Billy Bombers - Elections Day

Sorry for the late post... i really wanted to blog last nite about the whole day but i was really too tired to do anything other than source for some pictures to add to this blog entry.... yeh here's the entry.

Went to sleep at like 3 knowing that the next day was Saturday. I had nuthing planned for the day except Blading with Qiang and Adrian meeting at Bedok at 3. so was prepared to sleep till bout 11 or 12. Then dinesh calls at 9 plus and asks if i'm sleeping. of course i'm not sleeping anymore lah! i'm talkin to you!!! argh. so he finally got me up and out of bed with them promise to meet at Century Square for Billy Bombers at 11.30. He had some Polling day 50% off voucher and decided to use it. So he called along a few people like my 2 meis... but they both rejected him. until i asked them myself. HAHA... and Vera agreed to come after much psycho-ing her to ask her mum. Jamie couldn't join us coz she was meeting frens but i managed to bargain with her to ask her to pop by b4 she meets her fren coz it's all in tampines. haha so to summarize it all, Vera, Joash, Dinesh, Adrian and myself were going for lunch and Jamie was going to pop by. :)

Went there and seeing Vera again was really a treat for me la. i didn't need to eat or drink anything and i'd already have been a happy man. She came and we managed to take some silly shots by posing with the mirror above us. it actually was a really ingenious idea by Adrian. here we are, smiling before our meal...

Yup, as you can see, Adrian is holding the camera. haha... yeh... it was a cool gathering la... but what i really wanted to blog about was Vera. I know you're reading this mei, but yeh... hope you dun feel weird reading it and all. :P

Vera has been my mei for 2 years liao rite? since sec 1... it seems so short but actually the more i think bout it, it seems so long ago that i met this crazy young hyper NYGH girl. She came into my life in such a hurry and became so close to me. Youth camp, that's where it all started... i was your Angel rite? or was it that i was your mortal. sumthing tells me i was the Angel. haha. but nvm not impt. i remember how you caught my attention [as you do to everyone else] with your friendly, crazy and carefree attitude. :) must say that i immediately took a liking to your mad personality and was easily captured by your friendship. :) after camp, we got closer and i one day became her kor. dun ask me how it happened, but a huge part of me was very glad it did coz Vera's been such a joy to my life and there's no way that she can't make me smile. :) jus her little "i'm a princess-pouts lips" kinda expression is enuf. :)
Seeing her yesterday after such a long time was really a different experience for me i guess. i realized there and then how much we had lost in the few months that you took a break from Shalom. it really hit home when we took this picture...
When we posed for this, you jus instinctively rested your whole head on my shoulders... at first for a SPLIT second, i was a bit stunned... i guess it's coz this was the first time i've spent time with ya since you took that break... but in the next split second, i remembered exactly why i was your kor. I recalled all the times i watched you with a smile on my face and knowing deep down inside that i jus wanted to be sumone there for you, to protect ya [if i can] and to be an older person for you to look up to or gain support from. :) in that split second, i was so glad to be able to be there, at billy bombers, next to you, taking a picture that i knew i'd die to see when i got home...
I guess i really missed ya and was really glad you came. I did really want to grab you up in a tight embrace and ka-bish you for leaving church for so long... but i knew that you'd only give that silly pout look again. haha i hope you know that your kor wants you back ok? and that doesn't change the issues you might have with shalom yes... but jus know that i do miss you and would want to spend more time wif you whenever. :) i care bout ya loads k? :)

funny what one day and a picture can do to you. :)

Our food came and we started getting fat... jamie dropped by for like 5 minutes and she looked real nice too... was wearing my necklace. yay for mei! haha.but sad she had to run away so fast... next time la. :)

yeh. i'm real tired now and am actually dozing off in front of my com. so i shall end this here...to be continued....

---------------------------- The following was blogged on Monday, 8th may.

Yeh so like I was saying, the food came and we were all pigging out coz you should know Billy Bombers la. They have HUGE servings... decided to save mei and I some money and share our dish. We had surf and turf while the others had chix and ribs... quite a nice combi la considering how mei wanted beef steak and I was inclined to fish. So when our milkshakes came [of course we ordered milkshakes.. who wouldn't?] I was so excited to get some of the wonderful cookies and cream shake into my mouth can! Haha... and it was well worth the trip. Love the shakes from BB. Mei had a choco shake... so boring. HAHA. Oops.

Yeh so lunch was fantabulous... mei still needed me to cut her steak for her. Aiyoh. Vera ah vera... how old liao ah? Still need your 'servants' to serve you and cut your steak issit? Tsk tsk. but nvm, would and did do it gladly. Haha... so after our meal, things started getting crazy. Vera tried to draw on my hand with a marker but ended up getting vandalized on her "bei" the should blade part by Dinesh. He wrote stuff like "Hi Vera" and "Rui was here" on her shoulder blade la. Haha super funny... in the end I had to clean it off for her with COLD ICE WATER. Lolz. I'm so evil. Haha...but it was that or shakes... so I think shakes wouldn't have cleaned it off, only made it sweet. HAHAHA..

After that, we headed to Isetan to buy Vera's mother's day gift and Yamaha to look at Guitar Straps... hmm quite ex la. But as expected... so will keep looking around, maybe I'll find cheap ones. Who knows. after that, we had to part ways coz Vera was heading towards town, Dinesh and Joash to church and Qiang [yeh, he joined us after lunch at Vera's request], Adrian and I to East Coast park. :P Went to Bedok first to grab lunch for Qiang and grab roller blades for Adrian and I. Ended up spending quite a long time at Adrian's place... supposed to jus pick up the 2 pairs of blades and leave but I think we must have spent like half an hour or more there. Haha stupid qiang la... purposely trying to stall time so we won't end up going to ECP. Lazy bum.
So we arrived at ECP and it was crowded la! Sadly didn't take any pics there. we bladed for an hour and stopped by Macs to grab drinks before heading back to return qiang's rental blades. Jasmine, I spoke bout her in my last ecp entry, didn't seem to remember us. Finally [and I mean FINALLY coz it took a long time] got qiang to talk to her and ask her whether she remembers us... she apparently doesn't and dun think she read the tract we passed her la. From her replies, can see she dun even remember the tract. Haha sadded can... but yeh. Later on I made small talk with her about what she's doing now and stuff... intro-ed our names and we left for dinner… overall, the blading trip was fun la! Was learning how to brake from Adrian... he was teaching me the technique and until now, still can't brake properly. Shall keep practicing and learning.

Yup, the rest of the day was quite straight forward, dun wanna waste your time reading bout it. Dinner at Parkway and home. Chionged home by bus so I could watch the elections on tv... it was exciting la! Esp when WP won one of the constituencies... wah, can see the people who were pro-opp jus cheering. I was quite happy too la... not that I hate the lightning party [sorry, can't type their name... scared later government sue me]... but it was interesting to see how the times have changed... did ya see the Aljunid GRC? The lightning party won by like 56% of the votes la. How close is that can! The lightning party will have to work hard to keep support. yeh but it's all over...

Thus, this concludes the memorable day. memorable mainly coz of one person and a group of people that made my day sumthing worth blogging bout. thanks mei and the Billy Bombers peeps + Qiang. frens are always treasured.

Right now, sitting in office. This morning was fighting to stay awake. Dunno why I'm so tired. Gosh. Haha.. later so exciting, meeting up with a few Cfers... meliza, tian en, nick, maybe timo... we're going for dinner and then heading to Esplanade's Harry's Bar coz mel wants to go see and I dun mind seeing the atmosphere too la. The rest can go and drink their brains away... I'll have punch... or sumthing else. I should have brought a water bottle. Maybe I will. Haha I got a flask in the office. Cold water anyone? HAHA. cheap and good.

Yup, so thanks for reading this ultra long post. It's 2 days long! Wait... today's Monday... so it's 3 days. haha

haha! this is anonymous! i managed to hack into this person's bloggie cuz he has the same password as me!!!!! is that psychic or psychic. rOarS!!!! hehe. i don't know what to blog already.. this is so silly. Oh anyways THE NEWEST UPDATES:

-Mr Joel Tan Rui Ling is nominated for TP's valedictorian!!!! wOotS!!! *cheers* Congrats Joel!! Realised i didn't hear much about your school life.. only got to know you after it has ended.. lol. Anyhow, don't be so conscious about your grades too lar.. you have just shown how a valedictorian is not determined by mere grades only lor. They are nothing actually, just alphabets and numbers. =) You have been blessed with many other things like the ability to speak well and present well and many will agree with me on that. GOGO RUI!!! =)

hehe. that's it.. the end of my appearance. Continue to tag peeps.. ahaha.

