New Year's Eve 2014

Spent the day with le BFF on New Year's Eve and it was fun!!!

We resolved to cook something decent for lunch, in order to end the chronicles of unfortunate cooking episodes.

Not sure if I ever mentioned them, but here are some:

1. Jocelyn's oven tripped the electricity and potatoes ended up hard and undercooked  

2. Our baked pasta had the weirdest tomato sauce I ever tasted, and was too overloaded with our generous toppings of mozzarella cheese

3. We burnt sugar and butter into a hard caramel block which took forever to wash off (home econs class)

4. Got rashes from eating our own chocolate chip cookies =.=

So... Being passionate youths(?) who never give up, we decided to bake shepherd's pie today!!!

Here are the ingredients that we painstaking diced up.  

Jocelyn hard at work. 

We were planning to handle this ourselves but Jocelyn's brother helped out a lot. ＼(^o^)／ 

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And finally... The end product!!!

Yummy shepherd's pie topped with mozzarella!!! 

And as usual we forgot to take a nice picture before digging in, literally. Hastily put back that slice for a picture and covered another destroyed portion with the spoon. 

Yay, it was a great success! Shared with everyone in the family and I think they think so too :) woohoo, is this the start of the series of successful cooking episodes? ^_^

Lasik vs ICL: my review

This post is mainly for the people who are researching on vision correction options. Ive read up so much (blogs/reviews on lasik) and been to some forums. So here is my chance to give back to my community (the short-sighted community) Lol... Here we go!

Disclaimer: this is all I know but is not gonna be 100% correct due to doctors/optometrists/bloggers subjective opinions... And perhaps my own memory slips! Do more research if you want to do any vision correction surgery!

Firstly, my background:

I'm the girl who's been wearing glasses since I was 9. I've always set my eyes on lasik since that's what my dad did... Until I found out about Implantable Contact Lens (ICL). 

And I was faced with a huge decision to make, as each option has their pros and cons.

Here is what I gathered from my own research and visits to the doctor, with regards to comparison between ICL and Lasik.

Visual clarity 

Research says that ICL gives better visual quality than lasik for high refractive errors above 600 degrees (which mine is obviously super high la haha). 

Link: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/22865405/

People can have 6/6 (perfect) vision with bad visual quality - you can see up to the last line in the eye check, but it's just not completely sharp. 

Also, ICL has fewer instances of glares, haloes and dry eyes, which are common side effects of Lasik. 

BUT

So far, I've been to 3 lasik/ICL centers, and something seems quite weird... The mainly-ICL center said that ICL would definitely give highest quality vision, however, the mainly-lasik center says that their technology gives comparable vision quality.... Shrugs... It's a 自卖自夸 (praise whatever you sell) thing, but really scary because it's something I have to live with for the rest of my life!!

Iridotomy

I've read online about many complaints of iridotomy procedure in ICL (for the layman, it's something like the ICL will block the flow of liquid in the eye, so the doctor has to "poke holes" in the eye).

From the reviews I've read, the iridotomy is really horrible because of the increased glares and also it hurts!! If you're interested in ICL, you probably read the horror stories with regards to iridotomy too, but that's for the lower technology ICL lens. The newest 4th generation lenses has holes in them, making iridotomy obsolete, so you don't have to worry! (Not sure if these lenses are available in every country yet, from what I read there will be some FDA approval waiting time)

Risks

Lasik has a 0.01% risk of Ectasia (cornea steepening, and in worst cases, require a corneal transplant!!) while ICL has 1% risk of glaucoma and cataracts. 

I was initially put off by Lasik because I am so afraid of getting Ectasia!! But doctor has informed me that my cornea is thicker than average and my chances of Ectasia are pretty low. 

For ICL, glaucoma and cataracts can be halted - refer to next point about maintenance.

Maintenance

Lasik is much more fuss free compared to ICL (after the 2 post-op surgery checks, there is no need for visits to the eye doctor anymore). Whereas for ICL I'd need to visit the eye doctor EVERY year!! 

The doctor explained that she needed to monitor if the lens is still in place--- too big it'd cause glaucoma and too small it'd cause cataracts when it scratches on the natural lens! OTL 

Btw, you'll only realize you have glaucoma when it's very serious- there are no symptoms. Also, it causes vision loss which is irreversible due to permanent damage of optic nerves. 

Eye condition when the eye ages- cataracts

I won't deny that I was shocked when doctor told me that everyone will eventually have cataracts. To treat cataracts, the ICL must be removed and a new lens is put in!! Throwing away something so pricey is really... Ahh so wasted! (Not to mention that people with high myopia have higher risk of cataracts) (Mehh!!! High myopia is NOT FUN!)

Furthermore, there're some risks of removing the ICL (it's an invasive procedure). Whereas in the case of lasik, the procedure for cataracts follow the general treatment procedure (like for someone who didn't go vision correction surgery).

Weighing ICL and Lasik

ICL- better visual outcome, however, must live with yearly checks, and finally a removal when cataracts come along.

