Missy Messy Minty

Merry Christmas

2011-12-26T01:01:00.008+08:00

A picture of christmas tree in the morning.

P.S: Can you spot me? :)

Time for Christmas Lunch!!!

Hello Roasted Turkey!

Turkey, yorkshire pudding, gravy, stuffings, little sausages wrapped with bacon, honey glazed potatoes and parsnips, peas, carrots and cranberry sauce!

It gets dark at around half 3 here. Pitch black by 4pm.

Hello Family,

I hope you had lovely time with your family on Christmas. I am stuffed full and warm at Simon's house with his family.

New year is approaching soon in five days, and this year has been pretty good for me.

I just finished my University project - documentary, following a deaf boy and his mother as they wait for the surgery. It was a totally new experience for me as a producer but a good one.

Simon and my film idea got picked by ZOOM scheme, which selects only five and give them money and guidance to create film. Simon and I will be making a 24 minutes film. I will tell you more about what our film is about. At the moment, we are working on the script.

I've learnt so much about the script-writing through the screenwriting module that I picked for 2nd year, and as well as from working with ZOOM script editor. It was exciting!

What's more exciting is...Sophie, my best friend from MLC will be coming to England to visit me and Jess! (Jess is currently living in London) Am looking forward to catch up time in January! We've been friends for ten years!

Merry Christmas!

We will be having finger food soon at 6pm! Festive fat!

Love from Erika

Birthday Dinner

2011-11-18T03:31:00.006+08:00

A big thank you to Simon for cooking.

P.S: Simon bought me a 2nd hand iphone.

Will be using it in a few days.

So please download Whatapp please!

Simon's Bob Dylan hair

2011-11-18T02:45:00.000+08:00

Simon's Susan Boyle hair

2011-11-18T01:59:00.001+08:00

Birthday Menu!!

2011-11-15T09:52:00.004+08:00

Above is the menu...for my belated birthday dinner!! I had my birthday in October but I have been busy lately with shooting. Finally...Simon will cook me the feast this wednesday!! I got so excited and chose 6 foods!! :P Simon said my fancy choice of food made him stressful for him but he's got the skill in organising so I'm not worried. I am sure he can handle the pressure in Hell Kitchen. :D

2011-04-07T20:17:00.000+08:00

Little Preview!

2011-04-06T03:59:00.013+08:00

"THREE AND A HALF SENSES" is a documentary for my university project.

Below are some glimpses of the film!

I will upload the film into www.vimeo.com next week.

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts about the film.

THREE AND A HALF SENSES PRODUCTION photos

2011-04-06T03:01:00.021+08:00

15 January

2011-01-17T06:30:00.005+08:00

15th of January is a special day for me and Simon.

1 year of being together.

He took me to a small indoor water amusement park

called Wet and Wild in Newcastle,

where I can enjoy sliding into water in nearly tropical humid temperature.

Dinner. Italian pizza.

The pink dress is 22nd birthday present from Simon.

He made sure that I eat well..a lot

After dessert, Simon (aka giraffe with squashed neck) surprised me with this cool framed photograph.

A random Picture

2011-01-04T08:54:00.001+08:00

On christmas day...

Proper English Christmas Feast

2011-01-04T08:42:00.004+08:00

Roasted Turkey with stuffing, topped with gravy.

You'll be very pleased to hear that I ate healthy vegetables of

steamed carrots, peas and roasted honey glazed potatoes.

Frozen Geordieland

2010-11-28T08:29:00.005+08:00

Snow can be so beautiful yet very cruel.

When I walked towards Metro this morning,

I admired the beauty of the snow.

I snapped some photos on the way.

The bush barely visible under the snow!

Poor little plants buried under snow

That's how deep the snow is....

and I think it will get worse.

Simon and Claire said they never see snow in November in whole of their life.

Snow usually come in December.

Here's some quotes from the news:

"... experts say the worst-hit area is Northumberland where blizzards have dumped up to 35cm of snow.

It has led Northumbria Police to urge motorists to stay off the roads and only venture out if absolutely necessary....and there'll be heavier snowfalls working westwards across northern England."

I was so naive about the perils of snow.

Simon, Claire and I had dinner at Metro Centre (A huge shopping mall),

we stayed and chatted,

not knowing that the buses have been cancelled,

due to terrible heavy snow.

No wonder people have left the shopping mall early.

The clothing shops were already closed before 7pm,

the restaurants were nearly empty and lifeless,

which is strange for me because I know

Orchard Road in Singapore will be still alive and buzzing

with a lot of people walking around.

So...

No buses.

No taxi.

It was too dangerous to ask their parents to drive on icy slippery roads.

We had to use train and metro to go home.

Managed to reach my home safe.

Thank goodness that my bedroom is warm,

naturally warm without heater switched on.

Ahh...I can sleep well tonight, snuggled in thick warm blanket.

Good night, family!

P.S: How's the weather treating you?

25th November

2010-11-27T04:56:00.012+08:00

25th November.

Exactly one month before Christmas Day.

Snow, snowflakes, ice came!

White everywhere.

Lush!

The lone tree outside my flat.

My Ugg boots!

Simon and his handmade snowballs

Fancy Newkie Ice-Crunch?!

100 percent fat free.

Snooooooow!

Walking on the crunchy snow!

I love how the ice crunches under my Ugg boots.

But it can be a bit slippery walking on ice, especially on the slopes.

Christmas display in shopping malls on Northumberland Street

There are christmas decorations on the streets.

What's more exciting is that there are food stalls on the streets,

only for christmas period!

Yummy food from a wide range of different countries.

Dutch pancakes. German sausages. Polish beer. Spanish churros. And many more!

The warmth radiating from food stalls, the bright decorations and lights has really lifted the warm merry fuzzing feeling inside me.

Am looking forward to this weekend,

exploring the food stalls.

My goal is to try as many food stalls as possible.

Movember!!

2010-11-20T07:22:00.002+08:00

I purposely shot him on this angle because you can see how piggishy his nose is. :D

Okay but I have another purpose too,

which is showing you his "moustache".

A Mint Message from Missy Messy

2010-11-08T02:49:00.001+08:00

It gets dark at around half past 4! FOUR!

It feels a bit strange, looking at the dark sky, thinking it’s around 7pm and then looking at my mobile to find out that it’s just half past four! The sky is already completely pitch black by the time the clock ticks past five.

Minty love from Missy Messy!

A new blog

2010-11-08T02:07:00.002+08:00

Hello all,

I've set up a second blog, a blog where I can put my random thoughts about the films I've seen, discuss about what I've learnt in media area and update about my progress in making any films. Everything will be about the films.

I will still update here in Missy Messy Minty blog. This is my way to keep in touch with you all, family. Missy Messy Minty blog will just contain my personal messy ramblings about my life in England.

Please go to www.missmoviemanic.wordpress.com

:) Thank you for reading.

Love from Missy Messy Minty

Royal Revelation Revealed!

2010-11-06T08:47:00.007+08:00

Am I a royal pain? I know I’m being so dramatic about revealing something. Okay, this is just a really tiny announcement but this is something I’m very excited about. It’s like I’m having a new baby, and I can’t wait to tell you! My baby is....a new film! Oh I am overjoyed. I’ve been thinking of making this baby for a few months, and I’ve decided today to conceive the baby. And yes! I’ve conceived the baby!!! It’s a day old. A tiny embryo of script! It will grow and develop into a real beautiful baby, i hope!! Maybe you will see my baby next year, around in February. I’m excited! Now I must prepare for the baby, that is looking for a beautiful camera, making sure that my baby gets a superstar supervising from the director, finding a perfect director of photographer to photograph and record the important birth of my baby, and not forgetting the editor who will edit out the ugly blemishes of my baby, and many more! I’ve been thinking names for my baby. There are few names but one of my favourites is... “Rewind, Replay, Rewrite.” When I’ve decided on the name for my baby, and when it is ready, I will put it in the most bonny baby competition - Deaffest! (A film festival in United Kingdom)

I will update you with my baby’s progress regularly. :)

Love from excited erika!

P.S: Thank goodness that I don't have morning sickness!!!

Life, Learn, Love, Laugh

2010-11-06T08:17:00.002+08:00

I am writing this for me.

Life...

Life is here to teach us lessons about life. The lessons we either choose to learn or not. These lessons mould us into the person we are today. Love is here in our life. Love is here in our families. Love is here to teach us how to love people surrounding us. Love who you are now, love your family, friends and special someone. Laugh with them. Laughters bring joy to people in our lives. Also remember to just laugh during the bad or low points in your life. If we know how to see the funny side in the life during low points, then we have the world’s powerful and free medicine - laughters.

If you try to make the most of your life, if you grab the chances to learn to become a better person, if you have learnt to love with whole of your heart, if you can laugh freely and happily, then you are truly living the life fully.

A Life Lesson

2010-11-05T23:23:00.004+08:00

A life lesson to be learnt.

When I was young I drove my family, especially my mother up the wall with my endless chatter. I demanded their attention. I demanded them to convert every details of their spoken conversations into sign for me. I hated being left out. I still do.

As my body stretched longer, shooting taller towards the sky my signing became faster and faster. My family couldn't catch up with my signing. I soon turned to my friends where I can ramble freely and fast in signing. I met new people as I roamed from one country to another country. I learnt new sign languages. I could sign in four sign languages now (I like to think! :P)

Now, every-time I come back to family gathering, I realise I have to slow down my signing. I am not a little girl anymore. A little girl who can demand my family to translate their spoken words for me. Because of that, the feeling of being left out returns back.

But now, after seeing Simon losing his granddad, I thought of you, family.

I know I don't talk much with you, family. Perhaps I am lazy. Perhaps I am not that patient.

But remember that I love you. I will try my best to talk more to you when I get the chance to see you. And I hope you also make more effort to talk to me more. It will mean a lot to me.

Love, Erika

Halloween Party

2010-11-01T01:47:00.008+08:00

Here are some photos from the party. Some are too scary to show!!

Claire (Simon's sister) and Lotte.

A maid to clean Simon's bedroom.

A bewitching witch.

A pink pirate and a happy clown.

Vampire Madness

A very friendly Zombie

Kara from Sydney. She lives in Derby at the moment.

She came to Newcastle for the weekend.

JESS!! ALL THE WAY FROM LONDON!

In case you can't work out who it is. It's SIMON!

Us, the asian chicks!

Me and my "Johnny Depp" for a night!

My favourite photo of Jess and me.

2010-10-13T20:54:00.007+08:00

Hello,

I know the last entry might sounded a bit “negative”, but honestly, some of them are just reserved but they’re nice actually. One chinese girl gave me one of her pancakes to eat. The Vietnamese even offered me to try her beef and soup. Their cooking are very delicious. I also cooked carbonara pasta for them, carbonara pasta is the only dish I could cook very well. Heh, but hey my pasta is as delicious as theirs. Learnt this secret simple recipe from my real italian friends. So you can say it’s pretty authentic italian dish... er, but with british cheddar cheese and eggs laid by british hens in England. Anyway, the point is, my flat mates are getting warmer. In fact, they’re excited about my Halloween birthday party on the 30th.

I’m also starting to go out with my class. Few nights ago, they invited me to join them to hang out together, and I had a brilliant time with them. I never felt left out, they were always talking to me, and making sure I’m okay, which is really nice.

I’m happy being in here.

I wanted to blog about “Go Ape”, an adventure where you “swing” from a tree to a tree but in a tricky way, climbing up the tree and trying not to fall off the obstacle courses which consist of wobbly planks, thin ropes, barrels and sort of things suspended high above the ground, with only safety harnesses holding you if you fall off. I went there two weekends ago, with Simon and his father for his 55th birthday. We had to wake up early and drive through green countryside for 2 hours. It was beautiful looking at the vast green fields with shaved naked sheep scattered across. The place was in Cumbria, near Lake District, which is on other side of England. West coast of England. Yep, I went from east coast to west coast! Pretty cool, huh? Anyway, the best part of “Go Ape” is the flying fox! I absolutely loved the flying fox. It was the massive SWING from the tree to another tree! I did five flying foxes and landed beautifully on my feet like a ballerina, while Simon landed on his ass most of the time. I guess, the gravity of his ass caused this. Sorry. The view while you fly from a tree to another tree was amaaaazing! The view of lush green trees and fields!

After we succeeded our mission of going ape, we had lunch, and went for a walk around Lake District, then ate again. I had the famous english dish called “Toad-in-a-hole”, a yorkshire pudding with cumberland sausage. The yorkshire pudding was lovely, soft and warm!

University is going good too. I may write about university in the next entry. :) Now, it's time for pictures! I forgot to bring camera, sorry. So I "stole" some pictures from Google! :p

The lake I went to is Grasmere.

Lake Grasmere

:) Ciaooo

My personal thoughts

2010-10-01T00:58:00.001+08:00

I live in a flat full of Asians. I am an Asian myself but I don’t know if I should consider it lucky living with Asians. Some would say I’m lucky because it means I will have a clean and quiet flat. But I, living in a new country, prefer to mingle with like-minded people who are eager to have a taste of local culture. Meeting local people, and making friends with friendly people, it doesn’t matter where they are from as long as they are interested in getting to know new people.

