MOVED :D

Sorry for this very very very very very x987654321 notice to you guys! I’ve moved to www.theboywithnoblog.wordpress.com THANKS!

Doubts.

Don’t know why, but this post might just be pretty much depressing.

Looks like not everyone can be trusted. You never know when they will turn their back on you and give you a very deep backstab. You might think that they are the ones you can trust, but sometimes, they are not. Am I being over-sensitive or what? I don’t know, seriously. But after what happened today, this thought just struck me. Some people, like to always stand at gain and not care about the one they first started to support. Is this the society? Seems so. It’s purely backstab there and here. It just seems that this kind of friendship and support, will not last. It’s just like a fruit, presumably an apple. It looks awesome at the outside, perfect. No flaws at all. Flawless. But when you open it, the sight just shocks you. And guess what? A rotten apple. It is pretty much the same as don’t judge a book by the cover. Yup, I have tried to accept everyone’s differences, weakness and strength even if I like it or not. But it is not as easy as it looks. It’s about the same concept as it takes two hands to clap, but for this society, it takes more than just two hands.

Today was a fun day cause we get to know all our teachers. Quite fun. HAHA! The bad thing today is just that, my osmosis partners were split by Mdm Nora, shoots! Am pissed, no doubt. Actually nothing much to post today. Cause, it is a sian day whereby you mug. LOL.

What are your New Year Resolutions? :D

I know how SLACK-ed I have been this year. So, the New Year is coming. The year whereby I have my PSLE. After more than six years of education, let’s just take this as something to test how much you have learnt in this years. Starting from kindergarten for me. What’s making it stress is that the score of it leads you to your future. Let’s say, you go for a job interview and usually, they will pick the better school right? Getting into a good primary school isn’t really important but getting into a good secondary school and a good JC and stuff, is important. Knowing my weakness, I always tremble like a leaf during the examinations. Always scarring myself and questioning myself. Questioning myself whether is it correct ? Are you sure? For every single questions. This ALWAYS happens to me and.. I can’t stop myself. Pretty much pathetic huh. I should really start trying to remain calm at all times. PLEASE REMAIN CALM. Everyone has weakness, no one is perfect. But it is how you correct you weakness and how you deal with it. So, I shall start dealing with my weaknesses in the brand new year, 2010. There ain’t any limit to how many you have so, I’ll have a hell lot of resolutions.

My New Year Resolutions :

1. Treat my family better as in love the more etc.

2. Mug harder for PSLE. Buy more assesment books and go to more tuition. Stress myself out for all I care.

3. Delete ALL my computer game after Chinese New Year.

4. Limit myself to 30mins of facebook every weekdays and 2hours every weekends. Stop wasting your life on your computer!

5. Stop trembling like a leaf when it is near examination dates and during the examinations.

6. Listen attentively in class ( EXTRA ATTENTIVE ). (Kah Loon said that he listen attentively in class. So PSLE was tico for you? ) XD

7. Start reading more books. Improve your english.

8. Listen to my Chinese tutor and memorise more Chinese Composition no matter how tough it is.

9. Complete all my homework in time and pass them all up.

10. Stop being playfull already and better buck up!

I shall limit myself to 10 resolutions cause I got top 10 (just nice) in the level. I don’t want to put get into HCI cause am afraid I can’t D: But I will try my VERY VERY BEST. Haiz, I am a hazard to myself. T.T

I shall end my post here. BYE!

BACK FROM THE TRIP TO KOREA!

It was like a dream. A dream whereby it was all gone after 6 days. Dreams were made, especially to my dearest cousin, Yuxiang. I seriously hope you enjoyed this trip, despite many things, I hope you enjoyed it. To my cousins who went to Korea with me and those who sat in the plane with me, THANK YOU. You guys had made the trip ALOT more enjoyable and this trip was, indeed a memorable one. Korea, is a nice place, good for shopping for the girls. Not for the boys though. But, I still enjoy the trip with the funny tour guide and the shuai camera man Now, let me start posting.

Day 1 : Boarded the plane, watched Public Enemy on the plane. Quite a good movie though. Plane touched down and then we ate at the airport. We ate donuts, dunkin donuts. Then we went to the toilet to pee and then just board the bus and GO! How did we brush teeth? Well, eat the donut and then drink milo. Use the milo the guggle your mouth and then, you’re done. XD Disgusting but, who cares. HAHA! Went to Xilala spa or something. Stripped to swimming costume and went to Dr. Fish, the fishes were cute. Bitting you. Itchy though. Then went outside, which was freezing cold. It was like -5Degree Celcius. Went to different spa of different colour and smell. There were wine, flowers and tea flavours. Nice! After that, went to the naked area (Man only) to spa also. LOL. Was funny. Cause you see naked man around. And there was this not very high hill lorhs. What if, what if, what if somebody was up there. XD Then… Eww. LOL! After that went to some room with some kind of outfit. Quite fun in all~

-I will stop blogging now. Will continue in the near future -

I’ve decided to just copy and paste the entry from my sister, though some parts are the girl parts. I helped her to tag people in facebook, so she allowed me to copy! Remember! Source from http://kiss-thewind.livejournal.com/ :D

Korea (Day 1 & 2)

Dec. 19th, 2009 | 02:41 pm

Anyohaseyo!

Korea was okay, wasn’t the best trip ever but it was fun enough. Nothing beats the scenery of New Zealand (♥), the surreality of America, and the historical places and facts I’ve learnt about in China, Beijing – three countries I’ve been to for the past three years. Korea was a completely slack and relaxing trip, a huge contrast from the overload of information from Beijing last year which I thoroughly enjoyed. I don’t think I’ll ever choose to return to Korea again, unless it’s for skiing (AWESOME), because there’s honestly nothing much there. Dull scenery at the countryside, typical city in Seoul, the communication problems, horrible place to shop apart from really cheap cosmetics that I have no need for, etc.

The temperature averaged around -8 degree celsius, even lower when there’s wind. It was shit crazy but after my previous years in cold countries, I felt pretty okay except for the last day when everyone was literally freezing. I kept blowing smoke throughout the days.

