I wonder why, but I am losing positivity in everything I do. I don't know why, everything just doesn't seem important anymore. Then I wonder why I am doing what I am doing. See, I load a game and wonder why I play because it isn't even fun anymore. I look at the list of things to do and I wonder what is the point to each one. I load the Youtube page but I don't know what I want to watch. I wonder what I am doing here but I don't want to move. Music suddenly lost their feelings, I am just listening for the sake of listening. Playing basketball last night was a good thing. Acts like some sort of pain-killer, keeps me numb. I should go for a run tonight. At least I am doing something that has a point, meaning and use.

Over-exerting yesterday did have it's perks. I never felt this hungry in a long long time. =) You know, when you are hungry, everything taste extra super-duper licious. =p Currently am hungry for McDonald's Seaweed Shaker Fries. In the end, I couldn't take the hunger and ran downstairs for nasi lemak and chicken hotdog instead.

With the last bits of self-confidence left, I should tide through these difficult times. I should be more independent than what I already am. Carrying on my own two feet isn't enough. They need to be stronger so that they can carry me further.

One trouble after another came visiting. You see, I wanted to meet up with friends this holidays because I felt that I have somewhat neglected people during the busy term. They wanted to do things they have never done before together, so I suggested barbeque and chalet. It was quite a good plan and it got really exciting. Initially planned for 3rd January. When we planned, we checked the availability online and it was available so I happily think I should go book the next day because it was late at night and I don't have a credit card. However, the next day, a nasty surprise awaits. It was fully booked.

Ok, last minute change of plans. However, one of my friends is very busy and won't be free until 11th of January. I suppose that is still ok because school haven't started and I guess I need the time off so that I can face the challenges of the next semester. Yay, everyone was ok with that. Initially I didn't want it to be on a weekend because it would be a little more expensive. Why pay more right? Anyway, we had no choice so it was ok. Best case scenario was to book it the next morning. But I didn't want to tell my friends that I don't currently have enough money to pay for it first. Therefore, I decided to wait for some financial aid to come before I do so.

So today finally some financial aid came. Then I checked, a minimum of 2 nights is required for the specified date. That is ok, I planned to book two nights as well. Then the screwed up thing is, you need two nights but the second night is fully booked. Not only that, they changed the price. It was $44 for weekdays and $60 for weekends but it is all now a flat $75 a night. Sigh, prices went out of control again. Planning gone. Now I don't know what to tell my friends. Cancel? Or submit to the overpriced thing? Anyway I don't know how it would work out since they need two nights in a row to book on that date. I am so troubled, I am tempted to say I don't care anymore. But I can't. Yup, it is all my fault. I am sorry.

Did I say I treasure being able to do things whenever I wanted? I'll do things if I promised or they are like my responsibility or something. I don't like things being forced on me. Nobody does. That's why sometimes I don't like to go home. It is nice, with good food and satellite television. I can't plan when I want to go home. My father plans it for me. I can't plan what I want to do at home or when I want to sleep. My father plans it for me. Sometimes, all I want to do when I get home is rest, because I am so stressed during the semester and it is now holidays but no, I need to do this today, do this tomorrow, visit the hundred and one relatives. I suppose that is a good thing, but I don't have time to do what I want or just plain rest. Not to mention I don't even have my own bed there. I guess in our parent's eyes, we'll forever be the small kid. Maybe that's good. Just maybe.

I am supposed to be home today, but I am so troubled, I don't want to be doing anything. I want to go home when I feel like it. I am very ashamed too, because I am such a stupid failure. I wonder what I should do. I am lost. I am such a pleaser too, that I went home every holidays.

And I guessed it, NUS professors don't have a sense of humour. Oh well, I can't say who because I wouldn't know who marked my paper.

Now the blog have so many secrets, I am tempted to make it private. But doing so will go against what I believe.


Sigh, there is no recovery from that. Thankfully though, tonight I felt a little better than last night. I can't sleep yesterday, there was too much in my mind. I felt lifeless and useless, lying on my bed and unable to fall asleep. That's what university does to you. I think my body took a blow because I woke up a few times during my sleep just sneezing non stop. That's what stress does to you.

When I woke up though, I felt energetic and full of life, as if I can take on anything. Wait, I have to look at signs too. I woke up really late so that's bad sign number one. Should I count not being able to sleep in the morning as bad sign number two as well? I probably shouldn't. Feeling energetic and full of life should count as a good sign. Went straight to shower and then down for dinner. Had a nice dinner and met Soo Ting again. He invited me to go for basketball training with them. Wow, haven't met him in some time and getting a chance to play basketball should count as good signs! =)

I initially planned to go for a run, so that I'll be too tired to feel emo or think afterwards. Playing basketball is just as good I guess. Running burns more calories though and I think I'll feel even more tired. Angel wanted to know her results, so I guess since I'll be there anyway I'll just click. How bad can it get right? I am already at the bottom. I have nothing to lose. I clicked and regretted it. Mood really turned 180 degrees. Suddenly games lost their meaning. Everything I did lost their meaning. I really needed to play basketball, to tire myself out, to release some of the stress.

I played as bad as I could play. I was walking up and down court, being the last on attack. I didn't realize that all my teammates were at least year 6 or year 7 and all have graduated. Not playing for three weeks and I am already less energetic than them. Initially planned to do a run after the game to punish myself but decided not because my thighs felt like liquid and I could collapse anytime. Tomorrow. Promise. Well, I told myself to underpromise and overdeliver, so I shouldn't really be making any promises.

Reality hits me again afterwards. Oops, I am never really good at anything. Not even basketball. My life must have been a tragedy. I fear for my future. At this moment I hope that I can be the Wai Hong I was. Carefree, happy-go-lucky, yet gets the jobs done. I can't do all three now. Marred by fear, I am constantly hounded by stress. Furthermore, I can't really let things slip out of my control anymore. They always have nasty consequences. Getting the job done is another area the current Wai Hong lacks. Makes me wonder what I have been doing all this while. I must have been doing all the wrong things. Maybe I am just suffering karma from past mistakes.

I wonder what I should do now, when everything else has lost their meaning. I am just emotionless, don't even know if I should feel sad. I guess I am numb from the amount of failures I have achieved. I really should be studying now. Some people are having examinations coming really soon. I should study along with them and pretend I am having an examinations on the same day as them.

Now I have to plan next semester's timetable and my future. More stress.


I can't fall asleep. What should I do? I don't know why, my hands are shaking too. I can't type properly. Thoughts were somewhat melancholic too. I should just go for a run so that I'll be too tired to think. Nah, I just felt like writing. Write it all, then I can go forget about them. I believe people should start making friends with positive people because people like me would just pull them down along into the gloom. Maybe you should stop reading too, if you are not prepared to have an emo and gloomy night.

I can't help it. I am human. I woke up today, and realized I have numerous missed calls. I didn't have a good night's sleep last night because I sent all my pillows to laundry and then weren't dry by the time to go to bed. So I slept without them, and woke up with a headache and a neckache. Then I decided to take the next 'unknown' call since if it rang so many times it must be urgent. Bah, it's 'unknown', so how can I call back? Wow, it was an urgent Christmas wishes. Thank you! =) Anyway, I also got reminded that today is the doomsday.

I see signs to see if the day is going to be a good one or a bad one. Today seemed like it's going to be a good one, with the Christmas wishes and all, so I have decided there's nothing to fear. In case I got rather bad results, I have more time to recover from the shock. I was at the page already, and am just one click away... I realized I could not do it. My heart rate increased by a lot and whenever that starts happening, my hand starts shaking too. I have decided to hit the snooze button, just one more day, mum. I have decided to give myself one more day grace, because I am not ready to face the consequences. Heh. I am a loser. A sore loser.

Besides, as the day progressed, the signs wasn't so good. I had a headache so I couldn't think and function well. Jason asked for dinner, and that was like yay! Good signs plus one. I woke up rather late and it was getting late. I finally couldn't take the hunger because my dinner with Jason is going to be my blinner. (breakfast/lunch/dinner) He said 9.30p.m.. Now the signs aren't looking so good after all. My decision of giving myself one more day grace was rather right. Finally couldn't take the hunger and went for dinner. Bad signs plus one too.

We finally went to Holland Village for supper but at the time we were there most things are either closed or closing. Luckily though, there was a soccer match going on, Chelsea vs. Aston Villa and so one of the hawker centres was opening late. It was exciting alright. At the time we were there it was 2-2. After I bought my food, it was 3-2. After Jason bought his food, it was 3-3. The match ended 4-4. We were just talking about life and everything else under the sun. Jason, if you are reading this in time, I think I found the answer to your question. I would dump that 70 ringgit ticket and go for class chalet instead. But that's me. I am no life coach and I don't dictate how people should do things. I just felt it was worth it because if you miss the chance, you might not ever see some people again. Yeah, I know 70 ringgit is expensive too. I'm sorry.

At the time of parting, I felt that I should give a salute and I gave. Maybe I played too much games, dwarven style. The gesture have somewhat more sentimental value to me because I had many memorable salutes. One of those salutes, I gave to Eric at the time of parting. We talked about life so much we were like brothers. We knew how each other would do stuffs and so on. I never seen him or heard from him anymore, after that salute, somewhen in July or August 2004. Hey, you were not the only one tearing when you entered the airport.

