congratulations, you’re caught

haven’t been writing much this week,

caught in the rain this morning even though i had an umbrella.

bad headache now.

seems to have lower immunity this year.

didn’t use to get sick so often in the past.

sigh.

omh,

you haven’t answered my question,

and you backed out on your word.

very bad.

flip it

oh and happy birthday, zhao! (:

haha. it was so fun today! xh, louise and i tried 3 times before we successfully did the grand entrances for birthday parties! the kind you see on tv, when the cake is lighted and you bring the cake in singing happy birthday! haha. the wind was being so irritating and our candles kept going off, so we had to rewind so many times.

the best part is, zhao saw every part of the rewinding and forwarding. haha! so super hilarious. i think xh, lou and i were laughing so loudly while lighting the candles that the entire canteen could have heard us!

oh and xh’s “zhao, look there!” and i grabbing the cake and running off was classic. haha. all xh’s fault, cause she brought the cake into zhao’s sight before we could even do the grand entrance. oh wells. and the party popper kept moving out of target cause of the wind too. haha.

it was so super fun today (:

who knows, it’s yellow too.

a random recollection -

in recent years, there has been much talk about DINKs in Singapore, meaning Double Income, No Kids. but anyway, my parents must be called DIMKs, cause they are Double Income, Many Kids.

so being a double income parents, they had to put me in a childcare centre before or after i go to school, cause there wasn’t anyone to look after me at home. i loved my childcare centre, by the way. and my strong immunity against viruses probably came from there, and i wouldn’t have chosen any other way cause i think childcare centres are always good for a child’s independence.

anyway, there was one evening when my dad was bringing back home, and i was begging him to get me large fries from mcd so that i can eat on the way home. being DIMKs, i think it probably took a lot of begging from me before he agreed. so i was very happy, cause i got my large fries to eat on the way home, and when i got home i have dinner!

and so on the bus, i was just about to start on my large fries while sitting on the old red chairs that sbs buses used to have. i was sitting beside my dad, not of much importance, but still. after taking my first 2 fries, i accidentally dropped 1 fry on the bus floor!

i’m not sure whether i wanted to eat the fry, or i just wanted to pick it up to throw away, but i bent down to try to pick up the fry.

…

and the entire box of large fries dropped onto the bus floor.

… sigh.

my dad was obviously exasperated, and yeah, i suddenly realised the meaning of “giving up the entire forest for one tree”.

i spent the entire bus trip feeling very guilty, and very uncomfortable, mostly cause there was like splattered fries just where my legs were supposed to land. (contrary to popular belief, my legs do actually reach the floor of the bus.)

yeah that’s about it.

but i have always wondered,

what the person who sat on my seat after i left was thinking.

retrieval is zero

my mum’s birthday today (:

oh wells. this few days i’ve been reading xinyang’s book “joy of capitalism”. (sorry xinyang! i’m taking so long to read it =P) it’s so much econs for a non-econs student. so yeah well, it is very interesting, as xinyang said. haha.

one of the lines that stick in my mind say that many people think that profits is a “dirty” or “immoral” thing cause someone loses whenever a contract is made, i.e something is bought. because it would mean that the owner won something, and the consumer lost out.

but the author says that this is not true, cause when the consumer purchases the object, he believes that the object has a worth that is equal to the money that he is paying, or even worth more. whereas, the owner is selling the object for that sum of money cause he thinks that money is worth more than the object.

so both the owner and the consumer gains! (: but this is quite weird, cause it makes me think that one person is correct in his perception, while the other is wrong. haha. realist’s approach? okay not really. but then again, i guess it’s somehow a judgement of taste, and the worth you put on the object/money depends on how much you need it.

hm. for objects, this seems obvious, cause i mean it’s like barter trade, maybe you trade your chicken for the fish, cause you like the fish better than your chicken. but for money, the lines aren’t so obvious, who doesn’t like money? money has a common value to everyone right? cause whether the owner or the consumer has the $2.50, both of them will be able to purchase large fries at mcd.

