I find that it a constant struggle to stay on the sane side of the fence. During weekdays, work keeps my mind occupied and my body busy. But during weekends, I permit myself to rest and the ungrateful mind likes to dwell on depressing subjects. Feet betray me and lead me astray. Honestly, when I stepped out of my door at around 10.15pm just now, I only meant to get some fresh air. But I started walking and kept on walking through the cold, damp night. I walked all the way into the city centre and back. Returned around midnight. It wasn't a smart thing to do and I'm really surprised I'm unhurt. I didn't have my handphone with me so it's just as well that I didn't get kidnapped. I would have been unable to call someone to ransom me.

At mass today, the priest asked how many of us would like to get married or saw it as a possibility. Almost the whole room put up their hands. I didn't. It was a strange moment in which I realised that I was either extremely cynical or extremely different. I have to get used to being alone. Just in case I carry on being alive for many more years as family and friends either expire or get busy with their own lives. Young people like me should be banned. We are not good for demographics.

I am always cautious about calling people friends too soon after I meet them. There are friends, and there are acquaintances. Differentiate between people with whom you get along and exchange pleasantries and those who you really like and care about. One of my flatmates said that everyone just cares about themselves really. How sad if it were true. I had begun to believe that I could start to think of a few people as friends. Sheesh... why should I bother about what one cynical flatmate thinks? Better to believe in friendship. At least until I am proved wrong.

Studying and reading in the kitchen for prolonged periods has it's unexpected perks. I have spoken more to my flatmates in the past week than I had the whole of last term. Especially Anna, Rory and Mehdi. It has been nice getting to know them better. You all know how I am with new people. Not very good at all. I just have to be allowed time to get familiar with people before I feel comfortable enough to have proper conversations with them. I'm getting there. It helps that they are interesting people with lots of stories to tell me. Stories of different countries, cultures and, of course, food.

Chinese New Year is coming soon. I wish I was back home. I can't tell you how tempted I was to purchase an air ticket to fly back just for the CNY weekend. It was about £420 for a return trip. I clicked on the "confirm booking" button and almost, almost clicked on the "confirm payment" button after keying in my card details. But good sense took over my melancholic fingers and made them click on "cancel transaction" instead. My mother would have killed me if I had wasted £420 to fly back for one and a half days. Well...

I had a sudden bimbotic urge to paint my nails to match my red coat today. So I did. I've painted them red with blue edges. Red like my coat, blue like my hairband. Now I'm colour-coordinated, albeit in badly matched colours. It must be the stress and the archaeological theories messing up my mind and common sense.

Too bad there is no one to save me. And I'm not even sure I want to be saved from insanity. Reativism, dear friends. What seems mad to you, is perfectly normal and natural to me.

I don't think there will be issues with this lovely photo. But just in case, it was taken by Adrian Turner and I do not claim any rights on it.

We were on the way to a cave. While waiting for the rigging team, we decided to climb onto the roof of the minibus and enjoy the view of the Dales and nice sunshine. Kevin, that's the guy on the far left with the longish black hair, was doing giant Sudoku puzzles.

Note: Pictures of flatmates have been removed due to privacy issues and fear of being killed by aforementioned flatmates if they find out about the web publication of aforementioned pictures.

Nice reaction to my photo post. Jun seems to be leaning towards a Puritan point of view. She thinks people look better with more clothes. Next time, I'll take a picture of me in caving gear. I'm sure she will find it irresistably kinky. By the way, I've decided to put up the kinky photo again. Since you all like it so much. Xinying, go see.

Song change! Very aggressive stuff. In German. Check out Rammstein here

Hello Friends.
This week I've been studying far too hard and torturing myself for no reason at all. I sit in the kitchen every night reading academic texts. And I can sit there for hours and just study and study, forgetting all about dinner. The shortest session this week was three hours. The longest was five hours, from 7pm to 12am. I don't know why I do this to myself. I honestly need to get a life.

The night before, the boiler in out flat broke down. There was no hot water the whole of yesterday and today. They've only just fixed it an hour ago. When I turned on the tap and it was hot, I felt like singing and dancing and proclaiming the good news. When there was no hot water, I boiled water in the kettle and poured it in the sink and used a cup to scoop the water for my "shower". Just like I did when I was a little kid.

I was having fun with the camera today, I decided to put my pathological hatred of being photographed aside and took some photos of myself. In case you don't know, photos of me are really hard to come by. So these are rare gems. All those of you whose hearts are torn apart by my absence and can't sleep at night because you miss me so much, feel free to add these photos to your collection. Hee hee.

On the other hand, psycho maniacs should be warned that I have absolutely no problem stabbing you, strangling you, raping your dead body and dumping it on the railway tracks. I may appear rather sweet and nice but that is only because the pictures don't show neither the illegally acquired surgical scalpel set hidden under the bed nor the quivering wreck of a blond rugby player chained up under the bathroom sink.


Me and my characteristic smirk. You can see a bit of my bookshelf in the background.



A very artistic shot. Light reflects off my deathly pale skin. It's so artistic it doesn't even look like me. You can't find photography of this quality just anywhere you know.

He did it again. (refer to previous post)

He told me he was baking tomatoes in the oven. Then, he got out the oven tray and I saw that it was french fries. Man...

My flatmate the redhead (that's the half brit-half swiss guy), has an intriguing strategy where girls are concerned. He invites them to our kitchen and cooks a nice meal for them. Last week was one girl, this week it's another girl and next week is yet another "lucky lady" according to him. He says he only fancies the last one and the others are just very good friends. Man, this is so interesting. I never knew guys did this sort of "way to the heart through the stomach" thing. I can't help being amused. We shall see if his strategy works well.

