Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Fri 25 Jul
I deliberately ended my day in school punctually, and dropped my work so as to accompany my wife to the gynae. Baby was healthy, thank God! After the checkup, we made our way to Ikea Tampines. We wanted to buy a cheap cupboard to put the baby stuff like diapers and all, and some other bits and pieces. In the end, my wife tried and fell in love with a reclining armchair that we saw. My current couch is a high-back one, but somehow my wife could never find a comfortable position to sit through a movie on the TV. So I bought the armchair for her along with a footstool to rest her feet, swollen from the water retention due to pregnancy. I spent the night moving all the furniture around to have a new configuration that puts the armchair at the TV console area.
Sat 26 Jul
We woke up early to do some household chores and clean up the place in anticipation of some friends who were coming over at 2 pm. We started our mahjong session from then on, and including a short tea break to eat cake, a dinner break to have pizza, and a supper break to eat some cheesecake my wife bought, we played till 5.30 am the next morning! We played a total of six rounds, and I fought back from negative to positive winnings. Varian was the biggest winner of the day, and he was the silent killer of the session. I guess the fact that he watched his mother play since he was young helped his skills, but he also had incredible luck with the tiles. The other two players were husband and wife, and the guy's winnings helped to defray the losses of the wife somewhat. If Varian was incredibly lucky, then the only lady player at the table was incredibly unlucky. She cleared out her drawer, i.e. lost all her chips, by the sixth round.
Sometimes I amaze myself that I still have this much stamina. But nowadays it does take a toll on me; I can't function as well the next day as I used to.
Sun 27 Jul
I managed to wake up on time, and with terribly bloodshot eyes, I made my way to Eastpoint to join my boys for lunch and cell group. We made our way to service, and it was good to have Ps Khong back, and see service end at the usual time, i.e. extended. The guest pastors all preached short and sweet, were concise and professional, but I find it best when I hear Ps Khong speak, and bare his heart on certain issues, with immense conviction. I came home after service to take a nap while my wife supervised her girls in revision before I went out to buy dinner for me and my wife.
We made a discovery: the dou hua at Elias Mall's food court is really goooood. It is very smooth in texture, melting with a fragrant taste in the mouth, and has just the right amount of syrup for sweetness but not cloying.
Mon 28 Jul
Mondays are supposed to be packed to the brim for me, but today I was strangely relieved. My lessons with my TA1 classes were surrendered to a colleague who desperately needed to complete her biology experiments and topic. My two late afternoon classes for my TA4 had to be cancelled because the girls were having NAPFA, and my classes comprise 80% or more girls. I seized the chance to complete a whole bucketload of administrative work that had accumulated, and ran all over the place to perform errand tasks.
After school, my wife and I headed home first, and then to Elias Mall for a nice dinner. The new zi char place at the food court, though not fantastic, was certainly above average in quality, and we had pretty good xing zhou mi fen. We also had a couple of char siew buns from the superb dim sum stall (ok, I don't know about the other snacks, but the buns were generally excellent), and of course, the new favourite of dou hua.
Tue 29 Jul
Today was supposed to be a day that was not packed, but it ended up way longer than usual. I was rushing out some work that was needed last minute due to some prior miscommunication. In the afternoon, I sat in for my colleague's lesson because the current TA1 project is a biology-chemistry collaboration and both of us need to be around to facilitate discussions for both subjects. Once that was over, I made my way down to Hair De Vogue to get my now-long-and-somewhat-unkempt hair cut. That took up a huge amount of waiting time, as usual; my hairdresser's mighty popular. I then had dinner at my in-laws' place, and when my wife and I made our way back home, something interesting happened.
The first person under the age of 25 gave up his seat! Ok, maybe not exactly. To be precise, the kid (I'm guessing of P6 or Sec 1 age) prodded his dad who was sitting at the corner seat to ask him to give up the seat for my wife. That was amazing because of two reasons. The first is what I had been talking about on several occasions, that many youths of this generation are either supremely egocentric, or simply unempathic, and even if they stare at my wife's stomach for an hour, it wouldn't cross their minds that they should offer their seat. The second is that the father actually did notice my wife's pregnant belly. He also made eye contact with me and might have noticed my baleful stare. He even looked up and checked whether his seat had the sticker (to offer seats to those who need it), and it did, whereupon he proceeded to lean his head against the glass to sleep in deliberate obliviousness. Hence, to me it is amazing that the father's values did not get passed down to the son who was civic-minded enough to yank his father off the seat. I think the government should be proud of this little ambassador of justice, because he was wearing a nice red National Day t-shirt with the big bold caption "Celebrate the Singapore Spirit" no less!
I deliberately ended my day in school punctually, and dropped my work so as to accompany my wife to the gynae. Baby was healthy, thank God! After the checkup, we made our way to Ikea Tampines. We wanted to buy a cheap cupboard to put the baby stuff like diapers and all, and some other bits and pieces. In the end, my wife tried and fell in love with a reclining armchair that we saw. My current couch is a high-back one, but somehow my wife could never find a comfortable position to sit through a movie on the TV. So I bought the armchair for her along with a footstool to rest her feet, swollen from the water retention due to pregnancy. I spent the night moving all the furniture around to have a new configuration that puts the armchair at the TV console area.
Sat 26 Jul
We woke up early to do some household chores and clean up the place in anticipation of some friends who were coming over at 2 pm. We started our mahjong session from then on, and including a short tea break to eat cake, a dinner break to have pizza, and a supper break to eat some cheesecake my wife bought, we played till 5.30 am the next morning! We played a total of six rounds, and I fought back from negative to positive winnings. Varian was the biggest winner of the day, and he was the silent killer of the session. I guess the fact that he watched his mother play since he was young helped his skills, but he also had incredible luck with the tiles. The other two players were husband and wife, and the guy's winnings helped to defray the losses of the wife somewhat. If Varian was incredibly lucky, then the only lady player at the table was incredibly unlucky. She cleared out her drawer, i.e. lost all her chips, by the sixth round.
Sometimes I amaze myself that I still have this much stamina. But nowadays it does take a toll on me; I can't function as well the next day as I used to.
Sun 27 Jul
I managed to wake up on time, and with terribly bloodshot eyes, I made my way to Eastpoint to join my boys for lunch and cell group. We made our way to service, and it was good to have Ps Khong back, and see service end at the usual time, i.e. extended. The guest pastors all preached short and sweet, were concise and professional, but I find it best when I hear Ps Khong speak, and bare his heart on certain issues, with immense conviction. I came home after service to take a nap while my wife supervised her girls in revision before I went out to buy dinner for me and my wife.
We made a discovery: the dou hua at Elias Mall's food court is really goooood. It is very smooth in texture, melting with a fragrant taste in the mouth, and has just the right amount of syrup for sweetness but not cloying.
Mon 28 Jul
Mondays are supposed to be packed to the brim for me, but today I was strangely relieved. My lessons with my TA1 classes were surrendered to a colleague who desperately needed to complete her biology experiments and topic. My two late afternoon classes for my TA4 had to be cancelled because the girls were having NAPFA, and my classes comprise 80% or more girls. I seized the chance to complete a whole bucketload of administrative work that had accumulated, and ran all over the place to perform errand tasks.
After school, my wife and I headed home first, and then to Elias Mall for a nice dinner. The new zi char place at the food court, though not fantastic, was certainly above average in quality, and we had pretty good xing zhou mi fen. We also had a couple of char siew buns from the superb dim sum stall (ok, I don't know about the other snacks, but the buns were generally excellent), and of course, the new favourite of dou hua.
Tue 29 Jul
Today was supposed to be a day that was not packed, but it ended up way longer than usual. I was rushing out some work that was needed last minute due to some prior miscommunication. In the afternoon, I sat in for my colleague's lesson because the current TA1 project is a biology-chemistry collaboration and both of us need to be around to facilitate discussions for both subjects. Once that was over, I made my way down to Hair De Vogue to get my now-long-and-somewhat-unkempt hair cut. That took up a huge amount of waiting time, as usual; my hairdresser's mighty popular. I then had dinner at my in-laws' place, and when my wife and I made our way back home, something interesting happened.