I remember weird things but never seeing people you love again have some sort of emotional effect on me. Well, I guess the rest never had their loved ones die on them before. Then I had another call from my dad and we chatted another good 2 hours or so about life and everything under the sun.

More thoughts.

At some point, I felt that someone needed some love tonight, so I sent the message.

"Hello. Good night, sleep tight and sweet dreams! =)"

Oops. I guess in the end I freaked the person out.

Then I also sent a message that only hopeless me would send.

"Hey. In case I don't wake up by the time you go, have a blessed New Year and all the best in your future endeavours. =)"

But what I really wanted to say was...

"If I don't ever see you again, all the best in your future endeavours."

See, I am a hopeless loser.


I don't know what to do today. I just felt that I should be a good boy so that my wishes would come true. However, 'good' is relative right? I just felt that I should do work instead of having fun on this merry day. The other thing is, who works on Christmas day? I decided to do my laundry, was having an online chat, and this other person goes, "No laundry! It's Christmas!". I am confused.

Looks like everyone have got their Christmas plan ready too. I guess I shouldn't go disturb people. I would like to thank someone for inviting me to dinner/supper but it was rather far for me. I was not really in the mood to walk home after that too. Yeah, the cab fares have risen. More reasons to not take a cab. I am sure I have enough thoughts to last me the walk home too but hmmm, I guess I was just not in the mood.

I had a nasty surprise too. I went downstairs for dinner and seems like nobody opened for the day. I have been eating nasi lemak the past few days because Yong Tau Foo is gone and Char Siew rice is on a holiday. I went down, there was a long queue at the drinks stall. Other than that, only Beijing cuisines and Aston's opened. Luckily there was the faithful old canteen.

I was glad I went down too, because I was positive I saw an angel. Many thanks for the nice Christmas present. The drinks stall at the other canteen like to blast the radio so that the whole canteen could hear theirs. It didn't help because I was sitting near it and once I sat down, the piano opening of Eason Chan's Lonely Christmas began to play. Walau.


Eason Chan - Lonely Christmas


First and foremost, Merry Christmas everyone! =)

I think it's almost time to think of what I want for Christmas. (I still hope Santa Claus would come and give me a present tonight.) Just wanted to dream for a while. Anyway, I wish that I would have good results from now on. Rather selfish I guess but I kind of really need it. Really really need it. I don't know how else to emphasize that.

If I could have a second wish, I wish that all my family and friends would be safe.

Actually I had a lot to say, but guess tis the season to be merry so I deleted them. I'll leave it at that. Merry Christmas from the depths of my heart.


Ok, my biological clock have once again ran out of sync and needs readjustments. I have been sleeping and waking at very weird hours this few days. Being angelic is hard, but I think I am going to work over the next few days to sleep at the correct time again. As a result, not only I have lost track of days, I sort of lost track what happened when.

Results are coming out soon and most people (including me) are in a panic mode. We knew we didn't do as well as we expected and it can be really bad. I wish and hope and pray that I survive this semester. What do we do when we are in panic mode? We play as much as possible this few days because we know once the results come, games are not as fun anymore. We could be in a period of depression where games are no longer fun and all you want is do better semester. It is a vicious cycle, because usually, we don't. Usually.

University can sometimes be a cruel place. I felt like I am playing some online game where I am up against a lot of people who are mad and play 24/7 (there's a nicer term I think, was it powerplayer?). It is a place where your rank against your cohort count and not the actual absolute amount of knowledge present in you. Sometimes you are really good at something but there are a lot of people who are better. You score bad. Yeah, of course there are times when you did bad and there are a lot of people who are much better. Double bummer. Competition's tough. I guess the days where I can say, "Bring it on!" is numbered.

I think I am a failure so far. Yes, I have failed modules in University therefore I qualify to label myself a failure. That makes you rethink your abilities and life a little bit. To add insult to injury, I have failed two missions that I set out for myself to do this holiday. My fourteen days of purpose which I should be on the thirteenth day now. I wanted to live each day with discipline only for two weeks and I have somehow failed. I have put in a day of gaming in those and I haven't been solving nagging problems this few days. This have to change. The other mission I am failing is the spend $50 in 20 days mission. I just realized that I am no longer a school kid but with perseverance and a strong spirit I entered this somewhat improbable mission. (It actually can be done!) However, spirit fluctuates and sometimes it is strong (I think I can make it!) but sometimes it is weak. (I just can't take it anymore!) And money spent in the name of friends are worth it right? =)

That still does not solve the problem that is very real. How am I going to pay for my accommodation and food next semester? I realized it's not cheap and since I eat a lot, that is going to hurt even more. Actually my food consumption have dropped dramatically after leaving JC. I guess part of the reason must have been money. This is not the first time I go on save money missions and I think I did well in one of the missions back in 2006. I managed to survive on one meal a day for extended period of time. Sounded like a hunger strike but I was still big and strong back then. Still got my muscles from ACJC gyms. Now I feel weak, 'like butter spread over too much bread'. Unfortunately that didn't repeat. I guess I am a slave for good food. I realized I consume too much money. I probably blow S$500 a month now, S$200 a month on food. I need a job. I really really need a job. Circumstances didn't allow though. I probably should take Chinese modules.

No problem, Wai Hong says. He dies hard. He finally started Second Life for the second time, after the first time gave him a lot of stress and problem. I am just glad it didn't do any of those sort of funny things today. However, I am not exploring as much today. Just trying to get the avatar straight. This is not the first time I realized it but it is really really time-consuming. I guess I am better second time around. I managed to make a face that is quite close to a real-life picture. However, the hair and nose options were a disaster. Seriously, you go nicer bald in Second Life. I realized most people (I mean people I know) have noses that is positioned at a lower absolute position on their face. The nose is stuck so high. Not only that, some people have longer noses than others but there is no such option. Finally I am quite happy with whatever I achieved. I realized to get nice hair, you really need to get deep down and build. Watched a lot of really interesting tutorials on how to do that and it managed to keep my attention for a while. Yeah, I have one of those moments where I forget I was sitting on my chair again.

Instant noodles, instant noodles, why do you taste so nice, priced so cheap, easy to cook but is bad for health? I should probably be shouting at MSG. Or the instant noodles manufacturers because they only put carbo and no protein in there. I was feeling hungry and all of a sudden, I can taste those tasty noodles in my mouth. It makes me realize once again I am hungry for instant noodles. I remind myself that I am on day 4 of a 60 day without instant noodles mission. Or was it 30 days? =p I can do it.

I actually felt great today and I guess I achieved more than I usually achieve in two days. I guess it is a balance that I need to strike. However, the balance point is so delicate that I usually fail to find it. Balance point for sleep is one of them. Balance point for work and play is the other. I never seem to find the balance point for both. They say we need around 7 hours of sleep as an adult. I don't think so because if I put in those hours for extended period of time, one day I'll break and put in naps or sleep extra. Then the timetable becomes out of sync again.

Therefore, for many holidays now, I have been searching for the balance point of sleep. Holidays is like a 'sandbox' time where you can experiment with yourself. See, if I sleep too much, the next night when it's time to sleep again I won't feel sleepy and then I'll sleep later and later and my schedule is out of sync again. If I slept too little, I might break somewhere in between and that also throws my schedule out of sync. I need to find the time in a day where I can always keep a good cycle and also function to the max in the time I am awake. Based on latest data, I guess it is best when I sleep between 10-11 and wake up between 8-9. But this is hard to keep, because night is such a good time to do everything. Silent and cool, haven for the thinking mind.

Balance point between work and play is something I discovered recently after trying too hard to discipline myself. (That tells you I really didn't have much discipline before turning 21. =p) I am forever a kid, after all. Carefree and happy-go-lucky is what I live for. However, to survive university, I have to change my plan for this last golden period of mine. I have decided to try my hardest to stay disciplined. New mistake I have realized. Some games, (especially online ones) don't qualify as games anymore when they before too competitive. Play games to have fun. For some time, I thought playing MUD is beneficial to rest the mind. I was wrong I guess, it is just a chore now. Same to Maple Story and those of you who play WoW. Only the beginning was fun and if you are just starting on them, enjoy as much as you can.

Therefore, I realize I have been working all the time, and too little time is really being spent on recreation. Then I panic because the me for the past few months think that recreation robs me of time actually doing my work and since time is always absolute, having more time on work would mean more work done. That is logical and might be true but I guess the me from a few years back is smarter. The me from a few years back says, "Do more in less time. It is the quality of the time you spent not the quantity that matters." Going to university have made me dull. I felt more stupid now. It has been a long time since I experience brain saturation and guess my body does not respond very well to that. It terribly frustrates me when nothing can go into my brain anymore and all you want to do is everything but study. Then I actually spend time doing nothing. Wait, not really doing nothing. Trying to achieve nothing sounds more accurate.

The enlightenment I got today? I realized I took 10 hours of sleep, my eyesight is extremely clear and I felt energetic. I went on to complete a lot of thing that qualifies under work without feeling bored or feeling I cannot take things in anymore. The magic? I played all day yesterday, my first in a long long time. Since I am a failure at everything, I set out a mission for myself to be disciplined, and failed. I was thinking, I might as well set out a mission for myself to relax, and fail. It is a win-win situation because even if I relax or fail, I win. Setting a mission to be disciplined is a win-lose situation. There is only one way to win.

Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines have been fun so far, except that I never managed to find a resolution to why it crashes everytime I try to feed. Takes the fun out of being a vampire. I could lower the graphics options and it crashes less when I try to feed but I still have yet to manage to get rid of the problem that is marring the fun factor of the game. Another problem with it is that it goes through too many loadscreens. Get out of a building, load, get in the building right across, load, then get out of that building, load again, then back again to complete quest, and load once again. That's why I liked the last mission of the first map, blowing up the warehouse. There isn't a single load screen and I was free to operate and use whatever skills I have. I didn't play this other clan but I think it would be super cool if I could explode other people. =)

There was a mission where it felt like Silent Hill 2. Wait, I have seen the whole place before. Even the lighthouse and somehow right after I did it, I knew I was going to take a screenshot of the lighthouse. It felt really strange. There was a part where the ghost girl ran towards the right at an intersection and of course, I chase after her since that's how usually games progresses. Even in Silent Hill the first one you were chasing after your daughter's shadow at the start of the game. It spook me because the right intersection led to a dead end. Besides, I don't know why this kind of game like to make it so dark so that you cannot see anything and have to squint your eyes to see faint outlines. It somehow managed to annoy me because in the hotel, all the lights blow one by one as you walk past them and it grows darker. I didn't have the flashlight I can have in Silent Hill series.

There's something strange about the progression of today. Really really strange. Thinking back, I felt like I have played the game before. I had to turn right and talk to the 'high-class citizen' at the start of the game. I sort of knew what to do and even I think I have heard the responses before. Something is definitely amiss. Then I had to run into the clinic and do the quests inside. I am serious, I have seen this whole scene before. I have seen the person that you might want to save at the start of the game, Heather Poe, before. The more I play, the more I felt something is not right. The intersection running down to the beach, I have seen that before. The first combat area mission, I have seen it before. Really, really strange. Yeah, I still know what's real. Reality is, I never played the game before.

Then I decided to run down for dinner, since I am already late for dinner with Aik Hoe and Veng Hoong who were leaving for Japan. The thing I fear most has happened. Yong Tau Foo stall ceased to exist. Nasi lemak stall didn't open. Char siew rice stall on holiday till 25th of December. It was 9 so the other canteen definitely closed. In a desperate bid for food, I finally tried the Niqqi's cheese prata stall. I ordered my food and saw that the 'roti john' portion was a little small, I asked for rice and sambal sausage. We struck up a conversation and we got to know each other a little more. When I sat down, place the food in front of me, I begin to realize, I have had the conversation before too. I have seen him before before that. Even the food placed in front of me was in the exact order as I have saw it.

I must have seen it in one of my dreams. I hardly dream and remembering dreams are even more rare. Sometimes I do dream but by the time I woke up, I would have forgotten. Unless of course, I was forcefully awakened, like an emergency or if I am going to be late for school. This dream business is giving me the chills. Then I began to find similarity of things that happened before. Another case where I have seen the places and happenings before was when I am much younger. Before I took the scholarship to go to Boarding School. I saw the place and my exact position in the room before I took it and went down to Singapore. I never seen Singapore before before that. Can I really see the future? Now I wish I could document my dreams so that I'll see whatever pattern there is.

There's another incident worth mentioning. I guess this won't be the first time I am repeating this story but there was a time a dream felt really real. I was in Secondary Two and Kai Jin sleeps beside me. He usually wakes up a lot earlier than the rest of the room because there's only one bathroom cubicle shared between four people and he bathes quite a while. One day, I woke up as usual, went for breakfast and school. Had two lessons, then it was recess. I took a nap during recess because it was my common practice. (It saves money too, and I am probably still full from breakfast.) After recess, I had another lesson and poof! I am on my bed. Wait, I was in class right? It took me quite a while to realize the whole thing was just a dream. You mean I can even take naps in dreams? It really felt very real and had me wondering why it all happened. Sigh, I had to go to school twice that day. =(

However, the date and time of all those events does not bear a lot of significance to me. It was not like a turning point of my life or something. Or maybe it will be? Anyway, it was 21st December. That means today's 22nd December. I still can count alright. It's the sixth anniversary. Maybe she was just here to visit me. Just maybe.

Facebook gave me lots of blast from the past. You see, whenever you add a new friend or someone adds you, you will be reminded of what was so memorable of such a person. Mind even drifts back to how did you get to know the person, what was the first ever conversation you had with the person and so on. I had the privilege to see some of my Secondary 2 friends. The only problem is, we are no longer the Secondary 2 kids we used to be. Sometimes I get this problem where people are stranger than strangers. Precisely because it was so long and we were quite close back then so in the mind we tend to think the relationship grows over time but I don't know what to say all of a sudden. I just hope they still haven't forget all the games we played when we were in Secondary 2.

On the other extreme, I have friends whom the number of real conversations I had with them can be counted with a single hand. Of course you can sort of remember them if they were not too long ago. But we're friends alright. We know each other. We help each other. We acknowledge the existence of each other. We just didn't have the chance to hang out with each other. We know everything that does not matter about each other and yet we don't know things that really matters about each other. There can be a lot of reasons to why it happened so but somehow all that etched deep regrets in me. Sometimes I just didn't have the chance. Sometimes it must have been some mistakes I have made. It might have been poor first conversation or thing like that. Whatever it is, I just didn't have it.

It is no secret, that the best thing to keep conversations going is to be interested. Sometimes the interest is one-sided, so there wouldn't be much exchange. Oh well, I guess I'll accept it. It's better that I haven't tried at all. Then I'll get questions like why do you want to know people better. You mean I have to have a reason to want to know someone better? I don't know man. I really don't know. Maybe it is because you were such an interesting person? Maybe because you are the friend of more than one of my friends? Maybe because I see you so much it becomes weird if I don't know you? Or maybe because I simply want to know you better? Or maybe I have the gut feeling that we'll be very good friends? Or maybe I am trying to live without regrets? Or maybe I am just trying to work for my naive thought that I am going to make all my friends my best friend? I just don't know. And I don't want to be forever hoping to know you better. I am lost in my thoughts. Somebody save me.

And if someone doesn't love you back, it isn't such a crime.

If I ever have the chance to work for a game company, I want to work for one that makes great graphics. I actually spent time admiring the view, because I know it was really not easy to make.


Today I felt rather cold in the morning and I woke up to switch off the fan and went back to bed. Then I had a great sleep and I woke up minutes to 12p.m.. It looked like a great day and I am convinced that it is going to be my 'up' day since yesterday didn't really have much meaning. I was, on an uptempo mood, working on stuffs faster and faster which eventually felt really great. I almost forgot to eat lunch and at around 4p.m. when I finally went down for lunch, it felt like the day just started.

Then again I wanted to keep a nice bio clock so I set out to sleep at 10p.m. and I guess I was on rythm. I was in an interesting conversation with some online friends that I didn't want to leave. The adrenaline must be pumping after solving an interesting programming problem in record time. I got reminded of BASIC, arguably my first programming language, though by now I wouldn't know a single thing of it. I think in C, because I only know C.

Then I found out Aik Hoe is back in Singapore and am leaving for Japan through Singapore. There isn't much time left for the day, so I must be quick if I needed to do anything. Got into more interesting conversation with more online friends and was even planning to do a chalet sometime soon since there is not so many chance to meet each other otherwise. Anyway, I ended up going for supper too since I would be spending time with friends. Oh well, that threw the good boy plan out of the window but it's worth it right, since I am spending it with friends?

Had my first shot of vodka too but it isn't really nice. It was bitter and I wonder why people like to drink those. It wasn't even good tasting! I had weird feelings after too. I felt a bit more relaxed and don't feel like moving much, generally being lazy. My arm started shaking and it sort of goes out of my control on certain moments. Was playing cards and I couldn't even think properly to devise a strategy. I kept thinking I had less cards than I actually have and the objective of the game was to get rid of my deck as soon as possible. Sometimes I felt like winning the game already just to realize there was actually an extra card hidden behind some other cards and spoil my strategy.

Some people just don't believe me when I try to convince them that virtual space is cheap nowadays and you should just buy an additional hard drive when storage space is going low. The argument was DVD was much cheaper, going at $0.50 for one DVD that can store 4.5GB of data. Yeah, it is around $0.11 per GB right? And some people refuse to believe me when I quote prices where price per gigabyte is below $1. Latest December pricing places price per gigabyte ranging from S$0.35 - 0.50 with 50 cents a gigabyte being the worst case scenario. (You get better deals if you buy higher capacity drives.) 5400RPM models are not even in production anymore. Keep in mind I am looking for a secondary storage and speed is not important here, space is. I can get even lower prices if those 5400RPM models are still in town.

Problem number two is physical space and I believe DVD will always take up more physical space than a hard-drive. Don't believe me? I have seen people who have boxes and boxes of DVD, so much so that it would be a hassle to move. Anyway those DVDs probably provide you with enough movies, songs and other things to last you for a few years if you were just wanting to go through each item once. Do you think people watch every movie that ever went on to screens? They don't but I have seen people that archived every movie there is. If the person were to just watch movies he archived that he haven't watch yet, I suspect that will take at least a few weeks. Why do you need so many DVDs?

