i did my first race in a long long time... V and me went for the Anchorvale Endurance Challenge @ Sengkang West. The race consisted of a 300m swim and 3.5km swim. So fun - it was a quiet, no frills and decently organised event. with only an entry fee of $10, it was $10 well spent =)

 

So here's to the winners - one and two placings in the womns open category!! Congrats to us!!

 

 

And one for the photoalbum... (L)

 

 

omg omg omg...

competition this weekend!!!!!

kinda excited =)

 

sorri to say this, but nothing beats the feeling of new shoes - especially new Lunars. The plush nice bouncy running on the moon kinda feeling (not that i have ever run on the moon... ) but yeah, ran in them yesterday before i went for my swim. veli nice!!! but then again.. lunars are nice... even tho it was a short run, was a nice one. ANyway, what do we have nice shoes for if we can only use them at certain occasions!!! wth.. haha.

 

Swimming was kinda interesting yesterday.. first of all it was super crowded and i had to move out of the way A lot... wished that others cld occasionally move out of the way as well.. not always me... then also i wish that next time couples wldnt fondle each other under water.. coz actually ppl can see it, even they think no one can. But yeah.. covered 3.2km and later knocked out on the bed. my god, i cannot rem the last time i woke up and was sooooo desperate for another 10min of shut-eye this morning.. i did a 1.5km easy swim followed by 4 * 400m progressive swim. A joined me halfway =) cool. gave me that last bit of push to finish the sets coz i was REALLY getting a bit cheesed of with the crowded pool and the lovebirds.. so at the end, i did some sprints - 25m underwater followed by 25m sprint. in between one of my sprint sets this guy asked me whether i was a sprinter -

 

me - er... nooo.. haha, too slow for a sprinter

me - well, wat im doing is not really sprinting la.. im jus doing a bit anaerobic exercise.

me - I do Triathlon.

me - =) oki

 

and i think he did the 25m dive as well, but i wasnt really looking coz i was underwater.. but good for him =)

Thurs will be swimming again. wonder whether my fren there will come - do alternate lap races with me =p im up for it!!! Duan-o - next time u bet $20 can?? then u can buy me MacD later - they're open now. actually this whole new swim regime is kinda fun. I guess i didnt realise how much i missed it. =)

 

but yeah, haha.. back to my shoes... it has been the season for new things. nike Women new season kicked off in Feb, so i have gone out and got a lot of new things  im really not a big fan of pink, but for this season it seems that i am making an exception... a BIG one...

first of all these - the PINK lunars..

 

yes, and that wld be becauseeeeeeeeeeeeeee.......................

 

I have a friendly bus driver who greets all passengers at every stop in both chinese and english AND says "Thank you, See you again! =)" with a smile to every alighting passenger! How nice is that =) It sounds corny, but it really is a nice thing. Kids may laf at him for doing it, but he brightened up my MOnday and I will greet him next time i see him =) (coz i didnt this morning as i was too shocked to see someone who does that).

 

But anyway.. as i often ponder bout my Monday journery's to work, today was one of the more cheerful ones. first of all the bus driver was so friendly on the way plus i got a seat on the bus =) Thirdly, the coffee uncle knew my drink and he even added more milk to my coffee without me having to ask for it - jus the way i like it =) another nice thing was i saw my cousin C today - she hasnt been in town for a while, but nice to see her every now and then =)

 

So when u come home and see ur table cloth shredded to pieces on the floor with a happy dog next to it.. its really not that bad.. after all, its jus a stupid table cloth =) Lub you Pretty!!! =) Hey, it cld be worse like that time when i came home and saw you covered in shit and the floor and walls as well! =p

 

 

but pls dun do it again

when you see things like this, you know that life really does go by too fast....

Invitations to events that will happen 9 months in the future?? jeez mizella... i cld have a baby by the time the event ticks by...

 

 

Thir morning, CAF kindly gave me a lift halfway across the island saving me a lonely standing trip on the train from Sengkang to Boon Lay.. So after he dropped me outside his office, i took a long bus ride to Boon Lay.. i jus had to snap this as this is the kind of bus my mum always used to wait for when we used to visit singapore every yr. she wld make my sis and i wait for the half-hourly orange 602 bus (if i remember correctly..) along Farrer rd or Holland Rd. thousands of no. 7, 77 wld jus zip by and we'd jus sit there and wait... in those days u still had the option of travelling on a non-aircon bus.

 

see mother, change is inevitable... now even your fav bus has been converted =p

 

 

But yeah.. so i finally arrived in Boon Lay after this bus took me into every possbile neighborhood between Mindef and Boon Lay... I was amazed when i saw this:

 

 

and tahts only the half of it.

looks like a school yard jus outside the bus interchange.

 

but yeah.. has been an eventful day. tmw and sun i will be confined to the halls of the singapore expo.. trying to convince some poor soles to part with their money for the greater good of the my employer... but wat to doo.... we all have a job to do us here at work also need to empty our warehouse.  oh well... nothing like an hr or 2 of peace and quiet to calm the mind before i jump into two days of madness... hehe

 

Pretty was really noti tthis evening...

i slapped her pretty hard... so hard my hand hurt...

someone's gotta do it...

but i hope she stops being sooo noti, she is driving me up the walls...

arghhh...!!!