The first person under the age of 25 gave up his seat! Ok, maybe not exactly. To be precise, the kid (I'm guessing of P6 or Sec 1 age) prodded his dad who was sitting at the corner seat to ask him to give up the seat for my wife. That was amazing because of two reasons. The first is what I had been talking about on several occasions, that many youths of this generation are either supremely egocentric, or simply unempathic, and even if they stare at my wife's stomach for an hour, it wouldn't cross their minds that they should offer their seat. The second is that the father actually did notice my wife's pregnant belly. He also made eye contact with me and might have noticed my baleful stare. He even looked up and checked whether his seat had the sticker (to offer seats to those who need it), and it did, whereupon he proceeded to lean his head against the glass to sleep in deliberate obliviousness. Hence, to me it is amazing that the father's values did not get passed down to the son who was civic-minded enough to yank his father off the seat. I think the government should be proud of this little ambassador of justice, because he was wearing a nice red National Day t-shirt with the big bold caption "Celebrate the Singapore Spirit" no less!
Thursday, July 24, 2008
Wed 23 Jul
Today became a short day because of some miscommunication between departments, and the Chem department thought we had to cancel our protected time slot today because of NAPFA (can't remember the acronym by now) for half the cohort. There was also, surprisingly, no staff conference, so I left early. It was only till much later that I heard that it was a miscommunication and the protected time went on as scheduled. Anyway, because it was early, I convinced my wife to go to Nihon Mura with me to eat the Japanese buffet at 2.30 pm since we had an overwhelming breakfast, which was really good. The salmon sashimi portions they gave today, though they weren't the belly exactly, the slices came with a good portion of fat on them. We ate till about 5 pm, so that covered lunch and dinner in one shot. Heh.
Thu 24 Jul
My long day became a short day again thanks to one lesson being cancelled. There was a little department lunch outing to bid a fond farewell to our super enthusiastic relief teacher, Alaric. Nine of us went down to The Mushroom Pot (at the indoor stadium) for a steamboat buffet, and the food was really good. The meat was well-marinated, and the soup base was excellent. This must be the first time all the people at my (side of the) table eat pig's liver, so the soup at the end of the day tasted like tonic. The most amazing thing was that my two colleagues and my wife could also eat a lot! The other five colleagues at the other side of the table were knocked out after a while, and we went for a full second round. Sigh, looks like I'll be gaining some weight. Two buffets on two consecutive days.
It was far too early to go to cell group, so my wife and I went down to Furniture Mall, accompanied by Alaric. We went to order a set of fabric covers for the entire couch, so that we can change the covers and wash the old ones. That costed a shocking 1k!! Anyway, we saw the necessity of it, and besides, this was the very reason why we ordered a couch with fabric covers. It was still early by the time I was done, so the three of us went down to Suntec City's KBox, joined by another colleague a while later. I think I didn't have much form today, but it was still a fun time. This was probably the only time I left a KBox package early (by 45 min), since I usually don't want to lugi the money. But I had to go for cell group in the evening.
Cell group was shorter today, so I reached home just before 10.30 pm. By then I was famished, thinking I could skip dinner, and had to eat instant noodles.
Today became a short day because of some miscommunication between departments, and the Chem department thought we had to cancel our protected time slot today because of NAPFA (can't remember the acronym by now) for half the cohort. There was also, surprisingly, no staff conference, so I left early. It was only till much later that I heard that it was a miscommunication and the protected time went on as scheduled. Anyway, because it was early, I convinced my wife to go to Nihon Mura with me to eat the Japanese buffet at 2.30 pm since we had an overwhelming breakfast, which was really good. The salmon sashimi portions they gave today, though they weren't the belly exactly, the slices came with a good portion of fat on them. We ate till about 5 pm, so that covered lunch and dinner in one shot. Heh.
Thu 24 Jul
My long day became a short day again thanks to one lesson being cancelled. There was a little department lunch outing to bid a fond farewell to our super enthusiastic relief teacher, Alaric. Nine of us went down to The Mushroom Pot (at the indoor stadium) for a steamboat buffet, and the food was really good. The meat was well-marinated, and the soup base was excellent. This must be the first time all the people at my (side of the) table eat pig's liver, so the soup at the end of the day tasted like tonic. The most amazing thing was that my two colleagues and my wife could also eat a lot! The other five colleagues at the other side of the table were knocked out after a while, and we went for a full second round. Sigh, looks like I'll be gaining some weight. Two buffets on two consecutive days.
It was far too early to go to cell group, so my wife and I went down to Furniture Mall, accompanied by Alaric. We went to order a set of fabric covers for the entire couch, so that we can change the covers and wash the old ones. That costed a shocking 1k!! Anyway, we saw the necessity of it, and besides, this was the very reason why we ordered a couch with fabric covers. It was still early by the time I was done, so the three of us went down to Suntec City's KBox, joined by another colleague a while later. I think I didn't have much form today, but it was still a fun time. This was probably the only time I left a KBox package early (by 45 min), since I usually don't want to lugi the money. But I had to go for cell group in the evening.
Cell group was shorter today, so I reached home just before 10.30 pm. By then I was famished, thinking I could skip dinner, and had to eat instant noodles.
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Wed 16 Jul
Today was a day of meetings. I had a few short meetings with some colleagues, and later on, after the usual staff conference, there was still a SEM (School Excellence Model) meeting, and this time round, I was involved in one of the teams for one criterion. Sigh. I think ever since I got a promotion at the start of the year, and got one (miserable) roughly $200 increment, I had been working my socks off, doing way more things than what two hundred bucks command, I'm sure. Suddenly I see why some colleagues would choose to stay low-profile and have their personal space and time. Such is the price of obeying my Senior Pastor's call to excel in our respective fields. I shall persevere!
Thu 17 Jul
I had a long day in school today, and we didn't go on our weekly pilgrimage because we wanted to give our two super-relief teachers a treat, and brought in nasi lemak from Changi Village. I think our relief teachers this time (one is going into NIE, and the other to university) were the best thus far, both going way beyond their necessary job scope, and helped the department a lot, not just the team they were under. Hmm, technically, I think they might have done more and a better job than a couple of colleagues, but that is a highly debatable personal opinion, of course. In any case, even though I didn't directly work with them, I still felt that they were a blessing. I wonder how my wife's year 1 team will cope once the two of them leave, and she goes on maternity leave?
After my last lesson with my high-spirited, cranky-at-4-pm class, I caught a ride with two of my colleagues down to Parkway Parade where they were going to grab dinner. I was famished, so I ate some hana maki and a californian handroll while I waited for my actual dinner with my cell group and pastor. I wouldn't otherwise step into Sakae Sushi ever since I found better alternatives if not for the company, i.e. my colleagues wanted to eat there. When my G12 brothers arrived, I went upstairs to join them for dinner. Originally my G12 brother Collin planned to use the session with our pastor to discuss certain issues about the network with him. Somehow the conversation turned towards cyber-wellness issues that are close to my pastor's heart, and I ended up talking most of the time regarding several current trends and all. Oops.
Fri 18 Jul
Today was a very long day because of an impending Parent-Tutor Dialogue. However, we planned a fairly impromptu mahjong session at colleague ZH's place, so we left as early as we could. The mahjong room happened to be ZH's karaoke room as well, so at one point, ZH passed his seat to another colleague and went to sing karaoke by himself. I wanted to join him, so the funny thing was that he set up a standing mike for me, and I sang with him at the same time I was still playing mahjong! And guess what? I still won about ten bucks. Guess that was the epitome of multi-tasking for my colleagues.
Parent-Tutor Dialogue went on as usual, and I was kept busy for about two hours straight. Once I had a lull and didn't see any parents looking for me, I made my exit. This time round, at least I finished earlier than the last time, which was a scary 9.45 pm.
Sat 19 Jul
My G12 brother Collin, shups! and another church friend, Amanda, came by in the afternoon for a mahjong session. We played for about four hours straight before ordering in pizza from Sarpinos. I hadn't tried pizza from Sarpinos before, and man, I didn't know what I was missing! The pizza was definitely of superior quality compared to Pizza Hut, and Canadian 2-for-1. The best thing was that Sarpinos also had a menu of pizzas (restricted to 6 types) that had a buy-1-get-1-free promotion, so we ended up paying $29 for two medium pizzas, which was enough for five of us. We played another round of about four hours more, and at the end of the day, I was the biggest winner, but Collin pulled off a 自摸十三幺, which should be worth more than his 20 cents win. Such are the moments a mahjong player aims to create that one can boast of for a long, long time.
