I know, it's been months since my last REAL update. Since I got my DS and Wii, I've been devoting a rather huge portion of my time on games. After my return from Thailand on the 17th September, my normal life has been snapped out of track, until lately when things are starting to be picking up slowly again. It was a really enjoyable trip, and it's a wonder how so much fun can be packed into a mere 8 days.

My next trip to Thailand is just right around the corner - just 24 more days away. How can I not get excited?

Found this hilarious webpage: http://www.iselong.com/7/817.htm

Yet Another Boliao Quiz

You Are 55% Left Brained, 45% Right Brained

The left side of your brain controls verbal ability, attention to detail, and reasoning. Left brained people are good at communication and persuading others. If you're left brained, you are likely good at math and logic. Your left brain prefers dogs, reading, and quiet. The right side of your brain is all about creativity and flexibility. Daring and intuitive, right brained people see the world in their unique way. If you're right brained, you likely have a talent for creative writing and art. Your right brain prefers day dreaming, philosophy, and sports.

Are You Right or Left Brained?

Your Superpower Should Be Mind Reading

You are brilliant, insightful, and intuitive. You understand people better than they would like to be understood. Highly sensitive, you are good at putting together seemingly irrelevant details. You figure out what's going on before anyone knows that anything is going on! Why you would be a good superhero: You don't care what people think, and you'd do whatever needed to be done Your biggest problem as a superhero: Feeling even more isolated than you do now

What Should Your Superpower Be?

Looks like it's about 2 weeks since my last real entry, proving how monotonous these 2 weeks have been. It's a routine - working on weekdays, then meet up with friends at night, and then slacking my weekend away. Well, at least the monotony was "broken" when someone crashed into my car on Monday.

I was happily making my way home after a day of hard work, and just after I exited the expressway to my house, I had to make a right turn somewhere. After I made the turn, I ended up on the middle lane and noticed an old scrapyard Mercedes about to get stranded on the left lane as it was blocked by a stationery truck, so out of goodwill, I actually gave way for him to get onto the middle lane even though he was going REAL slow. After passing by the truck, I assumed that he wanted to get back onto the left lane so I waited, and waited. No signal nor action from him. As I would be turning left soon, I decided to go ahead onto the left lane and so I did. Since he was so slow, I eventually caught up with him and was about to pass him by, when suddenly, I caught a glimpse of him signaling left through my side window. A split second later, BANG! Bastard guy had just won a bumper car tournament. Deciding not to block other vehicles, I decided to stop at a bus bay to settle this misfortune with him. As expected, he followed suit.

The moment I got out of my car, I noticed a horrible long scratch along ALL the fenders and doors, plus a small indentation on the edge of my back door. The very first words to get out of his mouth were "What happened?". Wow, I personally assume he must be sleepwalking/sleepdriving then, as he was not even aware of what has happened. I told him he had crashed into my car, and offered him a choice of whether he would like to pay me via insurance or out of his own cash. He chose the latter, and offered $100, which I don't think is enough for even the paintwork to cover the bloody long scratches, let alone the dent. I insisted that we exchanged particulars in order to settle the repair costs after I get it done, but he refused. He even made me a higher offer of $150, and that really set me off, as he was making me sound like an extortionist. Of course, I refused. In the end, we went to the police station, with my brother on his car so he wouldn't run away.

It was simply a waste of time at the station. The policeman attending to us was simply incompetent. He knew that "by right", particulars should be exchanged in the event of a traffic accident, yet he did nothing to enforce it. To make things short, he did not manage to help any of us AT ALL. He simply told us to call our insurance agents to ask if the other party's particulars are needed. We left the station and I proceeded to make the call. The woman on the line simply told me all I needed was his car plate number, so I decided that things would be settled from there. Meanwhile, the bastard driver continued whining to himself. Well, from what my brother and I noticed, he kept referring to us as 'young man', and kept talking about 'experience'. In other words, he looked down on us due to our age. But hey, so much for experience. He was the one who collided into me anyway, not the other way round.

Soon, I decided to put an end to his whining and left the place. I then called my mechanic and related the incident to him. He told me that since the motherfucker had refused to exchange particulars, I should file a police report, so I went back to the station and had to get that incompetent policeman to file the report for me. Finally, I went home, totally tired out by the incident.

