Met hui for weights yesterday and did shoulders, lat and back.

As a result, was a little XD during this morning's canoeing sea training. Thought I was in trouble during the warmup rowing when shoulders felt heavy in the hot sun. But later during the sprints felt a little better:

During first sprint went off course and omg... that busturt melvin rammed the back of my T1 and made me swerve even farther to the right. Pulled up but came in very close with that bugger.

Next few sets went much better though. Managed to get direction right, and pull away from the other boats one by one. Got bigger and bigger leads too! Muhahahaha. Too bad Jag and Naresh weren't in T1s today... I need to pace with them and beat them damnit...

Did T2 with sebastian for a while after that, damn fast man. But, still no one to pace with. At least we tried harder to get the direction right that time. Its trickier in the T2 for some reason.

Peaked at the lineup for the march race. Holy crap.

Sebastian and Ruben (who spelled my name wrongly!?) - T2 500metres IVP
Naresh and Jag doing T1 IVPs
and me and sebas got T1 OPENS.

Opens... wth? Thats like nationals already. At least in IVP your only pitted against other polys and the unis.

Crap, must train harder.... get faster...

Bwahahah, I just came across a hilarious quote from Peter:

"It is not enough to succeed. Others must fail."

XD

Dragonboaters bbq last night. Bought some veggies and made salad over there, since no one else was bringing any vegetables. Whats the point in eating so much meat if your not going to eat a balanced meal anyway...

Well, despite the numerous suans and comments from Daryl and etc about my cutting habits or the size of the cucumbers... most of it was finished. Reu is pleased.

Then the night turned to be a night of little injuries for me...

First Bernard took my lighter and gave me a burn mark on my right shoulder... which still stings whenever it comes into contact with water...

Then left elbow started bleeding due to a small cut which I got from the ground when I was wrestling with Jonathan on the pavement. Almost got a groin injury because he was desperately trying to squeeze that area when I had him pinned under me. Geez... talk about fighting dirty, thank god for jeans.

Sore right chest thanks to Daryl's psycomathical nipple twist attempt. I swear that was the most painful twist I have experienced in my life. First second your sceaming in pain, then you immediately shut up and get stunned or go into shock. Almost heel stepped and backfisted that ass.

And to round it off, I sprained my right thumb trying to take off my damn shoe when I reached home.

But we had fun playing cards for a while.


Then to add to that, this morning I woke up and yeap, left hamstring sore from thursday's legs routine. Damn muscles never get sore the day after, its always 2 days later or something.... good job, legs.

So I managed to hobble over to Kallang for canoeing sea training. It was selections today.

Stress...

Sore leg: Possiblility of kicking difficulty + possible problem swimming if capsized.

Sprained right thumb: Possibility of problem holding paddle.

Of all days to have selections for the coming race.... but I was determined not to let it affect me.

First T1 set, with Ezra, Jag and Melvin = Came in first, Ezra coming in close then Jag and melvin far behind. Aimed at wrong end point and Sensei pointed to the white house so I had to make a shard turn right but still managed to come in first.

Second T1 set, same people = Capsize on start >_< Some wave hit from the right side. Bloody krrrr'ock.

Third T1 set, with Sebastian, Ezra = Was leading until the end where both me and Sebas aimed for the wrong ending point, got suanned by sensei again >_<

Fourth T1 set, same people = Can't remember if I came in first or tied with Sebas.

Did a couple of T2 sets paired with Sebas after that, got progressively better.

So Sensei wants me to go in a T2 with sebas for the march race. But when I told him I wanted to go for T1 also he said there was one more slot.

I need to master that stroke... asap.

Went to school to do some weights with a couple of the dragonboaters and went swimming. Then went to J8 where Ben and Ben-sao had a stall up selling stuff. Bought some stuff for the family and Ben-sao gave us some friendship bands. I picked a black and white one, its pretty cool.

Back to the MUGEN project, a couple of character teams lagging behind by a mile. Reminds me why its better to work alone sometimes. People who lack discipline, character or drive for the project will just be a big bummer to everyone.

So you lazy sons of bitches, wake up your bloody idea.

Christmas celebrations this year wasn't much different from previous years, cept the training bit.

Monday - Got back from penang, went to Jon chan's place to use the condo gym with Jon chan, Winston and Willy. Then ransacked Jon chan's room, hehe and played his piano for a while. Quite lucky that some pieces can just be played without practicing sometimes. Heck, they better be rehearsaless, their my arrangements or compositions anyway doh.

Tuesday- Canoeing. Tried out a K4 with sam, joyce and naresh, and we spend 20% of the time rowing, 40% capsizing, towing, draining and embarking, and 40% laughing.

There was once when we capped near shears bridge, and since we all couldn't get back on the boat without getting to shore Samantha and Joyce rowed to the beach and me and Naresh swam back. But the currents were pushing us out to the open waters and no matter how hard I swam I seemed to stay in the same bloody spot. I thought that I was gonna die or end up on some faraway beach or something. Then decided to swim at a 45% degree angle to the currents and managed to make it to the nearby rocks.

Oh yeah, Joyce boards the boat from a capsize in the middle of the water like a gu-niang ahuahua. First her leg got stuck at an angle, then she tried to climb up on one side, but ended up going head first over the boat and onto the other side.

Christmas party over at Ezra's place in the evening. Awesome food, and played ps2 for a while before eating dinner.

Wednesday - Went to the school gym with Jeremy, had a good shoulder workout. Then went to Uncle's place for dinner. Food was good, altho the beef was a little tough >_<. Then quickly rushed over to Ben's place. Watched tv and played with his dogs for a while, very cute dogs, one of them was so fascinated by the dog scent I carried from home and my uncle's place. Then ate a little cake, D'oh!

Thursday - Jio'd Thomas, Jon Kang, Hui, Jeremy and Rendy to weights at school. Had a most awesome back and legs workout, and did a couple of off-the-wall kicks.

Damnit need to warmup waist more next time. Everytime I try one without warming up, due to the speed and pressure of the rotational force of the kick I end up with a little sprained side. Anyway, I found out that I can do 2 new kicks a cuople of weeks back. One is a turning, reverse kick, whereby your do a turning kick and lift off the ground, and rotate fast enough to throw out a reverse kick before landing. The other is a reverse turning kick. Which is the same kicks but in reverse order ahuahua. With a little practice they could actually look presentable.

Went to play basketball just now. Met Weekiat and a couple of familiar faces. Glad to know I still haven't lost my touch. Did a couple of insane 360 jumpers, w00t. And my team won 3 out of 4. These guys are pretty awesome. They may be really short, like sec 3-4, but their psycho motor skills, reflexes, speed and agility can be quite scary. Can't expect any less anyway, most of them are in the school or local CC teams, or play everyday. Glad to say I scored the majority of the points. Some of them were really intimidated by my height and size, but there are a couple of fighters who just don't care.

They see you as a bigger obstacle that they must and will overcome. You can see it in their eyes when they are dribbling and want to get the point. Drive, to do something, fighting spirit. Not something you will see often. I can't imagine a bookworm or nerd with that look. You just wont see it in someone sitting for exams or staring at the computer screen. Unless he's playing MUGEN perhaps ahuahua.

Its this spirit which will make them go far in any sport, or perhaps anything? Its part of character afterall.

I guess I should log down something about the penang trip besides the race.

Well we travelled aboard the super bus konsortium. Which looks like one of the better coach companies around.

Quite nostalgic of my trip there 2 years back with Jabez. We headed to that same roti canai store which is supposed to be pretty awesome. But it still can't beat the one in Bishan. Heck, not even Jalan kayu's stores can beat the one in Bishan.

Went to sightsee some temples, and I bought 2 slingshots and one of those jet butane lighters. But I picked the most awesome one - this one has not one but two jet outlets and its shaped like a gun. W00t. Fascinating, I found how to change batteries, what type of fuel does it use, and how to refill the fuel. The slingshot is pretty awesome too.

We headed to Parkson and I checked out the local arcade with Melvin. Quite retarded. The guy in charge thought that CVS2 had a 4 button attack layout like CVS. And they even had it layed out KOF style so guess what? You have 3 punches and 1 light kick to play with. Ridiculous.

Then headed to parkson, went to the arcade with Melvin cuz we had some hours to burn before we could check in the hotel.

Then checked into the crown prince hotel. Played in the pool a little, then went to Gurney lane/drive to eat dinner. Another familiar place.

I was set to have the most awesome penang laksa experience so I set out to survey the stalls.

Total 8 stalls selling asam laksa, most of them had diferent colored bowls so it was easy to survey which ones were more popluar, Unfortunately 2 stalls used red bowls so it complicated things a little. Finally I came to the conclusion that the orange, blue and red bowled stalls were the most popular, and people closest to either stall bought the one that was nearer. Hence, no one stall stood out too much, but these 3 were the most popular.

The other food there scared me. Fried kway teow, fried this, fried that, I'm suprised people around there don't drop down by 70 due to coronary heart diseases.

We headed back to another shopping centre. Not sure what that one was called, but they had a toys r us. I tried one of the hoola hoops and hidayah somehow managed to capture a video sequence with her digital camera and proceeded to taunt me endlessly throughout the rest of the day by showing the clip to every single girl in the team.

We headed back to the hotel and had a little suprise birthday celebration for jon and one of the girls.

Then the guys headed over to one of the guys room to "ambush" Jon. Jeremy was dead set to get "sexy nude poses" of Jonathan XD and kept bugging me to bring my digital cam over. Then Jon found out when he caught me behind him putting the camera down to push him in the room and decided to undress himself before we did it for him... then jeremy went trigger happy with the camera and we proceeded to pummel Jon under a blanket. Hui was hilarious. He's so politically correct and just... good and holy type... only took out his slipper and gently thwapped Jonny at intervals during the barrage.