Lasik- not-so-optimal visual outcome (??), but lower maintenance.

Conclusion

Yup, that's all the info I have! What decision will I make? Stay tuned!!!

Post year 2 sem 1 holiday!

Woohoo, holidays are here (since 2 weeks ago)! Haven't been updating just because I've been busy slothing away. Teehee, has anyone missed me?

Just went to IMM to recontract our broadband and M1 has this new serve-customers-while-standing system. It's really good for saving space in the store but I almost passed out from standing for so long. #heartneedstopumpharder. 

Some backlog pics from studying for finals.

Wow... Looking real nerdy...

And bored... Lol

Studying with the Enactus battalion... Which turned out to be a talk nonsense session lol.

After exams my family went to sentosa woohoo~~

Here we are at Madame Tussaud's wax museum and I am WERKING it.

Hahaha.

And then to sea aquarium! I really loved the jelly fish! Apparently they are called sea jelly :0

Saw a dolphin in the distance too!

And of course, to USS!!

Check out my roller coaster face HAHAHAHAHA...

Love the holidays so much <333

Rachel's salsa competition

Went to support Rachel in her sexay salsa competition with Jingqi and Thomas. I can't believe my first trip to town for outing is in week 9 of the sem!! I've become a no lifer after school started. Wonder why I thought nbs year 1 was bad, year 2 is probably 20 times worse. I don't even know what to expect for year 3... Jingqi casually said to me, "oh, me and Thomas spontaneously went to Palau ubin to cycle last week." Me- "ok can."

Us! 

Right before the show, we realized that we forgot to buy flowers!! I think flowers are kinda impractical since they'll wilt soon but I guess it's a necessary thing to give performers haha. Thankfully scape, where the event was held, sold flowers so we went to buy a fake sunflower for Rach (erm fake flower more practical right? Haha) 

On to the show! The salsa competition was super eye opening! The "pop and lock" scene that I was used to drew cheers from their various stunts like sick body waves, isolations, box-splits etc, but what attracted me in salsa is the fiery chemistry between the male and female dancers. Woo, it was totally hot. 

Another notable thing is that at the lucky draw segment Jingqi won the first prize! This girl had her birthday luck man! No actually her luck is always very good LOL.

Finally met Rach after the competition. Rach looking all sexay~ Good job on the spectacular performance!

There was also this "social dancing" segment which people can randomly pair up and salsa away! Woah I dunno how they did it but a shy person like me would rather sit and watch (not that I can salsa anyways hehe XD) 

Ahhhh, this event really reminded me of my love for dance. Even though I can't do it well, I love how dance is able to inspire and energize people. I'll definitely try to pick it up again next time if time permits!

Here ends my short update ^_^ 

*edit*

Due to popular request for Thomas epic comment, at the risk of Rachel killing me, I shall just record it:

So me and Jingqi were drooling over the salsa ladies' costume, we were like "woah, so sexy!"

Thomas overheard and said in a matter-of-fact way "I can just wear my underwear and stick a cloth in there ah."

LOLOL.... The imagery was so funny and  we kinda giggled over that the whole night, Rachel don't kill us TT

And this is not the first epic comment from Thomas! If you're a long time reader you'll know about the "EZ link" comment also kekeke. 

Our most epic project

Woohoo so I decided to do a Samsung video competition with KC and so many epic things happened!

1) epic recruitment of Jocelyn

We actually had another team mate but she was super busy and couldn't really contribute to the team! Was meeting KC and Jocelyn for lunch and after lots of persuasion Jocelyn got recruited! We feel quite bad for girl who unfortunately got kicked out but I was quite happy that Jocelyn joined hahha. Because Jocelyn and I always get separated I almost forgot how fun it is to work with BFF hehehe. Filming throughout the day felt just like a fun outing :))

2) KC's epic drive

When we got into KC's car he suddenly couldn't turn on the engine! We realized that the wheel was locked TT sweated buckets in the hot car while we youtubed how to unlocked a locked wheel. Finally KC got through to his parents who told him to turn the wheel while switching on the engine. ._. Then we finally set off.

After that we exited from the carpark in KC's car and he decided to turn DOWN the innovation center slope. To our horror, it was a one-way road UP because the downslope has been blocked for some construction work :00 As you might have guessed, all of a sudden we had 3 cars right in front of our face!! We just looked on in horror when a guy from the DHL vehicle in front of us came out and was like "Bro, one way street la!" Lol we already knew by then lor XD Luckily the DHL guy taught us to 3 point turn and drive back up the slope! Crisis averted haha. KC says it's the worst day of his whole driving history lol.

3) having some epic bad luck at the start of the day

Jocelyn established that the driving episode as above was probably because of her bad luck cause she's been unlucky recently! Like it keeps raining during her project's pilot test TT After leaving ntu we had to find elderly to interview and Jocelyn suggested St Joseph Home. We later found out from the lady that the whole center was MOVING OUT on sat and it wasn't a good time :0 and also suan us that we should have called before coming :0 haha thankfully that was the end of our bad luck and it was good from then on!

