I’m waiting in the bus interchange cause I came out too early today. Lol. Later take the bus 96 to nus for another project, hr2002, which I haven’t been putting effort on.

Recently am busy with ee3001 which is my technical project. I have been doing the marketing part with koko. Just yesterday we got stunned by the prof during consultation. He totally did not understand what our project was abt. He kept giving us this look of disbelief like we are some idiots who don’t know how to guage if our business proposal is gg to work. He told us to keep it within the room, and that we are going to die if we had continued. Guess what, after some explanation, he got it and kept saying it’s ok. He even tried to save his face later on. Come on, this is a great team you know. Wee howe is amazing with his knowledge, yanling’s very organized, and I have my great team with me.

Luckily itwas still approved, but we still had to do a lot of work now. We have to get our parts ready soon. Saturday we are going to have to vet through each other’s part and ask questions. Then the remaining week is for us to correct all mistakes and submit the final paper.

And hr2002′s project is due soon and I only just started working. Thank goodness for great people in my team especially Nelson and Taiman who understands that I am very busy with ee3001 in the past week. Haha. So I think they gave me a lighter workload for hr2002.

Shall go off now. Hope life is great for all of you today. I’m feeling great now cause I just put down a huge stone. All the unhappiness has been put down already. Thanks.

Today is the big day of a good friend and man, Royston. We knew each other in Army when we were section commander and man. He was my first Law in Alpha Platoon 1, Section 1, and together with Jeremy, the three of us was Group 1 in the section. I remember the times when I was a harsh section commander, being really anal about everything when they were in BMT.

I remember the transition to being a Guardsmen was a trying period for me. Even though they were the ones who were physically and mentally pushed to their limits, I had to readapt to the idea that I stopped being a trainer training recruits. I am now their commander, and believe me, it was a hard time changing from vulgarities spewing, above all trainer to care for soldier and my man is my man section commander.

But I made it in the end, with the assistance of my PS and my fellow section commanders. We changed from being God and man to being commander and man. I recall the nights we spend together in the men’s bunk, eating instant noodles and talking nonsense. And laughing. The sense of bond you have with these guys are something precious that cannot be looked down upon.

I remember talking to Royston on some nights, chatting about his leg injury and how it will hurt during training. Especially when we are outfield. I remember the conversation we had about potentially downgrading, and I can still remember him telling me that he will push on. At that moment I could feel this bond between us. It’s like I can feel he knows I would care for him and help him because I am his section commander. And he will push himself and overcome his pain because he wants to remain with the rest of us.

At that moment, in the middle of NS, we became friends. Most section commanders do not really manage to go into the friends level. Some just do their duty and tour as a section commander, and then leave. But I am happy to have touched a few of their lives and remained as friends.

When I orded, we still kept in touch on MSN, and sometimes we talk on the phone. I remember the times I spoke to my section whilst I was a civilian and they were still soldiers. I remember attending their ORD parade. It all feels just so recent to me. When I orded, we were friends. No longer section commander and man. Even for reservist, when I was Platoon Sergeant, it was not commander and man. We were friends who will take care of each other.

It was especially a touching moment to get invited by your man for his own wedding. It is like a sign of affirmation of a job well done during NS, because he considered me as a friend enough to invite me to his own wedding party. As I sat there in the room, watching whilst he said “I do” to his wife, and her to him, I felt truly happy and proud. Here is my friend and man, getting married and starting his own family. And here I am, watching and looking on as he embarked on his new journey with his wife.

And it all felt worth it. I am still touched, and I cannot describe the happiness I feel inside me. Royston is the first friend I had to get married. He will be 27 this year. He is 3 years older than me. When he was in NS having that talk with me, he was 23. I’m 23 now, going to 24, and now I’m at that age he was in. Maybe one day when I find the person I want to live the rest of my life with, I’ll invite him to my wedding, and there he will be sitting amongst the audience, feeling proud because his friend and buddy is also embarking on a new journey.

To Royston and his wife, a happy marriage.

To National Service, friends, and brothers.