People don't remember that in order to burn DVDs you need a DVD burner drive. Your DVD burner drive will always be 3.5 inches. Instead of using that space in your casing for a DVD drive, why not consider putting a 3.5 inches hard drive? The cheapest DVD burner drive I can find is S$42.00. For the same amount of money and space, it could have been an 80GB hard-drive in it's place. Let's say one DVD can house 5GB of data, then you will already have 16 extra DVDs. You need an envelope or folder to store them too. Too messy and sometimes it might be difficult to find what you want to find. Looking for stuffs on a hard drive is just two clicks away.

In addition, usually people have a DVD burner and another DVD-ROM drive since it is more cost effective. Unless you have a laptop of course, which makes having two drives almost impossible. Then again, I would like to ask how often does your drive fail? For the record, I never had a hard-drive that failed on me. Maybe I was lucky and even though I had a lousy hard drive that was at the end of it's life, preventive measures and screening made sure the drive is still usable today. If you were wondering which one it was, it was my first wife's hard drive. Yes, it makes noise and I get the failure to detect operating system because the disk is corrupt and unreadable once in a while but have I lost any data?

Keep in mind things you burned on DVD is undeletable. Yeah, you must be thinking it is only 50 cents a piece, if it is unreadable then I'll just throw it away. What if the DVD contains 25% data you still need and 75% data you feel you don't need anymore? It is the nature of keeping an open mind that some files or data have more or less importance to me through the course of time. At some point in time, I just want to decide that some things are just not worth keeping anymore so I want to delete them. There must be some point of time where you will find things that you didn't even know you had and they are just wasting space if you are not going to use them anyway.

Prices:-
http://sg.hardwarezone.com/priceguide/priceguide.php?id=237
I show this page because I found a hard-drive that I might be buying in the future, seems to be at the sweet spot currently. I had previously targetted 300GB because it was the sweet spot on my previous research. Now I have moved it to 500GB. In case the page is updated and prices change, this is the current price. Hitachi Deskstar T7K500 500GB (16MB) SATA-2 at SGD185 from Fuwell International Pte. Ltd. that have branches in both Sim Lim Square and Funan IT Mall. Keep in mind prices can be higher than lower than listed. Higher because usually, people did not include GST in the price and that will make the prices look unattractive. Lower because if you are buying expensive stuffs at Sim Lim or Funan, you should be bargaining and sometimes end up with an even better deal. 500GB at SGD185 is $0.37 per gigabyte.

http://sg.hardwarezone.com/priceguide/cat.php?id=179
The page that links to all hard-drives currently in the market and Singapore prices, in case the page above get rearranged.

http://www.littletechshoppe.com/ns1625/winchest.html
Cost of hard-drive space from a historical point of view. Prices are in USD.

So ditch that DVD, and buy a new hard-drive. If you are still for DVD, by all means go for it. Like they say, as long as you are happy. =)

Somehow, my mind drifted back to another incident last year where my friend wouldn't believe me. Around June last year. I told the person I was using a 3.2Ghz Pentium 4 Dual Core and Radeon X550 and I could run Oblivion without lag. (Of course, anti-aliasing was off) Textures were at max, render distance was more than 50% of the bar. (If you put render distance to the max, it's quite fake because your own eyesight cannot see that clearly at far.) The person first didn't want to believe me that there was a 3.2Ghz P4D and proceeded to think that I was lying. It shows up on the control panel right? Unfortunately I was on the messenger so I had to send him screenshot. He still doesn't believe it.

Well, I have done all I can right? Maybe not. I proceeded to send the link to the Intel Processor's website and yet another tech review site just doing tests on the processor. He still doesn't believe it. Is he doubting me, or is he doubting Intel's website or is he doubting the tech review site? Maybe, just maybe, he was doubting the tech review site because it was not on his list of trusted site and his trusted tech review site have yet to feature an article on this thing. He argued that, "I have not read this on .". Ok nevermind. He then went to quote that another friend's rig, , , could not play the game without lag. It's case by case basis right? Plus, I have a witness and a gamer on the same computer. Well, whatever makes you happy.

Another debate which I stood on one side, is the debate whether is it better to leave your laptop shut-down or in hibernation while not in use. Guess which side I am on? I am all for shutting-down your laptop at the end of the day. I know of people that have not rebooted their system for a long time and just leaving their laptops in hibernation whenever it is not in use. I wonder from where they have heard that from.

When you shut down, the system runs clean-up scripts and clears the memory. Due to the many many programs, (and hence many many bugs nowadays) you might suffer a memory leak. I know utorrent the client had a memory leak problem. (It is fixed in their latest version.) If you left it on for an extended period of time, your memory usage goes up for an extended period of time and climbs as long as your program is still running. Now what if one of the background services had a memory leak problem?

Boot-up loads all the drivers and files into the memory again and that helps with system stability. If you run those files for extended period of time, one of those days it is going to go corrupt. It can't go corrupt if it is not loaded and the computer is not powered up. The period of time spend booting up is obviously larger than recovering from hibernating, but for a good reason. People save time at all the wrong places. With processors being so super fast nowadays, most of the processors have a good time idling. You cannot really use the full processing power unless you are running some 3D-intensive games. You could have saved the time 'wasted' from booting up by multi-tasking, doing two things at the same time. The processor definitely multi-tasks better than I do and the limit of multi-tasking is actually how much I can concentrate.

Hibernate is essentially a lower power state which was fine if you had compelling reason to keep your laptop on. Shutting down, they consume no power. You could even switch of the mains and remove the plug. However, if you still believe hibernate is better for you, hibernate all you want. If you believe in me though, you should start shutting down that laptop. =)

Maybe it's because when I am a little bit happier, I like to joke a bit more which makes people does not take me seriously. But I think it is an adult thing. People grow up, they tend to trust people less. That is what I have observed lately. If your account differs from what they were thinking, then it is not correct. Adults dislike to be proved wrong too. They think they'll lose credibility when they get proved wrong. I don't care, I don't have much credibility to begin with, right? People don't believe in me. I know it's hard to find people that really believe in you. But they are your friends leh, you don't feel extra hurt one meh? I wish I had my laptop and Wikipedia/Google with me all the time. Then I can give the most accurate information all the time.

Don't ever lose the wonder of that child within your eyes

Coming back, I was excited to try Titan Quest. With all my energy and hard-drive space left on the computer, I installed it and the updated it. I met with a brick wall again. Failure to initialize graphics engine was the message. Ok, then I Googled it and guess what I found. I perfectedly meet the requirement, except that my graphics card is an integrated one. Laptops usually feature integrated graphics card to reduce weight, cost and increase the battery life of itself. However, they are mostly weak at doing 3D things that required extra processing. Like one quote that I have found while searching the problem, "If you are running integrated graphics, you might as well give it up. What should I do now?

19th December 2007

$3 - Nasi lemak

$0.8 - Teh ping, but it tasted bad and bland. No choice because I took a lot of sambal.

$7.40 - Supper

Remaining credit until 28th of December - Negative $30.9

Do you believe in me?

Wai loved you at 6:49 AM

Tuesday, December 18, 2007

If it ain't broke, don't fix it (Day 9)

Forget all the ethics you learned in writing code and programming. Try not to update things to the latest version if your current version works well. (Applies only to Microsoft products) I was notified of a critical update for IE7, and of course after so many months of no accidents, I obliged. Updating Windows often is a way to stay safe if you are running Windows anyway. However, after the update, something went wrong.

My notifications and auto-updates no longer work. A lot of websites no longer work and that included the Windows Update website so I could not check what KB code was the culprit update. Imagine how furious I was since my IE6 was just destroyed by a cumulative security update and now my IE7 is ruined by a critical security update. I was handicapped once again, but I know I am online since my messenger works. I just cannot browse webpages.

Luckily for me, this is a well-documented problem. Though I cannot find out which was the culprit update, it revealed itself to me since it was the only update listed under IE7. Uninstalled it, and websites worked again! Not only that, my updates icons worked again. Here comes trouble part 2, I got notified of the update again and once again I clicked on it. Tell myself to shoot myself next time. This time it screwed the update icon again but it didn't install the update as well. There is therefore, nothing to uninstall and all these just go to illustrate the point that 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it'.

Anyway, the problem with this is that most anti-viruses and anti-spywares don't know where the new IE7 files are after the update. Therefore they all go haywire and block everything. The solution is very simple too but a little troublesome. You have to fully disable your antivirus, then install the update, then reactivate your antivirus. Some antivirus have to be uninstalled then only the security update will work and then you have to reinstall the antivirus again. Good luck if you are running some 'tua kee' antivirus. =p

Fixed it but downtime did its damage. Quite a bit of time today was spent rather unfruitfully and in due stress. Also gobbled up the last four packets of instant noodles for lunch. Though it tasted really nice, I got a new mission. Mission is, no instant noodles for the next 60 days. Yeah, go me!

