Yesterday was an... interesting day.

Had a field trip to Pulau Ubin to take photo-references for the project. Boatride + Rental of kickass Shimano full suspension bike = sponsored by school.

Made an interesting observation about cycling techniques.

The experienced cyclists would put their seat really high up, to the extent that both feet cannot touch the ground at the same time. This would give the cyclist a greater range of movement in his legs so that he can execute more power by extending his legs almost all the way after the contraction.

Leisure cyclists would put their seat at average height. For fear of the height of the experienced cyclists seat configuration, and fear of falling down.

Vincent on the other hand, put his seat all the way down. To the lowest, in fact. Saying that its "easier to cycle". This configuration would grant him ability to cycle with minimum extension of his legs, in other words, he knees would be bent alot all the time. Thinking that the less he moves his legs and cycles, the easier time he will have. But any experienced cyclist would tell you this is not true, but tell him that and he will raise his eyebrows and say "No. I find it easier." Needless to say what I think about that attitude... deceivingly self-satisfied ego, and lazy.



Went back to school after that when everyone else went home. Played wolfenstein for a while with the guys, playing some really retarded friendly fire matches.

Then went to Piano Ensemble.

Heard 2 juniors, and 1 senior play. Everyone else didn't prepare. *sigh* I thought the comments section was fine, but later on Caroline said that some of the seniors didn't feel comfortable giving comments after the playing, because they felt uncomfortable about giving "advice" when they're the same standard. I think that a team should be comfortable to help each other out. Regardless of fear of stepping on each other's pride and pettiness. Everything said should be taken with an open-mind, as the comments given are not always right either. But as a whole, I think it would give an interesting amount of pressure and provide useful information for the acceleration of the pianists musicality.

Gave a small talk on Ideal Performance State to the team after that. I wonder if they found that useful.

And, my home computer internet explorer is bust. Crash everytime I enter a website... stupid thing... need to find out what's wrong.

Training later, dunno if I should rest up my elbow... strained it a little too much doing lat pull down on thursday. Went up to 77kg doing back lat pulls. That's second highest on the machine liao. Haha, but only 4 reps. Stupid elbow...

Killed another mosquitoe. Hahaha, serves you right, damned creature from hell.


Just finished wts at home at... 12:30am.

I'm so screwed tomorrow, better go and try to Z asap.

Training today was... okay.

Running sucked.

During the final round around school I felt the familiar ache in my right knee. So slight, yet I remember the pains it caused last time so clearly. Then the pain inside my chest... lagged away from the team and finished the lap about 80 metres behind them.

You're such a gu-niang, Reu. Going to let fear stop you?
The damn knee is healed, cept for some pains now and then, get over it!

There is no reason why you cannot push yourself further in running.
If you cannot overcome the mental aspect of this task, how can you overcome the physical aspect.

Get over this. Move on.
You cannot let this set you back from your goal.

Social conflicts -

Ever encountered someone who you just had such a bad vibe off? Or someone who is so arrogant and cocky that you just can't stand?

I used to hear about such cases from otehr people, read about them. But now, it a very real part of my life.

My dear love Vincent, has just been assigned to the same project as me for the next 3 months. Hoo-bloody helling-ray.

Yes, such a genius as I has been challenged with a social problem. Yet this equation's solution baffled me this afternoon. Perhaps it was the fact that he directly came in and wanted to make drastic changes to the project task allocation, or perhaps its the fact that I still remember his back-stabbing, side-stabbing, groin-stabbing ways. But I was quite perplexed in the afternoon. Nevertheless, I solved things with yaofeng, as he was in the middle of things earlier.

So, genius, what's your solution? You used to say that confrontation is the solution of all social conflicts. Will it be the case here? And will confronting him resolve or help in any way? Well, will it? Will keeping quiet and enduring work? Will you be able to endure or not?

Finally, the answer came to me after talking to Stephen. Why the heck am I getting to flustered up over this little arrogant fat cock? One negative relationship in the class is nothing compared to the MANY fun and positive relationships I have in the class. Which is more than I can say for him - as stephen pointed out. Such people won't have very many friends. And its true in this case, always alone. Does he even realize it? Or does having a girlfriend shield his poor ego from the brutal truth? Yes, Genius, you have done it. Fruastration, has now turned into pity.

Well done. I shall continue to have fun, I shall continue to aspire, I shall continue to do better than him, effortlessly.

As stephen said, If you're really talented, you'll do well in anything you set out to accomplish.

True, but not quite. Talent covers only certain areas. Its willpower and determination that will set you in the right aptitude and direction. Fortunately, I have all three.

Sha-neroh!

Just finished a genious helping of weights with stephen at bishan gym.

Then went to J8 because he wanted to buy stationary and toiletries and I was sucked into the game store.

Turns out they had the av convertor to connect your ps2/xbox/gamecube/dvd player/vcd player/ps1 to your monitor.

So, I'll be LYING ON MY BED PLAYING FINAL FANTASY X IN THE COMFORT OF MY ROOM AND BED LATER! Hahahaha, sha-neroh. Bought a multitap too, so can play better multiplayer next time.

Sound connected to my sound blaster audigy platinum exterior module, connected to my sony hi-fi for very song, booming bassy, tweety trebly sound.

Ahh.... If I didn't have school and training I could rot in here for life.

Muhahahaha.

So I left the house and realized I left the report for the presentation at home.

More great news.

Went to school to render the stuff. No way the movie would render in time, so I rendered scenes instead, and put everything on a zipdisk. Went down to buy a file, 1 sausage egg mcmuffin, and headed to the LT. Then I realized... they may not have winzip.

So, I headed back up and unzipped my otehr files, and placed everything neatly in a folder on the disk and headed back down to the LT.

Then, I realized that everyone was using flash or powerpoint to present, and I only had rendered jpegs.

So, when it was my turn up

Vincent is ghey, he didn't want to let me copy my files over to the com and just started the presentation even after I told him about it. "Your file take very long to copy one." wtf? Stupid fat ass. At least let me copy while you are presenting or else later will be worse, right? He seriously only cares about himself lei, I can see now what charles meant about him being such an ass. I guess there will always be self-centered, arrogant assholes in life. All we can do is make the best of them and use them for our amusement.


Anyway, the presentation com was using winxp instead of win2000. Hooray. So for the presentation I just opened up my images directory, and hit "view as slide show." So impromptu, so pro. Yes, after fighting so hard, the presentation was a success. Genious, Reu.


Left early to run down for training.

11:30am. No more boats, no more paddles. So I watched the canoeists go back and forth. Examined their strokes again.

Then went running with some of the dragonboaters. And that's when everything went downhill again.

Bloody crap training day.

things that went wrong:

1. Felt bloody fatigued when running, even lost out to melvin.

2. Couldn't get direction right in the canoe.

3. Couldn't canoe properly due to fatigue.

4. Didn't get first for every set.

5. Felt woozy after canoeing so didn't go down to the dragon boat.



Yes, isn't that marvelous? It was really utter crap lah. A normal person would feel really down right now. But I, such a genious am extremely pissed off and shall analyze every aspect of what went wrong.

1. Felt bloody fatigued when running, even lost out to melvin. 3. Couldn't canoe properly due to fatigue. 4. Didn't get first for every set. 5. Felt woozy after canoeing so didn't go down to the dragon boat.
I was wondering why I was so beh gan. Bloody pissed that I couldn't push hard enough. But on retrospect, I should have seen the signs earlier. Little brother even hurt because even my piss was so damn bloody hot when I went to the toilet after the run.

a: Not enough energy: One sausage egg mcmuffin and one banana has insufficient number of calories for such training. Stick to the usual 2 sausage egg mcmuffins in the morning next time.

b: Take better care around the sun next time. Hyperactive sweat glands + high sensitivity to sunlight = good combination for burn out. Running shirtless along kallang in the 12pm sun != good idea (!= is noe equals to). Bloody hell. Why can't I just be an invulnerable iron training machine? Heck, screw it... even top atheletes know the importance of all these things.



