Jeffirean Stories
Monday, August 29, 2005
#$%^!&*#@
To dwell on the continued ill luck I have wouldn't be good on your eyes, but I will just say that life hasn't been really good these days.
Here's a warning to all those food junkies - someone in my life has been struck down with kidney failure (both). Apparently there are several reasons behind the cause, and one of them is poor eating habits. Remember that our lifestyle have been much comfortable than the times our parents endured, yet we are not faring better in terms of health. I sincerely hope everyone will keep in check what they eat, remember what I said long ago, eat in moderation. Try to go vegetarian from time to time. Better still, go vegan. You may like to consult the queen of vegans Ms B . While I understand things cannot change overnight, it is manageable over a month of gradual changes. Start by eating less junk food like snacks, and go on drink fruit juices often, eat plenty of fruits and vegetables, drink lotsa water and exercise whenever possible. (even power singing is a good exercise, although a small percent of you may damage others' hearing). If there is anyone who finds that they are in need of a change, start by finding people who like to change as well (which includes me). Hopefully everyone will be as healthy as always!
The weekend was pretty eventless as there wasn't much to do. On Friday I met up with Kevin late at night and again despite arranging the meet-up as 'supper', we ended up eating nothing and only me drinking a packet of honeydew melon juice. Looks like we do have an interesting habit here, nonetheless, the idea of a meet-up is to talk and see each other! We had an exchange of views on financial planning. He's monitoring the SMF(Singapore Managed Fund) while I've been observing Singtel shares since years ago they launched their IPO with everyone from old people to young working adults subscribing to their allotments with CPF. Well, it's difficult to find people to talk about business, economy, money and financial stuff, so it is really interesting to have that sort of exchange with Kevin. I borrowed a book from him called IQ FQ, which is Intelligence Quotient and Financial Quotient. After reading it, I felt it was pretty much like Rich Dad Poor Dad, except the wording was simpler, and the context more local flavoured. Hopefully most of you will start to take out your tax accounting textbooks, finance textbooks and the likes and begin a fruitful exploration of your financial health. (which will be quite useful to keeping yourself physically healthy) And again, if you like to talk about money, economy, and stuff, please feel free to find me.
Just before I finish, like to highlight something from TODAY (I recommend people who are busy to read this paper), that there aren't lifts for the disabled in the town area train stations, namely City Hall, Raffles Place and Tanjong Pagar, which I just experienced. You see, I am currently carrying an ankle injury and unfortunately, the places that I need to go do not have the disable-friendly facilities (although I'm not disabled, it will be less troublesome for them) so i can feel for these people. Even going to my work place there is still a flight of stairs to climb before reaching the lift. In short, it means the disabled will find it very difficult to get to town to work (even if you say they could drive, or take a cab, hey, the expressways are always horribly jammed despite ERP gantries, regretably) Taking buses is a no-no definitely for the disabled - look at the height of the bus boarding platform! (and the lack of space). Although it doesn't make sense to have special facilities for a small percentage of people, the act of not having them carries a tinge of discrimination. Try experiencing the same inmobility and you will understand. Hopefully we will have the authorities look into this again when they find the time to.
Oh well, there is simply many things to criticise about in our country, but we will leave it to the next time when we have the solutions for them. You should have observed that I have not put up any solutions despite having spotted so many inadequacies - typical Singaporean attitude. Perhaps the empty space will be a better way to get people to start thinking and put forward their entrepreneuric solutions. Yes! Come on, solve problems and make money. That is as easy as that.
"Kicking the ball to your feet"
Jeffire
Acknowledged my existence at
7:05 PM
Thursday, August 25, 2005
Phew. I finally finished my lessons for the week this morning. Now to relax a bit and look back..
Tuesday
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Collected the laptop from school which I loaned. It's an IBM R40, that looks to me like a 50yr old VHS player - it's thick and heavy! Nothing like what my friends carried, sleek Sony Vaios, Samsungs, handy Twinhead, flexible Fujitsus and artistic Toshibas! Well, what can you expect from IBM anyway. However, certainly I agree that IBM laptops are rugged and ready for the tough trekking (though dependent on the strength of the trekker). It serves me fine for the use for CAT lessons but I just can imagine carrying the real cool Sony Vaio or the seductive red Samsung (for ladies, but so?!)
Also went to meet up with the manager of Juju Hokkaido Hot Pot, and that means potentially more good deals for us students!
Wednesday
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THREE lessons scheduled for the day, all 3-hour long classes, beginning with the interesting CAT class led by a new professor who was quite humourous, Prof Michelle Chong. Realised my Excel knowledge, while still ahead of most peers, it's still inadequate to be of use on the bigger stage of life. Guess you guys should take it more seriously as it does really saves plenty of time for calculations and modelling.
