fifty bucks to cheat.

i was paid 50 bucks to cheat, really... i thought of it as doing my friend darren a favour, and it turns out that he took up this 'job' to do his friend a favour... and the job? doing a sec. 1 boy's homework... for 2 hours...

in some sense i am lucky that i still remember how to do those sums and questions... it's math, so i am pretty familiar with it... but... well... you know... i can't help but feel bad about this...

just appealed for my special term subject... felt that something has to be up... because i didn't expect that i would warrant such a grade... well... done the review paper work and all... hope it goes through well... *cross fingers*

anyhow... the next few days are insane days for me... got to attend a wedding and dance practice right after, tomorrow... i have 2 bday parties to attend at night... i don't know how to go about it... sunday... well the whole day's gone really... and monday... got to head to sentosa to 'test out' the games as i would be an orientation leader for the vcf foc camp... *dreads* and head off for my anntic meeting right after... tuesday is the start of the camp... til friday afternoon... one whole week...

funny how this would have been a typical week for me in the past... but it sounds so unbearable now... :/

why do i plan my time so poorly???

haiz... i guess one can never been 100% in everything that he or she does... i need to go take a test for a provisional license and it's this month. so it's apparent that i have to practice alot more since i don't find myself too comfortable with what i have been seeing thus far...

i also wanted all along to get a grip on an internship during this time, if there ever was one available any time even now... there were few really good offers... but i can't apply for them... because i had committed my time to attending the vcf foc camp as well as planned meetings and theory tests and all during the course of the day... i thought that the hsbc internship would have been perfect, given that i love to present and there would be an overseas trip involved for meetings... of course it mightn't be that i would get it but at this time of the year, most people would have either been the midst of internships or found some other form of work... so i guess i would be at the advantage, had i freed up this time...

but i think to myself now... had i been in the midst of an internship, would i have sacrificed work for church work? the probability is less, though i did go for a retreat last year in the midst of my internship thanks to God's grace... but i had doubted the occurance. so why am i thinking of sacrificing my church work for work now? i can always be frugal and go out when necessary... to meet up and have meetings... or bake at home!

rationalisations. the bane of my life. the heights of human psychology.

bother.

btw, i baked foccacia bread the other day and c'est superb! baked butter cake last evening and it turned out perfect... me and my mom are having a roll man! hehe...

brazilian samba, ukrainian exhilaration, french class!

wow.. football has never been this exciting to me... well when the whole world is on either side for each match... i suppose it has never not been hyped, hasn't it? :)

the brazilians just charged through by the thread, and were lucky with the poorer finishing of the ghanians... the ukrainians didn't deserve to win honestly... but their ball striking abilities just outclassed the swiss by a little in the crucial penaly shootout... the french... they remind me of the last minute 'chiongers' who never performed during the less crucial exams and yet aced the important ones... i was shocked at their performance... they really stepped up...

hopefully, i can do one with my academics as well? *shrug*

had a good time with jessie, meeting up and having an 'honest' talk... i realised that though i never had any intentions to hide and deceive, sometimes it isn't just the intentions that drive one to cover up.... it's the root cause of perhaps not wanting to give up time to stay back and explain myself? building walls to protect and keep myself safe...

i don't know... but thank God I was completely honest and it quite baffled jessie... haha... I usually only am honest with a few people... and it's not those with whom I am closest to... but those whom I know will not condemn me for who I really am, are open, and those would take time to see past me and through what i say and the way that i say things... because i admit i can be quite an actress... and i don't even do it purposefully...

call it professionalism... but perhaps it's hard for me to psychologically segregate work and play... real heart-to-heart talks from opinions... arguments from stands... but hopefully and prayfully i will change and become more like whom God wants me to be...

and I really pray that God will show me the way to go... clearly... and that I will go the way God shows me to go... for others' understanding of my situation as well... I have always felt that I am responsible for what I have gotten myself into... i still feel so... after all in life, everyone makes mistakes... but the perfectionist in me expects myself to prempt everything in life and put everything right. it's stressing... the idea that i don't have to excell in everything that i do is just so distant and foreign. but i must input that idea.

