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Wavy friends
Denise: So you have anymore curvy friends?
Me: Huh curvy?
Denise: Like, wavy friends.
Me: Wavy?
Denise: Like, you know, not straight. Hehe.
Me: OHHHH.
Feel like setting up a Twitter account like twitter.com/jesussays or something.
It’ll be full of updates like, “Met Michael Jackson today, finally got his autograph (:”, “Just lunched with Buddha, hoho”, “I saw that” or something… Think it’d be quite funny for me haha. But then it might be too sensitive, plus I would mean that I’m pretty bored if I spend all my time thinking about regular updates…
Just a random thought…
Favourite song for now, starting to like European bands:
Anyway, thanks a lot a lot friends, for the birthday wishes, I’m very grateful. I used to invest a lot of importance in birthdays when I was younger, but then I realized that by harboring too high expectations and wishful thinking I end up not treasuring what I already have, so I decided to downplay the expectations this year and I’m happy. Spent the day with ZW before he booked in. I’m starting to become fond of neighborhood places where it’s more secluded and quiet, an answer to my frustration with the always crowded Orchard Road, where the crowds end up stomping on my feet, shoving me around or suffocating me with body heat and cigarette smoke.
Anyway, at some point the conversation turned to the topic of the impending A level results and subsequent choice of university courses. Sigh, I’m awfully worried for my results and equally so for my friends’ results too. It wouldn’t be a happy day at all if even one of us gets shitty results. A few days ago, Liz joked, “I don’t mind turning Christian for this period of time, I pray to God every night and day for my results.” To think our futures will be changed just by a piece of paper and a few alphabets… And then there was the usual dilemma of not knowing what to do in uni. ZW rolls his eyes and says he can’t fathom why I’m interested in buildings, I dunno, I hope it’s as interesting as I think it is.
When I got home, I don’t know why, maybe I ate too much sushi and doughnuts or my brain & mouth were overworked or it was the fatigue from the Malaysia trip, but I could barely keep my eyes open and flopped onto the bed in exhaustion. Woke up a few hours later, ate birthday cake with my family, did some chores and here I am. Simple day, but grateful to have had someone to spend the day with and to have had friends who remembered.
Oo Skins Season 4 has started already, time to watch soon!!!
Turning 19 soon in 5 days, my last ‘-teen’ year. Not really feeling it this year, just been feeling very jaded from some stuff recently. My dream of visiting the zoo is slipping away… And I’ve been too lazy to go these few years anyway haha, I have no idea where it is, it’s just somewhere far.
Anyway I’ve just been feeling crabby… Plus, I gotta go back to Malaysia this Saturday to visit relatives, my dad’s side. I know a lot of friends say that I’m lucky to have parents and a sibling all from different countries so I get to travel and visit other places besides SG, but sometimes I just want to stay here during the holidays and not have to face relatives all the time. Sounds petty and ungrateful, but traveling around to the same places too often and facing people you don’t really want to hang out with (ie. My spoilt brat of a cousin – the William Hung lookalike, who will no doubt be tapping away at his PSP while speaking rudely to my parents when I see him this weekend) would make one feel almost as jaded as staying in one place all the time too…
Crab crab crabby
Some Photos from Taiwan
Photobucket’s photo sizes are annoying, the difference between the large and the medium is like humongous, so, sorry if the pictures are a little too big (but medium seems too tiny). Anyway I realized I never posted any photos of Taiwan whenever I go back there and I have a lot of time on my hands now, so here they are.
1. The buildings opposite my uncle’s place.
2. The SOGO opposite my uncle’s place.
3. The little street down from my uncle’s place.
4. My uncle’s living room – with TVBS blaring on the television (One of Taiwan’s more professional news channels, though it isn’t really that professional. Once, they did a report on ducks swimming among the houses during a flood.) Their place hasn’t changed for the all years I’ve gone back, except maybe the television or something, love it!
My mom went back first to spend a longer time with her family, so my dad and I joined her on Friday night. My aunt cooked some noodles, beef, pork and rice balls for us, IT WAS AWESOME. Food in Taiwan is never bad, everything tastes like the best thing you’d ever eat. One of the other reasons why I love Taiwan – their beef noodles are the best. Plus, they don’t really tend to add chili to their food too, another plus point. Food-haters like me will have a hard time resisting their stuff.
1. Outside the train station.
2. Inside the train station.
3. Taiwan’s version of Roti Boy, in the train station. Smelled gooood.
4. and 5. Some paintings on the walls of the train station, Singapore should do this!
6. Outside the opposite end of the train station. The cab drivers there are incredibly friendly – they act like a mini tour guide and they chat about everything. Cab fares there are pretty expensive though.
Starbucks.
We went to an exhibition of Van Gogh’s paintings, totally amazing. Unfortunately they didn’t have his more famous paintings like The Potato Eaters, but the collection was still great. They didn’t allow photography inside though 
And the portable-radio-tour thingies only came in Mandarin, blah.
TGI Friday’s, the delicious soup, and the view from the restaurant. Argh loved the food, hopefully it’ll be as good in SG. I was too hungry, I didn’t take a picture of the rest of the food because I gobbled it up.