Noon class began after an interesting coincidence. Saw Reina and Lionel (the golden couple) and waved but Reina didn't recognise me at all for the 1st few seconds. Then, saw Elise (Lionel's onscreen girlfriend and unexpectedly my classmate for 3 consecutive terms) at the wrong venue and told her that she was waiting at the wrong place. Realised there's a Networked Seminar Room 2.2, Seminar Room 2.2 and Classroom 2.2 in SESS! Walked from NSR 2.2 to SR 2.2 but realised it was actually CR 2.2 rather, and one more round we went before reaching the correct venue. As usual, I opted to sit in front of class and thankfully the stranger sitting beside me tried to talk to me. PHEW! I could never have made the 1st move. Made quite a good impression on the instructor Ms Vellina-Collins Loi, as during break we had a short chat and I presented my namecard to her. What made me happy was that there was really plenty to learn - networking, socialising, dress codes, etiquette, etc. Perhaps the seniors presented to us too bleak a picture, for the class was actually very fun. Of course the seniors did warn us for the sake of grades, which wouldn't be dependent on how hard you worked in this course. Rather, it depended on how observant you were, how street-smart, how inquisitive you can get (so as to make sure you wear the right stuff, show the right courtesy and make a great impression).
The last class for the day, MPW, was at the other end of the campus - LKC School of Business. The distant trip was made treacherous as hunger pangs were clearly felt, yet time was scarce. SOB is such a crowded place compared to other places. Reached the classroom with 10mins to spare and promptly went to the washroom to remove the irritating contact lenses. I couldn't wear it too long, not sure why. After I returned to class, very coincidentally the SA Welfare Secretary was sitting beside my place. And while she looked bewildered at the first sight of me, I was teasing her by saying '七月见鬼啦!'(7th lunar month see ghost!) We didn't see each since May I suppose. Nonetheless it was definitely more easy to integrate into the class as she had her friends beside. Our Prof was an AM (ang moh) and my second one. He was very young, 31 and much more interesting and relatable to than my previous AM instructor (perhaps the previous course, being Management Accounting, had a hand in making the lessons feel boring). MPW, as Prof Graham Brown described, is quite an introductory course to OB (organisational behaviour). This time the course had a research element to it and I'm not too sure if I can afford the time off to participate in the research exercises, and definitely it wouldn't sound good if I opted for the other kind of research - analysing published reports by reowned research groups. Hopefully there will be some opportunity for me but I guess I may have to go for the latter option.
Today
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BP resumed part II. One of my classmates sitting behind me said something that will surely describe the class aptly - 'is this JC tutorial class?' Like I mentioned, we were still copying from the board and then we answered questions like in JC times when your teacher asked you those answers that were already written on the board(perhaps only experienced in YJC and also i guess the instructor, Prof Lim, seemed quite desperate trying to get us to talk for the class was dead silent and sleepy and many people left even before he began)
After class, it was back to business for SCS. Passed the contract to Mr Andy of Juju, and had brunch at Paradiz Centre food court. Chatted with my mother (of all people) on administrative and financial issues of my dad's business. Then life was okie as you can see now I'm blogging....
BUT!
Last Night to Today Morning
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While brushing my teeth, my mother was lamenting that my brother should not have put her bottoms on the outside of the bamboo hanging rack but rather, should be nearer to the wall. While transferring it over, she didn't grip carefully and then hit my head. Then we were talking about her being 'pantang' (supertitious) but I am not sure if I should have heeded her at all. Firstly I had a real bad nightmare after being unable to sleep until around 1+am (since my brother and I always have bedside debates, from upper deck to lower deck). The last bits of the nightmare were getting a McDonald photo frame with a video of a laughing bugger inside which never stop despite me smashing it onto the toilet wall of my home. In the end I got rid of it by throwing it downstairs (yeah, get the courts in dreamland to prosecute me) but as I went to my room (in my dream) to look at the computer, it was like you have 27,221 viruses and the numbers still jumping, and the stupid laughing bugger again on the screen that no matter how many times you press the 'X' box, it will never go away. (and to me the biggest disaster in life is computer breakdown). I promptly woke up after the bad scare but I knew bad luck was stuck with me for the day. Then I descended to the floor to relieve myself and then check the football results. I lost 6 out of 7 slips with 2 lost by goals in the last minute (thanks to Pascal Cygan). Yet, Villareal was leading 1-0 as I was looking at all the scorers and determining which teams made it to the group stages of the Champions League, but Everton equalised (bringing a slight hope back), right after I finished my reading. Hanging on to the last hope of survival, (note that my strategy of now is to have every single slip's return value worth the total capital invested,ie, win 1 slip = level or a small margin win, and 2 slips means jackpot, and so forth) Forlan had to score strike one final blow to me on the 90th min when it was immaterial to them while D. Ferguson's goal was disallowed in the 81st! What should I feel?! To add salt (or saline) to the miserable wound, I couldn't put on my contact lenses in the morning and wasted 15mins of my time in front of the mirror.
So now, was that my mother right to be superstitious? You can see.
Ah well, my brother always say I like to blame everything else on the world except myself...haha. That's about all I have for you. Hope it kept you entertained! Enjoy your weekend!
Still happy
Jeffire
PS: Anyone for Mahjong on this SUNDAY? Need 2 khakis and venue is my home!
Acknowledged my existence at
6:50 PM
Monday, August 22, 2005
Good day!
