Reflections

Christmas in the air

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 03:28:54 GMT

Whoa, been so busy the past month, didn't have time to blog.

Where do I start? Well it's not anything big since November 1st, but somehow the time flies anyway. Mainly busy on weekends, always meant to wanna have a proper rest but never got down to it. It's like making New Year Resolutions and breaking them!

Now that Christmas is nearing, it's that time of the year again to spend even more on presents than the usual days. I do love Christmas, the atmosphere is so full of warmth and cheer... don't understand why grouch exists!

I'm offically done with the vocal classes, now just concentrate on my 古筝 and try to practice more... sigh! Time is never enough for all the things I wanna do!

I'm gonna try out something this year... hope it works! Well 2 things la not just one... I have my niggling doubts about the things but just brush it aside and give it a shot, after all, we'd never know till we try...

Life is like a dream...

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 08:50:56 GMT

这首歌一直在我脑里不断播放着... 词,真的写得很好,写出我常想的东西...阿信,谢谢你

如烟 (演唱: 五月天词:阿信曲:石头)

我坐在床前
望着窗外回忆满天
生命是华丽错觉
时间是贼偷走一切

七岁的那一年
抓住那只蝉
以为能抓住夏天
十七岁的那年
吻过他的脸就以为和他能永远

有没有那麽一种永远
永远不改变
拥抱过的美丽
都再也不破碎

让险峻岁月不能
在脸上撒野
让生离和死别都遥远
有谁能听见

我坐在床前
转过头看谁在沉睡
那一张苍老的脸
好像是我紧闭双眼

曾经是爱我的
和我深爱的
都围绕在我身边

带不走的那些
遗憾和眷恋
就化成最后一滴眼泪

有没有那麽一滴眼泪
能洗掉后悔
化成大雨降落在
回不去的街

再给我一次机会
将故事改写
还欠了他一生的
一句抱歉

有没有那麽一个世界
永远不天黑
星星太阳万物都
听我的指挥

月亮不忙着圆缺
春天不走远
树梢紧紧拥抱着树叶
有谁能听见

耳际眼前此生重演
是我来自漆黑
而又回归漆黑
人间瞬间天地之间
下次我又是谁

有没有那麽一朵玫瑰
永远不凋谢
永远骄傲和完美
永远不妥协

为何人生最后会像
一张纸屑
还不如一片花瓣
曾经鲜艳

有没有那麽一张书签
停止那一天
最单纯的笑脸和
最美那一年

书包里面装满了
蛋糕和汽水
双眼只有无猜和无邪
让我们无法无天

有没有那麽一首诗篇
找不到句点
青春永远定居在
我们的岁月

男孩和女孩都有
吉他和舞鞋
笑忘人间的苦痛
只有甜美

有没有那麽一个明天
重头活一遍
让我再次感受
曾挥霍的昨天

无论生存或生活
我都不浪费
不让故事这麽的后悔
有谁能听见
我不要告别

我坐在床前
看着指尖已经如烟...

Whirlwind Weeks

Fri, 09 Oct 2009 06:26:19 GMT

Phew! I promised myself I meant to blog a bit more regularly but some how promises are there to be broken! Haha!

After the Mayday concert, I went for a holiday to Hokkaido with my daddy dear. It is still different from Tokyo, so no internet for me to upload my photos at super fast speed. Ended up I had to upload the photos in Facebook in phases and yesterday only did I manage to upload them! Selection of photos is a headache too, everywhere is so beautiful in Hokkaido I just had to keep taking shots which looked almost the same but I took anyway!

How is it that the skies and landscape over there are so much nicer? Even when they had construction going on in Sapporo, Otaro etc... the place is so bloody CLEAN! And they have those cone thingys in different animal shapes, so cute! One thing though, it's hard to find a dustbin over there, and when you do, it is different bins for different kinds of rubbish.

I'm so glad I went over there during autumn... the turning point from summer to winter, the leaves changing colours and add special touch to the view. I had the luck to see 2 couples getting married/taking wedding photos as well =) Ah God bless them!

After coming back from a short (to me lah) holiday, there's work to be cleared. I was supposed to rest on the Friday which I took leave but went to attend the unplug performance by AMPs at night. Following Sunday, I went to help out at an event at Jurong Point FairPrice Xtra early in the morning. But when I headed home was caught in a terrible jam! And the sun was practically burning down on us! Sigh

Last weekend went to KL with Dory and Rongma for this Mid Autumn Festival performance (needless to say, Mr Lim was one of the performers). Jade Liu was there too! Woot! Really looking forward to her album =) We went to KLIA to receive him at the airport and I managed to pass him the music box I got for him from Hokkaido (Got a golden retriever on top of the box). Happily, he held onto it himself instead of passing to his assistant. I was surprised to know there was only one exit for all arrivals, kinda sad case!