Blading at ECP

Wah! i tell you. today was one of the better few public holidays i've spent can! :) Angel, Qiang and I went to East Coast Park to blade and it was a blast! promised to go coz Angel needed someone to teach her how to blade, and considering how i love ice skating and have bladed before... i offered to teach her.

though i knew i'd have to re-learn it again for myself. it's been SO long since i got on the ice and even LONGER since i bladed... last time i put on blades was probably 5 or 6 years ago now that i think bout it. or maybe even 10. i won't be surprised... needless to say, i can't find my old blades so went there to rent blades... Went to meet them at bedok and took a bus there.

We arrived at the blades shop and finally settled down after calling this girl to "serve" us... she was real nice, got us our blades and all but kept forgetting us coz of the busy-ness of the stall. So in the end when we were all suited up, i called her over and gave her a grin and said, urmmm we're all suited up but we haven't given you our IC or anything. and she was like. HUH?! you haven't paid yet? and we were like.. err no. haha... so she pai seh pai seh went to the back to issue us a receipt for our one hour of rental... [we were saying we should have jus bladed off la. they wouldn't know. but we were ethical and honest]... so she returned and we were on our way... her name's Jasmine btw, we asked.

Went to the learner's rink and it was quite funny coz there was quite a lot of people jam packing the rink... kids, pros... everyone was there blading, slipping, falling, laughing... you got it all there. haha so we slowly moved Angel there and of course being the first time in and on blades, she barely made it to the rink without falling. thank goodness she didn't coz the ground would have been very unkind. So getting there was tough enuf. we slowly inculcated her with instruction after instruction on what to bend, how to stand... it was quite info overload so we took it slow.. experiencial learning la... to cut a long story short, we spent the hour there letting her blade back and forth, falling numerous times [but getting back up immediately everytime]. We managed to even venture out to macs to pick up some drinks before heading back and trying again and again.
I'd like to say that i'm quite impressed by Gel... she was able to pick up quite fast, listen to our instructions and have the confidence to fall. Some people are so afraid of falling that they'll never leave the railing. but this girl insisted on going on and on with nuthing to hold on to but the railing at the end. She picked up real fast and was really much much better when we ended.

Yup, so after we ended, it started to drizzle really lightly. it was really good coz it was perfect timing. so we went back and Qiang made a comment about how the girl who gave us the blades looked like a Christian so we asked her when she came to get the blades back from us. Angel asked her if she was a christian and she said no. so i explained how she looked like one and so we thot she was... she said she grew up in a Catholic school though. IJ Punggol.. yeh, so anyways after she told us where she studied, Angel made small talk by asking her if she's workin part time and all. so after that, i asked her if it was ok if i gave her sumthing small to read. and i passed her a tract. We parted ways and she's been in my mind since then la. said a prayer for her that if i were to see her again during the day, i'd approach her and share the gospel with her. my little agreement with God. and if i didn't see her [which i didn't] i prayed that she'll read the tract and maybe find God some way. yeh. small perk me up for the day i guess. she was quite small sized but yet not really... told Angel that the moment i saw her, she reminded me of Angel herself. haha... maybe it was the hair, face or busy/blur service... and after a while, Angel agreed that she DID kinda resemble or remind her of herself. haha. it was quite funny. :)

Yeh, so after that, we went to macs so Angel could get her Hot Fudge and ended up walking all all all the way to the hawker centre at the other end of ECP. haha you know the one with good Stingray? yeh. after dinner, we took a stroll... mad. we walked all the way back to bedok interchange. haha it was fun walking in that "after rain" atmosphere. :)

yuppers... spent the day really well and had lots of fun. Thanks so much for the company and the great experience. :) *sian, tml got work*. haha... if anyone's heading to East Coast Park anytime soon let me know, i go ask you to help me find that Jasmine girl. :) thanks. aaha

oh yeh, due to the confusion about the prev post... this paragraph is dedicated to my other mei VERA SHAW! heh.. sorry bout that little mixup... was really glad when you promised me that time that you'll come for Family Day and even more happy when you did show up... i tell you, shawn and i were like sitting at the gate waiting for you to turn the corner and pop your silly head in la.. but you never came so we gave up sitting at the entrance of church.. we looked so dumb. haha... but we were looking forward to seeing you. it's been so long since you came back to shalom [well, the YF wasn't that long but...] but still, we missed ya, i know i did. So it was nice to see you. sorry i couldn't abandon my stall and walk the princess around. You're gonna have to excuse me on that but that stall only had August and I manning it.. and if you read in my prev post, i couldn't jus run away from the stall la. :) but yeh... like i said, for that short time i WAS able to see you, it was a joy to my heart. Sorry i didn't give ya a bye bye hug too. haha wanted to... but yeh... *hugz* gotta take that one as the real one for now... until you come back to shalom again... it'll be waiting. ahaha.. Yup. hope to see you more alrite mei? :)

pics from today:

Family Day 2006

Yawn. i'm real tired, mentally drained and quite physically exhausted too. so please excuse me if this is a short post. :)

Today was family day in shalom. it was a blast. though i was mainly cooped up in the fellowship hall, of which i vowed not to be this year but sigh, i still had an enjoyable time. k let me complain for one paragraph then i won't let myself complain anymore.

this year i really really really didn't wanna do anything. considering this year i'm chair of the yf, the last year as a free man from NS... and all the other stuff like me being the oldest YFer... i really wanted to jus spend time with the youths. going stall to stall hanging out with them, sharing laughters with them and basically being there for them and making memories with them. i tried my hardest and almost... almost was able to siam all committment this year. i was so close to being a free person today. i was all ready to buy coupons and just go fellowshipping game stall by game stall. I knew it was goin to be hard coz i'm quite high profile and all. rejecting yong jie and deb tan was really hard for me to do trust me. but i was able to not be stuck in a game stall this year. everything looked good.

then august asked me to help in his "wheel of misfortune"... wasn't 100% keen.. but i'd say 70% of me was quite excited bout it also la. jus joking with him is enuf to fill my day and all so i agreed. :S haha... i won't say it was a bad thing la.. but i really wanted to get out there and spend time with the youths... they were in the carpark and i was stuck in the deepest most inner part of the fellowship hall.

Was able to excuse myself from time to time to run outside, sit there and talk, laugh and help out the games stalls.. but it was really borrowed time. thankfully August was really really kind about not making a big deal about me being at the Wheel of Misfortune for maybe 50% of the time... but yeh. thanks august. really appreciated the time that i was given to go out and carry the laughs we made inside to the youths outside. :) [goodness... i sound like some maid asking for off days] haha...

but the wheel of misfortune was farn la. haha first victim was leonard and it was so saddening coz he won. haha... yeh but we had some good sabos... like my mum, vera, shawn tiang and dinesh. :) glad everyone was sporting and willing to pay to see someone get sabo-ed. :) it was fun spinning the wheel, dancing along to the silly looping music and stuff. :) thanks to august, he surely livened the station up a whole lot. :)

yeh, so to cut it all short, i gotta end off with 1 or two more paragraphs but family day was real fun. :) would do it again in a snap of a finger... but that's jus wishes. haha... i had tons of fun, the only reason why i'm so tired now. :)

Well, today made me realize how much i missed spending time and talking to my mei. yeh, this paragraph is dedicated to you and your kuku nonsense. :) thanks for smiling that heartmelting smile EVERYTIME. :) though i was afraid you almost lost my precious rings, i knew that even if i lost them, i was glad to have spent the day talkin and chilling wif ya mei. :) sorry i haven't been the best or least bit of a kor to you... hope to change that and watch out for you much more. but yeh, forgive me coz i'm still trying to work with the situation and circumstances surrounding my "absence" :) but hey, you still make my world and life so much joyous knowing you're being the silly pooters that i knew since you were sec 1. Just wanna say that i miss ya and though i dun or aren't able to always show it, you mean tons to me, more than you'll ever know. :) thanks, you. you're gonna be such a wonderful woman of God one day. i can't wait.

yuppers... that concludes my entry. :) you guys take care! going east coast tml! yay yay yay. aha i need the break from the drudgery of work. :) oh.. btw, the weekend flew by too fast.

Blogging from office

Wow... i got a new com today. large 19 inch flat screen... i want it for my home. haha new everything la... faster much faster. :) scroll mouse and all. okok, it's actually a super avg pc.. but compared to the one i've been working on the past month, this is the greatest achievement of technological advancements. haha

yeh, keeping this short coz i'm in the office mah, jus blogging for fun so i can say that i blogged from the office. :)

internet isn't free here. i'm using it secretly coz it's not supposed to be given to us... only my supervisor has internet.. but he log on for me. yay. haha. he's real nice to me. :)

today quite a lot of complain for kenneth, the other temp staff. seems like he's causing them problems and stuff. i used to be quite happy that he would get asked to do work coz he's never doing work. always sit there, sleep, play handphone game,listen to music... so now the rest of us are quite... displeased with his performance and attitude.

but now, the compassionate part of me comes up and i told jalil, my supervisor, not to complain or grumble bout him la. jus tahan till he leaves in sept... and jalil was complaining to me jus now then stopped himself and said, aiyah, cannot add sin. [he's a muslim mah]...:)

yeh, so work is getting better but still boring. :)

i wanna play my guitar and i wanna play it now.