I shan’t procrastinate this entry or I’ll never get it done. The below was blogged on MS Words on Sunday night, 13 December, because there wasn’t any internet connection there right then. Shortly after my laptop battery died, meh. 1245 photos plus a few videos altogether for the trip. (: I’ve included a few in here to make the entry seem less boring, but there are loads more on FB, you can check them out if you want to.

“I have my laptop but it’s pointless without an internet connection now. It’s 7.43pm in Singapore/8.43pm in Korea, I’m freaking tired, and I’m in the hotel room with my cousin Wan Ting. We’re watching “The Biggest Loser” or something on TV – thank god there’s an English show, surfed channels just now and there was Tom & Jerry as well as Pokemon in Korean, which was quite cool. Photo count for today: 299 OMG 1 more to 300 hahaha.

Saturday, 12 December

Left home at 7:45 with the feeling that I’ve forgotten something, not surprising because my packing was also rather last minute. Doesn’t beat my dad who, correction, packed one hour before leaving home. That got my mum super pissed off because she’s the extreme OCD kind and couldn’t stand to see my dad’s luggage unpacked with clothes lying around, so pissed that she seriously got diarrhoea.

At 8.15 or 8.30 we met up with the rest of our relatives at Changi Airport, so there’s 15 of us altogether – my mum, my dad, Yang Zhi, Wan Ting, Yichun, Yuxiang, Brian, Wei Ying, Da Yi, Xiao Jiu Mu, Er Jiu, Er Jiu Mu, San Yi, San Yi Zhang, and me. My little cousins were freaking excited. I love family trips like that that involves almost the entire extended family, because no matter where you go it’ll still be damn fun.

It struck us that whenever we’re in the airport we will start to spam take pictures like there won’t be a chance tomorrow, and every year we repeat this “realization” without fail. Then it was stoning and waiting and finally boarding the plane – Asiana Airlines because SQ was full so we didn’t have a choice. And every year without fail I will start to freak out inside when it’s time for security check, especially when I walk through the metal detector.. I’m not kidding, until now I’m still very scared of that part because the people there don’t crack a smile and they look like they can arrest me anytime.

Oh right before boarding there was this guy using the free internet access, and he was looking at 4D/Toto for the day, which resulted in everyone crowding around him. Tsk Singaporeans.

Sat with WT on the plane, took the window seat, and we were very excited to see that there’s “My Sisters’ Keeper” in the entertainment booklet. Turned out that they didn’t actually have it. -_- Okay yes we’re so lag that we haven’t watched that movie but ugh I’m dying to watch it, maybe after I reread the book. Ended up watching Bandslam instead which was a pretty lousy show, with the singing and performances as its only forte. Plot and everything else sucked but it wasn’t like I had expected better anyway. Supper was pretty good because I like airplane food, or should it be that I like all sorts of food except vegetables. Afterwards I slept for like 2 hours or so only, which explains why I’m feeling totally dead now.

Sunday, 13 December

Arrived at Incheon Airport at around 6 in the morning, Singapore time, which is 7am local time (I’m gonna use local time from now on). I was instantly down with the flu, or rather it had already set in on the plane. I’m kind of used to it already because that always happens when I travel to cold countries, that and the fact that my face and nose will be especially red on the first day. We had doughnuts from Dunkin’ Donuts for breakfast (I had two and they are damn nice) and that was the first sign of communication breakdown, realized and was told that most Koreans don’t understand and cannot speak English. That is bad because English is the universal language, so how are they going to communicate with the rest of the world? 

Hmm and their currency is SO COOL. Just the ten donuts and a cup of hot chocolate alone amounted up to over $13000, totally wtf. And at the airport there was this “Lost and Found” section, which made the 2003 Council song play in my head almost immediately after I saw that because it starts with “Lost and found, that’s how we came around”. Grahh I have yet to memorize the whole bunch of council info, but I’m done printing them out and I even brought it here. -_- Haha okay then we continued with a two-hour bus ride to Sealala Spa in Seoul, where we got to 泡温泉 and try Doctor Fish Leg Spa plus a bunch of other relaxing stuff. Korea is cold and the temperature today was about 1 or 2 degree Celsius in the day. Good thing we had experience and were all geared up, because even Beijing or rather Chengde (around -15) was already traumatizing enough.

We changed to our swimming costumes/swimming trunks and tried Doctor Fish first, you know the thing where they get small fishes to nibble the dead cells off your feet. Before I get on to that I think I should, or rather, have to tell you about the changing + locker room. Okay it was separated into guys’ and girls’ of course and the thing is YOU SEE NAKED WOMEN PARADING AROUND EVERYWHERE IN THE FEMALES’ CHANGING ROOM. Like wtf there were all sorts of (insert dirty thoughts here). There both the young and the old, so you get the idea. Obviously Singaporeans are too conservative because we don’t see this kind of thing around here, unless you want to get arrested, and even in Beijing last year we saw changing rooms like this one too. I was trying hard not to stare but I found it really fascinating how they made it seem so normal and could walk around so shamelessly; I’ve never seen so many naked bodies at once. The tour guide told us that we would attract more attention by doing it the other way round, which is desperately covering our private parts.

“为什么这个人怪怪的？”

Yah but in the end we didn’t do any of that of course. The changing into our swimming costumes were a swift and quick one with everybody facing their locker, and I learnt how to take my panties off after wearing my swimming costume over it (HAHA own). The Doctor Fish experience was totally shiok, though very very horrifying at first. I’ve always hated fishes and slimy stuff and I’ve never came into direct contact with a life one before, but I managed to face and overcome my fear today! The fishes were bigger than I had expected, so I didn’t dare to lower myself into the small pool at first but within ten minutes I was enjoying it already. My aunts were screaming and shrieking terribly loudly which was amusing because the first batch (we were the second batch) were mostly guys and they kept very still and quiet. So the uh, contrast was super huge. Take it like a man.

It wasn’t painful at all, just very ticklish, exactly like someone tickling your feet. I shall commend myself for having such high threshold even though when they got to my thigh it was almost unbearable. I was clenching my fists and willing myself not to jerk suddenly or all the fishes will scatter away. The twenty-minutes time limit passed by real quick and by the end of it I still hadn’t gotten enough. Then we went to 泡温泉 at four different tubs, quite special as the water had different colours and scents – red tea, chrysanthemum, rice wine, and red wine or something, the best and most fragrant was red tea. All these were outdoors in the 1 or 2 degree Celcius cold weather so it felt twice as good stepping into them because just a second ago you were freezing to death.