The following morning after, we went to send him off (wee hours, urgh) and we must have looked like the most zombied group there. He didn't look any better, haha, it took him a while to notice we were there to send him off!

Now this weekend a company retreat to Bintan, then Charis's wedding next Sunday, I'm gonna be the emcee speaking in Mandarin. Whoa, first time, hope things go smoothly.

All right, gotta eat lunch now!

Singapore Hit Awards 2009

Thu, 03 Sep 2009 01:27:32 GMT

Most disappointing

Went to have a look at the list of nominees for each of the categories and to my utmost surprise, Jj was only in 2 categories! What the...

I do often wonder how are the nominees selected for, say Best performer (最佳演绎） or best Producer/production of album? It seems so so odd that every year, it is just those few same artistes who are in the list... I really don't understand! Sixology is a good album, but it didn't get nominated??? %()#@*^%)#*&%^)@#&*%

I'm not the judge, but I'm a keen listener and isn't good music about able move the listeners, to bring out what the song is about etc etc?

As the years go by, looking at the awards, I stopped bothering altogether cause in the end, it is still prone to a certain extent of biasness. Awards are, after all, created by humans and how objective can a human be? Everyone has their favourites... so how can we expect fairness?

For the Taiwan Golden melody awards, there was a lady who always gave her vote to Jj, but is sad to know in the end he didn't get nominated. Haiz... They say getting an award is a sign that people are recognizing your efforts and talents, but is it really? Out of all those award winners, how many are really there for that true reason?

*Shakes head in resignation* Congrats to Mayday though, their "Poetry of the Day After" is really good, we all know Ashin has his standards in lyrics composing, though I noted that the fast songs sometimes have a certain lameness in the lyrics. Otherwise, other good numbers such as "你不是真正的快乐�，�如烟�，�知足� etc are all very very good. My personal favourites are still �生命有一种绝对�，�如烟�，�我� and �倔强�。

Jj, 加油! It doesn't matter how many awards you get/get nominated at this point in time of your career. You have always been number one in our hearts and forever will be =) 我想，这比得任何奖项更重要，更珍贵，更值得珍惜吧！ =D

Urgh, a bit mushy hor? :P

Post Concert (Mayday) Blues

Mon, 31 Aug 2009 08:50:54 GMT

Sigh, feeling the beginnings of the fatigue that comes after a weekend's worth of excitement. I couldn't get to sleep last night, try as I might to just shut my eye and snooze but sleep just won't come. I even woke up not feeling tired though I only managed to catch 2 hours of sleep. But now... a rainy, gloomy afternoon after lunch, Mr Sleep has come to bother me!

Still reliving the concert moments, especially for the first night... personally I preferred the feel of the first concert... very moving indeed. It was the first time I heard them sing "天天想你", which was arranged to be sung between "温柔" as a short bridge. I really love this song, I suppose it is more meaningful for Stone coz it was at one of their concerts when they sang it, he proposed to his wife in front of everyone! And now they have a cute son =)

I also, for the first time, threw caution to everything else and took off my slippers so I can jump properly (feet were sweating, so hard to jump). Soon, I noticed the fans in front of me took off their sandals too! Haha!

The most 温馨and lots of 感触 was when they sang "憨人" as the last song where towards the end, it's mainly humming. After Ashin finished singing, we were, as one, still humming "la, la la la~~~", to which they stood together in a row, shoulder to shoulder and gave a deepest bow to the audience. Even as we applauded, we continued to hum and hum and hum... we can see they are containing their feelings inside, 有心里的挣扎, 感动的控制着自己的情绪. Monster and Stone were a bit teary even, which is a rare sight.

What a long way they have come all these 10 years and I do look forward to more decades to come... for their music is always a reminder to be ourselves and never forgetting our dreams, to follow our ideals and never give up!

D.N.A. Construction Complete

Sun, 30 Aug 2009 13:03:09 GMT

Phew.... what a whirlwind weekend it has been... Previously this weekend seems so far away ever since the announcement of Mayday concert tix as early as January. And then followed by the news that a 2nd concert tix sale is out. Now that it is over, there's that wistful feeling again after having a hell of a good time!

First, the friday concert was better in the sense that we don't know what is there in store... and although some songs are left out, but those songs have been sung before in last year's JUMP concert. The song list has gotta change, of course, there are some classic hits that have to be sung, songs that describe the hopes and dreams we all have in our hears.

Thought the beginning video was a tad too long... could have squeezed one more song haha! But I know they wanna built up a story line, adds meaning to the concert.

This is my first time attending 2 concerts from a band in 2 consecutive days... it's tiring but the experience is definitely memorable and I can say I would do it again. There are people who cannot understand or find it too expensive to go concerts, well, everyone has their own hobby and what they are more willing to spend on. I just simply love music, love to go for great performances and admire the hardwork these people have put in to present the best they have to give. Their efforts are priceless.

