I feel defeated...
...and it's only the 3rd day.
One day, I forsee, this stubborn streak in me is going to cause my downfall.
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11:33 AM
Saturday, August 26, 2006
My 7th course in Fall 06 semester
COOKING 101Course description:
S/U. No pre-requisites, for absolute beginners in cooking with no prior experience. Professors: Mummy (distance learning via phone) and Chef Jun Chen. Office hours: almost 24 hrs, as long as profs are at home and not sleeping. Prelims every friday evening, task is to cook dinner for 6. Graded by 5 TAs.
BLACKBOARD - My GradesPrelim 1 - Braised chicken drumsticks, steamed egg with mushroom. Pass. (graded by TA chew yx)
HAHAHAHA.
ok, so classes have started. so far so good! love seeing all my friends again in class or just ard in school. i can't stop raving about my physical chem prof and macroecons prof! then again, i can forsee myself drowning in homework sets and readings (of bibles and koran!). so in case i don;t have time to blog in the near future, bye for now. haha
btw, today i have just swapped my 5-bulb standing lamp for my housemates' accidental-purchase of a hot pink standing lamp. now my room is rightfully and officially the "PINK suite" hahaha.
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10:58 AM
Thursday, August 24, 2006
The days before school reopens
These days have been spent like this:
Arranging my entire earrings collection (last count: 30 1/2 pairs) on my new earring rack
whee~~
Assembling my new swivel chair and computer desk
Arranging my sandals and bright-colored flowers
Unpacking all my clothes and books into the closet, drawers and book shelf
Making my new room damn PINK and cozy! hahaha
Shopping for groceries, ie stuffing yingyi's SUV's boot with enough stuff to feed 6 cows
[NOTE: these groceries are NOT for the entire house of 14!! we are split into 2 groceries grps]
And walking around the whole Central campus, from building to building, trying to settle my lab course, and declaration of my 2 majors and 1 minor. By the way, I got a place in the lab course successfully, without having to go through the waiting list torment, for ONCE!! and no 8am lab for me, for ONCE!! yay!
Life before school reopens is rather good, except for my damaged nail polish and rebonded hair and dwindling bank account balance. But school is starting tomorrow. no more slack days... boooooooo...
maybe it's not a bad thing. i need to be reminded i am studying in an american school before i get too comfortably isolated in my nice new 100% singaporean house.
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10:31 AM
orientation
yeah this non-freshman here embarrassingly still needs orientation. no, not orientation to cornell campus, but to my new estate and city of Ithaca.
well, my new estate is not that hard to get used to, but Ithaca is far bigger than i've imagined to orientate myself in a short period of time. my friends who have stayed in ithaca over summer know all the roads and places so damn well, while i am like a mountain tortoise who goes to Staples, Walmart, Bed Bath & Beyond, Win Li (arguably the best Chinese groceries stores in ithaca!) for the first time, and
oh boy what a consolation Wegmans for the second time... sighz, i badly need a car to explore this city! :(
i've more or less fixed the arrangment of my furniture and decided where and how to store all my big and small things. just need to wait for my new desk and high-back swivel chair to arrive, and to buy a few plastic storage boxes to store some misc food and medicinal stuff and i will be more or less all set! oh. i still need to wash/dry clean my winter jackets/coat. more money to be spent gah.
so maybe it's a good thing i am not able to go to NYC this weekend like most others. save money for winter trip!! hehehe :D
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8:46 PM
Wednesday, August 16, 2006
welcome back to sunny ithaca
yeah, i am back in ithaca after a long and dreary 19hr flight followed by an seemingly-endless 5hr coach ride. i only realised i was back in ithaca when i saw the brightly lit Statler hotel school, followed by the engineering buildings and my first thought was "wah i am back alr!" that says a lot: it means i don't have a sense of belonging to america, but i do to cornell. haha..
it's nice to have my dear future housemates so kindly picking us and our huge luggages up at 1.30am. it's nice to have a warm and sunny day today so i could walk happily under the sun in tank top and shorts and not starting to miss singapore's weather hehe. and of course it's nice to see my dear again :)
i saw my new room and i thought it was pretty decent hee. we went to the mall today and i splurged $100 odd on the essentials for my new room! gosh, and i havent even spent 24 hr in ithaca yet!! don't even try converting tt amount to singapore dollars... i really can't resist spending on nice stuff for my room la. for once i want to own a nice room please!!
photos of the room and house later! after i decided how to arrange my furniture, after unpacking, and after clearing all the mess in the house!
tonight and whole of tmr will be
moving, moving and moving! wait, disclaimer: not just my stuff lor. we are helping each other to move everyone's stuff to the new house. that's something i particularly appreciate about the singaporean friends i have here: everyone's not stingy abt helping each other :)
in any case, it will be good exercise for me! yay~
way to go!!! haha
i wish the weather will stay this way forever... *slaps myself out of daydream*
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11:27 AM
Saturday, August 12, 2006
Pampered
It has finally come to a time when my days in Singapore are numbered. (
one and
two..)
I feel pampered like a princess: My parents have been busy feeding me all my fave food these days: abalone, black pepper crabs, curry chicken, popiah, big prawn noodle, claypot rice... My best friends have been giving in to my inflexible schedule and giving me lotsa treats these days: sundae, manicure and sushi tei dinner (THANK YOU!!).
But saying goodbye to linda just now finally jolted me awake from my
singapore dream: i am going to leave this place soon, very SOON.
no more excitement this time round. cuz i know all the shit that i am going to be in again: school work, prelims, exams, the cold, static!, laundry.........
is this how the NSFs feel when they have to book in at the end of weekends?
i think all my busyness with experiences and attachment has somewhat made me forget that it is being at home in Singapore, in the company of my family and old friends that makes me truly happy without actually realising it.
The next happiest thing tt happened this summer hols is that i have formed close bonds with a group of easy-going and like-minded colleagues-to-be and that i finally found the strong conviction to the 10-year-path that i have chosen to take.
And when singing those national day songs at the ndp preview, it suddenly struck me that I am singing out aloud exactly what i am feeling abt spore when i am away and about my future i see with PUB/Singapore, and consequently, that all these years i don't really understand what i am singing really.
the last few days in spore have been and will be packing, packing and packing. No improvement in the gross overestimate of real luggage space with respect to the amount of things i am planning to bring back, but definitely a significant change in my way of dealing this huge task. Perhaps packing luggage is one way of telling one's progress of maturity.
photos, later on. now, to the bed, cuz char kway teow awaits me tmr morning haha.
(yes, my resolution to lose weight is close to dead. will only be resuscitated in 3 yrs' time, most likely.)
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1:20 AM