I arrived at the flat with a hope that I would meet some friendly flat-mates, eager to go out together, to get to know each other better, because we will live together for nearly one year. But sometimes I don’t get what I wish for. After two weeks in my flat, I must be honest - I am actually a bit frustrated. Most of them cook asian foods, and then scurry straight to their bedrooms with plates piled with food, only coming out when they have to wash the dishes. The living room is lifeless and empty almost all the time. I have yet to have conversations with half of my flat. I tried to make a first move last week, inviting them to go out together, only two replied. The rest kept silent.

Maybe I’m disappointed. Maybe I was hoping too much that I would enjoy chilling out with flat-mates in the living room at nights. I’ve heard the stories of flat-mates often hanging in the living room. I’ve heard of one friend saying that she get SMSes from her flatmates asking her if she’s okay if she is in her bedroom too long.

Well, If I am to live in a flat with 6 people who rarely mingle together, then I must look beyond the walls of my flat, and try to make friends with other people.

I just found out that someone from my class lives in Quay Point too. I was in laundry room when he came in. It was nice to have some company while waiting for clothes to be washed and dried.

Don’t worry too much about me. I have made friends with some deaf people in Newcastle. Wait. I think someone up there is listening to me, because I just got an SMS from my flat-mate, the one from “nice group”. :) Will dine with her next Tuesday, with me cooking pasta.

Maybe I have to be patient but I’m also keeping my window open.

Newcastle Part 1

2010-09-30T08:06:00.001+08:00

I thought that it will hit me when the gravity pulled my guts in the plane but it didn’t, and it remained a surreal dream for about three weeks, till I began my first week at University.

Nearly four weeks ago, I was in a plane, my face close to the window, staring at the black ocean, which eventually transformed into vast green fields, then into streets with neat rows of houses with red roofs, and in a few minutes, I was standing at the very back of a very long queue. That wait was unbelievably long but at that time, I didn’t know that once I step outside the airport and fill my lung with my first breath of cold English air, the time will go very fast.

Here I am, sitting at my desk, in my extraordinary neat bedroom, typing this entry for the blog

I ate the English dinner on my first night. Beef and gammon doused with generous gravy. Yorkshire Pudding. Potatoes. Dessert was brilliant! Bottomless jug of custard!! Oh, I think I floated a bit when I saw the word ‘bottomless’. I ate Fish and chips. Sausages and chips.

Okay, I better stop talking about food because as I type, it’s quarter to one in the morning and I don’t want to make myself hungry.

The buildings at Grey Street are beautifully old, so regal and majestic. The streets are paved with stone cobbles. I felt like I was just a tourist, exploring a tiny part of Europe. If you go down to Tyne river, you will see a modern bridge called ‘Millennium Bridge’, and ‘The Sage’, a centre for musical performances. You will see more bridges, one of these is famous ‘Tyne Bridge’, a green bridge which greatly resembles Sydney’s harbor bridge.

I explored my University campus, tried to remember my way around but I guess it didn’t work well as I nearly got lost on my 2nd day at University. Nice navigation, Erika! The lecturers here are really nice. I got some emails from the lecturers, they already knew that I’m deaf, and that they want to make sure that I’m okay, and that I can ask them any questions. They sent me attachments of informations and details for modules. It made me feel like ‘Hey, I exist!’ Yep, kinda made me feel extra special.

Okay, it’s time for me to snuggle in the bed!!!

I will update with more stories.

Love from Newcastle!!

My Bedroom!

2010-09-30T04:46:00.009+08:00

Good and long desk

Little hall with mirror on the wall.

My own bathroom

Shower!!

My comfy bed!

In order for my bedroom to be suitable for viewing, I tided up a bit! :)

Things I've Learnt...

2010-09-18T17:38:00.004+08:00

I used to believe that Simon is very tall

but after looking around in Newcastle,

I realise he is NOT that tall!

I used to believe that I'm pretty short

but after looking around in Newcastle,

I realise I'm NOT that short!

Anyway, I will move into my new room in a few hours! I need to go off to register with police with funny-looking hats. LOL. I get giggles whenever I see the police with funny-looking hats. Speaking about the police with funny-looking hats, I have to recommend you to watch one british film, which involves police with funny-looking hats. It's called "Hot Fuzz".

P.S: Strangely, the police don't look stupid with funny-looking hats in this movie. But then, it's movie.

Love from England

Choosing country for study...

2010-08-19T10:03:00.007+08:00

Why did I pick United Kingdom over United States?

Well, actually my first choice is Italia! It would be lovely to spend three years studying and living in Italia. Imagine being surrounded by Italian guys with tanned skin and long hair.

Enjoying delicious bruschetta and being served vino by the Italian guy.

Double awesome.

Real Italian pizza! Pizza! Pizza!

Lots of interesting places to see

Unfortunately, Italiano is Greek to me.

So my second choice is England, which is closer to Italy than America. :)

Flight

2010-08-19T02:57:00.002+08:00

My heart thumps against my ribcage. My eyes are glued on a man. I wait with impatience, my eyes never leaving that man for a second. A minute later, the man scans the room with his dark eyes, he spots me, waves his hand, beckoning me to come. I rise up.

He hands me a yellow envelope. I hurriedly sit down on a chair, rip the envelope open, plunge my hand inside the envelope, and pull a red passport out. I flip the pages of the passport quickly. There, it is. I blink.

Student Visa.

Valid from 15/08/10.

I stare at it. Yes, I am definitely going to England. My heart stops thumping against my ribcage. I close the passport, put it back inside the envelope, and walk out of the Visa Centre.

Wait... Is it real?

My hand dives inside the envelope, again. I open the red passport again. This time, I carefully trace every tiny details. My finger run over the bumps, holes and embossed stamp and text under my finger. I read the text.

Valid till 30/10/13.

It’s one day after my 25th birthday. O.u.c.h.

It’s an o.u.c.h. but it’s helluva sweet that I’m going to live in a new country for three years. I’m really grateful that I can go, thanks to my parents and their wonderful support. It’s a huge relief to get the student visa finally. With the visa, my hope of going to England is now real, but it won’t feel real to me till the gravity of the earth pulls my guts as the plane lift off the ground, and soar into the sky.

The exact feeling I had when I was twelve, sitting in the plane, with the seat belt strapped around my tiny waist. I just said goodbye to my family and some friends at Changi Airport, but it didn’t feel real yet, but of course, it eventually hit me like a gush of water, shaking me awake when I saw the island getting smaller and smaller.

Twenty two years ago, a baby was born in a tropical island, called Indonesia. The baby’s name is Erika. That’s me. I spent the first four years of my life in Jakarta, roads heavily congested with cars, motorbikes and tuk tuks. I went to an oral school for deaf but I couldn’t remember much of it. I painted half of my face with my mother’s red lipstick. I nearly drowned in a swimming pool. My mother saved my life.

Aged four, and with knowledge of some Indoneisan words, which I eventually forgot all words except ‘apa’ and ‘sakit’, my family and I moved to another tropical island, called Singapore. The roads are efficiently organized, the streets clean and free of chewing gum. A fine city with a lot of fines for breaking laws. I was enrolled into a deaf signing school. I sprinkled the baby powder in my most hated grade 3 teacher’s cup. I swam in the swimming pool and won some medals.

I spent eight years growing up in safe Singapore. Then came a chance of studying in a new island called Australia. I eagerly wanted it. The newness excited me. The new country, new city, new culture, new people, new food and new school excited me. I never felt any nervousness or worry. The excitement was overwhelming. Perhaps, I was such an optimistic child.

The newness still excite me now. I’m feeling the excitement bubbling inside me. Perhaps, I’m still almost as optimistic as a twelve years old Erika.

I do feel a bit worried about if I could cope with new course, but interpreter and note-taker will be provided, which I really, so much, desperately need after enduring three years of no interpreting or note-taking. A friend, who is currently studying in America, said that she realised how much she had missed out in Singapore, was mad about it, and felt that she did not achieve her full potential because of no interpreters or note-takers. I understood her totally.

Aside from university, I am not worrying much. I’m pretty laid-back, going with the flow, whatever happens I adapt to it. I only know one thing: I want to make the most of three years in England. I want to try new things, do new things, learn new things, and seize the day.

Carpe Diem.

For Papa

2010-07-05T01:15:00.000+08:00

When in India, Do as the Indians Do...

2010-07-02T22:37:00.003+08:00

Susanna. Italian. Me. Singaporean. We were born and raised in different countries but we share the same passion for travels and birthdays in the same month and year.

I first met her at Asia Pacific Deaf Camp in Indonesia, we met again in Singapore, we met again in her homeland, Italy, we met again at Deaflympics in Taipei, and we met again in my home. I just finished three years of studying at Lasalle while she just finished her three months of traveling around India with her friend, Grace. I will start studying in this September and I’m sure in this coming September, she would be still traveling.

She and Grace stayed at my place for about 11 nights. It was exotic watching them tell the stories about India, the staring Indian men, the hot and humid days, the spiders in toilets, lizards on the walls in their bedrooms, the small beds in the trains, chai tea, currys, naans, the bobbing heads, the adventure of riding on a motorbike with more than one passengers or being asked to hold a huge computer during a motorbike trip, witnessing three oceans at the same time, the beggars surrounding them constantly, walking towards the majestic Taj Mahal, sleeping on desert under the stars, seeing the famous Ganges River where the ashes of the dead, bathing, brushing their teeth with toothbrushes, washing long colourful saris, and washing animals mingle together in a long river, and many more.

They talked about how traveling in India has opened their eyes. They saw that Indians smile more often despite the fact that they live in very poor and dirty places. In contrast, people from rich countries rarely smile.

But like what they said, the stories are simply not enough, you got to be there to understand India. Taste, Breathe, See (and Hear for those non-deaf people).

Does traveling change a person? I think it’s the person’s own choice. One can choose to revert back to the old self, influenced by the society’s rules or come back a better person with a better understanding of the world. Well, I’m glad the italian girls fall in the latter category.

For my favourite men in my life

2010-06-20T13:25:00.004+08:00

Another Fantasy

2010-06-08T23:29:00.003+08:00

Being paid to travel? Just jump into a plane, land in a different country and go on an adventure right away, with only a few requirements, which are writing in a blog and making a video. That would be a big AWESOME for me. Apparently, two lucky people are doing it at the moment. World Traveler intern. That is their job now. I also saw some videos of Lonely Planet: Six Degrees. The two presenters working there are two very lucky people, and also not forgetting the lucky camermen and the rest of the crew. They get to meet the real local people in each country.

And I just realise the irony here is that I am getting worse in updating this blog. I used to update the blog quite regularly, and whenever I went traveling, I would come back with stories and photos. My latest trip to Phuket and other mini islands was awesome but I forgot the photos. It would be wicked if I had taken a photo of myself on the scooter and then show it to my nephews when they're older enough to remember. A photo of me on a white scooter with red hearts in Italy won't be enough to convince the little smart boys. It would be also aesome to say "Look, this is your cool auntie riding the scooter!" or "Hey, look, your auntie is standing on the top of the boat and is going to jump off into the sea!" And hope that I can get to watch my nephews drop their mouths in awe and think that I'm their most cool and fun aunt ever. Did I mention that I'm also their youngest aunt? Perhaps, their prettiest aunt too.

Okay, I need to deflate my big head now.

Though I do not have a job with a cool title that says "World Traveler Intern" or "Presenter of Lonley Planet: Six Degrees", I will still blog here and bring stories, photos and maybe videos if I travel again, hopefully! :)

P.S: I want to talk a bit about one documentary trailer which I saw months ago but I will save it for the next entry.

Another Dream

2010-06-07T01:30:00.002+08:00

I usually dream of dreams that are too big. I might not be able to fulfill all of them but I do not care. I will still dream because these dreams are what keep me alive and bring me forward in the life with a sense of purpose. It's like a boat pushed gently across huge ocean by wind. The wind of dreams.

I am always fascinated by different cultures, countries and people. I wonder what it's like to live in a certain country as a deaf person. I've watched some documentary films such as "Born into Brothels" and "Feet Unbound". These films are what inspired me to dream one dream. The dream of making a documentary film in a country where deaf people are less lucky than me. There are many deaf people out there in the world, who are like Kali, a deaf lady I met in Sikkim. Hidden. Unknown.

I honestly don't know how I can make this dream happen. All I know is I have many things to learn first. Learn to navigate across the ocean. Learn to read the silver stars in the black sky. Learn to fight through the roaring storms.

But hey, it's a lot better than floating still on the sea, tied to the port.

POST-PRODUCTION

2010-04-28T13:58:00.006+08:00

This part was not easy, as there have been some problems. The problems of transferring clips to computer. I had to make several trips to the company where I hired the camera before one equipment works! There is barely audible conversation in one scene. This was bad that we had to do voice recording, using my own mama's voice for replace, and Ginny again. But overall, I pretty enjoyed seeing the process of filming being completed. Big thanks to Simon who did all the editing and camera. Big thanks to Ginny who sacrificed her time for the shooting days. Big thanks to Papa for his big support. Okay, now - I've got to tell you two films that I recently watched and love.

