Wednesday, June 14, 2006

Stress at home

It seems like there is always something for mums to nag at their children, irregardless of which stage of their life they are at. I'm not spared from this agony as well.

Mum has been constantly hounding me to get a job quickly these few weeks. (the signs were already there when I haven even started my exams) Especially when she sees me playing JY online at home. (it makes the my idler image more complete in her mind when she sees that)

She would always try hints or blantant taunts to make me get a job.
From telling me so and so's son/daughter has got a job at so & so company, drawing $xxxx per month, or telling me eh now police salary for graduates are at 2900, to saying I hope that you quickly run out of money so that you will go and find job to do (when i'm now low on cash and not working... I din ask n will not ask for money from her) and the worst is when i try to explain to her that i'll be losing out if I get $2400 per month, she would say that XXX getting $2400 per month is BETTER than you not having a job now.

Dear has told me that mums' would never understand that graduates finding a job is not like O level people looking for jobs. I really understand what she went through in the 4 months when she did not have a perm job. They probably think that us looking for jobs are just as simple as a walk-in interview to macdonalds.

Mum is a workaholic and cannot stand seeing people at home doing nothing. Thats why she wants me to quickly get a job and start working, irregardless of the future prospects. She dunno what is the difference between a JOB and CAREER.

I just hope mum can a lil' bit more understanding, and not expect immediate results in job searching. Its not up to me whether the companies wanna call me or not. I can try to make it happen but the decision is ultimately not with me. I am also very stressed in finding my job too. I know what to do, just dun keep nagging at me.

The elevator will not move any faster irregardless of how many times you press the buttons.
My job search will not be any more progressive irregardless of how much stress u give me.

Its a common Asian illness that parents dun really like to compliment their children in the face. All I hear is always about all the wrongs i did (or more like what she deem is wrong), and never about the things that I have done to make her proud. I know that she is proud of me in some stuff, but wats the point when she is telling the whole world that she is proud me, but not to me?

Reminds me of the 'I not stupid 2' movie, where the parents would always give encouragements when their kids just infants, and the encouragements slowly turned into castigations as their kids grow older.

I know mum is concerned about me. I just need some breathing space, after carrying so much pressure to meet high expectations since primary 1.

Lets just hope that I get a good job quickly, if not i might get desperate and go for PhD in NTU which will be a super huge mistake...

Side show: Received a call this afternoon from an unknown number when I was in the car. I was getting a bit happy cos i tot it would be a call for an interview, but in the end it turned out to be dear calling me from her office line. hahaha. me cockster

Tuesday, June 06, 2006

From the pits to heavens

This 2 days had really been a quite a roller-coaster ride to me.

Brought Dear and Ah di to the beach for a walk on Sunday noon. Ah Di loved the beach, but hated the water, and never really had any experience swimming before. So this time, I forced him to swim by carrying him into the water then releasing him to let him swim a short distance back to the shore.

He din like his first swim, and ignored me after he hit the shore. After a few more tries, he gradually grew to like swimming a bit, and started to smile after the swims. Will upload the video later when I have the time.

Realised that I lost my wallet at the beach after me and dear went over to Mac, and after going back to search the spot where we walked the dog, we concluded that my wallet was officially lost and we went to make a police report. I was really upset cos a lot of my important identification stuff were in the wallet, not to mention the hundred odd dollars in it.

After that, we sent Ah Di back home and went back to search again, but to no avail. After giving up and returning home again, we received a call from mum saying that a Caucasian came to my place to return me the wallet with everything intact. The Caucasian told mum that he was initially waiting for someone to search for the wallet at the beach, but after sometime he decided to return the wallet to my home.

I was really relieved when I heard the news.

Through mum’s description, I realised that we had saw the Caucasian with his kids earlier on the beach. It was really amazing that the Caucasian took the trouble to take a cab to my home to return me the wallet, instead of keeping it for himself/ throwing it away/ handing it over to the police. I’m really thankful for his honesty and helpfulness. It saved me a lot of hassle in replacing everything.

It is even more amazing after I realised that my wallet was soaked in seawater, meaning that my benefactor had actually fished it out from the sea.

He did not leave a name nor number which I can identify and thank him for what he did. The only thing I can do for him is to wish him all the best in whatever he does, and may his children grow up strong and healthy. He is a really good model dad to his kids.

I really can’t believe my luck in recovering my wallet.

The emotional turbulence I experienced was pretty overwhelming.


TODAY

Was playing JinYong Online with mika this afternoon when I wanted to log off and check my results in case it came out, then mika msged me in the game that the results were out.

I was quite nervous as mum hovered around me wanting to see my results too.

I checked through my degree audit first and it would not show all my results at one go as I have to scroll down to see my grades. I was very disappointed to see a B+ for my FYP. Partly because me and my partner had worked very hard, and a B+ means that my chances of a 2nd upper honours is close to nil.

I was getting more n more upset. Then I switched over to the proper exam results paper to see the final judgement for a 2nd lower honours. To my surprise, I actually got a 2nd upper.

Super happy sia!
Worked so hard for 4 years, and it finally paid off!!!

From yesterday’s lost wallet, to today’s results, my mood has really went from the pit bottom to the heavens! SHIOK!!!

My reason to be ecstatic !!! Posted by Picasa

My first ever bungy jump!

Friday, June 02, 2006


Per and me going surfing. Shiok! Posted by Picasa

Waterfront lodging at Phi Phi island. Nice.. Posted by Picasa

Picture of Phi Phi Island captured from the boat. Notice that there are beaches on both sides Posted by Picasa

Per, Mika, BC, me and Tian Yee at Viewpoint Posted by Picasa

Thursday, June 01, 2006


Better view of Phi Phi island beach. The water is so clear! SG sea sucks big time Posted by Picasa

Taken on the beach of Phi Phi Island Posted by Picasa

Great Fun in Phuket !!!

