winter activities

this week has provided much freezing temperature and heavy snow.. that brings about TONS fo fun activities!!! hehe (yeah.. besides the main dreary purpose of going to school -_-)

went snowfighting in the evening one night and learnt the fine art of sculpting snowballs and whacking them at people's shocked faces... lol.. even in snowfighting you learn alot of people.. some people wait damn long and scuplt a beautifully hard and painful snowball before smacking them at others whilst there are those who can't for life sculpt a snowball and hence resort to shoving fistfuls of snow at people's faces point blank. hehe..


guys.. get ready..

err.. i dunno how to describe this "art-piece"..

then on sat we went to Greek Peak for snowboarding!!! omg, lik sin, if you think cable ski is fun ah.. wah.. snowboarding trumps it 100 times in terms of speed, the fun-ness, the ease, the seh-ness and everything lah! and the best is you don't generally fall face smack onto the snow unlike cable ski, and yeah, you don't need to swim back to shore everytime after you have collapsed into the water..

SO FUN!!! and it's like.. so beautiful.. you sorrta understand why winter sonata was so particularly beautiful with the scenic views upon the chair lifts and just the general landscape.. hehe.. i want more!!!!

of course methinks another great snow time activity would be simply to walk back to campus from church clutching a deliciously warm hot chocolate from ctb and yeah.. just admiring the most beautiful winterscapes one can possibly see in a lifetime..

nice.

ice, ice all around

so its back to the freezing winter of ithaca.. seems like ithaca took a break in the cold department and store power until we all come back, with temperatures dipping to -9 degrees now during mid-morning.

which kinda is bummerish. cos you don't wanna do anything outdoor-ish at all. lol.. like when we were are NYC and were trying to rush for Wicked tickets, the cold was so unbearable joshie went to hiding within the revolving doors.. -_-

oh yeah speaking about NYC.. my dream of skating in Rockefeller/Bryant Park STILL has not been fulfilled.. sigh... (well i guess so is gq's bluenote trip) Bryant Park's pond was being dismantled by the time we reached and Rockefeller skating fetched a shocking 17.50, prompting me to reconsider only brining my gf(when i get one) to there only.. lol

well aniwez speaking of Cornell, everything is white again, the lake is frozen solid and the waterfall looks damn nice with stalacites hanging precariously from above.. =) nice photo-op but haha.. my hands cannot take it.

i'm back @ NYC!

mom/dad, dun worry i'm at NYC le.. but the flight was absolutely dreadful cos i din sleep much and the movies were pretty bad.. lol

ok tired like mad... gonna sleep soon. dun worry =)

hey big spender

was slightly chagrined after meeting with GY and sunny this sun and finding out their err.. impression of my spending. ouch. the euphemistic way GY put it was.. "err.. you have a decent spending power"..

geez. do i really spend >that much? (dun answer that)

well, it's like pple got different shopping philosophy mah.. mine is as long as it fits comfortable and looks good then err.. if sale/no sale then buy lor if really need.. yah IF. lol.. and aniwez i think i've been very very restrained liao this time in singapore.. not spending anything until the penultimate days.. lol.. err.. sigh. nothing to say liao. a bit sad.

well, ok then it's time for a revamp. must really monitor my expenditure and not go crazy over abercrombie sales and stuff since.. yeah as lk puts it, everyone and the toilet sink has a abercrombie tee that probably was bought off cheap from some pasar malam in bugis. geez. talk about product differentiation. haha

well, i will be leaving tommorow to get back to US. had loads of fun here in sg, met up with most people that matter to me =) and yeah.. spent loads of time with my parents! haha.. hopefully they din get too upset with me and my food craze and stuff.

which brings me to my top few food places this visit.

1. chomp chomp!!
claims top spot yet again with delcious stringray-squid-kangkong combo, plus satay beehoon, hokkien mee and chicken wing. not to forget the refreshing sugar cane and nice desserts!

2. food republic @ vivo
wah.. the youtiao and dou hua damn nice.. haha.. kept reminding me of lin jun jie's dou jiang you tiao song when i was crunching the delicious youtiao and eat dou hua.. haha.. the laksa ain't bad too! but ex lah..

