haha! just so it doesn't say "last updated 12 weeks ago (3 months?!)"...

HULLO to anyone who cares (: hullo from the 'camp-site' at the State Library, which i declare the best library i know!

Well... updates over the last 11 weeks:

- i've been going to church, and even cell (for a very limited period of time). i still cannot call myself 'religious', and am still uncertain i want to.

- Chong was here, and we went skiing. At least Li and Chong did... i went... to the snow. Enough said.

- i missed Trashie's 21st (among the many others in the year)

- Slim and Kt were here. WHERE ARE THE REST, huh??!

- Li's sweet (not-so) little bro stayed with us for a week+ (and i have come to the conclusion that i can never live in a small place with any guy... ever - even if/unless he's insanely ridiculously hot,funny and 'domestically-trained', oh and doesn't go 'trigger-happy' with the telly remote)

- Attended Mel Chew's and Wong's grand ol Twenty-firsts.

- i kept up my ridiculous-ness of hours days without sleep over assignments.

- did not celebrate turning the 'big' 2-1 in a big way; not with the (whoever-the-hell-invented-concept-of) exams looming.

- what else? oh i'm listening to Devendra Banhart, Voxtrot, Mark Ronson and One Republic on repeat... i LOVE the lot of them and almost feel bad for having dl-ed the music. hey... i can't find the albums here!!

- i'm currently indulgence-starving myself and short of biting (what's left of) my fingernails over the state of my bank accounts.

- if i swore off shopping and starved myself from now till mid 2009, think i'll have enough for grand grad travel?? (by "grand", i mean kilometres-wise, 'budget' might be fine)

- have yet to discover the big deal about turning 2-1

Melbourne International Film Festival is on a roll. Very good reviews of most flicks and it all looks like fun! The best thing about it is that it's so very well-organised and there's no artsy-fartsy pretense about all of it.

Siti and i made it to the showing of Rescue Dawn at 9pm last night. That movie revolves around an aircraft pilot crashed and then trying to escape the Viet jungles during the Vietname War. Yeah sounds dreary huh. That easily put Li off right away. But i'm glad i got dragged to catch it. It's good. Not in a righteous over-ly intense way that anyone would expect from the 'War' movies. There were decent smatterings of humour amidst the whole ideal of human survival. It's one for the boys for sure. But hey how difficult is it for girls to watch Christian Bale? haha. i do almost worry for the state of his well-being though. What, the guy has a history of extreme method-acting and lets himself wither away for a meaty role (Machinist) and then pile on the kgs right after for yet another (in a more literal sense) meaty role (Batman, duh). Yeah we get it, he's a pretty sight most of the time but clearly no flesh in the pan. Does he really have to try so hard to prove that?

Anyways, part of the fun (for me at least) is seeing the people who go to watch each movie. i mean, Siti and me, we're like the amateur-movie buffs who watch nearly everything and anything that so much as piques our interest. i.e. next on our list is Lagerfield Confidential and then 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (winner at Cannes). So i've said aloud that we'll get a kick out of watching the very different sorts of people who'd be coming along to watch these. i've bet her that we'll be seeing guys in the skinnest of black and skinny jeans at Lagerfield and hemp-skirt-wearing bohos at the latter. FY(U for "useless")I - the audience at Rescue Dawn was maybe 70% men with shaggy unkempt hair and/or beanies. it'll be some amusement on the sidelines, you know, to go along with being an pseudo 'art-fiend' haha.

I am pretty excited to see all the eccentricities of the revered Monsieur Lagerfield (& wonder if i dare pull off the most un-glam attire of baggy jeans and sweatshirts in his celluloid presence) , also i'm quite a sucker for random movies in foreign languages every once in a while. Will try update ;)

so i'm finally sick for the very first time in urban melbourne! there goes record of not getting sick here but i blame it on an OD of 'asiad-ness'. Yeah! that's for yanking me into on of those "asian nights". whyy? is there really a need for such a night? and i'd think that that would just be an indication for a night to avoid a place! okok i AM asian. and proud of it too (most times anyway)! or let's put it this way, i'm sporean asian. sometimes i think there's just a tad of difference and no, i cannot elaborate. not in so many words that i cannot bear to type out right now.

