Long fruitful Saturday

It has been 3 years since i first got my class 2B license. And on friday, i managed to pass all lessons and evaluation for my dream class 2 license! I have already booked my test on the 1 August 2006, please let me pass so i don't have to waste more money! Hehe.

Then on friday night, puss and i went to visit Weijian where he was working. He's currently working for this heritage fair at Suntec City. We went there to disturb him and watch some stupid traditional Indian performance. After that we went for dinner and then watched Pirates of the Carribean 2. Well, the show was well made but the plot was a bit confusing for me, because i had forgotten part 1 completely. So please don't watch it if you haven fully understood part 1, you will catch no balls and waste your money haha.



Yesterday, Puss and i went to Sentosa for a jog then a tan. The results wasn't good, i am now a lobster face haha. Anyway it has been a long time since i relaxed on the Sentosa beach and it was nice doing it again after a long time. We settled for Palawan Beach. Where they have one point they call it the Southern most point of the Asian Continent haha.


Self Explanatory

After Sentosa, we met Sam for dinner. We had dinner at Ikoi Restaurant down at Miramar Hotel. The standard of the food wasn't as good as before yesterday and immediately after leaving the restaurant, both Sam and Puss came down with a stomach ache and rushed for the toilet. Haha for fortunately for me, there was nothing wrong, i probably have a much tougher stomach haha.

After dinner, we went to town for shopping. Sam bought some fake eye lashes while puss and i bought a cap each from Top Shop haha. Oh and it was there that i chanced into Simin, one of my CJC classmate. She looks so different from last time, i think the same can be said about me too haha.

After shopping, we went to Shangri-La's lobby lounge for a drink. I had a pot of Peach Garden tea. Didn't really like it although Sam thinks its not bad, just a little too sweet for me. Sam ordered some mocktail while Puss had his usual Darjeeling tea.


Shopping in town!




Chilling out at Shang!

After chilling out, both of them followed me for some mahjong session at Jackie's house. We reached there slightly earlier only to find Jackie not at home. So they suggested going to Changi and off we went. Somehow we ended up at Loyang's Dua Pek Kong Temple and sam went to pray a little. It was on our way back to Jackie's place that disaster striked. I met with a small accident. I guess i am quite fortunate to even put the word small before the word accident. I was turning onto PIE and somehow i just wasn't focused. I followed the car in front of me blindly and moved. But an oncoming Taxi from the opposite direction was coming straight for me. Fortunately for me, he wasn't travelling too fast. But still his bumper hit mine. I was in shock. But fortunately again for me, there was nothing wrong with his taxi, but my bumper was dented. Sob...just want to thank God everyone in the car was safe and nothing major really happened. So drivers, please be very careful on the road!!!


Me at Dua Pek Kong


My poor car

End of a 5 years journey

By now i guess most of you would have already known that sam and i are no longer together. Well...you might ask why, after all, 5 years of relationship, definitely will sayang lah, but when it happens, nothing you do can stop it. Its actually also kind of my fault that we ended up this way. I used to be a very doting bf but I had been rather lazy in our relationship in recent times and often took her for granted. When one day i finally woke up and realised how much she mean to me, she has already left my life and it was all too late. She told me that she is unable to get back the feelings as before and things between us just wasn't the same anymore. We can't possibly return back to the way they were before.

Just yesterday, we spent one fruitful day together. I had planned the day hoping to move her one last time. In the morning, i took her to pulau ubin for a cycling trip. After all, the last time we went there 2 years ago, we had a load of fun. So i suggested going there again and she agreed. Anyway they have shifted the jetty to something much newer now, but the boats and the boatmen were still the same haha. Reached the island at around 1pm and we immediately settled for the first bicycle rental store to rent our bicycles. We cycled north and ended up in this place called mamam beach. There, we found a poor stranded baby bird who has fallen down from its nest. Lying nearby were its 2 siblings...both dead. We wanted to do something to save this poor bird but there is nothing we can do, so we just brought it to somewhere safer and hope that someone else will come along and save it haha. After that we cycled west where sam wanted to go this thai temple to pray. By the time that was done, we have already spent 2 hours in pulau ubin and it was time to go.


Waiting for the ferry



Welcome to pulau ubin!


The poor baby bird with the makeshift shelter we made it


Oh there were lots of durians there!