"The Machinist"

and

"21 Grams".

Awesome films that hooked my attention from the beginning to the end. I like how "The Machinist" begins. It is a brilliant opening scene. I usually slouch like a lazy bum on the red sofa, but throughout this film, I sat with my back straight and my brain churning with theories. 21 Grams - I am amazed at how the stories intersect with each other, going forward and backwards in the time and yet the whole picture/story is clear and easy to follow. I mean, the story is not set in linear, it goes in a random order, and they don't display the time or date. Awesome.

I can't wait to watch two new films. "Avatar" and "The Hurt Locker" on DVDs, with beautiful subtitles. Subtitles! I waited for so long just for you, Subtitles.

And I am also looking forward to reading my mum's new book. :)

P.S: sorry for slow update.

Western v.s Asian. HELP!!!!

2010-04-19T20:40:00.004+08:00

Hello family,

I need your help. :D

I received a message from my sister. She mentions that since Simon's girl is Asian, he should learn to respect the Asian culture by calling her parents, "Uncle" and "Auntie".

Hmm...I wonder what Simon should call my older siblings? Should he call my sister, "Auntie?" Should he call my brother, "Uncle" too? Is there a name for "older brother/sister" in Asian culture? Koko? Cece? Are these names correct?

Please reply.

:) Love from Erika, your baby!

PRODUCTION PART

2010-04-16T15:02:00.011+08:00

That's me, pointing my finger in a posh way with my butt sticking out. You should have seen how I start the shooting. Simon kept laughing at how I start the shooting, driving me mad as usual.

Simon doing his work as a camera-man. He got sunburnt at the end of the day. That's typical of a white Englishman. He doesn't have our special south-east Asia gene of producing beautiful tanned skin. What a shame...wait a second. Kiat and Papa don't have that special gene!

Double shame!

Ginny shaping her hands into a butterfly.

and then into a heart.

Debating over who's hotter. Gerrard or Torres.

Am showing who's the boss.

That's our beautiful white cab car. Papa has been wonderful on these filming days. He bought the ice to keep the drinks chilled in the red box. That's clever. He drove us around. Thank you, Papa, my perfect cab-driver.

Caught Simon sleeping. Well, he was (slightly or very) jet-lagged. It was honestly a big surprise for me to see him sleeping without drooling salvia out. Aside from the drool issue, thank you for your big help!! :) Now, can you please reduce your nagging, pretty please?

A very delayed update from me

2010-04-12T19:29:00.008+08:00

I couldn't stand Simon nagging me to update the blog soon. So here I am, updating my blog for you, family. You won't believe the torture he has put me through to force me to update the blog. He says he will keep driving me mad till I update this blog. Poor me, poor miss messy blogger. Kidding, of course. He did not hurt me, twist my arm, or whatever that puts your little erika in pain. It's just his mouth and hands...doing all these annoying nagging. :) Seriously, he has been good to me.

Now... for some real updating!

I've finished my first short film, have sent it to university in UK, and also to a deaf film festival in UK. And I just started film-making course last Friday, where three persons from SINEMA Academy of Motion Pictures will come to deaf association and teach a group of deaf people.

There are three parts. Pre-Production, where you think of a message, story, context, and you do script, storyboard and prepare the locations and things for filming days. Next is Production, which is the filming. After Production is Post-Production, that is where editing happens. So I think I shall put up some photos I took during Pre-Production.

PRE-PRODUCTION STORY!!!

I had thought of a story I wanted to tell, I've done the script. But I needed to find a perfect location for two scenes. A lush green field with trees in background, and an empty, sad land for the last scene. So I needed a taxi-driver to drive me to various locations around Sengkang and Punggol. Since I'm on a tight budget, I searched and found a perfect taxi-driver.

The perfect taxi-driver is Papa. He has a beautiful white car. I do not know the brand of the car - I forgot. But what is perfect about Papa is I do not need to pay him. :) He has been a wonderful taxi-driver, the best one in Singapore. He can multi-task too. He can become a model for you in a second.. I used him as a model sometimes for photographs. Let's look at our taxi-driver and model!

Any feedback on his modeling skills?? Noticed his new hairstyle?? Nice Mohawk, eh? The wax brand is called "Wind"

Strong and dry....but short-lasting.

I will update soon with 2nd and 3rd Parts of my first film-making process!

From my heart

2010-02-14T11:29:00.002+08:00

February. Little cupids are flying around in the air. Their chubby cute naked ass wobbling like jelly. The sky seem pink today. I smile at thoughts of my friends, family and someone special. Today is Valentine's Day and I want to express from my heart how grateful I am to have love from my family. It's going to be cheesy one, but hey, Valentine's Day is only once a year. So it's time for me to grab the perfect excuse to be very cheesy for one day!

Papa,
Thank you for all of your hard work. You've been a great father.
You provided a roof over me. You provided me food.
You provided me the best education I could have.
But the best of all, you provided me your love.

Mama,
Thank you for your beautiful sacrifice. You've been a wonderful mother.
You gave me a stable home. You gave me your caring hugs.
You gave me the attention. You gave me your listening ears.
But the best of all, you gave me your love.

Brother and sister,
Thank you for your teasing. Both of you have been marvelous.
You treated me like a normal person. You made fun of me.
You laughed at me. You bullied me. You torturted me.
But the best of all, you showed me your love (in a weird way!)

I might not show you much love. I"m sorry for that.
But inside me, I'm really grateful to have you all.
I love you forever and ever.
Happy Valentine's Day!

P.S: please pass my hugs and kisses to little real cupids with wobbly asses.

2010-01-09T12:35:00.002+08:00

Dear little e,

I must write a little letter to you. I'm terribly shocked that you said you're cuter than me.

I'm fine with you saying that you outdone your parents in good looks, but outdone your aunty messy in good look? That ain't a nice thing to say to your aunty.

Yes, I know you're offended by my suggestion that you are short and will be short. I apologise. Well, you're short at the moment, but who knows. You might grow taller than your parents. After all, you have weird un-naturally light hair for an Asian dude. This might be a good sign that you skipped the 'short' gene. But hey, don't get your hopes high. Just pray, lah. Your dad prayed for a younger brother and he got me instead!

Thank you for reading my adventures in Thailand. I know I sound like I'm exaggerating but it's real like a chocolate cake made by your mum! (I still can't believe that your mum made all of these cakes.) Anyway, your aunty messy, as usual, forgot to bring something for her voyage. CAMERA! Her crew-mates' cameras broke from 9 months of traveling. Sad. That's why I don't have photos from thailand.

But you being a smart boy, you can google up the pictures of the islands I've been to. I've seen you using Mac when you were just a few months old. Amazing!

I saw some videos of you chasing after yellow car. Your Oma told me that you cried as you tried to catch the little yellow car. It's appalling. Your parents are abusing you, torturing you and making you exercise your baby fat off. Hang in there, little e! Oma will arrive melb pretty soon.

By the way, i heard from your parents that you're stubborn (plus cute). Ah, you've got my bad genes. :P

Love, Aunty M.

2010-01-05T22:23:00.002+08:00

Here's a photo of Aunty Messy with a Vulcan haircut.

See, little e, you still look cute with vulcan haircut, like I do!

Noah and Johan, want to join our club?

2010-01-04T01:11:00.008+08:00

Hello!

I will write more bed-time stories, i promise, little e. But for now, i shall recommend one film to you. When you grow up, my little nephews, make sure you watch it. It will make your aunty very very happy.

My new favourite film is... "The Prestige"! (Are you smiling now, annoying anonymous? )

It's a great film. Just watch it and you will understand why. I think this film will be a good training for your brains, little nephews.

Are you watching closely?

:) Good night!

2009-12-30T22:34:00.001+08:00

Hello,

Sorry. I know I have been absent from blogging for a long, long time. I planned to blog a few days ago but it got delayed because I needed time to recover from the shock over poor little e’s Vulcan haircut. But hey, I’m fine now after anaylsing some photos of him. I’ve concluded that little e is still cute. (Note to the parents of little e: you need to sweep his hair sideways for a superman look. You can’t have a Vulcan haircut and walk around with a red cloak at the same time! That’s a disgrace to Spock and Superman.)

Heck, I think I’m a proud aunty to three most handsome nephews on the earth. I can’t believe that I saw Johan’s mischievous smile and the “I-did-something-naughty!” look in his eyes! Noah’s still adorable as ever, with his huge grin.

Anyway, a quick summary of what Aunty Messy has been up to for last few months. Aunty Messy went to Deaflympics in Taipei, had a blast there, came back to Singapore, finished the semester, and went to Thailand with her friends before finally spending Christmas with her family in Indonesia.

Hmm, too short?

Aye, I think it’s too short.

How about this.

Aunty Messy went on an exciting voyage to Phuket, Thailand, and around Thailand! She and her crew explored Phuket for a first few days, riding on the scooters. Let me repeat, Aunty Messy learnt to ride the scooter! Her favourite beach in Phuket is Kata Noi. Brilliant waves there.

Then, she and her friends developed an itch to explore another island, so they decided to sail to an island called Phi Phi. There, the island is so small that you don’t need cars or scooters to travel. Just walk! Island so small yet so packed with Farangs. Farangs are white people. The nightlife there was awesome. There’s a great place called Reggae (Aunty Messy thinks so, she can’t remember the name.) Anyway, “Reggage” rocks because it got the Thai Muay fight. Aunty Messy remembers the first time she saw it. She thought it was totally brilliant. The high flying kicks. A somersault. The referee accidently punched by the fighter. Alas, the sad ending is she found out it’s staged. Totally fake. She felt cheated for a few moments but something cheered her up. A sign. “Whoever volunteers to fight will get a free bucket.” Her crew-mates wanted to volunteer but that was not the right time. One crewmate needed time to get his sore shoulder better.

While waiting for the right time, Aunty Messy and her crew did island hopping. They went to a famous beach, Maya beach!!! The same place from the film, “The Beach”. Aunty Messy learnt from her crew-mates that they knew one deaf guy who was in the film as an extra. That guy frigging stayed on Maya Beach for three months. Lucky.

Maya beach is very beautiful. Surrounded by cliffs. Aunty Messy did some snorkeling and some jumps from the top of ferry into the sea. And she saw her first sunset in Thailand. She was stunned by how fast the sun disappears. Once the glowering red sun “touches” the sea, it descends very quickly, less than five minutes.

Sailing back to Phi Phi island, and on their last night in Phi Phi, they decided that it’s time for two crew mates to fight, to show who’s the captain. They fought in the ring, surrounded by farangs. One of them got kicked in balls twice. Ouch! The final result was… the short one won. Ah, it shows that the short people can win, eh? So, don’t you worry, Noah! I have a feeling that little e might be short like his dad and mum. But hey, don’t you worry, little e.

After the great thai muay fight, they went back to Phuket in the morning. Island hopping was not over yet. Aunty Messy went on a day trip around some islands, canoeing through caves and witnessed some cheeky monkeys skating across the water, (she’s not kidding about that. She really saw monkey walking on top of the water like Jesus!). And she went to a famous island… James Bond island!!! Did she mention that she was on a strange boat? A pink boat with men in pink tops?! And pink canoes!

Anyway, they sailed back to Phuket in the pink boat. Aunty Messy and her crew-mate placed their map on a table and pondered their next voyage. After some moments of careful planning, no, sorry, I am exaggerating a wee bit here. The truth is…Aunty Messy and her friend were dead tired from the day trip. Her friend got stung by jellyfish and yet still managed to save Aunty Messy from being stung by jellyfish. Anyway, the good news is her friend recovered well after about eight hours of agony.

So, Aunty Messy and her crew-mate continued their island-hopping voyage the next day. First, they had to endure a long land bumpy bus ride to a town called, well, something that starts with ‘S’, Aunty Messy can’t spell it. Anyway, they stayed overnight in the town that starts with ‘S’. Aunty Messy thinks that the hotel she stayed at used to be a hospital. In the morning, they left the town that starts with ‘S’, and boarded a ferry to Koh Samui.

Koh Samui is bigger than Phi Phi island, you can hire the scooters there as well, just like in Phuket. Quite touristy there. Went to a famous rock thingy place there, which Aunty Messy thinks, is called Grandmother and Grandfather Rock. Aunty Messy experienced her first rainy days in Thailand. It rained everyday in Koh Samui. Hoping to escape the rain, she and her friend sailed to a small island, called Koh Tao.

Koh Tao is officially Aunty Messy’s favourite island so far. She was stunned by its beauty before she stepped on the island. There are huts standing on the cliffs near the sea, so near to the sea that you can practically open the window and dive straight into the blue sea. Awesome. She didn’t stay in these huts by the way. Too far from the pier.

Koh Tao is smaller than Koh Samui yet bigger than Phi Phi but the least touristy of all. That’s what Aunty Messy loves about Koh Tao. No Mcdonald, KFC or any fast food chains there. With the scooter, you can ride from the south tip to the north tip in like fifteen minutes.

