summer has come and past,
the innocent can never last,
wake me up when september ends.

school's out. Just like that, the first semester of university turned on its heel and sped into the past. I wish i had more time. I wish i was more prepared. I wish i could do more. But time has its limits, there's only 24hours in a day afterall. You fight like crazy to stay afloat in this storm ravaged sea and after all that has been said and done, what's left is only hope and prayers.

University...not quite what i've expected it to be. Too much responsibility. Too much expectations. Too much self-reliance. I'd be the first to admit i'm not the poster child of an independant strong individual. But hey, we all learn and cope in time. It befundles me how some, even amidst fun and games, still manage to score well. Does it truly boil down to 'smarts'. Having spend four months in our local institution, I'd say the answer is probably yes. In secondary school, even in junior college, there'd always be the 'dai(1) che(1) wei(3)"s. The equivalent of slackers and cushion-at-the -bottoms. So even when you're not putting in your 100% its ok, as awful as that makes me sound. But at university level, its a whole different ball game. When everyone is THIS hardworking, its hard fought not to panic a little. Whats unfortunate is that when everyone is on the same par in terms of hardwork, it all boils down to intellect. Who absorbs the most? Who understands the quickest? Who adapts the fastest? Its really an exemplery manifestation of darwin's theory of evolution - The strongest survive. As simple as that. As one of my more well-learned friends endearingly said, its hard to be on top when everyone here are 'long(2) de(4) chuan(2) ren(2)' which bluntly translates to the descendants of dragons. You'd soon notice frequent injections of chinese phrases and that's probably cause of the current environment i'm in and that's alright i guess. I just hope my english standards don't slide too much.

I won't deny that i do have doubts about my place in engineering. Its an awful place to be for one who isn't equipped with the 'smarts' to survive. Each step is an uphill battle and throughout the whole semester, there was a lingering thought that perhaps I belong somewhere else. Of where I can't be certain. A part of me leans toward the arts like a sunflower drawn to the sun but hey I'm no big fan of 10000word essays though i think i can probably hold my own in terms of writing. At this point, i just dont know.

Lamentations. Its all a load of crap. cest la vie.

something i dreamed up in the quiet of the night, lying on my bed trying to catch some sleep. nothing much really, just random jibberish

Insomniacs

thump thump its in my head
the sound of thunder
the walls are breathing
an audible sighh..
the night's pass young

a deep black void
i close my eyes
i hear it, yes
the sound of fear
sleep eludes me

a point of contact
i take the leap
i said hi and you said sleep
did you know?
fear has a heartbeat

i'm on my feet
running, falling, dancing, creeping
hands reaching
grasping for a tale
a dream.

A Dream, A Dream
one half full and the other half empty
make it one and alas,
its just a full empty scheme

oh dear old fear!
you're never too far.
a strand of thought,
a battle i fought
a lie i bought
a dream i sought
a scar within the recesses

Insomniacs,
thats just who we are

My bounty is as boundless as the sea,
My love as deep; the more I give to thee,
The more I have, for both are infinite.
-Juliet



Reading Romeo and Juliet seems to have caused an inner stirring of emotions. It's unfathomable how some can entirely disregard their emotions and live everyday devoid of it. To each their own seems to me, more an excuse than an answer. I confess, I'm rather idealistic when it comes to romance. Don't we all have a thought to our own interpretation of love? Some adopt a more practical approach, others methodical; and even still some prefer to ignore it entirely. I do worry at times, when i ponder about the imminent future, this vision of loneliness and solitude that surrounds me. Is this version of a future probable? yes, because not everyone gets to have a go at this thing called love. The white picket fence is but a dream for some. I do not pretend not to worry for as a wise friend once told me; partners(and later, even more so family) will always come before friends and as we trek towards that future, friends will invariably devote much of their time to other more pressing causes than you. And hereafter, lies my worry.

For thy lovebird beckons within; trapped and starved of its staple food.
Oh how illusive art thee; so wherefore art thou, love?

So I haven't been updating this musky old blog for some time. Inspiration doesn't always hit and when it does I'm always in the middle of doing something. And when I finally get to it, I find it too has deserted me. Leaving behind traces of thoughts, like the whiff of a lover's worn perfume, that which strings together an incoherent, disconcerting mess, leaving much to be desired. So i end up saving it in my computer, those half-written proses decaying in the bits and bytes of my hard drive. Maybe someday, they might survive to see the light of the world wide web.

