ADVENTURES

(Suddenly hit by this irrational sense of fear and anxiety. The Lord is my ever-present shield and rampart, my tower and strong fortress. He who watches over me will neither slumber nor sleep. Lord, hear my feeble prayers.)

I am currently typing this on 9 Dec 1415hrs, but it's probably better to not tell the world I'm home alone, so I'm gonna play around and schedule this to be posted on 10 Dec 1000hrs. Interesting. Of course, it ain't gonna stop hackers. But still, interesting. Anyways, I'm home alone, so the past few days have been rather an adventure, starting with the trip to Sumatra on Wed.

Came back on Thurs and met Joey Song for dinner before making a trip down to the airport to welcome Pamela Yeh home. SHE IS BACK. SHE HAS SAVED US ALL from Sam's continual whining. Hahaha our allegiance has switched to Pam, not Sam, especially now that they are attached. On my side, YAYYE MY EVB PARTNER IN CF AND SENT IS BACKKKKK. Throw her into the ocean of Arts CFers. Kidding. I'll be gentle as I can. *Self-reminder to stand by Pam*

On Friday, I didn't leave the house. I did cook instant noodles for lunch though. Dinner was... heh. A mixture of my sister's cheese snacks (fats and proteins), dried cranberries (fibres, vitamins and sugar),  and tapioca chips (complex carbs).

Saturday passed with the aid of Befrienders' meeting and an early dinner with Jasmine and Serene.

I had my normal routine on Sunday, plus a catch-up with Jun and the periodic wake-up call that both shakes me and re-centers my perspective on myself. Must develop mechanisms to cope with myself, particularly this winter, since I'll have to spend significant amounts of time home alone.

Monday and Tuesday saw some adventures into unexplored landscapes. On Monday, Esther and I went for a walk! We started from Khatib MRT at 0830hrs and followed the park connectors on the Northern Explorer Loop until Woodlands, where we decided to detour towards Marsiling. We talked a bit here and there while walking. I made her walk up a wide hill of grass with me (sorry!), and at the top we got a good view of the surrounding area and watched a man try to parasail, except without any vehicle attached. At Marsiling, around 1130hrs, we were going to part ways but I realised she was gonna walk home (HOME??!) and I was quite tempted by the adventure, so I followed her for a bit. The 1min-long look of disbelief on my face when she told me that she had also walked from home to Khatib MRT sent Esther laughing for that full minute. "I didn't know how to tell you," she said. Quite so. Anyways, Google Maps took us past some interesting place, I must say. We were quite close to Woodlands Checkpoint, so there were roadsigns pointing towards Johor (!!!). Quite epic. Then we headed further west towards Kranji MRT (EGGCITED) and for a short while, walked along the road that the bus to Sungei Buloh would take from Kranji. We then walked south towards Upper Bukit Timah, and that took us past industrial areas that had a wide variety of industries, from construction materials and machinery to wood products. Popped by a Mama shop in the middle of nowhere to buy water from a lonely uncle. We also went past the vicinity of Ejah, Thng and Joey Lee's house. Around 1457hrs in the Yew Tee area, we parted ways. I took a bus home, while she continued walking. You're crayyyy, Esther. Which is lovely. I am thankful for the conversations we had, thank you for sharing and thank you for your honesty. Also, I found out how cui and unfit I am: after my legs took a rest on the bus, I could not walk properly. Quite an interesting and queer feeling, hahahahaha.

Then on Tuesday, yesterday, I met the Buona folks for lunch from 1200hrs to 1430hrs, followed by a walk with Andryl from Venus Drive to Macritchie Reservoir from 1630hrs to 1900hrs. Huiru nagged at me, "Cannot walk properly but still wanna go and walk." It's a wonderful ache and a wonderful tan-line so I shall enjoy it while it lasts. And it's my left side of my back that is aching, so maybe walking is good for scoliosis. The trail was really nice, the forest was closing in on us both at the sides and above us. We talked while we walked, we talked about community and a bit on our personal lives. Then we ate dinner at the Mushroom Cafe in silence before parting ways.

The next epic adventure is entitled Mission Impossible: Mishaps & Misfits. 

Some Science CFers were sending Ursula off yesterday night and they brought her to eat Chili crab for her last meal in Singapore, at Jolie's uncle's restaurant. It's in the vicinity of Marymount, so I headed there to find them after dinner. Jolie picked us up after her worship practice for SWAT and we picked up her luggage from Bedok before we reached the airport at 2205hrs. We tried to help her check in her stuff, but lo! we could not. The big luggage (32kg) was overweight by 9kg. The maximum weight for one luggage is 23kg and she's allowed two check-ins, making a total of 46kg. So she took out the small luggage (which is full of stuff) from the big luggage, that weighed 9.4kg. Then, we had multiple cycles of moving stuff in between the carry-on bags, weighing them at the weighing machines, and failing to check in and clarifying what are the guidelines for luggage weights. After two cycles, 1hours, a trip to buy a lock and 2kg of grace, we finally checked in her luggage at 2310hrs.

After the mishaps with luggage problems, we went to find a charging point to charge Ursula's many devices and Joy's phone. And we lapsed into one of CF's punny moments involving Psalm 23 and computer parts. "He leads me beside stable Internet connection" "Even though I walk through the valley of bugs and viruses, I will not fear, for Your Norton Antispyware is with me" And another punny Joy moment with her harmonica. And Stella returned to her childhood when we wheeled her around on the luggage trolley. And Tang and Bertram lapsed into an intense discussion on Star Wars. But at 0010hrs, it was definitely time to send Ursula off. )': Joy and I left early to catch our bus so we didn't watch Ursula walk towards her gate, but we did have one last mishap: we missed the bus. So we cabbed home together and I finally found out that she has a mini sibling, just like me.

Having an exchange student in our midst was really interesting, I must say. Towards the end of the sem, when we had formed bonds with Ursula, Jolie really rallied the rest to bring Ursula around and take care of her. *thumbs-up* And we all studied together in the Science library during reading week. (: 

I'm going to meet a youth for youth camp in a while, then following Asaph to attend a talk on Groaning Creation with Asaph at his church! Another interesting day.

And tomorrow. SWAT!!! With the 3 other secretaries in my group. Our group and Jolie's group (4 treasurers) can be subjects for a mini social experiment, just by observing the flow of our conversations.