Mormonism and Musician

Today has been eventful. Meant to blog lots.. but someone got my mood down and dirty and thus, have not much motivation to blog a wonderfully bright and brilliant post. so do excuse and pardon me. :)

first, i'll talk bout my day. today started out quite bad... was late for church coz i msn-ed with debz and blogged after that. so went late... but as always, no problems.. jus guilt. :)

Reached office and spent the day in mindless dealings with flights from this country to tat country... and filled my head, thoughts and motivations on Ravi. His messages are power packed with truths and wonderous lessons to be learnt. today we covered Jonah, Nehemiah, The dying Thief... yeh.. jus selective memory on those he talked bout today...
so i indulged in the sermons and feasted upon the truths in God's word... come lunch time, i watched the next half and almost finished "underworld evolution"... and continued to listen to sermons after lunch break. knowing full well my battery was being drained... i had planned to charge it at 4pm [as always]. so the battery dwindled down to red bar at 4.30 and i decided to charge my zen. to my horror, when i looked into my bag, the jack for the charger was missing!!! that means i can't charge it! so i had a dying zen and an hour's trip to city hall. oh goodness.

cut a long story short, i stopped my sermons there and then and had to take a train instead of a bus due to the lack of entertainment. yeh so that wraps up the work side of my day.

Found Angel dozin off at city hall steps and promptly got the sleeping beauty to excelsior hotel. k, this is where i bore you with the background of the following topic. *flash back*

told lydia i was lookin for a guitar some time back and she gave me the 101 on buyin an acoustic. her info and knowledge was ... immensely useful and beneficial to me. Tian en heard i was lookin for a guit and got in touch with his fren, Kelvin, who works at a music shop. on another note, lydia recommended going Excelsior Hotel coz they had lots of guitar shops there and lo and behold, Kelvin worked there.
so last nite, i called him and we discussed bout what product i can look for there and worked with my budget and all. he gave me some specific ones to look at and i promised to pop by today to look see but he wasn't in.

so yeh, today i went to excelsior and checked out the guits. there were 3 that i was considering... $250 CORT - 2nd hand, plug in, rounder brighter sound
$249 BLAST - 1st hand, no plug in, nicer colour and look
$299 BLAST - 1st hand, no plug in, brilliant sound

so after talkin with the guy there for a while and weighing the pros and cons, i decided to buy tomolo after askin dinesh if church can handle my guit plugged in. but when i walked out, i called my mum and asked permission and dinesh to settle the PA issue. and it was all green lights so i walked back in and purchased it. it came with a free bag and so i walked out $250 poorer but tenfold-ly happy. :) so surreal. the exact amount i budgetted for, God provided a wonderfully "got standard leh" guitar... according to Lydia. haha

On the way to Subway for dinner, i approached a Mormon and spent an hour and 15 minutes speaking with him. My experiences with that is here [click to go to link] in my other blog. go read it. it was an interesting experience.

so we had wonderful subway, which i miss so much, and it wrapped [no pun intended] up a cool entertaining, informative and thought provoking day.

i are happy. i is going to learn how to play my acoustic guit well. :) and i promise to put pics when i have them.

Debz touched down in DC

Thank God, just got news from Debbie online that she's all safe and sound in DC. :) Uneventful flight and good weather. She's currently staying with Keewen's sister and looking forward to the week. here's her blog for updates.

Debbie's Safe

keep praying for her if you know her...
and we're all waiting for you to come back debz, but dun rush back... this could be one of the many holidays you have the pleasure of having. :)

on other news, had CF yesterday. it was great. :) and going to look at guitars today. hehe

Friends + Santuary Joke

Hey peeps. it's been a while since i blogged. i know... so yeh here i am. :)

today was a blast... we had beach games today for YF. :) it was good coz i was afraid since i was leading the whole yf... but it was good la. :) thank God that Chelsea and Jamie came. it was really encouraging to see those 2 sisters there today... esp Chelsea coz i know how hard it is for her to come to YF and what extreme measures she had to take jus to come today. :) thanks Chels... i was real glad you came today. :)

Yeh so on the way to church, i took a cab. knew i needed to coz i was late. so when i decided to take a cab, i decided that i HAVE to keep my promise with God. told Him before that whenever i take a cab, i will or at least try my best to share the gospel with the driver. so i did today. but i have created a blog to remember my experiences with Evangelism.. 2 reasons
1. To remember next time when i look back and read
2. To pressure myself to share with people. to also keep my promise to God. :) accountability and all.

yup. the new blog is Evangelism Blog jus for your info, "Joel" means declarer of God. so that's my new blog name coz i hope to really be able to declare to people about God. :)

yeh so read about that experience there la. dun wanna re-blog here. :)

Then after yf p[which was great. youths had fun] we had service choir and after that, stayed back with august and jodi to sing songs coz i really wanted to sing songs wif them. :) tell you. it was such a funny time la. we were trying to record a song "Sanctuary" but it turned out a hilarious time of us jus laughing at everything la. super funny. August and I were doing Vampire accents and jodi was jus dying la. she was laughing so hard we could never sing again.. and we tried so many times. :) if anyone wants to hear, let me know, i got the recording of our exploits. it's super funny. :) but you gotta be there to really understand why we're laughing so hard. :) it was so fun.

then after that went for macs with Jodi and Adrian. :) really miss eating and spending time with them. we were recapping on the train. i tell you, i thank God so much for friends. they make life so much better to live in. :) i love my friends so much... they make me happy, smile and laugh. nothing on the world can replace that. really. :)

Good Friday & Easter

Hey people, just a gentle reminder as the season came and went...

How often have you reflected on what Jesus did? As we live our lives, do we live our lives as people free-ed from Sin, from Death, from an eternity without God? or do we just live our lives without a second thot of what He paid for us?

And now since we know that, how often do we tell others He died for them? that they too have been saved from eternal damnation? The message is something that people need. Funny thing i realized this week after Street E was that people do want to hear the message, it's just how we deliver it.

God died so we might live. He sent His Son so that we might BE His sons.
Before i leave, let me just end off with a thought provoking statement.

Before we bacame Christians, we ran after Sin.
After we became Christians, we run away from Sin.

Enjoy your Monday and the week. God Bless you.

New Feature!

Guess who has a cool new feature on his blog? guess guess. hahaha.. check it out! Verse of the Day! haha.. so cool la. then like this, hopefully, every day the verse will be updated AUTOMATICALLY CAN! ahha so funky. so please do go view the verse when you tag or visit. it's jus below the tagboard... a place everyone always goes to. :)

heh so happy.

Kicked out of the Office

So today marks the 3rd day of me being sick. for those who don't know, i fell gravely [ok la. not so exaggerated.. but it was quite bad] ill on sunday night. i went to bed fine but tossed and turned in bed like a fish who jumped on shore [hmm that's quite a good imagery. dunno why no one's used that before to describe tossi... nvm] so woke [well you can't wake up when you never really did sleep much] up the next morning with a ultra high fever. this, i'm not exaggerating. my sis was freakin me and my mum out sayin how i was 38.6 and if i was 40, i'd have to go hospital and get that drip stuck in my hand. so duh, called in sick. Boss was real nice. he said take mc and rest.

So spent the first half of the morning jus dying. HAHA.. k k, trying to get rest and fight the ache... then went to poly clinic at bout 10... waited and finally got all the things done at 12. :) that's 2 wonderful hours. there came a point in the polyclinic i was sitting alone coz dad went to walk and the aches were so bad i was like dying in my hard chair la. twist and turn [people watching must have thot i'm on drug rehab or sumthing] but nuthing was comfortable. it's like one of those scenes where a person's trying to escape a straight jacket. wanted so much to cry out DAD!!! so i did it virtually. smsed him askin where he was and when he came back, laying on him was so much better. aiyoh. felt so uncomfortable b4 he came lor. dunno why also. evil fever. so yeh, got the mc and went home to rest. spent the whole day sleeping... managed to take winks in between smses coming in and stuff... and phone calls. -_-; but yeh. managed to rest quite a lot despite my high temp [i always told you people i'm hot] and aches...

the next day i still didn't feel well enuf... fever was lower but still not gone. aches were slowly going away but there was a weird feelin in my stomach. so woke up and decided to call in sick again. felt so bad. but necessities. this time, we didn't have the time, patience and.. ummm.. anything to sit thru 2 hours so we jus decided to pay a little extra and go to the family clinic outside. he was a real nice guy. really.. warm and frenly. :) he's a catholic. i saw the crucifix and he's closed on sunday. anyhow.. he charged $26.. which is $16 more than the poly clinic... so i pay $16 more and i got a full doze of antibiotics, one extra day mc, no wait and a warm smiling guy who makes you feel that you're actually a patient and not a tin can sitting on a conveyor belt that doesn't stop till you've cleared all the tin cans. :)

yeh. so i went back with 2 days of mc. so that's a total of 3 days... so spent yesterday resting and recovering. towards the night, the fever had disipated... but the stomach weirdness was getting worse... to cut a whole day short [coz when you're resting and sick, the day isn't interesting at all] i woke up today feeling much better so i decided to go work la.