2. Couldn't get direction right in the canoe.

a. For goodness sake, check stroke. It turns out when I'm tired and start sweeping, I don't sweep properly at all. Need to imagine that semi-circle better. Keep arms straighter, stroke is looking and feeling better now. Do more plymetric twistings.


On a lighter note, the new girls on our team are so promiscous. Before training Casandra and Jasmine were talking about some stuff, then I saw them looking at me from the corner of my eye...

"Reuben, can take of your shirt?"

wtf?

Daring and promiscious indeed... o_O
Geez, they think what, free show ah? Come to think of it... that group of canoeing junior GUYS asked the same thing. I suspect something's up with them.

Hehehe, she's so cute, and in school of health sciences lei. Smart and cute, and available, and year 2. Fuafwafwafwa. >_<

Perfect.

My presentation sequence which I planned to bring home to render for tomorrow's presentation is in my zipdisk.

This zipdisk, was in school.

I realized this, right before I reached home, at 8pm.

Luckily, dad was around fly me to school and back.

Isn't that wonderful?

What's even more wonderful is how my zipdrive is busted.

Good job, Zipdrive.

Heck, I'll just go to school tomorrow and render it which will take up a couple of hours...

But the forum starts at 9am.

I may have to persuade Ms Teo to let me present as one of the last few.

Or, I'll just whoop up some random stuff last minute with my supreme intelligence and fast-wit.

SCREW YOU situation, I will prevail, and with a godamn distinction at that.

The type of stuff that's said out loud in the games design lab is really funny.


Today, I was doing concept sketches. Did one of an army guy for our game, then did one of a "civilian woman". Supposed to be an average woman, but ended up with a really hot aerobics instructor type. Then I like... couldn't decide on the perfect breasts.

Zul comes up: "You want it to be more supple, issit?" Then he does some rough outlines for me.

Alvin: "Maybe make it pressed down like this" Then he does rough outlines again.

Me: "No! I want FULLER BREASTS!"

Zul: "The line here maybe make it protrude up more..."

Me: "I want bigger fuller beasts!"



Then I went down to buy a paper stub for shading at the school bookshop. And, they don't have any. Retarded. That's like... so important for shading loh, and they don't have it. Anyway I ended up grabbing 5 kneadable erasers to converge and mould random objects at my pleasure. Then there was this cute girl who went over to the box and picked it up to study it. Yeah, I had bought out their whole stock. So after watching her search around abit through the erasers section I offered her one of my kneadable erasers.
She was like "Oh, no its ok." *smile*
Then I went "Oh no, go ahead, I just need them to...." -long pause- "Go ahead" *smile*

Smooth, Reu, real smooth.

Anyway she thanked me sweetly and thanked me again after paying for it. Score 100 exp to hero gauge!

Just finished an interview via email. That took forever >_<

Date: Wed, 20 Aug 2003 12:12:10 -0500
To:
Subject: Sorry for being late on the interview :P

3 days late! unbelieveable! :p



Hello Reu, thank you for giving me the opportunity to interview you.
Thanks for giving me the opportunity to be interviewed by you :p

For starters, what did it feel like when you made your first character?
Woo... you mean starting off? Excited of course! Hehe, excited and happy. Everytime I put in something that I find fun, after balancing things out, I'd do it over and over again until its "more fun".

Why an Evil Ken and Ryu?
Well, I first got the idea to do Evil Ken from a local street fighter comic book series (not official capcom stuff). I figured, since capcom's never done Evil Ken before, I'd have more creative control over him and less capcom influence during development.

Do you think mugen is to play or create?
I guess this depends on what type of person you are. Some people love to listen to a certain genre of music, and some people love to play and listen to a certain genre of music. For me, its the latter. MUGEN can also simply be a vessel which people may want to channel their creativity into. Everytime I think: "Wouldn't it be cool if...", while playing MUGEN, or any game, I ask myself how it could be done in MUGEN.

So how did it feel to get Fighter of the Year at The Mugen Guild not once but two years straight and to be one of the most respected creators around?
Oh, Kingtigre and I were suprised, and flattered. He even took a screenshot of the poll page, hahaha. As for such a title, I don't think much about it. Placing one's ego in a high place is a dangerous place to go, not only will it limit how much higher you can go, I believe that socially, its not ethical. Any respect that people give is appreciated and reciprocated :)

What was Kingtigre like?
You say that like He's dead :p. A couple of weeks after I posted about Evil Ken back on the mugen development forum, I got an email from an rabi... avid street fighter fan. Kingtigre came to me with many new ideas and concepts for Evil Ken, which I appreciated, because both our ideas vary vastly, yet come together to complement each other perfectly. He can be pretty wacky at times, always open-minded and really fun to work with. I remember the time we were posting on a nonsensical thread at MugenShank, and he did an picture of supersaiyan9999 Kingtigre, which is Kingtigre with extremely long yellow hair. His description was something like the character being so super that his hair wrapped around the earth multiple times.

When/if you play Mugen who do you usually pick and by whom?
Hrm... I usually rotate around a large amount of characters. There are alot of well done characters which I enjoy.

What made you decide to want to start creating for mugen?
I can't remember.... I guess at that time it seemed fun to alter a part of what I enjoyed playing.

There is rumor that when you first came into the mugen community you had a habit of posting in the wrong forum and such as this, was that so? And How did the community appear to you when you first discovered it?
Hahaha, I don't think that I was that blur :p. The community seemed like an interested place to frequent. Many people expressed opinions which I could understand and relate to, and some wacky stuff went on, like silent storm and the big nasty's feuds.

How does it appear to you now?
It still feels the same to me actually. Even in new forums. I guess I don't keep track of stuff that happens too much. Come to think of it, some people are alot less nice nowadays, saying stuff like "please die" or, "just die". I can never agree with talking down to people or slamming people for their lack of foresight.

You are currently looking for new talented sprite editors to help you update Evil Ken and Ryu... What plans do you have for these chars now?
Hehehe, that's a secret :p. Well if you've been following their progress, you'd find that I always talk about team supers, but never actually get them in. That's what's next, along with some other stuff. The system itself is complicated... more complicated than the MSSM system, but so worth it.

Do you plan on making any new chars?
Ack. I would love to. But, school life is very demanding. I'll have to wait and see if I will be able to manage working on MUGEN in the future.

I don't want to take up too much of your time there are just so many questions I could ask, so I will begin closing this for you. How do you view yourself in the community?
Same as every other person in the community, I'm just one member.

What do you do outside of Mugen?
I'm currently studying for a diploma in digital media design, specializing in games design at a local college. Most of my time after school is occupied by co-curricular activites nowadays - I'm on the school dragonboat team and canoeing team aiming for the upcoming division races and nationals, and am presidenting the school's piano ensemble.

Do you have any parting tips for up and coming creators?
Just advice I constantly give myself:
Whenever you want to do something original, or express yourself, don't just aim for someone else's work or someone else's standard. Find your own unique way to express yourself as well, combine your favourite elements, and put in something that you've never seen or felt before. This way, you won't just hit the mark that someone has set before, who knows, you may go even higher ;)

Is there anything else you would like to add to this?
Don't think in an overly complicated manner. Its the simple things that work, that lead to the complicated whole which you can enjoy. While working in MUGEN also, consider making things hard for yourself or your character so you can actually feel like you've accomplished something when you've won.

I thank you once more for this chance to "speak" with you. I myself am a huge fan of your work as well and enjoy your positive attitude as a creator. Until next time.
Thank you too, its been a pleasure :)





Come to think of it, how I act and how I type out thoughts is vastly different.

I really respect people who get interviewed and actually make sense, took forever to think of intelligent answers to some of this questions.

Running and sprinting on monday = sore legs and poor running on tuesday.

sore legs and poor running on tuesday + running and squats on tuesday = fun.