Our bicycles!

We went to "my country club" for a bath before we headed to tampines mall because she wanted to buy her auntie sally a birthday card. Oh and we took one last lovegety card together there, the last time we took one was 4 years ago! Hehe.

After that we continued with our original plan to go kallang for dinner. Before that i presented her a bouquet of lilies, a teddy bear similar to the one she bought me from Dubai and a scrap book i spent the last 3 days compiling as part of my last burst of fire to try to salvage anything. Anyway i didn't succeed because as i said, it was all too late, she has already lost all feelings for me and has given up on me. Anyway don't worry people, i'm alright, clinging on to someone who don't love me as much anymore won't do me any good anyway hehe. Anyway we went on to eat at Jumbo Seafood Restaurant. Treated her to chilli crab, garlic chicken and sambal kang kong, wasn't all too fantastic although the crab was huge. And they kept irritating me by asking me if i wanted a change of plates hahaha.


Me with the big crab pincer!


The rest of the food!

After dinner, we decided to walk together hand in hand one last time across the kallang bridge where we will officially let each other go and carry on with our own separate lives. I'm sure we will continue to be good friends and hang out with each other. I will continue to live life and seek my own happiness and so will she! So guys don't worry about feeling awkward asking both of us out together k? Hehe.


One last hug!

After Kallang we went to orchard for a karaoke session haha. This time we tried party world ktv instead of the usual K-Box that we used to go to. Well..Party World was special in the sense that they served bubble tea and fruits haha. Other than that everything else was inferior to K-Box i guess.

That was the end of a very special day for me. Anyway Darby i want to thank you for the joy you've brought me the last 5 years. Life from now onwards without you will be very different but i will carry on with it optimistically nevertheless. Thank you for everything you've done for me all these years. Its going to be hard for me to give this all up but i have to do it or else you will have to go through future roller coaster rides again and never be happy. I will not harbour hopes of us being together anymore. May we continue to remain as very good friends and not lose contact for the rest of our lives. Do take care! Should you encounter any problems or ever need someone to talk to i will still always be there! Cheers!

The 5 years i was with Sam, i sort of drifted apart from many of my other friends especially those from church. So just now, i contacted Senior and met up with him. His name is also Nicholas Lim which is why i call him Senior and he calls me Junior. People in Christ The King calls me Junior too because there are just too many Nicholases around! Anyway we went for dinner at Chomp Chomp before heading for a bar nearbly called Happy Daze for a drink. Had a pint of Hoegardens and i must say its huge! I couldn't finish it and Senior had to help me with half of it haha. After that, Puss and Daryl Song joined us too. We went to this prata place at serangoon and chatted our night away. Its really nice meeting up with these people after such a long time. I'll try to be more active in church now that i have the time. Will seriously want to catch up with these old friends of mine!

Tekong ghost stories

I'm back from my platoon sergeant course. Ok not exactly back for good, there's one more torturous week to go. Life inside has been lonely and tiring, my life has been a mess nowadays and there's no one to talk to ever since sam left. Ok let's not talk about that.

Anyway, my bunkmate is an instructor from BMTC school and he told me a few ghost stories from tekong that i think are quite interesting so i thought of sharing them on my blog.

Story 1:
This story was told to him by a driver in tekong. One night, as the driver was driving a land rover along the reclaimed land together with one warrant officer as vehicle commander, the vehicle suddenly reduced speed from 50km/h to 10km/h. And no matter how hard he steps on the accelerator, the vehicle wouldn't pick up speed. Then the warrant officer turned around and he saw 3 persons sitting at the back of the land rover. Obviously, they are not people but the warrant didn't do anything, he just told the driver to continue driving. Suddenly as the rover approaches the bridge going back to sispec, the rover jerked forever back to 50km/h and almost caused it to ram against a tree. Spooky isn't it?

Story 2:
This second story was told to him by his recruit trainees. One day, a few of his trainees said to him: "Sergeant, i want to complain. Last night, this sergeant came into our bunk and started smoking." My friend told them not to worry about it and he will investigate. He went into their bunk the following night to check but didn't find anything. He finally realised something wasn't right when his next batch of trainees told him the same thing, only in another way. They said: "Sergeant, you don't trust us is it, so late in the night still come check on us in our bunk and still smoke in our bunk."

