Chalet (Day 1)

Woo after the long stretch of events i've finally had a chacne to catch a breather... and blog about the pharm chalet
A total of 49 people came, which is a result that guess would wow any pharm batch.. haha. think the seniors are rite, this batch is certainly more fun-loving than others.. though i've never seen the rest of the batch though.

my account of the two days:

woke up around 10am after a long night at wang's place ( i returned home first). washed up, then about 11:00 am waited for dad to come and partially clear my room at SH. Got the speakers, my toiletries, some clothes, that's about it. Bought the beer from Giant, 24 cans of Carls at about $60. dad had a emergency meeting at serangoon, so we left all the stuff in the car and he drove to his meeting, leaving me at clementi.

Glitch #1: then, i discovered my HP was almost dead: only one batt left... shit. And i posted on the yahoo groups that everyone going to the chalet was to call me... haiz

Glitch #2: found out that i had left my Bailey's at home. frantic, called jevin to pick it up from my house but no one's at home. so i had to ask him to bring his bottles instead. rushed off from clementi to tanah merah with mp3 music blasting in my veins on the MRT.
cool. was the first to reach there.. dots... began a 1.5 hour long sojourn as the early birds - seven of them - came. They left on the first shuttle bus to the resort at 2:30, whereas i deliberated for another hour and left tanah merah station at about 3:30 pm with the last arriving member, jevin. (didn't know i could charge my hp at mrt stations, ha...)

meanwhile the other group slacked away in the deck:

















reached chalet at about 4pm, checked in at bungalow 09. Paid about $298 for the chalet (cheap huh? see later.)
think the hp reception there is terrible, can't contact bingxun's group (later i heard they went to the deck and enjoyed the golfing scenery). anyway me and jevin "warmed" the house a bit, followed later by edwin and... more guys, i can't remember the sequence. we hung around the place sampling the essence of the chalet till about 5:30 pm...

Glitch #3: i forgot my remote control for the speakers (without it the speakers can't work). getting abit stressed liao.

the decision was made to retrieve the RC which was left behind at hall. so i called dad (which was fortunately in the area after dropping my stuff off at the chalet)... left behind my group of chalet people (about 10 people) and went back to NUS. Had dinner with dad at a certain coffeeshop eatery in Clementi before he dropped me off at Clementi station, with RC in hand (and some bananas which i salvaged from the car)...
again. that deja vu feeling. Jevin and co told me that they were going to ECP (east coast park) to get bikes. ok, no problem, guess i would meet them at about 7:30pm or so at ECP.

Glitch #4: when i left the chalet, i forgot to take my mp3 player. Hence took MRT from Clementi to City Hall. Without music blasting in my veins. Sien.

Arrived at City Hall about 7pm, damn crowded. Never realised that the 4 escalators up to the ground level (Raffles City) was so nice at night.. anyway scouted the area for "that bus" that would somehow take me to ECP. Managed to make it to "that bus stop" at "somewhere near CHIJMES".
Saw the bus list, hmm no ECP so what road would take me there? Remembered something like "16". Or was it "36"? looked down the list. Saw "Marine Parade Road" with both 16 and 36, so jumped upon the first 16 that was heading this way.

Glitch #5: the correct bus to take was 36. it 's faster. i din't take my bus guide nor street directory with me...

16 took me somewhere, i don't really know. along the way i saw signboards like "kallang" and something like "stadium boulevard", it went through some place where construction of the Circle Line was taking place, and turned into a Geylang-like street, complete with shophouses, coffeeshops and... one-way roads. When i saw this, plus the bus was damn packed with working people dressed in their best, got damn stressed again. Then the bus turned into Joo Chiat. I tot, where the hell is Joo Chiat man, sounds like somewhere near Geylang. SHIT. muz have overshot. then i asked the bus uncle is Marine Parade road nearby, he said no... dots.
Contemplated taking the bus to the end to hopefully an interchange with an MRT. i dun wanna get down here and end up taking 240 back. Frantically, called Jevin and asked for directions. i wish mui fong was still in singapore... then could at least tell me the GPS coordinates of this place, or else, the nearest route to ECP.

THEN, the bus turned into something with the words "Marine Parade CC" or something like that, and i breathed a sigh of relief. Whew. Got down the first stop after that, i was so relieved, i skipped down the steps when alighting and banged my head on the ceiling. ha.
Then, to my horror, i found out that this was the wrong area of Marine Parade...
I didn’t alight at the bus stop “outside Blk 49”, near some Police building or something. Remembered that place cos I bought some antiseptic spray there during a cycling trip at ECP and bruised my knee cap (that’s another story…)
First thing I saw across the road was a police post. Gingerly stepped in and asked for directions.. haha the sergeant inside must be quite surprised to see a guy with a plastic bag of stuff and a bunch of bananas.