i haaatte being down with the flu. it is easier to breathe and less sticky with perspiration here though. haha. useless info but yes, it's a teeny-bit less torturous to be sick over here. BUT i'm absolutely sick of the synthetic 'orange' taste! must everything, and i mean absolutely everything, that contains ascorbic acid aka vitamin c have to taste of orange???!! why can't they taste like... guava? or kiwi? or berries (blueberry? cranberry?) yeah! those things contain as much, if not more antioxidants/vit c than oranges... hell with the tangy citrus taste that ultimately put blisters on my tongue.

on a brighter note of 'Finality'... guess who can finally drive legally!!! but in the midst of this flu-ey existence or maybe after all the expectations each and every time over the last three years, it's very anti-climatic. but that's a piece of plastic i'm clinging onto for dear life!

Hallejuah!! i passed all the semester! i passed i passed i passed!!! i don't know how but it's a bloody pleasant surprise shock but i freaking passed! that's all i could ask for right now =))

A stupid lapse in judgement has earned me a new friend (& don't we all know how thrilled i get about 'new friends' haha). Yeah some guy i've never been particularly partial towards to decided it's time to claim that coffee i owe him for his marginal help on an assignment, you know, since it's the damned holidays and i must be so bored. Now he's got my full name, must think we're super 'buds' now and added me to Friendster, which i have already abandoned some time ago so... oops :P

okay he's nice-ish enough but i don't like nice-ish enough when we've got nothing to talk about and cannot take hints to walk away. when i think about what was actually said over those couple of hours... i almost feel bad that i really wasn't angelically nice at all. yeah yeah so i'm hardly ever "angelically nice" but i'm not sure about 'civil nice' either. For starters i don't remember ever having told so so many lies within such a short span of time directed at one person just to get home alone. oh and spoke to a couple of voicemails for... what ten/fifteen minutes. Yeah i did question my own sanity at those times. OH! this was actually such a P.L.town stalking thing! (those in the know would (should?) know exactly what i'm talking about). Guys, sometimes you just gotta know when your welcome has been exhausted, you know.

Besides making stupid judgement errors and avoiding more to come, i've been thoroughly enjoying solitude and reading indoors while the weather gets cranky out there. (YEAH girls... get back here now!!)

But boredom strikes and what's a girl to do? clearing out all the outstanding bills and credit payments, and then accummulating a new round of debt - that's what. yeah dammit my credit limit is gonna be tight again this month. oh but a very special mention for my special achievement of today: chilli! Well the story is this: i've been poring over N. Gaiman's book American Gods over the last couple of days, and very early on in the book there's a description of 'chilli' - the mid-western meat-in-sauce kind. Which got me craving ever so badly for a&w's chilli dog (they still exist??)! So here i go, in the name of boredom and ridiculous craving... i cooked up that 'chilli' from that 'recipe' in a friggin novel!! (a very good book but not 'Domestic Goddess' reference material mind you). eh... just so you know... it turned out pretty damn good ;) and so it is now the perfect accompaniment to my weekend of junk food while i indulge in 22 hours of Live Earth concerts! haha ooohh yeaaa....

i've only woken up less than an hour ago but right now i just wanna curl back up in my lousy single bed and go back to sleep, and sleep like a baby. You know, proper sleep. To sleep like one of those disproportionate allometric-developing things would be pure heaven. When i'm envious like that, you know it's bad. i desperately want to knock myself out for a proper dream-less sleep.

i've just been thinking how exhausting my life is. Obviously relative to some of the masses out there, i'm very fortunate and probably have absolutely zero right to whinge but why does my life feel like this... meandering river. That's the best analogy i can think of at the mo. Barely can anything at any point in time of my life flow smoothly without some attrition of sorts.

Just cos i have to vent and lay out just a few of the outstanding grumbles...

Driving - why can't i just bloody hell pass??! i've pretty much known how to drive for the last two and a half years but have nothing to show for it because of this little thing called the practical test that i can.not pass. i swear - one more shot and i'm through. those darned cab companies can start making me a prioroty customer pass or something.

