stolen colours

The last day of 2004. It has seemed a rather long year because it encompassed both M1 and M2. Not in a particularly verbose mood now, so I’ll keep it short.

Photos taken during the Sentosa outing. We did the standard put-feet-together-for-photo thing, after which I suggested fingers and some bright spark suggested elbows. I use the star photo as my MSN pic.

Thanks mini for not minding at all.

Just that I met AA at NUS yesterday. A brief talk was all we had, but it was good seeing her again. And she gave me this top (the spinning thing, not the thing you wear on your torso) from Prague. Fascinating.

I reached NUS before the library opened, so I perched myself at a bench outside the library. The weather was so good that I decided to stay there for the rest of the day. At various intervals I was actually shivering a little…how amazing! In Singapore! I don’t want this kind of weather to end. Had lunch with the other muggers. As usual, Shmeen and Jon were competing to see who could dig his/her own grave fastest.

Then got myself a new SIM card yesterday as well. I’m now using my brother’s old Mitsubishi phone, which is gorgeous and has a colour LCD screen i.e. it’s a fragile princess.

Today I attempted to stay at the bench outside the library again, but it was so windy I gave up and migrated indoors, where I subsequently froze.

Got a new handphone accessory today!

[and congrats again.]

To all: I have lost my handphone! I think I dropped it at Far East while rummaging for my car keys in the same pocket, which is rather shallow. It’s a prepaid line, so I’m not too bothered about the financial aspect; even SMSed the phone saying “pls return. prepaid acc so no point trying to make me pay for your phone bill.” I’m just rather upset at losing my handphone accessory, various messages and reminders. This might be an opportunity to upgrade my handphone, but I really don’t deserve that since I lost my 7210.

Met up with lynn and rie today, then went to Kino and bought 1602. Lynn left after we collected the engraved rings, and I spent the better part of the afternoon crapping with rie. I haven’t laughed so much or talked so much rubbish in a long while! No inhibitions with you, rie

This is for ivory’s benefit:

Rie: What did you guys cosplay?
Me: Do you watch Gundam SEED?
Rie: I roughly know…those two girls on your blog right?
Me: Did you say ‘two girls’?
Rie: Yah, those two are girls right?
Me: That’s MY line!

(Rie likes works where even I have problem telling who’s the guy and who’s the girl sometimes.)

***

I’m rather amused to see my fellow ringers commenting. The Conductor shall henceforth be known as just that.

Got three more Christmas cards in the post today!

Spent today totally out of character, sometimes by my volition, sometimes not.
So we reused our Gundam SEED costumes for convenience, and because the ZAFT jacket is just so darn cool.

Went with lynn to Expo in the morning to see people. Alanna was so chirpy as Fuu, and Kakita does look like Jin. Then Shuui, Min and Koichi were absolutely lovable as Peacemaker Kurogane; it’s always so fun to watch them. Kat and Ivory gave out Christmas cookies! Thanks guys. Kinda missed hanging around with you all; and missed seeing Ben too!

Also saw my handbell juniors there.
First B appeared and made me pose for a photo. Then E. Then M. All with cameras! I twitched, so my facial expression got more and more constipated. You three…I’m so sorry. Should have taken a photo with you there and then instead of going with my friends first T_T Was a bit deflated when one of them said “you look very chio!” I guess I just can’t look like a guy.

Then stood around with lynn for a while, and various people came up to take photos. There were these two really WEIRD people who actually directed us (Ha so America’s Top Model apart from the fact that I was cringing at what they wanted.) Anyone know who the girl with the long green wig was?

After that I drove us to Far East Plaza where we met lynn’s siblings and ate at Subway (Oh I love Subway! Why wasn’t it there when I was studying at RGS!). There were really few cosplayers there, perhaps 5-6 more anime cosplayers besides us. Two jrock cosplay groups, but nothing spectacular.

I got glomped by this gang of 4 girls (in tudungs! but they were diehard Gundam SEED fans) It was…an experience. But they were really sweet and even gave me a Kira+Athrun poster just before they left.

Here comes the really OOC part. I cringe even now. So I had the bright idea of going to buy rings ala episode 8 of Gundam SEED Destiny. [I'm a bit miffed that my ring finger isn't the same size as my middle finger 'cos there's no way I'm wearing it on the 4th phalanx on a daily basis.] And! The shop threw in free engraving XD.

And then…we took puri that somehow ended up like wedding photos. I hereby declare that I had no hand whatsoever in the decorating process.

Highlight of the afternoon: lynn’s brother dancing onstage. No further details since I’m sworn to secrecy. He was sabo-ed into going on when the emcee asked for volunteers. The emcee, by the way, is a really good Michael Jackson impersonator.

The competition? The Kyo cosplayer won Best Individual, but Karyn got runner-up! Just that…her prize was a 21-inch colour TV set. She attributes that to the fact that she kept her composure after the emcee knocked her head with the microphone.

Far East was quite fun. Everyone there was rather new to cosplay, so there wasn’t any politicking or competition. Sooo many cameras and cameraphones, though. We just sat down together and then people’d start taking photos. Also met some of the organisers, who’re really great people. We spent quite a lot of time asking others how old they thought we were. Karyn was the most tickled ‘cos everyone thinks she’s 18 years old. (The youngest I got was 16 years. Only.)