Moral of the story: Motherfuckers still exist in the world. Always make sure you are prepared to deal with them.

So, my vehicle is still with the mechanic, and surveyors are investigating the accident.

Your Driving Is is: 44% Male, 56% Female

According to studies, you drive both like a guy and a girl. This means you're a pretty average driver, with typical quirks. Occasionally you're frustrated and or a little reckless, but that's the exception - not the norm.

Do You Drive Like a Guy or a Girl?

You Are a Newborn Soul

You are tolerant, accepting, and willing to give anyone a chance. On the flip side, you're easy to read and easily influenced by others. You have a fresh perspective on life, and you can be very creative. Noconformist and nontraditional, you've never met anyone who's like you. Inventive and artistic, you like to be a trendsetter. You have an upbeat spirit and you like almost everything. You make friends easily and often have long standing friendships. Implusive and trusting, you fall in love a little too easily. Souls you are most compatible with: Bright Star Soul and Dreaming Soul

What Kind of Soul Are You?

Yet another week has passed, reducing 7 days from my countdown to the Thailand trip. That makes it 64 more days!

Ro and I went to watch 'Hot Fuzz' at Vivocity on Wednesday. Though I've already watched it on DVD, the show did not fail to keep me entertained and bursting out with laughter throughout. So far, it's the show I like most for this year, with '28 Weeks Later' being next and 'Transformers' being a close third. I'll put 'Surfs Up' on the fourth, followed by 'Shrek 3' as fifth. I'll give 'Wild Hogs' number six, and then 'Fantastic 4 - Rise of the Silver Surfer' seven. Guess 2007 is the Year of Good Movies.

Yesterday, I attended Ron's graduation ceremony at University Cultural Center. Many people turned up - Ron, his mum and dad, Mauryn, Peiwen, Jayson, Yuqing, Ro, Wenqi and I. We only had 3 passes for entering the holding room and auditorium, so we decided to settle it by 'o-a-peh-a-som'. In the end, Wenqi, Yuqing and I got the "privilege".

After the certificate/degree presentation ceremony, we basically hanged outside the building while waiting for Ron to emerge, as well as the refreshments to start. We were quick/lucky/kiasu enough to get our share before the queue started to build up. And it happened that the queue became really terrible shortly after. It was so crowded that Yuqing and I got separated from the rest amidst the crowd, but we managed to find the rest of them before long. We took some photos and fooled around, then left to Ron's house to meet up once again before heading to Newton Circus for dinner/supper.

Today, I initially planned to go for yet another cycling trip at Pulau Ubin with Raymond and Gabriel, but the bad weather ruined it all. To be honest, I was rather happy that I could catch a longer sleep as I had slept rather late yesterday night. In the end, I went out with Raymond. We went to the airport for Popeyes, then took a bus to Punggol followed by the train to Haborfront in order to past our afternoon. Big Megamart was under renovation, so there was nothing left for us there. Instead, we walked to Vivocity, which I was initially against due to the weekend crowd. I ended up going on a shopping spree and purchasing $100+ worth of items there.

In the evening, we went to Bedok to watch 'Transformers', which I have already watched but don't mind watching again. We ended the outing with dinner at Blk 85 Market.

Ass-Pain

AHHHHHHHHHHhhhhhhhhhhh... My ass still hurts, probably from the hot action I've had this afternoon. I feel penetrated, erm, by the seat of the bicycle I rode in Pulau Ubin earlier on.

Today's trip at Pulau Ubin was another typical one, except that there were talks all over about the 93.3 DJ who fell there while cycling and lost many of his teeth. Most of the shopkeepers of the bicycle rental shops warned cyclists of the dangerous slopes at some parts, citing the 93.3 DJ's unfortunate mishap as a real-life example of an accident that took place there recently. At the same time, I overheard a bunch of girls gossiping about the same incident. After a quick lunch at one of the eating houses there, Laibao and I rented our bikes and we wasted no time moving off. Our first destination was the Pandan Garden.