Sun 20 Jul
There was a slight change of routine today, and I tried having cell group before service for the sake of one of my boys who requested for it. Only that he didn't show up.
Hence, this might be the only time I was trying it, since it was awfully inconvenient to be off-timing with my wife and her own cell group. I had lunch with my wife at the food court at White Sands first, and went to the Japanese place that I usually go to at Eastpoint for cell group. The dessert there sucked. That was the last time I will eat dessert there.
Service was incredibly short with an interesting message from Os Hillman (I think that's the name), and then we all went off to Eastpoint again because one of my boys was waiting for someone, the other had nothing urgent to attend to, and I was waiting for my wife to end her cell group, so we all went to Daily Fresh for some good waffles and ice cream.
In the evening, my wife wanted to drop by the chalet at Downtown East to visit her graduated students there, so we went earlier to catch a movie, and we made it just in time to watch the 6.10 pm show for The Dark Knight.
This now ranks among the best superhero movies in my opinion, alongside Spiderman and Iron Man. What a fabulous performance from Heath Ledger! I never thought anyone could surpass Jack Nicholson's unrestrained performance as the Joker in the original Batman movie, but Heath had proven otherwise. He at the same appeared psychotic, intelligent, terrifying, and fascinating. With a performance like that, I think it was a shame he died so young earlier this year. There was so much character development in the movie, and the film's attempt to showcase human morality (or immorality) was terrific. Seldom did superhero movies spend so much time to go in depth into almost every major character, protagonist and villain. The stunts, action sequences, car chases and explosions were standard and well-done, but how the Joker's schemes sent the police running wild was brilliant. Aaron Eckhart also did a fantastic job in the show, and what can I say to a cast boasting Michael Caine, Gary Oldman and even Morgan Freeman? All the old heavyweights, and all of them merely in supporting roles. The Dark Knight is a must-watch!
Mon 21 Jul
I was anticipating some free time because I had four periods freed up, since the TA1s were all doing eLearning at home.
I was dead wrong. As usual.
There were so many people looking for me to help them with things, meet to discuss projects and action research, sort out some publicity video and stuff, and considering how well "sought-after" I was the whole day, I think I must be overworked. Anyway, the whole day left me with about less than two hours to do what I actually meant to do today, but the most amazing thing about me was that I finished everything I wanted to, and fire-fought some unexpected hiccups as well.
I was deadbeat by evening time, and I went home, grabbed a chicken pie, rested a while, awaiting my colleague Jonathan to come and pick my wife and I up. He and his wife were going to give us a treat to thank us for helping them get their flat. Hmm...not quite precise. More specifically, I helped him get a form with a relatively good queue number during the last (as in the final one) Walk-In Selection where I got my own flat, which got him his current flat. Considering how the property prices skyrocketed after that, theoretically that nice gesture on my part of remembering his need saved him possibly anywhere between one to two hundred thousand bucks. He brought us to The Paramount Restaurant, which was a Cantonese restaurant (under Tung Lok groups) in the not-so-famous Paramount Hotel.
The food was fantastic though! We started with a Peking duck, and the skin was so well-roasted and crispy. Although it still wasn't as good as the Quan Ju De duck I had in Beijing, this was one of the best I have tasted here locally. We had a bowl of soup that had some green apple boiled with carp (almost typed 'crap' there by accident) which tasted nutritiously good. The meat of the duck was fried with black pepper and onions and was quite delicious, and the spinach dish, though it looked plain, tasted excellent as well. We had ginseng chicken, which was very well-prepared, and the ginseng taste was soaked deeply into the chicken skin and flesh. We ended the main course with steamed carp, which was interestingly deboned, served in nicely cut rectangular pieces, topped with a big fresh mushroom and Chinese ham. For dessert we had honeydew sago and mango pudding, both of which tasted superb. The whole meal wasn't cheap, averaging $60 per head, but I think the food was well worth the money.
We stopped by at their place to see what they had done with the house, and to enjoy the powerful acoustics of Jonathan's expensive but well set-up audio system. They also dropped by our place to visit, but we called it a night soon after.
Tue 22 Jul
I took a day off, which was my off-in-lieu for burning my Saturday at the ExcelFest earlier this month, and my wife took a day off as well (it's one day we get to choose when to take a day off, but only once a year). It wasn't so that we could go out and play, and neither was it for the sake of rest, although waking up about two hours later than usual was certainly attractive.
It was to do housework.
We got a part-time maid over to help us clean the windows and one toilet, and we went around vacuuming and wiping the dust off a gazillion other things, wash and dry a few loads of laundry, change the bedsheets - in summary, cleaning up as well as making preparations for the arrival of the baby! Man, I felt more exhausted today than yesterday's full day. Whoever thought a housewife had an easy time should really reconsider that seriously.
Today was a day of meetings. I had a few short meetings with some colleagues, and later on, after the usual staff conference, there was still a SEM (School Excellence Model) meeting, and this time round, I was involved in one of the teams for one criterion. Sigh. I think ever since I got a promotion at the start of the year, and got one (miserable) roughly $200 increment, I had been working my socks off, doing way more things than what two hundred bucks command, I'm sure. Suddenly I see why some colleagues would choose to stay low-profile and have their personal space and time. Such is the price of obeying my Senior Pastor's call to excel in our respective fields. I shall persevere!
Thu 17 Jul
I had a long day in school today, and we didn't go on our weekly pilgrimage because we wanted to give our two super-relief teachers a treat, and brought in nasi lemak from Changi Village. I think our relief teachers this time (one is going into NIE, and the other to university) were the best thus far, both going way beyond their necessary job scope, and helped the department a lot, not just the team they were under. Hmm, technically, I think they might have done more and a better job than a couple of colleagues, but that is a highly debatable personal opinion, of course. In any case, even though I didn't directly work with them, I still felt that they were a blessing. I wonder how my wife's year 1 team will cope once the two of them leave, and she goes on maternity leave?
After my last lesson with my high-spirited, cranky-at-4-pm class, I caught a ride with two of my colleagues down to Parkway Parade where they were going to grab dinner. I was famished, so I ate some hana maki and a californian handroll while I waited for my actual dinner with my cell group and pastor. I wouldn't otherwise step into Sakae Sushi ever since I found better alternatives if not for the company, i.e. my colleagues wanted to eat there. When my G12 brothers arrived, I went upstairs to join them for dinner. Originally my G12 brother Collin planned to use the session with our pastor to discuss certain issues about the network with him. Somehow the conversation turned towards cyber-wellness issues that are close to my pastor's heart, and I ended up talking most of the time regarding several current trends and all. Oops.
Fri 18 Jul
Today was a very long day because of an impending Parent-Tutor Dialogue. However, we planned a fairly impromptu mahjong session at colleague ZH's place, so we left as early as we could. The mahjong room happened to be ZH's karaoke room as well, so at one point, ZH passed his seat to another colleague and went to sing karaoke by himself. I wanted to join him, so the funny thing was that he set up a standing mike for me, and I sang with him at the same time I was still playing mahjong! And guess what? I still won about ten bucks. Guess that was the epitome of multi-tasking for my colleagues.
Parent-Tutor Dialogue went on as usual, and I was kept busy for about two hours straight. Once I had a lull and didn't see any parents looking for me, I made my exit. This time round, at least I finished earlier than the last time, which was a scary 9.45 pm.
Sat 19 Jul
My G12 brother Collin, shups! and another church friend, Amanda, came by in the afternoon for a mahjong session. We played for about four hours straight before ordering in pizza from Sarpinos. I hadn't tried pizza from Sarpinos before, and man, I didn't know what I was missing! The pizza was definitely of superior quality compared to Pizza Hut, and Canadian 2-for-1. The best thing was that Sarpinos also had a menu of pizzas (restricted to 6 types) that had a buy-1-get-1-free promotion, so we ended up paying $29 for two medium pizzas, which was enough for five of us. We played another round of about four hours more, and at the end of the day, I was the biggest winner, but Collin pulled off a 自摸十三幺, which should be worth more than his 20 cents win. Such are the moments a mahjong player aims to create that one can boast of for a long, long time.