Went back to our changing room to dry ourselves and change before going to some sauna thing. There was this hilarious incident whereby we got stopped from going into the changing room by the caretaker there, because we had to dry ourselves before stepping inside. The problem was that we didn’t have any towels, and the only way to do so was to take off our swimming costumes, put them into the rice cooker or whatever boiler thing, and wait while it dries, and then put them back on ourselves again. Well that would require us to stand there fully naked and wait, wouldn’t it, so we were totally hell bent and insistent on not doing that. The aunty however was insistent that we do it too, because everyone also did it, and because she couldn’t speak English or Mandarin she demonstrated her instructions to us by lifting up her shirt such that we could see her bra. And she didn’t think anything of it.

We were probably more insistent than her because in the end she had no choice but to take towels for us lol. And then we “kamsahamnida”-ed her like crazy, which means Thank You in Korean but I don’t know how to spell it so whatever. I’ve been saying that a lot today and it’s the only Korean phrase I know, because knowing how to say Thank You is the most important of all. I hate it when someone does something for you and you can’t say Thank You; afterall it’s basic courtesy.

The rest of them went for the korean-style sauna, called JJimJilBang while Wan Ting accompanied me back to the 温泉 and Doctor Fish place, because I just had to snap photos (sorry no naked women) or I’ll be very 不甘愿. Oh and I braved through the freezing weather outside in my swimming costume just to get photos of the place! The 61 degree celsius Sauna was shiok too.

Lunch was quite terrible because it was 90% vegetables and it’s a well-known fact that I’m a carnivore (who was the one who gave classmates their vegetables during LSC). Thank goodness my dad ordered an extra plate of pork for my brother, himself and me because we’re all “meat people”. I can bet that my mum LOVES Korean food because it’s so much of vegetables (GROSS) and that she ate most of the 90% vegetables.

Afterwards it was another 2 hour long trip back to the hotel (Danyang Daemyung Condo), had a good sleep on the bus though my ass was hurting like crazy from sitting too long. My brother sleep-talked something about tidbits. Yeah that’s about all; the programme ended quite early today. Bathed and changed up back at the hotel room, went downstairs together to walk around and take loads of pictures. Dinner followed which was pretty good – Bi Bim Bab, and it’s like mixing the rice plus dishes together. Hmm and then we tried some amazing white candy thing (the way it was made is so funny and awesome) which was really good.. Ahh my mouth waters at the thought of it.

Slacked around the lobby because we were all tired from the lack of sleep and could walk no further, and here I am now in the hotel room. Yeah that’s all, going to the Ski Resort tomorrow! Haha first day and I’m already glad that I didn’t bring my SLR, because compact cameras are way more suitable for tours. A DSLR definitely can’t handle all the rushing and difficult circumstances, and I won’t risk it anyway.”

I’ll blog Days 3-7 later, though it’ll definitely be shorter, and hopefully finish uploading all the photos by today too (very ambitious huh). Sunday will be spent entirely on mugging council.

Korea (Day 3 & 4)

Dec. 19th, 2009 | 07:00 pm

Read Day 1 & 2 first if you haven’t.

Monday, 14 December

Morning call was at 7.30, packed up and checked out of the hotel one hour later. Breakfast was great – the typical hotel food. San Yi Zhang and family were late by fifteen minutes and my tour guide couldn’t forget that fact for the entire trip, because their names are both ‘Peter’. So he’s always going, “Peter 不要迟到 hor.” as a joke. My mum said that with San Yi Zhang here, she’s a alot less worried because he’s always later than my dad, who is terrible enough with his procrastinating.

One and the half hour bus ride to the rental shop where we could rent our ski attire as well as gloves and goggles (?) for the next day, when we will be going to ski (♥)! On the bus ride, Peter told us abit about Korea, including how they depend on 工业 for their economy, and that they are thankful to Lee Young Ae and Bae Yong Joon for boosting Korea tourism. It was freaking crowded at the rental shop with another tour group inside, and with everyone talking and moving around at the same time it wasn’t much different from a marketplace. I got a full pink ski attire (GO BIMBO), same as my little cousin and a few of my aunts as well. Crowding around the heater in the shop was awesome because it was freezing.

Headed for lunch afterwards, the traidional Korean way of sitting on the floor and having lunch on the really short table. Kind of like Japanese style, but I later learnt from Peter that Koreans really hate Japanese people as they were under their rule for 36 years (1910-1945). Like Singapore, except that it was way longer. Quite surprising that their hatred is still lasting until now because that was like a few generations ago, but I was told that Koreans are very patriotic people with really high national pride. And that if you speak Japanese in a Korean shop, they will raise the prices of items super high for you. And that most tour guides attending to Japanese people are older Korean ladies as they are more tolerant, definitely not men cause they might just bash them if there happened to be any disagreements.

After lunch, we proceeded to visit some casino in a hotel (there are two hotels there) at the ski resort which is damn huge. Since most of us were underage and couldn’t go in, we wandered around the hotel lobby while waiting for some of the adults who went in to come out. Played a few rounds of Dai Di or 大老二 and took pictures.

Took the cable car to the expert skiiers and snowboarders range, not sure if it was the mountains’ peak. Took a hell load of photos there, like over a hundred I think, because the scenery was quite good and there was (fake) snow! Of course it was damn cold and my fingers and toes were totally numb afterwards, almost couldn’t feel them at all. Not even when I slipped my gloves on, so that took about a minute to do. Once we were done we took the cable car back to the hotel (High 1 Hotel) and had around 3 hours to bathe and slack off before heading off for dinner, which was seafood that day.

Ate like crazy, one and a half bowl of rice. Cause Korean rice and seaweed are seriously super nice, and that was all I ate plus one type of side dish, though not Kimchi because that’s a vegetable.. I didn’t like the rest of the food but those three were enough – yes it’s the first time such simple stuff tasted so delicious to me. My mum was all “I should cook these at home everyday, so easy to cook and can save money.”