Welcome back to school, as my phone rang me up 6am in the morning. I just slept at 1.30am following the Chelsea's lucky win over Arsenal (virtue of a fluke goal from Drogba). I went for a morning run, in the dark lanes where the trees made the ground dark, and cars were rare on the route I took. After that, even with the early preparation of ironing my clothes the day before, I was still late for class by 8 mins due to an unfortunate incident - my pen was leaking ink and it smudged my hands! Till now the ink still stays.
The first class was Business Processes. In factI was intending to depart since I was locked out of class, but fortunately, someone else was as late as me. A kind hearted soul opened the door for her, of course I took the chance to 'steal' into class as well. The first segment was self introduction, but I got to talk more when the lecturer asked if anyone had working experience. I described my current golf travel consultant job in a very summarised manner, trying to keep relevance to class. In the end, the class was more about mathematical models used to improve procedures and decision makings in business processes, not the typical case study kind of class you would expect. While we were treated to a show of facilities in the seminar room (6 whiteboards available for writing), I was wondering if the professor knew of any technology afterall. He made the class copy one stupid question as he scribbled onto the whiteboard, and somebody even requested for him to write in larger font. Actually he could always use some thing called 'projector' or certainly just upload the question beforehand onto the virtual learning portal, SMU Vista. Yet some of my classmates were furiously typing and caught out in the end when they didn't know how to draw a graph in MS Word, while others had on their notebooks, scribbling, that you wonder if they were legible at all. Sheeshzzz.. so much for being a high-tech, resourceful school.
The positive segment about class was that my previous groupmates, Xiaoxiang and Esther did not recognise that it was me till I had spoken. I was actually wearing contact lenses and donned a lively hairstyle. The 2 testimonials from them proved that my changeover had succeeded in some sort, which was good news. Unfortunately, I may need to wear my unsightly spectacles again on Wed with the 3x 3hour classes and no breaks in between, which were no good for my eyes as my left eye seem to be uncomfortable with the contact lens on it for more than 3 hours. Perhaps I need to budget for a new pair of spectacles but there isn't any budget manoeveurability left for that, unless Singapore Pools blesses me with a windfall! Hahaha.
After school, life reverted to the usual - enjoying making calls and talking to strangers across territorial borders, via this thing called 'telephone' and 'IDD'. I had been assigned the project to acquire merchants for a certain program we were designing, and hence had to dial up the various merchants for their responses. Not too enjoyable, but still, it was a valuable experience considering I rarely call up people to talk.
Prior to school, the weekend was filled with football activities except for Saturday morning, which I had to bring my grandparents to hospital for a short check-up. After that it was the usual soccer game at NUS. I have to admit that it was a really bad day for me, even though I recorded 3 assists out of the 9 goals my team managed in the small tennis court sized area. I made several mistakes amounting to 20 in total, and 3 of those were sitters that I missed. Guess my shoes were firing blanks. My greatest asset - passing - was erratic and had caused my team several dropbacks for the counterattacks were quick and furious.
After the soccer game it was more of watching soccer for the rest of the day and resting as I acquired a present from the great o sun - sunburnt! My shoulders were burnt while my face had a healthy tan. Perhaps that contributed to my ex-project mates' inability to recognise me.
The new term brings a new challenge, a time-juggling act that I have to balance among the array of responsibilities in the many organisations I have got myself involved with. Notwithstanding any major downfall, I predict that I will make good time out of these 15 weeks and then enjoy a marvellous end to 2005, which will consequently, lead me nearer to higher achievements. Some may say it is too early to count the chickens before the eggs hatch, yet I still want to emphasise that, having set the goals early, having decided on the ways to reach it, constantly getting feedback and being on the ball for sudden breakouts by having flexiblity, at least ensures that I will not be driven to desperation like last term.
I will not want to live the ridiculous life of last term again. (Oh well, this sentence looks pretty nostalgic.. did I say it beginning of last term!?)
Acknowledged my existence at
8:49 PM
Wednesday, August 17, 2005
Hello guys,
It's been half a week since the previous post. Nothing much has happened actually, if you consider just the Jeffirean world. But the world that we all share had tons of stuff happening. I can recall mostly bad stuff though. The Jeffirean world is shielded from all these bad stuff, because the world is so small and clouded by selective vision - you see what you want to see. Oh well, perhaps let me first report on the Jeffirean world before we go on to talk about the world we share.
Firstly, it's less than a week to the start of school. Oh man, the first thing to solve is the resources needed for university education, ie textbooks, SMU Vista (the online resource access portal), a laptop and school fees. To be frank, I have no idea which textbooks are needed, SMU Vista isn't working, I don't own a laptop and school fees, oh well, my dad will pay for it first despite me having a full time job. I will be loaning the laptop from school because of a certain course that you call Computer as an Analysis Tool (CAT). Perhaps by then I will have solved the problem of accessing SMU Vista. As for textbooks, I'm going to see if I need them after attending the first lesson. Maybe I don't need them at all. Oh well, actually I could have summarised the whole paragraph into 6 words, "I am not ready for school". Gee, that's how I inflate word count.
