A gathering and a thought

Over the weekend, I met my JC classmates for a last supper of sorts for Rachel who's flying off to study in Cornell.

I think the word I always used to describe our class (with all tenderness) was dysfunctional. We were definitely a weird combination, with people taking weird subject combinations. I realised that as much as I had 2 years with this bunch, I probably haven't gotten to know everyone very personally.

It struck me that just maybe, I had placed too much of an importance on my studies back then (although I do not regret studying ultra hard for my A levels), and neglected/undermined the importance of relationships with the people around me. Meeting my classmates again after a year or so made me realise that I really like my class and dysfunctional as we were they're a really fun bunch :) so after meeting them again, there was a feeling like... being given a second chance to get to know these people better; and I think it's nice that after all this time we still met up :)

On my part, I think I'm starting to appreciate school as a place that forces you to build relationships with people around you. I keep telling myself that uni is the last chance for me to experience any school-like experiences, so... as much as I can I'll try to participate more and create more memories for keeping. 

-

On a less thoughtful note, 

when Paul and Yamani saw me, they asked me whether I did plastic surgery. I guess that just shows how long it's been since we last met. I told them it's called make up (along with a -_-). But I honestly think I haven't changed much. I think after JC when girls (or boys?) have time to worry about their looks and groom themselves and wear clothes other than school uniforms, they'd obviously look better than they did before. Okay, this sounds quite stupid but I guess it needs to be said. 

Also, my thoughts are flying elsewhere now, but once in awhile I like to facebook stalk myself and look at old pictures of me- sometimes for fun and sometimes when I'm deciding what fringe I should cut, mostly the latter (do you do that too?)- and EVERY SINGLE TIME I cringe and ask myself "WHAT WERE YOU THINKING" with that

- hairstyle

- terrible piece of clothing

and also "wow, look at that puberty" because

- jawline growth

- decreased fats on the face/puffiness

- obvious acne 

but my goodness. I guess 10 years from now I'll be looking at myself thinking the same thing. better give my future self something better to look at. 

I really should exercise more. 

and TAKE MORE PHOTOS. I'm becoming like some aunty. growing old already, must document my youth. 

Here are some baby photos of myself: 

I think I was really smiley. I'd like a baby like me. hahahahaha.

Addictive

I think my hair's growing too fast for my liking and I keep thinking about cutting it more. and more. and more. like yesterday I was on nastygal.com and I noticed this model had hair that was cropped shorter and it looked quite nice... and I suppose it would last longer before I would have to chop it again, because my hair now is fast approaching normal long-length I think and I do not like it I really like short hair now. :(

I think part of it is testing the limits of.. my face? hahaha. I expect at some point I'll be like :O what have I done and then swear all over again never to chop my hair that short ever again. but.. right now that girl (up there)'s hair is super chic. and I WANT IT. 

Stargazing

Sometime earlier this week, I think I was kinda free so I went around googling for interesting things to do in Singapore and chanced upon the free Stargazing sessions at The Science Centre Observatory.

I was really keen but honestly a little doubtful about what could be seen from Singapore's bright lit skies. So I went on Friday and I learnt that night- DO NOT UNDERESTIMATE THE POWER OF A POWERFUL TELESCOPE.

Their main telescope looked like this:

Like literally, this is the exact model. I went to google search it and all. and it came with the dome thingie too. ok let me be more scientific about it, it was a 40-cm Cassegrain reflector of combined focal length 520-cm (I copied that from the science centre website).