Story 3:
This third and last story was told to him by another of his recruit trainee. One night, in the middle of the night, a trainee's buddy suddenly waked him up from his sleep and said he was scared and needed him to accompany him to the toilet. So the trainee did so and waited outside the cubicle as his buddy went to shit. But after a long time, his buddy still didn't come out. So he knocked and knocked but there was no answer, he peeped inside the cubicle and was shocked to find that there was nobody inside. He thought that his buddy has sneaked out without him realising so he went back to bunk and true enough, his buddy was sound asleep in his bed. He woke his buddy up angrily and questioned him: "Eh why you came back from the toilet without me? You were the one that asked me to accompany you in the first place." His surprised buddy didn't expect this and answered back: "I where got ask you to accompany me to the toilet? I was asleep all these while." So guys, don't accompany your buddy to the toilet in the middle of the night, its not safe.

A fruitful week

Last Tuesday, i went to the new tiong bahru market together with my mum and sis. The place is a huge difference from the one i went to just probably over a year ago. I remember going to the old tiong bahru market with sam before, i didn't like the place one bit. It was old, dirty, smelly and the food wasn't fantastic. It also didn't help that i was quarrelling with sam on that day and some old uncle pissed me off there haha. Anyway the food at the new market is normal, we had some prawn mee, porridge, chicken wings and satays...not worth the trip if you live far away if you ask me.

It was a short work week for me last week. Work 3 days and it was Armour anniversary on Thursday. All of us had to go to Punggol Marina for some celebration. Since it was going to be a slack day the next day, i decided to go MOS together with Freddy and Bucky on Wednesday night haha. It was my first time there and indeed the place is huge and nicely done. But somehow the crowd wasn't pleasing to my eye and the music sucked haha. We left with our hands empty since we didn't have luck with girls and most of the girls there suck anyway haha.


Picture taken outside MOS while i was waiting for them

On Thursday at Punggol Marina, they had some games which we saboed some of our officers to play. There was the gladiator where i filmed my DYS3 fighting with my OC and my B2 fighting with my Ops WO. After the event, it was half day off for all of us haha.


Armour Anniversary at Punggol Marina

Then at night, Puss, Bernerd and I met for a swim at the "country club". It has been a long time since i had a good swim and it did feel refreshing. After the swim, we went for prata at Causaurina Road. It was just on Life! recently that the owner of this place became a millionaire just by selling pratas, i decided i must give it a try and boy did i have a good hell of a supper. The pratas were crispy, hot and delicious! Visit the place if you have the time! I think its going to be a new supper hang out place for me from now on haha.


Casaurina Curry!


Chocolate Prata


Milo Dinosaur


YES we finished everything

Then on Friday, I went to visit Villa Francis Home where some of us from our unit helped clean up the place and talk to the old folks there as part of Armour Anniversary. My men and i were tasked with repainting their chairs. It was a dirty job and i still have some black paint spots on my body lol. That night, i met Bernerd and Puss again. This time, we went to catch a movie. Puss wanted Just my Luck while i wanted Silent Hill or Scary Movie 4. Bernerd didn't want to make a decision and we had to play sissors paper stone. I won and we watched Silent Hill. What a huge mistake it turned out to be. The show was super duper crappy, even worse than Slither. The storyline was crap and everything just didn't make sense. Please don't even think of buying the VCD from malaysia haha.



Recently i decided i want to take a part-time degree while working in the army. Yesterday morning, Puss and i went to SIM to enquire about the different degrees they offer. I'm more or less choosing either some infomatics course at Uni Sim or a business course partnership degree under UOL. After leaving SIM, we went for lunch at Bukit Timah Plaza. Yes its an ulu place and i must say they really look like they are at least 10 years behind times. After lunch, we wanted to visit the new Ford Factory Museum but it was closed by the time we got there, we will visit the place the next time i go down to SIM. Since we were nearby, Puss suggested we visit the new Catholic Church at Bukit Batok. And dear me, the place is super modern and nice. Just look at the pictures i took and you'll understand haha.


The courtyard of the church


The entrance to the place where mass is held


The inside of the church, they use BOSE speakers!


Another picture of the inside

After leaving the church, we went to watch another movie. This time Just my luck Puss had wanted to watch haha. Ok although not a fantastic show, it still turned out to be a show ten times better than Silent Hill haha.



