I have to admit I was never a fan of Christmas, thinking that it's more of a festive occasion for couples and emo occasion for singles. Plus this year my parents will be overseas, leaving me all alone in the house and there's no emo xmas eve gathering this year since zx has found his happiness. Surprisingly for me, this year's xmas was one of my most fun-filled and happy Christmas.
So on Xmas eve, I met up with stoney for lunch and movie and coffee. Food can always make people happy even though stoney witness how small my appetite is. As for the movie, we watched Bedtime Stories. It's good to watch some children shows at times and let your imagination run wild. Despite being slow paced at times and fairly predictable, it's still a decent movie. Meeting an old friend on Xmas eve is not too bad an idea after all and it's nice to do catching up considering before the previous meet up last week the last time we met was around 4yrs back. Hopefully can meet up with the last member of our 'stoning gang', rock soon. So far both of us have lost contact of Linli aka rock. So if anyone knows any Linli born in 1987 and was from Hwa Chong, please tell me =)
On Xmas day, had a NP dinner gathering (part-time NP included) and met up with more old friends. Sure they are old friends since we have known each other for 8-9 years already. After food and dessert, went to Juncheng's house for cards and stayover. Daidee, Texas and in-between kept us occupied for the night.
After sleeping for the whole day on Boxing Day, at night was a party, AT MY PLACE!! This is probably the first time I held a party at my place and what a good timing since the house is empty. And who else but the Greenies. A night of Wii, movies, card games, food and most importantly good company. Even the long lost Dawn, Jieyi and Joys appeared and that's how rare!
After sleeping for the who day (again), at night was SMUX Xmas party. The dress code for the night is party attire, so I picked up my long sleeve and my blazer and head on to school for the party. The only thing I ate for the whole day is a piece of bread and ice-cream, so I was starving by the time of the buffet dinner. Had a nice chat with my Desaru group and after that was games like passing the parcel and don't forget the lyrics. And after the party, had tau huay with some of my Desaru group members for dinner. Looking at the standard of the party, I really felt that more can be done for archery in terms of cohesion. Although the culture in archery and SMUX is totally different, there's no harm in trying out. Alright, there's too many problems in archery at the moment, seems like this can wait a while more though.
I am beginning to like Christmas now =)
Went for my 2nd Desaru ride and my 5th Malaysian ride on the 22-23 December. That's the first overseas ride I had with my GT which makes life much easier for me.
As usually, we took a ferry ride from changi to Pengerang jetty
So upon arrival at the Pengerang Jetty, it's a relatively ride to Rengit where we had our lunch, before a hilly ride to Desaru. The wind this year is relatively strong and against us on our trip there, making the ride tough especially for the first timers. With the group supporting each other and helping each other out, eventually we made it to Desaru.
The Desaru resort was quite shiok, with a choice of showers and bath. Had a BBQ buffet dinner which wasn't the best though, as most of the food tasted quite bad. The breakfast the next morning was much better though. Afterwhich, we set off from Desaru back to Singapore. The ride back was a breeze with the tail wind and the slopes were generally more gentle.
Nonetheless, the ride was not exactly smooth through out as Jamie got injured...
And fatigue sets in and heads go down
But for all the FOOOOOOOOODDD, everything was worth it =)
Even though the ride seems relatively easier this time round, it was still a lot of fun. Thanks to the GLs, the organisers, my fun groups and most importantly my GT which went with me all the way. Desaru for a third time next year? maybe. haha.
After countless rides with SMUX including 4 Malaysia rides, I've finally decided to get my own bike. With my limited budget, I got myself a GT Avalanche 3.0 from white sands on Thursday. That's $550 injected to stimulate the economy =(
One day after I got the bike, it's well utilised during the desaru pre-ride, where we cycled from ECP to west coast to jurong hill to bukit timah and back. Had lot's of fun, food and thrill of riding. Actually of all the rides I had with SMUX, yesterday's ride was the fastest.
@ The EsplanadeIt was a tough ride up the Jurong Hill, but the view on top is splendid
Fats replenishing is present in all SMUX actitivities
And here's some after thoughts of the bike:
Now it's time to save up further to zhng my bike. I'll need a helmet, front light, back light, sleek tyres and perhaps neon lights. lolx.