Die lah, very beh gan running yesterday. Really pushed damn hard for monday's sprinting but didn't do enough stretching. So lame, Me, getting newbie muscle cramps. Bloody cK'ro'rorc'krock. Went late for training because was playing wolfenstein - enemy territory in the com labs with the games design gang. Damn fun. Rocket launcher is like, the super powerful artic. Sure, you have a 2 second fire delay, but hit anything around 5 or even 10 meters radius and its an instant kill. Sniping has never been so fun.

Weights was really slacked on monday, so I upped the intensity on tuesday. Then went home. An access of messages on the team forums to reply to, but managed to play marvel vs capcom 2 for 50 minutes till 12am.

Played with Omega Red. Slightly above average character with very fun air combos. Then I unlocked spiral after completing with Reddie. Will play with her tonight. This unlocking this is lame. Don't they know who I am!? All the character should be playable to me from the start. Stupid games nowadays...


Need to finish the design for the 2003 Polytechnic forum by today. So stressed. The poly forum is this big meeting where the 5 polys in singapore will send a few selected students to go and talk about current events. Shoot, I still need to go and get my passport renewed. Stupid man, go on a cruise also need passport renewed.

1. Finish poly forum design. - today

2. Finish attachment report - tomorrow

3. Finish attachment - friday

Psyche up! This year's poly forum is gonna be the damned best looking design compared to previous years and many years to come! Hell yeah!

Bloody tired today.

What a slacked day.


Stephen, Jeremy and Rendy came over after training on sat to play ps2. We played soul caliber 2 for the majority of the time. What a retarded game. Where's my chaining? Where's my combos? Air combos? Launcher? Super combos? Everything revolves around poking. Needless to say I lost in such a scrubby game to the guys. Hah, but thats just because the game is good for n00bs. Ivy is so cool, her sword, can frickin become a frickin nanchuk/whip fusion type of thing. She's so cool! And her posture and costume.. Wahhhh.... so fierce. Hahahaha. Soul caliber 2 seems more and more fun. Well done, Tecmo.

Dynasty warriors 4 is pretty boring. Graphics and everything is damn nice... but... everything is too repititious. I did the same combo like... 1000+ plus times in a single mission. Wtf?!

Winning eleven 7 is pretty fun. Lost to stupid Rendy 1-nil. So tyco... and oh my gosh... Japanese commentators are FABOOROUS! Damn hilarious. You can imagine the commentator standing on his chair, yelling in excitement, or dancing and smiling around the room.

Rendy and Jeremy headed back late, it was raining and there weren't any more buses to the two chao gu-niangs made me walk them down to the main road with an umbrella.

Stephen who stayed over wasn't feeling too good, gave him some panadols and vitamin C to help. He was alot better on Sunday. Went to eat Bishan prata. Best prata in Singapore and Malaysia from my trips to malaysia too. 2 egg, 2 plain, marvelous.

The day passed pretty fast, played ps2, went out, looked for games, Stephen bought some old version of winning eleven for the ps1 and got cheated, hahaha. Then we went to eat and shop for Mom's birthday present.









Back to today, what a tiring day. Bloody sheet, its 12 plus already, need to sleep early to be in school early.

Bloody sheet.

Woke up slightly late on saturday morning for training. Yuck. Managed to reach there are 8:15 and saw Pong, but to my suprise everyone started reaching after 8:30.

Let the juniors head down first before Coach patrick sent me on a racer t2 with Hongda. Hongda is slightly heavier (75kg) and slightly taller (1.85m), so he pretty much look like a giant. Yeah. Was frontman, and we made each other laugh like crazy througout the sets. Insane bugger. First we called ourselves "two giant buffoons on a small boat", because we are frickin tall and huge, and felt very unstable in the tiny t2 at first; then when we tried doing sprinting start sets and bursts and we called ourselves the "geh-kiang T2", due to the amount of stuff we wanted to try out and boats I wanted to chase on our first time together. Hahahaha. He politely agreed when I told him I wanted to race after the nus and hwachong boats.

Direction was pretty bad, so we couldn't gain very much on the nus t1s, but we actually overtook a hwachong k2 pair, although we did a starting burst set and they were finishing their distance lap. Current was insane again. Two of us kept sweeping, then sweeping again to counter our rotation. The current was so retarded at times that our boat was going in a "\" forwards instead of a "-" and I just had to yell "WTF?!!@#@#%".

Ended the training with a 250m sprint with samantha/grace k2 pair. I yelled out "Samantha, if we lose to you this set I'll give you 50 pumping!". Hahaha, so geh-kiang alright. Go geh-kiang t2 power. And low and behold, we won. By a couple of meters, says Hongda. Sha-neroh!

Patrick said that we make a very good match for a T2. Good size, and we have the power. But, technique-wise are lacking. Just need practice and time, I guess. I wouldn't mind going for a T2 race, and frankly, if there's anyone else on the team that I'd rather be on a t2 with, it would be Hongda, but having a dependancy on a teammate again for a race... would defeat the purpose of me coming to canoeing in the first place. I still want my T1 event. I want my own race.

Came up, washed boats, debriefed, then went down again in a starlum t1 for dragonboat canoeing.

It rained. Not a heavy windy rain though, which would have been fun; but a peaceful rapid precipitation. I just love it when it rains when I'm canoeing. Usually outside you'd see the rain, you'd hate to get wet in the rain, its so foreign, so cold, so annoying. But in the boat... when you see it rain and the little droplets jump up when it hits the water surface all around you. Its more humbling. The heavy drops beat against your bare arms, you can hear and feel them tapping on your lifejacket, your cap, and you can see it affecting everything around you. Its all around you, and you're rowing in it, depending on it. Almost as if its trying to tell you: "there is no where to go, I am everywhere, embrace me." Either that or "Who's yo daddy? Hahhahaha!". Probably the more peaceful first option though.

Was quite shacked from canoeing training earlier, but still managed to pull through and emerge first for all the sets we did despite atrocious directional control. I'd look down to check my stroke then look up and find myself heading straight for the wall or beach. Lovely.

Spotted more dead and rotting stuff too! Dead bloated puffed up rish at the pontoon, dead bird with all the feathers detached and hanging loosely by some hairs, dead rat in middle stages of decomposition. Seriously, the amount of dead stuff in Kallang basin is apalling, in fact, if anyone in singapore kills anyone and dumps the body anywhere, it would probably end up in the kallang basin.



Went to eat dinner with the guys and for the first time, Coach Ben came along. Jeremy, Stephen Rendy, Mei xuan, wani, jonathan, Willy and I headed to kallang market to eat. Walked along side Ben on the way, and we had a pretty long talk. Talked about canoeing, about Oliver, about races, training stuff, I had never talked to Ben for such a long time an in such a personal level before, but it was really nice. I guess its the stigma of mentors/teachers which we as students perceive them to have that makes us so... uncomfortably quiet and disciplined around him at times. Its the amount of respect we have, really, not anything to do with not liking him. I guess this rubbed off since my days with Mr Chua. All of us felt the same respect for him. During class, we had to have the utmost discipline until when it was after class and everything was informal again, and it was hard to talk to him then. I guess we as students want to make them so proud sometimes, that we want to filter out anything that would make them think any less of us at times?

Just watched the video of that rj teacher who tore up her students work recently. Woo... intense alright. I can still recall Chua tearing up our notes up to 3 times. He was that kind of insane eccentric teacher. My first day with him and I remember becoming so fraustrated that my eyes became red. But it was the 4 years with him that I worked up and saw my worth intellectually. From the bottom table in class, all the way up to the top smarties table with the RI guys. The Cat high guys were always more fun to work with, though.

I will forever remember his words: "I can teach so many gep or very smart students like michael, but to see a weak student like you last time come up and solve all these questions, that, is what makes me happy. " And to see that proud face everytime I managed to solve some retarded question from the ri GEP amaths or physics or chem papers, that same face when I did that differentiation question faster than the ri GEP student even. Heh, that was a drive alright. But the wanting to make other people proud can only take you so far if you don't want to do it for yourself. Yeap, amaths, physics, or chem wasn't as fun as marvel vs capcom 2. Damn... come to think of it... its such an old game now. And yet I was ecstatic when I got it for the ps2 on friday.

PS2 acquired...

