Backtrack

Austin Pre-Christmas Festivities with Beauty and the Beast, the State Capitol Building, a huge Turkey Leg and the GOP:

Equation

Magnetic Dartboard
+ Pictionary with supercompetitive people
+ Chocolate-covered almond clusters
= FunFunFun Evening

PEEKNEEK

O Happy Day

The Mun has landed.
And she won't shut up about the glorious Austin weather. Well I guess she's entitled to gush after flying in from chilly Charlottesville, VA. Haha, good to have you here, friend.
It was a sightseeing trip for both of us since I haven't really seen many of the Austin attractions either.

Day One: Historic party zone Sixth Street was really fun. I'm still underage, but it was great just walking the street, feeling the energy. The city really lives up to its unofficial motto: Keep Austin Weird. Everything's so quirky, slightly off-beat and random. It's kinda fun getting used to it. Mun really wants to go to Coyote Ugly. We'll do that when we get back.

Day Two: Church, then Trail of Lights with my roomies, Chris and Edward. A mile of Christmas lights and displays from various sponsors (there was this Beauty and the Beast one complete with the clock and the candle and the teapot with her son Chip but I can't remember the teapot's name and that's sad cuz I used to like her so much I had her on my birthday cake one year so can someone please tell me what she was called??) culminating in a huge spiral tree of lights which you stand under and spin with a friend while looking up and everything becomes momentarily psychedelic and '60s groovy and then you fall down on the autumn leaves and laugh 'til you hurt. At least that's what happened to me and Mun.

Day Three: Health-conscious grocery shopping at HEB, then a BBQ dinner, followed by a stop by 37th Street, where all the neighbors put up elaborate Christmas lighting. Again, operative word here: Random. This guy put his stove out in his yard, lit it with Christmas lights and made a kind of seascape out of it. There was a nativity scene featuring Bush and Cheney, and another house welcomed visitors with a large lighted Godzilla. Definitely an Alternative Christmas. After the requisite peppermint mocha break, we headed to 6th St again to listen to some jazz in this dingy but cosy little bar called the Elephant Room. Was mesmerized by the Matthew McConaughy/Ryan Gosling/Jesus lookalike double bass (i think) player, who just kept plucking and plucking with this blank, faraway look in his eyes. Such a gorgeous sound from that massive instrument.

Today: Intense (for me) outlet shopping with Kirsten and Kenaz. We hit all the right shops: Banana Republic, Old Navy, American Eagle Outfitters, Gap, Aeropostale. I mainly looked and coveted and lamented my financial state but got myself some cheap chocolate colored lace-less Converse sneakers. Grungey. I have to watch myself or I'll be strategically ripping my jeans very soon.

Yawn. 4-hour trip to Dallas tomorrow. Can't wait to see the godparents. I'll go now.

FAME

Haha I'm on the UT Website.

http://cns.utexas.edu/classroom

taken at 6:45am. that's why we look so zombified. my dear roomies are the 2 girls to my right. the 2 guys are my great 'crew leaders' who refuse to be called 'boss'. they gave us doughnuts again today for taking the extra effort to pose for the camera. believe me, on other days there's usually not even a hint of a smile at that unearthly hour.

as you can see, they're still looking for people, so if you guys wanna hang out with me at 6:30am cleaning tabletops and testing projector functions do drop them a line! :)

Two More Pics

Becks and I decking the halls

Group shot

Breathing Easy

Just back from a pretty fruitful study session with Chris and Kirsten. It started out at the library, then Kirsten and I left for Starbucks because we felt very strongly that the library was too brown. Extremely valid reason, I say. Green-and-red Starbucks just reeked of Christmas; it was like someone was pumping concentrated Christmas spirit into that tiny coffee shop. Listening to non-stop Christmas carols, from jazz to reggae to opera... sipping their divine peppermint mocha, which tasted like a molten After Eight chocolate square (the one caffeinated beverage I actually enjoy)... well yeah, the whole warm fuzzy atmosphere did get a little cloying after a while, but we found a good spot and I realised that I mug better when there's a comfortable level of noise and activity around me, as opposed to my surroundings being completely still and silent. Had a FILLING dinner at Mellow Mushroom, a stone-baked pizza kitchen. We shared an italian sausage and spinach pizza with the thickest, densest dough ever... real good.