Went to bed and had to beat on Thomas several times to get him to stop snoring in the middle of the night.

The race the next day was pretty awesome. Quite a number of top teams from the inter varsity polytechnic category was there, ntu, ngee ann. And the local teams... pretty impressive. The local buggers don't sit down to row, they squat on their seats, then towards the end they stand up and row. That was pretty cool! I'm inspired to try to squat and row in my t1 now :D

The race took place in a reservoir, near a dam. So that waters are so calm. And when you splash water in the boat and it gets in your eyes or mouth, hell, you can just drink it. Not like the putrid kallang water which will sting your eyes and send you into hypertension if you drink too much of it. The boats are alot lighter too, and so are the paddles. You could twirl one of their paddles easily around with one hand.

I was admiring some of the local teams strokes and was wondering about the concept behind their stroke. Ben came over and explained that some of the local teams brought their own paddles, which are longer than the default ones so that they can squat or stand and row and still catch enough water to pull. They also wear knee guards for their squat/stand strokes. Thats so creative and unorthodoxed :D. I wonder if we can bring our own paddles for local races too.

Talked with Agnes a little after the race. She's cool, and loves water sports alooooooooot. Canoeing, canoe polo, dragonboating, she's doing it all. And she understood my reason for picking up canoeing when she asked why I did it. She recognizes competitive spirit, or the lack of it, and anyone who knows that feeling, that fight or can recognize it in others, is highly respectable in my book.

We headed to grab some dinner, then headed back to the bus and slept the way back to Singapore. Pretty short trip :)

Dead silence.

"Attention!" The loud speaker sounded the starter's voice from the floating platform.

"Paddles up!" Ben prompted us in a soft voice, but the tone and accentuation showed great urgency.

I stared blankly at the lifejacket of the rower infront of me.

"Focus..."

Tilted my head up a little to look through the course.

"Lets fly!"

"GO!" The starter yelled through the loud speaker.

All 6 boats exploded with their different starting procedures. The waters flying out from behind the boats and onto the starting platforms behind us.

I looked at the waves rise from the front of our boat from the right side. So high, like a T1 under a hyperactive canoeist. The boats here were lighter, their paddles were lighter too. So light that if the coxswain lifted the rudder from the water and the boat is at a slight angle, it will swerve a full 90 degrees in just a few seconds. It happened in an earlier race to another team, and as their coxswain attempted to pull them back on course, the whole dragon boat tilted to its side and capsized under speed and momentum.

"Build your walls." I said silently as I stared back at the lifejacket of the rower infront of me, hoping that somehow my team mates would do the same. Concentrating to match my every pull to hers. I glanced at the side. All the boats were on par with one another.

Halfway mark.

"5 Hard ready!?" Ben yelled out.
"Ready!" I called out as I heard my voice merge with the boat in unison.
"GO!" We did the move, then the check was called for and we went back to long pull.

Sudden slow down in the timing almost caught me off guard. "What the heck?" I thought to myself. Breathing harder, recovering...

I saw the other boats slowly inching away. And I started to pick up the power. To yank and throw out the water from beneath my paddle.

"Enjoy yourself." I looked up and smiled. Concentrating on each twist and pull. Diana's face on the drummer's seat. Urgency in her wide opened eyes as she yelled out something to the front rowers.

We were falling behind.

"Another 5 hard!" Ben called out again. "Go!"
We did the move again, trying so hard to catch up.

Arm, tired. Lactic acid build up. I snuck in a big heavy breath through the fast rythmic pattern, must pull on and subside this! This is the last race! Pull until we die!

The sensation went away, and I begun my charging pull. Pulling up the water at each recovery. Momentum build up, go harder, longer, faster! But the other boats weren't getting any closer.

Then I realized that the team lacks the willpower to make up in such situations. Its happened before during training. Some of them lose the drive. But how can it be? These are the selected 10 rowers out of the whole team for the mixed event.

"Damnit not now... don't you dare give up!" I screamed in my head. Hoping that Ben would yell out something to wake them up.

Pissed off. I pulled even harder, and managed to do 'that' stroke. The retarded stroke that I love to do during pool rowing, where the water comes up in a huge wave behind you.

Looked up at the markers, second last buoy.... its over.

We came in at about the same time as NTU.

We had lost. I hate to lose.

I heard the team cheering from the nearby hill. But there was no point. We had lost.

It was my best set though, never managed to do 'that' stroke in an actual set. But the conditions are probably more suitable for it here.

I wondered if there was more I could have done to urge the rest of the team to not give up when we were falling behind. Throughout the whole thing I was silent, except for the responses and timings. I wonder if it would be better to leave it up to them to psyche up, or did I have a responsibility as a team member to do it?

Not serious. Even before the last event, they were doing the kallang wave to welcome the team back. They could've been focusing and concentrating on how to win the race. Instead, they were too happy already, celebrating, to show all their "support".

Discipline. Get serious and concentrate. But they were distracting themselves and in the end it showed. Perhaps I should have stopped them. Told them to wake up. But didn't want to be a killjoy. Even the captains are doing the damned kallang wave. They're new too. Perhaps don't know the discipline the previous batches had.

Whatever, its over now. And I hate to lose. So as usual this period will be a pissed off training period for me. Who knows where I'll end up after this transition in terms of fitness. I guess its good to lose. It drives me to train even harder. I only wish the rest of the guys would do the same.

The girls won the womens event that day. I worry about the inequality of the girls and guys team.

I wonder sometimes...

You see it all the time - people who act so tough and try to be confident just to bluff themselves. Then I wonder if I'm one of them. But then what does it mean to be truly be strong? Depending on someone else? Depending on some other thing or factor? Depending on God? Depending on self? Being able to see things in perspective doesn't put you in any higher position to judge oneself or others too.

I guess all I can do is acknowledge my weaknesses. I don't have to tell everyone about them, or show them off infront of others, but I had better now exactly where I am. That I'm not so far high up there, and by doing so not only will I be strong, but I will have enough compassion and empathy to the people around me.

Acknowledging and dealing with ones weaknesses - That's strength. And thats why I train.

Meeting up with winston and willy to head to bishan gym in about 30 minutes. My farewell session with them before heading off to penang tonight. Heh, its only 2 days anyway. No big deal.

No I haven't given up on chicken or anything like that. Blasphemy... its the type of chicken and which parts. Seriously, you can peel of the skin off a plate of chicken rice and clump it together, then imagine... "omg that damned thing almost went right into me and turned right into flab."

So yeah, chicken is still the most powerful food in the world. But things will try to stain its ultimate purity.

Anyway, been feeling a little down today. Its easy to get caught up doing the things you do until you stop and ask yourself, why the hell am I doing this again? I guess that goes for my intellectual projects... like mugen or the musical. But its easy when you enjoy it.

Things are different for the more physical projects, like training. It can be very dangerous to lose sight of your goal. Because once you do that, you will dread training, you will think why does this crap require so much discipline? You can't remember that its so fun to go out in the open water.

Its like when you wake up. Can you ask yourself what you are waking up for exactly? Do you want to wake up for that? If not, then might as well go back to sleep, right?

I constantly remind myself of the reasons that drive me to do something. There must be a damn good reason for everything. "Its fun", or "I dunno" are poor reasons which will lead to a waste of time. And sometimes when you lose sight of it, you can always wack some pushups to wake you up.

I have had to remind myself of my reasons for training these past few days as well. Sometimes you dread it so much... but when your actually there or doing it you enjoy it so much. Wacked the wts in my room just now. Sometimes it takes a concentration curl rep, where you're at your limit and that dumbell is inching its way up and you can feel your small little muscle fibres snap one by one, to tell you that your alive.

So why the heck do I train? Why do I want to push myself so hard? Am I a coward? Do I hate to lose that badly?

You could say that the people who train to be number one, are so insecure about their own worth, that they want to prove it to themselves that they are better than what they think.

Or maybe they are just tired of being looked down on, that they want to make it to show everyone.

Optimist/Pessimist view. One could say there is no one truth, only perspectives on facts or situations. Or what some people psycho themselves to think.

I used to look up to the seniors in the dragonboat team. And I couldn't believe that I couldn't accomplish what they have accomplished. That drove me at first. Then I met my Bro. He inspired me to work up to be like him, and I felt honored and grateful that he would accept me to train with him as his padawan.

I never beat hong before he left for NS... I could beat him in weights, but not pullups or running. Short of about 5-10 pullups from his 35 max. Running was more difficult due to runners knee.

Then before he left things were looking down for the team. Not enough guys, and that screwed up race. Totally screwed up. I didn't want to depend on the team anymore. I came over to canoeing, I would have my own race. Hong always said he wanted to join the canoeing team because it was an individual sport and he was dissapointed in our team. I would make our dream come true.

Then He left. I had no more target to beat. Instead just memories of him, the seniors, and faint glimpses of the strong opponents. Some other seniors in the team who were stronger in some areas, but weaker in some areas. I was the senior now. With my own padawan tagging along for extra trainings. Goal-less... Sensei sparked my interest in canoeing... I told everyone that I'm aiming for the gold. I'm improving fast but is it fast enough?

So now I'm left in a transition period. I am moving towards that gold, but I need to find my reason fast.

I want to become stronger. I will prove that someone who had a piece of shit level of fitness in year one will beat the secondary school and up school sportsmen. I will prove that you can work your way up from crap and beat those who are up there and take things forgranted.

