Saturday, December 31


Ah. New Year resolutions. (Oh by the way, 2 more hours to New Year, so I might as well greet everyone a 'Happy New Year!'. Lol.)

Argh, what the heck. I know for certain I won't be able to follow through with whatever I'm gonna write, but hey, it's all for the festivities yeah?

Right.

Anyway, continuing, I'm gonna try to list them down.

The first? Yes, the silent-and-taken-for-granted one. I will TRY to strive harder for my studies. I know it's not the best, yada-yada, and I CAN (or am supposed) do better, so I will work as hard as I can for my first class honours in chemical and biomolecular engineering. (Actually it's kinda a whole lot of bullshit for me. Being me, I'll probably just give up halfway.) And, I will TRY not to curse my professors too hard, especially when they've been so lenient on all of us this semester. (Check out my recent results.)

The second being that I will TRY (again) to spare time for all my friends I've neglected this past year, especially Heli. Heck, I was really guilty when I totally forgot about her birthday, and because it was her 18th, I felt even more guilty. (Will really have to make it up to her sometime.) I guess I haven't been the best of friends this year after I came into uni, but let's hope things will change for the better next semester. And if Xin gets her hostel at NUS, maybe we can meet up more frequently.

Third would be to plan the trip to Kuching during the term break, and make sure we get down to it. I know me, Xin, Ven and Heli have been talking about this over and over again, but I hope this time we can go for it. I'm really anticipating this, and I hope (I'm crossing my fingers), ahem, someone can also go with us.

Fourth? Well. I would really like a short escapade trip with, ahem, someone. Nothing too fancy, probably just a nice relaxing trip to... somewhere. I don't know. Ah, whatever.

The fifth... (I'm starting to run out of ideas.) I guess I should start spending more time with my family members. I know my grandma isn't getting any younger, and my mum's always home to take care of her. That's the problem of being the only child. You can't take turns being there. It's either I'm away or I'm not. No substitutes.

Is 5 enough? I should hope so. It's not easy just managing these 5 of them. Gonna have to take up a lot of time. I'm not getting younger I guess. Hitting the '2' next year. Argh. Freak. Sounds weird right? Lol.

Happy New Year, peeps.

Posted by Isabelle at 10:05 pm

Friday, December 30


Hey, I passed my 3-year anniversary with Blogger without knowing it. Anyway, it was 17 Dec 2002. Yep. Time flies damn fast. I know I was starting this blogger thing in Kuching then, thinking it probably won't work for me. Who knows, I've been writing for 3 years and counting, and coming close to 500 posts. Sounds phenomenal, but actually it's not a lot, if you divide it for 3 years. On average I only blog like what, 2 or 3 times a week? Yeah. Good enough for me I guess.

Well, it's memories buried long in time in the archives, and I don't particularly want to relive some of them. I know, I know, I'm getting philosophical, but that's because New Year's just round the corner, and I'm trying to trash things out, recollect what I've done this year.

Nothing much, been the biggest slacker after my A's, flew to Kuching to celebrate New Year there, and it's been the best time of my life. My dad's around and my whole family's back together for the festivities. The only regret was that I couldn't stay longer.

Flew back for my results, and it's some result which continues to stun me until now, and then whisked myself into IRAS to slog my guts out for a mere pittance of a salary. Met some good friends though, and it's a pity I couldn't meet up with them this holiday. Gotta really find some time for a gathering.

Got rejected from NUS Chem Engine, which then I was sobbing over my acceptance into the Science Faculty. Now? I snub them. Woo, I'm pragmatic. It's their loss. Heh. Anyway, I'm not disappointed coming to NTU. Met great friends in hall, got into a fantastic class, and found that special someone. (I'm all smiles now.)

Been busying myself with hall activities, school work, stuff. I think it's not really that good to throw yourself whole-heartedly into something. You tend to forget the people around you, you forget to spend time with them, no, rather you cannot find the time to spend with them. Somehow you get caught up with too much stuff, you lose track of stuff you are doing. But I will say it's been a good experience, no complaints there.

And I still think that living in hall is a once-in-a-lifetime thing, so if you can, go for it. What, it'll probably be the best time for you to chill out, have fun without your parents breathing down on you (in my case, my mum breathes down on me for my dad so she does it with extra effort), and learn how to live out of your comfort zone. Yeah. Cool right? You bet.