Yesterday's Singapore and Malaysian students' party was a ton of fun. I actually put some effort into dressing up after many weeks of just dashing out of the house with frizzy hair and the same ol' windbreaker. Put my sneakers away and wore the gold/khaki pointies Beth got me. Didn't realise the power of an eyelash-curler until I borrowed Sobeyda's... now I'm gonna get one of my own :) We had a really cool bachelor-pad-ish function room to ourselves, and there was rendang, prata, curry chicken, noodles, fish ball soup, red bean dessert (!!!), bread-and-chocolate pudding.

After stuffing our faces, we had a really entertaining gift-exchange - the kind where you could steal other people's gifts. After swiping the sparkly Victoria's Secret body lotion from Soehan's girlfriend Adeline, I was shown the same charity when Pammy took it from me. Haha. I ended up with some designer chocolates, so I'm not complaining. It was just cool to meet a bunch of new people. Nice people, good food. That's all you really need for a party. An annoying-but-infectious festive soundtrack helps too. "Laaaaast Christmas, I gave you my heart..."

Still waiting for better party photos. 1. my newfound fellow Asian English major Kimee 2. Chris with the ladies

One! Paper! Down! :D

Nuo Mi Fan

Today's Dinner...

... was surprisingly good! Had dried shrimp and mushroom in it too. Couldn't compare to Popo's though. I'll be heading back to that Asian market on a regular basis, I can tell. To get my pickled lettuce...

and...

yummy!

A Post

Gotta remind myself that my finals are really pretty well spaced-out, they don't constitute 70% of my grade (like PS1101E in NUS :), they aren't cumulative and I'll be able to celebrate almost immediately when my dear Munyuk drops in from chilly Charlottesville, VA, two hours after my last paper. Have good things planned babe. Lotsa Mexican food, that's for sure! Can't wait.

Thank you all for encouraging me when I was kinda overwhelmed with missing home and all. I felt the love! As a dear friend wrote to me, if God has brought me here, He will bring me through it. In the best way possible. My feelings are real, but now I know what to do with them :) I'm never alone.

Happy Holidays, all... have lotsa fun at Vivocity and all the other great malls that have sprouted on our island in my absence.

Through the Mire

TGIF! I'm so happy this week is over... It really seemed like a challenge.. like ploughing through mud. Like that line from that Wilfred Owen poem - "... we cursed through sludge." I wasn't exactly cursing, but it was still tough to get through and I was constantly plagued by negative thoughts and a sour attitude. And an aching, gnawing homesickness that I could actually feel in my chest. But. I know who lifted me from the pit, from my terribly narrow outlook and discouraging internal monologues. Thank You Lord, for hearing my cry, for being the lifter of my head, and for planting my feet on solid ground once more. Be encouraged, guys.

Psalm 40
For the director of music. Of David. A psalm.

1 I waited patiently for the LORD;
he turned to me and heard my cry.

2 He lifted me out of the slimy pit,
out of the mud and mire;
he set my feet on a rock
and gave me a firm place to stand.

3 He put a new song in my mouth,
a hymn of praise to our God.
Many will see and fear
and put their trust in the LORD.

The Chills

Brrr. Along with the pick-me-ups, there are the get-me-downs. I guess it's a combination of the sudden cold weather (1degC today), missing home, friends, family and preparing for finals. But I don't want to just hold out and tahan for 2 weeks til the holidays. I need Your peace, joy and strength. Thank You. Miss you guys, wherever you are.

"You can call me Flower, if you want to..."

I'm baaack! What a great weekend. Photos from Godpa soon (yes I forgot to use my own camera again).

Let's get the mandatory food bit out of the way, shall we?

Pecan Pie with Dreyer's vanilla ice cream is my new favourite dessert.