Inspiration, for me, is like a hummingbird high on redbull. Thoughts process at impossibly fast paces, darting in and out of focus. One moment it's on the surface, the next its lost in the recesses of my thoughts. And its almost always involuntary, there is no control as to when and how to retrieve them. Quite unlike hard facts, which is stored in tidy cabinets ready to be examined. Which is why I don't much fancy the arts students with their knee-high readings to complete each week, and their 10k word essays to submit, all at the whim of their wits and inspiration.

Words seem to be spilling out of my mind as my fingers dabble away on the keyboard now that the silence has been broken. But enough for now, there is more come morrow.

100 years - Five for Fighting

15 there's still time for you.
Time to buy and time to choose.

One of the songs that has always struck a personal chord with me since I'm always lamenting about how time and tide waits for no man. I wish I could buy more time - time to choose my options; time to figure out what I want in life before it runs out on me. We've all been 15; all had our fair share of time to decide on our interest and direction in life. As we approach our quarter-lifes, I believe we will soon find that the luxury of time isn't in our court anymore and that it is time to make our choice. I just hope that when I reach mid-life, I would be able to look back and say to myself: that 'yes, I made the right decision.' Don't we all?

On the same note of making choices, a dillema has been passed into my court as of late. A choice between pursuing a degree of (almost)interest or one of practicality. Though I severely suspect I'm the first Singaporean to have been presented this dillema in light of the academic stigma which plagues our youths living in this development-centric society we call our home. Singapore or its people and government, has always prided itself on its pragmatism. To look pass the clutter and focus on what is practical, that which would aid Singapore to develop and stay in the forefront of the world stage. It is afterall, a founding quality of our forefathers and what got us to where we are today. It is in the pledge we recite "so as to achieve happiness, prosperity and progress for our nation." and ultimately, imbibed in the young minds of the generation that has and will, in the future, take over the works of our forefathers. Ironically, happiness is lumped together with(and even placed in front of) prosperity and progress for our nation; a quality I feel that has taken a backseat 'in the best interest of Singapore'. Perhaps our forefathers saw the imminent threat and problem that may arise and deliberately placed the qualities together. Afterall, who likes to think of themselves as tools in the grand scheme of things. I may have come off slightly cynical, but I meant no disrespect or illwill. There is no shame in pursuing one's interest, the government's that is. No matter, it is of one's own choice to decide our own future. No one is pointing a gun into the back of our heads to force us into a decision though quite literally, it feels like that's the case; a do-or-die sort of mentality.

I just wish I had a clearer solution in mind. One that would encompass the best of both worlds. Alas, a decision has to be made at the end of May and honestly, if you asked me, an option is better than none. Make no mistake that I thank God for delivering this miracle right into my life.

It is said that National Service turns boys into men. From this sweeping statement one would naturally assume that the experience and lessons one learns from the army is the driving force behind this radical change in one's personality. While I did personally feel a change in my psyche; in the way i think and process information and the world around me, I will not hasten to jump to any unfounded conclusions as to attribute this change solely to my 2-year Army stint. Alas, the experience I recieved during NS, albeit valuable, had as much effect on my general psyche as would a lesson on NE. Then again, I would not have given up on any one piece of experience I have had. It is, in the least, a memory to treasure and store along life's journey. That, however, isn't the point of this post, the point that I wish to make known is that what I believe to be the driving force behind this change in my personality could quite possibly be attributed to the development of rational thinking and the harsh decisions that were forcefully placed on my path to consider.

As adolescents in our early stage of life, we lack rational thinking. That's why kids are that much easier to trick, that much easier to convince, and that much easier to satisfy. In a sense, it is what innocence is made of. I guess it is partly why in the court of law, kids are sentenced to juvenile detention instead of a jail term. Kids lack rational thinking and thus, are easily suayed by peer pressure or a negative adult influence, into doing things that does not necessarily born form their own intentions. Thus far, it is my belief that we reach that maturity, when the development of the part of our brain that governs rational thinking comes into its peak, at around the time we are serving NS. The evidence of that is subtle but in abundance. For one, isn't it true that we have started questioning ourselves about everyday life experiences more so than before? And found indelibly, that we grow more dissatisfied with life each time around. Life, in our own context, may not have deprove that significantly to warrant such a radical change but yet these feelings are undeniably real. My only conclusion is that if life didn't change, then we did. Of course, this is just an assumption made by me. There is no statistics to prove like-or-otherwise.