4) being epicly thick-skinned

Through the day we had to ask for volunteers to star in our video and we just had to approach strangers - elderly and youths included. It was quite the experience getting some teenagers to act for us. The most memorable would have to be asking the hawker that sold us our fish soup dinner to pretend to be chummy with us and we just faked "hahahahhaa" all the way for the 5 secs clip lol. The hawker is super nice and obliging and down-to-earth. We were so happy to meet him! Oh yea! We also had to do an interview with Jocelyn's granny and she was also superbly good at acting and really cute haha. Met so many nice people that day. 

And we worked through the night till 3am for the vid! Here are some behind the scenes

Selfie-ing while le team mates did some filming

Working hard on the graphics.

That's all folks!

I'm sure more happened but that's all I remember lol! Lack sleep TT

School rush (Y2S1)

BUSIEST TIME OF MY LIFE...

Wow, ever since school started things has been moving so fast! Super busy that I have 5 (!!!) episodes of channel 8 drama on hold. Totally no time for tv because I reach home late all the time and cca stuff and school preparation forces me to sleep at 2 almost everyday. 

At this point you might be wondering why I have time to blog hahaha. Well... Let's just say long bus rides coupled with emo songs somehow give blogging inspiration :D

But I must say it had been a good opportunity of learning and doing new things!

Here is a summary of the highlights!

1. Got an opportunity to do lecture pitch for Enactus!

Coupled with le BFF, we were given some time to do a recruitment pitch for Enactus at a lecture hall full of Adm freshies. And we totally loved their energy! To the question "how was your first week at school", they replied "Awesome!!" in unison! We said that just to be friendly and personable and didn't expect such a good response. Anyways we had. blast sharing about our projects :)

2. Conducted interviews for BWL recruits!

Interviews were fun at the start but because there were so many candidates, it gradually got quite tiring! But I gained a greater insight on how interviewers choose their candidates and felt the pressure of creating a fab team. It's really quite difficult to judge a person through interviews since it's difficult to know if a person is very good at "fluffing" and do not mean it or if they are just nervous to perform on the spot but are actually very good team mates. I hope that the choices that me and jw made are good! :)

3. Selling cookies at NTUFest!

BWL went down to ntufest for cookie sales!

All set up!

My fringe is totally plastered cause the tentage was like an oven and it was sweltering hot!!

But we managed to sell our everything super early and made $2K plus! Sales is tiring but satisfying!

4. Setting mini projects for a "intro to entre" class!

Our faculty mentor allowed enactus to set a few project-based questions as mini projects for his class! It was quite awesome because we can get help from students (whose grade depend on the proj) so I'm looking forward to good ideas! But the part I liked best is feeling like a cool teacher, setting questions for UNIVERSITY UNDERGRADUATES, having them ask us questions and us clarifying and giving then hints and ideas. How cool is that!

And very soon I will also get the chance of leading the freshies at camp and then finally starting BWL afresh. 

Busy but exciting days coming up!

Precamp!

Hah, Jocelyn said that she was an unsatisfied fan of ankukueh because I haven't blogged much in the holidays!!! So here's an update of the precamp we had today.

Met up with the group of project leaders and directors of enactus early in the morning at 10am (10am meet at serangoon means must wake up at 7.30 okay sobs)

The new batch of directors are super awesome, they have plans for ntu to have increased awareness of enactus, so they'd be rolling out marketing plans (including people like myself having to 抛头露面 and do pitching in random lectures lol). But still it's for the better good, in the future when I tell people I'm from enactus they won't go "Huh? What?" ten times before I go into a long story on what we do and my team project. :D

On to the games!

The first game was to create the tallest and sturdiest newspaper structure! It was project leader team vs exco team so we were dying to win them LOL. 

At the start our structure seemed to be so weak and swayed with the wind OTL But Jocelyn said that it was a "dancing flower" lol. 

It really did look like one with our base looking like the roots and one flimsy train of newspapers growing upwards lolll. We struggled with the masking tape and newspaper for 20 minutes, weathering the programmers' attacks of wind, water and even whacking our whole structure!!

Eventually the structure grew to be taller than me and looked like a tree! 

Time to claim credit: in the last 10 seconds when our structure was going to bend down, I strategically twisted it the other direction and it became steady!! While the exco team's structure fell like lightning struck their tree! Muahahaha!

Victory shot with exco photobombing us :D

After that we had a few games but u must talk about the tele-match! Got unfortunate story of Jocelyn lol.

In this tele-match we had to complete stations one by one and the fatest team wins. The first station was the worst for me because we had to find polo sweets from a plate of flour and I got so much flour in my mouth!! =.= gagged continuously after that and was miserable.

But Jocelyn was more miserable Hahaha. There was this 10 elephant spins station where we had to make ourselves dizzy before throwing a cup of water into a pail. 

