Dear Dreams – Page 63

Late by a Minute

Last Saturday morning, right after midnight, my family went to the prata shop for supper. I loved suppering with them more than any other meals for everyone’s mood would be better at the late hour. Apart from that, we would only go to nearby places such as the prata shop or MacDonald’s to spend quality time together.

I woke up late. I was back to the very ridiculous sleeping habit since reservist period when I was trying hard to rush work at home until early morning.

The afternoon was tiring and my work efficiency was low. I dragged on until late evening before leaving the house for my jog. It was not a good day for any activity for my stomach gave me lots of problems. Sitting down too long on the chair had also weakened my knees. I began the jog in my half dying body but I was very amazed of myself for no matter how many problems I had before each jog, I would make it to my destination.

I did not have much rest at Marina Barrage this time for the sky was already dark upon reaching. The place was completely dark as well and I could hardly see any person with fair skin. I went to the toilet again and missed the bus to give it a head start. Knowing that in my condition, I was never able to complete with it but I even fell behind the next bus which arrived less than three minutes later.

My timing for the to and fro trips was longer than the previous time for around a minute. I felt uncomfortable to jog without the Polar watch to keep track of all my time, duration and heart rate.

Lao Yu Sheng

Last Friday, my gang and I went to “Bao Gong” at West Coast for lunch. It was quite a tight lunch for I had to rush back to campus for invigilation. Daniel’s moodiness was the main focus. We had “low hei” and followed by a few dishes to share.

I got back to campus to face my dread. I had never expected to be involved with such invigilation. Most of the students who attended the retest were people who tried to test the system. As usual, there were many stupid questions. Uploading the files to thumbdrive and FTP server were problematic due to the virus infection.

In the late afternoon, I stayed on to wait for Mingfa’s confirmation for volleyball. I was very tired but was willing to stay behind to enjoy the game after speaking to Mr Peh the night before about enjoying what we were doing. However, Mingfa’s reply dragged over 5pm and I felt so stupid to stay behind longer on a Friday evening when most of my colleagues were gone. I left after 5.30pm.

I’m using Windows

I’m using Windows, are you?

Back to Bukit Batok and Fun Volleyball

Thursday morning, I dragged on my feet to Bukit Batok again. My eyes were tired in the morning rush and when I reached Jurong East, I was stunned by a hot girl showing off more than half of her chest who stood two metres face to face from me by the side of the doors. I was too sleepy to enjoy the great sight. She alighted at the next station with me but I overtook her soon.

The morning’s work was draining. Magdalene sent me back to campus after that for lunch together with Joy, Eunice and Adrian in the canteen.

I had my early dinner with two sandwiches and iced milo. The office was stuffy after the air-conditioners were switched off and I stayed at the lobby outside the administration office for volleyball.

I set up the net almost all by myself. There was a weird guy who watched me do the job and until I finished exerting my wrist, he came over to offer help. The strings at the top were tied and tangled, and when I was trying to remove the small knot to ease everything, he stupidly suggested unwinding the metal bar, which was the toughest job – it showed that he did not set up the pole before. Later, he tried to ask me to warm up with him, I faked deaf. I realised my judgement was good as I asked around to realise he was a proud and lousy player.

Jinyang came down to join us. We had quite good game mixing around even though my team lost most of the games. I did better than usual despite having lack of sleep.

The rest of them were going off for supper but I chose to leave with Kachua since he would be passing by my house and I was lack of sleep.

First Day of Work After Reservist

The first day of work after the long reservist and festival break was better than any other day. Due to the cancellation of the morning lesson at Bukit Batok, I was pardoned from official work. Magdalene was cute in her cheongsam and I made her take photos with me.

I handed over the Polar watch to Mr Neo and I knew it would affect me quite badly in my future jogs.

Having lunch together with my usual clings was more cherished than before for I knew there was not many chances in future after March. We went to IMM’s Red Ginger and after that, Meihoe and I gave the fruit stall a second chance.

Weitat’s idea to get a “Choco Exotic” cake from the Four Leaves cake shop for Joy kept me entertained in the afternoon. It was great to make friends happy.

The downturn of the day was the cancellation of Bukit Timah Walk. Basically, most people had either forgotten or changed their minds.

Chinese New Year 2010

At first, I thought I could spend more time on my web development during the Chinese New Year festival, but it turned out that I had lesser time to do my own stuffs.

A day before New Year Eve, I had already spent quite some time sweeping the floor and cleaning the toilet. I did not expect my family to start doing spring cleaning on the New Year Eve itself. I could not help much since the items to be thrown were mainly my mum’s “treasure”, inclusive of all the branded unused containers, collected since before I was born. As for the shoes and bathroom’s stuffs, I had no idea who they belonged to. Later part of simple tasks caused me backache. Nevertheless, my brothers did very good job in making my mum dump many old stuffs.