Sun 20 Jul
There was a slight change of routine today, and I tried having cell group before service for the sake of one of my boys who requested for it. Only that he didn't show up.
Hence, this might be the only time I was trying it, since it was awfully inconvenient to be off-timing with my wife and her own cell group. I had lunch with my wife at the food court at White Sands first, and went to the Japanese place that I usually go to at Eastpoint for cell group. The dessert there sucked. That was the last time I will eat dessert there.
Service was incredibly short with an interesting message from Os Hillman (I think that's the name), and then we all went off to Eastpoint again because one of my boys was waiting for someone, the other had nothing urgent to attend to, and I was waiting for my wife to end her cell group, so we all went to Daily Fresh for some good waffles and ice cream.
In the evening, my wife wanted to drop by the chalet at Downtown East to visit her graduated students there, so we went earlier to catch a movie, and we made it just in time to watch the 6.10 pm show for The Dark Knight.
This now ranks among the best superhero movies in my opinion, alongside Spiderman and Iron Man. What a fabulous performance from Heath Ledger! I never thought anyone could surpass Jack Nicholson's unrestrained performance as the Joker in the original Batman movie, but Heath had proven otherwise. He at the same appeared psychotic, intelligent, terrifying, and fascinating. With a performance like that, I think it was a shame he died so young earlier this year. There was so much character development in the movie, and the film's attempt to showcase human morality (or immorality) was terrific. Seldom did superhero movies spend so much time to go in depth into almost every major character, protagonist and villain. The stunts, action sequences, car chases and explosions were standard and well-done, but how the Joker's schemes sent the police running wild was brilliant. Aaron Eckhart also did a fantastic job in the show, and what can I say to a cast boasting Michael Caine, Gary Oldman and even Morgan Freeman? All the old heavyweights, and all of them merely in supporting roles. The Dark Knight is a must-watch!
Mon 21 Jul
I was anticipating some free time because I had four periods freed up, since the TA1s were all doing eLearning at home.
I was dead wrong. As usual.
There were so many people looking for me to help them with things, meet to discuss projects and action research, sort out some publicity video and stuff, and considering how well "sought-after" I was the whole day, I think I must be overworked. Anyway, the whole day left me with about less than two hours to do what I actually meant to do today, but the most amazing thing about me was that I finished everything I wanted to, and fire-fought some unexpected hiccups as well.
I was deadbeat by evening time, and I went home, grabbed a chicken pie, rested a while, awaiting my colleague Jonathan to come and pick my wife and I up. He and his wife were going to give us a treat to thank us for helping them get their flat. Hmm...not quite precise. More specifically, I helped him get a form with a relatively good queue number during the last (as in the final one) Walk-In Selection where I got my own flat, which got him his current flat. Considering how the property prices skyrocketed after that, theoretically that nice gesture on my part of remembering his need saved him possibly anywhere between one to two hundred thousand bucks. He brought us to The Paramount Restaurant, which was a Cantonese restaurant (under Tung Lok groups) in the not-so-famous Paramount Hotel.
The food was fantastic though! We started with a Peking duck, and the skin was so well-roasted and crispy. Although it still wasn't as good as the Quan Ju De duck I had in Beijing, this was one of the best I have tasted here locally. We had a bowl of soup that had some green apple boiled with carp (almost typed 'crap' there by accident) which tasted nutritiously good. The meat of the duck was fried with black pepper and onions and was quite delicious, and the spinach dish, though it looked plain, tasted excellent as well. We had ginseng chicken, which was very well-prepared, and the ginseng taste was soaked deeply into the chicken skin and flesh. We ended the main course with steamed carp, which was interestingly deboned, served in nicely cut rectangular pieces, topped with a big fresh mushroom and Chinese ham. For dessert we had honeydew sago and mango pudding, both of which tasted superb. The whole meal wasn't cheap, averaging $60 per head, but I think the food was well worth the money.
We stopped by at their place to see what they had done with the house, and to enjoy the powerful acoustics of Jonathan's expensive but well set-up audio system. They also dropped by our place to visit, but we called it a night soon after.
Tue 22 Jul
I took a day off, which was my off-in-lieu for burning my Saturday at the ExcelFest earlier this month, and my wife took a day off as well (it's one day we get to choose when to take a day off, but only once a year). It wasn't so that we could go out and play, and neither was it for the sake of rest, although waking up about two hours later than usual was certainly attractive.
It was to do housework.
We got a part-time maid over to help us clean the windows and one toilet, and we went around vacuuming and wiping the dust off a gazillion other things, wash and dry a few loads of laundry, change the bedsheets - in summary, cleaning up as well as making preparations for the arrival of the baby! Man, I felt more exhausted today than yesterday's full day. Whoever thought a housewife had an easy time should really reconsider that seriously.
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Tuesdays are supposed to be short days for me, but today ended up agonizingly long. I had the joy of a slow breakfast, but other than that, I was buried in all kinds of work not related to chemistry. Originally I had planned to go home early to do some chores like scrubbing the toilet, washing clothes, and etc, but my colleague asked for my help because a vendor didn't show up as previously agreed. So we spent our afternoon moving and setting up printers, along with ethernet switches and rerouting power cables. All this for the sake of having more printers available for teachers to use.
Anyway, I think the non-academic committees are generally taken for granted and under-appreciated. I think very few actually realize the sacrifices made by a lot of people to make life easier for others. Our IT committee is one such case, especially the Data Processing Unit, which does a tremendous amount of collating and printing everytime a parent-tutor dialogue approaches. I think few people notice the little changes made to the environment, often by the staff welfare committee. Hence, it is doubly irritating to hear comments about the place being blocked by more printers, the noise level, and etc, especially when they did not come from those who nobly agreed to locate the printers by their cubicles. I guess Singaporeans just enjoy complaining. Hmm...I guess by blogging this paragraph, I am guilty of the same!
I rushed home to at least finish some of the chores I meant to do, and rushed down to the Esplanade to watch Magicbox. One of my boys is working as a volunteer through all the shows, and today he happened to have three complimentary tickets which he gave to me. Although the seats were at Circle 3 (the furthest possible from the stage), still they were free, so it was still a big blessing. I went with my wife and mother-in-law, and one thing I don't like about the Esplanade theatre is the seating. It is one loooooooong belt of seats, and you have to squeeze past everybody if you happen to be sitting in the middle. Imagine the difficulty that my pregnant wife has.
Anyway, the show was fabulous! And it is not because the magician is my senior pastor. I have been faithfully attending his magic shows since the earliest inception, and I am witness to his steadily increasing professionalism. The first half of Magicbox was familiar, and most of the tricks were what he had used in the previous Magic of Love. Other than familiarity, the other issue was that I could roughly see through how the tricks were pulled off, so the first half was not engaging enough for me. Although the execution and timing were excellent, I was still a bit bored, having seen most of them before. The tricks involving pulling out umbrellas out of nowhere were fascinating though, but when it reached the second half, I was awed. All the illusions were new to me, but I didn't have a clue how the tricks were pulled off. It was a gradual building up to a spectacular climax, and I was wondering why I didn't pay more to get a close-up view.
I grabbed supper at the Makansutra place (glutton...something) next to Esplanade and had the oyster fried egg. It sucked. Big time. Actually, I wonder why I even bothered. So far I had been trying food from different stalls, and they all were mediocre, not to forget, beastly expensive. It makes me wonder why the Makansutra name was used in vain. Bleah. My poor suffering stomach.
Anyway, I think the non-academic committees are generally taken for granted and under-appreciated. I think very few actually realize the sacrifices made by a lot of people to make life easier for others. Our IT committee is one such case, especially the Data Processing Unit, which does a tremendous amount of collating and printing everytime a parent-tutor dialogue approaches. I think few people notice the little changes made to the environment, often by the staff welfare committee. Hence, it is doubly irritating to hear comments about the place being blocked by more printers, the noise level, and etc, especially when they did not come from those who nobly agreed to locate the printers by their cubicles. I guess Singaporeans just enjoy complaining. Hmm...I guess by blogging this paragraph, I am guilty of the same!