The only thing that wasn't too great was that you have to queue up to view whatever they're showing, since there's only one main telescope and shifting it takes awhile (since it's so huge). That friday night we got to see the moon and saturn. IT WAS DAMN COOL. 

because, the moon and saturn look exactly the same as the images we see in movies and on tv and on images. like this:

I know it looks fake, like a lousy CGI or 3D image a beginner generated in his first lesson. but... it really looks like that. and for a moment if they hadn't told me that that little shiny thing in the sky I thought was a star was the exact planet Saturn I was looking at in the telescope, I would've thought I was looking at a digital image and not a live.... view of Saturn. (ok la, I'm just making a point. but really it was damn cool, and I'm not that dense I would have believed it) I think for half a moment I would have expected the planet to move... but I suppose planets don't move so fast do they. no they don't... 

anyway, I got to see titan too! which is saturn's largest moon. it was so bright~~~ 

but it wasn't really the best time to go stargazing that night (and I kinda suspected it but because it was free and jw&I were free we just went down anyway) because it was really cloudy- it had rained in the day time and the skies weren't the clearest. so as a result saturn looked really much tinier in the telescope because zooming in too closely would distort the image.

the moon was as crater filled as it looks in images hahaha but we've seen the moon too often so I won't put pictures up here. I don't really have images of my own because it never really struck me to take photos... yeah. hahaha. and it was dark. 

and they had a beautiful map of the constellations hanging on the wall of the queuing area, it was circular and divided all the constellations into the different times of the year/when they're in view :) which gives us our star signs! 

I also found out from the star map they gave out that a lot of characters' names in fiction are named after constellations or stars hahaha. 

Sirius and Regulus are names of stars~ and those are of course names of the Harry Potter characters Sirius and Regulus Black. Castor and Pollux are also names of 'twin' stars that form Gemini... (I did a quick google), but the names are so familiar because they're also characters in the hunger games hehehe. 

but most of the star names are super fanciful and I'd sound stupid shouting at my kid so I don't think I'll name my kid after a star. 

but I wouldn't say it was impossible for me to dress my kid up as a star- literally.

Ultimately, the most interesting I learnt was from one of the volunteers from TASOS (the astronomical society of singapore), who was manning the telescopes. He's a middle aged sorta guy with an interest in star/astronomy photography and he showed us these AMAZING photographs of nebulas, star clusters, galaxies and constellations which he took himself. They were like this quality, no joke:

this is the Orion Nebula, apparently it's super easy to get an image of this beauty from Singapore :O

Anyway, the super funny/inspiring thing I realised was that, while this guy could take all these crazy images and explain the constellations and astronomical jargon to us, he wasn't all that tech-savvy and even had problems (like normal aunties and uncles) navigating their phones hahaha. Which led me to realise how amazingly passionate he was, I think if our stomachs weren't growling and we needed to go, he could have gone on allll night about how to start in an interest in Astronomy. Apparently, he was always interested in the stars and he began his journey in seeking the stars and learning about them around the 1980s. and even now TASOS (and him and his group of friends) take trips around the world to view different astronomical events like 20s solar eclipses (which aren't always successes) and meteor showers and the aurora and all that. 

It's so amazingggg.

but I think actual astronomy-enthusiasts would laugh and my childish attempts to describe what I learnt that night. and I guess they're right to do so because in my brain a lot of what I'm thinking is.... IT'S ALL SO PRETTY. 

In other news, I also watched the France vs Germany match that night. and it's getting so little mention in my blog because it sucked. the game was totally rigged. 

My Day Out

It was a really shitty start to the day.

but then I decided that being down in the dumps all day was no good and really, I should be doing something about my mood. and while I've never been good at math, I remembered something Nut told me which is that the most difficult math is the kind that enables us to count our blessings (upon googling this is actually a quote by Eric Hoffer, but Nut is my Eric Hoffer today). So I went out to try and cheer myself up!

And I think God really wanted to cheer me up too because it was a really good day. I took the bus out so I could take my time to read on the bus to town and calm down. The weather was super hot but I guess it was better than a dreary day.. 

I went to kinokuniya to see whether there were new titles to check out and at one point I saw many Happiness related books which really spoke to me~ 

at one point this middle-aged man approached me to ask for $3 because he didn't have enough money to pay for a $5 cookbook that he wanted to get his wife. I felt pretty bad for him because he really didn't look very well off at all, and on hindsight I'm somewhat upset at myself for not giving him more? But in the moment I didn't think much and so I only gave him that $3 and spoke to him for a bit. He seemed really touched at the gesture but on my part, I was touched by how he wanted to encourage his wife who was apparently learning how to cook. He started telling me about how keeping a job is hard for him, that he got fired after 3 weeks, that he was full of regrets and I should work hard and appreciate all I have. Then he thanked me again and gave me a hug. I was a little taken aback, because actually he gave me x2 hugs. I guess I just hope that it was good for him, that hug. 

