getting fat...

yeah, it was bound to happen. im putting on weight. and the scary thing is that im training for the marathon now, which means TECHINICALLY, i should be LOSING weight. if i can put on weight during this training time, think about how much fatter i would get after the marathon!! i shudder at the thought. and the tummy is developing too. im beginning to see some serious curvature here. haha.
i'll blame it on the cold. it makes me hungry ALL the time. just last night i ate half a bag of potato wedges AFTER dinner. and over the past week ive eaten two LARGE bags of potato chips while watching DVDs. i have fully embraced my inner couch-potato.
i need a JCC crash course now..........

this thing burnt a big ass hole in my wallet...

wow if there's one thing more expensive than uni semester fees, its the amt of money this freakin course sucks from your wallet!! for example, i just spent a large part of my "free" time this wk working on a model of a homeless shelter in an alleyway. and guess how much the damn thing cost me... about 70 bucks man!! thats for balsa wood, foam cores, paint and some other little nitty-gritty things! shit thats a lot of money to pour into one damn project!! and after all that, u know how much this counts towards my final grade?? a measely 25%..... ho hum...... and thats just for ONE subject. just 25% of ONE subject.... i have FOUR subjects.
oh and it gets better, towards the end of the semester there are going to be two HUGE model assignments. And from what ive heard from senior students, i should be expecting to spend at least $300 on each model!! i was like WHAT THE FWOOSH!??!?
yup so here are some photos of my finished model. pls take some time to look at the pics cos, remember, this is expensive shit! hahaha... haha. heh.....no seriously, it is.

ah, yes. the $70 model. its about A2 size base, and 30cm high.

if you're thinking..."hey, that looks sorta like an a-frame..." well, you're right!

another view

and yet another...

i apologise for the lack of pics of babes in my blog. as u can see, i am married to my work now. and divorce looks a long way off...

work work work

its been a hectic week... or more like a major "arrowing" week. Cos i have so so so many projects to do this weekend. lets recap shall we... ive got 1) site plan for Construction Tech, 2) hard-ass scaffolding alley model for Archi Design, 3) three A3 drawings for the proposed inner paintings in the childrens hospital, 4) on-site diagram drawings for City in History, and 5) Computer Modelling exercises..!!!! AHHH!!!

i havent even played any comp games this entire wk! and i've missed 2 soccer training sessions already. actually, thats my own doing though, cos i spent the time training for the marathon. speaking of training, my knee is starting to hurt a little again. shit. i feel a bit worried cos im only up to 15km now... still got a long way to go to 42... but i shall persevere. remember, this year is PAYBACK TIME... so im gonna go all out till my knees buckle underneath me and i cant walk. but till then i'll give it my best shot... hopefully there wont be any long-term damage... touchwood!

yest nite i ran out of meat in the freezer, so i had to eat pasta with tomato sauce for dinner. and it tasted oddly like combat rations... eeewwwwww. must remember to stock up on more chicken this wk, especially with all the running coming up.

ah, ok ive taken enough break time to write this entry. time to get back to work on my model...

work work work. (keep telling myself that no matter how bad it gets, its better than sitting in an OCS meeting.... and that helps.)

death to ashes

i really hate cricket. im sorry to all u cricket fans out there whom im sure have your own reasons for liking this obscure game.
i was pretty indifferent to the game of cricket up till about 24 hours ago. the reason being? bcos the freakin australian TV network decided to show a cricket game instead of the Man U vs Everton match!!! its supposed to be some HUGE cricket event called the Ashes Test between England and Australia..... BIG DEAL! WHO CARES?! certainly not ME!
All i see is some dude throwing a ball at some other dude and then him hitting that ball. and this goes on for hours and hours and hours and (im sorry cricket fans) but its just BLOODY BORING!! i mean....i could stare at paint peeling on a wall and THAT would be more interesting. alright, i guess my hatred is being incorrectly channelled... i dont hate cricket... its the damn australian TV network i should be lashing out at! HEY u a-holes! have u ever watched the EPL b4??? if u did, you'd probably shoot yourself in the head for airing cricket instead of soccer!! ARHAHRHA!! GAHGHHAGH!!! GAAAAHHHHHHH!!!
im just so frustrated now..... cant wait to go back to spore in november to my beloved ESPN and Star Sports.
sheesh....

listen to the kenyan's advice

sigh.. satiish is right... i have been really slacking off in my fitness routine. last week i only ran 10km once, then this wk onli once also. and ive been eating lots of unhealthy food too!! the other day, went to the supermarket and bought a HUGE bag of salt n vinegar potato chips. its always there on offer on the shelves, but normally i am able to convince myself that i shouldnt be eating it. but this time dunno y leh... i succumbed to temptation and grabbed it off the shelf. after finishing the whole bag in one DVD sitting, i was like.... shit, what did i just do?....

but no longer! the melbourne marathon is less than 2 months away, and if im gonna clock a decent timing, must start training seriously now.. cannot have these DVD snack-athons anymore...

