love today

Love Today

The day has come, and the suspense is finally over. A few weeks before I had put "<3>

"What?" you exclaim. "You're in love with an inanimate object?" Well... That depends on how you see things. Things referring to the medium widely used today that can allow the mordern day man (or woman, to be politically correct here) to share about his experience in his overseas trip, how that annoying auntie blocked his way for 10 whole seconds on the MRT after a tiring day of work, or just spam pictures.

No, I'm not talking about *gasp* facebook. I'm talking about exactly what you're staring at right now - A blog. "You can't be in love with a blog!" You protest. "You're supposed to tell everyone who you like in this post!" Well I never promised anything, and why can't anybody be in love with a blog? Especially if it's their own. And today is an even stronger reason why I love my blog. Guess what guys - stopping2think just turned one year old!

Bet you didn't know this, did you? Yes, I do celebrate my blog's birthday. The past 52 weeks have been filled with random listposts, reflections short and long (mostly long), and the most random of posts. We've gain a number of readers over the months, and the audience pool just keeps growing. So, from the bottom of our hearts, we thank you cows readers for your support, which is the only thing that keeps us from closing down. Other than April Fool's Day of course.

For those who haven't been with us from the very start, here's the best of stopping2think, presented to you in the only way that'd do justice to such a special post - a list.

The Top 7 Posts of stopping2think

7. My very first listpost

6. First listpost that I was given feedback about. (Which made me continue the concept)

5. My only post about CCA (and down right reflective too)

4. The longest post ever

3. The post attracting the most attention (Note the url)

2. The most fun interview I've had.

1. The Sam Study Style. No kidding.

Fast+Fresh

Slight prologue to my next post. Level camp will be updated soon, don't worry.


Stops.

(Stage is dark. Boy walks in and sits in the middle of stage on chair, where spotlight is focused.)

Boy: *Sigh*

(Another spotlight lights up, revealing a similiarly dressed person, standing near the side of the stage with back facing the audience.)

Stranger: It’s been a long time since we talked. Feeling down?

(Gives a small smile)
Boy: Sure has.

(Smile disappears)
Boy: Why ask? You know how I feel.

(Nods knowingly)
Stranger: Of course I do. But I thought you were getting along fine with her?

(Looks down)
Boy: I’d always thought that way, but apparently, I’m not even sure what she thinks of me. She could hate me for all I know.

Stranger: It’s hard, I know - to like someone, and to have to stand and simply watch from the corner, unable to say anything to her.

(Looks back up)
Boy: I freeze the moment I see her, and the only thing that’s in my mind is “What do I say without sounding like an idiot?”

Stranger: It’s not often that you get that feeling, since you don’t have much of a problem with conversations.

Boy: But yet she’s the one person that makes me tongue-tied.

Stranger: She makes your heart beat faster, your breathing faster, your thoughts slower, your mouth dry, your palms wet.

Boy: That’s cliché.

Stranger: I know. But clichés are what they are because they’re true, aren’t they?




Female Voice: Bugis.
(Whole stage lights up, except for the Stranger’s side where the spotlight is off. People shuffle on and off the stage. There are people standing holding onto poles and sitting beside the boy in a row.)

(After the people move on and off the stage, the whole stage is dark again, except for the boy, and another similiarly dressed stranger appears at the other side of the stage, back facing the audience.)

Stranger: Why don’t you tell her?

(Looks surprised, stares directly at Stranger for the first time)
Boy: Are you crazy? You know I can’t do that.

Stranger: And exactly why not? If you’re feeling so beat up about it, let it out then.

Boy: Th-that’s just mad! I’ll be laughed at; My parent’s would surely have something to say about this. And most of all…

Stranger: She’ll avoid you?

(Boy keeps silent, turning to look down at the floor)

Stranger: I still think you should tell her. Let her know where you’re coming from.

Boy: It doesn’t solve anything.