It encouraged me, because he told me that he was happy to meet a good person. and God knows I need to be reassured today.. that kindness and goodness can be shown and nurtured in the small acts of daily life. (in case it isn't making sense, this has to do with how my day started out really shitty; have you ever doubted yourself?)

Then I received encouragement from friends- and this is amazing because I never told anyone I was feeling down. sometimes it's just nice to be remembered :) (side note: I've also realised a skill I've always lacked is in maintaining my relationships, perhaps because of a different perspective I used to have, but I'm going to try to keep in touch with more people.)

And I got a new pair of earphones and met up with jw and had pizza. It ended up being a really really good day, and now I'm ready for school tomorrow :)

heading off to the lab at 8am to finish up my lab work (occlusal equilibration and occlusion waxups) which I'm... not exactly looking forward to because it's mind boggling and frustrating :( BUT, OPTIMISM. 

GONNA WEAR IT ON MY EYES.

The only constant is change

Last night, while I was up doing nothing, I was actually watching a bunch of TED talks and in particular I really enjoyed these two:

Now, you don't have to watch it, so I'm going to give you the main conclusion (or what I gather) from these two videos. From the first, it is that we should embrace the hard choices in life because they give us the opportunity to decide what kind of person we want to be and become that person. Easy choices are obvious, but hard choices require to weigh-in your values and prioritise what is important to you.

and the second video;
The illusion of the end of history
Basically it is that as humans it is far easier to examine ourselves in retrospect than to imagine our future selves. We always think that now is the time when we have fully matured and we will never change anymore. We think that we are our permanent selves. I found it interesting because I think that's really true (for me at least?) but I'm looking forward to the changes I'll make in my life in the future. I wonder how my values or priorities or outlook on life or favourite music or favourite activity will change.

One of my favourite quotes from that video was "when people say that they can't imagine how something will be in the future, they're really talking about their own lack of imagination" (or something along those lines)


But yes, it's actually been a helluva journey so far and I think that's what's so beautiful about life. Up till last month I never would have imagined cutting my locks off. I think they provided me with a sense of security because I always thought (vain as I am) that my face is really huge and I could never do short hair. I always associated my long hair with femininity and prettiness. But somewhere along the way I really wanted a change. Call it impulsive, but I had a sudden #yolo moment where I just wanted to SEE what I'd look like in short hair because truth be told, this is really the first time in my life I'm voluntarily cutting my hair so short.

(Side story: The first time I had my hair so short was in primary 1 because I was in CCPS and they didn't allow girls to have long hair unless you were a dancer. I cut my hair short, but I didn't like it very much and since then my mom wrote letters pretending I took ballet classes outside so I could keep my hair. The other time I had my hair short was completely by accident. My hair had grown so long it was up past my waist so I really wanted a trim, so I wanted to cut maybe 2 inches off my hair. My hairdresser took it upon herself to get rid of all the dried, split ends and I ended up with hair that was way shorter than I was mentally prepared for. That was in... 2009? I swore after that to never ever ever cut off my hair. but hahaha look, now I cut it all off. and after a recent perm in february too.)

I guess in secondary school or even JC I never would have imagined that I'd try to exercise regularly either. It's still a work-in-progress, but I want to be fit and love myself. I want to keep the body I've taken for granted all my life and stay slim, but not through starving myself (because I love food).

I've also been trying to eat more healthily in an effort to clear up my acne (it really works by the way- I know it might be me growing older too, but I think purposefully adding veggie and fruit into my diet has helped it stay a bit calmer). Speaking of which, I haven't had fruits today, perhaps after this I'll go on and scavenge for some fruit.