As expected from her always carsick/seasick/dizzy/headache moments, she was so dizzy that she tumbled into a big puddle of water!! Super miserable >< (actually I also had to crawl to the water pouring station after spinning but comparatively not as miserable lol)

And the story doesn't end here, Jocelyn still had a lot of flour in her mouth and she started drinking the dirty water from the pail!!! For a moment I really thought she became bonkers :0

But other than 3 scratches she is ok lol.

Jocelyn ah, next time don't so clumsy hor....

Last station was the water bomb games!! Weijian was "it" and we (all girls) had to protect him from getting wet.

Us and our weapons

Scheming face cause Jocelyn was in the exco team and she was going to help my team and turn the tables hoho.

As expected, my team won!! Unfortunately they told us that we can't make allies in the real game. :/ 

Finally the end of a super eventful and fun day. Tired! 

The day God spoke to me

Recently I was feeling very troubled over choosing my second specialization. The highly-sought-after way, as I've always followed, was to aim high and just choose banking and finance and open my options.

I knew I wouldn't get in since I didn't make the cut of B+ in financial management, but still decided to try... Alas, I got my second choice of biz law. 

Now I was stuck with 3 options, to appeal for baf, to stick with biz law, or to reject my second spec choice and use my AUs for unrestricted electives, well, unrestrictedly haha.

Dad told me to pray and ask for God's direction but I was quite doubtful, I only had 2 days to make a decision, the answer can come so fast meh?

Even after reading up on second specializations and asking some seniors what they thought, I remained indecisive.

Finally, yesterday night before I slept, I prayed for God to reveal to me the path I should take through colours. If he showed me white, I will take biz law, if it was blue or red, I will appeal for baf and if it was green, I would be set "free" from restricting myself from a second spec choice lol. The colours were chosen based on the colour of my files for the subjects lol. I expected God to somehow reveal the answer to me in my dreams or something. 

This morning I woke up and prepared to go to church. I kept trying to recall what dream I had last night. Nothing... I sat on my bed and thought and thought.

Suddenly when I looked out of the window:

Green! Everything is green! I never bothered about looking out of the window but wow, the trees sure were flourishing haha. Was God telling me that I shouldn't do a second spec through this?

But I thought to myself, I can't be so sure about it. Afterall, green is such a common colour.

Then I suddenly had the idea to ask my mother about what colour is used now for the church season. My mum is in charge of the banner ministry in church so she has to put up banners according to the church seasons. Ok I wasn't sure about what colours are included but from crivoice.org:

Haha blue, red, green and white all stood a chance!

Guess what was the colour for today, 22june? Green!!!!!!!

When my mum said it my eyeballs almost dropped out lol. Like "really ah?! You sure anot?! Really Green? Last week white then so fast change already?" My singlish lol.

True enough, green was the answer. Confirm and double confirm. 

Woohoo so now I don't even have to bother trying to appeal. God told me the answer through my circumstance. 

I have the faith that God's chosen path is the best path for me. :)

Ended stint at citi

Woo, in a flash, my 2 weeks at citi have come to an end.

While most people found it a breeze, I was struggling with it because of the pretty new jargon. Hedging and trading, anyone? Haha.

But I really liked my team at citi. We called ourselves team hungry for the ice breaking session on day 1 and we had this cheer:

D: hey guys, what do you feel like eating?

A: nasi Padang!

C: chicken rice!

C: (some Thai food I can't rmb)!

Me: Laksa!

D: but, what are we hungry for?

All: success! Goooooo, team hungry!

Lol... 

We we're sent on amazing race and spent around 8 bucks on transport... But didn't win TT I think the winning group had a driver so transport was great for them. But nevertheless still quite fun.

I realize I don't remember much technical banking knowledge but I can remember all the epic moments in my group. 

Let me just share the most epic moment. We have this guy C in my group who refuses to be a pushover in all circumstances. 

One day when we were trying to cross the zebra crossing together, a taxi driver tried to cut our path and squeeze past us. C totally flared up and and did the most epic thing ever- he put on a haughty look, said "no, girl, no!" in ghetto accent along with left-right head isolations and strutted across the road while the taxi driver looked on in shock!! Don't most people just let the taxi pass in this case!!! Hahahaha..

Lol, I kept doing the "no, girl" thing to him for the rest of the time left there.

Now I have that hungover feeling that I get when something great ends. We weren't the most bonded group but I hate to think that we'll won't get to meet like we did for the past 2 weeks and brainstorm for our project. During the programme I couldn't wait for it to end (fancy waking up at 6.30 everyday? Haha) but now I miss em. How ironic ><

First outing of my holidays

Had a dance session at step studios with jingqi from 1-6pm for only $5! Super worth it. Got to learn styles like street jazz, exo's growl, contemporary, hip hop, hyuna's ice cream and waacking! Needless to say, the studio was filled with many of exo's Xiao Mei Mei fans and so we felt very old..

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Zixin, jingqi and I just burned a hole in our pockets.