The other factor has more to do with our immediate environment than the former. As a typical Singaporean youth, I would approximate the age one has to start making, or finally realises one is making life changing decisions for oneself to be his early twenties. This is the period that one's future prospect becomes not a distant dream but an imminent lifeline. Reality has caught up with our dreams whether we like it or not. This is the time we begin seriously examining our options with fear and anxiety; the time we chart our route in life, and the time procrastination reaches a dead end. Here on out, we face multiple crossroads, ups and downs, success and failure, hope and regret all driven by the decisions we make in everyday life. If the past 20 years of our life is the run-down to the edge of the cliff then the only step left is to take that leap of faith off the cliff. Whether we soar high above or fall down below is really up to one's aptitude and that I believe is what turns boys into men. Or for that matter, a child into an adult.

same image taken a few minutes apart,
sunset and twilight

the former. A glowing hue of silver illuminating the last few minutes of daylight as the earth, commited to its age-defined tradition, pulls away from the warmth glow of the sun.

the latter. An iridescent paintjob of an artist-by-day who had only a few seconds left to showcase his work-of-art. As the last rays of light manage to hit the horizon, a golden hue is splashed across fine lines.

Watching the last light fall beneath the horizon, it struck me how such a drastic change can occur in such deathly silence and better yet, goes unnoticed. Even for the onlooker, it wasn't something I would have saw immediately if not for the photo evidence. Like the draw of a sunflower to the light or the widening petals of a morning glory at dawn, the phase from sunset to twilight or even the drift of a relationship occur at relatively unnoticeable degrees. Which goes to show we should take notice of the little things that happen in our lifes before it is too late; when the change is done and you are left with a gaping hole, wondering when the hole was dug and how it went by unnoticed.

5months after ORD; and yet again, i ponder.

ORD spelled freedom for most, if not all of us. But it brought forth yet another aspect of life - work. For the next 8months, while we await anxiously for the forthcoming of the 'big day' we return to school and once more don our thinking caps, most would invariably have a brief interception in the world we would come to know as 'the workforce'. While most of my peers chose to dabble with a more, shall i hazard to say, 'respectable' work(i.e. teaching, administratives in banks, offices, MNCs) , I however landed myself in the service sector where dealing with ill-mannered collegues and customers seem to be the order of the day. So why exactly did I choose this path for myself? Unfortunately, I cannot seem to arrive at a satisfactory enough reply to even answer myself. Perhaps, it had something to do with self-worth. Or it could quite simply have been my sloth getting the better of me. In any case, I am now bounded by contract which I fear to break in view of undue criticism. Somehow, I got myself into a situation which I detest more than any the Army had presented me. Funny how things work out. BUT...
In the spirit of triump through adversity, I shall persevere!
In the spirit of optimism, I shall learn something out of this horrible experience.
And as a prelude, this is what I have learnt about myself;

I, for the love of God, absolutely CANNOT multi-task. It is simply not an available function in my brain. The system is pathologically flawed!! I cannot do anything about it. When orders are coming in left, right and center, the only thing I can do is block out the wayward commands and focus solely on the one directly in front to keep from getting overwhelmed. The situation is THAT dire. And perhaps its for the same reason I cannot play sports like soccer and basketball where being aware of your surroundings is a requirement while you dribble away with the ball. Often, I find myself too engrossed in managing the ball I forget that people are closing in, both opponents and teammates. The next thing I know, the ball goes missing. If I am not made to multi-task then who am I to debase that. I rest my case.

I abhor the accusing finger directed at me. In other words, I hate to be wrong. Though to err is only human, I would be the first to graciously admit that I make mistakes on a regular basis. At times I find myself rising in self-indignation (my temper momentarily uncontrollable) to the accusations, more so if they were groundless ones. I would then proceed to dish out excuses(to myself) to soothe my guilt. But today, it occurred to me the importance of humility in accepting one's shortcomings. Learning is the gaining of wisdom through understanding. Only then can we set the stage for improving. That is not to say it is an easy feat since understanding does not necessarily equate improving(though it definitely sets a good foundation for other things to be built upon it). Because we do not live in a vacuum, so many other factors have to be brought into consideration; one's perseverance and negative externalities to name a few. But that is a whole different story unto itself and I reckon I've managed to bore most by now. So I shall spare most the pain of hearing me regurgitate yet another point of mine.
In the end, the jury is still out on this case. We can only wait and see.

Again, these are just my two pennies worth. You are welcome to disagree.