Anyway. My school exams flashed past without me knowing. One moment I remember I was mugging real hard at the last minute because I slacked too much the whole semester, and the other moment I realised I passed all my modules. Christmas came and went without the bang I wanted to have. (No time to create that bang.)

And New Year's coming. I won't have the energy to make a big thing out of it, but I hope I can have a good ole gathering with a few close friends, chill out, talk crap over dinner or something. Well, beats having nothing. Of course that's just dreaming. Well.

And then after this blog I'll have to go crack my head over what I want to blog for my New Year's resolution.

Posted by Isabelle at 10:09 pm


Cool. Had a really good break from everything this week. Or not really.

Was supposed to have a nice potluck dinner at Andrew's house the Christmas Eve, then I realised... potluck? Darn. And because of that, we (I'm just saying 'we' for formality, in fact, most of it is I) had to prepare some stuff to show people. And being hall stayers, we opt for the most economical and hassle-free: sandwiches. It's really hassle-free, right? Well.

Lol. If only we were better at estimating the amount of food to prepare. Over-bought almost everything. Finished only a loaf of bread out of the 2 we bought. Boiled 4 eggs out of the whole tray but we had to buy a tray la. Who heard of getting only 4 eggs from a supermarket? Bought too much ham, almost twice what we need, and yeah. Lol. Made loads of sandwiches.

The funny thing is we couldn't unload the food at Andrew's place early because of the rain, and we had to rush down from Boon Lay for Ven's christmas play at Kovan. The bread was stashed in my Adidas bag, and we were so worried about the bread meshing up together. Regretted we couldn't stay for long, since we had to rush back to Bukit Batok. Left about 6.45, but by the time we reached AMK to catch the MRT, it was 7.30. Had to hitch a cab down, since we don't want to let the rest wait too long for us.

Anyway, dinner was cool. Andrew and Ethel made fruit salad (with wine, no surprise) and pizza (or rather Andrew's mum made it) and Yixiang and Annabelle made fish and chips (ok, no chips, but the fish was pretty good). Not bad. Watched American Pie: Band Camp and caught the last bit of Ocean's Eleven on TV on Andrew's flat screen. Yep, lazy christmas.

The only down thing was that Xin had a bit too much to drink. Played indian poker, and Xin was so suay he had to down 4 shots of Vodka neat, and I couldn't really help him. Firstly, I can't drink for nuts. Secondly, he wouldn't let me drink, so yeah. The rest of the night was quite bad, and I don't particularly want to re-enact it. Anyway.

Hmm. Chalet was after christmas, and woot, I'm really glad everyone that said they'll be coming turned up for it (no pang sehs). The best thing about it was the attendance I guess. For a 5-month-old university class, we are pretty united. I think I'm pretty lucky to get into this class. I mean come on, it's not every day you see a uni class being fast friends with each other within such a short period of time. Yeah.

Anyway, BBQ was great, and Gen has photos uploaded. (That's damn fast.) I think for the 25 bucks we paid, it was worth every cent. Food was good, compared to the rest of the BBQs I've been to, and the people were raring. Woot.

Pictures here.

Yep. Had a great time chilling out. A few more days to the new year. Can't wait.

Yeah.

Posted by Isabelle at 1:44 am

Friday, December 23


Hmm. It's a cold christmas I guess. This year there's simply no festive mood in me. Or rather I just didn't want to go out and feel the festive mood. In fact, if I said I wanted the holidays to end faster, a lot of people will be hunting me down. Yeah. I really want the holidays to end faster.

I'm not complaining of anything. Saying that I'm consistently not free to relax by myself or do what I feel like doing, be it work or friends, is not me complaining about my life right now. I'm just stating stuff, talking them out so I feel better. Or maybe that IS complaining. Ah whatever.

I know I can't be saying much, because I happen to know a person who has a MUCH tighter schedule than I have, but I just feel like letting it all out. At least I understand how he feels, but then again, it's not the same. I'm looking at a calendar that's pinned onto my room's blackboard, and it's not reflecting any free days for me, myself and I. What I'm seeing is IH trainings, IH, meetings, choir, work to do, friends' obligations to meet. Blah, and the list goes on. No wonder I have no christmas mood.

(I'm writing all these at a very bad time. My writing reflects a lot of my mood, it's not in a very good one now, so this sounds extremely negative. Actually, if anytime else I were to rewrite my point again, it might just sound brighter. Ah well.)