After the reunion dinner, I struggled to do work until my family wanted to go to Chinatown at around 1am. It was a wrong choice to follow them for it was still too early for the big crowds to disperse and that the cheap goodies were not at the lowest prices yet. For the previous year, I would leave my house at around 3am. I got nothing in the end.

We visited my mum’s sister as usual on the first day of Chinese New Year. We bought MacDonald’s and dined over the house since we woke up late and did not want to further waste time taking lunch at the restaurant itself. Like the previous years, we were caught with visitors while we were eating. It was not an enjoyable trip since around ten years ago ever since my eldest uncle suffered from the unknown illness. It was only during Chinese New Year that my aunt would accept red packet from us and that explained why my “income” was lower than usual people’s during Chinese New Year. The topics they talked were dead boring and sad. It was more of the plans for my aunt’s future and mostly on the issue of the flat. A big joke was my mum’s second brother sending his son over during New Year Eve to show my aunt her “god daughter-in-law”, trying to hook up with my aunt obviously for the flat. The disgusting part was that this proud family would only visit my aunt once every year. Luckily, my aunt and my youngest uncle could at least recognise who were the relatives who had been treating them sincerely all these years.

We went to River Ang Bao at night as usual since my mum was determined to visit the big fortune god’s statue that would send tiny pieces of papers down as “gold” every interval. The floating platform’s event was run mostly by China people. It was boring except for all the costly big game machines. My only entertainment was looking at girls and I was stunned by two very “ang moh-ish” girls in their very delightful smiles and figures.

Second day of Chinese New Year was visiting to my uncle’s house where my main source of income came from. The location, structure of house and renovation was one of the most ideal I had ever seen. My uncle was the person who held the family together ever since my grandma passed away. All the food and preparation had certainly cost the couple a lot each year. However, it was sad to see him going out of the house to smoke every now and then; in fact, I did not witness it myself but my nose told everything. I loved playing with my nieces but they left earlier this year. I felt the pressure of not owning an iPhone for my brothers were busy with their games while I could not do my work, not even surfing net.

Friends for Now

Sometimes, it is useless to spend time talking to new friends because a few months later, they forget who you are.

A New Jogging Record from Marina Barrage

Last Tuesday, I finally made my trip down to Marina Barrage again after missing it for nearly two weeks. My target to jog for forty times this year was not on a safe margin yet.

Having been tortured by the awkward sleeping position on the chair during my reservist days, I was uncertain of my decision to make the trip down. Perseverance was perhaps one of my virtues. I started off with my lower back giving me the pains but I pushed on with my weak knees. I could feel myself slowing down at the beginning of the journey and I was basically dragging my feet after the finally T-junction separating Marina Barrage from Marina South Pier. Nevertheless, my timing was better than most of the trips.

It was a quiet evening. The usually long green snake kite was up there and it seemed to have conquered the other kites. I lay down by the side of the grass and tried to fix my phone as it could not save photos.

I took a long rest over there but my stomach ruled my mind and I could not wait any longer to race against the bus when the night hit 8pm. My return trip was tougher than usual but I managed to keep my speed consistent. I met the bus at the T-junction and it did not catch up with me given that it had to make a U-turn at the Barrage.

I was quite amazed of myself when I checked my timing at my finishing point – I made a new record again; moreover, it was a return trip after weakening my legs.

Reservist had Ended

My reservist was finally over on Thursday after they out-processed everyone, giving us a day off on Friday due to Chinese New Year.

The culture of the air base was way different from normal army’s camps, and everyone, regardless of ranks, basically showed respect to any small fry. I met many great and weird people. Conversations were most of the time pointless and nonsensical.

It was supposed to be two weeks of rest for me and also for me to ponder over the future; but somehow I did not make good use of the time.

There were some days that I was able to play table tennis, pool and table soccer. I was glad to be able to exercise so that I would not grow fatter like the rest of them.

I ate more than ever, taking my morning breakfast prepared by my mum, followed by my own breakfast in the camp. I was able to finish my lunch after that. It happened almost every day.

I spent the time at home editing my websites into late hours, and thus, I tried to spend my time sleeping in the day and afternoon, which I failed because of the noises. Sitting on the chair, trying to doze off, caused me bad aches after the long struggle. I had numbness caused by the prolonged position and my knees were badly affected.

The toughest thing to do was the travelling. I hated having to transit from train to bus and followed by the internal bus, which I could not afford to miss. Lunch was quite terrible except on the last second day, which was like of like western food.

The Toughest Battle to Fight is to Fight Alone

The toughest battle to fight is to fight alone. Different areas of focuses complete against prioritising and sudden inspirations emerge to fade off in the cruelty of time.

Why some people are able to absorb workloads and complete everything impressively?

I’m following the repeat telecast of the Legend of Bruce Lee because the determination of the hero is too inspiring.

Now, I refrain myself from saying the word “tired”, but I do not know how much I can accomplish.