THERE WAS INTERNET CONNECTION AT THE HOTEL LOBBY. AWESOME. All of us cousins were totally excited and literally ran to the computer room, regardless of age. Back in the hotel room WT and I watched some Twilight-lookalike show for awhile, called The Vampire Diaries. Afterwards Eagle Eye showed and I watched it, then went to sleep. I’ll watch it again some other time because it’s such a smart and great show, though I didn’t get it completely because I missed quite abit of the beginning.

Tuesday, 15 December

Breakfast in the morning. Some Hong Kong guy got pissed off and shouted loudly in damn funny English because his breakfast wasn’t served even after 20 minutes. After breakfast, we proceeded to the skiing area to rent ski equipments. First sign that skiing isn’t going to be easy – freaking heavy equipments: 滑雪板, 雪qiao1 (the sticks), and shoes. Wtf the shoes were insanely heavy and hard to walk with; I was struggling all the way. Oh it’s like roller blading shoes except without wheels, and you can’t bend your ankles to prevent spraining your leg. Even after taking them off at the end of the day, there was still the really heavy feeling hours after.

Then we went out to the open where there’s (fake) snow to learn the basics of skiing. Peter taught us and he’s really pro because he has been skiing and teaching people for the past ten years. I was struggling the most with securing my shoes to the skiboards because I didn’t have strength to “大大力采下去”. For the first half an hour or so I had absolutely no control of the skiboards because it was extremely slippery and I couldn’t stop them at all. So by the end of the hour I was sweating despite being in the negative temperature.

For the next two hours I was screaming down the like, 20m slope I painstakingly and with lots of effort climbed up to. Kept losing control and swerving to the right while skiing down, because my right leg was apparently using more energy. Fell down countless times but it was okay, because falling down is just part and parcel of learning! Glad I overcame my fear of falling because I’ve always been really terrified of it, which explains why I have to wait for like 3 seconds before stepping on an escalator, and I don’t know how to ice skate or roller blade because I gave up just after awhile. I took insanely long to learn how to ride a bike too.

The tour guide-instructor was seriously very patient and did’t lose his temper at all, unlike the tour guide of the other CTC group who is super fierce. She’s a woman and her eyes are super big and she yells at her students (Peter doesn’t like her). There was alot of falling down and screaming for help but fortunately Peter kept helping us up. (: Most of the people in my tour group gave up just after awhile, about 50% or so. Oh and I got pissed with my dad and yelled at him cause he threatened to pull me up the mountain slope, then he got pissed with me too. -_-

Maybe I should pick up ice-skating the next December holidays (LOL), since I learn skiing pretty fast! Well I did soon after I went up to the Beginner’s slope and not stay at that lousy slope where you spend most of your time climbing up. More on that later.

Lunch was awesome western food, finally. PORK CUTLET FTW OMG SO AWESOME BEST LUNCH EVER. Afterwards was sitting the cable car up to the Beginner’s area where only 6 out of 30 over people from my tour group went to ski! My parents and Da Yi went up there to take pictures for us. My first attempt was quite fail, really terrified because I had no idea how far and how steep the slope was. Fell down once or twice on the way. Second attempt on was successful though! I went very slowly on my second attempt and sped up afterwards, such that my seventh and last attempt was the fastest and most shiok.

It’s true how they say it’s much easier to learn at the beginners’ area than that slope you have to climb up. For starters, the slope is alot more even, though a little steeper and longer too (about 150m). There’s also a travellator to get up to the top of the slope so you don’t have to climb it, though it’s very slow and you have to stop at intervals and get up on it again. Hmm when you get the hang of the “A” shape when you ski and can control it, it becomes very easy already. Like when it’s too slow I close it to a narrower “A”, and when it’s too fast I open my legs to a wider “A”. Oh and I could finally control the direction I’m going to, meaning I could keep myself in a straight line and not swerve to the right!

I was the first to get the hang of it among my cousins, and Wan Ting was next so we skiied together for the last few rounds. I didn’t know that I’m still as daring as I was back when I was younger; always thought I’m getting increasingly “kiasi”. My brother kept falling but I should commend him on his courage to keep picking himself up and going on, though it was extremely hard. I didn’t fall down alot so I wouldn’t know how to pick myself up. Yichun had wobbling legs and got stuck in the net fencing, so here’s his FML entry, “Today, I went skiing and was caught in the net fencing for two hours. I screamed and my mouth was frozen in place. Now my mouth feels like MJ’s nose. FML” Of course it was exaggerated but he was really caught there for quite a long time.

Peter braved through the entire day without his gloves because he forgot to bring them, just to help and teach us. It was -8 degree celsius temperature, more than -10 when the wind blows. Honestly the biggest sacrifice ever, his hands were red and totally numb and cold even at dinner.. Couldn’t have been more thankful to him. I don’t think I’ll be able to stand even a minute with my gloves off in that crazily low temperature.

My dad too made a sacrifice (he requested for this to be up here but I would have blogged it anyway). He took videos of us skiing, and of course didn’t wear his gloves if not the video camera would just slip off from his hands. He took videos until the video camera couldn’t withstand the temperature and said “low temperature”, shutting off automatically. Thanks a bunch daddy you’re awesome!

I on the other hand didn’t really feel that cold because I was skiing. It’s an exercise obviously. Treasured the last time the most and went super fast (at least for me), almost wanted to shout “whooo!!” LOL. Hmm and I’m glad that at least half the songs they played there were in English, including M2M’s “Pretty Boy” and Kelly Clarkson’s “Because of You” I think.

When it was time to go back, Jovian (he’s ten years old) and his dad skiied down the expert slope all the way. They had experience because they came here before, but that’s still damn daring cause the expert slope is really quite long. Heck, we took a cable car back down. Taking off the shoes felt like heaven, and then we returned the rented equipments, took shuttle bus back to bathe, and had dinner at the same place last night. Best dinner(s) in Korea, ate more than one bowl again. Then it was chiong free internet!! While my parents and other adults were sitting around the lobby chatting.