18th December 2007
$2.50 - Nasi lemak (Yong Tau Foo and Char Siew not open)
$0.80 - Teh ping because I met a senior, we sat together for some chatting and I can't really stand hot stuff. (Sambal)
Remaining credit till 28th of December - negative $19.7

Wai loved you at 10:44 PM

Monday, December 17, 2007

Just a carefree Day 8

I woke up today just before 10a.m. and I was surprised after checking my phone. It said I had missed a call and there's a message for me, both at 4+ p.m. the day before. I was taking a short nap then, no wonder I didn't hear them but I also did not check my phone when I woke. At that moment I must have forgotten I had a phone. Today I have decided to be carefree, since the benefits of being carefree have been well-documented. I heard besides being happy, they do homework better too. I miss the good old me who was so super carefree.

There was a problem with the message and the call. It was an invitation from Jason to play basketball in the morning, so by the time I woke up they already started playing I guess. I apologized and sigh, they are going to end by noon. The fastest I can get there (Queensway) is by 11a.m. and there is no convenient way for me to get there. I planned to take 33 from Kent Ridge terminal, so if you have any other more efficient route you are free to enlighten me.

I was also assessing myself, since I haven't jumped since I got injured. Oh well, going all the way there to play a miserable 1 hour or less wasn't really inviting though I get to play with some people. I usually play more than 3 hours downstairs and it is less than 10 minutes walk to the courts. My bathroom is near too, and if I had gone there, I may not be able to shower and come back. I haven't played ball for 3 weeks too, so I must be really rusty. Time to go for a run.

Ended up going out with Jason. I am amazed, because Jason had a long list of people he was supposed to meet almost everyday in the short 3 weeks he's supposed to be here. Was supposed to meet Joon at 3 or something but it became playing basketball in the evening. Then it rained. I noticed a pattern, it always rain in the late afternoon nowadays. Morning must be the best time to play ball. Ended up going to the arcade again, and I whipped out my camera just in time for the photo finish but it was blurred and Jason swerved out of the screen just when I clicked. We were breaking records at racing, bettering ourselves almost every lap.

I managed to be more relaxed this time instead of getting super excited. Priceless. Managed to eat my favourite mixed rice again too. =) Priceless. Anyway, ended up going to sir's place where Jason have been camping for the past few days. I thought sir was still in Bangkok but he's back apparently. I had previously wanted to visit him in his Boarding School house and I found out today that he already moved out. He went to visit his new house at the Sports School instead. I just got rid of another nagging problem accidentally. =)

We watched some French movie and realized that smart people are indeed priceless. Even the gangsters wanted to hire graduates. =p The highlight was the spectacular escape, punctuated with a lot of dance like moves. I forgot the movie title since I didn't pay a lot of attention to that. Yay. Also watched college basketball for the first time and it was North Carolina vs. Rutgers. Woah, colleges in there all have their home court, nicely decorated and like a stadium. Just goes out to say how much they treasure sports. Even college basketball goes onto television. How come all we are getting in Singapore and Malaysia are outdoor concrete basketball courts?

It was rather a one horse race, with North Carolina leading all the way. Doesn't mean it was not worth watching. In fact, it was really spectacular. North Carolina has a good defense and reasonable offense. Actually their defense is creditable because Rutgers made some errors which resulted in steals and fast break points. What made it nice was the Rutger's offense and undying spirit. Even though they were getting pounded, they work very hard to get the ball to the enemy's basket and resulted in scoring. It felt like every time they scored, it was worthy of mention on highlight reels. North Carolina scores too easy, so there was nothing to see.

Oh well, no basketball for me today. No matter. We wanted to go visit Binh too, and his whole gang since the last time I saw Binh was more than 3 years ago. It was not my first time visiting their den anyway, and seems like they have new additions nowadays. Had my favourite mixed rice a second time for the day. It was nice of course. Just earlier I was complaining there are not enough new nice games to attract me to play. I think there was another expansion pack to Heroes 5 because there are units which I have never seen before. That sort of adds one more thing on my todo list.

Browsed their PS2 games and am kind of refreshed of what games I should be paying attention to. I admire them because they play day and night, really really carefree and I guess their results were decent too. Reminds me of myself sometime ago. I really don't want to grow up. I want to be the me back then without consequences. Watched some Titan Quest and Hellgate: London. You need to watch the opening movie. It was really cool with the shiny armours and all.



I got lost on the way home, and I almost go on the crazy idea to walk home because I see signs pointing me to Dover Road. I miss the view of school at night too, and maybe I can go Wah Kee fried rice for supper. Fortunately or unfortunately, I bumped into a bus stop that have the bus home.

17th December 2007
$1.20 - Arcade
$3 - Mixed rice
$3 - Mixed rice
$10 - Card top-up
Remaining credit until 28th of December - negative $16.4 (Screw it, I am going carefree.)

Wai loved you at 11:59 PM

Sunday, December 16, 2007

Day 7 in my heaven

I slept a little late the night before because after I fixed my junior's laptop, I tried in vain to fix my own. I thought reregistering all the .dll files worked, but after a while my browser crashed again. I was also a little too hyper from all the catching up with friends so I had energy to last a little longer than I should. In the end I woke up normal time, around nine plus, feeling tired. Nevertheless, I couldn't continue sleeping, which was a good thing, meaning I can schedule all 10a.m. classes next semester.

My browser is going crazy, and I am convinced that saving my IE6 is a lost cause. Partly because I do not have backup and therefore do not want to try a little more extreme methods in trying to get it to work again. I thought IE6 was one of the finest browsers ever to be made and I am not sure why everyone else kept telling me it was a sad little browser. Probably because they got screwed by the Windows Update once before.

Now the new great debate, what should I do? Should I download Mozilla Firefox, the pearl of open-source? Or should I upgrade the current browser up to IE7? I briefly considered Firefox. I do use then once in a while to see how my work looks on them. However, I am a little obsesses in keeping my system as clean as possible, with as little clone programs as possible. You can't really get rid of IE if you are running Windows. Installing Firefox then just means more files cluttering your hard drive. I know it works and it's cool. Plus, from the problem description I have read from excessive Googling of the problem, this thing does crash your Firefox as well, so downloading Firefox as a fix doesn't seem to be feasible.

I am fickle-minded too, since IE7 would mean extensive upgrade. I was not convinced to change up until they promised me I can have my IE6 back (and work on trying to get rid of the corruption problem) if I don't entirely like IE7. With a heavy heart, I clicked OK, but not before taking one last screenshot running IE6. Installed IE7 and it ran like a charm. I noticed I have used it before and quickly got familiar with it. One last obstacle now would be to get used to tabbed browsing and not accidentally close the window via the cross on the top right hand corner due to reflex. I am still interested to find out how exactly I could have solved my IE6 problem though I would not have the chance anymore.

First day surfing fuss-free after a few days of poor surfing experience was stress-relieving. I guess my brain either got blocked by days of doing repetitive things or it was saturated with things. I would hope it was the second. I don't know why, I don't feel like doing things that I have planned for myself to do. For the past two days too, I have solved almost zero nagging problems. Is it because they have dropped to an all-time low or I have lost my mastery against them? Solving nagging problems was not only stress-relieving, it was also a moral victory.

Here comes the what am I doing here debate. Seriously, what am I doing here in Singapore? Nothing much because everything I am currently doing here I can do at home. Most of my friends got a job, so I am the only one not doing anything around. I could have saved some money tiding out this holiday period at home. Besides, I get to see my family members after one semester. I went home every holiday, so the longest running period where I didn't see them should be one semester. Wait, I saw them in October when they came visiting and it's not a full 2 months since yet.

Do I have reasons to stay in Singapore? =) No. 1 reason have to be because of friends. I am rather ashamed of myself because I have neglected friends during term time. Free time were very precious during that period but I am sure everyone was busy too. Holidays become the best time to catch up and simply keep the friendship going. I don't have many friends left in KL and I definitely have many friends whom I haven't seen for more than 2 months. Now I have to devise a plan on how to catch up. Or should I leave it to fate? Maybe I should leave it to Facebook. =) But I can Facebook from KL what?

Yesterday have quite a huge impact on me though. It kept my hopes high. =) Maybe I should stay a few more days and give Singapore a second chance. Besides, I think maybe someone might feel sad if I have left. Maybe, just maybe, but I feel like giving it the benefit of the doubt, like I always do. Keep those surprises coming. =)

Realized I forgot to update yesterday again. Hmmm.
15th December 2007
$2.90 - The usual. =)
16th December 2007
$2.50 - The usual with some loyalty discount. =)
Remaining credit until 28th of December - $0.80

I am at the 7th day of my purposeful holiday plan and I don't know what is my purpose today. I guess today was just another bad day. I guess I need a good basketball games or just a good computer games. Yes, games must be my purpose today. Lastly, feeling bad after gobbling another 4 packets of instant noodles for dinner, I limit myself to one instant noodle meal every two days to spread out the effects. If I am hungry for cheap food, I should just eat bread.

Wai loved you at 10:07 PM

Saturday, December 15, 2007

When the past come knocking on your door (Day 6)

I woke up in the morning as usual but something is unusual about this day 6 of purpose. It is somehow the mid-point of the month, and there's exactly one month left before school starts. Most of my friends who are staying behind already got their jobs, and those who are unable to get one are going home. I appreciate friends who had helped me in one way or another to obtain a job, but the truth is, I am still jobless. Time to make a decision, to stay or go home?

