Life in heels...

Yup I've officially started work :D So u're now looking at the new medical writer ;) Its been a slow couple of days, but I love the people and the company... Everyone's just so nice :D It was a bit intimidating at first because all these people with PhDs and MDs were asking me for input on their projects, and I'm like the baby in the office, as D put it, the 'fetus' :p... But they're so down to earth and fun, and its such a cool mix of ppl :D We've got Americans, Australians, Irish, Malaysians, Singaporeans, British, Indian Americans, and Sri Lankans (yup I have company in that category :D)... We've already booked a couple of days for movies this week and today the girls went out for drinks after work (my boss actually dropped me home! how awesome is that :D), and yday was my welcome lunch... I also got my first new project to work on, and I'm really excited about it :) I came home today and couldn't stop beaming, a total happy high ;) (I strongly believe that one lychee martini isn't enough to make you high :P) Bugis is also a really nice place to work... Because of all the shopping that you can do (they seem to have sales ALL the time :D)

Onto other news, graduation was last week :D It was grand and a really big deal to me, specially having my family there in the audience, and celebrating with the peeps who've been through the last 4 yrs with me :) It was a pity that I missed a lot of my friends who graduated in the ceremony after us though :( Highlights of the event were that someone's sole got left on stage during the first part of the ceremony (this was really funny), the end of the ceremony marked by the streamers and balloons (I thought that was the best moment of the whole thing!) and the picture taking afterwards, which involved throwing our hats into the sky a million times to get the perfect picture, scanning the crowds for friends and posing and smiling and posing some more (pretty tiring I tell u, this graduation business..)

I got a graduation bear from Nips :D I absolutely love her (yes its a her, because I say so :P) and I'm still trying to christen her, but she's happy with the rest in the little soft toy kingdom in the corner of my bed, and definitely looks the most educated :P I've also given my room a new look... A little rearranging and voila, it looks spacey in spite of a double bed and a lot more stuff :$ My posters are up too and this time I have enough wall space ;)

All in all it's been a great couple of weeks.... I miss my parents a lot though :( it was so much fun having them here... And man did we eat... We tried Mexican, Indonesian, Swedish, Swiss, Western, Indian and Thai food, and in between were the little things like kaya toast, buns from bread talk, nasi goreng and roti johns, and sundaes from Haagen Daaz :D Yeah we all have healthy appetites :P

So things have definitely started to look up.. I love my new job and new apartment and life in general, and I'm glad the difficult stretch has passed... Now I just need to hit Ikea to spify up my room ;) I hope I get paid before the sale ends!

The gifted among us...

Erin showed me this vid last night... And i couldn't stop thinking abt it... Take a look :)



It's a bit difficult to follow the talk show host without subtitles, but in short the little 5 yr old girl on piano is blind, and the little girl singing is only 6 or 7 yrs old, and they performed together for this talent show.. :) I'm still in awe :D

The little Korean pianist has never been to music lessons or been taught the piano... She had been adopted by a family when she was a baby and had just started playing the piano when she was 3 :| Here's a clip of her playing "Fur elise" :D (There are more clips showing how she can just follow a tune the moment she hears it)



And the little singer has her own album out! This is her singing "i will always love you" by Whitney Houston.. It completely blew me away :|



Vids like these are just awe inspiring... And they give me the goosebumps every time :)

Moving on...