(Pause again)

Stranger: Well, no point continuing in a stalemate. Why not ask yourself this - Do you really like her?

Boy: We’ve went through this haven’t we? As a friend, definitely. But beyond that I really have no idea.

Stranger: After all, you’re just 15 - You wouldn’t exactly have that much experience of being in love.

Boy: But one thing that I do know would be friendship, and somehow I can feel - Just feel that I want our relationship to take a step further than that. I do like her, and more than just a friend.

Stranger: Yet how far beyond is the question, isn’t it?

Boy: And that was where I left it, wasn’t it?

Stranger: You’ve left out one thing.

Boy: I have?

Stranger: Haven’t you considered the possibility of this as not really love… but simply a crush?

Boy: Well, I…

Stranger: You have haven’t you?

Boy: Not much point hiding it anyway - Yes I have, and I dismissed it.

Stranger: Don’t you think you ignored it, rather, just to make yourself believe that you’ve truly fell in love with somebody you simply like more than a friend?

Boy: No. I don’t think so.

Stranger: Aren’t you ignoring it already? Why not give it some thought?

Boy: (Raising his voice) No, I already thought about it over and over - It just isn’t that simple!

Female voice: Tanjong Pagar.

(People shuffle on and offstage yet again, and after the lights dim, the stranger appears to be somewhere else again.)

Stranger: (Mockingly) Getting all riled up, aren’t we?

(Silence)

Boy: Shouldn’t I sort out my thoughts by talking to you? Because right now I don’t really see why we have to keep up with this.

Stranger: It’s not really my choice here - Remember the smoking commercials?

Boy: What?

Stranger: Step one - admitting you have a problem.

(Silence. Boy turns away from the Stranger for a while, before looking back at him again.)

Boy: Fine! So what if I ignored it?

Stranger: There we go… Now step two - Seek professional assistance by dialling 1800-I-talk-to-myself.

Boy: Been there, done that… Step three’s talking to my parents, which is not what I am going to do.

Stranger: I do have a step four, although it wasn’t in the commercial…

Boy: For five minutes, can you just talk straight to the point?

Stranger: A crush doesn’t mean that your feelings are just a whole manifestation of lies and fake emotions you know. You’re fifteen. It’s normal. Frankly it would be a little disturbing if you don’t like any girl at all.

Boy: You know, for the first time throughout this time, it seems like you make sense.

Stranger: Crushes are just something almost every teenager goes through, and you shouldn’t be ashamed of it.

Boy: Well, finally we agree on something.

Stranger: Yes, and a good thing it is. Not much time left to chat, is there?

Female Voice: Queenstown.

(People shuffle on and off stage, Stranger changes position, back facing the audience. Lights dim again.)

Boy: Surely enough to answer this - So now what? What do I do? It still feels hard bottling all this up.

Stranger: Good lord, boy - You’re really slow aren’t you? Did you forget to check the calendar these past few days?

Boy: Wait a minute… Lunar New Year was last week, and today’s a Thursday. That means-

(Lights turn on again. Boy looks around, and sees that all the people on stage are carrying boxes of chocolate, reading and writing pink and heart shaped cards.)

Boy: Are you saying that I should…

Stranger: (Nodding head calmly) Absolutely.

Boy: (Stands up and exclaims loudly, throwing up his arms) But its 7.30am! I’ve got to go to school!

Stranger: The convenience store you pass by on your way to school is named that way for a reason. I hope you brought the money from your red packets.

Boy: Why you are one smart-

Female Voice: (Cutting off the boy) Buona Vista.

(Lights light up the moment the voice starts speaking. Boy picks up his bag, and runs offstage in a hurry.)

Art in the blog

Art in the Heart Blog

Yeah, it's over. Five long, arduous days are finally behind us as we suffered shine (no rain strangely), dancing, screaming and a whole ton of fat, unhealthy lot of tidbits. After all that, I am glad to declare that I have finally escaped from the *shudder* level camp.