I rushed home to at least finish some of the chores I meant to do, and rushed down to the Esplanade to watch Magicbox. One of my boys is working as a volunteer through all the shows, and today he happened to have three complimentary tickets which he gave to me. Although the seats were at Circle 3 (the furthest possible from the stage), still they were free, so it was still a big blessing. I went with my wife and mother-in-law, and one thing I don't like about the Esplanade theatre is the seating. It is one loooooooong belt of seats, and you have to squeeze past everybody if you happen to be sitting in the middle. Imagine the difficulty that my pregnant wife has.
Anyway, the show was fabulous! And it is not because the magician is my senior pastor. I have been faithfully attending his magic shows since the earliest inception, and I am witness to his steadily increasing professionalism. The first half of Magicbox was familiar, and most of the tricks were what he had used in the previous Magic of Love. Other than familiarity, the other issue was that I could roughly see through how the tricks were pulled off, so the first half was not engaging enough for me. Although the execution and timing were excellent, I was still a bit bored, having seen most of them before. The tricks involving pulling out umbrellas out of nowhere were fascinating though, but when it reached the second half, I was awed. All the illusions were new to me, but I didn't have a clue how the tricks were pulled off. It was a gradual building up to a spectacular climax, and I was wondering why I didn't pay more to get a close-up view.
I grabbed supper at the Makansutra place (glutton...something) next to Esplanade and had the oyster fried egg. It sucked. Big time. Actually, I wonder why I even bothered. So far I had been trying food from different stalls, and they all were mediocre, not to forget, beastly expensive. It makes me wonder why the Makansutra name was used in vain. Bleah. My poor suffering stomach.
Monday, July 14, 2008
So much for resolve. Six days have gone by since my statement of wanting to blog more often...
Wed 9 Jul
I met my principal for lunch to discuss the progress and what needed to be done for my card game, and I was glad that she offered her full support, especially in the area of taking over some of the tricky administration and protocols that I had little knowledge in. Subsequently, she requested that I revamp the roadshow slides I made for her last year because there was a change in theme for this year's brochures and all. My vice-principal also gave me some of his inputs, and he requested to view it tomorrow morning if possible. Ouch. Anyway, I didn't plan to sit on it, since the first roadshow was coming up on Friday!
Therefore, after the protected time with the chemistry cohort was over, I made my way home to rush out a newly conceptualized theme and style for the roadshow slides. I'm glad I took on this role, because I firmly believe that the image of a school is related to its packaging, and boy, the old roadshow slides were certainly underwhelming. Not very conducive for attracting students, I would imagine. Now after my tampering, they at least look professional and stylish. I love my job.
Thu 10 Jul
Today we resumed our usual pilgrimage to Old Airport Road, and my first stop was to the Whitley Road Prawn Noodles. After not eating that for a month, I just had to. I think that is one of the best foods available there, if not the best. After lessons were over, I went to my in-law's place for dinner before I headed down to Bukit Merah for cell group. Another tiring day, and I still had to rush the roadshow slides and something for eLearning when I reached home at 11 pm. Sigh.
Fri 11 Jul
I managed to settle some administrative tasks, and finally completed the slides for the roadshow for the college in the morning. I brought my card games to class, including the new one slated for next year, and let the students have a go at them. So far the students look like they enjoy the game, so it is an encouragement to me.
I tagged along with my colleague when she went to pick up her daughter so that she could drop me off just before she reached her Hougang place. I was heading to meet my NIE supervisor to discuss some issues with him, and he offered his home instead of (the super ulu) NIE. I went to some coffeeshop to grab dinner because I was too early and too hungry, and I ate one unpalatable bowl of ban mian. I was considering doing a dissertation instead of a critical inquiry for my Master's. For those who don't know what I am talking about, the critical inquiry is a super mini thesis of the research we need to do, and it is worth 3 Academic Units, just like any other module I have taken so far. A dissertation is worth 6 Academic Units, and it is more rigorous in standard, and therefore tougher. Anyway, my supervisor was telling me that there are only two advantages in doing a dissertation: if I am considering a PhD then dissertation is a must, and if I want to take one less open elective.
The latter advantage was the most alluring because I was supposed to take two electives this semester, one of which is from Aug to Nov. Since my baby will be arriving in early Sep, dropping this elective would certainly free up more time. Additionally, I don't mind doing a more rigorous research, because my research is centred on the card game I designed anyway, and I do want to know how useful it is for students. I want evidence. I mused about taking a PhD before, but I doubt that would be in the pipeline. I only recently realized after taking the Master's course that I have an academic side of me that liked such pursuits (educational research and writing papers), but in all seriousness, at the moment only the prospect of having a prefix of "Dr" added to my name feels remotely attractive. In any case, my supervisor told me that I seem to be the only one who wants to do a dissertation out of my whole cohort. Ah well, I always knew I was different. Haha.
Sat 12 Jul
Today was the Prerelease day for Eventide! I made my way down to Suntec City when the tournament was held. Anyway, the session today sucked. The cards that I initially opened were excellent, and could make a fearsome deck, and added to that, there were two valuable cards that were worth half the registration fee. But the organiser commanded a trade with the person opposite, so I kissed the cards goodbye. What the guy opposite passed to me was so scattered the deck that arose from it was bad. Really bad. The only saving grace was that there were also two valuable cards worth half the fee. I think I managed to defeat two opponents only out of sheer playing skill because they seemed rather amateurish with the gameplay.
After the session, I went to Food Republic with my colleague and a student I met there to grab a quick lunch. I think every three months I eat exactly the same thing after the Prerelease, and that is the prawn noodles. Once I was done, I made my way down to Eunos to go to my wife's grandma's place to join her and her relatives there for a small family gathering. We spent a few hours watching some Hong Kong serial, and it seemed far more interesting than our usual local fare. I realized that quite a few Hong Kong serials have this little insert at the ending credits that talk about something relevant to the show, primarily due to sponsorship. For instance, the serial we were watching was about the construction industry, so the ending insert talked about the housing issues in Hong Kong, amidst other similar issues. I remember there was one lawyer-centred serial and the insert was about legal stuff. And so on. Knowing how "up-to-date" our Mediacorp is, I think it's a matter of time before the idea is replicated in our local dramas.
I think the recently built flats are really getting smaller and smaller. I think my study room area is bigger than the living room space of a three-room flat. Possibly four-room even. I think I have gotten used to the size of my current place...it will be hard to consider downsizing next time, if ever the need arises.
Sun 13 Jul
I had only two of my boys with me, and after service we went to Sakura restaurant at Eastpoint to eat and have cell group. Right after my mee goreng, I joined my wife for dinner at Long John's. Although I managed to stomach one piece of fish, one piece of chicken, some fries and a ton of the batter crisps, I was seriously full - so much so that I didn't feel like standing up and walking out.
I was tired from sleeping late last night, but somehow I was still energetic, and ended up playing games and watching anime till 2+ in the morning. This was a seriously bad idea. I guess I have to admit that lack of sleep is getting more intolerable these days; I am getting old. I think I should save my energy for overnight mahjong sessions only. Hehe.
Mon 14 Jul
Monday has always been my worst day of the week because of the fact that I have seven periods and see all my classes today. Additionally one of my colleagues was away, so I had to combine my TA1 class with hers, and it ended up one riotous mess. By its very nature, our lessons with the TA students are highly interactive, so students tend to be vocal to begin with. Having 40+ students in one room was awfully straining on my voice at the very least. It was worse because the venue my colleague booked was meant for one class even though it was a seminar room, and that was something both of us were ignorant of. The second session with my other TA1 class strained my voice further. Man, every Monday feels identical. It was doubly worse because I only slept about 3+ hours last night.
I was quite productive today though, and manage to settle many administrative tasks during the time I had between lessons. I managed to contact the relevant office in NIE as well and settled my application for a dissertation for my Master's. I think the best takeaway for today was that when I told my classes that they would be playing my card game the next lesson, they were mostly rejoicing. Heh.
Wed 9 Jul
I met my principal for lunch to discuss the progress and what needed to be done for my card game, and I was glad that she offered her full support, especially in the area of taking over some of the tricky administration and protocols that I had little knowledge in. Subsequently, she requested that I revamp the roadshow slides I made for her last year because there was a change in theme for this year's brochures and all. My vice-principal also gave me some of his inputs, and he requested to view it tomorrow morning if possible. Ouch. Anyway, I didn't plan to sit on it, since the first roadshow was coming up on Friday!