So got changed and stuff wif the motivation to go work. parly coz i missed working, partly coz i should go since work would be piling up and partly coz home was boring. So i went, despite having an Mc that covered the day... went there and had hell at the pass office.. first time had so much trouble. made me really late for work. anyhow, once my boss saw my MC he was like. eh! today also ah? joel come here... you on mc today ah? k k, let me try to re-anact...
Roles: Christopher [boss 1, nicer and playful] Alvin [boss 2, less playful but still nice]
Chris: eh, your mc covers you today ah?
Me: umm yeh yes sir.
Chris: then go home! go go. get lost. dun want you here. later you kenna sumthing then die la.
Me: yeh sir i understand... i won't drop dead la. but i can go home if you want
Alvin: eh, dun waste his trip la. since he's here.
Chris: if doc say dun work, then he's not supposed to be here. anythin go wrong i dun want to say he was working here mah. whatever he say also no use see. it'll look like we made him work.
Alvin: i'm fine wif him stayin la
Chris: eh, dun overwork yourself la. go home la. got mc dun want to go home. why? we dun torture you enuf issit? that's why you want to get more torture ah? hmm Alvin, i know liao la. see la. this temp get sick on weekend coz he got no work to do. so from now on, we make the temp staff take home work to do on the weekend. then they won't get sick. hows bout it?
Alvin: haha yeh yeh.
Me: -_-. haha very funny ah. haha... yeh, i clear my work then i'll go la.
Chris: go home la! why you so siao onz to get tortured?!?

yeh..so i managed to bargain with him to let me work till bout lunch time or at least till i finish my work. promised him i won't drop dead.
So i got off work at bout 11.30 and came home. been relaxing the whole day. so shoik. :) life's good so far. realized i actually dun mind working. haha dunno why. weird i guess. :)

Yeh, going out now to meet matt for dinner. yay. haha haven't dined with him in a while. bedok bend summore. shoik. good food. yay yay.

Apologies to Angel. spent the day making the blog and it turned out like [insert cute emoticon of a pile of dung with a cherry on top]... so sorry bout it. dun have to put it up if you dun want to. trust me. i like the black and white. if not, the skin of the day for Apr 7th is quite nice. :) sorry so much. sorry sorry.

till i next blog people! ciaoz!

Depressing Mail

I'm depressed.

It finally came. in the mail as promised. 21st july 2006. I am so sad. really i am.

Shalom Youths! I Need You!

This troubles me. As i walked into church for YF today, i passed by riverlife and glanced inside. I just love their little, hang out space la. like a patio yet it's like... an open space where it's jus SO nice to hang around, chat, drink coffee in. sigh. for a split second again, i wished so hard Shalom had one of that. that we converted our outdoor carpark into something like that. :S but yeh, not good thots.

YF was alrite. sad attendance. wished we had more but i'm so glad for the core group that comes every week. it's refreshing to see that in the midst of such troubling times, there's still a bunch of strong willed and clear hearted people. they inspire and encourage me.

After YF and dinner, i was back in church waiting for a lift from Auntie Alicia and glanced over to riverlife again. Adrian, Yuan and I then broke out into a discussion as to why at 9pm, there were still youths there, hanging around, going home... basically fellowshippin. We asked ourselves what makes them come, want to come and be so bonded? why aren't our youths that fired up?

Adrian said it's about the open sharing and the sense of belonging. they feel closer and bonded. I said it's coz they have vibrant and emotional worship which leads to them also feeling closer coz they experience more extreme emotional poles together and grow thru encouragement between each other. No one's right... but the fact we all agreed on is that their hearts aren't like ours. ours seem cold, indifferent, routined... worship isn't the winning factor, neither issit the activities.

it's the hearts

what's with the hearts? what makes our youths not have the hearts for God or each other? why aren't our youths reaching out to each other, finding support within the church, finding love and belonging? Why can't i share my dreams with you and you with me?
I wanted to buy a new acoustic guitar soon. to change the idea of worship in people's minds. to bring in more lively [yet spiritually grounded] songs. to liven up the mood so worship is really sumthing of an offerin to God. and not sumthing that starts YF every week. Worship isn't songs... worship is response. and i jus dun feel it now. i look at CF and sumtimes, jus having worship can be good enuf. now why is that? why isn't that the case for church?

Shalom. in charismatic churches, they call this a revival. When they see something's wrong and want to change. i dun like the word so i'll call it an examining of the heart.

If you're a Shalom youth and you're reading this. ask yourself why you come for yf. why you don't. why aren't you feeling loved by the other youths, why aren't you loving each other. why aren't you lookin up to older ones, why aren't you helping younger ones. what is Christianity to you? what is Youth Fellowship to you. How do you want to change, what do you want to change.

This is your chair. pleading. begging you to listen. to hear and to cut your heart open. find the inner most deepest core. find it and set it right before it's too late.

Tell us, tell me. what you want us to do. we're not here to entertain you. but if you feel we're boring, mundane, routined, strict, informal, indifferent, unloving, biased, judgemental, harsh, comformists... tell us. we want to be a loving community. not a loveless community.

i ask you to heed this call. coz it's gonna be gone soon. i'm 20. most of my youth is gone. i look back and i realized how much i missed what my youth was. when i was sec1, 3... i enjoyed it so much [i still do now] but i dun feel you guys do. what made my youth so much more... [make me wanna come to yf] then it is now?

This is your chair. there's so much i can say, the rest is up to you. Please Shalom, love each other. i need you to be there for each other, to be people of God. to be ONE.

Motivation
Obedience
Victory
Intentional
Numbness
Grief

On-going
Never looking back

To move on, you gotta have all those. when you wanna forget someone or something, you gotta have those things i've listed out. the list is not exhaustive. jus the first words that pop into my head when i thot of the corresponding letter.

Life is tough. but you won't appreciate Heaven if life wasn't Hellt. You won't know wad Treasure is if you never tasted Trash. You'll never find joy in Peace if you've never gone thru Pain. And you'll never know wad Love is until you've Lost.

Right? :)

1st Day of Work

::: Edit Added Below :::

OOO.... it's 3rd April! it's 8.15am! haha.. 15 minutes till i start work proper at SIA Training Centre! hehe...

going to work now. :) Prayin that the collegues there are good, the work isn't boring and there's internet to msn and stuff. haha but it's asking alot. :P we'll see how it goes. haha

Yup, wish me all the best and i'll update soon!

::: ADDED IN :::

So i went there and had to sit thru quite a info overload kinda session. Briefing and stuff... info about the company, SIA, the job scope, the people who matter and all that. Then we [there was another temp staff] assigned to a computer and slowly were assigned work. Very very mundane work la. that was like 10.30 and thots of working in church kept filling my mind. i wanted to quit so much there and then. told myself, how can this beat working in church, crapping with august and having msn?!?!? this was like NUTHING!
But then as i complained to my mum, i guess i jus needed to complain la. then after that i was like, ok. resigned to the fact i'll be working here so better look at the silver lining. :)

The work's really quite brain dead. but today was fun. scanned flight data and stuff into the com. this whole load. :) the people working there are ok la. too old to crap with, too different to find common interests.. i mean it's one indian man and one malay lady. :) but they're nice la. :)
Dun really like the other temp though. couldn't click with him at all. He's quite "jiao Ou" in a small way la. i dun think it's his fault, i just get that vibe. He's done with ns and waiting to go London to study Uni, came from CJ. His dad works there that's why he's there and stuff. so i ate alone.
I foresee myself eating alone for the next 3 months. :) it's ok. i'm used to being alone. always am.

Let me split the work into these two
Bad things: No Msn, No youths to crap with, no attractive fellow temp staff to jio. Mundane work
Good things: Cheap Food, Good pay, Easy going collegues, Near my place

yup. that wraps up day one. :) we'll see how day 2 goes.

Though the day looked bleak, i had a nice surprise. Met up with Angel for dinner at city hall area coz she went to smu to pay fees for us. We subway-ed... sumthing i haven't done in a while... The subway girl was cute la! sigh... why didn't i talk to her more? hmm maybe coz Angel was there and coz there was like quite a few of them behind the counter. lolz. but, in Angel's words, "she's cute. but quiet"... yeh... so haha... owells. :)
Yarh, then went gai gai after that to find stuff like photocopy shop, Candy empire, pan pac's lifts, handphones... the list goes on. :)

so glad i could go out today. been wanting to for a while. i blame the last week. packed full of meetings and stuff... sigh. heh this week i'm all free. thank goodness. maybe can breathe. haha...