I'm still reliving the concert moments... and looking at the videos I took as a memory diary, the feelings still live on in my heart. Every lyric that Ashin penned, every tune that brought out the message of the song, just beautiful! Even Jj's concert, especially Tales of the Red Cliff that was performed alongside with his family, brings a warm, fuzzy feeling inside me.

Thank you, Mayday
Thank you, Jj

Give me a break!!!

Thu, 27 Aug 2009 07:16:05 GMT

Been having a surge of calls since yesterday... the funniest thing is 99.9% of them are not even related to my dear company. But because of the shared name, people assume. I can't/don't blame the customers, but honestly the department should have planned out the letter sending better. Now it's like I wish I had a magic voice recorder to tell customers what we are going to do and no matter what they say, the bottom line is we can't help!

Sigh, barely having time to breathe let alone drink a sip of water.... voicemails galore too! Now I kinda miss talking to our own customers, at least we don't have to parrot as much!

Mayday's concert tomorrow! WOOOOOT I haven't actually started being excited very much yet, but I know when I enter the indoor stadium and the lights go dim, I'm gonna just let it all out!

Let's jump and leave the earth again...................... customers leave me far far awaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

Small surprises in life

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 03:56:26 GMT

Met up with Dory and Sophie yesterday after soooooooooo long, what with less of Mr Lim's events, so meeting up is a bit difficult especially since we have our own stuff to do. I reached Maxwell food centre first, so I roamed around to see what food is there to try and saw this looong queue. In typical SGean fashion, I promptly went up to queue as well, seeing that it was selling one of my favourite dishes, Fish Bee Hoon soup! The only small kicker was, they do not sell the fine version bee hoon, only the thick one (chu mi fen). At least the broth made up for it, but I never liked drinking soup with those flimsy plastic spoons, making the soup taste more oily than it actually is.

It's not bad la, but I still prefer the one in Permas Jaya, J.B. Very few fish bee hoon stalls I come across put deep fried egg in the dish, which will lend a very fragrant taste to the soup. This Maxwell one is okay, the fried fish portion is just nice, only hope they can use fresher vegetables.

After eating our fill at the food centre, Dory and I then headed to A.R.K as I wanted to eat dessert there, the yummy durian cake! I wasn't really supposed to, as I felt the beginnings of heatiness in my throat, but no matter, I can just drink more water!

Before stepping into the cafe, I went up to SMG store first to check out Wave 2... only 1 design caught my eye... the rest just wasn't my "piece of shirt" (cup of tea version for apparels haha). On my way upstairs I caught a glimpse of 2 guys in caps and my sixth sense sent me a silent message... which I knew was accurate. Coming back down to the cafe, I spotted Sophie sitting near the counter, I could tell she just arrived as she was slightly out of breath!

Walking towards her, one of the guys at the next table turned and I was only half surprised as I firmly believe in 女人的第六感. Just for that brief moment I said hi and exchanged eye contact, still in a mild state of disbelief at life's coincidences. I often hear/see other people's narration of bumping into him and taking photos etc, encounters which I couldn't have owing to my full time job. Of course, I'm actually quite a practical person, so even if I could go A.R.K. on a regular basis, I wouldn't, coz it is just plain waste of time and money. That place is no hawker centre, prices of the food will just make one broke in no time if daily trips are made there.

I think so far, since it's opening, I have gone there about 4 times, once with my vocal classmates. So much for third time's the charm, more like 4th for me, hahaz =)

It was good to see him needless to say, but he was with his friends so we didn't chat much. He looked thinner but more well rested than the last I saw him in May. I quote him "I'm back to my cranky self"! haha I'll say that's really good, hope his voice will regain soon!

Right now just feeling super sianz at work, just chasing for updates from others so I can reply to customers soon... argh, when can i go back to Japan? =(

I need a break!

Good food glorious food!

Sat, 27 Jun 2009 17:02:28 GMT

I had seen the Sin Wang Taiwan restaurant at City Link mall and heard from Lemon that the food is good, so my colleagues and I headed down there for dinner on Friday. Being in a Taiwan restaurant, one of the basic must trys is the bubble tea. So we all ordered a round of bubble tea (2 milk teas, 1 red tea).

I took one sip, and nearly cried with relief at that precise flavour and taste I found so difficult to find! Most of the milk teas (I'm not just a coffee lover, I like milk tea too) I ever drank are overly sweet, the taste of the tea covered over with the condensed milk or sugar. The bubbles in the tea are especially chewy and has the hint of a certain sweetness that the usual ones don't have.

