Here we go!
Ok, deep breath. This is going to be a very long and troublesome entry. I admit... Sentimental reasons aside, another major reason why I havent posted about singapore is because I am actually very lazy hahah.
But since this very kind person seems to be getting rather impatient, I shall get to it!! :D
Leejiaying thanks for making me feel like a repetitive emo slobhead :D
I don't even know what I'm going to do with this. So it's going to be some haphazard attempt at a day-by-day narration of events with lots of photos? Ugh! I'm feeling lazy already (Though I have just uploaded 60 photos to photobucket which is troublesome and irritating and which I use only because I don't know how to use picasa with LJ)
In order to not forget the large amount of things I did in Singapore, I made a list earlier this week, recording every single rememberable meal/meeting. Should be right! -->
Ok, let's go!!
Day One- Dec 2nd, 2008
Got up pretty early, and boarded flight to Singapore! I must mention here a very commendable (though somewhat pointless) personal effort- I did homework the whole plane ride and did not watch a single movie how amazing is that! Ok fine, I admit. Thinking back it was kind of silly and pointless. At least my Japanese verb conjugation table won't have to be touched again. :D
Here's my brother looking somewhat excited. And rather strange.
This was the first photo I took in Singapore! And.. It's not very impressive. But as you can see, it was raining! And that was funny cause when it rains in Australia it gets so cold but when I got off the taxi I was quite overwhelmed by the gust of hot, humid air that rushed forth to greet me! I do quite like the warm musty smell of Singaporean precipitation (haha- err maybe I should have just called it rain) though!
Took a picture with my brother, but as you can see I look terrible and he looks red and somewhat murderous. Quite strange. :D
After we arrived at our family friends house, we put our stuff down and set off on a pilgrimage back to ORCHARD ROAD!! which was extremely difficult to get to in the rain, and with all the new construction work up around the area. I think we managed to get lost. Anyhow... We finally made it to Takashimaya about an hour later (mind you, we should have taken less than 10 min)
This is this year's christmas tree. It's what, 3 storeys tall? I love these.
(And last night in my bizarre dream I was rushing to the airport and the tree had disappeared?)
And of course, my favourite bookstore in the world :D
And guess who I met for dinner! :D (Who also very kindly turned up an hour late- ok before you remind me why I will acknowledge that you were having rehearsals!)
Looking very, um, elated with her new supply of watermelon candy!
And that was day one!
Day Two- Dec3rd
Brother's birthday! Perhaps it was the heat or the excitement (I am inclined to think it was the former), I didn't sleep all night and proudly got up at 6am Singapore time to wish my brother a happy 10th birthday! :D
Looking very excited to be TEN! This was during breakfast at McDonald's
Practically no shops were open when we went out at 8am but at least the big decorations were intact! This year's christmas theme is candy or something. Or is it this every year?
Happily took bro to the science centre where we watched an inspiring Imaxdocumentary about the Alps. (Mum seems quite confused why people want to risk their lives climbing up huge mountains though- and I must say she's got a point!)
And we both stamped ourselves witht he funny re-entry stamps even though we didn't intend to re-enter the place seeing how busy we were!!
This might not have been a good decision- the ink wouldn't wash off for a week!
Lunch at Crystal Jade La Mian in Holland Village- which is where we used to go every time it was someone's birthday! :)
MMmmmm xiaolongbao :D
These are seriously better than the ones in Shanghai
And then I rushed home, changed and headed off alone to the Esplanade!!
It's kind of difficult taking a decent picture of the Esplanade with one's mobile phone so this will have to suffice
Met up with Chan-ning and Yuta for dinner at this Japanese restaurant in the Esplanade. So, what is pictured is actually rather expensive Jellyfish, not 'random cheap noodles?!?!' as mum proclaimed, somewhat horrified, after seeing this for the first time.
I also had a rather embarassing episode with my cha-soba but I will not discuss that here. Hehe
And then I met Sneha (who kindly came after a certain someone had to ditch me for rehearsal.... *significant look at leejiaying) and we watched Opus! And I was very impressed by my two dinner companions who were the first desk violinists! They were rather agitated at the end of the concert about some encore-related issue but in my opinion, it was a thoroughly wonderful concert!
(And the closest I've ever gotten to Opus, which I have miraculously managed to miss twice)
I should have taken a picture of the roses I brought!! I was probably the only giving flowers, and they were cheap but pretty ones from the supermarket. I managed to give away all but one before the concert, and the last one got confiscated by the Esplanade management when I tried to enter the concert hall. Oh well.
'
And after the concert (you will recall my previous sleepless night) I was completely beat but had to wait an hour plus for taxi which wasn't very cool.
Day Three- Dec4th
Went shopping in the morning, got some clothes that I quite like (that reminds me- some of my clothes have gone missing!!!), and of course since I was near Daiso I had to go there and splurge on cute $2 stuff.More notepaper notebooks and ERASERS!!!!! omg those thigns are too cute. Useless, but way too cute
And then we met up with Susan and Susan's mom and lots of other moms and had this MASSIVE sushi meal at sushi tei which was especially awesome because we got to eat expensive sushi without even thinking about the bill muahahahhaa. Look at all the multicoloured plates!
And then we went out and had uzumaki icecream and obviously I had my favourite green tea ice cream :D
The afternoon was spent walking and having a nice long chat with Susan who's my oldest friend in Singapore (and possibly in the world- I've known her since I was 8? pretty cool :D)
And then at night we went to the food court in Great World City where bro and I had a nice INDIAN prata thing (forgot what it was called ;( ) which was yummy! :D Look at how he's enjoying it.
And so it was that Thursday was the (relatively) most relaxed day of the trip.
Day Four- Dec5th
HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAPHNE AND TRISH!!