Aunty Messy’s favourite beach in Koh Tao is called Freedom Beach. The beach is actually small but very beautiful and almost magical. She went there every evening, to watch the sunsets. There’s a small restaurant on freedom beach, in fact, it’s the only restaurant on that beach. It’s got a brilliant view of sea and sky.

Now, it’s time for Aunty Messy to sail back to Phuket and catch a plane back to an island that starts with ‘S’, wait, Aunty Messy remembers how to spell it. S-i-n-g-a-p-o-r-e.

So Aunty Messy, her skin tanned brown from many days of exploring the blue sea and white beaches, made her voyage back to her family.

Hostel

2009-09-23T15:07:00.006+08:00

Hello,

just want to talk about the hostels. I shared the private twin bed room, with a private bathroom within, with my old school friend from Melbourne. She's pretty fussy about the standard, so the room we were staying in, was very good.
Clean towels everyday, bed made everyday. Feels like hotel rather than hostel.
And we had to pay about 40 bucks (about 20 euros?) per night. Expensive compared to the other hostels.

The cheapest hostel, with a good clean bunk bed in air-con dorm, you probably can pay around 10 -15 euros.

Anyway, the italian friends invited Mariana (my "room-mate") and I to their hostel for pasta night.
Their hostel's very basic. Bunk beds. No air-con. Lockers. Backpack bags lying on the floor. Shared bathroom. Shared kitchen.
Basic but good, considering that I've slept in a sleeping bag on a freezing floor for almost a month in Yuksam. Have slept in a tiny tent, sandwiched between two erm... rather large aussie girls. Have pooed and peed in the bush. Have tasted the life of never bathing for 3 - 4 days.

They paid only 6 euros per nite for that hostel, if i remember correctly.

Interesting.. it was my first time seeing what the real hostels look like!

Ever since I went to Asia-Pacific camp, I had to know the location of the cheapest and good hostels in Singapore.
No hotels, please - they say. :) That's their way. Many hostels are located in bugis and little india.
Cheaper hostels can be found in lavender, or seragoon area, but these locations are a bit far from the city.

Okay, new stories coming soon!

ciaooo

Deaflympics, Taipei

2009-09-20T14:05:00.002+08:00

I'm back from Deaflympics in Taipei. The experience was awesome. The culture in Taipei is different.

You need to have the names of places written in Chinese if you plan to use cab. And always stand in the right side when using the escalators. And what has struck me the most is... despite the fact that they live in crowded and rather congested city, they are really green. They often use paper bags. And if you buy small things, they don't give you plastic-bag. That's what i like. And there are different bins for recycling. Lovely.

I've been doing a bit of project research in Taipei. I've been asking people if they have any difficulty in communicating across the language. I got some interesting answers. And I also tried to walk around the streets and communicate with local people with no aid of paper or pen. It was like 50% successful. Haha. Interesting, through. I realized that the culture has played a big part. Some asians are pretty shy. The local people would giggle as they try to think of how to give me directions.
I've learnt a new thing about myself, I am bad in finding the way back to the train station. But then, I'm just a girl.

Anyway, aside from the research, I had a great time, socializing with new people. I went to the same spot where deaf people gather together every night. We would chat and chat till the wee morning, 5 am. That's real deaf culture.

Will write more later,
ciaooo

10 things I love about Melbourne

2009-08-01T23:17:00.001+08:00

Hello. I'm finally back to Singapore. I had a great time in Melbourne, thanks to Papa who helped to pay flight tickets.

10 things I love about Melbourne!!!

1. Brekkie (Breakfast) till 2 or 3pm. Some places even offer brekkie all the day. Perfect for late-risers, like me!! I've eaten so many brekkies at different cafes. The best one i had is probably from Buffterfly cafe in Camberwell, opposite the train station. Cheap compared to others. Only 12 bucks and it's huge. My favourite brekkie is Egg Florentine (2 free range poached eggs with spinach, toasted sourdough bread and hollandaise sauce.) The usual price for large brekkie with eggs is around 14 bucks, i think. I am already missing poached eggs sooo much.

2. The train journey is never boring. When there are some crazy (drunk) people singing loudly, out of tune, and banging on the windows in the train, the other sane normal passengers would act as if they haven't notice that they are sitting right next to the crazy people. And i find it very surreal and funny.

3. Great italian pizzas and pastas. My favorite italian restaurant is probably Sofia at Camberwell. But there is also another one good restaurant at Lygon st, selling a small pizza at 10 bucks and the largest at 16 bucks. That pizza taste like it's mixed with beer (yeast actually.)

4. Great cafe culture. Really good hot chocolate. Lot of good hot chocolate from Max Brenner! And Chocolate Royale from Pancake Parlour. Hot chocolate is crap in Singapore, seriously, they always dilute it with water! hello.. where's the milk? where's the real chocolate?

5. MY FRIENDS! (plus little elliot!)

6. VB (Victoria Bitter), an Australian beer is far better than Tiger Beer, Singaporean beer.

7. Subtitled TV shows.

8. Aussie people are very green as in, trying to use green bags instead of plastic bags when grocery shopping.

9. Getting all SMSes ending with "Love, mwah! xoxoxo" That's the friendly australian way.

10. Graffiti walls at train stations.

I will post 10 things I love about Singapore later! P.S: sorry for some mistakes like the spelling. Am sleepy. :)

Ugly Girl Part 2

2009-07-02T22:12:00.003+08:00

I had a lunch with a friend today. I asked her how would she adapt the tale, "Ugly Duckling" into the modern setting. She said she'll stick with the tale: the ugly girl growing up into a beautiful lady but she will add a twist... the girl realizes that she prefers ugly man. Not the handsome man.
Interesting. :) Okay, here's the 2nd part of "Ugly Girl"

----------------

When she finished high school, and earned enough money, she went to a renowned plastic surgery doctor.

"I want a perfect straight thin nose. I want to get rid of my scar on my neck."

And a few months later, Ellen was more gorgeous ever than before. She landed modeling jobs and grew more famous. Two years later, Ellen went back to the plastic surgery doctor again.

"I want bigger eyes, give me double lids. I don't want my ears to be sticking out anymore."

Ellen looked even more beautiful after second plastic surgery. She got more modeling jobs and even got to star in some big hollywood movies.

A year later, she went back again to have third plastic surgery.

"I want my lips to be fuller and pouty like Angelina Jolie. I want my boobs to be bigger, Cup C. I want botox. I want everything to look perfect."

After the plastic surgery, Ellen was now a very stunning beautiful lady with a hot curvy body. Media, gossip magazines and people praised her beauty, and voted her as number 1 in the "Most Beautiful People" list. Many men flocked to her, asking her out for dates. Ellen enjoyed the attention very much but alas, she learnt that men have short attention span.

To keep their attention on her longer, she decided to go for fourth plastic surgery.

But this time, the plastic surgery has turned her into a very plastic-looking Barbie. Unnaturally tiny thin nose. Puffed lips that looked as if it was stung by a thousands of bees. Too large breasts.

Men stopped flocking towards her, instead they pretended that they have something on and they had to rush away. Media turned its ugly head towards her, snickering at her flaws and condemning her for going for plastic surgeries.

Ellen went for more plastic surgery to correct the flaws, but instead she came out looking worse than before. Yet, she persisted, believing that plastic surgery will remove her flaws.

So Ellen grew uglier each year. And finally, she died of an old age. She was remembered by people as the most ugliest woman in the world.

(Wait, this is not the end. The real ending is in the next and final part)

2009-07-02T04:39:00.006+08:00

I just finished writing a short story, loosely based on a famous tale "Ugly Duckling" but with a rather sombre ending. I shall not put all of the story here at one go. Divided into 3 parts. For now, enjoy the first part... i hope! :)

----------------------
"UGLY GIRL"

Once there was a little girl called Ellen. She was just an ordinary girl with plain brown hair, small black eyes, a slightly squashed nose and a small burn scar on her neck. People in her town scarcely noticed her unless they accidently bumped into her. Whenever they see Ellen, they would gasp in shock. People whispered amongst themselves, "That poor child! Did you see the awful scar on her neck?" Ellen heard these whisperings.

She grew up believing that she was ugly that she never liked to look at herself in the mirror often. But when she turned thirteen, the beginning of the adolescence, she was horrified to discover that the pimples have popped all over her face. She began to walk around with slouched shoulder, back bent, her head bowed towards the floor and her long brown hair curtaining down, partially covering her face. She was too ashamed to show her face to the world.

One day, Ellen heard about plastic surgery and she wanted it so much. She sought for it but her mother refused to let her have it. "You're young. Adolescence is usually an ugly phrase. Who knows you might grow prettier?"

But Ellen, being stubborn, was determined to have plastic surgery so she worked hard to earn money. As seasons came and passed, Ellen blossomed into a quite pretty lady. Her pimples have disappeared. Alas, she didn't notice this as she never looked into the mirror, not even once.

New funny Heineken Advert

2009-06-28T20:11:00.002+08:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1ZZreXEqSY

Haha, this one is really funny. Def one of my fav ads.

Alice in Wooooonderland

2009-06-28T18:55:00.006+08:00

Watched a movie, "Transformer 2" yesterday with friends.
I'm not going to judge it till i watch it again on tv with subtitles. But what i can say about it is the visual effect is pretty cool.

Anyway, my friends and I talked about some films which we can't wait to watch.

I can't wait to watch this film, "Alice in Wonderland" burton-ized by Tim Burton! Look at these photos below. Awesome! Red Queen will be played by Helena Bonham Carter, and Johnny Depp will play Mad Hatter. This movie will come out in 2010, probably March.

I'm curious to see how Tim Burton will interpret this famous story. There are already some versions of "Alice in Wonderland", such as American McGee's Alice and of course, Disney's.

Man... i can't see any of Johnny Depp in Mad Hatter. This dude is the most versatile actor I probably ever seen. He often picks eccentric characters. If Tom Cruise plays Mad Hatter, I bet on ten mint chocolate ice-cream that he can't pull it. He can't.
But Depp can.

2009-06-17T06:43:00.004+08:00

It's irritating me. It's nearly 7 am, and i haven't got a single minute of real sleep. I think it's my first time watching the black sky turning into light blue colour for a long time. It's irritating lying on the bed, staring at the window, the blue light creeping out through the thin gaps around the blinder. I'm not a morning person. I usually sleep late and wake up late. But now, with internship and rehearsals, i kind of worry about oversleeping even through i've set the alarm clock to vibrate me awake. Plus, sometimes talking to my friends on MSN late at night can make my brain too hyperactive. My sleep pattern has gone mad. I can't sleep the whole night. Yawning throughout the day. Then the following night, i plop on the bed fast asleep - sleeping for twelve hours. This is second night this week that i failed to get a moment of sleep.
It's crazy... I feel so totally awake. No tiredness.

It's not like the nights where i rushed to finish the projects right before the deadlines. When i was doing that, i was tired, my eyes were puffy red, and i was so dying to get a few minutes of sleep.

But here... i have the chance to sleep. Perfect 9 hours of sleep. But no... 9 hours of sleep is wasted.

I guess it's time for me to shower now and go out for a proper breakfast which i haven't for a long, long, long, looooong time.

2009-06-16T22:58:00.005+08:00

I'm back to being a bookworm. A nerdy girl flipping the musty pages of library books. I'm reading a funny book by Xiaolu Guo : "A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers," at the moment. Hilarious! It's about a chinese lady living in a new country, England.

"Driver say: 'Please shut the door properly!'
I already shut the door, but taxi don't moving.
Driver shout me again: 'Shut the door properly!' in a concisely manner.
I am bit scared. I not understanding what is this 'properly'.
'I beg your pardon?' I ask. 'What is properly?'
'Shut the door properly!' Taxi driver turns around his big head and neck nearly break because of anger.
'But what is "properly", Sir?' I so frightened that I not daring ask it once more again.
Driver coming out from taxi, and walking to door. I think he going kill me.
He opens the door again, smashing it back to me hardly.
'Properly!' he shout.

Later, I go in bookshop and check 'properly' in Collins English Dictionary ('THE AUTHORITY ON CURRENT ENGLISH') Properly means 'correct behaviour'. I think of my behaviour with the taxi driver ten minutes ago. Why incorrect? I go to accounter buy little Collins for my pocket

And another one:

"I study little red dictionary. English words made only from twenty-six characters? Are English a bit lazy or what? We have fifty thousand characters in Chinese."

Haha. Good one.

Fat arsed Wombat

2009-06-15T02:10:00.005+08:00

This is unofficial mascot of Olympics 2000 in Sydney.
And this is my number 1 favourite mascot.

A strange dream

2009-06-14T02:53:00.002+08:00

I had a strange dream a few nights ago.
I dreamt that Johan, my little nephew, can sign so well.
I was so happy and proud till he started to finger-spell in German alphabet.
I only knew the first sign-letter which means "SCH" but the rest were all Greek to me.
I told him i don't understand.
He frowned, irritated.
He repeated the 2nd letter and mouthed, "eeeiiiooouu!"