Nights people. till the next i blog. this is Joel, the SIA employee, signing off!

FO: A Recess to Remember

Today has been an eventful day. good and bad things to blog bout. let's go thru my schedule for today first... planned and actual. :P sounds like accounts, Budget and Actual. lol

Planned:
Wake at 6am
Reach Airport at 7am to send Rachel off
Reach Bedok MRT at 9am for FO
Leave East Coast Park [ECP] at 1
Reach Church at 1.30
Follow Up with Nic till 2
Meet Yong Jie for Worship prac at 2 till 2.30
Have YF Prayer Meeting at 2.30
YF at 3
Leave church at 6

Actual:
Woke at 7. [smsed Debbie to wish rach for me] thereafter fell asleep
Woke at 9. [smsed Mark to tell him i'll go ECP straight]
Reached at 9.45 and ate breakfast while waiting for people.
Left ECP at 1.30 [smsed Nic to push follow up till after YF]
Met Angel at Pasir ris at 2
Reached church at 2.30 and had worship prac
Started Worship proper at 3 and YF
Met Nic for follow up from 6.30 till 8.30 [we talked alot]
Came home.

yup. so it's pretty tiring la i guess. :) Woke up 2wice [heh i like how that looks. 2wice] irritated with myself coz i overslept two important things. and thus i had to cab down to ECP. but it's amazing how God can flip a situation around. Here's why...
I got in the cab and the uncle was real easy going... nice chap and he was talkative in a nice way. very engaging. so he asked me going ecp for wad? so i said going to meet frens. then he said oh yeh, good good. must enjoy life. "ren shen shi yao xiang shou"... yes we conversed in chinese... or well, mine was more of this word is like, Chinglish [Chinese + English] yeh so to cut a long story short [coz i'm tired of typing].... i asked him where he thinks he'll go after dying coz he said life is short.
he told me that we'll go back to the ground coz that's where we came from. challenged him then to think of then wads the purpose... then since he didn't believe in a God that created [from listenin to him i could tell] so i told him...
if there's a painting, there must be a painter... building, builder.... creation, creator.
Then he laughed [he laughs alot. so nice and jolly] and said that that's what people always debate and argue about.. and no one really has an ans... talked to him more bout it and in the end b4 i got out of the cab, i told him "uncle, think about what i said about a building and a builder. creation and creator." :) laughed and waved him goodbye. He was so jolly and happy about it and all. so glad it wasn't offensive or what. Felt so on fire for God after that when i rushed in to tell Nicholas [cf] about it. :P

Yeh... so the FO event was real good. fun and tiring though. i had to take off my shirt for one game though. so pai seh. i shy leh. ahha... thankfully i didn't get any funny comments. :) only i understand what i mean and why. :P haha sorry bout that people. :) my little secret.

kenna tao pok-ed at the end though. haha. but anyways, it was fun. cabbed back to bedok with Sing and Dewi. :P

met Angel and brought her to YF and to cut a long story short... the YF was really really good. felt so inspired and encouraged. then at the end, intro-ed Hsiao Yun to Angel and they hit it off really well coz they both had a similar issue that they struggle with and it was really glad to see how Angel found comfort, inspiration and hope in talkin to Hsiao Yun... it was soooo touching when she told me online jus now how she was so glad she met Hsiao Yun. God is sooo good.

Tiring day. it's ending. Sabbath. so close but after today, i dun feel like i'm that dry anymore. God refreshes me so much. I love Him.

Be Still My Heart Lyrics

Be Still My Heart - Silje Nergaard

My heart is not lonely or broken
It's not of ice or of gold
Nor has my heart ever spoken
To me when a love has grown cold
I felt not the faintest flatter
When you brushed my cheek as you passed
Nor will I willingly clutter
My life with these thing that don't last

[chorus]
Be still my heart
My heart be still
Be still my heart
My heart be still

If our eyes should meet then so be it
No need to trouble the heart
That is hidden where no one can free it
Only to tear it apart

It's times like this where i wonder what God has planned for me, what He has that's so much better, what i can't think of that He already knew when He spoke to Adam. He knew me, He knows me, He will keep knowing me.
I need the weekend. And i need it now. My mind's too messed up to carry on without Him. My thots are distracted and my desires are wrong. Temptation to slip and slide is a bit overwhelming. Thank God i don't really have a choice, lest i be tempted worst. But on the other hand, a choice wouldn't be all that bad. tee hee. Sunday's almost within reach. I feel, breathe and hear the Sabbath. thank goodness it's close. I dunno what i'd do if i weren't a Christian. Religion to me is everything my life revolves and should revolve around.

FO Comm Presents! Heh, my small gift to the FO Comm. :) Glad they liked it... i put it on a normal kinda photo card thing like a R4 card thing. Then i wrote a note for each on the back. :) Yeh anyways, the 2nd picture is another version but i preferred the black and white version coz it's nicer. :) Thank You FO Comm.

Naruto Jigsaw

It is complete. It is Finally Complete!!! mwhahaha!

I have been working on this for like wad 2 weeks? everyday jus do a bit here and there here and there. haha finally, it is finished. haha sounds like Jesus' words on the cross... but no la. it's nuthing compared to Him dying for us on the cross. :)
Here it is!

One with the frame... can't wait to properly frame it up and hang it on the wall. :) I'll snap another pic of it when i get it up. :)



Yup, cool or cool? :) 1000 pieces, $2.90. Yes Leona, i know you'll kill me. but trust me, it was a faith buy coz the sign said, "$2.90. May contain missing pieces"... like what the.... missing piec... wad the... hahaha... so i jus bought it hoping nuthing's missing and while i did it i was like. pls pls pls. HAHAHA.. but thankfully everything's there otherwise the whole jigsaw would have been ruined and worthless. :)

Phew. looking back ah, it was REALLY tough can. 1000 pieces is MADNESS when every piece is like goodness. nvm. hahaha. jus know it was a tough tough job. :) wanna thank a few people [haha so oscars]
August for pei-ing me to buy it.
Mum and Sab for helping out fix it when i groaned.
Sab for taking the photo since.. since.. since i lost my baby [camera phone]
Jigsaw uncle for selling me all 1000 pieces [though i dun forgive you for that rotting frame!]

yay yay! haha... ok i am a happy man. :)It's HUGE man! haha so big! yay
this jigsaw was bought on the 15th of Mar and completed on the 27th of March 2006. 12days.

Devotion - This is what's devotion. I haven't been able to stop thinking or praying about Youth Sunday since i woke. Spent some time praying last nite and though you dun really hear HIM speaking auidably, I feel so much better knowing He hears me, that He lives and that He's God of gods, Lord of lords. There is none Higher, none Worthier, none Greater than the Lord God. And I speak directly to Him.

Youth sunday is happening in 2 hours. Time is 7am right now. All ready in front of my computer. Woke at 6.30am today... it was funny, my body and mind jus woke up by itself. Went to my phone and switched off the alarm the moment it came on... it was like i preceeded the alarm. :) Thank God.

Pray that everything goes smoothly, people point the congregation to God and that I will be a humble, worthy servant of the Most High. Exalted and Holy, He reigns and rules. May this small sunday service be an offering fit for King, delivered by a Servant. May you be Glorified Lord!

Bye z800i

Yup, this is the last nite i'll be using my Sony Ericsson z800i. :) i'll surely miss it greatly... with the snap flap. sigh. love you loads z800i, this blog was created coz of you.... owells, i guess we knew this day would come. :S doesn't make it any easier to say goodbye. guess i won't be snapping youth sunday stuff wif this phone anymore. Gotta return it to school today. sniff

I'll miss you. Have fun making the next owner's life a miserable one. :) i've made sure your keypad is only functioning if you have hard nails or strong fingers. :) yay. haha...

Goodbye.

Mummy's Eye Operation

Hey, today has been an eventful day... woke up late for Music Camp and ended up getting a lift to church. yay! ahah but anyways... nearing the end of the camp, i received comfirmed news that my mum had to have surgery today...

K, this is the background *insert smokey smoke here as we flashback*
3 plus days ago, my mum complained to me about her vision. she said that at the bottom right corner of her left eye, there was this patch that hinders her vision. At fist it was only when she changed focus from near objects to far.. but as the days went by, she said that it was getting constantly in the "way"... so we did some research and the stuff on the net said to get help immediately... to get it consulted wif a Eye Specialist la... so my nagging finally paid off and she decided to see an Eye Doctor today...