Yuna is so chio... dun cry, Yuna...

Too many games to play...

Heck, I'm going to bed.

Yes, I'm way too free right now...

Killed me some ahmalikans last night on ultima online. Made a post about the battle:

There was a tense atmosphere in the town of Vesper. Creel, Tristan and Grax stood near the bank. A dark green void ripped apart and out stepped the green beast, heaving his body heavily as steam rose out from his mouth in each breath. On him, the high priest of Set.

Moving straight to Tristan, a smirk came across the face of Zaratoz. "You, are in so much trouble,"

Tristan looked up defiantly, "Is that all you have to say to me?

Zaratoz brought his mace forward and pointed it at him, "Where, is your armor?"

"In a safe place, where it will not corrupt anyone." Tristan replied.

But Tristan did now know that Zaratoz was referring to whatever new armor Tristan had, for he had noticed that he was in commoners clothes.

From the corner of his eye, Zaratoz spotted the Paladin Creel. The high priest glared at the paladin, then turned his attention once again to Tristan.

"Foolsss.... Soon Set shall extend his realm into ours, you have just given up your spot with him!" Zaratoz approached Tristan slowly.

"Then what, what do you think he will do to you once he wins?" Tristan replied.

"As long as there are souls to be harvested, I shall be his marvelous instrument. When there is no more work to be done, then I shall rest." Zaratoz approaching closer and closer.

Tristan reaches into his backpack and pulls out his shield and sword and readies himself at Zaratoz.

"Oh please, what do you think you are going to do with that?"
Zaratoz's eyes grew wider, the menacing green tint in his pupils glowing brighter.

Tristan begun the charge. Zaratoz turned and lifted his mace up once again at the charging knight slowly. With a circular motion, Zaratoz deflected the sword and immediately struck an upward blow to the knight. Slowly, their fierce clashes made Tristan back up into the bank slowly. Tristan spotted an opening in his opponent's defence, and proceeds for a low thrust, unaware that the opening was done on purpose.

Zaratoz smashed his mace downwards with full strength, knocking the sword out of Tristan's hand and screamed against the floor as it slid across the room -

The final forceful blow upward with his mace. Tristan flew backwards and off his horse. Slumping onto the ground, never to get up.

Zaratoz approached his fallen fledgling. The scene, so familiar...

-A flashback-
Zaratoz stands over his fallen fledgling, calling out the spell to return him to life. "Ye..have passed the test. For avoiding the tactics of another, and the originality of your own. That is what makes you a true fighter.. a true dealer of death. Remember this day, Tristan..if ye ever think ye cannot beat anyone, there is always a way.

Zaratoz's eyes grow wider in anger. He steps across Tristan's fallen body, kicking his helmet off. Reaching down and pulling Tristan's head back from his hair, he takes out his knife and places it at his neck.

The Paladin Creel standing at the doorway, then, -

the stroke.

Tristan's green blood splashed on the walls of the bank, dripping from the roof in sickening heavy beads.

Zaratoz threw his head up and screamed at the top of his voice "Your soul for Set, TRAITOR!"

Creel immediately raised his sword and begun his charge at Zaratoz. More clashes, leading them outside of the bank.

Both reaching into their bags, Zaratoz brings out a candle infront of him and closes his eyes as creel takes out a handful of small stones. The high priest whispered a prayer as lightning struck the ground in front of him and a great golem arose to do his bidding. The Paladin threw out the pebbles around him, two large Thesselains appearing from the stones in a cloud of smoke as they continued to charge towards him.

A fierce battle ensued between the green Priest and the white Paladin, each side's beasts falling one by one. The Paladin summoned more and more Thesselains as Zaratoz swiftly charged past them on the green beast to exchange blows with the Paladin. The Paladin retreated to heal himself, unaware of the silent spelled unttered behind.

Creel almost flew off his Thesselain as it suddenly stopped and screamed as it spasmed painfully. From the corner of his eye, Creel spotted the flashing orb fly out and land near him. The bright orb grew brighter, then silent, as a void, then the great explosion. Creel gritted his teeth and held out his shield to cover both him and his mount, emerging unshaken by the attack, but burning.

Tristan appeared again, and Creel summoned more Thesselains again to his command. Zaratoz cleverly splitting them up by diving into the town to single them out, but they reunited time and time again. The two swordsmen slashing their swords to hit against the green mace. The solo on both sides, now turned into a duet against Zaratoz, both swords singing a distinctive different pitch.

Zaratoz retreated from the two knights and large army of Thesselains behind him, he spots Grax grinning and chuckling to himself at the side of the bank.

"Grax," Zaratoz smirks at the evil necromancer, "feel free to help." Grax nodding his head and smiled sinisterly.

Soon, Tristan fell again, and finally Creel. Zaratoz stepped over the body of the fallen Paladin, and placed his knife at his neck...




*Zaratoz holds up the heads of Tristan Kilgore and Creel* Let it be known! All who trespass against Set shall suffer a fate worse than death!





Yes, Ultima online is that cool
*grins*

Just realized that when I go back to school I'll see Her again.

Every morning going down the escalator in the mrt station, going up the escalator in school, smiling at me. But it can't beat her smile in person.

I'd see her in school, and raise the corners of my cheeks at her and nod upwards at her to receive her warm smile. Pretending... there's nothing.

Bah, what am I talking about. I'm not about to repeat the same mistake as last time. High profile girl + busy schedule != anything good. No time for these things already. Nationals next year. That's my damned love now.


Probably won't have as much time to blog when I start school, though. But these few weeks have been very productive. Been reading tonnes of other canoeists blogs. Proding into every bit of information I can get. I went in with the intention to collect data, but have emerged with a profound respect for each and every one of them. All of us have our little insecurities which we try to cover up by fighting hard. For some, this works, others find other reasons to fight.

It seems in life, you'll only go as far as your reasons will take you. Is my reason good enough to get me where I want to be?

Data indicates so.

My heart tells me so.

Yeap, I'm ready.

Sha-neroh!

Muhahahaha

I want to get:

Street fighter ex 3
Marvel vs capcom 2
Capcom vs snk 2
and Snk vs capcom: Chaos when it comes out on the ps2. Then I can go to the arcades and beat the shit out of those fat little kids who have nothing better to do than go to the arcade the whole day. Go and get some exercise! Turds...


These will also provide countless ours of multiplayer fun with the guys after sea training.

Not to mention the NARUTO FIGHTING GAME coming out. Which I swear I will master all the top tier characters just for the fun of it and beat the snot out of the hardest computer AI while picking my nose with the other hand.

I will also die when the new teenage mutant ninja turtles games is released. 3D Hyperstone heist, with better gameplay, special moves, team up moves!!!! And best of all! They're NINJA TURTLES! FRICKING NINJA TURTLES!!!!

Maybe get WWE just cuz Rendy wants it so badly...

Then for serious research, I shall have to play:
Legaia 2!!!
Devil may cry 1, 2
Final fantasy X, X2
Kingdom hearts
Suikoden 3!!!
Grandia extreme
.hack// series
Parappa 2!!!
Tenchu 3!!!
Xenosaga

Being in the games business with all these titles and features flashed out in your face during research and gameplay analysis makes me want to play them even more.


Die lah... so many... I'll never finish these damn titles. Maybe just stick to fighting games which I can play at leisure whenever I'm free. Heh, remember the times I would search for cheats just to ruin the game for myself and be able to move on to another title. That periods over now, tho. Training first, then school, then games. No problem.

Last day here at attachment. Really happy to go back to school on monday. Screw you, collared shirts! Screw you long pants! I'm going back to cutaways and berms, oh yeah!

I must begin the process of gathering the most elite team in games design and possible animation when I get back to school and start on my most magnificent MUGEN project yet.

Yess.... excellent. Capcom and stupid playmore can eat our dust.

Walau, my portable zip drive almost had to be sent for repair yesterday. Dunno why the opening flap somehow managed to get all the way inside the drive O_O. Banging the damn thing didnt help, and would only make things worse or damage something, so after careful consideration to the interior dynamics and much analyzing of the location of the contact points which are causing it to be stuck, I stuck my cutter into it and with one smooth stroke pushed it out of its stuck spot and out it came. Genius.