Secondly, I've been on a anime marathon at work and at home. Over the past 2 weeks I've watched 115 episodes of Prince of Tennis and also 22 episodes of School Rumble. I recommend School Rumble to everyone, especially guys. It's a love comedy and well, the characters are very interesting and most importantly it will take your bad feelings away as it's so funny! Not sure if girls will like it because the guys in this anime aren't the typical 'yandaos' but weirdos. Haha. If you like 'yandaos' perhaps watch Prince of Tennis. You will sure love tennis (and perhaps boyish tennis players) after watching it. In Wikipedia, they actually write that Prince of Tennis sparked a tennis rage in Japan and made it popular when it was right down in the doldrums. Certainly Singapore should make something like that and not have weird films like One Leg Kicking, Money No Enough (which I think made more people interested in betting). I do recall in the past we had sports related dramas, the latest one being in swimming (I didn't watch it). I still recall vividly there was a tennis, and volleyball drama before and surely we can have a bowling, table tennis, badminton soon? These sports are the ones doing pretty well, and perhaps bodybuilding! Haha.
Here's the photo of Yakumo Tsukamoto (my desired girlfriend) and her elder sister on the left, wearing a hat, the female lead, Tenma Tsukamoto, in School Rumble...
Well, apart from these, there isn't other stuff to mention about the Jeffirean world. Perhaps I will finish this segment with my timetable for the semester.
Mon - Business Processes (BP) 0830 - 1000
Tue - No class
Wed - Computer as an Analysis Tool (CAT) 0830 - 1145
The Finishing Touch (FT) 1200 - 1515
Managemment of People at Work (MPW) 1530 - 1845
Thu - Business Processes (BP) 0830 - 1000
Fri - No class
You will have to take into consideration my job takes up 12 - 9pm on all the weekdays except Wed, which will be 7-9pm instead, and Sat, it will be 9am - 3pm. That's pretty filled up and not too helpful when I'm actually now in the Exco of 3 CCAs. I will be dropping my position in MIC soon once I've identified my successor as it's too much a hassle for me to do the Sponsorship post.
Now to the world we all share...
Recently there have been several air crashes. I certainly hope things are getting better.
And about the Presidential elections, well, it's confirmed we will not have any for this term. I seriously have doubts that our President will be able to complete his next 6 year tenure. Hopefully he will be strong and healthy to complete the tenure, but even more importantly, we need to identify Presidential successors even before the next Presidential elections. I suppose 3 weeks isn't enough for the board nor Singaporeans to know about the candidates. Maybe 6 months in advance to hold the nominations will be a better idea.
In Japan, the Lower House election will be up on Sep 11. I certainly hope the whole Japan will unite and aid Koizumi in his bid to privatise Japan Post. Perhaps it's not too welcomed for those who have already served many years in the agency, but Japan's economy does need some big changes, and I guess the Japanese will have to brace themselves for these huge changes. Apart from getting out of Japan to work, they may also need to retrain themselves to find more jobs. I am sure the security sector can accomodate the whole lot of healthy Japanese who will be able to accomplish the job as the first line of defence against criminals.
The other thing of concern is perhaps the haze caused by illegal burning in Indonesia. It has affected many innocent people in Malaysia and Southern Thailand. We can see here the selfish intentions of a small group of people have resulted in the suffering of a large group of people.
This lead me to think that -- Did we ever do anything that had led to trouble for others? For example, did we ever waste water, not sparing a thoughts for those who doesn't have easy access to clean water like us? Did you ever leave your rubbish on the park facilities to wait for cleaners to clean for you? There are a ton of other examples to speak of, yet despite knowing and understanding all these, have we really stopped to spare a thoughts for others?
Hopefully, our society and our world will become more gracious and forgiving in the years to come. Perhaps we should just try from today onwards, giving in more to others who needs more, and not taking more than what we need.
Acknowledged my existence at
8:55 PM
Friday, August 12, 2005
Punters Galore~
As we all know, the new football season has already started with the Champions already into the final round of qualifiers - Today I have put up a new blog called Winning With Jeffire to fulfil my sideline aspirations - as a tipster! Haha. Nowadays there are so many prediction columns, each giving their own analysis of the games. I want a slice of the pie too! Well actually, it is not the winning predictions that are important to me, but a channel to know the people who are truly interested into knowing about football economics, just like the way we have our regular economics, demand, supply, blah blah. Punting is just like the stock market - study your teams (companies), put up your money (capital) and win money (capital gains, currently have yet to seen 'dividend-like' betting options). Other similar terms like 'hedging', 'arbitrage' and the likes are applicable as well. It's a real big business across the world, and can even be studied as a major (but which university will offer such a course?).
Of course, like the stock market, there are people who 'speculate' and there are those who use 'insider info', etc. There's a dark side to betting. While I don't advocate betting, nor I think it's easy money, but, a little punt here and there with a cool bit of analysis, research, allows one to gain satisfaction (with real returns) when you get your numbers right.