My cousins and I “bullied” my youngest cousin, Weiying (she’s five), with this boy called Wayne in her kindergarten whom she apparently has a crush on. Her reactions are damn cute, waiting for Wan Ting to upload the videos on Facebook. I SWEAR YOU MUST WATCH IT, SHE’S REALLY DAMN CUTE! We were bullying her and telling her that Wayne doesn’t like her and likes me instead, and even faked a phone call to Wayne. She almost cried and kept going, “是我先喜欢他的!!!” We all agreed that we should show the videos to her first boyfriend in future. Little kids are so nice to trick.

Yep that’s all. At night I went to my parents’ room to chat with them and to use the internet for a little while more. 

Korea (Day 1 & 2)

Dec. 19th, 2009 | 02:41 pm

Anyohaseyo!

Korea was okay, wasn’t the best trip ever but it was fun enough. Nothing beats the scenery of New Zealand (♥), the surreality of America, and the historical places and facts I’ve learnt about in China, Beijing – three countries I’ve been to for the past three years. Korea was a completely slack and relaxing trip, a huge contrast from the overload of information from Beijing last year which I thoroughly enjoyed. I don’t think I’ll ever choose to return to Korea again, unless it’s for skiing (AWESOME), because there’s honestly nothing much there. Dull scenery at the countryside, typical city in Seoul, the communication problems, horrible place to shop apart from really cheap cosmetics that I have no need for, etc.

The temperature averaged around -8 degree celsius, even lower when there’s wind. It was shit crazy but after my previous years in cold countries, I felt pretty okay except for the last day when everyone was literally freezing. I kept blowing smoke throughout the days.

I shan’t procrastinate this entry or I’ll never get it done. The below was blogged on MS Words on Sunday night, 13 December, because there wasn’t any internet connection there right then. Shortly after my laptop battery died, meh. 1245 photos plus a few videos altogether for the trip. (: I’ve included a few in here to make the entry seem less boring, but there are loads more on FB, you can check them out if you want to.

“I have my laptop but it’s pointless without an internet connection now. It’s 7.43pm in Singapore/8.43pm in Korea, I’m freaking tired, and I’m in the hotel room with my cousin Wan Ting. We’re watching “The Biggest Loser” or something on TV – thank god there’s an English show, surfed channels just now and there was Tom & Jerry as well as Pokemon in Korean, which was quite cool. Photo count for today: 299 OMG 1 more to 300 hahaha.

Saturday, 12 December

Left home at 7:45 with the feeling that I’ve forgotten something, not surprising because my packing was also rather last minute. Doesn’t beat my dad who, correction, packed one hour before leaving home. That got my mum super pissed off because she’s the extreme OCD kind and couldn’t stand to see my dad’s luggage unpacked with clothes lying around, so pissed that she seriously got diarrhoea.

At 8.15 or 8.30 we met up with the rest of our relatives at Changi Airport, so there’s 15 of us altogether – my mum, my dad, Yang Zhi, Wan Ting, Yichun, Yuxiang, Brian, Wei Ying, Da Yi, Xiao Jiu Mu, Er Jiu, Er Jiu Mu, San Yi, San Yi Zhang, and me. My little cousins were freaking excited. I love family trips like that that involves almost the entire extended family, because no matter where you go it’ll still be damn fun.

It struck us that whenever we’re in the airport we will start to spam take pictures like there won’t be a chance tomorrow, and every year we repeat this “realization” without fail. Then it was stoning and waiting and finally boarding the plane – Asiana Airlines because SQ was full so we didn’t have a choice. And every year without fail I will start to freak out inside when it’s time for security check, especially when I walk through the metal detector.. I’m not kidding, until now I’m still very scared of that part because the people there don’t crack a smile and they look like they can arrest me anytime.

Oh right before boarding there was this guy using the free internet access, and he was looking at 4D/Toto for the day, which resulted in everyone crowding around him. Tsk Singaporeans.

Sat with WT on the plane, took the window seat, and we were very excited to see that there’s “My Sisters’ Keeper” in the entertainment booklet. Turned out that they didn’t actually have it. -_- Okay yes we’re so lag that we haven’t watched that movie but ugh I’m dying to watch it, maybe after I reread the book. Ended up watching Bandslam instead which was a pretty lousy show, with the singing and performances as its only forte. Plot and everything else sucked but it wasn’t like I had expected better anyway. Supper was pretty good because I like airplane food, or should it be that I like all sorts of food except vegetables. Afterwards I slept for like 2 hours or so only, which explains why I’m feeling totally dead now.

Sunday, 13 December

Arrived at Incheon Airport at around 6 in the morning, Singapore time, which is 7am local time (I’m gonna use local time from now on). I was instantly down with the flu, or rather it had already set in on the plane. I’m kind of used to it already because that always happens when I travel to cold countries, that and the fact that my face and nose will be especially red on the first day. We had doughnuts from Dunkin’ Donuts for breakfast (I had two and they are damn nice) and that was the first sign of communication breakdown, realized and was told that most Koreans don’t understand and cannot speak English. That is bad because English is the universal language, so how are they going to communicate with the rest of the world? 

Hmm and their currency is SO COOL. Just the ten donuts and a cup of hot chocolate alone amounted up to over $13000, totally wtf. And at the airport there was this “Lost and Found” section, which made the 2003 Council song play in my head almost immediately after I saw that because it starts with “Lost and found, that’s how we came around”. Grahh I have yet to memorize the whole bunch of council info, but I’m done printing them out and I even brought it here. -_- Haha okay then we continued with a two-hour bus ride to Sealala Spa in Seoul, where we got to 泡温泉 and try Doctor Fish Leg Spa plus a bunch of other relaxing stuff. Korea is cold and the temperature today was about 1 or 2 degree Celsius in the day. Good thing we had experience and were all geared up, because even Beijing or rather Chengde (around -15) was already traumatizing enough.

We changed to our swimming costumes/swimming trunks and tried Doctor Fish first, you know the thing where they get small fishes to nibble the dead cells off your feet. Before I get on to that I think I should, or rather, have to tell you about the changing + locker room. Okay it was separated into guys’ and girls’ of course and the thing is YOU SEE NAKED WOMEN PARADING AROUND EVERYWHERE IN THE FEMALES’ CHANGING ROOM. Like wtf there were all sorts of (insert dirty thoughts here). There both the young and the old, so you get the idea. Obviously Singaporeans are too conservative because we don’t see this kind of thing around here, unless you want to get arrested, and even in Beijing last year we saw changing rooms like this one too. I was trying hard not to stare but I found it really fascinating how they made it seem so normal and could walk around so shamelessly; I’ve never seen so many naked bodies at once. The tour guide told us that we would attract more attention by doing it the other way round, which is desperately covering our private parts.