eh. but then again, i guess people with more money will just think that $2.50 is no big deal, but people with no money would think that $2.50 is a large sum of money. so perhaps, even when the money is technically the same amount, the value placed on it is different.

so weird! but with the same amount of money, you will be able to purchase the same stuff! why would the value be different..? especially since the owner thinks the money is worth more than the object, and the consumer thinks the object is worth more than the money, and the money could be used to buy something else by both of them anyway.

oh no, i think i’m getting confused.  

okay, i think what i’m saying is that whether Mr. A has 500 million bucks, $2.50 would buy him large fries at mcd, or Mr. B has 3 bucks, $2.50 would buy him large fries at mcd too. so the value is kind of like the same right? okay, assuming that Mr. A and Mr. B don’t have other things to buy, it would be the same. oh wells. but the fact is that in the real world, there are other things to buy, so the value of the money would probably differ for the two of them.

uh hm. i don’t think i’ve come to a conclusion yet, but money is such a cool idea, whoever who came up with it. now it saves much more time and effort when compared to barter trade, even though barter trade is more commonsensical. oh wells.

but anyway i was thinking yesterday that “knowledge” is quite a cool concept too. it’s like how when people pass on knowledge, they can’t take it back, but they don’t quite seem to lose anything even when they pass on the knowledge (made in reference to individuals, not talking about secret manuals and stuff).

it would be quite cool if we could trade in ideas! or knowledge. like, let me tell you this… blah blah blah… and you give me a large fries okay? (: that would truly be a cashless society!

yeah, it would probably raise a lot of ethical problems, such as like revealing secrets of your family’s secret wugong manual to like outsiders. or more important ethical problems, like espionage secret information.  

and it would probably face many practical problems, such as like, how to value the ideas, and in the first place, you would have to give knowledge first, before the person at the counter can evaluate it. then there’s not much point in trying to sell your knowledge already right? hm. and like how to keep the ideas etc would be another issue.

hm. apparently trading in ideas isn’t going to work out any time soon. but actually it is already happening in the modern society, just in a very subtle form.

… knowledge is power.

the art of durians

over the past few days, my family and i have been eating many durians. unlike weird people who think that durians are the foulest smiling stuff on this earth, my family and i love durians very very much. but it is not like we always eat durian as fruits for after every meal, we usually only eat when the craving is there, or when we pass a durian stall. which is not very common in singapore. yep.

so anyway, over the past few days, i learned a lot about durians in general. there is actually a culture/art behind the durian industry in singapore. damn cool right!

okay firstly, there is this special thing about durian selling that is different from all the other fruit selling. generally in singapore, durian sellers are durian sellers. as in, they sell only durians. (cause they can make a lot of money as durian sellers!) other fruit sellers sell a lot of other fruits. so actually, there are many unspoken rules about durian selling.

when durians are sold in quantities, like 5 for $10, it usually means that the durians are “bao sek” i.e. “guaranteed ripe” in hokkien. so maybe you tell the durian seller, i want 5 durians. what he does is that he will normally choose the durians for you, and open them one by one for you to check.

i used to think this action was ceremonial, as in like, even if you don’t like the durian flesh you see, you will still have to take it! as in he will push it to you. but after asking my dad (the super durian knowledge person), i learnt that it’s not ceremonial at all!

if the durian is really not ripe, he will throw it away, or give it to you at no cost. since no one’s going to buy the unriped and opened durian anyway. plus, one durian is almost no cost to the durian seller. but the thing is, even if you do not like the colour of the durian flesh, or the texture or whatever, but the durian is still ripe, you will have to pay for the durian! cause all the durian seller is promising you is that it is ripe (:

yeah, which now brings me to the point of when durians are sold in weight. like 10 kg at $25. so usually when durians are sold by kg, they are “bao jia” i.e. “guaranteed nice” in hokkien. actually literally it’s “guaranteed edible” but the meaning is not that. when you buy this expensive kind of durian, the durian seller will open the durians one by one, and now if you do not like the colour of the flesh or the texture or just see the durian bu shuang, you can tell the durian seller that you don’t want the durian! so you can pick and choose until you have the type of durians that you like.