Tomorrow I leave for penang for the mixed dragonboat event. Ben said he picked the couple of guys whom he felt were of higher calibre than the rest. Somehow I'm not flattered. With a team that mostly gathers together after the exams 1 month before the race. With crap attendance... maybe I'm looking down on us too much. But those guys had better not get happy with our silver for the mens ivp event. Even if we had a distinct disadvantage with number of rowers. The currents and lane were in our favour, enough said. And if they get too happy with how little they put in and how much they got from the race result, then we're screwed.

I know, not all of them are like that. Quite a couple have a genuine interest to improve. But the few of us is still not enough to row the boat.

Next semester will be a headache.

Just got Final Fantasy pray. Its a very scary soudtrack because its damn awesome. OMG OMG OMG they took those awesome melodies and added lyrics of choirs and ARGHHHH! I'm going mad!

Working on the MUGEN project can get quite... addictive. Have to pull myself away to grab food even when stomache is growling so badly, or to go and wack the pullup bar. Speaking of food... mom got kfc for dinner today. One year ago I would have dove into the chicken while glaring at anyone who meant to get near my chicken... but just now... was worried that it had insufficient carbs for a post-training meal, so mom cooked rice... then I tore away the skin and ate only the flesh.

I guess I'm turning into some kind of... health freak ahuahua. Pui. Last time I ate fast food for a meal was... last year maybe? And I refrain from chicken rice. Its not like I like to eat healthy or anything... like Ben said: You know why they call it junk food? Because its junk. And if I have to eat right to reach a more efficient functionative state to beat my competitors, then so be it.

Canoeing sea training in the morning, then dragonboat land training in the evening.

Managed to wack pretty hard during training... but now legs feel funny. Oh boy...

Thomas is an awesome training partner. We finished weights first today and he followed me to do extra calf raises and I followed him to do extra concentration curls.

Good news for canoeing... my pull is wudi! That means that I can pull damn hard and fast like a raging moron! But bad news is that I need to dip the blade further in. Need to hold smaller grip abit so the paddle can go furher in the water. Sha-neroh! I shall be the most awesome rower yet.

I think I'm going to slack and play FFX-2 for awhile... :D~

Had an awesome day in the water yesterday.

Got to use one of the red twins, which are my favourite racing Ts, because the black tamil tigers are so damned heavy... and the 218 brasca.

Sensei coached our strokes some more and I finally got the right angle during pull it seems. Still need to check entry depth though. Could feel the surge from every pull now... awesome :D

Samantha and joyce were in the K2. I think samantha was really crazy yesterday, laughing and giggling in the boat. She really loves this sport. Even yelled out to me to "Catch is if you can!", and I eventually did ahuahua. Then we were going to pace and I think they aet my backwash and capsized. It was damned hilarious... 2 girls screaming as they rotated slowly in the boat into the water.

Tried the K2 with yongqiang. Not bad for our first attempt... we managed to cover some 40 metres before we capsized. Mainly due to his good balance. Then we capsized and had to swim so long back to shore... and after we bailed... I felt something stick to my leg.

At first I thought it was a leaf... then I looked down and saw the shape and OMG IT WAS A DAMNED LIVING THING!? And yeah, kicked and screamed and lost my right shoe in the water. Had to fish my shoe back with absolutely no visibility in the water while hoping I didn't fish that damned sucker fish instead.

Then I mightly swung my paddle and created torrential currents to scare the suckerfish away... but it just kept going back and stuck upside down at the bottom of the k2. So we very swiftly towed the boat back to Sensei and He identified it to be a doctor fish. Not poisonous, not blood-sucking... but its damn annoying.

Tried the K1 after that... managed 2 strokes on my first attempt... its hard to balance that thing...

Went and paced with the ACJC team for a set. They've got one pretty fast rower... their more toned rowers are slower than the bulkier or heavier rowers. Kinda the same for hwa chong. Then why is it those damned skinny indians on our team are so fast.... nevermind... I have to beat them all.

Went to suntec to eat lunch then I headed back to kallang for dragonboat.

And for the first time in my 2.5 years in dragonboat I saw a sight to behold in the waters.

Some angmoh team... rowing a 24 crew dragonboat -

- Wearing outfits like angels and santa claus

- With a small christmas tree on the front of the boat

- Singing christmas carols while rowing

- And their coxswain who was dressed up like an angel had wings...

wtf...

It was greatly appreciated and quite amusing to the team though. Crazy americans...

I guess Christmas is coming.

omg I just played... the lord of the rings theme out on the piano. Come to think of it that melody is pretty captivating... although I condemned the damn thing previously because all it sounded like was C A, C A C A, C A C A, C A C C B B A... But apparantly the supporting harmony pushes and pulls this otherwise monotonous melody to new highs and lows.

Result of listening to the lotr soundtracks

The sung jazzy gollum's song is awesome... fabulous chords... although the lyrics are kinda depressing...

"where once was light, now darkness falls."

"Where once was love, love is no more."

"Don't say, goodbye..."

"Don't say, I didn't try..."

"These tears we cry, are falling rain."

"For all the lies you told us, the hurt, the blame"

"And we will weep to be so alone."

"We are lost, we can never go home..."

Depressing rite? Plus the melody I think can make a depressed person go and commit suicide.

Well, back to work...

Felt really overloaded during the weekend and wasn't feeling too good. So skipped training and the church camp. Woohoo.

Took the time to complete final fantasy X at last. Damn game... final boss battle has the boss doing one attack to do more damage than my max hp to my whole party in one move. Wtf? Died... 10 plus times, finally beat him by throwing out everything I had in desperation to rape that bastard before he had a chance to touch me. Awesome storyline, so I went out to get final fantasy X-2.

Damn thats a stylish game. They kind copied some aspects of charlies angels, but that helps a character driven story somewhat.

Had a good rest during the weekend so was ready to hit training again but sprained my leg... no idea how, so missed canoeing land training and went to do weights, then met up with Winston to swim. Freestyle sprints, I've never swam so hard since... dunno when. Till you feel yourself crawling so slowly when its supposed to be a 100m sprint.

Then DB training on tuesday... leg extensions and sprints from the previous day kinda took its toll I guess, we did more dashing. Could feel my legs not able to push hard, unable to feel the usual glide in the air, then saw the rest of the guys slowly pull away. Haha crap. Still ran until whole body went cold and lungs felt like they were going to burst although my legs were going to give way.

Jonny collapsed during the second round of dashing and just curled up on the side. I worry for the amount of stress he's giving himself, on one hand, nothing will get you further than to push yourself even during some sort of weak point, however aggrevating an injury might just make things worse or more serious, and I don't think his ligament's completely healed yet.

Had slight difficulty with the 5 sets of 10 pullups after that... I think my pullups are dropping liao... still remember the time I was chasing after tianhong for 10 sets of 10. Time to wack the bar again.

Weights with my training partner again, Thomas. That bugger is quite zai. Almost as zai as me as weights and pullups, but his running's better. I guess this would be a good opportunity to even out our weak points. The weights routine was quite siong... had to crawl out of the rowing machine again after squats... bloody legs damn weak lar... buck up you slackers.

Had a talk with Thomas after training about why he's always rushing off and so seriously after training. He has to wake up to sell vegetables at 4am to earn a living. Paying his own school fees, and everything while studying. He's finished NS and all, but its still hard to work, study and manage ccas at the same time. He told me to "treasure your life". I guess at times we do take stuff forgranted. But its this situation that I can concentrate on projects and ccas rite now. He's had his time during secondary school with his rugby and all. I guess he misses those days.

Kind of stressing out with ccas and managing this mugen project at the same time, but at least things are looking up.

Finally got some pics from the forum uploaded to webshots under my pics on the left side.

Feel kinda shacked these few days...

We won a silver for the ivp mens event, losing to NTU by less than a second, and got a bronze for ivp mixed event. Kind of a big thing, considering we had 19 rowers when the other teams had full 22 rower boats. More of that another time, I guess... not sure what's wrong... skin around my arms feels funny sometimes, and its peeling in odd ways.

Started during the cruise... could feel all my hair standing sometimes. I think I'm either having an odd reaction to their soap, or the pressure/altitude of the boat. Sheez... Oh well, lets shed to a lighter, fairer me!

During the race days felt kinda down too. Must be an overexpenditure of chakra.

XD

Poly forum was... pretty awesome.

Will have photos as well as some account of the activities on board once the batteries for teh digicam are charged.


Very insightful to the Singapore education system as well, since that was my sub theme for discussion and debate.

Never before have I heard the word "passion" been used to many times by these lecturers and staff, as well as the minister of education.

It seems like many of the select 60 student participants of the 5 polys are some pretty impressive achievers.

The students from Republic Polytechnic, particularly caught my eye. This new poly... RP, keeps telling their students that the're getting such creative teaching techniques, they tell people they have "PBL" or Problem Based Learning with such pride. Some, with over cockiness. But the things is, its because the poly is new, and the teaching methods so different from secondary school, that the students have such a sense of pride in how they are learning.

Ironically, for the older poly's particularly my course, we've been getting such problem based learning since year one. Its just that it was never pointed out, nor featured. So on the macro perspective, both the old polys and this new one may have similar problem based learning techniques, but because RP is new and its celebrated so much, the students think they're so special.

So yeah, well some of the RP students really are entreprenuers. Starting up a student union with the help of the staff, creating and organizing clubs for their polytechnic students to enjoy. Not bad.

But I'm still not sure what stand I have on one of the topics that was discussed. Its about creating solutions to give students more opportunity to pursue their "passions."

I think that, yes, its good that new schemes or some additions to the curriculum would help in giving students the chance to do what they are passionate for, since Singapore is now moving towards a value added workforce due to lack of manpower with respect to the other rising giants like China and India.

However, some possible problems posed are will these students actually be following their "passions", and not just some fleeting "Interest"?

