fly by.

wells, i just returned from the night safari. it's a place i haven't been to since primary school i reckon? but i went there with jing to catch up with sharika, vimala mum and mr. kamal. just yesterday, i dropped by river view hotel to catch up with mr. mishra because he had to fly back earlier to settle other commonwealth matters.

and it's all good catching up with them! and it seemed as if it was just yesterday when we were sitting together, 3 long tables joined together with numerous indian cuisines - BUTTER CHICKEN, BUTTER NAAN!?! and just a while ago, we are back at a round table again (eating) and reminiscing about the times in delhi, a month ago.

this week was yet another week whereby i spent almost every night out.

mon: evening was spent with this emo boy. had dinner, walked from lau pa sat back to city hall mrt in the rain and then realising the times in cambodia was hell of a fun with the three troublemakers. now that one has settled down in australia, the other two just feel that the equation is incomplete.

tues: went to smu to do my "green wall" presentation. was quite a refreshing experience - apprentice boardroom style with 3 profs and 1 nokia personnel i think. three year 3, one year 1 and one year 0. *fingers crossed* i'm desperate for the phone as i need dough for taiwan BADLY. owing ah kok money for travelling and rita san for my japanese lessons fees.

wed: simple evening to catch up with my grandma :)


外面风大雨大 - 真想找个停泊的港口，一个只有我和你的避风港。

你...却在哪儿呢?

transfixed.

stop and stare (and breathe)?

(caution! this is gonna be a long post)

i've watched Step Up 2 today and i was just blown away. it was waaaaaaaaaayyyy coool and plain neat. oh man, i'm like "sot" by the female lead - briana evigan. i so like her feisty and devil-may-care attitude. and her smile is like etched in my mind. and there's a part she said that i particularly like -

"it's not what you've got, but what you make out of what you've got"

before i go all besotted and ga-ga with her, i'm so glad i've rushed out one of my much over-due "writing pursuits" the title sounds corny but what the heck? i'd like to think that the higher beings are rather fair (so to speak) as I've told mich. since i'm not blessed athletically, artistically, musically (or perhaps even aesthetically), i just have to capitalize on my ability to write lotsa bull. well, briana taught me that, didnt she?

and here's it, if you may be interested in reading, i managed to cap it to 300 words exactly (phew)!

I have named the Green Wall as “Breathing Drapes of Nature” mainly because it somehow represents a gentle awakening and cognizance that amidst the hustle and bustle of school life, we students do need to find time to “breathe” like how the ‘creeping vines’ are.

From a functional point of view, these vines can be likened to drapes that provide the buildings with screening shade. Together with the complementing backdrop of garden courts and roof gardens, it is indeed “a signature for SMU’s ‘Campus in the Park’”

However, I like to believe the ‘hanging creepers’ exists for reasons more significant (though subtler) than that. The fact that the ‘hanging creepers’ line the normally cold and unfeeling skyscrapers in the SMU campus in harmony, goes to show that our environment and the urbanized landscape need not be mutually exclusive.

On the contrary, it instead reminds us that we are not only stakeholders in the modernized landscape but as well as in the environmental realm. And that the ‘creeping vines’ are shading us from the sun yet enveloping the warmth from within reiterates the dependency we have, on Mother Nature. Therefore, environmental awareness should indeed be a common shared concern and not be detached from us in our rat race. If not, we may literally be “burnt out” by the sun first before the heat from the competition even gets to us.

Last but not least, it’s back to the point of ‘needing to find time to breathe’. Caught in our constant pursuits to attain and then maintain impressive GPAs, seize the coveted places for exchanges and scholarships and what not, I thought that many of us (perhaps, including myself) sadly have not much of a life or time for ourselves.

We could have forgotten how to stop and stare and breathe.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

and like OMG, ed shared with me another youtube video for me to bask in the mood of love. guys and girls, you are in treat. it's like so damn sweeeeet can?

i'll finally find...

this song somehow keeps tugging at my emotional chords, of late. from that saturday night i listened to ling & owie (?) at National Museum with the other 163B folks and then it has been playing almost everyday on 98.7 when im at work. guess the radio provides me with the best solace after all.

and it's all the more interesting to go to youtube and read the comments from other users on the music video, especially since this was part of the ost for the movie - serendipity.

ryry16123 (1 month ago):

The first time I heard this song, I was with a girl i liked and everytime i hear this, i think of her. If i would ask for her hand in marriage, i would play this for her. This song makes me want to cry, in a good way.

then i realised it's HIGH time i catch a movie and vicariously bask myself, in love. hahhaha, sorry.

feeeling random lah.

sabbatical... where and when are you?

just on sunday, i went to laine mei's 21st. caught up miss angel doc and mun mei after having not seen them for like at least a year plus. glad to know they're still looking and doing good hah! anw... was talking to mun mei, then we were comparing work life and school life. and i told her candidly, "you know, i actually have an urge to start school like immediately" then she told me that it's very natural for me to think so and then when i'm in school, i will then look forward to work life.