I'm just feeling very tired. Argh.

Posted by Isabelle at 7:19 pm

Monday, December 19


Woah.

Hmm, just when I thought I gave up refreshing that exam result page, that result had to pop out. Hmm. Gave me quite a shock, but quite ok la. Can say I'm pleased with my results. Haha.

Basically I averaged an A- for the whole thing, so that said everything. And that Phy Chem paper was an A-, can you believe it? I remembered cursing the bloody damn paper and all the lecturers and tutors when I came out of the exam hall. I also remembered I didn't do at least 2 questions out of 4. Oh well, the moderation's too good to be true.

Haha. Not bad, it's a heavy load off my shoulders.

Posted by Isabelle at 5:57 pm


Argh. NTU is sick. They have an inhumane method of giving out exam results. It's damn sick.

They give out the results online, ONE FACULTY BY ONE FACULTY.

Argh.

Means the accountacy people will get it first, then the engine people. And if you have a cross module, you only get to see that result first. The rest of your core modules will have to wait. It's driving me crazy waiting for the results to be updated. Clawing me to nuts inside. I mean if you want to die, at least die a fast and painless death. What's more excruciating is to die slowly, watching yourself lose blood, drip by drip. I can't stand it.

Argh.

By the way, got my Econs back. Not bad. B+, considering I've never in my life taken Econs before.

Posted by Isabelle at 4:48 pm


Ok, normally I wouldn't be blogging about dreams. In fact I don't really have dreams all the time. I usually just forget about them.

But, last night's struck my heart cold. I think I must be mad.

Dreamt I woke up this morning, switched on my laptop, and rubbed my hands, ready to check my exam results. (Just for the info, I really did that this morning, but results weren't out yet. Damn.) Did some clicking here and there, then ta-da. The results. Plain shocked me. I did terribly for Maths (D, I think), failed both my Physics and Physical Chem (come to think of it, I wonder how I could have failed my Physics, the paper was damn easy), my MEB was a consolation though, got a B grade. I can't remember what I got for Bio and Econs, but these were bad enough.

Argh. The exams results are plaguing my dreams! It's damn scary, and felt damn real. I woke up with the shivers. Can tell how bothered I am by the results.

I don't wanna dabao (dabao = take-away = retake, lingo in NTU) my modules.

Posted by Isabelle at 11:13 am

Sunday, December 18


Woah, I'm quite surprised in the midst of rushing for deadlines and meetings and IH, I'll still have time to attend AJ's alumni dance club's performance at the Victoria Theatre. Not bad. I was kinda forced, nah, not really forced, pulled along, since my classmate's performing, so we went to support her.

Cool, not bad, but classical dance, a little hard to appreciate. Love the music though. We actually wanted the class to go together, but turns out there were only 5 pathetic souls. Lol. Me, Xin, Ben, Cheng and Zhihan. I mean, we originally thought there was going to be like what, 10 people at least? Hmm.

Well anyway, met up with Cheng and Zhihan to pool at Lucky Plaza before meeting up with Ben at 7. As usual, Xin was still in hall (think NTU, Boon Lay and Raffle Place MRT) when we called him at 7, so yeah. Quite surprised he managed to rush down just in time. Then he said it's practice, which I totally believe. Lol.

Well, the performance was good, people cheered, but I'm sorry, no encore. (I wonder how dance can have encore anyway. If they train for a dance to perform on encore, then it's not encore already. Encore must be impromptu wad.) We went down to the stage from our circle seats to pose, take a few pics, say great job, bye-byes, yada-yada. Haha. Very customary.

So yeah, left after the performace for some light dinner at Yakun. (Can you even say it's dinner?) Eggs and bread and kopi and teh. Cool. We didn't hang out long though. Left separate ways after that. Ben and Zhihan to East Coast area, me and Xin to the west side. Cheng... I don't know. Tiong Bahru? Haha.

Anyway, my night didn't end after that dinner. Took a bumpy ride (the bus was those kind super long and attached at the middle, so the back carrier was very bumpy) down to Holland V for Wala Wala. It was Xin's friend's girlfriend's 21st birthday, so yeah, we were there. Caught the band's last gig of the night. Woo, gotta love the drummer. Damn cool, he can play the drum, den then in the midst of hitting, twirl the stick in midair and be still on beat. Best I've ever seen. The band's really good.