Therefore, after the protected time with the chemistry cohort was over, I made my way home to rush out a newly conceptualized theme and style for the roadshow slides. I'm glad I took on this role, because I firmly believe that the image of a school is related to its packaging, and boy, the old roadshow slides were certainly underwhelming. Not very conducive for attracting students, I would imagine. Now after my tampering, they at least look professional and stylish. I love my job.
Thu 10 Jul
Today we resumed our usual pilgrimage to Old Airport Road, and my first stop was to the Whitley Road Prawn Noodles. After not eating that for a month, I just had to. I think that is one of the best foods available there, if not the best. After lessons were over, I went to my in-law's place for dinner before I headed down to Bukit Merah for cell group. Another tiring day, and I still had to rush the roadshow slides and something for eLearning when I reached home at 11 pm. Sigh.
Fri 11 Jul
I managed to settle some administrative tasks, and finally completed the slides for the roadshow for the college in the morning. I brought my card games to class, including the new one slated for next year, and let the students have a go at them. So far the students look like they enjoy the game, so it is an encouragement to me.
I tagged along with my colleague when she went to pick up her daughter so that she could drop me off just before she reached her Hougang place. I was heading to meet my NIE supervisor to discuss some issues with him, and he offered his home instead of (the super ulu) NIE. I went to some coffeeshop to grab dinner because I was too early and too hungry, and I ate one unpalatable bowl of ban mian. I was considering doing a dissertation instead of a critical inquiry for my Master's. For those who don't know what I am talking about, the critical inquiry is a super mini thesis of the research we need to do, and it is worth 3 Academic Units, just like any other module I have taken so far. A dissertation is worth 6 Academic Units, and it is more rigorous in standard, and therefore tougher. Anyway, my supervisor was telling me that there are only two advantages in doing a dissertation: if I am considering a PhD then dissertation is a must, and if I want to take one less open elective.
The latter advantage was the most alluring because I was supposed to take two electives this semester, one of which is from Aug to Nov. Since my baby will be arriving in early Sep, dropping this elective would certainly free up more time. Additionally, I don't mind doing a more rigorous research, because my research is centred on the card game I designed anyway, and I do want to know how useful it is for students. I want evidence. I mused about taking a PhD before, but I doubt that would be in the pipeline. I only recently realized after taking the Master's course that I have an academic side of me that liked such pursuits (educational research and writing papers), but in all seriousness, at the moment only the prospect of having a prefix of "Dr" added to my name feels remotely attractive. In any case, my supervisor told me that I seem to be the only one who wants to do a dissertation out of my whole cohort. Ah well, I always knew I was different. Haha.
Sat 12 Jul
Today was the Prerelease day for Eventide! I made my way down to Suntec City when the tournament was held. Anyway, the session today sucked. The cards that I initially opened were excellent, and could make a fearsome deck, and added to that, there were two valuable cards that were worth half the registration fee. But the organiser commanded a trade with the person opposite, so I kissed the cards goodbye. What the guy opposite passed to me was so scattered the deck that arose from it was bad. Really bad. The only saving grace was that there were also two valuable cards worth half the fee. I think I managed to defeat two opponents only out of sheer playing skill because they seemed rather amateurish with the gameplay.
After the session, I went to Food Republic with my colleague and a student I met there to grab a quick lunch. I think every three months I eat exactly the same thing after the Prerelease, and that is the prawn noodles. Once I was done, I made my way down to Eunos to go to my wife's grandma's place to join her and her relatives there for a small family gathering. We spent a few hours watching some Hong Kong serial, and it seemed far more interesting than our usual local fare. I realized that quite a few Hong Kong serials have this little insert at the ending credits that talk about something relevant to the show, primarily due to sponsorship. For instance, the serial we were watching was about the construction industry, so the ending insert talked about the housing issues in Hong Kong, amidst other similar issues. I remember there was one lawyer-centred serial and the insert was about legal stuff. And so on. Knowing how "up-to-date" our Mediacorp is, I think it's a matter of time before the idea is replicated in our local dramas.
I think the recently built flats are really getting smaller and smaller. I think my study room area is bigger than the living room space of a three-room flat. Possibly four-room even. I think I have gotten used to the size of my current place...it will be hard to consider downsizing next time, if ever the need arises.
Sun 13 Jul
I had only two of my boys with me, and after service we went to Sakura restaurant at Eastpoint to eat and have cell group. Right after my mee goreng, I joined my wife for dinner at Long John's. Although I managed to stomach one piece of fish, one piece of chicken, some fries and a ton of the batter crisps, I was seriously full - so much so that I didn't feel like standing up and walking out.
I was tired from sleeping late last night, but somehow I was still energetic, and ended up playing games and watching anime till 2+ in the morning. This was a seriously bad idea. I guess I have to admit that lack of sleep is getting more intolerable these days; I am getting old. I think I should save my energy for overnight mahjong sessions only. Hehe.
Mon 14 Jul
Monday has always been my worst day of the week because of the fact that I have seven periods and see all my classes today. Additionally one of my colleagues was away, so I had to combine my TA1 class with hers, and it ended up one riotous mess. By its very nature, our lessons with the TA students are highly interactive, so students tend to be vocal to begin with. Having 40+ students in one room was awfully straining on my voice at the very least. It was worse because the venue my colleague booked was meant for one class even though it was a seminar room, and that was something both of us were ignorant of. The second session with my other TA1 class strained my voice further. Man, every Monday feels identical. It was doubly worse because I only slept about 3+ hours last night.
I was quite productive today though, and manage to settle many administrative tasks during the time I had between lessons. I managed to contact the relevant office in NIE as well and settled my application for a dissertation for my Master's. I think the best takeaway for today was that when I told my classes that they would be playing my card game the next lesson, they were mostly rejoicing. Heh.
Tuesday, July 08, 2008
I will try blogging a bit more frequently so that I do not blog the equivalent of an essay (my last post was about 2000 words...)
Today was a fairly relaxed day for me, and that was good because I was so exhausted that I fell asleep working halfway at my laptop for almost an hour. I hope I didn't snore. Anyway, other than that, I managed to finish a bit of work and met a couple of students for consultation. I left school after clearing up some more work, and made my way to Ikea. My wife needed a plastic chair in the shower area so that she can sit down while she showers. It must be really tiring standing up for her now. Even more so when she is in school. So I bought some odds and ends, but I was unable to find the right stools; Ikea only had the children's stools, which were way too short. I headed over to Giant, and bought what I needed.
I was glad that the shuttle bus to Pasir Ris came after 15 min of waiting time only, but to my horror, when it circled over to Courts, the bus stopped there for half an hour before leaving! I was still feeling tired (I sure hope I am not falling sick), so I slept through most of that. After I reached home and changed, my wife and I went out to grab dinner and to catch a movie at Downtown East. We ate at New York New York, and the clam chowder was really good. Today's spaghetti was fantastic because the cream sauce was extremely thick and the taste was perfect. If I had bread with me, I would be soaking the bread in the sauce too!
We watched Hancock afterwards, and I thought it was quite a good show. It takes the superhero setting and tweaks it enough to make Hancock refreshing and unique, and there was a good twist in the later half of the movie. I was already mentally prepared for the twist, so it wasn't surprising, because my wife asked me about it (her cousin gave the spoiler). Anyway I think Will Smith is a solid actor. I've always enjoyed his performance in movies such as Men In Black, Independence Day, Hitch, and etc, so this show just gives extra credence that he can carry a movie almost all by himself while Charlize Theron has her usual screen presence. The movie's storyline is not exceptional, but it is refreshing and humorous enough to evoke laughs at many instances. Now that I have less and less time to catch a movie, when a show turns out good it makes me doubly happy (that I didn't waste a rare slot of free time).
Today was a fairly relaxed day for me, and that was good because I was so exhausted that I fell asleep working halfway at my laptop for almost an hour. I hope I didn't snore. Anyway, other than that, I managed to finish a bit of work and met a couple of students for consultation. I left school after clearing up some more work, and made my way to Ikea. My wife needed a plastic chair in the shower area so that she can sit down while she showers. It must be really tiring standing up for her now. Even more so when she is in school. So I bought some odds and ends, but I was unable to find the right stools; Ikea only had the children's stools, which were way too short. I headed over to Giant, and bought what I needed.