I watched about 7 movies in five days - action: The Sentinel (voted bo-rringg! by me, vic and el) and M:I 2 (great! better than the third!) and a late-night series of shamelessly chick-flicky chick-flicks in Victoria's room: When in Rome, where the Olsen twins still kinda looked alike; A Cinderella Story, with that hilarious "bend-and-snap" lady from Legally Blonde; and What a Girl Wants which I must admit I like a lot.

I watched the start and end of the restored platinum edition of Bambi, where I fell in love with Thumper all over again, and on the bus ride back the girl to my left was watching Little Women which I now believe is one of the most perfect shows out there.

And the movies were just a teeny part of Thanksgiving! Just hanging out with the coolest god-family in the world, hearing Christmas carols 24/7 on the radio (they're played the day after Thanksgiving) and being in a real home-home (not a college apartment) again was priceless. My first Thanksgiving will forever bring back memories of swinging my heart out at the CFNI playground and attempting to play basketball after dinner, hearing Victoria's shrieks, Godma's laughter, Peni-el's drumming and Godpa's wise counsel (really), making a surrealist-looking island with weird characters ("Take me to your leader!") with the clay Kellee and Harlen brought, trying to mold my piece of clay into an exact replica of a bunny a la Wallace and Gromit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit but failing badly, hitting the mall on Black Friday and seeing the crazy sales, finding the perfect pair of sunglasses for $5...

It was the perfect pick-me-up. :) Bring on the finals!

The Thanksgiving Post

First of all, apologies to those of you who can't follow the convoluted peach-club/ swirlyscentedpen discussion going on to your right... It's just a bunch of my sec 3/4 classmates reminiscing about our good ol' MGS days. That's all we do, basically. We can't seem to let go. So just indulge them.

I had one hour of class today and that was it! Yesss. Thanksgiving is upon us! It's almost like a Fall Break. Most teachers cancelled classes today, even though the official holidays are tomorrow and Friday. In about 5 hours I will be on my way to Dallas. And I have much to be thankful for:

Got my paycheck today! HaHA!
Watched the Longhorn Singers (school choir) on Friday and they did a frighteningly good rendition of Michael Jackson's "Thriller", complete with ripped clothing and in-sync twitching. Haha, guess you had to be there.
Went to pretty Zilker Park Saturday evening and then watched Borat. I think it was pretty good social commentary. There's no disputing Sascha Baron Cohen's talent. But...
Went to a UT Basketball game yesterday with some Nav people... The first live game I've watched. Go Longhorns! Wish you were there, Marko. Kevin Durant is amazingly good. And there was this blimp-like thingy shaped like a bottle of BBQ sauce floating around the stadium.
I'm starting to like fall weather. Especially when the sun comes out and its cold and bright. I just need a whole new wardrobe to match it. I should really learn to knit my own scarves.
I've been eating so much Mexican lately but I don't seem to tire of it. Rice, beans, guacamole, chicken, pico de gallo, cheese, onions, lettuce... It can't beat cai fan (1meat 2veg) from Bukit Batok but it sure comes close :)

I know I talk about food almost every post. I can't help it.

I'm still agonizing over whether I should take Latin next semester. It's apparently difficult for some and a breeze for others. Urgh decisions decisions.

Okay, I'm gonna start packing now. I'll be back with tales of turkey and pumpkin pie... unless the Chins are doing a Chinese dinner, which is perfectly fine by me! Bye guys...

Brew of the Day

I have a confession to make: yesterday I bought a cup of coffee just so I could look like everyone else. I had the impression that a cup of steaming hot coffee in my hand would would bring me complete and utter satisfaction. It seemed like the people who held coffee cups as they marched across campus looked like they had such a sense of purpose, like that hot drink in their hand was somehow helping them reach their glorious destinies. It's apparently the smartest accesory to any outfit, that perfect little accent which finishes off a look.