Had a drink, chocolate martini, sounds funny eh? It's just chocolate milk with Martini. Not bad, if you like the lychee version of the Martini. The waitress was damn nice. Somehow we got my orders mixed up, I ordered the chocolate martini, but the lychee one came, so they gave us the chocolate version on the house. Sweet right? The lady's damn nice. Anyway, I didn't even finish half of my drinks. Guess who slurped it up? Yeah. I can't hold my liquor for nuts, and I didn't want to end up like the birthday girl puking over the toilet bowl. My god, she looked damn pale after she came out of the toilet.

Cool. Met up with pretty cool people, especially Eddy, another of Xin's friends. Cool, chilling out at pubs, listening to great music, but I'm really gonna have to stay off as much liquor as possible.

Posted by Isabelle at 12:16 pm

Friday, December 16


Hmm, it's another night where Blogger refuses to load for the past 15 minutes. Ah, but I don't wanna waste my time nagging about it.

Anyway. Been a busy week for me. Othello inter-hall games took up my whole of Tuesday. Damn shagged. Eh, just because it's not sports doesn't mean my brain isn't exhausted thinking how to beat that PRC of an opponent. Oops. Eh, I mean they are good k? Not being racist here.

TSC main comm meeting on Wednesday, which I almost clean forgotten about it, a very unbecoming thing for a hon gen. (Hon gen in layman terms = Honorary General Secretary, a very nice flowery term for the sai kang personnel of the committee.)

Thursday and Friday was hall choir training. I mean, we've been slacking the whole term, it's about time we do something about it, like meeting up for practice and stuff. We're really very slack. That can't be helped when the organisers are damn slack as well.

Barely have time for a breather, so we did some impromptu stuffs like playing mahjong thursday night through. Played to about 4am, but I broke even, luckily. Went across the expressway to eat supper after one round. Cool to do that once in a while. Gonna make sure we have another session before school starts. Heh.

I'll gonna have to squeeze some time out of my next week schedule. It's gonna be another jammed pack week.

Posted by Isabelle at 11:20 pm

Monday, December 12


Woo.

Somehow, people all around me are getting attached. Cool. I can't say I'm surprised, but I can't say I expected it too. I think it's a sooner or later kind of thing. I mean we are all at the kind of age where it's time to move on. But woot, the way I hear June says it, she's in cloud nine, and I don't think she's coming down any time soon. Guan, I hope he treats you good.

And I guess, from right down here, I'm gonna share the joy and hope this time my friends finally met the right guy.

Posted by Isabelle at 2:48 pm


Wooo. Had a great weekend. Lunch at Cartel on Saturday with Guan, and the peeps, followed by a great session of K-box. As usual, the moment Guan sings, we swoon. Ah. Anyway, It was a great gathering, took a lot of pictures, sang a lot of crazy songs. And as usual, the photos had quite a number of gay pictures of Tan and Dau. Lol. Not gonna post up the pictures though. Too lazy. Heh.

Anyway, met up with Heli later at night at her house. The plan was to stay over at her house and be merry, but end up we didn't do anything much. Watch the repeats of Star Awards, and how Zoe Tay blubbered and blabbered. Lol, I missed the live version, so I had to watch it. And I had to bribe Xin to let me have the TV. She wanted to watch the taped final episode of 'Tong Xin Yuan', so she coerced me to go church the next day with her. Fine. Lol.

Anyway, turns out after that show, everyone went to bed. How exciting. Ah.

Got roused from bed by the stupid trash collector truck that comes every morning at 7am. The problem is that Heli lives on the 2nd floor, just metres away from the chute. Ahhh. And the noise the truck makes is tremendous. (Allow me to quote Miss Ng once more.) TREMENDOUS. Ya, forced myself to go back to sleep until 8.30 when the alarm rang.

Yep, church time. I don't know why, I have a lot of inertia when it comes to church. I'm a christian, I know, but I cannot work up the enthusiasm to go to church. At least I tried la. Xin's worse, she's stuck with 3 very good christian friends (me, Heli and Ven) so she's somehow always pulled to some function. Today she got an invitation from another friend, and asked us to go with her for moral support. I don't mind, Heli doesn't mind, so yeah, made our way down to Parkway Parade.

Turns out it's some ulu new church, but the pastor's good and friendly, so yeah, and he paid special attention to the three of us. Cool, he's one of those few pastors that I won't drift off listening to his preaching. Not bad.