Now, I'm not usually a picky person over food. As long as it taste good, I'm fine with it. More than often, I stumble upon mostly beverages that couldn't make it. I don't refer to the high classness or anything, just the taste that suits my palate. Especially the beverages at coffee shops or other food places. For instance, I can strongly recommend the milk teas at the following places:

Star Food Court at Sentosa J.B.
Tong Luo Wan restaurant at Low Yat Plaza K.L.
Sin Wan Taiwan restaurant

Even the Sin Wang Hong Kong restaurant's milk tea is too sweet for my liking. Oh! I love the "Yuan Yang" at Tong Luo Wan!

Anywayz moving on, I order the Sesame Chicken soup with Mee suah, Karen ordered this Mee hoon in Thickened soup with Cuttlefish and Wilfred ordered the one with fish. Thickened soup generally means starchy soup, something you'd see when u order hor fun. For side dish, we had the Oyster Omelette.

The dish I ordered was absolutely yummy! The fragrance of the soup is so enticing and the soup is not oily at all despite the name and the presence of chicken inside. The soup is very flavour full, the chicken tender and not fatty and best of all, they cooked the mee suah to my liking, which is just nice and not too soft!

See what I mean? Heh

Here's the rest of the food and all are equally appetising, but I just couldn't stomach the oysters (shellfish is not one of my favourites however fresh they are, but I can take lala cooked in sweet and spicy sauce), so I just ate the egg portion.

Can you see the huge oysters hidden underneath?

No? There it is! =)

Managed to down this one but I didn't want another one after that!

Karen's order, forgot to take Wilfred's one, but his is the fish one.

Full house! We had to wait a bit before our turn...

That's all for this food entry, will continue another 2 more next time... over and out!

Inevitables of Life

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 01:51:06 GMT

It's official.

Michael Jackson a.k.a MJ has passed away from cardiac arrest at age 50 on 25th June 2009.

He will be deeply missed, especially those who have grown up listening to his works and giving their full support despite bad publicity. He's only human still, and humans make mistakes. Being an international celebrity does not mean he has to be perfect. No doubt some people will see him as a role model in the past but even role models have their "dark" sides.

Rest in peace Michael.

It was sad for the Chinese pop industry to know of Ah Sang's demise 2 months back. She was only 34 and battled with cancer. Sigh

On a different note, I'm very very very happy with Tank's new album "The 3rd Round", making all the wait worthwhile. I never had to skip any tracks and I'm so in love with the song "Amen".

阿门 (Amen)

作词:蓝小邪作曲: Tank

请赐给我一颗不会熄灭的星
请赐给我一朵不被淋湿的云
请告诉我的眼睛再等一下就是黎明
请别笑我每天都要跟你谈心

Bestow upon me with a star that will not extinguish
Bestow upon me with a cloud that will never be wet
Please tell my eyes, in a little while it will be dawn
Please don't tease me that I want to talk to You everyday

请赐给我一颗不会受伤的心
请赐给我永远用不完的勇气
如果还能说下去请让我在这黑夜里
相信明天一觉醒来是个好天气

Bestow upon me with a heart that will never be hurt
Bestow upon me with endless courage
If I can go on speaking, into this night, let me believe tomorrow will be a fine day when I awake.

我不要飞来的运气
也不用比别人荣幸
只求当我在谷底
还有力气疼痛和哭泣
荆棘中还能辨认来时的脚印

I don't want luck that comes easy
I don't need to be more honourable than others
I only ask for the strength to feel hurt and cry when I'm at the lowest point in life
Even through pain I can still recognise the footprints that appear

我不求变成个奇迹
也不用开创天或地
只求我最迷茫时
还能找到最初的自己
如果我痛到必须要闭上眼睛
就看见你

I don't ask to be a miracle
Or ask to create the heaven and earth
I only ask to be able to discover my true self even when I'm most lost.
If it hurts too much till I have to close my eyes, I will see You.

原来每一颗星熄灭才会再亮
原来每一朵云湿透天才放晴
原来一颗心受伤
是为了要更有勇气
原来勇气因为失去才有了意义

Every star that is extinguished will relight again
It is only after the clouds have rained that the day will be fine again
A heart that gets hurt, will become stronger.
Courage that is once lost, seems to be more meaningful.

流过的泪留下运气
受过的伤都很荣幸
下一次跌落谷底
就该知道躺下看山顶
何不替眼睛谢谢所有的风景

Tears that have been shed leave more luck
All the hurt gone through leaves honour
The next time I fall into the depths of the valley
I know I should lie down and view the hills
We should be grateful for the beautiful scene we see.

我存在就是个奇迹你为我创造天与地
你让我不断迷路直到找到真正的自己
原来只要我能看见我的真心就看见你

My existence is a miracle, You have created the heaven and earth for me
You let me be lost until I can find my true self
I am able to see You, only when I can see my true self.

Okay, this translation is totally sucky, trust me, it's much easier when you know Chinese, the meaning is so true and beautiful.

Go have a listen, you may find peace =)