Nonetheless, it is also as important to view 'The Beautiful Game' as an art, and not just dollars and cents. I do watch football for the sake of the emotions it can bring, and I do play football often in a bid to keep myself immersed in the beauty of the game. It's a huge part of life, I guess. Oh ya, as usual, there will be the weekend football watching - sometimes if you like, you can always pop over to watch with us if you don't have cable tv. Just inform me beforehand since I may not be always at home on the weekends.
Leaving the topic of football in its own destined circle (there's a dedicated blog to it, right?), and back to the dailies of the Jeffirean life, the new school term is only 1 week and 3 days away!
I never had an enjoyable holiday ever since the days of primary school ended.
The demands of survival has engineered us into people who have to integrate ourselves into others' systems. You cannot have your own world, and yet survive. Worse still, we are all stuck in the myriad of life-draining cycles, emerging in the forms of 'bureaucracy', 'politics', 'business', 'education', 'factionalism', 'separatism', 'elitism', and much more to list. Life is no longer a simple case of eat, sleep, drink, natural calls, sex, birth and death. Every bit of life now is linked to something that will either support or eliminate the existence of another bit of life. For example, since half of the world eats rice as a staple, the rice producing communities have an impetus to grow more rice as a result of the increasing demand (with the increasing populations of rice consuming countries). We no longer plant because we need to eat. We plant because others need to eat. In the world today, there may be a billion reasons as to why we exist. In the past, it may be just because birth is just about continuing the family line. But now, birth can be accidental, can be engineered, and can be induced (through the use of birth incentives) or refused (through the use of abortion methods).
Have you ever wondered why did you exist in the first place? Why did your parents add you to this world which is no longer as simple as it actually was?
While we are trying to make living simpler, living has actually got more complicated. Food is very accessible, yes, only if you work and get the money to buy it. You no longer just pluck fruits off trees to eat when you feel hungry. You wait for the end of the month to get your paycheck (or allowance, if you are unemployed or in the army), you budget the amount to ensure you are able to buy the food you need to eat over the month. Add the other necessary stuff for survival, you will realise that living has indeed become more troublesome than it was.
One day I suppose I will hole myself up in some countryside of some inaccessible country, plant stuff for eating, and drink water that falls from heaven, get electricity from the movement of nature (wind, solar and water energy), and die and rot and return to nature as perhaps nutrients in the soil, rather than be stuck in coffins that don't rot (they are lacquered), and return nothing to nature at all.
Is that what life is supposed to be? Dream on...we no longer exist due to nature, that's why.
Philosphical thoughts
Jeffire
Acknowledged my existence at
7:50 PM
Wednesday, August 10, 2005
Time flies when you are enjoying...
Certainly the long weekend (it wasn't long enough for me as I had to work on Monday..) was very enjoyable. Here's the update on my life for the past few days.
10 Aug 05 - Today
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Met up with the owner of the Kiliney Kopithiam branch in our new campus. The branch will only be opened in mid Sep, but surely it will be a much coveted meeting place for all the SMU people and their friends...we had a good chat and a good deal is on the cards for our upcoming lunch concert...heh.
9 Aug 05 - National Day
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Well I spent my National Day going back to the workshop with my dad to pick up some documents before we went to get a 2nd-hand metal cabinet for his friend/colleague. My dad was offered $120 for the remaining cabinet but that included transport. Without transport, we had it at $80 but my dad didn't have enough cash with him, so he asked if $70 was fine (he had only $71). The warehouse boss accepted with parting words that read 'National Day discount'... woo. Anyway it was a good buy as the cabinet was quite brand new, and we transported it over with ease. After a sumptuous lunch prepared by my mother, we proceeded to a football game at NUS with Weijian. Without spectacles I moved much faster than before, but my reading of the game was still too slow and definitely I didn't play as well as I wanted too. One of the 'freelancing players' joining us playing as an aggressive winger (can't remember his name.. a Chinese or Hongkie I think). I was super disappointed with his crosses and he boomed 6 crosses across the field...what a waste as there aren't really that many quick wingers around. I played in a behind-the-striker role and not the usual forward role as my team had Johnny in front and I thought it would be better for me to sprint through the defence for through passes but those passes rarely came... And when they did come, I squandered a few. That was why it was disappointing...sigh.
Met Gregory Teo of my sec sch class(yr 1 and 2), he looked so much different! Anyway he doesn't seem to remember me but surely my constant shouting and instructions on the field should have rekindled some sort of 'hatred' we had? Haha. We were not exactly on the best terms for all sorts of reasons...but that was in the past...not sure what he feels now. I still remember him for his record breaking standing broadjump (>260cm!!) Nonetheless, it just show how small the world is!