The moment we reached a clearing in the garden, mishap struck. The chain on my bike came off from the gear, bummer! After some tinkering with the grease-coated mechanism, we managed to get it fixed. However, our hands were soiled with disgusting black grease, and we had to find a way to get it cleared off without touching our bags to get tissue paper. So, we had a smart idea. We saw a scarecrow nearby which seemed to be wearing clean gloves, and we wiped our hands on the poor scarecrow's gloves!

Poor, poor scarecrow	A communication tower
A peculiar-looking shack

We spent quite a short time there, before returning to the village and then taking the southern route instead. We headed to the beach where we once saw an eagle, as we've never had the chance to go beyond that trail due to rain the previous times. Weird, that it would usually rain once we reached that point. However, the weather was clear, or perhaps hot, today. As we cycled a short distance into the unexplored trail, we discovered that it was actually a dead-end. We went back to where we came from, and headed towards the German-Girl Shrine this time for a short break. I was hoping to buy some cold drinks there, but unfortunately, the shrine does not sell cold drinks anymore. There were quite a number of dogs at the shrine. I was quite surprised at how well-kept their coats were, despite the rugged environment they live in.

A huge spider we encountered along the way	One of the cute doggies
I love dogs	Abandoned chopped logs

We noticed that the trail actually continues beyond the shrine, so we decided to follow it to see where it would lead us to. Bad move. After we painstakingly maneuvered through 10 waterlogged pits, we encountered a dead-end. Therefore, we needed to make our way back through the 10 pits again, and by the time we were out, my socks were completely drenched.

Going by another path this time, we cycled towards the Marina Country Club resorts. As we were about to pass the resort, a group of women stopped me, asking if I could take a picture for them. After the photo-shot, Laibao suggested exploring the resort premises since it seemed open to public. Upon entering the gates, I already had quite a pleasant impression of the place - it seemed really beautiful to me. Basically, there was a bicycle cum drink kiosk, the chalets, an adventure course, a huge restaurant, a jacuzzi, and a huge lake in the center of it all. I had already expended all my drinking water, so I stocked up on my drinks at the drink kiosk. We found a sheltered bench and table, which we took a really long break on. Before we finally left the place, we decided to cycle one round around the lake to just have a closer peek at the facilities there. As we stopped at one point to take some photos, we caught a glimpse of some parts of a HUGE creature splashing in the water. HUUGEE!! However, when we tried to approach to have a closer look, it was gone. We started debating whether it was a freshwater dolphin or seal of some sort, or even an elephant. Bugged by my curiosity, I returned to the drink kiosk to see if I could find out more about the 'thing' we just saw. I was told that it was some kind of large fish imported from the Amazons, called the 'ju long yu' in Chinese. After some research, I concluded that it was the Arapaima which we saw.

Signs	Canoes along the lake
The bicycle/drinks/canoe kiosk	A tent from nowhere
The adventure course	Tribal structures
Another tribal structure	Rock climbing tower
Dragonfly along the lake	BBQ pits

Looks like we were finally getting tired, so we headed back to the village straight, which was already a long distance away. A few meters away from the village, the chain of my bike came off again. I decided to push the bike back instead of fiddling around with the mechanism and getting my hands dirty just for a few meters ride. After some washing up at the toilet there, we walked around the village for a bit. There was this kid who was doing something which caught our attention - he was catching earthworms at the beach. We approached him and watched - he was really good, catching like 4 to 5 worms on average over 1 minute. As we walked up from the beach, we saw these 2 cats digging holes, pooping, then burying their poop. Don't ask me why, but we actually enjoyed watching them poop, for some unknown reasons. Maybe it's just the funny expressions shown on their faces when they realize that people are watching them poop. I was so engrossed in watching them poop that I didn't snap them with my camera. However, I did catch some shots of a cat-in-a-bin.

Licking his paws	Hiding in the bin

It didn't take long before we were on our way back to the mainland on the bumboat. It was already early evening by the time we reached Changi Point Jetty. I changed into a clean shirt at the jetty's toilet. We headed towards the hawker center with the intention of having a cool, refreshing drink there, but we changed our mind after we came face-to-face with the drink stall auntie with a HUGE attitude problem. We decided to make do with our plain drinking water instead. We took bus 2 to Bugis area as we planned to have dinner at a vegetarian restaurant called 'Luo Han Group' at Fortune Center.