It was raining heavily yesterday, Rendy was smsing me worrying about the rain affecting training. Haha so gu-niang :p

We ended up running indoors around campus again, except for the stretch outside macdonalds where Ben made us do pushups in the rain. Grr... Then did cute step-aerobics again, first squats, then some weird leg exercises. Damn gay. Looked around and its even more gay when they new guys dont do it properly. But its like damn damn fun. Hahaha

Pullups, indoor bar, not wide enough. Stupid bar. Managed the pullups easily then went for pool rowing.

Wahahaha, can feel the catch, and pull damn song. If only I could apply this power in canoeing. Sux man, need more time in the water. Sweet sweet canoeing tomorrow.

Going to listen to the first years casual recital for the piano ensemble later, need to find those who have what it takes for our upcoming concert. Then, meeting with Rendy and Jeremy to get the ps2. Stupid Stephen going out with some other people. Hmph.

OMG.

I just realized that I want a PS2.

I WANT A PS2! I NEEEED A PS2! I MUST HAVE A PS2!!! ARGHHH!!!
NARUTO FIGHTING GAME COMING OUT ON PS2 IN NOVEMBER!!!!!!!!

*twitch*

My new goal in life is to, get a ps2, along with being the numbah one rower in singapore.

About 450 in bank... getting pay again this friday.. dunno how much. Need to budget PS2 with my next hoarde of myoplex. Enough for a PS2 already. Yes....


Excellent.

Did weights with Jeremy, Jonathan and coach Ben. Stephen came late as usual but later than usual. Sians... basketball team using the weights room. Like... the girls were doing 1.5kg... the guys only doing squats. Waste of time lah. Did shoulders and delts. Ben taught us about proper forms and stuff, very insightful. Helped stephen abit for lats pull down, then tried 200 pounds. Hahaha, insane. 200 pounds is like the whole machine. Anyway, I needed support and almost died at the second set, damnit... Must train harder!

Went for a dip in the pool with the guys after that... 10 minutes before the pool was closed. Ben continued with weights on his own. Showed of my l33t dive, and cannon ball, hahaha. Got pushed into the pool a couple of times by the buggers. Damn fun. Love the pool, its so full of water... yeah.

Then went to macs and got that quaterpounder. Sinful... but Mmmmm... damn nice. It's like cheeseburger's daddy. Okay, no more fastfood after that one, okay Reu? Ok.

Walked to the busstop and talked with Stephen and Jeremy about someone. They don't think that he's interested in the sport because this person wants to come late intentionally to skip running with the team and run on his own pace. I sympathize with that, actually. People will dread their weaknesses, and maybe sometimes want to take the easy way out, or just talk about it, but thats just that - a weakness. Nothing to do with the interest of the sport. And he's not as weak as I was in my first year, either. He can probably make it. And maybe, he'll develop a deeper love for the sport and the team. But he's definately not - not interested in the sport. If he wasn't, he wouldn't follow us to eat at S11 after training when he already has food waiting for him at home.

Went home and... I can play Ultima Online again! Hahahaha, the port's magically fixed. I bet it was the admin's fault anyway... Tomorrow's my last day here. Woohoo. Shit shit shit, need to do the damned report. Damn damn damn.

You're the cheerful smile,the one that's truly
happy with almost everything you do and would
never cahnge your life.


What Kind of Smile are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

Hilarity.




Another log of training. I so need to:
1. Get a new game!!!
2. Go back to school and work on games!!!

My parents will be leaving till sunday! Wahooo. Freeeedum!

Arrived late again, so I ran around the school looking for the team. Found them at the slope and ran up with them again. Did something insane for running today. I started dashing 100 meters away from the finish line for the second last round, and dashed all the way till 100 meters away from the finish line for the last round, then used up my super combo gauge with a double-heavy-step-then-sprint!!! Wahahaha, super shacked. Haven't pushed so hard in a long time, good job, Reu. Push that lazy ass. had good form, but monday's form was better.

Missed Ben's step aerobics but joined them from the cute aerobic squats. Then did pushups. Dunno if it was the pushups for canoeing training the day before, but I was seriously suffering during the 80 pushups. Then again, we haven't done 80 in one big set in a loooooong time. My metabolic rate/sweat rate has evolved into a more dangerous level. During the pushups I was like... sweating cups of water onto the floor. When I went down could see like 3-4 heavy drops of sweat hit the track. Flowing from my face, rolling down my back/chest onto my face. I wonder if anythings wrong. I looked around and not one other guy was sweating even half as much as I had wasted onto the floor. wtf? Was seriously scared and went to buy a bottle of 100 plus from the pool-tuckshop. Cool rite, it just opened. Theres like a... tuckshop at the pool now. Yeah baby.

Pullups - 4 sets of 10. Easy. But almost died trying to support willy up for his sets. geez... he's like 80kg lei and cannot pull so I'm doing dunno how heavy for shoulder presses at the same time. Got abit fraustrated when he couldn't even kick up when I was holding his legs and so I started yelling. Hehe... evil ah.

Wts was ok... Rendy kept qie'ing me and kept cursing me when I kept doing more reps. But oh boy... squats... Did 30kg fullsquats (15 per side), he did 17 reps, so I wacked until 20 to hear him curse again. But then later when I bent down to pick up the bar for bicep curl.. got some tight sensation near by butt. Haha cham. But it was ok lah, just a normal contraction.

Some of the alumni gang came down. Jingwei, Weiwen, Yeesang, Ryan. Was good to see my older brothers again. Some things never change, tho. After pullups they went to play soccer in the field. Jingwei and weiwen's eyes on the ball, that same look -playful and childish. Yeesang sempai was pretty quiet as usual.

Went to eat at S11 with jeremy, rendy, wani, jonathan and stephen. Made alot of noise laughing and talking cok again. hehes. The alumni was sitting at a nearby table. Haiyo... turns out the alumni team is forming very slowly. They said they're waiting for me to kick it off, but they forgot... my year's not going to be able to contribute very many people. Only me from the 2001 batch... and Jeremy who came in later.

Death, the second of The Endless, you are
responsible for ending all lives and taking
them to your realm, from which no one ever
returns. You are bright, positive, happy,
optimistic and enjoy everything about life, but
that does not mean your silly or stupid. You
can lay the smack down when you have to!
Everyone loves you, and they don't know why.


Which Endless are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

Canoeing training yesterday. Led running with Ah Loy. Only 6 rounds... really slow too, about 2:30 per big round, last round about 2:10. Did statics, Joyce counted really fast. Why do charboh always count so fast one ah? Couldn't maintain diamond all the way and resorted to normal pushups because she kept going too fast. Easy for them because their knees are on the floor lei, the guys who want to do standard all the way down and up pushups need slightly more time per rep lah. The new guys quite beh-gan for pushups. Towards the last set see them with a " >_<" expression, and just holding there while counting, without actually going down. *sigh* Should gan them next time.

Pullups, seniors did 6 sets of 10. That's like... more than what the dragonboaters are doing now, but still no problem, haha. Did 10, 10, 10, 10, 10 and 14 just for the heck of it as the juniors watched in horror. They're quite funny loh, There's this junior who kicks his legs outwards to the side when he pulls up. Jian peng laughed his head off when I told him that guy looked like a jellyfish.

Then we played games.

100 metres dash scissors paper stone was okie... my team lost cuz the other side cheated! Dunno why I was so sway... kept losing... especially to joyce *shakes fist*. I can't read signs as well as I used to. Hrm... totally forgot the tell-tale movement patterns.

Then we played captains ball. This went well, too, until I got the ball and...

"Reu has the ball"

"Taaaackle!!!"

2 guys around me, then I heard more, and I found myself crouched on the floor with the ball under me and people piled up on my back >_<. Buggers tau-pok'd me. Grrrrr..... We lost captains ball again during the 10 minutes game. Stupid, my team... LOST?! Impossible, yes, they must have cheated again.