Dinner after the soccer game was great (my mum's cooking again) and after deciding what to punt for the Champions League, was hit by Charles' message which eventually caused me to miss the window and both of us didn't get to buy any bets despite me rushing from Yishun to AMK. On hindsight I have to thank him for that! It turned out that I would have 'craypotted'(lost all) while he would have won a ticket with resulting profit of $4+. Ah well, certainly it is all fated! Haha. I then went to Toa Payoh to purchase toiletries at the famous Lee Hwa(now branded Beauty Spring) and spent $60.25 there! That included a seabed mineral clay at $34.90, which was quite nice to use...haha.. then I drove to my new home to take a look at the construction progress. It seemed to be left with the landscaping but I am not really sure because I couldn't see the interior of the individual flats. It was too dark. From the look on the outside it is very nice!! Hahaha.. super look forward to shifting house... After that,when I got home I opened the mailbox to get a pleasant surprise - a birthday card from Jinki!! Wooooohoo.. thanks brother.
I actually recorded my expenditure for the month, it's only the 10th but I have already spent $715.55, including a $50 loan, $240 went to changing my money to ringgit,$100 to my mom and a $45 bet (which resulted in a $61 profit win). I have yet to add in those bills that you deduct through GIRO... T_T. Looks like only a miracle will take me through to the next month...haha. So much for my birthday..
8 Aug 05 - Monday
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It was a day where I feared for my life - I was 2.5hrs late to work! Anyway I was at the ICA early in the morning to update my passport photo, and then against all odds, I felt it was a good time to go JB and come back quickly. How wrong could I get. The traffic was actually acceptable, except that many Singaporean drivers flouted the rules and caused a huge jam for the entire junction. They were stopping their cars on the yellow box and caused those car that needed to turn to stop on the yellow box as well, resulting in trucks and buses getting stuck. In short, if the drivers were more gracious, there would have never been a jam...idiots. When I got there it was already lunch time and I sped to get the indian snack and then subsequently to my optical shop at Plaza Holiday. I managed to learn how to put my contact lenses in just 10mins but the optician wasn't satisfied and wanted me to practise more... arghz. I took another 10mins to practise and then I went straight up to get my hair cut and dyed, which was my longest stay in any hair salon - 1.5hrs! However it was really a very nice style with my hairstylist (Sky from H20 hair salon)'s nimble hands, but too bad only my colleagues got to see it. (After that I didn't manage to style it as nice as he did..haha) When i got back to office my GM chided me for doing it the 2nd time, but luckily I got away with a stern warning. I am sure there will be no more JB trips on working days!!
7 Aug 05 - Sunday
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Sunday was dim sum at a restaurant in Chinatown called Yan Ge. 4 of us, Kevin, Junkai, Clarissa and me ordered in total $60+ worth of dim sum and desserts. But Kevin gave a treat and we paid $10 each to him. Thanks a million! Junkai had to join his friends for ktv after dim sum brunch, but he took a photo of me for my passport update before we departed... woo thanks to Junkai! I had a fun time at night erasing to background to pure white so that it would be accepted by the authorities. (using MS Paint!!) Finally Kevin got to use that polaroid camera I gave him for his birthday but too bad I wasn't in my new look yet, so the photo we took was of the old look.. Nonetheless we had a fun time trying to get the camera working as the we didn't realise the film catridge wasn't in, which buttons to press, etc. After Junkai's departure, Clarissa drove us around Chinatown where I gave a short tour of the heritage sites and we also found a place called Union in Club Street where she mentioned they had a very nice fondue that she wanted to try after seeing it on newspaper. Kevin said the Tanjong Pagar area had many pubs for gays...hmm...after working here for 2months I have yet to see any of them...haha. As Kevin had a meeting coming up, Clarissa dropped him off at his office building, and then she sent me home while en route to Causeway Point. Wheee.. thanks a million.
6 Aug 05 - Saturday
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The highlight of the day was the KTV in the afternoon. The chaps who participated were Charles, Jiaxing, Sirong, Qinyi, Guiqiang plus David, my 1st-3-mth-jc friend, who's in NTU and my SMU friend, Yenmei. Thank you all for your presents! If Yenmei was reading this..err.. I had no need for any fresh air at home.. haha. I had a good time singing English songs with David, which we rarely do, while Charles belted his usual hits less for the 2 older songs of Steve Chow (周传雄) and a few other English songs. The annoying one is that he chose to sing Penny's 爱疯了 with me in FALSETTO which I practised so long to hit the right notes using my true voice...hmph! I did badly at Coco's Before I Fall in Love and Jeff Chang's 下一个永远. I thought I did pretty fine for Terry Lin's new song 说不出的告别 since I have been singing it pretty often.. haha. Still love Partyworld KTV even though the pricing isn't very nice to your pocket.. haha.
After dinner at Chong Pang, David, Jiaxing and me actually spent 1hrs talking while standing outside Yishun MRT. We walked there from the kopithiam opposite Chong Pang Camp after dinner and then we had like a ton of stuff to discuss from school life in NTU to Uni+Vantage and Funkygrad.com. Hahaha. It was actually pretty enjoyable but TIRING... after the long discussion, Jiaxing, Charles and I went to Yishun Central to punt.. which I told you I won $61 proft on a $45 bet. It was pretty good to have another walk with Jiaxing and Charles to Khatib where we lived and I bid Charles goodbye as he finally got on the bus to home...
