Tsunami

Gosh.

26th December 2004. The Indian Ocean Tsunami killed an unprecedented 220000 people and till this day, some are still homeless.

26th December 2008. A weird-ass Tsunami has striked my tummy and is still in its wake of destruction now. 

Xmas was pretty coool until the pre-shocks started to rock my tummy. Felt pretty cold over the few days but BAM, on Xmas day I was down with a freakin fever at 38.5 but miraculously had no more fever the next morning. And then came the freakin tsunami in my tummy. Basket.

First time in loooooooong while that i'm down with some bloody sickness for close to a week. No idea what the heck this is but it's totally draining. Gastric flu? Stomach flu? Or even dengue? Feel pretty weak at times, can't train properly. It's that kinda of stomach-aches where defecating won't solve the problem. Tsunami. Aih. I didn even touch any weird foods, or even alcohol. Baah.

OH OH, just some updates from the real Tsunami. Singaporeans donated a sum total of S$57 million to victims of the catastrophe and many aid programmes have successfully sheltered the victims with new houses. But still many are homeless and living in the camps. Oh boy, one disaster could actually have so much repercussions in the following years. Tsunami warning systems are not exactly functional yet and hence, more spending on the relief fund was pledged to preventive measures rather than relief and response measures.

Mmmmm, reminds me of 4 years ago, on boxing day. Was really taken aback by the photos splashed over the headlines and the casualty count that increased by thousands everyday...

My heart still goes out to those who lost their loved ones .. aih

Oh yes and the following day, I started planning for the donation drive in sec sch. So of the the 57 million dollars, $3312.82 was actually from my donation drive. Haha

And back to my current Tsunami..

thanks to which, training was pretty sucky yea. Couldn push much at all. It became that i was pushing the sickness barriers, not the physical ones. Oh my oh my. Marathon's next Sunday. Whoosh.

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Xmas Eve!:

Met Kengkiat, heeyeong, sly and zhua. 

KK looks pretty fine when shaven yea, and he's got into the MOST HIONG COMPANY -  COUGARS in his BMTC. Man, haha his NS stories from his first 2 weeks were pretty cool. I guess the funniest was his malay OC (Officer-In-Command) for the BMTC (Basic Military Training Centre) 

This OC told them that when they go to the toilets, they should try to go in pairs, and quoted "do not do any funny businesses" in the toilet. 

But, there were some people from China who couldn understand english. (Yea they come to sg to get PR)

So, the malay OC who could speak some chinese said:

"同志!!!同志!!!

去 ce4 suo3 不可以打飞机!

Hahahah

We watched "The Day the Earth stood still" then went to hang out in the Irish Pub till 2. Yea

Xmas Day!:

Dinner at my Uncle's place was pretty fine but I felt kinda bad showing up with a stoney face thanks to the fever. Ate, talked to my cousins, be merry, sang carols, exchanged gifts (:

My cousins, ranging from 12 to 33 years old, went out for a midnight movie but i was too feverish to watch the TV, let alone watch a movie. Anw they watched IP MAN, which i watched earlier on. Heh pretty funny show, nice moves, and the translator was quite funny. Haha

29th Dec: Canoe Gathering @ My place!

Gathering was pretty nice, I hope. Hahaa, spent the morning cooking freakin' chicken stew. OH i told the juniors, "While you all were pumping iron, i was chopping onion" Hahaa.

Met nelson and qianwen at clementi to shop for stuffs and back to my house.

Gosh, because there were last-minute add-ons i had to cook freakin' pasta again.  0_0

Cut cut cut chop chop chop the whole day.

People came and yea things looked fine. We played Cherades! Hahah super funny. And gift exchange too. Post up the pictures when i get it.

Tomorrow's the last day of 2008! My dad's birthday. And countdown. Faddy Waddy's having a countdown at a unit he booked at Pan Pac. Oh gosh that's so damn cool. We'd have a great view of the fireworks. 

(Sorry to the canoe guys yea, maybe ill find you all aft everything ends.)

Class outing this Saturday!