matching toes and argentine luck.

i kinda injured my large toe whilst trying to trim my toe nails and it's really really swollen now... you know those moments when you simply want to rip off the nail instead of cutting it off? yeah... it happens... happened alot of times to me... and i still haven't learnt anything...

of course it can't be compared to someone's surgery done on a toe... goodness... i keep trying to imagine those times when i took my toes for granted... it finally dawned on me that my toes help me so much... in walking, running, jumping... and simply getting around...

the argentines got through, the mexicans weep and team ecuador has vowed to 'fry' the english...

we'll see we'll see...

swedish heartache!

when i saw the yellow and blue on the faces of the swedish supporters, i felt that i should root for the 'underdogs' due to germany's home advantage and of course, the fact that the swedish make such fantastic baked salmon and meatballs in sauce at ikea makes me all the more supportive?

but it wasn't to be... and like i said, some referees should be sacked, and the only reason why this referee shouldn't be given the boot is because there are worse referees out there in this world cup season... like that should be legitimate. hmph.

because of people like that, whom i doubt do not take in bribes, the game is tarnished and blemished with so much controversy... handballs are ignored, fouls are ignored in some and overly reacted to in others... yellow cards are handed out wrongly and red cards given after the yellow cards (which is right but they do it in other way around)...

talking about football players not being up to par to expectations and their abilities... we should also start 'hammering' the referees for such 'inappropriate' behaviour... this standard of refereeing should be done and over with... but then again, it makes shamsul maidin such a darling... and finally puts singapore on the global map for football albeit in an unusual fashion... :)

the next would be argentina against mexico... hm... well for all that my opinions are worth, i usually love the top seeds... but once they play under par, i hope for the cinderella story to come true for the underdogs...

but right now... i know i am overly concerned about soccer (which is rare) and making more comments than i usually would... i haven't been concerned too much with the looks of the players (though my younger sister has started to notice miroslav klose)...

weird.

i still love gerrard though. :)

in a world where tough isn't tough, and soft isn't soft...

what does it really mean to be a tough woman in the 'real world' out there? (as if the world isn't real enough to us)

is it showing only the strengths and never the weaknesses? being demanding yet commanding respect? being tough-minded and completely objective? it can be many things, but toughness can also be used to describe taking the road less traveled...

where everyone is acting the above as stated, being 'tough' in the world's sense of things, perhaps the one who's tough is really the one who dares to do the unexpected and shunned.... being soft. so perhaps being soft isn't really being soft... but ironically, it's being tough.

i was just thinking to myself... and when i do i start thinking of absurd things... like how a single word can mean so differently... and i am not just talking about the obvious, like 'match' in the word 'matchstick' or a 'football match'... but a simple 'sure' can be taken with different connotations...

i don't think i am such a politically correct person, because that would make me more guarded with my words and the like... (and i simply blurt out alot of things... ) but i tend to think that i am a person who likes to ponder alot... and study human relations and reactions... because i don't think i have much of an emotional side to talk about... so i look at my outside world to gain some form of inspiration to understand myself...

am slowly reverting to the lazy me... the me who waits till the last minute to do her work or study... maybe that studying method would suit me better... since i have always been successful at that... but you never know.... perhaps times have changed and the people around me are much more competitive... the variables have changed and so the predictions and hypothesis need to be adjusted to reflect such changes in the environment...

doing nothing has never been more of a blessing... i used to abhor not doing anything constructive... i now enjoy not doing much productively... but much enjoyably... baking, reading, writing, thinking, sleeping, sports, meeting up with people... ok so maybe it isn't nothing... i don't think i can do nothing... perhaps just some adjustments to activities?

but the lull period has come... the world cup is taking over my world... and i have come to a point of stoppage time in my life... the world can keep going... i need to watch soccer.

what men's minds can conceive can happen inevitably...

so it's important to make sure that everything that you think of is guarded and wholesome... otherwise, you'll let your subsconscious minds play you in... and you won't even know where you've been until you're in the ruddy gut...

on a lighter note, baked fatt kueh with my mom yesterday and it was so so fun! or rather, eating it was fun... *laughs*

i'm greedy.