Oh well, that's the report on my life and even though I'm late, I wish Singapore all the best in the years to come! Happy Birthday!! Oh ya, this goes to all the Aug babies too, like Junbin (4 Aug), Lixia (6 Aug), Fern (7 Aug), Baoqin (20 Aug), Jason (22 Aug)... anyone I missed!!?
That's all for today =) Stay tuned for the next post on Friday night where I will put up a new sidebar item called 'Winning With Jeffire'. Yep, it's my tips section.. hahaha... that continues my tipster career ever since I left HQ SA...hehe.
Yawnzzzzz
Jeffire
Acknowledged my existence at
8:35 PM
Friday, August 05, 2005
YOOoooooOooOOOOooooo!
Since dunno how many donkey years ago, I have begun to set birthday resolutions, that go by the birthyear. Let's see what I have accomplished this birthyear..
1. Set up a business - oh well, i have yet to set up mine but i set up my dad's.. so now to set up my own..
2. Lose the fats - Oh well, this takes ages... haha. Back to the drawing board for this.
3. Regular soccer/table tennis khakis - Hmm soccer khakis i have but not table tennis khakis... i wan tennis khakis too... so have to keep this goal for another year.
4. Win a BIG toto prize - ahh.. i haven't even won a small one so come on, let's wish for one BIG one!!
5. PDA or Pocket PC - Well...this one can settle easily by Xmas ba.
6. A new Jeffire - woooah... wahaha.. let's take this down and put some other goal ba..
So my birthyear resolutions you can see now on the sidebar~
Well, some of you must be thinking how did I spend my birthday? Ahh well.. I spent it MSNing at work! Haha... Okie Since I'm on afternoon-night shift, this morning I spent it playing Romance of the 3 Kingdom 10. Wooo.. whole morning defending against the stupid armies of Dong Zhuo, he has Cao Cao under him!! Damn, in one of the battles I nearly caught Dong Zhuo... if I did I wouldn't have spent the whole morning defending my city...fought like 4-5 battles ba. My brother bought me breakfast! (on the way only la..he wants to buy for himself) Unfortunately, as now I'm eating vegetarian on the lunar 1st and 15th (and some other days, as and when I like it), he couldn't get me my vegetarian breakfast so I asked him to get me the local pancake (the soft soft with peanuts or tau sar in between).. haha. Then had to loan Silun $50 again as he is still very deep in debt.. dunno what the hell he doing.. but since it's my birthday, do some kind deeds for a friend ba (but he forgot it's my birthday... T_T sighz) At work it was as usual, but my colleagues celebrated for me! Woooooooooooooooah.. my first cake in 20years! (last year also have one from Huiling but it's shared between me, Baoqin and Fern, haha) This year it's totally mine!! Fruit cake.. i like kiwi, strawberry and mango! Thanks a million gals (KB, MY and Sharen) + Sharon mummy (my senior colleague, copy her daughter's way of calling, wahaha) We had some vegetarian dim sum while they ate chicken pie! Best of all they got me Best Denki gift certificates so that I can buy my oven toaster!! waahaha. Then I can make my pizza, baked rice, and a whole lotsa goodies..(provided I have time).. After the celebration everyone left for their Friday Night while i stayed in office and received many birthday wishes, from SMSes to MSN messages.. woo! Unfortunately I missed the SCS BBQ today.. work so much still cannot enjoy... sigh. Likewise for MIC, nobody wish me happy birthday wan.. hmph! Dun wan to work so hard liao...haha. Just joking.
Okie so tomorrow got KTV!! Got about 8 people, too bad most of the army chaps cannot come.. but nvm! We always can have more once I get the Kbox discounts... it will be more affordable then.
Hopefully I can make it on time as yep, I'm going to JB to collect my contact lenses.. time to throw my trademark spectacles away le! It's been with me for 3 years le.. played a ton of soccer matches with me and still can use.. hahaa.
22 years old le! I just wanna stay at this age...
Ecstatic (don't you think this blog entry is kinda kiddy...=p)
Jeffire
PS: Download my latest song recording - Penny's 爱疯了
Acknowledged my existence at
10:07 PM
Tuesday, August 02, 2005
Oh boy!
I'm back from JB after a disastrous traffic jam. I am late for work!! Luckily my boss didn't chid me too much, as they were more worried for I was uncontactable by phone (out of batt, damn) Why did I have to wait in the cab?! It was because the stupid traffic police was giving priority to a certain road. I was like, how come the TP keep giving more time to the horizontal traffic? It was because there was a government vehicle inside the road! You can easily see there was something in front of the bonnet that signified a government vehicle (but it didn't have the flag). In the end the cab driver charged me more than usual for the trip (as if it's my bloody fault) but I couldn't care more as I was already late. Then the unlucky thing happened. I had to get a ticket for the SJE bus so I got it from the conductor but the bus didn't want to wait for me! So I was stuck there another 20mins waiting for the stupid bus to arrive. Okie so the bus did arrive and I was on my way back. At the Singapore Immigration checkpoint, the officer then told me that I should change my photo in my passort and ordered me to take out my IC to check. That took another 2 mins extra, but fortunately nothing else happened and I was 1 hour late for my work. I certainly did not have a good day although I managed to get my contact lenses ordered at 7 monthly pairs for 230RM. That's about SGD103. Okie my eyes had worsened to 600 and 700 respectively while the astimagtism remained stable at 225 and 275. Argh! That means if I want to make a new pair of spectacles it's going to cost me a bomb. Can you tell me if the contact lenses was a good deal, by comparing to the local prices ba.