We went to goki day Korean BBQ for our gathering and the bill came up to $29.60 per person!!!!! Goodness TT 

Food was quite standard but free drinks only included plain water =.= Ssiggek and 2D1N soju bang at least had flavored drinks. TT

Zixin was trying to convince the woman to give us a discount since we are still students and she said we were "saengsong" which is fish instead of "haksaeng" which is student LOLOL joke of the day.

Group pict!

Abrupt end since I reach my mrt stop already hoho

End of year 1 at ntu!

Hohoho I'm back, back baCK,BACK!!

-crickets chirping-

So overjoyed that exams are over. But as usual, this newfound freedoms is so strange. Like after some TV/YouTube, you mean I don't have to go back to studying? Hohoho. I don't know if I'll ever get used to being on "on-mode" every 3 months and holiday mode for the next 3 months. 

Anyway I keep getting reminded of something my IT groupmates said that's so hilarious!! Long back story coming up!

The last seminar before exams our prof let us try some excel questions that will be tested. (I feel that testing excel on paper is quite weird, like excel is meant for doing on comp where all the formulas are readily available. The computer will correct most of the errors in the formula. But in the exam we have to memorise formulas and remember the number of brackets to put etc... Quite tricky!)

So basically excel is about using formulas to do stuff on the data, like finding average, locating specific data etc.

Anyway, our prof asked us to print our data ourselves and work on developing the formulas as a group.

Somehow, the best person in excel in my group printed 2 slides per page and the rest of us printed 1 slides per page. As usual, we kept asking the pro guy how to do the questions.

After some bugging, he exclaimed, "YOU ALL PRINT SO BIG STILL BLUR THEN I PRINT SO SMALL HOW I KNOW!"

Lollllll!! Funniest thing we ever heard!! 2 slides in a page isn't even that small hahaha. Ok I dunno if I managed to describe it properly but it's really funny hoho. I keep recalling it and laughing to myself.

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Check out the waffle treat I got from dad after exams 

Woohoo holidays I'm all ready for you!

JDC 2014!

JDC was such a blast! Totally blown away.

Hoho selfie first!

Initially I was quite tired-out because of our intense training sessions that left me physically and mentally drained (the feeling of so much undone homework sucks!!)

And repeatedly landing knee-first on the ground that left this huge blue-black ouchhh. -Unglamorous picture- XD

But yesterday was so much fun!! We were told to be really smiley because of our concept "Fun and laughter" but I didn't even have to try. The vibe from fellow lockers was so powerful and the audience was amazing! I was just smiling and screaming and at the top of my lungs without me knowing!

Took so many selfies in the waiting room because we had 5+ hours to spare :O this is not all haha, rest shall be spammed on Facebook :)

Hehe check out the rose Jocelyn and xq gave me. Nice having my best friends and parents watching my first dance performance :)

Funny convo with Jocelyn after performance.

Jocelyn: Your skin looks good!

Angela: Nah, I put 3kg of makeup so that doesn't count.

Jocelyn: you should wear 3kg of makeup to school everyday!

-lol-

And before the performance in the waiting room everyone was getting really bored so the pro dancers started to cypher!! Cypher means everybody stands in a circle and take turns to go in and dance for awhile. I was like "oh man, shall not go out and embarrass myself among the pros." But Timothy pushed me out!!!! Ahhhh!!!!! Noooo!!!!

That was where creative writing phrases I taught my tutee felt quite applicable to me at that moment.

-A tingling sensation ran down my spine, and I was immobilized with terror.

-My heart pounded at an amazing speed.

-Beads of perspiration formed under my forehead and glistened under the fluorescent light.

TT.

Haha you get the idea. But bobian, with Tim's amazing force, I was flung into the center of the circle and was forced to dance a few scoobots and do a few points before retreating. Actually after it ended I was kinda glad I got pushed out! It's so terrifying yet weirdly fun at the same time. Hahahaha! 

And after that Marti came up with the idea of doing scoobots in a "soul train" down the whole aisle! So almost the whole of soul funky lined up and did consecutive scoobots and scooby doos till we were breathless.

Dancers really have really really high energy level! People I meet in business school are so calm and adult-ish but these people here are crazy, in a good way. :)

Immediately after performance we met back at the waiting room and watched our performance that somebody recorded for us. And we cheered on and on for ourselves lol. Everyone was just over the moon!

To conclude I really enjoyed my first performance with JDC locking segment! Felt slightly regretful that I couldn't do the awesome waacking/popping/fusion segments but this experience in locking itself already overflows, really happy!

National cashflow competition

National cashflow competition took place on Saturday and Jocelyn, Jingqi and I signed up as facilitators! Last time I would have hated going out on Saturdays but it feels really good to get together with friends through events :)

Haha posing with the cashflow board set.

I realize everytime I go out with Jocelyn I take more picture of her than myself. More like she Photobombs every picture haha.

Oh wait, what are the mice doing!