Exams - always always get me down. My grades looks mediocre at best because as we all know it, exams always count more than anything else. Stellar grades on assignments are that insignificant when the final grade just looks... blah. Shouldn't the result be positively related to the effort put in? How is it that the one unit i'd consistently slogged at the entire semester, done 15 past exam papers and am pretty sure i know the stuff, is the one unit i'm convinced i'm gonna flunk? the paper is haunting me. The blur that was the three hours in the exam hall. The blank that my degenerating brain registered. i can completely recreate the entire exam paper from questions i've seen and done but can't remotely imagine myself passing the paper. i swear it's eating me up.

At the end of the day, i just let myself and everyone who cares enough down. It's so much simplier to have absolutely no expectations and be content sailing through a mediocre life, with mediocre grades, mediocre everything.

and then, the best thing that's happened to me all year may just be snatched away just like that. Europe. Due to the time extent on my student visa, apparently the EU consulate will not grant me a visitation visa, which means Europe is a no-go. To renew my visa would incur medical check-up costs, renewal of the health insurance cover, application fees and admin costs, all of which would come up in excess of a thousand. oh, and first i have to somehow get the time extended on my course enrolment, which i'm not even sure is remotely possible.

seriously, tell me why i wouldn't want to just be swallowed up or just be drugged off to sleep for the longest time? i really am too tired.

Muahahaha

Just cos...
roulade :

"Whatever you do, just make sure you don't allow mesunderstood to get her little hands on a copy, ok? ((:"

ok! ((:

So today is one of those days that makes entries like the previous one seem positively silly. i must have been a good girl... very good girl(?). kay asie from the four online stores added to my 'Favourites' list, i reckon i've been quite the angel. cos today... aside from the early very pissy meeting with the "Frenchman" who's just too damn non-committal to be remotely helpful... it's been a damn good day =))

Hellooo... Cable tv! Well all 5 measly channels of it. but hey... i celebrate variety.

and...

Hulllooo Europe!! Got a confirmation on my acceptance for the study program! i'm as thrilled as can be about it. So... Bern! and Edward K.... i'm sure we could work something out, you know, instead of July '08!

and thus, Li, i was not bouncing up and down just because of Cable tv okay... not that the girl would actually see this but i just felt i had to justify all that prancing. haha!

Goddamn... Life sucks, and almost unfortunately still goes on.

If i were you, or you knew me, you wouldn't get your hopes up cos i just tend to flat-out disappoint people. It's just something i do, and i'm just so damn good at it.

I just submitted the worst assignment ever... and possibly spent the most time on it than i've ever spent on any other. i hate being anal about anything but handing in work of highly dubious quality definitely bugs me. In high school and jc and all it'll be just essays and blah... i'll willingly stay up late into the night to get them done the best i can. These days it's those assignments i cram in the very last minute. Hell so far so good... i can't quite complain about the grades i get on them which i actually really do depend on for decent overall grades. Goodness knows i completely stuff up exams... yup whole life same damn thing. Exams... just not my thing.

THIS last assignment... ridiculous. Unbelievable. Maybe it's just me and i should totally be absorbed into the textbook in the run up to exams cos i sure as hell don't know what i just handed in. Excluding the fact that i 'accidentally on purpose' forgot to attach a pretty important Appendix... you know that one i spent more than 3/4 the time spent on the entire thing and still couldn't produce, apparently i was supposed to hand in both the hard and soft copy of the assignment. Which i didn't find anywhere on the assignment instructions or in the unit guide or in the unit outline but scribbled in a little corner of some set of lecture notes from weeks ago. Uh huh i could go on ranting about the bitch that was that assignment. Don't even get me started on accounting and reporting, ans the jobs of auditors...(Damn you!) So yup i'd better just shut up, prep for a shite grade and then its mugging aplenty for the exam.

i gotta just love how i got to slack through the first seven weeks for the semester and from now till the 26th June it's full on, fifth gear, head spinning work. So with the first assignment done and out (and shit), i've got plenty to make me get over it. Here's hoping i have time to think before, during and after banging out each piece of work. Assignment, test, presentation, presentation, assignment, assignment, and oh, exams. And that is the story of my life in the weeks to come...


p.s. Siti- it's gonna be some lonng noisy weeks of rants, grumbles, profanities, sarcasm etc etc and whatever the hell else i do. Please be ready for S.O.S shopping =)

Just because the previous post made me ultra pissy...