The hotel that my dad, mom and I stayed in, and the graffiti-ed building from my uncle’s place to the hotel. My uncle’s place was too crammed for all of us to fit in it.
Hotel beds are the best, the pillows and sheets totally dissolve me when I sleep in them, sigh.
The next day, we met up with one of my dad’s old friends from his university at a breakfast place.
As usual, FOOD WAS GOD-LIKE.
1. The German breakfast place, called Wendel’s. Half bakery half cafe.
2. The interior.
3. The outside.
4. The kick-ass breakfast platter. I need to learn how to make such eggs.
Afterward we went to the National Palace Museum, where photography wasn’t allowed again, then we went shopping at the train station. Taiwan’s train stations are like underground shopping centres, so you can like shop on the way back home, what a life man.
The hot chocolate in one of the cafes in the train station.
That night was my grandfather’s birthday celebration (he turned 93 years old). I don’t know how my grandparents, in their 80s (grandmother) and 90s (grandfather) still stay considerably healthy. They have perfect eyesight for instance, that’s already a one-up on me, they travel back and forth between Taiwan and America, they walk fine and their minds are still pretty sound. I hope this long-term healthiness is genetic man. Anyway, during the celebration, the hotel had a crazy-ass buffet, didn’t manage to take a picture because I was too busy eating. They had salmon sashimi, sweet corn, freshly sliced beef and a humongous dessert platter – my 4 favourite things to eat.
Anyway besides the food, we met up with all the relatives, though I don’t know how they’re connected, I just recognize their faces. I’m guessing that one of them is my grandmother’s brother or something, 2 of them are my cousins but they’re in their 50s, a pair of siblings are my niece & nephew though they’re in their 20s and so on, the family tree’s all over the place. That’s when they all spoke Mandarin and I struggled to make myself sound understandable. I don’t really mind hanging out with these relatives much, they’re quite friendly, just that I tend to be pretty blur when it comes to noticing things, so whenever one of them tried to talk to me, I ended up appearing as if I was ignoring them when I was just daydreaming or unaware. Oh wells.
At some point, one of the relatives scolded her daughter (who was about 5 or 6 years old) when she wanted more food (in Mandarin), “Again! Stop eating so much, don’t come crying to me when you grow fat and want to diet!” Ugh another crazy mom saying crazy things to her kids.
My cute grandparents (on the right) with some of the relatives. Crazy mom is the one in plaid, her “going-to-be-fat” daughter is the kid in pink. Unfortunately the kids look douche-y in the photo, they actually weren’t too annoying in real life. I think the crazy mom’s husband is my cousin or something.
Anyway, my grandfather didn’t look too happy during the celebration, felt a little sad for him. The night before, he suddenly lashed out at us a little in Fuchow dialect so I didn’t know what the heck was going on. Afterward my mom told me that he had said, “I don’t have a birthday, what are all of you talking about?!” I guess turning older isn’t much cause for a celebration.
Breakfast at a cafe the next day. The cafe had a self-collection system, so they had this cute little device which would start lighting up and vibrating when your food is done, so you don’t have to keep going downstairs to check whether your order’s ready.
1. Lunch at a Chinese restaurant across the street.
2. Tips on how to order, so cute.
3. Freaking good tofu skin with wine(?) vegetables (jiu cai).
4. Pork in buns.
That’s about it, I didn’t really take a lot of photos. There is a shop though, a block down from my uncle’s place, that sells THE BEST CUSTARD BISCUITS EVER. I don’t really know how to translate the name into English but it has a cooked flour coating with plenty of hot custard inside, it’s so delicious. Argh the food there is just too good, I can’t take it! If food was like that in SG, I’d be a foodie.
Recently I’ve been thinking about SG, on whether I really want to stay here for the rest of my life or not, the trip got me thinking. I don’t want to, the thought of it makes my life seem so small. But I know I’m not ready to leave yet, everyone seems bent on going overseas to do their university education. It seems so easy for everyone to be so willing to start a new life in an entirely new environment right now at this point in their lives and leave their friends and family behind, but I just can’t, there’s still a lot here that I don’t feel ready to leave just yet. In the future, I don’t know when, I think I’ll leave. Taiwan seems like a pretty good option, I really love it there, but I guess the Mandarin-speaking environment will be an obstacle. Maybe if there was an English version of Taiwan, I’d go there instead. Man the trip was good, I wish I stayed there a little longer.
I just got back from Taiwan, celebrated my grandfather’s 93rd birthday. Sigh, I would really love to live in Taipei (minus the Mandarin part)! I’m jealous of all my relatives who are pros in speaking Mandarin and grew up in Taiwan culture. I feel so embarrassed when I talk to them because talking to them in Mandarin feels like a Karate-noob trying to do karate in front of a Master, like those Karate Kid movies. They think SG is a weird place because it’s predominantly Chinese, yet Mandarin is not spoken too often (then again I’m afraid they’ve gotten the wrong idea about the standard of Mandarin in SG from me since I’m below the national average). The weather was fantastic too, the minute I went out into the open air in SG when I touched down, I thought, “ARGH IT’S SO HOT HERE LIFE SUCKS.” Taipei really is a good option to consider if one plans to migrate, provided you’re proficient in Mandarin.
I’ll update properly tomorrow, super sleepy from the flight home.