Just this afternoon, Shawn and me attended Sham's sister's wedding. It was the first malay wedding i've attended and it sure was an eye opener. Congrats to her! Although i don't know her hahaha.


Shawn and Sham


The arrival of brother-in-law Sham


A final photo before we left

I will be away for my PS course for the whole of next week. So there will not be any post till probably 2 weeks later! Cheers!

Cars

Was in clubbing mood yesterday but everyone i messaged wasn't keen except for sham haha. Where is everyone's energy nowadays?

In the end i went to play snooker with bernerd before going on to watch Cars. The show was alright, the threater was filled with kids though. They were noisy, laughing and making funny noises throughout the show.



After the show, we went to jackie's place for mahjong and some world cup. Argentina is the team to watch this world cup, i needn't explain why, just watch their match last night.

Bus Stop

Haha ok you guessed it, you expected it, i failed my Ranger selection test miserably today. I passed all stations except for 3 out of 4 hahahaha. Dammit, now i know where i stand in terms of fitness. Not even close haha. Will be taking my ippt tomorrow, hope my confidence come back in time haha.

Had a nice dinner with sam, puss and mingli yesterday at Paragon's Sushi Tei. They have really special dishes there, go check it out. After dinner, we went shopping for awhile before mingli brought us to this new chill out place just off somerset. Its near the new high class condo the Ritz's showroom.

The place is call Bar Stop, yes i heard it as Bus top at first when mingli first said it. Its a nice place with a nice cosy ambience. We were greeted with a nice red ferrari just beside the place when we first arrived. It just goes to show what kind of people patronise the place. No the things are not that expensive there, although its not cheap also lah. One cup of coke cost $6.50! Hahaha. I had camomile tea for the same price too. I have a few photos to give you an impression of what the place is like. Enjoy!


Me and Sam


Me, Sam and Pussy


Me and Pussy


Mingli and Sam


Whats left of our mudpie by the time i want to take a pic of it

Nong Day

I haven had a long and fulfilling day for a long time now, but it was one such day yesterday. I had to wake up early in the morning, 8am to be precise, for my dental x-ray appointment in MMI, somewhere near NUH. This x-ray is for my ranger course. Security is really tight at MMI, i had to surrender my camera phone at the reception and there are no buttons for you to press in the lift itself, i had to decide the floor i want to go to at the lift lobby by pressing the button pads they have outside.

The x-ray was fast, i was out of there in 5 mins. As i was leaving, it started to pour really heavily. I got drenched running to my car which was parked in an open air carpark. It was already 10.30am then and i had a lunch appointment with my OC, CSM, PC and some others at taka's seoul gardens at 12.30pm. I decided not to go home and went straight to orchard instead. Huge mistake it turned out to be. Parking at orchard at that period can kill.

Anyway i drove around and decided to park at lucky plaza. I then walked around and even had a foot reflexology there haha. By time it was done, it was almost time for my lunch appointment. Just like most of my friends, they were all late and lunch didn't start until around 1pm haha. It has been ages since i ate at seoul gardens now, but nothing has changed, in fact there seem to be lesser food. There were even small cockroaches running around a few times near our table, gross right?

We walked around orchard after lunch and ended up in orchard cineleisure. We played pool for awhile there before they had to go off for their own appointments. It was around 5pm then and it was time for me to go for my next appointment, dinner with my poly classmates. Anyway the parking fee clocked when i finally left lucky plaza is the most shocking parking fee i've ever paid thus far, a cool $19.80! I can take a taxi there and home and probably still have change!


Joel pondering over his shot at pool

I had still some time before my dinner appointment so i went to the esplanade library, a personal favourite library of mine, to sit down, relax and read some papers hehe.



The time turned 7pm and it was time for me to go meet my classmates. As usual, some of them wasn't punctual and dinner didn't happen until 7.45pm. We ate at Mar-ches (Hey i just realised this is the same spelling as Marches). Just like Seoul Garden, nothing changed, same idea, same food, same ambience, my opinion of the place stays the same, not fantastic.


The guys


The girls

After dinner, we went to brewerks at clarke quay with the intention to chill out and also catch some football! What a night it turned out to be, i got all of them to bet together with me that night and our hearts were thumping all the way from the first minute to the last. Although we lost in the end, we had hell a lot of fun haha. Anyway if you people like to drink beer, brewerks is the place to go! They have this special tower that they put their beer in, here's a picture of it!