“为什么这个人怪怪的？”

Yah but in the end we didn’t do any of that of course. The changing into our swimming costumes were a swift and quick one with everybody facing their locker, and I learnt how to take my panties off after wearing my swimming costume over it (HAHA own). The Doctor Fish experience was totally shiok, though very very horrifying at first. I’ve always hated fishes and slimy stuff and I’ve never came into direct contact with a life one before, but I managed to face and overcome my fear today! The fishes were bigger than I had expected, so I didn’t dare to lower myself into the small pool at first but within ten minutes I was enjoying it already. My aunts were screaming and shrieking terribly loudly which was amusing because the first batch (we were the second batch) were mostly guys and they kept very still and quiet. So the uh, contrast was super huge. Take it like a man.

It wasn’t painful at all, just very ticklish, exactly like someone tickling your feet. I shall commend myself for having such high threshold even though when they got to my thigh it was almost unbearable. I was clenching my fists and willing myself not to jerk suddenly or all the fishes will scatter away. The twenty-minutes time limit passed by real quick and by the end of it I still hadn’t gotten enough. Then we went to 泡温泉 at four different tubs, quite special as the water had different colours and scents – red tea, chrysanthemum, rice wine, and red wine or something, the best and most fragrant was red tea. All these were outdoors in the 1 or 2 degree Celcius cold weather so it felt twice as good stepping into them because just a second ago you were freezing to death.

Went back to our changing room to dry ourselves and change before going to some sauna thing. There was this hilarious incident whereby we got stopped from going into the changing room by the caretaker there, because we had to dry ourselves before stepping inside. The problem was that we didn’t have any towels, and the only way to do so was to take off our swimming costumes, put them into the rice cooker or whatever boiler thing, and wait while it dries, and then put them back on ourselves again. Well that would require us to stand there fully naked and wait, wouldn’t it, so we were totally hell bent and insistent on not doing that. The aunty however was insistent that we do it too, because everyone also did it, and because she couldn’t speak English or Mandarin she demonstrated her instructions to us by lifting up her shirt such that we could see her bra. And she didn’t think anything of it.

We were probably more insistent than her because in the end she had no choice but to take towels for us lol. And then we “kamsahamnida”-ed her like crazy, which means Thank You in Korean but I don’t know how to spell it so whatever. I’ve been saying that a lot today and it’s the only Korean phrase I know, because knowing how to say Thank You is the most important of all. I hate it when someone does something for you and you can’t say Thank You; afterall it’s basic courtesy.

The rest of them went for the korean-style sauna, called JJimJilBang while Wan Ting accompanied me back to the 温泉 and Doctor Fish place, because I just had to snap photos (sorry no naked women) or I’ll be very 不甘愿. Oh and I braved through the freezing weather outside in my swimming costume just to get photos of the place! The 61 degree celsius Sauna was shiok too.

Lunch was quite terrible because it was 90% vegetables and it’s a well-known fact that I’m a carnivore (who was the one who gave classmates their vegetables during LSC). Thank goodness my dad ordered an extra plate of pork for my brother, himself and me because we’re all “meat people”. I can bet that my mum LOVES Korean food because it’s so much of vegetables (GROSS) and that she ate most of the 90% vegetables.

Afterwards it was another 2 hour long trip back to the hotel (Danyang Daemyung Condo), had a good sleep on the bus though my ass was hurting like crazy from sitting too long. My brother sleep-talked something about tidbits. Yeah that’s about all; the programme ended quite early today. Bathed and changed up back at the hotel room, went downstairs together to walk around and take loads of pictures. Dinner followed which was pretty good – Bi Bim Bab, and it’s like mixing the rice plus dishes together. Hmm and then we tried some amazing white candy thing (the way it was made is so funny and awesome) which was really good.. Ahh my mouth waters at the thought of it.

Slacked around the lobby because we were all tired from the lack of sleep and could walk no further, and here I am now in the hotel room. Yeah that’s all, going to the Ski Resort tomorrow! Haha first day and I’m already glad that I didn’t bring my SLR, because compact cameras are way more suitable for tours. A DSLR definitely can’t handle all the rushing and difficult circumstances, and I won’t risk it anyway.” 

Korea (Day 3 & 4)

Dec. 19th, 2009 | 07:00 pm

Read Day 1 & 2 first if you haven’t.

Monday, 14 December

Morning call was at 7.30, packed up and checked out of the hotel one hour later. Breakfast was great – the typical hotel food. San Yi Zhang and family were late by fifteen minutes and my tour guide couldn’t forget that fact for the entire trip, because their names are both ‘Peter’. So he’s always going, “Peter 不要迟到 hor.” as a joke. My mum said that with San Yi Zhang here, she’s a alot less worried because he’s always later than my dad, who is terrible enough with his procrastinating.

One and the half hour bus ride to the rental shop where we could rent our ski attire as well as gloves and goggles (?) for the next day, when we will be going to ski (♥)! On the bus ride, Peter told us abit about Korea, including how they depend on 工业 for their economy, and that they are thankful to Lee Young Ae and Bae Yong Joon for boosting Korea tourism. It was freaking crowded at the rental shop with another tour group inside, and with everyone talking and moving around at the same time it wasn’t much different from a marketplace. I got a full pink ski attire (GO BIMBO), same as my little cousin and a few of my aunts as well. Crowding around the heater in the shop was awesome because it was freezing.

Headed for lunch afterwards, the traidional Korean way of sitting on the floor and having lunch on the really short table. Kind of like Japanese style, but I later learnt from Peter that Koreans really hate Japanese people as they were under their rule for 36 years (1910-1945). Like Singapore, except that it was way longer. Quite surprising that their hatred is still lasting until now because that was like a few generations ago, but I was told that Koreans are very patriotic people with really high national pride. And that if you speak Japanese in a Korean shop, they will raise the prices of items super high for you. And that most tour guides attending to Japanese people are older Korean ladies as they are more tolerant, definitely not men cause they might just bash them if there happened to be any disagreements.

