walking in the rain

Tuesday, July 31, 2007

tagboard

The tagboard has been facing quite a bit of problems recently, which probably explains why it's been unusually quiet. I have tried replying to the messages but to no avail.

Thanks to all who drop by frequently - you know who you are, including you stalkers out there. Haha. I know who you are.

I'll be taking down the tagboard for now (since there has been lots of complaints that it comes with so many pop-ups), and I'll put up a new one when I find a better one. The comment feature will still be around, although for some reason I don't particularly enjoy using it.

If you ever need to leave me a message, you can drop me an SMS. For those who are overseas, there's always MSN/email.

If you're reading this, I hope you're doing well, whatever you're up to in life. :)
posted by Selwyn at 11:34 PM 0 comments

Sunday, July 29, 2007

who's that girl?

Recently, I came across a journal entry of a friend which really touched me.

This was what it read:

I don't even know who you are but I pray for you everyday.

First and foremost, I pray that you exist.
I pray that we meet only when we're ready, but not one second later.
I pray God takes care of you until then.
I pray He prepares and equips you to deal with my retardedness.
I pray that we can serve Him together.
Most of all, I pray that I can make you as happy as I know you will make me.


What an awesome entry.

I sincerely pray that you will find this special girl soon. I hope to find mine too. :)
posted by Selwyn at 10:55 PM 0 comments

Saturday, July 28, 2007

national day parade

This year's National Day Parade has probably got to be one of the best ever.

I've watched the parade live year after year, but this year is definitely the most spectacular, with a change of location, making way for new elements in the parade itself.

I caught the parade preview earlier this evening, and it was such a blast. I'm glad I had tickets to the preview, though, as I will be busy with performances on National Day itself.

A job well done to the organizer of this year's parade.
posted by Selwyn at 11:47 PM 0 comments

Friday, July 27, 2007

random stuff

I cannot understand why some people like to appear sophisticated in front of others – it makes them look really stupid sometimes.

The power of smells can be amazing. It triggers memories, even up to my primary school days. It’s interesting to know that on certain occasions I can actually recall which teacher puts on which smell of perfume when I come across different types of fragrances.

I was in church a couple of months ago and I remember the pastor preaching something along the lines of experiencing God’s peace. While my eyes were closed, I envisioned a long road, with no end in sight. I felt the Lord telling me to trust in Him in whatever I do in life. It was a great sense of peace – something I’d not experienced in a long time.

I like observing traffic and speed sensors on roads. Haha. Those who sit my car frequently will know. In fact, on roads that I travel often, I know where the different locations of the sensors are.

Both lifts in my block malfunctioned at the same time on one of the days last week. The doors of Lift A just wouldn’t shut and it kept opening and closing. I hopped over to Lift B, hoping for a smooth ride, but little did I know that the lift was faulty, with its cabin shaking and jerking all the way up. It was as if one of the ropes pulling the lift up was entangled and was about to snap. Never have I had such a freaky experience.

A pretty gigantic machine called Big Sweet Land has landed in most arcades in town and it's funny to see people pay dollar after dollar, hoping to scoop up their favourite sweet or snack. On most occasions, the machine doesn’t scoop up anything. Not much, at least. I don’t understand why people pay good money to catch a handful of sweets that’s been left in the machine for weeks, or even months. They might as well give me some of their money.

I opened one of my secret drawers at home a recently, and I happened to fish out a book containing the autographs of my primary 6 classmates. I remember going round collecting as many autographs as I could during the last 2 weeks of my primary school life. Well, I suddenly had a thought to search for some of my old friends on Friendster, to see what everyone’s been up to in life. It was really interesting – I found out that one of my ex-classmates is a good friend of another friend of mine from BMT. It’s a small world indeed.

I think it’s a whole load of fun knowing at the back of your mind what thoughts are going through that person’s mind and understanding how he or she is feeling, having your actions resulting in a particular way at that very point of time. Analyzing people can really be quite fun. :)
posted by Selwyn at 11:15 PM 0 comments

Thursday, July 26, 2007

the EZ-link story

If you’re an adult, don’t try paying your bus fares using a student pass, even though you think the driver doesn’t know since you’re hiding a student EZ-link card in your wallet. Well, unfortunately not. I read in the papers that, apparently, the details of the EZ-link card will show up on the little screen that’s located in front of the bus captain.

Which reminds me of an incident a couple of years back, actually.

I tried using my younger brother’s EZ-link card to pay for my fare. I hid the card in my wallet, and, thinking that the bus captain had no idea whatsoever, I happily tapped it at the reader and started walking towards the steps which led to the upper deck.

