Day 2

Woke up at 5am, by someone laughing in the room outside (guess was tracy. Dunno why she became quite hysterical.. haha, must be the bridge). Found jevin, Edwin, tracy and Chelsea playing bridge. Can’t sleep afterwards. The dudes were then playing mahjong downstairs and I thought that was more interesting, so I went down to have a look.. till about 7-8 am.

While I was looking at their antics, in the hope that this would make me tired and rest, it was to no avail. I was still fully awake at 10am – by that time most of the guys had woken up and Jevin mobilized them to return the bikes to east coast – about 17 of them.

Amazingly, this included everyone in the chalet except me… ha. Perfect, I closed all the doors and everything, drew the curtains, set the aircon to full blast, and slept away in the living room on a 3-seater couch. Best sleep I’ve ever had.

Someone woke me up at about 1:30 pm (think it was xuanwei’s message). The next hour was spent on logistics about the barbecue and on getting people who had not yet arrived to the chalet. Amazingly, one of the earlier guests which arrived was Prof Bernard, yes, in his trademark blue shirt and working pants and windbreaker.

The people who went to buy stuff all came back at 3:30 pm, some of them went bowling, some went to the beach, some in the guest rooms upstairs, knocked out. Some of the people who just came immersed themselves in the mahjong table who was sitting there seductively looking at us (that includes myself), or helped out with the barbecue, setting the fire and marinating the food.

Guess all I wanted then was a break… din’t mind the sedentary lifestyle and soon it was about evening time, about 6-7pm, and more people were arriving on top of the more people. A whole lot more people than me and yuantai were expecting. Very shockng indeed. Some of them i din't really know.

Ok, actually i forgotten what happened during the evening from 6pm to 9pm.. remembered mahjong, playing the laptop with all the retro songs until niron took over with his hip-hop, some tv, not much food, and drinking with niron, farveez, parry, zhong hao and choon han. The beer turned into ice, same for whatever drinks we put in the cooler (by now we called it a freezer), after some clever defrosting by weida, it tasted a bit "off" as what the guys put it, but still drinkable. I felt that it tasted the same - bitter.

Along the dialogue, Prof B mentioned that he was about to leave for Aust to study what he had originally hoped: medicine. Well done, man. Suddenly i felt a sense of loss - an undescribable feeling that perhaps could only be identified as a sense of loss. Bernard was an interesting man, no doubt, one of superior intelligence, and perhaps most of the class pitted their academic abilities against his own, took him to be a benchmark for greater improvement. But what made him shine in my eyes was that he was a outgoing person, going for every outing that the guys organised - and taking a main role in it, rather than be someone who coops up in his hostel room and mugs the night away when the chance comes. Maybe he's just smart enough.

When he paid his $10 for the chalet, i was expecting him to give me $10 straight, but instead he took out a pack of cards and bidded me to choose a number, i chose "7", then he told me to pick the 7th card. It was a "10" of diamonds, and then from himself he gave me a nicely folded $10 note in a diamond shape.
Interesting way. Wish i'd got to know the person more.

The bulk of the guests started filing out at around 9:30 or so, the last of them went back at 10:30, whoever was left behind would be the "campers".