Interests change, what if a students decides to go into music but later finds out that He does't like it after all? Will he have the rest of his education to fall back on? Or would he hit a dead end in his education so to speak?

Hence, some more passive, but yet sufficient syllabus for music and art would be more feasible.

Syed from RP during one of the final presentations shared that he once had a "passion" for music. But then later he looked at the long run and decided that it would be better and easier to make a living through other means. I don't think that that is passion at all. And if this is the misconception that students thinking that they want to do this for the rest of their life are thinking, then there may be some serious problems.

To me, passion is following an interest even when you hear that it would be much easier to make a living through other means. Even when your family members say that what you're playing is noisy. Yes, it was discouraging every time I heard my family members call my first composition noisy, even mom, or them rolling their eyes saying "there he goes again" every time I played that same piece.

But I didn't care. It angered me that these people were not being supportive like they were to someone else. It angered me that these people could not appreciate what I was trying to communicate, yet they critisized it. And despite all this, I didn't give a damn. Because this was MY passion. And if they couldn't get it? Then screw them.

But its because of this, that I can look at other pianists, who have gone through grade 8 or even Diploma, and not see as superior. For in contrast to those that had the training and nurturing and had fun and enjoyed themselves from clases, to me, who made it on my own and fought for what I believed in, I can say that I have come much furthur pursueing my passions then them.

People often ask me what grade I am after they hear me play. They always ask if I'm grade 8, but when I tell them that I only passed grade 1. And then sometimes I wonder if I've accomplished anything at all, during these few years of playing the Piano, but now I know. I've come damn far. Furthur then any pathetic grade or diploma will take you.

"Passion" is often contradictory to "Logic".

Then again, back to opportunities to pursue your interests? Its quite ironic that this school has provided me ample opportunity to pursue it. Now, it can be appreciated, but it would mean as much if I had not fought for it in the past.

Okay, I slept at 2:30am this morning... I ache, I'm grumpy and and pissed off for no reason. Haha, better go to bed. Erm... after playing Budokai 2.

Overall, this damned forum made me think too damned much.

Whew. Just finished packing for the poly forum. Yeap, grabbed as many wearable clothes from amongst the house and dumped them in the bag.

2 days 2 nights on the super star virgo! Its "The newest and largest world-class megaship in Asia-pacific", woooo.... there's a helipad, library, amphitheatre, cinma, arcade, track, basketball court, pool, gym, spa, disco, casino, hair salon, blah blah blah, its like a moving country or something. But according to the schedule we won't have much time for any of those... booo.... so many workshops.

Just hope I don't forgot to bring anything... ahuahau tomorrow then check lar...

I wonder if its possible to get sea-sick on something this frickin big... don't think so lar. I wonder if we'll see any giant whales... or giant squids... wow that would be fun. But I doubt we'd encounter a Leviathan on the way to malacca and back. Was it malacca... or kl... or penang... ah heck, somewhere around there.

Today damned slack in the com lab. FYPJ over so can work on anything now ahuahauhua!

Helped Dre with her project music, then worked on bot model for a while... went to play basketball, work on bot model for a while, took a nap, work on bot model for a while.

Damn productive...

Training after that was ok...

Was supposed to be "light" training, because the race is this weekend liao. Heh.

Did 6 rounds warmup, then circuit. Run like madmen, pushup sitump burpees. Getting used to wide angle pushups, whereby your arms are perpendicular to your body, instead of parallel, which is easier to start out with... but right now wide angle seems easier.

Panting like sheet... then did weights, ears blocked liao. Sign of exertion, which is good I guess. Then pool rowing. Still getting used to the left side. Apparantly I have to row left side for the race, because we've got too many right and too few left and I balance it out perfectly if one right side goes over. And so Ben put me on the left side... saying "you're the only one who can row both sides." That means row decently, at least. But its weird relearning everything again for your left side.

Asked him how my stroke was during rowing today and all got a pause, then "Not as good as your right side." Wtf... of course lah, that's my primary side. But then I remembered how exaggerated the twisting and drop is on my right side and did that for the left and hmm.... that works better.

I guess thats the thing about Ben. He won't tell you what he's feeling or what he thinks... he'll phrase things in a way so that you hear what you need to hear to achieve his desired effect.

Jonny got "reprimanded" by ben about attendance and stuff... I think Ben just said what needed to be said for a suitable course of action to take place... but I'm afraid Jonny might take it the wrong way. I guess its good if he gets pressured, interesting opportunity to learn, and at the same time, its good to see the coach care enough to give such a talk... but I actually went to imagine what it would be like to have no mens team next semester.

Maybe those who really want to continue will stay on, we'll pay for the rent for the dragonboats, and then those who really enjoy the sport and have a reason to fight for it will go on. But then we'll probably lose more numbers anyway. Argh what a pain in the ass team sports can be sometimes.

Poly forum is this wednesday.

Dress attire for most of the agenda is "jeans and polo T". Like... I have no jeans... only cargo pants or berms. I guess nows a good time to buy anyway. Maybe a normal pair, not anything too stuffy like bell-bottoms or what... that can look damn gh4y.

12:42am.... time to Z

Ben did some weird "exercise" after training on thursday.

It was kinda like hot seat.... everyone sat in a huge circle, girls and guys team, then we'd go through everyone one by one. Ben asked us to "settle any problems" with the person, so that we would not bring negative issues into the boat.

Although confrontation of certain issues was probably needed in the team, I'm not sure if some were necessary.

Some girls cried, blah blah, one even started sobbing when she tried to point something out about someone else. wtf? Then there was some talk about narrowmindedness about some people and some other serious stuff.

But all I got from the team was smiles, and playful threats. In the end only "complains" about me being too tanned, or thinking I'm neo in the matrix who can do kung fu. -_-. I guess that's a good sign ahuahua. Ahh the best was Jindian's turn, when the girls took the liberty to say together "you wear your socks very high."

I took the opportunity to suan Ken... and offer Willy some advice. Wonder if that worked. And being the extremely nice guy that I am... didn't feel too right that night in bed >_<.

But its out liao, and I guess it did help somewhat.

Friday's presentation for FYPJ went well. Operation flashpoint: Singapore's original soundtrack was awesome, thanks to creative's new SBS range speaker subwoofer system too.

Finally over, now can work on MUGEN.


Weekend canoeing sea training annoyed me...

That jag... he's fast in the canoe, as fast as he is on land. This is very annoying. Because I know that strength wise, I'm waaaay better. Weights, he does about 7.5kg per side for military press, I'm going for for 20kg pre side now. His pullups maybe 12-15 max, my max = 25. Yeah, a new high btw.

Only thing is his stamina is way better.

But the odd thing is I'm either on par with him or slightly behind him from the start already.

Damn annoying. I know I'm pulling way harder, but how come he can still go faster from the start? If it was stamina I'd understand if maybe he pulled away after 600-700 metres, but from the start? wtf?

So I narrowed it down to 2 probable causes.

1. I was using the 216 paddle instead of the 218 paddle which I usually train with. Shorter, weird positioning, odd catch and recovery.

2. Catch of the stroke. I'm not catching the water well enough. Was hitting or slamming the paddle in at times... instead of scooping.


So during today's canoeing training I went chasing other teams around kallang basin again. Overtook some team... not sure who they were, then went after ngee ann. They're not bad too. Gained on one of their rowers, but that other guy was fast. All the while checking catch and posture.

But towards the end heard someone call out my name from a dragonboat. Looked to see the whole boat looking at me... whoa... sounded like ivan... or sensei, couldn't find him among the many people on the boat then I head it "Reuben, pull harder!"

*%*(^%*(^@#%$ I need to ask sensei what he means by pull harder sometimes. When I go all out and wack the water he still says I'm not pulling hard enough. Maybe its catch first then pull fast... argh, have to check with him next week. Sensei enjoys rubbing it in that "I'm not there yet", which is saying "I'm not good enough yet". As much as I understand that this is meant to provoke me to train harder... it works alright. And bugs the hell out of me. Oh don't you worry... Jag's been rowing longer than me by a year only... but I'll catch up... very soon. I am a genius of technic and analysis... and if I have to train my running to be as zai as my weights then so be it.

Dragonboat on the weekend was okay...
Was finishing some 50 metre sprints in my t1 while some of the guys were waiting for training to start at the side. Stupid darren, keep saying stupid things like "Why you train so hard?" I guess some people will want to console or cheat themselves by thinking what they do is enough. But its not.

I cannot stand phrases like "there's no point to extra training", or "train so hard for what?" Because if they had any idea, how tough our opponents are, they had damn well be as worried and buck up ASAP.

But on the topic of consoling and cheating oneself. Does this make us who train extra hyprocrites as well? What if we think we're doing enough during extra training? Is it just for the sake of extra training or are we actually striving for something more?

Haiz... damn sleepy. And sunburnt again thanks to mr sunshine... Oh happy little mr sunshine always smiling down on this poor rower, screw you mr sunshine!

And quickly took out some info on the blog seeing as to how some people are finding this too easily. Scary. I'm glad Winston let me know he found this, I"m cool with that, but I wonder who else is reading this without telling me.

Argh... time to sleep

Second mock presentation yesterday went much better. But still got alot of changes to make to the slides today.

Went to the weights room for a while before the mugen meeting. Was pretty quiet... no one else around today. It seems everyone's ran away for holidays already. Felt kinda odd having the whole weights room to myself, but finished up a good number of sets anyway.

Ah, funny thing happened, the school's rugby coach came down the stairs to get a drink or something and approached me. He asked if I would be interested to join them for the rugby season after the dragonboat race.