After that my team had to do stupid forfeits. Turn 10 rounds around a pole, then belly dance for 10 metres. I told myself I wasn't going to get dizzy... but ended up dizzy. Grrr... weak. How do ballerinas do it. I must train by turning around in my room tonight.

Got some comments in the changing room from some of the juniors, and it hit me... these were the same things we said to our seniors back in the first year. They seemed so confident, so invincible, but yet, I now know that even us as seniors have our worries about our weaknesses. Stuff about having a nice bod, or being a machine or inhuman at the pullup bar. Still learning how to react to such comments. Its weird, in way, because in my mind I'm still that weak year one who's looking up at his seniors standards, yet these people are looking up to me?

Looking back, I wonder if I would be the same person that I am now without CCAs.

I joined the piano ensemble knowing only a few pieces and improv songs, now I've arranged and composed pieces that grade 8ers are asking scores for, and have done fully digitally orchestrated pieces.

I joined the dragons not being able to do even half a pullup. Now 10 sets of 10 is possible. Weights and running have seen vast improvements as well.

CCAs really are an extremely important part of the evolution of the human being throughout his years in school. I can't imagine being the same person that I was right after secondary school. Insecure in a way, quiet in a way.

And with these landmarks, I'm stil moving upward.

Designing and drawing or studying can only get you so far, I guess.

Wahahaha, I've just realized that I've got 4 shades of tan now.

Darkest: arms, legs - I swear sunblock is as useless as piss
Dark: Torso - Life vest compulsory for canoeists... but not for dragonboaters
moderate: Face - I love my white cap
Light: undie area, feet

What a mess.


Fridays my last day here. Can't wait to go back to school and start on projects.

Damnit, still cannot play ultima online. Stupid screwed up port.

Sea training today!

Canoeing for dragonboat training. Super fun. I got to use my brasca IV!

Stuff is kinda different now from the time we took our one star course. Back then, it was actually something that I managed to move faster than the rest of the guys. Now its like... chey, he's on the canoeing team, if he doesn't finish the sets first then somethings wrong. Pressure sucks, but I managed to forget all about this crap and enjoy my time in the t1.

We did sets of 500metres, managed to come in first all the time.

First set, direction was utterly fantastic, went straight all the way, finished first, Jonny a couple boat lengths behind. Jonny's not bad. He's canoed before for ocs. Captain of our team, hates to lose, yeap, I can count on him for a good set every time.

Second set, Hrm... direction off... managed to get on course with sweeping.

Sixth set, Coach Ben canoed with us. Damnit, got direction thrown off left and right and I was desperately telemarking then doing starting bursts again. What a waste of energy. And dunno how the heck he just went straight all the way. Either the waters nearer the beach has less currents, or my bursts were unbalanced. Anyway, managed to finish about the same time he did.

The waters in kallang are beyond my comprehension. I can be doing sweeping strokes over and over to try and move left, and I still end up turning right. It MUST be the damned current, I'm sure of it. Stupid gay current.

Saw the juniors rowing the big boat in the distance during one of the sets and I managed to gain about 100 metres distance on them and finished at the same time as them. Yuck... my T1 went faster than the dragonboat. Guys... need to buck up and check your stroke, yeah?

Then a whole bunch of juniors and seniors went to kallang market to eat. Fabulous, everyone eating seconds and talking kok and about rowing and stuff. Daryl's got a very charmismatic way of speaking. He's a national sailor, btw, yet another one of the interesting intakes this year. Daryl and Josh seem very interested in the sport. They're already talking about and "worrying" about selections for the coming race. Something odd strikes me about Willy, though.... I can't put my finger on it exactly...

Anyway these guys are really interesting. I hope the other seniors make a bigger effort to try and mould them into our team as soon as possible.

Just finished weights to end off a good training day.

Damnit.. still can't play UO!!!

*sigh*
Might as well do something "constructive"

Damn microsoft is screwing with my ports access. Either that or the router is acting up. *sigh*

National day parade yesterday was okie, very nice melodies for the acts again this year. But dunno why the composers kept sticking to techno/trance beats. o_O Even heard some raw midi drums.

Coverage glitches were amuising. First, the subtitles got lost, then during the kallang wave, the camera couldn't keep up with the wave! Hahahaha.

I think this year's parade commander is the first in a long time who could accentuate his engrish properly.

Kinda wish I was there in the stadium again. Remember the atmosphere, so saturated with music and patiotism. But that chanting thing is so communist-china-like. Then the guy playing the drums... I don't know why they even bothered makig his drums out of odd objects, since there was like no sound coming out from there but the speakers instead.

Was thinking what a challenge it would be to do music for the national day parade. All those traditional songs you'd have to learn to create original scores for, then the careful blend of genres so you don't lost the older generation yet maintain the interest of the younger generation. I dunno why they keep recycling tcaichovsky's blah blah blah overture every year for the fireworks, though.


Then came brothers 4. Its been such a long time since I've watched anything on tv, so I figured I'd give this show a go. Gurmit singh is hilarious. That scene where he was climbing down the pole, then realizes he's on the floor and jumps around doing his victory dance- that victory dance was so funny. And neo swee lin talking with her mouth full, and her posture- so natural. She always portrays motherly figures damn well. And that psychopathical girlfriend was damn funny too. Wahahaaha, that Kawaiiiii~ Melody Chen was acting! And tay ping hui very buaia indeed. All in all I think all of them got into their characters very well, that new guy too, forgot his name.


Okay, got to fix router again....

One saturday without canoeing and I already miss it too much. I want the T! Even that fat starlum would suffice.

Must be patient... just tomorrow now... stay calm.

Wahaha, was clicking some random links on my mp3.com page and eh? I've got the 1st, 3rd and 4th spot for the local charts.

http://golocal.mp3.com/gir?genre_id=0006&geo_id=20000707

You are Psalms.


Which book of the Bible are you?
brought to you by Quizilla



More quizilla.











Planting graveyards is now oddly entertaining.

Training yesterday was ok, I guess. Running was totally unacceptable, though. First calf felt tense, then ham felt tense. Maybe not conditioned enough for monday and tuesday's heavy running. Hrm... must work harder. Was doing a pathetic 2:10 average per middle sized round (lane 4-5) around the track. Jialat.

Then came pullups, 4 sets of 10. Plus the 3 sets of 20 form the day before left my wings in a constant state of contraction for the rest of training. Pool rowing = FUN.

Went to eat with Jeremy, Rendy, Kah yong and Jonathan. Then went home to try and upload more songs to be iuma website. Stupid server giving me problems. Managed to get one piece up, but the other just wouldn't go through the damned server for some reason. Next thing I know, its almost 1, and I gotta wake up before 8 the next day. D'oh.


Hrm... national day tomorrow. Dunno what to do. There's no canoeing this sat :(, but there'll be dragonboat canoeing on sunday. Please please please let me use my brasca, I will absolutely DIE and DROWN if I have to use that butterfly paddle. Equipment politics between canoeing and dragonboat is still very tight. I hope it lessens up soon. *sigh* Caught in the middle of things again.

Edelweis called. She's nominating me to go for the poly forum on the star cruise or something. Never been on a cruise ship before. Oh crap, I hope I don't get sea sick. Oh... the irony, dragonboater/canoiest who gets airsick/seasick so easily.

I detest convention.

I hate it when people let themselves be governed by other people.

I hate it when students let themselves be governed by the education system.

I hate it when people let themselves be governed by trends.

I hate it when people let themselves be governed by books.

I hate it when people let themselves be governed by religion.

I hate it when people let themselves be governed by situation or circumstance.

I pity the people who encourage such governments.


I don't do things against convention just to be against convention,

I do it when I want to, because I want to.

If you believe in something, the reasons for doing things should be your own, and not because you should or should not do such things.


You will never find out for yourself what you want to do if you follow guildelines your whole life. If you are the person whom you think you are, and who has been taught properly, live your own life.





Yes, I'm too much a a rebel.