3. MOF @ marina sq
haha.. beats me why they picked such a play of name.. (ministry of food), but the japanese food they serve here, especially the desserts are sublime. try the imo + matcha soft serve dessert. swoonsome man..

4. crystal jade korean food
hidden at the top floors of centerpoint lies this damn ex but damn nice crystal jade korean place that serves top notch pancakes and delicious dumpling soup!!

5. crystal jade
omg.. the barbeque pork with horseradish sauce..

6. soup kitchen
haha.. one dish - samsui chicken. nuff' said.

well.. these are the memorable ones.. but well, they are memorable mainly due to the people I went with and the fun times we relished there.. haha..

japan beckons

had a mini-revelation after watching Death Note 2 with KW and Jack tonite..

I SO WANNA GO WORK IN JAPAN IN THE END!!

haha.. misa amane (erika toda) is wah.. so adorable in the movie and wah.. seriously seriously cute. hmm.. plus japan has good food, interesting dramas and anime!!!

haha.. ok.. better stop the gushing.

aniwez, Death Note 2 made me realise a few things. (yeah besides how cute Misa was) For one, you can see how deep the author thought regarding the idea of serving out justice by yourself, and how grey the whole issue is, whereby each turn of the sotry makes you empathize or react in disgust to the antagonist/protagonist's role. there isn't a truly bad person, but people conflicted by issues of morality and justice (well maybe besides some of the people killed by the book)

seems really like the japanese ARE struggling for answers regarding morality and justice. it's telling of something, and i think someone (my sis) knows what I am talking about.

haha.. the deep stuff aside, err.. sis, can u get me stuff from Erika Toda to hand in my room? or like some drama with her.. haha.. she's really cute.

yeah.. more reasons to brush up my jap and head to the land of beauties and rising sun. lol

the one thing for summer...

can it just STOP raining!!?! man.. it dampens the mood, and seriously throws wrenches into whatever stuff that has been planned.. it BETTER not rain tommorow when we go chomp chomp.. -_-

plus it killed my running schedule that i was trying to diligently follow for at least one week. -_- geez...

well, aniwez i realized it might just been time to start planning for stuff like... PLACES TO GO FOR SUMMER BREAK.. (well, at least the remnants of it before summer school)

really, really would like to bunk (eh-hm) in sometime's dorm in UK (EH-HM) and then go to places like Spain, Egypt etc.. wah.. Eurotrip lor.. haha

haiz.. realised this kind of things can plan like mad and get very indulgent within but then without the commitment of others and a core planning group very hard (as experienced in the past).. so yeah.. i'm keeping my fingers crossed and hopefully I'll get a wunnerful summer break man!

lol..

*glances irritatedly at window and at the weak rain.. sigh

things that made 2006

all this is quite overdue.. but since I sorrta still have the time.. might as well reminisce..

1. preparation for sis wedding
im dun call myself the setimentalist for no good reason, cos it feels really good to return to singapore and meet back with my second sis to celebrate such a joyous event such as my sister's wedding. =) it was nice to see the house so riotous and noisy again =)

2. dsta obs
one of the fun-nest periods of my life, including the time after obs where we went cable-skiing, overnight cycling, more sailing, k box and the works.. enjoy sg to the fullest the months leading to my departure to US.. thanks guys!

3. the sending off
i was really touched. that was one of the kindest, nicest gestures for all of you to traipse down to Changi in the early morning of national day to send me off. and the gifts! haha.. will always treasure them (even the finished Godiva chocs.. lol)

4. living the dream - the various NYC trips
NYC's the stuff dreams are made of, and just visiting all the oft-heard places from movies and so on.. brings a tinge of reality into the shows and books that I've read..

5. the NYJC stint
invaluable teaching experience, had real fun tasting what life was as a teacher, marking papers, trying to be strict to students, err.. well.. i felt reasonably accomplished i hope.. lol

6. snowing!!!
years of lost childhood was substituted with the magical, bewitching, beautiful snow-storm that transformed Cornell into the magnificent white winter magick-land. =) and the snow fights.. haha!