Well... I wouldn't mind trying out rugby... but no offense to any of our school ruggers who read this... but I have no confidence in their team. Cept maybe Thomas. The rest look like they couldn't run 2.4km with a sub 12 minute timing - that bad. Their coach seems to have some interesting knowledge about weights tho... even if the team is still new at weights judging from their previous weights section. Plus, canoeing races are just 1 month after the rugby season and I want to concentrate more on canoeing.

So yeah, I politely declined.

MUGEN meeting with the art team was pretty good after that. Talked about some of animations, can see some good senses of animation around. Then talked about our unique selling points. And was quite suprised to see that the team could visualize some of the concepts and form a heated discussion about it. It was reassuring to have them get all excited and involved in the project, talking about it on the way home and stuff.

Met up with the programming team online after that, those guys are awesome. Started discussing possible problems and unique elements and implementation using variables and statecontrollers. I'm convinced that some of these guys are definite geniuses...

Damn... sound like a nerd again ahuahua.

Ok, I'll stop here.

Dragonboat training today... was late cause Miss Teo took forever to come and see our presentation slides... although alot of constructive feedback was given, at least she said it looks "cool" XD.

Ran the 4km on my own. Kinda slowed down during the later half but managed to speed up for the last round. I'm going to need to start chanting when I run next time...

"I'm light as a feather"
"Just floating above the ground"
"My legs are like wings"
"So swift as I drift"
"Open wider, go faster."

Ahh, I've come up with a way to increase efficiency while training this week!

During circuit or pushups or what not,
While in pushup ready position and sweating profusely:

1. Lower head for about 3 seconds.

2. Feel the huge beads of sweat roll up your chest or back, neck then your chin and lips.

3. Drink huge beads of sweat.

Ok... I'm resorting to odd ways to amuse myself during training... but it really helps! You can literally feel your parched throat get nice and moist again drinking your own sweat. Recycling salt and water kicks ass.

Sometimes really bo pian also... you can either get dehydrated and shacked.. or! Recycle salt and water!

Ahuahuahua


Weight was pretty good after that. Then a couple of the guys decided to go to J8 to eat, which is good, cuz near home. But we ended up going to Pastamania instead o_O. Ate an upsized creamy chicken linguini. 2 Bucks for the kinda Upsizing really sucks... its like... still not filling.

Stupid stingy pastamania...

After much contemplation... its done.

Its not dyed hair, or earrings, or tattoos, but its damn badass... (and best of all its not against school rules XD)

Went and got the streaks across the sides of my head whilst at the haircutting place today. Looks damn awesome lei... like the extra 2 pixels of shading in your web frames design, or the envshake on your shinshoryuken.

Hahaha feel like such a rebel. Now gotta get the rest of the dragonboaters to get the streaks by next week like we agreed.

Bobbie sez it looks damn cool, although yongqiang kept calling me a gangster... bloody arse.

Canoeing training went pretty well today. Ran about 3km+ only, but sorta fast. Still getting used to the new breathing technique that Jag taught me. Very handy indeed. Although by the last round could feel some sort of sensation at the solar plexus... maybe drank too much nutrisoy hahaha.

Circuit after that. How I enjoy combined circuit where the whole group goes together, cuz we have to wait for the girls. Its damn relaxing...

Captains ball after that. Sux being tall.. always the catcher. Aaron suprised me today. He seems like the non-active type... running also cannot make it; But damn can that guy fake. His fakes before passes to me scored us the majority of points.

Went to eat with a couple of guys and girls after training in J8 FJ. Its nice to eat with the canoeists because alot of us live arodn Bishan/ Toapayoh/ Potong area so can go Bishan to eat. Unlike the dragonboaters who must return to the far recesses of Singapore after training or a trip to AMK S11.

Very busy these few days.

Tomorrow's todo list:

1. Do this week's handouts for the MUGEN project
2. Help out Dre with music for her animation
3. Help out Caroline with music for her flash movie
4. DSTA kickass cool looking powerpoint
5. Music for DSTA
6. Preperation for Friday's meeting for the musical

More and more things coming up. Glad FYPJ is ending this friday, then at least thats one task off my list.

Steve isn't around anymore so I can blog in the studio liao.

Came up with a most awesome overture for the DSTA project last night. Then struggled to redo mission 1 attack scene theme.... but couldn't make it and just went to bed instead.

Oh yeah, we cancelled our LAN trip yesterday. Seems like the dragonboaters all hit some sort of economic crisis in unison. Good lah, row together, go poor together.

So Wille and Winston came over to play ps2. Had a blast playing 3 player sfex3, then cvs2 and Winston went outside to watch rugby with willie. Later we found Winston asleep with his mouth gawked open on the couch.

Let them see and hear a couple of projects and Willie was thoroughly amused.



Back to today... there's some sort of Linux seminar going on today in school. Seems interesting and I wanna go... but stuck in FYPJ...

Hahaha I must sound like a huge nerd "I wanna go for the Linux Seminar".

Going to scramble back to Bishan during lunch break to get a hair cut again.

Hope can get this powerpoint presentation done soon.

Long time no blog liao... hahaha

Luckily FYPJ gonna end liao.

Canoeing in the morning was damn great. Had a partner to pace with today, Sid. Kept teasing him about looking like an ape. I was really quite fascinated loh... Sid's been blessed with longer than average arms. I mean... he's about 1-2 head shorther, but when he reaches up, his fingers are almost at mine.

Went chasing the Hua Chong canoeists again. Overtook their black k1... a k2.... and kampong glam's 24-man dragon boat, but they were using an old heavy boat. Sid capsized and we botched up a T rescue... failed the mounting part so pushed his T1 to the beach.

Could really feel the catch today. Was flying around the water. Must be because I ate filet o fish for breakfast. Eat fish to move faster in water... must eat more fish.
Can't wait to go back and train with our team... I wanna let Jag and Naresh eat my backwash ahuahauhua!

Budden I capsized when Sensei asked us to do a 300m sprint set.... sia sway, right in front of the dragonboaters also. Climbed onto the pontoon but the boat was drifted away. Luckily the HC guys helped me pull the boat up and bail water. Later when washing one of them even helped hose down the boat. Friendly bunch those guys are. I'll miss chasing them around kallang basin.

Went chasing after our dragonboats after that... cause by the time I finished keeping the equip they left liao.

Ran to the da long kang... no one around... and the damned construction work prevented me from going further... so I ran back and hoped they were there and sure enough saw Jonny's head popping up looking around. Saved.

Went to eat after that with the guys. Chicken katsu curry rice + 3 bowls of rice + beef ball soup = heaven. It was nice to eat with the guys there again. Last time we ventured there after training was with all our long forgotten seniors. Quite odd being the one asking everyone to go and eat after training. I guess its up to me to pass on some traditions that we've learnt


And Willie's here so I'm gonna stop here ahuahuaahu

>_<

Project E119 is moving along fine,

need to meet up with stagearts this friday for the musical preperations...

Monday: Prepare for everything.... Music for dsta

Tuesday: Prepare for MUGEN meeting... Music for dsta

Wednesday: Prepare draft tracks for musical - MUGEN meeting

Thursday: Prepare draft tracks for musical

Friday: Musical meeting


I didn't think doing so much fun stuff could be this hectic...

Managing a 20 man team for the ultimate kickass fighting game while being tactful around eccentric personal but talented artists is fine...

Managine a bunch of musicians while meeting up with another club and shooting ideas back and forth tactfully is still fine...

Canoeing training, dragonboat training is even more fine...

Yes... its all fine.

Damn fine.

Somedays I feel like there's so much to do, yet I need to do more...

Sleepy and not making sense... I need to start recording music on the computer and not on the clarinova anymore... its alot easier and more organized for editting later. Only.... more troublesome maybe? D'oh

Been doing some thinking.

The reason why Miss Teo doesn't want too many people to take the MUGEN project up as a minor is because, if I grab like 3/4 of the minor group, she'll have no one to assign out her own projects too. And these projects are for her goal to establish NYP's gaming repertoire furthur. Always trying to get deals with the newest companies, getting projets for the gameboy advance, the N-Gage, organizing tours for Konami, or that special effects team that did lord of the rings which I can't remember... etc.

I can understand that, but if this goal of hers gets in the way of my project too much, well...
it will not be pretty.

I dunno... I used to like her so much... during the neverwinter nights project, and flash project, when I was like star programmer, she'd support and help out so much. Reu can do blah blah with neverwinter nights, the other groups all expecting something big from the creator of Character of the year for 2 subsequent years, busting out a flash side scroller with complex hit state system, juggle system, combo damage dampener system, planes system and scary AI when she said IT students couldnt set up a decent sidescroler in flash for nuts. I dunno what's changed... I still want to like her, because I do respect her to a certain extent, I want her to acknowledge me, but its difficult now when she keeps trying to pinpoint every mistake I make.

But I won't let this little matter bother me. I'm going to enjoy this major project, and every other project despite everything she throws at me. And what do I have to complain for anyway? Jag's parents are seperated, he alternates between staying at each parent's house, yet he's strong. He will be a tough opponent to beat in canoeing, but I must have more willpower.

Ran 5km then did weights today. Then learnt how to spin a bo or spear wushu style from marcus! Damn cool! Ahuahua, needed that so much.

Super stressed today...

Miss Teo is threatening to fail my major project because she says he and the supervisors caught me working on the mugen project twice today.

So she wants a task schedule of every hour I spent on the project tomorrow... how retarded is that? Fine, I'll server her up a many many paged report. Sha-neroh!

I appreciate her concern of trying to keep all the team members involved in the project... but its quite retarded when she threatens my grade just because of a few incidents working on another project.