We made this lame joke. "You raise me up, so I can stand on your nose~" (to look at cheese =.=)

Facilitating cashflow competition is really mad! The first 3 rounds were still okay because everyone was relatively chill. But I had to explain the instructions slowly to those who were playing for the first few times. Rare sighting of people competing without knowing anything about the game hah. In any case, the introvert in me was getting exhausted hahaha.

But final round was insane!!! I would just wait for my co-facilitator to shout the paychecks I needed to give out and fling the money at the participant 0.0 no choice, by the time I flung the money there would already be 3 more people shouting for paycheck. TT

At last, a guy that was in jingqi's group on facilitator' training day won the first prize! MacBook Air! TT when we saw that we wished that we were the ones competing instead haha. There's always next year!!! MacBook Air be mine!! Haha

Jamming!

Finally I'm done with Accounting and Financial Management mid-terms! Can finally take a small breather from mugging. Even after intense studying I still found the paper quite hard :( 

Jq booked her hall's cultural room to practice on the piano for her recital that would be happening tomorrow. She, as always, was non-surprisingly chill about performing 0.o

After awhile we were joined by Thomas the piano genius who could play songs by ear (!!!). Wow

In the end we jammed and sang all the songs of frozen :) "let the storm rage ONNNNNNNNNNNNN!" Hahaha. 

After that Thomas solo-ed a little and jq and I started to pop along with the beat LOL

And pretended we won a lot of trophies :P

I suddenly remembered how much I used to enjoy jamming with my guitar ensemble friends! Haven't done it since I graduated from GE around 2 years back :( we just needed Jialing the guitar pro to be on the guitar and the rest of us would sing at the top of our lungs. Just like that, hours would fly by without us knowing.

I love it!! It's so therapeutic and stress relieving!

Recently I was asking myself what are things I enjoy in life (that is like 80 percent filled with school work/procrastinating school work), and I didn't know. But now I think I know the answer ^_^

Challenging life

Random blogspirtion (blogging inspiration)- I think uni kids have challenging lives.

I, for one, have something to be stressed about every moment since I entered sem 2 in nbs. Does this only apply to me (since I have high neuroticism)? 

These are what I'm stressed about: presentations (I think I have a presentation almost once a week), piano playing for church, tuition materials for my tutee, my own incomplete work, projects (accompanied by so many project meetings that really take up a lot of time) and spending enough time with my family and friends :(

I haven't even passed zx and bong the beef noodles that I bought for them from Taiwan like 1.5 months ago...

On Friday when my comms presentation ended, I heaved a sigh of relief (and quickly chucked everything I memorized out the window) but then quickly remember that I was playing piano for church on Sunday and was barely ready yet. Felt worried the whole of Saturday through my cousin's beautiful wedding, and couldn't even go for dance event with BFF at night. 

And now since piano has ended, I heave another sigh of relief. Was totally trembling just now! Not sure if it was my nerves or the air con... Luckily I asked my mum and she said the mistake I made wasn't obvious. 明明 when I practiced the piece it was okay. Oh well, shall try and try again! And uncle BH said that I was "steady". Always shocking to hear compliments >< when can I believe in myself?

The relief proved to be temporal because yet again I am reminded that recess week is here and I have a thousand things to catch up on. 

Mid terms haven't started but I'm craving for the holiday already. Haha but for now, imma watch 2 episodes of wgm while eating the Mac breakfast I just bought ^_^

Peter's ultra belated birthday

Since xiuqi wasn't able to come (weekend trip to Bangkok?!) and jingqi brought Thomas, a new group has been formed- Couple and peeps. 

We decided to celebrate Peter's birthday with him even though it was exactly 2 weeks belated... Totally didn't have time to meet and his present was about to sprout mushrooms anytime soon XP 

The meeting time was 7.15 at scape to play kinect but when Jocelyn finished her project discussion at 6.30, she decided to eat pizza cause she was too hungry =.= 

And it turned out that jingqi and Thomas were also at NTU also, which made for a super late gang. Poor Pete reached at 7.30pm, thinking he was the latest. But despite being late we still went to get mini heart-shaped cake and write a birthday card for Peter. Thomas drew a monster cat on the card but I forgot to take a picture... Haha.

We finally reached scape at 8.15 and had pasta mania together. Halfway through the dinner, somehow we were talking about hearts and something ticked in Thomas' head which made him say to Peter "You should read the card". Peter was like "Huh, what card?" 

-Dramatic pause while everyone held their breath-

Jq, Jocelyn and me just stared at him for the longest 3 seconds, waiting for him to save the day, which brought about the weirdest save ever- "I meant your EZ link card."

Lol everyone doubled over laughing.

Immediately Peter caught on and the secret was literally out of the bag- we had to sing birthday song immediately. 

After dinz we went to play the dancing and sports game at playnation. And I subsequently realized that I suck at leg games like soccer but not bad at hand games like boxing and javelin haha. We kept shouting and cheering for each other until voice hoarse =.=

Played until 12.30am and took cab home! I told jq and Jocelyn that we were living on the wild side of life but they thought this was nothing much =.= ok....