That was scary seeing him so angry at me. haha.

2009-06-13T04:12:00.014+08:00

Hello.

I worked at one advertising company as an intern in Jakarta for a short time and now am doing internship at one advertising company in here, Singapore. I never thought much about sitting in front of a computer for a whole day till i began working. My ass. My back. My neck. My eyes!

:) Haha.

What i like about the job as a designer is that you can walk into the company wearing a yellow tee shirt with red printed words : "Hand Over the Donut and Nobody Gets Hurt." and a pair of flip-flops.
Yep, a pair of flip-flops.
BUT there is an art of looking cool with flip-flops at workplace.
Always wear skinny jeans if you're wearing flip-flops. No skirts, please. You'll look like an idiot wearing a skirt with flip-flops. Don't try wearing mini-shorts with flip-flops too. You're not going to beach.

Working as a designer is pretty interesting. You get to work on logos and graphics. In Jakarta, I was given the task of designing logos for a car brand oil. In here, I'm given the brief of designing core graphics for Youth Olympics 2010. Interesting. It far beats working at Seoul Garden.

Speaking about logos and Olympics, I had an interesting funny discussion with a friend recently. We looked at some of the past logos. Moaning at some bland boring logos, and oohing at some good logos. My favourite Olympics logo is Beijing's. It's brilliant. I love how the logo is simple and contemporary yet so RICH with chinese culture and symbols. Red chinese seal. Asian-style brush stroke. I like how the running stick-figure in logo is actually a chinese character, "wen" meaning humanity. Beijing's core graphics : "Lucky Clouds" is fantastic too. Very asian. Beijing's mascots are also cute and good because they've kept in touch with their asian roots.

And the most talked logo is probably London's.

Haha. I laughed when I first saw it. It's very different and frankly, quite obscene. I thought it as ugly but after some time, it grew on me. Ugly, bold but unique. It has achieved in making people notice it and TALK.

One blogger discussed about this logo, and i like how he summed it up:

"It is unique, not boring (definitely!) and highly flexible (design-wise, and the video, though being accused of causing epileptic fits, was able to successfully show how dynamic the emblem could be). The mere fact that ordinary people can conjure up various images, (ranging from the imaginative to humorous and even obscene!) proves it can be a dynamic graphical theme."

I've looked at some logos from as early as 1908, and I am pleased and amused at how the logos have evolved from complicated looking logos to simple and bright logos.

Alright, it's time for me to sleep.

Ciao!

2009-06-06T14:02:00.001+08:00

Yesterday night shook me and left me numb.
Heard the sad news about my good friend.
He and his family was in car accident, in m'sia.
He lost his mother.

I remember him saying how much he loved his mum's cooking.
I remember him saying how excited he was to see his mother's relatives in Malaysia.
He was grinning when he said these things.
That was two days ago.

We can't stop Death.
I guess what we can only do is.. appreciate and love people around us.

As i think about it, i feel glad that he said good things about his mother.
That he loved his mother. That he appreciated his mother.

And I'm glad that my relationship with mum is better now than last year or 5 years ago.

My mum gets scared easily. She even can't watch a PG rated movie for kids - "Inkheart." "Too scary!" she said.

But she's very brave inside.
My mum volunteers at an oral school for deaf in Indonesia.
I love it how she sees the good in children when other are ashamed of them just because they don't speak well.
I love it how she can stand up and ask "Why are you so ashamed of the children in the special class? You didn't see how they care and help each other."

I love that she thinks that character development is more important than the ability to speak. She could have put me in a lot of speech therapies but she didn't. She let me join swimming practices, ice-skating lessons, ballet classes, art classes and activities at KidsSport. I had a great childhood. A normal childhood like a hearing kid's.

She just knew that i like to run and explore the world rather than being cooped up in a room, staring at the mirror, trying to pronounce "Ssss".

Thank you, mama.

In Indonesia...

2009-05-22T21:51:00.005+08:00

I'm in my dad's new apartment. The interior design is very cool. Warm brown, cream and pale orange colour.

Am looking forward to seeing the little boys - giving them the cuddles and kisses. And eating indo-food. Standing fish. Crispy chicken. Avacado. Martabak. Frog legs. I had famous indonesia noodles and waffles from A&W today.

Will take photos of the lil boys tmw. Heaps! and upload some of the fotos here.

P.S The internet here in Indonesia is slow. Time to practice my patience.

love from Minty. Good night.

My wish

2009-05-21T12:02:00.001+08:00

So want to eat Johan's b'day ice-cream cake right now.

Looks so yummy. :) Auntie Messy is coming to Jakarta soon!

2009-05-21T11:16:00.011+08:00

hello.

Tonight is Lasalle Show Opening. My work is there.
But i thought i'll upload some photos of my favourite works, especially for my dad, who i think wants to see.

A graphic book about global warming.

Skippy storybook.

Below is my most favorite work piece. 850mm x 850mm. black and red markers. "99 things i love."

Wacky ideas!

2009-05-11T01:03:00.004+08:00

Oh! Some wacky ideas are popping inside my head.
Been talking to a few friends about the idea of setting up a new blog.

A special new blog by a group of DEAF Singaporeans!
A place where all people can come and enjoy our funny videos of skits. Some funny interviews, jokes and riddles in Sign Language. We also came up with the idea of inviting a deaf guest to our blog to share his/her funny story,maybe once every month? I'm so looking forward to this blog.

Hina, she's brilliant with coming up with wacky ideas. Had fun talking with her about the future new blog.
Good things need time to cook.

So for now, we are brewing special ingredients to make a yummier feast!

:D xoxoxoxo!

Quick thoughts from Minty (No.1)

2009-05-10T01:46:00.004+08:00

hello.

watched 2 films this week and wow, i love these films. "Before Sunrise" and "Before Sunset".
Will talk a bit more about these films later.

anyway, what i really want to say here is i just had an interesting deep talk with a friend online. It remind me of crab theory (from frontrunner 4 website - http://fr4.frontrunners.dk/mix/crab-theory.htm) and the ugly side of gossip all over again. Recently, i've been feeling like i'm a newbie in singapore. My friends said some names and i don't know these names. There, it hit me. i don't know half of deaf community. i used to think i know nearly all. i don't mean "know" them as friends, i mean i know them cos i saw them somewhere before or from newsletters. of course, u mite say, it's impossible to know all ppl in deaf community.

anyway, for the past few weeks, i've been hearing some stories. "that person doesn't like that person. or that person just broke up with that guy."

if you think about this, it rather feel like a stupid silly drama where people bicker and argue over what - i don't understand.

to be honest, i feel like i've escaped from "this" when i went off to Aust and have the liberty to be anonymous.
no backstabbing. no badmouthing.

so far, i haven't hear any really bad gossips about me, which is pretty good since i've been living in spore for 2 years now. well, yes there are some rumours but hey, these are the "harmless" stupid rumours. Very funny if you have the sense of humour.

okay, when i am fully awake, will write more about the 2 films which i just mentioned. Really interesting!!!!

:) sweet night
xoxoxo

Film-crazy

2009-05-07T19:39:00.007+08:00

I'm crazy about films.
Ever since i began studying films for English and learning about stage directing, costume design, lighting in Drama classes, I saw the films in a whole new way.

I begin to notice the colours, camera view, angle, shot, movement. And lighting. Visual effects. The work behind the scenes. And the acting by the actors.

You can see how crazy i'm about the films by looking at a "long" list of my favourite films on the right side.

I've decided that maybe once every week, i shall pick one film and say what i love about it. And hopefully you will watch it and agree with me that it's a great film!

Amelie. This is a french film. It's very quirky and i love how the colours are used in it. So colourful and funny. :) The actress, Audrey Tautou is brilliant as a wide-eyed lady with a mischievous smile. When you watch this film, enjoy the eccentric colours, interesting visual effects and of course, Amelie and her huge imagination!

Some kooky photos. A kooky dumb answer.

2009-05-05T15:51:00.009+08:00

Hola.

Just had an interview at school today. The interviewer looked pretty impressed by my presentation using powerpoint and she asked me some questions. I think i answered quite well till the last question. haha! terrible answer for the last question. Went off-track. :p oh well. look at the brighter side, i now know how to explain the meaning of "design issue".

Anyway, now for fun. The kooky photos of me! A few selected ones from my presentation. :p Enjoy!

P.S : Hina took these photographs. The photo above for the header is taken by her as well. Thanks, babe!

Will go out to meet two gals tonite for dinner.

xoxo, kooky minty

The little chick who can't fly

2009-05-03T17:20:00.007+08:00

These are two pages from my storybook for e little kids. It was one of my projects.

Exhibition

2009-05-03T16:45:00.005+08:00

Went to National Museum of Singapore to see
Christian Lacroix the costumier's exhibition.

B.E.A.U.T.I.F.U.L

It was really cool seeing all his costume design works for the ballet, theatre and opera.
Felt like I'm in other worlds by just looking at these costumes. The costumes felt almost alive with their unique personalities. I half expected the costumes to start dancing and singing aloud at any time.

Do not miss this exhibition!

Update from minty

2009-05-03T01:46:00.005+08:00

hello

i'm finally back to blogging.

I know it's been ages since i blogged. So, i will just summarize what i've been doing for the past months.

1. I worked a bit harder this semester and it worked. heh.

2. Ate new wacky ice-cream flavors this year. Horlick, lychee, milo, peanut butter, watermelon, kaya and many more.
(hey family! must try these ice-creams when u're in spore.)

3. Oohing and awwing when i read the news about my 3 little nephews.

4. Saying 'No' to the unnecessary plastic bags.

5. Bought some cool funky tampon boxes recently. Loved the fun part of twisting the bright neon plastic wrapping off the tampon. Purple. sky blue. Lime green. Orange. magenta. Yellow. How cool is that!

6. Showed the funky tampon box to my friends and they thought it was a box of condoms at the first glance.

7. Had a fun girls' nite out yesterday.

During that nite, I looked at the three gals and i thought about them. One has short spiky hair. A glance at her, and you know she has a strong spirit. She has a love for travel, different cultures and photography. She's not afraid to speak her mind. She can be blunt and straight forward but she is honest. That's what i like. Honesty. No fake words.

Another gal is thin with long black hair. As you get to know her, you'll find her a nice and friendly person, always with funny stories to tell. Beneath her thin frame is a strong independent spirit. Ain't a fool when it comes to guys' sweet talk. Golly, i love that she gave the fake numbers to the guys.

This third gal - she reminds me of Countess Ellen Olenska from "The Age of Innocence." She is different. she doesn't care abt the gossips about her. She can stare at you as if to say 'so'? I used to be "Hi and bye" with her till a fate brought us together on one project. Moly, i used to be a bit afraid of her. But as i get to know her, she's really not as scary as i thought. Soft inside. She ain't a mean bitch. She's a funny bitch.

And... also had a talk with a gal friend online. I was trying to understand her different family background. It was hard for me to understand because i never grew up feeling the need to achieve to their expectations. Her life sounds so much like the 2 movies i studied for English in Oz. Society. Expectations. Woah. Hope her family will eventually understand her. I mean, she really deserves it after working so hard in school and trying to please her parents and yet she remains the most bubbly girl i've ever met. Girl, don't ever lose your bubbly spirit.

Dear girls - if you happen to read this... I'm really glad to know you all. Love you all. :)

Researching for Essay

2008-10-01T16:53:00.002+08:00

Ask any Singaporean what 5Cs are and they sure will answer your question very easily.

"Eh, Cash, Credit card, Condo, Car and Country Club, ah!"

Okay, what about 4Bs? 3Ls?

"Again?" (What? Say again?)
...............

Only some know what 4Bs are.

Bang jio (Pass urine). Bang sai (pass motion). Bang pui (fart). Bang gang. (Off duty!)

Also, only some know 3Ls.

Live. Laugh. Love.

Last few weeks, my group and I had to do 5 minutes presentation on a sub-culture, 5Cs. We did a short film, focusing on how 5Cs have affected 5 different people's lives. Is 5Cs really worth to aspire for? Isn't the simple life enough?

Now, I have to write an individual 2,000 word essay about this sub-culture.
I want to look beyond the simple "whether it is worth to work for 5Cs or not?" I want to look at Singapore culture, the society, the expectations and of course, the social attitudes. Because this is where the 5Cs came from.

To do some research on 5Cs for the essay, I watched some local films. 5 films in a day!

Singapore Dreaming
Just Follow Law
Money No Enough
The Best Bet
I Not Stupid 2

And I also went to www.talkingcock.com, "Singapore's Premier Satirical Humour Website."

These films and the website made me chuckle and laugh, but at the same time, it was sad to watch these characters going through the problems in the films.

Of course, not all Singaporeans are obsessed with gaining 5Cs. Some are fine with 2 or 3 Cs. But if you look around in Singpaore, you will see that young children are already going to tuitions when they are just in primary schools. Just go to Popular bookshop and you will see a huge section of books - not for reading but to write in it. Student practice books. I call them "Drill books" because they drill you on the same things over and over. Children are already divided into the streams according to their "intelligence." when they are just ten years old.