After lunch, we proceeded to visit some casino in a hotel (there are two hotels there) at the ski resort which is damn huge. Since most of us were underage and couldn’t go in, we wandered around the hotel lobby while waiting for some of the adults who went in to come out. Played a few rounds of Dai Di or 大老二 and took pictures.

Took the cable car to the expert skiiers and snowboarders range, not sure if it was the mountains’ peak. Took a hell load of photos there, like over a hundred I think, because the scenery was quite good and there was (fake) snow! Of course it was damn cold and my fingers and toes were totally numb afterwards, almost couldn’t feel them at all. Not even when I slipped my gloves on, so that took about a minute to do. Once we were done we took the cable car back to the hotel (High 1 Hotel) and had around 3 hours to bathe and slack off before heading off for dinner, which was seafood that day.

Ate like crazy, one and a half bowl of rice. Cause Korean rice and seaweed are seriously super nice, and that was all I ate plus one type of side dish, though not Kimchi because that’s a vegetable.. I didn’t like the rest of the food but those three were enough – yes it’s the first time such simple stuff tasted so delicious to me. My mum was all “I should cook these at home everyday, so easy to cook and can save money.”

THERE WAS INTERNET CONNECTION AT THE HOTEL LOBBY. AWESOME. All of us cousins were totally excited and literally ran to the computer room, regardless of age. Back in the hotel room WT and I watched some Twilight-lookalike show for awhile, called The Vampire Diaries. Afterwards Eagle Eye showed and I watched it, then went to sleep. I’ll watch it again some other time because it’s such a smart and great show, though I didn’t get it completely because I missed quite abit of the beginning.

Tuesday, 15 December

Breakfast in the morning. Some Hong Kong guy got pissed off and shouted loudly in damn funny English because his breakfast wasn’t served even after 20 minutes. After breakfast, we proceeded to the skiing area to rent ski equipments. First sign that skiing isn’t going to be easy – freaking heavy equipments: 滑雪板, 雪qiao1 (the sticks), and shoes. Wtf the shoes were insanely heavy and hard to walk with; I was struggling all the way. Oh it’s like roller blading shoes except without wheels, and you can’t bend your ankles to prevent spraining your leg. Even after taking them off at the end of the day, there was still the really heavy feeling hours after.

Then we went out to the open where there’s (fake) snow to learn the basics of skiing. Peter taught us and he’s really pro because he has been skiing and teaching people for the past ten years. I was struggling the most with securing my shoes to the skiboards because I didn’t have strength to “大大力采下去”. For the first half an hour or so I had absolutely no control of the skiboards because it was extremely slippery and I couldn’t stop them at all. So by the end of the hour I was sweating despite being in the negative temperature.

For the next two hours I was screaming down the like, 20m slope I painstakingly and with lots of effort climbed up to. Kept losing control and swerving to the right while skiing down, because my right leg was apparently using more energy. Fell down countless times but it was okay, because falling down is just part and parcel of learning! Glad I overcame my fear of falling because I’ve always been really terrified of it, which explains why I have to wait for like 3 seconds before stepping on an escalator, and I don’t know how to ice skate or roller blade because I gave up just after awhile. I took insanely long to learn how to ride a bike too.

The tour guide-instructor was seriously very patient and did’t lose his temper at all, unlike the tour guide of the other CTC group who is super fierce. She’s a woman and her eyes are super big and she yells at her students (Peter doesn’t like her). There was alot of falling down and screaming for help but fortunately Peter kept helping us up. (: Most of the people in my tour group gave up just after awhile, about 50% or so. Oh and I got pissed with my dad and yelled at him cause he threatened to pull me up the mountain slope, then he got pissed with me too. -_-

Maybe I should pick up ice-skating the next December holidays (LOL), since I learn skiing pretty fast! Well I did soon after I went up to the Beginner’s slope and not stay at that lousy slope where you spend most of your time climbing up. More on that later.

Lunch was awesome western food, finally. PORK CUTLET FTW OMG SO AWESOME BEST LUNCH EVER. Afterwards was sitting the cable car up to the Beginner’s area where only 6 out of 30 over people from my tour group went to ski! My parents and Da Yi went up there to take pictures for us. My first attempt was quite fail, really terrified because I had no idea how far and how steep the slope was. Fell down once or twice on the way. Second attempt on was successful though! I went very slowly on my second attempt and sped up afterwards, such that my seventh and last attempt was the fastest and most shiok.

It’s true how they say it’s much easier to learn at the beginners’ area than that slope you have to climb up. For starters, the slope is alot more even, though a little steeper and longer too (about 150m). There’s also a travellator to get up to the top of the slope so you don’t have to climb it, though it’s very slow and you have to stop at intervals and get up on it again. Hmm when you get the hang of the “A” shape when you ski and can control it, it becomes very easy already. Like when it’s too slow I close it to a narrower “A”, and when it’s too fast I open my legs to a wider “A”. Oh and I could finally control the direction I’m going to, meaning I could keep myself in a straight line and not swerve to the right!

I was the first to get the hang of it among my cousins, and Wan Ting was next so we skiied together for the last few rounds. I didn’t know that I’m still as daring as I was back when I was younger; always thought I’m getting increasingly “kiasi”. My brother kept falling but I should commend him on his courage to keep picking himself up and going on, though it was extremely hard. I didn’t fall down alot so I wouldn’t know how to pick myself up. Yichun had wobbling legs and got stuck in the net fencing, so here’s his FML entry, “Today, I went skiing and was caught in the net fencing for two hours. I screamed and my mouth was frozen in place. Now my mouth feels like MJ’s nose. FML” Of course it was exaggerated but he was really caught there for quite a long time.

Peter braved through the entire day without his gloves because he forgot to bring them, just to help and teach us. It was -8 degree celsius temperature, more than -10 when the wind blows. Honestly the biggest sacrifice ever, his hands were red and totally numb and cold even at dinner.. Couldn’t have been more thankful to him. I don’t think I’ll be able to stand even a minute with my gloves off in that crazily low temperature.