Really fun night though! I haven't laughed so much in a while ^_^

Happy CNY!!

Haha long time no blog because school has been quite crazy!

I love that my family had this tradition of cooking abalone porridge on new year day. It's totally delicious and most of us have second and third helpings!! 

Also we will always take a family portrait of our 20 plus people clan standing at the same positions every year! So funny to see how my brother became so huge and long-legged in a span of a few years and a new addition of my little niece in the picture. Too cute!

The stress of school doesn't evade me on CNY day. Even while visiting relatives I occasionally reminded myself "YOU HAVE 2 PRESENTATIONS NEXT WEEK". :0 haha, chill Angela chill. -hypnotize self-

Visiting has become quite sian ever since we became teens. Like we have to wait for adults talking and talking non-stop while the kids (still considered kids in the family haha) watch the super lame programmes on tv. Sobs where are all the good movies when you need them?!

Selfie with fav coussie!

Only when someone decides to play blackjack or 21!! Totally the highlight of CNY woo.

Going Malaysia to visit mummy's side of the family tmr. In preparation of the likely long waits while adults go on and on (as usual), I have already downloaded running man as entertainment for me and my bro. Victorybaby.jpg 

Happy new year!

IM A QUALIFIED DRIVER

Test center: BBDC

Warm up: 1.25

Test time: 2.45

Wee I finally did it!! After so long and after spending so much money, I finally passed on my third try!!

With each failure I felt upset and like a loser, but not anymore. To whoever who hasn't passed, I'm not a loser and you're not a loser. It's a matter of time. The wait makes the feeling of passing sweeter. :) Don't ever give up until you pass!

Just some insight I got:

1) select the timeslot around 10-11am or 2-3pm where there are lesser cars.

For my first try I noobly selected the first time slot, not knowing that it was the peak hour. Haha I'll admit that that was a total lack of common sense. And at the u-turn, I did a dangerous lane change (car beside me was going too fast for me to cut in safely) that caused me immediate failure. One of the instructors told me that someone passed without executing the u-turn because road conditions didn't permit it. So remember to confirm safety before lane change!! Don't do it dangerously like me.

2) don't let your nerves get the better of you. 

But that's real hard isn't it. How to not be nervous in a cold waiting room where everyone else is shaking their legs, rushing to the washroom and sighing super loudly haha. Good for people who have low neuroticism. 

For my second try my warm-up instructor scolded me once I switched on the engine because I didn't step on brake pedal. He was like "try one time already still don't know?" But I really didn't know leh, usually the instructors switch on the engine so I didn't take note. =.= I was on to a bad start and it didn't help that the tester's face was completely black. And I immediately struck the kerb when I exited s course. Following which I struck again at the parallel parking. Which costed me 20 point. =.= but another instructor says DONT GIVE UP even if you made any "fatal" mistakes. If overall you prove to be a safe and competent driver, especially on the road, he might overlook small mistakes!

Remember to do each of the stages real slowly and breathe! Don't let your nervousness impair your judgement.

3) don't be afraid of the tester. I've realized that most of them have this super stern and intimidating look, but just try to focus on driving. 

4) be determined. I was fortunate enough to meet an instructor during my revision who immediately knew I wasn't confident in my driving abilities. Haih, traumatized twice already. He spent like 20min (hog parallel parking lot haha) to tell me how I was sabotaging myself with my lack of confidence. "Don't try, just do," he said. 

Conditions were great too! Good weather conditions (bright and sunny), nice warm up instructor who told me repeatedly to calm down and nice tester.

Of course, praying a lot helped me too. My parents were anxiously praying for me at home too.

“Let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think.” Romans 12:2a (NLT)

"I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me" Philippians 4:13

Thank you God, you brought me through another hurdle :)

Post week 1

Can't believe that I just flew back on Monday. In a short span of a few days, I already gained so much knowledge! As usual, everything is brand new, and I'm experiencing total information overload man. At least it's interesting. "Wastage of intellectual capacity during holidays", as Jocelyn would say. Lols

But boy, the stress catches up so fast. Always rushing to finish homework sigh. Juggling driving too and also looking for a job. Hope I settle down soon.

And I crazily signed up for not only SF's Jdc (which is compulsory so nevermind), but I also signed up for fusion (which is the combined performance from all dance ccas in NTU) @.@ turns out that I'm the only person in my OG who signed up. Round of applause please. =.= 

Ntu sem 2

First day of school with 2 lectures! I'm pretty excited, lecturers are good!

Money flying away steadily since I needa buy my textbooks. Jocelyn worriedly handed me a pamphlet for employment during lecture. (￣▽￣)

Revelation after coming back from Taiwan: 

1) Singapore is so colorful and bright! In Taiwan the buildings aren't so colorful and it's not so sunny as well (winter)

2) the searing heat is killin me. Better than freezing though haha. Me and Jocelyn finally saw our bare limbs after a month lol

3) can throw toilet paper into toilet bowl!!! At Taiwan the toilet paper is thrown into a rubbish bin beside the toilet bowl so sometimes it stinks.

