some things i've learnt

1) running up a tree is very tiring and dizzying work. and being beaten at it by a five year old kid is just. bah let's not go there.

2) snap is good for entertaining teenagers as well!

3) while we are on the topic of cards, i am now able to count in bulgarian, and even tell you what the suits are. (bows to the applause)

4) sheryl has never seen a condom before and had to get one of the teenagers to show her one. (note all you people. show is not the same as demonstrate hoh.)

5) magic tricks. remind me to show u.

6) there is at least a place in the world that is actually hotter than singapore. no prizes for guessing where that place is.

7) never put too much sausages on your omelette such that the egg becomes a side dish, because then you cannot possibly flip the egg over. it's just too heavy.

8) it is possible to slow cook eggs. (for the same egg, i forgot that the hob was off and just placed the pan on the hob, and wondered why it took so freaking long to cook.)

9) sheryl can do a wicked chikopek voice. it's brilliant. i've got it on my handphone as my alarm and ringtone. it's so effective, sheryl and serene get up 10 minutes before my alarm is due to go just to switch it off.

10) world cup is great. i don't know what to do now in my two days break.

11) how to make twisty friendship bands, as opposed to the knotty ones. that is what i am doing in my two day break.

12) i am an exercise freak. i've not properly gymed nor ran nor anything since last monday, and i am upset.

13) coming up with entertaining lists drains my tiny mind.

first day at gavroche

we've spent three lovely days slacking in varna. on friday when we arrived we were ushered around and generally just tried to get to know the place better. saturday, we woke up at 130pm (i was so upset! i planned to sleep till 3pm! but the sun was wayyy too bright and it was too hot. something like 30 degrees celsius. at least i know i will survive when i come home) and went out for lunch and grocery shopping again. visited the cathedrals - first time i've been in one for ages, witnessed a funeral and a wedding! (not concurrently, but in separate cathedrals on separate days). sunday was spent lazing in the reeeealllyyy scorching hot beach in varna, the water felt positively icy.

point is, we had a lot to do for the past 3 days yes? including watching just about all the world cup matches that are on (i'm still upset that netherlands is out, but what a match. and what a card-happy referee). and so we weren't expecting to be too much taxed when we starting working with the children at gavroche centre today. after all, it was 4 hours, we all thought, so how bad can it be?

how wrong can one get??

within the first 10 minutes of stepping into the centre, we were playing basketball with the kids, afer a futile attempt to try and organise them into some semblance of teams, but not knowing any bulgarian and not being well versed in the universal language called miming, we couldn't do it. so it was this whole flock of children running here and there and everywhere, and looking and pleading at you with their big brown eyes when you got the ball so you would pass it to them.

well and good, basketball is something i can handle. within the next half hour however, we were dancing to dont cha and 50 cent. these kids, mind u, are so unbelievably well versed in their english pop and club music, and they are so GOOD at dancing. and these are like, 5-15 year olds? the older ones won't even dancing! much pointers to pick up from them there.

20 minutes of dancing later, they decided to arm wrestle!! yayyyyyy!!! -dances around in happy glee because i am not tired yet!- so arm wrestle with everyone about twice, and being nice we let them all, even the small six-year old very skinny girl, win. so after they've realised what wimps we are (some guys thought it was funny to poke my biceps while i was arm wrestling someone), they decided it was time to play fun games like clapping your hands together, something like ping pong that we played when we were young.

abotu 20 minutes of that, maybe less? that's when things really started to get crazy cuz we really had no idea what else to do with the kids! and it was only an hour into the first four hour session we would have with them. it was honestly tiring, and kids have sooo much energy!

and the kids here are so mature. one of them owns a handphone, and his friend were showing us some pictures in his phone. it was porn. we nearly died. this guy is fifteen.

sheryl came back from the kitchen and said there's a bottle of jim beam in the fridge! the friend of the guy who owns the handphone, this guy is sixteen, goes, 'jim beam!!!' and visibly brightens up. the universal language of alcohol, when even miming fails.

if my entru is staccato and long, imagine how painful the four hours was. it was lovely, believe me, but excruciatingly slow when you had no idea how to entertain the handful of joy that was each kid. (i used handful for a reason, think about it.)

i need to go now, and as they say here, "ciao!"

bulgaria

so i'm here in varna, beach resort by the black sea. to use serene's phrase we "bumbled" our way here - really did. the only thing we had confirmed was the return trip ticket to bulgaria, we weren't even sure that we got visas till the day before we flew. but here we are, survived a day at sofie (not knowing the place at all, made our way to the train station), stayed at a dodgy hotel (many many stories about this one, especially involving sheryl and her spanish and being walked into while showering) took the train here to varna (another case, long story about finding the ticketing counter, basically we couldn't) and finally arrived at our flat.

really really funny, sheryl's got a cam, so i will have photos at some point.

tata for now~

gibberish

it's never a good idea to rush 2 terms worth of work in a night. i feel like i'm in one of those shopping competitions they used to show on tv, where people will run around the supermarket in a fixed amount of time and grab whatever they want/is most expensive. good summary of what i'm doing now actually - skimming through, no make that scanning through, notes on topics which i'm supposed to be on top of, hoping that somehow there's some retaining thing in my brain that i never knew existed exist.