Meiwen with the tower

After breworks, some of them left while some of us decided we wanted to continue partying and catch more football. We decided to go Club Momo, what a wrong decision it turned out to be. Meiwen, Meiting and Jack entered before us. But both Shawn and Sham were turned away at the entrance because the minimum age limit is 23. And the last time we came, the age limit is 21, how fickle can they get! Its not a problem with the law here, how inflexible can they get? Anyway i don't see what living a few more months in life can do to you, how much more mature can one get?! Dumb ass people that don't even want to earn some money when we came knocking on their door. Because Meiwen, Meiting and Jack already paid, we had to separate. So off we went.

It wasn't the end of my day after that though. We continued our football fever at the MacDonalds in East Coast Park. Bad idea, it turned out to be a super boring match and i was literally dozing off throughout the match. Anyway we betted and lost again, what a bad losing start to this World Cup. Better luck today i hope!

Celebrities and Lifts

Yesterday, I watched one of the worst movie ever produced. Its Slither. Do not even think of watching it. The plot is ridiculous, the graphics lousy, and the whole cast unknown. And Puss can still try to console himself by saying its hilarious...anyway its his recommendations..never believe what he says haha. I have no wish to elaborate on the storyline...its not worth it haha.



Before the movie, wayniest, puss and i went jogging at east coast park again. We jogged 5.6km...if we continue doing this every week, we will be of match to any gurkhas now haha. Just kidding..no way can we outrun those monsters who run practically everyday.

After the jog, we had a relaxing time in "our" country club before heading off to katong for a nice meal of chicken rice. We ate at 5 star chicken rice store, not sure if you people heard of it, but the chicken rice is decent enough, try it if you have the chance.

Oh and guess who we saw in the elevator before our movie at Balestier? There standing beside me was Yvonne Lim. Haha no do not be mistaken, not my sister, she's the mediacorp actress. She was with her boyfriend, and i must mention that she's really small size, somewhere around my height but much skinner haha. I think that the elevator can easily take in 30 of her at one go and the overload alarm won't go off haha!

Oh guess again who i saw at my own lift lobby just now? My very own MP Mr Indejit Singh. Like any other big shot, he arrived in a nice Mercedes E class accompanied by his chauffeur and several other sidekicks. I was expecting them to be ultra polite and friendly around the residents busy greeting everyone but no, instead they were busy talking among one another. While one of his assistant was held on to the lift button awaiting for his chauffeur to join them after parking his car, i walked past them and into the lift they were holding. As their chauffeur was still nowhere in side, they had no choice but to let me go up first hahaha. A sigh of relief, i won't want to entertain them in the lift. What if they ask me who i voted for last month? Haha...its supposed to be a secret you know haha.

I'll be going for mass again later with puss before going to the PC show in Expo..will update on whether its worth making the trip there!

A new phone a new bunk

For those of you that still don't know..i bought a new phone around a month back! Haha its the Sony Ericsson w800i...although not a new model..i fell in love with its orange sporty looks. I even went to get it decorated with the G-Mask...now it looks funky! Suits me through and through wahaha.



And the photos that i have in my last 3 posts are actually taken using the phone..quite clear right..its amazing how technology moved. Back in those days..a phone with a vga camera is already amazing enough..now its up to 3.2mp!

Oh i shifted to a new bunk today. I get to sleep alone now! At least till someone else comes in and share it with me haha. You won't believe how dirty it was when i took over...spider webs..thick layers of dust...trash..anything u can imagine! I decide to spend the next 2 hours of my time cleaning it and here is what it turned out to be! A nice clean bunk for me to sleep in!


Pic 1


Pic 2


I have a nice balcony!


And a nice view!

Dinner at Gordon Grill Restaurant

I just came back from dinner together with my mum and sis. We had planned to go Crystal Jade Kitchen restaurant at Scotts, so i took CTE to town..but my sister told me i could avoid the ERP charges if i turned towards Newton after exiting from Cairnhills. So i did and we drove past Goodwood Park Hotel. Thats when it all started. My sister had heard about Goodwood Park Hotel serving good Kobe Beef Steak, so we decided to change our plans and eat at Goodwood Park Hotel instead.