Mmmm i've been wanting to post about teaching. My first day of work starts this Friday! HOW COOL. Hurhur. 

Alright, till then,

Enjoy the last bits of 2008!

Last 8 of 2008

Hello everybody. I'm still alive. Hurhur.

Just came back from a supeerrrrrrrrrr long day. My brain's only semi-working now. Hmm yea details below.

And, cool,  the past week was more canoeing, catching up, reading and more.

Hmm, ok guess the discipline to canoe daily kinda paid off. Able to draft with coach easily now. Canoe marathon's in freakin 19 days.

Naysayers would probably go: "OH YOU NO LIFER", but hey, I decided this was all part of being extraordinary, unlike a severely bored person wasting life away on the computer or TV at home, or working aimlessly at work for the money.

And if you think extraordinary just meant being fit and spending hours under the sun, think deeper, or ask me (:

OH about work, i kinda settled the relief-teaching stuffs. 

Be back at sec sch to teach Bio and Chem, got classes from secondary 2 to 4. Whoosh, looking forward to it,

XMAS is coming in 3 days

As each year passes, there's less and less things to buy. Dont need much things at all. Shopping isn't really meaningful anymore. It's gonna be 2 years in NS anw. Heh was talking to ceyong saying, at 18 years old, we're kinda too old for the teenage stuff, and also too young for the adult stuff. 

Gifts for people would never fall out though. Can't possibly visit someone or someplace empty-handed isn it. Gifts are genuinely from the heart (:   [from me, at least]

OH 2 people's birthdays are coming soon, 26th and 30th december. uh oh

OH yes, and my dad's birthday gift too, he's a 31st December baby btw. Haha.

$_$

Mmmmm hmmm. They say, "Treat yourself with your head, treat others with your heart."

Towards a particular someone, guess I've been having a Heart and Head conflict, 

My different purposes, my different intentions, my different faces and my awkward image. Bleah. 

(And because this blog is like that, i wont express this in any other way.

You see, this is in itself part of the heart and head conflict, the heart wants to say something but the head makes it so weird. Completely wth.)

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WHACK.

Monday:

OK, i never knew i was even gonna do this but now it seems pretty cool. Swam and run in the morning, almost a biathlon distance. Cooked pasta for lunch, which I eventually brought to the chalet (like mentioned above, cant go anywhr empty handed =x). Went to sec sch for relief teaching stuffs. And to J1's chalet for night cycling! (Thank you J1s for having us at the chalet :D )

Tuesday:

An hour's of sleep, breakfast, and off to bedok for paddling with coach.

Like a diver-style hell week thing, with tons of fun though (:

NIGHT  CYCLING!

Really fun to cycle in such a LARGE group! 14 bicycles -> 13 B1s and 1 B2 (b1 - single; b2-double). Hahah we were practically jamming up every traffic junction when we crossed roads.

Renting the bikes were quite a hassle and thanks Aaron and hilary for helping with the booking and stuff. Appreciate it much man.

The Route:

50km on Mountain bikes. Man, very respectable for those who don't really cycle. 

Some of em thought of making a finisher shirt?! NAH. Nothing was really intended in the first place wasn it. Hahah

The route was just impromptu-ed along the whole way by Daryl and I anyway, oh and of cos my trusty phone maps. Thanks to us, most people's butts and thighs are somehow strained now. Ooops. Haha. We had a great time anw didn we (:

START!:

The Chalet - Costa Sands Pasir Ris. 

{The block of houses which are surrounding a pool)

Right out from the chalet, on the Phosphorus Cyanide. PCN, i mean, park connector. 

(Ceyong's Joke). Hurhur

A little clip of everyone (:

All the way down to...

Tampines MRT! Ok you can see we turned in here to go the Cheers at the MRT station to get drinks. 

Further down the MRT track, reached the Holy Trinity church, right turn and all the way down to...

Bedok Reservoir! We went to Jernan's house area. Tried calling her to come down but guess she was asleep alrd. So, we went on to....

To our shed! It was too dark and hence, we took a pic at the toilet, haha:

Johnny's arm looks... eee. 