All of a sudden, I was stopped by the bus captain, and I was asked to reveal the card I used to pay for my bus fare. I quickly fished out my real tertiary student card from my left pocket (I had it all planned, of course). He then asked me to re-tap my card at the reader. It beeped, instead of showing “Entry OK”, which obviously meant I had used another card to pay for my fare. I then quickly apologized profusely and told the bus captain that I had tapped the wrong card earlier – I had brought my brother’s card out to top up credits at the MRT station, and had put the wrong card in my wallet. Of course, once again, I already had myself prepared. The only thing was that I never knew that I would actually get caught.

Just in case you’re wondering, no, there wasn’t any fine or anything. I was just warned by the bus captain, who was really quite anal. I mean, look, it’s not as if he gets a pay rise if I pay a few more cents for my ride, right?

Anyway, the moral of the story is, don’t try paying your bus fares using a student pass if you ain’t a student. The details of the EZ-link card will show up on the little screen that’s located in front of the bus captain.

If only I had known.
posted by Selwyn at 2:25 AM 0 comments

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

the deathly hallows

You see, there's nothing wrong in being a Harry Potter fan, but if you start queuing for the book a day or two before its release, then there's probably something seriously wrong with you, and you should go get a life.

To those of you who were among the thousands who even bothered queuing up for the latest Harry Potter book, well, I hope you had fun queuing.
posted by Selwyn at 10:59 PM 0 comments

Tuesday, July 24, 2007

the problem with government doctors

Recently, I had this huge ulcer that mysteriously formed at the back of my mouth, and it got so bad I had to see a doctor to find out if there was anything I could do about it. The thing is, I didn’t really want to spend any money, so I went to visit the doctor at the polyclinic. For those of you who don’t know, it’s free, by the way, since I’m still in the army.

I woke up early in the morning and reached the polyclinic at 7.45am – 15 minutes before it opened, thinking that I would be one of the first few in line to see the doctor. Boy, I was so wrong. The polyclinic was already open (not officially) and there were more than 30 people sitting at the seats already waiting, although there wasn’t any staff around at that time. A security guard was present to usher people to the seats, which filled up really quickly. At 8am, the queue was so long, it was pretty much unbelievable. Well, it was a Monday after all.

The decision to visit the doctor at the polyclinic was so wrong. No, I didn’t have to wait long, but I hate it when doctors (both male and female) give us NSFs the wtf-are-you-doing-here-shouldn’t-you-be-reporting-sick-at-your-camp look. It annoying. They always don’t bother looking at you in the eye, and most of them like asking a whole bunch of the same, silly old questions, like ‘which camp are you from?’ and ‘what’s your vocation?’. And that’s not all. Some won’t even bother much about whatever illness you’re having (simply because they think we’re trying to ‘chao geng’) so after taking a look at your condition they’ll just say retarded things like ‘nah don’t worry, it’s just a small sore’ or ‘it’s okay, you’ll be fine in a few days’, before issuing packets and bottles of useless medicine that don’t really help at all.

Hello, if I wasn’t in such pain I really wouldn’t want to come all the way just to visit you, you freak.

The worst part? Some won’t even give MC. Even if they do, it’s only for a day. Nothing more.

Well, the only nice doctor I’ve come across in the polyclinic near my home is a female doctor who recently appeared in the newspaper for prescribing an overdose of medicine to her patient, an 88-year old woman. She had prescribed four times the normal dosage of digoxin – a medicine that that regulates the contraction of the heart, and the woman died a few months later. I believe the doctor was probably stripped of her post. And, of course, I never saw her again.

Anyway, back to my story. The ulcer took more than 2 weeks to heal (no thanks to Ben & Jerry’s Free Cone Day…haha) and I had to see a private doctor to get some better medicine (I can’t believe he actually told me to throw away whatever the doctor at the polyclinic issused me). Of course, I had to fork out money, but it was all worth it.

The moral of the story? Don’t visit the polyclinic, especially when you’re an NSF. No doubt, it’s free, but with the bloody treatment we get, I’d rather pay and see a private doctor anytime.
posted by Selwyn at 12:12 AM 0 comments

Wednesday, July 18, 2007

strange dreams

I’ve been having quite strange dreams recently. What's even more odd is that some of my dreams are about my manager, Paul.

I had my first dream about him about a month ago. I dreamt that Paul left the office and as usual, went out for lunch with his brother. For some strange reason, he ended up at my grandmother’s former house, which was at Redhill. And don’t ask me why, but I was there as well. As they stopped to park the car, I hid behind the wall of the building and I saw both of them coming out of the vehicle. I didn't want them to see me so I made sure I hid behind the wall carefully.

My next dream happened about 2 weeks later. Believe it or not, I dreamt that he died. No kidding. I remember walking past his room in the office and there was this huge sign which read “OFF-IN-LIEU” pasted on his door. It was strange. I don’t remember the exact details but I remember someone asking me in my dream if I would like to take over his post. Haha. Maybe it's just trying to tell me something. There’s more to this dream, but I don’t remember much of it anymore.