Yeah right.

A year or two ago, that may have been the 50 words summary of my level camp experience. Thankfully, unlike last time, I do not just know the meanings behind words like meaningful, art, culture and bonding, but rather I believe I understand them now.

So this is going to be one long post on my personal ups and downs of the camp, the long bus rides, the short happy moments, the big events that everyone took part in, and the small gestures, words and rare things that I look out for. Really, there's no point in going over what happened over the camp in general - everyone did the same thing. It's the details that make our experiences unique, don't you think?

Day 1 - Are we there yet? 

A bath, light breakfast and quick goodbyes later, I was set to leave for level camp. As always, I found it weird that I wasn't really excited for a camp or overseas trip. I call it "looking forward", not really being so excited to the extent that I can't even sleep. Thankfully, my father was able to send me to school, so I didn't have to take the MRT and drag my bags along.

I reached school and was greeted by a sea of yellow shirts, with the occasional white PE shirts here and there. Met some guys from my class and 3L, and took quite some time before we got organised into our classes. Mrs Bok asked me to do a headcount, and, like all the others in 3M, we all predicted a certain classmate will be late -Nicholas. He didn't disappoint.

So we left as the last bus, and when boarding the coach, Nicholas was called to take the what would be called and feared as the Osim Chair (cue "DUMDUM-DUM" scary music).

The early part of the bus ride was pretty slow. It was basically sharing of whatever portable technology was available - DSes, PSPs, phones, you name it. We were feeling the effects of being away from home (or rather really just our computers). So the bus ride went by uneventfully, as we whiled time away with card games, chatting, music and the like.

But then, such trivial forms of entertainment can only last so long, and before long most of us were sleeping already. Not me, I was still plugged into my playlist, and going on strong. After listening through the playlist on my phone two whole times, we finally arrived at the lunch place. Amazingly, despite Nicholas' amazing feat in the morning, we somehow made it there first. Our driver appears to be an Initial-D junkie.

So we happily got our food first and settled down at our respective tables. Sean was still sore at his PSP being unable to play memory card stored games, and was swearing while me, Sherman and Han Ping were talking about materia fusion. No we didn't mean to agitate him. Yes, it was fun.

After shunning the toilet by a mere look and sniff, we continued on our seemingly never ending journey by bus to Legend Resort. Games and miscellaneous forms of entertainment were underway once again, as we made our way to the next stop - Orang Asli village.

Frankly, the village seemed a little too small. 5 huts was the total count. I felt quite humbled by looking at their living conditions. The kitchen, dining room, living rom and bedroom took up the space of 1 of the rooms in my house. And I complain I need more space sometimes.

We read about these seemingly far away places everywhere, where the people live with minimal technology and money, and have almost zero awareness of what's going on in KODE5, the US Presidential elections, the Olympics - Every single thing that we deem as important knowledge. We see this everywhere - Reader's Digest, Time Magazine, even the Straits Times, but how many times have we seen it up close? How many times have we experienced it for ourselves? How many times have we appreciated our Pentium III computer? How many times have we thanked our parents for giving us an air conditioner in our room? How many times have we felt lucky to have that phone is also a walkman, camera, and reliable mode of communication? How many times have I said "How many times"?

We boarded the bus after less than half an hour. That was it. A touch and go thing, something that seemed more of like as a formality, there was no need for us to understand their way of life, and in that way look at ours more closely again. Hopefully the SC trip will provide that chance.

Most of us were getting bored fast, since cards and batteries can only last so long. Well, maybe phones might serve a better purpose, and Vanessa seemed to have found a pretty entertaining method of killing time:



When I stared out the window, it's just trees, trees, old hut, trees, trees, more trees, old huts, trees, broken down car, trees, unfinished building, trees, trees, Legend Resort signboard, tre- Wait, we're here? You mean we actually made it? 8 hours in the hot, stuffy, supposedly air conditioned bus have finally brought us to the promised land.