FAST-FORWARD. OK so from here we took the PCN that brings us to ECP:

Passing by Kembangan MRT. Oh yes the PCN route actually cuts into the pavement for MRT commuters. Weird. Hilary's bike started to get cranky, screwed up chain, but lucky it could be fixed.

All the way down Jalan Eunos, cross the underpass and here we are at East Coast Macs. Stomachs started to growl a little. Aaron wanted stuff like hokkien mee. Haha. This security guard told us that the Bedok Jetty Food Centre will actually be open till late, and when we went there...

IT WAS FREAKIN CLOSED. GOSH. And we lost Daryl here. He 'dissappeared' into the food centre. And found him waiting outside the toilet later cos he thought the B2, which louis and gideon was on, sped up ahead of him. 

Occasionally, the B2 partners were switched. Here, Lohboon went on a single while Gideon helped qianwen out by taking the double tgt. Much less taxing on the legs. After which, we went back to Macs area again.. yawn.

There was 7 eleven here. 

Bought some food and drinks and hung around the kid's rides area when there was actually proper seats for us. Maybe cos it was the brightest area. Jack switched off the electrical supply to some of the kid's rides and those "put-in-1-dollar-to-use-a-pincer-to-try-to-get-a-cute-toy-but-get-conned" machines, cos they were making hell a lot of noise. Hahaa.

Daryl fell when he was dismounting his bike, tripped on the pedal and went over.

And someone's bicycle wheel hit Biao's toe and he shouted damn freaking loud that we thought it was his knee or something again. Haha scary shit, crazy biao.

Qianwen and Nelson were all half-dead and want to take a cab back to the chalet alrd. Haha. We were only halfway through. Oops. Hahaha

B2 was now ceyong and qianwen.

After about a 20 minutes of break. And back on track again, towards Changi. As you can see, we travelled the same route 3 freakin times  =x 

OK, right here, ceyong let gideon get back on the B2 and suddenly Ceyong dissappeared. Literally. Turned back to find him only to know that his whole right leg cramped up. Man, kinda bad. So we had to go slow for a while. He was trying to use more body to cycle, and resulted in his head shaking on every step of the pedal, just like how he paddles. Hahahaa, funny as hell.

Everyone was waiting up ahead at this bridge for the rest to catch up. This is just pass the Sailing and Windsurfing club. Leon and Johnny were gassing out too.

Passed by the National Service Resort Country Club. And through the horrible MOE campsite. Leon's leg was bust here. Says it was damn sore. Just this moment, someone made the Jing-Ma-Jiang tune, only to realise his soreness was not a joke. Haha.

And on the B2 leon went with Ceyong.

From the pic you can see we're heading up Changi Coast Road, which is the road that surrounds the airport. Freaking long road with a dark path. It's the route for the Team Category in Adidas Sundown Marathon anw. Aaron lost control a little I almost slammed into him. Damaged the brakes of his bike. Lucky Jack our repairmen knew how to fix it. heh

Turned into Changi Beach Park. The most retarded park ever without any lights. Complete pitch dark. Just lasted for awhile only tho.

This is the SAF Ferry Terminal! Where most of us are gonna have to go to. Brings em to Tekong for BMT. OH Jonny is already done and over with it. Heh. 

Further up to the end of the park...

We are at Water Venture Changi. Where all the 1-star course takes place. Hur

CHANGI VILLAGE! Finally. But the food stalls were close. It was about 5am already anw. Luckily there was a 24-hour coffee shop there. Had drinks and pau.

AND GUESS WHAT? A pair of transvestites actually confronted Nelson cos he was the most approachable, pushing his bike while we were all cycling. He immediately called Johnny damn loudly. And for some reason, Johnny suddenly had a godlike burst of energy and cycled away super fast, with this hilariously flabbergasted expression. Hahahha

They had very manly voice. Heh

Down Loyang avenue all the way and back to downtown east (:

Slept an hour. Breakfast, then left the place. 

Bike shop only opened at 10am!

Freakin wasted 1.5 hours waiting for it to open while the rest already checked out and left for 

home.