The Iranian guy has recently developed a habit of telling me the strangest things.
1. Last week he told me that the reddish sauce he was cooking with was made of boiled potatoes. I was really intrigued and puzzled. How do you get boiled potatoes to go so red? Do you add food colouring to it? Then, he was confused and said no, you just boil the potatoes. Then I asked, " erm, do you mean TOMATOES?" Yes, he did.

2. He asked if I knew the biggest planet in the solar system.

Me: Yes. That's Jupiter

Iranian: No. It's Mars.

Me: What? It's obviously Jupiter, the gas giant.

Iranian: That's the one with the rings around it yes?

Me: No. That's Saturn. Seriously, Jupiter is the biggest planet. Earth is the third planet from the sun, Mars is the fourth. But Mars is definitely not the biggest planet.

Iranian: (looks like he is thinking really hard for a while) Oh. I think you are right. I was taking about Mars but Mars is not the biggest planet.

And the funniest thing is that what he wanted to tell me in the first place was that the head of the team in NASA in charge of the recent project that brought back soil samples from Mars was an Iranian. And was had to go through a whole discussion on the relative size of planets to get to the point.

Honestly, I don't know if the problem lies with him or me. Like when I say "American Psycho' He hears " Merica Cycle" Do I blame the Singaporean accent or the Iranian one? But communication problems notwithstanding, I quite enjoy talking to him because he tells me just the weirdest things out of the blue. Reminds me a little of Azeena in AJ a long time ago.

Yesterday, one of my colleagues in French class remarked that I spoke with an American accent. Weird...

But it is things like this that keep me amused.

I found a wonderful button for bored people to press.

Go here!

Many people are having exams here. Not me though. I wish I did. Perhaps I wouldn't be so bored then.

I was walking around campus when I heard one girl say to another:

"You know those multiple choice question? I mean, each question has four options. It's not one question anymore. It's four! And if you have sixty questions, that is... erm... that is, like, two hundred and forty questions altogether! It's riddiculous!"

It was so surreal. I can't imagine an easier form of exam than multiple choice. Even if you don't study, you still stand a chance of passing in an MCQ exam. Especially if you are lucky that day.

I changed the song again. This one fits my mood better. Enjoy.

Jun thinks that saying that I miss people is gay. Alright, tell you what. How about this? I miss everybody but Jun. Haha.

I'm bored to death.

I went to the city today and bought some food and a book. Then I came back, cooked some rendang, ate it with rice.

Three of my flatmates are having exams this week. Lucky me. I don't even start lectures until next week. But this leaves me with utterly nothing to do except stay in my room and read.

Over lunch, I talked with my Iranian flatmate about being bored. He said that if he had a laptop with internet connection in his room, he would never be bored but work all day. With my laptop, I have been Skyping people, blogging and erm, Neopets. It appears that more than one person needs to get a life. Oh, and did I mention that my Cypriot flatmate woke up early today (monday) to study for an exam on wednesday?

I've been alone in my room too much.
I sit at the door beside the radiator, switch off all the lights and stare into the artificial darkness. And think.

I think too much.
As I stare into the dark, I think about how there is no absolute, enduring truth. Only relative.

Perspective in space:
My right hand is on the right of my left hand. But if you were standing opposite me, my right hand would be on the left of my left hand.

Perspective in time:
I tell the truth when I say the cup is on the table. But the cup is only on the table now. It was in the sink 5 minutes ago and in another 5 minutes, it will be in my hand. So was I lying when I said, "the cup is on the table"?

Thoughts like this pave the road to the loony bin.

Never doubt the fact that I truly believed when I said the cup was on the table.
Please believe me when I say my right hand is on the right of my left hand.

I should have access to professional help.

All day, I chatted with Jun, then Ah Boy on Skype. What a wonderful thing Skype is. I'm worried that I might have talked too long about nothing to Ah Boy. She now thinks I like girls. Do I? I don't think so. It's all a terrible misunderstanding. Tell her, LL.

I've had absolutely nothing to do for the past 2 days except taking my TB medicine and sleeping. TB is almost cured by the way.

I miss people. :( What a strange thing for me to say.

The winter sky here is so grey. There is no colour. The palour is everywhere. Even grass seems less green. This is what leads to depression in the winter. Suicide rates will go up. But no, I won't be one of them. I've decided to live to see the people I have left behind yet again.

What a long long journey it was. It lasted close to 24 hours including waiting time. The que at the UK customs was so long. They were questioning everyone really thoroughly. Luckily I didn't have any problems re-entering the country. One Malaysian girl wasn't let in. Scary.

It was 8.30 pm by the time I arrived in York. By the time I made to to my room, it was about 9 pm. I was so tired, I ate biscuits and fell asleep. Lucky I didn;t fall asleep while eating biscuits or I might have choked.

I want to go home! Looks like this is going to happen everytime I leave Singapore to come here. I'm not the only one. Ah boy is homesick in Aussieland too. Only way to make it better is to keep busy and call up people at home.

My poor Geranium is almost dead. My flatmate sort of drowned it. I squeezed out all the water. I hope it will survive to see spring.

Once again I am blogging at KL International Airport. I've been waiting here for 2 hours. only one more to go. I had a fantastic time the past 3 weeks in Singapore. Food... and family and Family and friends. I had so much fun that I didn't blog at all since blogs are for pathetic people to whine about their pathetic lives and I had nothing to whine about. Except for the TB-like cougth. But that didn't bother me much. I'm still coughing but it should get better when I arrive in York due to drier and cleaner air.

Once again, everybody is scattered all over the world. Ah boy and Boon are already in Aussieland and Jun will be joining them next month. My sister is going to New Zealand next month too. I hope she becomes Kiwi-fied.

My lugguage is half books and half food. I hope the food sauces don't burst their packs and destroy the books. Or else, the University library will begin to smell like Rendang and Koka Instant Noodles.