In other news, the String Ensemble finally has no shows for 2 weeks in a row. It’s like a dream come true. I’m on off the whole of this week, and I’m glad I am, because there’s just tons of things I’ve been wanting to do for a long time now, and now I’ve finally got my chance. :)

I’m also starting to clear my off and leave soon. Gosh. Time really does fly.
posted by Selwyn at 1:58 PM 0 comments

Saturday, July 14, 2007

when you're gone

I met this girl about 4 years ago, during a lunch with a local celebrity. It was love at first sight, I think, but I never plucked up the courage to ask for her number, probably because she was with her friends at that time.

I regretted not doing so, of course.

I remember going home thinking of ways to see if I there was a way to contact her again. I even resorted to IRC, hoping to look for someone who knew her at that time. A few weeks later, I struck gold – a friend of hers revealed her email address to me.

It would have been way too obvious if I had added her on MSN at that time, so I didn’t. Instead, I found her on Friendster, and after months of hesitation, I finally decided to add her as a friend.

Of course, being the popular chick she was, it wasn’t long that she had reached the then-quota of 500 friends, and a few months later, I noticed that she deleted a whole bunch of people, and yes, including myself. One day I just realized that she wasn’t on my list of friends anymore.

It’s heart-wrenching, of course, but we all know there’s nothing much I can do.

There’s a lot more to this story, but I shall keep it short.

Ever since that day, I’ve only met her once, at the arcade at Cathay Cineleisure. It was unexpected, of course, and I remember myself standing quite a distance away from her, not knowing if I should go up to say hi. And no, I decided not to.

4 years down the road, I still think she’s one of the coolest and sweetest girls I’ve ever met. She’s the one and only girl that makes my heart break – on most occasions I can almost hear my heart break into a million pieces.

I pray for her every now and then, and since I’m not likely going to be the one taking care of her for the rest of my life, I pray that the Lord will do so.

There’s this song that’s playing on radio at the moment – it’s When You’re Gone by Avril Lavigne.

This song means a lot to me, and it’s specially dedicated to you, G. I love you, and I miss you dearly. I hope the Lord will continue to take care of you and bless you in everything you do.


I always needed time on my own
I never thought I'd need you there when I cry
And the days feel like years when I'm alone
And the bed where you lie is made up on your side

When you walk away
I count the steps that you take
Do you see how much I need you right now?

When you're gone
The pieces of my heart are missing you
When you're gone
The face I came to know is missing too
When you're gone
All the words I need to hear to always get me through the day
And make it OK
I miss you

I've never felt this way before
Everything that I do
Reminds me of you
And the clothes you left
they lie on my floor
And they smell just like you
I love the things that you do

When you walk away
I count the steps that you take
Do you see how much I need you right now?


When you're gone
The pieces of my heart are missing you
When you're gone
The face I came to know is missing too
When you're gone
All the words I need to hear to always get me through the day
And make it OK
I miss you


were made for each other
Out here forever
I know we were
Yeah Yeah

All I ever wanted was for you to know
Everything I do I give my heart and soul
I can hardly breathe, I need to feel you here with me
Yeah

When you're gone
The pieces of my heart are missing you
When you're gone
The face I came to know is missing too
When you're gone
All the words I need to hear to always get me through the day
And make it OK
I miss you



-When You're Gone by Avril Lavigne
posted by Selwyn at 11:08 PM 0 comments

Sunday, July 01, 2007

half a year gone

As I type this, I realize we've all stepped into the second half of the year.

Yet again, time has passed so quickly, it's hard to believe 6 months have flown past just like that.

These 6 months, especially the entire month of June, have been one of the most intense periods of my life. I have had so many things to do both in and out of camp, as well as settle lots of issues I've been struggling with lately. Being busy would totally be an understatement - those who work with me will probably know what I mean.

I work 7 days a week, and I've got a hundred over things to settle each and every day. I don't even get enough sleep at all, and I can't take off because I've got things to settle in camp daily.

I wouldn't want to imagine what would happen if I were to turn off my phone for say, an hour or two.

I've been wanting to blog for a long time now but I don't even have 5 minutes each day to log on and post something. I really do have plenty of stories and lots of photos to share with all of you but unfortunately time is never on my side. Well, at least not for now. My dinner slots are full for the next 2 weeks or so, so as usual, to those who'd like to meet up, please drop me a line 2 weeks in advance. I'm sorry, but I have to plan my schedule 1 - 2 months ahead.

I'll be blogging a full update on the month of June when I get the time. I'm quite sure I'll be less busy by mid-July - I don't see many MDC shows on the schedule at the moment but then again you'll never know - shows pop up all the time, anytime.

June has really been a shitty month. Argh. It's so shitty, it's unbelievable.

I can't wait to switch to ORD mode man.
posted by Selwyn at 2:09 AM 0 comments