But I'm strong because I fight.

I stare
at the stars
and the sky
up above
and think
what am I
made off?

Am I full
of sorrow
am I hurt,
and pain?
Or am,
I filled
with love?


- Harry Gregson-Williams, metal gear solid: substance ending theme







Met up with Jeremy and Stephen to go over to yck gym where Rendy is working as instructor.

Feel very powerful yet wings were aching after doing 3 sets of 20 pullups. PH43R.

Flashback to 4 years ago

Its my first taekwondo tournament, M is my bench coach for the match. I go over to the registration booth to get my headgear and torso guard. I spot my opponent. Shorter, but heavier, to be in the same weight category as me. I turn away to face the front. The current match is still going on.

We wait, for the first round to end. M comes over. His eyes, looking straight into my eyes, that confident stride. This national fighter is going to give me some words of advice....

"So.... "
He pauses, we look at each other in dead seriousness
"How are we going to get lunch later?"

The seriousness was broken like a violent blood-curdling scream of rape in the silence of the tranquil night.

I let out an amused grin.

The match is called, I walk to the centre of the mat where the referee is pointing. I look at my opponent in the eyes, we nod at each other in silent approval.

"Chong, hong! Chalyeo, Kyonge, Chumbi... "

We yell out battle cries.

"See jung!"

I maintain my stance, he doesn't move. What the heck is he doing?

'Okay, Reu, focus, read him'.

I examine his stance. Eyes fixed on my eyes, high standing stance, high arm guard. His right foot forward, earlier when tying his torso guard the right ribbon was over the left - right hander. Right hander + right foot infront = quick front kick counter pose. Perfect counterattack position. I take an aggresive step forward to test this, he responds with footing change as well. Shoot. His smaller and shorter frame would make it ideal for him to execute a quick counter attack should I move in. His eyes still on mine. He's waiting, too patiently, he's counting on the counterattack and probably has had the training for such a thing.

Damnit, my height gives me the range advantage, but his counterattack game seems too solid. I can read what he wants to do, but cannot form a plan to beat it.

"Chong, hong!"

The referee cuts in for awhile and makes the double fisting gesture to tell us to take action.

We still stare at each other.

I adopt a lower stance to feign an oncoming attack. His eyes shift to me torso, he's going to attack!

He executes a typical one step forward, slammy kick. I do a jumping kick while flying to the side. "BAM" Contact to his chest piece.

"Chong, hong!"

The referee restarts our positions.

M shouts for me to attack.

I go in. Sure enough, he jumps backwards while delivering a frontal kick. Pure defensive. I need to move in more! I advance with a turning kick, reverse high sweep combo which he blocks. He moves within range, eyes my torso again! Block!

'smack'
I manage to block his attack.

We break off. Referee calls for the half time.

M hands me the water. I drink it. He tells me which kicks to execute, and goes on... I stare at him and nod. His words whiz right past me. I'm a blank. How can I possibily make an offensive if this guy plans on counterattacking?

The referee calls us back.

"Chong hong, See jung!"

Second half begins.

We stare at each other again. Bastard, I'm not falling for your trap. Bring it on. I walk sideways and around the ring area, he follows likewise in the opposite direction. Eyes to my centre again! Incoming! I throw out a front kick but he's too fast, he's in already. Reverse sweep! Get away from me! I whiff air. Then feel the light hit to my back. A desperate attack while inside my space, he stumbles backwards and I deliver a punch to his collarbone sending him furthur back.

Expression of pain on his face, still looking into my eyes. Careless, I let him score a point.


The rest of the match was made out of attacks and breakaways, no points anymore.

The match ends, I slump on the floor, panting. M throws me the water. I drink. Regain composure, panting, sit up properly. I drink some more.

The results are out. tie game, 1 all, but he wins due to superiority (term for more aggresiveness).

Too concerned about having a perfect battle, analyzing and forming the perfect plan to beat him that I forgot the most important aspect - FIGHT.

Nothing can be accomplished by analysis alone. Sometimes you need to shut yourself up and just CHIONG.

(Running + sprinting on monday) + (Running + sprinting + squats on tuesday) = legs hertz



Went to school for lunch, called up Stephen and met up with him for lunch. What a sight, I haven't had anyone eat seconds with me in school before. 2 people to a table with chicken rice, duckrice, fried chicken with pineapple rice, fish and chips. Is it me, or has everyone in nyp suddenly shrunk in size? Hrm....

Went back to the office to plant more boring graveyards till training time.

3 rounds warmup, then 3 rounds, team circuit! Ahahahaha. Teamed up with Rendy and Willy.

First round: Big strided dash, stayed at a confrotable pace behind Jonny and Kelvin, chionged pushups/situps, then Rendy went off. Willy arrived, ran again, very confortable pace, we're in first place, heard Scary-he-man-Diana's sonic-the-hedgehog fast steps behind me, opened up more, arrived first to do pullups, sent Rendy off.

Second round: Willy arrived, pushed him up for pullups, went off running after Jonny again. Heard steps behind me, Let bernard overtake and cheered him on. Chionged pushups/situps, sent Rendy off. Willy arrived, dashed big strides, easy pace, can't hear anyone behind me, ahuahua, chionged pullups, sent Rendy off.

Third round: Willy arrived, pushuped him up for pullups, very seh, he's very heavy and too shacked liao. Then chionged again to do pushups/situps and sent Rendy off. Willy arrived, shoot, a few runners too far ahead liao. Caught up with melvin abit, then for the last 100 metres released -special-move!-single-step-low-brace-charge....-sprint! with a grunt, and flew past melvin to do pullups. Stupid kelvin, clear the pullup bar so slowly, move!

Rendy said we finished 3rd. But I think we overlapped a few teams until I dunno who's first and who's last anymore. Other teams first years have some powerful runners. national sailor, school track team, not bad indeed.

Played the hand-tangle game again, our group was the only one of the 4 who ended up with 2 small intertwined circles. Gifted, sia.

Weights next.

Did rowing machine. Damn powerful, made the machine squeek in agony for the first 1.5 minutes (Come to think of it, I"m about the only guy besides coach who made it squeek, fuafuafuafua), then my maintenance was too slacked already, finished with an extremely undesireable distance. Felt so retarded. Then ah, the stupid Bernard managed to do pretty well and was haolianing around. Sheesh. Boy ah, rowing machine is not that important. Next time pool rowing make sure you keep up with my pace then can haolian, ok.

Shoot... my english is going down the drain.

After debriefing Jonny called the guys around, Fahmy was making funny noises so Jonny pointed his finger at him with killer-intent eyes. Woo... dangerous grounds you walk on, jonny. Personally I think that was a little too much for a silent reprimand. *sigh*

Then Jonny talked to the seniors about Jingwei and his problem, apparantly Jingwei's been talking bad about Jonny to a couple of people because of a stupid small incident.
What's up with all this "politic" and ego crap. Either confront each other, or suck it down your ego lah. You keep playing behind each other's backs and nothing good will come from it.


Wasn't a very good day, felt like shit, walked to the mrt.

Then, got a call in the train.

"Oi.... Guess who this is"

"Hmmm? I dunno, I don't have caller ID"

"Tianhong lah"

My bro called from his bunk. Wah... can bring handphone in one o_O
We talked about the new guys first, then his "bueh tahan" training in camp. Obstacle courses and stuff. How they have to carry a total of 8kg in their backpacks (longform, water bottles and stuff) for running, in boots and go through obstacle courses. Then there are insane seniors in there who can do a weird monkey bar maneuver- Hold the bar with both hands, then release both hands, CLAP, then grab on to the bar infront of them. After egoisticly telling him the trick is probably in the technique and arm bend-angle, I must go and try it out someday. Then there are times when they are told to "drink up", and they have to finish up the 1.5 litre water bottle right there and then. He said he almost puked the first few days doing that (thinks back to the water station during the amazing race singapore) yeap, I can relate to that. Yuck. Ended off talking about C, how she was so excited to receive his smss, he laughed. Then animesuki's new releases. Hrm.. need to check out captain tsubasa for him.