so ironic, isn't it? i'm just the kind of person that will contend with status quo unless status quo can really keep me satisfied and moving. but so far, i haven't found that source to ignite the volcano with me. so till then, i'm still pretty... dormant? so to speak.

actually, i'm feeling quite sian diao. despite the completion of CH, we still have accounts unsettled and most importantly, no liquid cash to settle payments. and there's this lazy prick that suggests "helpful" solutions and even is more "helpful" by shuffing spreadsheets for me to churn the data out for him by lifting his heavy fingers to do some clicking and typing. like what the feng right? lol, the amusing thing was that i was still quite impressed by him, in fact. the way he presented himself and his ideas, the contacts he had and his extensive involvements etc. but it didn't take too long for me to realise it's nothing more than a farce. duhh... of course when my plate is getting fuller without me leaving my buffet table.

lesson learnt: don't pass premature judgements, good or bad, no matter how telling the appearances can be at first sight. time is the most telling, isn't it.

naive benjamin, is finally growing up.

settle and henceforth...

i haven't been here for quite a while and but i'm pleasantly surprised by the new tags on the tag board. thanks for them =)

well, life recently has been hectic that's as usual (i realised i use this adjective ever so often)... but it seems that i'm really flushed and inundated with emotions, desires and adrenaline. having two keynote commitments off my shoulder and soon to be a third one (my intern which i have already tendered for), i really have much to settle and recollect, in a retrospective and introspective manner.

and what logical ways to continue my entry than by sharing the two commitments that were polished off my plate. yesterday (07 March 2008) marked the culmination of my involvement in Project Creative Home after 8 grueling months since July'07! Looking back, there were indeed many highs and lows. as to which were more frequent than which, I can't really put my finger down on either as yet. numerous meetings, bunking in at my event site @ scape's red bus, interacting with my fellow comm members and volunteers and participants, the numerous accounts spreadsheets i've generated, letters drafted for sponsorships and adoptions and many others - all will stay dearly close to me and my hard disk. my 'creative home' folder is a whooping 293mb.

and during yesterday night's grand finale, it was really a relief for us in the comm. finally it puts an end to receiving 20-30+ email from our creative home email daily (during the peak periods) and event management. but for me, i'm still down with 4 reports to do and only when i'm over and done with them can I put a nice big fat black full stop to Creative Home. but in the interim, i'm contented that the events proper have all been concluded. we've indeed moved a long way since conceptualisation and it's amazing how Creative Home has become some sort of a family for me and many others.

undoubtedly, i would really cherish the creative home experience even though i gong gong took up a lot of extra saikang. this is because creative home was my springboard towards my current involvement and really opened my doors. it landed me in YAH and my CYAPL and then my current position. in terms of personal development, i've really learnt much and gained some finesse in micro managing people especially working with my volunteers to meet tight deadlines. that's definitely something which i have NOT learnt in NS. moving forward, i will continue to scale up and progress to managing on a macro level, steering teams and pushing for and with well-intended initiatives. after all, i've been living with that inertia for 20 years too many already. too many, at least by my definitions.

another commitment that swallowed a HUGE chunk of my "time pie" was a recent entrepreneurship program i attended. i would say the takeaway from this 3 full day programs is also likewise immense. but with a Japanese tesuto tomorrow morning, i'll just cut to chase though you would have realised i haven't really done so, if you are reading to this paragraph thus far.

in a nutshell, i've acquired some hard skills and polished my soft skills and the ideal training grounds for me to hone them. so what lies ahead is to just leap before looking. a leap of courage, a leap of faith and a leap of change.

and also i'm very fortunate in my team - Go-Getters. this team of mine is real diverse, from existing entrepreneurs with their own startups [richard, siva] (having turnovers of 15mil pa) to a 2nd gen engineer [bryan] in a family business to a financial services consultant [bernice] to a teacher [mavis] and to one of my better friends, an accountant [eva] whom i'm always chatting with on msn.

but they have been really supportive and affirmative of me. as a team, we have bagged the winners for best presentation, sales, flyer and 2nd best booth for a biz opp. fair that we've ran today. of which, i played the main role for clinching the first 3 assignments (: and the cool thing was we played with real cash - $200 to $300 sgd as the game loot. and we were so wee bit close to clinching the top prize for the last assignment as the 1st runner-up, so close to winning 7.2k as a team. still, i'm more than heartened.

more importantly, i've really forged strong friendships with these bunch of people which I normally wouldn't have the opportunity to. of course initially, it would be expected for others to size (not literally) you up. but in scaling the steep curve to change their perceived value of you for the better has allowed me to grow. thanks really... for fetching me home, the white wine and the robert kiyosaki cds and materials.

now with so many takeaways, i'll take a short sabbatical to really recollect. henceforth, it's north bound at full speed!

がんばりましょう!