and no more indomee also!!! (well, maybe 2 packets a wk.....hee)

mari kita rakyat singapura...

ok, i admit that this post is one day late.... but still,.... HAPPY NATIONAL DAY ALL U SINGAPOREANS!
I must confess, i woke up yesterday morning and completely forgot that it was national day. it was not till halfway in the day when i was sitting in my lecture theatre that it occured to me. haha. oh well, guess ive never been a very patriotic person to begin with.
I went out with Esther and one of her frens for supper to celebrate. (and yes, we all wore red n white). We went to this place in Crown hotel called Greco (i think)... its some cafe-cum-restaurant a-la NYDC in spore. my gawd, their cakes are soooooooo good! not to mention loaded with calories!! haha... but its national day lah... so can indulge a bit more. =)

drug alley

second wk has just come to an end, and the assignments keep on piling. Now i've got 3 major assignments due next week! and i went for my City In History tutorial yesterday and found out that there's a shit load of reading and researching needed for that subject. I guess the holiday is really over now... time to start getting serious about my work.

My latest project is to do a collage on this alleyway in the city called Hosier Lane. Our tutor gave us a choice of two lanes to visit and research, but Hosier was definitely the more interesting of the two. (see image above). This place is creepy in the day, and down right dangerous at night. Its like THE ghetto alley of melbourne, where ppl sell drugs and stuff. haha. Thats wat makes it so much fun to do a collage on. Well, if you're wondering, i didnt get to see any drug pushers, but thats probably cos i went in the day. And NO WAY am i going there at night!!

On a lighter note, i came home from soccer practice the other day with my t-shirt on backwards the entire journey on the tram. And i dont mean "inside out". I mean BACKWARDS!....... u know that tag on the back of your neckline that shows the size of the t-shirt? it was sticking out from the front collar at my neck!! and this was for the whole journey home! oh and i went to the supermarket on the way home too... so everybody there must have seen it too!!! AAHHH!!! i didnt realise till i got home and looked in the mirror. i was like... WAT THE...!?!?

prata night out!

federation square!

chillin' out!

Yongsi and I... cool backdrop!

Esther and I at federation square!

the FEET shot!

there's always room for dessert!

it looks good. it smells good. it tastes good!

THAT obligatory shot. =)

Yongsi and her HUGE Lassi.

ASSignments...nooooooooo.

the novety of uni is slowly beginning to wear off. Its just like eating sour plums... the outer fruit is nice and sour and sweet at the same time and exciting!... but eventually the sour and sweetness wear off and u get to the hard, inedible seed. (ok that was my poor attempt at an analogy)
its only the first wk, and ive already got ASSignments to do!!! and they're not the particularly easy ones either! im supposed to research on this building by an architect called Toyo Ito, the Sendai Mediotheque. yeah... cheeeeeem. Supposed to find out how the building was made lah... what materials went into making it lah... how the building relates to its surroundings lah... how i feel about the building lah... everything lah lah lah!! and im supposed to hand this in on thurs...noooooooo.
good thing is, i have a good partner (we're supposed to research in pairs). this girl from china, and she's really pleasant, unlike some of the other ppl in the class who look like they will give mono-syllabic answers when u ask them anything. okay, sorry thats a bit harsh.
alrighty, i'd better go to the library now...
oh, side note! i cut my wrist playing soccer yesterday... so now there's a scar on my wrist that looks like i tried to commit suicide. hahaha.

sweeeeeet

omg today has got to be my happiest day since i got here.
I found out that there was a typo on the timetable that i printed out. Initially, i had classes every day, with a total of 20 hrs per wk. That sucked.
BUT! now with my new timetable, i have wednesdays off!!! no school!! freeeeeee!!! and my contact hours have been reduced to 17!!! YAY!
oh this is just too good i simply have to gloat. wed off! wed off! i know some ppl who have like only 3 days of school per wk... that's just crazy. (in a good way) but im more than happy with what i got. What i'm not happy about though, is the price of all the materials needed for this course! already ive spent about $120 on materials, and $100 on textbks, notes, etc. And all this is for just ONE semester! this school's ripping us off! ah well.....
oh and one of my lecturers is called Blair Gardiener.... we call him the Blair Witch cos he's a really freaky guy. He talks in the most boring manner imaginable, and sniggers at his own jokes. eerie....

WinteRACE!!!

From left : Fendi(Indonesian), Me, Mike(Irish), Christopher(Philippino), Grace(S'porean)


Today was a fun day! The most fun of the orientation thus far. My new friends and i decided to take part in the traditional Melbourne Uni WinteRACE organised by the overseas student' union. The WinteRACE is a sort of "Amazing Race" style event where we explore melbourne city looking for checkpoints, and then answering the questions at each stop. At first, the whole concept sounded kinda lame, and we were reluctant to join. But we soon realised that we would have absolutely NOTHING to do on a saturday afternoon anyways, so we decided to give it a try. Luckily we did! It was way more fun than i expected. Partly due to the weather (if this was held in orchard road i think we would have dehydrated) and also the ppl in my group. All were really nice people, and we got along great.
Oh, and its amazing how much fun "topo" can be when its not done in a hot and humid brunei jungle.
But alas, we did not win any prizes in the race. At the endpoint, they announced the top 4 teams, and we were not amongst them. This leads me to believe that we were 5th!!! yes...i believe so! without a shadow of a doubt!