Woah, crazy, eh?

Maybe... i think Singaporeans have become accustomed to it so they see it as a normal thing. A normal thing to survive in a competitive society. They have the expectations to live up to. It makes hard for them to follow their passions. It's either drive your parents crazy or please them with doing the expected things or... you are just kiasu, afraid to lose your face. A few people dare to follow their dreams. Or a few people are very lucky to be born into the families who encourage them to follow their passions, rather than follow the well-trodden path.

Mana ooh pian?!

This is a mix of malay and Hokkien, which means "Who has a choice?"
A very Singaporean phrase. 100% Singaporean.

Mad weeks

2008-09-22T21:12:00.002+08:00

The weeks have been mad.

I keep bumping into two strangers in the trains.
Three deaf friends from overseas came over to Singapore to visit
IDD Party on last sat, 20 Sept.
Being a MCEE for IDD party.
And the make-up thingy at the supposed professional make-up shop went quite bad.

But still i had fun, fun, fun, fun!!

Will write more about travel stories and IDD later,
when i'm more free

Cheerio

Train Journey

2008-08-06T22:08:00.000+08:00

As my hand scribbles on this piece of paper, I’m sitting on a very clean, cold plastic seat. No sign of vandalism on the seats, walls or windows. No dust on the perfect polished windows. Air-conditioned. Surrounded by stone-faced passengers. Some of them are napping. Some of them are staring at the clean floor, with vacant look on their faces. I hear the announcements. The announcements in English, Chinese, Malay and Hindu.

I’m in MRT (metro) on the way home from school. Yes, in Singapore.

The word, “train” has a new meaning for me after the Italy experience.

Whenever I see the word ‘Train’, the memories of people I saw in the Italian trains surface, vivid and clear. The memories of the people with their luggage or backpacks on the platforms. The memories of some tired backpackers lying down flat on the floor inside the central train station. The memories of a few people frantically scrambling to catch their trains. The memories of some people desperately dragging their huge, over-sized heavy luggages through the narrow corridors in the trains. And the best memory of all memories is the smiles. The smiles from the strangers during the train journeys.

I love the train journeys in Italy. Even more than the triumph of seeing Pisa with my own eyes or sitting in a sleek black gondola, gliding on Venice water.

Sitting for a few hours till you reach your city or town. A few hours of gathering your thoughts properly. A few hours of a beautiful view of fields, trees, mountains and brilliant blue sky. A few hours of breathing in various different smells. The smell of dried grasses, the smell of cows’ pat, the smell of fresh leaves, the smell of lakes, the smell of people sitting next to you, and the smell of metal, iron, clothes, shoes, bags and plastic. A few hours of observing and discovering some interesting traits of the passengers, or trying to guess where they’re from if they are not Italian.

The windows are dusty, the dusts gathered from the outer environment.
The walls are vandalized with bright bold graffiti generated by a gang of graffiti artists at the nights.
Imperfect trains.
But I love these “flaws”.
These “flaws” give the trains a sense of personality, almost making the mechanical trains more humane.

When I landed in Italy, my friend was unable to pick me up at the airport so I had to take a half hour bus from Milan airport to Milan Centrale Train Station. From that place, I had to take a 2 hours train to Modena, a town of my friend. By the time I reached Modena, it was 12.07 AM.
My first Italian train journey. Alone. By myself.

Life has a way of surprising us.

You know why?
I feel like there were sort of guardian angels sent to be around me in my first Italian train journey. When I say “Guardian Angels”, I don’t mean the glorious handsome blond angels in pure white cloaks, their huge feathery white wings fluttering. I mean the real humans in their normal jeans and t-shirts.

When I was not sure about the platform number, I asked a long raven-black haired lady. She was not sure too, and a tall black man sitting next to her, joined to help me. The raven-haired lady went to look at the board. The black man went around, asking. In a few minutes, the lady told me the platform number. She smiled, her dark eyes twinkling. I thanked her, and began walking. I soon bumped into the black man. He also told me the platform number, and he walked with me to the platform. He explained to me about the carriage number and the seat number.

“You okay?”
I nodded, smiling.
He nodded his smooth baldhead and raised his hand.
“Ciao,” he said.

I saw the word “Ciao” very clearly on his lips. And ever since that, “Ciao” is one of my favourite words, because I find it very beautiful when Italians say it. I like the way they breath out ‘s’ and their mouth open in a big ‘O’ and gradually close to a small “o’.

The raven-haired lady, her dark eyes and her flowery patterned skirt.
The tall bald black man and his “ciao”.
They are sort of “guardian angels” to me.

And the surprise is that the surprises kept rolling in.

After the two “guardian angels”, came three old people. A small lady with short dark grey curly hair. And a fair-haired plump lady. And a thin man with receding hair. I entered in, smiling at them. And they smiled. As I tried to haul my backpack up on the rack, the old man quickly came forth to help. A gentleman. I smiled at him, and he knew that I was saying ‘thank you’ with my eyes and heart. I had quickly learnt from my traveling experience that smiling is very powerful. Smile opens the barrier between the strangers. Smile is the universal language. Smile brightens up the atmosphere. Smile brings the laughter.

When I opened my diary and began writing, I could feel the 3 old people leaning towards me, their eyes peering over my diary with curiosity. They were curious about me. They were curious about where I come from. They were curious about what language I’m writing in. I could see the many questions in their eyes, yet I knew that they knew no English and that I knew so little Italiano, which consisted of only a few words. “Ciao”, “Sono Sorda” and “Te Amo” were the only words I knew at that time. I suddenly wished I knew more words. The words to say that I’m from Singapore and I speak English. And ask their names. Ask about their life.

I turned my head towards the window; inside me was a crazy desperate desire to speak Italiano fluently NOW! While gazing at the beautiful sunset, I realized that the man has been trying to talk to me, through the reflection on the window. I knew that I might sound rude to them, ignoring their effort to talk to me. I turned back to them and told them that I am deaf. They nodded, as if it’s a fact. They didn’t say sorry or raise their eyebrows in shock.

Nonetheless, I was wearing a loose purple pants that looked much like a long skirt. I crossed my legs, and I saw the plump lady exclaiming and laughing. She pointed to her own fat legs and swollen ankles. I knew she was saying that she couldn’t cross her legs like me. I laughed with them.

At that moment, an African lady entered the scene. She had a sour look on her face, and it certainly changed the atmosphere very quickly. I felt the atmosphere becoming dark and stiff. The jolly old people, who once laughed with me, became quiet. Their eyes averted onto the floor.

I was amazed by the quick change.

At one time, the fair-haired lady offered to share her bread with tomatoes and cheese with me. A nice surprise here. I smiled, declining her kind offer politely. She nodded with a smile, and took a bite of her bread. I stared; I was a bit surprised. I almost expected her to offer her bread to the African lady after offering to me.

Did my smile truly made her want to offer her bread to me only?

I was and still am amazed by the power of a simple smile. Perhaps it is powerful only if your smile is genuine and comes from your heart.

Near The Beginning…

2008-08-05T08:57:00.000+08:00

Near the beginning of the summer holiday, I had a vague idea of what I will do during the three months. A vague idea. Not a crystal clear plan on a piece of paper.

But “Life has a way of surprising us.”

I just knew that the first half of holiday would be spent in theatre world. It was a surreal experience. Imagine going to work in the morning: you put on make-up. The more dramatic your make-up, the better. You put on your costumes and mask. You disappear under the costume and mask. You’re somebody else, a character from the book. You enter the stage and perform with other actors. Together with other actors, the props, the puppets and the backstage crew, the story from the book comes alive for the children to believe in. You hear them laugh during the funny scenes. You see their wide-open eyes.

During the intervals between every show, the actors peel off their fancy bright costumes, returning back to their normal clothes. The backstage crew pulls off their black suits. Time to eat nasi lemak or chicken rice, relax or snatch some short naps before the next show. Sometimes I would watch foreign films on laptop with the backstage crew. About a half hour before the show, the actors would cramp into the dressing room, re-touching their make-up and hair, and transform again into different characters with their vibrant colored costumes, masks or wigs.

Like I say, “Life has a way of surprising us.” There was someone from the backstage crew who picked up the signs very quickly. She was the one who invited me to stay with her at her Spanish friend’s home, in Barcelona.

This is one of the first “surprises”.
But I knew I had to ask my parents for permission first. And they gave me another surprise by agreeing to let me travel.

And the surprise is that the surprises kept rolling in.

I went to deaf Asia-Pacific camp in Indonesia at the end of June, and the surprise is that some Europeans have joined this camp.

Slowly, the vague idea was becoming less vague.

Near The End...

2008-08-04T23:50:00.005+08:00

(I wrote this piece a few days before the end of my holiday.)

The end of my three months of summer holiday is approaching soon.

The end of monkeying around on the stage, hoping on the trains to cities, observing the people surrounding me, savouring a wide variety of new different food, chilling out in the balcony, and laughing with new friends I made during the summer holiday.

I saw many things in Europe.
The way the Italians use their hands.
The way the Spaniards shrug their shoulders.
And so on.

The holiday might have come to the end soon.
But it doesn't mean it's the end.

I will still monkey around in life, hop on the trains to school, observe the Singaporeans surrounding me, savour the wide variety of local food, chill out in the hawker centre, and laugh with my old friends I made during my primary school.

I will see many things in Singapore.
The way the Chinese use their hands.
The way the Indians shake their heads.
And so on.

The beginning of sharing the travel stories will begin soon.
The stories of bizarre and surprising events, the stories of train journey, the stories of being lost in translation, the stories of how to save money, the stories of big cities and small towns, the stories of best food...

Please take a dose of patience till the next story.
Gracias!!

Camwhoring

2008-05-17T02:02:00.005+08:00

Did camwhoring with Hina last week. Our aim was to explore the black and white photography, and try to bring mood into the photos through lighting and cropping. We really had fun doing it.

Silly photos

2008-05-14T14:26:00.004+08:00

Hina is saying "Lame", referring to me. :)

Dunno what the hell were we doing!!

Time Changing

2008-04-28T23:46:00.000+08:00

When I was young, I remember my mum and dad bringing me to a McDonald on friday sometimes. McDonald was always filled with deaf people with their hands flying. Eager, I sat with them. They opened up the world, showing me the culture. I loved their expressive faces and the way they signed. It was like watching a play on the stage.

As i grew up, technology began advancing. Hand-phones started popping up everywhere. Soon, almost everybody has it. Then, there are emails, blogs, internet and msn.

The regular meeting at McDonald ceased into non-existence. There is no need for it. Hand-phones are the new "McDonald", a way to keep in touch with your deaf friends, a way to organize where and time to meet.

I am from the generation who practically live with technology everyday. I can't imagine stepping out of the door without my hand-phone. I think, in a way, we are taking our hand-phones for granted. If we are a bit late, we don't panic. We just send a sms to our friends, saying "SORRY! Will be a bit late."

I will never know the experience of the panic attacking me if i wake up and realized that I'm late to meet my friends. The anguish if i lose the precious day with friends just because i overslept and has no way to contact my friends because hand-phones do not exist.

Technology has been affecting our lives, in both good and bad ways.

Sometimes, i wonder if technology is one of the reasons that cause the change in deaf community, especially youths?

I don't know if it's just me or that it seems that many youths today seem to lack the passion in fighting for better life. Better life for deaf in Singapore.

I heard many stories from deaf adults in mid-twenties. They told how they became involved in many clubs or sports, joining deaf leadership camps, learning to lead, and they know so much about deaf issues.

I asked them what do they really think of deaf youths today.

"I find them rather materialistic."

Of course, they are not referring to all deaf youths, but it's very true with some of youths.

I feel like they are slightly too obsessed with gaining the possession of expensive handbags, jeans or whatever. Over 100 bucks.

Okay, it's up to them. I ain't complaining. It's not my money. It's their money.

It's just that there is one thing that irritates me more.

The lack of wanting to know more. The desire to know what's happening around them, in singapore and around the world.

Some of them seem so content to stay in their own world, sheltered. It is like seeing a black blob in your eyesight, yet you don't go to doctor to check it. You just turn "blind" to this black spot and continue your life as if the black spot doesn't exist. Be blind to the black spot, and just look at other things. Gotta have that tee. Gotta have that shoes. Gotta have that bag.

What other people think of you becomes more important, far more important than what you see and what you can learn from what you see.

Deaf Youth Forum

2008-04-27T01:54:00.000+08:00

I went to first Deaf Youth Forum today. They were discussing about why there is decline in youths involved in sports. (In Singapore.)

Something awakes inside me, and it is the fire. I could feel the fire burning stronger and stronger as I share my opinions to them. I knew i have the fire inside me but I didn't know how big my fire is till now. I didn't expect to be so vocal in the forum. It actually feels good getting my frustrations out.

But hey, it doesn't have to be so serious all the time. I made fun of myself to lighten the mood up.

There are many things to do if we want to encourage more youths to be involved in sports. Near the end of the forum, we threw in the ideas of how to encourage the youths.