With those objectives in mind, I got a piping-hot Caramel Macchiato from Java City, my first hot coffee purchase in the US :) And it soon became obvious that I'm a terrible coffee drinker. The floating foam on top with the caramel swirls was fine, but beyond that - ew. In my inexperience I failed to stir it prior to drinking, so all the caramel settled at the bottom. So it was something like bitterblandboringbitterbitterbitterSWEEEEEEET!! Plus I burnt my tongue while trying to appear elegant while sipping. And the coffee gave my teeth a sickening yellowish tinge. And after I'd finished my head hurt and I felt kinda jumpy and desperately wanted the aftertaste to leave my mouth.

So I don't do coffee too well. Back home, as some of you know, I loved Coffee Bean for its creamy chicken pasta and Starbucks for its iced cocoa. For its Frappuchinos too, but mainly because of the strong chocolate flavor. You could take the caffeine out and it wouldn't matter. I guess that excludes me from the cool coffee-clutching college crowd, which is, right now, almost the entire student population, as the cold weather is creeping in and everyone's staying up late to study for finals. But it's okay. I can always pretend, right? I'll put my green tea into a Starbucks paper cup and walk around with it like I own the world. Then I'll belong.

:)

Thank You Mom

3 of my long-sleeved tops and 3 jackets... I will now stay warm and happy in winter. Oh, and I love the stickers!

The Ultimate

My roomie Sobe just gave me a Ferrera Rocher.
Mm-mm-mm.
Right now, all is momentarily right with the world, and I can study for at least an hour more.
So much power in a little piece of chocolate.

~

It's a month to finals. And I'm kinda not used to having a long Thanksgiving weekend of fun and turkey and celebration in the middle of this crucial period. Back home, the final stretch of a semester is one long month of living in the library, skipping classes to study, going for intense tuition sessions, stocking up on coffee... stuff like that.

But Thanksgiving is what's keeping me going right now. I'm going to Dallas to see the dear godparents and have a nice home-cooked meal, will be able to wake up after 5:40am on Thursday and Friday. Definitely something to look forward to.

I finished the third latest instalment of the Isabel Dalhousie/Sunday Philosophy Club series by Alexander McCall Smith. It's called "The Right Attitude to Rain". It's the only book series I've ever followed in my life, and it's fun to be able to put a story aside and then return to the same characters again half a year later. I'm hoping that Professor McCall Smith won't hurry the publication of the next one - I like the idea of revisiting a place after some time. Namely Edinburgh, where the story is set.

Hungry. Bye.

TexRenFest 2006

I'm a terrible photographer. I couldn't be bothered to take pictures of all the knights, ladies, pirates, witches, monsters, etc. which were present at the Renaissance Festival so all you'll get is a shot of me and a troll. I figured there are much nicer pictures on the website.
It was still a fun experience (though half the day was spent driving there and back). I watched the joust (I think the results were fixed - England won every time!), saw some side-splitting medieval comedic acts, listened Shakespeare's musings on the current state of the world and ate 'battered pig' (basically a huge corn-dog). The fireworks display at the end of the night was really CLOSE and breathtaking. I love the type of fireworks which kind of glitter as they fade out.

Oh yes, and here's a belated Halloween photo of me as a crayon box. With my lovely crayons.

From the desk of Fluffy Livertushie

Get your silly name here:
http://www.scholastic.com/captainunderpants/namechanger.htm
I'm sure some of you have seen it before... Thanks, Ili, for single-handedly reviving this.
Beth and Mark - you guys are Crusty and Pinky Livertushie respectively. :)
I'm going to take a nap now... By the way, OC is alive and KICKING! I'm glad it's back.

Murphy Lives!

Was about to write a grumpy post on the demise of my beloved Murphy (my Zen Neeon mp3 player) which suddenly froze up as i was walking to school on Thursday. The screen was stuck on Death Cab for Cutie and it made this low humming noise. I couldn't bring myself to blame Creative, cuz I'd always been its staunch supporter -I refused to get an ipod for my 19th birthday- so I decided it was the cold weather. Cuz, you know, Murphy was, like, bred in Singapore and all, and was probably just... adapting to the weird temperature changes happening in Austin right now. Yeah.