I was glad that the shuttle bus to Pasir Ris came after 15 min of waiting time only, but to my horror, when it circled over to Courts, the bus stopped there for half an hour before leaving! I was still feeling tired (I sure hope I am not falling sick), so I slept through most of that. After I reached home and changed, my wife and I went out to grab dinner and to catch a movie at Downtown East. We ate at New York New York, and the clam chowder was really good. Today's spaghetti was fantastic because the cream sauce was extremely thick and the taste was perfect. If I had bread with me, I would be soaking the bread in the sauce too!
We watched Hancock afterwards, and I thought it was quite a good show. It takes the superhero setting and tweaks it enough to make Hancock refreshing and unique, and there was a good twist in the later half of the movie. I was already mentally prepared for the twist, so it wasn't surprising, because my wife asked me about it (her cousin gave the spoiler). Anyway I think Will Smith is a solid actor. I've always enjoyed his performance in movies such as Men In Black, Independence Day, Hitch, and etc, so this show just gives extra credence that he can carry a movie almost all by himself while Charlize Theron has her usual screen presence. The movie's storyline is not exceptional, but it is refreshing and humorous enough to evoke laughs at many instances. Now that I have less and less time to catch a movie, when a show turns out good it makes me doubly happy (that I didn't waste a rare slot of free time).
Monday, July 07, 2008
Tue 1 Jul
I used today to settle a whole bunch of financial matters with my school bursar, which took up a really long time, aside from some other administrative tasks. I had the wild idea to play mahjong with my colleagues but that fell through miserably as the people who do play mahjong all had late days, and I wanted to be home early enough to have dinner with my wife and keep her company since she was on one week MC to rest at home.
Wed 2 Jul
An otherwise relatively free day ended up becoming busy. I was settling some administrative tasks during my free periods. I was also roped in to help out with a last round of TA appetizers for some stragglers that probably couldn't make it for last week's interviews, so that took up my afternoon. Right after that, I had to attend a Quickr refresher course, and this was a software that we would be piloting soon for the TA1 students, so I had better pay good attention to this.
Thu 3 Jul
After lessons in the morning, I went with my colleagues to Hougang to eat some really nice beef noodles, because heading down to Suntec Convention Centre to set up for Excelfest tomorrow. We were done pretty early because I had tactically designed and printed pull-out banners that were really fast to set up (and take down) instead of sticking posters all over the booth walls. I was originally supposed to meet G12 brother Collin for dinner, so I hung around with my colleague to wait for some items that were supposed to be issued but were not ready yet. Collin suddenly had a meeting that was delayed, so I ended up with too much free time before cell, but not enough for me to make my way home first and back. It was more frustrating to know that we waited for nothing as the items that were to be issued were delayed till tomorrow morning. Fortunately I had spent the one-hour waiting time wisely, finishing a powerpoint slideshow to be used for the booth.
So I decided to wander Suntec and Marina before heading over to Bukit Merah for dinner. That turned out to be a costly decision as I ended up buying 3 polo tees, 2 tee-shirts and 1 short-sleeved shirt in the meantime, spending about $140 bucks, which was an unexpected spree, although the cost per item was reasonably cheap. I ended up at Bukit Merah early, and took my time with dinner before going to attend cell group.
Fri 4 Jul
Day one of Excelfest. We were quite free in the morning, because today was meant for teachers to visit, and schools only officially end at 12.30 pm. I let the student helpers preview the new game, and they took it up pretty fast. They got totally owned by the teachers of course, but they were learning fast. Quite a few colleagues came by to show us support, and the nicest gesture came from some of the TA4 kids who came by to visit their friends helping me, and we dumped them a small load of college publicity brochures to help us distribute (jokingly at first), but they graciously went around doing it. A little kindness goes a long way. Heh.
The Minister of Education, Dr Ng Eng Hen, was going by a few selected schools, and my booth was one of them. He was slated to come by around 5 pm, but by 4.15 pm when I was about to go to the gents, his 'runner' came over and forewarned us that he was about to arrive. It was so unexpectedly early and abrupt that I didn't have the response time to grab the camera, pass it to my students to help take pictures of me talking to the minister. Sigh.
After Dr Ng passed by, the traffic also began to dwindle as it neared dinner time, so we managed to wrap up by 7 pm punctually, whereupon I took my students to Qi Ji at Marina Square for a simple dinner. Home was far and away, and I was so tired I concussed on the MRT ride and overshot by a station (I was meeting my wife at Bedok).
Sat 5 Jul
Day two of Excelfest. Today was open to the public, and although we initially thought, "Which member of the public would come to Excelfest?", we were dead wrong. There was almost constant traffic from about 10 am onwards, and I was really surprised. We were busy distributing the college brochures left from yesterday, and despite the idea that 1000 sets were ridiculously many, we actually cleared them all by 2 pm thereabouts!
Lunch was finally decent, and I think they took feedback from yesterday seriously, and today's food supply was plentiful. Anyway, I continued to try out the new game with the students, and I could see a progress of complexity of thinking since yesterday! They now could hold their own against the teachers, and stopped making the mistakes they did yesterday. I think when I launch the new game, it would be even more powerful than the current SynTactic. Anyway, I think it was encouraging to hear comments from parents and other visitors not affliated with the education sector that they like what I am doing, and the card game, etc. It was also encouraging to see enough people interested enough in SynTactic to leave their contact with me so that they could order when it becomes commercialized.
My principal also came down to give her support, and she wasn't just passing through; she spent a very long time talking to us, watching us play the game to understand the process, and offer her help regarding the commercialization process because there would be a lot of networking with ministry side involved. It is very reassuring to have her support in this project. Likewise, it was a warm gesture from my HOD to come down with a box of 12 donuts from Donut Factory for us to snack on.
After we packed up, the whole bunch of us went to Crystal Jade La Mian and Xiao Long Bao to have a good dinner as a reward. It was late at 8 plus already, because packing up was bottlenecked at the lift to the carpark. I think at least I brought a fun lot of students to come help out at the booth. They worked hard during these two days, and fortunately one of my students was a PRC, so he managed to field the queries of several Mandarin-speaking visitors. I think after these two days, their organic chemistry must have surely improved, so it was rewarding for everyone I think.
Sun 6 Jul
I originally wanted to clean the hamster cages which were stinking bad, but I was too exhausted to wake up early to do it before service. Service was really cool. There was a guest speaker, Pastor Brey, and he had music in his soul! Haha...he was leading us with some hip-hop sing-along, before he sang a couple of songs, and hit the piano to play. His voice was top-notch, and so was the piano-playing. I think he was a slightly rougher-voiced version of Elton John, minus the homosexuality of course. But his message about self-consciousness being the manifestation of death from sin in the garden of Eden was jarringly enlightening. After service, there was a cluster prayer meeting, and I had a good talking session with my boys. I thank God for them, because spiritual parenting had taught me so much.
After everything was over, I went over to Hall 5 with my wife to have a look at the John Little sale. There were so many things there! There was a big range of baby clothes, and my wife went ballistic, because we seldom see such a big range, and at a very low cost. If our baby was a girl instead, she would have swiped everything there. Looks like being a guy means less variety of clothes right from day 1 of birth.
We headed over to Tampines Mall for dinner. Not that I want to, looking at the disgustingly crowded state of the place, but I had a Crystal Jade voucher to spend. I also had vouchers for Breadtalk from Excelfest, so this was the chance to use everything there. Anyway, I regret ordering porridge with fish in it from Crystal Jade everytime I do, because there are always bones in the fish. It was an arduous process everytime although the fish tasted nice.
Mon 7 Jul
Today my wife's mum, and cousin (Ruiguang) came by to visit, and we brought them and my mum to Downtown East to eat at Mr Chicken Rice. The standard was still good, and I let them try the Kung Fu milk tea from the basement which was really solid. We then headed home, and waited for a part-time maid to arrive. We had decided that our house was too difficult to maintain by ourselves. My mum is quite old already, and can't manage with some tougher chores. On top of that, my wife is pregnant, which leaves me to do the manual work, and unfortunately, I'm the one who is exhausted by a stockpile of work. The lady came down to work for about 4 hours, and cleaned our living room windows and kitchen toilet. She did a pretty good job actually, and I think we wouldn't have achieved the same sparkle had we done it ourselves. So it was money well-spent.