They talked about setting up Youth Committee, which I'm looking forward to.
I suggested organizing a youth sport camp here, where they can build team-spirit through playing activities and be inspired by a famous sport person from overseas.

Hopefully, this talk will turn into reality one day.

Films List

2008-04-24T21:50:00.002+08:00

Here are the films that i hope to watch someday!!

Joon and Benny
What's eating Gilbert Grape
Fight Club
Pulp Fiction
Trainspotting
A Clockwork Orange
Lost in Translation
Brazil
The Usual Suspects
The City of Lost Children (La Cite des enfants perdus)
Sin City
Being John Malkovich
Schindler List
The Lives of Others (Das Leben der Anderen)
Requiem for a Dream
Blade Runner
Amores Perros
Juno
Anatomy of a Murder

Film festival

2008-04-24T02:03:00.002+08:00

The 18th European Union Film Festival is coming soon.

Yay! More things to do on my holiday.

I'm having a really long holiday. And I realised that beside
acting in Moonbird, Asia Pacific deaf Camp and tagging behind my dad
to observe the advertising and marketing world, i don't have plan.

I'm like this person who lets the water flow to wherever it chooses to go.

Hmm...

There are some films I want to watch!
Such as...

Joon and Benny
What's eating Gilbert Grape
and...
Ah, more will come into my mnd later.

And I've got two books to read!!
One of my friends lend me a really fat book, and I've read the first page.
Very interesting!

Lots of thoughts are running inside my mind.
A hearing friend now knows how i see the signings inside my mind.

haha...

Friends

2008-04-20T01:11:00.003+08:00

Since my holiday started, I've been catching up with my friends.
I saw a heartwarming moment today.

Friends listening to their friend.
Friends throwing harsh words at their friend because
they want to protect their friend from harm or falling into traps.
Friends hugging their friend.

Sweet.

I think that being deaf, you tend to know many deaf people, no matter how old they are.
Young or old, they can be your friends.
I know some deaf friends who are older than me, and they are great, because they can guide you and
give you advices.

And i think it's nice...

Night Night!

Vinyl record cover

2008-04-19T13:28:00.003+08:00

My Vinyl record cover!
I did other works, such as book jacket, packaging, typography portrait, and underground mural and border.
But this vinyl record cover is my most favourite work.
:)

Photos and Memories

2008-04-15T14:32:00.002+08:00

Yesterday night, I looked at the photos of Sikkim, and I still can't believe I really went there.
I've forgetten how beautiful the mountains are. I've forgetten the fresh air. I've forgetten the amazing sky.
I've forgetten the happy roaming children. I've forgetten so many beautiful things in there.

These photos brought these memories back, like a flood. Crystal clear memories.

And I feel more grateful that I've been given the chance to go there.

:)

The photos are too awesome to be kept in computer so I printed some of them in the afternoon.

YAY!

2008-04-12T11:03:00.003+08:00

I've finished portfolio!!!

Finally, i can get to relax and chill out with my friends on this weekend. No worrying about the school work.
Just enjoy acting and hanging out with friends.

I had great time with my friends last night, we talked about really random things and we laughed alot.
It feels so good to enjoy after working pretty hard for last 2 weeks.

My friend told a really funny story!! When she was about six or something, she sprayed perfume into her mouth!!!
MWhahaha! She had to go to hopsital and get operated on her stomach.
Asked her why she did that.
She replied that she did that because she wanted to copy Mr.Bean.
Haha!

Lots of love from me!!

Hello!

2008-04-01T09:44:00.008+08:00

Hello
I know it has been ages since i wrote the last entry.
Sorry.

You see, the assessements are torturing me, but i'm okay!
I'm still kicking alive.

:) That's how I look now.

Yesterday was the first Moonbird workshop.
Yipee...and i got the role of monkey! Haha

True, I'm one of three monkeys in family.
Black monkey. Brown monkey. Fair monkey.

( i'm not fair monkey anymore. I'm now brown coloured,
but my sibling, the brown monkey is getting darker and rounder.)

Lately, people have been commenting that I have big eyes...like manga.
Ook.
Haha.
There was an oral presentation, which my group and I had to do. We decided
to do comics.
So, we created comics, by manipulating the photos of us into comic herores
and manga characters. Pretty funny.

Okay. I need to go now.

Will write longer when i'm on holiday.

Love, Minty

Moonbird

2008-02-03T20:34:00.000+08:00

Hello!

I received good news on last Friday. I got selected to act in “Moonbird”. :) Yay! If you want to know more about “Moonbird”, click: http://www.itheatre.org/Moonbird.html
I went to the audition last Wednesday, and it was interesting. I was nervous when I walked into the room! I didn’t have any previous acting experience but thank goodness that my nervousness didn’t affect my performance. So, it was frigging great that I got in. Freddie is also selected beside me. He and I will act with other 4 hearing actors. I am really looking forward to this new exciting experience!
I must thank my parents for being so supportive and being happy for me to be involved in this theatre. :)

Noah!

2008-01-31T19:25:00.001+08:00

The adorable boy. :)
I went over to my little nephew's home yesterday. :) It was so much better watching him sign in real life than in video.
He can sign "more" when he wants more food.
He can sign "please" when he wants something.
He can sign the name of the picture he recognizes in the book. For example: bird, boat, feet, nose, milk, shoes and more!
I'm so proud of him! :D Wow! How does a little boy know so much?! It's so neat that he knows a bit of his auntie's language.

Nephew signing!

2008-01-18T00:50:00.000+08:00

Was a bit tired from doing projects so i went to my sis's blog.

She blogs about her son, who's 1 year old.

There is a video of him signing "drink", "please" and "thank you".

:-) He made me smile. Very cute watching him signing. He signed "Thank you" very perfectly, as if he has signed it more than one hundred times! Aww...i wanna kiss his chubby cheeks!

Memories

2008-01-14T17:46:00.000+08:00

(In the last plane back to Singapore, we were VERY stunned to see mini-television. And we were VERY pleased about it. Ha ha.)

After the soccer match against a team of local boys. My team and I lost. We ran around like old farts, wheezing and groaning. Our feet clumspy. Curse to the thin air! But i bet that we will win if we play against them in extremely humid Singapore, at 12 noon. :)

The little boy from my homestay.

Homestay

How i love this photo. Superman in disguise!

Aww!

Spider in the toliet!

Pebbly road.

This one is an old traditional Bhutan hut. Look at the door! It's so small and cute!

Mushroom Girl

Our last dinner together.

Hobbit in the middle.

Meeting a deaf woman

2008-01-13T00:34:00.001+08:00

Meeting a deaf woman was probably my best experience in Sikkim. I asked around if there are any deaf people living in the village or if they have met deaf people before.

They answered that there are 2 or 3 deaf people. One is a lady who is married with kids. Another, I forgot. And then there is a 55 years old lady living with her brother and sister.

Excitement fluttered inside me when I heard that I would get the chance to meet the 55 years old lady, Kali. A few days passed and finally, the day came. The documentary team, deaf teammates and I walked on the pebbly street in the early cool morning. Her hut is perched on top of a hill beside the grassy football field.

When we arrived her place, Kali was not there. She was out, gathering grasses for the cows. So, we waited for ten or fifteen minutes. The sister of Kali invited us to sit in their bedroom. A small, simple and basic room yet with a cozy atmosphere. There are three beds; each bed is placed beside the wall. I began asking Kali’s sister about her. How do you communicate with her? Did she go to school?

Kali didn’t go to school. She gestures a bit.

An image of her formed inside my head. I imagine her to be a slightly wild-haired woman, wide eyed, her arms gesturing and waving randomly. Frustrations are probably boiling inside her. 55 years of no real communication and the inability of expressing what you really want or are thinking about.

Yet when Kali arrived.

I was blown. The image of her in my mind shattered into pieces, because she was so different to what I imagine her to be.

She stood there, smiling warmly at us. Her skin is brown. Her gray hair is tied neatly, and there was a calm and dignity aura around her. I see no sign of anger or frustration inside her.

Excited and nervous at the same time, I tried to tell her that I’m deaf like her. Her face brightened and her smile became bigger and sunny. She giggled with happiness as she watched Ee Wun and I signing some simple signs to her. Sometimes, she understood. Sometimes, she didn’t, but she kept grinning and grinning. She showed us around her home and she brought us to the cows. She pointed to the grasses, which she has gathered in the morning, and pointed to the cows. She was telling us that the grasses are for the cows to eat.

I was surprised by her constant warm smile and giggles. Was she always like that? When it was time for documentary team to interview deaf teammates and me. Kali hovered near us, watching us with curiosity. She seemed reluctant leaving us to eat her breakfast, although we told her that she could eat now.

You know, in the midst of my excitement, I told her about where we came from. I explained to her by gesturing, “flying”/ “plane”. And then drew on the paper a diagram of map to show the location of Singapore.

I felt so stupid afterwards. I forgot that she didn’t go to school. How can she understand that we come from different country, a tropical island, and that we came to yuskam by flying from Singapore in an airplane?

After the realization of my stupid conversation with her, it made me think hard. Kali appeared so calm. Many people said she is a very nice woman. And she indeed was.

I wanted to ask them what Kali was like when she was a kid. Did she display any tantrums or anger at the lack of information? I wanted to ask this but I was a bit afraid. Afraid that I might come across as an extremely nosy person. Also, I was not sure that they would answer this question honestly. They probably shake their head in melody way, with a small smile on their faces. “No, la. Kali was mostly a good girl.” I somehow feel that they wouldn’t talk bad things about Kali.

When I tried putting myself in her shoes. Pretending that I don’t know how to write and read. I can’t stand that.
Because I have curiosity nature.
I would be probably exploding with anger and frustrations.

How come Kali is so calm? Probably she learnt that it is no use being angry all the time. Just be content with what you have. Or the reason of her possessing such a serene personality is because she doesn’t know that there are many things she could have learnt about. And another reason is probably because she lives in a peaceful village surrounded by mountains, trees, grasses and sky. It is like living in a bubble. Free of worry, stress or tears.

But I’d rather have the ability to gain knowledge through reading and expressing my thoughts and feelings through writing even if it comes with the experiences of inequality and discrimination in the society. At least, I can meet other deaf people every week while Kali can’t.

Kali left me a deep impression. She stirred the flame inside my heart. She awakes something inside me.

Later, i heard people commenting how they never seen her so excited until we (deaf people) visited her. I didn't realise how much we've made her happy.

Ever since that meeting with her, I knew what I want to do.

My feet and hands are itching. My neck is craning. I peel my eyes wide open. I want to learn more about deaf people in other developing countries.

In a strange but funny way, I’ve grown more “comfortable” with kids. I actually didn’t like kids much before. Whenever little kids appear, I usually would stand stiffly, glued to the floor. My curly-haired friend would cry, “OOOH!” and bend down to the kids’ eye level. She would talk to them. I just stood, smiling awkwardly at them. I didn’t know what to say to kids. Both hearing and deaf kids.

Something changed.

I went on a trip to Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam last year. Went to visit Cambodian children. I was actually not looking forward to that. I was a bit nervous about it. I didn’t know what to talk to HEARING children!

In the classroom, I stood behind my team in effort to disappear. It did not work. The kids zoomed to me. They practically broke through the line where my teammates were standing. They grabbed my hand and dragged me. Stunned but strangely pleased with my “popularity”. I was afraid that when they discovered about my deafness, they would scatter away me. But they didn’t. They stayed with me, asking me questions as if I’m a hearing person. I looked around and realized that I had the biggest group of kids. Each teammate had one or two kid/s talking to him or her. I had more than 3 kids.

Thus, I grew more comfortable with hearing kids.

In Yuksam, it was similar story. When I was supposed to be working on brochure, the kids kept pulling my hand, indicating me to play with them outside. They didn’t ask anyone in the team to play with them. I was first.
They didn’t care that I’m deaf.

That’s something I like about the kids.
People around my age or older often ask, “Can you lipread?”

Flying down the stones

2008-01-10T00:45:00.000+08:00

With the fresh memories of gazing at the moon and sun at the summit burning brightly inside my mind, I walk down the slope. I gingerly press my left shoe on the wobbly rocks. After making sure that my left shoe is planted securely on the rock, I bring my right shoe over, and carefully place it on the other rock below. This process is repeated millions of times.

I reach a flat field, where the trekkers stop for lunch. I see a new group of trekkers hiking up. They are panting, their faces contorted with anguish. I chuckled silently because the hardest part of dzongri route is waiting for them after lunch.

Rocks under my shoes fade into panels of woods. I continue to walk down the slope, hardly believing that I’ve climbed this slope up before. I turn around and see the steep slope. I gasp. Awestruck at my ability of climbing up this very same steep slope. How on the earth did I do that?!

We arrive Tshoka, a village in the afternoon. Some teammates who arrived earlier are already eating lunch. We immediately ate lunch. (Nepali food usually consider of potatoes, momo (dumplings), puri (puffy light bread), noodles, rice and vegetables.)