Sure enough, I returned from the Renaissance Festival at Plantersville (more on that later) yesterday night to find Murphy ressurected and working perfectly again. Brrr. Stupid fall weather. Creative ROCKS, baby.

one other thing

I got an email from Sistic today (yeah i'm on their mailing list) saying The Phantom of the Opera will be coming to Singapore in March 2007. Noooo.. I've been wanting to watch that one since my parents saw it the last time they were here! I remember studying the program booklet they brought back and admiring the really good-looking cast. Hmph. Well, I guess it's a trade-off: Lion King's coming to Austin next March. But this is a heads-up to you guys anyway: get your tickets fast!

bag of assorted thoughts

Fall Retreat saw me attending my first Halloween Dance party. Yay! It was fun. I went as a crayon box, with six of my friends as the crayons. But we called ourselves the Prayons, with color names like Sword of the Spirit Silver, and Light of the World Yellow. Haha. It was a hoot.

Yesterday was actual Halloween, and there was no shortage of sexy nurses/policewomen/pirates walking around school. It's amazing how they survived in the pretty cold weather with so little on. Still, was fun to people watch.

On Monday, my Ethnic American Lit professor handed out Halloween chocolates in class out of a little plastic pumpkin lantern. I was immediately brought back to the Primary 4 days where Miss Soh would pass around Cheezels and I'm sorry Fish, but I have to mention the time you dropped the can and everything spilled on the floor, because I still can't get over how you deprived us all of the wonderful cheezy snack that fateful day. Now you have to go through the entire guilt cycle all over again. Get used to it - I'm pretty sure the memory will haunt you for as long as you live. :D

I was feeling a little homesick on Sunday night (I think it was just general Sunday-night blues) and suddenly had the impulse to read some Singaporean poetry. Don't ask me where that came from. So I checked the library and they had a few copies of Arthur Yap and Edwin Thumboo. After thumbing through Thumboo (TERRIBLE play on words, I KNOW, but let me have my fun!!) I felt a little better. I liked 'Ulysses by the Merlion' because it related to what I'm reading in Greek history now. I have to admit - most of Arthur Yap left me completely mystified. Deep dude. Except this one poem about 2 mothers in a HDB playground which was written completely in Singlish. That was completely Singaporean and completely lovely.

Oh yes, if i haven't totally lost you guys by now, let me tell you about my job, which is the BEST in the WORLD. I wake up at 5:40am and get to school by 6:30am to check the general IT stuff in 5 classrooms - DVD player, projector... blah. And by 7:30 I'm done and get to spend a nice half and hour eating a spinach bagel with cream cheese and preparing myself for class and doing my QT. Plus the pay is phenomenal - $11/hour and I get paid for 2 hours a day though I'm done in one. Awesome, right? I know that God closed the doors to all the other jobs I applied for so I could get this one. My supervisors are great and sometimes give us glazed doughnuts. And my roomies work with me too. It is such a BLESSING. And it's making me sleep and wake early... Totally revolutionizing my lifestyle. Yes, it's that much of a deal to me. I'm happy! Thank you God.

This Friday, I will be heading off the the Texas Renaissance Festival (www.texrenfest.com) to hang with medieval Scottish people and other cool characters from centuries past. Tell you more about it when I get back. Hope I'll get to try my hand at bagpipes.

It's also full-on mugging mode right now. Time to find a spot in the library I can call my own and live there until December. I miss the libraries back home; they're a lot prettier. I miss Cafe Galilee too. I am such a nerd.

Tomorrow's the OC season premiere which -would you believe it- is on at the SAME TIME as Grey's Anatomy. The only 2 shows I follow in the world. WHY do they do this to me?? But I caught the whole first episode on myspace, so all is cool til next week. Looks promising.

John Mayer's song "I Don't Trust Myself (With Loving You)" is really good. It's on his website, so I play it a lot and will probably get sick of it in a few days. But for now, it's lovely and slightly hearbreaking. Go give it a listen. You'll be boppin' along in no time.

I miss you. And no, this 'you' isn't a secret crush; it's all of you. All. Of. You. Bye!