Treesje Lotus Satchel in Choc
Seriously yum...



Steve Madden Patent Black Winged Charm




Steve Madden Loiss pumps


Much better. =) Yup, JUST COS.

All i can think of is "are you kidding me?!!! Explain to me in 100 words or less what in the entire logical universe justifies all these chunks of cash flowing into the governments' pockets. No Seriously, 25% (60% by '08)pay-rises for ministers and 14-33% for 'top civil servants'... what the hell is that. Budget surplus bursting the Treasury at its seams huh? Er hullo there're the poor to feed here, there and everywhere! Adopt a little Third-World country for goodness sake.

Damn you Mother dearest for even mentioning it to me, and hence me bothering to look it up. Now, feeling nothing but sick to my stomach and absolutely void of all patriotic sentiments, pride, regard; feeling disappointed, disgusted and annoyed. i could have been blissfully unaware and ignorant. Blissfully.

What else could add fuel to the flames better than the "official" reasons or excuses for these actions presented by very representative figures... Try a few of these headlines on for size: "It's not just about pay, it's about securing bright future", "For reality check, compare their pay with that of bosses", "What companies on the ST Index pay their top executives", "What is immoral about paying people what they are worth?", "Set private sector standards for public service: MPs", "Retaining talent for a first-class civil service"...

FOR REAL???!! How about comparing like-with-like? What are the governments of the US, UK, Europe, Aussie etc paid? What about those of say Switzerland, Finland, Hong Kong, S. Korea? Seriously how about comparing these people, governments, with similar responsibilities, and especially for the latter four, with similar problems. The companies on the stock index have to pull their weight with profits, while the government which pulls its weight around for sure, is financed largely by taxes of say two million taxpayers. Aren't the Spore government people already the highest-paid in the world? If we're looking at the same thing... these "public service/civil servants" are supposed to be about service to and for the people right? They sure aren't on all fours, serving on the people hand and foot, living the lives for poor tortured but impassioned souls who are the spokespeople and saviors of the needy. Hell, no. What's immoral is asking people to almost pledge their heart-felt support for all this. And then there's the underlying global concern about the widening income gap, the greater disparity between the rich and the poor... hmmm wonder why... And speaking of 'worth', how exactly is that measured here? Are they saying politicians are basically of higher 'worth' than every other person on the streets, than the farmers, than the teachers, the street sweepers? Sure sounds like it.

oh yes, and civil servants ranked lower on that 'scale' are merely "kindly informed" that they get a 10% per cut from when they reach sixty till they reach sixty-two when they're expected to retire. So is that a matter of 'worth' too?

i could rant all day and honestly not come up with a conscionable and logical explanation for all this bullshit happening. And i will have to rant because This(that) is what i get to look forward to coming home to - a society being told what to think and believe, essentially run by a group of pseudo-moralistic, questionably-intelligent, definitely over-paid bigots.

You can keep trying to tell yourself to believe in what you're trying to believe and have others believe until you actually believe in it all.

i finally have to admit, retracting everything i've ever said... John Mayer is very very cool, extremely talented, etc etc etc. In fact, he is arguably The unparallelled musical genius of his generation, if not forever. The John Lennon (+ Sir Paul) (can't satisfy myself with just one) of this day maybe. Oh and a guitar demi-god. Those skills on the guitar were sick sick sick!

Yup the man in concert is amazing. Smack centre on the floor seven rows from the stage... very very very amazing. If its any indication - the guys in the audience were more vocal than the ladies. Waaayy more vocal. If not a tad disturbing. i'm guessing the way he rocks the guitars, the girl he's dating... the guys just wanna be him.

Still, short of staring with your mouth gaping wide open... it's completely mind-numbing the things he does to those guitars. Very cool guitars too, all twenty-two of them onstage. i swear i will not and cannot get his guitar-playing out of my head, not for a long time. R.E.S.P.E.C.T. (Especially since i tried learning, it hurt my hands and i promptly gave up and forgot everything)

Oooh yeah... my playlist will be on repeat for a while...