 

 

Subject: Wisdom
from Lee Wei Ling, Kuan Yew's Daughter, By Lee Wei Ling

In 2007, in an end-of-year message to the staff of the National Neuroscience Institute, I wrote: 'Whilst boom time in the public sector is never as booming as in the private sector, let us not forget that boom time is eventually followed by slump time. Slump time in the public sector is always less painful compared to the private sector. Slump time has arrived with a bang.

While I worry about the poorer Singaporeans who will be hit hard, perhaps this recession has come at an opportune time for many of us. It will give us an incentive to reconsider our priorities in life.
Decades of the good life have made us soft. The wealthy especially, but also the middle class in Singapore, have had it so good for so long, what they once considered luxuries, they now think of as necessities.

A mobile phone, for instance, is now a statement about who you are, not just a piece of equipment for communication. Hence many people buy the latest model though their existing mobile phones are still in perfect working order.

A Mercedes-Benz is no longer adequate as a status symbol. For millionaires who wish to show the world they have taste, a Ferrari or a Porsche is deemed more appropriate.

The same attitude influences the choice of attire and accessories. I still find it hard to believe that there are people carrying handbags that cost more than thrice the monthly income of a bus driver, and many more times that of the foreign worker labouring in the hot sun, risking his life to construct luxury condominiums he will never have a chance to live in. The media encourages and amplifies this ostentatious consumption. Perhaps it is good to encourage people to spend more because this will prevent the recession from getting worse. I am not an economist, but wasn't that the root cause of the current crisis - Americans spending more than they could afford to?

I am not a particularly spiritual person. I don't believe in the supernatural and I don't think I have a soul that will survive my death. But as I view the crass materialism around me, I am reminded of what my mother once told me: 'Suffering and deprivation is good for the soul.' My family is not poor, but we have been brought up to be frugal. My parents and I live in the same house that my paternal grandparents and their children moved into after World War II in 1945. It is a big house by today's standards, but it is simple - in fact, almost to the point of being shabby. Those who see it for the first time are astonished that Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew's home is so humble. But it is a comfortable house, a home we have got used to. Though it does look shabby compared to the new mansions on our street, we are not bothered by the comparison.

Most of the world and much of Singaporewill lament the economic downturn. We have been told to tighten our belts. There will undoubtedly be suffering, which we must try our best to ameliorate.
But I personally think the hard times will hold a timely lesson for many Singaporeans, especially those born after 1970 who have never lived through difficult times.

No matter how poor you are in Singapore, the authorities and social groups do try to ensure you have shelter and food. Nobody starves in Singapore. Many of those who are currently living in mansions and enjoying a luxurious lifestyle will probably still be able to do so, even if they might have to downgrade from wines costing $20,000 a bottle to $10,000 a bottle. They would hardly notice the difference.
 
Being wealthy is not a sin. It cannot be in a capitalist market economy. Enjoying the fruits of one's own labour is one's prerogative and I have no right to chastise those who choose to live luxuriously. But if one is blinded by materialism, there would be no end to wanting and hankering. After the Ferrari, what next? An Aston Martin? After the Hermes Birkin handbag, what can one upgrade to? Neither an Aston Martin nor an Hermes Birkin can make us truly happy or contented. They are like dust, a fog obscuring the true meaning of life, and can be blown away in the twinkling of an eye.

When the end approaches and we look back on our lives, will we regret the latest mobile phone or luxury car that we did not acquire? Or would we prefer to die at peace with ourselves, knowing that we have lived lives filled with love, friendship and goodwill, that we have helped some of our fellow voyagers along the way and that we have tried our best to leave this world a slightly better place than how we found it? We know which is the correct choice - and it is within our power to make that choice.

In this new year, burdened as it is with the problems of the year that has just ended, let us again try to choose wisely.  To a considerable degree, our happiness is within our own control, and we should not follow the herd blindly.

*The writer is director of the National Neuroscience Institute. * "]

 

my mother bought from this rk-fashion.com and asked me to help her make the payment which instantly sparked another online shopping craving!!! these are my latest things that caught my eye...

 

 

And of course i wld nvr shop alone... hehe, so these are the ones my sis is eyeing....

 

 

actually the yellow one is kinda cute and i wldnt mind the white one too...

 

HMMMMMMMM

 

What you think mei?

you want anymore?

lemme know

 

http://huaymian.pixnet.net/album/photo/ 

 

 

a bit late.. but better late than never.

 

well.. this CNY has certainly been a different one. For one, i was on the giving end of the Ang Pow side. but I mus say... this surely made up for the fact that i didnt really bother with Xmas this yr... my fav season of the yr btw...

Giving out the Ang Pow's to fam and frens sure did bring back the season of giving and happiness. Apparantly the more u give, the more u will get. but watever it is.. i jus pray this yr will be a better one. And also thanks to my employer for the Ang Pow that despite the economic downturn still remains the same =) I guess there is still hope in this world for good things =)

 

So, for my dear mother who i know wished she cld be here to witness the another 'first' of a child's life... here is what my Ang Pow i gave out to the family looked like -

they came in a box or shld i say.... a milk carton. Then, the individual ang pow's had a cow pattern with a little bell attached to it =)