Today was a good day at work. In the morning when I left for work, I met Jing Han at the bus stop. She was heading out for work at MFA, and today she is out half an hour earlier because she had to reach half an hour earlier due to some event. On such a rare occasion, I actually got to meet her. The bus stop right outside my house! We spoke about my work, about her work, about graduation, internships. And she says she is old. We’re like the same age!!!

But it was a very nice conversation and it lasted all the way till I alighted at queenstown cause she’s going to redhill. I guess we’re working quite near too.

The day started off pleasant, and work proceeded well too. I had things to do for the entire duration. I was never bored waiting for things to come to me. I didn’t have time to brainstorm about what to write for my marketing proposal. It was a great day because I hated having nothing to do.

Lunch was also great because I didn’t eat alone. I ate with my colleagues, so I wasn’t bored the entire day.

Anyway at home I had to resume my work on marketing. I am slightly burnt out and tired, so I ended up watching some drama. I haven’t watched drama since Saturday! It is always typing and typing and trying to come up with more things and asking for price quotes and stuff. I can’t wait for the sem to be over. Like seriously.

I’ll resume typing and typing on Thursday. I wonder when this will all end.

Nothing to blog. My life’s pretty boring.

ほんとに　忙しいです。

This period of time is overwhelming. It’s a really sick period of time that made me wonder, who the hell thought of combining Industrial Attachment with two other modules? I wonder if EE3001 has been handled well by the department of electrical and computer engineering. In a way I seem to meet the prof once every two weeks, and everytime he sees us he says good. And it lasts about 20 minutes max? There was once we were out in about 5. I wonder what kind of guidance the prof gave us. Or are we that good? I highly doubt so.

With Mazin’s group only getting approval recently, as compared to us getting it quite some weeks ago, I wonder how she is going to survive. Even I feel tired. Just yesterday we presented the technical details to the professor. We got quotes and prices and we were about to tell him the price of each item, but he just simply asked us the final price of each mat. Swee la professor. Really like that cause the details doesn’t matter. But it just cut shorts the meeting timing. Was wondering if he could have given us something to think about.

Since our final report is due in a few weeks time, we have split into the three departments, technical department, finance department as well as the marketing department, of which its Marketing Manager is yours truly. Would have really loved to call myself Marketing Director but hey my boss is a Project Manager, so I can’t up myself. He should have called himself CEO or something. As Marketing Manager (self professed, just for fun), I have Ko Ko as my marketing executive. I’m sorry for making her my subordinate, though it is a just for fun thing. At least I gave it a cool sounding name. Executive! Wow. I asked for my pay, its about 4,500? Think I can get a phantom car soon. Asked for fake car allowances and perks, the finance manager says she’ll think about it. Well, it’s good we’re having fun to regain our sanity.

As Marketing Manager, or rather, just in the marketing department, my role is to set up the report on all things marketing. That’s the report role actually. The real purpose of the marketing department is to brainstorm and think of how we’re going to market and position our product to the world. That’s right, to the world. We supposedly belonged to “Activision Blizzard”, yes, we “make” those Warcraft, Diablo and Starcraft games. Supposedly.

Marketing’s an awfully exciting new journey for me. I would have loved to have time for myself to read more marketing books and how major firms do their marketing. But time is not on my side. I’m going to leverage on the books I have read in the past, ideas I have gotten from reading those blogs, and my experience in Internet Marketing to push this thing through. Oh ya. As well as MKT1001′s experience.

But it’s making my life busy. Just yesterday I finished my work at midnight because I needed to rest, not because I finished the entire thing. Already got quite a lot of stuff out, but I need to start asking for quotes and finding venues and event managing companies. Money money money. Need to present a report to the other departments on Saturday and submit the costs preferably by Saturday as well so that the finance department need not do last minute work trying to incorporate all the costs in. Busy! The life of a marketing manager. LOL.