Especially because in the last two of the four hours I was happily singing karaoke with Ruiguang (I was cleaning the hamster cages for the first two hours) His voice is pretty good, and today I wasn't having sore throat or anything, so my voice was in decent condition, and we sang through many of my KTV discs. In the evening, I carried on with some more cleaning while my wife rested; she had done a lot of cleaning earlier helping out her mum in the kitchen already.
I really sympathize with drivers now, and am convinced that I don't need or want a car. Another 5 active gantries added? Ouch.
I used today to settle a whole bunch of financial matters with my school bursar, which took up a really long time, aside from some other administrative tasks. I had the wild idea to play mahjong with my colleagues but that fell through miserably as the people who do play mahjong all had late days, and I wanted to be home early enough to have dinner with my wife and keep her company since she was on one week MC to rest at home.
Wed 2 Jul
An otherwise relatively free day ended up becoming busy. I was settling some administrative tasks during my free periods. I was also roped in to help out with a last round of TA appetizers for some stragglers that probably couldn't make it for last week's interviews, so that took up my afternoon. Right after that, I had to attend a Quickr refresher course, and this was a software that we would be piloting soon for the TA1 students, so I had better pay good attention to this.
Thu 3 Jul
After lessons in the morning, I went with my colleagues to Hougang to eat some really nice beef noodles, because heading down to Suntec Convention Centre to set up for Excelfest tomorrow. We were done pretty early because I had tactically designed and printed pull-out banners that were really fast to set up (and take down) instead of sticking posters all over the booth walls. I was originally supposed to meet G12 brother Collin for dinner, so I hung around with my colleague to wait for some items that were supposed to be issued but were not ready yet. Collin suddenly had a meeting that was delayed, so I ended up with too much free time before cell, but not enough for me to make my way home first and back. It was more frustrating to know that we waited for nothing as the items that were to be issued were delayed till tomorrow morning. Fortunately I had spent the one-hour waiting time wisely, finishing a powerpoint slideshow to be used for the booth.
So I decided to wander Suntec and Marina before heading over to Bukit Merah for dinner. That turned out to be a costly decision as I ended up buying 3 polo tees, 2 tee-shirts and 1 short-sleeved shirt in the meantime, spending about $140 bucks, which was an unexpected spree, although the cost per item was reasonably cheap. I ended up at Bukit Merah early, and took my time with dinner before going to attend cell group.
Fri 4 Jul
Day one of Excelfest. We were quite free in the morning, because today was meant for teachers to visit, and schools only officially end at 12.30 pm. I let the student helpers preview the new game, and they took it up pretty fast. They got totally owned by the teachers of course, but they were learning fast. Quite a few colleagues came by to show us support, and the nicest gesture came from some of the TA4 kids who came by to visit their friends helping me, and we dumped them a small load of college publicity brochures to help us distribute (jokingly at first), but they graciously went around doing it. A little kindness goes a long way. Heh.
The Minister of Education, Dr Ng Eng Hen, was going by a few selected schools, and my booth was one of them. He was slated to come by around 5 pm, but by 4.15 pm when I was about to go to the gents, his 'runner' came over and forewarned us that he was about to arrive. It was so unexpectedly early and abrupt that I didn't have the response time to grab the camera, pass it to my students to help take pictures of me talking to the minister. Sigh.
After Dr Ng passed by, the traffic also began to dwindle as it neared dinner time, so we managed to wrap up by 7 pm punctually, whereupon I took my students to Qi Ji at Marina Square for a simple dinner. Home was far and away, and I was so tired I concussed on the MRT ride and overshot by a station (I was meeting my wife at Bedok).
Sat 5 Jul
Day two of Excelfest. Today was open to the public, and although we initially thought, "Which member of the public would come to Excelfest?", we were dead wrong. There was almost constant traffic from about 10 am onwards, and I was really surprised. We were busy distributing the college brochures left from yesterday, and despite the idea that 1000 sets were ridiculously many, we actually cleared them all by 2 pm thereabouts!
Lunch was finally decent, and I think they took feedback from yesterday seriously, and today's food supply was plentiful. Anyway, I continued to try out the new game with the students, and I could see a progress of complexity of thinking since yesterday! They now could hold their own against the teachers, and stopped making the mistakes they did yesterday. I think when I launch the new game, it would be even more powerful than the current SynTactic. Anyway, I think it was encouraging to hear comments from parents and other visitors not affliated with the education sector that they like what I am doing, and the card game, etc. It was also encouraging to see enough people interested enough in SynTactic to leave their contact with me so that they could order when it becomes commercialized.
My principal also came down to give her support, and she wasn't just passing through; she spent a very long time talking to us, watching us play the game to understand the process, and offer her help regarding the commercialization process because there would be a lot of networking with ministry side involved. It is very reassuring to have her support in this project. Likewise, it was a warm gesture from my HOD to come down with a box of 12 donuts from Donut Factory for us to snack on.
After we packed up, the whole bunch of us went to Crystal Jade La Mian and Xiao Long Bao to have a good dinner as a reward. It was late at 8 plus already, because packing up was bottlenecked at the lift to the carpark. I think at least I brought a fun lot of students to come help out at the booth. They worked hard during these two days, and fortunately one of my students was a PRC, so he managed to field the queries of several Mandarin-speaking visitors. I think after these two days, their organic chemistry must have surely improved, so it was rewarding for everyone I think.
Sun 6 Jul
I originally wanted to clean the hamster cages which were stinking bad, but I was too exhausted to wake up early to do it before service. Service was really cool. There was a guest speaker, Pastor Brey, and he had music in his soul! Haha...he was leading us with some hip-hop sing-along, before he sang a couple of songs, and hit the piano to play. His voice was top-notch, and so was the piano-playing. I think he was a slightly rougher-voiced version of Elton John, minus the homosexuality of course. But his message about self-consciousness being the manifestation of death from sin in the garden of Eden was jarringly enlightening. After service, there was a cluster prayer meeting, and I had a good talking session with my boys. I thank God for them, because spiritual parenting had taught me so much.
After everything was over, I went over to Hall 5 with my wife to have a look at the John Little sale. There were so many things there! There was a big range of baby clothes, and my wife went ballistic, because we seldom see such a big range, and at a very low cost. If our baby was a girl instead, she would have swiped everything there. Looks like being a guy means less variety of clothes right from day 1 of birth.
We headed over to Tampines Mall for dinner. Not that I want to, looking at the disgustingly crowded state of the place, but I had a Crystal Jade voucher to spend. I also had vouchers for Breadtalk from Excelfest, so this was the chance to use everything there. Anyway, I regret ordering porridge with fish in it from Crystal Jade everytime I do, because there are always bones in the fish. It was an arduous process everytime although the fish tasted nice.
Mon 7 Jul
Today my wife's mum, and cousin (Ruiguang) came by to visit, and we brought them and my mum to Downtown East to eat at Mr Chicken Rice. The standard was still good, and I let them try the Kung Fu milk tea from the basement which was really solid. We then headed home, and waited for a part-time maid to arrive. We had decided that our house was too difficult to maintain by ourselves. My mum is quite old already, and can't manage with some tougher chores. On top of that, my wife is pregnant, which leaves me to do the manual work, and unfortunately, I'm the one who is exhausted by a stockpile of work. The lady came down to work for about 4 hours, and cleaned our living room windows and kitchen toilet. She did a pretty good job actually, and I think we wouldn't have achieved the same sparkle had we done it ourselves. So it was money well-spent.
Especially because in the last two of the four hours I was happily singing karaoke with Ruiguang (I was cleaning the hamster cages for the first two hours) His voice is pretty good, and today I wasn't having sore throat or anything, so my voice was in decent condition, and we sang through many of my KTV discs. In the evening, I carried on with some more cleaning while my wife rested; she had done a lot of cleaning earlier helping out her mum in the kitchen already.
I really sympathize with drivers now, and am convinced that I don't need or want a car. Another 5 active gantries added? Ouch.