i packed the horrendous room!

i spent the whole day packing up the remains of the enormous pile of books and things in my cupboards ('remains' referring to the very much reduced pile of things after dumping like a hundred tons of rubbish away)... it was tiring... very tiring... thought i would have wanted to cool down with a swim, but the weather does this to me again... everytime i want to, it doesn't let me. so i shan't and be a good girl and stay indoors... *bother*

my room looks very much improved! if you consider the fact that i used not to be able to see half of my bed and the whole of my table!

the clothes cabinet is next... but i hadn't the heart to... i thought i had just packed it lately? *wonders*

maybe 'lately' is really 'not very recently'... *sheepish smile*

noble novel-addiction?

i tend to think that there is no noble addiction, and that extremities are in general, horrid and should be avoided at all costs...

but is a book addiction all that bad? i used to think that anything that resembles academia is anything that would be legitimate... and never, ever be seen as any form of bad influence...

so though my body and mind wants to keep masticating the books i now seem to borrow more occasionally from the school's library, my instincts tell me that anything in excess is never the best thing... just like in the case of too much video games, too much eating - gorging, too much reading makes one a dull and homely-sort-of-sick girl, etc etc etc...

and too much sports takes the fun out of it and the cartilege from my knees...

too much is never good.

so why am i having so much good food to eat lately?

vomit.

it's amazing how vomitting can be likened to taking a paper...

i think all of us must have some idea of the irkling feeling that vomitting gives to everyone... and it's the churning of the stomach to the sour taste one has whenever one feels like puking... honestly it's very much like over-stuffing your brains with info for the exams and the subsequent sick feeling in the head... similarly one is unable to perform normal brain functions during the exams due to the fact that the 'clog' must come out...

and then after your relieve of the 'clog'... relief effectually!

but here am i actually relieving myself of emotional clogs... because i didn't regurgitate as much as i would have liked... never really had this feeling before... i usually always vomit everything i know out... to gain some sympathy points here and there in places which i might have lacked...

but here ends the classes! and here starts the catching up (continuation) and going out... meeting old friends who just came back from overseas and those going overseas...

yesterday's tennis was magnifique! played with uncle richard and apparently watching the tennis opens have made me into a crafty player who takes shots to amplify the little prowess within and tire the other... sheesh... haha... it's shots that people take when they ain't too good... *luffs*

swishing thoughts.

i never knew that a lack of brain usage for merely a while would tend to corrode one's ability to think, analyse, comprehend and memorize so much... but maybe it's the myriad of topics and readings... maybe it's just too much? or maybe i am just plain not-so-smart... or maybe i have to be selective and 'study smart'... thing is... i never have intended to 'study smart'... which is an irony because most would think that alot of people who have gotten into uni do so by studying smart... but i tend to study what i like, and not study what i don't like... i can have this enormous passion for a certain subject, and read all about it through external readings and neglect another.... rather completely... until the time calls for some responsibility of at least glancing through the text...

i cannot seem to be able to think of what i would write there and then on my exam paper... usually with arts subjects i tend to have a really good idea of what to write and how to write the essaies... now i am at a loss... i never studied last minute before as well... ok so maybe it's not so last minute... but i never really liked studying such that i would have just been done exactly with studying by the time the paper starts... *shudder*

ok maybe by the time night falls for me to retire to sleep for the next day's paper...

i technically have not much time to 'waste around'... tomorrow would be last few hours... and the thorn would be removed from my flesh... it's irritating to have this one throbbing thing sticking itself into your skin... when you know you could be reading, enjoying your time... and having more nothingness...

but tennis is on tomorrow with uncle richard... cool. i haven't had a swipe at the ball for what seems to me like ages... when the fact is i can't really find kakis to play with...

the one i thought i could count on to play with a few months back injured his neck and his kaki injured his elbow... oh injuries...

don't mind my incoherence... i am but a babbling little girl who knows not what to say... for now...

oh and the world cup has been so fantastic so far.... though not for the reasons i had thought... i actually like the game! not just the cute players! *amazed*

what if the person you can't stand is yourself?

am reading a book called "dealing with people you can't stand" and the ironic thing is that the more I read, the more I realise that I need to learn how to deal with people i can't stand- people like me. (yes yes I know I am taking to reading yet again)

kinda woke up early in the morning... I don't know why... the whole body clock is going haywire and I have no explanation except that I woke up really early sat morning to go climb bukit timah with my family and some church uncles and aunties and their families...