Ok, received his instructions and got to the underpass, crossed the expressway. On the other side I found myself in totally unfamiliar terrain, plus the dark sky didn’t help to identify much of the leafy foliage. Called Jevin again, “where the hell are u now?” he said.
“dunno” I replied
“any landmarks”
“erm… trees”… haha

Oh my. Not much of a help there. Then asked some fellas around this barbecue area “BBQ Pit 18” and found out the general direction of Mcdonalds (that was the RP). Walked about half a km and when I got to Macs…

No one there. I was the earliest… again. Haiz. Haha. Sienz. The main party was still walking from Victoria JC. Wonder where that is.

Anyway, they arrived like about 20 mins later around 8:20 pm and we went to this funny Indian eatery. The party had expanded greatly to include people like Chelsea, melody, farveez, victor, zhiwei etc. Funny thing about the restaurant is that its modeled on a fast food theme, which is ridiculous. Here are some of the things the guys ordered:

(pictures)

I ordered a “Sweet Lassi Drink”. It made me feel like I was in one of those Final Fantasy RPGs. It was actually disguised yogurt and it SUCKED. I wonder what the sour version tastes like… yeck
Felt a bit nauseous after the meal.

Glitch #6: never order the… whatever jevin ordered. Its hollow and it tastes bland… never ever order the lassi drink also… it costs $2.50 even though the price says $2.40.. shit

Next stop, the bike rental. Ordered about 15-20 bikes I guess. Tot everything was ok, then I and zhiwei whacked the pedals, high speed. I didn’t really care about the rest cos I couldn’t afford to slow down… haha weird cycling patterns dictate that I travel at fast speeds to keep my momentum.

The next thing we knew, we were at Bedok Jetty. Luckily zhiwei was with me, cos my HP had died out by then. We waited there for an hour for people to arrive but no one… only to call back the shop and find the rest of the main party there.

“we haven’t settled the bikes and we’re waiting for Jason and jingwen…” whoops, big blunder. So I and zhiwei talked a little at the jetty while watching planes fly past.. Hmm.. would be great if zhiwei was replaced by someone.. :P haha.. I think zhiwei muz have felt the same too.

Got tired of waiting and by 9:45 pm we cycled back to the bike rental shop, thinking “there is only one road, if the main party’s coming we will meet them anyway” And we did, about I think 10pm sharp when we almost reached the rental shop, we saw Victor and the rest of the cyclists. Then was it yijiang who told me, “your rear light’s not switched on!”

Giltch #7: always check whether your rear light is on. Or risk getting kissed or caught by the police.

Then we cycled, the advance party to Bedok jetty while we waited for them to catch up. Heard from the others that Edwin had gave up his rear seat on the double bike and decided to learn how to cycle on his own, albeit being extremely impromptu! Anyway, it was quite a long wait and at the trees facing bedok jetty Jason decided to take a leak… amongst the bushes, almost in full view of the girls who were there too (but they turned away.) Hmm. Didn’t take a pic of it. haha

Finally Jevin (who had one key to the chalet) and Edwin (who had the other key) showed up. Must really hand it to Ed, he is now cycling well, damn fast he learns. Thing is, there are people who have been waiting for us to come back to the chalet, and are at the doorstep of bungalow 09…

The rest of us then pedaled back at full… esp Alvin who took one of the keys and zoomed back, totally at the mercy of his “lower digestive system”. The last part of the way to the chalet at NSRCC was a long, desolate stretch of road WITH NO LIGHTS.

Glitch #8: Chelsea or who then told me, “yongqiang you didn’t on your lights”. Oh shit.

Anyway the last leg of the journey was damn creepy but fun.. I paced and overtook tracy, chelsea, couldn’t catch melody or who though. Felt a bit scared cycling by myself along that road, there was nothing around I can see, except the light. Thanks god I was still able to see among the darkened paths.

Anyway reached the chalet about 11;30 pm, Took care not to get slammed by the vehicular barriers when I cycled into the chalet (haha Edwin got into a very funny and unfortunate mishap). Rested for about 1h or so, whilst the others gathered to resume their journey to Changi beach. Not for me, I was too shagged out.

Played mahjong with Shannon, Monika, Pearlyn, Jia En and two more people until 3am at the request of Alvin, who was suffering from a bad stomach (poor guy went to eat buffet prior to the cycling). Realised I have developed a penchant for mahjong and bridge these days. And finally realized who can match our class rep, junice, in laughter.. haha
Took a shower at 3am, then slept upstairs in the bed room, while the people cycling to Changi returned. No nasi lemak for me though. Haha