Side note : bcos we did not register earlier and just decided to turn up a the last minute, we did not have to pay the $5 registration fee. Yup, so we enjoyed free pizza and free tram rides! YAY! (see, it pays to procrastinate sometimes. heh heh.)

first day...

yesterday was my first day of orientation. The day started off kinda scary, as i entered this big lecture room (which looked suspiciously like LT5 from ACJC. remember that guys? hehe) and saw hundreds of ppl whom i had never met before. Since this was an international students' briefing, there were students from literally ALL corners of the world. There were some from Sweden, Africa, the Carribean, Philippines, and of course the bulk from South East Asia.
After the customary "Welcome to Melb Uni speech", we split up into our own faculties and got a tour of the campus from some of our seniors. This was the first time that i got to see my coursemates. There were a group of australian girls, but they seemed more interested in mingling amongst themselves. I wonder if thats the way things will be around here - the aussies sick together, and the rest stick together. lets hope not...

Anyways, i was fortunate enough to make a few new friends on the first day. A guy named Chris from Philippines, Fendi from Indonesia, Lynn from Malaysia and Grace from Singapore. Quite an assortment of nationalities eh? haha. They're really nice people, and its good to know that i'll be working closely with them over the next few years. We're meeting up to watch a movie today (cos tuesdays is half-price). Better get going now...im meeting them in the lobby in a few minutes. ciao!

broomstick kid

I was never a fan of the Harry Potter books. I did like watching the movies (thanks in most part to Emma Watson), but i certainly dont qualify as a fan. So, as you might expect, i had no idea that Book6 of the series was released today.

It took me, however, about 10 seconds after stepping out of my apartment building to realise this. As i walked out the front door of the lobby, a mother with two kids walked by me. One of her kids was dressed in a long black cloak with a hood (looking a lot like the Emperor from Star Wars), and for a moment there i thought to myself "shouldnt Episode III fever have died down by now?" But her second son's outfit was a dead giveaway. He was carrying a broom (yes, a broom. not a fancy one like those potter movies, but a REAL HOUSEHOLD BROOM!!) and he was wearing thick rimmed classes and had drawn a scar on his forehead in what looked like brown lipstick.

There was no doubt in my mind after that. Today was the release of Harry Potter 6. You see, i live across the street from the state library. And there was a fair going on in the courtyard....a potter fair as you might expect. And there were people dressed up as witches and wizards and little witches and little wizards, all waiting anxiously in line to get their hands on a copy of the sacred book.

Potter mania is back. hmm... i wonder if Emma Watson will drop by to promote the book? (here's hoping!)

2 more days

yep, only 2 more days till orientation starts. and if u ask me, it couldnt come soon enough! Not that i mind sitting at home all day watching Smallville, but i just feel that precious hours are ticking away and i'm accomplishing nothing new in my life. Oh wait, i DID learn to cook a little. Erm... but that hardly counts.
I went the uni yesterday to collect my orientation booklet. There were senior students there who attended to us, and gave us a little insight into orientation week. The girl who attended to me was from Taiwan, and she was quite....erm...hot. yes. quite hot. But she had way too much make-up on, and that just turns me off.
Where are all the "natural-nice-looking-sporty-kind-warm-funny-sophisticated-down-to-earth" girls in my life? Maybe my standards are too high... i'm looking for the perfect person to match me, when i myself am far from perfect. Its a cliche that there's always someone out there for you... but i dont think its that easy. Ppl say "oh! i found my soul mate!" So what is a soul mate exactly? Is it one person in the entire population of the world who is destined to be with you? If that's the case, then almost everyone who claims to have found their soul mate is full of bullshit. Come on, think about it.... there are 6 billion people on the planet. In your lifetime, you'll have close relations with, say.....200 people? 300? OR sightly more if you're popular. The chance of finding your soul mate in that group of people is close to ZIP!! ZERO! KOSONG!
I think there are two kinds of girls. The ones you grow out of, and the ones you grow into. There's no such thing as a soul mate. And there's no perfect girl out there. Its a long 6 years here... hopefully i'll find someone i can grow into. (of course it would help if her name started with Natalie and ended with Portman).
kidding!

.........but that would be nice!

away with the triangle!

haha. i just realised that today is the one year anniversary of passing my driving test. and u know what that means..... i can now strip off that confounded bright orange and yellow triangle!!! mwahahahaha! no more being bullied on the road by old foggies and taxi drivers! its payback time!

of course it would help if i actually had a car to drive over here.......