well. that's abt it for now.. haha.. aniwez i've given up on resolutions as it is.. cos it's always the same ole things.. hmmz.. sigh.. sometimes i think the core of me is so damned insecure.. but well.. i'm improving (hopefully) =)

missing singapore (soon)

time really flies man.. well.. think i'll miss singapore even more now that i've come back and down a cleansweep of food here and just gone to memorable places.. haiz =)

shopping's tons better, food's tons better.. girls.. err.. haha (i'm not gonna risk getting killed).. but really going to nus today made me very wistful.. lol

haha.. oh well.. i can wonder all i like bah =)

the problem with the name

i finally deduced how my com science score was intially posted an F on JTF, sending me into a panicked frenzy to correct the socre and right my GPA before my scholarship board comes and murders me.. well look at my name.. it's written in US as

> Liheng Chen F

-_-.. which pretty much means anyone who couldn't be more bothered would easily mis-see an F and assume that's my grade. man.. the upside is that hopefully F is so far-fetched from reality that I would be able to detect it immediately.

hmm.. which prompted my dad to want to change my name to Adam. -_-

Well, aniwez, time really flies now that my sis has finally gotten married and has flown off for her honeymoon (hey.. SIA provides free cake for honeymooners..) soon my family will pretty much vanish off Singapore with my other sis flying back to Japan, me flying to US and my parents flying to China.. geez.. another inevitable stage in life i guess...

which brings me to the wedding. really mixed feelings about it, first because I was the banquet IC and was wah.. bustling around worrying about video, worrying about bridal march ins, coordinating emcees, having to put extra chairs for uninvited guests (-_-).. when i finally realised that the hotel people have MUCH better experience and skills in this and handled everything really well.. lol

but the main thing is the idea of losing a sis to another family, to have a familiar face that has shared a home for so many years finally start her own family and separate.. hard to describe the feeling, but i guess acceptance of this fact is yet again another inevitable step as life progresses...

oh well.. pictures hopefully should come soon... me and my sis both agree heartily - that we look much more charming when we actually shut our mouths.. -_-.. hehe

super tired

wah..

*plops on chair*

a wedding can be seriously tiring. hehe.. but i think my sis looks really pretty in her wedding dress =)...

what a wierd feeling to see your sis radiant and happy and getting married to someone relatively foreign.. hmmz

oh well.. i needa rest.. being banquet IC wasn't exactly the piece of cake i was expecting.. haha.. but good experience..

into the maddening crowd

sometimes i'm really glad to be back in Singapore, but tonight is a classic example of what's not so cool about singapore. -_-

went to esplanade area for countdown to 2007, an obvious mistake considering more than half of the singaporeans had a similar intention. hmmz.. so cue the crowds and crowd control people, as well as the sweltering heat and asphyxiating stuffiness associated with throngs of people and switched-off aircons. -_-

and i stupidly wore long sleeves, thinking we were gonna chill at some pub or smth. gee. that's mistake two, because cover charges and generally anything to do with drinks or food were prohibitively high and just irritating considering how you specifically know that you are being swindled since there ain't anything really special about today. man

well aniwez, what pissed me off the most was that we spent an hour plus waiting around the esplanade area, getting squeezed and packed like sardines and getting elbowed and nudged by countless of horrific banglas and fat women to see.. a display of fireworks at 11.00pm that could be mistaken as someone's sparkler party on the rooftop of a building. it was that bad, like some emasculated, pathetic excuse for a firework. not impressed.

so maybe we didn't wait till 12.00 for the true bonaza, but i guess most of us were pretty much irritated and pissed. lol.. maybe only me but heck. but i seriously couldn't stand the banglas elbowing around and just meshing themselves with the human crowd, ESPECIALLY THE DIRTY SWEATY ONES. then fat obnoxious women who similarly throw their assets around and force their way to the crowds should not complain of being molested or groped err.. because you were the one using your assets as battering rams to get past the crowd!?

seriously not too impressed. lol.

but well, the main intention was jack jack birthday.. and bay did the errm.. "interesting" idea of buying everything jack related for him.. cue the jackfruit, jacket, jack daniels, jack and jill chips, jacknife, jack and the beansprouts(for defence against possible bangla attacks).. u get the idea.(i thought it was beyond lame man.. lol) so err.. happy bday jack! everyone have a smashing 2007 as well!

p.s. this is traditionally the post where i reflect on 2006 and stuff.. but a little tired and cranky, plus for the first time i wasnt back at home when it struck twelve (yeah.. i was stuck on the mrt -_-).. so yeah.. coming soon bah. =)