Anyway, itchy for pool, so yeah. It's self-explanatory. Pooled, played around. Didn't pool for long though, since we had to head back to Compass Point to get steamboat food prepared. Somehow, Heli's house had this mini pool table (and by the word mini, I meant almost a 7-feet table, smaller versions of balls with shorter and a lot lighter cues) so we got it out, started another few rounds of pool. Lol, the table's so small it's like you can stretch out your arm and reach the width of the table. Haha. No kick. Oops. Lol.

Cool. Nice steamboat, we had You Cai chop the two honey glazed and black pepper chickens, then we ended up sitting round the chopping board distributing the chicken parts. Hehe. I bet there was only half of the meat left by the time the chicken was served. Cass was cooking the stock for the steamboat, and we all got worried. Her last attempt didn't really work out you know, but this time I think it improved. Or she was just lucky. Heh.

Anyway, I left pretty early, after I trashed Xin at pool twice. (She'll get me next time.) Have to begin a long journey back to hall. Ech.

Woot. Thanks Fey peeps, thanks for the lovely weekend.

Posted by Isabelle at 1:52 pm

Friday, December 9


I'd never thought this day would come. I thought that I, being the zealous Nokia fan and all, would have stuck to Nokia all my life. But here I am, tonight, carrying my first non-Nokia phone. The Sony Ericsson K600i. Lol.

Ah, not that I'm complaining. The camera's good, the phone's chic, the functions are on par if not better than what I have for my last crappy phone, and it's ultimately a 3G phone, no matter whether I use it or not. I have no grumbles. Er, except for one, maybe. I still can't get the hang of messaging through a Sony. Argh. Gotta adapt, my friend.

Anyway, I'll really need to thank that someone. You know who you are. Aww. Don't say I never give you credit. I really do. In the heart.

P.S. to that someone... Cheer up k? I know it's not been the smoothest of days, and my phone's partly to blame, but yep. Hope you are feeling better.

Posted by Isabelle at 2:25 am

Wednesday, December 7


I seriously need to change my phone soon. Ok, I'm not complaining, at least I've still got a phone to use for the time being.

Will be meeting a lot of external people regarding the upcoming Travel Fair in Jan, so I'll really have to rely a lot on my phone. Right now, the current phone practically goes from full batt to flat batt if I talk on the phone for more than 10 minutes. Well anyway, will be getting a phone latest Friday, I hope. *crosses fingers*

This week will be the week I'll be free most of the time. Next week Othello plus choir camp... Hmm. Come to think of it, I haven't planned much about the camp. Argh.

It's a busy holiday.

Posted by Isabelle at 4:43 pm

Sunday, December 4


Haha, just when I thought I'll probably stick to my old blog skin for a while, this had to pop out. And i could't resist it. Bleah. So yeah. Cool eh? Lol.

Posted by Isabelle at 9:34 pm


Dang, my phone conked out on me yet again. This time, I'm really gonna get a new phone. The 7200 is driving me crazy.

Argh. I've become so reliant on a phone. And I'm waiting for this travel agent to get back to me on her details so I can finish my job. Think I'll have to email her again. Argh.

My hall had the electricity and water supply stopped for repair works today. Dang. The stuffiness in my room without the fan was unbearable, but I slept through anyway. I mean, there's no electricity, there's no water, I can't bathe, I can't do anything on my laptop, there's nothing much I can do in the room. So I sleep. What a waste of time. Slept to almost about 4pm before I felt the fan blowing on me once again.

Woke up with still a bit of grogginess. (Hey, I slept for what, 16 hours?) The head's a bit heavy, but it'll pass.

Gonna get a shower. Argh.

Posted by Isabelle at 3:48 pm


I'm trying to get myself back together. Think I'm enjoying myself too much. Gotta stop and tie up the loose threads first.

I can't wait for this holiday to come to an end.

Posted by Isabelle at 3:48 pm

Thursday, December 1


Checklist for the holidays:

- Go shop at IMM, Mustafa Shopping Centre and Sim Lim with someone. (Don't ask me why.)

- Eat ice cream at Tiong Bahru. Some ice cream place where someone claims it's dang nice.

- Try to get an external hard drive and back up all my useless stuff in my laptop.

- Re-format said laptop.

- Go major shopping with Sophia and gang!

Think that's all for the moment, and in between hall activities, it's enough to kill me.

Posted by Isabelle at 9:31 pm