Apparently, it was quite bad... almost
*if you do not wish to hear details about my mum's eye, please move on to the next paragraph. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.*
almost half of her retina was torn or well, displaced la.. coz the whole thing is called Displace Retina... and so they had to patch it back and all. :S Yeh, so they managed to and the op was a success...

The thankful thing was that the Doc said that they might have to pump gas into the eye and the gas had to be kept upright or sumthing like that, that means she had to lie face flat for the whole day... wah.. that's nuts la.. can you imagine?!?! goodness. thankfully there wasn't a need to and she can be in any posture now.

Yup. so overall, it was a very successful op... the nurses and docs were very helpful and kind.. a nurse called home jus now to check on my mum... Nurse Aw!!! i shall make special mention to her coz she was so helpful in the hospital and even followed up on my mum.. whether it's part of her job or not, the thing is that she did. and that's all that matters... so touching...

yeh, here are some photos of today. :) Went to National Eye Centre... SNEC... :) And that's Pirate Mummy... you know how they always say One-Eyed-Jack... well, she's One-Eyed-Jen. :) hahaha

thanks to all who prayed, listened and thought of my mum today. In no special Order...
August, Nicholas, Joash, Linda Lee, Patrick Ang, Jacq Goh, Jodi, Debbie, Angel, Yan Sing, Ian

Thank you so much... it means alot to me that you people cared.. cared beyond words. :)

Paris Wallpaper

First attempt at actually making a proper wallpaper with photoshop CS... got some REAL cool brushes and i can't wait to work on them. sadly i just got a new blog skin!!!! so i dunno. haha might make one for someone soon. haha... see how la. :) can't wait to do a proper one with this brush i got... it's AWFULLY COOL LA. okok. anyways... tried another brush and made this wallpaper.. it's really nuthing, jus click here and there. okok, look at it this way, i took like 5-10 minutes making this... maybe less if you dun count the times i was distracted msn-ing.. so really, it's not gotten any much attention or tweaking. jus click click click save. hahah. yeh, enjoy... i will SURELY be making more wallpapers, blog skins and what nots since i'm gonna be taking it upon myself to learn photoshop. :)

Go ahead, click it. i know you wanna.

Wallpaper 2... this one i did in about 10 minutes too... likewise, jus testing my new hobby... photoshop. haha i'm STILL SUPER noob... so please, let me take these few steps to trip, fall and then one day i'll bloom. :) Paris Wallpaper. :) Enjoy.

Day Before FO Event

So yesterday was supposed to be a relaxing day. nuthing on till 7pm Esplanade for Jazzology... but then, August said he's doing the script with Eunice in church at 3... and persuading somehow became me going to meet august for lunch at like 1pm at Tampines. hahaha.. we ate at and had fish and chips which was HUGE LA... goodness... let me try to describe it to you... think of a normal slice of fish... take that, times 3 coz there were 3 slices... and then add on a coleslaw at the side, half the plate was Potato Salad [which was wonderous.. so nice]... and then on the side, how can you eat at BB without COOKIES AND CREAM MILKSHAKE!!! gosh... it was heaven on earth!
The waiter was so nice coz we were outside deciding whether we should eat there.. then there was a 1 for 1 offer.. but you gotta have the voucher la. then we were like.. umm dun want la.. i think never mind la... we were talkin to ourselves and all la.. then the waiter was like, "ok la, tell you what, i get you the voucher la. but dun tell anyone"... and were like. REALLY? wow!!! so we went in. haha and he was a nice chap la... quite kind and all. :) although we were jokin that after our meal, we'll go to pay and then he'll go like... "huh? what voucher? no... i didn't say anything." and act blur.. then we'll cry. hahaha... coz it would have been EXPENSIVE. :) but no la.
After we stuffed [literally] the food down our mouths, we didn't wanna move and i felt quite sick for a bit of the day.. but nvm. it was WONDERFUL... thanks a million August. really appreciate it. :)

After that, we went to jalan jalan the pasar malam... spontaneous spending took over me coz my mind kept saying wads $10 when my pay's coming on friday? which is tml!!! whee!!! haha anyways.... bought a jigsaw and a frame for it... i won't tell ya what it is till i finish it.. but i can't wait. it's in the office now coz it was too big to bring home. [WHEE! GET THE HINT? TOO BIG!] hahaha... yeh but i'm highly glad... hope to finish it by next week if i have time to. think i'll chiong it on monday. so no one ask me out! haha yeh, then will frame it and put it on my wall or sumthing. haha. we'll see. yay yay...

Went to church after that and had meeting wif Eunice and August regarding the musical script. ahha it was quite a fun meeting, as always, and we discussed quite a lot... cut here, added there... drew stupid pictures here... joked and laughed there.... :) took a pic of the meeting... it's jus a stylish pic of the script and stuff on the table... sorry, it's as stylish as a z800i camera phone can get. haha dun complain. :)

Before the meeting though, august and i snapped some pics... here's the rings i have been wearing for like so long now. :) i'd give ya a close up... but i'm lazy to crop, upload and talk bout them. :) but yeh... skinny fingers. :) oh oh.. points to the top right... if you haven't realized liao, i've changed my profile pic. hehe... love that shot la. it was sumthing we wanted to do for a while... take a real sharp focus on the zen and me in the background. :) you can't see the full power of that shot coz it had to be resized, cropped and compressed to upload it onto the template.. otherwise you'll have this HUGE pic there. haha and i dun like to link my pictures.. lest people steal it or sumthing. haha i'm jus weird. :) but yeh.


Yeh so after that, went to esplanade to meet Shawn, Mayfern and Meliza. Meliza was late again and this time her phone was dead so mayfern and i jus sat there like dumb dumb hoping to see her... went for the first performance and it was disappointingly sad... some indian guy playing on some indie musical instrument. totally not jazz. ahha so we left half way to eat dinner. we took too long for dinner so we decided not to go back. :S... so yeh, missed Jazzology and i'd say it was a wasted trip to the Esplanade.. but nvm. better than staying home. :)
We ate at Marina Foodloft... i skipped dinner coz of the lunch and so the 3 of them jus ate while i jus watched. haha.. spastik. :) played around with Shawn's Digi SLR... taking night shots and all. :)


Yeh, thus wraps up the day... can't wait for today. it's FO Event number 1!!! our FO event. yay... smell it, find it, eat it... :) hope it all works out and that everything goes according to plan... praying hard that freshies, CFers and everyone else comes... that no one will get injured, the weather will be pleasing and that everything will run according to schedule. :)

oh, it was also Angel's first day of work. haha seems to be an ok job.
Hope it continues nicely for ya yeh gel, :) work hard and dun slack too much coz yesterday seemed quite slack-y hor. haha... meet up for lunch when i'm free la... miss novena. so far -_-; haha jus kidding. yeh. next week. :) see me so nice, even spend my sleeping time making you a new blog... haha...

sigh. going to go write my resume now for this SIA job uncle Kah Kheng offered me. :) it's seriously not bad. pay wise dunno la. but should be ok. location and reputation is the best la. haha cioaz peeps! [i just love this skin]

"Don't Love You No More (I'm Sorry)" Craig David

Jus thot i'd share this with you. one of the songs i love. :) lyrics are below. Enjoy

"Don't Love You No More (I'm Sorry)"

[VERSE 1]
For all the years that I've known you baby
I can't figure out the reason why lately you've been acting so cold
(didn't you say)
If there's a problem we should work it out
So why you giving me the cold shoulder now
Like you don't even wanna talk to me girl
(tell me)
Ok I know I was late again
I made you mad and dinners thrown in (the bin)
But why are you making this thing drag on so long
(I wanna know)
I'm sick and tired of this silly game
(silly games)
Don't think that I'm the only one here to blame
It's not me here who's been going round slamming doors
That's when you turned and said to me
I don't care babe who's right or wrong
I just don't love you no more.

[CHORUS]
Rain outside my window pouring down
What now, your gone, my fault, I'm sorry
Feeling like a fool cause I let you down
Now it's, too late, to turn it around
I'm sorry for the tears I made you cry
I guess this time it really is goodbye
You made it clear when you said
I just don't love you no more

[VERSE 2]
I know that I made a few mistakes
But never thought that things would turn out this way
Cause I'm missing something now that your gone
(I see it all so clearly)
Me at the door with you in a state
(in a state)
Giving my reasons but as you look away
I can see a tear roll down your face
That's when you turned and said to me
I don't care babe who's right or wrong
I just don't love you no more.

[CHORUS]

[BRIDGE]
Don't say those words it's so hard
They turn my whole world upside down
Girl you caught me completely off guard
On the night you said to me
I just don't love you more.