I guess some stuff just isn't fair when you're being pinpointed. Sam watches his anime and plays games the whole day and nothing happens, Steve plays gba during breaks and I get called up for working on another project during breaks? Good job, Miss Teo, well done!

Then got more stressed during the MUGEN project meeting in the evening. Half of the team didn't show up so some guys were bitching. And I cannot stand it when people continue to dwell on whats wrong instead of focusing on what we can do with what we have. So I sort of.... fell into hyper scary soft black belt mode. I'm glad Adrian was around to get things moving up again.

But, we have a new addition to the team, Gerrard is joining us after surveying the meeting. I'm glad we have another strong artist to help moderate the art section.

Managing a rowdy bunch of designers can be pretty challenging, especially for an epic project of this proportion. We'll kick MVC2 and CVS2s ass to kingdom come.

Now to grab the l33t programmers in the MUGEN universe to combine forces for our final ultimate desperation move. Every one of these guys expanded the engine in one aspect or another, if we can combine all their findings... ohh boy.


Still pretty stressed but just got back and its 11plus so may be too late for a enraged run around the neighbourhood... I'll have to settle for some enraged pushups....

Bloody hell sun why must you always be so bloody annoying in my damn bloody face glaring hot burning rays of crap.

Its official, sunblock is as useful as piss. SPF 35... what the hell does that mean anyway? Protect for 35 minutes? or 35 seconds?

Stupid sun was out today during training... and I got sunburnt. But it doesnt help that that damned lifejacket which we are required to wear or kenah fined by the SDBA is giving me an imprint of a singlet on my body in contast to my burnt arms from the damn sun.

And my forearms are peeling. Wtf? I've never been so sunburnt before.

Training was ok today...

Took a looong time to warm up and get the hang of the balance in the boat. Unluckily capsized once at the start tho. Didn't see any of the NJC rowers today but I saw the hwa chong guys. Their coach is pretty funny... can crack jokes and make sarcastic remarks liddat. Then I paced with them a little. Could keep up and overtake a couple of laps but couldn't really feel the pull... until much later. Realized my pedal grip was abit too close. Haiz...

Still quite ham ji in the water. Canoeing can be pretty dangerous too... dunno if you'll suddenly realized if your caught in some idiotic uncle's fishing line... or capsize near rocks and get bad scratches, or the worst case, like last week; when you row so hard and suddenly capsize, then realize your legs have gone NUMB so you can't kick or swim and tow the boat back to shore. Worse is when you've rowed so hard you can't even thread with your arms, but luckily got lifejacket, and you can only cling onto your boat and hope the blood gets back into your legs. Even more annoying is when you capsize right smack in the middle of kallang basin, then you have to tow the boat some.... 500 metres to the nearest beach or pontoon or hope another canoeist comes by.

I can't wait to be able to row with the team again. I so want to overtake all their arses! Ahuahauha.

Sensei told me I'm not aggresive enough in the water. wtf? I suppose I was quite slow when my grip was wrong and was still warming up at the start, but after that I managed to overtake during pacings mah. Then he asked me to do one mroe set of 500metres. And I stupidly just wacked the water all the way... like some sort of newbie.... cuz I tot my previous sets weren't hard enough.

Nvm... next time just relax... stay calm, pull hard, don't capsize.... yeah.

Hmph... Sensei's expectations abit high for me, since he is ex-national rower some more... I'll exceed that. I'll beat them... I'll beat them all... next year ivp gold is mine!

First step, get back to rowing with the team and overtake them all first.

Still coming along....
Experimenting with beats can be quiet a daunting task... mainly because I've used simple yet effective beats in the past... but this genre just requires something more.... compelling, because there can't be a too obvious melody.

Was thinking of asking Jianan or Benson to help with the beats are, those trance/techno freaks... but I figured that would be quite gh3y...

Improvement only comes through struggling, this is the best opportunity for me to work up this rather "weak" area to get it on for the upcoming musical next year.

So yeah. Metal gear substance and rainbow six techy sexy ambient beats are belong to us now.







Headed to the weights room after class to do... duh, weights. No one around. This year is so slacked. I don't see anyone training during the exam period. Last year at least we still had a faithful bunch. Slackers...

But I have been seeing those atheletics guys around in the gym. They're quite hard working, coming in for extra trainings.



Okok, back to work. Sha-neroh!

Still working on the soundtrack...

Been doing some research on Bill Brown. Walau... his arrangements for movies and games are like... godly loh. Only thing is... his melodies are utterly unmemorable. But he does that on purpose because thats his style. Apparantly by not having any solid melody, his arrangements can blend in seeminglessly, yet the beats and chord progressions and modulations will get the feelings going just right.

"When writing music, please write like Wagner, only louder."

Awesome orchestrated pieces, but no melody. Kinda like senseless pop or rock where the only focus is on the beat.

I prefer Nobuo and Joe Hisaishi's pieces much more. They can have everything, awesome arrangements, yet engaging melodies. David Kalabakov, is another awesome composer.

Still evolving my style... but one thing's for sure. I concentrate on the melodies to drive the piece through. But I guess I'll play around with Bill Brown's style a little bit... see where in the middle do I land...

Some tracks are sounding good, some sound errr.... ok. When this is done I'll upload it somewhere for the masses to enjoy.

The human character.

Branched off into several personalities.

Unlike Multiple Personality Disorders, which have conflicting characters appearing, everyone has several personalities.

Nothing like extreme differences. But more like different reactions based on our surroundings and external factors.

For example, one could have different personalities when:

He is alone, in private,

He is alone, in society,

He is with friends, in society,

He is at work,

He is at play.

Like water, so fragile and sensitive, it can respond to vibrations from music, a gentle breeze, changes in temperature, or rise up as powerful waves when strong winds blow.

Cause and effect, one of the many things one must examine when he reaches a sufficient level of emotional understanding of himself, and the people around him.

But such knowledge is useless unless we use it to our advantage. Many people who realize such things and cannot see a reason to use it in a beneficial manner often turn cynical, or pessimistic.

Through mental imaging, psychomotor exercises, or vocal exercises, one can put himself into his most productive, or optimize a certain personality to be more productive.

But the most beneficial aspect one has to gain from this, if he dealt with art or creation, would be to find which environment he would be most productive in, or which personality he can control the best to syphon out inspirations.

Many succesful composers or artists make use of thic concept to put themselves in a more optimized state during the incubation period of their ideas.

Art and music isn't about logic. You can't piece together things you've heard before. Thought application would be no different than reciting poetry - its not yours hence unoriginal, and useless.

Then again, one could say he would go with "feelings" during the creation processes. But feelings, are based on past experiences afterall. What you've heard or felt before, you want to replicate, or nostalgia of a melody or beat. Still, ultimately useless.

Ahhh but the greatest irony is in this - to be creative, you would have to defy all logic. Because that is, afterall, the essence of it all. To ignore logic.

But that would mean that one would have to disregard everything written earlier, making it meaningless to attempt to comprehend the preceding information.

But creativity, without direction, is also, utterly meaningless and useless.

The perfect balance of both. To ignore logic to an extent, yet to obey it. A wave directed at a point.





Yes, I am having problems with the soundtrack for this damned military game....

Friday:

Holiday! Ahuahaua.

Went to get a haircut, then headed down to the street basketball courts.

The old gang is still around :)

Funny how some things never change... Most of the guys grew taller, got bigger, but everything still feels indifferent. But one thing's different now - ahahaha I haven't been playing ball often. Not like last time, when we'd see each other every day at the courts.

Nah, dragonboat and canoeing for me now, although most of these guys got into the school teams easily. Some quit because they didn't like to follow training procedures. Haha. Rebellious, so much so that they didn't want the fun of the game to be sapped away by siong training.

Oh, the main difference is that the street court gangs merged.

Well, once upon a time, there were two street basketball courts in Bishan. Each had a gang which frequented it. They would engage each other in friendly games, but the rivalry between these two gangs remained on for what seemed to be forever.

But one day, Bishan CC decided to renovate their whole premises, and the basketball court too. So the gang from the CC went over to the old court everyday.

These two groups then got more familiar with each other, and accepted each other. Then, when the new court behind Bishan CC was completed, everyone moved over there.

The end.

Its quite fascinating in a way, everyone from different schools, different age groups and walks of life, meeting regularly just to hang out and play ball. If a senior or older member of the gang walks across the court of happens to walk by, everyone would respectfully call out his name, even right in the middle of a match.

Strong bonds formed, strong friendships, the perfect team. This is probably what we lack, the love of the game. Then again, who in the hell would like dragonboat?

The only thing I disagree with the gang is their smoking. Even the youngest of the group smokes, sec 1-2. Well, nothing's perfect.


Played a match with the guys. Scored one incredible starting shot, then my team got trashed haha, opposing team was older, and more experienced, I guess we were seriously out-classed. Screwed up a few attacks myself, wtf?

Got CAPCOM VS SNK 2 at last... got my ass beaten by god rugal for half an hour and 9999 continues until I managed to find that damned opening in the AI. Basic over-offensive opening. Attack triggers flooding the AI processor nutil he forgets to block right when he gets up. Muhahahaha, I am the one!












Saturday:

Stupid project....

Then called Brian and found out there was no cell, and they didn't wanna play ball. Haiz, so what to do, went over to the gym and met some of team for extra-training. Mostly girls but I psychoed everyone to go and play ball with me there. Better play with girls then nothing.

Played 2 matches, then the girls wanted to play horse. wtf?

So melvin and I went along loh. Melvin kept screwing up everything for some reason, but I completely trashed the poor girl whos turn was after me.

But they managed to nail me once, so I got a H the second time through. Why do they do such things? I mean, you just DON'T shoot a ball at baseline and left one leg up as you jump off the ground and throw both arms out. Looks like one of chunli's victory poses.