But it is really fun. Sometimes its a little weird how you feel happy when you are busy and you have deadlines to hit. Sounds crazy I know. Some people probably roll their eyes. I think I got this problem ever since I entered the army. During that day in GCC where we were happy to get tekaned by the 5 min PT kit and then 5 min FBO and loop until CSM is tired. We all laughed and had fun. Maybe this is how we deal with it.

Anyway I just submitted my SIA Open Scholarship Application. I am going to pray that I get an interview. Meanwhile the quest is not over. Time to prepare for interview before they call me up.

And there’s HR2002. Need to do research on CSI. Haiz. How much work can one person take? I’m sorry if I cannot appreciate other people whining to me about how their semester is because you have seen nothing until you take IA and two modules which require projects. But I’m not saying whining is not good. I’m doing it anyway what.

So there. Back to more research!

I was having this conversation with my friends yesterday during dinner. Most of us are on attachment to various different companies, only one of us is in school. It seemed like no matter which place you went to work at, you just have this common thing amongst the working people, that is, when you return home, you just don’t feel like working at all. All you want is to slack and not do anymore work. Which explains why when I reach home I wish there was someone special. Then you can cook for each other, do some common activities. Watch our favourite shows. Just kidding. Slacking is super unproductive, I would say.

Whatever happened to wanting to improve and become above the rest? Whilst the rest are slacking and watching TV, you just read more books, read more annual reports, do analysis on the stock market, or simply do something that improves you? For example, learning a new language, or learning selling skills (sales), or learning about management, marketing and the rest? Or doing a second business during the night? Whatever happened to all those? I, and everyone in the discussion, seemed to have fallen into the working trap. The trap where you think you just had a long day and you deserved a break.

Yes you probably deserved it. You worked so hard for it. Oh really? Or are we just giving ourselves an excuse to slack and watch some drama? Or are we just plain addicted to watching shows on TV or on the computer, or going on Facebook and playing some lame game that involves some farming (Hey I did it for a long time last year)?

Are you just contented to remain plain average? Have you read the news recently? We’re having this new scheme where we have partner universities offering degrees, so polytechnic students can now upgrade their diploma to a degree. It makes it easier to have a degree now. And the new Singapore University that’s going to be built in the east? We’ll be swarmed with degree holders.

In our parent’s era, degree holders are like woah. They are rare, and when your family has a degree holder, the rest of the extended family will be so amazed and think your son is like some smart person. A rare gem. Now? The situation is totally different. You start to feel that almost everyone is a university graduate. Naturally it might be a little far fetched to suggest that statement is true in Singapore, but you get what I mean. There’s just so much more of us that it is now NORMAL to have a university degree.

When your parents and teachers tell you that you must study hard, go into a good university, get a degree and you’ll be set for life, they are lying. In reality, getting a degree is like the pre requisite to everything else. Now, to set yourself apart, you get a degree, and then get a second degree. Or a Masters, like I am planning to get. You have to set yourself apart from the rest, else how do you climb high and enjoy your life?

I don’t want to be a worker drone where I just keep working and working. I want a career that I am passionate about. A career that grooms me. A career that I can work and climb as long as I keep improving myself. I want so much in life! I want a nice car, a nice house, a beautiful wife (hey the girl I marry, she’ll be beautiful, no matter how what other people think. So this ain’t a shallow comment), two nice kids (what’s up with “NICE”), a yacht where you can go swimming and fishing, and retire to a life full of holidays and exploring other countries.

So how can I reach home and not do proper work? Like my friend said, in the past, when she had CCA, and more modules to catch up on, as well as tuition and other external lessons, she still had the energy to do her things when she reach home. We’ve all fallen to this new low of not working. Our energy being depleted as we reach home. What happened to us?

Our determination and engine have rusted. We’re just not hungry enough to push ourselves. We just need to get our engines resumed and moving. And once we make working a habit, the chains will be too hard to break.

