2008 look back

Everyone has wishes and resolutions for 2008.

With new goals, there comes wishes. I wish everyone would be able to attain their goals and strive hard to keep to their resolutions.

As for me, 2008 ended with a big bang, in a good way of course.

There has been many highs and lows but ultimately, it was surviving the ride that mattered most.

Where I am now, what I have become, I am thankful and appreciative for my family and friends.

January - Playing with nephew, Desean at Bro's place



Feburary - Airport send-off with Clara n Gwenne




March - Sydney Underground with Daphne



April - Guild Bar with Project mates




June - Dinner with Housemates at Southbank



June - Graduation and Farewell party at Eagle Street Pier with BECT




July - Wakeboarding @ Batam with Dave and Aaron



August - 24th Birthday Party at Oompahticos




September - Participated in F1 at the Paddock Club



October - Colleague's wedding (Faith's) at Fort Canning Hill with Nadiah



November - Kukup trip with Clara and Zhen Xiang



December - Taiwan with Ivan Zeng

Taiwan here I come

i'm off.

to.

Taiwan.

Toodles.

december days

time passes so fast.

it was difficult to comprehend when the month timer struck 12.

i have been fully utilizing my time out with friends.

enjoying the days as i work towards my goals.

no television for me and boy do i miss the telly.

Heroes Season 3 and Survivor Gabon, I have missed every episode.

life goes on as I choose the path that I set myself to be.

I'm invigorated every night, the aches all worth every ounce.

looking forward to my taiwan trip =], quietly. anticipating.

First holiday with friends on a faraway place on my own budget.

Damn excited of 2009 ahead.

Hope to get my license and something else more.

What ever will unravel will unravel. There is so much that I can push fate.

Maybe sometimes, I sink too deep but if I extract myself too much, I'm not being myself. Something cryptic, go figure.

On other separate random notes, think I fall sick too easily, been getting the flu bug and i'm like leaking now and I hate to sneeze.

Don't wanna fall sick. I wanna be strong. ROAR.

Photos (loads of them):

Me and Fernie

Mum. Dad and my nephew

Look who came to visit! - Marnie!

Me & Pam - F1 Buddies

Me and Nad at Faith's wedding

DMC buddies at @ Wine Bar

Kukup with Clara and ZX

Mosiac Madagascar

Kukup Camwhoring

Whisk me away

Getting Nerdy with Clara Ho Ho Ho

Bellini Grande with the Gang

Me n Gwenne Oktober-fester-ing

Boiler Room with F1 mates

Fierce

Me n Pretty Adeline

Poseur

october woof

What has my life been all about these days.

Revolving around friends these days and fulfilling a personal goal.

Had a house party at my place with my god-son which happens to be a Japanese Spitz.

Superbly cute. And my parents are now open to the idea of having a dog. Yay.

Will adopt one in due time, shall wait for the right moment.

Every day and night, I have pretty much filled up my days so I'm pretty pleased of maximising my days.

Woof

October Days

Haven't been updating much due to busy days.

Work. Gym. Friends. Mahjong. Been keeping me sane and less blog-centric.

I had my ups and downs for October.

Take this weekend. I was horribly sick on Friday but I still went to work.

Was out and about town alone most of the time and wouldn't make sense to go home.

Went Boiler Room with some F1 mates so that was fun despite them downing alcohol and me, coke.

Saturday went much better. met up with friends and Bellini Grande at night.

It was circus to me with Micheal Jackson, Ray Charles and Kermit the frog impersonators.

Not forgetting the exotic dancers for Latin to Samba to Salsa. It was an interesting and unique 'clubbing' experience.

Sunday was waking up late, still in recovery from flu and family day.

Ate at Thai Village and played with my nephew. My sis-in-law is pregnant again so I have another upcoming nephew.

I was climbing this indoor kids playground and jumping on the trampoline like I was young. The small kids there thought I was a father when I played with my nephew.

Last minute mahjong at my place and the weekend is over.

Time passes by so fast.

And soon it's November.

What a month it has been.

I know it is long overdue.

And yes, finally I have some time to sort through the pictures and post them up.

Yes, I have turned 24. 2 cycles of the zodiac calendar gone.

Wiser. Perhaps. Jaded. Even more. Cynical. You hit the spot.

But I guess that's what life is. You get tamed by the experiences in life.

A retrospect into the previous year's achievement was that I graduated and I mellowed down so much more.

Well birthday photos ahead. Until then. I'll be busy with the F1 coming. So exciting !

Party Grid Gal - Sharon
All dressed up and ready to P A R T Y

It's my party and I frown If I want to

ERP Warning Alert

Looking Colourlicious

Looking dorky

thanks to all who came =]

Cake, kudos to lovely Junne for getting Awfully Chocolate =]

Me and my twin Tiffany, Happy Birthday Hun

Aaron, Tiff and Ben - funny faces frens

The hunks of that night

Happy Tree Frens

In Bliss

Hot Babes - Beat that

Ivan and Eric - Mahjong mates

Blur cock, Jason

thumbs up for birthday boy

the gang that redefined the St James experience =]

party people

yes it is my big day soon.

lots of celebrations coming up.

Wee...

Getting sloshed with alcohol...

Puked for the second time in my lifetime outside Thumper.

Si bei tak glam.

Photos coming up soon ....

More bottles opening tonight loh.

Please pray that I can still run the nike run.

Cross fingers.

the price of success

Hot on the press right now is the success of Singapore striking silver in the Olympics with our foreign talent scheme. I congratulate the Singaporean team effort and applaud them for their accolades.

That aside, I will not backlog the amount of debates going on in the papers and online forums of the brickbats of foreign talent is yadda yadda. If you are bored, go read them, each side of the fence having their own detractors and supporters.