well, this is it. my last paper, finally my red carnation. (not that i particularly like carnations, nice as they are. it's just that oxford has this tradition of pinning carnations to our gowns for good luck, and a different colour for each stage of your examinations.) speaking of which, i should at some point post pictures of my friends and i in our silly silly gowns. provided i take them first. especially since some thrashing will take place, though thankfully it would not be along the lines of flour, eggs, wine etc etc on the expensive sub fusc (gown). just some tame glitter
and water, which i can handle i think.

speaking of gowns, my friend remarked that it's perhaps only in oxford and cambridge where the guys can say 'shit i left my gown behind' and still retain his masculinity. food for thought. reminds me of guys in eyeliner (which i emphatically think should not at all be attempted, even when drunk, unless of course you are johnny depp.)

i'm incorrigible. it's 8am, my paper starts at 930am, and i haven't finished revising 2/3 of what i am supposed to know. (and here i am blogging)

world cup world cup

this is not going to be an entry about the football world cup i'm afraid. i mean, i don't dislike football enough to write an entry about it - i might actually go down to the pub sometime to watch england play - but i have exams.

i was just thinking, because singapore is probably not going to feature very much on the international sporting scene for some time to come, i am probably going to support england a lot. i mean, about a year here, and i'm quite fond of the british and their culture (though i will forever whine about the food). can u imagine what will happen after 3 (hopefully 4 years here?)

i am going to get tickets for the rugby world cup, however. which is tricky cuz i am now torn between getting the team package for england or new zealand. urgh. my loyalty is still to the all blacks - but can u imagine wearing black from head to toe in the heat of the french summer? (yes guys who are snickering already. i am a bimbo, i actually think about such things) and if i were to support england then i can still claim to be supporting singapore (somewhat la).

decisions, decisions.

i think i might get tickets to watch new zealand after all.

am. getting. miffed.

bahhhhhh whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy is it that i am still studying for my exams? - whine whine whine- plus i only started revision on monday and i am so BORED with revising. and at some point of time i'd start wishing that rousseau was never born.

the us peeps are back home, most of the uk peeps have finished exams and are touring. whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy are the oxonians (and the tabs. =P) the only jokers with exams left???? whyyyyyyyyyyyy did rousseau have to make his social contract 4 books long???

i am going to persist in whining so if u are thoroughly sick by now stop reading my blog for the next two weeks.

lovely, almost too hot weather outside, and here i am, stuck in my room, with the sun mocking me as it streams in from my window where i am sat. come to think of it, the sheer irony of what is outside my window just struck me. a beautiful - i should post a picture at some point - scene of oxford. university church, and behind it, the sky-blue tower of radcliffe camera, framed by fluffy white clouds and more sky-blue.

university church! i see it every day. especially more so since i am in my room virtually all the time. hm. God is sending me a Sign.

serene claims i am becoming more atheist. hm i didn't know there was a sliding scale, but i kinda get her point. well i suppose at some point i have to reconcile with burning in hell. you know i wonder how my christian and catholic and muslim friends view me? like spiritually. i'm pretty sure they see a sinner, since i am in all respects one, and dare i say it, unabashedly so. i suppose they recognise that this girl they see in front of them, the easily amused girl, the whiny girl, the one who hates logic, is, at some point in time, going to writhe in eternal agony as she burns in hell. who is condemned because she has heard God's words, but has chosen to ignore them, knowing full well the consequences that await in her afterlife.

oh well.

some of the worst things to do

after a hugely unsatisfying dinner of a stale ham and cheese baguette is to remember the article you read about a good japanese buffet that offers oodles of fresh sashimi.

and refuse to learn how to use a microwave oven despite jerald offering constantly to teach it to me. and realising belatedly that a microwave can be used to cook broccoli. (just the thought of broccoli is enough to make me hungry!)

and because of the article, google the name of the restaurant and read food blogs. and then go to the makantime website and see their recommendations. which makes me think of popiah, chilli crab, sambal kangkong, sambal stingray, BAK CHOR MEE, wanton mee, yong tau hu, xiao long bao, har gao, steamed fish and two million other dishes right now that to continue thinking about them will make me weep.

(abiel you get the hint right?)

singaporean food is in a class of its own, i swear. even sainsburys tries to use our name in marketing their 'singaporean noodles' (which i haven't tried, since i know we don't have singaporean noodles!) but in case anyone wants to, it looks like badly fried and bland char kway teow.

how to sleep like that? =(

eh i shld start filling my calender with food dates. =D

mundane stuff

it suddenly occurred to me that i am not used to having a proper meal a day. like i had one on tuesday - jerald's birthday, and am going to have one today cuz huixin is here. i will have one tomorrow cuz hanyan and khoonliat are coming down for lunch. and i'm actually not used to it. no exaggeration.

i eat more in my room since hall food really leaves everything to be desired. a typical shopping list looks like this:

cans of sardine
chocolate
cans of tuna
apples
more chocolate
oranges
cereal
have i mentioned chocolate?
breakfast bars
polo
random biscuity things, preferably with chocolate
cup soup
eggs (easter eggs count too!)

gosh if you are what you eat, i wonder what i'd be. one very shrivelled up (too much salt in diet), hairless (ditto the preservatives) chocolate girl i think.

ewww.

i think even then the chocolate amendment to the three second rule doesn't apply.