EY!! it should be bloodly illegal for weird strangers apparently randomly asking you a very stupid, very annoying question right???! "Are you Indonesian?". What... The current count stands at two and that's just about two too many. Once in school and once in a very public shopping mall. That's considered harassment no? One more time and i will so call the Indo embassy and ask what on earth their guys are doing. That or give those guys a hell of a five minutes of crap and mutual annoyance so they'll wish they never asked. Then again, the obvious choice is... DON'T EVER ASK ME THAT BLOODY QUESTION AGAIN.

So whoopeedooda the week-long(ish) Easter break is here. But so is the worry about assignments and getting down to working on them. i almost take pride in being pretty darn good last-minute workaholic/assignment girl but this time i'm freaked. These massive assignment that are all so specific it's like i'm supposed to have everything taught over the last few weeks, every other thing learnt at Uni, oh and photographic memory of every detail in the financial newsingrained on my skull. The thrills... i'm damn scared. Which makes me wanna shop. Which my bank account doesn't quite allow. Which my closet has no room for. Which makes me feel all too guilty for wanting to shop.

And seriously, who in the darned right mind would want to spend heaps of hard-earned moolah on some piece of treated skin from a dead cow right? Fall prey to the doubly-devilish claws of materialism and consumerism?...

Let's see:


Givenchy Pluto Saddle Bag
- Available at your friendly neighbourhood Barney's (or the like) and other retailers you wouln't approach on a shoe-string budget (or any budget at all).



Givenchy Nightingale
- Ditto above.



Clockwise Left-Right: Poetic Licence, Checkmate; SHUBAR, Love; Lacoste, Ithia; SHUBAR, Lovex3


Hell yeah... i do. It's a sick sick world out there, too bad.

It's a boring Saturday afternoon. By boring i mean i've chosen to be too lazy to head out. Summer is definitely when the Aussies come out to play. Lots of happenings outdoors everywhere and all the cafes/restaurants have conveniently extended themselves al fresco.

We had this AC founder's day/excuse for gathering dinner at St Kilda on Thursday night. A lot of good food and even more nonsense, including singing the school song on the beach. But nothing Melb hasn't seen. This is the crazy month with a lot happening around here. The motor show is in town this weekend so all hail the pretty cars parade down the main roads. Crown casino's lobby has a Ferrari exhibition of all the models since the prototype. Late next week is the Melbourne Fashion Week. The weekend is the Moomba Festival/Carnival. Mar 17th is the start of the FINA World Swimming Championships. Thinking of getting a Day-pass for the synchronised swimming and waterpolo events. See i told you (and you and you and you) March is the time to visit!


So... on the school front. i've enrolled in this unit offered at Clayton's Art faculty (partly out of desperation since my school decided to be difficult) - International Political Economy. It's very interesting and the lecturer is really good, i.e. can talk a lot of intellectual 'nonsense', very well-informed, borderline overly-opinionated shoot-from-the-mouth sort. The lectures are supposedly recorded online and this is the sort of lectures i'd bother downloading and listening to again. Audio-revision - that's sorta counted right? It's amusing. For example, a digression from why US won't immediately attack Iran, "The number of US casualties in the Iraq war is about 3000, should they withdraw? Studies have shown that the number of homicides in Washington Dc is about 4000 a year. So evidently, you're more likely to be killed in DC than in Iraq. US should thus withdraw from Washington". HAH. Yah my lecturers for this sem are good save for the Indian-Aussie lady who's out to bore the life out of me. Then again it is Data Analysis and i probably shouldn't blame her (too much).

Hopefully this is a start to a good year, in which i intend to spend more time with school work, eradicate 6-hr sleep/week occurrences, sleep more, workout more, oh and shop less and be grumps less. Er yeah highly ambitious but worth a shot. Feel free to frequently remind me, and i might just thank you for it =)

When a blog dedicated to the endless stream of glorious 'lust-after' bags bothers to feature photos of a less-than-pretty human being... No kidding! - Celebrity Rumours...

Yup she's gone and flipped multi-dimensionally. i'm not sure how much more it takes to prove you've gone absolutely mental, completely psychotic. i'm also not sure why i care but anyone with one-eyed vision can see someone in desperate need of help.