We didn't manage to find any restaurant serving Kobe Beef so we enquired from the hotel receptionist. She directed us to Gordon Grill Restaurant. It was a posh restaurant, fine dining...i was lucky there wasn't any dress code as i was dressed rather casually in bermudas and t-shirt. When we looked in the menu, we couldn't find any Kobe Beef..instead they served Wagyu beef. We were told the origination was the same..Wagyu is from Australia but originated from Japan..only that the Kobe beef was of higher grade.

My mum ordered the set meal which came with 4 appetisers, one main course and dessert. Cost: $108. The appetisers were good, there was smoked salmon, frog legs, escargots and some sort of crab roll. My sis ordered the Rib-Eye steak while i ordered the tenderloin steak..each 10grams cost $2.80. They sliced it and weigh in front of us on their trolley of theirs..hers weight 280grams while mine was 310grams. The price turned out to be mind-boggling for us. I do not know how they actually calculated but hers cost $129 while mine cost $139...it turned out to be the most expensive steak i've ever eaten haha..it was nice...but not the best i guess.

And i realised that this restaurant had a practice, they will always serve the ladies first. No matter what they do, clear plates, refill ice water, take down order or serve our food...i'll always be the last one to get it. The waiter started by clearing my sister's plate...and he walked one big round around the table just to clear my mum's plate first before he tend to me haha. I'm not sure if its the same for all fine dining restaurants, I'm not complaining..just an interesting observation of mine.

Anyway people if you ever feel rich and hungry, do give this nice restaurant a visit. The service is excellent, the food good and the ambience posh. The bill turned out to be over $400! Poor sis picked up the tab because she just got her 1st pay check. Anyway its her fault in the first place that we ended up there haha...if she didn't want me to avoid the ERP, i wouldn't have drove past Goodwood Park and she wouldn't have remembered that they serve good Kobe steak..and we'll probably have filled our stomaches with Crystal Jade Kitchen's food instead..at a cost of only $50-$70? Haha


(My mum and sister enjoying their meal)


(My mum with her funny dessert..5 types of cheese..just not our cup of tea)


(I'm sorry i forgot to take a picture when the food arrived..this is all that is left haha)

Train train train!

I was supposed to go jog with cheap bird at east coast park and then go play lan yesterday. But i decided to abandon the jog because i had a late dinner and my muscles were still aching from the tough physical week i had in camp last week.

Monday: ARR training
Tuesday: AHM training
Wednesday: ARR training
Thursday: IPPT + Night jog at East coast
Friday: ARR training

Haha for all you that still don't know why i'm training so hard...i failed my damn ippt on thursday! OK don't laugh! I failed my SBJ..the damn PTI kept faulting me! And guess what, i've signed up for the army ranger course, and i'll be going for a selection test next month. I doubt i can make it but i just want to see how it is like and can probably better prepare myself the next time i want to try out for it. Oh for all of you that don't know..this course is a 65 days course..and i think i have only 1 day of rest and relax between these long days. But i'm ready for it..i want to test my mind and body this time..i want to know if i'm actually cut out for this commando training...if i do make it i hope to convert to red beret..although it'll take another 10 months of training..i'll gladly do it knowing its what i wanted anyway.

Oh for all of you that didn't understand the abbreviations i used, let me explain here.

1: ARR - Armour Road Relay (Teams are formed to run in this competitive road relay..thats why we're training..coz we want to win? Anyway the training is quite xiong, run 2.4km under 11.30, the do short sprints of 400m up slope. Then sets of static stations)

2. AHM - Army Half Marathon (This run happens once every year and the whole army will come together to run. I ran 12km last year but will be running 21km this time..i don't know how i am going to take it haha. Before we go for the actual thing, we do progressive training runing various distance of 3km - 18km.)

3. IPPT - Individual Physical Proficiency Test (I think some of you still know it as the NAFA test..haha its the same lah)

4. SBJ - Stand Broad Jump (A station in the ippt test, i'm sure most of you know this)

5. PTI - Physical Training Instructor (A vocation in the army..they are like our PE teacher)

Anyway i just woke up not long ago because i play mahjong the whole night with jackie, daniel and bucky. And guess what..they cleared my whole drawers of chips! Lost $29 last night..what super bad luck...have been losing at jackie's place consecutively for 2 straight months now. I vow to return!