My focus however does tread on the topical issue of foreign talent. Scholarships are being offered to more overseas scholars to bond them to our country, in the hope of them being chained down to Singapore, of some even willing to sacrifice their own mother land citizenship.

Granted that Singapore has a small talent pool of say 20,000 soon-to-be local students each year (numbers are just an estimation), and only 200 makes it to the elite universities, the rest of the cohort attends local universities or sponsors themselves overseas.

Also granted that all of us cannot be academically inclined, naturally those that are financially strapped are unable to afford tertiary education and move out into the big bad working world.

I believe that are many local aspiring students, each wanting to do well, craving for success and each embarking on the opportunity to strive through the hardship of getting a breakthrough like American Idol.

However, the sad case is as such seeing scholarships being offered to foreign students, each not having a strong inkling of what is Singapore made of, how our forefathers churn out their own success to create a 1965 backwater town to a 2008 bustling cosmopolitan city. In a way, they are here to emulate the success of striking gold, striking rich of having the guile of venture from where they originate tom come to stress-bound Singapore.

For that, I give them credit and hats off to them.

The only thing I cannot stand, is the fact that these scholars are ungrateful. Reading up news articles of same scenarios of mine, a personal encounter or chat with such a scholar really made me infuriated.

The bond holds them down to Singapore for 6 years or so, but essentially they are not proud to be Singaporean. The person was not proud to be associated with what carried him/her to success and is thinking of various mechanics on how to break or circumvent the bond breaking.

Not to digress, bond breaking happens to both Singaporean and foreigners alike, but that aside, I have acknowledged it as existent and each has their own circumstances.

The plight I am trying to bring forth is why support foreign talent that are here to seize the opportunity and abscond when they can whereas local talent has more of its roots here and essentially want to establish themselves here.

On a PR note, I know it is not the case for many and I am not trying to draw conclusion that one encounter is the mould of all scholars but it seems a prevalent cases from what is echoed around the walls and the black print I get to read when I do my morning dump.

I just find it very saddening that our own parents taxpaying money is to support ingrates rather than their future offspring.

It is understandable that if there are better opportunities out there besides our little red dot. And if many could leave for better options, who would be silly to not escape from the coop. But to weigh the scales of a true blue Singaporean and a make-shift Singaporean who’s here for the opportunities, who do you think is likely to escape. Again.

P.S. I understand it’s a dog eat dog world out there, a desperate climb to the highest rung of the ladder, but I do have this hope of humanity, that it is not about chasing for top dollar and #1 distinctions, but I understand what the government is trying to do is for the goodwill of the prosperity of future generations, but maybe on this particular note, the result has turned out rather flawed =(

08.08.08 weekend

I guess the date of 08.08.08 is pretty much talked about.

The buzz of the 3 fat ladies. People getting married, the big Toto draw and the Beijing Olympics.

So what was I doing that faithful day.

Well, I was at work, having a fruitful week wrapping up my deliverables and headed off for dinner at Tetsu.

It was organize by Clara's friend, Rayner who is a food blogger.

Rayner's webbie

So this was a special blog outing for about 30+ people ?

Anyway, for the price, it was really worth it since I never spend on such cuisine. And yes, it was 40 bucks.

Hole in my pocket but a little slice of experience tucked into my pocket of life.

Took loads of photos. Was happy feasting with Anthony (my colleague), Clara, Junne, Lucia and Pearlynn.

So after the sumptuous and filling meal, headed to nearby Dempsey and settled for Oosh.

Apparently everyone was packed at Chijmes according to Anthony who headed there instead.

Left me, Junne, Clara and Pearlynn as we settled for a cozy veranda spot sipping our drinks.

Trying to chill among the poseurs. Technically we are one since we are there haha.

Manage to catch a few glimpse of the Olympics ceremony with the big screen TV at a distance, and yes the fireworks was spectacular.

Headed home at 1 am as needed to rest for gym in the morning.

So its National Day next, went for a short workout then lunch at Straits Kitchen @ Hyatt with my family.

Saw my nephew who apparently doesn't wants me to carry him = \

I think he will remember me as the uncle who always wear a trucker cap who always tease him.

Need to nurture my fatherly skills. Bah.

Went shopping with my mom n pop around Orchard. It was relatively crowd free as everyone was chugging their way to NDP.

Had an exhausting Saturday. Sunday was awoken to the tune of blading.

Went blading again with Junne, Clara and Jason.

The rain dampen the experience and we settled for HK Cafe for lunch.

We talked about our future travel plans, so fun to think and talk about vacation plans.

Went to become a nerd and played Magic cards in the late afternoon, feeling damn dorky.

All in All.

It was a good weekend. Family time. Gym. Shopping. Friends. Food. Alcohol.

Couldn't ask for more. With the exception of Mahjong of course. But that can be left for another week.

Without further delay, the pictures of the 080808 weekend:

Tetsu - Location of the sinful food haven

Me and my colleague, Anthony Kunihiro, having pseudo jap names, Bento and

Junne - The Ringo Starr

Clara Ichigo - Strawberry Cutie

Menu for the feast

Starters: Kajiki Tataki and Kani Tofu

Sashimi Moriawase

Being stuffed with Sashimi

The real bento set - scrumptious

Great tea ice-cream with chewy balls - Lucia's favourite

My table

The gals

Group of 8

Posing at the entrance

Welcome to my party !!!

Obligatory act cute shot

Me and Lucia

Oosh

Sexy Junne

Slacker Ben

Clara loves her grass juice. Not.

Sexy Babes

Junne's scarily skinny arm

Ready to R.O.M