Ee Wun, the petite deaf lady, begins to tell HS and me about the “flying over the stones” experience. Apparently, when she was resting, she noticed C10 whispering to another guide, Tashi. And suddenly, Tashi grabbed her arm and ran. When you have the guide holding your arm firmly whilst running, you have no choice but go with his flow. That means, Ee Wun ran down the slope with the guide holding her arm! Rocks flashed very rapidly past under shoes. She practically flew over the stones.

“That was high feeling,” she says.

HS and I laughed loudly, amused at the idea of her flying over the stones. But the envy is simmering inside our veins. We missed the chance of flying over the stones.

I mutter to HS while walking about how hard it is to imagine Ee Wun running fast down the slope. HS agrees.

And to our surprise and amusement, Ee Wun answers by overtaking us, gliding down the slope quickly like a nimble experienced mountaineer.

Woah! Okay. I believe now.

The dawn arrives, and we set to walk down the mountain, all the way to Yuksam.

I ask the “qualified mountain hero” if he could kindly give me the first experience of flying over the stones. He replies by smiling and swaying his head in soft and gentle way, as Sikkimses usually do. It means yes.

The experience is exhilarating. It’s like being in roller coaster.

Then later in the afternoon, HS whizzes past me with C10. I glance at Kinzong, the other guide. We smile.
It’s competition time!
He grabs my arm and we begin to sprint after them.

As we approach them, my guide demonstrates the art of bullying our rivals by poking at their butts with my bamboo stick. He handles me the bamboo stick for me to practice the art of bullying our rivals. I happily poke at their butts. HS turns around, shaking her fist at my guide, thinking it was him who poked the stick at her butt. Ha ha.

Eventually, my guide and I overtake them… of course! I had the mountain hero beside me, while HS has the guy who is training to be mountain hero. (C10 is mountain god to Ee Wun. J )

But the sprinting left HS and I wheezing and gasping for air. If you were there, watching us, you would laugh your head off.

Our faces are wet with sweat (in my case, my face is flushed tomato red) and we are panting very loudly and in unglamorous way. The guides beside us? Cool as cucumber. Standing serenely and breathing gently. It is extremely embarrassing because you are gasping for air like a fish out of water in front of your (good-looking) guides. Haha.

Nonetheless, the point is that HS and I got the wish of running down the slope!
Lots of my wishes seem to come true during my stay in Yuksam. :) Heh heh heh. *winks*

More photos

2008-01-09T22:26:00.000+08:00

Photo of all guides, porters and cookers. Big team, eh?

25th December, Christmas night. Actually, fire is not allowed in mountain area but for this special night, they set up a big fire for once.

The petite lady is Ee Wun, deaf. At the first impression, you would think she is a sensible and responsible person who wouldn't do crazy and stupid things. But geez! She always give you surprises! Like at Christmas celebration night when she suddenly stood up and said to me and HS that she will make us jealous. And she proceeded to give C10 (beside her in the photo) a big hug in front of us.

Bitch!

Haha. Until now, i still can't believe that this small lady has the frigging courage inside her, to hug him. And guess what? She danced! There she was, dancing and shaking her body.

Someone exclaimed, "WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO HER?!"

True, it was like watching Ee Wun transforming into a new person.

Anyway, Ee Wun is really a lovely person.

Playing a silly game where contenders stuff in as many marshmallows as they can and must must the test of saying "Chummy Bunny" with marshmallows inside their mouth. Disgusting at the end of game, where they either vomit or pop out squashed, saliva-oozed marshmallow one by one out of their mouth. But it was very funny watching the competition!

The boy in yellow hoodie, is the best entertainer! He danced and sang so many times.

Me and friends. (note: Being very near to the sun, my face was roasted till reddish brown! For some strange reasons, only some of us succeeded in getting our faces brown while some others retained their ghastly white skin colour. You can spot brown and white faces in here! How funny.)
Eug: Pro at stretching his saliva as long as possible, and then slurping his saliva back into his mouth. Gross, i know but you get used to it.

Local guide trying to follow Eug

Mission: Failed

Mountains

2008-01-08T15:10:00.000+08:00

First night of trekking. Local people brought the huge lamp especially for us, deaf people. You know, deaf people love bright lights.
Second night, at Tshoka

Taken at somewhere...i forgot.
Taken at Tshoka.

3rd day. This is where we ate lunch. Right after the LONGEST AND STEEPEST SLOPE I've ever climbed.

3rd day, at Dzongri!

4th day, at the summit of Dzongri. The landscape is cool! It feels like you are on other planet, Mars. Rocky red landscape.

2 Photos below: Moon and Sun at the summit of Dzongri

(Note: The photo of moon and sun is taken at the same spot, at the same time, on the same day!) The mountain behind us (far right) is Mountain Khanchendzonga, which is 3rd highest mountain in the world. 8585 meters. The summit of Dzongri, where our shoes are planted on (in the photo), is like 4000 meters only. This is how it looks like when i descend after the moon disappears behind the mountains.
C10 the guide and me. (His name sounds like C10 and i can't spell his name properly. Heh)
Huge bulky babes.
(I wore 6 layers. :X)

I realise that without the local guides and some funny teammates, the trekking wouldn't be that enjoyable or fun.

So, in the next entry, i will show you the photos of them!

Trek Survival Tips

2008-01-06T19:53:00.000+08:00

I know I’ve been complaining and whining about the pain I went through to see the beautiful view. Well, I’m exaggerating. I just got breathless after twenty steps on 2nd and 3rd day of trekking. Thin air, man!
But hey, I’m actually very happy with myself for making it to the summit.

Here are some of my trekking survival tips, if you decide to take dzongri route. :D

#1: Mind over body.
Don’t say ‘die’. Here’s a demonstration of our fighting spirit! YAAAAH!

#2: Have fun!
Don’t need to walk fast all the way to the trekkers’ huts or camp or whatever. Take your time. It’s okay to pause and rest after just twenty steps. (Because some of us did that. Heh.)
The picture below: When we came across the area where there was snow, we stopped and mucked around on the snow. Having heaps of fun, shoving balls of ice in our teammates’ shirts and even pants.
Me pretending to ski with bamboo sticks. Me chasing after the guide for shoving the ice in my back.

#3: Toilet paper
With 19 years of experience, I believe that deaf people smell better than hearing people. So it means that we (deaf) are extremely sensitive to smells. We CAN’T STAND the stinky toilets. So, we came up with a “clever” idea of stuffing our nostrils with toilet papers to relief the pain of being in the stinky toilets for a few minutes. :) Ta da!

As we trek closer to the mountains, the view gets more and more beautiful. Awesome!
I’ll let you see one glimpse of it. :)
More awesome photos coming soon! Ciao.

The PAIN we went through

2008-01-03T18:07:00.000+08:00

Hopefully the photo below here describes perfectly how much pain we went through to bring the photos of mountains for you, my dear readers. :p

There and Back

2008-01-02T22:42:00.000+08:00

Where do I start? There are so many stories to tell. And some of them are best to be told through signing!

Let’s start from the beginning.
7 Dec – 31 Dec 2007.
Yuksam is a village up in the mountain, in Sikkim, which is one of the India’s states. The people who live there are Nepali, Bhutia and Lepcha. Majority of them are Nepali. There are some different tribes in Nepali group. The family who I stayed with for homestay belongs to Subba – a Nepali tribe.

So, what was the project? My team and I went there to help with eco-tourism information stuff. I was in a team that does brochure thing. Aside from the work, we get to do trek, homestay, raft and have fun time getting to know local people, especially our guides.

KCC - Khangchendzonga Conservation Centre. The place where we slept, washed our faces, brushed our teeth, peed, pooed and ate our brekky, lunch and dinner.

Do you know some of people who guided us on the trek happened to be “Mountain Hero”? Yep, they are named “Mountain Hero” in the magazine. And I was so lucky to have two mountain heroes to have taken me on a HIGH-feeling experience of flying on the stones down the mountain. I will explain about this story in the next entry!

So, what was the best moment/event during the trip?

I must say that it was the trek.
The trek was very, very tiring but it was the most amazing experience of all. Got to see the beautiful mountains, and the special moment of seeing the rise of sun and the set of moon at the same time, in the same place… and did I mention that it was on Christmas?!

Show you the photos of mountains?
Nope. Not now.

I went through the pain by trekking up the mountain just to see the beautiful view. I’m determined to make you wait like I waited for four days to see the “magical moment”. Heh.

H.S, my deaf team-mate also agrees with me. She strongly believes that we should not show you the awesome of photos of mountains now because...you know already. The PAIN we went through, remember.

Haha.

Funny stories coming soon!

Psst...

2007-12-07T15:49:00.000+08:00

FYI,

I'll be back on

31/12/2007, 1715, 9W18

BYEEEE!

2007-12-07T15:28:00.001+08:00

A few hours more to go, and I'll be in the plane to Sikkim!

Whooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

Beside the cold weather, which I'm quite nervous about,

i really look forward to the trip, the new different lifestyle,

new people, new culture, new landscape, new food.

Yet, at the same time, i will miss my family and friends in Singapore.

Wait, and the food!

I won't miss Internet or TV much.

Cos I've survived Marshmead for two months without Internet and TV.

Anyway, am so

excited!

EXCITED!

EXCITED!

You take care, my gang!

Love you always.

I will update the blog when i return back,

or if possible, i might can update during the trip.

Again,

I LOVE YOU, PAPA, MAMA AND EVERYONE!

Sentosa 2007

2007-12-06T12:54:00.000+08:00

Went to Sentosa with whole family.
Papa, koko, cece and oma flew to here to be with the rest of us.
So it was nice.

Beach

Oma and me

The number 1 fan of my brother.

Two botak boys.

Mama, Papa and Me.

Bobbing heads.

2007-11-25T00:53:00.000+08:00

I think some of us, deaf people, are guilty of nodding our heads, pretending that we know what Hearing people are talking about when we know NOTHING about.
Haha.
It happened at National Museum of Singapore. Security guard spoke to us. We guessed that he was telling us that it's closing time so we nodded and were about to leave...
But he kept talking and talking...

Err... okay. We kept nodding our head, smiling. "Oh. hmm... hmm... okay. thanks...."

And he was still talking!

We just smile and continue to nod our head.

Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah!

Then when he finally stopped talking. We walked away, snickering.

Why on the earth did we nod our head?! For what?! Haha.

Later, we laughed to ourselves because we realised that many, many of deaf people also did the same thing as us. Never informing hearing people that we are deaf. Just nod our heads, pretend that we understand them perfectly like Hearing people.

Well, sometimes we are lazy to interrupt them, lah. Especially not when they have talked for more than a full minute! How embarrassing would it be for them if we tell them in the end that we are deaf. :)

Festival and festival

2007-11-23T23:58:00.000+08:00

Woah! Animation Nation 2007 festival is here! Nov 23 till Dec 1. Lots of interesting films to watch. Really want to watch almost all of them. It's driving me insane because it pains my heart, knowing that i probably can't watch almost all of them. Heh.

So far, i've bought tickets to watch "International Shorts 1" and "Moebius Redux" (In french with English subtitles).

Heh...

Excited!

Plus, Asian Festival of 1st films is coming soon. 1 - 9 Dec.

I've not bought tickets yet. Hmm. I wonder what my mum would think when she finds out

that i want to watch three films in one day.

There are two films i want to watch, and they happen to be on the same day as "Moebius Redux".

10.45am "The Boy Who Died Of Fear"

12pm "My Palestine."

7pm "Moebius Redux"

Am I crazy?

Come on.... they are documentary-films. I like documentary films.

Anyway, i'm still happy that i can watch two Animation films through! Yet, i'm still hoping that i can watch documentary films. :)
Love you, mum! Mwah.

BAD HAIR DAY!

2007-11-23T02:00:00.000+08:00

My hair. Haha, i'm going to complain about my hair. Gosh, it's hard to manage my hair now after the new haircut. My hair sticking out everywhere! :p. Nevermind about my hair.

What's important is that i've got hair. Not bald.

2007-11-21T22:28:00.000+08:00

I'm in happy mood today.
:-)
My friend asked me to work with her in directing a play/theatre, as well as, writing scripts! : D Excited. Am really looking forward to that.

By the way, I work for no money. I work for fun. Ok.

I don’t mind because this means I will work closely with some deaf people to bring a play across to deaf and hearing audience. My hope is that they can laugh, cry, enjoy and learn some valuable lessons from watching the play. And of course, it akso means I will have fun in writing scripts and directing the play!
Wheee!

A friend took a pic of us. I was taking photos of him for my school project. Blah blah.

One of my photos for skool project.

It was not for skool project. Just took photo of her for fun. Liked this photo cos she looks cute and demure.

Anyway... ciao! :)

Yeeeaaaaahhhh!

2007-11-20T05:35:00.000+08:00

Finally...finished the portfolio, which is due in this morning, at 9am! heh.
Stayed up whole night...with heaps of little breaks in between.

17 days left till the day i depart for Sikkim!

YEAAAAAHHHHH!!!!! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!

Hello!

2007-11-19T22:14:00.000+08:00

Just a silly entry here cause i need a short break from doing projects, which is due tmw. :p
Can't wait for holiday and Sikkim trip!