Just something i just haven't been able to get off my mind.

The strategy: "keep your friends close, and your enemies closer".
i'm talking 'enemies' in the most highly exaggerated of terms here of course. Suspicions are enemies. They make one paranoid and insecure. Competition are enemies. They undermine your position. Do you really want to keep all of these close and 'play-nice'? Or would it be better to cast them faraway?

Can 'suspicions', 'paranoia', 'insecurity' and 'rivalry' become 'Friends' instead of 'Enemies' ?

This strategy in its application on the terms of social interaction isn't likely to work with the questions that will inadvertently arise.

So, what do you want from me?

OMFG... there're mice in my house. Little furry scuttling rodent things. First my bathroom, then my room (i heard something after i turned out the lights and of course jolted up cursing seeing the thing scuttle across) urghhhh fuck! oh yea and then caught sight of one of two in dad's study. double fuck triple.... of course by now the dad has been dragged up. but now i'm supposed to go sleep? How/where? The dad says, "They're little harmless clean house mice la, quite cute also. you have to sleep right". No, not really.

i'm gonna make do with mtv and the couch downstairs. And congrats to my mother... she got her wish: my dad will now be FORCED to clean out his study.

Great great wonderful... Vday is over. Whoops!! For those not in the know, it's my very most dreaded day among the 365 days in the year. For those of you who celebrated it with pink/red gusto, good on you and many thanks for not sharing it with me. Really, thanks. i do still love you very much, you know that.

Now all i need is for the cny to come and go. Pronto. And then... peace shall reign on earth. Well that peace is confined to my little self-centred, ethnocentric world but... it's a start (somewhat).

And now... for ultimate proof of my ridiculous boredom especially since i'm being pretty much under house arrest until the hurricane that is cny blows over... [Thanks to dearest cousin Lenny!]

Your Brain is Blue

Of all the brain types, yours is the most mellow. You tend to be in a meditative state most of the time. You don't try to think away your troubles. Your thoughts are realistic, fresh, and honest. You truly see things as how they are. You tend to spend a lot of time thinking about your friends, your surroundings, and your life.

- i like blue. Thank God my brain isn't Pink!

And then i get greedy...

Butterfinger

They call you sticky fingers for a reason!

You Are a Black and White Cookie

You're often conflicted in life, and you feel pulled in two opposite directions. When you're good, you're sweet as sugar. And when you're bad, you're wicked!

And just for Kiko's info...

You Are Japanese Food

Strange yet delicious. Contrary to popular belief, you're not always eaten raw.

- i guess you've sorta gotta learn how to cook before thinking of eating me. Never know what worms i'm incubating in my tum, you know those that the 'alcohol-kills-all' booze sessions might have missed.

You Have Your Sarcastic Moments

While you're not sarcastic at all times, you definitely have a cynical edge. In your opinion, not all people are annoying. Some are dead! And although you do have your genuine moments, you can't help getting your zingers in. Some people might be a little hurt by your sarcasm, but it's more likely they think you're hilarious.

clearly...


And i just don't stop. This thing's a wunnnerful time-buster LA...

You Are a Bloody Mary

You're a fairly serious drinker, who's experimented a lot with different drinks. You're a drunk, but a stable drunk. You don't ever let your drinking get out of control.

- see friends... worry not =P

You Belong in Milan

Stylish and sophisticated, you want to enjoy a truly European life - away from tourists! Milan fits you perfectly. Great shopping, high quality food, lots of culture... with very little hype.

And finally the ultimate clincher to seal the boredom spree on Blogthings...

What Cheryl Means

C is for Cinnamon H is for Hotness E is for Easy R is for Rum Raisin Y is for Yummy Kiss L is for Lambkin

HAH!!

ok i'm done. For now =)

1. i will cut down on the swearing. It's not cool.
2. i will not pick/exacerbate arguments with my mother.
3. i will not encourage my dad's jibes at my mother.
4. i will stop buying things i will not wear.
5. i will stop comparing Sporeland to Mel-Vic-Oz. (i could, you know, pick on something else 'my' own size, say... Laos? (= ) Nah, i stop. Sometime. Soon.