Went back to UWC! Same old walkway etc and it felt very familiar but also very foreign. Felt rather disorientated BUT it was nice seeing lots of people again! :) And some new people who I keep seeing in friends' pictures on facebook. Pretty weird, actually- i have a lot to say about facebook/networking websites in general but I'll save that for some other day because I need to focus!
I was hoping to have naan for lunch but the queue was insane as always so I ended up buying some cheapo egg sandwich with Aditi.
And I snuck into senior house during periods 7&8 and worked on Chingyu's TOK essay with her which was actually kind of cool! I think I would have enjoyed TOK, even though it would have been quite stressful
And then I went with Soolim to Vivocity where we tried on dresses and had popiah for dinner and took pictures witht he huge xmas tree! Vivocity's bigger than I remembered ;D
Spent the night at Soolim's where we binged on popcorn, watched half of Mamma mia and finally collapsed, exhausted, on soolim's uber comfy bed
I want a bed like that! (sorry, no photo)
Day 5- Dec6th
Left Soolim's after breakfast which was this really nice korean breakfast with kimchi and rice and stuff. :D Met Yuta for lunch which was really random and phail because the initial plan was to eat at this nice chicken rice place near my old house but it was UNDER RENOVATION and so after missing half a million buses we finally reached Clementi station
WHICH IS STILL UNDER HEAVY CONSTRUCTION URGHH
finally found my way to clementi post officein the POURING RAIN (ahahha embarassing umbrella incident. Yuta is too tall, so when I tried to save him with my umbrella I ended up opening it in his face)
Anyway, we reached the post office at 1.10...and guess what!
It'd closed at 1.00!!! TEN MINUTES!! ARGHH
So you see lynn, that's why your mail didn't get posted in the first week :(
by the way, this picture is not from saturday hence the cloudless sky
Ended up detouring back to dover and eating near school but it was still good! I was sad the kopitiam didnt have the waterchestnut drink but at least I got to have some grass jelly yay!
And then I met FAUSTY dearest for dinner at MOF! hhahahahaha she kept her word and treated me. What did we eat again? It was yummy!!!
<333
HEHEHEH this is fausty stressing about her haircut which I think is very cute what!!
Ok fausty maybe you don't really like this picture don't worry I've got better ones!!
Firstly, though, the food!! (or a small part of it)
see the cute soy sauce pot? i was trying to take a picture of the soysauce flowing out but, depite practically drowing the wasabi in soysauce, did not succeed.
Fausty delightedly prodding her food...
or whatever she's doing
Yayy ファウスティーちゃん大好き <3
And after that we had super cute and yummy icecream at that japanese pseudoeuropean icecream parfait place! :)
I love plastic food it's so adorable
And so are you my dear!!
Then after that, at about 10pm, I ventured off in a taxi to TOAPAYOH, picked up miss LEEJIAYING (YOU APPEAR!!) and headed off to tampines to sleep at her housee!!!! :D
We took some rather attractive photos of ourselves and went to bed
Ok yes but the night was really fun!! we must have chitchatted quite a bit and jiaying went to sleep on her sucky mattress but before that she piled me with two HUGE bags of stuff! including yummy new york chocolates which made it past customs and are now happily sitting in my kitchen cupboard :D
Day 6- Dec7th
Woke up to a fresh new morning! Had yummy roti prata and teh tarik (YAY SINGAPOREAN BREAKFAST FTW!) - thanks jiaying+parents!! but before that jiaying had a nice photoshoot with her lovely horse collection
oh how sweet :D
And we took some random pictures and set off (Extremely Late) to meet miss fausty!!
Cookie monster got his photoshoot too!! :D
Jiaying's lovely room!
Unfortunately, fausty didn't seem that pleased about or dillydallying. Sorry fausty! :( She seemed quite scary at a distance!
You can just about make out fausty's Glare of Death
Thankfully, things cleared up quickly enough- lunch at KFC!! (Sorry fausty I love these pictures too much to not use them!)
And then we took neoprints at cathay and were about to go into the arcade thing
I was ditched!! Actually I dont really remmeber what was going on. But then I had to rush off home take a speed shower and watch Chan-Ning's teacher's students' recital. Which was very ego-depleting because apart from Chan-ning all the kids were half my size and 10^425908360985309843853 million times my standard at violin (rather, next to them I have no standard. And that's a very fair thing for me to say!) And at the very end someone I kind of recognised- Alan Choo from HCISO played and he was so incredible it's crazy. It's very nervewracking to see how people so near to you can be so absurdly talented, but I think at the same time it's quite inspiring so alle ist good.
And then after the concert (during which I took no photos because I turned my phone off) I rushed off to Trish's birthday party where I met a ton of people I half knew and felt rather awkward and inadequate (espeically when I was recruited to throw reluctant strangers/people i barely knew into the pool!!). BUt it was nice seeing some old friends again. :)
Especially all my indian friends!! :D
Here's aditi, avi and vidhi looking quite surprised?
Oh gosh this is taking forever...!!! But I will persevere
Day 7-Dec8th
Finally had some time with parents! We shopped a bit, and had hotchocolate at starbucks which was yummy! And then I ran off to watch cape no.7wih fausty! It was a really nice movie, with a soundtrack that is win!! :D(mustfindit!)
And then I met ms ZEENATAN! for dinner and she was dressed up very nicely and spoke chinese with me most of the meal. :D
She wasn't all that enthusiastic about the camera though, hence this. ;)
..Ok it's 10.56 and I officially retire for tonight. Phew, at least I got through a week! part 2 tmr.
Great. and i just spent the past 2 hours+typing part two and whaddyaknow? it's all gone. That's it. I give up. Part two up... someday!