Laibao had a number of things to get after dinner. We went to Sim Lim Square as one of the items Laibao wanted was an MP3 player. It didn't take long before Laibao got his MP3 player and our next destination was Marina Square. We took the route through Suntec, and along the way, we found this new fountain built somewhere near the convention center.

Upon reaching Marina Square, the shop which we wanted to visit was already closed, so we just walked around aimlessly to waste abit of time. Marina Square was even more packed than usual, probably due to the GST increase from tomorrow onwards. We slowly walked to the MRT station, which was also unusually crowded. When I reached Bedok bus interchanged, it was already 10+. However, I did not feel like going home yet, I decided to take the loop 225 bus service. The loop journey on 225 was shockingly short, lasting only 15 minutes at max. It was time to return home after I reached the interchange once again.

Another week has passed. Initially I had plans to go for a Kelong fishing trip in Malaysia from Fri to Sat but after some contemplation, I felt I would be very bored there if I go without any intention to fish. So, back to a boring weekend for me.

Alright, maybe it wasn't really that boring, cuz I managed to hang out and watch movies on both Fri and Sat nites. On Fri, I went to the airport with Laibao, as both of us are in the holiday mood as we both have approaching holiday plans of our own. We had our favorite fastfood there - Popeyes. Thereafter, we made our way to Bugis Junction for some window shopping, before rushing back to Bedok in 2 hours time to catch 'Surfs Up'. It was a really great movie, and I'd give it a rating of 4/5 stars. Maybe I liked it due to my fondness of beaches and sea sports.

On Sat nite, I met up with Raymond and Gabriel for dinner at Changi Village. Due to the terrible crowd at the hawker center, we decided to eat at somewhere more "high-class". In the end, we picked a Japanese restaurant opposite the bus interchange. My wallet lightened tremendously after the dinner. Gabriel had plans to go clubbing with the rest of the guys, but I hate clubbing, so I opted out of the clubbing plan and went to watch 'Fantastic Four 2' with Raymond instead. I find it quite average compared to 'Surfs Up', so I'd give it a rating of 3/5. The movie seemed a little longer than an average 90-mins movie, and it ended at about 1.15am.

Other than that, most of my weekend has been spent on surfing the web, as well as nudging people mercilessly on MSN.

Pads / Tampons

Are these actually pads or tampons??

Cruise

The queue was long, but I sure was excited. Several minutes passed before it was my turn. I placed my Crumpler slingbag and Osprey backpack onto the conveyor belt of the security scanner, and walked through the metal detector. Oops, the damn thing sounded. It was the camera which I had forgotten to take out of my pocket. I placed my camera on a safe spot of the scanning machine, then re-walked through the bloody metal detector. I managed to get through this time.

At the next station, I handed the passport to the custom officer and stared right at him in order for him to verify my face. He smiled and returned the passport to me, and that's it. I had reached the tunnel-way leading into the ship. Some of the crew member had already gathered there to send us a warm welcome. It was only a matter of a few minutes' walk before I found myself standing right before the entrance of the ship. I had to queue up one last time as the crew verified and registered my boarding pass.

Before I knew it, I was already at the mid-lobby on the 6th level of the Superstar Aquarius. Our cabins were located on the 9th level, so we decided to take the lift up there. I shared a cabin with my mum and brother, while the other 3 relatives (an old couple and their grandson) shared the cabin next to ours. Upon opening our cabin-door, we had a pleasant surprise to find that our cabin was actually quite posh-looking, only that the bed was meant for 2. A third mattress could be found underneath the sofa though.

The lift lobby	Our cabin

We took a few minutes to settle down in our cabins, then moved on to the restaurant for dinner along with my relatives. The old people have a strong preference for chinese food, so we headed to the chinese restaurant, which was already awfully packed. We were given a reservation number and was told that our seats would be ready by 7.10pm, which was slightly an hour and a half later. I did some exploring on the ship's outer decks. There was this poolside Spice restaurant near the stern which really did appeal to me, but I decided to give it a miss as I knew the old folks will not probably be keen on the idea of having non-chinese food. As I walked out of the restaurant towards the outer deck, I spotted Superstar Virgo just beside our ship.