The past few days were pretty enjoyable.
Saturday night I had a treat from my GM, Fiona, at Chong Qing Steamboat (along Beach Rd). While the food wasn't really fantastic (and the ma la steamboat was too hot for me) the full table made it a enjoyable dinner. I guess SMU people could go visit there if they have the money and the crowd, as $15 for a steamboat meal isn't too expensive. Moreover you get 2 soup flavours! However the weekend crowd was certainly overwhelming for the crew and many people were actually standing and waiting for seats. After the dinner MY and KB wanted KTV but I couldn't join as Vivace 05 was awaiting me the next day! So I took the train back with Sharen who lives in Yio Chu Kang.. phew. At least got somebody to accompany me back lor.
Sunday was, yep vivace 05. I was slightly late, arriving at 920am at the Admin Building (after a long walk from Dhoby Gaut to LKC Business School and then crossing the road to Admin Builidng) The things were already shifted and I had to walk back to SIS underground to the Concourse. No shops nor the food court was up yet, but it was certainly bustling with all our students and staff preparing for Vivace 05 and also to welcome the procession group, organised by SMUve. Woah, you should see how the Concourse was flooded with students and parents! There were the freshies who had to visit the CCA booths to get a card stamped in order to receive their goodie bag package and also to sign up for the clubs they were interested in. I was helping out at Music Interactive Club, trying to sell the club until I had a sore throat as it was too noisy and we had to scream in our 'sales presentation' to the freshies! I also helped to divert the students to Japanese Cultural Club, another club I was in. Then nearer to the end, after finishing the lunch catered by the school (McDonalds!) I was at BizCOm booth to help to close shop and to get updated on the upcoming events such as the Freshman Bash 05 at Chinablack, 2 Sep I heard. And then Convocation 05, on 20 Aug, as usual, at Suntec. I certainly look forward to meeting the freshies as I need to handover my Sponsorship portfolio at MIC. I am sick of working with the people there because they never appreciate what you have done and support is really lacking. I still enjoy working with my Bizcom counterparts, and I can still recall that I was already in the club before school even started. We have come a long way since, with the Uni+Vantage branding building up gradually. I have already thought up of the next development for Uni+Vantage, while at MIC I think whatever I can suggest always goes to the trashcan. Maybe I will take up the portfolio in table tennis club while I train harder to improve my mediocre skills. Looks like the new term will be very interesting for me!
I have begun keeping track of my spending this month in a bid to identify my spending habits. I suppose I need to plan ahead well enough as I want to try to dabble in stocks and shares, and to diversify my money so that I will get to learn how to manage my finances. Hope that I will doing better for my finances in the coming months!
And well, tomorrow is my dad's birthday. My dad's birthday is always 2 days before mine, so it's like we usually have a joint celebration (sometimes at my expense, sometimes at his). This year all of us are unusually busy at work, so my mother says we need to push it back a bit. I think it's been weeks since my whole family sat down for a meal (oh the last time was at the celebration for my grandfather in mid July). That doesn't sound good. I think the most anticipated event for my family is our shifting to Punggol. It seems much more possible now that we may be moving before CNY next year as the construction of my flat is nearly completed, with the interiors remaining. I hope we can move during Dec, in fact, but if we need to do some renovations to spruce up our home (and to reduce the possibility of my brother destroying the furnishings with his football), we will not rush the whole thing. Hope things will be smooth-flowing...
Oh, looking at the itinerary I guess I need to change the thing to a local event as I think there isn't any point making everyone suffer the wait with me. Since I'm working in a travel agency, I can always find the best deals later to go out. Looks like this weekend we gonna have a ktv session (and i hope a big one) and perhaps a good (and cheap) meal. I think one good venue would be Toa Payoh Central, as Sakura has a deal with Kbox (like eat finish then go sing)... Maybe we could go for that one (sing then eat or vice versa also can) so yep, registration starts now! I think I will like it to be a pre-school gathering as it will be quite difficult to get again when school begins. The girls of my year have already graduated or are doing their honours years. Many of my friends are working and studying at the same time and many of my younger friends are doing their Os this year. Woo.. looks like 2005 is a year full of important changes. Hope things will be good!!
Guess I will leave it till next week to update this page again, till then see you!! Oh yeah, if you are interested to read about Jeffirean Theories, do visit My Scribble Book where I will write chimmer stuff... hopefully I won't end up a celebrity blogger but maybe a future author of some book!? Haha.. maybe like a new book called "How to earn your first million by just blogging" or something like that!? That sounds ridiculous... haha.
Catcha soon~1
Acknowledged my existence at
3:44 PM