No no this is not going to be some emo post about some break up or anything :P it's just a fitting title I guess for the last couple of weeks (my avid readers would have noticed the silence :P)
So I officially graduated and moved out of campus last week... And as my housemate nicely put it, it was a BIG step.. I guess I underestimated myself though.. I knew I'd miss campus a LOT, the convenience of it, the familiarity and the feeling of leaving my makeshift 'home' for the last four years, but so far I haven't exactly had a breakdown or anything :P And i don't see one coming up either... Maybe because I absolutely love my new place! :D and I've been busy with work and shifting (hell!) and settling down...
Pictures of the new place will follow as soon as its in a decent enough state to be photographed :P I only started properly unpacking today, and its going quite slow :P I really have too much of stuff :S My housemates are awesome too :D Hehe Natasha is a total karaoke person (she'll kill me if she sees this) so we're planning to hit KTV soon :P For her benefit... I guess the best part about them is they're not nosy or bitchy, and don't calculate stuff down to the last cent... I think that comes with being a working lady ;) And they're really cool and laidback about everything :)
I also officially stopped working part time yesterday... And it was a really cool day to finish with :) the highlight of the day was going to raffles quay, to this french bank to meet the CEO, who also happens to be french :D Hehe so he kept me waiting a bit and entertained me with french chocolates and coffee... And an awesome view from the 42nd floor :D I'm not sure how many ppl actually get to meet the CEO... I mean even my friends who work in the same company don't get to meet them :P
I've also realised from the 150 odd ppl I've interviewed over the last few months, that the top level people, if they're guys, are super nice and really really down to earth... If they're women, they're extremely bitchy and really don't think being nice is a worthy investment... i'm still trying to figure out why :P
I also picked up my gown and hat last week, and was officially declared not to be a student anymore (by way of an alumni card and credit card offers :P) it reminded me of orientation 4 yrs ago, but on a much smaller scale and with less people egging you on to join stuff... It felt a bit sad I guess, but it was more of a bittersweet thing :) Met Seah Fang and caught up with her too, which was great :) I think the part i'm gonna miss most are my friends... I've been with roughly the same group of labbies over the last 4 years and we're quite close, and it's sad there won't be any more fooling around and laughing our guts out and not caring what really happens with the bacteria or the DNA we're supposed to be learning abt :P And i graduate next week!!
My parents arrive on Sunday :D It's gonna be awesome to see them... I'm so glad I get to spend the entire week with them too... I guess that way my new job rocks! :D
I guess all these things changes are a part of growing up and moving on :) I'm not trying to make a big deal of it, b'cos I know it happens to everyone at some point, but that doesn't make it easy all the time either... So if i've been stepping on people's toes lately I'm really sorry :$ I just need a bit of time to get used to everything :)

My holiday job :)

Admitedly, its not so bad :P At the beginning it was a battle to get out of bed (and it still is :P) and i got lost enough times for the rest of this year, but I think i've grown into it or something and i'm actually beginning to enjoy it hehe... though it ends next week :P
I've been on a roll lately... Hanging out at hotels in Orchard and Raffles, interviewing CEOs (yup the CEO of Great Eastern is an absolute darling! the best out of the lot :D), being taken out for coffee a LOT (Starbucks is heavenly and even better when ur not paying for it :P) and cabbing all over the city... And all this while making money and not even working all 5 days :D And the other interns are a fun bunch :) So all in all i guess its abt time i stopped complaining that i'd rather be sleeping ;)

Single girls...

I've come to the conclusion that the single girls I know fall into two broad categories:

1) Those who are actually happy and comfortable to be single, don't have weird issues with men and men related topics, have normal relationships with guys, just haven't found their significant others yet, but aren't depressed or mopey about it either.

2) Those who are single and have issues with being single. These issues manifest themselves in several ways, a few examples being declarations of how men are sad and unnecessary and a waste of time, or of how no guy out there is good enough or the right one or how they'd rather invest in clothes and shoes than in a relationship...I think its what psychologists call a latent defence mechanism... To spare their own selves from the truth... On the other extreme, they just sporadically keep dating but never really commit, and end up very broken at the end.
These girls are a bit difficult to be around, because either there is constant snubbing at couples or men in general, or there are a lot of broken hearts to deal with.

Now this is just something I've observed, because I know girls who fit into both categories, and honestly speaking the ones in the first category are a lot happier and more stable. I'm sure everyone goes through being in both categories at some time or the other, but for their own sake, I hope they don't become a permanent resident in category 2 (it's really not healthy and not much fun to always be so cynical about these things). What's more disturbing is that everyone around category 2 girls, except the girls themselves, knows that they are like this because they don't want to face the harsh truth that they don't want to be single.