My dad too made a sacrifice (he requested for this to be up here but I would have blogged it anyway). He took videos of us skiing, and of course didn’t wear his gloves if not the video camera would just slip off from his hands. He took videos until the video camera couldn’t withstand the temperature and said “low temperature”, shutting off automatically. Thanks a bunch daddy you’re awesome!

I on the other hand didn’t really feel that cold because I was skiing. It’s an exercise obviously. Treasured the last time the most and went super fast (at least for me), almost wanted to shout “whooo!!” LOL. Hmm and I’m glad that at least half the songs they played there were in English, including M2M’s “Pretty Boy” and Kelly Clarkson’s “Because of You” I think.

When it was time to go back, Jovian (he’s ten years old) and his dad skiied down the expert slope all the way. They had experience because they came here before, but that’s still damn daring cause the expert slope is really quite long. Heck, we took a cable car back down. Taking off the shoes felt like heaven, and then we returned the rented equipments, took shuttle bus back to bathe, and had dinner at the same place last night. Best dinner(s) in Korea, ate more than one bowl again. Then it was chiong free internet!! While my parents and other adults were sitting around the lobby chatting.

My cousins and I “bullied” my youngest cousin, Weiying (she’s five), with this boy called Wayne in her kindergarten whom she apparently has a crush on. Her reactions are damn cute, waiting for Wan Ting to upload the videos on Facebook. I SWEAR YOU MUST WATCH IT, SHE’S REALLY DAMN CUTE! We were bullying her and telling her that Wayne doesn’t like her and likes me instead, and even faked a phone call to Wayne. She almost cried and kept going, “是我先喜欢他的!!!” We all agreed that we should show the videos to her first boyfriend in future. Little kids are so nice to trick.

Yep that’s all. At night I went to my parents’ room to chat with them and to use the internet for a little while more.

There will never be failures, only learning expriences.

There will never be failures, only learning experiences. When you felt like giving up. DON’T! Cause you will only be a failure until you give up. A phrase I got from my Kindergarten Postcard, A man is never a failure until he gives up. Pretty true. Let’s take Abraham  Lincoln life as an example, he failed countless times, at elections, at work and many more. But did he give up? He DID NOT. He perserved down all the way. And finally, he succeeded and became the President. Let’s get on to today.

Firstly, today was like any normal day. Nothing epic happened. Just doing my daily routine. Played computer games and slacked. Nothing much. Very boring right? Anyways, my sister is sick. No she is not sick, she is VERY SICK. She got stomach flu, fever etc. But thank god! She is getting better by the second Get well soon JieJie ok? I got nothing much to post about today… Soo, GOT TO GO!

Signing off,

Yang Zhi

Current Music : We weren’t born to follow – bon jovi

Current Mood : BOREEED!

All for 1, 1 for All!

Once again, I am finally blogging. Decided to revive my DEAD blog. Ohh, btw, I am back from camp. Camp was fun. DD Had many activites regarding leadership skills, which seriously, helped me alot in my leadership skills. From what I learnt from the camp and what I already know, perhaps to be a good leader you need to have the 2 I’s and 3C’s. The Is stands for Initiative and Integrity, while the Cs stand for Courage, Compassion and Confidence. The initiative to do the right thing at the right time. The Integrity to not cheat and be honest. The courage to stand alone. The confidence to make tough decisions and finally, the compassion to listen to the needs of others. Compassion, is still something that I will have to work on if I want to be a good leader. I really appreciate the lessons/values taught by our coaches and trainers. I was pretty much inspired by the speech by Coach Timothy, even though his saliva keeps on dropping on me. It was still a very inspirational and perhaps encouraging speech. I also love the gifts by them which includes lolipops and many more. What I liked most was the bottle (which the coaches claimed that it was Nike) which had the 5 phrases of sucess. Perhaps, I am going to bring it to school on DAY 1

Sigh, time really past fast. It is already December and it will very soon be 2010. Where I have my PSLE. Nothing to fret about but I know myself well, I will tremble like a leaf but I hope it would not affect me. Let’s talk about this year. Like most people in Singapore, I am a very kiasu Singaporean which leads me to extreme mugging (if needed) which would lead people who most likely envy us, call us nerds. If those that called us nerds are seeing this, I hope you will change cause you got the definition of nerd, completely WRONGLY ! There are I believe, many ups and downs this year which everybody exprienced. I hope that if I ever offended anybody, I would like to say a very very big sorry and a very very big thank you to those that helped me.

If you are asking me what I am currently addicted with, itd W3Ksea. It is a very neat game from my point of view. I will also TRY to blog presumable everyday. Haha! Okkay! Looks like enough for today. Good bye all.

Signing off,

Yang Zhi

Current Music : Russian Roulette

Current Mood : Happy

Finally posting again…

Well, I should have pretty much to say about today. Quite an eventful day again. Yup, I am finally posting after so many days. Don’t want it to be a dead blog, seriously. Today was 1 word : FUN. Just fun and nothing else. I would like not to talk about today’s lesson cause some parts are very… and might piss me off. Today, the prefect returned our badge and tie. People are starting to comment that I look like pai kia etc, but I don’t care. I am a GOOD  pai kia lorhs Before lessons started today, Mindy and I went to the P2 classes with bookmarks on hand Managed to give most P2 the bookmark. Looks like I am getting alot of support ^.^ The P2 are starting to rock. HAHA. Then we stayed back and waited for the P3. We also gave teachers the bookmarks. Many thanks to those who helped me! Okkay, enough of campaigning stuff.

Let me talk about the game I am currently addicted on.

It is call Mud And Blood 2, I have discovered myself my different strategies at different circunstances. If you are ever going to play it, here is one of my strategy. Starting, just move all of your soldiers up to the front of the battle field. Then slowly save points and build bunkers at the bottom right hand about 1/3 from the middle. After that, gun your bunker with 2 gunners. Then save up for 1 officer and 1 signaller. After that, save up for 2 snipers, put them at the bottom right and left hand corner of the map. They won’t get hit by artilery this way. It is boring telling you guys all this, perhaps you could ask me or call me or just discover it yourself. Okkay, there’s actually nothing much to post. Hahaha. Got to go!

Signing off,

Yang Zhi

Current Mood : Happy

Current Music : Bad Romance – Lady GaGa