[CHORUS 2X]

Jazzmatazz

Last nite i went with Meliza to the Esplanade for the Jazz Festival... Mosiac Festival


When i met her though, she made me wait like super long la. i was sitting at the steps for like an hour and a half can! goodness. haha but she had work to do la so i kinda excuse her. HAHA... :) So then we headed to esplanade to see if the stuff were still on. thank goodness there was still one at 9pm...

It was really cool la... it's the kinda jazz you hear at a longue or inside an elevator... jus take that and times it 10 times for the class factor.. and wow.. you get super classy or well, clazzy jazz. shoik... 3 guys... one jazz guitar, one pianist and one cello... it was super cool la. how they played and jus made the tune sound so nice... wahhhh made me wanna come back everyday if there was jazz everyday... anyways, here's a pic. it was at the concourse.. the open area inside that's normally for art exhibits...


Yeh overall it was really nice and i'm dying to go back. so i've already planned to go back on sunday till wed... ahha see if my week's plans allow for it la. so nice can. aiyoh. hahah jazz rocks.

Necessary Jewellery or Impulsive Spending?

My Accessories as of 9th March 2006

Work's tiring. tiring me out. real bad. :)

Here's two pics i took of myself on the first day of work.


That's me looking so sad at the start of the day. had to carry heavy heavy stuff... pengz... lifting my silly shirt to show the singtel logo. :)


This is what i have to carry around. it was SO heavy... 2200 flyers and 68 posters... oh gosh.

Memories to be forgotten

Some memories are to be forgotten, some aren't. Now which is this? :) I thank God for every moment though, I grew so much.

I was bored so i decided to try out this idea of mine. i think it turned out quite nicely. so from now on, expect pictures i upload to look sumthing like this. :) It's jus a rough jpg i threw together la. haha... Apologies for using the same pictures again, jus picked a few that had some relevance and made a nice kinda look. :) i love it to bits. haha

The Wedding of the DECADE!

Kenneth's getting married. It's finally here. 4th March 2006. The date we have all been waiting for. His wonderfully beautiful and wonderful bride is Hsiao Yun... or well, April Chan Hsiao Yun... soon to be Mrs Tan... wowz... i'm so excited. What i'll be doing for this wedding is basically i'll be singing in a group of 8 for backup... like praise team... jus that we're on stage like, the whole time. haha... scary stuff. and we'll be facing the audience summore lor! haha.. but i thank God and Kenneth for giving me such a big role in a wedding, sumthing i truly dun deserve....
but seriously. wowz. i can't wait la... It's kenneth! the person i like, look up to and one day wanna be like... you know, that sorta role model thing that just gives you the inspiration and courage to follow after. that kinda thing. :) Kenneth's that to me. :)
Marriage is a fitting beginning to a wonderful covenant life together and i'm so glad to see Kenneth stepping into that next stage.
May the Lord bless both of you and may u shine as a couple just as you have shined individually. :) My wishes to both of you [though you won't ever see this prob]... but yeh, i'm real glad for you guys.

So yesterday was a long long day. City hall, Suntec, Marina Square and Millenia Walk. It basically was many permutations of going to all of those yesterday. Walk and walk and walk. haha Met up with Angel [she's gonna kill me for putting a pic of her sleeping like this. she'll say it's super unglam. :P]

at 1pm coz i needed to do my game for the FO event. I shant tell ya what the game is coz there might be people who might be going to the event and i won't wanna spoil the game for them. but yeh... did what i needed to do then we walked to suntec to look at Taka Jewellery... yup, again... haha and i purchased ANOTHER ring. that makes it my 9th dollar spent there... haha yeh, sorry, no pic again but this ring is nice.. ahah

So we headed to millenia walk but Angel stopped by Osmose to get a top for formal wear... wow. it was cheap la. i was quite shocked at the price. haha... good buy i say. :) it was quite nice too...

ANYHOO... walked to millenia walk after that... went to this shop called Candy Empire coz Angel was dyin for chocs.... went there and there was this HUGE pick 'n' mix... biggest i've EVER seen... goodness... and it was double sided.. so imagine that!!! wait, you dun have to... i have a pic. hahhaa

Yup. that's the pick and mix station. huge rite? scary. haha and imagine it's double sided... so wow... think bout the amount of candy you can get jus walkin one round! haha... it was very expensive though... 100g for $3.80... scary... and Angel HAD to buy some... i won't tell you how much she spent in the end.. but i was appalled... hahaha... yes yes me dear girl i won't embarass you by telling EVERYONE how much you spent... well, here's a pic of it... if anyone can like mentally weigh it... you'll have an answer. :P

it looks very little... hmmm haha okok. i haven't brought my point across. it looks very little but it didn't weigh little. HAHA.. :P okok i'll stop alrite? :P

Yeh so after we got our chocolate stash... we originally wanted to go for coffee... but i banned her from spending money on anything else other than dinner... so we ended up in Carls Jr coz we both needed a drink and Carls has FREE REFILL!!! *everyone shakes head in shame and says what a cheapo* yes i know. hahah but it's $2.20 for like... drink after drink. :)

So there, we started getting silly and dumb and started eating chocs [well she did] and started taking pics.. here are some of the dumbness pic we took. haha. i like that word... dumbness.


looks like an Angel hor? haha.




Yeh so later on we met up with Yan Sing and Leona for dinner. :) it was an interesting dinner. I personally was quite quiet... [wow.. joel quiet? no way!] for personal reasons... and also coz i was observing the company i kept... i guess i'd say i was putting the book i'm reading into practice. seeing and observin for myself... haha if you want to know wad i'm reading, click PROFILE and look for i read. HAHA... [lame advertisment]

Yeh but it was great la... i was so glad i was fine. Later we walked a bit, looked at some jigsaw puzzle and left... took a bus coz i had extra time to get home and it was great la.. seeing some frens askin me how i was and all... made me feel like they cared and i know they did. yay. love me frens.... But yeh, thanks for asking. i'm fine. like i explained.. i finally have control of my life... not affected by external factors anymore. mwahha. :) so yeh, i'm finally movin where i wanna go.

So thanks to Angel for the wonderful company yesterday and for all the rest of the people who messaged me yesterday or sumhow played a role in yesterday... thanks.... since i'm the kind of person who always does this, i'll mention by names. :)
Thanks Meliza for messaging and not taking my first "i'm fine" as the final ans. :) means a lot that you're actually making me act like a big bro to you... feels nice. and yeh, i remember what you said last time. :)
Rachel. for support and advice that made it much easier to see the 2 sides and choose one. :) valued above so many things in my life, i treasure your guidance.
Yeh, thanks to all. thank you.

I bought a new ring! haha. it was super impulse buy.. but like i keep saying, at $3... what kinda impulse is that?

Was at Suntec with my fren meliza today. Then we walked past Taka Jewellery and I mentioned that that was the first taka i tried and it sold out. then when we walked closer, the sign still said it had the ring. so i decided to jus ask and apparently they had this tray of new ones... half gone though. So we tried a few and i bought one after being coaxed by Meliza to buy a new one. She didn't have to try too hard, after she chose one, i was dead set on getting one too since i was there. Bought a nice white one to compliment my black ring on my left hand. When i have a camera that can take close photos, i'll take a pic and show ya. :) so it's one ring on each hand now. love them both to bits... though i like the newer one coz it's bigger so not such a painful task to take off. haha...

I was so happy after buying it can. the wonderous effect $3 can bring to my mood. goodness. i am simple. HAHA... yup.

Will prob go look at them tml again with Angel... Sis complained "HOW COME NEVER BUY FOR ME!" So yeh, will use that as an excuse to maybe purchase 1 more. GOODNESS! someone stop me! i'll end up buying like 10... i was thinking... 10 fingers... $30 only. HAHAHAHA... but i'm not that spastik. i'll only wear 2 at one time. more than that jus makes you look quite... ah beng or tai tai. neither of which i'm trying to portray. :)

this is joel's pathetic but effective retail therapy... i'm SO glad i dun have money to spend.. otherwise my retail therapy could be much worse... zara jackets... levis jeans? g2000 shirts... topman cargo pants...
right now, i'll settle for the THRILL and HYPE $3 rings can bring me. it's more than i'll ask for. Simple guy, Simple retail therapy! haha

"I Cry" by Westlife
[Pop me if you want the song]

You said goodbye
I fell apart
I fell from all we had
To I never knew
I needed you so bad

You need to let things go
I know, you told me so
I've been through hell
To break the spell

Why did I ever let you slip away
Can't stand another day without you
Without the feeling
I once knew

[Chorus]
I cry silently
I cry inside of me
I cry hopelessly
Cause I know I'll never breathe your love again
I cry
Cause you're not here with me
I cry
Cause I'm lonely as can be
I cry hopelessly
Cause I know I'll never breathe your love again

If you could see me now
You would know just how
How hard I try
Not to wonder why

I wish I could believe in something new
Oh please somebody tell me it's not true (oh girl)
I'll never be over you

Why did I ever let you slip away
Can't stand another day without you
Without the feeling
I once knew

*Chorus

If I could have you back tomorrow
If I could lose the pain and sorrow
I would do just anything
To make you see
You still love me

*Chorus

Reading old chat logs isn't good for the mental, emotional and spiritual soul. why do i even keep them? haha... maybe coz some parts of them make me smile. I have no idea. The idea and the thought of moving on is so easy to type or say but hard to do. Found this pic off the internet. thot it was a real nice pic... would love to take a pic like that myself. but i'd have to find 2 willing parties and a nice camera. haha.. so for now, i'll jus take it off the net. But i love it. and it represents what i'm feeling right now. :) dun ask... jus let me blog bout it.
p.s. i'm FINE so dun tag my blog or sms me asking me how i'm feeling now. SERIOUSLY... i'm fine. jus didn't wanna lose this moment so i'll blog about it. :) so 5 years later when i read this again i'll remember i sat at home one tuesday afternoon with nuthing to do but wait for time to pass. And i ended up reading chat logs and got into a stupid state of sadness that allowed my lil devil a chance to breathe fresh air. :) Thank God that He came and subdued the devil and took control once again. :) God's good.