The Spice restaurant	Overlooking the Level 12 deck
Superstar Virgo	Close-up of Superstar Virgo
Looking down from deck 13

After enough gawking and photo-taking of Superstar Virgo, I went up to deck 13, the top, open deck. It looked like a nice place to lie down on the beach chairs and just relax, but I was distracted quickly by a curious-looking door nearby on deck 12, so I decided to check the door out and come back later instead.

Upon stepping into the door, I found the video arcade to my right and a casino to my left. Both were not open yet, so I decided to get on. This time, I took the staircase down to deck 9, just for a quick look. Deciding to leave some exploring for the night instead, I decided to head back to the chinese restaurant to see if we could actually go in earlier. It was a 'no', though. My brother suggested going to the bar nearby for a drink as well as to kill time. At the bar, I ordered a Superstar Special Mocktail, while my brother ordered a Bloody Mary, which he deemed 'unpalatable'. I was sure glad that my mocktail tasted rather good, aside from being too sweet. Finally, after a rather long wait, our reservations at the chinese restaurant was honored.

Outside the casino	Floor plan
Strange contraceptions on deck 9	A bar
The chinese restaurant (with my mum and grand-aunt)

Apart from the buffet-style appetizer, the variety of food served at the chinese restaurant was severely limited. There were only 4 dishes served (exclusive of soup and dessert). However, we could reorder any of the 4 dishes if we wanted more. Sweet and sour fish, veges with spinach and sea cucumber, black-pepper pork steak and stir-fried scallops and prawns.

The folks didn't seemed to be ready to leave the restaurant after a heavy dinner, so I initiated to go on my own first. However, they seemed to have gotten my hint and followed suit. I went back to my cabin and packed my stuff as I wanted to go swimming. However, after I had reached the swimming pool with extra clothes and a towel, I could not find any decent changing/shower room nearby, so I changed my mind. Grumpily, I returned to my cabin once again to lighten the extra weight in my bag, before heading out once again. I wanted to see the ship moving off on the open decks, and the ship was scheduled to leave the harbor at 9. There was still quite some time before 9, so I slowly made my way to the open deck at the bow on the 9th storey, getting lost in the maze of corridors several times along the way. In addition, I did drop by deck 13 in the process, and Superstar Virgo was still there, dazzling onlookers with her beautiful lighting. I tried to take several shots at the stunning scenery there, but my shaky and tense hands weren't of much help in getting clear pictures. I managed to reach deck 9 early, but there seemed to be no signs of the ship going to move off. The ropes were still anchored to the port. Soon after, an announcement was made that one of the captains had to disembark due to some medical problems, and we had to wait for the stand-in to arrive before the ship could leave. Meanwhile, Superstar Virgo had already began to move off, and her passengers were all in such high spirits that I could actually hear screams and cheering from them.

Superstar Virgo in the night	Virgo moving off
Looking out from deck 13	BBQ restaurant at deck 13
Jacuzzi at BBQ restaurant

Determined to have a good view of the sea when our ship was moving out, I waited all the way up on the deck. Eventually, I saw the workers below beginning to remove the anchor ropes from the hooks on the harbor. Yes yes, finally the ship began to move! I watched as the ship went out of the waterway at Haborfront, out into the open sea. As usual as this may have seemed, I always get very excited watching the sea when on a moving ship/boat. I only started heading back to my cabin a good 20 minutes later. Halfway through, I dropped by the lousy arcade just to try my luck at the UFO catcher game and to waste a few minutes on a car-racing game.

As the casino wasn't open yet, I suggested going to watch the Ladyboys show to my mum and brother. As my mum's main aim for the cruise was the casino, she had nothing else to do and naturally accepted my suggestion, along with my brother.

We reached the Stardust Lounge at 10.45, which meant that there were only 15 mins left before the show ended. However, I found the show quite entertaining despite the fact that I'm usually irked by the thoughts of transvestites. Basically, there were dancing and lip-syncing to songs pre-sung by real women, of course. I really respect these transvestites and wonder how they can gather up this much courage to alter their gender, though I would not want to alter mine!

As feminine as they may seem, they are actually gender-altered men.	This one too!