You know you are old when you are enjoying activities which old people enjoy doing, such as PRAWN FISHING!!!
Once again, with the greenies =)
And here's the prawn I caught, which is quite small. I always din manage to swing the bigger prawns up, so ended up catching quite a number of small prawns.
And that's y people always tell you not too look at how food is prepared otherwise you won't feel like eating the food anymore.
Prawns can be cooked to rare, medium rare and well-done. Bet you din know that.
This sums up why prawning is an old people thingy..
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Archery is another old man sports which I enjoyed. The past Sunday was Telok Blangah Open and it's more of a fun shoot for me than a competition. Since NUS Open last year or around that time, I have been jinxed in competitions and underperformed super badly. This competition was no exception. I did so badly with countless misses that usually don't happen during training, and I actually don't have strength to finish even one round of competition.
Probably now I will spend more effort on running the club than winning competitions, and I did not even bother to participate in the yr end competition. Think things just come naturally, just a week ago I was thinking of all the burden of being a president, now I feel like I'm thinking for the club most of the time. Seeing the club members getting more bonded and the potential the year ones are showing really makes me feel I should do more for them.
Congrats to the winner of the comp =)
Let's make this post a post of numbers.
42.195km is the distance I ran/walk
21477 is my tag number
6hr:2min:41s is my timing
3 friends running with me all the way
Shiwei, me and zx. Richie joined us later
0 of my photos taken by marathon photos
1% chance that I will run a marathon again
These are insufficient incentives for me to suffer another 42km
Had my archery retreat last week at Downtown East chalet. Just a simple and unofficial retreat where we played Xbox, mahjong, cards and sang Kbox.
One of the main purpose of the retreat was to have the AGM and somehow I became the president of SMU Archery Club. To be frank, I did not expect to get the position even though after the nominations I had a 50-50 chance. Maurice was so much hands-on and takes initiatives to do things for the club and I'm sure all the seniors can see his effort during training too. On the other hand, most of the time I am having a 'more talk, less action' approach, which is not what a club president should be having. Perhaps how I got the vote is during training, I often slack and go to talk to the year ones while Maurice is training hard. That's probably one of the main weakness of democracy.
The position comes with so much responsibility and work that I'm feeling it as a job jus a few days after I assume my responsibilities. Gone are the days where I can just go to the range as and when I like and just shoot. Now before I get to shoot I have to send out e-mails before the day, go to school first to get stuff which they need before I reach the range. Even after reaching the range, I still can't shoot in peace, as I have to make sure everything is in order and have to talk to the range master about admin stuff and to strengthen the relationship between the clubs.
I am starting to admire Winston and Vincent for their selfless contributions to the club for the past one year and I wonder how did they do it. No way will I be like them no matter how hard I try since my character is just not that type. For the good of the club, I will have to distribute the work well to my Exco and take more of a supervising role than a hands-on role like them. Probably some archery members will come across this post and sorry if you are disappointed to find out that your club president lacks passion in running the club, but rest assure that I will not neglect my responsibilities and everything will still be in order, just like the good old days.
My exams formally ended last Saturday and 5 exams in 3 days don't sound as bad as it sounds. At least mentally wise you could still last through the 5 papers but how well you can score is another matter.
The exams this time round are real tough, especially MA, where I am just writing whatever workings I can write and most of the time I am just guessing my way through. Truly demoralising for a first paper. Other papers seems alright though but at the end of the day, anything may happen. Results should be out one by one for the next few days and hopefully things are not as bad as they seems. Now my hope lies on stats, which should be the first result to be out. If even stats also chui then I will be totally gg-ed. I have even submitted to be a TA for stats, so just keeping my fingers crossed.
Even after exams, not too happening this time round. Spent Sunday for soccer and nua-ing, and today clearing up my room which by now look more like a room and I can finally see part of the surface of my table. Next few days will be quite packed with archery meeting tml, and SMUX bbq, archery retreat and 4SAB BBQ. Hopefully I still can have enough energy to last through. After that will be Archery training on Saturday and Standard Chartered on Sunday!!! Argh!! I am so gonna die. My pre-training will just be 5km today and another 10km tomorrow.