oh and usually the durian seller will ask you whether you like sweet or bitter durians, and durian sellers have some supernatural ability that can enable them to tell whether the durian is sweet or bitter just by knocking on the durian shell with their special durian knife.

but overall, my dad tells me that the durian sellers usually try not to offend the customers, so even if you buy in numbers, they will not force you to take the durians that you do not like, since that means you probably will not come back and buy durians anymore. but the customers also do not try to offend the durian seller most of the time, in case you get cursed by the special durian knife to not have anymore nice durians to eat in your life. or just get like slashed.

interesting right! it’s like some unspoken durian code of conduct. haha.

on a side note, i like sweet durians, and today when i ate the bag of durians my parents bought, there were different types, like peppermint taste, and milk taste! which was so weird, but still very nice (:

ah, the second thing i wanted to talk about is that when people eat durians, they will usually find out that their hands will start to smell like durians for more than 24 hrs. it’s like when you eat during dinner time, and the next day you go to school, you will still smell your weird durian smelling fingers.

that’s cause these people have not found out about the wondrous smell-killing durian shells.

all you have to do is to put one durian shell in a bucket, – okay maybe not bucket, maybe like a bowl? – and soak it in water. then, stick your hands in and wash them clean! after that, wash your hands in clean water. cause the durian shells might be abit dirty. and tadah! your hands will no longer have durian smells!

and if your hands still have durian smell, there are probably some durian fibres stuck in your fingernails. so now stick your hands into the bowl again, and scrub your fingernails. then, wash your hands in clean water again! and tadah! your hands will no longer have durian smells!

but if after these two attempts, and your hand still have durian smells, i think you should leave it. cause firstly, durians are nice smelling, and secondly, it will just be like famous amos, where they advertise that their shops have free “smells”. your fingers will have free smells too! (:

so cool! durians are so special.

maybe the esplanade would inherit some of the special durian culture in the near future. (:

so, take your pick!

“yo yo yo! modern dance and street dance performing at the amphitheatre now! go and check them out!”

“woohoo!”

“i’m not wearing underwear – avenue q”

“so what song do you want?”
“uh.. don’t have.”
“anything else?”
“uh… still don’t have.”
“i choose for you? okay? okay.”

“presenting mr- the one and only mr. siva!”

“sing sing sing!”
“i bet you can sing this!”
“… i really don’t want to sing.”

uh. personal reminder to self – don’t get stressed out during song dedicating/dj-ing sessions. excitement is not good too! it makes your voice more high-pitched than usual. crap.

xinyang, i’m not so sure about the money makes attaining milestones easier. hm. my dad tells me that when you’re at the top, it’s easier to come down. makes sense i think. so is that why money is so important?

but there are some things that you can never get even with the largest amount of money you can think of, like being a teacher at pathlight school. oh wells. i think it depends on your goals, and then it depends on how easy you want to make it to attain your goals (:

passing by; flickering in your eyes

uh hm. i just decided to list down my goals in the future, in case i ever forget. at this point of my life, i’m once again caught up by the fear that i have no idea what i’m going to do in my life, where i am going, and whether i will actually achieve it.

sometimes i feel like i want to be rich and famous, like rich till you can’t imagine how rich a person can be, cause good things always happen to rich people. yet again, most of the times i decide that that’s like really useless, and i really don’t want to be that way. so yeah, at times like these, i kind of make up my mind about how i want to go about living my life, and at this point of time, it seems so real. like how my life should be structured towards living those dreams, but yet again, at other times, i wonder how close i would actually get to living those dreams, and why aren’t i aiming for something more?

but at most times, i don’t want something more. all these dreams seem to be able to fulfill my life very well. but i don’t even know whether i would be able to see them through in the first place.

what i want to do with my life -

1. be a radio dj

2. be a teacher at pathlight school (and the rest of my life there.)

yeah. basically just these 2 goals. “teacher at pathlight school”, i think is something that i want to do for my whole life. i don’t really know how i might change in the future, but at this point of time, it is really very important to me.

now i just have to figure out how to do that.

but i want to be a radio dj too!

i hope my mum’s alright.