Went to Phuket with BC, Per, Mika and Tian Yee over last weekend. It was sort of like a graduation trip for me, since I dun have the money or company to go anywhere further. Anyway, this trip was fruitful, fun and farnie.

It was nightfall when we touched down at Phuket, so we went straight to the hotel. After checking in and received our room keys, we proceeded to take the lift to our rooms.
Farnie incident no. one: BC dropped his room key into the gap at the lift door…. (everyone got the WTF look on their face then, damned farnie).


(Official) Day 1
Hotel breakfast sucks. Went for a free city tour provided by the travel agent. Visited the local range, and had a go at the 0.22 rifle with scope. 10 shots at 650 Baht. Initially I thought the staff would teach us some technical handling stuff, but no, they simply took over everything, and all we had to do is just aim n pull the trigger. Din even get to cock the rifle. Sianz.

Went to the Wat Chalong Temple after that, nothing much to do there, just pray pray a bit.

Was supposed to go for elephant trekking, but most of the guys were against it, and i wasn’t too keen cos it was drizzling then, thus we moved on to the next destination.

BUNGY JUMPING !!
It wasn’t a damned beautiful place nor the shop was elaborately done up. Just a simple hut in the rurals and a crane to send us up to 50m to jump. BC couldn’t take the jump cos the body harness wasn’t available, so the rest of us just took the challenge.

To me, the most scary part of the jump wasn’t the moment I stood out on the launch pad, nor the moment I dived down, but it was the slow ascent to 50m. Had the “regret” feeling crawling in then.

But once I stood out on the launch pad and looked around and down, I din really feel any fear. The most exhilarating moment was when I just leapt off the launch pad into the head –down-first free fall. The feeling was out of this world. Damned shiok. (post the pics later when i get it)


After that, we went for a badly needed massage session. Bungy jumping wasn’t as easy as it seemed, and it was actually quite taxing on the respiratory system and muscles.


This is the first time I had a massage done by a real masseur. Had 1 hour of Thai massage followed by 1 hour of Oil massage. I always had the impression that Thai massage is very painful, but it seems like nothing much to me and Tian Yee. We actually thought that the masseur wasn’t using enough strength. BC, mika and Per actually felt that the Thai massage was painful. Maybe physically fitter people would find Thai massage easy on their muscles than most people. Tian yee and me thought the oil massage wasn’t really that good. Maybe we two should had went for a 2hr Thai massage instead.

We wanted to see the famed “Tiger Show” at night, but we took the recommendations of the tour guide and went to see the “Sexy and Erotic Top Model Show” instead. I actually found the show quite boring, just some “women” baring it all and moving around (I’m not sure if they are all real woman or not). It’s a real waste of money to me (800 Baht). It is just to make sure that we had a complete Thailand travel trip. I dun recommend those going to Thailand to go for tiger shows if they can help it.


Day 2
Went to the famous Phi Phi (pronounced as pee pee) island. It was a must go place for people visiting Phuket. Went snorkelling with the guys. Think it was a first for all the guys except me. I din have too much fun there. But its good for BC since he went down into the water with us.

Had some sun tanning on the beach on Phi Phi island after lunch. It was so damned hot and sunny, just the perfect setting for a perfect beach day. The only downside was that coconut wasn’t available from the shops by the beach.

After a short tanning period of about 1.5 hours, we went back to the boat for a ride back to Phuket.

Farnie incident 2: BC threw his towel to Per when we were on the boat, but Per missed it and the towel dropped into the seawater. (Towels were borrowed from our hotel, and has to be returned) Being a true singaporean in not wanting to pay penalty fines, I jumped into the water to ‘save’ the towel. Damned pai sei sia, the whole boat was watching me.

Night: I wanted to go diving on day 3, but it was a bit late when we went out to shop after dinner, so I thought of giving up the hope of diving, until we came across a booth offering day dive trips. Placed a 1000Baht deposit for 2 dives on day 3.

Day 3
The bus was supposed to pick me at 0730 for the dive trip, but after a few calls to the agent (cost me 120Baht to make 3 calls, WTF), it was established that the dive operator forgot to pick me and I had to go back to the booth to take my deposit back. So I ended up joining the rest of the guys for some beach action at the Patong Beach for the day.

Went surfing at the beach. We din use the American-styled surf boards where we had to stand on the board, instead, only those types that u used like a swimming aid was available. Anyway, it was pretty fun to surf at the beach, being washed quickly to the shore by the incoming waves.

After that, I went parasailing. Cost me 700 Baht for less than 5 minutes in the air. Pretty nice experience though. It was the closest I can get to skydiving for the moment. The view up there was great, but I couldn’t bring a camera up with me. just too bad.

Mika and I had rented a bike for the day. I just wanted to experience the kick of riding after so many years of layoff, as well as the kick of riding without helmet. Hahaha. Coaxed Tian yee to join in and get a feel of riding. (only mika, per and me have lic to ride)


Farnie incident 3: Tian yee was trying out the bike in the carpark outside our hotel, and almost lost control of the bike as he sped towards a shop. The lady in the shop was screaming and looked terrified when tian yee ‘flew’ towards her shop with a very loud throttle sound. (mika, per and me: super ROFL)


I really enjoyed myself on this trip with the guys. It was great fun and laughter all the way. If only we had more money and time at Phuket, then I could have went for diving, as well as white water rafting.

Well, till next time!!