Sean, Seng Wai, Xue Xun, Ron and I were overjoyed (and I mean overjoyed) to find that we had connecting rooms. Double the space, 5/2 the people, double the fun. Kind of. So we quickly did the same UNPACK process as I mentioned for Cairns trip - Un-Nicely Pile All Carried (insert synonym of luggage starting with K. Kargo?)

Really now, I don't want to talk about how I really felt about the games that we hard to learn, so here we go - Model answer style:

*Ahem*
We had a chance to experience first-hand various malay traditional activities. It was a refreshing eye-opener, and I was truly amazed at how ingenious all these games were. Simply by digging holes in the ground and using a number small pebbles, we can enjoy a fun game of "Congkak", a traditional malay game. The Sepak Takraw challenge was fun too, and allowed us to bond. Although we all weren't able to win the challenge, I'm sure we all had fun as we tried our best together as a class.

Now may the Good Lord forgive me for lying online.

The kite-flying was basically... non-existent. No wind, no breeze, no cyclone, no hurricane. So everyone's highly anticipated chance to take great photos went down the drain. Even after a whole hour nobody could get their kite up for more than a minute. No guesses for whether I bothered to try.

Thankfully, it didn't take long for dinner to start, and we didn't even get more than one kite up at the same time. I'm not complaining really. I was too busy trying to get the clock to move faster.

So we walked over to the dinner area, which is located outdoors on the grass patch. We chose a table near the buffet table, which also happened to be near to the (cue DUMDUM-DUM scary music) *gasp* - Light.

What's so scary about a light you may ask? After all, it'll be easier to eat your food. But the downside to that is just like bringing your PSP to a children's birthday party, and whipping it out, hoping to enjoy a game of Final Fantasy: Crisis Core (lol@sean), only to find that you're attracting all the fat, disgusting, pesky kids flies.

I gave up after some time, when I found 3 flies in my food in less than a minute. It's amazing how the flies can just keep flying into our food and on our tables, only to die over and over again. Maybe we should help them set up a contact network.

Time flies by (pun intended), and dinner was over. I sighed that damn-we-have-a-boring-activity-now sigh, and once again boarded the bus for another boring ride. Really now, something had to be done about these long journeys. But that's a story for another day. For now, let's get on with the turtles.

So when we first arrived at the pathetic excuse of a turtle sanctuary headquarters (You all know what I mean), I think I speak for all of us when I say that sitting down does not seem like an appealing action. What with lizards, flies and miscellaneous pests about, the place could do much better as an insect cum random disgusting domestic creature sanctuary.

Turtle watching was not much better. The place was beach dark, and we could hardly see a thing. Frankly, if a freakin' Blastoise came coming out of the sea and starts shooting Hydro Cannons at everyone, I doubt we'd still be able to see what's going on, let alone turtles half the size of our palms. I mean really. Can't we just release turtles in the day? They need light just like us too. Preferably from the sun instead of the torches. It's more convenient both ways, and we'd be able to dodge Hydro Cannon attacks more easily.

We finally made it back to our rooms at around 11:30pm, but that was when the real fun started. Remember, double the space, 5/2 the people, double the fun. For sure. We started off by once again making fun of Sean's PSP firmware, and the four of us decided to play Big 2 in our room while Sean stuck to his Ark of Nephitism. The following conversation sounded much, much better in real life, but then again, it's the best I can do. Note Sean that was fighting a boss battle, explaining the Gamer's Rage.

Ron: 10 Clubs.
Xue Xun: Jack Spades.
Me: Queen Hearts.
Seng Wai: Ace Diamonds.
Sean (From other room): Bring it on, faggotsxz!@#@#*^$!!!!

We collapsed into laughter, and it took quite awhile before we could carry on with our game. Good memories, good memories indeed...

Day 2 - Joy Luck Bus


stopped2think @ 2138hours may 24. look out for the joy luck bus next!