Army sounds fun. But it could turn out to be a major pain in the ass too.

What will you do when you stare the Dragon in the eye?
Will you run away in fear?
Will you take it head on?
Will you see just how far you can go?

Just realized that I have semi-contradictory goals... won't go into that over here, though.

Yesterday's canoeing training went okay. Ran 6 rounds with juniors, extremely slow, 2:40 per big round, then did another 2 seniors only, lagged out a little during the first round, then sprinted the last 100 and overtook limpo, phong and joshua. Dunno why I am so ham for long distance... grrr!

Then did 4X 100 metre sprints. All out for first round, then all out again with Cid, then a little slower, overtaking the other two, then all out, finished first. I'm such a retard... keep telling each other to "go slow", "relax", "as long as you push yourself", but instead of waiting for them, I find myself ahead and near the finish line already. Statics was very manageable, 3X 20 pushups, did diamonds all the way, 3X 40 situps. Samantha also doing very little right now to not scare the juniors away.

Then came weights. *sigh* so concerned about self. Asked naresh if I could go to the room and do my own shoulder wts because had db training the next day. Naresh was ok with it, but later Samantha didn't take it too well, because we were supposed to advocate the new guys with the weights. On retrospect, I was too concerned about improving as fast as possible and not disrupting my original weights plan, that I forgot that I was training with a team. The seniors meeting cleared up alot of stuff. I'm glad that everyone can joke and take things humbly. This team has come a long way together, indeed.

Shirley's blasting her music in the room again today. Stupid jap rock. I don't know if japanese girls think that they sound sexy by screaming into the mic, but its just plainly childish and annoying.

Yesterday was such a lazy sunday. Woke up, played uo, ate breakfast, took a nap. woke up, ate lunch, played uo, took a nap. Ahahahaha, felt so good indeed. Then met Stephen for weights at bishan gym. Felt like a lazy pig so didn't want to go running. Stephen never wants to run before/after weights, too concerned about bulking liao. Haiz... cannot train strength all the time man, our endurance will go to hell one.

Work's really monotonous around here, which I am spicing up with bloggin/reading blogs/bitching on forums. I'm looking at the GPS satellite pictures of pulau tekong or the west live firing area while planting graveyards. Would be a good idea to memorize the place while I'm working on this, kekekeke. You wouldn't believe the amount of cemeteries the place. There's buddhist cemeteries, hindu cemeteries, christian cemeteries, heck probably, taoist cemeteries, free-thinker cemeteries and satanism cemeteries as well.

Ahhh saturdays, the one day I look forward to.

Woke up at 6:30, sun wasn't up. Quickly got ready and left the house at about 7. It felt good to smell the fersh morning air again. Kallang at 8. Canoeing orientation today, Coach went to thailand, very relaxed and slacked. Carried boats out. Starlums. Lots and lots of starlums. Enough for 45+ people, infact. It was such a mess. Starlums everywhere on the floor in SDBA, then starlums everywhere in the water. Managed to use the 218 brasca IV for a good amount of time today. Figured I'm about tall enough to use the panel underneath as a foot rest. So, I can kick! Woohoo! Kicking + brasca IV = flying in the water. Was really flying! Managed to go straight for a good amount of the journey around today. The new guys did capsize drills, and I demonstrated twice as rescuer, hehe. Was a nice change :p

Did some pacing with Yongqiang, I managed to keep up and actually gain on him! (Although I crashed into his side when I did catch up.) He was supposed to go for the nationals along with Naresh, so I'm guessing the peak standard is about there. Muahahaha. Did another set and kept up pretty well, then suddenly I felt my paddle... oops, forgot to lift out of the water fully, hit the surface on my recovery and whee.... down I went. Managed to yell out "Yong qiaaaaaaaang!" As I flipped over. Stupid guy thought I found another dead fish. Hehehe, we found a dead fish earlier, and I scooped it up in my paddle and catapulted it a good distance away.

Phong is damn funny. I learned 101 new ways to paddle on the starlum, and 101 ways to act as a hood/rear ornament. My favourite paddle variation is the baywatch hand paddle. Where you keep your paddle in the boat, lean forward, and paddle with your arms. Some of his hood ornament variations were kinda.... obscene, ahahaha.

Dragonboat orientation next. Got logistics problems so we didn't manage to go down in the starlum. Ended up waiting at SDBA for the new guys/gals to come back, then we did a long distance set and some pickups only. Haiz.

Went to eat with Rendy, Willy Melvin and Jeremy. Jonathan, Wani and Meixuan came along too. Kallang market. Mmm........ hungry again thinking of the chicken rice.

Went home and played UO for a while and then went to bed. I hope sea training will pick up next week.

Hahaha, and I got an sms from my bro last night during training.

"Life is so sad in tekong... Sad sia"

Well, I'm glad he's enjoying himself :D
How he got out to send that sms I have no idea, but he could probably out-run any MP.

Yesterday's training was pretty fun.

Arrived late due to attachment ending at 6, so I did my own running. 7 rounds only, was doing about 1:50 per round, urgh... still not enough, need to push futher! 1:40 damnit! Only at that pace can I get a sub 10 timing for 2.4. Damn runners knee, make my running so jia lat. Sprinted for the last 100 metres, then could still go an extra 50 metres. *sigh* didn't plan my stamina distribution well enough.

Crap. How come I can psyche myself up so well for weights, pushups/situps or pullups, telling myself stuff like "there's nothing to endure", but I totally die for running?

Die, I think last semester's runners knee period had a detrimental effect to my mental game while running. I shall have to resort to reciting my battle mantra during running. Come to think of it, I've been doing that for everything except running. Ore no kac da! Ore kyaku kac da! Ore no do fan da se!

Pullups was super slacked. 10, 10, 14. Should try to do 14 all the way next time.

Weights was pretty fun, though. Ben put a tonnage limit of 7.5 per side for the seniors so the new guys won't feel like they have too much to catch up on. That rendy ah... kept wanting to do heavier, more reps. So I qie4 reps with him. Hahaha, then he qie4d me at hammer curl with extra reps and 1 extra set. Did his weird variation and emerged effortlessly victorious *grins*

Ran around the track abit after training. Started fast, then... felt the effects of the full squats we did for weights. Ended up stopping at 400metres >_<. Shall try for more next time.

Walked to the bus interchange and met up with the canoeists. Always end up laughing my lungs out when I'm with hong da. We were talking about the amazing race, and Huda.. hahaha. Her tired expression is priceless. Just makes you want to scream "POOR THING!".


Hrm... performing team for the piano ensemble's meeting today. Dunno what I'm gonna do with them. Hrm....
1. Explain that we will be meeting up once a week on fridays to play pieces. We shall rotate players.
2. Tell them to prepare for casual recital in 2 weeks time
3. Tell them to check online forum at least once a week
4. Submit their pieces to Caroline on wednesday, 5-6pm

2 MORE WEEKS HERE TILL I CAN GO BACK TO SCHOOL AND WORK ON GAAAAAAAMES AGAIN! AHUAHUAHUAHAUHAUA
Yaeh, that just hit me... now where was I...

5. Have seniors perform a couple of pieces. Maybe play something myself.




Hrm... Canoeing sea training orientation tomorrow morning, followed by dragonboat sea training orientation in the afternoon. Haiz... how am I supposed to orientate the canoeing juniors if I need to practice rowing so much. Put me in the racing T1! I wanna fly! Then for dragonboat orientation, the seniors will be going down in the starlums. I hate the starlums. For those of you who don't know what starlums are, they are the big FAT expedition t1 kayaks that you see NYP canoeists bobbing around in sometimes. They easy as hell to balance in, but hard as hell to MOVE. So damn fat, like its for obese people or something. Then Ben said that we'll only be using the starlums for dragonboat training. Btw, it has NO KICKER. Yes, nothing to kick! How retarded is that? Nvm, I shall take it as resistance training, then I will be flying for canoeing training in the racing t1.

I need to get in the water, need to canoe more! I want to go faster!