Was supposed to be down at Bedok at 930 to row with coach. LATE.

But luckily he was just getting ready to paddle when i reached at 11 odd. 

Dunno how and why, he knew that we went night cycling the night before and actually didn mind joining us but had a meeting so he cldn come. Rowed about 16,17km. 

What a day. Whooosh. 

Merry Christmas everyone!

Local sightseeing!

Thursday:

Just came back from perth yesterday and went out for dinner right after unloading the luggage. Perth was great, will blog about it soon (:

Canoeing dinner and Pre U Sem dinner clashed, so i went for Pre U Sem one instead. Hmmm

Saw SG14 again, all the nice people, and damn they are flying-high. Dion's actually got a PSC scholarship for a PhD in health sciences and what's more, there's only 2 PSC awardees for poly students, she's one of em. Imba.   0_0  

Everyone's doing pretty fine, and they're betting whether i'd utter vulgarities after entering NS. Haha interesting.

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Friday:

Cycling Expedition!

Pic shows a rough area of the route cycled. Whopping 90km.

1) Upp Bt Timah  ---> West Coast Park

Cycled from home, met mat at pine grove, went on to West Coast park. Shengkai was there having a little picnic with louiza. hurhur how sweet. 

2) West Coast park ---> Seah Im Market

Ok Seah Im Market's actually the hawker centre at Harbourfront bus terminal, just that no one knows it's called Seah Im. Had fruits there. But since we're around the area, we decided to go to  HortPark

3) To HortPark, Mount Faber then back to Harbourfront

Crap. Wanted to go to HortPark but apparently we were too amazed by the bridge and walked on it, ended up in Mount Faber.

Really beautiful bridges at HortPark. Back to Harbourfront

4) Harbourfront to Sentosa Cove!

Sentosa cove is b-e-a-utiful! But of course you only get to stay there if you're multi-millionaire. 

Got to go in cos Matin's dad actually designs one of the Condos there. Sweet.

The community club has like yachts and jet skis and all. That club's called One^o 15

Shelves of Jet skis and boats parked along side.   0_0

Houses are zen-like, HUGE, mostly angmoh-owned and very beautiful

And there are houses on islands within the place itself, like this:

Oh gosh. Imagine being able to take out your K1 from your own shed anytime you want and paddling it without any winds or choppy water. Woooo

5) Sentosa cove ---> Siloso, Palawan, Tanjong beaches

Nothing special at these beaches. Siloso just closed for ZoukOut tomorrow though.

Palawan Beach. Had to take a photo cos it'd look so out-of-place. HAHA

6) Sentosa ---> Seah Im 

Lunch

7) Harbourfront ---> Singapore Flyer

Ok we wanted to go esplanade park but missed it anw, Then went up further to the flyer area to see if the car exhibition was still on and obviously it isn't anymore. Haha (last saw it on Sunday during the marathon)

Ahh there it is. Hmm memorable place. The last 2km+ of the marathon where ankles and knees were really whacked. Heh, and just on the left side is Marina Reservoir actually, where Canoe Marathon was and will be held. (Crap, it's in like 3 weeks and i've not trained yet)

FYI, this stretch of road was actually made for the F1 race. So in a way, we were running and cycling on the best tar road in Singapore. There were some lane marks left behind too, coolness.

8) Singapore flyer ---> Marina Barrage

Took some navigation to get there. Quite far in and not convenient for commuters to go to unless by car. But the ride in was absolutely worth it cos Marina Barrage is exhiiiiiiilarating!

Let the pictures speak for themselves.

When you just first enter. This building's the visitor centre. Nice architecture. Has similar themes to esplanade and all. A very singaporean kind of design. Heh

And on the barrage! See those little viewing points on this barrage, I tell you they are magnificent cos you'd get a beautiful skyline of the whole city, and moreover you can use the bench made of marble for a little picnic table (:

This is the skyline (: (it was super cloudy and going to rain)

In the visitor's centre, you can go up to the rooftop to to the Green Roof. There's this slope up to the roof. Reminds me of the one at NTU, just that his one has field grass unlike the carpet grass hill at NTU.