This Weekend

I'll be at the Navigators Fall Retreat held here : www.threemountainretreat.com
Think it'll be fun. It's just that I'm so tired right now... I just wanna sleep. And I haven't thought of what to be at the costume party on Sat night.
Will post pictures when I get back on Sunday. Take care all, and use the tagboard!

pictures

top to bottom (these aren't in chronological order):
free soda after the maze - worrying about squishing the pumpkin - with becks at BBQ lunch - the glory of corn - awesome gourd-like fruit - gail punching her card at our first stop

Marble Falls

idontcarewhoyouarewhereyourefromwhatyoudidASLONGASYOULOVEMEEE...
You were my strength when I was weakYou were my voice when I couldn't speakYou were my eyes when I couldn't seeYou saw the best there was in meLifted me up when I couldn't reachYou gave me faith 'coz you believedI'm everything I amBECAUSEYOULOVEDMEEE...

The radio served up some great songs from the '90s as we cruised along the highway toward the town of Marble Falls for the Sweey Berry Farm Texas Maze. Oddly enough, there were no berries to be found at the farm, only pumpkins. And LOTS of them. The largest cost $25. Kids were sitting on pumpkins and rolling around in the haystacks.
Overalls-checkedshirts-scarecrows-homemadejam-cornmazes-strawbarns-pumpkinspumpkinspumpkins...

The maze took us 1hour15mins. We had to find 12 'towns' and get our cards punched at every stop. By the 6th town, I'd had enough of the blazing sun and walls of cornstalks. But with Rebecca's gifted leadership we soldiered on and found the last 6 towns in 15 mins. After that, of course, the sun was brilliant and the maze was beautiful. We got free pink lemonade too. Mm.

Apart from a really good time at Marble Falls, I was blessed with a really pleasant surprise today. I went to pick up a parcel from the Post Office, which the postman had tried to deliver twice before. It turned out to be a Creative webcam from Skype, as a prize in their September Back To College Giveaway! The last time I won something significant was a trip to Phuket in a children's contest by the Singapore Zoo. Haha. It's been a while. Thanks Skype!

So yes. Today was a good day of 'recharging' after a rather draining week. I'm all ready for the week ahead. In about 6 hours I will be taking part in the Great MG Gals Five Timezone Chat (with participants in Singapore, US, UK, Canada and Australia) and I'm wondering if I'll be awake enough to actually contribute anything significant to the conversation.

Alright, I'm going back to digging for deeper layers of meaning in the Disney Hercules movie for my Greece/Rome: FIlm and Reality class. Miss you guys.

Where I'll be on Saturday morning:

We're taking on the Sweet Berry Farm 'Texas' Maze! The sight of that thing fills me with childish delight. It's gorgeous. It'll get me through the two tests looming before me.
Right now... Missing home and the familiar. I wouldn't say the novelty has worn out or anything; every day will always be at least a little exciting and there's definitely no shortage of new things to do, people to meet, restaurants to try (from Rebecca's very own Amazing Austin Makansutra. I aim to cover them all!)
But you know the feeling. It gnaws at your insides. Like a beaver. The webcam is a wonderful device, but not nearly enough.
More to come after my tests.

My baby, my desk (which I assembled MYSELF. And oh it wasn't easy)

Don't you think my lamp looks like the Pixar Animation Studios one which hops onto the screen before a movie starts, jumps on and flattens the "I" in PIXAR and then kind of stares at you while everything fades to black? That being said, doesn't it seem like it's WATCHING YOU now? Creepy, huh? :)

Everything seems possible after a bath

Hi all (especially my dear Kyle, whom I haven't heard from for ages... can't believe you're half-blind, boy, but yeah you can do the ray charles/stevie wonder thing - hey, isn't that what you've always wanted??)

Mid-Autumn Festival was pretty cool, we had a little booth in the Union Ballroom in school along with all the other Asian societies. Of course all the Vietnamese girls were wearing their cute flowy ethnic outfits, and the cheongsam-ed Taiwanese/Chinese girls were strutting around in all their old-Shanghai glory. They looked really good though.