Went home to play more gunbound.... Zzzzzzzzzzz











Sunday:

Rowing was ok... not used to this paddle and boat in comparison to last week, so balance very cocked up in the beginning. Then halfway I ran up to the toilet at the breakwater due to stomache ache. And lo and behold... no toilet roll.

Disastrous...


So I headed back out to the T1, looked at SDBA. 500 metres away... but I could use the toilet there... but stomache ache tooo baddddd already!

Finally I summoned up the courage, and told myself this will be the fastest 500 metres that I have rowed in my entire life.

And it was so.

The waters parted behind my boat, the side splash threw itself up in fear as my paddle sliced and pulled inside the water! And I was there.




Rowing was much better after that, although felt a little under the weather... hrm... oh and I have another hold in my finger from I dunno what.

Woke up at 7am suddenly, realizing that I had left my damned dragonboat jersey and shorts at kallang yesterday.

Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.

Damn kallang toilet, so fricking dark and crowded!

Frick, there goes my only wearable blue jersey... the other one is too tiny liao. At least have the new red and previous orange one, eh.

Went to kallang macs to get some breakfast, and sat with two juniors while waiting for my food. Saw the two chio bus from the week before sitting in the corner! They're so cute... last week they sat in the corner near the window, this week they sat in inside corner.

I think they're from NUS or NTU. Couldn't read their windbreakers properly due to the angle, and any more staring and I may have seemed like I was staring... haha.

I think if I ever go to a singapore U... unless theres design stuff, the only reason for me to go would be for the chio bus!

Then Sensei patrick told me that he didn't get the key for the school's locker. So... I had to use his T1 and paddle. Which is pretty good anyway, and we hunted for a footrest which we managed to find later.

But the footrest was too short. So short that it only just managed to fit the plastic holders. So, later when I was launching I saw two dirty tennis balls floating in the water, and I ingeniously went to pick them up and use them to secure the ends of the footrest.

Super high waves near the pontoon, dunno why. And I was quite ham ji to go fast because havent warmed up yet and was afraid to capsize so I went super slow to the beach.

Then did laps. Spotted the NJC canoeists, paced with them abit. They may not have been going too fast... but they were doing laps without stopping. That's quite freaky. So I cut down on all my rest times too.

Saw the civil defence boat, apparantly Roy and Weiwen are rowing for CD now... dunno why. But kinda odd seeing them train with another team.

Then I paced with some baby boat - and won. But turned around to see some japs inside. Walau...

Crossing the area from the breakwater to oasis beach is like crossing the road. You need to look left, right, then left again or else you'll see some dragon boat charging straight at you.

Stroke is still improving, better catch, better pull. Even did charging sets today and was really flying.

High tide today, so didn't see any dead bloated stuff. Whew.

After the NJC canoeists finished their rowing went to chase dragonboats for a while. Almost went too near to one, but luckily they stopped their set or else I think I would kenah hammer by the paddles liao.

Went running after kept boats, then went to Bishan to look for game to buy. All my choices were sold out. Damnit, I swear they're stock is super lousy. Luckily my download of max payne 2 is at 98% ahuahuahuahua.

Since everyone turned ham ji to use kazaa, there have been newer better technologies developed for p2p. Quite ironic eh, they stop something, then people just go on to make better, faster more efficient applications. That's dealing with the problem in the wrong area for you...

So Ben still doesn't want the canoeists to join us for the race. Needless to say, I am quite pissed at the situation. But, He knows best so I'll let him have the final say ultimately.... this time.

So I don't think we can do too well for the mens ivp race. Not enough guys, poor attitude of some rowers. Spastic team... but I'll fight on with those who are willing, because only losers would give up, even when everything is telling you that we can't make it... I still believe that we can. I will hope for the best for the guys team, and count on the mixed event for my medal.

Training today was fantastic. Despite the retarded hot sun...

Got a cracked paddle, and, was wondering if it would break while I row. Previously, I've seen Jin tien break 3 cracked paddles... no one else, and I've had cracked paddles in the past but have failed to do any significant damage to the damned things.

But analyzing how far I've come with the technique and power... the possibility seemed quite high.

During one of our fartlek sets, I charged as usual, I felt the chakra encompase my arm and lats and the paddle became lighter, I pulled faster, until the whole length of the pull felt the force, throwing the water up in the air as I exited, faster, harder, faster, harder, then I felt the pull suddenly change, and the broken off piece flopped by some last wooden strands as I brought up the paddle to recover. Splash into the water for another stroke, then the next time it surfaced, the broken off piece was no more.

A smirk leaked out as we continued on infront of the girls boat, they finished their set... then we finished ours.

I have officially joined the ranks of Jin tien to strike fear in the hearts of all paddles.

Then later Ben asked me to "look at Mun Ting and tell her whats wrong with her stroke later." So I did.

Now, Ben never asked anyone specifically to look at someone then tell them whats wrong with their stroke. So this got me thinking.

Keeping in mind that He is usually quiet and is a deep thinker... I got a little worried as to why he asked that of me.

But I've come to the conclusion that I was thinking too far, it was just inconvenient for him to yell out to correct her since we were on different boats, and later it would be more appropriate for me to let her know.

So there.




Came back home to relax. And what do I see on icq? Yaofeng blah blahing about how they found a new world map tool for me to explore. Like... why the HELL are they still doing work in school, and why the hell are they bothering me about project crap on a WEEKEND?! Sheesh, I'm starting to think he's a workaholic... that's just scary. Doesn't he have a life? I may have to look around to set him up with a girl soon...


Saw the other teams today. NYJC is looking strong. That charboh shouting at the front sounded like Diana...

Must keep FIGHTING.

Tomorrow, canoeing sea training... aiming for 35km wahahaha. Hell yeah.

Got one of the more interesting fan mails in the inbox today:

hi Lord Reu, I've decided to disturb you (sorry sorry sorry) because i'd like to know if it's in your future projects to continue to work on Evil Ryu & Evil Ken for Mugen.....i hope so because they are really amazing characters, and, apart for other ideas u may have, there's little to do to make them complete......I am talking about the intro for Evil Ryu and both endings.........and, of course and most important, the Raging Demon Attack for Evil Ryu!!!!!!!!! He has a lot of cool moves, but that is really important!!!!!!! I am a great fan of Capcom chars and I have divinized you when I saw what u did with them........make me worship you again and finish them please........at least these things.............:))))))))
Ok, I've been too silly so I'll quit here and I wish u good work!! :)))
Regards,
SpaikMax


Needless to say, I am thoroughly amused.
Ahuahuahua.

Pissed.

Canoeing training was fun today.

Did 8 rounds, first 4 was pretty slow cuz we let the juniors lead, but they were like damned slack so me and Loy took the lead and sped things up. Was a little worried about my shin due to the speed that we were going at, but I managed to make it with the no-splash running technique.

Pushups after that, Loy's quite scary too... I thought I sweat a hell lot, because in-between pushups, your body forms this arch... so all the sweat will roll up (or down..) my chest or everywhere and accumulate at my nose or mouth so I can literally collect and drink it in my mouth or let it form a puddle on the floor. But today, his puddle was bigger than mine... whoa.

Then I think some of the juniors are quite perverted... one of the guys came up to me after statics and went "whoa" then proceeded to carass my stomach. Funny guys. Then that bastart Jeremy punched me so hard before training... I still haven't socked him back yet! But... its hard... I'll probably end up kaze no ken'ing him then got problem liao.

Then we did swimming! Ahahaha. Was quite curious to see how the canoeists would stand up to "Numbah one dragon boater fastest swimmer!". Got quite a few good swimmers, but I still managed to come in first, ahuahua. Had to borrow Hongda's shorts because my stupid shorts missing string... so cannot tie then when I go too fast I'll leave the damned thing behind.



Then came the dissapointing part. I was originally scheming with Ivan to ask the canoeing guys over to help the dragonboaters for the race. Seriously loh, our crappy numbers, and the shit attitude some of the juniors and even seniors are giving during training... we definately won't be able to make it for the race like this loh. If we can get the canoeing seniors in, which they are very keen on, it will help our numbers, boost team morale and increase our chances for the race.

But- Ivan told me that apparantly Ben said "no" and Jonathan said we have enough guys.

That's downright retarded. We had about the same number last year. But half of these guys aren't coming down regularly so whats the point? And the previous races spoke for themselves loh. Not enough guys, or no guys event at all.

Ben's not picking up the phone... Jonathan already said he was fine with it.

I hate it when they don't tell me things. Its fricking retarded. Whatever, I'm going to fight for this.

Saturday:

FYPJ in the morning was ok....

Training the afternoon was more fun. Although there was a pathetic number of the guys team showed up. At least the girls could fill in a baby boat. Then earlier I found out that Stephen wasn't going for training. Why? Because the attendance is like crap and he feels no morale to train. Got quite pissed and blasted at him a little over the phone.

Firstly, being in a team is about taking and giving. Yes, its good to feel good because you're part of some awesome team. But when you leave in bad times, then what's that say about your commitment? What's that say about the team's sincerity? Then, by not going because of such a reason, you're just making things worse loh...

Anyway, the water in kallang was like shiiiiiiiiiit. Like someone's lao sai water. So fricking brown. What the heck was the rain doing to my beloved basin?! Coach Ben asked me to go left, cuz boat was imbalanced. I geniusly managed to feel my usual powerful catch and pull on the left side, too. Ambidexterous Reu, good job.

We thrashed the girls boat for a couple of sets... although I think the head starts they had weren't enough. Looking around I felt quite dispaired. about 8-10 guys... then besides Jonny... all of them weren't twisting or throwing themselves forward enough during stroke.