On the way up the slope. The visitor centre or rather the Pump House.

When you reach the top! Wooh. That's called the Green Roof. Pretty great place to fly a kite or just chill out, picnic.

A fountain when you look down.

Further up, a solar park, the biggest one in singapore, though it looked really small, with not many panels. Btw, each solar panel has only one wire to connect it to a generator. Nice.

Solar panels

Had to put the phone on the dustbin to take this, could have got the skyline in the backdrop.

Oh, all the photos were taken with my trusty phone. The pics posted have been resized tho. My phone's maps helped with navigation too. Pretty great.

3 more weeks to the end of the year, hmmmmm. Anything that still needs to be accomplished?

Ponder, ponder..

Post on Perth coming soon!

42.195 (:

Full Marathon, 42.195km:

5 hours 23 minutes.

Sweet. 

Must say i'm pretty lucky for a first timer. Must really thank JACK for his great pacing and also his accompanion. Imba Jack, he only trained  ONCE, for 15km and he ran like the wind.

Whoosh it was really a wonderful run, very upbeat and enjoyable. I'm sure i'll be back next year but with more training prior to it. HAHA. Knees and ankles are a total whack now and i'm wondering how i'm going to survive walking around in Perth. Hmmm

OK so the great race started at Esplanade. Bloody heck it was messy. Had to walk like 3 or 4km in from where mom dropped me off. And it was damn confusing where to go to deposit bags and not. Jack waited for me cos i had his tag. Quick warm-up and Jack needed the toilet but the queue was longer than hello kitty queues, so he skipped it and we went on

Started 15 minutes late woohoo. 

The race plan was 15k run, 5k walk, 15k run, 5k walk, 2k max out. But on the 2nd set of 15km, totally whacked out. Our joints couldn't take it. So in the end it was: 15k run, 5k walk, 12k run, 4k walk, 6k run.

Ran ran ran, at the start, we saw the Women's Everest Team running with a small backpack. And also this women who was dragging 2 tyres behind her. She had a backpack and was using climbing sticks. Impressive, impressive.

Ran ran ran, stopped at the toilets. Jack picked up a pair of sunglasses here. HAHA basket. So much for running the race free already. (Running for my brother)

>>

Jack: "When i come out of the toilet, if no one takes it yet, it's mine"

*Finishes his business*

Eugene: *Says loudly* "Cmon cmon, take your things let's go"

>>

Haha, how innocent.

OH and before that, we saw the super natl team girl from RJ Canoeing, the girl with 12 pull ups.

Ran ran ran, and saw our group of girls. Qianwen, Weeling, Clarisse, Jernan and HUIQIN. Hmm they were doing pretty well. Please fast forward to the end of the race if you only wanna know about hq's story. Hurhur...

Ran ran ran, saw 2 ACJC canoeing, some C rower guy and another one.

Ran ran ran, saw Risheng and we slapped him damn hard on the back. Haha

Less than 1km from which, we lost him in the pack. But he caught up at the toilet again. at 18km mark. Never seen him for the rest of the race again. His race plan was 5k run, 1k walk, 5k run, 1k walk, all the way. Man, this race plan's kinda difficult, cos in any case, for noobs, it's best to stop less to walk. Takes a lot to start running again. Heart beat and joints will feel weird.

Ran ran ran, saw Melvin Sim Hong Yi at the 15km mark, oh dearest brother from the NP days, the one who only got a muscle tear upon getting hit by a taxi and flying four lanes across Sims avenue. God-like. Oh, and he's PJ Canoeing's Vice-captain too. 

Melvin's on the right. And pls ignore Matin's face. HAHA

Ran ran ran, we saw this man who was running blindfolded, he was tied to his girlfriend and they were running tgt. Wow, respect man.

Ran ran ran, at east coast park, we overtook this old man who was running bare-foot the whole way! OH my goodness. Impressive.