4) I unconsciously stand on the right side on the escalator now OTL hopefully driving is not affected

Aiesec winter explore day 40. LAST DAY

Hehe, blogging from plane again :)

Woke up at 5.50am today because not only did I have to DO my skincare, I had to PACK my skincare. Ah, the tedious quest for good skin. When will it pay off~~~

Anyways, I was super tired because I had to pack my huge luggage yesterday, occasionally body slamming it to ensure maximum compactness. And I did cards for my 3 host families too. Hands were totally NOT used to writing in Chinese and I had to type the words out on my phone before penning them down. -mental drain-

Went to school and tried to download movies that we can watch on the plane (Finally successful, but guess what? On the plane my laptop battery died halfway through when Akiyama was going to reveal his fabulous liar game strategy!!! Sorry Akiyama-kun... The tragedy). 

Suddenly, I was called to go class 102 cause the kids finished their exams and had nothing to do. So we danced to Singapore Town. With me in front alone TT Phina jiejie where are you TT But I'm glad the kids loved this activity. Like quite a few teachers/parents told me that their children look for the song on YouTube and dance to it! Become even more patriotic than Singaporeans already haha.

After that lesson, kids would come in periodically to give me cards and gifts :) so cute. The teachers would organize "draw-a-card-for-teacher-angela" activities since they had nothing to do after exams so I had many cards to bring home lol.

Went online to stars planner to see that all the indexes I wanted are all taken. Oh well, still hope school will be awesome next sem!

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When I was about to leave zhuren shouted to the whole staff room "Angela 要回新加坡了！” everyone started to wave to me. Awkwardly, I spiraled around 180 degrees waving back to everyone. Lol.

Went to airport early but our flight with scoot was delayed 45min due to turbulence. TT quite worried because I have 2 lectures tomorrow. Need sleeppppp.

We went to weigh our luggages and I realized that I exceeded the weight. So one of my hand carried bags of food had to go in- should it be pineapple tarts or beef Maggie? Since pineapple tarts were more ex, I decided to check in the Maggie. The counter lady said I could stick "fragile" on the bag and I was elated! Yay, there's a chance that my Maggie will not be manhandled. However, almost immediately, the luggage-loading man took my Maggie bag and landed it hard onto the conveyor belt!! I looked at Jocelyn but she was engrossed in the old man who had to drink up his whole bottle of medicine because there was an onboard restriction, yikes. :( and dear Maggie, I'm coming for you soon ok? Please survive the throws.

I guess this summarizes the day! Really excited to be going home. Almost seems like yesterday that we uncertainly stepped into the plane to Taiwan. So blessed and happy that everything worked out fine and we gained much valuable experience (cheesy but it's true). Who knew that we could have a whale of a time in a hostel that we chose and booked, following the itinerary that we planned and successfully make it to all our destinations (with much help from google maps lol). I'm sure my parents would be proud of me ^_^

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I've received so much kindness from the people here, more than I could ever imagine. Especially with my host families, they could have just given me the minimum food and accommodation that was in the contract, but they really went the extra mile to show me around, give me recommendations and treat me to the local food that I "must try" at Taiwan. About a month ago we were strangers, but they were so kind to me and helped me with every need. I'm thankful to Aiesec for allowing me to experience this. It's really eye-opening and I am truly humbled.

But of course I miss my home. The colorful painted buildings (somehow building are quite dull here), wearing tee and shorts, connectivity and transportation, my bed (your own bed is always the most comfy right?), knowing all parts of the country, eating with spoon and not just chopsticks, eating spicy food, most importantly, my family and friends. There is nowhere like home. Can't wait!

Aiesec winter explore day 39

Went to church in the morning!

Theme today was on love!

Pastor and his wife are so nice. Upon knowing that I would be flying back to Singapore tomorrow, they gave me a box of chiayi's local biscuits to bring back. (I'm so dead, currently have 3 hand-carried bags plus backpack)

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After that the geeky duo Angela and Jocelyn went to the national Taiwan science education center!

Photo with DNA~

Rolling beads to see Pythagoras theorem in action! a^2+b^2=c^2 anyone? ^_^

Selfie time cause we were tired again lol

Nice butterfly exhibits at the bug section. Poor Jocelyn was so afraid of seeing cockroaches lol

Bike with square wheels work well on curvy ground

Huge buggy at the lobby

Overall the center was quite okay, but many exhibits weren't working properly TT we didn't get a full experience of the museum but were still wowed many times haha. The awesomeness of science *_*

A must try is the 3D show where we put on 3D glasses and the seats could move! Spoiler: it shows a crazy trishaw ride where we travel along the Great Wall of china! Very realistic and fun!

Ok hasty end cause i need sleep! Flying home tomorrow!!! Yay!