AHHHH!!! I'm going to grab all these buggers for extra training!!!!11111

Talked to Jonny abit after training. Told him about some stuff regarding training. I always think of Jonny as having a really hard job... like being so young yet cap of older guys and such. But then... there's only one year difference between us anyway.

I talked to Steph about how to get the team back together... extra trainings, and such. I figured its quite stupid to leave everything to the cap and hope that he sorts things out. It may be expecting too much, but in the end, its up to us to take a pro-active role in the team. Because the team is made out of the team, not the cap.

Heh, fancy me talking about trying to get the team back together... the one who ran over to canoeing to have his own race just in case the dragonboat race sucked like last time...

Went to church after that. Really envisioned my bed but I figured I'd see what was going on. Lots of familiar faces... the on-screen presentation was quite good. Looked like the product of aftereffects and premiere. Went to eat CHICKEN RICE after that. Haven't eaten chicken rice in Novena for like sooooooooo long. It was awesome... but that damned soup! Still so much msg for what?!

Some problems with Lionel while we were going there... the group never changes. Same type of interactions going on. Its fun but I'm not sure if thats good or bad?

Took a bus back with Karen after that. Found out lots of stuff... and revealed some juicy background info on the gang to her... ahahaha.

Hmm... sweet, I can see why he likes her.



Sunday!:

Managed to talk to Sensei Patrick about me not being able to make it on Sats... and suprisingly... he's letting me come down on Sundays to row! *ecstasy*

Perhaps I saw this possibility whilst I was talking to him too... mainly because he has a passion for the sport... and wants to share it. I shall not take this passionate chance forgranted.

Woke up at 7... went down to kallang. The one star course Patrick was teaching was going to stay around the beach, so I was all along during all of my sets. Water was still as shit as saturday... but after it drizzled and stopped... drizzled and stopped, it cleared up a little. Took the RED racer out. The red boat is like damn sat... I look like team singapore rowing in it or something hahaha.

Kallang basin should be called Kallang Watery Animals Cemetery. Saw a bloated rat, which was rolling around on the shore due to the waves. It looked quite cute at first... like some cute ilttle fat rat... but then I realized the damned thing was dead so I did not play with it. Then saw a bloated toad in the middle of nowhere... and then a pigeon at the beach. Sensei Patrick asked "You want pigeon for lunch?", yuck loh...

Paced a little with the ngee ann canoeists. Not sure how far they were going per set... but I managed to catch up to their first canoeist a couple of sets along the beach. I recognized one of them... came in before his pair during the duo-athelon. I don't think they're that strong... what happened to all the other canoeists today? Cheers, ngee ann's coach spotted me and watched a little. Probably wondering why this bugger is canoeing all by himself haha. Genius secret training!


When the one star course ppl went for lunch, Patrick showered me with attention. Damn cool, during his tutelage I managed to get from okay stroke to super sat twisting on formz by the end of the day. That's why I regard him more of a Sensei then a coach... although they mean the same thing in some places... For Ben, everything's like... strict, high discipline. You ask him something... he'll give you a quick straight answer then move on. For Patrick, he'll let you push yourself... just to see your interest, then prod and poke you in the right direction with comments. Then when the time is right he will bombard you with attention. Even a simple question can be answer with several references. This really helps to keep the fun in canoeing, I think. Really lucky to have crossed paths with him.

Dragon boat races going on... some british, japan, australian, canadian teams duking it out. I stood there and watched them go out... felt quite sad at first... remembering my own race with the team... Will it ever be like that again? Then those cute japs almost overturned the dragonboat when they lifted their hands up for stretching exercise and stretched... right.

A lot of dragon boats going around today. Was quite afraid some coxswain wouldn't spot me then I would go flying out of the water. Tried to spy on some of the other teams too, hahaha. Some of the rowers are quite amusing. You see these huuuge guys who have closed squinted eyes rowing as if damn shacked.

You can tell the unity of a team by the rower's expressions, really. I don't think our team's unified even. If I looked at our team while they were rowing, I'd probably see many different expressions, instead of one unified one. I for one vary between normal, serious, PISSED OFF, to laughing and smiling like an idiot.

If a team is really serious they would only have one expression altogether - Serious.

Happened to capsize right in the middle of the basin when I was aiming for the toilet and beach. Omg... had to tow this huge boat a good 400+ plus metres back. Slowly slowly kicked, some dragonboats passed me by and the coxswain asked if I was ok, then I gave him the thumbs up. Nothing a dragonboat can do anyway... Luckily Loy and Sid came to help. I must learn how the heck Naresh managed to overturn his boat and get back on while still in the water. Thats quite shen...


30km altogether... arms not tired but was feeling damned sleepy so I took a nap earlier.

Dunno what game to play....

The tremors have been shaking the games design studio for about a week now...

First, the rumours, then the pictures, then the trailer.

FINAL FANTASY 7-2 ADVENT CHILDREN!

The continuation movie of final fantasy 7, by square....

Finally... THE final fanatsy movie.


"2 years ago.... we thought nothing would happen..."


-Cloud stands at a grave-


"I told myself I was going to love for you... but now..."



AHhhhh!!!1 I MUST WATCH THIS MOVIE >_<



Was approached by Mr Tan today... asked me if I wanted to go on some trip to Laos to do some design/web project...

Seems fun... plus the fact that only 2 design students can go on the trip...

"must be able to endure hardships" was on the criteria... dunno why he came up to me also... said he was looking for the outdoor type. This sparked my interest... but... the trip is right smack during the river regetta... the dragon boat races. So... I think I'll tell him I can't go on monday.

*sigh*

Seems like excos are more troublesome then I thought.

Was talking to K the other day, and he said the other reason why he's stopping canoeing for a while is because he doesn't believe in the new commitee. wtf? He doesn't believe in the new commitee? They haven't even had a chance to act yet and hes already not liking them.

I for one believe in Samantha, and her choice and decisions based on her interviews with the year 2s. I believe that the choices she made for the new commitee are at least 90% of the best choice makable.

Then I met another Weiheng during weights just now. She tried to act okay but my genius intuition told me something was wrong. Don't know how her club's giving her problems, but I don't think its right loh. She gives more to SE than I do to PE and they give her problems. Egos maybe? I think that if they're not in the club because of passion for what they believe in, then forget it. Don't know why some people join clubs for CCA points too...

Some of the juniors ask me "this event got CCA point or not?" or "if got go got CCA point or not?". wtf? If they have a passion for the club activities, they will naturally be more involved and the points will just reflect that loh? I got like... 38+ points at the end of year 2... thats like... beyond distinction or whatever for pearls...

More victims of Singapore's screwy education system....

Yes, I'm enjoying the project now. Screw certain retarded team mates, screw leave, screw supervisors, screw it all. Geniuses feel no pressure, because we shine naturally Ahuahuahauhuahuahuahuahau!

Was planting trees today for the island. Yes, I was bestowed with the powers of MOTHER NATURE!!! And the island felt the awesome wrath of FATHER NATURE! Trees and grass could grow out from their groups and onto roads, blocking all hideous mechanic objects from passing by! Trees and grass would hover and float all over hills and bumps! Millions of clusters of trees and grass blow up the polygon count in the area until the geforce 3 would lag! And the geforce 2mx would cough out blood and die when traversing my awesome plains! But now... all is calm.


Training just now went okay.

So runners knee is recovered! Hooray! But the 4km run I did every day 2 weeks ago for the duathlon has produced a new problem... shinsplints.

Reads up to be caused by a structural fracture in the bone. wtf? yes. WTF?! I just recover from one problem and a new shitty problem arises to bother my running. Heh. Geniuses always have extra obstacles to overcome. Yes! This damn thing will be no problem to me, AHUAHUAHUAHAUUAH. More milk... no... milk high in fat and crap. Calcium... alternate sources of calcium... absorption. Damn, more research to be done.

After running was circuit. There was a part where we did a 50 metre dash back on the grass. Woo, that was fun, no pain on the grass so I cycled my legs like sonic the hedgehog and enjoyed the speed while I could. Then durign weights.. felt like throwing up. Hrm... maybe haven't fully recovered yet. But still managed to clock 460meters for the 2 minute rowing. Third highest today while feeling like throwing up. I couldn't pull full strength and make the machine scream like my bitch. Then Rendy kept cursing me about being sick yet clocking 11 metres away from the highest score. Crap lah, if I was feeling okay I'd blow you all away okay...

Then at the end I heard someone call my name and turned to see Rachel. Secondary school classmate. Super shocked to see her in NYP. She was like "Whoa you changed soooo much." And I just gawked and smiled at her while she walked off hahaha, so intelligent.

Trying to call up the juniors for extra training tomorrow. A couple of buggers coming down... good.

Freaky, Luann asked a question which I asked myself on the blog earlier in the morning during afternoon meeting.


Been thinking about goals in life and priorities and commitments...

Seriously wouldn't mind doing music or doing something related to sports for ministry but...

Then I remembered why I "left" church in the first place.


I wanna see how far I can go on my own. Without his help, without depending on him.

I can't ever accept my successes to be fom him... yet.

I'm still on my own.

And until I either succeed and know what it feels like, or get into so much trouble that there's no other way.... I'll still go on my own.

Well Miss Teo is telling me to do work during the time that I am in on saturday.

Basically to earn the saturday off priviledge I'm going to have to put in extra work. Then doing bible study during this time may give my team mates a bad impression. But what bad impression is there to give if I'm doing extra hours and extra work in the first place?

*sigh* what a pain in the ass. She says she may fail me from the project if this keeps up.

Nows the time to blast out all powerfulness during the weekdays. We'll see what happens next sat.