By the time we finished watching the show, the casino had just opened. The casino happened to be just beside the lounge, meaning that only a few steps were required to get there. I'm never a hardcore gambler, but I did have initial plans to try out the slot-machines there. However, it was a different story the moment I stepped in - the whole casino was infes.. erm.. crowded with old folks and I changed my mind about trying out the slot machines after I saw how boring it was to just sit there and press a button repeatedly in hopes of winning a few quick bucks. I walked a few rounds and watched people play and ogled at the hot female dealers there, until supper-time.

The buffet-style supper was served at the restaurant right at the end of the corridor where my cabin was located. By the time my mum and brother and I reached there, the restaurant was packed with passengers like a can of sardines. We still managed to get a seat, though we had to share with with 2 other strangers. The queue was crazily long. My brother stayed behind while my mum and I went to get our food, and he took his turn after we returned. Porridge, noodles, and quite a number of dishes were served, but I found the ham and cheese way too salty for my taste.

We returned to our cabin after supper to take a short break. However, once my mum and brother left for the casino at 1am, I decided to take a nap so that they could have the bed by the time they returned. I was awaken by my brother at 4 in the morning. Already starting to feel restless, I decided to walk around the ship in wait for the sunrise, and my brother decided to tag along too. We went to various places - the open deck on the 8th and 9th level, the musterstations, the reception room, and finally settled down at the open space on the uppermost open deck. We found a spot of our own, grabbed some beach chairs and just lied there, relaxing to the sea breeze. I almost falled asleep on the beach chair, when I felt several drops of water on me. It was beginning to drizzle. My brother woke up and decided to go back to the cabin, while I stayed as I was determined to watch the sunrise, which would happen anytime from half an hour later. However, I noticed that I wasn't alone. A crowd was beginning to gather despite the drizzle. Many more people were there waiting for the sunrise too.

Soon, a little of the total darkness in the sky had faded away. The sun was slowly beginning to rise, shining in from behind the dark clouds. I stayed there for an hour, snapping away continuously and watching the morning scenery with awe.

Relaxing on the beach chair	The open deck
Early dawn	Spice restaurant at dawn
An industrial ship	Are those volcanos?
The dawn continues breaking	Solitary ship
Many other ships	Looks luxurious, doesn't it?

Before making my way back to my cabin, I took a walk around the open decks of the ships, deciding to utilize my camera well this time. As I walked around, crew members who were starting work greeted me as I passed by, displaying the fleet's awesome standard in terms of courtesy. I went back to the musterstation once again for some photo-shots. Before heading back to my cabin.

Safety float	One of the emergency crafts
Another one	Exploring the decks
Stern of the ship	Stern of the ship, from above

The moment I reached my cabin, the first thing that hit me was that my mum had not returned from the casino yet. Wow, I seriously don't think I'll be able to spend an hour there, much less the entire night. The second thing was that it was breakfast-time, and I had to rush if I wanted to get a seat at the restaurant. I quickly woke my brother up, and we hurried to the buffet restaurant located near our cabin. We managed to get a seat for 4, and we were lucky that the remaining 2 seats were unoccupied throughout. The queue wasn't as terrible as the one during supper the previous night, and there was a drastic improvement on the food. Scrambled eggs, fried rice, french toast, sausages, porridge, braised peanuts. Yummy!

Right after we were back in our cabin, I could hear my mum unlock the door. Finally, she was back, but she went out again almost immediately for her breakfast. Meanwhile, my brother went back to sleep, and I just hooked myself onto my iPod to kill time. My mum returned an hour later, just to leave once again, this time to collect our passports. When she finally returned, she announced that we would be disembarking from the ship at 3pm, much to my dismay. The reason was so that we would not need to push our way through the crowd of disembarking passengers at the official disembarking time at noon. I was already starting to feel restless and bored as I had been to almost every single corner of the ship, apart from the engine room and control room. Fortunately, I managed to convince her to leave at noon. We had 2 more hours to go. I tried to kill my boredom by doing silly things like balancing bottles and tissue boxes, and taking random pics.

Balancing trick	Fanciful toilet paper
Bedshock

The 2 hours have finally elapsed after a painstaking wait. There was indeed a human-traffic jam like my mum had anticipated, it was worth it. Soon, after half an hour of pushing through the human crowd, we met up with my sis who was waiting for us there, and we were home in no time!