Ran ran ran, at 20km, before the start of our 2nd 15k run:

>>

Eugene: "Jack ah, the real thing's just about to begin man, the 2nd half determines everything"

Jack: "Yea the real pain sets in"

>>

At 20+km to 30+km, the pain sure came in, at this moment, we really learnt how to appreciate DEEP HEAT RUB. Really helps a lot a lot. Can't find any use for it in canoeing tho.

Ran ran ran, 23km. GU POWER GEL STATION! Haha ok so we gladly ran past and grabbed the gel. But suddenly, Jack had 5 gels in his hand. ZOMG. Hero. Hahah, from then on, we shared a packet of gel every 3km. Hmm must be the reason why i can't sleep now, super caffeinated body.

GU power gel's actually not bad. But it's a definite must to drink it with water. It's much thicker than Power Gel. And the chocolate flavour really tastes like choc fudge, unlike power gel's choc flavour, taste like gooey crap.

Ran ran ran, saw more canoeing people. SRJC, Meridian, Hwachong. And this NJ Alumni girl just burnt us like free. Hurhur

Ran ran ran, at 30+, there was a deep heat station and we went "YAY" damn loud. The person kinda gave us a weird look.

>>

Eugene: "Jialat. This strain is going to be massive. You know what, the race doesn end when we cross the finish line, it only ends when our muscle and joints completely heal"

Jack: "Haha yea man"

>>

Ran ran ran, at 33km, there was a COOL ZONE, where they spray cold mist as you walk past. Completely useless.

OH along the way, there was lotsa RUNSPIRATORS too. Particularly, one angmoh man holding a bell. He was really great man, kept shouting everyone on. 

First he appeared at the east coast wakeboarding area, ringing his ice-cream man bell and shouting every one on. At that moment i told Jack, "Haha this angmoh, i bet when the sun comes out he'll take out his beer and celebrate"

Second-time on the return route at east coast. This was damn funny. He was shouting at everyone "THIS IS A NO-WALKING ZONE, YOU RUN!" Hahah. (fyi, many people were walking along the whole way, just that more people walked as we reached the end point)

Then he appeared again at the Singapore Flyer area. 

The last 4km was the most gruelling 4km ever. Freaking painful on the joints. 

AND THE LAST 200m.

We had our last burst. Shouted Jack's motto damn loudly "SA CANOE AI ZAI!"

Haha this group of guys replied "Kao Bei la"

But who gives a shit about them we burnt them like crazy.

And crossing the finishing line was exhilarating man. Great feeling. 5h23mins.

>>

Eugene: "I'm not gonna run till next year. We've done enough for these 2 years."

Jack: "OF COURSE MAN, more than enough"

>>

Heh, next year, we'll strive for a sub-5 hour timing. Interesstingg

Interesting part!:

OK so we collected our medals and finisher tee. And guess what? WE SAW HUIQIN. Holy cow. She said she came in like 5h20mins. EARLIER THAN US?! 

And she said all the other canoeing girls came back already.

OH CMON, don't shit me. I didn believe it. She said the other canoeing girls were back, to kinda borrow my trust for them, i'm sure, i'm sure.

So after limping to the baggage area to get my phone and call the rest of the canoeing girls, i got thorugh clarisse and they were still at 35km. HAHA nice one la huiqin.

She claims she ran with her NJ canoeing friend. Man, she didn look as tired as we were. God-like. Not in running i mean, but in fabricating. Oops.

Hey but she got her finisher tee and the medal. Aih, no glory at all, depressing.

In all her stunning integrity, she must have took a quick turn somewhere without ppl noticing. AND BASKET SHE WAS WEARING THE SAJC CANOEING SINGLET. DISGRACE! Grrr. 

Oh well, the ChampionChip will do justice, i hope. Her cert will not indicate completion. And hopefully they ask her to return her shirt and medal (which i dont think they will cos it's administrative-wise, it's troublesome, and she paid for it anw)

K, so that's very much most of the experience. Very interesting.

Leaving for perth later, gotta be at airport in 3 hours+. Hmm, i wonder how my legs will survive. Spamming glucosamine cream and icing it now. 

Happy holidays!