I would like to think that I'm self-aware; and while I like the person I've become, I really want to work towards being an even better person. Set aside all these high and lofty notions about how I'm so mature now, take whatever comes my way in my stride and just try to grow from it.

Ok.

I'll talk about my holidays another time. But here's a photo I really love :)

Writing is so therapeutic.

I guess it's not surprising

that old habits die hard and 1) is that I have not managed to maintain my dayre well at ALLLLL.

I guess it's a good thing because I realised (optimistically) of course, it means I have a life!!!! and I am simply caught up with reality.

and not so optimistically, I lack consistency and an ability to follow through with things... for the rest of my life?

BUT I guess it's good that this blog has been with me for all these years.

Right now, it's officially the last week of my holidays before I begin year 2 in dental school and I have tomorrow off and also today (I was so caught up with doing nothing but it felt so goooood).

For a change, that is why I decided to update my blog - not because I had work to procrastinate but simply because I had nothing to do.

I don't know where to start because I have loads of photos of hokkaido and actually hong kong too! but since I'm intending to go to bed and then continue this blogging thing tomorrow, here's just a photo of me after I've chopped my locks off (newssssss)

Excitement and Portability

I am basically updating here to say that I am now on Dayre.me!

You may visit my page which is dayre.me/hodypody via the giant dayre link on the side which you might have noticed hehehe.

I'm very excited about it because I just joined recently and it seems like a pretty much perfect solution to blogging on-the-go so most of the time I will probably put up my day-to-day updates there rather than here...

Although this wouldn't mean the end of my blog because I don't think I could bear to just abandon this treasured time capsule of mine :> Also, I don't trust dayre just yet because they are not as established as blogger which has lasted me throughout all these years and ultimately is a real blog that I can personalise and visit all my old posts at will hehe.

Through this Dayre discovery though, I have also somewhat discovered my talents in marketing and recruitment hahaha. I managed to get quite a number of my classmates on dayre within a week by psyching them up and making them think it's brilliant too! So I'm really happy about the fact that I have more dayre blogs to read. If you do join dayre please let me know (whoever ends up reading this hehehe)

It's also much easier to upload photos and all that there hahaha.

Once again, nothing new throughout the years, I'm blogging when I'm supposed to be studying. Kind of makes you wonder what else there is to this life right. It's been 9 years since I started this blog and I'm still studying. A large chunk of my life so-far has been studying.

GOTTA LIVE A LITTLE.

It's recess week now and I'm supposed to study but obviously dayre has got lots of my attention. I also intend to cook up a few cool new dishes from these cookbooks I got last week. Perhaps I will upload some photos here to archive my growth and experience hehe.

Oh oh oh,

TRAVEL UPDATES
I think it's quite safe to announce my dates here but I'm super excited that 2014 is looking to be a rather exciting year where I get to travel a lot! (ok twice- there are plans)

In April, I'll be going to Hong Kong for the HKU exchange with my class :) It should be a really wonderful time of class bonding and learning about how other dentists are being educated. Initially, I wasn't too keen because I'm the LAZIEST GIRL IN THE WORLD!!!!! and I wanted to play and not work; but I suppose alternating between days of half-day lessons and then playing wouldn't be so bad :) Especially if the company is good and the food is good. I hope Hong Kong will treat me better this time round. My impression of it wasn't so fantastic last June.

and then June! After special sem is over and before the madness of Rag preparations and orientation  comes upon us I will be going to Hokkaido!!!! I'm extremely excited because it'll be my first time going there (although strictly speaking as of right now we haven't booked the tickets)! Amelia says that the food there is the sex (which, I suppose, means it's amazing) and the ice cream and sashimi and food in general is to die for. so so so so, I'm damn excited la. I love food.

omg I really really love food.
a lot.

I'm still quite slim (for now)

but I shouldn't take that for granted. I should exercise or something because really, I'm hitting my 20s (say what-) and my metabolism is slowly degenerating. I'm going to become lumpy slowly but surely if I keep eating the way I do and not exercising.

I hope to be able to confidently put photos up here without filtering excessively and being ashamed of my body. hahahahaha.

ok ciao.