Here's a picture of our booth:

The 4 tubs to the right contain goldfish, which were the most popular prizes of the night. And my friend Andre on the left is pretending to be a beggar. That plastic container he's begging with originally held jelly sticks... the kind you can either squeeze out and eat right away or freeze for later. haha we loved them so much we tried our best not to give 'em away as prizes. I love the purple/grape flavor. FlavoUr. Whatever. I can't decide whether to spell American or British. One of my friends insists on the extra 'u' to show our loyalty to the crown. I know, weird.

But it was cool celebrating MAF (to steal a Hwa Chong term) and asking people quiz questions like, "How many suns did the archer Hou Er shoot down?" Answer: 9. BET YOU DIDN'T KNOW. Except maybe the HwaChongians.

After that we headed to a Chinese restaurant for nice rice and sesame chicken and kailan and doumiao and stupid but hilarious fortune cookies that taught you Chinese words at the same time.

Okay, gonna go do some Government reading. That's one subject I don't really like. But before I go, HAPPY EIGHTEENTH BIRTHDAY BETH!! Glad you got the top, yes you look UBER-HOT in it... I'm gonna go out and grab a kimono blouse for myself very soon too.

Til the next post then! And I like my simple grey on white layout, so no it's not gonna change anytime soon.

Okaaay

Alrighty.. so it doesn't sound so crude, I changed my blog address.
Any vulgar Taiwanese connotations were purely unintentional.

A Transparent Eyeball

Back! After 20 days. It's a nice little Friday night, and I'm not out ice-skating with the cell group because tomorrow I've got a full day with the Singaporean Students' Association meeting, then hanging out with Aunty Joyce, who is driving down from her meeting in Houston with my webcam, Fish's Julius Caesar and a whole lotta other junk for me... But. It's really not about the stuff (though the family will finally get to see my chubby face on skype).. I'm REALLY excited about spending time with her. Like a girls' day out. Ice cream and shopping and coffee...

I went to the Pita Pit for lunch today with Pammy. The pita they used was like an open oversized soft fluffy off-white cowrie shell, and they just shovelled in shredded lettuce, mushrooms, onions, chicken marinated greek-style, feta cheese and honey mustard dressing. It's amazing how much they stuffed in. yumyumyumyum.

Right now, I would like to give a shout out to my little brother, Mark "Dimples-so-deep-they-probably-touch-in-the-middle-of-his-mouth" Lim, who has been curiously silent after his string of Bright Orange Emails last week. Thanks for your Christmas '04 present, the furry blue Mango sweatpants that are serving me really well here. Muchos Gracias! And call me!

Hm. What else. I watched Dead Poet's Society just now and was riveted. Pretty inspiring.

Beth: Brandi Carlile is coming to perform at UT! But ticket prices are too steep.

Okay, will stop here. Miss you all. It was kinda heartwarming to read all your Hello Panda comments. I felt all warm and creamy inside :)

ps: Happy Mid-Autumn Festival! Remember Chang Er and her rabbit in the moon! Oh man now I'm craving lotus paste... this HAS to stop!

Greetings

Blogging is really a skill... suddenly I can't think of anything to write here. Hi all!
Sitting at my cluttered little desk, looking at my cluttered little half of a room- this is gonna be home for 9 months! I'm hoping the family will be able to find my stuffed manatee and send it over, along with my Sec 3 Julius Caesar text... who would've thought I'd need it for a Roman film class 5 years later?
Yesterday I got to eat -drumroll- HELLO PANDA cuz the guy upstairs had a pack. Oh man. All the chocolates in the US cannot compare to panda-printed biscuit shells filled with creamy, low-quality chocolate. Reminds me of JC lectures... and how one biscuit in a pack would inevitably have no chocolate in it. Sigh.
Tonight is the big game against Ohio State. That means absolutely nothing to me. Yet.
The whole uproar over the Facebook news feed was pretty funny. But yeah, it was too much info for me too.
I'm gonna go. Pictures will come when I buy a card-reader.
Love ya!