I don’t have any good photos of us! Grr. Sorry ivory…but updating my site might take some time while I beg for photos from people around the Net T_T

I love ringing. I’ll grab any opportunity to ring, thinking that it’ll only satisfy my hunger for bells, but the urge to ring just grows stronger. Which is why I’ve been a regular at caroling and alumni performances. In an ideal world…I’d want to be a ringer. I’ve chosen another path; but I’ll wait for the future to come and see if I can work out a way to have the best of both worlds, like I managed to this caroling. I’ll be going back to RGS on Thursdays and possibly Saturdays on a regular basis, I hope, so that you girls actually do get things done during self-prac.

Went to RGS in the morning to practise with the substitute ringers and give out Christmas cards. I had a ball of a time, maniacally moving up and down and subbing empty positions. Corinne sweatdropped.

We packed up and got ready to leave, only to discover that the bus company thought that our booking was for 6.15pm, not 2pm. So I frantically called them up, and somehow they dragged a driver out from home on CHRISTMAS DAY and he got us to the Esplanade at 3pm. At which point the security guard refused to let us into the unloading bay.

*after 5 minutes of arguing*
Corinne: Christine (the Esplanade rep) told us to meet her at the unloading bay.
Guard: But did she say that you could unload there?
Me: *cackle*
Corinne: *buries head in hands*

We did manage to get to the venue on time, only to find that they thought we were a SINGING choir, so the space was not quite adequate.

So I played for the 2nd performance. I love playing at the Esplanade because the acoustics are good, and we can actually play with all the dynamics that we spend hours rehearsing, unlike in shopping malls where we just play as loudly as possible. It’s always a great experience because the staff there are sensitive to our needs; like the guy helping us put our cases on the trolley actually asked “Is there a proper way to put these things upright?” And they gave us three performer’s rooms this time instead of a dressing room – which meant sofa and beds instead of dressing tables and mirrors.

Then went for dinner at Suntec. Ichiban Boshi is indeed value for money; big portions that tatse good, and for really affordable prices. Then dropped by Top Man where we got a $10 voucher after making a purchase! The catch: the voucher couldn’t be used for accessories or promotional items, and it expired that very day. So I was trying to give the voucher away to a group of 4 girls who looked like they were J3. They refused, then suggested that I buy underwear! “It’s only $9!” They chorused. “You can give it to your friends!” I was highly, highly amused but didn’t follow their suggestion.

Returned to the Esplanade to watch the last performance.
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[edit]

It’s the 24th of December. Two months since I turned 20. More than a month since I watched May Day.

Goodness. Those events seem so long ago.

I’m going to miss ringing so much.

I want to disembowel yesterday’s bus driver. First, he arrived late. Second, he took us to Raffles Place instead of Raffles City, despite me telling him and him verbally repeating after me “Raffles CITY”. Made big detours in peak hour traffic. Third, when he fetched us back the barrel of oil in the luggage compartment leaked and got onto our cases. @(*$%$&@(#*$ Which led to a mad rush for toilet paper, water and soap after we arrived at RGS.

I am caroling at the Esplanade at 4.30pm as of now.

Later I drove to Pris’ house for a sleepover. Taboo’s quite fun, and so’s Pictionary. Then played Polar Bear and got suaned. *stares daggers at bearbear* Had the gift exchange next, where I successfully guessed the identity of my gift-giver because of the very telling present – Furuba poker cards. I think I’m an abnormal girl ‘cos I didn’t put that much effort into dressing up my gift. After that we watched Ice Age – or rather, the others watched. I fell asleep after 10 minutes and woke up at the credits.

Everyone kept creeping up to the dinner table and picking at the leftovers of dinner; cold turkey actually tastes nice! Shmeen’s shepherd pie is heavenly, though it was cold by the time I got there.

The girls went to sleep, while Shmeen and I stayed downstairs with the guys and the PS2. Thereupon started dozing off in between videos of FFX and FFX2 and fighting for space on the sofa with likeminded people. For some strange reason we were speaking in Mandarin about 75% of the time. Tried my hand at other games, but was sorely disgraced by my lack of psychomotor skills. (Hey, it’s only my second time touching a PS!) Later hijacked Pris’ piano. I like playing other people’s pianos and their scores.

Things I learnt that night:

1. Guys have really low immunity – all of them were sniffling away or having angina.

2. I can still remember the second movement of the Moonlight Sonata!

3. Bacon bits are nice eaten alone. (I have not tried bacon bits + konyaku jelly, unlike Freddy.)

4. Pris’ bathrooms are really nice.

5. I have bad hand-eye coordination.

6. Cold turkey is nice.

Morning came really quickly. Thanks Pris for hosting us! Even though we depleted the downstairs bathroom of toilet paper. Made my way home without killing myself or my passengers. Shall go nap a bit now before going out again later.

Today’s caroling performance is at Raffles City, 7.30pm, indoors. The stage in the centre, with Winnie the Pooh as background. Ach. But judging from last Sunday the sound technician is a fabulous guy, so I’ll forgive them that.
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