There is nothing wrong with being single. It comes with its own merits and freedom, and it only becomes an issue when you start thinking of it as an issue, or start comparing yourself to your attached friends. I'm a very strong believer in the idea that there's a right time and place for everything, and sometimes you just have to wait for the good things in life.

Disclaimer: I'm not trying to be all judgemental about single girls, because I've been single too and I know what it's like. This is just an opinion and a disturbing trend that's caught my attention.

Swedish Midsummer in Singapore ;)

Yup it was kinda revisiting another part of my life, from way long ago, a lot of which i don't remember cos i was too little, but i do remember the maypole and the flowers in my hair :)
Swedish Midsummer is on the 21st and 22nd of June, when Swedes celebrate the longest day in the 2-3 week summer in Sweden. Its the day of the midnight sun too, where you can actually see the sun at midnight in the north of Sweden and other places there.
Erik and Shirin invited Nips and me over for the celebrations :) it was a really good night, and we did everything but dance around the makeshift maypole in the living room (a chair :P) They'd made all these traditional swedish dishes and finger food, and we had mango margaritas and shots of Schnapps, which are these alcoholic drinks with different spices in them. Hehe they went down fast and strong, and i'm still recovering :P
But what was best and most refreshing i think was meeting all those really cool ppl. There was Gustav from Sweden, June who's Singaporean but African-American-Malay, Dave from Leeds, Christine from some Chinese-Dutch-Portugese-Indian heritage, and Kiran, Max, Erik and Shirin of course. I blended in nicely with my hybrid background too ;) They had so many interesting stories about life and the culture in different countries, and I learnt so much just listening to them while laughing our guts out :D
I think one of the mistakes i made in university was not staying in touch with my 'international' friends enough. Maybe its the whole sieged mentality thing when we come here as foreign students and tend to stick with our own for company. But i've learned the hard way that most of the time, thats a mistake, and more often than not, you're better off making new friends :) But that's a story for another time...
All in all, it was a great midsummer night ;) It'll be nice to flip through the old albums at home and see the pics of little me holding hands and doing the 'frog dance' around the real maypole with flowers in my hair and a big smile on my face, and think that even in Singapore, 15 yrs later, the big smile on my face is still there. I just need those flowers... ;)

A peek into the awesomeness of Breaking Benjamin...

"Diary of Jane" (acoustic)



"Breath"



"So cold"


Ok so if the dark and gloomy vids are creepy, u can close ur eyes :P

My bestest friend :)

I sat in my room today for a long time thinking about how far back my best friend Nams and I go back.. We've been friends for more than 10 yrs now, well almost 15 I think, and she's getting married next month :D Some times I really can't believe we've grown up so much...I'm ecstatic for her, and I know that she and Sean will have a really great life together :) Like one of those matches made in heaven ;) I just wish I could be there.. :( I'm graduating the day before her wedding, and my parents will be here that weekend and I would've also started the new job, so I can't fly back for the wedding...

The timing really sucks :( She'd sent the invitations back home in SL and mum read them to me today... Sounds just like Namsy :) She also has a website with all the wedding stuff on it... Made me cry! All those years back in school when we used to talk about our 'future' weddings, I can't imagine hers being any different :) Right now I'd give anything to be there for the big day... it feels almost as important to me as my own wedding day, and this is something we've talked about for ages and its finally here... And I'm missing it :(

That's one of the downs of being away from home I guess... You miss out on a lot of important stuff you swore at 14 you'd be there for, but life happens in the meantime and you just can't make it...

Anyways to one of the few people who's stuck with me through everything for the last 15 yrs, and one of the fewer people who totally gets me and who's been armed with tissues and a shoulder whenever I needed it, I'll be right there with u next month in spirit ;) Love you loads Nams...

One of my idols...

... is Garfield :D I know he's a 'fat cat' and all that, but if u really think abt it, he's also sarcastic, funny, lazy to the bone, and always gets what he wants :D And he LOVES lasangna ;) Which is what makes him so great :)


My other idol is...

*drumroll*

Edna Mode :D For reasons that are pretty obvious ;)


Ok maybe its a bit disturbing that all my idols are cartoon characters :s