Maybe I am just not trying hard enough, but maybe it was a blessing in disguise. I had the opportunity to chat with a few friends who were able to get a job. In actual fact, they say they didn't want to work, and two of them jokingly asked me to replace them. I know they didn't mean it but it is worth pondering that there is a slight intention there. Some complain they have no time to do their own things, and some just wanted it to be a holiday because they were so stressed during the term, they have no time to rest before they are getting stressed again.

Maybe I typed yesterday's post in a hurry, because I think there were still things left that I forgot to mention. Yesterday I had opportunity to watch some basketball because it didn't rain that much today and the basketball courts were dry, but I assessed myself and thought that I shouldn't play basketball. My elbow and knee joint is weak at that point of time, and I think that was the aftermath of having a grand total of 8 packets of instant noodles for lunch and dinner. Though I drank a lot of water, I think it somehow affected me. Joints felt more sour than they usually are. My back isn't hurting anymore, though I am not so sure if it will hurt if I jumped. Besides, I guess it's around 3 weeks since that incident so I may be really rusty. Lastly, I haven't asked owner of the ball in my cluster for permission and I don't have a ball.

I was feeling quite bad at the end of yesterday, so I was telling myself, I don't care, I am going to eat Yong Tau Foo for breakfast/lunch tomorrow! I was excited when I woke up, because I can finally have some real food and some protein. However, yesterday was a little worthy of mention because I didn't spend a single cent. (Actually I did by eating instant noodle, but it was calculated into the account the day before yesterday.)

Other than the great breakfast/lunch I had, I only tried to learn some of the Facebook Markup language and read up on some other information that I needed. Other than that I debate with myself the whole day on what would be my plan for the next few days and weeks. I was trying to set up my development environment, my sandbox, or workspace where I can freely try out making Facebook applications, and I met with brick wall number one. I don't have my own hosting space, and all I have used are free online hosting services. I am not sure whether they permit me to host the application on their hosting services and if my application ever goes popular, I am going to hit the bandwidth limit.

I need my own hosting space to both host the application and my canvas to test the application. Hmmm, wonder if my very very old blog and website can be converted to that. Besides, it was using free online hosting services where a lot of things are prohibited. Would I ever be able to do anything at all? Using my current budget as well, I wouldn't have the extra money to spend on online hosting services. Hopefully there would be workarounds or someone would be nice enough to offer me a small part of their server. I had that opportunity for a period of time somewhere but the chances of such miracle happening again is very low.

Brick wall number two is of course my suddenly crash happy IE. There were other brick walls as well, but I guess I should just join a developer group to learn things. If I met with such a problem, chances are high that someone else have met the problem before and found a solution that he can share.

Facebook sort of gave me the shock of my life tonight. For the past two days, it had always been me adding friends, very rarely I get added by other people. It was nice because some of the friends I haven't seen them for a few years and Facebook made it easy to interact with them again. What shocked me was that there was someone who added me, but I have no idea who the person is. I see the name alright, it was an English name followed by the Chinese surname, which was also quite common. So I logged on, and see who added me.

To my delight and surprise, it was someone who at the back of my mind, I have almost totally forgotten the existence of this person. Probably because the last time we spoke to each other, I thought that we will never see each other again. No wonder the name didn't ring a bell because I always only knew her by her English name, and never knew her surname. It was really really pleasant. I really cannot believe it has been two years since we last saw each other. I last saw her on the Fun-O-Rama 2006 day. Coincidentally, after I left the school compound that day, I also never stepped back in until now. By now, the juniors of my juniors would have graduated, and I totally lost the connection.

I was so excited we chatted the whole night. It was nice, and I didn't know how we moved from topic to topic we ended up talking about things we watched when we were younger. I cannot believe it, she said she was a member of Rukawa's Fan Club! She was a fan of Slam Dunk too! By the time I watched Slam Dunk, I had already started playing basketball, but I heard a lot of people were moved into playing basketball from that show/comic. I think it was a very emotional and passionate comic about basketball. After watching some very emotional episodes, (sometimes moved to tears) I would feel strongly to want to play basketball. It would be as if the world would end today, I would want to be playing basketball when it ends. Maybe I am just too overly sentimental. The passionate episodes always end with my favourite ending song:- SPOILER! Comic ending in second video.




I am sure some people will be moved to tears right about now, and take their basketball out for a spin. Sekai Ga Owaru Made Wa (Until the World Comes to an End) by WANDS.

daitokai ni boku wa mou hitori de
nagesuterareta akikan no you da
tagai no subete wo shiritsukusu made ga
ai naraba isso towa ni nemurou ka...

sekai ga owaru made wa hanareru koto mo nai
sou negatte-ita ikusen no yoru to
modoranai toki dake ga naze kagayaite wa
yatsurekitta kokoro made mo kowasu...
hakanaki omoi... kono tragedy night

soshite hito wa kotae wo motomete
kakegae no nai nanika wo ushinau
yokubou darake no machi ja yozora no
hoshikuzu mo bokura wo tosenai

sekai ga owaru mae ni kikasete okure yo
mankai no hana ga niai no KATASUTOROFI-
daremo ga nozomi nagara eien wo shinjinai
...na no ni kitto ashita wo yume mite'ru
hakanaki hibi to kono tragedy night

sekai ga owaru made wa hanareru koto mo nai
sou negatte-ita ikusen no yoru to
modoranai toki dake ga naze kagayaite wa
yatsurekitta kokoro made mo kowasu...
hakanaki omoi... kono tragedy night
kono tragedy night

I'm all alone in the big city,
thrown away like an empty can.
If love is love until we know everything about each other
Then let's sleep forever...

Until the world come to an end, we won't be apart.
I wished it for countless nights
Why does the past destroy
even the worn-out heart that shines?
Melancholically fleeting thoughts... on this tragedy night

And so, people seek an answer
And lose something that's irreplaceable
A city filled with desires, even the stardust
in the night skies doesn't shine on us

Before the world comes to an end, please make me listen.
A catastrophy well suited to a flower in full bloom...
While everyone wishes, no one believes in eternity.
...Even so, they certainly dream about tomorrow.
Short-lived days and... this tragedy night

Until the world come to an end, we won't be apart.
I wished it for countless nights
Why does the past destroy
even the worn-out heart that shines?
Melancholically fleeting thoughts... on this tragedy night
This tragedy night
Then I realize just how small Singapore was, and I was in an extended network with the RJ-girl-who-shall-not-be-named. My friend have the whole set of Slam Dunk vcd and she's planning on rewathing it this holidays. I realize I might have taken this holidays a little too seriously, I need to learn to relax a little. Being a little late to save my junior's friend's laptop, I set out to met my junior you lives in my room last year. Going there is always a walk down memory lane, since it was my heaven last year. Though the corridor looks the same as my current block, there was something different about it besides the view. It must have been the memories. Memories of last year starts flowing back into me.

Actually I could have saved the laptop without even going on-site, but I have decided to do so because I wanted to see the cluster again. Besides, I also wanted to see what the virus does, because according to my junior's account, it is a very funny virus. It was really interesting though. Here's what it does. You start Firefox browser, and you get an error message saying, "I don't hate Mozilla, but use IE, or else..." and then it quits.

Most people's reaction was that, "IE has a fan?". I am not exactly a fan, but I use IE, because it works. Some people's reaction was, "Bill Gates must be behind this.". I guess all the virus writer wanted to show was that Mozilla Firefox was not as safe as you think. When you are online, nothing is really safe right? Thankfully, at this age and time, you just do a simple Google search and the answers stares back at you. Getting rid of the virus was fun! =) Caught up with my junior as well. It was truly an interesting day that made me more optimistic.

Wai loved you at 11:59 PM

Friday, December 14, 2007

The face(book) of day 5

Don't know why I got into this habit of putting a good day, then a bad day. I didn't accomplish much today but since I was new to Facebook, I spent the time trying to use it properly and I thought that was a fine use of time. However, I run into more problems as I think either the latest Windows Update screwed my IE6 (finally after 15 months) or was it the double blue screen of death I got from Second Life that was the problem. The culprit I am suspecting is some Cumulative Security Update for IE6, that I currently cannot unable to check the KB code.

It gave me random crashes and frustrates me greatly. Blogging was difficult too because my browser can crash any second. The only pattern I see is the the problem module causing it is urlmon.dll. That didn't amount to much except me suspecting the update or the blue screen crash corrupted it, but I cannot be sure. There are a few other modules that are dependent on this module, so it could have been the victim of the problem instead of being the problem itself. Luckily I could still Google, and found some possible solutions to it. So far none worked yet, and most of the solutions date back to errors caused by IE5.5 and Windows 98.

I am still very very new at using Facebook. Sometimes I remember I wanted to do something, and saw it the night before but all of a sudden, I cannot find it. Frustrates me because I'll end up clicking here and there and getting no where. After a while I got used to it and know where to find what I want though I spent quite some time. Must have been because I am getting old.