在追寻 那片梦想
寻找着 那线希望
在蓝蓝的天空
那片你会存在的地方

有人说 雨过天晴后
总会有彩虹的出现
我等待 我会等待
那 缤纷的 灿烂的
那个 我想珍惜的
让我想用我的一生去爱的
我相信的 彩虹幸福

只有你能把我那
受过伤的心 融化成 永远的快乐
只有你在我身旁
灰色的世界 才会是 永恒的 色彩缤纷

彩虹的微笑
像似隐形的翅膀
我想紧紧牵着你的手
我想飞

飞到 那宽阔的海空
飞到 天涯海角
只要有彩的陪伴
我哪里都愿意

为了彩 为了梦 为了幸福
我会勇往直前
我会飞

Ko Ko wrote this for me. Based on the things I have said to her, or via my tweets, or my blog. A collection of many ideas I wrote about the rainbow and waiting for my rainbow to come. It’s supposed to be a song but its tuneless since nobody knows how to write tunes.

Can you read the title? How is it pronounced at your side? If you said “xian cai. meng”, then you are wrong! Guess you don’t know me enough! Haha.

My family went to dinner at Vivocity today, at an Italian restaurant (resutoran. sorry just wanted to say that in jap style). It’s called Modesto’s and it was the first time I had dinner there. The occasion was to celebrate my sister’s excellent A level results, as well as my dad’s pay increment.

I ordered the Tagliatelle Nere Con Cappesante E Gamberi In Salsa Di Crostacei, which is actually fresh home made black ink flat pasta served with sauteed scallops, prawns and diced tomatoes in a shrimp bisque sauce. I didn’t remember the name, of course. I took it from the online menu. It smelled super nice when it came, and the scallops were great. I loved it. I ordered that dish for the scallops actually. But I had a problem with the prawns. They are too soft, meaning they are not fresh. It was quite a dampener to an otherwise nice meal. Black ink pasta is a nice try too, but I guess I will still pick linguine anytime.

Other than pasta, I chose a cocktail called Kamikaze, which is vodka, triple sec & Lime Cordial mixed together. It’s the only Jap name there and Lime sounded what I would like to have, so I chose it. I didn’t order the dessert because I was too full from the McDonalds lunch at 3pm.

It was an enjoyable meal. After dinner we went near the sea side facing Sentosa. They had fireworks! What a surprise. The IR looked like a place I would like to visit with a special someone. There’s this ride you can take up a tall tower and down. It’s not those roller coaster rides so it would be a nice romantic evening I guess, being on it? I haven’t even gone on the flyer yet. I wonder who will receive the honour of joining me on my maiden journey up the flyer.

Oh. And during dinner, there’s this male and female with their young boy. The boy had cream all over his face from his pasta/pizza (not sure which), and his mum whipped out her iPhone and took several cute shots. Don’t you find it heartwarming? Haha. I do.

Sorry about these recent bout of feeling for other’s established families. Maybe it’s that time already. I’m like quite old. Haha.

Once again, Nakama Yukie comes back as everybody’s favourite character, Yamaguchi Kumiko (Yankumi) in Gokusen 3! I had actually watched Gokusen 3 first, after I learnt that there was no continuation in the stories, although later I found out that there were a few characters that were from previous seasons. But there is nothing to worry because it can be watched as a standalone season. I watched this season first because Gokusen The Movie was coming, and I’m glad I did because after I had finished season 3, I went on my Sydney Trip and I watched Gokusen The Movie on the plane!

Gokusen 3 takes place in a new school called Akadou. Once again, Yankumi had to take care of the delinquent class (Class 3D, again!), and teach them about loyalty and friendship. About respect for elders and about fighting and violence. You know it already.

I had nothing to compare when I watched Gokusen 3 first. But after watching Gokusen 1 and a little of Gokusen 2, I feel that Gokusen 3 is relatively boring. There were more fight scenes and it always ends with Yankumi coming and defeating everyone. For Gokusen 1, there are more parts dealing with non fighting things. There are times when it doesn’t end with fighting and rescuing.

But I guess it is always good to watch Gokusen 3 first if you’re thinking of watching Gokusen The Movie. The main character came from Gokusen 3, and it is a story about the same school but the class has graduated and Yankumi is teaching a new class 3D. Hence it is relevant to watch Gokusen 3 to get an understanding of the story.