out that, hey, there are actually many pharmacy students in sheares hall, as

E(pharmacy students in sheares hall) = 0
Observed total for friday = 2
Ratio of observed / expected = undefined

so tried to find out pharm stuff from them, as i have valiantly done for the past 2 years. found out:

1) pharmacy is an extremely tough course. even tougher than medicine and dentistry, i think (cos both of them dun use culmulative freq curves)
2) and therefore, it is damn competitive.
3) which means, allies become enemies at some point.

and when hall is combined with pharmacy, ppl seem to be abit apprehensive and say
4) u need to manage your time well. my time is already screwed up, i dunno whether i can tahan the late nights (latest 2am), to wake up for 8am lecture, etc.

5) the modules seem to suck as well, u still have to bid for them, i tot like medicine, and since not all getting honours, prob it will resemble the science courses during yr 3 and 4.
6) sien.

so when will me "break out" or "break down"? the timer is counting.

The revelation

today is the date when the results of the application of sheares hall will be coming out, as i found out when i went to help for rag today. jeannie and amanda broke the news that they got into hall.

so, after rag stuff, i rushed back, eagerly to find out my hall results, but i was in for a surprise!

The next segment contains language that may not be suitable for minors. Parental advisory required.
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I found out that OSA didn't change my application!!!!! KNN!!!!

my original application:
1) kent ridge
2) sheares
3) temasek (.............for wang)

was made in absolute randomness, and after the sheares camp i felt that it should be like this:

1) sheares
2) kr
3) ke7

so i sent an email to this osa guy after paying a visit personally to osa in yusof ishak hall, the guy was not there, so i had to remind him by emailing him. quite fair, i thought. so i sent the email, the thing went through, hotmail confirmed it and blah.

obviously this fucker doesnt believe in reading his mailbox, so there, so the application, to my horror, when i checked the results, what could have been a yes/no answer is now a "application still in review".

WTF!

ARRRRRGgGHGHGHGHGHGHGH!!!!! feel like, wth, i visited u, u shua da pai and report sick or take leave, i give u the mail, u still dun do it for me, wtf!!!!

no more angst will now remedy the situation. *sigh* hope that 1) kr rejects me and 2) sheares still has some places left. otherwise have to try back door, which is damn shitty. if kr accepts me, i really dunno what to do.

blame it on some knn-ccb-lppl guy who doesn't do his job.

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IF THIS IS A TOTAL MISUNDERSTANDING IN THE DAYS TO COME, THIS ENTRY WILL BE TAKEN DOWN ASAP. DAMAGE TO ANY PARTY IS REGRETTED.

Etude 30

Repertoire:
1. Orient Express - a good starting song, very much took the concert into piece. Prepared us for what lies ahead.
2. The Phantom of the Opera - erm, quite messy and long. Seems too long.
3. Music from the Incredibles - this is one of the highlights i think. While a movie clip from the cartoon The Incredibles is showing on the overhead screen (ala projector style, another nice idea), the band provides the background music for the clip. Quite interesting.
4. Cry of the Celts - total of 5 movements, of which 1) ??? was quite ok, 2) (some celtic name) was quite sien, but guess that came as good prosody for 3) breakout, which was super, and the sad theme in 4) was very touching. 5) brought out a good ending to an excellent piece.
5. Star Wars - 3 movements in all. I'm very surprised that they actually played the actual music that John Williams played. Quite entertaining.

(Interval)

6, 7. Percussion Ensemble - 6), Tijuana Samba, was... erm not as exciting and full of energy as i expected it to be. the notes were all over, they weren't playing coherently... yep. guess abit too excited. 7), Circus Circus, was much better, but i still think they needed a conductor badly.
8, 9. Stage Band - 8) Music from Chicago and 9) Hello Dolly, was passable but, i feel, did not have the "wow" factor. Maybe i was too tired, but they didn't stand out very much, which was a pity, cos this is supposed to be one of the highlights of the show. The brass dominated the whole of both pieces i think, leaving the synth little space to breathe (which i must say cos this was my instrument!)
10, 11. Alumni Band - 10) Armenian Dances: a crazy 5/8 piece, which i can't catch at all. think i'm damn lousy at catching these dances. was getting drowsy (oops). 11) Pirates from the Caribbean was better, with its adrenaline-filled ship chases clashing well with the slow pieces, and the sad tune in the middle. For the amt of time that was put in, this result is extremely remarkable, esp the woodwind ppl.
12. Japanese Graffiti IV - after all the nice sounds, this is time to relax and this is one good piece to relax.
13. Tribute to Mr Ho - a slide show showing all his previous etudes, also showing other ppl like ms Kwa, some teachers, and alumni describing him. Very touching and... sometimes funny.
14. Amazonia - quite an exotic piece, a very nice way to end the concert.
15. Encore piece I
16. Encore piece II
17. School Song

Verdict:
4.5 / 5 stars. One of the best etudes i've ever heard, they have good players and good balance (although i think there is too much bass).

A smashing way to celebrate 30 years of etude.

the band's glory lies in its skill, but the band's identity lies in its mistakes

Once upon a december

rx has re-ignited my interest in this song...

uploaded the midi file into my hp and, hey, it sounded quite good! i like the vibes sound.

as a result, i'm going to pen the song down on paper... the midi version is extremely... messy, as i did not use any panning, hence it sounds like 13-14 different voices coming out from one point source (imagine squeezing the flute, piano, drums, vibraphone etc into one point source!!!)

guess after i write the song down, i'll try to get a band to perform it. it's quite simple a piece actually, about 3 minutes.

my first song! (or arrangement!) haha

Some weird ideas for next fright night

something i thought of when taking the MRT to orchard. lets not put these wasted neurons to waste (oh what the heck)

(wrt the camp's fright night)

1. objective - to get out of the house by finding "the yellow light stick". of cos this will be given to them when they've solved all the puzzles in the haunted house.

2. use lightsticks to denote the status of rooms, whether they are locked or unlocked. red lightstick - locked room, green lightstick - unlocked. all rooms will be marked with red lightstick initially (after telling them NOT to go into rooms with red lightsticks)

3. rem the house has 2 or 3 rooms, so each room will have a green lightstick except for the last one, which will reveal the yellow lightstick, and get them out of the place.

4. in the first room, (maybe the hallway) the participants must find the note, and realise that they can replace the green lightstick illuminating the note with the red lightstick hanging on one of the doors. as they do so, the observer in the hallway is expected to knock a certain number of times on the door (e.g. 7 on the first door, 3 on the 2nd, etc) to let the person inside unlock the door.

5. maybe in the 2nd room we can continue to have persona eg the urn lady, to make it more interesting. of course the urn lady in this case will present the green lightstick in exchange for a red one.

just some wild thoughts...