There was another thing that overwhelmed me. Adding friends. All of a sudden I must have gotten some mental block or something, because I don't know where to start recalling my friend's name. It was overwhelming since I guess I have too many friends in the course of my life that my brain can remember. So I thought I'll start with the recent ones, and those that invited me into Facebook. Those were fast enough, one click and they are added, but I guess the most neat thing is the small window that says, "You might know these people!" and list a few friends. That thing is very accurate so far, always listing people whom I know.

The rest of the day was just spent refreshing the window, see a few names I know, add them, then refresh again. After a while when it gets inaccurate, but another friend have added you and then window will have new people showing up. I must admit that thing was rather well designed. Another thing that I thought was neat was the mutual friend thing. Next time, you know who you can ask to a barbeque or gathering together.

I think Facebook should allow you to view profile picture in full before adding friends. Most of my friends were Chinese and if you search their name, sometimes a few people of the same name shows up. Worse is that they don't have a profile picture and don't allow you to view their friends. How would you know if it's the correct person? Equally bad is profile picture is a group picture. Coupled with the small size of the thumbnail, I can never see the faces properly. Of course, then there are those people with out-of-point profile pictures.

I am new but hmmm, sometimes the frequency of notifications annoy me. I was just trying out editing profile right, and seeing the available options and soon I found my mini news feed saying I have updated this and this and that. Hey, I was just experimenting around. Maybe I should just draft first then one shot change all, for the clean and neat mini-feed.

I also realize I am a rather nerdy 'Facebooker'. While my friends were fascinated with the ability to poke, play games together, ask questions, share books, links, videos and generally chatting, I realize I am fascinated by things like the friend finder I described above, mutual friends and social timeline. Yes, social timeline. Remember I started a blog because I am forgetful and would like to remember things that I don't want to forget but might forget one day? Social timeline is like that too. Therefore, I kind of put quite a bit of effort to get the timeline right. Yeah, I am a wikipedian. Social timeline is like another of an encyclopedia of me and my life. I want to be able to find from where and when I got to know this person.

Just an idea, but guess I shouldn't say it out now. =p People can easily copy ideas right? Wait till I developed something like that then I can share. =) How about an even more extended social timeline?

Eep, the online documentation currently only contains desktop application and web application but not yet the applications that you add to the profile. Guess I have to wait some more, and am tempted to ask people who developed applications how they started and what they used to develop them. I suspect knowledge of PHP and SQL is needed. Sigh, why haven't I started earlier in my life?

Wai loved you at 11:12 PM

Thursday, December 13, 2007

The pictorial journey of day 4

I woke up early this morning, and was convinced that I am going to do a lot for today. I even made appointment with Jason to make sure that I get out of my room. The weather was nice and warm! Finally I think it was the first day where it hasn't rained. However, I met with a few interesting problems along the way. Interesting!

The night before I thought of what I was going to wear for the day, and I was happily bathing and then went back to my room. Eek! The shirt is missing. I looked high and low for it. Perhaps it was a blessing in disguise. I ended up emptying my whole cupboard and folding everything nicely back. Oh no, I may have lost the shirt. I still remember wearing it recently. The exams must have dazed me somehow. Come to think of it, the exam week went pass like nothing significant happened. I know I was feeling like at the bottom of a bottomless pit, that's all. Dark and helpless.

Oh, Jason met with interesting problems too. He said he threw his last pair of socks into the washer then started it. So he was left with none. Well, we were both going to be late anyway, but I was happily packing my cupboard. Then I become very very very hungry, because I have just remembered that I forgot to eat dinner the night before. With some gastric pain, I set out for Clementi. Actually I could have ended the gastric pain earlier by eating downstairs, but I miss Clementi's food. The fine mood and the great weather of the day was spoilt by the bus that never came. It did at some point, after everyone got angry. Can't complain too much, it's lunchtime, all the office people were heading somewhere and back.

I haven't been to the mixed rice stall at Clementi Kopitiam for some time. I used to think it was expensive, and ate really sparingly, but due to the 'ayam penyet' disaster the day before and my more refined definition of 'value', it felt like it was a really good bargain. They haven't raised the price since this Kopitiam was renovated, some years ago. I think it was around five years ago. It was still S$3.20! With extreme hunger, I gobbled up, and was reminded of the great taste. Now I see them differently. It is definitely a good buy. Let's hope they don't raise their price anytime soon. Actually I felt bad, because I didn't wait for Jason for lunch. He is probably hungry too.

He arrived and we went to the arcade. Here is where a flood of memories returned. I also cannot remember when was the last time we raced Daytona 2. Luckily I was just a tiny bit rusty. I get all excited like the Secondary One kid I was. I somehow managed to remember how the arcade looked like when I was Secondary One. I wonder if going back for sight-seeing is possible. Secondary One is like, seven years ago. Once of these days I should dig out my old diaries again and archive them. One day... I don't know when, because I am already have a very long list of things to do and accomplish. I should have my own database of things to do so that I would be more organized and remember to do things. Who knows, I might even clear it! =)

Daytona 2 was really exciting. Somehow all the skills acquired over the years did not deteriorate much which was good. Every turn met with excited screams from me. If only my academic results were as good as racing. The first race was really close too. I probably lost to Jason in less than half a second. You see, he made a mistake at the last turn, so I catched up. When crossing the finishing line, my car was faster than his because he had to accelerate from a slow speed again. I should have took a photo at the finishing line! It also got me to start to sweat. I haven't have this kind of fun and excitement in some time. Much less sweat just by playing an arcade game.

I am amazed, most of the games that were there during Secondary One were still there, minus a few. They do have a few new games too, but they were unappealing to us old school people. Come to think of it, we are now members of the last generation. It was nice to see people still playing those old games. King of Fighters stopped like at 2002 right? What happened in the five years that have passed? Jason played Soul Calibur. Before seeing that same arcade machine we used to play, I kind of forgot that it even existed. I am like so super rusty now, I don't even know which buttons does what. I also forgot all the characters available for choosing, and Jason managed to get to Level 5 even though he was very rusty too.

Took a haircut too, since I thought my hair was getting a little messy. I guess it may help with trying to get a job. =) It is almost time to get a haircut anyway.

Jason needed to meet a friend in Orchard, so in another interesting turn, we took 14 to Orchard. I primarily use 14 to return from Orchard to my room nowadays since it is the most convenient method. Therefore, I haven't rode a bus 14 that runs through Dover Road for quite some time. Today is like the perfect day for nostalgia, the weather and all. Another trip down memory lane, and I see things like Dover MRT station, one of those MRT stations I used to frequent, ACS(I) Boarding School where I spent 6 full years, and the route which I ran to ACJC almost every morning.

All of a sudden I find myself in Orchard, and that changed my plan a little. I wanted to get to Jurong Point so that I can get to a Maybank ATM for some money. I realized I haven't been paying my phone bill for quite a while, so the master of nagging problem decided I should get some cash from the Maybank ATM and pay. I also wanted to update my bank book to see when the NUS loan came and how much came, then finally I wanted to go do a little shopping at NTUC or any supermarkets. Initial plan was to go Jurong Point and settle everything else in Clementi. I know Holland Village Maybank ATM is nearer but then, it is more convenient for me to get to Clementi and home from there.

Oh well, I shall improvise. Orchard is so huge, there should be everything there. We know that there is a Maybank ATM at Orchard Emerald, and Jason happened to need to meet at friend at Cineleisure. We stopped there, parted ways and I got some cash. Yay! Nagging problem number one, check. Then I need to deposit the money to my POSB account so that I can pay my bill to Starhub. That got me stumped for a while, but I remember when I and Michael was working at Far East Plaza, he used to deposit his daily earnings somewhere nearby. Suddenly it rang a bell, that I can deposit money at Orchard MRT, so I walked towards that side.

Met Dimas on the way to deposit money. Of course, I haven't seen him in a long time, and my chances of seeing him diminishes further after this period because he's moving into NTU hall (and be a hermit =p). Reached Orchard MRT sometime after and yay, I updated my bank book and deposited some money into it, so that's double check. Next, I need to find a post office so that I can pay the bill. Dimas and Jason told me that there's a post office near to the old Singtel Hello shop but I could never find it. Oh well, after a period of unsuccessful searching, went to Plaza Singapura instead, because I remember there's a Starhub shop there.

Upon reaching Plaza Singapura, I see that the queue at the shop is very long, and proceeded to use the AXS station right outside the cinema to pay my bills. Another nagging problem gone! =) Yay! Then I started the instant noodle debate with myself again. Today I shall be the mediator between the me yesterday and the me two days ago. The me yesterday say no more instant noodles. The me two days ago was hungry for instant noodles and wanted to stock a lot to tide through these difficult times. I actually wanted to buy 50 packets of my favourite! Today, I have decided to take both into account and only bought 20 packets at Carrefour in the basement.

I needed some dehumidifier too, because the last one is gone and my cupboard is starting to have a cupboard smell. I met with the huge savings brand with the one dollar coin and they sell six box of those for $6.20. That's mega-cheap considering Thirsty Hippo is going for $5+ for three boxes. (I don't remember the exact price.) Then like the sciencer I am, I decided to check what's the content of the dehumidifier. Both were 100% Calcium Chloride, but Thirsty Hippo have a much nicer packaging and some notes on what it does. When I reached home, I kind of regretted it, but oh well, as long as it works. I need more of those since nowadays my room always flood too.