The more exciting thing has been the world cup of course! though for the match between england and paraguay, i felt that the mexican referee had been bribed or sth... perhaps i feel this way because gerrard was down and given a yellow card with the beanpole crouch warned mutiple times... and the lack of fairplay that didn't seem to 'warrant' fair assessment of the moves on court by the referees...

everything has been an all time low... every activity... suppose it would be for the next month or so... *shrug* I hate to have to be studying for my exam this coming friday... I haven't started.

ops i did it again...

i read another book... argh. this habit has got to go... The Tapestries by Kien Nguyen is a rather moving and tragic book that reminded me alot of the scripts on channel 8 which depict old china... since the vietnamese were previously known as cochin chinese i guess the chinese culture extended to them as well...

it's a rather poignant tale that moved me but not so much as to bring me to tears... i suppose that one sad story after another does nothing to the soul... yet i find myself a little happier these days.. perhaps constant contrast between others' plights and my own would bring me to realisation of the blessed life i actually have...

and i read this whole book in like 4 hours... goodness...

been feeling like such a slob today... doing nothing but watching the telly with tennis players playing their guts out whilst i munch in front of the telly... it's utterly disgusting and i am disgusted with myself... well it's just for a day but i feel like a slug already...

no the fact that i read a book doesn't comfort me... but the fact that i now have no more books that i find interesting to consume is elation to me... because finally, the next time i want to read something, i would turn to my lecture notes and study... *cross fingers*

i didn't know how important it was that win took my article and said he liked it... i was pondering over the lack of spice and fuel into the whole article.. how listless i sounded and pointless i became... when ironically, i was trying to get my idea across in a more systematic way so that my point is taken across... but in that i lost myself... so i took it back and 'sophied' it a little... like he said... haha... hope that it works... for everyone else... but i sighed relief when he actually found it interesting...

been chasing people for work... i admit that this is rather taxing and i don't know how else to approach people to do some stuff for me without trying to sound too diplomatic... i just hope i appear friendly enough not to become a target for stoning...

class is on tomorrow and exco meeting as well... can't go play golf with my parents in the morning because i hadn't gotten that silly PC... i didn't know it was that disappointing for me until i got grumpy when my mom kept mentioning they were going to play... haha... now i know... and realise...

meanwhile... least it's something for me to do tomorrow and woo hoo we would be going to eat some seafood on friday.. can't wait! am trying not to think of the amount of exercise i would have to do to counter the fats... :(

stomach's rumbling...

and it rumbles when i have just eatened to the very brim... i wonder what that could mean for me...

:/

anyway, these few days of isolation from blogging has been a little therapeutic i must say... for once i didn't feel that i needed to 'report' to anyone... yet there was this nagging 'need' to blog... i am glad i now feel that i should blog whenever i feel like it and not when i don't... it's amazing how something so elementary would be able to grip my mind like a little vice you never noticed until you took the time off to view yourself in the mirror...

as it is... i have just swallowed the book by Darin Strauss of Chang and Eng and found it most amusing and interesting... the characterisation of Chang and Eng is humourous and the feelings so directly and purposefully discussed to give the characterisation as such was amazing... it was easy reading, easy to the eye, yet deep to the soul... justin said it would have been a heavy book to read... i suppose he meant the afterthoughts one has after reading such intensity of emotions...

in any case... there is this nasty habit of mine of reading other sorts of books rather than what i should- my exam material during the exam period... the exam's next week and i hadn't muster up enough sense to look through my exam material... maybe that accounts for my lack of performance.

oh well...

if it's a bad habit i should kick it... but somehow deep inside my mind the argument that i am merely reading something for interest' sake and not doing any mental harm to myself through the use of video games and all is brewing... but perhaps it injures my senses-to want to do a little better than i could... that reasoning should do the trick.