Sorry i haven't been blogging for a while.

Nuthing much to blog about, but i'll be blogging soon la. i hope. :P haha... but yeh, jus blogging now to let ya guys know i'm not dead or what... umm yeh. :P

Latest updates in my life... been hunting for a job. so if anyone knows some auntie or uncle that needs someone to maybe do a power point presentation or a website for them, let me know and we can work out the payment. :) wouldn't mind free-lance jobs like that. thankies. hahaha... will blog more after my shower.

I'm going to Hollywood!!! Haha.. gee
go ahead, click it. :P

So i made it for the auditions if you can see in the picture above. :) no big surprise actually.. i talk to August quite a bit and all plus the fact that they desperately need guys for the chorus line and lead roles and all that jazz... lolz. so yay yay. nonetheless, it was still quite special receiving my first successful audition letter. haha. so corney, he ACTUALLY did it on yellow paper... gosh. haha should have helped him design it la. so... plain... in Simon Cowell's words, "insipid". :) but nice la. haha

Anyways, that's not really why i'm blogging la... Went to sleep last nite praying real hard that God would heal me so i could go to church today. When i woke, still felt a bit unwell but i made myself go to church la. i really needed to go down. This week has had it's Super highs [Vday] and it's super lows [depression set in midweek]. Yeh so i was quite low thruout the week due to some issues and all... sick and all mahz. :P Yeh, so really needed the spiritual re-charging and i had already missed YF on sat... so managed to go church and it was quite an experience i had never had that intense b4... really felt like i was close to God today.
The worship was wowz... hard to describe but as i sang the second song, couldn't help it. started tearing and really thanked God there and then for how wonderful it felt like to be in church. to be standing amidst other brethren singing to God. the sound of a corporate worship session was jus WONDERFUL. And when the ladies sang alone, they sounded angelic... my mind really imagined what a JOYFUL time it'll be in the heavens when the angelic choir and the rest of His people raise their praises in one voice.
Thankfully managed to wipe them tears away and re-compose myself b4 anyone started noticing and asking silly questions i'd hate to reply to. ahha... but it was really wowz. :) I was wondering to myself how sumtimes we jus take church for granted. expected to be there everyweek... now wad if you were bed-ridden and never able to go to church? or if your parents objected to your faith [like my fren's situation is]... now how much would church mean to you, compared to those 2 situations?

I thank God that He gave me a chance to really treasure church above anything i felt that week. It's like my weekly date with God and His people. And i wouldn't trade sunday service for ANYTHING.... well, almost anything. coz i'd trade that for Heaven. HAHA.

Took this picture recently.. i think yesterday. it was an ad in the papers and i thot the kid looked SO cute la... goodness. fatty fatty one. hahah and then the nose red red. awww.. hahaha..


On to more important things... my current interest is RINGS! hahaha You Rong's mum apparently bought this ring from Taka Jewellery for like $3... so she bought it for everyone in the family. super funny la when he was telling me... whole family all wearing the ring. LOLZ... anyways... the ring is below... the $3 ring... the last picture in this entry... however, it isn't that design. ahaha
Yeh so this is MY ring... owned it for a while now. 2 years i suppose.. can't remember. :) it's engraved inside wif a bible verse... nice nice. love it... but i want another one i think... dunno. ahha dun normally wear it.. only wear the necklace... coz wear the ring a bit funny.


Close up of the ring. sorry it's blur... but jus showing the thickness of it and all la... it's very nice plain and simple.. i think i bought it for $10... should be. haha from Century Square. :)


Yeh, this is the promo they have now... i was going to go buy it or at least take a look at it today before YF.. but i fell super ill last nite. high fever and all so i had to stay home today and rest. so ARGH coz i missed Yf. and i'll be VERY miserable if i have to miss church tml... pls God, i want to go to church pls plspls....

Anyhowz, what do you guys think of the ring? haha... i will have to see it in person to see whether i wanna buy it... but it's quite a steal. :)

Wanna share a song with anyone out there reading. Enjoy. The song is really nice.

---

Silje Nergaard - I Don't Want To See You Cry

There is no tender way to say it's the end
And so win or lose
I am forced to choose
Between a lover and a loving friend
Let me hear you say
How you curse the day
You opened up your heart to me
That you ever invited me in
Tell me I'm the loser and you win

I don't want to see you cry
I beg you try
Not to let the pain I'm causing reach your eyes
I don't want to see you cry
Aim your words like spears
Don't break me up by breaking down in tears

Hide your pain but when push comes to shove
Don't keep your pride
Locked deep inside
Rage against the dying of my love
Don't sigh my name
Give me all the blame
Call me heartless call me cruel
And accuse me of dealing in lies
Just don't let my leaving cloud your eyes

I don't want to see you cry
I beg you try
Not to let the pain I'm causing reach your eyes
I don't want to see you cry
Aim your words like spears
Don't break me up by breaking down in tears

Dreams come... dreams go
Some fade... some grow
Dream on, dream on
You've got no dream on
After I've gone

---

Ask me for the song if you want. It's... painful. But I had to blog about it. Goodness. Silje is singing to me. When someone won't, Silje will. I was so shocked to read the lyrics. might as well have put "inspired by Joel Tan" at the top and I wouldn't have been surprised.
Funny how sumtimes songs seem to sing EXACTLY the situation you're going thru. funny huh? Well, i'm not really laughing. Thanks Silje.

Today i met up with Sing for her to study and me to kill time. I managed to do 2 weeks of my CE Class homework. YAY. more like we both needed the company, so yeh, met her at 3plus coz i was late... thot she'd let me buy coffee coz i was late but my plan was foiled and it only made me look like i was late. argh. haha next time i'm jus gonna not look for a reason or fake one out and jus pay. hahaha anyways, here are the photos!

Me on the train. yes i got bored. Was watching the first bits of Miss Congeniality 2 on my Zen Vision and just took out my phone, snapped this pic and continued watching. dun ask why i snapped it, jus spur of the moment, no pose no look jus snap kinda pics. haha [Apologies for the dao look. didn't wanna smile for this candid shot]

Yeh so met up wif Yan Sing and she was studying already.. can you see the cup at the bottom left corner of this pic? that's hers. purposely bought a big cup before i came so
1. I can't pay
2. I can't buy her a second cup.
Wargh. haha but anyways, she was studying hard.. really hard memorizing and glancing thru her lecture notes. how do i know she was studying really hard? coz... *points to next pic*

Need I even put any words for this pic? :) grinz. and i know i'm gonna get whacked for this.. but took it while she was taking her break nap. :) poor dear... was so tired she had to nap for a while... a while... TWENTY MINUTES. hahaha. Sigh, i'm SO gonna die for saying that.

Took this pic coz it was so cool. :) did ya know this starbucks at Novena has board games?!?!? didn't know and Sing needed a break. dun look at me, she needed another break alrite? aha so she challenged me to Dumb.. or well, more widely known and Checkers... so played wif her la. shant tell you the score... let's jus say i'll get whacked REAL bad. grinz. it was fun la... playing wif her and her mind. AHHA. anyways, nice shot rite? :)

Then Chin Fang and Angel came at 4... and they bought their drinks and got Snacks and Ladders and went to play that. haha i joined their second game and let's jus say... today was a good day for me at board games. haha Angel lost. MWHAHAHA. yay! now i'm gonna get whacked by 2 people. lol. worth it la. haha

Yeh, then later on Xin Ying, another fren, came by and Angel and her took this pic. ahha quite funny... supposed to send it to her tonite but she's not online... hmmmz. hahaha


After that we all went to subway to eat.. yummy and headed home. haha quite a fun day. much better than staying at home all day. yay! hahaha