Immediately had CQYD for dinner and it was great! I usually eat five packets for a meal, but being the Wai Hong with greater self control nowadays I ate only four. Yay, if I eat less and less, the noodles can last even longer, and I wouldn't get fat. However, I immediately felt the aftermath of having four packets of instant noodles with MSG. I should have listened to the me yesterday, and went on to knock myself today in the head.

I realized I forgot to update the latest update on trying to spend only $50 for 20 days. I also realized that I was being a little too optimistic at the start and I have grossly miscalculated. $50 for 20 days is only like $2.50 a day. I wouldn't survive even if I ate instant noodles all 20 days. Anyway, here's the update. Let's ignore the phone bills shall we? Since it is usually the minimum amount anyway.

12th December 2007
$3.50 - Ayam penyet
13th December 2007
$3.20 - Mixed rice lunch at Clementi
$10 - Hair cut
$6.20 - 6 boxes of dehumidifier
$1.60 x 4 = $6.40 (Carrefour is a little on the expensive side)
Remaining credit until 28th of December - $6.20 and I have 15 more days to go. Hooray.

My current favourite instant noodles! 4 down, 16 more to go.
The master of nagging problems even went to get a Facebook account. Yeah, I wanted to see how things were like over there for some time. I suddenly feel so overwhelmed by the vast amount of information available over there. There's like a million and one settings, (Ok, I am exaggerating, but there's a lot a lot of options you have to make before using the account properly) which was fine because I appreciated a higher degree of control. Then come the part where you have to add friends, and you cannot really do anything there without a single friend. Therefore, I am unable to use and explore any features yet to my very young account. Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day. =) I am just happy I got another problem out of the way.

Wai loved you at 10:51 PM

Wednesday, December 12, 2007

Tis the season to be emo (Day 3)

Well, you probably know that I am not in a writing mood today, but I felt that I really should finish today's business before advancing a new day. There must be certain magic about the video below, because even though the people are totally unrelated to me, I am tearing. It was perhaps the last stage of my life where I really had a guide.


Another trip around the sun, and we are now J5s.
I wonder if the trying to rob the planet of angular momentum thing really work. Hear me out, I learnt this from another nerdy cartoon strip. =) We could possibly stomp on the floor when we know that we are directly above the orbit's line of action, to slow it down a little, so that we can have a little more time, as an ACJC student. Before we get to the part in figuring out whether it would work or wouldn't, why not imagine how nice it will be if it worked? =) (Ok, we all know it doesn't work, but don't tell anyone! I am a dreamer after all.) J5s! Rock on!

If you're leaving will you take me with you?
Nobody knows how it's gonna be. I felt these words were strangely true. Even though I am partly surviving NUS, I felt that I was without guide, and I was thrown into this without knowing the expectations. I never knew how to do things right, though I am becoming wiser as I have taken yet another semester so I can do better in the next one. I never knew why I have to do things I do. Is it because someday I have to please some employer? I don't think there are many people standing by me, but maybe it's karma, as I am rather shy myself. (See, it goes one full cycle.)

That aside, this is really the season to be emo. Why? I heard just a few days ago, ACJC had their prom night this year. The year is coming to an end, so people are reflecting on the year that have passed. (Wait, the year haven't ended yet!) It's packing time, and you run across things that you have never seen in months, to be reminded of things that you never wanted to forget. I have a hard time trying to dispose of somethings. Just today I ran into somethings that have survived my evaluation every end of semester and I still keep them. I ask myself every semester, "Are they still worth keeping?". "Are they?". "Are they?".

Today has been a bad day. (I was going to say shitty.) However, things weren't always that way. I started the day great. Even though it was drizzling all day long, the sun actually shined, and it was warm enough. That's like the best possible weather you can get right? I wasted almost no time. Well, almost. I sent laundry, so that was like one nagging problem down. The pile contained clothes I wore the night I fell down bad, and even before that. How horrible was that? If you were wondering why I survived, it was because I wasn't actually in my room for a good duration of the exam period, and there's laundry there.

More importantly, the day seemed like a good day to go back to ACJC, and riding on the success of the day before, I planned multiple things that I wanted to get out of the way. It even included things like going out to hoard lots of CQYD instant noodles, update my bank book (since a very long time), pay my phone bill (as well). Of course, there's many more and it didn't felt like I was overworking myself. However, there was one catch. The Yong Tau Foo aunty notified me about the 'ayam penyet', so I am like one of the first to know, and strangely feel a little obliged to try it. I am also curious since I am a sciencer. =p

You see, the name itself sounds dubious, even though it was recommended by some of my Indonesian friends. The name can mean anything from 'flat chicken' to 'flattened chicken' to 'pressed chicken'. I didn't know what was in store for me. There was no picture for me to point to. Laptop wasn't present at that time, so Google and Wikipedia was out of my reach. I was excited, since it was recommended it must be nice right?

I sort of regretted it right after. First it was $3.50, I am not that calculative, but it was rather expensive for me, so that adds up to my dissatisfaction if it was dissatisfying. If it was worth my money, then I wouldn't have brought this up. =p The lady (oh yeah, I should stop using the word aunty, I don't think she's that old) notified me that sambal is extremely hot, so I told her to put less. She could probably infer than I am not a person for extreme hotness, as I never told her anything about my chilli tolerance. Hey, it looked like fried chicken. Flattened fried chicken. At best, it would taste like, very good fried chicken. What can I describe the taste as? Taste like chicken lo. No sauce, except for sambal. Tasted rather bland, but maybe because they were the Yong Tau Foo stall, no.1 for healthy food. Sambal was really hot so she wasn't joking.

Win some. Lose some. It was with regret that the victory yesterday had resulted in the defeat of today. Maybe I cannot be too greedy, but we can always work for the better right? I know it is all give and take, but we should give our best and take only what we need. So, I sacrificed some sleep to fulfill more on day 2. On day 3, I was dizzy and dazed, unable to think properly. I always knew staying up a little more just because you want to finish something immediately was a mistake. I just wouldn't realize it until the next day. It didn't help that I got two nose-bleeding incident in the same day, and a pimple outbreak.

I confuse myself sometimes. What is the difference between the me today and the me yesterday? I think we were both the same. The me yesterday would probably done things the same way as the me today. Wait, are we really the same? Maybe the me today have seen the light. But, the me yesterday have seen the light too. Yesterday was today! Decisions were up to me to make, but I once again overwritten what I have decided yesterday. This is not even being fickle minded. I just decided that the decision yesterday was a bad idea. Maybe the decision yesterday was a good idea, because the decision today resulted in procrastination. Problem is, I wouldn't know until today is over. (Or almost over.)

Recently, whenever I am hungry, I think of CQYD instant noodles. I had the privilege of gobbling up 20 packets in 2 days during the exam period. Trying to save as much time as possible, so that I can do as well as possible. They tasted really great too, so much so that they are above Indo Mie now. =p Maybe it is because when you are hungry, everything will taste great, but I miss the taste and the feeling. It's like when I am hungry, I get the phantom taste on my tongue, making me miss it even more. Maybe they put in some additive chemicals eh? =p It was only $2.30 for 10 packets, and I was thinking of getting 50 packets to last me through this season.

That's when the problem comes. That was the plan, a beautiful one, for my stomach as well. Then today I decided against it. Maybe it's because of all the packing and looking at nostalgic things. I got reminded of my long-term policy about instant noodles. I always tried to avoid instant noodles and I was successful until end of JC. What have I learnt in university? Eating instant noodles. I know they taste nice and they save a lot of time, but I have a good track record of MSG (non)consumption, so I am wondering why I am throwing that out of the window. Just the thought of it, I think I just lost a few hair.

Maybe the me tomorrow will throw this out of the window, and present new arguments why this was not feasible. I know I made up my mind. Therefore, I was just thinking about what was going on in my mind the day before. Amuses me, to know that I am me. Maybe it's the twice nose-bleeding that's making me think it was a bad idea after all. Am I me after all?

Too much packing, and hence seen too much things that have a lot of sentimental values. I do not wish to throw them away, but keeping them would mean I have a lot of things to move when the time comes. Lots of things to pack too. I try to keep these memories, and document them here. See, I started a blog because I am a forgetful person. I stumbled upon some old entries and... I guess you know. I should keep as much as I can, no matter how small. Here's some sweet things lately.

I thought it was very sweet! I guess you can see why. Anyway I editted out the name to protect people's privacy since I didn't get her permission. I can give you a clue though, her name have the same number of characters and rhymes with 'sweetness'. =) Unfortunately I am no accountant. Maybe next time. Just when I am typing this post, in fact just minutes ago, someone actually messaged me to find out if I really got dengue. The doctor didn't reply me, so I guess I'm safe. =) Thank you all for everything.

Wai loved you at 10:39 PM

About Me

Wai Hong is currently an undergraduate student at National University of Singapore. He majors in Computer Engineering at the Faculty of Engineering. He is a member of the forever sixteen :) club since he was sixteen. He was lucky enough to end up in Anglo-Chinese School Independent and then Anglo-Chinese Junior College, where he spent his best years and still looking to spend more best years. He was born into the world on 16th October, sixteen years ago. =)

Angel * Carol * Esther * Michael * Mindy * Samantha * Seraphina

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